By that logic, I expect a similarly timed unban, likely SFM and maybe something else, when the timing window is comparable in 2019. As I said before, this will likely be after the early 2019 Modern PT. Wizards doing nothing until then is responsible format management, if they are waiting for the same reasons they waited with BBE and JTMS. We have no reason to believe otherwise except for the frustrated and largely unsupportable conspiracy theories I've seen floated in this thread and other sensationalist outlets. There have been dozens of outrageous ban claims over the years and misassessments of Modern health. The format has proved incredibly stable and cyclical despite those claims. Given that track record, there is little to no cost to waiting until the 2019 timing window I am predicting.
were there any guarantees made about a modern pro-tour earlier next year? afaik is just this assumption people are making, but its questionable until the schedule is released now that there are both more in the calendar year and the likelihood of a modicum of arena integration to be involved.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern: UWGSnow-Bant Control BURGrixis Death's Shadow GWBCoCo Elves WCDeath and Taxes (sold)
Yeah, opinions of the Pros always need to be taken with a grain of salt. While their accomplishments to warrant some amount of respect, that’s no reason to put high faith in their opinions. As idSurge already stated, plenty of Pros claimed that Jace would break the format in half and mostly he’s just been “kind of okay sometimes”.
When one of the most notorious control players tells you splinter twin is miserable to play against and should stay banned, pay attention.
When Pro's tell us Jace will ruin the format...wait hows this supposed to work?
Wow, and that article is an absolute lie...normally I like Shaheen, but Modern was absolutely not 'flailing at the time in popularity'.
Top 10 Anime Betrayals...
Yeah, it's difficult to take this article seriously, even more when he states that Ponder and Preordain are safe unbans but Punishing Fire would be too good when paired with Grove of the Burnwillows
When one of the most notorious control players tells you splinter twin is miserable to play against and should stay banned, pay attention.
When Pro's tell us Jace will ruin the format...wait hows this supposed to work?
Wow, and that article is an absolute lie...normally I like Shaheen, but Modern was absolutely not 'flailing at the time in popularity'.
Top 10 Anime Betrayals...
Yeah, it's difficult to take this article seriously, even more when he states that Ponder and Preordain are safe unbans but Punishing Fire would be too good when paired with Grove of the Burnwillows
Exactly what I was going to chime in and say. While I personally think that Ponder is safe to unban, a lot of players and presumably Wizards of the Coast, doesn't like seeing the format become more "Turbo Xerox" in any shape or form. Ponder is strong enough to make it lean towards that.
Also, Shaheen Soorani doesn't like Twin. That much is obvious. Not sure why out of a lifetime Esper/UW Control player, whose matchup vs. Twin wouldn't be as good as something like Grixis, but still should be fine. While Twin can play out like a Control deck, it is mostly a tempo deck that has a Combo finish. That's part of what made it so strong; so many dimensions.
*I guess I'll try to let it go for now and we'll see what happens in 2019. It's coming up soon anyway, lol. I mean, people waited for unbans in 2018 and that didn't happen, so you cannot blame anyone for being somewhat hesitant to believe an unban is coming.
**I too play in the PPTQ/RPTQ circuit (although pretty terribly) and I wouldn't personally mind a change this past Monday. Things like this happen all the time for GPs and SCG Opens. I don't see why it would be so different. I can't honestly seeing an unban hurting someone at an RPTQ at all. A ban possibly could, but I don't think it would be worse than the timing of Felidar Guardian on Wednesday after the Monday announcement.
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)
When one of the most notorious control players tells you splinter twin is miserable to play against and should stay banned, pay attention.
When Pro's tell us Jace will ruin the format...wait hows this supposed to work?
Wow, and that article is an absolute lie...normally I like Shaheen, but Modern was absolutely not 'flailing at the time in popularity'.
Top 10 Anime Betrayals...
