Why I Am Quitting Standard Following the "No Ban" Announcement Despite Doing Well at GPs
Standard forum
Posted on March 14, 2017, 3:35 p.m. by Riro_Beavs
NOTE: Before you respond with unwarranted comments about how this post is simply complaining about combo being in Standard, please read the whole post especially the part about how I would not quit Standard simply because combo exist.
I have played Magic on and off for over 20 years now. I played through two player-base extinction level events (Combo Winter and Affinity into Jitte war) before eventually quitting all forms of completive play for 12 years after finally souring on the game during the Jitte war. You would think that Wizards would learn from past mistakes rather than doubling down when they make grossly negligent design errors, but I guess unlimited power leads to thought processes that are devoid of even the most basic forms of logic and reason. Standard is the weakest of the major formats; is it really too much to ask for to not have to play against a turn-four two-card infinite combo? If I wanted to play in a hyper-aggressive format with combo elements, I would play Modern where there are appropriate answers to both. Standard has become a format where any competitive deck needs to run ample answers to stop both the aggressive decks and combo while also being designed to devote its mana usage to having mana up for said combo answers every turn starting potentially on turn 3 if on the draw.
EXAMPLE: Game 2 Post Saheeli Hate Board Package on the Play with UB Eldrazi
Opening Hand: Sunken Hollow, Swamp, Aether Hub, Transgress, Negate, Cultivators Caravan, Thought-Knot Seer (an obvious keep vs 4-Color Combo on the play)
Turn 1 - I play Sunken Hollow; Opponents Turn 1 - he cast Attune with Aether; Turn 2 - I cast Transgress the Mind taking a Saheeli; Opponent Turn 2 - he plays a land and cast Oath of Nissa getting a Rouge Refiner; Turn 3 - I cast Cultivators Caravan to have a 5/5 attacker when I cast Thought-Knot Seer during the next turn if needed over holding up mana for Negate because I already took one Saheeli and I knew he had a Rogue Refiner. Opponents Turn 3 - he casts Rouge Refiner as expected. Turn 4 - I cast Thought-Knot Seer taking a second Saheeli leaving a Guardian, a Harnessed Lighting, and lands in his hand then I crew the Caravan and swing for five with no blocks; Opponents Turn 4 - he top decks a third Saheeli, cast it, and leaves Refiner up to block. I draw a land, cast Anticipate with mana up for every combo answer in the deck but get two lands and a Reality Smasher. I proceed to lose a game to variance where I had momentum significant enough that objectively the opponent would have otherwise struggled mightily to come back from at all (let alone being able to flip momentum and win in just two turns) but for top decking the second piece of a two-card infinite combo.
However, the combo itself (while it does severely warp the format) would not cause me to leave the format without certain other factors also being present. First, with two sets of ally-colored lands that need significant numbers of basic lands to be playable in the format, it has made playing ally-based three-color decks nearly impossible. Grixis and Esper both are boarderline per se unplayable because their respective mana bases cannot support the decks respective mana needs. I have even struggled to play a two-color ally-colored Eldrazi deck due to the mana base. Meanwhile the best non-combo decks in the format are BG Snake (enemy color-lands), Mardu (two sets of enemy-colored lands), and while I would put it in Tier-1.5 at best, Temur Tower (two sets of enemy-colored lands). Having one mana cycle that clearly outclasses the other is a significant hit to fairness on its own which left the format vulnerable to warping. Combo was then able to step in and warped the format with great efficiency. Even still, the combination of these two issues would still not be enough to drive me to leave the format. Variance is a fundamental part of Magic that must be accepted by any player that wants to ascend to a competitive level. One of the biggest contributing factors to me being able to develop into a competitive player so quickly after my return to the game was being able to accept variance for what it is rather than allowing it to put me on tilt thus leading to future mistakes. Many might try and take this article and twist it into being a manifesto against a clear culture of Tier-1 net-decking or some form of a salty response from a player on a bad luck streak, but that could not be further from the truth. On the contrary, I quite like playing non-meta decks against a sea of net deckers because a smaller deck pool makes side boarding easier and inexperienced players piloting Tier-1 decks rarely avoid material misplays. Moreover, I have actually been enjoying a relative uptick in positive variance in recent weeks. That being said, I have endured some truly unfortunate negative variance streaks since returning to the game a year ago without ever once seriously considering quitting. As long as the base variance in the game is uniform across players, I see absolutely no reason to be upset when variance snatches a win away (or prevents you from even competing at all).
