[Article] Getting Vintage Back on Track: The Case Against Ichorid by Cody Vinci

[RaleighNCTourneys]

http://magiceternal.com/vintage/IchoridMustDie.html

Being a part of Arsenal has also allowed me to see the birth and rise of Manaless Ichorid, developed by Arsenal teammate Bert Kyle. The concept and his design are amazing and a mathematical ingenuity. However, its effect on the format is something that needs to be seriously questioned.

Ichorid is harmful to Vintage and action needs to be taken by the DCI as soon as possible.

[bronxie]

very nice cody, completely agree.

i saw ichorid in top 4 last weekend, and it was basically an "oh, awesome, thanks for playing in the tourney."  we dont need that, and i would have loved another shot at ya cody

[Xyre]

WotC may restrict Bazaar at some point, but that won't be solely on the basis of Ichorid. This is simply because, given enough effort, Ichorid is easy to beat. It is a defining factor in metagames, but its weaknesses are easy to exploit. Why people go with Pithing Needle, though, escapes me. Yes, it's more versatile than, say, Yixlid Jailer, but it also does less on balance.

At one point, you cite Flash and Trinisphere. Yes, those cards were powerful and abusive, but that doesn't mean those decks were abusive. As has been cited numerous times by many format experts, the Trinisphere metagame was shifting when the card itself was restricted, as control decks realigned to fight the threat. This was why the decks running 3Sphere started moving toward 2Sphere. Flash is an imposing deck, but it suffers from a crippling lack of a consistent draw engine and thus is usually decimated by Duress + counterspell, and if it doesn't win in the first few turns, it will quickly be overrun by more consistent decks.

Ichorid is the same way - it looks powerful on paper, but the fact remains that it suffers from weaknesses, just like every other deck. That's no reason to go for more restrictions. Yes, Bazaar is powerful, but I still disagree at this point that it is format-breaking, especially based on the value of the solutions available in the format.

Ichorid decks are cyclical in formats as a result - they do well for a while, until decks start bringing in hate from the board, then they are decimated. They wait around for a while until people start removing their answers, then come back in response. However, it is not the format-warping deck that many claim it is. It may change the metagame in response, but that doesn't mean it is too broken.

Besides, I think there is some fallacy in an argument that Ichorid gets enough consistency from Serum Powder, which usually loses its effectiveness after two real mulligans. As a result, Ichorid decks will get 1 Powder off that does things, followed by the rest that (statistically) delay the inevitable. And while Ichorid can pull it off from 1-3 cards, those games are few and far between, because they pretty much require a Bazaar and dredger in hand.

[RaleighNCTourneys]

WotC may restrict Bazaar at some point, but that won't be solely on the basis of Ichorid. This is simply because, given enough effort, Ichorid is easy to beat. It is a defining factor in metagames, but its weaknesses are easy to exploit. Why people go with Pithing Needle, though, escapes me. Yes, it's more versatile than, say, Yixlid Jailer, but it also does less on balance.

At one point, you cite Flash and Trinisphere. Yes, those cards were powerful and abusive, but that doesn't mean those decks were abusive. As has been cited numerous times by many format experts, the Trinisphere metagame was shifting when the card itself was restricted, as control decks realigned to fight the threat. This was why the decks running 3Sphere started moving toward 2Sphere. Flash is an imposing deck, but it suffers from a crippling lack of a consistent draw engine and thus is usually decimated by Duress + counterspell, and if it doesn't win in the first few turns, it will quickly be overrun by more consistent decks.

Ichorid is the same way - it looks powerful on paper, but the fact remains that it suffers from weaknesses, just like every other deck. That's no reason to go for more restrictions. Yes, Bazaar is powerful, but I still disagree at this point that it is format-breaking, especially based on the value of the solutions available in the format.

Ichorid decks are cyclical in formats as a result - they do well for a while, until decks start bringing in hate from the board, then they are decimated. They wait around for a while until people start removing their answers, then come back in response. However, it is not the format-warping deck that many claim it is. It may change the metagame in response, but that doesn't mean it is too broken.

Besides, I think there is some fallacy in an argument that Ichorid gets enough consistency from Serum Powder, which usually loses its effectiveness after two real mulligans. As a result, Ichorid decks will get 1 Powder off that does things, followed by the rest that (statistically) delay the inevitable. And while Ichorid can pull it off from 1-3 cards, those games are few and far between, because they pretty much require a Bazaar and dredger in hand.

You do realize the Manaless Ichorid deck isn't possible without Serum Powder, right? The probability of finding Bazaar with Manaless Ichorid is something like 95% (Bert, help me out here). If you remove Serum Powder, the deck does not work. So, there is no fallacy in that argument.

Just because the DCI decided to go nuts with restrictions, doesn't mean this isn't a good time to discuss what I consider to be a serious problem for the format. I understand that Ichorid suffers weaknesses and can be hated out. That wasn't the point of my article. The deck requires extreme amounts of hate and hands excellent players random losses by removing all interaction from the game. I'm not going to go over all the points I made again, but it seems like you're didn't read what I had to say and just responded to the notion of neutering the deck.

[Xyre]

WotC may restrict Bazaar at some point, but that won't be solely on the basis of Ichorid. This is simply because, given enough effort, Ichorid is easy to beat. It is a defining factor in metagames, but its weaknesses are easy to exploit. Why people go with Pithing Needle, though, escapes me. Yes, it's more versatile than, say, Yixlid Jailer, but it also does less on balance.

At one point, you cite Flash and Trinisphere. Yes, those cards were powerful and abusive, but that doesn't mean those decks were abusive. As has been cited numerous times by many format experts, the Trinisphere metagame was shifting when the card itself was restricted, as control decks realigned to fight the threat. This was why the decks running 3Sphere started moving toward 2Sphere. Flash is an imposing deck, but it suffers from a crippling lack of a consistent draw engine and thus is usually decimated by Duress + counterspell, and if it doesn't win in the first few turns, it will quickly be overrun by more consistent decks.

