MTG Salvation

Quote from Bjamman

Based on these requirements, the real reasons why Living End isn't Proven are 1) It hasn't been successful in the past 6 months, and 2) Not many people play Living End.

Being Proven is just bragging rights as far as I'm concerned; Living End is still a competitive contender in the format.

Everything in Established is competitive in the current metagame. I will also ad that Proven decks are not necessarily the "best" decks in the format. They are just the decks to beat, those decks that are most representative of the current metagame.

Living End is still very competitive, but it definitely doesn't make up a sizable share of the metagame.

This is the official discussion thread for Modern forum organization. If you have comments, questions, suggestions, criticisms, or ideas about the forum's organization, this is the place to post them. Previously, this thread was used to refine the Proven/Established criteria and generally to overhaul the forum. You can check out that discussion throughout the first 13 or so pages of the thread, or read its summary in the posts below.


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Alright, so here is the semi-final criteria for Proven. Criteria would be stickied in each subforum. I am open to suggestions on all of the criteria, especially because they might be too exhaustive and not give enough room for flexibility (but then again, the specificity helps with information quality). (UPDATED 9/21)

Proven
Competitive Decks Representing the Current Metagame
Proven decks are updated every ban cycle. A Proven thread must have a primer updated since the last ban cycle. A deck is considered "Proven" if it fulfills TWO or more of the following criteria:

1. Makes up 3%+ of the MTGO metagame over the last 3 months (i.e. has prevalence greater than one standard deviation over average MTGO deck prevalence)
2. Has 1+ Grand Prix/Pro Tour Top 8 appearance in the last 6 months
3. Has 3+ Grand Prix/Pro Tour Top 16 appearances in the last 6 months
4. Makes up 5%+ of the Day 2 metagame at all GPs in the last 6 months (i.e. has prevalence greater than one standard deviation over average day 2 prevalence at GPs)
5. Makes up 4.50%+ of the Paper Top 8 metagame for events with 100+ players (i.e. has prevalence greater than one standard deviation over average deck prevalence at large paper events)

Under this new criteria, here are the decks that would fit into Proven, followed by a list of decks that do not meet the new Proven criteria. I have also given the numbered criteria that the decks meet, just for the sake of transparency. For example, Affinity fulfills all the criteria, so it gets a (1,2,3,4,5) next to it.

NEW PROVEN DECKS
Affinity (1,2,3,4,5)
UWR Control (1,2)
Melira Pod (1,2,3,4)
RG Tron (1,4)
Twin (1,2,3,4,5)
BG Rock (2,3)
Scapeshift (1,2,3,5)
Burn (1,2,5)
Jund (1,2,3,4,5)
Kiki Pod (2,4,5)
UWR Midrange (2,5)

And here are the current Proven decks that would be getting demoted to Established:

DEMOTED FROM PROVEN
UR Delver
Bogles
GW Hatebears
Wx Tokens
Soul Sisters
Gruul Zoo
Mono U Tron
UR Storm
Living End
Naya Zoo

Next, here are the working criteria for Established. (UPDATED 9/17)

Established
Tournament Decks with Results
Established decks are updated once every ban cycle. All Established threads must have a primer updated since the last ban cycle. A deck is considered "Established" if it does not meet the requirements of "Proven" but still fulfills ONE or more of the following criteria:

1. Has finished 4-0/3-1 at 6+ dailies in the past 3 months (above average finish count for decks that are not 2+ standard deviations over the pooled average, i.e. the "adjusted pool")
2. Has 1+ Grand Prix/Pro Tour Top 16 appearance in the last 6 months
3. Makes up 1.50%+ of the Day 2 metagame at all GPs in the last 6 months (i.e. any deck with above average day 2 prevalence for all day 2 decks at Modern GPs, all for the adjusted pool)
4. Has placed in the Top 8 of 4+ paper event with 100+ players in the past 6 months (above average finish count for the adjusted pool)
5. Has placed in the Top 8 of 2+ MTGO Premier Events in the past 3 months (above average finish count for the adjusted pool)

