Main Menu

On Demonic Tutor and its potential Ban

Started by Bobz0rd, 25-03-2017, 09:24:19 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

Goblin-Diplomaten

I don't get why we discuss in here if we should talk about a certain card. Demonic Tutor is on the watchlist, so there is a reason to see different points of views. As I said before, you can still open up a new thread and talk about how strong Back to Basics, Price of Progress or Squire is. Shahrazad e.g. was banned after being played in only one Top 8 deck, it wasn't even on the watchlist. Btw I don't have a personal vendetta against the demonic, in fact I play it in my deck for ages now. I love the card, you should see my opponents face whenever I cast it, so much joy.



Pro tip: If you have a problem with "Age of Aquarius" build a deck thats defeats them. We had 0 blue based decks yesterday at our FNM.   

Bobz0rd

I think you completely missed the point Maqi and I are trying to make here.

We are not discussing other cards and whether to ban them or not. Its about why (we think) banning DT would be a mistake.
To see why that is the case you cannot only look at the card in a vacuum, its always within a context. You need to have a look at the metagame as a whole - which was dominated by UR and mono R in the latest tournaments. Whether this is new or not is irrelevant here. It just shows that decks with DT are in fact not dominating. Weakening those decks would only shift the Metagame further towards the ones mentioned above.

And yes, you are right. There is a reason to see different points of views. This is why I opened this thread, to share mine and evoke a discussion.

Btw. I understand why a card like Shaharzard does not belong into our Format. Comparing this to DT is a bit of a stretch though ;)



ChristophO


#Maqi didnt make a point he made a really offensive post calling everybody else dumb and out of touch for not being of his opinion which was completely unneeded. As a fellow council member I expect more of him than shitposting.

Banning Demonic tutor for me has never been about taking away an opressive deck in the meta which most of you are claiming but taking away a tool meant for combo being most effectively used by 4c goodstuff decks (same can be said for Tainted pact).

Banning cards enabling a meta deck might be good on the short term. On the long term you end up with a non-sensical banned list that actively drives away people from the format. When discussing our banned list with potential players the absence of Demonic tutor is the most common talking point.

Regarding RDW I think the deck is quite beatable (outside of the MANY haymaker cards - e.g PoP, Ankh, Blood Moon, Vortex). The biggest problem I perceive is that RDW strongly underrepresented in local small tournaments where people stick to decks they like to play more. Which then seems to lead to players not repsecting the deck enough for big tournaments and choosing to pilot decks soft to RDW. Haymakers and plenty of card draw (or cycling) also enables the UR deck.

I think the best way to hurt both decks is taking away at least Blood Moon.
To reduce the amount of blue in the format we should look at dig through time - another really busted card.
I personally also really hate Tainted Pact though banning that looks really iffy on the banned list. The ruleset of HL coupled with the fetchland/dual mana base really pushges the format towards multicolor goodstuff decks and tainted pact is insane in those (and not a great card in most other decks). I think it is worth mentioning that players have really moved away from combo decks due to the clock/permission of RDW/UR.



nuorukain

Hi there fellow highlanderplayers of europe and esteemed counsil members.

First of all, I'll greet and tell who I am,
I'm Mikko, aka Nuorukain, a finnish mtg player since around 1996 or so.

I've played various formats through this 20+ years, thus I'd imagine I got some sort of experience and understanding of various metagames and formats, though I admit, that during the past 8-10 years or so, I've cut myself from those more modern formats of standard and modern, and concentrated my interest on highlander and legacy. (as vintage isn't played that much here)
But my experience is not the point of authority, or an argumentative power in itself, but just thought to mention that, so that we can ignore any "what do you know"-nonsense that might follow.

But as we are now discussing (the) Highlander, I've in form or another played it from 200X, at the time there was no distinguished "german"highlander with its own banlists, but the t1.5(legacy) banlist was used.

Anyways, now, out from the remembering old stuff, but into the current days issues.

There's some quite a bit of level of rumour and gossip and discussion here in Fi going on about the banning of Demonic Tutor and that there are many counsil members Pro that ban.

I'm here to offer my input here, as a player relatively deeply interested in the format.

First of all, one of the sentiments that seems to be on top of the finnish discussions on that matter is; "why would there ever be a need to ban DT in a format that is in its most balanced and intriguing state in a long time? At its most diverce form..?"

I mean, the original logic of ban DT as it is too good in 4c-blood has to my understanding gone away, as the meta&people have adjusted accordingly. (although, banning of DT would have very very slightly poked at the 4C, in the same time, it would have been a deeper cut on the decks that try to compete against the 4c.)

Also, if your metagames were filled with 4c and other decks with manabases with far too little basic land, that here in Fi we consider "extremely greedy". It is simply right and correct that X-Moon decks have been picked up and played to punish people from their greediness with their good stuff decks. That is actually one of the best ways to counter 4c that I'm aware of, but please, do correct me if I'm wrong on this part. Any competitive honest ex 4c player can give their honest input on this matter?

Now, then there was and still is, the menace of RDW, which is imho one of the deck that seems to be format defining. (underplayed compared to its powerlevel imho too, as some others have said before, but people actually want to play FUN stuff in this format, instead of the best deck.)

