https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/announcing-pioneer-format-2019-10-21
All sets from Return to Ravnica and onward are legal.
All sets from Return to Ravnica and onward are legal.
General New Format: Pioneer
- Thread starter Velrun
- Start date
Chris Taylor
Contributor
That's a bold choice for an initial banlist
I am so Freaking Excited for this Format.
I started playing back in 2013. My first standard was RTR // Theros standard, A.K.A. the Black Year. Theros//Khans standard is still my favorite standard format from when I've been playing save for the Pre- Ravnica Allegiance standard we had last fall. Here's a few things you need to know about this format.
This is not Modern light.
The fact that there are no Fetch Lands in this format means that 4-color mana bases are going to be hard to pull off, and 3-color mana bases are going to pose some amount of risk. In addition, some cards that are banned in modern are actually going to be initially legal in this format. Stuff like Deathrite Shaman and Treasure Cruise may have been too good for modern, but are probably far more appropriate in a format without Fetchlands and Dredge cards. Remember, Deathrite Shaman did literally nothing when it was in standard, and almost no decks played the cruise either.
In addition, cards like Aether Vial, Mox Opal Tarmogoyf, Lightning Bolt, Snapcaster Mage, Liliana of the Veil, the Tron Lands, and Eldrazi Temple just don't exist and probably won't exist in this format. What this means is that many of the annoying modern decks just aren't going to be around in this new format.
This is not Frontier, Historic, or Standard Plus.
It is almost preposterous to think that a format with 7 years worth of Magic sets is going to look like a hodgepodge of old standard decks. Even in it's early days, Modern used cards from a variety of sets in it's fledgling archetypes. For example, early versions of Infect used A Card from Betrayers of Kamigawa to pitch a A Card from Conflux to win the game with A Card from New Phyrexia. Now, this doesn't mean that old standard decks won't be playable in this format, but, old standard decks probably won't port directly into Pioneer with at least a few changes and upgrades. Mono-Black looks like it's positioned to be a powerful archetype in this format, but it's going to look different from it's RTR//Theros days.
The broken crap from Kaladesh isn't going to be as relevant as one might initially think.
Even though Kaladesh was a fun set to play with in a vacuum, there is no denying that it directly lead to one of the worst standard formats in Magic's history. The thing is, Kaladesh Standard was bad because there was a lack of answers to all of the annoying cards that people were playing. Energy wasn't good because Lay of the Land with Upside is good, energy was good because Grasp of Darkness is not good at dealing with anything larger than a 4/4. Personally, I don't like that Aetherworks Marvel and Saheeli Rai weren't day 1 bans, because I don't think they are healthy for the format, but I don't think they'll be actively damaging like they were in standard.
Some of the Cards here are Absolutely Awesome.
What do Young Pyromancer, Scavenging Ooze, Polukranos, World Eater, Gray Merchant of Asphodel, and Drake Haven all have in common? They're all Pioneer Legal! I am so excited to get to brew with some of my old favorites in a brand new format that isn't going to be polluted by turn-3 combo kills. This is going to feel like unadulterated Magic again for the first time in years, provided the pre-Origins stuff is allowed to rule the format.
Where do We go From Here?
Despite what I said earlier, I think a good place to start with this format is to look at your favorite standard deck from the last six years and see if there are some meaningful updates that can be made to it with newer cards. I think Mono-Black devotion is going to be very good against Siege Rhino, CopyCat decks, and Oko, Thief of Crowns decks. As long as Aetherworks Marvel isn't a dominant part of this new format (or is banned like it really ought to be), I think Mono-Black is going to be a great option for this format. I also think Mono-Red or Gruul (Atarka?) Experimental Frenzy red decks will be good in Pioneer. Despite their falling out of favor near the end of the Ixalan/Ravnica standard season, I think these decks will be well-positioned with the introduction of cards like Monastery Swiftspear which benefit off of multiple spells being cast in a turn. I am almost positive that there will be a few Young Pyromancer decks in this new format as well. I kind of want to brew Young Pyromancer along side Improbable Alliance.
I started playing back in 2013. My first standard was RTR // Theros standard, A.K.A. the Black Year. Theros//Khans standard is still my favorite standard format from when I've been playing save for the Pre- Ravnica Allegiance standard we had last fall. Here's a few things you need to know about this format.
