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  • 1

    Quote from Aazadan »

    Really? 4 Surgical Extraction mainboard was becoming common in every deck, not just to stop Hogaak, but because it's a good answer to opposing Surgicals since everyone was running them anyways.


    That deck won a big event recently, the consensus afterwards was that it didn't run enough GY hate.


    Same event, same top 8, while none were MB that's a burn deck with 6 pieces of GY hate.


    5 pieces, with an extra way to tutor for a piece MB, so effectively 6.


    4 main, 4 side.

    6 was the standard during week 2 of Hogaak, it was creeping up in week 3. And that's in addition to other cards being sideboarded just for it.

    The consensus was that the UW list was running the correct amount of hate, not that it wasn't enough

    Burn and Hardened Scales played the right amount of hate, 0 main and the have their sideboard ready, no problem there (although I don't see the tutor you mention in the scales list, Recombiner searches for Constructs only)

    The GDS list is interesting as I think it's the only I've seen with 4 maindeck cards to deal with graveyard strategies and even has room for 4 Jailers in the side, I think it's the list with most hate I've seen but it's still less than what you stated:
    mainboarding 4 pieces of GY hate and having another 6 to 8 in the SB

    These sideboards reflect how the deck warped the meta around it and are more than enough to justify the ban, no need to exaggerate, a deck with 10-12 graveyard hate cards is likely not going to succeed as it's diluting it's own gameplan too much, there is a point where going up is actually not worth it and it looks like 6-8 slots total was that point.

    And yes, it's possible it may have been less of an issue given a few more weeks... like I said before, this was a ban after 3 weeks which is unheard of, and something I'm not a fan of in general (should give the meta 3 to 6 months to adapt in most cases), but I think this was a perfect storm of a very good deck, little time to innovate (especially publicly), plus an upcoming high profile tournament where they wanted to show diversity, not dominance.

    Again, I agree with the ban, I never said they should have given it more time, just that they didn't need to cherrypick data to justify it.
    My concern is: if they cherrypick data in an obvious ban like this, how can we trust they won't do the same in future situations where it isn't obvious that a ban is needed?
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 1

    Quote from idSurge »

    I do not understand the Ban decision. Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis is only $4 right now. Altar of Dementia is only $3 right now. They don't need these cards to sell the set, unlike the Eldrazi.


    60% Match Win Rate.
    66% Game 1 Win Rate.
    Warped the Meta.
    Won through Main and Sideboard Hate.
    Won more 5-0 Leagues by 3 x than the next best deck.

    The ban choice was more obvious than we have seen in years. Bridge was the core issue.

    Re-reading the announcement I noticed that WotC could be cherrypicking the data showed to us:


    Initial? Was it decreasing after people started adjusting to it? Remember MH1 was released less than 1 month ago so taking the initial results before people adapted to it seems intentional to put more emphasis on how dominant it is. If it was still 60% I am pretty sure they would have told us but they didn't


    So, the most played deck gets the most trophies, 3 times more than the second most played deck. This really doesn't say anything unless you compare how much presence each deck had. If there were 3 Hogaak decks for every second best deck, it means both have the same conversion rate. Why not tell us how its winrate was compared to other decks?

    I don't disagree with the ban and I could totally get behind the battle of sideboard argument but the reasoning used makes me think that winrates were not so insane as of lately and WotC wanted to present some numbers that showcase how busted it was (even if they are not the usual ones like winrate was mentioned for KCI)
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 2

    Once the combo is assembled, Urza generates infinite mana that can be used to activate his "Mind's Desire" ability so some lists are playing stuff that ends the game on the spot like Ghirapur Aether Grid.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 1

    Quote from Nyzzeh »
    They don't test past standard, that's why the ban list exists, to ban problematic cards. Don't know why people are so afraid of bans. Bans are also what mantains the format fresh and evolving. Don't be afraid of bans. I guess I'm so used to "bans" aka buffs and nerfs in other online games that it's just a natural process to me.
    Half the bans wizards makes don't even outright kill the deck, just downgrade them from tier0 to tier1-3.

