What we really need back, is Ponder or Preordain, Honestly, I think that's the one thing missing to bring Tempo back into the fray as a competitive deck, right now, it's a joke. One of those two cards would be enough to bring it back.
Bitterblossom would be nice to give Combo a natural predator, however, Combo has evolved past the point of Fae being able to stop it... What we need is better counter magic.
You realize the juxtaposition here, right? By saying Combo has evolved past the point of Fae being able to stop it (an aggro control deck with tons of counter magic effects) but still wanting 2 cards that will make combo much better..?
I miss ponder and preordain. A lot. But storm is still a deck even without the two best ritual effects Modern had to offer and I don't think giving it even better card selection tools is going to have the desired effect on that deck, and I'm pretty sure that Twin would jump at the chance to run those over Sleight and Visions again.
I would love a good card selection spell to power up Tempo, Aggro Control, and Control decks in the format but I don't see that happening without the card being easily abused by the blue based combo decks in the format, and sadly the counter magic is (as you said) not up to snuff so we can't really just run a density of counters and removal with a mass draw spell ala Opportunity, Tidings... Heck, I'd love a reprint of Counterspell and Fact or Fiction right now.
GSZ was banned because it had so much utility that virtually all Green decks turned into GSZ decks, but cards are often banned because they are too powerful. Utility is a form of power. Ergo, banning a card because it has too much utility fits it in established criteria because cards are often banned because of their power level. QED
But DRS is not in virtually all green decks. GW Hatebears doesn't play him. RG Tron doesn't play him. Kiki Pod doesn't play him. Scapeshift doesn't play him. Gruul Zoo doesn't play him. Infect and Bogles don't play him. GSZ got banned because, in the words of the DCI, " However, this ends up with fewer different decks being played in practice, as Green Sun's Zenith is such a good choice that there are fewer green decks that do anything else". GSZ was in more or less every green deck in Modern. Moreover, GSZ provided far more utility than DRS, enough such that any deck could justify using it. GSZ was always a good topdeck, was always good in every matchup, and was always good in every archetype. It was always a good choice if you played green. DRS is not; only a fraction of green decks use him. As such, he doesn't fit the GSZ criteria.
I think DRS is broken. He's a mana elf that can be cast for black, which makes him radically different from similar cards and also deals damage and gains life. I consider DRS too powerful. The fact that's not a flashy dragon ot planeswalker does not mean he is not busted. Ponder isn't blatantly powerful either, but no one really doubts that Ponder it powers up combo decks too much. Well, DRS powers up midrange decks with a B/G shell too much.
Ponder got banned because it, and Preordain, made combo decks far too consistent and efficient at PT Philly in 2011. Those combo decks were too fast (lots of turn 2 and 3 wins), too prevalent (40% of decks at PT Philly were UR-based combo), and too resilient to disruption. DRS doesn't meet any of those criteria, most importantly the bit about being in 40% of decks in the metagame.
I'm totally willing to entertain the notion that DRS is broken and needs to be banned. I am also willing to believe that his obscene utility is what makes him bannable. But for any of that to be true, DRS needs to be either dominating the format (he's not), or being played in every green deck such that diversity is hurt (he's not). We can't just hate him and want him banned. He needs to be objectively hurting the format, and I don't think one can prove that. The paper statistics and MTGO statistics show that DRS is not even close to the big problem of the format. If you have a case to be made that shows he is just overwhelming the format, I would love to see it. But from all the information I have on the format, that evidence just doesn't exist.
But DRS is not in virtually all green decks. GW Hatebears doesn't play him. RG Tron doesn't play him. Kiki Pod doesn't play him. Scapeshift doesn't play him. Gruul Zoo doesn't play him. Infect and Bogles don't play him. GSZ got banned because, in the words of the DCI, " However, this ends up with fewer different decks being played in practice, as Green Sun's Zenith is such a good choice that there are fewer green decks that do anything else". GSZ was in more or less every green deck in Modern. Moreover, GSZ provided far more utility than DRS, enough such that any deck could justify using it. GSZ was always a good topdeck, was always good in every matchup, and was always good in every archetype. It was always a good choice if you played green. DRS is not; only a fraction of green decks use him. As such, he doesn't fit the GSZ criteria.
I didn't say it was in every green deck, I said it had too much utility and used GSZ as an example of another card that fit the same set of criteria. Also, most of the decks you listed are not real decks. The tier 1 Green decks other than Tron play DRS, and Tron isn't really a "Green" deck for obvious reasons.
Ponder got banned because it, and Preordain, made combo decks far too consistent and efficient at PT Philly in 2011. Those combo decks were too fast (lots of turn 2 and 3 wins), too prevalent (40% of decks at PT Philly were UR-based combo), and too resilient to disruption. DRS doesn't meet any of those criteria, most importantly the bit about being in 40% of decks in the metagame.
You aren't responding to the arguments I actually made. I didn't say DRS fit the same criteria as Ponder, I said that it is similar in that its not flashy despite being horribly overpowered in the shells that use it. I also have no idea why something has to be in 40% of decks to be banned, I definitely disagree with that. Should Seething Song being unbanned? What about Second Sunrise?
I'm totally willing to entertain the notion that DRS is broken and needs to be banned. I am also willing to believe that his obscene utility is what makes him bannable. But for any of that to be true, DRS needs to be either dominating the format (he's not), or being played in every green deck such that diversity is hurt (he's not). We can't just hate him and want him banned. He needs to be objectively hurting the format, and I don't think one can prove that. The paper statistics and MTGO statistics show that DRS is not even close to the big problem of the format. If you have a case to be made that shows he is just overwhelming the format, I would love to see it. But from all the information I have on the format, that evidence just doesn't exist.
It depends on what you mean by dominate. During affinity era standard there was a R/G deck that had a fairly decent matchup against affinity because it played cards like Oxidize maindeck. Does the fact that a deck could fight affinity prove that affinity was fair or good for the format? Well, no, not really. I also think you are failing to consider the way that DRS has powered up decks with a b/g shell. When did Jund become a problem? After DRS was printed. Would Pod be a problem if DRS did not exist? Probably not actually. It's like ponder in the sense that it powers up decks like this in a way I think is very unhealthy.
On a side note, there is no such thing as objectively hurting a format. Whether or not a format is helped or hurt by the existence of a card depends on what you consider to be a good format, which is a subjective question.
GSZ also wasn't in every G deck. Jund most of the time didn't play it, Meliria Pod most of the time didn't play it and the aggro version of Zoo didn't play it.
Okay so I went and got us a number so we can compare it to DRS. If DRS is broken by the prevalence test, it will have to meet, approach, or exceed this rate for GSZ.
Of the PT Philly decks that had 18+ points, 48 of them were playing green in some fashion. Of those 48 decks, 29 of them were playing GSZ for a GSZ prevalence rate of 60%.
Of ALL Modern decks at PT Philly, 172 of them were playing green. Of those 172 decks playing green, 99 of them were playing GSZ. That brings the tournament GSZ rate to 58%.
Before someone goes in and says "yeah but forest was in 100% of decks playing green so lawl", understand that we are not talking about a Forest or a Bolt. We are talking about GSZ, a card that on its own merits provides a ton of utility for decks that use it and is ALSO taking up an overwhelming percentage of the metagame.
