All B/R update speculation.

[funyun45]

avg(Belcher, TES, SI/x, Dredge)

At least two of these decks have over 50% first turn kills, Dredge and TES have the capacity for first turn kills.
Adding another turn makes TES and Dredge much more consistent to win, as well as rounding out SI/x and Belcher.

This was not your initial claim. Your claim was that every deck utilizing LED has a 30% chance of killing on turn one and a 60% chance on turn two. That claim is not equivalent to a claim about the average turn one kill rate between those decks. Dredge and T.E.S. certainly have the potential to win turn one, but nowhere near 30%. In fact, I'm dubious that either is at even 30% on turn two. Maybe T.E.S., but I'd put Dredge much lower.

Now, SI and Belcher have much higher turn one (and turn two percentages). However, what they gain in consistency they lose in resiliency. Force of Will is one of the most commonly played cards in Legacy and it makes those two decks cry all day long. It's the reason those decks can only ever make up so much of the meta. So when you say this:

No fair deck exists in Legacy that uses LED.

I have to disagree for that reason. All four of those decks are good, and "unfair" in the colloquial sense we Magic users tend to use with regards to Prison/Combo vs. Aggro/Aggro-Control. But "unfair" in that sense and "ban-worthy" are two different things. Only one of those four decks is a Tier 1 deck, and it is probably on average the slowest of them.

However, I digress. LED is a great, borderline broken card. Your arguments for its banning may be valid. Ultimately, though, they are not what I'm contesting. I am contesting your initial claim about the statistical likelihood each deck that brandishes LED has of getting a first turn win.

[Koby]

You're right, the word choice was poor to convey the information I wanted. Those four (three, since SI doesn't show up consistently enough) decks maintain the stigma that Legacy can be degenerate. It also reinforces the idea that without Force of Will, the format would degenerate into the fastest LED deck. I certainly don't think a format that is binary (LED or FOW or gtfo) would be enjoyable.

[Fizzeler]

You're right, the word choice was poor to convey the information I wanted. Those four (three, since SI doesn't show up consistently enough) decks maintain the stigma that Legacy can be degenerate. It also reinforces the idea that without Force of Will, the format would degenerate into the fastest LED deck. I certainly don't think a format that is binary (LED or FOW or gtfo) would be enjoyable.

I disagree look at Maverick decks they can still beat all those "degenerate" decks with abilities to win turn 1 or 2

I see no reason to ban LED, now Lotus Petal well that I can see as ban-able, but not LED

[funyun45]

You're right, the word choice was poor to convey the information I wanted. Those four (three, since SI doesn't show up consistently enough) decks maintain the stigma that Legacy can be degenerate. It also reinforces the idea that without Force of Will, the format would degenerate into the fastest LED deck. I certainly don't think a format that is binary (LED or FOW or gtfo) would be enjoyable.

I am sympathetic with your overall point (I think LED is on the "ban consideration" shortlist, along with Show & Tell), though I think the "without FoW" stigma is unfair. Obviously, without FoW the Eternal formats degenerate into craziness (in which, yes, LED decks would be at the very top of the heap, though perhaps not exclusively). To me, though, that's not a convincing argument for anything. FoW does exist in the format, and therefore inherently changes the landscape of the format. Its very legality changes the meta, much less its correct rate of presence, and much less still its actual rate of presence. So because LED decks would dominate if FoW was illegal tells us absolute nothing-- not a lot, not even a little-- about a format in which FoW is in fact legal. The format where FoW is illegal is not in the same ballpark, it's not even the same sport; Legacy and FoW-less Legacy are apples and oranges.

As for a binary format, I don't think such a thing would be enjoyable either. Fortunately, we don't have to suffer such a thing. Legacy isn't such a format.

[Awaclus]

No fair deck exists in Legacy that uses LED.

You just mentioned four.

[Koby]

You just mentioned four.

That's an interesting opinion. Why do you think that Belcher, Dredge, TES, and SI/other LED decks are objectively fair decks?

