The Iona ban is absolutely ridiculous. She's so innocuous I was laughing when I read the announcement. I still think Paradox Engine is fine and shouldn't be banned, but at least that card *was* legit broken if you're that kind of player. Banning Iona is just a sign to me that the rules committee has completely lost touch.
One vote of no confidence from me. I think Wizards should take the reins and come up with a ban list that makes at least a *little* bit of sense.
You should take a read on Sheldon's article on SCG.
Iona promotes exactly the kind of game play that the RC wants gone. Pengine is by far the worst offender on this list and that card lived on time borrowed out of the gate.
A lot of people seem to be confused about what the RC actually does.
If you honestly think Modern is just those three decks, I no longer believe you play Modern.
ah see, there's the illusion of diversity when in fact, there really isn't. all you have to do is look at all the last paper tourneys to see this. modern has never been diverse. it's always been about doing the most degenerate thing possible without giving your opp the chance too interact. that's Modern.
I saw way too many Humans and UW Control decks in paper tournament Top 8 results this month.
You may want to check www.tcdecks.net, especially its "Metagame of Last Month" section; a clear majority of the Modern results it gets are from paper tournaments.
For the record, I only remember Eldrazi Tron spiking within the last few days in MTGO results; it wasn't so hot in the early Hogaak days, from my recollection.
What I'm trying to get at is to say that Modern is genuinely NOT as diverse as people want to think it is. There was an article not too long ago that discussed this very facet (cannot recall who had written it but I think it might have been Ari Lax). Cards like faithless looting are an issue because it tends to homogenize archetypes (as it's clearly one of - if not- the most powerful thing you can do in modern). A healthy and varied format would contain aggro, midrange, control decks. What we are seeing are mostly just combo decks that ignore entirely what their opponents are doing.
Ok we have UW control, Burn and Jund. Those are 3 decks representing the major archetypes. However, when you look at the decklists that are consistently winning, these are not the decks (deck types) that represent the format. What you see are decks that look at minimizing the interaction and ensuring that their opponents have virtually no windows to respond. This in turn makes the games more much like a coin toss (going first is significantly better in modern, to the point of being the difference between a win and a loss). Cards like blood moon, chalice of the void, rest in peace etc create a non-zero number of non-games. These tend to be the cards most represented.
In addition to that, pros also agree with me that looting is a card that will need to be banned (at some point in the future). It's not like i'm talking out of my ass. It's the "subtle" glue that holds so many of these linear combo decks together.
Faithless isn't the only card i'd like to see gone. But it would be a start.
My mentions of Humans and UW Control doing well enough in this month's Hogaak meta were to counter this direct mention of yours:
I agree that the (Altar of) Hogaak (Bridgevine) deck was pushing down deck diversity, but your mention that Eldrazi Tron was one of the most prominent decks in the Hogaak meta, to the expense of others I do recall seeing in greater numbers such as Humans and UW Control, looked pretty wrong to me and led me to believe that you have a pretty skewed view of the meta. While www.tcdecks.net does not get the complete paper or MTGO metas into its database, it does get fairly close in my experience, and at least in its results collection (which is mostly of paper results), Eldrazi Tron has NOT been doing anywhere near as well in a Hogaak meta as you imply.
part of the reason why you might not think so is due to the short amount of time the meta has existed as such. eldrazi tron would have eventually been more prominent because it's the best chalice of thees void deck. this is the card that matters most. now that hogaak has been nerfed, we will reclaim a bit of normalcy. from my observations, there are a lot of decks in modern, yes. but it's consistently the same type of deck that raises to the top.
phoenix
hogaak
devastation druid
eldrazi tron can pray on this meta because of chalice. not because it's a better deck.
what do the 3 decks have in common? they are all uninteractive decks that seek to end the game by t3. THIS is a representation of modern. this format, in my opinion, sucks. how do u fix this?
No, you are wrong, and my position is backed by WotC NOT banning Looting. Sorry you have an incorrect understanding of the word "broken". Looting is not broken. Slowing down Modern is basically asking for Modern to become Standard. There are multiple decks in all 3 arches that can compete in Modern. That's format health.
oh yes, and WOTC is never wrong.........