For DRS to be bannable like GSZ, it needs to provide comparable utility and/or have comparable prevalence over Modern decks. If either of those things are true, the case for his banning becomes stronger. If BOTH of them are true, then the case for his banning becomes stronger still. The question of prevalence is a question that is purely answerable from data. The question of utility, however, is much more subjective.
You aren't responding to the arguments I actually made. I didn't say DRS fit the same criteria as Ponder, I said that it is similar in that its not flashy despite being horribly overpowered in the shells that use it. I also have no idea why something has to be in 40% of decks to be banned, I definitely disagree with that. Should Seething Song being unbanned? What about Second Sunrise?
Song was not banned because it was in 40% of decks. It was banned because it was too fast. Sunrise was banned because it messed with event logistics. Cards get banned in Modern for a variety of reasons, but as far as I can see, DRS doesn't fit any of those criteria. DRS isn't taking up a gigantic share of the metagame. He isn't pushing decks out of the metagame. He isn't forcing you to play him.
On a side note, there is no such thing as objectively hurting a format. Whether or not a format is helped or hurt by the existence of a card depends on what you consider to be a good format, which is a subjective question.
That's just arguing little points. We can make some absurd rhetorical argument that a format with a 80% affinity share is "healthy" because we personally like affinity, in which case, yes, I suppose that format health does become subjective. But if we take the objective standard to be the Wizards standard, then we can get away from those arbitrary and silly cases. Wizards doesn't want decks overperforming (Affinity and it doesn't want players forced to play with or against a certain deck in every match (Caw Blade). That's as objective as we can get. If you want to suggest that format health is totally subjective then we are really just at an impasse both here and in this thread generally, and I'm not going to get into that kind of semantical and meaningless discussion.
Back on the banned list, I dunno how you keep dragging this towards Affinity, DRS Is good, but it's not busted... I honestly don't see what's so powerful about it, If it's cast turn 1 it means they wasted a turn on a mana dork giving you an extra turn to do something else. Also, show me a modern deck that doesn't run some kind of Pyroclasm effect?
Also, lol to everyone wanting Kitty unbanned, As if green needed any more aggro power...
What we really need back, is Ponder or Preordain, Honestly, I think that's the one thing missing to bring Tempo back into the fray as a competitive deck, right now, it's a joke. One of those two cards would be enough to bring it back.
Bitterblossom would be nice to give Combo a natural predator, however, Combo has evolved past the point of Fae being able to stop it... What we need is better counter magic.
Really Plaguefather? You think that combo is too powerful for a Bitterblossom unban to stop yet you are saying that aggro doesn't need any help and that Ponder or Preordain, which won't just be used in tempo but also in combo, should be unbanned? I agree that Preordain should be unbanned. But to balance it out, we need to help aggro. That is why Wild Nacatl and Bitterblossom need to be unbanned.
Tinker with legs is a better tinker. Did you watch the video I linked? Did you hear how AF talked about SFM? How he said the swords were over powered?
I watched the video. That is why I said that it is highly unlikely that it will be unbanned for years, if ever. But I still have the right to discuss what would happen if it was unbanned. And seriously? Tinker with legs is a better Tinker? If that was the case it would be banned it legacy and restricted in vintage. By your logic, Grim Lavamancer is better than Punishing Fire, Bog Witch is better than Dark Ritual, and Mageta the Lion is better than Wrath of God. They aren't. They have to wait a turn and are vulnerable to removal. And the most broken thing that SFM could do if Batterskull was banned is a turn 3 Elbrus, the Binding Blade, which I think would be a cool, but not broken, deck. Turn 3 Deathrender wouldn't be run, because it would need Deathrender, SFM, a sac outlet, and a huge creature to cheat into play. Everything else either has a high equip cost and wouldn't be able to be used for a while or a low enough casting cost that all SFM did was act as a tutor. The swords are not broken with SFM. Turn 2 SFM, turn 3 sword, turn 4 equip and swing is not overpowered by any means. The tutoring ability on a 2 drop 1/2 is fair. The second ability barely reduces the cost. If the reason why the second ability is broken is because it can get the swords past counterspells, then why didn't your opponent just counter SFM in the first place? The fact that you can get it out at instant speed doesn't matter, because you have to equip it at sorcery speed. And if the reason that it is banned is because it will restrict equipment design in the future, let me ask you something? Do you really think that Wizards hasn't learned their lesson about overpowered equipment? And even assuming that they haven't, Living Weapon is a 6 on Maro's Storm Scale, meaning that it has slightly less than around a 40% chance of ever coming back. Without Living Weapon, the only thing that could break SFM again is the design of equipment that is high costed, stupidly powerful, and has a low equip cost. The only equipment ever designed like that are Elbrus and Deathrender, which I've already explained wouldn't be broken with SFM. If you can explain from your own point of view why SFM is broken with the swords, I'd love to hear it. But if you can't put together a coherent argument, nobody here is going to listen to you.
Edit: Also Bocephus, stop showing that video of Forsythe to prove that you are right. If we were discussing whether things would be unbanned instead of whether things should be unbanned, then we wouldn't even be bringing Ponder and Preordain into the conversation. After all, didn't Sam Stoddard say here http://www.wizards.com/Magic/magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/ld/252 that "Other cards, like Ponder and Preordain, just provide so much cardflow to the combo decks that they become nearly impossible for "fair" decks to compete against." But you still think that Preordain should be unbanned, despite what he said. That is how I feel about Stoneforge Mystic.
@Plaguefather, I built an all in Affinity deck that can hit you for 14-18 on turn 2 with a first turn ravager and a turn 2 boros charm. It does play inkmoth and can kill with 10 poison damage on turn 2. I was trying to build an all in deck that did not rely on plating to be explosive and got the idea from the RUG infect decks. Giving the deck artifact lands that tap for colored mana would help the deck a lot. Also, this is Modern, not Legacy, stop comparing. Legacy has the policing cards to stop a deck like I built, Modern does not.
Oh and Tezz in Modern is way too slow. By the time you drop him, you want to have won already. You dont have the tools to abuse him like you do in Legacy in Modern.
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I watched the video. That is why I said that it is highly unlikely that it will be unbanned for years, if ever. But I still have the right to discuss what would happen if it was unbanned. And seriously? Tinker with legs is a better Tinker? If that was the case it would be banned it legacy and restricted in vintage. By your logic, Grim Lavamancer is better than Punishing Fire, Bog Witch is better than Dark Ritual, and Mageta the Lion is better than Wrath of God. They aren't. They have to wait a turn and are vulnerable to removal. And the most broken thing that SFM could do if Batterskull was banned is a turn 3 Elbrus, the Binding Blade, which I think would be a cool, but not broken, deck. Turn 3 Deathrender wouldn't be run, because it would need Deathrender, SFM, a sac outlet, and a huge creature to cheat into play. Everything else either has a high equip cost and wouldn't be able to be used for a while or a low enough casting cost that all SFM did was act as a tutor. The swords are not broken with SFM. Turn 2 SFM, turn 3 sword, turn 4 equip and swing is not overpowered by any means. The tutoring ability on a 2 drop 1/2 is fair. The second ability barely reduces the cost. If the reason why the second ability is broken is because it can get the swords past counterspells, then why didn't your opponent just counter SFM in the first place? The fact that you can get it out at instant speed doesn't matter, because you have to equip it at sorcery speed. And if the reason that it is banned is because it will restrict equipment design in the future, let me ask you something? Do you really think that Wizards hasn't learned their lesson about overpowered equipment? And even assuming that they haven't, Living Weapon is a 6 on Maro's Storm Scale, meaning that it has slightly less than around a 40% chance of ever coming back. Without Living Weapon, the only thing that could break SFM again is the design of equipment that is high costed, stupidly powerful, and has a low equip cost. The only equipment ever designed like that are Elbrus and Deathrender, which I've already explained wouldn't be broken with SFM. If you can explain from your own point of view why SFM is broken with the swords, I'd love to hear it. But if you can't put together a coherent argument, nobody here is going to listen to you.