Under those definitions, which are more inclusive than even the last criteria, here is what the Established would look like. As with the previous section, I give the criteria that these decks fulfill under the Established definition. So for example, Hatebears fulfills criteria 1 and 5 but nothing else, so it gets a (1,5). New decks to Established as of 9/21/2013 are posted at the end of the list:

NEW ESTABLISHED
UR Delver (1,2,3,5)
Bogles (1)
GW Hatebears (1,5)
Wx Tokens (2,3)
Soul Sisters (1)
Gruul Zoo (1,2,3,4,5)
Mono U Tron (1)
UR Storm (1,2,5)
Living End (1,2)
Naya Zoo (2,4)
Domain Zoo (2,4)
Modern Merfolk (1,3,5)
Griselbrand (1,2,5)
Junk (1,2,3,4,5)
Death and Taxes (1)
Eternal Command (1)
Infect (1,3,4)
Restore Balance (1)
Mill (1,5)
Dredgevine (4)
4C Gifts (2,3)

Finally, here are the current Established decks that would get moved down to Deck Creation:

DEMOTED TO CREATION
U(x) Faeries (Still negotiating how to handle this and Delver)
Assault Loam
Combo Elves
BUG Midrange
Ritual Gifts
Azorius Midrange
Goblins
Bant
Modern Boros
UW Tron

Again, I cannot emphasize this enough: This is just a PRELIMINARY ORGANIZATION SCHEME. It has not been implemented and will not be implemented without input from the community. Feel free to suggest that a deck be moved to a different part of the forum.

If you know of a deck that fits Established criteria, and you can prove it as such, let me know and I will add it.

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As part of the larger improvements that the mods want to make to the Modern forums, we want to reorganize and change the way that Deck Creation and Establised work. There are a few issues with these subforums, both from a layout perspective and from an information perspective:

1. Unclear criteria: What makes a deck Established? What makes a deck stickied in Deck Creation?
2. Inconsistent primer quality: Some decks in Established have old primers that still talk about the 12Post matchup. Some decks in Deck Creation have primers that are updated almost every week with tons of information.
3. Differences in deck power/competitiveness: Bogles is in Established and that deck just got 2nd at Worlds and regularly gets 4-0/3-1 on MTGO. Eternal Command is also in Established and that deck hasn't been seen since the last Worlds. Deck Creation has decks that get run on MTGO or at FNMs all the time like 8Rack and Restore Balance. It also has total budget/fun decks that never see competitive play.

There are probably a half dozen more issues with these subforums, so feel free to post and add to the list. No matter how many we identify, we still want to try and address as many of them as possible. There is no single way to do this, but the mods have come up with two different organization schemes that we would love your input on. If you have your own idea, please post it and we can add it to the debate. These are just preliminary ideas that we had, so criticisms and changes are more than welcome.

PLAN 1: Make the Established forum home to only tier 1.5/2 decks. Move decks to Deck Creation that don't fit this criteria

• Under this plan, Established would become a stopping point before "Proven". Decks like Bogles, DredgeVine, and Living End would stay. Other decks that see very limited competitive play in recent months would go. These decks would be moved to Deck Creation where they would likely be stickied. As part of this, some Deck Creation threads might be unstickied depending on quality of the OP and number of active posters

PLAN 2: Make the Established forum home to any deck that has a well-written and updated primer, along with significant testing history and reports. Sticky the most competitive decks.

• Under this plan, Established would contain two sets of decks. It would have stickied primers that reflect the most competitive of the Established (but not yet Proven) decks. Then it would have well-written, thorough, current primers for all the other decks. They would not be stickied. This would be like the current Standard organization, with an Established sub, a Proven sub, and a Developing sub.

