Maybe my local playerbase sucks it harder than a black hole but at one LGS i played a 16 man standard tonight and saw NOTHING but boros burn, red devo and black devo with splash green for abrupt decay. and one guy had 4 color goodstuff.dec (WBGR) as a UW control player its not even worth paying into a tournament right now.
At the other of my LGS' stores the "midrange" strategy is prevalent, midrange being a fancy word for "screw strategy, i spend more money" these decks come in junk jund and bant but they are all the same, spam planeswalkers and money creatures until you win. its the most mindless deck possible but it wins because its the most expensive, therefore the one WOTC wants to encourage use of.
You have a point on the "expensive" aspect. But I disagree on "mindless". Any deck can be considered mindless if you make it sound like they don't have to think about what spells they are casting and can literally cast any spells in any order and win games. Sure, if you've stabilized against aggro, the game does kind of turn into "cast kill spell on your creature, go". But the turns that lead up to that point are filled with choices.
Here are a couple of scenarios that demonstrate the deck not being mindless:
Situation 1: Say I'm playing a Junk midrange deck against GR monsters. And my hand is some number of cards with 2 removal spells. One being Banishing Light and the other being Doom Blade and my opponent just played Courser of Kruphix. That's a card I have to deal with or it will generate a ton of card advantage for him. But which removal spell should I use? One of the cards can be played at sorcery speed, so you would think the smart idea is to play the Banishing Light first so you have the instant speed trick to use. However, Banishing Light hits Planeswalkers, which this deck usually runs at least Domri Rade, so playing the instant and saving the card that hits everything might be better right? But we're forgetting that GR also might be playing Mutavault and Stormbreath Dragon, which Banishing Light isn't hitting. There isn't a right answer, the correct play is probably going to depend on what else is your hand and what else is in play. Using critical thinking here might help you figure out which might be the slightly better choice because sometimes if you choose wrong and allow them to stick a card that generates card advantage without killing it ASAP, that's the game right there.
Situation 2: Same decks, Junk Midrange vs GR monsters. But now it's late in the game, you are both in top deck mode. You draw a Hero's Downfall, your opponent plays Courser of Kruphix. And you are about ready to kill it when you see the top card of his library is Domri Rade. You can only kill one of them. And it's a similar situation as the above hypothetical where the issue is allowing your opponent to generate card advantage if you allow one of those cards to stay on the table for too long. This time you don't have a choice, one of them is definitely going to stay, and you have to topdeck an answer for it. So you have to figure out which of these cards has more answers you can topdeck into. Domri can't be hit by a lot of removal spells, but can be hit by creatures. Courser can only be destroyed with removal. But it could get even more complicated than that because maybe some of the creatures you could draw to answer Domri are things that are easily blocked or can be hit by his removal. You could consider Mutavault an answer to Domri, but he could reveal/play a Sylvan Caryatid and block it forever. Again... it's something where there isn't always a right answer and sometimes making the right call is the difference between winning and losing.
Again... it's something where there isn't always a right answer and sometimes making the right call is the difference between winning and losing.
Exactly, its not just about throwing down expensive cards its about how to use them in context with whats happening in the game. There are plenty of players who spend more then others but that doesnt mean their always gonna win or be better. Knowing how to and when to use a card makes a big difference and even then if you dont know what they have the play that looked right at first could be the wrong move after they have answered your move.
Winning a match has more aspects then just having the most expensive cards and throwing them down, other things like luck of what your/they draw, skill on when to and when not to use cards/mechanics/abilities, certain types of interaction come into play. There is no such thing as 1 deck that will never lose or always be on top. Players with skill know that if you have a disadvantage knowing how to play around it or improve it can make a difference being the underdog or in a bad match up for you. Also if your doin poorly against a deck, studying and play testing it to learn its strengths and weakness is a good way to help improve your chances against it next time. And sometimes a bad match up is what it is and you cant have a good match up vs every single deck. A perfect example is looking at the many Legacy Primers where most of the time they talk about good and bad match ups.
Playing Standard in casual and tourney play I havent seen one deck always come in and always clean house. Im so happy RTR is still in Standard and hope to see more sets like them in the future.
