I'm just still disappointed that the general "play creatures, me smashhh" push that wizards has been doing for years is still progressing, and even intensifying. Some of the strongest cards in this set aren't cards that do cool new things, they are merely creatures with lots of power and toughness relative to their mana cost. Talk about a creature bashing snoozefest.
While that is true, some of the strong cards in the set are noncreature spells (Murderous Cut, the charms, Sorin, Sarkhan, and the Ascendancies come to mind)
The problem with the set so far isn't the strenght of the cards or their rarity. What has been spoilered so far just seems very bland and boring.
Theros had the Gods, a new and exciting creature type, aggressively costed with powerful abilities. None of them were instant modern/legacy staples but people were still excited to open and play with them. When dreaming about the Khans of Tarkir I imagined new and exciting cards like fortifications, from the artwork I suspected a new spin on the flagbearer mechanic and from the foreshadowing of M15 I assumed that "walls matter" was a thing.
There are still a lot of unspoiled cards left but so far it seems like nothing of that will be in KTK. And I don't want to sound like the spoiled guy that didn't get his wishes come true, I would have been happy with anything fresh and exciting but as it is the mechanics in KTK just feel like we've had them before. How many new versions of "if something something happened, put a +1/+1 on the creature" do we need? These new mechanics feel already old and stale to me before I even played with them. The most exciting cards are a bunch of reprinted lands. M15 with its guest designer cards showed some of the potential still left in this game but KtK is a step back into lazy and uninspired design.
^This sentiment exactly. In essence, from the artwork for Abzan, I was praying for fortifications and thought that would be exciting. Additionally, it doesn't appear that the cards are reflecting the beautiful artwork and creative back story of Tarkir. Wizards successfully slowed down Standard with Theros, but at least with that block, there was new and exciting design space being explored, and the Gods had a lot of appeal. Additionally, I wonder about the stagnation of eternal formats if Wizards continues to be overly cautious about power creep...
I'm just still disappointed that the general "play creatures, me smashhh" push that wizards has been doing for years is still progressing, and even intensifying. Some of the strongest cards in this set aren't cards that do cool new things, they are merely creatures with lots of power and toughness relative to their mana cost. Talk about a creature bashing snoozefest.
While that is true, some of the strong cards in the set are noncreature spells (Murderous Cut, the charms, Sorin, Sarkhan, and the Ascendancies come to mind)
Sort of. Cut is a nice card for older formats, I don't know how good it will be in standard though. Sarkhan is basically a creature anyway. The charms do seem decently powerful, while a lot of the ascendencies demand to be built around (not usually indicitive of a great card.). The exception is sultai, and it has the best charm as well, so I'm pleased with that clan.
I'm just still disappointed that the general "play creatures, me smashhh" push that wizards has been doing for years is still progressing,
Doing for years and still progressing? You do know that Revelations has been a top tier archetype for two years and actually won the Pro Tour right? One of the most successful aggressive decks is RW Burn, sporting 8 creatures in the entire list. Coming into the new Standard, Caryatid and Courser are all set to make games all about blocking, rather than turning creatures sideways. Aggro did get a shiny new toy in Goblin Rabblemaster, but this just points to all archetypes getting support.
On Topic:
I am happy that allied Fetches are coming to Modern and excited to play Charms in my Wedge decks. Some of the Ascendancies seem OK, but nothing ridiculous. None of the other cards spoiled so far interest me, and even the best ones seem to be worse or at par with Theros (which was a pretty underpowered block to begin with).
I'm just still disappointed that the general "play creatures, me smashhh" push that wizards has been doing for years is still progressing,
Doing for years and still progressing? You do know that Revelations has been a top tier archetype for two years and actually won the Pro Tour right? One of the most successful aggressive decks is RW Burn, sporting 8 creatures in the entire list. Coming into the new Standard, Caryatid and Courser are all set to make games all about blocking, rather than turning creatures sideways. Aggro did get a shiny new toy in Goblin Rabblemaster, but this just points to all archetypes getting support.
On Topic:
I am happy that allied Fetches are coming to Modern and excited to play Charms in my Wedge decks. Some of the Ascendancies seem OK, but nothing ridiculous. None of the other cards spoiled so far interest me, and even the best ones seem to be worse or at par with Theros (which was a pretty underpowered block to begin with).
