I invoke the law of Tooth and Nail. In that it has potential for abuse and equal potential to be fairly used. The people who would abuse it would have done so anyway and the other players should be given the chance to decide for themselves in a more friendly and casual environment.
Fair enough. Better unban everything. I'm sure I can create some hypothetical situation where each one does something fair. I mean, Channel is a pretty good card but I'm only using it to put 39 counters of Helix Pinnacle. I only use Yawgmoth's Bargain as a Phyrexian Arena every turn. Etc.
Come on. Lets be realistic here. Karakas is broken in half, even when you try and play it fairly.
Karakas just feels like a card that when played makes you not even want to play the game. It can be played turn one, taps for colored mana, and you can use it to generate value every turn rotation. Sure, it can be played like a maze, but jesus there are so many mazes already and mazes don't tap for colored mana usually. Run Erratic Portal if you want a once a turn bounce a creature if you want to milk ETB value.
With Karakas on the battlefield, your normal X + 1 hand becomes a X - Y hand (X is your normal hand, Y is the amount of legendaries in your hand, 1 is your commander). Some legendaries do invoke value on cast or ETB, but we shouldn't measure balance based off of this notion. Roughly 10 out of 166 Legendaries that include white would benefit from Karakas (This does not include all legendaries, just legendaries with white as a mana cost. The 10 that were decided were chosen based off of ETB effects, cast effects, tutor abilities). This is a subset of the entirety of legendary choices but outlines a major point, that 1/17 legendaries benefit from Karakas, which means roughly 16/17 are entirely negated. Lets assume, that Hexproof/shroud is more common and built into commanders and say my numbers are off, even by 2/17. That means 14/17 Commanders using these numbers are invalidated. Not to mention that not all of these legendaries are playable before Karakas anyway. The kicker to all of this, is that it only costs you a single land each turn rotation, to completely negate another players legendary creature which usually costs far more than a single land.
Playing Karakas makes it impossible to play your commander (or many other niche legendaries) into the battlefield for these reasons. It would give a lot more power to Control/ETB decks and further oppress Aggro/Voltron decks (This last comment is more of a personal reason).
There used to be rules errata for Commander, back when it was still Elder Dragon Highlander, where your Commander had "protection from Karakas". If the card was as inoffensive as some say it is, then the RC wouldn't have had to institute that kind of errata.
Those for unbanningKarakas
#1) It benefits underplayed and currently played commanders
#2) It has a good amount of answers to it that are not inherently land destruction.
#3) It has fair potential.
Those against unbanningKarakas
#1) It will be used mostly to bounce opponent's creatures and lock them out of the game.
#2) A good amount of answers to it are land destruction.
#3) It makes for annoying gameplay.
Pretty spot on summary imo. I think the #3 point in unbanning and the #1 point of keeping it banned are the same net thing, only looking at the card from different perspectives and executions.
The important thing to keep this a civil conversation here folks is the understanding that neither position is wrong and it's a difference of opinion, not facts.
It primarily benefits commanders who are not cast or their value is on their cast or ETB.
If it hurts anyone, it hurts casual players the most. The banned list does tend to be designed for casual - middle ground play after all.
It has no downsides (enters untapped, provides colored mana)
It creates undesirable gamestates. Keep in mind that Vesuva + Thespian's Stage are also lands in the meta and nothing that Karakas does requires white mana so literally any and everyone could get in on this especially given it seems like a tutor target. I understand that Karakas is legendary but you could copy someone else's for an undesirable gamestate.
MLD is frowned for most metas.
I might be making assumptions but, I feel like you are at the point of playing stax / stasis / combo / MLD tactics if you feel that this card should be unbanned. I think its fine if you want to play competitive and cutthroat magic but I feel like this card is right up with Limited Resources and Balance in my own desire to play against.
Karakas[/card] actually has four purposes:
1) Oppression.
2) Political leverage.
3) (ETB/LTB) effects.
4) Saving your own creatures.
I noticed a large body of talk about being against unbanning Karakas has only really regarded the first point, oppression. It was as if this land read to them:
Karakas Legendary Land (MR) T: Add W to your mana pool. T: Return target legendary creature you don't control to it's owners hand.
