Hello Community!
I will use this thread for my personal discussion of which cards I am going to vote for a ban/unban. I am strongly looking forward to read fromt he poeople that have been rooting for a more open discussion. When in doubt I always to prefer to do no changes. Due to human nature changes are always conceived as BAD by people and will cause negative opinions and discussion in communities. That said fixing things is still beneficial of course and will result in a net gain for the format and therefore all of us.
To ban a card it needs to be unhealthy for the format and quite powerful. If you compare our HL ban list with 60 card formats one can see that the cut off for power level runs somewhere between the vintage and legacy formats for the most part. This means that crazy powerful cards from all of magic's past should be in the HL meta like they are now. For evaluating card strength it is still necessary to evaluate the meta and availability of "enabler" cards. Biggest contrast between 60 card formats and Hl is the amount of strong fast mana you can put in your deck. There are very few playable Dark ritual effects that you can play in HL. The same is true for cantrips - which is one reason why some players are/were worried about the ban of SDT in April btw. This is important to keep in mind when talking about card power in a vacuum and moving to comparisions with 60 card formats and/or metas.
That said I personally am looking for a HL meta where the attack step/preventing the attack step is the typical way of winning a game of HL magic. Combo decks are fine in the meta but should not be a "deck to beat" and be common in the meta. There should be competitive combo decks that are attractive to play for players that like that stuff without completely taking over the meta and driving out the players that enjoy combo math etc. I know this is hard to "measure" and that this will rely on my judgment but also on the feedback of your impressions and feelings.
That beeing said I would like to talk about the current top 3 (imo) combo decks:
5c oath storm
Artifact combo
reanimator
I feel that 5c storm and artifact combo are too strong for the well beeing of the format right now. This is especially problematic because both decks do not rely on creatures at all. The decks also perform vastly differently from metagame to metagame which makes an openminded discussion even harder. Cards that have been in discussion by the council and the communtiy that might be banned are the following:
Fastbond (fast mana)
Oath of Druids (used as self mill outlet for a predeterminded combo win)
Tolarian Academy (fast mana)
Yawgmoth's Will
3 cmc Draw 7 effects/Time Spiral
limiting the avaiable tutors
Now the question is how to tone the decks without
- completely "banning" them
- doing a one time ban
I firmly believe that Fastbond should be banned. It is a do nothing/break everything card with no middle ground and upside for the format. It needs to leave the format and has done us no good. Just banning Fastbond will not be enough however. However it should be noted that the ban of Fastbond will tone done Yawgmoth's will severly in those combo decks.Now I would like to pull some teeth from the oath combo deck by taking away "Oath of druids" as well. This would have the splash daamge of ending the existance of the "oath control" archetype but I see no other way. That archetype plays a very niche role in the metagames I know so I am willing to pay that price. Let me know if you feel differently!
The artifact combo deck is a much tougher nut to crack. While I could still see a Yawgmoth's will and assorted two card combo deck beeing around after banning oath I dont see the same for 5c artifact combo after the ban of Tolarian Academy. I also feel that TA is spawning more T2 artifact ramp decks than oath, so I feel the splash damage would be a bit greater here. The deck also feels "only" opressive in the Berlin meta. Still we should fix it. I actually think we should attack the card drawing of that deck (as well as the storm combo deck).
I have the hope that banning Wheel of Fortune and Timetwister could cost the deck artifact combo deck quite a bit of resilience to counterspells as well as ways to reach critical mass of of artifacts to really break Tolarian Academy. I would like to discuss this with the community. Downside would be the splash damage to High Tide/Dream Halls and similiar combo decks.
I am perfectly fine with Tolarian academy tapping for 8 mana btw. If it is turn 8 or 10 of the game. TA is problematic tapping for four on turn 3 which is enabled by drawing another 7 cards to find 2 more artifacts along "win" spells.
Reanimator is in a very good spot right now power-wise and has been for a year or two. However i do not want to have a "oath" scenario with that deck which would be enabled by entomb always getting the perfect Fatty for the MU on T1. Thats why I am strongly in favor of keeping Entomb on the Ban list.
BAN
Fastbond
Oath of Druids
Ban Watch List
Wheel of Fortune
Timetwister
UNBAN
Nothing
esp. not Entomb
Quote from: ChristophO on 04-05-2016, 05:39:59 PM
That beeing said I would like to talk about the current top 3 (imo) combo decks:
5c oath storm
Artifact combo
reanimator
I feel that 5c storm and artifact combo are too strong for the well beeing of the format right now.
based on available data and based on personal experience I would say you've just missed the best one atm
http://mtgpulse.com/event/24189#327552
http://mtgpulse.com/event/24146#327216
http://mtgpulse.com/event/23505#321335
http://mtgpulse.com/event/23165#318199
furthermore I can't see any of the mentioned combo-decks are too strong in comparision how an average Midrange- (e. g. Blood, Jeskai) or Aggro- (e. g. RDW) deck performed in recent tournaments (also against the mentioned combo-decks from time to time)
additionaly I don't like the idea if all combo-player are forced to play Scapeshift while other combos become unplayable - or should the just switch to 4c Blood, Jeskai and Izzet? ... that's not my idea of a diverse meta
Why do you think the three decks I mentioned would be a unplayable?
That is also not my intention.
QuoteThere should be competitive combo decks that are attractive to play for players that like that stuff without completely taking over the meta and driving out the players that enjoy combo math
There have been at least two first places for artifact combo since January that I know of and has been a constant nuisance for parts of the Berlin meta. Reanimator and Storm has done really well at the Highlander GP level last couple of times. They are are more established to me than Scapeshift.
While I did not include Scapeshift in my combo list (which I sould have) it is a deck that needs to deny the attack step to win. It's a deck that prolongs every game to finnish with a combo. Or with Titania, Protector of Argoth. I also didnt include Azorious control or Artifact Ramp with Thopter/Sword. Though I agree that Scapeshift is much more focused on the Combo finish than those decks.
Quote from: ChristophO on 04-05-2016, 10:04:45 PM
Why do you think the three decks I mentioned would be a unplayable?
that wasn't my statement
Quote from: Vazdru on 04-05-2016, 09:39:38 PM
additionaly I don't like the idea if all combo-player are forced to play Scapeshift while other combos become unplayable
I just expressed that i don't wanna ban cards which probably lead to less playable decks and therefore to a more monotone and less diverse meta
in contrast I like the idea to ban cards which maybe weaken the overpresented decks like 4c Blood which is obviously hard as most cards of this archetype are easy replacable (as I don't wanna ban duals or fetchlands)
that is also the reason why I don't wanna weaken other archetpes atm (so I haven't voted for Ban Mystical Tutor and Mana Drain although I guess they are both ban-worthy based on power-level)
pet- / tier 2-decks won't become more competetive if we weaken some combo-decks as they will still lose to the currently most dominating decks
It wasnt?
Quote from: Vazdru on 04-05-2016, 09:39:38 PM
additionaly I don't like the idea if all combo-player are forced to play Scapeshift while other combos become unplayable
As you know I disagree on Mystical and Mana drain.
For now I would like to discuss the spell based "combo menace" that some parts of the community has a problem with (as far as I have heard). I thinik I know your standpoint from our internal discussions. I have posted here to get feedback from the community as well.
Thank you for writing this ChristophO.
