Either my opponent got bigger creatures, stack-interaction or a swarm-strategy that doesn't match my removal-suite.
So what's the consensus about the format in general? Is Reflector Mage teh best it gets?
Maybe i'm just tending towards one side singlehandily, but my guts tell me that there must be a piece of interaction that hits 75% or so of the format.
The best kind of interaction is proactive and incidental interaction. That is why Humans is a strong contender for best deck. They can basically curve out like any other aggro deck but pick apart your hand without going out of their way by dedicating cards to interaction. Its pretty aggregious to me that they also get access to the best mana fixing in the format as a bonus.
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Standard:
N/A
Modern:
Grishoalbrand / Grixis Death's Shadow / Jeskai Control / UW Control
I'm always watching for teh best overall interaction to combine it with agressive / valueable creatures for beatdown, but nowadays it's just very limited. Thought-Knot Seer, Tidehollow Sculler, Reflector Mage and Spell Queller are my personal heroes in this case, Vendilion Clique too, but it's so hard to figure out what deck / deck-composition suites the format teh best.
I'm always watching for teh best overall interaction to combine it with agressive / valueable creatures for beatdown, but nowadays it's just very limited. Thought-Knot Seer, Tidehollow Sculler, Reflector Mage and Spell Queller are my personal heroes in this case, Vendilion Clique too, but it's so hard to figure out what deck / deck-composition suites the format teh best.
You have described Humans. Play it and profit. It is by far the closest thing Modern has to a 51/49 deck, is proactive, has lots of 60/40+ matchupss against random decks, and rewards reps through some skill-testing cards (Image, Mage, Freebooter).
Thought already about this option, but Jeskai Control and Jund / Mardu are super-common matchups in my area.
Therefore i'm looking for more resilient options.
Right now i'm jamming RG Eldrazi just because it's overly good and the interaction suite (Bolt + TKS, Obligator) is just enough to cover the most common matchups.
I have had a problem as of lately. I just feel so lost in Modern. I don't know what deck I should be playing. I have been trying to play a numerous number of decks and haven't stuck with 1 recently. I want a deck that can give me the certain win percentage that I'm accustomed to.
And I can't leverage play skill to win matchups that are just horrible. I can make them closer matchups, but just a few poor draws keep it from happening. Maybe I've been bouncing around too much? Maybe I haven't given many decks their due? I figured I could leverage my play skill with a deck with many decisions to win.
Part of the reason that I bring up this thread is that I feel that Bogles is well positioned right now, but friends of mine don't think I can leverage my play skill here.
So, what do you think about the ramblings here?
"Leveraging playskill" and "best deck" are not synonymous, and is often a trap that you see high level magic players fall into.
"Among top players, the most common bias I see is one against linear strategies. The rationalization is that linear decks are too straightforward and don't offer the pilot enough opportunity to outmaneuver their opponents, an aspect of the game that is valuable to top players. If two decks are relatively equal otherwise, then choosing the more decision-intensive one makes sense, but too often I see this line used to justify playing a weaker deck. The player will convince themselves that the two decks are relatively equal when they aren't so they can play the deck they'd rather play, because demonstrating their play skill is important to them, perhaps as or more important than winning matches of Magic."
It's a fallacy to think there are two categories of decks, those with many decisions trees and those without. Every deck has decisions that are impactful to the game you are playing, whether it's something as complex as proper land and cantrip sequencing or as simple as "Which card do I Thoughtseize?" (Hint: the one you can't answer).
I have been playing modern since 2011, before PT Philadelphia even. I have owned many different decks over the years: Twin, Storm, Affinity, Living End, Birthing Pod, Kiki Pod, Zoo, Merfolk, Infect, Dredge, Elves, Scapeshift, Titanshift, Blue Moon, Dredge, Amulet (with and without Summer Bloom), Burn, Gifts Storm, Eldrazi Tron, Griselbrand, Hollow One and more.
These days I only own Gifts Storm, Amulet, and Affinity. And I can take apart my legacy decks to play Modern Griselbrand and Dredge. And I finally feel like I need to purchase no new decks for this format.
Going in to Modern, back in 2011, I knew that I liked two kinds of decks - Combo decks and super hard permission decks. I actually hadn't played Standard at the time since... 2009ish? Mirrodin-Kamigawa-Ravnica-Timespiral-Lorwyn was the span of standards I played. I quit when Alara came out. In that time frame, I played standard Ravager Affinity, Heartbeat, Dragonstorm, Dredge, Aussie Storm, Dralnu/Mystical Teachings Control, Reveillark Combo and Faeries. But I knew what kind of decks I liked going in.
