Cards that seem interesting to me:
-Sorcerous Spyglass: Unbelievable sideboard card that will cause headaches. This card is very important for decks like UW control who have horrid combo matchups and they can't play thoughtseize. This card will change sideboarding in modern. Also lantern just windslams this in the deck. The strongest modern card reveled thus far.
-Hostage Taker: This is the most interesting card in the set for me. Dimir NEVER gets a way to deal with artifacts. Plus if it survives a turn you get to cast their threat that you removed? This seems modern playable.
-Jace, Cunning Castaway: Once again people are underrating another 3 drop planeswalker again. This one looks pretty decent. He fits into tempo strats pretty well. Turn 2bitterblossom/threat into jace makes me interested as a faeries player. The token is also pretty decent sized for a three mana planeswalker to pop out. I wouldn't sleep on this card. This seems modern playable.
Cute but not good enough.
-Sanguine Sacrament: This is a great rate for lifegain. Plus it's an instant and it goes back into your library. Not bad by any means. It may ask for too much mana though.
-Tocatli Honor Guard: Another torpor orb effect. Now we have 12 of them. Maybe the terrible torpor orb deck gets a little bit better?
Do not Unban:
1) Jace, the Mind Sculptor:
- I strongly disagree with this card's unban. Jace is a bit too slow in a format full of affinity, burn and dredge, but the issue with Jace is when this card is unbanned, every single blue deck from Blue based Tempo, such as Grixis Shadow or blue based control such as Grixis Control, UWx Control or even blue based combo deck such as Storm and Grixis reanimator will play this card as an alternative win-con or card advantage engine.
There will be no reason to play cards like Keranos, Elspeth, Painful Truths etc...
Cards to Ban:
1)Ancient Stirrings:
This card is a a huge color pie offender. Green should not have the best card filter in the format. I think this card was fine without the Eldrazi, but this is extremely unfair with the Eldrazi in the format.
2) Cavern of Souls:
(I mentioned in the forum above). I think this card was fair without the Eldrazi, but this land can produce colorless and all your colors plus making your guy uncounterable at no drawback is way too unfair. I personally don't think Wizards will do anything about this card, and I don't think its that big of an issue in the format, but this is a card I personally would consider tackling.
Cards to Unban:
1) Dig Through Time:
(I mentioned this earlier in the forum) I think this card is safe to unban. The Jeskai Ascendancy deck list lost gitixian probe and there are alot more rest in peace to hold this card down. As a blue player, I can tell you Dig through time's delve cost isn't free. You really need to build your deck to support the delve, (not to mention rest in peace is a pretty good foil to the strategy).
The issue is there really isn't a reason to play blue in the format anymore outside of snapcaster mage. Blue decks just don't have the filter, finishers or answers compared to legacy counterparts.
Cards I think may get unbanned, but I wouldn;t advocate or vote against:
1) BloodBraid Elf:
I think this card is alot safer without the broken cascade mechanic. In their original ban, Wizards did state this ban was to weaken the Jund deck (But the real offender was Deathrite Shaman not the elf).
I would argue this card might restrict card diversity, but then again, we do have collected company in this format.
Unban dig through time when Grixis Shadow is the top dog. Think about this for just a second..........
Here is a short article about Yuta's faeries on ChannelFireball. It explains the choice of the playset of Remands too (while opponent gets time-walked you get extra value of LotV, BB and AV).
Not sure Remand is worthwhile in a list with only Bitterblossom and no AV/LotV tho
IMHO he's playing WAY too many snaps. Even 3 snaps in that list is pushing it pre board.
Realistically for modern, here are my two ban/ unban:
Ban Cavern of Souls
This card is quite unfair with the new Eldrazi. It produces your colorless + whatever mana your eldrazi needs at no life. It also makes blue decks significantly worse. I seen cases where UR twin was playing this and used Cavern to put their Keranos into play in a blue mirror and the other side just had to concede on the spot.
Unban Dig Through Time
I think Dig is bit safer without probe in the format to help delve. The graveyard cost is a real cost and with cards like Rest in Peace and other various gravehate more frequently played in the format, the card can be put in check.
I'm with you, but throw SFM in there as well. Blue and White are so embarassingly weak.
And I honestly think they should forget about bans for a while. The meta right now feels diverse if you look at decklists, but archetype-wise, it's all aggro. Fortunately it's not RDW style aggro; they at least require some thought. Just introduce some great <2cmc drop U/W creatures so PoE and Snap aren't the only reasons to run those colors.
