Stock lists do not play Night Whispers and Dreadbore. I think the recent approach with fast delve threats and Battlerage combo is the best way to build the deck. You have to go under Control & big mana decks because their lategame is just too strong. It can also help against creature decks because you threatening to kill them before they can build their army.
I see. Ok, will tell that to my friend who plays GDS when we meet again.
I saw your name in the practice rooms a few times yesterday, Galerion. I had a half day at work so I was able to just get some practice games in.
I used to invest into like every deck as well. I'm pretty much accepting that I own every GBx staple and Shadow. I have a decent amount of the URx staples, too. But I mean, I have a case and a half of GBx cards to pretty much playing anything that emerges unless it's using something obscure. I have Tron, just because it's nice to own and doesn't intersect with other stuff.
I would like to play Humans, but I have to be more responsible with my money nowadays and shouldn't just blow 1,500 dollars. Playing 4 different decks at once doesn't seem like good practice, either.
I had a lot of pieces into Phoenix so I thought, "why not?"
Owning the URx and GBx stuff really helps out. If you own all the shock lands/fetches and those you're pretty set. It's only when Tribal decks or combo decks emerge that I feel priced out. The Phoenix deck only required Arclight, Thing in the Ice, and the Manamorphose.
I'm pretty much just keeping my staples though, selling off staples has just hurt way more than helped. I sold off the UW Control pieces like 2x Teferi, 1x Jace, 1x Cryptic (4 seems like too much in modern nowadays) because I know I won't be going back to a super slow deck like that again. I still decided to keep things like Clique, 3x Jaces, etc because you never know.
I saw your name in the practice rooms a few times yesterday, Galerion. I had a half day at work so I was able to just get some practice games in.
I used to invest into like every deck as well. I'm pretty much accepting that I own every GBx staple and Shadow. I have a decent amount of the URx staples, too. But I mean, I have a case and a half of GBx cards to pretty much playing anything that emerges unless it's using something obscure. I have Tron, just because it's nice to own and doesn't intersect with other stuff.
I would like to play Humans, but I have to be more responsible with my money nowadays and shouldn't just blow 1,500 dollars. Playing 4 different decks at once doesn't seem like good practice, either.
I had a lot of pieces into Phoenix so I thought, "why not?"
Owning the URx and GBx stuff really helps out. If you own all the shock lands/fetches and those you're pretty set. It's only when Tribal decks or combo decks emerge that I feel priced out. The Phoenix deck only required Arclight, Thing in the Ice, and the Manamorphose.
I'm pretty much just keeping my staples though, selling off staples has just hurt way more than helped. I sold off the UW Control pieces like 2x Teferi, 1x Jace, 1x Cryptic (4 seems like too much in modern nowadays) because I know I won't be going back to a super slow deck like that again. I still decided to keep things like Clique, 3x Jaces, etc because you never know.
Yesterday? Yeah that was the The Rock day. I must admit it felt good playing it again and the new tools like Assassin's Trophy and Tireless Tracker did tons of work. I was impressed.
But it also made me realize that I personally don't want to stick with a non-blue deck anymore. Little anecdote.
Yesterday I kept a decent BG hand and played turn 1 Inquistion of Kozilek and I see a hand of Faithless Looting, Night's Whisper, Through the Breach and lands so I was up against Goryo's Vengeance and I take the Looting away. On turn 2 I fire off another Inquistion and take Night's Whisper away. On turn 3 I play a Dark Confidant and after that nothing interesting happens until he has 5 lands in play. He obviously plays Through the Breach and put's Worldspine Wurm into play. I have the Assassins's Trohpy ready to avoid taking 15 from the wurm but he still gets the 3 5/5 Wurm tokens with Trample. What happens? With the Confidant trigger I reveal my single copy of Maelstrom Pulse, kill the tokens with it and win the game from there. My opponent wrote me "topdeck of the year" and despite me just answering with "yeah that's what the deck does" he was absolutely right.
The limitations of the deck were obvious in this game. Despite me having a decent hand with two discard spells, a Confidant and removal I could have easily lost that game. Inquisition is fine but its limitation of 3 CMC or less means I could not take his Breach away and the deck cannot interact any other way with that card.
Things like planeswalkers, permanents with ETB or LTB abilities and instants and sorceries all need to be interacted with on the stack. Otherwise the opponent will gain value out of them or outright win the game. With something like Stubborn Denial in my hand I would have had that game 100% on lock instead of having to get so incredibly lucky.
