They aren’t the same deck at all though. I’m not pushing any narrative. Seemed you were. I literally just originally said this is the perfect event for u/w control because you can actually get the meta call correct for the build. This is a very tiny view of the actual modern meta at normal events. Don’t be so hasty to defend a narrative someone isn’t making.
Please feel free to quote where I said anything bad about uw or uwx decks though....
You did not say anything about "UW Control." You said (emphasis added):
It’s a pro tour, very small meta of people that all play established decks, and they are less worried about draws because there are 2 people to their sides that just have to complete their games. That’s where control is great.
Specifically, you were stating that in this PT environment, there are specific factors that make "control" (not "UW Control") "great". I argued against you, stating that "control" has been great all year, providing GP examples for UWx Control throughout the year. If you meant UW Control specifically, not control generally as you said, you should have said so. And even there, UW Control was great on both MTGO premier events and GP Bar, so I don't think you can argue that the PT alone was the necessary environment for UW Control to succeed.
1 gp being 4 of those decks lol and this pt is all uw hence talking about uw. Agree to disagree sir.
1 gp being 4 of those decks lol and this pt is all uw hence talking about uw. Agree to disagree sir.
Jeskai is tied for third in GP appearances in 2018, spread across four different GP. Also, assuming that lower case "control" equals the formal deck "UW Control" is just not a good assumption. This is what I mean by pushing a narrative and, in this case, now pushing a losing argument. UW Control is viable at all events, not just the narrower PT field. Just as Jeskai has been viable all year up until maybe the summer, where the pendulum may have shifted to UW Control instead.
Eh most Jeskai players are probably fine they probably had all or most of the cards to just go UW anyway.
Much like if RB Vengevine player used to play Mardu Pyromancer they should have had most of the same cards. Although I don't get why mardu is not RB Souls or Lingering Souls since in both cases that what the main dip into W or G are for.
I dont think dedicated UWR players will swap. No bolts, no helix? Not even playable.
Hard Control players though who float between the 3 (UW, UWR, Esper) should certainly be on UW right now.
I am just saying money wise it shouldn't be too much imposition for the average Jeskai Control player to move among that UW and ESPER.
But obviously if your dedicated to a deck keep at it.
Oh for sure. Money wise its nothing. If you have UWR, you already have all the expensive parts of UW. I cant think of a single money card that would make up any difference, in fact UW is probably cheaper.
Indeed I wonder if Ravnica will swing it one way or the other. I mean I figure we are getting some strong Blue cards considering how many characters with Blue in their color id are liable to be relevant.
After playing against Krark Clan today I think Ancient Stirrings is the only issue. The deck would not be consistent enough if you can't dig 5 cards deep for G.
I wouldn't predict a standard set will swing a modern meta rapidly if it is a return set. Let me put it this way: I don't think we are going to see another Tarkir or Zendikar situation, so we're probably looking at a giant reprint deluge with new cards using established mechanics... and then I just realized while typing this that the original Ravnica is what introduced Forecast, Dredge, Radiance, Transmute, Replicate, Hellbent, Convoke, Graft, and Bloodthirst. RTR introduced Detain, Overload, Battalion, Cipher, Scavenge, Bloodrush, Extort, Unleash, Populate, and Evolve.
To impact modern, they'd have to go with old Ravnica mechanics because those were more open. The later mechanics that came in RTR are much less versatile or rely on having a lot of resources to really make use of. Case in point, we have many ways to make token creatures already, so the selesnya mechanic "populate" is kind of dead. However, adding more spells with "convoke"? Return to the Ranks is one of the most powerful resurrection spells in modern and people still play with Chord of Calling. Control and toolbox decks would love to have more Transmute options as it's basically a way to swap a bad card for a good one, and I still feel that Forecast is an under-appreciated mechanic.
