All B/R update speculation.

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Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin

Oath has the same problem as Flash; it's cheap, splashable, and requires very few dedicated slots in your deck. It has the weakness of not being blue, or instant, and of only giving you Progenitus instead of the instant kill. However, it's still almost certainly too powerful to unban. There's a dozen or two dozen less contentious cards that should get a trial in the format before Oath is even seriously discussed.

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It's a permanent with summoning sickness, since it has no effect prior to your following upkeep. It's Spell Snare-able. It's Krosan Grip-able. It's EE-able. It's Vindicate-able. In other words most of the commonly played answers in the meta hit it. If it actually was as good as it seems like it might be then Diabolic Edict would make a comeback in a hurry and be there also. It's no answer against fast aggro because fast aggro probably already has you too low for Progenitus to matter much, given he can block only one creature, arrived a turn late and doesn't help you out against burn at all. It's of no value against creatureless decks. It would be played not just with Progenitus but probably also with Tarmogoyf, for defensive purposes if nothing else, meaning that it would function as a slow Tarmogoyf in many cases (4x Goyf, 1x Progenitus).

Basically the broken in the card is not as broken as just drawing and playing a Tarmogoyf in most instances.

Could people put together decks to heavily abuse it? Sure, and that's true for Painter's Servant and Grindstone, it's true for PD and Stifle, it's true for Natural Order and Progenitus, it's true for Ad Nauseum and whatever and it's true for Ichorid's circus. Oath of Druids isn't substantially more broken than any of the above and really it's not as broken as Stiflenought. Once you get into a meta where a control deck can put a 12/12 trampler on the board on turn 2 you've kind of exhausted the fear that any creature based combo that does not kill instantly evokes.

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Originally Posted by FoolofaTook

It would be played not just with Progenitus but probably also with Tarmogoyf, for defensive purposes if nothing else, meaning that it would function as a slow Tarmogoyf in many cases (4x Goyf, 1x Progenitus).

Basically the broken in the card is not as broken as just drawing and playing a Tarmogoyf in most instances.

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It's kind of amazing how you spelled out in the very same sentence why putting Tarmogoyf in Oath would be a bad idea and still totally missed it.

Also, please think a bit more about your comparison of Stifle/Nought and Oath/Progenitus.

Legacy is still a format dominated by creatures, and oath decks simply pwns them. Having a combo that most of the time is just a 1 card combo is absloutely not good for the format.

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Originally Posted by FoolofaTook

It's a permanent with summoning sickness, since it has no effect prior to your following upkeep. It's Spell Snare-able. It's Krosan Grip-able. It's EE-able. It's Vindicate-able. In other words most of the commonly played answers in the meta hit it. If it actually was as good as it seems like it might be then Diabolic Edict would make a comeback in a hurry and be there also. It's no answer against fast aggro because fast aggro probably already has you too low for Progenitus to matter much, given he can block only one creature, arrived a turn late and doesn't help you out against burn at all. It's of no value against creatureless decks. It would be played not just with Progenitus but probably also with Tarmogoyf, for defensive purposes if nothing else, meaning that it would function as a slow Tarmogoyf in many cases (4x Goyf, 1x Progenitus).

Basically the broken in the card is not as broken as just drawing and playing a Tarmogoyf in most instances.

Could people put together decks to heavily abuse it? Sure, and that's true for Painter's Servant and Grindstone, it's true for PD and Stifle, it's true for Natural Order and Progenitus, it's true for Ad Nauseum and whatever and it's true for Ichorid's circus. Oath of Druids isn't substantially more broken than any of the above and really it's not as broken as Stiflenought. Once you get into a meta where a control deck can put a 12/12 trampler on the board on turn 2 you've kind of exhausted the fear that any creature based combo that does not kill instantly evokes.

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Except that PD dies to everything and the combo to bring it out is highly vulnerable. Counter the Stifle or discard it or blow up the PD with a gazillion spells. Hell, Shatter kills the damn thing.

The thing about Oath is that it's power is contain and only needs 5 cards: 4 oath and a creature of your choice (Progenitus most likely, maybe some other beater). The thing is, the combo is so small that you can literally fill the rest of your deck with disruption so that it WILL come out. Oh, and decks that are creatureless are not an issue: say hello to Forbidden Orchard for me, will ya?

Oath would be bad to bring back. It would cause a warp to the format for the whole time that it is legal. Anything that will clearly warp the format should not be considered to bring off the B/R list. I do think there are some cards that could come off and not be bad for the format. Since they can take them put them back on in 3 months if they do mess the format there is some control that they have in case but a card like Oath will not make the format better.

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Originally Posted by Nihil Credo

It's kind of amazing how you spelled out in the very same sentence why putting Tarmogoyf in Oath would be a bad idea and still totally missed it.

Also, please think a bit more about your comparison of Stifle/Nought and Oath/Progenitus.

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Not putting Tarmogoyf in a blue deck with a green splash is probably enough of a competitive disadvantage at this point to make the inclusion of almost anything else in its stead indefensible. If you wanted to throw 4x Oath of Druids in instead to make sure you got your combo you'd be breaking even at best if the replacement was 1 for 1 with OoD replacing goyf in the deck.

If the argument is that a slower deck with OoD and blue control would be superior to the currently existing slower control decks, e.g. Landstill, I don't know that I think that would clearly be true. Elspeth makes the Landstill deck pretty ferocious at this point and having her x2 coming out for OoD and Progenitus wouldn't make me see a clear win for them.

Stifle/Nought has advantages that OoD/Progenitus does not. It's faster for one thing. Stifle has very significant value outside of the main combo. The combo is not Spell Snare-able, basically removing something like a quarter to a third of the counterspells used in the meta from consideration. Chump-blocking a nought just doesn't work.

I guess it's dimly conceivable that putting OoD's into a deck to enable the Prgenitus combo would be an improvement over the mechanisms that blue currently has in place to kill the opponent, however I don't see it. I'd much rather face a deck with 4x OoD and 1x Progenitus than a deck with 4x Tarmogoyf and another powerful card as the fifth in the suite.

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Originally Posted by FoolofaTook

If the argument is that a slower deck with OoD and blue control would be superior to the currently existing slower control decks, e.g. Landstill, I don't know that I think that would clearly be true. Elspeth makes the Landstill deck pretty ferocious at this point and having her x2 coming out for OoD and Progenitus wouldn't make me see a clear win for them.

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What's to stop a Landstill shell from adopting Progenitus-Oath combo?

Hell, Landstill can even safely wrath/disk away a Progenitus since it will just go back to the Library. They also don't have to worry about it getting hit with StP either.

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Originally Posted by DragoFireheart

The thing about Oath is that it's power is contain and only needs 5 cards: 4 oath and a creature of your choice (Progenitus most likely, maybe some other beater). The thing is, the combo is so small that you can literally fill the rest of your deck with disruption so that it WILL come out. Oh, and decks that are creatureless are not an issue: say hello to Forbidden Orchard for me, will ya?

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We already have decks filled with disruption that dominate based on that and win through inevitability. Landstill basically wins a huge percentage of games in which they have have not been beaten by turn 5 or so. Dreadstill wins those games and also can win on turn 2 off of a nuts draw in several different ways.

You need to make Progenitus combo better than those in terms of speed and inevitability in order to make the case that a combo with Oath of Druids would be clearly broken.

Landstill has the inevitability edge and Dreadstill has the speed edge and you can argue that both are competitive with your theoretical deck in the other side of the equation also.

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Originally Posted by DragoFireheart

What's to stop a Landstill shell from adopting Progenitus-Oath shell?

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What about the combo would make Landstill better if they chose to do so? The options they have now are pretty ferocious and very effective. You need to make the case that adding 4x Oath and 1x Progenitus would make them more so and given the prevalence of Spell Snare and Krosan Grip in the meta I just don't see it.

By the time you get to the point in the game that Oath/Progenitus is really scary a good Landstill player has either won or lost already, winning most of the time.

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Originally Posted by FoolofaTook

What about the combo would make Landstill better if they chose to do so? The options they have now are pretty ferocious and very effective. You need to make the case that adding 4x Oath and 1x Progenitus would make them more so and given the prevalence of Spell Snare and Krosan Grip in the meta I just don't see it.

