But please feel free to respond with a bunch of capital words again.
Looking at your signature, just imagine if Slippery Bogle and Simian Spirit Guide were banned because they were supplanting all these similar decks that don't exist (and still didn't exist after the ban). Your decks technically still exist, but are more or less unplayable trash with no meaningful notoriety for 2+ years. Then some other random cards get printed to build up other completely different decks that use less than 10% crossover cards, and everyone tells you that you should like that and shut up about losing your old deck because it's not coming back.
I mean you can try talking personally to me, but I'm a blatant bandwagon hopper. My signature isn't even up to date, I've been trying out Humans and KCI recently. This is the problem, I've constantly seen Twin supporters jumping between the objective arguments of unjust bannings and inability to do what they said they were trying to do, and emotional arguments of feeling personally attacked by the bans, and belittling comparisons to other banned decks.
In response to your scenarios, I've been wary about SSG for years. It's just waiting for the Ad Nauseam-style combo deck that's a notch or two above Ad Naus itself, and then it'll get banned. I'm enjoying the Tier 2 combo deck while it's still around, and when SSG is banned, I'll shrug and find another atypical combo deck that I enjoy piloting.
I'd be more upset about a Bogles ban, just because it was a pet deck at a low-point in my life and I've foiled it out as an homage to how it got me through some difficulties, but because of that I'd probably just shrug, find some foil Breeding Pools and throw Invisible Stalkers in. I don't play Bogles to grind, I play it to enjoy myself.
Similarly, we know there are non-Twin blue decks that are currently viable. Again, we don't know why that is specifically and we don't know how the Twin ban did or did not contributed to this. I also made no attempt to explain why. I am simply saying they are viable.
We know that every "blue" deck that exists as it does today, does so at the behest of multiple newly printed cards and the release of Jace. Of all those things, Jace is the only questionable action that may not have taken place. But judging by how unhelpful and bland Jace is without Teferi, we can be fairly certain that doomsaying stuff on the banned list is hyperbolic nonsense and a result of people inflating the past to ludicrously villainous boogyman status (just as people have done with Twin). Either way, the removal of Twin played no role in making these decks better. New cards 2+ years later did.
The only way to effectively argue for a Twin unban is to somehow make the case that Twin would increase format diversity in this current metagame. Repeating the alleged injustice of the ban does not do this.
This is literally impossible to argue for. There is no scenario that does not see Blue Moon unify behind UR Twin. Zero.
If it was competitive with UW and UWR, then it would cannibalize those meta shares as well.
The final nail in the coffin, is that despite how we got here (3 years of new cards, multiple unban's targetted intentionally to prop up a weak archetype over the same period) we have now realized Wizards goal.
Blue Diversity is real.
Competitive Diversity is real.
Since achieving that was the goal of banning Twin, it makes literally no sense to unban Twin, despite the fact that ban, is not what got us here.
So, as a biased 'Twin Defender' I have one simple ask to those who are not 'Twin Defenders'.
If you dont want to discuss Twin.
Dont talk about it.
Dont mention it.
Dont imply that it needed to go.
Dont imply the format is better for it being gone.
Dont imply that the ban accomplished its goals.
Dont imply its too good for Modern.
If that happens, you wont be subject to the horror of a few loyal defenders of the deck pointing out why your arguments are wrong, and we wont have to read wildly incorrect statements like 'Kiki is nearly as good'.
So, as a biased 'Twin Defender' I have one simple ask to those who are not 'Twin Defenders'.
If you dont want to discuss Twin.
Dont talk about it.
Dont mention it.
Dont imply that it needed to go.
Dont imply the format is better for it being gone.
Dont imply that the ban accomplished its goals.
Dont imply its too good for Modern.
If that happens, you wont be subject to the horror of a few loyal defenders of the deck pointing out why your arguments are wrong, and we wont have to read wildly incorrect statements like 'Kiki is nearly as good'.
This is probably the best advice on the topic since the equally-ridiculous discussion ban on it was lifted.
So now I want to point out that talk just a half year ago revolved around a lot of people here believing that 1. Stoneforge Mystic, 2. Preordain, and 3. Green Sun's Zenith could possibly be unbanned. Are many of the people that agreed with this off of that belief now?
I'm assuming most people are still on the Stoneforge Mystic unban, but is UW Control's "semi" success scaring people from Preordain? Have people concluded that Green Sun's Zenith will cause those decks to supplant Humans, Hardened Scales, Hollow One, UW Control, and KCI as the NEW best decks? Is it considered too good now?
I'm just curious about that. I personally am still on board with all of these unbans and I still don't think they effect more than 1 of the top 6 decks in Modern right now.
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Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
So now I want to point out that talk just a half year ago revolved around a lot of people here believing that 1. Stoneforge Mystic, 2. Preordain, and 3. Green Sun's Zenith could possibly be unbanned. Are many of the people that agreed with this off of that belief now?
I'm assuming most people are still on the Stoneforge Mystic unban, but is UW Control's "semi" success scaring people from Preordain? Have people concluded that Green Sun's Zenith will cause those decks to supplant Humans, Hardened Scales, Hollow One, UW Control, and KCI as the NEW best decks? Is it considered too good now?
I'm just curious about that. I personally am still on board with all of these unbans and I still don't think they effect more than 1 of the top 6 decks in Modern right now.
Go nuts with SFM, that's a do nothing.
Current blue players are cutting Serum for Hieroglyphic...which is so questionable to me, but are regardless moving away from Scry.
GSZ is the only powerful card you listed.
I don't know, at this point the power level of Modern is through the roof and you could unban several things and hardly dent the format.
Re: Twin
I will never bring up Twin and I haven't in years. But when Twin defenders try to justify the unban with any other argument other than "Twin will increase format diversity: here's why-", I will always push back. Same goes whenever Twin defenders misrepresent some element of Twin in 2015.
Re: SFM
I still think the card is a net benefit to format diversity even with UW at the top. It gives added incentive to play grindier decks that arent currently in vogue at the expense of a few percentage points on very aggressive decks. Those decks would still be viable and would still appear at events. You'd just see More stuff like Abzan, D&T, Valuetown, UWx Midrange, and others stealing those percentage points back.