I am relieved to see that (at least some) people in the council realize that there is indeed a problem. As a berlin player, who is confronted with 5cArtifacts alot, it has been a little difficult to voice my opinion without being targeted by stuff like "yeah, only because you lose to it", "only because you dont metagame versus it", "it is only a problem in berlin" - there has been a serious lack of professionalism and knowledge shown by some council members in my opinion. I know that sounds condecending but statements like "fastbond is not a real card in highlander" or "it has not won a "big" tournament" (while having 80%+ win percentage around here) just lack so much empathy, knowledge and thoughtfulness that I can not find other words than that.
That Vazdru says "you forgot the strongest one" is a perfect example. A few berlin players have said they believe there is a problem (over months now) and a council member, who has not played here, has probably not played more than 5 games vs artifacts (i would like to know), looks at a few results and says "obv scapeshift is better". From far away he looks into the berlin meta, totally dismisses what people have said/felt and basically says "nah, no matter what you guys say, mtgpulse makes it clear, scapeshift is stronger". That is naive, condescending, amateurish, not thoughtful and overall super arrogant. (Note: If Paul, our 5c Artifacts player, would post his winning list on mtgpulse every time he wins an FNM MTGPULSE WOULD BE TOTALLY OVERLY FLOODED with the same list week by week - there has not been "two wins by artifacts since january" but about 6-8, pointing to mtgpulse to argue for a strength of the deck feels so weak and limited to me. )
Now I kind of started a rant, which i didnt even want. But some of this stuff is just so baffling to me. Back to my original statement: Thank you ChristophO for writing this .
at least I don't ignore the available data ::)
but nevertheless I respect your opinion
Imagine this scenario: One gets the feeling there is a huge gap in knowledge and understanding of the game in between council members. Voicing this is difficult because saying "you don't know what you are talking about" sounds hurtful and aggressive and it is very hard to sugarcoat this statement – the opinion that some council members just lack some knowledge/understanding. So is there no way to say that without sounding like a total jackass? Let's find out.
"That said I personally am looking for a HL meta where the attack step/preventing the attack step is the typical way of winning a game of HL magic. Combo decks are fine in the meta but should not be a "deck to beat" and be common in the meta." – when I read this from a council member, I feel this format is in good hands. Those are only two sentences, but IMO there is a lot of knowledge and understanding in this. I enjoy reading this because I go "snap, that is well said and well phrased and contains much truth". (because it implies that tuning your deck vs one boogeyman deck – in this case 5c artifacts, a deck, that basically plays solitaire – means becoming vulnerable vs. the other 10 decks you could face in a tournament, something that results in a super shifted meta, where you need super specific answers vs one deck but can't have a decent matchup vs. the other decks, cause those specific answers you put in your deck..are..well.."specific" and don't carry their weight in those other matchups). One would expect every council member has written some good stuff, some knowledgable stuff that shows to the community: "We know what we are doing!" (And no I don't mean "statements I agree with" but things that touch the game on a deeper level, that go deeper than "here are some results, and this data is available" etc.). But I have been reading a lot of stuff on this forum and some council members deliver very basic and tier3 arguments, that makes it painfully obvious to me that there is just a lack of understanding for this game called Magic the Gathering. (again: I do not want to hurt anybody, its just my honest impression). So whats the solution? Will the council members agree or admit that some have a better idea what is going on in this game? Of course not, they are not aware and every persons instinct is to say "I know a lot of things! I am very knowledgeable! There is a reason I am in the council!" – so that will always be the reaction and I understand (kind of). But it remains my honest opinion and I think it has become obvious that some members deliver thoughtful and deep arguments while others only really scratch on the surface and deliver very basic arguments.
"That said I personally am looking for a HL meta where the attack step/preventing the attack step is the typical way of winning a game of HL magic. Combo decks are fine in the meta but should not be a "deck to beat" and be common in the meta."
I have to say that I feel the complete opposit if I read something like that. There are people who like playing combo and I'm all for the possibility to play aggro, control and combo strategies and they should all be tier 1.
Banning Combo Decks will lead to even more 4C Blood style decks.
I think Paul played Academy in the HL Ladder as well and it was not dominating there, we have a local Academy player in Würzburg as well who brewed a really long time on it and knows how to play that deck.
Of course this kind of deck feels more devastating if you loose against but it has it's downsides in playing 50% mana and "no" creatures.
"I have to say that I feel the complete opposit if I read something like that. There are people who like playing combo and I'm all for the possibility to play aggro, control and combo strategies and they should all be tier 1."
This is exactly what I mean. A Statement that is much deeper gets interpreted (misinterpreted) in the most basic way. I mean..you say "there are people who like playing combo..". WHO SAID COMBO SHOULDNT EXIST, WHO SAID IT SHOULDNT BE TIER 1? (Note: Artifacts is something close to Tier 0.5) His statement goes much deeper cause it implies that IF a combo deck is the strongest deck in the room, GEARING TOWARDS IT (or as he said "deck to beat") results in a super negatively shifted Metagame. Cause gearing your deck towards a deck with zero Creatures means cutting most/ all creature removal and stuff like Kavu/Reflector Mage, everything that interacts with Creatures. That, again, results in your deck being "good" (probably "decent" at best) vs his deck (you go from 10 dead cards to 0 maybe) but you are playing against other creature decks with no removal, which leads to you being highly disadvantaged (thats another big difference between scapeshift and artifacts, ux midrange decks have close to 0 dead cards vs. spapeshift, but they have close to 10 vs artifacts - every hand with path + reflector mage is a mulligan vs artifacts while its a fine keep vs scapeshift, for example). So its tournament day and you found a way to beat Paul maybe = Great. But you are unlucky and you are not even facing him but you are facing 6 creature decks with your Zero Removal deck. That maybe gives an Idea how simple minded statements like "you aren't metagaming vs it enough" are.
(And Shocker: Paul has 0 dead cards vs every opponent. 0. You know why? Cause he doesnt play vs. your deck, he plays vs himself and the clock)
So please, read a little deeper, read a little between the lines. He makes a very good and thoughful statement and it doesnt deserve to be met by a statement that is as simple and wrong as "people like combo, i think combo should exists" - OF COURSE IT SHOULD EXIST. By the way, i am gonna write an article called 20ThingsWrongWithArtifacts , maybe its gonna be 30 things, maybe that clarifies what problems exist with this deck.
I think T1 is a rather undefined term. When I talk about T1 decks I mean decks that perform well and are played "a lot". A lot meaning I would deem it likely to play more than once against them at a Highlander/MGM Type of HL event. Right now there are only three T1 decks in HL (according to my understanding):
4c Blood
Izzet Aggro control
Azorious control
There are a bunch of other well performing decks that I would expect to perform as well (let's call it T1.5):
Mono Red
Scapeshift
Reanimator
Artifact Combo
5c Storm
other stuff I am missing right now
...
T2 (decks that are not the optimal choice to win such a big tournament):
Pattern Rector
Artifact ramp
Mono black Aggro
DreamHalls
High Tide
....
Pls note I tried to focus a bit more on the Combo decks of the format. This is also I want to have combo decks in T1.5 - that means people can play combo and have a great/as great a shot at winning. But their deck might be more complicated, or needs to be be tuned a bit more thoroughly which will keep it's numbers in the meta down. Keep also in mind that such a list depends on your personally perceived MU's between archetypes. Which is especially hard to test with 100 card singleton decks.
