AF Anyway, nothing's been decided. Normally the process does not involve testing. People ask me, people have asked me a lot, you know, this has the
emergence of this deck want to test modern more, when you're making new cards?
And honestly, the return on that investement is just never gonna be great for us. Considering that
only 7% of the Pro Tour field found the good version of this deck, and they put more hours into it than we ever could. The odds of us having
productive playtesting that would have found just how powerful this deck was, in the amount of time we could have dedicated to it you know is just...
..why can't they? They have some of the best players in the world working for them. You can't have a crack team working on breaking your new cards?
A deck creator works in a team to refine a deck idea, whether that is a team that are friends or internet strangers that crowdsource the issue. We're talking hundreds of man hours even with a team of 5-10 on a-single-deck. They're building 2 blocks per year with several formats. This is not something even feasible to compare what the player can do especially with the internet.
Eldrazi began as a single person's deck as Processor, then it evolved into an internet deck that had several people trying to figure out the optimal version of the deck. Aggro was built through the traditional team format with heavy testing. Just because Einstein created the Theory of Relativity and knew it was possible to build a nuclear bomb, doesn't mean he knew how to build a nuclear bomb. That's the difference between mathematics, science, and engineering.
They're building a new Theory of Relativity quickly in a team, not constructing the nuclear bomb. That's our "job" to build the "bomb" to win this "war." The war being your local FNM or the PTQ or the Pro Tour. The issue is that we're mostly fighting with conventional weaponry that can counter each other. This is a Tier 0 deck and is the nuclear bomb and that why it's being banned.
And most of us aren't great deckbuilders and follow trends. We can built based on blue prints and innovate within an archetype, but to think that even being the greatest player in the world there is still broken content. World of Warcraft was designed and developed by one of the most renown game developing companies of all time that really take their time to make a great game. And it has been severely edited since the release over a decade ago to the point that some classes are no longer the same as they once were.
There are high expectations are like genie wishes, the question is resiliency in a system to adapt to new and recurring situations. You know a hurricane is going to pop up, but not always "where." So you build a system able to survive and rebuild after the natural disaster.
There are several tiers to mistaken design. This is in the middling of it, and in part because the cards are easy to play to which why we have seen such a high adoption and very fast adoption rate for this deck. It is the ease of playing the deck, ease to acquire the cards, as well as the rate spike we see in play that has created the intense hatred since it forces a Darwin environment. Adapt or die to Eldrazi, it is understandable.
But things happen, the key is that people have identified the problem and are fixing it in a timely manner. Equally allowing time to study the situation rather than a slam ban that destroys any future for Eldrazi in general. Look at any competitive game. League of Legends, Pokemon, and so on. You will find that even with great play testing, it takes editing and editions to create a relative environment. Any change creates chaos. As chaos continues, the greater likelihood we will see more of this as the years progress than less in our life times. The key is to prevent the worst, namely Urza Block.
There really is no objective standard that you can devise that would make Cloudpost Get banned and these eldrazi lands not.
Processor was fine, it just ate the hell out of graveyard decks and fell to specific hate. It was actually a great deck and considering we had 3 different threads going on trying to develop the most efficient form of the deck. The downside was how quickly Aggro came around and took Processor out as the premiere Eldrazi deck.
Right now, with what we know and the cards released. Eldrazi Aggro and it's children are bad for the format.
Processor wasn't the problem, but the lands together are still very much broken.
The interview is reminiscent of the public statements that WotC was making about CawBlade in 2010, although it's very compressed compared to that. WotC claimed for quite a long period of time that CawBlade wasn't broken and that there were answers to it if people just looked hard enough and then attendance at FNM's and ultimately larger events forced their hand and they went to DefCon 1 very quickly and banned several cards.
Well, to be fair, there being answers to it was true. Then they printed Batterskull.
It's surprising that they didn't learn enough from that series of events to pre-emptively emergency ban at least Eye of Ugin here.
That would be like "learning" after almost getting hit by a car to never cross any street unless there are no cars within eyesight. It's taking a valid idea and then going so far with it it ends up becoming a problem in and of itself. Emergency bans are a bad idea.
They do not even test bans. Like, we are playing a format they completely neglected to manage by anything other than gut feel and a need to have a 'FRESH' meta which they barely understand.
That's our reality.
Polemics doesn't win the debate, especially with me.
Right now, we know a few things:
1. Urza Block almost killed Magic because the deck was so efficient that a game was decided on a dice roll
2. Bloom was a difficult to play deck that with time refined itself over a year to go from a backwater combo deck to a real threat once it was in the hands of a Pro. It was a difficult to play against, that while requiring skill and specific cards to know how to sequence. The statistics bore out that it's win percentage was higher than average and destroyed value. Given enough time, it would have caught on more if it wasn't the fear of an impending ban and that Americans tend to play aggro or midrange decks over combo or at least combo similar to infect decks.
The deck had a year in part because it was still under the radar, once the radar came it was under a microscope.
3. Twin was a police deck, that gradually became "Twin+" and shifted out Jeskai and Scapeshift decks out of the game. It had 2 years or so, and became a staple of rotating decks with Tron and a few others. However, because of the refinement of the deck and slowly bleeding diversity it was banned.
4. Pod was gaining market share because it was an easy deck to build and play, but boring to play against and difficult to stop. Finally died especially with the rise of Collected Company.
5. Eldrazi is unique in that it started out as Processor that evolved into Aggro roughly a month ago. Eldrazi "Menace" was known as early as late December for those of us who were early adopters. The new shift was aggro when someone cracked the deck into aggro mode. There were a few variants like a BGX Eldrazi deck.
The current Eldrazi Deck is an aberration, but does not compare to Urza Block's pervasiveness or power level making that Urza Block deck a complete abomination that almost consumed and ate Magic alive. This isn't apologetics, it's analyzing history and consistency in branding and design and rules set expectations.
In terms of everything you're angry about the Eldrazi deck being everywhere. I understand that, because I have been there as well at different times during Magic. Have you played Standard during the original Mirrodin block with Affinity when it was actually Affinity? That was a nightmare too, that obliterated any concept of Magic in standard for quite sometime. Eldrazi is more similar to Pod and Bloom, it's interactive in weird ways but not enough so that people can't really stop it comfortably without huge new shifts in their game play.
The interview is reminiscent of the public statements that WotC was making about CawBlade in 2010, although it's very compressed compared to that. WotC claimed for quite a long period of time that CawBlade wasn't broken and that there were answers to it if people just looked hard enough and then attendance at FNM's and ultimately larger events forced their hand and they went to DefCon 1 very quickly and banned several cards.
It's surprising that they didn't learn enough from that series of events to pre-emptively emergency ban at least Eye of Ugin here. My guess is that attendance has not declined at this point and Affinity looks pretty strong against Eldrazi and they're just going to weather the storm the way they did right up until Batterskull was printed last time around. They'll do the ban on whatever as the next set releases and just hope the meta isn't 50/50 UW Eldrazi before that. I'm thinking they've got 50/50 odds on that at this point.
The deck as is survives one block cycle, rather than an entire year. What he wants to do is maintain as leader that he is on the case and is thinking about Modern as a format and that they do care as one of the faces of Magic. He also wants to maintain regular order and establish a relationship with deck builders. That you can break the format, but you cannot break it forever. The game is not where it was twenty years ago with Urza Block in which an entire block destroyed the entire game.
Today, the deck will send ripple effects into the game for several years, but will not destroy Magic. Bloom Titan and Twin were both broken for an entire year. This will be a much smaller cycle. There is a process, they have an idea what they're doing and that's what they want to maintain is order. The breakers get their day in the sun and get to profit, while people get a chance to battle against it and it creates some interesting stories.
If you look at the Eldrazi Processor deck threads and the amount of interest that the deck created by several players, you will see a series of decks that were refined and built. The downside, though, is that Processor is dying a slow death and aggro and midrange versions will live on unless if a type of Processor survives. Eldrazi will hopefully remain tier 1-2, but will not devastate the format as it used to.
Oh please stop pretending that Bloom or Twin ever even came to close to the current Eldrazi. I don't think Amulet Bloom ever had more than 10% metashare and I think Twin had something like 15% at its peak? How is this comparable to the 40+% of Eldrazi?
It doesn't matter gameshare, what matters is that there was a process and that as the decks became more and more of a threat and a spotlight was placed under them there was a course of action followed.
Pod, I believe, took too long to ban. Amulet Bloom lasted a year for a deck that not until the end of its life cycle started to catch on more, but remained difficult to play and with that one Mod's statistics website even stated that Bloom had a high win percentage than normal for a deck and that nerfing the deck was consistent.
If we're to look at something, we need to talk about a few concepts:
1. Adoption cycle
2. Marketing and communications
3. Establishing expectations and patterns of behaviors
The Eldrazi Aggro deck has had one of the fastest adoption rates in Magic in years. I stated Eldrazi Aggro, because Eldrazi Processor has major issues with specific decks and is rather beatable. To quote another player, "I don't like that deck, because it loses to itself." Processor was discovered early in December and gained traction for early adopters during late December around Christmas with the middle adopter period and going viral around January 1st. You can watch the price of Eye of Ugin spiking.
Eventually Aggro was released and Eye of Ugin went up to $45-$50, it is now last I checked at $35 and not moving in price as no one wants the card anymore because of the ban in a few weeks.
Early->Middle->Late
For the most part the card is most expensive at the Late phase, however since the deck is being killed off in its current form there are no more late adopters at this point and the Middle Adopters when the Aggro deck went viral would and are the Late adopters to a dead deck.
Forsythe is communicating a "we're leading, and looking into this and we know you're really ticked off please come yell at me." However, for the most part people are angry but considering no one saw this level of deck for quite sometime. We must conclude another point, that Bloom vs. Eldrazi Aggro was quicker and more efficient because Bloom is more difficult play, period, and why it took longer to crack the deck code and to lead to a ban.
By doing an emergency ban, this kills off deck designers with an incentive to build decks. Since you buy into a new deck and it dies immediately. And considering people are paying good money for decks, having some waylay between a deck's discovery through some adoption cycle to see the full meta shift. We have the evidence now that the deck is a Tier 0 deck. No one is arguing that.
The question is on relative speed, and for the most part we can even look at the earliest version of the deck:
This deck is the missing link between Processor's evolution into Aggro as the earliest nearest common ancestor to both Processor and Aggro. This comes from 1/31/16.
So let's do some math. Today is 3/8/16.
When the thing crawled out of the slimy cesspool, it's been 38 days of Eldrazi Aggro in it's Proto evolutionary form. The ban will be one month from now, which will be two months of Eldrazi.
So two months?
Two months.
So if we bifurcate the conversation between three different Eldrazi base decks:
1. Aggro
2. Processor
3. Dread Summonsing
The current cries about bans weren't around with the Tier 2 Processor or the Dread Summonsing version, it was when Aggro came on board with the earliest we can date right now 1/31 being generous and not seeing the fully refined list we see today.
Each of those decks had a different style and play to them, even between the different color combination for Processor there were variations and feasted on graveyard decks. It was an interesting concept, and a deck that had weaknesses. Dread Summonsing was it's own deck, even now short lived and interesting.
Aggro destroyed the meta.
But does it warrant an emergency ban? No.
Because let's start with a good article on this on why we need Eldrazi Winter:
I feel Sheridan Lardner does a good analysis here on keeping "the reality" of the situation understood.
My own understanding comes from more of a larger historical understanding, looking at the worst of the game with Urza Block towards other "bad times" prior to Modern concepts on design across the game and on what I consider necessary emergency bans. Urza Block was decided on a dice roll. That's Super Tier 0, no comparison to this Tier 0.
And speaking as someone who has played Vintage, Legacy, and on and on. I have my own perspective on this issue, that kneejerk reactions to kill off a deck that has potential is hyperbolic. Eldrazi has fans, I'm one of them. And we'd like to see Eldrazi fixed without destroying the deck. I own several other Modern decks. Processor was wonderful without breaking everything, Aggro destroyed the Eldrazi Brand.
So the middle ground is to analyze what is broken with the deck and specifically look at the data and the sense of the meta with a Tier 0. This isn't a year of hell, rather it is 2 months. I don't play Pro Tours, I care about FNM and FNM has seen warps with the meta. And I agree with a ban, but not at the time frame to warrant an emergency ban. This isn't Urza Block, probably the worst time in Magic. I also believe that A VERSION of Eldrazi is necessary in the format.
What I want to see is:
A. Eldrazi Tron
B. Eldrazi Aggro
C. Eldrazi Midrange
Each of those decks survive in some fashion, but not in their current fashion. I do not believe that Processor can live on as is and will be absorbed into one of the largest deck variants. We'll see some floundering as it gets hit hard to Tier 2, but survival is necessary for deck diversity. This would mean that a new tribe has emerged, a new deck variant has emerged, and a new era of Modern has shown that backwards compatibility with cards can create new decks when we revisit old planes. This also means that a new deck may come into existence with Emrakul's set.
That's the point in deck building, let's ignore Aggro's metashare and so forth but look at the pre Feburary world. There were three new decks available and each were competitive. They raised a lot of interest in the format. I for one am greatly annoyed that the innovation we saw from December through January did persist longer without the devastating results to see this Tier 0 deck emerge. That there is our reality, building deck building communities and people talking about their own version of the decks.
That's how each block should be for Modern. Bringing in new decks. That's what we want. And that's what the game needs to work towards, and this reflects the power of synergy and intra block design. Too much synergy, namely having too many Sol Lands destroyed a metagame. Prior to that discovery, we had an interesting new deck that in a year's time would have been a fine addition to the Tier 1.5 metagame. Two different realities, but one fact. If we can save the format from the Eldrazi Winter, so may we return in part to the drawing board and see the rise of a new, more pro-Modern Eldrazi deck especially in hopes that Emrakul's set will bring some fine new additions to the brood. That's the vision of Magic. Go back and read some of the BX Eldrazi Processor threads about people trying to figure the deck out. That's competitive Magic, not this aberration turned abomination.
Returning to a cleaner slate, we can begin again. Wiser.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
They do not even test bans. Like, we are playing a format they completely neglected to manage by anything other than gut feel and a need to have a 'FRESH' meta which they barely understand.
That's our reality.
