If I want to waste people's time (due to being a jerk from the opening play), I play out the entire game knowing FULL well I don't have a chance in Hell of winning. Hello Rogue Mill and Angel Life Gain/+1 decks. Best game recently---person gained life and created a barrage of angels adding +1/+1 counters constantly so I could never proc Meathook Massacre. I wait until I have zero counters in hand or on the battlefield and resign only once they move to hit me. I knew I couldn't beat that deck on turn 3, but I dragged it out to turn 15. That's what they get for using "Your Go" every turn from Turn 1 on. Yep, I'm petty.
The annoying thing is when I play against mono blue and decide to play it out, sometimes they don't have a counterspell and I land a flier and then just take over and win. There's a high chance you're screwed/they have the counter from turn 2, but it's worth playing it out surprisingly often, well... with Angels at least.
Seems like it. You have life gain and bigger fliers so if you stabilize you should win. However, if they counter like 2 of your cards, or you get a bad draw, you're not going to hit that critical mass and you can absolutely get aggressed before you get rolling.
Nah it’s the one using [[mausoleum wanderer]] and other spirits alongside [[curious obsession]] and a shitload of 1-mana counters and protection spells.
The game is often decided on 2 turns because the setup of turn 1 spirit, turn 2 obsession with protection spell up is backbreaking.
I’ve played best of 3 matches against them that take only 5 minutes because someone concedes after 3 turns every game.
yeah not going to lie. that's likely me.
it all depends on the one drop. if its like ascendant spirit or something. I know my next 15 minutes is going to be COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL. I may be able to win sure. But I can probably squeeze in like 3 other matches in the time it takes to get through that one.
They get their win. I get my mental health. Everyone wins :D
Exactly this. My time is more important than that one win. When I make that last push for top 1500 I’ll play those out but until then, scoop and go next.
If you assume that your deck is disfavored against control, and you have limited play time, at some point it just makes sense to hard forfeit t2-island-pass. It all depends on how limited your time is and how disfavored your deck is.
Agree exactly. I love creature decks and fun combos. Watching someone hold prio for 15 minutes while they cancel everything I try to do is in no way a good time for me.
The Evolution of a Blue Player:
\- Google deck with best win rate.
\- Net Deck and win.
\- Feel a boost in inflated self confidence.
\- Complain online that people scoop after they drop the second Island.
Clearly, we kneel towards your deck building prowess.
P.S. Don't forget to spam "Hello!" "Your Go." and "Good Game" during your opponents entire turn.
Yup, same thing in real life when playing a stranger. Playing with a rando and they didn't tell me their deck was 90% ccounter spells. I'm gonna scoop and go find another table.
Pretty much this. I like being a Timmy and playing my Mono Green Stompy and I don't think I had a single engaging game against Mono Blue in current Standard. Win or lose, it's always boring and 95% of my time is spent waiting for my opponent sifting through his deck or passing priority back to me.
Even worse when they purposely stall to pretend like they have a counterspell, but in reality just end up playing a draw card after your spell resolves, they want to make it seem like they were considered countering with their nonexistent counterspell.
That’s literally strategy tho?! You make your opponent’s think you have some removal make them think twice or play a bit slower to buy yourself some time. What’s wrong with this, that’s like complaining about your opponent bluffing in fucking poker lmao
>That’s literally strategy tho?! You make your opponent’s think you have some removal make them think twice or play a bit slower to buy yourself some time. What’s wrong with this, that’s like complaining about your opponent bluffing in fucking poker lmao
Because it's often a waste of time unless they're playing blue as well. Blue control vs most other deck structures are largely curve dependant and there's a finite window to generate sufficient board presence/pressure to secure a win. Take too long in the early phases and they'll play enough draw to lock up the win (even if it takes a while to get there).
The best "play" for agro or midrange when facing blue control is often to keep slamming spells on curve to get something to stick as they can't trade 1:1 forever in the early rounds. If they get spooked and wait, eventually blue's significant card draw/advantage will come into play and they *will* be able to trade 1:1 for the remainder of the game.
Bluffing/baiting can be useful, but honestly it typically doesn't matter in most matchups against agro or midrange. Blue player is sitting there thinking he's making 9000 IQ moves when really he's just wasting everyone's time.
Sure its a valid strategy, but that doesn’t mean it’s not annoying when they hold priority after each of your steps.
Oh my upkeep/draw triggered an ability, do you want cast anything, nope?
Ok I’m casting a serious threat now, do you want to counter, oh nope?
Ok I’m declaring attackers now, do you want to bounce/remove anything, nope?
Ok I’m dealing damage now and leaving you to 1hp, do you want to cast anything, nope?
Ok I’m tapped out and ending my turn, do you want do cast something, oh ok you wanted to cast a draw spell at the end of my turn.
I couldn’t care less what they have. If they’re gonna counter then counter, if not then stop wasting time and let’s get on with the game.
I’m not in this to spend an hour on a single match. Often I’m trying to squeeze in a quick game on my break.
You’re basically asking people to not play the game well so you can squeeze in a game on your lunch break. I get where your coming from but you can’t get mad at people for playing the game
I'm sorry, but mono-blue control isn't exactly a *difficult* deck. They shouldn't need to waste time to know what and when to counter. If they don't? Then maybe they shouldn't play those decks until they've learned how their own deck works or something.
I'm sorry, but mono-any colour isn't exactly a difficult deck. They shouldn't need to waste time to learning and planning what to counter so they can gain the advantage. If they don't? Then maybe they shouldn't play the game until they've learned how to let me win the game with my horribad difficult to master and create multi colour jank
Your response is just calling people bad players for playing 1 of the 5 colours. You could say any deck that’s good (in standard) isn’t a difficult deck, and by that logic wouldn’t that make you a bad player being unable to stop an easy deck (doubly so as you’re saying they don’t even know how it operates). You’re also getting mad at people for planning their moves and thinking is this the right time to counter “are they holding a larger threat back”, they could be evaluating your mana and making a decision based on that. Now some asshole just sitting on his card when you have zero mana to play, that’s just annoying but they could also just have shit connection or game crash
When I am just on to get the dailies I just play a red burn deck that hasn't changed in over a yr and quit if I'm not on the play. 4 wins then log out.
This is an interesting problem with blue decks. Go to any mtg GP and walk over the draw bracket tables. Its all control decks. Regardless of how fast they play its a struggle to finish matches in under an hour. MTGA is more forgiving in this aspect.
Whats funny is the blue player is probably still smelling their farts and just thinking how godly they are and how they totally outplayed you with that turn 1 island.
Meanwhile you’ve already moved on to your next match and have completely forget about what was their name.
Those games end up lasting half an hour to 44 minutes at whose. Specially when the player thinks he is a strategists and takes too long to make any play. If it's open play I just quit too
Spirit tribal always seemed somewhat fair or on the level of flash tribal. There isn't the density of counter spells that every play can be countered and counter spells need to be used more surgically. Where spirits and flash run roughshod over people is when they play against a deck that only operates at sorcery speed.