Modern IS only 3 decks:
Tron (of the eldrazi variant)
Phoenix
Hoggaak
That's modern right now. Ya super healthy format! WOTC has been notorious in banning the wrong cards for years now. They are simply unwilling to ban the enablers. Remember Blood Braid? Ya that card was scary! While a little elf went on to wreck further havoc...
If you honestly think Modern is just those three decks, I no longer believe you play Modern.
ah see, there's the illusion of diversity when in fact, there really isn't. all you have to do is look at all the last paper tourneys to see this. modern has never been diverse. it's always been about doing the most degenerate thing possible without giving your opp the chance too interact. that's Modern.
I saw way too many Humans and UW Control decks in paper tournament Top 8 results this month.
You may want to check www.tcdecks.net, especially its "Metagame of Last Month" section; a clear majority of the Modern results it gets are from paper tournaments.
For the record, I only remember Eldrazi Tron spiking within the last few days in MTGO results; it wasn't so hot in the early Hogaak days, from my recollection.
What I'm trying to get at is to say that Modern is genuinely NOT as diverse as people want to think it is. There was an article not too long ago that discussed this very facet (cannot recall who had written it but I think it might have been Ari Lax). Cards like faithless looting are an issue because it tends to homogenize archetypes (as it's clearly one of - if not- the most powerful thing you can do in modern). A healthy and varied format would contain aggro, midrange, control decks. What we are seeing are mostly just combo decks that ignore entirely what their opponents are doing.
Ok we have UW control, Burn and Jund. Those are 3 decks representing the major archetypes. However, when you look at the decklists that are consistently winning, these are not the decks (deck types) that represent the format. What you see are decks that look at minimizing the interaction and ensuring that their opponents have virtually no windows to respond. This in turn makes the games more much like a coin toss (going first is significantly better in modern, to the point of being the difference between a win and a loss). Cards like blood moon, chalice of the void, rest in peace etc create a non-zero number of non-games. These tend to be the cards most represented.
In addition to that, pros also agree with me that looting is a card that will need to be banned (at some point in the future). It's not like i'm talking out of my ass. It's the "subtle" glue that holds so many of these linear combo decks together.
Faithless isn't the only card i'd like to see gone. But it would be a start.
Looting is not a problem. It hasn't been a problem since it was printed. Stop asking for WotC to ban enabler cards. If you want a less powerful format go back to Standard.
BFB being the only change is kind of weak. There are multiple cards that could come off the list. The most safe being SFM.
you're 100% wrong on that. also wtf? i play all formats but vintage, don't tell me what to do. looting has been a major problem in modern for a long time. it enables too many stupid broken decks. getting rid of it would slow down Modern and give new life to the meta. if you can't see that, maybe you've never actually played Modern.
No, you are wrong, and my position is backed by WotC NOT banning Looting. Sorry you have an incorrect understanding of the word "broken". Looting is not broken. Slowing down Modern is basically asking for Modern to become Standard. There are multiple decks in all 3 arches that can compete in Modern. That's format health.
oh yes, and WOTC is never wrong.........
Modern IS only 3 decks:
Tron (of the eldrazi variant)
Phoenix
Hoggaak
That's modern right now. Ya super healthy format! WOTC has been notorious in banning the wrong cards for years now. They are simply unwilling to ban the enablers. Remember Blood Braid? Ya that card was scary! While a little elf went on to wreck further havoc...
If you honestly think Modern is just those three decks, I no longer believe you play Modern.
ah see, there's the illusion of diversity when in fact, there really isn't. all you have to do is look at all the last paper tourneys to see this. modern has never been diverse. it's always been about doing the most degenerate thing possible without giving your opp the chance too interact. that's Modern.
not surprising. it's not a magic card. but i think that they missed big time on banning looting. that card is horrendous. and good opp to let stoneforge out but ya... too strong apparently.
Looting is not a problem. It hasn't been a problem since it was printed. Stop asking for WotC to ban enabler cards. If you want a less powerful format go back to Standard.