Polemics doesn't win the debate, especially with me.
Right now, we know a few things:
1. Urza Block almost killed Magic because the deck was so efficient that a game was decided on a dice roll
2. Bloom was a difficult to play deck that with time refined itself over a year to go from a backwater combo deck to a real threat once it was in the hands of a Pro. It was a difficult to play against, that while requiring skill and specific cards to know how to sequence. The statistics bore out that it's win percentage was higher than average and destroyed value. Given enough time, it would have caught on more if it wasn't the fear of an impending ban and that Americans tend to play aggro or midrange decks over combo or at least combo similar to infect decks.
The deck had a year in part because it was still under the radar, once the radar came it was under a microscope.
3. Twin was a police deck, that gradually became "Twin+" and shifted out Jeskai and Scapeshift decks out of the game. It had 2 years or so, and became a staple of rotating decks with Tron and a few others. However, because of the refinement of the deck and slowly bleeding diversity it was banned.
4. Pod was gaining market share because it was an easy deck to build and play, but boring to play against and difficult to stop. Finally died especially with the rise of Collected Company.
5. Eldrazi is unique in that it started out as Processor that evolved into Aggro roughly a month ago. Eldrazi "Menace" was known as early as late December for those of us who were early adopters. The new shift was aggro when someone cracked the deck into aggro mode. There were a few variants like a BGX Eldrazi deck.
The current Eldrazi Deck is an aberration, but does not compare to Urza Block's pervasiveness or power level making that Urza Block deck a complete abomination that almost consumed and ate Magic alive. This isn't apologetics, it's analyzing history and consistency in branding and design and rules set expectations.
In terms of everything you're angry about the Eldrazi deck being everywhere. I understand that, because I have been there as well at different times during Magic. Have you played Standard during the original Mirrodin block with Affinity when it was actually Affinity? That was a nightmare too, that obliterated any concept of Magic in standard for quite sometime. Eldrazi is more similar to Pod and Bloom, it's interactive in weird ways but not enough so that people can't really stop it comfortably without huge new shifts in their game play.
The interview is reminiscent of the public statements that WotC was making about CawBlade in 2010, although it's very compressed compared to that. WotC claimed for quite a long period of time that CawBlade wasn't broken and that there were answers to it if people just looked hard enough and then attendance at FNM's and ultimately larger events forced their hand and they went to DefCon 1 very quickly and banned several cards.
It's surprising that they didn't learn enough from that series of events to pre-emptively emergency ban at least Eye of Ugin here. My guess is that attendance has not declined at this point and Affinity looks pretty strong against Eldrazi and they're just going to weather the storm the way they did right up until Batterskull was printed last time around. They'll do the ban on whatever as the next set releases and just hope the meta isn't 50/50 UW Eldrazi before that. I'm thinking they've got 50/50 odds on that at this point.
The deck as is survives one block cycle, rather than an entire year. What he wants to do is maintain as leader that he is on the case and is thinking about Modern as a format and that they do care as one of the faces of Magic. He also wants to maintain regular order and establish a relationship with deck builders. That you can break the format, but you cannot break it forever. The game is not where it was twenty years ago with Urza Block in which an entire block destroyed the entire game.
Today, the deck will send ripple effects into the game for several years, but will not destroy Magic. Bloom Titan and Twin were both broken for an entire year. This will be a much smaller cycle. There is a process, they have an idea what they're doing and that's what they want to maintain is order. The breakers get their day in the sun and get to profit, while people get a chance to battle against it and it creates some interesting stories.
If you look at the Eldrazi Processor deck threads and the amount of interest that the deck created by several players, you will see a series of decks that were refined and built. The downside, though, is that Processor is dying a slow death and aggro and midrange versions will live on unless if a type of Processor survives. Eldrazi will hopefully remain tier 1-2, but will not devastate the format as it used to.
Oh please stop pretending that Bloom or Twin ever even came to close to the current Eldrazi. I don't think Amulet Bloom ever had more than 10% metashare and I think Twin had something like 15% at its peak? How is this comparable to the 40+% of Eldrazi?
It doesn't matter gameshare, what matters is that there was a process and that as the decks became more and more of a threat and a spotlight was placed under them there was a course of action followed.
Pod, I believe, took too long to ban. Amulet Bloom lasted a year for a deck that not until the end of its life cycle started to catch on more, but remained difficult to play and with that one Mod's statistics website even stated that Bloom had a high win percentage than normal for a deck and that nerfing the deck was consistent.
If we're to look at something, we need to talk about a few concepts:
1. Adoption cycle
2. Marketing and communications
3. Establishing expectations and patterns of behaviors
The Eldrazi Aggro deck has had one of the fastest adoption rates in Magic in years. I stated Eldrazi Aggro, because Eldrazi Processor has major issues with specific decks and is rather beatable. To quote another player, "I don't like that deck, because it loses to itself." Processor was discovered early in December and gained traction for early adopters during late December around Christmas with the middle adopter period and going viral around January 1st. You can watch the price of Eye of Ugin spiking.
Eventually Aggro was released and Eye of Ugin went up to $45-$50, it is now last I checked at $35 and not moving in price as no one wants the card anymore because of the ban in a few weeks.
Early->Middle->Late
For the most part the card is most expensive at the Late phase, however since the deck is being killed off in its current form there are no more late adopters at this point and the Middle Adopters when the Aggro deck went viral would and are the Late adopters to a dead deck.
Forsythe is communicating a "we're leading, and looking into this and we know you're really ticked off please come yell at me." However, for the most part people are angry but considering no one saw this level of deck for quite sometime. We must conclude another point, that Bloom vs. Eldrazi Aggro was quicker and more efficient because Bloom is more difficult play, period, and why it took longer to crack the deck code and to lead to a ban.
By doing an emergency ban, this kills off deck designers with an incentive to build decks. Since you buy into a new deck and it dies immediately. And considering people are paying good money for decks, having some waylay between a deck's discovery through some adoption cycle to see the full meta shift. We have the evidence now that the deck is a Tier 0 deck. No one is arguing that.
The question is on relative speed, and for the most part we can even look at the earliest version of the deck:
This deck is the missing link between Processor's evolution into Aggro as the earliest nearest common ancestor to both Processor and Aggro. This comes from 1/31/16.
So let's do some math. Today is 3/8/16.
When the thing crawled out of the slimy cesspool, it's been 38 days of Eldrazi Aggro in it's Proto evolutionary form. The ban will be one month from now, which will be two months of Eldrazi.
So two months?
Two months.
So if we bifurcate the conversation between three different Eldrazi base decks:
1. Aggro
2. Processor
3. Dread Summonsing
The current cries about bans weren't around with the Tier 2 Processor or the Dread Summonsing version, it was when Aggro came on board with the earliest we can date right now 1/31 being generous and not seeing the fully refined list we see today.
Each of those decks had a different style and play to them, even between the different color combination for Processor there were variations and feasted on graveyard decks. It was an interesting concept, and a deck that had weaknesses. Dread Summonsing was it's own deck, even now short lived and interesting.
Aggro destroyed the meta.
But does it warrant an emergency ban? No.
Because let's start with a good article on this on why we need Eldrazi Winter:
I feel Sheridan Lardner does a good analysis here on keeping "the reality" of the situation understood.
My own understanding comes from more of a larger historical understanding, looking at the worst of the game with Urza Block towards other "bad times" prior to Modern concepts on design across the game and on what I consider necessary emergency bans. Urza Block was decided on a dice roll. That's Super Tier 0, no comparison to this Tier 0.
And speaking as someone who has played Vintage, Legacy, and on and on. I have my own perspective on this issue, that kneejerk reactions to kill off a deck that has potential is hyperbolic. Eldrazi has fans, I'm one of them. And we'd like to see Eldrazi fixed without destroying the deck. I own several other Modern decks. Processor was wonderful without breaking everything, Aggro destroyed the Eldrazi Brand.
So the middle ground is to analyze what is broken with the deck and specifically look at the data and the sense of the meta with a Tier 0. This isn't a year of hell, rather it is 2 months. I don't play Pro Tours, I care about FNM and FNM has seen warps with the meta. And I agree with a ban, but not at the time frame to warrant an emergency ban. This isn't Urza Block, probably the worst time in Magic. I also believe that A VERSION of Eldrazi is necessary in the format.
What I want to see is:
A. Eldrazi Tron
B. Eldrazi Aggro
C. Eldrazi Midrange
Each of those decks survive in some fashion, but not in their current fashion. I do not believe that Processor can live on as is and will be absorbed into one of the largest deck variants. We'll see some floundering as it gets hit hard to Tier 2, but survival is necessary for deck diversity. This would mean that a new tribe has emerged, a new deck variant has emerged, and a new era of Modern has shown that backwards compatibility with cards can create new decks when we revisit old planes. This also means that a new deck may come into existence with Emrakul's set.
That's the point in deck building, let's ignore Aggro's metashare and so forth but look at the pre Feburary world. There were three new decks available and each were competitive. They raised a lot of interest in the format. I for one am greatly annoyed that the innovation we saw from December through January did persist longer without the devastating results to see this Tier 0 deck emerge. That there is our reality, building deck building communities and people talking about their own version of the decks.
That's how each block should be for Modern. Bringing in new decks. That's what we want. And that's what the game needs to work towards, and this reflects the power of synergy and intra block design. Too much synergy, namely having too many Sol Lands destroyed a metagame. Prior to that discovery, we had an interesting new deck that in a year's time would have been a fine addition to the Tier 1.5 metagame. Two different realities, but one fact. If we can save the format from the Eldrazi Winter, so may we return in part to the drawing board and see the rise of a new, more pro-Modern Eldrazi deck especially in hopes that Emrakul's set will bring some fine new additions to the brood. That's the vision of Magic. Go back and read some of the BX Eldrazi Processor threads about people trying to figure the deck out. That's competitive Magic, not this aberration turned abomination.
Returning to a cleaner slate, we can begin again. Wiser.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
Yes, except for the premise of Twin being banned, it's great. That however, is just factually incorrect. It was not "bleeding diversity" by any means. 2015 was one of the most, if not THE most diverse years Modern has ever had. Which goes completely with the crux of players' dissatisfaction with the way Wizards handles Modern, its banned list, and its policies. Every reason they gave for the ban has been either borderline misleading, outright false, or produced the exact opposite effect. That was the tipping point that put players into unrest and the Eldrazi problem just made things worse. The laughably hypocritical statements made by Aaron Forsythe about not wanting to nuke Eldrazi out of existence (something they had no problem doing to Twin) showcased the complete disconnect Wizards has between theory and reality. It's something they have admitted to numerous times when they say they do not test for bans, unbans, or new cards in Modern. Up until Twin, Wizards had actually shown pretty strong and reliable consistency with its bans. However, if they don't nuke Eldrazi completely, then the Twin ban is just spitting in the face of players in addition to demonstrating further that Wizards knows F-all about Modern as a format.
They do not even test bans. Like, we are playing a format they completely neglected to manage by anything other than gut feel and a need to have a 'FRESH' meta which they barely understand.
That's our reality.
Polemics doesn't win the debate, especially with me.
Right now, we know a few things:
1. Urza Block almost killed Magic because the deck was so efficient that a game was decided on a dice roll
2. Bloom was a difficult to play deck that with time refined itself over a year to go from a backwater combo deck to a real threat once it was in the hands of a Pro. It was a difficult to play against, that while requiring skill and specific cards to know how to sequence. The statistics bore out that it's win percentage was higher than average and destroyed value. Given enough time, it would have caught on more if it wasn't the fear of an impending ban and that Americans tend to play aggro or midrange decks over combo or at least combo similar to infect decks.
The deck had a year in part because it was still under the radar, once the radar came it was under a microscope.
3. Twin was a police deck, that gradually became "Twin+" and shifted out Jeskai and Scapeshift decks out of the game. It had 2 years or so, and became a staple of rotating decks with Tron and a few others. However, because of the refinement of the deck and slowly bleeding diversity it was banned.
4. Pod was gaining market share because it was an easy deck to build and play, but boring to play against and difficult to stop. Finally died especially with the rise of Collected Company.
5. Eldrazi is unique in that it started out as Processor that evolved into Aggro roughly a month ago. Eldrazi "Menace" was known as early as late December for those of us who were early adopters. The new shift was aggro when someone cracked the deck into aggro mode. There were a few variants like a BGX Eldrazi deck.
The current Eldrazi Deck is an aberration, but does not compare to Urza Block's pervasiveness or power level making that Urza Block deck a complete abomination that almost consumed and ate Magic alive. This isn't apologetics, it's analyzing history and consistency in branding and design and rules set expectations.
In terms of everything you're angry about the Eldrazi deck being everywhere. I understand that, because I have been there as well at different times during Magic. Have you played Standard during the original Mirrodin block with Affinity when it was actually Affinity? That was a nightmare too, that obliterated any concept of Magic in standard for quite sometime. Eldrazi is more similar to Pod and Bloom, it's interactive in weird ways but not enough so that people can't really stop it comfortably without huge new shifts in their game play.
The deck as is survives one block cycle, rather than an entire year. What he wants to do is maintain as leader that he is on the case and is thinking about Modern as a format and that they do care as one of the faces of Magic. He also wants to maintain regular order and establish a relationship with deck builders. That you can break the format, but you cannot break it forever. The game is not where it was twenty years ago with Urza Block in which an entire block destroyed the entire game.
Today, the deck will send ripple effects into the game for several years, but will not destroy Magic. Bloom Titan and Twin were both broken for an entire year. This will be a much smaller cycle. There is a process, they have an idea what they're doing and that's what they want to maintain is order. The breakers get their day in the sun and get to profit, while people get a chance to battle against it and it creates some interesting stories.
If you look at the Eldrazi Processor deck threads and the amount of interest that the deck created by several players, you will see a series of decks that were refined and built. The downside, though, is that Processor is dying a slow death and aggro and midrange versions will live on unless if a type of Processor survives. Eldrazi will hopefully remain tier 1-2, but will not devastate the format as it used to.
Oh please stop pretending that Bloom or Twin ever even came to close to the current Eldrazi. I don't think Amulet Bloom ever had more than 10% metashare and I think Twin had something like 15% at its peak? How is this comparable to the 40+% of Eldrazi?
