Whether or not the opponent had two chalice in hand or drew one of the top does not change the correct course of action. If the opponent had zero chalice of the void in hand the correct play was still to TS on turn 1. Correct and incorrect plays are never decided based on outcome.
No one said otherwise. But correct process can often lead to poor results because of variance. Poker players have known this forever, but some Magic players still try and pretend that skill is the only way to win a tournament.
For those watching the Open, we just witnessed a spectacular example of a play skill loss disguised as a variance/luck loss. In G2, GDS pilot is up a game against ETron and on 7 cards. Tron mulled to 5. Tron drops a land and passes. GDS has the black land and TS in hand to virtually secure a win against ETron's one out (Chalice x=1) and instead plays... SV?? Opponent then slams Chalice at 1 next turn, shuts down 5+ cards, and STILL barely stabilizes with Wurmcoil before lethal after a prolonged game. GDS then loses G3 to a natural Tron after itself mulling to 5. Naturally, most of chat goes wild about Tron and variance.
This was not a variance loss. GDS pilot made a bad play and got harshly punished for it. Sure, maybe Tron pilot could have won that G2 anyway through a topdeck, but it was significantly less likely after the T1 TS that never was. Either the GDS player got sloppy or didn't know/think of the Chalice out. Either way, this was largely a player loss, not a variance one, and yet many will just remember the T3 Tron assembly. In my experience, many Modern games play out this way. Moral: play tight, know your matchups.
With 2x Chalice in hand, a T1 Thoughtseize still results in the same outcome. Hence variance.
But it's also another example of sloppy play at a win-and-in Open Top8 match... :/
He had two Chalice in hand, did he not? I don't remember exactly. While thoughtseize on turn one would be the right process, the results would be the same because of variance. I get your point though
A. He drew the second Chalice later and GDS would have had the answer for it.
B. @cfp, you have made it no secret that you only care about GP results and basically every other paper evrnt is largely irrelevant in determining Modern health. Given that, do you have any actual evidence to support your theory that play is sloppier in one type of open, public event than the other? I do believe you might look harder for Open punts than GP punts because you all but want Open gameplay to be sloppy to support your belief. But do you have evidence of that being the case? If not, I'm going with the far likelier explanation that 15 round event gameplay at public tournaments of a certain size is equally sloppy between all examples. I will happily admit that invite-only gameplay would be sharper. But Opens and GP are drawing from a largely similar pool.
EDIT:
C. I am not saying skill is the only way to win at Magic. I am merely pushing back against the specific and repeated allegation that skill matters less than determining match outcome in Modern than variance through draws, mulligans, matchups, etc. As shown dozens of times, top Modern players have the same Modern success as top Legacy players do in Legacy, and to the same degree. Legacy is often regarded as a utopia of low variance Magic, particularly by the usual "blue sucks, Modern is a lottery" suspects. And yet, the performance stats show that the outcomes across formats are the same. This annoying myth needs to die. It is exhausting to see people like DeCandio blame it for their consistent format failures.
Given that, do you have any actual evidence to support your theory that play is sloppier in one type of open, public event than the other?
I already answered this in the text you didn't quote, when I said "Of course, this is just a subjective feeling from watching them basically every weekend they're on."
But if you feel that GPs and Opens have the same level and caliber of play (especially at top tables/day 2/etc), then we just fundamentally disagree.
From the post-tournament interview with the winner: "Never played Humans before. Got the deck yesterday morning at breakfast. It's close enough to Merfolk, which I'm familiar with, and I just tried not to get game violations."
Considering Modern is usually a "play what you know" format, this was extremely interesting to hear!
I dont think its too far off really from what would be expected. Its not like you are doing a whole lot of crazy lines/plays.
"Got your creatures? Got your rainbow lands? Cast em silly."
I mean some of us have even said its close to Merfolk in that its disruptive creature aggro. What more can it do with 1000 hours of testing?
I know. It just flies in the face of "know the nuances, ins and outs, etc. of your deck to be successful." Sometimes, it's just a good deck, competent pilot, and great draws. Reminds me of when Tom Ross won something a while back with GW Tron, and in the post interview basically said "It was just a list I found online and put together for this weekend." Just interesting and humorous to see that from the winner. Especially after having beaten a Jeskai specialist in what should have been a difficult matchup.
