>>> PROSPERO's ARTICLE <<<
Questo è un gran bel leggere... strettamente parlando, può non essere utile al gioco, può non produrre liste specifiche, può non condurre da alcuna parte, ma a mio modo di vedere evidenzia molto del percorso fatto (volontariamente o involontariamente) dalla R&B nell'attualizzare ed incanalare i vari Artifact.dec o MW.dec, nel tentativo di radicare l'idea che la diversità delle funzioni che i "colori" in magic hanno sempre avuto, può subire dei mutamenti, può portare a degli accorpamenti e creare ibridi del tutto nuovi, anche a 20anni dalla nascita del gioco.
Ogni nuovo tentativo d'innovazione in Magic, ha delle ripercussioni epocali nel Vintage più che in altri formati, dove ogni sfaccettatura può corrispondere ad una singola carta e dove, con buona probabilità, gran parte delle nuove/vecchie magie, rimarranno in circolazione sui nostri tavoli da gioco per l'eternità...
Il vintage è il formato dove i cambiamenti sono macchinosi, faticosi e lenti ma nel quale quelle stesse variazioni hanno impatti duraturi, gli errori un peso maggiore e le gioie un sapore più maturo.
Ci son tanti spunti di riflessione "non operativi" in questo articolo. E' più un tentativo introspettivo di ragionare su come vengono impostate alcune meccaniche e loro evoluzione dalla R&B piuttosto che parlare delle meccaniche stesse. Il fine di voler inizialmente spaccare gli Artifact.dec in Aggro e Control e/o meglio Coloured o Monobrown prr poi arrivare ad avere una differente divisione in Welder.dec o Non Welder.dec basata sulla sola lettura dell'evoluzione temporale del gioco è molto suggestivo.
Non mi soffermerei troppo sulle carte esposte o le meccaniche raccontate. Quelle sono necessariamente (per motivi espositivi) incomplete e lasciano molto all'interpretazione. Apprezzerei e mi piacerebbe che si apprezzi di più, invece il taglio più profondo che anche oltreoceano ogni tanto san dare su argomenti solitamente ridotti in inneggiamenti a fazioni differenti e tiritere senza vinti e vincitori.
Buona lettura,
MaxxMatt
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I. The History of Workshops
“Be sure you put your feet in the right place, then stand firm.”
Abraham Lincoln
When a player decided to play a Workshop deck they were immediately faced with a decision: what kind of Shop deck? While blue pilots chose between Combo and Control, Shop pilots chose between Prison and Aggro.
That question led to another one: just how flexible do I want to be? The question was an important one. Shop Aggro could offer you aggressive starts with powerful cards, but it was unable to support the mana base that would be required in order to reliably cast colored spells. Colored spells weren'ta part of its game plan – the deck sought to use the disruption that it possessed as a series of Time Walks, not as cards used to establish a hard lock.
The two synergies were at war with one another. Shop Prison wanted to establish board control and play a longer game. The ideal game wasn't interactive, but it wasn't usually as fast as a Shop Aggro game. The Shop Aggro deck was different. It was a tempo deck, with Spheres, Wires and Wastelands meant to disrupt the opponent long enough to do 20 points of damage. The deck couldn't establish a hard lock – if your game went long you almost assuredly had lost. The strategy did have redemptive attributes though. Still, there were costs associated with either Shop deck. Both were strong, but did you prefer more power or more flexibility? Did you want the ability to dodge an opponent's threats, or did you intend on trying to run through them? How many lockpieces did you need and what was the opportunity cost of those lockpieces?
II. Printings Through the Years
“Don't be afraid to see what you see.”
Ronald Reagan
An important question that should be asked (by Wizards R&D at the very least) is how much mana a given effect is worth and where it fits in the color wheel. With the printing of cards like The Tabernacle at Pendrell Vale back in the early days of Magic the concept of zero cost associated with an effect was introduced. To be fair, Tabernacle is a card that comes with a cost, in that it costs you your solitary land drop for a turn and it doesn't make mana. Still, the effect of Tabernacle – forcing players to spend mana in order to keep their creatures on the board, is an effect that could be colored. Many years later it was, as Wizards printed Magus of the Tabernacle – a creature with the same effect as the original land from Legends – a creature that required a player to spend white mana in order to net the effect of the original Tabernacle. Other cards introduced other effects – Library of Alexandria and Bazaar of Baghdad both introduced the idea of brown draw (once again with restrictions or downsides.) Tormod's Crypt introduced free graveyard removal – an effect that would later be heavily identified with black mana.
