i think that control decks in modern have all the tools to dismantle linear strategies, but the problem are that:
1. There are a lot of strategies that need specific answers ASAP (and the sideboard has just 15 slots)
2. The time to find those answers is really short before its too late
so, i think that the problem of control decks in modern is the lack of good card selection. The problem with this is that every good cantrip you print in modern is used not just in control, but in unfair decks too, so you should print things like fow, hymn and flusterstorm. They are very powerfull cards, but whatever
Control will never be more than a second class deck that will randomly be hot for a month or two then fade back into irrelevance.
Why is that a bad thing? Why should control deserve to have the format adjusted to its needs, and not, say, white weenie decks or stax decks?
Because of the numerous statements and actions from WOTC themselves wanting to give control and reactive decks a boost after nuking from orbit a deck that was both the best at that, as well as inevitably hurting the control decks that beat on on it. Off the top of my head, it was specifically cited at least 3 times in B&R announcements, as well as random tweets or articles here and there. I had a compiled post from a while ago, but the search function here is pretty wonky. These are some of the relevant comments/actions:
4/16 B&R: While there are some control decks that would use Ancestral Vision, it is an underplayed portion of the metagame. To allow for an increase in the number of blue-based control or attrition decks, we are unbanning Ancestral Vision.
4/16 B&R: Sword of the Meek might enable some slower combo decks, perhaps of the combo-control variety. ... To allow for an increase in the number of controlling combo decks in the format, we are unbanning Sword of the Meek.
2/18 B&R: In watching the format evolve, we've observed that decks seeking to control the game have struggled against the speed and variety of threats present in the format. ... Our hope is that Jace, the Mind Sculptor will provide yet another option in an already diverse format, giving controlling decks an alternative way to close out prolonged games.
It's not like it's just some random, out of the blue claim that reactive control decks are trash, it has been something WOTC have been trying to improve on since they made the problem infinitely worse by banning Twin and effectively killing multiple archetypes out of Modern for years to come.
And worst of all, since two random European GPs were spiked by UW decks back to back, WOTC has it in their minds that all is well on the control front, despite being virtually non-existent before or since then. However, as pointed out, they really have nothing to care about with regards to Modern right now. They are shoving in 250 new cards in a few months and the new "Horizon's Modern" will likely be completely different than what we see today. Fingers crossed it does anything to help the life-support status of reactive/tempo/control decks.
What card are you scared of in the MH set and/or wouldn't like to see it?
Personally, I think Daze would break Grixis Death's Shadow and it would be too good, so I am not in for that. Wasteland would be bonkers good and traumatize the format in the worst way and also kick all ramp decks out of the meta.
I also see Sylvan Library being mentioned and I am sure that such a powerful card is not entering Modern any time soon.
I am sure non of this cards is due to be reprinted though.
IMO, Sylvan Library would perfectly slot into Modern and do more good helping raise up certain lower tier decks than bad. I'm aware that comparing a card's power through the strict lens of Modern vs Legacy doesn't always paint a representative picture, however, I'm going to do so anyway. AFAIK, there's no legacy deck that runs SL because of its abuse potential; the decks that do play it rarely run more than one in their 75. It's an excellent card for decks desperate for CA, yet functions in a way so that you never really want nor benefit from having multiple copies in play. If it were added to Modern, the only deck I can see trying to abuse it would be something like BG Shadow. Even then, I'm not sure they would even want it considering the plethora of cheaper options which they currently use to eat away at their life total; curious to hear what someone who plays the deck thinks about it.
Every time I see a Twin apology post not-so-subtly masqueraded as "Control needs a tool to beat all things at all times just because" I feel tempted to just copy and paste substituting the Twin apology parts for ThopterSword / Death & Taxes / Delver / whatever random Tier 2-3 deck I feel like at the moment, but then I remember that I would get infracted for trolling while the endless Twin drivel with the same old arguments that have been dismantled several times throughout countless threads we've had to endure for 3 years straight would still go unpunished. Infraction issued for trolling/flaming. --CavalryWolfPack
MaRo said MH will follow the new color pie rules. Is Sylvan Library in green color pie nowadays? I seriously doubt it.