Edit: also Patrick said something interesting at about the 32 min mark in the Final Round about how Opens are basically just a bunch of people playing decks that they own and the more top level competition are at Invitationals and such. Also goes along with my observations about Opens being like big FNMs. They don't have the replay up yet to get the full quote.
I'm happy enough that I'm able to make some borderline statements that pan out at this point, and understand what make match ups work, and why with some regularity.
Is Human's a hilariously good deck in the format? Yes.
Is Hollow One still not good, despite putting up some results? Yes.
Is UWR a viable choice? In this meta, yes.
If Rosum doesnt mull to 6, keep a one lander/two lander (I think it was 1) scry bottom, SERUM and still get stuck on 2 lands, well, maybe he walks away with it all. That happens. Thats Magic, period.
It doesnt change the fact Humans remains very good, but is not a '3 star difficulty' deck, assuming you understand the major players in Modern. I mean you are LITERALLY casting a bunch of creatures, turn, after turn, after turn.
If you have the 'Oh I can tap Vial on your turn' experience from Merfolk? Call it good, you can play Humans.
From the post-tournament interview with the winner: "Never played Humans before. Got the deck yesterday morning at breakfast. It's close enough to Merfolk, which I'm familiar with, and I just tried not to get game violations."
Considering Modern is usually a "play what you know" format, this was extremely interesting to hear!
It's always easy to cherrypick examples to prove a pithy internet point. Case in point, Legacy is widely regarded as THE format that rewards mastery of a deck. And yet, we can easily point to top GP and Open players who just pick up a deck and do well on it. This happens all the time and in basically every tournament. See Dylan Hand's T8 at the previous SCG Legacy Open in his first Legacy tournament ever. See Kowalski at 2018 GP Birmingham getting second with Grixis Delver admitting he doesn't play a lot of the format and just jammed the best deck. Some dude made T8 at Legacy GP Vegas in 2017 on a deck he was literally handed the day before. We can always come up with these little corner case examples to try and prop up our quotable about whatever argument we are trying to make.
Fortunately, it doesn't take long to realize these cherrypicked examples don't build cases. In the majority of cases, Modern remains a format that rewards repetitions on a deck. This obviously does not mean the more experienced pilot wins 100% of tournaments. It just means that, as a general rule, the more experienced pilot on their deck will generally do better than those that audible to a perceived "best deck," unless that best deck is a legitimately bannable best deck. In that case, I agree it's best to just play that deck regardless of experience on competing options.
I also find this entire discussion humorous because it runs contrary to the usual argument you and the "blue sucks, Modern = lottery" camp like to make. That is, the argument of "you can't pick a best deck and just win off play skill." This can obviously happen in all formats and Modern is no exception.
Edit: also Patrick said something interesting at about the 32 min mark in the Final Round about how Opens are basically just a bunch of people playing decks that they own and the more top level competition are at Invitationals and such. Also goes along with my observations about Opens being like big FNMs. They don't have the replay up yet to get the full quote.
Again, there are two ways we can interpret Opens, neither of which line up with your hypercritical treatment of their results.
Interpretation 1: Opens are giant FNMs. This might be true! But if so, I again ask you (a question I don't think you have answered, but if I have, sorry for missing it), what events are you regularly playing at? I would guess the overwhelming majority of worldwide Modern players play almost exclusively in FNMs, MTGO Leagues, regional events, SCG events, or mid-sized/large events by names like MKM, Hareruya, F2F, etc. Why do GP matter for these events? We already know GP don't drive these metagame developments; the metagame is driven by much more than a single GP finish. We also have recent counter-examples of GP results not even translating to PT or other GP results.
Interpretation 2: People go to Opens and play the deck they want in a big 15 round event - why is this not also happening at the GP level? The top SCG players are likely going to gravitate to the deck most likely to improve their SCG standings, just as the top GP players are likely going to gravitate towards the deck most likely to improve their Wizards standings. But basically everyone else will play what they know or what they already have. In this case, the composition of events would be the same.
