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A good way to do this would be printing cards that have easy mana costs like R oder B but have a clause that says "Play xxx only if you control a basic mountain" or something like that. I wouldn't like fetching a basic Mountain if I wanted to play Vendilion Clique or Jace...Quote:
Originally Posted by Oibade
Or sacrifice if doesn't control basic land type X, or a number of basic lands type X, or only basic lands X during upkeep or etc etc etc...Quote:
Originally Posted by Julian23
There are endless ways, but they keep printing multicolored cards with stronger stats as if multi color was worse than :b::b: or :g::g: instead... go figure...
The thing is that the concept itself of "counter" is superior to most discard or destroy effects. WotC will have to heavily break the color pie to achieve something for other colors. And moreover they would have to be cards that blue decks should find difficult to play.
Printing an exceptional white removal, or black hate piece, or an exceptional red burn spell would work only if they were tailored for mono-coloured or for awkward (meaning non-blue) combination of colours.
Why still blue? White has a lot of space for this kind of cards, something like an improved chancellor of the annex:Quote:
Originally Posted by dontbiteitholmes
Angel of Inertia - 2WW
Creature - Angel
You may reveal this card from your opening hand. If you do, when each opponent casts his or her first spell of the game, counter that spell unless that player pays 1.
Flying.
Whenever an opponent casts a spell, counter it unless that player pays 1.
3/4
Or simply:
The Dude W
Legendary Creature - Human
Each spell beyond the first each turn cost 1 more to play.
That's, uh, like, mh, totally your opinion man
1/1
Tambourines and elephants are playing in the band.
Won't you take a ride on the flying spoon?
Doo, doo doo.
Wond'rous apparition provided by magician.
flavor text, it's important.
We need a new Imperial Recruiter.
This (replacing the CMC 1 or less with just CMC=1) would have been perfect.Quote:
Originally Posted by dontbiteitholmes
Chaos Redux
RRR
Instant
You may discard a red card rather than pay * mana cost.
Change the target of a spell that has a single target.
Storm 1
Hello Painter!Quote:
Originally Posted by DragoFireheart
I tried.Quote:
Originally Posted by rukcus
Sorry to drag up this off-topic stuff, but that was seriously so funny I almost spit coffee all over my keyboard.Quote:
Originally Posted by Solaran_X
I agree. I think WotC is continuing to make mistakes in that regard. I mean in the end you can splash for BB as Hymn to Tourach has shown us, but to do it right you have to make an extremely fragile mana base which seems like a fair trade off.Quote:
Originally Posted by Oibade
Why not still blue? It's irrelevant to the actually playability of the card and blue is the color of counters. As your examples have shown it's pretty hard to make an answer to turn 0-1 combo plays that isn't completely terrible, or broken and isn't a counterspell or discard of some sort.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gheizen64
The Dude is cool, but the angel would be garbage vs. combo. I mean they just play the worst card in their hand and beat you down anyways. It might buy you a turn if they don't have an extra spell they don't need, and it might turn a turn 0 kill into a turn one kill but it's probably not enough in the end. In reality something like Misstep is the perfect solution.
The brilliance of Misstep was that it rewarded you for playing smart vs. combo when you weren't playing Blue and the mere threat of having it in hand forced to combo player to actually interact and play smart instead of just going all-in blind and knowing they were gonna blow you out. That's something permanent solutions don't have. If I'm playing combo and you drop a Thorn of Amethyst turn 2, it's out there and I know I have to play around it and destroy it. If there is the threat of a free counter and the other guy is putting on pressure I have to make the decision to wait until I can Duress/Chant/sculpt my hand or go for it and hope they don't have it. Right now they just go blind and hope you aren't dumb enough to play 4x Mindbreak Trap in the side. Mindbreak Trap is and always will be ass.
Yeah well the whole idea would be to have a good SB card vs. combo. I feel like as time goes on Pact of Negation will just see more and more play in combo until it finds it's true calling. When a combo deck has 4x Force and 4x Pact or something similar it makes it harder for blue decks that should be good against combo to interact. So might as well throw in the "or less" prematurely since it's pretty much irrelevant unless Pact is a problem.Quote:
Originally Posted by KevinTrudeau
Why would you want a non-blue solution when you could just play Merfolk and have at least a 50% win percentage against the whole field while still being able to fight combo?