By the time you get to the point in the game that Oath/Progenitus is really scary a good Landstill player has either won or lost already, winning most of the time.

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I that you keep saying "GRIP! SNARE!" but that can be applied to any 2Cmc spell or artifact/enchantment. That's like saying Goyf is a bad beater because it dies to Terror. You're going to need a better argument than that, since PD can also die to Grip or countermagic (and a lot more things than Progenitus/Oath). Humility can die to Grip or countermagic. Many things die to counter magic and Grip.

Here are some reasons why Pro/Oath is far superior to PD/Stifle.

- Oath doesn't open the window for 2-for-1

- Targeted creature removal and artifact removal have no effect on the Pro/Oath combo.

- Oath doesn't need (or want) Progenitus in hand.

- If Progenitus is somehow killed, Oath can get him AGAIN.

- You can't bounce Progenitus with targeted bounce spells.

- There is no chance of actually blocking Progenitus to survive another turn: it will deal 10 damage as it can not be blocked.

- Pro/Oath is a more favorable splash. You can splash blue for PD/Stifle, but it's generally weaker. On the other hand, splashing for Pro/Oath gets you Grip and other green tools.

See people forget that pro is NOT the only insane target for the card, there are many (see sundering titan and sweeper creatures) problematic creatures with it, infact ancestors chosen is NUTS vs the aggro decks you claim its bad against (Which I disagree on.)

Oath is insane, the fact that a vintage deck was based around it should be proof enough of this.

It's as simple as this: Oath + Progenitus is a 1 card combo, Stifle + Nought is a 2 card combo. OP >> SN. Not to mention everything Drago said above. Nought is even more susceptible because:
* It's an artifact
* It's targettable
* It only costs 1 mana

Oath is a bad idea to introduce. Sure, most people will go with the traditional Maher Oath style deck to get out Progenitus and beatface for 2 turns.

But the more clever among us will realise that there are creatures in magic that provide much better utility if we don't actually have to hard-cast them. Sundering Titan comes to mind, as well as Tidespout Tyrant, Realm Razor (if you're feeling gutsy). Why limit yourself to a 3 turn (4 really, cast Oath:1, Activate:2, Attack:3, Attack:4) kill when you can design the deck to win or dominate the game right now?

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Originally Posted by rukcus

Oath is a bad idea to introduce. Sure, most people will go with the traditional Maher Oath style deck to get out Progenitus and beatface for 2 turns.

But the more clever among us will realise that there are creatures in magic that provide much better utility if we don't actually have to hard-cast them. Sundering Titan comes to mind, as well as Tidespout Tyrant, Realm Razor (if you're feeling gutsy). Why limit yourself to a 3 turn (4 really, cast Oath:1, Activate:2, Attack:3, Attack:4) kill when you can design the deck to win or dominate the game right now?

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There's this as well. Oath can used and abused to drop other nasty creatures

Oath is a wildly stupid card. People currently have decklists that involve 10-15 green creatures and 3-4 Natural Orders just so that they can get a Progenitus into play. It's at least decently difficult to work that into a blue shell -- once you've added Ponder, Brainstorm, Force, and Daze or Spell Snare, you're nearly used up your deck space. Oath is five deck slots to get Progenitus into play and the rest of your deck is completely ready to be filled with the best of blue. But why stop at blue? The only land that you're locked into adds any color of mana, between that and your regular fetches/duals, you're free to dip into any color you want for practically any spell you want.

It's not just the rest of your deck that is wide open, the Oath parts are as well. Natural Order has no other useful targets than Progenitus (okay maaaaaaaaaybe Woodfall Primus or something, but seriously), Oath can just play any creature that suits their fancy. Ancestor's Chosen for absurd life? Sure. Akroma/Hellkite for fast beatdown? Sure. Tidespout Tyrant to wipe their board? Sure. Something weird like Realm Razer or Kederekt Leviathan because it fits your metagame? Go for it!

There's too much freedom to abuse the card and the printing of Orchard even lets you trigger it yourself. The metagame would degenerate into Oath and anti-Oath extremely quickly.

