Community Poll - Life from the Loam [Unban]

[Tabris]

Similar to Vazdrus thread about Senseis Divining Top last season I will ask the community what reasons could speak for the unban of LftL. Or which reasons speak against the unban.


Please make a statement and give a clear explanation. I would like a discussion about the card as well if people dont have a final opinion but maybe have some insight which could support the pros/cons.

[MarcMagic]

Cons are:

- Boring game states with lots of dredging and CA through cycle-lands
- Shutting down several decks through Wasteland-locks
- Hard to counter for some LD focused strategies and/or in control mirrors

Pros are:

- Re-enabling some strategies (Land.dec, Graveyard based decks, maybe as well as buff Staxx + Oath a bit)
- One card less on the Ban list

Short explanation on my point of view:
I don't think it's that strong in our actual meta to enable CA strategies with cycle-lands. This can be annoying in control mirrors but come on.. lots of stuff can be annoying in control mirrors ; ). Intution barely sees play atm (probably more after LftL unban) and Gifts are banned anyways (same is true for LoA ofc). LftL will buff all green midrange decks (midrange in form of aggro-control or just chunky beatdown) but won't give the edge in most matchups. I think the only real issue with LftL is the CA and/or Wasteland-recursion plan while the first one is too slow in our actual meta (imho) and the latter is just fine because once again heavy multicolored nonbasic decks will suffer more. And as usual.. it's 1:100 and not 4:60 so you cannot count on it as a straight deck plan.

I definetly vote for unban LftL because I do not see any harm coming from it but on the other hand it's a good addition to some "tier 2" decks (although ofc t1 decks will benefit from it as well).

[malz77]

Intution barely sees play atm (probably more after LftL unban) and Gifts are banned anyways

don't forget Realms Uncharted

[MarcMagic]

Realms uncharted does not count imo. This card can be played in combination with LftL but it does not tutor the combopart. While LftL was legal i played Realms Uncharted in my UG Aggro/Control and it did okay but nothing game breaking.

If your answer was ironic just forget my reply : )

[so_not]

Do not unban unless you ban Intuition. I would be glad to see this change since Loam would actually enable new decks.
I do not want to see these two legal at the same time because it would hinder deck building options. Nowadays it's not necessary to include graveyard hate in decks because there are so few gy-strategies and most of them can be disrupted with other cards like counterspells (or removal against hermit druid and so on) for example. Land manadude, land Intuition (Wasteland etc.) is just too good of a scenario. Intuition for something like Volrath's Stronghold, Eternal Witness, Loam is also pretty back breaking.

[LasH]

Do not unban unless you ban Intuition. I would be glad to see this change since Loam would actually enable new decks.

1rst part true. I think intuition is currently one of the most underplayed cards in the format (so many new flashback themes avaible) and 10 times more interesting if u play it than a boring lftl. So vote for a stay of intuition.

2nd part is bs. Lftl will not enable any deck new Deck. It didnt denie any deck when it got banned. It will not push ANY tier2 deck (saying it will push stax is total bs, its gonna push each other deck more than stax since stax does not rely on lands). It will push all currenty 3/4c decks since it will enable a EVEN better manabase---> leading to the next aspect:
It will denie all current builds based on land destruction. I met 2 ld decks at the grand prix already and thats the RIGHT direction according to the fact that playing 3/4 colors is standard atm and hard to punish anyway since only about 4 cards REALLY punish multicolor atm (And playing these cards forces you to play monocolor or a pretty bad landbase).

[PurlQg]

Lftl should be unbanned for sure. I would consider strip mine too just to try and make it harder to play more then 3 colours.

I undestand why people call for intuitions banning, but I would like to see how it plays out first with both available. I would like to see other cards like yawgmoths will, Dread return, Lions eye diamond and even Tolarian academy but Thays obiously another topic.

[Doks]

Do not unban unless you ban Intuition. I would be glad to see this change since Loam would actually enable new decks.

[...]

2nd part is bs. Lftl will not enable any deck new Deck.

[...]

