Every Ring is Fine
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- čas přidán 26. 06. 2024
- You can follow Dylan at his Twitter or support him on Patreon.
► / pariahpopular
► / ihumanmtg
Music:
Anchors Aweigh - Charles Zimmerman
Etude Op. 10 No. 3 (Tristesse) - Chopin
Siegfried Idyll - Wagner
0:00:00 Intro
0:01:16 August 7th Bans and Lack Thereof
0:14:18 Main Topic (Modern Bad)
0:14:44 Bad Play Patterns
0:35:00 Problems Summarized
0:35:47 Everything is an Avengers-Level Threat
0:37:50 Other Format Issues
0:39:39 43 Banworthy Cards
0:40:11 Ban the Evoke Elementals
0:41:25 Ban Force of Vigor
0:42:45 Ban Force of Negation
0:44:06 Problems with Free Answers
0:47:21 Ban The One Ring (financial discussion)
0:54:12 Ban Orcish Bowmasters
0:57:06 Ban Wrenn & Six
0:59:30 Ban the Triomes
1:03:45 Ban LotR Landcyclers (Lorien Revealed)
1:06:39 Ban Boseiju
1:08:07 Ban Urza's Saga
1:10:45 Ban Blood Moon
1:14:09 Ban Ragavan
1:16:48 Ban DRC
1:17:34 Ban Murktide
1:18:58 Ban Creativity
1:19:44 Ban Amulet
1:20:28 Ban Hammer
1:21:10 Ban Cascade
1:22:40 Ban the War Walkers
1:24:23 Ban Companions
1:25:26 Ban Yawgmoth
1:25:51 Ban Breach
1:26:25 The Cost of Bans
1:30:08 The Price of Modern
1:40:34 Technically Diverse
1:42:21 2023 Modern is the worst format ever
1:47:19 Who likes Modern?
1:52:57 How to fix Modern
1:57:11 What's safe to unban?
2:19:21 Pioneer
2:22:04 Balanced ≠ Fun
2:32:02 In Memoriam
► Patreon | / ammio
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The throughline between your recent videos on basically-this-topic is thus: You think that banning cards shouldn't be mostly about just checking too-strong decks that win too much. But that it should be about gameplay regulation. And that Wizards has abdicated its role as gameplay-regulator.
Good summation.
To sum up: Apparently, introducing a lot of broken interaction doesn't lead to interactive games, but to a meta where people play a minimal amount of threats that just can't be interacted with, plus all the broken interaction
It really feels like Modern stopped being Modern and started being Legacy.
Me putting together lots of interaction via with one ring and indestructible permanents and as many copys of wrath/Farwell I can fit. 😂 I don't play modern but I like watching from my burning trashcan in historic.
@@25_Cats_in_a_Trenchcoatew man, just play the absolute abysmal, disgrace of a format that brawl is...damn does mtg have any good formats???...pauper i guess right
2:22:06 This same situation actually happened in Hearthstone years ago. There was this insane aggro deck called pirate warrior that everyone wanted gone, but the stats said it had around a 50% win rate at high ranks. The problem was that was because about 50% of the time your opener was unbeatable and the other 50% it was unplayable. You can’t just look at stats like play rates and win rates to assess a format, you need to experience it
The good old days when patches had charge 🥰
ive played hearthstone for 8 years before quitting and its crazy how much the game had this problem, i still enjoyed the game plenty during times like that because im a weirdo, i quit for cost of game reasons but haveing wild not get any changes unless a deck was 60% win rate hurt the format bad bad and like you say that was mainly because no one on the balance team played the format for years
@@fartface8918 dw even shaman has been T1 for nearly 4 years now.
Also worth considering that the bigger a chunk of the meta a deck (or key cards) takes up, the less useful winrate becomes.
If broken deck X becomes 80% of the meta then that winrate being 50% means that... it's balanced in the mirror!
I can't wait to see how MH3 rotates Scam out for being too weak to keep up.
I was literally thinking, why ban Grief when it’s going to be powered out of the format.
Scam will probably get stronger 😂
Solved format btw
Idk. Hopefully they actually playtest the cards this time before printing them. I'm actually hyped for MH3 spoilers though lol. I don't buy cards anymore so Modern "rotation" doesn't affect me. I can sympathize with the complaints. Most are valid. But goddamn. MH spoiler season is always 🔥🔥🔥
Esper sentinel, but you have hexproof
I'm more of a commander player who enjoys watching mtg content from time to time, and to me it's absurd just how many decks MH2 completely eclipsed from the format, I've heard rumors but to see it all laid out like that seeing cards I recognise, and decks I remember just put to rest is such a soul crushing feeling that WOTC cashed out MH2 that much. It sucks
Seeing the memoriam at the end really showed how much of modern rotated
R.I.P Lingering souls😢
WOTC massacred our boy... RIP in peace Lingering Souls
@@vernonmeidlinger870that is a cool card
The main issue is free spells whether its cascade/evoke/force. Modern should not have been a format with free spells and free mana, that's for legacy. The second issue is how easy 5 color decks get to assemble their mana. Were these two problems solved, I think the format would be more playable.
