Alright. Issues time. Let’s talk turkey. Let’s talk about the important stuff, the real gritty bits of the game that nobody pays to hear about because, of course, putting the word out to the masses is far more important than some proletarian capitalist venture.
Not sure if I said something rude there.
Anyway, everyone has their own reasons to think that Wizards are incompetent – we all just voice them at different times. You may think you’re a genius for predicting Arcbound Ravager to get banned in Standard in the first few weeks after Darksteel came out, but you’re not, not really. Pretty much every chicken-little type who waves the banflag around predicted that, and they also predicted Proteus Staff and Darksteel Colossus as banworthy as well. If you’re one of those people who proclaimed, loud and proud, that Darksteel Reactor was going to be banned, congratulations.
Had I heard, at that time and in that place, I would have thought you an idiot.
So here I am, exposing myself to the world, showing what it is about this game that I don’t like. At the end of the article, you may well think that I am an idiot. That’s okay. I shouldn’t say such things without expecting to deal with that kind of criticism, and since I do it to other people – even if I don’t say it, I have no recourse against you. For me, one of the biggest problems I have with the game as it stands is that the people who are making the cards are not walking the walk or talking the talk. And this is highlighted best in the issue of the color pie, and how it relates to…
…You guessed it…
Green.
(Yeah, that’s right, another pissed-off Green mage whinging while Green is the second best color in Standard. Do we know appropriate or what?)
Maro Has No Idea What He’s Talking About
In Mark Rosewater article “Pretty Sneaky Sis“, he said:
“The easiest way to answer this question for an ally color pair is to look at what the shared enemy does. So what does Green do that drives black/blue up a wall? Green is everything that blue/black strives not to be. Green is open and sharing. It’s mindless in its motivations. It thinks about others. It strives to keep the status quo. But worst of all, it doesn’t have any of the traits that blue/black needs to control it. It’s not driven by selfish needs or secretive information. It can’t be bribed as its only desire is for nothing to happen. It’s the embodiment of something that is hard for blue/black to control. “
Okay. Taking a deep breath and composing my thoughts, because otherwise, I’ll swear too much for this one to get published.
So.
Let us examine this statement.
“Green is open and sharing.”
Okay, Green is open and sharing, it’s true. Of all the colors, Green is the one most conducive to splashing colors, and can handle doing so most readily. This is, theoretically, a good thing. After all – it makes sense that Green has the least bigoted perspective on the other colors. Green, lacking so many things of its own, can really recognize the merits and strengths of the other colors. Indeed, all colors offer Green removal, card draw, and creatures that it can’t have on its own.
Isn’t that strange to anyone else?
Green is the color of creatures. It is, theoretically, the color of good, fat creatures. We just finished a period of standard where the number one deck was a mono-Green deck that ponied up a ridiculously sizeable fat body, what color were those bodies?
They were an artifact and a Red creature. Or occasionally, a White creature and an artifact. Or just a pair of artifacts. In some strange parallel crazyverse, people used Tooth and Nail to fetch up Molder Slugs or Plated Slagwurms, but, really, let’s not kid ourselves. Tooth and Nail was a Green spell that devoted a nine-mana sorcery to serving up cards that weren’t Green. That’s a pretty big effect – except that Green really didn’t have what it took to give the effect its due. When you can go and get anything creaturewise, ignoring its mana cost…
You don’t go to Green.
You don’t even go to multicolor Green, such as Green/Red or Green/White, which, by all reasons, as the combination of the two best creature colors, should be the place to go for a meaty creature you can’t deal with.
Nope.
Right now, in Magic, the single biggest creature, on total power-plus-toughness scale, is the Krosan Cloudscraper, who has proven his value as fodder for a black card. He’s absolutely unplayable as a Green creature, and brings nothing to the table beyond being utterly outrageous in his overall girth, and equally unplayable. For half the mana, Blue gets Meloku.
