People will experiment with others, but SFM + Goyf + discard seems better than anything Jeskai, Esper, or UW has to offer.
I think there's something to that. However, Stoneforge Mystic would almost certainly be a bigger boost to non-GB decks. Abzan's gains from running SFM (in a meta that was not tooled to combat SFM) were demonstrated to be pretty minimal (outside vs. burn). My guess is that's because Abzan is already bursting with high-octane midrange cards - way higher quality than what your UWx Control or W-based Midrange deck is pulling out.
That said, I think a Stoneforge works best alongside another unban - preferably Preordain. That gives you a little more reason to run midrange that's not BGx, and both cards do good things from the format from very different vectors. Plus, UWx are the only decks that benefit from both, and it's not like Esper Draw-Go is tearing up the format or anything.
Basically this. Unbanning Mystic means Abzan may run it, but it gives Something like Bant a much needed shot in the arm. Mystic let's White no longer be "Path+Sideboard"
The major argument I have against Dig Through time is that Reanimator has been slowly gaining in power since the deck changed from Jund(Grishoalbrand) to Grixis and got to play with the Expertise Cycle and other "Discard to do more" cards(Collective Brutality). I'm not sure that giving a deck that's been rising slowly access to a "Look at Top 7, Draw 2" when it's already able to win through Counterspells (I had a game where I went Remand a Goryo's Vengeance cast in response to an Emrakul Shuffle Trigger, only for him to recast it thanks to SSG giving him a second Mana.) Especially with the Expertise half needing literally 2 cards in hand.
The issue fundamentally with Blue in Modern is two fold: Blue can make it to the late game on the back of perfect sequencing, but what can Blue do in the late game? Red can get you there and threaten lethal(Burn reaches a point where it's Topdeck Bolt), Green can get Goyf, Black has the endgames of Tasigur, and White, which is still weak, can give you an endgame play of Elesh Born/Secure the Wastes. Blue can draw cards, but the best threats in Blue aren't really that good by themselves.
The other issue is that Reactive Blue can stumble hard. As in, you think the coasts are clear for you to tap out and play a threat, only for your opponent to go off in the turn after. Following Turn 2/3, Reactive Blue has to always hold up Mana for the Answers, because is they don't then they can automatically lose. You tap out against Abzan Company on turn 4 to resolve a Verdict, when they've got nothing on board but 4 lands and they can go "End Step Chord for Viscera Seer, My turn CoCo for any combo pieces."
Hell, I'd be fine if we got something like "Anguished Banishment 2UU"
You may Exile a blue card and pay 3 life to cast this without paying it's Mana Cost
Counter Target Spell unless it's controller pays 3.
The way I see it with Reactive Blue is that for the first 4-5 turns, the decks are stuck between "Hold up Mana to try preventing my opponent from resolving threats" and "Try to not die to anything that's resolved".
I think the ideal answer would be some bastard child of Force Spike, Mana Leak, and Remand. Something like
"Spike Remand-UU"
Instant
Counter target spell unless it's controller pays 2. If the spell isn't countered, Draw a card.
Basically, what I think Blue wants is something that can act as a "hard" counter for the early game but becomes able to cycle in the late game.
That and I still maintain that Stoneforge Mystic and Jace should be unbanned, because the nightmares of Caw Blade make people forget that Mystic is useless once fetched and snuck in B. Skull and that Jace literally dies to Bolt
Honestly, if you want to weaken Tron/Bant Eldrazi/Eldrazi Tron/Valakut,you just need 3 changes:
Ban Ancient Stirrings(Card is essentially a dig through time Colourless centric decks, it borders on stupid that it exists and Preordain is banned)
Announce effective Immediately following the release of MM3 that there are two new rules errata on Urza's Tower/Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle. Tower now taps for two when Tron is online, Valakut is now rightfully legendary.
Sure, you'd piss off a bunch of these players, but you turn Tron from dropping Karn Turn 3 to Wurmcoil, fix a design mistake that never should have been a thing, etc.
The fact that the next ban/unban announcement comes literally 5 days before MM2017 should be a hint that something might be up.
Twin is not going to get unbanned. The fact is, Twin forces Blue players to go Blue Red, and that's a limiting aspect for Blue Control. Wizards definitely isn't going to unban it when it is still so recent.
Twin does not force anything. If other decks are not good enough (Spoilers, they have not been) then Twin would be what people play.
This is not about Twin suppressing anything, this is about Twin being the ONLY thing that Uxx had going for it and this has born out as fact, over the last year.
No, Twin does force it. Every deck that runs Blue and red will be asked "Why aren't you running Twin?". They literally mentioned it in the ban of Twin.
Twin was a Bandaid on the format that was covering a festering wound. Banning it finally revealed the wound, and you don't heal a wound like that with another Bandaid on top.
What Blue decks need is better card selection, better Counters, and better wincons). Twin doesn't give Blue that.
Twin is not going to get unbanned. The fact is, Twin forces Blue players to go Blue Red, and that's a limiting aspect for Blue Control. Wizards definitely isn't going to unban it when it is still so recent.
