The Rise and Fall of Modern (Magic: the Gathering's Biggest Competitive Format) 

WARNING: In this video I share my opinion.

There's no new player pipeline anymore. Used to be if you wanted to get into magic without a collection, you'd drop $10-15 at a time on drafts, then use the cards you drafted to play standard, then use your standard collections to play eternal formats. Now the standard cards dont interact with eternal so you either draft forever, drop $500 at once, or proxy everything.

Just reinforces the old adage: “the best thing wizards ever did for is forget it existed”

The last point you made is so right. We need to organize more and be a community of players.

The modern sets should have been staple reprints that already existed within the format. That way newer players could get their hands on the cards they wanted while the prices dipped, and the format wouldn't become soo warped.

MH1 did some damage. MH2 stepped up, and said "hold my beer". But the real culprit is the shift in philosophy by Hasbro. It's no longer about the game, it's only about "how can we make the most money, with the smallest amount of effort". This reminds me of mtggoldfish' reprint problem article from a couple of years. Seth thought there would be diminishing returns on reprinting fetches etc, but never did he anticipate what would actually happen (5-6 versions of the same card). Now that Hasbro has hit the ceiling with magic, d&d is their next target and boy are they in for a bad day.

Power creep was present in magic before as well, but it was like over 5 years you can see a power increase, now you can see one with every new set. Nothing makes me more sad in games than insane power creep. A minor power creep is fine, but not what's currently happening

I been playin modern since 2013 and sold my collection valued at over 10k this year as the format was nothing short of an addiction trying to keep my decks relevant. We proxy decks with a color printer and play whatever decks we want for like 15 bucks each (Paper, sleeves, ink and deck box cost per deck) we have 40-50 decks and play whatever we want against eachother at home now.

I love that Gavin Verhey helped create Modern and the helped drive a stake in its heart. Good Job, Wizards/Hasbro!

Damn... When affinity, jeskai geist, E-tron, mardu pyro, jund, hardened scales, UW control were all the top decks. ..That was without a doubt the best era of modern.

Good take. A take a lot of the Magic community doesn't want to admit. Cards that were once considered fair in the format were suddenly axed because they didn't mesh well with the newer ones have driven a lot of players away. I am also one of those players.

2019 pre War of the Spark was one of my favorite times in Modern. Phoenix was dominant, but there was still a healthy metagame around it. Tron, Lantern, Shadow, Burn, Dreadge, UW Conrol, Humans, and GB Rock were all solid, had play against each other, and consistently shared top 8 spots at GPs and SCG events.

I got into Modern shorty after I started playing Magic in 2015 where I turned my standard Esper Dragons list into a Modern deck. I was still in highschool at the time, so it took me a while to get the manabase for it. After the release of SOI I changed the win-con from Dragons to the Unburial Rites/Gifts Ungiven package. I always loved attending FNM those days since there was an LGS within walking distance to my house and my highschool friends would all attend too. One of them ran UB Faeries, another did U-Tron, and another Tooth-and-Nail. After the release of Modern Horizons we fell out of the competitive scene due to costs and swapped to EDH. I still attended every once in a while, but the banning of Opal caused my favorite deck at the time, Lantern Control, to be nigh-unplayable and I fell out of the scene. To this day I still think that while the card was almost banworthy, it died because of Urza's release in MH1. I recently got back into the format, but I can't help but feel jaded every time I see Ragavan or Omnath. It just reminds me of how Modern used to be, and how it will probably never be that way again.

