I basically did just this. I liked the large cardpool format feeling, its kind of an "infinite possibilities in a cause and effect" frame of thinking. There is a running bet in my crew of card playing friends as to if I will return to standard in February when the new set drops (Im still going with No) because something in Born of the Gods will make me interested in playing standard...but I am really interested in seeing how new cards shake up modern
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Decks I have in my bag of tricks- Needless to say, someone who wants to play will probably have a deck UB/x Faeries UR Storm XURWB Affinity G Elves UW control
I started playing MTG at the kitchen table during Onslaught block, then started with organized play in Mirrodin block. I took a break when I started college for budget reasons, after the Futuresight prerelease. I got back into the game when I heard about Modern's announcement from a good friend who played stereotypical 'kitchen-table-casual' magic. Modern encompassed pretty much every set I remembered playing with, so there was some nostalgia factor to pull me back in, and it was cheap enough that it could be done on a budget with some cool interactions, so I decided to jump into that play group and I just stuck to budget Modern decks. One of them started a MTG club on campus. Budget Modern became our default casual format because you can actually make a pretty sweet deck with a week's worth of beer money. And things started ratcheting up from there.
Most of us have since graduated, gotten 'real' jobs, and can afford to pimp out our decks, play Standard, and experiment with Legacy like we never could before. Suddenly our casual Modern turned into a "Modern Plus" set up. I tried Faeries and Cawblade and all those cool decks I missed out on between Timespiral and Scars.
I recently moved to a rural location for work and traded in the paper for MTGO. So I don't play as much now because rural internet blows. But I'm still keenly interested.
And to answer your question, yes, I think Modern is in the long term cheaper than Standard. You buy your cards once (at a slightly greater investment) but don't have to worry too much about building new decks every 3 months. Most MTGO decks cost about $200-400 for Standard and $250-500 for Modern, with a couple notable exceptions well above and below for each.
I started playing MTG when Zendikar came out, and was a standard player for a long time, When the Community Cup modern event was announced I tried out Modern and fell in love with it. It immediately became my favorite format, even through all the bannings, even when my favorite deck got hit with not one but TWO bannings, I still love the format. I played standard somewhat consistantly last season, but have yet to actively play any RTR THS standard cuz standard is lame, and Modern is ****ing awesome.
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I was a casual player for the first 12 or so years that I've been playing. I didn't start to get into competitive Magic until Modern was introduced. I never had much interest in any of the other formats.
I tried standard for a few months. Can't stand it... the idea of rotation is cool if you're playing magic every day, but it's horrific if you play once a week, which is all I have time for. Also, I've found "Tier 1.5/Tier 2" decks to be better in modern/legacy than they are in standard.
With regard to cost, modern is by far the cheapest format. If you're a standard player, you've probably already got the shocks. fetches are a little ridiculous right now, but once you've got them, congratulations... Every non-jund/UWR deck can be had for cheap. Tier 2 decks can be built for like $100.
I'll be honest, I got my fetches when they were $10, and I'm not willing to pay $55 a pop to fill out my collection (I'm missing scalding tarns and misties). But they WILL be reprinted, and I personally believe it will be soon. I hope next block, but it might be the one after that. When they do, they'll be back in the $10-20 range where they belong.
I'm getting really sick of standard, personally. I don't like the planned obsolesence of my cards expiring every year, so i not only constantly have to be buying new cards to keep playing, but I also can't keep playing my favorite decks.
Modern is cheaper in the long run, and also has so much more diversity. Quite frankly, the only reason I still play standard at all is that I just can't find enough Modern events in my area, hence my always wanting to see WotC continue to support and encourage the format.
You literally took these words right out of my mouth lol. On another note, I currently play a budget Gruul Zoo deck that cost about $200 (no goyfs or fetchlands), and honestly, it is pretty fun. Would it be better with goyfs and fetchlands? Of course. But it can certainly hold its own without them.