Ichorid is the same way - it looks powerful on paper, but the fact remains that it suffers from weaknesses, just like every other deck. That's no reason to go for more restrictions. Yes, Bazaar is powerful, but I still disagree at this point that it is format-breaking, especially based on the value of the solutions available in the format.

Ichorid decks are cyclical in formats as a result - they do well for a while, until decks start bringing in hate from the board, then they are decimated. They wait around for a while until people start removing their answers, then come back in response. However, it is not the format-warping deck that many claim it is. It may change the metagame in response, but that doesn't mean it is too broken.

Besides, I think there is some fallacy in an argument that Ichorid gets enough consistency from Serum Powder, which usually loses its effectiveness after two real mulligans. As a result, Ichorid decks will get 1 Powder off that does things, followed by the rest that (statistically) delay the inevitable. And while Ichorid can pull it off from 1-3 cards, those games are few and far between, because they pretty much require a Bazaar and dredger in hand.

You do realize the Manaless Ichorid deck isn't possible without Serum Powder, right? The probability of finding Bazaar with Manaless Ichorid is something like 95% (Bert, help me out here). If you remove Serum Powder, the deck does not work. So, there is no fallacy in that argument.

Just because the DCI decided to go nuts with restrictions, doesn't mean this isn't a good time to discuss what I consider to be a serious problem for the format. I understand that Ichorid suffers weaknesses and can be hated out. That wasn't the point of my article. The deck requires extreme amounts of hate and hands excellent players random losses by removing all interaction from the game. I'm not going to go over all the points I made again, but it seems like you're didn't read what I had to say and just responded to the notion of neutering the deck.

Just because it is useful to some extent doesn't mean that it ought to be removed. That's predicated on the immediate fallacy that the deck is broken, which I argue against.

I did read the article and picked out the immediate issues. Obviously this is a question that has no immediate answer; I merely critiqued your position. Whether you respond is inconsequential.

[meadbert]

WotC may restrict Bazaar at some point, but that won't be solely on the basis of Ichorid. This is simply because, given enough effort, Ichorid is easy to beat. It is a defining factor in metagames, but its weaknesses are easy to exploit. Why people go with Pithing Needle, though, escapes me. Yes, it's more versatile than, say, Yixlid Jailer, but it also does less on balance.

At one point, you cite Flash and Trinisphere. Yes, those cards were powerful and abusive, but that doesn't mean those decks were abusive. As has been cited numerous times by many format experts, the Trinisphere metagame was shifting when the card itself was restricted, as control decks realigned to fight the threat. This was why the decks running 3Sphere started moving toward 2Sphere. Flash is an imposing deck, but it suffers from a crippling lack of a consistent draw engine and thus is usually decimated by Duress + counterspell, and if it doesn't win in the first few turns, it will quickly be overrun by more consistent decks.

Ichorid is the same way - it looks powerful on paper, but the fact remains that it suffers from weaknesses, just like every other deck. That's no reason to go for more restrictions. Yes, Bazaar is powerful, but I still disagree at this point that it is format-breaking, especially based on the value of the solutions available in the format.

Ichorid decks are cyclical in formats as a result - they do well for a while, until decks start bringing in hate from the board, then they are decimated. They wait around for a while until people start removing their answers, then come back in response. However, it is not the format-warping deck that many claim it is. It may change the metagame in response, but that doesn't mean it is too broken.

Besides, I think there is some fallacy in an argument that Ichorid gets enough consistency from Serum Powder, which usually loses its effectiveness after two real mulligans. As a result, Ichorid decks will get 1 Powder off that does things, followed by the rest that (statistically) delay the inevitable. And while Ichorid can pull it off from 1-3 cards, those games are few and far between, because they pretty much require a Bazaar and dredger in hand.

Needle is way better than Jailer.  There are four reasons for this.  First is Chalice of the Void.  Chalice does nothing to Needle, but it keeps Jailer off the table for another turn.  During this turn it you have a chance to dredge Darkblast or Cabal Therapy.  Either of which can answer Jailer.

Second, which is harder to answer if they hit?  Needle is only answered by Chain of Vapor while Jailer is answered by Chain as well as Darkblast.  In addition, because Jailer did not touch your draw engine you will dig three times faster to find your answers.

Third, which is better with Leyline of the Void.  Given that you started with Leyline in play would you rather add Needle or Jailer to that?  Jailer does little extra while Needle shuts of your draw engine making it far more difficult to find answers.

Fourth, Dredge is masterful at removing threats.  What happens after a threat is removed?  Needle kept you from drawing/filtering with Bazaar thus your yard is near empty.  Once you remove Needle you are basically starting from square 1 or perhaps square 2 if you were able to discard once.  Jailer does not stop Bazaar from drawing and filetering so you may have 9 or more cards in the yard when Jailer is removed and thus be able to go nuts.

There are HUGE differences between Flash/Trinisphere and Ichorid.

Flash and Trinisphere won or locked up the game on turn 1.  While Trinisphere could be answered by Force or Wasteland, if it was answered with neither on turn 1 then the game may have been more or less rapped up.
Flash typically won on turn 2.
Ichorid does none of these things.  The lists I run typically win on turns 4 or 5 pre board and are even slower post board.  It does not lock opponents out of the game.  Opponents have 4-5 turns to find an answer or win themselves.
What makes this tough is that Ichorids runs so much disruption.

Those who say that Ichorid is not interactive and does not have to play spells have it all wrong.  The problem is not that Ichorid does not play spells or interact.  What makes Ichorid so good is exactly the opposite.  It is HIGHLY disruptive.  It is possibly the most disruptive deck in the history of magic.  Ichorid frequently uses 1-2 pieces of disruption on or before turn 1 and then follows up with 2 turn 2 Therapies, a turn 3 Therapy and a Dread Return on a Disruptive Creature.  The problem was that Ichorid interacted TOO MUCH with its opponent and played too many disrupting spells!

If the problem were a lack of interaction then combo/control would just counter the lone disruptive spell and race Ichorid and win on turn 3 or 4.  Instead Ichorid is highly interactive and severely disrupts the combo/control player by playing too many spells and interacting too much.

Ichorid is not just powerful on paper.  Some say it does not win tournaments, but it does.  It has won two tournaments in the Carolinas/Georgia in the past year or so and this is despite the fact that usually there is only 1 person playing it.  In my opinion, its shear power is the best reason for restricting Ichorid.

Ichorid is not easy to hate out at all.  In the past three tournaments I have taken it too I did better post board than pre board.  I started out 8-0 post board in Richmond.  I attribute much of this to the fact that I test post board extensively, while most folks do not test against Ichorid post board.  This may be because they do not find those games fun.  This is another good reason to restrict.

Finally, I would like to touch briefly on the difficulty to play question.  Ichorid is very difficult to play and to play against.  I actually largely attribute Cody's game 1 loss to Wiley in the finals to a misplay on his part.
Force of Will and Mana Drain and not particularly useful for disrupting Ichorid.  Instead, you beat Ichorid by outracing it.  On turn 2 Wiley still had not found a dredger (because he mulled to 3) which meant he was looking at possibly having to wait till turn 5 or later to win.  Anyway, Wiley drew with his Bazaars on turn 2 and found Chalice.  Cody had already dropped Sapphire and Sol Ring but decided to Force Chalice by pitching Thirst.  This was a terrible decision!  Although Cody was right in that Chalice does hurt the Tendrils win, it just did not matter in this case.  If Cody drew a mox, then casting Thirst and pitching the mox to Thirst is likely the best play anway.  If Cody wants to win with a Yawg then he should be casting Thirst to fill the yard and draw more gas.  If Cody wants to win without Yawg and instead use Reuild then Chalice is nearly irrelevant since it is bounced by Rebuild anyway.  The final option was to Tinker and play control in which case Thirst should have drawn cards and Force should been saved for a Dread Return.  Cody still had a good chance of winning game 1 untill he blew a Force and a Thirst on Chalice of the Void that was a turn too late to matter.

Anyway, my point is not that Cody is a bad player or anything.  Quite the opposite, he is far and away the best player in our area and that is one reason he wins so many tournaments.  My point is that it is very tough to play against Ichorid, even for experts and Ichorid is a skill rewarding archetype for both the pilot and its opponents.

 

[Zherbus]

The keys here are interactivity and consistency.

1) The interactivity issue has been beaten to death. I think we can all agree that when it wins, there's no real "game". Also, when it loses, it's not much of one.

2) The consistency issue is something most people ignore. They look at the satellite imagery of the weather pattern, but they don't see how the flood from a hurricane is affecting the people with thatched houses and brick mansions alike. Statistically, there's only a few deaths. This brings the alarm and severity level down, because there's not all that much damage, right?

But what's actually happening, on top of the few deaths, is that people are homeless, property is destroyed, and it's affecting property values adversely. Now this flood can be mitigated by stronger dams or fixing the levy. But instead of that, the people who are only seeing a relatively minor amount of people dying are waiting for it to be a "real" issue. They would rather see floods kill more people and ultimately destroy the entire area before fixing it.

Yes, I went there. I just compared Ichorid to a natural disaster. Change weather pattern to t8 lists. Change thatched houses and bricked mansions to budget decks and well-tuned, Ichorid-resistant metagame decks.  Change people dying to "getting blown out with no chance to even make a mistake". Change property being destroyed to "a third of peoples sideboard slots are going to essentially one deck". Change property values going down to "people becoming less interested in trying Vintage". Change dam and levy repairs to restriction one of the enablers.

So there's a mess at every event and it will keep happening. Top 8 extrapolations aren't the end all of what is healthy for the format and what isn't. And for reference: the concern, on my personal behalf, is from someone non-bias. I've played Ichorid 1-2 times every tournament since we got Bridge from Below printed, except for the last Cary Cup. I've never dropped a match to it, but I've seen too many people become disenchanted with the format over it.

[meadbert]

1)  We can not all agree, because I do not agree.  Usually Ichorid is winning on turn 4 or later and thus combo, aggro and combo control all have great chances to win.  In order to have no chance you must be playing a "pure control" deck and on top of that run neither Wasteland nor graveyard hate.  Some versions of Keeper fall into this category.  The reason the game 1 matchup between Dredge and Keeper is boring is because Keeper plays no solution to Dredge.  This is not Dredge's fault.  If Keeper ran 5 colors, 0 basics and no mass bounce and lost to Stax then I would not blame Stax for being an unfair archetype.  Instead I would recommend that Keep add basics and aritfact bounce/removal.  Anyway, I know many folks agree with you, but I certainly disagree here.

2)  I wholeheartedly agree here.  Nobody wants to see tournaments won and lost based on when a deck decides to mulligan into oblivion.  Going back to Wiley and Cody's finals matchup, Wiley mulled to 3.  He almost mulled to oblivion which would have probably given the match to Cody.  Is that how we want to see the winners of tournaments decided?  At Cary Cup #2 Cody and I met in the Semi's and I did mulligan to oblivion and thus Cody took the round and won in the finals.  The other two games of that round were fun, but the game where I mulliganed into oblivion was not much fun for either of us.

I am not against restriction at all, but I believe it is better to present a case with accurate reasons than with a list of false complaints that the DCI will see right through.

If we try to convince the DCI to restrict dredge because it is "non-interactive" and then they open up Wiley's list and see 4 Leyline of the Void, 4 Unmask, 4 Chalice of the Void, 4 Cabal Therapy, 1 Darkblast, Strip Mine, 2 Wasteland and 2 Sundering Titan then they are likely to chuckle and ignore what else has been said.

[RaleighNCTourneys]

I thought it was fairly clear that when Ichorid is described as non-interactive-- it's in reference to the opponent, not Ichorid itself.

A classic example of this is Trinisphere. This card is notorius for being "non-interactive." When people call Trinisphere non-interactive, this does not refer to the Workshop deck playing it. This, of course, refers to the opponents' inability to interact.