Yeah, it's difficult to take this article seriously, even more when he states that Ponder and Preordain are safe unbans but Punishing Fire would be too good when paired with Grove of the Burnwillows
Exactly what I was going to chime in and say. While I personally think that Ponder is safe to unban, a lot of players and presumably Wizards of the Coast, doesn't like seeing the format become more "Turbo Xerox" in any shape or form. Ponder is strong enough to make it lean towards that.
Also, Shaheen Soorani doesn't like Twin. That much is obvious. Not sure why out of a lifetime Esper/UW Control player, whose matchup vs. Twin wouldn't be as good as something like Grixis, but still should be fine. While Twin can play out like a Control deck, it is mostly a tempo deck that has a Combo finish. That's part of what made it so strong; so many dimensions.
agree i even remember that some great GBx players (duke? edel?) say that BGx vs twin was a 50/50 match up when the pilot was good
A year ago people were singing Shaheen Soorani's praise when he was on a crusade to free Jace. Now that he's against Splinter Twin it's "Pfftt, you shouldn't take his opinion seriously."
A year ago people were singing Shaheen Soorani's praise when he was on a crusade to free Jace. Now that he's against Splinter Twin it's "Pfftt, you shouldn't take his opinion serious."
Wasn't he one of the many who said Jace was too powerful and would break Modern? Or am I thinking of dozens of other pros and writers that were wrong and are horrible at evaluating cards?
A year ago people were singing Shaheen Soorani's praise when he was on a crusade to free Jace. Now that he's against Splinter Twin it's "Pfftt, you shouldn't take his opinion seriously."
Like I just told him on Twitter, 2 out of 3 (He was right on Jace, and SFM) isnt bad.
I'm not going to take any opinion seriously if its based on 'poor play patterns', when I look at what Modern actually is right now. The 'winners meta' as one pro said the other day.
I'll say this though. I'll leave the thread until the next set/ban date if someone can prove Modern was 'flailing in popularity' when Twin was around.
I think it's laughable that the cantrips Ponder and Preordain are on the banned list. Besides Storm, what other blue combo decks even exist? At the end of the day it's just a cantrip, and the only real reason a card like Ponder or Preordain should be banned is to avoid the situation they have in Legacy where Brainstorm warps the meta, skewing Blue heavily. This is far from the case in Modern and realistically only would buff decks like Storm or Grixis Death's Shadow.
The real fear of Punishing Fire would bring is the total elimination of Aggro, which I can't see as a reality. Combine this with Umezawa's Jitte and/or Stoneforge Mystic and Aggro could easily fall heavily. This is especially concerning that Stoneforge is candidate #1 currently for unbanning, making Punishing Fire a little less appealing, at least for now. However, I'm on board with Jitte and SFM coming off soon, since these two card would probably add more diversity than killing it, as well as being less powerful than other things you could be doing in Modern at the moment.
Jitte also creates subgames that usually result in who ever gets Jitte online first wins, essentially warping any Aggro/Midrange matches around it.
Birthing Pod is in a similar vein as its old Modern Pillar partner Splinter Twin. I personally don't have strong feelings for these two cards staying on or coming off the banned list either way, but if you're going to make the argument, as the guy did in the article, that Splinter Twin "eliminated all other options in its class, as well as made enemy combo decks atrocious in comparison." Or in other words, lessened diversity and pushed out many decks due to its presence, you have to make the same conclusion for Birthing Pod as well. Imo, Pod is a much scarier card, especially since the printing of so many cards that would slot into the archetype since its banning, that if he's going to advocate for Splinter Twin staying on the banned list, he's gotta do the same for Birthing Pod.
Lastly, Glimpse of Nature most likely just adds another degenerate linear combo deck in the top of the meta. Is that something we really need in Modern right now?
He strangely doesn't even mention Green Sun's Zenith when going over cards remaining ont he banned list. He says " The artifact lands, free spells, card draw that should have never been printed, fast mana, and mana boosts should all be kept out of a format that's currently infested with turn 3 and 4 wins." Yet, GSZ doesn't fit on any of these, but he's advocating for a obvious combo enabler with Glimpse of Nature, so I'm kind of confused by this. I advocate that Birthing Pod is a stronger card than GSZ in general in regards to Modern, so my conclusion is that GSZ should be in consideration for unbanning way before we begin to talk about Birthing Pod.