It doesn't matter gameshare, what matters is that there was a process and that as the decks became more and more of a threat and a spotlight was placed under them there was a course of action followed.
Pod, I believe, took too long to ban. Amulet Bloom lasted a year for a deck that not until the end of its life cycle started to catch on more, but remained difficult to play and with that one Mod's statistics website even stated that Bloom had a high win percentage than normal for a deck and that nerfing the deck was consistent.
If we're to look at something, we need to talk about a few concepts:
1. Adoption cycle
2. Marketing and communications
3. Establishing expectations and patterns of behaviors
The Eldrazi Aggro deck has had one of the fastest adoption rates in Magic in years. I stated Eldrazi Aggro, because Eldrazi Processor has major issues with specific decks and is rather beatable. To quote another player, "I don't like that deck, because it loses to itself." Processor was discovered early in December and gained traction for early adopters during late December around Christmas with the middle adopter period and going viral around January 1st. You can watch the price of Eye of Ugin spiking.
Eventually Aggro was released and Eye of Ugin went up to $45-$50, it is now last I checked at $35 and not moving in price as no one wants the card anymore because of the ban in a few weeks.
Early->Middle->Late
For the most part the card is most expensive at the Late phase, however since the deck is being killed off in its current form there are no more late adopters at this point and the Middle Adopters when the Aggro deck went viral would and are the Late adopters to a dead deck.
Forsythe is communicating a "we're leading, and looking into this and we know you're really ticked off please come yell at me." However, for the most part people are angry but considering no one saw this level of deck for quite sometime. We must conclude another point, that Bloom vs. Eldrazi Aggro was quicker and more efficient because Bloom is more difficult play, period, and why it took longer to crack the deck code and to lead to a ban.
By doing an emergency ban, this kills off deck designers with an incentive to build decks. Since you buy into a new deck and it dies immediately. And considering people are paying good money for decks, having some waylay between a deck's discovery through some adoption cycle to see the full meta shift. We have the evidence now that the deck is a Tier 0 deck. No one is arguing that.
The question is on relative speed, and for the most part we can even look at the earliest version of the deck:
This deck is the missing link between Processor's evolution into Aggro as the earliest nearest common ancestor to both Processor and Aggro. This comes from 1/31/16.
So let's do some math. Today is 3/8/16.
When the thing crawled out of the slimy cesspool, it's been 38 days of Eldrazi Aggro in it's Proto evolutionary form. The ban will be one month from now, which will be two months of Eldrazi.
So two months?
Two months.
So if we bifurcate the conversation between three different Eldrazi base decks:
1. Aggro
2. Processor
3. Dread Summonsing
The current cries about bans weren't around with the Tier 2 Processor or the Dread Summonsing version, it was when Aggro came on board with the earliest we can date right now 1/31 being generous and not seeing the fully refined list we see today.
Each of those decks had a different style and play to them, even between the different color combination for Processor there were variations and feasted on graveyard decks. It was an interesting concept, and a deck that had weaknesses. Dread Summonsing was it's own deck, even now short lived and interesting.
Aggro destroyed the meta.
But does it warrant an emergency ban? No.
Because let's start with a good article on this on why we need Eldrazi Winter:
I feel Sheridan Lardner does a good analysis here on keeping "the reality" of the situation understood.
My own understanding comes from more of a larger historical understanding, looking at the worst of the game with Urza Block towards other "bad times" prior to Modern concepts on design across the game and on what I consider necessary emergency bans. Urza Block was decided on a dice roll. That's Super Tier 0, no comparison to this Tier 0.
And speaking as someone who has played Vintage, Legacy, and on and on. I have my own perspective on this issue, that kneejerk reactions to kill off a deck that has potential is hyperbolic. Eldrazi has fans, I'm one of them. And we'd like to see Eldrazi fixed without destroying the deck. I own several other Modern decks. Processor was wonderful without breaking everything, Aggro destroyed the Eldrazi Brand.
So the middle ground is to analyze what is broken with the deck and specifically look at the data and the sense of the meta with a Tier 0. This isn't a year of hell, rather it is 2 months. I don't play Pro Tours, I care about FNM and FNM has seen warps with the meta. And I agree with a ban, but not at the time frame to warrant an emergency ban. This isn't Urza Block, probably the worst time in Magic. I also believe that A VERSION of Eldrazi is necessary in the format.
What I want to see is:
A. Eldrazi Tron
B. Eldrazi Aggro
C. Eldrazi Midrange
Each of those decks survive in some fashion, but not in their current fashion. I do not believe that Processor can live on as is and will be absorbed into one of the largest deck variants. We'll see some floundering as it gets hit hard to Tier 2, but survival is necessary for deck diversity. This would mean that a new tribe has emerged, a new deck variant has emerged, and a new era of Modern has shown that backwards compatibility with cards can create new decks when we revisit old planes. This also means that a new deck may come into existence with Emrakul's set.
That's the point in deck building, let's ignore Aggro's metashare and so forth but look at the pre Feburary world. There were three new decks available and each were competitive. They raised a lot of interest in the format. I for one am greatly annoyed that the innovation we saw from December through January did persist longer without the devastating results to see this Tier 0 deck emerge. That there is our reality, building deck building communities and people talking about their own version of the decks.
That's how each block should be for Modern. Bringing in new decks. That's what we want. And that's what the game needs to work towards, and this reflects the power of synergy and intra block design. Too much synergy, namely having too many Sol Lands destroyed a metagame. Prior to that discovery, we had an interesting new deck that in a year's time would have been a fine addition to the Tier 1.5 metagame. Two different realities, but one fact. If we can save the format from the Eldrazi Winter, so may we return in part to the drawing board and see the rise of a new, more pro-Modern Eldrazi deck especially in hopes that Emrakul's set will bring some fine new additions to the brood. That's the vision of Magic. Go back and read some of the BX Eldrazi Processor threads about people trying to figure the deck out. That's competitive Magic, not this aberration turned abomination.
Returning to a cleaner slate, we can begin again. Wiser.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
Yes, except for the premise of Twin being banned, it's great. That however, is just factually incorrect. It was not "bleeding diversity" by any means. 2015 was one of the most, if not THE most diverse years Modern has ever had. Which goes completely with the crux of players' dissatisfaction with the way Wizards handles Modern, its banned list, and its policies. Every reason they gave for the ban has been either borderline misleading, outright false, or produced the exact opposite effect. That was the tipping point that put players into unrest and the Eldrazi problem just made things worse. The laughably hypocritical statements made by Aaron Forsythe about not wanting to nuke Eldrazi out of existence (something they had no problem doing to Twin) showcased the complete disconnect Wizards has between theory and reality. It's something they have admitted to numerous times when they say they do not test for bans, unbans, or new cards in Modern. Up until Twin, Wizards had actually shown pretty strong and reliable consistency with its bans. However, if they don't nuke Eldrazi completely, then the Twin ban is just spitting in the face of players in addition to demonstrating further that Wizards knows F-all about Modern as a format.
I just need you to know that this is 100% your opinion about the issue and not a fact. It is fine to have this opinion, it is largely a defensible opinion, but just because you're angry that your deck got banned (I get it!!) does not make this subjective interpretation of a series of events objective. I 100% agree with Aaron about his comments about Eldrazi, and I think he took a very measured and balanced approach to talking about the bannings (something that is fairly unprecedented for Wizards).
Wizards did not nuke twin. They nerfed it a turn and made it susceptible to bolt. It's still a VERY powerful deck, but it's now in line with many of the other decks that have to deal with swingy matchups and don't have an almost 50/50 win % against the field. That's what they intend to do with Eldrazi, because just as much as you love twin and had it close, some people REALLY like Eldrazi and they're allowed to also want to get to play their deck in modern.
cfusionpm, there's actually no current hypocrisy regarding "I don't want to nuke Eldrazi" and what they did to Twin or Pod. First, the issue isn't ripe yet. Lets wait until we actually know what's being banned before we cry foul. But second, AF didn't actually say they aren't going to nuke the deck. Everybody thinks he said it, but HE DIDN'T ACTUALLY SAY IT. Here's what AF said, copied/pasted from the OP of this thread:
I mean, our goal is not going to be "Nuke the Eldrazi deck from existence".
I think that's the wrong... but we could do that, we coul pick multiple cards, make sure none of this no version of this shows up
BDM- but we know nuking this deck from orbit is the only way to be safe, right?
AF- I dont't wanna..No. Well, I don't think the goal is to necessarily make sure nothing like this ever happens again, I think this is just gonna happen when we make new magic
cards but I would like to see some version of the Eldrazi deck be part of Modern. I think, there are good play patterns involved here, it is after all
kind of a efficient creature deck and you know, it's just too efficient right now, ah, there's a couple of way's we could approach that, and I think we
could actually test some of those paths, becasue our goal is to make sure the deck sticks around. Ah, at least that's my goal, we'll see what the rest
of the guys back at the office think
So he says it's his personal preference not to nuke it but that they could end up doing that anyway and that other people back at WOTC may want that.
They do not even test bans. Like, we are playing a format they completely neglected to manage by anything other than gut feel and a need to have a 'FRESH' meta which they barely understand.
That's our reality.
Polemics doesn't win the debate, especially with me.
Right now, we know a few things:
1. Urza Block almost killed Magic because the deck was so efficient that a game was decided on a dice roll
2. Bloom was a difficult to play deck that with time refined itself over a year to go from a backwater combo deck to a real threat once it was in the hands of a Pro. It was a difficult to play against, that while requiring skill and specific cards to know how to sequence. The statistics bore out that it's win percentage was higher than average and destroyed value. Given enough time, it would have caught on more if it wasn't the fear of an impending ban and that Americans tend to play aggro or midrange decks over combo or at least combo similar to infect decks.
The deck had a year in part because it was still under the radar, once the radar came it was under a microscope.
3. Twin was a police deck, that gradually became "Twin+" and shifted out Jeskai and Scapeshift decks out of the game. It had 2 years or so, and became a staple of rotating decks with Tron and a few others. However, because of the refinement of the deck and slowly bleeding diversity it was banned.
4. Pod was gaining market share because it was an easy deck to build and play, but boring to play against and difficult to stop. Finally died especially with the rise of Collected Company.
5. Eldrazi is unique in that it started out as Processor that evolved into Aggro roughly a month ago. Eldrazi "Menace" was known as early as late December for those of us who were early adopters. The new shift was aggro when someone cracked the deck into aggro mode. There were a few variants like a BGX Eldrazi deck.
The current Eldrazi Deck is an aberration, but does not compare to Urza Block's pervasiveness or power level making that Urza Block deck a complete abomination that almost consumed and ate Magic alive. This isn't apologetics, it's analyzing history and consistency in branding and design and rules set expectations.
In terms of everything you're angry about the Eldrazi deck being everywhere. I understand that, because I have been there as well at different times during Magic. Have you played Standard during the original Mirrodin block with Affinity when it was actually Affinity? That was a nightmare too, that obliterated any concept of Magic in standard for quite sometime. Eldrazi is more similar to Pod and Bloom, it's interactive in weird ways but not enough so that people can't really stop it comfortably without huge new shifts in their game play.
Oh please stop pretending that Bloom or Twin ever even came to close to the current Eldrazi. I don't think Amulet Bloom ever had more than 10% metashare and I think Twin had something like 15% at its peak? How is this comparable to the 40+% of Eldrazi?
It doesn't matter gameshare, what matters is that there was a process and that as the decks became more and more of a threat and a spotlight was placed under them there was a course of action followed.
Pod, I believe, took too long to ban. Amulet Bloom lasted a year for a deck that not until the end of its life cycle started to catch on more, but remained difficult to play and with that one Mod's statistics website even stated that Bloom had a high win percentage than normal for a deck and that nerfing the deck was consistent.
If we're to look at something, we need to talk about a few concepts:
1. Adoption cycle
2. Marketing and communications
3. Establishing expectations and patterns of behaviors
The Eldrazi Aggro deck has had one of the fastest adoption rates in Magic in years. I stated Eldrazi Aggro, because Eldrazi Processor has major issues with specific decks and is rather beatable. To quote another player, "I don't like that deck, because it loses to itself." Processor was discovered early in December and gained traction for early adopters during late December around Christmas with the middle adopter period and going viral around January 1st. You can watch the price of Eye of Ugin spiking.
Eventually Aggro was released and Eye of Ugin went up to $45-$50, it is now last I checked at $35 and not moving in price as no one wants the card anymore because of the ban in a few weeks.
Early->Middle->Late
For the most part the card is most expensive at the Late phase, however since the deck is being killed off in its current form there are no more late adopters at this point and the Middle Adopters when the Aggro deck went viral would and are the Late adopters to a dead deck.
Forsythe is communicating a "we're leading, and looking into this and we know you're really ticked off please come yell at me." However, for the most part people are angry but considering no one saw this level of deck for quite sometime. We must conclude another point, that Bloom vs. Eldrazi Aggro was quicker and more efficient because Bloom is more difficult play, period, and why it took longer to crack the deck code and to lead to a ban.
By doing an emergency ban, this kills off deck designers with an incentive to build decks. Since you buy into a new deck and it dies immediately. And considering people are paying good money for decks, having some waylay between a deck's discovery through some adoption cycle to see the full meta shift. We have the evidence now that the deck is a Tier 0 deck. No one is arguing that.
The question is on relative speed, and for the most part we can even look at the earliest version of the deck:
This deck is the missing link between Processor's evolution into Aggro as the earliest nearest common ancestor to both Processor and Aggro. This comes from 1/31/16.
So let's do some math. Today is 3/8/16.
When the thing crawled out of the slimy cesspool, it's been 38 days of Eldrazi Aggro in it's Proto evolutionary form. The ban will be one month from now, which will be two months of Eldrazi.
So two months?
Two months.
So if we bifurcate the conversation between three different Eldrazi base decks:
1. Aggro
2. Processor
3. Dread Summonsing
The current cries about bans weren't around with the Tier 2 Processor or the Dread Summonsing version, it was when Aggro came on board with the earliest we can date right now 1/31 being generous and not seeing the fully refined list we see today.
