B&R | Delirious Obsessions

In this second post about the Modern B&R list, I will discuss some of the cards that I ‘unbanned’ in my last post and my reasons behind it.

But first, I forgot a card in my last post:

I forgot to mention this card in my last post. Sorry. This card was also one that I mulled a bit over. Because, without Stoneforge it is hard to judge how good this card would be. But I ultimately think that the card would be too good for modern and all decks with creatures would wan’t some number of it and thus having the same effect as Stoneforge would – have it or lose to it.

With that out of the way, lets get right into it. The following cards are the ones I ‘unbanned’ in my previous post. However, one disclaimer: I tried to include interactions between cards on the original B&R list in my judgment, but since I never have played with most of them, I probably missed a lot. And please remember, this is just a point of discussion. Here we go:

The first thing I want to discuss is some of the combo offenders above and how people perceive playing against combo. If you have ever dared to enter the dark and deep end of the internet (read: MTG Salvation forums), you have noticed that most Modern players have one thing in common: They love to complain about combo decks/players. It is not unlikely to read posts like this “I want to ban [Card] because it is so boring and I hate playing against it“. This is a completely fair opinion to have and I can respect that people can have different views of what they believe is fun. But why should we negate one players fun for the sake of the other? Can’t we find space to embrace all kind of play styles/preferences? Apparently not, or at least it seems like that. Cards like Seething Song, Second Sunrise and Jeskai Ascendancy are frequently referred to as boring. And yes, some people might find these cards incredibly boring to play against. But I can guarantee you that there also are people who find Tarmogoyf, Birthing Pod and Delver of Secrets incredibly boring. So why are we only listening to one part of the uproar? As mentioned in my last post, I hate (really hate) to play against Burn, but I would never go so far as to advocate that cards should be banned because they are boring. You either adjust or admit defeat – and I hope that our community one day can embrace that others might have different playstyle preferences than themselves and accept that they once in a while will have to accept to be bored in a match (just like everyone else).

With that in mind, lets start discuss some cards:

Jace, the Mind Sculptor is one of the most iconic cards in Magic and he is probably also one of the best. He might even be too good for Modern, but I would rather have him re-banned because of powerlevel issues than to never know if he could thrive in Modern. Most people will never get to play with this iconic card because of the steep cost of buying in to either Legacy or Vintage and I think he could help revive true Control in modern. This leads us to his age-old nemesis: Bloodbraid Elf. She can almost singlehandedly make sure he never gets our of hand and I thus think that we need both of them.

Green Sun’s Zenith is often victim of the same accusations as I put forward against Stoneforge Mystic and Umezawa’s Jitte. It’s hard to overlook if you are playing green and with creatures. However, I don’t believe this to be the case – at least not to the same extend. This would enable Elves to probably climb up a few tiers and it would also give creature decks a way to find hatebears to help fight combo and control MU’s. Then there is the case of Birthing Pod decks. They certainly doesn’t need a boost, but I am unsure if they would want this card at all? It can only find green creatures and come with a high cost. I think that Chord of Calling‘s instant speed and versatility is better for them. But i’m no expert. Finally, then there is the case about Dryad Arbor. Is that really so broken that we can’t have both cards? I personally don’t agree.

Next up is this little guy. He was unfortunate enough to be the scapegoat when Jund was dominating Modern. However, I believe with the changes to the B&R list I put forward, that he has served his time and can be released into Modern again. There is no denying that he is incredibly good and WOTC probably shouldn’t have made him a 1/2, but I still feel that with the changes I suggest he has a place. Especially because of the next two cards:

This pair falls under the category I discussed earlier about perceived fun. But it might also just be too good for Modern. One thing is sure though, Golgari Grave-Troll will do nothing on its own. So there is no reason for it to be on the B&R list. Dread Return on the other hand could prove a problem. But I am not convinced at all. Without Dredge all-stars such as Ichorid, Cabal Therapy, Breakthrough and Lion’s Eye Diamond I believe that it can be contained with cards such as Scavenging Ooze, Rest in Peace and Deathrite Shaman (see above).

Ancestral Vision is the fixed version of Treasure Cruise. And without any good cards to abuse it (like Shardless Agent) I can’t really see why it is on the list in the first place. However, I can see a world where this, JTMS and BBE are in the same deck and that might be a problem. But for know (and because I don’t thin JTMS will ever be unbanned) I can’t see any reason for it to be banned. It would give a small boost to control, but it is a horrible topdeck in the lategame, so I am not even sure they want it.

As mentioned in my previous post, I swapped the Artifact Lands with Cranial Plating. My reasoning for this is that Cranial Plating is already pushing the limits powerlevel-vise and the fact that the artifact lands enables other cards and strategies (Tezzeret anyone?). These lands could also enable Thirst for Knowledge in control strategies.

