They have not looked at modern since Troll and Probe got banned, I'm pretty sure they have explicitly said their attention has been on Standard since then since it was a dumpster fire.
They didn't, but considering how cryptic they are about everything I'm surprised they admitted to it at all.
Considering standard is how we get new cards and the issues that we do see with modern are a lack of good answers to specific strategies, the strain on sideboards by having so many specific strategies to fight off without having more good modal cards like rakdos charm, and the fact that the disparity in answers between colors forces certain play styles into certain colors, I am (trying to be) hopeful that the lessons being applied to standard will positively effect modern as well.
Edit: for years one of the biggest complaints about modern was that black, the color of removal and death, had some of the worst cheap removal spells forced it to be paired with red to have bolt for the early game. Fatal push completely alleviated that and now we see black as the most complete color and the best color in the format. I'm hoping we are only a few good prints from all the colors being equally viable in all stages of the game as well.
Edit: for years one of the biggest complaints about modern was that black, the color of removal and death, had some of the worst cheap removal spells forced it to be paired with red to have bolt for the early game. Fatal push completely alleviated that and now we see black as the most complete color and the best color in the format. I'm hoping we are only a few good prints from all the colors being equally viable in all stages of the game as well.
Although I think this isn't a bad sentiment, it's also symptomatic of one of Modern's biggest woes: many players will not be satisfied until Modern fits their vision of "perfect." It needs perfect archetype balance, color balance, deck diversity, linear/non-linear mix, strategy viability, cost, tournament availability, product support, etc. If players perceive it doesn't meet those standards on any one of those metrics, let alone all of them together, many players are immediately dissatisfied. In part, I blame Wizards for this. By not clearly explaining Modern's goals, they've created a unicorn format where everyone projects their own personal Magic utopia. On the other hand, players have a responsibility to realize many of these benchmarks are unrealistic, unimportant, and unprecedented. For instance, it's strange that some users in this thread simultaneously hold up Legacy as this pinnacle of format excellence and then criticize Modern because some colors are underplayed. Legacy is completely dominated by blue. Modern is much more open, with not even black having that kind of monopoly. These kinds of dissonances make it hard for Wizards to take the pulse of many vocal Modern critics, because their desires are inconsistent and sometimes impossible.
Jaysus, the ailing Twin players drive me nutty. "My deck got banned out from under me and it makes me mad that other decks that got banned can still function while mine can't."
And then the moving of the goalposts... "I want a UR based deck that can go Bolt-Snap-Bolt." "Well, these are these options." "But it doesn't feel the same!"
I have literally no interest in Twin remaining banned, it being unbanned, or what have you. I'm just tired of all of the ex-Twin players "oh poor me!"ing in this bloody thread. Either learn to let it go or go complain at the people in Magic who can actually friggin' change things rather than coming to this thread and repeating yourself for the Xth time; it's borderline spamming, we know what you're going to say, and we don't care that you've got a feel bad because other decks that got banned still exist.
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Well, I can saw a woman in two, but you won't wanna look in the box when I'm through.
I don't know what's worse the people complaining about twin being banned or the people complaining about the people complaining. To touch on the eldrazitron issue, I do believe that eldrazitron is warping the format in a negative way. The best way to beat it is to just go under it with fast linear decks like affinity.
They didn't, but considering how cryptic they are about everything I'm surprised they admitted to it at all.
Considering standard is how we get new cards and the issues that we do see with modern are a lack of good answers to specific strategies, the strain on sideboards by having so many specific strategies to fight off without having more good modal cards like rakdos charm, and the fact that the disparity in answers between colors forces certain play styles into certain colors, I am (trying to be) hopeful that the lessons being applied to standard will positively effect modern as well.
Edit: for years one of the biggest complaints about modern was that black, the color of removal and death, had some of the worst cheap removal spells forced it to be paired with red to have bolt for the early game. Fatal push completely alleviated that and now we see black as the most complete color and the best color in the format. I'm hoping we are only a few good prints from all the colors being equally viable in all stages of the game as well.
