Dont know what your are talking about.
UW/x Control is all about making correct decisions.
Look, I'm not saying there is no decision making. There is obviously some. I'm saying that the decision making is less than it has been previously.
As to control, I don't think there is that much decision making; You kill whatever creature they play and you sphinx when you can. Sure, there is some nuance, but not as much as we've seen even last season with American control, and certainly not as much as with, say, legacy miracles.
Also, that deck is hindered by the fact that it drags out games to the point where neither player wants to live anymore, let alone keep playing the match, means that even if it were the most interesting deck in the world makes it pretty painful to be one of the top decks in the format.
You are just wrong.
Control right now might be a good deck, a really good deck in fact. But very, very few matches are what I would call easy. Forcing situations where you put control into the think tank is a pretty common and very achievable thing and where Other decks reward you for choosing the right continuous lines of play through the game, UW rewards you for making the correct game state calls at the right time which. One demands that you follow the correct endgame depending on the match and the other demands that you make the correct lines of play to get to your end game.
Control, above any other deck right now, has to work for it's wins almost across the board, where other decks are capable of simply having straight up easy and favorable matches. As a GR Monsters player, there are a number of matches where I would love to play a specific deck so I do not have to sweat to a win. As a control player, it is impossible to simply just avoid the sweating with almost any match.
I'm mostly curious about what R&D thinks of this Standard format. In the eyes of Wizards, this could very well be the perfect one due to it being balanced and having all three major archetypes represented. But I get the feeling many (myself included) find this Standard to be boring...
In terms of viable Tier 1, and Tier 1.5 decks you have...
Uw/x Control Variants (Azorious, Esper, and Bant Walkers)
Gruul/Jund Monsters
Mono Blue and U/w Devotion
Mono Black and B/W Midrange
W/x Aggro (Mono-White, W/b Humans)
R/w Burn
R/w Aggro
Esper Midrange
Rakados and Mono Black Aggro
That's a total of 16 different decks you could chose from and have a solid footing on. That's an impressive number of decks for a standard format. Minus Mutavault costing a bit of cash, none of these decks are that expensive to build either.
So what's wrong with this format? I'm personally not sure. It's not that creatures are "too good" because the U/w Control variants play few creatures and still manage to do well. It's not that control or Midrange decks are too strong, because Aggro and Burn lists keep performing well.
I think it might have to do with the fact that a lot of these new decks are less "Good Stuff.dec" like we've seen in the last few standard seasons, and they're decks that synergize and require the other cards in the deck to help out to do well. Gray Merchant is a poor card without Underworld Connections, Desecration Demon and Pack Rat giving it some support.
Likewise Gruul Monsters relies on it's Scry Lands, Courser of Cruphix and Dormi Rade +1 Triggers, in order to generate enough card advantage to fight through the control and heavy black removal decks.
So when you have a format like this that relies on cards working well together, I guess it can seem a little un-fair and un-fun when the Gruul Monster deck, sets themselves up to draw essentially draw and put into play two cards from the top of their deck, as well as gain life. You get a, "Jeeze what doesn't that deck do?" Kinda feel behind it when you're on the receiving end.
I believe that Standard currently is a diverse, and synergistic format. It's just that the synergies are kind of easy to spot (Unlike say, using Karakas and Flickerwisp together in Legacy to remove something from play permanently) yet have game winning effects.
The UW/x Control decks are certainly far more expensive to build than all the other decks. You really have to like that style of deck before dropping that much cash on it. On the other hand the decks run a few cards that are Modern playable or even stables so there is that.
Straight UW is actually pretty close to the cost of GR Monsters... there really is not much disparity between the decks and their cost and adding black for Jund is just about as expensive as adding it to UW. The gap might grow a bit, but not much. I am pretty sure I spent more on GR Monsters than I did UW Control and that includes Kiora's.
Yeah I did go wit online prices and it looks like the prices have fallen a bit for it. I know there was a time where Blue/white was like 550 to build while Esper was like 700.
