I'm not too concerned about the prizes right now, since there are more pressing issues that need to be sorted out, but I agree on changing the prize structure if people think it needs to be changed. Since this is almost certainly going to be a proxy event, I would almost definitely be awarding prizes for the following:

1. Highest placing player with "No Proxies"
2. Highest placing unpowered player with "No Proxies"
3. Highest placing "Budget" player with "No Proxies"

I think this would encourage players without the cards to play, while still giving them the option to proxy if they wish to do so. Furthermore, I think this would give everyone a fair chance at winning prizes, which would justify a top-heavy prize structure.

I think the most alluring factor of a tournament is the prizes at the final table.


I know that a fair number of states offer enhanced driver's licenses, which allow for crossing over into Canada and Mexico. I am not sure if this is an option for everyone.

I would consider increasing the bazaar count as well. It's a card I like to see and it digs into answers/threats better than anything else and sets up welder tricks really quick. He is hard to abuse otherwise unless relevant threats got countered already.

-20 Lock components
-Sweet Draw Engine
-Super Consistent

It is even possible to cut the Thorn's or another lock piece for Darkblast, Demonic Tutor, Vampiric Tutor, and Imperial Seal.

Actually I'm in the humanities - American history, Revolutionary era.  Gordon Wood FTW.


Thank you.  

There are always more points to address, but I feel like the fundamental point of the article was to realize that 5CStax is an elegant hate deck.  If you know what the environment is going to be like I think that you can construct a build that can beat it.  It's not like most blue decks - you're not just going to run the same cards every time with a few variations here or there.  You can take the deck in radical directions.  I like that.  

There was a build running around a while ago that had maindeck Leyline of the Void with the Helm combo.  In a heavy Dredge metagame that could be the perfect deck (as you're basically pre-boarded.)  

Nothing is holy, you can change anything.

Well I'm not sure LED is the safest unrestriction as it can lead to degenerate and "unfun" plays with Yawg. Win. But your sentiment is basically right on par with my view as well.

I'd like to make a very important point regarding the slump of combo now as well.

Cause— One of the reasons Vintage popularity is slumping right now in the States is that there isn't enough power in the hands of players so proxy events (and pretty much 10-15 proxy across the board might I add) seem to be the only solution for creating a fair metagame that rewards the best players and not the biggest wallets.

Effect— Proxy events do detach players from the game a bit and remove some of their commitment to the game by making the price of entry very small.

Cause— When a player tries to go the "budget route" or play a metagamed Fish deck he still often find himself losing to a superior Tezz player in the Top 8.

Effect— "Budget Decks" that look more like 4-of.dec and not a highlander deck are frowned upon and thought to be "Jank" that only ever win by dumb luck.

Effect #2— As a result of this perception good players are not inspired to innovate on budget ideas because they feel they'll just get crushed by Tezz when push comes to shove.

ALL RIGHT, SO WHAT DO WE DO ABOUT IT?

Unrestricting/Printing good cards for combo decks actually helps a lot more than people think. I remember the first thing that got me into Vintage was the degeneracy and general "fun-factor" of Stephen Menendian's "Doomsday Device". You can read the article here:

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/vintage/8410_The_Doomsday_Device_The_Coolest_Win_Condition_In_Magic.html

This one article got me more into the idea of playing Vintage than anything else, and I've never looked back. Combo decks are fun. I remember Stephen saying something very insightful in that article that first hooked me:

"First of all, this deck is a great deck for the format because it is easily playable with five proxies. If you got into Type One because you can play Fish with five proxies, this is the deck for you. People shouldn't be forced to play with Null Rod; if you want to enjoy Type One, you need to play with broken cards. This deck is my team's gift to the powerless."

—Stephen Menendian

I think this rings more true today than ever before. If you play Type 1 you at least want the OPTION to play with broken cards and not just Null Rod. Don't misunderstand. I still like a Null Rod deck that baffles Tezz players as it beats down with Exalted Cold-Eyed Selkies as much as the next guy, but I also like to be able to play a busted combo deck that is high-risk —> high-reward.

Right now I feel we live in a Vintage environment where you either play:

a). Highlander.Dec that is medium-risk, high-reward and requires a bajillion dollars to effectively build.
b). Random Tier 2 stuff that is low-risk, low/medium-reward and requires a lot less money to build.

Both decks require similar low-medium playskill to win with so it really is in the best interest of the player to play Highlander.Dec if you can learn to not screw up too much with it.

I'd rather have to invest some serious practice in a high-risk—>high-reward combo deck that saves me some money to build then be stuck with Null Rod.deck forever. This is what D-Day was for me back then and what other combo could be again today.

*I'm sick of TPS looking so similar to Tezz. I want TPS to be its own nuanced deck with more distinct 4-ofs that help it win. Windfall/Ponder could do this.
*I wan to see Ad Nauseam turn into a real threat. Demonic Consultation could do this.
*I want to see Standstill decks viable again. Library Of Alexandria might do this.
*I want to see a Flash deck again. Unrestricted Flash + Ponder might do this.