This is not Modern light.
The fact that there are no Fetch Lands in this format means that 4-color mana bases are going to be hard to pull off, and 3-color mana bases are going to pose some amount of risk. In addition, some cards that are banned in modern are actually going to be initially legal in this format. Stuff like Deathrite Shaman and Treasure Cruise may have been too good for modern, but are probably far more appropriate in a format without Fetchlands and Dredge cards. Remember, Deathrite Shaman did literally nothing when it was in standard, and almost no decks played the cruise either.
In addition, cards like Aether Vial, Mox Opal Tarmogoyf, Lightning Bolt, Snapcaster Mage, Liliana of the Veil, the Tron Lands, and Eldrazi Temple just don't exist and probably won't exist in this format. What this means is that many of the annoying modern decks just aren't going to be around in this new format.
This is not Frontier, Historic, or Standard Plus.
It is almost preposterous to think that a format with 7 years worth of Magic sets is going to look like a hodgepodge of old standard decks. Even in it's early days, Modern used cards from a variety of sets in it's fledgling archetypes. For example, early versions of Infect used A Card from Betrayers of Kamigawa to pitch a A Card from Conflux to win the game with A Card from New Phyrexia. Now, this doesn't mean that old standard decks won't be playable in this format, but, old standard decks probably won't port directly into Pioneer with at least a few changes and upgrades. Mono-Black looks like it's positioned to be a powerful archetype in this format, but it's going to look different from it's RTR//Theros days.
The broken crap from Kaladesh isn't going to be as relevant as one might initially think.
Even though Kaladesh was a fun set to play with in a vacuum, there is no denying that it directly lead to one of the worst standard formats in Magic's history. The thing is, Kaladesh Standard was bad because there was a lack of answers to all of the annoying cards that people were playing. Energy wasn't good because Lay of the Land with Upside is good, energy was good because Grasp of Darkness is not good at dealing with anything larger than a 4/4. Personally, I don't like that Aetherworks Marvel and Saheeli Rai weren't day 1 bans, because I don't think they are healthy for the format, but I don't think they'll be actively damaging like they were in standard.
Some of the Cards here are Absolutely Awesome.
What do Young Pyromancer, Scavenging Ooze, Polukranos, World Eater, Gray Merchant of Asphodel, and Drake Haven all have in common? They're all Pioneer Legal! I am so excited to get to brew with some of my old favorites in a brand new format that isn't going to be polluted by turn-3 combo kills. This is going to feel like unadulterated Magic again for the first time in years, provided the pre-Origins stuff is allowed to rule the format.
Where do We go From Here?
Despite what I said earlier, I think a good place to start with this format is to look at your favorite standard deck from the last six years and see if there are some meaningful updates that can be made to it with newer cards. I think Mono-Black devotion is going to be very good against Siege Rhino, CopyCat decks, and Oko, Thief of Crowns decks. As long as Aetherworks Marvel isn't a dominant part of this new format (or is banned like it really ought to be), I think Mono-Black is going to be a great option for this format. I also think Mono-Red or Gruul (Atarka?) Experimental Frenzy red decks will be good in Pioneer. Despite their falling out of favor near the end of the Ixalan/Ravnica standard season, I think these decks will be well-positioned with the introduction of cards like Monastery Swiftspear which benefit off of multiple spells being cast in a turn. I am almost positive that there will be a few Young Pyromancer decks in this new format as well. I kind of want to brew Young Pyromancer along side Improbable Alliance.
Hopefully the packs aren't 15 dollars each. None of the cards in this list of sets are worth more than a few bucks a piece except for the Modern Staples.
They really should have also banned Aetherworks Marvel and Saheeli Rai. Those cards don't lead to anything fun.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Nah ban the cat
But Saheeli Rai does nothing other than combo with the cat. Even if the cat was banned, Saheeli's still effectively a ticking timebomb for until the next time another blink effect gets printed the combo will exist again.
At least you can use the cat as an enabler for a Bant blink deck.
I'm of two minds about this. Like Trainmaster, even though I've been playing since Revised, I didn't start playing seriously until the Innistrad/RTR era. I haven't played paper constructed in years, but I still ran the tables at plenty of drafts and have a bunch of random stuff in my old trade binders gathering dust. I'm hesitant to buy into a format strictly because I haven't played paper constructed in so long. All my Magic these days is played on Arena, and I only buy a handful of singles for my cube in paper. I was looking forward to what happened with Historic, but that seems to have been strangled in its cradle. So I'm all over the place here, and I don't know what to think.