Then their would be no discussion if this were the correct version of the land. However? That is not what the land reads and yet that is how it is being treated and viewed by those against its unbanning.
I know a couple other people hit on this, but I clicked quote as soon as I read it. Yes, we feel it should remained banned because it has the potential to be so very oppressive in a way that interacts poorly with the format. The fact that it can do that and a slew of other things makes it even more banworthy, not less. Your hypothetical version is much more fair and less broken than the real thing. That version would be good in some games and near useless in others.
Consider Prophet of Kruphix. I can achieve virtually the same thing with one less color if I combine Winding Canyons and Seedborn Muse, yet neither of those cards is banned. Prophet wasn't banned because it had a never before seen ability - it was banned because it combined multiple powerful abilities into one card and was so broken that the game revolved around it.
Karakas is the same way, only far more extreme. It has five powerful uses (you forgot to list #5 - generates mana), including one that interacts poorly with the format, without costing an actual card slot (it takes the place of a Plains or any other less powerful utility land). Prophet had two uses, required two specific colors and a card slot, and wasn't even run in every UG deck - just the creature heavy ones. Karakas would fit in every deck that ran W, regardless of general or strategy, simply because in every game, it can serve at least 2-3 of its purposes. There is practically zero drawback to running it. Of the 32 color identities available for a Commander deck (5 mono, 10 guild, 10 tri, 5 quad, five color, colorless), half of them run white. That means potentially 50% of all decks in the game could run this card. And aside from price, there's very little reason not to.
I see no reason to unban this card, ever. I would love to see a fixed version. But the original is too powerful. It is too oppressive, too versatile, and would completely devolve the game.
Prophet had two uses, required two specific colors and a card slot, and wasn't even run in every UG deck - just the creature heavy ones.
I don't know what your metagame was like, but every deck I ever saw that could run Prophet did run Prophet. Like Karakas, there's not many reasons not to.
That should be ignored, as it's largely irrelevant. Discussions about whether or not a card belongs in the game can't really take into account hypothetical political situations that may or may not arise in any specific game.
I must have been thinking of a different MTG multiplayer format that was a social game-like experience and how often many cards are brought up on their political usage within a given game. As that format would would more likely view that card with regard in that manner for its political usage.
A wide range of cards can potentially be used politically. That is irrelevant as to whether or not a particular card is somewhat broken in the format, and talking about a specific sort of hypothetical political situation that might occur is particularly irrelevant, since any number of such situations might - or might not - occur.
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The fact that the card is potentially very oppressive and that at the same time it also offers these other benefits is in fact a good example of why it is probably too strong to allow in the format
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Wouldn't the opposite be more true however? That if it was nothing but oppressive that it would be worse for the format?
Not at all. A card which is simply oppressive and which does nothing else is obviously noxious, and while it may or may not be played depending on exactly how oppressive it is, nobody is fooling themselves about what the card does. In contrast, a card which provides its user with lots of advantages and is also very oppressive can be very tempting if a person cares more about gaining advantage than they do about making for miserable games. The other advantages can actually encourage the use of a very oppressive card.
Its important to keep in mind that this is a discussion of the multiplayer banlist, and as such we don't have to worry about the impact of getting your commander bounced every single turn like in a dual. Generally, if that is happening to you, you have a must answer commander. The Karakas player must answer 3+ different commanders in a multiplayer game. Thus, in multiplayer, unless one commander is so clearly the biggest threat, Karakas functions less as a cheap lock and more as a cheap rattlesnake. You don't use Karakas until right before your turn, and your opponents get to keep their commanders until they attack you (or you just bounce the biggest threat or a random commander if nobody attacks you). While less inherently oppressive as it would be in duel, its still potentially very problematic as its a no cost way to have your opponent's kill each other.
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You don't use Karakas until right before your turn, and your opponents get to keep their commanders until they attack you (or you just bounce the biggest threat or a random commander if nobody attacks you). While less inherently oppressive as it would be in duel, its still potentially very problematic as its a no cost way to have your opponent's kill each other.