I sadly have to agree that the block's power-level is similar to Theros's. I just hope that I will never see a set as bad as Dragon's Maze or Born of the Gods again.
The problem with the set so far isn't the strenght of the cards or their rarity. What has been spoilered so far just seems very bland and boring.
I definitely agree with this. I don't doubt that many of the rares spoiled will be powerful in Limited. It's just that a lot of the rares just seem boring to me.
I'm not sure what others' criteria for determining the "flashiness factor" of cards is, but here are a few examples:
- Avalanche Tusker is just a guy that can force a guy to block. One ability, not very flashy.
- Bear's Companion is a small guy that brings out a big guy. not too rare-worthy.
- There's also that one card that just has morph and a "when this is turned face-up" ability. Not very interesting, as tons of morph creatures have this templating.
Again, I'm not doubting these cards' power levels in the Limited environment. I'm sure they'll do great.
Unfortunately, Magic's been around so long, that the game really doesn't have anything new to offer. I've got a Modern deck I'll play til the end of time. Same goes for a legacy deck. As for all these new cards, I dunno.
As the creators of the game, Wizards should be responsible for keeping the game fresh with each expansion, coming out with new mechanics and cool cards to keep old players coming back for more and to get new players hooked. If there doesn't seem to be anything new to offer, then it's Wizards' job to dissect what they haven't done to find new ideas to offer so that they can attract players new and old to their newest expansions.
Limited players must be having a field day, since an overwhelming amount of the rares in this set (I'm not talking the ordinary amount) look tailored specifically to a few rounds of draft and then the trash can. I don't see why they're getting so riled up from the natural lashback from people who don't enjoy the exceedingly exciting *flavor* Theros block added to Standard.
I think the big root of this whole "KTK doesn't feel as flashy as previous blocks and sets did" comes from Wizards deliberately powering down KTK to try and patch up what they did with what they deemed a powerful Standard when previous sets were in Standard. This power decline caused less-flashy-and-usually-less-powerful cards to be bumped up so that even-less-flashy cards could fill the slots that they used to occupy. This is fine from a Limited standpoint, as the only cards with which to compare in the format would just be cards from that very same set. But with Constructed, there's no doubt that people compare the flashiness level of the cards in KTK to those of RTR block or ZEN block.
Most times, cards are bumped up or down in rarity due to power level reasons or due to complexity reasons. They aren't usually bumped up or down due to "flashiness" reasons. This means that Wizards can definitely add "flashiness" to cards at rare or uncommon without influencing their power level or complexity too much. And by doing so, the people who want exciting cards to play for Constructed are satisfied too, without having those who love Limited to feel like they had something taken away from them.
In short, it seems that the nice, magic Limited-vs.-Constructed balance hasn't been reached with KTK, and that it is this lack of balance that is the root of most of the criticisms against the set.
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How to use card tags (please use them for everybody's sanity)
[c]Lightning Bolt[/c] -> Lightning Bolt
[c=Lightning Bolt]Apple Pie[/c] -> Apple Pie
Vowels-Only Format Minimum deck size: 60 Maximum number of identical cards: 4 Ban list: Cards whose English names begin with a consonant, Unglued and Unhinged cards, cards involving ante, Ancestral Recall
I'm just still disappointed that the general "play creatures, me smashhh" push that wizards has been doing for years is still progressing,
Doing for years and still progressing? You do know that Revelations has been a top tier archetype for two years and actually won the Pro Tour right? One of the most successful aggressive decks is RW Burn, sporting 8 creatures in the entire list. Coming into the new Standard, Caryatid and Courser are all set to make games all about blocking, rather than turning creatures sideways. Aggro did get a shiny new toy in Goblin Rabblemaster, but this just points to all archetypes getting support.
Even control revolves around creatures. They play less counterspells, less artifact / enchantment hate, and focus on handling opposing creatures. They generally utilize planeswalkers, a type which has ushered in the era of creatures by being difficult for most colors to kill it without attacking. You picked out two decks that don't simply deploy creatures and use them to win, but there are many many more that do (rabble red, mono U dev, Mono B dev, RUG decks, Jund monsters, Jund walkers, GW aggro).
Even control revolves around creatures. They play less counterspells, less artifact / enchantment hate, and focus on handling opposing creatures.
