It has been postulated in a few places that attrition/denial prison strategies will do well.
I am basically a prison player in Modern and Legacy, and I do not think there is much mileage in these sorts of decks as answers to Eldrazi. One or two may have decent matches but most won't.
The prison decks in the format at the fringes and more common are basically
Lantern*
Blue Moon* (with or without shackles/seas)
Skred Red (control version)
Martyr proc *(W or with splash based on wraths, Ghostlies, Martyr and often a recursive fog + Proclamation of Rebirth)
Mono-White emeria (same sort of deck but based around sun titan)
Boros Bridge (RW board control based around bridge, maybe chalice)
RW landkill/Stax * (Boom Bust/Molten rain, Magus of the tabernacle, Flagstones Ghostly Prisons, sometimes suppression field, maybe chalice, some sweepers)
Casual stax variants
Pillow-Fort * (w-x enchantments, based on Nykthos, Leylines and huge numbers of defensive enchantments up to sphere of safety, often running Porphyr Nodes and Heliod)
Enduring Ideal * - same deck, more combo-y
Loam Pox *(Levy smallpox, life from the loam, sometimes molten vortex)
8 Rack *
BW Small pox (similar-ish deck to 8 rack)
Death cloud
I have played them all through the years.
The ones marked * have had some SCG placements or a similar level of event in the past year. I am not sure on the Levy loam pox, but it has a star name player behind it, and I may be wrong on 8 rack,
The decks:
Lantern I don't think would have a bad chance, but the deck is bloody hard to play, it is not a pick up deck, the skill level required is high.
Blue Moon is obviously competitive in some form, the pro-tour showed that.
Skred I think would have an excellent chance, especially if Ensnaring Bridge is in the 75, more so if Spirit Guides are used. The Deck runs sweepers (volcanic fallout) and reckoners that take out anything, moon can hit the mana later on, although just running Moon is no protection at all. The deck does have a major issue- it has a pretty bad affinity match up, and is limited in sideboard terms, and affinity is a great deck now.
Martyr has a potentially better matchup, but that Though-knot seer is a huge issue- the deck does not run Leyline main, and the deck may have a hand that is low on "hate". The deck can gain 12 life easily t2, and cards like ghostly and Wrath offer a lot of attraction.
Mono-W emeria I think will be harder to get going. Those late game sun-titan type cards clog up the hand. It might be too slow too often.
The Boros Bridge deck is not a million miles away, and traditionally plays a mixture of defensive permanents and sweepers. Running both Bridge and Ghostly is pretty hard to hate with a Thought-Knot, and the deck runs SSG so can power out a t2 permanent nearly all the time. They often run halos, helices, bolts so should be well placed with the caveat that the deck is not often a 4 of deck, often running 2 copies here, 3 copies there of card like Leyline and the match may come down to the lucky starts (eg the Leyline/spirit guide/bridge hand is hard to beat).
The stax/landkill one I am dubious on- traditionally these decks can go t2 landkill, t3 Prison or landkill, t4 landkill, t5 landkill or magus etc. So yeah, with the fact that they run sweepers like pyroclasm there may be some unbeatable hands on the play. But- suppression field does nothing, and these decks have always had a hard time with blue tempo matches, and have to dedicate a significant portion of the board to being competitive in those. They can thus be overrun more easily than some of the above decks like Marrtyr, which are anti-aggro all stars.
Casual Stax are just that- too casual.
Pillow Fort is probably the best set up defensively- 4 Leylines, 4 Halos and often a full set of Nodes, Ghostly Prisons etc. Its not unusual to lock an aggro deck t4 making them pay 8-12 to attack per dude, having slowed them t1/2.
I can't see Deathcloud being fast enough, especially on the draw. Sure it is a damnation deck with defense, but the sheer speed of the Eldrazi deck I feel will be too great, that D cloud too hard to set up.
8 rack needs to draw the bridge and not get it ripped- its control tools are just not able to deal with those hoardes if the bridge is not there. Those small poxes seem to be not so stellar against the multiple 2/2 starts, esp on the draw. The racks are just not fast enough to race Eldrazi.
E ideal is a deck which has lots of variance as it is, its not as robust defensively as the Pillow-fort versions, and thus more vulnerable to fast Eldrazi starts. Having 4 Leyline is a start at protecting its hate pieces though.
So really whilst I can see these decks gaining a bit of popularity (and the price of a lot of the core cards has risen recently), I cannot see them being enough of an answer to the threat. the barrier to playing some of them skill wise is quite high, too.
Outside of these strategies I feel Jund/k are always going to have half-decent matches vs most decks, and that a lot of people will just try and ignore the Eldrazi by resorting to binary combo decks like storm/infect.
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People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
Something people are forgetting is the Eldrazi decks will also adapt. There is no getting past the fact that that amount of fast mana combined with big creatures and relevant abilities is borderline ban-able. If it was a non-tribal deck like Jund/Abzan that found a strategy like this people would be even more vehement about the ban talk IMO. It's because this is a "new" phenomenon facilitated almost completely by OGW that people are giving it time. Like a poster before said, the ambush Affinity analogy is relevant, but the part that makes it slightly incompatible is we have no hate to sideboard for the Eldrazi. 4CMC Sorcery "Destroy all Eldrazi" in R and G? Nope. 1R Instant "Destroy target Eldrazi" with G Flashback? Nope. 1W Enchantment "Eldrazi entering the battlefield don't cause abilities to trigger"? Nope. We need a variety of targeted answers to Eldrazi in multiple colors for the Affinity analogy to work. All we have at the moment is people lunging towards "Prison"-themed decks that stop anything from attacking...is that where we want to be? Where the "police" decks are ones that stop the primary method of winning a game of magic?
I'm not sure "Just run more removal" is even an answer worth entertaining, and neither is "Hope they don't have their solid hands". Cheap life gain can address burn, Artifact hate can address affinity, what non-generic answers exist solely for Eldrazi that could assist in a match up?
So just watched a couple pro tour videos with the eldrazi decks, playtested my own list i just made, i dont think this deck is as overly powerful consitent as its beinig made out to be, granted a lot of the videos were eldrazi vs eldrazi as i only was watching top 8 but there was some long grindy games from what i watched, the LSV vs Frank lepore game 3 for isntance, even in my playtesting a list very rarely would i have mimic and eye granted the decks play a 4 of on temple which functions about the same so its still a powerfull deck, but its not as format warping as a turn 4 win in twin or turn 2-3 in amulet bloom. To not really see anything else top 8 is a little terrifying tbh but as with anything youll have to see, by the time another big event comes up someone should have found something to combat the deck or some sort of emergency ban
But what do you ban? the sol lands seems to be easy targets for it. Banning eye hurts tron a bit but it's still a playable deck they usually only run 1 and ive seen a lot of lists that ran it sb that was also like over a year ago that i was really looking at modern lists just getting back to getting into modern so a lot of this post could be really off. Banning Temple would hurt the mono green eldrazi ramp decks which from what i can tell weren't tier 1 so they get hurt quiete a bit but they still have other choices the deck could stay a thing. However banning either really makes the eldrazi decks as a whole unplayable so that while it would help everyone not playing eldrazi its kinda like a dick move honestly. Other than the 2 sol lands i can't really think of anything really ban worthy, the only thing i can think of is eldrazi mimic. the deck could still function and still function at a very high level, it would be like banning arcbound ravager the rest of the affinity decks are scary efficent on its own, without mimic the deck just loses a an extra 4/4 or 5/5 turn 2-3, reality smasher and thought-knot seer arent really strong enough to get banned imo, matter reshaper isnt that strong either so really the strongest cards are mimic and lands imo, i could see banning eye and leaving temple as is it would slow the deck and still keep it a playable state so most people are happy.