Between the Ixalan spoilers hinting at some Merfolk support upcoming in Standard, the Merfolk/Goblin duel deck, a doubling up on Masters sets and a tribal Commander product run it seems likely that some needed cards for this deck are going to get reprinted - and seeing as I'm slowly getting the pieces together (Commander fan who just wants a box to open when strangers say they don't play EDH) I was wondering if more seasoned players have any opinions on what's safe to buy now and what would be worth holding off on.
I'm already set for the cheapo Merfolk like Harbinger of the Tides, Master of Waves, Silvergill Adept and a bunch of the little tech and sideboard pieces like Spreading Seas and Mutavault. I honestly don't expect Merfolk in C17 and my money is on two Cursecatchers in the deck for DD MVG and a promo of either of the Lords (preferably Lord of Atlantis with new art!) I think it's reasonable to expect Aether Vial to be in one of the two Masters sets at least, but Cavern of Souls is probably going to be benched considering WotC apparently views it as Mythic now, right? I've heard Spirits mentioned on and off for C17 because of that Taigam guy so I guess it's possible Kira, Great Glass-Spinner could be in that list.
Opinions? Thoughts? Inb4 "no one could possibly know yet dont ask" don't be that guy, I just wanna hear what people are thinking
Merged with the "Modern Prices Discussion" thread. This is an specific post that falls into this thread better than others, and in a way directly deals with the prices of these cards.
- Torpf
Buy Caverns. Merfolk vs elves is a duel deck that is coming this year....
I'd be surprised to see 'goyf in another masters or supplemental set for the foreseeable future. I think they've maxed out on the reprint value on that one. So while it will continue to dip while people sell out and it's not a heavy player in the meta, it will fairly quickly reach a bottom at which point it will start rising again. And if it ever picks back up in play-ability it will spike quickly.
Goyf seems perfect for Iconic masters tbh. He's the MOST iconic green creature they have ever made. I doubt he sits that one out.
So I had a great weekend at the scg invitational playing this deck!
I went 3/1 day one of the invi losing a close game 3 to a very good death shadow player. Standard was a bit worse but I decided to play the open rather than play day 2.
In the open I went 6/3, losing to Joe losett on Tron, pieter on affinity (the eventual open winner), and omen scape shift. I again decided to play the classic rather than day 2. All 3 loses were very close 3 game matches. 1 mana off infinite turns versus Joe and pieter drew an ancient grudge the turn I stabilized.
The classic I went 6/2 and ended 9th place as the best seated x/2, but there was a clean draw into top 8. I was the only loss for the eventual winner as well. I lost to tron in 3 close games (his only out was to ulamog me and he ripped it). I also kept a land heavy hand versus Jund in the dark and he thought seized my only action and I drew 6 lands in a row. Then when I assembled the combo he ripped an ancient grudge immediately. One turn later and I would have had too many thopters.
Beyond just the playing I had a ton of people comment on how awesome the deck I was playing is. Many people asked for a list and I shared it.
Mtg goldfish apparently commented on their podcast about the deck as well since I placed 9th.
I added a padeem for the classic just to try it out. I never got to test it but I think it is quite good versus death shadow grixis.
They however labeled the deck Ub improvise. I prefer UB Thopters as the deck name and I'll continue to call it that.
I'll likely be selling my standard tickets on modo and buying this to test more. I'll consider getting some gear to stream as Ive noticed the main issue players have is sideboarding decisions and I'm fairly confident in mine.
If anyone missed it, I consider this line important for future banlist discussions:
Color balance alone isn’t a reason to alter a format, but lack of variety in play experience is. Our intention is to try and trim excess power from clearly dominant decks to open up space for a variety of decks to succeed, not to introduce churn by adjusting the ban list.
So, deck/archetype diversity is more important than color balance perhaps? Huh...
This shouldn't surprise anyone. Legacy is in a reasonable state because they don't try to balance the color balance. Modern is similar but replace blue with black.
I think Gideon will drop to 5-6 dollars after rotation. That's what happen to Elspeth, Sun's Champion. I going to pick up a couple but I'm going to wait awhile.
The huge difference is that elsepth got duel decked while gideon didn't. He will be around $8-12. He's even seeing play in that small pox list now and that's slowly gaining traction
Jeskai Control is the only viable deck for her right now, and it's not doing that well. I don't think she sees play in Standard either.
She also good in WR prison and some titanshift builds. I've seen pros stream 4 color control decks with nahiri in it. (esper deck that flashes for nahiri)
My point exactly. WR Prison hasn't made a competitive appearance in ages and I'd never even heard of a Titanshift build that runs her until now.