Not to over simplify but what I just read was, once per turn rotation remove a threat/value generator that costs X mana (Where X is usually greater than 1), for one mana. Not to mention, it is a land (taking only a land drop). This means, you need removal that targets permanents, targeted land destruction, or mass land destruction. It can't be countered (only stifled, once or twice), it isn't swept in traditional sweeps, and it can't be targeted by traditionalremoval. I feel like just because it is multiplayer, doesn't decrease the overall problem enough to be anywhere close to consideration. It's feels like a 0 mana cost Tsabo Tavoc, that takes less mana, generates mana, is harder to remove, is less restrictive in terms of color identity, and has more utility. Tsabo Tavoc is a must answer commander, whereas Karakas is a must answer land except multitudes better.
I acknowledge that Tsabo is not banned, and I am using her as an example of un-fun play rather than an example of abusive play.
It's probably not a great idea in EDH, and I love the idea of the smallest workable banlist.
Also I want to get a copy for my cube and if it gets unbanned in EDH it's going to quadruple in price in an hour.
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I know a couple other people hit on this, but I clicked quote as soon as I read it. Yes, we feel it should remained banned because it has the potential to be so very oppressive in a way that interacts poorly with the format. The fact that it can do that and a slew of other things makes it even more banworthy, not less.
Since when is having fair uses a reason for banning a card? Should we also consider Riptide Laboratory and Crystal Shard for a ban because bouncing your own creatures is just too powerful?
Like, I think Karakas should probably stay banned because people would be likely to use it in a not very good way and bounce someone else's general over and over, which would lead to some awkward problems in the format. But saying that the self-uses of the card are oppressive is wrong.
Even without the intention of being oppressive, human nature will cause players to want full value out of the card. And that means using it every turn cycle, just because there was a target. Even under a "build casually, play competitively" lens, I can't imagine why I wouldn't run it, and once it's in play I would definitely use it to mess with my opponent's tempo whenever there wasn't a better use for it.
Good discussion on this so far. If unbanned, I suspect that it would be ubiquitous, which isn't enough of a factor on its own. I don't know how oppressive it would be, since as many folks have mentioned, it's only good for once per turn cycle without additional shenanigans. The secondary market impact is not a factor for us. I actually think its most broken use might be in comboing with one's own commander for excessive EtB tomfoolery. I might make it our thought exercise for the next meeting, which might happen ahead of schedule, since Scott will be here at the house on Thursday and Toby arrives Friday. We'll have a quorum every time we eat
Good discussion on this so far. If unbanned, I suspect that it would be ubiquitous, which isn't enough of a factor on its own. I don't know how oppressive it would be, since as many folks have mentioned, it's only good for once per turn cycle without additional shenanigans. The secondary market impact is not a factor for us. I actually think its most broken use might be in comboing with one's own commander for excessive EtB tomfoolery. I might make it our thought exercise for the next meeting, which might happen ahead of schedule, since Scott will be here at the house on Thursday and Toby arrives Friday. We'll have a quorum every time we eat
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Good discussion on this so far. If unbanned, I suspect that it would be ubiquitous, which isn't enough of a factor on its own. I don't know how oppressive it would be, since as many folks have mentioned, it's only good for once per turn cycle without additional shenanigans. The secondary market impact is not a factor for us. I actually think its most broken use might be in comboing with one's own commander for excessive EtB tomfoolery. I might make it our thought exercise for the next meeting, which might happen ahead of schedule, since Scott will be here at the house on Thursday and Toby arrives Friday. We'll have a quorum every time we eat
It looks like I am $80.00 invested into currently banned cards for the day (yes I ordered two just in case lol).
Good discussion on this so far. If unbanned, I suspect that it would be ubiquitous, which isn't enough of a factor on its own. I don't know how oppressive it would be, since as many folks have mentioned, it's only good for once per turn cycle without additional shenanigans. The secondary market impact is not a factor for us. I actually think its most broken use might be in comboing with one's own commander for excessive EtB tomfoolery. I might make it our thought exercise for the next meeting, which might happen ahead of schedule, since Scott will be here at the house on Thursday and Toby arrives Friday. We'll have a quorum every time we eat
How problematic do you consider it to be that Karakas could more or less single-handedly shut a voltron deck (other than Uril/Thrun/Sigarda, of course) or other highly commander-centered deck out of the game?