Sadly, WotC doesn't seem to notice or care.
Nikachu mtg said it best, no more zero mana spells, except force of negation, that one's fine, because if you ban force of negation then we're all going to be playing neoform
As a former player of the deck, Neoform died when Simian Spirit Guide died. And while FoN is unbeatable without Veil of Summer, discard is also very good vs. Neoform.
Pauper is the healthiest, most diverse format right now and its not even close.
And it probably always will be because of how many hoops WOTC would have to jump through to monetize powercreeping common cards.
@@xtensioncordtv1969you sweet sweet summer child
@@xtensioncordtv1969Boy did this age bad. They've announced from now on, common cards will be more powerful
Really good video. You guys covered a lot of what makes modern un-fun nowadays. I'd just however like to share my thoughts on Blood Moon.
I think you overlook that Blood Moon is less so a "shut down any deck that isn't 2 or 1 color," but more so a threshold that any multi-color deck needs to pass to truly become a tier-1 deck. Back when Yorion wasn't banned and 4-color was the best deck, Blood Moon was the most useless it had ever been, to the point where 4-color was a bad matchup for Ponza. 4-color's manabase was essentially perfect as it was colorful enough to cast all the best spells but resilient enough through running cards like Abundant Growth and W&6. The deck itself was able to overcome the biggest barrier to building a multi-colored soup deck that being blood moon. Obviously that deck was egregious but the point is that a lot of what makes deck-building fun and challenging is working out how to counter your biggest weaknesses, your most deadly silver bullets.
The tradeoff you make when you run more non-basic lands is a higher ceiling but a lower more fragile floor, and at least for me I think it's fun to try work through my decks most glaring flaws. Yes, Blood Moon can just end the game on the spot but that's primarily because of your deck building choices. You can absolutely build a multi-color/nonbasic heavy deck that's also equipped to consistently deal with Blood Moon; The two aren't mutually exclusive if you build for it.
In fact the reason why I think there's so many greedy manabases in modern is because blood moon is so answerable nowadays by multiple decks. You have the triomes allowing you to play more basics, Boseju, Force of Vigor, Wear & Tear etc. The card is definitely getting weaker every year as more decks pass the Blood Moon threshold.
Traditionally, the downsides to greedy mana bases were supposed to be things like inconsistent color-fixing, lands entering tapped, or lands inflicting damage on you (fetches, shocks). These seem to be reasonable downsides to me. What's not a reasonable downside is the opponent being able to play a turn 3 (or sometimes turn 2) card that auto-wins a substantial % of the time.
@@AmmiO2 I wish it was still the case but I think after 30 years of magic the traditional drawbacks of greedy mana bases just don't cut it anymore. There's more than enough high-quality cards that makes playing these lands a no-brainer.
It's a matter of taste I guess but I think turn 2-3 blood moon is reasonable. You know it's coming so you're incentivized to build around it or play around it. Deciding whether to risk fetching a shock or safely basic is a skill check and makes your decisions important. Blood Moon isn't like Ragavan or Grief, you actually have control over how much it impacts you through your deck building choices and in-game decisions.
Imagine the following. You are on the play on Scam. You evoke a fury, pass. I play amulet of vigor and Urzas saga. You play dauthi voidwalker, hit me for 8. I play an Azusa and unload lands. You play blood moon, but in your figurative universe even postboard this isn’t a realistically answerable card. I lose. 10/10 gameplay.
Blood moon is 100% a cancer card and not the answer if manabases are intolerably good. It’s like putting lions in your backyard because the stray dogs are attacking your family.
@@9forMortalMen I think Blood Moon is acceptable if it's only answering land-based combo decks like Amulet and Tron, the same way other silver bullets hose various strategies, like Rest in Peace against graveyards, although I'm not a fan of those play patterns either. Blood Moon is at it's most heinous when it auto-wins against multicolor "fair" decks.
But ultimately, as regards greedy multicolor manabases and land-based decks, I think it's a classic example of "the cure is worse than the disease".
@@AmmiO2 it’s certainly better when used as a silver bullet, and at its least acceptable when used as a random “oops lol u lose heh” card against fair decks.
People need to realize that there’s a middle ground between not punishing multicolor and moon, and the design space is pretty underutilized in modern.
There is a game design lesson taught, "Be prepared for players will optimize the fun out of your game."
Yes. Make the strategies that are most fun also the best ones for winning, and vice-versa.
@@AmmiO2 Can't tell you how many fighting games would benefit from this lol
The One Ring really needed some caveat like "if The One Ring leaves the battlefield for any reason, put it on the bottom of its owners library" to prevent these stupid blinking shenanigans.
Blood moon is only as good as mana bases are broken. When mana is fair, blood moon is sideboard. When mana is wren and triomes, Blood moon wins gams
5 months later and Modern remains Ring loops and Bowmasters lockdowns. Crazy how they thought jamming Ancestral Recall and Timewalk on an artifact would be ok lol.
Imagine hitting Jitte with Ragavan that's like the omega nuts
Wotc 2015: Delve is a powerful ability that needs to be banned or restricted in all formats.
Wotc 2021: wE giVe yOu blOo drAgUn foR Muny.
