What is the 'White Deck' play style that is missing, and what would it add to the formats depth? This isnt just about a colour (hi Fish) its about an archetype and play style.
This.
The problem is white is that other colors (and colorless) are better at doing white things than white itself is.
Affinity and Merfolk are better weenie decks than white weenie.
Lantern Control is a better prison deck than Ghostly Prison decks/D&T.
White-based control's main problem isn't white (Verdict, Path, Wall of Omens, etc are all strong cards), it's that the mostly commonly paired color (blue) doesn't offer much.
So while white does suck, most of its archetypes are doing well. This lessens some of the sting for fans of white, and means there isn't a giant hole in the metagame where white would normally be.
The second reason people aren't as dire about white in modern is that WotC seems pretty comfortable pushing white cards, even if they're not entirely sure how. I'm pretty confident that one day they'll print a strong fair white card that will make a big splash in modern. TKS could have very easily been a white card, for example.
So, you personally would like to go another year without a tier 1 blue deck.
Sure, this isnt Legacy. This isnt a blue based format. Which I am glad for. Its nice to not have to play blue to be competitive.
I'm not saying that one should have to play blue to be competitive. I am not saying that at all. I am saying that at all times, there should be at least 1 tier 1 deck of each color. Standard and Legacy both manage to do it almost all of the time. Why can't Modern?
Blue mages are looking for blue reactive decks from the past and Wotc has changed hard unconditional counters to 3 mana, sweepers to 5 mana, and banned the majority of deck/hand sculpting spells (or shifted their colors). It would seem Wotc doesnt want a blue reactive deck like the old days. They are doing everything in their power to stop that from happening.
Then why did Wizards explicitly say when they banned Splinter Twin that they banned it because they wanted to improve other blue interactive decks? Wizards clearly thinks that blue interactive decks should have improved since the Twin ban, but they haven't.
Reactive blue players: in your opinion, what is the problem with your decks? And don't just say "we don't have Twin." Let's see if we can dig a little deeper. Is it an inability to close out games quickly? An inability to find answers? Weak answers? All of the above and, if so, what extent for each explanation?
As the card pool grows bigger and bigger, there is one way blue based Control decks will become Tier 1 again.
- Have a good win con. Nahiri, The Harbinger was kind of there, but not exactly what was needed. I don't know if Splinter Twin is on WOTC's books, but those decks need something like that. So, we either hope a new print help those decks by accident(a better Nahiri), or they design a good control finisher(something good with flash I suppose), or they unban Twin. That's the way I see it. I prefer the second way, but not gonna happen.
We certainly need some generous unbans, but Preordain is not coming IMO(decks like Cheerios and other will get what they want), and Jace, The Mind Sculptor won't help. It's easy to just ignore it and win if you are either a big mana deck or an aggro deck. Stoneforge Mystic is off the books as well, because it straight up helps a deck that's a true Tier 1 deck the most(Junk).
Atm, all cards in the banlist except Splinter Twin (maybe GSZ as well but thats a different beast) are a no go for Wizards the way I see it.
I really am not concerned about Preordain helping Cheerios or Storm. Both of those decks completely rely on keeping a creature that dies to every removal spell in the format alive for more than a turn while having at most 2 protection spells. There is no way that either of those decks could stay on top for long.
You make a good point in that those decks are interactable. But my gut says they won't unban Preordain right after banning Gitaxian Probe. Yes, the former does not eliminate the ability to bluff from the entire format, but I feel Sam Stoddart thinks Serum Visions is the Modern's signature catrip(he speaks of the card highly). Also, I feel they don't want to "risk" it with Preordain. They fear making a linear format, that's why.
I also doubt that they will unban Preordain this soon, but I think they will do it within the next year if interactive blue decks continue to suffer.
Lots of interesting ideas here. It's very clear, based on this tiny sample and our experience out of the thread, that the Modern community is very divided on this issue. Most people do agree blue isn't in a great spot, but not everyone agrees and not everyone agrees about the extent to which blue is struggling. Most people want to see more unbans, but many still want to see bans and no one agrees on either the specific unbans or the specific bans themselves. As bocephus often says, Wizards can't please everyone, and the thread disagreements are a great microcosm of the broader Modern community in illustrating why Wizards can't please everyone: many players want different things!