It really is unfortunate how F.I.R.E design effectively introduced cards and ideas that made Modern a rotating format. I remember back when I started playing in 2016 that Liliana of the Veil was the scariest card to see your opponent drop on turn 3 and a Tarmogoyf becoming a 4/5 commanded being Path to Exiled. Cryptic Command was an insane tempo play and if Burn had a good game they could finish you off on Turn 4, Turn 3 if they drew the absolute nuts. It was UNHEARD of to have a deck see more than 10% of the meta share. Nowadays if you connect with a Ragavan on turn 2 you've effectively won the game on the spot against most decks and an 11/11 Hammer Wielder can be headed your way on the same turn. Liliana of the Veil? Try Wrenn and Six on for size. Remember the last time you played a Tarmogoyf? Just looking at MtGGoldfish you can see that even with all of these different "decks," we can see some odd similarities: almost all of the non-land cards are from Modern Horizons. EIGHT out of the TOP TEN most played creatures were released in MODERN HORIZONS ALONE, 7 of them in MH2! It doesn't help that Ledger Shredder is also amongst the top ten and is another product of F.I.R.E. design. The last basion in the top 10 is Magus of the Moon for Pete's sake! So yeah, I'd rather not have an MH3.

I think you're looking at the "golden years" of modern through rose-tinted spectacles - it wasn't all that much different in terms of price really. Wizards has been hawking heinously expensive piles of cardboard for a lot longer than Modern has been a thing. The only difference is that in the old days of modern, a lot of the high prices and overcentralizing cards were accidents. When they printed Tarmogoyf for example I genuinely think they had no idea it was going to be a $200 card. The egregious thing about current Modern prices is that the prices have stayed this high despite multiple reprint and supplementary sets nominally intended to make the format more accessible. Why? Because they've done every trick in the book to undermine that accessibility in the name of profit: increasingly expensive packs, rarity upshifts, "draft focused" premium masters sets that consequently are full of chaff cards, strategic staggering of important reprints across multiple sets, banning old cards for the sins of new powercrept cards, and now with Modern Horizons just straight up obsoleting half of the format to drive demand for the shiny new mythics only available in premium-priced packs. MH1 and especially MH2 were calculated attacks designed up milk players for as much as possible. The best trick of all though is how WOTC, intentionally or by accident, exploited the elitism of its playerbase to defend it at every turn. Every time I criticised WOTC business practices on reddit or youtube, there were legions of nerds coming out of the woodwork to tell me that magic is plenty affordable if only you treat it as a stock market and not a game. It seemed to be lost on them that if they got to play "for free" through risky speculation on thousands of dollars worth of cardboard (an activity that not everyone can afford even if they don't find such a requirement nauseating), it was only through being subsidized by their less-established and less-obsessed fellow players. Not only was there no solidarity between Magic players in the face of WOTC, but many people took conspicuous pride in exploiting newer and less experienced players for profit in the form of hoarding and inflating the value of cards. Basically, we've arrived in this place today because of the complacency of players who already bought in, and their contempt for players who had not yet bought in. I hope at least some of these guys have, in the last few years of WOTC's most money-grubbing stunts yet, learnt their lesson somewhat about the ways companies will stab you in the back if you actively help them shoot down pro-consumer voices.

As a former modern player back until mh1 came out. I swapped to pionner since they announced it and didnt look back, i do miss the golden years of post eldrazi winter modern. And i live in constant fear of a pioneer horizons, as i feel the format is great and cam grow organically over the next year.

