Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, Sol Ring, Chrome Mox, Mox Diamond, arcane signet, The ten signets, the ten talismans, darksteel ingot, chromatic lantern, Trinket Mage, Seething Song, Caged Sun, Gauntlet of Might, Gauntlet of Power, Kodama’s Reach, Cultivate, Harrow, Circuitous Route, Explosive Vegetation, Sakura-Tribe Elder, Nature’s Lore, Farseek, Three Visita, Boreal Druid, Llanowar Elves, Elvish Mystic, Fyndhorn Elves, Birds of Paradise, Noble Hierarch, Land Tax, Tithe, High Tide, Bubbling Muck, Cabal Coffers, Nykthos, Ancient Tomb, City of Traitors, Expedition Map, Thaumatic Compass, Exploration, Mul Daya Oracle, Azusa, Coiling Oracle, Gitaxian Probe, Preordain, Ponder, Serum Visions, Brainstorm, Time Spiral, Timetwister, Wheel of Fate, Rhystic Study, Consecrated Sphinx, Sylvan Library, Smothering Tithe, Windfall, Necropotence, Phyrexian Arena, Yawgmoth’s Will, Toxic Deluge, Cyclonic Rift, Wrath of God, Damnation, Chaos Warp, Generous Gift, Beast Within, Harmonize, Blasphemous Act, Skullclamp, Grasp of Fate, Swan Song, Force of Will, Force of Negation, Cryptic Command, Pongify, Rapid Hybridization, dreamstone hedron, Hedron Archive, Brainstone, carpet of Flowers, Perilous Vault, Nevinyrral’s Disk, Sylvan Scrying, Crop Rotation, Enlightened Tutor, Idyllic Tutor, Sterling Grove, Open the Armory, Steelshaper’s Gift, Mystical Tutor, Merchant’s Scroll, Worldly Tutor, Tooth and Nail, Chord of Calling, Eldritch Evolution, bloom tender, Natural Order, Vampiric Tutor, Demonic Tutor, Beseech the Queen, Mastermind’s Acquisition, Diabolic Tutor, Increasing Ambition, Gamble, Imperial Recruiter, Curse of Swine, diabolic intern, Recruiter of the Guard...
That is over a hundred cards I just listed and that is likely the tip of the iceberg. While some of them aren’t competitive right now, you need to nuke almost everything to get rid of the auto-picks. Even if all of the top rate tutors in black were banned, for example, it would still be better to run Diabolic Tutor rather than running yet another token creator in your Endrik deck.
This is why I don’t get the complaint. You want to get those deck slots “back” but the simple fact is that you likely never had them to begin with. What most likely happened is that you (and/or your gaming group) gained more knowledge of the card game and got better cards. The game didn’t magically change overnight.
Beyond that, the request doesn’t make sense when you get down to it. When I’m crafting Toshiro Umezawa, he wants me to use kill spells. If any of those kill spells are decent, however, I will feel pressured to use them in my Endrek deck to interact and follow the template. If there are enough awesome token makers for Endrek that it’s worth not using that kill spell, however, then Toshiro is pressured to use those token spells. I don’t know what sort of artificial silos you want between commanders but that is fundamentally not how this game works.
I guess that I should ask what type of cards you actually want. It seems that you oppose generic good cards and cards that are so great for the archetype that they are obvious. When building an Orzhov Enchantment Deck, you would be against Land Tax and necropotence (which are generically powerful) along with cards like Enlightened Tutor (which is an auto-include for enchantment decks). That just seems to leave us with middle-ground cards like Extinguish Hope or Three Dreams. If you banned tutor/necro/tax, however, we would be having this exact same conversation about how cards like Extinguish Hopes, by being the best available tier of enchantment support, forces you to include it and robs you of your deck slots.
I don’t know, maybe I’m wrong. Could you give me an example of the sort of synergy cards you wish could be played that would not risk becoming autoincludes if all of the better cards were banned? That just seems like a problem of infinite regression from where I’m standing.
I don’t disagree with Carthage core premise; too many decks I have seen I felt always are same variation of cards; in my current meta, artifacts and ramp. Lesser extent unrelenting graveyard recursion, always via very similar methods.
Some of this is meta specific, and I have my thoughts on other reasons for this. But you know of those 100 cards you just listed; I’ll be blunt 70%-80% of those I am just fine getting dodo’d. Only ones I don’t, I can basically list as; 1 CMC Manadorks, Wrath of God, Chord of Calling, Diabolic Tutor, Wrath of God, I am indifferent to Kodoma’s Clone (if not the biggest fan of their existence), Ingot and Archive, Toxic Deluge and lesser extent Damnation.
If your list was meant to prove how many cards are ubitigous and everyone play those not removed from the cardpool, from me it did the exact opposite.
I don’t disagree with Carthage core premise; too many decks I have seen I felt always are same variation of cards; in my current meta, artifacts and ramp. Lesser extent unrelenting graveyard recursion, always via very similar methods.
Some of this is meta specific, and I have my thoughts on other reasons for this. But you know of those 100 cards you just listed; I’ll be blunt 70%-80% of those I am just fine getting dodo’d. Only ones I don’t, I can basically list as; 1 CMC Manadorks, Wrath of God, Chord of Calling, Diabolic Tutor, Wrath of God, I am indifferent to Kodoma’s Clone (if not the biggest fan of their existence), Ingot and Archive, Toxic Deluge and lesser extent Damnation.
If your list was meant to prove how many cards are ubitigous and everyone play those not removed from the cardpool, from me it did the exact opposite.
CerberusJund (Modern)GRB
Sidisi, Brood Tyrant Morphentress (Commander) GUB
I also play YGO (DragunFusion) and Hearthstone (Dragon Control Warrior)