Because that is what the card does. Formats are defined by their card limits. Most constructed formats have a card limit of 4. Singleton, obviously, has a limit of 1. Rat Colony overrides this limit. If it can override it when the limit is 4, it stands to reason that it can override any limit, including 1.
Come on, people. Rat Colony deck is possibly the easiest thing to win against. It has simplistic and obvious game plan, people usually don't run proper answers or card draw and the card itself doesn't increase its toughness, having to trade with basically everything, including (but not limited to) saproling tokens, soldier tokens, vampire tokens and even Reassembling Skeleton. And you can wipe them with basically anything, including Golden Demise, Radiating Lightning, Shake the Foundations and Plague Mare. Heck, Dual Shot takes out two at once. If you face the deck regularly, just adapt a bit.
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standard: BUG The Baron (it doesn't work, but I try anyway)
Come on, people. Rat Colony deck is possibly the easiest thing to win against. It has simplistic and obvious game plan, people usually don't run proper answers or card draw and the card itself doesn't increase its toughness, having to trade with basically everything, including (but not limited to) saproling tokens, soldier tokens, vampire tokens and even Reassembling Skeleton. And you can wipe them with basically anything, including Golden Demise, Radiating Lightning, Shake the Foundations and Plague Mare. Heck, Dual Shot takes out two at once. If you face the deck regularly, just adapt a bit.
Yeah duh, just draw your one Golden Demise before turn 5 in a Singleton game. So easy people.
Come on, people. Rat Colony deck is possibly the easiest thing to win against. It has simplistic and obvious game plan, people usually don't run proper answers or card draw and the card itself doesn't increase its toughness, having to trade with basically everything, including (but not limited to) saproling tokens, soldier tokens, vampire tokens and even Reassembling Skeleton. And you can wipe them with basically anything, including Golden Demise, Radiating Lightning, Shake the Foundations and Plague Mare. Heck, Dual Shot takes out two at once. If you face the deck regularly, just adapt a bit.
Yeah duh, just draw your one Golden Demise before turn 5 in a Singleton game. So easy people.
I admit, the singleton nature of, well, singleton is a bit of an issue. Nonetheless, their plan is still obvious and easy to counter. I did lose one game against Rat Colony yesterday, but my draws were abysmal. I did win the four other games against it, so there's that (the one I lost and two of the wins were with a WG top-heavy midrange, the other two wins were with a UB pile of junk I built from my cheapass FtP cardpool). By the way, am I the only one who regularly draws an opening hand with 0 lands and then mulligans to 6 basics?
But really, playing against a deck that runs only swamps and Rat Colonies is downright hilarious.
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standard: BUG The Baron (it doesn't work, but I try anyway)
What I actually find more amazing than the endless rat colonies, is the huge number of people in Singleton all playing the same expensive decks. I've run into this deck at least 8 times - https://aetherhub.com/Deck/Public/23722 and there's a green/white deck that everyone is playing as well that has a large number of rare/mythic cards in it. Rat colony is a cheap deck to make, but I can't get over how many people are dumping real cash money into this game already in order to play huge netdecks in things like 'free singleton weekend'
I have to disagree and side with the premise of the OP. In a singleton event, where everyone only has 1 copy of a card, answers for that type of aggro were just impossible to reach before the battlefield was swarmed with them. Every rat makes the others stronger. It was broken in a singleton format. They dropped turn 2 and it was an endless flood. You are dead before you can possibly answer the overwhelming board position. I saw the rat on turn 2 I conceded immediately.
Rat Colony is a stupid card. It encourages players to make magic boring which isn't fun. Playing with or against that deck just kills all the fun. All I fought against were rat colony decks in the singleton event and it was dumb. I run into them in standard though as well rather frequently and they are still a major problem for me. I'm open to suggestions on how to counter it. It's easy with red or black or a deck that generates a million tokens. When I'm playing my mono blue deck though it's just dumb. Once they're on the board there doesn't seem to be anything I can do except maybe return some to their owner's hand. Is there a blue card that I'm unaware of that will deal 1 damage to them all, make them -1 or something that can deal with more than 1 rat at a time? Right now all I can find are counter creature spell and disperse spells.... which are not very effective at all against this since they have unlimited copies of the card and returning rats to their hand just delays the inevitable.
