Oko is genuinely unfun in commander. Even gets around indestructible. Any good card will have 3 opponents against it. Prophet of Kruphix for example; so it’s not a valid reason. Oko isn’t even tolerable in commander of all formats. It’s just very poor design that I find highly astounding slipped passed play testing, regardless of what excuses they’ve made for it. Just ban it across the board. Even as someone who loves Simic and shirtless men I can’t stand the design of that card to even use it myself. It just feels cheap.
I feel like Ballista is more likely to get the ban than Heliod. It’s a matter of time. No way that combo is surviving. Heliod will just have to stand out for his intended design, not a combo like that. He’s a well designed white card.
I'm going to get pissed if they ban Ballista too. It's my favourite card.
These bannings, other than Oko, are ridiculous and completely miss the mark. Like back when they banned Bridge From Below instead of the big hoe this summer. Incompetent.
My guess is they're going to wait until they've sold a sufficient amount of Theros packs and then ban ballista. It's all about the mnoney for them. "But they're a company are you saying they can't make money???? lol why are you so stupid??" Of course they can earn money, but you can earn money and still have a brain, some form of integrity and trustworthiness.
This is ******* ridiculous.
I agree Urza should have been banned instead of Opal, it just going to keep getting better with any relevant artifact and will be broke again in a few months.
As for lattice, the problem I see with this ban is the inconsistency, if they don't like strategies that turn magic into solitaire they should ban other unfun cards as blood moon.
Something I would like to see is a Mox for only colored spells, that artifact decks can't use, specially designed to give speed to "fair" decks trying to catch up. Maybe like chrome mox but with some limitations on the use of its mana.
I agree Urza should have been banned instead of Opal, it just going to keep getting better with any relevant artifact and will be broke again in a few months.
As for lattice, the problem I see with this ban is the inconsistency, if they don't like strategies that turn magic into solitaire they should ban other unfun cards as blood moon.
Something I would like to see is a Mox for only colored spells, that artifact decks can't use, specially designed to give speed to "fair" decks trying to catch up. Maybe like chrome mox but with some limitations on the use of its mana.
Lattice also wasn't good in every match, especially against stuff like burn and other decks of similar speed and aggression. Yeah it was really strong, but it wasn't broken and isn't that the ******* idea of playing modern? having access to really strong cards? It's ******* lame.
I agree Urza should have been banned instead of Opal, it just going to keep getting better with any relevant artifact and will be broke again in a few months.
As for lattice, the problem I see with this ban is the inconsistency, if they don't like strategies that turn magic into solitaire they should ban other unfun cards as blood moon.
Something I would like to see is a Mox for only colored spells, that artifact decks can't use, specially designed to give speed to "fair" decks trying to catch up. Maybe like chrome mox but with some limitations on the use of its mana.
The Lattice combo is way more powerful than Blood Moon, Blood Moon is mostly a speedbump against Tron, unless you can back it up with pressure, Tron can just wait it out until you can use a Forest to fire off enchantment hate, or even hardcast Karn or Stone, in fact Blood Moon has fallen out of favor against Tron. The Lattice combo on the other hand truly shuts you out of the game at the low price of ONE sideboard slot, no matter which deck you're playing. I'm glad to see that crap banned tbh, even if it wasn't warping the metagame losing to such a cheap combo is too infuriating.
Oko...anyone surprised? Hope R&D learned their lesson here.
Regarding Mox Opal, guess I can stop feeling frustrated at my Affinity deck, the only thing I was missing was the Opal playset so the deck sucked...just like it's meant to be from now on, but I can understand the reason for banning it, fast artifact mana is always begging to be broken. I wonder if with Opal gone they may want to bring Lotus Petal into Modern...nah, somebody would bust that wide open as well.
I’m glad they’re aware of the Heliod combo. Wish they’d ban a part of it so people won’t hoard Heliod for this silly and likely temporary reason.
Can we just ban Oko in commander and call it a day?
