Of course but it seems like every good deck deserves a ban just because it's good. This is a non rotation format. The logic is that always a very good deck will emerge, cause the cardpool grows bigger and bigger. Maybe (and i say maybe cause we dont really know the real power of the deck atm) it's time for decks like jeskai or esper to rise to attack this strategy (path+caster+fatal push or more white graveyard hate or something)
Jace doesn't solve anything against aggro, I don't think it'd help against Death Shadow Zoo, although I do think it would make Jund a tier 2 deck (Junk could possibly handle it), and Titanshift, Scapeshift, Bloom Titan, Tron, Bant Eldrazi, Eldrazi Tron would absolutely laugh at it.
If blue decks with Jace are crap against a huge swathe of the field, how on earth are those blue decks with Jace going to be prevalent enough to be a problem for Jund?
Jace doesn't solve anything against aggro, I don't think it'd help against Death Shadow Zoo, although I do think it would make Jund a tier 2 deck (Junk could possibly handle it), and Titanshift, Scapeshift, Bloom Titan, Tron, Bant Eldrazi, Eldrazi Tron would absolutely laugh at it.
If blue decks with Jace are crap against a huge swathe of the field, how on earth are those blue decks with Jace going to be prevalent enough to be a problem for Jund?
That's what I've been trying to warp my brain around. especially given that Jund is doing just peachy despite already having unfavorable matchups vs. Control.
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Playing UX Mana Denial until Modern gets the answers it needs.
WUBRG Humans BRW Mardu Pyromancer UW UW "Control" UR Blue Moon
Why would Jace, The Mind Sculptor push everyone out of BGx? For once, I think U based control decks are supposed to at least have a 50-50 if not favorable MU against Jund like strategies, because they are doing similar thing but slightly bigger, with more value. It would only make sense to have BGx decks with a 50-50 MU against more or less everyone, control being slightly bigger and Tron being much bigger. All these strategies have other strategies which punish them and that is fine.
I see people saying it is Splinter Twin or bust. ST is NOT a way to fix blue based control decks because it doesn't fix the fundamental problem which is that blue cards are just not good enough besides snapcaster mage. The reason ST decks worked was because of the threat to die if you ever tapped out, not because it was able to play an excellent control game. On the contrary, ST would lose to control decks, exactly because it couldn't play that game. It had enough tools to slow aggro decks and win by T4 and enough end-the-game potential to threated BGx. These are all fine things, but are not related to the level of blue. Unbanning ST will do nothing to solve Us issues, it will just create a blue based combo deck on T1 and none will be playing control still.
Jace, The Mind Sculptor on the other hand actually GIVES blue decks a way to close the game, in color, and fight the long game they are supposed to be able to fight. We all saw the grixis control matches at the latest events (and many of us experience it week in week out). There was almost no way to capitalize to gained value because there was no proper way to close the game. It always seemed a path to exile away for the opposing decks to destroy grixis' massive lead. JTMS will help tri-colored U based decks have a decent win condition which plays along with their game plan. In what way does that make things linear?
Jace doesn't solve anything
Were you not watching that one game against Eldrazi in the top 8 last weekend? He had all those cards in his hands, if he dropped Jace at any point it wouldn't have solved anything
And the Grixis player who list to Majors in the semi-finals? Well, he beat himself, he shouldn't have dropped the EE period, but when he chose to drop EE, he punted so incredibly hard I thought he was ******* Janikowski
Jace doesn't solve anything against aggro, I don't think it'd help against Death Shadow Zoo, although I do think it would make Jund a tier 2 deck (Junk could possibly handle it), and Titanshift, Scapeshift, Bloom Titan, Tron, Bant Eldrazi, Eldrazi Tron would absolutely laugh at it.
I truly, truly think Twin needs to come back. Blue needs a win con, you can't keep doing fair things in modern. I am convinced at this point that even something like counterspell isn't good enough.
If we see DS Shadow eat a ban, I really think ramp decks will be the best archetype in the format, and then people will demand for things like Temple to be banned, then something like Ancient Stirrings
Unban Twin and I think we will prevent a large amount of possible future bans
If Jace doesn't solve anything then why is he banned? If he is as safe then WOTC should unban him and STILL consider blue cards.
I watched all games this weekend (and the previous one). The Delver player was expected to lose against Eldrazi, and that is fine. Eldrazi decks can easily go over the tempo style of play of Grixis Delver by put threats slightly ahead of curve, and that is indeed fine. I don't want blue decks to beat them all. Plus, grixis delver wouldn't really want Jace, he is too expensive at 4 mana.
