The Year in Vintage: 2008

[Spiderman]

Here

I thought this was interesting and probably to Oversoul and 13NoVa as well, primarily. Not much mention of the impact of the Vault, aside from that Tezzerrat is definitely being used with it. But it seemed like it didn't win in the months that it was available? But not sure if the author just picked and chose the Vintage tourney reports or if that was all there was during those months.

Interesting just to see the general ebb and flow of the Vintage metagame as sets are released and the B/R list gets updated.

 

[Oversoul]

Not much mention of the impact of the Vault, aside from that Tezzerrat is definitely being used with it.

Scroll to the "November" section. I think it gets quite a mention.

But it seemed like it didn't win in the months that it was available?

Are you saying that because the example decklist was only "piloted to a Finals split..." or something? I think that was just because it was a decklist he liked and that exemplified the archetype. It has won.

Edit: I'm sure I can find an example of a 1st place finish for Tezzeret later if you'd like, but I have to go to work now.

But not sure if the author just picked and chose the Vintage tourney reports or if that was all there was during those months.

He picked and chose in order to highlight the shifting of the format across the entire year. No one would be crazy enough to try to include information about every single Vintage tournament in all of 2008. Notice that he didn't even provide comprehensive information for the ones he did mention. Typically it was just a single decklist that placed. This was about emergent and/or evolving decks and not exhaustive statistics. He's done the same thing for the past few years. I caught the last three (2005, 2006, 2007) and kind of forgot about it this time, but thankfully you reminded me.

Edit: Also, since this article reminded me, I dismissed Ad Nauseum offhand when I initially saw it. I forget if I did so here, but I definitely did so elsewhere. Man, that was stupid. It's an amazing card.

 

[Spiderman]

I did read all of it, but the November section didn't convey quite the sense that it was an overwhelming deck, if that was the intent. In addition, from 13NoVa's comment in the Single Card Strategies thread, at least in his area, Tezzeret doesn't seem to be an overwhelming archtype.

I just figured being the year in review, even if the author only used one decklist as an example and one tourney result, something would have been said to the effect that "Vault-Tezzeret became the deck to watch out for", kinda like that mention of the one deck that used that white? card that was overlooked when Shadowmoor was released. Yeah, the deck won, no problem since there's probably lots of tournaments going on, but there just wasn't a sense that it was dominant. It rose up through the ranks, sure, but again, it just didn't seem to be a deck to beat or that everyone was playing (either with or against).

 

[Oversoul]

Well, I mean, that's accurate. He put it as: "Although Storm combo, currently represented by TPS and Ad Nauseam, might actually be the best deck in Vintage at the moment, decks like this are simply irresistible to Vintage pilots. Mana Drains are currently far and away the most populous engine in Vintage with well over 40% of Top 8s sporting the counterspell, dwarfing the proportion of Gush decks in the metagame at the start of the year." And that's exactly my impression too. Tezzeret isn't dominating and I don't know who said it was. It's just a good deck. I don't know who said that it was dominant, but it isn't. There are several other decks that are just as viable.

 

[Spiderman]

No one has said it was a dominant deck. The article was merely reinforcing what I've thought since the Tezzeret thread was posted in Single Card Strategies. The only comments about Tezzeret there that mention any type of "dominance" is 13NoVa's comment from back in October that Tezzeret was "broken as hell" and your comment later on about Vintage being the "format with the now broken Time Vault", which you actually didn't really fully explain now that I read it over again.

If someone using the term "broken", usually that means that the deck is pretty dominant/overwhelming/nothing-can-stop-it-so-everyone's-playing-with-it-or-against-it. So at some point you and 13NoVa thought it (although it could just be in 13NoVa's local metagame since he's actually played in a tourney where it made some appearances) but have seem to have backed off.

In other words, early fears that the Vault combo would be overwhelming due to the new wording seems to have been unfounded.

 

[Oversoul]

If someone using the term "broken", usually that means that the deck is pretty dominant/overwhelming/nothing-can-stop-it-so-everyone's-playing-with-it-or-against-it.

I called Time Vault broken. Time Vault is not a deck. WotC rightly restricted Time Vault before the latest erratum because they knew it would be broken too. It should have been obvious.

So at some point you and 13NoVa thought it (although it could just be in 13NoVa's local metagame since he's actually played in a tourney where it made some appearances) but have seem to have backed off.

No, I don't think I backed off anything.

In other words, early fears that the Vault combo would be overwhelming due to the new wording seems to have been unfounded.

I don't recall anyone actually having these fears.

 

[Spiderman]

<shrug> Calling a card "broken" doesn't really mean anything unless the card's in a deck. Given the context of the thread, no one was simply talking about the card just by itself, but in a deck. Therefore, any mention of "broken" seemed to be in context of a deck including the Vault.

You may not have intended it that way, but that's the way it came across.

I don't recall anyone actually having these fears.

That was pretty much the whole point of the Tezzeret thread and why it was even posted.

