Survival of the Fittest

[Amon Amarth]

As for the French, I respect you for playing decks you like and for being different! Culturally I think the US just likes playing the strongest decks and whatever wins. But that isn't exactly a good thing.

You seem to be inferring that the French, Europeans, whomever, don't play to win... which seems disingenuous at best.

[pippo84]

You seem to be inferring that the French, Europeans, whomever, don't play to win... which seems disingenuous at best.

Don't know about French, but Italians play to win.

[(nameless one)]

Don't know about French, but Italians play to win.

While were at it, yes Italians play to win. Have you ever played one on MWS?

[Oiolosse]

While were at it, yes Italians play to win. Have you ever played one on MWS?

Low blows fellas, I love this dialog, keep it coming.

[Cthuloo]

While were at it, yes Italians play to win. Have you ever played one on MWS?

I think it's time to reveal the secret. In Italy we call it Idiotic Army Project For Demotivating People On The Magic Work Station And Profit From Their Confusion, in short: IAPFDPOTMWSAPFTC. That's right, we have a group of highly skilled agents whose only purpose is to play as many foreigners as possible on the MWS messing up with the rules, speaking bad english and keeping the most irritating behaviour. This is meant to prevent foreigners from having real playtesting, saturating them instead with false/absurd information, so that they will either:

a) Quit magic in rage
b) Play worse since they couldn't test and are in general nervous and/or anxious
c) Buy more italian pizza (I can't actually tell you how we manage to achieve this, it's still top secret)

The project is performing very well, the Italian Supreme Council For Discouraging Foreigner Magic Players And Force Them To Quit Magic Or Buy More Pizza (in short ISCFDFMPAFTTQMOBMP) is very happy.

[Nelis]

Europeans play like Arsenal FC. Americans (and Italians) play like Inter Milan.

* Hmm, weird, I suddenly feel like eating Pizza tonight.

[godryk]

The Source: your source for euro-american love (and discussing who's giving and who's receiving).

[Pippin]

So topic about potential survival banning turned into lots of nationalist statements... special thanks go to redneck that first started it

Going back on topic...
Results (or rather inability of meta to adapt) proved wrong my previous statements. At this rate I presume we'll see Survival getting the axe in next B/R list update. A shame

[Gheizen64]

Yeah, as much as i'd love seeing it untouched and some unbanning, i fear WotC will give Survival the axe and say the usual things "enabler, limit future creatures print, we have fauna shaman and you can buy 10th edition packs zzz".

[Tacosnape]

Yeah, as much as i'd love seeing it untouched and some unbanning, i fear WotC will give Survival the axe and say the usual things "enabler, limit future creatures print, we have fauna shaman and you can buy 10th edition packs zzz".

I've had this thought. A terrifying thought, for somebody who has had a Survival deck since one week after the format was created. And should it prove the case, I will immediately go do the following:

1. Go take a massive shit on a Fauna Shaman.
2. Wipe with another Fauna Shaman.
3. Build some kind of UG Intuition Madness deck and still play Vengevine.

The ironic part of this is that if they ban Vengevine, I'll end up playing Fauna Shaman in Survival. I will also bronze my Vengevines and cherish them forever.

[SpikeyMikey]

I sincerely hope they don't end up banning anything. I'm tentatively planning on going to the SCG Open in KC in Jan. but if SotF or VV gets the axe, it will push Rock back into the depths of obscurity and there's no point in driving almost 700 miles to play a deck that's unlikely to T8. Guess we'll wait and see.

[konsultant]

I've had this thought. A terrifying thought, for somebody who has had a Survival deck since one week after the format was created. And should it prove the case, I will immediately go do the following:

1. Go take a massive shit on a Fauna Shaman.
2. Wipe with another Fauna Shaman.
3. Build some kind of UG Intuition Madness deck and still play Vengevine.

The ironic part of this is that if they ban Vengevine, I'll end up playing Fauna Shaman in Survival. I will also bronze my Vengevines and cherish them forever.

I'm never one to post in these hypothetical threads but I admit I will be quite pissed and disgusted at wizards if they banned Survival. It's a fucking creature manipulating engine that has been around for a long time. It's completely stoppable with relevant cards that see play in the format. The high appearence of people running it will fade away once the deck starts to recieve some meta hate that it deserves. Needle, Extirpate, Krosan Grip are all very relevant cards to run. Spellsnare even Spellpierce, Perish, Propaganda, Hibernation there are tons of answers to the deck or here is a crazy idea just print a new card that would be relevant. I'm sure they could come up with some kind of Trap card that triggers of a certain number of creatures coming into play in one turn.