I still don't know if I want to stick with GDS but if I would have to choose between it and the BG/x decks my choice is now pretty clear.
At least you're addicted to good decks and cards. I'm attempting to play Disrupting Shoal and Simic Charm while everyone else is playing Modern.
But yeah, having some consistency tools and countermagic just gives a totally different feel, and some players love that. Burkhart, for example. And he makes his rogue deck work, so I can try for that.
But give us Preordain, please. The Delver decks it will enable are going to more than make up for the 2% improvement to Storm. Please, wizards.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I can't say I'm pleased to see you and must warn you I may have to do something about it.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: URDelver
Modern: UGRDelver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
As I said in another thread, Absorb really emphasizes the countermagic playability bar in Modern. It's really hard to make a playable 3-mana counter that wouldn't also be too strong in Standard. We've actually had some good limit-pushers in recent years: Disallow, Sinister Sabotage, and now Absorb. Wizards also keeps playing in this space with stuff like the less playable Ionize, the actually playable Counterflux from an older Standard season, Render Silent, and Wizard's Retort. Most of these cards didn't make the cut. I was actually hard-pressed to find any 3-mana counters from Magic's history that would make the Modern cut. Counterflux was really it because it's so strong in the control and combo matchups, but even that sees fringe play at best. Possible examples might include:
Dromar's Charm (never a dead card) Forbid (very strong in grindy matchups, converts dead cards into value) Undermine (tempo decks?)
Basically, in order for a counterspell to be Modern playable at 3-mana, it probably needs to be unconditional and it definitely needs an upside that is about as good as drawing a card. Dismiss at CMC 3 would definitely be playable, for instance. I don't think Wizards can solve this problem while Teferi is legal in Standard, so it might be a while before we get a truly strong CMC 3 counter.
Yeah, Gallerion. As a GBx player in modern for years, I've started to say the same things. Why on earth do I want to play a grindy deck without blue? That scenario took a major topdeck to win, despite you keeping a very good hand.
I've really become disenchanted with Rock decks in modern. It used to beat up on tribal decks but I don't even feel that edge anymore.
As a GBx player I'd really encourage you to stick with GDS or some form of Shadow. Unlike GBx, the deck knows what it wants to be. It's an aggro control deck that can win the game fast and post-board become grindy enough to have game against a lot of things. GDS can be very punishing but it really lets you levy your skills.
Taking out -4 Gurmags and beating down Humans with a grim lavamancer, Izzet staticaster, and a 4/4 Shadow was a rush, man. After seeing how bonkers Stubborn Denial is in general it feels so awful to let a major thing resolve on the stack. GBx doesn't have the clock to discard and beat down with a 2/1 in modern.
That being said, the moment Jund becomes really good again I'll be on that train.
Grixis Death's Shadow and 4C Shadow have really fixed a lot for players looking to play fair with unfair elements to keep up. Without all the DnT decks, maindeck Chameleon Colossus it's fun to play. I recommend continuing to play GDS and getting your ass beaten with it, the ceiling on the deck is very high in this format. The only true hopeless matchups are UW Control firing on all cylinders and people resolving multiple copies of lingering souls. Lingering soul decks are in a major, awful position right now.
It's redundant in Standard, where Sinister Sabotage exists and filters (which is almost always better than life gain), as well as Ionize for the Jeskai builds. There's also already Negate, Disdainful Stroke, and Spell Pierce available.
And it's unplayable trash in Modern. It's such a massive missed opportunity on so many levels. Merry Christmas fans of countermagic!
I'm pretty sure standard plus is going to be everything Ixalan and up. They have no reason to start in a broken standard season that nearly killed everyones interest in the format. Ixalan and up gives the mana-base, the best balance we've had in ages, and a fairly minimal ban list. The only thing on it is Rampaging Ferocidon, and that card is likely safe in a bigger format.
stuff that seemed busted in whatever standard format isnt necessarily a problem given the card pool is large enough. for instance how do you think some UBx scarab god deck would fair against a fully powered temur energy deck, or a GBx delirium deck, or saheeli combo (probably would be banned at the outset though). how does teferi stack up comparatively? etc.
powerful stuff can be balanced out with other powerful stuff. its sorta the premise for non-rotating formats.
not to say that they wont start at ixalan, however if they do so i think it will be in part because its just easier. ive made my opinion known about how dubious i am about this new format considering how much wizards has on their plate dev wise. observing their statements and actions over this last year or so up through the open beta launch of arena; im lead to believe they are reacting instead of having some grand plan years in the making.
