Lately, Modern community members have expressed interest in talking holistically about the challenges and problems facing Modern. Whether or not Modern has "challenges" or "problems" is up for debate, but what is clear is that people want to talk about all of these issues in one unified setting.
As such, Modern staff are opening this thread as a replacement for the old "Banlist Discussion" thread and the "State of the Meta thread." You can use this thread to talk about any and all of these varied Modern issues and their intersection. This thread will be heavily moderated, so be sure to read the rules before posting; anyone who posts in this thread is assumed to have read and understood these rules.
Allowed topics
Bans, unbans, and all things related to the banlist and banlist policy
Metagame health and diversity
Reprint suggestions and reprint philosophy
New cards and design philosophy
Prices and Modern finance
Archetype definitions
Format health, successes, and challenges
Anything that constructively relates to these different issues
Some cards enable a top tier deck to consistently win on turn 3 or earlier. Because this violates the "turn 4" rule of the format, the following cards have been banned:
Other cards have been banned because they make certain decks too consistent/reliable and thus stagnate the format. Here are some examples of these cards:
Some cards, currently only one, are banned because they were just mistakes. This card is one of the most broken cards of all time and has been banned in almost every format where it was or is legal:
There are also some cards that were banned for logistical reasons. These cards made tournaments last too long and were banned to make events run smoother. They were not necessarily banned for power reasons.
Effective immediately, we are reinstating a suspension on discussion of Splinter Twin until the post-Pro Tour B&R update. This will be reevaluated after the January 15, 2018 B&R announcement. Until then, discussion of Splinter Twin in State of the Meta (and not anywhere else) will be a one-time warning, with any other offense being an infraction.
As it was stated that there are no plans for a metagame shakeup with bans or unbans before the Modern Pro Tour, we feel that it will be best for the thread to once again restrict talk about Splinter Twin. The thread was not as toxic once we lifted the restriction after our initial three month period, but it wasn't great either. Once the topic becomes relevant again we will reevaluate the situation and announce an update on the rules of the thread.
For an explanation about the past reasoning for this ban on a given topic please see this post. Please remember to re-read the rules before posting. If you have any questions please PM the mods (CavalryWolfPack, Ulka, Xaricore, and myself) with your questions/comments/concerns.
To pick up where the discussion left off (without Twin that is) you can also go back and see the last few points of the old thread. This updated thread is a bit overdue so I am sorry for that.
On the General Modern Meta discussion. Part of what makes my meta kinda toxic right now is that it's steadily shrinking. We typically vary from 40-80 people for Thursday and Friday Modern. Lately that number has dwindled down to barely 20. Of those 20, many are still on fast combo, aggro or big mana because they enjoy the non-interactive meta. It's just been a perpetual spiral downward over the last 2-3 months.
Just to get discussion going again, if GDS continues to decline and Storm stays consistently good (which I don't think it is quite there yet) do you think it would affect URx diversity? I actually think if they banned something from it like Past in Flames it would kill the deck and URx would drop off in numbers.
I really think the color of decks that prey on it besides Black, would be UR.
On the General Modern Meta discussion. Part of what makes my meta kinda toxic right now is that it's steadily shrinking. We typically vary from 40-80 people for Thursday and Friday Modern. Lately that number has dwindled down to barely 20. Of those 20, many are still on fast combo, aggro or big mana because they enjoy the non-interactive meta. It's just been a perpetual spiral downward over the last 2-3 months.
Don't have a good idea of what the overall health is, but to get a better picture is this online play or local game store this number of modern players coming from?
I think if Storm stays good through the PT (which is what I expect currently). Wizards will issue the final death sentence to it afterwards. It's another one of those strategies that has been nerfed and hampered multiple times but keeps coming back. Past in Flames would be what they'd hit if that's the case. I actually don't mind Storm as much in this iteration because its pretty deterministic that they will kill you so you don't have to sit there and watch them figure it out. That being said, the combination of E. Tron, Regular Tron, Storm, Affinity and Titanshift (and the like) are really smothering the format.
On the General Modern Meta discussion. Part of what makes my meta kinda toxic right now is that it's steadily shrinking. We typically vary from 40-80 people for Thursday and Friday Modern. Lately that number has dwindled down to barely 20. Of those 20, many are still on fast combo, aggro or big mana because they enjoy the non-interactive meta. It's just been a perpetual spiral downward over the last 2-3 months.
Don't have a good idea of what the overall health is, but to get a better picture is this online play or local game store this number of modern players coming from?
