All B/R update speculation.

[LegacyIsAnEternalFormat]

I think I am in agreement with the majority when I say that Goblin Recruiter, Earthcraft, and Mind Twist need to come off. I havent heard a decent argument for keeping these on the banlist, they say Goblin Recruiter takes too long, but come on have you ever played a game against miracles and besides, no one is going to take 8hrs to order the top 2-4 cards of their deck. For Earthcraft they say that some RUG cantrip deck will break it using the combo with Young Pyromancer, but that requires Earthcraft which is near useless without a token generator and a basic land, I mean maybe that type of deck will be good but I just cant see it being broken. And lastly for Mind Twist, as others have been saying, losing to a Mind Twist really isnt that much different than losing to any other combo, so whats the deal? Anyways I think I have shown that these 3 cards are a joke on the banlist and provided sufficient evidence supporting my opinion that they should be taken off.

[Lemnear]

I havent heard a decent argument for keeping these on the banlist, they say Goblin Recruiter takes too long, but come on have you ever played a game against miracles and besides, no one is going to take 8hrs to order the top 2-4 cards of their deck.

I could swear people complain since years that repeditive "ordering the top 3 cards" with SDT takes forever and is close to stalling. I wonder what the argument is for UNBANNING a 4-off allowing you to repeditive "order the top 20 cards".

You are wrong, if you think that WotC has to proof that cards on the B&R list are not safe to unban/-restrict. Its the other way round.

And lastly for Mind Twist, as others have been saying, losing to a Mind Twist really isnt that much different than losing to any other combo, so whats the deal?

So ... unban Minds Desire, Yagmoths Will, Necropotence & Co too? Because "its not different if you lose to Will or to PIF"?

Anyways I think I have shown that these 3 cards are a joke on the banlist and provided sufficient evidence supporting my opinion that they should be taken off.

What "evidence"? Lol. Grab a dictionary browsing for the word and its meaning. You imply that if similar cards are legal and some are banned/resticted, all should be legal. So if Infernal Tutor is legal, we should unban Demonic Tutor. If PIF is legal, we should unban Y.Will. If Wasteland is legal, we should unban StripMine.

[dragonwisdom]

cards that need to be unbanned

In Legacy
Survival of the Fittiest
EarthCraft
Yawgmoth's Bargain
Frantic search


In modern
Jace
SFM
Splinter Twin

[Crimhead]

I don't think the format degenerates into linear combo all the time in a world without cantrips (by which I specifically mean Brainstorm, Ponder, and Preordain).

I completely agree (but am in no sense in favour of a cantrip ban). Though its very intersting that for the first time since pretty much forever we have a tier-one/dtb combo deck that realistically aims to go off on either the first or second turn. What's also interesting is that this deck isnt really running any new cards (I seriously doubt the playability of this deck hinges on the SB Collective Brutality). In other words, its been Legacy legal for quite some time.

Has this deck become playable only because of a recent mega shift (and the reduction of FOW/BS decks)? I don't think so. I believe you could have sleeved this deck up in 2012, and that it likely would never have dropped below tier 1.5 ever since. I wonder how many unplayed competitive quality decklists there are which exist in theory but have not been discovered?

[laststepdown]

Can you reopen the poll so I can vote for top?

[Dice_Box]

No.

[Lemnear]

I completely agree (but am in no sense in favour of a cantrip ban). Though its very intersting that for the first time since pretty much forever we have a tier-one/dtb combo deck that realistically aims to go off on either the first or second turn. What's also interesting is that this deck isnt really running any new cards (I seriously doubt the playability of this deck hinges on the SB Collective Brutality). In other words, its been Legacy legal for quite some time.

Has this deck become playable only because of a recent mega shift (and the reduction of FOW/BS decks)? I don't think so. I believe you could have sleeved this deck up in 2012, and that it likely would never have dropped below tier 1.5 ever since. I wonder how many unplayed competitive quality decklists there are which exist in theory but have not been discovered?

