The banning is reasonable. We don't need more infinite combo and/or storm, consider how prevalent artifact mana is. Mono-color deck is already at an disadvantage without oppressor like Iona.
Is this for serious? That’s cool in my eyes. I don’t think paradox engine nor Iona were worth banning, but painter has never been an actual problem card; it was banned ‘preemtively’, but it’s actually really tame.
I think unbanning Painter's Servant is fine. There's already so many possible combos in EDH, it doesn't make sense to keep a card of that level on the banlist for that reason only. It will also allow some new janky interactions with stuff like Douse or Pentarch Paladin and I'm perfectly happy with that!
I also like the banning of Iona, Shield of Emeria. Like you said, she was mostly an oppressor for monocolored decks which do not really need it.
I'm a bit sad to see Paradox Engine go but it was certainly too good of an enabler.
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Sorry for my possible english mistakes, I'm not a native speaker.
It will also allow some new janky interactions with stuff like Douse or Pentarch Paladin
In combination with Painter's Servant, one of the cards allows you counter any spell that you want to counter (assuming it can be countered) and the other allows you to destroy any permanent you want. Those are not what I would call "janky" applications.
No big surprise on Paradox Engine , except that it lasted as long as it did. It was always a big shiny "I win" button, I can't think of a time that I saw it hit play and not be degenerate.
Iona makes sense, I just don't know why it took so long for it to get the axe.
Painter's Servant is a neat unbanning. I can't think of any immediate decks I want to put it in, but having access to another unique-ish effect is cool.
It will also allow some new janky interactions with stuff like Douse or Pentarch Paladin
In combination with Painter's Servant, one of the cards allows you counter any spell that you want to counter (assuming it can be countered) and the other allows you to destroy any permanent you want. Those are not what I would call "janky" applications.
Yeah, except that, individually, the cards suck Maybe "janky interactions" wasn't a proper choice of words, it should be closer to "janky inclusions". I like them, and maybe I'll build a deck with them in the future. But I can't see a deck like that doing well in anything but the most casual groups. (and my group is already fairly casual)
EDIT: It works well with the shards dragon fromInvasion though. That's nice!
Someone is out of his mind unbanning Servant while cards like Ugin, the Spirit Dragon exist. Iona was just icing on a cake of banning it. Prepare for Grindstonning...
I have long advocated for Iona's banning. She adds nothing to the game, except to make people reconsider monocolour decks which are almost by definition, already in a weaker position.
Iona is powerful, but is it possible what pushed it over the edge is that they wanted to unban Painter's Servant more? Having the two of those legal in the format at the same time would be pretty devastating.
Someone is out of his mind unbanning Servant while cards like Ugin, the Spirit Dragon exist. Iona was just icing on a cake of banning it. Prepare for Grindstonning...
Someone is out of his mind unbanning Servant while cards like Ugin, the Spirit Dragon exist. Iona was just icing on a cake of banning it. Prepare for Grindstonning...
They banned Servant using Iona as their rationale. And it looks like lazy work unbanning Servant once they kick Iona. What's silly is that a 9 mana white card is apparently a greater threat to the game than 5 mana blue legends, 2 mana artifacts, 4 mana blue sorceries, 7 mana colorless planeswalkers... for ****'s sake, this card's biggest issues were legal and that's why they banned it in the first place.
This really feels like the rules committee justifying their own existence with a pointless action.
(the bans are pointless too. If you had games ruined by these two cards so often that you think they need bans you are bad at this game. Cater to your base and not people too stubborn to adapt.)
Someone is out of his mind unbanning Servant while cards like Ugin, the Spirit Dragon exist. Iona was just icing on a cake of banning it. Prepare for Grindstonning...
Do you think that anyone out there who is willing to do this couldn't just run some other combo?
Grindstone Combo: 7 mana to do everything in one turn and its an artifact creature + artifact which are probably the types of permentant that have the most options to remove and or respond to not to mention it only eliminates a single player not the table.
Ugin, the Spirit Dragon: 11 mana combo and also it is something easy to interact with not to mention somewhat difficult to tutor up being a planeswalker + creature / artifact.