It's a very popular local store. It's of course just 1 store but speaking with other stores in the area, all have seen Modern attendance drop. Speaking with lots of players, they just don't like playing Modern in it's current state. I suspect MTGO numbers are being affected as well. At this point I've stopped worrying about playing normal Modern and have gone back to brewing janky nonsense like towards the end of Eldrazi Winter. When the format isn't fun, you have to find your own amusment somehow.
“ play on MTGO every day, anywhere from 2-5 games, and I've not seen Humans in a while. I see a lot of Storm, TitanShift, Grixis and GBx Shadow variants, and Burn. I was seeing a ton of UW control for a while, but that trend seems to have calmed down. I'm seeing Affinity and ET less as well. Of course there is huge diversity and we all see a small sample size, so it's really hard to say.”
2-5 games is almost nothing. I’m talking about people that play 2-5+ (Competitive) leagues a day.
Since a lot of people are jumping on HolyDiva to announce their disgust with her comment from the previous page, I'd like to chime in that I personally agree with it quite a bit! It may have seemed rude or whatever, but some people are just brutally honest.
I mostly played Combo decks when Twin was around. I also played a lot of Bogles during this time. Losing to Bolt/Snap/Bolt is much, much less a concern when my deck has 6 pieces of lifegain, ranging from 1 mana to 3 mana. If I gain 4-8 life points on a swing and maintain that Hexproof creature, direct damage goes nearly completely out the window. But having only 3-4 Path to Exile in my deck without filtering like Serum Visions/Snapcaster Mage, it honestly felt like 3-4 Path to Exile vs. 12 Splinter Twin. I lost a bunch to this deck. I lost games where I Path to Exiled 2 creatures on separate turns with a Splinter Twin on the stack, targeting them. I'll admit it was rare for it to lose after it happened twice. If I did not build my deck purposely with Twin in mind, I would straight up lose. Even with other decks that I played (Combo), there was very rarely the fear of being burned out. I would normally get time to cobble the pieces to win together or just not find anything and die to some 2/1s (which was rare).
I'll give you an example that I remember very vividly that I did get burned out. I was playing against a Jeskai Control opponent in Round 6 of a local PTQ. I was playing Bogles. I did a turn 1, fetch and shock for Temple Garden, and play a Slippery Bogle. When I had lethal on the field, this opponent continued to Cryptic Command my (much more than) lethal creature to tap him and draw. He did this when he had one card in hand and kept doing it until he found lethal burn. He ended up doing 18 points of direct damage to me, while Cryptic Commanding me 7 times. This was the most extreme version of something like that happening to me and it was Jeskai Control, probably my best matchup. Although I was a bit on tilt from losing that game, in the end I was fine with him having 1 card in hand constantly and chaining Cryptic Commands. He ended up winning the 3rd game too after I mulled to 5 by doing 5 more Cryptic Commands, so maybe in Magic, the cards are telling the players something?
I've been honest about this before and it probably has to do with the decks that I play, but Twin has very, very rarely beaten me with Snap/Bolt beats. Sure, I have taken my share of them, but usually the decks that I play can cobble together a win by that time and if they go on that plan early, revealing that they have nothing, it can be very detrimental for them. Maybe I just never played good Twin palyers? Who knows? I played some that won PPTQs, but never a Pro on Twin since Ponder and Preordain were banned and rarely the top grinders. Who knows?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
Since a lot of people are jumping on HolyDiva to announce their disgust with her comment from the previous page, I'd like to chime in that I personally agree with it quite a bit! It may have seemed rude or whatever, but some people are just brutally honest.
Don't think any of us are disagreeing with what she said, just the way she said it.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Well, I can saw a woman in two, but you won't wanna look in the box when I'm through.
I think if it comes down to banning storm due to a lack of interactive gameplay on the part of blue's inability to metagame effectively, wizards will have failed and ruined its best format through lack of needed answers passed through standard. I dont think this is the future we will come to however
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Decks I have in my bag of tricks- Needless to say, someone who wants to play will probably have a deck UB/x Faeries UR Storm XURWB Affinity G Elves UW control
I mostly played Combo decks when Twin was around. I also played a lot of Bogles during this time. Losing to Bolt/Snap/Bolt is much, much less a concern when my deck has 6 pieces of lifegain, ranging from 1 mana to 3 mana. If I gain 4-8 life points on a swing and maintain that Hexproof creature, direct damage goes nearly completely out the window. But having only 3-4 Path to Exile in my deck without filtering like Serum Visions/Snapcaster Mage, it honestly felt like 3-4 Path to Exile vs. 12 Splinter Twin. I lost a bunch to this deck. I lost games where I Path to Exiled 2 creatures on separate turns with a Splinter Twin on the stack, targeting them. I'll admit it was rare for it to lose after it happened twice. If I did not build my deck purposely with Twin in mind, I would straight up lose. Even with other decks that I played (Combo), there was very rarely the fear of being burned out. I would normally get time to cobble the pieces to win together or just not find anything and die to some 2/1s (which was rare).