No world of no. I might be the only one on the planet to admit it but I love oko, Commander is the only place he has left.
Legacy?
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Currently Playing: Standard:
Nothing, the format Bores me! Legacy: RBurn (Made on the Cheap!)R RGBelcherRG WSoldier StompyW BReanimatorB EDH: BUGRWSliver OverlordWRGUB BGeth, Lord of the VaultB
"But they're a company are you saying they can't make money???? lol why are you so stupid??" Of course they can earn money, but you can earn money and still have a brain, some form of integrity and trustworthiness.
This is ******* ridiculous.
They do have integrity and trustworthiness! For their stockholders.
"But they're a company are you saying they can't make money???? lol why are you so stupid??" Of course they can earn money, but you can earn money and still have a brain, some form of integrity and trustworthiness.
This is ******* ridiculous.
They do have integrity and trustworthiness! For their stockholders.
I'm still trying to find any group anywhere in which big table commander free for alls don' become a race for who combos and is not countered first every single damn time... lol.
the only way that happens is if you play the "fair play" card and makes everyone to avoid instant win combos, because if you don't then everyone will always simply do that.
you either play the combo or a control heavy enough to disallow other people to combo.... there's no other way to win in a FFA game....
and, yes, sure, in a FFA game where anyone drops Oko, he'll be instantly killed, but that's just because of how stupid big of a threat it is.
It sounds like everyone you played with wants to play cEDH. Casual groups still retain balance between combo-control-aggro strategies. The higher the power level of the playgroup the more it gravitates toward combo winconditions. Which is unfortunate because I would gladly play cEDH with more varied winconditions.
yeah, thank god for playgroups that actually care about good games and dismantle the "hey, I won" decks.
and no, I don't want to play CEDH, I mostly don`t even want to play EDH. My experience with the format has not been good all along mainly because like 70% of the time you bring 2 unknown guys to a very casual table, one of them will have a combo do burst the entire table down on turn 6 or something.
My point was just that.... if you don't enforce a local rule to avoid instant win combos in FFA matches, then, every single one of those will be decided by those every single time.... because the combo will win or because it will be countered enough times so the guy playing it will only be frustrated.
so.... banning anything at all will always simply be irrelevant unless that thing makes such combos even faster somehow....
I just said that because the argument that Oko could be labeled as "unfun" was countered with "when you drop it, all your 3 opponents will bash him down"
and sure he'd not be that much of an issue in a FFA multiplayer game.
if by "hey, i won" decks you mean combo then dismantling them by house-banning infinite combo i don't think that's a good idea. it severly criples metagame by removing vital part of the game (there are also non-infinite combos that can win the game, nondeterministic combos etc, defining them is close to impossible). i have played in multiple playgroups in multiple countries and never encountered playgroup that had problems with neither "combo" nor power level. the key seemed to be that people who were in those playgroups wanted to have challenging game for both them and their opponents so discussing what decks they can play beforehand was pretty normal. but this is not the place to continue that discussion, we can move this to separate thread in edh subforum.
I agree Urza should have been banned instead of Opal, it just going to keep getting better with any relevant artifact and will be broke again in a few months.
As for lattice, the problem I see with this ban is the inconsistency, if they don't like strategies that turn magic into solitaire they should ban other unfun cards as blood moon.
Something I would like to see is a Mox for only colored spells, that artifact decks can't use, specially designed to give speed to "fair" decks trying to catch up. Maybe like chrome mox but with some limitations on the use of its mana.
The Lattice combo is way more powerful than Blood Moon, Blood Moon is mostly a speedbump against Tron, unless you can back it up with pressure, Tron can just wait it out until you can use a Forest to fire off enchantment hate, or even hardcast Karn or Stone, in fact Blood Moon has fallen out of favor against Tron. The Lattice combo on the other hand truly shuts you out of the game at the low price of ONE sideboard slot, no matter which deck you're playing. I'm glad to see that crap banned tbh, even if it wasn't warping the metagame losing to such a cheap combo is too infuriating.