You too, FoodChainBro, likely know what kind of decks you like and have had success with. My advice, is find a few of those decks and play them. Don't psyche yourself out thinking you can leverage your skill any more or any less in any deck versus any other deck. That's simply not a true statement.
THIS 100X!!! If you don't agree with this then there is no amount of logic that will ever convince you that good, non-oppressive, combos should be allowed. If you don't agree with it then just don't play this game, and you certainly shouldn't feel entitled to make any comment on ban lists ever.
I try to brew, build oddball stuff.....but when those suck for too long, when I can't win to save my life, I just fall back on Tron, classic green, no Eldrazi whatsoever. Brews to mix things up, Tron when I have had a few bad weeks of it and want to do well.
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I try to brew, build oddball stuff.....but when those suck for too long, when I can't win to save my life, I just fall back on Tron, classic green, no Eldrazi whatsoever. Brews to mix things up, Tron when I have had a few bad weeks of it and want to do well.
I get this and I often do the same thing, but unless I give "worse" decks a solid chance and play them fully optimally, how will I ever get better at winning with bad decks? I have proven that I can do it with Bogles. I have proven that I can do it with Grishoalbrand. But still, I have a chip on my shoulder that I "can't win without falling back on those decks" or Titanshift. I want to prove that I can win with whatever deck I'm handed (I own most of them, so technically it would most likely be my own deck used). I also am constantly on the prowl for the next broken deck. I am trying KCI next.
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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 try to brew, build oddball stuff.....but when those suck for too long, when I can't win to save my life, I just fall back on Tron, classic green, no Eldrazi whatsoever. Brews to mix things up, Tron when I have had a few bad weeks of it and want to do well.
I get this and I often do the same thing, but unless I give "worse" decks a solid chance and play them fully optimally, how will I ever get better at winning with bad decks? I have proven that I can do it with Bogles. I have proven that I can do it with Grishoalbrand. But still, I have a chip on my shoulder that I "can't win without falling back on those decks" or Titanshift. I want to prove that I can win with whatever deck I'm handed (I own most of them, so technically it would most likely be my own deck used). I also am constantly on the prowl for the next broken deck. I am trying KCI next.
Oh, I know that I can win with some of these decks, I am pretty good with Stompy. I love Burn and am constantly tinkering with it. I am working on mono-blue TitI. It's just that while I am building, figuring out how best to make them tick, sometimes I need to replenish my store credit, lol.
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It's a fallacy to think there are two categories of decks, those with many decisions trees and those without. Every deck has decisions that are impactful to the game you are playing, whether it's something as complex as proper land and cantrip sequencing or as simple as "Which card do I Thoughtseize?" (Hint: the one you can't answer).
That's mostly true, but the complexity of these decision trees varies a lot. Some players at my LGS are, to put it diplomatically, either not the brightest bulbs in the box or perhaps not interested enough in the finer points of the game. This, of course, doesn't deter some of them from playing whatever the flavor of the month deck is at any given point in time. I have seen them put up very respectable results with linear decks like Tron, but when the flavor of the month deck requires a considerable amount of thinking ahead (e.g. Grixis Shadow) or more than a basic understanding of how the opponent's deck works and how to stop it (e.g. when piloting a control deck), those players usually fail miserably. They still have fun and I'm not the one to judge them, but it is very obvious that Modern decks vary in terms of complexity and that this has influence on the playability of those decks if you are not a pro player.
And that's one of several issues I see with Ross Merriam's article. He makes various assumptions on the motivations of other players without any proof. What if those players that he accuses of finding excuses for playing a weaker deck rather than a good linear deck just want to play a deck that they actually enjoy playing? If I attend a MtG event with hundreds of other players, including some pro players who have way more practice against better opponents than me, I don't go there assuming that I will make the top 8. It may happen and it has actually happened before, but the odds are very much not in my favor. Even if I was convinced that Tron (or a similar deck) was the actual best deck in the given metagame, I would still feel miserable playing so many rounds with it. And I don't drive hundreds of miles and book a hotel room for 10+ hours of self-inflicted misery, even if it increases my odds of making the top 8 from 0.5% to 1.5%. Thus, I would consciously choose a different deck or play one of my own brews, with the added bonus that every victory feels more earned than when I play what dozens of other people are playing. I enjoy overhearing the confused discussions of my would-be opponents between the rounds when I do well with a deck that they haven't figured out yet. I love it when my opponents make poor decisions when sideboarding against my deck because they haven't seen all of the spicy stuff in it. I don't need to come up with excuses for not playing Tron.
