[Free Article] So Many Insane Plays -- Exploring Possible Unrestrictions

[Smmenen]

http://www.starcitygames.com/magic/vintage/17491_So_Many_Insane_Plays_Exploring_Possible_Unrestrictions_Designing_for_Balance_Channel_and_More.html

Editor's Blurb:

Monday, May 18th - Last week, Vintage maestro Stephen Menendian explored the problem of a Vintage format dominated by Mana Drain strategies. Today, Stephen takes a look at some innovative solutions for answering the questions asked by this dominance. He analyses the Banned and Restricted list, and suggests that unrestriction may be a way to balance the teetering metagame…

I explore possible unrestrictions in light of the problematic metagame, and address, systematically, all of the counter-arguments raised in response to my article last week.  

[personalbackfire]

Good read, just had a few questions.

In your GAT list why was Dark Confidant left out? Right before the restrictions the Gush engine had begun to use Bob, so wouldn't it make sense to use him?

Also, do you think Tyrant Oath would make a come back? The deck didn't use the full engine and never ran Mystical because of space issues.

[zeus-online]

For us non-premium (just expired) what cards did you consider?

/Zeus

[Smmenen]

This article was over 24 pages in Word, and was one of my best written articles, I believe.  I designed decklists for 4 Channel and 4 Balance, to see what they would look like.   My analysis was rigorous, and I hope that people enjoy this. 

Good read, just had a few questions.

In your GAT list why was Dark Confidant left out? Right before the restrictions the Gush engine had begun to use Bob, so wouldn't it make sense to use him?

Also, do you think Tyrant Oath would make a come back? The deck didn't use the full engine and never ran Mystical because of space issues.

Dark Confidant with 9 5cc Spells doesn't make much sense.   I never ran Bob in 4 Gush builds.   The thing about Gush without Scroll, Brainstorm and Ponder is that the Gush-Engine is dead.   One of the things about Tyrant Oath was not just that you could use Gush to bounce your opponents permanents, but that you could combo out and win the game using Gush-bond engine.  That is *much, much* harder to pull off, and really not worth it. 

[wiley]

I still haven't seen anyone answer my question on balance from the BR thread so I'll ask it again here; What stops Balance from pushing fish right out of the format?  There isn't a fish deck currently in existence that could be said to top deck out of a halfway decent resolved balance.  The decks rely on the incremental advantage they gain from their multiple disruptive creatures and being able to maybe hold some of that in reserve in their hand.  A good Balance will destroy all of that and in a top deck war the balance deck should always win.

Not only that, but what exactly stops tez, the current dominant drain deck, from running 4 balance in the side to completely hose one of its few bad match ups?  Drain decks are almost invariably going to top deck out of a balance better than a fish deck of any color.  Even painter would only need to hold back the painter before casting balance as grindstone would be unaffected.  Even looking at other match ups, is it really that bad when you cast balance to get rid of shop aggros juggernauts and welders if you lose 2-3 cards (most of which are most likely draw spells)?

I think a two mana wog is worth playing in this format even if you have to sac a land and discard a card or two, especially when it completely pushes out a huge number of the 'random' decks that make up the format.  I can easily see that pushing a lot of people out of the format, at least every single one that doesn't want to play combo-control mirrors all day long.

I hope I'm wrong and the possible drawbacks to balance outweigh its possible gains, but as the old saying goes; "Hope in one hand and shit in the other and see which one fills up first."

Other than that I think it was an excellent article with a lot of thought put into it.

[Vegeta2711]

For us non-premium (just expired) what cards did you consider?

/Zeus

Summary:
Channel makes a deck that's too fast.
Flash, Balance and Gush should be unrestricted

@wiley
You realize you just described Pyroclasm or the effect of a Threads of Disloyalty on a Tarmogoyf, right? If you run a deck that scoops to a Wrath effect and aren't willing to deal with that in some way, you should just play a different deck.