Come on, people. Rat Colony deck is possibly the easiest thing to win against. It has simplistic and obvious game plan, people usually don't run proper answers or card draw and the card itself doesn't increase its toughness, having to trade with basically everything, including (but not limited to) saproling tokens, soldier tokens, vampire tokens and even Reassembling Skeleton. And you can wipe them with basically anything, including Golden Demise, Radiating Lightning, Shake the Foundations and Plague Mare. Heck, Dual Shot takes out two at once. If you face the deck regularly, just adapt a bit.
So basically if your deck doesn't generate a ton of tokens and it's not red or black then you're screwed? That's what it sounds like to me.
Rat Colony is a stupid card. It encourages players to make magic boring which isn't fun. Playing with or against that deck just kills all the fun. All I fought against were rat colony decks in the singleton event and it was dumb. I run into them in standard though as well rather frequently and they are still a major problem for me. I'm open to suggestions on how to counter it. It's easy with red or black or a deck that generates a million tokens. When I'm playing my mono blue deck though it's just dumb. Once they're on the board there doesn't seem to be anything I can do except maybe return some to their owner's hand. Is there a blue card that I'm unaware of that will deal 1 damage to them all, make them -1 or something that can deal with more than 1 rat at a time? Right now all I can find are counter creature spell and disperse spells.... which are not very effective at all against this since they have unlimited copies of the card and returning rats to their hand just delays the inevitable.
That is how the pillars of Magic work. Has been that way since the beginning of the game. Traditionally it is Control < Weenie < Combo < Control. Modern Magic is something like Control < Aggro < Midrange < Combo < Control. A pure U control deck is going to get pounced by a pure any color aggro deck more often.
Unfortunately, I have no suggestions for a pure U player other than the obvious. Shift your strategy accordingly and play a Ux deck or even an entirely different color(s).
BUG The Baron (it doesn't work, but I try anyway)
modern:
RGShaman Aggro
legacy:
UHigh Tide
German highlander:
BUG aggro control
EDH:
a positively unhealthy amount of decks
Yeah duh, just draw your one Golden Demise before turn 5 in a Singleton game. So easy people.
I admit, the singleton nature of, well, singleton is a bit of an issue. Nonetheless, their plan is still obvious and easy to counter. I did lose one game against Rat Colony yesterday, but my draws were abysmal. I did win the four other games against it, so there's that (the one I lost and two of the wins were with a WG top-heavy midrange, the other two wins were with a UB pile of junk I built from my cheapass FtP cardpool). By the way, am I the only one who regularly draws an opening hand with 0 lands and then mulligans to 6 basics?
But really, playing against a deck that runs only swamps and Rat Colonies is downright hilarious.
BUG The Baron (it doesn't work, but I try anyway)
modern:
RGShaman Aggro
legacy:
UHigh Tide
German highlander:
BUG aggro control
EDH:
a positively unhealthy amount of decks
So basically if your deck doesn't generate a ton of tokens and it's not red or black then you're screwed? That's what it sounds like to me.
GW Midrange/Lifegain GW
Also making Abzan Knights
GW Legendary Galore! GW
GW Angel Tribal GW
GW TOKENS GW
That is how the pillars of Magic work. Has been that way since the beginning of the game. Traditionally it is Control < Weenie < Combo < Control. Modern Magic is something like Control < Aggro < Midrange < Combo < Control. A pure U control deck is going to get pounced by a pure any color aggro deck more often.
Unfortunately, I have no suggestions for a pure U player other than the obvious. Shift your strategy accordingly and play a Ux deck or even an entirely different color(s).
There is a reason why Black Lotus and Moxes are freaking expensive...
If singleton don't want x same rats, well they can ban those cards from the format.