[quote]But it's particularly irritating because whenever it comes to white and blue, Maro is happy to take away their weakness, give white better card draw than blue and give blue better removal than black.
Where in modern design does white (by itself) have better card draw than blue? Where does blue have better removal than black? I play Modern a lot and I don't see any of that.
I would echo this question. I, too, think Rapid Hybridization is a little iffy, but black's removal is still way better, in just about any format you look at. In standard black is the undisputed king of removal (Hero's Downfall, Bile Blight, Ultimate Price, Devour Flesh), and modern too (Dismember, Terminate, Abrupt Decay, Doom Blade) but to a lesser extent, with Red having Bolt and Anger, and white having Path). And I don't know what you mean at all about white card draw. I did a Gatherer search for all white cards in Modern that say "draw a card" and only got 48 results; most of them are multicolored and most of them only draw 1 card because they're a cantrip or because they cycle.
What does black have that's better than RH in...ever? I really can't think of anything.
I'll answer your question with a question: If Rapid Hybridization is so great, why does it see zero Modern play?
I'd rather face down a Path to Exile over a Rapid Hybridization, TBH. If you're using removal on anything weaker than a Hill Giant, you're doing it wrong. And of course, PTE is generally considered better than most black removal. Oh, and Maro's biggest problem with RH is that it destroys rather than exiling.
What does black have that's better than RH in...ever? I really can't think of anything.
Really? Let me check the top decks in Modern really quick...nope, no RH. How about common tier 2 decks? At least not in Modern, I don't follow Standard well enough to say for sure. At the point in the game when a 1 cmc removal spell is most valuable giving you opponent a 3/3 is probably going to hurt your game more than help it. In Modern I would play Victim of Night, Darkblast, or Tragic Slip over RH all day and night.
And I distinctly remember back when Puresteel Paladin came out, players were eager to add it to WU Caw-Blade...then Stoneforge and Jace got banned.
Maybe...I don't recall for sure, but it could have been a blip. The problem is you are saying that in a small Standard in which some people were talking about doing a thing equates to an untested white creature being "better card draw than blue". Puresteel Paladin is not better card draw than blue unless you limit the sample size unrealistically.
Agreed, and I think that development is where things like Delver getting pushed (though I honestly think it is fine) starts to irritate people.
But it's particularly irritating because whenever it comes to white and blue, Maro is happy to take away their weakness, give white better card draw than blue and give blue better removal than black.
Where in modern design does white (by itself) have better card draw than blue? Where does blue have better removal than black? I play Modern a lot and I don't see any of that.
I'd rather face down a Path to Exile over a Rapid Hybridization, TBH. If you're using removal on anything weaker than a Hill Giant, you're doing it wrong. And of course, PTE is generally considered better than most black removal. Oh, and Maro's biggest problem with RH is that it destroys rather than exiling.
So Lightning Bolt should always go to the face? Turning a 1 or 2 drop into better Wild Nacatl doesn't exactly slow down the aggro plan that much. Rapid Hybridization just isn't worth a card against the targets that you want 1 mana removal like Lightning Bolt for. The only targets you can even think about using Rapid Hybridization on, you would rather spend 2 mana for a Doom Blade.
Any color can use Dismember. And, come to think of it, any color can use dredge 3, dredge being the main reason anyone plays a dredge card anyway. LOL
But I still think it compensates a little too much.
The other issue I have is cards that are really gold cards but have hybrid mana costs.
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Card advantage is not the same thing as card draw. Something for 2B cannot be strictly worse than something for BBB or 3BB. If you're taking out Swords to Plowshares for Plummet, you're a fool. Stop doing these things!
I prefer a rigid color scheme, but not in the sense of only blue having counterspells, or only red having direct damage, etc... I think they should branch it out a bit, as long as it's kept flavorful. I think what should be rigid is the play style of the colors. I don't want to see a green burn deck, or a white discard deck, or blue mana ramp.
Dash Hope Is great, of course black is going to find a way to do something like this, it's extremely flavorful, and it has an equalizing drawback. It's nowhere near a blue counterspell because it can easily be stopped. Damnation Of course black needs this. It's all about creature destruction, and there is strong flavor. You're da**ing everything to oblivion. Limiting it to something lie, all creatures get -x-x until end of turn would just be making another typical black sweeper. Why make a reprint? Don't we have enough of those? High Tide Mana ramp for blue, this is fine because the mana isn't permanent, it only lasts for one turn. It's flavorful, blue is about intellect, take advantage of a natural occurrence to strengthen your spells. Hornet Sting This is weak, and the flavor isn't that great, but I like the idea. Keep it in typical green flavor and have that huge tree folk throw a boulder at the enemies face. Pognify / Rapid Hybridization Blue's version of creature removal? I don't really feel that from this card. Yeah it kills a creature but it's not really effective in doing so. Low mana cost is the only reason this is reasonably playable. Early game you're most likely giving your opponent a bigger threat to use against you I would be more inclined to use it on one of my own ETB creatures early game to give me a decent body to use. Either way it's flavorful, and fits blues color theme. Blue mage gets cornered by an intelligent enemy, so he turns it into a mindless beast and retreats to later take care of a lesser threat, or turns that now useless ally into a mindless beast to take care of or hold off the enemy for him while he developes a better battle plan. Brute Force This is great for red. Red is about speed, killing quick, this fits that scheme well, the flavor with this particular card isn't that great. But it's a good card type that red needs. Red is always getting haste trample cards. There is a certain kinship between green and red when it comes to big creatures blasting their way through. Give red a cheap bump every once in a while. Seething Song Mana ramp for red. Temporary, you're really only getting two from it. But it's big, and that is definitely in reds style, red mages style is go big or go home.
