MTG Salvation

Quote from boombox_smk »

It's similar to Peasant (Pauper with 5 uncommons), but I don't remember that ever being nearly as popular as Pauper. To be honest, there have been many powerful uncommons, often times more powerful than the Rares/Mythics in their respective sets. Pricing can be difficult, but I'm not sure there is really a way around that. Shocklands are one thing, but if a player has been playing for a while, having a playset of shocklands shouldn't be that expensive. Often times when Ravnica sets come out they dip fairly low. Some recently have been as cheap as $5 a piece. Wild Slash is currently sitting at $4.50 and that's a common. Cards that are extremely hot in a format will always spike and retract. You are obviously free to make your own formats and try to recruit players, but without Rares and Mythics cuts you off from a lot of theme payoffs. Delirium without Grim Flayer or Ishkanah, Grafwidow seems really boring and bad. I suppose you could just play Gurmag Angler, but then that's just Pauper, anyways. Although I enjoy Pauper and do play it sometimes, adding Uncommons seems to kill the fun of the format. Playing all commons for the sake of playing commons is interesting, but playing commons and uncommons because I don't want to have to buy rares and mythics seems less interesting. I don't think I would ever try this format, but that's just my 10 cents.

Fair enough. It wouldn't be for everyone of course.

I thought about what if you extended it back to Modern. But that would bring in more problems that positive points I would think. I would love a format where 99% of the cards I own aren't relegated to the dumpster. Pauper is a great start but expanding it to uncommons seems appealing to me. As for others who knows?

I hope you see that these are two different things entirely.

They are and they aren't at the same time. As for power of play, yes they are coming at different angles, but that isn't what I was referring to. I was referring to straight variance/luck.

Increasing variance (by reducing consistency) by banning a green card would be the same as banning a black card (Thoughtseize) which would increase the variance of a black deck. Thoughseize is a guaranteed hit on turn 1 or 2. There is ZERO variance when it is played. No luck involved. And nearly no skill involved as well. People aren't going to hold all land hands. You hit a card and it will always be the most important card. Its a shotgun blast that is guaranteed (ZERO variance) to pick apart a hand early game. Then on top of that it gives valuable information of what and how an opponent will be playing. I would like to see the increased variance of players making a choice between Despise and Duress. Now there is some real variance. Even a "whiff" isn't so, again knowing an opponents hand is HUGE in this game.

Killing OuaT reduces green variance by introducing inconsistency. A ban of TS would do the exact same thing, reduce black consistency and up variance. It can be argued that banning TS would be a far greater blow to black decks than OuaT to green. But that is another debate.

I hope I have conveyed my point and I am not trying to enflame. I am pleased as punch at the recent bans and I hoping they cut just a bit deeper soon. Just my opinion, nothing more, nothing less.

Giving Green the free digging power of OUaT when they already have so many playable 1 mana dorks gives it a consistency that circumvents variance, a huge part of Magic.

play something like Duress and completely whiff against creature-based decks

Interesting, so variance is good when it comes to green but bad when it comes to black? I get what you are saying, I just think the message needs to be consistent. I would be fine with a Duress/Despise split and I play a lot of mono black.

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/december-2-2019-pioneer-banned-announcement

Once Upon a Time
Smuggler's Copter
Field of the Dead

BANNED

A from me, thank you WotC.

Quote from CarbonatedDan »

Banning grazer would be a good way to rein in field and 'tron'drazi ramp decks if they become oppressive: losing grazer would make them much more vulnerable to aggro without affecting their strategy at all.

It might not be enough of a nerf, but I'd try a grazer ban before a field ban.

That said, I'd ban every one drop mana dork from pioneer, so many decks lack efficient interactions for them

Good points on grazer. If it were an 0/2 with defender and put a basic into play I'd be okay with it but at 3 toughness and reach and ANY land it puts it over the top at common for sure.

As for banning the dorks, I feel there are plenty of unswers out there in black, red and even blue with Unsummon at the 1 cmc slot.

Here's a weird one. Is Arboreal Grazer too good and should be monitored?

Unline the mana dorks you are almost guaranteed to drop that land (not even a basic). You can't use removal to slow the ramp. Then it has reach and is an 0/3 to stop aggro as well.

This funny little common seems to do its job almost too well. Thoughts? (Other than don't ban Thoughtseize)

Design and build decks that hose his blue spells, protection from blue, islandwalk, hexproof, etc. Beat him continually with them until he gets the point.

Either that of just swap decks with him to give him a trial of how the other colors play. Maybe he will like it. Good luck.

I'm not the only one with some of the cards I mentioned above needing a ban.