Would take more than "a few good prints" wouldn't it? I mean with color fixing being as good as it is in Modern you would have to see cards printed that are at a minimum as powerful as the options that Black offers. If not you would have to justify not simply making the super easy splash for black. Anything that gets printed into the pool is in direct competition with every other option at the same cost and function. For instance this is really the only reason to play Blue, no other card filtering does what Serum Visions does without some wonky aspect stapled on like Ancient Stirrings, which while "better" in terms of value really can only go into a very narrow spectrum of decks. We have seen this with the drop off of bolt in decks running black, no need for it anymore.
Given that what black has is the product of 15 years worth of design and it literally only equals like 7 playsets of cards I doubt that any kind of balance could be achieved in less than a decade. They would need to print cards in other colors that are on par or better than the available black options and just looking at how bad Thoughtseize warped the last standard it was in I doubt WotC will be printing the kinds of spells at a cheap enough rate to really see modern play.
For those who still want to play a twin style deck: since at this point in time it seems Kiki Jiki is the closest thing to a replacement you will get have you guys tested all the variants? I heard someone say Grixis is bad, so fair enough. A friend and I built a UR version right as soon as twin got banned, and he topped an event with it the weekend that Pro Tour Eldrazi happened, though at this point that deck probably isn't good enough anymore. What about USA/UWR/Jeskai Kiki Jiki flash though? It keeps all of the EOT flash elements you guys love, still has bolt snap bolt and can chip away at the opponent with all the fliers. What seems to be the issue with this deck, it seems to fit your wants better than Copycat combo will.
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Modern URBSome variant of Death's Shadow URB Grixis Control (Chapin Version) JFM Storm / Treasure Cruise Delver / Splinter Twin / Infect
I repeat, and this is a response to cfusion. Every player that wants Twin back and is not satisfied from U/W Control's dynamic in this meta can not be taken seriously.
We get that you want to have a deck that is losing from nothing, but move on. While Shadow is legal, Twin is not coming back.
Moving towards August: NO CHANGES. Modern is great and interactive once again.
tell me. how many of the top 8 decks are very interactive? What percentage of modern is control right now?
It is a good thing that they were able to keep a deck competitive after a ban, isn't that the point of every ban?
I'd love to see twin unbanned. I don't want to play it, but anything that pushes skill intensive, interactive magic is good in my book.
It's sad that they banned it and it's sad that they were so disillusioned to think that kiki was a viable replacement but the fact that they banned an oppressive strategy but allowed it to live competitely is a good thing. It shows they may be learning from past mistakes.
I want SFM unbanned, but it's not happening, I'd be fine with twin being unbanned, but probably isn't happening either. They have messed up before but I don't include them not banning temple as one of those mistakes. I even agree that etron is the most warping deck in the meta but the answer is new prints (because we aren't getting unbans for a long time, it's time for us to accept that), not more bans.
They claim to now realize the error of their ways and while it sucks to say we need to give them two years to judge how they handled that mistake that is the nature of the situation we are in. If that time passes and the format is worse off then we need to collectively destroy them for it.
They let eldrazi survive yet they ban pod and Twin off of the face of the earth...
pod and Twin encouraged interaction
Eldrazi discourages interaction, stifles 2 archtypes and encourages racing it.
Wizards logic.
And now jund is falling and the best interactive deck is half aggro...
I repeat, and this is a response to cfusion. Every player that wants Twin back and is not satisfied from U/W Control's dynamic in this meta can not be taken seriously.
We get that you want to have a deck that is losing from nothing, but move on. While Shadow is legal, Twin is not coming back.
Moving towards August: NO CHANGES. Modern is great and interactive once again.
tell me. how many of the top 8 decks are very interactive? What percentage of modern is control right now?
Interactive and control are two different things. Maybe that's part of the problem here. Discard is interactive, so is combat math and removal. The stack is not the only form of interaction that exists, and your post is outright wrong to try to put the two together in this way. Grixis Shadow is highly interactive in that it uses several forms of disruption, discard, countermagic and creature removal. Yet it also plays unfair by getting cheap fatties into play.