BFB being the only change is kind of weak. There are multiple cards that could come off the list. The most safe being SFM.
you're 100% wrong on that. also wtf? i play all formats but vintage, don't tell me what to do. looting has been a major problem in modern for a long time. it enables too many stupid broken decks. getting rid of it would slow down Modern and give new life to the meta. if you can't see that, maybe you've never actually played Modern.
No, you are wrong, and my position is backed by WotC NOT banning Looting. Sorry you have an incorrect understanding of the word "broken". Looting is not broken. Slowing down Modern is basically asking for Modern to become Standard. There are multiple decks in all 3 arches that can compete in Modern. That's format health.
oh yes, and WOTC is never wrong.........
Modern IS only 3 decks:
Tron (of the eldrazi variant)
Phoenix
Hoggaak
That's modern right now. Ya super healthy format! WOTC has been notorious in banning the wrong cards for years now. They are simply unwilling to ban the enablers. Remember Blood Braid? Ya that card was scary! While a little elf went on to wreck further havoc...
not surprising. it's not a magic card. but i think that they missed big time on banning looting. that card is horrendous. and good opp to let stoneforge out but ya... too strong apparently.
Looting is not a problem. It hasn't been a problem since it was printed. Stop asking for WotC to ban enabler cards. If you want a less powerful format go back to Standard.
BFB being the only change is kind of weak. There are multiple cards that could come off the list. The most safe being SFM.
you're 100% wrong on that. also wtf? i play all formats but vintage, don't tell me what to do. looting has been a major problem in modern for a long time. it enables too many stupid broken decks. getting rid of it would slow down Modern and give new life to the meta. if you can't see that, maybe you've never actually played Modern.
not surprising. it's not a magic card. but i think that they missed big time on banning looting. that card is horrendous. and good opp to let stoneforge out but ya... too strong apparently.
Having access to artifact cost reductions such as helm of awakening[ to reduce the overall cost of the deck, plus all the moxens, it should be fairly easy to push through the deck really quickly.
With that said, it seems like it's powerful, but I don't think it's THAT great. Not being able to play non-colorless spells is a bit of a drawback. Granted, we have the void keyword, which lets you play cards that are technically colored. So keep that in mind, you're not entirely locked out of playing colored spells.
Making a 4/4 flier on T4 is simply not good enough right now. If it was, Phoenix would see a LOT more play.
What a silly thing to say. By the same logic you could argue that Nissa, Who Shakes the World is bad, because "making a 3/3 on turn 5 is not good enough". Clearly, there is great value in making a creature while leaving a planeswalker behind.
Apples and oranges.
Nissa can make a 3/3 EVERY turn (which is clearly a lot better than 1 4/4 - maybe). Plus she doubles your mana.
Try again.
I stand pat when I say making a 4/4 (and nothing else) is bad in Standard and the format as is clearly agrees with me. Othewise we'd see more Rekindling Phoenix in Standard.
Here's another list of 4 drop creatures that are great that see ZERO, or close to it, competitive play:
Notice a pattern? If a card like Rekindling Phoenix can barely see any play, how can a 4/4 French Vanilla that you can *maybe* create on T4 has any chance of being any good? The card would actually be decent if you could immediately minus her and create that same creature on T3. Or that it would cost 2 in loyalty instead of 3, so that you could activate it twice after the plus.
As it stands, this thing is so incredibly under powered compared to everything else in the format that I can't conceive any reason why you'd consider playing this in your deck if you wanted to win an MCQ.
Let's call a spade a spade. This card is a dud and that's ok. Not all mythics can be crazy flashy things. Once in a while, blue's gotta swing and miss too (can't always be red that sucks).
I truly believe this card is unplayable if your intentions are to be a competitive standard player. As someone else mentioned, lots of good cards are unplayable in the current format.
- I don't believe that proliferate is good enough in Standard (even though there are great enablers)
- Standard is not a format about durdling in the slightest. When you have T3 Nissas, 6-7 power on red creatures or a a walker+ranger, a 3 mana "basically" do nothing is not where you want to be
- I can't think of a scenario where you'd rather drop this over Narset. Either way, if there's pressure on the board, you'll lose the walker. The difference with narset vs Mu is that with one, you're not down a card.