A year ago people were singing Shaheen Soorani's praise when he was on a crusade to free Jace. Now that he's against Splinter Twin it's "Pfftt, you shouldn't take his opinion seriously."
I don't think either CFP or idsurge, nor any other Twin proponents, would ever be convinced by anyone that Twin is unsafe. Their minds are firmly made up by all indications. I will say that Shaheen makes some questionable claims in that article that don't appear to have backing, but they are no more unsupported than many of the untested and unresearched claims he made in the JTMS unban arguments. Him arguing against Twin just underscores that it's more of an open question than many Twin defenders would let on.
If any of these pros put out an intellectually honest article on why Twin had to stay banned, well at least it would be hopefully we'll argued.
Nobody has the courage to do it though.
The actual numbers we as a group have posted in these threads are far more work than anything I've seen from a pro in years and not a single data point shows an issue, or supports the card staying banned.
Now as I mentioned if someone has proof that the format was 'flailing in popularity', then fine I'll buy it.
See there's this whole debacle when pros make claims. Even the pro community is split on this issue. We went through this same song and dance way back with hellfire and sisicat. Quoting what pros say only devolves the thread into so-and-so pro said this therefore my opinion is validated while dismissing the other bunch of pros who say differently. For every pro who wants twin in, there's likely one who wants twin out. And let's be real, they're not going to able to prove anything anyway. Articles like these are just that, theories.
Appeal to 'authority' should have no place in these discussions or be taken with a huge grain of salt.
Guys please opinions on japanese cards. Lost a 3/3 creature against Japan celestial colonade. This guy played all creatures and spells in english cards, but some cards in his manabase was japanese. I dont registrated this really ( my brain say its all fine and all english to me lets attack his empty board)...and i am sure it is a Kind of legal cheating. It is not ok, but i know legal. I Hate such people. I never forget colonade normally, but with this Tricks it can happen one time in 3 years and such people take advantage of this
If I am a customer spending premium amount of dollars, I expect a premium service. Jund falls into the category of a premium deck costing more dollars than a majority of the rest of the format. I'm not getting the desired performance ratio per dollars spent out of the Jund deck because WOTC decided to make the format more diverse.
I don't think either CFP or idsurge, nor any other Twin proponents, would ever be convinced by anyone that Twin is unsafe. Their minds are firmly made up by all indications.
If the burden of proof was as strong to prove that it's unsafe as we're held to in order to "prove" it's safe, we might have more productive conversations. There's a REAL EASY WAY to find out though. Either way, Soorani's rants about Twin are just that, totally unfounded in anything other than personal dislike for the deck. His claims are wildly untrue and easily disproved.
I think it's laughable that the cantrips Ponder and Preordain are on the banned list. Besides Storm, what other blue combo decks even exist? At the end of the day it's just a cantrip, and the only real reason a card like Ponder or Preordain should be banned is to avoid the situation they have in Legacy where Brainstorm warps the meta, skewing Blue heavily. This is far from the case in Modern and realistically only would buff decks like Storm or Grixis Death's Shadow.
I think you are underselling the power of the blue cantrips. There is a reason they are eternal all-stars. Magic after all is a game of chances. We are playing with a randomized deck so variance is a thing and so no game plays out like the last one. How often have you heard "I didn't draw card X in time so I lost" or "I drew only lands and no gas so I lost?
The blue cantrips make every blue deck more consistent at whatever they are doing. It's silly to think only about its implications in Combo when it's good in everything besides Aggro. Suddenly that removal spell, board wipe, counter spell, threat or hate card always seems show up at the right time while a deck like Jund would have drawn a useless discard spell for example. "I hope he doesn't have card X" is far less likely to happen against a blue deck.
I mean don't get me wrong. If they are getting unbanned I will play them gladly and I won't complain about it. Im not arguing for them to stay banned here.
