I enjoyed the article. I appreciated Sheldon using the "cascade" (i.e. logical continuation) idea for unbans, even if he doesn't like it for bans.
It is also interesting to note that he views the gap between Tolarian Academy and Gaea's Cradle as that large -- one is in the "top 10" of the ban list, and the other doesn't make the cut even in the extended version.
Although, Academy is probably much more offensive in a powered format.
I will agree that Cradle will produce way more mana than Academy--but it's the when that's important. Our view is that Academy produces too much too early.
I will agree that Cradle will produce way more mana than Academy--but it's the when that's important. Our view is that Academy produces too much too early.
Out of curiosity, if Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, and other controversial fast mana sources from artifacts weren't around, do you think you would still feel this way? I never got to play in the Tolarian Academy era of Magic, so it's difficult for me to see why it's a more problematic card compared to Gaea's Cradle.
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I will agree that Cradle will produce way more mana than Academy--but it's the when that's important. Our view is that Academy produces too much too early.
Out of curiosity, if Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, and other controversial fast mana sources from artifacts weren't around, do you think you would still feel this way? I never got to play in the Tolarian Academy era of Magic, so it's difficult for me to see why it's a more problematic card compared to Gaea's Cradle.
The Academy deck of the late 90's ran full complements of stuff like Mox Diamond and Mana Vault, plus Time Spirals and Windfalls. You can see where this is going.
Academy is not problematic when you don't include fast mana, it compounds the problems caused by the introduction of fast mana. That's why I said it would be stronger in the hypothetical format where the Moxen were made legal. On the other hand, if your Academy is being powered by Sky Diamond and Mind Stone, it is more on par with Cabal Coffers -- not really a big deal at all.
Cradle, I think, has more power than it is being credited. An elf deck with Cradle often demands an immediate Wrath, or wins on turn 3 or 4. (EDIT: And oftentimes, it can kill you before you can even cast your sweeper)
Cradle, I think, has more power than it is being credited. An elf deck with Cradle often demands an immediate Wrath, or wins on turn 3 or 4. (EDIT: And oftentimes, it can kill you before you can even cast your sweeper)
Isnt that exactly the kind of deck the ban list does not care about?
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
That article really got my thought-exercise going but I don't think it's worth a thread of its own (since it's largely hypothetical), so I'll just put my list/thoughts here instead.
I'm not going to go through them in great detail, but simply put: Channel outright breaks in a 40-life format far more than any Lotus/Mox... except Mox Lotus Gaea's Cradle/Tolarian Academy for pretty much the same reasons. Sure, the academy is magnitudes higher in the format (especially with the Mox around), but I simply think the sheer expansion that the Cradle creates within a single turn is an issue by itself as well (especially the way creatures have been going) that the "Solved by Wraths everywhere" doesn't feel quite valid to me anymore. Griselbrand/Yawgmoth's Bargain - they pretty much explain themselves in a 40-life format. Karakas - lots of cards don't work well with the format / go against the concept and if I had to choose a poster child, it would be this. Limited Resources is the poster child for "unfun" the way Karakas is for "Anti-format". Panoptic Mirror/Time Vault - Yes, we greatly accelerated the format, but I'm still uncomfortable with some of the easiest infinite turn combos. Mirror stays on because I decided a lone Time Walk is better off free in a 10-card banlist and we just lock the single card that interacts with all the time magic. Tinker - Unlike Sheldon, I don't think the "1-time" effect saves this card from the list... because the Mox are free on top of the already fast mana acceleration we have in the format. Sure, we can leave it to social contracts, but I still think a competitively-contracted meta will involve the Mox and Tinkering into some quick win-condition. I may have let the Mox free due to their scarcity, but I don't take it into a large account when I account for these scenarios.
A quick recap for the other cards on Sheldon's list, but not mine... Balance - Well, it's #1 on Sheldon's list, but I don't actually think it's that broken in a 10-card banlist world. Scepter can't imprint it and I have the Mirror on the list. It might cause grief when cast at a low cost, but I really don't see people going all the way out to rapidly Balance-Grief in a 10-card banlist world. Prophet of Kruphix, Primeval Titan, Sylvan Primordial - All the relatively-recently banned cards in the format... that I honestly think would be too slow in a 10-card banlist world.
Just the clarification (and disclaimer) that I don't take the actual quantity of the released cards into account, I assume that all groups, even those with social contracts will eventually improve to a more-competitive state, the same way I generally see more Mana Crypt arms-races recently (although that was due to Eternal Masters). So bluntly put, I'm ignoring reprint policies and prices as a 10-card banlist requires much more attention to whatever impact a card that isn't on the list has on the format itself, regardless of actual quantity out there (at least I took that assumption for this hypothetical exercise).
I may be alone in this, but I disagree with Karakas being on his hypothetical 10 card list (perhaps even on the regular list, but that's a different story). One of the things Sheldon was forced to do was to take a look at the ban list philosophy and condense it. He removed PBtE altogether, and "interacts poorly with the format" was largely slimmed down to only Karakas. You can argue that cards like Prophet, Sylvan Primordial, Griselbrand, and Bargain also fall under this category because the higher life total or multiplayer nature make the cards much stronger than they would be in 20 life one on one formats, and you'd be right, but there are other reasons why these cards are so bad as well. So Karakas is the only card left on his list which solely cares about this criteria. Further, look at the other concessions that Sheldon had to make. He had to settle on allowing some very broken and annoying cards being in the format with the hopes that the social contract and "answers exist" mentality will prevail.