I'll give you an example that I remember very vividly that I did get burned out. I was playing against a Jeskai Control opponent in Round 6 of a local PTQ. I was playing Bogles. I did a turn 1, fetch and shock for Temple Garden, and play a Slippery Bogle. When I had lethal on the field, this opponent continued to Cryptic Command my (much more than) lethal creature to tap him and draw. He did this when he had one card in hand and kept doing it until he found lethal burn. He ended up doing 18 points of direct damage to me, while Cryptic Commanding me 7 times. This was the most extreme version of something like that happening to me and it was Jeskai Control, probably my best matchup. Although I was a bit on tilt from losing that game, in the end I was fine with him having 1 card in hand constantly and chaining Cryptic Commands. He ended up winning the 3rd game too after I mulled to 5 by doing 5 more Cryptic Commands, so maybe in Magic, the cards are telling the players something?
I've been honest about this before and it probably has to do with the decks that I play, but Twin has very, very rarely beaten me with Snap/Bolt beats. Sure, I have taken my share of them, but usually the decks that I play can cobble together a win by that time and if they go on that plan early, revealing that they have nothing, it can be very detrimental for them. Maybe I just never played good Twin palyers? Who knows? I played some that won PPTQs, but never a Pro on Twin since Ponder and Preordain were banned and rarely the top grinders. Who knows?
This reads I played decks that wanted to goldfish and not interact, so of course your experience is losing to the splinter twin combo instead of bolt-snap-bolt and ambush viper beats. And of course twin decks will typically try to slam combo against bogles a deck that plays voltron and that twin players were essentially unable to interact with using their creatures and removal.
As for the jeskai example, I'd guess that was very much the extreme of top decking running cryptics and snaps into burn spells. I honestly am hitting one of my points in time where I wonder why I bother even trying to interact in modern.
I'm probably going back to jeskai-4 next week or going to be brewing with delver, because it's what I own in paper at this point. I'm not super happy with the meta game, but I'll keep trying to figure out how to attack it doing what I love, drawing cards, utilizing tempo, and playing control.
You can infract this post if you want, but the censorship rule is bull*****. I don't particularly enjoy seeing and having to talk about the topic in question anymore either since it's all the same dumb arguments over and over, but this is the state of the meta and banlist thread. This is the place for discussions like that. If people don't want to talk about certain banned cards, MAYBE THEY SHOULDN'T BE IN THE BANLIST THREAD. Or they could just learn to skip over and ignore comments on topics they don't want to talk about.
The bottom line is that that particular banning was controversial (thus why people are still talking about it 2 years later), Wizards basically gave us a heads-up that they might unban something after the PT, and it's a card on many people's short-lists of potential unban targets. Whether or not it's a viable unban at this point is a perfectly reasonable debate to have IN THE BANLIST THREAD.
That's all I have to say on the topic, but you can consider this my formal dissent to reinstituting this censorship rule in this thread.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern UBR Grixis Shadow UBR UR Izzet Phoenix UR UW UW Control UW GB GB Rock GB
Commander BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
It's a bit frustrating to try and gauge the meta, especially when hard data is at an all-time low. I play standard on MODO, but I've kept to strictly paper for Modern since my LGS has so many modern players. That being said, I've had the time of my life the past two weeks playing Modern, because I've just been having a field day with my UB Faeries deck.
The look on people's faces when I lay down Secluded Den turn 1 is priceless. The deck itself tears apart combo, but it does struggle against some aggro. I encounter a lot of Tron and Storm players, and to be able to take them down with a Homebrew deck just puts a smile on my face. If you're curious, Familiar's Ruse does a lot of work.
The whole point is that although I'm seeing a bit of doom and gloom about the fun factor in Modern, take heart that at least in a little corner of the country, there is still fun being had.
You can infract this post if you want, but the censorship rule is bull*****. I don't particularly enjoy seeing and having to talk about the topic in question anymore either since it's all the same dumb arguments over and over, but this is the state of the meta and banlist thread. This is the place for discussions like that. If people don't want to talk about certain banned cards, MAYBE THEY SHOULDN'T BE IN THE BANLIST THREAD. Or they could just learn to skip over and ignore comments on topics they don't want to talk about.
The bottom line is that that particular banning was controversial (thus why people are still talking about it 2 years later), Wizards basically gave us a heads-up that they might unban something after the PT, and it's a card on many people's short-lists of potential unban targets. Whether or not it's a viable unban at this point is a perfectly reasonable debate to have IN THE BANLIST THREAD.