Each of those decks had a different style and play to them, even between the different color combination for Processor there were variations and feasted on graveyard decks. It was an interesting concept, and a deck that had weaknesses. Dread Summonsing was it's own deck, even now short lived and interesting.
Aggro destroyed the meta.
But does it warrant an emergency ban? No.
Because let's start with a good article on this on why we need Eldrazi Winter:
I feel Sheridan Lardner does a good analysis here on keeping "the reality" of the situation understood.
My own understanding comes from more of a larger historical understanding, looking at the worst of the game with Urza Block towards other "bad times" prior to Modern concepts on design across the game and on what I consider necessary emergency bans. Urza Block was decided on a dice roll. That's Super Tier 0, no comparison to this Tier 0.
And speaking as someone who has played Vintage, Legacy, and on and on. I have my own perspective on this issue, that kneejerk reactions to kill off a deck that has potential is hyperbolic. Eldrazi has fans, I'm one of them. And we'd like to see Eldrazi fixed without destroying the deck. I own several other Modern decks. Processor was wonderful without breaking everything, Aggro destroyed the Eldrazi Brand.
So the middle ground is to analyze what is broken with the deck and specifically look at the data and the sense of the meta with a Tier 0. This isn't a year of hell, rather it is 2 months. I don't play Pro Tours, I care about FNM and FNM has seen warps with the meta. And I agree with a ban, but not at the time frame to warrant an emergency ban. This isn't Urza Block, probably the worst time in Magic. I also believe that A VERSION of Eldrazi is necessary in the format.
What I want to see is:
A. Eldrazi Tron
B. Eldrazi Aggro
C. Eldrazi Midrange
Each of those decks survive in some fashion, but not in their current fashion. I do not believe that Processor can live on as is and will be absorbed into one of the largest deck variants. We'll see some floundering as it gets hit hard to Tier 2, but survival is necessary for deck diversity. This would mean that a new tribe has emerged, a new deck variant has emerged, and a new era of Modern has shown that backwards compatibility with cards can create new decks when we revisit old planes. This also means that a new deck may come into existence with Emrakul's set.
That's the point in deck building, let's ignore Aggro's metashare and so forth but look at the pre Feburary world. There were three new decks available and each were competitive. They raised a lot of interest in the format. I for one am greatly annoyed that the innovation we saw from December through January did persist longer without the devastating results to see this Tier 0 deck emerge. That there is our reality, building deck building communities and people talking about their own version of the decks.
That's how each block should be for Modern. Bringing in new decks. That's what we want. And that's what the game needs to work towards, and this reflects the power of synergy and intra block design. Too much synergy, namely having too many Sol Lands destroyed a metagame. Prior to that discovery, we had an interesting new deck that in a year's time would have been a fine addition to the Tier 1.5 metagame. Two different realities, but one fact. If we can save the format from the Eldrazi Winter, so may we return in part to the drawing board and see the rise of a new, more pro-Modern Eldrazi deck especially in hopes that Emrakul's set will bring some fine new additions to the brood. That's the vision of Magic. Go back and read some of the BX Eldrazi Processor threads about people trying to figure the deck out. That's competitive Magic, not this aberration turned abomination.
Returning to a cleaner slate, we can begin again. Wiser.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
Yes, except for the premise of Twin being banned, it's great. That however, is just factually incorrect. It was not "bleeding diversity" by any means. 2015 was one of the most, if not THE most diverse years Modern has ever had. Which goes completely with the crux of players' dissatisfaction with the way Wizards handles Modern, its banned list, and its policies. Every reason they gave for the ban has been either borderline misleading, outright false, or produced the exact opposite effect. That was the tipping point that put players into unrest and the Eldrazi problem just made things worse. The laughably hypocritical statements made by Aaron Forsythe about not wanting to nuke Eldrazi out of existence (something they had no problem doing to Twin) showcased the complete disconnect Wizards has between theory and reality. It's something they have admitted to numerous times when they say they do not test for bans, unbans, or new cards in Modern. Up until Twin, Wizards had actually shown pretty strong and reliable consistency with its bans. However, if they don't nuke Eldrazi completely, then the Twin ban is just spitting in the face of players in addition to demonstrating further that Wizards knows F-all about Modern as a format.
I just need you to know that this is 100% your opinion about the issue and not a fact. It is fine to have this opinion, it is largely a defensible opinion, but just because you're angry that your deck got banned (I get it!!) does not make this subjective interpretation of a series of events objective. I 100% agree with Aaron about his comments about Eldrazi, and I think he took a very measured and balanced approach to talking about the bannings (something that is fairly unprecedented for Wizards).
Wizards did not nuke twin. They nerfed it a turn and made it susceptible to bolt. It's still a VERY powerful deck, but it's now in line with many of the other decks that have to deal with swingy matchups and don't have an almost 50/50 win % against the field. That's what they intend to do with Eldrazi, because just as much as you love twin and had it close, some people REALLY like Eldrazi and they're allowed to also want to get to play their deck in modern.
If that is their definition of "not nuking" a deck, I would be happy to see the same treatment of Eldrazi. Ban the engine that allows the deck to do broken and powerful things (both lands). Casting the creatures for the cost printed on the card is fair. Making you spend resources with limitations or drawbacks to subvert that cost is fair. Free, painless, multi-use, 2-mana lands designed to work with heavily-pushed, efficient, aggressively-costed, 2-for-1 creatures have no place in Modern.
Polemics doesn't win the debate, especially with me.
Right now, we know a few things:
1. Urza Block almost killed Magic because the deck was so efficient that a game was decided on a dice roll
2. Bloom was a difficult to play deck that with time refined itself over a year to go from a backwater combo deck to a real threat once it was in the hands of a Pro. It was a difficult to play against, that while requiring skill and specific cards to know how to sequence. The statistics bore out that it's win percentage was higher than average and destroyed value. Given enough time, it would have caught on more if it wasn't the fear of an impending ban and that Americans tend to play aggro or midrange decks over combo or at least combo similar to infect decks.
The deck had a year in part because it was still under the radar, once the radar came it was under a microscope.
3. Twin was a police deck, that gradually became "Twin+" and shifted out Jeskai and Scapeshift decks out of the game. It had 2 years or so, and became a staple of rotating decks with Tron and a few others. However, because of the refinement of the deck and slowly bleeding diversity it was banned.
4. Pod was gaining market share because it was an easy deck to build and play, but boring to play against and difficult to stop. Finally died especially with the rise of Collected Company.
5. Eldrazi is unique in that it started out as Processor that evolved into Aggro roughly a month ago. Eldrazi "Menace" was known as early as late December for those of us who were early adopters. The new shift was aggro when someone cracked the deck into aggro mode. There were a few variants like a BGX Eldrazi deck.
The current Eldrazi Deck is an aberration, but does not compare to Urza Block's pervasiveness or power level making that Urza Block deck a complete abomination that almost consumed and ate Magic alive. This isn't apologetics, it's analyzing history and consistency in branding and design and rules set expectations.
In terms of everything you're angry about the Eldrazi deck being everywhere. I understand that, because I have been there as well at different times during Magic. Have you played Standard during the original Mirrodin block with Affinity when it was actually Affinity? That was a nightmare too, that obliterated any concept of Magic in standard for quite sometime. Eldrazi is more similar to Pod and Bloom, it's interactive in weird ways but not enough so that people can't really stop it comfortably without huge new shifts in their game play.
It doesn't matter gameshare, what matters is that there was a process and that as the decks became more and more of a threat and a spotlight was placed under them there was a course of action followed.
Pod, I believe, took too long to ban. Amulet Bloom lasted a year for a deck that not until the end of its life cycle started to catch on more, but remained difficult to play and with that one Mod's statistics website even stated that Bloom had a high win percentage than normal for a deck and that nerfing the deck was consistent.
If we're to look at something, we need to talk about a few concepts:
1. Adoption cycle
2. Marketing and communications
3. Establishing expectations and patterns of behaviors
The Eldrazi Aggro deck has had one of the fastest adoption rates in Magic in years. I stated Eldrazi Aggro, because Eldrazi Processor has major issues with specific decks and is rather beatable. To quote another player, "I don't like that deck, because it loses to itself." Processor was discovered early in December and gained traction for early adopters during late December around Christmas with the middle adopter period and going viral around January 1st. You can watch the price of Eye of Ugin spiking.
Eventually Aggro was released and Eye of Ugin went up to $45-$50, it is now last I checked at $35 and not moving in price as no one wants the card anymore because of the ban in a few weeks.
Early->Middle->Late
For the most part the card is most expensive at the Late phase, however since the deck is being killed off in its current form there are no more late adopters at this point and the Middle Adopters when the Aggro deck went viral would and are the Late adopters to a dead deck.
Forsythe is communicating a "we're leading, and looking into this and we know you're really ticked off please come yell at me." However, for the most part people are angry but considering no one saw this level of deck for quite sometime. We must conclude another point, that Bloom vs. Eldrazi Aggro was quicker and more efficient because Bloom is more difficult play, period, and why it took longer to crack the deck code and to lead to a ban.
By doing an emergency ban, this kills off deck designers with an incentive to build decks. Since you buy into a new deck and it dies immediately. And considering people are paying good money for decks, having some waylay between a deck's discovery through some adoption cycle to see the full meta shift. We have the evidence now that the deck is a Tier 0 deck. No one is arguing that.
The question is on relative speed, and for the most part we can even look at the earliest version of the deck:
This deck is the missing link between Processor's evolution into Aggro as the earliest nearest common ancestor to both Processor and Aggro. This comes from 1/31/16.
So let's do some math. Today is 3/8/16.
When the thing crawled out of the slimy cesspool, it's been 38 days of Eldrazi Aggro in it's Proto evolutionary form. The ban will be one month from now, which will be two months of Eldrazi.
So two months?
Two months.
So if we bifurcate the conversation between three different Eldrazi base decks:
1. Aggro
2. Processor
3. Dread Summonsing
The current cries about bans weren't around with the Tier 2 Processor or the Dread Summonsing version, it was when Aggro came on board with the earliest we can date right now 1/31 being generous and not seeing the fully refined list we see today.
Each of those decks had a different style and play to them, even between the different color combination for Processor there were variations and feasted on graveyard decks. It was an interesting concept, and a deck that had weaknesses. Dread Summonsing was it's own deck, even now short lived and interesting.
Aggro destroyed the meta.
But does it warrant an emergency ban? No.
Because let's start with a good article on this on why we need Eldrazi Winter:
I feel Sheridan Lardner does a good analysis here on keeping "the reality" of the situation understood.
My own understanding comes from more of a larger historical understanding, looking at the worst of the game with Urza Block towards other "bad times" prior to Modern concepts on design across the game and on what I consider necessary emergency bans. Urza Block was decided on a dice roll. That's Super Tier 0, no comparison to this Tier 0.
And speaking as someone who has played Vintage, Legacy, and on and on. I have my own perspective on this issue, that kneejerk reactions to kill off a deck that has potential is hyperbolic. Eldrazi has fans, I'm one of them. And we'd like to see Eldrazi fixed without destroying the deck. I own several other Modern decks. Processor was wonderful without breaking everything, Aggro destroyed the Eldrazi Brand.
So the middle ground is to analyze what is broken with the deck and specifically look at the data and the sense of the meta with a Tier 0. This isn't a year of hell, rather it is 2 months. I don't play Pro Tours, I care about FNM and FNM has seen warps with the meta. And I agree with a ban, but not at the time frame to warrant an emergency ban. This isn't Urza Block, probably the worst time in Magic. I also believe that A VERSION of Eldrazi is necessary in the format.
What I want to see is:
A. Eldrazi Tron
B. Eldrazi Aggro
C. Eldrazi Midrange
Each of those decks survive in some fashion, but not in their current fashion. I do not believe that Processor can live on as is and will be absorbed into one of the largest deck variants. We'll see some floundering as it gets hit hard to Tier 2, but survival is necessary for deck diversity. This would mean that a new tribe has emerged, a new deck variant has emerged, and a new era of Modern has shown that backwards compatibility with cards can create new decks when we revisit old planes. This also means that a new deck may come into existence with Emrakul's set.
That's the point in deck building, let's ignore Aggro's metashare and so forth but look at the pre Feburary world. There were three new decks available and each were competitive. They raised a lot of interest in the format. I for one am greatly annoyed that the innovation we saw from December through January did persist longer without the devastating results to see this Tier 0 deck emerge. That there is our reality, building deck building communities and people talking about their own version of the decks.
That's how each block should be for Modern. Bringing in new decks. That's what we want. And that's what the game needs to work towards, and this reflects the power of synergy and intra block design. Too much synergy, namely having too many Sol Lands destroyed a metagame. Prior to that discovery, we had an interesting new deck that in a year's time would have been a fine addition to the Tier 1.5 metagame. Two different realities, but one fact. If we can save the format from the Eldrazi Winter, so may we return in part to the drawing board and see the rise of a new, more pro-Modern Eldrazi deck especially in hopes that Emrakul's set will bring some fine new additions to the brood. That's the vision of Magic. Go back and read some of the BX Eldrazi Processor threads about people trying to figure the deck out. That's competitive Magic, not this aberration turned abomination.
Returning to a cleaner slate, we can begin again. Wiser.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
Yes, except for the premise of Twin being banned, it's great. That however, is just factually incorrect. It was not "bleeding diversity" by any means. 2015 was one of the most, if not THE most diverse years Modern has ever had. Which goes completely with the crux of players' dissatisfaction with the way Wizards handles Modern, its banned list, and its policies. Every reason they gave for the ban has been either borderline misleading, outright false, or produced the exact opposite effect. That was the tipping point that put players into unrest and the Eldrazi problem just made things worse. The laughably hypocritical statements made by Aaron Forsythe about not wanting to nuke Eldrazi out of existence (something they had no problem doing to Twin) showcased the complete disconnect Wizards has between theory and reality. It's something they have admitted to numerous times when they say they do not test for bans, unbans, or new cards in Modern. Up until Twin, Wizards had actually shown pretty strong and reliable consistency with its bans. However, if they don't nuke Eldrazi completely, then the Twin ban is just spitting in the face of players in addition to demonstrating further that Wizards knows F-all about Modern as a format.
