The only thing we have is their word, and it isn't worth much. MaRo, Forsythe and Stoddard are consecrated liars because that's the nature of non-disclosure.
It is possible they have all the tools necessary to test for modern and don't do it because Modern to them is a compromise, not a goal, and they want to spend as little time thinking about it as possible, or that Modern is their absolute favorite baby and they hate not being able to give it what it desserves.
It's also possible they don't give a ***** about it because despite their bull***** about Modern players not buying sealed product, we do buy a *****load of boosters for fun, pool testing and trade fodder.
Either way, you don't know *****, I don't know *****, nobody knows *****, but you keep acting like you're the only one who knows and understands how WotC works from tip to toe and it's getting stale.
I believe logistics was the reason given when they announced they would no longer be testing older formats. It had become too time consuming and took up too much man power. Granted you dont trust the figureheads of the establishment so its probably not worth even continuing this convo. We see this from 2 very different sides and nothing you say is going to sway me, as nothing I say is going to sway you.
I believe logistics was the reason given when they announced they would no longer be testing older formats. It had become too time consuming and took up too much man power. Granted you dont trust the figureheads of the establishment so its probably not worth even continuing this convo. We see this from 2 very different sides and nothing you say is going to sway me, as nothing I say is going to sway you.
Probably because, while they don't outright lie, they tell half-truths or purposely mislead players with with overly-specific technicalities, or overly-vague statements. One of the best recent examples is MaRo telling us that enemy fetchlands wouldn't be in BFZ (which caused all of them to price spike by as much as 100% in less than an hour), and then later revealing that they will be available within BFZ booster packs, but are technically "Zendikar Expeditions."
Do you trust them? I don't. Nothing any of them say should be taken at face value.
Do you really think Wotc will all of a sudden start testing for older formats? Do you understand the money that would take to test all those interactions? Do you understand the time it would take? The man power?
I'm willing to bet you that there are countless Modern players who would volunteer to playtest Modern all day for no pay if it meant getting to use new cards sooner.
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EDH GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG UBRNicol Bolas and his SuperfriendsPawnsUBR
Modern UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW WUBRGHumansWUBRG BGMidrangeBG
Do you really think Wotc will all of a sudden start testing for older formats? Do you understand the money that would take to test all those interactions? Do you understand the time it would take? The man power?
I'm willing to bet you that there are countless Modern players who would volunteer to playtest Modern all day for no pay if it meant getting to use new cards sooner.
Bocephus didn't your supposed local store do EXACTLY THIS? SECRET OLDER FORMAT TESTING? Now you CLAIM that Wizards WOULDN'T do this?
Do you really think Wotc will all of a sudden start testing for older formats? Do you understand the money that would take to test all those interactions? Do you understand the time it would take? The man power?
I'm willing to bet you that there are countless Modern players who would volunteer to playtest Modern all day for no pay if it meant getting to use new cards sooner.
Bocephus didn't your supposed local store do EXACTLY THIS? SECRET OLDER FORMAT TESTING? Now you CLAIM that Wizards WOULDN'T do this?
You're confusing man.
Testing already printed cards trying to figure out which format they wanted to go with as opposed to letting a certain number of stores/players get information on new sets months, possibly years ahead of time are two very different things.
I would jump at the chance to see whats coming out in a years time so I could invest and speculate with less risk. I doubt Wotc is willing to allow only a certain group of people have that information.
I can understand why you are confused.
Quote from TribalElfMage »
I'm willing to bet you that there are countless Modern players who would volunteer to playtest Modern all day for no pay if it meant getting to use new cards sooner.
The fact you think that is an option makes me laugh. There is no way Wotc will allow regular players access to cards that far in advance to be able to game the market.
I believe logistics was the reason given when they announced they would no longer be testing older formats. It had become too time consuming and took up too much man power. Granted you dont trust the figureheads of the establishment so its probably not worth even continuing this convo. We see this from 2 very different sides and nothing you say is going to sway me, as nothing I say is going to sway you.
