Introducing the Core Format!
General forum
Posted on July 24, 2014, 6:22 a.m. by Dorotheus
Now with M15 released there are a bunch more cards being passed around, a lot of them are new and some of them are reprints like Chord of Calling
.
With this release we would like to introduce the Core Format. It consists of all the cards from Fourth Edition through Magic 2015 and all future core sets.
Its been determined that the best we can tell is that is that it is actually a very healthy and diverse pool with cards that are playing together than have never seen play together before. Like any format some thing in the overall game are either physically broken, or outdated so a ban list will be introduced. The current total card pool is 2186 cards and will grow each summer with the new released of Core sets.
Banned:
Tempest Efreet
, Rebirth
, Bronze Tablet
, Balance
Mana Vault
, Mind Twist
, Flash
Watch List/Being Considered:
Necropotence
, Mystical Tutor
, Goblin Recruiter
, Channel
, Black Vise
, Ponder
, Preordain
, Seething Song
If you think some of these cards are too weak to be considered banned or there are other cards or the ones listed should definitely be banned, please say so, and give your reasoning!
(This is not official Wizards of the Coast or sanctioned, but we would like to work toward that direction with this idea).
fluffybunnypants says... #3
Hold on, let me brush off my old Necropotence deck.
July 24, 2014 7:28 a.m.
aeonstoremyliver says... #5
I concur with Zar.
And this does sound like a fun idea!
July 24, 2014 8:33 a.m.
DarkMagician says... #6
I suggest a renaming of the format to MtG: Heart of the Cards. It's fitting seeing as how core sets are the very heart (core) of the game. Plus it's a great pun with a decent sound to it.
July 24, 2014 9:47 a.m.
Goblin Recruiter is only good with Goblin Ringleader . Otherwise, he's a Worldly Tutor on a 1/1 body.
I'm also unsure about Seething Song , since core sets don't have Storm cards. Dark Ritual and Pyretic Ritual are available, but not Manamorphose or Desperate Ritual . I don't think it would need to be banned.
Necropotence absolutely needs to be banned. Otherwise, you end up with a bunch of decks that go turn one Dark Ritual -> Necropotence -> draw three cards -> turn two more Dark Ritual s -> play more shenanigans. Even if Black Vise isn't banned, you end up with a really overbearing deck.
Black Vise should probably go, as well. When it wasn't banned, just about every deck started with four copies of Black Vise just so they could get repeatable Lava Spike s every turn.
Channel is an absolute must. Turn two Channel -> Darksteel Colossus would become a regular thing.
Vampiric Tutor needs to be banned. Don't forget it was in Sixth. It enables a lot of combo decks to consistently find pieces. Or it allows control decks to find any answer. Or aggro decks to curve out. Or midrange to do whatever it wants. Basically, it becomes an automatic four-of in any deck and they simply splash black to play it.
Ponder , Preordain , Brainstorm , and Mystical Tutor should be watched closely. I think with all of the main combo pieces banned, they might could be fine.
July 24, 2014 6:47 p.m.
We want it to be a format, and we still want it to be competitive as well as a different style. We do still want balance.
This is just discussion to talk about those changes and updates before 'going live.'
Goblin Recruiter
will likely not be banned at all, and will be easily welcomed into the format.
Necropotence
, Black Vise
,and Channel
are the most likely to be banned and Necropotence itself, we are considering it to possibly be limited, but we'd rather a card be banned or not, similar to how Legacy and Modern are, it makes the format much more tangible to players.
July 24, 2014 8:54 p.m.
sylvannos, do you think you could Theory-craft that Channel
into the Darksteel Colossus
for me?
I need to see what other pieces for things like that also need to be examined.
July 24, 2014 8:56 p.m.
the3rdH0kage says... #10
@ Dorotheus you play Channel pay 11 life and then play Darksteel Colossus
July 24, 2014 9:54 p.m.
I'll be honest, I've never had the pleasure of playing with Channel, so I always just read it as if it leaves a lingering triggered ability for whenever you activate a mana ability pay 1 life, add 1.
So I absolutely understand that now, and with no FoW, or free-type of counterspell, that I've been made aware of right now, I believe that Channel will be banned.
July 24, 2014 10:16 p.m.
@Dorotheus: What the3rdH0kage. It basically reads:
You get an emblem with "Pay 1 life: Add 1 to your mana pool. At the beginning of the end step, sacrifice this emblem."
The reason it says "any time you could activate a mana ability" is because adding mana to your mana pool doesn't use the stack. You can't, for example, Shock an Elvish Mystic to prevent it from tapping for mana. In the case of Channel , you can't Stifle adding mana.
There's a reason it's banned in every format and restricted in Vintage. Even Channel -> Charcoal Diamond + Sky Diamond + Gilded Lotus and paying 7 life is ridiculous. Turn three, you'd have GGBU and 3 of any color available. If Necropotence isn't banned, play it off of the Gilded Lotus after you Channel .
July 24, 2014 11:10 p.m.
Yea I got it. I said I understood.
I know you can't respond to mana abilities, triggers could still happen due to a mana ability however, but that's irrelevant.
Channel will definitely be on that ban list.
Black Vise, Tempest Efreet, Rebirth, Bronze Tablet, Balance, Mana Vault, Mind Twist, Flash, Channel.
Now, is Necropotence
still too powerful, what are we digging for since there is no storm, is there still a turn one win, and can it be disrupted? Does that just make something like Pithing Needle
an appropriate punish?