First of all, I'd like to add context to my comment by telling a bit of my history with Magic. I started playing back in 2009 but was 100% kitchen table enjoyer until 2014 when I started playing EDH and finished High School. I slowly creeped up my decks power levels searching for more competitive experience with EDH, never actually reaching CEDH because it wasn't really a known thing until 2020. I have however followed Modern and Legacy tournaments and metagate from 2015, focusing more on Modern because of it's cheaper price tag and arguably longer games since the format didn't have as explosive and polarizing matchups as Legacy. Two years ago a friend of mine convinced me to come to our local FNM and one borrow of his decks. I instantly fell in love. I played couple of FNM's that Winter and Spring before finally acquiring a Modern deck in late Summer of 2021. I have played in every FNM we had in our city after that, traveled for bigger tournaments in Finland (country I live in) which we had 6 or 7 after Summer of 2021 I think. I enjoyed the power of the format compared to Pioneer, which I play as well, but I also loved the "downgrade", at least in terms of power level, from Legacy, which I also started playing last Spring. Now, we've had multiple discussions, within our FNM group, about the Modern format during last 6 months as the uproar of the Modern community against current metagame and MH-sets feel became stronger and players wanting the good old days back. Most of the people I've spoken to agree that the current metagame is the best in Modern's history and most balanced and most enjoyable. And yes, most of the people playing in our LGS have been playing Modern before MH-sets. However, as Harry stated in the video, current policy of WOTC seems to battle against Moderns original meaning and reason why it was created in the first place. While I agree that overpriced mythics with insufficient reprints are a huge problem for the health of the game in general and, at the moment, mostly for Modern and EDH, I bring myself to disagree with people that seem to justify the criticism towards Modern with the price tag it has. Yes decks are less affordable, but shouldn't the criticism then be towarded against WOTC's reprint policy instead of the formant and most importantly players of the format. I've seen incredible amount of hate towards people who play 4cc/4c elementals, Scam, any deck with Ragavan or W6 in them just in general, just because they play the best cards (or how I believe the most expensive ones). I've not heard that such hate have occurred towards Tarmo-players when it was 150€+. Also I'm not seeing such hate against for example Hammer even tho it has been arguably the best Modern deck for a while, at least in Modo. So this bring to my main point. Every format is rotating format. Power creep is inevitable. People make mistakes, were they cards that slipped thru playtest (Oko) or greed (Hasbro), which accelerates power creep. But will it justify the hate? No. Will it justify constructive criticism towards Wizards, not players? Yes. All one can do is adapting the metagame and finding new ways to have fun. Find new deck archetypes, explore other formats, create custom events for your local players, for example Modern as it was 2015. If you just sit still and only cherish the old instead of cherishing both the new and the old you just find yourself being bitter. Sorry for the long comment. There's so much more I'd like to say and compare different viewpoints, find and tell arguments for and against current and past Modern, tell my own experiences and analyze the overall metagame, community, decks, power creep etc before and now, it won't fit in a RU-vid comment in any sensible way. Also this comment in most likely being read by 6 people till the end and 4 of them disagree with me and of those 2 tell me they did stuff with my mother so I find discouraging to use any more energy for this. Anyways I am open for discussion in replies if someone wants to. Always glad to exchange opinions and find new opportunities to discuss about the game (and format) that I love with people who, I hope, share the same passion as me.

Not only the money and the cost of MH1, but also the 2 MH sets forced an artificial rotation to a format built on the appeal of non rotation.

The Opal Ban is what killed it for me. Dropped the format and never looked back. Luckily they started focusing on Commander, and now they're killing that as well lol.

Great video! It’s been fascinating watching modern evolve.

Your choice of animation for this video is amazing! Well done!

I used to go to modern twice a week at my LGS, now they don't even fire anymore because everyone has switched to pioneer

the issue is that they actually tried to grow the player base, but didnt manage to do so, and their advisory group just threw the option of extracting value before the inminent death of the game so they took it.

How much I needed someone to say this! This is pretty much my case and I supose from many others. When mh1 came out I was pretty excited too, but toghether with the power creep modern started to feel like a rotating format, a very expensive rotating format...

I agree with you. 2018 was the golden age of Modern. I really enjoyed that year. At first I thought Modern Horizons was cool because it was something new and exciting, but now I think it is a mistake.

My local gamestore created a new format (common/uncommon singleton $15 max per card). It has been doing great the past month and brings life to all the bulk cards people have.

Great question! Very thought provoking. I don't see an end. Wotc has a parent company who is pressing on the gas and I don't see a stop in sight! Well done!

It seems like the supplemental sets seem to become more and more of a cash grab. It makes me hope that the new heritage format idea gets more traction.

Very good production value, thanks for the entertainment and brain power!