It doesnt matter what I feel. AF explained how they feel about the card and what it does. With his explanation I dont feel the card will be coming into the format, so I dont worry about it. I am pretty sure Wotc doesnt want oppressive decks in Modern since they have taken full blown FAe out, castrated Jund and have the parts to make Caw-blade viable on the ban list. There are still cheap evasive creature to attach those swords to. I doubt anyone wants to see a Caw-blade variant in Modern, except for those who enjoyed Caw blade in the first place, which was a minority of the player base. I would say what you want out of Modern is something more accustom for Legacy.
izzetmage is trying to distract from the point by dredging up my opinions from a few months ago... As in before the DGM Prerelease...
Being clueless about what goes into a competitive Affinity deck doesn't do wonders for your credibility. Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than speak out and remove all doubt.
Beck//Call is just the tip of the iceberg. Saying that no-one plays Inkmoth Nexus or that Steel Overseer is "outdated" is simply ludicrous.
If you demonstrate that you don't know Affinity, time and again, it just goes to show that your opinion on how to balance Modern - a task which requires understanding more archetypes than just Affinity - can't be taken seriously.
BTW, somehow, in a format MORE competitive than Modern, Tezzeret is more competitive than the builds you linked to...
You do realize that artifact lands are not banned in that format, right? And that they are also part of the reason why Tezzeret can crank out so much damage?
Overseer is slow, Fact. He has very little board impact, Fact. He's too slow for the affinity game.
Overseer shows up in winning decklists, fact. So does Inkmoth Nexus, if that hasn't sunk in yet. I'll trust results from someone who has multiple GP Top 8s than some random who claims he is 45-5 against unknown decks which may or may not be mono-green Unicorns. You should, too.
It doesnt matter what I feel. AF explained how they feel about the card and what it does. With his explanation I dont feel the card will be coming into the format, so I dont worry about it. I am pretty sure Wotc doesnt want oppressive decks in Modern since they have taken full blown FAe out, castrated Jund and have the parts to make Caw-blade viable on the ban list. There are still cheap evasive creature to attach those swords to. I doubt anyone wants to see a Caw-blade variant in Modern, except for those who enjoyed Caw blade in the first place, which was a minority of the player base. I would say what you want out of Modern is something more accustom for Legacy.
We are discussing whether SFM should be unbanned, not whether it will be. I admit that the powers that be disagree with me. But you have yet to put together a coherent argument for its banning. I really want to know why you view SFM as a different case than Preordain and why you think a turn 4 sword is too broken for Modern. I am also curious how Turn 1 Suntail Hawk, turn 2 SFM, turn 3 sword, and turn 4 equip and swing is any more broken than turn 1 Steelshaper's Gift, turn 2 Squadron Hawk, turn 3 sword, and turn 4 swing and equip. It is almost exactly the same result. And I don't want Modern to be like Legacy. I like Modern as it is. I think that there are things that could be done to make it better, but Modern is much closer to the format that I want than Legacy is, which is why I am arguing for change in the Modern forum instead of the Legacy one.
Also, next time you argue for a change in the banned list, can I quote you saying "It doesn't matter what I feel."?
As someone who plays competitive vintage about once a month in one of the best areas in the US for vintage and frequently plays against (and often looses to) some of the best players in the US. I know a thing about tinker in a competitive setting.
Anyone who compares SFM to Tinker, much less says SFM is better, has very little understanding of competitive mtg. I don't care who it is. Especially someone like AF or Maro. I would and do take anything they say about competitive mtg with a grain of salt.
Bocephus you have said that you would instantly scoop to an opponent playing faeries. You also desire a very low powered format. Forgive me but your opinion and views on competitive formats are somewhat suspect. I've suggested it before but I'm positive what you are looking for is pauper. I don't really take your views seriously when it comes to this stuff.
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If you couldn't tell I hate greedy blue decks.
As someone who plays competitive vintage about once a month in one of the best areas in the US for vintage and frequently plays against (and often looses to) some of the best players in the US. I know a thin about tinker in a competitive setting.
Anyone who compares SFM to Tinker, much less says SFM is better, has very little understanding of competitive mtg. I don't care who it is. Especially someone like AF or Maro. I would and do take anything they say about competitive mtg with a grain of salt.
Bocephus you have said that you would instantly scoop to an opponent playing faeries. You also desire a very low powered format. Forgive me but your opinion and views on competitive formats are somewhat suspect. I've suggested it before but I'm positive what you are looking for is pauper. I don't really take your views seriously when it comes to this stuff.
I said I would scoop to Fae because I have played it so much. I do not desire to play against it any more. My son played it for years and I was his play test partner. It is one deck I simply hate to play against.
As for your points on SFM, I heard local pros say the exact same thing AF said in the video before AF said it.
Just because you enjoy the power level and interactions of other older formats, does no mean Modern has to fall in line to appease players like you. Sorry I like something different then you for Modern. I play those older formats also, if I wish to play interactions or power level like those formats, i will go play them. Competitively also.
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We are discussing whether SFM should be unbanned, not whether it will be. I admit that the powers that be disagree with me. But you have yet to put together a coherent argument for its banning. I really want to know why you view SFM as a different case than Preordain and why you think a turn 4 sword is too broken for Modern. I am also curious how Turn 1 Suntail Hawk, turn 2 SFM, turn 3 sword, and turn 4 equip and swing is any more broken than turn 1 Steelshaper's Gift, turn 2 Squadron Hawk, turn 3 sword, and turn 4 swing and equip. It is almost exactly the same result. And I don't want Modern to be like Legacy. I like Modern as it is. I think that there are things that could be done to make it better, but Modern is much closer to the format that I want than Legacy is, which is why I am arguing for change in the Modern forum instead of the Legacy one.
Also, next time you argue for a change in the banned list, can I quote you saying "It doesn't matter what I feel."?
No, you are pleading that SFM be discussed to be unbanned. Some dont care one way or the other. SFM was part of a very oppressive deck. SFM can tutor and cheat out what it was tutored for around control magic. That would make SFM probably the most powerful turn 2 play in Modern. In my opinion SFM is too powerful for the format. It would warp the format towards white. Any deck running white now will find room for 4 copies. Even if you take away bustedskull, there are plenty of other equipment cards that could and would be playable then. Like 5 swords of different color combos. You keep comparing SFM to stealshapers gift, its not even close. Stealshapers gift is a 1/3 of SFM. For your example, you are lacking a creature. Leaves your board open to sac effects and your sword sits there unusable. With SFM the sword gets used. You can not just look at what you would be doing, but what you are playing against also. If you thoughtseized or IOK'ed into a hand with stealshapers gift or SFM which would you rip out of the hand? 99% of the player base knows the right answer is SFM because its a much more powerful card then gift.