Also worth noting i just finished building abazan and i have nothing worth siding in against this deck and no real chance of racing it, taking 3-5 damage to thoughtsieze seems like a waste enough of the deck is above 3 cmc so iok isnt great, siege rhino comes in too late unless i get it turn 3 off noble hierarch but its at best just a trade with one of prob 3-4 creatures attacking me, my other modern deck is faeries and it bleeds itself and doesnt really do well against creatures so its screwed as well.
All in all this really is an amazing thing thats happpened. A totally new deck dominated a pt top 8 and no one has any idea where to go from here and honestly ive seen it elsewhere the only real way to beat it is to play or looking at the top 8 play affinity which is effectively a smaller version of eldrazi. Im fairly speechless to see an event where top 8 didnt have a single lightning bolt, tarmogoyf, collected company, almost no fetches, snapcaster mage, wow im honestly not even really upset im just amazed. its just a great deck super eficent and consistent enough, I know this thread is for grievances but im only upset im not playing it its a great deck
I would like to draw attention to this analysis by DeadPresident2910:
"Ok fair enough, I'm not knocking your preferences or what you find fun or satisfying. What I'm saying is what you want to use the lands for and what's actually making them problematic are two different things, and further (and unfortunately) the fact that some minor percentage of people want to use the lands to do fair things like reduce a 10CMC creature to 8CMC won't be considered when they make their ban. That's like me saying all I want to do to in my Amulet Bloom deck is ramp up to as many 2/2 bears as possible in my opening turn because I found it fun. That's irrelevant when other people understand how to maximize its application and get a Primeval Titan into play T2 through a Remand on the draw.
It's possible to make any number of banned cards seem innocuous by saying "I'm only trying to do this cool thing, not break it", but unfortunately the people "Just doing cool things" are in the minority, and most people are just trying to replicate the lists that destroyed PTOGW and make playing fair magic a distinct impossibility.
Big creature decks aren't an issue, if the costs they pay to play the creatures are scaled to the size of the creatures. When a pair of lands can make smaller creatures unfair or heavily under-costed, that's a problem. When something like a T2 TKS is possible, which is a functional Clique except it has +1/+3 and comes down a turn earlier, that's a problem. The same thing goes for an effective 3CMC Thundermaw Hellkite in Reality Smasher. It's also problematic because the Eldrazi ignore the color pie, TKS is essentially a black/blue effect card, while Smasher is effectively a red/green/blue card. It's patently absurd when colorless creatures have all the benefit associated with a certain color and no drawback, in addition to becoming far cheaper than worse equivalents in the actual colors.
I believe it was Brian Braun-Duin that recently said something along the lines of playing this Eldrazi list feels like playing a Legacy deck in Modern. It's bringing a tank to a knife fight."
Last edited by DeadPresident2910: 1 day ago
I can't say how much I agree with the paragraph beginning with "Big creature decks..." and the last sentence.
The bannings in the past have been to keep the degeneracy in check. Wizards now bans a card to promote variety but achieves the opposite. I think they are not putting a lot of effort to balance modern and make it a healthy format or this is a deliberate decision to help sell the latest product. I want to lean on the first and keep the tinfoil for cooking.
First, you can't promote variety by banning a single card. Sure, people will move on to play the closest color combinations but they will be watered down or less powerful versions.
Second, the way to create variety is by printing new cards that can take the tier 2 decks or developing deck up a notch. But, this requires to monitor the meta with a small but dedicated team. Given how they read the meta Channel Fireball's modern team could do that, for example. Then, all you need to do is print cards that can improve the said tier 2/developing decks. Having said that you don't need to push strategies, they should just go with the flow and flavour of whatever the current set is and tuck in a card here and there, being a little more generous if the card will make an otherwise losing strategy more favorable. There are a ton of archetypes and decks which haven't gotten any love since forever or just a teaspoon at a time, while some decks are constantly getting tons of good stuff, or like in this case, either being deliberately shoved into the meta or come stumbling in like an elephant in a China shop.
Last, if the smaller Eldrazi that were printed in OGW were playtested I think we wouldn't have this mess know. There is the possibility of them being playtested and still make it, but that possibilty tends to make you branded with "tinfoil hatter" so I won't get into that. If they need to ban cards to keep this deck in check I think they must be the Eldrazi Mimic and Endless One. Noone is going to miss them outside this deck and they won't have the degenerate hands worse than affinity and back it up with the Rock quality disruption + fatties. They will still have a good mid and late game, but they will lack the early pressure which they shouldn't have had in the first place. A deck shouldn't dominate in all phases of the game. If those two don't stop the deck, then the next season they can still ban the Eye of Ugin, which reduces costs by 2 without even tapping. If, let's say, a legendary land like this existed "Green Ooze spells cost GG less to play" would it be overpowered? how about a "Green Shaman spells cost GG less to play" and mind you your average ooze and shaman don't have 10/10 bodies, and spells to back it up. Yet we can give the Eye and other fair decks that use it a chance.
Cult of the Succubi Eating Kitten and Brotherhood of Hamsters - Zombie One/Hulking One - Brotherhood of Hamsters disapproves of Damage on the Stack amputation, the corruption of Mythics, and the "Major changes to Extended" in July 2010. You aborted our cards., but we approve of the Modern format. Even if it doesn't ha ve Carrion Feeder or Caller of the Claw in it.
Dex: http://deckbox.org/users/Egementium_instructoid
So? Magic has a constant influx of new cards which can invalidate a deck at any time. I doubt Legacy players threw fits about the death of goblins or the rise of Cawblade decks. If people want to play something that never changes they can play block or 95, because Modern has never been static.
True, but rarely does the release of a new set invalidate such a wide swath of a metagame at once. The explosion of Eldrazi onto the scene may or may not represent a new world order. But if it DOES, that means that Eldrazi have "killed" not just one deck, but several.
Nope. You just want the new deck to be beatable by the old decks. Well too bad. You can't always have that. Sometimes you have to use new decks to beat it. They exist. If the decks didn't exist there would be a problem. No one cares if you don't like them or find them "boring" because those things are completely subjective to you and you alone.
