People always think cards like Ponder and Brainstorm are innocuous.
They're not. Ponder is restricted in Vintage. It's heavily played in Legacy. Brainstorm is restricted in Vintage and extremely dominant in Legacy. Don't underestimate cantrips.
Any such change will indeed result in a loss of vailble plays - it's these unintuitive plays which are the offending culprit; without them there is no need to make a change. Sometimes we will get new plays in return to compensate, but not always. Damage on the stack, for instance, put us to a decision countless times over our playing experince. Now there are no choices to be considered at that time.
It might just be me, but I would have an easier time understanding your posts if you dumbed it down for me by spelling things properly. Also, did you actually just claim that allowing damage on the stack expanded the decision matrix during combat?
I'm kind of annoyed that this means no more Braids, since she's both unique in her effect and perfectly balanced as a member of the 99. Will have to cut her from my Stax decklist
On the other hand, I like that Metalworker is unbanned. I don't really care about Rofellos since green has more than enough herpy ramp options and I have no particular opinion on Erayo.
People are imagining that raid will just trigger itself every turn, then when this card comes out you will play a bunch of games where this sits in your hand because raid isn't turning on.
I honestly can't blame them that much- most of the cool names have been used up and now they're reduced to filling 90% of a set with forgettable crap like "Akroan Mastiff" and "Dreadbringer Lampads". I'm sure that Lampads are some form of nymph from real Greek Mythology but it comes across as nonsensical. Props for putting in "Deicide" though.
Just page through the cards from Mirage, which is also referencing a real-world setting. The names and art are a breath of fresh air.
Right now black is by far the most powerful color in standard period, mono-black devotion is putting up constant numbers and mono-black aggro is also a very strong deck that can win a lot of games.
So Black has not one but two decks in standard right now that are both mono-black, those complaining about a lack of black cards have to be joking. This set may not be the best set ever for black, but black's cup has runneth over lately period.
Seriously, some of these folks are unbelievably clueless.
"Black sucks because Avacyn beats Griselbrand in a fight."
"Black sucks because Rule of Law Guy might see Eternal play" (no, not really).
"SO, wizards is supposed to make gods warp the format, and no one is allowed to have an answer for them? And Slaughter Games isn't unfun? This isn't slaughter games. Dispel. That is all."
Even Jace, the Mind Sculptor didn't get this level of treatment (Despise, Hex Parasite, heh none of these cards stopped it), and I think we can all agree that the Gods didn't do what JTMS did to the format. Playable Gods in a Greek-themed block is a good thing. And only 5/15 really saw play anyways. The frontunner, Thassa, is a 4-of in a deck full of *****ty draft birds, a deck that gets slammed by Control and Mono-Black.
So why are we printing this ***** again?
I* didn't know people could get so upset about a fringe sideboard card that shuts down 0 archetypes. No, this isn't a silver bullet vs anyone since no deck, not even mono blue, relies all that much on having a God out.
Also after colorshifting enchantress to White in Mesa Enchantress and Kor Spiritdancer, looks like we're back to green, with the White constellation card being uniquely terrible.
AVR had a ton of awesome cards for Constructed though, so I can forgive the rest. It made control decks playable in Legacy (Terminus, Entreat), it gave tribal Legacy decks and EDH an awesome land (Cavern of Souls), it changed the face of Legacy with Griselbrand (arguably a negative, but whatever), and it had some really popular casual cards (Avacyn, Gisela, et. al.)
In my opinion control was very viable in legacy before miracles and it was much more interesting format before that.
Now it is just those blue tempo decks, miracles and combo decks staring at each other and no true creature decks at all.
The biggest problem with fair creature decks has always been *****ty uninteractive combo decks, not miracles. Also miracles craps on TNN, which is great, because TNN is the least fun card for Legacy since Mental Misstep.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
They're not. Ponder is restricted in Vintage. It's heavily played in Legacy. Brainstorm is restricted in Vintage and extremely dominant in Legacy. Don't underestimate cantrips.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
It might just be me, but I would have an easier time understanding your posts if you dumbed it down for me by spelling things properly. Also, did you actually just claim that allowing damage on the stack expanded the decision matrix during combat?
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
On the other hand, I like that Metalworker is unbanned. I don't really care about Rofellos since green has more than enough herpy ramp options and I have no particular opinion on Erayo.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
People are imagining that raid will just trigger itself every turn, then when this card comes out you will play a bunch of games where this sits in your hand because raid isn't turning on.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
For the non-funny ones, I've always been partial to much of Time Spiral block. E.g. Barren Glory.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
"Jimbob's Revenge"
"Rando's Annoyance"
"Plotguy's Minion"
"FantasyNoun Verb/Noun"
I honestly can't blame them that much- most of the cool names have been used up and now they're reduced to filling 90% of a set with forgettable crap like "Akroan Mastiff" and "Dreadbringer Lampads". I'm sure that Lampads are some form of nymph from real Greek Mythology but it comes across as nonsensical. Props for putting in "Deicide" though.
Just page through the cards from Mirage, which is also referencing a real-world setting. The names and art are a breath of fresh air.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
Seriously, some of these folks are unbelievably clueless.
"Black sucks because Avacyn beats Griselbrand in a fight."
"Black sucks because Rule of Law Guy might see Eternal play" (no, not really).
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
Is this guy for real.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
I* didn't know people could get so upset about a fringe sideboard card that shuts down 0 archetypes. No, this isn't a silver bullet vs anyone since no deck, not even mono blue, relies all that much on having a God out.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
Also after colorshifting enchantress to White in Mesa Enchantress and Kor Spiritdancer, looks like we're back to green, with the White constellation card being uniquely terrible.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
Irrelevant.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
Um, what? Which control decks?
The biggest problem with fair creature decks has always been *****ty uninteractive combo decks, not miracles. Also miracles craps on TNN, which is great, because TNN is the least fun card for Legacy since Mental Misstep.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades