Hrm. Interesting. I wasn't necessarily expecting a ban but I was surprised to see no change in any format.
Here's what I expect their thought process was for Standard. They had a Standard people didn't like, then banned cards. Unlike previous bannings, these wasn't just one deck ruling the format, so the bannings were received somewhat dubiously. And the results of those bannings... was a format people seem to like even less than the one before (granted, various new cards entered the format to help cause that, so it's possible the bannings prevented an even worse format from happening... but one is still left wondering if the format might be healthier, at least in terms of deck diversity, if the bannings hadn't happened). So what happens if they try to ban something again, and the format doesn't improve or gets even worse as a result? That's not an unreasonable fear, particularly because so much of what's messed up in Standard isn't really attributable to specific cards but more the general philosophy they've been cultivating of how printing anything resembling good removal is a no-no.
There also may or may not be cards in Amonkhet they figure could try to fix things up. Maybe we'll see things like Torpor Orb or Pithing Needle. It was likely to late to change Amonkhet (though who knows, maybe an ultra last minute change was possible) in response to the bannings and discovery of CopyCat, but those cards might have been there independently.
Oh well. At least I've got a Force of Will (the TCG) deck together, so I can play that some. Their version of Standard is actually rather healthy at the moment, especially compared to Magic's.
Copy cat is way more broken than copter smashing you in the face.
At least copter would have been controlled by Fatal Push which can't kill the cat unless you can somehow keep an Evolving Wilds spare all game.
Yup
All not banning anything has done is confuse me more as to why Copter was banned. At least you could fly in and kick Saheeli in the head with it.
Because you can throw Copter in practically any deck and it will perform very well. Felidar Guardian requires a much more specific deck to be housed in (i.e. One that plays lots of permanents).
Also look at the Saheeli deck: it's built around the combo. The deck plays a lot of cards that help you draw (Oath of Nissa, Rogue Refiners, etc.) and stall for time (Whirler Virtuoso, Elder-Deep Fiend, etc.). What you have here is a deck that relies a lot on two cards, lacking in removal, and plays otherwise extremely janky cards. Yeah it's good and well-made because the cards do all seem to work together harmoniously, but to call it "broken" or "unfair" is too much.
Logically the statement that standard is a 2 deck format means the games are very skill dependent since the matchup would have to be close to 50-50 otherwise we'd have caw-blade again.
So either standard isn't REALLY a 2 deck format, it just looks like it, or standard is fun regardless of deck choice and people are whinging because they can't play their tokens deck
Well, the only thing I got is that WoTC knows something about what is in Amonket and are banking on either the new set drawing attention away from what is broken, or having some answer from the new set fix the issues we currently have in the existing meta. Considering how powerful the second half of these two set blocks are the first one rarely matches up to the second half of the last. Eldrich Moon had more power in it than Kaladesh did, and it will take an act of God(s) to out power Aether Revolt.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Copy cat is way more broken than copter smashing you in the face.
At least copter would have been controlled by Fatal Push which can't kill the cat unless you can somehow keep an Evolving Wilds spare all game.
Yup
All not banning anything has done is confuse me more as to why Copter was banned. At least you could fly in and kick Saheeli in the head with it.
Because you can throw Copter in practically any deck and it will perform very well. Felidar Guardian requires a much more specific deck to be housed in (i.e. One that plays lots of permanents).
Also look at the Saheeli deck: it's built around the combo. The deck plays a lot of cards that help you draw (Oath of Nissa, Rogue Refiners, etc.) and stall for time (Whirler Virtuoso, Elder-Deep Fiend, etc.). What you have here is a deck that relies a lot on two cards, lacking in removal, and plays otherwise extremely janky cards. Yeah it's good and well-made because the cards do all seem to work together harmoniously, but to call it "broken" or "unfair" is too much.
Does janky mean high value these days?
Rogue refiner. for 3 mana you get a card, 2 energy, and a 3/2 body.
Whirler Virtuoso, 3 mana 2/3 body plus at least 1 possibly a lot more 1/1 flying bodies to either win the game or delay.
Elder-Deep fiend, flash, tap 4 win machine (which I haven't noticed to be even necessary in the better performing decks).
The mana (with the enablers) on 4 color Saheeli is so good it only runs 21 land and consistently can cast anything at any time. There is math out there done on the deck already that has it ahead before the game starts of even Mardu over-pushed vehicles.
It is quite broken. I wish people wouldn't keep giving the guys responsible for balance so much credit (not design team). They are the ones who left GY hate off the menu. They are the ones that allowed 'story' to dictate card power (Emmy), and then ban it after it was out of control. They're the ones who admitted they missed dirtykitty, and then chose to not ban it 3 weeks ago lazily not taking recent events into account.
Amonkhet was in the can when they made the last ban decision. They couldn't possibly have stopped making mistakes for Amonkhet. It's more likely that the power crazy is just as bad and cards from that set may eclipse what we have now. Plenty of pros are calling it broken, and not just the vehicles players.
So I went to one of my LGS to play some Modern and asked the owners how many people for standard showed up, Answer:
1
ONE. This is a major store in the Austin Area and they had 1, everyone else was drafting or playing modern (at least 18 on a Tuesday), You can chalk it to spring break, or SXSW but it was very odd, lots of people are off, and standard didn't fire. I've come to this store since I started playing the game again in 2014 and this is the first time I've ever seen standard not fire.
On the 4c Saheeli deck and Mardu, no one wants to play against these things anymore, no one; Unless you are forced too...
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Standard Arena: Eh? Gruul or Die
Modern: Decks I'm playing right now: G Mono Green Tron (34-10-3 paper record, only SCG/Regionals/PPTQ record) C Eldrazi Tron (9-5) UG Infect RW Burn
Copy cat is way more broken than copter smashing you in the face.
At least copter would have been controlled by Fatal Push which can't kill the cat unless you can somehow keep an Evolving Wilds spare all game.
Yup
All not banning anything has done is confuse me more as to why Copter was banned. At least you could fly in and kick Saheeli in the head with it.
Because you can throw Copter in practically any deck and it will perform very well. Felidar Guardian requires a much more specific deck to be housed in (i.e. One that plays lots of permanents).
Also look at the Saheeli deck: it's built around the combo. The deck plays a lot of cards that help you draw (Oath of Nissa, Rogue Refiners, etc.) and stall for time (Whirler Virtuoso, Elder-Deep Fiend, etc.). What you have here is a deck that relies a lot on two cards, lacking in removal, and plays otherwise extremely janky cards. Yeah it's good and well-made because the cards do all seem to work together harmoniously, but to call it "broken" or "unfair" is too much.
Does janky mean high value these days?
Rogue refiner. for 3 mana you get a card, 2 energy, and a 3/2 body.