That's all I have to say on the topic, but you can consider this my formal dissent to reinstituting this censorship rule in this thread.
I agree with this post, though not for the same reasons.
I'd rather we talk about the card in question and go in circles for days on end then have posters dance around the issue, doing just enough to not break the rules, and just turn the thread into a game of chicken with the mods. Censoring that one card makes people want to talk about it more because it's taboo.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Level 1 Judge
"I hope to have such a death... lying in triumph atop the broken bodies of those who slew me..."
You don't call "dying to removal" if the removal is more expensive in resources than the creature. If you have to spend BG (Abrupt Decay), or W + basic land (PtE) to remove a 1G, that is not "dying to removal". Strictly speaking Goyf dies to removal, but actually your removal is dying to Goyf.
I agree with this post, though not for the same reasons.
I'd rather we talk about the card in question and go in circles for days on end then have posters dance around the issue, doing just enough to not break the rules, and just turn the thread into a game of chicken with the mods. Censoring that one card makes people want to talk about it more because it's taboo.
The other aspect to it is that while I know you and I have said all we want to say on the topic, we do get new people in these threads who haven't been following this discussion over the past two years and want to voice their opinions. Why should these people be banned from asking about that situation or giving their opinion of it? And why should we not be allowed to each argue our own sides for these people who haven't heard this discussion a million times like we have? If people are tired of it and don't want to discuss it further, they can skip down the page until they find a topic that interests them. Nobody's forcing anyone to engage in conversation on any particular topic.
Edit: And to be clear, I don't feel this way because I have an interest in the particular topic, I would be saying the same thing if they were trying to censor discussion on Gitaxian Probe or JTMS. I don't think any meta or banlist topic should be censored in this thread.
I think censorship in this way is counter productive, but given how much of these threads involved a small number of users whining about the state of Modern since Twin was banned and how it was unjustly banned and would fix all the problems of Modern etc, I can fully understand why they decided to do it.
The thread was 90% talking about a banned card from 2 years ago and 10% talking about things actually pertaining to the current meta.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Well, I can saw a woman in two, but you won't wanna look in the box when I'm through.
I agree wit the censorship dislike.
I'd honestly be better to just cap the amount of times an individual user can reference the banned card in a certain time frame (ie: only 2 posts a day, or something).
As was mentioned earlier in the thread though, I definitely feel for the people who's attendance has dropped.
I definitely wish modern was more appealing to everyone (and not "oh you like interactive decks? Good, you have three choices: UW, UWR, or shadow. Oh, you like noninteractive decks? Pick from these 12").
I do hope that wizard's changes in set design (I hope opt, perilous voyage, chart a course, search for azcanta, and all the other borderline cards from ixalan are only the start) and banned list control start to change this.
Someone in the previous thread mentioned that the pro tour has a good chance of revealing some deck to be a lot stronger than everyone is aware of.
I almost want that to happen, just because any big change afterwards feels like it would be an improvement. Of course, getting someone's deck banned doesn't feel great either.
I agree with the last few posts. Glad to see I'm not alone in disliking the censorship. Where am I supposed to have this conversation about an unbanning that would better the health of the format? I thought I thought I was on the right board. That banning was controversial then, it still is and WOTC said there is probably an unban happening if FEB of 2018 so I think we should be able to discuss this card.
I had this convo with the mods last time. There will be no place for it on this forum. I even asked for a thread just about that card so only the people that wanted to discuss it could and got turned down.
If people wanted a thread to discuss it, couldn't they just make one? Or am I missing how making general threads works? If people were constantly debating it in such a thread, it wouldn't need to be stickied or anything.
Having a thread actually sounds like a pretty good idea. There could even be a "primer" updated with the arguments from both sides.
If people wanted a thread to discuss it, couldn't they just make one? Or am I missing how making general threads works? If people were constantly debating it in such a thread, it wouldn't need to be stickied or anything.
Having a thread actually sounds like a pretty good idea. There could even be a "primer" updated with the arguments from both sides.
No I was told by the mods this isn’t an option.
This was lanterns reply when I suggested it.
“Because the same reasons we stated in the thread. It was a cylindrical discussion where nothing advanced and pitted people for or against it. We will not be creating a separate thread for people to discuss twin, as that is completely apposed to the reason why we did it in the first place.
We have tried almost every option available to us. We have carded flamers/trollers, we have red texted and red texted, the root of the problem of that thread is in fact twin talk. And as its been 20 months with literally no hint of the card coming off, we are banning the discussion of it. We have done this in the past with brainstorm in legacy, delver in pauper and so on. Other sites have done this as well, a good example is pokemon in their teiring system.
