Survival of the Fittest

[GGoober]

Sigh.

It's no doubt that if the deck keeps putting result, WotC will take action. If they banned Survival, I think I will be quite disappointed. MTutor ban wasn't really needed but the card itself was almost as powerful as a Vampiric Tutor (which decks would run VTutor? It would be decks that mostly wanted to tutor instants/sorceries, aka why MTutor was potentially powerful).

Survival may have the same problem, and perhaps with WotC's banning policy, it's better to ban the enabler than other future cards that can be printed. So WotC would most likely ban Survival, but I think those who play or play against the deck, can all agree that the true culprit isn't Survival, it's Vengevine. I think this becomes a touchy issue when banning, since Survival has been perfectly fair, even with broken Iona/Retainers, and it's the spawn of diversity in green decks. It's only with the printing of Vengevine that the ONLY performing Survival decks are the ones WITH Vengevines. As much as it sounds dumb to ban Vengevine because in the future, future cards may make Survival + Future card broken again, the main culprit is Vengevine, but from a banning principle, Survival would most likely get the axe.

I just hope this won't be the case. If Survival is banned, Legacy would be quite dull, the card was strong and was supposed to be represented, but was never popular. Vengevines aroused interest and got everyone wild on the card, so it's getting its "hype", apparently the deck itself is strong (my playgroup still hates and thinks its a weak deck when you answer it, which is true). I'm against banning Survival or Vengevine, but if WotC were to ban, they probably ban Survival, even though Survival is really just the scapegoat of the true convict: Vengevine.

[Koby]

It's fair to say that whenever WotC prints cards that cheat mana costs, problem arise in multiple formats.

This is true for Saga Untappers.
This is true for Storm mechanic.
This is true for Cascade (ala Extended Seismic Assault Lands deck).
This is also true for Vengevine.

Argument for Not Banning Survival:
It would be a terrible mistake to ban Survival of the Fittest. Not only because it doesn't answer the "free spell", but it removes a ton of diversity in the format that existed at equilibrium prior to the offending card. It would still be a problem with other cards as well (imagine Buried Alive, Fauna Shaman, etc).

Argument for Not Banning Vengevinel:
It would be very disappointing to also see WotC ban a recently printed Mythic creature - this would not bode well for the credibility of Mythics in all aspects. I can only imagine the backlash from this move would stir up more controversy than touching Survival.

Consideration (placing decks from SCG 5K since RoE released)
Philadelphia (June 6th) - 0 placings
Seattle (June 13th) - 1 Survival, 0 Vengevine
St Louis (June 27th) - 0 placings
Denver (Aug 22rd) - 1 Survival + VV
Minneapolis (Aug 29th) - 5 Survival + VV
Baltimore (Sept 19th) - 5 Surviva,l 4 Vengevine

The results clearly point to VV being abused with Survival (duh!), but do not back the argument that Survival alone is overpowered.

[troopatroop]

You know, I think people like playing this deck. That's why everyone's crying for no bans, because people enjoy winning. When 1 deck is clearly monkey stomping the rest, I think it's time for a change. I wouldn't mind it if they banned Survival, apart from the nostalgia

[Shabbaman]

You know, I think people like playing this deck. That's why everyone's crying for no bans, because people enjoy winning. When 1 deck is clearly monkey stomping the rest, I think it's time for a change. I wouldn't mind it if they banned Survival, apart from the nostalgia

But then again,isn't Legacy about nostalgia? I think ruckus got to the point of it: wizards screws up free spells.

[Blitzbold]

People should stop complaining and learn how to adapt. Use Pithing Needle (great in this meta), use Extirpate if you're in black or change to another deck if your beloved petdeck can't compete with this. Vengevival is very strong, but it's far from unbeatable, folks. Use your brain and fight back.

[DragoFireheart]

People should stop complaining and learn how to adapt. Use Pithing Needle (great in this meta), use Extirpate if you're in black or change to another deck if your beloved petdeck can't compete with this. Vengevival is very strong, but it's far from unbeatable, folks. Use your brain and fight back.

That's not the argument. The issue is even with hate, the deck is still powerful (or so I'm told). I personally have not played it or against it yet, so I'm relatively indifferent to the deck. If WoTC doesn't ban SotF come Dec, I may put the deck together but until then I'll play Bant Aggro.

[Cabal_chan]

People should stop complaining and learn how to adapt. Use Pithing Needle (great in this meta), use Extirpate if you're in black or change to another deck if your beloved petdeck can't compete with this. Vengevival is very strong, but it's far from unbeatable, folks. Use your brain and fight back.

