I think SFM should be unbanned and tested before we even think about Jace
Jace just smothers fair decks even more and doesn't help against others. His ban isn't needed right now, and I don't particularly feel sorry for blue players with Grixis being king, and UW/Jeskai having shares in the meta now.
Did anyone read Merriam Ross' article on why he thinks Shadow may need a ban? (he says it's close but not needed yet). It's a premium article so it can't be shared.
I wrote a long response but for some reason the site can't register my post. I was annoyed since I wrote him a long message consisting of this:
Ross, I really disagree with almost everything you wrote here. The top deck (sometimes top three decks) will tend to warp a meta no matter what, that's just how things become, if another deck became the top deck, it'd also evolve into a situation of either playing the best deck, a deck that beats the top deck, or playing some tech that beats those decks.
You talk about the disappearance of midrange decks--but it honesty feels like you're talking about Jund, because Abzan is still reaching a bunch of top 32's in paper/mtgo tournaments. Abzan has primarily been tier 2 minus Fate Reforged and the Grim Flayer popularity.
But look where the meta was going in Brisbane GP after the infect/dredge ban, it was heading towards big mana and linear combo decks, and that's not a meta where jund/junk would have thrived either. E-Tron is definitely the bigger culprit on why Jund has been pushed out, not Shadow.
Even looking on mtggoldfish's top 12 decks, Jund has a bunch of negative matchups or hard earned 50/50 wins, why on earth play that in a large tournament?
You also left out that Jeskai and UW Control are actually good decks in this meta! Blue has been awful in modern since the Twin banning, and now they have a role. While Abzan and Jund lost shares, blue decks gained shares.
DnT is actually a good deck now, which has been a huge issue for white decks not running lingering souls. For once, people can't firmly say, "it's time for an SFM/Preordain unban because those colors are bad".
If you ban Death's Shadow, it's not going to be some great, flourishing format, it'll devolve into a more linear, combo/big mana format. Why haven't you mentioned that Grixis Death shadow is also a police deck?
You're one of THE dredge players, but no offense, 2016 for modern was hot garbage after the Twin ban, the summer of dredge and infect into nearly 2017 was awful; what followed before that wasn't great either with Eldrazi Winter. Blue had anemic results except for that small window where you wrote a hastily written article about how Nahiri needs a ban.
You want to talk about a top deck warping the format, decks were shoving in graveyard hate in the main and playing about 6 graveyard hate cards in the side to beat dredge. Modern became more about variance and sideboard cards, at the same time dredge didn't just push other graveyard decks out of the meta, it obliterated and invalidated a bunch of decks because graveyard hate was that strong and that prevalent
I love your articles and watching your vids on modern---but I really disagree'd on you with this one.
Thanks for the article though, keep up the good work.
Did anyone read Merriam Ross' article on why he thinks Shadow may need a ban? (he says it's close but not needed yet). It's a premium article so it can't be shared.
I wrote a long response but for some reason the site can't register my post. I was annoyed since I wrote him a long message consisting of this,
Ross, I really disagree with almost everything you wrote here. The top deck (sometimes top three decks) will tend to warp a meta no matter what, that's just how things become, if another deck became the top deck, it'd also evolve into a situation of either playing the best deck, a deck that beats the top deck, or playing some tech that beats those decks.
You talk about the disappearance of midrange decks--but it honesty feels like you're talking about Jund, because Abzan is still reaching a bunch of top 32's in paper/mtgo tournaments. Abzan has primarily been tier 2 minus Fate Reforged and the Grim Flayer popularity.
But look where the meta was going in Brisbane GP after the infect/dredge ban, it was heading towards big mana and linear combo decks, and that's not a meta where jund/junk would have thrived either. E-Tron is definitely the bigger culprit on why Jund has been pushed out, not Shadow.
Even looking on mtggoldfish's top 12 decks, Jund has a bunch of negative matchups or hard earned 50/50 wins, why on earth play that in a large tournament?
You also left out that Jeskai and UW Control are actually good decks in this meta! Blue has been awful in modern since the Twin banning, and now they have a role. While Abzan and Jund lost shares, blue decks gained shares.
DnT is actually a good deck now, which has been a huge issue for white decks not running lingering souls. For once, people can't firmly say, "it's time for an SFM/Preordain unban because those colors are bad".
If you ban Death's Shadow, it's not going to be some great, flourishing format, it'll devolve into a more linear, combo/big mana format. Why haven't you mentioned that Grixis Death shadow is also a police deck?
You're one of THE dredge players, but no offense, 2016 for modern was hot garbage after the Twin ban, the summer of dredge and infect into nearly 2017 was awful; what followed before that wasn't great either with Eldrazi Winter. Blue had anemic results except for that small window where you wrote a hastily written article about how Nahiri needs a ban.
You want to talk about a top deck warping the format, decks were shoving in graveyard hate in the main and playing about 6 graveyard hate cards in the side to beat dredge. Modern became more about variance and sideboard cards, at the same time dredge didn't just push other graveyard decks out of the meta, it obliterated and invalidated a bunch of decks because graveyard hate was that strong and that prevalent
I love your articles and watching your vids on modern---but I really disagree'd on you with this one.
Thanks for the article though, keep up the good work.
These are exactly the kinds of problems we will needlessly face moving forward, as we no longer have any reliable and timely meta data. Writers and "pros" will dictate narratives and we have very little to push back with other than words and opinions. Without numbers, credibility will almost always go to the person whose name appears in a big site's article, regardless of whether or not they are correct. This is a much bigger problem than simply discussing whether or not a deck "needs" a ban, as the most common criteria for banning (metagame oppression) is literally impossible to track anymore. It's really a shame because I feel Wizards LOVES this outcome. They would much rather see people not know a meta and bring anything and everything to an event (which leads to massive variance in terms of matchups and possible outcomes), rather than have people carefully study, prepare, and choose specific decks to attack the meta. Under this same veil of secrecy, they can point to the meta and say "things are fine, no need for unbans." It's literally a catch-all answer that leaves us out to dry. Unless we have multiple blowout GPs or the Pro Tour is a complete sham, I see nothing changing for the foreseeable future.
I just thought it was an interesting take from him
He boldly claimed that he thinks Nahiri would be banned (which i'm certain fueled the ban talks here for her)
I also didn't see him writing about dredge needing a ban in 2016, unless I missed that. I was so disgusted with modern and busy moving across the country I dropped MTG for about half a year.
