What happened to Eldrazi Stompy?

[MGB]

There was a time not too long ago that Eldrazi Stompy occupied a pretty huge share of the metagame. You'd see it everywhere in paper tournaments and it was the #2 or #3 deck in terms of results, only 2nd to Miracles usually, online in Dailies and other MTGO events.

Now, it's not even on the MTGGoldfish list of decks per the Legacy metagame. It's completely fallen off the map online, seemingly.

You still see it occasionally in paper tournaments but no more than 2-3 Eldrazi Stompy pilots usually make it to the later rounds of the tournaments and the top tables.

I'm just kind of curious because it's not really apparent to me as to why it's had this steep decline in playability or results. When it was popular it seemed almost like a pillar of the format - one of the main non-blue decks to actually have a shot at winning tournaments and doing well alongside Lands and Death n Taxes. I thought it would be a staple of the Legacy metagame for as long as all of the cards were legal. But what happened to cause this decline?

[Stuart]

Some guesses:
- Blue mages (in particular, Delver and old-Miracles pilots) adapted their playstyles and lists to beat it.
- Dragon Stompy replaced it as the best Chalice deck.
- RB Reanimator and Turbo Depths became popular budget options, while some Eldrazi pieces (Chalice and City) spiked, so there’s less likelihood for new/budget players to be drawn to it.
- People got bored of it.

[Ace/Homebrew]

Damn, Stuart nailed each point I was going to make! :wink:

I'll add that in addition to Blood Moon Stompy gaining in popularity, several other decks with Chalice have also been competing for that space in the meta.

Plus the fact that most players would rather play with 1 cmc spells than try to keep others from playing with them.

[kabal]

TC says it's still top 8ing

https://i.imgur.com/KVZV5d7_d.jpg?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium

[Eldariel]

Its best match-up got banned. The #1 reason for the success of Eldrazi was that it boasted a somewhat positive match-up versus Miracles which was the clear #1 deck but with no Miracles, Eldrazi just has average and difficult match-ups left. Grixis Pyromancer was always a tad difficult for it as was D&T, Czech Pile poses similar issues if not quite to the same level, Storm and Elves are positive MUs but not a sufficient portion of the metagame to catapult a Stompy-deck to the top. It's very clear when you look at metagame trends; as soon as Miracles left the DTB, so did Eldrazi.

At the very least the streamlined Mono-Void version is having trouble and the deck might have to innovate with colour splashes to better fit the new metagame, which brings about the same problems with consistency that keeps other Stompy-variants from dominating; Dragon Stompy and Faerie Stompy spent a bit of time each over the last 10 years in DTB but this happens very sporadically. And of course, the best lists haven't probably been optimized and spread for that yet. The spreading of tech in Legacy tends to be rather glacial, which also probably contributes.

[Hopo]

^What he said.
Also, eldrazi aggro has been evolving. Grim Monoliths are being implemented and more emphasis is put on the mid-game than early game aggro. Players are dropping Mimics and some even Matter Reshapers (which I think is very wrong) in favor of more 6-drops or colored replacements.

The lists without any colorless artifact mana tend to suffer quite much from Blood Moon so the traditional lists should in theory be have meta issues as long as moon stompy has significant meta presence.

[ESG]

The deck's numbers have waned a bit, but it's still a presence. It made the finals at Eternal Weekend: http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=17343&d=307277&f=LE

And it won the Card Kingdom/Mox Boarding House 1K last month: http://mtgtop8.com/event?e=17317&d=307115&f=LE

Those are both current successes.

[Dice_Box]

They became a DTB.

[Raizen884]

I'll disagree here who says the format is worse for it then it was, for me when a deck gets the spotlight it is heavily played because of 2 reasons.
Hype: People wanting to test this "new" deck.
Opponents unprepared: When you have a deck that few people played against, people are unprepared to fight it, they usually don't take optimal lines of play because of the inexperience in the MU.