It has nothing to do with the size of the card pool. The game was literally designed differently during Kaladesh to HOU. The format was designed so that spells which destroy creatures would only temporarily remove them, like a bounce spell. It was also designed around abilities that negate blocking, preventing more defensive play styles from ever forming. This is miles different from the modern format you are used to, where the games are fast and damage spells are technically more efficient than creatures, hence why burn is the major aggro archetype and not something like red rush.
I mean, you could build creature kill .dec and still lose to it because there is no way to kill Hazoret the fervent or scrapheap scrounger without exile effects, which are exclusive to Magma Spray and Vraska's Contempt. I could see zombies potentially becoming a deck again thanks to having two decent Liliana walkers, but yeah, I don't think anyone wants to go back to that format.
Oh, and lets not forget that red has multiple options to fight the long game as well. Besides Chandra, Torch of Defiance, we have the new izzit cards such as Risk Factor, which also acts as a way to smack someone in the face.
The new format would probably be more turn 2 based for most effects people are used to on turn 1 in modern, but the results are still games that end on turn 4-5, with more of a push towards turn 5 compared to modern where the turn the game ends is potentially 3-5 and edging to 4. Now Arena will make your life hell, but that is another problem entirely.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
We still got a third set coming later in the year and Undermine fits into the mana curve the designers established with post modern counter magic. They might value the bolt damage higher though, given that the format staple 3 damage card is now lightning strike and not lightning bolt. A 4 CMC version is more likely, but pretty unplayable.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
It has nothing to do with the size of the card pool. The game was literally designed differently during Kaladesh to HOU. The format was designed so that spells which destroy creatures would only temporarily remove them, like a bounce spell. It was also designed around abilities that negate blocking, preventing more defensive play styles from ever forming. This is miles different from the modern format you are used to, where the games are fast and damage spells are technically more efficient than creatures, hence why burn is the major aggro archetype and not something like red rush.
I mean, you could build creature kill .dec and still lose to it because there is no way to kill Hazoret the fervent or scrapheap scrounger without exile effects, which are exclusive to Magma Spray and Vraska's Contempt. I could see zombies potentially becoming a deck again thanks to having two decent Liliana walkers, but yeah, I don't think anyone wants to go back to that format.
Oh, and lets not forget that red has multiple options to fight the long game as well. Besides Chandra, Torch of Defiance, we have the new izzit cards such as Risk Factor, which also acts as a way to smack someone in the face.
The new format would probably be more turn 2 based for most effects people are used to on turn 1 in modern, but the results are still games that end on turn 4-5, with more of a push towards turn 5 compared to modern where the turn the game ends is potentially 3-5 and edging to 4. Now Arena will make your life hell, but that is another problem entirely.
maybe im missing something, but what exactly is your point? of course the card pool matters, every standard environment is designed differently. kaladesh/hou standard isnt some special snowflake.
in fact everything you said just proves that. standard formats are insulated. red aggro was particularly strong with the cards you mentioned because there werent similarly powerful strategies, and there werent sufficient answers within the card pool.
including more sets means not only would red aggro be getting more cards, but so would other strategies; including answers. on top of this entirely new strategies can emerge.
for example say they include back through SOI block. there could be an arclight phoenix deck including thing in the ice, lightning axe, or any other synergistic spells im not thinking of.
say you go back to bfz block. how much does chainwhirler hose a token deck with march of the multitudes and trostani discordant backed by nissa, voice of zendikar and gideon, ally of zendikar?
you are telling me that kaladesh/hou was so unique in design and power NOTHING could compete with red rush decks?
as i said, powerful stuff balances out other powerful stuff. if they dont include older sets, then yeah they might choose to exclude kaladesh or whatever. however if they could go back to say origins for example, those sets or the standard you are thinking of isnt some insurmountable obstacle.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: UWGSnow-Bant Control BURGrixis Death's Shadow GWBCoCo Elves WCDeath and Taxes (sold)
Opinions on the difficulty of the popular decks in modern. Looks fairly reasonable. Gds one of the harder decks
Super interesting data that I want to use in future analyses. In particular, I want to correlate it with the existing MWP data I have from this year. Some cursory analysis: there's a moderately positive correlation (r=.4) between MWP and deck difficulty. This suggests that decks which are more difficult to play generally perform better. Note that MWP should not be considered the sole gold standard of deck performance. That would probably be the spectrum of matchup percentages and its spread. A deck with 60% MWP may still have a huge spread and lots of 80/20 and 20/80 matchups, whereas a 50% MWP deck might all be in the 50/50 range. So take the MWP numbers with a grain of salt to begin with.