On another note, perhaps this sentence from hellfire is indicative of another problem in MtG - we boil down tournaments with hundreds or even thousands of players to the top 8. That's the playoff cut, so it's easy to do, but honestly we all know that the difference between 8th and 12th is generally tiebreakers. Does it make more sense to alter our data collection for large events? Should we develop a new system where tournaments up to X players reveal top 8, up to Y players top 16 and Z up to 32? Hell I'm just throwing stuff out there.
Edit: for years one of the biggest complaints about modern was that black, the color of removal and death, had some of the worst cheap removal spells forced it to be paired with red to have bolt for the early game. Fatal push completely alleviated that and now we see black as the most complete color and the best color in the format. I'm hoping we are only a few good prints from all the colors being equally viable in all stages of the game as well.
Although I think this isn't a bad sentiment, it's also symptomatic of one of Modern's biggest woes: many players will not be satisfied until Modern fits their vision of "perfect." It needs perfect archetype balance, color balance, deck diversity, linear/non-linear mix, strategy viability, cost, tournament availability, product support, etc. If players perceive it doesn't meet those standards on any one of those metrics, let alone all of them together, many players are immediately dissatisfied. In part, I blame Wizards for this. By not clearly explaining Modern's goals, they've created a unicorn format where everyone projects their own personal Magic utopia. On the other hand, players have a responsibility to realize many of these benchmarks are unrealistic, unimportant, and unprecedented. For instance, it's strange that some users in this thread simultaneously hold up Legacy as this pinnacle of format excellence and then criticize Modern because some colors are underplayed. Legacy is completely dominated by blue. Modern is much more open, with not even black having that kind of monopoly. These kinds of dissonances make it hard for Wizards to take the pulse of many vocal Modern critics, because their desires are inconsistent and sometimes impossible.
Fair point. All colors and strategies have inherent built in weaknesses that are as much of their identity as any strengths they have. It is important to keep that in mind while we sit here demanding X or Y be better, Z card be unbanned, C card be banned, etc. Still though, Magic is a great game and modern is the premiere non-rotating format of which is very important to the long term health and stability of the game.
We as a community have the ability and responsibility to push Wizards to continually make the format better and closer to these ideals while simultaneously realizing these goals are unattainable and unnecessary to the viability to the format. Getting closer to these ideals would just make it a format where more people feel welcome and that is never a bad thing.
The problem is that these features are asymptotic; when you are close to "perfection" every new positive change has less and less of an impact while negative changes have the ability to cause a much greater percentage of damage to the formats health. I completely understand WotC's hesitancy to make changes for this very reason. There are near infinite variables in play in this equation. That is why it is up to us a a player base to aid WotC in this unattainable goal of perfection with data driven tests and results, not just the hyperbole and rhetoric we often espouse here; when the hyperbole contradicts itself, it is completely cancelled out into useless information for WotC to attempt to process.
We do have power as consumers but only if our voice is uniform. It'd be great if we could band together as a community to do mass testings of certain banned cards to create a near irrefutable data set to aid Wizards in their difficult attempt at improving upon near perfection. I think we can all agree Twin should be first just to silence this never ending argument, but I very much enjoy white based attrition strategies that used to be more of a part of its color identity. I would be extremely delighted for SFM to come off the list as long as it did not cause further homogenization because it would help my BW non-eldrazi, non-D&T, attrition decks and because it is a card I believe to be of a fair powerlevel in the current age of modern. This is a very specific wish, and when this specific of requests are what we are discussing here (bolt-snap-bolt, non-control, flash, potential combo deck) it is a sign that the format is very near this unattainable perfection we all dream the format to be. It is unreasonable to think WotC would make any decisions to accommodate such a small voice at the expense of potentially alienating a much larger subset of the player base. That is why it is on us to aid them in this endeavor.
So, with that said, I will take the GDS vs. Twin testing. Any other volunteers?
A lot of the people here calling for a powerful control deck in Modern are also conveniently ignoring a fact that has occurred in any Magic format with any breadth, which is as follows:
Control decks can only exist and be powerful strategies if there is a specific meta they are attacking, if the card pool is small, or if they are using a synergy that is more powerful than the rest of the format.
