Ep. 30 - What Are They Doing...

This ban announcement really set me off...

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Credits
Written and performed by Daniel Wagner, aka CovertGoBlue
Edited by Roman Milan
Logo design by HolyMTG - [e-mail] Twitter @HolyMTG
© CovertGoBlue Entertainment, LLC

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Cover Go podcast is now on iHeartRadio, Spotify, and
Apple Podcasts, and is proudly sponsored by cool stuff ink
dot com. Use the promo code CGB pod at check
out to get a discount and show your love for
the audio version of the show. Do Do Do Do
Do Do Do Do dood cover goodbo podcast. Ladies and gentlemen,

(00:27):
Are you ready for a band and restricted announcement? Will
it hit standard? Probably because that was the whole reason
they moved the window. Will it change standard? Will it
save standard? Let's dive in and let the nonsense begin.
By the way, it's me, It's CGB and boom vvorneer

(00:47):
is banned, screaming Nemesis is banned. Props identic memory is banned.
What's that? I hear? I hear our voices screaming out enjoy, gosh, Wow.

(01:12):
They went for the Nemesis. They went for the Nemesis.
I gotta say, the Nemesis has been an annoying card.
Those are some mythic wild cards, I believe coming back
to you. And prosidetic memory. A lot of people wondered.
They wondered if prop'side memory would get banned because, oh
my goodness, it still makes the deck go absolutely burr.

(01:34):
Heartfire Hero is banned in Pioneer. Nobody plays that Modern,
no changes. I guess they like the format. In Legacy
we banned in Tomb and no do shocking Vintage, no
changes improper. They banned High Tide. Oh my gosh, what
was that? Fallen Empires or Homelands Fallen Empires? I believe

(01:56):
probably is that the first Fallen Empire's card to get
proper band Historic Force of Negation is pre banned. This
is an arena and these are cards in the extra
sheet that is coming. Frantic Search is pre banned. Mystical
Tutor is pre banned, and Tomb is pre banned. And
Dark Depths. Dark Depths is pre banned. You will have

(02:18):
no fun in Historic, like what are we doing Timeless?
Everything's legal? Oh my god, they came for Bral, they
came for Brall strip Mine is banned. Manadrain is a banned.

(02:41):
Chromox is banned like a day after I crafted the
original Meridian style, so I didn't have to look at
the eighth or Drift Trophy anymore. Ancient toom I just
crafted the other art for this as well is banned,
asked mana oh, God, this is gonna make some bral

(03:04):
players really happy. This This signals a shift. This is
a shift in Brall philosophy of anything goes. I guess
timeless is where you get that. But it used to
be anything goes baby, and they focused on the matchmaking
to fix it. Now they're banning fast MANA, they're banning
free MANA, They're banning mana denial. Oh my god, Oh

(03:28):
my god. They came for brawl. I can't believe it.
I really can't. I'm very surprised. This is this is
a wild day. I'm more hit by the brawl than Standard.
I expected Standard, Like I was kind of prepared for
whatever whatever they wanted to do. All right, out of gamers.

(03:48):
My name in Arman Clampern, Senior Designer. Welcome to the
final ban and restrict of twenty twenty five. Guys, we're
safe for the rest of the year. No more bands.
Summer announcement, we saw a number of cards banned Standard,
like six of them. Since then, it's become clear that
additional action would be necessary in a couple of formats,

(04:08):
so we've got a few different people talking about changes.
They adjusted the timing window because quite frankly, two more
weeks of this standard would somehow be worse. I don't
know how much wort's can it be? Oh god, So
let's get into this standard article VV band screaming them

(04:30):
as bands Prosidetic memory band standard has been in poor
shape the past few months. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, huh.
The is It Cauldron deck has cemented itself as the
strongest deck in the format and has had unacceptably high
win and play rates over a sustained duration, Like how

(04:50):
many months since the band's in the summer? That's June, July, August,
and September and October. That's five months going on six Jesus.
This deck utilizes propsidetic memory core that we've previously seen
power decks like jess Sky Oculus, now taken to a
new level with VV and Soul Cauldron combo. It has

(05:12):
dominated the tournament scene since Standard rotated with the release
of Edge of Eternities, placing five or more copies into
the top eight at all three of Standard Magic Spotlight
Series events that have occurred since then. Yep, yep, it's
worst day. It was five copies in top eight. Guys,
As somebody who has enjoyed competitive magic coverage each of

(05:36):
these events that occurred the Spotlight series. I turned on
the coverage and I didn't make it an hour. I
was just out. I was just out. I couldn't watch
the VV or the screaming Nemesis do the thing anymore.
It is wild that we see cards like Duel List
of the Mind and you see Quantum Riddler thriving. It's

(05:57):
like a fifty dollars mythic or something kind of crazy.
I'll see what the price does after this, But like these,
this deck, this deck is a monster, absolute best of
three monster in best of three. Once you sideboard, like
the only thing that can touch it really is red.
And then when Red, when the Red player gets the sideboard,

(06:20):
their matchups don't get as good as every other matchup
does against Red because now they know you're kind of
one goal burned game plan. They shut you down. So
that was it you had. You could play this or
you could play Red, and the way you go. So
I just by the way, I just woke up. I

