I think that Imperial Aluren has actually been pretty fine against wasteland. The dream stalkers are fat enough that you don't need to look to red for your midrange in the maindeck (compared to Guardian Aluren which I think has to look to white for board stability), and you're left with 4 basic lands and 10 fetchlands to find them. That's pretty reasonable in the face of wasteland.
I'm not sure we really differ that much on Baleful Strix. I'm generally okay with baleful strix in imperial aluren, but choose to skimp on it as part of a cost/benefit analysis of my meta (Coiling Oracle has greater benefits vs D&T, Miracles, Lands, and Combo and I'm willing to accept the costs of a weaker set of match-ups vs Infect and Delver).
All that being said: I think you can only really support three primary colours in legacy and still have a stable manabase. In guardian aluren, if you add baleful strix, you're pushing black up to being a kind of primary colour for the deck, thus stretching you to four. I haven't been able to get a stable manabase that supports this in the face of wasteland.
All fair points. I would still like to see something a little better at carrying Sword/Jitte for the matchups that are going to gum up the ground more. I'm tinged a little bit by my own meta here, which I'll admit is a little skewed at times. You have less disruption than the recent Imperial builds I've seen, so I would want the equipment to be very reliable. Quickling over Arctic Merfolk could help that, despite being a little more vulnerable to removal.
For what it's worth, I haven't seen anything pop up (here or elsewhere) that's really enticing me away from Imperial either.
I think that if you really want the flyer, the choice is sadly Shrieking Drake, not Quickling ("sadly" because it can't trade unassisted with Delver). That targeting clause is just too brutal on your resiliency (also, 2-for-1s are bad).[EDIT: Huh, I'd been misremembering quickling. It's not as bad as I remembered. I might be able to get behind it for versions that skip shardless] I also could easily be talked into a mainboard stonecloaker in most white versions.
Mainboard TNN is also totally reasonable (and probably correct).
I dunno though, it's all just so much more tight on space (your value package necessitates more slots, you have less room for stuff like decay, etc) and with worse mana to boot (compared to Imperial). And even after dozens of spitballed builds I'm still not seeing a guardian list I like.
I think that Imperial Aluren has actually been pretty fine against wasteland. The dream stalkers are fat enough that you don't need to look to red for your midrange in the maindeck (compared to Guardian Aluren which I think has to look to white for board stability), and you're left with 4 basic lands and 10 fetchlands to find them. That's pretty reasonable in the face of wasteland.
I'm not sure we really differ that much on Baleful Strix. I'm generally okay with baleful strix in imperial aluren, but choose to skimp on it as part of a cost/benefit analysis of my meta (Coiling Oracle has greater benefits vs D&T, Miracles, Lands, and Combo and I'm willing to accept the costs of a weaker set of match-ups vs Infect and Delver).
All that being said: I think you can only really support three primary colours in legacy and still have a stable manabase. In guardian aluren, if you add baleful strix, you're pushing black up to being a kind of primary colour for the deck, thus stretching you to four. I haven't been able to get a stable manabase that supports this in the face of wasteland.
just out of curiosity, how often do they ban/unban cards in legacy for the sole purpose of just shaking it up?
In short: Never.
To echo/expand: Hagalaz is absolutely correct here. WotC hasn't gone for the cheap thrills here that they have done for the modern banlist. Cards come off the ban list when they ascertain that they are no longer a threat to the format, they go on when the meta is in a bad place. They don't ban cards just to make things "fresh" for a tournament like they have explicitly admitted to doing for modern.
WotC has also (imo) shown an admirable amount of restraint in their Legacy format management. They have taken a very long term view of things and are okay with letting the format sort out most issues on its own.
I tried messing around with it today, trying to solve the manabase problems. Here's one possible draft below. I cut black to the bone. Still not really feeling this over Imperial Aluren ftr. The zero entries are things not in the deck that maybe should be.
@OP: I think, as others have pointed out, I believe you're misframing libertarianism. Admittedly, there's also a major question of defining terms. Libertarianism as a political philosophy is different from Libertarians as in the political party. I recommend you step back from trying to frame particular opinions on social welfare and the like and instead bring it back down to the fundamental concepts. The best manifestation of this that I've seen was this article that I highly recommend you read.
It's entirely possible to ask these questions of libertarian philosophy (as presented in the linked article) and come to different conclusions than yours, and in fact I do, but the key part is understanding where your position is arising from.
As a point of interest, I would pose this to you: if you fear the government exerting expanding power and control, how do you differentiate this from corporations exerting expanding power and control?
