This Standard format is probably one of the best and most balanced in the last decade. Anyone who played through Standard in any of the last 4 blocks should easily recognize that.
I have played said blocks, and I still don't think that 32 Jace is balanced. I understand that it's too late to ban him, because we've all seen Valakut in the top seat and it is a very ugly thing, but I do not think such a precarious balancing act -- wherein one card is needed to keep an entire archetype at bay to the point where every top eight deck runs four of it -- is at all healthy.
Quote from koloblicin »
Stoneforges ability to break both standard and extended and hell even legacy at this point shows its strength
Stoneforge is not even close to be being broken in Legacy, it sees play in some iffy BW decks that aren't even really worth putting in your testing gauntlet.
(My post from the last locked thread)
It seems like the problem is Squadron Hawk. Stoneforge + Equipment are healthy in a variety of other decks, but the Hawk providing significant card advantage coupled with flying makes it the perfect equipment carrier. It interacts too well with JtMS, often creating pseudo Ancestral Recalls, and makes consistent removal incredibly difficult (this is why Mortarpod) is becoming so popular.
If DCI needs to look at banning a card, they need to look at the Squawk. If WoTC wants to rectify the problem, they need viable Reach creatures/spells in the card pool.
Banning cards would do absolutely nothing in the current format but worsen it.
Ban SoFaF or Stoneforge, and decks revolving around Jace still take over the format.
You ban Jace, Valakut becomes the best deck again and people start hating Primeval Titan.
Ban Primeval, and Goblin Guide and aggressive decks take over the format.
This Standard format is probably one of the best and most balanced in the last decade. Anyone who played through Standard in any of the last 4 blocks should easily recognize that.
I wouldnt call it balanced simply because there is really no tier 1 or tier 2 combo decks. The format is all aggro or control and control has the edge as of late.
The only reason I could see to ban any card is if that card prevented any other decks from being viable. This is certainly not the case. The reason you saw 15 out of 16 top 8 decks at GP dallas being jace/mana leak decks is because those are simply the best decks, which get piolted by the best players (who understand that those are the best), and then they win.
If all of the best players played..idk...naya, then you would most likely see it having a couple top 16 spots as well.
This Standard format is probably one of the best and most balanced in the last decade. Anyone who played through Standard in any of the last 4 blocks should easily recognize that.
I have to, respectfully, disagree.
I know that there aren't really any true "end-all-be-all" sources in the Magic community, but there are a few that different people rely on. I would say that two of the most common ones relied upon, are Patrick Chapin and LSV. And since one of them is especially known for being a blue/control genius, we have to take what they say, at least somewhat seriously.
And what have both Patrick Chapin and LSV said? That Jace needs to be banned, because he is just that strong.
And the evidence we have proves that. Do you know what the Caw-Blade win percentage for the month of March is? 58.87%. Caw-Blade wins over half the matches it plays in.
Do you know what the second highest win percentage of any deck is, in that same time frame? RUG. At 57.19%. Again, that is over half the matches it plays.
Those two decks have a few things in common. Islands, of course. Blue fetchlands. And Preordain and Jace. The two true powerhouses of the decks.
That shows us that Stoneforge isn't the problem (but should seriously be looked at for banning), that the Swords aren't the problem, that Lotus Cobra isn't the problem, but either Jace or Preordain is.
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"Imagination is more important than knowledge." - Albert Einstein
Stoneforge is not even close to be being broken in Legacy, it sees play in some iffy BW decks that aren't even really worth putting in your testing gauntlet.
It does see some play in the Bant decks, which are pretty good. But, it's nowhere near broken in Legacy. But hey, something that tutors up Jitte? That's definitely strong.
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"Imagination is more important than knowledge." - Albert Einstein
Well, so long as you got my point. I was nitpicking anyways, which was lame, but I've grown tired of non-Legacy players saying how good SFM is in the format just because they heard down the grapevine that it was in a list somewhere.
This post is not directed at the person I originally quoted in this thread, either, just a general statement.
Caw Blade is far from unbeatable. Mono Red has shown us that. If you take the best parts of mono red and tag it on to a midrange strategy that beats control (Vengevine) you basically have a deck that toasts Caw Blade. Can it beat Valakut.. well that's a hard one.