Regarding the Grixis control deck. His game against Abzan company, had he been able to actually play Jace at some point the game might not have taken 25 minutes to end because there would actually be a win condition in color. The guy was ahead all the time and still almost lost despite 2 resolved AVs because there was no decent control win condition. Jace solves that.
Jace doesn't solve anything against aggro and that is fine because some aggro decks can indeed overpower control decks and that is still fine. With grixis colors and Jace you can play 4 Bolts/4 Pushes/4 Terminates and you don't have to go to weird routes to get a win con (Tasigur in this case). It creates more room in decks and gives a win con again which means when control decks manage to stabilize against aggro they will have a way to close out the game.
The same goes against midrange strategies like the Abzan company I said above or Jund/Junk style decks. And it is fine for blue control decks to be able to win against Jund type decks because, as I said, they plan to go a bit bigger on the value game. Counterspell isn't good enough indeed because Logic Knot and Mana Leak do decent impressions for the early game. The problem of Blue decks is managing to stabilize and win.
Unbanning Twin won't do anything for blue control decks. It will just make another combo/control deck.
Jace is banned because of price IMO. If he gets unbanned he's probably jump up to $150 and I doubt WoTC wants that sort of thing going on in Modern where card scarcity is already a problem.
Modern is not a fair format, there is a reason it got moved away from the Pro Tour. If you like going through fast games where you just execute your own gameplan, Modern is a great format and it appeals to alot of people.
I am under the impression that you personally dislike Modern. This is fine, but you shouldn't allow your personal biases against the format to influence your arguments. Your stated reason for the elimination of Modern from the Pro Tour is wholly false. Modern was removed because it didn't showcase new cards in new sets, because it rewarded repetitions on existing decks and not innovating new ones, and because it expedited the pace of bans in the format. Forsythe literally said this in last year's "Where Modern Goes From Here" article, none of which have anything to do with the unsupportable claim you are making. If you want a format where you can play a deck with a 50-50 or better matchup across the board, Legacy is probably a better format for you. Modern is never going to have this deck and that's obviously fine for Wizards and fine for the majority of players.
if death shadow eats a ban, i think that it would be the last nail in the coffin, i mean, i see shadow jund like bant eldrazi, they are really efficient "midrange" decks that can race non interactive decks with raw power (a common complain about modern is the power of non interactive strategies). You just cant ban things because they are good decks. It's like the old cardboard crack comic when the people were cheering for their deck to lose at the pro tour afraid of bannings
If DS Jund sustained a 20% share across the format, that would be Pod, TC Delver, and DRS BGx territory and it would eat a ban. I guess I'm comfortable with that if it was over a long period of time. The big issue is that Legacy has a very similar deck consistently pushing 15%-20% (Miracles), and Wizards never touches it. Modern would be better off with this kind of hands-off approach to bans.
If Wizards is going to keep banning cards, I hope they are small cuts like Probe/GGT and not archetype-killers like Twin, or thinking about current cards people want banned in this thread, Opal, SSG, Death's Shadow/Traverse, Temple, etc. And honestly, it would be so much better from a marketing and management perspective to ADD to the format rather than subtract. People get super excited about unbans, reprints, and new cards. Bans just lead to the Cardboard Crack scenario in event after event; it's not sustainable for non-rotating formats.
Jace is banned because of price IMO. If he gets unbanned he's probably jump up to $150 and I doubt WoTC wants that sort of thing going on in Modern where card scarcity is already a problem.
There is no reason to suggest price has anything to do with bans or unbans. Wizards has plenty of other public reasons why cards are banned or unbanned, so unless you have specific evidence about this criterion, we shouldn't speculate about it.
How is Bant Eldrazi "anti-fair"? It plays creatures and swings with them and it's not that difficult to interact with them.
how well does it do vs jund? thats what I mean by anti fair.
So any deck that has a good Jund matchup is anti-fair and deserves to be banned? At least you're open about your bias.
Did God descend from the clouds and hand us a stone tablet that reads YE AND JUNDE SHALL HAVE A FIFTY-FIFTY MATCHUP AGAINST ALL OF YE FIELD OF MODERNE?
its not just jund in which i am talking about. there are lof of fair decks that cannot beat the current big/fast mana strategies in this format.
and its also very obvious people cant talk about bans at all in this thread without losing it lol. if you cant handle ban talk then dont come to this thread.
My issue isn't that you're suggesting bans; it's that your suggestion bans with no actual basis apart from you not liking the deck in question and then claiming that you're making the suggestion to "help blue out" in Modern. You've made it clearly obvious that you're unhappy with how the format has changed since Twin got banned and you're ignoring the fact that the format is looking amazingly healthy at the moment so you can suggest bans to the decks you don't like.
healthy in your opinion, I happen to dissagree. and im not wanting a ban beacuse i dislike a deck, its to lower the amount of anti fair decks in the format....