PLAN 3: Divide decks into four subforums based on competitiveness

• Thanks to izzetmage for articulating this idea. Under this plan, we would have the Proven subforums be only for tier 1 decks with multiple MTGO and paper wins. Established subforums would be for decks that consistently show up in competitive events but don't always win and/or haven't seen a lot of top tier action in a while (Infect, Bogles, Living End, etc.). Developing decks are for those popular decks with lots of testing but not a lot of real world results. Finally, Deck Creation would be for decks in their early stages of development and for rudimentary deck ideas.
• As part of this plan, we would probably want to make some system of identifying which deck goes where. For example, Proven decks would need to be 5%+ of the MTGO metagame and 10%+ of Top 8 finishes at big events (just an example figure! Not set in stone!). Established decks would need a 2-5% MTGO share and a few Top 8 appearances at paper events (more example figures! Again, not set in stone!). Developing could be any deck that has a thorough matchup section, a well-written primer, and some local FNM/LGS success. Creation is all the rest.

As an editorial note, I personally like the second and third options. We have a lot of primers on our site that are very high quality and talk about very interesting decks. But they don't have the competitive record to go up there with stuff like Living End. They also have too much time and interest to be alongside all the developing ideas of Deck Creation. I think that by moving those decks up to Established, but not stickying them, we would "promote" them while not overpromoting them. But again, this is just my first opinion and I and the other mods are totally open to suggestions.

STANDARDIZED PRIMERS?
Another idea that was floated around by a few users was that of standardized primers. Under this plan, all primers in Proven and Established would have a predetermined format that they had to follow. This would make it easy to find information and conduct quality control on the site. Stickied decks in Developing (or in Established, if we went with Plan 2) would also need formal, standardized primers. Creation decks would not require them. We would not need to decide on the format here (we could talk about it if people wanted to), but we should consider the idea going ahead with the forum reorganization.

So what do you all think? Any new ideas? Improvements to these ideas? Criticisms? Scathing rebukes? We are going to keep this thread open for a few weeks to collect opinions. If you know anyone who has an interest in Modern or the MTGS Modern forums, invite them over to join the talk.

Comment Hidden

Quote from NessOnett

That's straight up wrong. I was at the pre-release event where they made a big fuss about "We know, Skullclamp is banned in standard on release, but you are still allowed to draft with it for the pre-release, it shouldn't be as broken in draft."

Maybe you are misremembering, but Skullclamp was definitely legal in Standard before being axed. Indeed, it was banned specifically because of its performance in Standard. Upon Skullclamp's release, most people weren't quite sure as to how broken it was. Only after it went into most decks under the sun did the collective Magic community cry out in terror. It's a minor point in the grand scheme of things, but Skullclamp existed in Standard for a few months before eating the banhammer.

Quote from Barandis

This is known as "self-selection bias" and makes any argument of "this thread is full of people who hate the banned list!" null and void. Note that I don't have a horse in this argument, but there's simply no way that you can point at a place where people post without being compelled and claim that it looks anything like a correct statistical distribution.

Everyone, yourself included, knows that this gives the "squeaky wheels" an inordinate voice. Everyone also knows that voluntary posting is much more likely to be done when someone has a problem than when someone thinks everything is great.

There are no relevant statistics in a forum. Even in a forum poll, however fun it is to post them. Please don't try to find any here.

I'm going to have to agree with Barandis here regarding the sample of Magic players on our forum. We have no reason to believe that it is representative. It certainly isn't random, and it is very difficult to identify the mechanisms that lead some players to go to forums over others. Moreover, even amongst those users that go to a forum, we only have a very small number that post in this thread.

In this current iteration of the banlist thread, there have been a grand total of 255 unique, unduplicated posters. On average, each poster has made 12 contributions to the thread, but the population's standard deviation is pretty large at 29. So we can already tell that this thread is representing a vocal minority. This interpretation is supported by the general distribution of posts across the thread, with just 15 users making up 50% of posts in this thread. Stated another way, 6% of the unduplicated posters in this thread make up 50% of the posts. Going up to 75% of the posts brings us to 17% of the posters, which is still pretty darn disproportionate.

No matter how you shake it, I can't put my statistician credentials behind using this thread as a representative sample of Magic players, or even Modern players. Everyone has selected into this thread, and unless we account for that selection, we aren't going to be able to make any conclusions.