Re: Ponder and Preordain
Unlike SFM, these are just direct bonuses to tiered decks and they don't so much as increase diversity as they make existing top-tier decks better. Yes, they would help flagging strategies like Delver, but they would be a far bigger boon to things like Storm and UWx that don't need the help.
Re: GSZ
This one is interesting. I THINK it's a net diversity gain in that there aren't a lot of Gx toolbox decks at all. Let alone those that might use GSZ. Elves is a big winner here, as is Titanshift and maybe Amulet, but Traverse decks still want delirium and Shadow, Counters Company and BGx want non-green creatures, and stuff like Valuetown is really underplayed. This suggests to me that GSZ just helps a few struggling decks while also giving more regular access to powerful answers. I doubt it homogenizes green decks, as lots of green decks are already doing powerful, distinct things that dont synergize with GSZ at all.
EDIT: Actually, BG Rock with GSZ sounds very good. Your pick of Arbor, Goyf, Ooze, Tracker, and Flayer sounds very strong. I don't love Bob in BG Rock to begin with because of Tracker/Field, so I'm happy to trade in slots for that toolbox. You could also go a very light BGw, ditching Souls entirely and just running white for some SB bullets and Rhino, Teeg, Guilds' new Knight, and others on top. Not sure if that'd be too strong but it's definitely strong and might definitely be the homgenizing force that Wizards is worried about.
Re: Twin
I will never bring up Twin and I haven't in years. But when Twin defenders try to justify the unban with any other argument other than "Twin will increase format diversity: here's why-", I will always push back. Same goes whenever Twin defenders misrepresent some element of Twin in 2015.
Re: SFM
I still think the card is a net benefit to format diversity even with UW at the top. It gives added incentive to play grindier decks that arent currently in vogue at the expense of a few percentage points on very aggressive decks. Those decks would still be viable and would still appear at events. You'd just see More stuff like Abzan, D&T, Valuetown, UWx Midrange, and others stealing those percentage points back.
Re: Ponder and Preordain
Unlike SFM, these are just direct bonuses to tiered decks and they don't so much as increase diversity as they make existing top-tier decks better. Yes, they would help flagging strategies like Delver, but they would be a far bigger boon to things like Storm and UWx that don't need the help.
Re: GSZ
This one is interesting. I THINK it's a net diversity gain in that there aren't a lot of Gx toolbox decks at all. Let alone those that might use GSZ. Elves is a big winner here, as is Titanshift and maybe Amulet, but Traverse decks still want delirium and Shadow, Counters Company and BGx want non-green creatures, and stuff like Valuetown is really underplayed. This suggests to me that GSZ just helps a few struggling decks while also giving more regular access to powerful answers. I doubt it homogenizes green decks, as lots of green decks are already doing powerful, distinct things that dont synergize with GSZ at all.
EDIT: Actually, BG Rock with GSZ sounds very good. Your pick of Arbor, Goyf, Ooze, Tracker, and Flayer sounds very strong. I don't love Bob in BG Rock to begin with because of Tracker/Field, so I'm happy to trade in slots for that toolbox. You could also go a very light BGw, ditching Souls entirely and just running white for some SB bullets and Rhino, Teeg, Guilds' new Knight, and others on top. Not sure if that'd be too strong but it's definitely strong and might definitely be the homgenizing force that Wizards is worried about.
I feel you on all of those...except I do in fact think that Preordain won't help Tier 1 decks too much. I think the difference in minimal, especially if you consider that Sleight of Hand sees play only in Storm and Ad Nauseam, where the Sleight of Hand to Preordain change is a bit more optimal. Serum Visions vs. Preordain...they are much, much closer than people think and I don't think I've heard 1 single player ever complain about Serum Visions in Modern. I hear a lot more disdain about Ancient Stirrings and I am starting to lean toward their side. Even with new cards printed, which certainly is good, Ancient Stirrings still may need a ban, considering freaking Preordain isn't currently legal.
I never lump Ponder with Preordain. I personally would love to see the card, but then I'd like to try Dig Through Time and some other stuff as well. But I digress. We can start with a Preordain unban. If the fears of a million people that UW Control becomes 15% of the meta, winning 50% of its matches, then Wizards can always retract the unban and ban. It's not like they haven't done that before. I do NOT think Preordain is that much a risk where it's not worth trying it in Modern (I mean without the Git Probe, Ponder, Rite of Flame, Seething Song, and the other 5 cards that were legal at that time). Let's try it now!
Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
My gut intinct is that GSZ is a smidge too powerful. Haven't done any testing, but I keep having visions of how much the card helps decks like Legacy Elves. Not saying the same would happen in Modern, but it would be pretty easy to find a way to break the card, I think. Happy to be convinced I'm wrong, I think a shorter banlist is an admirable goal, I just think GSZ isn't quite an easy unban.
I feel you on all of those...except I do in fact think that Preordain won't help Tier 1 decks too much. I think the difference in minimal, especially if you consider that Sleight of Hand sees play only in Storm and Ad Nauseam, where the Sleight of Hand to Preordain change is a bit more optimal. Serum Visions vs. Preordain...they are much, much closer than people think and I don't think I've heard 1 single player ever complain about Serum Visions in Modern. I hear a lot more disdain about Ancient Stirrings and I am starting to lean toward their side. Even with new cards printed, which certainly is good, Ancient Stirrings still may need a ban, considering freaking Preordain isn't currently legal.
My biggest fear is that UW Control's best card is currently Terminus. Sure, Teferi and JTMS and Snapcaster are amazing too, but Terminus is the brokenness that gets the deck to the top tables. Preordain is at the least a marginal improvement to that gameplan and at the most a big one. This makes me very hesitant to predict an unban, as Wizards has never unbanned a card that will almost directly slot into a top-tier contender. Sure, we could argue about how many Preordains UW Control would want vs. Opt and other options, but that's a very technical and in-the-weeds discussion with no clear answer. It's much more obvious, for us and Wizards, to look at those cards, see a fit, and realize it might be unsafe (or at least not match previous unban precedents).
Re: Twin
I will never bring up Twin and I haven't in years. But when Twin defenders try to justify the unban with any other argument other than "Twin will increase format diversity: here's why-", I will always push back.
