You've done so much testing in the last 3 hours that you know what the format is going to look like already? Bravo sir.
Zoo could help keep Pod in check as it can pressure their life total fast enough to force them into plays that slow the deck down and Bolt to kill the Melira. Voice of Resurgence and Kitchen Finks are going to be very important in that match up. If Zoo splashed blue like it did at PT Philly, it will also have some counterspells and Bant Charm for Pods.
If a Faeries deck shows up, that will also help keep Pod in check as it offers reasonable counterspells to stop the combo half of the deck. Again, Voice is going to be important.
Pod will probably the deck to beat, but there will tools to beat it. You can also just go bigger and play Tron which has always had a reasonable match up.
Wow. So according to you a modern format based around pod, zoo, faeries, and tron is a diverse format? Is some kind of improvement or holy grail? Is that just going back to moderns inception.
The argument for nacatl is flawed. They banned it to promote diverse aggro decks. Because they failed now they are going back to play zoo or lose. Do you seriously beleive there is a alternative aggro deck choice?
Banning drs for "format diversity" is wotc bull****. Goyf has needed a ban since the very start. It way more format warping than drs was. Goyf overshadows every green creature , displaces every other beatstick and brickwalls almost all attacking based wincons.
Want more diversity wotc? Have a look at how fetches have reduced diversity. There are too few tier 1 decks of one or two colors. There is zero punisher cards for greedy manabases.
On top of ever increasing card prices. On top of wotc policy of artificial scarcity. On top of wotc blatant capitulation to scg. I will probably throw the game away after this season. Its just becoming a ****stir. Wotc is run by degenerates who have no idea about large scale inclusive games. Look at COD series league of legends etc they put magic to shame. They are more accessible AND they make bigger profits than mtg ever has.
DRS getting the banhammer is a little undeserving, but hey it was overpowered and broke the color pie for black, and maybe it'll come back in the not to distant future like Wild Nacatl did.
BB on the other hand...well let me just say I'll be maindecking one more Spell Snare than before, and those Wear/Tear from the sidebord are going to be getting a workout.
And goyf provides way too high a p/t for its mana cost.
And lightning bolt provides too much reach for its mana cost.
And delver.....
All the cards you listed are unidimensional.
Goyf is a beat stick.
Lightning Bolt is a burn spell.
Delver is a beat stick.
DRS is a 1-mana utility tool. It gains you life, it reduces the oponnent's life, and it accelerates your mana, all the while interacting with another zone within the game that only benefits its controller. That is too much utility for a 1 drop. Had DRS been a 2 drop, or only contained 2 abilities instead of 3, it probably would be considered "innocent" enough to avoid banning. However, it would definitely see a lot less play had it been that way.
And goyf provides way too high a p/t for its mana cost.
And lightning bolt provides too much reach for its mana cost.
And delver.....
Now, I don't really care much here or there about the banning, but you're being a little bit intentionally obtuse on the subject. Those all do one thing very well, and extremely well for their cost. They are all at least somewhat narrow (Goyf is just a big creature, albeit an absurdly good big creature, Delver is just a creature that needs a certain type of deck to really work well, lightning bolt is fantastic burn, but it's just fantastic burn). Deathrite Shaman, on the other hand, has a massive range of utility, and has virtually no narrow scope to his abilities. He works well just by the game moving forward. And he is incredibly strong and incredibly versatile at what he does.
Now, I'm not agreeing with the banning, as I could care less, but let's at least be honest with ourselves here and not make ridiculous and absurd analogies. DRS provides too much bang for the buck, and probably should never have seen the light of day as it is. But the same goes for many cards (Snapcaster being another recent prime example). Whether this means it's ban-worthy or not is a different discussion, but the point is that anyone who says it isn't a bit overmuch of a card is delusional. It's blatantly and obviously overpowered. It also hoses a few strategies pretty hard, and provides a hard clock at the same time. And stabalizes against aggressive decks. I can understand the banning in that light, as it does pretty much everything you want it to do, and effciently at that. It's not the most degenerate card in existence, but considering how effectively it does everything it's not nonsensical.