My point is that there is plenty of room to give each color a splash of aspects that the other colors usually only get. Just make sure to balance it, and don't change the overall playstyle of the colors.
I like a rigid color pie. My problem is I don't think WotC is using it too creatively. I would like Standard seasons to not just be RDW, U/x Control, and G/x ramp over and over again. Why not rattle the board a bit from time to time? This also ties into color pairs. Why does G/B almost always involve reanimation shenanigans? Why is U/W so inclined to a control strategy? Instead imagine a whacky season dominated by:
R/W Control
U/B Reanimator
G/B Aggro
U/R Aggro
W/G Control
I think even with a strict color pie, such things are possible, it's just a matter on putting a focus on cards that allow these colors to play off beat. For example, Red is very capable of board control within the color pie; it just needs such cards to be accented.
That's a fine goal. The issue is when you realize that what you are effectively doing is having the same colors but calling it red instead of blue. If you give blue a Thundermaw Hellkite, then it's just the new red.
^Not necessarily. Blue is very capable of being aggressive without looking like another color. Look at Mono-U Devotion as an example. The deck still feels very Blue and it didn't even have to break the color pie. That's what I want for other colors. I want to see a Red-heavy deck that plays for the late game. I want to see a Green/Black deck that's in-your-face and fast instead of graveyard-comboish. Most importantly, I want to see these things in ways that don't turn the color pie on its head.
I want to see a Red-heavy deck that plays for the late game. I want to see a Green/Black deck that's in-your-face and fast instead of graveyard-comboish. Most importantly, I want to see these things in ways that don't turn the color pie on its head.
Red-heavy late game deck: Defender deck in Conspiracy. Black-green aggro deck: Infect. There were also some black/green undying decks during Innistrad/RTR standard that used Strangleroot Geist, Dreg Mangler and other aggressive cards, if I recall correctly.
Building red control or blue aggro, or any other variation on a color's normal theme is possible, but it typically won't be as good as the colors that excel at it. It's an important part of keeping the colors' identities. If there's always a strong blue aggro deck, for example, it sends the wrong message to players about blue and also means the non-aggro blue cards suffer. That's why they'll allow for non-typical decks every once in awhile, but try not to have them appear all the time.
^I never played Conspiracy, so I'll have to take a look at that red defender deck. Sounds interesting!
Also, I am definitely NOT advocating to see these "script-switched" decks in every Standard season, just from time to time. I don't mind that G/B decks generally lean towards the GY and that Red decks are often aggressive, I'd just hate for that to be their only defining traits for Standard.
I totally think that the color pie should be strict.
It's the only reason Magic as we know it even exists. Every color should have their trademark strengths and weaknesses.
Blue being the only color to interact with the stack, black being the only one being able to discard cards from opponents, etc.
I cast Scapeshift and sacrifice eight lands to put 6 mountains and 2 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle into play. You take 36 damage and are just dead because you were not playing blue and had no way stop the spell
^Not necessarily. Blue is very capable of being aggressive without looking like another color. Look at Mono-U Devotion as an example. The deck still feels very Blue and it didn't even have to break the color pie. That's what I want for other colors. I want to see a Red-heavy deck that plays for the late game. I want to see a Green/Black deck that's in-your-face and fast instead of graveyard-comboish. Most importantly, I want to see these things in ways that don't turn the color pie on its head.
What I mean by "blue being the new red" is that switching the colors doesn't mean anything. Because if you want red to be able to play late game, why not just play blue (or another late game color)? Why do we need red to be able to play the late game when we already have a color that does it? You want green black to do something other than be graveyard based... but with 3 other colors and multiple other color combinations, you can go to any of those if you don't want something graveyard based. Do you just want this to happen for the sake of seeing something different?
