Too much Zoo, and aggro in general. I agree with Bloom I think it might even get two slots and Affinity is almost a lock but two may be too many. I think Burn can sneak in due to the PT player bias of playing decks that are generally soft to it. 1-2 Junk decks seems likely and I think a Geist deck will make it. Control I'm not seeing but McClaren or Wafo Tapa might come up with something so you can't rule it out. Rather than Merfolk I think a Blue Moon will make another appearance. In the last slot I'm going to say Twin because Patrick Dickmann is that good and a lot of people are going to be aiming to keep Junk down. So I guess that gives me:
Amulet Bloom
Affinity
Burn
UWx Control
UWR Midrange
Blue Moon
Junk
Twin
this would be my choice of an ideal top 8. It would be a small sample size but all major archetypes are represented here. Midrange, control, combo (fast, control, tempo), aggro (synergy vs power) etc.
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Currently Playing:
Modern: RUGScapeshift[RUG...Occasionally with goyfs RUGTarmotwinRUG(RIP)
Legacy: UWxuwr miracles and stonebladeUWx
Commander: UWRShu Yun/Ruhan SmashUWR
I'm just waiting for all the trolls to come out and complain about Birthing Pod having too big a share of the meta game....
yes I know that its banned, it's a joke....
Should be interesting, but I will be very disappointed if Junk dominates the meta which is highly likely because it is a new meta, not all Pros play a lot of Modern, and many perceive Junk as the best deck (whether or not that is true is a different debate...)
Yes I was thinking Zoo could come back and be the tier1 deck it was before.
Could some zoo expert enlighten me?
Was zoo being kept back by Pod? I suspect it was... fetching for finks is bad when you're attacking with nacatl's I guess.
Yes I was thinking Zoo could come back and be the tier1 deck it was before.
Could some zoo expert enlighten me?
Was zoo being kept back by Pod? I suspect it was... fetching for finks is bad when you're attacking with nacatl's I guess.
As a Pod player, I looked forward to the Zoo matchups as we were almost always going to win either through value or combo. Finks/Resto/Rhino/Shriekmaw/Redcap/Reveillark/Archangel, basically all the high end cards were just bombs against them. Wizards wants to see more midrange and agro creature decks, part of the reason Pod was banned, apparently Finks with a sac outlet to get other value creatures is busted in a format with Storm, Twin and other combo decks.
Zoo is decent but its got a bad matchup against most of the format. Anything running Bolts, Decays and Paths will have a decent chance of fighting it and after PT Born of the Gods I doubt we will see it in numbers or performing decently again. Modern is a creature format, every deck needs an answer to creatures or they die. And when Zoo tries to play these fair creatures like Nacatl, Kird Ape, Loam Lion, ect. they just get blown out by so many cards.
I doubt we will see Zoo in the top 8 BUT if we do it will be some form of a disruptive agro/Zoo deck much like Hatebears or Death and Taxes or just splash black for Siege Rhino cause the card is busted.
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Active Modern Decks
U Tron GW Bogles RG Loam UR Blue Breach RBU Grixis Goryo BRU Grixis Delver GBR Jund GBW Junk
I think it's wrong to expect nothing agressive like Affinity or Burn in a BG heavy meta.
The thing is that not many of the big pros will ever touch an aggressive deck.
Sure maybe a no-name makes his way in but players like Luis Scott-Vargas will never seriously consider Burn or Affinity which lack interaction and can easily be hated out.
What decks do you think we'll see at the PT? By that I mean not just the T8.
Junk will be the deck to beat - BGx was the best deck before Khans, and still a top deck during Khans. The thing is, even if it is a 60-40 deck, and 30+% of people play it, they will end up fighting with each other during the Swiss rounds, so we'll most likely NOT see 4+ Junk in the T8.
Storm, clearly Finkel and some of his pals will be playing it. I wanna know if they prefer Thought Scour or Tormenting Voice though - I feel Tormenting Voice didn't get a chance to shine when TC was still legal, but now it isn't, and in its place we have a card draw spell that costs red mana (i.e. you don't need Manamorphose), gets cost-reduced by Electromancer, and gives net +3 cards off a PA (regular cantrips only give +2). It's weak to counters, but then again so was TC.