GR has a ridiculous amount of money cards that just seem to be overlooked price-wise unless you are actually building the deck. 4 Domri Rade could buy you 8 Jaces and Scavenging Ooze is still a $20 card. Pile that onto Mutavaults, Stormbreath Dragons and a bunch of $8-$10 rares it adds up fast. Money really is not a big deal right now though, I have seen worse standards where the cheapest deck cost more than today's most expensive decks and it is not what makes this format boring.
What makes this format boring is that while all of the major archetypes are evenly represented, they do not vary too much when you talk about how the decks like to play out key strategies. It is very turn your dudes sideways or kill, kill, kill, stick, swing. If you think about interactions that creatures can create, there actually is not a whole lot that strays from vanilla compared to a format like Alara/Zen where cards could create crazy insane interactions in so many different ways.
You have a number of cards that could possibly do it though, such as Heroic cards or Inspired, but they are incredibly under powered compared to more vanilla options.
That sounds like a problem of your play group, not a problem with the format. Mono Black is a reasonably inexpensive deck (besides Mutavaults, but it doesn't count 'cause every deck plays it) so it can be easily represented at that level. Summing up the entire format because of how your FNMs are going is like summing up a novel after reading the first page; it misrepresents the big picture and the actual state of the game.
GP Cincinnati, by example, has no Mono Black or Mono Blue Devotion in the Top 8, with Orzhov and Azorius popping up instead. Only 3 Esper Control decks means the deck is strong without having a stranglehold on the format, which is a far cry better than many past Standards. The Top 16 sported some more typical Black decks, but with a few others splashing Red, so the 75 is far from defined now. There's plenty of good about this Standard, and it's not just 'netdecking' (which I think is a term that should be put out to pasture, as the sharing of information regarding the game has gone so far beyond the times when that was supposedly a bad thing; now it's pretty much the norm, and this need to be original for some people- and the subsequent failure- somehow convince them that anyone who spends the time to take a more established deck and learn the nuances of it and tweak it as necessary doesn't actually do any work, which we should be able to agree is utter nonsense); knowing how to play the game well is why you see frequent competitors playing at the highest level.
Third sentence of my post...:p
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Vintage. That's about it. Maybe Standard, if it could get it together into something interesting enough to play.
Scavenging Ooze is $6 not $20. Would people stop saying MBD is cheap when you remove one its most powerful cards? Oh yeah it's great when you don't buy $120 worth of mutavaults.....really sick of seeing people advocate the cost of a MBD deck that would lose virtually every mirror match and be greatly underpowered in general.
Scavenging Ooze is $6 not $20. Would people stop saying MBD is cheap when you remove one its most powerful cards? Oh yeah it's great when you don't buy $120 worth of mutavaults.....really sick of seeing people advocate the cost of a MBD deck that would lose virtually every mirror match and be greatly underpowered in general.
I think people ignore Muta in the cost of the deck, simply because it's presumed that 4 of would be in there. It's like the cost of admission. They shouldn't ignore it, as $120 on 4 cards is a lot (throw in the set of Seize also) but that's how people evaluate MBD as a whole.
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Vintage. That's about it. Maybe Standard, if it could get it together into something interesting enough to play.
Scavenging Ooze is $6 not $20. Would people stop saying MBD is cheap when you remove one its most powerful cards? Oh yeah it's great when you don't buy $120 worth of mutavaults.....really sick of seeing people advocate the cost of a MBD deck that would lose virtually every mirror match and be greatly underpowered in general.
The only deck I'd call synergistic is Monoblue Devotion, because it plays individually weak cards in order to make two cards (Thassa, God of the Sea and Master of Waves) better.
Monoblack is not a synergistic deck because of Gray Merchant of Asphodel. Gary just happens to be strong with all the other individually strong cards. You can very well take away the "synergistic" Gray Merchant and still have a very solid deck (just look at the more popular BW version.)
When I think of synergistic decks, I think of stuff like Innistrad's Reanimator or Aristocrats decks. Heck, even its tribal and token decks had more interesting synergies than the current devotion decks.