Whirler Virtuoso, 3 mana 2/3 body plus at least 1 possibly a lot more 1/1 flying bodies to either win the game or delay.
Elder-Deep fiend, flash, tap 4 win machine (which I haven't noticed to be even necessary in the better performing decks).
The mana (with the enablers) on 4 color Saheeli is so good it only runs 21 land and consistently can cast anything at any time. There is math out there done on the deck already that has it ahead before the game starts of even Mardu over-pushed vehicles.
It is quite broken. I wish people wouldn't keep giving the guys responsible for balance so much credit (not design team). They are the ones who left GY hate off the menu. They are the ones that allowed 'story' to dictate card power (Emmy), and then ban it after it was out of control. They're the ones who admitted they missed dirtykitty, and then chose to not ban it 3 weeks ago lazily not taking recent events into account.
Amonkhet was in the can when they made the last ban decision. They couldn't possibly have stopped making mistakes for Amonkhet. It's more likely that the power crazy is just as bad and cards from that set may eclipse what we have now. Plenty of pros are calling it broken, and not just the vehicles players.
Yet I have beaten that deck (with a home brew no less) several times due to it having mana consistency-related issues: they were unable to get their 4th color, and it just happened to be white in each instance. I know what you're saying but mana consistency can be only so high in this format when you're playing 4 colors.
By "janky" I cards with very narrow functions. I'll admit Rogue Refiners is good; Whirler Virtuoso, maybe alright (doubtful that it'd win you the game directly). But stuff like Oath of Chandra or Oath of Jace? I wouldn't even pick those cards in limited. Yet they're played here because Felidar Guardian can interact with them.
And what about the players? In every Standard, there's at least 1 new deck to emerge into Tier 1 somewhere in the middle of the meta, but we didn't get one this case (Maybe Temur Tower but that deck barely made a splash). In a meta with only 3 decks to beat, is it truly impossible to brew a deck that is specifically designed to beat only 3 archetypes? Or are we all just unwilling, probably paranoid they might ban more cards?
So what's Wizards going to do? Clearly banning cards not only didn't fix the format but also made it worse, and establishing the precedence that cards can be banned in Standard likely caused irreversible damage to consumer confidence. Maybe restrict the OP cards in lieu to banning them? Or maybe restrict certain cards from being played alongside each other in the same deck (i.e. If a deck runs Heart of Kiran, it can't also run Gideon).
So what's Wizards going to do? Clearly banning cards not only didn't fix the format but also made it worse, and establishing the precedence that cards can be banned in Standard likely caused irreversible damage to consumer confidence.
[/url]
What precedent has been established in the past 3 months? This is the 4/5th time cards have been banned in Standard and in none of the other cases did people lose confidence in WOTC due to the bans.
[quote]
Maybe restrict the OP cards in lieu to banning them? Or maybe restrict certain cards from being played alongside each other in the same deck (i.e. If a deck runs Heart of Kiran, it can't also run Gideon).
Both of these 'fixes' make things worse not better. Back in Darksteel when Skullclamp was banned from everything they contemplated just restricting it but worked out that instead of making the situation better it just made it worse as the game became a race to get their broken card on the table first and the player that succeeded in that usually won the game.
And for banning cards in combination this leads to an ever increase banned list as new and degenerate combos are found and need to go on the list. This is also ignoring the logistical issues involved with getting the Deck checks sorted out. Where instead of just looking for individual cards that might appear the judge is now looking either for specific numbers of cards or cards which might be legal is certain circumstances and then illegal in others.
Whilst it is a very blunt tool the current Banned and restricted list is the best comprimise we are going to get for the problem
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Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag and start slitting throats.
- H.L Mencken
I Became insane with long Intervals of horrible Sanity
All Religion, my friend is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination and poetry.
- Edgar Allan Poe
I think one of the greatest problems of standard bannings is that people loose monetary value on the banned cards. But, I was wondering (and I don't have a great answer) if WOTC could compensate players for lost $$, wouldn't this make bannings more palatable (and, thus, opening up this tool for WOTC)?
My propsal for compensation is this: WOTC announces on day X that a card (say, felidar guardian) is banned. You then have 2 weeks to mail your guardians, together with a receipt prooving that you purchased the guardian prior to day X, to WOTC. Then, they reimburse you the market value that felidar guardian had on day X. Sure, this only reimburses your cards if you bought them from a vendor (i.e., not if you traded for it, or if you opened up in a pack), but at least this is something. Ideas?
So what's Wizards going to do? Clearly banning cards not only didn't fix the format but also made it worse, and establishing the precedence that cards can be banned in Standard likely caused irreversible damage to consumer confidence.
[/url]
What precedent has been established in the past 3 months? This is the 4/5th time cards have been banned in Standard and in none of the other cases did people lose confidence in WOTC due to the bans.
[quote]
Maybe restrict the OP cards in lieu to banning them? Or maybe restrict certain cards from being played alongside each other in the same deck (i.e. If a deck runs Heart of Kiran, it can't also run Gideon).
Both of these 'fixes' make things worse not better. Back in Darksteel when Skullclamp was banned from everything they contemplated just restricting it but worked out that instead of making the situation better it just made it worse as the game became a race to get their broken card on the table first and the player that succeeded in that usually won the game.
And for banning cards in combination this leads to an ever increase banned list as new and degenerate combos are found and need to go on the list. This is also ignoring the logistical issues involved with getting the Deck checks sorted out. Where instead of just looking for individual cards that might appear the judge is now looking either for specific numbers of cards or cards which might be legal is certain circumstances and then illegal in others.
Whilst it is a very blunt tool the current Banned and restricted list is the best comprimise we are going to get for the problem
</blockquote>
Well if new, degenerate combos pop up, they'll likely get on a B&R list anyway, so would creating a new list that prohibits the use of some cards with others in one deck be so infeasible?
As far as logistics go, don't they require you to submit a deck list at official tournaments anyway? Even so, some players will catch that, because knowing the rules is part of being good at Magic, and knowing what cards are banned or restricted seem like pretty fundamental rules.
So what's Wizards going to do? Clearly banning cards not only didn't fix the format but also made it worse, and establishing the precedence that cards can be banned in Standard likely caused irreversible damage to consumer confidence.
[/url]
What precedent has been established in the past 3 months? This is the 4/5th time cards have been banned in Standard and in none of the other cases did people lose confidence in WOTC due to the bans.
[quote]
Maybe restrict the OP cards in lieu to banning them? Or maybe restrict certain cards from being played alongside each other in the same deck (i.e. If a deck runs Heart of Kiran, it can't also run Gideon).
Both of these 'fixes' make things worse not better. Back in Darksteel when Skullclamp was banned from everything they contemplated just restricting it but worked out that instead of making the situation better it just made it worse as the game became a race to get their broken card on the table first and the player that succeeded in that usually won the game.
And for banning cards in combination this leads to an ever increase banned list as new and degenerate combos are found and need to go on the list. This is also ignoring the logistical issues involved with getting the Deck checks sorted out. Where instead of just looking for individual cards that might appear the judge is now looking either for specific numbers of cards or cards which might be legal is certain circumstances and then illegal in others.
Whilst it is a very blunt tool the current Banned and restricted list is the best comprimise we are going to get for the problem
Well if new, degenerate combos pop up, they'll likely get on a B&R list anyway, so would creating a new list that prohibits the use of some cards with others in one deck be so infeasible?
It will end up being a lot bigger and more complicated than the current one. To take Stone forge mystic as an example. With non degenerate equipment it is fine. But the current list of equipment it falls over with is Batterskull and the swords of cycle.
If you allowed Stone forge mystic just not in combination with those 6 artifacts where you would have 1 line on the banned list to say no Stoneforged mystic you need 6 to say these specific combos are banned
Then if for some reason they complete the cycle of swords so it includes the allied pairs that is then 5 more entries that go on the banned and restricted list just to deal with 1 single card that is a problem, Stone forge mystic. Far easier and simpler to say you just can't use the mystic period.
As far as logistics go, don't they require you to submit a deck list at official tournaments anyway? Even so, some players will catch that, because knowing the rules is part of being good at Magic, and knowing what cards are banned or restricted seem like pretty fundamental rules.
True but not the problem. Currently deck checks are simple and can be done fairly quickly. Check to make sure that the cards and deck list match up. There are no cards that aren't in the format, check there are no cards on banned and restricted list and make sure there are no more than 4 of any non basic land. something that can be done fairly easily and quickly and the only information a player knows about their opponents deck if a deck check is done is that it is legal.
With combinations banned you have to take a lot closer look at the deck to make sure the player hasn't slipped something in either by mistake or deliberately which makes the deck check process a lot longer so the tournmanent is going to be significantly disrupted either with the lenght of deck checks or a larger number of judges assigned to them to speed up the process. Again if a deck check is called for by a player who see a SFM it it comes back confirmed that the deck is legal he then knows he doesn't need to worry about Batterskull or any of the Mirrodin swords so has a lot more information than he is otherwise entitled to
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Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag and start slitting throats.
- H.L Mencken
I Became insane with long Intervals of horrible Sanity
All Religion, my friend is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination and poetry.
- Edgar Allan Poe
It will end up being a lot bigger and more complicated than the current one. To take Stone forge mystic as an example. With non degenerate equipment it is fine. But the current list of equipment it falls over with is Batterskull and the swords of cycle.
If you allowed Stone forge mystic just not in combination with those 6 artifacts where you would have 1 line on the banned list to say no Stoneforged mystic you need 6 to say these specific combos are banned
Then if for some reason they complete the cycle of swords so it includes the allied pairs that is then 5 more entries that go on the banned and restricted list just to deal with 1 single card that is a problem, Stone forge mystic. Far easier and simpler to say you just can't use the mystic period.
Well in your example you have one card that has an OP interaction with 6 other cards, so banning the one card would make more sense. Right now Standard's issue are just instances of two cards.
True but not the problem. Currently deck checks are simple and can be done fairly quickly. Check to make sure that the cards and deck list match up. There are no cards that aren't in the format, check there are no cards on banned and restricted list and make sure there are no more than 4 of any non basic land. something that can be done fairly easily and quickly and the only information a player knows about their opponents deck if a deck check is done is that it is legal.
With combinations banned you have to take a lot closer look at the deck to make sure the player hasn't slipped something in either by mistake or deliberately which makes the deck check process a lot longer so the tournmanent is going to be significantly disrupted either with the lenght of deck checks or a larger number of judges assigned to them to speed up the process. Again if a deck check is called for by a player who see a SFM it it comes back confirmed that the deck is legal he then knows he doesn't need to worry about Batterskull or any of the Mirrodin swords so has a lot more information than he is otherwise entitled to
So you think tournaments will take significantly longer if they have to cross-check for two cards that are banned if played in the same deck? Even so, Wizards does need a solution, even if that solution becomes a logistical nuisance. Besides, this would be easily enforced. If Wizards imposes that rule, there's bound to be at least one player at any FNM who will catch if someone tries to play two cards that shouldn't be together. That player will then be DQ'd for the night, and [potentially] gets that recorded in their DCI record or banned indefinitely if done at an official event. So there's no need for players to call for deck checks, because they'll just win if they spot their opponent playing two cards that are banned together, and their opponent will never play Magic again.
What you suggest is never going to happen. They've been happy with the ban system since forever, and when a bad Standard comes up they mostly weather through it. We'll see if Amonkhet changes things dramatically. If it doesn't, they'll kill the cat. Meanwhile, I was pondering giving up on standard if they didn't ban the combo. But I think I'll work through it. There are ways to fight back however difficult it might be, and as long as I have a deck that can anwser that combo, it's playable. It is extremely narrow though, down to these cards:
Grasp, Shock, Harnessed, Unlicensed, Stasis Snare, Thalia, Authority, counterspells, Transgress, Ballista, Fireweaver, Dynavolt, fog, and that's about it. And Gift of Tusks!
Find a deck that runs about 8 copies of these cards and then figure out how to actually win. OR, find a way to outrace them and win by turn 5. And also play well against Mardu.
Here's an idea, no idea how good: Insolent Neonate. T2 Sac, discard Haunted Dead. T2 (their end step) reanimate it, T3 cast Distended Mindbender for 1BB. Make them discard Felidar Guardian and Saheeli or Harnessed Lightning.
Jund Tower is a fairly good match up from what I can see, but right now I'm very skeptical of Amonket changing the meta without the cards being printed at least matching the power of the cards in Aether Revolt, and even if something did dethrone the deck, there are so many powerful and underutilized cards in Aether Revolt like Gifted Aetherborn and Renegade Rallier that the set will still be the primary focus for a while.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Grasp, Shock, Harnessed, Unlicensed, Stasis Snare, Thalia, Authority, counterspells, Transgress, Ballista, Fireweaver, Dynavolt, fog, and that's about it. And Gift of Tusks!
I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but that is a lot of options, which goes back to what I and others have mentioned before: learn how to play around your opponents' decks.
Grasp, Shock, Harnessed, Unlicensed, Stasis Snare, Thalia, Authority, counterspells, Transgress, Ballista, Fireweaver, Dynavolt, fog, and that's about it. And Gift of Tusks!
I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but that is a lot of options, which goes back to what I and others have mentioned before: learn how to play around your opponents' decks.