A much more reasonable interpretation of the thread is this: Vocal Modern players with a history of online Magic activity tend to disagree with the banlist (and maybe Modern's direction as a format). That's much more accurate but still based on an extremely biased sample.

Quote from Valanarch

So you are fine with an unbalanced format where midrange and combo dominate everything. Modern only has 3 control decks even if you count Mono-blue Tron and Scapeshift as control decks. Other than Affinity, aggro rarely wins anything. Prison does not exist in Modern, and tempo barely does. Green and red are played far more than other colors. This is not a balanced format.

Haven't made a substantive weigh-in on this issue yet, as I am still mulling over the possibilities of and explanations for the recent announcement. But I can give some idea of what the metagame looks like, as it overlaps with my current project on format reorganization. This is also a shameless plug to check out the Reorganization Thread itself and give some input on the ideas. It also, of course, relates heavily to our topic of metagame health and how this relates to bans.

Here is the criteria that I am using for "Proven" decks under the new organization. For the purposes of this discussion, this criteria gives us an extremely accurate and evidence-based picture of what the metagame really looks like. It should help us assess whether or not the metagame is truly healthy and if bans/unbans are really needed; a lot of arguments about bans concern the wider metagame perspective, so hopefully this will give us some direction in that area.

Proven
Competitive Decks Representing the Current Metagame
A deck is considered "Proven" if it fulfills TWO or more of the following criteria:

1. Makes up 3.5%+ of the MTGO metagame for the last 3 months (i.e. has prevalence greater than one standard deviation over average MTGO deck prevalence)
2. Has 1+ Grand Prix/Worlds/PT Top 8 appearance in the last 6 months
3. Has 3+ Grand Prix/Worlds/PT Top 16 appearances in the last 6 months
4. Makes up 7%+ of the Day 2 metagame at all GPs in the last 6 months (i.e. has prevalence greater than one standard deviation over average day 2 prevalence at GPs)
5. Makes up 5%+ of the Paper Top 8 metagame for events with 100+ players (i.e. has prevalence greater than one standard deviation over average deck prevalence at large paper events)

Under these criteria, here is what the Proven forum would look like.

PROVEN DECKS: TIER 1
Affinity
UWR Control
UWR Midrange
Bogles
Melira Pod
RG Tron
Twin
BG Rock
Scapeshift
Burn
Jund

This is our Tier 1. You could probably bring any of these decks to a tournament and do well. There are a ton of decks that go under the Tier 1.5/2 level which are probably also "viable" (UR Delver, Naya Midrange, Storm, Living End, GW Hatebears, etc.), but this is our real Tier 1. Remember that all of these decks are meeting 2+ of the criteria listed above, so they all represent the metagame from various angles.

From this perspective alone, ignoring both the Tier 1.5/2/etc. decks and the performance of decks WITHIN that tier 1 metagame, things look pretty healthy. Here's a general decktype breakdown based on the decks included in Tier 1:

Combo: Scapeshift, Twin, Melira Pod
Combo/Aggro: RG Tron, Affinity
Aggro: Burn, Bogles
Midrange: Jund, BG Rock, UWR Midrange, Melira Pod
Control: UWR Control

I double counted Melira Pod because I was uncomfortable categorizing it as either Midrange or Combo exclusivey, and I didn't want to make up a Midrange/Combo category. We could also question the inclusion of Affinity under Combo/Aggro and instead just move it to Aggro.

Either way, this isn't that ugly of a metagame. It's certainly not as bad as GP Detroit would have us believe. True, some of those decks aren't doing great of late (poor Scapeshift) and true, some of those decks are doing a lot better than the rest (looking at you Melira Pod). But overall, there is perhaps a surprising degree of format health in this metagame, even if it is probably not a decisively healthy metagame in the grand scheme.

Overall, this suggests to me that we need to wait and see what happens at GP Antwerp, and what happens over the next 3 weeks on MTGO. If the pendulum swings back towards UWR Control and Scapeshift, for example, then we might be less worried about the results of GP KC and GP Detroit. But if we see nothing but BGx in the T16 of Antwerp, let alone its Day 2 metagame, then we have a serious problem on our hands. It will also help determine what we should and should not consider unbanning.