As someone who did miss our on modern all through COVID it was a brutal shock coming back. You guys hit the nail on the head in that respect.
I hate the 4 Color Omnath deck, but it isn't Omnath that angers me, it's W&6. That card just does too much for too little and too often. Every turn shuffling, shuffling, shuffling! Ugh, I hate it so much.
Additionally, almost all of the "problem" cards in the format have triggered abilities. Just make a 1 mana Pithing Needle that nullifies triggered abilities. 1 Mana, name a card, triggered abilities of the named card don't trigger. Boom done.
Stifling Needle
@@Doublecake17I was going to call it a "Forget-Me Rock"
Problem is that the people at wizards making the decisions on what cards to print or ban don’t actually play the game at that level.
The one ring should have the text "you may only have one copy in your desk"
Given the average physique of Magic players, having to lug a desk to your LGS would essentially be a ban. I kid, I kid.
A couple years from now, Modern will be today’s Legacy.
A couple years from now, Pioneer will be today’s Modern.
A couple years from now, there’ll be a new version of Pioneer that only accounts for the last 10 years of cards printed.
Lather, rinse, repeat forever.
Interesting analysis on the Modern format! By far the worst part of the format for me is that, yes, the format is basically only Modern Horizons block. I’m more lenient about the way the format plays than both of you are, but I can definitely see how someone could come to that conclusion too.
All that matters is that we keep loving the game we play, regardless of how we choose to play it! :)
What made old modern good was it was kinda greatest hits of past standard formats battling it out. People where willing to dump incredible amonts of cash to pick up snappies and goyfs because it wasn't realistic for wizards to print cards into a standard set that would be better or more well rounded then those without breaking standard in half. The masters sets came and where a massive hit making tons of money. What wizzards realized though is that if they just printed the same cards over and over into the ground is they couldn't keep charging huge cash for the packs. So they decided to just make new modern sets with new busted cards. Destroying peoples old collections as well as the feeling of the format being home to legendary cards. Just ban MH1 and 2 and lotr from the format and you've made it much better.
Modern used to be a middle ground: not quite as busted as legacy so you can brew a little bit and not just die on turn 2 if you don't play a meta deck but non-rotating so it stays stable over years while getting a few new cards from time to time.
I played monogreen stompy, monored empty the warrens and monoblue tron before it was op and I could get by, get a few wins win with a pile of cards costing 50 bucks.
Now it's just legacy without the fun of legacy.
My major critical argument against Magic remains the invalidation of the color pie towards deck building.
Going off the old rules, each deck interacted with each other based on those color characteristics, while generating towards some sort of winning position. However, this acted in a sort of rock, paper, scissors deck building meta game. Opponent plays blue, then you play something which goes under blue or overwhelms blue, such as white or red, as an example.
Multiple colors were meant to trade off the overall strengths of each color while shoring up the weaknesses.
However, multiple color spells, along with the strong mana base, just turns ever deck into a race to abuse the most broken card or engine. This degenerates any sort of push and pull in the deck building meta game to four color good stuff piles which can answer everything.
I do remember a Modern back in 2012 to 2016 where any deck could take over the meta if well positioned. Then Eldrazi winter caused problems, but that was Wizards ignoring their own rules on card design. Though that became a predictable event, instead of the exception. I do believe Wizards simply ignores the old rules of card design to create cards that look cool, and will drive up that short term profit. However, most players do not want to play anymore due to these price hikes.
Shoot I piloted a mono-green Tron using sub-optimal creatures, along with fog in the sideboard, and still managed to beat out the stronger decks.
"Hey kid... have you heard of pure modern?"
One part of this video i especially disagree with is the implication that Modern players only enjoy Modern because they are lonely or because they are winning. I genuinely enjoy modern because it is highly interactive. There is a constant exchange of respurces and while some cards invalidate that (The One Ring in particular) most games are actual games. I play Jund, Hammer, and Yawg and find that each of these decks test me as a player in different ways. The main skill tested in modern is your ability to read your opponent's hand, deck, and kntentions and play around the worst possible scenarios. It is highly punishing but it is also highly skill intensive and rewarding. I often feel that my losses are my own fault for poor threat analysis or poor muligan decisions and feel that my victories are well earned. For every Turn 2 Hammer OHKO theres a dozen games of using threats to distract my opponent and draw out respurces before dropping a surprise aid hammer and pushing for lethal. Its more about playing your opponents deck than your deck, and while i can understand why a lot of people dont like that, i find the games to be highly rewarding.
A thought on erratas:
While it is true that everyone has access to gatherer anytime, it doesn't mean it's a good idea.
I can imagine the waste of time that would cause one of the players not knowing the new card text, and also the need to remember every single card ever changed (and what changed).
And yes, they did some relevant changes in the past, but even changing a point of thoughness would be several magnitude more of an hassle to track than anything they've done recently (even than companions, even though that's already a quite messy change)
at 10:55, they did come across this when Inverter combo was popular in Pioneer. Its winrate was below 50%, but the format was so plagued by it and breach combo that no one played Pioneer for a very long time. It's shocking, but also not surprising, that WotC didn't learn their lesson that data doesn't encapsulate everything.