July 24, 2014 11:22 p.m.
@Dorotheus: Necropotence is just raw card advantage. It's hard to beat once it's resolved. Aggro uses it so that it never runs out of gas. Control uses it so it never runs out of answers. Combo uses it to dig for combo pieces.
It's like Deathrite Shaman in Modern, or Strip Mine in Legacy. It may not win you the game right away, but it becomes a no-brainer, four-of, auto-include for multiple decks. I think Core Format would quickly be taken over by black decks where you'd see everyone playing Necropotence . It's even worse when you have no maximum hand size or your hand is empty. Then it hits Ancestral Recall -levels of card advantage.
July 25, 2014 4:39 a.m.
Seeing exactly what Necropotence
would enable is what interests me at this point. It doesn't appear that there is any combo it would enable viably. As soon as we can figure out what it enables then we can make a reasoned ban.
Then we'd have to consider Brainstorm
and Co. for the same reasons.
July 25, 2014 4:50 a.m.
The Core Format, as an easier way to show the banlist as it changes.
July 25, 2014 6:09 a.m.
@Dorotheus: These are the two I came up with:
The Pox deck would take a lot of fine tuning to be successful. I think a three-color control deck might be better, rather than Pox + Mutilate etc. It's really similar to the older Necropotence decks right after Black Vise got banned. 1-for-1 your opponent, refill your hand at the end of the turn, repeat until you Corrupt them to death.
The Suicide Black deck is what I'm scared of. Fast kills with serious draw power. Opponent hits you with Wrath of God ? No problem, draw back to seven and play your hand again. Opponent has too many creatures out? No problem, start digging for removal, fatties, or Bad Moon s. The only thing really holding the deck back is good one-drop creatures. Splashing red or white could fix this and make the deck problematic to deal with.
July 25, 2014 7:37 a.m.
aeonstoremyliver says... #18
Black Summer of 1996, I think it was, saw Necropotence decks reign. It definitely needs the ban hammer.
July 25, 2014 8:03 a.m.
Ok, I was really hoping that Necropotence
wouldn't be as bad now as it was then, but yea it is. It does create this scenario where if they have a Dark Ritual
and Necropotence
they can very very easily just lock you out of the game on turn two. This allows any color combination with black and focused on control, The Deck is usually a deck design that a format doesn't really want to see. This means that either Dark Ritual
or Necropotence
would be banned. If Dark Rit were banned then black blue would be The Deck and just control until they can play Necropo and then repeat as before without Rit and just basic control.
This does justify a ban Necropotence
.
Now I'm still looking for any combos that might be available within the format, but I am seeing a lot, lot, lot of mono-centered decks that might splash blue for Counterspell
, or white for Swords to Plowshares
.
July 25, 2014 2:34 p.m.
Yeah I'm excited for this! Looks like a really fun format.
The mana base isn't the best though. With no fetches, shocks, or duals, we're limited to pain lands, buddy lands, man lands, and stuff that comes into play tapped. There's also Tron, I might mess around building a deck.
Any ideas for what combo decks exist? Are mono-colored decks with a splash of a second color going to be the norm?
July 25, 2014 3:55 p.m.
It seems out of personal playtesting, that "devotion" for each color is very heavy since it is, in fact, Core sets. Then there is still a Red Deck Wins, and Tron. Color+x seems to be the simplest way to build. One of the testers made a Winter Lock deck, which was very powerful, but beatable. Reclamation Sage
is a very very powerful card since it is also an Elf. Goblin Recruiter
, gives you whatever lands your start with, and that you are guaranteed to drops every turn.
Any of the combos I've seen so far, are either not too viable (cute), or just poor. I am going to see if I can make an Elf-Ball style deck.
July 25, 2014 9:47 p.m.
sylvannos do you have access to Cockatrice? We need some playtesters that are willing. We also need more people to pull others in.
July 26, 2014 1:39 p.m.
aeonstoremyliver says... #23
I'll build a RDW and mayhap even a white weenie deck of Olde. I'll see what I can brew up.
July 26, 2014 2:56 p.m.
@Dorotheus: No, I don't. I do want to get into Un Tap.in. It's a browser-based client for MTG. They have all the pictures for cards loaded and you can load decks from TappedOut. It works just like MWS or Cockatrice. You can find it here.
July 26, 2014 3:26 p.m.
I had a meeting with some other players today that were interested in the idea. Notes from said meeting were that Strip Mine
was obviously powerful, Flash
was more akin to a legacy-like format but not influential enough, Winter Orb
has potential to be oppressive, and Crucible of Worlds
and Strip Mine
is oppressive but more because of each other and less as individual values.
Please, if anyone would like to add to that, I would be happy to just hear more educated in depth insight.
July 28, 2014 11:43 p.m.
I completely forgot Strip Mine was in fourth. That's an auto-ban, otherwise every deck starts with four copies and matches come down to who draws Strip Mine first.
Be wary of Flash . It's probably fine in a format without Protean Hulk , but it still combos with cards like Hoarding Dragon , Mindclaw Shaman , the titans, Resolute Archangel , Rune-Scarred Demon -> Animate Dead , Solemn Simulacrum , Thragtusk , Boonweaver Giant -> Abduction , etc.
RussischerZar says... #2
I would lean my ban-list towards the legacy ban list, therefore I'd ban Necropotence , Channel , Mystical Tutor , Black Vise and Goblin Recruiter too. The others should be fine as there are pretty much no storm cards in core sets.
July 24, 2014 7:15 a.m.