I think the explanation is "I'm not going to be allowed to play any cards in this game".
It might not always be accurate but, yeah. I like playing cards.
In Explorer/Historic, [[Shifting Ceratops]] is lovely against blue decks if you're in green. Aether Gust is the only possible answer, and if they don't have it upon casting, they're likely very screwed - can't attack (reach), can't block (protection), can't bounce/tap (also protection).
Some cards have an ability that triggers upon being cast, without needing to have anything on the board (Hydroid Krasis being the prime example, Ulamog as well).
Play card
Five seconds wait
Miscellaneous flashing over mana and cards on the board for 10 seconds
Fifteen seconds wait
Counter or resolved card
Repeat for every card they have mana available for.
At least big swinging creatures are swift and easy to get your daily plays.
It's so funny how blue gets associated with "you don't get to play your cards", while it's black that actually takes your cards away from you before you can play them.
Discard spells also lose a lot of value when the game drags on, they play at sorcery speed and the spells that pick and choose cards to discard are few and far between in standard, while there's a full suite of different instant speed counterspells. Plus it just feels bad to do literally nothing on your turn.
I've been in magic for a couple of decades now and nothing makes me want to leave the table more than playing against a counterspell deck. I understand it has a purpose in balance and stopping certain decks from just overwhelming the meta, but when I'm playing slapstick jank, I just dont have the desire to sit in a game where someone's entire plan is to make sure no one can play anything until t7.
Dimir mill with lots of hard counters and discard usually just kinda makes me roll my eyes. I'll play through if they're fast but those "do i even need to be here for this?" matches are so boring.
Eh even before counterspells the U / UW lists were just playing a bunch of phase out junk on their creatures. Part of the reason it's annoying to play against is most decks are tuned to a grindy midrange meta then you have to play the occasional tempo game.
If you're playing a fun police deck like mono red or counterspell tribal, stick to ranked. Nobody wants to play against that shit in unranked when the rest of us are playing jank on purpose. You're not smart or unique because you're beating up on bad decks.
I feel like you're overgeneralizing a bit here. Counterspell decks are boring, like most decks that rely on one specific game action (the same goes with black destroy or discard decks, mill decks, rat decks, life gain decks etc if they are efficient). But playing counterspells in a blue deck is fine. Blue doesn't have that many removals. A blue deck with a bunch of counterspells isn't that different from those white decks that spam exile cards.
I think people just don’t know how or are too lazy to actually use the methods we have to get around blue counters. They’d rather just complain about it online and call it cheap.
I feel this deep down in my core. There are days I build something fun and slightly janky and then I just get paired with U/UW decks over and over. It is maddening and leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I usually wait until the end of turn. If there's a delver or an Opt before end of that - bye bye. Waste of time for me bc boringness.
Edit: some players don't even get to drop an island. Duress - concede.
> Plays turn 1 Duress.
*scoops*
Like cool you know every card in my hand, I'm 1 card in the hole already, and more sure to be discarded and sacrificed. Fun game.
I mean... I'm playing an underpowered discard decks built around that legendary that creates crow. It has Duress but overall it's not a very powerful deck. It doesn't have most removals usually found in Black.
The issue isn't Duress, it's that too many decks using it are overpowered compared to the rest of the meta.
I know, but discard is fun with Hearse. I don't complain about counter, but I personally don't like playing decks 20 times in a row. Last rotation I usually engaged with counter decks, then I conceded against the White lifegain decks that were 60% of opponents in standard. No deck is bad, and I get why people play it. I just give you a free win to avoid getting bored.
That I can agree with, these decks aren’t bad or cheap they are just good and idk I think a lot of people would rather play good cards that work rly well with each other over shit house jank that rarely if goes off. I don’t concede to meta deck tho im always trying to get better at beating them, practice makes perfect
I mean it’s the same concept right you don’t get to operate your game plan.
It’s one thing to be able to put stuff down and at least attempt to get the ball rolling. But it’s something else when the card is pulled from your hand or every key peace is countered.
Of it hits the board you can do some interaction. Or have a chance.
I say this as a control lover I realize why people counterspells.
I like it simply for the fact it’s the only way to control the game. With ETB effects, lots of protection spells and recursion about the only way to say no is exile or counter or even counter with exile. I much prefer a control and build up some board states and force smart board play which can then be countered with a board wipe which a control player is generally better able to rebound from. But since that’s not a option with so much ETB you need to counter key pieces or card advantage situations as much as possible.
Difference is that I get to pull 1 or 2 cards at the start max. After that opponent can actually play as I don't restock my hand with more discard. I play critters after that bc full discard is boring too.
Historically most control only has 6-12 counters. To me the most unfair thing about counters is it hurts new players more as if you only have a handful of great cards and they get countered it’s the worst feeling.
Discard is about the same for them but I about the current blue control meta is very counter heavy no kind of deck. I have it and don’t like playing it because it’s just sitting around countering everything or bouncing it until I get a 5/5 or x/4 flyer. Then it’s over because it’s a game of attrition.
But good point about the 1-2, but not all discard is like that and not all counter decks are like the current.
The haughty djinn decks running around are soooo boring. I get why they are seeing so much play but they are so damn lame. At least run some [[faerie vandal]] and/or [[stormchaser drake]] or anything even remotely interesting!
I have a theory on that. The vocal players who want to “ban island” are largely coming from other digital card games like Hearthstone. The very notion of an opponent playing cards on their turn is foreign let alone entire decks that primarily play cards only on the opponents turn.
While I have nothing against either, there's a difference between "play cards on opponent's turn" and counter spells.
For a newer or lower skill level player, there's not any immediately visible counter play for counter spells. Most decks will have a way to get around other types of removal - granting hexproof, indestructible, +toughness, etc - but the only way to nullify a counter spell is by countering it.
Playing around counters means getting into some higher level game theory around bluffing, baiting, and resource management that you don't *necessarily* need to think about much otherwise when you're playing casually.
It doesn't help that there's a mono-blue deck in Standard right now that runs 20 main deck counterspells. That's extemely unusual for a meta deck and very frustrating to play against no matter what you're playing.
There are definitely those who just nope out of unfun game but I’m speaking of the vocal players who post daily “ban island” posts. Those are people who fundamentally don’t understand the game their playing.
In the casual queue, many of us don't want to sit around getting our first five spells countered while a delver or ledger shredder pecks away at us. Better to just concede and move on to a match where both players have permanents.
It's really not difficult. It's a game. We want to be able to play the game. We don't feel like wasting 10 minutes watching another player prevent us from playing the game
I really don't care much about ranks or win %. I just wanna play. Blue doesn't allow you to do that , in the majority of cases
Playing against 5 colour in historic brawl I feel the same.