This exactly. I can't think of any deck that will evolve out of the nothing just because Loam gets unbanned. IMO, LftL would be just another autoinclude in those decks that can abuse it to at least a certain extend (you don't really have to make full use of it; as long as there are some synergies with LftL it's already worth the slot). For example, I'd run it 100% in my UWg Oath Control deck since it would

a) offer a more reliable CA engine with cycle lands (so the costly Jace's Ingenuity / Opportunity / Tidings weren't needed)
b) strengthen the nonbasic hate element in addition to Wasteland / T. Edge / CoW / B2B etc.
c) be just a strong addition in general, especially after Oath triggered once or after I already drew some recursion or combo piece (find LftL / Ruins / Foundry / Sword / Wasteland, use intuition to complete engine / combo ftw)

An argument could be made that Loam will benefit the slower decks that provide masses of mana more than those that rely heavier on creatures to finish in the midgame (which is a good approach to be honest), but on the other hand it would make control mirrors revolve around finding Loam asap to win the attrition war like it was in the past again.


All in all, I can't really decide and wouldn't mind either way, so let's put it this way: as long as there is retardedly strong shit like Stoneforge Mystic + Birthing Pod + Wordly Tutor in the format, the inclusion of Loam can't really hurt any more.

[MMD]

Unban LftL

In the past I was against an unban but LftL seems too slow to hurt the format. People cutted Crucible from their lists for the same reason. In theory this card will cause stupid control games but in most of the cases you will have no time to set up a winning LftL because creatures are too good nowadays.

Please do not touch Intuition either because this card is one of the last survivors for combo archetypes and has received some flashback goodies with the last editions which are not fully explored yet.

Proposal/request:
Be more brave with the unbannings. Unban some of the of the shaky cards(Imo: Dread Return, LftL, Imperial Seal, Jitte, Yawgmoth´s Will)
for a season and see what happens.

[Ball.Lightning]

I vote also for UNBANNING LftL. I would propably vote for banning intuition from preventive reasons, even though I think, even with intuition it would be too slow to affect format, we have nowadays. Control on control yes, it would be quite good to assemble this, but there are some more unfair spells around, that should one be afraid of. For exaple compare impact of intuition for loam and some godness and Wheel of Fortune. I think, we have here double meter of grading what is too strong.

With LftL on format people might start be interested on what is in oponents graveyard. Now we have so many options to get rid of oposing GY cards, that are useful aside beeing just GY hate(or at least dont loose card to it). Nihil spellbomb, Loaming Shaman, Ground seal, Phyrexian Furnace, Relic of Progenitus, Shred Memory,...

It is not true, that loam is hard to deal even though graveyard is wiped (bc. of cyclelands). Just imagine, loosing whole grave and then starting playing loam for nothing and starting dredging while not knowing, what to mill (maybee one fetch?). Overal loosing grave with loam on hand turns it almost into blank. Yes, it can be great in some scenarios. But to be honest - would someone play pure bad (useless) cards, that aren't great in some scenarios?

LD is not even close to call it strategy (aside Armagedon style effects in agro or stax decks). People playing lots of standard LD will propably not loose due to Loam, but more likely to all sort of spells oponent can play. Loam can't hinder it more ;-)

On the other hand Loam could create or enable some sort of disruptive decks.

Fun is relative factor. While agroplayer would not jump on tree getting wrathed, control player would be propably not pleased to see oponent casting Winter Orb...

[Tiggupiru]

I really dislike the idea of Intuition and Loam in the same format. I would maybe like to see Wasteland go anyway, but it's not as big of a problem as Intuition is.

When both Loam and Intuition are available, you really don't need that many cards to make Loam good enough. Random goodstuffs would be perfectly okay with Wasteland, 7-9 fetches, 2-3 cyclers and some random stuff you want to be playing anyway like Stronghold and Horizon Canopy. None of these cards actually make your deck worse in comparison to other decks, but they'd give you a very nice suite of options with Intuition. Drawing Loam alone would be pretty weak, but getting like two fetches back right now is not too bad especially if you run 3-5 colors.

Something like Loam, cycler, wasteland is quite powerful just by itself and if the situation demands it, you can just switch gears and take something else. Witness, Stronghold, Loam is pretty awesome and my personal favorite: Raven's Crime, Urborg, Loam is a pretty effective lock. Intuition doesn't even need to get Loam if you have no answers to the current board, just find triple removal like you have up until now. Having both of these cards would just make goodstuffs better and that would not create anything new to the format as I don't think straight up full-on Loam abuse is as good as general goodstuff with Intuition-Loam thrown in the mix. This is why there haven't been any new decks since the Loam was last in.