Neither of these are very efficient and an artifact creature is very fragile as far as combos go. Generally speaking I doubt any of these options are better than combos that blue, black, and or green could already assemble so maybe for red, white, or boros colors it might be something new but I think this is probably a big knee jerk reaction.
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I have officially moved to MTGNexus. I just wanted to let people know as my response time to salvation decks being bumped is very hit or miss.
Someone is out of his mind unbanning Servant while cards like Ugin, the Spirit Dragon exist. Iona was just icing on a cake of banning it. Prepare for Grindstonning...
Someone is out of his mind unbanning Servant while cards like Ugin, the Spirit Dragon exist. Iona was just icing on a cake of banning it. Prepare for Grindstonning...
They banned Servant using Iona as their rationale. And it looks like lazy work unbanning Servant once they kick Iona. What's silly is that a 9 mana white card is apparently a greater threat to the game than 5 mana blue legends, 2 mana artifacts, 4 mana blue sorceries, 7 mana colorless planeswalkers... for ****'s sake, this card's biggest issues were legal and that's why they banned it in the first place.
This really feels like the rules committee justifying their own existence with a pointless action.
(the bans are pointless too. If you had games ruined by these two cards so often that you think they need bans you are bad at this game. Cater to your base and not people too stubborn to adapt.)
Agree. I don't think that a 9 Mana card in the worse color that not even win you the game on the spot like other cards with that mana cost and can easily be interacted with before she enters the battlefield or with colorless removal is that broken. Did she required some build around/answers well yes but so do other cards. There are other feel bad cards, too. Like loosing to Triumph of the Hordes early in the game. MtG was really good at adding answers against her. But she was call out for years now, so I guess they wanted to throw the community a bone.
Agree. I don't think that a 9 Mana card in the worse color that not even win you the game on the spot like other cards with that mana cost and can easily be interacted with before she enters the battlefield or with colorless removal is that broken. Did she required some build around/answers well yes but so do other cards. There are other feel bad cards, too. Like loosing to Triumph of the Hordes early in the game. MtG was really good at adding answers against her. But she was call out for years now, so I guess they wanted to throw the community a bone.
-"being in the worst color" doesn't really mean anything as long as multicolor commanders exist (fun fact, there are a decent number of them).
-being 9 mana doesn't mean much in a format with so many ways to cheat things into play
-colorless removal is rare and mostly very inefficient, do you seriously want every deck to run karn and tutor for it ASAP just in case iona gets played? How are you supposed to predict that?
-the problem with iona is NOT that she's too powerful. She's not. The problem is that she creates undesirable game states for a casual game, where someone is completely prevented from casting anything because they're playing a mono-color deck. It also creates a problem because mono-color is already a big disadvantage, and iona punishes players even more for playing it.
Triumph of the hordes ends the game if it works. You can go start another one, no problem. Iona keeps you in the game, but unable to do anything. Way less fun. Kill me and get it over with.
It really bugs me that paradox engine was banned. Yes it's a strong enabler but it's often times considered strictly worse than scepter+dramatic reversal. Engine decks are flooded with mana rocks to a degree that they tend to fail if the engine is answered. The majority of complaints regarding engine is the actual speed of playing out the turns due to player inexperience, and this is easily fixed by assisting the player or just stop harassing/complaining so they have a chance to learn how to play out the engine scenarios.
If this is the sort of banning that they think is important for the format then I'm really worried about what sort of decks they are exposed to, because their group must be very... very.... very limited.
There are many fair decks that can run engine in a non-degenerate way. Something like my 8+ year old rakka mar deck hardly ever gets new cards but I guess I have to remove this now and power her back down from a 6 to a 5.
So they unban painter, so I guess they want everyone to start playing at least one eldrazi titan to answer a possible cheap and quick mill combo? Imperial painter is a legitimate (although not tier 1) legacy deck that can easily win on the first few turns. With the artifact synergy commanders we have already is this not just the dumbest thing to unban? Or maybe they really do like playing against eldrazi titans because my main playgroup has already decided to just stuff one in each deck.