(06:42):
just ate some breakfast. I came down here. I started talking.
My throat is so you're gonna get special throat CGB.
That sounds really bad, don't repeat that. Let's read some
more of what Wizards of the Coast has to say
about Standard. The deck has a strong fair game, efficient
interaction and a combo ceiling that other decks in the

(07:04):
format can't overtake. It is a strategy that has all
its bases covered with no clear angle of counterplay. Yeah.
As a result, the meta game has been unable to adjust,
and the deck likely won't be able to the deck
and likely won't be able to in the future. They're
talking about the meta the meta will not adjust to
busted deck. Yes. To open up the Standard format for

(07:25):
innovation and a wider variety of decks, It's clear we
need to disrupt the VV Soul Cauldron combo. The interaction
is too much stronger than the rest of the format.
We're opting to ban VV as the card that's more
likely to cause to create future balance problems if allowed
to remain in the format. We believe Standard will be
more fun and diverse without VV in it. Well, guys,

(07:47):
they have proven they can ban a pushed universes beyond card.
There's no conspiracy about Final FANTASYEIP being protected from bands
at least for like six months. Let let the conspiracies continue.
There are clear parallels between Profsidetic Memory and Up the

(08:08):
bean Stock, which we banned in June's update. Both cards
are one card game plans that provide a lot of
strength over the course of a game. In addition, there
are both two men and Chamans that draw you a
card when you play them. They're just going to be
afraid to print every single two man a draw card
Enchatman now compounding conundrum busted Oracle of the Sea busted.

(08:29):
In addition, there are both two man Chamans. Yeah. This
makes both cards hard to profitably interact with, since both
cards leave you with a full card following the exchange.
This combination of qualities is a dangerous recipe for a
card in the strongest deck in the format, as it
greatly limits the number of decks acting combat the strategy
like to none. Like you kill them before they can
take advantage of the card, so that the two Man

(08:51):
of Tempo hit actually cost them. That's it. That's all
you could do against Memory. That's all you could do
against Up the bean Stock. In terms of power level,
the Memory has proven itself as a strong standard engine.
It broke onto the scene with Jescai Oculus at proter
Eighth Drift, although that deck like that was a good
best of three deck but never became dominant, with a

(09:14):
deck lurking in nearly every standard metagame since Sure prior
incarnations of the deck have been healthy additions to the metagame,
but additions like Winter Night Stories in Quantum Riddler, as
well as an increased level of optimization for the core shell,
leave us concerned that even without vv the deck would
continue to be one of the best decks in the format,

(09:34):
potentially even the clear best deck. To ensure that the
standard metagame has room for new decks and innovation, the
Memory is banned. We are also acting against Mono Red
ergro let, the propaganda end let, the need to always
have a good burn deck that's like the best thing
you can do in the format. End Mono Red has

(09:54):
proven itself as the deck most able to hang with
is It Cauldron, despite failing to meaningfully prove an obstacle
to is Its Cauldron dominance in the format. It's play
a rate at competitive events, and it's win rate in
our internal data has us concern that it may prove
to be the clear front runner and standard in the
post is a Cauldron World. Meta games where an aggressive

(10:15):
deck is clearly the best deck are often painful for
diversity because many slower decks can't compete. To prevent this outcome,
we are electing to ban Screaming Nermosis. Get it out.
Stupid card, terrible card, always, always a mistake the rest
of the game. Why are we handing out emblems those
are supposed to be attached to planes walker ultimates, literally

(10:38):
taking away the only viable interaction with the red deck
other than maybe counter spells, but like burn spells are
one man a, counter spells are like three two if
you have a negate that's limited. Right, Oh my god,
what a mistake, What a stupid, stupid mistake this card
was to print the way it is, it is disgusting.

(11:00):
I mean, in Commander, it's really good. Get rid of it,
go on bye, all right. Screaming Nemesis is among the
strongest cards in the default monoreed Agger deck and one
of the most frustrating cards to play against in the deck.
It single handily removes counterplay against monored I mean this
band philosophy has talked about counterplay twice now, as if

(11:20):
they actually know it exists. Is wizards actually banning for
counterplay and designing for counterplay in the future. That would
be fun. I would enjoy that. That's cool. I thought
that their whole new idea was we just want you
to play your cards. End of story. See great game
play against two of Monoreed's natural predators, life gain and

(11:41):
large blockers. Yep, yep, who designed this card? What Mono
Reed propagandists design this card with Screaming Nemesis out of
the equation. We believe it is far more likely that
the meta game will be able to find a healthy
equilibrium with Monoreed as just part of the lanelandscape, not
the deck to beat. It will always be the deck

(12:02):
to beat, always on arena. Every time there are versions
of Mono Red that forgh Screaming Nemesis, there are instead
opting for oh lay line of Residents is still legal
in best of three, I always forget that and slick
Shot show off for a faster and more all in
version of the Mono Reed deck. Despite such a deck
winning Magic Spotlight spider Man in Baltimore a few weeks ago,

(12:25):
we believe that this strategy is more inherently attackable than
the versions of Red that play screaming Nemesis, Yeah, removal spell,
did it done? We're fine. A slick shot show off
is a beating of a card, but you can kind
of see it come in, and you can prepare for it,
and it does make games pretty interesting. Learnings and the future,

(12:49):
let's talk about what we've learned today, Ladies and gentlemen.
Look at these paragraphs of learnings. This is going to
make a good video all its own. A common element.
By the way, I'm going to read all of this
stuff or you know, the YadA YadA in a little bit,
but we're gonna read the stuff. Then I have thoughts.