I should also note that if i had the money I would be playing Legacy mainly, although I would still battle Modern sometimes. I prefer getting FoW'ed to getting Thoughtseized. Constantly having to buy new cards for standard didn't seem sustainable.
What I did this standard season is buy a bunch of cheap cards before rotation and built a GB aggro deck (the kibler deck basically). All of the expensive cards are modern staples so it worked out.
Next standard, if an opportunity like that doesn't show up (to play modern or legacy staples in standard), I will just buy an event deck to continue my community service.
I switched from Standard to Modern. I swapped for three reasons:
1. My friend started to get into it.
2. My cards were rotating.
3. I played the Chaos Reigns planechase deck, which got me hooked on cascading. Luckily Jund hadn't become the Big Bad Boogeyman yet so I was able to get everything for much less than it would cost now.
If so why? Im not bashing, but Im thinking of getting back into magic and an eternal format might be what I want. Are the costs really cheaper over time? It seems skeptical to me that the costs are infact cheaper. Anyone got some handy numbers to sway me?
Costs are infact cheaper. I really started getting into Modern early last year, in that time I've had 3 decks. Eggs (originally the tier 1 list, my own brew post SS ban), Melira Pod (t1 list), and Superfriends (in heavy flux but keeps the same core, all brew... tier 1.5 power wise, it can win competitive FNM's).
Pod cost me around $600, originally $400 but then VoR and Archangel of Thune became things... so it has had some expensive recent updates. Eggs was about $300, plus $40 to update post legendary change. Superfriends is about $300 but lacks fetchlands since the other decks are using them. So overall for a year of decks that are competitive, don't rotate, and have been in a time with lots of expensive updates I've spent about $1250 on Modern. In that same time for Standard, excluding random buys while trying to solve a format post set release I played UW Flash, Junk Aristocrats, Naya Blitz, 4c Control (brew), MUD, and MBD. I'm not entirely sure of what it cost over time to put these decks together (I get most of my standard cards through trade/FNM wins so value is tougher to gauge) but a rough estimate is probably $1800. I suppose you could say I got twice as many decks for only 50% higher cost, but the thing about standard is that the decks don't have as much depth and the meta rotates quickly. This means you go through more decks, and decks just don't have as many lines open to them, so they get boring fast.
For example a deck like Melira Pod has a good 20+ lines of play at almost any point in the game while the toughest decision in a deck like MUD is do you play the Jace or the Master.
Chances are I won't end up spending much on any of my Modern decks this year, while standard has several updates looming between the fall set duals, MBD updates for BNG, potential future MUD updates, and so on.
A lot of the lack of expense in Modern though (or Legacy for that matter) lies in choosing a deck that will hold your attention for a long time. My Legacy decks are Elves, Burn, and High Tide each were pretty inexpensive at the time (no Candelabras) and I have a blast playing them with low upkeep. Modern is in much the same boat... particularly with my first two decks. In standard the quick pace of the meta isn't conducive to sticking with one deck.
Someone else said it earlier but I have the same opinion, I only play Standard as a community service because it's what everyone wants to play and we need the numbers at FNM sometimes. I would much rather be playing Legacy and Modern because they aren't bottomless money pits and the decks are just so much more fun even though I'm at a bit of a disadvantage in Legacy when the popular decks around here are things like Sneak & Show, Reanimator, and Dredge. On that note... I'm 43-43 in Dredge games against Burn. That's a surprisingly equal match.
I played standard from kami/rav though ts/Lor. I stopped playing constructed formats (yet kept my cards and played EDH) because I got tired of building standard decks just to see my collection rotate. This was an understandable cost of playing, but as I grew older and other commitments arose, it really irritated me to sink money in a format I could only play 1-2 times a month.
With Modern I can play when I have time without worrying about "forcing myself to play" because my deck is getting ready to rotate. I enjoy playing with more "powerful" cards and a much more diverse card pool.
