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    posted a message on The State of Modern Thread (B&R 20/05/2019)
    It kinda feels like a lot of the reaction to FoN can be traced to people who don't play a ton of legacy. Here are some reasons FoN is good:

    1. Control can tap out in earlier turns to deploy a creature, board wipe or planeswalker.
    2. Strong turn 1-2 plays (most of which involve a noncreature spell, see faithless looting and ancient stirrings).
    3. You need to make your opponent stumble to generate a tempo advantage.

    For instance, I play some grixis shadow. Last night I deployed a turn two angler on the draw against a rakdos control deck, which was promptly met by a Liliana of the Veil using its -2 to turn the tide. With a couple forces in the 75, that play becomes way riskier, because even as a two for one, them losing a turn while I now have a 5/5 clock and plenty of cantrips is a big deal.

    Another one, assuming we adopt the London Mulligan: you are on merfolk (which I think gets a big boost from this card) against tron. They mull to 5 and get tower, mine, chromatic star, sylvan scrying, karn. They have the nuts, but a force of negation can give the merfolk player the extra turn needed to win on the crackback instead of worrying about attacking down the planeswalker.

    One more, why not? UW control against phoenix, they lead with a faithless looting and drop a phoenix and a land. You can play serum visions turn one. Phoenix player goes for manamorphose turn two. Oops, forced! Is the game over? Not at all, but you didn't have to sit there with a mana open to threaten spell pierce or snare.

    These aren't extremely weird situations, in my opinion. There are certainly times force will not be that good, but that sort of thinking applies to every single card in the game. Even if negation becomes a two-of type "well at least I have a chance now" style of counterspell, hell its a step up from before, and it has the mental impact of players being more cautious. I am already looking at ways to build shadow to accomodate a couple.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
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    posted a message on Modern Horizons - is the price tag justifiable + other ponderings
    If these premium sets weren't of equal value to their price point, the value of old masters boxes would be plummeting. Instead, a UMA box is about $400 on tcgplayer. Just because YOU cannot afford it, or YOU would prefer to spend less, does not mean that the price is evil.

    Here's the reality: if you are right, and the item is overpriced, very few will sell, and in a couple months you will be able to snag a box of MH for substantially less. If it holds its value, as almost every other premium product has, it just means that your concept of value is different from the vast majority of people.

    Oh, and capitalism ******* rocks. I'll throw this out there for the above poster:

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/rainerzitelmann/2019/05/14/no-the-rich-didnt-get-rich-at-the-expense-of-the-poor/#3307cd8c38ca
    Posted in: Magic General
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    posted a message on [MH1] Modern Horizons Discussion Thread


    I mean you'd need an elvish spirit guide to get the kill, though a might of old krosa would do the trick!
    Posted in: Modern
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    posted a message on [[Official]] Modern Prices Discussion
    Quote from Joban8 »
    The rare lands from the horizon canopy cycle should open up a myriad of possibilities for both established archetypes and brews. Their pre-order price is unsurprisingly high, but considering they are rare in a print to demand set, I'd expect them to wind up somewhere around the 15-20 mark while in print. However, I can see the price of Horizon Canopy itself taking a hit despite it NOT being included in the set.


    The newer canopy printings are already dropping. IMA copies on TCGPlayer have plumtted from high 50s to low 40s. WOTC will finish the cycle, and there's virtually no chance they only print horizon lands in a future set for UW, UB, BR, and RG while leaving out the original.
    Posted in: Modern
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    posted a message on The State of Modern Thread (B&R 11/03/2019)
    Quote from ElectricEye »
    So Tron is now the top deck in the meta, just got Karn the Great Creator, gets even more powerful with the London Mulligan which will be implemented soon, and makes for miserable game play.

    Can we finally start talking about how the Urzatron lands may be too strong in a format without wasteland?