"The Deck" played:
* four Disenchants for Artifact/Enchantment hate
* two Moats and four Swords to Plowshares for Creature hate
* two Serra Angels as creatures
"UW Control" by Ivan Floch played:
* three Planar Cleansing for Artifact/Enchantment hate
* four Supreme Verdict and three Planar Cleansing for Creature Hate
* zero creature spells plus two Mutavaults
You picked out two decks that don't simply deploy creatures and use them to win, but there are many many more that do (rabble red, mono U dev, Mono B dev, RUG decks, Jund monsters, Jund walkers, GW aggro).
The number of viable control archetypes is constrained by the fact that Revelations is a universally strong control shell. Aggro and midrange strategies need to adapt drastically to the expected metagame, but control is just so much more powerful than anything else that all it really needs to ask itself is whether it wants to go with D.Spheres or Cleansing, and whether it wants a side-order of Hero's Downfall.
That distribution is caused by the fact that mtgtop8 puts Nykthos decks into the "aggro" umbrella and not the "combo" one. Personally I have no problem with this, except they then throw Storm and Titan Post into Combo in their Legacy section. They're not even being consistent with it in the same section, seeing as Burn is in the aggro section of Legacy.
In any case even taking your points into account, all you proved is that "creatures matter more now than they did before". Standard is hardly a format of "play creatures, me smashhh".
Um...no, there are around two decks who don't play an abundance of creatures; The U/W deck and the red deck, almost every other deck is a creature based deck. Devotion decks are not combo decks, i don't know where you get that from; there is a distinct lack of archetypes in standard at the moment, you play a creature deck or an anti creature deck. It's really sad.
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Quote from Wolfman about lack of Conspiracy spoilers-
"I'd say this about guarantees that it won't be up till this Friday, but considering the current track record, the ETA is now probably two weeks after the set has been out."
Quote from Sirius_B
Speak for yourself, if drawing *****-headed wurms makes social justice warriors cry I'll make it my favorite hobby.
Um...no, there are around two decks who don't play an abundance of creatures; The U/W deck and the red deck, almost every other deck is a creature based deck.
Jund Planeswalkers runs either eight or twelve creatures (all of them mana producers). Maze's End saw play at the Pro Tour. Even among the decks that are based heavily on creatures, they are not all about simply playing them and attacking. Black Devotion decks are primarily defensive outside of their turn two Pack Rat draws.
Devotion decks are not combo decks, i don't know where you get that from;
If Devotion decks are not combo decks, then neither are Storm decks. Here, let me repost something from the source:
Quote from ukyo_rulz »
I feel that in a perfect deck taxonomy, "combo" would refer to decks like Aluren and Painted Stone that actually try to assemble a specific combination of cards. "Ramp" would refer to decks like Storm (ritual/artifact ramp), 12-Post (land ramp) and SnT ("put directly into play" ramp) that are really just trying to get around large mana costs.
Quote from Smmenen »
I agree. It's a vestigal classification from the early game.
Instead of ramp, you could call them Critical Mass combo decks. But, from an evolutionary perspective, those decks are the same as the Stroke decks and the Fireball decks before them.
Burn, Storm, Post, Tron and all other decks that can be described as "we have a lot of X in the deck, and when we draw enough of it we win" are essentially the same deck.
ok sure, i guess aggro is combo also, because it assemble a critical mass of creatures.
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Quote from Wolfman about lack of Conspiracy spoilers-
"I'd say this about guarantees that it won't be up till this Friday, but considering the current track record, the ETA is now probably two weeks after the set has been out."
Quote from Sirius_B
Speak for yourself, if drawing *****-headed wurms makes social justice warriors cry I'll make it my favorite hobby.
I agree with your overall statement, though. In my opinion, the focus has recently been too much on Limited and not enough on Constructed (especially Standard and - to some extent - Modern), leading to sets where large amounts of cards are (close to) unplayable outside of Limited and very few cards that are even considerable options for eternal formats.
As I understand it, though, Wizards designs sets primarily based on Limited because their goal is to sell boxes of booster packs. Drafting is the most consistent way that consumers use up those boxes. Many people (myself included) draft at least partially to score Standard-playable cards. That part is gambling, really, because there are so few good cards anymore. I'm not a huge gambler and I don't think I would draft much if the matches were no fun.