And if it were that damned simple we woudn't have seen two GPs in completely different continents and attended by nearly 3000 people completely and utterly dominated by Mardu Vehicles and Saheeli Cat, nor would we be seeing Mardu Vehicles at 38% of the winning metagame or Saheeli at 25%.
If all it took to beat these decks, or even do well against them, was learning to play around them, then we simply wouldn't see the format devolve as heavily as it has. You are effectively trying to be smarter than the 3000 people at the two Grand Prixs this weekend, tens of thousands of people online, the combined experience of Pros throughout the world, and many others. That is a might fine level of hubris you have.
To be frank, your statements seem to indicate you don't have much experience against the decks in question, nor experience seeing how effective(Or really ineffective) these cards are against these strategies. To be blunt, the removal package we have is not nearly good enough to keep those decks in check. If it were, we would not see the results we have been seeing at all. I can speak from experience that none of these cards are particular great at "beating" the deck. The removal we have either has too many holes that can be exploited trivially through main deck cards, just plain bad most of the time (Such as shock), and the good removal options we have are very quickly overwhelmed by the constant stream of need-to-answer threats.
What you need to do to be competitive is apply a strong clock and board presence while being able to leverage the 4-8 removal spells you have. Turns out that the decks that do that best are Mardu Vehicles and 4-C Saheeli, and it's not even remotely close. That is the problem. If you are going to run Fatal Pushes and Disintegrations in a threat-heavydeck (A necessity of the format), you pretty much should be playing Mardu Vehicles and it's not even close. Not only do you maintain the strongest removal suite in the format, but you do so while applying the most pressure. If you are playing Harnessed Lightning, you might as well be playing a deck which can generate enough to turn it into Doom Blade. And if you are doing that, there is simply nothing better than have an auto-win combo on top of your energy production.
Sure, you can play a crappier deck. You could do that during Affinity standard, or Caw-Blade. Doesn't mean that it's good, or going to work. The simple truth is that no decks can reasonably compete with the ridiculous boardstate that Mardu Vehicles presents nor can they compete with the constant pressure to always maintain instant speed removal from turn 4 on else you just plain lose.
I read a quote today where Rosewater said straight up they shifted design to this battlecruiser magic to please people and try to draw more people in. He admitted that design philosophy (and he mentioned making cards based on story <cough> Emrakul, <cough> gatewatch) were mistakes. He said it. Mistakes. They are going to apply what they've learned to future sets... that means we get nothing for Amonkhet block because it's too far along in their process. The block after that is where hopefully 'lessons learned' will lead to the return of regular control and aggro for our triangle of equality. Control - aggro - midrange. As Brian DeMars pointed out
Everything right now is midrange... battlecruiser magic, and that has sapped the variety and balance from the game.
As has been pointed out. Math doesn't lie. Home brews can win a single FNM sure, probably lots of netdeckers who can't pilot their Saheeli to save themselves. But you cannot keep winning because the math is completely against you. The mana for 4C dirtykitty is way too good. They only need to run 21 lands and they can cast whatever they need to constantly. The cards you complain about enable the deck to win and have the pieces it needs very quickly and consistently.
Test 10-15 matches vs a proper pilot and you will see.
In the meantime... selling all those standard cards!
Sadly, I sold all my standard stuff to buy into modern this season. I'm not quite sure Amonkhet will have the answers we are looking forward, however by this time next (jan-march 2018) year standard will be very different. It's one thing for local players to just opt to not play the Tier 1 decks at FNM for the sake of fun, but more often than not many local players near me have opted to forgo standard this season and buy into modern decks. I miss the grindy standard game play but that's not where this format is at right now, here's hoping there are solutions before rotation, because if there aren't; I foresee attendance dropping even more in my area.
I'd rather lose to Blood Moon right now, and I'm okay with that. Hey, gotta punish greedy mana bases, something we can't do in current standard.
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Standard Arena: Eh? Gruul or Die
Modern: Decks I'm playing right now: G Mono Green Tron (34-10-3 paper record, only SCG/Regionals/PPTQ record) C Eldrazi Tron (9-5) UG Infect RW Burn
Grasp, Shock, Harnessed, Unlicensed, Stasis Snare, Thalia, Authority, counterspells, Transgress, Ballista, Fireweaver, Dynavolt, fog, and that's about it. And Gift of Tusks!
I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but that is a lot of options, which goes back to what I and others have mentioned before: learn how to play around your opponents' decks.
And if it were that damned simple we woudn't have seen two GPs in completely different continents and attended by nearly 3000 people completely and utterly dominated by Mardu Vehicles and Saheeli Cat, nor would we be seeing Mardu Vehicles at 38% of the winning metagame or Saheeli at 25%.
If all it took to beat these decks, or even do well against them, was learning to play around them, then we simply wouldn't see the format devolve as heavily as it has. You are effectively trying to be smarter than the 3000 people at the two Grand Prixs this weekend, tens of thousands of people online, the combined experience of Pros throughout the world, and many others. That is a might fine level of hubris you have.
To be frank, your statements seem to indicate you don't have much experience against the decks in question, nor experience seeing how effective(Or really ineffective) these cards are against these strategies. To be blunt, the removal package we have is not nearly good enough to keep those decks in check. If it were, we would not see the results we have been seeing at all. I can speak from experience that none of these cards are particular great at "beating" the deck. The removal we have either has too many holes that can be exploited trivially through main deck cards, just plain bad most of the time (Such as shock), and the good removal options we have are very quickly overwhelmed by the constant stream of need-to-answer threats.
What you need to do to be competitive is apply a strong clock and board presence while being able to leverage the 4-8 removal spells you have. Turns out that the decks that do that best are Mardu Vehicles and 4-C Saheeli, and it's not even remotely close. That is the problem. If you are going to run Fatal Pushes and Disintegrations in a threat-heavydeck (A necessity of the format), you pretty much should be playing Mardu Vehicles and it's not even close. Not only do you maintain the strongest removal suite in the format, but you do so while applying the most pressure. If you are playing Harnessed Lightning, you might as well be playing a deck which can generate enough to turn it into Doom Blade. And if you are doing that, there is simply nothing better than have an auto-win combo on top of your energy production.
Sure, you can play a crappier deck. You could do that during Affinity standard, or Caw-Blade. Doesn't mean that it's good, or going to work. The simple truth is that no decks can reasonably compete with the ridiculous boardstate that Mardu Vehicles presents nor can they compete with the constant pressure to always maintain instant speed removal from turn 4 on else you just plain lose.
What do you mean by too many holes?
You realize that at the PT, people were even playing Implement of Combustion simply because it can disrupt the combo? Yet the suite of removal cards that were just mentioned above are "not nearly good enough?"
I also never said playing around your opponents' decks is easy, just that it is possible.