I just need you to know that this is 100% your opinion about the issue and not a fact. It is fine to have this opinion, it is largely a defensible opinion, but just because you're angry that your deck got banned (I get it!!) does not make this subjective interpretation of a series of events objective. I 100% agree with Aaron about his comments about Eldrazi, and I think he took a very measured and balanced approach to talking about the bannings (something that is fairly unprecedented for Wizards).
Wizards did not nuke twin. They nerfed it a turn and made it susceptible to bolt. It's still a VERY powerful deck, but it's now in line with many of the other decks that have to deal with swingy matchups and don't have an almost 50/50 win % against the field. That's what they intend to do with Eldrazi, because just as much as you love twin and had it close, some people REALLY like Eldrazi and they're allowed to also want to get to play their deck in modern.
If that is their definition of "not nuking" a deck, I would be happy to see the same treatment of Eldrazi. Ban the engine that allows the deck to do broken and powerful things (both lands). Casting the creatures for the cost printed on the card is fair. Making you spend resources with limitations or drawbacks to subvert that cost is fair. Free, painless, multi-use, 2-mana lands designed to work with heavily-pushed, efficient, aggressively-costed, 2-for-1 creatures have no place in Modern.
That's what I'm saying though, you have no idea if that's what they're going to do or not. You're pissed about a thing that hasn't even happened yet!
You know what I find funny is they say they don't have enough time to test for modern, but 4 people in my area were already brewing with eldrazi most of the oath spoilers were out, and they were all saying to me it was a very fast deck. I just find it sad that such an obvious interaction like eye of ugin was missed. When quite a few players were like that's gonna be sweet right away.
You know what I find funny is they say they don't have enough time to test for modern, but 4 people in my area were already brewing with eldrazi most of the oath spoilers were out, and they were all saying to me it was a very fast deck. I just find it sad that such an obvious interaction like eye of ugin was missed. When quite a few players were like that's gonna be sweet right away.
What you and many other people are missing is that it doesn't matter. They could KNOW that they're breaking all of the older formats and it wouldn't matter. They ONLY print cards in standard that are made for Standard and Limited. Period. This has been stated by Maro for years and years - they will ALWAYS address power issues through post release bannings.
You know what I find funny is they say they don't have enough time to test for modern, but 4 people in my area were already brewing with eldrazi most of the oath spoilers were out, and they were all saying to me it was a very fast deck. I just find it sad that such an obvious interaction like eye of ugin was missed. When quite a few players were like that's gonna be sweet right away.
ian duke said during the PT coverage that they knew and decided to ignore it.
You know what I find funny is they say they don't have enough time to test for modern, but 4 people in my area were already brewing with eldrazi most of the oath spoilers were out, and they were all saying to me it was a very fast deck. I just find it sad that such an obvious interaction like eye of ugin was missed. When quite a few players were like that's gonna be sweet right away.
ian duke said during the PT coverage that they knew and decided to ignore it.
It simply doesn't matter - all of us are playing a format that is beholden to a different format. If Ancestral Recall was going to be a good fit in a standard environment they would print it and then ban it out of the older formats. ...wait. They DID do that, because that's what they said they were going to do.
They do not even test bans. Like, we are playing a format they completely neglected to manage by anything other than gut feel and a need to have a 'FRESH' meta which they barely understand.
That's our reality.
Polemics doesn't win the debate, especially with me.
Right now, we know a few things:
1. Urza Block almost killed Magic because the deck was so efficient that a game was decided on a dice roll
2. Bloom was a difficult to play deck that with time refined itself over a year to go from a backwater combo deck to a real threat once it was in the hands of a Pro. It was a difficult to play against, that while requiring skill and specific cards to know how to sequence. The statistics bore out that it's win percentage was higher than average and destroyed value. Given enough time, it would have caught on more if it wasn't the fear of an impending ban and that Americans tend to play aggro or midrange decks over combo or at least combo similar to infect decks.
The deck had a year in part because it was still under the radar, once the radar came it was under a microscope.
3. Twin was a police deck, that gradually became "Twin+" and shifted out Jeskai and Scapeshift decks out of the game. It had 2 years or so, and became a staple of rotating decks with Tron and a few others. However, because of the refinement of the deck and slowly bleeding diversity it was banned.
4. Pod was gaining market share because it was an easy deck to build and play, but boring to play against and difficult to stop. Finally died especially with the rise of Collected Company.
5. Eldrazi is unique in that it started out as Processor that evolved into Aggro roughly a month ago. Eldrazi "Menace" was known as early as late December for those of us who were early adopters. The new shift was aggro when someone cracked the deck into aggro mode. There were a few variants like a BGX Eldrazi deck.
The current Eldrazi Deck is an aberration, but does not compare to Urza Block's pervasiveness or power level making that Urza Block deck a complete abomination that almost consumed and ate Magic alive. This isn't apologetics, it's analyzing history and consistency in branding and design and rules set expectations.
In terms of everything you're angry about the Eldrazi deck being everywhere. I understand that, because I have been there as well at different times during Magic. Have you played Standard during the original Mirrodin block with Affinity when it was actually Affinity? That was a nightmare too, that obliterated any concept of Magic in standard for quite sometime. Eldrazi is more similar to Pod and Bloom, it's interactive in weird ways but not enough so that people can't really stop it comfortably without huge new shifts in their game play.
The deck as is survives one block cycle, rather than an entire year. What he wants to do is maintain as leader that he is on the case and is thinking about Modern as a format and that they do care as one of the faces of Magic. He also wants to maintain regular order and establish a relationship with deck builders. That you can break the format, but you cannot break it forever. The game is not where it was twenty years ago with Urza Block in which an entire block destroyed the entire game.
Today, the deck will send ripple effects into the game for several years, but will not destroy Magic. Bloom Titan and Twin were both broken for an entire year. This will be a much smaller cycle. There is a process, they have an idea what they're doing and that's what they want to maintain is order. The breakers get their day in the sun and get to profit, while people get a chance to battle against it and it creates some interesting stories.
If you look at the Eldrazi Processor deck threads and the amount of interest that the deck created by several players, you will see a series of decks that were refined and built. The downside, though, is that Processor is dying a slow death and aggro and midrange versions will live on unless if a type of Processor survives. Eldrazi will hopefully remain tier 1-2, but will not devastate the format as it used to.
Oh please stop pretending that Bloom or Twin ever even came to close to the current Eldrazi. I don't think Amulet Bloom ever had more than 10% metashare and I think Twin had something like 15% at its peak? How is this comparable to the 40+% of Eldrazi?
It doesn't matter gameshare, what matters is that there was a process and that as the decks became more and more of a threat and a spotlight was placed under them there was a course of action followed.
Pod, I believe, took too long to ban. Amulet Bloom lasted a year for a deck that not until the end of its life cycle started to catch on more, but remained difficult to play and with that one Mod's statistics website even stated that Bloom had a high win percentage than normal for a deck and that nerfing the deck was consistent.
If we're to look at something, we need to talk about a few concepts:
1. Adoption cycle
2. Marketing and communications
3. Establishing expectations and patterns of behaviors
The Eldrazi Aggro deck has had one of the fastest adoption rates in Magic in years. I stated Eldrazi Aggro, because Eldrazi Processor has major issues with specific decks and is rather beatable. To quote another player, "I don't like that deck, because it loses to itself." Processor was discovered early in December and gained traction for early adopters during late December around Christmas with the middle adopter period and going viral around January 1st. You can watch the price of Eye of Ugin spiking.
Eventually Aggro was released and Eye of Ugin went up to $45-$50, it is now last I checked at $35 and not moving in price as no one wants the card anymore because of the ban in a few weeks.
Early->Middle->Late
For the most part the card is most expensive at the Late phase, however since the deck is being killed off in its current form there are no more late adopters at this point and the Middle Adopters when the Aggro deck went viral would and are the Late adopters to a dead deck.
Forsythe is communicating a "we're leading, and looking into this and we know you're really ticked off please come yell at me." However, for the most part people are angry but considering no one saw this level of deck for quite sometime. We must conclude another point, that Bloom vs. Eldrazi Aggro was quicker and more efficient because Bloom is more difficult play, period, and why it took longer to crack the deck code and to lead to a ban.
By doing an emergency ban, this kills off deck designers with an incentive to build decks. Since you buy into a new deck and it dies immediately. And considering people are paying good money for decks, having some waylay between a deck's discovery through some adoption cycle to see the full meta shift. We have the evidence now that the deck is a Tier 0 deck. No one is arguing that.
The question is on relative speed, and for the most part we can even look at the earliest version of the deck:
This deck is the missing link between Processor's evolution into Aggro as the earliest nearest common ancestor to both Processor and Aggro. This comes from 1/31/16.
So let's do some math. Today is 3/8/16.
When the thing crawled out of the slimy cesspool, it's been 38 days of Eldrazi Aggro in it's Proto evolutionary form. The ban will be one month from now, which will be two months of Eldrazi.
So two months?
Two months.
So if we bifurcate the conversation between three different Eldrazi base decks:
1. Aggro
2. Processor
3. Dread Summonsing
The current cries about bans weren't around with the Tier 2 Processor or the Dread Summonsing version, it was when Aggro came on board with the earliest we can date right now 1/31 being generous and not seeing the fully refined list we see today.
Each of those decks had a different style and play to them, even between the different color combination for Processor there were variations and feasted on graveyard decks. It was an interesting concept, and a deck that had weaknesses. Dread Summonsing was it's own deck, even now short lived and interesting.
Aggro destroyed the meta.
But does it warrant an emergency ban? No.
Because let's start with a good article on this on why we need Eldrazi Winter:
I feel Sheridan Lardner does a good analysis here on keeping "the reality" of the situation understood.
My own understanding comes from more of a larger historical understanding, looking at the worst of the game with Urza Block towards other "bad times" prior to Modern concepts on design across the game and on what I consider necessary emergency bans. Urza Block was decided on a dice roll. That's Super Tier 0, no comparison to this Tier 0.
And speaking as someone who has played Vintage, Legacy, and on and on. I have my own perspective on this issue, that kneejerk reactions to kill off a deck that has potential is hyperbolic. Eldrazi has fans, I'm one of them. And we'd like to see Eldrazi fixed without destroying the deck. I own several other Modern decks. Processor was wonderful without breaking everything, Aggro destroyed the Eldrazi Brand.
So the middle ground is to analyze what is broken with the deck and specifically look at the data and the sense of the meta with a Tier 0. This isn't a year of hell, rather it is 2 months. I don't play Pro Tours, I care about FNM and FNM has seen warps with the meta. And I agree with a ban, but not at the time frame to warrant an emergency ban. This isn't Urza Block, probably the worst time in Magic. I also believe that A VERSION of Eldrazi is necessary in the format.
What I want to see is:
A. Eldrazi Tron
B. Eldrazi Aggro
C. Eldrazi Midrange
Each of those decks survive in some fashion, but not in their current fashion. I do not believe that Processor can live on as is and will be absorbed into one of the largest deck variants. We'll see some floundering as it gets hit hard to Tier 2, but survival is necessary for deck diversity. This would mean that a new tribe has emerged, a new deck variant has emerged, and a new era of Modern has shown that backwards compatibility with cards can create new decks when we revisit old planes. This also means that a new deck may come into existence with Emrakul's set.
That's the point in deck building, let's ignore Aggro's metashare and so forth but look at the pre Feburary world. There were three new decks available and each were competitive. They raised a lot of interest in the format. I for one am greatly annoyed that the innovation we saw from December through January did persist longer without the devastating results to see this Tier 0 deck emerge. That there is our reality, building deck building communities and people talking about their own version of the decks.
That's how each block should be for Modern. Bringing in new decks. That's what we want. And that's what the game needs to work towards, and this reflects the power of synergy and intra block design. Too much synergy, namely having too many Sol Lands destroyed a metagame. Prior to that discovery, we had an interesting new deck that in a year's time would have been a fine addition to the Tier 1.5 metagame. Two different realities, but one fact. If we can save the format from the Eldrazi Winter, so may we return in part to the drawing board and see the rise of a new, more pro-Modern Eldrazi deck especially in hopes that Emrakul's set will bring some fine new additions to the brood. That's the vision of Magic. Go back and read some of the BX Eldrazi Processor threads about people trying to figure the deck out. That's competitive Magic, not this aberration turned abomination.
Returning to a cleaner slate, we can begin again. Wiser.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
Yes, except for the premise of Twin being banned, it's great. That however, is just factually incorrect. It was not "bleeding diversity" by any means. 2015 was one of the most, if not THE most diverse years Modern has ever had. Which goes completely with the crux of players' dissatisfaction with the way Wizards handles Modern, its banned list, and its policies. Every reason they gave for the ban has been either borderline misleading, outright false, or produced the exact opposite effect. That was the tipping point that put players into unrest and the Eldrazi problem just made things worse. The laughably hypocritical statements made by Aaron Forsythe about not wanting to nuke Eldrazi out of existence (something they had no problem doing to Twin) showcased the complete disconnect Wizards has between theory and reality. It's something they have admitted to numerous times when they say they do not test for bans, unbans, or new cards in Modern. Up until Twin, Wizards had actually shown pretty strong and reliable consistency with its bans. However, if they don't nuke Eldrazi completely, then the Twin ban is just spitting in the face of players in addition to demonstrating further that Wizards knows F-all about Modern as a format.
Decks that are this strong can hurt diversity by pushing the decks that it defeats out of competition. They can also reduce diversity by supplanting similar decks. For instance, Shaun McLaren won Pro Tour Born of the Gods playing this Jeskai control deck. Alex Bianchi won our most recent Modern Grand Prix playing a similar deck but adding the Splinter Twin combination. Similarly, Temur Tempo used to see play at high-level events but has been supplanted by Temur Twin.
We considered what one would do with the cards from a Splinter Twin deck with Splinter Twin banned. In the case of some Jeskai or Temur, there are very similar decks to build. In other cases, there is Kiki-Jiki as a replacement.
So thus far we've seen some new decks rise up within the combo category, but the Aggro Eldrazi shift is taking space with Eldrazi so we're not seeing the increased diversification within aggro.
However, comparing the two aggro lists there's more diversity in the current offering for combo than Twin and Bloom bans.
Polemics doesn't win the debate, especially with me.