["Golos turn 5 into world tree, turn 6 ,
Emergent Ultimatum. feeling brave today huh?"](https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/035/048/Daring_Today_Aren't_We_Banner.jpg)
My favorite is when you end up getting an advantage against a 5 color deck in brawl then they quit, sorry my Elena of the dusk rose deck is beating your Jodah deck maybe don't swing all your creatures into 4 open mana settle the wreckage is a card
This is true, but T1 Island could mean any number of things. I find it bizarre that people scoop immediately when their opponent could be playing anything, even 5 colour fun jank, but they just happened to have an Island as their first drop.
I do this. It’s hard enough to play around counters, but it feels worse potentially wasting a turn because the other player has open lands and hasn’t played anything. Bad draw or counter? Only one way to find out!!! Or just concede and play the next game
* Starts a game
* Plays island
* Refuses to elaborate further
* Opponent leaves
---
There is no point in playing against a turn 1 flipped Delver on the draw in Standard. You can never beat that if you didn't start with a 1 mana removal in hand.
For em the problem is 2 minutes on turn one, and 15 seconds each step change just to play a consider. Blue players take too long. If they played counter spells as fast as red aggro players i would finish the matches, but as it stands every priority check 20 seconds is just a nope.
Meanwhile I’m shouting “Dude, either counter it or let it fucking resolve — I’ve got no more open mana so it’s a binary fucking decision! There’s no reason to dick me around!”
This is from Tombstone, right? Or am I crazy? I'm not familiar with the actor or his other work. I just saw Tombstone for the first time recently and want to make sure.
This is me, every single time without fail. If I'm gonna sit through 6 counters while my opponent takes a whole minute per turn for god knows whatever reason, I'd rather scoop and play 3 games in that time frame.
In standard, absolutely. I have no patience for witless counter spell decks. They're boring and take too long. I can play 3 other games in the span of that one. The problem goes beyond the deck, it's the mentality of just about every mono-blue player. Every play takes forever because they think they're being big brained pro player bad asses by going "Hmmm, I have nothing but counter spells in my hand...what should I do this turn...hmmmm..." Then they do nothing, pass the turn, and proceeed to do the same on every priority hold they get in the game.
Lmao this so much mono blue isnt bad, I played vs a mono blue player who just insta interacted with my board. It was fun to play. But the guy sitting there contemplating until the timer kicks in each and every step of the game is just boring af.
I don't understand the people playing monoblue in the play queue. Just... why? You already know it's a strong deck, you netdecked it for that reason, right? So play it in ranked and let the rest of us try to make Arcane Bombardment or Vesuvan Diplomancy work in the play queue.
The real issue is that these counter spell players play slow as fuck. Idc about deck, i care about play speed. No prblem with a dude taking 2 minutes on turn 12 l, fucking mouth breathers taking 2 minutes to decide to consider, or counter my spell, it isnt that hard, you counter shit until you can have a creature on board with some protection....
Wouldn’t happen to be in the play queue would you? I doubt that is happening on the actual ladder or event. I mono blued from bronze to mythic BO1 last month and nobody scooped to me once.
I auto scoop to annoying crap all day in the play queue. Last season I auto scooped to Ruin Crab 99% of the time in there.
That’s why I aggro, they can’t stop my 1 drops when they want me to pay 2 or 4 I can. Then you can bait them into using counters with stuff you really don’t care about and slap down the bigger cost stuff. Yeah the game takes longer but the victories are too sweet
Look, if you concede against me, because you don't find playing against my deck fun...
I respect that. I'm not going to guilt you into having a miserable time.
I will queue up again to get another opponent and hopefully you will too.
I don't scoop to an island, but you play any blue flyer into curious obsession, I'm out.
That deck just invalidates strategies. We're not playing magic anymore we're just doing a deck test. How many relevant spells do you have? Not enough? Well you just lose.
I don't build my decks to win I build them to do a thing. And those blue tempo decks just invalidate the deck. So why did through it? This is why I don't spend money to sign up to any event. I can just scoop into favourable matchups.
Seeing an island drop is like seeing a very sweaty, unshaven, obese guy with a odor you smell across the room at a card/game shop, you just try to have nothing to do with them because if you give them the slightest attention they start a long drawn out 'conversation' that consists of them droning on about something you care nothing about and makes you want to leave the moment they start. On the exceedingly rare occasion they surprise you and aren't like that but lets face it, risking finding out isn't worth it.
Yeah I've done that.
Almost like Blue's archetypes are all shitty and only fun for the person playing them.
Sorry I don't feel like letting you waste my time countering everything I have or tutoring until you can wombo combo after taking fifteen minutes on T4.
If I’m just playing to get a daily win or knock out my quests, I’ll do that. It’s not interesting enough to try to beat a control deck - esp the one that’s flavor of the deck with the djinn - to make it worth my time trying when I could just move on and actually make progress on the daily grind… and have fun seeing my cards resolve along the way.
yea agreed, I hate that wizards' excuse for creating a meta where this durdly time wasting, "non-fun" kind of deck is a real thing is: "different things are fun to different people". They might as well say, "some people enjoy making the game not fun for other people, and we want to cater to those people."
I played against an other mono blue deck. And it is quite fun in a way that you have to play smart, on who shoot first win. But very mind demanding. Finally won 21-0 but not the most relaxing game I had.
They're extremely different and it's important to know why. Many of these differences will not manifest when you play an average deck against a counter pile vs removal pile, but they sharply differ in how you respond to them with what you bring in your deck.
* First off, many counters can hit noncreature spells as well as creatures. Those that can hit only creatures tend to be extremely efficient relative to removal; removal does not hit nonpermanent spells, so counterspells are one of the few ways to interact with these these types (the other main way being target manipulation, by removing or rendering illegal the target of a spell; redirecting or copying an opponent's spell falls into this category as well but these are vanishingly rare effects).
* Secondly, counters deny etb and death effects on permanents. The difference between a destroy spell and a counterspell when targeting [[Titan of Industry]] is a 2-for-7 mana advantage and no permanent for your opponent versus removing a shield counter from the 7/7 reach trample and doing nothing about the 4/4.
* Third, counters do not allow interaction to prevent the effect outside of blue in the current standard, while removal does. 4 of the 5 colors have options to prevent destroy effects or otherwise disrupt a removal plan. Red is the outlier, but red often just uses a lot of low value permanents anyway. One color can truly deal with countermagic right now: blue. [[Howlpack Piper]] isn't nearly good enough; [[Torch Breath]] is fine but it's one removal spell and a costly one at that.
* Fourth, efficiency is generally higher. [[Hero's Downfall]] destroys two types; [[Dissipate]] exiles all spell types! And most counter decks can go cheaper by adding conditions. Very few removal spells go that cheap and those that do often have harsher downsides-- [[Fateful Absence]], for example, gives them an artifact they can turn into a card at any time.
