Is WotC killing modern?
Modern forum
Posted on Feb. 12, 2015, 12:24 p.m. by wwhitegoldd
So, looking at the banned list yesterday it seemed to me that WotC is banning every card that simply gets to good, instead of printing or unbanning a card that would balance the impact of the previously said card. (I know I'm going to get a lot of hate for this next bit.) With this in mind what if they simply unbanned every card on the list and let the PLAYERS find a way to balance the meta. And then after a couple of months if some card is simply dominating the format ban it or better yet print something to counteract it. what are your thoughts?
I would like to point out how good RIP is against goyf ChiefBell
February 12, 2015 4:55 p.m.
PreZchoICE1 says... #3
I think a huge misconception in the minds of players is that it has to be busted to work, or the deck has to contain a whole bunch of money cards to work. This is something that has plagued the minds of nigh every player since the game was created. There is actually quite a few cards that have a lot of untapped potential that arent tried/used because the general consensus is they are bad, or people have an inherent fear of the unknown AKA no one else has used it, so i dont know how it will do. Rather than take the odds on that they play something more familiar and never try out that synergy/combo that everyone says is jank and will never work.
One of the things I miss the most about pre-internet magic (I know the internet has been around longer than Magic, but never on its current scale) is showing up to a tourney and not having anything but the slightest idea of what others might be playing, or what new cards they may be trying out. Before people could test on a multitude of different platforms and interact on a multitude of different platforms people showed up to tournaments with stuff to 'try out'. This has mostly been killed by the advent of the internet as we currently know it.
February 12, 2015 4:56 p.m.
mathimus55 says... #4
Funny story on that note ChiefBell: I was playing against Tarmo-Twin at FNM and had to Slaughter Pact w/ only 3 lands out. Then he played Molten Rain on his main phase b/c he took out the Splinter Twin...that sucked
February 12, 2015 4:57 p.m.
GlistenerAgent - destroying pod did sort of screw them up to a large extent. Remember the deck contained a lot of 1ofs so without pod they have awful consistency. Batterskull answers most aggro or lower speed decks. You land a batter skull against something like zoo and it's pretty much gg. Even against tokens it's potent. I see batter skull as a way for any midrange deck to stabilise. It totally does address an entire weakness of the deck - suicidal manabase and a slow start.
February 12, 2015 4:58 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #6
I'd only bring in RIP against pure graveyard decks, of which there are no prominent archetypes. RIP answers Goyf, yes, but they can Abrupt Decay and build the yard back up. There is really one playable card that answers Siege Rhino, Tarmogoyf, Tasigur, the Golden Fang and Scavenging Ooze, and that card is Harvest Pyre. All of you should play it.
February 12, 2015 4:58 p.m.
PreZchoICE1 I agree that the internet can have an affect on the cards people play but isnt that half of what this site is trying to accomplish is to show people how good a card can be in a certain deck
February 12, 2015 4:59 p.m.
No rest in peace is not a viable card against BG/x. You don't even answer goyf. It's still there. They still have scooze. They still have their other win con - rhino, obliterator, something else. They also have Abrupt Decay. Stop it.
February 12, 2015 5 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #9
Yeh, but it was more like: pesudo-control mirror, Player A loses to Batterskull game 2 and brings in his Ancient Grudge. That happens a lot more in Modern, and people don't change their sideboard plan going into game 3 enough.
February 12, 2015 5 p.m.
I think the funnies slaughter pact I saw was someone was playing against merfolk and slaughterpacted then the fish player double spreading seas the two black sources they had out
February 12, 2015 5:03 p.m.
PreZchoICE1 says... #11
I agree, thats something thats a plague across all formats I observe anyhow that people do not change their sideboard plan nearly enough for game 3.
February 12, 2015 5:07 p.m.
The problem is sometimes you don't see any of their side board cards or just dont have any cards to change out for game three usually I just dump my entire SB in and pull it back or after I shuffle my deck a llittle even if I don't SB just so it looks like I did and they have no idea how many you sideboard
February 12, 2015 5:10 p.m.