I don't hate the format. Just like you, I'm playing an Ephara, God of the Polis deck and I like it just fine. But it just isn't as crazy as what was possible during previous Standard formats. There are other more synergistic decks to build, but they are far too fragile to be played seriously (Thoughtseize being in Standard doesn't do synergistic decks any favour, that's for sure.)
I really, really miss Aristocrats. Junk Aristocrats was easily one of the most enjoyable decks I have played in a long time.
Scavenging Ooze is $6 not $20. Would people stop saying MBD is cheap when you remove one its most powerful cards? Oh yeah it's great when you don't buy $120 worth of mutavaults.....really sick of seeing people advocate the cost of a MBD deck that would lose virtually every mirror match and be greatly underpowered in general.
Scavenging Ooze is $6 not $20. Would people stop saying MBD is cheap when you remove one its most powerful cards? Oh yeah it's great when you don't buy $120 worth of mutavaults.....really sick of seeing people advocate the cost of a MBD deck that would lose virtually every mirror match and be greatly underpowered in general.
$8.42 on TCG mid. While not $20, also not $6.
Okay, so congrats, you shaves $12 of a near $600 deck.
My point still stands.
As for Mono Black, it is pretty cheap now that Downfall is some $4. You pay for Mutavault, Thoughtseize and that is pretty much it. I think Desecration Demon is next in line for the spendy card slot and that dude is pretty cheap.
Seize is also a relatively cheap card unless you are buying the old ones...
Thoughtseize will also hold value post rotation as well so buying into monoblack is a good idea if you were buying into standard and didnt have a deck. Plus I find it hard to see either Monoblack or B/X deck not being a thing with Downfall and Thoughtseize when RTR block rotates.
Thoughtseize will also hold value post rotation as well so buying into monoblack is a good idea if you were buying into standard and didnt have a deck. Plus I find it hard to see either Monoblack or B/X deck not being a thing with Downfall and Thoughtseize when RTR block rotates.
That I can agree with. These are like the Azorius cards in RTR. They enable a deck for as long as these are legal.
Gonna be honest, I sincerely miss Inistrad. The meta is not one I am enjoying particularly, and feel that not only are the top decks ridiculously costly, but that there's less room than ever for experimentation or even variations on builds. It's not terrible or anything, but I doubt very much you'll hear me say, "I really when miss Theros and Ravnica were in standard."
Hearthstone made me appreciate this Standard, I think. It isn't perfect, but it isn't nearly as dull as that game either. It's still Magic.
Also to any who loathe the known archetypes, brew. Last weekend, with RW Burn, B/W Humans, Mono Black Aggro, etc. showed us that there is still room for innovation.
It isnt about only being able to play certai strategies for me. Its that every game of Standard feels the same for me. All games are very linear and boring. We need some good combo decks to break the mold. Other than that aggro and control are just playing the same decks no matter the color combo. There just isn't that many viable cards right now. And I'm not alone. My shop has smaller and smaller turnouts each week. Most everyone feels the same and isn't having fun right now.
I have fun and all the people playing in big tournaments right now have too. Combo wont be a part of Standard again. Dont even get your hopes up.
Sadly, I agree that it will probably never come back (for stupid reasons). This is what is keeping many Modern players from playing Standard (along with the nerfed counterspells and there being even less good library manipulation).
I'm mostly curious about what R&D thinks of this Standard format. In the eyes of Wizards, this could very well be the perfect one due to it being balanced and having all three major archetypes represented. But I get the feeling many (myself included) find this Standard to be boring...
All 3 major archetypes used to mean aggro, control, and combo. I take it that midrange has replaced combo in that?
I cam shocked that standard got worse that Swagtusk Jund, but it did.
Any anyone calling this meta diverse is nuts. The decks that win are the same as before. Did they change a little? Sure. But the decks themselves are basically, certainly feature the same central cards.
Now, no standard will every be terribly diverse. Standard just can't be very diverse, not at the top tier, so I don't care about diversity.