I considered getting into Standard in the Scars-Innistrad season, initially via a WU Haunted Humans build, and then with a WB Tokens deck. The token deck was the only one I ever got relatively complete, and even then I only pitted it against a couple people's decks at school. I never brought it to an FNM.
Since then, I've been mostly into casual and EDH. However, I have a growing interest in modern, and I recently started putting together a RWU control deck(though it might end up being midrange)to start testing and possibly bringing to weekly modern matches at some of the stores near me. In my time of watching standard, I've seen more things that I found uninteresting than I found vaguely interesting or good.
I've slowly been trying to get into Modern (I don't have a job so I rely on doing well at FNM and winning credit to buy things I need), but I gave up on actually buying cards for Standard since Caw-Blade era, which was when the great money mythic/rare scheme occurred. Since then, I've borrowed cards/decks for FNM, or put together budget decks from scraps people left behind.
In the same way you can tell someone is from the XVIII century because he is arroused by ankles, you can tell someone is from USA because he feels nipples disturbing.
When RtR hit I left standard for modern. Tired of the crazy price fluctuations of cards that tanked post rotation and having to invest heavily into a new set. so I just focused on modern (though I would be in legacy if I could afford that format).
Ya, I transitioned from Standard to Modern and I'm loving it. I still ask others what standard is like and all I here is complaints about it being stale and only b or u devotion is playable.
When RtR hit I left standard for modern. Tired of the crazy price fluctuations of cards that tanked post rotation and having to invest heavily into a new set. so I just focused on modern (though I would be in legacy if I could afford that format).
Thragtusk is what did it for me, $25 for a rare that will hold absolutely zero value upon rotation is/was insanity. Worse, you needed it for practically every deck. Atleast a card like Thoughtseize or Snapcaster would hold some value.
Ya, I transitioned from Standard to Modern and I'm loving it. I still ask others what standard is like and all I here is complaints about it being stale and only b or u devotion is playable.
Mono Blue Devotion and Mono Black Devotion are the current top decks, but they're far from the only playable ones. Esper and Azorius Control are both big, and there's also RG Monsters and a bunch of different kinds of aggro decks.
Though personally my biggest annoyance with Mono Blue Devotion is people's tendency to refer to it as MUD, and whenever I see that I think they're talking about the Legacy or Vintage deck.
I used to play Standard. It got frustrating as someone who likes to brew. It always seemed like by the time I got all the kinks worked out of a deck, half of it was rotating out of the format. I recently tried to get back into Standard again since I had a lot of cards for the WG Midrange thing, and did my best to collect Archangel of Thune while it was at $35. It's now down to $20, and the loss reminded me of why I didn't like investing in Standard cards. It's almost the exact opposite of investing in Modern cards. For example, I picked up Horizon Canopy when they were about $12-13, and now they are above $30.
I have also completely abandoned Standard for modern. A lot of the reasons have been rehased throughout this thread, so ill skip them. But the biggest reason for me is:
How aggro heavy the meta is. There are almost no control decks (UW being the only one currently, last season it was not a competitive deck) and absolutely no pure combo decks.
Modern is the exact opposite. So many archetypes are playable (competitively so) and new ones are popping up all the time. I am not a play creature, swing with everyone kind of player (no disrespect to those who are) and being forced to play something not my style (and at obscene prices) just does nothing for me.
Thragtusk is what did it for me, $25 for a rare that will hold absolutely zero value upon rotation is/was insanity. Worse, you needed it for practically every deck. Atleast a card like Thoughtseize or Snapcaster would hold some value.
I used to play Standard. It got frustrating as someone who likes to brew. It always seemed like by the time I got all the kinks worked out of a deck, half of it was rotating out of the format. I recently tried to get back into Standard again since I had a lot of cards for the WG Midrange thing, and did my best to collect Archangel of Thune while it was at $35. It's now down to $20, and the loss reminded me of why I didn't like investing in Standard cards. It's almost the exact opposite of investing in Modern cards. For example, I picked up Horizon Canopy when they were about $12-13, and now they are above $30.