The Goblins and 'Junk/Dark Bant' (Rock??? What is with these naming schemes they have), and Merfolk splash B did have three or so SB hate cards. Extirpate for the first two types, and various 'artifact removes the grave yard' cards. I hardly think Goblins, Rock, and Merfolk fall in the pet deck category.

[jardach]

Deck is powerful for sure...we know that already...what does it so strong? Tutoring by Survival and Vengevine´s abillity....don´t we forget for something? If we need to speed up this combo,we need to cast 2 creatures...what are we using? Basking Rootwalla....how good would be the combo without Rootwala? I think it would be much slower and more vulnerable....ban Basking Rootwala and it will be the right compromise...

[menace13]

Sigh.

It's no doubt that if the deck keeps putting result, WotC will take action. If they banned Survival, I think I will be quite disappointed. MTutor ban wasn't really needed but the card itself was almost as powerful as a Vampiric Tutor (which decks would run VTutor? It would be decks that mostly wanted to tutor instants/sorceries, aka why MTutor was potentially powerful).

Survival may have the same problem, and perhaps with WotC's banning policy, it's better to ban the enabler than other future cards that can be printed. So WotC would most likely ban Survival, but I think those who play or play against the deck, can all agree that the true culprit isn't Survival, it's Vengevine. I think this becomes a touchy issue when banning, since Survival has been perfectly fair, even with broken Iona/Retainers, and it's the spawn of diversity in green decks. It's only with the printing of Vengevine that the ONLY performing Survival decks are the ones WITH Vengevines. As much as it sounds dumb to ban Vengevine because in the future, future cards may make Survival + Future card broken again, the main culprit is Vengevine, but from a banning principle, Survival would most likely get the axe.

I just hope this won't be the case. If Survival is banned, Legacy would be quite dull, the card was strong and was supposed to be represented, but was never popular. Vengevines aroused interest and got everyone wild on the card, so it's getting its "hype", apparently the deck itself is strong (my playgroup still hates and thinks its a weak deck when you answer it, which is true). I'm against banning Survival or Vengevine, but if WotC were to ban, they probably ban Survival, even though Survival is really just the scapegoat of the true convict: Vengevine.

Every deck ever(almost, you would need a really good reason not to run 4 Vamps) would run Vamp Tuts and not just Sorcery/Instant decks. Singelton sideboards are no longer singelton allowing all hate cards to be played from artifacts,enchantments to lands. Also it changes the way decks are built since you now just need only 1 of in the deck. Mystical pushed out a lot of decks from being played because they could not ever beat Reanimator or ANT.

Clearly Vines are the abused card, but i do not like where this is headed every time a deck is good WotC bans a card. If Surv gets it then this will be the second card banned in 6 months for Legacy. Banning Rootwala or Survival would be wrong because without Vines ,Rootwalas are terrible madness creatures and Surv goes back to being, well, just Surv.

The 5k results are really alarming, tbh, but i think it has to do with more people playing SurvVine than more playing what beats it. Less people should be playing "their" decks and move to something that abuses Surv mus. Doesnt Merf and Gobs lose to Surv? Why are people still playing decks that lose to the most popular deck?
23 out of 80 in the top 16 inthe last 5 SCGs 5ks were Survival variants.

Does any one know how many SurvVine lists were there in total at all 5 SCGs 5ks and out of how many other decks?

[Koby]

I agree with menace13 here. We would need more data to look at what is actually happening at these tournaments.

[Cabal_chan]

Deck is powerful for sure...we know that already...what does it so strong? Tutoring by Survival and Vengevine´s abillity....don´t we forget for something? If we need to speed up this combo,we need to cast 2 creatures...what are we using? Basking Rootwalla....how good would be the combo without Rootwala? I think it would be much slower and more vulnerable....ban Basking Rootwala and it will be the right compromise...

WotC would never ban Rootwalla. Not with their policy to go after enablers as opposed to bombs(Flash vs. Protean Hulk, Mystical Tutor vs. Tendrils of Agony).

[Jonathan Alexander]

WotC would never ban Rootwalla. Not with their policy to go after enablers as opposed to bombs(Flash vs. Protean Hulk, Mystical Tutor vs. Tendrils of Agony).