Ignoring the Cloudscraper and Autochthon Wurm – another fine reanimation target – we get our next stop being Phyrexian Dreadnought. Who has been in a number of decks – at least one of which, Masknought, was designed to actually put him into play to kill your opponent. Below him? Darksteel Colossus. Below him, Krosan Colossus – another unplayable fatty. Below him, Sundering Titan, one of the best creatures ever printed if Vintage and Extended is to be considered evidence.
This aside – which disgusts me anyway – doesn’t address the real problem. I can get 16 Krosan Groundshakers for a single ticket on MODO – Green is not lacking for big, brawny creatures. What ultimately, Green lacks, is big brawny creatures that in any way hold up to that philosophy purported above and are costed in any way to be relevant.
“It’s mindless in its motivations. It thinks about others. It strives to keep the status quo.”
Now, Maro contradicts himself. Green doesn’t think, and yet it does think. Well, more accurately, Green doesn’t think much about why, just about the what. I’m okay with that. It doesn’t bug me, too much – though it does mean that Green creatures fall, all-too-readily into the trap of being Big Green Idiots, something I think we should be avoiding, since most colors get to play shenanigans but for Green.
Green thinks about others. Green will stop you because if it doesn’t, you might hurt someone else. Green wants to stop things from changing. These are novel ideas… but why aren’t they born out? First, Green creatures don’t think about anything. Green’s creatures don’t protect themselves or your other creatures very well – those abilities are exclusively in white. Green’s creatures don’t punish you for killing them – that usually falls to Black or Red. Now that regeneration is being made more relevant by the slow ratcheting-back of removal spells, Green’s creatures occasionally handle themselves a little more relevant, pursuing their goals of growth – but if you haven’t noticed, there’s been one playable Green regenerator in two years, and that’s Isao.
And what keeps the status quo?
Saying “no” to change.
Like counterspells.
I have to stop here, because I think that I’m going to blow this entire sentence way out of proportion. But it’s still part of Green’s coming to the ass-kicking contest with only one leg – Green is the color that wants to change things the least, and wants everything to stay the same. Which means that it gets fewer proactive elements than anyone else. Its good cards tend to take a turn to do anything.
Because Green plays “fair”, it’s always going to come to the party last. Green’s only ever been good when it could do something grossly unfair, like get nine mana on turn 4 – it could never reign in another, out-of-control tournament force. When Affinity was king of the mountain, Green tried to reign it in, but all Green could ever do was outrace it – and it ultimately wasn’t Green that topped that particular mountain – it was the artifact men that Tooth and Nail ponied up. Or the White creature with the artifact creature. Or the mono-Blue deck.
So if Green’s the mollifying force to the other colors, why does it fail at this task so readily? It’s Blue that holds the Vintage metagame together, keeping the format from degenerating under the hand of so much fast mana and broken early plays. In Urza’s Saga, Stompy Green hinged on using cards that weren’t supposed to be Green (Wild Dogs and their ilk), along with cards that were a mistake (Rancor) and one reasonably fair rare (Might of Oaks) alongside an unfair one (Masticore), to kill your opponent before they did anything cute.
So, in other words, it was basically Boros Deck Wins, except all of it’s in the wrong color.
Basically, if this is part of Green’s identity, it is a part that is not born out in cards. If Green shares, it doesn’t share the right way. White should get powerful, rules-setting enchantments, like Rule of Law. But the thing is, while White should be saying “We will do it this way,” Green should be the color saying “We will not do things this way.”
Green rejects artifice. Green rejects doing things weirdly. Why is it that the color that would most hate zombify effects is the color that can do the least about them? Ground Seal is the only Green card that can actually stop someone from reanimating stuff. You want to hurt reanimation strategies, you go to Blue for bounce.
“But worst of all, it doesn’t have any of the traits that blue/black needs to control it. It’s not driven by selfish needs or secretive information. It can’t be bribed as its only desire is for nothing to happen. It’s the embodiment of something that is hard for blue/black to control.”
Except Green is the color most hurt by the card Bribery. Green is not hard for Blue/Black to control. I have played Green decks, and I have played Blue/Black decks. Let me tell you, cards that say “no”, and cards that say “dienowkthxplz” are the epitome of good against Green. Green has precisely one hard to contain creature right now, and that’s Kodama of the North Tree. Since he doesn’t say “I can’t be countered”, Blue is still more than able and willing to send him packing before he ever hits the table.