Land Tax is terrible, unplayable trash. I know this from personal experience.

Oath of Druids was crap in 1.5... but that was before Forbidden Orchard and Progenitus. I think it's too powerful now. At any rate, we should clear the list of the less problematic cards before even thinking about trying Oath.

Entomb is fine. I hear people call Entomb a tutor and say it's busted all the time, but they can never really provide examples of super broken plays beyond first turn Golgari Grave-Troll. Which is a great play for a deck that already has lots of ways to dump it's library fast and still loses hardcore to Crypt.

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Originally Posted by rukcus

Oath is a bad idea to introduce. Sure, most people will go with the traditional Maher Oath style deck to get out Progenitus and beatface for 2 turns.

But the more clever among us will realise that there are creatures in magic that provide much better utility if we don't actually have to hard-cast them. Sundering Titan comes to mind, as well as Tidespout Tyrant, Realm Razor (if you're feeling gutsy). Why limit yourself to a 3 turn (4 really, cast Oath:1, Activate:2, Attack:3, Attack:4) kill when you can design the deck to win or dominate the game right now?

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Because unreliable tricks are worse than reliably killing someone right now.

If I wanted anything over Progenitus (which is never hard cast, so I don't know why you tried to bring that up), it'd be Empyrial Archangel.

Entomb doesn't seem to be that big of a problem to me either. Sure, maybe if reanimator was already big in the format or Ichorid was DTB. But it's not.

As for Land Tax, I think you might find it has its places once some deck design is done around it. But by no means does it break anything.

Oath is a nasty card to bring back to Legacy. It takes up less real estate to work with, is a lot less disruptable, and is faster than Aluren and Solidarity, wins much faster than the current Threshold kill package, and can run almost everything a blue-based control shell can run. It doesn't matter if Progenitus exists or not - hell, you can ban every creature with a CMC of 6 or higher and it's still WAY too good.

Before Gush was re-restricted, almost every deck in the format ran the exact same 20 cards (Brainstorm, Ponder, Force, Scroll, Gush). If you weren't blue, you probably sucked. Period. Oath would force Legacy to follow a similar pattern of Oath or anti-Oath.

I would rather unrestrict Time Walk or print a 5/5 for W - at least there would be SOME diversity left.

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Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin

Because unreliable tricks are worse than reliably killing someone right now.

If I wanted anything over Progenitus (which is never hard cast, so I don't know why you tried to bring that up), it'd be Empyrial Archangel.

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I agree that the techy, fun stuff is worse than Progenitus in most situations, but it's still important to note how crazily versatile of a gameplan Oath can run. For instance, the Natural Order/Prog decks and all of their variations are always going to be weak to Perish, Hibernation, CoP: Green, or even just combo strategies that interact on a level above Progenitus. Oath doesn't have that problem, if someone does board in Perishes you can flatten their face with Inkwell or Akroma. If they're playing Storm you can Oath up Platinum or something. Even though those things are usually worse than Progenitus, just 2-3 sideboard slots of different Oath targets can completely change the angle that you're attacking from. That, combined with the ability to dump it in a blue countertop shell makes it sound like a deck that's very hard to hate.

Is Entomb better or worse than Gamble in Aggro Loam? Worse, right?

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Originally Posted by Anusien

Is Entomb better or worse than Gamble in Aggro Loam? Worse, right?

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Worse in red builds I think. Gamble gives you the chance of putting LFTL in your hand letting you maybe use it this turn. Entomb would get you closer to play GBw Aggro Loam though. Without knowing a lot about the reasons for playing red over white and/or black, is Gamble the actual card you're gaining? I've seen lists with Burning Wish, Devastating Dreams, and Countryside Crusher all figuring prominently so I'm not sure that Gamble is even the point in that color (although obviously nice).

I say unbanned the dumb shit before doing something as stupid as banning top.

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Originally Posted by Anusien

Is Entomb better or worse than Gamble in Aggro Loam? Worse, right?