[JDawg13]

Fish isn't exactly doing its job of keeping Mana Drain decks from dominating, so the argument that unrestricted Balance wrecks Fish, and could potentially used to bolster Mana Drain decks, doesn't make much sense.

[Smmenen]

Yeah, and Balance is really bad against Ichorid, which Wiley wondered if Balance would hurt on the SCG forums.   

One of the key points in the article is showing -- with history -- how the DCI tends to overrestrict, and I illustrate this in a pretty new graph. 

[Clint_NZ]

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this article.

The post script was impressive as well.

You also hinted that Burning Wish and Frantic Search should be looked at.
Did you make any list for these to cards? if so, how did they turn out?

Cheers
Clint

[nineisnoone]

I think a two mana wog is worth playing in this format even if you have to sac a land and discard a card or two, especially when it completely pushes out a huge number of the 'random' decks that make up the format.

Purely considering Balance as a two-mana Wrath of God....

We already had a 0-mana Wrath of God in Massacre... and when I say "had" I mean "had" because with Tarmo running around you won't kill everything with it anymore.  But Massacre has been around for awhile and pre-Goyf (and pre-Teeg) there were fish decks that scooped their board to Massacre.  There are various ones that still do.  And fish still survives.  And to be honest, I don't think fish is that strong to warrant the wide-spread usage of Balance, especially over hate cards for Shops and Ichorid (which Balance isn't good against). 

Plus, Balance actually creates an inborn solution to itself, unlike Wrath of God.  Burn out your hand.  Unlike Wrath, where you don't want to overextend into it, you want to over-extend into Balance to effectively Mind Twist your opponent.

[Roat17]

Is this graph a: "pretty" "new graph", or a "pretty new" graph.  If it's the former than damn, I didn't know you were the artistic type and can you mod my Yawg Will sil vous plait?

On a more serious less ambiguous note, if Flash were to be unrestricted, whould the sliver kill be preferable to Rector or perhaps something else?  I didn't read as I can't afford Premium (student).  If this was discussed than I apologized, but I was always a fan of Rector and trying to make her work somewhere and for me flash -> rector was the best way to do this.

Thanks.

[FlyFlySideOfFry]

Is this graph a: "pretty" "new graph", or a "pretty new" graph.  If it's the former than damn, I didn't know you were the artistic type and can you mod my Yawg Will sil vous plait?

On a more serious less ambiguous note, if Flash were to be unrestricted, whould the sliver kill be preferable to Rector or perhaps something else?  I didn't read as I can't afford Premium (student).  If this was discussed than I apologized, but I was always a fan of Rector and trying to make her work somewhere and for me flash -> rector was the best way to do this.

Thanks.

I'm pretty sure it would still be Hulk->Reveillark.

To be honest I'd be surprised if a deck based around Balance wouldn't a problem, not just decks splashing in a balance or two.

[wiley]

Fish isn't exactly doing its job of keeping Mana Drain decks from dominating, so the argument that unrestricted Balance wrecks Fish, and could potentially used to bolster Mana Drain decks, doesn't make much sense.

So instead of strengthening one of the archetypes that has a chance to keep drains in check but isn't doing so well right now you risk eliminating it.  Yeah, that makes perfect sense.

Balance can't really be compared to pyroclasm or massacre as it puts the two decks at parity where before the fish deck could have card advantage or more land in play and maybe come back.  Not to mention that massacre only works on white fish, which is not the only current flavor and neither work on goyfs.  Drain decks, and especially any actual balance deck will be better from that position.

If you run a deck that scoops to a Wrath effect and aren't willing to deal with that in some way, you should just play a different deck.

You can still run it in this format as there really isn't an effective wrath.  Even when massacre and pyro were effective wraths they weren't strong enough to build a competitive deck around.  Maybe it won't be played so widely that it shuts out creature based strategies (remember this isn't just about fish, just that fish makes up the widest margin of creature based strategies) all together, but is it really worth it to risk that when other options remain?

