SMIP # 65: Amokhet Vintage Set Review & B&R Fallout

Smmenen

We actually reviewed Nissa (our last card), but my audio on that card alone was corrupted, so it was cut in the final edit. It was a good ten minute discussion, but we both predicted zero.

Topical_Island

@Smmenen Oh dang. What did you think of it? Is it any good?

Smmenen

I wish I could recall all of the salient points of analysis, but we focused heavily on the casting cost. You need at least 3 mana to cast her. Her abilities have utility. Making creatures uncounterable is also nice. But you'd need to build around her as well.

If you were playing UGW or BUG aggro-control, there are so many cards that compete for slots at or near this mana cost that it's challenging to predict that this would see play. Would you play this over Clique, Trygon Predator, TNN, or other planeswalkers?

It's getting annoying to have people just picking on Stevens line of thought on every fucking topic here. You can disagree, but let's stop with the tomato x tomahto bullshit please.

That said I disagree that deck + anti-deck is a bad Vintage meta. In a sense every deck played in Vintage always had to deal with the presence of the powerful trio of Bazaar/Drain/Shops. Those decks always defined the format so the format has always been a deck x anti-deck format. Having to play artifact hate or Red Elemental Blast maindeck (a 20+ year old tech) has always been here. So I don't think that's reason to restrict or ban anything. Gush is powerful but I still say the culprit for its dominance is Mentor (and CotV restricted).

ajfirecracker

@fsecco I made a pretty small point (obviously Gush is going to see less play and other blue draw engines are going to see more play) which only became a big thing because people decided to ask like four further questions about it

Topical_Island

@Smmenen I almost just preorderained one just to jam it into my Bomberman Oath. I already don't run Spellbomb there and just use sneaky win cons, like casing Emrakul, or using Explosives + Sensei's Top + infinate mana to draw the entire deck... or just blow up the world with Explosives is almost always winning.

I figured an arbitrarily large planeswalker would be pretty good. But I tested a little bit and it wasn't that awesome. It looks like at first glance you could use her to cheat giant creatures into play, but if you have enough mana to cheat, you have enough mana to cast them anyways... idk. It makes huge attackers. I like that. It's value and pitches to FoW. I just don't know about this card. It feels like the sort of thing that I tend to get really excited about, then find out isn't that great, then stubbornly hold on to for a long time before finally cutting it in favor of something completely banal like an extra Preordain.

I look forward to expert opinions.

Islandswamp

I honestly have mixed feelings about the Gush restriction. I really enjoyed playing the card, but it felt pretty oppressive any time I wasn't playing it myself.

I've been messing around with a TfK Mentor deck though, and it's odd that I keep drawing the one Gush and one Probe I added to the deck. The Mentors still crank out a ton of tokens too. But I don't think that means Gush was a fair card by any means.

kistrand

@Islandswamp TfK mentor sound interesting, care to share a list?

Topical_Island

@Islandswamp Ha. Up to the exact same thing, only probably worse. Enjoying casting things on the end of opponent's turns again?

Chase_Dagger

@mdkubiak said in SMIP # 65: Amokhet Vintage Set Review & B&R Fallout:

The concern I have about is this restriction seems to be more about outcry of people than actual data

I completely agree, I'm concerned that when they make restrictions based on the complaints it pits the community against each other.

BazaarOfBaghdad

I strongly disagree that there wasn't data. Plenty of data suggested that Gush Mentor was the best blue deck by a wide margin, and that the only likable deck that could handle it effectively was Shops. Results-data should be the primary data source, but anecdotal data is not devoid of value. Without a lot of resources, only anecdotal data can convey certain impressions, like, for example, how much more hate a deck has to dedicate to top decks X,Y, and Z compared to the top decks of yesteryear. Yes, Dredge could stand on its own too, but I've never heard of anyone wanting Dredge as some ideal part of a rock-paper-scissors metagame (and possibly more people say that about Shops players, though they have a much wider fan base).

I have a problem with what they did as a result of their data (a Mentor restriction alone seemed much more sensible for now), but don't doubt that they used data to confirm the need for change.

evouga

In any case, tell that to Keeper players in 1998-2002 or TPS playerd in 2004. Having a critical mass of synergistically functioning sources of card advantage certainly qualifies as a draw engine.

Yes, exactly. We are used to thinking of draw engines in terms of "4x this or that black creature or blue card" but once you start building a shell with

1x Ancestral Recall
1x Dig Through Time
1x Treasure Cruise
1x Gush

and some number of ancillary sources of card advantage (Planeswalkers etc) you do essentially have an "engine," in the sense of reliably drawing more than one card per turn over the course of the game.

ajfirecracker

@evouga That's a pedantic point. Anywhere else in Magic, people use the term 'engine' to mean a repeatable interaction. Jace is a draw engine, Gush into Gush is a draw engine, playing a bunch of entirely distinct effects that do similar things is not an 'engine' in anything but a metaphorical sense.