Threats are inherently better than answers; a single threat left unchecked can end the game whereas a single answer has to have a threat that it answers. Sure, with Wrath of God style cards you can X-for-1, but anyone who wants a Control deck in Modern that does well have to face up to the fact that most decks will be running more threats than you can run answers. Control decks tend to be land heavy, aggro and midrange decks tend to be more land light. It's simple mathematics.
Miracles was the best deck in Legacy because it used a two card synergy that could, in the course of a game, end up as a 20-for-1 or even better,and ran enough other answers that anything that slipped through the Counter-Top cracks could also be dealt with. If you think that Modern needs an effect of that calibre, or that it will ever receive one, you are delusional.
It's worth noting that Splinter-Twin is an example of that type of synergy, by the by. Yes, it was easy to answer, yes it was turn 4 at the latest unless you were particularly all-in, but it was also an effect that didn't care how many creatures I had on the board or how much life I had - if you had the pieces, you could kill me. I am aware that a lot of the time the deck didn't specifically win with the combo, but it was still a particularly warping synergy - after you had 3 mana or more, I couldn't tap out without the possibility of just dying.
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Well, I can saw a woman in two, but you won't wanna look in the box when I'm through.
Its funny but when I hear interaction, all I envision is control. To me discard, counter, permission, removal and combat tricks are all controlling the outcome of what an opponent does. Interaction would be an opponent responding to an action played against them. When I hear players saying they want more interactive decks I hear "I want to control what you do." Its just how I look at it. I know its not how the entire Magic community views it but its how I see it. Its all control in a way. Even a linear, "non-interactive" goldfish deck is trying to control the outcome of the game.
Just a random thought, not trying to incite anything, just bringing up a point.
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Playing since 1994: Currently MAGS (HomeBrew),Standard & Pauper (Pioneer and Modern are degenerate trash formats)
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
I repeat, and this is a response to cfusion. Every player that wants Twin back and is not satisfied from U/W Control's dynamic in this meta can not be taken seriously.
We get that you want to have a deck that is losing from nothing, but move on. While Shadow is legal, Twin is not coming back.
Moving towards August: NO CHANGES. Modern is great and interactive once again.
tell me. how many of the top 8 decks are very interactive? What percentage of modern is control right now?
Those Hatebears/Death and Taxes decks are interactive decks that rose to at least Tier 2 status as of late. A DnT deck won SCG Invitational Roanoke, two more top8ed the GP Vegas and one was finalist.
U/W Control is another example. UWx Control had several copies at SCG Invitational Roanoke's top 32(~20%) and it's on the rise.
We had an interactive Esper Midrange deck and another interactive Jeskai Queller/tempo in GP Kobe's top8 as well.
Also, those Grixis Shadow decks are super interactive decks that won GP Copenhagen and top 8 ed GP Kobe. In addition, those decks present a huge reason for one to be playing a control deck, because every control deck has a good matchup vs Shadow basically.
Also, several other decks, like Junk Midrange, or Grixis Delver/Control do exist and it would not come as a surprise if one of those would top 8 the next GP.
All of those mean one thing: Preordain would boost two Tier 1 decks(Storm, Shadow). Stoneforge Mystic is something that decks like UW Control and Death and Taxes don't need anymore, since they seem to be doing just fine. Jace, The Mind Sculptor presents financial issues and those issues IMO prevents WOTC from unbanning the most powerful walker of all times. Splinter Twin is a police deck like Grixis Shadow only stronger and a lot less beatable. I am not totally opposed, but there is zero reason in unbanning the card atm, so Wizards just won't(at least while Grixis Shadow is arouund) Bloodbraid Elf is a risk, but it could come off.
That all said, I am confident that in the next Banlist we will get a "No changes in Modern"
Listen, G, I like you, but...
This is purely a meta call, UW Control is not some long standing tier 1 deck. SFM should still come off the unbanned list. And despite DnT, the deck will fall off the face of the earth the second Shadow falls from grace.
I've very much noticed a huge shift from your attitude, it's like YOU received your grixis shadow deck and decided everything is fine now; the bias is really coming off strong, dude.
