[Article]Eternal Europe: Innovation Spotlight III

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

It's time for another one :)

http://www.starcitygames.com/article/29833_Innovation-Spotlight-III-Amazing-Legacy-Decks.html

[Sisyphos]

IMaybe I just don't understand some hidden weakness here. If you can come up with something, let me know.

Best explanation for the transformational sideboard of the Leyline deck I could come up with is: possibilities to play around hate cards. The main deck cannot win against a resolved Teeg or Leyline of Sanctity for example. Both SnT/Titan and PainterStone can ignore Teeg. SnT/Titan can ignore Leyline. You can also screw up opponents bringing in Revoker or Needle by switching out your combo kill of choice. If the deck is as fast as it looks, Teeg/Revoker should in theory be too slow to really matter, but maybe it comes up from time to time. With a deck like this it could also be like Dredge, Oops all Spells! or Belcher where you can run 15 Atogs in the board if you want to (Hyperbole I know), so maybe it's just for lack of better options and shoring up the 1% of matches it might matter in.

[Ellomdian]

Oh man, Iggy Pop meets Leyline.

"In a world where Force of Will isn't a card, there can be only one Combo..."

[Barook]

Lejay's list is sadly already outdated since it now runs a MD KotR and two Mox Diamonds, with a second Dryad Arbor to guarantee a T1 GSZ for it.

[M+1]

With the power level of Treasure Cruise added to the blue cantrip shell, there are those that are once again shouting that Legacy is stale because you're "forced to play blue."
You know what? You're forced to play blue because you're spending your time complaining instead of working on the format.

Well said.

[DLifshitz]

With the power level of Treasure Cruise added to the blue cantrip shell, there are those that are once again shouting that Legacy is stale because you're "forced to play blue." You know what? You're forced to play blue because you're spending your time complaining instead of working on the format. Did it really have to take this long for someone to figure out that Green Sun's Zenith can be both your acceleration and your lategame consistency in a Chalice of the Void deck? How about someone getting over the bias against multiple Sylvan Libraries in the last ten years the card was legal (it even keeps you from drawing dead extra copies of itself)?

Legacy is alive and healthy, and innovation is going on and still paying off. Yes, there are a ton of blue strategies running around and succeeding. How can that be a surprise when at least half the player population is working on actually getting only those decks to work?


I find this bad logic. As in "The format is fine because go build a better deck." This line of argumentation attempts to shift the focus away from the perceived staleness of the format and to portray the complainers as lazy and whiny. A few subtle ad hominems later on (saying people are crying and raging) continue along this line. And the latter paragraph is a tacit admission that the starting point for any better deck really is the blue cantrip shell.

[Gheizen64]

Intellectual dishonesty at its finest. Drop a tons of list that place scarcely, say people don't innovate, and then proceed to go see tournaments swarmed and won by U-based decks. Pyroblast and maindeck chokes being highlighted as smart decision whereas they're simply answer to an inbred 70%+ blue meta, and even with all those maindeck hate piece those deck don't sport a particularly favored matchup vs U-decks. There was also a 4 Chains +4 blasts maindeck Jund list that won a Brazil tournament, that's some really smart innovation too /s

[force_of_phil]

These articles seem to be getting more and more biased. Pick a needle out of a haystack and use it to make generalizations.

[Svknoe]

I liked the article. It's always nice to see new approaches to the format.

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

@Sisyphos: Makes sense, though I'm as doubtful of it being right here as I was when that Dredge deck popped up that transformed into Painter postboard - and Dredge at least really has to deal with disgustingly powerful hate.

@Barook: Sweet! Thanks for letting me know, though I was happy to find a list for the deck at all thanks to Google. Is there a thread for deck somewhere on here? I haven't been as avidly reading the forums for a while now as I did in the past, sadly.

@M+1: Thanks :)

@DLifshitz: The thing is, Legacy decks are really hard to actually get to work. Just look at how long it took to get Storm, Death and Taxes, Elves and a number of other decks from the idea stage to the machines they are today. Given how many people legitimately prefer blue decks (plus the number of people who have bought into the "you must play blue" hype), the number of players working on any one non-blue strategy is comparatively minuscule when most of the hive mind is just working on making the blue decks better and better. It just makes sense that a lot of potential in non-blue shells isn't realized and it will never change unless those that don't want to play blue put in a ton of work. Complaining that the format is stale when those few that do put in the work come up with very different concoctions that do in fact work anyway is a sign that the problem is not exactly with the format. Heck, two of these decks are finally showing that running four copies of what is likely Green's most busted card in the format other than Natural Order and Glimpse of Nature (Sylvan Library) is actually a really good idea, in spite of the conventional (totally illogical) wisdom that Sylvan is a 1-2 copies card "because multiples are dead."
As for the last paragraph, it isn't any tacit admission at all. It's just a reminder that the blue players are getting lazy with their Delver, Miracles and Stoneblade strategies, too. It's a call to the blue lovers out there to stop tuning the known and look for the potential other archetypes we could be building, too.

@Gheizen64: This is exactly the mindset that leads to the format feeling stale in the long run. You've decided there's nothing better than the blue cantrip shell, nothing to help non-blue decks to successfully fight variance and as a result you've decided not only that you should stop trying but also that everybody else who actually does is wasting their time - and you even try to convince people that they simply should stop trying and clamor for bans instead. Obviously these decks are random blips on the radar. The whole point of the article is to highlight fringe archetypes that have managed to be successful somewhere or that look like they have potential to me so that we don't sit around ignoring the next Death and Taxes for half a dozen years again and instead find people that want to work on tuning them and giving them playtime.
Chains plus Blasts in Jund is metagaming, not innovative deckbuilding. Intellectual dishonesty my ass.

@force_of_phil: How is the article biased? I mean, I can see considering the closing statement biased (which I was reasonably sure would raise some hackles) but the article itself is just presenting innovative decks that deserve a look from the community at large.

@Svknoe: Thanks :)

[amalek0]

@Sisyphos: Makes sense, though I'm as doubtful of it being right here as I was when that Dredge deck popped up that transformed into Painter postboard - and Dredge at least really has to deal with disgustingly powerful hate.

@Barook: Sweet! Thanks for letting me know, though I was happy to find a list for the deck at all thanks to Google. Is there a thread for deck somewhere on here? I haven't been as avidly reading the forums for a while now as I did in the past, sadly.

That's a travesty Carsten. Any time you're ready to come back into the light and do what you know is right, We'll be here to argue that your articles are intellectually dishonest, Brainstorm should be banned, and storm isn't a viable deck, among other lies ;)

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

That's a travesty Carsten. Any time you're ready to come back into the light and do what you know is right, We'll be here to argue that your articles are intellectually dishonest, Brainstorm should be banned, and storm isn't a viable deck, among other lies ;)

Ah, the beauties of internet discussion ;)

[Barook]

@Barook: Sweet! Thanks for letting me know, though I was happy to find a list for the deck at all thanks to Google. Is there a thread for deck somewhere on here? I haven't been as avidly reading the forums for a while now as I did in the past, sadly.
The deck is discussed and developed in this (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?28759-Sylvan-Plug-%28or-whatever-splashed-Green-stompy%29&p=852248&viewfull=1#post852248) thread. First page also has some match-up discussion.

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

The deck is discussed and developed in this (http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?28759-Sylvan-Plug-%28or-whatever-splashed-Green-stompy%29&p=852248&viewfull=1#post852248) thread. First page also has some match-up discussion.

Sweet, thanks!

[amalek0]

Ah, the beauties of internet discussion ;)

Why do you think I click to SCG every day looking to see if one of your articles is up? It's almost like a discussion with someone NOT over the internet. Then you get people like Lemnear who, while I respect the hell out of them as players and deckbuilders, come across as asshats most of the time on the forums.

[Echelon]

@Carsten: You do know the prevailing opinion on this board is that when your opinion differs from the popular opinion, you are wrong by default, right?

In general, I do agree with the premise. Even though I'm bored of seeing the blue shell, it is by no means the win-all, end-all. But unfortunately we can't force people at gunpoint to start playing different decks.

At the moment, I just go with Manaless Dredge and weep when someone drops a RiP/Grafdigger's Cage. No balls, no glory!

[Hopo]

Chains plus Blasts in Jund is metagaming, not innovative deckbuilding. Intellectual dishonesty my ass.


This is so important. Thanks for pointing it out, even when I'm sure it makes no difference to some people. By reading the Source one would almost think that no one knows what metagaming is anymore. People: if you are so sure there's a strictly best deck, play with it or metagame against it. That is how tournament magic works. This is so basic level shit that I don't even. Other options are to play something else or create something new. Also, there are numerous examples of skilled players winning whatever they feel comfortable with. If you think you can take down a tournament with maindeck blasts and chains, not playing those makes you a, well, not sure what exactly but at least you shouldn't be crying about how you lose to blue spells and card draw if you have a sound theory and the tools but refuse to play it out.

How do you know how a certain matchup pans out? You playtest. What is playtesting? It is playing the matchup ad nauseam until you know how it works and who is favored. This is not something that happens in tournaments. It's super sad to read about people "playtesting" when all they actually did was that they attended a tournament and got beaten up because they didn't know how they should play the matchups because they didn't test. You playtest your deck against the field in order to win tournaments. Tournaments are not for testing. And playtesting is how you find the metagame solutions or new decks. But it's simply too much to ask. For some reason this is perfectly clear to standard players, to limited players, to modern players and it was clear to former extended players. It seriously underlines that legacy is a casual format when the players themselvees don't treat it as competitive one but instead whine about irrelevant matters like colors of the cards, very good cantrips and other nonsense. You have 10 dual lands and 10 fetchlands to help you pick the best cards in all colours and build a deck. Broken things aside, whether some of these cards are also played by others is highly irrelevant.

[Bed Decks Palyer]

To sum it up: people dislike playing aganst 12 Ancestrals without their own 12 Ancestrals. Something something learn to innovate.

[Sisyphos]

@Sisyphos: Makes sense, though I'm as doubtful of it being right here as I was when that Dredge deck popped up that transformed into Painter postboard - and Dredge at least really has to deal with disgustingly powerful hate.

I'm also doubtful about the board configuration being the right one as in being the best one possible. But the explanation I mentioned was the only one I could come up with that gives a logical connection between the result (the given board) and the idea of having a sideboard (being able to react to problems your maindeck can't). Transformational sideboards are usually only applicable if there are indeed flaws with the maindeck strategy that can not be overcome, like extremely powerful hate you mention. And even then it is extremely narrow and sometimes it is a better solution to accept that you will simply loose because the transformational sideboard does not significantly increase your chances. Transforming Dredge into Painter dodges graveyard hate, but if the resulting attempts only chance of winning is by relying on your opponents hate cards to be irrelevant, their own win condition to be slower then yours and them not having any other non-specific-hate cards that can interact with the transformation, why bother?

