blue

[seveninchcowboy]

AHHH!!! how could blue even be #2 on the favorite magic color vote. I hate blue; it's the worst color ever made. and you know why? one word: counterspell. the card that started blue. Since that card WOTC continued to make cards that just made blue into the four year old that always gets what it wants. i dunno maybe it's jus the environment that i play in i.e. when an island hits the table on the first tun, everyone gets real aggressive, real fast, but i jus don't like it. So all you and anti-blue, or at least non-blue players, unite against it and vote for your favorite non-blue color and show everybody jus how much you hate blue

 

[Multani]

Tag Guard

Blue ROCKS!
Green is nice too, but it's not as powerful as blue.
Counterspell decks are actually very phychological decks.
The moment people think of counterspells, they think that none of their spells will get through.
Blue is not as "denying" as most people think.
Trust me. I play counter decks.
It's impossible to counter every spell.
Also, counter blue does fairly poor in multiplayer.
You just can't stop that many people.
Of course, counterburn is another story.
You can burn someone, and counter someone and get two people pissed off at you.
In duels, blue is at it's best. It can concentrate on one person. It has the potential to defeat any deck. (Yes, even Replenish. )
However, it still loses to extremely fast decks. (Like Stompy and Rebel.)
The point is....
BLUE ROCKS!!!

 

[Y The Alien]

Tag Guard

Blue is the only thing stopping cheesy combo decks from ruining my favorite game. (Well, except Tolarian Blue ). Blue makes you design your decks with more strategy, not to rely on a few cards, to diversify your threats and play smart, like baiting out counterspells. Blue keeps all the other decks in check. Blue is the moderator of Magic. Blue is the even color, able to beat anything else, with the proper tuning.

 

[Seeker of Truth]

Multani:

I guess it's just the whole "mind games" aspect of blue decks that make them firstly, an annoyance to play against, and secondly, very frustrating to lose to. A well-tuned blue deck can stop all the serious cards from hitting the table, and the prospect of always asking "are you going to counter that?" makes blue a major annoyance, and losing to blue, especially at the hands of some card like Morphling or Mahamoti Djinn (in the old days) is frustrating because of the fact that, if the blue deck is played right, there will be many turns where the opponent won't be able to do anything useful.

The fact that blue isn't too good at multiplayer also seems to raise a big question as to why blue is so many people's favorite color. Multiplayer seems to be a foundation of casual play, and blue is definitely a "non-casual" color, so that's an interesting commentary on the position of the people who voted on the topic.

Y The Alien:

How can you say that blue is saving Magic from combo decks when it finds its way into so many combo decks? Extended was ruined this past season because of Donate and Illusions of Grandeur (or was it Delusions of Mediocrity?), and not too long ago, there were tons of mana engine decks that focused on Stroke of Genius as its kill card (which never made sense in a real-life setting; I get a stroke of genius, and I die?). Let's not forget Turbo-Stasis of a couple years back, either. Blue has been a focal point of combos and combo decks for a long time, all the way back to the beginning, when Mana Drain/Mahamoti Djinn was popular.

As for the idea that blue beats everything else if played properly, that is probably the reason why people don't like blue. In a game where no one color is supposed to be able to beat everything else, blue finds that it can, if played properly. Green can't win against everything, as its creature-heavy strategy loses to dedicated control (blue or black). White is strong, but it loses out to faster strategies or land denial(green, black or red). Red is good at resource denial and some speed, but some strategies don't require too much land, and control can slow it down considerably (green and blue). Black's combos are fast, but there is still the ability for other dedicated decks to overrun those combos (green and white). Blue, on the other hand, while it has its weaknesses, has the all-powerful answer, "I'll counter that." Sure, you can't counter everything, but if you counter the four creatures your opponent had in his opening hand, why would you need to counter Wild Might or Vitalizing Wind? What you called the "moderator" actually is the first sign of dominance of blue. The fact that it can beat anything if played correctly demonstrates its unfairness.

I don't hate blue (I'm making a blue deck right now, as a matter of fact), but I think it's very easy to see why so many people at least dislike blue, and I'm also very shocked to see blue with so many supporters for favorite Magic color.

 

[Spiderman]

Hmm, Seeker, I'll agree with your analysis of everything you said EXCEPT for your last sentence where you're "shocked to see blue have so many supporters". My question is, why not? Let's take the reasoning a bit further:

If blue always wins when PLAYED properly, why doesn't everyone play it? I would guess the answer is people have not grasped it yet. If they have and it were easy, all you would see are blue decks (kind of like the "Dojo effect").

So perhaps people like the complexity blue offers, more so than the rest of the colors.