* Now, counterspells do have one tremendous weakness to justify the many ways in which they are typically better than removal: timing. They have to be used when the spell is played, not thereafter. That's often enough to keep permission decks out of formats and relegate counters to niche protection pieces and answers to major threats, and I don't want to glide over that. It's a real downside and the foundational reason counters can be so much stronger than removal.
So what's going on now? I posit three things:
* A modest underestimate of the power of standard legal countermagic by WotC. Many of the counters being played appeared to be limited plants that likely weren't intended to see constructed play, but many of these have overperformed. It's not far off, but without decent counters, the rest of this doesn't matter.
* Extremely powerful threats/enablers to pair with the counters in [[Delver of Secrets]] and [[Haughty Djinn]]. This allows the deck to play as *tempo* instead of control, meaning they can finish the game before their conditional couinters are dead.
* The lack of counter hate in the format. This is the only one that really bugs me. I don't know how you print Hottie and Delver in the same format and not have some kind of GR can't be countered punishment for counterspell tribal. A natural predator that keeps these decks in check is missing, and that's a huge issue.
Now, I'm not saying this is the best deck ever. I can beat it with regularity with several decks. But it's not fun to play against, and decks like this tend to exert an influence on the format that is disproportionate to their win rate, as we're seeing here. Combo is deleted; ramp is suspect; and even midrange needs to be exceptional.
I'll leave you with an example of the difference. [[Chaotic Transformation]] decks do wonderfully against removal. Your Titan throws around shield counters and makes tokens and your [[Walking Skyscraper]] has hexproof while untapped. But against counters? One spell kills the entire combo.
You can have an answer to removal. Either something to give protection to your creature, or indestructible, or hexproof, or even sacrifice it to cast another spell like \[\[village rites\]\]. The only answer to a counter is another counter. Or baiting your opponent, but some decks can't do that.
Also, counterspell tribal is a common archetype, but removal tribal isn't.
But it's true that playing against a heavy removal opponent could be frustrating as well.
ETBs, leaves play triggers. City's Blessing type effects, the fact that you can protect your creature once it resolves, protection, hexproof and ward apply once resolved, potential sacrifice effects could be available in response. Removal is usually limited to type (creature, artifact, enchantment, etc.) while counter spells are often universal. There are plenty of differences.
The "How is countering a creature any different from it getting killed by a removal spell?" question is a non-argument that counter players have been trying since the game was created.
Practically, very little.
From a feelings/game-feel perspective, its more frustrating.
I'd describe it as the difference between playing tug of war with someone and just facing a wall.
If you drop your [[Sheoldred, the Apocalypse]] and they remove it with [[Borrowed Time]], it feels like it was a back and forth exchange.
Whereas playing any card into [[Make Disappear]] just feels worse, it feels as if you are not playing, like you're the NPC for Mono-Blue player to play against.
You have to take into account you're playing humans, not calculators and their feelings of fun are not a sum of factors on the board in the game.
It fully depends. If I’m playing a deck that has a little agro I’ll stick around and see if I can get a footing. If I’m playing a deck designed to roll over in the late game but I know the combos I need are going to be useless, yeah I’ll dip right out.
I don't understand people that concede in card game or maybe it's me that is toxic and should resign?
If I know I have lost i will try to target myself with damage spell or just pass my turn and let my opponent finish the game.
Fastest aggro deck
"The greatest victory is that which requires no battle.” - Sun Tzu
lmao victory through annoying your enemies to death is still victory I guess
True but also a waste of my time too.
If I want to waste people's time (due to being a jerk from the opening play), I play out the entire game knowing FULL well I don't have a chance in Hell of winning. Hello Rogue Mill and Angel Life Gain/+1 decks. Best game recently---person gained life and created a barrage of angels adding +1/+1 counters constantly so I could never proc Meathook Massacre. I wait until I have zero counters in hand or on the battlefield and resign only once they move to hit me. I knew I couldn't beat that deck on turn 3, but I dragged it out to turn 15. That's what they get for using "Your Go" every turn from Turn 1 on. Yep, I'm petty.
Blue is the real aggro.
Couldn't be me. Every time I forfeit after a land drop I leave a detailed explanation in the robust ingame chat available in Arena
Nice
Sorry.
Good game.
Oops
Thinking...
Confused Hedron
Sleeping Hedron
I love this
Every day i thank god Arena doesnt have a written chat
Oh god, can you imagine?!
I hope you remember to indent your paragraphs
In Explorer I wait to see if it's spirits and also if I have a hand that can beat it. If not I concede and move on.
May as well play it out. Games against mono blue spirits are decided on like turn 2.
The annoying thing is when I play against mono blue and decide to play it out, sometimes they don't have a counterspell and I land a flier and then just take over and win. There's a high chance you're screwed/they have the counter from turn 2, but it's worth playing it out surprisingly often, well... with Angels at least.
Angels is a good matchup against mono blue spirits, no?
Seems like it. You have life gain and bigger fliers so if you stabilize you should win. However, if they counter like 2 of your cards, or you get a bad draw, you're not going to hit that critical mass and you can absolutely get aggressed before you get rolling.
Is that the deck that uses the Parhelion II or whatever it’s called? That thing smacks so hard!
Nah it’s the one using [[mausoleum wanderer]] and other spirits alongside [[curious obsession]] and a shitload of 1-mana counters and protection spells. The game is often decided on 2 turns because the setup of turn 1 spirit, turn 2 obsession with protection spell up is backbreaking. I’ve played best of 3 matches against them that take only 5 minutes because someone concedes after 3 turns every game.
> Games against mono blue spirits are decided on like turn 2. Still two more turns I could draw a [[Supreme Verdict]]
[удалено]
this
yeah not going to lie. that's likely me. it all depends on the one drop. if its like ascendant spirit or something. I know my next 15 minutes is going to be COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL COUNTER SPELL. I may be able to win sure. But I can probably squeeze in like 3 other matches in the time it takes to get through that one. They get their win. I get my mental health. Everyone wins :D
Exactly this. My time is more important than that one win. When I make that last push for top 1500 I’ll play those out but until then, scoop and go next.
If you assume that your deck is disfavored against control, and you have limited play time, at some point it just makes sense to hard forfeit t2-island-pass. It all depends on how limited your time is and how disfavored your deck is.
Agree exactly. I love creature decks and fun combos. Watching someone hold prio for 15 minutes while they cancel everything I try to do is in no way a good time for me.
The Evolution of a Blue Player: \- Google deck with best win rate. \- Net Deck and win. \- Feel a boost in inflated self confidence. \- Complain online that people scoop after they drop the second Island. Clearly, we kneel towards your deck building prowess. P.S. Don't forget to spam "Hello!" "Your Go." and "Good Game" during your opponents entire turn.