I think that's the whole point. You want to play what you want to play because you get enjoyment from it. I believe what Ross Merriam is getting at is exactly THAT. Players make an excuse to not play the best deck. I do it. I know that I can be super successful with Humans, but it is not all that fun for me (although I did 3-1 last FNM, trying it in a tournament for the first time since I did CoCo Humans). I personally feel that Humans is a super easy deck to play and that is a "good" thing. Also I am not going to hold it against anyone who believes that it is hard to play. I know I don't play it perfectly, but I play it well enough, lol.
BTW, people still don't know how to side against Tron. Probably around 90% of the time, it's pretty easy to figure it out, but how about this? With Grishoalbrand, do I side in Blood Moon? When I had 4, I used to side in all 4. My reasoning is that I have Faithless Looting and Cathartic Reunion to ship extras if not needed. I felt like it was enough to slow them down until I Breach a Wurm or do the Griselbrand/BoBo kill. But it sometimes didn't play out this way. Then I started siding fewer. The issue with Blood Moon is that I have to side something out. Usually this comes down to Cathartic Reunion and a 1 of Collective Brutality/Lightning Axe...perhaps the Manamorphose. I lose some of the 11 card draw that I have, between 4 Looting, 4 Night's Whisper, and 3 Cathartic Reunion. Night's Whisper is one I would never take out vs. Tron. That card is too good!
I feel that nowadays, I am just better leaving in the draw cards and hoping to goldfish them before they can beat me, which happens nearly all the time. (I guess I've won around 18 of 20 times against Tron with Griselbrand, but one of the losses was in a PPTQ final and that HUUUURT. That one is kind of a stain on my memory.)
It's okay to have "excuses" to not play Tron. Don't take it as a negative or him cutting you down. I don't play it because I don't think it's super good and I don't enjoy Tronning fools. I also hate playing Burn, but I actually tried Burn for 3 weeks when Treasure Cruise was legal and Rhino Pod was nearly absent from my LGS. If Burn became hands down the best deck, I'd play it. Enjoyment goes out the window (for me) if I am winning 80-90% of the time. During Eldrazi Winter, I won 84% of my matches. Sure, it may have not been the most enjoyable deck, but winning cards and money, while buying more cards with winnings kind of makes up for that (at least for me). If I was a millionaire, I don't know if I'd feel the same way.
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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 that's the whole point. You want to play what you want to play because you get enjoyment from it. I believe what Ross Merriam is getting at is exactly THAT. Players make an excuse to not play the best deck.
I don't really agree. Lets look again at what he wrote (as quoted by Earthbound21 above):
"Among top players, the most common bias I see is one against linear strategies."
Notice the terms "top players" here. I would argue that most posters in this thread, including myself, don't fall into the category of "top players", but lets pretend otherwise for a moment.
"The rationalization is that linear decks are too straightforward and don't offer the pilot enough opportunity to outmaneuver their opponents, an aspect of the game that is valuable to top players."
I wrote about enjoyment, Ross Merriam writes about leveraging player skill. So how can the content of my posting be EXACTLY what he meant? While I prefer interactive decks, there are some fairly linear decks that I actually enjoy playing. One of the more recent examples is Hollow One, a deck that seems to alternate between nuts draws and total disaster. Tron, on the other hand, feels as if it playing a puzzle game that could be interesting, if it weren't for the bazillion ways to tutor up the solution. It feels like the kind of puzzle designed for toddlers where they put objects in different shapes into the appropriate holes. As far as I can remember, I was pretty good at this kind of game, so the player skill is certainly there. I just don't want to play it anymore as an adult, while I can still enjoy the walk on the edge of insanity that is Hollow One.
But lets go back to the Ross Merriam quote:
"If two decks are relatively equal otherwise, then choosing the more decision-intensive one makes sense, but too often I see this line used to justify playing a weaker deck."
Here he makes assumptions on the deck choices of other players based on some personal experience cannot be fact-checked. He makes it sound as if this the most common motivation for not playing decks like Tron. Yet, from my personal experience, the main reason why people don't want to play Tron is a disdain for the deck that has grown over several years and is not, as Ross Merriam makes it sound later in his posting, orchestrated by an angry Twitter mob.
The last part of the quote reads:
"The player will convince themselves that the two decks are relatively equal when they aren't so they can play the deck they'd rather play, because demonstrating their play skill is important to them, perhaps as or more important than winning matches of Magic."
So again, he talks about showing off play skill, which is not my point and probably isn't the point of most players in the MtG community. To his credit, he explicitly talks about "top players", so maybe I should direct my critique more towards the people taking his words out of context and applying them to normal players like you (I assume) and me.