(13:09):
I have plenty of thoughts. We'll get to my thoughts.
I promise my thoughts will be at the end, including
what decks are going to be good? Now? Is standard good? Now?
What the heck is going on with magic, et cetera.
A common element in all three of today's standard bands
is an emphasis on counterplay. It's like I figured it's
like wow, I figured it out from what they banned

(13:30):
and what they said what they were going for. But
it's good that they spell it out. It actually is.
It's better than like, here's what's banned. Mic Drop we
want Standard to be a format where decks are strategically distinct,
with a clear identity and the ability to do powerful things.
Creating a healthy metagame in a world where decks have
clear and powerful game plans means that those strategies need

(13:54):
to have strong counterplay available. It is a failing of
the format if there is a strong deck the metagame
that doesn't have a good counter strategy available. This philosophy
underpins both our choices today and our card design in
the future. So what you're telling me is somehow they're
gonna print like answers to all kinds of powerful strategies,

(14:17):
but they still have to cost them well, so that
like agro and midrange can be good and everything is
in a control deck. Interesting. I can't wait to see
what that means. This philosophy of powerful decks with appropriate
counterplay means we have to be careful with cards like
Screaming Nemesis. Oh God. The role we intended for Screaming

(14:38):
Nemesis was to give Mono Red players who wanted to
play their deck in a hostile metagame a way to
feel like they had room to maneuver and a fighting
chance to win their fair share of matches a fighting

(14:58):
chance as a Red deck that is just trying to
kill you as fast as possible, need to always have
a nice, fair fighting chance. It is literally the limitter
on the format. It is literally the thing that doesn't
let people play cool cards. It is literally the thing
that stops a format from being diverse, because if you

(15:19):
can't handle being dead on turn four, you can't look
at a format a mythic that doesn't win you the
game and put it in your deck. Like there's a
lot of ways to design for control to like not
let control be the best thing, make something that can't
be countered, give it haste, make it like hexpert like
when it enters a battlefield. Make it a voice of
victory so that the opponent can't cast spells that turn

(15:41):
to make sure it gets its value or hits. But
with Red, you can't design a foreman of card to
play against Red because they just win the game, especially
if you take away your ability to gain life. What
are we talking about. I'm telling you the Red propaganda
at WATSI is so real. We always have to have
a good just shut up, stop stop anyway they're doing

(16:04):
something about it, which I do appreciate. I'm sorry. I
have strong feelings and opinions. I've been doing this for
a lot of years, guys, I've been playing Arena against
Mono reed Hagro for a lot of years. The hairs
will turn gray, and when they finally do, it'll be
Monored's fault. All right, it's fine. It succeeded at that

(16:25):
job too well, and instead denied players who wanted to
attack Monored the ability to do so. We took a
risk making the card that insulated Mono red against life
gain and blocking at the same time, and introduced the
possibility that missing en rate would lead to exactly what
we have seen play out of recent standard, a strong
version of Monored that lacks efficient counterplay. Yeah, nice risk,

(16:48):
Nice risk, one man a counterspell when you know, when
can we try that? Missing on the power level of
a new card is to some extent inevitable, but there
can There are always ways to improve our accuracy. VV
is an example of a card where the ramifications of
an individual power level mistake were amplified tremendously by our

(17:10):
failure to find the interaction with Agatha's soul cauldron. I
literally like I just made a video a Cimo and
we talked about it. You can go back to the
final Fantasy episode of Worst Possible Commander Show. I had
vv's Soul Cauldron in my Commander deck. It wasn't hard

(17:36):
to find. Increasingly, the standard metagame has been defined by
a ceiling of strong multi card synergies rather than the
power level of an individual card. A ceiling of strong
multi card synergies. Adjusting to this is a design shift
that is in progress, and we still have room to grow.

(17:58):
So what they're saying, all right, my first thought is
a cynical thought, and I'm going to say it, and
I try to be more charitable when I can, but
my very first thought is what you're saying is you
have to actually play the format with the new cards
you're designing and the cards that are going to be
in the format more to find the multi card synergies

(18:20):
that take it to the top, which implies they are
not doing that. Maybe I'm missing something. I mean, maybe
it's as simple as building more decks, or just having
a hot button on certain cards like Soul Cauldron, whose

(18:41):
power just multiplies based on how many cards in the
format have sweet activated abilities, or just having a watch
on a card like profsidetic Memory, which power greatly increases
the more rummaging and looting cards you have in the format.
Maybe we just always have to put an ass risk
on cards like that and try them a little more carefully.