But this standard, even less than the last one, features so few interesting decisions. Aristocrats had decisions to make, for example. Relevant instants are necessary for a good format. Decks that depend on specific cards and unique interactions are necessary. But right now, every deck is just play good cards.deck, and the cards all do the same thing, so you just play them in some order, rather than needing to really figure out the right play every time.
This standard is boring, not because it hasn't changed. A 1 deck meta can be awesome if that deck is fun to play against itself. This standard is boring because the only question is what cards do the two players draw, not which card do they play.
At least Innistrad-RTR had a tier 3 deck that was trying to ramp into Omniscience and kill you with Door Into Nothingness.
Gonna be honest, I sincerely miss Inistrad. The meta is not one I am enjoying particularly, and feel that not only are the top decks ridiculously costly, but that there's less room than ever for experimentation or even variations on builds. It's not terrible or anything, but I doubt very much you'll hear me say, "I really when miss Theros and Ravnica were in standard."
I could see missing Theros. I like the Gods, Heroic, BNG/THS Limited, Bestow, Steam Augury, and plenty more. Half of what I said is just jank right now, but if anything the things I mentioned are playable when RtR leaves I could see really loving Standard.
The problem I think is that the multicolor block just isn't flowing well with Theros. The nature of devotion along with UUU/BBB and RRR/WWW creatures and so on is screwing with deck building as well, causing a playable sideboard creature (Nightveil Specter) to be a 4-of maindeckable format defining thing. With is weird and kind of gross. There are a lot of decks, but one major issue with Standard in addition to the aforementioned was touched on a few months ago by some writers...
All of the answers are too good/universal.
Thoughtseize/D. Sphere/Hero's Downfall kill damn near everything, ignoring textboxes. These answers work great with Revelation, allowing you to answer whatever questions your opponents present with reasonably efficient, all-encompassing, answers.
This forces either really fast decks (which get hated out by Mono Blue, Sylvan Caryatids and Coursers and Mortars and giant monsters, etc.), R/W Burn or for one to just play Mono Black/Sphinx's Rev/whatever. Thoughtseize also does a number of synergy based strategies; Hidden Strings Heroic, for example, has been insane for me locally (it has some unbeatable draws) and I've heard of Crouching Cipher Hidden Strings Top 16'ing at a PTQ too. But the issue with decks like those is that none of the cards individually are good, and they're also land light (which means mulligans when you have 0-1 lands). This is embarrassing in the face of maindeckable discard that doesn't discriminate for a single B and a measly 2 life. It's hard to think of a good 6 that a Heroic deck could present a T1 Thoughtseize; I guess something like Dude/Strings/God's Willing/God's Willing/Land/Dude would work (they take Strings), but then you get stuck having to runner runner lands/gas just to stand a chance.
Thoughtseize in general is just a pretty unfair card. It plays like it should cost 1B, at least in the context of Standard. I understand that it doesn't affect the board, but I'm not sure why tapping "B" should produce such stomach churning power. Just watch a control mirror to get the idea; there's draw go, land drops, the Jace shuffle, and so on, and then suddenly somebody taps "B" and their spell HAS TO BE DISSOLVED. Like, MORE SO THAN A 4 MANA JACE. Not to mention that Dissolving the damn thing, well, Thoughtseize was probably going to just take the Dissolve anyways. Ah well.
Gonna be honest, I sincerely miss Inistrad. The meta is not one I am enjoying particularly, and feel that not only are the top decks ridiculously costly, but that there's less room than ever for experimentation or even variations on builds. It's not terrible or anything, but I doubt very much you'll hear me say, "I really when miss Theros and Ravnica were in standard."
I take it you have not been playing the Standard format for very long... there is a reason people are saying $300 and $400 decks are cheap and for as long as I have played, I can even say that $600 for a deck is certainly not the most I have paid into a Standard deck.
Kids these days have it easy with your damn Shock Land reprints...
It is silly pretending this format is any more expensive than last rotation. And seriously you people need to stop nitpicking about prices. If you can get a card for $6 then it is in fact $6. Going by your logic 4 mutavaults is $140 not $120, Thoughtseize is $68 for a set of 4, 4 lifebane is $26, 4 demon is $21,4 Connections is $8, Pack rat is $12 for 4, Downfall is $23.