*The important thing is that Ad Nauseam could easily be built on 5-Proxies (Lotus, Sapphire, Jet, Ancestral or the only real necessities, for #5 you could run Timetwister or Time Walk depending on your build)

If these 5-proxy decks became more powerful then why wouldn't/couldn't the budget player go for finding the funds to build THESE decks for big Sanctioned Tournaments?

This would allow players to build quality decks at less than half the current price of entry into the Sanctioned Vintage scene as the variety of good, POWERFUL decks would be more than doubled.

I simply want to express a good reason as to why I think unresticting cards that help combo/ printing new cards that help combo is in the best interest of Vintage. I know combo can be degenerate, but I contest that it is ever not fun to play/ play against. There is a lot of skill to piloting a combo deck well and there are many opportunities for play mistakes/opponents to capitalize on play mistakes so I think it is very fair. The hate cards that exist today are also far more potent than they were 5 years ago and so combo should be kept in check if it every did get a bit out of hand.

These are my thoughts,

Peace,

-Storm

I don't think that it's possible for a player to master all five pillars at the same time.  I think that the environment changes quickly enough now that the nuances that a veteran would understand may be lost on someone stretching themselves quite so thin.

The sense of entitlement that Americans have is amazing.  There may be some angry and upset replies to this post, but honestly, this has to be stated.

Most readers will fail to see the American housing market analogy but I will make it anyways.  I'll also throw in a combo of politics as well. 

1.  Competitive Vintage is an expensive format to play.
2.  Competitive Standard is an expensive format to play.
3.  Competitive Legacy and Extended are expensive formats as well.

Vintage proxy mania



The use of proxies basically allowed many people that couldn't afford to play in competitive Vintage the ability to play competitive Vintage.  Even if they could not afford to play competitive Vintage.

USA Housing bubble
Likewise many people that had no jobs or credit or money were allowed to buy homes that they could not afford. 
The US banks were basically creating "proxy" loans.  Sham loans were made to people that could not afford and therefore did not deserve to own an expensive "McMansion" home. 
Now the chickens have come home to roost and people are getting evicted out of their homes they could not afford to own. 

This is called reality. 

In Vintage there is now earnest discussion of zero proxy tournaments in America.  This would mean a lot of people that cannot afford to play competitive Vintage would be evicted from competitive Vintage. 

This too is called reality. 

Love alone is not enough
I understand a lot of you love Vintage.  In business, in relationships, and in reality, love alone just is not enough.  Just because you love a format, does not give you entitlement to play a format.     

Here's an example.  I love the Mercedes Roadster.  I study the specs of  Mercedes Roadsters and know a lot about Mercedes.  A Mercedes Roadster is my favorite car.  I do not have enough funds to buy a Mercedes Roadster.  I am not entitled to it. 

I understand this sounds like I am a Vintage Elitist, but actually I'm simply a realist. 

Europeans understand reality a bit better than Americans.  Europeans have suffered under the yo-yo government schemes of Communism and Socialism for many years. 

Politics and Magic, Vintage comboed
Clearly America is eagerly rushing towards that lovely ideal of Socialism and perhaps even quasi-Communism.  You read evidence of this fact on these forums the outright demands that everyone, every man, every child, is intrinsically entitled to play the format consisting of the most expensive, most collectible cards in the entire game of Magic the Gathering. 

Why do we have to have subset communities?  Why does there have to be a community of Shop players, Drain players, etc? 

I thought that was something worth moving away from?  I thought the idea of players being generalists as opposed to niche specialists is a worthwhile goal?  Don't we have enough players unwilling to set outside of their comfort zone?  Shouldn't players play whatever they feel is best rather than what they are used to playing? 

It's interesting that you say that I'm a combo player.    I've played combo decks in the past, but I've also played Drain decks just as much, designing Meandeck Gifts, for example.   And I've played other decks besides on many occasion.   

I invented null rod in stax going back as far as 2005 and the monster attendance waterbury I won at the height of gift's dominance over the metagame.
But that doesn't really matter, I think you guys are looking at the card the wrong way.  You are not taking out lock pieces to add it to the deck, null rod IS a lock piece, and probably the best one in the deck.

I also have run more then 2 crucibles on fewer occasions then I can remember.  This card is largely dead against blue based control (to the extent that I board it out), and only truly effective against fish or the shop mirror.  I truly can't remember ever losing more then a single match against a workshop mirror, this isn't really exaggeration.  I may have given up 1 match against Ray with his staxless stax deck at a myriad tournament, I seem to remember losing to gorilla shaman + welder.

Besides, the added bonus of null rod is that if you're on the draw, you actually have  a chance to stay in the game against a deck like tezz that just splooges all over your face on its opening turn with 3 artifact mana and a draw spell or something.