I honestly saw the DRS ban coming from far away, I've been saying it was a high possibility for the last year or so. I don't play modern or legacy, but it's utility is incredibly high for a one drop that it's no wonder that it happened.
Now, I don't really care much here or there about the banning, but you're being a little bit intentionally obtuse on the subject. Those all do one thing very well, and extremely well for their cost. They are all at least somewhat narrow (Goyf is just a big creature, albeit an absurdly good big creature, Delver is just a creature that needs a certain type of deck to really work well, lightning bolt is fantastic burn, but it's just fantastic burn). Deathrite Shaman, on the other hand, has a massive range of utility, and has virtually no narrow scope to his abilities. He works well just by the game moving forward. And he is incredibly strong and incredibly versatile at what he does.
Now, I'm not agreeing with the banning, as I could care less, but let's at least be honest with ourselves here and not make ridiculous and absurd analogies. DRS provides too much bang for the buck, and probably should never have seen the light of day as it is. But the same goes for many cards (Snapcaster being another recent prime example). Whether this means it's ban-worthy or not is a different discussion, but the point is that anyone who says it isn't a bit overmuch of a card is delusional. It's blatantly and obviously overpowered. It also hoses a few strategies pretty hard, and provides a hard clock at the same time. And stabalizes against aggressive decks. I can understand the banning in that light, as it does pretty much everything you want it to do, and effciently at that. It's not the most degenerate card in existence, but considering how effectively it does everything it's not nonsensical.
Heaven forbid good cards get played. Drs is heavily conditional. It needs x card type in the gy to get a particular effect. The point is to give other colors strong cards not take this away. It basically made burn viable but now burn will not be b/r and will not be viable.
If drs is "overpowered" then every planswalker card is basically broken. I hate planeswalkers because they provide way too much utility. But you drs haters never talk about banning cards that can go off immediately the turn they are played. Can protect themselves. Have very few answers. And basically have a win the game clause printed on them. Its just ridiculous and petty.
And your characterisation of cards like delver are just absurd. Your talking about a card that singlehandedly shapes legacy. "Just a beater"? Yeah I will leave it to others to judge the naivety of your remarks.
I will admit up front that I'm only trying to get into modern at the moment, though I've been observing the format from the outskirts by watching coverage.
In any case, I find the complaints in here peculiar. Deathrite Shaman was only printed a year and a half ago. Jund was a dominant archetype back then already. People also complained when they banned Bloodbraid Elf, and that didn't inhibit Jund all too much.
The point is banning the Elf made Jund unable to win a GP (while it was all over the place before the ban). So, why punish a deck that's not winning, the one deck that includes a main deck answer to Pod, that is instead performing quite well?
That is why Hearthstone will always be a better balanced game. It is full digital, so them can change the cost and P/T every time it is need to balance the cards.
Oh men, if Wizard could just change DRS to be 2 manas or 1/1 or whatever...
Anyway... it is the price you pay to be real.. you will never be able to play Heathstone with your friends at kitchen table.
I'm SO SICK of the "too strong for Standard" argument. It's the new "Dies to removal". We can have a two mana 4/4 with a zillion abilities, but we can't just have Accumulated Knowledge. Makes sense.
Heaven forbid good cards get played. Drs is heavily conditional. It needs x card type in the gy to get a particular effect. The point is to give other colors strong cards not take this away. It basically made burn viable but now burn will not be b/r and will not be viable.
And this is what I'm talking about when I said people are being disingenuous about Deathrite. It is incredibly simple to get any of the three abilities to work. It's first ability is trivial in a format that has Fetchlands. The second is just a function of the game moving forward. The third is also fairly trivial to occur if needed. Considering that it is also in the color of Thoughtseize, you have at least a good 3 activations worth of DRS on turn 2-3. And as the game moves forward, the more you will have going forward. DRS is "heavily conditional" in a vacuum only and only if you completely ignore how the entire game actually works. It's laughable if you actually argue that DRS is "heavily conditional" in the formats it is played in.
