The price of casual format

[Vazdru]

Tutoring whole combo, and getting 2 pieces of it in your hand = GG.

You missed something - > Combo in HL is actually dead!

It's a fact that Gifts Ungiven do not have a huge impact on our Meta anymore - there may have been different times but actually it seems easy to win vs. a resolved Gifts Ungiven. Maybe you forgot cards like Jund Charm, Shred Memories, Relic and lots more ?

latest GP: 6 Aggro, UG, Oath - only two copies of Gifts Ungiven in the Top 8

Frankfurt, 29.12.: 14 Players, RDW and UW-Control which didn't even run Gifts Ungiven won the tourney
Mannheim, 3.1.: 17 Players, Oath won the tourney but without any Gifts-Ungiven-Combo, 2nd place Tokenmania

I had a quite different opinion to Gifts Ungiven two years ago. I vehemently pushed for banning Gifts Ungiven (http://www.magicplayer.org/phpbb/viewtopic.php?t=784) - meanwhile the Meta totally changed and I'm a bit wiser after 1.500 recorded test games.

Gifts bringt also nicht nur etwas in einer Zwei-Karten-Kombo, sie ist eine derartige Kombo !

Gifts Ungiven ist in den Top 8 des diesjährigen GP 4mal vertreten (Jans Staxx, 2x TPS, UG) !!!, letztes Jahr 3mal (Jans 5c, Dredgeatog, UG), im Vergleich dazu: Trinisphere in beiden Jahren gerade mal 1x. Auf den folgenden Plätzen ist Gifts sicherlich ähnlich oft vertreten wie in den Top 8 (den Eindruck hatte ich zumindest) - also knapp in jedem zweiten Deck ?!?!

Gifts do not only support "Two-Card-Combos", Gifts IS a "Two-Card-Combo" !

Gifts Ungiven was 4 times in the Top 8 of this years GP(2) (Staxx, 2x TPS, UG), last year (GP1) 3 times (5CC, Dredgeatog, UG)...so in almost half of the Top 8 Decks

Times have changed - the GP is always a good tracer for. That's why i don't think Gifts Ungiven needs to be banned.

But plz back to topic.

[so_not]

Gifts for Aluren, Imperial Recruiter, Regrowth and Eternal Witness is far from dead what I can see.

[Vazdru]

Gifts for Aluren, Imperial Recruiter, Regrowth and Eternal Witness is far from dead what I can see.

There are hundreds of examples like this...

BUT have you ever seen an Aluren-Deck Top 8 ?? After 6 HL GPs and lots of other tourneys I can say: I did NOT.

Such examples like yours above are nice but obviously pure theoretical and far from what usually happens if you play Highlander. And why? Yeah right - there is an opponent sitting in front of you!

Playing vs aggro you can't even play eot Turn 4 Gifts -> Aluren, Imperial Recruiter, Regrowth and Witness -> Aggro Player just gives you Regrowth and Witness and wins next turn by beatings - GG! so you maybe need to add Momen't peace to stay alive a turn longer.

Ever seen Stonecloaker in action after a resolved Gifts? - i did in GP 5 where i've won with UW-Skies vs a eot resolved Gifts of my opponent by just playing Stonecloaker while he tried to get back his game-winner from grave - GG, but for me after i dropped Winter Orb!

Just a early Relic, Claws, Furnace, Crypt, Wretch or things like Jund Charm, Beckon Apparation .... denying Gifts = GG!

It's a nice theoretical Gifts staple but far from beeing a realistic end for that Aluren-deck playing Gifts eot Turn 4.

You are invited to convince me from the opposite but i think you can't.

[so_not]

Gifts for Aluren, Imperial Recruiter, Regrowth and Eternal Witness is far from dead what I can see.

There are hundreds of examples like this...

BUT have you ever seen an Aluren-Deck Top 8 ?? After 6 HL GPs and lots of other tourneys I can say: I did NOT.

Such examples like yours above are nice but obviously pure theoretical and far from what usually happens if you play Highlander. And why? Yeah right - there is an opponent sitting in front of you!

Playing vs aggro you can't even play eot Turn 4 Gifts -> Aluren, Imperial Recruiter, Regrowth and Witness -> Aggro Player just gives you Regrowth and Witness and wins next turn by beatings - GG! so you maybe need to add Momen't peace to stay alive a turn longer.

Ever seen Stonecloaker in action after a resolved Gifts? - i did in GP 5 where i've won with UW-Skies vs a eot resolved Gifts of my opponent by just playing Stonecloaker while he tried to get back his game-winner from grave - GG, but for me after i dropped Winter Orb!

