Frontier wont be cheap for long, I mentioned this elsewhere, but speculation is already taking place, and several vendors are dry of some of the cards folks would expect to find.
The day it becomes an 'official' format, is he day it ceases to be anything but a mirror to moderns price issues.
Prices will go up, but I'm skeptical of those who say they'll mirror Modern's. Without Tarmogoyf, Liliana and enemy fetchlands, there are far fewer cards that push up the price of a deck.
And ? Am I not allowed to express my thoughts to the post before mine just because something along the same line has been said previously ?
I was under the impression that that post was directed at me. If it wasn't, I apologize.
Yes it will slow down the dredge deck. Those two cards is sometimes a life line. And to be able to play 6/6 regen over cage is something. The thug will dredge for 4 alittle short on the dredge part and alot shorter on the threat part... now cage will really kill a dredge deck if goes un answered on early turns.
kid I played dredge when there was no golgari grave-troll or prized amalgam! I know its evolution all the way through modern. Dredge is not down or out!
But yes I also agree with idSurge that it won't be cheap for long. The format, if taken as official, will definitely have its own set of 'powerhouse' staples. Flip Jace is one of them, I can see Gideon being another. But the format will still be cheap to get into relative to Modern like how Modern is cheap to get into relative to Legacy, at least for the short term.
But on the other hand, I'm not too fussed about Frontier as a new format. It has its own appeal and target audience. I don't see it eating Modern's slice of the pie. Maybe modern sees a lower influx of new players but I don't see modern losing players to frontier.
Guys please opinions on japanese cards. Lost a 3/3 creature against Japan celestial colonade. This guy played all creatures and spells in english cards, but some cards in his manabase was japanese. I dont registrated this really ( my brain say its all fine and all english to me lets attack his empty board)...and i am sure it is a Kind of legal cheating. It is not ok, but i know legal. I Hate such people. I never forget colonade normally, but with this Tricks it can happen one time in 3 years and such people take advantage of this
If I am a customer spending premium amount of dollars, I expect a premium service. Jund falls into the category of a premium deck costing more dollars than a majority of the rest of the format. I'm not getting the desired performance ratio per dollars spent out of the Jund deck because WOTC decided to make the format more diverse.
But yes I also agree with idSurge that it won't be cheap for long. The format, if taken as official, will definitely have its own set of 'powerhouse' staples. Flip Jace is one of them, I can see Gideon being another. But the format will still be cheap to get into relative to Modern like how Modern is cheap to get into relative to Legacy, at least for the short term.
But on the other hand, I'm not too fussed about Frontier as a new format. It has its own appeal and target audience. I don't see it eating Modern's slice of the pie. Maybe modern sees a lower influx of new players but I don't see modern losing players to frontier.
I agree with about all of this, to be honest. Jace is definitely a problem, but other than him there aren't a core of expensive staples that will provide a harsh barrier to those looking to enter.
Plus people can play both. I don't play it currently, but I'm half tempted to because it's the only constructed format where you can play a set of Dig Through Time, which is kind of a neat Magic card.
You should not be able to look at your opponents hand for zero mana.
You shouldn't be able to generate an additional mana every turn by an artifact that costs 0.
You shouldn't be able to generate mana through an uncounterable abiity of a card, at instant speed.
You shouldn't be able to generate 2 mana off a land for a creature type.
You shouldn't be able to generate 7 mana on turn 3 and escalating towards 10 from that point.
There's a lot of thing wrong in this format. The fact is that WOTC pays attention to what they want, and lack transparency. Probe is broken, so are other 10 cards in the format. Banning cards can be dangerous and it can sprial down very fast.
This is such a true statement. I think if wizards would have cut alot of the mana ramp cards from being created the speed of the game would have been preserved.
I don't understand this sentiment. If you want slower "fair" games (usually) both limited and standard offer this in spades, so why wouldn't you just stick to the formats that are dominated by the playstyles you prefer?
agreed 100%, but as I gather years of play , my collection builds and I'd like to play more modern if other stratagies were more viable, but the broken nature and speed of modern keeps me watching from the sideline.I like constructed, and my collection of out of cycle standard decks collect dust because of the broken nature of older sets balanced against the new.
But yes I also agree with idSurge that it won't be cheap for long. The format, if taken as official, will definitely have its own set of 'powerhouse' staples. Flip Jace is one of them, I can see Gideon being another. But the format will still be cheap to get into relative to Modern like how Modern is cheap to get into relative to Legacy, at least for the short term.