A different point: As much as I liked the article, I would prefer if you could give more background on where you found the decklists you presented. Innovation is nice to have, but it is only useful if the result actually shows promise. For example the only information I can get out of the article about the power of the Helm/Gains deck is that it placed 7th in an unmentioned tournament. For all I know, it could have been an 8-man where the other players all played Kamigawa draft decks and where drunk. SCG labeling all tournaments not run by themselves as "Miscallaneous" or the lists as "Test deck" does not really help. For example for the Dark Depths deck you mention that it was the runner up in a 144-man tournament. That gives the result a lot more credit in regards to the innovation being worthy of continuing than the 7th place finish of the Helm/Gains deck in a tournament I know nothing about. It's a bit of a different thing with Lejay's list, as his name alone carries weight. I don't want you to track down information about random events you don't have, but then I would like to know about your lack of information to have a better baseline to differentiate between pure theory and innovation backed up by at least some results. Just a thought for further improving your great writing.

[NilsH]

Thanks for writing about my Grixis list. :smile: Your analysis regarding Spell Snare and Snapcaster Mage was spot on. My teammate and I made the same conclusions before the tournement. Spell Snare is very good right now, and did very well for met. Snapcaster might seem strange with delve, but keep in mind the list have lots of targets for him. Flashback Treasure Cruise is not unsual, and happend once or twice during that tournement.

Currently we're working on a list in UR colors, replacing Toxic Deluge with Pyroclasm.

[Lemnear]

Why do you think I click to SCG every day looking to see if one of your articles is up? It's almost like a discussion with someone NOT over the internet. Then you get people like Lemnear who, while I respect the hell out of them as players and deckbuilders, come across as asshats most of the time on the forums.

I apologize. No, seriously. It 's just in my nature to get douchy if I spend 200 words to discuss all facetts of a mentioned issue and the response is a one-liner, not giving a fuck and repeating the same bold, indifferentiated statements again which is a repeating pattern in all B&R discussions and the reason the same topics and arguments pop up every month. After more than 3 years on this board, I'm no more willing to put serious time into dishonest discussions like in all the B&R threads like you can see on the "Ban Fetchlands to hurt all cantrips" topic, the "on blue" thread or "banning Brainstorm is GOOD for combo" nonsense. I focus my time rather on the deck-development to solve problems and users really caring for progress rather than just raging for rages reason. If any dear user is interrested in a honest discussion and arguments, you can still bet that that I leave the asshat at home and do my best to help out. This is also within my nature. :)

[maharis]

I don't think it's fair to accuse people of not wanting to innovate. Innovation, as you define it, seems to mean "brew narrow hate decks for the blue decks." But the answers are always worse than the questions. The UWR shell is so consistent and strong at this point that you can basically take 45 cards and jam in whatever you want for the last 15 (see the deck Rich Shay posted on reddit here: http://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/2o4c9w/legacy_jeskai_ascendancy_control_i_just_40d_a/) and really, are you ever worse than 40% against the field?

I think the price of cards is a huge consideration. Strong hate decks like D&T, Painter, MUD are still subject to the whims of variance at a much higher level than the blue shell. And they're not cheap (MUD is probably the cheapest, but worst one of those decks). Think about the UR or even the URW decks: Fetches have had a big reprint, Batterskull was a GP promo, SFM was in an event deck, heck even Jitte was in an intro pack. You can take the budget you'd have to spend on Port + Wasteland + Vial and really just plug it into Forces and Volcs and have a pretty solid list.

Bahra's winning Richmond deck is the same price as a stock UR delver list and is only about $500 less than the Jeskai Stoneblade lists. (and much of that cost can be made up by eschewing cards like Clique and Flusterstorm in favor of other anti-combo tools in-color like Canonist or Spell Pierce)

I feel when we see these decklists that have done well as one-offs, it's like commercials for the scratch-off lottery. Sure, you could be the rogue deck that runs hot and places in a sea of blue. Or you could be me and lose three out of four die rolls at Eternal Weekend while winning almost every game in which I'm on the play.

I could sell my entire deck and buy a proven GP winner off the shelf. I don't because I like non-blue brewing. But I know that even if I play 4 GSZ and 3 Sylvan Library and 3 Stoneforge and a Knight of the Reliquary that I am at a pure disadvantage against even fair blue decks, let alone combo decks with good draws. But for someone for whom winning is more important, there's no real incentive to do that. You don't save enough money by brewing or playing anti-meta decks relative to the actual gain in winning percentage against the meta.

On another note, check out this recent IQ top 8 (http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/deckshow.php?event_ID=29&start_date=2014-11-30&end_date=2014-11-30&state=PA&city=Hatboro&order_1=finish&limit=8&t_num=1&action=Show+Decks)in PA. Six non-blue decks, at least one of which was manned by a person who had won the last IQ at the store with a blue deck (http://sales.starcitygames.com/deckdatabase/deckshow.php?t[T2]=3&event_ID=29&feedin=&start_date=09%2F13%2F2014&end_date=09%2F15%2F2014&city=Hatboro&state=&country=&start=&finish=&exp=&p_first=&p_last=&simple_card_name[1]=&simple_card_name[2]=&simple_card_name[3]=&simple_card_name[4]=&simple_card_name[5]=&w_perc=0&g_perc=0&r_perc=0&b_perc=0&u_perc=0&a_perc=0&comparison[1]=%3E%3D&card_qty[1]=1&card_name[1]=&comparison[2]=%3E%3D&card_qty[2]=1&card_name[2]=&comparison[3]=%3E%3D&card_qty[3]=1&card_name[3]=&comparison[4]=%3E%3D&card_qty[4]=1&card_name[4]=&comparison[5]=%3E%3D&card_qty[5]=1&card_name[5]=&sb_comparison[1]=%3E%3D&sb_card_qty[1]=1&sb_card_name[1]=&sb_comparison[2]=%3E%3D&sb_card_qty[2]=1&sb_card_name[2]=&card_not[1]=&card_not[2]=&card_not[3]=&card_not[4]=&card_not[5]=&order_1=finish&order_2=&limit=25&action=Show+Decks&p=1#content_decks_legacy-tab) and another was manned by a player who has access to blue lands but has made a conscious choice to not play a Brainstorm strategy with mixed results.

The thing is, it shouldn't be up to good players with good cards to take it on themselves to increase deck choice diversity at the expense of their chances for success in the tournament. (Could we call that a "gentleman's agreement?") Everyone knows that if you are serious about winning, you play Brainstorm, because in a game where the order of the cards in your deck is randomized, you do whatever you can to change that. And if you're really serious about winning, you don't play BUG Nic Fit or Food Chain just because they have Brainstorm, you play one of the clearly established best Brainstorm decks.

The diversity of competitive legacy is a mirage created by people who are willing to sacrifice their own chances at victory to create a more enjoyable play experience for themselves. This is unique in competition. No NFL team is signing a comedian to play wide receiver because they like his jokes. But you can bet they would sign 8-foot cyborgs until the rules explicitly prevent it.

TL;DR: it's fair to discuss whether it's bad at it's core that the blue shell dominates legacy, or discuss the best card to remove to weaken it. But it's not right to act like it isn't the best core in the format. Because it is, or it wouldn't dominate. Simple as that.

[Lemnear]

I think the price of cards is a huge consideration. Strong hate decks like D&T, Painter, MUD are still subject to the whims of variance at a much higher level than the blue shell. And they're not cheap (MUD is probably the cheapest, but worst one of those decks). Think about the UR or even the URW decks: Fetches have had a big reprint, Batterskull was a GP promo, SFM was in an event deck, heck even Jitte was in an intro pack. You can take the budget you'd have to spend on Port + Wasteland + Vial and really just plug it into Forces and Volcs and have a pretty solid list.

I don't think we should EVER argue with monetary arguments. Buying into Legacy is absurd for a hobby. It was kinda unreasonable to buy german FBB U.Seas for 75 Deutsche Mark (former german currency) in the late 90's for a piece of cardboard and with the look at the current prices of Karakas, Tarmogoyf, Cradles and more we can't just blame blue duals for being responsible for the step entry barrier. Hell, you can buy a lot of video games for the price of the average UR Delver list and get a second/third hand car on top of that.

[Admiral_Arzar]

The thing is, it shouldn't be up to good players with good cards to take it on themselves to increase deck choice diversity at the expense of their chances for success in the tournament. (Could we call that a "gentleman's agreement?") Everyone knows that if you are serious about winning, you play Brainstorm, because in a game where the order of the cards in your deck is randomized, you do whatever you can to change that. And if you're really serious about winning, you don't play BUG Nic Fit or Food Chain just because they have Brainstorm, you play one of the clearly established best Brainstorm decks.

The diversity of competitive legacy is a mirage created by people who are willing to sacrifice their own chances at victory to create a more enjoyable play experience for themselves. This is unique in competition. No NFL team is signing a comedian to play wide receiver because they like his jokes. But you can bet they would sign 8-foot cyborgs until the rules explicitly prevent it.


This is among the most insightful comments about Legacy I have seen in a long time, because it describes me to a T (and some other good players I know well). I have deck ADD and don't enjoy playing the blue shell, so I play other things in order to have an enjoyable play experience. If I must play blue I usually play jank or outdated combo decks like Food Chain, Aluren, or High Tide. However, I'm aware that I would probably win a lot more if I just picked up *insert Delver or Stoneblade list here* and played it long enough to learn the ins and outs of the deck. I find constant blue mirrors boring though, and I don't really enjoy playing the decks in the first place (especially the generic goodstuff a la Deathblade). So what to do? Play inferior decks that sometimes win because it's more fun.

[maharis]

I don't think we should EVER argue with monetary arguments. Buying into Legacy is absurd for a hobby. It was kinda unreasonable to buy german FBB U.Seas for 75 Deutsche Mark (former german currency) in the late 90's for a piece of cardboard and with the look at the current prices of Karakas, Tarmogoyf, Cradles and more we can't just blame blue duals for being responsible for the step entry barrier. Hell, you can buy a lot of video games for the price of the average UR Delver list and get a second/third hand car on top of that.

This is so ignorant, both of my point and of Legacy in general. Of course it's absurd to buy into Legacy for a hobby from a pure utilitarian perspective. It's absurd to talk about it on the Internet and honestly, to play it as well.

The player base of Legacy, however, is people with a certain level of disposable income and time. They are making the choice to play this game. Some have had cards for a while, but others are buying in because they can and it's fun to them. You can be assured that if people decided not to buy into it because they could just get a car for the same price, it wouldn't be played at a high level any more than Vintage is. The money spent on Legacy singles is the incentive for stores to run the events. By the way, you look at the choice Starcity has made and it's clear that they aren't making enough money on Legacy opens to rationalize running them more regularly than Standard, otherwise they would do that. That's including their stock and prices of Legacy staples and their projection of future revenue. They are expecting more people to choose the beater car or the metal shop in their garage or the mountain bike over Legacy.