That all said... yeah it's pretty obvious they are going to ban something from Eldrazi. Temple makes the most sense to me.
Man, I have no idea why you're even bothering to reply. You're pretty clearly coming across as somebody with a pet deck that suddenly found a slightly better role in the metagame. Congratulations, you lucked into being on the beneficial side of this paradigm shift. That doesn't make me wrong for happening to play a more mainstream deck that has suffered somewhat.
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Formerly Angrypossum over at the now-defunct WotC forums.
imagine Affinity was a new deck. Imagine nobody had sideboard cards against it, and one team decided to go all-in on a rogue affinity strategy. At its first tournament, how would it perform?
it would be carnage. would the deck need a ban? no!
It's a perfect storm of big team, no hate, new deck. there's nothing realistically to panic about. no bans need to be made.
sure, lots of people will pick up the deck over the next few weeks and try it out (who can blame them?). I myself had all the cards already before the ProTour and built the deck while watching the coverage. I'm psyched to have a go at playing it, and i'm sure it'll be a reasonably powerful option going forward, in-line with many other top-tier decks of the past.
is it broken though? no! obviously.
case in point - at a large local event, I saw Living End absolutely crush a metagame, not losing any matches and breezing through. If this had been the deck's first ever outing, on camera for the world to see, it would look COMPLETELY BUSTED. can you imagine the hysteria it would cause? "free spells are broken", "three mana instant-speed wraths are broken", "ban simian spirit guide"... sound familiar? fact of the matter was though, nobody was packing any graveyard hate. *shrug*. does the deck need a ban? no!
this forum, and particularly this thread, is full of panic-mongering. I hope Wizards takes the time to appreciate the lack of depth and imagination of this panic. I also hope that the panic doesn't result in some kind of dumb self-fulfilling prophecy, where people's stubborn negativity actually does get something banned when it really didn't need to. that would be the worst.
You may very well be right, and I hope I've qualified my "panic mongering" adequately to not be part of a larger problem. But there's one significant difference here:
"Affinity is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
"Anything against artifacts is good. Try Vandalblast or similar in the sideboard. And hey, if you're Grixis or Jund, Kolaghan's Command is good enough value in the main deck and gets absolutely nuts versus Affinity. Small changes will go a long way."
"Living end is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
"Graveyard hate in the sideboard shuts Living End down hard, and you can afford to mulligan aggressively to find it. Also, the combo is really weak to basic countermagic like Remand."
"Eldrazi Processors is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
(Actual responses I've seen and been given) "Heh, you don't" "Play a different deck" "Hope they flood".
New decks can emerge, and demanding that the metagame shift to accept them is fine. What I'm scared of here is that the Eldrazi Processors deck demands too drastic a metagame shift, possibly to the point where the necessary technology doesn't even exist.
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Formerly Angrypossum over at the now-defunct WotC forums.
Marsupial is correct on this. Not just because of the meta implications, but also the implications to the player base both in small and large MTG playing communities. If Burn/Affinity/Other Aggro strategies just become patently worse than Eldrazi aggro, that sets an incredibly bad precedent. For a single deck to have to adjust significantly to a new arrival like Eldrazi it's not too bad, if entire strategies are made null and void that's pretty unacceptable. It's especially egregious if the majority of the decks getting tanked are currently Tier 1.
A primary concern with Eldrazi Aggro is that it allows creatures to hit the board at a similar rate to Burn (possibly Affinity if it dumps a bunch of Mimics T1) but those creatures provide more power than Burn and Affinity's do. That should already serve as a bit of an alarm bell, if Eldrazi Aggro can do what other Aggro decks do but with midrange creatures that's a bit concerning.
If WotC finds this acceptable I hope they're comfortable with the large knock confidence in the format is likely to take.
imagine Affinity was a new deck. Imagine nobody had sideboard cards against it, and one team decided to go all-in on a rogue affinity strategy. At its first tournament, how would it perform?
it would be carnage. would the deck need a ban? no!
It's a perfect storm of big team, no hate, new deck. there's nothing realistically to panic about. no bans need to be made.
sure, lots of people will pick up the deck over the next few weeks and try it out (who can blame them?). I myself had all the cards already before the ProTour and built the deck while watching the coverage. I'm psyched to have a go at playing it, and i'm sure it'll be a reasonably powerful option going forward, in-line with many other top-tier decks of the past.
is it broken though? no! obviously.
case in point - at a large local event, I saw Living End absolutely crush a metagame, not losing any matches and breezing through. If this had been the deck's first ever outing, on camera for the world to see, it would look COMPLETELY BUSTED. can you imagine the hysteria it would cause? "free spells are broken", "three mana instant-speed wraths are broken", "ban simian spirit guide"... sound familiar? fact of the matter was though, nobody was packing any graveyard hate. *shrug*. does the deck need a ban? no!
this forum, and particularly this thread, is full of panic-mongering. I hope Wizards takes the time to appreciate the lack of depth and imagination of this panic. I also hope that the panic doesn't result in some kind of dumb self-fulfilling prophecy, where people's stubborn negativity actually does get something banned when it really didn't need to. that would be the worst.
I agree with most of your argument but there aren't any great sb cards for eldrazi yet. We need cards that don't Exist yet in modern like wasteland , force of will or maybe an 3mc wath of god that kills only colorless creature, think of Perish for colorless creatures. I would rather have more answers than bans but Idon't know if wizards can do that with out hurting standard.
imagine Affinity was a new deck. Imagine nobody had sideboard cards against it, and one team decided to go all-in on a rogue affinity strategy. At its first tournament, how would it perform?
it would be carnage. would the deck need a ban? no!
It's a perfect storm of big team, no hate, new deck. there's nothing realistically to panic about. no bans need to be made.
sure, lots of people will pick up the deck over the next few weeks and try it out (who can blame them?). I myself had all the cards already before the ProTour and built the deck while watching the coverage. I'm psyched to have a go at playing it, and i'm sure it'll be a reasonably powerful option going forward, in-line with many other top-tier decks of the past.
is it broken though? no! obviously.
case in point - at a large local event, I saw Living End absolutely crush a metagame, not losing any matches and breezing through. If this had been the deck's first ever outing, on camera for the world to see, it would look COMPLETELY BUSTED. can you imagine the hysteria it would cause? "free spells are broken", "three mana instant-speed wraths are broken", "ban simian spirit guide"... sound familiar? fact of the matter was though, nobody was packing any graveyard hate. *shrug*. does the deck need a ban? no!
this forum, and particularly this thread, is full of panic-mongering. I hope Wizards takes the time to appreciate the lack of depth and imagination of this panic. I also hope that the panic doesn't result in some kind of dumb self-fulfilling prophecy, where people's stubborn negativity actually does get something banned when it really didn't need to. that would be the worst.
I'm glad you bring up Affinity, because that is another deck which dominated a meta in part by using Sol lands. And against many Affinity players' objections, the artifact lands were banned. Fast forward 8 years, and the deck is still T1.