Who is making this argument? What quotes do you have to support that people are making this argument? At most, people are saying that it would add one more good deck among other good decks, likely at the cost of other decks that are currently not good (like Blue Moon and other low-tier jank). And that current diversity is wholly independent to the banning of Twin, since it took 3 years and dozens of new cards to achieve. It sounds more like you are making projections onto others and misrepresenting their arguments.
Re: Twin
I will never bring up Twin and I haven't in years. But when Twin defenders try to justify the unban with any other argument other than "Twin will increase format diversity: here's why-", I will always push back.
Who is making this argument? What quotes do you have to support that people are making this argument? At most, people are saying that it would add one more good deck among other good decks, likely at the cost of other decks that are currently not good (like Blue Moon and other low-tier jank). And that current diversity is wholly independent to the banning of Twin, since it took 3 years and dozens of new cards to achieve. It sounds more like you are making projections onto others and misrepresenting their arguments.
Your recent posts focused on the alleged injustice of the Twin ban, including an inaccurate and misleading comparison to the Nacatl precedent. Stop alleging that the Twin ban was unjust. It doesn't matter for unbanning purposes and yet you frequently cite that injustice when making or advancing your pro-Twin arguments. idSurge literally said there is no argument for Twin's unban and also appeared to be making an appeal to our sense of injustice by comparing it to Dredge and Amulet (i.e. decks not killed by a related ban). These are not reasons for unbanning a card. Either make the objective case that it improves diversity or stop bringing it up.
Your quoted post is also yet another example of the frustrating Twin defender double standard. Earlier today you were asking me to consider how T8 tiebreakers changed the 2015 picture for Twin. Now you're telling me that Blue Moon is worthless when it has two T8 tiebreaker appearances this year which you don't seem to count or consider.
Your quoted post is also yet another example of the frustrating Twin defender double standard. Earlier today you were asking me to consider how T8 tiebreakers changed the 2015 picture for Twin. Now you're telling me that Blue Moon is worthless when it has two T8 tiebreaker appearances this year which you don't seem to count or consider.
Then you completely missed the point of that comment (and the original post with the data crunch). It has nothing to do with what tie breakers have or have not done since then. It has everything to do with a company making the biggest and most controversial ban decision in the history of the format on the backs of what were essentially four coin flips.
What's done is done. I'm just trying to show why it might be so infuriating and insulting to the thousands of people that played the deck to make such a huge decision from such a small and easily manipulated data set. (This is of course in addition to the multitude of other failures that never realized as a result of the ban).
It definitely can be frustrating. Others have lost their decks as well. I lost Bloom Titan, although people will convince you of 75% win rates on turns 0, 1, or 2 across the board because every Bloom player palms their opening 7 like Stephen Speck does. Others have lost Birthing Pod. That one right there actually pissed ME off more than any of the bans they've done, although admittedly Twin was a close 2nd. Basically Wizards was saying that "we are going to print creatures much, much better than Siege Rhino, Restoration Angel, and Thragtusk, so we are banning the card because it can only get better." That and Siege Rhino broke it open.
Players have lost Infect, although I know a guy who has ******* killed it with Infect recently. He beat me in the top 4 of a PPTQ, but then he won that PPTQ, then nearly beat Hall of Famer Mark Herberholtz in the finals of a PTQ at the Grand Prix Las Vegas (Hall of Famers tend to play 3 Path to Exile and a Terminus by turn 3, then Field of Ruins X 2 for Inkmoth Nexii; that's part of why they're Hall of Famers). I don't become fans of players who beat me in the top 8 of PPTQs because I am actually trying to win them, but he has swayed me.
Players lost Dredge. Heck, Sam Black lost Mono Blue Infect with Ponder, Preordain, Blazing Shoal, and Probe.
I will admit that Twin was the most surprising ban that has ever happened in Modern. There's no denying that. But we have to move on from there. If Wizards does intend to unban it, it is only going to be because they want to, not because we bullied them to do so. That has never worked.
Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
Re: GSZ
This one is interesting. I THINK it's a net diversity gain in that there aren't a lot of Gx toolbox decks at all. Let alone those that might use GSZ. Elves is a big winner here, as is Titanshift and maybe Amulet, but Traverse decks still want delirium and Shadow, Counters Company and BGx want non-green creatures, and stuff like Valuetown is really underplayed. This suggests to me that GSZ just helps a few struggling decks while also giving more regular access to powerful answers. I doubt it homogenizes green decks, as lots of green decks are already doing powerful, distinct things that dont synergize with GSZ at all.
EDIT: Actually, BG Rock with GSZ sounds very good. Your pick of Arbor, Goyf, Ooze, Tracker, and Flayer sounds very strong. I don't love Bob in BG Rock to begin with because of Tracker/Field, so I'm happy to trade in slots for that toolbox. You could also go a very light BGw, ditching Souls entirely and just running white for some SB bullets and Rhino, Teeg, Guilds' new Knight, and others on top. Not sure if that'd be too strong but it's definitely strong and might definitely be the homgenizing force that Wizards is worried about.
About Green Sun Zenith... perhaps it could revive those toolbox decks that disappeared when Birthing Pod got banned?
I'm okay trying to bootstap our samples as much as possible to compensate for small Ns. I'm also okay extrapolating from smaller N samples to estimate possible MWPs. But N=1 matches? I'm still dealing with flak from N=20 MWP estimates. I would have been downvoted to oblivion on Reddit with my recent MWP post if I had posted N=1 matchup data. So I think we can all agree there is no meaningful information we can draw from the SCG Vs. Series example.
I'm not presenting any data for the matchups from the SCG Vs. videos, I was just presenting my impressions of the matchups based on the cards the decks were playing, and my feeling of how they played out in the videos. And you'll notice that my conclusions were actually against the result of the match a couple times. Even though UW lost, the games were all very close, and I would expect UW to win that more than it would lose. Tron lost, but it was because Stevens punted a game he should have won. Hardened Scales won, but that's the kind of deck that Twin always used to beat up on, although I think it has better tools for Twin than Affinity used to have, so my opinion is that Twin would be a slight favorite. And then I don't see how you could watch the Mardu match and come to any conclusion other than Twin being a huge dog to it. The first two games weren't even competitive. So, you can take or leave my opinions, I just wanted to state them.