Lastly, since you've established yourself as more experienced than I am and based on your claims that none of the removals currently in Standard are effective against 4c Saheeli, what type of card(s) do you think needs to be printed in order to deal with the copycat combo effectively? And how feasible do you think such a card would be printed on Standard?
Lastly, since you've established yourself as more experienced than I am and based on your claims that none of the removals currently in Standard are effective against 4c Saheeli, what type of card(s) do you think needs to be printed in order to deal with the copycat combo effectively? And how feasible do you think such a card would be printed on Standard?
I haven't read the whole discussion, but the answer to this question is really simple. It has three parts, that combine to explain why removal seems great but in reality is terrible. The first thing to understand is that dealign with cat is easy. If cat was all we had to deal with, I can brew up 2 or even 3 control decks that destroy it completely; the point is that those decks fold to vehicles. The real question is: how can you beat the cat while simultaneously have a chance vs vehicles"
The planeswalker/creature connundrum: the top 2 decks play a fine mixture of creatures and non creatures (typically in the form of walkers). Mardu plays vehicles, chandra gideon alongside resilient creatures that in some cases are even backed up by avacyn granting indestructibe; Saheeli plays virtuoso and refiner, alongside chandra. Unfortunately, there are few answers that overlap all these threata, meaning that there is a high chance of having in hand the wrong answer for the question your opponent is asking (say, have a shock in hand vs a whirler virtuoso, or having a negate when the opponent casts the cat). What cards do we print to fix this? print removal that is universal across walkers and creautres (like hero's downfall or even something like silumgar's command), and a counterspell that can catch both creatures and walker (1U instant: counter target creature or planeswalker). PS: these "waker or creature " answers must be instant speed, to help fight the combo.
Most of the creatures played are either imprevious to removal or have ETB effects that removal consistently trades at worse than 1-1. Mardu plays thraben inspector (which produces an artifact for all the artifact synergies), scrounger (that just comes back and means you ended up "trading" 0-1); Saheeli plays virtuoso (with energy for instant activation) and rogue refiner (which etb draws a card and 2/3 of a thopter), so trying to play 1-1 removal vs them is terrible. Currently, there are two ways to deal with creatures that replace themselves, and both are terrible: (1) sweepers (of which fumigate is too inefficient and radiant flames forces you to play 3 colors to be remotely playable... and both of these make you tap our and risk a gideon resolving or being combo-ed out) and (2) "counter target creature" spells, of which we only have horribly awry (see item 1 above to why you can't play too many of them, hence why you can't bank on this card, or others like it, to bail you out). And before anyone claims "what about 3 mana universal counters", the point of a counterpell is to gain tempo. If you are spending 3 mana to counter a 1,2 or 3 mana creature, you are further setting yourself behind. What to print: a "creature or planewsalker" 2-mana counterspell, go back to 4 mana wraths, or print cards that allow you to remove the creature and gain back the value your opponent got form the ETB trigger (example: "1BB instant: destroy target creature. If that creature has cmc less than or equal to 3, it's controler discards a card" or "WUB: exile target creature. Draw a card." Yes, these are much more powerful cards than what we are used to nowadays, but the whole point is that threats became so powerful, that answers must also become morte powerful. I would even go as far as saying that the classic counterspell is a fine card for standard, given the power level of some threats.)
AFTER you print instant apeed answers that can deal with both creatures and walkers (either as counterspells or removal spells that recoups the lost value form your opponent's etb creatures), you must print a 1-mana deck manipulation effect to help with hitting land drops. Currently, 4C saheeli has a ponder of sorts, and a tutor of sorts, whereas reactive decks have anticipate. If the proactive deck is able to find threats more efficiently than the reactive deck can find answers, there is no point in printing the answers in the first place.
You realize that at the PT, people were even playing Implement of Combustion simply because it can disrupt the combo? Yet the suite of removal cards that were just mentioned above are "not nearly good enough?"
To many holes means that the removal is so bad against the rest of the field that it is just plain unplayable elsewise. If you are warping your deck to play a hyper-narrow answer that is utterly useless in almost every situation, and barely deals with the deck it is meant to be played against, there is something fundamentally wrong with the format. Having to play Implement is exactly the point I am making: The answers that are available are complete trash that even when they are good, they are marginally so, and when they are bad they are useless.
Case in point, exactly one copy of Implement showed up in the top 32 player's decklists. If Implement was worth playing at all, and effective at keeping the combo at bay, it should have been everywhere.
You are conflating the concept of answers in the abstract with actually effective answers. Implement is not an effective answer to Saheeli-Cat, even if it answers the combo in the abstract. It is far, far too inneffecient to actually be useful, and it does so little on top of that it that it just feels miserable to actually play it. Shock falls in the same boat: It barely answers anything aside from the Cat Combo effectively, which it still doesn't do nearly as well as you would think because the deck is pretty efficient at rebuilding the combo the next turn anyway.
You are conflating answers the card in the abstract with actually being a decent answer to the deck. And almost none of these cards actually are great answers to the decks at all - they are at best functional, and more commonly desperate attempts at inneffectively answering a very narrow card that doesn't actually do nearly as much to blunt their game plan as you would like; equally being forced to play these incredibly bad cards leaves you dead to every deck and situation that the card is bad in.
This is the warping effect that the Cat-combo has on the format: You are forced further and further into running too many narrow, inefficient, and bad cards in your deck so as not to straight up die to the Combo that you are just an utter dog to Mardu Vehicles (Which you were an utter dog to to begin with due to how ridiculous the deck is, but that's neither here nor there). If these "answers" were so effective at dealing with Saheeli-Cat, it would not be represented at 25% for 4-color, and 30% as a whole in the format.
Not only are you warping your deck building significantly to accomodate for just not losing to the combo, but you also at some point during the game have to stop playing the game or else you lose. That is not healthy at all. That is the opposite of healthy game play; it's one thing to be punished for putting your shields down at the wrong time, or losing due to a high risk play. It is a completely different situation to be at 20 life and not do anything at all on your turn because it just plain loses the game for you on the spot.
I also never said playing around your opponents' decks is easy, just that it is possible.
Once again, you are failing to see the difference between "in the abstract" and "in reality". In reality, even if you play around it perfectly you are still dead to the fact that you are playing horrible cards in your deck under the premise that you just plain lose the game if you don't have an immediate answer to your opponent. Equally, you are under constant pressure to continuously find, and always have, an instant speed answer to the combo at all times in the game from turn 4 to turn infinity. That is completely and utterly ridiculous to ask. A single shock isn't going to stop you from losing the game. Your going to need to find a shock, on time, at every single point that they represent the combo. The reality of the situation is that the game does not operate like that at all, particularly when you have diluted your deck so significantly to running cards that just aren't great to begin with, and aren't even that great against the cards you are trying to deal with except in a very narrow subset of situations.