(19:03):
Maybe they have more to say on them, let's keep reading. Similarly,
Prosidetic Memory is an example of a strong engine card
where the ever increasing density of strong interactions available in
the format got away from us. Uh huh. We designed
and tested Prosaidetic Memory and Murder's standard a format where
most of its powerful synergies didn't exist. See. I hate

(19:28):
reading this because it implies that they just they did
that and stopped playing with the card. They'm gosh, I'm
getting cynical the more I read. What's going through my
head and I'm trying to find the nice way to
say it is, why did you create a three year
standard environment and then stop testing it or refuse to

(19:53):
test it or failed to test it. You created a
bigger standard environment, but then you only tested these cards
in it small environment. And maybe it is because the
three year window is still getting here. But like, no,
that can't be true. It's like two years ago they
announced the three year window right, So that would mean
they had to Maybe maybe it's still close, maybe it's

(20:14):
still not the standard that they've been designing for three
year standard, but it still feels like when they make
that announcement, you have to go in and you have
to test everything in the three year window. Now, which sucks.
I get it. You lose years of work because you
test a certain window. But it does sound like they
announced three year standard and said it will be fine. Yeah. Anyway,

(20:38):
I'm lamenting the last like five or six months of
standard that I played that honestly felt terrible. But I
get in their shoes that maybe you just prepare for
a better future, because that's, honestly, that's how I handle
it when things go bad in business for myself, Like
I don't go back and try to apologize for or

(20:59):
fix whatever video came out yesterday. I just tried to
make my next video better. So like, I get it,
I get it. I don't know this. This is making
me a little mad, but let's keep reading. Maybe it's
maybe it's more explained. Maybe I'm jumping ahead of myself.
We noticed this lack of options and made steam corese
scholar in the same set to be a great card

(21:21):
alongside Proft's Memory. Because there weren't a lot of strong
synergies with Memory, we felt comfortable printing it at a
high individual rate. We thought the overall deck was of
medium strength but pretty fun. We particularly enjoyed that, despite
synergizing with car Draw, it asked players to tap out
on their turn to get full value. Our prediction was

(21:42):
that might show up here and there, but it was
unlikely to be the strongest decks in the metagame, and
we were right for that environment. It took seven months
until the release of Dusk Warn with Fear of Missing
Out for Memory package to really cement itself as a
keep playing centered But see I'm I'm struggling because that
would have still been the same standard environment. Like whether

(22:05):
or this was a two or three year standard, you
still would should have could have tested this. As new
cards were released and the overall package became stronger, the
experience of playing against the deck became less fun. For example,
the addition of Fear missing Out gave it access to
bursts of combo damage, and the versions that we tested
didn't have this. Addition of a combo finish made the

(22:25):
deck stronger and more punishing to play against I mean,
I think what we're really saying is the card designers
liked rummaging so that Tasa light shatter that when it
enters discards to draws two and has haste and can
cast a spell from the graveyard. They were like, yep,

(22:47):
this thing where this creature enters, and we discard too,
and then draw up to two the season Pyroman ser vibe,
because I swear to God, the people designing cards right
now are modern fans. Everything looks like a throwback to
modern or a modern Horizon set, and so they're like, yep,
more of that, and then never considered that they were
just printing too much of the effect on two push

(23:07):
cards that just continue to scale upwards and upwards. They
did they test up the beanstalk with Overlords. From reading this,
my impression is since those sets were seven months apart
probably or no, like nine months apart, ten months apart,
then probably not. They probably didn't or it was over
a year anyway, The number doesn't matter. They were going

(23:30):
to be in the same standard anyway. But it sounds
to me like they never even consider, like they take
a card, look at it in the set it's coming
out in and the standard that would exist at that time,
and then don't consider the future because want print good card,
I want print fun card. I mean, they have a
lot of pressure on them to do things right. But
that just seems it feels bad to me. As the

(23:54):
person who has to work in the environment. It feels
bad to me. It upsets me, all right. Once we
recognize that prosidetic memory had the capacity to be exceedingly
powerful alongside creatures that draw cards and cheap spells that
draw multiple cards, we should have considered how likely we

(24:15):
were to make more of those cards in the future.
In this case, the answer was extremely Yeah. People like
to draw cards. Absolutely in the future, there is the
question we'll be asking me for shipping similar engine cards
at high rates. Good good good good. To close out
this section on standard, I'd like to acknowledge that this
year's cadence for ban and research to announcements has not
been ideal and competitive standards suffered for it, especially in

(24:38):
the last three months. We still believe in our underlying
standard ban list update philosophy. We want these updates to
be predictable and we want standard format to feel stable.
While our fundamental philosophy remains intact. We recognize that our
execution this year caused pain which we need to address.

(24:58):
As mentioned at the beginning of the our next year,
we will be increasing the number of ban and restricted
update windows. This will allow us the flexibility to respond
quickly if the metagames ends up in a severely unbalanced state. Again,
increasing the number of ban restricted update windows. Just why
did we make the windows? Why? And now we're just

(25:22):
going to put in more windows and eventually the whole
wall is going to come down again and we're going
to be back to Hey, guys, it's been two weeks
of this thing being insanely busted because we didn't test
it in the environment it was going to be in.
So we're banning it and we'll be right back to
golos Oco omneath. I don't know, man, I'm so cynical
right now. Sorry, it's been a rough couple of months

(25:45):
for making standard content. As stated above, the next ban
restricted announcement will be on February ninth. We'll also be
discussing these changes on the update window on November eleventh,
so be sure on weekly MTG on November eleventh, that's tomorrow.
At the time I'm recording this, be sure to tune in.