Today LSV had a video on Shadow also saying the deck may be too good for modern
It's frustrating hearing all of this from them. Modern is going to be a sea of linear decks if Grixis shadow disappears.
Grixis Death Shadow is a really difficult deck to pilot
I'll be honest, I don't think I'm a good enough player to fight off all these heavy, removal interactive decks to consistently play the deck well. I also haven't been grinding enough games with it, to be fair.
At my LGS, I was facing hateful decks every week for a month straight and couldn't really do more than 2-2. The same applied for Jund and Junk, everytime I played my favorite deck I remembered, "oh, thats why this deck is bad right now" (more Jund than Junk though).
A month ago I went 3-1 losing to 8Rack (seems miserable), and beating Little Kid Junk (designed to destroy other midrange decks), Esper Control (awful, but he land flooded games 2 and 3), and Bogles (I don't think Bogles is bad though, any input?)
AfterI went 3-1 with that, I got off the deck. It's taking serious hate, even at a local level. I definitely can respect the players winning through all the control and graveyard hate.
E-Tron's been rewarding me more lately, it's easier, proactive and isn't facing concentrated hate, it just needs to dodge Titanshift/AD Naus and win hard earned wins against things like Humans, Affinity, etc.
It's frustrating hearing all of this from them. Modern is going to be a sea of linear decks if Grixis shadow disappears.
I agree completely. Hopefully they have learned from what happened the last time they did this and leave Shadow alone.
Eldrazi, on the other hand... I have a hard time understanding how the format can be healthy with such a black cloud remaining from the worst times in the format's entire history. At least Ancient Tomb deals you damage. I don't think Eldrazi would be so bad if they started at 14-17 like almost every other fetch/shock-based deck in the format. They have the benefit of perfect mana, accelerated mana, with zero life loss or any meaningful drawback.
Eldrazi Tron flat out can't beat combo spell decks that don't rely on the graveyard. It needs the perfect Thought-Knot into Smasher curve to compete.
E-Tron also commonly does nothing for 2 turns, or can lose tempo playing a turn 3 Matter Reshaper. It's not quite like RG Tron where it does nothing for 3 or 4 turns and nearly auto-wins with a demoralizing planeswalker/creature.
Been playing the deck a ton, the turn 2 thought-knot isn't that common. It's not magical christmas land, but it's very uncommon.
I'm not sure the deck would be viable at all if it did a ton of damage to itself, it would only beat fair slow decks and lose to everything else. Mana flood is also extremely real in this deck---like, really really real. Chalice and Relic can also flat out be blank cards game 1
Opening hands are ugly
Honestly, Eldrazi Tron was a garbage deck until Walking Ballista elevated it and Todd Stevens fixed the deck up and decided mindstones and relics is what the deck needed and cut the clunky Ulamogs/Batterskulls.
Looking at the deck on paper, it looks extremely bad, clunky and no synergy, it's actually quite a work of beauty that the deck is good, because the 75 looks ugly and unplayable in a format this fast.
Eldrazi Tron flat out can't beat combo spell decks that don't rely on the graveyard. It needs the perfect Thought-Knot into Smasher curve to compete.
E-Tron also commonly does nothing for 2 turns, or can lose tempo playing a turn 3 Matter Reshaper. It's not quite like RG Tron where it does nothing for 3 or 4 turns and nearly auto-wins with a demoralizing planeswalker/creature.
Been playing the deck a ton, the turn 2 thought-knot isn't that common. It's not magical christmas land, but it's very uncommon.
I'm not sure the deck would be viable at all if it did a ton of damage to itself, it would only beat fair slow decks and lose to everything else. Mana flood is also extremely real in this deck---like, really really real. Chalice and Relic can also flat out be blank cards game 1
Opening hands are ugly
Honestly, Eldrazi Tron was a garbage deck until Walking Ballista elevated it and Todd Stevens fixed the deck up and decided mindstones and relics is what the deck needed and cut the clunky Ulamogs/Batterskulls.
Looking at the deck on paper, it looks extremely bad, clunky and no synergy, it's actually quite a work of beauty that the deck is good, because the 75 looks ugly and unplayable in a format this fast.
What I'm interpreting here is that matches can be wildly swingy, with huge variance in outcome depending on the hodge podge of cards you draw and the matchups you face? This is literally the description of what I perceive as the biggest flaw in Modern: match results dependent so highly on luck.
That same luck could be applied to GDS. I actually had a big post written out about GDS, but lost it on a page refresh. Short version is: the deck isn't actually that hard to pilot, IMO, once your role as aggressor/control is fairly clear. From then, it feels mostly out of your hands, relying heavily on opponent's deck, whether or not they have main deck hate for you, whether or not they draw side board hate against you, and whether or not either of you stumble in your draws or land drops in a race. Another great example of many matches decided by pairings boards, dice rolls, and card draws, and another example of skill taking back seat to metagaming and deck choice.
Whether it's the case that Wizards does not like 50/50 decks or that decks with mostly 60/40-40/60 matchups no longer exist because of metagame shifts, it feels that they want to do everything in their power to INCREASE the level of variance in any given match outcome. It creates a better spectacle and is more "exciting." It's why blue filtering is all banned any anything resembling consistency is also banned (or never introduced).
Eldrazi Tron flat out can't beat combo spell decks that don't rely on the graveyard. It needs the perfect Thought-Knot into Smasher curve to compete.
E-Tron also commonly does nothing for 2 turns, or can lose tempo playing a turn 3 Matter Reshaper. It's not quite like RG Tron where it does nothing for 3 or 4 turns and nearly auto-wins with a demoralizing planeswalker/creature.
Been playing the deck a ton, the turn 2 thought-knot isn't that common. It's not magical christmas land, but it's very uncommon.
I'm not sure the deck would be viable at all if it did a ton of damage to itself, it would only beat fair slow decks and lose to everything else. Mana flood is also extremely real in this deck---like, really really real. Chalice and Relic can also flat out be blank cards game 1
Opening hands are ugly
Honestly, Eldrazi Tron was a garbage deck until Walking Ballista elevated it and Todd Stevens fixed the deck up and decided mindstones and relics is what the deck needed and cut the clunky Ulamogs/Batterskulls.
Looking at the deck on paper, it looks extremely bad, clunky and no synergy, it's actually quite a work of beauty that the deck is good, because the 75 looks ugly and unplayable in a format this fast.