So they unban painter, so I guess they want everyone to start playing at least one eldrazi titan to answer a possible cheap and quick mill combo? Imperial painter is a legitimate (although not tier 1) legacy deck that can easily win on the first few turns. With the artifact synergy commanders we have already is this not just the dumbest thing to unban? Or maybe they really do like playing against eldrazi titans because my main playgroup has already decided to just stuff one in each deck.
Leyline of the Void and Rest in Peace, I already posted in my local group FB page that if i see PS+grindstone and either one of those two i'm scooping.
i'm surprised some people think that painter's servant is genuinely going to cause some massive combo spike. thing is, sure, painter is a combo enabler, but in EDH, there are far more broken enablers for combos than painter. What painter does do though, is something that's quite unique, in that it enables colour-control as an archetype (which is what i also happen to play in legacy).
@macabre; almost all red versions of painter can kill turn 1-2, but it's only possible with a nut-draw. And, so you know, i've milled out decks with 4x emrakuls in them before; it's not impossible, but it can be a bit tricky.
but anyways, this isn't legacy, its EDH. painter opens up cards like douse, omen of fire and king crab to be playable. there aren't many genuinely feel-bad cards that combo with it (iona, ugin and wipe out being the only ones that pop to mind, and shutting off eye of ugin).
paradox engine i realise might have met its end with these urza decks that are popping up.
With the artifact tutors blue has, this turns off all creature based decks extremely quick. So if there is such a consistent anti-creature deck possible, isn't the answer to just play more degenerate combos?
With the artifact tutors blue has, this turns off all creature based decks extremely quick.
So why is iona banned again?
Not being able to cast creatures hardly matters when it comes to breaking the "lock". Path to Exile, Murder and a ton of other spells can still break the lock with Llawan. Not so with Iona. They aren't even close to being comparable.
Duplicat, spine, ugin, all is dust, etc all see play in my area, while iona was always considered too slow.
Llawan represents a single card + commander that prevents people from playing their commander and a fraction of their deck, hyper early in the game, until an answer is found. And if that answer isn't krosan grip it can be countered.
Not all decks rely on creatures but if they rely on something like reclamation sage then they are doomed.
What if the painter deck resolves douse or ugin? Sounds like a good fun time.
Painter's Servant shouldn't've been unbanned because it fits in any deck and can be a problem if left unanswered - especially with hoser cards.
As far as banning Paradox Engine, now it just makes sure that all cEDH decks need to splash U in order to to run Isochron Scepter + Dramatic Reversal in its place. Other nonblue cEDH decks that ran it will surely suffer in comparison because of it.
I'm just hoping for silver-bordered legendary creatures to be unbanned (just the legends not any other silver-border cards; I can understand the hatred to a certain extent) and for WotC to make functionally reprints of the nephilim on legendary creatures. Ink-Treader Nephilim is my dream deck and so far I have to keep it mono-red with Zada, Hedron Grinder at the helm.
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Duplicat, spine, ugin, all is dust, etc all see play in my area, while iona was always considered too slow.
Llawan represents a single card + commander that prevents people from playing their commander and a fraction of their deck, hyper early in the game, until an answer is found. And if that answer isn't krosan grip it can be countered.
Not all decks rely on creatures but if they rely on something like reclamation sage then they are doomed.
What if the painter deck resolves douse or ugin? Sounds like a good fun time.
All of the reasons that you're using to say Painter's should stay ban, would also apply to banning Iona as well. So I think you should explain it some other way.
Look, whatever reason is keeping Panoptic Mirror banned is basically the same reason Paradox Engine is banned. Paradox Engine is essentially the cEDH version of Panoptic Mirror (i.e. an engine that turns into a perpetual motion machine too easily and too accidentally with cards everyone already has in every deck).
If people wanted to color hack before Painter, it was possible but very inefficient (e.g. Glamerdye, Swirl The Mists). Unbanning Painter allows for people to color hack/hose at an efficient rate. If people enjoy doing that, so be it. Unbanning cards is awesome. More players get to do what they want.