Yeah, this 100%. I'm so happy to hear other people have come to the same realization about Standard that I did.
I moved to Commander about 2 years ago. I couldn't throw money away on Standard anymore. At least Commander cards keep their value from month to month. Finally, I got to a point where I had 20, yes 20, Commander decks, and they all felt mostly complete. Without dropping tons of money, I wasn't going to improve my Commander decks. I wasn't going to buy fetches or the original duals, so I was pretty much done. This was a sad revelation for me because I LOVE deck building. I kept putting off Modern saying "I'll get into it one day. When the fetches are reprinted" but recently I decided to just go for it. Now I am only a few cards away from UWR Midrange.
2 Geists, 2 Cliques. 4 Aird Mesas, and 4 Scalding Tarns. Yes, that's a good $500+, but I do believe that Fetches will be reprinted soon. Until then, I'll play the deck with what I have. It won't be Grand Prix caliber, but it will be fine for FNM. Also, in about a week, I should have the Geists and Cliques.
How aggro heavy the meta is. There are almost no control decks (UW being the only one currently, last season it was not a competitive deck) and absolutely no pure combo decks.
To be fair, Orzhov Control sees a bunch of play too.
A large portion of my meta (myself included ) switched to Modern. The main reasons most of us did so:
-We got tired of spending $300-600 on decks that rotated out and were worth $30-50. We got tired of making other people rich.
-There are many decks that some of us loved before they rotated, and it was a good chance to play old friends (Pod, tokens, good RDW, etc)
-Standard, to many of us, got amazingly boring when Theros came. There's that one mono colored aggro deck... and that other mono colored aggro deck... and that other two color aggro deck... oh, and that one kinda-control deck. Yawn.
I stopped playing before ZEN came out and started up again before return to ravnica. Most of my collection was either worthless junk or modern staples.
I switched to modern when I realise how boring the standard is right now withe the mono archetype who doesnt let you brew enought. And how boring can be 75% of the m u.
Also the fact every cards lost 90% of the value due to the rotation if they arent played in modern legacy.
I really hate theros and bng right now and I m enjoying the modern right now . Except the fact i just lost my jund deck to the new banlist and dont want to jump on 50$ BB.
Jund will survive. It can run either Birds or Grim Lavamancer. It probably won't be 55/45 in every matchup now, but it will have a collection of good and bad matches like every other deck does, I'll even go a step further and say it will still be tier 1. The Rock decks are the ones that are going to disappear because they relied too heavily on DRS. In their place we're going to see several other decks however so it's a net gain for the format.
BB was tested heavily here to figure out if it was too good or not. It was found to be good but didn't really change anything that's why it was considered to be a safe unban. Look that testing up if you want opinions on the card that are free of unban hype. BB will come down when it's performance doesn't reflect a $50 card.
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UB/x Faeries
UR Storm
XURWB Affinity
G Elves
UW control
Most of us have since graduated, gotten 'real' jobs, and can afford to pimp out our decks, play Standard, and experiment with Legacy like we never could before. Suddenly our casual Modern turned into a "Modern Plus" set up. I tried Faeries and Cawblade and all those cool decks I missed out on between Timespiral and Scars.
I recently moved to a rural location for work and traded in the paper for MTGO. So I don't play as much now because rural internet blows. But I'm still keenly interested.
And to answer your question, yes, I think Modern is in the long term cheaper than Standard. You buy your cards once (at a slightly greater investment) but don't have to worry too much about building new decks every 3 months. Most MTGO decks cost about $200-400 for Standard and $250-500 for Modern, with a couple notable exceptions well above and below for each.
Speculate less. Test more.
Thanks to Rivenor for the signature and XenoNinja for the Avi!