You aren´t even looking at the correct Eldrazi deck. The problematic decks are colorless, UR and to an extend GR Eldrazi. Countermagic is actually good vs all of them, unlike the processor version which you so happened to pick to compare. Processor Eldrazi has not had the successful appearances the other decks have.
I literally just picked a subtype of Eldrazi deck at random, because I got tired of saying "Eldrazi" to mean a deck as opposed to a creature type.
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Formerly Angrypossum over at the now-defunct WotC forums.
Like a poster before said, the ambush Affinity analogy is relevant, but the part that makes it slightly incompatible is we have no hate to sideboard for the Eldrazi. 4CMC Sorcery "Destroy all Eldrazi" in R and G? Nope. 1R Instant "Destroy target Eldrazi" with G Flashback? Nope. 1W Enchantment "Eldrazi entering the battlefield don't cause abilities to trigger"? Nope. We need a variety of targeted answers to Eldrazi in multiple colors for the Affinity analogy to work. what non-generic answers exist solely for Eldrazi that could assist in a match up?
You are clearly looking in the wrong places if this is the type of extremely narrow answers you are looking at to beat Eldrazi.
"Affinity is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
"Anything against artifacts is good. Try Vandalblast or similar in the sideboard. And hey, if you're Grixis or Jund, Kolaghan's Command is good enough value in the main deck and gets absolutely nuts versus Affinity. Small changes will go a long way."
"Living end is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
"Graveyard hate in the sideboard shuts Living End down hard, and you can afford to mulligan aggressively to find it. Also, the combo is really weak to basic countermagic like Remand."
"Eldrazi Processors is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
(Actual responses I've seen and been given) "Heh, you don't" "Play a different deck" "Hope they flood".
You aren´t even looking at the correct Eldrazi deck. The problematic decks are colorless, UR and to an extend GR Eldrazi. Countermagic is actually good vs all of them, unlike the processor version which you so happened to pick to compare. Processor Eldrazi has not had the successful appearances the other decks have.
Modern needs:
- Eldrazi ban
- Cranial plating ban (there is a replacement in khans)
- Mutagenic growth ban
Unbans:
- Deathrite shaman
- Birthing pod
- Splinter twin
- Ancestral vision
- Bloodbraid elf
- Jace, Mind sculptor (or print new jace that ennables miracles)
- Stoneforge mystic
anything different of that is a mistake for the future success of the format. Modern will die and a new format internet-driven-without-WOTC-influence will arise. Time will tell.
I´m not even sure how seriously this post is meant to be taken.
These hosers we keep getting told to play... Restore Balance is the only applicable 3-mana wrath I'm aware of. Though it does also attack the mana base, so the RB/Eldrazi matchup may still be interesting.
It saddens me that, based on the posts made in this thread, most of you haven't actually played with the deck yet still come to drastic conclusions like bans/unbans to address the meta. If this thread's purpose is to draw attention from wizards, I do hope they see through this. Public outrage is one thing. Public outrage based anecdotal tournament evidence is another. Public outrage by people that can't distinguish between the different styles of Eldrazi decks is yet another thing.
Can someone explain to me where the word "degenerate" comes about? It's used so often in conversation yet it does not really seem to describe anything in any sensible way. What makes Eldrazi temple degenerate? I can understand that it produces one more mana than a typical land for eldrazi tribal, but that doesn't fit under the word "degenerate". Not to mention people are talking about a "degenerate" format, which doesn't describe anything either except some strange emotional position.
Oath of gatewatch, splinter twin ban and the lacking of unbans show us the incapacity of WOTC handling modern format. They need to be fired up, all of them. Starting with AF, ending with the last hired guy in the office.
Oh you really want them to handle modern? There is one thing I know from seeing what happened with Eldrazi at the Protour and the Splinter Twin Ban: If wizards starts handling modern, it's going to become an extended version of standard. In order for them to balance modern they have to control the design space of modern, which means doing a lot of research into what cards are there, banning things that speed the game up too much, unbanning things that no longer need to be banned, etc. This would happen every block rotation in standard as they make sure the design space they previously used doesn't break anything in their now completely controlled modern format.
Wizards hasn't controlled modern for quite some time. They've just been playing referee and sometimes hopped in to ban a card or two to keep the format running and not anger fans. If they start controlling modern in earnest and create a strong pro-tour forget about paying over 30 usd for any card.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
It saddens me that, based on the posts made in this thread, most of you haven't actually played with the deck yet still come to drastic conclusions like bans/unbans to address the meta. If this thread's purpose is to draw attention from wizards, I do hope they see through this. Public outrage is one thing. Public outrage based anecdotal tournament evidence is another. Public outrage by people that can't distinguish between the different styles of Eldrazi decks is yet another thing.
Sometimes something comes along that's so obviously broken, you just know it's going to get banned simply for warping the meta too much and being too good. Having lands that generate 2-4 mana in a single turn with very little deckbuilding drawbacks is beyond Treasure Cruise levels of broken.
The question isn't "Will the Eldrazi decks take a ban?", but "Will they ban EoU, Eldrazi Temple, or both?"
Said as yet another person who has not actually tested with or against the deck much. It isn't very consistent, and it is very beatable. The fact that it "pushes out" previously T1 strategies (well, Burn - which can be adapted to be +EV) is immaterial. This attitude is reactionary and unhealthy. The deck is much closer to Glimpse Elves (amusingly, LSV and co did the same thing with that deck) than it is, say, Flash Hulk. In other words, yes, it is busted in the current metagame. That doesn't mean it is busted in a metagame that has adapted to it. It is the latter that matters for the format!
the problem with this deck is that plays very similar to affinity but we don't have responses to it
like a huskyll recall not for artifacts but colorless cards?
maybe errata for affinity hate cards to hit eldrazi too?
No, the solution is to wait and see how the metagame shakes up. Emergency bans are a terrible idea that would actually lose far more players in the long run than simply waiting until April.
It saddens me that, based on the posts made in this thread, most of you haven't actually played with the deck yet still come to drastic conclusions like bans/unbans to address the meta. If this thread's purpose is to draw attention from wizards, I do hope they see through this. Public outrage is one thing. Public outrage based anecdotal tournament evidence is another. Public outrage by people that can't distinguish between the different styles of Eldrazi decks is yet another thing.
Sometimes something comes along that's so obviously broken, you just know it's going to get banned simply for warping the meta too much and being too good. Having lands that generate 2-4 mana in a single turn with very little deckbuilding drawbacks is beyond Treasure Cruise levels of broken.
The question isn't "Will the Eldrazi decks take a ban?", but "Will they ban EoU, Eldrazi Temple, or both?"
Said as yet another person who has not actually tested with or against the deck much. It isn't very consistent, and it is very beatable. The fact that it "pushes out" previously T1 strategies (well, Burn - which can be adapted to be +EV) is immaterial. This attitude is reactionary and unhealthy. The deck is much closer to Glimpse Elves (amusingly, LSV and co did the same thing with that deck) than it is, say, Flash Hulk. In other words, yes, it is busted in the current metagame. That doesn't mean it is busted in a metagame that has adapted to it. It is the latter that matters for the format!