The scariest part of these god awful lands is a quote in the article itself:

There was some concerns within development that the scry lands might be too powerful.

I'm just happy we didn't get the "balanced" versions.

At this point, my hope is that Theros design represents a scaling back in power level for all subsequent sets, and not just a widespread design failure that has afflicted the entire company. Because the design of these cards, and a disproportionate number of others in the set, is alarmingly out of touch with competitive constructed Magic.

Quote from Barandis

When the format is healthy, bannings and unbannings are going to be extremely judicious. I would not be shocked from that standpoint to see no action at the end of the month.

Secondly, Wizards gave a good hint of what they want to do last year when Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle was unbanned. It was one card, meaning a minimum effect on the metagame. It proved well-placed, as it spawned a new archetype that was competitive but not overpowered. I think it's a model of what Wizards wants to do now that they've done their flurries...play with the list a little, let some of the initial bannings expire, and see what happens.

This strikes me as accurate. Wizards has a healthy format by most statistical standards, with a large selection of viable/competitive decks. Tournament attendance was pretty solid at the end of last year, although MTGO Dailies have started to lag at the end of the summer. There isn't as much archetype diversity as some players would probably like, but that might just be a feature of the format more than a feature of bannings. Given these factors, it is unlikely that Wizards wants to shake things up too much. That suggests a 1-2 card unbanning with Valakut as a best-case-scenario model.

The most likely unban is definitely Golgari Grave-Troll for reasons already discussed to death. But I actually don't want this card back in the format because it won't actually help any new decks. Between DRS and Ooze in maindecks across the metagame, Dredge and dredge-based strategies are in really bad shape right now. GGT isn't going to help them, let alone cause a new deck to materialize in the format. It's not an unban that will help diversity, even if it will help decrease the length of the banlist.

That's why I want to see Dread Return unbanned.

DR can leave a bad taste in players' mouths. In that sense, it's much like Bitterblossom and Stoneforge Mystic, and we know how Wizards feels about those two cards. But in the context of the format, DR is a lot safer than it might initially appear. At least 25% of the format is currently running maindeck graveyard hate in the form of DRS and Ooze. The rest is running it in the board in some capacity. Moreover, all of the most degenerate DR effects are either based on vulnerable creatures (i.e. Hedron Crab and Drowned Rusalka), or easily stopped by countermagic (UR Delver, UWR Midrange, and UWR Control are everywhere). This format looks mature enough to handle a DR-powered deck without too much risk.

Of course, there's the turn 4 rule to think about. If DR-powered Dredge, or any other deck, is winning before turn 4 with any consistency, then it's not an appropriate unban for the format. But if the case of Infect tells us anything, it's that decks that are too fast on the goldfish are safe if they cannot replicate that speed against real decks. DR-based decks have triple vulnerability to removal on their creatures, countermagic on the DR itself, and graveyard hate. And no, this isn't a rehashing of the fallacious "dies to removal" argument. This is just a reapplication of the reality that we see with both Infect and Griselbrand Reanimator.

I don't think that DR is an automatic unban that is so obvious as to require no testing or argument. But I do think it is much safer than people realize, and that DR would actually increase metagame diversity beyond most other unbans on the list. Overall, I'd love to hear thoughts on DR and how it would impact the format.

Quote from NessOnett

I see 2 main problems with the logic. The first, obviously being that since the elementals are elementals, they aren't merfolk. So if the Master dies, which isn't hard with 1 toughness(even if he is immune to bolt), they all die. They are weak, evasionless, vulnerable to sweeps(if all you have is red, you probably carry pyroclasm), and they are wholly dependent on a weakling.