I contend that Karakas is not the problem that it is made out to be. Yes, it is very annoying to have your general bounced every turn, but consider how much the format has evolved since the card was banned. Perhaps most importantly, spot removal has become more of a thing. We now have 4-5 playable Strip Mines, and a number of good spells that can remove lands (as well as most other permanents). We also have a large number more of lands which are deserving of eating a Strip Mine. This means that Strip Mine should be a staple of every deck, no metagaming against the possibility of facing Karakas required. Secondly, generals have changed in their dynamics. We have generals with experience counters, indestructible ones, and others that practically win the game on the spot. We also have a lot more ETB effects that neutralize the downside of bouncing. Third, ETB effects have increased as well, so it isn't always in the best interest to bounce a general. Lastly, this is still a once a round effect, and each opponent will have it in their interest to remove the Karakas or player.
TL;DR Sheldon should have freed Karakas and left something more powerful on the list.
Nice thought experiment. Although I'd really like to see Academy off and Trade Secrets back on. To me the ban list is about sending a message and the message generally isn't "fast mana is bad" it's "don't ruin games by breaking the spirit of the format". Academy doesn't do that any worse than Sol Ring but Trade Secrets only does it.
TL;DR Sheldon should have freed Karakas and left something more powerful on the list.
An interesting idea. I think the lack of land answers in the format degrades 'answers get played', but maybe that would show people they need to play more LD, targeted not mass. But a card that will have a relevant target in every game, is reusable, has a single CI, AND does not take a spell slot seems rather spicy even in the 10 ban world.
I get what you are saying about ETB creatures and other reasons it could be a useful answer in itself to rough Commanders so I would not object strongly if it stayed legal in such a 'verse.
However Sundering Titan and Emmy being free when Prophet is on the ban list makes no sense in 10 card land. I have to chalk it up to bias based on how recently it ruined games. The other 2 are colorless, have VERY limited 'fair use', and removal was pretty pointless.
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
Cradle, I think, has more power than it is being credited. An elf deck with Cradle often demands an immediate Wrath, or wins on turn 3 or 4. (EDIT: And oftentimes, it can kill you before you can even cast your sweeper)
Isnt that exactly the kind of deck the ban list does not care about?
The "casual" elf deck is a mainstay of kitchen tables, though, and even with subpar card choices still threatens lethal in the early turns. Cradle makes it that much worse.
I would posit that the ban list should cater much less to decks planning to go "Sol Ring into Mox into Tolarian Academy".
The "casual" elf deck is a mainstay of kitchen tables, though, and even with subpar card choices still threatens lethal in the early turns. Cradle makes it that much worse.
I would not call that casual at all, nor mainstay. I don't think decks that threaten 120+ damage in early turns makes sub-par choices. Yes elfball is a thing at casual tables, but by that criteria so it goblins or tokens. Cradle does not make or break that strategy, and isnt on the back of other items making mana.
I would posit that the ban list should cater much less to decks planning to go "Sol Ring into Mox into Tolarian Academy".
If I understand you, you mean the ban list should be much more interested in making kitchen table games good. We agree. I just think Cradle does a lot less in most 'fair' decks than Academy would because of the interaction with mana rocks and how often creatures get wiped vs artifacts.
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
The "casual" elf deck is a mainstay of kitchen tables, though, and even with subpar card choices still threatens lethal in the early turns. Cradle makes it that much worse.
I would not call that casual at all, nor mainstay. I don't think decks that threaten 120+ damage in early turns makes sub-par choices. Yes elfball is a thing at casual tables, but by that criteria so it goblins or tokens. Cradle does not make or break that strategy, and isnt on the back of other items making mana.
I would posit that the ban list should cater much less to decks planning to go "Sol Ring into Mox into Tolarian Academy".
If I understand you, you mean the ban list should be much more interested in making kitchen table games good. We agree. I just think Cradle does a lot less in most 'fair' decks than Academy would because of the interaction with mana rocks and how often creatures get wiped vs artifacts.
-I am not arguing that one card "makes or breaks" either strategy.
- Of course suboptimal decks can still End the game early and abruptly.
- I'm also having a hard time coming up with example hands with 'fair' artifacts that push Academy over the top.
I see where you are coming from, but we are just on such different wavelengths that I guess we will just have to agree to disagree.
Oh my, how far we have come if SP, PT, PoK are all on the top 10 of undesirables.
How many ways are there of ending the game before Turn 5 even comes around for PoK, when all the Power 9 are legal, along with SRMC? I think basically any deck with Time Walk and Eternal Witness in it will accidentally win the game Turn 4 an uncomfortable amount of the time.
Thing is though, I can't really disagree with the logic of taking a lot of those other cards off. If you argue yourself into knots with certain of the apologetics often used (only broken if you break it, etc), stuff like Time Vault will actually show itself to be outside of your argument. Busted as all get out and would turn the game into a crap shoot, but outside the argument.
Just set aside the theories for a minute, ban all the stuff that is actually wrecking games rather than what theoretically should be wrecking them, and let's have some decent pickup games in this format for once.