Probably because, while they don't outright lie, they tell half-truths or purposely mislead players with with overly-specific technicalities, or overly-vague statements. One of the best recent examples is MaRo telling us that enemy fetchlands wouldn't be in BFZ (which caused all of them to price spike by as much as 100% in less than an hour), and then later revealing that they will be available within BFZ booster packs, but are technically "Zendikar Expeditions."
Do you trust them? I don't. Nothing any of them say should be taken at face value.
You are free to believe what you wish. I dont have a problem with how Wotc does business and I am thinking the majority doesnt or else maybe, just maybe, Wotc would change its ways if the majority of the player base felt the way you do.
I believe logistics was the reason given when they announced they would no longer be testing older formats. It had become too time consuming and took up too much man power. Granted you dont trust the figureheads of the establishment so its probably not worth even continuing this convo. We see this from 2 very different sides and nothing you say is going to sway me, as nothing I say is going to sway you.
Probably because, while they don't outright lie, they tell half-truths or purposely mislead players with with overly-specific technicalities, or overly-vague statements. One of the best recent examples is MaRo telling us that enemy fetchlands wouldn't be in BFZ (which caused all of them to price spike by as much as 100% in less than an hour), and then later revealing that they will be available within BFZ booster packs, but are technically "Zendikar Expeditions."
Do you trust them? I don't. Nothing any of them say should be taken at face value.
To be honest most people are indifferent unless WoTC creates an unmitigated disaster or something. The modern community is probably the most vocal and divided amongst itself out of the majority of formats, but the standard community is probably the primary group that gets their attention. It has the largest mix of players in it going from casual to competitive, while modern has a great many more competitive players and also tends to put more money in the secondary market. That has been my own experience at least in my area since the game store is located near two major high schools, so a lot of the players are younger ones. The other shop that's a bit further away has more 25+ year old gents coming in and is a bit more divided between EDH and modern.
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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!
I believe logistics was the reason given when they announced they would no longer be testing older formats. It had become too time consuming and took up too much man power. Granted you dont trust the figureheads of the establishment so its probably not worth even continuing this convo. We see this from 2 very different sides and nothing you say is going to sway me, as nothing I say is going to sway you.
Probably because, while they don't outright lie, they tell half-truths or purposely mislead players with with overly-specific technicalities, or overly-vague statements. One of the best recent examples is MaRo telling us that enemy fetchlands wouldn't be in BFZ (which caused all of them to price spike by as much as 100% in less than an hour), and then later revealing that they will be available within BFZ booster packs, but are technically "Zendikar Expeditions."
Do you trust them? I don't. Nothing any of them say should be taken at face value.
I believe logistics was the reason given when they announced they would no longer be testing older formats. It had become too time consuming and took up too much man power. Granted you dont trust the figureheads of the establishment so its probably not worth even continuing this convo. We see this from 2 very different sides and nothing you say is going to sway me, as nothing I say is going to sway you.
Probably because, while they don't outright lie, they tell half-truths or purposely mislead players with with overly-specific technicalities, or overly-vague statements. One of the best recent examples is MaRo telling us that enemy fetchlands wouldn't be in BFZ (which caused all of them to price spike by as much as 100% in less than an hour), and then later revealing that they will be available within BFZ booster packs, but are technically "Zendikar Expeditions."
Do you trust them? I don't. Nothing any of them say should be taken at face value.
Yep, it definitely is their business, but some people are scared that the direction that Hasbro is moving toward is short term profits at the cost of long term profits. Or maybe it is in their best interest to only do a format for so long until it is canned for another one?
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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)
PT OGW was a disgusting train wreck, twitch hates Eldrazi, Eldrazi, Eldrazi, Eldrazi, Eldrazi.
Granted, twitch hated twin too, but I never read these kinds of complaints on SCG Legacy streams or the Eternal Weekend stream. Legacy not being entertaining to watch is all in your head, and you don't know what WotC wants from it's formats either.
Yet we have heard multiple times by multiple people in Wotc that they need to shake up Modern for the pro tours due to staleness. SO either the player base is wrong or Wotc is wrong. The thing is, its Wotc's game and they can do as they wish.
You misunderstand the PT. The challenge of the PT isn't in playing the games, most people on the PT are fairly close in play skill (some are better than others of course). The challenge in the PT is in figuring out what deck everyone else is going to play, and then picking a deck with good matchup's, and a well tuned sideboard.
