Every time they are talking about the eggs deck, they seem to stumble a bit searching for words when they need to come up with the name "second breakfast", and every time they slip up and want to say "eggs" the quickly correct themselves.
I don't know anyone in the modern community that doesn't call the deck "eggs" at this point. Is there a reason that it seems like the commentators were instructed to call it by a different name?
edit: wrong subforum, any chance a mod can move this to general?
I assume they're calling it breakfast as a tribute to eggs, a food item usually eaten during breakfast, because there are no literal eggs in the modern version. Similarly to this, Modern Affinity is often called "Robot Aggro" by the coverage team because most builds don't play a single card with the affinity mechanic anymore.
Also, they could just be throwing out the word breakfast for nostalgia's sake. For example, Cephalid Breakfast was a combo deck but was not named after a breakfast cereal (as is the convention), so they just kind of left it as "breakfast." Several other combo decks are named after kinds of breakfast cereals as well. Wish I could be of more help on why that is, but its always just seemed like an inside joke among older pros who played when "Trix" was a dominant deck, and the meme stuck.
It doesn't make any sense to me either, but hey, its not my coverage so whatever floats their boat.
I do think it's partly to do with the confusion of the "classic" Eggs decks... but I've heard it said that they want to avoid deck names that aren't n00b friendly. Jund is Jund in any format once you know what Jund means. Eggs makes zero sense if you don't know the history of the deck and says nothing about what the deck DOES.
I do think it's partly to do with the confusion of the "classic" Eggs decks... but I've heard it said that they want to avoid deck names that aren't n00b friendly. Jund is Jund in any format once you know what Jund means. Eggs makes zero sense if you don't know the history of the deck and says nothing about what the deck DOES.
I can understand that they want to use a term that's more understandable for those who don't know what it is, but as a relatively new player, I don't like how they're trying to drop the important history of the deck name completely in order to make it understandable for brand new players. When I didn't know eggs was, and I wanted to find out, I went and looked it up. It's not that hard to do. I mean, all they would have to do is take bit of time to explain the deck and why it's called eggs and they'd save themselves a lot of trouble. You can summarize the meaning of the name 'egg's in about two sentences:
Eggs is a combo deck based on the card second sunrise and a plethora of artifacts that enable the deck to go through itself several times for infinite damage or something similar. It's called eggs because it used to use 'egg' cards introduced in odyssey, and the newer cards it employs from mirrodin still resemble eggs.
That took me about 60 seconds to type, and it would probably take someone 30 seconds to read it. That's about all they would have to say in order to call it 'eggs' over 'second sunrise combo'.
But we're probably all making this a bigger deal than it really is. You can call it whatever you like, but the commentators are deciding to call it by it's more formal name.
Commentators are generally pretty terrible in terms of knowing what a deck is called. There are some really bad commentators out there, and rich hagon is one of them. I personally rarely listen to WotC commentators as they kill my brain cells when I listen to them.
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"Yawgmoth," Freyalise whispered as she set the bomb, "now you will pay for your treachery."
The original Eggs deck used cards that are not legal in Modern. Some people do not like using names that are not exactly "correct" when describing deck archetypes.
For instance, modern artifact decks used to be called Affinity, but are now usually called Robots.
For that reason, since there are no "Eggs" in the Modern legal deck, they give it another name, based on the card Second Sunrise. If they wish to make an homage to the original archetype, they tend to call it Second Breakfast.
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Currently playing:
Standard: WBRG Aggro-Reanimator Humans GRBW
Modern: UR Twinning RU G Venus Fly Trap G U Artifacts Aggro U
Technically, there are no "eggs" decks anymore, at least not in the traditional sense because of the cards that are not modern legal. Same with Affinity, though IMO, Affinity is still valid. But I can see both sides of it. Personally, I hate robots however.
But eggs really doesn't work anymore, especially if you're an old time purist.
Yep, Eggs just doesn't fit anymore because it's referencing something unfamiliar and out of the format.
If anything, the deck should be called Second Sunrise or something to that effect. Nobody needs a cheeky name, what's needed is a descriptive one.
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A voice for Timmy.
Commander R Ashling, the Pilgrim Mono Red Wildfire Control GBW Karador, Ghost Chieftain Abzan Dredge Rock WBR Tariel, Reckoner of Souls Mardu Aggro-Reanimator Midrange
Speaking of names that don't fit anymore, anyone got a thought about what to call Affinity? Only four cards in my list have that mechanic while 3 times that have metalcraft. Sadly I think metalcraft as a deck name feels kind of dull.