But on the other hand, I'm not too fussed about Frontier as a new format. It has its own appeal and target audience. I don't see it eating Modern's slice of the pie. Maybe modern sees a lower influx of new players but I don't see modern losing players to frontier.
I agree with about all of this, to be honest. Jace is definitely a problem, but other than him there aren't a core of expensive staples that will provide a harsh barrier to those looking to enter.
Plus people can play both. I don't play it currently, but I'm half tempted to because it's the only constructed format where you can play a set of Dig Through Time, which is kind of a neat Magic card.
I suppose being one of the guys who was here before modern became a format. I can speak to this a bit. Frontier feels very much like what modern was before it was announced as a format. The same way that over extended was a thing before they made modern. The truth is What modern was trying to solve was the reserved list. What frontier is trying to solve is modern's prices/availability and instability as a format. Frontier solves the first by making it all newish standard cards and by straight up murdering most decks by killing off their cards.
The issue here is modern solves the reserved list problem it was rebeling against by not doing reserved list, but the problems frontier solves are done flawed. Frontier Doesnt actually solve the instability problem because it just mega bans everything, until it will need to do the same exact thing wizards is doing to modern, banning everything, because they completely lack answer cards, just more so than modern. It also doesnt solve the whole reprint thing wizards isnt doing, because they wont reprint stuff like flip jace... so in 5 years it will be exactly what modern is.
Frontier is baby modern, and in 5 years it will have the same problems. Theres a problem that needs to be solved, and its with the lack of testing and balancing wizards does.
This is a major reason why I can't get behind Frontier. That third bulletpoint only holds water so long as the format isn't popular. Remember Jace hitting $90+ on Standard demand? That supply hasn't increased, and Wizards is no more/less likely or able to reprint any Frontier staple than any Modern staple. Some Frontier players acknowledge this fundamental problem, but others do not, either ignoring it outright, dismissing it, or lying about it.
Frontier's only selling point is a different (lower, for the most part) power level than exists in Modern. Unfortunately, the format looks like it will be overwhelmingly defined by Khans cards, which Wizards probably wouldn't include in a post-Modern format anyway. Either way, I'm not a fan and hold out hope for Modern this next year.
Frontier is baby modern, and in 5 years it will have the same problems. Theres a problem that needs to be solved, and its with the lack of testing and balancing wizards does.
Exactly this. Every advantage the format has is due to its infancy. It will not take long for it to have the same issues as modern, except they have even less powerful answers.
This makes sense in Japan where getting pre-Khans MTG cards is difficult - supply issues (due to low printing of japanese language cards) similar to Legacy but because of language rather than reserved list. It north america it makes little sense.
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Modern Decks
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
This is a major reason why I can't get behind Frontier. That third bulletpoint only holds water so long as the format isn't popular. Remember Jace hitting $90+ on Standard demand? That supply hasn't increased, and Wizards is no more/less likely or able to reprint any Frontier staple than any Modern staple. Some Frontier players acknowledge this fundamental problem, but others do not, either ignoring it outright, dismissing it, or lying about it.
Frontier's only selling point is a different (lower, for the most part) power level than exists in Modern. Unfortunately, the format looks like it will be overwhelmingly defined by Khans cards, which Wizards probably wouldn't include in a post-Modern format anyway. Either way, I'm not a fan and hold out hope for Modern this next year.
Right, like I was saying. Frontier is baby modern. In 5 years it has all the problems modern has today.
Thanks goodness. It's a relief that no cards from Affinity and Eldrazi got banned.. I was worried about Mox Opal and Eldrazi Temple.
Even if the ban article was horrible, I still believe bans are results-driven and not totally arbitrary and alarmist as many have alleged. Sadly, because Wizards sucked at articulating this, we'll get more undue ban mania and ban fear where there is no need for it. It will also be harder to argue against this mania and fear because Wizards hasn't given us the tools to cite their rationale.
