Some answers to those who quoted me:
I think you were referring to me, but this is not what I stated. I know very well that ANT can win through Chalice at zero, at one, and even both given enough time. But that was my point: Chalice at zero prevents t1 wins (ok, you can have 3xritual, but that's a bit unlikely to happen) and makes t2 wins difficoult, buying time to drop other hate or simply beat face. Anyways, this was not my main point, and this thread wasn't meant to discuss the efficiency of combo hate, so I'll stop here.Originally Posted by frogboy
Boring was probably not the correct word for what I was trying to say. Anyways, reconsidering it a bit I agree with you. People bastardize decks to maindeck answers all the time. Goblin is probably the best example: monored Goblin is the fastest and more consistent version, but the strongest ones are those with a splash for stp/disenchant/grip/weirding/etc. There's probably no problem whatsoever in zoo maindecking combo hate. Extended zoo already plays blue (and I don't think it does because Meddling Mage speeds up its clock).
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I'm not going to claim that ANT is an unbeatable monster. I think it's perfectly reasonable in its power level. I still feel it is the best deck though, but being the best doesn't mean it will always win.
It is true, the deck does not put up impressive numbers for how much hype the deck receives on the internet. This is due in large part because the deck is extremely difficult to play correctly. Even Saito, one of the most well respected and skilled pro players/deckbuilders in the game, expressed in his GP Madrid report that he was concerned with his ability to pilot the deck effectively.
I think the problem here is that most players are simply nowhere near the level to play this deck correctly. I would consider myself to be very experienced with it, and even I wouldn't claim to be able to pilot the deck to 80% of its full potential.
Quite frankly there are a lot of bad players in Legacy, or simply players who don't wish to invest the time necessary to become truly good at the format. The latter is perfectly understandable, especially given that a lot of Legacy players at the SCG 5k events are probably there primarily for Standard anyway.
It just so happens that a deck like ANT highlights mistakes whereas a deck like Zoo covers them up. This is a pretty big reason to play a deck like Zoo over ANT, even if ANT itself is the better deck. Being able to effectively play through the tournament is very important and I have known very capable players to choose Zoo over ANT precisely because of this reason.
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I kind of agree, ANT is the best deck. But only under certain circumstances:
a) It's played correctly.
If even Saito has concerns about being able to do so, I think it's fair to assume only a handful can do so - and in this case wouldn't be fair to generalize and say ANTs "true powerlevel" is only 80% of it's theoretical?
b) Combo is "underhated"
What others and I have been saying earlier, as mentioned by the dutch guy (sorry, name eludes me) Goblins run Thorn of Amethyst maindeck to stand a chance for instance -- despite the Thorns being less than spectacular against the majority, a deck need to evolve if it wants to stay in the tier 1 group. As I've mentioned earlier the days of Academy, Trix and Tinker (Jar to some degree -- emergency banning etc) the viable aggro and control decks ran plenty of countermeasures.
c) Metagame haven't caught up
Bandage as a measure against Goblins anyone? I mean what the hell? You need an entirely different deck, if you're that desperate...
What I'm trying to say is ANT and non-belcher combo is good (Playing Belcher is just a coin-toss that can be skewed in the opponents favor with hate), no doubt about it, and will trash decks that are not prepared. Rather than keep trying to fight Goliath with your sling shot and pray for a miracle, build a mech and smash him to bits...
I'll do it if you pay me the thousand of dollars that costs building Canadian Thresh. Until then, I'll patch my deck with 50$ in cards.
This I can accept. Tier .99, a hair ahead of the rest of Tier 1. :P I don't necessarily agree, but I find that acceptable and the difference is so subtle that it's not worth arguing.
Then it's not the best deck. If the deck is so hard to play that no one can play it to 100% potential, and the best pilots in the world are playing it to 80%, then 80% is where it's powerlevel is. Because who gives a f*** about 100% potential if none of your opponents can ever actually reach it? Potential /= results.It is true, the deck does not put up impressive numbers for how much hype the deck receives on the internet. This is due in large part because the deck is extremely difficult to play correctly. Even Saito, one of the most well respected and skilled pro players/deckbuilders in the game, expressed in his GP Madrid report that he was concerned with his ability to pilot the deck effectively.