Now, perhaps you might be saying that you want red to be able to play the late game, but still do all the things it does now. The issue with that is the less disctinct each of the colors are, the less they matter. If you give black the ability to easily kill enchantments, it gives you less of a reason to play the other colors. If you follow Standard for example, you see this actually play out in the way that Mono black devotion has tried splashing green because of how cards like Detention Sphere can be good against them. If we gave black a destroy target enchantment effect, then they wouldn't need to even splash the color.
the colour pie only applies to a particular setting. in that setting (for example), white might be the colour of "getting a bunch of 1/1 tokens"... whereas fast forward to a different entire block with a different setting, and BLUE might become the colour of "getting a bunch of 1/1 tokens" because of the new dynamic for that particular plane/world/story
it's all based on setting.
there is of course a general underpinning for everything (which i agree should be upheld). but it's general and vague, and over time can (and should) evolve.
the questions in the poll for this thread assume that there's one colour pie and you are either strictly adhering to it or breaking it. that's simply not the case, and the questions should reflect this.
it's kind of like asking someone "if they prefer their cars with two wheels or four". if you only assume that there's one type of vehicle (the question seems to think there are only cars), then you are either adhering to tradition or breaking it (and the whole discussion is pointless, like this thread). if you accept that there's lots of ways to go down a piece of tarmac, you begin to accept that 2 wheels can be acceptable in a different context (i.e. motorbike - and suddenly the discussion actually has some merit).
change the questions to reflect the inherent concept of the colour pie, rather than about ten questions asking essentially the same thing, and you might have a proper discussion.
Every color gets tokens. Setting (or more accurately, block) has to do with which specific mechanics are seen en masse, but has nothing to do with the color pie. For example, blue doesn't get haste, no matter the setting. That was the philosophy they used in New Phyrexia (every color had access to black's part of the pie) and it was a worse set for it in my opinion.
What I mean by "blue being the new red" is that switching the colors doesn't mean anything. Because if you want red to be able to play late game, why not just play blue (or another late game color)? Why do we need red to be able to play the late game when we already have a color that does it? You want green black to do something other than be graveyard based... but with 3 other colors and multiple other color combinations, you can go to any of those if you don't want something graveyard based. Do you just want this to happen for the sake of seeing something different?
Now, perhaps you might be saying that you want red to be able to play the late game, but still do all the things it does now. The issue with that is the less disctinct each of the colors are, the less they matter. If you give black the ability to easily kill enchantments, it gives you less of a reason to play the other colors. If you follow Standard for example, you see this actually play out in the way that Mono black devotion has tried splashing green because of how cards like Detention Sphere can be good against them. If we gave black a destroy target enchantment effect, then they wouldn't need to even splash the color.
I'm not asking for a Red deck that breaks the color pie, I'm asking for a late game Red deck. I get the impression that you think Red has a "never goes late" stamp, which is not the case. Red is the color that: Burns, has haste creatures, uses wienies, has rituals, occasionally blows up the world, threatens, has some ways to dig through the library, prefers attacking vs. defending, likes punisher effects, and has no ways to heal, counter spells, kill really big creatures efficiently, nor deal with enchantments. Late game play is not something Red is inherently incapable of doing.
Just imagine a Standard season where Red has: Flame Slash, Anger of the Gods, Magma Jet and Fated Conflagration for Scry, Chandra, Pyromaster for repeatable card "draw", a 4-5 cmc card that deals 4-5 damage to all creatures, and a 6+ drop bomb. All of a sudden, Red is a dominating creature control color, and it would only be using everything within its color pie to do so.
It's important for me to see decks like G/B Aggro or R/x control because it tests the limitations of the color pie. Hypothetically, if all we see in Standard for the next several years are RDW, U/W control, and G/B Reanimator, this is an indication that only part of the color pie is being tapped.
I think the color pie should be adhered to strictly and only violated when it make sense flavor wise. The problem is that flavor wise is a subjective term. Also once the color pie is violated it sets at precedence to violate it more, i.e a slippery slope. Take Polymorph for example. Because this exists it justifies Pognify, because of Pognify we can make Rapid Hybridization. The result is that Blue now has a one mana creature removal spell in a color that is supposed to have difficulty killing creatures.
I view the color pie as a whole, over the course of every magic card. Sure each color will have cards on the verge of color bleeding but when those out liners are used to justify the development of more of the same cards I have issues with that. Consider that Polymorgh cost 4 mana and Pognify/RH cost 1 mana is a huge problem.
Cards like Beast Within, Hornet Sting, and Chaos Warp I am ok with because the flavor of the card explains why it is in the color it is in. Hopefully these cards won't lead to more efficient versions of themselves.
As far as Protection from Color XXX. This ability should be done away with because they are very unbalanced how they affect the colors, as well as in how often they are printed. Protection from Red is made more than anything else and has a much larger affect on the games in which it is played, vs, Protection from White which is printed less and means nearly nothing. I think intimidate is a much cleaner way of doing protection from a color.
The real problem I have with the color pie is simply that white, blue, and green have a way to deal with every card type, while black and red do not.
Green used to have a simlar problem with removal until the fight mechanic was invented. I wish they would find a similar solution for red and black.
For red maybe something similar to capricious efreet. Or just make chaos warp modern legal, the random effect makes the flavor inherently red.
For black... I'm honestly not sure why they can't destroy enchantments? What is the flavor reason behind this exactly?