Now my perception is that for Berlin only players put artifact combo into the T1 category I have defined a bit more precisely in this post. That is a problem because it will start to warp card choices. The perception in Berlin right now seems to be that artifaxct combo is a problem and based on the many reports from their torunaments in our forum over the course of at least the last year (which not all them have been uploaded to mtgpulse) I can understand that feeling. So Vazdru, I am not ignoring data, it's just that you seem to be disregarding that data (it's in our forum - have a look). Those results are not changed a lick by Scapeshift also being a good choice (which I have never disputed).
Now what will acutally help is honest input from artifact combo players. how can we weaken the deck a bit to take away the most busted (and thus most hated) quick kills and add a bit more vulnerability to the deck without banning the decks centerpieces and making it unplayable which I think most of us dont want to happen. But if I read Vazdru and derStefan82 it feels like we should be discussing unbanning Mana Vault, Mana Crypt and maybe Mox Saphire (bad in 4c blood after all) to increase deck diversity...
All calm down a little pls... The passive aggressive sidenotes are annoying as hell.
Quote from: ChristophO on 05-05-2016, 07:38:37 PM
Now what will acutally help is honest input from artifact combo players. how can we weaken the deck a bit to take away the most busted (and thus most hated) quick kills and add a bit more vulnerability to the deck without banning the decks centerpieces and making it unplayable which I think most of us dont want to happen.
I will write Paul/ Silberhase a PM. Maybe he is willing to give some input to this topic.
Thanks for starting this discussion, Christoph. I agree a lot with the initial approach that combo and fast mana should not become overly strong. Regarding the dominance of Artifact/Academy based decks piloted by the Silberhase in unique fashion (in Berlin) I can just repeat that the deck's result numbers are incredibly lopsided. Statements like "it has never won a big tournament" or "it didn't do good in the online league" are mindblowing to me and have been analyzed enough in the previous posts. The number of total Highlander players in my opinion totally allows the assumption that no one has mastered these decks like Silberhase. Meaning: nobody else seems to know how to play this deck and is maybe a year behind him experience wise. At his level of play the deck to me is absolutely busted. The fact that he didnt win the big tourneys (one person playing this deck to its full potential, no one else) and that he didn't win the online league (variance, different concentration level on screen) are things that can be easily explained even though the deck wins at an alarming 70+ percent rate.
As someone who has actually witnessed it I can only say this: The only ban that will do anything in my opinion is Tolarian Academy, although this also hurts other decks. The artifact decks will still be very good in Silberhase's hands. They still attack from a unique angle. And I have seen the decks win without Academy many times. I can only tip my hat to the Silberhase again, because he has done something beautiful to the meta that's unheard of. But facing him when he plays the deck is simply traumatizing. Maybe he has an idea how to shoot himself in the foot without an Academy ban, but that deck would still be Tier 1 in his hands even if he shoots both feet.
(I say "decks" sometimes because what he did with artifact staxx last friday was just as traumatizing as what he does with 5c)
Finnish Nationals, Apr. 9th 2016, 51 players
1. 4c Blood
2. RDW
3. Jeskai Control
4. Esper Control
5. 4c Blood
6. Pattern Rector
7. Cruel Control
8. Mono G Ramp
Meta-Game-Masters # 5 Berlin, Feb. 27th 2016, 52 players
1. 4c Blood
2. RDW
3. Scapeshift
4. Grixis Control
5. Articfact Combo feat. Academy
6. Jeskai Midrange
7. 4c Goodstuff (w/o W)
8. Scapeshift
HL Cup # 16, Hanau, Jan. 2nd 2016, 102 players
1. 4c Blood
2. 4c Blood
3. MBU Control
4. Jeskai Midrange
5. 4c Blood
6. Izzet Aggro-Control
7. Pattern-Rector
8. Simic Aggro-Control
that are the results of the hl tournaments with 50 players+ this year
2:0 vs G(r)-Devotion (Iulus)
2:0 vs RDW (dsck)
1:2 vs Izzet (Tazi)
1:2 vs Esper (Payron)
2:1 vs Reanimator (K0d013e4st)
0:2 vs RDW (r4nd0m)
2:0 vs MBC (piepser)
0:2 vs 4c Goodstuff (w/o G) (Peddy Frost)
overall 10:9
that is Silberhase's performance in HLL Online Leagues with 5c Tolarian Academy-Combo-Control
so you can say the data is useless - like everybody who don't like the data presented / this is your good right
but you shouldn't blame we for taking this data in account
at least I won't think about ways to weaken Stax or 5c Artifact Combo-Control atm
maybe the only way to convince me is if you play in next online league to prove the data is useless and your opinion/experience is right
looking forward facing some Staxx, Artifact-Combo-Decks, Fastbond-Combos in next season
deal?
I seriously wanna stress that I am not trying to make fun of you. But I read this statement 10 times and I cannot understand what you are saying.
Can you like use other words?
Quoteso you can say the data is useless - like everybody who don't like the data presented / this is your good right
but you shouldn't blame we for taking this data in account
at least I won't think about ways to weaken Stax or 5c Artifact Combo-Control atm
maybe the only way to convince me is if you play in next online league to prove the data is useless and your opinion/experience is right
looking forward facing some Staxx, Artifact-Combo-Decks, Fastbond-Combos in next season
deal?
On another note, it's super hard to argue with you if you keep posting random decklists and ignore, what people say.
Unfortunately you do not seem to understand that he is the only player who is playing these decks to their full potential
and the fact that his exceptionally high win percentage is not perfectly mirrored in every tournament that he played in that
is on mtgpulse is simply a normal result of variance.
The online league results are very different from what we have seen in real life on a weekly basis. There are many possible reasons for this,
but as long as you just post tournament results like they mean anything in this very special one-player-case it feels like we are speaking
different languages.
Vazdru, you get accused of oversimplifying cards/decks, overall concepts and presenting basic arguments. What do you do now? You present the most simplified micro data argument, you just point to some Top8 lists - you make it real easy on yourself- and present even more basic arguments than you usually do. You have a history of not going deeper into a thought/a deck/ a problem, but just pointing to lists tops it all. I am sorry to say this, and i know it sounds harsh, but the way you present arguments is not worthy of a council member.
