Would you quit Legacy if Brainstorm was banned?

[dsck]

Theres modern for you whom dont like brainstorm.

[Dragonslayer_90]

I wouldn't quit, but the format would be dramatically worse than it is now. Glass cannon combo would actually get better because decks now only have seven chances at a Force of Will rather than the ten they got on the play with Brainstorm. Banning Brainstorm wouldn't solve the main diversity-reducing problem of the format now, which is True-Name Nemesis. TNN decks would just shrug, run Preordain and Ponder instead of Brainstorm, and carry on as before.

Brainstorm isn't the culprit here. True-Name Nemesis is. TNN gave blue the best card ever in fair matchups. Legacy was fine before C13 was printed when the fair Brainstorm decks tended to have trouble with Jund, Death and Taxes, Goblins, and Maverick and those decks were real contenders. TNN throws that out the window and makes blue the best colour at everything. It only follows that Brainstorm, a heavily played blue card, is played more because of that.

Something I've already said and can't say enough. Stop hating on the wrong card guys.

[nedleeds]

Theres modern for you whom dont like brainstorm.

Sweet didn't have do wait long for that ... can I get a

"pillar of the format"
"go play standard"
"wouldn't be legacy without it"
"skill intensive"

to go with that tired meaningless response?

[Dragonslayer_90]

You know what would be more embarrassing? People stop showing up to events and banning a creature that was a 5-of in the top 8 of the GP. It's going to take a lot to get a ban if attendance continues to be great and there being a significant amount of different decks in the meta blue or not.

Just because TNN had a small presence in the Top 8 doesn't mean the card isn't warping the format in an unhealthy way enough for Wizards to consider banning it. The fact that all decks in the Top 8 were mostly decks that either don't care about TNN and/or built to beat TNN is disconcerting in addition to the fact that all but one of the decks of the Top 8 was blue.

[JPoJohnson]

2 Card combo (Show and derp mostly) would be impacted profoundly. Not only their ability to chimp together their 2 cards, but the inability to save one half from targeted discard. Dredge as a combo deck is a redudant pile looking for enabler -> dredger. Storm combo would also be impacted savagely, being unable to setup a winning turn whilst hiding a key card and also not being able to ancestral and flush extra tutors and lands to find more gas cards.

I was thinking more that Painter, Belcher, Elves, Dredge, etc would get stronger. Show and Tell, I feel, would get stronger since control would get that much weaker. If control/Midrange can't find the answers fast enough, they get trampled.

[DragoFireheart]

Sweet didn't have do wait long for that ... can I get a

"pillar of the format"
"go play standard"
"wouldn't be legacy without it"
"skill intensive"

to go with that tired meaningless response?

"BS is killing the format"
"Tarmogoyf is best blue card, ban him"
"SnT breaks the format, ban it"
"Delver breaks the format, ban it"

etc.

I was thinking more that Painter and dredge would get much stronger. Show and Tell, I feel, would get stronger since control would get that much weaker.

Combo decks would be more impacted than Control decks. I'd argue that losing Top would hurt control more than Brainstorm.

[Asthereal]

It's not the only argument not to ban Brainstorm.
There's another one. A very good one.
Want to know it?
Okay, here it goes:
"All arguments in favour of banning Brainstorm are incorrect."

LET'S GO!

A. Brainstorm is good? So what? We're not playing standard here. We want to play good cards. Don't fall for the same trick that killed Modern. And banning one good cards makes another card stand out. Shall we ban that one also, until there's no card to play anymore?
B. Brainstorm is played a lot? So what? People will always play the good cards. There's a reason we run Tarmogoyf over Grizzly Bears.
C. Banning Brainstorm would make the format healthier? No one can predict what would happen. Don't be arrogant and say you can. You just can't. Banning Brainstorm turns the whole format upside down, and there's no way of telling whether the format will become healthier or not.
D. There's too much blue being played, and Brainstorm is the reason. But if you ban Brainstorm, Ponder and Force of Will, another colour will become strongest, and everybody will switch to that colour. Now let's go ban the three cards from that colour that "warp" the format? There will always be a colour more popular than others. Using that as an argument to ban stuff is just flawed in itself.
E. Brainstorm makes combo too strong! Yes it does, but you don't want the opposite, believe me. Because combo without Brainstorm is Belcher. Or a TES/ANT variant that aims for the same thing: combo on turn one or just lose. That is MUCH more annoying to play against, because you can never predict whether you will win or lose against it. Brainstorm makes combo more consistent, but it also makes it a tad slower, giving you time to find answers. Giving you time to play a land so you can now cast Flusterstorm, instead of just praying they don't murder you turn 1 when you're on the draw. A format where you have to mull to Force of Will half the time isn't a healthy format at all.

Anything else someone wants to throw at me?

[DragoFireheart]

Here's an argument for banning Brainstorm:

It makes it too easy to cheat in tournaments by keeping an extra card ala Sleigh of Hand.

[wooboy11]

D. There's too much blue being played, and Brainstorm is the reason. But if you ban Brainstorm, Ponder and Force of Will, another colour will become strongest, and

Derp.

[Erdvermampfa]

These threads have always been the most entertaining on TheSource so I look forward on how it will turn out this round. But frankly, there's no sensible argument for NOT banning Brainstorm (which doesn't mean I advocate it). Pretty much every criteria of previous bans clearly apply to it (ubiquity, format-warping, whatever) so people have to resort to very irrational arguments which nedleeds has already listed. In the end, my guess is that there's a latent consensus that BS is obviously overpowered but that we like it that way.