Either way, that isn't the point I'm talking about. The point is that if you are choosing to buy into the format now, for whatever reason, and you want to play competitively, you have a choice. One is to buy into the high-priced cards and shells that are proven to be successful over time independent of set releases and meta shifts. Another is to buy into the high-priced cards and shells that have a slight advantage in certain metagames at a point in time. Given that this potential person is already making the irrational choice to purchase up to $2,000 worth of flimsy cardboard, why would they ever pick the latter?

My proof that this is happening are the price trends on blue duals. Yes, they are falling now (as are almost all eternal card prices, other than Vintage pillars and rare Legends cards, I believe) but they increased at a rate much higher than their non-blue counterparts. That data indicates that demand was that much higher for blue decks at the beginning of the year. So when Carsten says people aren't innovating, what he's seeing is a player base that has grown in such a way that it's tilted toward one particular shell. They aren't innovating because they don't have the cards, because it's pointless to buy the other cards.

[eays]

I don't think it's fair to accuse people of not wanting to innovate. Innovation, as you define it, seems to mean "brew narrow hate decks for the blue decks." But the answers are always worse than the questions. The UWR shell is so consistent and strong at this point that you can basically take 45 cards and jam in whatever you want for the last 15.

The thing is, it shouldn't be up to good players with good cards to take it on themselves to increase deck choice diversity at the expense of their chances for success in the tournament. (Could we call that a "gentleman's agreement?") Everyone knows that if you are serious about winning, you play Brainstorm, because in a game where the order of the cards in your deck is randomized, you do whatever you can to change that. And if you're really serious about winning, you don't play BUG Nic Fit or Food Chain just because they have Brainstorm, you play one of the clearly established best Brainstorm decks.

The diversity of competitive legacy is a mirage created by people who are willing to sacrifice their own chances at victory to create a more enjoyable play experience for themselves. This is unique in competition. No NFL team is signing a comedian to play wide receiver because they like his jokes. But you can bet they would sign 8-foot cyborgs until the rules explicitly prevent it.

TL;DR: it's fair to discuss whether it's bad at it's core that the blue shell dominates legacy, or discuss the best card to remove to weaken it. But it's not right to act like it isn't the best core in the format. Because it is, or it wouldn't dominate. Simple as that.

Very eloquently put and I think spot on.

[bruizar]

Add to that the mention of anecdotal evidence of non-blue deck top 8's. N=1 is not a sufficient sample size to counter argue against blue dominance.

[Jamaican Zombie Legend]

The sentiment is nice, showcasing some "innovative" decks that break from the pack, but it's not a strong argument against those who claim the Legacy metagame is warped around certain cards/shells, and worse off for it. And I don't believe innovation is as easy or possible as the article insinuates; as big as the Legacy cardpool is, there really aren't a whole lot of unplumbed depths that maverick deckbuilders could tap into.

Most potential decks simply can't compete on a raw power level. Most of the ones that can compete happen to be, unsurprisingly, combo decks. The (big A) Archetype of Combo has always relied on non-interactivity, through speed and zones/playstyles that the opponent isn't prepared to do battle upon or with. This gives them a raw power that a rogue deck in other archetypes (Aggro, Tempo, Control, Prison, etc.) can't count on. It's why in any format where combo is prevalent, some pile o' crap will luck their way into decent finishes on the strength of good hands (for the pilot; bad ones for the opponent) and good matchups. I bet every combo player on this forum can recount a time when they took down or top-8'd some tourney with an abysmal pile. Heck, I could recount the time I took a godawful Restore Balance deck to second place in an Old Extended tournament. That doesn't mean that deck was good or had any sort of longevity, though.

But making a non-combo deck that breaks the mold? That's damn hard.

There really aren't many powerful engines or synergies that have gone unnoticed, unexplored, or unused. I don't think Tortured Existence and Krovikan Horror are going to be the next Delver and Brainstorm, as cool as they are. Similarly, the DrJones special of Kavu Predator, False Cure, and cards like Invigorate or Reverent Silence is basically a worse version of U/G/x Infect. Which, coincidentally runs the Blue shell to smooth out all the problems that "The Cure" has, while being faster and better equipped to fight other combo with their maindeck Force of Will as opposed to some discard spells in "The Cure". Unless you were someone with a burning hatred of Force (a la Source luminary DrJones), there would be few reasons to run B/G Makebigd00d over U/G Infect.

I doubt there are many cards/interactions that can break into the absurdly high power level of contemporary Legacy. This isn't the good old days where the most dangerous creature that could be vomited out as part of a two-card combo was just a 13/13 trampler (not flying Yawgwin or the idiocy that is Emrakul), where the tempo decks used Nimble Mongoose (or even Quiron Dryad waaaaaay back) to beat face, where if combo fizzled it didn't leave 10+ power on the board, where wraths weren't instant speed for W, and where Aggro actually existed as an Archetype. Wizards mistakes from Zendikar onwards have been pretty disastrous for the format by skyrocketing the power level of the top archetypes, making the gap between higher tier decks (T1/T1.5/T2) and the lower tiers really wide. 10-Land Stompy revival might have flown in that era, but now my Winter Orbs

This is why most "new" brews, most "innovations" are going to be either one-time combos or extremely metagamed hate decks. Full sets of Chalice and Choke in the mainboard isn't the start of some vibrant, new deck that will be discussed for years to come on The Source, but a reaction to a field that's mostly Blue tempo and combo. Brilliant as it is, from a competitive standpoint (and it really is some ace meta work), it doesn't speak well on the health of the format and to fun that can be had in Legacy deckbuilding. But hey, at least it's convinced me that maindeck Chokes in Enchantress is probably the right call.

[aahz]

But hey, at least it's convinced me that maindeck Chokes in Enchantress is probably the right call.
Those in the know have been doing that for YEARS.

The diversity of competitive legacy is a mirage created by people who are willing to sacrifice their own chances at victory to create a more enjoyable play experience for themselves. This is unique in competition.
http://www.mns-images.org/aahz/clap.gif

[Bed Decks Palyer]

This is so ignorant, both of my point and of Legacy in general. Of course it's absurd to buy into Legacy for a hobby from a pure utilitarian perspective. It's absurd to talk about it on the Internet and honestly, to play it as well.

The player base of Legacy, however, is people with a certain level of disposable income and time. They are making the choice to play this game. Some have had cards for a while, but others are buying in because they can and it's fun to them. You can be assured that if people decided not to buy into it because they could just get a car for the same price, it wouldn't be played at a high level any more than Vintage is. The money spent on Legacy singles is the incentive for stores to run the events. By the way, you look at the choice Starcity has made and it's clear that they aren't making enough money on Legacy opens to rationalize running them more regularly than Standard, otherwise they would do that. That's including their stock and prices of Legacy staples and their projection of future revenue. They are expecting more people to choose the beater car or the metal shop in their garage or the mountain bike over Legacy.

Either way, that isn't the point I'm talking about. The point is that if you are choosing to buy into the format now, for whatever reason, and you want to play competitively, you have a choice. One is to buy into the high-priced cards and shells that are proven to be successful over time independent of set releases and meta shifts. Another is to buy into the high-priced cards and shells that have a slight advantage in certain metagames at a point in time. Given that this potential person is already making the irrational choice to purchase up to $2,000 worth of flimsy cardboard, why would they ever pick the latter?

My proof that this is happening are the price trends on blue duals. Yes, they are falling now (as are almost all eternal card prices, other than Vintage pillars and rare Legends cards, I believe) but they increased at a rate much higher than their non-blue counterparts. That data indicates that demand was that much higher for blue decks at the beginning of the year. So when Carsten says people aren't innovating, what he's seeing is a player base that has grown in such a way that it's tilted toward one particular shell. They aren't innovating because they don't have the cards, because it's pointless to buy the other cards.
Very eloquently put and I think spot on.



I apologize. No, seriously. It 's just in my nature to get douchy if I spend 200 words to discuss all facetts of a mentioned issue and the response is a one-liner, not giving a fuck and repeating the same bold, indifferentiated statements again which is a repeating pattern in all B&R discussions and the reason the same topics and arguments pop up every month. After more than 3 years on this board, I'm no more willing to put serious time into dishonest discussions like in all the B&R threads like you can see on the "Ban Fetchlands to hurt all cantrips" topic, the "on blue" thread or "banning Brainstorm is GOOD for combo" nonsense. I focus my time rather on the deck-development to solve problems and users really caring for progress rather than just raging for rages reason. If any dear user is interrested in a honest discussion and arguments, you can still bet that that I leave the asshat at home and do my best to help out. This is also within my nature. :)
Your problem is that you'Re not reading the 200 words that other people write and you discredit them, delegiitimaze their point of view and mock them. your posts are a pain to read and anything reasonable that's in them is buried under your pompous IBA-like behaviour towards anyone daring to oppose you. That's why a lot of people (including me) don't give a phuck in trying to discuss with you.

[Lemnear]

Your problem is that you'Re not reading the 200 words that other people write and you discredit them, delegiitimaze their point of view and mock them. your posts are a pain to read and anything reasonable that's in them is buried under your pompous IBA-like behaviour towards anyone daring to oppose you. That's why a lot of people (including me) don't give a phuck in trying to discuss with you.

Here is the point. We are not discussing the serious matter of a banning on a rational base, but because of POVs and feelings how the metagame should look like for people.

There are claims that the metagame would be more diverse, which isn't pretty likely because of the cream-of-the-crop-principle in tournament Magic, the available and obvious replacements for Brainstorm for the blue shell to remain the best tool to reduce variance for the Delver/SFM strategies and the significant weakening of various archtypes which already struggle. This point leaves so many question marks, that I can't let it count as "pro" for banning the blue instant.

Another issue comes with the data we have. Since 2011 the penetration of brainstorm rised from ~53% to ~70% in 2014. Mind, that Jace, Mental Misstep, SFM, Preordain, Gitaxian Probe, Delver, SCM, TNN, Griselbrand, Emrakul, the complete Miracles mechanic, DTT and TC saw print within that timeframe and are responsible for Zoo, Goblins and Maverick to be pushed out and KotR, a former staple in more than 20% of decks (according to MTGtop8) dropped to insignificant numbers. The point which is relevant for discussing "diversity" is that even if those cards pushed the penetration of Brainstorm and often share the BS/Ponder-core which drives so many people mad in this forum, they fuel differenct strategies, which (for me) IS the definition of diversity and more relevant than a certain image of color-balance, which other people use for their definition of "diversity". That however does not mean i'm fine with all these printings, just saying. Brainstorm is 50%+ in Legacy for years and attendence of tournaments was growing. Vintage had it's "golden age" of attendence with unrestricted Brainstorm/Ponder/Gush/Merchant Scroll and 90% of decks running Moxen and 60%+ the named core of cards. These examples show that its blatantly false that the dominance of a certain support-card (mind: not talking about threats which would streamline the metagame) harms format popularity.

I'm convinced that if anything really annoys the average tournament-player, it's not the two-sided brainstorm & cantrip durdling, but playing against Delver/SFM/TNN round after round after round as the various flavors of that subtype make about 40% of the WHOLE WORLDWIDE METAGAME to the point where the field is maindecking Pyroblasts to handle that oppressive linear threats.

