All B/R update speculation.

[ahg113]

What would we do without you...

I dunno. I reckon most wouldn't notice. Just go about being dicks as is the usual course for some folks.

Have any idea what it'd be like without your presence?

Cool avatar. Einstein makes for a good wiki read, hyperlinking into various topics.

[FTW]

I wonder if it would be more useful to first establish the set of non-p9, non-ante, non-Dex cards that are absolutely unbannable (for now). That would then reduce the list of possible options to unban and simplify discussion.

Here's where I would start...


2cc control card that reads "win the game":
Balance

Degenerate 1-card combo:
Hermit Druid
Oath of Druids
Tinker

Adds nothing positive to format except as degenerate combo enabler:
Channel (turn 1 hardcast Emrakul with Time Walk? :S)
Flash
Time Vault

Makes combo decks too powerful, restricted in Vintage for that reason:
Sol Ring
Mana Crypt
Mana Vault
Tolarian Academy
Vampiric Tutor
Demonic Tutor
Demonic Consultation
Wheel of Fortune
Windfall
Yawgmoth's Will

Draws >10 cards for cheap:
Skullclamp
Necropotence

Powerful engines that are Pillars of Vintage and presumably should be kept in Vintage to maintain a format distinction?
Bazaar of Baghdad
Mishra's Workshop
Mana Drain

Gives too much advantage in a tempo format:
Gush
Strip Mine

Anyone have any to add or remove? That leaves a number of the more contentious cards up for debate.

[HammerAndSickled]

I agree with all of the above except Windfall. They just printed a Windfall with upside for one more mana and it wasn't even on anyone's radar. Not that one mana isn't a lot but the line between unplayable and broken isn't drawn at 1 mana in a ritual color, you know? It's worth debating.

[FTW]

I agree with all of the above except Windfall. They just printed a Windfall with upside for one more mana and it wasn't even on anyone's radar. Not that one mana isn't a lot but the line between unplayable and broken isn't drawn at 1 mana in a ritual color, you know? It's worth debating.

Good point. Especially in Legacy, where combo decks with Islands are not comboing off on turn 1, Windfall is much less of a draw 7 and much weaker than Wheel.

[Admiral_Arzar]

I agree with all of the above except Windfall. They just printed a Windfall with upside for one more mana and it wasn't even on anyone's radar. Not that one mana isn't a lot but the line between unplayable and broken isn't drawn at 1 mana in a ritual color, you know? It's worth debating.

Agree with this. Wheel of Fortune is scary because it's a guaranteed seven cards - Windfall just doesn't have the same consistency, but the ability to Burning Wish, crack LED, and then draw up to seven without any extra mana source seems pretty insane nonetheless.

Edit: Other than that, I think your list is rock solid. There was a discussion once on here about unbanning Vampiric Tutor because it enables lots of different decks (not just combo like Mystical) but I think we came to the conclusion that it was still too good.

[HammerAndSickled]

Giving your opponent a fresh hand is dangerous too. Storm players play Diminishing Returns or Reforge the Soul and we can all agree that's not where you want to be against blue. You just fought through the counters to get your Wish to resolve, now you want to give your opponent a new hand to attack you with?

[Megadeus]

Giving your opponent a fresh hand is dangerous too. Storm players play Diminishing Returns or Reforge the Soul and we can all agree that's not where you want to be against blue. You just fought through the counters to get your Wish to resolve, now you want to give your opponent a new hand to attack you with?

Thats okay. We cast Silence before hand ;)

How about Yawgs Bargain? Just throwing it out there to possibly stir up discussion. Probably has been discussed a billion times before, but in the storm decks right now, Ad Nauseam actually on average should draw you more cards than a bargain, and can do so at instant speed in response to a discard spell or something. Obviously a deck built around Bargain would be built with the higher average CMC, but I mean between Griselbees and AN already being legal, what is what more insane draw engine?

[Dice_Box]

The difference between Bargain and AN is you do not need to build your whole deck to not kill you when you cast Bargain. Also the fact that you are able to draw at will, not just off the back the the spell makes it just too strong.

[nitewolf9]

However with Bargain every color has a cheap answer to it in the form of Pithing Needle/Beetle. And when you needle it, it won't ignore it and attack you for 7 in the air. Still might be too powerful, but it gets a lot more feasible when you compare it to what else is already running around. The reason it would probably be too dumb is because show and tell decks would just run bargain AND griselbrand. I think show and tell would need to be banned for bargain to come off, and I would be ok with that.

[Dice_Box]

A cheap answer? Not really. You need it on the table before Bargain hits the table. Because Bargain is very much a win con in of itself and is nearly unstoppable once on the table. Of all the cards I would never agree are safe, Bargain is in my top 5. It will always have the issue that the more cards that are printed, the more the card breaks.

Sent from my mobile, forgive spelling and grammatical errors.