Has anyone else noticed the person who made this post hasn't posted at all on it
February 12, 2015 5:13 p.m.
EndStepTop says... #15
People actually think RIP is SB tech for rock decks, daamn ChiefBell please make instructional "How to play modern" videos.
February 12, 2015 5:17 p.m.
That happens.
Honestly, I think modern is in a bad position but people just need to play the game to figure out what works. Wizards should just leave it well alone for a while. I've played games against Mirran Crusader where I've just auto lost basically. I've played games against Thalia that were a total nightmare. Similarly met folk and spreading seas is super annoying. There's always tron too. That strategy is a bit all or nothing though.
There are ways that dont require peculiar sideboard ing to beat abzan. Players will find them. They will capitalise on them and they will win. I have faith in this. It's just a shame it had to come to this.
February 12, 2015 5:20 p.m.
To me the bottom line is yes, the meta is in a bad place right now, but at the end of the day, for it to stabilise, we need to play. Not go running back to standard. Play. Brew. Win. Lose. In the end, we the players make the format. But we need to be playing it for that to happen.
On a side note, ChiefBell I would be more than happy to watch videos on modern by you, or GlistenerAgent or any other experienced modern player here I have something to learn from. It would be quite instructive, and in the current state of things, constructive.
February 12, 2015 5:36 p.m.
PreZchoICE1 says... #18
I hope that all of you would put thought into playing in our proposed Skype league (still in infancy of planning)
February 12, 2015 5:45 p.m.
My two cents, I'm not going to call the present meta healthy, but rarely is a meta healthy right after a major banning. Lets look at the meta in 6 months after mm2 has been released, and see if it's healthy.
Secondly modern is a tough format for wizards to regulate, and I honestly think they are still trying to figure out how to handle it. It obvious they don't want it to become legacy 2.0, that's why a large number of legacy staples are banned in modern. Birthing Pod was the ban we all saw coming, but nobody expected. And by banning treasure cruise, wizards has stated that they are uncomfortable with people drawing 3 cards for less than 4 mana.
Wizards isn't trying to kill modern, with mm2015 on the horizon I think we can expect wizards to make a modern master set fairly consistently. And everyone remember that while mm1 didn't lower the prices of goyf, or other top teir cards, it did lower the price of almost every other card printed in the set. For example the kamigawa dragons had a price drop, and lighting helix almost dropped in price 50%. As modern becomes more and more popular we can expect more and more support from wizards. Stay calm and play modern, because it's the best format.
February 12, 2015 6:04 p.m.
FreddyFlash311 says... #20
When I saw something about a restricted list for Modern in the first page I cringed. Seriously people, let's all just give the idea a big hell no and move forward.
It's been less than a month since the last time the Modern Banned List was updated. How can we judge the format to be any place but a place of flux? We're talking about the same Modern right? The (mostly) eternal format, right? Is it "bad" because it hasn't been "broken" yet? For really, give it some time and don't be so resistant to change.
February 12, 2015 6:50 p.m.
CanadianShinobi says... #21
Is Wizards killing Modern? That's a complicated question with no easy answer. So, to attempt an answer I will say both yes and no.
As ChiefBell has already noted, Wizards has made terrible judgements lately. For a company promoting Modern so much, they do very little to make sure it stays accessible and healthy to a large player base. This is especially true for those, like many of us here, who do not desire to engage in high levels of competitive play. Of the major points that ChiefBell listed I wish to address these four:
"1. They're failing to reprint cards that need to be reprinted to increase accessibility.
They're failing to print modern relevant cards in large numbers in new sets
They're failing to let the meta run its course for extended periods before bannings (insufficient evidence for bans)
They're making poor ban decisions that seem to destabilise the meta instead of restabilise it (see pod ban and current abzan dominance)"
The first point is fairly obvious. There are several cards in Modern that are considered staples. Not just for competitive play, but to even have a competent Modern deck. This can largely boil down to the Zendikar Fetchlands, but Noble Hierarch also falls into this category as it is a card that sees a wide range of play, or did.