Part of the point is that SP, PT, and PoK aren't necessarily on the top10 list of undesirables, but craft the best possible narrative given the (admittedly-contrived) circumstances.
PoK is quite a joke for it to be T10. Environments can adjust to it. It's not a card that generates instant rewards (pardon the pun) or creates an unbreakable combo/archenemy situation. Actual work needs to be done for a payoff.
It was a card, that for the longest time, was untouched and unmentioned by the RC until its recent axing. It makes me wonder if there's some sort of disconnect between the "world meta" and the basement meta.
And when the realization eventually hits the RC for them to slam that hammer, now suddenly it's in a arbitrary/provisional/Off-the-top T10 cards to be banned already? It must have been such a vile card in order to shoot its way up to the T10, just that the basement wasn't opened until the nuclear has subsided.
I feel like as a thought exercise this was a good way to really focus on the heart of what EDH "means" to an individual and what they value as most important. However, as a public thing (and especially from someone who is constantly under a microscope)I think this exercise was destined to fail because there is just no way to avoid any amount of subjective "you'd ban X buy not Y? What's wrong with you, yo?"
I took the entire exercise with the assumption that all groups strive to improve and we'll all eventually devolve into Time Vault races eventually. I admittedly didn't take scarcity of the actual cards into account and that some groups may not strive for the same thing and hence wouldn't change (which I think was what Sheldon took into account), but would also like to argue since the banlist has a 10-card limit, we cannot afford the luxury to account for these groups either.
Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the exercise, and it was one of the better EDH articles as of late.
I think it just illustrates (again) that the ban list isn’t designed to stand on its own. There’s some amorphous principle at work where players can’t be trusted with PoK under any circumstances, but in a pinch they could be counted on to continue to have great games with Time Vault and Time Warp. Figure out how that could possibly be the case, and you’ve figured out how to always have fun in this format, I suppose.
The debate continues to be had on whether this governing principle needs to be/ought to be as amorphous and unofficial as it is, but that’s somewhat outside the point. The exercise did do a good job at drawing the lines, once again.
I think it just illustrates (again) that the ban list isn’t designed to stand on its own. There’s some amorphous principle at work where players can’t be trusted with PoK under any circumstances, but in a pinch they could be counted on to continue to have great games with Time Vault and Time Warp. Figure out how that could possibly be the case, and you’ve figured out how to always have fun in this format, I suppose.
I don't think the principle is all that mysterious. The format is meant to be played for the players' personal satisfaction, so the governing power has to be used to address that context, because necessary intervention is going to be different than for a competitive format.
People play magic for fun. I'm not suggesting people playing competitive formats aren't doing so for the joy of the game, but when playing competitively, your primary motivator has to be winning or you're not going to have fun doing it. If you build a modern deck designed to just ramp into Panglacial Wurm, your chances of winning against a burn deck are slim to none and the interaction is going to be zilch. Neither player is gonna have a good time if there's absolutely no contest, so there's a prerequisite to playing that everyone has to try their best, which means playing good decks with the best cards. And if a few cards are so far the best that they limit the number of good decks, it makes things stale, and that's where wizards comes in and bans things to make sure people can continue to play a wide range of decks with success.
With a casual format, that's entirely unnecessary. The rules committee doesn't have to encourage people to play a variety of decks because people will already play whatever they want. I'm sure there are people who force themselves into archetypes because their only preference in winning, but most players in a casual format are playing what they enjoy whether it's top tier or not. It's not like people were flocking to simic in mass to gain access to Prophet of Kruphix, but rather that people were playing Prophet of Kruphix in mass because they already wanted to play simic decks and it's a great card to work with most of those colors' strategies.
I don't think Time Vault is really a threat to this format for this reason: it's not a great card to use in most strategies, but rather a strategy of its own. Time Vault is a win condition that you have to decide you want to use, and even if the card were shipped free to every magic player, I think most people wouldn't make that decision. Sure, you can just stick voltaic key and time vault into literally any deck and make them win more games. If I put those 2 cards into hypothetical homarid tribal, I could absolutely steal games with them, but as soon as my opponents couldn't stop me, they would scoop, which means that I didn't get to play Homarid tribal. Ramming cold, efficient winning machines into any random deck might let you win the game, but it doesn't let the deck you really wanted to build win the game, and I think most players understand that. Literally any red deck with creatures could easily justify Kiki-Jiki/Zealous Conscripts, but the vast majority don't do that because that isn't the way they intend to win.
It comes down to the endless debate of casual vs competitive. Sometimes it gets characterized as casual players not trying to win, but that isn't true. Sometimes it gets characterized as competitive players not trying to have fun, and that's not true either. Nor do I think there's some sliding scale between to two. I think the difference between the two is that competitively you have to ask yourself "what cards should I play" and casually you have to ask yourself "what cards do I want to play," and that has to shape where the ban list goes. If you're worried about people asking what they should play and reaching the conclusion that Time Vault is effective, you have to ban it because it will really unbalance the format. If you're worried about people asking what they want to play, I don't think many of them conclude "I really want to win with Time Vault infinite turns!" I really don't think Time Vault should be unbanned because it's got nothing to add to the format, but I don't think it would hurt much either because people don't want to undermine all the cards they really want to win with.
