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MolotDET
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« on: October 23, 2003, 11:53:43 pm » |
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***I have been working on this for about a month. Now that Smmenen and Rakso have posted their dissertations on SCG I think this holds less prevalence, but let it be known that this is all original work and was not gleaned from others statements nor is it meant as a rebuttal of any type. This is about half of a longer work which I no longer care to finish.***
It is widely believed that Chalice of the Void is in need of restriction. While it is understandable that it hoses 0 casting cost artifacts and therefore has a major effects on Type One as a whole, it is harder to understand that this card will perform a bit of a balancing act for the format. Many combo decks that rely on 0 casting cost artifacts to win will no longer be viable for play in their present incarnations in the post-Mirrodin meta-game.
Unfortunately, budget aggro decks are taking a bigger hit here. Decks like Sligh, Stompy and to an extent, White Weenie will be severely affected by this card. While these decks were nearly pushed out of the format by TnT and Tainted Mask almost a year ago, their viability is called into question in what will become the age of the Chalice. Of course, the viability of these decks could have been called into question before the release of Chalice but, there is no longer debate.
Is this card format distorting? Well if you ask anyone who has been doing any testing for the post-Mirrodin meta-game you will come to realize that there will only be three kinds of decks: those that use Chalice Maindeck, those that use it Sideboard and those that will simply work around Chalice to the best of their abilities. Now for those budget decks mentioned above, any of these options are none too appetizing. But more importantly, we get to the comparison of Chalice to Black Vise. While the Chalice, like the Vise, would only be played in a few decks were it restricted, it will be played by nearly everything while it isn’t. So like the Vise, perhaps Chalice should find its way to the restricted list, but at what cost?
It is a sure thing that Chalice will have to be the last of a barrage of restrictions if it is to be restricted at all. Sitting in a new metagame that is filled with 3+ Workshop decks, a new more powerful Keeper, Dragon combo (which will be all but untouched by the new set) and a new faster Longer.dec, you will find yourself mulliganing into hands that include a Chalice or several Force of Wills. Restricting Chalice before something else is done about the state of the format would be foolish. In this part I almost agree with the school of “wait and see,” because if anything the time is so not right to give chalice the axe.
It is plain to see that unchecked, Longer.dec will if not dominate, than further distort the format. This is not to say that Long will win every tournament, but the presence of several of these decks at any tournament will effect the decks that make top eight. And thereby, it warps the format even more, not by just winning but by limiting the decks that are playable. With Chalice, every deck gets a turn one answer to Longer.dec, but at the cost of numerous arch-types falling to the wayside. And worst of all, some of the decks that were actually fast enough too give Long a run for it’s money, have now gotten an even better weapon against other decks. Clearly, other decks will become more powerful after Mirrodin. Keeper will return, revitalized and strong, Mono-Black will also return, as will TnT, Stax and Stacker, but all these decks will be packing Chalices. I am sure there will be completely new decks sporting Chalices as well as new combo decks utilizing Chrome Mox and Spoils of the Vault. But one thing is for sure, Chalice will be everywhere.
So, where do we go from here? For the last year or so people have been saying that Type One is reaching a point of critical mass. There is so much untapped potential in the card pool that many new cards will break some of these older untouched gems. If you look at the case of Academy, this deck was waiting for another playable Draw-7 to be printed. It got much more than this with the printing of Storm cards in general and Tendrils of Agony and Mind’s Desire in particular. An uncounterable win condition was much more than what Academy decks were looking for. The Storm mechanic itself was a mistake, not for the limited formats, but for Type One.
The worst part of this is that there are Academy type decks that don’t rely on Lion’s Eye Diamond or Burning Wish. Now while they do play a heavy amount of 0 casting cost artifacts they are not dependant on Lion’s Eye Diamond, which is the weakness of Longer.dec. So even though Chalice of the Void will hurt these decks, it will not outright make them obsolete. And of course, the addition of things like Chrome Mox and Spoils of the Vault will very well speed these decks (including Long) to a Turn One kill and then the addition of Chalice to the meta-game would be moot other than actually turning most games into a coin-flip.
The problems with Type One today actually harkens back to years ago. Our format has always been the poor cousin of the Magic circle. With a renewed interest of many of our older players and the fact that the format has gathered so many new players to itself, it is growing out of control. The simple fact is that three years ago when certain people would say, “card X or idea Y was no good in Type one,” it would be excepted as cannon whether it was true or not. This is no longer true and more innovation has been made in this time period than in any other. This is a slow process. The card pool is so vast that it does take time to reach the most optimal decklist. If you take Mishra’s Workshop as a for instance, Mono-brown Mud spawned many decks (i.e. Stacker1,2 and 3, TnT, Stacks, Ducktape) before it became Welder Mud, yet this deck could have been built over 2 years ago. So, while the ingenuity was present the deck itself took over two years to evolve.
As far as critical mass of cards go I think we reached that some time ago, but a critical mass of players is a more recent thing. The changing viability of decks has never been more dependant on the most recently released set, as it is now. The influx of players from the limited formats has changed the face of Type one and forced it be a less stagnant format. Now while I don’t think that this is a bad thing, I do think that when the format is changing so much that other things need to change as well.
