post 6-1 mana drain viability/impact

[surillious]

As many other people have already noted on TMD, a large percentage of the deck's making it to the final table in recent month's have contained the same basic shell. If a player were running blue one usually could expect to see 4 Gush, 4 Brainstorm, usually 3-4 Merchant Scroll, and sometimes 4 Ponder, as well as the perfunctory 4 FoW.  My question, and the reason for this post, is to discuss whether the  6-1 Banned & Restricted changes will cause a precipitous increase in the number of Mana Drain's being played.

As I see it, the restriction of gush (again) on top of Brainstorm, Scroll, and Ponder will work to slow the format down slightly. The best draw engine--probably ever--is gone, which works to the advantage of deck's like Control Slaver which was just to slow to compete with the Gush/Bond engine. Will decks like Slaver have a chance again--perhaps splashing Servant's--or will Blue control go in an entirely new direction? In any of these possible scenarios will Mana Drain make the comback I foresee, thus preserving Blue's spot as the default go-to-color, or will the absence of so many other blue staples keep people from flocking to drain?

[bluemage55]

I forsee the format getting faster, not slower.  Gush served to slow the format down. 

Now that it is gone again, along with a bunch of other blue cards that made FoW stronger, I expect fast decks like Painter's Servant, turn 1 Oath, Belcher, and Grim Long, as well as a greater prevalence of turn 1 Duress/Thougthseize, to make Mana Drain less prevalent.

[Moxlotus]

Drains will definitely become more prominent.  Long as we know it is dead as the deck needed brainstorms to cheat on lands, put back stuff like Desire, Jar, Bargain, and Tendrils, and allow you to keep 1 land hands.  Drain would much rather face Belcher than storm combo.  Drains would love to face Shops too.  Mana Drain is coming back and will be a top tier deck.

[Lemnear]

Off course Long used brainstorm and at least ponder to fix their manabase but won't it obvious that the times of pretty tight manabases are gone too? I guess that the very first reaction will be an increase of manasources in the decks. The former averange landcount of 14 will maybe be 16/17 now to handle with manadenial. To think another step forward I could imagine that Thorn of Amethyst and Sphere of Resistance will become a bit less powerful as at times players keep 1-land-hands with Ponder/Brainstorm to fix their mana. Nothing sucks more than an opponent laying down more mana than me (the 9Sphere-Player).

[zeus-online]

I don't think long is dead, it still has alot of broken plays....It's just a matter of time before long becomes playable again, sure it will probably not be as good but probably still viable.

And yes, i have played long.

/Zeus

[orgcandman]

I think people should question their assumptions. Namely, why do drains beat shops, and why do drains beat belcher?

Drain used to have a really great matchup against shop decks. This was back before shop sported 9 spheres, and ran efficient fat. This was also when drain decks had digging power via brainstorm, merchant scroll, and more importantly when workshops meant $T4KS almost exclusively.

I don't think that drains can function in this meta. I don't think drains have been functional for a long time, and that's mainly because decks are much more aggressive and efficient.

[LUPO]

Guys,

It is def going to take a real amount of time for this all to shake out.  Even slaver, what most would call a drain deck, was a brainstorm deck just as much.  Long and storm, same thing, brainstorm made them tick.  It is also going to be necessary to question the need for 9 spheres, as a lot of the chaining of spells (brainstorm into merchant scroll into A Recall) is now gone as well.  The real power of the spheres was to shut down the effects that kept decks so consistent.  Depending on the direction that vintage takes, spheres could be much less effective than they used to be because so many of the effects that they were powerful against and utilized to stop are now gone.

[surillious]

The real power of the spheres was to shut down the effects that kept decks so consistent.  Depending on the direction that vintage takes, spheres could be much less effective than they used to be because so many of the effects that they were powerful against and utilized to stop are now gone.

I agree, and would add that it seems likely that spheres will also be less effective as decks begin to run more land and mana producers. Decks like MServant and Bomberman will have healthy manabases, and will probably run drains in addition to their other counter/disruption  suite. 

[Sean Ryan]

I've been gold fishing Slaver and it is still a monster.

I predict Atog Lord or FFY will put Slaver back on the map at the next big event ;