This is actually kind of an issue, because if every color cannot deal with artifacts and enchantments in some way, then artifacts and enchantments cannot be as good as they would otherwise be, or it would be unfair to the colors that cannot deal with them.
Since those are major card types, and not just niche effects, I find that a little troubling.
Edit: I suppose white and green cannot actually deal with planeswalkers, while black and red can. However, planeswalkers are a much rarer card type than say, enchantments, and every color can at least just kill planeswalkers with creatures so it's not as big of an issue in my mind.
The real problem I have with the color pie is simply that white, blue, and green have a way to deal with every card type, while black and red do not.
Green used to have a simlar problem with removal until the fight mechanic was invented. I wish they would find a similar solution for red and black.
For red maybe something similar to capricious efreet. Or just make chaos warp modern legal, the random effect makes the flavor inherently red.
For black... I'm honestly not sure why they can't destroy enchantments? What is the flavor reason behind this exactly?
This is actually kind of an issue, because if every color cannot deal with artifacts and enchantments in some way, then artifacts and enchantments cannot be as good as they would otherwise be, or it would be unfair to the colors that cannot deal with them.
Since those are major card types, and not just niche effects, I find that a little troubling.
Edit: I suppose white and green cannot actually deal with planeswalkers, while black and red can. However, planeswalkers are a much rarer card type than say, enchantments, and every color can at least just kill planeswalkers with creatures so it's not as big of an issue in my mind.
A few things
Blue cannot deal with anything permanently except with their counterspells. They only have bounce to deal with stuff that hit the board.
Black cannot deal with artifacts and enchantments since they use death magic and you cannot kill something that is not living.
Red can deal with artifacts because they can smash them them but enchantments are not something physical and therefore can't be touched by red.
The issue that you mention is not an issue at all actually. There are balanced by that.
Red is the fastest color. They can kill you or before those enchantments or artifacts of yours matter.
Black is already the all-round color. They are the best at killing creatures, they have card draw, the exclusively have discard which can take any card out of your hand. Give them removal for artifacts and enchantments too and you basically have a color that can do anything. It's slice of the color pie would be way to big compared to the other colors.
Personally I think your example of Path to Exile is of f and that makes me disagree with you. I'm pretty sure that exile was the first card to bring in exiling and that's a white card. So exiling i ab****ely a white thing (banisher priest, o-ring, etc..) and that i gives the guy a free land..
personally I love the color restrictions because it harpens back to where the spells come from. The land! It was a huge discoveri in the Ice Age stories when that guy realized that each land was once a different land, and the whole concept of lands producing the power that casts the spells is something that almost seems like it FORCES spell restriction. Without it Magic wouldn't be Magic.
The real problem I have with the color pie is simply that white, blue, and green have a way to deal with every card type, while black and red do not.
Green used to have a simlar problem with removal until the fight mechanic was invented. I wish they would find a similar solution for red and black.
For red maybe something similar to capricious efreet. Or just make chaos warp modern legal, the random effect makes the flavor inherently red.
For black... I'm honestly not sure why they can't destroy enchantments? What is the flavor reason behind this exactly?
This is actually kind of an issue, because if every color cannot deal with artifacts and enchantments in some way, then artifacts and enchantments cannot be as good as they would otherwise be, or it would be unfair to the colors that cannot deal with them.
Since those are major card types, and not just niche effects, I find that a little troubling.
Edit: I suppose white and green cannot actually deal with planeswalkers, while black and red can. However, planeswalkers are a much rarer card type than say, enchantments, and every color can at least just kill planeswalkers with creatures so it's not as big of an issue in my mind.
A few things
Blue cannot deal with anything permanently except with their counterspells. They only have bounce to deal with stuff that hit the board.
Black cannot deal with artifacts and enchantments since they use death magic and you cannot kill something that is not living.
Red can deal with artifacts because they can smash them them but enchantments are not something physical and therefore can't be touched by red.
The issue that you mention is not an issue at all actually. There are balanced by that.
Red is the fastest color. They can kill you or before those enchantments or artifacts of yours matter.
Black is already the all-round color. They are the best at killing creatures, they have card draw, the exclusively have discard which can take any card out of your hand. Give them removal for artifacts and enchantments too and you basically have a color that can do anything. It's slice of the color pie would be way to big compared to the other colors.
First off, I'm sure you can find a flavorful way for black and red to deal with their weaknesses. Chaos warp is actually a great example of this, as mentioned. I am arguing from a purely mechanical perspective. So your saying that balance is found for flavor reasons rings pretty hollow.
So I'll argue pure mechanics.
Blue's bounce mechanic can deal with every permanent type. It doesn't matter if it doesn't solve them forever, it solves them at all.
As for red being the fastest color... so? Does this justify red just folding to certain enchantments (such as leyline of sanctity) just because they have no answers?