But Im realistic and can see beyond my own selfish desires. At the end of the day less variance is always better than more variance. That's only logical and while you might not notice it if you look at single games Im sure over a large sample size blue decks would show themselves to be generally more consistent than non-blue decks. That is the case in every single format where those types of cards are legal and so saying that for some reason it would not be so in Modern has no ground to stand on.
Sure we would still have no Brainstorm but Ponder is still a powerhouse of a card and the number 2 card in Legacy and an automatic 4-of in every blue deck. Preordain sees less play sure but it still sees a decent amount of play and you can say that is only because Brainstorm and Ponder are better and already automatic 4-ofs.
I think it's laughable that the cantrips Ponder and Preordain are on the banned list. Besides Storm, what other blue combo decks even exist? At the end of the day it's just a cantrip, and the only real reason a card like Ponder or Preordain should be banned is to avoid the situation they have in Legacy where Brainstorm warps the meta, skewing Blue heavily. This is far from the case in Modern and realistically only would buff decks like Storm or Grixis Death's Shadow.
I think you are underselling the power of the blue cantrips. There is a reason they are eternal all-stars. Magic after all is a game of chances. We are playing with a randomized deck so variance is a thing and so no game plays out like the last one. How often have you heard "I didn't draw card X in time so I lost" or "I drew only lands and no gas so I lost?
The blue cantrips make every blue deck more consistent at whatever they are doing. It's silly to think only about its implications in Combo when it's good in everything besides Aggro. Suddenly that removal spell, board wipe, counter spell, threat or hate card always seems show up at the right time while a deck like Jund would have drawn a useless discard spell for example. "I hope he doesn't have card X" is far less likely to happen against a blue deck.
I mean don't get me wrong. If they are getting unbanned I will play them gladly and I won't complain about it. Im not arguing for them to stay banned here.
But Im realistic and can see beyond my own selfish desires. At the end of the day less variance is always better than more variance. That's only logical and while you might not notice it if you look at single games Im sure over a large sample size blue decks would show themselves to be generally more consistent than non-blue decks. That is the case in every single format where those types of cards are legal and so saying that for some reason it would not be so in Modern has no ground to stand on.
Sure we would still have no Brainstorm but Ponder is still a powerhouse of a card and the number 2 card in Legacy and an automatic 4-of in every blue deck. Preordain sees less play sure but it still sees a decent amount of play and you can say that is only because Brainstorm and Ponder are better and already automatic 4-ofs.
There was a Modern Nexus article a few months ago testing Preordain and it only made the decks slightly better. There's a huge difference in Lgeacy where the quality of cards become better, which makes cantrips better in turn. Also Brainstorm is broken.
Which decks would benefit from ponder and Preordain? Storm obviously, but what else? To me, mostly fair decks would
I agree with his unbannings, but I disagree that Splinter Twin promoted uninteractive gameplay like he claims.
Passing your turn and bluffing removal is absolutely an example of interactive gameplay.
Compare that to playing against tron. They're going to jam that turn 3 Karn no matter what, and if it gets countered they don't really get punished for it as they still have 7+ mana next turn to play their next threat.
With Twin, on the other hand, if they try and go for the combo and you do have removal they just lost two cards to your one and were punished. That is why Twin produced good game play because the Twin player was actually set back quite a bit when their combo was disrupted.
I agree with his unbannings, but I disagree that Splinter Twin promoted uninteractive gameplay like he claims.
Passing your turn and bluffing removal is absolutely an example of interactive gameplay.
Compare that to playing against tron. They're going to jam that turn 3 Karn no matter what, and if it gets countered they don't really get punished for it as they still have 7+ mana next turn to play their next threat.
With Twin, on the other hand, if they try and go for the combo and you do have removal they just lost two cards to your one and were punished. That is why Twin produced good game play because the Twin player was actually set back quite a bit when their combo was disrupted.
Really? Because from everything I'm told twin was just fine winning by bolt/snap/bolt. The problem with twin isn't bluffing removal once, it's that you have to do it in perpetuity for the rest of the game. Honestly? There's a reason new card games don't bother with instants or other cards you play on your opponents turn outside of highly, conditional plays.