Oko...anyone surprised? Hope R&D learned their lesson here.
Regarding Mox Opal, guess I can stop feeling frustrated at my Affinity deck, the only thing I was missing was the Opal playset so the deck sucked...just like it's meant to be from now on, but I can understand the reason for banning it, fast artifact mana is always begging to be broken. I wonder if with Opal gone they may want to bring Lotus Petal into Modern...nah, somebody would bust that wide open as well.
I have to agree with Blood Moon, it can be countered by not playing an all nonbasic mana base. Even decks that are hurt by Blood Moon can ignore it existing. Lattice though if you literally didn't have the answer in your hand as they were playing it, and mana to do so, you were just done unless you're playing one of the few decks that don't care about it, which weren't many.
Mox Opal I can understand, but just barely. It can do some crazy things for you, but it's not all that common and the card isn't great the later the game goes. Compared to Urza though it looks like a Clestial Prism.
so they ban a 2 card win combo (karn and lattice) that costs 10 mana (usually) in total, that can basically go of turn 4 in ideal situations
now we have a 2 card win combo (heliod and balista) that costs 9 mana (usually) in total, that can basically go of turn 4 in ideal situations
AND WE WAIT AND SEE ? thank you wizards... guess i gotta cancel gp brussels...
i've got no real complaints with these bannings. especially over time its going to be more and common to see two card combos given the volume of cards designed. that said sometimes i wonder how much cards being new influences their decision making process, and it calls into question how well they can police their own formats. the posts here make it clear the majority feel urza is the real problem, but the set he's in is premium priced and relatively new compared to mox opal. banning opal doesn't really hurt sales of packs, banning urza may slow the sale of modern horizons packs despite it being 6 months old now. it could be a stretch to make that assumption, but if it isn't i'd wager that line of thought toward bannings will have more of a detrimental effect on the game than oops we printed oko ever could
i've got no real complaints with these bannings. especially over time its going to be more and common to see two card combos given the volume of cards designed. that said sometimes i wonder how much cards being new influences their decision making process, and it calls into question how well they can police their own formats. the posts here make it clear the majority feel urza is the real problem, but the set he's in is premium priced and relatively new compared to mox opal. banning opal doesn't really hurt sales of packs, banning urza may slow the sale of modern horizons packs despite it being 6 months old now. it could be a stretch to make that assumption, but if it isn't i'd wager that line of thought toward bannings will have more of a detrimental effect on the game than oops we printed oko ever could
Yet they've now banned oko from almost every format, which will definitely hurt eldraine packs. I think past decision making has been pretty clear that they don't really mind combos or even just powerful cards too much, they prefer to try and ban around them to make them less consistent rather than ban the combo pieces themselves. Mycosynth lattice just happened to have a nasty habit of turning affinity decks to 11 even if they don't actually play artifacts. Urza affinity is a lot less menacing or consistent when you have to manually cast a whole mess of fragile cards before winning on the spot.
i've got no real complaints with these bannings. especially over time its going to be more and common to see two card combos given the volume of cards designed. that said sometimes i wonder how much cards being new influences their decision making process, and it calls into question how well they can police their own formats. the posts here make it clear the majority feel urza is the real problem, but the set he's in is premium priced and relatively new compared to mox opal. banning opal doesn't really hurt sales of packs, banning urza may slow the sale of modern horizons packs despite it being 6 months old now. it could be a stretch to make that assumption, but if it isn't i'd wager that line of thought toward bannings will have more of a detrimental effect on the game than oops we printed oko ever could
Yet they've now banned oko from almost every format, which will definitely hurt eldraine packs. I think past decision making has been pretty clear that they don't really mind combos or even just powerful cards too much, they prefer to try and ban around them to make them less consistent rather than ban the combo pieces themselves. Mycosynth lattice just happened to have a nasty habit of turning affinity decks to 11 even if they don't actually play artifacts. Urza affinity is a lot less menacing or consistent when you have to manually cast a whole mess of fragile cards before winning on the spot.
