Tournament Results and the Impact of Hulk Flash

[shteev]

You know what this whole Flash business reminds me of? Time Vault. Remember the power of Time Vault+Flame Fusilade decks? The DCI stepped in and gave Time Vault some Power Level Errata... excuse me, I mean, they errata'd it to 'restore it to it's original intent'. Whatever the hell that is.

The funny thing about Flash is that the old power level errata was clearly what 'the original intent' of the card was; you get to play a creature at instant speed, but you have to pay it's cost or you don't actually get it. Back in Mirage, when the card was designed, there were no creatures with 'comes into play' or 'leaves play' effects, which meant that any creature you played with Flash, and allowed to die, literally did nothing.

There's definately an inconsistancy here, but I'm not really grousing about that. Quite the opposite, in fact; when a 2 card combo costing 6 mana that killed at sorcery speed arose, the DCI stepped in a nerfed it. I'm quite confident they'll do the same now there's a 2 card combo costing 2 mana that kills at instant speed.

[scrumdogg]

@ shteev - I think your reasoning is solid, as well as your example. It sums up one of the many points (and fears) many of us have about the effect of Flash on our format. However, you have a lot more confidence in the WOTC & the DCI than I do.... Oh well, we will see what happens on the 1st but even if the combo is nerfed (correctly, the first time, something else they have a long, bad record of doing properly i.e. Necro....) it will still be legal until June 20th, which is a long time to run new, casual, or budget players out of the format at the local level. Some of us were discussing drafting on Sundays for a month instead to minimize that sort of damage.

[Nihil Credo]

Back in Mirage, when the card was designed, there were no creatures with 'comes into play' or 'leaves play' effects, which meant that any creature you played with Flash, and allowed to die, literally did nothing.

Whoa, I didn't know that Man-o-War was such an innovation - you learn something new every day (although, technically, you could use Pyknite to draw a card).

[Arctic_Slicer]

It was legal in type 1.5 for years. It did nothing broken. Comparatively speaking, it's not overpowered. It's very good, but not broken when compared with the rest of the card pool. For the most part I agree with your other assessments.

Actually they announced the banning of Skullclamp in 1.5 on September 1st 2004, the same day the split they lists for type 1 and 1.5. It was also when they banned the clamp in extended and tribal wars. This means Skullclamp was 1.5 legal for about 6-7 months before being hit with the banhammer; hardly years like you say.

You can see Forsythe's article about it here.

Cards that are/were banned in Extended: Not every card that has ever been banned in Extended is banned in this new format, but we felt the most powerful ones had no place here. These include Earthcraft, Goblin Recruiter, Hermit Druid, Land Tax, Oath of Druids, Replenish, and newly exiled Skullclamp and Metalworker. With “1.5” now a little less like Vintage and a little more like Extended, it makes sense that the banned list is a compromise between the two. Most of these cards are very cheap combo enablers that are hard to defend against.

Skullclamp and the other cards mentioned in that paragraph were banned for being "cheap combo enablers that are hard to defend against". By this same criteria it seems resonable that Flash needs to be banned as well. Anyway it will be interesting to see what June 1st 2007 brings.

[shteev]

Actually they announced the banning of Skullclamp in 1.5 on September 1st 2004, the same day the split they lists for type 1 and 1.5. It was also when they banned the clamp in extended and tribal wars. This means Skullclamp was 1.5 legal for about 6-7 months before being hit with the banhammer; hardly years like you say.

You can see Forsythe's article about it here.



Skullclamp and the other cards mentioned in that paragraph were banned for being "cheap combo enablers that are hard to defend against". By this same criteria it seems resonable that Flash needs to be banned as well. Anyway it will be interesting to see what June 1st 2007 brings.

I'm glad you brought my attention to that article... I confess I hadn't really considered the power of Flash compared to cards that are already on the banned list, as opposed to just the current tier 1 cards.

It would seem ludicrous to have Flash+Hulk legal in a format where Hermit Druid, Oath of Druids, and Earthcraft are all banned, would it not? You just can't build AS degenerate a combo deck with those cards...