As its been said before, if there is anything that changes twins hard position on the ban list, we will open the topic back up. Until then, it does more toxic than good in that thread.”
I agree wit the censorship dislike.
I'd honestly be better to just cap the amount of times an individual user can reference the banned card in a certain time frame (ie: only 2 posts a day, or something).
As was mentioned earlier in the thread though, I definitely feel for the people who's attendance has dropped.
I definitely wish modern was more appealing to everyone (and not "oh you like interactive decks? Good, you have three choices: UW, UWR, or shadow. Oh, you like noninteractive decks? Pick from these 12").
I do hope that wizard's changes in set design (I hope opt, perilous voyage, chart a course, search for azcanta, and all the other borderline cards from ixalan are only the start) and banned list control start to change this.
Someone in the previous thread mentioned that the pro tour has a good chance of revealing some deck to be a lot stronger than everyone is aware of.
I almost want that to happen, just because any big change afterwards feels like it would be an improvement. Of course, getting someone's deck banned doesn't feel great either.
I agree that fair decks have 2 options.
I'm going to be honest, UW is a bad deck. Yes, it has times where it's good, but I have several issues with the deck
No real, clear win con
Too reactive
Too slow
Profits from a defined, known meta
Too mana hungry
I'm sure i'll rustle some peoples jimmies, but it's just a bad deck in modern. You can't be this reactive in modern. This will never be a good archetype until legacy like power stuff is released or created. If you want to play a real control deck, you just play lantern (which is really more prison).
Shadow decks and Jeskai feel like the only truly interactive decks to pick, everything else has become. I've seen more jund and junk players accept that their decks suck now, and less activity in the Facebook chats.
Pick from a huge closet of combo decks or linear creature aggro decks
Even the humans deck is forgoing a lot of interaction for super aggressive disruption (not that this complete a solitaire deck).
Now i waste again 10 minutes of my life reading about this card. Ok not the card itself, reading about censoring it. Is this discussion really our goal? Again and again? By the way, i scrolled down... And scroll again and again... The same everywhere. Sorry but censoring is maybe our only chance to develope and go on without beeing a vintage thread. All you want to say, ALL of you did it several times
Great question what is the goal for this thread. All talk just kinda goes around in circles. Isn’t that the point though give opinions and get feedback? Not sure there are any new topics to really discuss if that’s what you’re looking for. Give it a couple days (let something of interest happen in modern)and the thread will be back on track. Same thing kinda happened last time if I remember correctly.
Now i waste again 10 minutes of my life reading about this card. Ok not the card itself, reading about censoring it. Is this discussion really our goal? Again and again? By the way, i scrolled down... And scroll again and again... The same everywhere. Sorry but censoring is maybe our only chance to develope and go on without beeing a vintage thread. All you want to say, ALL of you did it several times
Great question what is the goal for this thread. All talk just kinda goes around in circles. Isn’t that the point though give opinions and get feedback? Not sure there are any new topics to really discuss if that’s what you’re looking for. Give it a couple days (let something of interest happen in modern)and the thread will be back on track. Same thing kinda happened last time if I remember correctly.
Aaaaand back to discussions that actually get us somewhere, I can point to a number of areas of thread/Modern progress in the past year.
1. GDS and JDS ban talk. The metagame visibly adapted and the early 2017 panic proved unfounded.
2. ETron ban talk. Yes, some people still hate ETron cards, but they no longer have tournament results to justify that hatred. The format has again visibly adapted in the past few months and ETron's share is way down.
3. Wizards actively considering an unban. Given the consensus in Reddit and MTGS polls/threads, as well as the consensus of article authors (a few of which got cited in mothership daily updates), the only real unban frontrunners look like BBE and JTMS, with maybe SFM in the picture. After that, there's basically no consensus, and even that consensus around those three cards mostly covers BBE alone. That's a big change from earlier in the year where BBE seemed less likely than SFM or JTMS.
4. Wizards called the current Modern, current as of last week, "healthy" in a "no changes" justification. That's tangible progress from earlier this year when they were nervous about color balance. It also clearly influences their subsequent unban decision, as Wizards will only unban cards that don't jeopardize that health. BBE looks great there, judging by Jund's non-existent share. JTMS is riskier, but still probably okay, and SFM is riskier still. Everything else is probably too swingy.
Overall, that's a lot of forward progress we've seen in this thread. I'd rather blaze trails on these topics than recycle tired, circular discussions.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Over-Extended/Modern Since 2010
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Lately, Modern community members have expressed interest in talking holistically about the challenges and problems facing Modern. Whether or not Modern has "challenges" or "problems" is up for debate, but what is clear is that people want to talk about all of these issues in one unified setting.