I believe that WoTC has some way of collecting data that is never going to be revealed to the public. They should at least tell people on how they judge cards / decks to be "too powerful" and it's time for the ban. For example.. Glimmervoids are the only missing piece in my Affinity.. 4 Glimmervoids is the same price as a decent brand new camera that I could use at cosplay photoshoots - should I buy the glimmervoids only to suddenly get one-upped by WotC with an announcement that "for a long time Affinity has been too strong and we now feel that it needed an Opal / Glimmervoid ban" - it's a scary thought when one wants to invest on expensive cards for the format. My worries come from the Twin ban.. because twin has been around for a long time, people felt safe and then suddenly the ban came.
He also had this to say about the article (emphasis added):
Sperling was the first to have an article with a take on the Banned and Restricted announcement. His take is relatively accurate with regards to R&D's decision. The thinking didn't match up perfectly, but it's close enough that reading this should give you a good snapshot of some of the best reasons for the decision.
On the one hand, at least we get to hear something from Wizards about the rationale.
On the other hand, why the heck can't Wizards just give us the rationale directly instead of Blake citing some third-party article that is only partially correct? Sperling makes all sorts of claims in that article and we have no clue which are accurate, which are a little off, which are totally off-base, etc. I'm holding out hope that Wizards releases an actual explanation in the next few weeks, but this update just underscores some of the more ridiculous gaps in their Modern communication.
I disagree fundamentally with Matt's closing point. It is not an impossible, or close enough, task to fix this format. I would take a significant pay cut to be given the job of doing it.
EDIT: And the Wizards article is a bit too 'pat myself on the back' and not nearly enough meat from THEM. I dont want to hear what 'pros' think.
I disagree fundamentally with Matt's closing point. It is not an impossible, or close enough, task to fix this format. I would take a significant pay cut to be given the job of doing it.
EDIT: And the Wizards article is a bit too 'pat myself on the back' and not nearly enough meat from THEM. I dont want to hear what 'pros' think.
Thats because were in the minority who are screaming "I get the formats needed bans, but this shows a flaw in the game on your side of things." Most people are just extra happy about the bans and don't think anything of it (until the next bans, which are now 8 times a year mind you.)
Splinter Twin.dec --> Banned
DRS Jund.deck --> Nerfed Twice Birthing Pod.dec --> Banned
Infect --> Banned & Nerfed
People say Abzan Midrange_Fatal Push.dec will police the meta now
Big difference between a police deck and a format parameter IMO. Infect and Burn are examples of format parameters - if your deck is too goldfishy, and doesn't pack any interaction, Infect will beat you. If your deck is too careless with its life total, Burn will beat you. These decks just set limits on how extreme your deck can be.
Police decks, like Jund and Twin, keep the format's most powerful linear decks in check. A deck like Infect, that can and will win on turn two or three if not interacted with, is supposed to have a very hard time against decks like these. They should be natural foils to the fastest, most abstractly powerful decks available.
the card itself really isn't worth the card board its printed on...does it serve a purpose? Sure its a blue 1 drop that might not be a 1/1. I would not put it in a list and expect to win a PTQ or GP though.
I might (probably won't) call #freegitaxianprobe or #freegravetroll, but not until I see tourney results postban. Hopefully the format is more fun (with more control and less battle-of-sideboards) or more diverse, and I won't complain about the ban unless the effect is negative.
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BRGMy Deck(Modern): Bolts'n'Burns WMy other, WIP casual deck: Zero to Hero
Protection from Will-O'-the-Wisps, Ali-from-Cairos, and Uncle-Istvans
Legendary snow landwalk
---------------------------------------
On the reserved list: Wizards won't remove it. Only we can. In other words: Play Modern, Pauper, or No-RL Eternal.
Maybe if WotC didn't pander to noobs and nerf removal and permission to nigh unplayability, we wouldn't have this problem. But no, control is bad feels, so its much better to just ban cards and thus decks. The constant bannings and trend toward all aggro, all the time in modern is the end result of this (yes, I know combo exists, it just gets banned immediately if its any good unless its aggro combo like infect).
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The Meaning of Life: "M-hmm. Well, it's nothing very special. Uh, try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations"
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Whether its blue players countering your spells, red players burning you out, or combo, if you have a problem with an aspect of Magic's gameplay, you can fix it!
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
Well, Matt Sperling said in his article about the banning at Channel Fireball this about the troll ban:
"
The Dredge deck gets weakened here, not killed, and that’s a good thing. This card was recently taken off the banned list and it was done so on a trial-and-error basis. Modern Dredge became such a consistent and resilient weapon that it made players feel like they had to have a sideboard with plenty of graveyard hate in order to keep up. This is different than Affinity because ____________ (which brings me to….)"