Unfortunately, detain is just garbage and I think the only major mechanic out of the RtR block to stick in modern is Battalion. Overload is great in commander, though.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Indeed I wonder if Ravnica will swing it one way or the other. I mean I figure we are getting some strong Blue cards considering how many characters with Blue in their color id are liable to be relevant.
Probably. Other than the vastly ignorant who dont even play Modern and think Standard sets dont touch Modern, most people at this point realize, every set has an impact. I mean look at my list. UW, UWR, Esper. I forgot completely about Grixis, why?
Indeed I wonder if Ravnica will swing it one way or the other. I mean I figure we are getting some strong Blue cards considering how many characters with Blue in their color id are liable to be relevant.
Probably. Other than the vastly ignorant who dont even play Modern and think Standard sets dont touch Modern, most people at this point realize, every set has an impact. I mean look at my list. UW, UWR, Esper. I forgot completely about Grixis, why?
Well, I did say rapidly. If they are using established mechanics I'm kind of hoping they can at least tell that they aren't going to break things horribly. Albeit, I'm also now saying that after they openly admitted knowing about Eye of Ugin when printing cards like Thought-knot seer.
I don't know, sometimes I feel like WoTC kicks us in the shins and then comes over and plops a birthday cake on us as we wreath in pain.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
1 gp being 4 of those decks lol and this pt is all uw hence talking about uw. Agree to disagree sir.
Do you similarly take 4 of those off of Tron’s GP tally due to 1 GP?
Nope, I don’t track that stuff. He said what gp control was great at and I looked it up. I then kept reading is t8 decks and said huh 4 of those are from that one particular gp. I stand by what I said this pt is the perfect spot for control to be great. Never said control was bad, garbage, unplayable, needs unbans, needed cards banned to be good.... was discussing the pt and the prevalence of control that’s all. Seems that got some backlash and I guess that’s to be expected in this thread. That said 2 humans 1 h1 and 1 kci in top 4 huh....
On the one hand, these results should be considered fairly meaningless because it's a team event. Both Hollow One and Humans had very middling performance going in, and Humans had so many pilots on Day 1 that it would be surprising for at least 1 not to make T4.
On the other hand, KCI continues a multi-month stretch of being the secret best deck in the format. Although I'm willing to dismiss the Humans and H1 results in a team setting, KCI just continues to look ridiculous. If Stark's team wins the event, the KCI-targeted ban calls will be very loud. I am unlikely to disagree with them, and I think more GP this year will continue to show Stirrings and KCI/Gx Tron/other Stirrings decks as frontrunning archetypes by a large degree.
Stirrings is simply indefensible in my book. Needs a ban hammer. Must Play Colorless be it Tron, Eldrazi or Artifacts is not enough of a liability to justify its power level compared to the other options. Especially when you consider its not like Colorless has been historically underpowered.
I'd be cautious to get too far ahead with stirrings being the ban target in Krark. Opal is just as clutch and has had runs of being scary good too (in lantern, puresteel, etc). They could also hit kci itself.
I'm not sure killing every flavor of Tron, lantern and eldrazi is better or worse than affinity and kci and possibly Cheerios and lantern / ur prison. Pretty tough call.
The fairest thing is probably just to ban kci if necessary since it eliminates any collateral damage.
If Krark-Clan Ironworks requires a ban, which I'm not convinced of (both UWx Control and Humans have put up better results, from what I can tell), then the proper targets would be Krark-Clan Ironworks or Scrap Trawler.
Humans keeps getting better and the only thing people pay attention to is combo decks. Looting and stirrings are too good lol. Release twin then and let it help police the format.
Because Humans is what WOTC likes in MAGIC these days and it doesn't have any one card that clearly provides it broken power. WOTC likes Creature Based Combat Decks with ETBs that fit in Tribal Synergy Decks. Hence they keep trying to make various tribes work in Standard all the time. Much like for instance Teferi and Jace wont be eating any bans any time soon even if UWx Control keeps dominating cause well for Jace he just got back but mostly cause Walkers are the face of the franchise and WOTC wants them played in the most popular non rotating format. That and they cost a lot. Calling for bans here would be a waste because based on WOTCs established behavior.