Don't forget Heliod+Ballista, and Kethis. The format had only 4 viable decks (already not great) and all of them were linear combo.
Counterargument - If enough people and time exist, people will optimise the fun out of anything.
There is not really a solution to this. By making a new format with a limited pool of cards is the only option. However, doing so is only temporary, as optimisation is inevitable.
And say you could invent an "Interactive fun card game/format" the human nature actually will break this. As a mechanically balanced format doesn't need any changes, it doesn't need any new product. People call these types of formats "stale". The experience of the format has been solved, there is nothing new to learn past a point.
This is why you are just moving chairs on a sinking ship.
There have been plenty of time frames where formats were fun despite being optimized.
@@AmmiO2 Yes and those times pass because they are inevitably solved OR the company adds new product to change the game. You wouldn't play these formats forever, and you don't because of what I said. People want new stuff, even if it is worse or the same as old stuff. This is why COD and FIFA games get re-skinned ever damn year or so.
This is the greatest video ever made. Inject this shit into my veins.
Spent 400 on opals to play Urza-sword at release. A few months later, opal gets banned, haven't played modern since.
1:01:53 Late comment, but I think this falls under the "Commander-ification" of Magic.
Commander decks are locked into a specific color identity, so you don't notice the power of Triomes there.
Once you remove the color id restriction, everyone is playing 4-5 colors.
(Ps: they are *also* pumping out 5 color commanders like there's no tomorrow, but that's another topic, imho.)
I think power creep is just an inevitable aspect of tcg's especially in an eternal format like modern. Wotc is not going to ban so many cards to revert the power level of modern imo; we are beyond the point of no return in modern. Also, you claim legacy has a strong presence of fair decks which is fairly true, but decks like painter, reanimator, depths, mono red prison, doomsday, cephalid breakfast, and sneak and show are also doing well despite having STP and FOW as safety valves. Also the unbans you suggested only accelerate the degeneracy even more and won't help to fix the format imo. This is just my respectful and realistic opinion on the matter.
as a modern faeries player in the Midwest I don't really have the luxury of going to locals and playing and when I do now I usually go 0-5 (1-4 if I'm lucky). I have a substantial collection to play multiple decks but I grew to love this game through the 2017-2019 era of modern where, I thought, was it's golden age, while everyone was playing meta decks, my buddy would show up with dinos and i would show up with faeries and we would perform well. I'm currently in hopeless denial of all my favorite cards being rotated out and unplayable but I'm going to stick with the format and hope that it gets better because I already invested so much into the game.
After a lifetime of being interested but never having the time, money or opportunity (sometimes a combination of these) it really sucks to have shown up to Magic just in time to see the game go up in flames at every level.
LTR aside, 99% of problems in Modern could be solved just by banning the Horizons sets, lmao. But that’s never going to happen, the cancer of Ragavan and especially the Evoke elementals will continue killing this format for years to come…and they’re making another Horizons set, oh joy.
The last second should have been like the end of a movie.
“In March 2024 the fans of these cards rallied and created a Players Modern format that only allowed sets that went through Standard, and all of these cards were brought back to play” 🎉🔥🎉
I hate to break it to you but Standard cards are also problems.
@@AmmiO2 Of course. But we get rid of abunch. No Horizons helps big time.
I think I didn't mind modern as it was (granted I didn't play it before, joined the game during the release of mh2), but lotr turning every list a ring deck or an orc deck does sour me on wanting to bother playing. Pioneer is also not very compelling and knowing one of my better decks carries a big target on its back also makes me less keen on playing games of it. Fortunately I am having a lot of fun with Pauper right now so there is good magic out there for me but yeah, atm my modern/pio piles look more like those porcelaine piggy banks that are just a well-timed hammerstrike away from cashing out.
The "What's safe to unban?" section made me lol. You have someone in who has experience playing against some of these decks stating, "I don't think so, it's too powerful" and then you pressure them into saying "yeah, it's probably okay". If you have problems with Evoke Elementals being in the format but want Dark Depths, Dread Return, Eye of Ugin, etc. unbanned makes me laugh.
The in memoriam section also tickled me too.
Dylan's mic sounds really high-pitched and gives me a headache if I listen at the normal volume. Maybe some audio mixing is in order for the future? Just a suggestion.
If other people agree with this, please reply or like ryanstudham640's comment so I know it's not an isolated issue.
It's not painful to me but it is tinny and high-pitched so I can appreciate the sentiment. @@AmmiO2
Wizards: everything is fine, not like ring is cancer and literally what we said we didn’t want by banning stuff like astrolabe since you know…drawing cards is the most powerful effect. Evoke is fine, even though we said we hated cards like evoke years ago when we disliked shriekmaw. LITERALLY BANNED MOX OPAL CAUSE IT WAS PLAYED EVERYWHERE BUT RING IS CHILL!?
Trying to play Jund through all this bullshit has been really interesting, lol. The Ring is so much worse than Oko or Hogaak because it lacks any and all commitment. It is a 4 generic mana indestructible rock that literally any deck besides full-send aggro can run. Rather than a single overpowering deck, like Hogaak dredge, the Ring is a card that shoves itself into every deck and reduces games to wars of who can keep one in play the longest. The fact that some Jund piles have devolved to 4x Ring 4x Bowmaster 4x Sheoldred should tell us how healthy the format is.