Well, Matt Sperling said in his article about the banning at Channel Fireball this about the troll ban:
"
The Dredge deck gets weakened here, not killed, and that’s a good thing. This card was recently taken off the banned list and it was done so on a trial-and-error basis. Modern Dredge became such a consistent and resilient weapon that it made players feel like they had to have a sideboard with plenty of graveyard hate in order to keep up. This is different than Affinity because ____________ (which brings me to….)"
My guess is that the raw number of Dredge hate cards was higher than the raw number of Affinity hate cards. This would be true both as an average % of sideboards, and also in total copies of cards across all sideboards. Speaking of percentages, there is a non-zero percentage I write an article about that difference at some point to see if it's real or not. This is yet another reason Wizards needs better communication around such issues. If I played Affinity, I would very justifiably be worried at the Dredge ban's rationale and Wizards' failure to address the similarities.
How is the Probe ban reasonable? With the printing of Fatal Push those "T3 win" decks would have too many problems to stay T1. Also, Probe ban hurts delver lists, who were the bane of those 3 decks and could be aggressive enough to handle Tron and/or Valakut decks.
If they really wanted to hurt the Turn 2-3 wins they should've cut Become Immense, since Delve is by itself broken.
Probe is casting a sorcery free version of peek. It takes a lot of the skill out of playing these super fast decks by just getting information for basically free while filling up graveyards for become immense. I really don't feel bad that super fast decks actually have to THINK before they cast their stuff now.
Most of Infect's and Suicide Zoo's godhands were irrelevant of Probe, fetches and growths filled their Graveyards and enabled those 1 mana Become Immenses. With the printing of Push they should've waited with ANY bans on those aggressive decks, since probe or not 8 pieces of 1 mana removal from most interactive decks is too much to handle.
And I'll repeat myself: Become Immense is the real problem not Probe or Growth. With the probe ban the're gutting delver decks that are by design interactive decks.
Those god hands lost to blessed alliance so I wouldn't consider them god hands. They were really good with probe since you had info whether to go for it or not.
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On mtgsalvation people don't want to discuss ideas, so I give people something else to discuss: my controversial opinions.
Theres a problem that needs to be solved, and its with the lack of testing and balancing wizards does.
This.
It basically comes down to a huge design flaw in their modern paradigm which is making threats better than answers. Formats can't exist if the answers are too weak, because everything then becomes a race to land the biggest, baddest threat. Wizards just banned the top 3 threats out of Standard because there were no answers for them. It's odd to say this when we're finally getting Fatal Push but Magic needs a lot more cards like that. Modern, and by extension Frontier will not work as formats without strong answer cards.
Well, Matt Sperling said in his article about the banning at Channel Fireball this about the troll ban:
"
The Dredge deck gets weakened here, not killed, and that’s a good thing. This card was recently taken off the banned list and it was done so on a trial-and-error basis. Modern Dredge became such a consistent and resilient weapon that it made players feel like they had to have a sideboard with plenty of graveyard hate in order to keep up. This is different than Affinity because ____________ (which brings me to….)"
My guess is that the raw number of Dredge hate cards was higher than the raw number of Affinity hate cards. This would be true both as an average % of sideboards, and also in total copies of cards across all sideboards. Speaking of percentages, there is a non-zero percentage I write an article about that difference at some point to see if it's real or not. This is yet another reason Wizards needs better communication around such issues. If I played Affinity, I would very justifiably be worried at the Dredge ban's rationale and Wizards' failure to address the similarities.
The sustantial difference between the both of them is the axis both operate on. One has tremendous inevitability and the other one has a hard time coming back a wave of removal.
There´s no question both require specific SB hate to beat them. Which leads to a simple question: Why does R&D think that Affinity is fine whereas other pillars like Twin,Old Jund,Pod aren't?. Last time i checked Affinity hasn't been below Tier 1 since 2012. That's some longevity right there, on the back of a card that equates the power level of cards from the Power-9.
Yeah, that's exactly why Modern is so volatile. Too many unpredictable and unexplained situations.
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Prices will go up, but I'm skeptical of those who say they'll mirror Modern's. Without Tarmogoyf, Liliana and enemy fetchlands, there are far fewer cards that push up the price of a deck.