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To be honest, I haven't really seen much Gamble in Aggro Loam, mostly just 43lands. In that deck I'd definitely take Gamble, as you can't get a Manabond or Exploration with Entomb. It's probably the same in Aggro Loam if you chose to run it, you can't Entomb up your Burning Wish or Devastating Dreams. Of course, Entomb is a great card and I could easily see decklists being revamped to make good use of it. But just as a strict-substitution type of thing, I don't think it's very impressive.

I pose a question for everyone: If you could unban some stuff for Legacy, what would you unban?

Personally, I think that combo has been lacking power. Looking at the DTB lists, I see CounterTop, TempoThresh, Landstill, Merfolk, Goblins, Zoo and ANT. A single combo deck that I expect to fall off from the DTB section. Let's face it...combo needs some love.

I've been going over the B&R List for Legacy and after some thinking and having the dream hypothetical situation of unbanning a card.

Although it's a niche card that would only go in 2 decks, I'd pick Frantic Search. I know I'm not the only player who misses Solidarity. I'm about 99% positive that it wouldn't be played in aggro. And I'm pretty sure control has better cards to run. Black based storm decks have Ad Nausem and would most likely avoid FS because of it's 3cc. But Spring Tide and Solidarity might make a comeback if it was unbanned.

It's not like I'm asking for anything insanely powerful like Goblin Recruiter or Oath of Druids. Just a card that fills a small niche to potentially resurrect an old favorite of mine :P

Banning Top would help combo more than unbanning any card that is unplayable right now because of the Counterbalance + Top combo. The mere fact of unbanning something is because it no longer can affect significatively this meta.

That card was just the final nail on the coffin.

Top has legitimate uses outside of counterbalance/top. It's used in control decks, like landstill or Quinn as a way of digging for answers. It's used in some combo decks, like Doomsday, as both a setup tool and a combo engine.

These uses of top aren't breaking the format, they even allow more deck diversity. Most of the complaints against top are aimed at the counterbalance lock.

Counterbalance doesn't really have any legitimate uses outside of CB/top. It wouldn't be used if top were banned. Banning top would be like banning two cards, and would hurt some decks that are using top in a fair manner. Banning counterbalance, on the other hand... That'd solve the CB lock problem, and it would leave the deck variety that top creates.

If CB/Top needs to be banned, take out Counterbalance, but please leave the top.

Well the reason Top got the axe in Extended was to "speed up the game". If Top does get the axe in Legacy though, then combo will get a huge boost.

As far as something coming off the List, I would love to see Dream Halls. I have a hard on for that card.

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Originally Posted by Carabas

Top has legitimate uses outside of counterbalance/top. It's used in control decks, like landstill or Quinn as a way of digging for answers. It's used in some combo decks, like Doomsday, as both a setup tool and a combo engine.

These uses of top aren't breaking the format, they even allow more deck diversity. Most of the complaints against top are aimed at the counterbalance lock.

Counterbalance doesn't really have any legitimate uses outside of CB/top. It wouldn't be used if top were banned. Banning top would be like banning two cards, and would hurt some decks that are using top in a fair manner. Banning counterbalance, on the other hand... That'd solve the CB lock problem, and it would leave the deck variety that top creates.

If CB/Top needs to be banned, take out Counterbalance, but please leave the top.

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Most of the reasons people give to ban top are not for the cb lock as far i am concerned. It's mainly because it slows games too much

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Originally Posted by Carabas

Top has legitimate uses outside of counterbalance/top. It's used in control decks, like landstill or Quinn as a way of digging for answers. It's used in some combo decks, like Doomsday, as both a setup tool and a combo engine.

These uses of top aren't breaking the format, they even allow more deck diversity. Most of the complaints against top are aimed at the counterbalance lock.

Counterbalance doesn't really have any legitimate uses outside of CB/top. It wouldn't be used if top were banned. Banning top would be like banning two cards, and would hurt some decks that are using top in a fair manner. Banning counterbalance, on the other hand... That'd solve the CB lock problem, and it would leave the deck variety that top creates.

If CB/Top needs to be banned, take out Counterbalance, but please leave the top.

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Finally someone who get it....

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Originally Posted by johanessen

Most of the reasons people give to ban top are not for the cb lock as far i am concerned. It's mainly because it slows games too much

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Those reasons are bullshit. If you wanted to speed up the game you'd ask them to ban fetchlands.