If drs is "overpowered" then every planswalker card is basically broken. I hate planeswalkers because they provide way too much utility. But you drs haters never talk about banning cards that can go off immediately the turn they are played. Can protect themselves. Have very few answers. And basically have a win the game clause printed on them. Its just ridiculous and petty.
DRS cost 1 mana (Flexible mana at that), cannot be attack by creatures, and has no actual negative ability to counteract a positive, coupled with the ability to exist in multiples. If a planeswalker read as DRS did, people would be crying foul on it all day long. But this is neither here nor there; DRS is overpowered. How anybody cannot see this is beyond me. It's not that no other creature matches it; it's that no creature at 1 cmc should ever have been able to do so much so easily. Considering that it also hoses an entire suite of archetypes on top of this is just insult to injury. DRS does *too* much for it's cost. Hence why every deck that even contemplates B/G runs Deathrite. It does everything, and extremely well and efficiently at that. It's not about it being efficient, it's about it being efficient at doing everything. It's not a jack-of-all trades, master of none. It's a Master of All Trades, jack of none.
And your characterisation of cards like delver are just absurd. Your talking about a card that singlehandedly shapes legacy. "Just a beater"? Yeah I will leave it to others to judge the naivety of your remarks.
I did not say that Delver was "just a beater". I said that it requires a specific archetype to work. A specific archetype which happens to be quite good in Legacy. You are referring to someone else methinks.
Edit: I also think Chaos sums it up fairly well. Honestly, all anybody needs to do is look at the last Modern GP to realize that there is a major problem with Modern right now, and that Deathrite is probably the largest issue at hand. It is single-handedly allowing Jund to dominate the scene. Not compete, mind you, but dominate. 3 out of 8 in the top 8 playing Jund lists, and a fourth being Junk, all playing Deathrite. The consistency it adds to those decklists is just beyond obscene. It completely negates any drawbacks towards the already obscene cards in those lists. Bob and Thoughtseize are already obscenely good. Having DRS in the lists makes the deck run far more smoothly than should be allowable. The tourney results prove it.
So.... Shamanism player here. First bloodbraid and now this. Stop banning the super competitive cards that are important for my super uncompetitive deck!!!
This is probably the end of modern for me. Toolbox-Shamans was the most fun i ever had in the format and it cant recover a hit like this =(
So.... Shamanism player here. First bloodbraid and now this. Stop banning the super competitive cards that are important for my super uncompetitive deck!!!
This is probably the end of modern for me. Toolbox-Shamans was the most fun i ever had in the format and it cant recover a hit like this =(
Feels bad, man...
Even though I played Jund my Combo Elf deck was also hit hard by the ban, so I can understand. Now I have no efficient, reliable means to get Ufor Beck / Call.
I think the problem with DRS is more about lack of solid alternative as opposed to cards like SFM which is just broken.
Want good 1 drop for your midrange? Play DRS. Which means every midrange is now BGx.
After they print more good 1-drops DRS can get off the list.
That is why Hearthstone will always be a better balanced game. It is full digital, so them can change the cost and P/T every time it is need to balance the cards.
Oh men, if Wizard could just change DRS to be 2 manas or 1/1 or whatever...
It's not that simple. Blizzard switches things around every patch like it is WoW.
WOTC are actually forced to print new cards to shake meta instead.
Everytime I hope to get banned the 1-card-armies: Scapeshift & Splintertwin. I actually see no reason to ban DRS. Seems a fair card to me & not like the mentioned ones. Oh banning of Cranial Platling would also be GREAT news one day.
Declaring a deck that had three players in the Top 8 of the Last Modern GP as unable to win a GP is a strange thing to say. And I'm not even counting the Junk variant which also played four copies of DRS.