"Inconsistent and very beatable" is also a great way to describe the pre-ban Amulet Bloom deck, yet that was still correctly (in my opinion) identified as unhealthy for the metagame. In many ways, Bloom and Eldrazi have a lot in common; both abuse the fastest possible mana generation in the format to potentially win in such an explosive fashion as to be virtually unstoppable. Bloom could be beat, but Modern was worse for its presence, and now it is gone. Could Eldrazi be the same?
I'm gonna step back from the doomsaying for a while. I tried to make what I thought were good points in this thread, but I'm apparently not making them clearly enough because I've seemingly become part of a larger problem. Here's the long and short of what I tried to say here: Eldrazi decks demand uniquely efficient answers in an extremely timely fashion or simply win games unopposed, and those uniquely efficient answers at best would seem to require major overhauls of existing decks, and at worse don't currently exist in Modern. That scares me.
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DISCLAIMER: I have read through the PT thread, the Banlist Thread and this thread and am aware of all the different views presented across the board. The following post is just my opinion/prediction, it is unlikely that you will change my mind with an opposing argument since I've likely to have already read a similar opinion already before making this post.
Either Eye of Ugin or Eldrazi Temple will be banned in the next B&R Announcement, when Shadows Over Innistrad releases.
I do not claim to be an expert in the Modern Metagame(s) (In fact, I barely get out to play with my only Affinity deck), but the obvious crux of the Eldrazi deck is the fast mana it produces in a short span of time. It has 8 lands that are effectively Ancient Tombs without any drawback (because the deck is built around the limitation of those lands). I personally think that Urborg making Eye of Ugin effectively Mishra's Workshop is simply just bonus value on top of it at the moment.
It's not a matter of being able (or unable) to find answers to the archetype, it's the effectiveness of the answers. Affinity operates on the fast-mana concept to this day even, yet it has stayed relatively safe from the banhammer simply because due to the sheer amount of artifact-hate present in the format and the many of such options there are available to decks that don't really compromise too much on the effectiveness of the deck's original intent (coughKolaghan's Commandcough). This allows many decks to be check Affinity without too much sacrifice of cards slots required, or at least the loss of the value in doing so.
Eldrazi doesn't have this many effective silver bullets and the frantic search occurring now for one may not even prove to be as versatile as those used against Affinity. This puts the deck speed-wise comparably to a deck like Bloom Titan. Both decks can potentially just sweep and win turns 2/3 but they don't always accomplish it, but that is not a reason to keep the deck at full strength around in the format. Just like Summer Bloom was the card banned instead of Primeval Titan/Hive Mind, it is the accelerators that makes the deck have the potential swinginess (without enough versatile answers).
I'm not saying there aren't answers to the Eldrazi Archetype or that all of them are not versatile, there might turn out to be a couple that do fit the bill, but the PT has already shown that the deck is still largely evolving and still adapting. When Processor Eldrazi decks were in the limelight, it was more or less agreed the deck's worst matchups were generally the fast aggro decks like Affinity and Burn, but in PT, they took simply the engine that made a midrange-to-lategame deck that operated faster than its competition and literally made an aggro deck that operated faster than its competition (followed by the UR to counter that aggro version, but I believe the UR version is the most inbred of the all the Eldrazi Subtypes). Regardless of the type of Eldrazi deck, they all used the same engine at varying amounts to make sure they were faster than the competition, which effectively makes Eldrazi a "speed-tier/format" of its own. Honestly, at this point of time, having space for Simian Spirit Guide and Chalice of the Void to further punish the competition was just more salt to the injury of outspeeding.
However, as much as I believe the archetype to be indeed detrimental to the format, I do not think that it will destroy the format immediately as some has envisioned. Yes, perhaps after a few more weekends, attendance for Modern Events will start to show signs of decline, especially when answers prove to be ineffective and/or not versatile, creating the "Affinity Standard" effect of Eldrazi and Anti-Eldrazi decks. Personally, I really think none of the predicted answers will indeed be that effective against the Archetype and that no such effective answer will be present in the next few sets either. Unless Wizards confidently thinks Shadows Over Innistrad has an absolute answer, they will also deem that there aren't enough effective answers and will issue a ban on either Eye or Temple.
How many people do you really think will wash their hands entirely off Modern, sell off all their staples and never return to the format if the format enters a turmoil of 3 months? I'm sure there are many players like myself who don't play all that often and will simply opt to not play the format for 3 months before even considering that option. Modern already isn't an easy format to get into due to the prices and I doubt many people are just literally jumping off and on the format by buying/selling their entire collections for the format. The format is a lot more resilient than people give it credit for, at least I'm confident it can survive 3 months of Eldrazi turmoil.
I can see the arguments for both Eye of Ugin and/or Eldrazi Temple, but I personally think Eldrazi Temple will get the ban first. Yes, Eye enables more explosive turn-1 plays, but the Urborg combo doesn't enable Thought-Knot Seer and Reality Smasher, which effectively neuters the explosive follow-up play that I simply think should not be around at all even if it doesn't happen all the time. I think the stacking of Temples is what builds the deck's strength in outspeeding the Midrange-Slower competition, since Eye is Legendary. Eye does add resilience to those versions with the tutoring, but the crux problem with the archetype is its speed (over time) rather than its resiliency. Tron also uses Eye for resiliency and it has not shown to be too much of a problem in that department.
To summarize if you didn't want to read the entire thing: Archetype too fast for the competition of its type (Aggro/Midrange/Slow), crux is in the speed of the deck enabled in lands. I personally think that there will be no effective answers found/printed in time (somewhat like Bloom Titan) and a ban will happen in 3 months. The format is still more resilient than people think in surviving 3 months of the deck though, so emergency ban will not happen. I personally think that Eldrazi Temple will get the boot (first), although I can see reasoning for Eye and/or both being banned.
EDIT: Please do not provide a counterargument (if you still wish to do so after the disclaimer at the start) using only the summary and I may not reply since I think the views have already gone full circle and its highly unlikely anyone changes their opinions anyways. (Also, I might not have the time to reply but I wanted to state my opinion anyway.)
I´ll ignore your argument as the poorly thought out paragraph it was, then? Different Eldrazi builds require different game plans. UWx builds will have a much harder time vs the processor build due to counters being less relevant, although they are much slower. Colorless and UR will spew most of their hands as early as they can (no, a turn 2 win that requires 7 specific cards is not a common occurrance) while green red packs world breaker, kozilek´s return and ancient stirrings. All these builds are a lot weak to counterspells.