As such, Modern staff are opening this thread as a replacement for the old "Banlist Discussion" thread and the "State of the Meta thread." You can use this thread to talk about any and all of these varied Modern issues and their intersection. This thread will be heavily moderated, so be sure to read the rules before posting; anyone who posts in this thread is assumed to have read and understood these rules.
Allowed topics
Prohibited topics and behavior
The mod team will strictly enforce these rules. Please make this a place where people are unafraid to post constructive thoughts.
Update from the 10/17/2017 B&R Announcement:
No changes
Next B&R Announcement:
January 15, 2018
Current DCI Modern Banned List
Here are some reasons that cards are banned in Modern:
Skullclamp
Second Sunrise
The following are links to WotC's in-depth explanations as to why cards have or have not gotten banned since the beginning of the format:
October 2017: No changes
March 2017: No changes
Gitaxian Probe and Golgari Grave-Troll are banned
Eye of Ugin banned, Ancestral Vision and Sword of the Meek unbanned
Summer Bloom and Splinter Twin banned.
Birthing Pod/Treasure Cruise/Dig Through Time banned, Golgari Grave-Troll unbanned
Bitterblossom/Nacatl unbanned. DRS banned
Addition of Second Sunrise
Addition of Bloodbraid Elf and Seething Song
Removal of Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle
3rd Banned List change with explanations
2nd Banned List change with explanations
1st Banned List change with explanations
Community Cup Announcement with the Initial Ban List.
Old threads:
7/18/2017 - 10/27/2017
3/23/2017 - 4/24/2017
3/13/2017 - 3/23/2017
1/9/17 Banlist Update
12/8/2016 - 3/13/2017
9/28/2016 - 12/10/2016
7/18/2016 - 9/30/2016
4/4/2016 - 7/18/2016
1/16/2016 - 4/4/2016
7/13/2015 - 1/16/2016
1/19/2015 - 7/13/2015
7/14/2014 - 1/19/2015
2/9/2014 - 7/14/2014
1/20/2014 - 2/10/2014
6/23/2014 - 1/20/2014
4/22/2013 - 6/23/213
1/27/2013 - 4/22/13
9/20/2012 - 1/27/2013
7/19/2012 - 9/20/2012
MTGO/MTGA: Tyclone
My Primers ~ GWx Vizier Company ~ Knightfall ~ RG Eldrazi ~ Green's Sun's Zenith
More Brews ~ Modern Four Horsemen ~ Gitrog Dredge
As it was stated that there are no plans for a metagame shakeup with bans or unbans before the Modern Pro Tour, we feel that it will be best for the thread to once again restrict talk about Splinter Twin. The thread was not as toxic once we lifted the restriction after our initial three month period, but it wasn't great either. Once the topic becomes relevant again we will reevaluate the situation and announce an update on the rules of the thread.
For an explanation about the past reasoning for this ban on a given topic please see this post. Please remember to re-read the rules before posting. If you have any questions please PM the mods (CavalryWolfPack, Ulka, Xaricore, and myself) with your questions/comments/concerns.
To pick up where the discussion left off (without Twin that is) you can also go back and see the last few points of the old thread. This updated thread is a bit overdue so I am sorry for that.
MTGO/MTGA: Tyclone
My Primers ~ GWx Vizier Company ~ Knightfall ~ RG Eldrazi ~ Green's Sun's Zenith
More Brews ~ Modern Four Horsemen ~ Gitrog Dredge
I really think the color of decks that prey on it besides Black, would be UR.
Thanks to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the sigpic.
Spider-Man Mafia 3 (Off-Site: NGA)
Metroid Mafia (Off-Site: Mafia Universe)
Thanks to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the sigpic.
Spider-Man Mafia 3 (Off-Site: NGA)
Metroid Mafia (Off-Site: Mafia Universe)
It's a very popular local store. It's of course just 1 store but speaking with other stores in the area, all have seen Modern attendance drop. Speaking with lots of players, they just don't like playing Modern in it's current state. I suspect MTGO numbers are being affected as well. At this point I've stopped worrying about playing normal Modern and have gone back to brewing janky nonsense like towards the end of Eldrazi Winter. When the format isn't fun, you have to find your own amusment somehow.
“ play on MTGO every day, anywhere from 2-5 games, and I've not seen Humans in a while. I see a lot of Storm, TitanShift, Grixis and GBx Shadow variants, and Burn. I was seeing a ton of UW control for a while, but that trend seems to have calmed down. I'm seeing Affinity and ET less as well. Of course there is huge diversity and we all see a small sample size, so it's really hard to say.”
2-5 games is almost nothing. I’m talking about people that play 2-5+ (Competitive) leagues a day.