So logically, Magic R&D focuses most on how to make those drafts enjoyable, even for the people who don't pull anything decent. Otherwise, a lot of Standard players would stick to buying singles, which makes those singles more expensive and only benefits the secondary market rather than Wizards itself. Sure, a good number of people would probably buy boxes, which is where the singles would come from, but face it, you don't always get your money's worth when you buy a box if there's nothing you want to use and only a few tradable cards and the couple of mythics you get are crap (foil Hythonia the Cruel, looking at you). Not everyone wants to take that gamble. The people who do are the ones who drive up sales; Wizards sells more boxes of each new set because there are fewer Constructed-playable cards in each box.
We just have to accept that Constructed formats aren't of much concern to Wizards, except to throw in enough of an incentive to ensure Standard players will continue to dump money into drafting. The players themselves are the ones who figure out how to make the best of what they have. Modern and other eternal format players are effectively no longer a target market, since they tend to only focus on the few (usually out-of-print) cards relevant to their decks. Tournaments and huge events and promos and all the hype around anything to do with Constructed? The "flavor" of a set? The very existence of "pro players?" It's all window dressing. Or it's sponsored by the secondary market, which profits the most from Constructed.
"The Deck" played:
* four Disenchants for Artifact/Enchantment hate
* two Moats and four Swords to Plowshares for Creature hate
* two Serra Angels as creatures
"UW Control" by Ivan Floch played:
* three Planar Cleansing for Artifact/Enchantment hate
* four Supreme Verdict and three Planar Cleansing for Creature Hate
* zero creature spells plus two Mutavaults
Seems comprable to me.
The deck is similar to Floch's list because it was a similar metagame. There wasn't much of a card pool, this was one of the early concepts of a control deck, and the first real combo decks had never even been made. It's focused on dealing with creatures for a reason, because thats what it was facing. It is quite comprable.
The number of viable control archetypes is constrained by the fact that Revelations is a universally strong control shell. Aggro and midrange strategies need to adapt drastically to the expected metagame, but control is just so much more powerful than anything else that all it really needs to ask itself is whether it wants to go with D.Spheres or Cleansing, and whether it wants a side-order of Hero's Downfall.
It's not so much more powerful than anything else. It's percentage of the metagame is fractional compared to more popular decks like U devotion and B devotion. Also want to know why Revelations succeded where so many other X draw spells failed? It gained life. Why is life gain good? The format is about punching people with creatures.
That distribution is caused by the fact that mtgtop8 puts Nykthos decks into the "aggro" umbrella and not the "combo" one. Personally I have no problem with this, except they then throw Storm and Titan Post into Combo in their Legacy section. They're not even being consistent with it in the same section, seeing as Burn is in the aggro section of Legacy.
Nah. Things like mono-G devotion aren't combo. Getting a lot of mana for a big creature that gets you another big creature from your deck is no combo. It's just ramp. Combo decks attempt to move toward a specific card or combination of cards that create a winning board state. Casting a big Hydra isn't a combo.
Storm is an engine combo deck, it still moves toward a specific kill card. Titan post is a bit fuzzier (we've been having the argument of where ramp ends and combo begins since tooth in nail was printed), and i personally wouldn't call it a combo deck but it certainly is a unique design we aren't likely to see replicated in standard.
In any case even taking your points into account, all you proved is that "creatures matter more now than they did before". Standard is hardly a format of "play creatures, me smashhh".
Storm is an engine combo deck, it still moves toward a specific kill card.
If combo is "moving towards a specific kill card" then Ivan Floch just won the Pro Tour with combo. Man, I didn't realize that Elixir combo had been tearing up Standard all this time.
Fortification - You can thank this mechanic for the idea of Planeswalker cards. The subsequent likelihood of seeing it is thus dropped significantly.
Can you comment further on this? I don't see the connection.
...
it appears that I was talking out of my posterior. I confused Fortify with another mechanic that was mentioned concerning Future Sight's development, but that was eventually cast aside in order to make the Planeswalker cards.
Many apologies.
I will say that Fortify still wouldn't work for Abzan, due to the fact that it's Equipment, and therefore Artifacts, and subsequently, is supposed to be for All Decks, not GWB decks only.
You stopped your previously reasonable arguments and started semi-flaming so I'm done here.
On topic: the cards spoiled very recently were pretty nice I think. I'm feeling a lot better about the set now, I'm pretty excited by Treasure Cruiser in particular, if it is confirmed.
The format is about punching people with creatures.