I'm too tilted that you feel the Twin ban accomplished diversity in today's meta to address these directly without devolving into frustration.
I have repeated hundreds of arguments hundreds of times and been banned for these repetitions twice. I have previously addressed every single thing you have said and I would simply be repeating myself yet again here. If I address this, it will be after I sit on it to avoid possibly getting banned again. But I grossly disagree with your analysis on several levels.
I don't think Ktk is saying that the Twin ban is what caused Modern to become diverse, he's just saying that it happened afterwards, and let's be honest here, it's pretty likely that WotC believes that the Twin ban had something to do with it.
So, if you want to address this issue, the one million dollar question would be:
1) What do you guys believe that would happen if Twin had not been unbanned in Jan, 2016?
It's the only Twin related issue that we have not discussed extensively in here.
Ooh, this sounds fun, I'll bite. First of all, Twin would have gotten buried by Eldrazi just like everyone else. What happened in the no banlist tournament pretty much proves that. If Twin had still been around in late 2016, Infect and Dredge probably don't become as big of a problem, and we probably don't see Probe or GGT get banned. I don't know how long Twin would have remained as the best deck, but at some point it would have fallen back to the pack as a slew of new decks were enabled by new cards, while Twin didn't receive anything. I don't know if WotC would have been brave enough to unban Jace with Twin still around, but they probably would unban AV, and it would still be bad, lol. Coming to today, I think the format would look almost exactly the same, except Twin exists instead of Blue Moon. There would probably be a slight shift towards instant speed interaction, like Mardu playing Terminate instead of Dreadbore. Decks like Humans play a couple copies of Dismember main deck instead of just in the side.
So now I want to point out that talk just a half year ago revolved around a lot of people here believing that 1. Stoneforge Mystic, 2. Preordain, and 3. Green Sun's Zenith could possibly be unbanned. Are many of the people that agreed with this off of that belief now?
I'm assuming most people are still on the Stoneforge Mystic unban, but is UW Control's "semi" success scaring people from Preordain?
No, I wouldn't play Preordain in UW, you don't want sorcery speed cantrips in a Terminus deck. It would be good in GDS, though.
Current blue players are cutting Serum for Hieroglyphic...which is so questionable to me, but are regardless moving away from Scry.
It's not the scry, it's the sorcery speed. You can only Miracle your Terminus if it's the first card you draw in a turn. Instant speed cantrips double your chances of miracling a Terminus. It feels really really bad when you need to find a Terminus to clean up the board, so you cast Serum Visions to try to dig to one, and you draw it from the SV. I've straight up lost games like that, and it's why I quickly dropped SV from my list. Another point is that you're often setting up your Terminus with a Jace Brainstorm, so you don't need the filtering. You just need the instant speed cantrip to trigger the Miracle on your opponent's turn. Hieroglyphic Illumination does a fine job of doing that, and the cycling is uncounterable, which is a niche benefit. Finally, it has the upside of sometimes being card advantage in the late game. I've Snapped back a Hiero to draw cards in control mirrors, I've set up a Terminus on top of my deck with Jace when I had 5 mana and cast Hiero to draw 2 and Miracle the Terminus from the first draw. You want as many instant speed cantrips as you can get to really maximize your Miracle chances.
My biggest fear is that UW Control's best card is currently Terminus. Sure, Teferi and JTMS and Snapcaster are amazing too, but Terminus is the brokenness that gets the deck to the top tables. Preordain is at the least a marginal improvement to that gameplan and at the most a big one.
Nope, it's not. Read above about why you don't want sorcery speed cantrips in a Terminus build of UW. I know some people are still playing SV in UW Miracles, but that's honestly just people who can't let go of the idea that SV is a good card, so you're just supposed to play it if you're playing blue. It's bad in the deck. And don't even get me started on the people still playing Wall of Omens and Spreading Seas along with Terminus... At the absolute best, Preordain is not as bad as SV in the deck, since you get to scry 2 before you draw. That way, if Terminus is in the top 2 cards of your library, you can put it second from the top and draw the other card. But if Terminus is the 3rd card in your deck you're going to be really really sad. I might try it if it got unbanned just to see how things went, but I'm pretty happy with 4 Opt and 2 Hieroglyphic Illumination as my main cantrips.
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Modern UBR Grixis Shadow UBR UR Izzet Phoenix UR UW UW Control UW GB GB Rock GB
Commander BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
Ban the actual amulet, or Prime Time and we can talk.
No lie, I actually pray they ban one of my favorite cards of all times and one that's brought me a ton of $ until now, so I can move on and play 5 decks instead of 8. It makes my choices limited, which in my opinion, is good. Not everyone likes lowering the choices of decks to play in Mdoern though.
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Legacy - Sneak Show, BR Reanimator, Miracles, UW Stoneblade
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/ Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander - Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build) (dead format for me)
My biggest fear is that UW Control's best card is currently Terminus. Sure, Teferi and JTMS and Snapcaster are amazing too, but Terminus is the brokenness that gets the deck to the top tables. Preordain is at the least a marginal improvement to that gameplan and at the most a big one.
Nope, it's not. Read above about why you don't want sorcery speed cantrips in a Terminus build of UW. I know some people are still playing SV in UW Miracles, but that's honestly just people who can't let go of the idea that SV is a good card, so you're just supposed to play it if you're playing blue. It's bad in the deck. And don't even get me started on the people still playing Wall of Omens and Spreading Seas along with Terminus... At the absolute best, Preordain is not as bad as SV in the deck, since you get to scry 2 before you draw. That way, if Terminus is in the top 2 cards of your library, you can put it second from the top and draw the other card. But if Terminus is the 3rd card in your deck you're going to be really really sad. I might try it if it got unbanned just to see how things went, but I'm pretty happy with 4 Opt and 2 Hieroglyphic Illumination as my main cantrips.