What I'm interpreting here is that matches can be wildly swingy, with huge variance in outcome depending on the hodge podge of cards you draw and the matchups you face? This is literally the description of what I perceive as the biggest flaw in Modern: match results dependent so highly on luck.
That same luck could be applied to GDS. I actually had a big post written out about GDS, but lost it on a page refresh. Short version is: the deck isn't actually that hard to pilot, IMO, once your role as aggressor/control is fairly clear. From then, it feels mostly out of your hands, relying heavily on opponent's deck, whether or not they have main deck hate for you, whether or not they draw side board hate against you, and whether or not either of you stumble in your draws or land drops in a race. Another great example of many matches decided by pairings boards, dice rolls, and card draws, and another example of skill taking back seat to metagaming and deck choice.
Whether it's the case that Wizards does not like 50/50 decks or that decks with mostly 60/40-40/60 matchups no longer exist because of metagame shifts, it feels that they want to do everything in their power to INCREASE the level of variance in any given match outcome. It creates a better spectacle and is more "exciting" (just like watching PVDDR win on an opponent punt when he was dead to rights).
That's how Modern is intentionally designed, my win percentage is directly correlated to whether or not I get good pairings or not. The incentives to turn an unwinnable matchup to an even one are not there for me to dedicate the time to figure it out. I'd get more out of being a slave labourer in a third world country picking cotton off a field than figuring out how to turn an extremely unfavorable matchup to a favorable one. I only play Modern when it is PPTQ season and I put the Modern cards down afterwards since I personally don't enjoy that my win percentage is heavily influenced by what you get paired against. Diversity increases variance, you cannot have a format that is both diverse and playskill rewarding at the same time. Which is why players like Owen Turtenwald and PV never top 8 Modern GPs even though they are considered extremely skilled technical players. They actively avoid Modern GPs if they can just because they know the format does not reward their skillset. Also add to the fact that there are significantly more casual players than spikes which means more opportunity to monetize them from twitch views.
Lol at Ross "I love Dredge" Merriam for his article premise. At this point it seems that professional players are nothing different from whiney biased players(much like us) who happen to have a bigger voice than some others, and start lobbying to see changes they want in the format for their personal preferences.
Dredge summer was a disgusting period of Modern. Poor Ross i think now he doesn't have a 90-10 matchup against the whole midrange/control spectrum of decks WHILE having the inability to lose a G1 against those, is making him unhappy. Give me a break.
I can only imagine in my darkest nightmares what Modern would be if Shadow gets banned and nothing else happens. Welcome to 2Ships Passing in the Night: The Gathereing.
I can only imagine in my darkest nightmares what Modern would be if Shadow gets banned and nothing else happens. Welcome to 2Ships Passing in the Night: The Gathereing.
We don't have to imagine, we lived through that period already in 2016 It was book-ended by the banning of GGT and Probe (and I still stand by the opinion that Probe wasn't necessary, and we should have seen the impact of Fatal Push first).
Eldrazi Tron flat out can't beat combo spell decks that don't rely on the graveyard. It needs the perfect Thought-Knot into Smasher curve to compete.
E-Tron also commonly does nothing for 2 turns, or can lose tempo playing a turn 3 Matter Reshaper. It's not quite like RG Tron where it does nothing for 3 or 4 turns and nearly auto-wins with a demoralizing planeswalker/creature.
Been playing the deck a ton, the turn 2 thought-knot isn't that common. It's not magical christmas land, but it's very uncommon.
I'm not sure the deck would be viable at all if it did a ton of damage to itself, it would only beat fair slow decks and lose to everything else. Mana flood is also extremely real in this deck---like, really really real. Chalice and Relic can also flat out be blank cards game 1
Opening hands are ugly
Honestly, Eldrazi Tron was a garbage deck until Walking Ballista elevated it and Todd Stevens fixed the deck up and decided mindstones and relics is what the deck needed and cut the clunky Ulamogs/Batterskulls.
Looking at the deck on paper, it looks extremely bad, clunky and no synergy, it's actually quite a work of beauty that the deck is good, because the 75 looks ugly and unplayable in a format this fast.
What I'm interpreting here is that matches can be wildly swingy, with huge variance in outcome depending on the hodge podge of cards you draw and the matchups you face? This is literally the description of what I perceive as the biggest flaw in Modern: match results dependent so highly on luck.
That same luck could be applied to GDS. I actually had a big post written out about GDS, but lost it on a page refresh. Short version is: the deck isn't actually that hard to pilot, IMO, once your role as aggressor/control is fairly clear. From then, it feels mostly out of your hands, relying heavily on opponent's deck, whether or not they have main deck hate for you, whether or not they draw side board hate against you, and whether or not either of you stumble in your draws or land drops in a race. Another great example of many matches decided by pairings boards, dice rolls, and card draws, and another example of skill taking back seat to metagaming and deck choice.
Whether it's the case that Wizards does not like 50/50 decks or that decks with mostly 60/40-40/60 matchups no longer exist because of metagame shifts, it feels that they want to do everything in their power to INCREASE the level of variance in any given match outcome. It creates a better spectacle and is more "exciting." It's why blue filtering is all banned any anything resembling consistency is also banned (or never introduced).
This statement, I'm sorry, reeks of being spoiled of the manabase possibilities alone. Three, four, and even five color decks are pretty easy thanks to the consistency of fetch + shock.
Blue filtering is banned because they don't want combo to become stupidly consistent, and if that comes at the cost of inconsistency for all decks that is an acceptable consequence to WOTC. We can debate the veracity of that statement, but don't claim its about making the game better as a visual spectacle.
Variance in draws is why we have mulligans and access to some card draw/selection like Serum Visions, Collected Company, and even Tasigur or Snapcaster Mage. Variance is the reason matchups are 60/40 instead of 100/0. Hell, why even play out the game the way you describe the "ideal." We can just swap decklists, look up the matchup % and whoever was favored can fill out the match slip in his or her favor. There's the end of variance.
We can just swap decklists, look up the matchup % and whoever was favored can fill out the match slip in his or her favor. There's the end of variance.
This actually happens on a macro level, which is exactly why we rank decks and their performances rather than players and their performances. It is often better to bring a deck that has highly positive matchups against a predicted meta than bring a deck with mediocre matchups that you are fantastically proficient with because matchups matter more than skill most of the time (unless the matchup difference is +/-10% or so). But even that could be influenced by individual draws, mulligans, etc. While I absolutely love truly intense, back-and-forth, skill-testing games, very few of my matches in Modern actually fit that criteria whatsoever anymore.