Now with that said, i'm not the most diplomatic person in the world. I got a little aggressive because time and time again folks reiterate magical christmas land scenarios for competitive formats. Is this card awesome in your 4 color bird deck in EDH? Ok, sure. Great. But you can't get all up in arms when I provide basis for my argument to refute your belief that this card is competitively playable.
Making a 4/4 flier on T4 is simply not good enough right now. If it was, Phoenix would see a LOT more play.
I'm only making my observations based on the current standard format. Like someone mentioned previously, there doesn't appear to be anything that's been revealed that would throw the format on its head.
The thing is, I completely disagree with the statement 'we can't evaluate this in the current standard format because we haven't played with the cards yet'. I think that's just plain wrong.
Additionally, I'm not sure why it's an issue to express an opinion to what appears to be the popular opinion? I provide reasons why i think this card is bad and what to be shown scenarios (applicable ones) where it is good and no one has done this. No one has shown me an existing deck that wants to play this that is better than anything else they can play in that spot.
Is this a site where we can have meaningful discussions or just be fan boys that can't handle constructive criticism?
What discussions can be had when the card is labeled “literally unplayable”? Because at that point it is not a discussion, you just want people to agree with you because there is nowhere to go with the discussion.
And “constructive criticism”? Lol that’s what this-
i mean this in the nicest way possible but the majority of you are quite terrible at evaluating cards.
-is? First off, you may need to brush up on what constructive criticism actually is, because that is certainly not what you’ve demonstrated through this thread. What’s wrong with fanboys? They can like the card. They’ll play the card, maybe even have it in a FNM winning deck, at that point it makes all that “unplayable” nonsense you’ve been spewing look pretty stupid.
I mean this the nicest way possible, but you come off as an arrogant dick that probably prefers the sound of their own voice over anything else.
magic players are generally bad at evaluating cards. this is not an insult, it's simply true. this is why there's always cards that slip everyone's radar.
i gave plenty of reasons why this card is unplayable in the current format. it just is. mono red is not even the boogeyman anymore.
if you think I'm being a dick about my point of view... well maybe you need to get your panties out of that knot i tied.
This is actually really great (in Standard). It's probably the best card draw spell in the format, by far. Plus if you want to get cute, this gives Teferi's +1 a legit card to cast at opponent's EOT. Pretty much a "GG, I win" card. Really pushed.
Saying that a card is bad is just as silly as saying a card is good at this point because we haven't seen it in play or in action yet. After that then arguments favouring either side are acceptable and more valid.
'buster
I don't disagree with this in principal, but it's also not absolute. We've been playing with a lot of these cards for a long time and understand how they interact. I would say--understanding there's more M20 to be spoiled that could change this--we can look at the meta and cards spoiled so far and can at least make an educated guess about a new card's power level.
The current meta is an important qualifier here. Lost of cards in this meta will be gone come rotation, and this card has a full ~15 months to fill in somewhere. So, unless you have a crystal ball, you cannot speak in absolutes, one way or the other. Then combine that with -
i mean this in the nicest way possible but the majority of you are quite terrible at evaluating cards.
and your left with where we’re at now. At the end of the day, it really doesn’t matter how good or bad a card is, people will still play it. Nobody is passing out medals to people who guess right about “trash tier” labels. It’s just nonsense and literally adds nothing to the discussion.
I forgot this forum will close, but others will pop up and i'll show up there. I am not afraid of eating crow if I'm wrong, but i'm 100% sure I'm not.
A lot of folks like to live in magical Christmas land and that's fine. But to argue that this card is good is only to delude one-self. Hell, spend your hard earned dollars on playable stuff. This card fits in zero archetypes. Creatures are too good these days that giving one -2 power really doesn't do anything.
The difference with Sarkhan is staggering.
1) Sarkhan makes your other planeswalkers into threats immediately
2) The 4/4 dragon actually kind of has text because if you attack the walkers, it will deal one damage to your guys. It's not great, but it's something
3) Sarkhan will essentially win you the game over 2 turns. This card, does not.