Still, Wizards wasn't exactly prolific with these kinds of printings. There were things that fit within the color wheel and the cards that had those effects would require spending the appropriate mana.
III. Dredge and Leylines
“Everyone has his day and some days last longer than others.”
Winston Churchill
There are cards that we can look back on and call mistakes. Psionic Blast wouldn't be printed nowadays, just as Gate to Phyrexia wouldn't see the light of day either. They are cards that don't fit within their restrictions in the color wheel.
Ravnica block was wildly important to modern Vintage for many reasons. Ravnica brought us Dredge and the advent of a very powerful Bazaar pillar. Ravnica block brought us Dark Confidant – one of the modern draw engines of blue Vintage decks. Ravnica block also brought us something else though, the ability to get a colored effect (for nothing, a brown cost of 0) with Leylines. It wasn't the first time and it will not be the last.
Ravnica block necessitated graveyard hate in modern Shop lists, but it also gave Shops Leyline of the Void, the card that Dredge pilots (rightly) fear most. The presence of black cards in the sideboard of a Workshop deck seems wrong at first, especially four mana enchantments.Many of the Shop decks that use Leyline of the Void can't cast it reliably, or can't cast it at all. The Sphere effects that most every Shop deck plays push Leyline of the Void out further on their curve and the presence of Mishra's Workshop (a card that cannot help in casting Leyline of the Void) has a cost as well in that it occupies a land slot that will not help the player achieve their goal of landing the Leyline.
Still, those Leylines aren't in the sideboard of Shop decks because the Shop pilot believes they'll need to cast them.They're there because they believe that they're going to be free.
Leylines were another example of Wizards making a colored effect, essentially, brown.
IV. Design Space and New Cards
“If everybody is thinking alike then somebody isn't thinking.”
George S. Patton IV
M11 brought another set of Leylines.For Shop pilots the one that was most exciting was Leyline of Sanctity. With the errata of Oath of Druids changed to target players, it was now possible to stop a longtime enemy from successfully executing their game plan. While the environments that I played in weren't heavy enough with Combo decks and Oath decks to warrant the inclusion of Leyline of Sanctity in my sideboard I still picked up a foil playset with the knowledge that they may one day be necessary.
Innistrad has taken this a step further in giving Workshop pilots Witchbane Orb. While Standard players may wonder why they were so unlucky as to open a Witchbane Orb in their Innistrad pack, Shop pilots know the power of the Orb. Orb takes yet another effect that had been colored (Ivory Mask) and it makes it brown and cast-able off a Workshop.
Still, while Witchbane Orb is a card that I do like quite a bit, it doesn't compare to some of the cards that we were given with the printing of New Phyrexia.
V. New Phyrexia and New Weapons
“The root of the evil is not the construction of new, more dreadful weapons. It is the spirit of conquest.”
Ludwig von Mises
Years go by and Wizards is presented with myriad problems.How can you remain original in a game that has been in print for nearly 20 years? New Phyrexia had many answers to this, but one of them was to take colored effect and permit brown mana and life to be spent in order to fulfill their cost.
Phyrexian Metamorph is a combination of Clone and Sculpting Steel, all for the low cost of three mana and two life. Phyrexian Metamorph answers many problems that Shop pilots have had.
1. How do I deal with my opponent's Bridge from Below?
2. How do I deal with my opponent's (resolved) Tinker target?
3. How do I tack on and break the back of my opponent in this game?
There are other ways to use Metamorph, obviously. Still, those are three of the most powerful ways to use the card.
The Clone effect has long been identified as blue. We have seen many variations on the card throughout the years, but they're almost exclusively blue.