"maybe the only way to convince me is if you play in next online league to prove the data is useless and your opinion/experience is right
looking forward facing some Staxx, Artifact-Combo-Decks, Fastbond-Combos in next season" - thats not a good look, vazdru. cause you imply that "your 6months complains havent convinced me one bit, i need more" (Shocker: here in berlin, we are not facing SOME of that deck, but ONE, a fact that you totally never talk about), you also say "maybe the only way to convince me.." - like you do not even know what would convince you and what not. and like its our job to convince you and we havent been doing that correctly. maybe this is new to you, vazdru, but its your job as a council member to take feedback seriously, to listen to the community, the cities . its just so weak and entitled to say "maybe the only way to convince me is xyz". if you do not know what convinces you, how would we know? you have taken this berlin-problem not serious from the beginning and i think you are slowly realizing that this has resulted in many players not taking you very serious. something needs to change.
now to your incredibly weak arguments/lists: do you know that somewhere out there, in 2011, lets say nevada, dakota, somewhere in the nowhereland - there was probably an online league somewhere where a good player only went 10-9 with caw blade. the most busted standard deck of the last 10 years. a deck that HAD to be banned. 10-9? are you serious? this is your argument? this micro data means nothing in the overall sphere of things. we told you that paul has a win percentage of 75-80% over 6 months now. thats probably something like 60 games he won, maybe with about 10 lost (an estimation). and you come knocking with silly 10-9, just because its more available than going into the berlin results forum and seeing how well paul did there (that one time where i wrote he won 5 times in a row - nobody said anything - as a council member I expected to be curious there and find out whether there is a problem). Instead you point to finish nationals, which, for me, is the peak of the whole trainwreck you presented here. Finish nationals? Did you expect me to buy Paul a plane ticket to Finland? That proves absolutely nothing - that they have not picked that deck up. It only proves that you often go to the most basic, simplified data/arguments and present it as something that has value. Vazdru, it has no value. MGM top8, yes, paul went 5-0 in swiss there and lost in quarters - WE ARE TALKING ABOUT ONE PLAYER - he went 5-1 there and in games 11-3 (i have micro-data too as you can see) - so you are presenting a tournament where Artifacts went 11-3 (a win percentage way higher than healthy) and present it as an argument AGAINST THE STRENGTH OF THE DECK. This is kind of comical to be honest. I really have no words for some of this anymore, but I tried and I hope you take this critisism to heart(I know some of it sounds harsh but something must change with this style of presenting arguments).
Metagame Masters V:
4c Blood: 4 in tournament
placed: 1, 21, 41, 50 out of 52 total
5c artifact combo: 4 in tournament
placed: 5, 22, 35, 39
The perfect storm (5c oath storm): 2 in tournament
placed: 9, 11
---------------------
midrange: 15 in tournament (28,8% of field)
placed: 1, 6, 7, 10, 16, 21, 24, 26, 27, 30, 41, 44, 45, 46, 50
combo: 13 in tournament (25% of field)
placed: 3, 5, 8, 9, 11, 19, 22, 25, 35, 38, 39, 43, 48
I personally would not place to much relevance in the last third of the placings. Results there will most likely be skewed by drops, byes, inexperienced players and so on.
Posterchild of a tournament to prove that 4c blood is too strong and combo weak. In my opinion that metagame there was right on the brink of being really unhealthy with 7 decks not giving a shit about creature removal (corner cases excluded) and 3 reanimator decks that only cares for some of the lines avaible to the deck.
It would be really great to have the same data for finnish nationals and the HL GP in Frankfurt (now and for the future).
Big thanks to Dr. Opossoum for putting in the time and effort to make the data from the MGM avaiable in our forum!
online results:
That is one person winning 50% of his matches. Doenst prove anything one way (deck op) or another (deck underpowered). Would it have been clear cut proof if he went 6w 2l that the deck is too strong? I dont think so. So dont try to make me believe the opposite with 50% win percentage.
tony/berlinballz:
You are underselling the problem by saying it is only one guy. First of all it is not true. See results from MGM 5. There have also been placings in Frankfurt as well. One of them from Christoph A. from Nuremberg, for example. Which Vazdru decided not to show here by only posting 2016 results.
Just as a heads up:
I want to add two cards to our Ban watch list - nothing more (nothing less) which has jumpstarted this discussion. Keep in mind that as a council member I look at different metas not just the one next to your home.
@ berlin guys
sorry, I haven't made sufficient effort to express my thoughts clear enough this time
I was expecting the message would be understandable anyway
my bad I've asked too much and baffled you
______________________________________________________________
the message was:
give me some facts to underline your claims and I am happy to follow your approach
as long your statements sounds implausible to me based on the available data I am sorry to say: I can't
There are a lot of ways (not only the online league - i missed to use a " ;)") how you can try to convince me obviously. The online league would be one of it to show that your arguments are right.
But I'm not the guy choosing the easiest way and follow always the ones shouting out loudest.
As professional auditor analyzing available data just runs in my blood, my bad either.
@ ChristophO
Quote from: tonytahiti on 05-03-2016, 02:35:18 PM
Paul (edit: Silberhase) in Berlin has a Win Percentage that is about 82-83% (thats a guess, a generous one even, it might be higher) and at the recent MGM5 he went 9-3 in Games (75% win percentage, thats still very high, eventhough low for this freakin insane standards). It is important that we focus on this Man, this Man named Paul Templin since he invented the deck, tuned it to insane heights, is the most skillfull with it and, maybe most importantly, knows how to mulligan with this deck - he mulligans aggressively. To make it short: Paul Templin is a completely different animal with this deck! Now you say "so its the player?" It is not the player, it is the deck, that gets flawlessly by this certain player. Like Blood gets played pretty flawlessly by about 10 People in Germany, this deck gets played flawlessly by one. Thats important to realize.
that was the reason why I picked out Silberhase's performance in the Online League
it is better than mine but far away from being frightening to me
sure this has no fundamental statistical significance, so get more data (e. g. via Online League) seemed the easiest way for me to check the claims
And thanks for the MGM review - that's the approaches I appreciate much.
So someone who is really really good with a deck that attacks a specific meta wins repeatedly. That is probably how it should be.
I see that you are uncomfortable with that and want to change it by banning vital cards. You might be right or wrong, but to me it looks like every game ever where someone else gets stomped by a superior player and deems something is broken and needs fixing. Sometimes that is true but generally it is just renitence to adapt. The available data suggests that it is a local problem but I am the first to admit that the amount of data in highlander is small.
You are getting way too aggressive and insulting just because someone else does not flop over and assimilates your opinion. You think whoever shares your views is smart and whoever does not is dumb.
I may be mistaken, but whenever I check the Berlin FNM results all I see is creature and midrange decks and mostly tier2 decks at that. I am an outsider looking in and to me it seems just to be a really good player preying on a meta his deck can not be contained by and whose players are unwilling to adapt to or accept what is happening. With all the praise silberhase is getting I can not stress enough how normal it is for a good player with a favourable matchup to win a match.
Hey Guys,
now after I went on holiday and was thinking about this actual problem, I wanna tell you my opinion about this now. First I wanna tell some beackground information about this deck. As far I can remember I've been working on this deck since 2.5 years, nearly the same time when the first eggs combo decks apeared. And I also did many many testgames with that deck. My experience with artifact decks in general is even longer. I've been playing artifact decks in Highlander since I'm playing Highlander. And as you can see, you need much experience with that deck when you look the the performance of other players with that deck. And there are only few people who could have that eperience with that deck, like ChristophO, Tabris, etc. The same goes for TPS. It's really strong, but very few people can play this. In general there is one question left: Does a deck break a format cause only one or two people can pilot such a deck? A very hard question to answer imo.
Please note, this was only the indroduction of my post, the rest I will finish tonight of maybe the next days.
I read a lot about crying for the need of banning tolarian academy in the last months (years ?). But I totaly agree in Vazdru´s and DerStefan´s Statements. In Frankfurt the guys are crying because they get rid of playing against 4C an there are voices to ban fetchlands or duals just to weaken one deck. Overall we have to have Combo Deck in our format and due to the fact that we have no sideboard you always have to think about the richt mix of your spells.
If the council acts like Wizards for banning decisions they rely on tournament results and Metagame presence. So what is wrong to act in the same way ?
