The thing is that Theros and probably Born of the Gods have had less Modern-playable cards than the overwhelming majority of all Modern-legal sets.
Some people, myself included, view that as a good thing. My deck doesn't need new cards every set. Just one or two every other year is fine, and only to keep up with the one or two cards that went other decks.
Though I do see where others are coming from. When decks don't change quick enough the format can feel like it is getting stale. This is only magnified by the lower number of players who play eternal formats, so it can often feel like we are playing the same decks over in over in local games.
It can be tough to strike a balance.
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Lycanthropy Awareness Day.
Hoping for a cure, or at least an outbreak.
Some people, myself included, view that as a good thing. My deck doesn't need new cards every set. Just one or two every other year is fine, and only to keep up with the one or two cards that went other decks.
Though I do see where others are coming from. When decks don't change quick enough the format can feel like it is getting stale. This is only magnified by the lower number of players who play eternal formats, so it can often feel like we are playing the same decks over in over in local games.
It can be tough to strike a balance.
i believe im one of the "others". i love when a new competitive deck appears in modern so i'd prefer at least a few cards in every set to be designed for modern although i'd cap it at 3 per set. that would keep it from feeling too much like standard and also keep it evolving and not feeling stale
i believe im one of the "others". i love when a new competitive deck appears in modern so i'd prefer at least a few cards in every set to be designed for modern although i'd cap it at 3 per set. that would keep it from feeling too much like standard and also keep it evolving and not feeling stale
The problem with designing cards specifically for modern is that if they're not careful they will be absolutely overpowered in standard. So what you usually get instead are niche cards like Spirit of the Labyrinth or Deathrite Shaman that are still good, but not ridiculous. In the case of Deathrite Shaman, fetchlands make it borderline-broken though, which obviously will not happen in standard.
Well considering that BNG isn't released yet, I tend to agree. How about making statements like these after maybe a month or so after it's released?
Fine. I will stop complaining about Born of the Gods until after the Modern Pro Tour. If the Modern meta remains the same, I will go back to complaining.
Fine. I will stop complaining about Born of the Gods until after the Modern Pro Tour. If the Modern meta remains the same, I will go back to complaining.
You will complain that a 165 card set will not alter a meta that is comprised of a couple thousands cards? Seems reasonable.:rolleyes:
but DKA didn't really do that much. Huntmaster is a potential thing but I haven't seen him do an awful lot.
Thalia, Lingering Souls, Sorin and Faithless Looting are all pretty good, some of them are just hurt by 1 drop graveyard hate that is a mana dork, pinger and life gainer
NPH provided us with wonderful things for modern, WWK gave us manlands (and bannables), but DKA didn't really do that much. Huntmaster is a potential thing but I haven't seen him do an awful lot. All DGM gave us was Voice. It's pretty hit and miss whether small sets give us cool things for modern. at first glace, this set seems like a bit of a miss. That said, I haven't really scrutinized the set properly myself, which is bad given that I am going to a prerelease in around 3 hours...
WB Tokens won a Grand Prix once. Also Jund with Lingering Souls was the best deck until the Bloodbraid Elf ban. After that, Huntmaster became the go-to 4 drop in Jund until Scavenging Ooze took its place. So Dark Ascension did a lot. Dragon's Maze only gave us Voice and Wear // Tear, but Voice was powerful enough to make Melira Pod the best deck for a while. Honestly, this set seems more like Mirrodin Besieged or Conflux in terms of Modern-playable cards.
They're certainly one of the worst sets in the sense that they have a very low amount of interesting cards.
Well I guess you can't please everyone. I think theros block so far has added some fantastic ideas and dynamics to the game.
If you're a power-gamer And Only rate the highest power cards, assigning everything else to the rubbish bin, yeah sure maybe. But for everyone else and the casual scene, theros is a goldmine!
Not everything's a tournament. Remember that.
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Modern: G Tron, Vannifar, Jund, Druid/Vizier combo, Humans, Eldrazi Stompy (Serum Powder), Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Breach Titan, Turns, Eternal Command, As Foretold Living End, Elves, Cheerios, RUG Scapeshift
Last night's prerelease was amazingly fun. If you don't think there's tons of new stuff here you're just objectively wrong, sorry. We played some multiplayer and realized what insane bonkers fun Tribute is in multiplayer (do you want to let my Ravager get big or fight his Sealock Monster?). My deck was heavily R/G heroic, which is a weird weird build but worked amazingly well.
Last night's prerelease was amazingly fun. If you don't think there's tons of new stuff here you're just objectively wrong, sorry. We played some multiplayer and realized what insane bonkers fun Tribute is in multiplayer (do you want to let my Ravager get big or fight his Sealock Monster?). My deck was heavily R/G heroic, which is a weird weird build but worked amazingly well.