In situations like this, I try to table the opinions and start with the hard numbers. Or, at least, to the hard numbers we have publicly available. Looking at those numbers, reactive blue ("blue") really is struggling more than it was during the Twin era, and much more than it was even during May, June, and July of 2016 when Jeskai Nahiri looked like it might save the strategy. Unfortunately, it's been downhill since then with no Tier 1 reactive blue decks in more than 6 months. It's the first time this has happened in years, and is clearly not what Wizards intended when they banned Twin in part to open up the metagame to other URx strategies.
In essence, this suggests blue really isn't where Wizards wanted it to be, and that blue is objective underperforming relative to previous eras of Modern. This doesn't solve whether or not we need unbans or bans, but it should suggest that those who really have identified a problem are on the mark. I know that some users might counter with arguments to the effect of "well, Wizards ultimately decides if something is a problem or not, so it doesn't matter what we think here." That's not a very good argument. By that logic, there was no problem with Eldrazi Winter, TC/DTT Winter, DRS Jund, etc. because Wizards hadn't acted until the end of those imbalanced Modern seasons. Obviously, it's okay for us to identify the problem to predict what Wizards will do, as we correctly did in numerous other time frames.
Based on this, I suspect Wizards will unban something rather than ban something. A back to back banning is very unlikely. But a ban followed by an unban literally happened last year under the same circumstances. Indeed, at the time, Wizards acted to improve blue with significantly less data than they have now.
Given that Wizards' unbanning process is mostly intuition and a bit of MTGO testing in a closed and small N environment, I suspect JTMS or SFM would be likelier than Preordain or Twin. Preordain is unlikely to pass the intuition check of "does this make combo too powerful." Wizards is petrified of blue-based combo, and Preordain seems to trip on that too much (even if I think those fears are unwarranted). JTMS, however, succeeds on all their testing metrics. It doesn't go into top-tier decks, it would look pretty reasonable in a small testing environment, and it goes exclusively in grindier blue decks. SFM passes similar scrutiny but there's always the Abzan issue; I have no idea how Wizards will process that. All told, I'm preliminarily guessing at either an SFM or JTMS unban between now and July.
As far as I can tell, Wizards is fine with combos that die to Bolt, Path, and Push. I'm not sure if Preordain would be enough for Storm to return to playing Pyromancer's Ascension, but I don't think Wizards is that afraid of a decks like Storm and Cheerios as long as they rely entirely on creatures that die to every removal spell in the format.
My theory is that WOTC wants blue control to have answers that you need to build around. Blatant responses like counterspell just wont cut it. Twin didnt make blue better, more than twin pieces happened to be red and blue. Twin could make any color better because it was a consistent combo. I refuse to believe that blue control only works in a combo core.
Counterspells like Deprive, Stubborn Denial, Disrupting Shoal, Logic Knot, etc... all "hard" counter spells, which is exactly what control wants to do. But you need to build around them. WOTC will never, in my opinion, want a deck that can splash blue because there was a catch-all counterspell at their disposal.
And I want to repeat again: I refuse to believe that blue control needs Twin unbanned, for it to be a thing.
Its like ex-pod players complaining that creature toolbox decks are impossible without Birthing Pod.
I actually find the ex-pod crowd to have taken the pod banning much better than the twin crowd. We have plenty of toolbox decks at our disposal, and you can choose to be combo, or midrange. Up to you.
What decks would splash blue for Counterspell? BGx Midrange and Death's Shadow work better with discard than countermagic and Affinity, Burn, Tron, Eldrazi, etc. aren't going to play any interaction like that.
Let me retweet some of Saheen Soorani Tweets (Link HERE)
Shaheen Soorani
Big_Z_MTG yes...I just don't want to accept it without constantly pressuring wotc to unban the necessary cards to revive an archetype
Shaheen Soorani
Big_Z_MTG I look through the lens of format health. Legacy and Standard have each archetype represented. Modern is an absolute train wreck(meaning no Control representation)
Saheen Soorani
You think Grixis Control or any control is flexible currently? Record wise maybe, 9-6, 11-4, 10-5
fffreakmtg Big_Z_MTG Corey_Burkhart haha come on brad. You are formally stating control is a viable archetype to win modern events?