Most decks that run Jace can also run easy hate cards against Red. T2 Kor Firewalker against Caw Blade means bad days for the Red decks, also yeah, easy wins against Caw Blade = bad wins against Valakut.
I have a feeling the MEtagame is going to evolve either so that the Caw blade decks are only good against other Caw Blade decks or Valakut. It's kinda sucks that it has to be this way, but ah well.
Banning Jace would be nice and give other walkers a time to shine (Hi Tezzeret, are you alright there?)
I know that there aren't really any true "end-all-be-all" sources in the Magic community, but there are a few that different people rely on. I would say that two of the most common ones relied upon, are Patrick Chapin and LSV. And since one of them is especially known for being a blue/control genius, we have to take what they say, at least somewhat seriously.
And what have both Patrick Chapin and LSV said? That Jace needs to be banned, because he is just that strong.
And the evidence we have proves that. Do you know what the Caw-Blade win percentage for the month of March is? 58.87%. Caw-Blade wins over half the matches it plays in.
Do you know what the second highest win percentage of any deck is, in that same time frame? RUG. At 57.19%. Again, that is over half the matches it plays.
Those two decks have a few things in common. Islands, of course. Blue fetchlands. And Preordain and Jace. The two true powerhouses of the decks.
That shows us that Stoneforge isn't the problem (but should seriously be looked at for banning), that the Swords aren't the problem, that Lotus Cobra isn't the problem, but either Jace or Preordain is.
I would dare to say the Preordain is more powerfull than jace.
It's a really strong turn 1 card, a great draw fixer AND a cantriper.
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“And if at first you don't succeed / Then dust yourself off and try again / You can dust it off and try again, try again.”
:symw::symb:Steel Wb Weenie
I'm against banning any cards in standard for now, let's wait to see what adding more cards to standard does to the meta game.
Jace was fine before MBS, and RUG and U/B control aren't nearly as warping as Caw-Blade, if you ban him, you cripple most blue decks and Valakut probably jumps back to smash face, another "fun" meta. Valakut is also an issue as it just rips apart any deck with a hope of beating Caw-Blade(with the exception of RUG) which I feel puts this meta in a very awkward position.
Mystic isn't the culprit(imo) as she was hardly used before MBS and she has done some good in giving Boros a more consistant game and a better late game. Yes, she adds consistency to an already very consistent deck(caw-blade), but I wouldn't blame the mystic herself.
Honestly, if I HAD to choose a card to ban right now, it would be Sword of Feast and Famine. This is the card that made mystic a $25 card. This is the card that allows caw-blade to make a potential game ending play in the early, mid, and late stages of the game(sword, Jace, Gideon) that are a bit harder to disrupt compared to other decks with similar power(RUG), not to add in the consistency of this deck. It allows caw-blade to attack you from multiple angles, and if you take out 1 angle of attack, you get hit from the next angle. Every time it connects, that's card disadvantage for your opponent(add that with the card advantage you get) and allows you to make back breaking plays. Tap out, play spells, and have counter magic up? Yup. Jace and Gideon in one turn? Yup. I can go on and on.
In the end, I'd rather wait it out, I'm hoping that a larger card pool will help balance things out and diversify the meta, but I do point my finger to SoFaF for the way things are right now. Before that sword came along, standard seemed to be in better shape and just about all of the cards getting the blame now were around then, except for the sword.
The only reason I could see to ban any card is if that card prevented any other decks from being viable. This is certainly not the case. The reason you saw 15 out of 16 top 8 decks at GP dallas being jace/mana leak decks is because those are simply the best decks, which get piolted by the best players (who understand that those are the best), and then they win.
If all of the best players played..idk...naya, then you would most likely see it having a couple top 16 spots as well.
The card to ban based on viability would be Valakut. It almost singlehandedly removes non-blue midrange from the meta and non-blue midrange would act as a dampening element on blue control and aggro-control as it almost always has.
This is a broken meta for any number of reasons, although the most important one is that JtMS is a required card to establish a realistic chance to win in a big tourney. Other people win now and then but they're not playing the list that gives them the best chance to do so.