I realize playing Merfolk seems like the best bet right now if I'm playing to win. While I like to go into events with the best chance of top 8ing I will probably not play Merfolk at SCG Indy because I play Magic as a hobby first and foremost. I'm not saying I'm going to walk into events with a "fun" deck if I think it's a bad choice, or that I'm opposed to playing the best possible deck at any given event, but I have school and life during the week and Magic is my hobby/diversion so I'm not going to go play 9 rounds with a deck I personally find boring and linear. I like to make decisions beyond drop Lords and counter spells. I'm not saying Merfolk is not challenging to play and there are not plenty of decisions, but for me swinging blue guys every turn is tedious.Quote:
Originally Posted by DragoFireheart
It just sucks that if you don't play blue you have to roll the dice the first 3 rounds and hope you don't hit the 10% of the field that you can't even sideboard for no matter how hard you try.
There are a couple of fixes that would have made MMS fair.
Mental Mishap #1
U (P blue mana)
Instant
Counter target instant or sorcery.
Mental Mishap #2
U (P blue mana)
Instant
Counter target instant or sorcery with a CMC of 1.
Mental Mishap #3
U (P blue mana)
Instant
Counter target instant or sorcery with a CMC of 3 or less.
I think had Wizards had done that, they would have struck gold.
Regardless, Mental Misstep is banned. It's in the past and harping on it any longer is futile.
I suspect the meta change will be such:
Goblins, Zoo, and Merfolk will be played more since they are the three popular aggro decks. In response to the goblins, Storm decks (AnT, TES, High Tide) will rise up to fight the flood of mid-range aggro decks. In response to that, various flavors of CounterTop. We'll see CounterTop Thopter, Supreme Blue, and CounterTop decks running the Stoneforge Mystic Batterskull combo to help fight aggro decks. The meta will settle after 4-8 months and we can expect the top tier decks to look something like this:
Merfolk
Zoo
TES
High Tide
Dredge
Goblins
CounterTop (with Blade Top being the most popular version in whatever colors it finds to be the best fit I suspect either UW or UWr will be the most popular choice.)
Bant (Aggro / NO-Pro variations).
NO RUG (I highly suspect this deck will stick around even after the MMS banning. It might be slightly weaker but it's still going to make its presence known).
If that is the case, there shall be a fair share of each relevant archetype represented in the metagame. I.E. the metagame is going to be healthy (with due time).Quote:
Originally Posted by DragoFireheart
I also do not see S&T-based decks in your projection. Are they going to disappear? (Cheating things into play does suck.)
I am looking forward to the impact of Snapcaster Mage on the metagame. Hope it won't screw too much with BS and stuff.
Lion's Eye Diamond in 2 1/2 months.
I think that actually the next big thing is Brainstorm. Just look at the justification for MM banning. Brainstorm was one of the reason MM got printed. And Brainstorm/Ponder/Preordain got banned basically everywhere except legacy. With Brainstorm gone and MM back in, control would be as good as ever but they'd cripple combo. Exactly what WotC like.Quote:
Originally Posted by death
Banning Brainstorm for any other reason than an emergency measure to correct a major problem with the format would be a huge mistake, and I think Wizards knows it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gheizen64
It's definitely the strongest card in the format, and you can make a logical argument for its banning based on power level alone, but ultimately a large amount of Legacy players play this format specifically because they can play Brainstorm in it. I can't think of a card they could ban that would produce more negative player backlash than Brainstorm, particularly if there's not a very very compelling reason to do it.
- If Wizards of the Coast banned Brainstorm, I would sell off all of my legacy related cards and forever stick to playing casual / EDH magic until the backlash killed the secondary market and Magic as we know it collapsed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zilla
No. it's Lion's Eye Diamond. Brainstorm is not even needed when a hand can just Tendrils or Belch you out of the game before your turn begins. LED is just too fast against non-FoW decks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gheizen64
Could be, but at the latest B&R they hinted strongly that they think Brainstorm is a problem card, and the banning of Ponder and Preordain in Modern just enforce that idea. This is enough imho to make Brainstorm one of the next most likely candidates.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zilla
Also, if combo come back in full force, then i'm hoping they're going for the better route of unbanning misstep instead of just banning LED and a couple extra cards. Unbanning more than banning would help also differentiating more Legacy and Modern, since Vintage is a dead sanctioned format anyway.