Quotes:
With regard to cost, modern is by far the cheapest format. If you're a standard player, you've probably already got the shocks. fetches are a little ridiculous right now, but once you've got them, congratulations... Every non-jund/UWR deck can be had for cheap. Tier 2 decks can be built for like $100.
I'll be honest, I got my fetches when they were $10, and I'm not willing to pay $55 a pop to fill out my collection (I'm missing scalding tarns and misties). But they WILL be reprinted, and I personally believe it will be soon. I hope next block, but it might be the one after that. When they do, they'll be back in the $10-20 range where they belong.
You literally took these words right out of my mouth lol. On another note, I currently play a budget Gruul Zoo deck that cost about $200 (no goyfs or fetchlands), and honestly, it is pretty fun. Would it be better with goyfs and fetchlands? Of course. But it can certainly hold its own without them.
What I did this standard season is buy a bunch of cheap cards before rotation and built a GB aggro deck (the kibler deck basically). All of the expensive cards are modern staples so it worked out.
Next standard, if an opportunity like that doesn't show up (to play modern or legacy staples in standard), I will just buy an event deck to continue my community service.
Ux Whirza
Rb Goblins
Legacy
U Urza Stompy
Duel Commander
Sai, Master Thopterist
1. My friend started to get into it.
2. My cards were rotating.
3. I played the Chaos Reigns planechase deck, which got me hooked on cascading. Luckily Jund hadn't become the Big Bad Boogeyman yet so I was able to get everything for much less than it would cost now.
I also play EDH very often and some legacy, but modern is just such a good format. Its love.
Costs are infact cheaper. I really started getting into Modern early last year, in that time I've had 3 decks. Eggs (originally the tier 1 list, my own brew post SS ban), Melira Pod (t1 list), and Superfriends (in heavy flux but keeps the same core, all brew... tier 1.5 power wise, it can win competitive FNM's).
Pod cost me around $600, originally $400 but then VoR and Archangel of Thune became things... so it has had some expensive recent updates. Eggs was about $300, plus $40 to update post legendary change. Superfriends is about $300 but lacks fetchlands since the other decks are using them. So overall for a year of decks that are competitive, don't rotate, and have been in a time with lots of expensive updates I've spent about $1250 on Modern. In that same time for Standard, excluding random buys while trying to solve a format post set release I played UW Flash, Junk Aristocrats, Naya Blitz, 4c Control (brew), MUD, and MBD. I'm not entirely sure of what it cost over time to put these decks together (I get most of my standard cards through trade/FNM wins so value is tougher to gauge) but a rough estimate is probably $1800. I suppose you could say I got twice as many decks for only 50% higher cost, but the thing about standard is that the decks don't have as much depth and the meta rotates quickly. This means you go through more decks, and decks just don't have as many lines open to them, so they get boring fast.
For example a deck like Melira Pod has a good 20+ lines of play at almost any point in the game while the toughest decision in a deck like MUD is do you play the Jace or the Master.
Chances are I won't end up spending much on any of my Modern decks this year, while standard has several updates looming between the fall set duals, MBD updates for BNG, potential future MUD updates, and so on.
A lot of the lack of expense in Modern though (or Legacy for that matter) lies in choosing a deck that will hold your attention for a long time. My Legacy decks are Elves, Burn, and High Tide each were pretty inexpensive at the time (no Candelabras) and I have a blast playing them with low upkeep. Modern is in much the same boat... particularly with my first two decks. In standard the quick pace of the meta isn't conducive to sticking with one deck.
Someone else said it earlier but I have the same opinion, I only play Standard as a community service because it's what everyone wants to play and we need the numbers at FNM sometimes. I would much rather be playing Legacy and Modern because they aren't bottomless money pits and the decks are just so much more fun even though I'm at a bit of a disadvantage in Legacy when the popular decks around here are things like Sneak & Show, Reanimator, and Dredge. On that note... I'm 43-43 in Dredge games against Burn. That's a surprisingly equal match.