[maharis]

Right. Your opinion of the problems with the meta are "creatures are good." Hence listing SFM, Griselbrand, and Emrakul (and I can bet that if you made this post in two months, Young Pyro would've been there), none of which are blue or require blue to play optimally absent absurdly overpowered ancient cards like Brainstorm and Show & Tell.

You didn't mention Past in Flames, which gave storm players virtual access to not just Black Lotus and Demonic Tutor, but Yawgmoth's Will as well...

The thing is, as I've mentioned multiple times, the blue dominance may feel like different strategies, but at their core they are just using the same cantrip engine to fuel different endgames. That engine is so good and difficult to disrupt that it pushes out previously viable engine cards like Life from the Loam, Dark Confidant and Knight of the Reliquary. Glimpse of Nature is an exception but it doesn't open up more than one archetype (unless Cheeri0s is doing better than I thought)...

And since only one engine is competitive, the number of playable cards drops, until you have an effective pool not dissimilar in size to Standard. That makes it easier to find a best deck. Today, it's creature-based decks that are supreme, generally playing Delver, SFM, and Young Pyro or some combination thereof. If we ban creatures back to the stone age, then it will probably be your beloved combo and control decks. Unless we ban the Miracle mechanic and Gitaxian Probe. But that's just undoing years of card design, and who's to say where that should stop? Maybe Odyssey was the last great set.

[HSCK]

Right. Your opinion of the problems with the meta are "creatures are good." Hence listing SFM, Griselbrand, and Emrakul (and I can bet that if you made this post in two months, Young Pyro would've been there), none of which are blue or require blue to play optimally absent absurdly overpowered ancient cards like Brainstorm and Show & Tell.

You didn't mention Past in Flames, which gave storm players virtual access to not just Black Lotus and Demonic Tutor, but Yawgmoth's Will as well...

The thing is, as I've mentioned multiple times, the blue dominance may feel like different strategies, but at their core they are just using the same cantrip engine to fuel different endgames. That engine is so good and difficult to disrupt that it pushes out previously viable engine cards like Life from the Loam, Dark Confidant and Knight of the Reliquary. Glimpse of Nature is an exception but it doesn't open up more than one archetype (unless Cheeri0s is doing better than I thought)...

And since only one engine is competitive, the number of playable cards drops, until you have an effective pool not dissimilar in size to Standard. That makes it easier to find a best deck. Today, it's creature-based decks that are supreme, generally playing Delver, SFM, and Young Pyro or some combination thereof. If we ban creatures back to the stone age, then it will probably be your beloved combo and control decks. Unless we ban the Miracle mechanic and Gitaxian Probe. But that's just undoing years of card design, and who's to say where that should stop? Maybe Odyssey was the last great set.


There's no way you can group Miracles in Storm into the same playing strategy. There are probably less playable cards, but I don't think there's ever been a time where there are more different things happening than now. You can't even really group all the Delver decks together anymore, Miracles stands quite a ways apart from Stoneblade, Storm and Shardless are worlds apart too. It's not just different end games, it's different in every part of the game except they want to sculpt their draws.

[Finn]

There's no way you can group Miracles in Storm into the same playing strategy. There are probably less playable cards, but I don't think there's ever been a time where there are more different things happening than now. You can't even really group all the Delver decks together anymore, Miracles stands quite a ways apart from Stoneblade, Storm and Shardless are worlds apart too. It's not just different end games, it's different in every part of the game except they want to sculpt their draws.

Depends your angle of perception. Miracles and ANT look rather similar to DnT. They represent the two ends of a spectrum of decks that DnT seeks to muddle in much the same way. That is because DnT is built specifically to inhibit The One Strategy that some folks in here think does not exist.

DnT is great against blue and various degrees of lackluster against everything else because they do not follow The One Strategy. If there was not The One Strategy, how is it ever winning?

[maharis]

There's no way you can group Miracles in Storm into the same playing strategy. There are probably less playable cards, but I don't think there's ever been a time where there are more different things happening than now. You can't even really group all the Delver decks together anymore, Miracles stands quite a ways apart from Stoneblade, Storm and Shardless are worlds apart too. It's not just different end games, it's different in every part of the game except they want to sculpt their draws.

I agree, but let me explain why I'm making this point. Rather than fully rehashing the argument I'll link to my other posts.

The basis of whether or not one thinks Brainstorm's dominance is healthy for the format is whether that person believes that the diversity in strategies (in that there are combo, aggro and control archetypes) makes up for the uniformity in cards played. For a longer explanation, please see this post on two high-placing, well-regarded decks from GPNJ:

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?28886-On-Blue&p=852181&viewfull=1#post852181

TL;DR: A URW and Grixis deck, despite playing a wholly different color, and different wincons/strategy, shared 45 of the exact same cards, and had a number of functionally similar cards making up the other 15, to the point where there were only a handful of cards that were truly different strategy-wise between them. Are the decks truly "different?"

When I say that the decks are all just blue cantrips + win conditions, I'm of course oversimplifying. But that's what some people say about "decks that turn creatures sideways" (which of course has been the main win condition since Magic's inception). What's questioned is the motivation of the person who wants the change. The common accusation is that they want their "pet deck" to be successful. However, many commonly cited non-blue "pet decks" are in fact plenty viable in the format if you just look at their win conditions. It's just that for those win conditions to be effective, they must be combined with the blue shell to keep up with other popular decks. Here's the post on that:

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?28886-On-Blue&p=853022&viewfull=1#post853022

So that leads to another fork in the road. Is the problem defeatism? If you don't like blue, why not fight it? I talk about some of the reasons why that's not practical here:

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?28903-Article-Eternal-Europe-Innovation-Spotlight-III&p=853518&viewfull=1#post853518

TL;DR: The expected percentage gain in win probability does not outweigh the time and monetary investment required to build a blue-meta-fighting deck, nor is it practical for the competitive player who wants to play the best deck against the field. (By the way, the main argument against banning brainstorm is that it will remove the Storm deck from the format and with it a unique win condition that isn't ever going to happen in magic again. That to me sounds like defeatism. It also seemingly implies that any storm deck that doesn't resolve a brainstorm can't win, which isn't true.)

In fact, the only reason you would do so is because you want to, which is not a competitive reason. This gets into the question of what is the point of playing? If you want to win, you know what decks give you the best chance of winning. Playing anything else means you are not serious about winning. See here:

http://www.mtgthesource.com/forums/showthread.php?28903-Article-Eternal-Europe-Innovation-Spotlight-III&p=853542#post853542

So the question is what kind of format do we want? Do we want one where there is such a clearly defined best shell that is for the most competitive players, and the other entrants choosing something else are doing so simply out of love of a particular archetype? Or do we want a format that will challenge us to respect a wide range of playable cards and engines, each with their own sort of weaknesses? I think it's healthier to have the latter, because if prices and playstyles keep people out of the format, it will die because there will no longer be a player base to support high-level tournaments.

[amalek0]

Right. Your opinion of the problems with the meta are "creatures are good." Hence listing SFM, Griselbrand, and Emrakul (and I can bet that if you made this post in two months, Young Pyro would've been there), none of which are blue or require blue to play optimally absent absurdly overpowered ancient cards like Brainstorm and Show & Tell.

You didn't mention Past in Flames, which gave storm players virtual access to not just Black Lotus and Demonic Tutor, but Yawgmoth's Will as well...

The thing is, as I've mentioned multiple times, the blue dominance may feel like different strategies, but at their core they are just using the same cantrip engine to fuel different endgames. That engine is so good and difficult to disrupt that it pushes out previously viable engine cards like Life from the Loam, Dark Confidant and Knight of the Reliquary. Glimpse of Nature is an exception but it doesn't open up more than one archetype (unless Cheeri0s is doing better than I thought)...

And since only one engine is competitive, the number of playable cards drops, until you have an effective pool not dissimilar in size to Standard. That makes it easier to find a best deck. Today, it's creature-based decks that are supreme, generally playing Delver, SFM, and Young Pyro or some combination thereof. If we ban creatures back to the stone age, then it will probably be your beloved combo and control decks. Unless we ban the Miracle mechanic and Gitaxian Probe. But that's just undoing years of card design, and who's to say where that should stop? Maybe Odyssey was the last great set.

Have you been watching top 8's recently? Lands has been KICKING ASS and that is THE BEST LOAM SHELL in legacy right now. Sure, it hasn't been *winning* events. But consider the top 8 penetration on RG and RUG lands over the events since Khans became legal, and then consider HOW FEW LANDS PLAYERS there are compared to all the delver, miracles, and even storm pilots in the metagame. There are so few of us lands players most of us know each other, at least via the forums if not in person. I've run into lands players at events, and been like, who are you on the source/MTG salvation, and had name recognition via our online tags. Find another deck has that % of players in field punching through to top 8. I doubt any other archetype comes close. You should all buy a tabernacle and start playing real magic.

Also, Lejay, I took your most recent list for a spin, played like 2 dozen games, and kept feeling like I wanted one more green source in there. Thoughts?

[Bed Decks Palyer]

@DLifshitz: The thing is, Legacy decks are really hard to actually get to work. Just look at how long it took to get Storm, Death and Taxes, Elves and a number of other decks from the idea stage to the machines they are today. Given how many people legitimately prefer blue decks (plus the number of people who have bought into the "you must play blue" hype), the number of players working on any one non-blue strategy is comparatively minuscule when most of the hive mind is just working on making the blue decks better and better.

@Gheizen64: This is exactly the mindset that leads to the format feeling stale in the long run. You've decided there's nothing better than the blue cantrip shell, nothing to help non-blue decks to successfully fight variance and as a result you've decided not only that you should stop trying but also that everybody else who actually does is wasting their time - and you even try to convince people that they simply should stop trying and clamor for bans instead.
You're very right! Look for example on Storm. For some reason people were missing the obvious for years, until one day one guy took all those long forgotten old frame beauties like Infernal Tutor, Ad Nauseam and Past in Flames, and build the deck of them. It takes nothing but brewing, new prints have hardly any impact.

I expect similar process in other archetypes, too, esp. now when the remaining non-blue colours got huge boost in the recent sets with:
- white getting a true-killah in True-Name Nemesis
- green being powered up with Treasure Cruise
- black having another amazing nigh-tutor in Dig Through Time
- and red going literally berserk with Delver of Secrets and Snapcaster Mage

It's a thrilling time to play NOT blue, and as the ever declining numbers of cantrips all over the worldwide metagame tell us, there's really no need to be sceptic about the future of your average kavu.dec and its brethren.

[Jander78]

You're very right! Look for example on Storm. For some reason people were missing the obvious for years, until one day one guy took all those long forgotten old frame beauties like Infernal Tutor, Ad Nauseam and Past in Flames, and build the deck of them. It takes nothing but brewing, new prints have hardly any impact.