Now, back to your posting:
I do it. I know that I can be super successful with Humans, but it is not all that fun for me (although I did 3-1 last FNM, trying it in a tournament for the first time since I did CoCo Humans). I personally feel that Humans is a super easy deck to play and that is a "good" thing. Also I am not going to hold it against anyone who believes that it is hard to play. I know I don't play it perfectly, but I play it well enough, lol.
IMHO, you don't do it. You are more about enjoyment, like me, and less about the lack of opportunity to show of your awesome play skills, like Ross Merriam claims to have seen very often, as if he could look into people's heads.
BTW, people still don't know how to side against Tron. Probably around 90% of the time, it's pretty easy to figure it out, but how about this? With Grishoalbrand, do I side in Blood Moon?
From what I gathered (mostly from other people's postings), Blood Moon is not a particular good card against Tron, especially after sideboarding when they have Nature's Claims in addition to their more expensive ways of getting rid of it. They also play 8 eggs which can get them green mana if they need it, so they don't really have to play around Blood Moon like other decks do.
Enjoyment goes out the window (for me) if I am winning 80-90% of the time. During Eldrazi Winter, I won 84% of my matches. Sure, it may have not been the most enjoyable deck, but winning cards and money, while buying more cards with winnings kind of makes up for that (at least for me). If I was a millionaire, I don't know if I'd feel the same way.
I lost all interest in Modern during Eldrazi Winter and came back when the mess was cleared up. I'm not interested in winning cards and money. It's just not what I seek in MtG or any other game.
For me, it's often about enjoyment of exploration. When I started playing on MTGO, I played Standard when Jund dominated the format (Alara block + Zendikar block + the appropriate core set). Back then, I played mono-black vampires, a deck not exactly known for having a good Jund matchup, but I could build it without putting a small fortune into virtual cards. I lost A LOT of games against Jund, yet that deck shattered my dreams in such an elegant way that I somehow found enjoyment in defeat and kept playing. I tuned my deck again and again, until I had found a configuration with multiple copies of Grim Discovery, which I used with fair success to generate some much-needed card advantage vs. Jund's cascade-into-Blightning engine. I also played two copies of Ob Nixilis, the Fallen, a card not commonly seen in vampires, to put my extra lands to good use and have some inevitability when the battlefield got clogged up by Sprouting Thrinax and friends. In the end, I was able to win about 50% of the games against Jund, which felt like a real accomplishment, compared to my initial win percentage of less than 25%.
But the best part was still to come. With all this practice under my belt, I went to one of the bigger tournaments in my area, which turned out to be literally almost mono-Jund, at least for me. I'm not exaggerating, I played against Jund every single round except the first or the second one. And, miraculously, I won all those matches. Ob Nixilis, the Fallen, a card that several of my opponents had to read, did some serious work while the vampires often held the ground. I had turned an established aggro deck into a (probably bad) midrange deck, but I had the moment of surprise (and probably also luck) on my side and was facing the deck that I had heavily practiced against. The comments I got from several opponents let me to believe that they had never seen a vampires deck played this way. In the end I got at least a booster box and a bunch of foils, but that was just icing on the cake. The real accomplishment from my perspective was that I had beaten the odds and won with good preparation and an original deck. Experiences like this have drawn me back to playing MtG time and again: The enjoyment of having (moderate) success with an unusual deck. I will never get the same enjoyment out of playing "the best deck".
I was "lost" in Modern for more than two years, but have really found my place in Breach Moon. I've covered a lot of my thoughts in the Blue Moon thread, but the gist of it is that I no longer care about winning overall events and just focus on making my interactive games as good as possible. From there, my success or failure is almost entirely based on what deck I am paired with. Being fairly lucky with my matchups and totally wrecking every form of midrange and control, I actually have a 75%+ overall win percentage. This change in philosophy of just accepting losses against bad matchups and just hoping to dodge them (and being successful at doing that) have done wonders for me over the past 2 months.
Oh knight of the reliquary how I miss you. But you flew to close to the graveyard. You'll find wizards printing answers to cards rather than specific enhancements more often than not. But I've always been a Grindy rock type of player so I'm pretty excited to sleeve up elves again. Free the 1 mana planeswalker that destroyed my maverick deck.
I'm just happy when my deck doesn't get banned. So far, so good.
Seriously though, I'm a player who gets bored. The guy who rolls 4-5 characters in maplestory, all characters in Diablo 3, plays all weapons in CS. Typically end up being Jack of all trades.
Doing this in MTG has a real monetary cost, though. But this is how I enjoy the game. Or any game, really.
Skill-wise, playing a plethora of decks has improved my win rate by knowing more decks in-depth. When I meet UR storm or Elves at the table, I *know* where the clutches are, where to spend my cards, when to react or be proactive. When to "blink", basically. Because I'm not particularly skilled at piloting any deck, I often win games where the opponent is playing a deck I've played (I have 70% knowledge of my deck + 70% of the opp's = 140% for example), but I tend to lose games against decks that are strange to me (70% knowledge of my deck + 0-10% of the opponent's deck = 70% to 80%).