I don't understand your argument for black. Mono-Blue can already deal with anything, and mono-white can deal with everything. Outside of the low card pool of standard how exactly is mono-black, which has a lot of trouble against just about any good artifact or enchantment, way too good in comparison?
alright, lets take the Leyline approach: assuming no opening hand, Red just kills you before you can cast it, or if you do manage to cast it, or its that big of a threat to you in the meta, why don't you splash green for enchantment removal? After all, how hard is that? Why should every color deal with everything?
just because you can justify something flavor wise, doesn't make it a good idea. After all, I can justify a Red Counterspell by making the flavor you threatening them not to cast it. that doesn't mean that red should get counterspells, because Red just doesn't think like that. Why should Red, the color of freedom, restrict the opponent? Red wants to burn and kill. Red can get artifacts, because those are tangible things that red can FEEL. but, Enchantments cannot be felt, physically, and Red, even though it feels like it COULD learn to deal with them, decides "screw it. kill 'em more."
Green wants a contest of strength, if anything, so Green isn't going to counter things, either, because that is a contest of wills. But, Green also abhors anything unnatural, and wants a contest of strength unfettered by such, so it will destroy such things, it doesn't necessarily understand enchantments and artifacts, but it understands either the thing being enchanted or the materials that are in the artifact, and can return them to their natural state.
A note on Green not getting flying as much: Green's domain is nature, more specifically, the forest. the dominion of the sky (clouds, wind, and such) belongs to Blue. People often forget that Blue is also the color of wind as well as water.
a good (sort of) comparison would be between Zeus and Artemis. while Artemis is the Goddess of the Wild, Zeus is the God of Storms and the Sky. so, while Artemis DOES technically have dominion over the birds, they more appropriately fall under Zeus's domain, because of where they spend most of their time.
part of Green's hatred of Flying might come from the fact that it feels like it SHOULD control them, they ARE natural, and Green will destroy them because they don't follow the "natural" order and follow Green.
You know, we could totally see Control Red with Dash Hopes or Parallectric feedback type effects; Red isn't going to counter you, but it's going to hurt like hell if he doesn't want you to do something. Suppose a sort of RR: The controller of target Instant spell takes 5 damage, or similar. It would control just as well as any actual hard counter, but Red would still have to worry about whatever the heck just got cast.
Mind you, it would have to be balanced just right, because that sort of effect could get hella OP if put in the same standard as Goblin Guide, for instance.
As for Black not having good enchantment removal, I always thought the point of Black was that it could do everything just as well as any other color..... As long as your willing to pay the price. For this reason, I wouldn't mind seeing cards that destroyed any type of permanent in black, but just like Vendetta there is a price to be paid. I'm honestly surprised that Black isn't as suicidal as it should be, imho.
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Oath of the Gatewatch; the set that caused the competitive community to freak out over Basic Lands.
alright, lets take the Leyline approach: assuming no opening hand, Red just kills you before you can cast it, or if you do manage to cast it, or its that big of a threat to you in the meta, why don't you splash green for enchantment removal? After all, how hard is that? Why should every color deal with everything?
The point isn't how hard it is to splash another color. The point is that white, blue, and green can deal with every permanent type, and red and black cannot. I mean, why shouldn't every color be able to deal with every major permanent type? (creature, artifact, enchantment)? Or, more specifically, why should some be allowed to, but not others?
just because you can justify something flavor wise, doesn't make it a good idea. After all, I can justify a Red Counterspell by making the flavor you threatening them not to cast it. that doesn't mean that red should get counterspells, because Red just doesn't think like that. Why should Red, the color of freedom, restrict the opponent? Red wants to burn and kill. Red can get artifacts, because those are tangible things that red can FEEL. but, Enchantments cannot be felt, physically, and Red, even though it feels like it COULD learn to deal with them, decides "screw it. kill 'em more."
Red can copy spells, as well as redirecting, and applying chaos to the stack. In these parameters, red can already essentially counter spells in a way that is completely in line with it's flavor.
Again, chaos warp exists already and is perfectly in line with how red deals with intangible things. Also, I already specified I was arguing mechanics, so what is this?
Green wants a contest of strength, if anything, so Green isn't going to counter things, either, because that is a contest of wills. But, Green also abhors anything unnatural, and wants a contest of strength unfettered by such, so it will destroy such things, it doesn't necessarily understand enchantments and artifacts, but it understands either the thing being enchanted or the materials that are in the artifact, and can return them to their natural state.
I mean, your argument at this point pretty much just sounds made up. I mean, read your own quote about justifying things flavor-wise, that's all your doing here, there's no real arguments?
A note on Green not getting flying as much: Green's domain is nature, more specifically, the forest. the dominion of the sky (clouds, wind, and such) belongs to Blue. People often forget that Blue is also the color of wind as well as water.
a good (sort of) comparison would be between Zeus and Artemis. while Artemis is the Goddess of the Wild, Zeus is the God of Storms and the Sky. so, while Artemis DOES technically have dominion over the birds, they more appropriately fall under Zeus's domain, because of where they spend most of their time.
part of Green's hatred of Flying might come from the fact that it feels like it SHOULD control them, they ARE natural, and Green will destroy them because they don't follow the "natural" order and follow Green.