I was under the impression that that post was directed at me. If it wasn't, I apologize.
Edit: I see. It seems I'm wrong.
URW Control
WBG Abzan
GRW Burn
EDH
GR Rosheen Meanderer
kid I played dredge when there was no golgari grave-troll or prized amalgam! I know its evolution all the way through modern. Dredge is not down or out!
But yes I also agree with idSurge that it won't be cheap for long. The format, if taken as official, will definitely have its own set of 'powerhouse' staples. Flip Jace is one of them, I can see Gideon being another. But the format will still be cheap to get into relative to Modern like how Modern is cheap to get into relative to Legacy, at least for the short term.
But on the other hand, I'm not too fussed about Frontier as a new format. It has its own appeal and target audience. I don't see it eating Modern's slice of the pie. Maybe modern sees a lower influx of new players but I don't see modern losing players to frontier.
I agree with about all of this, to be honest. Jace is definitely a problem, but other than him there aren't a core of expensive staples that will provide a harsh barrier to those looking to enter.
Plus people can play both. I don't play it currently, but I'm half tempted to because it's the only constructed format where you can play a set of Dig Through Time, which is kind of a neat Magic card.
URW Control
WBG Abzan
GRW Burn
EDH
GR Rosheen Meanderer
agreed 100%, but as I gather years of play , my collection builds and I'd like to play more modern if other stratagies were more viable, but the broken nature and speed of modern keeps me watching from the sideline.I like constructed, and my collection of out of cycle standard decks collect dust because of the broken nature of older sets balanced against the new.
Spirits
I suppose being one of the guys who was here before modern became a format. I can speak to this a bit. Frontier feels very much like what modern was before it was announced as a format. The same way that over extended was a thing before they made modern. The truth is What modern was trying to solve was the reserved list. What frontier is trying to solve is modern's prices/availability and instability as a format. Frontier solves the first by making it all newish standard cards and by straight up murdering most decks by killing off their cards.
The issue here is modern solves the reserved list problem it was rebeling against by not doing reserved list, but the problems frontier solves are done flawed. Frontier Doesnt actually solve the instability problem because it just mega bans everything, until it will need to do the same exact thing wizards is doing to modern, banning everything, because they completely lack answer cards, just more so than modern. It also doesnt solve the whole reprint thing wizards isnt doing, because they wont reprint stuff like flip jace... so in 5 years it will be exactly what modern is.
Frontier is baby modern, and in 5 years it will have the same problems. Theres a problem that needs to be solved, and its with the lack of testing and balancing wizards does.
This is a major reason why I can't get behind Frontier. That third bulletpoint only holds water so long as the format isn't popular. Remember Jace hitting $90+ on Standard demand? That supply hasn't increased, and Wizards is no more/less likely or able to reprint any Frontier staple than any Modern staple. Some Frontier players acknowledge this fundamental problem, but others do not, either ignoring it outright, dismissing it, or lying about it.
Frontier's only selling point is a different (lower, for the most part) power level than exists in Modern. Unfortunately, the format looks like it will be overwhelmingly defined by Khans cards, which Wizards probably wouldn't include in a post-Modern format anyway. Either way, I'm not a fan and hold out hope for Modern this next year.
This makes sense in Japan where getting pre-Khans MTG cards is difficult - supply issues (due to low printing of japanese language cards) similar to Legacy but because of language rather than reserved list. It north america it makes little sense.
KnightfallGWUR
Azorius Control UW
Burn RBG
Right, like I was saying. Frontier is baby modern. In 5 years it has all the problems modern has today.
>implying storm wasn't already dead
URW Control
WBG Abzan
GRW Burn
EDH
GR Rosheen Meanderer
I think the concept is that it was on life support perhaps before, but this one really hurt it for keeping the cards flowing.
Spirits
I believe that WoTC has some way of collecting data that is never going to be revealed to the public. They should at least tell people on how they judge cards / decks to be "too powerful" and it's time for the ban. For example.. Glimmervoids are the only missing piece in my Affinity.. 4 Glimmervoids is the same price as a decent brand new camera that I could use at cosplay photoshoots - should I buy the glimmervoids only to suddenly get one-upped by WotC with an announcement that "for a long time Affinity has been too strong and we now feel that it needed an Opal / Glimmervoid ban" - it's a scary thought when one wants to invest on expensive cards for the format. My worries come from the Twin ban.. because twin has been around for a long time, people felt safe and then suddenly the ban came.