I need a question answered if I want to keep participating in the discussion:
define interaction.
Don't define it by the opposite, please. I want to know what qualifies as interaction.
Targeting the opposing Player's Hand, Stack, or Board State, while having the ability to prevent your opponent from doing the same through using Instant's on the Stack.
EDIT: Blossoming Defense is Interaction, Bogles is not.
That's how Modern is intentionally designed, my win percentage is directly correlated to whether or not I get good pairings or not. The incentives to turn an unwinnable matchup to an even one are not there for me to dedicate the time to figure it out. I'd get more out of being a slave labourer in a third world country picking cotton off a field than figuring out how to turn an extremely unfavorable matchup to a favorable one. I only play Modern when it is PPTQ season and I put the Modern cards down afterwards since I personally don't enjoy that my win percentage is heavily influenced by what you get paired against. Diversity increases variance, you cannot have a format that is both diverse and playskill rewarding at the same time. Which is why players like Owen Turtenwald and PV never top 8 Modern GPs even though they are considered extremely skilled technical players. They actively avoid Modern GPs if they can just because they know the format does not reward their skillset. Also add to the fact that there are significantly more casual players than spikes which means more opportunity to monetize them from twitch views.
I have played Modern for 6 years now. I do agree with some of your sentiment about Modern being matchup dependent. It also can't be argued that a diverse format is always going to be tougher to do consistently well in. But I would like to point out some of my personal experience. I have had a 65.4% win percentage in Modern (kavu.ru). This is also despite a lot of scoops to players, especially during GPTs when I already have Byes and just want prizes. I will admit that the places that I play are not the most "spikiest" of places. They don't have Grinder or Pro level competition, but they are no slouches either. Of course, there's always occasionally going to be nearly free wins. But it is not like this too often. I have an over 70% win rate with the most inconsistent Modern deck - Grishoalbrand. And I have a close to 70% win percentage with the 3 other decks I've played the most in Bogles, RUG Scapeshift, and Ascension Storm. I've found success because I'm invested in the format. I'm invested card and deck-wise and emotionally. I would not enjoy formats as a player or for fun without Modern. I hear what you're saying. It takes a lot more playing to get to this level. But I enjoy it. I have played crappy decks, which I fear have made my win percentage go below 70%, and enjoyed myself. My goal now is to slowly get closer to 70%, but it is a work in progress since I've scooped a lot (while not getting as many scoops to me) and played some crappy decks.
I just wanted to share my experience because there are players who are invested greatly in Modern that do pretty well consistently. They could probably do better if they were invested with Standard, but it just doesn't appeal to some people as much.
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)
Jace, the Mind Sculptor being a degenerate card, while a Sol Land, or an Ancient Tomb without you taking damage, but for only a specific type of creatures(and the most powerful in the game) is ok is beyond me!
If JTMS is not fine, then cards like Eldrazi Temple, Simian Spirit Guide, or heck even Collected Company are not fine as well.
Temple is narrow because it only affects Eldrazi. In any other deck it is worthless. SSG is card disadvantage. CoCo is tempo advantage but not degenerate because it is answerable. If I am playing someone who is showing they are playing Green and have 4 mana open, I expect it. Creatures are also the easiest permanent to remove in the game. Most decks that have a problem dealing with CoCo need to pack board wipes. It is just like any other deck. JTMS is almost impossible to deal with unless you remove it the turn it comes out. U has the best support to protect it and if it lives more than 1 turn, you lose the game in a grind. Every deck in the format would need to dedicate hate for it or they lose. The power level of it is backbreaking if left unchecked unlike any of your above mentioned cards.
Yeah like fow, counterspell... oh wait that's legacy. So you can't give examples of how Jace is bad currently but can for the other cards mentioned? Decks need to play more wraths to deal with creatures but Jace is seemingly impossible to deal with? A sol land is narrow because it requires running arguably the best tribe in mtg (guess eye never should have been banned and it was even legendary)? Those aren't good arguments imo of cards power levels.
Jace is answered by burn to the face, having more than 1 creature, combining off before it remotely matters, stripping it out of opponents hand, making opponents sac it, counter it... I don't get how you could argue like it's the best card in the game or even the modern format. Maybe Ds lands a shadow then fames it welp sweet Jace you had. There are plenty of cards to fight Jace just like anything else and decks would adapt.
You act as if U has no answers for creatures? How many JTMS are going to be played in Mono U? None. How many mono U decks are in format? 1.and Fish doesn't want or need it. Any control deck in format is either going to T4 wipe, turn 5 Jace or vise versa. Burn is Jace's worst enemy yes but it is easily countered with life gain and counter support. This is not Legacy where a deck goes off turn 1 and you shrug and keeps a card like JTMS at bay. This is Modern where this as a turn 4/5 play with proper support wins you games.
Blue has basically no answers for creatures, you just proved that. Jace being UU is a real cost to that too. What deck are you wiping and then casting Jace and straight winning against right now? Affinity? Didn't need the Jace there, eldrazi? Assuming the wrath/Jace wasn't hit with tks, Ds? Maybe they start playing claim//fame, Valakut, can't keep them off everything, dredge? Don't think they care about a nonexililing wrath, regular tron? Don't think they care too much, coco, zoo, fish sure I'll give you that but that's fine. I wasn't saying burn as the deck I was just saying a burn spell but yes burn is another deck that won't care too much about Jace. Nothing in t1 currently really will imo. Isn't that what you want in modern a t4/5 threat that you are hoping sticks around to win you the game because if it's not that and not an infinite combo are you just saying control should never have a way to win before they take 25 min in g1(I believe Jace would help this not hurt)? This is why I said we need real proof because your idea of how it plays out and mine are very different.
? For people on here, do you think modern would even be a format if not for the reserve list/price? I ask this because so often price, legacy power level, and just results in other formats are arguments for and against cards. So if everyone had access to legacy do you think people would play modern? Everyone I talk to loves legacy, now I don't play it too much myself because our store only has like 8-12 people and modern have 20+ every night, and tons of things seem viable right now. So would a legacy lite be that bad?