Should I similarly ignore your argument as a malicious and intellectually dishonest strawman? The fact that I misidentified the correct flavor of Eldrazi doesn't invalidate the major tournament results that these various Eldrazi decks are putting up. And nobody is claiming that the Eldrazi strategies are utterly unassailable, simply that it is really hard to do so. You pointing out that, yes, I could actually counter some of the spells that they cast isn't exactly news to me.
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I am basically a prison player in Modern and Legacy, and I do not think there is much mileage in these sorts of decks as answers to Eldrazi. One or two may have decent matches but most won't.
The prison decks in the format at the fringes and more common are basically
Lantern*
Blue Moon* (with or without shackles/seas)
Skred Red (control version)
Martyr proc *(W or with splash based on wraths, Ghostlies, Martyr and often a recursive fog + Proclamation of Rebirth)
Mono-White emeria (same sort of deck but based around sun titan)
Boros Bridge (RW board control based around bridge, maybe chalice)
RW landkill/Stax * (Boom Bust/Molten rain, Magus of the tabernacle, Flagstones Ghostly Prisons, sometimes suppression field, maybe chalice, some sweepers)
Casual stax variants
Pillow-Fort * (w-x enchantments, based on Nykthos, Leylines and huge numbers of defensive enchantments up to sphere of safety, often running Porphyr Nodes and Heliod)
Enduring Ideal * - same deck, more combo-y
Loam Pox *(Levy smallpox, life from the loam, sometimes molten vortex)
8 Rack *
BW Small pox (similar-ish deck to 8 rack)
Death cloud
I have played them all through the years.
The ones marked * have had some SCG placements or a similar level of event in the past year. I am not sure on the Levy loam pox, but it has a star name player behind it, and I may be wrong on 8 rack,
The decks:
Lantern I don't think would have a bad chance, but the deck is bloody hard to play, it is not a pick up deck, the skill level required is high.
Blue Moon is obviously competitive in some form, the pro-tour showed that.
Skred I think would have an excellent chance, especially if Ensnaring Bridge is in the 75, more so if Spirit Guides are used. The Deck runs sweepers (volcanic fallout) and reckoners that take out anything, moon can hit the mana later on, although just running Moon is no protection at all. The deck does have a major issue- it has a pretty bad affinity match up, and is limited in sideboard terms, and affinity is a great deck now.
Martyr has a potentially better matchup, but that Though-knot seer is a huge issue- the deck does not run Leyline main, and the deck may have a hand that is low on "hate". The deck can gain 12 life easily t2, and cards like ghostly and Wrath offer a lot of attraction.
Mono-W emeria I think will be harder to get going. Those late game sun-titan type cards clog up the hand. It might be too slow too often.
The Boros Bridge deck is not a million miles away, and traditionally plays a mixture of defensive permanents and sweepers. Running both Bridge and Ghostly is pretty hard to hate with a Thought-Knot, and the deck runs SSG so can power out a t2 permanent nearly all the time. They often run halos, helices, bolts so should be well placed with the caveat that the deck is not often a 4 of deck, often running 2 copies here, 3 copies there of card like Leyline and the match may come down to the lucky starts (eg the Leyline/spirit guide/bridge hand is hard to beat).
The stax/landkill one I am dubious on- traditionally these decks can go t2 landkill, t3 Prison or landkill, t4 landkill, t5 landkill or magus etc. So yeah, with the fact that they run sweepers like pyroclasm there may be some unbeatable hands on the play. But- suppression field does nothing, and these decks have always had a hard time with blue tempo matches, and have to dedicate a significant portion of the board to being competitive in those. They can thus be overrun more easily than some of the above decks like Marrtyr, which are anti-aggro all stars.
Casual Stax are just that- too casual.
Pillow Fort is probably the best set up defensively- 4 Leylines, 4 Halos and often a full set of Nodes, Ghostly Prisons etc. Its not unusual to lock an aggro deck t4 making them pay 8-12 to attack per dude, having slowed them t1/2.
I can't see Deathcloud being fast enough, especially on the draw. Sure it is a damnation deck with defense, but the sheer speed of the Eldrazi deck I feel will be too great, that D cloud too hard to set up.
8 rack needs to draw the bridge and not get it ripped- its control tools are just not able to deal with those hoardes if the bridge is not there. Those small poxes seem to be not so stellar against the multiple 2/2 starts, esp on the draw. The racks are just not fast enough to race Eldrazi.
E ideal is a deck which has lots of variance as it is, its not as robust defensively as the Pillow-fort versions, and thus more vulnerable to fast Eldrazi starts. Having 4 Leyline is a start at protecting its hate pieces though.
So really whilst I can see these decks gaining a bit of popularity (and the price of a lot of the core cards has risen recently), I cannot see them being enough of an answer to the threat. the barrier to playing some of them skill wise is quite high, too.
Outside of these strategies I feel Jund/k are always going to have half-decent matches vs most decks, and that a lot of people will just try and ignore the Eldrazi by resorting to binary combo decks like storm/infect.
I'm not sure "Just run more removal" is even an answer worth entertaining, and neither is "Hope they don't have their solid hands". Cheap life gain can address burn, Artifact hate can address affinity, what non-generic answers exist solely for Eldrazi that could assist in a match up?
But what do you ban? the sol lands seems to be easy targets for it. Banning eye hurts tron a bit but it's still a playable deck they usually only run 1 and ive seen a lot of lists that ran it sb that was also like over a year ago that i was really looking at modern lists just getting back to getting into modern so a lot of this post could be really off. Banning Temple would hurt the mono green eldrazi ramp decks which from what i can tell weren't tier 1 so they get hurt quiete a bit but they still have other choices the deck could stay a thing. However banning either really makes the eldrazi decks as a whole unplayable so that while it would help everyone not playing eldrazi its kinda like a dick move honestly. Other than the 2 sol lands i can't really think of anything really ban worthy, the only thing i can think of is eldrazi mimic. the deck could still function and still function at a very high level, it would be like banning arcbound ravager the rest of the affinity decks are scary efficent on its own, without mimic the deck just loses a an extra 4/4 or 5/5 turn 2-3, reality smasher and thought-knot seer arent really strong enough to get banned imo, matter reshaper isnt that strong either so really the strongest cards are mimic and lands imo, i could see banning eye and leaving temple as is it would slow the deck and still keep it a playable state so most people are happy.
Also worth noting i just finished building abazan and i have nothing worth siding in against this deck and no real chance of racing it, taking 3-5 damage to thoughtsieze seems like a waste enough of the deck is above 3 cmc so iok isnt great, siege rhino comes in too late unless i get it turn 3 off noble hierarch but its at best just a trade with one of prob 3-4 creatures attacking me, my other modern deck is faeries and it bleeds itself and doesnt really do well against creatures so its screwed as well.