This part of your post is in reply to someone else's discussion, so I'll leave it be.
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I would echo this question. I, too, think Rapid Hybridization is a little iffy, but black's removal is still way better, in just about any format you look at. In standard black is the undisputed king of removal (Hero's Downfall, Bile Blight, Ultimate Price, Devour Flesh), and modern too (Dismember, Terminate, Abrupt Decay, Doom Blade) but to a lesser extent, with Red having Bolt and Anger, and white having Path). And I don't know what you mean at all about white card draw. I did a Gatherer search for all white cards in Modern that say "draw a card" and only got 48 results; most of them are multicolored and most of them only draw 1 card because they're a cantrip or because they cycle.
I'll answer your question with a question: If Rapid Hybridization is so great, why does it see zero Modern play?
Modern: GW Hatebears/midrange, WGU Knightfall/evolution midrange stuff
Standard: nope
Legacy: W Death & Taxes
EDH (not Commander!): W Avacyn, Angel of Hope, GR Ruric Thar, the Unbowed, WGB Anafenza, the Foremost, WU Hanna, Ship's Navigator
Maybe...I don't recall for sure, but it could have been a blip. The problem is you are saying that in a small Standard in which some people were talking about doing a thing equates to an untested white creature being "better card draw than blue". Puresteel Paladin is not better card draw than blue unless you limit the sample size unrealistically.
Reprint Opt for Modern!!
FREE DIG THOROUGH TIME!
PLAY MORE ROUGE DECKS!
So Lightning Bolt should always go to the face? Turning a 1 or 2 drop into better Wild Nacatl doesn't exactly slow down the aggro plan that much. Rapid Hybridization just isn't worth a card against the targets that you want 1 mana removal like Lightning Bolt for. The only targets you can even think about using Rapid Hybridization on, you would rather spend 2 mana for a Doom Blade.
Disfigure, Darkblast, Dismember, Doom Blade, Murder. Rapid Hybridization is a terrible removal spell.
People were eager to add it? That's why it didn't show up in top 8 placing caw blade decks? People were eagerly adding Phyrexian Metamorph, Dismember, Batterskull, and Sword of War and Peace, but I don't see any Puresteel Paladins. Even Gitaxian Probe and Mental Misstep were being tested out while Puresteel was completely ignored.
But I still think it compensates a little too much.
The other issue I have is cards that are really gold cards but have hybrid mana costs.
On phasing:
Dash Hope Is great, of course black is going to find a way to do something like this, it's extremely flavorful, and it has an equalizing drawback. It's nowhere near a blue counterspell because it can easily be stopped.
Damnation Of course black needs this. It's all about creature destruction, and there is strong flavor. You're da**ing everything to oblivion. Limiting it to something lie, all creatures get -x-x until end of turn would just be making another typical black sweeper. Why make a reprint? Don't we have enough of those?
High Tide Mana ramp for blue, this is fine because the mana isn't permanent, it only lasts for one turn. It's flavorful, blue is about intellect, take advantage of a natural occurrence to strengthen your spells.
Hornet Sting This is weak, and the flavor isn't that great, but I like the idea. Keep it in typical green flavor and have that huge tree folk throw a boulder at the enemies face.
Pognify / Rapid Hybridization Blue's version of creature removal? I don't really feel that from this card. Yeah it kills a creature but it's not really effective in doing so. Low mana cost is the only reason this is reasonably playable. Early game you're most likely giving your opponent a bigger threat to use against you I would be more inclined to use it on one of my own ETB creatures early game to give me a decent body to use. Either way it's flavorful, and fits blues color theme. Blue mage gets cornered by an intelligent enemy, so he turns it into a mindless beast and retreats to later take care of a lesser threat, or turns that now useless ally into a mindless beast to take care of or hold off the enemy for him while he developes a better battle plan.
Brute Force This is great for red. Red is about speed, killing quick, this fits that scheme well, the flavor with this particular card isn't that great. But it's a good card type that red needs. Red is always getting haste trample cards. There is a certain kinship between green and red when it comes to big creatures blasting their way through. Give red a cheap bump every once in a while.
Seething Song Mana ramp for red. Temporary, you're really only getting two from it. But it's big, and that is definitely in reds style, red mages style is go big or go home.
My point is that there is plenty of room to give each color a splash of aspects that the other colors usually only get. Just make sure to balance it, and don't change the overall playstyle of the colors.
That's a fine goal. The issue is when you realize that what you are effectively doing is having the same colors but calling it red instead of blue. If you give blue a Thundermaw Hellkite, then it's just the new red.
Building red control or blue aggro, or any other variation on a color's normal theme is possible, but it typically won't be as good as the colors that excel at it. It's an important part of keeping the colors' identities. If there's always a strong blue aggro deck, for example, it sends the wrong message to players about blue and also means the non-aggro blue cards suffer. That's why they'll allow for non-typical decks every once in awhile, but try not to have them appear all the time.