Thanks for making this video. I had just made something similar that was not nearly as in depth. It was pretty therapeutic to make and now to listen to this. I used to play 4 to 5 times a week, and I haven't touched the game all year. Just feels like diversity isn't actually a diverse gameplay experience, and everything I loved has "rotated".
Oooh awesome! Can't wait to listen to this whole podcast, looks like its gonna be an interesting one
You nailed it spot on with modern no longer being an eternal format.
I personally love blood moon it provides answers to the BS mana piles that are in modern now. When we have cards that would make Deathrite shaman look like it is a fun and balanced card you know you have issues. It is also a great indicator of how much of a garbage fire a format is at the moment. The more copies you see floating around the worse the format is to play. Also realistically would like to add to the ban pile of just ban the fetch lands make it so if you really want to play your Four Color Piles make them work for it.
Edit* I am not saying it is well designed or heathly just that I personally love the card
Blood Moon fighting 'too easy color-fixing' is a classic "the cure is worse than the disease".
You can always build your deck to not lose to blood moon. And if you don't, you'll have to pack answers, race them or just accept you can't win. I do think it can be problematic as a turn 2 play, but on turn 3 it's absolutely a fair card
@@edde2429amulet Titan can’t. Most decks that can build around it do build around it. Blood moon leads to non-games, whereas too many colors in a deck just waters down the format.
@@9forMortalMen But they do run copies of Boseiju and can sometimes win before it even hits the battlefield
@@edde2429 the response to brokenness is not to add brokenness.
I wish there where more of these long form discussion videos on different formats
This video is a masterpiece, gives a really good overview of the current Modern metagame
I think we need a end to modern. Not an end to the format, but an end to the ability to print cards into it.
I propose a format called "Classic Modern" Which ends before modern horizons. No new standard sets. No Modern horizons. Just a fixed card pool. WOTC cannot be trusted to print cards anymore.
But the profit margin doe.
The only reason preordain was unbanned was bc it was in LoTR.
Yeah my pet modern deck is currently unplayable and im thinking about just selling my modern deck and sticking with pioneer. which im also dreading playing due to the prevalence of mono green. guess i'll try pauper?
Alchemy nerfing bowmaster by removing its ETB and The One Ring by adding a cost of 1 mana to the ability is incredibly bizarre
What I take from this video: Blood Moon is single handedly preventing the format from self-destructing. Just by knowing what the card does I would never have thought it can be played outside of mono-red
I do want B2B in modern, multi-color decks should be heavily taxed in exchange for playing the best cards of each color and stronger multi-colored cards, mono colors decks are simply too weak at the moment.
Back to Basics is a horribly designed magic card, just like Blood Moon. The big problem with them is that they are not hate pieces against multi-colored decks. No, they are hate pieces against non-basic lands. Which is an issue because one of the biggest appeals of decks with fewer colors is that you get to play more value lands in your mana base. But both of these two cards prevent that and you get the fact that even the mono black coffers deck gets absolutely dumpstered by them. Do we really want a format where even the mono colored decks need to contain mostly basics in their mana bases?
These cards were a mistake and I hope we never get anything like them again. Wizards needs to pursue other design spaces to punish greedy mana bases.
Also when you have shock lands, fetch lands and triomes in the format, there really is no excuse to at least play two colors. Even the mostly one colored decks have no issue to splash for better sideboard options.
If you want to reduce the number of colors in decks, then the best option is to not have as many good color fix lands aviable. And that is pretty much what Pionier is.
Alternatively, rather than punishing 5C mana bases, print cards that incentivize playing only 1 color. So instead of cards like Leyline Binding, Prismatic Ending, Omnath, and Triomes, print more cards that have triple or quadruple of the same color pips in their cost, strong utility lands that only make colorless or a single color, or any other "basics matter" or "mono color matters" cards, e.g. Devotion.
@@AmmiO2 The problem with this solution is powercreep of single colored cards that will now overtake multi-colored ones, as well as the fact that it doesn't fix the problem, because 3+ color decks (which are already shitpiles vomiting value of the most powerfulcards in the format) will simply play those cards themselves, multi-color cards are stronger on average due to requiring what should be a less consistent mana base and that's good design because the player should make the willing choice to play high risk high reward decks, likewise players should also be able to make the choice to play more consistent decks which threats are weaker on a 1 by 1 basis when compared to multi-colors, however, in modern the whole mana fixing is doing by fetches and they have been the format defining cards of modern since forever, so they can't really be banned, which means that in return mono colors decks should have access to strong silver bullets that deal with greedy mana bases, this is also not a new concept in modern, just thinn a few years back of dredge/vengevine vs graveyard hate or tron vs all the silver bullets printed in the last years.
We’ll, ever since inverter ban, I’ve been enjoying pioneer so much. It reminds me of old Modern. I only hope they don’t mess it up by printing a pioneer masters.
bowmasters made me swap out my hierarchs for gilded geese..