From this point the council has to make more thoughts of getting rid of that 4C Blood deck because it is by far the most played deck and wins big tournaments very often.
This discussion about banning single cards (Academy) which allows single strategies is exhausting. In Frankfurt we talked about the Artefact Combo Deck and tested a bit with it. In my opinion it is a strong deck, but as every combo deck it has problems with counterspells and disruption plus it has to kill on turn 4 constantly because for example RDW or even 4C Blood have suche a hard clock.
Overall, I can understand that it is annoying to play against this deck sometimes but I don´t think its is unhealthy for the format.
Thx to all community members for their replies in recent days.
silberhase:
Good to have you here! looking forward to your input on how to tone done 5c artifact combo a bit without destroying the deck.
kenshin/promole:
I understand that you guys do not have a lot of combo in your formats but a lot of 4c blood. Let's take a step back.
Imagine 100 people having to make a deck choice for a big tournament. If you leave out "soft" choice factors like card availability
and deck preference due to fun piloting it players pick what they perceive to be the best deck (or at least best deck for their playing skills).
Now perception is a strange animal. It very much depends on your personal peer group. On the opinion of your RL friends that you talk with.
Of your play experience in smaller weekly/bi-weekly or monthly tournaments. But also of highly respected players that perform especially
well. Tabris/silberhase/Maqi/Christian Hauk are such examples of players. They tend to do well irrespective of which (good) deck they pick because
they are strong Highlander players. So if those guys champion a deck the community tends to follow at least in part. That is just fine. That process happens
in many different aspects of life in general (e.g. "small-ball" in NBA basketball right now).
The culmination of that is that at the latest MGM in Berlin Midrange and Combo were almost represented in equal numbers. I have posted about that tournament
prior in this thread. It is also very showing that Vazdru's cited the first place finish of a 4c blood deck to prove his point while I pointed out why I see
that completely differently in my prior post in this thread. The fact of the matter is that many Berlin players are unhappy with due to the perceived strength of
5c artifacts and have been vocal about this since ~mid 2015 (at least it has been on my radar since then). It is not a "new" development at all.
In the past the discussion has always been very polar on the topic of this deck. For Berlin it is abviously a big problem while the rest just shrugs their shoulders
and blames it on bad players/bad decks or their own superiour knowledge/skill/etc. That doesnt help to resolve the perceived situation for the Berlin players at all.
Which is why I think talking about "Combo meta" is important. A notion of mine that has been strongly reenforced by the repsonses to this thread.
promole:
I dont want to ban Tolarian Academy. I want to add two 3cmc draw 7 effects to the ban watchlist (Wheel of Fortune/Timetwister) which also doenst necessarily mean I would
vote to ban them come october. But I want to talk about it to be able to reflect on my opinion and upcoming decision. I also decided to this pupblicly because there was
demand from the communtiy to be more open and democratic.
4cblood topic:
Since it has come up several times in this thread my opinion on that. I would like the deck to be less strong. Since it is a goodstuff deck that is hard to achieve with
banning single cards. I also dislike pure "metagame" bans because they look extremely strange on a ban list and therefore criticism of the format. That being said the best card I currently know would be "Tainted Pact" and i have voted for watchlisting that in march and will (most likely) do so again in June. For further discussion please use a new thread If you want.
fetchland topic:
I would like to have a HL format without Duals and fetchlands just due to deck cost reasons. That being said our current format would feel extemely stupid with all-time allstar cards int he format but a purposely gimped mana base. I would go for two two different Hl formats under "one roof" to offer nice Highlander experience for players who can afford decks >1000€ as well as for players who cant do that. Would also make it possible to have big weekend tournaments with two HL events. Same as with the 4c blood topic pls discuss this in a different thread (maybe the one where MMD last talked about banning fetchlands).
Don´t get me wrong. I personally don´t want o get fetchlands or duals banned. My point is that I think, that only a few of experienced players are able to play these Combo decks with success but neither dominate each tournament with it. So why is there a need to ban cards played in these decks ?
Silberhase explained that he put a lot of work in his Deck and played it for about 3 years. He gets rewarded sometimes with good results in some tournements others don´t.
My point is, if the council decides to add "draw seven spells" or key cards for some decks (Academy, Bazaar etc.) to the banned list, we get a Meta full of Goodstuff Decks and nothing else. I want diversity in our format.
I understand that the Berlin players are unhappy to have one, in their view dominating Deck (or well Combo player) in their field and try to fix that problem.
There are two points:
1. Berlin thinks everybody don´t see the problem because nobody trys the deck or understands how broken those combo decks are.
2. Everybody else shrugs the shoulders because these decks just play a minor role in their enviroment (which does not mean that nobody had tried it)
I tried this artefact deck at some HL events in Frankfurt and in my point is not the most consistent deck. Sure sometimes you have the nuts but most likely you don´t. And even if you have the nuts you sometimes loose to a well pointed counter or discard spell or a wasteland...
Sure, if you play a deck full of creature hate it gets hard to win against combo. But isn´t it a kind of metagamecall ?
The key question is:
Do we want to have combo decks in our format or not ?
If not, the right weapon is to ban "draw 7" spells. But again I am more afraid of a scissor, stone, paper format than of the existence of combo decks which (played by experienced players) get some good results.
If that decks have a high % in the metagame and consitently wins tournaments or place guys in top 8, we could think about it again. But at this point it doesn´t.
Quote from: Promole on 12-05-2016, 02:18:34 PM
I tried this artefact deck at some HL events in Frankfurt and in my point is not the most consistent deck. Sure sometimes you have the nuts but most likely you don´t. And even if you have the nuts you sometimes loose to a well pointed counter or discard spell or a wasteland...
Now imagine having the guy with 3 years experience sitting next to you and pointing out all the missed avenue's, the incorrect mulliganing etc. Your impression might have been very different. That deck certainly is one of the tougher decks to pilot.
Quote
Do we want to have combo decks in our format or not ?
I dont know a single person playing Highlander that wants to have no combo decks in the format. I have also stated several times in this thread that I do want to have combo in the format and competitive (able to win tourny) at that. It is just that I strongly feel that uninteractive stack based combo decks are bad for the enjoyment of the format if their share of the metagame is too big. In the Berlin metagame their share is the biggest compared to other metagames and has aproached a share size that is unhealthy (in my opinion). At the last MGM the artifact combo deck and 4c Blood had the same amount of players and were tied for first (+ second) place of the metagame. Maybe TPS and 5c Artifacts are complicated enough to keep the numbers down even without a ban. But that limit works best if no good players is helping out the gyus going "tried it three times, didnt win with it, therefore it must be bad" too really see all their mistakes. And combo decks tend to be rather unforgiving when doing mistakes.
I mean you say:
Normaly everbody has to play this deck because it is by far the best deck. It is just not that dominant because nearly everyone plays it wrong (except maybe Silberhase ;-))
BUT:
Do you really think the whole players (except players in Berlin who recognize the strength) are not able to build their own opinion and they all are wrong because the deck plays a minor role in their metagame ?
I still don´t get the point. Vazdru showed the results from the last couple of (big) tournaments. And the deck was not nearly as dominating as 4C Blood was and is. So why do we discuss all the time about niche combo decks which play a minor role in the overall metagame ?