[dontbiteitholmes]

I agree with all of the above except Windfall. They just printed a Windfall with upside for one more mana and it wasn't even on anyone's radar. Not that one mana isn't a lot but the line between unplayable and broken isn't drawn at 1 mana in a ritual color, you know? It's worth debating.

One mana difference can mean everything to combo decks. I still think Windfall is too strong. Granted sometimes it isn't optimal, but when it's on it's on in a big way.
I mean it doesn't add anything to the format anyways. It's basically just a turn 1 win enabler. Outside of a deck that is trying to combo out asap there is no real reason to run it.
If it was unbanned it would become a Wish target in every "Burning" combo sideboard and it would shine there.

Edit: Other than that, I think your list is rock solid. There was a discussion once on here about unbanning Vampiric Tutor because it enables lots of different decks (not just combo like Mystical) but I think we came to the conclusion that it was still too good.

Vamp tutor is the best tutor in the game. IMO the appropriate power level for a one mana tutor in Legacy would be an Imperial Seal that reveals the card before putting it on top.

How about Yawgs Bargain? Just throwing it out there to possibly stir up discussion. Probably has been discussed a billion times before, but in the storm decks right now, Ad Nauseam actually on average should draw you more cards than a bargain, and can do so at instant speed in response to a discard spell or something. Obviously a deck built around Bargain would be built with the higher average CMC, but I mean between Griselbees and AN already being legal, what is what more insane draw engine?

The problem is Bargain is hardcastable. You basically need a combo just to get Griz on the board, but 2x land 2x Rit = win with Bargain. Think about current Ad Nauseum decks, they run 1-2x Ad Nauseum because flipping AN and losing 5 life sucks. Most of the time they Tutor and crack LED just to get AN online. With Bargain legal in Legacy you can run 4x, you can draw out the cards one at a time happily cracking LEDs as you go for value. There are lots of things Bargain lets you get away with that AN doesn't.

[apple713]

One mana difference can mean everything to combo decks. I still think Windfall is too strong. Granted sometimes it isn't optimal, but when it's on it's on in a big way.
I mean it doesn't add anything to the format anyways. It's basically just a turn 1 win enabler. Outside of a deck that is trying to combo out asap there is no real reason to run it.
If it was unbanned it would become a Wish target in every "Burning" combo sideboard and it would shine there.

i also think it works pretty well with past in flames. Also pretty ridic in High tide


Vamp tutor is the best tutor in the game. IMO the appropriate power level for a one mana tutor in Legacy would be an Imperial Seal that reveals the card before putting it on top.

The problem is Bargain is hardcastable. You basically need a combo just to get Griz on the board, but 2x land 2x Rit = win with Bargain. Think about current Ad Nauseum decks, they run 1-2x Ad Nauseum because flipping AN and losing 5 life sucks. Most of the time they Tutor and crack LED just to get AN online. With Bargain legal in Legacy you can run 4x, you can draw out the cards one at a time happily cracking LEDs as you go for value. There are lots of things Bargain lets you get away with that AN doesn't.

I dont think revealing the card makes imperial seal any less broken or even that it is sorcery speed. If im playing a combo deck and i get exactly what i need, there are very few things that my opponent can do with that information before you win. You give them a 1 turn window of either winning or losing. Revealing helps but not enough. It would also increase t2 win consistency by like 30% in combo decks



+1, furthermore, i think necropotence's drawing engine would be fair if it costed more because it would eliminate the abuse you get with bargain. drawing 2x dark rituals to cast a bargain is like comboing into gris btw.

[dontbiteitholmes]

Drawing 2x dark rituals to cast a bargain is like comboing into gris btw.

Not at all actually, the Dark rits have a function in the deck outside of getting Bargain into play while the cards you use to cheat in GBrand almost exclusively cheat him (or another fatty) into play and serve no other purpose. Not to mention there are multiple ways to easily hardcast Bargain without 2x Rit while GBrand is almost never hardcast (or you can still cheat it into play if that's your style). Also not to mention graveyard hate vs Shallow Grave or things like Humility/Karakas/Angel of Despair/Gilded Drake which can be dropped for free off Show to deal with GBrand and the fact he can only draw in chunks of 7. Basically apples and oranges. They both are black and draw cards for life and that's about all Bargain and GBrand have in common.

[Ellomdian]

I dont think revealing the card makes imperial seal any less broken or even that it is sorcery speed. If im playing a combo deck and i get exactly what i need, there are very few things that my opponent can do with that information before you win. You give them a 1 turn window of either winning or losing. Revealing helps but not enough. It would also increase t2 win consistency by like 30% in combo decks

[Emphasis Mine]

Imperial seal != Demonic Tutor. Top of Library != In Hand. And for a terribly small, hypothetical value, revealing the card would be pretty significant, because Any Information > No Information.