All in all this really is an amazing thing thats happpened. A totally new deck dominated a pt top 8 and no one has any idea where to go from here and honestly ive seen it elsewhere the only real way to beat it is to play or looking at the top 8 play affinity which is effectively a smaller version of eldrazi. Im fairly speechless to see an event where top 8 didnt have a single lightning bolt, tarmogoyf, collected company, almost no fetches, snapcaster mage, wow im honestly not even really upset im just amazed. its just a great deck super eficent and consistent enough, I know this thread is for grievances but im only upset im not playing it its a great deck
BWTeysa, Orzhov Scion Combo
GUEzuri, Claw of progress Morph
GUBSidisi, Brood tyrant
RWGisela, Blade of Goldnight Random red white cards i dont use.dec
GBLoam Pox
Modern
UBFaeries
GBWGoyfless Abzan
On Squirrels
On Risen Executioner
I can't say how much I agree with the paragraph beginning with "Big creature decks..." and the last sentence.
The bannings in the past have been to keep the degeneracy in check. Wizards now bans a card to promote variety but achieves the opposite. I think they are not putting a lot of effort to balance modern and make it a healthy format or this is a deliberate decision to help sell the latest product. I want to lean on the first and keep the tinfoil for cooking.
First, you can't promote variety by banning a single card. Sure, people will move on to play the closest color combinations but they will be watered down or less powerful versions.
Second, the way to create variety is by printing new cards that can take the tier 2 decks or developing deck up a notch. But, this requires to monitor the meta with a small but dedicated team. Given how they read the meta Channel Fireball's modern team could do that, for example. Then, all you need to do is print cards that can improve the said tier 2/developing decks. Having said that you don't need to push strategies, they should just go with the flow and flavour of whatever the current set is and tuck in a card here and there, being a little more generous if the card will make an otherwise losing strategy more favorable. There are a ton of archetypes and decks which haven't gotten any love since forever or just a teaspoon at a time, while some decks are constantly getting tons of good stuff, or like in this case, either being deliberately shoved into the meta or come stumbling in like an elephant in a China shop.
Last, if the smaller Eldrazi that were printed in OGW were playtested I think we wouldn't have this mess know. There is the possibility of them being playtested and still make it, but that possibilty tends to make you branded with "tinfoil hatter" so I won't get into that. If they need to ban cards to keep this deck in check I think they must be the Eldrazi Mimic and Endless One. Noone is going to miss them outside this deck and they won't have the degenerate hands worse than affinity and back it up with the Rock quality disruption + fatties. They will still have a good mid and late game, but they will lack the early pressure which they shouldn't have had in the first place. A deck shouldn't dominate in all phases of the game. If those two don't stop the deck, then the next season they can still ban the Eye of Ugin, which reduces costs by 2 without even tapping. If, let's say, a legendary land like this existed "Green Ooze spells cost GG less to play" would it be overpowered? how about a "Green Shaman spells cost GG less to play" and mind you your average ooze and shaman don't have 10/10 bodies, and spells to back it up. Yet we can give the Eye and other fair decks that use it a chance.
Thanks for reading.
Cult of the Succubi Eating Kitten and Brotherhood of Hamsters - Zombie One/Hulking One - Brotherhood of Hamsters disapproves of Damage on the Stack amputation, the corruption of Mythics,
and the "Major changes to Extended" in July 2010. You aborted our cards., but we approve of the Modern format. Even if it doesn't ha ve Carrion Feeder or Caller of the Claw in it.Dex: http://deckbox.org/users/Egementium_instructoid
Man, I have no idea why you're even bothering to reply. You're pretty clearly coming across as somebody with a pet deck that suddenly found a slightly better role in the metagame. Congratulations, you lucked into being on the beneficial side of this paradigm shift. That doesn't make me wrong for happening to play a more mainstream deck that has suffered somewhat.
You may very well be right, and I hope I've qualified my "panic mongering" adequately to not be part of a larger problem. But there's one significant difference here:
"Affinity is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
"Anything against artifacts is good. Try Vandalblast or similar in the sideboard. And hey, if you're Grixis or Jund, Kolaghan's Command is good enough value in the main deck and gets absolutely nuts versus Affinity. Small changes will go a long way."
"Living end is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
"Graveyard hate in the sideboard shuts Living End down hard, and you can afford to mulligan aggressively to find it. Also, the combo is really weak to basic countermagic like Remand."
"Eldrazi Processors is nuts! How do I survive against it?"
(Actual responses I've seen and been given) "Heh, you don't" "Play a different deck" "Hope they flood".
New decks can emerge, and demanding that the metagame shift to accept them is fine. What I'm scared of here is that the Eldrazi Processors deck demands too drastic a metagame shift, possibly to the point where the necessary technology doesn't even exist.
A primary concern with Eldrazi Aggro is that it allows creatures to hit the board at a similar rate to Burn (possibly Affinity if it dumps a bunch of Mimics T1) but those creatures provide more power than Burn and Affinity's do. That should already serve as a bit of an alarm bell, if Eldrazi Aggro can do what other Aggro decks do but with midrange creatures that's a bit concerning.
If WotC finds this acceptable I hope they're comfortable with the large knock confidence in the format is likely to take.
URW PillowFort Stasis (costruction)
modern:
U Taking Turns combo
pauper:
UB Servitor Control
xenob8 : you know you are going to have a bad time when opponent starts with snow covered island
I'm glad you bring up Affinity, because that is another deck which dominated a meta in part by using Sol lands. And against many Affinity players' objections, the artifact lands were banned. Fast forward 8 years, and the deck is still T1.
RBGLiving EndRBG
EDH
UFblthpU
BRXantchaRB
BGVarolzGB
URWZedruuWRU
I agree with a lot of your post, but I wouldn't consider this god hand to be "easy". In practice, Eldrazi don't kill on turn 2.
I literally just picked a subtype of Eldrazi deck at random, because I got tired of saying "Eldrazi" to mean a deck as opposed to a creature type.
I was extrapolating the Affinity analogy.
But tell me, what are the right places?
As far as I can tell, it's strictly worse than Spell Snare in the matchup and an exceedingly narrow card overall.
URW PillowFort Stasis (costruction)
modern:
U Taking Turns combo
pauper:
UB Servitor Control
xenob8 : you know you are going to have a bad time when opponent starts with snow covered island
Oh you really want them to handle modern? There is one thing I know from seeing what happened with Eldrazi at the Protour and the Splinter Twin Ban: If wizards starts handling modern, it's going to become an extended version of standard. In order for them to balance modern they have to control the design space of modern, which means doing a lot of research into what cards are there, banning things that speed the game up too much, unbanning things that no longer need to be banned, etc. This would happen every block rotation in standard as they make sure the design space they previously used doesn't break anything in their now completely controlled modern format.
Wizards hasn't controlled modern for quite some time. They've just been playing referee and sometimes hopped in to ban a card or two to keep the format running and not anger fans. If they start controlling modern in earnest and create a strong pro-tour forget about paying over 30 usd for any card.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Said as yet another person who has not actually tested with or against the deck much. It isn't very consistent, and it is very beatable. The fact that it "pushes out" previously T1 strategies (well, Burn - which can be adapted to be +EV) is immaterial. This attitude is reactionary and unhealthy. The deck is much closer to Glimpse Elves (amusingly, LSV and co did the same thing with that deck) than it is, say, Flash Hulk. In other words, yes, it is busted in the current metagame. That doesn't mean it is busted in a metagame that has adapted to it. It is the latter that matters for the format!
like a huskyll recall not for artifacts but colorless cards?
maybe errata for affinity hate cards to hit eldrazi too?