I expect similar process in other archetypes, too, esp. now when the remaining non-blue colours got huge boost in the recent sets with:
- white getting a true-killah in True-Name Nemesis
- green being powered up with Treasure Cruise
- black having another amazing nigh-tutor in Dig Through Time
- and red going literally berserk with Delver of Secrets and Snapcaster Mage

It's a thrilling time to play NOT blue, and as the ever declining numbers of cantrips all over the worldwide metagame tell us, there's really no need to be sceptic about the future of your average kavu.dec and its brethren.
Your attempt at sarcasm, and ignorance of the format in general, displays your complete misunderstanding of Carsten's article's intentions. Your statement above only further assists at proving his point.

[bruizar]

Your attempt at sarcasm, and ignorance of the format in general, displays your complete misunderstanding of Carsten's article's intentions. Your statement above only further assists at proving his point.

Perhaps Carsten should have done a better job conveying his intentions then.

[Bed Decks Palyer]

Your attempt at sarcasm, and ignorance of the format in general, displays your complete misunderstanding of Carsten's article's intentions. Your statement above only further assists at proving his point.

Then maybe you can inform me where I am wrong.
Storm, Miracles, Delver, all those decks are possible only thanks to the printings. Look, it's called "Delver" for reasons.
Saying that we're obliged to brew in non-blue is silly, when there are far less non-blue powerful printings than those bombs that WotC vomit for blue.

[Jander78]

Then maybe you can inform me where I am wrong.
Storm, Miracles, Delver, all those decks are possible only thanks to the printings. Look, it's called "Delver" for reasons.
Saying that we're obliged to brew in non-blue is silly, when there are far less non-blue powerful printings than those bombs that WotC vomit for blue.
Besides Storm, those aren't the decks he mentioned at all in the quote you responded to. Storm, Death and Taxes, and Elves were all in development for a long time before morphing into what they exist as today. Storm has been in development since 2004 when Lion's Eye Diamond and Lotus Petal were re-introduced into the format from the splitting of the Vintage / Legacy lists. It is not a new deck and was around long before Ad Nauseam / Past in Flames existed. (Infernal Tutor has been around since 2006)

He never said you're obligated to brew non-blue decks. It's a call out that instead of complaining about it and trying to convince yourself and others that it's not worth it, go out and give effort to build something to compete against blue, because by the examples he referenced in his article, it is possible.

[Tammit67]

This is some really reasonable discussion. Thanks for the article!

I'm not concerned with making the colors balanced (and I'd have a a hell of a time doing it). Instead, even when UR delver and Nimble Mongoose RUG share many of the same cards, the goal of the decks individually lead to different styles of play: UR wants to velocity through the deck, RUG wants to land 1-2 threats and lock an opponent out through efficiency.

I'm not as happy that fair non-blue decks don't come in as many varieties as the blue counterparts, but the diversity in play styles leaves me ultimately satisfied where Legacy is despite the odd looking penetration of brainstorm etc. And it seems WotC is of the same mind since they haven't even gone so far as to say "Brainstorm is on our cards to watch"

[M+1]

Saying that we're obliged to brew in non-blue is silly, when there are far less non-blue powerful printings than those bombs that WotC vomit for blue.
No offense, but you are giving up without even trying, just because - look how blue gets all the good cards.
It's (kind of, and again, no offense) like saying yeah, I'm a lazy and unemployed loser, but it's society's fault for giving the other guys better parents and more money than me.

I think Carsten's point is that yes, blue is that good, and yes, brewing in nonblue colors is difficult, but in no way impossible, and there is a world of difference.

[Lejay]

Also, Lejay, I took your most recent list for a spin, played like 2 dozen games, and kept feeling like I wanted one more green source in there. Thoughts?
You should have posted that in the sylvan plug thread, or at least in a thread in which I posted once.
I don't know which list you tested but my current list has 24 lands including 2 dryards, 3 tombs and 4 wasteland and I feel I can not go down in the green sources number, so your feeling is probably right.

[Bed Decks Palyer]

Besides Storm, those aren't the decks he mentioned at all in the quote you responded to. Storm, Death and Taxes, and Elves were all in development for a long time before morphing into what they exist as today. Storm has been in development since 2004 when Lion's Eye Diamond and Lotus Petal were re-introduced into the format from the splitting of the Vintage / Legacy lists. It is not a new deck and was around long before Ad Nauseam / Past in Flames existed. (Infernal Tutor has been around since 2006)

He never said you're obligated to brew non-blue decks. It's a call out that instead of complaining about it and trying to convince yourself and others that it's not worth it, go out and give effort to build something to compete against blue, because by the examples he referenced in his article, it is possible.

Omg.

Look, I really know that Storm decks existed ever since... well, printing of th storm mechanic? But they weren't in existence before, there's no "Storm before the Storm", unless it's some kind of cosmogony or Churchill's book. So what Long and Cook and whoever else did was that they innovated when the new things were printed: storm things.
Same goes for Elves and DnT, it's not like Elves were teh no.1 dek before GSZ, Hoof and watnot. In fact there are very few decks that are new brew yet completely built of old parts, like that deck with Tortured Existence, Ichorid, Phantasmagorian and something else; yep, that's new and it's build from old parts (at least mostly).
But the decks in mention are build of new cards that.... needed to be printed first. I guess. Maybe not. I don't know.

Then if we follow this line of thoughts, it might be possible - but I cannot exclude the opposite -, that the new blue prints empowered the colour blue, which is irrelevant (as colour identity is irrelevant) and it has a synergistic effect with already strong blue "shell" of BS/Pinder/Fow. So the brewing will happen in blue, I guess, if only I correctly interpreted those two blue drops in DTT's manacost. Would there being more prints in other colors (say things like Grimaz, RiP, etc.) there might be more brewing in non-blue, as there'd be more new malt to brew from.

And don't be mistaken, the prints matter. It's not like 99 % of Legacy players are idiots who cannot build a new deck. I'd say that most of the old techs/possibilities are already known/explored, and only timefrom tiem a Tortured Pahantasmagioraidn deck shows up to show up.

People mostly don't have time to dick around with cards, it's not like our time is unlimited and 99 % of Legacy players got other life than just Magic, so that - and the price of cards that also doesn't have any impact, true Lem? -, is the reason why nobody brews, because screw that.

Also, I don't really get what's this all hiss about. If you'd take a shortest look at what I replied, Jander, you'd realize that I in no way comment the original article, but instead focus on Mon's silly post. Saying that "your... displays your complete misunderstanding of Carsten's article's intentions" is senseless, unless you've thought that it's somehow necessary to inform me of what I haven't done.


Speaking of brewing in more general:
I'd love to try some deck with 4x Sylvan Libraries, Coursers of Crupitz, GSZ and something else (preferably some numbers of Root Mazes and Verduran Etress) as I like Libraries and I guess that the deck could be funny and strong. But then again I realize that this would cost an enormous amount of time and money which are properties I do not own in unlimited numbers, so yeah, screw the brew. In M+1s words I'm like lazy unemployed blah blah, google the rest on your own. So yeah, whatever. It's not like your opinion changes a jackshit about how many hours I'll have to spend in work or what my family needs me to do, neither it will clean my cat's litter box. Brew, brave man, brew. Sorry, I got other things to do.

And no, I'm not even bitching about how "non-blue cannot win against blue" or whatever.



He never said you're obligated to brew non-blue decks. It's a call out that instead of complaining about it and trying to convince yourself and others that it's not worth it, go out and give effort to build something to compete against blue, because by the examples he referenced in his article, it is possible.
Sure.



No offense, but you are giving up without even trying, just because - look how blue gets all the good cards.
It's (kind of, and again, no offense) like saying yeah, I'm a lazy and unemployed loser, but it's society's fault for giving the other guys better parents and more money than me.

I think Carsten's point is that yes, blue is that good, and yes, brewing in nonblue colors is difficult, but in no way impossible, and there is a world of difference.
Sure. Oh wait, my cat needs to clean her litter box.


PS: It surprises me that I need to write elaborates on how important the new prints are for a game like MtG, but if you disagree, I'm fine with that. Surely, DDT meant nothing, Delver meant nothing, DRS meant nothing, TC meant nothing...

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

@maharis: You made a lot of very good points, I hope I didn't screw up the order of the quotes too much when trying to respond to everything you said. Thank you for helping to make this a useful and productive discussion instead of lot of incoherent ranting.


I think the price of cards is a huge consideration. Strong hate decks like D&T, Painter, MUD are still subject to the whims of variance at a much higher level than the blue shell. And they're not cheap (MUD is probably the cheapest, but worst one of those decks). Think about the UR or even the URW decks: Fetches have had a big reprint, Batterskull was a GP promo, SFM was in an event deck, heck even Jitte was in an intro pack. You can take the budget you'd have to spend on Port + Wasteland + Vial and really just plug it into Forces and Volcs and have a pretty solid list.

This is an excellent point actually. The fact that cards are so expensive actually has a strong normalizing effect on Legacy given that it means anybody who's newly coming into the format is incentivized to buy into a blue shell deck simply because it's demonstrate-ably one that works (and is supported by the hype to boot). I don't really see what it has to do with the whole "ban stuff" discussion it's addressed to other than as another argument that metagame isn't unbalanced because something is wrong with the legal cards but that the overwhelming numbers of Brainstorms seeing play are caused by player choice instead of the shell being to strong compared to other options in the format.
In fact, it kind of contradicts your own point:


The diversity of competitive legacy is a mirage created by people who are willing to sacrifice their own chances at victory to create a more enjoyable play experience for themselves. This is unique in competition. No NFL team is signing a comedian to play wide receiver because they like his jokes. But you can bet they would sign 8-foot cyborgs until the rules explicitly prevent it.

TL;DR: it's fair to discuss whether it's bad at it's core that the blue shell dominates legacy, or discuss the best card to remove to weaken it. But it's not right to act like it isn't the best core in the format. Because it is, or it wouldn't dominate. Simple as that.
These people you cite as buying into blue don't do so for a higher chance at in general, they do so because it gets them into the format cheaply with a deck that is proven to have the tools to compete and that provides a lot of varied options to spend further money on (instead of locking you into a specific set of archetypes). Your two statements don't go together - or at least they aren't related to one another - or am I missing something there?


My proof that this is happening are the price trends on blue duals. Yes, they are falling now (as are almost all eternal card prices, other than Vintage pillars and rare Legends cards, I believe) but they increased at a rate much higher than their non-blue counterparts. That data indicates that demand was that much higher for blue decks at the beginning of the year. So when Carsten says people aren't innovating, what he's seeing is a player base that has grown in such a way that it's tilted toward one particular shell. They aren't innovating because they don't have the cards, because it's pointless to buy the other cards.
Once again, I think this is a very interesting and valuable observation, I just don't see how the underlined part follows out of it at all. It just means people have spent money on a working shell and refrain from buying into the format any further, it doesn't say anything about the viability of other decks given development of those in any way.