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/brewer-s-minute-pioneer-bannings-and-watch-list-2-0

And yes some are mentioning Thoughtseize as well in the comments.

Quote from inked »

[quote from="WarMachinePrime »" url="/forums/the-game/pioneer/814856-pioneer-banned-list-speculation?comment=65"]Top cards in the format. Total Golgari-fest.

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/pioneer/full/all

I would ban the top 3 and then Oko as well. Players hate LD and Thoughtseize on the play turn one ripping out a critical piece is "feel bad" as it gets. Duress and Despise would be there to fill the gap. OuaT smoothes out the strategies for G way too much and is "free" to boot. Copter will warp the meta and eat up SB slots in non tier decks so they can't battle the aggro decks as well.

I am for a heavy hand in this format. Its not "solved" yet but it is getting close already just a month or so into it. Decks are just turning into piles of good stuff, basically a Modern Light. Prices for Tier decks are soaring as well as everyone has to play the same cards to compete. It is what it is but I feel it needs aggressive bannings to keep it fresh.

PS: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/metagame/pioneer#paper

Top 7 decks as of this time are all $450 USD in paper and up. The usual pay to play.

What is pressing Collected Company out of being a top 50 played card, ditto Aetherworks Marvel and Jeskai Ascendancy? If I'm not mistaken these three were supposed to be "look out for" pillars of three strong decks entering the format, and potential ban targets -- yet none of the three are banned and none are top 50 played cards, despite being a 4 of in a deck featuring them?

They are all "too slow" at this moment. Why wait until turn 3 or four when you can have 3 creatures/threats on the board in in any other color by turn 2? Don't worry all the G creature heavy decks will be mashing CoCo into them in a while anyway. I like the idea of this format, its just quickly devolving into Modern-lite. Pricey decks, flashy Spike rares and mythics and not a whole lot else.

Again, I am for a HEAVY hand in this format. I am sure I am in the minority. The same cards played in slightly different configurations becomes stagnant to me. Ban some of these cards that everyone jams into their decks and their may be more diversity. Time will tell.

After seeing the paper prices of tier decks in Pioneer soar past the $500 mark and online versions of the same past the $300 mark, I am quickly being priced out of the competitive format. But what if there were a variant where it had Pioneer set legality with only commons and uncommons legal, no rares or mythics?

Yes I do understand that the prices of the "power/playable" uncommons would increase in response, but would you be willing to play such a format? I have always loved Pauper and still play on occasion, but it can be sorely lacking at times. Pioneer Artisan would not have Shocklands or any of the powerful Planeswalkers or top notch rares and mythics that dominate Pioneer to the point of excluding most uncommons and commons.

So simple question, would you play online or in paper or both?

PS: Looks like there would be 4,509 cards legal in the format.

Top cards in the format. Total Golgari-fest.

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/format-staples/pioneer/full/all

I would ban the top 3 and then Oko as well. Players hate LD and Thoughtseize on the play turn one ripping out a critical piece is "feel bad" as it gets. Duress and Despise would be there to fill the gap. OuaT smoothes out the strategies for G way too much and is "free" to boot. Copter will warp the meta and eat up SB slots in non tier decks so they can't battle the aggro decks as well.

I am for a heavy hand in this format. Its not "solved" yet but it is getting close already just a month or so into it. Decks are just turning into piles of good stuff, basically a Modern Light. Prices for Tier decks are soaring as well as everyone has to play the same cards to compete. It is what it is but I feel it needs aggressive bannings to keep it fresh.

PS: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/metagame/pioneer#paper

Top 7 decks as of this time are all $450 USD in paper and up. The usual pay to play.

I don't think that I need to run the full 4x copies of Creativity

Statistics would argue to the contrary. 4 copies gives you a better shot especially since you have to dig/filter for them at times. I also think you are going to find you may not even have the 2 tokens necessary to complete the combo a lot of the time as well with all the removal in the format. Personally I would focus on upping the token generators a hair and maxxing the 4 copies of your combo piece. Good luck with whatever you decide.

Bannings are never "random".

They may be made on small amounts of data or observation, but are never "random".

Personally I think Once Upon a Time is bad for the format from the observations I have made in games I have played. I also think Smuggler's Copter needs to go as it fits into every deck and is too big a threat for a lot of non tier decks.

Again this is based on my observations and limited data, far from random.

No changes.

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/november-25-2019-pioneer-banned-announcement

I was personally hoping for a heavier hand in this format. Time will tell I suppose.

Or I could go buy a nearly indistinguisable Bitterblossom proxy online for a few bucks, sleeve it up and 99% of players would never know.

Hard pass.