Just a early Relic, Claws, Furnace, Crypt, Wretch or things like Jund Charm, Beckon Apparation .... denying Gifts = GG!

It's a nice theoretical Gifts staple but far from beeing a realistic end for that Aluren-deck playing Gifts eot Turn 4.

You are invited to convince me from the opposite but i think you can't.

Why the hell it should be turn 4? Oh really, is graveyard hate good in this format? Obviously there haven't been any Aluren combos in GP top 8's since the deck (or any other combo deck for that matter) is pretty hard to pilot and I doubt those players are very good at least based on the decklists in top eights. Those are constantly misbuilt or have bad cards in them.

And that was just an example how silly the whole "ban combo pieces" policy is when something like Chain of plasma is banned but Aluren or Earthcraft for example aren't

AND now you guys are thinking of unbanning Ancestral??? LOL I must say!

[Vazdru]

is pretty hard to pilot and I doubt those players are very good at least based on the decklists in top eights. Those are constantly misbuilt or have bad cards in them.

It seems you think you are better player as many of the last GPs Top 8-Player so you easily judge the top 8 decks of the recent GPs?! so i have to take a bow for the new HL-master? sorry never heard that you won anything so i can't judge you but your analsis do not impress me much / btw. ever heard of Andre Müller, Marco Blume or Simon Görzten - i bet you do not.

Modesty is a goodness.

[so_not]

is pretty hard to pilot and I doubt those players are very good at least based on the decklists in top eights. Those are constantly misbuilt or have bad cards in them.

It seems you think you are better player as many of the last GPs Top 8-Player so you easily judge the top 8 decks of the recent GPs?! so i have to take a bow for the new HL-master? sorry never heard that you won anything so i can't judge you but your analsis do not impress me much / btw. ever heard of Andre Müller, Marco Blume or Simon Görzten - i bet you do not.

Modesty is a goodness.

Sorry if I pissed you off. Obviously there are also good players with good decks and maybe I have bad memory but I don't recall seeing Blume or Muller in the top 8's of last couple GP's.
They would probably do fine with any sort of combo deck but majority of highlanderplayers aren't pros. I don't say I'm a better player but many of those decks have pretty obvious flaws. You are saying that those lists in those GP top 8's are close to optimal?
At the moment the metagame might be enough combo- and Gifts-hating in form graveyard- and nonbasiclandhate but that doesn't save you from that banning of Chain of Plasma.
I don't know who you are so neither have I heard you win anything.

[Vazdru]

Sorry if I pissed you off.

accepted

I don't know who you are so neither have I heard you win anything.

That doesn't matter at all. The difference is that I've never judged the top 8 player rather the guys playing Highlander at the GP the way you did. That was the only thing that pissed me off. And yes, Andre Müller played WW at the last GP (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=155.0).

[Payron]

Just wanted to write some comments also ... I do think after 7 swiss rounds it isn t only luck that player reach the top8 ... so i guess most top 8 players thought about there card choises  ...

...but I am not happy with the watchlist either timetwister is maybe ok ... but the recall is just to imbalanced .. I guess wizards had it thoughts why no card got even nearly the power of this singel card and its gonna be a auto include that means alot of decks just gonna splash for Gifts, Intuition and recall ... and I don t wanna see that players just run around with "99" card highlander becasue everybody gonna play the recall ... about the other card choises ... when everybody thinks aggro is dominating why unban dustbowl for ME it is also a pretty good aggro card ... they just empty there hand and it is like every land is an LD ... I mean how can you think about banning b2b and unban a other nonbasic land hate ... thats in my sense pretty wierd :-/

just my opinion here

[coldcrow]

As far as I can see the meta in those GPs is pretty much combo-hate. Aggro-Control/Prison cuts alot of potetnial combos out of the top rankings. Since they almost all apply huge mana/spelldenial or are insanely fast combo often does not get the time to properly set up the win.

Its a gripe I have with the format for quite awhile ... pure combo isn't going to work that well in HL naturally.
I have a rather good TPS deck (list is in the strategy thread) which wins like 80% after resolved gifts. The problem still is the redundancy of aggro/control. Combo suffers alot if critical spells are countered/dealt with, on the other creature after creature or a multitude of lock pieces/counters are interchangable.

Dedicated combo so often has to wait for the right moment to push through the counterwalls that certain decks become unbeatable for it, which are funnily most of the top 8 of the gp.

I certainly want to see something done about the dominance of aggro, aggro/control.