Stoneforge is not even close to be being broken in Legacy, it sees play in some iffy BW decks that aren't even really worth putting in your testing gauntlet.
Then you haven't heard of Excalibur. Caleb Durward played something similar to a Top 8 finish in Atlanta (report is here), and several of my friends have had impressive finishes with the deck including several Top 8's and many top 16's at Jupiter Games, Vestal, NY (a premier Legacy tourney scene) and winning a Mox at another tourney. While I do admit that the deck isn't the complete bee-knees as it does have bad MUs (Lands, Stax/DStompy), my group was actually sad that Survival got banned because we simply rolled it with this deck.
I think a Bant shell is the best for a SFM deck in Legacy and if more people in the spotlight like Caleb play this deck (Lewis Laskin also played something similar in DC), it might be a force in the metagame.
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"I don't know why people say a double-edged sword is bad. It's a sword. With two edges." - Kamahl, Pit Fighter
Yeah, someone already reminded me of the Bant lists. I did honestly forget about them, even after watching one smash face at a recent feature match. They're still sort of new and definitely need continued tweaking. Won't deny the power in that many beaters though. My main point was that SFM is not broken in Legacy. I am sure we can all agree on that.
You have to run counter spells to consistently beat Valakut, and if you're running U, you're running Jace. The decks that beat Jace decks lose to Valakut, so Jace decks win out.
I have played said blocks, and I still don't think that 32 Jace is balanced. I understand that it's too late to ban him, because we've all seen Valakut in the top seat and it is a very ugly thing, but I do not think such a precarious balancing act -- wherein one card is needed to keep an entire archetype at bay to the point where every top eight deck runs four of it -- is at all healthy.
Fae, Jund, Affinity, 5CC, practically every deck saw this level of dominance at some point.
Maybe it's not 'balanced' by the ideal definition, but compared to the last few blocks? Yeah, it's quite fine. We were all saying these exact same things during the reigns of those previously mentioned decks, and more.
Just because Patrick Chapin and LSV say it, certainly doesn't mean it's right. Plenty of other pros, including Kibler, say that's it's not required.
And no, Stoneforge is certainly not 'breaking' Legacy by any means.
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Quote from Patrick Chapin on SCG »
Magic is a game full of bright people — and all too often bright young men who are used to always being the smartest guy in the room find themselves surrounded by a room full of intelligence and lose their cool.
Fae, Jund, Affinity, 5CC, practically every deck saw this level of dominance at some point.
Didn't Fae and 5CC play Jace?
And Affinity actually did cause so much of a problem, it got banned. Well, at first it was just Skullclamp, and then the deck just got faster because of Welding Jar... But, eventually!, it got its core components banned.
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"Imagination is more important than knowledge." - Albert Einstein
Since I cannot get the editor to publish this article right away. I am going to give you guys all a free preview, since this issue is a definite concern to a large amount of people.
Here is my new article relating towards Jace and the issue of Banning him.
I hope you guys enjoy the read, the reason I am sharing (especially when I am not even really suppose to) it is to enlighten people, before we get into any hostile discussion.
If you want to answer the Valakut issue, why not look at banning the Titans? I believe they are the warping cards currently. Valakut would fall of the face of the earth as a consistent win-con, and some more aggressive creatures would then be able to see play, applying more aggro pressure against caw-blade/ jace-based control decks. I just think the 6 drop bombs have warped standard too drastically. When there are cards like Baneslayer Angel, Sphinx of Jwar Isle, Consecrated Sphinx, Massacre Wurm, Thrun, the Last Troll, Vengevine, and so many other beefy creatures in standard currently, and they see little to no play currently because "They aren't Titans"... that's when standard has its problems. And would banning the Titans destroy Caw-blade? No, it would probably remain one of the best decks in the format. But I think more bad matchups would occur, bringing a bit more balance/ingenuity to the standard environment.
But all of this is for nothing, Wizards isn't going to ban Jace or any other standard card for that matter. Imagine if you went out and dropped the 300+ to get a playset of Jace, and then they banned him. I don't know about you, but I would quit in a heartbeat. Also, standard will drastically change this fall with zendikar block rotating, so I doubt they'll ban anything. But here's to hoping for a Titanless core set!