I *am* partial to certain decks, but they don't often stay exactly the same for very long. I love new tech, and my Grixis control deck currently sports a full playset of Young Pyros and 2 copies of Claim // Fame. Theoretically this is supposed to help me better compete against Mardu Pyro and Hollow One. In practice this is somewhat true, although I hardly have a large sample size since I have also been playing a lot of Hollow One (see, this is why I can't master a deck). I also enjoy playing Ponza, although its not very good in the current meta. It currently sports a playset of the new Sarkhan and 11 dragons. I'm calling it Dragon Moon. And I haven't played it yet. Its just sleeved up.
So many decks to play, so little time.
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BGW Elves BGW|BW Tokens BW|WBR Sword&ShieldWBR|BUG DelverBUG|UWR Kiki UWR | UR Storm UR
I'm just happy when my deck doesn't get banned. So far, so good.
Seriously though, I'm a player who gets bored. The guy who rolls 4-5 characters in maplestory, all characters in Diablo 3, plays all weapons in CS. Typically end up being Jack of all trades.
Doing this in MTG has a real monetary cost, though. But this is how I enjoy the game. Or any game, really.
Skill-wise, playing a plethora of decks has improved my win rate by knowing more decks in-depth. When I meet UR storm or Elves at the table, I *know* where the clutches are, where to spend my cards, when to react or be proactive. When to "blink", basically. Because I'm not particularly skilled at piloting any deck, I often win games where the opponent is playing a deck I've played (I have 70% knowledge of my deck + 70% of the opp's = 140% for example), but I tend to lose games against decks that are strange to me (70% knowledge of my deck + 0-10% of the opponent's deck = 70% to 80%).
I *am* partial to certain decks, but they don't often stay exactly the same for very long. I love new tech, and my Grixis control deck currently sports a full playset of Young Pyros and 2 copies of Claim // Fame. Theoretically this is supposed to help me better compete against Mardu Pyro and Hollow One. In practice this is somewhat true, although I hardly have a large sample size since I have also been playing a lot of Hollow One (see, this is why I can't master a deck). I also enjoy playing Ponza, although its not very good in the current meta. It currently sports a playset of the new Sarkhan and 11 dragons. I'm calling it Dragon Moon. And I haven't played it yet. Its just sleeved up.
So many decks to play, so little time.
ha, I fit into this category as well. Recently I'm extremely tempted to tear apart my Jund and turn it into a Mardu Pyromancer, an RUG Delver, and the rest can go back to my 8 Rack, but Reid Duke just gave me a lil extra faith in Jund
ha, I fit into this category as well. Recently I'm extremely tempted to tear apart my Jund and turn it into a Mardu Pyromancer, an RUG Delver, and the rest can go back to my 8 Rack, but Reid Duke just gave me a lil extra faith in Jund
I'm just going to put this out there and I hope I'm not spamming, because it is off-topic. Mardu Pyromancer is a very, very good deck. I think it's in the top 3 in fact and if you can dodge Tron, you probably will do very well. Jund as a deck is just okay at best. (just my 2 cents) The only thing Jund has going for it is the surprise factor, but it's lessened because people know how to play against it from the past (unless they started a half year ago only). Modern players who have played for a while know how to play against Jund and they probably will remember and adjust as well.
RUG Delver (the Modern version) is merely okay, as Tempo is not really where it's at in Modern. If you want a Modern Tempo deck, go Bant Spirits. They just got 2 new tools in M19 - Remorseful Cleric and Supreme Phantom.
It's just my opinion of course. Modern is the format that I know the most about, so if I don't know Modern well, then I literally don't "know Magic." Lol.
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)
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Spirits
The best kind of interaction is proactive and incidental interaction. That is why Humans is a strong contender for best deck. They can basically curve out like any other aggro deck but pick apart your hand without going out of their way by dedicating cards to interaction. Its pretty aggregious to me that they also get access to the best mana fixing in the format as a bonus.
N/A
Modern:
Grishoalbrand / Grixis Death's Shadow / Jeskai Control / UW Control
Thought-Knot Seer, Tidehollow Sculler, Reflector Mage and Spell Queller are my personal heroes in this case, Vendilion Clique too, but it's so hard to figure out what deck / deck-composition suites the format teh best.
Green @ it's best
Spirits
You cant beat luck though.
