Banned and Restricted - Jan 9th 2017
General forum
Posted on Jan. 9, 2017, 2:08 p.m. by Bovine073
That's a lot of bannings. What does everyone think about this?
Effective Date: January 20, 2017
Magic Online Effective Date: January 11, 2017
Standard:
Emrakul, the Promised End is banned.
Smuggler's Copter is banned.
Reflector Mage is banned.
Modern:
Gitaxian Probe is banned.
Golgari Grave-Troll is banned.
Next B&R Announcement: March 13, 2017
When was the last time three cards have been banned in Standard? How will these bannings affect standard and modern?
For Standard, bye-bye, Vehicles (maybe it will still be psuedo-playable?)! U/W flash receives a huge hit. GB Delirium and Marvel have suffered huge losses as well.
For Modern, Gitaxian Probe banning affects infect, delver, suicide bloo/zoo, pyro ascension, and more. GGT Ban cripples Dredge (again).
These bans in Modern are what makes me too anxious to try the format.
What if I outlaid a lot of money on a deck, only to have a key piece banned?
January 10, 2017 3:14 p.m.
Argeaux thats why good rogue builds are always best, not prevalent enough in the meta to get banned and if you're good they can keep up with the tier one decks
January 10, 2017 3:21 p.m.
Argeaux, if you're familiar with the format you can see the bans coming. If there's ever a deck so degenerative that it restricts diversity in the format, Wizards will nuke a key piece of that deck. The same goes for cards that enable a lot of strategies in an "unfair" manner. That being said I'm fairly surprised they didn't nuke Become Immense, but with Fatal Push coming out it probably doesn't need a ban now.
January 10, 2017 3:26 p.m.
Jimmy_Chinchila says... #5
Really dumb. Nothing should be banned in Standard if R&D does their job properly. Hopefully someone lost their job as well, as this will internationally end up cost tens of thousands of dollars in lost value. Everyone who bought playsets is gonna lose like 75% of the value as you will likely be able to buy 4 for what has been the price of one. Add up how many thousands of people this happened to and it gets absurd. Someone failed at doing their job and now we have to suffer financially to make it right. Just plain retarded.
January 10, 2017 3:37 p.m.
@Argeaux If that's really your concern then I suggest not choosing a modern deck based on how degenerative it is. If your only playing a deck because it's busted and hard to disrupt (like during the splinter twin or eldrazi days) then something will be done about it to prevent the format from becoming warped and stale (i.e. that deck and the one that beats it only being played). You'll never invest money into a fair deck and have to be worried about a key piece being banned. It doesn't mean those decks are bad, they're just not so degenerative to the format that strong action needs be to taken in order for change to be made and the meta to diversify.
January 10, 2017 3:41 p.m.
Jimmy_Chinchila says... #7
I can see banning one card every few years due to oversight but this is ridiculous. Every Standard format ever has had but a handful of tier 1 decks, and it always gets shaken up with a new set release. This time we're getting 3 bans that affect 3 of the top archetypes and just a few weeks shy of a new set release. I don't like the precedent it sets. Have faith in the community that new decks will disrupt the status quo rather than preemptively assuming things will stay the same. And again, literally every Standard format has come down to a few competitive archetypes so that is no excuse to ban. And if they are willing to do Standard bans why the f**k wouldn't they have banned CoCo when it too provided an advantage that singlehandedly shaped a format? Makes absolutely no sense. No way in hell Reflector Mage had anywhere near that impact.
January 10, 2017 3:44 p.m.
WizardLogic says... #8
I saw the Emrakul ban coming for quite some time now, as when she was first spoiled I seriously questioned why they printed a steal your opponents turn effect, on a card that can have it's CMC reduced significantly, and Wizards cares a lot about how players feel about the Standard Environment, and the consensus was losing to Emrakul was about the shittiest thing that could happen. With Emrakul gone control decks can actually focus on sticking to a regular game plan now, not trying to get super fancy trying to delay or cancel cast triggers.