In short, she puts up zero results right now.
Heavily disagree with this post as many decks are viable right now if you tune them correctly. Taking turns/faeries have been doing good in tournaments but are tier 3 decks. If you want to play nahiri in a deck I would look into 4 color control since pros have been streaming it recently.
Nahiri isn't putting up results. Hence the current price point. Yes I'm sure you can take down a random FNM with 5 color Barbarian Nahiri Storm, that's not the point here.
Nahiri's price went down because she isn't being played in standard anymore. She was a center piece in the Saheeli rai combo decks.
sorry i didn't rehash all of your review into my reply, but I didn't want to boggart the entire page of the thread with it.
The problem I have with your assessment of Supreme Will is the "its isn't dead until turns 3-5" but you can't even cast the mana leak side until turn 3 so it is always closer to starting out as dead half of a card. I think Censor is better over all because while it isn't taxing the spell for as much it also is all around cheaper for each function the card offers. Not saying it wont see play, I just have trouble thinking of a deck that can actually make use of it. Esper is already heavily clogged at the 3cc and this doesn't seem better than the things like Esper Charm or Lingering Souls, UW doesn't even run many counters at all and the ones it prefers are hard counters with upside like Cryptic or functionally hard counters like Logic Knot, Grixis also runs very light on counters in favor of creature removal and Cryptic or Spell Snare as hard counter options, Jeskai similar to UW doesn't run many counters and the ones it does run are again leaning more towards the harder counter options and is more of a long game burn deck with creature removal; maybe they swap out the one of leak for this?
Again I'm not saying it will not see play, its just that 3 mana is expensive for a affect that currently sees little to no play in the decks that have access to the affect for a mana less.
Nimble Obstructionist also I think will suffer from the cost stapled onto it, if it had the ability as a ETB trigger on top of the cycle affect it would be much more playable but as it stands the format is so fast and most decks that offering targets for the affect are doing so very early T1 T2 so maybe you snipe a T3 fetch but decks like Grixis DS will have most likely seen him in your hand by that point and either discarded him if he is problematic or simply be at a phase in the game in which they can disregard him as they will likely have you in a position of needing to cast him to chump block. And cycling this against something like Inkmoth Nexus just seems like a losing situation since affinity likely can simply pay 1 to activate it in response so you achieved what? making a Inkmoth activation cost 2 instead of 1? hardly seems worth it. the Stifle affect should have been costed at 1U if the creature is going to simply be a vanilla flash flier.
I also think that Bontu's Last Reckoning is a bit better than your giving it credit for, I could see it easily sliding into any UBx since getting to the late game is paramount in those types of decks and casting this on 3, serum visions or fatal push on 4, and having the option to Snap it back on 5 seems like a solid plan for pulling aggro decks into deep water. Haste creatures are not hyper prevalent out side of burn and your likely isn't going to want to over commit in the face of a follow up wipe on 5.
Hallow One doesn't seem worthy of a Honorable mention his stats are just bad, if you cast him for 1 you get a vanilla 4/4, way better things that you can cheat into play for 1 mana in the format. Not to mention he dies to the shatter half of Kcommand which just seems like such a swing in favor of the Kcommand caster.
Hollow One is a free card when you meet it's threshold and that's worth talking about. "dies to removal" is a poor argument for him not seeing play since he dodges fatal push/bolt with ease. I can see reanimator decks trying it out at the very least since they run faithless looting/other loot effects. Explain why Damnation/Supreme Verdict/Wrath of God are worse than Bontu's reckoning in traditional decks that are full of removal. Out of the tier 1 decks only affinity kills you by turn 3 with creatures alone for someone to turn faster wrath. Bontu's last reckoning needs a reason to be played over the other ones for it's high drawback. You have to think of Obstructionist like shadow of doubt where it gets you value for very little cost or it's a beater. You are mad that it doesn't do everything. I agree to disagree on how you view supreme will. The most played deck in the format is almost never out of mana leak range.
First off I didn't say "dies to removal" I said it dies to the least relevant side of Kcommand and I don't see reanimator decks wanting to slow down their main plan for this which it will have to do to facilitate the cards existence in the deck. Maybe a sideboard card against RiP/ Relic affects but out side of that it seems like a card that simply would make their primary plan less consistent as they will have to cut pieces to have it in the builds. Maybe Living end runs it as a early blocker while they dig for cascade cards? but again they already run utility creatures like Fulminator and Fae that pull double duty.
