metalmusic_4 wrote: ↑4 years ago
FoodChainGoblins wrote: ↑4 years ago
In my opinion, that's the scariest part. I was
STRONGLY considering buying all of the companions except Lurrus just yesterday. But I don't know what will happen. I really want to try a
Planebound Accomplice,
Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast deck, but I don't know where that deck will be when I can actually play it. Who knows what will happen? Companions stay in, Companions stay but Lurrus banned, Companions all banned, Companions errataed, or anything other than those as well.
I'm not willing to buy Lurrus for $20 in paper in fear of a banning. Am I willing to buy the other companions in case they get banned? They're $5 each and less (other than Gyruda), so maybe so? It is the uncertainty of what will happen that makes it the toughest. If Companions are here to stay for the time being, then I am all for buying the ones I need to be competitive and the ones I need to have fun.
Magicaids posted a great 4-1 video, today I think, with that
Planebound Accomplice and
Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast combo at the core of his deck. It looked good.
That was the main video that got me hyped up. I stumbled upon it while watching hours of youtube videos (suggested and others) during this quarantine.
I had seen it when a streamer that I was watching played against it, but it didn't do much. I am a bit wary because the MagicAids video and the followers seem very hype happy. I would like the deck to at least be somewhat solid or else if it's a worse Glass Cannon than even Neobrand, then I'd rather just play Neobrand. I want to at least have a chance at 3-1ing my FNM or top 16ing a Comp REL weekend tournament. The biggest part is that I don't know where this deck will be at when paper resumes again. What will be banned? Will anything be unbanned? Well, obviously no on that one, lol.
metalmusic_4 wrote: ↑4 years ago
I can't speak for everyone, I'm more fringe I think in my liberal unban ideas. But I primarily want to play powerful combo decks. Combo doesn't always exist in standatd, is to often shut down by force of will in legacy, and pioneer isnt quite powerul enough for me. That's what I enjoy doing and modern has traditionally been a home for powerful combo. Twin, kci, crabvine with bridge from below, Maybe birthing pod, that is what I want to do and see if the opponent can stop me.
Everyone wants something somewhat different from Modern, but I feel like I'm in a similar boat. I would suggest playing Amulet if you haven't yet. I've found that many Eggs or KCI players also seem to enjoy Amulet and the power level is pretty close to there, even despite Companions.
Modern started in late 2011. I was still playing Standard UW Delver (not because it is a favorite play style or anything; I just couldn't see myself not playing Ponder or a deck that was clearly Tier 0 and I thrived to get even better with it) at the time, but I watched the Modern tournaments that went on next to us (usually about 50 for Standard and 20 for Modern). I was interested. I built up a deck that I copied online - a RG
Cloudpost deck with Through the Breach, Emrakul, the Aeon's Torn, and Primeval Titan. Before I could even play it at a tournament, Cloudpost was banned. That was my first introduction to how this format was gonna be run - with the strictest hand of any previous format. Then I played it a bit, trying Merfolk, Living End, and settling on RUG Scapeshift. I noticed the power level of Storm. Twin and Jund were very powerful, but they could be beaten and I always hedged against Twin if I could. I looked at a ban list with
Sword of the Meek,
Ancestral Vision, and more. I wondered why those were not legal, but
Rite of Flame, yes, the card that killed me on turn 2 on the play was legal. So I stocked up on the cards that I thought would or more importantly, SHOULD be unbanned. It took so long for some of these to happen that I honestly didn't care at many points and still stocked up on more copies.
Why do I bring this up? I honestly have always felt that there should have been no preconceived banlist. Nobody could possibly figure out what would be too good in this format without playing it. Especially with new sets coming out all the time, albeit much less often as nowadays. I have never felt like it was "too late" to "start over" and do a no ban list Modern. I do feel that probably Hogaak, Eye of Ugin, and Mental Misstep should start out banned, but everything else feels at least fun to me. Sure, you could say Jund gets Deathrite Shaman, Taxes gets Chrome Mox into Thalia on turn 1, Chalices are played more, Combo kills freaking consistently, but that's just it. We don't know what would be better, so let it play out. Sword of the Meek should never have been banned. I played it in Extended. It was the best deck at the time, but took so much play skill to master and was barely better than the rest. There were ways to disrupt it. 2019 and beyond has brought some %$#% up things to Modern. I would not take it all back if I could because I felt that there were also positives. I do feel like it's getting to the point of no return on going back to a no ban list Modern, while most people think we've passed that crossroad years ago.
I think a possible positive that came out of Companions is that players now realize how little the restrictions actually affect a deck, and even less so of course with Arcum's Astrolabe available. They learned to evaluate how 1 free card that gives insane value if it lives makes Jund drop Liliana of the Veil and Bloodbraid Elf (a card once on the ban list itself, lol). I've seen Jim Davis run Yorion, Sky Nomad in Goblins. Yorion in 80 card decks. Remember, 60 used to be sacred? Maybe this is an experiment to show people how much they are willing to alter their decks to fit in busted %$#%?