Probably an excellent time to push the community backlash button, especially with all the loot box controversy happening at the minute. Let us but full sets of cards without having to gamble on opening packs, that's all I want.
As I mentioned, they're only removing it from mana abilities because it's unnecessary clutter. This doesn't mean they're removing its mention from all cards.
Cards like these, which directly care about what's in your mana pool, will still utilize the word mana pool, just as the only card which cares about state-based actions is also the only card to actually mention state based actions.
Mana pool is still a mechanic, and it is still going to be a word that is used on cards. It just isn't on mana abilities, unless there is some specific interaction with the mana pool.
It shouldn't change at all, from my understanding. The 'Mana Pool' is still a mechanic in MTG, they just removed its direct mention from mana abilities because it's fairly unnecessary clutter on the card, and also has a tendency to confuse new players.
It's like how the only time in MTG when state-based actions are ever directly mentioned is on Rules Lawyer. They still exist whenever you're playing the game, but cards only need to directly acknowledge it as a mechanic when it's being directly manipulated.
What this discussion really hinges upon is what exactly you want to accomplish when you say 'equalizing' the first and second turn player.
Do you want to:
1. Give going first and second their own individual strategic merit, so that there's a relatively even percentage of people choosing either first or second.
2. Make it so that first and second each are so evenly advantaged that people effectively don't care which one they get.
If the first one is your goal, then understand that it would probably leave us in a very similar situation to what we're in now, perhaps marginally more even.
If 50 percent of decks want to go first, and 50 percent of decks want to go second, then you'll still have quite a few games occurring where people don't get what they want because of dice rolls, giving one side the same advantage that they have now.
If Deck A likes going first, and Deck B likes going second, then matching them against each other would pretty much be a perfect situation. No matter who wins the die roll, both sides are fairly happy, assuming they choose to go whichever their deck prefers.
However, if Deck A is put into a mirror match, or perhaps goes against another different deck that likes going first, then we're in the exact same situation that we're in now.
This is also a fairly generous analogy, as I don't think it's likely that you'd be able to find a mechanic that benefits 50 percent of decks in a format to the point where they'd take it over going first.
The second option, making people not care about whether or not they go first, is impossible for the exact reason that I mentioned above. There is no advantage you could give a player that is so unanimously useful that it rivals being able to go first, unless you made it ludicrous to the point of people preferring to go second.
No matter what you gave to the second turn player, some decks would care way more about it than others, leading to the exact same situation we're in now where losing the die roll just sucks most of the time.
If whatever we change is going to lead to a different, but still existent advantage to winning the die roll, then I don't think it's worth making the change.
I would prefer a format wherein you had 20 life, 60 singleton cards, and either a planeswalker as general or a legendary creature (not both). It needs more streamlining, probably. I doubt WOTC playtested it and fear the format will be dominated by two or three decks at most.
What's wrong with being able to choose between either a planeswalker or a legendary creature? That literally just adds diversity.
Also we know for a fact they playtested it lol, did you read the post about Brawl? It was one of the most popular test formats amongst wizards employees that they've ever tried out.
Rudy from Alpha Investments just did this box opening.
Watch the whole thing, or just skip to around the 20 minute mark to see everything laid out. Literally the only difference between the two is that the second box had a Jace instead of Center of the Sea (although the second box still got a Center of the Sea as a foil.)
Is this stupid luck, a quality control issue, because they were part of the same case?
Hour of Revelation is way too slow. It is probably good against Tokens, but not good enough to be maindeckable and not close to being good in the Mardu matchup. I think Slash of Talons is the best bet against the deck, but even that only buys you a little time if you have to use it on Scrapheap Scrounger.
My main concern is that Authority of the Consuls has been underwhelming in the match up. It feels like since you have less spot removal that the card isn't nearly as good at buying time as it used to be.
What I've been doing in matches against any sort of aggro like that, Mardu included, is basically board in a ridiculous amount of lifegain and hope I get to it before I lose the game.