Something like Prophet on the other hand isn't undermining anyone's desired win condition. The player can still end up winning with Experiment Kraj voltron while benefitting from Prophet. They not only get to win the way they wanted, but they get to do it even better. Prophet of Kruphix enhances so many strategies so well that it becomes the answer to "what do I want to play" all over the place as it helps people fulfill their wildest dreams. Meanwhile, the opponents aren't sitting there thinking "we all lost to Experiment Kraj," they're thinking "we lost to Prophet of Kruphix... again." That's where I think banning cards is most useful in a casual setting. Cards that are fun for players and their opponents are obviously free to exist. Cards that are so strong they become bland for players and their opponents are probably going to be avoided by most of the player base because they don't want to play boring games. It's the cards that are exciting for the person using them and awful for their opponents that deserve the most scrutiny, and those are generally not the cheap combo pieces but rather the gross enablers that let people play all the cards they really want to but still be unfairly ahead of everyone else.
So basically, what I'm saying is that we should really ban Sol Ring already.
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Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
It's not like people were flocking to simic in mass to gain access to Prophet of Kruphix, but rather that people were playing Prophet of Kruphix in mass because they already wanted to play simic decks and it's a great card to work with most of those colors' strategies.
Funny. As I recall, one of the rationales for the POK ban was precisely that the RC didn’t want to give more of an incentive to play UGx than there already was, and by implication, that they had their finger on the pulse of the format as leaning toward that style. Even the article above refers to Red as being behind the other colors, which is only really true when looked at through that lens.
Tying into your main point, what happens when unfettered ramp into draw into Avenger of Zendikar, Rite of Replication becomes stale for the people you’re playing against?
Well, one of the options is to play more Time Vault. Your opponents will have to adapt by not tapping out, and playing counters or artifact kill in every deck. Except even so, Time Vault is broken as all get out, and will still polarize the game around itself due to enabling a win from any position and 4-5 mana open.
See the difference?
If I find that losing to a certain thing is awful and dull, then chances are that I am enamored with the counter-strategy to that thing. If I don’t like every game ending to Craterhoof, then Instant speed wipes are something I will happily sleeve into my decks, then happily play them out. That’s what makes Magic the game that it is.
Except, that can’t occur when there is no counter-strategy. If a card or strategy is so powerful that it can’t be interacted with by a player who is conscious of it and adapting to it, then that is where a ban is warranted. It’s not just for things that people are sick of playing against. It should be for things that are both out of balance in terms of impact and don’t go away once people start running answers.
That happens to be true for the Green meanies on the ban list, but it happens to be true for reasons other than just people being sick of them. It’s also that they don’t become less represented in a metagame that anticipates them. Just more clone and reanimate ensue.
Well, one of the options is to play more Time Vault. Your opponents will have to adapt by not tapping out, and playing counters or artifact kill in every deck.
Except there's another option: it's called losing. I would never advise someone against running disruption; answers help make the game great, but there comes a point where running more answers to handle something would morph your deck into something you didn't want to play. Personally, I'd rather lose than play only decks that fit the criteria for answering Time Vault.
People often talk of how playing strong decks forced their playgroup to adapt and play better themselves, "rising tide carries all ships"-style. The opposite can also be done by playing down to get others to play down as well. If you were playing Time Vault and winning with it every game, I would absolutely let you, I would encourage others to let you, and I don't think it would take particularly long for you to get bored of winning that way. I think just losing is a pretty powerful counter-strategy to something that grossly unbalanced.
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Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
People often talk of how playing strong decks forced their playgroup to adapt and play better themselves, "rising tide carries all ships"-style. The opposite can also be done by playing down to get others to play down as well. If you were playing Time Vault and winning with it every game, I would absolutely let you, I would encourage others to let you, and I don't think it would take particularly long for you to get bored of winning that way. I think just losing is a pretty powerful counter-strategy to something that grossly unbalanced.
I can't believe I'm reading this.. You do realize this is social manipulation, right? If you purposefully lose games just to discourage people from playing certain cards that you deem unsuitable for the format, then you are just as bad as kingmakers and colluders. You are basically trying to instigate a massive game ruining. Why would someone play with a person like that? Moreover, what would you do if someone started doing it to you; identify cards you play that seem problematic to them and then purposefully throw games where they appear, just to force you to stop playing them.
Probably best using the good ol' "just don't play with them" stance, right?
What you described is the diametral opposite of getting better at EDH, in both spirit and execution.
I can't believe I'm reading this.. You do realize this is social manipulation, right? If you purposefully lose games just to discourage people from playing certain cards that you deem unsuitable for the format, then you are just as bad as kingmakers and colluders. You are basically trying to instigate a massive game ruining. Why would someone play with a person like that? Moreover, what would you do if someone started doing it to you; identify cards you play that seem problematic to them and then purposefully throw games where they appear, just to force you to stop playing them.
Probably best using the good ol' "just don't play with them" stance, right?
What you described is the diametral opposite of getting better at EDH, in both spirit and execution.
I think you misunderstand. If I understood correctly, he is suggesting that plaging more casual, less-tuned decks will encourage others to follow suit. That doesn't mean intentionally playing bad or nerfing yourself.