You have described Humans. Play it and profit. It is by far the closest thing Modern has to a 51/49 deck, is proactive, has lots of 60/40+ matchupss against random decks, and rewards reps through some skill-testing cards (Image, Mage, Freebooter).
Therefore i'm looking for more resilient options.
Right now i'm jamming RG Eldrazi just because it's overly good and the interaction suite (Bolt + TKS, Obligator) is just enough to cover the most common matchups.
Green @ it's best
"Leveraging playskill" and "best deck" are not synonymous, and is often a trap that you see high level magic players fall into.
Ross Merriam sums it up nicely here: http://www.starcitygames.com/articles/37361_Tron-What-Took-You-So-Long.html
"Among top players, the most common bias I see is one against linear strategies. The rationalization is that linear decks are too straightforward and don't offer the pilot enough opportunity to outmaneuver their opponents, an aspect of the game that is valuable to top players. If two decks are relatively equal otherwise, then choosing the more decision-intensive one makes sense, but too often I see this line used to justify playing a weaker deck. The player will convince themselves that the two decks are relatively equal when they aren't so they can play the deck they'd rather play, because demonstrating their play skill is important to them, perhaps as or more important than winning matches of Magic."
It's a fallacy to think there are two categories of decks, those with many decisions trees and those without. Every deck has decisions that are impactful to the game you are playing, whether it's something as complex as proper land and cantrip sequencing or as simple as "Which card do I Thoughtseize?" (Hint: the one you can't answer).
I have been playing modern since 2011, before PT Philadelphia even. I have owned many different decks over the years: Twin, Storm, Affinity, Living End, Birthing Pod, Kiki Pod, Zoo, Merfolk, Infect, Dredge, Elves, Scapeshift, Titanshift, Blue Moon, Dredge, Amulet (with and without Summer Bloom), Burn, Gifts Storm, Eldrazi Tron, Griselbrand, Hollow One and more.
These days I only own Gifts Storm, Amulet, and Affinity. And I can take apart my legacy decks to play Modern Griselbrand and Dredge. And I finally feel like I need to purchase no new decks for this format.
Going in to Modern, back in 2011, I knew that I liked two kinds of decks - Combo decks and super hard permission decks. I actually hadn't played Standard at the time since... 2009ish? Mirrodin-Kamigawa-Ravnica-Timespiral-Lorwyn was the span of standards I played. I quit when Alara came out. In that time frame, I played standard Ravager Affinity, Heartbeat, Dragonstorm, Dredge, Aussie Storm, Dralnu/Mystical Teachings Control, Reveillark Combo and Faeries. But I knew what kind of decks I liked going in.
You too, FoodChainBro, likely know what kind of decks you like and have had success with. My advice, is find a few of those decks and play them. Don't psyche yourself out thinking you can leverage your skill any more or any less in any deck versus any other deck. That's simply not a true statement.
I get this and I often do the same thing, but unless I give "worse" decks a solid chance and play them fully optimally, how will I ever get better at winning with bad decks? I have proven that I can do it with Bogles. I have proven that I can do it with Grishoalbrand. But still, I have a chip on my shoulder that I "can't win without falling back on those decks" or Titanshift. I want to prove that I can win with whatever deck I'm handed (I own most of them, so technically it would most likely be my own deck used). I also am constantly on the prowl for the next broken deck. I am trying KCI next.
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)Oh, I know that I can win with some of these decks, I am pretty good with Stompy. I love Burn and am constantly tinkering with it. I am working on mono-blue TitI. It's just that while I am building, figuring out how best to make them tick, sometimes I need to replenish my store credit, lol.
And that's one of several issues I see with Ross Merriam's article. He makes various assumptions on the motivations of other players without any proof. What if those players that he accuses of finding excuses for playing a weaker deck rather than a good linear deck just want to play a deck that they actually enjoy playing? If I attend a MtG event with hundreds of other players, including some pro players who have way more practice against better opponents than me, I don't go there assuming that I will make the top 8. It may happen and it has actually happened before, but the odds are very much not in my favor. Even if I was convinced that Tron (or a similar deck) was the actual best deck in the given metagame, I would still feel miserable playing so many rounds with it. And I don't drive hundreds of miles and book a hotel room for 10+ hours of self-inflicted misery, even if it increases my odds of making the top 8 from 0.5% to 1.5%. Thus, I would consciously choose a different deck or play one of my own brews, with the added bonus that every victory feels more earned than when I play what dozens of other people are playing. I enjoy overhearing the confused discussions of my would-be opponents between the rounds when I do well with a deck that they haven't figured out yet. I love it when my opponents make poor decisions when sideboarding against my deck because they haven't seen all of the spicy stuff in it. I don't need to come up with excuses for not playing Tron.