I didn't say that Supreme Verdict or any other wrath is worst than Bontu's, it isn't very nice to assert that I claimed something I didn't. I simply said that this is cheaper, and in Modern cheaper tends to mean better. All I said was that this is able to do what those do earlier, yes it has a draw back but it isn't as devastating as it would be for the others given that clearing the board is so much more useful than the other god's last etc.. cards. A turn against decks like DS or Affinity or Zoo or even EldarziTron makes a huge difference and while the draw back is real another reality is that the majority of cards played in decks tend to be 1c.c. so you can wrath on 3 and still likely have 1 mana up to deal with a follow up or to cast a serum visions to set up for the next turn. Decks like Grixis Shadow and Affinity are often able to have multiple creatures on board by turn 2-3 and turn 4 is a long way off and most of the aggro decks can easily have you dead by then. Look at just how little any of the wraths you mentioned are actually seeing real play, Supreme Verdict sees some in UW control but again that deck still struggles to make it in a meta-game in which faster aggro decks which it should be having a positive match up. The cost of the other affects is why Anger of the Gods see's more play its quick enough in enough match ups and hurts a specific deck dredge a lot, the other wraths in the format don't even crack into the top 50 of just non-creature spells.
Again on Nimble Obstructionist, I think it is just to expensive to ever really gain "value" out of. The biggest difference between it and something like Shadow of Doubt is the cost, shadow cost 2 and can always simply cycle. The beater side of Obstructionist is actually the least exciting part of it a 3/1 flyer with flash that nets you value every time its cast is already available and doesn't see play (clique) and I think it isn't seeing play for the same reasons the format is very quick and 3 mana for such a underwhelming card doesn't scream out to me as the 3/1 body attached to a vanilla creature doesn't scream out "beater" at all imo and if you are most often casting it for the body it is terrible. If the format ever moves back towards mid-range decks than the card becomes instantly playable, its just that in the current meta it seems to slow for anything its offering to see real play.
-This gives reanimtor a way to deal with graveyard hate since they can just start beating face with Hollow ones that they get off of their looting effects. This sounds great since Grixis reanimtor has NO WAY to beat a leyline of the void off of turn 0. I'm not confident on it seeing tons of play but that is worth mentioning hence why it got an honorable mention in my rating. Also you did say that it's bad because it dies to k-command without mentioning what removal it dodges which is very relevant. Being able to dodge fatal push and come down as a pesudo 1 mana 4/4 on turn 2 is something that only tasigur, the golden fang/gurmag angler can do which is interesting.
-Show me what statistic that anger of the gods is seeing more play than all the other wraths. The other wraths not seeing a ton a play is mainly because the decks that they go into are tier 2-3 in terms of power not because of the power level of the wraths themselves. Bontu's last reckoning has to be better than those cards to replace them hence why I asked that question. The only decks that I see Reckoning going into are 8 rack because it has issues hitting 4 mana, small pox because it plays so many planeswalkers that it doesn't mind taking a turn off and potentially tezzeret because mana rocks can help subsidize the cost.
-Have you played against a Vendilion Clique? 3/1 body on a flash creature can close out a game relatively fast since almost nothing in this format flies besides lingering souls. Nimble "always cycles" too since it's a cycling card. The best deck in the format is a "midrange" deck with a faster clock.
Jeskai Control is the only viable deck for her right now, and it's not doing that well. I don't think she sees play in Standard either.
She also good in WR prison and some titanshift builds. I've seen pros stream 4 color control decks with nahiri in it. (esper deck that flashes for nahiri)
My point exactly. WR Prison hasn't made a competitive appearance in ages and I'd never even heard of a Titanshift build that runs her until now.
In short, she puts up zero results right now.
Heavily disagree with this post as many decks are viable right now if you tune them correctly. Taking turns/faeries have been doing good in tournaments but are tier 3 decks. If you want to play nahiri in a deck I would look into 4 color control since pros have been streaming it recently.
I think his point has more to do with how many people actually play the deck and to be more specific, play the deck well. How many people play the deck affects the prices. Do you think WR Prison cards would be the same price as they are now if 5.5% of the meta (instead of what, 1% at most) played the deck? No, they would be much higher.
I wouldn't take his post as offense towards the deck. I think many Modern players have realized that fringe decks can do well - look at Mono White Death and Taxes, GW Craig Wescoe and Taxes, and UB Turns at the most recent LV Grand Prix. Personally, I realized it even more. The Mono White D and T looks like a pile honestly to me. I can think of 30 decks that I think are "better" than it. Yet, I was proven wrong. I give a lot of props to that player, maybe even more than the UB Turns (because I personally have done solidly with UG Turns).