The straw the broke the preverbal camels back for me was the emergence of the latest variant of the 4-Color Combo deck this weekend. I am only quitting the format following the lack of a Guardian ban because when you combine the current mana base issues discussed above with the mana efficiency of the 4-Color Combo deck, it warps the foundational assumptions about variance that underlie the fairness of the game. This latest versions plays four colors with somewhere between 19 and 21 lands and yet the deck is able to avoid any material issues related to getting enough mana or mana of the correct color. Further, by having an auto-win combo that only takes eight spots in the deck, it frees up space for pure resource cards that no other deck could get away with running in such large quantities (Attune with Aether/Oath of Nissa). These eight main deck spells in turn thins lands from the deck (or puts them on the bottom of the deck in the case of Oath sometimes). The end result is a top deck value variance percentage that skyrockets as the game goes along. In a nutshell, the deck has variance advantages in all of the following areas:
Opposing decks will lose due to mana variance issues (insufficient total mana or insufficient color balance) at a rate that reflects their mana curve and the color complexity of their card base meanwhile 4-Color Combo is able to play the most valuable cards from four colors with a total land count that would make most aggressive decks jealous while giving away games to mana variance at a much lower rate than the average deck in the format or even compared to the other Tier-1/Tier 1.5 decks in the format.
Opposing decks will lose due to top deck variance issues (mana flooding, drawing cards out of sequence, opponent top decking timely material value) at a normal rate meanwhile 4-Color Combo will rarely mana flood and the 4-Color Combo mana base and card selection has led to a deck that can sequence cards in almost any order and still win.
As in my above example, 4-Color Combo is able to turn around a game state that no other deck in the format could come back from with any consistency by drawing one card because it is able to win on command regardless of board state.
The 4-Color Combo variant only breaks the fairness of the game when you combine these three variance-warping effects. The fact that the deck is beatable is not relevant when variance is warped to this great of a degree. The unavoidable fact is that before the players ever draw a card, 4-Color Combo has an unfair advantage because the underlying variance that is a part of Magic is significantly skewed in their favor. Even worse, Wizards appears to be covering this up by preventing there from being statistics to show win percentages of a specific deck against the field. Sadly, we have reached a point where the game itself is now warping as a result of several very poor R&D decisions combining with one grossly negligent missed combo. Banning Guardian would have likely resulted in a format dominated by Mardu, but at least the resulting narrow format would be due to an imbalance in the strength of the cards available to other color combinations/decks rather than being the result of inherent statistical variance imbalances that cannot be easily fixed by infusing new value for the weaker colors in future sets. Seeing how Wizards appears resolute to double down on their incompetence for now, here is hoping for allied-colored Pain Lands and a Heros Downfall reprint in Amonkhet.
I actually expected the ban of Felidar Guardian, and when it didn't happen, I just thought the format has become stale. What Wizards has done, essentially, pushed the sales of Aether Revolt and Kaladesh above what is good for the game. Now, of course, that is WotC's prerogative, but I think putting sales above the format is a mistake. Of course, money makes the world go 'round.
March 14, 2017 5:07 p.m.
I grew pretty frustrated with Standard. I've been playing the relatively new Eternal digital card game. It's basically Magic with some changes. When I told my friends this, they immediately shot me down saying "It's not magic." Well, yeah, no shit. But it sure as hell beats the current state of standard. I also get to play dimir control deck to my hearts content.
Standard's pretty shitty atm. For control players, the mere existence of Heart of Kiran and Scrapheap Scrounger make things insanely complicated. We actually have more support for control in standard than in a long while with win cons that don't kill the game like Elixir of Immortality... Sucks for hardcore draw-go fanatics.
March 14, 2017 9:04 p.m.
I have to agree - I have not played standard, with exception the game day. The issues outlined here are not an exhaustive list either - I would add lack of a whole archetype (control), rock-paper-scissors meta gets boring every week, there has been close to 0 variation in the past month.
I am with TheDevicer on the Eternal plan (join us on T/O Eternal discussion - here). I have been having more fun with that game than any standard or most games of magic.
The last time I had fun when playing magic is when I played Canadian Highlander and Pauper, formats which are very wide in terms of top tier decks.
March 15, 2017 3:49 a.m.
pleasiodmakerblooloo says... #6
So, what format are you planning to move on? And would you recommend it?
March 15, 2017 7:22 a.m.