People often talk of how playing strong decks forced their playgroup to adapt and play better themselves, "rising tide carries all ships"-style. The opposite can also be done by playing down to get others to play down as well. If you were playing Time Vault and winning with it every game, I would absolutely let you, I would encourage others to let you, and I don't think it would take particularly long for you to get bored of winning that way. I think just losing is a pretty powerful counter-strategy to something that grossly unbalanced.
I can't believe I'm reading this.. You do realize this is social manipulation, right? If you purposefully lose games just to discourage people from playing certain cards that you deem unsuitable for the format, then you are just as bad as kingmakers and colluders. You are basically trying to instigate a massive game ruining. Why would someone play with a person like that? Moreover, what would you do if someone started doing it to you; identify cards you play that seem problematic to them and then purposefully throw games where they appear, just to force you to stop playing them.
Probably best using the good ol' "just don't play with them" stance, right?
What you described is the diametral opposite of getting better at EDH, in both spirit and execution.
I didn't mean throw the game whenever the card is played. Sort of the opposite in fact. I just mean I wouldn't stop it.
When some card or strategy dominates a group, people usually react. Either they change their decks significantly to try and counter it, or they concede games quickly then proceed to pitch a fit about how unfair it is and how it should be banned. Only one of those methods is constructive, but I'll admit I've been tempted into both on occasion. Adapting decks to counter strategies is usually a good thing, but there is a limit to that.
Time Vault is a great example of this in every way. It's possibly for someone to go "Swamp, Dark Ritual, Sol Ring, Time Vault, Voltaic Key" on turn 1. I've made minor card choice changes in zedruu depending on meta, but there's no chance I'm ever adding the Force of Will or Mental Misstep to stop that play from happening. I don't want to play that game, so I wouldn't. I would accept in my deckbuilding that I can't handle Time Vault. That's the first step of "just losing."
The second step is not conceding. Conceding the game to an overwhelming deck is practically encouraging them to keep doing it. If the person is playing something strong to feel powerful, scooping to them is giving them as much power as possible. If they're doing so because they think it will be fun and are naive of how gross it is, they'll never learn if you don't let them play it out. I can't imagine a person who could manage to win with infinite Time Vault turns and play out the whole rest of the game more than a couple times before feeling immensely bored or guilty.
But just to be perfectly explicit with this: I don't want anyone to play poorly on purpose or throw a game on purpose. But I do think they building low-powered decks or refusing to adapt to high-powered is preemptively accepting the high probability of losing, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that. If someone came into my zedruu-powered meta with something strong, let's just say Sliver Queen - 5 Color Boonweaver Combo, I can tell you it would win almost every game without challenge. If we never change our decks or build new decks to handle it, we are basically just accepting losses. And then out of desire for interesting games, you'd be the one adapting your deck or building weaker ones to foster an environment where we could compete fairly. And if I go into a highly competitive group determined to win with my zedruu deck, I almost certainly lose, but if it intrigues people, they might be encouraged to build weaker decks to play at that level. When people want to compete with each other, it's usually a narrative of the weak becoming stronger, but it doesn't have to be. It can go both ways.
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Zedruu: "This deck is not only able to go crazy - it also needs to do so."
In my experience, winning is one thing that certain people never get tired of. And it only takes one even in the most consistent group, because you know, the deck that keeps winning is the deck that gets its way on the play mat.
There is also the fact that every game needs an objective. That's not to be understood as the reason people play a game, or the reason that games exist in general, but an objective is an essential ingredient to a game. The objective of Commander is to reduce the life totals of other players to zero (or other such win condition, like mill). No matter how efficient or inefficient your deck is at doing that, it continues to be the objective of the game.
Now, the minute you suggest that someone's continuing experience with a game should be divorced from the discovery process of how to better reach the game's objectives, that's the minute you invite all sorts of subjective judgments, social manipulation, and personal quibbling to your game. The merit of the game's objective and the particulars to reaching that objective is that they are unbiased. There's no debate whether such and such card needs to be interacted with. If it reaches the game's objectives in advance of other cards doing so, then it needs to be interacted with, or else that player reaches the game's objective. It's a very simple idea, really. Determining what's "fun", or in "the spirit of the format", these are not simple questions. And if you have any interest in playing with other people, you will want those things to be as clear as possible.
That's what separates a good game that fosters continuous development from a visual exercise, like Cat's Cradle.
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I will agree that Cradle will produce way more mana than Academy--but it's the when that's important. Our view is that Academy produces too much too early.
Out of curiosity, if Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, and other controversial fast mana sources from artifacts weren't around, do you think you would still feel this way? I never got to play in the Tolarian Academy era of Magic, so it's difficult for me to see why it's a more problematic card compared to Gaea's Cradle.
Trap your friends in an endless game with this 23-card combo!
Academy is not problematic when you don't include fast mana, it compounds the problems caused by the introduction of fast mana. That's why I said it would be stronger in the hypothetical format where the Moxen were made legal. On the other hand, if your Academy is being powered by Sky Diamond and Mind Stone, it is more on par with Cabal Coffers -- not really a big deal at all.