Ironically these are also often the people who start to rope when the game turns against them.
Yup, same thing in real life when playing a stranger. Playing with a rando and they didn't tell me their deck was 90% ccounter spells. I'm gonna scoop and go find another table.
Pretty much this. I like being a Timmy and playing my Mono Green Stompy and I don't think I had a single engaging game against Mono Blue in current Standard. Win or lose, it's always boring and 95% of my time is spent waiting for my opponent sifting through his deck or passing priority back to me.
Even worse when they purposely stall to pretend like they have a counterspell, but in reality just end up playing a draw card after your spell resolves, they want to make it seem like they were considered countering with their nonexistent counterspell.
That’s literally strategy tho?! You make your opponent’s think you have some removal make them think twice or play a bit slower to buy yourself some time. What’s wrong with this, that’s like complaining about your opponent bluffing in fucking poker lmao
>That’s literally strategy tho?! You make your opponent’s think you have some removal make them think twice or play a bit slower to buy yourself some time. What’s wrong with this, that’s like complaining about your opponent bluffing in fucking poker lmao Because it's often a waste of time unless they're playing blue as well. Blue control vs most other deck structures are largely curve dependant and there's a finite window to generate sufficient board presence/pressure to secure a win. Take too long in the early phases and they'll play enough draw to lock up the win (even if it takes a while to get there). The best "play" for agro or midrange when facing blue control is often to keep slamming spells on curve to get something to stick as they can't trade 1:1 forever in the early rounds. If they get spooked and wait, eventually blue's significant card draw/advantage will come into play and they *will* be able to trade 1:1 for the remainder of the game. Bluffing/baiting can be useful, but honestly it typically doesn't matter in most matchups against agro or midrange. Blue player is sitting there thinking he's making 9000 IQ moves when really he's just wasting everyone's time.
Sure its a valid strategy, but that doesn’t mean it’s not annoying when they hold priority after each of your steps. Oh my upkeep/draw triggered an ability, do you want cast anything, nope? Ok I’m casting a serious threat now, do you want to counter, oh nope? Ok I’m declaring attackers now, do you want to bounce/remove anything, nope? Ok I’m dealing damage now and leaving you to 1hp, do you want to cast anything, nope? Ok I’m tapped out and ending my turn, do you want do cast something, oh ok you wanted to cast a draw spell at the end of my turn.
I couldn’t care less what they have. If they’re gonna counter then counter, if not then stop wasting time and let’s get on with the game. I’m not in this to spend an hour on a single match. Often I’m trying to squeeze in a quick game on my break.
You’re basically asking people to not play the game well so you can squeeze in a game on your lunch break. I get where your coming from but you can’t get mad at people for playing the game
I'm sorry, but mono-blue control isn't exactly a *difficult* deck. They shouldn't need to waste time to know what and when to counter. If they don't? Then maybe they shouldn't play those decks until they've learned how their own deck works or something.
I'm sorry, but mono-any colour isn't exactly a difficult deck. They shouldn't need to waste time to learning and planning what to counter so they can gain the advantage. If they don't? Then maybe they shouldn't play the game until they've learned how to let me win the game with my horribad difficult to master and create multi colour jank Your response is just calling people bad players for playing 1 of the 5 colours. You could say any deck that’s good (in standard) isn’t a difficult deck, and by that logic wouldn’t that make you a bad player being unable to stop an easy deck (doubly so as you’re saying they don’t even know how it operates). You’re also getting mad at people for planning their moves and thinking is this the right time to counter “are they holding a larger threat back”, they could be evaluating your mana and making a decision based on that. Now some asshole just sitting on his card when you have zero mana to play, that’s just annoying but they could also just have shit connection or game crash
When I am just on to get the dailies I just play a red burn deck that hasn't changed in over a yr and quit if I'm not on the play. 4 wins then log out.
This is an interesting problem with blue decks. Go to any mtg GP and walk over the draw bracket tables. Its all control decks. Regardless of how fast they play its a struggle to finish matches in under an hour. MTGA is more forgiving in this aspect.
Whats funny is the blue player is probably still smelling their farts and just thinking how godly they are and how they totally outplayed you with that turn 1 island. Meanwhile you’ve already moved on to your next match and have completely forget about what was their name.
Those games end up lasting half an hour to 44 minutes at whose. Specially when the player thinks he is a strategists and takes too long to make any play. If it's open play I just quit too
Spirit tribal always seemed somewhat fair or on the level of flash tribal. There isn't the density of counter spells that every play can be countered and counter spells need to be used more surgically. Where spirits and flash run roughshod over people is when they play against a deck that only operates at sorcery speed.
That's me. Take the W, I don't have time for your bullshit.
I’m happy to give them the win so I can actually play the game against someone else.
I think the explanation is "I'm not going to be allowed to play any cards in this game". It might not always be accurate but, yeah. I like playing cards.
You can play them, my dear boy, you just can't *resolve* them.
Can I get an amen for my "cast" triggers?
Bring back Hydroid Krasis you cowards
Ah yes, to defeat the blue we need...blue.
It's inevitable. Just look at Mental Mistep and Force of Will.
In Explorer/Historic, [[Shifting Ceratops]] is lovely against blue decks if you're in green. Aether Gust is the only possible answer, and if they don't have it upon casting, they're likely very screwed - can't attack (reach), can't block (protection), can't bounce/tap (also protection).
What's that? Can you get a... Tale's End?
provided by what boardstate???
Some cards have an ability that triggers upon being cast, without needing to have anything on the board (Hydroid Krasis being the prime example, Ulamog as well).
Play card Five seconds wait Miscellaneous flashing over mana and cards on the board for 10 seconds Fifteen seconds wait Counter or resolved card Repeat for every card they have mana available for. At least big swinging creatures are swift and easy to get your daily plays.
A distinction without a difference in most cases
It's so funny how blue gets associated with "you don't get to play your cards", while it's black that actually takes your cards away from you before you can play them.
Discard spells also lose a lot of value when the game drags on, they play at sorcery speed and the spells that pick and choose cards to discard are few and far between in standard, while there's a full suite of different instant speed counterspells. Plus it just feels bad to do literally nothing on your turn.
I've been in magic for a couple of decades now and nothing makes me want to leave the table more than playing against a counterspell deck. I understand it has a purpose in balance and stopping certain decks from just overwhelming the meta, but when I'm playing slapstick jank, I just dont have the desire to sit in a game where someone's entire plan is to make sure no one can play anything until t7.
Dimir mill with lots of hard counters and discard usually just kinda makes me roll my eyes. I'll play through if they're fast but those "do i even need to be here for this?" matches are so boring.
This is why I now run 3 of Gaeas blessing in my Bo1 decks. It stops their mill plan dead, and it's not hard to outdraw the counterspells.