Without Intuition in the format, you really would need to make effort to abuse Loam. You can still tutor for it with a number of tutors, but you would also need other components for it to get the ball rolling and you would not have access to cheap way to tutor up Loam AND an effect to abuse. Not to mention, by randomly dredging cards with the Loam you probably don't end up having the best possible land to abuse. I mean, Wasteland isn't good against MonoR and cyclers are too slow to make an impact when you are losing on the board. This would make the decks that want to play Loam more focused on it, because it's just a bad card if you don't have easy access to synergy. All of a sudden, we may have a new deck or two.

Banning Intuition is somewhat unfortunate, but the way I see it, it doesn't create new decks rather than just make some archetypes better, like UB control, Reanimator and combo. People just like playing those decks and having no access to Intuition makes them weaker sure, but still very much playable. On the other hand, Loam could very well make a new archetype(s) if it were introduced. Summa summarum, we might get a new competitive archetype without losing any. That's gotta be good, right?

So, just to clarify: I would like to see Loam unbanned and Intuition banned.

Oh, and I think MMD is right about more ballsy unbannings. I mean, season or two might get stupid before council would have a chance to fix things back again, but at least we would have as short banlist as possible and documented reasons why some of the cards were problematic.

[Scalpelexis]

Hello!

First of all, I think there is a need of a little introduction from my side. I am a casual player from the Czech Republic, which loves to play limited and Highlander format. We have here a small group of people, which play generally following the rules of this Highlander format, except we start with 25 life in cotrast with the classic 20. There have been many polls in between the group if we want to change the structure of play to the official version of yours, however we never ended up in a single conclusion, thus we keep on playing by our rules. I am not here to suggest a change on the life-starting aspect, but I mentioned this so you can imagine how our format looks like. 5 life is quite a number and obviously slows down the pace, so there is more room for inovation of control and combo decks. Please, accept my next views on Life from the Loam from my sole perspective, because even though I can imagine how a format with 20 starting life is, still doesn't make me an expert and I have no experience with it at all. Thanks.

Ok. Let's get it straight and I think i can speak for all our group: Unban Life from the Loam. Why? Our reasoning is:

1. As a player of a green aggrocontrol deck (BGw), it is tough to generate card advantage in green colors, specially in contrast to blue decks. I admit that green has received lately some gifts (Thrun, Momentous Fall, first 2 Garruks etc.) which can generate quite some card advantage and might with the help of some worse draws of blue decks outdraw his opponent, but the chance is rather slim. I again mention, that our metagame is shifted more to the aggrocontrol - control side, thus I shouldn't be complaining we made this way blue colour even stronger. Regardless of that, Loam would make a weapon to somehow combat the blue menace and presents a solid drawing/destroying engine, if you gather all the pieces.
2. Loam is slow. Let's face it: Drawing a Loam and cyclers/wasteland is not very frequent, so until you assemble this, it takes time. Time, where aggro decks will stomp you down or control decks set up their defenses. So until you're online with your Loam engine, many turnes have passed and everyone is going to be ready for it.
3. Life from the Loam is not a gamebreaking card. It sure is handy after an armageddon, death clouds or when you have it with a wasteland on turn 2. When speaking fot he long term use of this card, it is rather slow, clunky and still perfectly manageable from the opponent's side! There is a lof of graveyard hate, which can completely shut down any Loam shenanigans..and now what?
4. Without Intuition it can't be tutored that easily. There are card like Demonic Tutor, transmute cards, personal tutor (a very rare card in our meta) or the often mentione Intuition. But after the bans of Mystical Tutor and Gifts Ungiven (and Intuition?), it canť be searched effectively.
5. As you could probably read in between the lines, yes, I am for a ban of Intuition as a counterweight of unbanning Life from the Loam. These 2 cards obviously work well together, however, Intuition is a card which I could play without. Yes, I am biased, since I'm not a blue player, but I didn't feel from any our grou member, that they would miss it. The cal for LftL is much more bigger.
6. Crucible of Worlds is not banned and people are afraid of Wasteland + Loam? Why? Crucible is a colorless card, can be technically played in every single deck in contrast to LftL. I know, the synergy of Crucible with Ituition is not that great, but that would solve the ban of Intuition.
7. I don't get why are we pursuing to make 5cs more viable. A 5c or 4c deck cannot work with a lot of non-basic lands and with the power of the fetch lands, the ravnica duals and the old duals, those deck have no mana problems AT ALL. C'mon, don't know how about you, but I would like them pay for playing the best spells all colors have to offer. Loam + Waste could be a good hosing strategy.