Smmenen

@ajfirecracker said in SMIP # 65: Amokhet Vintage Set Review & B&R Fallout:

@evouga That's a pedantic point. Anywhere else in Magic, people use the term 'engine' to mean a repeatable interaction. Jace is a draw engine, Gush into Gush is a draw engine, playing a bunch of entirely distinct effects that do similar things is not an 'engine' in anything but a metaphorical sense.

First of all, "engine" is entirely a metaphor. So the idea that these cards aren't an engine in anything but the "metaphorical" sense is a completely nonsensical statement.

You started off misrepresenting what was said in this podcast, but if you listened to any of the last three shows, I said over and over again that I think the Dack-Delve-Gush engine, even with Gush restricted, is likely a candidate for the best draw engine in the format. I said that repeatedly in episode 63.

The first page of Chapter 3 in the Gush book goes over the definition of an engine.

I acknowledge that restricted cards generally do not constitute engines, but the Khans cards are different. Because they printed two functionally similar draw spells (Cruise and Dig), even restricted, they form an engine, especially when surrounded by cantrips, tutors and cards like JVP and Dack.

Yes, the Dack-Delve-Gush engine is still an "engine," and it's a quite viable one, as Andy and I established yesterday, even with the main sources of card advantage restricted.

I discuss both the Gushbond and Dack Delve draw engine in the Gush book. The restriction of Gush destroys the Gushbond engine, but not the Dack-Delve draw engine. That can only be destroyed by bannings at this point, I think; or, perhaps, mass restrictions of Preordain and JVP on top of what's already been restricted.

BazaarOfBaghdad

@ajfirecracker said in SMIP # 65: Amokhet Vintage Set Review & B&R Fallout:

@evouga That's a pedantic point. Anywhere else in Magic, people use the term 'engine' to mean a repeatable interaction. Jace is a draw engine, Gush into Gush is a draw engine, playing a bunch of entirely distinct effects that do similar things is not an 'engine' in anything but a metaphorical sense.

Gush into Gush into Gush Gush is an engine for you but Gush into Ancestral into Dig into Cruise is not? Also, people can't make valid points using metaphors (even if that's the right word)? A little open-mindedness instead of damned condescension would go a long way with your posts.

"engine" is just a romanticized description of cards that draw more cards - even Survival of the Fittest is just drawing more cards. There's nothing saying you have to play 4 Thirst or 4 Gush; you could play 2 and 2. I made a thread about this a while back and everyone laughed at me.

Serracollector

Nights Whisper, Preordain, and the restricted list is more than enough of a "draw engine". Why play some antiquated draw 2 for 3 mana? Pffft. Mentor and Notion Thief is all you need.

BandsWithOthers

@BazaarOfBaghdad To be honest I always thought of Null Rod as the scissors. Fish decks from five or six years ago were so plucky!

Then Dredge was lizard and Key/Vault was Spok...

BandsWithOthers

Am I the only one after listening to this that thinks we need to start a vocal attempt to get Windfall and Yawgwill unrestricted??? It was a throwaway comment but I think a bunch of folks were probably dismayed that there were no Unrestricts...

Also, in the analysis of the actual announcement, it was noted that WotC wants to decrease sphere effects by weakening mentor. @Smmenen do you guys think that the restrictions Will actually allow Workshop players to diversify their portfolios?

I think commentary on the Stax thread really underscores how much Workshop players really miss having multiple approaches to making life miserable for everyone ... so is this actually going to enable that?

@desolutionist said in SMIP # 65: Amokhet Vintage Set Review & B&R Fallout:

"engine" is just a romanticized description of cards that draw more cards - even Survival of the Fittest is just drawing more cards. There's nothing saying you have to play 4 Thirst or 4 Gush; you could play 2 and 2. I made a thread about this a while back and everyone laughed at me.

Survival is not a CA engine by itself. It needs stuff like Squee, Rootwalla or that hasty 4/3 creature to get actual CA. It can be an engine, more probably a combo engine, but not a draw engine.
So no, "engine" is not drawing cards romanticized. "Draw engine" is different than other "engines".
I also dislike attempts to disqualify Magic theory lingo since that's important for the game position as a strategic masterpiece. You can't mix CA with VCA nor draw engine with cards that draw. I've seen a big decline in actual Magic theory in the last 5-7 years and it's a shame.