All of this returns to the existence of a camp of Modern players/critics who criticize the format at almost every turn, and have done so since the Twin ban. My goal is not to convince these players that their cases are flimsier than they make them out to be. They don't entertain other explanations for perceived negative phenomenons. They don't look for examples of both sides. They rarely support their arguments with actual numbers. I don't think many of them can be convinced of these ongoing weaknesses in their arguments. But I do want to mythbust some of the most ridiculous and unsupportable arguments they make so other players/newcomers don't share their negativity.
I also find this entire discussion humorous because it runs contrary to the usual argument you and the "blue sucks, Modern = lottery" camp like to make. That is, the argument of "you can't pick a best deck and just win off play skill." This can obviously happen in all formats and Modern is no exception.
You're lumping me in with people and statements I haven't made in quite a long time and ignoring what I am writing today. You are projecting arguments I am not making.
People go to Opens and play the deck they want in a big 15 round event - why is this not also happening at the GP level?
Opens are cheaper, lean heavily on local players and resident SCG names, other big names and pro players don't usually travel to them, they are generally 500-1000 people max, and there is generally a lighter atmosphere when playing, in addition to being regionally locked to midwest and east coast US. GPs have people traveling all over the world to go, are tied to the Pro Tour (so their results matter to high level players), are more expensive to play in, have higher payouts, and generally much larger fields (1500-3000 people). There are higher stakes and fewer events, so people (mostly) only make the trip to compete with the intentions of bringing their best. There are certainly a number of people that take these Opens very seriously, and its probably why we see the same dozen or so people at every single one of them.
If people are bringing "the deck they want" to a GP, they are often stomped out by "the meta," which is why we see a bunch of spicy brews day 1 and the usual suspects day 2 and on. This happens to some degree at Opens, but because of the smaller sizes and looser play, you can be more successful with a random deck more often than at a GP.
If I lived in the midwest/east coast, I could imagine the SCG universe would matter a lot to me. But being out in California, and having only ever been to one SCG event ever (an Invitational/Open in Vegas several years ago), it's mostly meaningless to me. Its meta is both irrelevant to my local/state/region meta, as well as irrelevant to "the high end competitive meta" as a whole, which is usually represented by MTGO and GPs.
being able to pick up a deck and do well with it isnt proof that there is less skill involved, its just a testament to how universally translatable the largest portion of the magic skillset is. long time players get jaded by this because at some point decisions seem obvious or common sense, but fail to realize that this is only true because that knowledge has long since been ingrained over the years. its also the reason that players who frequently play cross-format do so with decks that represent 'nuts-and-bolts' magic and forego investing themselves in options that function more on non-intuitive lines of play; since those gains in experience will likely serve them less in the long run.
as for how relevant certain events are - the way i see it is if you assume wizards will ever make decisions to balance the game (or a format), then they have to do so based on some set of information. to do this they have to take skill out of the equation as much as possible. GPs and invitationals being higher profile events do this better than others.
however i also believe that if there is anything going on that wizards might care about balancing in the first place, that it will eventually show on all levels of play. it just happens to show up first, and be more pronounced, in a certain class of events.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: UWGSnow-Bant Control BURGrixis Death's Shadow GWBCoCo Elves WCDeath and Taxes (sold)
I mean lets not pretend this guy could have picked up lantern the day before, and won with it.
true, but lets also not pretend that lantern players are better at the game. its far more likely that he built skills and experiences playing other decks with similar play patterns, and could therefore leverage them. which is entirely different from someone who has barely played magic picking up a deck and doing well with it (which does happen occasionally).
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: UWGSnow-Bant Control BURGrixis Death's Shadow GWBCoCo Elves WCDeath and Taxes (sold)
I mean lets not pretend this guy could have picked up lantern the day before, and won with it.
true, but lets also not pretend that lantern players are better at the game. its far more likely that he built skills and experiences playing other decks with similar play patterns, and could therefore leverage them. which is entirely different from someone who has barely played magic picking up a deck and doing well with it (which does happen occasionally).
Right thats what I'm saying, and did last page.