I also predicted the looter scooter ban, Vehicles were a new type of card, and it was obviously quite pushed. It does too much for little investment, and it became the poster card of standard where you either play it and have the better deck, or you don't play it and hope you can avoid running into it. People argue why not ban Gideon if the looter scooter is too good, the difference is that Gideon requires deck building restrictions, obviously you have to be in white, and you also have to have a plan to use his abilities, he is good jamming him on turn 4, but he is a dominant card when the deck he's in can back him up and use his abilities correctly. Also as a personal note, I lost more games to the scooter than I have to Gideon, since Gideon can't "hide" from your targeted burn or creatures beating on him.
Reflector Mage is the odd one out, however U/W flash is history making since it makes up so much of the field, my local game stores have at least 6 players playing the deck at FNMs. Making it to the top 8 and facing the same deck 3 times in a row gets really old really quickly, so I understand the targeting of the deck. So why did our favorite azorius mage get the axe? I think this has to do with the fact that it's ability is a hedge against aggro and midrange strategies that would otherwise race or even crush the deck. W/U Flash in it's concept is a tempo deck, and reflector mage is certainly a poster card towards tempo. I feel wizards wanted to approach neutering the deck in the least painful way possible, so instead of targeting big expensive cards, they targeted a somewhat inexpensive card that had a frustrating ability to play against.
Verdict? Good bans in my opinion, I was avoiding standard since the consensus was you either had a plan to beat emrakul, flash, or the scooter, or you played those decks and hoped you were more consistent. I think Delirium is still playable despite the loud whining from the players, grim flayer and ishkanah are still insane cards in their own right, and no graveyard hate was printed. W/U Flash may be less oppressive now, but the concept of the deck still stands, people will probably replace reflector mage with another value 3 drop, or possible end up splashing a third color to take advantage of other cards. I don't think Marvel is playable now without their token finisher, although I can see some decks playing World Breaker or some other big Eldrazi instead to make up for it. Vehicles will have to approach with a new strategy, Sram seems decent for the deck, and fleetwheel is still a good reward.
January 10, 2017 4:06 p.m.
@Jimmy_Chinchila try telling that to the modern community where every time a new powerful deck shows up 1000's of people create direct copies of it instead of building new decks to combat it. Or how every time something is banned in modern the entire community reverts back to the previous decks that were played instead of exploring new options being opened up. Wizards can't get the community to come up with new decks and break the "status quo" in a format with a card pool 100 times the size of standard, how could you possibly expect them to hope rotation shakes up the format when we already know there are a ton of enablers coming in that actually make Reflector Mage better than it was with Collected Company?
Your thoughts are narrow minded and misguided. You ignore relevant information just to prove your point. Like the fact they changed when rotation happens again, meaning Reflector Mage will not only be in standard longer than originally planned but will also interact with cards it was never intended interact with in standard. They even outright admitted that people have been calling for something like this since coco was legal, so the fact that it has still been detrimental to the health of the format with the introduction of U/W flash and is only going to get worse when newer cards are introduced forced their hand and made them take action now, as opposed to in a couple weeks after the new set was released. These bans were coming regardless, the announcement only came early so we didn't have 2 weeks of standard where the banned cards hadn't officially been banned yet. One of my favorite quotes of your is when you say, "no way in hell reflector mage had anywhere near that impact", it only highlights that you have no understanding of whats going on or how the upcoming set release has just as much effect on why this was banned as Collected Company had it.
January 10, 2017 4:16 p.m.
New cards coming out, combined with some cards we already had, would mean you could bounce Reflector Mage each Turn after it came out, very reliably.
That's three turns of tempo loss for anyone playing against it. Pretty broken, if you ask me.