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Originally Posted by TheInfamousBearAssassin

Those reasons are bullshit. If you wanted to speed up the game you'd ask them to ban fetchlands.

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A single top slows more the game than a full set of fetchlands. And those reasons are not bullshit: see the ban in Extended, or Sharazad.

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Originally Posted by johanessen

A single top slows more the game than a full set of fetchlands.

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It takes three seconds to look at the top three cards of your library, but thirty to find a card and thoroughly randomize it.

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And those reasons are not bullshit: see the ban in Extended, or Sharazad.

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I'm wondering why you think those are examples of not-bullshit.

See;

Wrath of God, Counterspell, Smokestack, every control spell ever.

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Originally Posted by johanessen

A single top slows more the game than a full set of fetchlands. And those reasons are not bullshit: see the ban in Extended, or Sharazad.

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really? I've never gone to time playing CB top in any tournament. Maybe people need to call a judge to watch for slow play. There is no reason top slows down the game. If you know your deck and understand the lines of play it should take a few seconds to set up your library. Speeding up the game is an illegitimate reason to ban top.

Top is the strongest card quality card in the format. All decks can play it, which means you either play 4, play a deck that beats decks playing Tops (ichorid/White stax) or you are at a huge disadvantage to resolved tops (tempo/landstill/merfolk)

People dont really see how gamebreaking the card is because its a consistent small innocious advantage past the first turn.

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Originally Posted by irrelevant

really? I've never gone to time playing CB top in any tournament. Maybe people need to call a judge to watch for slow play. There is no reason top slows down the game. If you know your deck and understand the lines of play it should take a few seconds to set up your library. Speeding up the game is an illegitimate reason to ban top.

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Again, we are not talking about cb, we are talking about TOP.

Blame on Counterbalance. There are still Chalice/Trinisphere/Force/Stifle to keep combo in check. But nothing to keep in check aggro/control. Oh, well, Krosan Grip. But when your opponent continues to flip Shackles/his own Grips/Trinket Mages, then you'll see how Counterbalance is annoying. They say Stompy decks beat Counterbalance. Well, T1 Top, if it escapes Chalice, and T2 Counterbalance, if it hits the field, can and will shut down a deck, regardless of its curve. I once lost a game because my opponent just kept a 3cmc on top of his deck, then rearranged it to second from the top, drew the card in his turn, and pretty much countered everything I proposed. Blood Moon? Flips Shackles. Dragon? Flips Sower. Slogger? It hasn't a FoW in the top3, but has one in hand. See, if anything goes through Counter/Top, there is still conventional countermagic to deal with. Leave the top, take the Counterbalance. Yes, I'm whining, because I actually think it's not helpful for the format. There are still EE/Chalice/Deed which help avoiding fast aggro to become rampant, and the combo winter is just a thing some guy said because he still wanted to play Counterbalance. You can say, "then play your own Counterbalance". This is design constraint. I want to play the deck I like, which is Dragon Stompy, without having to worry about some :u::u: enchantment. I'm not saying "hell I want to play my 40 relentless-rats-and-20 swamps.deck". Fuck, Dragon Stompy. It is possible that if I don't draw my Chalices or they get countered, I am defeated by a single, dumb card? And I play a deck with a high curve. Imagine what Zoo players do think about this...

P.S. Nothing actually needs to be banned, but I would be happy seeing that card gone. Keep the top, take the Cbalance. Even if it is detrimental for the format, I hope my wishes can become true.
P.P.S. I know they banned nothing 3 months ago, so nothing will change this time...

EDIT: atm Tarmogoyf is in 2nd place. Didn't they say they won't ban vanilla creatures or am I wrong?

Aren't the changes, if any, not until 20th September? Not the 1st anymore...
I thought they changed it!?

The announcement is still 1st, even though the changes aren't valid until the 20th.

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Originally Posted by DrJones

The announcement is still 1st, even though the changes aren't valid until the 20th.

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I thought the announcement will be on the 20th, and effective on October 1st: http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazin...ly/feature/15a