Instead of thinking about Master's 1 toughness in a vacuum, we need to think about his 1 toughness and pro red in the context of Modern. The only things that hit this card are Path, Wrath, and Verdict. Everything else either sees minimal play (e.g. Dismember) or completely misses (e.g. Abrupt Decay and all the red removal). So when this guy gets dropped on turn 4, your opponent needs to Path/Wrath or lose the next turn. If he had Wrath, he was going to use it anyway to sweep out your other dudes, so Master just forces his play with a one card investment. If he had Path, any other lord was going to get exiled, so it might as well be the answer-or-lose card.

Even if he gets blocked and killed, he is still sending probably 11 power across the board (3 from himself, Lord included, and 8 from his elementals). That's either flat out game over on the spot, or just unrecoverable for most decks.

The second problem is the cost of 4. And not necessarily in general, but in terms of merfolk. Merfolk last I checked had a relatively low land count, relying on their minor costs and aether vials to get stuff out without running through their steam too fast and going into topdeck mode. This means that hitting the 4th mana on turn 4 isn't always going to happen. And when it doesn't youre left with a dead card in a deck that can't afford the lost pressure of dead cards.

Here's the thing: Merfolk, as it currently exists, is not a good deck. It has a small MTGO presence, virtually no paper appearances, and isn't really distinguishing itself from any other aggro deck in the format. Master gives it a top of the curve presence that the deck currently lacks. You land a Master and, in most cases, the opponent has one turn to answer it. So if that means that Merfolk ups its land count from 20 to 23, then that's probably what needs to happen. I am more than willing to modify the current version of Merfolk to try and include something as bomby as Master, just because the current version of Merfolk is clearly missing something.

Quote from rxavage

I agree, lets only be hypocritical when it suits us.

Agreeing with someone when they're right and disagreeing with them when they're wrong is not hypocritical. It's simply using your brain and not being a mindless sheep.

Comment Hidden

Quote from Beat

To me it seems that the people who are upset at speculators are upset that the speculators can get their hobby to pay for itself but they can't .

I understand if that is how it appears to you, but let me explain why I feel the way I do about speculators.

In 2007 my wife and I started looking to buy a home. We weren't interested in trying to "flip" it, as was extremely popular at the time. We just wanted a nice place to live and not just throw away money on rent.

We stated our price range and were shown various houses and apartments. I was appalled at the condition of these places. There was no way that these places could be worth $175k! But the realtors kept assuring me that yes, this is the nature of things, and that the housing market is only going to keep going up because "land is finite".

I said hell no, something is wrong with the system. I didn't know what it was, but I knew that it was way off from what I was shown and the "value" I was told they were worth. I did think it was odd that they never cared to see my W2 at the bank when we inquired about a loan. We kept renting.

Do you remember what happened that later that year, and the years that followed? The market crashed. There were speculators, basically, that were manipulating the market to grab cash. People were duped into believing they could afford houses well above their standard of living, and it was partly their fault because they didn't second-guess it. They wanted to believe that the banks were right. The "stock" got handed off to other people who thought they were good investments. When it crashed, it was a big game of hot-potato with stocks and mortgages.

So what's happening now? Let's consider how much it costs, real world, to make Magic cards. WotC pays for the R&D, the materials, the work of printing, the packaging, etc. Did it really cost WotC upwards of $100 to design and print Tarmogoyfs? Seriously, now.

The market is being managed under the idea that artificial inflation is a good thing. And maybe it is, to a degree. But let's be realistic about the value of some of these pieces of cardboard. So if someone comes along that can offer the same product with somewhat equal quality, what happens to the market? Can people really afford these prices? I'm sure some can, sure, but just as the majority of the people who went under due to the weight of their mortgage during the housing bubble, there are people playing right now, paying for these cards at these prices, that are essentially not being fiscally responsible.

I am at well above the poverty line, and I will be debt free at retirement at the age of 42 in just under nine years. I am a minority in the world, and I can't reasonably afford the prices of staple cards in this game. So what is the financial outlook for people who aren't in the minority, like myself? And what effect will the future of those consumers of Magic product mean for the game itself?