There is some card selection in green, for instance Oath of Nissa, I guess they could make a slightly worse version that allows you to show lands or creatures from the top and put them in hand as that is more fitting to what green does than grabbing just any of those cards
Every time I see a Twin apology post not-so-subtly masqueraded as "Control needs a tool to beat all things at all times just because" I feel tempted to just copy and paste substituting the Twin apology parts for ThopterSword / Death & Taxes / Delver / whatever random Tier 2-3 deck I feel like at the moment, but then I remember that I would get infracted for trolling while the endless Twin drivel with the same old arguments that have been dismantled several times throughout countless threads we've had to endure for 3 years straight would still go unpunished.
Personally I think that post qualifies as trolling as it doesn't add anything to any topic of conversation, it just sounds like you attacking twin supporters. The twin points being repeatedly dismantled is your opinion, I support a twin unban still and with them uping the power level a bit with new cards from MH I think the twin conversation will get even hotter in the future. It was a good deck, but not at all lile teir zero eldrazi winter. It was one top deck among many others and would be fine today. Oh it would be good and win a lot of games, but it would not forever be known as splinter twin summer. I didn't bring up twin, you did.
MaRo said MH will follow the new color pie rules. Is Sylvan Library in green color pie nowadays? I seriously doubt it.
There is some card selection in green, for instance Oath of Nissa, I guess they could make a slightly worse version that allows you to show lands or creatures from the top and put them in hand as that is more fitting to what green does than grabbing just any of those cards
The biggest problem imho is the loss of life not the card selection. Exchanging cards for life is supposed to be black. Hence I can't see it reprinted "as is".
Agree that there could be a lot of pseudo-cards as seen with Cabal Therapist, so a fixed sylvan library is possible.
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Decks played: Modern:
0 Affinity;
URG Delver
URGW Countercats
(Here you can find some video contents about Countercats and Temur Delver decks)
Please, let‘s not discuss *that* topic again - the conversation gets destructive very fast and nobody seems to gain anything out of it.
As much as I‘d like to see Sylvan Library in Modern, with Ancient Stirrings being criticised whenever some colourless deck does well I‘d seriously doubt that we‘ll get such a toy in green.
MaRo said MH will follow the new color pie rules. Is Sylvan Library in green color pie nowadays? I seriously doubt it.
There is some card selection in green, for instance Oath of Nissa, I guess they could make a slightly worse version that allows you to show lands or creatures from the top and put them in hand as that is more fitting to what green does than grabbing just any of those cards
The biggest problem imho is the loss of life not the card selection. Exchanging cards for life is supposed to be black. Hence I can't see it reprinted "as is".
Agree that there could be a lot of pseudo-cards as seen with Cabal Therapist, so a fixed sylvan library is possible.
True, I didn't think about the pay life to draw cards mechanic, as you say, they will probably print a fixed version of it that is more representative of the current color pie
Twin is not the answer. A "I win" button is not he answer, and I'm going to leave it at that.
Good answers to threats is the solution to make Modern great.
Control is totally fine, as it has always been, you are 100% correct. It has a high conversion rate, good win rates, etc.
I think the important thing when discussing modern control is how the answers line up with the treats in Modern, which is what I think people really are complaining about when they complain about control being bad.
There was a great post on reddit:
"There's nothing unfair about fast mana inherently...The issue is when your accelerated threats can't be effectively.If you gain too much speed, then card advantage is irrelevant because you've won the game. This why Faithless Looting initially started to creep up in GDS. Card advantage became much less important than card quality..."
Faithless Looting is not an inherently overpowered Magic card. Faithless Looting being SO good right now is a symptom of Modern's problems, not the cause.
Answers to threats need to line up with threats themselves. When we are forces to play something like Anger of the Gods or Terminus, cards that are not easy to fit into decks, of course its going to heavily affect deck building, and in turn the meta itself.
Side note: i kind of find it funny that Looting is so good now. When I first joined mtg, people would try and fit in looting into some red decks. I would call it a noob trap card and laugh. Nowadays it is at the forefront of the meta game lmao
As a control player, I think we are pretty close to good enough to consistently hitting top 8's of tournaments if we get a few more tools. One thing is that while counterspell is balanced out by the fact that cavern of souls and aether vial exists, it would still be a boon in the right matchups.