I guess too many 3 cmc counterspell in Standard is not good. The newbies could be upset if too many stuff cannot resolve.
Ever checked out the MTGA Reddit? It's anecdotal/qualitative evidence, but one of the most popular topics there is complaining to varying degrees about UWx Control and countermagic. I thought all that hate was apocryphal, but seeing it in action online has been eye-opening.
Opinions on the difficulty of the popular decks in modern. Looks fairly reasonable. Gds one of the harder decks
This is why it is an article about a Pro Player's opinion.
Dredge is harder to play than Affinity? Lol. Burn is easier to play than Tron? Lol. Storm is harder to play than any of the decks above it? GBx is that tough to play? You pretty much just almost always play things on curve, outside of discard occasionally. What an opinion, PVVVVDR...
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)
Opinions on the difficulty of the popular decks in modern. Looks fairly reasonable. Gds one of the harder decks
This is why it is an article about a Pro Player's opinion.
Dredge is harder to play than Affinity? Lol. Burn is easier to play than Tron? Lol. Storm is harder to play than any of the decks above it? GBx is that tough to play? You pretty much just almost always play things on curve, outside of discard occasionally. What an opinion, PVVVVDR...
I'm less interested in PVDDR's opinion, which is notoriously slanted in Modern. I'm more interested in the aggregate pro and player ratings. It's good data as long as you realize its limitations and treat it carefully in analyses. Overall, I think it's more legitimate than we might think just framing it as PVDDR's opinion.
I've played Storm most of my life and would continue to play Storm if the mechanic was printed in every set. I don't see it as hard as some of these others. I've also played a lot of Amulet, but completely agree that it IS as hard as they say, lol. Dredge has a lot of triggers, but outside of that, it's not super tough. Most of it is just guessing what type of hate your opponent has in games 2 and 3, based on their deck and deck lists you've seen online. Outside of that, it's just figuring out how to do the best combat math and sometimes you just dredge 2 Creeping Chills and it didn't even matter.
I still don't see what's super hard about casting a Thoughtseize on turn 1 though.
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 have tried a good portion of the decks in Modern, I have quite a few. All of the 'most complicated' usual suspects show up regularly in my LGS,so here's my hot take. The cards in Modern are so optimized that there are really only a few decks that should be considered 'difficult' to play, any more than the rest. Any Modern deck takes practice to play well, but generally speaking you're going to be as good as you are going to get with a deck after 6 months to a year of regular play. I may not be a real expert, but I can play competently with most decks. The exception seems to be prison decks, because there can be more actual choices instead of a clear optimal play.
Now sideboards are a different matter. There are a lot more viable options and choices and builds, and you do have to understand the other deck. I can pick up any of the 7-8 decks I own and be in a solid spot for FNM, but the new guy shows up with an odd combo deck and I really struggle to sideboard sometimes.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Project Booster Fun makes it less fun to open a booster.
As I said in another thread, Absorb really emphasizes the countermagic playability bar in Modern. It's really hard to make a playable 3-mana counter that wouldn't also be too strong in Standard. We've actually had some good limit-pushers in recent years: Disallow, Sinister Sabotage, and now Absorb. Wizards also keeps playing in this space with stuff like the less playable Ionize, the actually playable Counterflux from an older Standard season, Render Silent, and Wizard's Retort. Most of these cards didn't make the cut. I was actually hard-pressed to find any 3-mana counters from Magic's history that would make the Modern cut. Counterflux was really it because it's so strong in the control and combo matchups, but even that sees fringe play at best. Possible examples might include:
Dromar's Charm (never a dead card) Forbid (very strong in grindy matchups, converts dead cards into value) Undermine (tempo decks?)
Basically, in order for a counterspell to be Modern playable at 3-mana, it probably needs to be unconditional and it definitely needs an upside that is about as good as drawing a card. Dismiss at CMC 3 would definitely be playable, for instance. I don't think Wizards can solve this problem while Teferi is legal in Standard, so it might be a while before we get a truly strong CMC 3 counter.