The second point, to me at least, is perhaps one of their biggest sins. Let us think of Theros Block. How many cards in that entire Block have become Modern staples? I can think of 1. Eidolon of the Great Revel and that only sees sideboard play. Courser of Kruphix saw some play in GBX decks, but has since fallen into a fringe role. If Wizards is to engage people in Modern they must print Modern usable cards, however, as we have witnessed this is clearly not the case. Even in the most recent Khans and FRF sets we see little to no playability. Yes, Onslaught Fetches are a godsend, but aside from that what cards made it into Modern? Treasure Cruise and Dig Through Time, but the moment they were used in any widespread fashion Wizards banned them. And yet, Wizards complains that people are not using new cards within Modern. It seems to me that Wizards has a very poor understanding of what is actually usable in Modern. It needs to be low cost and big impact. This is why Siege Rhino is incredible. It gives Abzan players what they want for minimal investment. It fits the Turn Four rule perfectly by making a major impact upon the board.
To move on to point number three and number four, since I consider them interrelated. The failure to let the Meta run its course and by extension poor decisions when it comes to banning cards is something that I find inexplicably irresponsible. This is closely linked to number two for me because it tells me that Wizards does very little to encourage Modern from a development standpoint. If you are going to promote a format then you must needs understand that format. With the recent banning, especially of Birthing Pod it tells me, as a player who desires to work his way into competitive forms of Magic, that Wizards does not understand Modern. They banned Pod because of it's potential in the future, or according to a podcast by Patrick Chapin last month, they banned Pod because of the Modern Pro Tour. Both reasons are arbitrary and absurd. This is because the discussion of Pod was not a recent event. It had been going on for at least a year. And to make matters worse we have seen a recent surge of Abzan decks which now constitute as roughly 30% of the meta. I seem to recall several members of T/O making predictions that GBX decks would rise in the wake of the bans, but to such a level is ludicrous. It shows a vital lack of foresight on Wizards part.
However, despite all of this, they are not trying to kill Modern. They do want it to succeed and are attempting to make things better, however they are going about it in the wrong way. To those who say, Modern Masters is a benefit to Modern, I respectfully disagree. The staple cards are being driven too high. If Wizards wants to help Modern players they must begin to allow Standard to have more power so that Modern can acquire its reprints. They must also stop banning things based around the data of Pro Tours and must allow the meta to work itself out over a longer period of time than 3 months, because Pro Tours do not reflect Magic in a significant way. And perhaps most of all, Wizards must begin testing for Modern. They should not simply design sets within a vacuum, especially since they want people to play with new cards and they want those cards in Modern.
February 12, 2015 8:42 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #22
To play devil's advocate here: Eidolon of the Great Revel is a four-of in burn. Courser of Kruphix is still quite strong in GBx. Anger of the Gods is one of the best sweepers available. Keranos, God of Storms is a strong finisher in sideboards and sometimes maindeck in Twin and control decks. But yeh, agree with most of what you said.
February 12, 2015 8:47 p.m.
Courser I also played heavily in scapeshift decks
And I know that it was already in decks pre theros but it also brought the reprint of thoughtsieze
February 12, 2015 8:54 p.m.
GlistenerAgent says... #24
It's not played heavily in Shift. It saw some play when Delver was around.
February 12, 2015 9:08 p.m.
hey let me defend the theros block even if it is bad
February 12, 2015 9:10 p.m.
PreZchoICE1 says... #27
I think courser is going to find a home in Junk.