Also, I am definitely NOT advocating to see these "script-switched" decks in every Standard season, just from time to time. I don't mind that G/B decks generally lean towards the GY and that Red decks are often aggressive, I'd just hate for that to be their only defining traits for Standard.
It's the only reason Magic as we know it even exists. Every color should have their trademark strengths and weaknesses.
Blue being the only color to interact with the stack, black being the only one being able to discard cards from opponents, etc.
Any color can interact with the stack. For instance, you play Boom Blade on my Solider of the Pantheon. While it is on the stack, I play Brave the Elements and choose black. You play Lightning Strike on my Elvish Mystic. While it is on the stack, I play Giant Growth. You get the idea.
I cast Scapeshift and sacrifice eight lands to put 6 mountains and 2 Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle into play. You take 36 damage and are just dead because you were not playing blue and had no way stop the spell
What I mean by "blue being the new red" is that switching the colors doesn't mean anything. Because if you want red to be able to play late game, why not just play blue (or another late game color)? Why do we need red to be able to play the late game when we already have a color that does it? You want green black to do something other than be graveyard based... but with 3 other colors and multiple other color combinations, you can go to any of those if you don't want something graveyard based. Do you just want this to happen for the sake of seeing something different?
Now, perhaps you might be saying that you want red to be able to play the late game, but still do all the things it does now. The issue with that is the less disctinct each of the colors are, the less they matter. If you give black the ability to easily kill enchantments, it gives you less of a reason to play the other colors. If you follow Standard for example, you see this actually play out in the way that Mono black devotion has tried splashing green because of how cards like Detention Sphere can be good against them. If we gave black a destroy target enchantment effect, then they wouldn't need to even splash the color.
a BIG problem.
the colour pie only applies to a particular setting. in that setting (for example), white might be the colour of "getting a bunch of 1/1 tokens"... whereas fast forward to a different entire block with a different setting, and BLUE might become the colour of "getting a bunch of 1/1 tokens" because of the new dynamic for that particular plane/world/story
it's all based on setting.
there is of course a general underpinning for everything (which i agree should be upheld). but it's general and vague, and over time can (and should) evolve.
the questions in the poll for this thread assume that there's one colour pie and you are either strictly adhering to it or breaking it. that's simply not the case, and the questions should reflect this.
it's kind of like asking someone "if they prefer their cars with two wheels or four". if you only assume that there's one type of vehicle (the question seems to think there are only cars), then you are either adhering to tradition or breaking it (and the whole discussion is pointless, like this thread). if you accept that there's lots of ways to go down a piece of tarmac, you begin to accept that 2 wheels can be acceptable in a different context (i.e. motorbike - and suddenly the discussion actually has some merit).
change the questions to reflect the inherent concept of the colour pie, rather than about ten questions asking essentially the same thing, and you might have a proper discussion.
Just imagine a Standard season where Red has: Flame Slash, Anger of the Gods, Magma Jet and Fated Conflagration for Scry, Chandra, Pyromaster for repeatable card "draw", a 4-5 cmc card that deals 4-5 damage to all creatures, and a 6+ drop bomb. All of a sudden, Red is a dominating creature control color, and it would only be using everything within its color pie to do so.
It's important for me to see decks like G/B Aggro or R/x control because it tests the limitations of the color pie. Hypothetically, if all we see in Standard for the next several years are RDW, U/W control, and G/B Reanimator, this is an indication that only part of the color pie is being tapped.
Something to the effect of Ire of Kaminari, but for Red Instants/Sorceries in general?
I view the color pie as a whole, over the course of every magic card. Sure each color will have cards on the verge of color bleeding but when those out liners are used to justify the development of more of the same cards I have issues with that. Consider that Polymorgh cost 4 mana and Pognify/RH cost 1 mana is a huge problem.
Cards like Beast Within, Hornet Sting, and Chaos Warp I am ok with because the flavor of the card explains why it is in the color it is in. Hopefully these cards won't lead to more efficient versions of themselves.
As far as Protection from Color XXX. This ability should be done away with because they are very unbalanced how they affect the colors, as well as in how often they are printed. Protection from Red is made more than anything else and has a much larger affect on the games in which it is played, vs, Protection from White which is printed less and means nearly nothing. I think intimidate is a much cleaner way of doing protection from a color.
Green used to have a simlar problem with removal until the fight mechanic was invented. I wish they would find a similar solution for red and black.
For red maybe something similar to capricious efreet. Or just make chaos warp modern legal, the random effect makes the flavor inherently red.
For black... I'm honestly not sure why they can't destroy enchantments? What is the flavor reason behind this exactly?
This is actually kind of an issue, because if every color cannot deal with artifacts and enchantments in some way, then artifacts and enchantments cannot be as good as they would otherwise be, or it would be unfair to the colors that cannot deal with them.
Since those are major card types, and not just niche effects, I find that a little troubling.