Tapping your lands to draw card is good, but if you get to a point where you can do that AND cast spells, you've already won the game.
My point is that folks tend to over evaluate cards at the onset without thinking of how they can be applied in existing archetypes. Sure, there'll be rotation in October (4 months from now), but you got a LOT of magic to play between then and now. And at this stage, the card is unplayable.
Additionally, I'm not sure why it's an issue to express an opinion to what appears to be the popular opinion? I provide reasons why i think this card is bad and what to be shown scenarios (applicable ones) where it is good and no one has done this. No one has shown me an existing deck that wants to play this that is better than anything else they can play in that spot.
Is this a site where we can have meaningful discussions or just be fan boys that can't handle constructive criticism?
You should take a read on Sheldon's article on SCG.
Iona promotes exactly the kind of game play that the RC wants gone. Pengine is by far the worst offender on this list and that card lived on time borrowed out of the gate.
A lot of people seem to be confused about what the RC actually does.
part of the reason why you might not think so is due to the short amount of time the meta has existed as such. eldrazi tron would have eventually been more prominent because it's the best chalice of thees void deck. this is the card that matters most. now that hogaak has been nerfed, we will reclaim a bit of normalcy. from my observations, there are a lot of decks in modern, yes. but it's consistently the same type of deck that raises to the top.
phoenix
hogaak
devastation druid
eldrazi tron can pray on this meta because of chalice. not because it's a better deck.
what do the 3 decks have in common? they are all uninteractive decks that seek to end the game by t3. THIS is a representation of modern. this format, in my opinion, sucks. how do u fix this?
What I'm trying to get at is to say that Modern is genuinely NOT as diverse as people want to think it is. There was an article not too long ago that discussed this very facet (cannot recall who had written it but I think it might have been Ari Lax). Cards like faithless looting are an issue because it tends to homogenize archetypes (as it's clearly one of - if not- the most powerful thing you can do in modern). A healthy and varied format would contain aggro, midrange, control decks. What we are seeing are mostly just combo decks that ignore entirely what their opponents are doing.
Ok we have UW control, Burn and Jund. Those are 3 decks representing the major archetypes. However, when you look at the decklists that are consistently winning, these are not the decks (deck types) that represent the format. What you see are decks that look at minimizing the interaction and ensuring that their opponents have virtually no windows to respond. This in turn makes the games more much like a coin toss (going first is significantly better in modern, to the point of being the difference between a win and a loss). Cards like blood moon, chalice of the void, rest in peace etc create a non-zero number of non-games. These tend to be the cards most represented.
In addition to that, pros also agree with me that looting is a card that will need to be banned (at some point in the future). It's not like i'm talking out of my ass. It's the "subtle" glue that holds so many of these linear combo decks together.
Faithless isn't the only card i'd like to see gone. But it would be a start.
ah see, there's the illusion of diversity when in fact, there really isn't. all you have to do is look at all the last paper tourneys to see this. modern has never been diverse. it's always been about doing the most degenerate thing possible without giving your opp the chance too interact. that's Modern.
oh yes, and WOTC is never wrong.........
Modern IS only 3 decks:
Tron (of the eldrazi variant)
Phoenix
Hoggaak
That's modern right now. Ya super healthy format! WOTC has been notorious in banning the wrong cards for years now. They are simply unwilling to ban the enablers. Remember Blood Braid? Ya that card was scary! While a little elf went on to wreck further havoc...
you're 100% wrong on that. also wtf? i play all formats but vintage, don't tell me what to do. looting has been a major problem in modern for a long time. it enables too many stupid broken decks. getting rid of it would slow down Modern and give new life to the meta. if you can't see that, maybe you've never actually played Modern.
Having access to artifact cost reductions such as helm of awakening[ to reduce the overall cost of the deck, plus all the moxens, it should be fairly easy to push through the deck really quickly.
With that said, it seems like it's powerful, but I don't think it's THAT great. Not being able to play non-colorless spells is a bit of a drawback. Granted, we have the void keyword, which lets you play cards that are technically colored. So keep that in mind, you're not entirely locked out of playing colored spells.
Apples and oranges.