I'm only quoting this because I feel that it's...not inaccurate, but not...correct? I can't find the exact word.
Every format is about punching people with something. Why does it being creatures make a difference?
And I'll fully admit to being in the dark about this because I don't play constructed formats very often, but from what I gather, the main path to victory is still "Reduce Opponent's Life Total to 0 through Spellcasting."
So, what makes punching people with creatures worse than punching people with a fireball?
This is going to sound weird, but every strategy is a form of control, and every strategy is a form of aggression. Combo wants to assemble its pieces quickly, and without interference, to end the game in a hurry. Control wants to manipulate every state of the game, and finish it off with something big, be it a creature or a spell. Aggro wants to control the board (and usually their mana curve) and smash through. And Midrange wants to control time, making bigger plays earlier, and disrupting the opponent's ability to respond.
Again, I'll admit to my words not adding up to much, but it seems a bit ridiculous to get upset about this stuff.
The format is about punching people with creatures.
I'm only quoting this because I feel that it's...not inaccurate, but not...correct? I can't find the exact word.
Every format is about punching people with something. Why does it being creatures make a difference?
And I'll fully admit to being in the dark about this because I don't play constructed formats very often, but from what I gather, the main path to victory is still "Reduce Opponent's Life Total to 0 through Spellcasting."
So, what makes punching people with creatures worse than punching people with a fireball?
Because Hadoken spam is apparently more accepted than just doing basic punches and kicks.
You stopped your previously reasonable arguments and started semi-flaming so I'm done here.
I am amused at how you interpreted the way I exposed the fallacies of your arguments as semi-flaming, and then responded with an actual flame. But then it's hardly surprising when I remember that every time I pointed out why your arguments were wrong, you moved the goal posts.
Part 1
"Magic has become all about attacking creatures!"
"Two recent highly successful archetypes use few, if any, creatures. A lot of the other creature decks are about defending with creatures, rather than attacking."
Part 2
"Non-creature decks now revolve around creatures! They don't care about artifacts and enchantments anymore. Also there are many more creature archetypes than non-creature ones! And combo is dead!"
"The first successful control deck has roughly the same distribution of answers to creatures and non-creatures as the latest one. The reason there are few non-creature archetypes is that Revelations pushed everything else out of the format. As for combo, it's only dead if you don't count Nykthos decks as combo."
Part 3
"The Deck is similar to UW control because they functioned in a similar meta! Revelations was strong because of life gain! Nykthos isn't combo because combo decks build toward a specific card or combination of cards, except that card cannot be a creature, except when the creature is Emrakul!"
"Your initial statements actually agree with my point, and your weird classification of combo somehow includes UW Control."
Part 4
"You're full of hot air! And also you flamed me!"
the general "play creatures, me smashhh" push that wizards has been doing for years is still progressing,
Even if we were to uncritically accept every argument you made was correct (and they're not) they still don't lead to the conclusion that MtG has morphed into a game where attacking with creatures is all that matters.
EDIT:
I still don't see anything exciting in the spoilers aside from the Charms and Fetches.
EDIT:
I still don't see anything exciting in the spoilers aside from the Charms and Fetches.
How about the 2 Delve draw spells (especially the instant one that lets you select the best 2 cards from your top 7)? Or the Delve kill spell, Delve 4/4 trampler, Anafenza, and a few other Modern/Legacy playables.
While that is true, some of the strong cards in the set are noncreature spells (Murderous Cut, the charms, Sorin, Sarkhan, and the Ascendancies come to mind)
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
^This sentiment exactly. In essence, from the artwork for Abzan, I was praying for fortifications and thought that would be exciting. Additionally, it doesn't appear that the cards are reflecting the beautiful artwork and creative back story of Tarkir. Wizards successfully slowed down Standard with Theros, but at least with that block, there was new and exciting design space being explored, and the Gods had a lot of appeal. Additionally, I wonder about the stagnation of eternal formats if Wizards continues to be overly cautious about power creep...
Sort of. Cut is a nice card for older formats, I don't know how good it will be in standard though. Sarkhan is basically a creature anyway. The charms do seem decently powerful, while a lot of the ascendencies demand to be built around (not usually indicitive of a great card.). The exception is sultai, and it has the best charm as well, so I'm pleased with that clan.