Combo didn't put numbers for months after misstep was legal. LED may see a resurgence due to trends, but you can stay sure traditional storm combo wouldn't be the best combo (that being hivemind) when MM is legal. Decks like belcher weren't especially viable even before MM was legal, so i dunno exactly what you're on now.Quote:
Originally Posted by death
Like I said, you can make a solid case for Brainstorm's banning, but it doesn't change the fact that to do so would be to alienate a huge amount of Legacy players, which seems contrary to Wizards' interests. The only way I can see them banning Brainstorm is if they think it will please more players than it will enrage, and I can't really think of a scenario where that would realistically occur.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gheizen64
For the record, I think there's a lot of Chicken Littleing going on right now with regards to combo. It wasn't dominant before MM, and while it might be a bit stronger now, it won't be dominant after. The skill required to pilot fast combo decks through hate is simply too high for them to become dominant. If a card is ever printed that changes that fact, you're going to see that card get banned.Quote:
Also, if combo come back in full force, then i'm hoping they're going for the better route of unbanning misstep instead of just banning LED and a couple extra cards. Unbanning more than banning would help also differentiating more Legacy and Modern, since Vintage is a dead sanctioned format anyway.
What we're going to see is a whole mess of people jumping on the "combo is going to take over the format" bandwagon, and it will be played much more than is typical for the next month or two. Then people are going to realize how much of the combo dominance thing was hype, and we'll return to a time when it only gets played by a few intensely skilled players who are still able to put up numbers with it in the face of a field comprised largely of blue-based aggro control decks.
It's not like Misstep was printed to stop combo from being dominant in the first place, because combo never was dominant. Misstep was printed to give non-blue decks a chance against combo, but just ended up strengthening blue even more rather than making it less necessary, hence the ban.
3 bans in the past year and a half and more to come because people are unhappy with Brainstorm, LED, Show and Tell, Top and what ever else they deemed not fun. When will you be happy?
- When Grizzly Bears is a viable creature again.Quote:
Originally Posted by menace13
For the record, I have not clamored for any card to be banned except for Survival of the Fittest. I was playing Burning Wish-ANT when Mystical Tutor was legal and wasn't surprised when MT was banned because the deck was incredibly fast/consistent/resilient. I still own LEDs, FoWs and I have access to all blue duals.
When I said Lion's Eye Diamond in 2 1/2 months, I was speaking on behalf of people who don't own and will never own Force of Wills.
I have 4 Candelabras and was playing High Tide when WotC printed Mental Misstep. I didn't care whether Mental Misstep is going to be banned or not because I can easily build decks which are immune to it. I have resources and because I have the 'knack' for spotting strong decks. I re-introduced Hive Mind on The Source months before it went viral and started winning online. I don't want Brainstorm/Entomb/Show and Tell/Natural Order to be banned because I love playing with those. It may sound ironic that Brainstorm is an integral piece of combo decks but together with Force of Will they also keep combo in check.
When Time Spiral was unbanned it was deemed as a tier 2 deck, of course not until the Hatfields swept the circuit with it. When I created the Hive Mind thread, the deck was deemed terrible for months before Brian Eleyet almost won a GP with it. Sourcers love to whine I know that's why threads like these thrived:
SCG-Article-DOOM-on-Time-Spiral!!!
Let's-Bitch-About-Show-and-Tell
I don't get it why people here would like a ban on Brainstorm/Time Spiral/Show and Tell/Natural Order and at the same time believe that Lion's Eye Diamond is fair and safe. Time Spiral/Show and Tell/Natural Order decks don't kill before your turn even starts. If you've done nothing on your turns 1-3 you deserve to lose and that's legacy in a nutshell for those still playing fair decks.