$140
68
26
21
8
12
+23=about $310 with the other commons/uncommons. FYI Blood Baron is $66 for a set of 4 but I didn't add him to be fair. Honestly seems comparable to Mono U unless I'm missing something.
Oh those U/W temples are absurdly priced. Stupid modern ruining other formats. $9 for tap lands? What the literal flip!
Too many stupid creature decks, too little life gain.
To be fair the few non-creature decks are in the top tier with UW and Esper Control. I dont care what the meta looks like as long as I can play those.
The issue is that those are the same shell of decks. There's one non-creature deck (UW) and then everything else is 20 mediocre creatures+, 4 mutavaults and utility.
It's extremely upsetting that there equally as many unplayable two-color combinations as there are playable. For some reason BG, UR, UG, UB hardly see any play. Any BG or BU deck is basically Mono black at this point. It's even more upsetting that these color combinations go ignored in favor of extremely linear, boring monocolored decks. That's why I hate devotion - because you can only make one kind of deck out of it.
The meta is just complete bull excrement when 2x main board Doom Blade in Esper control decks invalidate all the creature decks in the format.
I assume we're going to see things go full circle and there will be nothing but mono black next week.
It's boring seeing these shifts to and from removal depending on how popular creatures get. Removal shouldn't be overpowering creatures to the extent it is.
The meta is just complete bull excrement when 2x main board Doom Blade in Esper control decks invalidate all the creature decks in the format.
I assume we're going to see things go full circle and there will be nothing but mono black next week.
It's boring seeing these shifts to and from removal depending on how popular creatures get. Removal shouldn't be overpowering creatures to the extent it is.
That depends on who you ask.
A lot of the older players dont like creatures much and definitely dont like the recent trend in making them better while weakening spells.
While im not of those older players I agree with them. I have nothing against creatures per se but I dont like playing with or against 30 creatures.dec
I dont think there will be many Standard seasons that make both camps happy. But the contra-creatures camp at least has the the non-rotating formats for this.
Underutilized color combinations will ebb and flow with the season. UB has historically been a strong choice but Wizards has taken an active role in making standard the creature-combat format, something that UB has traditionally been lacking in. UR and UG on the other hand are two areas I find wizard completely lacking. The have no idea how those combinations should interact with the color pie and I would argue they've never been successful at designing them.
Which is kind of a peev of mine seeing as Rosewater thinks they consistently get it right...
Underutilized color combinations will ebb and flow with the season. UB has historically been a strong choice but Wizards has taken an active role in making standard the creature-combat format, something that UB has traditionally been lacking in. UR and UG on the other hand are two areas I find wizard completely lacking. The have no idea how those combinations should interact with the color pie and I would argue they've never been successful at designing them.
Which is kind of a peev of mine seeing as Rosewater thinks they consistently get it right...
A good point that you touch on.
By pushing creatures certain color combinations like UB as an example got hit on a fundamental level I feel. Blue and Black have always got their power from their non-creature spells like Necropotence, Yawgmoth's Will, Yawgmoth's Bargain, Brainstorm, Force of Will etc. and not from their creatures(exceptions exist).
This leads to the problem that has existed for some time now that when you play something like UB you have play with your mediocre spells against random creature decks with ridiculous pushed creatures which outclass your spells easily.
In RTR they tried to solve this dilemma and combine creatures with spells with the Cipher mechaninc but again they were afraid of making the spells too good and overcosted them so much to make them unplayable. The fact that every second UB card is about mill doesnt help that either.
Im really interested in seeing how Wizards wants to solve this problem. If they even see it as a problem that needs to be fixed or if they want the spell color combinations to just be the casual colors that are only played at the kitchen table and FNM.
It is silly pretending this format is any more expensive than last rotation. And seriously you people need to stop nitpicking about prices. If you can get a card for $6 then it is in fact $6. Going by your logic 4 mutavaults is $140 not $120, Thoughtseize is $68 for a set of 4, 4 lifebane is $26, 4 demon is $21,4 Connections is $8, Pack rat is $12 for 4, Downfall is $23.
