Elves is more like Half the Banned List Is Broken (Surprise!) .dec
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Elves is more like Half the Banned List Is Broken (Surprise!) .dec
And what's sad is that it takes approximate equivalents of Tolarian Academy, Tinker, and Ancestral Recall for a non-blue deck to compete nowadays :(.Quote:
Originally Posted by Zombie
This is so true. Never thought of it this way.Quote:
Originally Posted by Admiral_Arzar
Why is this sad - the cards are there to support those decks. How many different colour-combinations of good-stuff midrange do we need before the format is considered healthy?Quote:
Originally Posted by Admiral_Arzar
Also, how does this principle apply to D&T? It seems like a pretty "fair" deck to me with no such equivalents.
Calling DnT fair is amusing in its inaccuracy.
I don't think there is consensus on the term "fair deck". Some people say no Legacy deck is fair!Quote:
Originally Posted by Dice_Box
I use the term basically to mean any non-combo deck. Given the context - a suggestion that competitive non-blue decks need cards of similar power and function to Tolarian Academy, Tinker, and Recall, I think it's a good use of the term!
D&T factually doesn't need anything like that to compete. Let's stay on topic rather than nit-pic semantics please.
Edit:
Seriously, Dice. the idea that any blue-less deck needs crazy shit like that to compete is just wrong. I cite D&T as the counter-example to this obviously false assertion, and your contribution is to bicker over the term "fair deck"? Get a little perspective on what's actually being discussed!
You've got no problem with Admiral_Arzar's false statement, no critique of my refutation of that statement, but you draw the line at "fair deck" being applied to aggro/prison? You want to debate the meaning of "fair deck'? PM me or start a new thread.
Or did you just want to get a dig in?
I agree with him. The amount of broken shit you need to be doing to match up with the Blue Shell (ie, not be playing Blue) is quite high. I think it is sad that a deck needs Tinker, Academy and Recall to be even seen as competitive against a sea of decks that have so much control. DnT needs to play so much disruption or it doesn't work. Burn is the poster child of consistency and Lands ain't playing fair either.
I am not here to take a cheep shot at you, I just don't agree with you. His point is fair. A little hyperbolic but no less sound. The hoops you need to jump though when your not playing Brainstorm, Ponder, Probe and Force to be competitive are just crazy.
I would be interested to know what non Blue deck is not doing something crazy to keep up. I am not seeing one.
Cradle, Glimpse, and NO are the "crazy shit" which has been likened to restricted Vintage staples. Even Lands runs Loam, which can be a pseudo Recall in that deck.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dice_Box
But D&T doesn't need any crazy powered cards like that. It runs normal stuff like Wasteland, Port, Vial, and creatures. It doesn't run anything over the top - just mana denial, threats, and removal. How is this jumping through hoops? How is this doing something crazy on the level of Cradle or NO?
I would agree that blue-less midrange is not well positioned. But being not midrange does not entail jumping through hoops or doing anything crazy.
What's DnT doing that's not crazy? As a pool of cards you have:
Your shit costs more
Your lands don't exist
Your lands are not available to you
You can't draw more than one card a turn (And you would not think at first glance this was an issue)
Your Legendary shit can't stay nailed down
They have an artifact that gives them a massive mana advantage
They can fuck you at instant speed with said artifact
They can protect their creatures near on ad nauseam
So yea. That's DnT. Fair. Nice. Not at all doing anything crazy. It's not planing to lock you out of the game or anything. It's sure as hell not a massive ball that's easily called "The sum of its parts".
You want to look at a card and say "That's the broken card in the deck" then I think your overlooking the importance of what these things do and what they are forced to do to be competitive. As a whole DnT is mostly made up of cards that are either really old mistakes or post MM banning lock pieces that have been printed when Wizards changed their direction on printing hate cards.
Each other of the non Blues are like this. Jund lives and dies on 2 for 1 game play, MUD dies to itself but if it was not so inconsistent... well check Vintage for that example, Nic Fit hopes not to die early so it can exploit the Mana advantage it can create. I mean, these are as close to "Non crazy" decks as you can get and of them, only one I would argue is even kind of competitive.