I played modern from the moment it came out and this video glosses over a lot of that time. I remember when certain cards were extremely oppressive and were banned to help the format well before Eldrazi winter--cards like Splinter Twin and Birthing Pod. The bans were good for the format and so were the later bans mentioned here. Wizards was proactive about the bans of Oko and Uro and Field of the Dead. MH1 and MH2, while they introduced great cards, did make the format much more expensive in the rush to get the new tech first. The fact that these cards were so expensive reinforces the health of the format when taken as a snapshot in time. If there had been more supply and less players, the cards would have gone down in value and been more reasonable to buy. Supply and demand... What really hurt modern (and is still doing so) in my opinion is 1. Covid all but eliminated paper magic for a time, and events suffered; 2. In the push to digitize MTG, Wizards eliminated so many tournaments and in-person magic that there was no reason to keep playing standard and modern, and a lot of players went the casual (and much less expensive) EDH route; and 3. Wizards forgot that this is a game first and not just a money mill. Just a couple thoughts on my mind as i watch this video. Keep grindin' those games.

I think you’re right about the power creep. It sells cards though, so they can’t stop. They have two choices to keep creeping in Modern: more free spells, or find a way to invalidate the old free spells

For the algorithm, keep at it Harry!! Love the content!

The constant changing of the format with power creep is the reason im taking a break from mtg to play yugioh's time wizard format, its formats that are based on a certain year with its banlist so the cardpool doesnt change. Also, these older cards are heavily reprinted so its easy to spend around 100$ to build a full deck.

I started playing Modern seriously when Jace TMS was unbanned and man was that a great time to play Modern. I built 3-4 tier 1 decks that lasted me until MH1 and 2 completely warped and ruined the format. Now if I want to compete I need at least $500-$600 of upgrades in basically all of my decks. Eternal format it is no longer.

I used to adore modern. Now i just play pauper (a format I hope to God wizards doesn't find a way to monetize), cube, and play 2018-era modern decks with friends. With the exception of my pauper decks, everything I run is proxied. Wizards can kick rocks as far as I'm concerned-MH1 and 2 shattered any trust I had in them, as well as any hope for their ability to maintain magic healthily in the longterm. And all for a quick buck :( Hope it was worth it, Hasbro!

Horizons sets aren't the evil, WotC's handling of them has been. If you were to take out the following cards, people would look at MH sets as the best things to happen to modern. - Hogaak - Astrolabe - W&6 - Urza's Saga - Ephemerate - the Evoke Elementals (but Fury and Grief specifically) - Ragavan - Unholy Heat (Obviously, thr LotR set belongs in yhis discussion too. Specifically,ToR and Bowmasters.) And I think that's about it. No one minds that Enchantress, Merfolk, and Asmo decks are a thing. In fact, the format is better because they are here. We need a company that will see cards like these and instead of chasing $$$ think about the impact they will have on the format.

Great, looks like HarryMTG is back on the menu!

Harry, you continue putting out the best MTG content! Truly great video! I really agree with your opinion and hate the thought of MH3.

Right now the closest thing we have to old school Modern is Pioneer... So I guess it's just a matter of time before Pioneer Horizons becomes a thing

Welp, Modern Horizons 3 is coming later this year. May the lord have mercy on our souls.

Cool video, I think you could easily let more exploratory videos like this go a bit longer to really dig into the issues.

Great Channel!

Hasbro forgot that the appeal of an eternal format was that it was eternal

amazing video as always Harry. i was there at GP barca and didnt play against a single Hoogak in the Trial and main event ^^ lucky me

More videos like this one please!!!!!

Sick vid 👏👏

Feels inspired by the rystic study videos. I like it.

Great video. Awesome points. I played both G Tron and GDS. I abandoned Tron when I found I couldn’t afford the what was a $10 Mycosynth Lattice on Monday but somehow shot up to $75 on Tuesday. I picked up Lurrus and enjoyed GDS having had to retire Tron. Soon afterwards, Ragavan insured that both my irl modern decks would be retired as I couldn’t then afford to continue. As of today, Tron is an option but I just don’t feel like it’s the same. And MTGO prices!!! Covid somehow gave WOTC the ability to “overnight” triple and quadruple prices. 2020 in January what was 1 tix somehow became 15 tix by February. Then you would think years later the prices would have stabilized…. Nope. I have left legacy as well. Pauper is a breath of fresh air when you need it but it doesn’t help the disappointment of realizing the format you once loved is nolonger accessible because you’re poor…

do more vids like this, this is great

This video format is very good! I really liked.