Great wish list for bans. I agree with basically every point, except maybe the landcyclers (seems mostly broken with pitch-spells, which optimally should go instead).
I don't agree with the unbannings, which would make the format even faster, more degenerate and unfun.
Great breakdown Ammi! Well done as always. I think you missed out on how fetchlands become a problem in this format as time goes on... you mentioned the triomes and the landcyclers, but really if you are not able to fetch out these lands with fetchlands, most of the problems in the format could be solved. Also, most of the metaplayers dont see the format as that problematic because they play the evoke elementals themselves. You are kinda forced to play some amount of freespells.
I took Scam to 1st place this week at my store's Modern Championship. Gotta say, it's a lot more fun being the Scam-er rather than the Scam-ee. But I still want the cards banned.
@@AmmiO2 yes, i can relate to that. if you can't beat the thing, you have to play the thing yourself. ;D really sad to hear you won't be doing modern as much anymore. You are by far the most interesting content creator for this format. Who knows, maybe mh3 can push the power level even further and make some decks viable again. I will be still playing some modern and take little breaks here and there after geting solituded+ephemerate equals 3 creature removal for one single mana. But yes, horrible state of the game definetely.
What is your opinion on modern if /only/ Grief and the ring are banned? Do you think we would reach a salvage-able point?
No, although it would be an improvement.
AmmiO2, how do you feel about fan formats like Premodern or High Modern that no longer have new cards being added?
I don't have any experience with those formats, but the idea of NO CARDS whatsoever being added EVER feels like it would get stale. There's also 0% chance of Wotc supporting a format that doesn't let them sell new cards.
My favourite thing that midwits do when talking about deck archetypes is describing things in the lotus field/tron realm as 'control' instead of combo decks.
Sure dog, the deck whose goal is to uninteractively ramp their way to something stupid like Ugin/Karn/Ultimatum is totally control and not just slow combo.
Or just maybe they are ramp?
Love the memorial of cards at the end lolll
I like modern because my local meta is incredibly versitile and very different from the general meta. We have 4 Tron players but the rest are other decks and different brews. We even have relics like yours truly playing druid
This too will be a reason for differing opinions. MTGO, and my local meta, are filled with tier 1 decks like Scam and Tron. Scam is probably the deck I encountered the most when I did the Modern Marathon streams.
@@AmmiO2 yeah, my meta is pretty competitive but we see huge deck diversity because most of us enjoy brewing, I was pushed completely out of playing druid for example so now I just swapped to samwise coco because it's more resistant to bowmasters + fury.
i love playing 3+ color piles, but imo blood moon should be in modern to act as the policeman of the format. It's the same as force of will in legacy. If you allow modern players to have access to 3+ colors without punishment it's still going to lead to a situation simmilar to the one we have today. What deckbuilding cost are you paying to have access to the best cards in each color in a format with fetchlands and shocklands? a bit of life? conversely, if you choose to play bloodmoon in your deck, you must pay a price because the effect is simmetrical.
Can’t find this episode on the podcast apps. Am i looking in the wrong place?
Woops! Looks like I never uploaded it to Spotify et al. I'll do that now, thanks.
At this point modern needs a complete restart, as an affinity player I would be ok sacrificing my playset of urza's sagas if it means the rest of this crap gets banned
No idea if this will get any eyeballs, but would a points list system similar to what Canadian Highlander uses be viable for some of these eternal formats with issues of "too many good cards in a pile"? It definitely wouldn't be super simple to set up, but it would at least sit in between "banning 40+ cards" and "open the floodgates/do nothing" as an approach. Implementation would be tricky since Canlander isn't a format with 4-ofs, but it's just a thought I had
In the Triomes section... Couldn't one counterargue to ban fetchlands? As long as you ban one of those things, then it's much harder to play four and five colors, right?
Yes. It's an either/or. Banning Triomes is more palatable because fetchlands command higher prices, are played in more formats, and come in untapped as opposed to triomes.
Ending was fantastic lol
And all of these decks can be crushed by an urza's saga on the field and that's why I play affinity, I always have played affinity, except when karn was printed and when KCI took off, I liked ironworks better and when karn was printed I just played my deck in pauper because it was basically the same deck
Edit: field of the dead is far more busted than saga because with field you don't have to spend any mana for the ability and you can have 4 of them trigger at once multiple times a turn and they don't leave until they're destroyed, with saga you need to pay 2 and tap it meaning you can only use the ability once per tern, and to trigger all four of them at once you need 8 mana total and you can only do this twice before they're destroyed, that's 16 mana total over two turns while field on the other hand is pumping out 8 power every single turn with no downside but having to use your wrenn and six and losing a life to a fetch land, yeah who cares you have 8 power being generated every single turn it's game over in 4 turns basically, I think 4 life to win the game is a small price to pay, not to mention there's so much enchantment hate and bounce effects in the format as well as artifact destruction AND karn to get pithing needle and liquimetal coating, vs land destruction for field there's really not all that much other than cards like field of ruin, stone rain, and blood moon, and those ALSO counter saga, I think I've gone on for long enough there's so many ways to get around those construct tokens before they become a problem, heck if you hate the tokens so much then put some Karns in your decks because it can fetch out literally every answer for any deck ever, pithing needle being my favorite but there's also tons of graveyard and free cast hate you can get with it, I mean isn't this was Karn was printed for? For literally every single deck in the format to have an answer to artifact decks? The card that literally killed affinity when it was spoiled???