This guy apparently is a merfolk player. He picked up what is the same style of deck, but better, and was able to win with it.
Thats all. Transferable skills, and limited lines of play. Its an easier, more straightforward deck, but it has redundancy and raw power.
I mean all we are describing here is a wordy way to say 'Humans is really good'.
Lantern has unique play lines, and is...not transferable at all imo, to things like Aggro decks.
I think it's easy to use some transferable skills to play a "new" deck solidly.
I decided to play Mono Red for this Standard PPTQ season. Why? Because it is the cheapest and I don't really care much about Standard. But I do (kind of) want to win a PPTQ so I can play in an RPTQ. I played at FNM and went 3-0-1. I ID'd the final round and played for fun, losing 0-2. I play tested against my teammate around 4-5 matches vs. UW, then 6-8 the following week vs. GB Constrictor. I took it to 4 PPTQs now, losing in the finals in the first one, losing in the top 4 of the next one, losing in the top 8 of the next one, and now going 0-3 after starting 2-0 in a PPTQ today. Sometimes it takes limited skill and a LOT of luck!
I don't know how to play Mono Red well. I don't have a sideboarding guide. I don't know half the cards in Standard. The last time I played Red, it was Burn in Modern with Treasure Cruise and it was only 1 time ever before that. I'm the type of person who can play Amulet or KCI better than I can play Burn. But...there is some luck involved in Magic. Who would have thunk it? Lol. I'm actually doing worse, even despite actually now learning most of the Standard cards and the decks most likely to face at PPTQs.
Sometimes I think people make too big a deal about who top 8s and what they say (remember Bobby Fortanely said Bloom Titan needs to have a ban and Wizards listened?). I played Control decks for half of my Magic life and Combo for the other half of my Magic life. I literally didn't know combat math as early as 6 years ago. Yet, I could play Mono Red competently. Yes, I made mistakes. I should have actually won the mirror when I lost in the top 8 in fact. But luck is always going to be a factor. I have top decked more with this deck than I have with the 4 decks that I've played in Modern for over 4 years put together (Bogles, Grishoalbrand, Titanshift, Storm). That's just variance!
*I often think people on this forum believe that the guy at 9-0 has played perfectly throughout the day and the guy who is 5-4 played like *****.
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)
i think people over exaggerate on both ends of the spectrum. better players win more, but eating the bad end of variance happens just as often as running hot. both could decide the course of a tournament. likewise a lot of players think some class of decks are like playing 5D underwater chess while others are just flipping coins; the same goes for formats. neither is remotely true.
for deck evaluations specifically i believe a lot of the perception stems from a decks skill floor rather than skill ceiling.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: UWGSnow-Bant Control BURGrixis Death's Shadow GWBCoCo Elves WCDeath and Taxes (sold)
Yes, I have been known to over exaggerate variance, but when I see things like myself doing better when I didn't know the format at all or play test very little, then I see players who play Standard waaaay more often than myself and even on MTGO (which I haven't done yet!) do worse than myself. Yes, in the end, I did fail. I didn't win. But then some 100 odd players or more also didn't win.
Yes, I think players consider the floor a lot more than the ceiling. Affinity is a deck that is super hard to play in my opinion. I actually consider it possibly the toughest Tier 1/2 deck to play (there may be some version of Storm or UR Prison/Lantern) that is tougher possibly. But someone can play Affinity to it's 75% potential and still do well, depending on variance and matchups.
I still do believe that the better player wins "more often" than the worse player, but it is not even close to always so. I would not have beaten several Pros recently, despite my play skill being way worse than it was 6 years ago.
P.S. - Caleb Sherer on Storm (nicest guy BTW) and Pieter Tubergen on Affinity are proof that better pilots do better quite often. Caleb is slowly becoming my hero in Modern because he and Paul Muller are literally nearly the only ones that place with Storm and have the guts to keep going at it.
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)
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
No one said otherwise. But correct process can often lead to poor results because of variance. Poker players have known this forever, but some Magic players still try and pretend that skill is the only way to win a tournament.