Getting hacked is a miserable experience, hope you'll pull through it. Love your vids btw

I am thinking about switching to pioneer. But will they print pioneer horizons at some point?

What "song" is playing at 1:38?

I do want a Modern Horizon's 3, and by that I mean simply a set that allows older cards to be rotated into Modern (And not cards specifically made for the format).

I started in the golden age and it was a great time and I had fun for years playing almost every top deck. I stuck it out during war of the spark and MH1 but I was very quickly losing patience with WOTC. One of my main complaints was they wouldn't just ban the new problem card, they would ban a format staple instead like Faithless Looting hoping that would solve the issue only to later have to ban the real problem like Hoggak. This happened several times. I was already on the verge of quitting and was watching some announce video of all the upcoming products that included Street Fighter cards, some other set printed into Modern directly, etc. I started unsleeving before the video ended and cashed out. It was the right decision.

I got into Magic via Modern, bought the Modern Event deck, upgraded it and even went to a tournament with it. Now, I won't touch that format, because I don't really want to see, who can stick a Ragavan the earliest.

2016 was not only Eldrazi winter that made people loose interest. Modern had been plagued with having lots of linear decks that could win as early as turn 3 consistently and they banned the only deck that kept things in check, Splinter Twin. 2016 was when I stopped playing modern, MH2 made want to return to modern. Modern Horizon 2 has been great for Modern in general and I rather them trying to add more powerful cards than trying to push Standards powerlevel to insane hights just so Modern players buy the new set

I just came back to Magic after not playing for only 2 years or so. The modern meta was awesome and perfectly paced. Now everything is too quick, powerful, and expensive. Competitive play on MTGO is absolutely saturated with Urza's Sagas, Ragavans, and those ridiculous elementals (Fury, Grief, etc.)

Well put. Myself for example. In the past i could upgrademy modern deck with relatively ease. But after MH i cant never catch up. I couldn’t upgrade my jund deck in like a year. There was w6, eho throwed my lilis tobthe garbage, then came the monkey with lurrus and overprices baubles… soon after lurrus was gone and i had to rebuild again. Its a never ending “pay a ton or leave the store being last”. And i love modern, but this has been too much and ended up not playing magic for a while now.

I totally agree, although I am more of a commander player myself, it has a similar problem, the best cards are the most recent ones, with exception of a few old jank cards, overtuned ones or very specific fits. Think about modern horizon cards, tashas oracle, dockside extortionist and so on. I do like new toys, however it way too quickly invalidates decks. In the last few sets for instance a competitive urza deck could pick up a artifact tutor that is in itself an artifact, multiple other artifacts that are practically upgrades (urza's battlethopter over shimmer myr for instance or moon snare prototype over springleaf drum, or both). I do like a few new cards every now and then, however needing to reconsider 1/20th to 1/10th of the deck every half a year or so is just to much, I want to be able to dust off an old favorite and still play it just fine after a year without having the "oh, I should have put these 10 cards, too bad".

old modern truly was good times. so many viable decks that didn't put you in the poorhouse.

I've had to quit, not because I want to but because I can't afford it, and if I work more to afford it I have no time to play

Regardless of if we, the players, want it or not we *are* getting Modern Horizons 3 with the release of Universes Beyond: Lord of the Rings.

EDH I going through the same thing. Commander is a rotating format now. Gotta keep the stock up.