What damage would an unbanning of BBE do? Oh no! not Temur being a thing! Oh my, it could make Jund a tier 2 deck! Maybe death shadow jund will forgo the K Command/LOTV so it can play 3 BBE's in an 18 land deck! *shivers*
You calling Twin a more unbeatable deck is ridiculous, the deck can now be crushed by fatal push itself. Goyf became worse with push, why wouldn't exarch? You can go on here and post all the reddit data you'd like, but you can't hide that Jund/Grixis Shadow decks have been hitting top 8's all over the place, including those little side events---if it continued for 2 years, I really don't think it's numbers would be any different from Twin, so please, stop being this biased because you have a tier 1 deck that you're thrilled about, because you're being transparent.
Let's also not pretend that Grixis didn't get 2nd place just at the invitational, and a myriad of top 8s previously.
You saying people wouldn't be shocked if Jund/Junk took an entire tournament is disgenius, there's a reason why people were shocked and excited that Reid Duke made the top 8 in Baltimore, because the deck isn't even tier 2 anymore, and while tier=/=power, I can immediately look at the top 8 decks on Goldfish and see how atrocious the field is for Jund
Junk is purely hanging onto that 1.90% meta share because of how lingering souls lines up, the deck is on its way to tier 3 as well.
Grixis and E-Tron are your midrange decks now, one leaning towards aggro and the other leaning to big mana; this isn't me demanding bans, decks rise and fall---but I'd definitely appreciate reading less massively bias logic from your recent posts.
So, with that said, I will take the GDS vs. Twin testing. Any other volunteers?
If someone wants to build a Twin deck, I'll play the Eldrazi Tron side through Cockatrice or whatever.
I'd be interested but I am probably far from the best twin player to undertake that request. I dabbled with twin, decided it wasn't for me, and played delver instead. If no one else is willing I would be better than nothing.
To be truly useful though, this would need to be a long process with a lot of games played at many stages of the process, since it would be differential with the decks needing to be adjusted based on the fact twin would "be in the format", as well as take into account deck considerations that would have to be made knowing that other decks would also be different in this supposed meta.
Ideally we could get several people in on this using different decks they are familiar with so they could make the call on how it would need to be adjusted.
It would force Eldrazi Tron to play more Dismember or Warping Wail in the mainboard.
It would cause dredge to sacrifice some of its speed in order to interact with the combo.
Even affinity would need to run more removal, even if that means maxing out on Galvanic Blasts.
So basically, every deck would end up playing more interaction which is a great thing IMO
Or would it be T0 with ancestral vision and ceremonious rejection new to the pool since it was banned? I don't think so, not even sure it would be one of the top 3 decks, but these are the kinds of discussions we need to be backing up with numbers if we hope to have any chance of it being unbanned.
It would force Eldrazi Tron to play more Dismember or Warping Wail in the mainboard.
It would cause dredge to sacrifice some of its speed in order to interact with the combo.
Even affinity would need to run more removal, even if that means maxing out on Galvanic Blasts.
So basically, every deck would end up playing more interaction which is a great thing IMO
Twin never had the effect you're referring to even when it was legal. Take a look at Affinity lists when Twin was legal - they're largely the same. The more blue lists are still more blue and the more red lists have the same number of Blasts as they always did.
Twin would also destroy both Grixis Death's Shadow and Eldrazi Tron. I don't see a single deck in the current meta that would prey on Twin, which means it would simply re-warp the meta around it. That's not a healthy unban at all.
Twin would also destroy both Grixis Death's Shadow and Eldrazi Tron.
What makes you say this? Twin folds to discard spells, creature removal, counterspells, and fast clocks that don't die to Lightning Bolt. That is literally exactly what GDS is.
Twin would also destroy both Grixis Death's Shadow and Eldrazi Tron. I don't see a single deck in the current meta that would prey on Twin, which means it would simply re-warp the meta around it. That's not a healthy unban at all.
As much as I hate to give any ammunition to the pro-Twin camp, this is probably wrong. Grixis Delver was a very bad Twin matchup, and Grixis DS is a much better Grixis Delver for most intents and purposes. Twin would almost definitely have a horrible matchup here.