A. He drew the second Chalice later and GDS would have had the answer for it.
B. @cfp, you have made it no secret that you only care about GP results and basically every other paper evrnt is largely irrelevant in determining Modern health. Given that, do you have any actual evidence to support your theory that play is sloppier in one type of open, public event than the other? I do believe you might look harder for Open punts than GP punts because you all but want Open gameplay to be sloppy to support your belief. But do you have evidence of that being the case? If not, I'm going with the far likelier explanation that 15 round event gameplay at public tournaments of a certain size is equally sloppy between all examples. I will happily admit that invite-only gameplay would be sharper. But Opens and GP are drawing from a largely similar pool.
EDIT:
C. I am not saying skill is the only way to win at Magic. I am merely pushing back against the specific and repeated allegation that skill matters less than determining match outcome in Modern than variance through draws, mulligans, matchups, etc. As shown dozens of times, top Modern players have the same Modern success as top Legacy players do in Legacy, and to the same degree. Legacy is often regarded as a utopia of low variance Magic, particularly by the usual "blue sucks, Modern is a lottery" suspects. And yet, the performance stats show that the outcomes across formats are the same. This annoying myth needs to die. It is exhausting to see people like DeCandio blame it for their consistent format failures.
Spirits
But if you feel that GPs and Opens have the same level and caliber of play (especially at top tables/day 2/etc), then we just fundamentally disagree.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Only one I'm not sure on is UWR Affinity, I'm so far 3-0.
Spirits
Jim got steamrolled and wasn't even close.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I heard he only had 2 cryptic, with Sphinx Rev main. Thats as near an auto loss build against ETron as it gets.
EDIT: UWR over Affinity, almost like I know what I'm talking about around here.
EDIT x 2: Top 4 Predictions.
Humans over ETron.
UWR over Jund...but this is close I think.
Spirits
Well Jim did beat Carl during the tournament already, so I don't think it is quite as bad as it seems on paper.
Chat saying its Humans vs UWR in the final. UWR ROLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLED Jund so hard, just smoked him.
If this is correct, I'm 6 and 0, and UWR now takes the final.
EDIT: Rough beats game 3, Humans takes it.
Spirits
Considering Modern is usually a "play what you know" format, this was extremely interesting to hear!
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
"Got your creatures? Got your rainbow lands? Cast em silly."
I mean some of us have even said its close to Merfolk in that its disruptive creature aggro. What more can it do with 1000 hours of testing?
Spirits
I know. It just flies in the face of "know the nuances, ins and outs, etc. of your deck to be successful." Sometimes, it's just a good deck, competent pilot, and great draws. Reminds me of when Tom Ross won something a while back with GW Tron, and in the post interview basically said "It was just a list I found online and put together for this weekend." Just interesting and humorous to see that from the winner. Especially after having beaten a Jeskai specialist in what should have been a difficult matchup.
Edit: also Patrick said something interesting at about the 32 min mark in the Final Round about how Opens are basically just a bunch of people playing decks that they own and the more top level competition are at Invitationals and such. Also goes along with my observations about Opens being like big FNMs. They don't have the replay up yet to get the full quote.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I'm happy enough that I'm able to make some borderline statements that pan out at this point, and understand what make match ups work, and why with some regularity.
Is Human's a hilariously good deck in the format? Yes.
Is Hollow One still not good, despite putting up some results? Yes.
Is UWR a viable choice? In this meta, yes.
If Rosum doesnt mull to 6, keep a one lander/two lander (I think it was 1) scry bottom, SERUM and still get stuck on 2 lands, well, maybe he walks away with it all. That happens. Thats Magic, period.
It doesnt change the fact Humans remains very good, but is not a '3 star difficulty' deck, assuming you understand the major players in Modern. I mean you are LITERALLY casting a bunch of creatures, turn, after turn, after turn.
If you have the 'Oh I can tap Vial on your turn' experience from Merfolk? Call it good, you can play Humans.