February 12, 2015 9:28 p.m.
wwhitegoldd says... #28
cjk191997 I have been out all day so I have not had a chance to comment. Here is my 2 cents. Before the banings I played pod and from personal experience people seem to think pod players are pissed of that pod got banned because they spent $500+ on the deck. At least in my case that is not true. I'm pissed because pod was opressive, yes, but that's because treasure cruise made delver a thing which in turn made people not play Jund/Junk/Tron which are the weak match ups for pod which in turn made more people play pod because it beat delver which was the most prominent deck in the format. What WotC should have done is ban cruise let ugin get printed, let tron have essentially an insta win against pod. WotC also underestimates the players. At my local store when cruise got printed there where 5-7 people playing delver, then people started to play pod which brought the numbers of delver decks down to 2-3 and brought the number of pod decks to 4-6. a couple of weeks after that people started to play twin and jund/junk and then those decks did really well and pod didn't. then the banings happened and I didn't have a chance to see what else would happen to the meta. my point is if wizards had left the format alone it would have stabilized. Instead they decided to jump the gun and ban pod, cruise, and dig, thus killing one of the most loved decks in modern. If pod was still to oppressive after another couple of months ban kitchen finks. You laugh, but as an experienced pod player if they banned finks pod would HURT like hell. banning finks makes melira pod SOOO much worse and it hurts the burn, aggro, and jund/junk match up by a lot.
February 12, 2015 9:32 p.m.
CanadianShinobi says... #29
@ wwhitegoldd There are Pod players pissed off that their deck became useless. Especially those who don't have the funds to make another Modern deck. Wizards got the Hype Train to full speed and then slammed on the breaks. It was reckless and irresponsible. Also, Pod did not become oppressive because Delver became a Tier 1 deck, that's nonsense. Pod had been putting up good results for quite some time. Jund had also fallen out of favour due to it's suicidal mana base and the lack of DRS to create long term support for the deck.
Ugin and Tron are not an answer to Pod, I have no idea where you came to that conclusion. Pod was an incredibly resilient deck.
"If pod was still to oppressive after another couple of months ban kitchen finks."
Firstly that's utterly asinine. Kitchen Finks was only good in Pod as were so many other cards that were a one of in the deck. You can't just ban Kitchen Finks and keep Pod. No, Pod should have been banned, but under Wizard's reasoning it should have been banned last year, before the massive Modern hype. Secondly, I'm sorry but I don't particularly support your anecdotal evidence, but I agree Wizards should have let the format stabilize.
February 13, 2015 12:12 a.m.
JexInfinite says... #30
I think that Wizards should finally stand up to the secondary market and print staples in core sets. Look at KTK fetches. They are hovering around $10-$20. They are still being printed. That's pretty good.
The DTT ban was also really dumb because it was speculative, and probably wouldn't have been a problem.
February 13, 2015 1:55 a.m.
JexInfinite DDT definitely would've been a problem while its not ancestrial recall its an instant speed for the almost the same cost as cruise because its an instant it leaves to much room to kick ass it let's a delver player choose to burn or counter something or just go for the DDT vs cruise you have to commit to during your main phase
February 13, 2015 8:12 a.m.
It costs literally double the mana and draws fewer cards. It is not TC. Delver decks would undoubtedly run it, but the effect for them would be weaker. Delver decks didn't run too many counterspells or tricks - they just ran burn, cantrips, and wincons. Drawing cards was their bread and butter. Allowing them to draw fewer cards, even if they are chosen, is a nerf to the deck. It's not a problem for a combo deck that's looking for something specific, but it is a problem to a tempo deck that just wants cards.
Banning things speculatively is just stupid. No one has any proof or evidence of what could have happened. Its completely pointless to argue about. Even the argument along the lines of 'but it made twin and scapeshift too powerful' is absolute rubbish because both (whilst undoubtedly strong) are very answerable by a variety of other decks. There should never, ever be a situation where something is banned because if what it could be. Bans should ONLY be based on what actually happens. It's such an awful, dangerous precedent to set; to allow wizards to ban cards with no proof of their format warping effects.
February 13, 2015 8:43 a.m.
ChiefBell im not saying it wouldnt have hurt delver if they had to run DDT over cruise I'm just saying there are some advantages to it while cruise was the better card for it DDT would've definatly taken the place of cruise not to the exact same effect but it would've taken the place and I was explaining why it would've and the rational behind why its not a terrible alternative to cruise if it had been able to come to that
February 13, 2015 8:48 a.m.