DnT is and exception (and Lands/MUD arguably are too) because it is a hate deck that preys on weaknesses of the dominant blue shell. Elves needs incredibly broken cards to compete with the consistency and power of the blue shell because it isn't directly hating on it - and that is what the essence of my previous post was about. You either play blue, hate blue, or play a deck packed with incredibly busted and synergistic cards to have a chance to compete (and Elves is really the only notable deck in that category).Quote:
Originally Posted by Crimhead
Fellas, as much as I like to see a good disagreement, this topic has a history that may quell both of you:Quote:
Originally Posted by Crimhead
Death and Taxes looks on paper like a pile of jank. This is what kept pros from even looking at it for literally years. In fact, even after Thalia got printed, it was a year and a half of the forum denizens basically gushing about how many decks fold to it before the Dutch boys showed the rest of the world what the deck was.
Before that, the few pros who gave it a run could not understand how to pilot it. I could tell because they would take out Flickerwisp in favor of beef. Then they would be too willing to trade their Revokers just because there was not a Pernicious Deed or a Jace on the table - psst... Flickerwisp use number 172: reset the Revoker. You have to manage resources differently than other decks. And you have to know that you are inhibiting the opponent even though you can't see it. Your decisions are based upon this. "Can't see it" is so important. Even Cedric, Mathias, and whomever at SCG continued to demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of the deck as recently as last summer. They could not see how it "bends" its opponents even though they were watching and discussing it while it was happening. Consequently, they were always caught by surprise when it succeeded. (Btw, Adrian Sullivan seems to have gotten it right away.)
So a fellow can be forgiven for not being able to describe what it is doing in a field of far more broken lines of play.
Sure, but isn't this a far cry from leaning on the approximate equivalents of the likes of Recall and Tol-Ac?Quote:
Originally Posted by Dice_Box
By your definition what competitive decks aren't doing something crazy? Delver decks and Deathblade? It sounds like you are saying anything besides aggro-control (tempo and midrange) is unfair, or doing something crazy.
So, anything besides tempo or midrange is crazy and jumping through hoops? I'm sure this can't be what you mean, but I can't think of any other way to interpret your position.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dice_Box
I would say that playing the "blue shell" of a bunch of cantrips, DTT, and free countermagic IS doing something crazy. The shell is broken by default, which is why so few engines can compete with it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Crimhead
http://i.imgur.com/Wv5uOBR.jpg?1
The first step to recovery is admitting that we are powerless over Brainstorm -- that our decks have become unmanageable.
Everybody is identical in their secret unspoken belief that way deep down they are different from everyone else. Yet we are all really just building 56 card decks. What passes for hip cynical transcendence of sentiment by playing Blue is really some kind of fear of really being a planeswalker, since to really be a planeswalker is probably to be unavoidably sentimental and naïve and goo-prone and generally pathetic without being able to draw 3 cards at instant speed for one Blue mana. It is chaos.
You can be shaped, or you can be broken. There is not much in between. Try to learn. Be coachable. Try to learn from everybody, especially those who fail (by not playing Blue). This is hard. How promising you are as a Student of the Game is a function of what you can pay attention to without running away.
The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you.
Then I guess every deck is doing something crazy. That's just what I was told to expect getting into Legacy!Quote:
Originally Posted by Admiral_Arzar
I do see you've softened your claim somewhat to allow for "exceptions" like Lands, D&T, and MUD.
I wouldn't go so far as to say that those decks are anti-blue! All those decks were developed at a time when blue was less dominant. Lands hates on blue-less fair decks a lot harder than it hates on blue combo decks. The fact that competitive fair decks are pretty much all blue is a coincidence as far as Lands in concerned. D&T is pretty weak to Storm.
Really, I don't think any deck actually hates on everything blue! There are just too many decks and too many different strategies which use blue for any one deck to hate them all. I would replace your statement with: either play blue, play combo, or play a deck which hates on fair decks. In other words, play blue, or play combo or play prison.
I'm not sure that is such a bad thing - especially seeing as D&T is quite aggressive for a prison deck; not really a hard control list. At the times when Jund was big (and Maverick before that) there were no viable prison decks in Legacy. Enchantress and Pox has fallen our of favour, while Lands had yet to come into its own. Personally I think having a whole unique style (prison) adds far more variety than having more midrange decks viable in more different colours. And I think this is a good case.
I think the thing that people are missing is that Lands, D&T and MUD are still doing crazy things; it's just on a different axis to the majority of the metagame. For example, ANT, Tinfins and Belcher all attempt to do crazy things before hte opponent can successfully interact. Delver decks do crazy things by stalling so that their threats get the job done. D&T works on a similar axis to Delver, but it's a much more strangle-based deck, like MUD. Lands and Dredge work by attacking from a position that most decks are struggling to interact with, at leats game 1.Quote:
Originally Posted by Crimhead
I enjoy legacy because it's full of powerful cards and strategies, do you?