You think a format that has access to 10 Fetches and 10 Shocks/5 Battlelands would not consistently hit UU by turn 4? Heck half the time in Standard UU is very obtainable by turn 4! As far as the wipe/winning comment goes. You used 2 instances where Jace is weak: swarm strategies and fliers. What control player in their right mind drops Jace into a board presence that removes him the following turn? As far as wipes go, JTMS might single-handedly make U/W control t1. JTMS following or followed by Supreme Verdict will win games. GDS still needs creatures on board to win. -1 is as relevant as Brainstorm all while creating tempo and locking players out of a game. U/W or even Esper have RIP to handle Dredge and W has ways to deal with Affinity as well (Stony, Disenchant, etc). Hand disruption is fine against the deck but U can play a counter suite to handle it and protect itself. JTMS being legal eliminates a lot of U's weakness in format and allows anyone playing the color in control to do degenerate things.
Legacy and Reserve List talks don't apply here. The only reason why I brought it us is because of the power level of the Format is higher and the fact of the T4 rule in Modern would make JTMS much much more relevant. The reason why JTMS is perfectly fine in Legacy/Vintage is because there are a lot more answers for him as well as faster decks that win games before JTMS even hits the board.
Its not that UU cannot be reached, of course it can. Its that having colour density becomes an issue the wider apart those colours are.
My Kiki Deck had RR, UUU, UWW and RRR at one point, and I've come around to just giving up on Cryptic because it was too damaging to try and fit that in when I had the W and R costs that are more important.
Ross Merriam article is laughable. Shadow has ushered in a wave of interactive decks, in turn making modern better for competition by helping reward skillful players.
That's how Modern is intentionally designed, my win percentage is directly correlated to whether or not I get good pairings or not. The incentives to turn an unwinnable matchup to an even one are not there for me to dedicate the time to figure it out. I'd get more out of being a slave labourer in a third world country picking cotton off a field than figuring out how to turn an extremely unfavorable matchup to a favorable one. I only play Modern when it is PPTQ season and I put the Modern cards down afterwards since I personally don't enjoy that my win percentage is heavily influenced by what you get paired against. Diversity increases variance, you cannot have a format that is both diverse and playskill rewarding at the same time. Which is why players like Owen Turtenwald and PV never top 8 Modern GPs even though they are considered extremely skilled technical players. They actively avoid Modern GPs if they can just because they know the format does not reward their skillset. Also add to the fact that there are significantly more casual players than spikes which means more opportunity to monetize them from twitch views.
I have played Modern for 6 years now. I do agree with some of your sentiment about Modern being matchup dependent. It also can't be argued that a diverse format is always going to be tougher to do consistently well in. But I would like to point out some of my personal experience. I have had a 65.4% win percentage in Modern (kavu.ru). This is also despite a lot of scoops to players, especially during GPTs when I already have Byes and just want prizes. I will admit that the places that I play are not the most "spikiest" of places. They don't have Grinder or Pro level competition, but they are no slouches either. Of course, there's always occasionally going to be nearly free wins. But it is not like this too often. I have an over 70% win rate with the most inconsistent Modern deck - Grishoalbrand. And I have a close to 70% win percentage with the 3 other decks I've played the most in Bogles, RUG Scapeshift, and Ascension Storm. I've found success because I'm invested in the format. I'm invested card and deck-wise and emotionally. I would not enjoy formats as a player or for fun without Modern. I hear what you're saying. It takes a lot more playing to get to this level. But I enjoy it. I have played crappy decks, which I fear have made my win percentage go below 70%, and enjoyed myself. My goal now is to slowly get closer to 70%, but it is a work in progress since I've scooped a lot (while not getting as many scoops to me) and played some crappy decks.
I just wanted to share my experience because there are players who are invested greatly in Modern that do pretty well consistently. They could probably do better if they were invested with Standard, but it just doesn't appeal to some people as much.
Modern is wide open and diverse, but that's also a double-edged sword. The pro's don't like it because predicting a meta is much more difficult. Standard has like 4 viable decks and the pro's test from there. I do think standard is a skill testing format, but it makes pro's happier because they can spike a tournament with the right testing.
Modern isn't all luck based though, and people running that assertion are wrong, we constantly see big names at the top table in these Opens, GP's and Invitationals; they didn't stumble into the top 32 by luck.
Modern rewards knowledge of the format, knowing your deck inside and out and how your deck needs to sideboard, along with foreseeing if you're the beat down or control.
Modern doesn't have brainstorm, ponder and sylvan library to make games consistent; WOTC intended for variance to be a thing in modern and standard. By no means would I tell Cfusion, "if you dislike variance go play legacy". Legacy isn't available for everyone, but if that fact is true, you truly need to accept that variance is where Magic is going now, and if you don't enjoy the variance aspect, you may want to evaluate if this game is for you at all.
If you want to avoid variance, you should play competitive fighting video games or chess, where you rely solely on your skills.
Ross Merriam article is laughable. Shadow has ushered in a wave of interactive decks, in turn making modern better for competition by helping reward skillful players.
The last part should be "by helping those who choose to attack the meta with a choice of deck that has massive a positive matchup against the most popular deck(s)." Which is again, less about play skill and more about meta-reading and prediction skill (also a skill not easily put into practice without access to multiple decks). Unless I get some amazing opening hands, I might as well sign the slip and go get food if I'm paired with UW or D&T.
Temple is narrow because it only affects Eldrazi. In any other deck it is worthless. SSG is card disadvantage. CoCo is tempo advantage but not degenerate because it is answerable. If I am playing someone who is showing they are playing Green and have 4 mana open, I expect it. Creatures are also the easiest permanent to remove in the game. Most decks that have a problem dealing with CoCo need to pack board wipes. It is just like any other deck. JTMS is almost impossible to deal with unless you remove it the turn it comes out. U has the best support to protect it and if it lives more than 1 turn, you lose the game in a grind. Every deck in the format would need to dedicate hate for it or they lose. The power level of it is backbreaking if left unchecked unlike any of your above mentioned cards.
Yeah like fow, counterspell... oh wait that's legacy. So you can't give examples of how Jace is bad currently but can for the other cards mentioned? Decks need to play more wraths to deal with creatures but Jace is seemingly impossible to deal with? A sol land is narrow because it requires running arguably the best tribe in mtg (guess eye never should have been banned and it was even legendary)? Those aren't good arguments imo of cards power levels.
Jace is answered by burn to the face, having more than 1 creature, combining off before it remotely matters, stripping it out of opponents hand, making opponents sac it, counter it... I don't get how you could argue like it's the best card in the game or even the modern format. Maybe Ds lands a shadow then fames it welp sweet Jace you had. There are plenty of cards to fight Jace just like anything else and decks would adapt.