So, those are my two cents and opinions on the debated card and I think I covered the main angles. I have to again empathize on the point of Loam being to slow to really make it a superstar, especially when taking in account your faster format of 20 life.

[Sephiron]

Unban Loam

Reasons:
1. It was originally banned because of it's interaction with gifts ungiven, wasteland, LoA and cycle lands. Half of those are currently banned. So it's not as powerful as it was.
2. Metagame became quite stagnant with bant being on top and no other decks doing good enough.
3. Loam is slow, but unbanning loam will give control and other slower decks better lategame. Like BUG control will get much more value of loam than bant giving it good fighting chance. And oath with reanimator become playable decks (they aren't good enough now).
4. People are afraid of games going to LftL->wasteland, but metagame is flooded with 5c decks and other goodstuffs. Loam makes people think about manabases making 5c goodstuff strategies worse. Also i think wasteland should be banned because it's too random to win games just because of wasteland in opening hand (tectonic edge + ghost quarter + back to basics + magus of the moon + blood moon are still good answers to decks abusing nonobasics).
5. Goodstuff and control decks are supposed to play tutorable graveyard hate anyway, so loam shouldn't be broken in this metagame anyway.
6. Shaking up the metagame to change it and make highlander more fun, since current meta is quite boring.

P.S. I agree with the opinion that council should be more brave with unbannings. Unban  yavgmoths will, dread return, loam. You won't know how bad they are until you actually unban them, and if worse comes to worst you can just ban them again 3 months later.  But you will get good testing and opinions from multiple sources.

[carte_blanche]

• Unban Life from the Loam
  
  I agee with MMD and Ball.Lightning.
  
  - LftL is a card that demands time - therefore it will not be very good against a huge number of decks in the current metagame (neglecting a meta-shift due to unbannings at the moment - not just because LftL). Even if the meta changes and new decks / other decks will become tier 1 decks, I think heavy aggro strategies will still be very competitive, because these decks are highly redundant. Therefore these decks embody some kind of "speed benchmark" your control / aggro-control deck has to deal with. Loam starts to work at a point in time when aggro decks have won or lost the game already.
  - With Loam unbanned control decks have to play more grave-hate again. Even if your opponent gets Loam online (in the control mirror), gravehate blanks the card (at least) for several turns - just as Ball.Lightning has pointed out. If your opponent spends some of his recources to regain a considerable graveyard you should have an advantage of recources during these turns. At least if you did not allow him to use Loam several turns in advance (but there are other cards, that win games if not handled within a few turns - e.g. planeswalkers).
  
  It seems that the discussion of Intuition has become "coupeled" to the possible Loam unban... the Loam-Intuition interaction might become very strong indeed. Anyway you have to invest at least two turns to get the Loam engine running - a lot of time for your opponent to resolve his threads as well.
  In the place of the council, I would just give it a try - unban Loam, leave Intuition where it is. After half a year we will know whether leaving Intuition in the format was a good idea or not. Without trying all discussions remain speculation to a large degree.
  
  @the council: You're doning a great job - keep going!

[PurlQg]

I am positive that what carte_blanche is saying is true, I couldn't have said it better myself.
The format is to fast to be really bothered by intuition in to loam and lands in the early game. Most decks would punish you because they are playing creature based strategies. You have to be well ahead for this to be a good thing! it would obiously be devestating lategame but there are many cards currently available that are devasting later in the game....

I for one would love to se less 4c - 5c decks so bring on the land hate. At the same time I would hate to se Intuition go as mmd said it would weaken the posibility of combo being viable and whenever the only decks viable in a format is aggro and control the format grows somewhat stagnent.