[(nameless one)]

LOL its been 3 years and you guys still wanna ban Force of Will? Why?

And yes, Both LED and Show and Tell will get banned first before Force of Will does and I don't even see these two cards getting banned. They have their stints but it wasn't as format dominating as Survival of the Fittest.

[Julian23]

Unfair doesn't necessarily mean ban-worthy. Just like playing "fair" doesn't mean that nothing needs to be banned. It's just a strategical difference.

Fair usually refers to creature-centric strategies, interaction, trading 1:1 etc.
Unfair usually refers to strategies that plan on ending the game without giving the opponent much room for interaction, thus creating the feeling of having lost in an "unfair" way.

[ahg113]

That's an interesting opinion. Why do you think that Belcher, Dredge, TES, and SI/other LED decks are objectively fair decks?

I think these are fair decks due to them being easily disrupted, and failing at their original mission, decks full of the durdle and dying.

Having played against Dredge, appropriate GY hate (which is cheap and plentiful) cripples the deck. Surgical Extraction/Extripate, Relic of Prog., Crypt, Ooze, Nihil Spellbomb...

Playing Belcher- Thalia, discard, counterspells, Ethersworn Canonist, Teeg, Solidarity Confinement, and Leyline of Sanctity all make me cry. Thalia and Ethersworn less so than the others... but yeah... once I was "forced" to cast a Simian Grunts. I lost that game, hard.

I think these are all fair decks because they lose a lot. If they were, "I play, therefore I win," type decks, maybe they'd be unfair. It ain't fun being Wasteland locked by Aggro Loam or Maverick, yet those are fair decks? I thought LD wasn't fun so folks weren't supposed to do it...? WAAH!

LED shouldn't get banned because it's a playable deck- that's easily hated, under represented at winning tables, and gives cause for concern to other archetypes.

Banning Lotus Petals would be dumb. Said because of the temporary boost at expense of further development. It makes tempo matter. Slowing down "fast" decks to play the speed of "fairer" decks homogenizes the game, which is lame, hence dumb. When that player hits a cascade card 1st turn with a land and two quick mana cards, that's just optimization. Now, hypothetically, was that lotus petal or one of the spirit guides? And lotus petal can be countered. In a good world, there'd be a black spirit guide too.

Obvi,
What would the US gov't be with only two branches instead of three?

[Koby]

I think these are fair decks due to them being easily disrupted, and failing at their original mission, decks full of the durdle and dying.

I can disrupt any strategy with any card. Being able to do so in theory doesn't make the deck in question fair. Long.dec can be disrupted with a Force of Will; but that doesn't make Long.dec a fair deck. Instead it's the type of interaction that needs to address the strategy that makes decks fair/unfair.

Having played against Dredge, appropriate GY hate (which is cheap and plentiful) cripples the deck. Surgical Extraction/Extripate, Relic of Prog., Crypt, Ooze, Nihil Spellbomb...

Of these hate cards, only two can operate at instant speed with zero mana. Faerie Macabre and Surgical Extraction. Against an opening with LED and a draw spell, those are the only two that are effective. Dredge openers with LED are usually the ones that are unstoppable. That is not to say the deck is unstoppable, but when interaction is limited to: 'do you have this specific card before you get your first turn?' is what is defined as unfair.

Playing Belcher- Thalia, discard, counterspells, Ethersworn Canonist, Teeg, Solidarity Confinement, and Leyline of Sanctity all make me cry. Thalia and Ethersworn less so than the others... but yeah... once I was "forced" to cast a Simian Grunts. I lost that game, hard.

All but two of these "answers" require getting mana. Belcher especially is designed to prevent an opponent from getting a second turn. When a match is decided in as little as 4 turns between two players - is this a sign a deck is fair?

I think these are all fair decks because they lose a lot. If they were, "I play, therefore I win," type decks, maybe they'd be unfair. It ain't fun being Wasteland locked by Aggro Loam or Maverick, yet those are fair decks? I thought LD wasn't fun so folks weren't supposed to do it...? WAAH!