You act as if U has no answers for creatures? How many JTMS are going to be played in Mono U? None. How many mono U decks are in format? 1.and Fish doesn't want or need it. Any control deck in format is either going to T4 wipe, turn 5 Jace or vise versa. Burn is Jace's worst enemy yes but it is easily countered with life gain and counter support. This is not Legacy where a deck goes off turn 1 and you shrug and keeps a card like JTMS at bay. This is Modern where this as a turn 4/5 play with proper support wins you games.
Blue has basically no answers for creatures, you just proved that. Jace being UU is a real cost to that too. What deck are you wiping and then casting Jace and straight winning against right now? Affinity? Didn't need the Jace there, eldrazi? Assuming the wrath/Jace wasn't hit with tks, Ds? Maybe they start playing claim//fame, Valakut, can't keep them off everything, dredge? Don't think they care about a nonexililing wrath, regular tron? Don't think they care too much, coco, zoo, fish sure I'll give you that but that's fine. I wasn't saying burn as the deck I was just saying a burn spell but yes burn is another deck that won't care too much about Jace. Nothing in t1 currently really will imo. Isn't that what you want in modern a t4/5 threat that you are hoping sticks around to win you the game because if it's not that and not an infinite combo are you just saying control should never have a way to win before they take 25 min in g1(I believe Jace would help this not hurt)? This is why I said we need real proof because your idea of how it plays out and mine are very different.
? For people on here, do you think modern would even be a format if not for the reserve list/price? I ask this because so often price, legacy power level, and just results in other formats are arguments for and against cards. So if everyone had access to legacy do you think people would play modern? Everyone I talk to loves legacy, now I don't play it too much myself because our store only has like 8-12 people and modern have 20+ every night, and tons of things seem viable right now. So would a legacy lite be that bad?
You think a format that has access to 10 Fetches and 10 Shocks/5 Battlelands would not consistently hit UU by turn 4? No I think it's a restraint when also going for ww for wrath effects Heck half the time in Standard UU is very obtainable by turn 4! As far as the wipe/winning comment goes. You used 2 instances where Jace is weak: swarm strategies and fliers.Yes current/actual startegies being played in modern What control player in their right mind drops Jace into a board presence that removes him the following turn? As far as wipes go, JTMS might single-handedly make U/W control t1 Does he though? What do decks look like that play against a jtms meta?. JTMS following or followed by Supreme Verdict will win games.not vs a lot of current decks in modern GDS still needs creatures on board to win.claim//fame as I stated as well as the fact that you hope you still have it after hand disruption -1 is as relevant as Brainstorm all while creating tempo and locking players out of a game. U/W or even Esper have RIP to handle Dredge and W has ways to deal with Affinity as well (Stony, Disenchant, etc). are you saying there are no good sb cards vs jtms? Hand disruption is fine against the deck but U can play a counter suite to handle it and protect itself. JTMS being legal eliminates a lot of U's weakness in format and allows anyone playing the color in control to do degenerate things.the fact that couterspells are still bad isn't eliminated and the whole point would be to help those style decks. Some of the reasons you give are why people want jtms
Legacy and Reserve List talks don't apply here. The only reason why I brought it us is because of the power level of the Format is higher and the fact of the T4 rule in Modern would make JTMS much much more relevant. The reason why JTMS is perfectly fine in Legacy/Vintage is because there are a lot more answers for him as well as faster decks that win games before JTMS even hits the board. I think modern is actually much faster than legacy but ok
Those shadow players are definitely earning those wins, after the meta adjusted free wins stopped happening. Todd Anderson said he bombed with Grixis Shadow for two tournaments in a row before he hit the top 8 in the Invitational. It took him serious grinding and practice as a player at his skill level to become good with the deck
Ross wrote that awful, awful piece on Nahiri needing to be banned last year, which was an atrocious article.
I also didn't see him calling out dredge in the months of August to November. Funny enough, the other big name dredge player, Ben Friedman, has written several times he thinks dredge won't even stay legal now in modern. Whether I agree with that isn't really the point, it's the fact he wasn't afraid to call out the deck he had the most success with, showing a lack of bias.
Remember when we had people defending dredge in this topic? Man, were they wrong or what? I don't think Titanshift playing a 1 of Colossus is particularly warping or detrimental.
Hell, a bunch of fair decks mainly have to play 2 to 3 copies of Ceremonious Rejection just for Tron/Eldrazi decks alone.
Dredge was miserable as the best deck, decks were maining graveyard hate and playing anywhere from 4 to 6 graveyard hate cards in the side just for dredge alone. I was really annoyed he pointed at the disappearance of jund and junk and then totally ignored that blue decks were cropping up as interactive powerhouses.
If decks like UWx decks and DnT are good now because Shadow is warping the meta then sign me up; god forbid we now have to bare decks playing against one another instead of at each other.
Jace just smothers fair decks even more and doesn't help against others. His ban isn't needed right now, and I don't particularly feel sorry for blue players with Grixis being king, and UW/Jeskai having shares in the meta now.
I wrote a long response but for some reason the site can't register my post. I was annoyed since I wrote him a long message consisting of this:
Ross, I really disagree with almost everything you wrote here. The top deck (sometimes top three decks) will tend to warp a meta no matter what, that's just how things become, if another deck became the top deck, it'd also evolve into a situation of either playing the best deck, a deck that beats the top deck, or playing some tech that beats those decks.
You talk about the disappearance of midrange decks--but it honesty feels like you're talking about Jund, because Abzan is still reaching a bunch of top 32's in paper/mtgo tournaments. Abzan has primarily been tier 2 minus Fate Reforged and the Grim Flayer popularity.
But look where the meta was going in Brisbane GP after the infect/dredge ban, it was heading towards big mana and linear combo decks, and that's not a meta where jund/junk would have thrived either. E-Tron is definitely the bigger culprit on why Jund has been pushed out, not Shadow.
Even looking on mtggoldfish's top 12 decks, Jund has a bunch of negative matchups or hard earned 50/50 wins, why on earth play that in a large tournament?
You also left out that Jeskai and UW Control are actually good decks in this meta! Blue has been awful in modern since the Twin banning, and now they have a role. While Abzan and Jund lost shares, blue decks gained shares.
DnT is actually a good deck now, which has been a huge issue for white decks not running lingering souls. For once, people can't firmly say, "it's time for an SFM/Preordain unban because those colors are bad".
If you ban Death's Shadow, it's not going to be some great, flourishing format, it'll devolve into a more linear, combo/big mana format. Why haven't you mentioned that Grixis Death shadow is also a police deck?