But counters can be played around, I hear you say. That’s true, but that’s the player doing the job – not the color. Green can’t defy Blue/Black in any way. It can sometimes shuffle its cards back into its library, but the last time Green could do that was Judgment – the most recent incidents of those have been given to Blue (Stream of Consciousness and Mnemonic Nexus, with Reminisce in the core set). Since that’s four years since we saw a Green graveyard shuffler, and Blue gets one in the core set, I am going to assume that that mechanic is now in Blue.
Asleep At The Wheel
Let us speak now of theft.
Theft is a Blue mechanic. It’s very Blue. Except where it’s Red, which, I think we all know, means, when it’s not as good. But hey, I don’t mind Red having theft. It’s very appropriate, in my mind, for Red to be able to kick things so they fall apart in a funny way. But this all curtails back to one of my favorite, would-have, could-have, never-was cards.
So close to being Constructed playable, yet so far. As a morph, too vulnerable in a world full of Shock, as a 3/4, too expensive to play fair. So good in casual, and so lousy everywhere else. Then, the next set rolls along, and what happens?
Blue gets the ability back. On a creature with a better creature type. Sure, Synapse Sliver didn’t exactly rule the world, but he still had the ability. And spread it around. Oh well, says Randy – it’s an ability the colors share! So don’t worry about it, Green mages.
What’s the next card drawing creature we see? Seshiro, in Champions. Who is, sorry to say it, junk. He’s a six-mana creature whose effect is really cute, but Snakes dropped off the map early in Champions block because they were simple an inferior option to the good aggro decks like Black Hand and White Weenie.
So, then, what came next?
Who.
Is.
Blue.
Oh, it’s all okay, it’s fine. After all. Exceptions exist. We’re trying to downpower Blue, after all – we’re trying to reign it in, keep it from being top dog.
R&D, you are either lying to us, or you suck at your job.
Go ask Mike Flores what the top deck in the format is. He’ll tell you – after slapping the name “Flores” on the front of it* – and you’ll go look up the decklist, and guess what. It’ll be Blue. It’ll have Islands and counterspells and card drawing because those mechanics are so fundamentally powerful that two or three good ones in any format are going to do enough to keep the deck afloat. Ninja of the Deep Hours is showing up in Vintage, Extended, and, I suspect Legacy (though I have not actual information to back that one up). Seshiro couldn’t even compete in his own block environment.
What about token making? Oh, that’s an area where Green kicks ass! I mean, look at Verdant Force! He costs eight mana, and he’s a 7/7 without evasion, sure, so he’s basically got a “chump me” sign on his forehead, but he gives you a 1/1 every turn! Now compare him to Meloku. One of these costs three mana less, flies, makes his tokens fly, and comes in the color which can dispose of Verdant Force with consummate ease.
Who let Meloku through the net? Who let Shackles through? Why did Jushi Apprentice get missed? What exactly makes Gifts Ungiven a fair card, given that it’s Inspiration on crack? Okay, we’ve got Blue decks that actually want to use permanents, I suppose that’s a step up from the days of Whisper-Capsize–Forbid. So Blue is now playing on a similar field to the other colors – and it’s still just plain better than them at it.
You can say “these are exceptions”, but we’ve had multiple exceptions of this ilk in the cardpool ever since Onslaught Block Constructed. Odyssey-Onslaught blocks Standard? Psychatog, Cunning Wake, and U/G Madness. Mirrodin-OLS Standard? Broodstar Affinity and UW control. While Clamp was legal, mono-Blue control couldn’t hold its own, then, once Clamp got banned, Mono-Blue was back in force, with maindeck Annuls and Temporal Adepts in the board. And it hasn’t gone away since – the banning of Affinity only made it stronger, and the deck hardly noticed Boseiju. Some sideboard slots were dedicated to it, and that was that.
This is not a downpowered color. This is not a color that sucks. Anyone who wants to proclaim “Blue sucks” had best realize that just because you don’t have The Counterspell any more, doesn’t mean you’re not still championing what is the best color in Magic.