It's not really worth it to try to make your turn 1-5 much better, I find it to be a better gameplan to just reinforce the power of your deck on turn 4-5 and hope that you can get there. What Authority does is allows you to more consistently get to turns 4-5, where you have access to your fumigates, settles and caracals that will give them too much to deal with.
Slash of talons is fine, but I don't like investing that much into early turn interaction apart from things like Censor/Authority.
IMHO every build of this deck should run 1-2 Field of Ruin in the mainboard, since it's a ridiculously versatile card.
Kills Ramunap Ruins, kills flip lands like Azcanta, the Sunken Ruin in the mirror match, though it's most interesting use that I've found is against temur.
Most temur/4 color builds only run 1 island, often relying on Botanical/Spirebluff to produce blue mana. In games 2 and 3 they'll almost always leave enough mana open to cast negate on approach, oftentimes their only source of blue mana being a single dual land. If they already have a tapped island out, you can use Ruin on that dual land so they no longer have blue mana avaliable until their next untap, giving you clearance to cast Second Sun without fear of negation.
This is something I've thought about for awhile, as it's been a fairly common occurance in the last two standards.
Basically, what is the point to which a variant on a decklist is unique enough to where it is it's own deck?
For instance:
BG Delirium into GB Constrictor
RW Vehicles into Mardu Vehicles into Mardu Ballista
The most recent example of this format is 4 Color Energy into Sultai Energy. IMO, Sultai is different enough of an overall deck that it really shouldn't be called Sultai Energy, as it doesn't actually share that much with the Temur/4 color builds. It's much more of a Sultai Constrictor deck, but I'm not sure if it's distinct enough to call it a completely new decktype.
When exactly should we star considering a variant on a decklist it's own deck? Is Sultai Energy different enough to no longer be called an Energy deck?
Taking a look at the two paper tournaments we've had so far; SCG Open and Classic in Atlanta, the one simple Felidar ban seems to have evolved our Standard from one of the worst in recent history, to one of the most blatantly diverse and interesting I've seen in awhile.
UR control is a good investment if rotation is your concern; the only real things that the deck will end up losing that aren't likely to be reprinted are Void Shatter and Wandering Fumarole, neither of which is vital to your win condition, with Void Shatter being totally replaceable by Disallow.
One of the biggest things is that 4c Saheeli still works just fine.It no longer has access to that particular infinite combo but does it really need it to win? No.... Especially since the deck can go into a grindy midrange 4c walker deck with so much value it can stomp a lot of other decks.....
The deck has no reason to be four colors, or to run Saheeli. Therefore it would pretty much just be Temur Midrange, which would need a new win condition. It doesn't really 'work just fine', it's a different deck.
That is not a profitable business model.
Cards like these, which directly care about what's in your mana pool, will still utilize the word mana pool, just as the only card which cares about state-based actions is also the only card to actually mention state based actions.
Mana pool is still a mechanic, and it is still going to be a word that is used on cards. It just isn't on mana abilities, unless there is some specific interaction with the mana pool.
It's like how the only time in MTG when state-based actions are ever directly mentioned is on Rules Lawyer. They still exist whenever you're playing the game, but cards only need to directly acknowledge it as a mechanic when it's being directly manipulated.
Do you want to:
1. Give going first and second their own individual strategic merit, so that there's a relatively even percentage of people choosing either first or second.
2. Make it so that first and second each are so evenly advantaged that people effectively don't care which one they get.
If the first one is your goal, then understand that it would probably leave us in a very similar situation to what we're in now, perhaps marginally more even.
If 50 percent of decks want to go first, and 50 percent of decks want to go second, then you'll still have quite a few games occurring where people don't get what they want because of dice rolls, giving one side the same advantage that they have now.
If Deck A likes going first, and Deck B likes going second, then matching them against each other would pretty much be a perfect situation. No matter who wins the die roll, both sides are fairly happy, assuming they choose to go whichever their deck prefers.
However, if Deck A is put into a mirror match, or perhaps goes against another different deck that likes going first, then we're in the exact same situation that we're in now.