Song was not banned because it was in 40% of decks. It was banned because it was too fast. Sunrise was banned because it messed with event logistics. Cards get banned in Modern for a variety of reasons, but as far as I can see, DRS doesn't fit any of those criteria. DRS isn't taking up a gigantic share of the metagame. He isn't pushing decks out of the metagame. He isn't forcing you to play him.
I don't those cards weren't 40% of the metagame. That was my entire point, you created a strawman of my position and then attacked it rather than responding to the argument that I actually made. People weren't forced to play Affinity either. As I said, there were decks that had good matchups against it. The question is whether its power level is too high, and I think that it is. It will continue to make B/Gx decks a problem and should really just get sent to the cornfield already.
That's just arguing little points. We can make some absurd rhetorical argument that a format with a 80% affinity share is "healthy" because we personally like affinity, in which case, yes, I suppose that format health does become subjective. But if we take the objective standard to be the Wizards standard,
I'm not willing to do that and neither are most of the people on this forum. If you want Bitterblossom to be unbanned you have already rejected Wizards highly nebulous criteria.
then we can get away from those arbitrary and silly cases. Wizards doesn't want decks overperforming (Affinity and it doesn't want players forced to play with or against a certain deck in every match (Caw Blade). That's as objective as we can get. If you want to suggest that format health is totally subjective then we are really just at an impasse both here and in this thread generally, and I'm not going to get into that kind of semantical and meaningless discussion.
It's not a semantic debate at all, it's actually a very substantive debate about what makes something good or bad. Magic is a game, and games are meant to be fun. Is fun objective? No, it's not. You are just wrong.
I don't those cards weren't 40% of the metagame. That was my entire point, you created a strawman of my position and then attacked it rather than responding to the argument that I actually made. People weren't forced to play Affinity either. As I said, there were decks that had good matchups against it. The question is whether its power level is too high, and I think that it is. It will continue to make B/Gx decks a problem and should really just get sent to the cornfield already.
I have directly responded to your position in every single post, and I will do so again. DRS does not fit the criteria for banning. I have laid out the criteria that Wizards uses for bannings in this format, illustrating it with other card examples, and DRS does not meet any of them. It's not too fast. It's not too prevalent. It's not reducing deck diversity. You repeatedly claim that its power level is too high, and I have repeatedly tried to show a variety of ways in which that is just not the case. Again, I will happily entertain an argument about DRS's bannability that involves some actual evidence beyond the purely rhetorical argument of "DRS has too much utility". Does it show up in too many decks? Are those decks winning too much? Are those decks winning because of DRS or independent of DRS? Is he reducing tournament attendance because he is so loathsome to play against?
It's not a semantic debate at all, it's actually a very substantive debate about what makes something good or bad. Magic is a game, and games are meant to be fun. Is fun objective? No, it's not. You are just wrong.
You are escalating this pretty quickly into the realm of personal attack, and I'm not really sure why. We aren't discussing the meaning of funness in a game. We are discussing the bannability of a card in a format with certain per-established guidelines. I reject the Bitterblossom ban not because I don't like the guidelines of the format, but because I don't think that the reason BB was banned (it would theoretically be too oppressive) is true any longer. The underlying criteria of that ban is still fine. If BB did make a deck oppressive, then it need to stay banned.
In the case of DRS, his being fun/not-fun alone has zero bearing on his bannability. For him to be a bannable card, he needs to be oppressive in such a way as to reduce deck diversity. Now, if his un-funness stems directly from his oppression, then he can get banned. I fully appreciate that you find DRS to be an unfun card. But does that translate to a format wide banning? Where is the evidence for that claim?
EDIT: I will even try and give a case for DRS being banned because I actually haven't seen one yet. When GSZ got banned, Wizards said...
If one intends to build a deck that has turn-one accelerants, Green Sun's Zenith is a great choice. If one wants to more access to utility green creatures, Green Sun's Zenith is a great choice. If one wants to more reliably get a large green creature, such as a Primeval Titan, onto the battlefield, Green Sun's Zenith is a great choice. However, this ends up with fewer different decks being played in practice, as Green Sun's Zenith is such a good choice that there are fewer green decks that do anything else.
We can try and rewrite that to substitute in DRS for GSZ, but even then we would have to acknowledge that DRS is far less powerful than Zenith. We might envision a DRS ban that read something like this:
"If one intends to build a deck that has turn-one accelerants, DRS is a great choice. If one wants to accelerate to big threats and stall through life gain, DRS is a great choice. If one wants to play an aggressive deck with acceleration and constant damage, DRS is a great choice. However, this ends up with fewer different decks being played in practice, as DRS is such a good choice that there are fewer green decks that do anything else."
That might be a justification to ban DRS, but it's clearly overstated, especially because that last sentence just isn't true. There aren't "fewer green (or black/red) decks that can do anything else" because of DRS. There are plenty of such decks in current Modern that aren't running DRS. So even that explanation for the card's bannability would probably fall flat.
I said I would scoop to Fae because I have played it so much. I do not desire to play against it any more. My son played it for years and I was his play test partner. It is one deck I simply hate to play against.
As for your points on SFM, I heard local pros say the exact same thing AF said in the video before AF said it.
Just because you enjoy the power level and interactions of other older formats, does no mean Modern has to fall in line to appease players like you. Sorry I like something different then you for Modern. I play those older formats also, if I wish to play interactions or power level like those formats, i will go play them. Competitively also.
It's not about tastes. It's about an ability to objectively evaluate a single card or a decks power level and its impact on the format. I do not think you can do this objectively, and that you base a majority if not all of your arguments on anecdotal evidence.
Saying stuff like SFM is better than Tinker doesn't help your case.:rolleyes:
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Currently Playing:
Modern: UWUW TronUW
Legacy: WDeath N TaxesW CEldrazi C
If you couldn't tell I hate greedy blue decks.
I'm done arguing with you kktkenshinx. If your claim is that I made no arguments and that you responded to every point I made then you are living in an alternate reality and I do not wish to waste my time arguing with you. I guess I should have based my claim on nonsensical "testing" I did with my friends or some sort of statistically invalid model. Then maybe you would have accepted it.
It's not about tastes. It's about an ability to objectively evaluate a single card or a decks power level and its impact on the format. I do not think you can do this objectively, and that you base a majority if not all of your arguments on anecdotal evidence.
Saying stuff like SFM is better than Tinker doesn't help your case.:rolleyes:
Cost one less then tinker and has legs (I wont even go into the extra cost for tinker)... To me thats better. Take it as you wish. In a format where the one of the most powerful cards is a planeswalker that makes you sac a creature, the legs on SFM is huge in allowing your equipt creature connect.
I think its those who wish Modern look more like the older formats are the ones unable to evaluate cards unbiased. They wish to have those interactions and power level in Modern.
Cost one less then tinker and has legs... To me thats better. Take it as you wish. In a format where the one of the most powerful cards is a planeswalker that makes you sac a creature, the legs on SFM is huge in allowing your equipt creature connect.