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Casual Cube EDH: UR Niv-Mizzet's Madness BGW Ghave's Garden WUBRG Karona's Chaos
Retired: Too damn many to count Vintage: URWelder WUBRG Dredge Kitchen Table: B Zombies in Your Head
Speaking of names that don't fit anymore, anyone got a thought about what to call Affinity? Only four cards in my list have that mechanic while 3 times that have metalcraft. Sadly I think metalcraft as a deck name feels kind of dull.
Speaking of Affinity, and speaking of the topic at hand, that's something that seriously bothers me. The commentators for modern events never refer to the deck as Affinity, always as "robots" or "artifact aggro" or something. We all know what Affinity is. It's a name that resonates with many players. What's with the head games?
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Time to bring back a 5-year old sig banner. DEDICATION!
Speaking of Affinity, and speaking of the topic at hand, that's something that seriously bothers me. The commentators for modern events never refer to the deck as Affinity, always as "robots" or "artifact aggro" or something. We all know what Affinity is. It's a name that resonates with many players. What's with the head games?
Probably invokes traumatic memories about the bloody reign of the actual Affinity, I'm sure everyone referring to your design mistakes as common place is kind of annoying.
I always called new eggs sunny side up (named both for eggs and second sunrise).
I didn't know people even had a name for it, I've heard sunrise combo and eggs but none of the other names.
Affinity is affinity, I'm not calling it robots even if the deck runs 0 cards with that namesake, some archtypes are just too iconic. It would be like calling jund something else just because it doesn't run cards from shards block in it (even though yes I know modern jund does, but jund has caught on in standard as well).
Though I did get irate a few years back when I top8ed a ptq with a mono white nightsky mimic deck in block and it was labeled kithkin both in the tournament report and in the daily deck archive on wizard's main page. The deck ran like 6 kithkin, 4 figure of destiney and 2 knight of the meadowgrain. It wasn't even legal in tribal.
I dunno, I always liked the name "robots" even when the deck USED affinity creatures. Especially back when I played it in standard and I could do a spot-on Dr. Zoidberg in those days and go on about my ROBITS! bawlalwlallarhagharlarhl
Yeah, I totally get "Robots." It really doesn't resemble Affinity as we knew it from back in the day.
I suppose the same can be said for Eggs too... but there was nothing wrong with calling it Second Sunrise Combo, which is what plenty of people were indeed calling it before now.
I assume they're calling it breakfast as a tribute to eggs, a food item usually eaten during breakfast, because there are no literal eggs in the modern version.
For a while in the mid-late 90's, every combo deck was named after some sort of breakfast, usually a brand of cereal. Illusions/Donate was 'Trix', Enduring Renewal/Goblin Bombardment was 'Fruity Pebbles', and so on. The trend eventually culminated in a Volrath's Shapeshifter/Flowstone Hellion/Phyrexian Dreadnought monstrosity named 'Full English Breakfast' (and may have been used after that, I don't remember).
Second Breakfast seems to be a combination of the fact that the deck was called 'Eggs' back when it actually ran eggs (the Skycloud Egg cycle) and the aforementioned theme naming.
I don't understand how a player new to Magic is going to understand "Jund" any better than "Eggs". At least Eggs is a real word.
It's dumb to call decks "Jund" or "Grixis" when they aren't really defined by signature Jund or Grixis cards (e.g. Broodmate Dragon, or Cruel Ultimatum). Also, shortcutting every deck to its colors is wrong because it implies that that's all you need to know.
It's dumb to call decks "Jund" or "Grixis" when they aren't really defined by signature Jund or Grixis cards (e.g. Broodmate Dragon, or Cruel Ultimatum). Also, shortcutting every deck to its colors is wrong because it implies that that's all you need to know.
No more than Azorious or Boros decks after the original Ravnica, which happened a ton as well. The thing is, these names describe a color combination, but not nessessarily the theme of the deck. So calling something Jund means that deck will always have those three colors. Usually, you'll see something like Boros Weenie or Esper Control which helps clarify.
Eggs, Pebbles, Trix, Rock, Pickles... those don't say ANYTHING about what the deck actually DOES.
I prefer these days where people use the "color words" to name a deck. It got REALLY old when people spent more time discussing what a deck's stupid name should be rather than improving it (OMG I CAN'T WAIT TO SHOW YOU MY OMEGASTOMPFROGLASHER DECK!!!" "But that's just a mono U control deck that runs X instead of Y?" "NO IT'S OMEGASTOMPFROGLASHER!!!!" )
No more than Azorious or Boros decks after the original Ravnica, which happened a ton as well. The thing is, these names describe a color combination, but not nessessarily the theme of the deck. So calling something Jund means that deck will always have those three colors. Usually, you'll see something like Boros Weenie or Esper Control which helps clarify.