BTW, people still don't know how to side against Tron. Probably around 90% of the time, it's pretty easy to figure it out, but how about this? With Grishoalbrand, do I side in Blood Moon? When I had 4, I used to side in all 4. My reasoning is that I have Faithless Looting and Cathartic Reunion to ship extras if not needed. I felt like it was enough to slow them down until I Breach a Wurm or do the Griselbrand/BoBo kill. But it sometimes didn't play out this way. Then I started siding fewer. The issue with Blood Moon is that I have to side something out. Usually this comes down to Cathartic Reunion and a 1 of Collective Brutality/Lightning Axe...perhaps the Manamorphose. I lose some of the 11 card draw that I have, between 4 Looting, 4 Night's Whisper, and 3 Cathartic Reunion. Night's Whisper is one I would never take out vs. Tron. That card is too good!
I feel that nowadays, I am just better leaving in the draw cards and hoping to goldfish them before they can beat me, which happens nearly all the time. (I guess I've won around 18 of 20 times against Tron with Griselbrand, but one of the losses was in a PPTQ final and that HUUUURT. That one is kind of a stain on my memory.)
It's okay to have "excuses" to not play Tron. Don't take it as a negative or him cutting you down. I don't play it because I don't think it's super good and I don't enjoy Tronning fools. I also hate playing Burn, but I actually tried Burn for 3 weeks when Treasure Cruise was legal and Rhino Pod was nearly absent from my LGS. If Burn became hands down the best deck, I'd play it. Enjoyment goes out the window (for me) if I am winning 80-90% of the time. During Eldrazi Winter, I won 84% of my matches. Sure, it may have not been the most enjoyable deck, but winning cards and money, while buying more cards with winnings kind of makes up for that (at least for me). If I was a millionaire, I don't know if I'd feel the same way.
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)"Among top players, the most common bias I see is one against linear strategies."
Notice the terms "top players" here. I would argue that most posters in this thread, including myself, don't fall into the category of "top players", but lets pretend otherwise for a moment.
"The rationalization is that linear decks are too straightforward and don't offer the pilot enough opportunity to outmaneuver their opponents, an aspect of the game that is valuable to top players."
I wrote about enjoyment, Ross Merriam writes about leveraging player skill. So how can the content of my posting be EXACTLY what he meant? While I prefer interactive decks, there are some fairly linear decks that I actually enjoy playing. One of the more recent examples is Hollow One, a deck that seems to alternate between nuts draws and total disaster. Tron, on the other hand, feels as if it playing a puzzle game that could be interesting, if it weren't for the bazillion ways to tutor up the solution. It feels like the kind of puzzle designed for toddlers where they put objects in different shapes into the appropriate holes. As far as I can remember, I was pretty good at this kind of game, so the player skill is certainly there. I just don't want to play it anymore as an adult, while I can still enjoy the walk on the edge of insanity that is Hollow One.
But lets go back to the Ross Merriam quote:
"If two decks are relatively equal otherwise, then choosing the more decision-intensive one makes sense, but too often I see this line used to justify playing a weaker deck."
Here he makes assumptions on the deck choices of other players based on some personal experience cannot be fact-checked. He makes it sound as if this the most common motivation for not playing decks like Tron. Yet, from my personal experience, the main reason why people don't want to play Tron is a disdain for the deck that has grown over several years and is not, as Ross Merriam makes it sound later in his posting, orchestrated by an angry Twitter mob.
The last part of the quote reads:
"The player will convince themselves that the two decks are relatively equal when they aren't so they can play the deck they'd rather play, because demonstrating their play skill is important to them, perhaps as or more important than winning matches of Magic."
So again, he talks about showing off play skill, which is not my point and probably isn't the point of most players in the MtG community. To his credit, he explicitly talks about "top players", so maybe I should direct my critique more towards the people taking his words out of context and applying them to normal players like you (I assume) and me.
Now, back to your posting: IMHO, you don't do it. You are more about enjoyment, like me, and less about the lack of opportunity to show of your awesome play skills, like Ross Merriam claims to have seen very often, as if he could look into people's heads.
From what I gathered (mostly from other people's postings), Blood Moon is not a particular good card against Tron, especially after sideboarding when they have Nature's Claims in addition to their more expensive ways of getting rid of it. They also play 8 eggs which can get them green mana if they need it, so they don't really have to play around Blood Moon like other decks do.
I lost all interest in Modern during Eldrazi Winter and came back when the mess was cleared up. I'm not interested in winning cards and money. It's just not what I seek in MtG or any other game.