A deck that loses or wins isn't sufficient criteria for being a fair/unfair deck. As Julian23 mentioned above, it's the type of interaction required to prevent the strategy that deems it fair. Aggro Loam and Maverick examples show an interaction that is taking advantage of the fact that Legacy decks play non-basics. Belcher and TES take advantage that not every deck has meaningful ways to stop spells within the first two turns.

LED shouldn't get banned because it's a playable deck- that's easily hated, under represented at winning tables, and gives cause for concern to other archetypes.

<deck> is <quality> because <cards> loses to <answer>. Nice blanket statement there. Let me show you a set of Belcher decks that got Top 8 without a sideboard, or were played by complete degenerate drunks.

I want to make clear that I'm not advocating banning of LED. I am however, attempting to show that LED is on a relative short list of cards that comprises a series of decks that strain the limits of acceptable level of interaction. It may very well take one new spell to finally push LED from "tolerable" to "degenerate". Examine the effect that Faithless Looting had on the Dredge archetype to finally push it away from Manaless and non-LED builds.

[ahg113]

@Koby-

Unfortunately, a lot of decks are tuned so whomever wins the die roll is in the driver's seat. As I've read in the SCD of Gifts Ungiven, Legacy typically won't permit a player to durdle. Just as some decks strive to interact a lot (Maverick, U/R Delver) there should be balance with decks that don't want to interact at all (except for High Tide, those jerks...)

There's always FoW as an answer. I mean, I've asked what a better card against blue is than Sable Stag, and folks jumped down my throat that playing against a color is stupid (I get it...) and the best way to fight blue is play blue.

So there are options. Lack of options = unfair.

If LED were blue, would that make it more fair as Pyro/RE blast could act against it?

[funyun45]

LOL its been 3 years and you guys still wanna ban Force of Will? Why?

And yes, Both LED and Show and Tell will get banned first before Force of Will does and I don't even see these two cards getting banned. They have their stints but it wasn't as format dominating as Survival of the Fittest.

Who said anything about banning FoW?-- unless you're referring to some dumb shit posted pages ago.

[Lemnear]

If LED were blue people wouldn't run REB's to answer it but cry how overpowered Blue is.

Normal reaction today isn't metagaming but calling for the axe. That's all we have learned from Survival and Misstep. People refused to maindeck spell snare, enchantment removal or graveyard hate but spam forums with all their hatered and complaints.

Misstep was dodgeable by either overload 1cc spells (a 1cc zoo made #1 during misstep-era) or avoid strategies based on 1cc spells. But the tenor was that Misstep is so unfair because ist counters Lackey, Nacatl and Aether Vial and should counter instants/sorceries only, blaming it for the absence of Goblins as Tier 1 (hilarious as we can see). So misstep got banned before the meta adjusted once more.

Since then we had S&T as well as Brainstorm, Delver, Griselbrand, Time Spiral discussed for bannings. Half of the cards are affected by REB's but how many REB's do you see in decks that aren't named RUG that runs them for the mirror?

[TkDodo]

Misstep was dodgeable by either overload 1cc spells (a 1cc zoo made #1 during misstep-era) or avoid strategies based on 1cc spells. But the tenor was that Misstep is so unfair because ist counters Lackey, Nacatl and Aether Vial and should counter instants/sorceries only, blaming it for the absence of Goblins as Tier 1 (hilarious as we can see). So misstep got banned before the meta adjusted once more.

Misstep was bad because it introduced more variance to the game. As an UW control Player, I loved Misstep at first, but I played countless of games which revolved around who had more Missteps than the opponent. When a card is as omnipresent as MM, its not good for the metagame. And imagine it with Snapcaster Mage - that's ridiculous. It should stay where it is.
And regarding "avoiding playing strategies based on 1cc spells": Do you suggest playing Dragon Stompy? That's not even a real deck.

