It isn't inconsistent, and doesn't require 3 cards. You should probably stop at this point? Are you seriously struggling to come up with cards you can cut from GB to have a 1-hit kill, or are you just trying to figure out how you can still justify SFM, which appears to be a pet card for you? When did Swords + SFM become "fair"? It is a tutor, card advantage, and a counter-beater. That's fair hmm?
Agreed with this.
The deck is a two-land kill, given a couple other mana. There is a lot of land search in the format (see Tron decks for details). This would be very overpowered. It would be more powerful than a 12-post deck (since the lands alone would kill, no other cards needed), and that is banned in Modern too.
Twin is also a two-card kill, yes. However, Twin is also vulnerable to a lot of different things--counterspells, burn, disenchant effects, Torpor Orb, instant creature removal, etc. These are relatively common elements in all decks, and are useful against more decks than just Twin. In contract, Thespian/Depths requires something very specific to stop it, and can even play around that.
Thespain/Depths would be far too good in the format, in my opinion.
UWR control is definitely still a major player in the format. It may not have Top 8'ed a single GP, but it was just half the field (with Jund being the other half) in the World Championship. It also continues to put up good numbers online, along with Jund and Tron, which are currently the Big 3 online.
When you go to ban cards b/c they are broken with another more broken card, you're probably doing it wrong. Why aren't you banning an infect dude instead of shoal? Why not ban mana leak instead of Jace TMS?
It sure looks like you only deviate from banning the broken card when it's a card you like.
Agreed. Two things in that list stick out:
1. DRS is pushing graveyard-based decks out of the format? Hasn't Melira Pod won the last few GPs? Didn't Butakov play a Gifts deck in the Player's Championship? Living End also did well last GP.
2. Banning Batterskull, a card which is legal and perfectly fair in current Modern, and keeping Stoneforge Mystic? That is just terrible. It limits the design space of equipment to "cards which are fair to tutor for for 1W, and fair to cast at instant speed for 1W." SFM is just plain too strong. We don't need that in Modern, and I don't think Wizards wants it to exist in Modern for the card design choices it forces on them down the road.
There are many, many fewer fair pieces of equipment that can be printed if we live in a world where SFM is Modern-legal.
Eggs is rightly banned in Modern. It could be allowed online, where there is a chess-style timer, but the deck simply breaks the format for tournaments.
Top doesn't affect game lengths in the same way Eggs does. Eggs makes an infinitely long single turn, while Top makes the entire game longer but doesn't make each turn that much longer. Thus, in a big tournament, when "five more turns" is called, you can end up waiting 20 minutes every single round for the last Eggs turn to finish. Meanwhile, with Top, each turn will just be 20 seconds longer.
The end result is that Eggs delays large tournaments significantly, given the lack of Magic Online chess-style timers to keep it in check.
Mindslaver, used once, without the loop rarely wins games alone in Modern. At least, that was my experience with it in Tron decks. Rarely does a single activation do too much. Once in a while you get to nuke their side (with a sac outlet that they couldn't destroy/you topdecked), or Scapeshift into 0 lands found or something, but that is pretty rare. Far more often, it is just Time Walk.
So the format is supposed to have the lesser card banned and the better card free?
Oh, I mis-spoke. I mean that Preordain is better than Ponder 90% of the time. Preordain is a much better card. Thus, I would think Ponder would get unbanned faster than Preordain.
However, I don't think either should be unbanned. Both will improve combo more than anything else.
First, it's unbanning wouldn't make sense, given that Ponder is better 90% of the time and is banned.
Second, I don't know why everyone is clamoring for "control" to begin with. There are lots of control decks. They just aren't base blue. For that matter, UW and UWR control builds have been doing alright for a long time anyhow.
Third, Ponder isn't really what control is missing. I think it is missing strong counterspells, given the diversity of the format.
Fourth, Ponder/Preordain make combo better just as much as they make control better. At best, this would just strengthen combo and control, and thus weaken aggro. And there are already next-to-no pure aggro decks. (Just Affinity, basically.)