Most of the people here are talking about viability in standard and modern, not limited and casual.
Looking back at some of these threads, i can see that whenever someone makes a topic about a new set being bad or disappointing , there's always a big vanguard defending it, not matter how much the topic creator is right.
The Saviors of Kamigawa topic is hilarious. There were actually people defending the Kamigawa block's power level back then. The fallacies seem to remain the same:
1. Limited bomb argument: saying that a crappy card is a "limited bomb" or amazing in some other casual format, implying that being good at crippled power levels makes a set competitive (and by the way, most cards labelled as "limited bomb" cards are actually pretty average even in limited).
2. Flavor argument: saying that while the set was below average power levels, the set theme and flavor text on some cards more than make up for it. Ironically, the Mirrodin block not only was very powerful and had competitive cards for every format, but also had, flavor-wise, some of the best designs in the game. Urza block, which was also extremely powerful, had probably the best story so far. And even the Kamigawa block, the scapegoat for many people that defend the idea of sacrificing power levels in favor of some flavor, had strong cards for every format, like Gifts, Kokusho, Needle, Sensei's Divining Top and many others. Kamigawa didn't ruin standard, since it had either Mirrodin's power or Ravnica's balance. Today's standard is composed of one weak set after another.
3. Power creep terrorism: more like "creature creep" accompanied with a lot of artifact-phobia, enchantment-phobia, instant-phobia, spell-phobia (combo and control-phobia while we are at it). And the decks aren't even powerful. You can see how the game is overly dependent on creatures by reading the comments on the new cards. Every creature who dies to [insert creature destruction spell that is a watered down version of a past card] is "not viable at standard" and a "limited bomb" at best. The entire creature "New World Order" idea, making the game more combat-centric, created a bubble that is slowly, but surely going to pop. It's ruining the deck diversity and toning down the game to the combat phase.
Both BNG and Theros have worse flavor, worse top cards and are less relevant to the eternal formats than Kamigawa. Unlike Kamigawa, however, they are highly relevant to shape standard, and are not doing a good job at it. The problem, other than being excessively combat-centric, are the very slow gameplay (overcosted cards) and uninspired mechanics.
There are some few good cards in BNG, such as Bile Blight, Brimaz (despite being 1 mana too slow to justify more P/T than necessary), Satyr Firedancer and Xenagos, but the overall set, just like every set these last years, has mediocre power levels and boring mechanics.
Most future sets will be based around synergy than power, because powerful cards are boring. If they just print ridiculous cards then those become the only ones that get played, but if cards are only powerful in combination with other cards then it opens up deck variability and strategy.
If you want just outright power cards that are good on their own then you might as well just open a regular deck of cards and play war.
I thought Theros was a great set that had an immediate impact on the metagame.
Born of the Gods however seems worse than Dragon's Maze. I guess I will check back in a month. Looking at AEIOUsometimesY compilation post though, I haven't changed my mind on any of the opinions I had for specific sets.
Most future sets will be based around synergy than power, because powerful cards are boring. If they just print ridiculous cards then those become the only ones that get played, but if cards are only powerful in combination with other cards then it opens up deck variability and strategy.
If you want just outright power cards that are good on their own then you might as well just open a regular deck of cards and play war.
This is probably the most intelligent comment I've seen on this website in months if not years.
Most future sets will be based around synergy than power, because powerful cards are boring. If they just print ridiculous cards then those become the only ones that get played, but if cards are only powerful in combination with other cards then it opens up deck variability and strategy.
If you want just outright power cards that are good on their own then you might as well just open a regular deck of cards and play war.
I am fine with this, but would it be possible for them to make more powerful synergies that aren't only Standard-playable or more cards that create powerful synergies with cards outside of Standard?
I am fine with this, but would it be possible for them to make more powerful synergies that aren't only Standard-playable or more cards that create powerful synergies with cards outside of Standard?
Problem is, whenever they actually do that, players usually complain about the cards being too good and screwing up the other formats. For example, Deathrite Shaman.
I am fine with this, but would it be possible for them to make more powerful synergies that aren't only Standard-playable or more cards that create powerful synergies with cards outside of Standard?
No, probably not. What you're asking for are standard strategies that are fast, consistent, and powerful enough to compete with strategies in modern. And ultimately, anything that qualifies for that will very likely be too strong for standard.
No, probably not. What you're asking for are standard strategies that are fast, consistent, and powerful enough to compete with strategies in modern. And ultimately, anything that qualifies for that will very likely be too strong for standard.