Cradle, I think, has more power than it is being credited. An elf deck with Cradle often demands an immediate Wrath, or wins on turn 3 or 4. (EDIT: And oftentimes, it can kill you before you can even cast your sweeper)
Draft my Mono-Blue Cube!
lichess.org | chess.com
My list will look like this:
Channel
Gaea's Cradle
Griselbrand
Karakas
Limited Resources
Panoptic Mirror
Time Vault
Tinker
Tolarian Academy
Yawgmoth's Bargain
I'm not going to go through them in great detail, but simply put:
Channel outright breaks in a 40-life format far more than any Lotus/Mox... except Mox Lotus
Gaea's Cradle/Tolarian Academy for pretty much the same reasons. Sure, the academy is magnitudes higher in the format (especially with the Mox around), but I simply think the sheer expansion that the Cradle creates within a single turn is an issue by itself as well (especially the way creatures have been going) that the "Solved by Wraths everywhere" doesn't feel quite valid to me anymore.
Griselbrand/Yawgmoth's Bargain - they pretty much explain themselves in a 40-life format.
Karakas - lots of cards don't work well with the format / go against the concept and if I had to choose a poster child, it would be this.
Limited Resources is the poster child for "unfun" the way Karakas is for "Anti-format".
Panoptic Mirror/Time Vault - Yes, we greatly accelerated the format, but I'm still uncomfortable with some of the easiest infinite turn combos. Mirror stays on because I decided a lone Time Walk is better off free in a 10-card banlist and we just lock the single card that interacts with all the time magic.
Tinker - Unlike Sheldon, I don't think the "1-time" effect saves this card from the list... because the Mox are free on top of the already fast mana acceleration we have in the format. Sure, we can leave it to social contracts, but I still think a competitively-contracted meta will involve the Mox and Tinkering into some quick win-condition. I may have let the Mox free due to their scarcity, but I don't take it into a large account when I account for these scenarios.
A quick recap for the other cards on Sheldon's list, but not mine...
Balance - Well, it's #1 on Sheldon's list, but I don't actually think it's that broken in a 10-card banlist world. Scepter can't imprint it and I have the Mirror on the list. It might cause grief when cast at a low cost, but I really don't see people going all the way out to rapidly Balance-Grief in a 10-card banlist world.
Prophet of Kruphix, Primeval Titan, Sylvan Primordial - All the relatively-recently banned cards in the format... that I honestly think would be too slow in a 10-card banlist world.
Just the clarification (and disclaimer) that I don't take the actual quantity of the released cards into account, I assume that all groups, even those with social contracts will eventually improve to a more-competitive state, the same way I generally see more Mana Crypt arms-races recently (although that was due to Eternal Masters). So bluntly put, I'm ignoring reprint policies and prices as a 10-card banlist requires much more attention to whatever impact a card that isn't on the list has on the format itself, regardless of actual quantity out there (at least I took that assumption for this hypothetical exercise).
I contend that Karakas is not the problem that it is made out to be. Yes, it is very annoying to have your general bounced every turn, but consider how much the format has evolved since the card was banned. Perhaps most importantly, spot removal has become more of a thing. We now have 4-5 playable Strip Mines, and a number of good spells that can remove lands (as well as most other permanents). We also have a large number more of lands which are deserving of eating a Strip Mine. This means that Strip Mine should be a staple of every deck, no metagaming against the possibility of facing Karakas required. Secondly, generals have changed in their dynamics. We have generals with experience counters, indestructible ones, and others that practically win the game on the spot. We also have a lot more ETB effects that neutralize the downside of bouncing. Third, ETB effects have increased as well, so it isn't always in the best interest to bounce a general. Lastly, this is still a once a round effect, and each opponent will have it in their interest to remove the Karakas or player.
TL;DR Sheldon should have freed Karakas and left something more powerful on the list.
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StaffI get what you are saying about ETB creatures and other reasons it could be a useful answer in itself to rough Commanders so I would not object strongly if it stayed legal in such a 'verse.
However Sundering Titan and Emmy being free when Prophet is on the ban list makes no sense in 10 card land. I have to chalk it up to bias based on how recently it ruined games. The other 2 are colorless, have VERY limited 'fair use', and removal was pretty pointless.
I would posit that the ban list should cater much less to decks planning to go "Sol Ring into Mox into Tolarian Academy".
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If I understand you, you mean the ban list should be much more interested in making kitchen table games good. We agree. I just think Cradle does a lot less in most 'fair' decks than Academy would because of the interaction with mana rocks and how often creatures get wiped vs artifacts.
- Of course suboptimal decks can still End the game early and abruptly.
- I'm also having a hard time coming up with example hands with 'fair' artifacts that push Academy over the top.
I see where you are coming from, but we are just on such different wavelengths that I guess we will just have to agree to disagree.
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How many ways are there of ending the game before Turn 5 even comes around for PoK, when all the Power 9 are legal, along with SRMC? I think basically any deck with Time Walk and Eternal Witness in it will accidentally win the game Turn 4 an uncomfortable amount of the time.
Thing is though, I can't really disagree with the logic of taking a lot of those other cards off. If you argue yourself into knots with certain of the apologetics often used (only broken if you break it, etc), stuff like Time Vault will actually show itself to be outside of your argument. Busted as all get out and would turn the game into a crap shoot, but outside the argument.
Just set aside the theories for a minute, ban all the stuff that is actually wrecking games rather than what theoretically should be wrecking them, and let's have some decent pickup games in this format for once.