I would love to move on to Frontier, but there aren't enough people interested in it at my LGS.
Commander is what I have gravitated to. I can use some of my old cards that I used to love, and there are plenty of different playgroups around.
In fact I signed up for Standard tonight, dropped immediately, and played Commander.
Three people turned up to play Standard tonight. That was down from six last week.
March 15, 2017 8:06 a.m.
I'm primarily an EDH player, so I'm not worried. No playing in organized shop events tho. My local shop does weekly standard, draft, modern, and legacy, so I could do any format if I wanted it badly enough.
March 15, 2017 9:19 a.m.
Can it deal with Copy Cat and Vehicles? I'm a little doubtful. I think a deck with multiple expensive cards like Avacyn and Sorin will have a hard time answering the aggro curve of mardu. You also only have 2-6 mainboard answers to copy cat. That's pretty shitty, if I'm honest. You can run it and it won't be shit at shop level, but I doubt it's going to make big waves.
March 15, 2017 10:07 p.m.
I have played Control against both Copy Cat and Mardu Vehicles and they absolutely eat it alive.
Heart of Kiran being a Vehicle means that you can only use an Instant, or sac Land, to get rid of it.
You are limited to Fatal Push, Grasp of Darkness, Murder, To the Slaughter, Blighted Fen, or Anguished Unmaking. For To the Slaughter or Blighted Fen they can just choose the Crew member, then they get another one out next Main Phase.
That sounds like a lot of options, but you can only stuff so many of them into one deck.
Murder is usually too little, too late.
You can't snatch Heart of Kiran with either Harsh Scrutiny or Transgress the Mind.
Anguished Unmaking speeds up the count down, to aggro you out.
Another problem is Scrapheap Scrounger. You've got to Exile it with Declaration in Stone or Anguished Unmaking, or it will keep coming back.
Using Anguished Unmaking on a 3/2 Creature is GREAT for your Opponent. They usually have lots of other stuff they'd rather you not use it on.
There are so many low cost Creatures in Mardu Vehicles that you have a hard time removing them all.
By the time you can board wipe, it is Turn 4. Their Heart of Kiran won't be hit and they just need another Crew member to continue on their merry way.
Copy Cat players will make sure their Main and Sideboards contain enough Counter spells to match your removal.
That includes stuff like Spell Queller.
The timing has got to be just right to stop them comboing off.
You have to keep mana open from Turn 3 onwards, so you can clear away Saheeli Rai, and Felidar Guardian.
That stops you setting up your Win Cons.
Normally you would put Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet on the field around Turn 4. Now you can't, because you must leave mana open.
You usually don't get to play your Archangel Avacyn Flip and Sorin, Grim Nemesis unless your Opponent has an insanely bad draw.
In order to play them you have to have at least seven mana - five for Avacyn Flip and two for Grasp of Darkness, or eight mana to play Sorin and Grasp.
You can't really play Evolving Wilds to kill Felidar Guardian with Fatal Push, because you'd need a few copies for consistency, and that then slows down your mana base.
Slow mana is not good for a Control deck.
I'm sure people will look at this description and pick apart my card choices, and play style.
All I can tell you is that I have been playing Control successfully since SOI and it has never struggled like it has at the moment.
Control is not good against Aggro. Snek Deck outpaces it, too.
March 16, 2017 11:48 a.m.
I'll tell you another thing that indicates Standard is in trouble at the moment.
Where did all the Planeswalkers go?
Apart from Saheeli Rai you don't see them on the field much at LGS level, these days.
I am still rocking Ob Nixilis Reignited and Sorin, Grim Nemesis but I can't remember the last time I saw Liliana, the Last Hope or Dovin Baan, which used to be everywhere.
Some people used to use Chandra, Torch of Defiance as well. Haven't seen her for ages.
The reason is, when you've got a 4/4 Flier hitting you on Turn 3, Planeswalkers aren't very effective.
March 16, 2017 12:23 p.m.
I work part-time at a LGS. Standard has all but died. We had 2 months straight of not getting enough people (8) to fire standard FNM while we'd run 3-6 drafts that same day. We switched to Frontier and have seen over 15 people a week consistently.
Standard is pretty poor. To me the most notable issue with it is just how designed it has become and how that does not fly with a player base that has access to the internet. Decks in standard are very apparent. Mardu vehicles, UW spirits, delirium.... these are very obvious decks. There is very little of players discovering and using unnoticed combinations of cards. Thus, most of the game exists within the R&D designed metagame where players know the field - a very small field with a very limited card pool.