I still think it is a kind of berlin thing and the metagame is healthy (except the high numbers of 4C Blood decks) :-)
I do not want do defend combo decks but I think the council does not good weaken combo with adding key cards to the banned list.
I mean if this changes, the council can react and change something but at this point I still do not feel this is necessary.
Evaluating how strong a deck is is really difficult. Different people will have different opinions. There have been Pro Tour Top 8 MU where both Sides believed they were advantaged. That is just analyzing Deck A vs Deck B after 2 weeks of testing to really know your deck and a whole night of testing that single MU by the brightest people. That is why I have a problem when you write stuff like "I tried this artefact deck at some HL events in Frankfurt and in my point is not the most consistent deck. Sure sometimes you have the nuts but most likely you don´t. And even if you have the nuts you sometimes loose to a well pointed counter or discard spell or a wasteland...".
Like I said in my last post it is two things. You have tried it very briefly and did not suceed on your own. Therefore you stick with your initial bias which seems to be 4c blood = best deck. The second thing is you lack a person capable with the deck and willing to share and champion the deck. Regarding Vazdru's "statistics". Top 8 results alone are completely irrelevant. 2/8 making Top 8 with 4c blood is awful if the meta had more than 2/8 4c Blood decks for example. A statement that might very well be true for HL GPs in Hanau. Having a deck make Top 8 just shows that the respective archetype is somwhat viable. Now if the deck is really strong it will reach Top 8 with a larger % of its players than other deck archetypes. 2 out of 2 in Top 16 (MGM 5c Storm) is much more impressive than 1 of 4 winning and the other 3 in bottom half (MGM 4c blood). I doubt 4c blood would do well on that metric - but since the data for the 50+ non-berlin tournaments simply isnt there nobody can check. Either way we lack data to come to any fact based result and we will always lack the necessary amount. It would be nice if people like Vazdru could agree on that.
Either way thanks for the input. I am acutally able to play in Frankfurt this weekend and looking forward to start/continue discussing there in person. Also I will not be able to play the non interactive combo decks because I also lack proficiency . Maybe Silberhase is willing to do 20 games with me using skype on Cockatrice and I can swap decks for the next MGM which I hopefully can finally attend for the first time as well.
I never argumented in a way that I said I had no good results with the deck therefore it is bad. I said that I tried in a couple of tournaments and played with it a while to get an impression how strong the deck is after all that complainments here in this forum.
In fact I played it in 3 tournaments with 10, 8, 16 players and became 1st, 2nd and 4th with this deck but I never had the feeling it is unbeatable. I lost 2 games in three tournaments to 4C Blood and Scapeshift. But in several other testing games I lost games in the described way in one of my former posts.
I also did´t say that 4C is the best deck. I said it is not good for a format where one deck is all around plus it finishes well in top 8s often plus winning big tournaments...
Nevertheless it would be a plessure to continue this discussion in Maintal on Saturday.
CU there :-)
What I don't like is the assumption that there is only one player who is able to play the deck and build a good Academy Combo deck.
One of our best players in Würzburg build and played an Academy Deck for 2 years as well, I would say the deck he build is really strong and he is able to play it.
He switched to UR Control now and won the last 3 monthly tournaments in a row.
For our meta it felt not over the top because if you put enough pressure against it there are games where you just not assemble fast enough.
But back to topic and being constuctive.
I thought a lot about this decks, and I personally think there could be 2 cards that could be removed probably easy which could improve things.
For the Academy the additon of Fastbond worried me a lot because it allows extrem broken starts + it gives this deck another combo with Crucible, Zuran Orb, Fastbond for a much lower price then other Decks.
Fastbond starts always feels unfair and so removing it will weaken the deck but still keep it strong.
There are no decks which require Fastbond so you will not destroy whole deck types and I think it will not have a big influence in variance.
As we have seen it's usage is almost always in pure combo decks.
The second card you could think about if you worry about TPS and Eggs would be LED.
This card is as well only used in pure combo builds, it allows TPS earlier kills, Doomsday piles etc. and Eggs the addition of Oath for the Salvager kill.
So removing this as well will not kill one of the decks, weaken stack based combo decks and will not have an influence on the variance of decks.
The opposite will happen I assume if you ban cards like Demonic Tutor or Oath of Druids. My feeling is that those cards both keep the deck variance high and are required to have a good balance between strategies.
But again for me / us in Würzburg the actual format feels really good and we have with ~15 players a preety equal amount of Combo, Aggro, Control and Midrange.
We have HighTide, Academy, ComboOath, TwinShift, Blood, UR, Jeskai, Boros, RDW etc. and everything can compete.
For me UWx/URx and Blood feel like the strongest Decks in the format because of there pure consistency, that's why I not weaken those edge decks to hard because that will result in more UWx/URx and Midrange (Blood) decks.
Insert The First Avenger: Civil War Meme here.
(I wish we had a forum that was a tiny bit more up to date...)
The banning of sdt should already have been a slight blow to the academy.dec. I think we mustn't discard the possibility, that if the deck was overpowered, it maybe isn't anymore already.
Ok, I will continue now my thoughts about this discussion. Many people see the academy decks as too strong for our format, other people also see TPS as problematic. But what about other combo decks? Vadru mentioned, that Scapeshift is really dominant, too. It won the last tournament at the HLL and also got great performence at the last MGMs. And I guess he is also right. I also think, this deck is underplayed and could be even more dominant, when more people decide to play this. I watched Payron some games and it felt, he could combo out consistently about turn 6. And the most games also were nearly non interactive. Christoph also mentioned, that reanimator is also dominant, but I don't think so. It appears sometimes in the top 8 of big tournament, but aren't a real problem imo. I also think that cards like phyrexian furnace etc. are too much underplayed in our format, especially cause of the delve cards (And it could also weaken Y-Will ;) ). But all in all we seem to have a problem with combo deck in general. So what we can do? I really wonder, why noone came to the idea to unban the tutor spells, especially Demonic and Mystical Tutor. Imo they are too powerful beeing healthy for any format. Two cards, that can win mid-lategames on its own, even in combo decks. Demonic Tutor is played in every deck, that plays black. There are also various decks like UW control that splash black only for this tutor. Can such a card be healthy for our format and generate various meta? The answer is simply no. This card says you play every card in your deck twice. Mystical Tutor into Demonic says you play every card 3 times. Merchant Scroll into mystical 4. And I'm also playing muddle the mixture who can find demonic. So do you all see, how problematic these cards are?
Quote from: Silberhase on 13-05-2016, 04:01:38 PM
I really wonder, why noone came to the idea to unban the tutor spells, especially Demonic and Mystical Tutor. Imo they are too powerful beeing healthy for any format. Two cards, that can win mid-lategames on its own, even in combo decks. Demonic Tutor is played in every deck, that plays black. There are also various decks like UW control that splash black only for this tutor. Can such a card be healthy for our format and generate various meta? The answer is simply no. This card says you play every card in your deck twice. Mystical Tutor into Demonic says you play every card 3 times. Merchant Scroll into mystical 4. And I'm also playing muddle the mixture who can find demonic. So do you all see, how problematic these cards are?
Thanks for your input. I absolutely agree!