I said this before, you're playing the wrong format if you want "fair". Do I play kinda fair decks in modern? Yes, it doesn't mean I go asking for all these bans.
I didn't lose it because you mentioned one card, you constantly make outlandish suggestions with no data or facts backed up except that you don't like that it's unfair.
Ban Opal! Ban this, ban that! Ban Tron lands! Ban Eldrazi Temple!
Your ban mentality is so dangerous, and if there were a mob of like minded players, we would be seeing more bans, it's why your posts on here are constantly upsetting, you're clearly a BGx player that wants all the unfair decks to go away so you can have more 50/50s
notice how the things i mention cheat mana. in legacy and vintage this is fine. but i do not believe this fine in modern.
jund is by far not the only deck i think about as a fair deck. there are plenty of others that this current metagame is stifling imo
i was fine when we had tron popular. but now we have valakut, tron AND eldrazi all in tier 1. this HAS to have a negative impact on all fair decks. heck, even bg/x is adapting (dsz)
my point is, there are too many big/mana fast mana , and linear aggro,mindless decks in tier 1 that it makes the game boring quite frankly. not to mention why would anyone in thier right mind play something fair other than dsz right now?
its not just jund in which i am talking about. there are lof of fair decks that cannot beat the current big/fast mana strategies in this format.
You present an extreme bias against these strategies in this thread. It's so extreme that many people believe you are just trying to improve your own strategies (those in your signature) at the expense of other strategies you personally dislike. Generally speaking, people that rail against big mana decks don't even consider how many other players play and enjoy these four major top-tier options: RG Valakut variants, Gx Tron variants, Bant Eldrazi, and Eldrazi Tron. Add Eldrazi and Taxes to that list, if we're talking about Temple decks. A good chunk of Modern plays these strategies and enjoys them, so the burden for killing any number of these decks to hypothetically open space to other strategies is very high.
Historically, when you kill a top-tier deck to open up space, only a few of the "opened" decks actually excel. See the Twin ban, which opened up a lot of space in theory, but in practice just allowed a few decks to rise to the top (Infect, DSZ, and Dredge). All the other decks which many said were suppressed by Twin were still bad in the post-Twin metagame.
Posts like yours represent a classic level of ban mania. You have invented an issue (a wide range of fair decks struggle) and then invented a solution that is ban-related (ban the decks that beat your preferred strategies). Even if this was an issue, which I'm not convinced it is, there are many non-ban ways to solve and address it. By immediately turning to bans and by building the issue in a ban context, you're perpetuating the same kind of ban mania which pushes many away from the format and leads to an overall hostile Modern climate.
Just to illustrate this point further, please list the fair strategies you think will suddenly excel in a post-big mana Modern.
honeslty the biggest take away from this data is that eldrazi is still very strong after its nerf, and i dont feel its a healthy deck to have in the meta game at this level as it just plays creatures better than any other deck.
since blue is in fact need of help. I feel an eldrazi temple ban would help if we are not going the twin route.
That's your takeaway from the data? Yikes. Seems like a pretty selective and narrow reading.
Banning Eldrazi Temple makes absolutely no sense. For the twentieth time; the only decks struggling with Eldrazi decks are reactive blue ones. Everyone else is doing just fine. Clearly the problem is with the reactive blue cards themselves, not everything else around those cards. The solution is to improve the reactive blue decks.
There continues to be a tiny subset of players in this thread and the community at large that just want to ban everything they personally deem unfair and unfun. These players typically play a small selection of traditionally fair decks that they feel should have 50-50 matchups across the board. They also have very narrow definitions about what is fun, fair, and appropriate for Magic. Quite honestly, these players shouldn't play Modern. Not every format can appeal to every person, and Modern is clearly in the direction of a format where these strategies are appropriate and part of the game.
but what if reactive blue decks cannot do well in this meta? what if the meta is the problem?
people hate bans, mine are strictly hypothetical. tell me, if we could simulate the meta game without eldrazi tmeple and valakut in it, how would reactive blue be doing?
its not just jund in which i am talking about. there are lof of fair decks that cannot beat the current big/fast mana strategies in this format.
You present an extreme bias against these strategies in this thread. It's so extreme that many people believe you are just trying to improve your own strategies (those in your signature) at the expense of other strategies you personally dislike. Generally speaking, people that rail against big mana decks don't even consider how many other players play and enjoy these four major top-tier options: RG Valakut variants, Gx Tron variants, Bant Eldrazi, and Eldrazi Tron. Add Eldrazi and Taxes to that list, if we're talking about Temple decks. A good chunk of Modern plays these strategies and enjoys them, so the burden for killing any number of these decks to hypothetically open space to other strategies is very high.