Couldn’t quote old thread obviously
I mostly played Combo decks when Twin was around. I also played a lot of Bogles during this time. Losing to Bolt/Snap/Bolt is much, much less a concern when my deck has 6 pieces of lifegain, ranging from 1 mana to 3 mana. If I gain 4-8 life points on a swing and maintain that Hexproof creature, direct damage goes nearly completely out the window. But having only 3-4 Path to Exile in my deck without filtering like Serum Visions/Snapcaster Mage, it honestly felt like 3-4 Path to Exile vs. 12 Splinter Twin. I lost a bunch to this deck. I lost games where I Path to Exiled 2 creatures on separate turns with a Splinter Twin on the stack, targeting them. I'll admit it was rare for it to lose after it happened twice. If I did not build my deck purposely with Twin in mind, I would straight up lose. Even with other decks that I played (Combo), there was very rarely the fear of being burned out. I would normally get time to cobble the pieces to win together or just not find anything and die to some 2/1s (which was rare).
I'll give you an example that I remember very vividly that I did get burned out. I was playing against a Jeskai Control opponent in Round 6 of a local PTQ. I was playing Bogles. I did a turn 1, fetch and shock for Temple Garden, and play a Slippery Bogle. When I had lethal on the field, this opponent continued to Cryptic Command my (much more than) lethal creature to tap him and draw. He did this when he had one card in hand and kept doing it until he found lethal burn. He ended up doing 18 points of direct damage to me, while Cryptic Commanding me 7 times. This was the most extreme version of something like that happening to me and it was Jeskai Control, probably my best matchup. Although I was a bit on tilt from losing that game, in the end I was fine with him having 1 card in hand constantly and chaining Cryptic Commands. He ended up winning the 3rd game too after I mulled to 5 by doing 5 more Cryptic Commands, so maybe in Magic, the cards are telling the players something?
I've been honest about this before and it probably has to do with the decks that I play, but Twin has very, very rarely beaten me with Snap/Bolt beats. Sure, I have taken my share of them, but usually the decks that I play can cobble together a win by that time and if they go on that plan early, revealing that they have nothing, it can be very detrimental for them. Maybe I just never played good Twin palyers? Who knows? I played some that won PPTQs, but never a Pro on Twin since Ponder and Preordain were banned and rarely the top grinders. Who knows?
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)Don't think any of us are disagreeing with what she said, just the way she said it.
UB/x Faeries
UR Storm
XURWB Affinity
G Elves
UW control
This reads I played decks that wanted to goldfish and not interact, so of course your experience is losing to the splinter twin combo instead of bolt-snap-bolt and ambush viper beats. And of course twin decks will typically try to slam combo against bogles a deck that plays voltron and that twin players were essentially unable to interact with using their creatures and removal.
As for the jeskai example, I'd guess that was very much the extreme of top decking running cryptics and snaps into burn spells. I honestly am hitting one of my points in time where I wonder why I bother even trying to interact in modern.
I'm probably going back to jeskai-4 next week or going to be brewing with delver, because it's what I own in paper at this point. I'm not super happy with the meta game, but I'll keep trying to figure out how to attack it doing what I love, drawing cards, utilizing tempo, and playing control.
The bottom line is that that particular banning was controversial (thus why people are still talking about it 2 years later), Wizards basically gave us a heads-up that they might unban something after the PT, and it's a card on many people's short-lists of potential unban targets. Whether or not it's a viable unban at this point is a perfectly reasonable debate to have IN THE BANLIST THREAD.
That's all I have to say on the topic, but you can consider this my formal dissent to reinstituting this censorship rule in this thread.
UBR Grixis Shadow UBR
UR Izzet Phoenix UR
UW UW Control UW
GB GB Rock GB
Commander
BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG
BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
The look on people's faces when I lay down Secluded Den turn 1 is priceless. The deck itself tears apart combo, but it does struggle against some aggro. I encounter a lot of Tron and Storm players, and to be able to take them down with a Homebrew deck just puts a smile on my face. If you're curious, Familiar's Ruse does a lot of work.
The whole point is that although I'm seeing a bit of doom and gloom about the fun factor in Modern, take heart that at least in a little corner of the country, there is still fun being had.
I agree with this post, though not for the same reasons.
I'd rather we talk about the card in question and go in circles for days on end then have posters dance around the issue, doing just enough to not break the rules, and just turn the thread into a game of chicken with the mods. Censoring that one card makes people want to talk about it more because it's taboo.
"I hope to have such a death... lying in triumph atop the broken bodies of those who slew me..."
Edit: And to be clear, I don't feel this way because I have an interest in the particular topic, I would be saying the same thing if they were trying to censor discussion on Gitaxian Probe or JTMS. I don't think any meta or banlist topic should be censored in this thread.