(26:05):
I will acknowledge it's a hard job. I will acknowledge
that card design is a hard job, and a balanced
standard is not an easy thing to achieve. I mean,
thank you, thank you for recognizing that your execution this
year caused pain. It's a lot to make people want

(26:26):
to keep playing the format. It's a lot. I don't know.
Will people come back, Will Standard stay the most played
format on arena? I don't know. I really don't. I'm
very nervous about it. Let me check out these other things.
I'm not going to read these whole things, but like
I don't play Pioneer, but for those of you who do,

(26:48):
Heartfire Heroes band. Turns out this mouse was broken forever
and ever. It's nice to see that the mono red
propaganda might be ending because people are actually taking action
against it in multiple formats. No changes in Modern is interesting.
Seems to be a combo heavy char Belcher format, which

(27:08):
is very interesting. Amulet tighten up, yep combo, Kambo Kamo
Kamo combo. The Jeskui Blink deck does look pretty cool.
I watched some I watch more Modern coverage in the
last few months than Standard coverage, and it was because
these modern ducks do look kind of good and maybe
someday modern will be on Arena like years and years away.

(27:29):
And Tom is banned and Nadu is banned in legacy,
none of that surprises me. Those are busting cards. I
don't need to I don't need to find that out.
I'm surprised. And two made it this long to be
honest in a format with reanimate. But there you go.
High Tide being banned in Popper. I'm sure Gavin wrote
a whole article about everything to do with High Tide.

(27:51):
I can't believe High Tide is still legal in Popper, like,
I mean, that's a busted magic card until end of turn.
Whenever player TAFs Island for Blue, they make an additional
I just played it on command and are at home.
You guys can check that out. Yeah, high tight good,
very very good. Alchemy has no changes. They rebalanced VV
by the way and made it into a tappability that's
kind of funny. Historics pre bands. These are all cards

(28:17):
coming to Arena, which is exciting. So if you haven't
checked out the list of cards entering brawl for my
bral players, for some Negation, Frantic Search, Mystical Tutor in
Tomb and Dark Depths is a very interesting set of
cards also coming to Brawl that are banned in Historic
and Timeless. They're like, Timeless is great Brawl, though this

(28:40):
is new, this is new. They're actually banning in Bral.
I can't believe it. Strip Minus banned, Managerina's band, Chromox's Band,
Ancient Tombs banned. Bral has been undergoing a lot of
flux in the past few months. Many powerful and widely
applicable cards have been added to the arena, anthologies, bonus sheets,
and special guests releases, as well as just snuck in there,

(29:02):
Like they don't even say that they're putting lightning greaves
there to craft, but it's there. It's really funny how
they are working. Like Leovold just showed up what they
forced players to adapt to new staples and play styles
that accelerate the game beyond the pace of Brawl of
years past. We've historically taken a lighter touch to format
management in the spirit of allowing players to play with
cards and commanders they want, but it's become clear that

(29:25):
certain shapes of cards are too impactful for the format,
and we want to be a safe place for casual fun.
I agree, and I don't. I the bracket system for
Commander I think handles this reasonably well, especially the way
it's been kind of adopted. I'm stunned that we have

(29:48):
banned cards because you could have just sent the deck
straight to HELQ just immediately. Wait these cards, they're only
playing against the most powerful decks in the format. They
could have done it. They could have all also introduce
rngth brawl. But now, like I'm torn, because they say
they want to be a place for casual fun. And

(30:08):
this is a dangerous loaded word. Because you are a
one v one game on the Internet, there will always
be optimizing for competitive play. And I guess you can
say some experiences are worse than other and your band
strip Mine. But I'm telling you, man, this doesn't solve
the problem that people want to stomp the crap out
of somebody's fun deck. But I really do think, I

(30:32):
really really do think they had it right with the matchmaking.
Just push the matchmaking on these cards to the max,
and I think you help solve that problem so that
people do feel the difference when they take a strip
Mine out of their otherwise very normal deck and they
get to play a more fun game. You know. Content
creators will help let people know. Amy the Amazonian will

(30:54):
sing it from the rooftops. I'll make a video about it.
LVD will make a video about it. It's like, don't
add the five cards to your deck if you don't
want to be in hell Q. You know, if you
for a more fun expirits or however you want to
make the thumbnail anyway, let's read what they have to say.
As such, we are re examining the band list and
our format philosophy to preserve the fun, open ended experience

(31:17):
that brawl promises in the face of continual change. For
these bands, we considered cards that satisfy three conditions. They
are homogenizing, efficient, and polar. Homogenizing cards have a high
format presence due to their popularity and strength. Powerful colorless
cards and lands are inherently more homogenizing since they can
be included in any deck Field of the Dead and

(31:40):
oog in the Spirit Drag, it can be in any deck.
Guys our cards on the current band list that fell
into this category. Efficient cards have higher rates relative to
their cost and can often make their impact early on
the game, like oog in the spirit sorry, I couldn't
help myself. Not all cheap cards are efficient, but the

(32:01):
most efficient cards are cheap. Polar cards have a high upside,
embodying a range of outcomes beyond what was typical for
their cost. They can often win the game outright when played,
but can also be situationally useless. I think of stifle
when I think of this, to be totally honest. In
other words, they make the game all about themselves. When combined,

(32:23):
these conditions describe a class of card that players can
that players play against all the time and dictate the
outcome of the game on their own man A drain definitely,
I think falls into this category. This can be stifling
to deck building and gameplay diversity, which we are hoping
to promote as much as possible. Strip Mind is one
of the most disgust recent editions to brawl and emblematic