Maybe I was a bit harsh calling it mindless but to me getting such versatility simply because you spent more is ridiculous. Its why I'm against easy three color mama fixing it just makes goodstuff.Dec a thing. I like control and aggro because they are truly strategic. Aggro says: i will kill you with many small things before you cast the big stuff I can't handle. control says I'll play defensively until I have the advantage then strike quickly with a big thing you can't handle. That's having a game plan, a strategy.
Typically in standard !midrange decks just say: I choose green and two other colors and play nothing but the expensive rares. Look at the midrange deck lists count how many mythics and rares are in a deck. Then count the other cards. You'll notice a pattern right away. No synergy no game plan, just brute force rewarded to the person with the deepest pockets.
If that was the case then anyone would do well with decks like Monsters and other Green-centric mdirange builds. But they don't, and that's because despite not having an overly high amount of synergy, those decks still require skill to play. Playing a host of powerful, if not particularly synergistic, cards does not make the game less skill intensive. Choosing the proper threats and answers to deploy on specific turns is still highly important, and knowing how to sideboard against specific match ups is very relevant. Yes, they are amongst some of the more rare heavy decks in the format, but that does not intrinsically reduce the necessary skill required to pilot them.
That just means Black is the most popular colour and that Mono Black represents the largest single share of the format. You'll note that almost every one of those cards gets played as a 3-4 of in most Black Devotion decks. That doesn't mean there's bad diversity, it just means that Black is by far the most popular colour. The Top 10 creatures list, for instance, has 4 Black cards and 1 Black/Blue hybrid card, then another 5 creatures that aren't Black at all. Given which creatures they are, it demonstrates that along with Black Devotion, RG-based Monster decks are plenty popular.
top 10 non-land cards, anyway. Mutavault isn't in the top 10 list, but according to that page, it makes it into 74% of decks.
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Cards are game pieces, and should be treated as such, easily replaceable.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 2 decades later.
"Entitled:" the entire ad hominem fallacy condensed into a single word. It doesn't strengthen your argument to attack motivations, it just makes you look like you don't understand the argument.
I guess it's diverse if you look at it from a color perspective, but from the perspective of what the decks do, there is only vomit out your hand of burn/creatures and control.
There's no combo, no land destruction, no prison, nothing using enchantments( enchantment block... ), basically no alternate strategies.
I agree with Carthage. In terms of color, yes: there are viable strategies in essentially every color and two- and three-colored combo, but, Standard is very same-samey. At my LGS Control is MIA, so basically it's all Aggro/Midrange - no combo, no alternate win cons, just turning dudes sideways.
If there were combo and alternate win conditions people would just complain about that. EHHHHHHHHHHH there's no interaction, this deck isn't fun to play against. So you're telling me you want to see a bunch of turbo fog maze decks pop up? Or want to see a lot more naya hexproof decks? No matter what the metagame is people will complain about it. If the metagame was perfectly diverse people would complain they can't use a specific deck to capitalize on the metagame.
If there were combo and alternate win conditions people would just complain about that. EHHHHHHHHHHH there's no interaction, this deck isn't fun to play against. So you're telling me you want to see a bunch of turbo fog maze decks pop up? Or want to see a lot more naya hexproof decks? No matter what the metagame is people will complain about it. If the metagame was perfectly diverse people would complain they can't use a specific deck to capitalize on the metagame.
Of course there will always be complaints.
My post is one of them.
I don't particularly like playing creatures and turning them sideways, so my only alternate option has been control for about 6 years now.
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You have a point on the "expensive" aspect. But I disagree on "mindless". Any deck can be considered mindless if you make it sound like they don't have to think about what spells they are casting and can literally cast any spells in any order and win games. Sure, if you've stabilized against aggro, the game does kind of turn into "cast kill spell on your creature, go". But the turns that lead up to that point are filled with choices.