Edit: I suppose white and green cannot actually deal with planeswalkers, while black and red can. However, planeswalkers are a much rarer card type than say, enchantments, and every color can at least just kill planeswalkers with creatures so it's not as big of an issue in my mind.
A few things
Blue cannot deal with anything permanently except with their counterspells. They only have bounce to deal with stuff that hit the board.
Black cannot deal with artifacts and enchantments since they use death magic and you cannot kill something that is not living.
Red can deal with artifacts because they can smash them them but enchantments are not something physical and therefore can't be touched by red.
The issue that you mention is not an issue at all actually. There are balanced by that.
Red is the fastest color. They can kill you or before those enchantments or artifacts of yours matter.
Black is already the all-round color. They are the best at killing creatures, they have card draw, the exclusively have discard which can take any card out of your hand. Give them removal for artifacts and enchantments too and you basically have a color that can do anything. It's slice of the color pie would be way to big compared to the other colors.
personally I love the color restrictions because it harpens back to where the spells come from. The land! It was a huge discoveri in the Ice Age stories when that guy realized that each land was once a different land, and the whole concept of lands producing the power that casts the spells is something that almost seems like it FORCES spell restriction. Without it Magic wouldn't be Magic.
First off, I'm sure you can find a flavorful way for black and red to deal with their weaknesses. Chaos warp is actually a great example of this, as mentioned. I am arguing from a purely mechanical perspective. So your saying that balance is found for flavor reasons rings pretty hollow.
So I'll argue pure mechanics.
Blue's bounce mechanic can deal with every permanent type. It doesn't matter if it doesn't solve them forever, it solves them at all.
As for red being the fastest color... so? Does this justify red just folding to certain enchantments (such as leyline of sanctity) just because they have no answers?
I don't understand your argument for black. Mono-Blue can already deal with anything, and mono-white can deal with everything. Outside of the low card pool of standard how exactly is mono-black, which has a lot of trouble against just about any good artifact or enchantment, way too good in comparison?
just because you can justify something flavor wise, doesn't make it a good idea. After all, I can justify a Red Counterspell by making the flavor you threatening them not to cast it. that doesn't mean that red should get counterspells, because Red just doesn't think like that. Why should Red, the color of freedom, restrict the opponent? Red wants to burn and kill. Red can get artifacts, because those are tangible things that red can FEEL. but, Enchantments cannot be felt, physically, and Red, even though it feels like it COULD learn to deal with them, decides "screw it. kill 'em more."
Green wants a contest of strength, if anything, so Green isn't going to counter things, either, because that is a contest of wills. But, Green also abhors anything unnatural, and wants a contest of strength unfettered by such, so it will destroy such things, it doesn't necessarily understand enchantments and artifacts, but it understands either the thing being enchanted or the materials that are in the artifact, and can return them to their natural state.
A note on Green not getting flying as much: Green's domain is nature, more specifically, the forest. the dominion of the sky (clouds, wind, and such) belongs to Blue. People often forget that Blue is also the color of wind as well as water.
a good (sort of) comparison would be between Zeus and Artemis. while Artemis is the Goddess of the Wild, Zeus is the God of Storms and the Sky. so, while Artemis DOES technically have dominion over the birds, they more appropriately fall under Zeus's domain, because of where they spend most of their time.
part of Green's hatred of Flying might come from the fact that it feels like it SHOULD control them, they ARE natural, and Green will destroy them because they don't follow the "natural" order and follow Green.
"normality is a paved road: it is comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow there."
-Vincent Van Gogh
things I hate:
1. lists.
b. inconsistencies.
V. incorrect math.
2. quotes in signatures
III: irony.
there are two kinds of people in the world: those who can make reasonable conclusions based on conjecture.
Mind you, it would have to be balanced just right, because that sort of effect could get hella OP if put in the same standard as Goblin Guide, for instance.
As for Black not having good enchantment removal, I always thought the point of Black was that it could do everything just as well as any other color..... As long as your willing to pay the price. For this reason, I wouldn't mind seeing cards that destroyed any type of permanent in black, but just like Vendetta there is a price to be paid. I'm honestly surprised that Black isn't as suicidal as it should be, imho.
The point isn't how hard it is to splash another color. The point is that white, blue, and green can deal with every permanent type, and red and black cannot. I mean, why shouldn't every color be able to deal with every major permanent type? (creature, artifact, enchantment)? Or, more specifically, why should some be allowed to, but not others?
Red can copy spells, as well as redirecting, and applying chaos to the stack. In these parameters, red can already essentially counter spells in a way that is completely in line with it's flavor.
Again, chaos warp exists already and is perfectly in line with how red deals with intangible things. Also, I already specified I was arguing mechanics, so what is this?
I mean, your argument at this point pretty much just sounds made up. I mean, read your own quote about justifying things flavor-wise, that's all your doing here, there's no real arguments?
This part of your post is in reply to someone else's discussion, so I'll leave it be.