As for a 30% Turn 2 win rate increase - I do not like this number without hard evidence, and it's even worse with the "like" in it. I would be fine with "Increased Turn 2 consistency" but tying a hard number to it without math is bad and undermines your argument internally. If Seal is increasing your turn 2 consistency, you are either playing it turn 1 and drawing the card turn 2 (meaning you have everything for a combo except that one card in your opener) or you are playing it turn 2, and then doing something to draw the card (meaning you still only need just that one perfect piece and you are willing to sacrifice quite a bit to get there.)

My argument is not that Seal presents a direct advantage to Combo (with some interesting implications to, say, Shardless BUG.) It's that people downplay the downsides of having to cast it during your turn, after your draw step, and still only just putting the card on top of your library. One of Vampiric Tutor's biggest strengths was that you could EOT it at effectively 0 opportunity cost, changing the Text to "If you play this at the EOT, skip your draw step and put the card in your hand instead."

[bjholmes3]

My musings on this topic's poll: I am very surprised to see Sensei's Divining Top considered so widely as the most bannable card in Legacy, by this poll's standards, anyway. I have very little IRL interaction with people who have any kind of opinion on Legacy at all, so I don't know what people are calling broken these days, but I thought for sure it would have been something else, like FoW (my local meta has soft banned the card for being unfair, what in the world, I should introduce them to Mr. Belcher and make them reevaluate that little decision) or something combo-related, as I've seen twice already in Modern.

I guess what I'm asking is this: is this poll an accurate reflection on your average player's opinion on the game, or is it only a reflection of our localized Source opinion? I want to know because I'm paranoid, and I really don't want Wizards to surprise ban my decks, because things like that seem to happen a lot (and not just in Magic, but in fighting and shooting games too). My experience has shown that the opinion of the casual players always seems to be the most important to game developers, and the casual opinion always seems to be what goes, and I want to be ready for it.

[Lord Seth]

My musings on this topic's poll: I am very surprised to see Sensei's Divining Top considered so widely as the most bannable card in Legacy, by this poll's standards, anyway. I have very little IRL interaction with people who have any kind of opinion on Legacy at all, so I don't know what people are calling broken these days, but I thought for sure it would have been something else, like FoW (my local meta has soft banned the card for being unfair, what in the world, I should introduce them to Mr. Belcher and make them reevaluate that little decision) or something combo-related, as I've seen twice already in Modern.

Force of Will? Heck no. Few people think Force of Will should be banned. Based on here and other message boards, the cards that seem to get the most suggestions for banning are Brainstorm and Show and Tell.

I guess what I'm asking is this: is this poll an accurate reflection on your average player's opinion on the game, or is it only a reflection of our localized Source opinion?

It's the reflection of what was the Source's opinion 4 years ago. Look at when this topic was started.

Though I am still a little surprised that Sensei's Divining Top got so many votes. Was it really that big a problem back then?

[FTW]

+1, furthermore, i think necropotence's drawing engine would be fair if it costed more because it would eliminate the abuse you get with bargain. drawing 2x dark rituals to cast a bargain is like comboing into gris btw.

I remember playing when Bargain was in Standard. Deck was something like

4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Dark Ritual
4 Mox Diamond
4 Yawgmoth's Bargain
4 Academy Rector
X Phyrexian Tower

in STANDARD

Between Sol Lands, Moxen and Rituals it was pretty easy to get a turn 2 Rector sac'd into a turn 3 Bargain, and sometimes you'd just hardcast Bargain on turn 2. In Legacy you would have access to Cabal Therapies as both protection and a sac outlet for Rector. Aside from cheating it out with Rector or Show and Tell, Bargain only costs 1 more to hardcast than AN and has none of the drawbacks (limited card choice options, have to draw all at once and can't cast any spells in between, can randomly lose the game), meaning you can throw in more tutors for consistency, MD Tendrils, alternate win conditions, etc.

Like Griselbees, it's very hard to lose if that card ever resolves with no pre-emptive Needle. That said, the loopholes needed to get it out may make it only on par with other degenerate combos in the format right now and the win conditions it enables may not be that different in power level. I'd say that is worth at least debating. But it would be very hard to remove now that people almost exclusively rely on Abrupt Decay over Krosan Grips.

[bjholmes3]

Yeah, my local meta is not very competitive, obviously. Banning FoW is absolutely ludicrous. It would completely overhaul the metagame.

Yeah, Show and Tell is what I've been hearing a lot of, but Brainstorm? Really?

[Polish Tamales]

Why on earth would you ban Force of Will? It's the only thing keeping the format in check.

[bjholmes3]

My thoughts exactly. It makes no sense why, but everyone I know who plays Legacy thinks that FoW should be banned. Absolutely absurd. Maybe I took that into subconscious consideration when I committed to playing combo... It must be a Georgia thing.