I think the problem here is that most players are simply nowhere near the level to play this deck correctly. I would consider myself to be very experienced with it, and even I wouldn't claim to be able to pilot the deck to 80% of its full potential.
Quite frankly there are a lot of bad players in Legacy, or simply players who don't wish to invest the time necessary to become truly good at the format. The latter is perfectly understandable, especially given that a lot of Legacy players at the SCG 5k events are probably there primarily for Standard anyway.
This is false. I used to hear this same argument about aggro in T1, often in conjuction with "the best players play blue". The idea that aggro rewards mindless play is silly. I can't speak for Zoo from experience, because I don't play Naya Zoo on any sort of regular basis. But I played Sligh in T1 for several years, and I learned that while there are less decisions per game, making the correct decision can be equally important. I learned to pick up a lot of games that the mindless player would've left out there by playing my threats in the correct order, learning what constituted over-extending, etc. In fact, I even wrote an article about it on SCG (http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/v..._Can_make.html). It's not a great article, but I've been advocating the idea that aggressive decks can be skill intensive for years.It just so happens that a deck like ANT highlights mistakes whereas a deck like Zoo covers them up. This is a pretty big reason to play a deck like Zoo over ANT, even if ANT itself is the better deck. Being able to effectively play through the tournament is very important and I have known very capable players to choose Zoo over ANT precisely because of this reason.
I agree that there are too many unfair decks in Legacy to correctly choose play a fair one objectively. And that except for an unparalleled consistancy, that Zoo is indeed a fair deck. Here's the part I can't get to make sense.
If AnT and Dredge are the most overpowered and unfair decks in Legacy. And if they are, as these experts claim, simply too difficult for the vast majority of the idiots who populate Legacy tournaments to play correctly. Since even when these do show up in any measurable number, they rarely win. And if Zoo is so much easier to play, and only beats these unfair decks when they either 1) are piloted by the unending sea of retards who play Legacy, or 2) have a misstep due to their inherent inconsistancies that Zoo can exploit. And if most people avoid them additionally due to the toll that using your brain over the course of a tournament on such complicated ineractions is too taxing. And any four-year old with decent motor skills can pilot Aggro; then why wouldn't any non-Legacy Genius/Expert/Writer want to play Zoo at tournaments? It sounds like every advantage goes in that direction.
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If this is the point of the article, then I feel the article is largely irrelvent. Anyone in tune enough with competitive Legacy or Magic in general knows that combo just gets attacked for a turn or two, sculpting its hand, then goes off. I don't feel that "Combo doesn't care about creatures and will largely outrace aggro" is worthy of an article. Combo beats Aggro. Aggro beats Control. Control beats Combo. There's always exceptions, but stripped down to the core, its rock-paper-scissors.
Nailed it. I think this pretty much explains why things are the way they are.
If combo is so strong, then why does it perform SO poorly?
Saying 'people can't play it well' is not a sufficient answer since the DCI doesn't respond to hypothetical metagames.
Combo performes really well. Apparently it doesn't in the USA. In Europe and Japan, it does very good.
If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it's probably delicious.
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Combo perform just fine...
DCI shouldn't respond anyway, the metagame is fine as it is right now. ;)
To my mind, that's a numbers game. People seem to have a difficult time acknowledging what a huge role luck plays in a tournament setting. But even if you're posting 70% against the field you're not making day 2 over a 10 round day 1 on averages alone and nobody posts 70% against the field or even against a large percentage of the field. There's not necessarily a large difference in playskill or deck viability between a guy that's 6-4 and a guy that's 8-1-1. All it takes is one bad game to throw an otherwise winnable match and dump you into unfavorable pairings. Of course, it works the other way too, an early loss could dump you into a lower bracket where the pairings are more favorable and you could go 9-1.