Ichorid is the same way. Of course you cast your Cabal Therapies, Chalices, Unmasks and put Leylines into play (all for free). The non-interaction occurs on the other side of the table. My deck does not matter, and no matter how many times you say that I had a chance or could have won game one, it's simply not true. Even if I wouldn't have pitched TFK to FOW (which I still think is highly debateable), the chances of me winning that game might have gone from 3% to 5%. The Tinker plan obviously didn't work out too well, so I'd be forced into finding bounce, Yawgmoth's Will, Tendrils of Agony AND a big enough yard to get to 10 spells. It simply would not have happended in the time I had to work with.

Anyway, when I play Ichorid I feel like I have no chance for my deck to interact with my opponent, and I still stand behind that statement. Game 2 is so much worse because its entirely anti-Ichorid versus anti-anti-Ichorid. There is no possible way this is healthy for the format.

[meadbert]

so I'd be forced into finding bounce, Yawgmoth's Will, Tendrils of Agony AND a big enough yard to get to 10 spells.

This is exactly what Drain Tendrils is best at!
I bet you had close to a 50/50 shot at game 1.

[Xyre]

Meadbert: In order:

1) On Needle vs. Jailer: Even Jailer on turn 2 is powerful, because Dredge can no longer dredge, flashback, reanimate Ichorids, get Narcomoebas (w/o dredgers), or get tokens from Bridge from Below. Or, simply put, the deck is decimated, unless they can pull together Contagion + another card. If we consider that the hate vs. creatures (Contagion) and the hate vs. artifacts (Oxidize et al) are fairly balanced in sbs (with space dedicated primarily to Leyline hate), we can see that Jailer hurts dredge more. Yes, Needle slows them down, but it doesn't stop them from discarding at end of turn and dredging the next. At that rate, it's only a matter of time before dredge hits enough Ichorids and Narcs to go off anyway. It's not a permanent solution, whereas Jailer is. And Needle on turn 2 does less than nothing, meaning, like Leyline, it's a "have it or forget about it" card.

As for solutions, usually Needle is answered by Oxidize. And while Ichorid may be able to dig for answers faster, it loses its ability to control the game while it searches for a solution it can cast, more so than with Needle. If we consider Dredge as really a "Draw X" for Dredge, you can see why Bazaar isn't the problem. It's the difference between drawing 2 and "drawing" 6.

As for usefulness with Leyline, I argue that the Needle isn't changing much. If Ichorid doesn't draw its solution within the first few draws, it usually loses so much material to Bazaar's drawback that the difference is negligible. And even though they do not directly compliment each other as well as Needle + Leyline, I must point out that in order to truly work together, you have to have BOTH Needle and Leyline in your opening hand. The same cannot be said necessarily for Jailer.

And for that last point, I again point out that you only think Ichorid uses Chain of Vapor, which is untrue. And again, removing Needle is not integral to winning, because you can dredge during your "dredge step", and again, I refer you to the draw 2 - draw 6 comparison.

2) Re: Flash/Trini. I fail to see how you get the "usual sequence of events" related to disruption. With the exception of Cabal Therapy, all of Ichorid's disruption has to exist in the top 9 cards of their deck (or less with mulligans). There's no way you can expect to get more than 1 off, and usually, you don't get any. Because the deck is so redundant by necessity, it doesn't get the luxury of waiting around for disruption to show up or mulliganing for it. Ichorid's wins come not from the fact that it is disruptive, but rather from the fact that it is both hard to disrupt directly and fast*.

3) Successes. I'm not saying it doesn't win; my local tournament has had at least 1 dredge in the top 8 for several tournaments running now. However, I would like to point out that these are usually coming out of fields of several Ichorid players. The deck wins in part based on skill (it is a hard deck to play, especially post-board) and in part based on luck.

4) "Fun". If we made restrictions based on the "fun" issue, I can give you a long list of decks that aren't/weren't fun to play against. That's not a standard of evaluation that's good for the format, imho.

5) "Skill-rewarding archetype". Exactly. It's the kind of deck that rewards good players and good opponents and punishes poor players and poor opponents. How is this different from every competitive deck ever?


Zherbus: Yes, Ichorid isn't a fun deck for the budget player to play against. But:

1) It's an easy deck to build on a budget with a few proxies, meaning it's a good choice for the budget player anyway, and

2) This isn't solely for Ichorid. Most of the competitive decks in the format beat up on most of the budget decks, based on multiple factors, especially available card pool. By that standard, we ought to ban Yawgmoth's Will and restrict basically every powerful card in the format, because it makes the format too selective. That's the nature of the metagame, not the nature of Ichorid.


RNCT: For your example of "non-interactive game 1s", I return again to my point about the cyclical nature of the format. If Ichorid gets too playable, it promptly gets hated out again. That's how it works. And while the deck does have excellent game 1s against the field, those numbers plummet games 2 and 3 due to losses in redundancy, speed, and ability to cope with hate.


* based on the usual list that runs Sage/FKZ/Angel. I know that yours runs other solutions. I'm looking at the majority here. Some cases may vary. The fact is that combo decks can't "win on turn 3 or 4" when your opponent's deck wins on average on turn 2.5.

[bronxie]

Ichorid basically goldfishes in game 1.  theres very few decks that have any chance of beating it game one, and those that do run maindecked Echoing truth (not all that effective but good) and maindeck tormod's crypt.  Addressing the mulligan issue, Wiley mulled to 2 against me and won in 3 turns, and that is not due to my deck being bad.  game 2 i had to keep a hand at 7 with 2 off color lands simply because i had a leyline in hand.  i should have mulled it in any other matchup, but not vs ichorid.

I think that the restiction should be on ichorid itself and serum powder.  this would cut dredge out of the format and make it a pretty much useless mechanic.

just my thoughts...

[Smmenen]

Some say it does not win tournaments, but it does.  It has won two tournaments in the Carolinas/Georgia in the past year or so and this is despite the fact that usually there is only 1 person playing it.

 

No, no, no.

You are misreading what I've said.  I have said that it doesn't win large tournaments. or, that is very unlikely to do so.  And even if it has, it has won very, very few.  Winning a 20 person tournament should have zero impact or relevance to B&R list policy. 