Good discussion on this so far. If unbanned, I suspect that it would be ubiquitous, which isn't enough of a factor on its own. I don't know how oppressive it would be, since as many folks have mentioned, it's only good for once per turn cycle without additional shenanigans. The secondary market impact is not a factor for us. I actually think its most broken use might be in comboing with one's own commander for excessive EtB tomfoolery. I might make it our thought exercise for the next meeting, which might happen ahead of schedule, since Scott will be here at the house on Thursday and Toby arrives Friday. We'll have a quorum every time we eat
Hold up. Didn't you say that the price jump Library would take is something you'd consider if you were thinking about u banning it? I realize that a $40 ubiquitous card getting unbanned is not the same as a $800 ubiquitous cards getting unbanned, but still.
How many good voltron decks don't have shroud/hexproof other than Bruna (who probably becomes shroud/hexproof unless you can respond right now)? I don't think I've ever seen a deck go hard into that strategy without it other than the Isamaru beatdown or Skullbriar deck I saw a couple years ago. It hates on Thromok and Kresh pretty hard, but I haven't seen them really go voltron specifically and they tend to get stupid big like Hamletback Goliath really fast and draw a lot of attention anyway. It hating on voltron a big might actually be a plus point since heavy voltron can really speed up the format when it's really good. I've always tried to keep my volton decks down to a small number of games specifically to not push the speed of the format.
Its important to keep in mind that this is a discussion of the multiplayer banlist, and as such we don't have to worry about the impact of getting your commander bounced every single turn like in a dual. Generally, if that is happening to you, you have a must answer commander. The Karakas player must answer 3+ different commanders in a multiplayer game. Thus, in multiplayer, unless one commander is so clearly the biggest threat, Karakas functions less as a cheap lock and more as a cheap rattlesnake. You don't use Karakas until right before your turn, and your opponents get to keep their commanders until they attack you (or you just bounce the biggest threat or a random commander if nobody attacks you). While less inherently oppressive as it would be in duel, its still potentially very problematic as its a no cost way to have your opponent's kill each other.
You're assuming that all of my opponents' commanders must be either equal or one is a must-answer. In my experience, though, if I have three opponents, one may have an ETB (not going to bounce that), one either doesn't have their commander in play or it's one that doesn't affect me/does its own thing but I don't care/is a must-answer but has hexproof, and one is a threat but hardly a "must-answer" situation. However, the mere fact that I have a Karakas, with such a low opportunity cost, means I might as well bounce the third guy's commander every turn before I untap, if for nothing else than to slow them down. Yes, it's a choice, and I can choose not to, but I'd be willing to bet a large percentage of players would do just that.
I know a couple other people hit on this, but I clicked quote as soon as I read it. Yes, we feel it should remained banned because it has the potential to be so very oppressive in a way that interacts poorly with the format. The fact that it can do that and a slew of other things makes it even more banworthy, not less.
Since when is having fair uses a reason for banning a card? Should we also consider Riptide Laboratory and Crystal Shard for a ban because bouncing your own creatures is just too powerful?
Like, I think Karakas should probably stay banned because people would be likely to use it in a not very good way and bounce someone else's general over and over, which would lead to some awkward problems in the format. But saying that the self-uses of the card are oppressive is wrong.
When did I say anything about fair use or self uses being the reason to ban it? I quoted and was responding to a comment that we keep complaining about just the oppressive anti-commander use when it has even more. I say if just that one aspect is so bad that we think it's banworthy, adding additional utility is not a favorable argument. I never said it should be banned because it can be used fairly. I stand by the statement that it should be banned on the one oppressive use alone because of how poorly it interacts with the format.
How many good voltron decks don't have shroud/hexproof other than Bruna (who probably becomes shroud/hexproof unless you can respond right now)? I don't think I've ever seen a deck go hard into that strategy without it other than the Isamaru beatdown or Skullbriar deck I saw a couple years ago.
How "good" something is will of course depend how you define that, but generals like Godo, Daxos I, Rafiq or Sram can be good voltron generals without having hexproof of their own, depending on getting it through other sources. Some other generals, like Ruhan, more or less depend on the voltron route to be effective at all. Karakas single-handedly removes that strategy from consideration unless one is going with innately hexproof generals like the ones I already mentioned, or Geist of St. Traft. Seems pretty limiting to me, especially since voltron is already a pretty limited strategy.