So what's my point? If you've got 6 copies of a deck in a tournament, you're more likely to have someone that's piloting that deck and having incredible luck. Beautiful openings, amazing topdecks, good matchups, etc. A large showing of a deck that goes 55% against the field is more likely to yield T8 spots than a lone deck that goes 65% against the field. So a field dominated by AnT will see more successful AnT decks than the matchups would lead you to believe and a field dominated by Zoo will lead to more successful Zoo decks.
Honestly, for my money, the best deck in the format is probably Fish, but the deck hates me and doesn't draw well for me. But I've seen other people melt face with it and some draws are just unbeatable. Fish isn't entirely fair (they cheat costs with vial, allowing them to dump critters on the board while still playing control), but it's certainly not combo.
What was the last 200+ player tournament that a combo deck won?
Frogboy's claim that zoo can't beat combo decks is baseless. I agree that Zoo cannot beat storm and that it would be a waste of board space to try do so. However, with graveyard hate, Ichorid becomes a very winnable matchup. Lands is also unfavorable, but a very aggressive start can get there. Price of Progress out of the board (which is also relevant in other matchups) wins the match when it resolves. I'm not sure we're talking about the same deck if you consider Enchantress to be unfair, but Pridemage is > the deck, along with Grips out of the board.
Whatever discrepancies that exist in regards to these matchup percentages are irrelevant, however, because combo isn't played nearly as much as the two decks that zoo should almost always beat: Countertop and Merfolk. In a large 8-10 round tourney, if a zoo player is likely to play Storm/Ichorid/Lands/Enchantress (with only Storm being unwinnable) more than twice then zoo probably isn't a wise choice. Luckily for zoo (and the format) that doesn't happen and hasn't happened since Ad Nauseum was printed. "Fair" decks are played because they are consistent. Zoo punishes bad draws and can conceivably win every single matchup outside of Storm. Storm can't even beat the (arguably) most played deck, Countertop!
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Zoo does what Magic is supposed to do. Every other deck is either worse or cheats.
If you don't want to play against unfair decks, play limited and shut up. Otherwise, pick a deck you like and be prepared to have a bad matchup.
Please with this. Do Anh was 80% to win Madrid when he cast Ad Nauseam in game three.
When in doubt, mumble.
When in trouble, delegate.
That didn't answer my question.
There have been, how many SCG Opens now, and how many ANT decks have made top 8, let alone win? How many Zoo decks have made top 8?
Facts are facts.
How many were played vs how many Zoo at these events? That's a pretty important fact too, right?
Ad Nauseam has been, at many of the SCG opens, one of the most popular archetypes. Yet it's performance is dismal.
I pretty much whole heartedly agree with the person on the SCG forums who posted:
And if you don't believe me, just read my or Jared Sylva SCG analysis articles, or, take a look at monthly stats that someone on these forums had been compiling. They were aggregating all of the 32+ player tournaments all over the world, and consistently show that Zoo is a top performing deck, if not THE top performing deck.Max is wrong and all the data confirm it. The data I refer to are the results from all the large 5Ks from this year and last and the two post-flash legacy GPs. Saying the format is underdeveloped and it's STILL just waiting to be broken is ludicrous. The last two Legacy GPs have been enormous. Combo has not dominated them. Combo has been a reasonable component of the decks that finish well. The 5ks have had pretty good attendance too and combo has actually done horribly in those. I do think pilot error has a lot to do with this and ad naseum is underrepresented in top 16s because of this, but whatever. If it were that broken, people would win with it anyway, like they did with flash (Sadin didn't even know how his deck worked at the start of GP Columbus and he won the whole thing).
Is it going to take a legacy pro tour to motivate a pro to ACTUALLY break this format? Are GPs really not enough motivation? I doubt it. I think the real reason the data make the format look balanced is because it is. Legacy is only broken in Max McCall's imagination.
Zoo is not exactly tearing up the 5ks, either.Yet it's performance is dismal.
Note that the premise of the article is "attacking without Force of Will is an awful strategy" not "Tendrils is the best deck in the format."
When in doubt, mumble.
When in trouble, delegate.
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