I'm just going to defer to the best-placing UW Control decks in 2018 on this issue. This includes:
So we're averaging about 2.3 copies for the best UW placements with 4 decks using 0, one using 1, two using 2, zero using 3, and six using 4. Based on that, I'm comfortable sticking with my statement that it is by no means a closed question that Preordain will not do exactly what I said it would: somewhere between marginal improvement and big one. I'm also confident saying that this idea you "don't want sorcery speed cantrips" in this deck is not as clear as you presented it. That's at least an open question and at most a closed one that leans towards "play sorcery speed cantrips."
I'm guessing preordain, stoneforge, and green sun zenith would be fine power level wise but would eliminate some of the diversity in deckbuilding. Similar to how bloodbraid elf can be run in almost in any red/green deck (titanshift, ponza, jund, ect).
So we're averaging about 2.3 copies for the best UW placements with 4 decks using 0, one using 1, two using 2, zero using 3, and six using 4. Based on that, I'm comfortable sticking with my statement that it is by no means a closed question that Preordain will not do exactly what I said it would: somewhere between marginal improvement and big one. I'm also confident saying that this idea you "don't want sorcery speed cantrips" in this deck is not as clear as you presented it. That's at least an open question and at most a closed one that leans towards "play sorcery speed cantrips."
Sheridan, look at the lists you linked. Almost every one of the decks playing 4 SV were not 4 Terminus builds. Of course you play 4 SV if you're playing a Verdict/Wrath build, but if you're playing a Miracles build you don't want the sorcery speed cantrips. People realized this, and that's why you see some people in recent months going down to 1 or 2 SVs in Miracles, but I feel like that's still holding onto the old idea that you're supposed to play SV if you're playing a blue deck because it's always been the best cantrip. Except it's not the best cantrip in UW Miracles. Opt is. You play 4 Opt, and then if you want more cantrips you find a couple others that are instant speed, like Hieroglyphic Illuminations (which is going to become more popular, trust me), Censor, Remand, Thought Scour, Peek, etc.
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Modern UBR Grixis Shadow UBR UR Izzet Phoenix UR UW UW Control UW GB GB Rock GB
Commander BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
Sheridan, look at the lists you linked. Almost every one of the decks playing 4 SV were not 4 Terminus builds. Of course you play 4 SV if you're playing a Verdict/Wrath build, but if you're playing a Miracles build you don't want the sorcery speed cantrips. People realized this, and that's why you see some people in recent months going down to 1 or 2 SVs in Miracles, but I feel like that's still holding onto the old idea that you're supposed to play SV if you're playing a blue deck because it's always been the best cantrip. Except it's not the best cantrip in UW Miracles. Opt is. You play 4 Opt, and then if you want more cantrips you find a couple others that are instant speed, like Hieroglyphic Illuminations (which is going to become more popular, trust me), Censor, Remand, Thought Scour, Peek, etc.
I did look through them. Decks with 0 SV run 4 Terminus on average. For 1 SV, it's 4 as well. For 2 SV, it's 3.5 Terminus. For 4 SV, it's 2. Top performing UW Control decks are still playing both. Maybe it's the idea you are postulating that they are holding onto a bad piece of tech, or maybe it's just an optimal construction. Maybe it's a spectrum from 4 Terminus to 2 Terminus depending on the metagame. I don't know the dynamics and we don't know where they are heading, but we do know the deck would almost certainly play Preordain in some quantity. And that means my original statement continues to hold, which was not a particularly controversial statement to begin with: Preordain will range from a slight upgrade to a big one and it's more of an open question than you are framing it.
Moreover, we haven't even discussed Preordain's slight-to-major boost to other top-tier decks like Jeskai, GDS, and Storm. These would just be further strikes against the card. I was all for a Preordain unban discussion when blue decks were struggling but now they aren't. I doubt Wizards even looks twice at this card in unban discussions these days.
Sheridan, look at the lists you linked. Almost every one of the decks playing 4 SV were not 4 Terminus builds. Of course you play 4 SV if you're playing a Verdict/Wrath build, but if you're playing a Miracles build you don't want the sorcery speed cantrips. People realized this, and that's why you see some people in recent months going down to 1 or 2 SVs in Miracles, but I feel like that's still holding onto the old idea that you're supposed to play SV if you're playing a blue deck because it's always been the best cantrip. Except it's not the best cantrip in UW Miracles. Opt is. You play 4 Opt, and then if you want more cantrips you find a couple others that are instant speed, like Hieroglyphic Illuminations (which is going to become more popular, trust me), Censor, Remand, Thought Scour, Peek, etc.
I did look through them. Decks with 0 SV run 4 Terminus on average. For 1 SV, it's 4 as well. For 2 SV, it's 3.5 Terminus. For 4 SV, it's 2. Top performing UW Control decks are still playing both. Maybe it's the idea you are postulating that they are holding onto a bad piece of tech, or maybe it's just an optimal construction. Maybe it's a spectrum from 4 Terminus to 2 Terminus depending on the metagame. I don't know the dynamics and we don't know where they are heading, but we do know the deck would almost certainly play Preordain in some quantity. And that means my original statement continues to hold, which was not a particularly controversial statement to begin with: Preordain will range from a slight upgrade to a big one and it's more of an open question than you are framing it.
Moreover, we haven't even discussed Preordain's slight-to-major boost to other top-tier decks like Jeskai, GDS, and Storm. These would just be further strikes against the card. I was all for a Preordain unban discussion when blue decks were struggling but now they aren't. I doubt Wizards even looks twice at this card in unban discussions these days.
The problem I have with Preordain and this entire argument of "We only unban when X archetype/color is struggling" is that in essence the ban is still artificial. Bloodbraid Elfwas fine for years. This exact forum used the argument Jund is doing fine, don't need to unban is not the same argument as Other cards in the card pool have equal or greater value, we should have X unbanned for power level reasons. Every time I read these similar arguments, in the abstract I see something along the lines of "Shock is banned in the Modern format, so that Lightning Bolt doesn't get a boost"
Opt has superseded Serum Visions. Preordain doesn't replace Thought Scour in GDS, Storm is redundant anyway, and UW Control would run 6 cantrips at most, and to optimize Snapcaster Mage, they would need to maximize the Opt numbers.