January 10, 2017 4:26 p.m.
frogkill45 says... #11
I haven't been playing standard to long (since khans of tarkir) i always played modern but kept a standard deck for funs, nothing to expensive but least playable. After Kaladesh release I stopped all together. Standard wasn't fun with only 3 decks competitive enough to 5-0 a fnm. This is more of a case of cards being to important, or powerful. Emrakul had very few answers that deal with it. Sinister Concoction could kill her but then you most likely lost to the Mindslaver. Pick the Brain and Shamble Back being the only 2 cards I can think of that were good ways to deal with Emrakul in the hand or gy. Both of which are black. One thing I miss was actual ways to remove gy's. Delirium was almost impossible to shut off once achieved. Cranial Archive / Day's Undoing or some sort of effect like this in standard would have helped. Aetherworks Marvel including the word "cast" in the text is what made Emrakul strong in that deck. Getting controlled on the next turn made it so they could blow your sorcery removal on another target. Getting a 13/13 Flying, trample, protection from instants on turn 5 is already good enough. Same can be said for Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger. I'd also be interested to see the number of decks that run Marvel but not any big fat eldrazi's.
Smuggler's Copter was just a mistake. the card was way to efficient for 2 CMC and a crew of 1. Loots on attack and blocks. Your almost always going to get a card off it.
Lack of cheap instant artifact removal was also something I didnt like. Natural State was your best answer to most artifacts but the amount of things out its range were huge, and really none outside of green.
I really think the bans were to bring people back to standard. WOC wanted us to know they care about balancing. They want standard to be diverse. I totally agree with that. It really comes down to R&D doing a better job testing future sets. Banning 3 in standard definitely proved this.
January 10, 2017 4:44 p.m.
I don't see Aetherworks Marvel decks being slowed that much by being forced to relay on Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger. At least the universal presence of emrakul meant you could mainboard the answers (Clip Wings seemed generally overlooked in my opinion.
Getting hit with a turn 4/5 ulamog hurts so bad. take out two lands and that is just devastating. It seems so clear to me that Aetherworks Marvel just put permanents into the battlefield and only 'cast' non permanent spells.
January 10, 2017 5:47 p.m.
I'll throw in my 2 cents for shiggles, note I primarily play modern with standard on the side in a semi casual level:
The only banning I wasn't surprised by was Golgari Grave-Troll. Among my play group I was calling that or Cathartic Reunion being banned just because wizards has had a long history of despising that they made dredge as a mechanic. And for those like me that were in the process of building the deck remember that we still have Golgari Thug to replace as a bittersweet option but still an option none the less, it could even be a nice way to get a Narcomoeba back on top of a library for a dredge-reanimate trigger set up.
Gitaxian Probe definitely surprised me but after reading wizards reasons and thinking about it along with recollecting matches against the decks that used it against my playing reactive control decks like grixis and mardu, that ban and reason seemed more justified and a step in the direction of helping out attrition and control players. Information is one of the most powerful tools in magic and in the case of control style decks being able to bluff removal whether it's there or not is an invaluable skill that takes time to perfect and is one of the nuances that makes the games interesting from a play perspective and makes games a battle of wits of who makes the first mistake and can they recover. Git probe did away with this, letting hyper aggressive combo decks like infect, kiln fiend and Death Shadow aggro decks know immediately if their foe has the trump card in hand reducing the suspense of the game from all perspectives since once that hyper aggro player knows their opponents hand, they can now craft the perfect strategy around it and usually eek out a win within a turn or 2 if not, on that exact turn. Keep in mind this effect for these decks is essentially for free given those decks don't care about life totals. Banning probe allows a multitude of decks taking advantage of this fact to get slightly stifled without outright destroying them and also allows the art of bluffing and suspense back into modern magic which can make the format more fun to watch for the do they or don't they style of suspense.
As for the standard bannings (discussing probe took longer than I thought it would): Emrakul's seemed a little lame honestly and I run BR zombies. The card is good but that was the intention from the start. BG delirium can survive without it in my mind contrary to some of the opinions out there. Marvel I think got hurt more which may be deserved anyways given how fast it could operate.
Smuggler's Copter got banned for the same reason Mental Misstep and to an extent Treasure Cruise got banned or restricted in every eternal-style format. It basically was so good and so easy to force in that it becomes an auto 4 of in every deck. Misstep is the same way given the prevalence of one drops in older formats and cruise's lifetime saw BURN splashing blue just to run it. I'm not saying that copter is nearly as good as those cards, it's not. I'm saying in the vacuum that is the standard format, it may as well have been.