The sentiment is nice, showcasing some "innovative" decks that break from the pack, but it's not a strong argument against those who claim the Legacy metagame is warped around certain cards/shells, and worse off for it. And I don't believe innovation is as easy or possible as the article insinuates; as big as the Legacy cardpool is, there really aren't a whole lot of unplumbed depths that maverick deckbuilders could tap into.
I never said it was easy, however I very much disagree that there aren't a ton of things that could be improved if someone puts the hours in. Lejay's Sylvan Plug is just the latest example of how much potential has been left untapped since at least RTR (probably since GSZ) by revealing that there was actually a consistent Chalice shell to be found that nobody figured out in all that time.


This is why most "new" brews, most "innovations" are going to be either one-time combos or extremely metagamed hate decks. Full sets of Chalice and Choke in the mainboard isn't the start of some vibrant, new deck that will be discussed for years to come on The Source, but a reaction to a field that's mostly Blue tempo and combo. Brilliant as it is, from a competitive standpoint (and it really is some ace meta work), it doesn't speak well on the health of the format and to fun that can be had in Legacy deckbuilding. But hey, at least it's convinced me that maindeck Chokes in Enchantress is probably the right call.

I don't see Chalice as a dedicated hate card and more as a card that is just really good in a format with really low mana curves, but that's besides the point. The innovation in that deck aren't the Chokes, it's the fact that the biggest problem for Chalice decks has always been their inherent tendency to lose to themselves and Lejay seems to have found a shell that improves that issue significantly (Sylvan plus GSZ engine) that would have been available for years but hasn't seen any use before afaik. How is solving the inherent problems of a high-variance high power archetype not exciting deckbuilding?


The basis of whether or not one thinks Brainstorm's dominance is healthy for the format is whether that person believes that the diversity in strategies (in that there are combo, aggro and control archetypes) makes up for the uniformity in cards played.
This is probably the best foundation for arguing against Brainstorm legality I've seen. It ignores the fact that there actually is a reasonable number of successful decks that don't run Brainstorm but at the very least it finds a useful definition of "variety" that might - and I mean might - be improved without Brainstorm in the format.


TL;DR: A URW and Grixis deck, despite playing a wholly different color, and different wincons/strategy, shared 45 of the exact same cards, and had a number of functionally similar cards making up the other 15, to the point where there were only a handful of cards that were truly different strategy-wise between them. Are the decks truly "different?"
Well, I don't find the similarities between the two decks at all surprising or concerning given that Eli's and BBD's deck aren't actually very different strategies but implementations of the same strategy in different colors. Both are burst-card-advantage based aggro-control decks that aim to take over the game with overwhelming card-advantage while occupying the opponent by deploying cheap, highly efficient threats (which might accidentally win the game before the card advantage win happens). They are still different decks. For a similar phenomenon, look at Belcher and Oops all spells - two very similar strategies implemented with different cards.


TL;DR: The expected percentage gain in win probability does not outweigh the time and monetary investment required to build a blue-meta-fighting deck, nor is it practical for the competitive player who wants to play the best deck against the field. Well, while I agree with what you said above - that a part of the perceived blue dominance is caused by how expensive branching out is - Magic and Legacy are a game, not the society's social contract or something. If those that want to play non-blue decks can't invest the time and/or money to get them to work, that's sad but not a reason Wizards should change the format (other than maybe reprinting a ton of staples). Lack of effort /= the right to have some outside force change things so you don't need to do what others have already done for some archetypes.
The incentive you describe for wanting to change the perceived Brainstorm dominance basically boils down to the fact that it would make the format more fun for a number of players. How is that different from forcing them to make the negative EV decision of needing to spend money on cards without an actual increase in win percentage because they could have just kept playing what they already own and done just as well - other than that one of the two options penalizes everybody who enjoys the format as is while the other is worse for those that want things to be different?


On another note, check out this recent IQ top 8 in PA. Six non-blue decks, at least one of which was manned by a person who had won the last IQ at the store with a blue deck and another was manned by a player who has access to blue lands but has made a conscious choice to not play a Brainstorm strategy with mixed results.
I'm happy to see that but how exactly does that argue for an actual (instead of perceived) dominance of cantrip shell decks? In fact, if anything it argues that you can actually win with non-cantrip decks once you actually decide to run them. I'm honestly confused what that was doing in your post.


it shouldn't be up to good players with good cards to take it on themselves to increase deck choice diversity at the expense of their chances for success in the tournament. (Could we call that a "gentleman's agreement?") This "gentleman's agreement" is actually a fundamental part of the MtG experience. You fall flat when you brew quite often but it's also what gives you a shot at creating Trix, Academy, Ravager Affinity, StoneBlade, Vintage Gifts, GroATog or whatever other broken past archetype you want to mention. 90+% of the time you harmstring yourself by choosing an unproven archetype - you play them anyway because you hope you've found one that doesn't.


Do we want one where there is such a clearly defined best shell that is for the most competitive players, and the other entrants choosing something else are doing so simply out of love of a particular archetype? Or do we want a format that will challenge us to respect a wide range of playable cards and engines, each with their own sort of weaknesses?

When you make such blanket statements of the format we'd end up with without Brainstorm, keep in mind that the Legacy format we have is actually an absurd abnormality as far as Magic metagames are concerned. I've been playing for a long time and I can't remember a single explored constructed format that came even close to having as many viable archetypes and strategies as Legacy, both past and current. We might end up with a format with a variety of different viable engines and strategies, we might also end up with yet another midrange-shitfest like the ones WotC has been trying to create in the smaller formats for years now or some other format state that significantly decreases format variety (just for the sake of argument, assume that banning Brainstorm leads to the complete demise of the tempo shell, in turn leading to super-fast combo becoming extremely dominant. Not that I claim that would happen, this is just meant for illustrative purposes). I simply don't know what would happen and neither do you, so you shouldn't reason as if you did.


That engine (cantrip-shell) is so good and difficult to disrupt that it pushes out previously viable engine cards like Life from the Loam, Dark Confidant and Knight of the Reliquary. Well, Loam is doing better right now than it has been in forever (see Lands.dec - also see amalek0's post below yours) and Dark Confidant was actually quite successful compared to its metagame penetration until Khans, Brainstorm or no Brainstorm.


Depends your angle of perception. Miracles and ANT look rather similar to DnT. They represent the two ends of a spectrum of decks that DnT seeks to muddle in much the same way. That is because DnT is built specifically to inhibit The One Strategy that some folks in here think does not exist.

DnT is great against blue and various degrees of lackluster against everything else because they do not follow The One Strategy. If there was not The One Strategy, how is it ever winning?
As much as I hate to contradict you on a deck you're so intimately familiar with, the reason D&T treats Miracles and Storm so similarly isn't because they're close to the same strategy in a vacuum (without looking at them from the point of any specific deck) but because they try to force the game onto the same field of battle - the stack (Or is playing on the stack instead of the battlefield that One Strategy you were referring to? Because in that case the blue Midrange and Tempo decks are in fact not part of the One Strategy, though you could argue Treasure Cruise gives them the option to simulate that kind of play). As D&T acts as a control deck and has certain tools aimed at dealing with on the stack gameplay, obviously those are the tools D&T will use to fight both decks because both decks refuse to play their own battlefield game (one deciding to simply ignore it, the other by repeatedly cleaning it up until it finds something that just ends the game).

@Bed Decks Player:


You're very right! Look for example on Storm. For some reason people were missing the obvious for years, until one day one guy took all those long forgotten old frame beauties like Infernal Tutor, Ad Nauseam and Past in Flames, and build the deck of them. It takes nothing but brewing, new prints have hardly any impact.

I expect similar process in other archetypes, too, esp. now when the remaining non-blue colours got huge boost in the recent sets with:
- white getting a true-killah in True-Name Nemesis
- green being powered up with Treasure Cruise
- black having another amazing nigh-tutor in Dig Through Time
- and red going literally berserk with Delver of Secrets and Snapcaster Mage

It's a thrilling time to play NOT blue, and as the ever declining numbers of cantrips all over the worldwide metagame tell us, there's really no need to be sceptic about the future of your average kavu.dec and its brethren.Reading comprehension is tech. I never talked about the quality of blue cards coming out - I fully agree that there's a problem with at least Delver and TNN as well as most likely Cruise - I was talking about the fact that the vast majority of the effort in Legacy isn't put into non-blue decks and that those complaining aren't putting in the necessary work to find alternative archetypes that are already available even without new cards being printed. There's a lot of evidence that the non-blue decks evolve and incorporate new options at a snail's pace compared to the mainstream cantrip shell decks (I mention a ton of examples elsewhere in this post).


Then maybe you can inform me where I am wrong.
Storm, Miracles, Delver, all those decks are possible only thanks to the printings. Look, it's called "Delver" for reasons.
Saying that we're obliged to brew in non-blue is silly, when there are far less non-blue powerful printings than those bombs that WotC vomit for blue.
Well, yes, those decks are possible because of new printings. Now think one moment about how those decks have come into being, because I'm reasonably sure there weren't any pre-made decklists included in those booster packs.


Look, I really know that Storm decks existed ever since... well, printing of th storm mechanic? But they weren't in existence before, there's no "Storm before the Storm", unless it's some kind of cosmogony or Churchill's book. So what Long and Cook and whoever else did was that they innovated when the new things were printed: storm things.
Same goes for Elves and DnT, it's not like Elves were teh no.1 dek before GSZ, Hoof and watnot. In fact there are very few decks that are new brew yet completely built of old parts, like that deck with Tortured Existence, Ichorid, Phantasmagorian and something else; yep, that's new and it's build from old parts (at least mostly).[quote]

[quote]It's not like 99 % of Legacy players are idiots who cannot build a new deck. I'd say that most of the old techs/possibilities are already known/explored, and only timefrom tiem a Tortured Pahantasmagioraidn deck shows up to show up.

Well, if you know all that, I really don't understand what the heck was unclear in what I said. Look at the time it took for Elves to be developed to its current form (and the process was cut short because LSV and Matt Nass - aka the pro players that freaking play the format twice a year - made the last step of including NO + Hoof for us) or until Death and Taxes became a thing or Cloudpost MUD (which should really have been an obvious innovation in hindsight) or the new lands shell with Depths/Stage or whatever, with Lejay's radical reworking of the Chalice shell as the latest example. Now compare that to the time it took for Snapcaster Mage, Delver of Secrets to be adopted and made successful. The difference is striking and massively based on the amount of man hours going into deck development.

My point is that there are a lot more players working on blue shells and as a result innovation is happening at a much faster pace around the cantrip shell than anywhere else in the format. Before you scream for bannings, you should first see what can be done with old and new non-blue cards and a similar amount of effort should go into those non-blue decks before we talk about banning anything at all or complain about a supposed dominance of a certain type of shell.



People mostly don't have time to dick around with cards, it's not like our time is unlimited and 99 % of Legacy players got other life than just Magic, so that - and the price of cards that also doesn't have any impact, true Lem? -, is the reason why nobody brews, because screw that.

