[Discussion] Team secrecy and the decline of the meta

[BlkXplsn]

I think the "decline" of the meta is simply the result of people changing the decks they play more often. As the format grows, more playtesting is need to keep up with all the new stuff being created and (re)discovered. Some people simply aren't willing to invest that kind of time into playtesting, but still want to discuss ideas. That often leads to people parroting other people's opinions. It also leads to uninformed opinions.

EDIT: Another thing to remember is that everyone's metagame is different. Thus, ideas and decks that have worked really well for you may be utter and complete ass to someone else.  For example, every deck I've seen from Dulmen would need an extra 2-3 land in it in my metagame, along with a way to kill Blood moons.

I know from a personal perspective that my skill as a type 1 player is limited by the fact that I love to change what deck I'm playing. When I win several tournies in a row, I stop playing that deck. It becomes boring to me. I want to learn how other things work. Granted, many people aren't like me in that regard, but are "forced" to change decks to stay competitive in their metagame.

Man-hours playing and testing a deck are the only thing that can improve a person's skill after a certain point. There isn't a whole lot someone can do to get around that.

[Zherbus]

I really view this as an advance in the metagame, not a decline.

[Triple_S]

For a change I actually have to agree w/ Az on this topic.  While Paragons have become more or less a non-entity (in part because of the success from GenCon and the resulting burnout for atleast the Richmond faction of the team, or former members of the team), w/o the efforts of teams, and a specific goal for the team to work for, you really don't have a focused metagame.  I am sure that as GenCon and the t1 championship comes around again (or possibly the Virginia Vintage 3 at GP: DC) that some of the teams will get fired up again and the months following the big event will have a more crystalized metagame.  Then someone or something will come along again to shatter the metagame just as it occured this year w/ the coming of Long.

[BlkXplsn]

I really view this as an advance in the metagame, not a decline.

And thusly my sarcastic "quotes" were born.

[waSP]

I want to thank Milton for identifying what I see as the problem so succinctly.  With the decline in interest by some of its older players, the new blood hasn't quite taken over yet.  I think that a more supportive community would likely get us past the funk that TMD is in right now.

I think there are some aspects of the more popular decks that are from being fully explored.  I think it's time to start considering some of the other options we have with decks.  We shouldn't just accept what is given to us by the prominent teams.  The time constraint issue is one that can't be denied for most players.  Testing a deck can be quite time intensive.  I think it's important that it gets done as much as possible, though.  There need to be more threads on what people do find in their testing.  1 archetype that could likely make a resurgence (relatively) is a Reanimator variant.  With WGD declining slightly, this deck may have a place in the new metagame.

[rozetta]

Actually, waSP, a friend of mine has a damn good reanimator deck that he's been working on which gives a decent amount of the current gauntlet a run for it's money due to the range of utility creatures it runs. It even plays a good game versus dragon. I think your predictions are pretty accurate from the sounds of things

[Smmenen]

One of the problems I see, though, is that some of the legends (no pun intended) of this community are becoming less and less vocal.  This causes a bit of a problem in that these legends are still around, just with much less frequency.  Their words still have weight, so they are very easliy able to make or break a thread.

This is unfortunately true. The upper echelon of players here (in terms of name recognition) has had very, very few people entering it since it first began to gel, but more and more of those "famous" players are putting Magic on a back burner or quitting altogether. Hopefully, the community will recognize the less known talented people we have here and shore up this problem in time.

When I first started on Bdominia the only "name" people I remembered where Darren, JP, Matt D'Avanzo (who was PROLIFIC), and Oscar.

Of those people, Darren sold his cards, JP hasn't touched a card since October, Matt quit, and Oscar, well Oscar does his thing.

The point is, OUT WITH THE OLD, in with the new .  I'm part joking, but I'm part not.  I'm glad to see people leave who don't actually playtest.  I believe that playtesting is the core of the game and people who want to sit around and dick around with their favorite cards becuase they like being dominant in an unexplored format can eat my turds.  

Fever called me the new Azhrei - so why are you hanging around here anyway Darren .  

I beleive Vintage still has along way to go.  We have teams, but those teams need to do more playtesting.  We have playtesting, but it needs to be more serious.  We have tournaments, but we need a more well defined metagame.  We are making progress, even if it is babysteps.

Stephen Menendian

[Eastman]

The point is, OUT WITH THE OLD, in with the new .
Stephen Menendian

Sup.





I've gotten what I wanted from the replies in this thread (well most of them) but I think what useful replies will be made have been. It may be a good idea to close this before it makes a turn for the worse (as it has already begun to)

[MuzzonoAmi]

I agree. That still leaves who 'the new' are generally up in the air, which right now is a good thing. And by and large, I agree with Steve. If you don't actually test your decks/cards, what good are they?

[Azhrei]

Fever called me the new Azhrei - so why are you hanging around here anyway Darren .  