Sometimes having negate or logic knot at the wrong times can lead to losses. If I get counterspell this will help my decks with some consistency and as much as it will homogenize my counters and it also affords me some ability to put in one-offs since I have a consistent turn 2 counter. I've used one counterflux in jeskai builds or one to two disallow before however, these do not pair well with conditional counterspells because it may force you to use this for the wrong situation instead of holding it for what you actually have it in the deck for.
Also, for the arguments that I need some sort of hammer to win games consistently, I am pretty sure jace or teferi can definitely fill this role, especially when backed by counterspell. I am missing why I need some magical I win button. I play control to grind my opponent methodically and play the matchup as best I can.
This is why I don't play combo. If you're wanting a magical T4 I win button, and you're asking for certain things to be back because you think that's control. It's not. It's tempo combo which is completely different.
Stop asking for combos back under the guise of it being for control reasons.
I mean I think its obvious Answers have not kept pace with Threats. Answers are basically too slow and/or not versatile enough for Modern.
Agreed to an extent. If you look across the ways that aggro has expanded the axis in which it can attack:
1. Uncounterable (Vial & Cavern)
2. From the Graveyard (Dredge)
3. From the library (Collected Company)
4. From the hand (Burn)
5. With protection (GDS, Spirits, Humans)
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Current Decks:
Modern
Modern Warp / UR Control / UR Storm / Naya Breachshift / ElectroBalance
Legacy
Solidarity / Lands / Sneak and Show / Grixis Delver / Reanimator / Belcher / Storm / Dredge
I don't expect this at all and would much rather have Counterspell, but a card that could act like a counterspell for things like Phoenix Triggers or Vial triggers would be nice.
I mostly anticipate the rise of 2cmc removal with upside. I still very much do not want anything better at 1cmc than Path, Push, or Bolt... 2cmc though. Unfortunately, no one is clamoring to coin something like "Trophy-Snap-Trophy", but things could change.
Edit: Has anyone considered that WotC would print fixed versions of things and ban the "not fixed" version? An easy example (that I don't think will happen) is Vial changing to cast that creature for free with its trigger instead of directly into play. Now that I'm typing this it feels like even less of a statement, to be honest. Hitting whatever card with an eratta seems more likely and yet still next to 0% chance of happening.
Just a rough analysis of SCG regionals top8 decks.
Izzet Phoenix 19
Mono-Green Tron 5
Amulet Titan 5
Azorius Control 5
Dredge 4
Affinity 4
Humans 3
Whir Prison 3
Ad Nauseam 3
Colorless Eldrazi 3
Burn 3
Golgari Midrange 3
Hardened Scales 2
Selesnya Hexproof 2
Mono-White Martyr 2
Grixis Death's Shadow 2
Merfolk 2
Titan Shift 2
Kiki Vengeance 1
Ad Nauseum 1
Storm 1
Counters Company 1
Grixis Delver 1
Azorius Spirits 1
Bant Spirits 1
Infect 1
As Foretold 1
Eldrazi and Taxes 1
Shadow Zoo 1
Jeskai Control 1
Jund 1
Golgari Tron 1
Abzan Midrange 1
Grixis Control 1
For what it's worth, I think phoenix hit the highest number since many years. It's about 22% of all decks. In any case 34 different decks out of 88 is still a good diversity.
Private Mod Note
():
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Decks played: Modern:
0 Affinity;
URG Delver
URGW Countercats
(Here you can find some video contents about Countercats and Temur Delver decks)
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Why is that a bad thing? Why should control deserve to have the format adjusted to its needs, and not, say, white weenie decks or stax decks?
1. There are a lot of strategies that need specific answers ASAP (and the sideboard has just 15 slots)
2. The time to find those answers is really short before its too late
so, i think that the problem of control decks in modern is the lack of good card selection. The problem with this is that every good cantrip you print in modern is used not just in control, but in unfair decks too, so you should print things like fow, hymn and flusterstorm. They are very powerfull cards, but whatever
Because of the numerous statements and actions from WOTC themselves wanting to give control and reactive decks a boost after nuking from orbit a deck that was both the best at that, as well as inevitably hurting the control decks that beat on on it. Off the top of my head, it was specifically cited at least 3 times in B&R announcements, as well as random tweets or articles here and there. I had a compiled post from a while ago, but the search function here is pretty wonky. These are some of the relevant comments/actions:
4/16 B&R: While there are some control decks that would use Ancestral Vision, it is an underplayed portion of the metagame. To allow for an increase in the number of blue-based control or attrition decks, we are unbanning Ancestral Vision.