I have alot of objections to Codi's article, the first and most important being: even if Ichorid is non-interactive and unhealty as a deck, that doesn't mean that its bad for Vintage as a format.  A system behaves differently than its components.  I believe removing Ichorid would be bad for Vintage because it gives Vintage players another, and very unique and very different archetype to play.  It may, as an element, be unhealthy (which I am somewhat willing to grant, but with the caveat that its no real less healthy than most great vintage decks in the abstract), but I think the ultimate EFFECT is to increase the health of vintage by increasing its diversity.   

Also, the fact that it doesn't win tournaments or is unlikely to do so and the fact that it basically is rarely more than 10% of top 8s does not in any way make it a better candidate for restriction.   That's ridiculous.   Your argument is basically that it distorts the metagame by its presence whether it does well or not.  So what?  What good deck doesn't?  I mean, how much anti-artifact junk do people run in their sbs?  Should we restrict workshops as well?  What about Red Blasts for blue decks?  Should we restrict them as well.   Even if the degree is greater, which I'm not willing to grant, I think you are wrong. 

Also, discounting my opinion because I was the first to top 8 with Ichorid in a major tournament two years ago is pretty silly.   It was a very different deck back then. 

[meadbert]

Xyre, you are bringing up some interesting points that apply to Manaed Ichorid and older combo versions of manaless Ichorid.

Manaed Ichorid does not run Serum Powder.  Instead it runs Moxes, Colliseums and other lands and uses Careful Study for consistency and Breakthrough for brokenness to win on turn 2.5 with Sage/Zealot.

As Cody pointed out in his article the weakness in only restricting Serum Powder is that this deck will be untouched.

Manaed Ichorid is easier to interact with in that you randomly win games by using Duress/Thoughtseize/Force/Daze to counter their Careful Study and then they are stuck with little in the way of an engine.
Also, Chalice@1, Sphere of Resistance, Thorn of Amethyst and Trinisphere can cause real problems.
All of the above cases only apply when Manaed Ichorid kept a hand with no Bazaar.  WIth only 4 Bazaars and no tutors this is common, but Bazaars end up in opening hands all the time anyway.

Manaed Ichorid mulligans to oblivion less and is easier to disrupt wiith traditional vintage disruption.  In that manner there are fewer "unfun" games.  The deck is still wicked fast and in fact much faster than Powder versions of the deck.  TK reported winning several games on turn 1 and he even had a turn 1 win at the last tournament that he took Manaed Ichorid too.  Cody would like to see this version go away too, thus he is suggesting that Bridge from Below be restricted along with Serum Powder.  Bridge is a very busted card.  Bridge also does not kill the Archetype.  In fact Manaless Ichorid originally existed without Bridge at all.  One option for Wizards is to take an incremental approach and restrict Bridge first and then Powder later if it is a problem.  Generally I see Powder as inherently more problematic.  While Bridge is sort of like Empty the Warrens in that it throws out tons of creatures for little cost, it also needs an engine to get it going.  I see Serum Powder as more of an uncounterable, free, one-sided draw 7 that can be played on turn 0 and is thus far better than Timetwister which is nearly universally understood to be deserving of its spot on the restricted list.

The older lists that you may alluding to were Powder versions that use Dryad arbor in the main.  These decks were fairly fast in game 1, but had a tremendous amount of trouble post board because without Chain of Vapor they were forced to run a mix of cards like Oxidize that were too narrow.  The flaws in these lists were that they rolled to Wasteland and post board they had to run narrow anti-hate cards such as Oxidize and Contagion rather than flexible anti-hate cards like Chain of Vapor.  Also they achieved a faster clock by running more pieces that Comboed with Dread Return and this left them with less disruption.

[wiley]

{edit} content removed

To Xyre:  Your opinions and Meadbert's (as well as my own) will have irreconcilable differences as you site builds that he (and I) have determined to be sub par in the current and foreseeable meta.  As long as you both keep such a thing in mind when addressing one another I believe you can have a fruitful discussion.

To Bronxie: Keeping a sub par hand with oath just because it has a leyline was a serious play error.  Oath is one of the few decks that can win faster than ichorid, you simply willingly sacrificed your game plan to attempt stopping mine when any prior testing, or simply reading the ichorid thread would have told you that this was a mistake.  And I believe Dan Carp and some others would like to dispute your claims that no deck has a favorable game 1 against ichorid.

{edit} content added

Decks that have good game against Ichorid:

DeezNoughts
Dark Illusions
Bomberman
Shop Aggro (some builds have an extremely strong match up, some are fairly weak)
URBana Fish
GobLines

There is a pattern here if you look.  Ichorid (my build anyway) is designed to be an aggro control deck.  Indeed it is one of, if not THE, best aggro control decks ever built.  It is perfectly designed to trounce control, as evidenced by the fact that counters are almost useless, and it stops any amount of combo that isn't simply faster than its control (ie fast storm decks).

If you take an objective view of DT and Ichorid and look at their control suite you will not be surprised at why DT has such a bad match up.  It is the exact type of deck Ichorid is supposed to slaughter.  Aggro control typically loses in 1 of 2 ways, either 1)it faces combo that comes in under its control or 2)it faces a better aggro deck.  Ichorid follows these flaws and adds two more, it has specific, easily splashed cards that cause massive road block for it and it has the ~5% probability of simply crapping out.

Just because the field is currently filled with its natural prey does not mean that ichorid deserves restriction.  I have much more to say on the matter but it will wait until tomorrow.

[RaleighNCTourneys]

Some say it does not win tournaments, but it does.  It has won two tournaments in the Carolinas/Georgia in the past year or so and this is despite the fact that usually there is only 1 person playing it.

 

No, no, no.

You are misreading what I've said.  I have said that it doesn't win large tournaments. or, that is very unlikely to do so.  And even if it has, it has won very, very few.  Winning a 20 person tournament should have zero impact or relevance to B&R list policy. 

