I think price is a bigger deal than many people let on as well. Why shell out 40-80$ a card when you can pick up a play set tasigurs or corsairs which (almost) do the same thing for half the price?
I think price is a bigger deal than many people let on as well. Why shell out 40-80$ a card when you can pick up a play set tasigurs or corsairs which (almost) do the same thing for half the price?
Tasigur and Dark Confidant may not fulfill the same role, but they do have complete anti-synergy to the point that you're likely going to be playing only one. And in terms of price, Tasigur is way cheaper.
My theory on Dark Confidant is that the death knell for him in modern was ACTUALLY the banning of Deathrite Shaman. DRS provided a way to mitigate bob's downside, a mana boost to effectively abuse the early CA and to generate tempo off the cheap curve, a lightning rod (in combination with delver and goyf) to draw removal away from bob, and reach to help close out the game. DRS was (In my opinion) a very fair card in the tempo shells, just not in the midrange ones, and that banning was a loss to the delver-esque side of the archetype pie, not just to midrange. I think if DRS ever comes back, or if we get another GOOD utility one-drop in bob's color, we could see his return, but we really don't have any playable utility one-drops in black. And so he will languish.
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Yes, I am a local area mod. WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE
Primary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
It's funny how many people are scared of playing him. He is kinda like Fisherman's Friend.
He separates the real men from the scared boy scouts
It depends on the build, for example for Abzan Midrange with Goyf and Jund with Goyf as that is what those shells have evolved around with a casting cost of 3. With Tasigur builds, we're talking a different strategy altogether where the current metagame developments have revolved around the Delve mechanic which has a high casting cost. It doesn't incentivize using Bob, while some classic Midrange lists do use Tasigur. And when considering top tier, that the affordability if the trinity Bob-Liliana-Tarmo for the top two midrange decks is still hundreds and hundreds of dollars would probably be the larger context than out of fear of life loss. It's basically been the "we can't reprint this in standard therefore you're only gunna see it in promo and Modern Masters" that's made Liliana at her current price point. While she's great, we have to take into context the real price of cards than the imaginary.
However, the deck innovation and the tectonic shifts away from Trinity is a good move as it diversifies the format and doesn't create a rock, paper scissors format. Where you have Force of Will and the like "keeping the man's deck down" which is something that I'm rather against. I prefer the shift in the metagame away from Tarmogoyf consolidation and the experimental lists even for Abzan without the old fellow and decks that are Bobless. It's not that the Trinity has it's place in the format, it's just that not every shell and deck format needs to be build around them.
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It's funny how many people are scared of playing him. He is kinda like Fisherman's Friend.
He separates the real men from the scared boy scouts
It depends on the build, for example for Abzan Midrange with Goyf and Jund with Goyf as that is what those shells have evolved around with a casting cost of 3. With Tasigur builds, we're talking a different strategy altogether where the current metagame developments have revolved around the Delve mechanic which has a high casting cost. It doesn't incentivize using Bob, while some classic Midrange lists do use Tasigur. And when considering top tier, that the affordability if the trinity Bob-Liliana-Tarmo for the top two midrange decks is still hundreds and hundreds of dollars would probably be the larger context than out of fear of life loss. It's basically been the "we can't reprint this in standard therefore you're only gunna see it in promo and Modern Masters" that's made Liliana at her current price point. While she's great, we have to take into context the real price of cards than the imaginary.
However, the deck innovation and the tectonic shifts away from Trinity is a good move as it diversifies the format and doesn't create a rock, paper scissors format. Where you have Force of Will and the like "keeping the man's deck down" which is something that I'm rather against. I prefer the shift in the metagame away from Tarmogoyf consolidation and the experimental lists even for Abzan without the old fellow and decks that are Bobless. It's not that the Trinity has it's place in the format, it's just that not every shell and deck format needs to be build around them.
But, but the value of an uncontested Bob
No, seriously I can understand the concerns about running him but I disagree with the notion that he is somehow unplayable. Again there are dozen of Jund lists doing well to this day with a playset in the main.