Eggs, Pebbles, Trix, Rock, Pickles... those don't say ANYTHING about what the deck actually DOES.
I mentioned this is another thread. So Death & Taxes should be called White Aether-Vial Aggro Control, and Junk & Taxes should be called WhiteAether Vial Aggro Control Splashing Some BGW Midrange?
How is that easier to remember, easier to immediately identify a deck's lineage, and easier to keep track of different versions?
Should all Storm decks with Ad Nauseam just be called Ad Nauseam Tendrils? Pretending that TES is exactly the same, and Spanish Inquisition is exactly the same, despite fairly important differences?
Not everything has to be for the guy who just played Duels of the Planeswalkers. These names are often convenient (and funny) for experienced players, and people getting into the format will eventually learn, it's not even close to the biggest obstacle. If you can throw down $1000 for a legacy deck, you are not going to be overwhelmed by the fact that there are interesting and relevant deck names. You may even be intrigued.
And no, I'm not talking about taking this to ridiculous excess, like in the silly example you give. If a name is really useless, it won't catch on. Problem solved.
Also, turning every deck name into [Color] + [Archetype] is an abomination. It's not only incredibly bland (and thus bad for memory, discussion, and all that), it's often useless because it mashes together decks from different eras, or even the same era, with different strategies, different cards, and so on. Instead of calling them "High Tide" and "Pickles", two mono-blue combo-control decks (8 years apart) that have very memorable and distinctive names, we can call them both "Mono U combo-control", eh? When you say, "Boros Weenie", are you talking about RW aggro deck from the year 2012? 2010? 2009? 2005? Which variant? When you say "Boros Bushwhacker", I now know exactly what deck you are talking about, and the particular angle of attack it has vs any other RW aggro deck (Landfall critters, Ranger of Eos, Bushwhacker finish).
No more than Azorious or Boros decks after the original Ravnica, which happened a ton as well. The thing is, these names describe a color combination, but not nessessarily the theme of the deck. So calling something Jund means that deck will always have those three colors. Usually, you'll see something like Boros Weenie or Esper Control which helps clarify.
Eggs, Pebbles, Trix, Rock, Pickles... those don't say ANYTHING about what the deck actually DOES.
I prefer these days where people use the "color words" to name a deck. It got REALLY old when people spent more time discussing what a deck's stupid name should be rather than improving it (OMG I CAN'T WAIT TO SHOW YOU MY OMEGASTOMPFROGLASHER DECK!!!" "But that's just a mono U control deck that runs X instead of Y?" "NO IT'S OMEGASTOMPFROGLASHER!!!!" )
For someone who never played Alara block, Jund is less descriptive than eggs. There are a multitude of decks that can be constructed with those 3 colors but eggs is a very specific combo that tells you exactly what you're up against.
In regards to the OP, I don't see what the big deal with the commentators is. They called it Second Breakfast and repeatedly pointed out that it's a Modern version of Eggs. Besides, it isn't even eggs because it doesn't have the eggs from Odyssey in it.
I don't know anyone in the modern community that doesn't call the deck "eggs" at this point. Is there a reason that it seems like the commentators were instructed to call it by a different name?
edit: wrong subforum, any chance a mod can move this to general?
Please use card tags when you're asking a question about specific cards: [c]Serra Angel[/c] -> Serra Angel.
https://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/worlds06/dtegg
I assume they're calling it breakfast as a tribute to eggs, a food item usually eaten during breakfast, because there are no literal eggs in the modern version. Similarly to this, Modern Affinity is often called "Robot Aggro" by the coverage team because most builds don't play a single card with the affinity mechanic anymore.
Also, they could just be throwing out the word breakfast for nostalgia's sake. For example, Cephalid Breakfast was a combo deck but was not named after a breakfast cereal (as is the convention), so they just kind of left it as "breakfast." Several other combo decks are named after kinds of breakfast cereals as well. Wish I could be of more help on why that is, but its always just seemed like an inside joke among older pros who played when "Trix" was a dominant deck, and the meme stuck.
It doesn't make any sense to me either, but hey, its not my coverage so whatever floats their boat.
Speculate less. Test more.