I agree that they would never ban Basking Rootwalla (which sounds even worse than banning Wild Nacatl) but Basking Rootwalla is in fact one of the enablers. Vengevine obviously is the bomb, and it's a pretty good bomb in that you don't even need to draw it, because Survival Of The Fittest (which is the real enabler) will just find it.
Anyway, I still don't think that the deck is too good. Maybe it just didn't smash me enough.

[majikal]

Just got back from Charlotte, where 5 of us were playing Survival in the Top8 (and 7!!!! in the top 16). As sad as I am to admit it, I think something is going to get banned. I don't think it should be Survival, since it's just such a cool card with lots of flavor, but I think something will, unfortunately.

The part that makes me think this is how ridiculously easy it was to fight through all the hate, even the dedicated hate decks that showed up en masse (so-called "Dark Horizons"). I even played against Storm combo, which is supposed to be a trump to the strategy, but my sideboard into G/W hate + Null Rods made easy work of it in games 2 and 3.

Sell em while you can, boys. I think this is it.

[Tacosnape]

The fact that Survival lets you tutor Gofys or Kotor as a back up plan should tell you which is more likely to be banned.

It's always done this. Nobody's been breaking formats with it before. Besides, it tutors at a cost. A card per shot. Or running Squee. Take your pick.

Vengivine, while nifty, is just a beater that requires some bad cards (Mongrel and Aquamobea for example) to enable properly.

Seriously? Pay attention. Some of the top Survival builds aren't running either one of these. And Vengevine's so powerful in Survival that it's pushing Tarmogoyf out of builds. Nothing in mono green should be pushing the format's second most powerful creature out.

Also, survival does not allow "hundreds" of decks. Dozens maybe, but not hundreds.

Introduction time! Drago, this is Hyperbole. Hyperbole, Drago.

[arebennian]

Seriously? Pay attention. Some of the top Survival builds aren't running either one of these. And Vengevine's so powerful in Survival that it's pushing Tarmogoyf out of builds. Nothing in mono green should be pushing the format's second most powerful creature out.

Hang on...
What is the most powerful creature then? Vengevine?

[TOGITwill]

Hang on...
What is the most powerful creature then? Vengevine?

Valid arguments could be made for Goblin Lackey, and more likely, Dark Confidant.

[Lemnear]

I predict, it will happen again: An archtype Zoo can't beat is gettin' the axe because of that fact.

I mean I've talked to a meerfolk Pilot lately and that guy claimed survival to Be unfair cause He can't Beat it with his 3 spell pierce, 3 daze, 4 FOW main and 4 sb slots. Respect Sir for your meta prediction! If that's enough reason to eliminate an archetype so cast-creature-attack is a to-Beat strategy again? Yeah, if it's Tom LaPille that'll try to explain that. Maybe He plays a few rounds MTG:O against Type 2 ramp first ;@p

I don't think vengevine was created without testing it's interaction with Survival. The printing of Fauna shaman is (to me) an indicator of that desired interaction and not a windfall. Vengevine can kill turn 5 and seriously, that's nothing overpowered. Every tribal Deck can do that, easily.

If it really happens that they kill this archtype by banning that Legacy staple out of tournament existance (much to weak in vintage especially compared to oath) just 'cause some people won't change their pet decks I'll go with Survival (tournament Data proves that more than enough people still play decks that have a Bad Survival matchups). If nacatl and vial are the Holy grails of this format I'll no longer be it's crusader, dood!

[Tacosnape]

Hang on...
What is the most powerful creature then? Vengevine?

Er. Actually. That sentence was typed under the influence of lots of cold medicine and I meant to say Tarmogoyf was the most powerful, not second.

Though while I'm at it, I'd say there could be decent arguments that Knight of the Reliquary is flat out a better creature, though far less played due to the double color requirement. I'd still go with Tarmogoyf, though.

[Amon Amarth]

I think I may just start playing TES instead as a trump. The G/W versions are byes and you only really have to worry about FoW in the G/U versions. Or maybe I'll play something with Humility instead. Decisions, decisions...

[DragoFireheart]

It's always done this. Nobody's been breaking formats with it before. Besides, it tutors at a cost. A card per shot. Or running Squee. Take your pick.

A tutoris a tutor is a tutor, and we know how WotC feels about those.

Seriously? Pay attention. Some of the top Survival builds aren't running either one of these. And Vengevine's so powerful in Survival that it's pushing Tarmogoyf out of builds. Nothing in mono green should be pushing the format's second most powerful creature out.

Serioulsy? I used those two as examples and you pretend they are the only creatures.

Introduction time! Drago, this is Hyperbole. Hyperbole, Drago.

I doubt that is what you meant.