(32:44):
of the type of card we believe should stay in
more competitive formats, which means we just which means competitive
brawls not real. It's not real, guys. It is overwhelmingly homogenizing.
It can be included in any death and lacks deck
building and gameplay cost you to being a land It
is polar when it's target happens to be land shy,

(33:07):
preventing them from casting spells altogether. But if they happen
to have a land heavy draw, it's a minor setback.
At best, it is efficient on its own, but when
built around options for graveyard recursion is Zeuza ren and
six Let's Go, it turns into an annoying from an
annoyance into a win gone. Over All, we expect the

(33:28):
format to be more fun and diverse with strip mind going. Guys,
what they're not saying is you did this. You did this,
brawl players, you ran out. I'm not. I'm guilty too.
We're all guilty. We all made the video, the content creators,
we all made the video. We ran out there. We

(33:50):
made a Zusa ren and six strip mind loops. We
locked people out of the game. And you guys, you guys,
the players, you said, hell, yeah, that's what we want
to do, and you did it. You did it so
much they banned it. They had to take your toy away.
It was too powerful. Well there you go. Strip mine's gone. Managrain,

(34:16):
same thing. I mean, i'ves every blue deck every time. Man,
you can't take Managrain away from me. We even had
Ian from Watseie on the show said that Managrain lowered
your win rate and you know what, you guys still
overplayed it. Managrain has been controversial since its debut. Its
overall win rate has never been high since it's awesome.

(34:40):
But as we've taken closer look at both the numbers
and our format philosophy, we found that managrain fits the
conditions that indicate a ban is appropriate. Due to its
generic nature as a counter spell, it is an auto
include in any blue deck and is homogenizing. It's true
a well time Managrain will often prompt a concession, you know,

(35:00):
like I'm turn two on anything when used on a commander,
oh for sure, or any spell worth a few mana
early in the game. Yep. The swinging game state is enormous,
and the numbers reflect that players who draw a mana
drain in their opening hand have a ten percent higher
win rate, a hallmark of a highly of a high
polarity card, although Manadrain evens out to a more reasonable

(35:24):
one for one later in the game. The experience of
having to play around or lose to an early Managrain
against any blue deck is one that we're happy to
remove from Brawl for now. Goodbye, my beloved. It was fun.
It also wasn't fun anytime I didn't play blue. But
goodbye Ancient Tomb and Chrome Max. Honestly, this doesn't surprise

(35:47):
me at all. Chrome mocks in an Ancient Tomb fall
into a similar category. Both are colorless mana accelerants that
cost no manna but ask you to pay some other
high polarity cost, either card or life. When you are
the proactive player, these costs are small relative to the
additional manna you gain, and it's easy to pull out
a win with your manna advantage. When you are being

(36:09):
attacked and are on the back foot, Ancient Tune becomes
unusable and you are suddenly down a land. Chromoks can
still be used in those situations, but is a uniquely
poor top deck and depending on your draw, can easily
be a blank card. Both cards can fit into any
deck and are those homogenizing, have unarrivaled efficiency, and are

(36:31):
highly sensitive to the game state. In the spirit of
keeping Brawn more casual, they are banned. I like both
of these cards kind of. I like decks that aren't green,
having access to mana acceleration, especially in Commander, where green
mana acceleration is incredibly important. In brawl as a one

(36:55):
v one format, I don't think we need these. I
think that they do make your deck better and you
feel like you have to run them because with the
right draw they just run away with the game. But
I can feel the pain of it every time I'm
planning a game plan around like this turn, my opponent
does this. The next turn they can play their commander,
So this turn is a window where I can do

(37:16):
X and Y, and then they drop an ancient two
or chromox and I'm like, well crap. Oh. And when
you're on the draw and they just go like chromc's
ancient two and they're that much man ahead, you just
don't want to play the game like these make sense. Honestly,
these bral bands make sense, and I do. It hurts
me a little to know that casual brawl is forever

(37:39):
and that competitive brawl or ranked bral is unlikely to
ever be a thing. We've been seeing the rank on
our brawl games, but we also know that rank's not
real and it's probably just a glitch. If they don't
introduce ranked bral even after these bands, like, if they
don't introduce ranked bral, I will be hurting because I

(38:00):
plan to get to mythic playing brawl and I was
very excited to do that because standard wasn't satisfying. It
hasn't been for a while. So these being banned I
think is a step in that direction, a little step
back from competitive brawl, which does bother me a bit.
They can still do it after these bands, but they
mentioned it being a safe, casual play format. That tells

(38:22):
me we probably won't get a rank. But what does
it hurt to add a rank? Man? What does it
hurt to add a rank? There's still always a play queue.
Come on. Note that these bands mark a new approach
towards our stewardship of brawl, and we intend to watch
and listen for community input as a situation continues to develop.
For example, the Brawl Metagame challenge we ran in early

(38:42):
October was an experiment that is helping us gauge interest
in a more competitive brawl space. I should have kept
treating that can be distinguished from the regular casual brawl queue.
We're excited to explore an understand player interest here and
see if the population is large enough to support a
viable game mode, it will be. Brawl has risen from
a complete afterthought, not even meant to be in the