I currently own legacy Death & Taxes, but I own few staples outside of that deck. I am finally ready to begin investing in another deck, but I can't decide what I'd like best.
I enjoy playing control/tempo decks that aren't blue. I've considered 4c Loam and Maverick, but I'm quite open to other options.
Ideally the deck would be something strong against Jund and/or Elves, which are prominent decks in my meta and horrendous match-ups for D&T.
Thanks for your input!
I think 4C Loam is a bit better than Maverick, but I don't have enough familiarity with it to know its match-ups against the mentioned decks.
I would mention Lands, especially RUG Lands as an option that will typically crush those two.
I also have a running plug for people to try Aluren as a control-ish midrange-ish combo-ish thing.
Return to Ravnica was the best single set draft in recent years.
If you're willing to splurge, I recommend Modern Masters 1 or Tempest as fun formats.
Do not do Coldsnap. That format was so bad that they had to do bait-and-switches for Top8 in limited events "Oh, you played Ravnica sealed for your PTQ swiss portion? WELCOME TO THE COLDSNAP DRAFT TOP EIGHT"
I love people that say sealed is mostly luck. Sure, it has more variance than draft, but it's still a very skill-intensive format. Why do you think the people who talk about how important practicing sealed is and who practice a lot consistently do better at it than others?
Yeah. Honestly, I always found sealed to be a far more challenging format.
Back when I was traveling for GPs, I used to love the sealed section because you knew walking in that there would hardly be any people in the room who actually knew what they were doing. It's a format that gives you no room to hide your weaknesses as a player. For everyone above: if you're still trying to sell sealed as luck and bombs, I think you should really start playing the format. You'll get beaten down in large event after large event and it won't be coincidence of "bad pools".
Now, regarding the OP's question: I think the driving reason is money. If you're trying to get someone who has never played limited, it's a lot easier to sell them on a ~14USD buy-in than a 20-30USD buy-in. I also know that for smaller shops, the financial outlay on sealed is rough (it goes through massive amounts of product, so the store needs to "bet" larger on their predicted player numbers. If they're wrong, it's either dissatisfying for customers or brutal for the store).
Iso (and others: *cough* tom *cough*), I think you made a major failing in playing this game so lopsided in information distribution:
Remember that a huge part of people reading you as town is being able to see your vote reasoning and thought process, even when the vote is on them. Pushing for a lynch without laying the full case on the line with the person you're pushing isn't giving them anything to clear you with later if the lynch wagon falls apart. Similarly, look at my chat with Seppel. I admit that I didn't do a great job in that chat, but he apparently disengaged entirely based off a scummish-read on me. Game information in this game was ENTIRELY based off of voluntary distribution. The hubris of assuming that a read in the moment would be guaranteed correct for the whole game meant that the town was shooting itself in the foot. I don't mean to say I played well this game -- while I liked parts of my play day 1, I never gained rigorous scum reads (apart from Iso ) -- but I do think the one area I did well was at the very least attempting to articulate the reasons for my votes and pushes, where it was pulling teeth to get that from anyone else. Whenever you were building a lynch consensus in this game without explicitly detailing why to the person, I think it was a play mistake that contributed to ending we experienced being possible.
@iso: I'm still frustrated with that chat. Your longform post helped a *little* once I got past the first couple paragraphs, but you admitted to lying in a way that could very easily have gotten town lynched (me) and in reality arguably did (you) and generally didn't provide reasoning on your votes. You also specifically really need to look at the way that you phrase things. Your one sentence that amounted to "can you explain how you're out of touch with reality?" was infuriating and really served no purpose -- it showed a lack of conversational respect and didn't set you up to gain a better read. I'm seriously considering avoiding entering another game with you if stuff like our chat is to be the norm. We get along very well in other contexts and I'd rather not feel that level of personal frustration and offense towards someone that I like and respect.
That targeting clause is just too brutal on your resiliency (also, 2-for-1s are bad).[EDIT: Huh, I'd been misremembering quickling. It's not as bad as I remembered. I might be able to get behind it for versions that skip shardless] I also could easily be talked into a mainboard stonecloaker in most white versions.Mainboard TNN is also totally reasonable (and probably correct).
I dunno though, it's all just so much more tight on space (your value package necessitates more slots, you have less room for stuff like decay, etc) and with worse mana to boot (compared to Imperial). And even after dozens of spitballed builds I'm still not seeing a guardian list I like.