I can understand that they want to use a term that's more understandable for those who don't know what it is, but as a relatively new player, I don't like how they're trying to drop the important history of the deck name completely in order to make it understandable for brand new players. When I didn't know eggs was, and I wanted to find out, I went and looked it up. It's not that hard to do. I mean, all they would have to do is take bit of time to explain the deck and why it's called eggs and they'd save themselves a lot of trouble. You can summarize the meaning of the name 'egg's in about two sentences:
Eggs is a combo deck based on the card second sunrise and a plethora of artifacts that enable the deck to go through itself several times for infinite damage or something similar. It's called eggs because it used to use 'egg' cards introduced in odyssey, and the newer cards it employs from mirrodin still resemble eggs.
That took me about 60 seconds to type, and it would probably take someone 30 seconds to read it. That's about all they would have to say in order to call it 'eggs' over 'second sunrise combo'.
But we're probably all making this a bigger deal than it really is. You can call it whatever you like, but the commentators are deciding to call it by it's more formal name.
Modern Junk Primer
Legacy ANT Primer
L1 Judge
Currently Playing:
Retired
Legacy:
combo elves
Modern:
White Rock (41-24-4 in matches. Beginning 10/14/14. Last updated 1/2/15)
List:
4 Dark Confidant
3 Siege Rhino
1 Thrun, The Last Troll
Spells - 20
4 Inquisition of Kozilek
3 Thoughtseize
4 abrupt decay
2 maelstrom pulse
1 slaughter pact
1 path to exile
1 Disfigure
1 damnation
3 lingering souls
NCP - 4
3 Liliana of the Veil
1 Bow of Nylea
4 verdant Catacombs
2 marsh flats
2 windswept heath
2 Swamp
1 Forest
1 Plains
2 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
3 overgrown tomb
1 godless shrine
1 temple garden
1 Treetop Village
2 stirring wildwood
2 Tectonic Edge
4 Leyline of Sanctity
1 Thrun, the last troll
2 Duress
1 Creeping Corrosion
2 Stony Silence
2 Nihil Spellbomb
1 Back to nature
1 Utter End
1 Golgari Charm
For instance, modern artifact decks used to be called Affinity, but are now usually called Robots.
For that reason, since there are no "Eggs" in the Modern legal deck, they give it another name, based on the card Second Sunrise. If they wish to make an homage to the original archetype, they tend to call it Second Breakfast.
Standard:
WBRG Aggro-Reanimator Humans GRBW
Modern:
UR Twinning RU
G Venus Fly Trap G
U Artifacts Aggro U
Legacy:
B Reanimator B
WU Stoneblade UW
EDH
WBGGhave, Guru of SporesGBW
URGRiku of the Two ReflectionsGRU
WUBRGScion of the Ur-DragonGRBUW
Casual
Far too many to list
But eggs really doesn't work anymore, especially if you're an old time purist.
If anything, the deck should be called Second Sunrise or something to that effect. Nobody needs a cheeky name, what's needed is a descriptive one.
Commander
R Ashling, the Pilgrim Mono Red Wildfire Control
GBW Karador, Ghost Chieftain Abzan Dredge Rock
WBR Tariel, Reckoner of Souls Mardu Aggro-Reanimator Midrange
EDH:
UR Niv-Mizzet's Madness
BGW Ghave's Garden
WUBRG Karona's Chaos
Retired: Too damn many to count
Vintage:
URWelder
WUBRG Dredge
Kitchen Table:
B Zombies in Your Head
Speaking of Affinity, and speaking of the topic at hand, that's something that seriously bothers me. The commentators for modern events never refer to the deck as Affinity, always as "robots" or "artifact aggro" or something. We all know what Affinity is. It's a name that resonates with many players. What's with the head games?
Time to bring back a 5-year old sig banner. DEDICATION!
Currently Playing:
=Legacy=
RUUG Delver
=Modern=
BRRG LOAM
=EDH=
BGGR Karrthus
RRRX Norin
UUWW Bruna
BBBB Skithiryx
Probably invokes traumatic memories about the bloody reign of the actual Affinity, I'm sure everyone referring to your design mistakes as common place is kind of annoying.
I didn't know people even had a name for it, I've heard sunrise combo and eggs but none of the other names.
Affinity is affinity, I'm not calling it robots even if the deck runs 0 cards with that namesake, some archtypes are just too iconic. It would be like calling jund something else just because it doesn't run cards from shards block in it (even though yes I know modern jund does, but jund has caught on in standard as well).
Though I did get irate a few years back when I top8ed a ptq with a mono white nightsky mimic deck in block and it was labeled kithkin both in the tournament report and in the daily deck archive on wizard's main page. The deck ran like 6 kithkin, 4 figure of destiney and 2 knight of the meadowgrain. It wasn't even legal in tribal.