$140
68
26
21
8
12
+23=about $310 with the other commons/uncommons. FYI Blood Baron is $66 for a set of 4 but I didn't add him to be fair. Honestly seems comparable to Mono U unless I'm missing something.
Oh those U/W temples are absurdly priced. Stupid modern ruining other formats. $9 for tap lands? What the literal flip!
The scry lands aren't even used in Modern except in a few fringe decks that have won maybe 1-2 dailies ever and not ever made day 2 at a GP. Don't blame Modern for cards being expensive because of Standard.
Development at Wizards considers Ramp and Combo to represent the same niche of decks; I suspect this is because more 'traditional' combo decks are typically acceptable in older formats but not Standard whereas Ramp functions along similar lines but is decidedly more fair, usually advancing its board state in subsequent turns rather than having a 'big turn'. They also consider disruptive aggro (which is often referred to as aggro-control or tempo) to be its own form of deck type, separating it from pure aggro decks. There was a Latest Developments article over at the mothership that laid the 6 different archetypal decks, and how they try to design some to be particularly weak to others. Given that making 6 different decks be viable as 'top tier' options can be difficult, I imagine nailing all 6 different deck archetypes in a format is pretty difficult, and Ramp not being a player in this format after it has been a dominant deck multiple times in the past (I'm looking at you, Primeval Titan) is certainly not the end of the world.
If you are, however, holding out for the return of Storm combo, I daresay you'll be disappointed. I don't think this is an inherently bad thing, as the main format should revolve around decks that look like they are playing a game of Magic with their opponent, and not spamming spells and Pyromancer Ascension (and as someone who spent a long time trying to get that deck to work in Standard- despite Jund then Cawblade- I do not state this opinion because I myself do not enjoy playing those kinds of combo decks).
Development at Wizards considers Ramp and Combo to represent the same niche of decks; I suspect this is because more 'traditional' combo decks are typically acceptable in older formats but not Standard whereas Ramp functions along similar lines but is decidedly more fair, usually advancing its board state in subsequent turns rather than having a 'big turn'. They also consider disruptive aggro (which is often referred to as aggro-control or tempo) to be its own form of deck type, separating it from pure aggro decks. There was a Latest Developments article over at the mothership that laid the 6 different archetypal decks, and how they try to design some to be particularly weak to others. Given that making 6 different decks be viable as 'top tier' options can be difficult, I imagine nailing all 6 different deck archetypes in a format is pretty difficult, and Ramp not being a player in this format after it has been a dominant deck multiple times in the past (I'm looking at you, Primeval Titan) is certainly not the end of the world.
First, ramp is a big player in this Standard (Colossal Gruul and similar decks). Second, Ramp and Combo are not the same thing. Combo is a deck that relies on a combo of multiple cards to win or gain an enormous advantage quickly as its primary win condition. Ramp is a deck that accelerates into any number of high cost cards. Combo is dedicated to specific combos. Ramp isn't. That is why they are different.
If you are, however, holding out for the return of Storm combo, I daresay you'll be disappointed. I don't think this is an inherently bad thing, as the main format should revolve around decks that look like they are playing a game of Magic with their opponent, and not spamming spells and Pyromancer Ascension (and as someone who spent a long time trying to get that deck to work in Standard- despite Jund then Cawblade- I do not state this opinion because I myself do not enjoy playing those kinds of combo decks).
I'm not wishing for Storm. I'd settle for something like Splinter Twin, Pyromancer Ascension, Valakut, or even something like Mythic Conscription.
Yeah I did go wit online prices and it looks like the prices have fallen a bit for it. I know there was a time where Blue/white was like 550 to build while Esper was like 700.
What makes this format boring is that while all of the major archetypes are evenly represented, they do not vary too much when you talk about how the decks like to play out key strategies. It is very turn your dudes sideways or kill, kill, kill, stick, swing. If you think about interactions that creatures can create, there actually is not a whole lot that strays from vanilla compared to a format like Alara/Zen where cards could create crazy insane interactions in so many different ways.