(39:06):
game designed by somebody on their spare time, to the
second most played format on the platform and easily the
most fun format on the platform when you do need
a break from the redundant metagames of other formats. So
I do think like bral because of the way the
matchmaking works, the fact that you can choose your commander,

(39:27):
and once you get used to it, build your deck
in such a way that you play different cues, ensures
that you can or won't will or won't play against
certain commanders and experiences, almost like once you get used
to doing it, I know how to build my cloud
deck in a way that it will play against certain
commanders versus building cloud deck in a way that plays

(39:49):
against HELLQ. And you can choose do you feel spicy
today in your brawl endeavors or do you feel more
casual today in your brawl endeavors? If you queue up
with Ruscoe, you know what you're gonna get. So I
love that Brawl kind of has that controllable element of
what kind of experience do you want to play? Right? Now,
and you can build different commanders in different decks and

(40:11):
ways to kind of get that experience. Doesn't mean you
automatically win, but you know what you signed up for.
The rule zero to use commander terms is built into
the format, and that's why I didn't think you had
to ban these. But I do get it, I do
support it, and I'm glad that they're still exploring possible
ranked Bral play. Maybe they'll bring back the Bral Metagame challenge.

(40:33):
I was gone that weekend, which was really heartbreaking for
me because I did really want to try it and
I wanted to watch people try it online and I
had to work that weekend and just wasn't acceptable, Like
there was no way that I could like participate. So
hopefully it comes back and I get to do something
with that in the future, because I bet the Bral
Metagame Challenge was sweet. Let me know in the comments

(40:53):
if you won the Brawl Metagame Challenge and what you played.
I bet it had ancient tomb Chrommok's managerin and strip mine.
Maybe not managerin as a negative win rate, after all,
standard is standard back. I find this article disturbing, to
be honest. I appreciate that they're sharing I appreciate that

(41:17):
they mentioned that they caused pain like it does mean
something to me, and I do wish the best to
the designers. And this is gonna sign, this is gonna
sound critical. I want you to succeed. I want a
fun game. I there's been a lot of videos critical

(41:40):
of Magic, critical of Standard, critical of Universes Beyond, all
of this, and I hear all of it. I watch
all of it, and I haven't I you know, I
kind of stayed away from that because I felt like
other people said it said it well. I can see
that a lot of people watch and like those videos.
I read the comments on those videos, all of them,

(42:01):
whether it's Ashles'll having a rant about Standard or profs
video about Universes Beyond, and everybody like God, I know,
Jim the Command Zone, like everybody I follow, I'm gonna
forget names. Of course in Magic seems to have made
that video. And I've been chilling because honestly, I feel
like they said it best and I don't have anything

(42:23):
to add other than that just sounds like ranting and
belly aching. But at my core, I want Magic to
outlive me. I want it to be there for the
person who doesn't fit into the typical box as a
kid and has something else to do because it was
there for me, and I don't feel like I'll ever

(42:43):
pay that back. For those who don't know my long long,
long term like my way back when magic origin story,
the short version is I was the weirdo and it
made me. It gave me something I was good at.
It gave me a new confidence and a new like
like I found my place, you know, I found what
I was good at, and I went from me and

(43:04):
somebody who frankly didn't want to get up in the
morning to somebody who could go out there and do
things with confidence and you know, learn a bit of
self confidence. And I feel like that gift is invaluable
because not everybody has something that they just find early
in life that clicks with them, or parents that give
that to them. In the case of my parents, they

(43:26):
gave me love, but like they would have been much
more impressed with me if I was good at sports, right,
So they didn't quite get magic for the most part.
My mom was super supportive once I found it, but
like they didn't know to go find magic for me.
I had to find it myself. And if magic didn't exist.
I don't know what would have happened. Like you could
say it would be chess or another card game, but
I tried those things and it didn't click the same way.

(43:49):
I want magic to be here when I'm gone, for
the kid like me who couldn't find their place. I
want that kid to have self confidence. So that's my mission,
and just ranting about how bad things are doesn't get
that job done. But when it comes to this article,
I'm the passion I have that that turns into frustration
when I read this, When I read about what happens

(44:11):
in standard, I touched on it. I'll just say it again,
the idea that they created a three year standard and
then just didn't test anything into the future. When it's
just it feels simple. It feels simple. I'm I'm it
might you can point out why it's harder, why it's
a hard job and such, but it feels simple to

(44:32):
test out a card like pross identic memory with discard
draw cards when they're printing them in every set. I
swear you can look at the list of cards in
this set that work with idetic memory at a cheap rate,
from the new Sphinx to the Light Shatter, Legend Card,

(44:53):
the Quantum Riddler, like all this stuff right, fear of
missing out and you're like, they didn't test that. Agatha's
Soul Cauldron and VV aren't that far apart. Those would
have been in standard together if it were still a
two year rotation, along with the cards I just mentioned
for prosidetic memory, they didn't find that. Do they play

(45:20):
that format? Do they play prosidetic memory once Murders is out?
And the idea here is that no, no, they don't.
I feel like Up the Beanstalk in Overlord of the
Hauntwoods was the most obvious one two punch, and this
article makes me think they didn't try that. They forgot
about Up the bean Stalk a month after it came out.