So, what you are saying is that Modern will barely ever change again and since it can't get cards from supplemental sets like Legacy can, Modern is doomed to remain almost exactly the same as it is now for all eternity. That doesn't sound like a good thing for Wizards to do.
Most future sets will be based around synergy than power, because powerful cards are boring. If they just print ridiculous cards then those become the only ones that get played, but if cards are only powerful in combination with other cards then it opens up deck variability and strategy.
If you want just outright power cards that are good on their own then you might as well just open a regular deck of cards and play war.
Born of the Gods is probably the worst set since Coldsnap. The ONLY card that will see serious Modern or Legacy play is Spirit of the Labyrinth. And that is a fact. The set does nothing to shake up standard except to make the best deck, Mono Black Devotion, slightly stronger. As for limited, after playing in the prerelease, it is a poor extension of Theros. Inspired is just not an interesting mechanic. All in all, garbage set. And it's a shame.
Born of the Gods is probably the worst set since Coldsnap. The ONLY card that will see serious Modern or Legacy play is Spirit of the Labyrinth. And that is a fact. The set does nothing to shake up standard except to make the best deck, Mono Black Devotion, slightly stronger. As for limited, after playing in the prerelease, it is a poor extension of Theros. Inspired is just not an interesting mechanic. All in all, garbage set. And it's a shame.
They did push mill a tad bit harder with that new UB god...
Most future sets will be based around synergy than power, because powerful cards are boring. If they just print ridiculous cards then those become the only ones that get played, but if cards are only powerful in combination with other cards then it opens up deck variability and strategy.
If you want just outright power cards that are good on their own then you might as well just open a regular deck of cards and play war.
And yet this is exactly the opposite of what's been happening.
Mono black wouldn't be a thing without many of it's "ridiculous" cards like thoughtseize, desecration demon and pack rat ( see all the synergy between these 3 cards? I sure don't )
Every deck in standard pre-theros was basicaly a goodstuffs deck.
Some cards are in fact SO RIDICULOUS that they cause you to run a few bad cards just to go with them, and even those will die out as the standard cardpool increases with more sets.
And about your "war" comment, have you seen how current standard plays out? It comes down to top deck wars a huge percentage of the time.
Synergy is also not always a good thing. Affinity is regarded as a terrible mechanic for standard. Caw blade was loaded with synergy and caused a massive participation drop out. tolarian academy was synergistic, but it was way over the top.
Some people, myself included, view that as a good thing. My deck doesn't need new cards every set. Just one or two every other year is fine, and only to keep up with the one or two cards that went other decks.
Though I do see where others are coming from. When decks don't change quick enough the format can feel like it is getting stale. This is only magnified by the lower number of players who play eternal formats, so it can often feel like we are playing the same decks over in over in local games.
It can be tough to strike a balance.
Hoping for a cure, or at least an outbreak.
Level 1 Judge (yay)
i believe im one of the "others". i love when a new competitive deck appears in modern so i'd prefer at least a few cards in every set to be designed for modern although i'd cap it at 3 per set. that would keep it from feeling too much like standard and also keep it evolving and not feeling stale
The problem with designing cards specifically for modern is that if they're not careful they will be absolutely overpowered in standard. So what you usually get instead are niche cards like Spirit of the Labyrinth or Deathrite Shaman that are still good, but not ridiculous. In the case of Deathrite Shaman, fetchlands make it borderline-broken though, which obviously will not happen in standard.
Well considering that BNG isn't released yet, I tend to agree. How about making statements like these after maybe a month or so after it's released?
Fine. I will stop complaining about Born of the Gods until after the Modern Pro Tour. If the Modern meta remains the same, I will go back to complaining.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
You will complain that a 165 card set will not alter a meta that is comprised of a couple thousands cards? Seems reasonable.:rolleyes:
Standard
W.I.P.
EDH
WNorn Tokens
Dark Ascension didn't do too badly with that. Neither did Dragon's Maze. And New Phyrexia and Worldwake both did well with that too.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Thalia, Lingering Souls, Sorin and Faithless Looting are all pretty good, some of them are just hurt by 1 drop graveyard hate that is a mana dork, pinger and life gainer
edit: also Grafdigger's Cage
WB Tokens won a Grand Prix once. Also Jund with Lingering Souls was the best deck until the Bloodbraid Elf ban. After that, Huntmaster became the go-to 4 drop in Jund until Scavenging Ooze took its place. So Dark Ascension did a lot. Dragon's Maze only gave us Voice and Wear // Tear, but Voice was powerful enough to make Melira Pod the best deck for a while. Honestly, this set seems more like Mirrodin Besieged or Conflux in terms of Modern-playable cards.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Well I guess you can't please everyone. I think theros block so far has added some fantastic ideas and dynamics to the game.