Not that I'm a huge fan of Stone Forge Mystic, I do agree that unbanning it was wise, to diminish the relative power of rdw.
And on the same level&context, I simply DO NOT understand the reasons to wish to ban tutors, thus making multible deck types that much worse against RDW too.

Combo is heavily underplayed in the format due the singular nature of this format pushes all, but the creature based combos into a really tight spot on being able to assemble their combos by itself. Competing against the almost legacy speed RDW and permission&distuption of other decks, why do you need to put the close to final nail into the coffin of the decktype that is already on a tight spot?

I mean, I'd almost could understand the emotional need&wish to ban demonic, IF combo was overpowering the format. But even then, my rational approach would be; that is just one deck type to take into consideration in deckbuilding. I mean, there are assloads of answers against Combo available practically in any deck type. If and ONLY IF afrer those answers,combo was still a serious problem, then by all means, ban demonic&whatever needed. But I do not believe this could be the case.

Also, as a provocation, what the hell is this need for you germans to go wildly with the banhammer when there seriously is no need for it at all?
Why trying to "FIX" something that definitely is not _broken_, in its own context?

When you get pissed off at losing to certain decktypes, or some archetype goes strong for a while in your local meta, especially played by a strong player, why not, instead of screaming how unfair that deck is and shout for bannings to break the deck, could you perhaps be able to approach the issue maturely as a deckbuilding challenge to beat, not as a problem that needs to be fixed with bannings? (especially as the strong player will anyway just adapt to the bans, and play something else that breaks your local meta)

If you can't or won't adapt to your local metagames and decks, and there is someone who actually does that, and plays well.
Well, to my understanding that is exactly the moment when the person that has put in the thought and effort actually deserves to win tournaments. That does not mean that any fricking portion of that deck is necessarily broken and needs to be banned. Players just need to ADAPT.

OR are you having the old school classical approach of "ban everything untill Necro(potence) is good again. Then ban Necro."

Do you wish to de-diversify highlander format into the "combat step only"-format, where there is no _real_ room into more intricate mental puzzles of deck construction and metagaming?

Please, the format is not broken, it is healthy and doing fine. Don't hurt&screw it with unnecessary bannings. Ty.



ChristophO

Dear Mikko,

thank you for your long post and sorry that nobody bothered to answer. Right now we have the shortest ban list that we have ever had in our format (and I think this is fun for players) so that you can try and build around almost all of Magic's historic cards. You are talking a lot about combo decks - so here are my two cents:

1)
I dont think we can treat combo as a normal archetype. 30% UR decks or 30% 4c midrange decks or 30% UWx control decks will be a fun meta for most players. 30% Storm decks will not be. I strongly agree that Combo needs to be compettive (and some combo decks have always been the last couple of years). It is just that with the singleton nature of our 100 card decks and convoluted combo wins that the deck pilot probably needs a lot more experience with his deck (opposed to playing a goodstuff deck for example). Keeping this in mind we have started to evaluate strict combo deck only cards a lot less harsh when thinking about ban/unban decisions.

2)
Tutoring has been drastically improved the last couple of years. There have been unbans of enlightened tutor, mystical tutor, and now Entomb and Imperial seal. I personally really like strengthening black's color identity towards tutoring btw. Yes Mystical has been banned again as well. I would argue that for UBx combo decks this is somewhat of a sidestep owerwise (at a certain cost of € to be sure!). Still I want to talk about some problems with tutors as well

3)
Problems with tutoring have mostly shown up in Midrange and control decks which are using the tutors to be a lot more flexible towards the metagame by including many tutors and silver bullets. In that respect Mystical tutor for me personally was a little bit too strong. The unban back then was meant to bolster combo decks. Instead it enabled to kill tapped out opponents by grabbing (Cryptic Command, Ruination, PoP, that sort of stuff). At worst the card can be turned into a sort of 7 card impulse for 3 mana (Dig through time). Again, my personal hope is that with the Mystical -> Imperial Seal swap nothing relevant changed for combo.
When it comes to Demonic tutor for most of my time in the council I was for keeping the card around. It is somewhat of an iconic card for our format by now though it not only strong in combo but also in goodstuff decks (by not causing card disadvantage). That being said I voted for a ban a few times now in the recent past. Right now I will not vote far a Ban again I think. If the meta shifts into 4c blood for me (as of a viewpoint right now) the first card to look at should be Tainted pact. It is basically instant demonic in 4c goodstuff but an unplayable card in many combo decks.

4)
Some few council members believe we have introduced too many tutors. Personally I disagree with that viewpoint but I am a bit scared of the powerlevel of Reanimator in capable hands.

5)
Blood Moon/Back to basics in a singleton format are not enough to punish greedy decks. Instead they are "free win" cards in some archetypes only. I would strongly prefer a format where the inherit rules of Magic (mana consistency) made deckbuilding more rewarding by making 4c decks less stable mana wise. For example just normal mulligan rule (instead of free mull) and/or a fetchland ban. However I dont think such a sweeping change would be apreciated by many players of our format. It not something i would like to try and push people to do. But I do believe changes of such a scope would be needed to deal with greedy 4c decks.

Maqi