Lastly, since you've established yourself as more experienced than I am and based on your claims that none of the removals currently in Standard are effective against 4c Saheeli, what type of card(s) do you think needs to be printed in order to deal with the copycat combo effectively? And how feasible do you think such a card would be printed on Standard?
I don't think the combo is at all reasonable in standard. We had it before in Splinter twin, however what kept that in check is that any form of removal killed both halves of the combo out of the game, and they had to completely rebuild it from there (Vapor Snag was a bit different, however we do not have an aggressive blue-based deck that are typically what use these effectives). The need to constantly not play to the board in order to just plain not lose, regardless of what the game state is, is not a healthy one. It is particularly frustrating when one of the combo pieces is a planeswalker, which notoriously have the fewest means of interaction with them. The constant pressure to always have an answer and never play to the board warps the format in an unhealthy way. There is no card that exists or could exist that changes my mind on this one.
Of course, maindeckable removal that you feel good running as it's not utterly useless in most situation, and is cheap enough not disrupt gameplay would help some. It would not fix the fundamental issue, however. The real issue is that the Combo requires you to warp your deck into being too inefficient to function properly in any context. The only deck that answers it is Mardu Vehicles, and that is carried more by its blistering clock that ensures the opponent doesn't get to the combo moreso than by its ability to disrupt the combo.
I think the format is "survivable" depending on if people are playing the S Tier decks in your local meta or not. There are plenty of "A" rank decks possible in the format that are way more affordable than the top decks, such as various tower builds, R/B aggro, Simic evolution, etc. The big trouble is that the second either of the S rank decks step in the entire game night just turns into a slaughtering ground. It's almost unbelievable to watch, but the last standard I saw pretty much went from a bunch of people having fun to basically Saheeli vs Saheeli in the final rounds. I don't even remember who made third place on the night.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
What cards do we print to fix this? print removal that is universal across walkers and creautres (like hero's downfall or even something like silumgar's command), and a counterspell that can catch both creatures and walker (1U instant: counter target creature or planeswalker). PS: these "waker or creature " answers must be instant speed, to help fight the combo.
Here's what I expect their thought process was for Standard. They had a Standard people didn't like, then banned cards. Unlike previous bannings, these wasn't just one deck ruling the format, so the bannings were received somewhat dubiously. And the results of those bannings... was a format people seem to like even less than the one before (granted, various new cards entered the format to help cause that, so it's possible the bannings prevented an even worse format from happening... but one is still left wondering if the format might be healthier, at least in terms of deck diversity, if the bannings hadn't happened). So what happens if they try to ban something again, and the format doesn't improve or gets even worse as a result? That's not an unreasonable fear, particularly because so much of what's messed up in Standard isn't really attributable to specific cards but more the general philosophy they've been cultivating of how printing anything resembling good removal is a no-no.
There also may or may not be cards in Amonkhet they figure could try to fix things up. Maybe we'll see things like Torpor Orb or Pithing Needle. It was likely to late to change Amonkhet (though who knows, maybe an ultra last minute change was possible) in response to the bannings and discovery of CopyCat, but those cards might have been there independently.
Oh well. At least I've got a Force of Will (the TCG) deck together, so I can play that some. Their version of Standard is actually rather healthy at the moment, especially compared to Magic's.
At least copter would have been controlled by Fatal Push which can't kill the cat unless you can somehow keep an Evolving Wilds spare all game.
All not banning anything has done is confuse me more as to why Copter was banned. At least you could fly in and kick Saheeli in the head with it.
Because you can throw Copter in practically any deck and it will perform very well. Felidar Guardian requires a much more specific deck to be housed in (i.e. One that plays lots of permanents).
Also look at the Saheeli deck: it's built around the combo. The deck plays a lot of cards that help you draw (Oath of Nissa, Rogue Refiners, etc.) and stall for time (Whirler Virtuoso, Elder-Deep Fiend, etc.). What you have here is a deck that relies a lot on two cards, lacking in removal, and plays otherwise extremely janky cards. Yeah it's good and well-made because the cards do all seem to work together harmoniously, but to call it "broken" or "unfair" is too much.
So either standard isn't REALLY a 2 deck format, it just looks like it, or standard is fun regardless of deck choice and people are whinging because they can't play their tokens deck
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Does janky mean high value these days?
Rogue refiner. for 3 mana you get a card, 2 energy, and a 3/2 body.
Whirler Virtuoso, 3 mana 2/3 body plus at least 1 possibly a lot more 1/1 flying bodies to either win the game or delay.
Elder-Deep fiend, flash, tap 4 win machine (which I haven't noticed to be even necessary in the better performing decks).
The mana (with the enablers) on 4 color Saheeli is so good it only runs 21 land and consistently can cast anything at any time. There is math out there done on the deck already that has it ahead before the game starts of even Mardu over-pushed vehicles.
It is quite broken. I wish people wouldn't keep giving the guys responsible for balance so much credit (not design team). They are the ones who left GY hate off the menu. They are the ones that allowed 'story' to dictate card power (Emmy), and then ban it after it was out of control. They're the ones who admitted they missed dirtykitty, and then chose to not ban it 3 weeks ago lazily not taking recent events into account.
Amonkhet was in the can when they made the last ban decision. They couldn't possibly have stopped making mistakes for Amonkhet. It's more likely that the power crazy is just as bad and cards from that set may eclipse what we have now. Plenty of pros are calling it broken, and not just the vehicles players.
1
ONE. This is a major store in the Austin Area and they had 1, everyone else was drafting or playing modern (at least 18 on a Tuesday), You can chalk it to spring break, or SXSW but it was very odd, lots of people are off, and standard didn't fire. I've come to this store since I started playing the game again in 2014 and this is the first time I've ever seen standard not fire.
On the 4c Saheeli deck and Mardu, no one wants to play against these things anymore, no one; Unless you are forced too...
Modern: Decks I'm playing right now:
G Mono Green Tron (34-10-3 paper record, only SCG/Regionals/PPTQ record)
C Eldrazi Tron (9-5)
UG Infect
RW Burn
EDH: GWCaptain Sisay
Yet I have beaten that deck (with a home brew no less) several times due to it having mana consistency-related issues: they were unable to get their 4th color, and it just happened to be white in each instance. I know what you're saying but mana consistency can be only so high in this format when you're playing 4 colors.
By "janky" I cards with very narrow functions. I'll admit Rogue Refiners is good; Whirler Virtuoso, maybe alright (doubtful that it'd win you the game directly). But stuff like Oath of Chandra or Oath of Jace? I wouldn't even pick those cards in limited. Yet they're played here because Felidar Guardian can interact with them.