[Zilla]

Since this seems to be the only argument anyone can come up with for why the card shouldn't be banned, let's get some numbers. If Brainstorm was banned, would you quit the format entirely?

Not a fan of this thread, being that it's based on a faulty premise. The assertion that this is the only viable argument in favor or Brainstorm is condescending at best and outright disingenuous at worst. Your position on the subject is rather obvious based on the way you've decided to present the topic. Other topics for which you might consider creating polls:

- Since all homosexuals are pedophiles, would you let one babysit your children?

- Since laziness is the only reason poor people exist, are you in favor of outlawing unemployment?

- Since racial minorities are the source of all crime in America, would you support an enforced curfew for non-whites?

- Why are Irish people drunk all the time?

[dsck]

Sweet didn't have do wait long for that ... can I get a

"pillar of the format"
"go play standard"
"wouldn't be legacy without it"
"skill intensive"

to go with that tired meaningless response?

pillar of the format
go play standard
wouldn't be legacy without it
skill intensive


Do you expect fresh replies when topic has words "ban" and "brainstorm"? The whole topic is more dry than a desert.

[Higgs]

I find the argument "Brainstorm reduces diversity" a flawed argument. If by this, one means that BS reduces strategic diversity they either don't understand the concept of strategy or they are delusional. If by diversity they mean the card pool or color saturation I agree with this. But the solution to this should not be to ban BS, but to shift the design mentality so that you can have synergistically whole decks that don't depend on BS-Fetchland efficiency to crush face (D&T and Elves comes to mind). For color saturation the biggest culprits for me are Delver and TNN. A green Delver and white TNN could have made the format much less disgusting in terms of blue saturation. If blue decks were penalized for playing goodstuff cards and threats which were not blue (less blue cards in the deck, less cards to pitch for FoW, even further stretched manabase), the format wouldn't have been this polarized even with Brainstorm IMO. OK we still have Tarmogoyf and SFM but when you also have SCM, Delver and TNN it's basically free to play blue in any tactical combination your heart desires.

[Asthereal]

Derp.

Ah, my apologies. I forgot about the fact that some here are unable to read an comprehend entire arguments.
Allow me to make a statement that even you will understand.

"Sometimes people advocate the banning of Brainstorm from Legacy, and it's okay to kill those people."

[Purgatory]

I would absolutely quit Legacy if Brainstorm was banned. It's my favourite card and the main reason I still play the format in lieu of Standard and Limited.

[Secretly.A.Bee]

I find the argument "Brainstorm reduces diversity" a flawed argument. If by this, one means that BS reduces strategic diversity they either don't understand the concept of strategy or they are delusional. If by diversity they mean the card pool or color saturation I agree with this. But the solution to this should not be to ban BS, but to shift the design mentality so that you can have synergistically whole decks that don't depend on BS-Fetchland efficiency to crush face (D&T and Elves comes to mind). For color saturation the biggest culprits for me are Delver and TNN. A green Delver and white TNN could have made the format much less disgusting in terms of blue saturation. If blue decks were penalized for playing goodstuff cards and threats which were not blue (less blue cards in the deck, less cards to pitch for FoW, even further stretched manabase), the format wouldn't have been this polarized even with Brainstorm IMO. OK we still have Tarmogoyf and SFM but when you also have SCM, Delver and TNN it's basically free to play blue in any tactical combination your heart desires.

+1

Thank you, I agree with this, I just couldn't figure out how to word it this elegantly.

@ IBA: I didn't vote in your dumb witchhunt. People need better than you to lead a productive discussion on these topics, your attitude is incorrect to set any kind of positive environment to discuss any topic, let alone the banning of Brainstorm.

-ABC

[btm10]

These threads have always been the most entertaining on TheSource so I look forward on how it will turn out this round. But frankly, there's no sensible argument for NOT banning Brainstorm (which doesn't mean I advocate it). Pretty much every criteria of previous bans clearly apply to it (ubiquity, format-warping, whatever) so people have to resort to very irrational arguments which nedleeds has already listed. In the end, my guess is that there's a latent consensus that BS is obviously overpowered but that we like it that way.

I think this is basically right, which is why the "pillar of the format" argument is important and shouldn't be blithely written off. No one doubts for a moment that Mishra's Workshop is format warping in Vintage, but proposing its restriction is a marginal position because Workshop decks ultimately keep the format more diverse and the overall restricted list shorter. If Workshop were restricted, a whole slew of restrictions would likely follow to keep other decks, paricularly combo, in check.

Among the things that differentiates Legacy from Vintage or Modern is the legality of 4-of Brainstorm, and the decks that 4-of Brainstorm enables. So in an important way (i.e., which decks are viable), banning Brainstorm will start an almost inexorable shift toward making Legacy more like Modern because bannings have already nerfed the replacements that are merely restricted in Vintage and the ongoing creature power creep will drag the format closer to Modern because newer creatures are consistently better than the older ones while the old library manipulation/card drawing spells keep finding themselves banned for making blue "too good".

[aluisiocsantos]

Just shuffle TNN back where it came from: Commander decks, and Jund will rock your Brainstorms any time of the day.

[menace13]

Meh. Play it or gtfo. Have you seen wotc signal any other message yet?

[trino]

I wouldn't quit legacy. I run 5 control decks that utilize blue, but only one of them uses brainstorm. I would just have to redesign the deck