Nissa can make a 3/3 EVERY turn (which is clearly a lot better than 1 4/4 - maybe). Plus she doubles your mana.
Try again.
I stand pat when I say making a 4/4 (and nothing else) is bad in Standard and the format as is clearly agrees with me. Othewise we'd see more Rekindling Phoenix in Standard.
Here's another list of 4 drop creatures that are great that see ZERO, or close to it, competitive play:
And here's some examples of cards that are seeing play
Notice a pattern? If a card like Rekindling Phoenix can barely see any play, how can a 4/4 French Vanilla that you can *maybe* create on T4 has any chance of being any good? The card would actually be decent if you could immediately minus her and create that same creature on T3. Or that it would cost 2 in loyalty instead of 3, so that you could activate it twice after the plus.
As it stands, this thing is so incredibly under powered compared to everything else in the format that I can't conceive any reason why you'd consider playing this in your deck if you wanted to win an MCQ.
Let's call a spade a spade. This card is a dud and that's ok. Not all mythics can be crazy flashy things. Once in a while, blue's gotta swing and miss too (can't always be red that sucks).
I truly believe this card is unplayable if your intentions are to be a competitive standard player. As someone else mentioned, lots of good cards are unplayable in the current format.
- I don't believe that proliferate is good enough in Standard (even though there are great enablers)
- Standard is not a format about durdling in the slightest. When you have T3 Nissas, 6-7 power on red creatures or a a walker+ranger, a 3 mana "basically" do nothing is not where you want to be
- I can't think of a scenario where you'd rather drop this over Narset. Either way, if there's pressure on the board, you'll lose the walker. The difference with narset vs Mu is that with one, you're not down a card.
Now with that said, i'm not the most diplomatic person in the world. I got a little aggressive because time and time again folks reiterate magical christmas land scenarios for competitive formats. Is this card awesome in your 4 color bird deck in EDH? Ok, sure. Great. But you can't get all up in arms when I provide basis for my argument to refute your belief that this card is competitively playable.
Making a 4/4 flier on T4 is simply not good enough right now. If it was, Phoenix would see a LOT more play.
I'm only making my observations based on the current standard format. Like someone mentioned previously, there doesn't appear to be anything that's been revealed that would throw the format on its head.
The thing is, I completely disagree with the statement 'we can't evaluate this in the current standard format because we haven't played with the cards yet'. I think that's just plain wrong.
magic players are generally bad at evaluating cards. this is not an insult, it's simply true. this is why there's always cards that slip everyone's radar.
i gave plenty of reasons why this card is unplayable in the current format. it just is. mono red is not even the boogeyman anymore.
if you think I'm being a dick about my point of view... well maybe you need to get your panties out of that knot i tied.
but ok.
I forgot this forum will close, but others will pop up and i'll show up there. I am not afraid of eating crow if I'm wrong, but i'm 100% sure I'm not.
A lot of folks like to live in magical Christmas land and that's fine. But to argue that this card is good is only to delude one-self. Hell, spend your hard earned dollars on playable stuff. This card fits in zero archetypes. Creatures are too good these days that giving one -2 power really doesn't do anything.
The difference with Sarkhan is staggering.
1) Sarkhan makes your other planeswalkers into threats immediately
2) The 4/4 dragon actually kind of has text because if you attack the walkers, it will deal one damage to your guys. It's not great, but it's something
3) Sarkhan will essentially win you the game over 2 turns. This card, does not.
Tapping your lands to draw card is good, but if you get to a point where you can do that AND cast spells, you've already won the game.
My point is that folks tend to over evaluate cards at the onset without thinking of how they can be applied in existing archetypes. Sure, there'll be rotation in October (4 months from now), but you got a LOT of magic to play between then and now. And at this stage, the card is unplayable.
Additionally, I'm not sure why it's an issue to express an opinion to what appears to be the popular opinion? I provide reasons why i think this card is bad and what to be shown scenarios (applicable ones) where it is good and no one has done this. No one has shown me an existing deck that wants to play this that is better than anything else they can play in that spot.
Is this a site where we can have meaningful discussions or just be fan boys that can't handle constructive criticism?