I remember a while ago, when Lodestone Golem was spoiled, there was a lot of hype for Shops. It was dominating two summers ago to the point that blue pilots picked the deck. Now that the metagame has adapted, there have been very few shop pilots who have continued to don the mantle.
Aside from Marinara Shops and Terranova, there have been no advancement in shop tech, and it bothers me. Why are there so many more Blue proponents than Shop proponents on this site? Does anyone where consistently play shops here on this site, and if so, what has been you experience these last few months. I played my last tournament when Metalworker Shops was on an all-time high and stepped back for family reasons. I came back to study up for this summer, and at this website, on TheManaDrain, and having read the tournament reports, it seems that the shop think-tank has been abandoned.
What gives?
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Blue: teaching Magic players manners since 1995
Shops: Teaching blue players manners since 2009
I think we are all secretly testing out new changes Honestly, that's the best site for vintage discussion and I think activity has just died down a bit after the worlds event last month. I keep tinkering with my builds too - no metalworker though.
No, we have a reasonably active vintage scene in Austin and Marinara shops is here. It's a red splash shops deck that runs Goblin Welder. Some builds go deeper on red, running Flame Jab to remove problematic cards such as Kataki, War's Wage from the board.
The most experienced player of that type of shops deck in our local meta also happens to run the Uba Mask/Bazaar of Baghdad combo in his deck, as a way to blow out control players while generating card advantage. It's kind of a wonky build, but it has a much greater degree of flexibility against control decks than your old prison shops lists.
Personally, I've been working on a list that hybridizes the best of Nick Detweiler's most recent prison shops deck and the combo shops deck that beat Terranova shops at Bazaar of Moxen. It has a few additions of my own that are particularly good in our local meta, where blue control decks are big and a lot of them pack transformational sideboards to become Oath decks.
There's a local vintage tournament this weekend, unlimited proxies, at a local game store. About a dozen people I know have been testing up a storm. So I don't think shops is dead, just upgrading quietly so blue players don't put together the hot new tech. I mean, a lot of people have found answers to traditional shops threats like Lodestone Golem and Tangle Wire. You don't broadcast your next weapon to the enemy in an arms race until you're ready to use it.
I remember a while ago, when Lodestone Golem was spoiled, there was a lot of hype for Shops. It was dominating two summers ago to the point that blue pilots picked the deck. Now that the metagame has adapted, there have been very few shop pilots who have continued to don the mantle.
Aside from Marinara Shops and Terranova, there have been no advancement in shop tech, and it bothers me. Why are there so many more Blue proponents than Shop proponents on this site? Does anyone where consistently play shops here on this site, and if so, what has been you experience these last few months. I played my last tournament when Metalworker Shops was on an all-time high and stepped back for family reasons. I came back to study up for this summer, and at this website, on TheManaDrain, and having read the tournament reports, it seems that the shop think-tank has been abandoned.
Aside from Marinara Shops and Terranova, there have been no advancement in shop tech, and it bothers me. Why are there so many more Blue proponents than Shop proponents on this site? Does anyone where consistently play shops here on this site, and if so, what has been you experience these last few months. I played my last tournament when Metalworker Shops was on an all-time high and stepped back for family reasons. I came back to study up for this summer, and at this website, on TheManaDrain, and having read the tournament reports, it seems that the shop think-tank has been abandoned.
What gives?
Blue: teaching Magic players manners since 1995Shops: Teaching blue players manners since 2009
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The most experienced player of that type of shops deck in our local meta also happens to run the Uba Mask/Bazaar of Baghdad combo in his deck, as a way to blow out control players while generating card advantage. It's kind of a wonky build, but it has a much greater degree of flexibility against control decks than your old prison shops lists.
Personally, I've been working on a list that hybridizes the best of Nick Detweiler's most recent prison shops deck and the combo shops deck that beat Terranova shops at Bazaar of Moxen. It has a few additions of my own that are particularly good in our local meta, where blue control decks are big and a lot of them pack transformational sideboards to become Oath decks.
There's a local vintage tournament this weekend, unlimited proxies, at a local game store. About a dozen people I know have been testing up a storm. So I don't think shops is dead, just upgrading quietly so blue players don't put together the hot new tech. I mean, a lot of people have found answers to traditional shops threats like Lodestone Golem and Tangle Wire. You don't broadcast your next weapon to the enemy in an arms race until you're ready to use it.
Bear in mind just how many good things Blue/X goodstuff decks have gotten since Lodestone Golem hit. They got Jace in the same set, and in the following sets we've seen hit after hit like Stoneforge Mystic (becoming good with Batterskull), Snapcaster Mage, Young Pyromancer, Delver of Secrets, Geist of Saint Traft, etc.
Control and Aggro/Control decks have gotten a ton of tools. Meanwhile, WotC has been avoiding printing good stax cards like the plague.
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