@smmenen said in SMIP Podcast # 88 - The "London" Mulligan in Vintage:
If I am reading this table correctly, it says that the probability of finding a particular/specific restricted card in your opening hand under the London system and with 4 powders is 75.52%?
I'm assuming that Bazaar is the column, and Powder the row. That's pretty astounding.
This is quite exciting and scary. In addition to what you pointed out above, if you include tutors as additional copies of restricted cards, you can get access to any restricted card as a consistent gameplan. I wonder how much this opens up building around restricted cards. Of course it's already done to some degree, but this could catapult it even further.
Very well-written piece and I enjoyed reading it, even though I disagree with most of it.
I find it interesting that Rich proposes a major spring cleaning of Vintage when he's talked about how disastrous the restrictions of 2008 were to Vintage many times before. What makes him think the same thing won't happen again?
But more to the point, let's even assume the changes you propose above will ultimately be good for Vintage. Currently there is a game that plenty of people engage with, and for all intents and purposes is popular. As far as I've seen, I understand attendance in the Vintage challenges is fairly high. Is this not taking a game plenty of people currently enjoying and saying "You know what, you can no longer play this game. However, here's this game that looks very similar and is better for you". If I currently enjoy playing and do so regularly Vintage, what makes you think I want my entire format changed like that? Once again, it might be better in the long run, but if a company tells me that I can no longer play something I currently enjoy, but substitutes it with something else, I'm probably not going to want to play that something else.
Why do you think alienating a large portion of your player base is a good idea with massive sweeping changes? You do not enjoy the current Vintage play-patterns but that does not mean everybody shares this opinion. And simply looking at the players who show up to Vintage Challenges does not suggest that Vintage is in any way unhealthy relative to recent times.
Also, Vintage as a format is special. Simply because the DCI has attempted to police how un-fun certain cards are in other formats does not mean they should do so to the same level in Vintage. Vintage is home to strategies that no longer exist anywhere else because WOTC has decided those strategies are unfun, such as Prison. Implementing the same policies of other formats removes these strategies (as it has already done with Workshops no longer being a real prison deck).
I am not going to discuss the specific restrictions because I disagree with the fundamental premise that Vintage is in a bad place and requires "spring cleaning". By extension, I do not think power level bans have a place in Vintage at all.
EDIT: A little tidbit I found. You say that having a small restricted list is not the goal of the DCI. However, please check out this link: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/august-28-2017-banned-and-restricted-announcement-2017-08-28
As we observe the Vintage metagame evolve, we also re-evaluate cards already restricted to see if they might be safe to unrestrict. With Vintage, one of our guiding philosophies is to let players play with as many cards as possible—it's the only sanctioned format where cards like the Power Nine and Library of Alexandria are legal, after all. We discussed two cards as candidates for unrestriction: Yawgmoth's Bargain and Windfall. Since these cards were restricted, other more powerful draw engines have been introduced, such as Griselbrand and Paradoxical Outcome.
Above statement clearly shows that the DCI does indeed care about the size of the restricted list and endeavors to make it as small as possible. A massive spring cleaning and restriction frenzy would be opposed to such a goal, let alone a banning frenzy.
@p3temangus said in Proposed New Mulligan Rule for Mythic Championship London:
Its probably easier to leave the mulligan rule as is for eternal formats than have to deal with multiple rounds of bannings/restrictions before they got this right.
While this might true, I think in the long run it's probably not a good thing if different formats follow different basic rules of MTG!
This was an incredibly fascinating article. Really enjoyed reading, thank you for sharing!
You know, all I said was that the hate bears that need to be printed need to not be so binary in their function and they become more interesting to play against for me.
Resistors are examples of interesting hate because there are multiple ways to deal with it. I like playing against resistors as it promotes interesting gameplay. It taxes and slows you down, but is usually symmetrical and you are still able to play your cards and attempt to execute your gameplan, albeit slower. I enjoyed playing against workshops very much, even when it taxes my deck to defeat. Similarly, Thalia is just as interesting to play against, in my opinion.
On the flipside, cards that say "your opponent cannot do X" is on the other end of the spectrum and extremely boring to play against. If such a card is effective, it usually shuts down a deck from functioning till you can remove it. Worse, sometimes there cards aren't even symmetrical effects.
Once again this is simply my opinion. I dont understand how this went to talking about social classes and all that when I simply expressed my preferences and what I enjoy when playing magic. This has nothing to do with wanting change or not wanting change. I'm happy to see more Vintage relevant cards being printed, but I wish they were less binary in their function. Of course this card has already been printed and I'll have to deal with it one way or the other, but it doesn't mean I'm going to enjoy it.
@chubbyrain said in Single Card Discussion - Lavinia, Azorious Renegade:
@hrishi Sounds like they need to print more and better Hatebears. Then they'll see more play and you can play your Lightning Bolts and your Swords and "not feel bad".
No, the hatebears that need to be printed need to not be so binary in their function. I don't really consider bolting a hatebear whose only function is turning specific vintage cards off to be the epitome of interesting gameplay. More binary hatebears simply mean there'll be more such non-interesting decision making in games.
But perhaps this is simply my opinion.
I hate this constant printing of humans whose names I can't remember that say "you cannot do X" where X is something I like to do in Vintage. So much fun!
The deck I hate playing against the most is hatebears because there is next to no decision making for me. Do I have the removal? Yes? Awesome, I will most likely win. Do I not have the removal? No? Cool, I'll lose while I get beaten down by shitty 2/2s that prevent Vintage decks from working, that being their only function.
You know, it wouldn't be so bad if Hatebears took up a larger metagame percentage because then I wouldn't feel bad for including a full-blown SB plan to deal with them. As it stands, it's irresponsible to include too many SB cards specific to Hatebears considering the tiny metagame percentage it usually occupies, which really makes it a coinflip as to whether I can draw removal or not.
If it's a situation where I would have conceded in RL Magic, I will concede in MTGO as well. While it may be "incorrect"to do so, I'm not interested in using the clock as a resource and don't feel any satisfaction from getting wins through the chess clock.
@juice-mane said in Cards/Decks/Strategies against White Eldrazi:
@hrishi Porphyry Nodes has great potential. Have you tried them yourself? If so, how useful have they been?
I've tried them before, but not in a Xerox-style deck. They worked fine for that type of deck, but I'm not sure how well it would translate over. That's why I'm not entirely sure how well it would work for you!