Now all this is based on the assumption that blue wins everything. I would postulate that every deck is a thinking game, from "mindless burn" to creature swarms. Every deck can win, the chance factor of deck shuffling notwithstanding.

The opinions of the vote just give a glimpse to a person's playing style, which control seems to be the majority right now. Why this should be "shocking" I haven't the faintest idea. It might be frustrating to play against, but that's no reason to "comdemn" blue's popularity.

Disclaimer: I recognize this is an opinion replying to an opinion.

"Personally, I voted Red myself because it's my favorite color in life and the one that I started out with "

 

[theorgg]

To the stroke of genious question-- you have SUCH a brilliant idea that was so simple, you hit yourself on the forhead waaaayy to hard and bash in your head.

at least that's what I always imagined happened.

 

[Y The Alien]

Tag Guard

I was referring to heavy blue control, not combo-cheese-crap side of blue. Every color has that side. Yes, the fact that blue can beat everything probably IS the reason people don't like it. But who likes losing? But the assumption that blue can beat "everything else" is totally false.

There is no "dominant color" or, in reality a "dominant deck". There are decks that can rip Blue to shreds. Stompy, for instance, has SO many threats that it is impossible for blue to counter them all. Rebels, while another quickly-becoming-overused decktype, can drop a 1st turn Ramosian Sergeant, and pump out a friggin army, and blue can do nothing about it. Blue can handle just about everything, yes. So can heavy black discard. Why ask "can I play this" when you have no hand? Unmask, Duress, Ostracize, Stupor, Flay... all these are like pre-played Counterspells. Stupor stops two cards from ever being played. Counterspell stops one. Unmask stops a spell for free. Is that so abusive and broken? I haven't seen anyone complaining about black never being able to be beaten. Red burn, with a good draw, can rip blue's heart out. Especially the Hammer of Bogarden. Got infinite counters? No? Oh, then I guess I'll have to beat you to death then. Now, I just descrobed four widly played decks that can all beat blue. Discard (by removing blue's few "threat cards"), Burn (by having reusable threats and a huge number of them), Stompy (again, the huge number of threats) and Rebel (uncounterable searching effects). Blue CONTROL does indeed keep combo from running over everything. Nothing like Counterspelling the game winning Replenish or Soul Feast. Just because you don't like how blue wins doesn't mean it is a bad color. It wins through being smart, and thinking reactively, as opposed to (ironically) some of the decks I mentioned above (cough Stompy cough). However, both of those playing types stand an equal chance of winning.

Blue still rules.

 

[Istanbul]

No, discard is NOT like countermagic.
It's all (okay, almost all) sorceries.

I can draw a card and play it before you can force me to discard it; in effect, if I have no cards in my hand during your turn, your hand destruction is basically useless so long as I can cast whatever I draw.

 

[Y The Alien]

Tag Guard

There really isn't much discard instant, is there? Greel (and he's pretty crappy) and.... anything else? Guess I'll have to put some LD to make sure you never play anything.

 

[Apollo]

Note: Funeral Charm is an instant.

Anyway, this was a rant, like the message board page says should go in this section. He probably just lost to a blue deck. Everybody's getting pretty defensive of blue, and he was just saying he didn't like it.

I don't like blue either.

But that doesn't matter, I know it's just my opinion, and other people have other playing styles.

Apollo

 

[Spiderman]

Hey, I realize this is where you put rants. But if you intend that no one should reply to it you should say so; otherwise, if you DO expect a reply and don't get one because everyone sees that you're just "ranting", you might end up feeling like FadingInsomniac and wonder why no one's replying to your posts.

I also realize he might have just lost to a blue deck. I just feel lashing out at a color and backed by his perception of it needed to be addressed and replied with "the opposite side". It's all opinion vs. opinion, but if you don't hear what the other guy has to say, then how do you grow?

 

[seveninchcowboy]

guess i didn't get around to replying to my own post. well you all present decent points as to why blue is an ok color but i still hate it and you can't change that. As to blue being more complex: i guess i'll accept that although all complexity that comes out of it is based on no i don't want you to do that cards. And you're right, in multiplayer(at least where I play) blue does not stand to much of a chance. As i said before we kill whoever has islands .

I chose black myself jus' cause it's what i started with and it's always more fun to kill yourself while killing your opponent(s). And Spirits of the Night are just really cool.

 

[Multani]

Tag Guard

My counterburn is probably fast enough to take down at least one player if everyone turns on me in a multi. Also I'll be able to hurt another player severely. Then I'd probably die.