I don't think Reanimator/Ichorid are as degenerate as Storm because you can beat them when you get to your turns (GY hate, spot removal). You don't need a blue deck to interact with both of them and I think that's fair enough.
On the other hand, when Belcher/TES wins turn 0 against non-blue decks, something isn't right. It's like if you don't have Force, go home! Thoughtseize, Hymn to Tourach, Counterbalance, Chalice of the Void, Trinisphere, Wasteland, Gaddock Teeg, Ethersworn Canonist -- These cards have no value when LED decks can jizz in your face before you can even drop them.
Lion's Eye Diamond will force the meta to become more degenerate or more blue than ever until it's not even funny.
While I agree with most of your post, Death, I do disagree with the fact that you say
This implies that missteps banning suddenly makes LED more powerful than it was before. LED is not any more powerful now than before Misstep was printed. Do I think it's above the power level of the format? Yes, I do. But that's what seperates Legacy from being Modern or Standard. I don't think because misstep got banned suddenly LED will break in half. As Zilla said, it will come in a rush of people who want to play "teh br0kenz" and then they will realize "wow. i suck with this deck. I should go back to riding Gerry T's coat tails"Quote:
Lion's Eye Diamond will force the meta to become more degenerate or more blue than ever until it's not even funny.
Very few people will stick with the LED based combo decks due to the requirement of either high play skill or an innordinate amount of good luck. It won't be any more dominant now than it was prior to Mental Misstep.
This. LED decks have NEVER dominated the format, not even when Mystical Tutor was legal, and decks like NLS had positive matchups against everything that wasn't ReAnimator. The skill barrier in playing such decks ensures that they will never fill the top tables. Likewise, Spiral Tide will never be a dominant archetype simply due to the extreme scarcity and cost of Candelabras.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sims
We have this argument on the source every time the format shifts, and LED decks never dominate. Storm comes out in force for a couple of opens, and then fades away once blue decks return in strength. LED does not need to be banned, and probably never will be unless they print another Dark Ritual effect or something else dumb.
The format was fine before Misstep was printed and most people thought it the best time in Legacy's history and now people seem to think there needs to be bannings again? Oh wait, of course they do, I keep forgetting that dumb people exist.
The format will be more blue with LED around, just like what I said. I thought people didn't want a blue heavy meta that's why they wanted MM banned.Quote:
Originally Posted by Admiral_Arzar
I'm doing this for the sake of aspiring legacy players and format diversity. You can thank me later.Quote:
Originally Posted by dahcmai
IMO WotC should reprint a Misstep that doesn't hit perms then walk the fuck away from the banned list.
NPH was the right context for such a card, i guess printing a new card with alternate costs by itself in a set is a no-no in modern design. Also, sets nowadays are designed when... 1 year in advance? We'll se the new try to "fix" legacy in an year at the earliest.Quote:
Originally Posted by dontbiteitholmes
And maybe they could print some decent red card while they're at it instead of giving blue the majority of the good cards every set (Delver and Snapcaster zzz).
Alternate casting costs have been in practically every block since the beginning of blocks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gheizen64
Again, your tone and way you worded your response implies that Lions Eye Diamond is somehow this new card that is going to make the format more blue than it was already. This is simply incorrect. Mental Misstep made the format more blue than it was prior. During that prior period, LED was still around. LED still being around will not make the format any more blue dominated than it was prior to Misstep.Quote:
Originally Posted by death
So what do you want the format to look like? Honestly. What is your vision of Legacy? Does it include powerful strategies and cards from Magic's history that cannot succeed in the only other format they are legal (Vintage)? Is it a format where you play your dual lands to reach Domain faster so you can tribal flames someone while swinging with Cats? Rebels a tier 1 deck?
I'm dead serious here, we don't want Wizards to set and maintain the precident of banning cards because people bitch. The old joke "Ban everything until rebels is good, and then ban Lin Sivvi" is a scary prospect. If the DCI bans eveery strong card because someone bitches and complains than the format known as Legacy will be nothing more than Standard part 2, The Revenge of Jackal Pup. Legacy is unique because it is the home of a balance between skillful interaction, gameplay, and some of magic's most powerful cards. If you push for a card to be banned that has never proven itself to be a problem, you need to have a better reason than "for the sake of aspiring legacy players and format diversity," as again, Lion's Eye Diamond is not going to force the format to be any more blue than it was before Mental Mistep was printed.