Mono colored Workshop list should abuse as many Spheres as possible. The 5 color Stax lists cannot take this route due to its dependency on multi-colored bombs that need to resolve. The real question is which Spheres does one run? Out here in Cleveland we cannot run Thorn of Amethyst due to the absurd amount of aggro, but on the East coast there never appears to be creature based decks. Must be nice...!


I am in the middle of writing a comprehensive primer on Workshop Prison strategies and BRstax that should be up in a week. I hope that it will lead to further discussion on the archetype.

-Twaun P. Pownertown

I believe -- although I could be wrong -- that Stax players have made a simple observation: they have seen how Sundering Titan has hit the table -- often through Tinker -- won the game, reinforcing the early decision to include it.

It's because it's beyond the scope of this thread.   This is a thread about 5c Stax.   Everyone assumes, including myself, that 5c Stax is not optimal with Null Rod.   

I agree with JuggernautGo, however.   That's why I don't think that 5c Stax is optimal for this particular metagame.

Null rod can easily be fit into a 5c build.  Most players underestimate how good null rod is against a mirror match as well.  Null rod absolutely crushes any mono-red shop aggro version that runs sword of fire & ice.

I will say that Bazaar and Titan are either in or out as a package.  If you don't run Bazaar, Titan is just a hugely overcosed dude.  If you run bazaar giving yourself 1 or 2 game breakers like Titan or Jar make sense.  I see the logic behind either choice... its really consistancy v brokenness (conditional on having welder). 

but I am pretty certain that in this current metagame, if you aren't playing null rod in stax, you're pretty much doing it as wrong as you possibly can.

My position is that it is a mistake to load up on cards because or in part because of the presence of multiple Crop Rotations.  My view, at the highest level of abstraction is that this is a johnny design move, not a Spike one.   The same is true of Tinker.  Just because you run Tinker doesn't mean you should include suboptimal Tinker targets.  One of the reasons that I think that blue decks can get away with having a dead draw is that they have (had) multiple Thirst for Knowledge and Brainstorms to shuffle away the giant robot.   

Crop Rotation's presence does not justify including a toolbox of suboptimal lands that you wouldn't play if you didn't have Crop Rotation.    I think that's an easy error to make, but one that is wrong.   Each card has to carry its own weight in your opening hand in Stax on account of just how important the not losing is in the first instance and within the first few turns. 

Consistency.

As great as being able to play the best colored spells in the game is in theory, it actually detracts from what Stax wants to accomplish, which is to lock up the board.  It's almost a miss-assignment of role.

Another aspect that contributes to the general notion of consistency in the aggro builds is that they don't have to completely lock their opponent out of the game to win, just slow things down enough to beat face before the opponent recovers.

Aggro-Mud is on the opposite spectrum of Workshop decks compared to 5cStax.  Instead of broken spells and trying to completely lock the board down, it opts to run a higher concentration of both lock pieces and acceleration.  On top of that it doesn't have to acheive complete control to win.  It's disruption  has to be just good enough.

If I were to play Shops in the current metagame I would want to be able to run Null Rod.  If your Stax deck can't run Rod you really should be asking yourself why?  Vintage used to be Yawgmoth's Will vs Null Rod, now its Time Vault vs Null Rod. 

The recent success of running B/R with Bob as a draw engine supports is another example of finding new creative ways to achieve consistency. 

I think the time has arrived for thinking about Workshop decks in terms of those that want to lock the opponent out of the game and those who pursue a more aggro route to victory.  I don't even think it's necessarily that useful to focus on the minutia of 5c Stax vs UR vs BR vs RG in separate terms when they have the same strategy with slightly different tactics.  The discussion shouldn't only be about the last 2-3 slots in your pet 5cStax list, but about the pros and cons of various tactics the different Shop decks employ in the current metagame.


Sean

I haven't really been impressed by tarmogoyf yet, he seems only be good against aggro, fish and shops. While that is certainly relevant he is not really any good against Tez or combo...Both tend to ignore the goyf. When i'm on  the other side of the fish match-up i'm never really scared of the goyf.

Great read Dennis!
It's nice to get updated on Stax for a change. My knowledge of it is terrible, as well as my record against it. On paper 5c Stax looks absolutely the best Stax deck out there. It has all of the annoying lock pieces and plays the best colored spells in vintage to boot. It is interesting to see that Aggro MUD and Mono Red Shop outperform 5c Stax though. What do you think could be the reason for this?

@Sean Ryan
In the end my article turned out to be more general primer than anything else.
But I disagree with your statement that the 5C versions of Stax are the most inconstent and the players need to reexamine their lists. When examining the Morphling.de recent T8 data the most Stax decks that make T8 are indeed 5C. This leads me to believe that's 5C Stax is hardly inconsistent and still outperform other Stax lists.
Of course there are other lists and people are more than welcome to try out new things. That's the beauty of Stax. You have a better possibility to try out different things than you have with any other deck. E.g I've been tinkering with a list playing multiple crop rotations, enlightened tutors and entombs.