 

[Ura]

blue can do pretty good in group games, just don't depend on countering everything same as red can't depend on burning everything, it'll die from gang beating. I had a blue deck with a slight touch of green for veteran explorers and gaia's blessings that could deck entire group games infinatly on 3rd turn if it came out right. Yes I know thats cheesy as hell, but it proves blue can handle itself in the masses.

 

[Duel]

In every type, there will be accelerated blue control there. It is with stompy in the eternally existing deck type. That is why blue rocks.

 

[Gizmo]

I wouldn`t want to play Magic without blue in the game - it`s this diversity of strategy that makes M:tG better than L5R of Battletech. Blue can be irritating bcause it IS a different threat to your deck, and it CAN beat you senseless in a dull way, but at the same time it an also lose really badly to faster decks. Once you learn to play against blue you won`t feel so badly about it.

And Countermagic is more powerful than Discard because:
a) as Istanbul said, discard cannot stop topdecking.
b) Discard is where you pay mana (For the Hymn, Unmask etc) but they are then free to cast another spell on their turn, whereas Counntermagic is where they pay for the spell and you then stop it, they cannot then go on to cast a different spell because they had to pay for the one you countered. THAT is a big difference as well. Discard removes options, but Countermagic removes the window of opportunity as well.
If you wanted to kill blue you would print cards like:

Pygmy Scragnoth
G1
If Pygmy Scragnoth is countered you may untap two lands.
2/2

 

[Seeker of Truth]

Gizmo:

Not to nitpick or anything, but even once you learn how to play against blue, and you know you're facing counterspells or bouncing or something like that, isn't it still frustrating to play against that? I don't know, I guess I don't know how to play against blue, but most of the blue decks I've seen I would consider quite frustrating to play against (including my own, which I'm currently working on, shameless hypocrite that I am).

 

[Cateran Overlord]

I agree that blue is very frustrating to play against, but so is black. I long since realized that blue and black are what have kept everyone from taking the final plunge to cheesy combo town. Black is much more aggressive than blue, but the fact remains that a discard spell is really just a preemptive counterspell. True, you're tapping your mana to stop them, but now they can't play that on their next turn, which is basically the same thing as you keeping mana open to counter it. These are what are keeping Bargain and Replenish in check once again, as they are both hard pressed to stop blue countermagic and black discard. Ultimately, it comes down to this: every color is frustrating to play against, and every color keeps another in check. It doesn't go how the colors say it should, it goes with allies keeping each other in check. It ends up being:

Black is countered by Red which is countered by Green which is countered by White which is countered Blue which is countered by Black.

This doesn't always work, but this is the classic model I've always used based on the themes of each color. Think on this before you respond.

 

[Gizmo]

Seeker Of Truth:
When you get to a top level of playing the blue counter decks are no more frustrating than the red burn decks or the wierd combo decks or the fattie/geddon decks - when they work you lose without being able to fight back. All good decks are just as frustrating in a good player vs good player matchup because they are designed to be winners. In these games both players know each other`s decks and how they should best go about beating them, they also know, long before the final whistle has sounded, who is going to win the game.
The difference is that it is far harder to develop an anti-blue playstyle than it is the others as blue falls less easily to hosers and the like because Counterspell stops everything - there are few ready-made spoilers (Scragnoth was one, Pyroblast another).

When I sit down aginst blue I know I have a window of opportunity up to and until the card advantage engine kicks in, until then you have the edge if you play correctly. We always used to concede to Whispers-Buyback, now we concede to Stroke or Masticore. The key factor against blue is determining when the vital resource moves from being mana available to cards available, and then using that information to plan the correct time for your attack.

Cateran Overlord:
No, you are wrong.
The fact that the Counterspell takes up your opponent`s main phase is of key importance in a denial strategy. A discard spell is NOT just a pro-active counterspell, because if your opponent has two threats it only stops one of them, but the other still happens that turn.
Zur`s Wierding is a pro-active counterspell because they skip their draw, on the other hand Wand Of Denial isn`t because they still get another card.

"These are what are keeping Bargain and Replenish in check once again, as they are both hard pressed to stop blue countermagic and black discard."

No, Stampy is keeping Bargain in check, and discard is terrible against Replenish because they simply Tutor stuff to the top of their library, where discard cannot touch it.
Bargain is kept in check by being terrible, and Replenish by the HUGE amount of hate it faces in the current metagame, not by specific decks. In actual fact one of Replenish`s easiest matches is the blue one, and Bargain goes about 40% against it as well.

 

[Istanbul]

(Nobody EVER uses this on me, thank god...)

I go first.
Turn 1, Mountain. Go.
Your turn, Island, Go.
Turn 2, Mountain, tap out, cast Scald. Watch my opponent groan.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. You can either take damage from what I do, or counter it and still take damage from the mana you tap.