Here are a couple of scenarios that demonstrate the deck not being mindless:
Situation 1: Say I'm playing a Junk midrange deck against GR monsters. And my hand is some number of cards with 2 removal spells. One being Banishing Light and the other being Doom Blade and my opponent just played Courser of Kruphix. That's a card I have to deal with or it will generate a ton of card advantage for him. But which removal spell should I use? One of the cards can be played at sorcery speed, so you would think the smart idea is to play the Banishing Light first so you have the instant speed trick to use. However, Banishing Light hits Planeswalkers, which this deck usually runs at least Domri Rade, so playing the instant and saving the card that hits everything might be better right? But we're forgetting that GR also might be playing Mutavault and Stormbreath Dragon, which Banishing Light isn't hitting. There isn't a right answer, the correct play is probably going to depend on what else is your hand and what else is in play. Using critical thinking here might help you figure out which might be the slightly better choice because sometimes if you choose wrong and allow them to stick a card that generates card advantage without killing it ASAP, that's the game right there.
Situation 2: Same decks, Junk Midrange vs GR monsters. But now it's late in the game, you are both in top deck mode. You draw a Hero's Downfall, your opponent plays Courser of Kruphix. And you are about ready to kill it when you see the top card of his library is Domri Rade. You can only kill one of them. And it's a similar situation as the above hypothetical where the issue is allowing your opponent to generate card advantage if you allow one of those cards to stay on the table for too long. This time you don't have a choice, one of them is definitely going to stay, and you have to topdeck an answer for it. So you have to figure out which of these cards has more answers you can topdeck into. Domri can't be hit by a lot of removal spells, but can be hit by creatures. Courser can only be destroyed with removal. But it could get even more complicated than that because maybe some of the creatures you could draw to answer Domri are things that are easily blocked or can be hit by his removal. You could consider Mutavault an answer to Domri, but he could reveal/play a Sylvan Caryatid and block it forever. Again... it's something where there isn't always a right answer and sometimes making the right call is the difference between winning and losing.
Exactly, its not just about throwing down expensive cards its about how to use them in context with whats happening in the game. There are plenty of players who spend more then others but that doesnt mean their always gonna win or be better. Knowing how to and when to use a card makes a big difference and even then if you dont know what they have the play that looked right at first could be the wrong move after they have answered your move.
Winning a match has more aspects then just having the most expensive cards and throwing them down, other things like luck of what your/they draw, skill on when to and when not to use cards/mechanics/abilities, certain types of interaction come into play. There is no such thing as 1 deck that will never lose or always be on top. Players with skill know that if you have a disadvantage knowing how to play around it or improve it can make a difference being the underdog or in a bad match up for you. Also if your doin poorly against a deck, studying and play testing it to learn its strengths and weakness is a good way to help improve your chances against it next time. And sometimes a bad match up is what it is and you cant have a good match up vs every single deck. A perfect example is looking at the many Legacy Primers where most of the time they talk about good and bad match ups.
Playing Standard in casual and tourney play I havent seen one deck always come in and always clean house. Im so happy RTR is still in Standard and hope to see more sets like them in the future.
Typically in standard !midrange decks just say: I choose green and two other colors and play nothing but the expensive rares. Look at the midrange deck lists count how many mythics and rares are in a deck. Then count the other cards. You'll notice a pattern right away. No synergy no game plan, just brute force rewarded to the person with the deepest pockets.
http://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/standard
top 10 non-land cards, anyway. Mutavault isn't in the top 10 list, but according to that page, it makes it into 74% of decks.
Cards are not money, investments, or a retirement fund, and should never have been treated as such.
Wizards made a mistake caving to speculators once, and we still pay for that mistake 2 decades later.
"Entitled:" the entire ad hominem fallacy condensed into a single word. It doesn't strengthen your argument to attack motivations, it just makes you look like you don't understand the argument.
There's no combo, no land destruction, no prison, nothing using enchantments( enchantment block... ), basically no alternate strategies.
And it's been like this for way to long.
UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU's prison: blue is the new orange is the new black.
Mizzix Of The Izmagnus : wheels on fire... rolling down the road...
BSidisi, Undead VizierB: Bis zum Erbrechen
GTitiania, Protector Of ArgothG: Protecting Argoth, by blowing it up!
GYisan, The Wanderer BardG: Gradus Ad Elfball.
Duel EDH: Yisan & Titania.
In Progress: Grand Arbiter Augustin IV duel; Grenzo, Dungeon Warden Doomsday.
Of course there will always be complaints.
My post is one of them.
I don't particularly like playing creatures and turning them sideways, so my only alternate option has been control for about 6 years now.