Here is what I think: Saheen Shoorani is a man who loves Controls and wants to have a viable, competitive Control deck that won't give him 11-4 at best or 9-6 at worse. He does not and so he thinks the format is frustrating for not letting him play his favourite kind of deck and for not having a blue based control deck that's capable of winning events.
Even if he is a little bit extreme in his opinions, I agree with him. Blue based Control is NOT playable in Modern. Blue based Control deck CAN NOT WIN Modern events(like Twin used to per say).
Seeing Kai Budde try to describe Jund as control is just painful.
Lets be honest, from what I'm hearing, do you guys really REALLY want modern to be like Legacy where Blue Reigns supreme and due to all the countering, no other color combination is viable unless they're running some sort of blue deck?
No, but I would like there to be at least 1 tier 1 blue deck.
Lets be honest, from what I'm hearing, do you guys really REALLY want modern to be like Legacy where Blue Reigns supreme and due to all the countering, no other color combination is viable unless they're running some sort of blue deck?
No, not at all. One competitive Tier 1 blue deck is not too much to ask for.
But having a tier 1 white deck IS to much to ask for? Every time white is brought up people say BUT BUT ABZAN!!!!! even tho that is a GB deck. The bias is real.
I'd personally be fine if the one tier 1 blue deck was Sultai. The difference between blue and white is that white at least has a role as the third color in a top tier interactive deck while blue sees no play in any of the top tier interactive decks. However, I do agree that white needs more help. The problem is that with the exception of Stoneforge Mystic, there isn't really anything that could be unbanned to make white better.
Yeah man. That's what I'm describing honestly. In fact what I'm describing would be MUCH better than Twin, and you see all the love I have for Twin.
I'm often wrong, I hope I'm wrong. But it's been some weeks of watching the deck, talking about it, thinking about it a lot, and the thing is brutally good.
Consider that you are using ghash77's data and that it may be skewed. Not only because he's a really good player, but also, and more importantly, because the sample size of 5 matches is just too small. As a counterpoint, Corey said he has a great win % against it with Grixis, which also matches my personal experience. We basically need a lot more data to say anything conclusive for the meta as a whole. Also, we saw Merfolk go 1-1 in matches and 3-2 in games against it, which may suggest the matchup is even to good for Merfolk. Which would also explain the sudden online comeback of Merfolk these last few days.
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Modern:WU WU Control | WBG Abzan Company Frontier:UBR Grixis Control | BRG Jund Delirium
If Wizards is not going to give us back Twin, then give us better blue tools.
If Wizards is not going to give us better blue tools, then give us back Twin.
It's really that simple. We've had more than a year since the banning of Twin, which was supposed to help other blue decks, and yet, they are no better than they were (many are actually worse). If the reason Twin has to stay banned is so they can release better blue cards... well... DO IT ALREADY. If not, then give us back Twin. By all accounts and justifications, their Twin ban has failed, and above are the only two options they have based on the statements they made about wanting to keep blue reactive decks competitive.
This thread is unusually reactionary and alarmist following the GP results. Are we really at the point where any new breakout deck or strong result is going to immediately lead to ban talk? I guess we were there already, but it's still distressing to confront it after what feels like every GP. Since the GP, I've seen ban suggestions for Goyf, Shadow, Traverse, Chalice, and the usual suspects like SSG and various ramp lands. Maybe we should wait and see how the metagame adopts the new strategy instead of instantly reverting to ban mania mentality.
About the only good conclusion we can draw is that blue decks need help. We should be talking about Preordain, JTMS, and other options instead of fretting about a deck with literally one GP under its belt,
Can we unban Chrome Mox? Which decks would even use it?
If you just need one more free mana to do something busted that turn, Simian Spirit Guide is better because it requires only itself and not another card.
Mox is better if you want an extra mana for multiple turns, which makes me think Control would use it over any sort of combo decks although I'm sure there will also be combo that uses it.
I don't know what you refer to with the sample size of 5 matches. I've watched around 300 games of the deck, GHash770s's sample is higher. Now, 2 matches vs Merfolk or any deck can't indicate anything at all, that much is certain.
About how the sample could be skewed by the pilot's quality, there's always a chance of that being relevant, yes. Also, people being less prepared against it, both at the deck-building level and at the gameplay level.