For me, it's often about enjoyment of exploration. When I started playing on MTGO, I played Standard when Jund dominated the format (Alara block + Zendikar block + the appropriate core set). Back then, I played mono-black vampires, a deck not exactly known for having a good Jund matchup, but I could build it without putting a small fortune into virtual cards. I lost A LOT of games against Jund, yet that deck shattered my dreams in such an elegant way that I somehow found enjoyment in defeat and kept playing. I tuned my deck again and again, until I had found a configuration with multiple copies of Grim Discovery, which I used with fair success to generate some much-needed card advantage vs. Jund's cascade-into-Blightning engine. I also played two copies of Ob Nixilis, the Fallen, a card not commonly seen in vampires, to put my extra lands to good use and have some inevitability when the battlefield got clogged up by Sprouting Thrinax and friends. In the end, I was able to win about 50% of the games against Jund, which felt like a real accomplishment, compared to my initial win percentage of less than 25%.
But the best part was still to come. With all this practice under my belt, I went to one of the bigger tournaments in my area, which turned out to be literally almost mono-Jund, at least for me. I'm not exaggerating, I played against Jund every single round except the first or the second one. And, miraculously, I won all those matches. Ob Nixilis, the Fallen, a card that several of my opponents had to read, did some serious work while the vampires often held the ground. I had turned an established aggro deck into a (probably bad) midrange deck, but I had the moment of surprise (and probably also luck) on my side and was facing the deck that I had heavily practiced against. The comments I got from several opponents let me to believe that they had never seen a vampires deck played this way. In the end I got at least a booster box and a bunch of foils, but that was just icing on the cake. The real accomplishment from my perspective was that I had beaten the odds and won with good preparation and an original deck. Experiences like this have drawn me back to playing MtG time and again: The enjoyment of having (moderate) success with an unusual deck. I will never get the same enjoyment out of playing "the best deck".
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Seriously though, I'm a player who gets bored. The guy who rolls 4-5 characters in maplestory, all characters in Diablo 3, plays all weapons in CS. Typically end up being Jack of all trades.
Doing this in MTG has a real monetary cost, though. But this is how I enjoy the game. Or any game, really.
Skill-wise, playing a plethora of decks has improved my win rate by knowing more decks in-depth. When I meet UR storm or Elves at the table, I *know* where the clutches are, where to spend my cards, when to react or be proactive. When to "blink", basically. Because I'm not particularly skilled at piloting any deck, I often win games where the opponent is playing a deck I've played (I have 70% knowledge of my deck + 70% of the opp's = 140% for example), but I tend to lose games against decks that are strange to me (70% knowledge of my deck + 0-10% of the opponent's deck = 70% to 80%).
I *am* partial to certain decks, but they don't often stay exactly the same for very long. I love new tech, and my Grixis control deck currently sports a full playset of Young Pyros and 2 copies of Claim // Fame. Theoretically this is supposed to help me better compete against Mardu Pyro and Hollow One. In practice this is somewhat true, although I hardly have a large sample size since I have also been playing a lot of Hollow One (see, this is why I can't master a deck). I also enjoy playing Ponza, although its not very good in the current meta. It currently sports a playset of the new Sarkhan and 11 dragons. I'm calling it Dragon Moon. And I haven't played it yet. Its just sleeved up.
So many decks to play, so little time.
BGW Elves BGW|BW Tokens BW|WBR Sword&ShieldWBR|BUG DelverBUG|UWR Kiki UWR | UR Storm UR
ha, I fit into this category as well. Recently I'm extremely tempted to tear apart my Jund and turn it into a Mardu Pyromancer, an RUG Delver, and the rest can go back to my 8 Rack, but Reid Duke just gave me a lil extra faith in Jund
UBRGrixis ControlUBR | URPhoenixUR | UWMiraclesUW |GBRJundGBR | UBFaeriesUB | UBWAd NauseumUBW |GBRWBlueless ShadowGBRW |
MTGA
UBRGrixis ControlUBR | UTempoU
I'm just going to put this out there and I hope I'm not spamming, because it is off-topic. Mardu Pyromancer is a very, very good deck. I think it's in the top 3 in fact and if you can dodge Tron, you probably will do very well. Jund as a deck is just okay at best. (just my 2 cents) The only thing Jund has going for it is the surprise factor, but it's lessened because people know how to play against it from the past (unless they started a half year ago only). Modern players who have played for a while know how to play against Jund and they probably will remember and adjust as well.
RUG Delver (the Modern version) is merely okay, as Tempo is not really where it's at in Modern. If you want a Modern Tempo deck, go Bant Spirits. They just got 2 new tools in M19 - Remorseful Cleric and Supreme Phantom.
It's just my opinion of course. Modern is the format that I know the most about, so if I don't know Modern well, then I literally don't "know Magic." Lol.
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)