I have alot of objections to Codi's article, the first and most important being: even if Ichorid is non-interactive and unhealty as a deck, that doesn't mean that its bad for Vintage as a format.  A system behaves differently than its components.  I believe removing Ichorid would be bad for Vintage because it gives Vintage players another, and very unique and very different archetype to play.  It may, as an element, be unhealthy (which I am somewhat willing to grant, but with the caveat that its no real less healthy than most great vintage decks in the abstract), but I think the ultimate EFFECT is to increase the health of vintage by increasing its diversity.   

Also, the fact that it doesn't win tournaments or is unlikely to do so and the fact that it basically is rarely more than 10% of top 8s does not in any way make it a better candidate for restriction.   That's ridiculous.   

Also, discounting my opinion because I was the first to top 8 with Ichorid in a major tournament two years ago is pretty silly.   It was a very different deck back then. 

I didn't discount your opinion. Infact, I wanted to provide other opinions through you and Bert. The fact that Bert created the deck and you have done well and developed a version of it in the past probably are not coincidental with being the only people I talked to who thought the deck was healthy for Vintage.

I think it's ridiculous to dedicate 8 sideboard spaces to a deck that is so underplayed. If the deck was played in any large quantitiy, then at least dedicating that much of my sideboard to it would be reasonable. Your most recent SCG top 8 board consistend of 4x Leyline and 2x Jailer. Imagine if there was another deck out there (that didn't even show up too often) that needed such specific cards to even be competitive with.

[Smmenen]

You are making a very big leap of logic.   The presence of Leylines etc in your example of my sb was not simpy for Ichorid, but also for Flash and a few other niche decks.   We have absolutely no way of saying that X cards in a given sb on average were for Ichorid.  Why don't you wait and see if that is actually true now that Flash is gone instead of assuming as much. 

Even so, again, I typically sb the same number of cards for Workshop matches.  I don't think that Workshops should be restricted either, even though they require even more effort and are often even less interactive to play against.   

[Smmenen]

Also, when it loses, it's not much of one.

I also don't agree with that.   When I beat Ichorid, it is usually a very interesting game.  I think that games 2 and 3 are highly interactive.  Ichorid brings in a suite of cards and I bring in a suite of cards.  Winning is just as often by the sweat of your balls as in any really close matchup.   I think that losing game 1 is the price we pay to have Ichorid in the format.  I don't think it would be viable if it didn't have such a lopsided game 1.   

[bronxie]

I think it's ridiculous to dedicate 8 sideboard spaces to a deck that is so underplayed. If the deck was played in any large quantitiy, then at least dedicating that much of my sideboard to it would be reasonable. Your most recent SCG top 8 board consistend of 4x Leyline and 2x Jailer. Imagine if there was another deck out there (that didn't even show up too often) that needed such specific cards to even be competitive with.

World-Gorger Dragon Combo deck.  Not highly played, but these same cards (leylines) are aces against WGD

[Xyre]

Xyre, you are bringing up some interesting points that apply to Manaed Ichorid and older combo versions of manaless Ichorid.

Manaed Ichorid does not run Serum Powder.  Instead it runs Moxes, Colliseums and other lands and uses Careful Study for consistency and Breakthrough for brokenness to win on turn 2.5 with Sage/Zealot.

As Cody pointed out in his article the weakness in only restricting Serum Powder is that this deck will be untouched.

Manaed Ichorid is easier to interact with in that you randomly win games by using Duress/Thoughtseize/Force/Daze to counter their Careful Study and then they are stuck with little in the way of an engine.
Also, Chalice@1, Sphere of Resistance, Thorn of Amethyst and Trinisphere can cause real problems.
All of the above cases only apply when Manaed Ichorid kept a hand with no Bazaar.  WIth only 4 Bazaars and no tutors this is common, but Bazaars end up in opening hands all the time anyway.

Manaed Ichorid mulligans to oblivion less and is easier to disrupt wiith traditional vintage disruption.  In that manner there are fewer "unfun" games.  The deck is still wicked fast and in fact much faster than Powder versions of the deck.  TK reported winning several games on turn 1 and he even had a turn 1 win at the last tournament that he took Manaed Ichorid too.  Cody would like to see this version go away too, thus he is suggesting that Bridge from Below be restricted along with Serum Powder.  Bridge is a very busted card.  Bridge also does not kill the Archetype.  In fact Manaless Ichorid originally existed without Bridge at all.  One option for Wizards is to take an incremental approach and restrict Bridge first and then Powder later if it is a problem.  Generally I see Powder as inherently more problematic.  While Bridge is sort of like Empty the Warrens in that it throws out tons of creatures for little cost, it also needs an engine to get it going.  I see Serum Powder as more of an uncounterable, free, one-sided draw 7 that can be played on turn 0 and is thus far better than Timetwister which is nearly universally understood to be deserving of its spot on the restricted list.

The older lists that you may alluding to were Powder versions that use Dryad arbor in the main.  These decks were fairly fast in game 1, but had a tremendous amount of trouble post board because without Chain of Vapor they were forced to run a mix of cards like Oxidize that were too narrow.  The flaws in these lists were that they rolled to Wasteland and post board they had to run narrow anti-hate cards such as Oxidize and Contagion rather than flexible anti-hate cards like Chain of Vapor.  Also they achieved a faster clock by running more pieces that Comboed with Dread Return and this left them with less disruption.

Once again, for reference, I'm addressing the most common decklist of the deck, e.g. this one. I know your deck runs differently, and as I haven't read the entire thread, I don't know how much I can comment, but I have tested so-called "old Ichorid" exhaustively and found it doesn't work quite as much as you want it to (see my sig).

To Xyre:  Your opinions and Meadbert's (as well as my own) will have irreconcilable differences as you site builds that he (and I) have determined to be sub par in the current and foreseeable meta.  As long as you both keep such a thing in mind when addressing one another I believe you can have a fruitful discussion.

Okay, but in as much as we're discussing Ichorid as an archetype, I believe it's appropriate to discuss the archetypal deck, no?

[wiley]

Your post answers itself Xyre, the "typical" list fails quite often.  Bert and I have both converted to what we feel is the stronger list and still neither of us feel the deck needs to be nerfed.

