As someone who plays Stoneforge Mystic in Zoo, the biggest problem is actually getting the equipment destroyed, either in response to the equip activation or in response to you attacking. Using Stoneforge to put the equipment directly into play at EoT is often the best play, because then you can untap and equip, then re-equip if they Plow your guy. I mean, yeah, this lets you save on mana at the expense of life, but if you're connecting with a Jitte-wielding Tarmogoyf, the mana saved is actually not really as big of a deal as it seems at first blush: whether you have two mana up or no mana up is irrelevant as the game is effectively over against a lot of decks. Jitte-Goyfs are that good.
Furthermore, sometimes you will activate an equip knowing full well they have the removal, simply to bait the spell out; losing your Nacatl and not having anyone carrying a Jitte is fine if it draws attention away from your Knights and Goyfs. There are plenty of situations where it is correct to sink mana into sacrificing a guy because it maximizes damage in the medium and long terms. Situations like this are ideal for Misstep, but depending on the matchup Misstep itself might not be worth boarding in; this trick is cute, but sometimes brute force is just better, and there's nothing you want to take out because it reduces your ability to brawn your way through situations. I realize that sideboard cards are all "context-dependent," but I try to select cards that are good across the widest variety of contexts while also being clearly superior to cards in my main in those same contexts. Against a Bant deck, for example, there's nothing I'd want to side out for Misstep as my maindeck is already quite solid, and I'm fine throwing away a Nacatl every now and then to force the opponent to discard a StP.
That said, Qasali Pridemage and Krosan Grip make investing in equipment in the first place incredibly unattractive, and neither of those are Misstep-able.
As for other Zoo decks, I don't know. Yeah, not having to face Vial is nice, but you're beating the kind of decks that pack Vial on a strategic level by having better guys and a high density of removal. Vial is their highest-profile weapon to fight you, but you already have incidental removal for it in the form of Pridemage and possibly GSZ. As for Top, well...you're probably already running Krosan Grips if you're expecting a lot of Top matchups, and in Big Zoo you've got GSZ for Pridemage on top of that, so I'm not really seeing the need to run Misstep over, say, Null Rod, which is better against Thopter decks and helps against combo and Affinity. And what is "medium" Zoo supposed to beat? You have fewer trumps than Big Zoo, and less speed than Cat Sligh - what's the attraction of that kind of build over the others?
No it isn't. With 2-3 weapons and 20-30 creatures, the math is pretty simple. Oh, in practice it is true too. STP is not typically a big problem for decks with enough creatures to be using Aether Vial or equipment. MM is going to be a hard sell on those grounds.Originally Posted by IBA
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I stand to reason that the deck that gains most from MM are the Aggro-Control Bant decks. Decks that operate on very little mana (19 land typically), have a few big hitters (Goyf, KotR, and an assortment of 2 and 3 drops), and need more resistance to push through pinpoint removal OR disruption. These decks are most likely to be answering Combo using Hate bears. They are most likely to board into a critical mass of counters (Pierce, Daze, FoW, and now MM). They also have the most trouble with Xantid Swarm and Silence from TES.
Being able to become both aggressive, and have some tempo-counter available is a big boon for such a deck. Being able to cast a hatebear, then protect it using only 2 mana is also extremely useful. Being able to maintain your fat beater (Goyf, KotR, even Noble Hierarch) from cheap removal (stp, innocent blood, bolt) that Spell Pierce would not hit in the late game is useful.
To counter Finn's point - it's deck that don't run 20-30 creatures where this spell shines. Team America, Dark Tempo, and Bant Tempo stand most to gain from this spell as both disruption and as protection.
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Anything with Blue spells and a significant aggro plan is going to love this card. End of story. Be able to beat that (which as of right now, doesn't seem incredibly easy) and you will do well.
This is basically what Finn was implying, but from an equipment perspective: decks with high creature counts are resilient to targeted removal because each of their individual creatures matters less. If you go to equip one and it dies in response, you'll still have ~2-4 other guys in play to grab the equipment.
Problem; your opponent may not give you infinite combat phases to try and connect a guy.
Oh, and against Thopter-Foundry decks, Misstep will also counter Humility and Ensnaring Bridge. That seems relevant.
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Um...pardon? Those cost four and three, respectively.
I'm being half-facetious, but they're one ofs they usually need Enlightened Tutor to find.
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And found I was for endurance made
I'm getting off track a bit here. But I want it clear that having equipment on the field actually does a decent job of making STP suck. If you have a Tarmo and a Hierarch, for example, you equip Sword of this and that to the Hierarch. He has to zap the Hierarch to prevent big problems so Tarmo gets through. Instead of Hierarch, if it were a Pridemage you could even sac the Pridemage for an extra FU. Without the weapon, your opponent would have plowed the Tarmo and been in far better shape, and you never even made contact with it.
Mental Misstep is awful in this deck in this scenario. Anecdote, sure, but so is everything at this point.
"Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job."
"Politicians are like diapers. They should be changed often and for the same reason."
"Governing is too important to be left to people as silly as politicians."
"Politicians were mostly people who'd had too little morals and ethics to stay lawyers."
That's true; on the other hand, MM can act as an extra set of removal spells, which will help the MM player. Then again, Daze would probably have more reach.
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So, not sure if this has been mentioned yet, but could this lead to Mystical Tutor beeing safe for unban? I guess it's time to wait until the dust settles. Your thoughts?
What are you talking about? Are you insinuating that Mental Mistep could make combo unviable and Mystical Tutor could be thus safe to unban because it's 1cc and Mistep will still counter it?
In regards to Mystical Tutor: Just because something can be answered -- even answered efficiently -- does not make it balanced or suitable to reappear.
He's just meaning that with the printing of Misstep, that will probably be played by lots of decks, playing cc1 tutors becomes a bit less reliable. In my opinion, Mystical should be unbanned, even pre-Misstep.
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Mystical Tutor didn't need banned in the first place, but let's not open that can of worms in an SCD thread about a different card...
My thoughts? Following that kind of reasoning we could unban Demonic Tutor too since we have Spell Snare. ;-)
But joking aside, I agree with a-slice-of-cake's reasoning and with Hanni's remark - please let not the thread degenerate into yet another Mystical Tutor argument...
My thoughts on the card: it's "just" a tier 1 counter, some changes will be made to mainboards, a new deck or two might emerge but I doubt it'll change the face of Legacy as we know it. Wouldn't mind being proven wrong tho - I love when formats get shaken around by new sets.
Here's a novel idea: let's wait for this card to make an appearance in the metagame first; wait three months; then re-evaluate the B&R list.
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I hope he didn't mean that. By that logic, why not just unban Demonic Consultation or Ancestral Recall since Mistep makes them a bit less reliable?
You do realize the difference or you are just trolling?
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If you use the reasoning that Mistep makes Mystical Tutor weaker, then it can said of DC (maybe not Ancestral, but yeah I was being an ass there :p). More importantly, the card is not even out yet and people won't be able to play it in tournaments until a month from now. It's pointless to speculate about unbannings or bannings caused by NPH when we haven't even seen any tournament results yet.
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