If you're a power-gamer And Only rate the highest power cards, assigning everything else to the rubbish bin, yeah sure maybe. But for everyone else and the casual scene, theros is a goldmine!
Not everything's a tournament. Remember that.
Most of the people here are talking about viability in standard and modern, not limited and casual.
Excellent post!
Looking back at some of these threads, i can see that whenever someone makes a topic about a new set being bad or disappointing , there's always a big vanguard defending it, not matter how much the topic creator is right.
The Saviors of Kamigawa topic is hilarious. There were actually people defending the Kamigawa block's power level back then. The fallacies seem to remain the same:
1. Limited bomb argument: saying that a crappy card is a "limited bomb" or amazing in some other casual format, implying that being good at crippled power levels makes a set competitive (and by the way, most cards labelled as "limited bomb" cards are actually pretty average even in limited).
2. Flavor argument: saying that while the set was below average power levels, the set theme and flavor text on some cards more than make up for it. Ironically, the Mirrodin block not only was very powerful and had competitive cards for every format, but also had, flavor-wise, some of the best designs in the game. Urza block, which was also extremely powerful, had probably the best story so far. And even the Kamigawa block, the scapegoat for many people that defend the idea of sacrificing power levels in favor of some flavor, had strong cards for every format, like Gifts, Kokusho, Needle, Sensei's Divining Top and many others. Kamigawa didn't ruin standard, since it had either Mirrodin's power or Ravnica's balance. Today's standard is composed of one weak set after another.
3. Power creep terrorism: more like "creature creep" accompanied with a lot of artifact-phobia, enchantment-phobia, instant-phobia, spell-phobia (combo and control-phobia while we are at it). And the decks aren't even powerful. You can see how the game is overly dependent on creatures by reading the comments on the new cards. Every creature who dies to [insert creature destruction spell that is a watered down version of a past card] is "not viable at standard" and a "limited bomb" at best. The entire creature "New World Order" idea, making the game more combat-centric, created a bubble that is slowly, but surely going to pop. It's ruining the deck diversity and toning down the game to the combat phase.
Both BNG and Theros have worse flavor, worse top cards and are less relevant to the eternal formats than Kamigawa. Unlike Kamigawa, however, they are highly relevant to shape standard, and are not doing a good job at it. The problem, other than being excessively combat-centric, are the very slow gameplay (overcosted cards) and uninspired mechanics.
There are some few good cards in BNG, such as Bile Blight, Brimaz (despite being 1 mana too slow to justify more P/T than necessary), Satyr Firedancer and Xenagos, but the overall set, just like every set these last years, has mediocre power levels and boring mechanics.
If you want just outright power cards that are good on their own then you might as well just open a regular deck of cards and play war.
Born of the Gods however seems worse than Dragon's Maze. I guess I will check back in a month. Looking at AEIOUsometimesY compilation post though, I haven't changed my mind on any of the opinions I had for specific sets.
This is probably the most intelligent comment I've seen on this website in months if not years.
I am fine with this, but would it be possible for them to make more powerful synergies that aren't only Standard-playable or more cards that create powerful synergies with cards outside of Standard?
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Problem is, whenever they actually do that, players usually complain about the cards being too good and screwing up the other formats. For example, Deathrite Shaman.
No, probably not. What you're asking for are standard strategies that are fast, consistent, and powerful enough to compete with strategies in modern. And ultimately, anything that qualifies for that will very likely be too strong for standard.
So, what you are saying is that Modern will barely ever change again and since it can't get cards from supplemental sets like Legacy can, Modern is doomed to remain almost exactly the same as it is now for all eternity. That doesn't sound like a good thing for Wizards to do.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
...and yet they print Thoughtseize?
They did push mill a tad bit harder with that new UB god...
Thanks Argentleman;)
WB Teysa token aggroBW (retired)
MAKING (Onmath, Numot, maybe something in Esper)
And yet this is exactly the opposite of what's been happening.
Mono blue wouldn't be a thing without master of waves
Mono black wouldn't be a thing without many of it's "ridiculous" cards like thoughtseize, desecration demon and pack rat ( see all the synergy between these 3 cards? I sure don't )
Control would be dead in the water without sphinx's revelation.
Every deck in standard pre-theros was basicaly a goodstuffs deck.
Some cards are in fact SO RIDICULOUS that they cause you to run a few bad cards just to go with them, and even those will die out as the standard cardpool increases with more sets.
And about your "war" comment, have you seen how current standard plays out? It comes down to top deck wars a huge percentage of the time.
Synergy is also not always a good thing. Affinity is regarded as a terrible mechanic for standard. Caw blade was loaded with synergy and caused a massive participation drop out. tolarian academy was synergistic, but it was way over the top.