Part of the issue with 3+ cmc counters is that even if you have one that is good enough to meet value considerations, you still need the 2 cmc counters, because of the speed of modern play.
If you are on the draw, you are always one mana behind an opponent, and Modern has a banlist influenced partly by the concept of the 'turn 4 rule', where consistent wins aren't allowed to happen before turn 4 for combo or aggro decks (wins before that can happen of course, they just can't consistently happen then, for whatever measures WotC uses). The implication there, though, is that winning on turn 4 somewhat reliably in a combo deck is fine.
If the combo deck is on the play, that means that the last chance to counter something for the control deck is turn 3 against the 'consistent' point, but just getting those consistent points isn't good enough, you need to be able to stop some of the nut draws and such to keep win percentages reasonable, and sometimes the final piece to a combo simply can't be answered directly with a counterspell, so it's much more reasonable to need to be able to answer the combo deck's turn 3 play, rather than having to wait to answer the turn 4 one, especially if the last combo piece is one they can attempt to play multiple times due to being 2 or less cmc, just needing the turn 3 stuff out already or whatnot, or other sorts of backup situations that would make only answering on opponent's turn 4 with counters too unreliable.
If Modern had a more extensive banned list to slow the game down and make it a 'turn 5 rule', then I could see 3 cmc counters being fully good enough, even when on the draw, but as it is, with the turn 4 rule, 3 cmc counters are likely only good enough when on the play to form the core of your counters that allow you to fight against combo (which is supposed to be control's strong spot). Of course, 3+ cmc counters are still worth playing sometimes if they meet value calculations, as Cryptic Command proves, but that is for a different stage of the game when the control decks are building their advantages towards the final win, rather than when preventing themselves from being run over so they even have a chance to get to play their game.
This means that, in the end, it doesn't really matter how good a 3+ cmc counter is when it comes to certain aspects of modern playability, and that likely any such cards aren't competing with 2 or lower cmc counters for slots in a deck, but will be competing with Cryptic Command for slots in a deck instead, which would go handily into explaining why they don't often see Modern play, given how amazing Cryptic Command is, as a 3+ cmc counter plays an entirely different role than a 2 or less cmc counter, and the 2 cmc or less counter remains neccesary no matter how good the 3+ cmc one is, if you are relying on counterspells for your answers (instead of discard or against non instant/sorcery based combo, various forms of removal).
Opinions on the difficulty of the popular decks in modern. Looks fairly reasonable. Gds one of the harder decks
This is why it is an article about a Pro Player's opinion.
Dredge is harder to play than Affinity? Lol. Burn is easier to play than Tron? Lol. Storm is harder to play than any of the decks above it? GBx is that tough to play? You pretty much just almost always play things on curve, outside of discard occasionally. What an opinion, PVVVVDR...
Just a note, its not just that players opinion's. Its also the aggregate of other players, and other pro's. I mean I get it, you dont like GDS as a 'difficult' deck. But look at the list, are you honestly going to put it on the 'easy' side of the list?
I mean GDS does more then any other deck play with a Third Resource Bar in its Life Total that has to be properly controlled and balanced.
Besides difficulty is relative.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Nice to see this blast from the past. I remember seeing this many years ago.
I see. Ok, will tell that to my friend who plays GDS when we meet again.
Nexus MTG News // Nexus - Magic Art Gallery // MTG Dual Land Color Ratios Analyzer // MTG Card Drawing Odds Calculator
Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
I used to invest into like every deck as well. I'm pretty much accepting that I own every GBx staple and Shadow. I have a decent amount of the URx staples, too. But I mean, I have a case and a half of GBx cards to pretty much playing anything that emerges unless it's using something obscure. I have Tron, just because it's nice to own and doesn't intersect with other stuff.
I would like to play Humans, but I have to be more responsible with my money nowadays and shouldn't just blow 1,500 dollars. Playing 4 different decks at once doesn't seem like good practice, either.
I had a lot of pieces into Phoenix so I thought, "why not?"
Owning the URx and GBx stuff really helps out. If you own all the shock lands/fetches and those you're pretty set. It's only when Tribal decks or combo decks emerge that I feel priced out. The Phoenix deck only required Arclight, Thing in the Ice, and the Manamorphose.