Iona is one of the only "casual/Timmy" lock pieces that actually exist. How can one reason that Iona should be banned when more powerful hosers exist? Being stopped from playing spell is an "undesirable" board state, I get it. I think Braids, Erayo, Leovold are all correctly banned. There are colorless cards at about 33% the cmc that do much worse (i.e. hinder all players regardless of their colors).
Disregarding the combo with Painter, what color can you name? Name white to stop ***'s and step's, you get it Control Magic'd. Name blue, it gets Murder'd. Name any color, it gets Oblivion Stone'd... Banning Iona so people can play Painter leaves a lot left to be said, especially since Painter + Ugin, the Spirit Dragon is very similar.
Agree. I don't think that a 9 Mana card in the worse color that not even win you the game on the spot like other cards with that mana cost and can easily be interacted with before she enters the battlefield or with colorless removal is that broken. Did she required some build around/answers well yes but so do other cards. There are other feel bad cards, too. Like loosing to Triumph of the Hordes early in the game. MtG was really good at adding answers against her. But she was call out for years now, so I guess they wanted to throw the community a bone.
-"being in the worst color" doesn't really mean anything as long as multicolor commanders exist (fun fact, there are a decent number of them).
-being 9 mana doesn't mean much in a format with so many ways to cheat things into play
-colorless removal is rare and mostly very inefficient, do you seriously want every deck to run karn and tutor for it ASAP just in case iona gets played? How are you supposed to predict that?
-the problem with iona is NOT that she's too powerful. She's not. The problem is that she creates undesirable game states for a casual game, where someone is completely prevented from casting anything because they're playing a mono-color deck. It also creates a problem because mono-color is already a big disadvantage, and iona punishes players even more for playing it.
Triumph of the hordes ends the game if it works. You can go start another one, no problem. Iona keeps you in the game, but unable to do anything. Way less fun. Kill me and get it over with.
Are you speaking of multi-player games? Iona is a 7/7 flyer without any protection. She will not be on the battlefield forever. The monocolor player doesn't have to sit there and wait. He can give up and leave if he wants. Triumpf of hordes often kills just one player. That player has to wait until the game is finished or find another group. Is basically the same.
No not everyone has to play colorless removal because not everyone is playing mono color decks. You should know your game group and you can perfectly adjust your deck to your meta.
There are better ways to keep other players from playing magic. She is an iconic card for me. One of the first creature I got by trading with friends. I have good memories with her, like preventing some Bord wipes or protection from counters.
Look, whatever reason is keeping Panoptic Mirror banned is basically the same reason Paradox Engine is banned. Paradox Engine is essentially the cEDH version of Panoptic Mirror (i.e. an engine that turns into a perpetual motion machine too easily and too accidentally with cards everyone already has in every deck).
Panoptic mirror should have been unbanned a long time ago. We are in an age of God-Eternal Kefnet + turn spells, The mana cost and time investment on panoptic mirror is a joke compared to what is possible now.
My complaint is mainly how engine was banned over more obvious cards.
Slamming paradox engine doesn't just win the game. It requires resolving a 5cmc artifact, an already existing large density of mana tapping effects, spells to cast, and some sort of card advantage to actually work. Sometimes these elements can be combined.
Dramatic scepter has a much smaller mana investment and startup cost, and the parts can be used early if needed for other effects.
If paradox engine is the focus of the deck an it's delt with, then the deck will likely fail since such a large % of it is dedicated space for the engine parts. If a part of dramatic scepter is delt with then the deck has room to build some other wincon.
If these people actually wanted to stop the degenerate combos that use these effects then they could just get rid of Thrasios.
Currently my group is talking about just making our own house banlist because it's clear to us that this official banlist is limited by the exposure of those who run it. I don't think our group is compatible in any way with menery.
Slamming Paradox Engine doesn't win the game. But neither does having infinite mana. Infinite mana doesn't literally "win the game," but c'mon.
Dramatic Scepter is a higher investment than Paradox Engine. It's 2 cards.. How can you say it's a "much smaller mana investment" when it's only one mana less. 1 mana less vs. 2 cards. I know which cost has a bigger impact.