4/16 B&R: Sword of the Meek might enable some slower combo decks, perhaps of the combo-control variety. ... To allow for an increase in the number of controlling combo decks in the format, we are unbanning Sword of the Meek.
2/18 B&R: In watching the format evolve, we've observed that decks seeking to control the game have struggled against the speed and variety of threats present in the format. ... Our hope is that Jace, the Mind Sculptor will provide yet another option in an already diverse format, giving controlling decks an alternative way to close out prolonged games.
It's not like it's just some random, out of the blue claim that reactive control decks are trash, it has been something WOTC have been trying to improve on since they made the problem infinitely worse by banning Twin and effectively killing multiple archetypes out of Modern for years to come.
And worst of all, since two random European GPs were spiked by UW decks back to back, WOTC has it in their minds that all is well on the control front, despite being virtually non-existent before or since then. However, as pointed out, they really have nothing to care about with regards to Modern right now. They are shoving in 250 new cards in a few months and the new "Horizon's Modern" will likely be completely different than what we see today. Fingers crossed it does anything to help the life-support status of reactive/tempo/control decks.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
What do I want Containment Priest and Council's Judgement. At minimum counterspell.
UB Faeries (15-6-0)
UWR Control (10-5-1)/Kiki Control/Midrange/Harbinger
UBR Cruel Control (6-4-0)/Grixis Control/Delver/Blue Jund
UWB Control/Mentor
UW Miracles/Control (currently active, 14-2-0)
BW Eldrazi & Taxes
RW Burn (9-1-0)
I do (academic) research on video games and archaeology! You can check out my open access book here: https://www.sidestone.com/books/the-interactive-past
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Want to play a UW control deck in modern, but don't have jace or snaps?
Please come visit us at the Emeria Titan control thread
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
IMO, Sylvan Library would perfectly slot into Modern and do more good helping raise up certain lower tier decks than bad. I'm aware that comparing a card's power through the strict lens of Modern vs Legacy doesn't always paint a representative picture, however, I'm going to do so anyway. AFAIK, there's no legacy deck that runs SL because of its abuse potential; the decks that do play it rarely run more than one in their 75. It's an excellent card for decks desperate for CA, yet functions in a way so that you never really want nor benefit from having multiple copies in play. If it were added to Modern, the only deck I can see trying to abuse it would be something like BG Shadow. Even then, I'm not sure they would even want it considering the plethora of cheaper options which they currently use to eat away at their life total; curious to hear what someone who plays the deck thinks about it.
Link to Discord server where anybody from MTGS can keep up with thread topics while everything is being sorted out with the new site.
Infraction issued for trolling/flaming. --CavalryWolfPack
Thanks to DNC from Heroes of the Plane Studios for the sig
Check my Pauper Cube!
Modern:
There is some card selection in green, for instance Oath of Nissa, I guess they could make a slightly worse version that allows you to show lands or creatures from the top and put them in hand as that is more fitting to what green does than grabbing just any of those cards
Personally I think that post qualifies as trolling as it doesn't add anything to any topic of conversation, it just sounds like you attacking twin supporters. The twin points being repeatedly dismantled is your opinion, I support a twin unban still and with them uping the power level a bit with new cards from MH I think the twin conversation will get even hotter in the future. It was a good deck, but not at all lile teir zero eldrazi winter. It was one top deck among many others and would be fine today. Oh it would be good and win a lot of games, but it would not forever be known as splinter twin summer. I didn't bring up twin, you did.
Yeah, and with Daze and FOW legal also. Let's not nitpick here.
Abzan Traverse / Traverse Shadow / UR Kiki
The biggest problem imho is the loss of life not the card selection. Exchanging cards for life is supposed to be black. Hence I can't see it reprinted "as is".