Amulet, Matthias Hunt's deck of choice. This deck has gained a lot more recognition after T8ing two GPs, so I expect its opponents to be better prepared against it. The deck has flex slots, and people still can't agree on what to play - more consistency (Sleight of Hand/Ancient Stirrings), or more speed (Simian Spirit Guide)?
RG Breach, another unknown that suddenly T8ed two GPs. That deck has a great Pod matchup because Anger wrecks them and they can't do anything about Breach + Emrakul. Now Pod is gone and Junk is poised to take over - a deck which has more discard, making it harder to assemble a 2-card combo. TC (= Delver) got banned too, making maindeck Chalice questionable.
Zoo, they gained Rhino and Pod was banned. Now seems like a good time for it to shine.
RG Tron, will Ugin see play? I wrote Ugin off initially, but after playing against it I can see its power. All is Dust is one card. Ugin is TWO All is Dusts and then some.
Will Tasigur be played in any deck(s)? Delver and Twin can splash for him, Junk can play him if they don't have Bob. In UR Twin/Delver, if you splash a third color, it's for at most one card in the maindeck (Goyf), and SB options (Ancient Grudge, Wear // Tear). Black doesn't seem to provide any good SB options other than discard, which is redundant because of counterspells.
Dredge? lol. Bad until proven otherwise.
Where will the banned decks go? i.e. Pod, Delver, Ascendancy (both types). Delver was playable before Khans so logically it's still playable after TC got banned. They still have Swiftspear. Pod...just doesn't function without Pod. Finks+Angel is a great combo, but without Pod you should be playing Blade Splicer+Angel, 4 copies each instead. That shell is actually workable - I've seen it in at least 3 decks (GW D&T, UW Restoration, Cifka's RW Twin). Ascendancy, JA wasn't banned, but both versions were reliant on either TC or Dig. My prediction is that nobody will play Ascendancy.
Two more decks that probably matter more to me than anyone else, so skip if you want:
1) Ad Nauseam. It's the only one of "my" decks that has yet to T8 a GP or PT.
2) UW Restoration. It was a pretty good deck during the BBE era. 2 colors = fantastic mana: you can max fetches, Colonnades, Seachrome Coast and Tectonic Edge. Pod was a huge problem for the deck because it didn't have any answers for a T1 mana dork, or a resolved Voice of Resurgence. UW is rather weak to Lingering Souls though - even if you play Baneslayer they can just chump block for 4 turns, topdeck a removal spell, and kill it. UWR has Thundermaw Hellkite, so it might be better.
I look at the rounds that are going to be played and what decks are the most forgiving.
As been mentioned, most 'pros' dont like full aggro decks that are not interactive. We may see an Affinity deck crack the top 8, but I doubt it.
Decks like Bloom Titan are extremely hard to pilot and not very forgiving. You miss a trigger on turn 3 and you lose turn 5 because of it and usually you dont realize it till you see the replay or someone tells you. 2 days and double digit rounds, is going to be very difficult to pilot this deck to top positions.
As for predictions, I think we see some new builds of past decks. When I say past decks I am talking decks like Bant, UWR control and midrange, Grixis, rebuilt Delver, and possibly Esper. I think the pros are going to see if this is the meta for control.
My top 8, no specific order.
1-URW control
1-Junk/BG rock
1-Bant (traditional build or conscription)
1-URW midrange
1-UW control
1-Scapeshift
1-Zoo
1-Tron deck
The thing is that not many of the big pros will ever touch an aggressive deck.
Sure maybe a no-name makes his way in but players like Luis Scott-Vargas will never seriously consider Burn or Affinity which lack interaction and can easily be hated out.
Pros will play aggressive decks. Like UR Delver. They just won't play Burn, Shahar Shenhar being the exception.