Doing for years and still progressing? You do know that Revelations has been a top tier archetype for two years and actually won the Pro Tour right? One of the most successful aggressive decks is RW Burn, sporting 8 creatures in the entire list. Coming into the new Standard, Caryatid and Courser are all set to make games all about blocking, rather than turning creatures sideways. Aggro did get a shiny new toy in Goblin Rabblemaster, but this just points to all archetypes getting support.
On Topic:
I am happy that allied Fetches are coming to Modern and excited to play Charms in my Wedge decks. Some of the Ascendancies seem OK, but nothing ridiculous. None of the other cards spoiled so far interest me, and even the best ones seem to be worse or at par with Theros (which was a pretty underpowered block to begin with).
I sadly have to agree that the block's power-level is similar to Theros's. I just hope that I will never see a set as bad as Dragon's Maze or Born of the Gods again.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
I'm just hoping the Temur Legendary is good...
I definitely agree with this. I don't doubt that many of the rares spoiled will be powerful in Limited. It's just that a lot of the rares just seem boring to me.
I'm not sure what others' criteria for determining the "flashiness factor" of cards is, but here are a few examples:
- Avalanche Tusker is just a guy that can force a guy to block. One ability, not very flashy.
- Bear's Companion is a small guy that brings out a big guy. not too rare-worthy.
- There's also that one card that just has morph and a "when this is turned face-up" ability. Not very interesting, as tons of morph creatures have this templating.
Again, I'm not doubting these cards' power levels in the Limited environment. I'm sure they'll do great.
As the creators of the game, Wizards should be responsible for keeping the game fresh with each expansion, coming out with new mechanics and cool cards to keep old players coming back for more and to get new players hooked. If there doesn't seem to be anything new to offer, then it's Wizards' job to dissect what they haven't done to find new ideas to offer so that they can attract players new and old to their newest expansions.
I think the big root of this whole "KTK doesn't feel as flashy as previous blocks and sets did" comes from Wizards deliberately powering down KTK to try and patch up what they did with what they deemed a powerful Standard when previous sets were in Standard. This power decline caused less-flashy-and-usually-less-powerful cards to be bumped up so that even-less-flashy cards could fill the slots that they used to occupy. This is fine from a Limited standpoint, as the only cards with which to compare in the format would just be cards from that very same set. But with Constructed, there's no doubt that people compare the flashiness level of the cards in KTK to those of RTR block or ZEN block.
Most times, cards are bumped up or down in rarity due to power level reasons or due to complexity reasons. They aren't usually bumped up or down due to "flashiness" reasons. This means that Wizards can definitely add "flashiness" to cards at rare or uncommon without influencing their power level or complexity too much. And by doing so, the people who want exciting cards to play for Constructed are satisfied too, without having those who love Limited to feel like they had something taken away from them.
In short, it seems that the nice, magic Limited-vs.-Constructed balance hasn't been reached with KTK, and that it is this lack of balance that is the root of most of the criticisms against the set.
[c]Lightning Bolt[/c] -> Lightning Bolt
[c=Lightning Bolt]Apple Pie[/c] -> Apple Pie
Vowels-Only Format
Minimum deck size: 60
Maximum number of identical cards: 4
Ban list: Cards whose English names begin with a consonant, Unglued and Unhinged cards, cards involving ante, Ancestral Recall
Fortification - You can thank this mechanic for the idea of Planeswalker cards. The subsequent likelihood of seeing it is thus dropped significantly.
Even control revolves around creatures. They play less counterspells, less artifact / enchantment hate, and focus on handling opposing creatures. They generally utilize planeswalkers, a type which has ushered in the era of creatures by being difficult for most colors to kill it without attacking. You picked out two decks that don't simply deploy creatures and use them to win, but there are many many more that do (rabble red, mono U dev, Mono B dev, RUG decks, Jund monsters, Jund walkers, GW aggro).
Check out this aggregated metagame breakdown: http://www.mtgtop8.com/format?f=ST
65% aggro. 0% combo. Sadness.
"The Deck" played:
* four Disenchants for Artifact/Enchantment hate
* two Moats and four Swords to Plowshares for Creature hate
* two Serra Angels as creatures
"UW Control" by Ivan Floch played:
* three Planar Cleansing for Artifact/Enchantment hate
* four Supreme Verdict and three Planar Cleansing for Creature Hate
* zero creature spells plus two Mutavaults
Seems comparable to me.
