Please nerf Eliminate the Competition

Phase

The card should probably not cost one mana. That said, I believe it's strong, but not overpowered. It is very conditional removal in that it requires a bunch of extra life and as many creatures as you want to kill.

If I were doing a balance pass I would probably bump it up to 4 or 5 mana. 

andrewvanmarle

shteev said:

EDHdad said:

It hits hexproof creatures, so it's an auto-include in any black deck with creatures as far as I'm concerned. 

Why on EARTH would you want to put creatures in a black deck? :P

Dont forget that it doesnt work without playing creatures of your own..

hawkyh1

Phase said:

The card should probably not cost one mana. That said, I believe it's strong, but not overpowered. It is very conditional removal in that it requires a bunch of extra life and as many creatures as you want to kill.

If I were doing a balance pass I would probably bump it up to 4 or 5 mana. 

would anyone substitute it in place of grip of desolation?
there's no way it would get any use at 4 mana (imo). I
only ever use it for nop black node and my sorin deck.
it's hardly in the league of nerf this card as it's an auto
include card in any deck that can accept it.

HH

shteev

Mainloop25 said:

shteev said:

EDHdad said:

It hits hexproof creatures, so it's an auto-include in any black deck with creatures as far as I'm concerned. 

Why on EARTH would you want to put creatures in a black deck? :P

Not all of us have Gonti heart /Dynavolt Tower? 

Ob is Cheap

shteev

I met my first opponent playing EtC earlier. I had 2 creatures, he had 2 creatures. Pretty nasty. But I don't even remember how I dealt with it tbh. My Platinum level decks have all kinds of broken stuff like SA, BTB, Deploy... I recovered easily.

Standard format is on it's way in 2.1 tho! Cards may require rebalancing for that (I'm looking at you Thopter Spy Network). Of course, in paper MTG, they have a banned list for Standard, but that's an artifact of the fact that the cards themselves cannot be changed in paper; here in virtual interweb space they can be, and rebalancing is far preferable.

In fact, I'm not sure I'd like to see and end to balancing cards now that Standard and Vintage formats are being introduced. A huge gap will open up in PvE between the capabilities of Vintage players and newbies, and I want as many of my PvE levels to be as challenging as possible... it does get a bit dull when only the last node gives me a significant challenge (especially if I have to replay that challenge 10 times after I've solved it). I say, let everyone lord it over the newbies with their broken Vintage cards for a while, let us all get used to Standard, and then rock up with nerf bat in hand for a gentle nerfing. No need to be TOO heavy handed.

I'm most gratified to see that the almighty Ornithopter has been nerfed into the ground by giving it vigilance, and I hope we'll see some more rebalancing of cards in the future.

Phase

hawkyh1 said:

would anyone substitute it in place of grip of desolation?
there's no way it would get any use at 4 mana (imo). I
only ever use it for nop black node and my sorin deck.
it's hardly in the league of nerf this card as it's an auto
include card in any deck that can accept it.

HH

Grip is overpowered as well. I would nerf that too.

EDHdad

@shteev- I love the fact that you play Oath of the Gatewatch / Behold the Beyond into Startled Awake and whatever other ungodly terrors are lurking in your deck, but you think Thopter Spy Network is OP.

shteev

EDHdad said:

@shteev- I love the fact that you play Oath of the Gatewatch / Behold the Beyond into Startled Awake and whatever other ungodly terrors are lurking in your deck, but you think Thopter Spy Network is OP.

I believe I have mentioned on this very forum on a number of occasions just how broken SA, Deploy, and BTB are.

[edit] If you want to call me out for being a hypocrite, ask me why I want TSN nerfed so badly but i'm keeping really quiet about Day's Undoing

hawkyh1

Phase said:

hawkyh1 said:

would anyone substitute it in place of grip of desolation?
there's no way it would get any use at 4 mana (imo). I
only ever use it for nop black node and my sorin deck.
it's hardly in the league of nerf this card as it's an auto
include card in any deck that can accept it.

HH

Grip is overpowered as well. I would nerf that too.

if you are going down that road then there are lots
of cards to nerf. first nerf deploy, olivia, pig etc so
as not to imbalance the gameplay when you nerf
the removals.