I think it would make Twin/Storm/Scapeshift more common and more powerful, and have a negligible effect on "control"
Ugh @ that Vendilion Clique error. Made me cringe. I can understand being tired of being too focused on ensuring that the Clique resolves, but man. Cost him the game.
Well, unless the next card down was also a Scapeshift
Thus far on Magic Online, in two tournaments, it has been okay but not crushing. Last daily, one guy 4-0'ed with it (chopping the finals), and another 3-1'ed. However there were five others who finished 0-2 or 1-2 with it
I really hope these doom & gloom predictions don't come true. I really liked the pre-Valakut (online) Modern metagame, and I hope that Valakut does not significantly warp/skew that metagame.
That said, I am not sure how viable the "get 7 lands, cast Scapeshift" plan will be against other combo decks, since both Storm and Twin can go off on Turn 4 pretty consistently if unmolested.
Agreed with this.
The deck is a two-land kill, given a couple other mana. There is a lot of land search in the format (see Tron decks for details). This would be very overpowered. It would be more powerful than a 12-post deck (since the lands alone would kill, no other cards needed), and that is banned in Modern too.
Twin is also a two-card kill, yes. However, Twin is also vulnerable to a lot of different things--counterspells, burn, disenchant effects, Torpor Orb, instant creature removal, etc. These are relatively common elements in all decks, and are useful against more decks than just Twin. In contract, Thespian/Depths requires something very specific to stop it, and can even play around that.
Thespain/Depths would be far too good in the format, in my opinion.
Agreed. Two things in that list stick out:
1. DRS is pushing graveyard-based decks out of the format? Hasn't Melira Pod won the last few GPs? Didn't Butakov play a Gifts deck in the Player's Championship? Living End also did well last GP.
2. Banning Batterskull, a card which is legal and perfectly fair in current Modern, and keeping Stoneforge Mystic? That is just terrible. It limits the design space of equipment to "cards which are fair to tutor for for 1W, and fair to cast at instant speed for 1W." SFM is just plain too strong. We don't need that in Modern, and I don't think Wizards wants it to exist in Modern for the card design choices it forces on them down the road.
There are many, many fewer fair pieces of equipment that can be printed if we live in a world where SFM is Modern-legal.
Top doesn't affect game lengths in the same way Eggs does. Eggs makes an infinitely long single turn, while Top makes the entire game longer but doesn't make each turn that much longer. Thus, in a big tournament, when "five more turns" is called, you can end up waiting 20 minutes every single round for the last Eggs turn to finish. Meanwhile, with Top, each turn will just be 20 seconds longer.
The end result is that Eggs delays large tournaments significantly, given the lack of Magic Online chess-style timers to keep it in check.
I would play white/green, with cards like Leyline of Sanctity, Wrath of God, Thrun/Sigarda, Linvala, Rest in Peace, etc.
Oh, I mis-spoke. I mean that Preordain is better than Ponder 90% of the time. Preordain is a much better card. Thus, I would think Ponder would get unbanned faster than Preordain.
However, I don't think either should be unbanned. Both will improve combo more than anything else.
First, it's unbanning wouldn't make sense, given that Ponder is better 90% of the time and is banned.
Second, I don't know why everyone is clamoring for "control" to begin with. There are lots of control decks. They just aren't base blue. For that matter, UW and UWR control builds have been doing alright for a long time anyhow.
Third, Ponder isn't really what control is missing. I think it is missing strong counterspells, given the diversity of the format.
Fourth, Ponder/Preordain make combo better just as much as they make control better. At best, this would just strengthen combo and control, and thus weaken aggro. And there are already next-to-no pure aggro decks. (Just Affinity, basically.)
I think it would make Twin/Storm/Scapeshift more common and more powerful, and have a negligible effect on "control"
Completely disagree. Combo decks are already very strong, and this would help combo decks more than any other types of decks.
Well, unless the next card down was also a Scapeshift
Sucks missing the Clique trigger though.
That said, I am not sure how viable the "get 7 lands, cast Scapeshift" plan will be against other combo decks, since both Storm and Twin can go off on Turn 4 pretty consistently if unmolested.