[quote from="ElectricEye »" url="/forums/the-game/modern/801804-the-state-of-modern-thread-b-r-26-11-2018?comment=235"]There's a reason new card games don't bother with instants or other cards you play on your opponents turn outside of highly, conditional plays.
And Magic is still the better game, because it allows it.
The reason those new games dont have it, is the same reason Standard sucked for so long (listening to the wrong market segment) and now its great (listening to the community on threats/answers).
"There's a reason Standard is so great, its because Control is great."
Thats the same kind of leap you keep making.
Snap/Bolt comment is funny, as I saw on Twitter a few days ago 'Remand and Snap Bolt are very good plays'. Yeah, all that success we are seeing in the top level with Remand, and Snap Bolting. Is UR Wizards still running 8 Bolts?
But sure, its Preordain and Ponder that make Blue what it is in Legacy.
Yep. I love that argument. So funny. Preordain is what makes Legacy? Lol.
Preordain is not even that good in Legacy. Preordain in Legacy is the Sleight of Hand of Modern. Serviceable, but definitely not that good. Combo decks like Sneak Show in Legacy need all the cantrips they can get. Decks like Storm and Ad Nauseam in Modern need all the cantrips they can get.
People seem to have a misunderstanding of Preordain and Ponder. They do make finding cards more consistent. They don't...well kill anybody. I'm pretty sure that the way some people talk is that when Sam Black Mono Blue Infect was really good, they believed it to be Ponder and even more so, Preordain's "fault." They would love to have Blazing Shoal still unbanned. It makes no sense to me. So you're allowed to have turn 3 kills if you always draw the pieces or manipulate your deck, but there can be no consistency? I don't believe that a little more consistency in Modern is a bad thing. Wizards does and many of their fan base does also.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
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)
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were there any guarantees made about a modern pro-tour earlier next year? afaik is just this assumption people are making, but its questionable until the schedule is released now that there are both more in the calendar year and the likelihood of a modicum of arena integration to be involved.
UWGSnow-Bant Control
BURGrixis Death's Shadow
GWBCoCo Elves
WCDeath and Taxes(sold)When one of the most notorious control players tells you splinter twin is miserable to play against and should stay banned, pay attention.
When Pro's tell us Jace will ruin the format...wait hows this supposed to work?
Wow, and that article is an absolute lie...normally I like Shaheen, but Modern was absolutely not 'flailing at the time in popularity'.
Top 10 Anime Betrayals...
Spirits
Sensationalist, clickbait article, from a website that charges for its non-sensationalist clickbait articles.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Yeah, it's difficult to take this article seriously, even more when he states that Ponder and Preordain are safe unbans but Punishing Fire would be too good when paired with Grove of the Burnwillows
Exactly what I was going to chime in and say. While I personally think that Ponder is safe to unban, a lot of players and presumably Wizards of the Coast, doesn't like seeing the format become more "Turbo Xerox" in any shape or form. Ponder is strong enough to make it lean towards that.
Also, Shaheen Soorani doesn't like Twin. That much is obvious. Not sure why out of a lifetime Esper/UW Control player, whose matchup vs. Twin wouldn't be as good as something like Grixis, but still should be fine. While Twin can play out like a Control deck, it is mostly a tempo deck that has a Combo finish. That's part of what made it so strong; so many dimensions.
*I guess I'll try to let it go for now and we'll see what happens in 2019. It's coming up soon anyway, lol. I mean, people waited for unbans in 2018 and that didn't happen, so you cannot blame anyone for being somewhat hesitant to believe an unban is coming.
**I too play in the PPTQ/RPTQ circuit (although pretty terribly) and I wouldn't personally mind a change this past Monday. Things like this happen all the time for GPs and SCG Opens. I don't see why it would be so different. I can't honestly seeing an unban hurting someone at an RPTQ at all. A ban possibly could, but I don't think it would be worse than the timing of Felidar Guardian on Wednesday after the Monday announcement.
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)agree i even remember that some great GBx players (duke? edel?) say that BGx vs twin was a 50/50 match up when the pilot was good
A year ago people were singing Shaheen Soorani's praise when he was on a crusade to free Jace. Now that he's against Splinter Twin it's "Pfftt, you shouldn't take his opinion seriously."
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Like I just told him on Twitter, 2 out of 3 (He was right on Jace, and SFM) isnt bad.
I'm not going to take any opinion seriously if its based on 'poor play patterns', when I look at what Modern actually is right now. The 'winners meta' as one pro said the other day.
I'll say this though. I'll leave the thread until the next set/ban date if someone can prove Modern was 'flailing in popularity' when Twin was around.
Spirits
The real fear of Punishing Fire would bring is the total elimination of Aggro, which I can't see as a reality. Combine this with Umezawa's Jitte and/or Stoneforge Mystic and Aggro could easily fall heavily. This is especially concerning that Stoneforge is candidate #1 currently for unbanning, making Punishing Fire a little less appealing, at least for now. However, I'm on board with Jitte and SFM coming off soon, since these two card would probably add more diversity than killing it, as well as being less powerful than other things you could be doing in Modern at the moment.
Jitte also creates subgames that usually result in who ever gets Jitte online first wins, essentially warping any Aggro/Midrange matches around it.
Birthing Pod is in a similar vein as its old Modern Pillar partner Splinter Twin. I personally don't have strong feelings for these two cards staying on or coming off the banned list either way, but if you're going to make the argument, as the guy did in the article, that Splinter Twin "eliminated all other options in its class, as well as made enemy combo decks atrocious in comparison." Or in other words, lessened diversity and pushed out many decks due to its presence, you have to make the same conclusion for Birthing Pod as well. Imo, Pod is a much scarier card, especially since the printing of so many cards that would slot into the archetype since its banning, that if he's going to advocate for Splinter Twin staying on the banned list, he's gotta do the same for Birthing Pod.
Lastly, Glimpse of Nature most likely just adds another degenerate linear combo deck in the top of the meta. Is that something we really need in Modern right now?
He strangely doesn't even mention Green Sun's Zenith when going over cards remaining ont he banned list. He says " The artifact lands, free spells, card draw that should have never been printed, fast mana, and mana boosts should all be kept out of a format that's currently infested with turn 3 and 4 wins." Yet, GSZ doesn't fit on any of these, but he's advocating for a obvious combo enabler with Glimpse of Nature, so I'm kind of confused by this. I advocate that Birthing Pod is a stronger card than GSZ in general in regards to Modern, so my conclusion is that GSZ should be in consideration for unbanning way before we begin to talk about Birthing Pod.
URStormRU
GRTitanshift[mana]RG/mana]
Here is Ben Starks opinion by the way.
#TheProsknow
I don't think either CFP or idsurge, nor any other Twin proponents, would ever be convinced by anyone that Twin is unsafe. Their minds are firmly made up by all indications. I will say that Shaheen makes some questionable claims in that article that don't appear to have backing, but they are no more unsupported than many of the untested and unresearched claims he made in the JTMS unban arguments. Him arguing against Twin just underscores that it's more of an open question than many Twin defenders would let on.
Nobody has the courage to do it though.
The actual numbers we as a group have posted in these threads are far more work than anything I've seen from a pro in years and not a single data point shows an issue, or supports the card staying banned.
Now as I mentioned if someone has proof that the format was 'flailing in popularity', then fine I'll buy it.
Spirits
Appeal to 'authority' should have no place in these discussions or be taken with a huge grain of salt.
If the burden of proof was as strong to prove that it's unsafe as we're held to in order to "prove" it's safe, we might have more productive conversations. There's a REAL EASY WAY to find out though. Either way, Soorani's rants about Twin are just that, totally unfounded in anything other than personal dislike for the deck. His claims are wildly untrue and easily disproved.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
They really did set the bar high with that one
I think you are underselling the power of the blue cantrips. There is a reason they are eternal all-stars. Magic after all is a game of chances. We are playing with a randomized deck so variance is a thing and so no game plays out like the last one. How often have you heard "I didn't draw card X in time so I lost" or "I drew only lands and no gas so I lost?
