April 4, 2016 B&R Announcement
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http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/banned-and-restricted-announcement-2016-04-04
I unfortunately predict this will be a scary meta. Shops does less good of a job keeping storm in check without the clock provided by LSG. Not hitting gush and dark petition shows (to me) that the DCI does not really understand why the meta is how it is.
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with the restriction of lodestone i'm interested in whether mono brown will still be the best shop build
it may be time to branch back into 5c or red
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Yeah I don't like the precedent this sets at all. A deck that literally has been 1) not as represented as gush in the most recent big tournaments and 2) seems to have had a card restricted mostly on the back of pros complaining.
That being said, I think shops will still be a deck, and furthermore, will diversify a lot more (the return of shops decks with colors in them). I do think they have been relegated to a much lower status now.
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This betrays a lack of understanding of the health of the format on Wizards' part. If they were trying to really shake up the format, they wouldn't just be restricting one card so they clearly think that Lodestone Golem by itself is making the format unhealthy - something that is not supported by the data.
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The line that says "Chalice of the Void is unrestricted." is missing :(
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Not really shocking, but still unfortunate.
The explanation of "We continue to see an imbalanced metagame" seems to reflect that WoTC is only looking at online only. I also don't see how having 4x Gush or 4x Dark Petitions leads to more interactive games.
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I have a hard time imagining shop decks breaking into tier 1 anymore. The prison variants have no clock now.
Tiny Robots seems the least affected, but it has only been getting fringe play to begin with.
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Restricting Lodestone Golem does not make sense as the only restriction without taking something else away like Dark Petition from the storm decks, or Gush. It is my belief that this is not a well thought out change that reviews the format as a whole.
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This makes me sad. Chalice of the void should have come off the list at the very least.
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"Significantly over represented" ????
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@joshuabrooks said:
"Significantly over represented" ????
Yeah I have no idea how they got the idea that this is the case. What do they think an appropriate level of representation is?
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Maybe Wizards IS looking at online only, since that's the place they've actually decided to support Vintage. Eternal formats are not supported by Wizards anymore on paper, so...
So, this is the first creature restricted in what? 20 years? I guess the last one on the list was Ali from Cairo.
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I think the only thing that is "significantly over represented" is the pros influence on the DCI.
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This is disappointing . I would not have done anything, as we are still resolving the effects of the chalice restriction, but I have repeated ad nauseum that if they intended to restrict lodestone, then they should also restrict gush, and probably dark petition.
That WotC wanted to restrict lodestone is not unreasonable, but that they did not follow through against other cards betrays a misunderstanding of the metagame. Now it is quite possible (even likely) Gush and Storm are the new meta, and although it will be refreshing, it is not an improvement.
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So now what becomes the most effective deterrent to ridiculous combo decks? Should everyone just be jamming Storm and Belcher and seeing who can go off the fastest?
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@Leoj You're exaggerating a bit. The Gush decks are still quite good and capable of fending off Storm. I wouldn't even be surprised to see Thalia decks take up a lot of the slack.
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I'm not going to cry over the loss of lodestone but no corresponding move, like restricting gush, and un-restricting chalice and ponder seems (for example, not saying this would have been best...) really shows how disconnected the folks at the DCI are from the pulse of the community.
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Well, now that the damage is done, I think we have to pour out a little for Mr. Lodestone Golem.
First creature restricted in Vintage since Ali from Cairo.
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So, why are people still in support of the VSL, again? They dont represent our vintage format and definitely aren't in support of our format.
People were worried the format would be even more split if somehow implemented a separate b&r list for VSL.
I still say there should be.
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(as usual, and as expected) I'm far more concerned about the reasoning than the announcement itself.
If Wizards had just said "we don't like shops, so we're restricting Lodestone" I wouldn't have been thrilled but I would have understood. Instead we got an argument about "significant overrepresentation", despite the fact that Shops is neither the most played, nor the best performing deck right now.
If they're basing decisions on data they think is real but is easy to verify as false, where are they getting this information from? What could be restricted next time? Will someone tell them that a totally unplayed card is winning everything, and they won't bother to check?
I don't think missing Lodestone will kill the format, but I feel very powerless right now as a member of the Vintage community, and I'm not sure what, if anything, we can do in the future.