You have a number of cards that could possibly do it though, such as Heroic cards or Inspired, but they are incredibly under powered compared to more vanilla options.
Third sentence of my post...:p
I think people ignore Muta in the cost of the deck, simply because it's presumed that 4 of would be in there. It's like the cost of admission. They shouldn't ignore it, as $120 on 4 cards is a lot (throw in the set of Seize also) but that's how people evaluate MBD as a whole.
$8.42 on TCG mid. While not $20, also not $6.
I really, really miss Aristocrats. Junk Aristocrats was easily one of the most enjoyable decks I have played in a long time.
Okay, so congrats, you shaves $12 of a near $600 deck.
My point still stands.
As for Mono Black, it is pretty cheap now that Downfall is some $4. You pay for Mutavault, Thoughtseize and that is pretty much it. I think Desecration Demon is next in line for the spendy card slot and that dude is pretty cheap.
Seize is also a relatively cheap card unless you are buying the old ones...
Cash? Credit? Gold? or Jace?
That I can agree with. These are like the Azorius cards in RTR. They enable a deck for as long as these are legal.
How To Keep Your FOIL Cards From Curling: http://youtu.be/QTmubrS8VnI
The Best Deck Boxes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEwgLph_Pjk
The Best Binders: http://youtu.be/H5IauASYWjk
Sadly, I agree that it will probably never come back (for stupid reasons). This is what is keeping many Modern players from playing Standard (along with the nerfed counterspells and there being even less good library manipulation).
All 3 major archetypes used to mean aggro, control, and combo. I take it that midrange has replaced combo in that?
At least Innistrad-RTR had a tier 3 deck that was trying to ramp into Omniscience and kill you with Door Into Nothingness.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
I could see missing Theros. I like the Gods, Heroic, BNG/THS Limited, Bestow, Steam Augury, and plenty more. Half of what I said is just jank right now, but if anything the things I mentioned are playable when RtR leaves I could see really loving Standard.
The problem I think is that the multicolor block just isn't flowing well with Theros. The nature of devotion along with UUU/BBB and RRR/WWW creatures and so on is screwing with deck building as well, causing a playable sideboard creature (Nightveil Specter) to be a 4-of maindeckable format defining thing. With is weird and kind of gross. There are a lot of decks, but one major issue with Standard in addition to the aforementioned was touched on a few months ago by some writers...
All of the answers are too good/universal.
Thoughtseize/D. Sphere/Hero's Downfall kill damn near everything, ignoring textboxes. These answers work great with Revelation, allowing you to answer whatever questions your opponents present with reasonably efficient, all-encompassing, answers.
This forces either really fast decks (which get hated out by Mono Blue, Sylvan Caryatids and Coursers and Mortars and giant monsters, etc.), R/W Burn or for one to just play Mono Black/Sphinx's Rev/whatever. Thoughtseize also does a number of synergy based strategies; Hidden Strings Heroic, for example, has been insane for me locally (it has some unbeatable draws) and I've heard of Crouching Cipher Hidden Strings Top 16'ing at a PTQ too. But the issue with decks like those is that none of the cards individually are good, and they're also land light (which means mulligans when you have 0-1 lands). This is embarrassing in the face of maindeckable discard that doesn't discriminate for a single B and a measly 2 life. It's hard to think of a good 6 that a Heroic deck could present a T1 Thoughtseize; I guess something like Dude/Strings/God's Willing/God's Willing/Land/Dude would work (they take Strings), but then you get stuck having to runner runner lands/gas just to stand a chance.
Thoughtseize in general is just a pretty unfair card. It plays like it should cost 1B, at least in the context of Standard. I understand that it doesn't affect the board, but I'm not sure why tapping "B" should produce such stomach churning power. Just watch a control mirror to get the idea; there's draw go, land drops, the Jace shuffle, and so on, and then suddenly somebody taps "B" and their spell HAS TO BE DISSOLVED. Like, MORE SO THAN A 4 MANA JACE. Not to mention that Dissolving the damn thing, well, Thoughtseize was probably going to just take the Dissolve anyways. Ah well.