And what about the players? In every Standard, there's at least 1 new deck to emerge into Tier 1 somewhere in the middle of the meta, but we didn't get one this case (Maybe Temur Tower but that deck barely made a splash). In a meta with only 3 decks to beat, is it truly impossible to brew a deck that is specifically designed to beat only 3 archetypes? Or are we all just unwilling, probably paranoid they might ban more cards?
So what's Wizards going to do? Clearly banning cards not only didn't fix the format but also made it worse, and establishing the precedence that cards can be banned in Standard likely caused irreversible damage to consumer confidence. Maybe restrict the OP cards in lieu to banning them? Or maybe restrict certain cards from being played alongside each other in the same deck (i.e. If a deck runs Heart of Kiran, it can't also run Gideon).
Both of these 'fixes' make things worse not better. Back in Darksteel when Skullclamp was banned from everything they contemplated just restricting it but worked out that instead of making the situation better it just made it worse as the game became a race to get their broken card on the table first and the player that succeeded in that usually won the game.
And for banning cards in combination this leads to an ever increase banned list as new and degenerate combos are found and need to go on the list. This is also ignoring the logistical issues involved with getting the Deck checks sorted out. Where instead of just looking for individual cards that might appear the judge is now looking either for specific numbers of cards or cards which might be legal is certain circumstances and then illegal in others.
Whilst it is a very blunt tool the current Banned and restricted list is the best comprimise we are going to get for the problem
- H.L Mencken
I Became insane with long Intervals of horrible Sanity
All Religion, my friend is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination and poetry.
- Edgar Allan Poe
The Crafters' Rules Guru
My propsal for compensation is this: WOTC announces on day X that a card (say, felidar guardian) is banned. You then have 2 weeks to mail your guardians, together with a receipt prooving that you purchased the guardian prior to day X, to WOTC. Then, they reimburse you the market value that felidar guardian had on day X. Sure, this only reimburses your cards if you bought them from a vendor (i.e., not if you traded for it, or if you opened up in a pack), but at least this is something. Ideas?
Well if new, degenerate combos pop up, they'll likely get on a B&R list anyway, so would creating a new list that prohibits the use of some cards with others in one deck be so infeasible?
As far as logistics go, don't they require you to submit a deck list at official tournaments anyway? Even so, some players will catch that, because knowing the rules is part of being good at Magic, and knowing what cards are banned or restricted seem like pretty fundamental rules.
It will end up being a lot bigger and more complicated than the current one. To take Stone forge mystic as an example. With non degenerate equipment it is fine. But the current list of equipment it falls over with is Batterskull and the swords of cycle.
If you allowed Stone forge mystic just not in combination with those 6 artifacts where you would have 1 line on the banned list to say no Stoneforged mystic you need 6 to say these specific combos are banned
Then if for some reason they complete the cycle of swords so it includes the allied pairs that is then 5 more entries that go on the banned and restricted list just to deal with 1 single card that is a problem, Stone forge mystic. Far easier and simpler to say you just can't use the mystic period.
True but not the problem. Currently deck checks are simple and can be done fairly quickly. Check to make sure that the cards and deck list match up. There are no cards that aren't in the format, check there are no cards on banned and restricted list and make sure there are no more than 4 of any non basic land. something that can be done fairly easily and quickly and the only information a player knows about their opponents deck if a deck check is done is that it is legal.
With combinations banned you have to take a lot closer look at the deck to make sure the player hasn't slipped something in either by mistake or deliberately which makes the deck check process a lot longer so the tournmanent is going to be significantly disrupted either with the lenght of deck checks or a larger number of judges assigned to them to speed up the process. Again if a deck check is called for by a player who see a SFM it it comes back confirmed that the deck is legal he then knows he doesn't need to worry about Batterskull or any of the Mirrodin swords so has a lot more information than he is otherwise entitled to
- H.L Mencken
I Became insane with long Intervals of horrible Sanity
All Religion, my friend is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination and poetry.
- Edgar Allan Poe
The Crafters' Rules Guru
Well in your example you have one card that has an OP interaction with 6 other cards, so banning the one card would make more sense. Right now Standard's issue are just instances of two cards.
So you think tournaments will take significantly longer if they have to cross-check for two cards that are banned if played in the same deck? Even so, Wizards does need a solution, even if that solution becomes a logistical nuisance. Besides, this would be easily enforced. If Wizards imposes that rule, there's bound to be at least one player at any FNM who will catch if someone tries to play two cards that shouldn't be together. That player will then be DQ'd for the night, and [potentially] gets that recorded in their DCI record or banned indefinitely if done at an official event. So there's no need for players to call for deck checks, because they'll just win if they spot their opponent playing two cards that are banned together, and their opponent will never play Magic again.
Grasp, Shock, Harnessed, Unlicensed, Stasis Snare, Thalia, Authority, counterspells, Transgress, Ballista, Fireweaver, Dynavolt, fog, and that's about it. And Gift of Tusks!
Find a deck that runs about 8 copies of these cards and then figure out how to actually win. OR, find a way to outrace them and win by turn 5. And also play well against Mardu.
Here's an idea, no idea how good: Insolent Neonate. T2 Sac, discard Haunted Dead. T2 (their end step) reanimate it, T3 cast Distended Mindbender for 1BB. Make them discard Felidar Guardian and Saheeli or Harnessed Lightning.
GB Electric Dreams BG Deal 20 in one shot, or discard their hand?
GWU Free Stuff Midrange UWG Slowly bury the opponent with more threats and answers than they can handle.
My greatest hits:
GURFate Reforged Temur Ascendancy COMBORUG
GUDragons of Tarkir Whisperwood Forever UG
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but that is a lot of options, which goes back to what I and others have mentioned before: learn how to play around your opponents' decks.
And if it were that damned simple we woudn't have seen two GPs in completely different continents and attended by nearly 3000 people completely and utterly dominated by Mardu Vehicles and Saheeli Cat, nor would we be seeing Mardu Vehicles at 38% of the winning metagame or Saheeli at 25%.
If all it took to beat these decks, or even do well against them, was learning to play around them, then we simply wouldn't see the format devolve as heavily as it has. You are effectively trying to be smarter than the 3000 people at the two Grand Prixs this weekend, tens of thousands of people online, the combined experience of Pros throughout the world, and many others. That is a might fine level of hubris you have.
To be frank, your statements seem to indicate you don't have much experience against the decks in question, nor experience seeing how effective(Or really ineffective) these cards are against these strategies. To be blunt, the removal package we have is not nearly good enough to keep those decks in check. If it were, we would not see the results we have been seeing at all. I can speak from experience that none of these cards are particular great at "beating" the deck. The removal we have either has too many holes that can be exploited trivially through main deck cards, just plain bad most of the time (Such as shock), and the good removal options we have are very quickly overwhelmed by the constant stream of need-to-answer threats.