Spirits
Considering standard is how we get new cards and the issues that we do see with modern are a lack of good answers to specific strategies, the strain on sideboards by having so many specific strategies to fight off without having more good modal cards like rakdos charm, and the fact that the disparity in answers between colors forces certain play styles into certain colors, I am (trying to be) hopeful that the lessons being applied to standard will positively effect modern as well.
Edit: for years one of the biggest complaints about modern was that black, the color of removal and death, had some of the worst cheap removal spells forced it to be paired with red to have bolt for the early game. Fatal push completely alleviated that and now we see black as the most complete color and the best color in the format. I'm hoping we are only a few good prints from all the colors being equally viable in all stages of the game as well.
Although I think this isn't a bad sentiment, it's also symptomatic of one of Modern's biggest woes: many players will not be satisfied until Modern fits their vision of "perfect." It needs perfect archetype balance, color balance, deck diversity, linear/non-linear mix, strategy viability, cost, tournament availability, product support, etc. If players perceive it doesn't meet those standards on any one of those metrics, let alone all of them together, many players are immediately dissatisfied. In part, I blame Wizards for this. By not clearly explaining Modern's goals, they've created a unicorn format where everyone projects their own personal Magic utopia. On the other hand, players have a responsibility to realize many of these benchmarks are unrealistic, unimportant, and unprecedented. For instance, it's strange that some users in this thread simultaneously hold up Legacy as this pinnacle of format excellence and then criticize Modern because some colors are underplayed. Legacy is completely dominated by blue. Modern is much more open, with not even black having that kind of monopoly. These kinds of dissonances make it hard for Wizards to take the pulse of many vocal Modern critics, because their desires are inconsistent and sometimes impossible.
And then the moving of the goalposts... "I want a UR based deck that can go Bolt-Snap-Bolt." "Well, these are these options." "But it doesn't feel the same!"
I have literally no interest in Twin remaining banned, it being unbanned, or what have you. I'm just tired of all of the ex-Twin players "oh poor me!"ing in this bloody thread. Either learn to let it go or go complain at the people in Magic who can actually friggin' change things rather than coming to this thread and repeating yourself for the Xth time; it's borderline spamming, we know what you're going to say, and we don't care that you've got a feel bad because other decks that got banned still exist.
Would take more than "a few good prints" wouldn't it? I mean with color fixing being as good as it is in Modern you would have to see cards printed that are at a minimum as powerful as the options that Black offers. If not you would have to justify not simply making the super easy splash for black. Anything that gets printed into the pool is in direct competition with every other option at the same cost and function. For instance this is really the only reason to play Blue, no other card filtering does what Serum Visions does without some wonky aspect stapled on like Ancient Stirrings, which while "better" in terms of value really can only go into a very narrow spectrum of decks. We have seen this with the drop off of bolt in decks running black, no need for it anymore.
Given that what black has is the product of 15 years worth of design and it literally only equals like 7 playsets of cards I doubt that any kind of balance could be achieved in less than a decade. They would need to print cards in other colors that are on par or better than the available black options and just looking at how bad Thoughtseize warped the last standard it was in I doubt WotC will be printing the kinds of spells at a cheap enough rate to really see modern play.
URB Some variant of Death's Shadow
URB Grixis Control (Chapin Version)
JFM Storm / Treasure Cruise Delver / Splinter Twin / InfectCommander/EDH
This pile of cards when I feel like it
Death's Shadow discord link
decks playing:
none
They let eldrazi survive yet they ban pod and Twin off of the face of the earth...
pod and Twin encouraged interaction
Eldrazi discourages interaction, stifles 2 archtypes and encourages racing it.
Wizards logic.
And now jund is falling and the best interactive deck is half aggro...
Good job wizards. Healthy diverse format..
decks playing:
none
Interactive and control are two different things. Maybe that's part of the problem here. Discard is interactive, so is combat math and removal. The stack is not the only form of interaction that exists, and your post is outright wrong to try to put the two together in this way. Grixis Shadow is highly interactive in that it uses several forms of disruption, discard, countermagic and creature removal. Yet it also plays unfair by getting cheap fatties into play.