Lastly, while Reflector Mage was surprising, and odd in general I'd like to point out some things. 1. in the grand scheme of wizards orginal abbreviated cycle, mage was going out with amonkhet so this ban takes away only a few months from its original intended life cycle when it was printed which may have had an influence. 2. While their actions (specifically with modern) have tended to contradict this ideal, they really, really dislike killing an entire archetype for the sake of deck A is to0 strong over decks B,C,D, etc. unless they view that deck as absolutely degenerate (eggs.....), or hurts their ability to design cards and/or one ban prevents mass future bannings to neuter a problem deck (birthing pod....). Reflector mage being banned allows for them to actually try and follow that ideal for a change since banning it hinders UW flash to an extent, not much but to an extent, that makes the deck still good and playable. I know that wasn't totally in their reasons behind it but it is still something to maybe look into.
My only hope is that this is a one time extreme for standard since it would otherwise hint at irresponsible design. Sorry for making this so long and feel free to disagree with me just figured I'd throw my thoughts out into text.
(TL;DR The bannings while surprising all make sense once you consider factors that have existed in reasons for other bans and unbans.)
January 10, 2017 6:29 p.m.
How are these bans going to be handled at the FNM level? It seems kind of unfair that random kids who were lucky enough to pull an Emrakul, the Promised End should not be allowed to play them at their LGS. I don't know about anyone else, but if I was told I wasn't allowed to play with the card I opened I probably wouldn't want to open packs anymore.
January 10, 2017 7:18 p.m.
Dredge4life says... #15
They shouldn't be opening packs outside of draft and prerelease anyway. Random packcracking is a sure way to lose money, and it's good to break new players of bad habits early. It's unfortunate that it happened, but these cards are still broken in Standard (except RM, but I trust that at least SOMEONE at WotC knows what they're doing,) so they aren't fair to use. It's unfortunate for anyone who spent large quantities of money on aquiring these cards, but Standard as a whole just seems nigh-unplayable to me right now.
January 10, 2017 7:45 p.m.
The cards won't be allowed, it'll differ at each LGS depending on how strict they are, but officially they are illegal and grounds for a DQ
January 10, 2017 7:54 p.m.
Dredge4life If standard is unplayable now, why would a new player think it would ever be playable? Also, just because cracking packs isn't a good idea doesn't mean people don't do it. Someone in the 10-15 age range (usually) isn't going to care about getting the best bang for their buck, they just want to have some fun on friday nights with their allowance. All I'm saying is that the environment matters. Sure, there are net-deckers at your local LGS that run a $500 optimized 75, but on the other hand that kid I am using as an example probably would just add his Emrakul, the Promised End into his intro pack. Telling them to go play Pokemon instead is not good for the game, or the community.
January 10, 2017 8:10 p.m.
YamishiTheWickedOne says... #18
I just wanna throw out there that infect can still fill their grave and cantrip by running Street Wraith, they just don't get to peek at your hand.
January 10, 2017 8:32 p.m.
SwaggyMcSwagglepants says... #19
I mean, I dont agree with really any of Wizards bannings. Probably because im anti-banning, but nothing is degenerate. I would have banned Marvel itself, and Felidar Guardian. In modern, I think I wouldnt have banned Gitaxian Probe, but Im just biased there bc of infect. If there was reeeaaally a need to nerf infect, I'd go for Mutagenic Growth personally. Maybe thats not a significant enough card, but its the card that really makes T2 or T3 wins plausible.
January 10, 2017 8:43 p.m.
Dredge4life says... #20
Araganor I don't advocate for players leaving for Pokmon, and I understand your concern. However, my point still stands. Standard doesn't seem playable to me, but all who do choose to play it need to abide by proper regulations at an FNM. If I crack a Splinter Twin from an MM2015 pack, because I just randomly got it and don't play it in combonation with Pestermite does not mean it is legal for Modern play. My point regarding freelance opening of packs also stands. Packs are not a good idea to open just for the sake of it, and are a very good way to lose money. People still open them, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea, and if a new player opens an Emrakul, by all means play it at home, but as it sits it is illegal at FNM level events for a reason. FNM is a level of which rules are enforced, and exceptions cannot be made just because someone spent their allowance on a pack with a banned card in it. Once again, this was written late at night, so the defense of my statements may contain issues, but please try and understand what I meant.