However Stirrings and to a lesser extent Looting break the rules established for card draw and card selection based on the bannings of various blue cantrips.
Humans keeps getting better and the only thing people pay attention to is combo decks. Looting and stirrings are too good lol. Release twin then and let it help police the format.
I love watching games with 20+ power swinging in on Turn 3, or Karn dropping down Turn 3 and taking 1 of my 2 lands, and thinking
"Twin was just so damn good, it for sure needed to be nuked from orbit, unlike Amulet, unlike Infect, unlike Bloo, unlike Storm, unlike Dredge.
Because Humans is what WOTC likes in MAGIC these days and it doesn't have any one card that clearly provides it broken power. WOTC likes Creature Based Combat Decks with ETBs that fit in Tribal Synergy Decks. Hence they keep trying to make various tribes work in Standard all the time. Much like for instance Teferi and Jace wont be eating any bans any time soon even if UWx Control keeps dominating cause well for Jace he just got back but mostly cause Walkers are the face of the franchise and WOTC wants them played in the most popular non rotating format. That and they cost a lot. Calling for bans here would be a waste because based on WOTCs established behavior.
However Stirrings and to a lesser extent Looting break the rules established for card draw and card selection based on the bannings of various blue cantrips.
Well, let's remember that P&P are not just banned because they are consistency tools. That's just part of it. More specifically, they were key elements of T4 rule violators. That's definitely not Stirrings' problem, although it is admittedly related to the issues with Looting in some decks. But that said, Looting decks have very limited GP performance so they really shouldn't be on the table right now. Stirrings decks, however, have a sizable share of the GP T8 decks and are clearly a recurring and consistent issue.
I think the issue with Looting, is people are looking at things like Hollow One, or the new Vengevine, and then forgetting that the 'best midrange deck' is a Looting deck, like completely.
You take Faithless Looting, and you have GDS left as the Thoughtseize deck. Is that what people really want?
"We also look for decks that hold a large enough percentage of the competitive field to reduce the diversity of the format. In the interest of competitive diversity, Splinter Twin is banned from Modern." - Wizards, January 18th, Banned and Restricted Announcement.
"We also look for decks that hold a large enough percentage of the competitive field to reduce the diversity of the format. In the interest of competitive diversity, Splinter Twin is banned from Modern." - Wizards, January 18th, Banned and Restricted Announcement.
Where is humans at at this point in comparison?
Look, Wizards isn't giving us Twin back. I guarantee they will ban Aether Vial before anything else, and make changes to the banned list that reflect old Extended.
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1 gp being 4 of those decks lol and this pt is all uw hence talking about uw. Agree to disagree sir.
Jeskai is tied for third in GP appearances in 2018, spread across four different GP. Also, assuming that lower case "control" equals the formal deck "UW Control" is just not a good assumption. This is what I mean by pushing a narrative and, in this case, now pushing a losing argument. UW Control is viable at all events, not just the narrower PT field. Just as Jeskai has been viable all year up until maybe the summer, where the pendulum may have shifted to UW Control instead.
I dont think dedicated UWR players will swap. No bolts, no helix? Not even playable.
Hard Control players though who float between the 3 (UW, UWR, Esper) should certainly be on UW right now.
Spirits
But obviously if your dedicated to a deck keep at it.
Do you similarly take 4 of those off of Tron’s GP tally due to 1 GP?
Oh for sure. Money wise its nothing. If you have UWR, you already have all the expensive parts of UW. I cant think of a single money card that would make up any difference, in fact UW is probably cheaper.