On another note, perhaps this sentence from hellfire is indicative of another problem in MtG - we boil down tournaments with hundreds or even thousands of players to the top 8. That's the playoff cut, so it's easy to do, but honestly we all know that the difference between 8th and 12th is generally tiebreakers. Does it make more sense to alter our data collection for large events? Should we develop a new system where tournaments up to X players reveal top 8, up to Y players top 16 and Z up to 32? Hell I'm just throwing stuff out there.
Fair point. All colors and strategies have inherent built in weaknesses that are as much of their identity as any strengths they have. It is important to keep that in mind while we sit here demanding X or Y be better, Z card be unbanned, C card be banned, etc. Still though, Magic is a great game and modern is the premiere non-rotating format of which is very important to the long term health and stability of the game.
We as a community have the ability and responsibility to push Wizards to continually make the format better and closer to these ideals while simultaneously realizing these goals are unattainable and unnecessary to the viability to the format. Getting closer to these ideals would just make it a format where more people feel welcome and that is never a bad thing.
The problem is that these features are asymptotic; when you are close to "perfection" every new positive change has less and less of an impact while negative changes have the ability to cause a much greater percentage of damage to the formats health. I completely understand WotC's hesitancy to make changes for this very reason. There are near infinite variables in play in this equation. That is why it is up to us a a player base to aid WotC in this unattainable goal of perfection with data driven tests and results, not just the hyperbole and rhetoric we often espouse here; when the hyperbole contradicts itself, it is completely cancelled out into useless information for WotC to attempt to process.
We do have power as consumers but only if our voice is uniform. It'd be great if we could band together as a community to do mass testings of certain banned cards to create a near irrefutable data set to aid Wizards in their difficult attempt at improving upon near perfection. I think we can all agree Twin should be first just to silence this never ending argument, but I very much enjoy white based attrition strategies that used to be more of a part of its color identity. I would be extremely delighted for SFM to come off the list as long as it did not cause further homogenization because it would help my BW non-eldrazi, non-D&T, attrition decks and because it is a card I believe to be of a fair powerlevel in the current age of modern. This is a very specific wish, and when this specific of requests are what we are discussing here (bolt-snap-bolt, non-control, flash, potential combo deck) it is a sign that the format is very near this unattainable perfection we all dream the format to be. It is unreasonable to think WotC would make any decisions to accommodate such a small voice at the expense of potentially alienating a much larger subset of the player base. That is why it is on us to aid them in this endeavor.
So, with that said, I will take the GDS vs. Twin testing. Any other volunteers?
Control decks can only exist and be powerful strategies if there is a specific meta they are attacking, if the card pool is small, or if they are using a synergy that is more powerful than the rest of the format.
Threats are inherently better than answers; a single threat left unchecked can end the game whereas a single answer has to have a threat that it answers. Sure, with Wrath of God style cards you can X-for-1, but anyone who wants a Control deck in Modern that does well have to face up to the fact that most decks will be running more threats than you can run answers. Control decks tend to be land heavy, aggro and midrange decks tend to be more land light. It's simple mathematics.
Miracles was the best deck in Legacy because it used a two card synergy that could, in the course of a game, end up as a 20-for-1 or even better,and ran enough other answers that anything that slipped through the Counter-Top cracks could also be dealt with. If you think that Modern needs an effect of that calibre, or that it will ever receive one, you are delusional.
It's worth noting that Splinter-Twin is an example of that type of synergy, by the by. Yes, it was easy to answer, yes it was turn 4 at the latest unless you were particularly all-in, but it was also an effect that didn't care how many creatures I had on the board or how much life I had - if you had the pieces, you could kill me. I am aware that a lot of the time the deck didn't specifically win with the combo, but it was still a particularly warping synergy - after you had 3 mana or more, I couldn't tap out without the possibility of just dying.
Its funny but when I hear interaction, all I envision is control. To me discard, counter, permission, removal and combat tricks are all controlling the outcome of what an opponent does. Interaction would be an opponent responding to an action played against them. When I hear players saying they want more interactive decks I hear "I want to control what you do." Its just how I look at it. I know its not how the entire Magic community views it but its how I see it. Its all control in a way. Even a linear, "non-interactive" goldfish deck is trying to control the outcome of the game.