January 10, 2017 9:03 p.m.
Dredge4life I do understand what you are saying. Regardless of your pack opening beliefs (which I agree with by the way), I think we can both agree that bans due to overpowered cards hurt the game. Sure, it might entice some people who were upset with the broken cards to come back (although some may have just quit for good), but just as many people are going to be upset that their favorite card got banned.
To me, it's not a matter of whether the bans were warranted, but more that printing cards that need to be banned is irresponsible and not a sustainable model. Modern needs a banlist, but banning cards in a format that is played casually (I consider FNM to be a casual event, but these semantics are besides the point) by a very large amount of people is not going to encourage newer people to play the game. Even if it is for the "health of the format", many people don't give a flying fuck what the pros are playing and just want to be able to play with the cards that they opened in packs or bought. These bans and the added opportunities for more bans makes it seem to me that Wizards is going to start treating Standard like Modern: with a regularly updated banlist that axes whatever deck is dominant in the meta. I certainly hope this is not the case, and I would love to be shown that this is a mistake they will learn from.
January 10, 2017 9:41 p.m.
SwaggyMcSwagglepants how could you possibly even THINK about banning Felidar Guardian when we haven't even seen it see ANY play yet? You don't ban a card right after you spoil it. That's not how it works. Wotc knew that it infinitely combos with Saheeli, they aren't going to ban it unless the deck somehow becomes oppressive (which I don't think it will).
January 10, 2017 9:49 p.m.
Dredge4life says... #23
Araganor I absolutely agree. This is a design error and 100% causes damage to the playerbase. However, I think it must also be said that there are good and bad ramifications to every decision. I am unqualified to judge which side ways heaviest in this case, so I won't say anything towards it, but I believe that WotC deserves credit for recognizing that they made a mistake and are taking steps to fix it. They are thankfully working towards a better future for the game. But it is as you said; the problem lies within. They need to get a grip and put more work into testing and tweaking these cards, so that 15-year-old will not be able to open a banned card. The FFL as they call it is doing a terrible job, so they should hire actual pros to prevent this from happening again imo. But the fact that it happened remains, and these cards are banned in Standard. I'm just as unhappy about it as you are, and I feel for you and everyone else that may have been messed up by this, but that doesn't mean that those cards are legal. The only way to fix this would be to add in-store rules, but if you did that there would be people complaining about how some could use Emrakul and others could not, so I'm kind of at a loss for how to fix that particular byproduct.
January 10, 2017 10:14 p.m.
Dredge4life Yep, just a shitty situation all around.
January 10, 2017 10:18 p.m.
AwezomePozzum says... #25
Ok. Here goes my substantially-greater-than-2 cents.
I only play EDH. (and I am legally a minor) I've made a conscious financial decision to only open Booster Packs at Limited events (with exceptions being 1 or 2 packs of a masters set, which I can almost never afford to run Draft or Sealed of; or someone gave me a bundle for my birthday, for the sake of example).
This plan has actually saved me a large sum of money, buying the singles I want to use instead of opening random packs to make my Commander decks playable (even the expensive ones, singleton instead of playsets). However, Standard still has a huge impact on the price of singles, and the banning of Looter Scooter and Emrakul is definitely going to help me and my playgroup get those cards, even if their bans aren't the best choice going to the future from WotC.
I typically enjoy building decks here on TappedOut to theorycraft, and keep my deckbuilding senses going (I still need to try porting to Cockatrice or XMage to play them), but I can almost never afford to make them in paper, due to the price spike that any good card in standard (or to a lesser extent, modern) gets. I might decide to branch out into more inclusive, fun, budget formats like Frontier or Pauper, but recent events have still caused me to lose a lot of respect for WotC, and their set design choices.
I like to be creative with my decks. I strive to stand out and be seen as someone who took an idea of their own and ran with it, rather than someone else's. Kaladesh and Aether revolt have surely been AMAZING to my johnny side, with all the combo cards and build-arounds, but every set has its flaws, and the more recent ones certaintly had QUITE a few of them, truly too many to count in this comment (For the sake of clutter and of time).
