@thewhitedragon69 said in What could replace the fetches/duals as a default mana base:

@blindtherapy You mean paying 0 to put gilded lotus into play would be OP?

Look, it's 2020...The Fetches/Duals have had a good run and it's time for them to fall victim to power creep like all cards.

Jewelers Loupe
(0)
Artifact
Tap, Pay 1 life, Sacrifice ~: Search your library for an artifact Lotus or Mox and put it into play. Shuffle your library.

This should help replace Fetches and Duals. Plus, other formats have Moxen and they are really popular so Wizards can print this in Standard with Mox Platinum or something and have it be a huge hit. Will make Mox Tantilite more than a bulk Mythic from Modern Horizons. I don't see what's wrong with this card. It's all upside.

I like it. I think with modern card design it would be a common Island and part of cycle where all the other ones are much worse.

@vaughnbros said in How do you beat W&6 with fair hatebears?:

@stormanimagus

They should 1 drop creatures are extremely underpowered in Magic.

They are underpowered in Vintage because of various attributes of the format. There is a much healthier distribution of one drops in other formats. Legacy is arguably dominated by a one-drop in Delver. Modern has a ton of mana dorks and aggressive red creatures. Pioneer has mono black aggro, mono red aggro, mono white (Thraben Inspector is OP), but Inverter is strangling the format right now. Standard has the very powerful Cat Oven based around a 1-drop. I'm really not sure 1-drops are that bad. Like, the power creep is pretty obvious...

In an effort to keep discussion going on new decks and ideas, I'm trying to share some of the lists that I have been playing to success and my reasoning behind playing them. A card that interested me when Ikoria was printed was General Kudro of Drannith, a B/W Human lord which in 2020 has much more text than it would previously. The incidental graveyard hate and the Reprisal ability are both relevant as they provide unique functionality. An interaction that has come up frequently has been using the graveyard ability to shrink opposing Tarmogoyfs in the BUG and 4 color matchups. Removing an artifact or a planeswalker can often turn them into a 3/4 and let your team through. The Reprisal ability was something I was interested in when UR Sprite Dragon was seeing a lot of play. That card is difficult to race and I wanted an answer that wasn't narrow in the main deck.

The first iteration of the deck trophied and can be found here: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/3167642#online

I have played the deck in two more leagues, finishing 4-1 in both. You play a lot of grindy games. Wrenn is a problem, as discussed here, but I simply switch decks when Wrenn becomes popular, and all decks tend to wax and wane on MTGO. Vintage has been very dynamic lately. I wasn't a fan of the Kitesail Freebooters. I found them not as impactful and poor against the Bazaar decks that were seeing more play in the field. Similarly, Dark Confidant feels slow in this format and I only run a few. You are ironically playing from behind often against HollowVine and Dark Confidant is terrible in that matchup specifically. Deafening Silence has also been a card that has been horrible for me and I keep reducing the numbers on the off chance it demonstrates a shred of promise.

Regarding the Mayors, those are considerations for having access to active FoV on turn 1, which is important for the Shops matchup (a traditionally abysmal matchup) and against PO. I'm tweaking the numbers of other cards and I haven't run into a situation in which Kambal has been good (should probably just be more Sanctum Prelates). Surgical Extractions are necessary against the HollowVine decks. You can't beat 12-16 power on turn 1, with some having haste. You just can't. You need to stop that and Surgicals are the best option. Exile the Vengevines, and then realized that you are going to have to do a lot of combat math, smart blocking, and good sequencing to salvage the game at a single digit life total.

Heck, it's a Modern deck with Power. The games are going to be tough at times. The advantage is much of the field is poorly configured to deal with your threats (both the number and the fact they are uncounterable) and you get to leverage two of the most powerful cards right now in Wasteland and Force of Vigor.

The last list I ran was:

@desolutionist said in SMIP: 2020 B&R Roundup:

You're thinking too hard.

Damn, I hate it when I do that...

@griselbrother

If things change regarding Workshops and Bazaar, then I'll update my recommendations. However, I don't think we can ignore the presence of other unrestricted cards in the format when considering action.