This is another close-to-borderline card. However, I have a hard time seeing elves being really oppressive without Gaea’s Cradle, Natural Order, Wirewood Symbiotic, Birchlore Rangers and Quiron Ranger. I might be wrong and Beck // Call alongside GSZ is enough to push Elves to playable, but I don’t see that.

Here we encounter our first problem. These cards by themselves is far from ban worthy in my opinion. The problem is that the cards they find are broken is you are too effective in finding them. As mentioned in my other post, Serum Visions is a bad card and I hate that I need to play it. Unbanning both of these might be stretching it, but I think that at least Preordain should be released back into Modern.

When talking about Cloudpost, it is easy to compare it to the Tron lands – so lets do that. The perfect turn 3 with Tron leaves you with 7 colorless mana. The perfect turn 3 with Cloudpost leaves you with 6 mana. When we move on Cloudpost slowly overtakes the Tron lands. As of this moment I can’t remember the last time a Tron deck put up any respectable results? To be honest, I don’t think that Tron is a top tier deck and also it is pretty far from it. By unbanning Cloudpost we suddenly make ramp-into-big-awesome-things a top tier strategy. Even with the subpar land destruction we have in Modern already, I believe that this strategy can be kept under control.

I already discussed this in my last post when I discussed why Rite of Flame had to stay on the bench for know. This card will put Storm back on the radar and provide Modern with what I perceive as a ‘real’ combo deck, but the uprise in control will help keep its dominance down and the lack of interaction (compared to its Legacy counterpart) will continue to make Storm an easy deck to disrupt. So stop crying, make a better sideboard and get on with it.

Punishing Fire is also a mystery for me. People say that it would invalidate creature strategies. I don’t believe that is the case. In Modern each creature is already undergoing the “Bolt Test”, meaning that every creature with toughness below 4 has to be really efficient, have a value EtB trigger or something third. I don’t believe that spending 5 mana to kill a Wild Nactl or Kitchen Finks is too broken. This would help other creature strategies prevent Birthing Bod decks from out-valuing them and also help keep creature based combo decks (like Elves) and Planeswalkers in check.

Sword of the Meek is one of the cards on the current B&R list the the lowest powerlevel and I have a hard time seeing it warping Modern in any way. It might be used as wincon in some control builds or in a Tezzeret shell, but that’s it.

Last but not least, the final two cards from the list. Both banned because of their interference with tournaments by dragging out rounds (And yes, I will be very biased in my judgment of these. Sorry).

Sensei's Divining Top — Sensei’s Divining Top

First of all, I wanna make it clear that the reasoning behind the banning of these cards are BS. Both of the are clearly borderline good at what they do and if any, that should be the reason for banning them. Lets start with SDT. This is probably the card I want to see unbanned the most so that I can make a Modern version of Miracles (which I play in Legacy). This is the missing piece and such a good control card, but at the same time, I have a hard time seeing SDT + Counterbalance dominate Modern as people fear. First of all, Abrupt Decay sees a lot of play and AD don’t care much for our SDT + CB interactions. Second, even though the manacurve in Modern isn’t as widespread as in Standard, it is far from the streamlined ones of legacy, meaning that SDT + CB will be a lot less effective. Finally Brainstorm is not legal in Modern which means that the Miracle cards will be much less oppressive. This combination will also help keep the revival of engine-combo decks in check since they are very streamlined in their CMC curves.

This leaves us with Second Sunrise. Before everyone and their neighbor started hating on the Ascendancy combo, they all hated (and probably still do) Eggs. Eggs have a special place in my heart. I never really got to play it myself, but I enjoyed the deck. There is something beautiful about the way it works and how everything has synergy – the last true (engine) combo deck of Modern. Unfortunately some players were not adept to play with it, but still decided to bring it to tournaments. Combine that with the people who insist on not scooping when the deck goes of, and the rest is history as they say. First of all, I want to stress that the people forcing players to ‘play out’ their entire combo are entitled to do so, but my problem is with those who at the same time complain that rounds go to time. Like any other modern engine deck (Storm and Ascendancy) Eggs can easily be disrupted. Eggs are even disrupted by cards already in people’s sideboards like graveyard- and artifact hate.

In order to sum up or if TL;DR is the case here are the main points I wanted to bring forward:

Accept that people have different perceptions of what is fun and accept that I might not align with your perceptions. If we embrace all the play styles, Modern can flourish and grow to its full potential.
WOTC can help this on the way by having a less conservative approach to the B&R list. By releasing a large amount of the cards on the list, they will create a truly diverse format that embraces all aspects of our beloved game.

Once again, let me know what you think in the comment section below. Am I completely crazy or is there some sense to my ideas?

PS.

I would love to create some video showcasing Modern as it would look like with this B&R list. Unfortunately though, I don’t own any Modern cards on MTGO (outside the ones I use in Legacy Miracles). So if you are interested in making a video series with me and have a substantial collection online, then please reach out to me.