Agreed. WotC's philosophy is to keep the deck viable but neuter it until it is less of an issue.
so they ban a 2 card win combo (karn and lattice) that costs 10 mana (usually) in total, that can basically go of turn 4 in ideal situations
now we have a 2 card win combo (heliod and balista) that costs 9 mana (usually) in total, that can basically go of turn 4 in ideal situations
AND WE WAIT AND SEE ? thank you wizards... guess i gotta cancel gp brussels...
Keep in mind Karn/Lattice is actually a 1-card combo, and it's colorless.
so they ban a 2 card win combo (karn and lattice) that costs 10 mana (usually) in total, that can basically go of turn 4 in ideal situations
now we have a 2 card win combo (heliod and balista) that costs 9 mana (usually) in total, that can basically go of turn 4 in ideal situations
AND WE WAIT AND SEE ? thank you wizards... guess i gotta cancel gp brussels...
Keep in mind Karn/Lattice is actually a 1-card combo, and it's colorless.
That's just warping the meta though. If every viable deck has to include the same set of counters to one or two decktypes, you end up with matches that might as well just be two players flipping a coin since they play out the same way over and over.
That's just warping the meta though. If every viable deck has to include the same set of counters to one or two decktypes, you end up with matches that might as well just be two players flipping a coin since they play out the same way over and over.
One of my biggest pet peeves in ban discussions is when people talk about counterplay as if it were, by its very existence, a valid rebuttal to a ban argument. The fact that a card or strategy is beatable is irrelevant because every strategy in the game is beatable if things go good enough for one player or bad enough for the other. If a bannable card or deck actually does reach the point of being unbeatable, then the metagame has problems deeper than what can be solved with a few bans.
This is because ban (and nerf, in other games) decisions are based in the metagame, which should take a much wider view of the game than what players get in a game-to-game basis. It's perfectly possible for a strategy that feels 'fair' game-to-game to be a metagame black hole (as was the case of Splinter Twin), or a deck that feels totally broken in individual games to not make a splash in the broader meta (like Neoform combo decks). As such, questions of whether and how a deck can be beaten are not near as important as the question of what effect a deck has on the metagame.
That's just warping the meta though. If every viable deck has to include the same set of counters to one or two decktypes, you end up with matches that might as well just be two players flipping a coin since they play out the same way over and over.
One of my biggest pet peeves in ban discussions is when people talk about counterplay as if it were, by its very existence, a valid rebuttal to a ban argument. The fact that a card or strategy is beatable is irrelevant because every strategy in the game is beatable if things go good enough for one player or bad enough for the other. If a bannable card or deck actually does reach the point of being unbeatable, then the metagame has problems deeper than what can be solved with a few bans.
This is because ban (and nerf, in other games) decisions are based in the metagame, which should take a much wider view of the game than what players get in a game-to-game basis. It's perfectly possible for a strategy that feels 'fair' game-to-game to be a metagame black hole (as was the case of Splinter Twin), or a deck that feels totally broken in individual games to not make a splash in the broader meta (like Neoform combo decks). As such, questions of whether and how a deck can be beaten are not near as important as the question of what effect a deck has on the metagame.
while i do not agree with splinter twin example but you are correct about everything else.
i might add that while there is a lot of answers to problematic cards/combos the problem is that most of them are not maindeck cards. no one sane would maindeck lost legacy or return to nature. cards like thoughtseize can be maindecked but they do nothing against topdecks and library manipulation. also filling your deck with answers after sideboarding dilutes your deck and lets your opponents do other stuff their deck is trying to accomplish unimpeded.