Basically Eldrazi Aggro is as good as it has always been, but its not that the numbers are lower than it should, but when the deck appeared the numbers were higher than what the deck really is. Guess what, it is exactly the same thing that is happening to Czech Pile now, it was like THE most played deck 3 months ago, and now it is the third and slowly going down. Its not that the deck isn't good, its just it isn't the menace people hype for when it starts to see play. So Eldrazi had 9-10% on mtgtop8 on 2016, that did not reflect what the deck really is, the deck is a tier 1.5 to 1, not the tier 0 people were hyping for, now its like 5%, which is MUCH more plausible to what the deck really is, and its number is still high to say that it just "fallen off the map". Yeah, and it is a DTB.

[Lord_Mcdonalds]

There are two answers in this thread, people trying to reason why Eldrazi disappeared, and people pointing out it’s still played and doing well.

[lordofthepit]

It completely fucked up every format it touched.

[GoblinSettler]

It completely fucked up every format it touched.

https://uniqlo.scene7.com/is/image/UNIQLO/kaws-key-visual?$jpgMQ$

(at uniqlo next monday (https://www.uniqlo.com/us/en/page/kaws-x-peanuts-black.html))

[Eldariel]

There are two answers in this thread, people trying to reason why Eldrazi disappeared, and people pointing out it’s still played and doing well.

Still played and doing well, but not nearly as well as it was doing pre-bannings. We're talking about a matter of scale, not a binary on-off sort of a deal here and Eldrazi, while still present, are a significantly smaller and up until now at least (we'll see if this is a blip or if the new builds manage to gain a permanent position in the top tiers), less successful part of it.

[Finn]

I’m a bit confused. Are we actually discussing why a deck to beat is not popular? Or is there some subterranean nuance that is secretly present in the discussion?

[MGB]

I’m a bit confused. Are we actually discussing why a deck to beat is not popular? Or is there some subterranean nuance that is secretly present in the discussion?


Subterranean nuance sounds good.

[tescrin]

Subterranean Nuance was my bands name in high school

[Hopo]

I’m a bit confused. Are we actually discussing why a deck to beat is not popular? Or is there some subterranean nuance that is secretly present in the discussion?
The transition from bulk to DTB happened after this topic was opened.

[Finn]

Why would you write that? The decks to beat section does not determine which decks are popular. It is a reflection of them. The topic predates the update in DTB by like a day. So any changes in it has been present in the meta for weeks already. And you already know that.

[Stuart]

I’m a bit confused. Are we actually discussing why a deck to beat is not popular? Or is there some subterranean nuance that is secretly present in the discussion?

Why would you write that? The decks to beat section does not determine which decks are popular. It is a reflection of them. The topic predates the update in DTB by like a day. So any changes in it has been present in the meta for weeks already. And you already know that.

Is this topic really that egregious? The OP was going off MTGGoldfish (which currently shows Eldrazi at 2% of the meta) and personal experience. I guess he could have dug around on more sites (or waited a day to see this month's updated DTB) before posting, but just working from those, it's a reasonable question to ask.

[Eldariel]

It's also reasonable to ask the question considering during the whole of Miracle's reign, Eldrazi spent nearly every month in DTB with very solid results. Starting in May? It's been May, June, July, August, September until it hit DTB again. So 5 months not as a DTB and now 1 month as the DTB (1/6 thus far) as opposed to ~9/10 months as DTB since printing until Miracle's banning. Yeah, still a presence, yeah, a solid deck, but certainly not the same presence it used to be. Or who knows, mayhap the meta has taken a shape more favourable for our Noodly Lords again, but for now the question still remains.

[jrw1985]

The hype and interest in this deck has really died down, at least on The Source. The last post in the Eldrazi Stompy thread is from 11/6, despite this deck recently being moved to DTB.

My personal guess as to why people aren't hyping it is that the deck is just too consistently linear. AKA its boring. Cast one creature per turn and turn em sideways.

[Ace/Homebrew]

It's also unlikely to get new toys until Eldrazi are revisited.

[Hopo]

Why would you write that? The decks to beat section does not determine which decks are popular. It is a reflection of them. The topic predates the update in DTB by like a day. So any changes in it has been present in the meta for weeks already. And you already know that.
I, like many, don't follow much other sources. Apparently same with the starter of this thread. What's so difficult about this? I also think that the question was a bit controversial but I understand why someone would ask it.