Paradox Engine is never the focus of a deck. But that doesn't mean it's OP. If you remove Paradox, it doesn't lead to a good deck failing. Paradox Engine does not require a lot of setup. If you have a Sol Ring in play, it basically splices Dark Ritual onto all 1 cmc cards. And a player is likely to have much more than just Sol Ring in play.
Your group might not be like Menery's. But your group would have to be "not like" any group for Paradox Engine to be anything other than ridiculous.
I can understand why people would want the P.Engine banned, but to me, it was like any other game ending combo that resulted in its opponent's defeat; scoop it up, and move on to the next game. Also it's kind of sad to see such an expensive card the the axe, especially for those that purchased it recently.
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Paradox Engine and Iona, Shield of Emeria banned.
But Painter's Servant unbanned.
The banning is reasonable. We don't need more infinite combo and/or storm, consider how prevalent artifact mana is. Mono-color deck is already at an disadvantage without oppressor like Iona.
Not sure about the Servant though.
What do people think about this?
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Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
I also like the banning of Iona, Shield of Emeria. Like you said, she was mostly an oppressor for monocolored decks which do not really need it.
I'm a bit sad to see Paradox Engine go but it was certainly too good of an enabler.
In combination with Painter's Servant, one of the cards allows you counter any spell that you want to counter (assuming it can be countered) and the other allows you to destroy any permanent you want. Those are not what I would call "janky" applications.
Iona makes sense, I just don't know why it took so long for it to get the axe.
Painter's Servant is a neat unbanning. I can't think of any immediate decks I want to put it in, but having access to another unique-ish effect is cool.
Yeah, except that, individually, the cards suck Maybe "janky interactions" wasn't a proper choice of words, it should be closer to "janky inclusions". I like them, and maybe I'll build a deck with them in the future. But I can't see a deck like that doing well in anything but the most casual groups. (and my group is already fairly casual)
EDIT: It works well with the shards dragon from Invasion though. That's nice!
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This really feels like the rules committee justifying their own existence with a pointless action.
(the bans are pointless too. If you had games ruined by these two cards so often that you think they need bans you are bad at this game. Cater to your base and not people too stubborn to adapt.)
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Do you think that anyone out there who is willing to do this couldn't just run some other combo?
Grindstone Combo: 7 mana to do everything in one turn and its an artifact creature + artifact which are probably the types of permentant that have the most options to remove and or respond to not to mention it only eliminates a single player not the table.
Ugin, the Spirit Dragon: 11 mana combo and also it is something easy to interact with not to mention somewhat difficult to tutor up being a planeswalker + creature / artifact.
Neither of these are very efficient and an artifact creature is very fragile as far as combos go. Generally speaking I doubt any of these options are better than combos that blue, black, and or green could already assemble so maybe for red, white, or boros colors it might be something new but I think this is probably a big knee jerk reaction.
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Agree. I don't think that a 9 Mana card in the worse color that not even win you the game on the spot like other cards with that mana cost and can easily be interacted with before she enters the battlefield or with colorless removal is that broken. Did she required some build around/answers well yes but so do other cards. There are other feel bad cards, too. Like loosing to Triumph of the Hordes early in the game. MtG was really good at adding answers against her. But she was call out for years now, so I guess they wanted to throw the community a bone.
-being 9 mana doesn't mean much in a format with so many ways to cheat things into play
-colorless removal is rare and mostly very inefficient, do you seriously want every deck to run karn and tutor for it ASAP just in case iona gets played? How are you supposed to predict that?
-the problem with iona is NOT that she's too powerful. She's not. The problem is that she creates undesirable game states for a casual game, where someone is completely prevented from casting anything because they're playing a mono-color deck. It also creates a problem because mono-color is already a big disadvantage, and iona punishes players even more for playing it.
Triumph of the hordes ends the game if it works. You can go start another one, no problem. Iona keeps you in the game, but unable to do anything. Way less fun. Kill me and get it over with.
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PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
If this is the sort of banning that they think is important for the format then I'm really worried about what sort of decks they are exposed to, because their group must be very... very.... very limited.
There are many fair decks that can run engine in a non-degenerate way. Something like my 8+ year old rakka mar deck hardly ever gets new cards but I guess I have to remove this now and power her back down from a 6 to a 5.