Fae, Jund, Affinity, 5CC, practically every deck saw this level of dominance at some point.
I'm not disagreeing just for the sake of it, but I really don't remember those decks holding this level of dominance, except for maybe Cryptic Command for a much smaller window (Even between Fae and 5CC - still certainly not 32 copies in any major events). Jund didn't put up these numbers, and Affinity saw mass bannings.
I would dare to say the Preordain is more powerfull than jace.
It's a really strong turn 1 card, a great draw fixer AND a cantriper.
You're wrong for any number of reasons, 1 being is that preordain is only as the powerful as the cards you get from it. And it doesn't get you card advantage.
I'd also like to point out that Jace can be played as a cantrip, which is why even if someone kills Jace with a hexmage/bolt, the Hexmage/bolt player loses the interaction, since the Jace player can brainstorm, get 3 new cards including replenishing their hand to the same size it was before casting Jace, while the other player loses a card.
ban jase
ban 0 casting cost artifacts
and ban any card that reaches over 25$
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Standard: pft, i love to see my cards depreciate in value once they rotate :S
Mordern: Melira, UR Storm, RDW, Infect, W life/control, UW Tron
Legacy: RDW, Pox
Vintage: Dark Depths, R Grey Orge
Look, I'm just as happy as the next guy that the mods like CorpT are completely understanding towards the community that there is enough concern to warrant the banning of a card whatever you all may decide it may be.
Yet I would like to tell everyone now, that this thread is going to be a waste of time if people keep talking about how the card functions, because no one cares how the card functions or how resilient it is. Since those factors do not alone decide if a card warrants banning.
The warping of a metagame, and the results present in winning decks, and the lack there of in losing decks is what is the main concern to ban a card. If we can just dedicate this thread towards the proper concerns, it would make this thread more appealing, and less "you're stupid" replied with "no you're the stupid one" and other forms of flaming.
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On topic, I have shared my piece in this article Here, but I would like to address towards this forum a few other points.
1) Jace is warping the Metagame.
2) Jace helps allow blue to be the most dominating color without exception (he gets help from the obvious Mana Leak and Preordain, but those cards are not on the same power level in order to consider a banning)
3) Jace allows the consistency of control decks to increase by a large fold in order to shut down aggro decks. When both combo and aggro don't exist, and only control does. That's a fuggin problem.
4) Nationals is on the rise, with qualifiers this weekend. (I addressed this in the article but it needs to be said) This is seriously important, with major tournaments across the globe it is near impossible to distinct the better players from the worse ones based on ridiculous amounts of draws + wins in order to represent countries for Worlds. If you think this Grand Prix was a problem, Nationals will be a complete ☺☺☺☺-fest.
I have played said blocks, and I still don't think that 32 Jace is balanced. I understand that it's too late to ban him, because we've all seen Valakut in the top seat and it is a very ugly thing, but I do not think such a precarious balancing act -- wherein one card is needed to keep an entire archetype at bay to the point where every top eight deck runs four of it -- is at all healthy.
Stoneforge is not even close to be being broken in Legacy, it sees play in some iffy BW decks that aren't even really worth putting in your testing gauntlet.
It seems like the problem is Squadron Hawk. Stoneforge + Equipment are healthy in a variety of other decks, but the Hawk providing significant card advantage coupled with flying makes it the perfect equipment carrier. It interacts too well with JtMS, often creating pseudo Ancestral Recalls, and makes consistent removal incredibly difficult (this is why Mortarpod) is becoming so popular.
If DCI needs to look at banning a card, they need to look at the Squawk. If WoTC wants to rectify the problem, they need viable Reach creatures/spells in the card pool.
I wouldnt call it balanced simply because there is really no tier 1 or tier 2 combo decks. The format is all aggro or control and control has the edge as of late.
If all of the best players played..idk...naya, then you would most likely see it having a couple top 16 spots as well.
I have to, respectfully, disagree.
I know that there aren't really any true "end-all-be-all" sources in the Magic community, but there are a few that different people rely on. I would say that two of the most common ones relied upon, are Patrick Chapin and LSV. And since one of them is especially known for being a blue/control genius, we have to take what they say, at least somewhat seriously.