This is also a fairly generous analogy, as I don't think it's likely that you'd be able to find a mechanic that benefits 50 percent of decks in a format to the point where they'd take it over going first.
The second option, making people not care about whether or not they go first, is impossible for the exact reason that I mentioned above. There is no advantage you could give a player that is so unanimously useful that it rivals being able to go first, unless you made it ludicrous to the point of people preferring to go second.
No matter what you gave to the second turn player, some decks would care way more about it than others, leading to the exact same situation we're in now where losing the die roll just sucks most of the time.
If whatever we change is going to lead to a different, but still existent advantage to winning the die roll, then I don't think it's worth making the change.
What's wrong with being able to choose between either a planeswalker or a legendary creature? That literally just adds diversity.
Also we know for a fact they playtested it lol, did you read the post about Brawl? It was one of the most popular test formats amongst wizards employees that they've ever tried out.
Rudy from Alpha Investments just did this box opening.
Watch the whole thing, or just skip to around the 20 minute mark to see everything laid out. Literally the only difference between the two is that the second box had a Jace instead of Center of the Sea (although the second box still got a Center of the Sea as a foil.)
Is this stupid luck, a quality control issue, because they were part of the same case?
What I've been doing in matches against any sort of aggro like that, Mardu included, is basically board in a ridiculous amount of lifegain and hope I get to it before I lose the game.
Specically, I've been doing 4 Regal Caracal, 2 Sunscourge Championand 3 Authority of the Consuls as well as a 3rd Fumigate to go with the 2 that I have in the mainboard.
It's not really worth it to try to make your turn 1-5 much better, I find it to be a better gameplan to just reinforce the power of your deck on turn 4-5 and hope that you can get there. What Authority does is allows you to more consistently get to turns 4-5, where you have access to your fumigates, settles and caracals that will give them too much to deal with.
Slash of talons is fine, but I don't like investing that much into early turn interaction apart from things like Censor/Authority.
Kills Ramunap Ruins, kills flip lands like Azcanta, the Sunken Ruin in the mirror match, though it's most interesting use that I've found is against temur.
Most temur/4 color builds only run 1 island, often relying on Botanical/Spirebluff to produce blue mana. In games 2 and 3 they'll almost always leave enough mana open to cast negate on approach, oftentimes their only source of blue mana being a single dual land. If they already have a tapped island out, you can use Ruin on that dual land so they no longer have blue mana avaliable until their next untap, giving you clearance to cast Second Sun without fear of negation.
Super cool card.
Basically, what is the point to which a variant on a decklist is unique enough to where it is it's own deck?
For instance:
BG Delirium into GB Constrictor
RW Vehicles into Mardu Vehicles into Mardu Ballista
The most recent example of this format is 4 Color Energy into Sultai Energy. IMO, Sultai is different enough of an overall deck that it really shouldn't be called Sultai Energy, as it doesn't actually share that much with the Temur/4 color builds. It's much more of a Sultai Constrictor deck, but I'm not sure if it's distinct enough to call it a completely new decktype.
When exactly should we star considering a variant on a decklist it's own deck? Is Sultai Energy different enough to no longer be called an Energy deck?
http://decks.tcgplayer.com/Magic/deck/search?format=Standard&location=scg-open-standard-atlanta-04-30-2017
http://decks.tcgplayer.com/Magic/deck/search?format=Standard&location=scg-classic-standard-atlanta-04-30-2017
The Open was a bit less diverse than Classic, likely because nobody knew what was good yet and thus everyone just stuck with Mardu.
The Classic, however, looks AMAZING. Bant marvel winning? Only two of the same deck in top 8? I'm impressed.
Anyone else hopeful for this format?
The deck has no reason to be four colors, or to run Saheeli. Therefore it would pretty much just be Temur Midrange, which would need a new win condition. It doesn't really 'work just fine', it's a different deck.
Wrote a primer for this decktype here.
Largely I think our core is the following:
I personally consider Blisterpod to be vital, but the above are the most relevant aspects of the deck (as Golgari).