Wild how most issues you brought up with decks are related to modern horizons 👀
The worst part of this video was the ending. 😭
I remember all those cards and how important they were. To dissapear so quick after being so played by so many... Like tears in the rain. 😭
I think contradicted yourselves a bunch. You want the decks to be stable investments you can play for years, but also want to avoid having the same deck be good for 18+ months. You want them to ban all the free interactive cards, but also want them to unban a bunch of cards that would be bad into the free interaction.
I just really hate how they treat modern as the new legacy.
But duals are just way too expensive, so they rely on modern to be the competitive format for their new cards to shine, whereas honestly legacy is so fuckin fun still (atleast for me) since Force of Will just makes the games so much more interactive and slower which I very much like. But i also am too poor for paper legacy...
Although I do hope they ban Orcish Bowmaster so my baleful strix doesnt feel like im just trolling myself in my beloved esper miracleblade
I just want to play kuldotha 8-whack at my lgs
1:51:36 Dylan is currently playing 14 hours of MTGO per DAY? ... wow ... like how long is "currently"?
And now I play Mono Green Cloudpost in legacy
Bowmasters is Synergy card. Can your deck produce Black Mana? Toss in 4 Bowmasters.
2:19:35 I'm down for a Pioneer version of this :P
What’s the smallest possible ban patch you envision that could fix the most problems that currently exist? You didn’t really cover this angle in your video and I’m curious.
I personally believe that most of my problems with the format are solved by Grief, violent outburst, and maybe ring being banned.
That's tough because the rot goes deep. The greatest ratio of least bans + highest fix is probably to ban: Grief, Violent Outburst, The One Ring, and Blood Moon.
@@AmmiO2 Blood moon is an interesting pick, though I understand it. My main concern is what keeps Tron and amulet in check. Dampening sphere I suppose mostly does that job but is worse against fair decks. Honestly the more I write the more I agree.
@@9forMortalMen There are silver bullets for land-hate besides Blood Moon. If the argument is _ONLY_ Moon is keeping these decks in check, the format has far deeper problems. It would be like saying the only thing keeping Dredge in check is Rest in Peace and the other graveyard hate is worthless.
@@AmmiO2 Right. Like I said, we have dampening sphere if people want land hate that dumpsters big mana, or my old favorite Blood Sun if people want to hate on utility lands. Blood sun is specifically really good hate for Titan, as the deck struggles to actually play Titan without repeatable land drops, and struggles to close the game with a fair 6/6 ramping beater that does nothing else. The reason why we “need” blood moon is so that people can spend 3 mana to accidentally get a free game against a fair deck. Truly amazing design, /s.
@@AmmiO2 had a thought, you can press the button and Blood moon is banned, but Wasteland is printed in MH3. Is that better for the format?
Unban artifact lands with saga in the format?
Endurance is as bad as the others incarnation/elementals. Why would you put this one in a strictly less concerning compartiment?
I like how detailed your discussion turns out. You guys summed a lot up. The paradoxical point you're making is that F.I.R.E era succeeded in WotC becoming the only one deciding what format and how it will turn to. At the time players claiming cards would be too busted for a format would be heard by design team and mostly "formats authorities" so the latters could take actions against the unhealty or problematic addition. So the real problem was that only WotC had data at the pandemic times. If player base had the opportunity to see how transformed modern would get then live events attendance would contribute to the protest.
Things are that WotC wouldn't test for others formats than Standard (as I heard). Modern Horizons sets have never been their playtesting time correctly done or even considered. Pros have upload videos of how their point of vue were neglected by WotC design managers. They firstly asked them for advice and then even WotC would lay magic pro players off their duty due to... what again?
The case is that all their decisions in printing, banning and unbanning might not ever be utterly questioned again, 'cause you know shareholders will anyway have theirs profits. Our only choice as player is buy or not buy without being granted that your deck would keep staying in the meta is what deeply piss me off
What deck have you Ammi02 actually liked playing or liked in modern?
I liked playing some of the decks on the Modern Marathon streams, e.g. 8-Rack, although who knows what part of that was _streaming_ being fun.
Endurance is not problematic. It doesn't kill creatures, counter spells, or strip cards out of hand. It has narrow uses: graveyard hate or anti-mill tech.
Scamming/blinking endurance does nothing. All of the other elementals are strong attacking creatures due to double strike, evasion (flying/menace), or lifelink enabling racing. Endurance has reach, putting it as more of a defensive card.
Man that little funerary service for outlived modern cards at the end... I played against those cards. I PLAYED some of them. And used to think they where way too good and/or the best. Now moat stuff I want to play is invalidated by orcish bowmaster and boseiju...
Nice taste in classical music.
Isn't it crazy that decks this expensive bring so little joy compared to pauper or EDH?