Mostly because you don't have any style, and someone needs to keep things entertaining.    I was never the best player (I burn out mentally if I miss a meal, lack sleep, or start to get bored), but I was a solid deck builder and had a pretty good grasp on gaming strategy and how Magic works at its core. Lots of people have those skills though-- even you, now that you've moved past the "Why play FoW?" stage of your development... but what I have that can't be learned is style, plain and simple.

Actually, the truth of the matter is that some of us are iconic. I came on BD back in 1997, when most of the site's original members were leaving. I became the first of the new old guard, and pretty much did most of the T1 work myself. I posted in almost every topic, helped on every deck... people came and went, and I remained prominent. Some people came on and later left, others came and have intermittently remained, and a few people showed up and stayed as long as I did. JP, Matt, and Oscar are prime examples of this-- they did their legwork, and I ended up friends with all of them. We were the initial Paragons. They're iconic figures, regardless of what you think of them. Legend is another good example of an iconic character. Zherbus is another person who became iconic by starting TMD after relative obscurity on BD. All of these people are knowledgable, but they all also have distinct personalities that are at least somewhat heavy on showmanship.

If people want to fill the shoes of these kinds of characters, they need to have some style points.    Be irreplacable, and that tier will fill again.

I realize I'm rambling a bit here, but I get to do that because I'm old.

[Smmenen]

Your initial post was little more than an incoherent sentence or two and this thread doesn't exist to serve you.  The people who can post here are hand picked and thus unlikely to flame.  And I think this thread serves an important cathartic purpose.  In any community, these issues have to be dealt with and I see no evidence whatsoever that this will degenerate.  

Steve

The point is, OUT WITH THE OLD, in with the new .
Stephen Menendian

Sup.





I've gotten what I wanted from the replies in this thread (well most of them) but I think what useful replies will be made have been. It may be a good idea to close this before it makes a turn for the worse (as it has already begun to)

[Razor]

[Pertinent stuff from the Fro Deck thread]

Phantom_Tapeworm: [slightly off topic] Regarding eastman's thread, i just don't see it at all. Many people seem to think the metagame is in a depression right now, but i see the metagame as being alive and well. The death of long.dec left the metagame open for aggro utility, eg. o.stompy. Which can prey on the decks that had risen to power in the metagame to combat long, eg. fish. Fro preys on other aggro decks and decks that have little creature removal. It's a very natural logical evolutionary cycle really.[/slightly off topic]

This is yet more proof that Type 1 is evolving faster than ever right now. I mean, Oshawa Stompy is a good example. You've built a great hate deck in reaction to it in less than 4 weeks after I built the *initial* version. We live hundreds of miles apart.  Wow, this is amazingly fast adaptation.

Whomever thinks the metagame is 'depresed' or 'stagnant' needs to play in more tournies!

[Phantom Tape Worm]

This is yet more proof that Type 1 is evolving faster than ever right now. I mean, Oshawa Stompy is a good example. You've built a great hate deck in reaction to it in less than 4 weeks after I built the *initial* version. We live hundreds of miles apart.  Wow, this is amazingly fast adaptation.

Whomever thinks the metagame is 'depresed' or 'stagnant' needs to play in more tournies!

Amen to that.

I think Eastman's primary gripe is that the format has seemed to slow down such that goofy decks that look like they should not be competitive are thriving (btw razor, when i call a deck goofy that means i love it).  Thus he has concluded that there is somehow a "decline of the metagame".

Team secrecy may exist, but the "decline of the metagame" does not.  There is good reason for the rise of decks that don't aim to have you dead by turn 2, they are simply better suited to deal with whatever else is currently out there.  The type 1 metagame is darwinism at its finest, and as such, is fairly predictable.   I really have not experienced any of what eastman is talking about.

I think for eastman's claims to be valid, _ALL_ information regarding decks would have to become secret, so secret that there would be no opportunity for deck builders to react to one another.  Then people would go to tournaments without even the slightest inkling of what to expect.   This cannot happen simply because information flows too quickly with sites like this one around; tourney reports tell us about our environment and smart players can and will adapt (even without the help of their teams).

[Eastman]

I do play in a lot of tourneys.

I'm not claiming armageddon here, but I still insist that when the best players go secret with their tech, the meta has to slow down by some margin.  I seem to be taking a lot of flak for pointing this out in the hopes of decreasing some individuals allegiance to these team contracts.

[Azhrei]

I seem to be taking a lot of flak for pointing this out in the hopes of decreasing some individuals allegiance to these team contracts.

Do you understand that your goal runs contrary to the idea of "winning", which is the whole point of tournaments in the first place? Imagine if football teams shared their playbooks with everyone else-- because that's basically what you're advocating.

In fact, it's advantageous for teams to slow down metagame progression as much as possible, because that way once you have an edge you can keep it as long as possible. I used to generally keep public releases of information 4-5 months behind wherever my designs were, so I could present an idea, then present a counter, but only after I'd worked out a solution to the counter so I'd still remain 1-2 steps ahead of the established metagame.