What can be done to save our format from degeneracy? It is of no surprise to anyone when I say that the Banned and Restricted list is quite a bit behind the format. Of course the reason being that, Wizards doesn’t pay much attention to Type One and so, we only get restrictions or un-restrictions when there is a massive outcry for them. With this in mind, it behooves us to be our own police (or DCI), so to speak, though getting people to agree on what should or shouldn’t be, Banned or Restricted is a bigger kettle of fish.
The problem that you hear most often nowadays is that the fundamental turn in Type 1 has moved to turn two. Truthfully, the fundamental turn is turn one. In a match between Welder Mud and Longer.dec the out come of the game is nearly decided by the coin flip, after which some aggressive mulliganing will decide the outcome of the game (who goes first? Did the long player pull disruption or a turn one win? Did the Welder Mud player pull 2 mana and a Sphere of Resistance or Chalice or both?).
Is it truly necessary to restrict Lion’s Eye Diamond? If Chalice of the Void is to be restricted than it is clear that LED will need to be restricted as well. While Chalice will be the only thing that is keeping decks running LED from winning with regularity it will also be keeping down a horde of other decks. And so, Lion’s Eye Diamond (which was created to be balanced, but this didn’t work oddly enough) will have to be restricted as well. The saddest part about this is though it will stop Long.dec in its pre-Mirrodin form, it will not be the catch-all restriction to slow all Storm combos by a turn or two and, the growing fad of Type 1 Madness decks will take a big hit here as well.
The storm cards themselves are the culprits here. It was plain enough that Mind’s Desire would be format distorting. I think it took deck builders all over the world five and one half seconds to understand exactly how broken this card was. The preemptive restriction was a good thing but this was only damage control. Tendrils of Agony is just as bad as Mind’s Desire and I will go so far as to lay out the fact that Long.dec would have worked just as well has only Tendrils been printed. The mistake that Wizards made here was the Storm mechanic itself. Had neither Mind’s Desire nor Tendrils of Agony ever seen print people would have used Brain Freeze and/or Hunting Pack as their kill. The simple fact remains that if you are to rid the format of the dominance of Storm combos, you could restrict and/or ban about seventeen other cards or you could just ban the Storm cards. With this as the solution perhaps the restriction of Lion’s Eye Diamond need not happen, though I still doubt that. The other reason that restricting LED is the wrong answer to Long is that even if this does slow Storm combos to a third turn kill, they can just wait in the wings until another mana accelerator is printed and then come back just as strong.
Spoils of the Vault and Chrome Mox are the final nails in the coffin of Vintage, though I might add here that restricting these cards might drop Storm combos back to turn 2. Unrestricted, these two cards turn a plethora of combo decks into the consistent first turn monstrosities that have always been fabled to rule vintage. This will become painfully apparent as the next few weeks unfold and the true post Mirrodin decks are unveiled.
Whenever the re-restriction of Mishra’s Workshop is discussed it always falls into an argument. The argument that the card is environment distorting is always countered by the argument that Workshop decks are not ruling the format. Perhaps after Mirrodin is playable people will notice that the top two tiers will have 4+ Workshop decks in it. I think the best argument here is that Workshop is an unrestricted uncounterable colorless Black Lotus every turn. But even more important, if we are planning to slow the fundamental turn down, Mishra’s Workshop will need to be restricted.
My actual opinion about the restriction of Mishra’s Workshop is that it needs to be restricted. That not only is this needed now, but that it should have never been unrestricted. This Welder Mud deck that is the rage right now (though I shouldn’t say rage because no one actually likes to play it) could have been made two years ago, as I said before. Is this the ultimate expression of a Workshop deck? Using the card pool we have presently I would hazard, the answer is no. And as far as what Mirrodin and what the future may give Workshop decks, it can only get worse.
Unfortunately, the restriction of this card is never a popular subject and there are convincing arguments on both sides. One of the best arguments for restriction seems to be that Prison as an arch-type is squeezing the magic triangle. It is making most aggro unplayable. Pre-Mirrodin it was squeezing most control out of the meta-game. Only the most focused control decks (I.E. Hulk) were able to compete with it. And of course even playing against the most broken combo deck of all time (pre-Mirrodin), Long.dec was akin to coin flipping. So is it distorting the format? Well in the sense that it is not bringing home all the prizes… no, but it is removing numerous decks from viability (read: all aggro).
Post-Mirrodin this would not be one of the first cards I would see restricted. But if restrictions or bannings do happen, then it will be plain to see that Workshop needs to go. And I can’t for the life of me understand how some very vocal people don’t see this…
One last note:
I do not profess to be a type one guru, or the man with his finger on the pulse of or in the ass of Type One. I do understand that many of the things I am advocating will leave us with a format that is dominated by Keeper and dragon combo, and that the eventual restriction of Chalice of the Void will allow the return of Hulk and Neo-GrowAtog to the top of the heap. There are other cards that many people see as in need of restriction and have also not fallen from my radar. Maybe someday I will post these ideas as well, but for now I will just leave you a list.
Intuition
Bazaar of Baghdad
Cunning Wish
Isochron Scepter
Chalice of the Void
Cabal Therapy
Burning Wish
Dark Ritual
Illusionary Mask
MolotDET\n\n
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