The number of viable control archetypes is constrained by the fact that Revelations is a universally strong control shell. Aggro and midrange strategies need to adapt drastically to the expected metagame, but control is just so much more powerful than anything else that all it really needs to ask itself is whether it wants to go with D.Spheres or Cleansing, and whether it wants a side-order of Hero's Downfall.
That distribution is caused by the fact that mtgtop8 puts Nykthos decks into the "aggro" umbrella and not the "combo" one. Personally I have no problem with this, except they then throw Storm and Titan Post into Combo in their Legacy section. They're not even being consistent with it in the same section, seeing as Burn is in the aggro section of Legacy.
In any case even taking your points into account, all you proved is that "creatures matter more now than they did before". Standard is hardly a format of "play creatures, me smashhh".
"I'd say this about guarantees that it won't be up till this Friday, but considering the current track record, the ETA is now probably two weeks after the set has been out."
Quote from Sirius_B
Speak for yourself, if drawing *****-headed wurms makes social justice warriors cry I'll make it my favorite hobby.
Jund Planeswalkers runs either eight or twelve creatures (all of them mana producers). Maze's End saw play at the Pro Tour. Even among the decks that are based heavily on creatures, they are not all about simply playing them and attacking. Black Devotion decks are primarily defensive outside of their turn two Pack Rat draws.
If Devotion decks are not combo decks, then neither are Storm decks. Here, let me repost something from the source:
Burn, Storm, Post, Tron and all other decks that can be described as "we have a lot of X in the deck, and when we draw enough of it we win" are essentially the same deck.
ok sure, i guess aggro is combo also, because it assemble a critical mass of creatures.
"I'd say this about guarantees that it won't be up till this Friday, but considering the current track record, the ETA is now probably two weeks after the set has been out."
Quote from Sirius_B
Speak for yourself, if drawing *****-headed wurms makes social justice warriors cry I'll make it my favorite hobby.
As I understand it, though, Wizards designs sets primarily based on Limited because their goal is to sell boxes of booster packs. Drafting is the most consistent way that consumers use up those boxes. Many people (myself included) draft at least partially to score Standard-playable cards. That part is gambling, really, because there are so few good cards anymore. I'm not a huge gambler and I don't think I would draft much if the matches were no fun.
So logically, Magic R&D focuses most on how to make those drafts enjoyable, even for the people who don't pull anything decent. Otherwise, a lot of Standard players would stick to buying singles, which makes those singles more expensive and only benefits the secondary market rather than Wizards itself. Sure, a good number of people would probably buy boxes, which is where the singles would come from, but face it, you don't always get your money's worth when you buy a box if there's nothing you want to use and only a few tradable cards and the couple of mythics you get are crap (foil Hythonia the Cruel, looking at you). Not everyone wants to take that gamble. The people who do are the ones who drive up sales; Wizards sells more boxes of each new set because there are fewer Constructed-playable cards in each box.
We just have to accept that Constructed formats aren't of much concern to Wizards, except to throw in enough of an incentive to ensure Standard players will continue to dump money into drafting. The players themselves are the ones who figure out how to make the best of what they have. Modern and other eternal format players are effectively no longer a target market, since they tend to only focus on the few (usually out-of-print) cards relevant to their decks. Tournaments and huge events and promos and all the hype around anything to do with Constructed? The "flavor" of a set? The very existence of "pro players?" It's all window dressing. Or it's sponsored by the secondary market, which profits the most from Constructed.
Can you comment further on this? I don't see the connection.
The deck is similar to Floch's list because it was a similar metagame. There wasn't much of a card pool, this was one of the early concepts of a control deck, and the first real combo decks had never even been made. It's focused on dealing with creatures for a reason, because thats what it was facing. It is quite comprable.
It's not so much more powerful than anything else. It's percentage of the metagame is fractional compared to more popular decks like U devotion and B devotion. Also want to know why Revelations succeded where so many other X draw spells failed? It gained life. Why is life gain good? The format is about punching people with creatures.
Nah. Things like mono-G devotion aren't combo. Getting a lot of mana for a big creature that gets you another big creature from your deck is no combo. It's just ramp. Combo decks attempt to move toward a specific card or combination of cards that create a winning board state. Casting a big Hydra isn't a combo.
Storm is an engine combo deck, it still moves toward a specific kill card. Titan post is a bit fuzzier (we've been having the argument of where ramp ends and combo begins since tooth in nail was printed), and i personally wouldn't call it a combo deck but it certainly is a unique design we aren't likely to see replicated in standard.