(Every time you say that, somewhere, God kills a Dan Paskins.)
(Please, think of the Dans.)
What Am I Trying To Say, Anyway?
This is really a “Green sucks, Blue rules” article in disguise. A very, very, cunning, not-very coherent disguise, wrought while under the influence of a heavy head cold. I’m not whinging about Green’s overall power level. I am complaining about the direction and philosophy it’s taking. I’m complaining that Green is the color that spreads its legs to other colors and has to rely on other people to prop itself up while every other color has something to make it worthwhile in a pure strategy of its own. I’m complaining about good mechanics that you’ve said are Green – like commando creatures that draw cards, or drawing cards based on creatures, or even efficient creatures that defeat enemy strategies – are simply nonexistent, or not being implemented in a way that’s actually useful. Even Kodama North falls to Cruel Edict.
We’ve been lied to, and while we, the Green mages, may well be used to the status quo, this is nothing short of bullcrap. Tell us the truth and quit dancing around the subject. Quit with this penny-ante bull, slowly working Blue back until it’s a tournament leader, but at least, not grotesquely so. Either do your job – and admit that you’re making more mistakes than you are – and actually downpower the color, or stop telling us you’re doing it while you’re blatantly not.
Simply put, the flavor department have a great bead on things I love in this game. I love the conflict between the colors, and I love how Black and White, when taken to their extremes, look so similar. I love how much depth the color wheel has and how interesting it can be to explore. I love that Blue and Green – enemies of the greatest kind – share abilities while differing in motivations.
But that flavor isn’t being born out. Green creatures are the easiest in the world for Blue and Black to control. They are fundamentally fragile permanents that Blue and Black can brutalize. Every set, we get – if we are lucky – one Green creature who is legitimately hard to remove. We also get, at minimum, one decent counterspell, and one decent removal spell. Green shouldn’t be being pushed into a weenie strategy – but fat sucks. Fat sucks because all the cards that deal with it cost less and are good in other places.
(An Aside on Removal, though: I don’t want removal fixed. I think most of the removal in the game is fine, and reasonably fair. I think the counterspells, in general, are solid, and aren’t distorting the format. But I dislike how few tools Green has against its enemies. Black can smash creatures – White and Green’s flagship permanents – all day, and Blue can say no to everything starting from turn 2 and going upward.
Green? Green can’t stop instants, it can’t – with one exception in Standard – defy counterspells, and its creatures that think they dodge removal do a poor job of it. Isao remains a brilliant Green creature, able to tangle with bigger dudes who cost more and survive, while sharing and protecting himself and his allies, all the while defying Blue.
Then he gets Last Gasped, Hideous Laughtered, Boomeranged, or flown over.)
Turn, Turn, Turn.
Let’s talk cycles. These are big, flagship things that help to draw your attention to what exactly each color brings to the table. So, in Champions of Kamigawa, we have six readily identifiable cycles.
You have the uncommon flip cards (Bushi Tenderfoot, Student of the Elements, Nezumi Graverobber, Initiate of Blood, Orochi Eggwatcher), the rare flip cards (Kitsune Mystic, Jushi Apprentice, Nezumi Shortfang, Akki Lavarunner, Budoka Gardener), the Honden (Of Cleansing Fire, Of Seeing Winds, Of Night’s Reach, Of Infinite Rage, of Life’s Web), The instant-speed enchantments (Indomitable Will, Mystic Restraints, Ragged Veins, Uncontrollable Anger, Serpent Skin), the zubera (see Honden), the dragons (Yosei, Keiga, Kokushou, Ryusei, Jugan) and the Myojin (See Honden).
Now, quickly, let me get this out of the way; the worst rare flip card is easily Lavarunner, and the worst instant-speed enchantment is clearly Ragged Veins, with none of the enchantments being really playable in Constructed barring for Will in Block. Now look at the cards and consider – which of these are tournament-playable cards?
Graverobber. Apprentice. Shortfang. None of the Honden barring for Ideal.dec. Yosei. Keiga. Ryusei. Kokusho, oh lords, Kokusho. And every Myojin but the Green one.