[Kassow-Rossing]

I strongly agree with un-banning Ancestral Recall for several reasons:

1. I do not see this card ruin the format like Painter's Servant. If you draw Ancestral Recall it's not BANG = win. You need to set up a combo (as with the Painter) but this time it's not an artifact combo that every one can play. This is a coloured combo

2. For those of us (me included) who has actually spend the money on buying such an expensive card it would be nice to actually be able to play it once in a while. Since vintage is not played anywhere in the world these years I feel sort of stupid having spend so many hundreds of dollars on a card made of wood. I want to use my AR and in Highlander I draw it rarely so Highlander would be the right format

3. Agro seems in control (please note the irony) of this format and a strong control card would probably tip the glass into a 52-48 in agro favour instaed of 55-45 agro favour. Please do not take the actual numbers into account. It was just a mere example

I thank you all for reading even though I admit: There must have been some spelling mistakes.
Patrick Kassow, 21, Denmark

[Mythrandir]

Although this topic was a bit dead, i´m inclined to answer this.

1. I do not see this card ruin the format like Painter's Servant. If you draw Ancestral Recall it's not BANG = win. You need to set up a combo (as with the Painter) but this time it's not an artifact combo that every one can play. This is a coloured combo

Although not a "game ruin format" card, it sure needs testing, this is one of the cards that gives a player huge (for a low price) advantage on the game. Although coloured combo, like you said it is easily splashed for. Some decks run U just for gifts + intuition.. this would be another card worthy of such splashing.

2. For those of us (me included) who has actually spend the money on buying such an expensive card it would be nice to actually be able to play it once in a while. Since vintage is not played anywhere in the world these years I feel sort of stupid having spend so many hundreds of dollars on a card made of wood. I want to use my AR and in Highlander I draw it rarely so Highlander would be the right format

For those of us (me included) who doesn't own one it would be very frustrating not to be able to take full advantage of the available pool card. And the fact that these are available in CE, doesnt really do it for me...

3. Agro seems in control (please note the irony) of this format and a strong control card would probably tip the glass into a 52-48 in agro favour instaed of 55-45 agro favour. Please do not take the actual numbers into account. It was just a mere example

Well, imagine this: 1st turn, mox (discard land), island, mother of runes, ancestral recall, on the 1st turn you get 2 mana, 1 creature and keep your hand at 5... i know this is a god hand. But ancestral is powerful not only for control, but aggro too, and not to mention combo (altough combo is a bit dead). Like i said in the first comment, it needs testing. i dont think it's that straight forward that his card is a "strong control card" like you said, unlike LoA.

I thank you all for reading even though I admit: There must have been some spelling mistakes.
Patrick Kassow, 21, Denmark

No problem, welcome to the forums! It's good to see that this format is reaching more and more countries.


P.S. Sorry for reviving this topic, but i don't like "unanswering" (does this exist?) to new members. Feel free (everybody else) NOT to go again with the "aye" VS "nay" on the recall

[Payron]

I don t even think that the main reason should be that it is such an expensive card (but it also is a strong argument). In my opinion this card is just to strong, I don t remeber any card that got such a power I don t even know an example for a instant card for 2 mana where you can just draw 3 cards ... I think it is just to strong and because of its low mana coast it is also usefull for aggro like alrdy mentioned ... and everybody knows skies is pretty much a counter to control decks ... so you also improve a counter deck for control ... I think to draw such an expensive card in the pool is the wrong thing ... and the only good reason from Kassow-Rossing is that he is actualy owning this card 

[Kassow-Rossing]

First of all: Thx for answering me
Second: That you do not own the card and that the card is expensive in dollars is JUST as bad an argument as my argument that I own the card and that it has costed me a lot of money, so I would like to use it once in a while.

So.. If we need to agree on unbanning the card or not, we need to look at the power lvl of the card in this format. I do not think it will be auto-win when you get AR. I do not think you will win 20% more games after drawing AR. I believe it's less than 20% bigger chance of winning. That argument should be enough for a testing period. We all know that IF AR is unbanned, it will go straight to watch-list and if it doesn't work out, it will be banned again. I think it's worth testing for a few months

[Kassow-Rossing]

Nastaboi wrote: "And resolved Gifts IS gg"
I believe that no matter what combo you might get with Gifts Ungiven, I can stop it with Vindicate and Dissipate in my hand

If you want Gifts = gg to be true, then it needs to win you the game all the time. Since many people in here - already - have written the fact that they do not win all the times, proves that it is not auto gg. And the opponents did not auto gg too. So Gifts Ungiven is not auto-win.

[Nastaboi]

I believe that no matter what combo you might get with Gifts Ungiven, I can stop it with Vindicate and Dissipate in my hand

Right, you got me there. I guess Gifts is pretty fair card then.