UBR Grixis Shadow UBR
UR Izzet Phoenix UR
UW UW Control UW
GB GB Rock GB
Commander
BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG
BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
The thread was 90% talking about a banned card from 2 years ago and 10% talking about things actually pertaining to the current meta.
I'd honestly be better to just cap the amount of times an individual user can reference the banned card in a certain time frame (ie: only 2 posts a day, or something).
As was mentioned earlier in the thread though, I definitely feel for the people who's attendance has dropped.
I definitely wish modern was more appealing to everyone (and not "oh you like interactive decks? Good, you have three choices: UW, UWR, or shadow. Oh, you like noninteractive decks? Pick from these 12").
I do hope that wizard's changes in set design (I hope opt, perilous voyage, chart a course, search for azcanta, and all the other borderline cards from ixalan are only the start) and banned list control start to change this.
Someone in the previous thread mentioned that the pro tour has a good chance of revealing some deck to be a lot stronger than everyone is aware of.
I almost want that to happen, just because any big change afterwards feels like it would be an improvement. Of course, getting someone's deck banned doesn't feel great either.
Having a thread actually sounds like a pretty good idea. There could even be a "primer" updated with the arguments from both sides.
Interested in RUG (Temur) Delver in Modern? Find gameplay with live commentary at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8UcKe8jVh1e2N4CHbd3fhg
No I was told by the mods this isn’t an option.
This was lanterns reply when I suggested it.
“Because the same reasons we stated in the thread. It was a cylindrical discussion where nothing advanced and pitted people for or against it. We will not be creating a separate thread for people to discuss twin, as that is completely apposed to the reason why we did it in the first place.
We have tried almost every option available to us. We have carded flamers/trollers, we have red texted and red texted, the root of the problem of that thread is in fact twin talk. And as its been 20 months with literally no hint of the card coming off, we are banning the discussion of it. We have done this in the past with brainstorm in legacy, delver in pauper and so on. Other sites have done this as well, a good example is pokemon in their teiring system.
As its been said before, if there is anything that changes twins hard position on the ban list, we will open the topic back up. Until then, it does more toxic than good in that thread.”
I agree that fair decks have 2 options.
I'm going to be honest, UW is a bad deck. Yes, it has times where it's good, but I have several issues with the deck
No real, clear win con
Too reactive
Too slow
Profits from a defined, known meta
Too mana hungry
I'm sure i'll rustle some peoples jimmies, but it's just a bad deck in modern. You can't be this reactive in modern. This will never be a good archetype until legacy like power stuff is released or created. If you want to play a real control deck, you just play lantern (which is really more prison).
Shadow decks and Jeskai feel like the only truly interactive decks to pick, everything else has become. I've seen more jund and junk players accept that their decks suck now, and less activity in the Facebook chats.
Pick from a huge closet of combo decks or linear creature aggro decks
Even the humans deck is forgoing a lot of interaction for super aggressive disruption (not that this complete a solitaire deck).
Great question what is the goal for this thread. All talk just kinda goes around in circles. Isn’t that the point though give opinions and get feedback? Not sure there are any new topics to really discuss if that’s what you’re looking for. Give it a couple days (let something of interest happen in modern)and the thread will be back on track. Same thing kinda happened last time if I remember correctly.
Aaaaand back to discussions that actually get us somewhere, I can point to a number of areas of thread/Modern progress in the past year.
1. GDS and JDS ban talk. The metagame visibly adapted and the early 2017 panic proved unfounded.
2. ETron ban talk. Yes, some people still hate ETron cards, but they no longer have tournament results to justify that hatred. The format has again visibly adapted in the past few months and ETron's share is way down.
3. Wizards actively considering an unban. Given the consensus in Reddit and MTGS polls/threads, as well as the consensus of article authors (a few of which got cited in mothership daily updates), the only real unban frontrunners look like BBE and JTMS, with maybe SFM in the picture. After that, there's basically no consensus, and even that consensus around those three cards mostly covers BBE alone. That's a big change from earlier in the year where BBE seemed less likely than SFM or JTMS.
4. Wizards called the current Modern, current as of last week, "healthy" in a "no changes" justification. That's tangible progress from earlier this year when they were nervous about color balance. It also clearly influences their subsequent unban decision, as Wizards will only unban cards that don't jeopardize that health. BBE looks great there, judging by Jund's non-existent share. JTMS is riskier, but still probably okay, and SFM is riskier still. Everything else is probably too swingy.
Overall, that's a lot of forward progress we've seen in this thread. I'd rather blaze trails on these topics than recycle tired, circular discussions.