It's a matter of taste. There is no right or wrong when it comes to running him. If you want to up the number of your 4-drops and Tasigurs then yes he gets worse but you don't have to built your deck that way.
By the way they wanted to reprint Liliana of the Veil in M15 because the obvious flavor connection with Garruk, Apex Predator but it turned out that Mono-Black was the dominating deck in Standard and they got scared.
No, seriously I can understand the concerns about running him but I disagree with the notion that he is somehow unplayable. Again there are dozen of Jund lists doing well to this day with a playset in the main.
It's a matter of taste. There is no right or wrong when it comes to running him. If you want to up the number of your 4-drops and Tasigurs then yes he gets worse but you don't have to built your deck that way.
By the way they wanted to reprint Liliana of the Veil in M15 because the obvious flavor connection with Garruk, Apex Predator but it turned out that Mono-Black was the dominating deck in Standard and they got scared.
Liliana of the Veil in RTR-THS Standard would've made Mono-Black broken, and some would argue that Mono-Black during that time period was already broken lol.
No, seriously I can understand the concerns about running him but I disagree with the notion that he is somehow unplayable. Again there are dozen of Jund lists doing well to this day with a playset in the main.
It's a matter of taste. There is no right or wrong when it comes to running him. If you want to up the number of your 4-drops and Tasigurs then yes he gets worse but you don't have to built your deck that way.
By the way they wanted to reprint Liliana of the Veil in M15 because the obvious flavor connection with Garruk, Apex Predator but it turned out that Mono-Black was the dominating deck in Standard and they got scared.
Liliana of the Veil in RTR-THS Standard would've made Mono-Black broken, and some would argue that Mono-Black during that time period was already broken lol.
No, seriously I can understand the concerns about running him but I disagree with the notion that he is somehow unplayable. Again there are dozen of Jund lists doing well to this day with a playset in the main.
It's a matter of taste. There is no right or wrong when it comes to running him. If you want to up the number of your 4-drops and Tasigurs then yes he gets worse but you don't have to built your deck that way.
By the way they wanted to reprint Liliana of the Veil in M15 because the obvious flavor connection with Garruk, Apex Predator but it turned out that Mono-Black was the dominating deck in Standard and they got scared.
Liliana of the Veil in RTR-THS Standard would've made Mono-Black broken, and some would argue that Mono-Black during that time period was already broken lol.
I'm pretty sure that all these cards listed were on the top-10 most played spells in Standard list on MTGGoldfish. In fact, I think that at one point, all 10 cards on that list were black.
I'm pretty sure that all these cards listed were on the top-10 most played spells in Standard list on MTGGoldfish. In fact, I think that at one point, all 10 cards on that list were black.
It's funny how many people are scared of playing him. He is kinda like Fisherman's Friend.
He separates the real men from the scared boy scouts
Referring to the cough drops right? I love those licorice and menthol :), they work great!
On topic, I think bob will always be a round unless they print something better. He can just run away with the game, and a lot of times one activation is all you need.
Burn makes playing bob a little dangerous, but he also fun in BR burn too. He really shines though against control and midrange decks.
I think how much Bob is valued depends how much you think of Jund. Reid Duke is all aboard the Jund train, thinking it can beat the collected company builds that are beating up abzan. If he's right Jund can be at the top and Bob is potent.
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Modern UB Tezzerator UBW Gifts B 8Rack
Legacy RB Goblins
which is why I said "utility" not "disruption". That's my point.
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Yes, I am a local area mod. WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE
Primary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
Not being able to control the top of the deck is not a barrier for bob in BGx. If you take the deck reid played recently the CMC of an average draw off bob is 1.25 (not counting things like fetching etc). On top of this he has a finks, 2 huntmaster and 2 ooze in the maindeck as life gain. Apart from the single tasigur the worst you can flip is a huntermaster which gains 2 life when it comes into play making it like a 2 CMC off bob so really your 'big' hits are things like liliana and pulse. If you've had a bob in play from turn 2 and been unable to win before you die from the flips something has gone hugely wrong.
Dark Confidant is still one of the best creatures ever printed in the history of the game. He may not be well positioned, but his power is undeniable.
In vintage, a turn 1 Confidant (played off of land + moxen) can completely win a game by himself if he's not answered.
He's fallen out of favor in Vintage since the printing of Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise. Most decks with blue (i.e. most decks) run a draw package of 4 Preordain, 1 Ancestral, 1 Time Walk, 1 Ponder, 1 Brainstorm, 1 Treasure Cruise, and 4 Dig. Add in the fact that most of those decks are likely also running 4 FoW and Bob gets too painful.
But he's still VERY good in Modern Jund, and Jund is much better positioned in the current Modern metagame than Abzan is, so he's starting to tick up in Modern play again. Jund just has a better matchup against Burn and Affinity than Abzan, yes even with Bob, and those are 2 matchups that are typically poor for BGx. 4 Lightning Bolt goes quite a long way.
I switched from Junk to Jund because I missed playing him.
The big reason that Confidant will never truly die is the cycle of Abzan and Jund. Abzan is better against fairer and more midrangey decks because of Souls and Path. Jund is better against aggressive ones because of Bolt and a less painful manabase. Abzan can't support Bob to the same extent as Jund (Abzan's average cost is about 1 higher than Jund's, when all is said and done), so we won't see Bob in periods where Abzan is common. But once Jund comes back, as it is doing now and as we identified back in early May when Jund reached tier 1 status again, then Bob finds his home again.
To some extent, Burn is going to keep Bob down more now than in the past. But Burn's metagame share seems to be stabilizing or declining these days, particularly in paper, which gives Bob a huge metagame edge. Also, as more decks like Podless Pod come into the metagame, Bob becomes way better: he feels like cheating against a deck that only has 2-3 maindeck removal spells.
Dark Confidant is still one of the best creatures ever printed in the history of the game. He may not be well positioned, but his power is undeniable.
In vintage, a turn 1 Confidant (played off of land + moxen) can completely win a game by himself if he's not answered.
He's fallen out of favor in Vintage since the printing of Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise. Most decks with blue (i.e. most decks) run a draw package of 4 Preordain, 1 Ancestral, 1 Time Walk, 1 Ponder, 1 Brainstorm, 1 Treasure Cruise, and 4 Dig. Add in the fact that most of those decks are likely also running 4 FoW and Bob gets too painful.
But he's still VERY good in Modern Jund, and Jund is much better positioned in the current Modern metagame than Abzan is, so he's starting to tick up in Modern play again. Jund just has a better matchup against Burn and Affinity than Abzan, yes even with Bob, and those are 2 matchups that are typically poor for BGx. 4 Lightning Bolt goes quite a long way.
Good point, but with the way Mentor is dominating Vintage right now, I wouldn't be shocked to see Dig get restricted.
In regards to modern and on a personal level, I've always wanted to see Bob get used in some kind of Grixis list, but I don't think that'd ever be practical or feasible.
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He separates the real men from the scared boy scouts
Yes, I am a local area mod.WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVEPrimary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
It depends on the build, for example for Abzan Midrange with Goyf and Jund with Goyf as that is what those shells have evolved around with a casting cost of 3. With Tasigur builds, we're talking a different strategy altogether where the current metagame developments have revolved around the Delve mechanic which has a high casting cost. It doesn't incentivize using Bob, while some classic Midrange lists do use Tasigur. And when considering top tier, that the affordability if the trinity Bob-Liliana-Tarmo for the top two midrange decks is still hundreds and hundreds of dollars would probably be the larger context than out of fear of life loss. It's basically been the "we can't reprint this in standard therefore you're only gunna see it in promo and Modern Masters" that's made Liliana at her current price point. While she's great, we have to take into context the real price of cards than the imaginary.
However, the deck innovation and the tectonic shifts away from Trinity is a good move as it diversifies the format and doesn't create a rock, paper scissors format. Where you have Force of Will and the like "keeping the man's deck down" which is something that I'm rather against. I prefer the shift in the metagame away from Tarmogoyf consolidation and the experimental lists even for Abzan without the old fellow and decks that are Bobless. It's not that the Trinity has it's place in the format, it's just that not every shell and deck format needs to be build around them.
Modern
Commander
Cube
<a href="http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/cube-lists/588020-unpowered-themed-enchantment-an-enchanted-evening">An Enchanted Evening Cube </a>
But, but the value of an uncontested Bob
No, seriously I can understand the concerns about running him but I disagree with the notion that he is somehow unplayable. Again there are dozen of Jund lists doing well to this day with a playset in the main.
It's a matter of taste. There is no right or wrong when it comes to running him. If you want to up the number of your 4-drops and Tasigurs then yes he gets worse but you don't have to built your deck that way.
By the way they wanted to reprint Liliana of the Veil in M15 because the obvious flavor connection with Garruk, Apex Predator but it turned out that Mono-Black was the dominating deck in Standard and they got scared.
Could be. We will never know.
Mono-Black was already filled with 3 CMC cards. Nightveil Specter, Lifebane Zombie, Underworld Connections, Hero's Downfall, Drown in Sorrow and even Pack Rats ability costs 3. There would have been cuts in the deck if she would have been reprinted.
Good.
Should be more often the case
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Referring to the cough drops right? I love those licorice and menthol :), they work great!
On topic, I think bob will always be a round unless they print something better. He can just run away with the game, and a lot of times one activation is all you need.
Burn makes playing bob a little dangerous, but he also fun in BR burn too. He really shines though against control and midrange decks.
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
UB Tezzerator
UBW Gifts
B 8Rack
Legacy
RB Goblins
Viscera Seer maybe?
Black's one drops are thoughtseize and inquisition.
UB Tezzerator
UBW Gifts
B 8Rack
Legacy
RB Goblins
Yes, I am a local area mod.WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVEPrimary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
In vintage, a turn 1 Confidant (played off of land + moxen) can completely win a game by himself if he's not answered.
But he's still VERY good in Modern Jund, and Jund is much better positioned in the current Modern metagame than Abzan is, so he's starting to tick up in Modern play again. Jund just has a better matchup against Burn and Affinity than Abzan, yes even with Bob, and those are 2 matchups that are typically poor for BGx. 4 Lightning Bolt goes quite a long way.
Standard: lol no
Modern: BG/x, UR/x, Burn, Merfolk, Zoo, Storm
Legacy: Shardless BUG, Delver (BUG, RUG, Grixis), Landstill, Depths Combo, Merfolk
Vintage: Dark Times, BUG Fish, Merfolk
EDH: Teysa, Orzhov Scion / Krenko, Mob Boss / Stonebrow, Krosan Hero
JundBGR
RW Blood MoonRW
Pauper
Delver U
Elves G
Control B
Commander
Edgar Markov BRW
Captain Sisay GW
Niv-Mizzet, Parun UR
Tymna and Ravos WB
The big reason that Confidant will never truly die is the cycle of Abzan and Jund. Abzan is better against fairer and more midrangey decks because of Souls and Path. Jund is better against aggressive ones because of Bolt and a less painful manabase. Abzan can't support Bob to the same extent as Jund (Abzan's average cost is about 1 higher than Jund's, when all is said and done), so we won't see Bob in periods where Abzan is common. But once Jund comes back, as it is doing now and as we identified back in early May when Jund reached tier 1 status again, then Bob finds his home again.
To some extent, Burn is going to keep Bob down more now than in the past. But Burn's metagame share seems to be stabilizing or declining these days, particularly in paper, which gives Bob a huge metagame edge. Also, as more decks like Podless Pod come into the metagame, Bob becomes way better: he feels like cheating against a deck that only has 2-3 maindeck removal spells.
Good point, but with the way Mentor is dominating Vintage right now, I wouldn't be shocked to see Dig get restricted.
In regards to modern and on a personal level, I've always wanted to see Bob get used in some kind of Grixis list, but I don't think that'd ever be practical or feasible.