Looking forward, I'll be keeping a close eye to WotC's actions and practices, but if they start to slowly return to sanity and print more cards like Fatal Push, Harnessed Lightning, Anguished Unmaking, Declaration in Stone, and Disallow to actually give removal/counterspells a chance, then I'm all for it. By upsetting the insane power and overvalue of the Creature (and to a lesser extent, Combo) in constructed formats (which is usually relegated to Limited, which, by that token, loves removal), I feel that it will make a much more fun, inclusive, and honestly more interactive and diverse play experience, that will, in the end, make WotC relatively the same, or greater, profit.
Thank you, and I'll be back here tomorrow. For now, I have to sleep. Thanks to all of you for hosting a community that we, as players of Magic: the Gathering, can use to improve our experience in the game, and our community outside of the LGS.
Have a good week! (And a hopefully even better prerelease!)
AwezomePozzum
January 10, 2017 10:32 p.m.
Izu_Korasu says... #26
standard was dying, at my lgs modern quadrupled in size due to players not wanting to play standard anymore.
the ban of three cards makes sense, removing emrakul nerfs aetherworks and delirium, and removing smugglers copter hurts more or less every deck equally. and while there may be an argument for Spell Queller instead, but reflector mage is a staple in both panharmonicon and u/w flash so removing it prevents it from overwhelming standard with its main competition crippled.
all and all, welcome to spells matter standard, where planeswalkers harder to remove, ways to counter aggro are plentiful and the promised end has disappeared.
January 10, 2017 10:38 p.m. Edited.
readerrw07 says... #27
I know that I'm finally trying Standard again after the inclusion of Copter made every game feel the exact same of "Crew Copter, swing with Copter. Pass"
January 10, 2017 10:41 p.m.
DredgeforLife.. You make very excellent points, and I don't dispute your reasonings. That being said, cracking packs is really fun and shouldn't be bashed. Yes I am aware that I'm paying $4 for a $0.50 card most of the time but cracking packs is extremely fun and I do it frequently. "Cracking packs should be reserved for draft" is so annoying and I hate it when people try to tell me how to enjoy this game.
January 10, 2017 10:54 p.m.
SwaggyMcSwagglepants says... #29
@Bovine073 splinter twin was banned in modern not because it wasnt fair but because wizards and players and coverage was butthurt that there would just be free wins. This isnt the same (Deceiver exarch has flash, the reason you could win is bc u go eot flash it in, that stuff) but standards disruption is soooooooo much worse. If people are angry about mindslavers, why arent they angry about turn 4 concede?
One of the reasons emrakul was banned is because people didnt like marvel and turn 4 eldurzle. This literally WINS THE GAME turn 4. I have a feeling people will get more angry about this than about marvel.
January 10, 2017 11:33 p.m.
SwaggyMcSwagglepants this combo dies to shock. Harnessed lightning. A revolted push. Spell Queller. Stasis Snare. The list goes on. Standard disruption is just fine. And still, you do not ban a card out of pure speculation when it hasn't seen any play. WOTC knew about this combo, and clearly felt okay printing it. This combo will not be a tier 1 deck.
January 10, 2017 11:54 p.m.
CanadianShinobi says... #31
People who compare this new combo to Splinter Twin don't understand what Twin was. Twin was a win con in a tempo-control deck that was refined to perfection. Twin, I still argue, should have never been banned in the first place. Without it Control doesn't exist in Modern, even if I never was a fan of the deck, I still saw its value for the format. These days Modern is a cesspool of aggro decks.
January 11, 2017 midnight
JakeHarlow says... #32
......aaaaaand just when I was thinking I'd come back to Standard.
Nevermind, I guess.
January 11, 2017 12:18 a.m.
zyphermage says... #33
Splinter twin wasn't banned because it is unfair but because if you were playing those colors you had to play it. Just like white for stoneforge mystic, if you weren't playing that card while legal you were not doing the best thing you could be doing.
January 11, 2017 1:52 a.m.