If memory serves, from the time we started having sanctioned tournaments around here, a Paragon won in the vast majority of instances-- often because we had counters figured out well in advance.

To be fair, there were times where we'd be on plan D to deal with plan C, but people would still be on plan B... overshooting the metagame can be just as bad as falling behind. A classic example of this is Duress in Hulk-- the use of 3-4 maindeck Duress was clearly where things were leading, but at one tournament I ran into enough people still stuck in the "Sligh is good" stage that I'd have been better off running maindeck Smothers. But that's what happens in local stuff-- GenCon was a more "correct" metagame and look how that went.

[Eastman]

Do you understand that your goal runs contrary to the idea of "winning", which is the whole point of tournaments in the first place?

In fact, it's advantageous for teams to slow down metagame progression as much as possible, because that way once you have an edge you can keep it as long as possible. I used to generally keep public releases of information 4-5 months behind wherever my designs were.

In those days type 1's popularity was dwindling away to nothing and tournaments were few and far between. Perhaps there were reasons for this.

The format has got a long way to grow yet. I have a vested interest in keeping tournaments as prolific as they have become so that I have the oppurtunity to unleash tech on them.

[Grand Inquisitor]

In fact, it's advantageous for teams to slow down metagame progression as much as possible, because that way once you have an edge you can keep it as long as possible. I used to generally keep public releases of information 4-5 months behind wherever my designs were.

It seems to me that this is only true in cases where many of the top tier decks are overly metagamed or depend on hate.  In this environment you could play decks that our powerful enough, and dodge the most recent cylce of hate cards.  Our current metagame looks sort of like this, since there are multiple top decks, and even more decks which have only a few bad matchups.  Still, nothing has stepped forward as the leading deck yet, and both control (B2B hulk) and aggro (O stompy) dedicate maindeck spots to hate.

However, in the case where the top deck wins simply by being more powerful than the rest of the field (Necro, Academy, Mono-U), then slowly using your tech to stay ahead of the meta curve should be pointless.  Instead you could just play the most powerful deck and wait for restrictions (if its overly dominant), or play tournaments of mirrors and anti-deck (if its waiting for the next meta innovation).

[Kerz]

It seems like team secrecy has taken over themanadrain main type one forum as well. There is maybe... one new thread a week, with constant chatter and whispering on IRC of "team X broke this" and "that team is going to unleash.." and it really makes me sad to come to the realization that this is what the format is coming to. Even *gasp* Type two isn't rearly as secretive as type one players are- most of this secrecy is unneeded, and releasing your decks is only going to help you (remember the '2 heads is better than 1' idiom?).

Don't be afraid to post a deck without complete and utter knowlege with hours of playtesting. As long as you know what you are doing generally with this game, you won't look stupid.

With that said, I am preparing a post on a new-ish deck.

Aaron Kerzner

[jpmeyer]

Well, whenever I want to post something new I post it in the open forum instead.  It's not like Worlds is coming up for a while so there isn't too much to hide tech-wise.

[Dr. Sylvan]

I think the open forum is getting most of the ideas, since people aren't cracking open new archetypes all the time these days. With the cardpool so heavily explored compared to last year, it's much more likely for someone to think of a single tech card rather than an awesome new deck. There is, for instance, a Control Slavery discussion here, and we have a still-somewhat-recent Keeper thread. To me, it just seems that people are trying to keep this forum for their most serious posts, though I am surprised that the FCG primer didn't trigger its own thread that I've noticed.

[rvs]

though I am surprised that the FCG primer didn't trigger its own thread that I've noticed.

I know why that is. It's essentially a budget deck. Sure, you can add power and make it better, but noone with full power will probably start playing FCG any time soon.

[kl0wn]

though I am surprised that the FCG primer didn't trigger its own thread that I've noticed.

I know why that is. It's essentially a budget deck. Sure, you can add power and make it better, but noone with full power will probably start playing FCG any time soon.

BAH! BAH I SAY! I'll make you eat those words.

Meh...no I won't. Buying all these newfangled cards like Food Chain and Joblin Lackey are too much of a hassle. Damn Wizards and their marketting juggernaut.

[Matt]

Yeah, all those brand new cards that came out...in 1999-2000...three years before the fetchlands everyone and their parole officer owns.

[Smmenen]

Back on topic...

Team Secrecy is absolutely essential for a higher level of competition.  It fosters team solidarity, a willingness to invest in technology, and a desire to keep things "in-team."  

Steve

[Eastman]

Back on topic...

Team Secrecy is absolutely essential for a higher level of competition.  It fosters team solidarity, a willingness to invest in technology, and a desire to keep things "in-team."  

Steve

I agree for my part.


Funny how this dead discussion accidentally got started up again.

[Triple_S]

I suspect that team secrecy will only increase w/ GP: DC, the Andystok 2 Lotus tournament, and the summer convention season heating up.  Other than working on BoW openly, most other work is kept tight w/ the Bus.