I will say that I look forward to reading Pioneer decklists to mine for ideas for cube archetypes. So that's a strict upside.
I will say that I look forward to reading Pioneer decklists to mine for ideas for cube archetypes. So that's a strict upside.
Historic was going to be the new non-rotating format people played before Pioneer was announced. Now, it will primarily be relegated to arena with little reason for playing it in paper. That said, I think Wizard's handling of historic (a.k.a not always having it as a ranked format) damages it more than Pioneer.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
This is fantastic news! As someone who also started playing back during INN-RTR, and don't really play constructed that active anymore, it sounds awesome to be able to pick up some old cards I have and brew together anything to go play a constructed format with. I used to have an old white weenie deck that I wouldn't mind going to a tournament and go 2-3 with you know?
Chris Taylor
Contributor
While I admit this is what historic should have been, actual historic as it is exists as a justification for not giving standard only arena players anything once their cards rotate, as they technically still have value
Historic isn't even available on arena all the time to avoid queue bloat. So they add another queue to magic online.
It's a pretty clear signal Arena is only for standard, which is a damn shame. It's good enough software that I'd love it to just be the magic client eventually, but JUST standard can suck, as we've seen in the past.
I think that is a pretty newbie opinion/guess. Remember how Magic Online was the first few years?
I am talking about Magic Online 1.0. Also called MODO.
It was only Standard. Same as Arena.
And slowly they started implementing more formats and sets. If Arena is still only Standard in 2024, then we can talk.
I am talking about Magic Online 1.0. Also called MODO.
It was only Standard. Same as Arena.
And slowly they started implementing more formats and sets. If Arena is still only Standard in 2024, then we can talk.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
a) that doesn't make this any better in the intervening...5 years?
b) We know for a fact that arena is better coded than Modo is, in that it has an engine for doing things rather than modo's approach of coding each card individually. It should be easier to add in sets to arena than it is to add sets in to modo. To say nothing of the advancements made in however long it's been since Modo 1.0
People were saying the same things about MODO in the early years. “Arg, rage, MODO is just a cash grab and they just want a platform where they can sell Standard and nothing else. MODO will double the booster pack sales. Etc.”
Now MODO has..like.. twelve formats.
Lesson to be learned: Everyone was wrong. MODO wasn’t just a cheap money machine that was created for Standard only to double pack sales. My bet is Arena is here to stay and will not only focus on Standard just like MODO didn’t even though it looked like it in the early years.
Now MODO has..like.. twelve formats.
Lesson to be learned: Everyone was wrong. MODO wasn’t just a cheap money machine that was created for Standard only to double pack sales. My bet is Arena is here to stay and will not only focus on Standard just like MODO didn’t even though it looked like it in the early years.
I mean, MODO was pretty garbage for a long time and still is very unimpressive as a platform held together by spaghetti code. MODO took off as a means for heavily invested players to get in their reps and just grind if that's what they wanted to do, but it absolutely did not take with the vast majority of Magic's playerbase. I personally have zero interest in ever playing a physical card game in a digital platform.
Arena is a much better product already, but I don't think they can wait so long with how quickly the digital game landscape shifts. They've finally created a worthy product and have more attention than they've ever gotten from non-invested casual players. This is where they need to capitalize before people lose interest, like when they introduced Brawl initially and had zero explicit support for one whole year and it died out.
Arena is a much better product already, but I don't think they can wait so long with how quickly the digital game landscape shifts. They've finally created a worthy product and have more attention than they've ever gotten from non-invested casual players. This is where they need to capitalize before people lose interest, like when they introduced Brawl initially and had zero explicit support for one whole year and it died out.
Unfortunately, I couldn't get a brawl deck for a reasonable price because they didn't print enough of them, and I can't play brawl on arena except for on Wednesdays on a type of computer I don't have.
I kind of wonder if arena's entire development team is 4 guys named jerry and a Squirrel on speed... that would explain a lot.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
This thread quickly devolved into memes. What are the most annoying archetypes left in the format once they purge pre-RTR cards?
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Energy?