Fewer Green cards than any other, more Black than any other, and Blue is in second place. What the hell? Aren’t these all creatures? Why are Black and Blue’s creatures so far ahead of Green’s? What am I missing here?
Well, what I’m missing here is any of these Green creatures being anywhere near as clever as the Blue or Black ones. Green is the #2 color for card draw, provided that card draw is on a creature – such says R&D. Please note that the Jushi Apprentice and Myojin of Seeing Winds must just be going through a color identity crisis. The Green Myojin just gives you more of what you already have – dudes you wish you hadn’t paid so much for. The black one costs seven mana and dies to Last Gasp – but it’s still more playable than the Green one because it affects your opponent in a way that matters!
And the Dragons. You can tell me that Green has a “good” dragon because he’s a 5/5 flier for six in the color that doesn’t get flying. Except Akroma was a White creature with haste and trample, and I don’t see her paying through the nose for it. Keiga gets to be a good, evasive 5/5 creature in Blue – but he didn’t have to pay an extra amount for it – hell, he got a discount, because apparently, he’s in a “good Dragon color”. And Jugan’s ability is a joke. Whatever you want to try and buff with Jugan is going to die. Besides, when my creature dies, I want compensation for it, not a bad buff spell. Blue gets your creature, Black gets to shorten the game by a quarter or extend it by a quarter depending on how you look at it, the White one gets to take an extra turn, and Ryusei (who, admittedly, saw play primarily in Sneak Attack decks) wipes the board clear.
If being a Dragon lets you break the rules, then why the hell does Green still have to play fair by those rules, while Blue gets to have fatties without drawbacks and good abilities? Isn’t Green the go-to color for fat bodies? Apparently not!
Now then, on to Betrayers. We have the Ki Counter flippers (Didn’t Flores call them Dolphins? [Not one of his better days… – Knut]) (Faithful Squire, Callow Jushi, Cunning Bandit, Hired Muscle, Budoka Pupil), the two-mana Legendary rares (Hokori, Chisei, Yukora, Fumiko, Iwamori), the one-drops who sacrificed for an effect (Kami of False Hope, Teardrop Kami, Bile Urchin, Frostling, Child of Thorns), the Patrons (Kitsune, Moon, Nezumi, Akki, Orochi), the Lobotomizers (Scour, Quash, Eradicate, Sowing Salt, Splinter), the Shoals (Shining, Disrupting, Sickening, Blazing, Nourishing), and the Baku (Waxmane Baku, Quillmane Baku, Skullmane Baku, Razormane Baku, Petalmane Baku).
First, we cut the chaff. All the Baku are Limited cards at best, though Razormane did indeed get some attention in Constructed, primarily by those of us too poor to afford good cards. The Lobotomizers are highly inflexible, and not really big plays in tournaments, barring for Sowing Salt, which had a place in the metagame keeping TnN at bay. And the Dolphins probably fill the same suit, though Cunning Bandit is quite, quite beefy for a three drop in Red.
This leaves us with Hokori, who is king of the heap of his particular cycle. Blue and Red get the worse part – and Fumiko is at least a grand-scale house in multiplayer. The only one-drop sacrifical dude worth playing in a 60-card pile was really Frostling. The four-drop cycle produced three tournament-caliber creatures. One of them was Black, but, astoundingly, the Green and White ones were actually good cards!
But when we get to the Patrons and Shoals, we see the problem once more rear its head. All the Shoals barring Nourishing go for multiple tix online. Sickening is free removal, Disrupting – despite how much people complain about it – is still seeing Constructed play as a free (and arcane) counterspell. Blazing Shoal has its proponents (shout outs to Phil Standen, yo), and Shining Shoal is, while not quite as good as Aaron Forsythe hyped it to be, still a beating. Nourishing Shoal is nothing short of a total joke.
(Note; while I look down on Nourishing Shoal as being a bad card, I have lost to it at least once. Humility, don’cherknow.)