I'm pretty much just keeping my staples though, selling off staples has just hurt way more than helped. I sold off the UW Control pieces like 2x Teferi, 1x Jace, 1x Cryptic (4 seems like too much in modern nowadays) because I know I won't be going back to a super slow deck like that again. I still decided to keep things like Clique, 3x Jaces, etc because you never know.
Yesterday? Yeah that was the The Rock day. I must admit it felt good playing it again and the new tools like Assassin's Trophy and Tireless Tracker did tons of work. I was impressed.
But it also made me realize that I personally don't want to stick with a non-blue deck anymore. Little anecdote.
Yesterday I kept a decent BG hand and played turn 1 Inquistion of Kozilek and I see a hand of Faithless Looting, Night's Whisper, Through the Breach and lands so I was up against Goryo's Vengeance and I take the Looting away. On turn 2 I fire off another Inquistion and take Night's Whisper away. On turn 3 I play a Dark Confidant and after that nothing interesting happens until he has 5 lands in play. He obviously plays Through the Breach and put's Worldspine Wurm into play. I have the Assassins's Trohpy ready to avoid taking 15 from the wurm but he still gets the 3 5/5 Wurm tokens with Trample. What happens? With the Confidant trigger I reveal my single copy of Maelstrom Pulse, kill the tokens with it and win the game from there. My opponent wrote me "topdeck of the year" and despite me just answering with "yeah that's what the deck does" he was absolutely right.
The limitations of the deck were obvious in this game. Despite me having a decent hand with two discard spells, a Confidant and removal I could have easily lost that game. Inquisition is fine but its limitation of 3 CMC or less means I could not take his Breach away and the deck cannot interact any other way with that card.
Things like planeswalkers, permanents with ETB or LTB abilities and instants and sorceries all need to be interacted with on the stack. Otherwise the opponent will gain value out of them or outright win the game. With something like Stubborn Denial in my hand I would have had that game 100% on lock instead of having to get so incredibly lucky.
I still don't know if I want to stick with GDS but if I would have to choose between it and the BG/x decks my choice is now pretty clear.
Spirits
But yeah, having some consistency tools and countermagic just gives a totally different feel, and some players love that. Burkhart, for example. And he makes his rogue deck work, so I can try for that.
But give us Preordain, please. The Delver decks it will enable are going to more than make up for the 2% improvement to Storm. Please, wizards.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: UR Delver
Modern: UGR Delver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
As I said in another thread, Absorb really emphasizes the countermagic playability bar in Modern. It's really hard to make a playable 3-mana counter that wouldn't also be too strong in Standard. We've actually had some good limit-pushers in recent years: Disallow, Sinister Sabotage, and now Absorb. Wizards also keeps playing in this space with stuff like the less playable Ionize, the actually playable Counterflux from an older Standard season, Render Silent, and Wizard's Retort. Most of these cards didn't make the cut. I was actually hard-pressed to find any 3-mana counters from Magic's history that would make the Modern cut. Counterflux was really it because it's so strong in the control and combo matchups, but even that sees fringe play at best. Possible examples might include:
Dromar's Charm (never a dead card)
Forbid (very strong in grindy matchups, converts dead cards into value)
Undermine (tempo decks?)
Basically, in order for a counterspell to be Modern playable at 3-mana, it probably needs to be unconditional and it definitely needs an upside that is about as good as drawing a card. Dismiss at CMC 3 would definitely be playable, for instance. I don't think Wizards can solve this problem while Teferi is legal in Standard, so it might be a while before we get a truly strong CMC 3 counter.
I've really become disenchanted with Rock decks in modern. It used to beat up on tribal decks but I don't even feel that edge anymore.
As a GBx player I'd really encourage you to stick with GDS or some form of Shadow. Unlike GBx, the deck knows what it wants to be. It's an aggro control deck that can win the game fast and post-board become grindy enough to have game against a lot of things. GDS can be very punishing but it really lets you levy your skills.
Taking out -4 Gurmags and beating down Humans with a grim lavamancer, Izzet staticaster, and a 4/4 Shadow was a rush, man. After seeing how bonkers Stubborn Denial is in general it feels so awful to let a major thing resolve on the stack. GBx doesn't have the clock to discard and beat down with a 2/1 in modern.
That being said, the moment Jund becomes really good again I'll be on that train.