By a look at the metagame shift, i suspect the answer roots on the sharp drop of tempo strategies in the format to keep stuff like Reanimator in check. I am in no way surprised to see cheat-Fatty-into-play a viable strategy against D&T, Eldrazi, Miracles, even if I thought it would be on the back of S&T

[Zombie]

Wouldn't they prefer to just derp a Craterhoof into play instead? Given the option of winning or masturbating around with some big ol twisties, it seems like winning would be the better option. If they have Force for NO they're going to force the Mind Twist anyway so you end up in the same spot. And if you have 83 elves in play, approximately a million mana available to you and NO and Twist in hand, you were going to win the game anyway. Twist and the other cards Nedleeds posted are legitimately laughable compared to what is legal now. Especially ma boi Recruiter. Apparently being too OP in 2001 is a good indication that it should remain banned in 2017

You can jam Mind Twist a lot more freely since it doesn't cost you a creature to cast.

[CutthroatCasual]

Show and Tell griselbrand. Nice mind Twist asshole

This just in! Every strategy has at least one weakness!

[Crimhead]

While Elves would almost certainly run Twist, Im not convinced it would make the (struggling) deck that much stronger - certainly not to the point of dominating the format! If anything the deck might get a leg up and become competitive in this hostile-to-combo environment of Chalice & Counter-Top. That would be a good thing.

I suspect the concern over Twist is motivated by people thinking they won't have fun playing against it and/or that their deck is particularly vulnerable. I don't think anybody is seriously believing Elves will overrun the format to the point of inhibiting diversity. Nobody is even making that claim!

By a look at the metagame shift, i suspect the answer roots on the sharp drop of tempo strategies in the format to keep stuff like Reanimator in check. I am in no way surprised to see cheat-Fatty-into-play a viable strategy against D&T, Eldrazi, Miracles, even if I thought it would be on the back of S&T

S&T is pretty dead to D&T, so Reanimator makes more sense. Still, Sneak Show has been off and on tier one over the previous years, and I suspect RB Reanimator could have been as well if only people had thought to put it together.

[Megadeus]

This just in! Every strategy has at least one weakness!

The point is, saying mind Twist is over powered when the line of show and tell on flying lifelink yawgs bargain is not makes you sound stupid

[nedleeds]

The point is, saying mind Twist is over powered when the line of show and tell on flying lifelink yawgs bargain is not makes you sound stupid

I don't think the Elves inclusion makes any sense. You are winning with elves or by turning your elves into dreadnoughts with your 8 tinkers. A Thoughtseize or Duress or Therapy is far more useful in that context than Mind Twist.

Regardless it seems like a total lack of interest in managing legacy (no shit) that more cards haven't come off given that no recent unbanning has done dick in the face of Derpstorm, Show and Chimp and Ponderp.

Land Tax, Dragon, Black Vise, Metalworker, Monolith, Dream Halls, Time Spiral ... you have to go all the way back to Entomb to find an unbanning that had a 5%+ impact on the internet metagame.

Finally, none of you have ever even played with Mind Twist because you are children. So stop talking about cards you have no experience with. You're zygotes. Twist is a relic of the formats being a conjoined fetus, not because it dominated Type 1.5 in Spring of 1996. Most of you weren't even alive then, or were learning to use the god damn toilet.

[ESG]

I could swear people complain since years that repeditive "ordering the top 3 cards" with SDT takes forever and is close to stalling. I wonder what the argument is for UNBANNING a 4-off allowing you to repeditive "order the top 20 cards".

Goblin Recruiter is arguably faster than Sensei's Divining Top, since you trigger it once and you can preplan types of piles, just like with Doomsday. With Top, the game state keeps changing, and the game goes long more often than not, which means lots of activations and reasons to alter the top three cards. Recruiter would simply add another slow combo deck to the format in Food Chain Goblins. If you'd like that addition to the format (and miss seeing Goblins at a Legacy tournament), that's the argument. Personally, I would be more likely to just ban Sensei's Divining Top for logistical reasons like WOTC did in Extended.

So stop talking about cards you have no experience with. You're zygotes. Twist is a relic of the formats being a conjoined fetus, not because it dominated Type 1.5 in Spring of 1996.

Had a good laugh over this. Thank you, Nedleeds. Sometimes your abrasive statements are just what I needed. I actually am old enough to have played with Mind Twist, and it was powerful back in the day. That said, I don't think past performance is a good way to judge current strength, as we've seen with Land Tax and Black Vise, which were from the same era. I agree with your assessment of previous unbannings not doing much. If I was in charge of the list, I would be a lot more active in banning AND unbanning. I think bans and unbans add interest to a format, and I agree that there is a power-level disconnect between some of the cards currently legal and some of the cards currently banned. It's also very easy to reban a card if unbanning it proved to be a mistake.