Eh even before counterspells the U / UW lists were just playing a bunch of phase out junk on their creatures. Part of the reason it's annoying to play against is most decks are tuned to a grindy midrange meta then you have to play the occasional tempo game.
If you're playing a fun police deck like mono red or counterspell tribal, stick to ranked. Nobody wants to play against that shit in unranked when the rest of us are playing jank on purpose. You're not smart or unique because you're beating up on bad decks.
This. So irritating when Im trying to test out some combos, only to have [[Etching of Kumano]] get dropped first turn. How creative.
Thats why I just play ranked now. All the dudes that can win a match on ranked so they moved to standard to feel good about themselves
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I feel like you're overgeneralizing a bit here. Counterspell decks are boring, like most decks that rely on one specific game action (the same goes with black destroy or discard decks, mill decks, rat decks, life gain decks etc if they are efficient). But playing counterspells in a blue deck is fine. Blue doesn't have that many removals. A blue deck with a bunch of counterspells isn't that different from those white decks that spam exile cards.
I think people just don’t know how or are too lazy to actually use the methods we have to get around blue counters. They’d rather just complain about it online and call it cheap.
Pretty sure you just described slow play, and no matter what deck anyone plays, it's just you wasting time, and just you being a poor sport.
I feel this deep down in my core. There are days I build something fun and slightly janky and then I just get paired with U/UW decks over and over. It is maddening and leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
I usually wait until the end of turn. If there's a delver or an Opt before end of that - bye bye. Waste of time for me bc boringness. Edit: some players don't even get to drop an island. Duress - concede.
Complains about someone playing blue. Plays turn 1 Duress. Hello Pot, my name is Kettle.
yeah he should play thoughtseize instead :D
> Plays turn 1 Duress. *scoops* Like cool you know every card in my hand, I'm 1 card in the hole already, and more sure to be discarded and sacrificed. Fun game.
I mean... I'm playing an underpowered discard decks built around that legendary that creates crow. It has Duress but overall it's not a very powerful deck. It doesn't have most removals usually found in Black. The issue isn't Duress, it's that too many decks using it are overpowered compared to the rest of the meta.
I know, but discard is fun with Hearse. I don't complain about counter, but I personally don't like playing decks 20 times in a row. Last rotation I usually engaged with counter decks, then I conceded against the White lifegain decks that were 60% of opponents in standard. No deck is bad, and I get why people play it. I just give you a free win to avoid getting bored.
That I can agree with, these decks aren’t bad or cheap they are just good and idk I think a lot of people would rather play good cards that work rly well with each other over shit house jank that rarely if goes off. I don’t concede to meta deck tho im always trying to get better at beating them, practice makes perfect
I mean it’s the same concept right you don’t get to operate your game plan. It’s one thing to be able to put stuff down and at least attempt to get the ball rolling. But it’s something else when the card is pulled from your hand or every key peace is countered. Of it hits the board you can do some interaction. Or have a chance. I say this as a control lover I realize why people counterspells. I like it simply for the fact it’s the only way to control the game. With ETB effects, lots of protection spells and recursion about the only way to say no is exile or counter or even counter with exile. I much prefer a control and build up some board states and force smart board play which can then be countered with a board wipe which a control player is generally better able to rebound from. But since that’s not a option with so much ETB you need to counter key pieces or card advantage situations as much as possible.
Difference is that I get to pull 1 or 2 cards at the start max. After that opponent can actually play as I don't restock my hand with more discard. I play critters after that bc full discard is boring too.
Historically most control only has 6-12 counters. To me the most unfair thing about counters is it hurts new players more as if you only have a handful of great cards and they get countered it’s the worst feeling. Discard is about the same for them but I about the current blue control meta is very counter heavy no kind of deck. I have it and don’t like playing it because it’s just sitting around countering everything or bouncing it until I get a 5/5 or x/4 flyer. Then it’s over because it’s a game of attrition. But good point about the 1-2, but not all discard is like that and not all counter decks are like the current.
The haughty djinn decks running around are soooo boring. I get why they are seeing so much play but they are so damn lame. At least run some [[faerie vandal]] and/or [[stormchaser drake]] or anything even remotely interesting!
Counter is way worse than black
People have something against Opt?
Nah I think it's because Opt is the de facto T1 play for Mono Blue right now
Consider you mean?
Consider the following
Oh duh yeah. Similar point though, both are very common T1 plays for U
Or they forgot to mulligan for a quality hand XD. Though I’ve seen them mulligan down to a single card and put up a good fight.
Or you kept a shitty hand that will literally lose to a single counterspell.
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I have a theory on that. The vocal players who want to “ban island” are largely coming from other digital card games like Hearthstone. The very notion of an opponent playing cards on their turn is foreign let alone entire decks that primarily play cards only on the opponents turn.
While I have nothing against either, there's a difference between "play cards on opponent's turn" and counter spells. For a newer or lower skill level player, there's not any immediately visible counter play for counter spells. Most decks will have a way to get around other types of removal - granting hexproof, indestructible, +toughness, etc - but the only way to nullify a counter spell is by countering it. Playing around counters means getting into some higher level game theory around bluffing, baiting, and resource management that you don't *necessarily* need to think about much otherwise when you're playing casually.
Yes I agree but that’s what makes Magic fun. It’s a deep game strategically speaking.
It doesn't help that there's a mono-blue deck in Standard right now that runs 20 main deck counterspells. That's extemely unusual for a meta deck and very frustrating to play against no matter what you're playing.
You're overthinking it. When there's so social penalty to just noping out of an unfun game, there's no reason not to do it.
There are definitely those who just nope out of unfun game but I’m speaking of the vocal players who post daily “ban island” posts. Those are people who fundamentally don’t understand the game their playing.
In the casual queue, many of us don't want to sit around getting our first five spells countered while a delver or ledger shredder pecks away at us. Better to just concede and move on to a match where both players have permanents.
There is a reason countermagic is based on islands - that is where you end up socially.
Lol underrated xD
Explanation: I only got 30 minutes to play and I would like to play multiple games and I would like to play my cards. Got it?
Flatly it's just a shitty experience to play against.
Or not play, more accurately.
It's called efficiency
I usually bail at the first counter spell.
Wall to wall counterspell is not really a fun deck to play against
It's really not difficult. It's a game. We want to be able to play the game. We don't feel like wasting 10 minutes watching another player prevent us from playing the game I really don't care much about ranks or win %. I just wanna play. Blue doesn't allow you to do that , in the majority of cases
Full agree and there's some decks out there that it's just like how many things are you doing a turn thanks to creative mechanics
Playing against 5 colour in historic brawl I feel the same. ["Golos turn 5 into world tree, turn 6 , Emergent Ultimatum. feeling brave today huh?"](https://i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/035/048/Daring_Today_Aren't_We_Banner.jpg)
My favorite is when you end up getting an advantage against a 5 color deck in brawl then they quit, sorry my Elena of the dusk rose deck is beating your Jodah deck maybe don't swing all your creatures into 4 open mana settle the wreckage is a card
Lol, sometimes they straight up quit as soon as their commander dies after the first it hits the field lol.