 

[Oversoul]

<shrug> Calling a card "broken" doesn't really mean anything unless the card's in a deck. Given the context of the thread, no one was simply talking about the card just by itself, but in a deck. Therefore, any mention of "broken" seemed to be in context of a deck including the Vault.

You may not have intended it that way, but that's the way it came across.

While I don't know the etymology of this peculiar usage of "broken" we use to describe cards, it seems be used to mean "overpowered." Wiktionary has a "sports and gaming" definition for broken that reads...

A single tactic or option which is powerful enough to be considered overpowered.

And being overpowered is the main reason cards are restricted. Some cards in Vintage that are restricted aren't really used, but would dominate if unrestricted, and I think those are commonly thought of as "broken." Channel, for example, is a card most players would call broken. Actually, I'll go a step further and say that if you'd say Channel isn't broken, then we really don't seem to mean the same thing when using the same word, but I hear my understanding of it all the time, and not just in Magic. I'd call almost everything on the restricted list broken.

That was pretty much the whole point of the Tezzeret thread and why it was even posted.

Actually, when that thread started, the person who created it (BigBlue) was unaware that Time Vault was changed again, hence my "Time Vault = win" post and the subsequent confusion until I linked to it and you yourself simplified it as "So basically, the Voltaic Key and Time Vault combo is back." So Time Vault had nothing to do with the thread being posted. The topic of Time Vault did quickly take over the discussion, though.

 

[Spiderman]

But the reason WHY a card is overpowered is because it's in a deck and interacting with other cards.


You're right about why BigBlue started the thread.

The topic of Time Vault did quickly take over the discussion, though.

Very quickly, as in the second post. Hence my assumption that it was the cause of the thread

 

[Oversoul]

But the reason WHY a card is overpowered is because it's in a deck and interacting with other cards.

But if it's banned or restricted, then it's not necessarily going to appear in a deck at all. Hence the example of Channel. Only being available as a one-of means that all the cards that would normally combo with Channel can only do so if you happen to draw into it or have some way of searching for it.

Haven't you seen people refer to restricted cards as broken? This principle applies, to some extent, to just about everything on the restricted list (except for cards that arguably shouldn't be there). Even something like Black Lotus that's used in virtually every deck is thrown in as an accelerator. People aren't usually depending on drawing it and it's just there to speed the strategy they're actually using up when it is drawn into. Restricting a card might stop it from being used to make a single deck dominant, but I wouldn't say this means the card is now "fixed" or no longer broken. It's just restricted. Maybe you would say that it's fixed. But I think there's an important distinction, even if it probably is only academic...

 

[Spiderman]

I agree, but again, it's how the cards are used in a deck. Black Lotus is fast, free, and plentiful mana. No one's arguing that one by itself is going to break a deck, but if it was unrestricted? The chances of drawing into one suddenly increase by however much and that in turn fuels whatever deck that takes advantage of fast mana. Same with the Moxes and other free mana, to whatever extent.

Some cards made a deck dominant during their time and newer cards might have caused that deck to become obsolete, others get their wording changed - different things might happen to cause a card to be removed from the list or added later on. It's because of how cards interact with each other and decks are continually created. There's no single "I win" card where upon drawing it, you win immediately. THAT would be a broken card by itself

 

[BigBlue]

OS is correct that I didn't know about the TV interaction... I just thought in general having the ability to Tutor every turn (albeit for artifacts) is just sick... Inclusion of him in any artifact deck would seem fundamental. His other abilities are equally grotesque...

I will of course caveat all of this with the fact that I've never playtested w/ him etc, so perhaps it looks better on paper than it actually functions.

 

[Oversoul]

I agree, but again, it's how the cards are used in a deck. Black Lotus is fast, free, and plentiful mana. No one's arguing that one by itself is going to break a deck, but if it was unrestricted? The chances of drawing into one suddenly increase by however much and that in turn fuels whatever deck that takes advantage of fast mana. Same with the Moxes and other free mana, to whatever extent.

This is true, but seems pretty unrelated to what I was saying or really more like expounding on what I was saying. I'm not talking about decks being broken, I'm talking about individual cards being broken. And in my experience, a broken card that is banned or restricted is still referred to as broken. In the case of a restriction, it might be used as a one of or it might not. In the case of a ban, it obviously can't be used at all. It's like...

A: So we're building decks for Legacy.
B: Yeah, here's the banned list.
A: I can't use Necropotence?
B: Yeah.
A: Why not?
C: Because Necropotence is broken, NOOB!
B: He means because Necropotence is too overpowered.
A: Oh. Really?
B: Yes, really.
C: Here, I'll show you. Grab one of your stupid decks and prepare to be violated.

Does that seem like a reasonable usage of "broken"? Or should it be more like this?