Grixis Death's Shadow and 4C Shadow have really fixed a lot for players looking to play fair with unfair elements to keep up. Without all the DnT decks, maindeck Chameleon Colossus it's fun to play. I recommend continuing to play GDS and getting your ass beaten with it, the ceiling on the deck is very high in this format. The only true hopeless matchups are UW Control firing on all cylinders and people resolving multiple copies of lingering souls. Lingering soul decks are in a major, awful position right now.
It's redundant in Standard, where Sinister Sabotage exists and filters (which is almost always better than life gain), as well as Ionize for the Jeskai builds. There's also already Negate, Disdainful Stroke, and Spell Pierce available.
And it's unplayable trash in Modern. It's such a massive missed opportunity on so many levels. Merry Christmas fans of countermagic!
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
It has nothing to do with the size of the card pool. The game was literally designed differently during Kaladesh to HOU. The format was designed so that spells which destroy creatures would only temporarily remove them, like a bounce spell. It was also designed around abilities that negate blocking, preventing more defensive play styles from ever forming. This is miles different from the modern format you are used to, where the games are fast and damage spells are technically more efficient than creatures, hence why burn is the major aggro archetype and not something like red rush.
If they include the older format cards, I can tell you already that the format would devolve into a red rush format once again simply because the power of those decks came from cards like Earthshaker Khenra, scrapheap scrounger, Ahn-Crop Crasher, and Hazoret the fervent. Token and life gain decks are suppressed by Goblin Chainwhirler, and if they start with a new ban list Rampaging Ferocidon.
I mean, you could build creature kill .dec and still lose to it because there is no way to kill Hazoret the fervent or scrapheap scrounger without exile effects, which are exclusive to Magma Spray and Vraska's Contempt. I could see zombies potentially becoming a deck again thanks to having two decent Liliana walkers, but yeah, I don't think anyone wants to go back to that format.
Oh, and lets not forget that red has multiple options to fight the long game as well. Besides Chandra, Torch of Defiance, we have the new izzit cards such as Risk Factor, which also acts as a way to smack someone in the face.
The new format would probably be more turn 2 based for most effects people are used to on turn 1 in modern, but the results are still games that end on turn 4-5, with more of a push towards turn 5 compared to modern where the turn the game ends is potentially 3-5 and edging to 4. Now Arena will make your life hell, but that is another problem entirely.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Spirits
maybe im missing something, but what exactly is your point? of course the card pool matters, every standard environment is designed differently. kaladesh/hou standard isnt some special snowflake.
in fact everything you said just proves that. standard formats are insulated. red aggro was particularly strong with the cards you mentioned because there werent similarly powerful strategies, and there werent sufficient answers within the card pool.
including more sets means not only would red aggro be getting more cards, but so would other strategies; including answers. on top of this entirely new strategies can emerge.
for example say they include back through SOI block. there could be an arclight phoenix deck including thing in the ice, lightning axe, or any other synergistic spells im not thinking of.
reflector mage, spell queller, declaration in stone, always watching, archangel avacyn, tireless tracker. and thats just listing off the top of my head.
say you go back to bfz block. how much does chainwhirler hose a token deck with march of the multitudes and trostani discordant backed by nissa, voice of zendikar and gideon, ally of zendikar?
you are telling me that kaladesh/hou was so unique in design and power NOTHING could compete with red rush decks?
as i said, powerful stuff balances out other powerful stuff. if they dont include older sets, then yeah they might choose to exclude kaladesh or whatever. however if they could go back to say origins for example, those sets or the standard you are thinking of isnt some insurmountable obstacle.
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)Come on Colt.
Spirits
Odd. But UB also sees way less play then UW or UR so that might had something to do with decision.
Opinions on the difficulty of the popular decks in modern. Looks fairly reasonable. Gds one of the harder decks
I guess too many 3 cmc counterspell in Standard is not good. The newbies could be upset if too many stuff cannot resolve.
Nexus MTG News // Nexus - Magic Art Gallery // MTG Dual Land Color Ratios Analyzer // MTG Card Drawing Odds Calculator
Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
Spirits
Super interesting data that I want to use in future analyses. In particular, I want to correlate it with the existing MWP data I have from this year. Some cursory analysis: there's a moderately positive correlation (r=.4) between MWP and deck difficulty. This suggests that decks which are more difficult to play generally perform better. Note that MWP should not be considered the sole gold standard of deck performance. That would probably be the spectrum of matchup percentages and its spread. A deck with 60% MWP may still have a huge spread and lots of 80/20 and 20/80 matchups, whereas a 50% MWP deck might all be in the 50/50 range. So take the MWP numbers with a grain of salt to begin with.