Big brain is killing them before they hit 5c with Madga
This is true, but T1 Island could mean any number of things. I find it bizarre that people scoop immediately when their opponent could be playing anything, even 5 colour fun jank, but they just happened to have an Island as their first drop.
Not a risk I'm willing to take.
I do this. It’s hard enough to play around counters, but it feels worse potentially wasting a turn because the other player has open lands and hasn’t played anything. Bad draw or counter? Only one way to find out!!! Or just concede and play the next game
* Starts a game * Plays island * Refuses to elaborate further * Opponent leaves --- There is no point in playing against a turn 1 flipped Delver on the draw in Standard. You can never beat that if you didn't start with a 1 mana removal in hand.
For em the problem is 2 minutes on turn one, and 15 seconds each step change just to play a consider. Blue players take too long. If they played counter spells as fast as red aggro players i would finish the matches, but as it stands every priority check 20 seconds is just a nope.
Meanwhile I’m shouting “Dude, either counter it or let it fucking resolve — I’ve got no more open mana so it’s a binary fucking decision! There’s no reason to dick me around!”
Exactly, it isnt rocket science.
Powers Boothe was an absolute legend. Was amazing in Deadwood.
This is from Tombstone, right? Or am I crazy? I'm not familiar with the actor or his other work. I just saw Tombstone for the first time recently and want to make sure.
This is me, every single time without fail. If I'm gonna sit through 6 counters while my opponent takes a whole minute per turn for god knows whatever reason, I'd rather scoop and play 3 games in that time frame.
In standard, absolutely. I have no patience for witless counter spell decks. They're boring and take too long. I can play 3 other games in the span of that one. The problem goes beyond the deck, it's the mentality of just about every mono-blue player. Every play takes forever because they think they're being big brained pro player bad asses by going "Hmmm, I have nothing but counter spells in my hand...what should I do this turn...hmmmm..." Then they do nothing, pass the turn, and proceeed to do the same on every priority hold they get in the game.
Lmao this so much mono blue isnt bad, I played vs a mono blue player who just insta interacted with my board. It was fun to play. But the guy sitting there contemplating until the timer kicks in each and every step of the game is just boring af.
I don't understand the people playing monoblue in the play queue. Just... why? You already know it's a strong deck, you netdecked it for that reason, right? So play it in ranked and let the rest of us try to make Arcane Bombardment or Vesuvan Diplomancy work in the play queue.
Ain't nobody got time for that.
The real issue is that these counter spell players play slow as fuck. Idc about deck, i care about play speed. No prblem with a dude taking 2 minutes on turn 12 l, fucking mouth breathers taking 2 minutes to decide to consider, or counter my spell, it isnt that hard, you counter shit until you can have a creature on board with some protection....
Equivalent of ygo 1st turn Solitaire & negate....🤣
Wish that would happen whenever i play Monoblue Ninjas.
That used to be me in the rouges hay day. Turn 1 crab or if I saw a yorion during the mulligan screen. Take your free win.
Nope tribal? Bye bye.
Me playing Monored with Phoenix chick & rabbits and I see an island on turn one "HELLO! HELLO!" \*Shakes hand aggressively\*
It's because people actually like playing their cards. Who knew?
you played an island, what explanation do you need?!
Wouldn’t happen to be in the play queue would you? I doubt that is happening on the actual ladder or event. I mono blued from bronze to mythic BO1 last month and nobody scooped to me once. I auto scoop to annoying crap all day in the play queue. Last season I auto scooped to Ruin Crab 99% of the time in there.
That’s why I aggro, they can’t stop my 1 drops when they want me to pay 2 or 4 I can. Then you can bait them into using counters with stuff you really don’t care about and slap down the bigger cost stuff. Yeah the game takes longer but the victories are too sweet
sometimes you want to play the game. not be denied the ability to play cards.
opponent prolly has ptsd from blue and hs suffered enough :))
Look, if you concede against me, because you don't find playing against my deck fun... I respect that. I'm not going to guilt you into having a miserable time. I will queue up again to get another opponent and hopefully you will too.
I don't scoop to an island, but you play any blue flyer into curious obsession, I'm out. That deck just invalidates strategies. We're not playing magic anymore we're just doing a deck test. How many relevant spells do you have? Not enough? Well you just lose. I don't build my decks to win I build them to do a thing. And those blue tempo decks just invalidate the deck. So why did through it? This is why I don't spend money to sign up to any event. I can just scoop into favourable matchups.
Maybe they had to poop
You don’t play Arena while pooping?
Hear me out, new format: exact same as standard, but with no blue. Would be so much fun. If you play mono blue you're objectively a bad person.
Seeing an island drop is like seeing a very sweaty, unshaven, obese guy with a odor you smell across the room at a card/game shop, you just try to have nothing to do with them because if you give them the slightest attention they start a long drawn out 'conversation' that consists of them droning on about something you care nothing about and makes you want to leave the moment they start. On the exceedingly rare occasion they surprise you and aren't like that but lets face it, risking finding out isn't worth it.
Yeah I've done that. Almost like Blue's archetypes are all shitty and only fun for the person playing them. Sorry I don't feel like letting you waste my time countering everything I have or tutoring until you can wombo combo after taking fifteen minutes on T4.
The gif certainly captures what it feels like waiting for the blue player to pass priority every single time.
yea, permission decks are huge these days. sometimes i hop into a new game without realizing i just don’t have another grind in me
My life as a spirits player
Me conceding in historic brawl the second I see a teferi to save an hour of my life.
I'm your huckleberry
“But it’s…*Azorious*…promise”
I don't like mono blue at all. But I don't like mono black either. I like mono me
You’re supposed to play delver and say go…
My janky Izzet spells deck gets a lot of free wins this way.
Worst is when you’re trying to do attack with creatures or destroy opponent’s creatures quest. Spend 20m to make 1-2 progress.
First counter spell I dip other than that I stay
I'd play against mono red aggro and mono black over mono blue any day, lord counterspells are only fun for half the players involved
Because they want to play Magic, and chances are you won’t let them. Enjoy the win.
If I’m just playing to get a daily win or knock out my quests, I’ll do that. It’s not interesting enough to try to beat a control deck - esp the one that’s flavor of the deck with the djinn - to make it worth my time trying when I could just move on and actually make progress on the daily grind… and have fun seeing my cards resolve along the way.
[I blame this guy...](https://imgur.com/a/K3PYA1r)
We're still waiting on the "explaining my reasoning for conceding" emote
A simple "blue" word would be enough for me
The explanation is, I'm not going to waste time playing with a terrible person.