And what have both Patrick Chapin and LSV said? That Jace needs to be banned, because he is just that strong.
And the evidence we have proves that. Do you know what the Caw-Blade win percentage for the month of March is? 58.87%. Caw-Blade wins over half the matches it plays in.
Do you know what the second highest win percentage of any deck is, in that same time frame? RUG. At 57.19%. Again, that is over half the matches it plays.
Those two decks have a few things in common. Islands, of course. Blue fetchlands. And Preordain and Jace. The two true powerhouses of the decks.
That shows us that Stoneforge isn't the problem (but should seriously be looked at for banning), that the Swords aren't the problem, that Lotus Cobra isn't the problem, but either Jace or Preordain is.
It does see some play in the Bant decks, which are pretty good. But, it's nowhere near broken in Legacy. But hey, something that tutors up Jitte? That's definitely strong.
This post is not directed at the person I originally quoted in this thread, either, just a general statement.
Anyways...
Most decks that run Jace can also run easy hate cards against Red. T2 Kor Firewalker against Caw Blade means bad days for the Red decks, also yeah, easy wins against Caw Blade = bad wins against Valakut.
I have a feeling the MEtagame is going to evolve either so that the Caw blade decks are only good against other Caw Blade decks or Valakut. It's kinda sucks that it has to be this way, but ah well.
Banning Jace would be nice and give other walkers a time to shine (Hi Tezzeret, are you alright there?)
I would dare to say the Preordain is more powerfull than jace.
It's a really strong turn 1 card, a great draw fixer AND a cantriper.
:symw::symb:Steel Wb Weenie
Oh, I know. And when paired with Jace, it becomes even more incredible.
I think that the list of strongest cards in Standard right now, goes like this:
1. Jace, The Mind Sculptor
2. Stoneforge Mystic
2a. Preordain
3. Lotus Cobra
Jace was fine before MBS, and RUG and U/B control aren't nearly as warping as Caw-Blade, if you ban him, you cripple most blue decks and Valakut probably jumps back to smash face, another "fun" meta. Valakut is also an issue as it just rips apart any deck with a hope of beating Caw-Blade(with the exception of RUG) which I feel puts this meta in a very awkward position.
Mystic isn't the culprit(imo) as she was hardly used before MBS and she has done some good in giving Boros a more consistant game and a better late game. Yes, she adds consistency to an already very consistent deck(caw-blade), but I wouldn't blame the mystic herself.
Honestly, if I HAD to choose a card to ban right now, it would be Sword of Feast and Famine. This is the card that made mystic a $25 card. This is the card that allows caw-blade to make a potential game ending play in the early, mid, and late stages of the game(sword, Jace, Gideon) that are a bit harder to disrupt compared to other decks with similar power(RUG), not to add in the consistency of this deck. It allows caw-blade to attack you from multiple angles, and if you take out 1 angle of attack, you get hit from the next angle. Every time it connects, that's card disadvantage for your opponent(add that with the card advantage you get) and allows you to make back breaking plays. Tap out, play spells, and have counter magic up? Yup. Jace and Gideon in one turn? Yup. I can go on and on.
In the end, I'd rather wait it out, I'm hoping that a larger card pool will help balance things out and diversify the meta, but I do point my finger to SoFaF for the way things are right now. Before that sword came along, standard seemed to be in better shape and just about all of the cards getting the blame now were around then, except for the sword.
The card to ban based on viability would be Valakut. It almost singlehandedly removes non-blue midrange from the meta and non-blue midrange would act as a dampening element on blue control and aggro-control as it almost always has.
This is a broken meta for any number of reasons, although the most important one is that JtMS is a required card to establish a realistic chance to win in a big tourney. Other people win now and then but they're not playing the list that gives them the best chance to do so.
Then you haven't heard of Excalibur. Caleb Durward played something similar to a Top 8 finish in Atlanta (report is here), and several of my friends have had impressive finishes with the deck including several Top 8's and many top 16's at Jupiter Games, Vestal, NY (a premier Legacy tourney scene) and winning a Mox at another tourney. While I do admit that the deck isn't the complete bee-knees as it does have bad MUs (Lands, Stax/DStompy), my group was actually sad that Survival got banned because we simply rolled it with this deck.