Historically, when you kill a top-tier deck to open up space, only a few of the "opened" decks actually excel. See the Twin ban, which opened up a lot of space in theory, but in practice just allowed a few decks to rise to the top (Infect, DSZ, and Dredge). All the other decks which many said were suppressed by Twin were still bad in the post-Twin metagame.
Posts like yours represent a classic level of ban mania. You have invented an issue (a wide range of fair decks struggle) and then invented a solution that is ban-related (ban the decks that beat your preferred strategies). Even if this was an issue, which I'm not convinced it is, there are many non-ban ways to solve and address it. By immediately turning to bans and by building the issue in a ban context, you're perpetuating the same kind of ban mania which pushes many away from the format and leads to an overall hostile Modern climate.
Just to illustrate this point further, please list the fair strategies you think will suddenly excel in a post-big mana Modern.
"A good chunk of Modern plays these strategies and enjoys them, so the burden for killing any number of these decks to hypothetically open space to other strategies is very high."
wasn't the pod ban to open up more creature strategies?
"You have invented an issue (a wide range of fair decks struggle)
did i though? am i not right?
there is too much "rock" in this rock paper scissors meta game imo
he punted so incredibly hard I thought he was ******* Janikowski
Not to nit pick but I think you were looking for a Shane Lechler reference, Janiskowski doesn't actually punt.
But the point here is that Jace doesn't help blue against the fast decks so if he does get unbanned it would look fine at first, but then when they actually accomplish the goal of slowing down the format it could severely limit diversity if other midrange decks can't compete. I think them being weary of unbanning him is the correct approach since it doesn't solve anything and only potentially creates more problems down the road. I bought my playset of stoneforge last week just HOPING that he is the card released to try to give a UW tempo deck some hope of existing. I believe the shell of caw-blade they were so scared of is totally acceptable in modern now given that power creep has helped other strategies but power has been creeping down in U tempo based spells for awhile so caw-blade doesn't get the same bonuses from new sets like other decks do.
he punted so incredibly hard I thought he was ******* Janikowski
Not to nit pick but I think you were looking for a Shane Lechler reference, Janiskowski doesn't actually punt.
But the point here is that Jace doesn't help blue against the fast decks so if he does get unbanned it would look fine at first, but then when they actually accomplish the goal of slowing down the format it could severely limit diversity if other midrange decks can't compete. I think them being weary of unbanning him is the correct approach since it doesn't solve anything and only potentially creates more problems down the road. I bought my playset of stoneforge last week just HOPING that he is the card released to try to give a UW tempo deck some hope of existing. I believe the shell of caw-blade they were so scared of is totally acceptable in modern now given that power creep has helped other strategies but power has been creeping down in U tempo based spells for awhile so caw-blade doesn't get the same bonuses from new sets like other decks do.
I know, I just wanted to name a big time NFL kicker to illustrate the point
Hellfire, you did't name a single thing that Sheridan called you out on, all because you know you can't answer it.
If Eldrazi Temple went away, my prediction would be that blue would still suck. Titanshift wouldn't just disappear, you'd probably be asking for a Valakut ban in a few months.
I'm a BGx player and I've never complained half as much as you have about Temples, Tron lands, Mox opals, etc. The only bans I pushed for were Eye of Ugin/Dredge. I said a year ago I think BI should be banned, but it looks like probe was more the issue.
Even now, playing DS Jund, if it reaches crazy high shares and keeps winning tournaments, maybe that too should be banned (not that we're there yet, its new, people like to play new things, etc)
You're constantly trying to improve your own decks strategies in this thread, and it's selfish.
I personally hate playing combo decks but I wouldn't tell people to stop playing it or want a ban.
Furthermore, outside of ramp decks, Jund has game against unfair decks, sorry if there's a bigger midrange deck that hurts your feelings, I play Jund too, get over it.
Hellfire, you did't name a single thing that Sheridan called you out on, all because you know you can't answer it.
If Eldrazi Temple went away, my prediction would be that blue would still suck. Titanshift wouldn't just disappear, you'd probably be asking for a Valakut ban in a few months.
I'm a BGx player and I've never complained half as much as you have about Temples, Tron lands, Mox opals, etc. The only bans I pushed for were Eye of Ugin/Dredge. I said a year ago I think BI should be banned, but it looks like probe was more the issue.
Even now, playing DS Jund, if it reaches crazy high shares and keeps winning tournaments, maybe that too should be banned (not that we're there yet, its new, people like to play new things, etc)
You're constantly trying to improve your own decks strategies in this thread, and it's selfish.
I personally hate playing combo decks but I wouldn't tell people to stop playing it or want a ban.