What you need to do to be competitive is apply a strong clock and board presence while being able to leverage the 4-8 removal spells you have. Turns out that the decks that do that best are Mardu Vehicles and 4-C Saheeli, and it's not even remotely close. That is the problem. If you are going to run Fatal Pushes and Disintegrations in a threat-heavydeck (A necessity of the format), you pretty much should be playing Mardu Vehicles and it's not even close. Not only do you maintain the strongest removal suite in the format, but you do so while applying the most pressure. If you are playing Harnessed Lightning, you might as well be playing a deck which can generate enough to turn it into Doom Blade. And if you are doing that, there is simply nothing better than have an auto-win combo on top of your energy production.
Sure, you can play a crappier deck. You could do that during Affinity standard, or Caw-Blade. Doesn't mean that it's good, or going to work. The simple truth is that no decks can reasonably compete with the ridiculous boardstate that Mardu Vehicles presents nor can they compete with the constant pressure to always maintain instant speed removal from turn 4 on else you just plain lose.
http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/how-to-fix-standard/
Everything right now is midrange... battlecruiser magic, and that has sapped the variety and balance from the game.
As has been pointed out. Math doesn't lie. Home brews can win a single FNM sure, probably lots of netdeckers who can't pilot their Saheeli to save themselves. But you cannot keep winning because the math is completely against you. The mana for 4C dirtykitty is way too good. They only need to run 21 lands and they can cast whatever they need to constantly. The cards you complain about enable the deck to win and have the pieces it needs very quickly and consistently.
Test 10-15 matches vs a proper pilot and you will see.
In the meantime... selling all those standard cards!
I'd rather lose to Blood Moon right now, and I'm okay with that. Hey, gotta punish greedy mana bases, something we can't do in current standard.
Modern: Decks I'm playing right now:
G Mono Green Tron (34-10-3 paper record, only SCG/Regionals/PPTQ record)
C Eldrazi Tron (9-5)
UG Infect
RW Burn
What do you mean by too many holes?
You realize that at the PT, people were even playing Implement of Combustion simply because it can disrupt the combo? Yet the suite of removal cards that were just mentioned above are "not nearly good enough?"
I also never said playing around your opponents' decks is easy, just that it is possible.
Lastly, since you've established yourself as more experienced than I am and based on your claims that none of the removals currently in Standard are effective against 4c Saheeli, what type of card(s) do you think needs to be printed in order to deal with the copycat combo effectively? And how feasible do you think such a card would be printed on Standard?
I haven't read the whole discussion, but the answer to this question is really simple. It has three parts, that combine to explain why removal seems great but in reality is terrible. The first thing to understand is that dealign with cat is easy. If cat was all we had to deal with, I can brew up 2 or even 3 control decks that destroy it completely; the point is that those decks fold to vehicles. The real question is: how can you beat the cat while simultaneously have a chance vs vehicles"
To many holes means that the removal is so bad against the rest of the field that it is just plain unplayable elsewise. If you are warping your deck to play a hyper-narrow answer that is utterly useless in almost every situation, and barely deals with the deck it is meant to be played against, there is something fundamentally wrong with the format. Having to play Implement is exactly the point I am making: The answers that are available are complete trash that even when they are good, they are marginally so, and when they are bad they are useless.
Case in point, exactly one copy of Implement showed up in the top 32 player's decklists. If Implement was worth playing at all, and effective at keeping the combo at bay, it should have been everywhere.
You are conflating the concept of answers in the abstract with actually effective answers. Implement is not an effective answer to Saheeli-Cat, even if it answers the combo in the abstract. It is far, far too inneffecient to actually be useful, and it does so little on top of that it that it just feels miserable to actually play it. Shock falls in the same boat: It barely answers anything aside from the Cat Combo effectively, which it still doesn't do nearly as well as you would think because the deck is pretty efficient at rebuilding the combo the next turn anyway.
You are conflating answers the card in the abstract with actually being a decent answer to the deck. And almost none of these cards actually are great answers to the decks at all - they are at best functional, and more commonly desperate attempts at inneffectively answering a very narrow card that doesn't actually do nearly as much to blunt their game plan as you would like; equally being forced to play these incredibly bad cards leaves you dead to every deck and situation that the card is bad in.
This is the warping effect that the Cat-combo has on the format: You are forced further and further into running too many narrow, inefficient, and bad cards in your deck so as not to straight up die to the Combo that you are just an utter dog to Mardu Vehicles (Which you were an utter dog to to begin with due to how ridiculous the deck is, but that's neither here nor there). If these "answers" were so effective at dealing with Saheeli-Cat, it would not be represented at 25% for 4-color, and 30% as a whole in the format.
Not only are you warping your deck building significantly to accomodate for just not losing to the combo, but you also at some point during the game have to stop playing the game or else you lose. That is not healthy at all. That is the opposite of healthy game play; it's one thing to be punished for putting your shields down at the wrong time, or losing due to a high risk play. It is a completely different situation to be at 20 life and not do anything at all on your turn because it just plain loses the game for you on the spot.
Once again, you are failing to see the difference between "in the abstract" and "in reality". In reality, even if you play around it perfectly you are still dead to the fact that you are playing horrible cards in your deck under the premise that you just plain lose the game if you don't have an immediate answer to your opponent. Equally, you are under constant pressure to continuously find, and always have, an instant speed answer to the combo at all times in the game from turn 4 to turn infinity. That is completely and utterly ridiculous to ask. A single shock isn't going to stop you from losing the game. Your going to need to find a shock, on time, at every single point that they represent the combo. The reality of the situation is that the game does not operate like that at all, particularly when you have diluted your deck so significantly to running cards that just aren't great to begin with, and aren't even that great against the cards you are trying to deal with except in a very narrow subset of situations.
I don't think the combo is at all reasonable in standard. We had it before in Splinter twin, however what kept that in check is that any form of removal killed both halves of the combo out of the game, and they had to completely rebuild it from there (Vapor Snag was a bit different, however we do not have an aggressive blue-based deck that are typically what use these effectives). The need to constantly not play to the board in order to just plain not lose, regardless of what the game state is, is not a healthy one. It is particularly frustrating when one of the combo pieces is a planeswalker, which notoriously have the fewest means of interaction with them. The constant pressure to always have an answer and never play to the board warps the format in an unhealthy way. There is no card that exists or could exist that changes my mind on this one.
Of course, maindeckable removal that you feel good running as it's not utterly useless in most situation, and is cheap enough not disrupt gameplay would help some. It would not fix the fundamental issue, however. The real issue is that the Combo requires you to warp your deck into being too inefficient to function properly in any context. The only deck that answers it is Mardu Vehicles, and that is carried more by its blistering clock that ensures the opponent doesn't get to the combo moreso than by its ability to disrupt the combo.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
So something like Brutal Expulsion?