[Xyre]

Exactly. But the fact remains that everyone is playing said deck. Thus, it's kind of hard for me to converse about a minority case I know nothing about instead of a case I do. So a discussion of Ichorid, imo, is about lists like the one I linked to above.

[arctic79]

I enjoyed the article for the most part.  A few issues I have are already being discussed, such as leyline and pith in the SB are very good against a number of teir one decks and not dedicated to Ichorid.  
I really dislike playing against Ichorid, but I feel it will get hated out of the format.  The problem with this scenario is it is unhealthy for the format, and rather dull, for a single archtype to rise and be such a threat that everyone is going to play that deck or the deck that beats it.  This is where the DCI is dead wrong with their assertation that the latest restrictions will encourage innovation, instead we have a deck that is unparalleled (currently).  At least when we had Brainstorm you could dig for answers, or protect your hand against ichorid after turn 1, thus making more decks able to compete against Ichorid.

[TheWhiteDragon]

In response to the original comment posted on this thread, I would have to agree that action SHOULD be taken by the DCI that would hurt Ichorid, but not necessarily just Ichorid.  Bazaar should be restricted on the basis of the criteria the DCI appears to be using, or at least uses in the explanations for recent restrictions.  The jist of the explanations for ponder/brainstorm/gush is that they are cheap or free draw/dig, often with a bonus (like gush adding mana, bs putting away crap w/ a shuffler, and ponder....well...).  If this is the criteria, then what can be the justification for keeping 4x a card that is free, reuseable, uncounterable draw/dig with a benefit of a drawback?  I believe whether via welder, dredge, reanimation, flashback, etc., bazaar is extremely broken at what it does (at the least moreso than ponder) and warrants restriction.  This would make welder decks less threatening, the squee draw engine not so good, and take the punch out of ichorid (at least causing it to play mana and spells like breakthrough).  I am not one for the DCI restricting cards to nueter decks, but if they are going to restrict cards at all and have some sort of "pretend to be consistent" criteria for restricting, then bazaar is a sure candidate and needs to get the axe.

[meadbert]

The sideboard question is an interesting one.

Is there something inherently wrong with having to run 8 cards in the sideboard to address one matchup?  Is this uncommon?  Might it be a symptom of another problem?

It is not that uncommon to bring in 8 or more cards from your board for one matchup.  As Steve mentioned above, he actually had 9 anti-shop cards in his sideboard.

Basically, devoting 8 cards in a sideboard to one matchup is a great luxury that most deck cannot afford.  Only decks that are very strong and already do well against large portions of the field can afford to dedicate such large portions of their board to a single matchup.  Many decks that are less powerful are forced to write off certain  match-ups as not winnable and focus on those deck that they are able to beat.

Steve, playing GAT, and Cody, playing Drain Tendrils, can afford to dedicate 9 cards each to Shops and Ichorid respectively because there decks are so powerful to begin with.  They do not lose sleep over Fish, Oath and random aggro because their decks are highly powerful and already beat those decks.  The reason Drain Tendrils runs 9 anti-Ichorid cards in the sideboard is because it can, not because it must.

Consider someone playing a rogue deck that lacks the raw power of GAT and Drain Tendrils.  Rich M. ultimately decided to concede the Dredge matchup at gencon because he had no room in his deck for that matchup.  He already had to use so many Rack and Ruins and Red Blasts on Shops and GAT that he had no space for Ichorid.

Consider this roshambo of magic.

There are three decks in the format. 

1) There is the "linear" deck which is easily hated out with about 8 cards, but left unchecked can rage through a tournament destroying everthing.  Examples might be Flash, Dragon, Stax and Ichorid.

2)  There is a "best" deck which is not only extremely powerful, but it also is resilient enough to hate that it cannot be called linear.  Examples might be Gifts, Slaver or GAT.

3)  Finally there are "rogue" decks which lack the power of the above decks and must "hate" out those decks to win.  Examples are too numerous, but R/G beats, Fish and Landstill are a few examples.

In such a format the powerful deck will be very common and will dedicate large portions of their board to hate out the linear deck and they will dedicate much of the rest to fighting the mirror.  They will only dedicate a small portion to fight rogue decks.  Because the "best" deck will hate out the linear deck so heavily the linear deck is a tough deck to play in this format.

The linear deck will much less common than the best deck.  It will mostly run anti hate in its board with some hate for the best deck or the linear deck as well.

Finally you have the rogue decks.  These must hate out either of the other in order to win.  Since the "best" deck is more common, rogue decks will hate out the best deck and because the best deck is not hating them out in reverse they actually have a good chance.

What happens if the linear deck is removed?

In this case the best deck dedicates large portions of the board to the mirror, but is also able to use a significant portion of the board on the rogue decks.

The rogue decks save a bit of space by not having to dedicate 5 spots to hate out the linear deck, but they were probably already running 10 cards to hate out the best deck so the law of diminishing returns say they cannot hate out the best deck much more.

The new metagame consists of the rogue deck being crushed and the top decks competing over who can hate each other out the best!

Has this already happened?

It sort of has happened.  Stax was the linear deck for a while.  If you did not prepare for it you lost, but if you dedicated a large portion of your board to it then you could hate it out.
Gifts/Slaver/Pitch Long was the "best" deck.  They were tougher to hate out than Stax.
Finally Fish and to a lesser extent Oath acted as rogue decks.

There was a decent mix of all of these for a while until Stax became very weak.  Part of this was due to new cards that were printed (Empty the Warrens, Shattering Spree) and part was because folks improved at playing against it.

Anyway, the result was that Stax nearly disappeared, and Gifts could just about ignore Stax when constructing a sideboard.  Adding an extra Hurkyl's, Rebuild or Empty the Warrens would be all that was needed.  From there Gifts/Slaver/Long were able to hate out Fish with perhaps 5 cards such as Flametongue Kavu, Empty the Warrens, Pyroclasm, Massacre, Old Man of the Sea and Thrashing Whumpus.  This left Fish in a very tough spot.  Gifts/Slaver/Long had always been more broken to begin with, but without Stax around to worry about those "best" decks could actually dedicate space to hating out the rogue decks, although they mostly hated each other out.