For instance, I think Thorn and Lodestone Golem are the most clear casualties of Workshops existing in the format. The fact that these cards function as a one-sided Sphere in most cases, when combined with Workshops mana generation, make the tempo disparity in a match too skewed in favor of the Shops player as Shops moved to more of an Aggro game plan.

A similar pattern exists with the Bazaar decks - the tempo gained from Bazaar, combined with the pitch spells and wasteland effects - creates pretty skewed game play from turn 1. You can say Vintage is format in which broken things happen but the frequency of those things is modulated by the restricted list and Bazaar has become much more consistent with the implementation of the London mulligan and printing of Once upon a Time.

Is the fault Bazaar/Shops or the other cards? Does it matter if no action is taken against Bazaar or Shops?

For what it's worth, I've had a lot of success recently with various Hatebearsish lists, including GW Maverick and Azban Humans. I enjoy the archetype, too.

@griselbrother The issue is that Chalice and Misstep are pretty effective in Bazaar strategies. The most played anti-Bazaar card right now is Surgical Extraction at 49% of lists because exiling Turn 1 Vengevines is often important for buying yourself time to deal with the rest of the deck. And the majority of Bazaar decks were running Chalice of the Void.

The way to conceptualize the Hollow One Bazaar decks is honestly a lot like Legacy Delver where you want to generate a quick clock and disrupt the opponent long enough for that clock to get there. This is Vintage though so instead of playing a 3 power flier, you get 6-12 power on turn 1, some of it having Haste. Chalice and Misstep are excellent for that purpose and will further exacerbate the swingy gameplay of which these decks are capable.

I think Lodestone Golem is a card that could be considered down the line as Shops isn't the metagame force it once was with FoV printed, but Windfall and Seal are easy unrestrictions that probably could have been unrestricted earlier.

Edit: I would also point out that Mental Misstep was the card that led most restriction polls for years before it was finally hit. Unrestricting Misstep and Chalice ignores how many players feel about these types of cards. I think it's actually better to unrestrict cards like Fastbond that spawn new archetypes and provide a different type of play experience, rather than slot into existing shells (examples, I think are Jar or even Channel).

Karakas is quite solid as a speed bump for Hogaak - they aren't Dredge so they can't always put cards in the yard quickly. Surgical is worse, but still fine. You have to be good with your timing as they can put in a Dryad Arbor in as the second creature and you can't respond.

Tabernacle is still alright to keep the threat base down and allow Swords to manage their remaining threats, but you need something like Needle to protect it or Wastelands of your own.

Good luck, Lupo. Let me know if you find something that works. I've been literally playing Vintage Maverick as a way to bring all those different pieces together.

Taking PO down a peg has very little to do with where other decks are in the format.

It has much more to do with peoples' perceptions that PO is doing something too broken, too uninteractive.

It is a subjective view informed by play experience, not an objective view based on metagame share, win rate, or top 8's.

Elevating other decks doesn't change how interactive PO is. Your suggestion is really just going to tick off the people that have a different vision of the format than you by promoting more of the types of games they don't like.

Fwiw, I do not believe any card needs to be restricted right now in Vintage. If you feel you need to address something in PO, I would recommend PO itself - Opal has been seeing play in some fringe strategies like Welder/Painter/Emry/Urza that are new and fresh, but get crowded out by hate directed against PO. To be consistent from an interactivity perspective, you should also hit something in the various Bazaar decks like Hollow One as they are perhaps even more consistent at generating the type of uninteractive games that PO gets a bad reputation for. It boils down to this:

Me, Steve, and Brian:

• Unban Lurrus,
• Unrestrict Windfall,
• Unrestrict Seal - (Not sure if Brian agrees on this, I don't remember for sure).

Steve:

• Restrict Mox Opal

Brian:

• Restrict PO
• Restrict Hollow One

Somehow I'm the minimalist on restrictions...

I must stress that under no circumstances should Gush be unrestricted in Vintage (with or without Fastbond). Mystic Sanctuary has put the final nail in that coffin.