I think its those who wish Modern look more like the older formats are the ones unable to evaluate cards unbiased. They wish to have those interactions and power level in Modern.
One puts it directly into play the turn you cast it, the other doesn't. One can get any artifact, the other has to get an equipment.
There's a large difference between the two and why Tinker is better.
People want to play certain cards, decks, or strategies; which has nothing to do with wanting modern to look like the eternal formats. Also, SFM is no where near the power level of Tinker, let's be real here.
One puts it directly into play the turn you cast it, the other doesn't. One can get any artifact, the other has to get an equipment.
There's a large difference between the two and why Tinker is better.
Quote from rxavage »
People want to play certain cards, decks, or strategies; which has nothing to do with wanting modern to look like the eternal formats. Also, SFM is no where near the power level of Tinker, let's be real here.
You should write a letter to AF and the pros that disagree with you. They made the comparison, I simply agree with it. Watch the video.
I'm done arguing with you kktkenshinx. If your claim is that I made no arguments and that you responded to every point I made then you are living in an alternate reality and I do not wish to waste my time arguing with you. I guess I should have based my claim on nonsensical "testing" I did with my friends or some sort of statistically invalid model. Then maybe you would have accepted it.
I will happily respond to any argument that you think that I missed. Also, I fail to see how my methods are statistically invalid. I would love if you could point out any of my statistical claims that are using bad methods or that you just disagree with. These methods are widely accepted in interpreting social science data, and they have clear relevance to this discussion. Numerous posters on this site have affirmed these methods and I can assure you that they meet accepted standards.
DRS is not an enjoyable card to play against, at least for me, and I would legitimately like to see some evidence that suggests his bannability. You say he has too much utility. You say this has an adverse effect on the format. Can you prove that using non-anecdotal evidence? Can you look at the decks that are played in the format, their win percentages, and their top 8/top 16/4-0/3-1 rates, and show that DRS is causing problems?
I refuse to argue with you about DRS, but I have no problem with pointing out your methodological flaws. I don't think you have made any terrible mathematical mistake as much as you have made analytical mistakes -I think we went over this once before. You read too much into the data that you have by claiming it implies things that it doesn't and leave out information that you need in order to reach your conclusions. This is especially obvious when you are talking about the implications of GP attendance.
No, you are pleading that SFM be discussed to be unbanned. Some dont care one way or the other. SFM was part of a very oppressive deck. SFM can tutor and cheat out what it was tutored for around control magic. That would make SFM probably the most powerful turn 2 play in Modern. In my opinion SFM is too powerful for the format. It would warp the format towards white. Any deck running white now will find room for 4 copies. Even if you take away bustedskull, there are plenty of other equipment cards that could and would be playable then. Like 5 swords of different color combos. You keep comparing SFM to stealshapers gift, its not even close. Stealshapers gift is a 1/3 of SFM. For your example, you are lacking a creature. Leaves your board open to sac effects and your sword sits there unusable. With SFM the sword gets used. You can not just look at what you would be doing, but what you are playing against also. If you thoughtseized or IOK'ed into a hand with stealshapers gift or SFM which would you rip out of the hand? 99% of the player base knows the right answer is SFM because its a much more powerful card then gift.
So you are worried that it will warp the format towards white? I don't see anybody shouting for Lightning Bolt to be banned but it warps the format towards red. I mean, our top control decks are WUR, not the traditional Esper. And what is wrong with equipment being playable? The swords, Cranial Plating, Batterskull are the only played equipment now, and one of those is treated like a creature. More equipment being playable would be a good thing for the format. Steelshaper's Gift is more like half of an SFM than a third. For the swords, the second ability barely matters, so You are getting a 1/2 creature for one more mana than Steelshaper's Gift, which is perfectly fair. And the part about Thoughtseize and IOK proves my point. Even if you get SFM out despite counterspells and targeted discard, what is stopping your opponent from making you discard your sword, or from bolting SFM, or from using artifact destruction, or from blocking whatever creature you put the sword on (most of the time the creature won't have flying because realistically, most creatures don't). You also still haven't answered the following question.
How is using SFM to get out a sword broken? Look at the following example for a Junk list.
Turn 4: Land, Tarmogoyf, activate Liliana of the Veil's first ability, discarding a land, flashback Lingering Souls, swing with Knight of the Reliquiary
As you can see, the second one is much more powerful and has a far better defense. How would SFM make it broken?
Also Bocephus, if you don't like what the majority of us want Modern to be, maybe you are the one who should go play a different format instead of telling us to. How about Commander, where if anybody does something overpowered, you can just gain up on them?
I refuse to argue with you about DRS, but I have no problem with pointing out your methodological flaws. I don't think you have made any terrible mathematical mistake as much as you have made analytical mistakes -I think we went over this once before. You read too much into the data that you have by claiming it implies things that it doesn't and leave out information that you need in order to reach your conclusions. This is especially obvious when you are talking about the implications of GP attendance.
Every post I have written on the topic includes tons of disclaimers about interpreting the data. Sure, I'll give my own spin on it, because this is a forum and it's interesting to share opinions. But I will also try and include a variety of cautions in over-reading the results. And if I neglect to give disclaimers in some posts, it is because they are neither professional reports nor academic papers. As such, I do not feel a need to post a hyper-nuanced and comprehensive discussion section with every single statistic. But when I catch it, I try and offer all statistics with all the interpretation disclaimers that people need.
As to DRS, the offer still stands to you or anyone else: Give some actual data about why DRS needs to be banned. We can try and make that case for a card like Pod (it's overperforming all over MTGO, but that might be a function of players or it might be a function of the card). We can try and make that case for a card like Griselbrand (it does violate the turn 3 rule, but the deck isn't doing well enough to make it "top tier" or "consistent"). But I have scoured this thread looking for a similar argument about DRS, and they all take the form of "he has too much utility" or "he is broken" or "he is unfair". There is never any reason for that other than personal preference. If he's too unfair in B/G decks, then we should see evidence of those decks being unfair. But we don't.
Turn 2:
Land, SFM, search for Sword of Whatever You Need At The Moment
Turn 3:
Land, activate SFM's ability, put sword into play, exile fetchland, equip sword to SFM
Turn 4:
Land, Lingering Souls, flashback Lingering Souls, exile an opponent's fetchland, Path to Exile, swing with SFM.
Replace the sword up in the above with batterskull. Lifelink makes the chump blocking inneficient, pathing will just slow down opponent until he re-equips the batterskull, on a flyer most probably.
Replace the sword up in the above with batterskull. Lifelink makes the chump blocking inneficient, pathing will just slow down opponent until he re-equips the batterskull, on a flyer most probably.
Now maybe batterskull then is the broken piece?
Batterskull is what prevents Stoneforge Mystic from being unbanned going by a mechanics standpoint, yes.
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Collecting Maw of the Mire! Feel free to send me any you have, so long as they're in reasonable condition.
Replace the sword up in the above with batterskull. Lifelink makes the chump blocking inneficient, pathing will just slow down opponent until he re-equips the batterskull, on a flyer most probably.
Now maybe batterskull then is the broken piece?