You're one of THE dredge players, but no offense, 2016 for modern was hot garbage after the Twin ban, the summer of dredge and infect into nearly 2017 was awful; what followed before that wasn't great either with Eldrazi Winter. Blue had anemic results except for that small window where you wrote a hastily written article about how Nahiri needs a ban.
You want to talk about a top deck warping the format, decks were shoving in graveyard hate in the main and playing about 6 graveyard hate cards in the side to beat dredge. Modern became more about variance and sideboard cards, at the same time dredge didn't just push other graveyard decks out of the meta, it obliterated and invalidated a bunch of decks because graveyard hate was that strong and that prevalent
I love your articles and watching your vids on modern---but I really disagree'd on you with this one.
Thanks for the article though, keep up the good work.
These are exactly the kinds of problems we will needlessly face moving forward, as we no longer have any reliable and timely meta data. Writers and "pros" will dictate narratives and we have very little to push back with other than words and opinions. Without numbers, credibility will almost always go to the person whose name appears in a big site's article, regardless of whether or not they are correct. This is a much bigger problem than simply discussing whether or not a deck "needs" a ban, as the most common criteria for banning (metagame oppression) is literally impossible to track anymore. It's really a shame because I feel Wizards LOVES this outcome. They would much rather see people not know a meta and bring anything and everything to an event (which leads to massive variance in terms of matchups and possible outcomes), rather than have people carefully study, prepare, and choose specific decks to attack the meta. Under this same veil of secrecy, they can point to the meta and say "things are fine, no need for unbans." It's literally a catch-all answer that leaves us out to dry. Unless we have multiple blowout GPs or the Pro Tour is a complete sham, I see nothing changing for the foreseeable future.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
He boldly claimed that he thinks Nahiri would be banned (which i'm certain fueled the ban talks here for her)
I also didn't see him writing about dredge needing a ban in 2016, unless I missed that. I was so disgusted with modern and busy moving across the country I dropped MTG for about half a year.
Today LSV had a video on Shadow also saying the deck may be too good for modern
It's frustrating hearing all of this from them. Modern is going to be a sea of linear decks if Grixis shadow disappears.
Grixis Death Shadow is a really difficult deck to pilot
I'll be honest, I don't think I'm a good enough player to fight off all these heavy, removal interactive decks to consistently play the deck well. I also haven't been grinding enough games with it, to be fair.
At my LGS, I was facing hateful decks every week for a month straight and couldn't really do more than 2-2. The same applied for Jund and Junk, everytime I played my favorite deck I remembered, "oh, thats why this deck is bad right now" (more Jund than Junk though).
A month ago I went 3-1 losing to 8Rack (seems miserable), and beating Little Kid Junk (designed to destroy other midrange decks), Esper Control (awful, but he land flooded games 2 and 3), and Bogles (I don't think Bogles is bad though, any input?)
AfterI went 3-1 with that, I got off the deck. It's taking serious hate, even at a local level. I definitely can respect the players winning through all the control and graveyard hate.
E-Tron's been rewarding me more lately, it's easier, proactive and isn't facing concentrated hate, it just needs to dodge Titanshift/AD Naus and win hard earned wins against things like Humans, Affinity, etc.
I agree completely. Hopefully they have learned from what happened the last time they did this and leave Shadow alone.
Eldrazi, on the other hand... I have a hard time understanding how the format can be healthy with such a black cloud remaining from the worst times in the format's entire history. At least Ancient Tomb deals you damage. I don't think Eldrazi would be so bad if they started at 14-17 like almost every other fetch/shock-based deck in the format. They have the benefit of perfect mana, accelerated mana, with zero life loss or any meaningful drawback.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
E-Tron also commonly does nothing for 2 turns, or can lose tempo playing a turn 3 Matter Reshaper. It's not quite like RG Tron where it does nothing for 3 or 4 turns and nearly auto-wins with a demoralizing planeswalker/creature.
Been playing the deck a ton, the turn 2 thought-knot isn't that common. It's not magical christmas land, but it's very uncommon.
I'm not sure the deck would be viable at all if it did a ton of damage to itself, it would only beat fair slow decks and lose to everything else. Mana flood is also extremely real in this deck---like, really really real. Chalice and Relic can also flat out be blank cards game 1
Opening hands are ugly
Honestly, Eldrazi Tron was a garbage deck until Walking Ballista elevated it and Todd Stevens fixed the deck up and decided mindstones and relics is what the deck needed and cut the clunky Ulamogs/Batterskulls.
Looking at the deck on paper, it looks extremely bad, clunky and no synergy, it's actually quite a work of beauty that the deck is good, because the 75 looks ugly and unplayable in a format this fast.
What I'm interpreting here is that matches can be wildly swingy, with huge variance in outcome depending on the hodge podge of cards you draw and the matchups you face? This is literally the description of what I perceive as the biggest flaw in Modern: match results dependent so highly on luck.
That same luck could be applied to GDS. I actually had a big post written out about GDS, but lost it on a page refresh. Short version is: the deck isn't actually that hard to pilot, IMO, once your role as aggressor/control is fairly clear. From then, it feels mostly out of your hands, relying heavily on opponent's deck, whether or not they have main deck hate for you, whether or not they draw side board hate against you, and whether or not either of you stumble in your draws or land drops in a race. Another great example of many matches decided by pairings boards, dice rolls, and card draws, and another example of skill taking back seat to metagaming and deck choice.
Whether it's the case that Wizards does not like 50/50 decks or that decks with mostly 60/40-40/60 matchups no longer exist because of metagame shifts, it feels that they want to do everything in their power to INCREASE the level of variance in any given match outcome. It creates a better spectacle and is more "exciting." It's why blue filtering is all banned any anything resembling consistency is also banned (or never introduced).
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
That's how Modern is intentionally designed, my win percentage is directly correlated to whether or not I get good pairings or not. The incentives to turn an unwinnable matchup to an even one are not there for me to dedicate the time to figure it out. I'd get more out of being a slave labourer in a third world country picking cotton off a field than figuring out how to turn an extremely unfavorable matchup to a favorable one. I only play Modern when it is PPTQ season and I put the Modern cards down afterwards since I personally don't enjoy that my win percentage is heavily influenced by what you get paired against. Diversity increases variance, you cannot have a format that is both diverse and playskill rewarding at the same time. Which is why players like Owen Turtenwald and PV never top 8 Modern GPs even though they are considered extremely skilled technical players. They actively avoid Modern GPs if they can just because they know the format does not reward their skillset. Also add to the fact that there are significantly more casual players than spikes which means more opportunity to monetize them from twitch views.