If they ban my Ballistas, I'm going to be furious, the combo isn't THAT good. there is nothing you can't beat in Modern if you do what you have to do. I sound like a broken record, but we have so many toys, so many tools, there's no excuse for 'deck XYZ is unbeatable'. I hate the argument of 'warping the metagame', that's what metagame IS, not just playing whatever random thing you like if you want to win. They should unban about half the cards on the list, Modern players aren't Standard players, we shouldn't need someone to hold our hand and give us sets that basically make our deck a precon. you want to beat Urza decks? those are the big problem for you? give up a few points in a matchup you don't see often, and beat Urza decks! they need to stop forcing rotation and lighting our money on fire because some deck hit 13% of a tournament
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while i do not agree with splinter twin example but you are correct about everything else.
i might add that while there is a lot of answers to problematic cards/combos the problem is that most of them are not maindeck cards. no one sane would maindeck lost legacy or return to nature. cards like thoughtseize can be maindecked but they do nothing against topdecks and library manipulation. also filling your deck with answers after sideboarding dilutes your deck and lets your opponents do other stuff their deck is trying to accomplish unimpeded.
The fact that people were unironically calling Twin a "police" deck while largely acting like the strategies that it pushed out of modern did not deserve to exist by virtue of losing to Twin is, to me, evidence enough that the deck warped Modern. Threats do not police formats, answers do, and that players treated its banning as the removal of a Force of Will-caliber format cornerstone is proof of the myopic effect that personal preference has on perceptions of format health.
WotC needs to improve answers for the format with new designs, recently stuff like stony silence has been made easily answerable by new cards like blast zone, I do like blast zone design but it feels like an arms race now, it also feels like permanents (as stony or damping sphere) are no longer the way to go, so they should print better one use spells.
Also, "protection from colorless" should become more prevalent, I mean they clearly know it is needed after they printed giver of runes so hope they step up with more creatures featuring it to punish colorless decks.
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I'm going to get pissed if they ban Ballista too. It's my favourite card.
These bannings, other than Oko, are ridiculous and completely miss the mark. Like back when they banned Bridge From Below instead of the big hoe this summer. Incompetent.
My guess is they're going to wait until they've sold a sufficient amount of Theros packs and then ban ballista. It's all about the mnoney for them. "But they're a company are you saying they can't make money???? lol why are you so stupid??" Of course they can earn money, but you can earn money and still have a brain, some form of integrity and trustworthiness.
This is ******* ridiculous.
As for lattice, the problem I see with this ban is the inconsistency, if they don't like strategies that turn magic into solitaire they should ban other unfun cards as blood moon.
Something I would like to see is a Mox for only colored spells, that artifact decks can't use, specially designed to give speed to "fair" decks trying to catch up. Maybe like chrome mox but with some limitations on the use of its mana.
Lattice also wasn't good in every match, especially against stuff like burn and other decks of similar speed and aggression. Yeah it was really strong, but it wasn't broken and isn't that the ******* idea of playing modern? having access to really strong cards? It's ******* lame.
The Lattice combo is way more powerful than Blood Moon, Blood Moon is mostly a speedbump against Tron, unless you can back it up with pressure, Tron can just wait it out until you can use a Forest to fire off enchantment hate, or even hardcast Karn or Stone, in fact Blood Moon has fallen out of favor against Tron. The Lattice combo on the other hand truly shuts you out of the game at the low price of ONE sideboard slot, no matter which deck you're playing. I'm glad to see that crap banned tbh, even if it wasn't warping the metagame losing to such a cheap combo is too infuriating.
Oko...anyone surprised? Hope R&D learned their lesson here.
Regarding Mox Opal, guess I can stop feeling frustrated at my Affinity deck, the only thing I was missing was the Opal playset so the deck sucked...just like it's meant to be from now on, but I can understand the reason for banning it, fast artifact mana is always begging to be broken. I wonder if with Opal gone they may want to bring Lotus Petal into Modern...nah, somebody would bust that wide open as well.
Legacy?
Currently Playing:
Standard:
Nothing, the format Bores me!