Yeah, and Balance is really bad against Ichorid, which Wiley wondered if Balance would hurt on the SCG forums.  

Not saying that you are wrong as my memory is horrible, but I don't remember this and after doing a search of balance with my name as the poster I don't see it.  Did I ask it for something other than stax which could handle the land and card loss?

Again, I hope I'm wrong in my views.  I just don't believe that I am.

[Vegeta2711]

Maybe it won't be played so widely that it shuts out creature based strategies

Serious question, why is this a problem? If creature based strategies are no longer good enough to exist, then is that something that needs to be fixed? This is a format with all of the most powerful cards in the game, it shouldn't come as a shock that when push comes to shove and everyone is playing to win ultimately these strategies aren't good enough. If Balance is actually fair, then it shouldn't matter that creature strategies take a hit.

[Troy_Costisick]

Maybe it won't be played so widely that it shuts out creature based strategies

Serious question, why is this a problem?

Because a meta overly dominated by combo decks is no more fun than a meta dominated by control decks.

[Smmenen]

My analysis suggests that Balance decks would not produce combo archetypes.   Also, I don't think that unrestricted Balance would make aggro decks or the Aggro-Control decks any less viable, to be honest.   

[Vegeta2711]

Maybe it won't be played so widely that it shuts out creature based strategies

Serious question, why is this a problem?

Because a meta overly dominated by combo decks is no more fun than a meta dominated by control decks.

...and that has nothing to do with anything, thanks.

You completely side-stepped my question. If creature-based archetypes can't hang, why do we have to make concessions for them to exist?

Oh and to head off any, 'But you can replace 'creature stuffs' with any archetype and it'd be unfair!' Key difference being that in this format it's generally accepted that effects > duders, or really any format past a certain power level. There's a reason formats like Standard and Block are typically dominated or has large amounts of creatures running around while that amount keeps dropping the more cards you make legal.

[Bongo]

Interesting article, very well written!

Although I know the article was one of your longest, I really would have liked to hear your thoughts on

- Burning Wish
- Crop Rotation
- Enlightened Tutor
- Regrowth

It would be really helpful if you could expand a little on these.

[JDawg13]

Fish isn't exactly doing its job of keeping Mana Drain decks from dominating, so the argument that unrestricted Balance wrecks Fish, and could potentially used to bolster Mana Drain decks, doesn't make much sense.

So instead of strengthening one of the archetypes that has a chance to keep drains in check but isn't doing so well right now you risk eliminating it.  Yeah, that makes perfect sense.

What would you do regarding the restricted list to make Fish "have a chance to keep drains in check"?  It already has a pretty hard time of that with some of the best artifact and mana denial there is and there's not really anything on the restricted list that could come off and immediately help a Fish deck beat Drains.  Short of Wizards printing something really really good for Fish, I don't think it has that much of a shot at beating Drains consistently any more if it can't do it already.  Unrestricting Balance would do little to change that situation.

[Smmenen]

That's basically my view of the situation.   It's not clear that Balance decks, particularly if it just helped Workshop the most, and 5c Stax in particular, wouldn't actually -- counterintuitively -- help Fish decks.  Here are some ways that could happen:

1) Workshop decks will be very interested in running 4 Balances, which really hurts Workshop Aggro.  Right now the ratio of Workshop Aggro to Stax is about 2 to 1.   That ratio would invert, in all likelihood.  Fewer Juggies around is only good for Fish.   Slower Stax decks means more opportunities for decks like Fish to win with cards like Energy Flux, etc.   
2) If Worshop decks get a nice little boost, then Drain decks -- and others -- will have to devote more sideboard space to them, which means potentially less for Aggro. 
3) Finally, Fish decks can always answer Balance with Force, Daze, Meddling Mage, etc, just as they do right now.   Fish decks combat Oath with Duress, and the same can be true of Balance. 

I really don't think -- as a practical matter -- that the proprtion of Fish decks as the % of top 8s would really change that much if Balance were unrestricted.  There really aren't any aggro decks in top 8s, even though I've tried to make new budget decks.   And I don't think that Balance would really affect the Budget decks I've been proposing in any significant measure.   Elves still can combo out on turn two before Balance can be played and Goblins can use Vial to topdeck creatures to win the game.   

[Guli]

5c Stax also runs Tinker and puts a lot of pressure on the fish early on while being able to balance very quickly. Not every fish runs blue and even if they do not all of them pack Daze. You can't cover everything with Meddling Mage.

I don't feel comfortable at all with balance unrestricted as a fish player. Especially because mana denial doesn't stop balance because it is so cheap. Right now you can stop it with Aven because they most likely need to tutor for it while also answering Tinker. How is losing your bears not a bad thing while they keep their moxes/crucibles/spheres/whatever they run. You most likely lose your hand as well which is common against prison/stax.

Workshop aggro IS fish in many ways.

I tend to trust most things you say Smmenen, because I came to the same conclusions (on some matters) after analyzing, testing, tuning ideas. So you have tested 4x Balance stax against possible fish decks?

Balance is not just Massacre or Pyroclasm. It nails your hand and lands as well next to your win condition. So how are you going to recover without a serious draw engine? You were put top deck mode with almost no permanents left. Please explain.

[Diakonov]

You completely side-stepped my question. If creature-based archetypes can't hang, why do we have to make concessions for them to exist?

A very large percentage of Vintage players run Fish and/or various aggro because they have no choice.  We do run the risk of losing a lot of players if you off their only deck option.  Whether we care about that is wide open to debate, but I personally would rather play it safe and try not to lose players.  If anyone wants to respond, "this is a competition, if they can't cope, then those are breaks," that's fine.  I would disagree.

As for whether or not Balance would actually affect those decks, I think it would.  People have mentioned Massacre, Pyroclasm, and Threads of Disloyalty.  They all suck to deal with for a Fish deck, but Balance is still worse:

Massacre: only works against white (realistically), and doesn't hit Tarmogoyf.  It's a tough blow, but Fish can keep pushing with Goyf on the table.
Pyroclasm: better than Massacre since it hits any Fish deck, but it still doesn't kill Tarmogoyf.
Threads: this one can be quite scary in certain situations.  The only downside is that it doesn't actually remove their other creatures like Confidant and Meddling Mage from the table (assuming you targeted a Goyf), so they can come back from it with removal or more Tarmogoyfs.
Balance: everybody dies.  Same cost as Pyroclasm.  The loss of land/cards in hand is probably negligible.

*Most importantly*, Balance would see play game 1!  The rest of these anti-Fish cards are sideboard cards.  That is the main reason why it would be so devastating.

That's basically my view of the situation.   It's not clear that Balance decks, particularly if it just helped Workshop the most, and 5c Stax in particular, wouldn't actually -- counterintuitively -- help Fish decks.  Here are some ways that could happen:

1) Workshop decks will be very interested in running 4 Balances, which really hurts Workshop Aggro.  Right now the ratio of Workshop Aggro to Stax is about 2 to 1.   That ratio would invert, in all likelihood.  Fewer Juggies around is only good for Fish.   Slower Stax decks means more opportunities for decks like Fish to win with cards like Energy Flux, etc.   
2) If Worshop decks get a nice little boost, then Drain decks -- and others -- will have to devote more sideboard space to them, which means potentially less for Aggro. 
3) Finally, Fish decks can always answer Balance with Force, Daze, Meddling Mage, etc, just as they do right now.   Fish decks combat Oath with Duress, and the same can be true of Balance. 

I really don't think -- as a practical matter -- that the proprtion of Fish decks as the % of top 8s would really change that much if Balance were unrestricted.  There really aren't any aggro decks in top 8s, even though I've tried to make new budget decks.   And I don't think that Balance would really affect the Budget decks I've been proposing in any significant measure.   Elves still can combo out on turn two before Balance can be played and Goblins can use Vial to topdeck creatures to win the game.   