Also, I don't really get what's this all hiss about. If you'd take a shortest look at what I replied, Jander, you'd realize that I in no way comment the original article, but instead focus on Mon's silly post. Saying that "your... displays your complete misunderstanding of Carsten's article's intentions" is senseless, unless you've thought that it's somehow necessary to inform me of what I haven't done.

Speaking of brewing in more general:
I'd love to try some deck with 4x Sylvan Libraries, Coursers of Crupitz, GSZ and something else (preferably some numbers of Root Mazes and Verduran Etress) as I like Libraries and I guess that the deck could be funny and strong. But then again I realize that this would cost an enormous amount of time and money which are properties I do not own in unlimited numbers, so yeah, screw the brew. In M+1s words I'm like lazy unemployed blah blah, google the rest on your own. So yeah, whatever. It's not like your opinion changes a jackshit about how many hours I'll have to spend in work or what my family needs me to do, neither it will clean my cat's litter box. Brew, brave man, brew. Sorry, I got other things to do.


I tell you that unsurprisingly the shell that receives the most attention and development in the format - carried out by a significant majority of the hive mind - is performing better by absolute numbers (can't speak to performance relative to format penetration) than the rest of the format and call out for those that don't want to play that shell to innovate those decks they'd like to see viable/play instead of complaining - and you tell me you have every right to complain because you aren't ready to take the time to brew or work on those decks. And you really think you're making a coherent argument or valid point? You gotta be fucking kidding me.



Perhaps Carsten should have done a better job conveying his intentions then.
I guess I could have added a specific reminder that "large card pool" doesn't mean "old frame cards" or something along the lines of "it's ok to use new cards to innovate and brew, that still counts" or something else that made clear that innovation means combining the different cards in the card pool in ways we haven't used so far, old and new alike? I rather assumed that part was obvious.

@Jander: You got it. Thanks for showing me I'm not talking Egyptian or something.

@tammit67: Thanks, happy you liked it - and I very much agree on the fact that it'd be sweet if the non-blue deck spectrum had as much depth and strategic variety as the blue ones. Maybe we get really lucky and WotC prints cards that help out with that - and have people who actually work at building those decks once they do.

[Bed Decks Palyer]

Well, if you know all that, I really don't understand what the heck was unclear in what I said. Look at the time it took for Elves to be developed to its current form...
Green Sun's Zenith? I mean: it was about the print, right? There was no GSZ deck before GSZ, right? So maybe the ever increasing number of blue bombs might have an impact on general deckbuilding. But I can be wrong...



My point is that there are a lot more players working on blue shells and as a result innovation is happening at a much faster pace around the cantrip shell than anywhere else in the format.
Maybe it's because the blue cantrip shell is stronger? Idk, I am yet to discover the power of monored Kavus.



Before you scream for bannings...
Stop right there.



I tell you that unsurprisingly the shell that receives the most attention and development in the format - carried out by a significant majority of the hive mind - is performing better by absolute numbers (can't speak to performance relative to format penetration) than the rest of the format and call out for those that don't want to play that shell to innovate those decks they'd like to see viable/play instead of complaining - and you tell me you have every right to complain because you aren't ready to take the time to brew or work on those decks. And you really think you're making a coherent argument or valid point? You gotta be fucking kidding me.
It's nice that you have so much spare time that you might brew in subpar colors.



I guess I could have added a specific reminder that "large card pool" doesn't mean "old frame cards" or something along the lines of "it's ok to use new cards to innovate and brew, that still counts" or something else that made clear that innovation means combining the different cards in the card pool in ways we haven't used so far, old and new alike? I rather assumed that part was obvious.
Well, I just wrote that the trouble is that blue gets powerful tools more often. You commented otherwise. Now you seem to agree with that. I'm perplexed.


My only wish was that the non-blue deck spectrum had as much depth and strategic variety as the blue ones. Maybe we get really lucky and WotC prints cards that help out with that - and have people who actually work at building those decks once they do.

[Zombie]

I finally figured out what irks me about the "just innovate" argument: It typically comes from people playing blue who insist that other colors have tons of room for innovation and improvement and that people should stop complaining - and then these very same people continue playing blue, maybe even while saying they love to brew. What gives?

[Bed Decks Palyer]

The main reason why there's much more brewing in blue is because of the pace with which blue gets powerful tools. See the several cards I mentioned. Each of them could have been printed in a different color and they could spark some innovation, yet they made them blue. I do understand that they cannot stop to print good blue cards for the rest of the century, and Delver (although stupid design mistake) is not that bad, as the color needed some creatures.

What's less understandable why the heck blue needed Treasure Cruise and Dig Through Time on the top of Brainstorm, Ponder, Preordain, Portent, Predict, Impulse, Serum Visions, Ancestral Vision, Peer Through Depths, Windfall, Accumulated Knowledge, Opt, Mental Note, Gitaxian Probe, Braingeyser, Timetwister and Ancestral Recall.

Nothing would be wrong about green TC or black DTT. Green draw has precedents and even if it hadn't so waht? Look up the Delver. Black plays tutor, even conditional ones like IT or whatever the sac-this-to-search or Demonic Consultation no.5-12.

Now, saying that it's a question of hive mind is not only impolite, but also intellectually dishonest. It's of no surprise that people brew there where is something to brew and as the blue shell is the most potent and the new prints are more often, it is natural that people play with those cards. It's not my fault that WotC have raging boner over color blue and the color is supported with new powerful prints more often than the rest. And it's not my problem neither guilt that the cantrip shell absorbs this new prints more fluently and with less effort than say burn based or enchantment based or hatebear based strategies. Btw, for those lacking in the reading dpt.: I'm not advocating bans. The only card I'm ambivalent about is Brainstorm, because I acknowledge its extreme power, yet I'm not sure it should be banned already.

I'm not obliged to brew, and nobody is. It's a game, and we play it for w/e the reasons, one of them is having fun, I guess. If people have fun with blue, who you are, Carsten, to insult them with "hive mind" sauce? Moreover, I think that most of the players (and I'm pretty sure it's well over 98 % of them) don't play for their living, and have other things in life than brew to make you happy. Carsten, may I aks you how many children you have? How many of your relatives are sick and need cnostant help? What amount of time do you spend in work weekly?

Sorry, I got no desire to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to dick around with children's pictorial game, and I guess that lots of people have it the same, especially ever since the prices went absurd. And make sure you switch on your Egyptian-American translator: this is not me bitching about a need for bans, or inexistence of non-blue decks, or whatever other nonsense I read in this thread. It's me notifying you of your impoliteness and dishonesty, and your false expectation that we are here to fulfill the roles of your jesters so that you're not bored during the next tournament. Moreove,r and this was the crux of my first post here, learn to read. I never said anything about the article neither about BS nor the impossibility of viable non-blu decks, but I rather commented that it's natural that blue gets more attention as it already has more powerful tools than other colors, this discrepancy is only ever-increasing with everyn new print that brings stuff like TNN, TC, DTT, etc., and the fact that the prive of cards might have an impact on what the people may (not) brew with.

So far you affrimed me that you maybe can write (articles), but you definitely have troubles reading. I'm not going to continue in a discussion with somebody who's giving very little emphasis on how stifling/limiting/thrilling are the aspects like the already established card pool or recent prints, all the while having insults and disdain for anyone who for w/e the reason is unable or unwilling to onanize with 60Forests.dec during his very own limited and valuable spare time.

[Star|Scream]

You say the format is too blue. He says try to brew something non-blue. You say you need to change your cat's litter box.

How can anyone take you seriously?

[Mon,Goblin Chief]

Well, I just wrote that the trouble is that blue gets powerful tools more often. You commented otherwise. Now you seem to agree with that. I'm perplexed. The thing is, you started your whole sarcasm-excursion in response to a quote that didn't have anything to do with the power level of new cards printed. I never said anything about the rate at which new cards are released for the different colors, either for or against it being a problem - which is why there's this surprising fact that I agree that blue is getting too much love compared to the other colors. That's true, but it wasn't what I was talking about. You shouldn't be surprised that you aren't understood when you talk about something that isn't actually related to the quote you're responding to.


Green Sun's Zenith? I mean: it was about the print, right? There was no GSZ deck before GSZ, right? So maybe the ever increasing number of blue bombs might have an impact on general deckbuilding. But I can be wrong...
It's an easy to observe fact that the development of non-blue decks happens at a significantly slower pace than that of blue archetypes even when new cards/rules changes allow those decks to evolve - and that's what I was pointing out. So sure, new blue cards mean more development options in blue archetypes, yet the time frame in which that adoption happens over the spectrum of different archetypes should be at least similar if there's a similar amount of developmental work invested. This isn't the case - which the examples I gave are evidence of - which in turn means that those decks fall more and more behind the curve because they aren't worked on with a remotely similar amount of over all effort - which makes it at least questionable to assume that the blue shell is in fact as much better than other shells as is frequently claimed based on results. A big part of it might simply be that blue decks are a couple of steps ahead of the non-blue ones as far as integration of new options or adaption to metagame demands is concerned.


It's nice that you have so much spare time that you might brew in subpar colors.
And they're subpar because... you in your infinite wisdom have decided they are? This is exactly the kind of attitude that leads to that development lag happening in the first place, and thereby makes it pretty much impossible to judge correctly how much the different shells are actually positioned power-level wise.


Now, saying that it's a question of hive mind is not only impolite, but also intellectually dishonest. It's of no surprise that people brew there where is something to brew and as the blue shell is the most potent and the new prints are more often, it is natural that people play with those cards. It's not my fault that WotC have raging boner over color blue and the color is supported with new powerful prints more often than the rest. And it's not my problem neither guilt that the cantrip shell absorbs this new prints more fluently and with less effort than say burn based or enchantment based or hatebear based strategies. Btw, for those lacking in the reading dpt.: I'm not advocating bans. The only card I'm ambivalent about is Brainstorm, because I acknowledge its extreme power, yet I'm not sure it should be banned already.
You don't get it, do you? Nobody is saying anything is your fault, I simply deny that there's any right to claim the non-blue shells are worse when the difference in performance is easy to explain related to the comparative amount of development effort going into said shells. Also, for what it's worth, I'm not insulting anybody by talking about the hive mind. There's a vast collective of people working at ameliorating the blue cantrip shells (what I called the hive mind here - and don't get me wrong, I'm definitely part of that hive mind when I suggest new decks like golddigger a couple of weeks ago) and only a very limited number of players working on the rest of the format. The point being, the blue cantrip shell doesn't necessarily absorb new printings more fluidly, the difference in development speed simply makes sense, seeing as only a fraction of the development time that goes into blue decks is invested in other shells. If ten people work on deck A and two on deck B, it only makes sense that it takes five times as long for deck B to reach the level of fine tuning deck A reaches.


I'm not obliged to brew, and nobody is.
True. You're also not entitled to seeing new decks when you aren't ready to put the work into helping develop them.