I proxied GW Hatebears, playtested it a while and love how it plays. I like it more aggressive than WB vial version - the blink tricks are cool, but always came a bit late for my taste. Now I'm thinking about buying into it as my first "real" non-budget deck. My hesitation is, that I barely see good results on a competitive level and I don't really understand why? Does GW Hatebears have any extreme horror match-ups? I don't need to play a Tier 1 deck, but I think I need something at solid tier 2 power level to compete in long terms, because I want to play the deck for a looong time and stay always viable. I really appreciate your help. I want to play a deck I love but I also like winning. The other deck I like would be Coco Elves. Please help me to make the right decision
Thank you
Welcome to the mostly quiet thread of GW hatenbears.
Hatebears is a deck you play if you know your meta extremely well. It's not a solid choice for a blind meta, at least, not anymore. Back when Pod was in charge we were a lot better with Maindeck search hate, but these days we've fallen by the wayside. Hatebears is a deck for unfair metas, in my opinion. Thalias, Quasali Pridemage, Scooze, all the good stuff is used to slow the opponent down and make them play honest or deny them resources
The deck's main issue is that, due to it's colors of G/W and don't bother running a third color thanks to Leonin Arbiter, is that we lack removal. Path is fine and all, but removal like Dromoka's Command and ect require that you have a creature on board. Because of that, the top tier decks will kill you if you go into the late game, or if you don't establish a boardstate early. Jund will easily out attrition you, Tron dropping Ugin is a GG, Eldrazi is Eldrazi (Screw TKS even if our Mana Denial works wonders on them), Burn will ruin your day unless you can stick a Thalia or Kor Firewalker or Finks, and Affinity's a rough fight game 1.
It's a deck that will win despite the odds, but it comes down to you, the pilot. You have to KNOW your Meta very well in order for this deck to do well, not to mention you need to work on predicting how your foe might react.
tl;dr Very skill and knowledge intensive, but very rewarding.
I'll add from my experience that you can out grind Jund with the right build. I've been having great Jund Matchups since I added a Seagate Wreckage, as it effectively helps us draw twice per turn.
But yeah, the Two biggest lopsided matches for the deck have to be Tron and Affinity IMO. Burn you can beat with Scooze/Eidolon of Rhetoric/Finks/What have you, but Affinity just rolls over us Game 1 unless you draw the perfect hand to their bad one. It gets better postboard, but Tron does not. Tron can't be slowed down as easily and Turn 3 Karn/O-Stone just obliterates us.
Are we after an SSG ban simply because it pumps out an early Chalice or Moon? That seems silly. Just because I can get clocked by a god hand, doesn't mean Goryos needs a ban, and same with SSG.
Name me one deck in Modern that uses SSG fairly. Even the most "fair deck" running it (AD Naseum) uses him to power out a win they can(and do) switch to Lab Maniac post board.
As Corey Burkhardt said on a recent Masters of Modern Podcast, SSG is a better card then Chrome Mon. It's a 1 Card investment vs a 2 card investment that dies to Stony Silence.
Fair points, but I'm just not still entirely sold on it. Has Rogue's Passage ever been floated around? It accomplishes a similar enough goal(letting Knight get through for Damage)
Is Kessig Wolf-run/Static Caster a strong enough reason to run Red? I can't help but think that the Kessig pump isn't worth it with so much of the deck being able to evade 90% of blockers.
I just wish/hope that something from Tron will end up biting the dust. Nothing beats the feeling of despair quite as much as GQ your opponents Tower during their draw step, only for them to play a Tower during main phase and you've effectively done nothing.
Like, I know that it's not always true, but it always seems to have turn 3 Tron.
Fyi, this is the last Ban Window before MM2017 comes out. It is scheduled for March, not May last I checked,meaning if they are reprinting something in it as an Unban target it has be unbanned now or after the set has been released.
I said this many times before and will continue to do it. Dredge is not unbeatable, it doesn't win on turn 3 a respectable number of times neither. The great issue is that it put too much strain on Modern sideboards. If you don't have a preliminary fine matchup, you find yourself having 4-5 slots ONLY for the Dredge matchup. To me that's just too warping and boring, as it creates the classic "Wheel of Fortune" type of gameplay where you know it is Hate or Bust.
Another issue is that Dredge is so much better in small metagames where it isn't really that represented. For example: Metagame consists of "X" decks, 1 player shows up with Dredge, nobody has any hate in their SB, that's a virtual Top 8 if you play your lines correctly. No other deck has that upside in Modern other than Dredge.
I just hope WOTC doesn't chicken out and ban something out of the deck. I'm not asking for a nuke, just a simple re-ban of Golgari Troll, even if i think both GGT and Stinkweed Imp should go.
I'll also add that this SB strain means less resilient GY decks get hammered by players packing 4-5 dedicated GY hate spells in G2 and G3. This is a major reason why Dredge is the only tiered GY deck in Modern when we once had Abzan Company, Living End, Grishoalbrand, and others. This is a net diversity loss, especially because a nerfed (but not nuked) Dredge would still likely be Tier 2 while allowing other decks to compete too.