[thefringthing]

The "past performance" argument is what everyone runs out when I tell them I think Mana Drain could be unbanned (in a post-Miracles environment).

"B-b-but I used to play three in Vintage! VINTAGE!"

"Okay, but would it be too good in Legacy?"

"You could cast Jace on TURN THREE!"

"You can already do that."

"Oh."

[Lemnear]

The "past performance" argument is what everyone runs out when I tell them I think Mana Drain could be unbanned (in a post-Miracles environment).

"B-b-but I used to play three in Vintage! VINTAGE!"

"Okay, but would it be too good in Legacy?"

"You could cast Jace on TURN THREE!"

"You can already do that."

"Oh."

Honestly, at this point I would gladly see UW control returning to use their UU spells to trade 1-for-1 instead of 1-for-20

[Fox]

Is there really any point to unbanning Mana Drain? It's known to be more expensive than FoW (all the more if unbanned); is the format being helped by unbanning a strictly better Counterspell (which isn't supposed to exist without mana burn) with that kind of a price tag? I don't really see the need to reintroduce get X mana after a Counterspell if it means an opponent will potentially present a worse deck b/c they didn't have a few hundred to spend. Knowingly adding cost to legacy, especially when it's for no good reason, doesn't help the format; it's already expensive enough.

@dragonwisdom I don't know that unbanning Frantic Search can ever lead to anything good. Seems unlikely that you ban one card in a format (like pauper and Peregrine Drake) and do an almost immediate 180 and unban the more offensive analog in a different format. Is there any historical evidence of this? How long between ban X in format A before unban X* in format B?

[LegacyIsAnEternalFormat]

I could swear people complain since years that repeditive "ordering the top 3 cards" with SDT takes forever and is close to stalling. I wonder what the argument is for UNBANNING a 4-off allowing you to repeditive "order the top 20 cards".

You are wrong, if you think that WotC has to proof that cards on the B&R list are not safe to unban/-restrict. Its the other way round.



So ... unban Minds Desire, Yagmoths Will, Necropotence & Co too? Because "its not different if you lose to Will or to PIF"?



What "evidence"? Lol. Grab a dictionary browsing for the word and its meaning. You imply that if similar cards are legal and some are banned/resticted, all should be legal. So if Infernal Tutor is legal, we should unban Demonic Tutor. If PIF is legal, we should unban Y.Will. If Wasteland is legal, we should unban StripMine.

no one is going to order the top 20 cards, you clearly have no idea what you are talking about, if you haven't won with the 4th card from the top you're probably going to lose the game.

also I don't think anyone except you thinks that mind twist is going to be broken yet alone played in any legacy deck if it were to be unbanned. If anything it makes elves a little better but that isn't really a cause for concern.





edit: Mana Drain is only going to make miracles better and people are already whining about how overpowered that deck is, but if miracles gets weakened, I definitely would have no objection to an unban along with a reprint in the next eternal masters.

[Lord_Mcdonalds]

Only way Drain gets unbanned is with a large reprint, at around $200 a pop (or whatever it is), I can only imagine what it would cost unbanned.

[rlesko]

Only way Drain gets unbanned is with a large reprint, at around $200 a pop (or whatever it is), I can only imagine what it would cost unbanned.

Card availability aside, the primary concern should be is "is this card too strong for the format?" Affordability is a secondary concern IMO. I think its probably ok, its hard to use the colorless mana effectively. As a secondary concern, if its a mythic in the next EMA and they continue to distribute judge foils, then I think it would be ok.

[grimfield]

no one is going to order the top 20 cards, you clearly have no idea what you are talking about, if you haven't won with the 4th card from the top you're probably going to lose the game.

Now I haven't played food chain goblins since approximately 2005 (in vintage, maindeck REBs baby) and there may be more applicable printings that make for shorter piles, but why the hell wouldn't you stack basically your entire deck? What four goblins are going to win you the game? You can't chain ringleaders into additional ringleaders unless you stack *DING DING DING* more than four cards. Want to win through moat with goblin sharpshooter? Gonna need more than four goblins, like, oh I don't know, perhaps siege gang and kiki-jiki? Goblin recruiter can be used in corner cases as a vamp tutor for goblins only, but generally you are trying to win the game on the spot! Don't be so quick to throw shade when maybe you actually haven't ever played the deck at all. That said, it's fairly quick to make piles, and ordering generally doesn't matter much as long as you chain ringleaders.