Don't take it as a slight toward the deck. This is the "Modern Prices" thread and it honestly has more to do with the visibility of the deck.
I actually disagree on your point of WR prison since the only card that it plays that could see a price hike is chalice of the void and that card is already expensive. Everything else has already been reprinted to death besides spirit guide and that card is already up there in price for a common.
Cards that seem interesting to me:
-Sorcerous Spyglass: Unbelievable sideboard card that will cause headaches. This card is very important for decks like UW control who have horrid combo matchups and they can't play thoughtseize. This card will change sideboarding in modern. Also lantern just windslams this in the deck. The strongest modern card reveled thus far.
-Hostage Taker: This is the most interesting card in the set for me. Dimir NEVER gets a way to deal with artifacts. Plus if it survives a turn you get to cast their threat that you removed? This seems modern playable.
-Carnage Tyrant: Straight up replaces Gaea's Revenge in Titanshift. It can also be tutored up by summoner's pact.
-Jace, Cunning Castaway: Once again people are underrating another 3 drop planeswalker again. This one looks pretty decent. He fits into tempo strats pretty well. Turn 2bitterblossom/threat into jace makes me interested as a faeries player. The token is also pretty decent sized for a three mana planeswalker to pop out. I wouldn't sleep on this card. This seems modern playable.
Cute but not good enough.
-Sanguine Sacrament: This is a great rate for lifegain. Plus it's an instant and it goes back into your library. Not bad by any means. It may ask for too much mana though.
-Tocatli Honor Guard: Another torpor orb effect. Now we have 12 of them. Maybe the terrible torpor orb deck gets a little bit better?
-Deeproot Champion: Another miracle grow creature that joins myth realized and Quirion Dryad. It's still not playable. Cute but probably not good enough.
Unban dig through time when Grixis Shadow is the top dog. Think about this for just a second..........
IMHO he's playing WAY too many snaps. Even 3 snaps in that list is pushing it pre board.
As much as I love mystic, this is just plain false. UW control is tier 1 according to this list, death and taxes is tier 2 and won a HUGE tournament.
(http://tappedout.net/mtg-articles/2017/jul/17/modern-tiered-list-now-bi-weekly-update-71717/)
The Ixilan spoilers showed these lands so.....
Buy Caverns. Merfolk vs elves is a duel deck that is coming this year....
Goyf seems perfect for Iconic masters tbh. He's the MOST iconic green creature they have ever made. I doubt he sits that one out.
Just curious. Why play the time sieve?
This shouldn't surprise anyone. Legacy is in a reasonable state because they don't try to balance the color balance. Modern is similar but replace blue with black.
The huge difference is that elsepth got duel decked while gideon didn't. He will be around $8-12. He's even seeing play in that small pox list now and that's slowly gaining traction
Nahiri's price went down because she isn't being played in standard anymore. She was a center piece in the Saheeli rai combo decks.
-This gives reanimtor a way to deal with graveyard hate since they can just start beating face with Hollow ones that they get off of their looting effects. This sounds great since Grixis reanimtor has NO WAY to beat a leyline of the void off of turn 0. I'm not confident on it seeing tons of play but that is worth mentioning hence why it got an honorable mention in my rating. Also you did say that it's bad because it dies to k-command without mentioning what removal it dodges which is very relevant. Being able to dodge fatal push and come down as a pesudo 1 mana 4/4 on turn 2 is something that only tasigur, the golden fang/gurmag angler can do which is interesting.
-Show me what statistic that anger of the gods is seeing more play than all the other wraths. The other wraths not seeing a ton a play is mainly because the decks that they go into are tier 2-3 in terms of power not because of the power level of the wraths themselves. Bontu's last reckoning has to be better than those cards to replace them hence why I asked that question. The only decks that I see Reckoning going into are 8 rack because it has issues hitting 4 mana, small pox because it plays so many planeswalkers that it doesn't mind taking a turn off and potentially tezzeret because mana rocks can help subsidize the cost.
-Have you played against a Vendilion Clique? 3/1 body on a flash creature can close out a game relatively fast since almost nothing in this format flies besides lingering souls. Nimble "always cycles" too since it's a cycling card. The best deck in the format is a "midrange" deck with a faster clock.
I actually disagree on your point of WR prison since the only card that it plays that could see a price hike is chalice of the void and that card is already expensive. Everything else has already been reprinted to death besides spirit guide and that card is already up there in price for a common.