That is exactly what I've been saying. I want Batterskull to be banned and SFM to be unbanned. Imagine the possibilities for an Elbrus, the Binding Blade deck, which I think would be a fair and interesting addition to the format.
You realize the juxtaposition here, right? By saying Combo has evolved past the point of Fae being able to stop it (an aggro control deck with tons of counter magic effects) but still wanting 2 cards that will make combo much better..?
I miss ponder and preordain. A lot. But storm is still a deck even without the two best ritual effects Modern had to offer and I don't think giving it even better card selection tools is going to have the desired effect on that deck, and I'm pretty sure that Twin would jump at the chance to run those over Sleight and Visions again.
I would love a good card selection spell to power up Tempo, Aggro Control, and Control decks in the format but I don't see that happening without the card being easily abused by the blue based combo decks in the format, and sadly the counter magic is (as you said) not up to snuff so we can't really just run a density of counters and removal with a mass draw spell ala Opportunity, Tidings... Heck, I'd love a reprint of Counterspell and Fact or Fiction right now.
But DRS is not in virtually all green decks. GW Hatebears doesn't play him. RG Tron doesn't play him. Kiki Pod doesn't play him. Scapeshift doesn't play him. Gruul Zoo doesn't play him. Infect and Bogles don't play him. GSZ got banned because, in the words of the DCI, " However, this ends up with fewer different decks being played in practice, as Green Sun's Zenith is such a good choice that there are fewer green decks that do anything else". GSZ was in more or less every green deck in Modern. Moreover, GSZ provided far more utility than DRS, enough such that any deck could justify using it. GSZ was always a good topdeck, was always good in every matchup, and was always good in every archetype. It was always a good choice if you played green. DRS is not; only a fraction of green decks use him. As such, he doesn't fit the GSZ criteria.
Ponder got banned because it, and Preordain, made combo decks far too consistent and efficient at PT Philly in 2011. Those combo decks were too fast (lots of turn 2 and 3 wins), too prevalent (40% of decks at PT Philly were UR-based combo), and too resilient to disruption. DRS doesn't meet any of those criteria, most importantly the bit about being in 40% of decks in the metagame.
I'm totally willing to entertain the notion that DRS is broken and needs to be banned. I am also willing to believe that his obscene utility is what makes him bannable. But for any of that to be true, DRS needs to be either dominating the format (he's not), or being played in every green deck such that diversity is hurt (he's not). We can't just hate him and want him banned. He needs to be objectively hurting the format, and I don't think one can prove that. The paper statistics and MTGO statistics show that DRS is not even close to the big problem of the format. If you have a case to be made that shows he is just overwhelming the format, I would love to see it. But from all the information I have on the format, that evidence just doesn't exist.
I didn't say it was in every green deck, I said it had too much utility and used GSZ as an example of another card that fit the same set of criteria. Also, most of the decks you listed are not real decks. The tier 1 Green decks other than Tron play DRS, and Tron isn't really a "Green" deck for obvious reasons.
You aren't responding to the arguments I actually made. I didn't say DRS fit the same criteria as Ponder, I said that it is similar in that its not flashy despite being horribly overpowered in the shells that use it. I also have no idea why something has to be in 40% of decks to be banned, I definitely disagree with that. Should Seething Song being unbanned? What about Second Sunrise?
It depends on what you mean by dominate. During affinity era standard there was a R/G deck that had a fairly decent matchup against affinity because it played cards like Oxidize maindeck. Does the fact that a deck could fight affinity prove that affinity was fair or good for the format? Well, no, not really. I also think you are failing to consider the way that DRS has powered up decks with a b/g shell. When did Jund become a problem? After DRS was printed. Would Pod be a problem if DRS did not exist? Probably not actually. It's like ponder in the sense that it powers up decks like this in a way I think is very unhealthy.
On a side note, there is no such thing as objectively hurting a format. Whether or not a format is helped or hurt by the existence of a card depends on what you consider to be a good format, which is a subjective question.
Okay so I went and got us a number so we can compare it to DRS. If DRS is broken by the prevalence test, it will have to meet, approach, or exceed this rate for GSZ.
Of the PT Philly decks that had 18+ points, 48 of them were playing green in some fashion. Of those 48 decks, 29 of them were playing GSZ for a GSZ prevalence rate of 60%.
Of ALL Modern decks at PT Philly, 172 of them were playing green. Of those 172 decks playing green, 99 of them were playing GSZ. That brings the tournament GSZ rate to 58%.
Before someone goes in and says "yeah but forest was in 100% of decks playing green so lawl", understand that we are not talking about a Forest or a Bolt. We are talking about GSZ, a card that on its own merits provides a ton of utility for decks that use it and is ALSO taking up an overwhelming percentage of the metagame.
For DRS to be bannable like GSZ, it needs to provide comparable utility and/or have comparable prevalence over Modern decks. If either of those things are true, the case for his banning becomes stronger. If BOTH of them are true, then the case for his banning becomes stronger still. The question of prevalence is a question that is purely answerable from data. The question of utility, however, is much more subjective.
Song was not banned because it was in 40% of decks. It was banned because it was too fast. Sunrise was banned because it messed with event logistics. Cards get banned in Modern for a variety of reasons, but as far as I can see, DRS doesn't fit any of those criteria. DRS isn't taking up a gigantic share of the metagame. He isn't pushing decks out of the metagame. He isn't forcing you to play him.
That's just arguing little points. We can make some absurd rhetorical argument that a format with a 80% affinity share is "healthy" because we personally like affinity, in which case, yes, I suppose that format health does become subjective. But if we take the objective standard to be the Wizards standard, then we can get away from those arbitrary and silly cases. Wizards doesn't want decks overperforming (Affinity and it doesn't want players forced to play with or against a certain deck in every match (Caw Blade). That's as objective as we can get. If you want to suggest that format health is totally subjective then we are really just at an impasse both here and in this thread generally, and I'm not going to get into that kind of semantical and meaningless discussion.
Really Plaguefather? You think that combo is too powerful for a Bitterblossom unban to stop yet you are saying that aggro doesn't need any help and that Ponder or Preordain, which won't just be used in tempo but also in combo, should be unbanned? I agree that Preordain should be unbanned. But to balance it out, we need to help aggro. That is why Wild Nacatl and Bitterblossom need to be unbanned.
I watched the video. That is why I said that it is highly unlikely that it will be unbanned for years, if ever. But I still have the right to discuss what would happen if it was unbanned. And seriously? Tinker with legs is a better Tinker? If that was the case it would be banned it legacy and restricted in vintage. By your logic, Grim Lavamancer is better than Punishing Fire, Bog Witch is better than Dark Ritual, and Mageta the Lion is better than Wrath of God. They aren't. They have to wait a turn and are vulnerable to removal. And the most broken thing that SFM could do if Batterskull was banned is a turn 3 Elbrus, the Binding Blade, which I think would be a cool, but not broken, deck. Turn 3 Deathrender wouldn't be run, because it would need Deathrender, SFM, a sac outlet, and a huge creature to cheat into play. Everything else either has a high equip cost and wouldn't be able to be used for a while or a low enough casting cost that all SFM did was act as a tutor. The swords are not broken with SFM. Turn 2 SFM, turn 3 sword, turn 4 equip and swing is not overpowered by any means. The tutoring ability on a 2 drop 1/2 is fair. The second ability barely reduces the cost. If the reason why the second ability is broken is because it can get the swords past counterspells, then why didn't your opponent just counter SFM in the first place? The fact that you can get it out at instant speed doesn't matter, because you have to equip it at sorcery speed. And if the reason that it is banned is because it will restrict equipment design in the future, let me ask you something? Do you really think that Wizards hasn't learned their lesson about overpowered equipment? And even assuming that they haven't, Living Weapon is a 6 on Maro's Storm Scale, meaning that it has slightly less than around a 40% chance of ever coming back. Without Living Weapon, the only thing that could break SFM again is the design of equipment that is high costed, stupidly powerful, and has a low equip cost. The only equipment ever designed like that are Elbrus and Deathrender, which I've already explained wouldn't be broken with SFM. If you can explain from your own point of view why SFM is broken with the swords, I'd love to hear it. But if you can't put together a coherent argument, nobody here is going to listen to you.