2/6-2/8/2015: Washington, DC
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1. Affinity
2. Zoo
3. Zoo
4. Bloom Titan
5. Junk
6. Affinity
7. Burn
8. Merfolk
Aggggggggrrrrrrrrroooooooooooooooo
'78 CB750F, '09 CBR600RR
That's an awful lot of decks that are super soft to UWR Control in the top 8
1. Gruul/Small Naya Zoo
2. Kibler's Midrange
3. Dark Zoo
4. Counter-Cat
5. Domain/Tribal Zoo
Too much Zoo, and aggro in general. I agree with Bloom I think it might even get two slots and Affinity is almost a lock but two may be too many. I think Burn can sneak in due to the PT player bias of playing decks that are generally soft to it. 1-2 Junk decks seems likely and I think a Geist deck will make it. Control I'm not seeing but McClaren or Wafo Tapa might come up with something so you can't rule it out. Rather than Merfolk I think a Blue Moon will make another appearance. In the last slot I'm going to say Twin because Patrick Dickmann is that good and a lot of people are going to be aiming to keep Junk down. So I guess that gives me:
Amulet Bloom
Affinity
Burn
UWx Control
UWR Midrange
Blue Moon
Junk
Twin
I hope this happens so we can have a retrospective about the PT titled "50 Shades of Zoo."
'78 CB750F, '09 CBR600RR
1: Junk
2: Bloom Titan
3: Affinity
4: Zoo
5: UWR
6: Twin
7: Junk
8: Scapeshift
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
this would be my choice of an ideal top 8. It would be a small sample size but all major archetypes are represented here. Midrange, control, combo (fast, control, tempo), aggro (synergy vs power) etc.
Modern:
RUGScapeshift[RUG...Occasionally with goyfs
RUGTarmotwinRUG(RIP)
Legacy:
UWxuwr miracles and stonebladeUWx
Commander:
UWRShu Yun/Ruhan SmashUWR
Tempo Twin
WUR Control
Zoo
Amulet Bloom
Junk
Junk
Affinity
Scapeshift
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
2. Don't
3. Care
4. Now
5. That
6. Treasure Cruise
7. Is
8. Banned
Should be interesting, but I will be very disappointed if Junk dominates the meta which is highly likely because it is a new meta, not all Pros play a lot of Modern, and many perceive Junk as the best deck (whether or not that is true is a different debate...)
1-2 Junk
1 Twin
1-2 flavors of Zoo
1 Bloom Titan
1 Affinity
1 UWr
If only 1 Junk/Zoo show up, I'm going to say a Storm and a Tron.
URW Control
WBG Abzan
GRW Burn
EDH
GR Rosheen Meanderer
Could some zoo expert enlighten me?
Was zoo being kept back by Pod? I suspect it was... fetching for finks is bad when you're attacking with nacatl's I guess.
As a Pod player, I looked forward to the Zoo matchups as we were almost always going to win either through value or combo. Finks/Resto/Rhino/Shriekmaw/Redcap/Reveillark/Archangel, basically all the high end cards were just bombs against them. Wizards wants to see more midrange and agro creature decks, part of the reason Pod was banned, apparently Finks with a sac outlet to get other value creatures is busted in a format with Storm, Twin and other combo decks.
Zoo is decent but its got a bad matchup against most of the format. Anything running Bolts, Decays and Paths will have a decent chance of fighting it and after PT Born of the Gods I doubt we will see it in numbers or performing decently again. Modern is a creature format, every deck needs an answer to creatures or they die. And when Zoo tries to play these fair creatures like Nacatl, Kird Ape, Loam Lion, ect. they just get blown out by so many cards.
I doubt we will see Zoo in the top 8 BUT if we do it will be some form of a disruptive agro/Zoo deck much like Hatebears or Death and Taxes or just splash black for Siege Rhino cause the card is busted.
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
The thing is that not many of the big pros will ever touch an aggressive deck.
Sure maybe a no-name makes his way in but players like Luis Scott-Vargas will never seriously consider Burn or Affinity which lack interaction and can easily be hated out.
Junk will be the deck to beat - BGx was the best deck before Khans, and still a top deck during Khans. The thing is, even if it is a 60-40 deck, and 30+% of people play it, they will end up fighting with each other during the Swiss rounds, so we'll most likely NOT see 4+ Junk in the T8.
Storm, clearly Finkel and some of his pals will be playing it. I wanna know if they prefer Thought Scour or Tormenting Voice though - I feel Tormenting Voice didn't get a chance to shine when TC was still legal, but now it isn't, and in its place we have a card draw spell that costs red mana (i.e. you don't need Manamorphose), gets cost-reduced by Electromancer, and gives net +3 cards off a PA (regular cantrips only give +2). It's weak to counters, but then again so was TC.