This is Legacy, we have to deal with powerful cards like Natural Order, Moat, Loyal Retainers, Show and Tell, Sneak Attack, Tabernacle. All cards that are arguably over powered that are in the format. So what it's ok to ban Survival because its an all Green mana combo that can put a bunch of green men into play quickly and thats over powered yet you can Reliably Show and Tell Emerkul into play by turn 3-4 on slow hands and somehow that's not overpowered? Or good old Stifle Dreadnought, I mean 2 mana gets you a 12/12 trample or 4 Mana for Natural Order gets you a 10/10 protection from everything and thats ok? This deck isn't killing people on turn 1,2,3 or even 4 really. Are they really gonna ban a deck because it's popular?

I would like to think this giant fuss is really just because it's the first highly competitive new deck in the format and not because a card that has been fairly dormant for years has suddenly become unbeatable. I would also hope that if they do determine that something needs to be done that they would just ban Rootwalla as the true enabler; without Rootwalla everything about this deck becomes considerably slower and in my opinion it would disrupt the consistency enough to calm people down about it.

[GGoober]

i would also hope that if they do determine that something needs to be done that they would just ban rootwalla as the true enabler; without rootwalla everything about this deck becomes considerably slower and in my opinion it would disrupt the consistency enough to calm people down about it.

This is MADNESS!!!!

[SurFitOfTheVine]

I've had this thought. A terrifying thought, for somebody who has had a Survival deck since one week after the format was created. And should it prove the case, I will immediately go do the following:

1. Go take a massive shit on a Fauna Shaman.
2. Wipe with another Fauna Shaman.
3. Build some kind of UG Intuition Madness deck and still play Vengevine.

The ironic part of this is that if they ban Vengevine, I'll end up playing Fauna Shaman in Survival. I will also bronze my Vengevines and cherish them forever.

That post made my day! :D

I'm never one to post in these hypothetical threads but I admit I will be quite pissed and disgusted at wizards if they banned Survival. It's a fucking creature manipulating engine that has been around for a long time. It's completely stoppable with relevant cards that see play in the format. The high appearence of people running it will fade away once the deck starts to recieve some meta hate that it deserves. Needle, Extirpate, Krosan Grip are all very relevant cards to run. Spellsnare even Spellpierce, Perish, Propaganda, Hibernation there are tons of answers to the deck or here is a crazy idea just print a new card that would be relevant. I'm sure they could come up with some kind of Trap card that triggers of a certain number of creatures coming into play in one turn.

This is Legacy, we have to deal with powerful cards like Natural Order, Moat, Loyal Retainers, Show and Tell, Sneak Attack, Tabernacle. All cards that are arguably over powered that are in the format. So what it's ok to ban Survival because its an all Green mana combo that can put a bunch of green men into play quickly and thats over powered yet you can Reliably Show and Tell Emerkul into play by turn 3-4 on slow hands and somehow that's not overpowered? Or good old Stifle Dreadnought, I mean 2 mana gets you a 12/12 trample or 4 Mana for Natural Order gets you a 10/10 protection from everything and thats ok? This deck isn't killing people on turn 1,2,3 or even 4 really. Are they really gonna ban a deck because it's popular?

I would like to think this giant fuss is really just because it's the first highly competitive new deck in the format and not because a card that has been fairly dormant for years has suddenly become unbeatable. I would also hope that if they do determine that something needs to be done that they would just ban Rootwalla as the true enabler; without Rootwalla everything about this deck becomes considerably slower and in my opinion it would disrupt the consistency enough to calm people down about it.

I second that. Except the part where you say they should ban Rootwalla instead.

[majikal]

I've had this thought. A terrifying thought, for somebody who has had a Survival deck since one week after the format was created. And should it prove the case, I will immediately go do the following:

1. Go take a massive shit on a Fauna Shaman.
2. Wipe with another Fauna Shaman.
3. Build some kind of UG Intuition Madness deck and still play Vengevine.

Agreed. Vengevine is the stone-cold nutz with or without Survival, honestly.

[samurai_socks]

I had the same thoughts as some of the above posters. If SOTF is banned then you just play 4 Fauna Shaman and 4 Intuition.