As an Example it was not uncommon to see Gifts run something like 5 Red Elemental Blasts, 2 Pithing Neelde, 2 Tormod's Crypt and a few Duresses in the sideboard.

This led to a relative lack of diversity in the format for a while.  Control Slaver struggled with Long and the format basically degenerated into Meandeck Gifts versus Pitch Long for a while.  This showed up frequently at our Cary tournaments.  One top 4 was Grim Long, Pitch Long, Drain Tendrils and Meandeck Gifts.  Basically, Tendrils of Agony was THE win condition.  It did not matter that the rest of the store showed up with board heavily dedicated to beating us because our decks were so much better and we could actually dedicate space to beating them.  Sure I had Pyroclasm and Empty the Warrens in my board, but I knew that in later rounds it was REB, Duress and Tormod's Crypt that I would be bringing in.


My point is that although a linear deck may promote some unfun games, it also functions as a way to promote diversity by forcing the "best" decks to spend valuable sideboard space on hating out "linear" decks rather than rogue decks.

[Smmenen]

Albert, read what I already wrote, which pretty much encapsulates your entire post:

even if Ichorid is non-interactive and unhealty as a deck, that doesn't mean that its bad for Vintage as a format.  A system behaves differently than its components.  I believe removing Ichorid would be bad for Vintage because it gives Vintage players another, and very unique and very different archetype to play.  It may, as an element, be unhealthy (which I am somewhat willing to grant, but with the caveat that its no real less healthy than most great vintage decks in the abstract), but I think the ultimate EFFECT is to increase the health of vintage by increasing its diversity.   

I think that Codi's questions are misleading, or more properly, the wrong frame.

He asks: Is Ichorid Fun?  Is Ichorid Unhealthy?  Is Ichorid Unfair?

The RELEVANT questions are:

Is Ichorid fun FOR Vintage?  Is Ichorid Healthy FOR Vintage?  Is Ichorid unfair FOR Vintage?

It is a fundamental property of systems theory that a system behaves differently than its elements.  Magic metagames are complex systems.  There are many interacting elements. 

Think about the economy.   Someone might think that some asshole capitalist is a bad person for screwing people over.  But even liberals and progressives ultimately concede that the greedy capitalist is a good thing for economy as a whole because it drives innovation and economic growth, etc.  (the invisible hand, etc - people pursuing their own selfish ends results in a greater good). 

Thus, even those people or decks might be bad when we evaluate them by themselves, there is another effect and that is their effect within the context of the systems itself.   I think that Ichorid is a very good thing for Vintage, even though the deck itself might seem ridiculous.  If Ichorid will never win major tournament or is every unlikely to do so, and if Ichorid is never going to be more than a 10-15% of the top 8s type deck, why in gods name are we talking about restriction?

[meadbert]

  I am not one for the DCI restricting cards to nueter decks, but if they are going to restrict cards at all and have some sort of "pretend to be consistent" criteria for restricting, then bazaar is a sure candidate and needs to get the axe.

This is a good and relevant comment.  Basically, my strongest argument against restricting Bazaar used to be that it was one of the few options to Brainstorm.  At the time decks were basically Brainstorm decks or Bazaar decks and it hardly seemed right to restrict the Bazaar decks which were losing out heavily to the Brainstorm decks anyway.

Now that Brainstorm has been restricted, it does remove my best excuse for leaving Bazaar unrestricted.  I will say that Bazaar remains one of the few non blue draw engines so it will still promote diversity, but if we find that Sensei's Diving Top is the draw engine of choice then that argument will not really hold water anyway.

I still do not want to see Bazaar restricted, but when compared to Library and Brainstorm it is on much shakier ground than it used to be.

[Vegeta2711]

Yeah sorry I never got around to shipping a response, but honestly this whole thing just feels like beating a dead horse at this point. Nobody is going to change their mind on how they feel against the deck anytime soon.

My point is that although a linear deck may promote some unfun games, it also functions as a way to promote diversity by forcing the "best" decks to spend valuable sideboard space on hating out "linear" decks rather than rogue decks.

You mean spend valuable sideboard space on trying to beat other tier 2 decks that may match-up well right? Because sideboarding against a 'rogue' deck seems kind of unlikely and self-defeating when trying to build a good sideboard.

Also packing cards against linear decks hardly encourages diversity, if anything it encourages people to stay with the same old shit that they think works. It took a lot of people in Extended months before they realized the proper Ichorid board was a combination of 3 hate cards versus 4 Leyline and 4 Crypt or 0.

EDIT:

The RELEVANT question is:Is Ichorid fun FOR Vintage?  Is Ichorid Healthy FOR Vintage?  Is Ichorid unfair FOR Vintage?

No, Eh, probably not and no.

[Smmenen]

  I am not one for the DCI restricting cards to nueter decks, but if they are going to restrict cards at all and have some sort of "pretend to be consistent" criteria for restricting, then bazaar is a sure candidate and needs to get the axe.

This is a good and relevant comment.  Basically, my strongest argument against restricting Bazaar used to be that it was one of the few options to Brainstorm. 

I disagree wholeheartedly with the underlying premise.   There is no consistency.    As I've pointed out many times, there are ridiculous and obvious discrepancies in their restriction list policy.  Grim Monolth is restricted, but Mishra's Workshop is not.   Why Gifts and not Intution? They do not even PRETEND to be consistent.   There is no pretense.   They have no problem citing previous restrictions to justify later ones, but they have never made an overall claim to consistency.   

[meadbert]

You mean spend valuable sideboard space on trying to beat other tier 2 decks that may match-up well right? Because sideboarding against a 'rogue' deck seems kind of unlikely and self-defeating when trying to build a good sideboard.

Exactly.  I meant tier 2 decks that are less powerful than the best decks but likely to show up.  U/W fish would have been an example.  Goblins would have been on the edge of an example.  I did not mean "Parfait" or truly rogue decks that were very unlikely to show up.

A question that should be asked is what impact would the restriction of Serum Powder and Bridge from Below have on the Drain Tendrils vs. Dark Illusions matchup?