In a format like Modern where everything is a known quantity, that is trivial to do, which in turn drastically reduces the challenge of the PT. As a result, Wizards is using shakeup bans in order to preserve some of the tournaments challenge.
Yep, it definitely is their business, but some people are scared that the direction that Hasbro is moving toward is short term profits at the cost of long term profits. Or maybe it is in their best interest to only do a format for so long until it is canned for another one?
Yeah, but short term money always means long term pains.
In any case I think that is not their biggest issue with Modern. I think they need to take a long hard look at their decision making with regards to this format. Between the bans they needed to do, they ones they did not and the ones nobody knows are needed or not, they created a mess. A rotating mess. Standard has got much smoother rotations than modern, the reason being simply that the rules are well known and people prepare adequately for it. In Modern there do not seem to be any strict rules, only vague concepts which make some of their decisions even more bizarre to fathom. I think this is particularly serious from a player's perspective since, as much as you can pretend otherwise, nobody really knows what will happen in the future. After the Twin thing, who the heck can guess what deck is going to be obliterated for the next PT? How do you prepare for that? You don't. Chaos ensues and from chaos sometimes good things emerge, sometimes Eldrazi decks emerge. And the cycle re-starts. Until they actually clarify what they want this format to be and what are their plans for the future, quite honestly, it will be a lottery since you have no way to guess their decision making, nor a way to prepare for the future. Its a short term format, actually even shorter than Standard as this Eldrazi debacle will prove.
After the Twin thing, who the heck can guess what deck is going to be obliterated for the next PT? How do you prepare for that? You don't. Chaos ensues and from chaos sometimes good things emerge, sometimes Eldrazi decks emerge.
Sorry, but this is really far of the mark IMO. With just the summer bloom ban before the PT we would have been in exactly the same mess. The Eldrazi issue has nothing to do with the Twin ban.
After the Twin thing, who the heck can guess what deck is going to be obliterated for the next PT? How do you prepare for that? You don't. Chaos ensues and from chaos sometimes good things emerge, sometimes Eldrazi decks emerge.
Sorry, but this is really far of the mark IMO. With just the summer bloom ban before the PT we would have been in exactly the same mess. The Eldrazi issue has nothing to do with the Twin ban.
Neither did I say it was. It you want my argument broken down , it goes like this:
- Twin ban showed a degree of arbitrary randomness
- This randomness makes it highly unknown what the future decision making process is
- From these voids created by random decisions good things may come, or bad things may arise (an example of bad things is this Eldrazi fiasco)
-
After the Twin thing, who the heck can guess what deck is going to be obliterated for the next PT? How do you prepare for that? You don't. Chaos ensues and from chaos sometimes good things emerge, sometimes Eldrazi decks emerge.
Sorry, but this is really far of the mark IMO. With just the summer bloom ban before the PT we would have been in exactly the same mess. The Eldrazi issue has nothing to do with the Twin ban.
Also, the Twin ban was explicitly to pave the way for new decks to appear. It just did not work the way WotC intended, since they got far more than they bargained for.
After the Twin thing, who the heck can guess what deck is going to be obliterated for the next PT? How do you prepare for that? You don't. Chaos ensues and from chaos sometimes good things emerge, sometimes Eldrazi decks emerge.
Sorry, but this is really far of the mark IMO. With just the summer bloom ban before the PT we would have been in exactly the same mess. The Eldrazi issue has nothing to do with the Twin ban.
Also, the Twin ban was explicitly to pave the way for new decks to appear. It just did not work the way WotC intended, since they got far more than they bargained for.
It didn't work (yet) but it might work out after Eldrazi gets banned and makes room for many other decks.
Well, at best, it will make room (if we compare with the pre-ban scenario) for 15% of new decks. If that will be new decks, or existing decks occupying a now empty space, nobody knows. Again, we are back to the series of unknowns and leaps into the dark (lottery) that their management of the format has created.
Sorry, but this is really far of the mark IMO. With just the summer bloom ban before the PT we would have been in exactly the same mess. The Eldrazi issue has nothing to do with the Twin ban.
