Magic: The Gathering,GO TEAM MS!

[Sudo_Nym]

(They're never going to bring back Extended)

(I still haven't heard an argument for why they won't)

(Because MaRo is still in charge)

[bv310]

Because if they did, they'd be admitting that Modern was a mistake. By every metric, Modern is not a mistake. The PT Stream this weekend drew in like 25 000 viewers at one time. That's more than every other PT stream I've seen. Modern is still super popular, and the fact that a fairly cheap deck took 2nd at this PT is going to draw in a bunch of players.

[Natirasha]

(Because MaRo is still in charge)

I don't think MaRo has any interaction with modern or the DCI/policy-making outside of R&D.

And, real question, do you think Modern is a mistake? I obviously think the answer is yes.

[bv310]

Absolutely not. No one played Extended.

[PJ.]

why are people selling serum visions for 6 bucks a piece?

[Natirasha]

Absolutely not. No one played Extended.

Because they distinctly went out of their way to kill the format.

[bv310]

why are people selling serum visions for 6 bucks a piece?

Splinter Twin won the PT, and it plays 4. Also, the card hasn't seen printing in ages, so there's a lower supply.

@Nat, So? Everything I see from back then is that Extended was boring, whether they supported it or not. Just the same 3 or 4 decks that dominated Standard, but with a few sets of consistency for good measure. How is that better? Also, they won't cut a format that pulls in 25000 viewers on a Saturday evening. That's more than Standard. Saying that people "didn't look happy to be there" is a terrible argument from a business perspective. Until Modern tourneys stop pulling in numbers, the format's here to stay. I mean, the biggest GP of all time was Modern based (GP Vegas, the MMA one). That's not something that they're going to stop caring about because Tarmogoyfs are $200 a piece. If anything, they'll just reprint fucking Tarmogoyfs again.

I also thoroughly disagree that Bloom Titan and Twin are linear strategies, but I'm not debating a format with someone who has already said they hate it.

[hasdgfas]

Twin is like the least linear "linear deck" ever. The threat of the Twin combo is the reason that the deck works so well as a tempo-y deck, but it's not a combo deck.

[Natirasha]

I'd grant that twin is pretty nonlinear, but I really don't know how you can make the argument Bloom Titan is not a linear strategy?

[Knight of Cydonia]

Bloom Titan can either Hive Mind + Pact their opponent to death or win off straight up Prime Time beats. It's a combo deck, but it arguably has two separate combos that stem from it's main Amulet + bounceland setup.

[PJ.]

On extended: to he fair, the last official extended season only had one standard deck(faeries). The reason that format sucked had more to do with the fact that three combo decks(depths, thopter, hypergenesis) dominated the format to an unreasonable degree which later become a field of 2 once depths and thopter became 1 deck.

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

Extended would be the worst format right now, you think Modern is dominated by a single deck? Well watch as literally no one plays anything other than RestoRhinoTusk or UW control in Extended.

[Knight of Cydonia]

Oh come on, there would totally be a burn deck and a sligh deck that both make UW Control and RestoRhino sweat until Turn 5.

[Natirasha]

It'd be Abzan vs Jund(I'm not convinced Abzan is better) vs 4c Midrange(no blue) vs UWR control vs Mardu Burn vs Black Devotion.

[Sudo_Nym]

You guys all badly misspelled "Red Deck Wins"

[Natirasha]

Thragtusk, Sphinx's Revelation, Siege Rhino AND Grey Merchant of Asphodel are all in the format, though.

[PeregrineV]

OK, might be thinking of playing Modern (and trying to win- I have plenty of modern causal decks).

What staples should I get (regardless of final color choice)?

And one current thought/idea I have for a deck is Mono Black devotion. Would that be doable in Modern?

Finally, costs. Not rich here.

2nd part
Pauper tournament next Thursday.

I like Pauper. Easy to get cards, cheap decks to build.

Thoughts on current popular pauper decks.

Then, the best way to beat them.

[Shanba]

For the pauper tournament, which banlist? I've never played it in paper but I imagine legal Hymn to Tourach is a big deal for the mono black deck. Although given that Treasure Cruise is still legal in the format, you're likely supposed to just play delver if you really want to win.