Agree that there could be a lot of pseudo-cards as seen with Cabal Therapist, so a fixed sylvan library is possible.
Modern:
As much as I‘d like to see Sylvan Library in Modern, with Ancient Stirrings being criticised whenever some colourless deck does well I‘d seriously doubt that we‘ll get such a toy in green.
Legacy: Death&Taxes (almost there)
EDH: Squee, Goblin Nabob / Phelddagrif
True, I didn't think about the pay life to draw cards mechanic, as you say, they will probably print a fixed version of it that is more representative of the current color pie
Good answers to threats is the solution to make Modern great.
Control is totally fine, as it has always been, you are 100% correct. It has a high conversion rate, good win rates, etc.
I think the important thing when discussing modern control is how the answers line up with the treats in Modern, which is what I think people really are complaining about when they complain about control being bad.
There was a great post on reddit:
Answers to threats need to line up with threats themselves. When we are forces to play something like Anger of the Gods or Terminus, cards that are not easy to fit into decks, of course its going to heavily affect deck building, and in turn the meta itself.
Side note: i kind of find it funny that Looting is so good now. When I first joined mtg, people would try and fit in looting into some red decks. I would call it a noob trap card and laugh. Nowadays it is at the forefront of the meta game lmao
URStormRU
GRTitanshift[mana]RG/mana]
URStormRU
GRTitanshift[mana]RG/mana]
Sometimes having negate or logic knot at the wrong times can lead to losses. If I get counterspell this will help my decks with some consistency and as much as it will homogenize my counters and it also affords me some ability to put in one-offs since I have a consistent turn 2 counter. I've used one counterflux in jeskai builds or one to two disallow before however, these do not pair well with conditional counterspells because it may force you to use this for the wrong situation instead of holding it for what you actually have it in the deck for.
Also, for the arguments that I need some sort of hammer to win games consistently, I am pretty sure jace or teferi can definitely fill this role, especially when backed by counterspell. I am missing why I need some magical I win button. I play control to grind my opponent methodically and play the matchup as best I can.
This is why I don't play combo. If you're wanting a magical T4 I win button, and you're asking for certain things to be back because you think that's control. It's not. It's tempo combo which is completely different.
Stop asking for combos back under the guise of it being for control reasons.
URStormRU
GRTitanshift[mana]RG/mana]
Agreed to an extent. If you look across the ways that aggro has expanded the axis in which it can attack:
1. Uncounterable (Vial & Cavern)
2. From the Graveyard (Dredge)
3. From the library (Collected Company)
4. From the hand (Burn)
5. With protection (GDS, Spirits, Humans)
Modern Warp / UR Control / UR Storm / Naya Breachshift / ElectroBalance
Solidarity / Lands / Sneak and Show / Grixis Delver / Reanimator / Belcher / Storm / Dredge
I mostly anticipate the rise of 2cmc removal with upside. I still very much do not want anything better at 1cmc than Path, Push, or Bolt... 2cmc though. Unfortunately, no one is clamoring to coin something like "Trophy-Snap-Trophy", but things could change.
Edit: Has anyone considered that WotC would print fixed versions of things and ban the "not fixed" version? An easy example (that I don't think will happen) is Vial changing to cast that creature for free with its trigger instead of directly into play. Now that I'm typing this it feels like even less of a statement, to be honest. Hitting whatever card with an eratta seems more likely and yet still next to 0% chance of happening.
"Reveal a Dragon"
Mono-Green Tron 5
Amulet Titan 5
Azorius Control 5
Dredge 4
Affinity 4
Humans 3
Whir Prison 3
Ad Nauseam 3
Colorless Eldrazi 3
Burn 3
Golgari Midrange 3
Hardened Scales 2
Selesnya Hexproof 2
Mono-White Martyr 2
Grixis Death's Shadow 2
Merfolk 2
Titan Shift 2
Kiki Vengeance 1
Ad Nauseum 1
Storm 1
Counters Company 1
Grixis Delver 1
Azorius Spirits 1
Bant Spirits 1
Infect 1
As Foretold 1
Eldrazi and Taxes 1
Shadow Zoo 1
Jeskai Control 1
Jund 1
Golgari Tron 1
Abzan Midrange 1
Grixis Control 1
Modern: