January 2020 Ban List Update - No Changes

plushpenguin · Post by **plushpenguin** » 4 years ago

bobthefunny wrote: ↑
4 years ago
My strongest memory of this was a structured event, where I was paired with a (guessing) 13-14 year old boy, a 15-16ish? girl, and her father. After giving a similar introduction to the above, the boy mentioned that his main deck, Meren, was more combo focused, and instead switched to a Zombie Tribal deck. The girl and her father said that their decks were new, and that they were generally new to Commander, so they weren't 100% sure on the power level. She ended up playing Ur Dragon, and he was playing Xengos. She got out an early Dromoka thanks to ramp and Ur Dragon, so she had ever growing dragons of scariness. (Knights don't do well with flyers).

So we're all discussing about how we might reign that in, and I'm saying "I think I can deal with one," while Zombie kid says that he can stall another. Then her father goes "I think I might be able to kill you." This is turn 4, fyi. (Previous turn he'd dropped Xenagos). Sure enough, he tries for it, drops Godo, Bandit Warlord, fetches and auto equips Embercleave, Xenagos doubles him, for 8 double strike, second combat for another double into 16 more double strike. Although Zombies manages to bounce Godo (so he can't autoequip, so it's at least a stall), Xenagos follows up with Sneak attack, Worldspine Wurm sneak,+xenagos to kill zombies, leaving several large wurms, into me dead on the next follow up, as I couldn't deal with a wurm army + god + sneak, any of which would certainly seal the game unanswered.

Thing is - both Ur Dragon, plus every individual card Xenagos played are definitely casual... I wouldn't even say that anything really topped it off into serious territory (well, maybe sneak attack), but there wasn't anything unfair - it was just an issue of communication and expectations. Which is difficult.

I personally have done my fair share of godo-cleaving and I'd think that most people would not consider it a fair interaction. Sure, a communications issue, but a hand that is definitely screaming turn 5-6 table wipe if unanswered is pretty close to what high power decks too. Hell, the dragon deck wouldn't be able to do a whole lot that early against a t4 Godo draw.

I think they might not have had enough experience yet to know precisely where the deck should fit.

Sheldon · Post by **Sheldon** » 4 years ago

Catching up on the reading here and want to reply about Braden's reddit post: First, he's a good guy and was incredibly and informative in discussions at GP DC. Second, he's also right that we (both the RC and CAG) understand a whole lot more about cEDH than that part of the community thinks we do. I've been saying that somewhat obliquely for a long time; the RC has considerable experience in competitive Magic. We get what makes formats tick, we just see things from a 10,000 foot view. BTW, I'm open to anyone sending me their opinions on stuff--but a six page metagame breakdown doesn't do me much good. The bullet points are way more helpful.

Anyway, we're still listening and talking, hopefully in that order.

Hermes_ · Post by **Hermes_** » 4 years ago

[mention]Sheldon[/mention] I think it might help the discussion if you were to say (if possible) here's our biggest concern with a flash ban : "blah blah big concern,why it's a concern" blah blah"

EDIT: ast it stands from my limited view point and understanding, with a flash ban Cedh would go back to a rock paper scissors meta,whereas as it currently stands (to my understanding)it's one deck type.

cryogen · Post by **cryogen** » 4 years ago

Hermes_ wrote: ↑
4 years ago
Sheldon I think it might help the discussion if you were to say (if possible) here's our biggest concern with a flash ban : "blah blah big concern,why it's a concern" blah blah"

EDIT: ast it stands from my limited view point and understanding, with a flash ban Cedh would go back to a rock paper scissors meta,whereas as it currently stands (to my understanding)it's one deck type.

To my understanding they more or less have: it won't necessarily balance the format like everyone hopes it will, and do they really want to get into the business of banning cards for reasons that go against their fundamental philosophy.

Zealcat · Post by **Zealcat** » 4 years ago

A shop just posted on cEDH reddit about their recent tourney with a large prize pool. Only 20-25% of the field was hulk, and the top 4 was totally hulkless. Instead of appreciating this data, the thread was swarmed with hostile comments and downvotes, and assertions paper tournaments with vendors and large prize pools are supposed to allow proxies or they're "invalid". There were also fears this data would sway the narrative away from flash being unbeatable. The tournament thread has since been deleted (either by mods or the OP after the harassment). Reddit has been so full of bad faith behavior. I really appreciate forums (like this one) where people can't just manipulate the narrative.

EDIT: The pilot of one of the top 4 decks had this to say: "However, I do think that a lot of people who only play Magic online are overreacting and may be making overly aggressive arguments that are influenced by being unable to play in paper themselves. I could be wrong about that, but the post that was deleted earlier today included lots of aggression and at least a couple of users harassing the OP and going after them in every single on of their comments."

Post by **pokken** » 4 years ago

Wow, they seriously deleted that thread huh? It was really interesting.

I mean, they do have a point that it's not *exactly* CEDH if people aren't playing the best cards, but if the real life paper metagame is in a healthy place I'm not sure it's right to hide that.

My meta is not superbly dominated by flash at the moment either, though Oracle is pretty dominant. Kind of a quirk I guess since there is one guy who hasn't been around much who's the best flash hulk player in the area, and another guy who is building the third hulk deck in the meta.

I have definitely noticed quite a bit of political machinations going on in the r/CEDH stuff. People who do not toe the party line get whomped on pretty hard.

Hermes_ · Post by **Hermes_** » 4 years ago

The things I miss while asleep.

onering · Post by **onering** » 4 years ago

Zealcat wrote: ↑
4 years ago
A shop just posted on cEDH reddit about their recent tourney with a large prize pool. Only 20-25% of the field was hulk, and the top 4 was totally hulkless. Instead of appreciating this data, cEDH reddit mods deleted the thread, because according to them tournaments with vendors and large prize pools are supposed to allow proxies or they're "invalid". Reddit has been so full of bad faith behavior. I really appreciate forums (like this one) where people can't just manipulate the narrative.

Reddit is for %$#% posting, not actual discussion. I'm not saying that you can't have actual discussions on Reddit, but that when you do you should take it as a nice surprise that you didn't expect, like if you rent a movie about a dinosaur ninja because you're in the mood for some cheap brainless fun and then it turns out to be superbly acted and written with well done special effects and is actually a genuinely good movie all around. It's great, but it's a bonus, and realistically all you should be expecting from a movie about dinosaur ninjas is a velociraptor with nunchucks.

cryogen · Post by **cryogen** » 4 years ago

Zealcat wrote: ↑
4 years ago
A shop just posted on cEDH reddit about their recent tourney with a large prize pool. Only 20-25% of the field was hulk, and the top 4 was totally hulkless. Instead of appreciating this data, cEDH reddit mods deleted the thread, because according to them tournaments with vendors and large prize pools are supposed to allow proxies or they're "invalid". Reddit has been so full of bad faith behavior. I really appreciate forums (like this one) where people can't just manipulate the narrative.

Well we CAN, we just choose not to because it is counterproductive to our goals of gathering as much information as possible in order to help the Rules Committee make informed decisions.

Zealcat · Post by **Zealcat** » 4 years ago

Oh I realize reddit is horrible for productive discussion but it's where most of this controversy has been centered, for better or for worse.

One of the top 4 decks of that tournament was mono white Heliod hatebears with some sweet anti fishhulk tech. Guess it's not unbeatable after all. Here's his writeup, provided it hasn't been censored by the mods yet.

https://reddit.app.link/nW4NrIQvL3

And his followup to people saying there weren't real decks being played:

"I think people are misrepresenting things quite a bit. Yes, it was a no proxy tournament. However, there was plenty of T + T Flash Hulk, Najeela Tempo, and all of the other decks that would be associated with being priced out of a no proxy tournament.

Let's look at the price on the top 16 decks (at least the 12 that have been posted so far):

Yisan: $1,983.44
Zur: $3,240.15
Blood Meta Pod: $2,783.77
Niv-Mizzet Parun Control: $2,401.41
Unesh: $1,772.94
Gitrog: $2,420.75
Forbidden Forest Gitrog: $3,158.61
Najeela: $3,109.18
Oona: $3,166.71
Tatyova: $2,553.46
Yisan: $2,052.52
Heliod: $1,973.93

Plenty of expensive, optimized lists. One Gitrog deck was missing Imperial Seal and Bazaar of Baghdad because he left his deck at home and had to scrape it together when he arrived. The cheapest decks are 1 and 2 color decks, as expected.

What do the three posted Fish Hulk decks, all missing the top 16, cost? $3,227.18, $3,135.77, and $2,815.72, all being essentially Shaper's list with just the last list lacking Imperial Seal. There was also a $2,667.78 Opus Thief deck and a $3,181.91 Najeela deck that also didn't make top 16. There were definitely others, but only 33 of the decks are currently posted. The point is that plenty of fully powered lists (+/- no more than a couple of cards) that are considered to be the best decks in the format were played, and they didn't make the top 16.