Edit: Also Bocephus, stop showing that video of Forsythe to prove that you are right. If we were discussing whether things would be unbanned instead of whether things should be unbanned, then we wouldn't even be bringing Ponder and Preordain into the conversation. After all, didn't Sam Stoddard say here http://www.wizards.com/Magic/magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/ld/252 that "Other cards, like Ponder and Preordain, just provide so much cardflow to the combo decks that they become nearly impossible for "fair" decks to compete against." But you still think that Preordain should be unbanned, despite what he said. That is how I feel about Stoneforge Mystic.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Oh and Tezz in Modern is way too slow. By the time you drop him, you want to have won already. You dont have the tools to abuse him like you do in Legacy in Modern.
It doesnt matter what I feel. AF explained how they feel about the card and what it does. With his explanation I dont feel the card will be coming into the format, so I dont worry about it. I am pretty sure Wotc doesnt want oppressive decks in Modern since they have taken full blown FAe out, castrated Jund and have the parts to make Caw-blade viable on the ban list. There are still cheap evasive creature to attach those swords to. I doubt anyone wants to see a Caw-blade variant in Modern, except for those who enjoyed Caw blade in the first place, which was a minority of the player base. I would say what you want out of Modern is something more accustom for Legacy.
Being clueless about what goes into a competitive Affinity deck doesn't do wonders for your credibility. Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than speak out and remove all doubt.
Beck//Call is just the tip of the iceberg. Saying that no-one plays Inkmoth Nexus or that Steel Overseer is "outdated" is simply ludicrous.
If you demonstrate that you don't know Affinity, time and again, it just goes to show that your opinion on how to balance Modern - a task which requires understanding more archetypes than just Affinity - can't be taken seriously.
You do realize that artifact lands are not banned in that format, right? And that they are also part of the reason why Tezzeret can crank out so much damage?
Overseer shows up in winning decklists, fact. So does Inkmoth Nexus, if that hasn't sunk in yet. I'll trust results from someone who has multiple GP Top 8s than some random who claims he is 45-5 against unknown decks which may or may not be mono-green Unicorns. You should, too.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
We are discussing whether SFM should be unbanned, not whether it will be. I admit that the powers that be disagree with me. But you have yet to put together a coherent argument for its banning. I really want to know why you view SFM as a different case than Preordain and why you think a turn 4 sword is too broken for Modern. I am also curious how Turn 1 Suntail Hawk, turn 2 SFM, turn 3 sword, and turn 4 equip and swing is any more broken than turn 1 Steelshaper's Gift, turn 2 Squadron Hawk, turn 3 sword, and turn 4 swing and equip. It is almost exactly the same result. And I don't want Modern to be like Legacy. I like Modern as it is. I think that there are things that could be done to make it better, but Modern is much closer to the format that I want than Legacy is, which is why I am arguing for change in the Modern forum instead of the Legacy one.
Also, next time you argue for a change in the banned list, can I quote you saying "It doesn't matter what I feel."?
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Anyone who compares SFM to Tinker, much less says SFM is better, has very little understanding of competitive mtg. I don't care who it is. Especially someone like AF or Maro. I would and do take anything they say about competitive mtg with a grain of salt.
Bocephus you have said that you would instantly scoop to an opponent playing faeries. You also desire a very low powered format. Forgive me but your opinion and views on competitive formats are somewhat suspect. I've suggested it before but I'm positive what you are looking for is pauper. I don't really take your views seriously when it comes to this stuff.
Modern:
UWUW TronUW
Legacy:
WDeath N TaxesW
CEldrazi C
If you couldn't tell I hate greedy blue decks.
Vintage
WWhite Trash
I said I would scoop to Fae because I have played it so much. I do not desire to play against it any more. My son played it for years and I was his play test partner. It is one deck I simply hate to play against.
As for your points on SFM, I heard local pros say the exact same thing AF said in the video before AF said it.
Just because you enjoy the power level and interactions of other older formats, does no mean Modern has to fall in line to appease players like you. Sorry I like something different then you for Modern. I play those older formats also, if I wish to play interactions or power level like those formats, i will go play them. Competitively also.
No, you are pleading that SFM be discussed to be unbanned. Some dont care one way or the other. SFM was part of a very oppressive deck. SFM can tutor and cheat out what it was tutored for around control magic. That would make SFM probably the most powerful turn 2 play in Modern. In my opinion SFM is too powerful for the format. It would warp the format towards white. Any deck running white now will find room for 4 copies. Even if you take away bustedskull, there are plenty of other equipment cards that could and would be playable then. Like 5 swords of different color combos. You keep comparing SFM to stealshapers gift, its not even close. Stealshapers gift is a 1/3 of SFM. For your example, you are lacking a creature. Leaves your board open to sac effects and your sword sits there unusable. With SFM the sword gets used. You can not just look at what you would be doing, but what you are playing against also. If you thoughtseized or IOK'ed into a hand with stealshapers gift or SFM which would you rip out of the hand? 99% of the player base knows the right answer is SFM because its a much more powerful card then gift.
I don't those cards weren't 40% of the metagame. That was my entire point, you created a strawman of my position and then attacked it rather than responding to the argument that I actually made. People weren't forced to play Affinity either. As I said, there were decks that had good matchups against it. The question is whether its power level is too high, and I think that it is. It will continue to make B/Gx decks a problem and should really just get sent to the cornfield already.
I'm not willing to do that and neither are most of the people on this forum. If you want Bitterblossom to be unbanned you have already rejected Wizards highly nebulous criteria.
It's not a semantic debate at all, it's actually a very substantive debate about what makes something good or bad. Magic is a game, and games are meant to be fun. Is fun objective? No, it's not. You are just wrong.
I have directly responded to your position in every single post, and I will do so again. DRS does not fit the criteria for banning. I have laid out the criteria that Wizards uses for bannings in this format, illustrating it with other card examples, and DRS does not meet any of them. It's not too fast. It's not too prevalent. It's not reducing deck diversity. You repeatedly claim that its power level is too high, and I have repeatedly tried to show a variety of ways in which that is just not the case. Again, I will happily entertain an argument about DRS's bannability that involves some actual evidence beyond the purely rhetorical argument of "DRS has too much utility". Does it show up in too many decks? Are those decks winning too much? Are those decks winning because of DRS or independent of DRS? Is he reducing tournament attendance because he is so loathsome to play against?