Right now, we know a few things:
1. Urza Block almost killed Magic because the deck was so efficient that a game was decided on a dice roll
2. Bloom was a difficult to play deck that with time refined itself over a year to go from a backwater combo deck to a real threat once it was in the hands of a Pro. It was a difficult to play against, that while requiring skill and specific cards to know how to sequence. The statistics bore out that it's win percentage was higher than average and destroyed value. Given enough time, it would have caught on more if it wasn't the fear of an impending ban and that Americans tend to play aggro or midrange decks over combo or at least combo similar to infect decks.
The deck had a year in part because it was still under the radar, once the radar came it was under a microscope.
3. Twin was a police deck, that gradually became "Twin+" and shifted out Jeskai and Scapeshift decks out of the game. It had 2 years or so, and became a staple of rotating decks with Tron and a few others. However, because of the refinement of the deck and slowly bleeding diversity it was banned.
4. Pod was gaining market share because it was an easy deck to build and play, but boring to play against and difficult to stop. Finally died especially with the rise of Collected Company.
5. Eldrazi is unique in that it started out as Processor that evolved into Aggro roughly a month ago. Eldrazi "Menace" was known as early as late December for those of us who were early adopters. The new shift was aggro when someone cracked the deck into aggro mode. There were a few variants like a BGX Eldrazi deck.
The current Eldrazi Deck is an aberration, but does not compare to Urza Block's pervasiveness or power level making that Urza Block deck a complete abomination that almost consumed and ate Magic alive. This isn't apologetics, it's analyzing history and consistency in branding and design and rules set expectations.
In terms of everything you're angry about the Eldrazi deck being everywhere. I understand that, because I have been there as well at different times during Magic. Have you played Standard during the original Mirrodin block with Affinity when it was actually Affinity? That was a nightmare too, that obliterated any concept of Magic in standard for quite sometime. Eldrazi is more similar to Pod and Bloom, it's interactive in weird ways but not enough so that people can't really stop it comfortably without huge new shifts in their game play.
It doesn't matter gameshare, what matters is that there was a process and that as the decks became more and more of a threat and a spotlight was placed under them there was a course of action followed.
Pod, I believe, took too long to ban. Amulet Bloom lasted a year for a deck that not until the end of its life cycle started to catch on more, but remained difficult to play and with that one Mod's statistics website even stated that Bloom had a high win percentage than normal for a deck and that nerfing the deck was consistent.
If we're to look at something, we need to talk about a few concepts:
1. Adoption cycle
2. Marketing and communications
3. Establishing expectations and patterns of behaviors
The Eldrazi Aggro deck has had one of the fastest adoption rates in Magic in years. I stated Eldrazi Aggro, because Eldrazi Processor has major issues with specific decks and is rather beatable. To quote another player, "I don't like that deck, because it loses to itself." Processor was discovered early in December and gained traction for early adopters during late December around Christmas with the middle adopter period and going viral around January 1st. You can watch the price of Eye of Ugin spiking.
Eventually Aggro was released and Eye of Ugin went up to $45-$50, it is now last I checked at $35 and not moving in price as no one wants the card anymore because of the ban in a few weeks.
Early->Middle->Late
For the most part the card is most expensive at the Late phase, however since the deck is being killed off in its current form there are no more late adopters at this point and the Middle Adopters when the Aggro deck went viral would and are the Late adopters to a dead deck.
Forsythe is communicating a "we're leading, and looking into this and we know you're really ticked off please come yell at me." However, for the most part people are angry but considering no one saw this level of deck for quite sometime. We must conclude another point, that Bloom vs. Eldrazi Aggro was quicker and more efficient because Bloom is more difficult play, period, and why it took longer to crack the deck code and to lead to a ban.
By doing an emergency ban, this kills off deck designers with an incentive to build decks. Since you buy into a new deck and it dies immediately. And considering people are paying good money for decks, having some waylay between a deck's discovery through some adoption cycle to see the full meta shift. We have the evidence now that the deck is a Tier 0 deck. No one is arguing that.
The question is on relative speed, and for the most part we can even look at the earliest version of the deck:
This deck is the missing link between Processor's evolution into Aggro as the earliest nearest common ancestor to both Processor and Aggro. This comes from 1/31/16.
So let's do some math. Today is 3/8/16.
When the thing crawled out of the slimy cesspool, it's been 38 days of Eldrazi Aggro in it's Proto evolutionary form. The ban will be one month from now, which will be two months of Eldrazi.
So two months?
Two months.
So if we bifurcate the conversation between three different Eldrazi base decks:
1. Aggro
2. Processor
3. Dread Summonsing
The current cries about bans weren't around with the Tier 2 Processor or the Dread Summonsing version, it was when Aggro came on board with the earliest we can date right now 1/31 being generous and not seeing the fully refined list we see today.
Each of those decks had a different style and play to them, even between the different color combination for Processor there were variations and feasted on graveyard decks. It was an interesting concept, and a deck that had weaknesses. Dread Summonsing was it's own deck, even now short lived and interesting.
Aggro destroyed the meta.
But does it warrant an emergency ban? No.
Because let's start with a good article on this on why we need Eldrazi Winter:
I feel Sheridan Lardner does a good analysis here on keeping "the reality" of the situation understood.
My own understanding comes from more of a larger historical understanding, looking at the worst of the game with Urza Block towards other "bad times" prior to Modern concepts on design across the game and on what I consider necessary emergency bans. Urza Block was decided on a dice roll. That's Super Tier 0, no comparison to this Tier 0.
And speaking as someone who has played Vintage, Legacy, and on and on. I have my own perspective on this issue, that kneejerk reactions to kill off a deck that has potential is hyperbolic. Eldrazi has fans, I'm one of them. And we'd like to see Eldrazi fixed without destroying the deck. I own several other Modern decks. Processor was wonderful without breaking everything, Aggro destroyed the Eldrazi Brand.
So the middle ground is to analyze what is broken with the deck and specifically look at the data and the sense of the meta with a Tier 0. This isn't a year of hell, rather it is 2 months. I don't play Pro Tours, I care about FNM and FNM has seen warps with the meta. And I agree with a ban, but not at the time frame to warrant an emergency ban. This isn't Urza Block, probably the worst time in Magic. I also believe that A VERSION of Eldrazi is necessary in the format.
What I want to see is:
A. Eldrazi Tron
B. Eldrazi Aggro
C. Eldrazi Midrange
Each of those decks survive in some fashion, but not in their current fashion. I do not believe that Processor can live on as is and will be absorbed into one of the largest deck variants. We'll see some floundering as it gets hit hard to Tier 2, but survival is necessary for deck diversity. This would mean that a new tribe has emerged, a new deck variant has emerged, and a new era of Modern has shown that backwards compatibility with cards can create new decks when we revisit old planes. This also means that a new deck may come into existence with Emrakul's set.
That's the point in deck building, let's ignore Aggro's metashare and so forth but look at the pre Feburary world. There were three new decks available and each were competitive. They raised a lot of interest in the format. I for one am greatly annoyed that the innovation we saw from December through January did persist longer without the devastating results to see this Tier 0 deck emerge. That there is our reality, building deck building communities and people talking about their own version of the decks.
That's how each block should be for Modern. Bringing in new decks. That's what we want. And that's what the game needs to work towards, and this reflects the power of synergy and intra block design. Too much synergy, namely having too many Sol Lands destroyed a metagame. Prior to that discovery, we had an interesting new deck that in a year's time would have been a fine addition to the Tier 1.5 metagame. Two different realities, but one fact. If we can save the format from the Eldrazi Winter, so may we return in part to the drawing board and see the rise of a new, more pro-Modern Eldrazi deck especially in hopes that Emrakul's set will bring some fine new additions to the brood. That's the vision of Magic. Go back and read some of the BX Eldrazi Processor threads about people trying to figure the deck out. That's competitive Magic, not this aberration turned abomination.
Returning to a cleaner slate, we can begin again. Wiser.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
Yes, except for the premise of Twin being banned, it's great. That however, is just factually incorrect. It was not "bleeding diversity" by any means. 2015 was one of the most, if not THE most diverse years Modern has ever had. Which goes completely with the crux of players' dissatisfaction with the way Wizards handles Modern, its banned list, and its policies. Every reason they gave for the ban has been either borderline misleading, outright false, or produced the exact opposite effect. That was the tipping point that put players into unrest and the Eldrazi problem just made things worse. The laughably hypocritical statements made by Aaron Forsythe about not wanting to nuke Eldrazi out of existence (something they had no problem doing to Twin) showcased the complete disconnect Wizards has between theory and reality. It's something they have admitted to numerous times when they say they do not test for bans, unbans, or new cards in Modern. Up until Twin, Wizards had actually shown pretty strong and reliable consistency with its bans. However, if they don't nuke Eldrazi completely, then the Twin ban is just spitting in the face of players in addition to demonstrating further that Wizards knows F-all about Modern as a format.
I just need you to know that this is 100% your opinion about the issue and not a fact. It is fine to have this opinion, it is largely a defensible opinion, but just because you're angry that your deck got banned (I get it!!) does not make this subjective interpretation of a series of events objective. I 100% agree with Aaron about his comments about Eldrazi, and I think he took a very measured and balanced approach to talking about the bannings (something that is fairly unprecedented for Wizards).
Wizards did not nuke twin. They nerfed it a turn and made it susceptible to bolt. It's still a VERY powerful deck, but it's now in line with many of the other decks that have to deal with swingy matchups and don't have an almost 50/50 win % against the field. That's what they intend to do with Eldrazi, because just as much as you love twin and had it close, some people REALLY like Eldrazi and they're allowed to also want to get to play their deck in modern.
If that is their definition of "not nuking" a deck, I would be happy to see the same treatment of Eldrazi. Ban the engine that allows the deck to do broken and powerful things (both lands). Casting the creatures for the cost printed on the card is fair. Making you spend resources with limitations or drawbacks to subvert that cost is fair. Free, painless, multi-use, 2-mana lands designed to work with heavily-pushed, efficient, aggressively-costed, 2-for-1 creatures have no place in Modern.
The original Twin deck was Kiki Jiki. People just went back to Kiki Jiki. Jeskai piloting was like trying to drive while getting shot in the head when not playing Jeskai Twin, Evil Twin, Temur Twin, and various variants. Twin itself was Twin+ deck with a blue red base.
Eldrazi's core problem was Eye of Ugin and the ability to chain cast cheap Eldrazi creatures while playing lands. Each tribe since Fates has been given a universal rainbow land with a special ability tied to it. Temple is restricted to Eldrazi use. We also have Tron itself that has rapid mana generation.
If Temple and Eye get banned, we're going to see Eldrazi Tron, the deck isn't dying with the ban.
If we see just Temple, we'll see midrange with Eldrazi Control and Eldrazi Tron.
The difference between Twin and Eldrazi, though, is that each of the decks can and will have a different tempo and meter. This is a point with tribal getting stronger and better notice rather than a condemnation at Eldrazi. We need more diversification mechanically in tribal design to allow for different kinds of tribal decks, especially ones that can mechanically prey on specific kinds of decks or build around format weaknesses.
Eldrazi is overpowered because of the lands, the creatures are fairly in line with Tarmogoyf and friends and even less powerful in some respects with the Processor speeds.
And what I can say with regard to a few things with tribal. I wrote Rosewater a few years ago about "tribal design" and what constituted "good tribal design" using the Slivers vs. Elements as a base. And in the recent few years we have been seeing better support for tribes.
Namely:
1. Legendary that includes all the colors.
2. Special land
So I feel that communication works with the right people. I don't claim that to be "my idea" or whatever, but getting your point across in what you specifically expect in a coherent manner can get better quality product out if other people also support it.
A) That modern nexus article does not show an uptick. "three new URx" decks does not mean a significant uptick if it constitutes 1% (or less) of the meta.
Also: Most upticks in scapeshift has been GR variants.
Paper Post-Ban: 10.5%
Grixis Control: .9%
Grixis Midrange: .4%
Temur Scapeshift: 2.3%
Jeskai Control: 1.4%
Temur Delver: 1.4%
UR Delver: .9%
UW Control: .9%
Jeskai Kiki Control: .9%
Grixis Delver: .5%
Jeskai Midrange: .9%
Final comparison here:
Twin Pre-Ban MTGO: 9.2% Non-Twin Ux(x) Pre-Ban MTGO: 14% Total Ux(x) Pre-Ban MTGO: 23.2% Total Ux(x) Post-Ban MTGO: 14%
Looks like that shift isn't working out so well. At least non-Twin decks have the same share as before. What about paper?
Twin Pre-Ban Paper: 11.6% Non-Twin Ux(x) Pre-Ban Paper: 11.5% Total Ux(x) Pre-Ban Paper: 23.1% Total Ux(x) Post-Ban Paper: 10.5%
Well, that one didn't work out either. Looks like the non-Twin Ux(x) decks lost 1% of ground too.
It's early and I expect we'll see some of this iron itself out, but the initial diagnosis does not see URx decks taking back Twin's share. Those decks either have the same shares they had before the ban or lower, and haven't at all recouped any of Twin's old territory.
Granted the data is from before the Eldrazi takeover, that may actually make it MORE relevant than comparing a skewed meta destroyed by Eldrazi, as it shows us what it may look like after Eldrazi is banned.
The interview is reminiscent of the public statements that WotC was making about CawBlade in 2010, although it's very compressed compared to that. WotC claimed for quite a long period of time that CawBlade wasn't broken and that there were answers to it if people just looked hard enough and then attendance at FNM's and ultimately larger events forced their hand and they went to DefCon 1 very quickly and banned several cards.
Well, to be fair, there being answers to it was true. Then they printed Batterskull.
It's surprising that they didn't learn enough from that series of events to pre-emptively emergency ban at least Eye of Ugin here.
That would be like "learning" after almost getting hit by a car to never cross any street unless there are no cars within eyesight. It's taking a valid idea and then going so far with it it ends up becoming a problem in and of itself. Emergency bans are a bad idea.
My problem in a nutshell is that WotC has created a classic dilemma here for the FNM crowd. We can get our brains beat in by Eldrazi Aggro for another month or we can buy into a list that is likely to see a few bans at the end of that month, with the necessary cards in high supply and at a high price at the moment due to price memory.
That's just a totally crappy situation to be in.
