I keep reading this statement and I feel those saying it dont realize burn started being a dominate deck prior to KTK being released. The meta has had time to adapt and has not been able to. Add in KTK being released and making the deck better. Now people are saying wait for the next set. How long do we wait for the adjustment or this magical card to even the playing field? People seem to not understand what warping means.
That is correct and incorrect, it's all about context. Yes Burn appears to be dominant in MTGO. In paper the situation is somehow under control with burn having a much smaller percentage of the field. Burn so far has 80 top top 16 appearances in Paper Events (7.59%), followed by BG with 76(7.21%) and surpassed by affinity with a staggering 109 (10.34%).
Moreover, since there have been practically 1 GPs where Burn was dominant, the numbers do not support the conclusion that Burn is Overwhelming. Examine the large and most recent non-gp event that concluded just some days ago, the 155 person Challenger to God of Modern in Japan, that saw 2 Burn decks in the top 16, and there you have it. Why? Because if you check the list of the other players, they were prepared to face Burn. Innovation and adaptation to the meta usually comes when people get down to it, and start brewing, or have a specific direction and goal in mind. I don't want to lose to Burn could be a start. Remember when people sided in all kinds of cards to fight THE MENACE (jk) of Boggles?. Innovation however, usually happens before and after a GP or a PT. Which brings me to another point I want to adress.
So far, regarding Paper Magic, the deck warrants no BANS. These numbers are not warping. Burn has its uprise in MTGO so far with an astonishing 15.44%. The reasons for this are plenty, Burn is cheaper than everything else, why not pick a Winner etc. However as with most things on the internet, MTGO in my opinion, is based around a trend-flowing metagame more than anything else. It usually follows the decks that are performing well, decks that have a strong showing on the GP circuit, or decks that have a hype going on for them (Jeskai Ascendancy, which is almost nowhere to be seen on Paper).
As I've noted earlier, I don't even play Burn anymore, so I am kinda partialy to the deck in either way. However the reason I am running heads off here, is that it really saddens me to see people complaining about Burn's power and presenting it like it's Jund DRS era over again, and claiming that THEY CANNOT ALLOW 4-5 useless sideboard cards to their decks to kill burn. Unfortunately for them I will say, and to anyone who has not as of yet grasped this, Modern, as an Eternal Format, has its living spark in the Sideboard. I am not going to go into Legacy comparisons now, but by playing an Eternal Format, which already has its father-format Legacy being seriously Side-Board oriented, you should know by its very essence, that it would become, and be, a format revolving around Sideboards.
At the very worst, I think that Burn will end up being like Dredge in Legacy sideboard wise,and I find that amusing and welcome by any means. If you are prepared for it, the deck simply has no game. If you are not however prepared for it, the deck will run through the gates. So far, we didn't have this effect in modern for a deck, maybe it's going to be a first.
PS. The main reason of concern for me, is that people advocate banning Eidolon of the Great Revel. The fundamental problem I have with that is that the card produces a symmetrical effect, granted the burn deck uses it to its advantage, but thats about it. It doesn't enable something broken, it doesn't provide mana fixing, doesn;t accelerate, doesn't find you pieces. All in all, it's a fair symmetrical card. By advocating banning such a card, you are willingly or unwillingly (which one is better is up to you and Socrates to decide)about to enter a situation where people will have a reason to advocate banning similarly symmetrical cards on the grounds of previous Bannings. And that, that's the scariest part of all.
The finals of that Japanese modern tournament was the two burn decks that "made the top 16", so.
Did everyone actually enjoy watching standard at the Pro Tour? I found it incredibly boring. A lot of the games were absolute blowouts, and or very matchup dependent.
I've been watching this standard season since it began, and I found this Pro Tour very exciting. The UW Control & B(x) matchup is so fun and grindy to watch.
Does Indiana Jones count in this discussion? Because for me personally, dismissing Kingdom of the Crystal Skull entirely comes at no cost to my enjoyment and admiration of Raiders of the Lost Ark.
I was at first very repelled by the Watchers, but as the film went on, and more specifically, when they started to strip trees like thyme sprigs; I started to like them.
That fast-cut Creation scene though.
My actual biggest problem with the film, was the font choice by Aronofsky, which rotted in my brain from the introduction on, which I also felt was unnecessary; I felt the film would've succeeded more in line with Aronofsky's stylistic ideals and a film as a whole if he had simply left the blurbs of introductory text and let the images of the Garden of Eden/Cain & Abel exist independently. The film would've tied up any questions anyways, at least with a competent viewer it would.
You mention that Geist can get down and end the game quicker than a walker, but the point is that in draw-go your game plan should be to extend the game until your opponent has expended all of their resources before you start clocking them. It's not about winning sooner. That's a tempo strategy.