I think you posted here or Twitter that ghash77 was 4-1 against Grixis Control, so that's where the 5 match sample size comes from. I was just discussing this specific matchup, which is why I also mentioned Corey's experience in the matchup, as well as mine. If I'm wrong, then it's my bad. Also, just went to the Merfolk thread and it seems Shadow indeed has trouble with the deck. My point is that while the deck is indeed pretty good, it probably has more bad matchups than just Abzan Midrange, so I'm not worried about it oppressing the format or being banned. For now, at least.
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Maybe we should wait and see how the metagame adopts the new strategy instead of instantly reverting to ban mania mentality.
When Wizards shows us a general "salt the earth" policy towards both Modern AND Standard, banning multiple cards out of multiple decks, what other reaction do we expect? It makes matters worse that one of the decks targeted for ban (DSZ) is not only relatively unscathed, but doing great! Decks like Infect and Delver have fallen off considerably, but Death's Shadow is better than ever. Dredge even did well, despite a ban! The only conclusion players might be able to draw is that they wanted to target these kinds of decks, made the wrong choice in ban target, and now will get hit again. This has happened before in their banning history and is a reflection of their poor methods and "gut feeling" judgement calls they use to manage the format's banned list. They are a joke and their decisions promote ban-mania.
it seems people have forgotten that other non-twin blue decks had a lot of game against twin. they were merely average at best against the rest of the field. you take away their biggest source of food, and the other decks (which were kept in check by twin) crushed the non-twin blue decks. wizards really screwed up the equilibrium of the uxx axis of modern.
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I speak in sarcasm because calling people ******* ******** is not allowed.
it seems people have forgotten that other non-twin blue decks had a lot of game against twin. they were merely average at best against the rest of the field. you take away their biggest source of food, and the other decks (which were kept in check by twin) crushed the non-twin blue decks. wizards really screwed up the equilibrium of the uxx axis of modern.
I've made that point multiple times. It is often dismissed or ignored. But I fully agree this has been one (of many) contributing factors to the low level of competitive success in other blue decks.
I laughed at everyone that was pumping up fatal push so hard and how it helps grixis/esper. Then you see the best grixis player play 0 copies and try for a logic knot instead. On top of that you see the death shadow deck run rampant despite the printing of push (and you don't even need to revolt it)!
I think we saw an interesting phenomena this weekend with respect to the Fatal Push dynamic. With the abundance of Eldrazi, Fatal Push had some binary matchups - it either did nothing or was a key card. Early in the event, we saw Eldrazi decks keep Fatal push decks down. Later in the event, this allowed Death's Shadow decks to dodge their bad matchup and take advantage of the field of tons of tron/eldrazi. If anything, Fatal Push was a card that had a notable effect on the tournament, which was exploited by the best players at that event.
Level 1: "If everyone is on fatal push, I'll be on Eldrazi/tron."
Level 2: "If all the push decks are losing to Eldrazi/tron, I'll be on Death's Shadow"
As far as I understood it, anyways.
Well the ds decks had to play the early rounds too. And chalice/ballista equipped isn't bad vs ds. I don't think the reason to play ds was eldrazi tron, the reason was it's better vs everything despite push being a card.
I know that this will likely never happen, but I'm starting to think that Dig Through Time might be the best choice for an unban. It would make blue-based Tempo and Control decks tier 1 again, but it wouldn't fit into Cheerios, Infect, Dredge, or Grishoalbrand and it wouldn't solve Storm's current problem of relying on keeping creatures that die to every removal spell in the format in play. What exactly are the reasons to not unban Dig Through Time?
Death's Shadow is great news for the format. It's what we need and a great deck to have/watch.
The problem lies elsewhere to be honest though. It's a Thoughtseize + inquisition of kozilek + Tarmogoyf format if you want to play fair and super interactive. This has to change. Blue decks need serious help.
From what I can see the whole thread minus Bocephus plus 1 or 2 more posts I feel they thrive on hyperbole agree that U based Control/attrition decks need help.
So, does WOTC know the issue? Do we have any answers/indications to that? They should, because the previous time URx was struggling, they have Ancestral Vision to the format for this specific reason.
Well, on a completely different note: We all got what we wanted guys! They reprinted Domri Rade in Modern Masters 2017! That leaves one slot left for a walker reprint that we actually need and given it likely has to be from innistrad we got a russian roulette as to what it is going to be. I thought for sure they would cram value into this set and especially the walkers, but given they reprinted Domri I'm starting to have a bad feeling about this.
Come on good luck tree sapling, we need the power of the gods right now channelling through you for this MM2017. And if anyone is wondering what I'm talking about I'm actually growing a tree sapling right now for good fortune this coming year. Silly tradition, but I figure I might as well add Modern Masters 2017 onto the wishing card.
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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!
Maybe we should wait and see how the metagame adopts the new strategy instead of instantly reverting to ban mania mentality.
When Wizards shows us a general "salt the earth" policy towards both Modern AND Standard, banning multiple cards out of multiple decks, what other reaction do we expect? It makes matters worse that one of the decks targeted for ban (DSZ) is not only relatively unscathed, but doing great! Decks like Infect and Delver have fallen off considerably, but Death's Shadow is better than ever. Dredge even did well, despite a ban! The only conclusion players might be able to draw is that they wanted to target these kinds of decks, made the wrong choice in ban target, and now will get hit again. This has happened before in their banning history and is a reflection of their poor methods and "gut feeling" judgement calls they use to manage the format's banned list. They are a joke and their decisions promote ban-mania.
To be fair, even if they had tested without Gitaxian Probe, it takes a great or some great minds to find out that the deck should continue on a different axis(going more midrangey). THey would test an all in version of DSZoo and that version would not pass the test and they would be right, so would we.
Now, I agree with the rest of your post in that:
Jund is doing great after the DRS & BBE bans.
Abzan COCO is doing just fine after the Pod ban.
Amulet Titan is still playable.
DSZoo is better than ever(in fact, it did just broke Modern format, mind you, IT WILL BE the best deck and the deck to beat).
Dredge makes double top 8's.
URx decks though, take the suck and that feels bad. It's the only deck they killed.
Wizards: We considered what one would do with the cards from a Splinter Twin deck with Splinter Twin banned. In the case of some Jeskai or Temur, there are very similar decks to build. In other cases, there is Kiki-Jiki as a replacement
They were completely wrong and it feels so bad that the only decks that hurt so much were the reactive and enjoyable decks that create interactive, fun and skill testing games without ever breaking the T4 rule.
(@Valanarch IMO it makes no sense unbanning Preordain right after banning Gitaxian Probe because in their books it's a Turn 4 rule violator piece and a linear combos tool).
Gitaxian Probe was banned for being a turn 4 violator in Infect and Death's Shadow. What would Preordain break the turn 4 rule in? The only 3 fast combo decks left in Modern are Storm and Cheerios, which both are inconsistent and vulnerable to basically every removal spell in the format, and Grishoalbrand, which wouldn't run it.
Preordain isnt free! Is it better dig? Yes, yes it is, but its not Phyrexian, its not instant for End of Turn plays. Its literally a different (better in 99% of cases) Serum Visions, which, if I have to remind everyone, is derided as a terrible card that Blue Modern has to endure, not like.
Storm, right now, is a Turn 3 deck with the double 'Mancer. I've watched it, I've tried to remand it, its great. Preordain is not going to make it 10-25% better, and frankly who cares, 1cmc 5/5's running around this format that improve by 'playing magic'. 2 mana 6/7's with regularity, G for 'find your creature' on turn 2 delirium.
Unban Preordain.
Unban Jace.
You all are afraid or have some clinical issue with Twin? Fine. Standard WILL NOT help Blue, its not part of how they design anymore. Unban, in March, Jace and Preordain.
If thats not enough to have Blue Reactive decks sniff at T8? Then its hopeless.
Wizards: We considered what one would do with the cards from a Splinter Twin deck with Splinter Twin banned. In the case of some Jeskai or Temur, there are very similar decks to build. In other cases, there is Kiki-Jiki as a replacement
They were completely wrong and it feels so bad that the only decks that hurt so much were the reactive and enjoyable decks that create interactive, fun and skill testing games without ever breaking the T4 rule.
Jeskai control with Kiki-Jiki won the Classic. Kiki-Chord is also a strategy that uses Kiki. So, no. I would not say that they were wrong about Kiki being a replacement.
I think they will probably give us back Jace, as its the safest unban right now and no current top tier deck would use him.