    Modern Horizons can change this, true. But, as weve seen, even all the recent tron hate printed lately has done very little


    I won't, and here is why:

    Infect
    Burn
    Storm
    Valakut
    Ad Nauseam

    You can easily build a deck that preys on tron. I personally believe that the problem isn't tron, because these decks still exist with very good tron matchups. The problem really, is that tron has the best late game of just about any deck in modern. The other side is that people usually call for bans on decks that are fast. The slower the format becomes, the better tron gets. In short, the current situation is actually the result of UW control becoming so good. I say this based on years of seeing people complain about "mindless goldfish" decks which I have said for ages serve a critical role in keeping ramp down. It has only been a couple weeks of tron being #1. I would rather people start to gravitate towards these decks to beat tron (and other things, they certainly have other good matchups) and create something more akin to a rock/paper/scissors meta.***

    ***most of this is motivated by my extreme hatred of slow, boring control and midrange decks
    Posted in: Modern Archives
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    posted a message on Burn
    Here's the thing with searing blood: it hoses humans. The only lord they have in the deck is thalia's lieutenant, so unless that comes down blood kills the following:

    hierarch
    kitesail
    both thalias
    champion of the parish on turn 2 vast majority of the time
    meddling mage
    sin collector
    knight of autumn

    this also means you can hold your searing blaze for mantis riders, reflector mages, etc. Path also matters still because of auriok champion, which is usually a 2 or 3-of in a humans SB. Champion slows the game down to a painful crawl, and I personally like having the out. I have contemplated splitting between path and ensnaring bridge or even engineered explosives. Never tried either, but they certainly have their uses. Then again, if you have a full playset of skullcrack in the 75 that helps too. I might be overthinking.

    Think about the top decks in modern right now overall: tron, humans, uw, phoenix. Path is good in all of those matchups, as you have to contend with wurmcoil, various big humans, lyra or baneslayer out of the uw sideboard, and thing/drake. If you hate giving up the land and want to play chained to the rocks, fine I'll give you that. I just think there are too many creatures that have more than three points of toughness that spell "game over." Palm is nice, but my issue with palm is the extra mana plus narrower window of use. I think I've had one big swing from palm ever steal a game.

    Posted in: Aggro & Tempo
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    posted a message on The State of Modern Thread (B&R 11/03/2019)
    *yawn* twin's dead, old news.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
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    posted a message on [[Official]] Modern Prices Discussion
    Oh boy, so happy I found that mycosynth lattice.
    Posted in: Modern
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    posted a message on The State of Modern Thread (B&R 11/03/2019)
    Quote from Ym1r »
    Quote from BlueTronFTW »
    I thought Confidant wasn't affected because you don't "draw" the card explicitly, but rather just reveal it, then put it into your hand?

    Other note, here's the thing I love about the tron hate: it is well known that several decks are good against tron. Valakut, burn, infect, storm, ad nausea, all great choices. What tron is good against is known, yet the folks who hate tron also hate everything that beats tron.
    Well, isn't that logical? Why on earth would you love (or not hate for that matter) Tron as a midrange or control player? Playing against it is mostly a miserable uphill experience that can blow you up at any random point. It is very easy to have played the perfect game as a control deck, have set up an advantage, have them on 0 cards in hand, and they just draw their random Ulamog and win any way.

    Or have them draw T3 tron into Karn which you counter, into T4 Ulamog which you also counter, but then lose anyway. You are punished for having the answers to their threats basically. I don't see why you wouldn't hate it.


    Except that wasn't the point I made. The point was that Tron's weaknesses are well-known. You go underneath. If you want to beat tron, play something that is better against tron. It feels to me that oftentimes the people who only like midrange and control want to ban everything that beats them. I have, however, addressed your post's general point before: everyone in modern has to sometimes sit across from an opponent where they will be a three to one underdog. ***** happens.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
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    posted a message on The State of Modern Thread (B&R 11/03/2019)
    I thought Confidant wasn't affected because you don't "draw" the card explicitly, but rather just reveal it, then put it into your hand?

    Other note, here's the thing I love about the tron hate: it is well known that several decks are good against tron. Valakut, burn, infect, storm, ad nausea, all great choices. What tron is good against is known, yet the folks who hate tron also hate everything that beats tron.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
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