I'm sad I really don't know what to replace for my 4 copters and reflector Mage to make it as competitive:(
January 11, 2017 2 a.m.
I'm guessing the mage ban has something to do with Panharmonicon.
I dont mind the new bans, although its a shame I wont be able to cast turn 4 Emrakul in my Marvel deck anymore. I guess I'll switch to Ulamog now.
January 11, 2017 4:42 a.m.
WizardLogic says... #36
It was the kids in the 10-15 age group that were getting huffy and mad about losing to Emrakul in the first place, Wizards pays attention to what new players take of their "poster format." Getting your turn stolen is probably a fast way to make a new player want to quit. The card was printed with a mechanic that doesn't have a place in today's time for magic, and it isn't something that is new player friendly. A mistake was made, and they banned the mistake. Hopefully they will now know to never print "steal your opponents turn" effects again.
January 11, 2017 4:51 a.m.
Dredge4life your understanding of how/why people open packs is a little bit myopic.
A LOT of LGS give packs to each player who takes part in FNM.
So it's not always about spending money unwisely.
Lots of younger people who play in regular weekly tournaments are opening a couple of packs per week just PLAYING in those tournaments.
However, I don't think it's doing the wrong thing by them to say that they can't play their copy of Emrakul, the Promised End that they just cracked.
Firstly, they are now going to be opening AEther Revolt cards, and none of those are banned.
Secondly, people open packs with junk Rares in them all the time. Opening a pack with a banned card is basically the same as opening one with a junk Rare that is unplayable.
Finally, I have held on to all of my cards over the years, no matter how crap they seemed.
Then I started playing Commander and had this wonderfull collection of cards that contained gold. Cards that weren't that good in Standard but were amazing for Commander.
So your Emmy may not be playable in Standard any longer, but she may still prove useful in the long run.
Named_Tawyny if there's a one drop Copter DO WANT!!
January 11, 2017 8:04 a.m.
I have a question, and I am curious what other people think. This may be stupid because I have other stupid ideas, but I will use Emrakul, the Promised End as an example. How about this? Emrakul is not banned but cannot be played with decks that are also running Aetherworks Marvel. A turn 4 Emrakul is dumb, but with not allowing it within a marvel deck, the turn count would then be 6 or 7 before she hits the field, if the deck even allows it. So instead of flat out banning something, you restrict it from being played with another card or cards that make it even better than it already is. I mean that wouldn't work with every card. Saying Golgari Grave-Troll can't be played with other cards that have the dredge mechanic would basically be a banning because no one would play with it. However the example I gave would probably make G/B Delirium the power house deck in standard, so everyone would probably just play that instead of everything else and thus make standard even less diverse than it was prior to the banning announcement. And also this would be harder to enforce at the FNM level since, at least in my experience, you do not provide a deck list to the LGS or wherever you play, and also with the aforementioned people that just play for fun and may not know anything about a banlist within the game. I'm not saying that this should happen or that there is any current combination of cards that this should be applied to, but I want to know, do you think that this could possibly be a good action as opposed to a flat out ban?
January 11, 2017 11:32 a.m. Edited.
CanadianShinobi says... #40
HSF117 it's needlessly complicated idea that doesn't solve the problems with the current Standard. Restricting where you can play a card is incredibly unfair and at that point you may as well ban the card anyway. It goes against the spirit of the game and is far to authoritarian.
January 11, 2017 11:49 a.m.
EpicFreddi says... #41
I'd hoard Emmy like there is no tomorrow now. Played in both Legacy and Vintage, SHE (okay, I read it up, it's really a she. God damnit, it shouldnt have gender.. anyway..) is an Eternal Powerhouse.
January 11, 2017 11:57 a.m.
Jimmy_Chinchila says... #43
abenz419 you lose all validity when you resort to name calling. You have your opinions I have mine.
I was gonna pick apart your tirade piece by piece but I won't stoop to your level. I will however say that if I continue to see this level of arrogance, disrespect and maliciousness coming from you across the site I will most certainly report and block you. You contribute very little to this site yet I always see you in the forums talking shit and stirring up trouble. I think Epochalyptik would agree that attempting to belittle someone is frowned upon here. There are other sites you can use to rant if you have no interest in being a part of the community here.