Actually my votes would look like:
Watchlist:
* Demonic Tutor (+ vote for Ban / power-level)
* Mystical Tutor (+ vote for Ban / power-level)
* Tainted Pact (+ vote for Ban / meta-reasons, weaken multicolor-goodstuff strategies)
* Fastbond
* Tolarian Academy
* Mana Drain
* Oath of Druids
* Gifts Ungiven
* Stoneforge Mystic
Hey everyone. I had a great weekend at the MKM event playing Highlander (and Legacy). As you might have seen in Vazdru's report from the torunament http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=1206.0 (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=1206.0) We had 2 reanimator players and a slightly different take on the 5c artifact combo deck in the in the top 8 with the finals being 5c artifacts vs. reanimator. So people claiming those deck types not really being viable (at least not in southern Germany) have certainly experienced something different in that tournament.
Judging the format from that tournament alone the format feels pretty good with lots of of different strategies being represented in the 66% (or more) match win bracket. Watching the semis of 4c blood vs artifacts really showed the problem of Fastbond/Draw 7 effects couple with Academy. Even single turns lasted upwards of 10 minutes and made the 4c blood comment on the lack of engagement/fun he was having ("Man, es macht echt keinen Spaß gegen dein Deck zu spielen." I think was said in german).
I also had nice chats with Dalibor and Maqi and a longer talk with derStefan82. I really like Stefan's notion of not banning Oath but instead opting to go after LED/or Will as an alternative to weaken spell based combo.
Tutor discussion:
I think good tutors are needed to enable non-goodstuff decks to do their thing. Of course Demonic tutor is a great card and played a lot. If we push non goodstuff decks to play even more very mediocre Transmute tutors or higher costed tutors those decks will lose a lot. That being said I really like the notion of watchlisting Tainted pact since the plays like Demonic nr 2. in midrange decks but is a lot worse in many (most?) combo decks which can not afford to exile many cards since they lack the redundancy midrange decks posess.
I was glad when I saw an Academy deck won. Maybe it will make some people realize some things (especially the people who are sooo obsessed with "it hasnt won a 50 person tournament yet").
To not take anything away from the deck Tom Fischer played (I think his performance lately is unbelievable etc.): we had two very skilled players playing that Eggs-Academy Deck in 2015, the list was only 4 cards different - and the deck, while being strong, was not on the level of the Artifact deck that is dominating here now. It was Thoralf Severin, probably one of the top10 Players in Germany and a Pro Tour Regular and Jonny aka Tabris, a player that IMO can pick up any deck and play it close to flawlessly. They actually worked on that deck together. Turns took 10 Minutes and it won a few events but also fell to its own consistency issues (issues the 5c artifact deck that does not have). It was the first time, we, as Berlin players, realized that Academy is not healthy in this format and it was also very frustrating to play against (a Blood player complained about 10 min turns, we had that for months with eggs and still have that sometimes with artifacts and we keep saying that and we keep complaining and we keep sending SOS-signals). That deck was really unfun to play against and not enjoyed by the whole community - and to be honest thats why Thoralf and Jonny sometimes did not play it. Imagine that: a council legalizes a broken card, keeps it legal and the only thing a community can do to have fun FNMs is to not play the deck and doing it AS A FAVOR for the community. Thats messed up. Thoralf is not a HL regular and he only liked to play decks like that (eggs, high tide etc, not because he likes to make opponents furious, but because he likes complex puzzles and likes to get away from the abc magic standard and modern has to offer). Jonny also put that deck down - while having broken draws (academy draws), it was not the most consistent and also opponents would fault him for choosing that deck. So then a few months passed, Paul invented 5c Artifacts (a deck where 1-2 Counterspells is not enough to win, unlike Eggs) and we are now enduring that for 12 months now.
Just to give you an overview, how baffling it is for us that MAYBE only now people start realizing that academy is a problem.
hi guys, I got some questions and suggestions
- it would be nice, if somebody could send me a copy of this 5c artifacts list. (just pm me)
- I played some games vs. eggs and also goldfished with it a lot. I think its viable, but you are quite dependent on how good your opp. knows what you are trying to do (which is nothing I like to rely on). So eggs is ok for me at the moment.
- brief comment on the league performance of Silberhase (as mentioned by Vazdru). There were two 2:0 games included, where one of it, was against monoB which is not really a viable deck I think, and one match was against Gerry's 7-9 year old son with a deck thats also not really viable. (that said, this data is only a very limited indication and not statistically significant. Nevertheless it is an indicator)
- I would encourage the Berlin players to upload their FNM results to mtgpulse
- I think the format is perfectly healthy at the moment. (For me it would even be ok, to unban stoneforge mystic and natural order)
- Could it be possible to easily adjust a 4c blood deck to this MU (taking in tidehollow sculler, reclamation sage, some other hatebears)?
- I think any ban that makes 4c blood better is a bad ban (like mana drain for example).
- I somehow could imagine a ban of tainted pact as being helpful, as its mostly played in 4c Blood and helps this decktype by far the most.
I watched the Eggs decks play in round 3 or 4, he got very lucky in a couple of situations. Zero cards in hand topdecking Tolaria West for Zuran Orb into endless life/mana against Izzet Control who just had the wrong counterspells in hand (remand/venser). Any other card on top and he is out of top8 range.
Of course the people were talking about the eggs deck at the tournament. But so far as i witnessed it, everybody, even Tom, said thats its not a broken deck, its just a good deck.
Now Eggs has won a 46 player tournament, so has Blood, UW, UR, UWR, Reanimator and many more.
I agree with Tazi, for me the format is perfectly healthy at the moment. (pls dont unban stoneforge and natural order ^^)
This is exactly what has to stop.
A person asks me for the artifact combo list (implying he has not seen it, is not familiar with it, has not played vs. it etc.) and then 5 sentences later says "the meta is perfectly healthy". How can you say that? You are obviously missing some information (and you just said you do..and then you said everything is fine..wtf). A meta is not "healthy" because your local store has nobody going rampant with a deck. I mean..i seriously dont understand how anybody can say those two sentences in the same post. This is super close minded, "locally minded" if you will.
Then another player says Eggs got lucky and meta is perfectly healthy. Eggs is the inconsistent stepchild of Artifact Combo. Eggs is not even operating in the same sphere/universe as Artifact Combo. Artifact Combo is a totally different animal. And IF Egss, which, admittely is a inconsitent combo deck, cna win a tournament that big, it speaks volumes about Artifact Combo. What qualifies me to make that assumption? I played vs. both decks for years now, i tried to beat both decks, I have seen every kind of deck being thrown at those decks, i see it every friday.
But the guy, who asks me for the artifact combo list and the guy, who saw eggs in action now, are saying the metagame is fine. It is fine.
Quote from: TaZi on 23-05-2016, 09:11:50 PM
- it would be nice, if somebody could send me a copy of this 5c artifacts list. (just pm me)
- I would encourage the Berlin players to upload their FNM results to mtgpulse
I think there is no other local group that publishing decklists more seriously than the Berliners (also nearly every result has been posted in this forum). 16 out of the 26 front page events on mtgpulse are from Berlin. Moreover, Artifact Combo even has its own archetype on mgtpulse (with 2 Top8s on big tournaments)!
And sorry, but assuming that mtgpulse (as the central platform for HL-decklists) is one of the major tools to investigate the HL-meta you haven't done your homework. I know it's only your personal opinion, but I don't get how you can say, that the meta is healthy at the moment without knowing "the meta".