Ok cool. So it would have replaced cruise. So what? We need proof that it replacing cruise would warp the format. That delver would continue to dominate the meta. That it would be an autoinclude in most decks etc. It shouldnt matter if one card replaces another in a deck - what should matter is the result of that replacement. If delver stayed on top then it would need a ban. If delver started to perform worse it wouldn't. Simple.
February 13, 2015 8:52 a.m.
I'm just saying I understand where wizards is coming from that that it should've happened besides this argument is pointless its not going to help by us saying this wouLD or wouldn't have happened we don't know but I see where wizards was coming from and I see your point as well is that an acceptable answer ChiefBell
February 13, 2015 8:57 a.m.
JexInfinite says... #36
ChiefBell People don't understand that Pod was banned alongside DTT. There are quite a few decks which Pod rendered useless which could stand up to Delver, like Living End. Banning DTT just removes another two decks from the format without really powering down any other decks. Control and combo worked well before, and work well after. We just don't have Delver or Ascendancy Combo. Neither would have been oppressive.
Cruise was splashable in things like 8rack and Burn because it was really cheap, and fixed the problems of the deck. Dig can't fix the problem, because 2 specific cards and UU is much worse than 3 random cards and U.
I've been saying this a lot: the DTT ban was arresting the man before he may have attempted to murder someone. You have no proof, and he hasn't done anything yet.
February 13, 2015 9:02 a.m.
It's just super weak for wizards to justify banning a card with a prediction of what might maybe happen. Not that dig would replace cruise - that's almost guaranteed, but that it would do it in such a way that delver would still dominate the meta. I don't think it's ok for wizards to use that as the reason for banning a card because as you rightly pointed out - we just can't say.
They banned Bitterblossom from the outset because it was powerful in standard at the time. It was banned because it was supposed to be powerful. When it was finally unbanned it was almost completely ignored. Wizards made an assumption and they were wrong.
February 13, 2015 9:02 a.m.
God. Living End against Delver. That would be brutal.
February 13, 2015 9:04 a.m.
PreZchoICE1 says... #39
Im fairly certain wizards wanted to let the format stabilize and look at banning pod at the end of this year but the players (pros) got up in arms that there was (originally) no Modern Pro Tour.
February 13, 2015 9:43 a.m.
CanadianShinobi says... #40
I suppose I must ask a stupid question: If Wizards knows that the majority of their player base are not pros, then why bother basing their bans around the results of the Pro Tour? Is it because the influence Pros have over the common player base?
February 13, 2015 10:48 a.m.
It's influence, but also it's because it's better to make bans at the highest level, rather than based on the lowest. If they listened to most unskilled players Lightning Bolt would go haha. Also the tournament scene brings in money (sponsors) and attracts new players so it's more important to support that than casuals that bring in less money.
I follow competitive E-sports like DOTA, StarCraft and Counsterstrike so I have this discussion often. The gist is basically that for the company to continue producing the game and attract new sponsors and new players and build up hype its better to listen to the pros than the unknowns.
February 13, 2015 11:26 a.m.
JexInfinite says... #42
TappedOut has no influence at all over Wizards. We are powerless. All we can do is watch.
February 13, 2015 6:55 p.m.
CanadianShinobi says... #43
@JexInfinite in my experience there's nothing a good ol fashioned contract with the Devil can't solve.
February 13, 2015 10:54 p.m.
Hjaltrohir says... #44
I feel I am way out of my depth here what with CanadianShinobi making contracts with the devil, I will take a strategic retreat from this conversation...
February 14, 2015 2:41 a.m.
JexInfinite says... #45
awesomeguy37 Oh hell no, you're in it with us. We're all in. No turning back. No sitzpinkling out. We're going to ask the Devil to manipulate Wizards to our will.
February 14, 2015 2:45 a.m.