At some point someone will come along with an equal product, quality wise (like the recent Chinese counterfeiters), and what will WotC and the secondary market do? That's a big game of hot-potato with the cards, except there will be no government assistance for Magic the Gathering. That will be people who own our LGS eating the debt and trying to figure out how to get their business to survive. That's a whole lot of speculators, who will then claim they were just "players trying to make their hobby pay for itself", getting very upset at something that will then be out of their control.

It's not a question of if it will happen, it's when, because Magic cards are not that difficult to make. Maybe WotC has already recognized this, and thus the reasoning behind MM and this recently announced Modern Event Deck. Maybe they're trying to ease down the prices. But they are racing against time, racing against when the counterfeits will start flooding the market.

EDIT - I like to do more than just point out what I see as problems. I like to provide solutions.

It is possible that WotC could start reprinting cards to drive down the prices of Vintage, Legacy, and Modern staples. They would have to do some insane guestimating to figure out how many, exactly, to print and distribute. If they distribute too much, the secondary market and LGS's take the brunt of the hit. They could forewarn the LGS's, but then the LGS's would likely hold a fire sale to minimize losses. That means handing off the hot potato to the players, who would likely be very, very unhappy at that point. If they print too little, then it would have a negligible effect on the market, and they're still in the race with high-quality counterfeiters.

But there is an alternative, where the LGS's, WotC, and players are relatively happy. Special events could be held, and gold-bordered (non-playable in sanctioned events) staples could be offered as alternative prizes for attendance, winnings, and various special challenges. Attendance would be the only way to get these cards, initially (I'm sure some would hit Ebay quickly after the initial distribution), which would be good for both the LGS's and WotC. Players would get to choose their prizes, based on their preference, and allow players to play how they wish.

There is the problem that some LGS's may try to make a quick buck and just sell off this special product immediately rather than offer them as prizes. Of course, I for one know that I would be much more likely to attend a LGS where I could possibly get these staples just for attending and playing than one that does not offer this special bonus to me. That, and the LGS would be risking adverse consequences from WotC.

Hi,

So 2 of my user names are The_Great_Dustini and Noobie7. As I have noticed, this thread has discussed the Borderpost-less Restore Balance build, based off of suspend cards, that I have been working on. This makes me very happy, because the deck is a lot of fun. It is powerful and mulligans very well. It rarely loses when it draws Gargadon (over 50% of games, including added % from mulligans), and it has a decent shot at winning even when it doesn't draw GG. The main strategy is to wipe the opponent's creatures and hand, not destroy their lands. If GG lets you do that too, great, but it's usually not necessary. Boom/Bust gives you the armageddon option for those decks that are land based (e.g. scapeshift or tron).

I don't see the need for Nihilith at all. There are perfectly fine win cons in the other 4 colors. I can understand the drive to have more consistent cascaders, but the odds are pretty good already, especially when you consider that Sand-Mage can speed up a naturally suspended restore balance. Sand-Mage plus Balance plus Gargadon means you are going off on turn 4 even without a cascade spell. I'm going back and forth between 25 land (15GW) and 24 land (14GW). The 24 land build lets it fit in the 4th Sand Mage, which has been a useful card in many ways. However, having the right colors early is important, and a deck that wipes all lands often wants to draw land after that point. This last card is the only question for me at this point.

Regardless, glad to see people are thinking about the deck and I hope you play it because, again, it's loads of fun

Here's a brief history of my version that raised recent interest. This is the list spanky_kc played the following day to 4-0 the DE.

Kaas' cascade balance list from Magic-League is the inspiration for this borderless version. His list isn't built to focus on the armageddon aspect. Rather, it attempts to mind twist the opponent so that they're left in topdeck mode to find an answer to a threat on the board.

From his comments:

"for the 'easily recovering' part. I think you're better off when your opponent is in topdeck-for-removal-mode than topdeck-for-land-mode. Because removal is very cheap nowadays. if you're opponent can keep 1 path to exile in hand, and only needs to topdeck 1 land, then you're *****ed if you don't have more than 2 creatures. Topdecking removal is harder to do, takes longer, and gives you time to recover as well, which is not so difficult if you already have 2 land or something or a suspended search for tomorrow, or a coalition relic."