The Patrons are another example of the problem – while the Moon is by no means an amazing card (the entire moonfolk tribe being a bit of a bad joke with the exception of Meloku), he’s still a five-power flier who can come out at instant speed on turn 4. With mutually craptastic tribes, the Patron of the Orochi gives you nothing more than that which you already had, if you’ve cast him – a ridiculous amount of mana.
Consider the Patron of the Kitsune, though. He’s a house. A 5/6 for six, with a theoretical potential to get out cheaper and faster (though, ah, I don’t see that happening off any of the Foxes in the game – barring for Blademaster, there’s no nice curve into casting the Patron as a surprise. He’s fat and his ability both dissuades an opponent’s assault and encourages your own. Simply put, a nutty good fat-bodied spirit, who actually does something reasonably clever, and in a color that can attempt to protect him. And he’s not Green.
In Saviors, we get the Kirin, the Descendants, The Epic spells, the Wildebeests, The Maro, the Ascendants, and the Onna. None of The Descendants are Constructed-playable (with the possible exception of Gaze of Adamaro). Of the Kirin, the Blue and Red ones haven’t seen play, and the Green one is a total joke – for the same supposed reason as Jugan. The Maro – a cycle inspired by Green – has the Green one in Worst Place, since he’s the most expensive, doesn’t do anything interesting, and doesn’t evade or have trample. The best cards of the cycle? Kagemaro and Adamaro.
The Ascendants are a joke, really, with only Erayo proving to be worthy of a place in a 60-card deck. And he’s… a Blue creature. The Onna – well, okay, here we have one where they’re all about equally rubbish.
Which leaves us with the Epic Spells. It’s a pathetic knife-fight between Black and Green as to whose is the worst card, since both are tied directly to Wisdom. Neverending Torment is in a color that can get the board stabilized before it Goes Epic, while Green doesn’t have that luxury. Green could theoretically go hell-for-leather trying to get enough mana in play to explode into an early Swarm – but then that’d be swarming with one, maybe two cards in hand the first time.
And the tokens are summoning sick. Nothing quite like waiting another turn for your opponent do draw their Infest/Nausea/Night of Soul’s Betrayal/Hideous Laughter/Pyroclasm/Practically Any Good Card.
I can handle Green getting the worst of cycles just as often as every other color. But at least this past year or two, it hasn’t felt fair, with none of the cycles providing Green with the king-hitting spell that is clearly recognized as the ‘best’ of its ilk. And when Green consistently gets the worst creature card in a cycle, it behooves me to ask exactly what the point of Green spells is. Accelerate, increase, expand, grow… so you can turncoat on what got you there and play a creature who’s better because he’s not Green?
Something Resembling A Conclusion
The biggest hurdle to actually writing this kind of article – and bringing it to some kind of satisfying conclusion while not making it sound like some kind of tantrumesque ultimatum. When it’s Sheldon Menery throwing down the glove, you can bet Wizards will listen – but me? Casual player I may be, but I’m not nearly able to contribute the game in as meaningful a fashion. I don’t have any kind of worth to threaten with. These articles and their ilk rarely “solve” things. R&D are working well in advance of now, and, at least if I understand things correctly, are not in any kind of position to really change things in a way that we’ll see for two years. I make comments now, and R&D decides to take them to heart – as though R&D is some monolithic creature that’s wandering and and doing things – and, then, we won’t see the results of that until 2007. That’s just how things are.
Curiously, by writing this down, I am increasing my overall value, but, curiously, only microcosmically – and the more worth I think I have, at least at this point, the less likely I am to have it. So, forgive me if this article feels somewhat unsatisfying by now.
R&D needs to step up to its claims. You’ve got a pair of kids brawling in a playpen, except one of them has a bat with a nail in it and the other is blind. Stop taking away our stuff, stop telling us you’re doing one thing when you’re not, and stop, for the love of god, stop letting exceptions to your policy through the net with an attitude of, ‘Well, it’s just one card’.
There are more issues – white and card draw spring to my mind – but this is the cross I’m waving today.
Hugs and Kisses.
Talen Lee
Talen at dodo dot com dot au
* Just kidding. LOVE MIKE.