Like that the jund picture is Wrenn and Six for a tournament in 2012. 😅

I have played the entire length of modern. I remember all these events. I really liked MH or the prospect of it. Through sunken cost fallacy I bought into MH2; just as heavy. Modern players are separated by their love of a certain thing (archetypes, card styles, basics) these divides are so ingrained and deep there’s no unity. A heritage format; this only caters to entrenched players. My POV, I’m fine with this cause I own all the good cards from the “golden era”. New players this not as easy. Do I want MH3? In the interest of format shake up yes. In the perspective of banning cards, power creep, free spells, Gandalf in Modern? Idk 🤷‍♂️ can I walk away? Can I do whatever I want? Yes. Do I want too? Idk 🤷‍♂️ Roast me in the comments…

Uro wasn't quickly banned, it stayed for a whole year if memory serves me right. It was milked for money for as much time as possible before any action was taken. They waited until *after* they released a secret lair version of the card before banning it.

Great video, I don't want a MH3 at all, but we already know that we're getting one with the LotR set too

Fullheartedly agree. 👍🏼

God I miss playing Gifts Storm and having it not be a fringe deck

I think you're absolutely right. WoTC wants formats like modern to buy lots of packs again. They are forcing modern players into the standard grind because they see short term profits. This is exactly the kind of thing that wall-street investigator found. Printing too many cards too quickly for short term profit, while destroying the longevity and collectibility of the game itself. Hasbro doesn't care, I think. They see MTG as temporary, and are trying to pump up the numbers as much as possible. DnD is also going through something similar. A bunch of limited products squeezed between regular products and announcements of the new edition coming out. They want people to be FORCED to buy new products, or quit the hobby.

I miss the old tournaments that would be streamed. I used to watch the Grand Prix after a long day while serving in the military. 😢

I've been playing Modern at the same local store for the last 4 years and I have only seen a few new faces ever since I started playing. We used to be 40+ players at the Modern FNM. The store even had to ask the restaurant next door to use their tables! Nowadays, it's a miracle if they can pull 16 players on a Friday Night. They even told us they are reducing the prize pool if less than 16 people show up. The EDH event, on the other hand, consistently brings over 50 people. There are no new players getting introduced to Modern over time and some are even quitting...

Interesting catching this video today. I was thinking wouldn't it be nice to have a format without the sets printed just for modern...

The only difference between Standard and Modern these days is that Modern allows for cards specifically made for Modern. Otherwise Standard is based on the last THREE YEARS of sets. That’s fucking INSANE for new players to play into.

I 100% agree. I was a big modern fan. It was the only format I played. It has just gotten worse and worse. I think there are a ton of problems with modern, but there are two that stick out to me- Triomes and the pitch elementals. If I could get rid of anything it would be the pitch elementals. However, the triomes just make mana way to easy as well. Wren, Ragavan, Urza's saga are also issues, but I would like to see those without the triomes and pitch elementals. Modern is so gone to me I just don't know what WOTC can do now. All of the "brews" now are just a small number of cards in every deck and a slightly different win con or addition of 1 different card. The largest draw to modern was the fact that you could play your favorite deck for a long time and at least be competitive. That is gone and so are a lot of the original modern fans. From a pure play stand point the games can be entertaining, but from an overall standpoint Modern has definitely become boring and sideboard dependent. Boring and dependent are two things that inevitably cause the death of a game. We shall see what they do, but modern may be to far gone for help at this point. I hope not.

I agree and that's why I only play Paper: it's an eternal format with a wide arrange of strategies and card available, but it's super affordable and even if your deck is hit by bans or power-creeped by new cards, the cost of upgrading to the new tier 1s is what? 30-50$?

_'Do I want a Modern Horizons 3?'_ Yes. Commander can always use more cards!

How does this only have 17k views?

i like these kinds of videos

I stopped playing in paper altogether. Modern and Legacy were my favorite formats and were just too expensive to play in. The price of fetch lands has come down since but MH2 and Ragavan have made it impossible to get back into it at this point. I just play on arena now and I think that’s what WOTC’s goal was along.

