(The announcement of the updated Ban/Restricted lists can be found here; if you click on this link you'll see the official explanation for the updates)
Hey guys!
Earlier this morning Wizards of the Coast posted their December 20th Banned/Restricted List update to take effect January 1, 2012.
No formats were touched...except Modern.
NEW BANNINGS IN MODERN
Punishing Fire
Wild Nacatl
Wild Nacatl and Punishing Fire were both featured in Zoo builds.
Punishing Fire would be combined with Grove of the Burnwillows to either do a net of 1 damage to the opponent that's reuseable or to get a reuseable 2 damage hit to creatures. And with enough mana and Punishing Fires, that turns into 4, 6, or 8 to a creature in exchange for some life gain the opponent will end up losing because you're re-re-reusing your Punishing Fires.
Wild Nacatl has a lot in common with Kird Ape. Kird Ape was popular in the then-new Extended format. It could easily be a 2/3 creature on Turn 1 thanks to Taiga being legal in the format then. Because it was so efficient, it got banned. And in later years, everyone laughed that a potential 2/3 for 1 mana ever got banned in Extended.
Flashforward to Modern. Wild Nacatl has a little more going for it. We have the Modern equivalent of Dual Lands in the form of "shock lands". As well, Wild Nacatl has a friend Kird Ape never had :"Fetch lands." Yes, on Turn 1 Wild Nacatl could easily be a 2/2 for 1 mana, then next turn a 3/3 for 1 mana with little chance for an opponent to answer until a few turns later. Here's all it takes:
Turn 1: Arid Mesa, "crack" the Fetchland to get a Temple Garden/Stomping Ground, cast Wild Nacatl. Now that you control a Plains/Mountain (whichever of those lands you got), you have a 1-mana 2/2.
Turn 2: If your opponent didn't have a Lightning Bolt, you play any of the other Plains and/or Mountain "shocklands" and Wild Nacatl becomes a 3/3. Add Noble Hierarch to the mix and you have a 4/4 when attacking on Turn 2.
And it seems this kind of play happened more often than not. With fetchlands and Exalted triggers, it's easy to make Nacatl much more powerful than it was for Kird Ape to ever be and much faster too.
For these reasons, the DCI felt that the variety of the format was being threatened. Zoo decks are too prominent, in part because of Wild Nacatl and in part because of the Grove of the Burnwillows/Punishing Fire combo. As well, the Grove/Fire combo was being used as a win condition in other decks that could afford to run the combo.
And because deck variety was being threatened, the DCI felt the need to ban these 2 cards.
On the plus side...this is the fewest bannings that have happened to Modern since the format sprang up earlier this year. Last update had 6 cards banned, and the initial announcement (on August 12th) had a whopping 21 cards on it. With 29 cards on the list, I have a sneaky suspicion we'll see at least a couple cards come off the list next update (scheduled for March 20th to be effective April 1, 2012).
What do you all think? Are these bans the correct move? Should something have been unbanned? What about in other formats? Feel free to leave your comments here and share and discuss! :)
Showing posts with label restricted. Show all posts
Showing posts with label restricted. Show all posts
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Monday, June 20, 2011
It's Official: Stoneforge Mystic AND Jace, the Mind Sculptor BANNED IN STANDARD!!!
Say goodbye to your Jace, the Mind Sculptors and Stoneforge Mystics (well...mostly on Stoneforge Mystic) in Standard.
Wizards of the Coast announced today the next set of Banned/Restricted List changes.
No formats had changes, as was expected...except Standard.
EFFECTIVE JULY 1st, THE FOLLOWING BANNINGS TAKE PLACE IN STANDARD:
Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Stoneforge Mystic*
*The problem with banning Stoneforge Mystic is that there's an otherwise-Standard legal preconstructed deck with her in it, War of Attrition (scroll down a little bit on that link to see the decklist). To keep her FNM legal (because the Event Decks are meant to be bought at FNM and played straight out of the box), Stoneforge Mystic is allowed as long as the contents match exactly to the War of Attrition event deck decklist. ANY deviation (even as minor as adding an additional Puresteel Paladin or replacing Sword of Vengeance with Sword of War and Peace or changing out the Side Deck) will force you to take out both Stoneforge Mystics.