Furthermore, outside of ramp decks, Jund has game against unfair decks, sorry if there's a bigger midrange deck that hurts your feelings, I play Jund too, get over it.
im talking about ur/x mostly in my arguments not bg/x. and the reason I think bg/x is doing fine in this format regardless is because of 1 major difference: proactive vs reactive.
i dont think reactive could EVER be good in this kind of meta game.
its not selfish when your favorite archetype sucks and there is little that can be done about it.
Asking if 2 archetypes went away, what would be the impact on 1 archetype is pretty pointless. I'll keep the other 2 every day of the at the expense of 1.
And thats as a reactive blue player.
Standard allows for Control. It has a piss poor viewership, and about 4 meaningful decks.
Frontier (and post-modern when it comes around) will almost CERTAINLY be mid range heavy, and control will be possible.
Modern, nope, you must close the door too quickly, and blue alone cannot do it. Unless you do something unfair and take all the turns.
Honestly hellfire simply does not want to play Modern, so move on. Nothing is in need of a ban, and the day SSG is banned, we lose 3 completely unique decks at least, and that would be disappointing.
"A good chunk of Modern plays these strategies and enjoys them, so the burden for killing any number of these decks to hypothetically open space to other strategies is very high."
wasn't the pod ban to open up more creature strategies?
Pod was indeed banned to open up creature strategies, but that's because its share of the field was way too high:
"Over the past year, Birthing Pod decks have won significantly more Grand Prix than any other Modern decks and compose the largest percentage of the field."
"Pod won five of the twelve Grand Prix over the past year, including winning the last two. "
"The high percentage of the field playing Pod suppresses decks, especially other creature decks, that have an unfavorable matchup."
The issue wasn't that Pod was abstractly suppressing other strategies. It was that Pod's share was too high.
but what if reactive blue decks cannot do well in this meta? what if the meta is the problem?
If blue reactive decks can't succeed in this metagame but BGx strategies can, this suggests the problem isn't the metagame. It's the bad cards in reactive blue.
people hate bans, mine are strictly hypothetical. tell me, if we could simulate the meta game without eldrazi tmeple and valakut in it, how would reactive blue be doing?
my guess is better.
Blue would do badly. BGx would be the best deck by a mile. We just saw this approach fail with the Twin ban, which was designed to open up the format to all the decks being suppressed by the evil Twin, but instead just opened it up to the top echelon of the decks which Twin was holding back (Dredge, DSZ, Infect).
EDIT: Also, thanks spiegel, I ask you again to please name the fair decks that would be opened up if big mana suddenly disappeared.
the weird thing with the Jace ban was it was never in Modern from the start? Why didnt they see if the format could handle it first before banning it, same thing happened with Bitter Blossom , and look what happened when they unbanned it nada, tier 2 or 3 status. I say they unban him or stone forge, if it becomes too strong they go ahead and ban it again.
This thread is full of idiots... Lightning Bolt is NOT being reprinted.
Many times has a writer in Wizards said so, because of the plain and simple fact that it's too powerful for what it costs. x/3 creatures shouldn't be able to die at instant speed for one mana without a signifigant drawback. (like PTE giving you a land)
I absolutely guarantee that LB will not be printed in M10, and you can quote me on that.
"A good chunk of Modern plays these strategies and enjoys them, so the burden for killing any number of these decks to hypothetically open space to other strategies is very high."
wasn't the pod ban to open up more creature strategies?
Pod was indeed banned to open up creature strategies, but that's because its share of the field was way too high:
"Over the past year, Birthing Pod decks have won significantly more Grand Prix than any other Modern decks and compose the largest percentage of the field."
"Pod won five of the twelve Grand Prix over the past year, including winning the last two. "
"The high percentage of the field playing Pod suppresses decks, especially other creature decks, that have an unfavorable matchup."
The issue wasn't that Pod was abstractly suppressing other strategies. It was that Pod's share was too high.
but what if reactive blue decks cannot do well in this meta? what if the meta is the problem?
If blue reactive decks can't succeed in this metagame but BGx strategies can, this suggests the problem isn't the metagame. It's the bad cards in reactive blue.
people hate bans, mine are strictly hypothetical. tell me, if we could simulate the meta game without eldrazi tmeple and valakut in it, how would reactive blue be doing?
my guess is better.
Blue would do badly. BGx would be the best deck by a mile. We just saw this approach fail with the Twin ban, which was designed to open up the format to all the decks being suppressed by the evil Twin, but instead just opened it up to the top echelon of the decks which Twin was holding back (Dredge, DSZ, Infect).
EDIT: Also, thanks spiegel, I ask you again to please name the fair decks that would be opened up if big mana suddenly disappeared.
but can you really compare such different decks to each other? they are 2 different archetypes. 1 reactive the other proactive.
maybe reactive strategies are doomed in this format?