-Cheers-

[GGoober]

If SOTF is banned then you just play 4 Fauna Shaman and 4 Intuition.

I really see this happening if SotF gets banned, and we can all continue crying and then shooting ourselves in the feet for thinking Survival is the problem and not VV. To be honest, I don't mind this happening just to get some laughs and cry later that we lost an important yet completely fair card that is only relevant in Legacy and perhaps EDH. People forget that as much as tutoring is powerful, Survival tutoring doesn't end games in 1-2 turns. It never did, only VV builds broke it, and Natural Order, SnT/Emrakul all these end games in 1-2 despite being less tutor-powerful than Survival.

And btw, Needle is only effective against Vengevival when they don't run Fauna Shaman. When you play Fauna AND Survival, Needle gets a little weak against the deck. Although I was testing 4 Survival, 4 Fauna, I must say that as long as a UGB(x) control player controls your early game, Deeds is a huge beating.

CalebD's article on his version of Countertop with 4 StP + 4Path seems pretty good against the deck, once again I would like to point out, the problem is VV, because why would any control deck in the right mind want to remove creatures when better options: Firespout/Perish exists in the format? It shows how much you need to go into to beat the deck. Survival has and always will be a problem, but not as problematic as a new interesting creature that functions quite differently than the creatures we're used to seeing. And in such a deck, VV >>> Goyf, simply because it still has 4 power (usual Goyf 4/5) but is hasty and is free and comes back! Goyf costs mana and has summoning sickness as mentioned earlier lol.

[Rico Suave]

There are a whole slew of extremely faulty lines of thought in this thread. I'm not going to go through each and every one because that would take hours, but there is one in particular that a number of people in this thread seem to cling to that is particularly fascinating to me.

I see people mention all the time that Survival of the Fittest is not a problem card, and their reasoning is that it has been around for a while and has not been a problem before. There was another card that fit a similar description over a decade ago - Necropotence. You see, at the time most people were using Necropotence for a nice 5-6 years and it was fine. They used the skull to cast cards like pump knights or Nekrataal or maybe a Hymn to Tourach. Then suddenly people started using the card not to cast "fair" creatures but to do rather "unfair" things like kill the opponent on turn 3. This was completely overpowered at the time and a ban needed to happen, which of course set people apart because they had differing opinions on what exactly to ban. There were two main parts: the combo engine and the outlet. The combo engine was Necropotence, and the outlet was Illusions/Donate. If you ask people nowadays, they will tell you that Necro must be banned and Illusions/Donate is perfectly fine.

Guess what? The same evolution has now happened to Survival. People have awoken from playing poor versions of Survival and have finally improved to good versions. From this point on, every competitive Survival list will never be the same just like old Necro decks never went back to their pump knights.

Now, the current crop of Survival decks is such that there is a ridiculous combo engine, which is Survival, and then there is the outlet which is either Vengevine or Necrotic Ooze or something equivalent. Yet I see people who have not learned from history and spout off that somehow the outlet is the problem. Do you want to unban Necropotence too? If there is a problem, the clear target to ban is the combo engine in Survival of the Fittest.

For what it's worth, I don't think Survival needs to be banned. I think people are just upset and frustrated.

[Vacrix]

For what it's worth, I don't think Survival needs to be banned. I think people are just upset and frustrated.

Agreed. Thats because they aren't playing Storm combo and castrating the Survival players.

[dahcmai]

In other news I went to our local tournament and ended up getting to the finals with GW Survival. Not exactly a major accomplishment as despite the fact the decks I played were good, they were also woefully unprepared for a Survival deck. Ummm, that's not going to cut it. One vengevine went all the way by himself while a guy sat with Smothers in his hand. I hard casted the thing too. It wasn't exactly fast. People need to stop playing these standardized lists they see and adapt to this stuff.

In the finals, I ran into a deck I built myself that I lent out to a person. It was my own reanimator. The thing trashes Survival. It's no contest. Turn 3 wins ooze reanimator is not something that a survival player wants to see on the other side. If that deck can go through a couple of control decks and another Survival deck to get to the finals, so can other people. I don't get what this craze is all about. It's not that hard to beat. It's good against a lot of the cheaper to build decks. That's half the problem.

As far as I am concerned, it's a great deck like Merfolk or Goblins that can pull wins out of it's ass, not unbeatable craziness. Reanimator won that day in all reality.