I stand by it. To each his own.
Do you instantly win after assembling these creatures? If yes: Combo (see: Elves)
If the metagame now is similar to what it was over a decade ago, then by definition it could not possibly have changed for the worse.
So many additional qualifications. No true Scotsman indeed.
Lifegain is bad. Card drawing is good. Card drawing with lifegain is better than just card drawing.
If combo is "moving towards a specific kill card" then Ivan Floch just won the Pro Tour with combo. Man, I didn't realize that Elixir combo had been tearing up Standard all this time.
Frankly, the Charms are where it's at for me here. That and Utter End.
...
it appears that I was talking out of my posterior. I confused Fortify with another mechanic that was mentioned concerning Future Sight's development, but that was eventually cast aside in order to make the Planeswalker cards.
Many apologies.
I will say that Fortify still wouldn't work for Abzan, due to the fact that it's Equipment, and therefore Artifacts, and subsequently, is supposed to be for All Decks, not GWB decks only.
You stopped your previously reasonable arguments and started semi-flaming so I'm done here.
On topic: the cards spoiled very recently were pretty nice I think. I'm feeling a lot better about the set now, I'm pretty excited by Treasure Cruiser in particular, if it is confirmed.
I'm only quoting this because I feel that it's...not inaccurate, but not...correct? I can't find the exact word.
Every format is about punching people with something. Why does it being creatures make a difference?
And I'll fully admit to being in the dark about this because I don't play constructed formats very often, but from what I gather, the main path to victory is still "Reduce Opponent's Life Total to 0 through Spellcasting."
So, what makes punching people with creatures worse than punching people with a fireball?
This is going to sound weird, but every strategy is a form of control, and every strategy is a form of aggression. Combo wants to assemble its pieces quickly, and without interference, to end the game in a hurry. Control wants to manipulate every state of the game, and finish it off with something big, be it a creature or a spell. Aggro wants to control the board (and usually their mana curve) and smash through. And Midrange wants to control time, making bigger plays earlier, and disrupting the opponent's ability to respond.
Again, I'll admit to my words not adding up to much, but it seems a bit ridiculous to get upset about this stuff.
Because Hadoken spam is apparently more accepted than just doing basic punches and kicks.
I am amused at how you interpreted the way I exposed the fallacies of your arguments as semi-flaming, and then responded with an actual flame. But then it's hardly surprising when I remember that every time I pointed out why your arguments were wrong, you moved the goal posts.
"Magic has become all about attacking creatures!"
"Two recent highly successful archetypes use few, if any, creatures. A lot of the other creature decks are about defending with creatures, rather than attacking."
Part 2
"Non-creature decks now revolve around creatures! They don't care about artifacts and enchantments anymore. Also there are many more creature archetypes than non-creature ones! And combo is dead!"
"The first successful control deck has roughly the same distribution of answers to creatures and non-creatures as the latest one. The reason there are few non-creature archetypes is that Revelations pushed everything else out of the format. As for combo, it's only dead if you don't count Nykthos decks as combo."
Part 3
"The Deck is similar to UW control because they functioned in a similar meta! Revelations was strong because of life gain! Nykthos isn't combo because combo decks build toward a specific card or combination of cards, except that card cannot be a creature, except when the creature is Emrakul!"
"Your initial statements actually agree with my point, and your weird classification of combo somehow includes UW Control."
Part 4
"You're full of hot air! And also you flamed me!"
Don't forget, your initial statement was that:
Even if we were to uncritically accept every argument you made was correct (and they're not) they still don't lead to the conclusion that MtG has morphed into a game where attacking with creatures is all that matters.
EDIT:
I still don't see anything exciting in the spoilers aside from the Charms and Fetches.
Thoughtseize
Courser of Kruphix
Mana Confluence
Anger of the Gods
And some fringe play with.
Ashen Rider
Elspeth, Sun’s Champion
Spirit of the Labyrinth
Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx
As for Khans of Tarkir, only time will tell but I know at least 5 cards that surely will see play in every format
How about the 2 Delve draw spells (especially the instant one that lets you select the best 2 cards from your top 7)? Or the Delve kill spell, Delve 4/4 trampler, Anafenza, and a few other Modern/Legacy playables.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.