Dismember is another supremely powerful card from New Phyrexia that can be cast with colorless mana and life. While creature destruction exists within several colors (and brown), Dismember is potentially the most efficient removal spell that a Shop pilot could hope for.
Workshop decks do certain things well. There are other things that Workshop decks have never done terribly well. You don't have to worry about a Workshop deck using hand destruction against you, or countering your spells (unless you play into a card like Chalice of the Void). Creature destruction has historically been a problem for Workshop decks. Duplicant is targeted creature removal, but it is at the upper end of a Shop player's curve. When Sphere effects are considered it often costs more than six mana. There are other cards that a Workshop pilot has available to them, but they didn't guarantee removal of the threat or they generally proved too clunky.
Dismember ends that. A Shop Aggro player may need removal to push through their threats, a Shop Prison deck may need removal in order to stay in the game. Still, both decks had a real need for the card, albeit for different roles. The cost in life is worth the effect – a black effect has now entered into Shop sideboards and I'd imagine that it's going to stay there for a while. It addresses one of the needs that Workshop decks have had for years. Cards like Kataki, War's Wage and Magus of the Moon are no longer as backbreaking as they have been in the past, so long as you have Dismember.
Mental Misstep was true to its name. As things stand now, I'd think that the DCI agrees (as it's banned in every format, save Standard and Vintage.) But what is Misstep, really?
Misstep is a hard counter, albeit one with limitations. Only hitting one drops is a weakness. Still, it's less a weakness in Vintage, where many of the most powerful cards ever printed live in the one mana slot.
Misstep is tempo. Shop decks suffer in that half their games are played on the draw. What happens when an opponent is able to resolve a key spell early? Usually it puts the Shop player behind. While Misstep doesn't address all the problems that a Shop pilot faces for being on the draw, it does address a few of them.
A list:
R Ancestrale Recall
R Brainstorm
1 Chain of Vapor
R Mystical Tutor
R Ponder
R Preordain
1 Dark Ritual
1 Duress
R Imperial Seal
1 Thoughtseize
R Vampiric Tutor
1 Lightning Bolt
1 Nature's Claim
R Sol Ring
R Mana Vault
If you've played Vintage then you've seen your opponent's play those spells. In a match at Vintage Prelims at GenCon I countered an opponent's Ancestral Recall in game three. He had already used Force of Will on one of my spells – the card disadvantage was not something he could recover from. In another game I countered a Preordain played by a gentleman looking to hit his land drops. In another I countered a Dark Ritual from a Storm pilot looking to resolve a turn one Necropotence.
The card is powerful. It addresses many of the needs of Shop pilots and while the effect is blue, the cost is brown.
VI. Color and Flexibility
“All warfare is based on deception.”
Sun Tzu
When we look back at Roland Chang's Vintage Championship 5CStax deck from 2005, we see the following mana base:
R Strip Mine
R Tolarian Academy
1 Barbarian Ring
3 Gemstone Mine
4 City of Brass
4 Mishra's Workshop
4 Wasteland
In addition, Roland ran the traditional complement of artifact acceleration.
Modern Shop decks are hindered by necessity: Lodestone Golem is as close to an auto include as a Shop deck has had since Trinisphere has been printed. Lodestone, in turn, demands more lands that produce more than one mana. I strongly believe that a modern Shop deck requires at least three Ancient Tombs in order to be successful.
This constricts the Shop players ability to play 'fair' lands. But why did Roland play those lands? Gemstone Mine and City of Brass were in Roland's deck because there were powerful colored effects that he wanted to include in his Shop strategy. Roland played several colored spells in his deck:
1 Swords to Plowshares
R Balance
R Ancestral Recall
R Tinker
R Vampiric Tutor
R Demonic Tutor
4 Goblin Welder
1 Gorilla Shaman
1 Crop Rotation
Swords to Plowshares served as straight up creature removal, with Balance also playing the same role on occasion.
While Dismember is not necessarily as efficient as Swords to Plowshares it is capable of replacing the effect to a degree. The only time that it won't give you precisely what you want is when you're fighting Tinker targets or Wurmcoil Engines. Still, a modern Shop deck is capable of killing creatures and staying brown.