Dredge summer was a disgusting period of Modern. Poor Ross i think now he doesn't have a 90-10 matchup against the whole midrange/control spectrum of decks WHILE having the inability to lose a G1 against those, is making him unhappy. Give me a break.
I can only imagine in my darkest nightmares what Modern would be if Shadow gets banned and nothing else happens. Welcome to 2Ships Passing in the Night: The Gathereing.
We don't have to imagine, we lived through that period already in 2016 It was book-ended by the banning of GGT and Probe (and I still stand by the opinion that Probe wasn't necessary, and we should have seen the impact of Fatal Push first).
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
This statement, I'm sorry, reeks of being spoiled of the manabase possibilities alone. Three, four, and even five color decks are pretty easy thanks to the consistency of fetch + shock.
Blue filtering is banned because they don't want combo to become stupidly consistent, and if that comes at the cost of inconsistency for all decks that is an acceptable consequence to WOTC. We can debate the veracity of that statement, but don't claim its about making the game better as a visual spectacle.
Variance in draws is why we have mulligans and access to some card draw/selection like Serum Visions, Collected Company, and even Tasigur or Snapcaster Mage. Variance is the reason matchups are 60/40 instead of 100/0. Hell, why even play out the game the way you describe the "ideal." We can just swap decklists, look up the matchup % and whoever was favored can fill out the match slip in his or her favor. There's the end of variance.
This actually happens on a macro level, which is exactly why we rank decks and their performances rather than players and their performances. It is often better to bring a deck that has highly positive matchups against a predicted meta than bring a deck with mediocre matchups that you are fantastically proficient with because matchups matter more than skill most of the time (unless the matchup difference is +/-10% or so). But even that could be influenced by individual draws, mulligans, etc. While I absolutely love truly intense, back-and-forth, skill-testing games, very few of my matches in Modern actually fit that criteria whatsoever anymore.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
define interaction.
Don't define it by the opposite, please. I want to know what qualifies as interaction.
Targeting the opposing Player's Hand, Stack, or Board State, while having the ability to prevent your opponent from doing the same through using Instant's on the Stack.
EDIT: Blossoming Defense is Interaction, Bogles is not.
Spirits
I just wanted to share my experience because there are players who are invested greatly in Modern that do pretty well consistently. They could probably do better if they were invested with Standard, but it just doesn't appeal to some people as much.
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 think a format that has access to 10 Fetches and 10 Shocks/5 Battlelands would not consistently hit UU by turn 4? Heck half the time in Standard UU is very obtainable by turn 4! As far as the wipe/winning comment goes. You used 2 instances where Jace is weak: swarm strategies and fliers. What control player in their right mind drops Jace into a board presence that removes him the following turn? As far as wipes go, JTMS might single-handedly make U/W control t1. JTMS following or followed by Supreme Verdict will win games. GDS still needs creatures on board to win. -1 is as relevant as Brainstorm all while creating tempo and locking players out of a game. U/W or even Esper have RIP to handle Dredge and W has ways to deal with Affinity as well (Stony, Disenchant, etc). Hand disruption is fine against the deck but U can play a counter suite to handle it and protect itself. JTMS being legal eliminates a lot of U's weakness in format and allows anyone playing the color in control to do degenerate things.
Legacy and Reserve List talks don't apply here. The only reason why I brought it us is because of the power level of the Format is higher and the fact of the T4 rule in Modern would make JTMS much much more relevant. The reason why JTMS is perfectly fine in Legacy/Vintage is because there are a lot more answers for him as well as faster decks that win games before JTMS even hits the board.
My Kiki Deck had RR, UUU, UWW and RRR at one point, and I've come around to just giving up on Cryptic because it was too damaging to try and fit that in when I had the W and R costs that are more important.
Spirits
Modern is wide open and diverse, but that's also a double-edged sword. The pro's don't like it because predicting a meta is much more difficult. Standard has like 4 viable decks and the pro's test from there. I do think standard is a skill testing format, but it makes pro's happier because they can spike a tournament with the right testing.
Modern isn't all luck based though, and people running that assertion are wrong, we constantly see big names at the top table in these Opens, GP's and Invitationals; they didn't stumble into the top 32 by luck.
Modern rewards knowledge of the format, knowing your deck inside and out and how your deck needs to sideboard, along with foreseeing if you're the beat down or control.
Modern doesn't have brainstorm, ponder and sylvan library to make games consistent; WOTC intended for variance to be a thing in modern and standard. By no means would I tell Cfusion, "if you dislike variance go play legacy". Legacy isn't available for everyone, but if that fact is true, you truly need to accept that variance is where Magic is going now, and if you don't enjoy the variance aspect, you may want to evaluate if this game is for you at all.
If you want to avoid variance, you should play competitive fighting video games or chess, where you rely solely on your skills.
The last part should be "by helping those who choose to attack the meta with a choice of deck that has massive a positive matchup against the most popular deck(s)." Which is again, less about play skill and more about meta-reading and prediction skill (also a skill not easily put into practice without access to multiple decks). Unless I get some amazing opening hands, I might as well sign the slip and go get food if I'm paired with UW or D&T.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
reply bolded
Ross wrote that awful, awful piece on Nahiri needing to be banned last year, which was an atrocious article.
I also didn't see him calling out dredge in the months of August to November. Funny enough, the other big name dredge player, Ben Friedman, has written several times he thinks dredge won't even stay legal now in modern. Whether I agree with that isn't really the point, it's the fact he wasn't afraid to call out the deck he had the most success with, showing a lack of bias.
Remember when we had people defending dredge in this topic? Man, were they wrong or what? I don't think Titanshift playing a 1 of Colossus is particularly warping or detrimental.
Hell, a bunch of fair decks mainly have to play 2 to 3 copies of Ceremonious Rejection just for Tron/Eldrazi decks alone.
Dredge was miserable as the best deck, decks were maining graveyard hate and playing anywhere from 4 to 6 graveyard hate cards in the side just for dredge alone. I was really annoyed he pointed at the disappearance of jund and junk and then totally ignored that blue decks were cropping up as interactive powerhouses.
If decks like UWx decks and DnT are good now because Shadow is warping the meta then sign me up; god forbid we now have to bare decks playing against one another instead of at each other.
Spirits