Never played modern before, but it doesn't seem too interesting anyway
I don’t really play modern but I have seen the pure misery of the one ring and bowmasters through your gameplay. I am absolutely feeling the problems of pioneer (or I guess more accurately explorer on arena, I spend too much paper money on commander since I like owning the real cards)
The main things I want banned in Pioneer are of course Fable of the Mirror Breaker and Karn (aka your sideboard is actually in your main deck himself). I’d also really love a thoughtseize ban, since pioneer doesn’t have free counterspells like force if negation, making it way too good imo as a turn one play on the play (much like grief in modern). As evidence of why I think it’s so ridiculous, Rakdos Sac went from a fringe-ish deck to 2nd place almost overnight just because they started main boarding that card, and that’s in spite of the fact that the top deck, green devotion (ugh) hard countering it.
Duress will take Thoughtseize's place after an eventual ban. Maybe not even in the mainboard.
Which is good.
@@malakimphoros2164 Duress is way more balanced on turn one, can’t hit creatures
Modern is misery. I agree.
Pioneer is my favourite format. Explorer doesnt have many of the cards it needs.
I can definately agree on the KTGC ban, its a stupid card, and mono green can still go off with cavalier and storm the festival. It doesnt kill a deck.
Fable is... hard to say. Although i am biased since i pretty much only play fable decks. (Being Keruga fires, Yorion fires, Rakdos midrange). Casting faithless looting is very strong, not to even mention how stupid the interaction of 2 fables is.
Thoughtseize is fine for pioneer. I dont really feel like it is banworthy on its own, since it turns into a worse card to cast later in game. Turn 1 might be brutal for the hand, but i do not feel it loses you the game outright.
What WoTC needs to do is use unbans and the sideboard to tweak the meta
They could easily ban Karn and make the sideboard 20 cards so no one has an excuse not to sideboard against tron or mox opal decks if they ever unbanned it
to fix modern print this
1r sorcery
each player sacrifices a nonbasic land
You're describing Boom/Bust.
@@AmmiO2 almost - i'm describing 5-8th boom/bust, and one that sets basic land decks ahead instead of flagstones of trokair ahead
Intro is 10/10 please upload in shorts separately
Fable is so obviously busted its wild. You look at it and its just the red oko.
>player who plays multicolor value pile hates blood moon
I would accept a moon ban if they banned fetchlands, shocks, and triomes. Ban all those cards and moon can go
As a newer player what do you think was the best format in MTG history?
I haven't played for the whole game's lifespan so I can only talk about time frames I actually played. That said, I have good feelings about Khans/RTR Standard and certain periods of Modern (times when Jund was tier 1, at some point before 2019).
Opinion on Alpine Moon?
It's fine.
I love modern but I agree with most is y'all's bannings - 2 I play 2-3 times a week but there are like 6 shops in my area but I drive 2 hours to go to a college town because they play more fun decks there playing in my area is so toxic it's all t1 and it feels so bad to watch all of the most fun old decks show up and sit at the last table I live the format but it's fucked unfortunately
Control and combo completely dominate this entire game. Every format. WotC cannot design against them
Blood moon NEEDS to exist right now. Would need to remove a lot of lands for that need to go away. Triomes are an interesting take ive never thought of. Actually agree, good points. Between triomes, w6, and others theres way too much fixing. Running 3+ colors is barely a restriction.
I would take almost any other option over Blood Moon, up to and including Wasteland or Back to Basics. Not saying those would be okay either, but better than being Mooned.
@@AmmiO2 I'd trade blood moon for wasteland easily. Think blood moon is less of a feels bad in comparison to back to basics. Couldn't see that trade happening or what would justify it
@@AmmiO2 I think wasteland is just as cancerous as blood moon
@@voluntarism335 Wasteland is 1-for-1 only and doesn't kill your entire landbase, sets back the player using it, and doesn't stop you from casting your other spells. You can hold fetchlands until you need to use them and you can shut it off with Pithing Needle. The only time it becomes a problem is when players start looping it with Life from the Loam.
Bloodmoon is a specific hoser. Atuff like the old protection from colour cards. Its itself degenerate interaction. But I dont think efficient 1for1 land destruction would be strong enough to stop 5 colour valuepiles from dominating.
Triomes, shocks fetches, some really good taplands together make for an extremely versatile manabase.
Honestly I think we would be better off with more multicolour manadorks, at least those can be interacted with without breaking the game in half.
this video is so daam good holy smokes
For Ring answers you forgot Pithing needle.
In relation to how easy the manabases are with triomes. Do you think the format would be healthier without fetch lands? Is the problem triomes or just how easy it is to find them.
Or maybe fetches are just too engrained in modern that we couldn't think of banning them
Fetchlands are a huge design mistake that causes numerous problems, one of them being fetching multicolor lands.
@@AmmiO2 another one is them being absolutely annoying with all the shuffling
Fantastic content!
Can’t believe I watched for almost three hours. Time ran by 😍
The best path forward is to hit a hard reset on the ban list.
Unban everything except for eye of ugin and other very egregious contenders.
And then ban what needs to be banned as the time goes on.
That is the best way to shake up the meta and actually see whats healthy or not.
This is fine 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