(45:41):
And you know what, I don't even blame them that
much because the release schedule is crazy. I mean, back
in the day, four sets a year, all of them
were standard legal, but it was still only four sets
a year, like look look at the year prior, look
at the year coming up, like Foundations was a standard
set out of nowhere that a lot of people didn't

(46:02):
even expect it. It's legal for five years. Do you
think they've tested cards for the last five years against foundations.
I hope so. But they already had to ban a
card a Boilo's Awakening because of its interaction with omniscience.
I mean, is the COMA deck just gonna take off
and now we have to ban coma. I don't know. Man,

(46:24):
it looks bad. It looks so bad. It feels so
bad that they create these mega environments with more sets
and more years of legality because they think it will
be good for sales, and then they just can't. They
don't find interactions even though they're tied to cards that

(46:45):
would just repeat it there repeatedly printing fear of missing
out type cards, steam course scholars type cards. But they
didn't think about what that would do. And it's it's
like they did say the lessons. Maybe they'll stop doing
that in the future. I hope they do. I hope so.
I hope. So. It's a frustrating article, but it's been

(47:06):
a frustrating standard. Here's what I applaud. I applaud them
kind of sharing that, sharing those shortcomings. It does create
a sense of accountability and hope for the future, so
thank you. It also opens them up to criticism like
this of a frustrated nerd like me on the internet
just going off, and you know that is a bullet.

(47:29):
That is a bullet they take. That sucks. And that's
probably why in the past when we would get band announcements,
we get much shorter articles. Right, Screaming Nemesis, I mean
you heard me rant about this, like, guys, why are
we taking the only weaknesses a deck has and just
making sure it has no weaknesses? Like what are we

(47:49):
doing anyway? Good to see Screaming Nemesis gone. Good to
see VV gone. Good to see identic memory gone. Good
of them to identify adetic memory was the problem. I
think that some people were afraid that wouldn't happen, and
we're going to go find the next sidetic memory or
up the bean Stalk that was a cool card when
it came out, but didn't get tested after that, And

(48:10):
that is how you find designs mistakes at this point
until they shore it up, is the way. As for
the metagame, a standard, will it be good? I mean
Red takes a step back, but they'll probably still be
a good Red deck. There always is. You know, you
take Screaming Nemesis out of the deck, and we don't
have a l a line in best of one Best
of one, Red is weaker, and that is a good thing.

(48:32):
That is a good thing one hundred percent because it's
always been the most played, highest win rate deck. It
feels like now the life gain decks are going to
give it a serious hard time. And life gain has
been a popular strategy in best of one, so those
will do well. The decks I'm watching land of Ar
elf decks, These decks have a real shot now if
Red isn't just picking their stuff off and running them

(48:52):
into the ground, the Laniar elves of the environment are
going to continue to get better, and we'll see how
that trans into a powerful green deck. Can we actually
get a meta defining green deck that plays creatures? Is
the Kona Omniscience deck good enough? Now? I don't think
that the Red deck has slowed down enough for that

(49:12):
to be true. I think that those kind of strategies
are still going to struggle. But I think now you
can play a big creature like a four or five
for three and the Red deck has to look at
it like crap, I've got problems. I have to adjust
my playoff to run which soccer frenzy or scorching shot,
so I can't run like twenty burn spells and that's it,
and I think that that's good. I think that's interesting.

(49:35):
But there are definitely the Demure deck was not hit
at all. Demure mid Range is a very good deck
before the ban and after, and will probably be played.
It was one of the few decks that saw a
good amount of play in best of three, even with
vv in the environment, So I think Demere mid Range
will be very popular in best of three, and in

(49:55):
best of one it gets a little better because like
just any hits to the red deck make a min
range deck a little better. But in best of one
it's still hard to be midrange. It's a very polarized format.
You're either hard control or your hard agro usually to
make a best of one deck good. I mean, my
beloved Blue White Control only improves. Every dragon in the
format improved from this experience. Nova hell Kite is a

(50:17):
go to now with Screaming Nemesis gone. It was already
a four of but decks that we're just considering it
or holding out on crafting it will probably pick it
up now, and every deck in the format that wants
to live past turn four, it's a little better chance
without screaming nemesis. So is it a good standard environment?
We will find out. Let me know in the comments.

(50:38):
This has been a fun video. I've been talking for
fifty minutes. This is a cover go podcast by myself.
The guest is me CGB. What is the next great
standard deck? As for brawl, I don't think these change
the brawl meta. They just make every deck now has
spots to be a little more interesting, and the openers

(50:59):
are less busted. So overall, I think brawl will continue
to be fun. I don't need to know what the
new brawl meta is. I think this doesn't change it.
But in Standard obviously no VV, no prosidetic memory is
it might finally take a breather, finally after a hell
of a year that saw Corey steel Cutter and Monstrous

(51:21):
Rage and VV and Prosidetic Memory all banned. Maybe is
it takes a breather? Anyway, Let's go play some Standard.
Let's go check out some brawl. I still love Magic.
I enjoy playing Magic. I'm glad they released the article.
Even if it's a painful read, and if this was
in some ways a painful listen to you sometimes pain
is a part of life. It can be cathartic and

(51:43):
help with moving on. It doesn't have to be the
end of the world, and it doesn't have to just
be ragy Twitter posts and Reddit posts until the end
of time. We can experience pain and we can move
on and grow from it. It is possible. Thank you
for listening. As always, my friends, You're cool.