January 11, 2017 1:04 p.m. Edited.
I think Reflector Mage would've been designed better if it would have a "if you cast it" instead of "when it enters the battlefield". But then again, I don't play standard, modern or legacy so what do I know ;)
January 11, 2017 3:06 p.m.
Haha, that's hilarious..... name calling.... do you really expect to get sympathy from others when they can scroll up and see what I said, proving that your either lying now or really have no clue what your talking about. I've never seen someone handle criticism so poorly, it's sad. Getting all butt hurt and accusing me of things I never did, and then running to Epoch isn't going to get you anywhere.... here or in life. If you don't like people pointing out how you ignore relevant information to suit your argument then I suggest you stop doing it. It clearly bothers you when people take notice of it and it's not a strong argument in the first place if you have to twist/omit facts in order to make what your saying seem more believable. It's better to just take all information into account before making declarations like that.
Also it should be noted that those were NOT my opinions. They are actual facts. So while, yes, I have my opinions and you have yours..... that literally has nothing to do with what I said before. It is a FACT not opinion that they switched the rotation schedule and now Reflector Mage will be in standard with cards that it was never intended to interact with in standard. It is a FACT not an opinion that WotC admitted that people have been calling for this and that the combination of the new upcoming set and how degenerate it has been forced their hand, because they knew these banning were coming and it didn't make sense to play the first 2 weeks after AER comes out with them. It is a FACT not an opinion that this is information you ignored or didn't account for when making your argument. And, last but not least, it is a FACT not an opinion that my favorite quote of yours is when you say "no way in hell reflector mage had that kind of impact", because it proves that you don't actually understand why Reflector Mage was banned. If you've read any of the information put out, at all, it should be obvious that Reflector Mage isn't being banned because of past transgressions, it's being banned because of how much worse it's going to continue to skew and warp the format.
I highly suggest you start reading things before going on a rant about them. I don't want you coming back and accusing me of something I didn't actually do again, simply because you decided to respond before you actually read it.
January 11, 2017 3:27 p.m.
CanadianShinobi: I do not disagree. It would become quite complicated.
January 11, 2017 3:54 p.m.
WizardLogic, Argeaux: You both bring up some good points. I just want to be clear: I actually am in favor of the Emrakul banning. I just think it sucks that cards in standard are at the point that they need to be banned in the first place. Let's hope this is a one time thing, and things are better balanced in the next few sets. If they're going to give us powerful creatures, we need more powerful removal to back it up and keep the format healthy.
January 11, 2017 4:57 p.m.
Agreed.
I think that was the biggest problem playing against Emrakul, the Promised End.
There were only a few sure fire ways of dealing with her and, if you weren't in those colours, bad luck for you.
January 11, 2017 8:54 p.m.
WizardLogic says... #49
On a different note, these banning of cards has hyper accelerated the Frontier Format, as players who are outraged by the bannings are running to that format, as the format promises no ban list.
For those who share this mentality, be very wary. Wizards are banning these cards in standard with a game plan for the future in mind, and if Wizards picks up Frontier, it is reasonable to assume that they will do to that format what they do to every other format, and present a banned list to control the format.
January 11, 2017 9:06 p.m.
WizardLogic I'm not sure that's going to be an issue honestly, as long as Frontier maintains a separate rules committee like EDH does.
jamesfiek says... #1
The Reflector Mage ban is a bit upsetting. Why ban that over Spell Queller? I saw the Smuggler's Copter ban coming from the day it was spoiled so I'm happy about that. I didn't think that dredge was thaaaat good, but it makes sense. I did not see the Gitaxian Probe ban coming at all. They are clearly trying to nerf infect so why not ban Mutagenic Growth so it doesn;t screw with all of the lower tier combo and delver decks or Inkmoth Nexus? I feel like Inkmoth Nexus would be an excellent choice for a ban. If makes infect less reliable, but still somewhat playable while also slowing down affinity.
January 10, 2017 3:09 p.m.