A: So we're building decks for Legacy?
B: Yeah, here's the banned list.
A: I can't use Necropotence?
B: Yeah.
A: Why not?
C: Because Necropotence is broken, NOOB!
B: Technically, Necropotence can't be broken because it's banned. In order for something to be broken in a format, it has to create a dominant deck. Necropotence can't go into any deck beause it's banned. It WOULD be broken, but banning it stops it from being broken.
C: No, it's still broken. Within the set of broken cards, there's a subset of cards that are banned. The cards themselves remain as they were. They didn't change and are therefore still broken. But they are banned, so this brokenness is kept in check by tournament rules.
B: That can't be right because different cards are broken in different formats. And all of those formats have different rules. Squandered Resources is banned in Mirage Block Constructed, but no one uses it in Legacy at all even though it's allowed. Would you say Squandered Resources is broken?
A: What's Squandered Resources?
C: Shut up, noob. Squandered Resources is broken in Mirage Block Constructed, but not broken in Legacy because Legacy has a much larger cardpool. You know this.
B: So if what's broken necessarily depends on the format in question, then the banned lists for formats also apply. Cards don't exist in a vacuum. A card can only be broken in a format if it's allowed in the format. Necropotence isn't broken in Mirage Block Constructed because it isn't allowed there. Same with Legacy. It isn't allowed, so it can't be broken.
C: Necropotence is part of Legacy though. It's on the banned list. It could, hypothetically, be unbanned. It couldn't be "unbanned" from Mirage Block Constructed because it isn't on the banned list. It's not printed in the cardpool available to that format. It's not a part of the format. In Legacy, it is available in the cardpool, but banned. It's banned because it's broken.
B: It's not broken precisely because it's banned...
A: You're both crazy. I'm going to go play Yu-Gi-Oh.
B: Look what you did!
C: Me? Look what YOU did.
...
Four hours later, B & C are still arguing.

 

[Spiderman]

Good lord. You spent your time writing *that*? Which one of us is B and C?

The first is what's commonly used as shorthand for the second, if what I understand from those two samples is correct. Necro isn't broken by itself; you can't just throw it in any and every black deck in whatever format it's legal in and expect to win. It interacts with other cards in the deck to make it win.

Otherwise, you come back to the "I win" card.

 

[Oversoul]

Good lord. You spent your time writing *that*? Which one of us is B and C?

I was bored. I guess technically I would be C, although I'd like to think I'm not quite as much of a jerk as that...

The first is what's commonly used as shorthand for the second, if what I understand from those two samples is correct. Necro isn't broken by itself; you can't just throw it in any and every black deck in whatever format it's legal in and expect to win. It interacts with other cards in the deck to make it win.

But every card, except Dryad Arbor, must interact with other cards in order to win. It's understood that cards don't REALLY win all by themselves. They need help.

 

[Spiderman]

Exactly. Which is what I've been saying all this time...

 

[Oversoul]

But it just seems so obvious. No one, at any point, claimed that cards are broken without any other cards at all to interact with. It's just common sense that this isn't the case. How is it worth noting?

 

[Spiderman]

Actually, you yourself called Time Vault, a single card, broken in post #6 of this thread, which led to this whole discussion. No mention of any interactions with any other cards - you go on to further wiki the term broken and try to use other example of single cards. So it must not have been obvious from the start to you

Anyway, it seems we agree now...

 

[Oversoul]

Actually, you yourself called Time Vault, a single card, broken in post #6 of this thread, which led to this whole discussion. No mention of any interactions with any other cards - you go on to further wiki the term broken and try to use other example of single cards. So it must not have been obvious from the start to you

Anyway, it seems we agree now...

Come on, Spidey. You know it's not like that. I did call Time Vault broken and I still do. People call cards broken all the time without specifying the exact circumstances under which those cards are broken. They don't say, "Yawgmoth's Will is broken as long as you have a deck with cheap spells and mana acceleration and enough of that deck in your graveyard, where 'enough' in this case means..."

You're pushing this into the domain of the absurd. Time Vault is broken. The errata over the years have kept that from being true, but now it's broken again. It was preemptively banned in Legacy and restricted in Vintage precisely because of this. I don't consider this to mean that it's no longer broken. Just banned/restricted. If you disagree, then fine. The term "broken" did not evolve to distinguish between things that are overpowered but kept from actually dominating by bans/restrictions and those that are overpowered and not restricted in any way. This idea of a total vacuum in which no card is broken but interactions between cards potentially are would be cumbersome and silly. With that focus, instead of banning cards, we'd ban certain interactions.

 

[Spiderman]

Dude, that's what your sample conversations boiled down to.

Time Vault is NOT broken by itself. Taking an extra turn is fine. It's when it's combined with certain *other* cards that get around its inherent restriction that make the *combo* broken. That's what I've always said.

And yes, the whole B/R list is pretty much banning/restricting interactions.

And sure, you can say there's people who say a single card is broken without correcting them, but that's just not correct. The game might have evolved into that shorthand and might be accepted, but when it comes down to it and when you're discussing it as strenuously as you have, then the true distinction comes out.