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Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/daily-magic-update/update-2017-01-10
Blake highlighted Sperling's CF article first:
http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/matt-sperling/emrakul-copter-reflector-mage-grave-troll-probe-banned/
He also had this to say about the article (emphasis added):
On the one hand, at least we get to hear something from Wizards about the rationale.
On the other hand, why the heck can't Wizards just give us the rationale directly instead of Blake citing some third-party article that is only partially correct? Sperling makes all sorts of claims in that article and we have no clue which are accurate, which are a little off, which are totally off-base, etc. I'm holding out hope that Wizards releases an actual explanation in the next few weeks, but this update just underscores some of the more ridiculous gaps in their Modern communication.
EDIT: And the Wizards article is a bit too 'pat myself on the back' and not nearly enough meat from THEM. I dont want to hear what 'pros' think.
Spirits
Thats because were in the minority who are screaming "I get the formats needed bans, but this shows a flaw in the game on your side of things." Most people are just extra happy about the bans and don't think anything of it (until the next bans, which are now 8 times a year mind you.)
Police decks, like Jund and Twin, keep the format's most powerful linear decks in check. A deck like Infect, that can and will win on turn two or three if not interacted with, is supposed to have a very hard time against decks like these. They should be natural foils to the fastest, most abstractly powerful decks available.
Counter-Cat
Colorless Eldrazi Stompy
WMy other, WIP casual deck: Zero to Hero
Protection from Will-O'-the-Wisps, Ali-from-Cairos, and Uncle-Istvans
Legendary snow landwalk
---------------------------------------
On the reserved list: Wizards won't remove it. Only we can. In other words: Play Modern, Pauper, or No-RL Eternal.
Onering's 4 simple steps that let you solve any problem with Magic's gameplay
Step 1: Identify the problem. What aspect of Magic don't you like? Step 2: Find out how others deal with the problem. How do players deal with this aspect of the game when they run into it? Step 3: Do what those players do. Step 4: No more problem. Bonus: You are now better at Magic. Enjoy those extra wins!
"
The Dredge deck gets weakened here, not killed, and that’s a good thing. This card was recently taken off the banned list and it was done so on a trial-and-error basis. Modern Dredge became such a consistent and resilient weapon that it made players feel like they had to have a sideboard with plenty of graveyard hate in order to keep up. This is different than Affinity because ____________ (which brings me to….)"
And I have to agree with him totally.
My guess is that the raw number of Dredge hate cards was higher than the raw number of Affinity hate cards. This would be true both as an average % of sideboards, and also in total copies of cards across all sideboards. Speaking of percentages, there is a non-zero percentage I write an article about that difference at some point to see if it's real or not. This is yet another reason Wizards needs better communication around such issues. If I played Affinity, I would very justifiably be worried at the Dredge ban's rationale and Wizards' failure to address the similarities.
Those god hands lost to blessed alliance so I wouldn't consider them god hands. They were really good with probe since you had info whether to go for it or not.
Decks I'm playing in Modern right now:
URB Grixis Reveler (http://www.mtgvault.com/supast4r7/decks/modern-grixis-reveler/)
UB Faeries (http://www.mtgvault.com/supast4r7/decks/ub-fae-2/)
UW Azorious Control (http://www.mtgvault.com/supast4r7/decks/modern-ojutai-control-2/)
This.
It basically comes down to a huge design flaw in their modern paradigm which is making threats better than answers. Formats can't exist if the answers are too weak, because everything then becomes a race to land the biggest, baddest threat. Wizards just banned the top 3 threats out of Standard because there were no answers for them. It's odd to say this when we're finally getting Fatal Push but Magic needs a lot more cards like that. Modern, and by extension Frontier will not work as formats without strong answer cards.
The sustantial difference between the both of them is the axis both operate on. One has tremendous inevitability and the other one has a hard time coming back a wave of removal.
There´s no question both require specific SB hate to beat them. Which leads to a simple question: Why does R&D think that Affinity is fine whereas other pillars like Twin,Old Jund,Pod aren't?. Last time i checked Affinity hasn't been below Tier 1 since 2012. That's some longevity right there, on the back of a card that equates the power level of cards from the Power-9.
Yeah, that's exactly why Modern is so volatile. Too many unpredictable and unexplained situations.