Adjusting to a Modern World will be a recurring theme this week, and the first part will be about the Banned & Restricted list of Modern and how I, if given the chance, would change the list. This first part discusses how I envision the B&R list of Modern. Modern was the first format that my friends and I played and for a long time it was the only format that interested me. As time went by I grew increasingly frustrated by the limitations of the format (or at least what I perceived as limitations), and last year I almost solely focused on Legacy. However, looking from the outside Modern had changed a lot since I ‘left’. Khans of Tarkir especially seems to have shaken the format – for the better. I have always been opposed to the VERY conservative approach Wizards have had to the format. However, the recent sets have impacted modern in a good way. In my opinion the last couple of sets has elevated the powerlevel of Modern to a place where you don’t want to pierce your eyeballs with needles whenever you are forced to play incredible inefficient and bad cards – Serum Visions and Mana Leak I am looking at you. My only complaint is that Burn is now a real deck in both Modern and Legacy. I hate burn. I really really hate burn and I will hate to play against you 100% of the time if you play burn – and fell free to quote me on that. I will even make the quote for you:

I hate burn. I really really hate burn and I will hate to play against you 100% of the time if you play burn

With that out of the way, let’s start by looking at one of my biggest issues with modern: B&R List. Patrick Chapin wrote a great article on SCG a couple of days ago (You can find it here – requires SCG Premium) and for a large part I agree with him. However, I will go over what I think could be the ‘right’ B&R list for ME (This is my opinion and it reflects what I want Modern to be). As of today, the Modern B&R list looks like this. If it was up to me, the B&R list would be very small and ultimately look something like this:

I know this is a very radical change and that this also will never happen. But one can dream right? This B&R list would change modern completely and hopefully for the better. But with changes like this, you never really know how it will unfold and maybe some cards would need to be re-banned. In the following part I will briefly go over why I feel these cards need to be on the list:

Blazing Shoal would singlehandedly make Infect a reliable Turn 2 deck, which is way to fast for what Wizards will allow in Modern.

As much as I love to play with Dark Depths in Legacy, I believe that it is too strong in modern. Here we don’t have access to Karakas, Wasteland or Stifle to help combat this deck, while it get access to cards like Life from the Loam, Vampire Hexmage, Thespian’s Stage and Into the North.

This card is just too busted – in every sense. It would take more than a Modern reprint of Force of Will before I think this could be unbanned. If you disagree, then just watch this videoseries from Caleb Durward on CFB.

My only really problem with this card is that it would be included in almost every deck in modern and thus warp the format around itself. It has a unique effect that I could see thrive in modern if it somehow could not go into every deck in the format. The problem is that its greatest strength is also what takes it over the top.

Of the two rituals on the current B&R list I believe that this is the more powerful of the pair. I feel that with my ‘improved’ B&R list Storm would be a viable deck again and the format would be able to regulate itself to a stage where Storm can be beaten but has to be respected. But giving Storm both of the Rituals (and Chrome Mox) would be too much.

Everyones favorite Kor is not too powerful by it self, but combined with Batterskull and the different swords she would warp the format to a place that if you play white you play her most creature decks would either adopt or lose to her. You could argue that if you ban Batterskull she could be released, but I still think she is too good with the swords alone.

This card is just too busted. Anything that is too good to Legacy is probably way too good for Modern. And Skullclamp falls into this category. Nothing to see here.

Is was on the fence on this one for a while. On one hand, I would love to brew me some Blood Moon prison deck with this. But on the other hand, Splinter Twin on turn 3 seems even less fun that Spliter Twin on turn 4 already is. No to mention that Storm already got handed a bone with my new B&R list.

The keen observer might have noticed that I not only removed cards from the B&R list, I also added one: Cranial Plating. My reasoning for banning Cranial Plating is that I feel that the Artifact Lands + Plating would be too good and I would rather get to play with and against the Artifact Lands since they could enable other strategies than affinity alone. I also feel that this card basically boils the affinity MU down to if the affinity player “has it or not”.

The last card on the list is Ancestral Recal …ehm Treasure Cruise. Even though I am an advocate of raising the powerlevel of Modern, there has to be boundaries. And this card is just too good for Modern and it also helps keeping the Ascendancy deck in check. On a sidenote I want to mention that I think this is fine for Legacy (alongside our beloved Brainstorm), but that is a discussion for another time. So this is how I envision the B&R list for Modern. My next post will discuss some of the cards that came of the list and how I justify their return to Modern. In the mean time I would love to hear how your ‘perfect’ B&R list looks like and your thoughts about mine and what cards I overlooked if any. J

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Delirious Obsessions

Tag Archives: B&R

Adjusting to a Modern World: B&R list part 2

Adjusting to a Modern World: B&R list part 1