So they unban painter, so I guess they want everyone to start playing at least one eldrazi titan to answer a possible cheap and quick mill combo? Imperial painter is a legitimate (although not tier 1) legacy deck that can easily win on the first few turns. With the artifact synergy commanders we have already is this not just the dumbest thing to unban? Or maybe they really do like playing against eldrazi titans because my main playgroup has already decided to just stuff one in each deck.
Links to my most current deck lists;
Primary EDH; Rakka Mar Token Perfection, Crosis Mnemonic Betrayal, Cromat Villainous, Judith Gravestorm, Rakdos Empty Storm, Exava Artifacts, Bant Trash, & Fumiko Voltron!
EDH kept at home; Ruzzian Isset & Rakdos LoR!
EDH (nostalgic/pimp/retired) in storage;
Latulla Burns, Akroma Smash, Jeska Voltron, Rakdos Storm, Bladewing Darghans, Lyzolda Worldgorger, Xantcha Steals your Heart, Jori Storm, Wydwen Permission, Gwendlyn Paradox, Jeleva Warps, & Sigarda Brick!
Legacy Showanimator and High Tide!
Leyline of the Void and Rest in Peace, I already posted in my local group FB page that if i see PS+grindstone and either one of those two i'm scooping.
@macabre; almost all red versions of painter can kill turn 1-2, but it's only possible with a nut-draw. And, so you know, i've milled out decks with 4x emrakuls in them before; it's not impossible, but it can be a bit tricky.
but anyways, this isn't legacy, its EDH. painter opens up cards like douse, omen of fire and king crab to be playable. there aren't many genuinely feel-bad cards that combo with it (iona, ugin and wipe out being the only ones that pop to mind, and shutting off eye of ugin).
paradox engine i realise might have met its end with these urza decks that are popping up.
Legacy - Solidarity - mono U aggro - burn - Imperial Painter - Strawberry Shortcake - Bluuzards - bom
With the artifact tutors blue has, this turns off all creature based decks extremely quick. So if there is such a consistent anti-creature deck possible, isn't the answer to just play more degenerate combos?
So why is iona banned again?
Links to my most current deck lists;
Primary EDH; Rakka Mar Token Perfection, Crosis Mnemonic Betrayal, Cromat Villainous, Judith Gravestorm, Rakdos Empty Storm, Exava Artifacts, Bant Trash, & Fumiko Voltron!
EDH kept at home; Ruzzian Isset & Rakdos LoR!
EDH (nostalgic/pimp/retired) in storage;
Latulla Burns, Akroma Smash, Jeska Voltron, Rakdos Storm, Bladewing Darghans, Lyzolda Worldgorger, Xantcha Steals your Heart, Jori Storm, Wydwen Permission, Gwendlyn Paradox, Jeleva Warps, & Sigarda Brick!
Legacy Showanimator and High Tide!
Llawan represents a single card + commander that prevents people from playing their commander and a fraction of their deck, hyper early in the game, until an answer is found. And if that answer isn't krosan grip it can be countered.
Not all decks rely on creatures but if they rely on something like reclamation sage then they are doomed.
What if the painter deck resolves douse or ugin? Sounds like a good fun time.
Links to my most current deck lists;
Primary EDH; Rakka Mar Token Perfection, Crosis Mnemonic Betrayal, Cromat Villainous, Judith Gravestorm, Rakdos Empty Storm, Exava Artifacts, Bant Trash, & Fumiko Voltron!
EDH kept at home; Ruzzian Isset & Rakdos LoR!
EDH (nostalgic/pimp/retired) in storage;
Latulla Burns, Akroma Smash, Jeska Voltron, Rakdos Storm, Bladewing Darghans, Lyzolda Worldgorger, Xantcha Steals your Heart, Jori Storm, Wydwen Permission, Gwendlyn Paradox, Jeleva Warps, & Sigarda Brick!
Legacy Showanimator and High Tide!
As far as banning Paradox Engine, now it just makes sure that all cEDH decks need to splash U in order to to run Isochron Scepter + Dramatic Reversal in its place. Other nonblue cEDH decks that ran it will surely suffer in comparison because of it.