CrazyLittleGuy says... #46
@ChiefBell You're saying that they can't ban speculatively, yet I don't see the problem with planning for the future. In fact, almost all of what Wizards does is based on speculation for the future, like you know, printing cards. They seem to be pretty good at it, considering how infrequently the banlists are changed. Sure, mistakes are made, but supposing that the entire system is flawed based on outliers is a fallacy. Saying that you can't ban a card based on what it might do is just like saying you can't refrain from printing a card based on what it might do. Example: at the time, Wizards didn't reprint Liliana of the Veil, despite testing it for a planned M14 printing. Why? Because their testing was proof enough for them that it would be too good. And lo and behold, Monoblack Devotion decks turned out to be the dominant archetype, and would have been absolutely bonkers with LotV. I would wager Wizards did some testing with Dig Through Time before banning it too.
February 14, 2015 3:13 a.m.
the thing is I don't think wizards are good at planning for the future of modern in the slightest. Not one bit. This is highlighted by the reasons I gave on page one. Their history of supporting this format is riddled with mistakes. If they were better I might be more inclined to agree, but as it stands - no.
Comparing reprints in standard to bannings in modern is a false equivalency. Standard sets are tested extensively for months at a time, and we know this. We have lengthy reports for this being the case. Ban lists are often finalised shortly before the announcement. I really don't think wizards do play test prospective scenarios with ban lists - I've never heard of such a thing. If no reports surface suggesting that something happens then we have to assume it doesn't happen. Besides if they did they wouldn't claim that delver wants dig as much as it wants cruise. It doesn't and we all know that. Furthermore wizards DONT speculate for the future of modern when printing new cards. They themselves have said they do not test new standard cards in modern. So no, they don't test for this format rigorously. They approach modern differently to standard so comparing the two isn't valid. Also standard has a much smaller card pool and a more shallow meta game therefore it is just easier to test and predict for.
My argument is that when considering a ban list for a format where the cards that come in are completely untested (as wizards themselves have admitted) speculation is far less important than watching what actually happens. Even if they did test I'd still say this though because there's a comment from Aaron forscythe somewhere where he basically says that they test the shit out of standard then players go and do crazy things they never planned for anyway. They do seem to be pretty transparent at saying 'we are not fantastic at planning for the future'. Furthermore the number of games played by a closed R&D department pales in comparison to the number of games played by millions of players all over the world. We're better at play testing than they are because there are millions of us and tens of them.
I think arguing about how good wizards are at speculating is a bit of a red herring. We should approach magic scientifically. There just shouldn't be any guessing at all. The reason I say this is because we can actually never really tell how good a guess is. With dig banned we don't really know what would have happened. It's such a dangerous thing to do because it completely stifles any hint of evidence seeking and development. Wizards can't actually be proved wrong. The difference between pod and dig is that pod had years of evidence suggesting it was great, dig had absolutely zero evidence when referring to the reason they banned it (delver). Because no one ran it in delver yet. The precedent this sets is that we have a company who have admitted they don't test for modern, who have admitted they're quite poor at guessing, and who have admitted that the player base is more imaginative than they are, making decisions about something without proof. It takes away any creativity and just stops the argument. We can't argue because neither one of us are right. Dig could be shit. It could be great. If they keep doing this in the future not only are they going to stop new powerful cards from being tested, but they're also going to completely stagnate the meta. I maintain the ONLY way they can make bannings in modern is based on proof from high level play.
It's madness to think that we're comfortable for wizards to make decisions about how we play the game behind closed doors. They don't design the game for them, they should be designing it for us - as their clients. Therefore any meta changes should be down to evidence collected from thousands of public games. I'm not arguing this should be you average fnm but ptqs etc. When wizards plan for the future they should refer to previous evidence to drive their decisions - not guesswork. A future based on shaky foundations is not one we deserve as players.
ChiefBell says... #1
You want to beat delver? Run mass removal.
Want to beat Abzan? Turn off their efficient removal and liliana with Thalia, Guardian of Thraben. Attack their manabase so they can't even cast the spells they want. Bonus points for destroying lands after they Slaughter Pact so they're forced to lose. Alternatively dodge their entire deck almost with protection black, and to a lesser extent protection green.
February 12, 2015 4:54 p.m.