This gets me to what I think is the real point: Would you make this same argument for a Vintage or Legacy paper tournament? Those paper metagames have always had this problem, it's part of the metagame of these types of eternal formats. It's just as much the real metagame as the Cockatrice games we play through the Discord, which often have less Fish Hulk anyways purely because people find it boring. Is the only "real" metagame the metagame that doesn't exist where every pod is 4 of the exact same Fish Hulk deck? That isn't existing anywhere, and we shouldn't pretend that it is. If the argument is that this causes greater pod diversity and pod diversity creates a greater variance in individual deck performance, then I'd say that's a good thing that's healthy for the format."

bobthefunny · Post by **bobthefunny** » 4 years ago

cryogen wrote: ↑
4 years ago

Zealcat wrote: ↑
4 years ago
A shop just posted on cEDH reddit about their recent tourney with a large prize pool. Only 20-25% of the field was hulk, and the top 4 was totally hulkless. Instead of appreciating this data, cEDH reddit mods deleted the thread, because according to them tournaments with vendors and large prize pools are supposed to allow proxies or they're "invalid". Reddit has been so full of bad faith behavior. I really appreciate forums (like this one) where people can't just manipulate the narrative.
Well we CAN, we just choose not to because it is counterproductive to our goals of gathering as much information as possible in order to help the Rules Committee make informed decisions.

Well we CAN, we just choose not to because because we're not jerks.

ftfy

plushpenguin · Post by **plushpenguin** » 4 years ago

This is good data, but one data point is not going to prove or disprove any points. It will take time to see how often sushi is served to all the other players relative to other win conditions.

Hermes_ · Post by **Hermes_** » 4 years ago

apparently because proxies weren't allowed it doesn't matter

cryogen · Post by **cryogen** » 4 years ago

According to someone on Twitter, the poster took the post down, not the mods.

Zealcat · Post by **Zealcat** » 4 years ago

cryogen wrote: ↑
4 years ago
According to someone on Twitter, the poster took the post down, not the mods.

That's what it looked like. When I saw the thread, it had been swarmed with hostility and repeated assertions paper tournaments are supposed to allow proxies or they're invalid. There were also fears this data would sway the narrative away from flash being unbeatable. Then the thread just poofed. The Heliod pilot had this to say about it:

"However, I do think that a lot of people who only play Magic online are overreacting and may be making overly aggressive arguments that are influenced by being unable to play in paper themselves. I could be wrong about that, but the post that was deleted earlier today included lots of aggression and at least a couple of users harassing the OP and going after them in every single on of their comments."

I'm not sure what's worse, the mods deleting the thread or the cEDH community harassing the OP because it goes against their agenda. There have been many threads posted to r/EDH that have been cross posted in r/cEDH to let cEDH players disproportionately control the discussion, making those narratives extremely biased. In reddit terms, this is called brigading, but several cEDH mods are also mods in EDH so it's been ignored. That's just the tip of the iceberg of the bad faith behavior from reddit. It should never be considered representative of the real playerbase.

Segrus · Post by **Segrus** » 4 years ago

Zealcat wrote: ↑
4 years ago
In reddit terms, this is called brigading, but several cEDH mods are also mods in EDH so it's been ignored. That's just the tip of the iceberg of the bad faith behavior from reddit.

Very likely that even if somebody was able to prove brigading with evidence, reddit admin probably wouldn't do anything about anyway it since both subreddits are relatively small. Some kind of massive vote manipulation scandal combined with possibly illegal activity would probably be required for traction. I didn't feel like the mods of the two subs necessarily directly encourage brigading behavior, but they definitely seem to go way out of their way to let two kinds of people talk: anybody who hates the RC and cEDH players.

Zealcat wrote: ↑
4 years ago
One of the top 4 decks of that tournament was mono white Heliod hatebears with some sweet anti fishhulk tech. Guess it's not unbeatable after all.

This looks like a pretty cool deck. I'm glad to see that somebody was able to find a way to take advantage of the meta. With any luck more stuff like this will continue to be developed.

Your Community

Top Sections

Deck Formats

Cards & Previews

Delve Further

Community Content

Game Tools

Site Tools

Other Resources

January 2020 Ban List Update - No Changes

Artisan Brewery: Jumping the Gun, Are We?

Artisan Saloon: Doc's Our Huckleberry

Thunder Junction: The Good, the Bad, the Ugly

Artisan Brewery: I Want YOU!

Dual Land Directory