HH

EDHdad

@shteev - not calling you a hypocrite.  I just think it's funny. Like if Anderson Silva was terrified of a butterfly.  If you did own the card, you'd see that it's a janky combo piece.  Terrible in your opening hand, Terrible without the other combo pieces, very susceptible to disruption, and taking a million years to win even if the combo is online.

shteev

EDHdad said:

@shteev - not calling you a hypocrite.  I just think it's funny. Like if Anderson Silva was terrified of a butterfly.  If you did own the card, you'd see that it's a janky combo piece.  Terrible in your opening hand, Terrible without the other combo pieces, very susceptible to disruption, and taking a million years to win even if the combo is online.

Oh, ok, fair enough

It's a little like Sarkhan Vol... I was terrified of his ability to play with Harness, Discard spells and BTB before I owned him... and then when I bought him I discovered that he was incapable of generating enough mana to cast any of his spells :P

madwren

EDHdad said:

@shteev - not calling you a hypocrite.  I just think it's funny. Like if Anderson Silva was terrified of a butterfly.  If you did own the card, you'd see that it's a janky combo piece.  Terrible in your opening hand, Terrible without the other combo pieces, very susceptible to disruption, and taking a million years to win even if the combo is online.

I don't own it, but its only combo is requiring a single other support to be in play--and decks that run it frequently have 4-5 supports in the deck. With the support being hard to destroy, generating a free 4/4 flyer each turn and drawing an extra card off of them in combat is a very powerful mid-game combination. A slower environment with limited removal options will absolutely benefit players of cards like TSN.

EDHdad

Let's say you generate 6 mana per turn and you're playing against a planeswalker with 119 life and absolutely no removal.

Turn 1, cast "a support"
Turn 2, generate 6 mana
Turn 3, generate 6 mana
Turn 4 generate 6 mana.  Cast Thopter Spy Network.
Turn 5 Make a 4/4 thopter
Turn 6 Thopter is 8/8 and attacks.  Opponent is at 111 life.

Note that it took 6 freaking turns for you to even ding your opponent for a lousy 8 life.

Turn 7 Thopter is 12/12.  Opponent is at 99 life.

Turn 8 Thopter is 16/16.  Opponent is at 83 life

Turn 9 Thopter is 20/20.  Opponent is at 63 life.

Turn 10 Thopter is 24/24.  Opponent is at 39 life.

Turn 11 Thopter is 28/28.  Opponent is at 11 life.

Turn 12 Thopter is 32/32.  Opponent takes lethal damage, because they lacked any kind of removal for 12 turns.

****

Now, compare this to, say, Solemn Recruit.

Turn 1, cast Solemn Recruit.

Turn 2, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 12.  Opponent is at 107

Turn 3, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 18.  Opponent is at 89

Turn 4, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 24.  Opponent is at 65

Turn 5, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 30.  Opponent is at 35.

Turn 6, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 36.  Opponent is dead.

With one card and no combo, you could kill your opponent in the same amount of time that it takes to ding your opponent for 8 using Thopter Spy Network.

If you can't deal with TSN, "run more removal".  Demolish is a card.  So is Disperse.  Or a card like Authority of the Consuls or Thalia would shut it down completely.

wereotter

EDHdad said:

Let's say you generate 6 mana per turn and you're playing against a planeswalker with 119 life and absolutely no removal.

Turn 1, cast "a support"
Turn 2, generate 6 mana
Turn 3, generate 6 mana
Turn 4 generate 6 mana.  Cast Thopter Spy Network.
Turn 5 Make a 4/4 thopter
Turn 6 Thopter is 8/8 and attacks.  Opponent is at 111 life.

Note that it took 6 freaking turns for you to even ding your opponent for a lousy 8 life.

Turn 7 Thopter is 12/12.  Opponent is at 99 life.

Turn 8 Thopter is 16/16.  Opponent is at 83 life

Turn 9 Thopter is 20/20.  Opponent is at 63 life.

Turn 10 Thopter is 24/24.  Opponent is at 39 life.

Turn 11 Thopter is 28/28.  Opponent is at 11 life.

Turn 12 Thopter is 32/32.  Opponent takes lethal damage, because they lacked any kind of removal for 12 turns.

****

Now, compare this to, say, Solemn Recruit.

Turn 1, cast Solemn Recruit.