It was a card, that for the longest time, was untouched and unmentioned by the RC until its recent axing. It makes me wonder if there's some sort of disconnect between the "world meta" and the basement meta.
And when the realization eventually hits the RC for them to slam that hammer, now suddenly it's in a arbitrary/provisional/Off-the-top T10 cards to be banned already? It must have been such a vile card in order to shoot its way up to the T10, just that the basement wasn't opened until the nuclear has subsided.
The lag seems real to me.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
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I think it just illustrates (again) that the ban list isn’t designed to stand on its own. There’s some amorphous principle at work where players can’t be trusted with PoK under any circumstances, but in a pinch they could be counted on to continue to have great games with Time Vault and Time Warp. Figure out how that could possibly be the case, and you’ve figured out how to always have fun in this format, I suppose.
The debate continues to be had on whether this governing principle needs to be/ought to be as amorphous and unofficial as it is, but that’s somewhat outside the point. The exercise did do a good job at drawing the lines, once again.
I don't think the principle is all that mysterious. The format is meant to be played for the players' personal satisfaction, so the governing power has to be used to address that context, because necessary intervention is going to be different than for a competitive format.
People play magic for fun. I'm not suggesting people playing competitive formats aren't doing so for the joy of the game, but when playing competitively, your primary motivator has to be winning or you're not going to have fun doing it. If you build a modern deck designed to just ramp into Panglacial Wurm, your chances of winning against a burn deck are slim to none and the interaction is going to be zilch. Neither player is gonna have a good time if there's absolutely no contest, so there's a prerequisite to playing that everyone has to try their best, which means playing good decks with the best cards. And if a few cards are so far the best that they limit the number of good decks, it makes things stale, and that's where wizards comes in and bans things to make sure people can continue to play a wide range of decks with success.
With a casual format, that's entirely unnecessary. The rules committee doesn't have to encourage people to play a variety of decks because people will already play whatever they want. I'm sure there are people who force themselves into archetypes because their only preference in winning, but most players in a casual format are playing what they enjoy whether it's top tier or not. It's not like people were flocking to simic in mass to gain access to Prophet of Kruphix, but rather that people were playing Prophet of Kruphix in mass because they already wanted to play simic decks and it's a great card to work with most of those colors' strategies.
I don't think Time Vault is really a threat to this format for this reason: it's not a great card to use in most strategies, but rather a strategy of its own. Time Vault is a win condition that you have to decide you want to use, and even if the card were shipped free to every magic player, I think most people wouldn't make that decision. Sure, you can just stick voltaic key and time vault into literally any deck and make them win more games. If I put those 2 cards into hypothetical homarid tribal, I could absolutely steal games with them, but as soon as my opponents couldn't stop me, they would scoop, which means that I didn't get to play Homarid tribal. Ramming cold, efficient winning machines into any random deck might let you win the game, but it doesn't let the deck you really wanted to build win the game, and I think most players understand that. Literally any red deck with creatures could easily justify Kiki-Jiki/Zealous Conscripts, but the vast majority don't do that because that isn't the way they intend to win.
It comes down to the endless debate of casual vs competitive. Sometimes it gets characterized as casual players not trying to win, but that isn't true. Sometimes it gets characterized as competitive players not trying to have fun, and that's not true either. Nor do I think there's some sliding scale between to two. I think the difference between the two is that competitively you have to ask yourself "what cards should I play" and casually you have to ask yourself "what cards do I want to play," and that has to shape where the ban list goes. If you're worried about people asking what they should play and reaching the conclusion that Time Vault is effective, you have to ban it because it will really unbalance the format. If you're worried about people asking what they want to play, I don't think many of them conclude "I really want to win with Time Vault infinite turns!" I really don't think Time Vault should be unbanned because it's got nothing to add to the format, but I don't think it would hurt much either because people don't want to undermine all the cards they really want to win with.
Something like Prophet on the other hand isn't undermining anyone's desired win condition. The player can still end up winning with Experiment Kraj voltron while benefitting from Prophet. They not only get to win the way they wanted, but they get to do it even better. Prophet of Kruphix enhances so many strategies so well that it becomes the answer to "what do I want to play" all over the place as it helps people fulfill their wildest dreams. Meanwhile, the opponents aren't sitting there thinking "we all lost to Experiment Kraj," they're thinking "we lost to Prophet of Kruphix... again." That's where I think banning cards is most useful in a casual setting. Cards that are fun for players and their opponents are obviously free to exist. Cards that are so strong they become bland for players and their opponents are probably going to be avoided by most of the player base because they don't want to play boring games. It's the cards that are exciting for the person using them and awful for their opponents that deserve the most scrutiny, and those are generally not the cheap combo pieces but rather the gross enablers that let people play all the cards they really want to but still be unfairly ahead of everyone else.
So basically, what I'm saying is that we should really ban Sol Ring already.
Funny. As I recall, one of the rationales for the POK ban was precisely that the RC didn’t want to give more of an incentive to play UGx than there already was, and by implication, that they had their finger on the pulse of the format as leaning toward that style. Even the article above refers to Red as being behind the other colors, which is only really true when looked at through that lens.