    If cards were free, bans and unbans could be made with much more ease and less risk (JTMS comes to mind, unbanning it was dangerous in part because of its price and the economic implications, it had to come with a reprint to alleviate the increase in demand)

    In terms of gameplay, you are correct, bans are made to fix something problematic and improve the game experience so being able to fix those quickly should be positive. But when your playerbase has already invested money to get their cards, making these changes becomes a challenge since you now have to keep in mind other things besides how good the format will look afterwards, otherwise you could take away motivation from some players (even if their cards didn't plummet in price, having to move to another deck is not easy in paper and usually takes some time) resulting in less people attending tournaments, even if gameplay had improved. That's why WotC has to always be cautious with B&R announcements affecting paper magic.

    Arena could be the environment where WotC is quicker in terms of bans and unbans since the economic and logistic repercusions are diminished or almost gone. I know, crafting new cards requires game resources but you can get them for free in a reasonable amount of time so players don't suffer too much if a card gets banned like Nexus of Fate did.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 1

    posted a message on [MH1] Modern Horizons Discussion Thread
    Quote from cfusionpm »
    Quote from Hellgrammite »
    Nobody really hyping up Urza because they want to lock in their copies at a reasonable price first? Laughing

    I'm almost positive that this will either be banned or unofficially shunned from Commander (it's true home). It's wholly irrelevant to Modern, and just... really encourages broken awful play lines in Commander. It's an enabler and payoff all in one card. It's GROSSSSS.

    It's not irrelevant IMO, it makes the Thopter-Sword combo generate inifinite mana that you can use for the Mind Desire ability and win on the spot
    Posted in: Modern
  • 1

    Quote from cfusionpm »
    Quote from ktkenshinx »
    2. Modern is currently healthy in Wizards' eyes. So take a snapshot of Modern for the past few months: that's healthy. If you don't like that, you are probably out of sync with Wizards' views on format health.

    WOTC things an abundance of high variance graveyard abuse is healthy. I guess it's time to sell out of the format? I have heard many people compare the past few months to how awful the GGT/Probe meta was, and I agree with them. I'm curious how many at WOTC actually play competitive Modern, instead of simply look at excel spreadsheets of deck labels and card names.

    Well, based on the announcement itself, it seems like they were focused on the MC results to assess Modern's health:

    We were happy with the outcome of the Modern portion of Mythic Championship II

    Which seems super loose after some months of Phoenix dominance (at least in metagame share).

    We already know that we shouldn't make conclusions from a small sample size and that PTs MCs are not the greatest data source since it combines limited and players are trying to metagame everyone else as there aren't that many players compared to a GP, so using the London MC that tested a new mulligan rule and also gave decklist information, seems rather questionable.

    I agree that no changes is probably the best outcome for Modern right now but I didn't like that they used the MC as an indicator of how Modern fares to be honest.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 4

    Quote from Kathal »
    Quote from Bearscape »
    As long as skillful players deem it necessary to put Surgical Extraction in their mainboard I will not consider Modern to be "fine".
    Why? When everybody and their mom were playing Midrange (aka DRS times) people played things like Elspeth, Sun's Champion in their main, cause it was so darn good vs the metagame.

    Well, the difference is that Elspeth is a card you could want to include as part of your strategy, not for the sole purpose of not being annihilated game 1
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 2

    Quote from ElectricEye »

    Dread Return makes dredge somewhat better than it is currently, but it doesn't solve any of dredge's problems. It still loses to the same graveyard hate that it currently does.

    Having played Dredge in Vintage with Bridge from Below and Dread Return, I think you don't realize how explosive the nut draws can be when you have access to a free reanimation spell that creates an army of zombies when you cast it.

    Seriously, it's one of those cards you don't realize how stupidly strong it is until you play it.
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 1

    Quote from gkourou »
    Gitaxian Probe would going to be banned ultimately. But, kind of the same thing is happening with Faithless Looting also, yes?

    Not really, Gitaxian Probe could be played in literally any deck without even using blue mana, the fact that it also let's you see if you are able to go off without being disrupted is also promoting bad play patterns. Imagine playing a GBx deck vs Infect, you didn't draw any removal but decide to keep mana up so they don't go for it. With Gitaxian Probe you are dead as they are going to see you don't have the answer and are going for it without even having to spend 1 single mana. It also fuels delve very easily and now would be busted with Arclight Phoenix as well. IMO, it is a mistake on a similar level as Mental Misstep
    Posted in: Modern Archives
  • 1

    A ban possibly could, but I don't think it would be worse than the timing of Felidar Guardian on Wednesday after the Monday announcement.

    They really did set the bar high with that one
    Posted in: Modern Archives