Decks like Infect, Jeskai Ascendancy & UR Wizards would get a boost. It's hard to disagree that Preordain, Stoneforge Mystic, & Green Sun's Zenith are the least powerful cards on the banned list.
Issues such as archetype and color diversity need to be solved with new product, not the banned list. The banned list should be used for the grievous errors, and tournament disruptors. We need to stop viewing the banned list as a nerf to the metagame list.
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I mean you can try talking personally to me, but I'm a blatant bandwagon hopper. My signature isn't even up to date, I've been trying out Humans and KCI recently. This is the problem, I've constantly seen Twin supporters jumping between the objective arguments of unjust bannings and inability to do what they said they were trying to do, and emotional arguments of feeling personally attacked by the bans, and belittling comparisons to other banned decks.
In response to your scenarios, I've been wary about SSG for years. It's just waiting for the Ad Nauseam-style combo deck that's a notch or two above Ad Naus itself, and then it'll get banned. I'm enjoying the Tier 2 combo deck while it's still around, and when SSG is banned, I'll shrug and find another atypical combo deck that I enjoy piloting.
I'd be more upset about a Bogles ban, just because it was a pet deck at a low-point in my life and I've foiled it out as an homage to how it got me through some difficulties, but because of that I'd probably just shrug, find some foil Breeding Pools and throw Invisible Stalkers in. I don't play Bogles to grind, I play it to enjoy myself.
We know that every "blue" deck that exists as it does today, does so at the behest of multiple newly printed cards and the release of Jace. Of all those things, Jace is the only questionable action that may not have taken place. But judging by how unhelpful and bland Jace is without Teferi, we can be fairly certain that doomsaying stuff on the banned list is hyperbolic nonsense and a result of people inflating the past to ludicrously villainous boogyman status (just as people have done with Twin). Either way, the removal of Twin played no role in making these decks better. New cards 2+ years later did.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
This is literally impossible to argue for. There is no scenario that does not see Blue Moon unify behind UR Twin. Zero.
If it was competitive with UW and UWR, then it would cannibalize those meta shares as well.
The final nail in the coffin, is that despite how we got here (3 years of new cards, multiple unban's targetted intentionally to prop up a weak archetype over the same period) we have now realized Wizards goal.
Blue Diversity is real.
Competitive Diversity is real.
Since achieving that was the goal of banning Twin, it makes literally no sense to unban Twin, despite the fact that ban, is not what got us here.
So, as a biased 'Twin Defender' I have one simple ask to those who are not 'Twin Defenders'.
If you dont want to discuss Twin.
Dont talk about it.
Dont mention it.
Dont imply that it needed to go.
Dont imply the format is better for it being gone.
Dont imply that the ban accomplished its goals.
Dont imply its too good for Modern.
If that happens, you wont be subject to the horror of a few loyal defenders of the deck pointing out why your arguments are wrong, and we wont have to read wildly incorrect statements like 'Kiki is nearly as good'.
Spirits
This is probably the best advice on the topic since the equally-ridiculous discussion ban on it was lifted.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I'm assuming most people are still on the Stoneforge Mystic unban, but is UW Control's "semi" success scaring people from Preordain? Have people concluded that Green Sun's Zenith will cause those decks to supplant Humans, Hardened Scales, Hollow One, UW Control, and KCI as the NEW best decks? Is it considered too good now?
I'm just curious about that. I personally am still on board with all of these unbans and I still don't think they effect more than 1 of the top 6 decks in Modern right now.
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)Go nuts with SFM, that's a do nothing.
Current blue players are cutting Serum for Hieroglyphic...which is so questionable to me, but are regardless moving away from Scry.
GSZ is the only powerful card you listed.
I don't know, at this point the power level of Modern is through the roof and you could unban several things and hardly dent the format.
Spirits
I will never bring up Twin and I haven't in years. But when Twin defenders try to justify the unban with any other argument other than "Twin will increase format diversity: here's why-", I will always push back. Same goes whenever Twin defenders misrepresent some element of Twin in 2015.
Re: SFM
I still think the card is a net benefit to format diversity even with UW at the top. It gives added incentive to play grindier decks that arent currently in vogue at the expense of a few percentage points on very aggressive decks. Those decks would still be viable and would still appear at events. You'd just see More stuff like Abzan, D&T, Valuetown, UWx Midrange, and others stealing those percentage points back.
Re: Ponder and Preordain
Unlike SFM, these are just direct bonuses to tiered decks and they don't so much as increase diversity as they make existing top-tier decks better. Yes, they would help flagging strategies like Delver, but they would be a far bigger boon to things like Storm and UWx that don't need the help.
Re: GSZ
This one is interesting. I THINK it's a net diversity gain in that there aren't a lot of Gx toolbox decks at all. Let alone those that might use GSZ. Elves is a big winner here, as is Titanshift and maybe Amulet, but Traverse decks still want delirium and Shadow, Counters Company and BGx want non-green creatures, and stuff like Valuetown is really underplayed. This suggests to me that GSZ just helps a few struggling decks while also giving more regular access to powerful answers. I doubt it homogenizes green decks, as lots of green decks are already doing powerful, distinct things that dont synergize with GSZ at all.
EDIT: Actually, BG Rock with GSZ sounds very good. Your pick of Arbor, Goyf, Ooze, Tracker, and Flayer sounds very strong. I don't love Bob in BG Rock to begin with because of Tracker/Field, so I'm happy to trade in slots for that toolbox. You could also go a very light BGw, ditching Souls entirely and just running white for some SB bullets and Rhino, Teeg, Guilds' new Knight, and others on top. Not sure if that'd be too strong but it's definitely strong and might definitely be the homgenizing force that Wizards is worried about.
I feel you on all of those...except I do in fact think that Preordain won't help Tier 1 decks too much. I think the difference in minimal, especially if you consider that Sleight of Hand sees play only in Storm and Ad Nauseam, where the Sleight of Hand to Preordain change is a bit more optimal. Serum Visions vs. Preordain...they are much, much closer than people think and I don't think I've heard 1 single player ever complain about Serum Visions in Modern. I hear a lot more disdain about Ancient Stirrings and I am starting to lean toward their side. Even with new cards printed, which certainly is good, Ancient Stirrings still may need a ban, considering freaking Preordain isn't currently legal.