[Megadeus]

Is it a DTB based on like SCG and online results I guess? My recent seventy person quarterly in Atlanta I think I saw one person playing eldrazi and it was the grim monolith post variation

[Thresh84]

My recent seventy person quarterly in Atlanta I think I saw one person playing eldrazi and it was the grim monolith post variation

Same tournament where I heard Pox made top 8 and goblins, merfolk and painter made appears. So there is that.

[Ellomdian]

Same tournament where I heard Pox made top 8

So, like 1998 or something? :cool:

[Lord_Mcdonalds]

Is it a DTB based on like SCG and online results I guess? My recent seventy person quarterly in Atlanta I think I saw one person playing eldrazi and it was the grim monolith post variation

It’s based on the councils data which tracks information globally, so it may not necessarily be reflective of regional meta games (US vs EU for example)

[Crimhead]

Is it a DTB based on like SCG and online results I guess? My recent seventy person quarterly in Atlanta I think I saw one person playing eldrazi and it was the grim monolith post variation


The transition from bulk to DTB happened after this topic was opened.
Over the Fall I have occasionally taken a peak at MTG top8 to check the last 2 months of live tournament data. Eldrazi has consistently been in 2nd or 3rd place for overall representation every time I have looked.

Yet there are always people happy to explain that the deck is not actually good because it is too inconsistent and/or the format has "adapted". Threads like this are common on Reddit. I think there those who want very much to believe Eldrazi cannot compete with the more interactive decks in the format; but the facts seem to have different ideas.

[Dice_Box]

The deck was never Bulk. It can run 13 to 16 Sol Lands, build dependent, Spirit Guides, Chalice, Thorn and a clock that disrupts or has protection. The deck is solid. The deck is also EXTREMELY boring.

As a prison lover I would rather play Lands, Stax or Metalworker than Eldrazi because each one of those decks is fun for me to play. Eldrazi is not a simple deck (Though some argue it is) but it's a repetitive one. You have exactly one game plan and you can't do much other that turn beefsticks sideways. That means that while strong it's not for everyone. It's sure as hell not for me and you would think looking at it I would be it's target audience.

[tescrin]

I think Dice has it. I didn't see it much a couple months back when I was at my local a lot, and one of the people who had run it had gotten tired of it. He likes slamming T1 blood moons with Big Red, Goblin-Fetcher-Dude Stompy, runs Belcher, and other obnoxious decks; but I think he probably hates that Eldrazi usually can't interact on the stack and plays the same a lot. There's a lot less tinkering you can do to the deck too, because it's card interactions are insular; which is to say that you don't get a lot of choices to play with due to Eldrazi lands and being colorless. I think his deal (Blood Moon guy) is that it's not a real lock. I can attest that Prison players like to run you out of mana and watch your face cringe at your hand [I've fancied some various Loam, Pox, and KotR piles in my day], and nothing feels better than swinging for X while your opponent has no lands.

It's obviously successful, but I assume it's harder to continue playing a deck that doesn't offer High-Skill-Cap Credit-Bux because it doesn't play into the ego. On the stack you can say "Oh, well I wouldn't have lost if I had just BRainstormsd THAT card away instead; obviously my genius would've won the day THEN"


There's your "I just woke up" Psyche 101 for the day from someone in an engineering field.

[Claymore]

When it was fresh, Jund DTB was similar. It basically...was. Made DTB extremely fast when it hopped over from Modern and the thread was only like 3 pages long. The decklist was largely set in stone, with 1-2 flex spots (Maelstrom Pulse, 3 or 4 BBE's) and variations being the ratio of AD to Punishing Fire. The deck shuffled up and ran itself, and you won or lost based on the order of what you drew or cascaded into and how your Hymn die rolls landed.

Eldrazi Stompy is a pretty stable deck that doesn't afford a lot of tinkering or have a very complex strategy. Find the latest MTGtop8 result, copy the list, and run it.