EDIT: Deck Lists, Top 32.
http://www.starcitygames.com/decks/results/format/28/event_ID/47/start_date/26-05-2018/end_date/26-05-2018/city/Minneapolis/state/MN/start/1/finish/32/w_perc/0/g_perc/0/r_perc/0/b_perc/0/u_perc/0/a_perc/0/order_1/finish/limit/50/start_num/0/
Spirits
It's always easy to cherrypick examples to prove a pithy internet point. Case in point, Legacy is widely regarded as THE format that rewards mastery of a deck. And yet, we can easily point to top GP and Open players who just pick up a deck and do well on it. This happens all the time and in basically every tournament. See Dylan Hand's T8 at the previous SCG Legacy Open in his first Legacy tournament ever. See Kowalski at 2018 GP Birmingham getting second with Grixis Delver admitting he doesn't play a lot of the format and just jammed the best deck. Some dude made T8 at Legacy GP Vegas in 2017 on a deck he was literally handed the day before. We can always come up with these little corner case examples to try and prop up our quotable about whatever argument we are trying to make.
Fortunately, it doesn't take long to realize these cherrypicked examples don't build cases. In the majority of cases, Modern remains a format that rewards repetitions on a deck. This obviously does not mean the more experienced pilot wins 100% of tournaments. It just means that, as a general rule, the more experienced pilot on their deck will generally do better than those that audible to a perceived "best deck," unless that best deck is a legitimately bannable best deck. In that case, I agree it's best to just play that deck regardless of experience on competing options.
I also find this entire discussion humorous because it runs contrary to the usual argument you and the "blue sucks, Modern = lottery" camp like to make. That is, the argument of "you can't pick a best deck and just win off play skill." This can obviously happen in all formats and Modern is no exception.
Again, there are two ways we can interpret Opens, neither of which line up with your hypercritical treatment of their results.
Interpretation 1: Opens are giant FNMs. This might be true! But if so, I again ask you (a question I don't think you have answered, but if I have, sorry for missing it), what events are you regularly playing at? I would guess the overwhelming majority of worldwide Modern players play almost exclusively in FNMs, MTGO Leagues, regional events, SCG events, or mid-sized/large events by names like MKM, Hareruya, F2F, etc. Why do GP matter for these events? We already know GP don't drive these metagame developments; the metagame is driven by much more than a single GP finish. We also have recent counter-examples of GP results not even translating to PT or other GP results.
Interpretation 2: People go to Opens and play the deck they want in a big 15 round event - why is this not also happening at the GP level? The top SCG players are likely going to gravitate to the deck most likely to improve their SCG standings, just as the top GP players are likely going to gravitate towards the deck most likely to improve their Wizards standings. But basically everyone else will play what they know or what they already have. In this case, the composition of events would be the same.
All of this returns to the existence of a camp of Modern players/critics who criticize the format at almost every turn, and have done so since the Twin ban. My goal is not to convince these players that their cases are flimsier than they make them out to be. They don't entertain other explanations for perceived negative phenomenons. They don't look for examples of both sides. They rarely support their arguments with actual numbers. I don't think many of them can be convinced of these ongoing weaknesses in their arguments. But I do want to mythbust some of the most ridiculous and unsupportable arguments they make so other players/newcomers don't share their negativity.
Teferi was the last piece. We are at 'cyclical meta' territory now I think.
Spirits
You're lumping me in with people and statements I haven't made in quite a long time and ignoring what I am writing today. You are projecting arguments I am not making.
Opens are cheaper, lean heavily on local players and resident SCG names, other big names and pro players don't usually travel to them, they are generally 500-1000 people max, and there is generally a lighter atmosphere when playing, in addition to being regionally locked to midwest and east coast US. GPs have people traveling all over the world to go, are tied to the Pro Tour (so their results matter to high level players), are more expensive to play in, have higher payouts, and generally much larger fields (1500-3000 people). There are higher stakes and fewer events, so people (mostly) only make the trip to compete with the intentions of bringing their best. There are certainly a number of people that take these Opens very seriously, and its probably why we see the same dozen or so people at every single one of them.
If people are bringing "the deck they want" to a GP, they are often stomped out by "the meta," which is why we see a bunch of spicy brews day 1 and the usual suspects day 2 and on. This happens to some degree at Opens, but because of the smaller sizes and looser play, you can be more successful with a random deck more often than at a GP.