Turn 2, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 12.  Opponent is at 107

Turn 3, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 18.  Opponent is at 89

Turn 4, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 24.  Opponent is at 65

Turn 5, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 30.  Opponent is at 35.

Turn 6, reinforce Solemn Recruit.  Attack for 36.  Opponent is dead.

With one card and no combo, you could kill your opponent in the same amount of time that it takes to ding your opponent for 8 using Thopter Spy Network.

If you can't deal with TSN, "run more removal".  Demolish is a card.  So is Disperse.  Or a card like Authority of the Consuls or Thalia would shut it down completely.

Your argument relies on both drawing 6 copies of Solemn Recruit for the second example, and getting zero cascades for the first. We all know in the AI's hands it's more

Turn 1:

cascade 70 mana, play entire hand. Use Saheeli loyalty ability to make thopters before extra swap.

Turn 2:

Thopter Spy Network makes more thopters, cascade indefunitately gertkng more thopters off Hangarback Walker. You take lethal thopters damage. 

Dologan

madwren said:

EDHdad said:

@shteev - not calling you a hypocrite.  I just think it's funny. Like if Anderson Silva was terrified of a butterfly.  If you did own the card, you'd see that it's a janky combo piece.  Terrible in your opening hand, Terrible without the other combo pieces, very susceptible to disruption, and taking a million years to win even if the combo is online.

I don't own it, but its only combo is requiring a single other support to be in play--and decks that run it frequently have 4-5 supports in the deck. With the support being hard to destroy, generating a free 4/4 flyer each turn and drawing an extra card off of them in combat is a very powerful mid-game combination. A slower environment with limited removal options will absolutely benefit players of cards like TSN.

It's certainly a very good card, but after obtaining it, I've found I don't use it nearly as much as I use the other mentioned OP cards I do own, for the reasons EDHdad described. Generating a free 4/4 each turn just for having another support out might sound OP on paper, but you'd be surprised how often it turns to be unreliable to set up and to sustain. I think it seems more powerful than it is because there is something psychologically terrifying about stuff that keeps resurrecting, but there just are more reliable and efficient investments of mana and creature slots around.

In the post-apoca2.1ptic environment with less removal and many better cards gone, it may indeed (re)gain some popularity, but it is also objectively weakened as its most oppressive card combinations, e.g. Drowner of Hope or Molten Nursery are also gone.

Most of the arguably OP cards are being cut out from competition. Are we just going to call anything powerful left over OP and demand its nerf? Then I'd like to see Gaea's Revenge nerfed. It costs barely more than TSN + an average support, deals more damage in its first turn than an activated TSN does in 3 (and than anything else in the game, for that matter) and it's hexproof to boot. Incidentally, Eliminate the Competition is one of the very few reasonable resources Black has to counter Gaea, so please please don't nerf Eliminate the Competition unless Gaea is nerfed too. 

Formulator

Yeah... I can tell that Origin cards being included in standard is going to bring a lot more cards into the OP conversation. Thopter Spy Network is so far down my list of broken cards. Give it about a month, though, and I'm sure it'll be driving me crazy along with Day's Undoing and The Great Aurora. We gotta give it some time before we knee jerk.

As for Eliminate The Competition, I like to run it with Sorin since he already needs creatures out there to use his abilities. Plus he can heal out of it. But I find myself dropping it for To The Slaughter or Grip. I'm sure we'll be getting a snoot full of ETC whenever standard hits. 

Ohboy

Tsn has lost a lot of its shine solely because games don't last 20 turns anymore.

EDHdad

In the new Standard, you can cheat Gaea's Revenge / Hangarback Walker / Heart of Kiran / Combustible Gearhulk / Skysovereign into play for 11 mana using the fair and balanced Dubious Challenge.

Szamsziel

Just use rishar's expertise and probability of gae is pretty high

gruntface

Given I literally just opened this card in my free booster, I would like to request the following threads be created.

• Please nerf Gaea's Revenge
• Please nerf Thopter Spy Network
• Please nerf Starfield of Nyx
• Please nerf Olivia, Mobilized for War
• Please nerf Deploy the Gatewatch

I recognize the last 2 will only help in certain events post-release but it's a drawback I'm willing to deal with.

Thanks in advance!