I'm just hoping for silver-bordered legendary creatures to be unbanned (just the legends not any other silver-border cards; I can understand the hatred to a certain extent) and for WotC to make functionally reprints of the nephilim on legendary creatures. Ink-Treader Nephilim is my dream deck and so far I have to keep it mono-red with Zada, Hedron Grinder at the helm.
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All of the reasons that you're using to say Painter's should stay ban, would also apply to banning Iona as well. So I think you should explain it some other way.
Would have been a better announcement had they banned Paradox Engine and just unban Painter's Servant and keep Iona, Shield of Emeria around.
Look, whatever reason is keeping Panoptic Mirror banned is basically the same reason Paradox Engine is banned. Paradox Engine is essentially the cEDH version of Panoptic Mirror (i.e. an engine that turns into a perpetual motion machine too easily and too accidentally with cards everyone already has in every deck).
If people wanted to color hack before Painter, it was possible but very inefficient (e.g. Glamerdye, Swirl The Mists). Unbanning Painter allows for people to color hack/hose at an efficient rate. If people enjoy doing that, so be it. Unbanning cards is awesome. More players get to do what they want.
Iona is one of the only "casual/Timmy" lock pieces that actually exist. How can one reason that Iona should be banned when more powerful hosers exist? Being stopped from playing spell is an "undesirable" board state, I get it. I think Braids, Erayo, Leovold are all correctly banned. There are colorless cards at about 33% the cmc that do much worse (i.e. hinder all players regardless of their colors).
Disregarding the combo with Painter, what color can you name? Name white to stop ***'s and step's, you get it Control Magic'd. Name blue, it gets Murder'd. Name any color, it gets Oblivion Stone'd... Banning Iona so people can play Painter leaves a lot left to be said, especially since Painter + Ugin, the Spirit Dragon is very similar.
Are you speaking of multi-player games? Iona is a 7/7 flyer without any protection. She will not be on the battlefield forever. The monocolor player doesn't have to sit there and wait. He can give up and leave if he wants. Triumpf of hordes often kills just one player. That player has to wait until the game is finished or find another group. Is basically the same.
No not everyone has to play colorless removal because not everyone is playing mono color decks. You should know your game group and you can perfectly adjust your deck to your meta.
There are better ways to keep other players from playing magic. She is an iconic card for me. One of the first creature I got by trading with friends. I have good memories with her, like preventing some Bord wipes or protection from counters.
Panoptic mirror should have been unbanned a long time ago. We are in an age of God-Eternal Kefnet + turn spells, The mana cost and time investment on panoptic mirror is a joke compared to what is possible now.
My complaint is mainly how engine was banned over more obvious cards.
Slamming paradox engine doesn't just win the game. It requires resolving a 5cmc artifact, an already existing large density of mana tapping effects, spells to cast, and some sort of card advantage to actually work. Sometimes these elements can be combined.
Dramatic scepter has a much smaller mana investment and startup cost, and the parts can be used early if needed for other effects.
If paradox engine is the focus of the deck an it's delt with, then the deck will likely fail since such a large % of it is dedicated space for the engine parts. If a part of dramatic scepter is delt with then the deck has room to build some other wincon.
If these people actually wanted to stop the degenerate combos that use these effects then they could just get rid of Thrasios.
Currently my group is talking about just making our own house banlist because it's clear to us that this official banlist is limited by the exposure of those who run it. I don't think our group is compatible in any way with menery.
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Dramatic Scepter is a higher investment than Paradox Engine. It's 2 cards.. How can you say it's a "much smaller mana investment" when it's only one mana less. 1 mana less vs. 2 cards. I know which cost has a bigger impact.
Paradox Engine is never the focus of a deck. But that doesn't mean it's OP. If you remove Paradox, it doesn't lead to a good deck failing. Paradox Engine does not require a lot of setup. If you have a Sol Ring in play, it basically splices Dark Ritual onto all 1 cmc cards. And a player is likely to have much more than just Sol Ring in play.
Your group might not be like Menery's. But your group would have to be "not like" any group for Paradox Engine to be anything other than ridiculous.