URW PillowFort Stasis (costruction)
modern:
U Taking Turns combo
pauper:
UB Servitor Control
xenob8 : you know you are going to have a bad time when opponent starts with snow covered island
No, the solution is to wait and see how the metagame shakes up. Emergency bans are a terrible idea that would actually lose far more players in the long run than simply waiting until April.
"Inconsistent and very beatable" is also a great way to describe the pre-ban Amulet Bloom deck, yet that was still correctly (in my opinion) identified as unhealthy for the metagame. In many ways, Bloom and Eldrazi have a lot in common; both abuse the fastest possible mana generation in the format to potentially win in such an explosive fashion as to be virtually unstoppable. Bloom could be beat, but Modern was worse for its presence, and now it is gone. Could Eldrazi be the same?
I'm gonna step back from the doomsaying for a while. I tried to make what I thought were good points in this thread, but I'm apparently not making them clearly enough because I've seemingly become part of a larger problem. Here's the long and short of what I tried to say here: Eldrazi decks demand uniquely efficient answers in an extremely timely fashion or simply win games unopposed, and those uniquely efficient answers at best would seem to require major overhauls of existing decks, and at worse don't currently exist in Modern. That scares me.
Either Eye of Ugin or Eldrazi Temple will be banned in the next B&R Announcement, when Shadows Over Innistrad releases.
I do not claim to be an expert in the Modern Metagame(s) (In fact, I barely get out to play with my only Affinity deck), but the obvious crux of the Eldrazi deck is the fast mana it produces in a short span of time. It has 8 lands that are effectively Ancient Tombs without any drawback (because the deck is built around the limitation of those lands). I personally think that Urborg making Eye of Ugin effectively Mishra's Workshop is simply just bonus value on top of it at the moment.
It's not a matter of being able (or unable) to find answers to the archetype, it's the effectiveness of the answers. Affinity operates on the fast-mana concept to this day even, yet it has stayed relatively safe from the banhammer simply because due to the sheer amount of artifact-hate present in the format and the many of such options there are available to decks that don't really compromise too much on the effectiveness of the deck's original intent (coughKolaghan's Commandcough). This allows many decks to be check Affinity without too much sacrifice of cards slots required, or at least the loss of the value in doing so.
Eldrazi doesn't have this many effective silver bullets and the frantic search occurring now for one may not even prove to be as versatile as those used against Affinity. This puts the deck speed-wise comparably to a deck like Bloom Titan. Both decks can potentially just sweep and win turns 2/3 but they don't always accomplish it, but that is not a reason to keep the deck at full strength around in the format. Just like Summer Bloom was the card banned instead of Primeval Titan/Hive Mind, it is the accelerators that makes the deck have the potential swinginess (without enough versatile answers).
I'm not saying there aren't answers to the Eldrazi Archetype or that all of them are not versatile, there might turn out to be a couple that do fit the bill, but the PT has already shown that the deck is still largely evolving and still adapting. When Processor Eldrazi decks were in the limelight, it was more or less agreed the deck's worst matchups were generally the fast aggro decks like Affinity and Burn, but in PT, they took simply the engine that made a midrange-to-lategame deck that operated faster than its competition and literally made an aggro deck that operated faster than its competition (followed by the UR to counter that aggro version, but I believe the UR version is the most inbred of the all the Eldrazi Subtypes). Regardless of the type of Eldrazi deck, they all used the same engine at varying amounts to make sure they were faster than the competition, which effectively makes Eldrazi a "speed-tier/format" of its own. Honestly, at this point of time, having space for Simian Spirit Guide and Chalice of the Void to further punish the competition was just more salt to the injury of outspeeding.
However, as much as I believe the archetype to be indeed detrimental to the format, I do not think that it will destroy the format immediately as some has envisioned. Yes, perhaps after a few more weekends, attendance for Modern Events will start to show signs of decline, especially when answers prove to be ineffective and/or not versatile, creating the "Affinity Standard" effect of Eldrazi and Anti-Eldrazi decks. Personally, I really think none of the predicted answers will indeed be that effective against the Archetype and that no such effective answer will be present in the next few sets either. Unless Wizards confidently thinks Shadows Over Innistrad has an absolute answer, they will also deem that there aren't enough effective answers and will issue a ban on either Eye or Temple.
How many people do you really think will wash their hands entirely off Modern, sell off all their staples and never return to the format if the format enters a turmoil of 3 months? I'm sure there are many players like myself who don't play all that often and will simply opt to not play the format for 3 months before even considering that option. Modern already isn't an easy format to get into due to the prices and I doubt many people are just literally jumping off and on the format by buying/selling their entire collections for the format. The format is a lot more resilient than people give it credit for, at least I'm confident it can survive 3 months of Eldrazi turmoil.
I can see the arguments for both Eye of Ugin and/or Eldrazi Temple, but I personally think Eldrazi Temple will get the ban first. Yes, Eye enables more explosive turn-1 plays, but the Urborg combo doesn't enable Thought-Knot Seer and Reality Smasher, which effectively neuters the explosive follow-up play that I simply think should not be around at all even if it doesn't happen all the time. I think the stacking of Temples is what builds the deck's strength in outspeeding the Midrange-Slower competition, since Eye is Legendary. Eye does add resilience to those versions with the tutoring, but the crux problem with the archetype is its speed (over time) rather than its resiliency. Tron also uses Eye for resiliency and it has not shown to be too much of a problem in that department.
To summarize if you didn't want to read the entire thing: Archetype too fast for the competition of its type (Aggro/Midrange/Slow), crux is in the speed of the deck enabled in lands. I personally think that there will be no effective answers found/printed in time (somewhat like Bloom Titan) and a ban will happen in 3 months. The format is still more resilient than people think in surviving 3 months of the deck though, so emergency ban will not happen. I personally think that Eldrazi Temple will get the boot (first), although I can see reasoning for Eye and/or both being banned.
EDIT: Please do not provide a counterargument (if you still wish to do so after the disclaimer at the start) using only the summary and I may not reply since I think the views have already gone full circle and its highly unlikely anyone changes their opinions anyways. (Also, I might not have the time to reply but I wanted to state my opinion anyway.)
Should I similarly ignore your argument as a malicious and intellectually dishonest strawman? The fact that I misidentified the correct flavor of Eldrazi doesn't invalidate the major tournament results that these various Eldrazi decks are putting up. And nobody is claiming that the Eldrazi strategies are utterly unassailable, simply that it is really hard to do so. You pointing out that, yes, I could actually counter some of the spells that they cast isn't exactly news to me.