Amulet, Matthias Hunt's deck of choice. This deck has gained a lot more recognition after T8ing two GPs, so I expect its opponents to be better prepared against it. The deck has flex slots, and people still can't agree on what to play - more consistency (Sleight of Hand/Ancient Stirrings), or more speed (Simian Spirit Guide)?
RG Breach, another unknown that suddenly T8ed two GPs. That deck has a great Pod matchup because Anger wrecks them and they can't do anything about Breach + Emrakul. Now Pod is gone and Junk is poised to take over - a deck which has more discard, making it harder to assemble a 2-card combo. TC (= Delver) got banned too, making maindeck Chalice questionable.
Zoo, they gained Rhino and Pod was banned. Now seems like a good time for it to shine.
RG Tron, will Ugin see play? I wrote Ugin off initially, but after playing against it I can see its power. All is Dust is one card. Ugin is TWO All is Dusts and then some.
Will Tasigur be played in any deck(s)? Delver and Twin can splash for him, Junk can play him if they don't have Bob. In UR Twin/Delver, if you splash a third color, it's for at most one card in the maindeck (Goyf), and SB options (Ancient Grudge, Wear // Tear). Black doesn't seem to provide any good SB options other than discard, which is redundant because of counterspells.
Dredge? lol. Bad until proven otherwise.
Where will the banned decks go? i.e. Pod, Delver, Ascendancy (both types). Delver was playable before Khans so logically it's still playable after TC got banned. They still have Swiftspear. Pod...just doesn't function without Pod. Finks+Angel is a great combo, but without Pod you should be playing Blade Splicer+Angel, 4 copies each instead. That shell is actually workable - I've seen it in at least 3 decks (GW D&T, UW Restoration, Cifka's RW Twin). Ascendancy, JA wasn't banned, but both versions were reliant on either TC or Dig. My prediction is that nobody will play Ascendancy.
Two more decks that probably matter more to me than anyone else, so skip if you want:
1) Ad Nauseam. It's the only one of "my" decks that has yet to T8 a GP or PT.
2) UW Restoration. It was a pretty good deck during the BBE era. 2 colors = fantastic mana: you can max fetches, Colonnades, Seachrome Coast and Tectonic Edge. Pod was a huge problem for the deck because it didn't have any answers for a T1 mana dork, or a resolved Voice of Resurgence. UW is rather weak to Lingering Souls though - even if you play Baneslayer they can just chump block for 4 turns, topdeck a removal spell, and kill it. UWR has Thundermaw Hellkite, so it might be better.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
Affinity
Abzan midrange
Abzan midrange
Sultai midrange
Zoo
Sultai midrange
Jeskai Control
Burn
Standard
UB UB Midrange UB
Modern
GRWUBTribal Flames ZooGRWUB
RUGTemur DelverRUG
Legacy
UW Stoneblade UW
As been mentioned, most 'pros' dont like full aggro decks that are not interactive. We may see an Affinity deck crack the top 8, but I doubt it.
Decks like Bloom Titan are extremely hard to pilot and not very forgiving. You miss a trigger on turn 3 and you lose turn 5 because of it and usually you dont realize it till you see the replay or someone tells you. 2 days and double digit rounds, is going to be very difficult to pilot this deck to top positions.
As for predictions, I think we see some new builds of past decks. When I say past decks I am talking decks like Bant, UWR control and midrange, Grixis, rebuilt Delver, and possibly Esper. I think the pros are going to see if this is the meta for control.
My top 8, no specific order.
1-URW control
1-Junk/BG rock
1-Bant (traditional build or conscription)
1-URW midrange
1-UW control
1-Scapeshift
1-Zoo
1-Tron deck
You do realize Sultai Midrange is basically non-existent right?
U Tron
GW Bogles
RG Loam
UR Blue Breach
RBU Grixis Goryo
BRU Grixis Delver
GBR Jund
GBW Junk
Active Legacy Decks
BR Reanimator
Standard
UB UB Midrange UB
Modern
GRWUBTribal Flames ZooGRWUB
RUGTemur DelverRUG
Legacy
UW Stoneblade UW
The biggest issue for that I can see is that Tron and Amulet Combo are bad matchups. But pretty much every other matchup at the moment is really good.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.