I'm not sure we really differ that much on Baleful Strix. I'm generally okay with baleful strix in imperial aluren, but choose to skimp on it as part of a cost/benefit analysis of my meta (Coiling Oracle has greater benefits vs D&T, Miracles, Lands, and Combo and I'm willing to accept the costs of a weaker set of match-ups vs Infect and Delver).
All that being said: I think you can only really support three primary colours in legacy and still have a stable manabase. In guardian aluren, if you add baleful strix, you're pushing black up to being a kind of primary colour for the deck, thus stretching you to four. I haven't been able to get a stable manabase that supports this in the face of wasteland.
WotC has also (imo) shown an admirable amount of restraint in their Legacy format management. They have taken a very long term view of things and are okay with letting the format sort out most issues on its own.
4 Coiling Oracle
4 Stoneforge Mystic
4 Recruiter of the Guard
4 Shardless Agent
2 Arctic Merfolk
1 Cavern Harpy
1 Parasitic Strix
1 Eternal Witness
1 Reclamation Sage
1 Umezawa's Jitte
1 Sword of Fire and Ice
1 Batterskull
4 Brainstorm
4 Force of Will
2 Savannah
2 Tropical Island
1 Tundra
1 Bayou
2 Forest
1 Plains
1 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Windswept Heath
1 Flooded Strand
1 Verdant Catacombs
1 Orzhov Pontiff
1 Wasteland Strangler
1 Karakas
1 Scavenging Ooze
1 Faerie Macabre
1 Tamiyo, Field Researcher
2 True Name Nemesis
1 Tsabo's Web
1 Pithing Needle
4 Abrupt Decay
1 Engineered Plague
0 Meddling Mage
0 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
0 Phyrexian Revoker
0 Containment Priest
It's entirely possible to ask these questions of libertarian philosophy (as presented in the linked article) and come to different conclusions than yours, and in fact I do, but the key part is understanding where your position is arising from.
As a point of interest, I would pose this to you: if you fear the government exerting expanding power and control, how do you differentiate this from corporations exerting expanding power and control?
I would mention Lands, especially RUG Lands as an option that will typically crush those two.
I also have a running plug for people to try Aluren as a control-ish midrange-ish combo-ish thing.
If you're willing to splurge, I recommend Modern Masters 1 or Tempest as fun formats.
Do not do Coldsnap. That format was so bad that they had to do bait-and-switches for Top8 in limited events "Oh, you played Ravnica sealed for your PTQ swiss portion? WELCOME TO THE COLDSNAP DRAFT TOP EIGHT"
Eretoryi, would you consider adding this link to the OP?
-
Back when I was traveling for GPs, I used to love the sealed section because you knew walking in that there would hardly be any people in the room who actually knew what they were doing. It's a format that gives you no room to hide your weaknesses as a player. For everyone above: if you're still trying to sell sealed as luck and bombs, I think you should really start playing the format. You'll get beaten down in large event after large event and it won't be coincidence of "bad pools".
Now, regarding the OP's question: I think the driving reason is money. If you're trying to get someone who has never played limited, it's a lot easier to sell them on a ~14USD buy-in than a 20-30USD buy-in. I also know that for smaller shops, the financial outlay on sealed is rough (it goes through massive amounts of product, so the store needs to "bet" larger on their predicted player numbers. If they're wrong, it's either dissatisfying for customers or brutal for the store).
Remember that a huge part of people reading you as town is being able to see your vote reasoning and thought process, even when the vote is on them. Pushing for a lynch without laying the full case on the line with the person you're pushing isn't giving them anything to clear you with later if the lynch wagon falls apart. Similarly, look at my chat with Seppel. I admit that I didn't do a great job in that chat, but he apparently disengaged entirely based off a scummish-read on me. Game information in this game was ENTIRELY based off of voluntary distribution. The hubris of assuming that a read in the moment would be guaranteed correct for the whole game meant that the town was shooting itself in the foot. I don't mean to say I played well this game -- while I liked parts of my play day 1, I never gained rigorous scum reads (apart from Iso
@iso: I'm still frustrated with that chat. Your longform post helped a *little* once I got past the first couple paragraphs, but you admitted to lying in a way that could very easily have gotten town lynched (me) and in reality arguably did (you) and generally didn't provide reasoning on your votes. You also specifically really need to look at the way that you phrase things. Your one sentence that amounted to "can you explain how you're out of touch with reality?" was infuriating and really served no purpose -- it showed a lack of conversational respect and didn't set you up to gain a better read. I'm seriously considering avoiding entering another game with you if stuff like our chat is to be the norm. We get along very well in other contexts and I'd rather not feel that level of personal frustration and offense towards someone that I like and respect.