If you anticipate a lot of delver, one of the appeals of Stompy is it has a decently favourable delver matchup - but it requires a lot of practice to get it right. Don't play your pump into open mana and risk getting blown out by snap (in game 1), spellstutter is their best card against you, but generally you can play under their permission and threaten to race. Post board resolving a scattershot archer is suuuuper good. The deck also benefits from Treasure Cruise being legal, because although it makes delver stronger in the abstract, it actually involves making it worse against stompy AND as a benefit it pushes mono black out of the meta, which would otherwise prey on the green men.

If you like combo, play esper familiars. It's just a much better deck than Eye Candy, imo. I don't like playing it into a delver meta, but if you're against a lot of slow decks, it is straight up the most resilient deck I have ever played - it's just a pile of divinations, after all. I've won many times after being torn apart by discard, I've won after a mull to 4, it's just really strong. But, you know, get in reps with it.

I've honestly never been a fan of the Tron decks that replaced the Post decks. I don't like falling behind while assembling tron, and I don't think the catchup cards are powerful enough to make up for the slow starts you can get. But sure, whatever.

If you want something off the wall, I have like 30 tier 2 or 3 decklists <.>

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

I just play Bogles in both Modern and Pauper because I don't like people and they don't like me.

[Shanba]

[quote="In post 5818, Debonair Danny DiPietro"][/quote]
Bogles is good vs stompy, affinity. Bad vs mono b, mono g - think it's pretty bad against flickerpost too. Metagame accordingly.

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

I want to know what you consider the difference between mono green and stompy. Is mono green, elves and aurochs?

Pauper
Bogles favored against Stompy, Affinity, Tron, UR Delver, Burn, White Weenie
Completely un-interactive matchup: Esper Familiar
Slight underdog to Mono blue delver tempo, Mono green
Bad matchups: Mono blue delver control, Mono black, Slivers

[Shanba]

I don't consider there to be a difference - the mono g should have been mono U, but brain went bzkt.

Edit: Elves, of course, is another green deck, but Mono G is a little undescriptive at that point.

Is slivers really a bad matchup? I'm a bit surprised by that - I thought the deck had an edge over everything trying to beat down with creatures thanks to being able to make 12/12 first striking lifelinkers.

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

Is slivers really a bad matchup? I'm a bit surprised by that - I thought the deck had an edge over everything trying to beat down with creatures thanks to being able to make 12/12 first striking lifelinkers.

I'm like 1-5 against the deck, basically there's no real removal in Bogles so the key slivers stay around forever. They can kill you super fast with virulent sliver via poison and if even with normal damage they'll get you unless you have an Armadillo Cloak.

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

Anyways Modern:

Aggro

GW Abzan
Burn (~330)
Infect
Affinity (~540)
~
Bogles (~470)
Merfolk (~340)
BW Tokens
~
Zoo
UR Delver

Combo

Twin
Bloom Titan (~460)
~
Pyromancer's Ascension (~375)
Ascendency Combo
~
Living End (~450)

Combo/Control

Scapeshift

Midrange

Abzan
~
UWR Midrange

Something else entirely

Tron (~585)

Control

Hahahahahaha

~~

I wouldn't play anything in the third tier or UWR Midrange and I listed everything under 600 dollars (Ascendancy combo probably is as well but there's no real definitive list right now) but price also depends on what you already have. There's only one true format staple in Tarmogoyf and that's crazy expensive; the real staples are fetches and shocks.

If you insist on building something new instead of playing an already well defined archetype then you need to ask yourself the question of what is how your deck is winning the game. What does mono black offer you? Phyrexian Obliterator is awesome against other creature decks but doesn't help you against combo decks; Grey Merchant is probably too slow for modern though, and you absolutely are going to want to run 4 Thoughtseize and 4 LotV to make a remotely competitive mono black list and those aren't cheap cards. A playset of Lilly will set you back as much as the entire burn list and thoughtseize tacks on another 80.

[Klazam]

why is leyline of the void necessary?