What do you accomplish by LED being banned? You force Tendrils decks to adapt and go a differnt direction, away from Ad Nauseum. Okay, you force them to probably give up turn 1 wins, but they adapt and turn into a Ritual powered Past in Flames deck. Tendrils remains a threat. Painter decks won't have weldable mana to activate grindstones, which that deck isn't heavily played anyways... Belcher won't have it's turn 1 win percentage, but that deck is a luckshot blowout anyways. Will this reduce blue's prevelance? Merfolk will still have a good matchup, probably at least even, across the board... Control will be able to focus less on stopping combo and traditional control/board control might come back. Canadian Thresh variants, Stoneblade variants, and the like will still thrive with their new toys and not having to worry about keeping one hand or another against an unknown opponent for fear of the turn 1 LED, land, petal, rit, rit, adn. But how does it reduce blue's presence? The most powerful strategies in this format are inherently blue. Blue has the best countermagic (which is used for more than stopping combo), it has the best card draw and filtering, it has some of the easiest and splashiest tutoring and utility in the format.... Why would people stop playing blue because they don't have to worry about a turn 1 tendrils?
The bigger question is why would you run non-blue if there is tendrils turn 1 to worry about? Call me crazy, but I would rather have them misstep my nactyl than letting it resolve then hit me for 24 life loss next turn.
This. There's a handful of people who always crush with Storm, but if you discount their performances the deck has very subpar win percentages at events (actually 50% or worse).Quote:
Originally Posted by Admiral_Arzar
People forget, if LED based combo ever becomes a serious threat people crack out counterbalance's and top's and they crush storm with that combination I hear. Then we have the rock paper scissors format of aggro decks beating countertop, countertop beating storm, and combo beating aggro. Aggro includes at least goblins, merfolk, and zoo. Countertop has a million variations seemingly though I might be exaggerating just a tad. Combo decks likewise have a lot of variation; there's ddft, SI, belcher, ANT, TES, and probably PiF decks soon. As well as painter, hive mind, and other random 2 card combos and elves!
LED didn't dominate prior to misstep so why are people clamoring for its ban again? Oh yeah right, people love to overreact and bitch and moan about whatever wins but I assure you that if storm starts winning this week in force people will bring out the countertop decks and proceed to crush the storm decks with it, just like in 2008.
But I agree that people cracked out storm for indy because they wanted to sling tendrils decks for the first time in months since misstep kicked storm decks right in the crotch and made them unplayable chaff due to the 8 free counterspell's decks could run that heavily impacted storm. I died a little inside whenever one of my protection spells got misstepped because that's what happened a lot of the time and the opponent had FoW backup as well to just wreck me.
If you play an aggro deck you should accept that combo is a bad MU. If you expect to win against storm with your aggro deck but perform badly against control you're doing it wrong.
My Counterblade deck took a crap on my friends storm deck. If he tried to go for the win FOW stopped him. If he waited I got CBT or SFM+ BS out, putting my life total beyond storm range. If he tried for a ETW token kill, I could get out batterskull and pwn them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark Ritual
I think we played 8 games and he won once only because he killed me turn one and I didn't keep a hand with FoW.
*Dingdingding* Take this and apply it to every deck except Zoo and decks with Force and that's pretty much my take on "actual win %s". Most people just aren't up to the task of playing decks with too many interactions. Force of Will makes it easier because it can sometimes act as a band-aid for errors on your part and Zoo can win plenty of games on autopilot. Most people who play Beltcher are idiots with Insane Clown Posse tattoos who can't think beyond "Winning on turn 1 = broken" but if you look at someone like Christian Valenti, he took Belcher and top 8'd twice in 2 months with a deck that has top 8'd all of 5 SCG events in the past 4 years. I cry when I see other Enchantress players at events and they are running Horizon Canopy and no Mirri's Guile and missing triggers all over the place. I've won more games vs. Doomsday to the other guy making a terrible pile than to me actually killing them. I've seen Loam players play right into GY hate all day when they could have easily won without overextending. Don't even get me started on sideboarding mistakes or people that just don't know how to manage time and end up drawing games they should have won.Quote:
Originally Posted by AriLax
People take SCG results to heart and everyone ends up piling up on certain decks and underestimating everything else. Storm is probably the worst though, lots of bad players play it because it can always just blow out certain decks, but then when the other deck puts up resistance they fall apart. Good players can play around counters and discard.