Is having to deal with Balance really all that better than having to deal with Juggernaut?  At least a Tarmogoyf can block a Jugg.  Also, Fish's Oath match-up is terrible to begin with, so it's tough to compare Balance to it and say that it can get by.

You do have a good point though that Fish decks aren't exactly Top-8'ing right now, so maybe the argument is moot.  I just think it's a risky move to push that archetype even further outside the ring.

[JDawg13]

You completely side-stepped my question. If creature-based archetypes can't hang, why do we have to make concessions for them to exist?

*Most importantly*, Balance would see play game 1!  The rest of these anti-Fish cards are sideboard cards.  That is the main reason why it would be so devastating.

What decks bring in Massacre, Pyroclasm and Threads?  Drain decks (for the most part).  A singleton Balance is currently available to these decks, but sees no play.  I would argue that very few Drain players would take the opportunity to play 4x Balance maindeck.  The most likely deck to pack 4x Balance would be 5c Stax, as Steve has said.  If Stax makes a comeback on the back of Balance, then Drain decks have to deal with Stax much more so than it does now, opening the door for Fish to prey on Drains better than they can now.  It's a little weird, but it's impossible to say that 4x Balance would absolutely eliminate Fish from the metagame.

[Beralt]

I wish that we lived in a more balanced world where the colors were more equal, where White and Green were as strong and as playable in Vintage as Blue and Black - giving us a wider variety of archetypes.  My initial reaction on the talk of unrestriction of Balance and even Enlightented Tutor was that this would give more strength to white as a playable color in vintage - but in all discussions both of these cards it seems as if both of these cards would still only see splashes of white added to existing archetypes - i.e. 5CStax adding Balances, Dragon Adding Balances, Time Vault decks adding E. Tutor for more consistency etc.  These possible additions do not seem to create new archetypes or further a wider variety of decks, if anything they constrict the field, by hurting creature based strategies (Fish primarily) and strengthening Blue/Black based strategies that allow for recovery via card drawing or recursion (ancestral, will, bargain etc).

On another note I completely agree with Stephen on the overreaction of restricting too many cards at once - Ponder is a prime example.  When you restrict 5 cards at once and the fifth is based on the fact that it is similar in function (Brainstorm) to one of the other offenders - where does this logic stop? Is Impulse next? Or even Lat-nam's Legacy? Let Ponder prove itself as a broken card and then restrict if needed.  History has shown us (as illustrated by all those pretty graphs from the SCG article), that mass restrictions are wrong, that we are indeed throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

[Guli]

You completely side-stepped my question. If creature-based archetypes can't hang, why do we have to make concessions for them to exist?

*Most importantly*, Balance would see play game 1!  The rest of these anti-Fish cards are sideboard cards.  That is the main reason why it would be so devastating.

What decks bring in Massacre, Pyroclasm and Threads?  Drain decks (for the most part).  A singleton Balance is currently available to these decks, but sees no play.  I would argue that very few Drain players would take the opportunity to play 4x Balance maindeck.  The most likely deck to pack 4x Balance would be 5c Stax, as Steve has said.  If Stax makes a comeback on the back of Balance, then Drain decks have to deal with Stax much more so than it does now, opening the door for Fish to prey on Drains better than they can now.  It's a little weird, but it's impossible to say that 4x Balance would absolutely eliminate Fish from the metagame.

Who do you think that will take up the 5cc shop decks? There will be drain players who will switch from drain to stax to go for the 4x balance, not saying that there will be a major shift but we should not forget the fact that making 4x balance available will decrease the numbers of drain decks as well.

I don't care about drain being played less, the prize is too high when it has to be done with a card like balance, who are you fooling here? Balance is good for fish because it indirectly improves their match against drain? That doesn't really make me feel more secure.