That's why WotC eventually did the bans in 2010. The price of CawBlade was high. The list was very hard to compete with except in the mirror. Nobody wanted to spend a lot of money on a list that was going to rotate out soon anyway. So attendance at FNM's plummeted like a stone. Attendance at major events went down. WotC broke the glass and did the emergency ban, knowing all along that they had created and sustained this unattractive dilemma for their most faithful customers, the people who actually cared enough about the game to play every Friday night.
It's the SAME THING HERE. Same dilemma for the invested fan. Same power dynamics in play.
And I refuse to believe that WotC had no idea that Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, Thought-knot Seer, Eldrazi Mimic and Reality Smasher were going to be totally broken crapola when they printed this set. If they really didn't catch that then they seriously need to get better software in to do by AI what R&D vets should have known by the eye test.
My problem in a nutshell is that WotC has created a classic dilemma here for the FNM crowd. We can get our brains beat in by Eldrazi Aggro for another month or we can buy into a list that is likely to see a few bans at the end of that month, with the necessary cards in high supply and at a high price at the moment due to price memory.
This is actually almost the opposite dilemma that many people are normally in from the FNM crowds in that this Tier 0 (!!) deck came out of the ashes and was for a long time built mostly of draft chaff and standard legal cards. Most of the younger players or players that aren't able to invest as much into the format are the one's currently playing Eldrazi in my store because for a long time so many of the pieces were cheap - ESPECIALLY if you're a diligent players and kept ontop of the new upcoming decks, the writing was on the wall for Eye AND temple when all of the Bx Eldrazi lists were spiking dailies. Smart players bought 4 of each when they were each under two and didn't look back. NOW it kind of sucks because they're going to have a VERY competitive deck removed and I'd argue it stings worse because it's not like these players all spent 2k on Jund and had a piece banned, many of these players are running budget decks and then had access to this monstrosity for the last two months.
That's why WotC eventually did the bans in 2010. The price of CawBlade was high. The list was very hard to compete with except in the mirror. Nobody wanted to spend a lot of money on a list that was going to rotate out soon anyway.
The price of the deck had absolutely nothing to do with the situation. We've seen more expensive decks than caw blade that were VERY high performing and bannings were never considered. Price wasn't a factor in the caw blade ban, the oppressiveness of it's grouping of cards in it's meta was.
So attendance at FNM's plummeted like a stone. Attendance at major events went down. WotC broke the glass and did the emergency ban, knowing all along that they had created and sustained this unattractive dilemma for their most faithful customers, the people who actually cared enough about the game to play every Friday night.
Again, false. The ban wasn't an emergency ban, it was banned on the normal rotation schedule. Memory Jar is the ONLY non rotation based ban that has ever happened.
And I refuse to believe that WotC had no idea that Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, Thought-knot Seer, Eldrazi Mimic and Reality Smasher were going to be totally broken crapola when they printed this set. If they really didn't catch that then they seriously need to get better software in to do by AI what R&D vets should have known by the eye test.
And again with this point, it does not matter. They DO NOT hold standard or limited beholden to older formats. They could KNOW with 100% certainty that a card would break an older format but if it fits within the context of standard and limited they will (AND SHOULD) print that card. They have always dealt with power level issues post release for older formats. If you're playing modern, legacy, vintage, EDH, pauper, canadian highlander, WHATEVER then you HAVE to know that your card pool and the banning decisions are at the mercy of standard, it simply comes with the territory.
My problem in a nutshell is that WotC has created a classic dilemma here for the FNM crowd. We can get our brains beat in by Eldrazi Aggro for another month or we can buy into a list that is likely to see a few bans at the end of that month, with the necessary cards in high supply and at a high price at the moment due to price memory.
That's just a totally crappy situation to be in.
Which is not exactly solved by an emergency ban, because then that suddenly puts the frustration on anyone who bought into the deck with the expectation that it would be safe until the next banning announcement. I mean, a major purpose of only banning stuff on set dates is that people will know their cards will be safe between those points. And violating that causes a much larger long-term problem in that people are now paranoid to invest in any deck that's doing well for fear it'll get banned at a random time, whereas in the situation you describe you just have to wait for a month and then the problem is fixed. Well, okay, we'll still have the problem of the format being dominated by uninteractive linear decks because they banned the deck that was at least sort of keeping them in check, but at least there will be some diversity among those uninteractive linear decks.
At any rate, it's not exactly conducive to consumer confidence to implicitly promise that cards will only be banned on the set dates and then ban cards between. There's a reason they've never done that (no, that did not happen even with Memory Jar, the only "emergency" part of it was when they announced it, not when they banned it).
That's why WotC eventually did the bans in 2010. The price of CawBlade was high. The list was very hard to compete with except in the mirror. Nobody wanted to spend a lot of money on a list that was going to rotate out soon anyway. So attendance at FNM's plummeted like a stone. Attendance at major events went down. WotC broke the glass and did the emergency ban, knowing all along that they had created and sustained this unattractive dilemma for their most faithful customers, the people who actually cared enough about the game to play every Friday night.
So attendance at FNM's plummeted like a stone. Attendance at major events went down. WotC broke the glass and did the emergency ban, knowing all along that they had created and sustained this unattractive dilemma for their most faithful customers, the people who actually cared enough about the game to play every Friday night.
Again, false. The ban wasn't an emergency ban, it was banned on the normal rotation schedule. Memory Jar is the ONLY non rotation based ban that has ever happened.
Actually, even Memory Jar wasn't a non rotation based ban, not exactly. People always call it an "emergency ban" but it wasn't in the sense that the term is typically used.
What happened was they made their standard banlist announcement a month before the bans took effect, as normal (back then there was a much longer gap between the announcement and it taking effect). Then, between the announcement and the bans taking effect, they added Memory Jar onto the "to be banned" list, and it was banned at the same time as everything else. The one-and-only "emergency ban" was not even an emergency ban in the way people discuss the term!
For whatever it's worth, there was actually still a larger time gap between Memory Jar being announced as banned and it actually being banned than there is nowadays between cards being announced as banned and actually being banned.
And I refuse to believe that WotC had no idea that Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, Thought-knot Seer, Eldrazi Mimic and Reality Smasher were going to be totally broken crapola when they printed this set. If they really didn't catch that then they seriously need to get better software in to do by AI what R&D vets should have known by the eye test.
in fairness, the entire community missed this as well.
if there hadn't been a pro-tour team testing this in the extreme, I honestly don't think the colourless deck running mimic and endless one would have surfaced for a loong, long time. and people wouldn't have had such a panic about the deck.
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Modern: G Tron, Vannifar, Jund, Druid/Vizier combo, Humans, Eldrazi Stompy (Serum Powder), Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Breach Titan, Turns, Eternal Command, As Foretold Living End, Elves, Cheerios, RUG Scapeshift
And I refuse to believe that WotC had no idea that Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, Thought-knot Seer, Eldrazi Mimic and Reality Smasher were going to be totally broken crapola when they printed this set. If they really didn't catch that then they seriously need to get better software in to do by AI what R&D vets should have known by the eye test.
in fairness, the entire community missed this as well.
if there hadn't been a pro-tour team testing this in the extreme, I honestly don't think the colourless deck running mimic and endless one would have surfaced for a loong, long time. and people wouldn't have had such a panic about the deck.
The PT was what...a week after the set released? I don't think it would have taken too long for people to put 2 and 2 together. The biggest innovation of that colorless deck was SSG and Chalice.
So you can't really say the entire Community missed cards that were legal for a week, especially when most people were just waiting to see the results of the PT and go from there.
And I refuse to believe that WotC had no idea that Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, Thought-knot Seer, Eldrazi Mimic and Reality Smasher were going to be totally broken crapola when they printed this set. If they really didn't catch that then they seriously need to get better software in to do by AI what R&D vets should have known by the eye test.
in fairness, the entire community missed this as well.
if there hadn't been a pro-tour team testing this in the extreme, I honestly don't think the colourless deck running mimic and endless one would have surfaced for a loong, long time. and people wouldn't have had such a panic about the deck.
The PT was what...a week after the set released? I don't think it would have taken too long for people to put 2 and 2 together. The biggest innovation of that colorless deck was SSG and Chalice.
So you can't really say the entire Community missed cards that were legal for a week, especially when most people were just waiting to see the results of the PT and go from there.
it's been said before, but a crew of people, backed up by a community, brainstorming and brewing one single deck, will always trump a few guys and girls in Renton who have to design entire sets, years in advance and can't focus on one deck particularly.
the whole "wizards should have known hurr durr" argument just smacks of hindsight bias. it's going to be difficult to spot every interaction, especially if it's based on a metagame thing, and trying to predict how a bunch of seasoned pros would build a deck. it's impossible.
i mean could you - TWO YEARS IN ADVANCE - have predicted how team ChannelFireball would build an eldrazi deck designed specifically to beat infect and burn, in a metagame that was expecting Tron to be the big-bad?
no, i thought-knot (see what i did there =P)
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Modern: G Tron, Vannifar, Jund, Druid/Vizier combo, Humans, Eldrazi Stompy (Serum Powder), Amulet, Grishoalbrand, Breach Titan, Turns, Eternal Command, As Foretold Living End, Elves, Cheerios, RUG Scapeshift
And I refuse to believe that WotC had no idea that Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, Thought-knot Seer, Eldrazi Mimic and Reality Smasher were going to be totally broken crapola when they printed this set. If they really didn't catch that then they seriously need to get better software in to do by AI what R&D vets should have known by the eye test.
in fairness, the entire community missed this as well.
if there hadn't been a pro-tour team testing this in the extreme, I honestly don't think the colourless deck running mimic and endless one would have surfaced for a loong, long time. and people wouldn't have had such a panic about the deck.
The PT was what...a week after the set released? I don't think it would have taken too long for people to put 2 and 2 together. The biggest innovation of that colorless deck was SSG and Chalice.
So you can't really say the entire Community missed cards that were legal for a week, especially when most people were just waiting to see the results of the PT and go from there.
it's been said before, but a crew of people, backed up by a community, brainstorming and brewing one single deck, will always trump a few guys and girls in Renton who have to design entire sets, years in advance and can't focus on one deck particularly.
the whole "wizards should have known hurr durr" argument just smacks of hindsight bias. it's going to be difficult to spot every interaction, especially if it's based on a metagame thing, and trying to predict how a bunch of seasoned pros would build a deck. it's impossible.
i mean could you - TWO YEARS IN ADVANCE - have predicted how team ChannelFireball would build an eldrazi deck designed specifically to beat infect and burn, in a metagame that was expecting Tron to be the big-bad?
no, i thought-knot (see what i did there =P)
First, Ian Duke admitted during the PT coverage that they knew about the interactions and simply didn't care to change their Standard and Limited environments due to Modern or eternal issues.
And second, the colorless aggro list had been floating around the internet for about a week and a half before the PT. All CFB really did to it was add SSG and Chalice. It was the UR version that was the real surprise. And they only came to the UR version by metagaming against the known quantity of the colorless aggro version.
What are any of you looking for? Should Wizards not have printed the Eldrazi creatures they did (which are 100% fine in Standard and Limited, ya know, the sets they make all of their money from and are extremely popular), or pre-banned Eye and Temple (INFURIATING the community before there was even a problem)?
What are any of you looking for? Should Wizards not have printed the Eldrazi creatures they did (which are 100% fine in Standard and Limited, ya know, the sets they make all of their money from and are extremely popular), or pre-banned Eye and Temple (INFURIATING the community before there was even a problem)?
Me? Nothing from WOTC. I'm just looking for purkehuffinpuff and other Eldrazi defenders to stop practicing revisionist history.
What are any of you looking for? Should Wizards not have printed the Eldrazi creatures they did (which are 100% fine in Standard and Limited, ya know, the sets they make all of their money from and are extremely popular), or pre-banned Eye and Temple (INFURIATING the community before there was even a problem)?
Me? Nothing from WOTC. I'm just looking for purkehuffinpuff and other Eldrazi defenders to stop practicing revisionist history.
Not directed at you specifically, just people who keep saying 'BUT THEY DON'T TEST FOR MODERN, THEY KNEW ABOUT ELDRAZI'. Yeah, and? Is this shocking anyone? Really?
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A deck creator works in a team to refine a deck idea, whether that is a team that are friends or internet strangers that crowdsource the issue. We're talking hundreds of man hours even with a team of 5-10 on a-single-deck. They're building 2 blocks per year with several formats. This is not something even feasible to compare what the player can do especially with the internet.
Eldrazi began as a single person's deck as Processor, then it evolved into an internet deck that had several people trying to figure out the optimal version of the deck. Aggro was built through the traditional team format with heavy testing. Just because Einstein created the Theory of Relativity and knew it was possible to build a nuclear bomb, doesn't mean he knew how to build a nuclear bomb. That's the difference between mathematics, science, and engineering.
They're building a new Theory of Relativity quickly in a team, not constructing the nuclear bomb. That's our "job" to build the "bomb" to win this "war." The war being your local FNM or the PTQ or the Pro Tour. The issue is that we're mostly fighting with conventional weaponry that can counter each other. This is a Tier 0 deck and is the nuclear bomb and that why it's being banned.
And most of us aren't great deckbuilders and follow trends. We can built based on blue prints and innovate within an archetype, but to think that even being the greatest player in the world there is still broken content. World of Warcraft was designed and developed by one of the most renown game developing companies of all time that really take their time to make a great game. And it has been severely edited since the release over a decade ago to the point that some classes are no longer the same as they once were.
There are high expectations are like genie wishes, the question is resiliency in a system to adapt to new and recurring situations. You know a hurricane is going to pop up, but not always "where." So you build a system able to survive and rebuild after the natural disaster.
There are several tiers to mistaken design. This is in the middling of it, and in part because the cards are easy to play to which why we have seen such a high adoption and very fast adoption rate for this deck. It is the ease of playing the deck, ease to acquire the cards, as well as the rate spike we see in play that has created the intense hatred since it forces a Darwin environment. Adapt or die to Eldrazi, it is understandable.