Yup. Abzan Company has completely died off because the big hate card for Dredge(Grafdigger's Cage) basically prevents CoCo/Chord from working while also making Finks not work if it's out.
I know Wizards doesn't like to completely gut decks, but killing both Imp and Grave-Troll Makes Cathartic Reunion at best a "Dredge 12". I think that even with Imp you still get stupid Dredge amounts by Turn 2. I mean, Neonate T1, Dredge 5 with Imp. T2 Cathartic Reunion Pitching Imp and Troll, Dredge 9(likely hitting something in that 9 that lets you Dredge more).
Dredge shouldn't be able to have half their library effectively "Drawn" by turn 3. It doesn't violate the T4 rule, but it does hurt sideboards and other decks that use the graveyard.
Basically this. Unbanning Mystic means Abzan may run it, but it gives Something like Bant a much needed shot in the arm. Mystic let's White no longer be "Path+Sideboard"
What makes Blue have to close out the game on Turn 4/5/6? Grixis Control doesn't, and that deck is still good.
The point is, how does unbanning a Red Card help Blue? All you're doing is forcing a bandaid over blue by making UR be "the" blue deck.
The other issue is that Reactive Blue can stumble hard. As in, you think the coasts are clear for you to tap out and play a threat, only for your opponent to go off in the turn after. Following Turn 2/3, Reactive Blue has to always hold up Mana for the Answers, because is they don't then they can automatically lose. You tap out against Abzan Company on turn 4 to resolve a Verdict, when they've got nothing on board but 4 lands and they can go "End Step Chord for Viscera Seer, My turn CoCo for any combo pieces."
Hell, I'd be fine if we got something like "Anguished Banishment 2UU"
You may Exile a blue card and pay 3 life to cast this without paying it's Mana Cost
Counter Target Spell unless it's controller pays 3.
I think the ideal answer would be some bastard child of Force Spike, Mana Leak, and Remand. Something like
"Spike Remand-UU"
Instant
Counter target spell unless it's controller pays 2. If the spell isn't countered, Draw a card.
Basically, what I think Blue wants is something that can act as a "hard" counter for the early game but becomes able to cycle in the late game.
That and I still maintain that Stoneforge Mystic and Jace should be unbanned, because the nightmares of Caw Blade make people forget that Mystic is useless once fetched and snuck in B. Skull and that Jace literally dies to Bolt
Ban Ancient Stirrings(Card is essentially a dig through time Colourless centric decks, it borders on stupid that it exists and Preordain is banned)
Announce effective Immediately following the release of MM3 that there are two new rules errata on Urza's Tower/Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle. Tower now taps for two when Tron is online, Valakut is now rightfully legendary.
Sure, you'd piss off a bunch of these players, but you turn Tron from dropping Karn Turn 3 to Wurmcoil, fix a design mistake that never should have been a thing, etc.
The fact that the next ban/unban announcement comes literally 5 days before MM2017 should be a hint that something might be up.
No, Twin does force it. Every deck that runs Blue and red will be asked "Why aren't you running Twin?". They literally mentioned it in the ban of Twin.
Twin was a Bandaid on the format that was covering a festering wound. Banning it finally revealed the wound, and you don't heal a wound like that with another Bandaid on top.
What Blue decks need is better card selection, better Counters, and better wincons). Twin doesn't give Blue that.
I'll add from my experience that you can out grind Jund with the right build. I've been having great Jund Matchups since I added a Seagate Wreckage, as it effectively helps us draw twice per turn.
But yeah, the Two biggest lopsided matches for the deck have to be Tron and Affinity IMO. Burn you can beat with Scooze/Eidolon of Rhetoric/Finks/What have you, but Affinity just rolls over us Game 1 unless you draw the perfect hand to their bad one. It gets better postboard, but Tron does not. Tron can't be slowed down as easily and Turn 3 Karn/O-Stone just obliterates us.
Name me one deck in Modern that uses SSG fairly. Even the most "fair deck" running it (AD Naseum) uses him to power out a win they can(and do) switch to Lab Maniac post board.
As Corey Burkhardt said on a recent Masters of Modern Podcast, SSG is a better card then Chrome Mon. It's a 1 Card investment vs a 2 card investment that dies to Stony Silence.
Like, I know that it's not always true, but it always seems to have turn 3 Tron.
Yup. Abzan Company has completely died off because the big hate card for Dredge(Grafdigger's Cage) basically prevents CoCo/Chord from working while also making Finks not work if it's out.
I know Wizards doesn't like to completely gut decks, but killing both Imp and Grave-Troll Makes Cathartic Reunion at best a "Dredge 12". I think that even with Imp you still get stupid Dredge amounts by Turn 2. I mean, Neonate T1, Dredge 5 with Imp. T2 Cathartic Reunion Pitching Imp and Troll, Dredge 9(likely hitting something in that 9 that lets you Dredge more).
Dredge shouldn't be able to have half their library effectively "Drawn" by turn 3. It doesn't violate the T4 rule, but it does hurt sideboards and other decks that use the graveyard.