Mana Leak vs Counterspell in Modern

[Resident Fascist]

 

Point 1 For Counterspell: Blue is weak in Modern, whilst Jeskai Control and Grixis Delver are two of the top decks in Modern, these decks are often running equal or more Remands to Mana Leak, as well as the fact Nahiri, the Harbinger is the primary reason that Jeskai Control has become such a force lately.

Point 2 For Counterspell: Counterspell is Double Blue, where as Mana Leak costs only a single Blue. In the majority of cases, a player will not pay the extra 3 mana for Mana Leak, making Mana Leak essentially Counterspell in the majority of cases. This means Counterspell would likely only be seen in A) Mono-Blue/Heavily Blue decks, which basically means Merfolk, who prefer Remand for the single Blue and card draw anyway, and Faeries, which aren't doing anything right now.

Point 3 for Counterspell: Counterspell is best against unfair decks. Modern is a very fair format right now, with Living End as the only real "unfair magic" deck right now. 

 

tldr: Print Counterspell in some random non-Standard set so it gets into Modern, pls Wizards?

 

[Simping For Hina]

No complaints. I have four foil ones for my OhShitai deck

[Resident Fascist]

No complaints. I have four foil ones for my OhShitai deck

 

Are those... Foil Ojutais?

[Simping For Hina]

Are those... Foil Ojutais?

Nah. Those are non foils. I kept my foil Ojutais with me, my friend was at SCGWorcester who was able to get me some cards.

[Chaosix]

counterspell looks cooler, therefor is better.

[Flame Dragon]

The only way for a card to get into modern is through standard and Counterspell could easily be too good for Standard.

 

But yea, Counterspell doesn't seem too good for Modern. Though your point of "it would only be good against a few decks" raises the question of why bother reprinting it if that is the case.

[Resident Fascist]

The only way for a card to get into modern is through standard and Counterspell could easily be too good for Standard.But yea, Counterspell doesn't seem too good for Modern. Though your point of "it would only be good against a few decks" raises the question of why bother reprinting it if that is the case.

Because why not? Blue promotes fair Magic, players like fair Magic. Players like Blue, everybody wins.

[Simping For Hina]

The only way for a card to get into modern is through standard and Counterspell could easily be too good for Standard.

 

But yea, Counterspell doesn't seem too good for Modern. Though your point of "it would only be good against a few decks" raises the question of why bother reprinting it if that is the case.

Counterspell would have to be in an environment where Blue doesn't have any good measures of card advantage if it were going to be in Standard. Blue has to be bad. It wouldn't be wrong to have and it would be hard to splash, but it would also be really good if there was just enough to have blue doing something.

[Poc]

The double blue makes me wonder how playable counterspell is in modern. I know its by far the best counterspell out there and modern is a fetchland format but most modern decks live and die on curving out properly, especially in 3 color decks. Mana leak is much better early game as a catch all where counterspell is better against big mana decks. Modern is such a fast format that narrow answers like spell snare become much better due to their mana efficiency.