[JDawg13]

That's the intended result though, some Drain players drop their Drains and pick up Shops instead.  Whether or not this is good for Fish is debatable, but it would probably be a good thing for Ichorid, and voila, we have a fairly diverse metagame.  If unrestricting Balance is too extreme in your view, then what can be done to bring down Drain's dominance?  And don't say "build a better Fish deck" because Fish has had plenty of time to adapt and still isn't putting up results.

[wiley]

My views match up Diakonov's on the why we should care issue so I'll try to address some of the other questions sparked by my resistance to balance.

A singleton Balance is currently available to these decks, but sees no play.

A singleton gush doesn't see play in anything either, but it still allowed for well above average power level decks when it was allowed as a four of before.  The same with entomb, flash, frantic search and lion's eye diamond.  You need to evaluate Balance in the terms of the new system it would create not the current system that it isn't legal in.

I would argue that very few Drain players would take the opportunity to play 4x Balance maindeck.

I would go one step further and say there will never be a drain deck that runs 4x balance main deck.  There may be a drain deck that decides to be UBw to splash for some main deck chants and some side board balnace to gain a pretty heft advantage over its current predators of rituals and little dudes.

The most likely deck to pack 4x Balance would be 5c Stax, as Steve has said.  If Stax makes a comeback on the back of Balance, then Drain decks have to deal with Stax much more so than it does now, opening the door for Fish to prey on Drains better than they can now.

But now those fish decks get rocked by an almost one sided wog 4 times a game, including game one.  Thor all of the meddling mages and counter effects at that you want, you still won't get better than a coinflip match up, which then means that both drain decks and shop decks are beating the crap out of fish and pushing them further out of top 8s.

It's a little weird, but it's impossible to say that 4x Balance would absolutely eliminate Fish from the metagame.

People will still play fish despite its never being the correct choice again, and maybe some will still see top 8 once in a while.  Unfortunately many players will get disgusted when they get blown out by that top deck balance for the fourth tournament in a row that they take a hiatus from the format for a few years, something the format can't really afford.

And don't say "build a better Fish deck" because Fish has had plenty of time to adapt and still isn't putting up results.

I challenge that.  Drain decks have constantly changed their win conditions and draw engines in non-insignificant ways since the start of their current dominance.  Fish decks work well against a stagnant meta and despite the fact that we are at a high number of drain decks all around, the meta is changing rapidly all the time  (or at least was until Tez came out, and even then there are still a lot of Tez variants).  A moving target is hard to hit as they say.

That said, Bert's idea of unrestricting cards that are good in control mirrors (library of alexandria) still strikes me as a safer and smarter way to stop the drain dominance.  The other option is to unrestrict ponder to give a small boost to combo.  As the dci said when they restricted it, its sorcery speed naturally makes it help combo more than control.

There is also gush, which hasn't really been talked about in this thread.  I think Stephen is right on when he says this card can come off the list.  It would provide a natural predator to all drain decks and cause some people to switch from drains to workshops.  If we only get to see one card come off the list like Stephen says he wants then let it be gush.

[nineisnoone]

Balance: everybody dies.  Same cost as Pyroclasm.  The loss of land/cards in hand is probably negligible.

Since when was card advantage and mana development negligible?  In Vintage, the *exact* opposite is more frequently the truth.  The board is negligible but hand and mana are vitally important. 

That said, Bert's idea of unrestricting cards that are good in control mirrors (library of alexandria) still strikes me as a safer and smarter way to stop the drain dominance.

This I do not understand at all.  Explain to me why giving Library of Alexandria would suddenly stop the dominance of Drain?

[JDawg13]

The theory behind unrestricted Library being beneficial to other decks is that with the availability of 4x Library, Drain players will either have to completely retool and weaken their manabases in order to play both Libraries and Drains, or significantly weaken their sideboards in other matchups to make room for Libraries for the mirror matchup.  I don't think I like the idea, but that's the theory behind it.

[Sextiger]

Imagine your on the play and you mulligan into two libraries.   Unless your opponent does nothing for 2-3 turns, it seems like you would probably lose at that point.