The blue cantrips make every blue deck more consistent at whatever they are doing. It's silly to think only about its implications in Combo when it's good in everything besides Aggro. Suddenly that removal spell, board wipe, counter spell, threat or hate card always seems show up at the right time while a deck like Jund would have drawn a useless discard spell for example. "I hope he doesn't have card X" is far less likely to happen against a blue deck.
I mean don't get me wrong. If they are getting unbanned I will play them gladly and I won't complain about it. Im not arguing for them to stay banned here.
But Im realistic and can see beyond my own selfish desires. At the end of the day less variance is always better than more variance. That's only logical and while you might not notice it if you look at single games Im sure over a large sample size blue decks would show themselves to be generally more consistent than non-blue decks. That is the case in every single format where those types of cards are legal and so saying that for some reason it would not be so in Modern has no ground to stand on.
Sure we would still have no Brainstorm but Ponder is still a powerhouse of a card and the number 2 card in Legacy and an automatic 4-of in every blue deck. Preordain sees less play sure but it still sees a decent amount of play and you can say that is only because Brainstorm and Ponder are better and already automatic 4-ofs.
There was a Modern Nexus article a few months ago testing Preordain and it only made the decks slightly better. There's a huge difference in Lgeacy where the quality of cards become better, which makes cantrips better in turn. Also Brainstorm is broken.
Which decks would benefit from ponder and Preordain? Storm obviously, but what else? To me, mostly fair decks would
URStormRU
GRTitanshift[mana]RG/mana]
But sure, its Preordain and Ponder that make Blue what it is in Legacy.
Spirits
Passing your turn and bluffing removal is absolutely an example of interactive gameplay.
Compare that to playing against tron. They're going to jam that turn 3 Karn no matter what, and if it gets countered they don't really get punished for it as they still have 7+ mana next turn to play their next threat.
With Twin, on the other hand, if they try and go for the combo and you do have removal they just lost two cards to your one and were punished. That is why Twin produced good game play because the Twin player was actually set back quite a bit when their combo was disrupted.
Really? Because from everything I'm told twin was just fine winning by bolt/snap/bolt. The problem with twin isn't bluffing removal once, it's that you have to do it in perpetuity for the rest of the game. Honestly? There's a reason new card games don't bother with instants or other cards you play on your opponents turn outside of highly, conditional plays.
And Magic is still the better game, because it allows it.
The reason those new games dont have it, is the same reason Standard sucked for so long (listening to the wrong market segment) and now its great (listening to the community on threats/answers).
"There's a reason Standard is so great, its because Control is great."
Thats the same kind of leap you keep making.
Snap/Bolt comment is funny, as I saw on Twitter a few days ago 'Remand and Snap Bolt are very good plays'. Yeah, all that success we are seeing in the top level with Remand, and Snap Bolting. Is UR Wizards still running 8 Bolts?
Spirits
Yep. I love that argument. So funny. Preordain is what makes Legacy? Lol.
Preordain is not even that good in Legacy. Preordain in Legacy is the Sleight of Hand of Modern. Serviceable, but definitely not that good. Combo decks like Sneak Show in Legacy need all the cantrips they can get. Decks like Storm and Ad Nauseam in Modern need all the cantrips they can get.
People seem to have a misunderstanding of Preordain and Ponder. They do make finding cards more consistent. They don't...well kill anybody. I'm pretty sure that the way some people talk is that when Sam Black Mono Blue Infect was really good, they believed it to be Ponder and even more so, Preordain's "fault." They would love to have Blazing Shoal still unbanned. It makes no sense to me. So you're allowed to have turn 3 kills if you always draw the pieces or manipulate your deck, but there can be no consistency? I don't believe that a little more consistency in Modern is a bad thing. Wizards does and many of their fan base does also.
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)