Also, the Twin ban was explicitly to pave the way for new decks to appear. It just did not work the way WotC intended, since they got far more than they bargained for.
It didn't work (yet) but it might work out after Eldrazi gets banned and makes room for many other decks.
Well, at best, it will make room (if we compare with the pre-ban scenario) for 15% of new decks. If that will be new decks, or existing decks occupying a now empty space, nobody knows. Again, we are back to the series of unknowns and leaps into the dark (lottery) that their management of the format has created.
Of course we are yet to see what will happen but there are options, if nothing other we will be back to pre Eldrazi meta which is already something since it allows many other decks (mostly fair) to come back and put up some fight because in this metagame full of Eldrazi you basically have to play Eldrazi or someother linear deck or you're just beating a dead horse.
See, that is the issue and the gist of what I have been arguing. Forsythe yesterday argued that they want to keep the deck around in a nerfed form. What form this takes, its anybody's guess. What result this will have is also highly unknown, so to say we will be rid of the Eldrazi is not correct. The consequences of whatever form this residue of Eldrazi takes and its impact will be yet another variable they will be introducing. They keep introducing new elements, but do not introduce any elements that could provide generic answers to these new variables. This locks the format into a series of ban and bust cycles.
PT OGW was a disgusting train wreck, twitch hates Eldrazi, Eldrazi, Eldrazi, Eldrazi, Eldrazi.
Granted, twitch hated twin too, but I never read these kinds of complaints on SCG Legacy streams or the Eternal Weekend stream. Legacy not being entertaining to watch is all in your head, and you don't know what WotC wants from it's formats either.
Yet we have heard multiple times by multiple people in Wotc that they need to shake up Modern for the pro tours due to staleness. SO either the player base is wrong or Wotc is wrong. The thing is, its Wotc's game and they can do as they wish.
You misunderstand the PT. The challenge of the PT isn't in playing the games, most people on the PT are fairly close in play skill (some are better than others of course). The challenge in the PT is in figuring out what deck everyone else is going to play, and then picking a deck with good matchup's, and a well tuned sideboard.
In a format like Modern where everything is a known quantity, that is trivial to do, which in turn drastically reduces the challenge of the PT. As a result, Wizards is using shakeup bans in order to preserve some of the tournaments challenge.
A solved format is not TV friendly. After listening to Lapilles interview 9 months prior to the ban of Twin, and the Tweets and such from Maro and AF, Wotc desires a format that is exciting and fun to watch as well as play. It seems they are trying to shape the game to be TV friendly. A lot of games have been changed in the past due to TV. Granted the Eldrazi kind of ruined what they were trying to do by removing Twin. Wotc didnt want to see Twin vs. <insert deck here> for 2 days.
Yes I understand the Eldrazi did just that, but Twin wouldnt have solved anything that Eldrazi brought. It was a perfect storm of banning and cards entering that did exactly the same thing that Wotc was trying to avoid.
I also disagree about the skill level at PTs and GPs. There is a reason we see the same names for the most part in the top 64 or so spots in these events. There is a group of players heads and shoulders abouve the thousands of others vying to just money in these events. Mixing up the meta gives those lower skilled players a better chance to catch to better skilled players off guard. Wotc has to show newer players they can win at events like these.
In short, the 'shake up' is for TV and to level the playing field to an extent.
Then they are going at it the wrong way, bring in a couple of celebrity guests and some semi-clad ladies rolling the dice and you would be in for a TV show that would have a ton more audience... and you could still leave Twin in.
Heck, if the semi-clad ladies did the deck shuffling even eggs would be welcomed.
Yes I understand the Eldrazi did just that, but Twin wouldnt have solved anything that Eldrazi brought. It was a perfect storm of banning and cards entering that did exactly the same thing that Wotc was trying to avoid.
What deck won the GP in Detroit? And what has been the next best deck behind Affinity during Eldrazi winter? Abzan Company. Seems like a creature-based infinite combo does pretty decent against Eldrazi. I could imagine one playing counterspells and kill spells doing pretty well too. Shame we can't run those in blue anymore.