Tying into your main point, what happens when unfettered ramp into draw into Avenger of Zendikar, Rite of Replication becomes stale for the people you’re playing against?
Well, one of the options is to play more Time Vault. Your opponents will have to adapt by not tapping out, and playing counters or artifact kill in every deck. Except even so, Time Vault is broken as all get out, and will still polarize the game around itself due to enabling a win from any position and 4-5 mana open.
See the difference?
If I find that losing to a certain thing is awful and dull, then chances are that I am enamored with the counter-strategy to that thing. If I don’t like every game ending to Craterhoof, then Instant speed wipes are something I will happily sleeve into my decks, then happily play them out. That’s what makes Magic the game that it is.
Except, that can’t occur when there is no counter-strategy. If a card or strategy is so powerful that it can’t be interacted with by a player who is conscious of it and adapting to it, then that is where a ban is warranted. It’s not just for things that people are sick of playing against. It should be for things that are both out of balance in terms of impact and don’t go away once people start running answers.
That happens to be true for the Green meanies on the ban list, but it happens to be true for reasons other than just people being sick of them. It’s also that they don’t become less represented in a metagame that anticipates them. Just more clone and reanimate ensue.
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Except there's another option: it's called losing. I would never advise someone against running disruption; answers help make the game great, but there comes a point where running more answers to handle something would morph your deck into something you didn't want to play. Personally, I'd rather lose than play only decks that fit the criteria for answering Time Vault.
People often talk of how playing strong decks forced their playgroup to adapt and play better themselves, "rising tide carries all ships"-style. The opposite can also be done by playing down to get others to play down as well. If you were playing Time Vault and winning with it every game, I would absolutely let you, I would encourage others to let you, and I don't think it would take particularly long for you to get bored of winning that way. I think just losing is a pretty powerful counter-strategy to something that grossly unbalanced.
Probably best using the good ol' "just don't play with them" stance, right?
What you described is the diametral opposite of getting better at EDH, in both spirit and execution.
I think you misunderstand. If I understood correctly, he is suggesting that plaging more casual, less-tuned decks will encourage others to follow suit. That doesn't mean intentionally playing bad or nerfing yourself.
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I didn't mean throw the game whenever the card is played. Sort of the opposite in fact. I just mean I wouldn't stop it.
When some card or strategy dominates a group, people usually react. Either they change their decks significantly to try and counter it, or they concede games quickly then proceed to pitch a fit about how unfair it is and how it should be banned. Only one of those methods is constructive, but I'll admit I've been tempted into both on occasion. Adapting decks to counter strategies is usually a good thing, but there is a limit to that.
Time Vault is a great example of this in every way. It's possibly for someone to go "Swamp, Dark Ritual, Sol Ring, Time Vault, Voltaic Key" on turn 1. I've made minor card choice changes in zedruu depending on meta, but there's no chance I'm ever adding the Force of Will or Mental Misstep to stop that play from happening. I don't want to play that game, so I wouldn't. I would accept in my deckbuilding that I can't handle Time Vault. That's the first step of "just losing."
The second step is not conceding. Conceding the game to an overwhelming deck is practically encouraging them to keep doing it. If the person is playing something strong to feel powerful, scooping to them is giving them as much power as possible. If they're doing so because they think it will be fun and are naive of how gross it is, they'll never learn if you don't let them play it out. I can't imagine a person who could manage to win with infinite Time Vault turns and play out the whole rest of the game more than a couple times before feeling immensely bored or guilty.
But just to be perfectly explicit with this: I don't want anyone to play poorly on purpose or throw a game on purpose. But I do think they building low-powered decks or refusing to adapt to high-powered is preemptively accepting the high probability of losing, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that. If someone came into my zedruu-powered meta with something strong, let's just say Sliver Queen - 5 Color Boonweaver Combo, I can tell you it would win almost every game without challenge. If we never change our decks or build new decks to handle it, we are basically just accepting losses. And then out of desire for interesting games, you'd be the one adapting your deck or building weaker ones to foster an environment where we could compete fairly. And if I go into a highly competitive group determined to win with my zedruu deck, I almost certainly lose, but if it intrigues people, they might be encouraged to build weaker decks to play at that level. When people want to compete with each other, it's usually a narrative of the weak becoming stronger, but it doesn't have to be. It can go both ways.
There is also the fact that every game needs an objective. That's not to be understood as the reason people play a game, or the reason that games exist in general, but an objective is an essential ingredient to a game. The objective of Commander is to reduce the life totals of other players to zero (or other such win condition, like mill). No matter how efficient or inefficient your deck is at doing that, it continues to be the objective of the game.
Now, the minute you suggest that someone's continuing experience with a game should be divorced from the discovery process of how to better reach the game's objectives, that's the minute you invite all sorts of subjective judgments, social manipulation, and personal quibbling to your game. The merit of the game's objective and the particulars to reaching that objective is that they are unbiased. There's no debate whether such and such card needs to be interacted with. If it reaches the game's objectives in advance of other cards doing so, then it needs to be interacted with, or else that player reaches the game's objective. It's a very simple idea, really. Determining what's "fun", or in "the spirit of the format", these are not simple questions. And if you have any interest in playing with other people, you will want those things to be as clear as possible.
That's what separates a good game that fosters continuous development from a visual exercise, like Cat's Cradle.