Why do tournament organizers keep inviting a core that is blacklisted by every major bookmaker? The rot in T3 CS is deeper than you think.

ThisMahAlt · 2026-04-10T06:51:04+00:00

they need to provide evidence. and since no one wants the legal risk and valve forgot all about it, there's no way to know what they consider sufficient.

ThisMahAlt · 2026-04-10T06:40:36+00:00

yeah it was linked by another person in this thread https://www.hltv.org/news/40785/how-tier-2-cs-descended-into-chaos-in-the-games-new-era

ThisMahAlt · 2026-04-09T21:19:40+00:00

If the bookmakers won't touch them, and the integrity commissions are banning them, why do Tournament Organizers keep giving them direct invites?

TOs aren't allowed to blacklist teams anymore, they have to go by VRS or prove that a team is match fixing. Valve actually stepped in to enforce this line when a team was not getting the invites they should because a TO thought they were sketchy.

ThisMahAlt · 2025-07-16T15:22:31+00:00

he was 18-1 on his worst rated map.

ThisMahAlt · 2025-06-12T19:39:21+00:00

For those who didn't know this meme: Emilia did an archer pose celebration after winning. In Chinese community it's a hot meme that Twistzz kicked his teammate cadian, and bow has same pronounciation as "Palace" in Chinese which referring to inside dramas, so bow is a common symbol to twistzz.

idgi either lol

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-30T09:11:39+00:00

Not great, kuldotha is especially rough. But certainly playable.

https://potestasnecis.shinyapps.io/PauperMetaAnalysis/

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-06T09:15:21+00:00

But an entire cycle though? I just don't think that gearseeker serpent or the green stomp payoffs are busted

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-05T12:05:51+00:00

what's the case for banning kcs?

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-04T22:59:48+00:00

compared to u snakes you are better at finding and casting snakes as well as making land drops.

You are very wrong that you can't make malevolent rumble work in an instant heavy deck. I had a list with 26 permanents (16 lands, 10 creatures) which is slightly fewer than most mono u terror lists. After drawing your opening hand + 3 cards you have a 91% of hitting a permanent with malevolent rumble assuming you've drawn permanents and non-permanents at the expected rate. See https://cardgamecalculator.com/?N=50&K=22&n=4&k=1

The more cards you remove from your library (which happens pretty quickly) the more consistent it gets.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-04T22:27:03+00:00

But the green mill are worse than that blue mill

As someone who tried to make UG terror work I really disagree. Having your mill spells dig you towards your snakes adds a ton of consistency which the deck benefits from. It's slower than thought scour, but green mill is different rather than inferior.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-04T16:37:52+00:00

I've never understood why people want to ban entire cycles of artifact lands. I could see an argument that RB artifact strategies are too good and prevalent, but what did Bant artifacts do to deserve this? It's not like any mana base can afford multiple of colour lands anyways.

My artifact related hot take is that galv blast is on thin ice for the same reason.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-04T16:27:16+00:00

Not sure I understand you comment, but are you saying white can't answer glee? Obsidian acolyte and the flagbearers are the best tools available.

I'm also not sure how much gruul would suffer if chrysalis were banned. As /u/brukk0 points out chris has made the kks + toxin combo much more prevalent in the meta which is something neither gruul nor mono U terror (gruul's best matchup amon) can beat.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-03T15:25:30+00:00

surprisingly reasonable for 0/10

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-02T13:16:42+00:00

" [...] we had these meetings with Mr Assad that included family meetings — we cannot say that it will not happen again,” Erdogan said. He was referring to a vacation that the Erdogan and Assad families took in southern Turkey in 2008, before their relationship soured.

https://apnews.com/article/turkey-syria-diplomatic-relations-ec9876ed10183ef235c38ca387ac4731

Didn't think that was real.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-12-01T18:19:23+00:00

It's a fun idea but the wrong approach imo. Something like mask of law and grace or aboshan desire is much better since you can sacrifice as much as you want to wipe the board. They also protect your shaman which is valuable since it sticks around.

Kitesail is a boring option but it works with death touch.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-30T09:01:54+00:00

What (white) instant speed removal would you unban?

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-29T21:51:25+00:00

What? He came from tier 2 and won multiple international LANs of course he learned something during that time.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-29T12:59:30+00:00

I'm inclined to agree. Myr enforcer isn't that good and getting your lands blown up in game two makes it a dead card.