Just a random thought, not trying to incite anything, just bringing up a point.
STOP using "dude/bro" as a pejorative or insult. Grow up.
Margaret Thatcher: “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.”
Benjamin Franklin: "Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Martin Luther King Jr.: "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."
If someone wants to build a Twin deck, I'll play the Eldrazi Tron side through Cockatrice or whatever.
Listen, G, I like you, but...
This is purely a meta call, UW Control is not some long standing tier 1 deck. SFM should still come off the unbanned list. And despite DnT, the deck will fall off the face of the earth the second Shadow falls from grace.
I've very much noticed a huge shift from your attitude, it's like YOU received your grixis shadow deck and decided everything is fine now; the bias is really coming off strong, dude.
What damage would an unbanning of BBE do? Oh no! not Temur being a thing! Oh my, it could make Jund a tier 2 deck! Maybe death shadow jund will forgo the K Command/LOTV so it can play 3 BBE's in an 18 land deck! *shivers*
You calling Twin a more unbeatable deck is ridiculous, the deck can now be crushed by fatal push itself. Goyf became worse with push, why wouldn't exarch? You can go on here and post all the reddit data you'd like, but you can't hide that Jund/Grixis Shadow decks have been hitting top 8's all over the place, including those little side events---if it continued for 2 years, I really don't think it's numbers would be any different from Twin, so please, stop being this biased because you have a tier 1 deck that you're thrilled about, because you're being transparent.
Let's also not pretend that Grixis didn't get 2nd place just at the invitational, and a myriad of top 8s previously.
You saying people wouldn't be shocked if Jund/Junk took an entire tournament is disgenius, there's a reason why people were shocked and excited that Reid Duke made the top 8 in Baltimore, because the deck isn't even tier 2 anymore, and while tier=/=power, I can immediately look at the top 8 decks on Goldfish and see how atrocious the field is for Jund
Junk is purely hanging onto that 1.90% meta share because of how lingering souls lines up, the deck is on its way to tier 3 as well.
Grixis and E-Tron are your midrange decks now, one leaning towards aggro and the other leaning to big mana; this isn't me demanding bans, decks rise and fall---but I'd definitely appreciate reading less massively bias logic from your recent posts.
I'd be interested but I am probably far from the best twin player to undertake that request. I dabbled with twin, decided it wasn't for me, and played delver instead. If no one else is willing I would be better than nothing.
To be truly useful though, this would need to be a long process with a lot of games played at many stages of the process, since it would be differential with the decks needing to be adjusted based on the fact twin would "be in the format", as well as take into account deck considerations that would have to be made knowing that other decks would also be different in this supposed meta.
Ideally we could get several people in on this using different decks they are familiar with so they could make the call on how it would need to be adjusted.
Spirits
It would force Eldrazi Tron to play more Dismember or Warping Wail in the mainboard.
It would cause dredge to sacrifice some of its speed in order to interact with the combo.
Even affinity would need to run more removal, even if that means maxing out on Galvanic Blasts.
So basically, every deck would end up playing more interaction which is a great thing IMO
Or would it be T0 with ancestral vision and ceremonious rejection new to the pool since it was banned? I don't think so, not even sure it would be one of the top 3 decks, but these are the kinds of discussions we need to be backing up with numbers if we hope to have any chance of it being unbanned.
Twin would also destroy both Grixis Death's Shadow and Eldrazi Tron. I don't see a single deck in the current meta that would prey on Twin, which means it would simply re-warp the meta around it. That's not a healthy unban at all.
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
What makes you say this? Twin folds to discard spells, creature removal, counterspells, and fast clocks that don't die to Lightning Bolt. That is literally exactly what GDS is.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Edit: jund lived with Twin, GDS is a better JDS, which was a better Jund.
It's not so much MMA math, but GDS has every ability to clown Twin.
Spirits
As much as I hate to give any ammunition to the pro-Twin camp, this is probably wrong. Grixis Delver was a very bad Twin matchup, and Grixis DS is a much better Grixis Delver for most intents and purposes. Twin would almost definitely have a horrible matchup here.