Free spells are a feels-bad, even if they're not that powerful. Modern should be the format of fetchlands and no free spells. Also, if a card is too powerful for legacy, it's too powerful for modern. Wrenn and Six is busted and Ragavan is one of the best creatures ever printed. A lot of the old cards on the banlist need to come off. It's a just that cards like Ragavan can be legal, but artifact lands can't. Artifact lands aren't a problem in any format except pauper.

I started Plating modern on Affinity and the started playing urza ThopterSword. My decks have always been good enough to bring to any FNM or RCQ only recently I switched to a new homebrew that I think is more powerful. I'd say modern right now has more room to brew but I do agree that MH1 and MH2 cards make up to much of the format staples

Post Uro + Field of the Dead ban, Pre MH2 was peak Neo-modern. No monkey, no incarnations. Just look at the kinds of decks played between February 16th 2021 and June 17th 2021.

Great vid, much better than YT Support

This vid finally made me like and subscribe, really should have done so earlier

Extended was the best format i played by far

I agree with your opinion

What's funny is Harry himself made a video, maybe inadvertedly, showing the way to counteract the modern horizons effect only 33 videos ago...

I have an idea. Instead of printing the 30th aniv proxy’s for $1K, instead wizards should just print $1K Modern precons .Modern Challenger deck??

Beautiful video, I wish I had seen it when it came out. The only thing I disagree with is faithless looting. To me it always felt like a long time coming. It felt like red brainstorm to me for a long while.

As someone who started playing magic during the Return to Ravnica block, hearing the phrase "modern was designed to be cheap" just seems like such a weird concept to me. I know that was during the time when cards like Tarmogoyph were at their all time peak in terms of price, but even back then I though that modern was still way too expensive to get into. Now I WISH the price of modern was what it was back then....

Pay to win is cancer. Thats the real issue. Greed kills this game. The banned list could be worked on as well. IMO there should be NO turn 2 or debatable even turn 3 combos.

I remember seeing Ragavan at MH2 release and thinking, how long till this card gets banned. Guess that day never came 😅

I had spent a while collecting the cheaper cards I needed n then when I had the money n most of my family n friends had stopped playing so I needed proxyless decks to go play at the cards store so I go ally dropped the funds to finish my Hardened Scales deck. But I was busy with work n couldn't get to a modern night at the LGS for 3 months n 2 months in they banned Opal... 0_o my baby!! 😭😭 The real problem with MTG is that WOTC has forgotten how to balance card power based on rarity n mana cost n colour identity. I used to teach new players by showing them Birds of Paradise cuz it is a perfectly balanced card. But it's pointless to even explain y anymore cuz new cards never follow that philosophy. They used to know how to make creatures n struggled with balancing spells n the decided to make all the spells cost more mana unless they cost more money n the creatures r basically just spells with bodies now n the bodies r just as string as the vanilla creatures used to be.

Dude used to love watching the live gameplay

@HarryMTG good to see you got your account back mate. Was afraid we lost you permanently.

Good Video! I just recently started playing modern, built a budget tron, realized it's not good in my meta and switched to Affinity, also for budget reasons. I could hold my own against most decks for a game or two, but the modern horizons cards are just so oppressive. Ragavan is the devil incarnate if you ask me. The problem I could identify for me and the people at my LGS is, that modern becomes stale, even though tournaments have a great variety. It just feels like a race, probably just like legacy which I have never played, but more exhausting and less fun. In Legacy and Vintage you can do degenerate things which is fun. Either you own or you get owned and no hard feelings are taken, because this overpoweredness balances out over time. In Pioneer and Pauper you get to play magic like you used to in your childhood. Cast a bunch of creatures or find a fun combo that needs 3-4 pieces to win and the game is not just over on turn 2 or 3 when a monkey attacked twice or a free elemental destroyed 2 manadorks on your side. just my 2 cents.

Dr. Garfield himself said that the only way to keep the game alive was to have power creep or a rotating format. Looks like they decided they could make more money by doing both

Lol I just found out that today was the last day our shop runs modern.