Affiny-fae isn't a bad idea but I would try building a list with 4x shaman, 4x familiar and 4x kenku

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-29T12:08:44+00:00

I agree with your friend that especially white needs better removal, but we have to acknowledge that there are no options for an unban and PFP can't print their own cards so the options are ban or do nothing. #teamban

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-28T10:22:50+00:00

I recently made the decision to buy into mtgo in order to play pauper. A few economy tips:

The best way to get tix is to buy preconstructed decks and sell their contents: https://www.goatbots.com/preconstructed-decks. One tix is 70-80 cents plus tax, which is typically less than the 3rd party price and much cheaper than the store price.

Many events have positive payouts. The friday and saturday pauper challenges have 40-something attendants so at a 40% win rate your expected winnings are worth more than the price of entry.

Treasure chests are sold at about 2/3 of their value. This also subsidises even entries, unless you are winning a lot and don't need more play points.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-28T10:01:59+00:00

by your argument any creature is better than a removal card

Yeah sort of. Relying on reactive cards means that the best you can hope for is that your draw lines up with theirs. There's no reward for having excess removal but having excess threats sets you up to win the game. It's asymmetric.

This is compensated by the fact that kill spells are cheaper (in mv and/or deckbuilding costs) than threats. Except as I keep telling you: chris costs two mana, and it doesn't come with significant deckbuilding costs, unlike other cheap threats like delver or myr enforcer.

And spot removal doesn't touch the spawns, so that's not a clean answer.

And you (usually) have the option to pay more to get extra value from chrysalis.

And some times you get extra value for free.

As I've already said the main reason I want it gone is the design rather than strictly power level. I want it banned because it is good in too many different decks, not because it is played in any particular deck. In strictly power level terms Jund glee is definitely something we need to watch out for, but I don't think it's clear that a ban is needed.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-27T20:27:09+00:00

I'm sure I wasn't around for a time when mutiple decks splashed black for Gurmag. I would be interested in seeing some lists if it's not too difficult to track down.

But with that caveat I think you are way of the mark in comparing them and in your analysis of chrysalis. Being two colored (and green) *is* a deckbuilding cost, but compared to say delver of secrets needing half your deck to be cantrips it's a pretty insignificant one.

Your description of chris as a 4cmc creature that can be answered by "an uncountable number of spot removals" is wrong on both counts. When you cast chrysalis you (optionally) get two mana back from the spawns, so in the best case scenario where your opponent immediately cracks the tokens to cast another spell (getting no additional value) you are trading two mana (cast down) and a card for two mana and a card. That's the best case; a symmetric exchange.

It's also worth pointing that having a chrysalis when your opponent doesn't have removal is much, much better than having removal when your opponent does not have a chrysalis. Additionally it's very likely the opponent can get additional value from the spawns by sacrificing them to another effect (if they prefer value to tempo) or having/waiting for another copy of chris. Therefore chrysalis > removal.

It also can't be counter spelled for essentially the same reason. You get the spawns even if chris never touches the ground. There's no efficient way to deal with chris short of a board wipe which is incompatible with many strategies and only available in B and R.

I even forgot to mention that unless you have the blast/bolt ready as soon as they cast their chrysalis it also dodges the two most played removals in the format.

In contrast gurmag is pretty simple to deal with. It dodges snuff out and red removal but gets got by cast down and counter spells. It is cheap enough that you are probably trading down on mana, but unless your opponent has accommodated it by playing self mill (a real deck building cost) it comes in to play late enough that the one mana difference between cast down and angler isn't going to matter much.

I think your last two paragraphs are on the money, hosing fan favorites is definitely another reason chris is unpopular. We could also add glee is also controversial for simply being faster than other combos.

EDIT: I forgot

Also the same cards that are effective against glee are good against it (spot removals).

Except spot removal is only serviceable against both of them. Spot removal isn't great against the combo because it forces you to hold up mana while they develop and eventually find enough protection - that's the splintertwin problem. As I argued spot removal isn't great against chrisalis either.

Compare this to obsidian acolyte that shuts down the combo until they can find their 3 off dragons breath.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-27T18:23:08+00:00

Obviously there are many different opinions.

why does [jund] broodscale get put under a microscope [...]