Legacy:
RBurn (Made on the Cheap!)R
RGBelcherRG
WSoldier StompyW
BReanimatorB
EDH:
BUGRWSliver OverlordWRGUB
BGeth, Lord of the VaultB
They do have integrity and trustworthiness! For their stockholders.
Exactly hehe
I have to agree with Blood Moon, it can be countered by not playing an all nonbasic mana base. Even decks that are hurt by Blood Moon can ignore it existing. Lattice though if you literally didn't have the answer in your hand as they were playing it, and mana to do so, you were just done unless you're playing one of the few decks that don't care about it, which weren't many.
Mox Opal I can understand, but just barely. It can do some crazy things for you, but it's not all that common and the card isn't great the later the game goes. Compared to Urza though it looks like a Clestial Prism.
now we have a 2 card win combo (heliod and balista) that costs 9 mana (usually) in total, that can basically go of turn 4 in ideal situations
AND WE WAIT AND SEE ? thank you wizards... guess i gotta cancel gp brussels...
Yet they've now banned oko from almost every format, which will definitely hurt eldraine packs. I think past decision making has been pretty clear that they don't really mind combos or even just powerful cards too much, they prefer to try and ban around them to make them less consistent rather than ban the combo pieces themselves. Mycosynth lattice just happened to have a nasty habit of turning affinity decks to 11 even if they don't actually play artifacts. Urza affinity is a lot less menacing or consistent when you have to manually cast a whole mess of fragile cards before winning on the spot.
Agreed. WotC's philosophy is to keep the deck viable but neuter it until it is less of an issue.
Theoretically the combo can be kept in check with discard (i.e. Thoughtseize, Collective Brutality). Even cards like Lost Legacy, Banishing Light, Tibalt, Rakish Instigator, Unmoored Ego, etc. can keep it in check. Walking Ballista also needs 2 counters on it and they need the 1W mana to give it lifelink via Heliod, Sun-Crowned. If it has only 2 counters, after the first activation you can respond with Return to Nature, Wild Slash, etc. to kill it, and their combo whiffs. Revoke Existence was also reprinted.
I'm always more of a proponent of trying to beat something rather than banning everything, but that's just me.
I agree and it's definitely not just you
This is what got Golgari Grave-Troll (re)banned in Modern.
One of my biggest pet peeves in ban discussions is when people talk about counterplay as if it were, by its very existence, a valid rebuttal to a ban argument. The fact that a card or strategy is beatable is irrelevant because every strategy in the game is beatable if things go good enough for one player or bad enough for the other. If a bannable card or deck actually does reach the point of being unbeatable, then the metagame has problems deeper than what can be solved with a few bans.
This is because ban (and nerf, in other games) decisions are based in the metagame, which should take a much wider view of the game than what players get in a game-to-game basis. It's perfectly possible for a strategy that feels 'fair' game-to-game to be a metagame black hole (as was the case of Splinter Twin), or a deck that feels totally broken in individual games to not make a splash in the broader meta (like Neoform combo decks). As such, questions of whether and how a deck can be beaten are not near as important as the question of what effect a deck has on the metagame.
i might add that while there is a lot of answers to problematic cards/combos the problem is that most of them are not maindeck cards. no one sane would maindeck lost legacy or return to nature. cards like thoughtseize can be maindecked but they do nothing against topdecks and library manipulation. also filling your deck with answers after sideboarding dilutes your deck and lets your opponents do other stuff their deck is trying to accomplish unimpeded.
The fact that people were unironically calling Twin a "police" deck while largely acting like the strategies that it pushed out of modern did not deserve to exist by virtue of losing to Twin is, to me, evidence enough that the deck warped Modern. Threats do not police formats, answers do, and that players treated its banning as the removal of a Force of Will-caliber format cornerstone is proof of the myopic effect that personal preference has on perceptions of format health.
Also, "protection from colorless" should become more prevalent, I mean they clearly know it is needed after they printed giver of runes so hope they step up with more creatures featuring it to punish colorless decks.