The September 20th 2011 Banned / Restricted List Update Reaction Thread

[Di]

The meta will look like High Tide, Dredge, and ANT. Other decks aren't a good choice here.

Snapcaster Mage, I'm pretty sure, is going to vault High Tide to being the #1 deck.

I'm on the fence with the Snapcaster theory here. On paper it seems incredible, but in testing I've found it to be rather poor in the deck. It's particularly awful post-Spiral when you have no graveyard, and the only applications I've really had for it were either flashing back a Tide or Turnabout pre-Spiral, which indicated I would generally have a lot of extra mana anyway and Snapcaster was unnecessary, or I played it late into a post-Spiral and it was basically win-more. I'm just not convinced it will benefit the deck as you already have to cut the spells you'd want to flash back, whether they are draw, counters, or untappers.

Although I will agree with your alleged tier 1. I don't see Counterbalance being that strong through Dredge and midrange decks. It'll at least be viable though.

[ivanpei]

The only way I can justify playing Countertop again is if Storm is like a quarter of the field. Aether Vial is still a major problem and its not an easy problem to solve. I can see URG Counter top with Goyf and Grims doing well in this meta. Throw in Trinket Mage, Basilisk Collar and Snapcaster Mage and it should turn out to be an interesting Brew. Good against tribal, storm (especially with SB blasts) and fairly dependable in the Control mirror. Grims are infinitely more potent now since Mental Missteps are out of the picture. Folk has very little answers to a resolved Grim.

Btw mana-less dredge seems a bit pointless now. Back to good old fashion LED-less dredge? Speed is definitely very important.

[xfxf]

I'm just pissed to see the little green man return. I don't like playing against weenie style decks in general (zoo is different, it has Sligh roots and that's OK in my book), I could tolerate Merfolk because it was fellow blue but can't bear Goblins! :D

Joking aside, it's true that speculating about the new meta so early isn't very accurate.

However, if it turns out like the list DragoFireheart posted it means we have a good amount of combo (ANT, TES, High Tide, Dredge, Hive Mind) and aggro (Zoo, Merfolk, Goblins) with just CounterTop to represent control.

I don't like playing Magic in such an environment and was hesitant to start playing Magic again (although I was following Legacy closely). After Mental Misstep was printed I started playing Magic again and started buying some duals and stuff. Now I lost my excitement again :)

Oh and people who were rampant about Mental Misstep killing diversity in Legacy don't seem to be interested in my buried/revived decks comparison on last page. I wonder why.. :D

[Mr. Safety]

The only thing that irks me about Mental Misstep being banned is that I don't have Force of Wills (being a budget player) so Mental Misstep was my go-to free counterspell to boost my lousy Faeries deck, lol. I think it's healthy for the format, though. I think the cross-section of decks was pretty exciting in legacy pre-MM.

Modern will adapt, I think. The banned list isn't as long as Legacy's yet, so that's a good sign. Losing the good cantrips will hurt any possible control-brew as much as the combo decks, but hey, it's a start. The format is so damn new, it shouldn't affect too many people. It's still finding it's identity. Borderline playable cards like Mystic Speculation and Telling Time will now see some play because there are literally *zero* better options. Hell, even Sleight of Hand and Serum Visions will be played again.

[voltron00x]

...sry, whut?

That is just not true.

but at least two people did well with it at a couple events!

[ivanpei]

@ bilb_o, Thanks for reminding me. I worked alot of Buried Ooze back in the day and looks like it can make a come back now. Nothing's been printed to change the deck much, but that deck is really fast and consistent. It still gets beaten by an overload of hate/counters, but so do most combo decks. The advantage it has over Storm is that it can board into Show and Tell and dodge all kinds of hate.

Also, @ Pander- Painter back in business? Lots of fish to feast on. ;)

[Pastorofmuppets]

I'm just excited that I can play Elves! again without always losing my 1st drop.
Still though, as someone who uses Magic to make money, I'm disappointed in the lack of unbannings. Throw me a friggin' bone here, Wizards!

[Rizso]

We are gonna see so much Flusterstorm on Flusterstorm action!

[OurSerratedDust]

What is it with everyone saying Tendrils decks are going to make a sudden comeback and ruin the format? Any Mental Missteps are going to arguably be replaced with Spell Snare or Spell Pierce in the MD and aggro-control will have the same counter density as before. About the only leg up Tendrils gets is that Xantid Swarm is more reliable out of the SB. This match up always comes down to whether or not aggro-control SBs for the match up, not which counter spells it uses MD.

High Tide on the other hand looks pretty damn scary again.

I have to agree with this. Storm wasn't crazy popular before MM, and I don't really foresee it being a really common deck. Storm will definitely be good in the meta, but the deck has a learning curve that prevents some people from picking it up.

[Goaswerfraiejen]

My point was/is Force of Will, Daze and Mental Misstep compared to Force of Will, Daze and Spell Snare isn't going to lead to an imbalance in matchup % between aggro-control and Tendrils combo. Obviously tho' Spell Snare isn't a direct substitution for Mental Misstep in all decks i.e. NO RUG. doesn't want either Spell Snare, Spell Pierce or Daze in place of Mental Misstep.

People are acting like Mental Misstep was the glue holding the Tendrils combo match up together, and it's bull shit.