Oh you do, too? Awesome! Let's be best frie...ok maybe that's a bit too far. To the point then:
Instead of complaining about cards or "shells" that are too powerful in your mind, why not contribute to the game by discussing potential cards for other colors that compete with what blue has? There are powerful cards in every color, the others just need a little more love and that's a much more realistic way of fixing this "problem" than trying to ban everything that's popular.
Promote a more diverse legacy format by channeling your efforts into creative discussion, instead of illogical banter that repeats itself every few pages.
Discussing potential cards they could print is less fruitful - they couldn't take suggestions from forums even if they wanted to because of legal issues.Quote:
Originally Posted by Norm
If you mean brewing new decks, the consistency is the problem, and the cantrip cartel is just the best engine for the job for most cases. There's a small handful where more specialized green or green-black shells can provide enough consistency, but they tend to be much more narrow and far easier to hate out.
You know basically no one is advocating banning "everything that's popular". A small handful of broken cards that do their job way better than any other alternatives in the format, sure, but "everything" is just sad hyperbole.Quote:
Originally Posted by Norm
Discussing potential card contribute exactly 0 since we can't decide what card get to be printed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Norm
Alternative decks already exist, but the cantrip cartel representation border 80%, worse than any other period in the history of this format. MM pushed blue around 70%, and got banned on the basis that "it made the format too blue".
Ban everything that's popular? I was against SotF and MM ban, but i'm pro BS ban. I'm also pro Earthcraft, SotF, Twist, Vise, Jar unbanning, so sure, "ban everything". If it were for me, the banned list would be considerably shorter.
They print lots of playable non-blue cards, but that's not what (some) people need to be happy with the format. Cards like Pyromancer, GSZ, DRS, AD etc are "good-stuff". When your deck design is basically stuffing a bunch of good cards into a deck, you can easily accommodate three colours, and there is little reason not to include blue for FOW and consistency tools.Quote:
Originally Posted by lavafrogg
They can print consistency tools in other colours, but when GSZ, Ponder, and Preordain are considered too good for Modern, there is not much hope. They could put some in specialty products, but I imagine we would need quite the arsenal before three colour "good-stuff" decks would forgo blue. I think we have to accept that blue will be a staple colour in good-stuff decks for a long time to come. (D&T is the closest we have to a tier one blue-less "good stuff" deck - it can run SFM, Miran Crusader, Mum, and other cards which are good on their own merit).
I think there are two ways to enable competitive decks which don't thrive on cantrips:Of course it's not necessary that these cards be printed. Unbanned is just as good! There are a few cards on the banned list which are likely safe and are likely to help specific unique decks but not so much good-stuff decks:
- Print cards which have unique applications (not good-stuff). Examples would be Reclamation Sage and Molten Vortex.
- Print cards which are anti-synergistic with cantrips. Examples are Thalia and Spirit of the Labyrinth.
I realise the last two decks do run blue, but Affinity runs very little, and neither deck runs the cantrip package that so many players are sick of seeing. I would unban all these cards if it were up to me.
- Earthcraft - potential boost to Enchantress
- Mnid Twist - potential boost to Tezzerator
- Black Vise - potential boost to Affinity
On the other hand, we also have zero say as to what gets banned or unbanned! But I agree this thread is not the best place for home-brewed cards.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gheizen64
A common assumption, but never explicitly stated! Who exactly are you quoting, btw? Not WotC, I think!Quote:
Originally Posted by Gheizen64
MM was statedly printed to make the format less blue, which failed. But they never say that is why it was banned! The official explanation for the ban was in "hopes of restoring the more diverse metagame that existed prior to the printing of Mental Misstep". And that's a genuine quote! WotC has never defined a diverse meta game on the basis of colour:Quote:
One key to the continued health of Magic is diversity. It is vitally important to ensure that there are multiple competitive decks for the tournament player to choose from.
So far you've identified Tempo, Prison, combo, and control. It sounds like you consider every deck except mid-range to be "doing crazy things"! It seems there is a sub-culture in MTG which considers midrange to be the base play-style, and everything else to be exceptional. I can understand this from Modern or Standard players (or even limited players), but from players of a format as wide open and strategically diverse as Legacy, it baffles me.Quote:
Originally Posted by Darkenslight