2 Life is a joke of a drawback too.
I take it you have not been playing the Standard format for very long... there is a reason people are saying $300 and $400 decks are cheap and for as long as I have played, I can even say that $600 for a deck is certainly not the most I have paid into a Standard deck.
Kids these days have it easy with your damn Shock Land reprints...
$140
68
26
21
8
12
+23=about $310 with the other commons/uncommons. FYI Blood Baron is $66 for a set of 4 but I didn't add him to be fair. Honestly seems comparable to Mono U unless I'm missing something.
Oh those U/W temples are absurdly priced. Stupid modern ruining other formats. $9 for tap lands? What the literal flip!
The issue is that those are the same shell of decks. There's one non-creature deck (UW) and then everything else is 20 mediocre creatures+, 4 mutavaults and utility.
It's extremely upsetting that there equally as many unplayable two-color combinations as there are playable. For some reason BG, UR, UG, UB hardly see any play. Any BG or BU deck is basically Mono black at this point. It's even more upsetting that these color combinations go ignored in favor of extremely linear, boring monocolored decks. That's why I hate devotion - because you can only make one kind of deck out of it.
I assume we're going to see things go full circle and there will be nothing but mono black next week.
It's boring seeing these shifts to and from removal depending on how popular creatures get. Removal shouldn't be overpowering creatures to the extent it is.
That depends on who you ask.
A lot of the older players dont like creatures much and definitely dont like the recent trend in making them better while weakening spells.
While im not of those older players I agree with them. I have nothing against creatures per se but I dont like playing with or against 30 creatures.dec
I dont think there will be many Standard seasons that make both camps happy. But the contra-creatures camp at least has the the non-rotating formats for this.
Which is kind of a peev of mine seeing as Rosewater thinks they consistently get it right...
A good point that you touch on.
By pushing creatures certain color combinations like UB as an example got hit on a fundamental level I feel. Blue and Black have always got their power from their non-creature spells like Necropotence, Yawgmoth's Will, Yawgmoth's Bargain, Brainstorm, Force of Will etc. and not from their creatures(exceptions exist).
This leads to the problem that has existed for some time now that when you play something like UB you have play with your mediocre spells against random creature decks with ridiculous pushed creatures which outclass your spells easily.
In RTR they tried to solve this dilemma and combine creatures with spells with the Cipher mechaninc but again they were afraid of making the spells too good and overcosted them so much to make them unplayable. The fact that every second UB card is about mill doesnt help that either.
Im really interested in seeing how Wizards wants to solve this problem. If they even see it as a problem that needs to be fixed or if they want the spell color combinations to just be the casual colors that are only played at the kitchen table and FNM.
The scry lands aren't even used in Modern except in a few fringe decks that have won maybe 1-2 dailies ever and not ever made day 2 at a GP. Don't blame Modern for cards being expensive because of Standard.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Wizards does it and then it hates on itself for making cards playable. It's all a little crazy. Arcbound Ravager
If you are, however, holding out for the return of Storm combo, I daresay you'll be disappointed. I don't think this is an inherently bad thing, as the main format should revolve around decks that look like they are playing a game of Magic with their opponent, and not spamming spells and Pyromancer Ascension (and as someone who spent a long time trying to get that deck to work in Standard- despite Jund then Cawblade- I do not state this opinion because I myself do not enjoy playing those kinds of combo decks).
First, ramp is a big player in this Standard (Colossal Gruul and similar decks). Second, Ramp and Combo are not the same thing. Combo is a deck that relies on a combo of multiple cards to win or gain an enormous advantage quickly as its primary win condition. Ramp is a deck that accelerates into any number of high cost cards. Combo is dedicated to specific combos. Ramp isn't. That is why they are different.
I'm not wishing for Storm. I'd settle for something like Splinter Twin, Pyromancer Ascension, Valakut, or even something like Mythic Conscription.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.