With Modern I can play when I have time without worrying about "forcing myself to play" because my deck is getting ready to rotate. I enjoy playing with more "powerful" cards and a much more diverse card pool.
Since then, I've been mostly into casual and EDH. However, I have a growing interest in modern, and I recently started putting together a RWU control deck(though it might end up being midrange)to start testing and possibly bringing to weekly modern matches at some of the stores near me. In my time of watching standard, I've seen more things that I found uninteresting than I found vaguely interesting or good.
WU Grand Arbiter Augustin IV
RWU Numot, the Devastator
WUB Oloro, Ageless Ascetic
WB Athreos, God of Passage
Thragtusk is what did it for me, $25 for a rare that will hold absolutely zero value upon rotation is/was insanity. Worse, you needed it for practically every deck. Atleast a card like Thoughtseize or Snapcaster would hold some value.
Mono Blue Devotion and Mono Black Devotion are the current top decks, but they're far from the only playable ones. Esper and Azorius Control are both big, and there's also RG Monsters and a bunch of different kinds of aggro decks.
Though personally my biggest annoyance with Mono Blue Devotion is people's tendency to refer to it as MUD, and whenever I see that I think they're talking about the Legacy or Vintage deck.
FREE BLOODBRAID ELF
How aggro heavy the meta is. There are almost no control decks (UW being the only one currently, last season it was not a competitive deck) and absolutely no pure combo decks.
Modern is the exact opposite. So many archetypes are playable (competitively so) and new ones are popping up all the time. I am not a play creature, swing with everyone kind of player (no disrespect to those who are) and being forced to play something not my style (and at obscene prices) just does nothing for me.
Yeah, this 100%. I'm so happy to hear other people have come to the same realization about Standard that I did.
I moved to Commander about 2 years ago. I couldn't throw money away on Standard anymore. At least Commander cards keep their value from month to month. Finally, I got to a point where I had 20, yes 20, Commander decks, and they all felt mostly complete. Without dropping tons of money, I wasn't going to improve my Commander decks. I wasn't going to buy fetches or the original duals, so I was pretty much done. This was a sad revelation for me because I LOVE deck building. I kept putting off Modern saying "I'll get into it one day. When the fetches are reprinted" but recently I decided to just go for it. Now I am only a few cards away from UWR Midrange.
2 Geists, 2 Cliques. 4 Aird Mesas, and 4 Scalding Tarns. Yes, that's a good $500+, but I do believe that Fetches will be reprinted soon. Until then, I'll play the deck with what I have. It won't be Grand Prix caliber, but it will be fine for FNM. Also, in about a week, I should have the Geists and Cliques.
PucaTrade Invite. Sign up and enjoy the first 500 points ($5) free!
To be fair, Orzhov Control sees a bunch of play too.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
-We got tired of spending $300-600 on decks that rotated out and were worth $30-50. We got tired of making other people rich.
-There are many decks that some of us loved before they rotated, and it was a good chance to play old friends (Pod, tokens, good RDW, etc)
-Standard, to many of us, got amazingly boring when Theros came. There's that one mono colored aggro deck... and that other mono colored aggro deck... and that other two color aggro deck... oh, and that one kinda-control deck. Yawn.
:symb::symr::symg: Living End
Delver
RDW
Jund will survive. It can run either Birds or Grim Lavamancer. It probably won't be 55/45 in every matchup now, but it will have a collection of good and bad matches like every other deck does, I'll even go a step further and say it will still be tier 1. The Rock decks are the ones that are going to disappear because they relied too heavily on DRS. In their place we're going to see several other decks however so it's a net gain for the format.
BB was tested heavily here to figure out if it was too good or not. It was found to be good but didn't really change anything that's why it was considered to be a safe unban. Look that testing up if you want opinions on the card that are free of unban hype. BB will come down when it's performance doesn't reflect a $50 card.