How did it manage not to win that GP being 3x in top8, again?
How did it manage not to win that GP being 3x in top8, again?
Luck plays a much larger role than people like to admit. The exact composition of where the decks lie in a given top 8 is largely irrelevant to the discussion of whether a deck is dominant or not. A few different cards drawn in a slightly different order could have easily changed those results. It's the way it is in almost every sport. Just because in one instance, one player beat another, does not automatically mean that that player or deck is suddenly "better".
I have beaten players running far better decks than me, and are far better players than I am. This is even more a thing once you start getting people of equal skill. Sometimes you are just SoL.
You rather look at the overall performance of those decks. And Jund's overall performance is phenomenal.
If you were to say that a deck needs to get first in a GP or PT to be competitive, then there are remarkably few competitive decks in Modern (Or any format). This line of thinking is just asinine, to be frank.
The fact that Jund held nearly *half* of the top 8 list, and 4x DRS appeared in exactly half of the top 8 lists, should be a telling sign that the deck is more than competitive. I don't understand your thinking at all, to be frank. It's nonsensical. Appearing in 3/8s of the top 8 of the last GP somehow means that a deck isn't competitive? Do you even realize how absurd that is to say?
Im not sure why people are defending DRS so strongly, it is extremely powerful.
It ramps, mana fixes, hoses cards that use the graveyard, gains life, deals damage and breaks stalled board states all by itself for one mana. Also (though this is more relevant in legacy where everyone is trying to kill True Name) it has 2 toughness
Im unsure how i feel about the bitterblossom unban, and all of my negative feelings towards it stem from it ridiculous pricetag which is now 80$.
I had been wanting to pick up a Bitterblossom for a while now but the store was out of stock. And today, just checking out on the price....100$. For BB. Let that sink in. 100$ for BB. That's just gross.
I had been wanting to pick up a Bitterblossom for a while now but the store was out of stock. And today, just checking out on the price....100$. For BB. Let that sink in. 100$ for BB. That's just gross.
Let them waste their money, especially when it's so blatantly obvious that BB is in the Modern Event deck this summer.
Well congrats to the people who bought BB's and stand to make hundreds to thousands of dollars.
Really sucks that DRS was banned. I have to agree with those that have already posted that its a real confidence breaker for the format when they ban a card like this. Ya DRS did a lot for a 1-drop, but it also provided a good way to fight GY strategies.
Guess its time to de-construct 4 color burn back into RW burn or something. So sad.
Wow. So according to you a modern format based around pod, zoo, faeries, and tron is a diverse format? Is some kind of improvement or holy grail? Is that just going back to moderns inception.
The argument for nacatl is flawed. They banned it to promote diverse aggro decks. Because they failed now they are going back to play zoo or lose. Do you seriously beleive there is a alternative aggro deck choice?
Banning drs for "format diversity" is wotc bull****. Goyf has needed a ban since the very start. It way more format warping than drs was. Goyf overshadows every green creature , displaces every other beatstick and brickwalls almost all attacking based wincons.
Want more diversity wotc? Have a look at how fetches have reduced diversity. There are too few tier 1 decks of one or two colors. There is zero punisher cards for greedy manabases.
On top of ever increasing card prices. On top of wotc policy of artificial scarcity. On top of wotc blatant capitulation to scg. I will probably throw the game away after this season. Its just becoming a ****stir. Wotc is run by degenerates who have no idea about large scale inclusive games. Look at COD series league of legends etc they put magic to shame. They are more accessible AND they make bigger profits than mtg ever has.
BB on the other hand...well let me just say I'll be maindecking one more Spell Snare than before, and those Wear/Tear from the sidebord are going to be getting a workout.
Sell your DRS cheap so I can flip them at the next legacy tournament.
And goyf provides way too high a p/t for its mana cost.
And lightning bolt provides too much reach for its mana cost.
And delver.....
All the cards you listed are unidimensional.
Goyf is a beat stick.
Lightning Bolt is a burn spell.