I never lump Ponder with Preordain. I personally would love to see the card, but then I'd like to try Dig Through Time and some other stuff as well. But I digress. We can start with a Preordain unban. If the fears of a million people that UW Control becomes 15% of the meta, winning 50% of its matches, then Wizards can always retract the unban and ban. It's not like they haven't done that before. I do NOT think Preordain is that much a risk where it's not worth trying it in Modern (I mean without the Git Probe, Ponder, Rite of Flame, Seething Song, and the other 5 cards that were legal at that time). Let's try it now!
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)My biggest fear is that UW Control's best card is currently Terminus. Sure, Teferi and JTMS and Snapcaster are amazing too, but Terminus is the brokenness that gets the deck to the top tables. Preordain is at the least a marginal improvement to that gameplan and at the most a big one. This makes me very hesitant to predict an unban, as Wizards has never unbanned a card that will almost directly slot into a top-tier contender. Sure, we could argue about how many Preordains UW Control would want vs. Opt and other options, but that's a very technical and in-the-weeds discussion with no clear answer. It's much more obvious, for us and Wizards, to look at those cards, see a fit, and realize it might be unsafe (or at least not match previous unban precedents).
Who is making this argument? What quotes do you have to support that people are making this argument? At most, people are saying that it would add one more good deck among other good decks, likely at the cost of other decks that are currently not good (like Blue Moon and other low-tier jank). And that current diversity is wholly independent to the banning of Twin, since it took 3 years and dozens of new cards to achieve. It sounds more like you are making projections onto others and misrepresenting their arguments.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Your recent posts focused on the alleged injustice of the Twin ban, including an inaccurate and misleading comparison to the Nacatl precedent. Stop alleging that the Twin ban was unjust. It doesn't matter for unbanning purposes and yet you frequently cite that injustice when making or advancing your pro-Twin arguments. idSurge literally said there is no argument for Twin's unban and also appeared to be making an appeal to our sense of injustice by comparing it to Dredge and Amulet (i.e. decks not killed by a related ban). These are not reasons for unbanning a card. Either make the objective case that it improves diversity or stop bringing it up.
Your quoted post is also yet another example of the frustrating Twin defender double standard. Earlier today you were asking me to consider how T8 tiebreakers changed the 2015 picture for Twin. Now you're telling me that Blue Moon is worthless when it has two T8 tiebreaker appearances this year which you don't seem to count or consider.
There no reason to unban it, other than that it should never have been banned.
That's it. There is nothing else to discuss on it.
Spirits
Then you completely missed the point of that comment (and the original post with the data crunch). It has nothing to do with what tie breakers have or have not done since then. It has everything to do with a company making the biggest and most controversial ban decision in the history of the format on the backs of what were essentially four coin flips.
What's done is done. I'm just trying to show why it might be so infuriating and insulting to the thousands of people that played the deck to make such a huge decision from such a small and easily manipulated data set. (This is of course in addition to the multitude of other failures that never realized as a result of the ban).
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Players have lost Infect, although I know a guy who has ******* killed it with Infect recently. He beat me in the top 4 of a PPTQ, but then he won that PPTQ, then nearly beat Hall of Famer Mark Herberholtz in the finals of a PTQ at the Grand Prix Las Vegas (Hall of Famers tend to play 3 Path to Exile and a Terminus by turn 3, then Field of Ruins X 2 for Inkmoth Nexii; that's part of why they're Hall of Famers). I don't become fans of players who beat me in the top 8 of PPTQs because I am actually trying to win them, but he has swayed me.
Players lost Dredge. Heck, Sam Black lost Mono Blue Infect with Ponder, Preordain, Blazing Shoal, and Probe.
I will admit that Twin was the most surprising ban that has ever happened in Modern. There's no denying that. But we have to move on from there. If Wizards does intend to unban it, it is only going to be because they want to, not because we bullied them to do so. That has never worked.
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)Ban the actual amulet, or Prime Time and we can talk.
Spirits
About Green Sun Zenith... perhaps it could revive those toolbox decks that disappeared when Birthing Pod got banned?
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I don't think Ktk is saying that the Twin ban is what caused Modern to become diverse, he's just saying that it happened afterwards, and let's be honest here, it's pretty likely that WotC believes that the Twin ban had something to do with it.
Ooh, this sounds fun, I'll bite. First of all, Twin would have gotten buried by Eldrazi just like everyone else. What happened in the no banlist tournament pretty much proves that. If Twin had still been around in late 2016, Infect and Dredge probably don't become as big of a problem, and we probably don't see Probe or GGT get banned. I don't know how long Twin would have remained as the best deck, but at some point it would have fallen back to the pack as a slew of new decks were enabled by new cards, while Twin didn't receive anything. I don't know if WotC would have been brave enough to unban Jace with Twin still around, but they probably would unban AV, and it would still be bad, lol. Coming to today, I think the format would look almost exactly the same, except Twin exists instead of Blue Moon. There would probably be a slight shift towards instant speed interaction, like Mardu playing Terminate instead of Dreadbore. Decks like Humans play a couple copies of Dismember main deck instead of just in the side.
No, I wouldn't play Preordain in UW, you don't want sorcery speed cantrips in a Terminus deck. It would be good in GDS, though.
It's not the scry, it's the sorcery speed. You can only Miracle your Terminus if it's the first card you draw in a turn. Instant speed cantrips double your chances of miracling a Terminus. It feels really really bad when you need to find a Terminus to clean up the board, so you cast Serum Visions to try to dig to one, and you draw it from the SV. I've straight up lost games like that, and it's why I quickly dropped SV from my list. Another point is that you're often setting up your Terminus with a Jace Brainstorm, so you don't need the filtering. You just need the instant speed cantrip to trigger the Miracle on your opponent's turn. Hieroglyphic Illumination does a fine job of doing that, and the cycling is uncounterable, which is a niche benefit. Finally, it has the upside of sometimes being card advantage in the late game. I've Snapped back a Hiero to draw cards in control mirrors, I've set up a Terminus on top of my deck with Jace when I had 5 mana and cast Hiero to draw 2 and Miracle the Terminus from the first draw. You want as many instant speed cantrips as you can get to really maximize your Miracle chances.