Quote from: tonytahiti on 24-05-2016, 02:29:59 PM
This is exactly what has to stop.
A person asks me for the artifact combo list (implying he has not seen it, is not familiar with it, has not played vs. it etc.) and then 5 sentences later says "the meta is perfectly healthy". How can you say that? You are obviously missing some information (and you just said you do..and then you said everything is fine..wtf). A meta is not "healthy" because your local store has nobody going rampant with a deck. I mean..i seriously dont understand how anybody can say those two sentences in the same post. This is super close minded, "locally minded" if you will.
hmmm?
A meta is "unhealthy" because your local store has someone going rampant with a certain deck? This is super close minded, "locally" minded if you will.
Tazi has at least some connections to different metas while playing the online league where players from different parts of Germany and even Austria and Finland take part. Ok - that's obviously limited experience but when do you have had your last hl experience outside your local playgroup in Berlin?
@Christoph I agree with stefan here. Banning LED/Will would hurt spell based combo way more than banning oath esp. in the grizzel list from kötter (which is inferior to the creatureless version but thats not the point and he still made easily top8 three times (and lost in the quartefinals against UR which he would have won if he didnt have grizzel in his list...but again thats not the point)
@Tazi/Bat as MacGyver already stated you can find most of the berlin lists (including pauls 5c artifacts) on pulse and the berlin community has its own thread about weekly tournament which gives a nice insight about the development of the local meta.
Now to the eggs deck and artifacts in general. The remark that Tom got lucky is close to a tautology in this context since every deck/player needs to have some luck to get to t8. Every t8 participant can tell you about the one game were he/she got that lucky topdeck/missed lethal by opponent/ one outer silver bullet on the starting hand and so on. So diminishing Toms result by saying "he got lucky" (which I imagine is not your intention but your proposition implies that) does not help when we try to acess how strong those single cards are. I played with and against the deck many times I ve tested different builds with Toffel and had some discussions with Tiggu who presented the deck some time ago in the forum. So my experience with it is sufficient I would say and while I dont think the deck is on the same
level as the 5c artifact combo decks (due to consistency issues and the all in approach) its still very strong (rendering a lot of cards in the opposing deck useless and having sometimes 8+ mana on t2/3) While I agree that knowing what the deck wants to do take some win percentage away it doesnt mean you magically beat the whole "I laugh about your Lightning Bolt/Flametongue Kavu/Swords/Path/ etc." approach. You still need to have specific answers right on time to beat eggs. Now as Luca already said its only the stepchild and it brings other problems to the table besides the obvious ones (academy fastbond)
The first time I proposed the ban of Academy was because of the experience with this deck (at that point I never played against but with it). Since its very non interactive (which was the reason why I loved this deck so much. You are most of the time playing a solitaire game and laugh about the silly midrange value cards from your opponent) and time issues (even if you are lightning fast and experienced with this deck (sidenote: no one knows how to play that deck to its full potential) you will face turns which will take 10 minutes or more if you get your "crack egg crack egg into draw 7 into untap into crack 3 eggs into sunrise into draw 7 draws" (which are the draws which will win you the game) during tournaments. Now I dont want to repeat myself. I wrote about the deck some time ago and now it got even stronger with Fastbond (having the side-combo with infinite life or infinite mana is icing on the cake ) and let me assure you we are not some lazy scrubs who dont know how to play against combo decks in fact berlin had always a strong "combo" field so to assume we are just too dumb/inexperienced (while paul is crushing us in his local meta he can only beat 8ys old and tier4 decks online) is very short sighted. It would require a lot of "metagame warping" to fight this deck, making your deck weak against 75% of the rest of the field and I would say if Artifact Combo decks had the same numbers in appearance as Blood or Ux Value decks a lot more people would rise their voices. As I alrady said in the other thread about banning/unbannings WotC to this day thinks fast mana is the worst thing you can do to the game and with good reason they try to stay away from it. The opportunity costs to enable academy are just way too low
I suggested the Berlin guys should upload their lists had the following reasons:
- before my post, I read the full 3 pages here and there were some statements like "if we would post anytime, Paul is winning with the deck in FNM, you would see whats going on". that made me think "ok, then maybe you just do so"
- I checked the last 10 or so FNMs from Berlin on mtgpulse and there was not a single copy of the artifact deck in there (i know, its in the MGM turney)
Again, Vazdru, you are oversimplifying things.
We have all decks present in Berlin, not every Friday, but overall in the community, everything is present, very diverse metagame, and we follow other communites, we actually check mtgpulse etc. and we see nothing completely new. But there is this +1 deck, the deck that we have here that is played close to nowhere else. So we have a complete meta (blood, rdw, reanimator, scapeshift, uwx midrange, oath, gruul, high tide, eggs even, everything you can think of) + 1! PLUS ONE, Vazdru. THE PLUS ONE DECK IS THE PROBLEM. So it is not locally minded at all, it is only local in the regard that only we, locally, have this deck. But this problem would be a problem EVERYWHERE if every city had a skillful artifacts player.
And you with your question about me. I have played the last 5 Metagame Masters tournaments here in Berlin, a tournament in Berlin, where more than half the players are not from berlin. Very nonlocal meta etc. You should check it out, we have Erfurt people here, Halle, Leipzig, even Mannheim Players like Maqi and Ronald L. made the trip. I am actually a little surprised you as a council member who is "so in touch with all the communities" havent participated in one of those tournaments, its the second biggest HL series in Germany. Maqi as a council member made an effort at least, and we appreciated that. There is a 6th Installment of the tournament on 4th of June. Come by, say hello to the community, "keep in touch". It is quite important for a council member to understand and follow what is going on in the cities and judging your arguments (lack there of)and the problem you have grasping the root of this problem it might have to do with you not "keeping in touch" with the communities enough.
What I don't like on this thread is that there is that there is no real discussions about changes.
Besides a post from Christof and some comments from Jonnie there is no discussion about what to do.
Only crying and battling.
I shared my ideas about thinking about LED/Fastbond to weaken combo decks but not destorying archetypes but there was less (nearly no) discussion.
As well there were not any suggestions.
Do you want to have Academy banned (Berlin players)?
Or do you think like me that Academy and Oath are 2 cards which enable broken strategies but are also enablers for quite a number of archetypes.
That's why my hope was more in discussing cards like LED/Will/Fastbond which create higher consistency of those decks but not destroy them if they get the hammer.
FYI:
My votes what should be watchlisted:
Fastbond
Workshop
Oath of Druids
Tainted Pact
Tolarian Academy
Yawgmoth's Will
LED
Wheel of Fortune
Timetwister
Gift's Ungiven
Stoneforge Mystic
Please keep in mind that I do NOT feel all those cards need to be Banned/Unbanned. Some cards on that list need to be banned in my opinion; others shouldnt according to me ;D. I simply think it is important to be able to discuss them. Without prior discussion of past watchlist votings etc. there would also be a few tutors and Mana drain on my list. Howeever I strongly feel those have been discussed Ad Nauseam already and I have made up my mind on them and so should everybody else. Please note that I strongly disagree with the notion to ban tutors. Not so long ago we had way way too much goodstuff only decks. Having strong tutors makes decks other than 4c goodstuff competitive. Rather than neutering all non goodstuff lists by banning certain tutors I would rather look at stuff like LED, Will, Fastbond etc. to tune done especially concerning stuff.