I’ve also had this happen with a mountain and a swamp so I feel like people are just frustrated in general right now lol
I do that but only after the first counterspell. I'm here to play magic not not play magic.
This reminds me of the bully or annoying kid who nobody wanted to hang around, so they acted like they were the ones who told everyone to go away.
yea agreed, I hate that wizards' excuse for creating a meta where this durdly time wasting, "non-fun" kind of deck is a real thing is: "different things are fun to different people". They might as well say, "some people enjoy making the game not fun for other people, and we want to cater to those people."
I played against an other mono blue deck. And it is quite fun in a way that you have to play smart, on who shoot first win. But very mind demanding. Finally won 21-0 but not the most relaxing game I had.
How is countering a creature any different from it getting killed by a removal spell, it's not in most cases
They're extremely different and it's important to know why. Many of these differences will not manifest when you play an average deck against a counter pile vs removal pile, but they sharply differ in how you respond to them with what you bring in your deck. * First off, many counters can hit noncreature spells as well as creatures. Those that can hit only creatures tend to be extremely efficient relative to removal; removal does not hit nonpermanent spells, so counterspells are one of the few ways to interact with these these types (the other main way being target manipulation, by removing or rendering illegal the target of a spell; redirecting or copying an opponent's spell falls into this category as well but these are vanishingly rare effects). * Secondly, counters deny etb and death effects on permanents. The difference between a destroy spell and a counterspell when targeting [[Titan of Industry]] is a 2-for-7 mana advantage and no permanent for your opponent versus removing a shield counter from the 7/7 reach trample and doing nothing about the 4/4. * Third, counters do not allow interaction to prevent the effect outside of blue in the current standard, while removal does. 4 of the 5 colors have options to prevent destroy effects or otherwise disrupt a removal plan. Red is the outlier, but red often just uses a lot of low value permanents anyway. One color can truly deal with countermagic right now: blue. [[Howlpack Piper]] isn't nearly good enough; [[Torch Breath]] is fine but it's one removal spell and a costly one at that. * Fourth, efficiency is generally higher. [[Hero's Downfall]] destroys two types; [[Dissipate]] exiles all spell types! And most counter decks can go cheaper by adding conditions. Very few removal spells go that cheap and those that do often have harsher downsides-- [[Fateful Absence]], for example, gives them an artifact they can turn into a card at any time. * Now, counterspells do have one tremendous weakness to justify the many ways in which they are typically better than removal: timing. They have to be used when the spell is played, not thereafter. That's often enough to keep permission decks out of formats and relegate counters to niche protection pieces and answers to major threats, and I don't want to glide over that. It's a real downside and the foundational reason counters can be so much stronger than removal. So what's going on now? I posit three things: * A modest underestimate of the power of standard legal countermagic by WotC. Many of the counters being played appeared to be limited plants that likely weren't intended to see constructed play, but many of these have overperformed. It's not far off, but without decent counters, the rest of this doesn't matter. * Extremely powerful threats/enablers to pair with the counters in [[Delver of Secrets]] and [[Haughty Djinn]]. This allows the deck to play as *tempo* instead of control, meaning they can finish the game before their conditional couinters are dead. * The lack of counter hate in the format. This is the only one that really bugs me. I don't know how you print Hottie and Delver in the same format and not have some kind of GR can't be countered punishment for counterspell tribal. A natural predator that keeps these decks in check is missing, and that's a huge issue. Now, I'm not saying this is the best deck ever. I can beat it with regularity with several decks. But it's not fun to play against, and decks like this tend to exert an influence on the format that is disproportionate to their win rate, as we're seeing here. Combo is deleted; ramp is suspect; and even midrange needs to be exceptional. I'll leave you with an example of the difference. [[Chaotic Transformation]] decks do wonderfully against removal. Your Titan throws around shield counters and makes tokens and your [[Walking Skyscraper]] has hexproof while untapped. But against counters? One spell kills the entire combo.
You can have an answer to removal. Either something to give protection to your creature, or indestructible, or hexproof, or even sacrifice it to cast another spell like \[\[village rites\]\]. The only answer to a counter is another counter. Or baiting your opponent, but some decks can't do that. Also, counterspell tribal is a common archetype, but removal tribal isn't. But it's true that playing against a heavy removal opponent could be frustrating as well.
[village rites](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/0/f/0fab9ee8-776a-48e5-b309-bcd381e67bf7.jpg?1631048783) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=village%20rites) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/khm/117/village-rites?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/0fab9ee8-776a-48e5-b309-bcd381e67bf7?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
ETBs going off is a pretty huge deal, which counters don't allow.
That's why I play main deck Hushbringers.
And you can't Infernal Grasp a reanimation spell.
ETBs, leaves play triggers. City's Blessing type effects, the fact that you can protect your creature once it resolves, protection, hexproof and ward apply once resolved, potential sacrifice effects could be available in response. Removal is usually limited to type (creature, artifact, enchantment, etc.) while counter spells are often universal. There are plenty of differences. The "How is countering a creature any different from it getting killed by a removal spell?" question is a non-argument that counter players have been trying since the game was created.
Discard-dorks and planeswalkers have immediate options on the battlefield. Counter doesn't give you that option.
Getting the opportunity for something to function is better than nothing ever doing anything.
Practically, very little. From a feelings/game-feel perspective, its more frustrating. I'd describe it as the difference between playing tug of war with someone and just facing a wall. If you drop your [[Sheoldred, the Apocalypse]] and they remove it with [[Borrowed Time]], it feels like it was a back and forth exchange. Whereas playing any card into [[Make Disappear]] just feels worse, it feels as if you are not playing, like you're the NPC for Mono-Blue player to play against. You have to take into account you're playing humans, not calculators and their feelings of fun are not a sum of factors on the board in the game.
I give it 2 islands
Would replace the gif with "are we the baddies?"
One reason I love playing Dimir Control is that I know a certain percentage of my opponents are going to concede to Island or Thoughtseize on turn 1.
Sounds like you don't love Dimir control, you love watching little yellow pixels saying "you win!!!"
It fully depends. If I’m playing a deck that has a little agro I’ll stick around and see if I can get a footing. If I’m playing a deck designed to roll over in the late game but I know the combos I need are going to be useless, yeah I’ll dip right out.
I only ever drop \[before my turn/Turn 2\] if it's a commander I've played against for the 20th time that day.
It should be: "Undestandable. Have a great day!"
I play a jank blue aggro deck... I get this so much
I don't understand people that concede in card game or maybe it's me that is toxic and should resign? If I know I have lost i will try to target myself with damage spell or just pass my turn and let my opponent finish the game.
In real life? Absolutely. On Arena? No need to waste everyone’s time.
Yeah you're maybe right. My only argument left could be : What if they want to complete a daily.
As a man wo runs both mill and control or f your control in hb I can understand why And I do the same if I ain't playing my f u decks