I suppose the same can be said for Eggs too... but there was nothing wrong with calling it Second Sunrise Combo, which is what plenty of people were indeed calling it before now.
For a while in the mid-late 90's, every combo deck was named after some sort of breakfast, usually a brand of cereal. Illusions/Donate was 'Trix', Enduring Renewal/Goblin Bombardment was 'Fruity Pebbles', and so on. The trend eventually culminated in a Volrath's Shapeshifter/Flowstone Hellion/Phyrexian Dreadnought monstrosity named 'Full English Breakfast' (and may have been used after that, I don't remember).
Second Breakfast seems to be a combination of the fact that the deck was called 'Eggs' back when it actually ran eggs (the Skycloud Egg cycle) and the aforementioned theme naming.
It's dumb to call decks "Jund" or "Grixis" when they aren't really defined by signature Jund or Grixis cards (e.g. Broodmate Dragon, or Cruel Ultimatum). Also, shortcutting every deck to its colors is wrong because it implies that that's all you need to know.
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
No more than Azorious or Boros decks after the original Ravnica, which happened a ton as well. The thing is, these names describe a color combination, but not nessessarily the theme of the deck. So calling something Jund means that deck will always have those three colors. Usually, you'll see something like Boros Weenie or Esper Control which helps clarify.
Eggs, Pebbles, Trix, Rock, Pickles... those don't say ANYTHING about what the deck actually DOES.
I prefer these days where people use the "color words" to name a deck. It got REALLY old when people spent more time discussing what a deck's stupid name should be rather than improving it (OMG I CAN'T WAIT TO SHOW YOU MY OMEGASTOMPFROGLASHER DECK!!!" "But that's just a mono U control deck that runs X instead of Y?" "NO IT'S OMEGASTOMPFROGLASHER!!!!" )
I mentioned this is another thread. So Death & Taxes should be called White Aether-Vial Aggro Control, and Junk & Taxes should be called White Aether Vial Aggro Control Splashing Some BGW Midrange?
How is that easier to remember, easier to immediately identify a deck's lineage, and easier to keep track of different versions?
Should all Storm decks with Ad Nauseam just be called Ad Nauseam Tendrils? Pretending that TES is exactly the same, and Spanish Inquisition is exactly the same, despite fairly important differences?
Not everything has to be for the guy who just played Duels of the Planeswalkers. These names are often convenient (and funny) for experienced players, and people getting into the format will eventually learn, it's not even close to the biggest obstacle. If you can throw down $1000 for a legacy deck, you are not going to be overwhelmed by the fact that there are interesting and relevant deck names. You may even be intrigued.
And no, I'm not talking about taking this to ridiculous excess, like in the silly example you give. If a name is really useless, it won't catch on. Problem solved.
Also, turning every deck name into [Color] + [Archetype] is an abomination. It's not only incredibly bland (and thus bad for memory, discussion, and all that), it's often useless because it mashes together decks from different eras, or even the same era, with different strategies, different cards, and so on. Instead of calling them "High Tide" and "Pickles", two mono-blue combo-control decks (8 years apart) that have very memorable and distinctive names, we can call them both "Mono U combo-control", eh? When you say, "Boros Weenie", are you talking about RW aggro deck from the year 2012? 2010? 2009? 2005? Which variant? When you say "Boros Bushwhacker", I now know exactly what deck you are talking about, and the particular angle of attack it has vs any other RW aggro deck (Landfall critters, Ranger of Eos, Bushwhacker finish).
0 Karn
W Darien
U Arcanis
B Geth
R Norin
G Yeva
UW Hanna
RB Olivia
WB Obzedat
UR Melek
BG Glissa
WR Aurelia
GU Kraj
BRU Nicol Bolas
RGB Prossh
BGW Ghave
GUB Mimeoplasm
WUBRG Sliver Overlord
GWU Treva, the Renewer
EDH Spike:
U Azami, Lady of Scrolls
Trades
For someone who never played Alara block, Jund is less descriptive than eggs. There are a multitude of decks that can be constructed with those 3 colors but eggs is a very specific combo that tells you exactly what you're up against.
In regards to the OP, I don't see what the big deal with the commentators is. They called it Second Breakfast and repeatedly pointed out that it's a Modern version of Eggs. Besides, it isn't even eggs because it doesn't have the eggs from Odyssey in it.
Player: "Its a RGB black, often midrange."
New player: "Why is it called eggs."
Player: "cause of the egg cycle in oddessy."
New player: "??? It doesn't run those."
Player: "no it doesn't, the original version did and this deck uses modern equivalents."
I can see the point, jund is alot easier to describe than eggs overall.