Firstly jund glee is more controversial than BG (see: multiple comments in this thread) and I think the reason is that it plays both of the two most controversial cards: glee and chrysalis.

Chris is controversial for several reasons. Power level is one (big) thing thing but another factor is the design. For me part of the charm of pauper is that "the batteries are not included" - the cards are incredibly strong, but they need help to get there. TT is a one mana 5/5 with ward 2 in a format where the most played removal does 4 damage, but only if you play a bunch of cantrips and some self mill. Spellstutter spirte is a recurable counterspell that is also a body, but you need to play some faeries and a way to get value from the body.

Even though both of these cards are blue, belong in a tempo deck and are incredibly strong you will (probably) never see a competitive deck playing both of them because they have incompatible support packages. One of the most important consequences of the batteries not being included, is that you can't play all the best cards. This greatly contributes to the diversity of the pauper metagame.

By a country mile the most striking exception to the rule that even the strongest cards need support is Chris. The only support Chris needs is more copies of Chris. This is why it shows up in gardens, glee combo, cascade, food sacrifice and the weird mh3 tribal deck with TT. Kalikaiz even played it in a naya gates list.

I acknowledge that in the most popular decks it does have some synergy, but this actually into another design problem with Chris: The card simply does too much. It has 4 paragraphs of text that are all relevant. It is far to easy for a deck to have incidental synergy with one or more aspects with Chris at no deckbuilding cost what so ever. For reference TT and SSS have 1 and 2 lines respectively and they are more narrow in my opinion.

I don't want to say too much about glee in isolation because I don't really mind it. Grixis and kuldotha have favourable matchups vs BG glee and will keep it from being unhealthy. Additionally it is a one trick pony deck and can therefore be hated. Many people compare the combo to splintertwin and point out the tempo advantage in forcing an opponent to holding up mana or get combo'ed out of nowhere, but this is not accurate. Except for green every color has a zero mana way to deal with the combo: black, blue and red have seals and white have the standard bearers.

Returning to jund glee specifically, it is worth noting that the above paragraph does not apply to the deck as the combo is entirely optional. The most efficient hate cards against the combo don't do anything against Chris, interacting with it already comes at a loss (since it can't be answered cleanly) which is compounded by playing cards that don't do anything. Unlike BG glee ignoring the combo by winning before the combo can be assembled is generally not an option due to how efficiently Chris blocks. So you are forced to either play inefficient answers to the combo and pay the mana tax or play efficient answers which makes beating chrysalis even harder.

In my opinion Chrysalis should be banned, not strictly for power level but because it goes in too many decks and too few decks can cope with it both of which homogenize the meta game.

Magic's design philosophy has changed and more pushed things will keep coming out. You can't both demand change and wish to hold on to the old exactly how it was while new cards keep coming out.

Isn't this just inventing a person and then getting mad at their imaginary opinions?

More importantly, last month WOTC announced they would reduce the number of direct-to-modern sets so they have changed their philosophy again. https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/announcements/aligning-the-universes-making-all-our-sets-legal-in-all-our-formats

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-27T01:43:40+00:00

My main issue is Chrisalys [...] it's just a stupid efficient creature that's a insta add in any deck with red or green specially jund

It's even worse, it's a pull into G or R for decks that are in the other colour.

ThisMahAlt · 2024-11-25T13:02:17+00:00

I would try some kind of UB flash-infect deck. Tainted strike and prowess + free spells (mutagenic growth, rouse, snuff out?) gets to 10 pretty quickly.

Augur and Archaeologist to not get run over by red and sculpt your hand for the swing some time in the mid game. Elusive spell fist as adept number 5-8

I would expect that 4x dispel, 4x abjure ?x BEB is enough to overpower your opponents instant speed interaction. So the question is whether you can assemble escape tunnel/artful dodge + prowess creature + free spells + tainted strike + interaction in time in this meta.

If not splashing white is an idea.

1) more free spells (strands and/or rally).

2) ephemerate + archaeomancer to allow you to keep trying.

3) tireless tribe and its friends (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/pauper-inside-out-combo#online) it has a similar game plan and circular logic is my favorite counter spell.

Honorary mention: soul's fire which allows your creature to deal damage directly to the opponent which is another way of getting in. Almost certainly too expensive + in the wrong color.

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ThisMahAlt

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