But things happen, the key is that people have identified the problem and are fixing it in a timely manner. Equally allowing time to study the situation rather than a slam ban that destroys any future for Eldrazi in general. Look at any competitive game. League of Legends, Pokemon, and so on. You will find that even with great play testing, it takes editing and editions to create a relative environment. Any change creates chaos. As chaos continues, the greater likelihood we will see more of this as the years progress than less in our life times. The key is to prevent the worst, namely Urza Block.
Processor was fine, it just ate the hell out of graveyard decks and fell to specific hate. It was actually a great deck and considering we had 3 different threads going on trying to develop the most efficient form of the deck. The downside was how quickly Aggro came around and took Processor out as the premiere Eldrazi deck.
Right now, with what we know and the cards released. Eldrazi Aggro and it's children are bad for the format.
Processor wasn't the problem, but the lands together are still very much broken.
Modern
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That would be like "learning" after almost getting hit by a car to never cross any street unless there are no cars within eyesight. It's taking a valid idea and then going so far with it it ends up becoming a problem in and of itself. Emergency bans are a bad idea.
No one here even acknowledged this post. Kudos to you and your desire to bring a higher level of analysis to this board. This is so ridiculously refreshing when compared with the average fear mongering post. Thank you.
Yes, except for the premise of Twin being banned, it's great. That however, is just factually incorrect. It was not "bleeding diversity" by any means. 2015 was one of the most, if not THE most diverse years Modern has ever had. Which goes completely with the crux of players' dissatisfaction with the way Wizards handles Modern, its banned list, and its policies. Every reason they gave for the ban has been either borderline misleading, outright false, or produced the exact opposite effect. That was the tipping point that put players into unrest and the Eldrazi problem just made things worse. The laughably hypocritical statements made by Aaron Forsythe about not wanting to nuke Eldrazi out of existence (something they had no problem doing to Twin) showcased the complete disconnect Wizards has between theory and reality. It's something they have admitted to numerous times when they say they do not test for bans, unbans, or new cards in Modern. Up until Twin, Wizards had actually shown pretty strong and reliable consistency with its bans. However, if they don't nuke Eldrazi completely, then the Twin ban is just spitting in the face of players in addition to demonstrating further that Wizards knows F-all about Modern as a format.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I just need you to know that this is 100% your opinion about the issue and not a fact. It is fine to have this opinion, it is largely a defensible opinion, but just because you're angry that your deck got banned (I get it!!) does not make this subjective interpretation of a series of events objective. I 100% agree with Aaron about his comments about Eldrazi, and I think he took a very measured and balanced approach to talking about the bannings (something that is fairly unprecedented for Wizards).
Wizards did not nuke twin. They nerfed it a turn and made it susceptible to bolt. It's still a VERY powerful deck, but it's now in line with many of the other decks that have to deal with swingy matchups and don't have an almost 50/50 win % against the field. That's what they intend to do with Eldrazi, because just as much as you love twin and had it close, some people REALLY like Eldrazi and they're allowed to also want to get to play their deck in modern.
So he says it's his personal preference not to nuke it but that they could end up doing that anyway and that other people back at WOTC may want that.
In other words, we don't know anything yet.
Standard: lol no
Modern: BG/x, UR/x, Burn, Merfolk, Zoo, Storm
Legacy: Shardless BUG, Delver (BUG, RUG, Grixis), Landstill, Depths Combo, Merfolk
Vintage: Dark Times, BUG Fish, Merfolk
EDH: Teysa, Orzhov Scion / Krenko, Mob Boss / Stonebrow, Krosan Hero
If that is their definition of "not nuking" a deck, I would be happy to see the same treatment of Eldrazi. Ban the engine that allows the deck to do broken and powerful things (both lands). Casting the creatures for the cost printed on the card is fair. Making you spend resources with limitations or drawbacks to subvert that cost is fair. Free, painless, multi-use, 2-mana lands designed to work with heavily-pushed, efficient, aggressively-costed, 2-for-1 creatures have no place in Modern.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
That's what I'm saying though, you have no idea if that's what they're going to do or not. You're pissed about a thing that hasn't even happened yet!
I loathe creatures! Praise Prison and Land Destruction!
My Peasant Cube (looking for feedback)
What you and many other people are missing is that it doesn't matter. They could KNOW that they're breaking all of the older formats and it wouldn't matter. They ONLY print cards in standard that are made for Standard and Limited. Period. This has been stated by Maro for years and years - they will ALWAYS address power issues through post release bannings.
Standard: lol no
Modern: BG/x, UR/x, Burn, Merfolk, Zoo, Storm
Legacy: Shardless BUG, Delver (BUG, RUG, Grixis), Landstill, Depths Combo, Merfolk
Vintage: Dark Times, BUG Fish, Merfolk
EDH: Teysa, Orzhov Scion / Krenko, Mob Boss / Stonebrow, Krosan Hero
It simply doesn't matter - all of us are playing a format that is beholden to a different format. If Ancestral Recall was going to be a good fit in a standard environment they would print it and then ban it out of the older formats. ...wait. They DID do that, because that's what they said they were going to do.
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/january-18-2016-banned-and-restricted-announcement-2016-01-18
http://mtgtop8.com/format?f=MO
UWX Midrange is seeing some increase in play:
http://mtgtop8.com/archetype?a=181&meta=51&f=MO
Scapeshift is seeing play:
http://mtgtop8.com/archetype?a=269&meta=51&f=MO
Rug Aggro:
http://mtgtop8.com/archetype?a=216&meta=51&f=MO
Metagame Share: 25%
Creatures Toolbox 76 7 %
Infect 45 4 %
Living End 36 3 %
UR Storm 17 2 %
Ad Nauseam 16 2 %
Scapeshift 16 2 %
Twin Exarch 14 1 %
Instant Reanimator 14 1 %
Jeskai Ascendancy 7 1 %
Bloom Titan 6 1 %
Elemental Combo 1 0 %
Sunny Side Up 1 0 %
Other - Combo 7 1 %
2015 Meta with Twin:
http://mtgtop8.com/archetype?a=216&f=MO&meta=101
Twin Exarch 11%
Bloom Titan 5%
Infect 3%
Creatures Toolbox 3%
Scapeshift 3%
So thus far we've seen some new decks rise up within the combo category, but the Aggro Eldrazi shift is taking space with Eldrazi so we're not seeing the increased diversification within aggro.
However, comparing the two aggro lists there's more diversity in the current offering for combo than Twin and Bloom bans.
The original Twin deck was Kiki Jiki. People just went back to Kiki Jiki. Jeskai piloting was like trying to drive while getting shot in the head when not playing Jeskai Twin, Evil Twin, Temur Twin, and various variants. Twin itself was Twin+ deck with a blue red base.
Eldrazi's core problem was Eye of Ugin and the ability to chain cast cheap Eldrazi creatures while playing lands. Each tribe since Fates has been given a universal rainbow land with a special ability tied to it. Temple is restricted to Eldrazi use. We also have Tron itself that has rapid mana generation.
If Temple and Eye get banned, we're going to see Eldrazi Tron, the deck isn't dying with the ban.
If we see just Temple, we'll see midrange with Eldrazi Control and Eldrazi Tron.
The difference between Twin and Eldrazi, though, is that each of the decks can and will have a different tempo and meter. This is a point with tribal getting stronger and better notice rather than a condemnation at Eldrazi. We need more diversification mechanically in tribal design to allow for different kinds of tribal decks, especially ones that can mechanically prey on specific kinds of decks or build around format weaknesses.
Eldrazi is overpowered because of the lands, the creatures are fairly in line with Tarmogoyf and friends and even less powerful in some respects with the Processor speeds.
And what I can say with regard to a few things with tribal. I wrote Rosewater a few years ago about "tribal design" and what constituted "good tribal design" using the Slivers vs. Elements as a base. And in the recent few years we have been seeing better support for tribes.
Namely:
1. Legendary that includes all the colors.
2. Special land
So I feel that communication works with the right people. I don't claim that to be "my idea" or whatever, but getting your point across in what you specifically expect in a coherent manner can get better quality product out if other people also support it.
This is Forsythe's twitter account:
https://twitter.com/mtgaaron?ref_src=twsrc^google|twcamp^serp|twgr^author
If anyone has the big feels, tell him about your feelings. Just be concise and considerate.
Modern
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I was referring specifically to this post made by forum moderator and stats cruncher ktkenshinx: http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/662745-current-modern-banlist-discussion-1-18-2016-update?page=95#c2369
Granted the data is from before the Eldrazi takeover, that may actually make it MORE relevant than comparing a skewed meta destroyed by Eldrazi, as it shows us what it may look like after Eldrazi is banned.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
My problem in a nutshell is that WotC has created a classic dilemma here for the FNM crowd. We can get our brains beat in by Eldrazi Aggro for another month or we can buy into a list that is likely to see a few bans at the end of that month, with the necessary cards in high supply and at a high price at the moment due to price memory.
That's just a totally crappy situation to be in.
That's why WotC eventually did the bans in 2010. The price of CawBlade was high. The list was very hard to compete with except in the mirror. Nobody wanted to spend a lot of money on a list that was going to rotate out soon anyway. So attendance at FNM's plummeted like a stone. Attendance at major events went down. WotC broke the glass and did the emergency ban, knowing all along that they had created and sustained this unattractive dilemma for their most faithful customers, the people who actually cared enough about the game to play every Friday night.
It's the SAME THING HERE. Same dilemma for the invested fan. Same power dynamics in play.
And I refuse to believe that WotC had no idea that Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, Thought-knot Seer, Eldrazi Mimic and Reality Smasher were going to be totally broken crapola when they printed this set. If they really didn't catch that then they seriously need to get better software in to do by AI what R&D vets should have known by the eye test.
This is actually almost the opposite dilemma that many people are normally in from the FNM crowds in that this Tier 0 (!!) deck came out of the ashes and was for a long time built mostly of draft chaff and standard legal cards. Most of the younger players or players that aren't able to invest as much into the format are the one's currently playing Eldrazi in my store because for a long time so many of the pieces were cheap - ESPECIALLY if you're a diligent players and kept ontop of the new upcoming decks, the writing was on the wall for Eye AND temple when all of the Bx Eldrazi lists were spiking dailies. Smart players bought 4 of each when they were each under two and didn't look back. NOW it kind of sucks because they're going to have a VERY competitive deck removed and I'd argue it stings worse because it's not like these players all spent 2k on Jund and had a piece banned, many of these players are running budget decks and then had access to this monstrosity for the last two months.
The price of the deck had absolutely nothing to do with the situation. We've seen more expensive decks than caw blade that were VERY high performing and bannings were never considered. Price wasn't a factor in the caw blade ban, the oppressiveness of it's grouping of cards in it's meta was.
Again, false. The ban wasn't an emergency ban, it was banned on the normal rotation schedule. Memory Jar is the ONLY non rotation based ban that has ever happened.
And again with this point, it does not matter. They DO NOT hold standard or limited beholden to older formats. They could KNOW with 100% certainty that a card would break an older format but if it fits within the context of standard and limited they will (AND SHOULD) print that card. They have always dealt with power level issues post release for older formats. If you're playing modern, legacy, vintage, EDH, pauper, canadian highlander, WHATEVER then you HAVE to know that your card pool and the banning decisions are at the mercy of standard, it simply comes with the territory.
At any rate, it's not exactly conducive to consumer confidence to implicitly promise that cards will only be banned on the set dates and then ban cards between. There's a reason they've never done that (no, that did not happen even with Memory Jar, the only "emergency" part of it was when they announced it, not when they banned it).
Caw-Blade was not emergency banned.
What happened was they made their standard banlist announcement a month before the bans took effect, as normal (back then there was a much longer gap between the announcement and it taking effect). Then, between the announcement and the bans taking effect, they added Memory Jar onto the "to be banned" list, and it was banned at the same time as everything else. The one-and-only "emergency ban" was not even an emergency ban in the way people discuss the term!
For whatever it's worth, there was actually still a larger time gap between Memory Jar being announced as banned and it actually being banned than there is nowadays between cards being announced as banned and actually being banned.
in fairness, the entire community missed this as well.
if there hadn't been a pro-tour team testing this in the extreme, I honestly don't think the colourless deck running mimic and endless one would have surfaced for a loong, long time. and people wouldn't have had such a panic about the deck.
The PT was what...a week after the set released? I don't think it would have taken too long for people to put 2 and 2 together. The biggest innovation of that colorless deck was SSG and Chalice.
So you can't really say the entire Community missed cards that were legal for a week, especially when most people were just waiting to see the results of the PT and go from there.
it's been said before, but a crew of people, backed up by a community, brainstorming and brewing one single deck, will always trump a few guys and girls in Renton who have to design entire sets, years in advance and can't focus on one deck particularly.
the whole "wizards should have known hurr durr" argument just smacks of hindsight bias. it's going to be difficult to spot every interaction, especially if it's based on a metagame thing, and trying to predict how a bunch of seasoned pros would build a deck. it's impossible.
i mean could you - TWO YEARS IN ADVANCE - have predicted how team ChannelFireball would build an eldrazi deck designed specifically to beat infect and burn, in a metagame that was expecting Tron to be the big-bad?
no, i thought-knot (see what i did there =P)
And second, the colorless aggro list had been floating around the internet for about a week and a half before the PT. All CFB really did to it was add SSG and Chalice. It was the UR version that was the real surprise. And they only came to the UR version by metagaming against the known quantity of the colorless aggro version.
Standard: lol no
Modern: BG/x, UR/x, Burn, Merfolk, Zoo, Storm
Legacy: Shardless BUG, Delver (BUG, RUG, Grixis), Landstill, Depths Combo, Merfolk
Vintage: Dark Times, BUG Fish, Merfolk
EDH: Teysa, Orzhov Scion / Krenko, Mob Boss / Stonebrow, Krosan Hero
Standard: lol no
Modern: BG/x, UR/x, Burn, Merfolk, Zoo, Storm
Legacy: Shardless BUG, Delver (BUG, RUG, Grixis), Landstill, Depths Combo, Merfolk
Vintage: Dark Times, BUG Fish, Merfolk
EDH: Teysa, Orzhov Scion / Krenko, Mob Boss / Stonebrow, Krosan Hero
Not directed at you specifically, just people who keep saying 'BUT THEY DON'T TEST FOR MODERN, THEY KNEW ABOUT ELDRAZI'. Yeah, and? Is this shocking anyone? Really?