Quote Originally Posted by Cire View Post
Going all the way - it seems like:

Cantrip/Fetch Shell (S&T, Storm, Delver, Grixis, Reanimator)
Ancient Tomb Decks (Chalice, Moon Decks, Eldrazi, Various Stompy type builds)
Other (D&T, Elves, Dredge, Lands)

When people complain about format staleness - what they really want is more of "other" decks, but designing for other is hard. You need to come up with cards that can't just be used in the Cantrip Shell OR in the Ancient Tomb shell. The successful "other" decks are extremely idiosyncratic and unique.
I am totally with you here. I am all for powerful cards which don't slip easily into the colorless ramp or Fetchland shells. Unfortunately, we are at a point where WotC has to come up with very artificial Restrictions to prevent new cards to be simply absorbed by the 3c/4c goodstuff.decs. From SFM to Tombstalker to Decay, we have seen countless examples of that happened still