The field in standard becomes set very quickly and we are seeing very little evolution within a standard season. Where is the creativity? It is being choked out by a format too easily charted.
As for the OP, I don't find Guardian/Saheeli to be the issue. From what I understand, Wizards missed that combo in play-testing. To me it is the thing that shows just how designed the rest of the cards are. They are creating a very restricted field of play in standard and this does not make for a lasting, evolving play-experience.
I don't think this is a new problem for standard... it just seems to be getting worse, and the player base is getting wiser (online financial tracking of cards, proxy/online access to other formats, mass amounts of MTG strategy discussion). Less people are committed by neccessity to the grind of standard, as other options (commander, legacy, frontier, modern, pauper....) have never been better supported AND these other options tend to offer a fuller play experience.
Players tend towards the new and the interesting. Standard may contain all new cards but new power cards there tend to simply become the new power deck. They don't alter and grow the format like when the release of fatal push sets off dominoes in modern. Frontier for instance, simply by grouping cards that previously weren't grouped together, offers a new and interesting playing field for players who have played all the cards in it. It may eventually be charted as well as standard but it takes longer and changes affect a larger card pool.... there is more sand in the box for people to play in.
Standard makes me think of people who were happy to build their Legos according to the schematics of each set rather than pooling the pieces to really see what can be built.
March 16, 2017 1:16 p.m.
Guinessthemenace I play B/W Midrange and it can beat both Copycat and Mardu. It really only struggles against G/B Delirium.
I run 9 removal. that can help you survive and take control against Mardu.
and post side board against Copycat renders it helpless.
March 16, 2017 8:12 p.m.
Dredge4life says... #15
Argeaux Gideon, Ally of Zendikar says hi. You're right though. Aside from him and Nissa planeswalkers are too slow for standard. We've hit some pretty dark times.
April 3, 2017 10:32 p.m.
Isn't this Standard format suffering due to the changes in release schedule? They were originally planning on sets rotating at a much quicker rate. They may have seen the combo, said it'd be fine if combo players got to enjoy some spotlight for 3 to 4 months, then the combo would rotate out. WotC changed the release schedule back to how it was before BFZ, AFTER they had designed for having 3 blocks per year. As far as I know, this also caused problems in BFZ because it was supposed to be a 3 set block, instead of a 2 set block, so Limited was messed up and so were the strange mechanics that didn't cross over well.
It seems to me that WotC got really greedy. They thought they could rotate more times per year, forcing people to buy new decks on a more frequent basis, but players just decided to stop playing Standard or Magic altogether. Standard has been pretty garbage for several years for a variety of reasons (maybe even longer? Caw Blade was pretty shit). I think this is starting to put some nails in the coffin.
April 5, 2017 3:47 a.m.
The thing is Mardu Vehicles is mostly built with cards from the last two sets. Faster rotation would really have only removed Gideon, Ally of Zendikar, and the deck doesn't rely on that.
As I mentioned above, Heart of Kiran was just a poor design with so many ways available to Crew it on Turn 3.
You could argue that Copy Cat wouldn't be viable without a longer rotation,
Wizards have already acknowledged that they did not see the infinite combo. If they had, they would have made it so Felidar Guardian could only bounce a Creature.
Once again, poor design.
April 5, 2017 1:29 p.m.
Homura_Akemi says... #18
I have the same feelings. I don't want to play standard anymore, I'm more into commander, and don't really care about Amonkhet. It's kind of sad that Wizards has turned the game (Standard and new sets specifically) into a money making scheme instead of what we all know and love. We have the Face-walker problems and the Magic Story controversy over the Gatewatch which is just frustrating. While a lot of these changes may benefit newer, less dedicated players, it's like a knife in the back for those who have been faithful to the game over the years.
April 9, 2017 2 p.m.
Dredge4life says... #19
Don't get me started on the Gatewatch...
Garruk
For
President.
April 9, 2017 5:19 p.m.
@Argeaux: Ah so it was just Mind Over Matter/Skullclamp all over again lol.
Do you know if there were any issues at all though with the changes to the schedule? Normally, they design blocks 2 years before they rotate in. With the changes to the Standard format release dates, were there any issues for R&D that caused them to overlook things because of time?