I'll post WotC's explanations later, but for now you're on notice that 11 days from now you can no longer use Jace, the Mind Sculptor and can very rarely use Stoneforge Mystic in Standard.
Wizards of the Coast announced today the next set of Banned/Restricted List changes.
No formats had changes, as was expected...except Standard.
EFFECTIVE JULY 1st, THE FOLLOWING BANNINGS TAKE PLACE IN STANDARD:
Jace, the Mind Sculptor
Stoneforge Mystic*
*The problem with banning Stoneforge Mystic is that there's an otherwise-Standard legal preconstructed deck with her in it, War of Attrition (scroll down a little bit on that link to see the decklist). To keep her FNM legal (because the Event Decks are meant to be bought at FNM and played straight out of the box), Stoneforge Mystic is allowed as long as the contents match exactly to the War of Attrition event deck decklist. ANY deviation (even as minor as adding an additional Puresteel Paladin or replacing Sword of Vengeance with Sword of War and Peace or changing out the Side Deck) will force you to take out both Stoneforge Mystics.
I'll post WotC's explanations later, but for now you're on notice that 11 days from now you can no longer use Jace, the Mind Sculptor and can very rarely use Stoneforge Mystic in Standard.
Monday, December 20, 2010
Legacy Banned List Update: Survival of the Fittest BANNED, Time Spiral UNBANNED
The ban hammer came down on the strongest card in Legacy right now.
ANNOUNCEMENT
Effective January 1, 2011, the following changes occur in Legacy:
BANNED
Survival of the Fittest
Basically, the reasons they banned Survival of the Fittest were that it was too resilient to removal and that all decks had to start carrying anti-Survival cards just to have a chance against the decks. If those decks didn't draw their answer to Survival, the game was as good as over.
They contemplated banning Vengevine, but R&D noted that other cards, like Necrotic Ooze, were comboing with Survival of the Fittest so a Vengevine ban would be useless.
The root of the problem was Survival of the Fittest, so now those roots are cut.
UNBANNED
Time Spiral
Yep. Basically a "free" version of Time Reversal. Or I guess you could say it was an attempt at a free version of Timetwister but double the initial cost. Sounds fair, right? If you've gotta get to 6 lands to make this effectively free, you're trading off time for cost.
Yeah, but when it dominates tournaments, it's anything but fair.
While I don't have a history lesson for this card, I do know Mark Rosewater considered the "free spells" in Urza's Saga to be the absolute worst design decision in the history of the game. Combine it with a piece of the Power 9 and...yeah, it doesn't take long for things to go crazy.
But apparently R&D felt the environment had changed enough in Legacy since it was initially banned to be safe to unban it.
Will it be a powerhouse by itself? Or will another previously-ignored card bring Time Spiral to dominance once again? Find out, starting January 1st.
As for the other formats, no changes.
Enjoy planning your new Legacy decks!
ANNOUNCEMENT
Effective January 1, 2011, the following changes occur in Legacy:
BANNED
Survival of the Fittest
 |
| Thorn in the side of Legacy players for months. Good riddance! |
Basically, the reasons they banned Survival of the Fittest were that it was too resilient to removal and that all decks had to start carrying anti-Survival cards just to have a chance against the decks. If those decks didn't draw their answer to Survival, the game was as good as over.
They contemplated banning Vengevine, but R&D noted that other cards, like Necrotic Ooze, were comboing with Survival of the Fittest so a Vengevine ban would be useless.
The root of the problem was Survival of the Fittest, so now those roots are cut.
UNBANNED
Time Spiral
 |
| THIS...oughta be interesting... |
Yeah, but when it dominates tournaments, it's anything but fair.
While I don't have a history lesson for this card, I do know Mark Rosewater considered the "free spells" in Urza's Saga to be the absolute worst design decision in the history of the game. Combine it with a piece of the Power 9 and...yeah, it doesn't take long for things to go crazy.
But apparently R&D felt the environment had changed enough in Legacy since it was initially banned to be safe to unban it.
Will it be a powerhouse by itself? Or will another previously-ignored card bring Time Spiral to dominance once again? Find out, starting January 1st.
As for the other formats, no changes.
Enjoy planning your new Legacy decks!
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