Yes I understand the Eldrazi did just that, but Twin wouldnt have solved anything that Eldrazi brought. It was a perfect storm of banning and cards entering that did exactly the same thing that Wotc was trying to avoid.
What deck won the GP in Detroit? And what has been the next best deck behind Affinity during Eldrazi winter? Abzan Company. Seems like a creature-based infinite combo does pretty decent against Eldrazi. I could imagine one playing counterspells and kill spells doing pretty well too. Shame we can't run those in blue anymore.
One card does not nullify a deck. The attitude that the deck is dead because you dont agree with something does. No one has even tried because they have new play toys in the form of the Eldrazi.
In short Twin is still playable with Kiki. Instead of crying about a card being banned, think about what if the card had never been printed.
Quote from jmlima »
Then they are going at it the wrong way, bring in a couple of celebrity guests and some semi-clad ladies rolling the dice and you would be in for a TV show that would have a ton more audience... and you could still leave Twin in.
Heck, if the semi-clad ladies did the deck shuffling even eggs would be welcomed.
Wrong crowd. Wotc needs younger players into the game and more women. What you suggest is for the late teen early male adult.
Nobody tried because it was disrupt able enough before, and is now far worse. Why bother playing T2/T3 anything if you can pick up something else thats Tier 1?
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I believe logistics was the reason given when they announced they would no longer be testing older formats. It had become too time consuming and took up too much man power. Granted you dont trust the figureheads of the establishment so its probably not worth even continuing this convo. We see this from 2 very different sides and nothing you say is going to sway me, as nothing I say is going to sway you.
Probably because, while they don't outright lie, they tell half-truths or purposely mislead players with with overly-specific technicalities, or overly-vague statements. One of the best recent examples is MaRo telling us that enemy fetchlands wouldn't be in BFZ (which caused all of them to price spike by as much as 100% in less than an hour), and then later revealing that they will be available within BFZ booster packs, but are technically "Zendikar Expeditions."
Do you trust them? I don't. Nothing any of them say should be taken at face value.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I'm willing to bet you that there are countless Modern players who would volunteer to playtest Modern all day for no pay if it meant getting to use new cards sooner.
GWSelvala and the Return to HumanityGW
UWDragonlord Ojutai, Control's Elder DragonUW
UBGTasigur, the God-Pharaoh's Gift to EDHUBG
UBRNicol Bolas and his Super
friendsPawnsUBRModern
UWUW Control/Midrange/Bad JundUW
WUBRGHumansWUBRG
BGMidrangeBG
Bocephus didn't your supposed local store do EXACTLY THIS? SECRET OLDER FORMAT TESTING? Now you CLAIM that Wizards WOULDN'T do this?
You're confusing man.
Testing already printed cards trying to figure out which format they wanted to go with as opposed to letting a certain number of stores/players get information on new sets months, possibly years ahead of time are two very different things.
I would jump at the chance to see whats coming out in a years time so I could invest and speculate with less risk. I doubt Wotc is willing to allow only a certain group of people have that information.
I can understand why you are confused.
The fact you think that is an option makes me laugh. There is no way Wotc will allow regular players access to cards that far in advance to be able to game the market.
You are free to believe what you wish. I dont have a problem with how Wotc does business and I am thinking the majority doesnt or else maybe, just maybe, Wotc would change its ways if the majority of the player base felt the way you do.
Don't worry, we all know this.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
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!
Ignore the meat of the post to be snarky.
I learn from the best!
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
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)You misunderstand the PT. The challenge of the PT isn't in playing the games, most people on the PT are fairly close in play skill (some are better than others of course). The challenge in the PT is in figuring out what deck everyone else is going to play, and then picking a deck with good matchup's, and a well tuned sideboard.
In a format like Modern where everything is a known quantity, that is trivial to do, which in turn drastically reduces the challenge of the PT. As a result, Wizards is using shakeup bans in order to preserve some of the tournaments challenge.
Yeah, but short term money always means long term pains.