Delver is a beat stick.
DRS is a 1-mana utility tool. It gains you life, it reduces the oponnent's life, and it accelerates your mana, all the while interacting with another zone within the game that only benefits its controller. That is too much utility for a 1 drop. Had DRS been a 2 drop, or only contained 2 abilities instead of 3, it probably would be considered "innocent" enough to avoid banning. However, it would definitely see a lot less play had it been that way.
Now, I don't really care much here or there about the banning, but you're being a little bit intentionally obtuse on the subject. Those all do one thing very well, and extremely well for their cost. They are all at least somewhat narrow (Goyf is just a big creature, albeit an absurdly good big creature, Delver is just a creature that needs a certain type of deck to really work well, lightning bolt is fantastic burn, but it's just fantastic burn). Deathrite Shaman, on the other hand, has a massive range of utility, and has virtually no narrow scope to his abilities. He works well just by the game moving forward. And he is incredibly strong and incredibly versatile at what he does.
Now, I'm not agreeing with the banning, as I could care less, but let's at least be honest with ourselves here and not make ridiculous and absurd analogies. DRS provides too much bang for the buck, and probably should never have seen the light of day as it is. But the same goes for many cards (Snapcaster being another recent prime example). Whether this means it's ban-worthy or not is a different discussion, but the point is that anyone who says it isn't a bit overmuch of a card is delusional. It's blatantly and obviously overpowered. It also hoses a few strategies pretty hard, and provides a hard clock at the same time. And stabalizes against aggressive decks. I can understand the banning in that light, as it does pretty much everything you want it to do, and effciently at that. It's not the most degenerate card in existence, but considering how effectively it does everything it's not nonsensical.
Heaven forbid good cards get played. Drs is heavily conditional. It needs x card type in the gy to get a particular effect. The point is to give other colors strong cards not take this away. It basically made burn viable but now burn will not be b/r and will not be viable.
If drs is "overpowered" then every planswalker card is basically broken. I hate planeswalkers because they provide way too much utility. But you drs haters never talk about banning cards that can go off immediately the turn they are played. Can protect themselves. Have very few answers. And basically have a win the game clause printed on them. Its just ridiculous and petty.
And your characterisation of cards like delver are just absurd. Your talking about a card that singlehandedly shapes legacy. "Just a beater"? Yeah I will leave it to others to judge the naivety of your remarks.
The point is banning the Elf made Jund unable to win a GP (while it was all over the place before the ban). So, why punish a deck that's not winning, the one deck that includes a main deck answer to Pod, that is instead performing quite well?
The awesome-est MTG webcomic out there. Go check it out!
Oh men, if Wizard could just change DRS to be 2 manas or 1/1 or whatever...
Anyway... it is the price you pay to be real.. you will never be able to play Heathstone with your friends at kitchen table.
that would be nice, but together with one or two fetches the price would be jacked up to the point of me losing my interest in the product.
Mission 4: Print True-Name Nemesis in a standard set to make it modern legal. am I rite?
And this is what I'm talking about when I said people are being disingenuous about Deathrite. It is incredibly simple to get any of the three abilities to work. It's first ability is trivial in a format that has Fetchlands. The second is just a function of the game moving forward. The third is also fairly trivial to occur if needed. Considering that it is also in the color of Thoughtseize, you have at least a good 3 activations worth of DRS on turn 2-3. And as the game moves forward, the more you will have going forward. DRS is "heavily conditional" in a vacuum only and only if you completely ignore how the entire game actually works. It's laughable if you actually argue that DRS is "heavily conditional" in the formats it is played in.