You are escalating this pretty quickly into the realm of personal attack, and I'm not really sure why. We aren't discussing the meaning of funness in a game. We are discussing the bannability of a card in a format with certain per-established guidelines. I reject the Bitterblossom ban not because I don't like the guidelines of the format, but because I don't think that the reason BB was banned (it would theoretically be too oppressive) is true any longer. The underlying criteria of that ban is still fine. If BB did make a deck oppressive, then it need to stay banned.
In the case of DRS, his being fun/not-fun alone has zero bearing on his bannability. For him to be a bannable card, he needs to be oppressive in such a way as to reduce deck diversity. Now, if his un-funness stems directly from his oppression, then he can get banned. I fully appreciate that you find DRS to be an unfun card. But does that translate to a format wide banning? Where is the evidence for that claim?
EDIT: I will even try and give a case for DRS being banned because I actually haven't seen one yet. When GSZ got banned, Wizards said...
We can try and rewrite that to substitute in DRS for GSZ, but even then we would have to acknowledge that DRS is far less powerful than Zenith. We might envision a DRS ban that read something like this:
"If one intends to build a deck that has turn-one accelerants, DRS is a great choice. If one wants to accelerate to big threats and stall through life gain, DRS is a great choice. If one wants to play an aggressive deck with acceleration and constant damage, DRS is a great choice. However, this ends up with fewer different decks being played in practice, as DRS is such a good choice that there are fewer green decks that do anything else."
That might be a justification to ban DRS, but it's clearly overstated, especially because that last sentence just isn't true. There aren't "fewer green (or black/red) decks that can do anything else" because of DRS. There are plenty of such decks in current Modern that aren't running DRS. So even that explanation for the card's bannability would probably fall flat.
It's not about tastes. It's about an ability to objectively evaluate a single card or a decks power level and its impact on the format. I do not think you can do this objectively, and that you base a majority if not all of your arguments on anecdotal evidence.
Saying stuff like SFM is better than Tinker doesn't help your case.:rolleyes:
Modern:
UWUW TronUW
Legacy:
WDeath N TaxesW
CEldrazi C
If you couldn't tell I hate greedy blue decks.
Vintage
WWhite Trash
Cost one less then tinker and has legs (I wont even go into the extra cost for tinker)... To me thats better. Take it as you wish. In a format where the one of the most powerful cards is a planeswalker that makes you sac a creature, the legs on SFM is huge in allowing your equipt creature connect.
I think its those who wish Modern look more like the older formats are the ones unable to evaluate cards unbiased. They wish to have those interactions and power level in Modern.
One puts it directly into play the turn you cast it, the other doesn't. One can get any artifact, the other has to get an equipment.
There's a large difference between the two and why Tinker is better.
You should write a letter to AF and the pros that disagree with you. They made the comparison, I simply agree with it. Watch the video.
I will happily respond to any argument that you think that I missed. Also, I fail to see how my methods are statistically invalid. I would love if you could point out any of my statistical claims that are using bad methods or that you just disagree with. These methods are widely accepted in interpreting social science data, and they have clear relevance to this discussion. Numerous posters on this site have affirmed these methods and I can assure you that they meet accepted standards.
DRS is not an enjoyable card to play against, at least for me, and I would legitimately like to see some evidence that suggests his bannability. You say he has too much utility. You say this has an adverse effect on the format. Can you prove that using non-anecdotal evidence? Can you look at the decks that are played in the format, their win percentages, and their top 8/top 16/4-0/3-1 rates, and show that DRS is causing problems?
So you are worried that it will warp the format towards white? I don't see anybody shouting for Lightning Bolt to be banned but it warps the format towards red. I mean, our top control decks are WUR, not the traditional Esper. And what is wrong with equipment being playable? The swords, Cranial Plating, Batterskull are the only played equipment now, and one of those is treated like a creature. More equipment being playable would be a good thing for the format. Steelshaper's Gift is more like half of an SFM than a third. For the swords, the second ability barely matters, so You are getting a 1/2 creature for one more mana than Steelshaper's Gift, which is perfectly fair. And the part about Thoughtseize and IOK proves my point. Even if you get SFM out despite counterspells and targeted discard, what is stopping your opponent from making you discard your sword, or from bolting SFM, or from using artifact destruction, or from blocking whatever creature you put the sword on (most of the time the creature won't have flying because realistically, most creatures don't). You also still haven't answered the following question.
How is using SFM to get out a sword broken? Look at the following example for a Junk list.
Turn 1:
Fetchland, Deathrite Shaman
Turn 2:
Land, SFM, search for Sword of Whatever You Need At The Moment
Turn 3:
Land, activate SFM's ability, put sword into play, exile fetchland, equip sword to SFM
Turn 4:
Land, Lingering Souls, flashback Lingering Souls, exile an opponent's fetchland, Path to Exile, swing with SFM.
In the same amount of time that it took to do that, you could of done this with a similar deck that is legal now
Turn 1:
Fetchland, Deathrite Shaman
Turn 2:
Land, exile an opponent's fetchland, Liliana of the Veil, use first ability, discard Lingering Souls
Turn 3:
Land, Knight of the Reliquiary, activate Liliana of the Veil's second ability
Turn 4: Land, Tarmogoyf, activate Liliana of the Veil's first ability, discarding a land, flashback Lingering Souls, swing with Knight of the Reliquiary
As you can see, the second one is much more powerful and has a far better defense. How would SFM make it broken?
Also Bocephus, if you don't like what the majority of us want Modern to be, maybe you are the one who should go play a different format instead of telling us to. How about Commander, where if anybody does something overpowered, you can just gain up on them?
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Every post I have written on the topic includes tons of disclaimers about interpreting the data. Sure, I'll give my own spin on it, because this is a forum and it's interesting to share opinions. But I will also try and include a variety of cautions in over-reading the results. And if I neglect to give disclaimers in some posts, it is because they are neither professional reports nor academic papers. As such, I do not feel a need to post a hyper-nuanced and comprehensive discussion section with every single statistic. But when I catch it, I try and offer all statistics with all the interpretation disclaimers that people need.
As to DRS, the offer still stands to you or anyone else: Give some actual data about why DRS needs to be banned. We can try and make that case for a card like Pod (it's overperforming all over MTGO, but that might be a function of players or it might be a function of the card). We can try and make that case for a card like Griselbrand (it does violate the turn 3 rule, but the deck isn't doing well enough to make it "top tier" or "consistent"). But I have scoured this thread looking for a similar argument about DRS, and they all take the form of "he has too much utility" or "he is broken" or "he is unfair". There is never any reason for that other than personal preference. If he's too unfair in B/G decks, then we should see evidence of those decks being unfair. But we don't.
Replace the sword up in the above with batterskull. Lifelink makes the chump blocking inneficient, pathing will just slow down opponent until he re-equips the batterskull, on a flyer most probably.
Now maybe batterskull then is the broken piece?
Batterskull is what prevents Stoneforge Mystic from being unbanned going by a mechanics standpoint, yes.
That is exactly what I've been saying. I want Batterskull to be banned and SFM to be unbanned. Imagine the possibilities for an Elbrus, the Binding Blade deck, which I think would be a fair and interesting addition to the format.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.