In any case I think that is not their biggest issue with Modern. I think they need to take a long hard look at their decision making with regards to this format. Between the bans they needed to do, they ones they did not and the ones nobody knows are needed or not, they created a mess. A rotating mess. Standard has got much smoother rotations than modern, the reason being simply that the rules are well known and people prepare adequately for it. In Modern there do not seem to be any strict rules, only vague concepts which make some of their decisions even more bizarre to fathom. I think this is particularly serious from a player's perspective since, as much as you can pretend otherwise, nobody really knows what will happen in the future. After the Twin thing, who the heck can guess what deck is going to be obliterated for the next PT? How do you prepare for that? You don't. Chaos ensues and from chaos sometimes good things emerge, sometimes Eldrazi decks emerge. And the cycle re-starts. Until they actually clarify what they want this format to be and what are their plans for the future, quite honestly, it will be a lottery since you have no way to guess their decision making, nor a way to prepare for the future. Its a short term format, actually even shorter than Standard as this Eldrazi debacle will prove.
Sorry, but this is really far of the mark IMO. With just the summer bloom ban before the PT we would have been in exactly the same mess. The Eldrazi issue has nothing to do with the Twin ban.
Neither did I say it was. It you want my argument broken down , it goes like this:
- Twin ban showed a degree of arbitrary randomness
- This randomness makes it highly unknown what the future decision making process is
- From these voids created by random decisions good things may come, or bad things may arise (an example of bad things is this Eldrazi fiasco)
-
Also, the Twin ban was explicitly to pave the way for new decks to appear. It just did not work the way WotC intended, since they got far more than they bargained for.
Well, at best, it will make room (if we compare with the pre-ban scenario) for 15% of new decks. If that will be new decks, or existing decks occupying a now empty space, nobody knows. Again, we are back to the series of unknowns and leaps into the dark (lottery) that their management of the format has created.
See, that is the issue and the gist of what I have been arguing. Forsythe yesterday argued that they want to keep the deck around in a nerfed form. What form this takes, its anybody's guess. What result this will have is also highly unknown, so to say we will be rid of the Eldrazi is not correct. The consequences of whatever form this residue of Eldrazi takes and its impact will be yet another variable they will be introducing. They keep introducing new elements, but do not introduce any elements that could provide generic answers to these new variables. This locks the format into a series of ban and bust cycles.
A solved format is not TV friendly. After listening to Lapilles interview 9 months prior to the ban of Twin, and the Tweets and such from Maro and AF, Wotc desires a format that is exciting and fun to watch as well as play. It seems they are trying to shape the game to be TV friendly. A lot of games have been changed in the past due to TV. Granted the Eldrazi kind of ruined what they were trying to do by removing Twin. Wotc didnt want to see Twin vs. <insert deck here> for 2 days.
Yes I understand the Eldrazi did just that, but Twin wouldnt have solved anything that Eldrazi brought. It was a perfect storm of banning and cards entering that did exactly the same thing that Wotc was trying to avoid.
I also disagree about the skill level at PTs and GPs. There is a reason we see the same names for the most part in the top 64 or so spots in these events. There is a group of players heads and shoulders abouve the thousands of others vying to just money in these events. Mixing up the meta gives those lower skilled players a better chance to catch to better skilled players off guard. Wotc has to show newer players they can win at events like these.
In short, the 'shake up' is for TV and to level the playing field to an extent.
Then they are going at it the wrong way, bring in a couple of celebrity guests and some semi-clad ladies rolling the dice and you would be in for a TV show that would have a ton more audience... and you could still leave Twin in.
Heck, if the semi-clad ladies did the deck shuffling even eggs would be welcomed.
What deck won the GP in Detroit? And what has been the next best deck behind Affinity during Eldrazi winter? Abzan Company. Seems like a creature-based infinite combo does pretty decent against Eldrazi. I could imagine one playing counterspells and kill spells doing pretty well too. Shame we can't run those in blue anymore.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
One card does not nullify a deck. The attitude that the deck is dead because you dont agree with something does. No one has even tried because they have new play toys in the form of the Eldrazi.
In short Twin is still playable with Kiki. Instead of crying about a card being banned, think about what if the card had never been printed.
Wrong crowd. Wotc needs younger players into the game and more women. What you suggest is for the late teen early male adult.
Spirits