#1.
Will, the most broken card in the game, dropped to about half its level of play out of nowhere. Fortunately, it's easy to explain because Oath kinda makes it hard to accumulate a graveyard. Still, I was creeped out by it when I first looked at it.
Certainly true, but this may be oversimplifying things a little. I would explain it this way:
Looking at your "State of the Metagame" table:
11.2% - _8.3, _8.9, 11.1, 17.5,
14.1, _6.3 Storm Combo10.7% - 14.6, 19.6, _9.7, _7.5,
10.9, _1.6 4C Control_7.7% - 10.4, 10.7, _8.3, _2.5,
_9.4, _5.0 Hulk Smash_6.9% - _2.1, _7.2, _2.8, 12.5,
_6.3, 10.0 Stacker_6.2% - _2.1, _3.6, _6.9, 10.0,
_4.7, 10.0 Stax_5.8% - _6.3, _1.8, _1.4, _7.5, _7.8, 10.0 Control Slavery
_5.4% - _2.1, _0.0, 13.9, _2.5,
_6.3, _7.5 MUD / wMUDThe frequencey of top 8 occurences 3 of the 4 "prominent" archetypes (in this case I'll define prominent as >5% mean metagame occurence) that can support Yawgmoth's Will - 4cC, Hulk, and Storm combo - all dropped off dramatically from September to October-November.
The new presence of Orchard Oath in Top 8 brackets is almost certainly coupled to much of the decrease in 4cC (not necessarily because one beats the other, but because people playing one archetype may have switched to the other) . Maybe Tog's as well, although for me a more satisfactory explanation is that Tog's decline is coupled to the rise in Control Slaver (can't really couple it to Fish because Fish's presence also decreased during this time period) and since both of these archetypes play Yawgmoth's Will, you would only see a decrease in Wills if the total % of Hulk + Control Slaver decks decreases too. This does happen (17.2% -> 15%), so it's another contributor.
The most major contributor appears to be the coupling of Storm Combo to Workshop decks. Storm drops from 14.1->6.3%, and at the same time Stax+Stacker+MUD increases from 17.3->27.5%. Since the Storm decks are highly played and invariably use Yawgmoth's Will, it then makes sense that the increased presence of their overall worst matchup, Prison decks, would keep more Wills out of T8 brackets.
So, to summarize, the decrease in Yawgmoth's Will is not only due to the increase in Oath (at the expense of 4cC) but also due to the increase in Workshop decks (at the expense of Storm combo). This is an important distinction to make because even if Oath declines over the next couple months, if Workshop decks are still highly played they may keep the number of Yawgmoth's Wills in check by themselves.
#2. Re: Child of Gaea. Built-in insurance against Control Magic and Animate Dead/Necromancy?
#3. Can we steer this discussion away from Nassif's deck and more towards the rest of Dr. Sylvan's article?