If I lived in the midwest/east coast, I could imagine the SCG universe would matter a lot to me. But being out in California, and having only ever been to one SCG event ever (an Invitational/Open in Vegas several years ago), it's mostly meaningless to me. Its meta is both irrelevant to my local/state/region meta, as well as irrelevant to "the high end competitive meta" as a whole, which is usually represented by MTGO and GPs.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
as for how relevant certain events are - the way i see it is if you assume wizards will ever make decisions to balance the game (or a format), then they have to do so based on some set of information. to do this they have to take skill out of the equation as much as possible. GPs and invitationals being higher profile events do this better than others.
however i also believe that if there is anything going on that wizards might care about balancing in the first place, that it will eventually show on all levels of play. it just happens to show up first, and be more pronounced, in a certain class of events.
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)Spirits
true, but lets also not pretend that lantern players are better at the game. its far more likely that he built skills and experiences playing other decks with similar play patterns, and could therefore leverage them. which is entirely different from someone who has barely played magic picking up a deck and doing well with it (which does happen occasionally).
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)Right thats what I'm saying, and did last page.
This guy apparently is a merfolk player. He picked up what is the same style of deck, but better, and was able to win with it.
Thats all. Transferable skills, and limited lines of play. Its an easier, more straightforward deck, but it has redundancy and raw power.
I mean all we are describing here is a wordy way to say 'Humans is really good'.
Lantern has unique play lines, and is...not transferable at all imo, to things like Aggro decks.
Spirits
I decided to play Mono Red for this Standard PPTQ season. Why? Because it is the cheapest and I don't really care much about Standard. But I do (kind of) want to win a PPTQ so I can play in an RPTQ. I played at FNM and went 3-0-1. I ID'd the final round and played for fun, losing 0-2. I play tested against my teammate around 4-5 matches vs. UW, then 6-8 the following week vs. GB Constrictor. I took it to 4 PPTQs now, losing in the finals in the first one, losing in the top 4 of the next one, losing in the top 8 of the next one, and now going 0-3 after starting 2-0 in a PPTQ today. Sometimes it takes limited skill and a LOT of luck!
I don't know how to play Mono Red well. I don't have a sideboarding guide. I don't know half the cards in Standard. The last time I played Red, it was Burn in Modern with Treasure Cruise and it was only 1 time ever before that. I'm the type of person who can play Amulet or KCI better than I can play Burn. But...there is some luck involved in Magic. Who would have thunk it? Lol. I'm actually doing worse, even despite actually now learning most of the Standard cards and the decks most likely to face at PPTQs.
Sometimes I think people make too big a deal about who top 8s and what they say (remember Bobby Fortanely said Bloom Titan needs to have a ban and Wizards listened?). I played Control decks for half of my Magic life and Combo for the other half of my Magic life. I literally didn't know combat math as early as 6 years ago. Yet, I could play Mono Red competently. Yes, I made mistakes. I should have actually won the mirror when I lost in the top 8 in fact. But luck is always going to be a factor. I have top decked more with this deck than I have with the 4 decks that I've played in Modern for over 4 years put together (Bogles, Grishoalbrand, Titanshift, Storm). That's just variance!
*I often think people on this forum believe that the guy at 9-0 has played perfectly throughout the day and the guy who is 5-4 played like *****.
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)for deck evaluations specifically i believe a lot of the perception stems from a decks skill floor rather than skill ceiling.
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)Yes, I think players consider the floor a lot more than the ceiling. Affinity is a deck that is super hard to play in my opinion. I actually consider it possibly the toughest Tier 1/2 deck to play (there may be some version of Storm or UR Prison/Lantern) that is tougher possibly. But someone can play Affinity to it's 75% potential and still do well, depending on variance and matchups.
I still do believe that the better player wins "more often" than the worse player, but it is not even close to always so. I would not have beaten several Pros recently, despite my play skill being way worse than it was 6 years ago.
P.S. - Caleb Sherer on Storm (nicest guy BTW) and Pieter Tubergen on Affinity are proof that better pilots do better quite often. Caleb is slowly becoming my hero in Modern because he and Paul Muller are literally nearly the only ones that place with Storm and have the guts to keep going at it.
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)