If JTMS does get unbanned, what's the consensus? 2 MB / 1 SB? 1 MB/2SB? 0MB/2SB? I'd probably test 2/1 in Esper at first. I doubt we ever get him off the banlist though and I'm not sure how much of an actual upgrade it would be. I'd cut a Gearhulk and a Clique (I play 2 Gearhulk and 2 Clique MB) and see how it goes. The biggest hole though is not having a good universal 2 mana counter imho. Something that's serviceable if not particularly great against aggro decks (unlike leak and sometimes Logic Knot), but real good at all parts of the game against mid-range, combo, and big-mana decks. If we had counterspell the Tron, Valakut, etc. MU's would get a lot better. We wouldn't have to dedicate so many SB slots for those MU's. Caverns is still a big issue, though. Also a 2 mana instant draw 2 would be fantastic (with some hoop to jump through so it wouldn't be perceived as "OP"). If we could get the counter and the 2 mana CA card that'd do way more imho than getting preordain and Jace off the banlist. Though, in the latter's case, I'd be down for unbanning Dig Through Time and giving us a good 2 mana counter through new printing. That would probably be ideal.
Well, on a completely different note: We all got what we wanted guys! They reprinted Domri Rade in Modern Masters 2017! That leaves one slot left for a walker reprint that we actually need and given it likely has to be from innistrad we got a russian roulette as to what it is going to be. I thought for sure they would cram value into this set and especially the walkers, but given they reprinted Domri I'm starting to have a bad feeling about this.
Come on good luck tree sapling, we need the power of the gods right now channelling through you for this MM2017. And if anyone is wondering what I'm talking about I'm actually growing a tree sapling right now for good fortune this coming year. Silly tradition, but I figure I might as well add Modern Masters 2017 onto the wishing card.
What's so surprising about one of the planeswalkers being Domri? While I personally expected Jace, Architect of Thought or Garruk Relentless instead (especially since I was guessing that Huntmaster of the Fells would get reprinted and there is only room for one RG mythic), Domri has seen signficiantly more play in Modern than Sarkhan Vol or Tezzeret the Seeker, both of which have been printed in past Modern Masters sets. There is no reason to believe that Domri being reprinted means that Liliana won't be.
This.
The problem is white is that other colors (and colorless) are better at doing white things than white itself is.
Affinity and Merfolk are better weenie decks than white weenie.
Lantern Control is a better prison deck than Ghostly Prison decks/D&T.
White-based control's main problem isn't white (Verdict, Path, Wall of Omens, etc are all strong cards), it's that the mostly commonly paired color (blue) doesn't offer much.
So while white does suck, most of its archetypes are doing well. This lessens some of the sting for fans of white, and means there isn't a giant hole in the metagame where white would normally be.
The second reason people aren't as dire about white in modern is that WotC seems pretty comfortable pushing white cards, even if they're not entirely sure how. I'm pretty confident that one day they'll print a strong fair white card that will make a big splash in modern. TKS could have very easily been a white card, for example.
I'm not saying that one should have to play blue to be competitive. I am not saying that at all. I am saying that at all times, there should be at least 1 tier 1 deck of each color. Standard and Legacy both manage to do it almost all of the time. Why can't Modern?
Then why did Wizards explicitly say when they banned Splinter Twin that they banned it because they wanted to improve other blue interactive decks? Wizards clearly thinks that blue interactive decks should have improved since the Twin ban, but they haven't.
I also doubt that they will unban Preordain this soon, but I think they will do it within the next year if interactive blue decks continue to suffer.
As far as I can tell, Wizards is fine with combos that die to Bolt, Path, and Push. I'm not sure if Preordain would be enough for Storm to return to playing Pyromancer's Ascension, but I don't think Wizards is that afraid of a decks like Storm and Cheerios as long as they rely entirely on creatures that die to every removal spell in the format.
What decks would splash blue for Counterspell? BGx Midrange and Death's Shadow work better with discard than countermagic and Affinity, Burn, Tron, Eldrazi, etc. aren't going to play any interaction like that.
Seeing Kai Budde try to describe Jund as control is just painful.
No, but I would like there to be at least 1 tier 1 blue deck.
I'd personally be fine if the one tier 1 blue deck was Sultai. The difference between blue and white is that white at least has a role as the third color in a top tier interactive deck while blue sees no play in any of the top tier interactive decks. However, I do agree that white needs more help. The problem is that with the exception of Stoneforge Mystic, there isn't really anything that could be unbanned to make white better.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Frontier: UBR Grixis Control | BRG Jund Delirium
If Wizards is not going to give us back Twin, then give us better blue tools.