Nope, it's not. Read above about why you don't want sorcery speed cantrips in a Terminus build of UW. I know some people are still playing SV in UW Miracles, but that's honestly just people who can't let go of the idea that SV is a good card, so you're just supposed to play it if you're playing blue. It's bad in the deck. And don't even get me started on the people still playing Wall of Omens and Spreading Seas along with Terminus... At the absolute best, Preordain is not as bad as SV in the deck, since you get to scry 2 before you draw. That way, if Terminus is in the top 2 cards of your library, you can put it second from the top and draw the other card. But if Terminus is the 3rd card in your deck you're going to be really really sad. I might try it if it got unbanned just to see how things went, but I'm pretty happy with 4 Opt and 2 Hieroglyphic Illumination as my main cantrips.
UBR Grixis Shadow UBR
UR Izzet Phoenix UR
UW UW Control UW
GB GB Rock GB
Commander
BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG
BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
No lie, I actually pray they ban one of my favorite cards of all times and one that's brought me a ton of $ until now, so I can move on and play 5 decks instead of 8. It makes my choices limited, which in my opinion, is good. Not everyone likes lowering the choices of decks to play in Mdoern though.
Premodern - Trix, RecSur, Enchantress, Reanimator, Elves https://www.facebook.com/groups/PremodernUSA/
Modern - Neobrand, Hogaak Vine, Elves
Standard - Mono Red (6-2 and 5-3 in 2 McQ)
Draft - (I wish I had more time for limited...)
Commander -
Norin the Wary, Grimgrin, Adun Oakenshield (taking forever to build)(dead format for me)I'm just going to defer to the best-placing UW Control decks in 2018 on this issue. This includes:
4 SV for Exupery's 8-1 list in the 09/08/2018 MTGO PTQ: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1317868#online
0 SV for jhacer1's event-winning list in the 09/01/2018 MTGO PTQ: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/mtgo-standings/modern-ptq-2018-09-02
4 SV for McWinSauce's 9-0 3rd place list in the 09/01/2018 MTGO PTQ: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1306397#online
0 SV for Felicette's T8 list at SCG Baltimore: http://www.starcitygames.com/decks/123353
2 SV for Lanthier's T4 list at GP Detroit: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1318666#online
0 SV for Kinnell's T4 list at GP Det: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/1318671#online
4 SV for Seegelken's 10th place list at GP Prague that missed on breakers: https://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gppra18/9-32-decklists-2018-08-26
0 SV for Sasso's 10th place list at GP SaoP that missed on breakers: https://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gpsao18/9-16-decklists-2018-07-08
4 SV for Dagen's T8 list at GP Barcelona: https://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gpbar18/top-8-decklists-grand-prix-barcelona-2018-2018-07-01
2 SV for Ballestin's T8 list at GP Bar: https://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gpbar18/top-8-decklists-grand-prix-barcelona-2018-2018-07-01
1 SV for Poroskai's T8 list at GP Bar: https://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gpbar18/top-8-decklists-grand-prix-barcelona-2018-2018-07-01
4 SV for Mechin's 11th place list at GP Bar that missed on breakers: https://magic.wizards.com/en/events/coverage/gpbar18/9-16-decklists-2018-07-01
4 SV for Norton's T8 list at SCG Atlanta: http://www.starcitygames.com/decks/122028
So we're averaging about 2.3 copies for the best UW placements with 4 decks using 0, one using 1, two using 2, zero using 3, and six using 4. Based on that, I'm comfortable sticking with my statement that it is by no means a closed question that Preordain will not do exactly what I said it would: somewhere between marginal improvement and big one. I'm also confident saying that this idea you "don't want sorcery speed cantrips" in this deck is not as clear as you presented it. That's at least an open question and at most a closed one that leans towards "play sorcery speed cantrips."
UBR Grixis Shadow UBR
UR Izzet Phoenix UR
UW UW Control UW
GB GB Rock GB
Commander
BG Meren of Clan Nel Toth BG
BGUW Atraxa, Praetor's Voice BGUW
I did look through them. Decks with 0 SV run 4 Terminus on average. For 1 SV, it's 4 as well. For 2 SV, it's 3.5 Terminus. For 4 SV, it's 2. Top performing UW Control decks are still playing both. Maybe it's the idea you are postulating that they are holding onto a bad piece of tech, or maybe it's just an optimal construction. Maybe it's a spectrum from 4 Terminus to 2 Terminus depending on the metagame. I don't know the dynamics and we don't know where they are heading, but we do know the deck would almost certainly play Preordain in some quantity. And that means my original statement continues to hold, which was not a particularly controversial statement to begin with: Preordain will range from a slight upgrade to a big one and it's more of an open question than you are framing it.
Moreover, we haven't even discussed Preordain's slight-to-major boost to other top-tier decks like Jeskai, GDS, and Storm. These would just be further strikes against the card. I was all for a Preordain unban discussion when blue decks were struggling but now they aren't. I doubt Wizards even looks twice at this card in unban discussions these days.
The problem I have with Preordain and this entire argument of "We only unban when X archetype/color is struggling" is that in essence the ban is still artificial. Bloodbraid Elf was fine for years. This exact forum used the argument Jund is doing fine, don't need to unban is not the same argument as Other cards in the card pool have equal or greater value, we should have X unbanned for power level reasons. Every time I read these similar arguments, in the abstract I see something along the lines of "Shock is banned in the Modern format, so that Lightning Bolt doesn't get a boost"
Opt has superseded Serum Visions. Preordain doesn't replace Thought Scour in GDS, Storm is redundant anyway, and UW Control would run 6 cantrips at most, and to optimize Snapcaster Mage, they would need to maximize the Opt numbers.
Decks like Infect, Jeskai Ascendancy & UR Wizards would get a boost. It's hard to disagree that Preordain, Stoneforge Mystic, & Green Sun's Zenith are the least powerful cards on the banned list.
Issues such as archetype and color diversity need to be solved with new product, not the banned list. The banned list should be used for the grievous errors, and tournament disruptors. We need to stop viewing the banned list as a nerf to the metagame list.