If people have fun with blue, who you are, Carsten, to insult them with "hive mind" sauce? Moreover, I think that most of the players (and I'm pretty sure it's well over 98 % of them) don't play for their living, and have other things in life than brew to make you happy.
First, I'm not insulting anybody with "hive mind sauce." The hive mind is a reality of modern magic, created by the fact that information exchange about decks is happening at a very fast pace due to the internet. If you work on what the majority works on, you're part of the hive mind. So am I when I do. That isn't an insult, it's a statement of fact.
And I don't mind people having fun with blue. What I mind is people who don't invest any time to develop the format outside of established blue cantrip shells (or at all) claiming it's stale as a result of others making the same choice. If someone thinks the format is stale and overly blue, they should try to do something about it instead of complaining (or at least before complaining). I'm not asking them to brew to make me happy (I'm doing just fine), I ask them to brew to make themselves happy as evidently they aren't given the fact that they complain and it's neither my job nor the dci's to do that for them.


So far you affrimed me that you maybe can write (articles), but you definitely have troubles reading. I'm not going to continue in a discussion with somebody who's giving very little emphasis on how stifling/limiting/thrilling are the aspects like the already established card pool or recent prints, all the while having insults and disdain for anyone who for w/e the reason is unable or unwilling to onanize with 60Forests.dec during his very own limited and valuable spare time. The only person being insulting in this thread has been you, varying between open and thinly veiled insults aimed at me, my writing and my posts, and it's perfectly ok for you to work on whatever decks you like. Just don't complain that those very few people work on lag behind those that a huge collective does work on and claim that's proof the format is fundamentally imbalanced because you say so.


this is not me bitching about a need for bans, or inexistence of non-blue decks, or whatever other nonsense I read in this thread. It's me notifying you of your impoliteness and dishonesty, and your false expectation that we are here to fulfill the roles of your jesters so that you're not bored during the next tournament.
How was my comment in response to which you started spouting (very badly executed) sarcasm impolite? As for dishonesty, if you say that "that it's natural that blue gets more attention," how is it dishonest to point out that non-blue decks get less attention and therefore develop much more slowly? Also, I don't consider anybody my jester and I'm far from bored when I enter Legacy tournaments - I just don't think calls for bans or complaining about the overwhelming number of blue decks getting played is justified from people who don't make the effort to actually develop non-blue decks to play with. Obviously there won't be any non-blue decks to play if (almost) nobody is even trying to make them work. If the number of blue decks seeing play is a problem for you, that implies you want non-blue decks to play with (because why are you complaining if you are part of the perceived problem?) so the onus is on you to freaking try to build one before you claim the format is stale.

[amalek0]

Carsten, you can lead a horse to water...

That being said, Decks like sylvan plug make it clear innovation in the format for nonblue decks can happen, if slowly. I do have one slight bone to pick with you in that you argued it took a while for the thespian's stage/dark depths combo to make it into the loam shell. It took VERY little time for decks to integrate marit lage kill to great effect in lands. Here are some links, all within the period from July of 2013 when the changes went into effect on the legend rule until the end of the year.

http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=59751
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=58932
http://sales.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=61509

In the case of the Spiess list, it took a whopping two months to top 8 with the deck after these sweeping changes, and that list was still evolving at that time as crop rotation was relatively new tech, the white splash in the RG build was still popular, and the sideboard was a far cry from what more streamlined lists play now.

It isn't necessarily that decks innovate slowly in the non-blue sphere, but rather that there are fewer players, so it takes longer for innovations to trickle out and affect the entire group playing a given nonblue deck. That process gets short-circuited when a dedicated player spikes a tournament and the innovations get distributed on a wide level. Also, I would like to point out that the vast majority of the hive mind that is brewing blue decks is not as good at magic as Kurt, and that quality over quantity is in fact a thing--I would be much more scared of a blue midrange shell that, say, Bob Huang and Philip Schonegger took two hours testing for a tournament than the list produced by the amalgamated testing results and discussion of a hundred random no-namers, even if those hundred people all were dedicated stoneblade players. That is entirely because even though those two players aren't known at all for that archetype, they have the experience and skill to make their contributions inherently more insightful/valuable to a given legacy deck than your average joe. There's a reason you and Kai can take a storm list to a legacy tournament without much testing and do well, and it's not JUST because you're both very experienced with the archetype in general--You also know how to prepare for a given metagame AND YOU'RE BETTER PLAYERS.

Now pardon me while I go read your article that went up today and prep for the next discussion thread.

[Bed Decks Palyer]

The thing is, you started your whole sarcasm-excursion in response to a quote that didn't have anything to do with the power level of new cards printed. I never said anything about the rate at which new cards are released for the different colors, either for or against it being a problem - which is why there's this surprising fact that I agree that blue is getting too much love compared to the other colors. That's true, but it wasn't what I was talking about. You shouldn't be surprised that you aren't understood when you talk about something that isn't actually related to the quote you're responding to.
Do you mean the "Legacy decks are really hard to actually get to work. Just look at how long it took to get Storm, Death and Taxes, Elves and a number of other decks from the idea stage to the machines they are today" quote? Because pardon me, but part of what turned those decks into machines successful were the printings, weren't?
Or was it the "this is exactly the mindset that leads to the format feeling stale in the long run. You've decided there's nothing better than the blue cantrip shell, nothing to help non-blue decks to successfully fight variance and as a result you've decided not only that you should stop trying but also that everybody else who actually does is wasting their time - and you even try to convince people that they simply should stop trying and clamor for bans instead." quote, one that implies that anyone who doesn't have a time, money or will to brew is somehow bad human being?



It's an easy to observe fact that the development of non-blue decks happens at a significantly slower pace than that of blue archetypes even when new cards/rules changes allow those decks to evolve - and that's what I was pointing out. So sure, new blue cards mean more development options in blue archetypes, yet the time frame in which that adoption happens over the spectrum of different archetypes should be at least similar if there's a similar amount of developmental work invested. This isn't the case - which the examples I gave are evidence of - which in turn means that those decks fall more and more behind the curve because they aren't worked on with a remotely similar amount of over all effort - which makes it at least questionable to assume that the blue shell is in fact as much better than other shells as is frequently claimed based on results. A big part of it might simply be that blue decks are a couple of steps ahead of the non-blue ones as far as integration of new options or adaption to metagame demands is concerned.
And the point is?



And they're subpar because... you in your infinite wisdom have decided they are? This is exactly the kind of attitude that leads to that development lag happening in the first place, and thereby makes it pretty much impossible to judge correctly how much the different shells are actually positioned power-level wise.
Maybe they're not subpar, but then I'm surprised why far less people play them. Maybe you got a secret knowledge or skill how to make them work, but I cannot believe that Legacy's players base as a whole was missing them.



You don't get it, do you? Nobody is saying anything is your fault, I simply deny that there's any right to claim the non-blue shells are worse when the difference in performance is easy to explain related to the comparative amount of development effort going into said shells.
Yet it's not only about comparative amount, it's also about prints. UR Cruise wouldn't be a deck would TC been printed in another color, especially if the colored cost would be more prohibitive, lets say 4GGG. And your quotes that started this whole nonsense tried to make any such an argument invalid by saying that we're simply lazy and part of the problem.
Look, we're not. It's not my fault that WotC shits blue, it's not my fault that peole cannot purchase cards, it's not my fault that our times are limited. So forgive me if I find it arrogant if you act like we are obliged to brew.



Also, for what it's worth, I'm not insulting anybody by talking about the hive mind. There's a vast collective of people working at ameliorating the blue cantrip shells (what I called the hive mind here - and don't get me wrong, I'm definitely part of that hive mind when I suggest new decks like golddigger a couple of weeks ago) and only a very limited number of players working on the rest of the format. The point being, the blue cantrip shell doesn't necessarily absorb new printings more fluidly, the difference in development speed simply makes sense, seeing as only a fraction of the development time that goes into blue decks is invested in other shells. If ten people work on deck A and two on deck B, it only makes sense that it takes five times as long for deck B to reach the level of fine tuning deck A reaches.
Oh so, then I apologize that I misunderstood it.



True. You're also not entitled to seeing new decks when you aren't ready to put the work into helping develop them.
The pain.



First, I'm not insulting anybody with "hive mind sauce." The hive mind is a reality of modern magic, created by the fact that information exchange about decks is happening at a very fast pace due to the internet. If you work on what the majority works on, you're part of the hive mind. So am I when I do. That isn't an insult, it's a statement of fact.
And I don't mind people having fun with blue. What I mind is people who don't invest any time to develop the format outside of established blue cantrip shells (or at all) claiming it's stale as a result of others making the same choice. If someone thinks the format is stale and overly blue, they should try to do something about it instead of complaining (or at least before complaining). I'm not asking them to brew to make me happy (I'm doing just fine), I ask them to brew to make themselves happy as evidently they aren't given the fact that they complain and it's neither my job nor the dci's to do that for them.
Do you want a bank account where you may send me some money so that I may arrange a caregiver's service for my grandpa while I'll be brewing?



The only person being insulting in this thread has been you, varying between open and thinly veiled insults aimed at me, my writing and my posts, and it's perfectly ok for you to work on whatever decks you like. Just don't complain that those very few people work on lag behind those that a huge collective does work on and claim that's proof the format is fundamentally imbalanced because you say so.
So the format isn't completely imbalanced just because you say so? The 6/8 blue Top8s don't exist?
I don't belittle your effort neither your zest for brewing, I'm just asking on what fundament you've built the argument that the format isn't imbalanced. Btw, I'm not even saying it is imbalanced. Maybe the 6/8 Top8s are balanced, cosidering all possible aspects.



How was my comment in response to which you started spouting (very badly executed) sarcasm impolite? As for dishonesty, if you say that "that it's natural that blue gets more attention," how is it dishonest to point out that non-blue decks get less attention and therefore develop much more slowly?
Nice sidestep.



Also, I don't consider anybody my jester and I'm far from bored when I enter Legacy tournaments - I just don't think calls for bans or complaining about the overwhelming number of blue decks getting played is justified from people who don't make the effort to actually develop non-blue decks to play with.
Wanna that bank account number or not?



Obviously there won't be any non-blue decks to play if (almost) nobody is even trying to make them work. If the number of blue decks seeing play is a problem for you, that implies you want non-blue decks to play with (because why are you complaining if you are part of the perceived problem?) so the onus is on you to freaking try to build one before you claim the format is stale.
No the onus is not on me. Neither on anybody else. I may "bitch" as much as I want - if you feel that my mention of disproportional level of powerful blue prints should be called "bitching" -, but forgive me that I got more important things in life than brewing with either blue or non-blue.

The only things I wanted to know and that's why I made that badly executed sarcasm, was
- why you're harsh against Gheizen
- why you act like if the powerful blue prints and the lack of the non-blue isn't a trouble
- why do you expect each of us to brew like if we've got no other life and finally
- why a clamor for bans should be unreasonable or unnecessary

I wasn't given the answers, but I can live without it.


Good luck brewing. /badly executed sarcasm