The difference in power level beween MM and its replacements is palpable, and becomes especially important post-board. FoW and Daze alone are just not enough against a good combo player. Whittling away a combo player's life total is very important, but difficult to do if you have to keep one or two mana open for the first three turns so that you can cast a single Spell Pierce. MM really helped those of us playing aggro-control by allowing us to spend the first couple of turns developing our board positions, and then keeping our mana open. Post-board, we still brought in more hate, which maximized our counterspell density. Without MM, it becomes much harder to do all those things simply because combo is so fast and can already survive so much hate. It's doable, but it was a lot easier with MM than it is without it. MM went a VERY long way towards adjusting those matchup percentages.

[The Treefolk Master]

There are 3 kinds of Magic players:

1-Players good enough to play storm (very few).

2-Players good enough to realize they are not good enough to play storm (very few).

3-Players not good enough to realize they are not good enough to play storm (99% of the storm players). These can then be divided into:

a) Players who are so unsure about how to play the deck that they wait until turn 18 to go off, only to realize they are at a negative life total, and that their opponent is eating a ham sandwich three blocks away after an easy 2-0

b) Players so blind they always try to go off turn 2, which leads to them realizing that they are 7 mana and 12 spells short of killing their opponent.

Since most storm players don't know how to properly play their decks, mediocre players like me can kill them with a counterspell when they screw up with the order of spells.

[SpikeyMikey]

Seriously guys? The sky isn't falling yet chicken little. I have not a clue why you think the top decks are going to rotate just because they lost Misstep. NORUG is still a good deck, it just runs daze or snare instead now. And I have no idea why everyone thinks that Stoneblade is suddenly dead. There has literally never been a time when we didn't have both Batterskull and Misstep. Honestly, it seems to me that SFM+Skull is going to be as good vs aggro as ever. Maybe we should all just calm down for a week or two and see what actually happens.

NO RUG dies because everyone else stops running Misstep (which is damn near completely irrelevant against it) and starts running Spell Pierce (which is very relevant against GSZ and NO, 2 of the 3 threats the deck has). Same for Stoneblade. Those decks thrived because they got mileage out of Misstep while completely dodging it. As much as everyone has a leghump on for Brainstorm, Misstepping a Brainstorm is simply a tempo play; it doesn't actually answer a threat. When your threats are 2/3/4 mana, Misstep just isn't going to shine against you. Now that other blue mages will be forced to play counters that are relevant against the (current) top decks, those decks are going to sink again. I think Bant goes back to being the color of NO as Zoo gets better in a format without MM and Stoneblade gets worse. NO RUG will be too slow to deal with Zoo (RWM goes a long way) consistently

[Gui]

@SpikeyMikey

Your ideas are good, they really are, but here's a constructive criticism:
Hit Enter a few times when you finish an Idea and starts another. All your posts seems to be Wall of Texts oO

[tsabo_tavoc]

There are 3 kinds of Magic players:

1-Players good enough to play storm (very few).

2-Players good enough to realize they are not good enough to play storm (very few).

3-Players not good enough to realize they are not good enough to play storm (99% of the storm players). These can then be divided into:

a) Players who are so unsure about how to play the deck that they wait until turn 18 to go off, only to realize they are at a negative life total, and that their opponent is eating a ham sandwich three blocks away after an easy 2-0

b) Players so blind they always try to go off turn 2, which leads to them realizing that they are 7 mana and 12 spells short of killing their opponent.

Since most storm players don't know how to properly play their decks, mediocre players like me can kill them with a counterspell when they screw up with the order of spells.

What a joke! You would be right if you were referring to 99% world population. 99% Magic players won't fall into either case (a, b) after goldfishing a couple of games.

[Richard Cheese]

Damn...what am I going to replace Misstep with in my janky Pox build?

Also, pretty surprised they actually went through with it, although by looking at Modern and Extended, it seems WotC is taking a much more aggressive approach to shaping their formats.

[Draener]

The degree in which they are aggressively updating the banlist is a wee bit disturbing. Don't win more than a couple SCG's, or expect your deck neutered. I feel almost like hightide / storm will be viable until the next ban, in which those decks will get key cards removed.

[dontbiteitholmes]

I'm just really pissed that non-blue is now a total dog to combo again. It doesn't have to be Misstep, but we need something. Even if it was...

~Not MMcardname~ R
Instant
You may play ~this~ without paying it's mana cost by discarding an additional card card at random from your hand. Counter target instant or sorcery with cmc=1.

I would actually be fine with something even this shitty, but we need something.

[DragoFireheart]

I'm just really pissed that non-blue is now a total dog to combo again. It doesn't have to be Misstep, but we need something. Even if it was...

~Not MMcardname~ R
Instant
You may play ~this~ without paying it's mana cost by discarding an additional card card at random from your hand. Counter target instant or sorcery with cmc=1.

I would actually be fine with something even this shitty, but we need something.

- I'll make you a deal: If you agree to have Aether Vial and Wasteland banned, then I agree that Lion's Eye Diamond and Bridge from Below should be banned.

[dontbiteitholmes]

- I'll make you a deal: If you agree to have Aether Vial and Wasteland banned, then I agree that Lion's Eye Diamond and Bridge from Below should be banned.

I don't want anything banned. I just don't think it's reasonable that only one of 5 colors can interact with combo turn 0, except for Mindbreak Trap, which is shit.

[DragoFireheart]

I don't want anything banned. I just don't think it's reasonable that only one of 5 colors can interact with combo turn 0, except for Mindbreak Trap, which is shit.

- Well, they made mental misstep for the aggro kiddes but apparently they got jealous that blue used it better than them.