For further commentary, I also found this interview a few days ago, which may be an interesting read for anyone interested in his take.

Sometime around RTR's release, I decided to take play around with Kaas' template to port it to a jund manabase. The keyrunes seemed like an upgrade to the coalition relics and cutting the 5-color manabase to 3 provided the room to add man lands. This added 5 additional threats that didn't count towards having a creature in play, increasing the opportunity to capitalize on damage after a balance. In the control match ups, it also punished players for wasting a turn on counter spell mana (or in the case of key runes, wasting counters on irrelevant spells or risk losing tempo and invalidating tax counters). Always consider using a Simian Spirit Guide to play a turn 2 keyrune. Decreasing your hand size pre-balance is a good thing in most matchups.

Despite having access to 11 cascade spells and a more consistent ability to suspend balance if drawn, I didn't like the idea of using gemstone mines. True, they do whittle down your land count when you balance, but in the control match ups you often wanted the land in play for the reasons above. 3 lands in play and a suspended Nihilith quickly puts a lot of pressure on rwu players. 6 in play and a Nihilith coming off suspend threatens to pay for the counter and potentially follow up with a more lethal cascade spell.

In my initial versions, I did try Liliana. The discard ability seemed good, but it wasn't the greatest since it was another symmetric effect. After all, if you're going to balance, you want to come out ahead on at least 2 of the 3 cases. Both players having empty hand sizes when balance resolved happened more than I would have liked. In addition, Liliana as removal was just that - a 3 mana removal spell that maybe fogged some damage. In both cases, balance is trying to do the same thing. Versus Jund, it was nice being able to wipe their Liliana but also annoying when your option is to let them sac a Bob or Deathrite and letting the 'Goyf in play gain an additional +1/+1.

Beast Within was also tested, naturally, given the proven synergy with the jund suite of cascade spells. However, similar to Liliana, it targeted card types that Restore Balance was supposed to handle. Vs. Aggro, trading an early drop for a 3/3 didn't give you the time that you wanted to draw into a cascader, and hitting a land vs. control pre-cascade came up less frequently than getting jammed with multiple Beast Withins in hand.

It was because of these constant awkward hands that I tried adding the cyclers. Having played Living End enough times to know the limited choices of cmc 3 or more spells and that plan 'B', which is playing them as threats, is a valid option for wins, it seemed like a good idea. Misleading the opponent to deck archetype is a bonus.

I'll try to follow up with a post about match ups later. I've had better results playing vs. rwu than what's discussed here and a few other discrepancies that's worth noting, but I've run out of time. Anyway, I thought bringing up the path to this version was worth adding to the thread.

Quote from bocephus

Because you would make 2 fringe decks top notch decks. Which in turn would warp what other decks have to play to combat those T1 decks. So more or less, the definition of meta warping.

Okay, I think I'm finally starting to understand your point of view here. What's happening is that we have fundamentally different definitions of "warping" which is skewing our ability to communicate properly.

When I say a deck is "format warping," I mean to say that the meta has devolved into state where you either play Deck A, or you play a deck specifically built to beat Deck A. Caw Blade is the perfect example of this: you either played Caw Blade or you played a deck to beat Caw Blade. There was no in-between (unless you just liked losing a lot).

When you say a deck is "format warping," you mean to say that it causes the metagame to shift because of its presence. A new deck can't suddenly jump into tier one without causing a metagame disruption, and you use the word "warp" to describe that shift.

The trouble is, I don't believe most people share your definition of the word "warp." When you say "warp," I think most people read that you're claiming that Faeries would become an oppressive force on the format. If you're just claiming that unbanning Bitterblossom would cause a metagame shift, then you and I agree on that.

That being said, I don't believe that's necessarily a bad thing. The format is going to be constantly shifting, and I don't believe that Bitterblossom's reintroduction would be a negative impact on the future of Modern. Sure, maybe Jund plays more Abrupt Decay than it does now, and maybe we see some Volcanic Fallouts or Illness in the Ranks hit sideboards, but that doesn't mean that the format has gotten worse because of it.