DRS cost 1 mana (Flexible mana at that), cannot be attack by creatures, and has no actual negative ability to counteract a positive, coupled with the ability to exist in multiples. If a planeswalker read as DRS did, people would be crying foul on it all day long. But this is neither here nor there; DRS is overpowered. How anybody cannot see this is beyond me. It's not that no other creature matches it; it's that no creature at 1 cmc should ever have been able to do so much so easily. Considering that it also hoses an entire suite of archetypes on top of this is just insult to injury. DRS does *too* much for it's cost. Hence why every deck that even contemplates B/G runs Deathrite. It does everything, and extremely well and efficiently at that. It's not about it being efficient, it's about it being efficient at doing everything. It's not a jack-of-all trades, master of none. It's a Master of All Trades, jack of none.
I did not say that Delver was "just a beater". I said that it requires a specific archetype to work. A specific archetype which happens to be quite good in Legacy. You are referring to someone else methinks.
Edit: I also think Chaos sums it up fairly well. Honestly, all anybody needs to do is look at the last Modern GP to realize that there is a major problem with Modern right now, and that Deathrite is probably the largest issue at hand. It is single-handedly allowing Jund to dominate the scene. Not compete, mind you, but dominate. 3 out of 8 in the top 8 playing Jund lists, and a fourth being Junk, all playing Deathrite. The consistency it adds to those decklists is just beyond obscene. It completely negates any drawbacks towards the already obscene cards in those lists. Bob and Thoughtseize are already obscenely good. Having DRS in the lists makes the deck run far more smoothly than should be allowable. The tourney results prove it.
This is probably the end of modern for me. Toolbox-Shamans was the most fun i ever had in the format and it cant recover a hit like this =(
Feels bad, man...
Even though I played Jund my Combo Elf deck was also hit hard by the ban, so I can understand. Now I have no efficient, reliable means to get Ufor Beck / Call.
Want good 1 drop for your midrange? Play DRS. Which means every midrange is now BGx.
After they print more good 1-drops DRS can get off the list.
It's not that simple. Blizzard switches things around every patch like it is WoW.
WOTC are actually forced to print new cards to shake meta instead.
How did it manage not to win that GP being 3x in top8, again?
Luck plays a much larger role than people like to admit. The exact composition of where the decks lie in a given top 8 is largely irrelevant to the discussion of whether a deck is dominant or not. A few different cards drawn in a slightly different order could have easily changed those results. It's the way it is in almost every sport. Just because in one instance, one player beat another, does not automatically mean that that player or deck is suddenly "better".
I have beaten players running far better decks than me, and are far better players than I am. This is even more a thing once you start getting people of equal skill. Sometimes you are just SoL.
You rather look at the overall performance of those decks. And Jund's overall performance is phenomenal.
If you were to say that a deck needs to get first in a GP or PT to be competitive, then there are remarkably few competitive decks in Modern (Or any format). This line of thinking is just asinine, to be frank.
The fact that Jund held nearly *half* of the top 8 list, and 4x DRS appeared in exactly half of the top 8 lists, should be a telling sign that the deck is more than competitive. I don't understand your thinking at all, to be frank. It's nonsensical. Appearing in 3/8s of the top 8 of the last GP somehow means that a deck isn't competitive? Do you even realize how absurd that is to say?
It made the mistake of not playing Snapcaster Mage and Lightning Bolt.
It ramps, mana fixes, hoses cards that use the graveyard, gains life, deals damage and breaks stalled board states all by itself for one mana. Also (though this is more relevant in legacy where everyone is trying to kill True Name) it has 2 toughness
Im unsure how i feel about the bitterblossom unban, and all of my negative feelings towards it stem from it ridiculous pricetag which is now 80$.
I like Turtles
Let them waste their money, especially when it's so blatantly obvious that BB is in the Modern Event deck this summer.
Exactly.
Really sucks that DRS was banned. I have to agree with those that have already posted that its a real confidence breaker for the format when they ban a card like this. Ya DRS did a lot for a 1-drop, but it also provided a good way to fight GY strategies.
Guess its time to de-construct 4 color burn back into RW burn or something. So sad.
WBG Karador GBW
R Daretti R
RG Omnath GR
WRG Modern Burn GRW
WB Modern Tokens BW
DCI Rules Advisor as of 5/18/2015