If Wizards is not going to give us better blue tools, then give us back Twin.
It's really that simple. We've had more than a year since the banning of Twin, which was supposed to help other blue decks, and yet, they are no better than they were (many are actually worse). If the reason Twin has to stay banned is so they can release better blue cards... well... DO IT ALREADY. If not, then give us back Twin. By all accounts and justifications, their Twin ban has failed, and above are the only two options they have based on the statements they made about wanting to keep blue reactive decks competitive.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Spirits
About the only good conclusion we can draw is that blue decks need help. We should be talking about Preordain, JTMS, and other options instead of fretting about a deck with literally one GP under its belt,
If you just need one more free mana to do something busted that turn, Simian Spirit Guide is better because it requires only itself and not another card.
Mox is better if you want an extra mana for multiple turns, which makes me think Control would use it over any sort of combo decks although I'm sure there will also be combo that uses it.
Basically - why is it still banned?
Frontier: UBR Grixis Control | BRG Jund Delirium
When Wizards shows us a general "salt the earth" policy towards both Modern AND Standard, banning multiple cards out of multiple decks, what other reaction do we expect? It makes matters worse that one of the decks targeted for ban (DSZ) is not only relatively unscathed, but doing great! Decks like Infect and Delver have fallen off considerably, but Death's Shadow is better than ever. Dredge even did well, despite a ban! The only conclusion players might be able to draw is that they wanted to target these kinds of decks, made the wrong choice in ban target, and now will get hit again. This has happened before in their banning history and is a reflection of their poor methods and "gut feeling" judgement calls they use to manage the format's banned list. They are a joke and their decisions promote ban-mania.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I've made that point multiple times. It is often dismissed or ignored. But I fully agree this has been one (of many) contributing factors to the low level of competitive success in other blue decks.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Well the ds decks had to play the early rounds too. And chalice/ballista equipped isn't bad vs ds. I don't think the reason to play ds was eldrazi tron, the reason was it's better vs everything despite push being a card.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
What's wrong with Preordain?
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Come on good luck tree sapling, we need the power of the gods right now channelling through you for this MM2017. And if anyone is wondering what I'm talking about I'm actually growing a tree sapling right now for good fortune this coming year. Silly tradition, but I figure I might as well add Modern Masters 2017 onto the wishing card.
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!
Gitaxian Probe was banned for being a turn 4 violator in Infect and Death's Shadow. What would Preordain break the turn 4 rule in? The only 3 fast combo decks left in Modern are Storm and Cheerios, which both are inconsistent and vulnerable to basically every removal spell in the format, and Grishoalbrand, which wouldn't run it.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Storm, right now, is a Turn 3 deck with the double 'Mancer. I've watched it, I've tried to remand it, its great. Preordain is not going to make it 10-25% better, and frankly who cares, 1cmc 5/5's running around this format that improve by 'playing magic'. 2 mana 6/7's with regularity, G for 'find your creature' on turn 2 delirium.
Unban Preordain.
Unban Jace.
You all are afraid or have some clinical issue with Twin? Fine. Standard WILL NOT help Blue, its not part of how they design anymore. Unban, in March, Jace and Preordain.
If thats not enough to have Blue Reactive decks sniff at T8? Then its hopeless.
Spirits
Jeskai control with Kiki-Jiki won the Classic. Kiki-Chord is also a strategy that uses Kiki. So, no. I would not say that they were wrong about Kiki being a replacement.
I think they will probably give us back Jace, as its the safest unban right now and no current top tier deck would use him.
Its not like Thug vs Troll here.
Spirits
Shadow deck has a lot of glaring weaknesses and talk of bannings is, as it generally is, premature and largely groundless.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
What's so surprising about one of the planeswalkers being Domri? While I personally expected Jace, Architect of Thought or Garruk Relentless instead (especially since I was guessing that Huntmaster of the Fells would get reprinted and there is only room for one RG mythic), Domri has seen signficiantly more play in Modern than Sarkhan Vol or Tezzeret the Seeker, both of which have been printed in past Modern Masters sets. There is no reason to believe that Domri being reprinted means that Liliana won't be.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Spirits