LED definitely should not be banned, but it does make the format more blue because as long as Reanimator and Ad Nauseum are being played blue is the best answer and aggro is a dog.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sims
Aggro doesn't have shit on combo.
I mean combo's problem matchups are things like aggro control w/ blue and counterbalance, but look at all the top tier SB cards they have (many of which have moved to MD in some decks because combo can afford to have dead cards vs. aggro if it improves the blue matchup because they are so heavily favored). Krosan Grip, Chant, Discard, Pact, Xantid Swarm, Echoing Truth, Chain of Vapor, the list goes on.
Blue decks are dogs to aggro, but they have cards like Firespout, Submerge, Perish, Explosives, all kinds of sweepers, all kinds of spot removal, BEB that can make aggro manageable.
What do Aggro decks have vs. combo? Mindbreak Trap is dog shit, it only is relevant vs. decks with storm and even then it is easily played around and Tide is going to be able to counter it 95% of the time when it matters so it really only ends up being workable vs. 2 decks. Cannonist, Thorn, and Teeg come down turn 2 at earliest and most combo decks can either combo out before turn 2 or are unaffected by all of those cards. What else is there?
I mean sure for things like Reanimator you are going to have GY hate, or vs. Painter you are going to have some good options, but it's mostly stuff you need anyways that just happens to be playable vs. those decks. Vs. storm for the most part you eat a bag of dicks G1 then have to hope they don't go nuts on you G2/G3 and win before you can play whatever hate bear you run or that you can open a hand of Trap + a fast clock so they don't have time to sit there and sculpt hands and play around it. Lets face it though, no one runs Trap, the card is just awful vs. anything not Beltcher. It's criminally easy to play around for Tendrils and Tide if it does end up coming to that.
The answer isn't to ban, like I said they just need to print a Misstep that doesn't hit perms. It never is going to be MD material and blue probably has equal or better options in Flusterstorm or Spell Pierce even if those do cost one mana. I mean shit if it makes people happy make the card's alternate casting cost say "If you control no Islands you may pay 2 life and play XXX without paying it's casting cost." It actually makes Storm and Reanimator interact with aggro and actually lets aggro interact with combo. The card would be relevant in most combo matchups but far from overpowering and certainly wouldn't make Aggro beat combo on it's own but would serve as a compliment to other potential SB cards. Right now Storm probably just safely assumes you aren't running Trap because it's shitty and goes off before your T2 if they can, Reanimator doesn't care about Trap or hatebears and has counters for GY hate or Swords/Path, Hive Mind / Show and Tell decks don't care about anything you are going to do. Combo decks are the worst kind of matchup vs. aggro. They are imbalanced as hell and pretty much goldfishing even post board, there is usually zero interaction and only as much skill as is required to competently autopilot to victory. If you get a real answer like fixed Misstep suddenly Ad Nauseum has to say, "Wait, if I try to go off turn one and my Ritual gets countered it sets me back two turns, but if I wait until turn 3 to be able to play around a Misstep he has time to drop a hate bear," or Reanimator has to actually think beyond "as long as he doesn't have 2x Swords I can turn 2 Entomb/Reanimate," or Show and Tell or whatever random combo has to worry about Brainstorm/Ponder being countered and slowing the inevitable assemble combo/play combo/win game formula that is pretty much mindlessly going through the motions at this point.
If aggro had the same power level of SB choices vs. combo that combo and blue decks had vs. the rest of the field the format would be perfect IMO.
- This is what WotC tried to do with Mental Misstep but that obviously failed in their eyes. If MMS hit only instant and sorcery cards it would have been fine.Quote:
Originally Posted by dontbiteitholmes