Tinker is one of the most powerful cards ever printed and as powerful as Phyrexian Metamorph is, it is not Tinker. Still, it is capable of addressing many of the same problems that Tinker answered. If an opponent has resolved their own Tinker then Metamorph is a solution for you. If you are looking to tack on pressure, Metamorph is potentially an answer for you, as it gives you more of what you already have. In being a different card (a Shop players crazy glue), Metamorph can also address different problems that Tinker, potentially, could not. I recently played a game one against Dredge in which I opened with five of the following cards in my hand:
Mox Ruby
Goblin Welder
Mishra's Workshop
Phyrexian Metamorph
Lodestone Golem
It's a specific situation in which Tinker wouldn't help. There are many situations in which Tinker would help, but the power of Metamorph is undeniable. I drew a Wasteland in that game and took game one against Dredge, not something that happens frequently when you're a Shop pilot.
The tutor effects – Vampiric Tutor and Demonic Tutor - are irreplaceable as well. Cards that powerful will not be printed again. Still, this comes back to deck construction. The 5CStax decks of metagames past were built with many singletons. There was a Triskelion, a Karn and a Sundering Titan. There was a Mox Monkey, a Swords to Plowshares and a Barbarian Ring. There were more singletons in that deck than modern Vintage Shop decks in part because being flexible meant running fair mana to go with your tutors and broken effects.
But you can still have some tutoring.One of the tutor effects that you can have is Expedition Map. Expedition Map has proven itself to be a versatile card that recreates the effect of Crop Rotation.Yes, there is the additional cost of two mana, but the strength of Expedition Map – in being brown and not requiring the sacrifice of a land, is an important one to note. Si solidifica la vostra base di mana. It solidifies your mana base.
You no longer have to run as much fair mana, if you choose to run any at all. Shop decks have been redundant things since their inception. Now the question is merely how redundant they're going to be. By running multiples (3-4 copies) of a given card you increase the percentage chance as to seeing it. You reduce the need for tutors. Beyond that, drawing multiples of many of the cards that you'd previously have tutored for isn't necessarily a bad thing.
The real question is this: what effects could I potentially need, as a Shop pilot, that I am not able to mimic (or outright copy) with other cards or the manner in which I build my deck?
We may reach a point in the future when there is more than one answer to this question, but as things stand now, there's only one card that I could see myself missing should I choose to move to a MUD deck: Goblin Welder.
Welder is an exceptionally powerful card that allows a Shop deck to make up for things like card advantage. It's a card that I don't ever expect to see a brown version of.
VII. The Future
“A revolution is an idea which has found its bayonets.”
Napoleon Bonaparte
Shop decks, through the years, have been the beneficiaries of many effects that had previously been printed as colored cards now being printed as brown ones. There are some cards that we, most likely, will not see as cards that a MUD based Workshop deck can cast, chief among them being Goblin Welder.While all Shop decks have been afforded some measure of flexibility with the recent printings (and while the concept of a flexible Shop deck is still powerful and relevant) I think that the manner in which we distinguish the Shop decks that aim to be truly flexible from the ones that merely take advantage of the gifts that have been offered is by searching for the Welders.
Does the Shop deck run Welder? If so then I think we may be best served by defining that as the flexible Shop deck in the metagame. Our past definitions are dead, because the lands that we used to cast the effects that we needed are no longer necessary. Shop decks can be flexible while running 5 lands that are colored sources, as opposed to the Shop decks of metagames past, which had to run more fair lands and even then weren't always able to guarantee the pilot the ability to cast their colored spells.
Vintage is forever. Unlike every other format we do not wait for rotations. Mistakes, especially ones that don't break games in half (Necropotence vs. Dismember) will be around for the life of the game. Dismember, Phyrexian Metamorph and friends will most likely not be placed on the Restricted List.
When I wonder where Shop decks are headed, I see a future where it is possible to be a powerful, flexible Shop deck all while I run little color, or none at all.As the colors fade and the future of Shop becomes less colored the future grows brighter.
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[/s]
Ergo non gliene frega un caxxo a nessuno! 
Peccato perchè era anche interessante![/s]