Spirits
To impact modern, they'd have to go with old Ravnica mechanics because those were more open. The later mechanics that came in RTR are much less versatile or rely on having a lot of resources to really make use of. Case in point, we have many ways to make token creatures already, so the selesnya mechanic "populate" is kind of dead. However, adding more spells with "convoke"? Return to the Ranks is one of the most powerful resurrection spells in modern and people still play with Chord of Calling. Control and toolbox decks would love to have more Transmute options as it's basically a way to swap a bad card for a good one, and I still feel that Forecast is an under-appreciated mechanic.
Unfortunately, detain is just garbage and I think the only major mechanic out of the RtR block to stick in modern is Battalion. Overload is great in commander, though.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Probably. Other than the vastly ignorant who dont even play Modern and think Standard sets dont touch Modern, most people at this point realize, every set has an impact. I mean look at my list. UW, UWR, Esper. I forgot completely about Grixis, why?
Teferi, Hero of Dominaria.
Spirits
Well, I did say rapidly. If they are using established mechanics I'm kind of hoping they can at least tell that they aren't going to break things horribly. Albeit, I'm also now saying that after they openly admitted knowing about Eye of Ugin when printing cards like Thought-knot seer.
I don't know, sometimes I feel like WoTC kicks us in the shins and then comes over and plops a birthday cake on us as we wreath in pain.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Nope, I don’t track that stuff. He said what gp control was great at and I looked it up. I then kept reading is t8 decks and said huh 4 of those are from that one particular gp. I stand by what I said this pt is the perfect spot for control to be great. Never said control was bad, garbage, unplayable, needs unbans, needed cards banned to be good.... was discussing the pt and the prevalence of control that’s all. Seems that got some backlash and I guess that’s to be expected in this thread. That said 2 humans 1 h1 and 1 kci in top 4 huh....
On the one hand, these results should be considered fairly meaningless because it's a team event. Both Hollow One and Humans had very middling performance going in, and Humans had so many pilots on Day 1 that it would be surprising for at least 1 not to make T4.
On the other hand, KCI continues a multi-month stretch of being the secret best deck in the format. Although I'm willing to dismiss the Humans and H1 results in a team setting, KCI just continues to look ridiculous. If Stark's team wins the event, the KCI-targeted ban calls will be very loud. I am unlikely to disagree with them, and I think more GP this year will continue to show Stirrings and KCI/Gx Tron/other Stirrings decks as frontrunning archetypes by a large degree.
I'm not sure killing every flavor of Tron, lantern and eldrazi is better or worse than affinity and kci and possibly Cheerios and lantern / ur prison. Pretty tough call.
The fairest thing is probably just to ban kci if necessary since it eliminates any collateral damage.
UW Ephara Hatebears [Primer], GB Gitrog Lands, BRU Inalla Combo-Control, URG Maelstrom Wanderer Landfall
That's a feature of hitting Stirrings. Tron could use the hit.
Spirits
However Stirrings and to a lesser extent Looting break the rules established for card draw and card selection based on the bannings of various blue cantrips.
I love watching games with 20+ power swinging in on Turn 3, or Karn dropping down Turn 3 and taking 1 of my 2 lands, and thinking
"Twin was just so damn good, it for sure needed to be nuked from orbit, unlike Amulet, unlike Infect, unlike Bloo, unlike Storm, unlike Dredge.
Yeah, Twin needed to die."
/s
Spirits
Well, let's remember that P&P are not just banned because they are consistency tools. That's just part of it. More specifically, they were key elements of T4 rule violators. That's definitely not Stirrings' problem, although it is admittedly related to the issues with Looting in some decks. But that said, Looting decks have very limited GP performance so they really shouldn't be on the table right now. Stirrings decks, however, have a sizable share of the GP T8 decks and are clearly a recurring and consistent issue.
You take Faithless Looting, and you have GDS left as the Thoughtseize deck. Is that what people really want?
Spirits
Where is humans at at this point in comparison?
Look, Wizards isn't giving us Twin back. I guarantee they will ban Aether Vial before anything else, and make changes to the banned list that reflect old Extended.