Ever checked out the MTGA Reddit? It's anecdotal/qualitative evidence, but one of the most popular topics there is complaining to varying degrees about UWx Control and countermagic. I thought all that hate was apocryphal, but seeing it in action online has been eye-opening.
This is why it is an article about a Pro Player's opinion.
Dredge is harder to play than Affinity? Lol. Burn is easier to play than Tron? Lol. Storm is harder to play than any of the decks above it? GBx is that tough to play? You pretty much just almost always play things on curve, outside of discard occasionally. What an opinion, PVVVVDR...
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'm less interested in PVDDR's opinion, which is notoriously slanted in Modern. I'm more interested in the aggregate pro and player ratings. It's good data as long as you realize its limitations and treat it carefully in analyses. Overall, I think it's more legitimate than we might think just framing it as PVDDR's opinion.
I've played Storm most of my life and would continue to play Storm if the mechanic was printed in every set. I don't see it as hard as some of these others. I've also played a lot of Amulet, but completely agree that it IS as hard as they say, lol. Dredge has a lot of triggers, but outside of that, it's not super tough. Most of it is just guessing what type of hate your opponent has in games 2 and 3, based on their deck and deck lists you've seen online. Outside of that, it's just figuring out how to do the best combat math and sometimes you just dredge 2 Creeping Chills and it didn't even matter.
I still don't see what's super hard about casting a Thoughtseize on turn 1 though.
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)Now sideboards are a different matter. There are a lot more viable options and choices and builds, and you do have to understand the other deck. I can pick up any of the 7-8 decks I own and be in a solid spot for FNM, but the new guy shows up with an odd combo deck and I really struggle to sideboard sometimes.
Part of the issue with 3+ cmc counters is that even if you have one that is good enough to meet value considerations, you still need the 2 cmc counters, because of the speed of modern play.
If you are on the draw, you are always one mana behind an opponent, and Modern has a banlist influenced partly by the concept of the 'turn 4 rule', where consistent wins aren't allowed to happen before turn 4 for combo or aggro decks (wins before that can happen of course, they just can't consistently happen then, for whatever measures WotC uses). The implication there, though, is that winning on turn 4 somewhat reliably in a combo deck is fine.
If the combo deck is on the play, that means that the last chance to counter something for the control deck is turn 3 against the 'consistent' point, but just getting those consistent points isn't good enough, you need to be able to stop some of the nut draws and such to keep win percentages reasonable, and sometimes the final piece to a combo simply can't be answered directly with a counterspell, so it's much more reasonable to need to be able to answer the combo deck's turn 3 play, rather than having to wait to answer the turn 4 one, especially if the last combo piece is one they can attempt to play multiple times due to being 2 or less cmc, just needing the turn 3 stuff out already or whatnot, or other sorts of backup situations that would make only answering on opponent's turn 4 with counters too unreliable.
If Modern had a more extensive banned list to slow the game down and make it a 'turn 5 rule', then I could see 3 cmc counters being fully good enough, even when on the draw, but as it is, with the turn 4 rule, 3 cmc counters are likely only good enough when on the play to form the core of your counters that allow you to fight against combo (which is supposed to be control's strong spot). Of course, 3+ cmc counters are still worth playing sometimes if they meet value calculations, as Cryptic Command proves, but that is for a different stage of the game when the control decks are building their advantages towards the final win, rather than when preventing themselves from being run over so they even have a chance to get to play their game.
This means that, in the end, it doesn't really matter how good a 3+ cmc counter is when it comes to certain aspects of modern playability, and that likely any such cards aren't competing with 2 or lower cmc counters for slots in a deck, but will be competing with Cryptic Command for slots in a deck instead, which would go handily into explaining why they don't often see Modern play, given how amazing Cryptic Command is, as a 3+ cmc counter plays an entirely different role than a 2 or less cmc counter, and the 2 cmc or less counter remains neccesary no matter how good the 3+ cmc one is, if you are relying on counterspells for your answers (instead of discard or against non instant/sorcery based combo, various forms of removal).
Just a note, its not just that players opinion's. Its also the aggregate of other players, and other pro's. I mean I get it, you dont like GDS as a 'difficult' deck. But look at the list, are you honestly going to put it on the 'easy' side of the list?
Of course not.
Spirits
Besides difficulty is relative.