@Homura_Akemi: Part of the problem is experienced, long-time players don't buy sealed product. We buy singles on the secondary market. The only time we ever buy sealed product is for Limited. IMO, this is entirely WotC's fault. I don't feel like spending $4 for $1 worth of cards. However, I jump all over the chance to buy things like Commander pre-constructed decks, From the Vault, etc. WotC really doesn't make enough of these products, and they don't always make them to match their value. Even some of the Commander decks are only worth $20 when their MSRP is $30.
Obviously, they can't just make decks filled with a bunch of overpowered nonsense or come with 4 copies of Jace, the Mind Sculptor and 4 Tarmogoyf. They could, however, make decks that are actually playable for an FNM. For instance, budget Infect or RDW sold in precons that have 4 copies of their important cards with rares that actually fit the deck, along with the correct types of lands.
The event decks are a step in the right direction, but they're also rather lacking. The B/W Modern Tokens deck was okay. But seriously? Only 3 Path to Exile when the deck needs 4? 2 Inquisition of Kozilek with no Thoughtseize? Elspeth, Knight-Errant as the mythic? A mana base consisting of 4 Caves of Koilos and 2 City of Brass? The value was there, except it wasn't in the right places.
April 9, 2017 6:17 p.m.
I am still playing some budget casual standard stuff because I mostly play with kids who can't afford to buy singles like veteran players do.
I have decided that I have no reason to be playing with cards worth more than $5 each in this environment. For example, I pulled a Saheeli and threw her in a deck because I had her but now I'm planning to drop my value cards like her at 75% tcg mid because not only do I not want to buy cards over $5, I don't even want to keep and play with them. Instead, I want to sell them off and try to play budget casual for even cheaper than cheap.
I think FNM needs to break out of a narrow focus on hypercompetitive tournaments.
April 9, 2017 6:53 p.m.
Honestly, it's not Copy Cat or Mardu Vehicles alone causing the problem but both of them together are way too devastating... Copy Cat is easy enough to control but doing so means you're weak to Vehicles, stopping Vehicles is a little bit harder but still doable, however doing that usually means you're weak to combo.
I've also gone from driving 40 minutes to play standard because it was fun to quitting the format. I'm playing a lot of modern and commander and draft, but haven't even felt any desire to play standard since Aether Revolt released. I was hopeful for Amonkhet and while we finally got some answers for the stupid Scrapheap Scrounger, none fight off the Cat Combo well enough. I do think that Amonkhet has some of the answers and if aided by a Felidar Guardian ban, it might start being fun again... but it doesn't look likely yet.
April 9, 2017 8:03 p.m.
Thinking about it #1 Mardu Vehicles is what killed Standard for me.
Not the deck in and of itself.
More the fact that, unless I buy the deck that wins the Pro Tour, everyone else is going to build that and smash with it.
The great joy of Standard to me is building a deck and seeing if I can tweak it to beat decks that other people have built themselves.
My LGS used to run two flights of FNM - Serious and Casual.
If you had a Pro Deck you played Serious. Which meant that those of us playing Casual could face off against other builders.
Now, due to Standard numbers dropping, only one flight is being run.
So now my joy of playing against other deck builders has gone. If I win my first game I just end up playing against Pro Decks for the rest of the night.
My love of Standard as a format has died.
April 10, 2017 10:19 a.m.
@sylvannos Although you're right about enfranchised players being reluctant to buy sealed products, it's when things like Conspiracy 2 or Modern Masters 3 come out that we happily shove out cash. Those two releases were absolute slam dunks and I'm sure most people here bought something related to those expansions.
Unless I seriously get back into standard, I don't see myself buying boosters. Even then, i'll draft rather than just crack. I think that's a view shared by many people.
That being said, if standard improves a bit, I have no problems jumping back into the format. The last time I played was when we had KTK out as the last set.
Argy says... #2
A lot of people really can't understand why there are those of us that no longer enjoy Standard.
Besides the colour advantage you mentioned, Delerium was strong coming into AEther Revolt. Winding Constrictor just pushed it WAY over the top.
I think it was assumed that Heart of Kiran would be more difficult to Crew than Smuggler's Copter but nuh-uh, plenty of options abound in
Some people on Tappedout are saying that they have been able to build decks that match the Unholy Trinity.
I wonder what their meta is like and whether they consistently beat the Trinity.
I'm at the stage where I'm not even that interested in Amonkhet any longer.
I trusted that Wizards would balance things up a little bit for AER, but that turned out to be so wrong.
March 14, 2017 4:29 p.m.