Updated my top 5 list after running through more of my watchlist and some rewatches:
1. Before Midnight
2. Spring Breakers
3. Beyond the Hills
4. The Act of Killing
5. Leviathan
Still have Laurence Anyways, The Great Beauty, At Berkeley and A Touch of Sin to watch most notably, but I also need to rewatch Her, The Hunt, Stories We Tell, Inside Llewyn Davis and Upstream Color to see where they stand when all is said and done. Also maybe Blue is the Warmest Color for a third time.
The remaining five;
6. Her
7. The Hunt
8. Blue is the Warmest Color
9. Short Term 12
10. All is Lost
I just want to point out that Sittner abandoned his shell from PT: Born of the Gods and went instead with Yasooka's, with just a few changes to the MB--
-2 Liliana of the Veil
-1 Agony Warp
-1 Smother
-1 Inquisition of Kozilek
+1 Snapcaster Mage
+1 Go for the Throat
+2 Spell Snare
+1 Mana Leak
Ellen Degeneres reminds us that she's bad at stand up, Pink gave me pause by how well she did with "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," the fact that they followed up a very well-executed and tastefully done memorial sequence with "Wind Beneath My Wings" was corny to the point of appalling, this year for movies sucked, with the exception of Gravity I will be amazed if any of the Best Picture nominees will be remembered two years from now, Pharrell made me happy; and for the second year in a row, the only movie I cared about was the Disney movie.
Which won this time, I was pleased by that.
I turned the show off after "Let it Go" won best song. I don't feel like I missed anything afterward.
One thing I would like to do is check out those animated shorts that were nominated. I could always use more animation in my life.
I still don't understand this opinion that "this year for movies sucked". Are you basing this entirely off of the Oscars? I still have roughly 10-15 films I need to watch, as well as several films to rewatch, but my top ten of 2013 is so packed that a couple 5-star films might have to be cut by the end of it. Also, I would bet both 12 Years a Slave and more notably, Her, will be remembered at the very least two years from now.
This film is so painfully pretentious in it's namedropping, but I still enjoyed it to a degree, and thought it provided a unique, albeit not entirely fleshed out take on vampires.
I think a lot of people in this thread have written off Liliana as bad or theorized her out of contention without ever trying her, or if they did try her, been too scared to +1 her for fear of losing their Mistbind or whatever.
What did you think of Blue is and Pan's Labyrinth?
Pan's is up there as one of my favorites. The intricate use of symbolism throughout the entire feature was fantastic. Blue is was very well done also. A bit more hardcore porno than I had expected though. That one scene in particular I was not prepared for. But the film touched on a lot of the things that make love the best and worst emotion we as human beings are capable of experiencing as well as what it was like to be young and confused
Wouldn't the success of those two films in your eyes open up the possibility of other foreign films being able to transcend the 'subtitle stigma' as well?
Im sure there are others that transcend the stigma....but I dont know that im interested enough in finding them to be willing to wade through all the bad ones. There are always going to be exceptions to any rule. I hate Musicals but enjoyed Les Miserables
Well, there is a wealth of information out there for finding the good ones, just the same as for English-language film. I'd say a few fairly accessible ones off the top of my head that would be worth checking out are; The Hunt, A Separation, Let the Right One In, and In the Mood for Love.
The finals of that Japanese modern tournament was the two burn decks that "made the top 16", so.
That fast-cut Creation scene though.
My actual biggest problem with the film, was the font choice by Aronofsky, which rotted in my brain from the introduction on, which I also felt was unnecessary; I felt the film would've succeeded more in line with Aronofsky's stylistic ideals and a film as a whole if he had simply left the blurbs of introductory text and let the images of the Garden of Eden/Cain & Abel exist independently. The film would've tied up any questions anyways, at least with a competent viewer it would.
1. Before Midnight
2. Spring Breakers
3. Beyond the Hills
4. The Act of Killing
5. Leviathan
Still have Laurence Anyways, The Great Beauty, At Berkeley and A Touch of Sin to watch most notably, but I also need to rewatch Her, The Hunt, Stories We Tell, Inside Llewyn Davis and Upstream Color to see where they stand when all is said and done. Also maybe Blue is the Warmest Color for a third time.
The remaining five;
6. Her
7. The Hunt
8. Blue is the Warmest Color
9. Short Term 12
10. All is Lost
-2 Liliana of the Veil
-1 Agony Warp
-1 Smother
-1 Inquisition of Kozilek
+1 Snapcaster Mage
+1 Go for the Throat
+2 Spell Snare
+1 Mana Leak
Just out of curiosity, would you mind providing a list of the films you've seen this year?
I still don't understand this opinion that "this year for movies sucked". Are you basing this entirely off of the Oscars? I still have roughly 10-15 films I need to watch, as well as several films to rewatch, but my top ten of 2013 is so packed that a couple 5-star films might have to be cut by the end of it. Also, I would bet both 12 Years a Slave and more notably, Her, will be remembered at the very least two years from now.
Well, there is a wealth of information out there for finding the good ones, just the same as for English-language film. I'd say a few fairly accessible ones off the top of my head that would be worth checking out are; The Hunt, A Separation, Let the Right One In, and In the Mood for Love.