Asking if 2 archetypes went away, what would be the impact on 1 archetype is pretty pointless. I'll keep the other 2 every day of the at the expense of 1.
And thats as a reactive blue player.
Standard allows for Control. It has a piss poor viewership, and about 4 meaningful decks.
Frontier (and post-modern when it comes around) will almost CERTAINLY be mid range heavy, and control will be possible.
Modern, nope, you must close the door too quickly, and blue alone cannot do it. Unless you do something unfair and take all the turns.
Honestly hellfire simply does not want to play Modern, so move on. Nothing is in need of a ban, and the day SSG is banned, we lose 3 completely unique decks at least, and that would be disappointing.
I actually do want to play modern fyi. this game could use alot of improvement however.
Jace is a much better choice for Uxx reactive decks. Part of the challenge with Uxx vs Tron/big mana is not having the card selection/advantage required to be able to answer all their threats - most can be countered by a simple negate/countersquall and they don't have eye of ugin anymore to go over the top of card advantage. Terminate / Path to exile answer everything else, with only Ulamog requiring a specialized answer (or just eat the cast trigger). The problem is that blue lacks the card selection to be able to play enough counters maindeck. Since counters in hand are really bad against aggro while being really good against big mana, improved selection is needed to find the right answer at the right time - the meta is too diverse for the minimal selection available to Uxx reactive decks.
In short, both Jace and Preordain help the selection challenge facing Uxx decks right now. Twin is just a bandaid that helps URx at the expense of the rest of Uxx strategies. I'd rather have no tier 1 Uxx deck than force all Uxx tier 1 decks for the remainder of the format to run twin (which is the essential result of twin in the meta)
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Wizards never seemed to have a problem with goyf being $150 or more.
Well they reprinted it in both MM and MM2015, so they know that price and/or supply were a problem.
Plus Goyf wasn't a banned card. It grew up from a 5$ FS rare.
While, for Jace, it's a choice, to put "online" a card they know will jump over 100$ in a short time.
That may be, and correct me if I am wrong, but we have no reason to believe that Wizards bans or unbans cards with any thought to their price correct? And there is nothing stopping them from a future reprint as far as I know. There will always be expensive cards in the modern card pool, and I suspect Jace would likely make as many waves as Ancestral Vision after the month or so of testing wore off.
but what if reactive blue decks cannot do well in this meta? what if the meta is the problem?
If blue reactive decks can't succeed in this metagame but BGx strategies can, this suggests the problem isn't the metagame. It's the bad cards in reactive blue. ....
Heck, you can say that from anything. The reason my pet tribal camel deck is bad is because of the *****ty cards that the camel tribe has.
C'mon, is that really an answer?...
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If blue decks with Jace are crap against a huge swathe of the field, how on earth are those blue decks with Jace going to be prevalent enough to be a problem for Jund?
Cubetutor Peasant'ish-Funbox
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That's what I've been trying to warp my brain around. especially given that Jund is doing just peachy despite already having unfavorable matchups vs. Control.
WUBRG Humans
BRW Mardu Pyromancer
UW UW "Control"
UR Blue Moon
I watched all games this weekend (and the previous one). The Delver player was expected to lose against Eldrazi, and that is fine. Eldrazi decks can easily go over the tempo style of play of Grixis Delver by put threats slightly ahead of curve, and that is indeed fine. I don't want blue decks to beat them all. Plus, grixis delver wouldn't really want Jace, he is too expensive at 4 mana.
Regarding the Grixis control deck. His game against Abzan company, had he been able to actually play Jace at some point the game might not have taken 25 minutes to end because there would actually be a win condition in color. The guy was ahead all the time and still almost lost despite 2 resolved AVs because there was no decent control win condition. Jace solves that.
Jace doesn't solve anything against aggro and that is fine because some aggro decks can indeed overpower control decks and that is still fine. With grixis colors and Jace you can play 4 Bolts/4 Pushes/4 Terminates and you don't have to go to weird routes to get a win con (Tasigur in this case). It creates more room in decks and gives a win con again which means when control decks manage to stabilize against aggro they will have a way to close out the game.
The same goes against midrange strategies like the Abzan company I said above or Jund/Junk style decks. And it is fine for blue control decks to be able to win against Jund type decks because, as I said, they plan to go a bit bigger on the value game. Counterspell isn't good enough indeed because Logic Knot and Mana Leak do decent impressions for the early game. The problem of Blue decks is managing to stabilize and win.
Unbanning Twin won't do anything for blue control decks. It will just make another combo/control deck.
UB Faeries (15-6-0)
UWR Control (10-5-1)/Kiki Control/Midrange/Harbinger
UBR Cruel Control (6-4-0)/Grixis Control/Delver/Blue Jund
UWB Control/Mentor
UW Miracles/Control (currently active, 14-2-0)
BW Eldrazi & Taxes
RW Burn (9-1-0)
I do (academic) research on video games and archaeology! You can check out my open access book here: https://www.sidestone.com/books/the-interactive-past
I am under the impression that you personally dislike Modern. This is fine, but you shouldn't allow your personal biases against the format to influence your arguments. Your stated reason for the elimination of Modern from the Pro Tour is wholly false. Modern was removed because it didn't showcase new cards in new sets, because it rewarded repetitions on existing decks and not innovating new ones, and because it expedited the pace of bans in the format. Forsythe literally said this in last year's "Where Modern Goes From Here" article, none of which have anything to do with the unsupportable claim you are making. If you want a format where you can play a deck with a 50-50 or better matchup across the board, Legacy is probably a better format for you. Modern is never going to have this deck and that's obviously fine for Wizards and fine for the majority of players.
If DS Jund sustained a 20% share across the format, that would be Pod, TC Delver, and DRS BGx territory and it would eat a ban. I guess I'm comfortable with that if it was over a long period of time. The big issue is that Legacy has a very similar deck consistently pushing 15%-20% (Miracles), and Wizards never touches it. Modern would be better off with this kind of hands-off approach to bans.
If Wizards is going to keep banning cards, I hope they are small cuts like Probe/GGT and not archetype-killers like Twin, or thinking about current cards people want banned in this thread, Opal, SSG, Death's Shadow/Traverse, Temple, etc. And honestly, it would be so much better from a marketing and management perspective to ADD to the format rather than subtract. People get super excited about unbans, reprints, and new cards. Bans just lead to the Cardboard Crack scenario in event after event; it's not sustainable for non-rotating formats.
There is no reason to suggest price has anything to do with bans or unbans. Wizards has plenty of other public reasons why cards are banned or unbanned, so unless you have specific evidence about this criterion, we shouldn't speculate about it.
its not just jund in which i am talking about. there are lof of fair decks that cannot beat the current big/fast mana strategies in this format.
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notice how the things i mention cheat mana. in legacy and vintage this is fine. but i do not believe this fine in modern.
jund is by far not the only deck i think about as a fair deck. there are plenty of others that this current metagame is stifling imo
i was fine when we had tron popular. but now we have valakut, tron AND eldrazi all in tier 1. this HAS to have a negative impact on all fair decks. heck, even bg/x is adapting (dsz)
my point is, there are too many big/mana fast mana , and linear aggro,mindless decks in tier 1 that it makes the game boring quite frankly. not to mention why would anyone in thier right mind play something fair other than dsz right now?
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You present an extreme bias against these strategies in this thread. It's so extreme that many people believe you are just trying to improve your own strategies (those in your signature) at the expense of other strategies you personally dislike. Generally speaking, people that rail against big mana decks don't even consider how many other players play and enjoy these four major top-tier options: RG Valakut variants, Gx Tron variants, Bant Eldrazi, and Eldrazi Tron. Add Eldrazi and Taxes to that list, if we're talking about Temple decks. A good chunk of Modern plays these strategies and enjoys them, so the burden for killing any number of these decks to hypothetically open space to other strategies is very high.
Historically, when you kill a top-tier deck to open up space, only a few of the "opened" decks actually excel. See the Twin ban, which opened up a lot of space in theory, but in practice just allowed a few decks to rise to the top (Infect, DSZ, and Dredge). All the other decks which many said were suppressed by Twin were still bad in the post-Twin metagame.
Posts like yours represent a classic level of ban mania. You have invented an issue (a wide range of fair decks struggle) and then invented a solution that is ban-related (ban the decks that beat your preferred strategies). Even if this was an issue, which I'm not convinced it is, there are many non-ban ways to solve and address it. By immediately turning to bans and by building the issue in a ban context, you're perpetuating the same kind of ban mania which pushes many away from the format and leads to an overall hostile Modern climate.
Just to illustrate this point further, please list the fair strategies you think will suddenly excel in a post-big mana Modern.
but what if reactive blue decks cannot do well in this meta? what if the meta is the problem?
people hate bans, mine are strictly hypothetical. tell me, if we could simulate the meta game without eldrazi tmeple and valakut in it, how would reactive blue be doing?
my guess is better.
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"A good chunk of Modern plays these strategies and enjoys them, so the burden for killing any number of these decks to hypothetically open space to other strategies is very high."
wasn't the pod ban to open up more creature strategies?
"You have invented an issue (a wide range of fair decks struggle)
did i though? am i not right?
there is too much "rock" in this rock paper scissors meta game imo
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Not to nit pick but I think you were looking for a Shane Lechler reference, Janiskowski doesn't actually punt.
But the point here is that Jace doesn't help blue against the fast decks so if he does get unbanned it would look fine at first, but then when they actually accomplish the goal of slowing down the format it could severely limit diversity if other midrange decks can't compete. I think them being weary of unbanning him is the correct approach since it doesn't solve anything and only potentially creates more problems down the road. I bought my playset of stoneforge last week just HOPING that he is the card released to try to give a UW tempo deck some hope of existing. I believe the shell of caw-blade they were so scared of is totally acceptable in modern now given that power creep has helped other strategies but power has been creeping down in U tempo based spells for awhile so caw-blade doesn't get the same bonuses from new sets like other decks do.
I know, I just wanted to name a big time NFL kicker to illustrate the point
If Eldrazi Temple went away, my prediction would be that blue would still suck. Titanshift wouldn't just disappear, you'd probably be asking for a Valakut ban in a few months.
I'm a BGx player and I've never complained half as much as you have about Temples, Tron lands, Mox opals, etc. The only bans I pushed for were Eye of Ugin/Dredge. I said a year ago I think BI should be banned, but it looks like probe was more the issue.
Even now, playing DS Jund, if it reaches crazy high shares and keeps winning tournaments, maybe that too should be banned (not that we're there yet, its new, people like to play new things, etc)
You're constantly trying to improve your own decks strategies in this thread, and it's selfish.
I personally hate playing combo decks but I wouldn't tell people to stop playing it or want a ban.
Furthermore, outside of ramp decks, Jund has game against unfair decks, sorry if there's a bigger midrange deck that hurts your feelings, I play Jund too, get over it.
im talking about ur/x mostly in my arguments not bg/x. and the reason I think bg/x is doing fine in this format regardless is because of 1 major difference: proactive vs reactive.
i dont think reactive could EVER be good in this kind of meta game.
its not selfish when your favorite archetype sucks and there is little that can be done about it.
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And thats as a reactive blue player.
Standard allows for Control. It has a piss poor viewership, and about 4 meaningful decks.
Frontier (and post-modern when it comes around) will almost CERTAINLY be mid range heavy, and control will be possible.
Modern, nope, you must close the door too quickly, and blue alone cannot do it. Unless you do something unfair and take all the turns.
Honestly hellfire simply does not want to play Modern, so move on. Nothing is in need of a ban, and the day SSG is banned, we lose 3 completely unique decks at least, and that would be disappointing.
Spirits
I really wish people would read the actual explanations Wizards posts:
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/banned-and-restricted-announcement-2015-01-19
Pod was indeed banned to open up creature strategies, but that's because its share of the field was way too high:
"Over the past year, Birthing Pod decks have won significantly more Grand Prix than any other Modern decks and compose the largest percentage of the field."
"Pod won five of the twelve Grand Prix over the past year, including winning the last two. "
"The high percentage of the field playing Pod suppresses decks, especially other creature decks, that have an unfavorable matchup."
The issue wasn't that Pod was abstractly suppressing other strategies. It was that Pod's share was too high.
If blue reactive decks can't succeed in this metagame but BGx strategies can, this suggests the problem isn't the metagame. It's the bad cards in reactive blue.
Blue would do badly. BGx would be the best deck by a mile. We just saw this approach fail with the Twin ban, which was designed to open up the format to all the decks being suppressed by the evil Twin, but instead just opened it up to the top echelon of the decks which Twin was holding back (Dredge, DSZ, Infect).
EDIT: Also, thanks spiegel, I ask you again to please name the fair decks that would be opened up if big mana suddenly disappeared.
“Homo homini lupus est.”
but can you really compare such different decks to each other? they are 2 different archetypes. 1 reactive the other proactive.
maybe reactive strategies are doomed in this format?
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I actually do want to play modern fyi. this game could use alot of improvement however.
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In short, both Jace and Preordain help the selection challenge facing Uxx decks right now. Twin is just a bandaid that helps URx at the expense of the rest of Uxx strategies. I'd rather have no tier 1 Uxx deck than force all Uxx tier 1 decks for the remainder of the format to run twin (which is the essential result of twin in the meta)
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
That may be, and correct me if I am wrong, but we have no reason to believe that Wizards bans or unbans cards with any thought to their price correct? And there is nothing stopping them from a future reprint as far as I know. There will always be expensive cards in the modern card pool, and I suspect Jace would likely make as many waves as Ancestral Vision after the month or so of testing wore off.
Heck, you can say that from anything. The reason my pet tribal camel deck is bad is because of the *****ty cards that the camel tribe has.
C'mon, is that really an answer?...