[damionblackgear]

And regarding "avoiding playing strategies based on 1cc spells": Do you suggest playing Dragon Stompy? That's not even a real deck.

Aggro-Loam would be better suited as a deck that dodges the 1 slot and is competitive.

[Malchar]

Misstep was bad because it introduced more variance to the game. As an UW control Player, I loved Misstep at first, but I played countless of games which revolved around who had more Missteps than the opponent. When a card is as omnipresent as MM, its not good for the metagame. And imagine it with Snapcaster Mage - that's ridiculous. It should stay where it is.

While there may be some merit to banning mental misstep, I still think that they acted way too quickly before the meta had a chance to bounce back from the initial hype. Everyone seems to write it off as just another unfair counterspell because it costs nothing, and because it counters itself, so the "appropriate" meta response is to have every deck running four of them. However, that logic doesn't hold up when you consider the example of force of will. It's also a free counter (force and misstep both have various advantages and disadvantages but overall they're quite similar). Also, most combo decks are running them as an answer to opposing control decks which use them as well. In fact, every aggro deck that can run them does so as well (merfolk, faerie stompy). Yet, everyone generally agrees that force of will is great for the meta.

The reality might have been that mental misstep actually was a great widening of the color pie, giving free (conditional) counters to every color. It might have been great, but we'll never know for sure because they didn't give it a chance. Instead, we're plagued with stronger and stronger storm and reanimator decks which rely on multiple insane 1-drops, and crazy aggro decks using delver. Believe me, if we had mental misstep, it would definitely hurt those annoyingly popular decks more than it would help them. Heck, goblins might even be competitive again since they'd have a fighting chance against storm (sure, misstep counters lackey and vial, but it's not like that hasn't been happening since the beginning of time anyway, at least this way the other player would be under the threat of counterspells as well). At worst, it would allow for more interactivity in matches, for example, even if a storm deck can use mental missteps of their own, at least it would give goblins some way to interact. I don't see how you can justify banning mental misstep without also wanting to ban force of will.

Overall I think that the meta is acceptable, but it would be better with mental misstep, and they at least could have given it a few more months for people to be able to adapt properly.

And regarding "avoiding playing strategies based on 1cc spells": Do you suggest playing Dragon Stompy? That's not even a real deck.

Since when is it better to have fewer viable decks? It seems like people just want to play their delver/reanimator/storm/1cc decks and not have anyone else be able to interact with them at all.

[Lemnear]

Since when is it better to have fewer viable decks? It seems like people just want to play their delver/reanimator/storm/1cc decks and not have anyone else be able to interact with them at all.

Loved that one




I feel at this Point i should mention that at the end players began running misstep INSTEAD of FoW because it does similar things (stopping turn 1 plays on the draw and removal if they tap out for creatures).

It might have Been able to become a cheap replacement for FoW but the overreaction to misstep-battles (yeah, Swords-misstep-misstep did happen like Jace-FoW-FoW) and the pet.dec-Syndrom (especially decks that only work if their turn 1 play resolves like Aether Vial, Goblins Lackey, Wild Nacatl, delver, exploration, ritual->belcher, whatever) killed it before

In the end people defended of their 50$ counterspells from a 0.50cent one and white/red/Green from having a weapon against Combo ... Well done ... Really made Legacy more accessable.


Own topic:

Anybody Share the Feeling that Thalia is just the beginning of new permanent Wide-Range-Combo-hate?

[Final Ritual]

Do you really want to play in a format with Snapcaster Mage + Mental Misstep

[joemauer]

Do you really want to play in a format with Snapcaster Mage + Mental Misstep

The real question was: do you want to play in a format with Mental Misstep?

The answer to that question was a resounding no for many players.

I am confused to why people would reminisce about Mental Misstep like it was the good old days of legacy.

[Final Ritual]

I'm in totally agreement with you Joe. I felt the format was terrible, I was bringing up the point to Lemnear about the interaction of Snapcaster and MM.