I think a Bant shell is the best for a SFM deck in Legacy and if more people in the spotlight like Caleb play this deck (Lewis Laskin also played something similar in DC), it might be a force in the metagame.
Fae, Jund, Affinity, 5CC, practically every deck saw this level of dominance at some point.
Maybe it's not 'balanced' by the ideal definition, but compared to the last few blocks? Yeah, it's quite fine. We were all saying these exact same things during the reigns of those previously mentioned decks, and more.
Just because Patrick Chapin and LSV say it, certainly doesn't mean it's right. Plenty of other pros, including Kibler, say that's it's not required.
And no, Stoneforge is certainly not 'breaking' Legacy by any means.
Didn't Fae and 5CC play Jace?
And Affinity actually did cause so much of a problem, it got banned. Well, at first it was just Skullclamp, and then the deck just got faster because of Welding Jar... But, eventually!, it got its core components banned.
But all of this is for nothing, Wizards isn't going to ban Jace or any other standard card for that matter. Imagine if you went out and dropped the 300+ to get a playset of Jace, and then they banned him. I don't know about you, but I would quit in a heartbeat. Also, standard will drastically change this fall with zendikar block rotating, so I doubt they'll ban anything. But here's to hoping for a Titanless core set!
WR Heroic
Modern
FISH
Legacy
FISH
EDH
Hanna, Ship Navigator - Enchantments
Sygg, River Guide - Fish Tribal
Mayael, the Anima - Power5orGreater
Zedruu, the Greathearted - Gifts
Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker - 1 Power Recursion
Roon of the Hidden Realm - ETB Triggers
Edric, Spymaster of Trent - TurboFog
Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Shapeshifters *IN PROGRESS*
Krenko, Mob Boss - Goblins *IN PROGRESS*
I'm not disagreeing just for the sake of it, but I really don't remember those decks holding this level of dominance, except for maybe Cryptic Command for a much smaller window (Even between Fae and 5CC - still certainly not 32 copies in any major events). Jund didn't put up these numbers, and Affinity saw mass bannings.
You're wrong for any number of reasons, 1 being is that preordain is only as the powerful as the cards you get from it. And it doesn't get you card advantage.
I'd also like to point out that Jace can be played as a cantrip, which is why even if someone kills Jace with a hexmage/bolt, the Hexmage/bolt player loses the interaction, since the Jace player can brainstorm, get 3 new cards including replenishing their hand to the same size it was before casting Jace, while the other player loses a card.
ban 0 casting cost artifacts
and ban any card that reaches over 25$
Mordern: Melira, UR Storm, RDW, Infect, W life/control, UW Tron
Legacy: RDW, Pox
Vintage: Dark Depths, R Grey Orge
Yet I would like to tell everyone now, that this thread is going to be a waste of time if people keep talking about how the card functions, because no one cares how the card functions or how resilient it is. Since those factors do not alone decide if a card warrants banning.
The warping of a metagame, and the results present in winning decks, and the lack there of in losing decks is what is the main concern to ban a card. If we can just dedicate this thread towards the proper concerns, it would make this thread more appealing, and less "you're stupid" replied with "no you're the stupid one" and other forms of flaming.
---------
On topic, I have shared my piece in this article Here, but I would like to address towards this forum a few other points.
1) Jace is warping the Metagame.
2) Jace helps allow blue to be the most dominating color without exception (he gets help from the obvious Mana Leak and Preordain, but those cards are not on the same power level in order to consider a banning)
3) Jace allows the consistency of control decks to increase by a large fold in order to shut down aggro decks. When both combo and aggro don't exist, and only control does. That's a fuggin problem.
4) Nationals is on the rise, with qualifiers this weekend. (I addressed this in the article but it needs to be said) This is seriously important, with major tournaments across the globe it is near impossible to distinct the better players from the worse ones based on ridiculous amounts of draws + wins in order to represent countries for Worlds. If you think this Grand Prix was a problem, Nationals will be a complete ☺☺☺☺-fest.