Similarly, Karakas would effectively neuter a lot of generals that need to be on the board for a bit to do anything. Hanna, Ertai (either version), Sisay.... really anything that has a tap effect and doesn't have built-in haste is rendered effectively non-viable by adding Karakas to the mix.
Good discussion on this so far. If unbanned, I suspect that it would be ubiquitous, which isn't enough of a factor on its own. I don't know how oppressive it would be, since as many folks have mentioned, it's only good for once per turn cycle without additional shenanigans. The secondary market impact is not a factor for us. I actually think its most broken use might be in comboing with one's own commander for excessive EtB tomfoolery. I might make it our thought exercise for the next meeting, which might happen ahead of schedule, since Scott will be here at the house on Thursday and Toby arrives Friday. We'll have a quorum every time we eat
Hold up. Didn't you say that the price jump Library would take is something you'd consider if you were thinking about u banning it? I realize that a $40 ubiquitous card getting unbanned is not the same as a $800 ubiquitous cards getting unbanned, but still.
Not as far as I recall, and least not in recent years. We have to be aware what potential bannings/unbannings would do to a card on the secondary market, but using the market as a decision criterion is setting ourselves up for a world of hurt.
Understood. I am a big advocate for playing white though so assuming it would ever be unbanned.... I would probably need like 3-4 of them. I also own a few other banned cards with a "just in case" standing on them.
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Not as far as I recall, and least not in recent years. We have to be aware what potential bannings/unbannings would do to a card on the secondary market, but using the market as a decision criterion is setting ourselves up for a world of hurt.
Yeah, I know you don't think about how banning/unbanning a card will impact the price of card for the most part, but I swear I remember when we discussed LoA you said that because of the extreme price it's at now and how it would likely double at least, that it was something you would take into consideration.
I don't suggest that you worry yourselves with price of a card since that has never been a criteria for banning a card, but given the expected ubiquity of Karakas and the relative price now compared to if it were to be suddenly unbanned, I would think that the associated "feel bad" for anyone who didn't already have a copy for Legacy/cube/collecting would be left high and dry for missing the boat should be something to consider.
This is a format that is defined by having access to your legendary creature. It encourages you to build a deck around it, because you are more or less guaranteed acces to it. In decks that can run it, Karakas would be an even bigger auto-include than Sol Ring and Mana Crypt together. In my meta, every multiplayergame at least one player plays a deck with white so it would be present in every single game. I know it can help some commanders to be more efficient, but it would basically invalidate any commander with CMC 5 or more without an ETB effect. At least that is what it would do in my meta, your meta may vary.
Let wizards print a Ruins of Karakas card that can be used only on a creature you control. That would be a powerful but fine card to have. But Karakas? No. It's the biggest anti-spirit-of -EDH card I can think of.
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Come on. Lets be realistic here. Karakas is broken in half, even when you try and play it fairly.
With Karakas on the battlefield, your normal X + 1 hand becomes a X - Y hand (X is your normal hand, Y is the amount of legendaries in your hand, 1 is your commander). Some legendaries do invoke value on cast or ETB, but we shouldn't measure balance based off of this notion. Roughly 10 out of 166 Legendaries that include white would benefit from Karakas (This does not include all legendaries, just legendaries with white as a mana cost. The 10 that were decided were chosen based off of ETB effects, cast effects, tutor abilities). This is a subset of the entirety of legendary choices but outlines a major point, that 1/17 legendaries benefit from Karakas, which means roughly 16/17 are entirely negated. Lets assume, that Hexproof/shroud is more common and built into commanders and say my numbers are off, even by 2/17. That means 14/17 Commanders using these numbers are invalidated. Not to mention that not all of these legendaries are playable before Karakas anyway. The kicker to all of this, is that it only costs you a single land each turn rotation, to completely negate another players legendary creature which usually costs far more than a single land.
Playing Karakas makes it impossible to play your commander (or many other niche legendaries) into the battlefield for these reasons. It would give a lot more power to Control/ETB decks and further oppress Aggro/Voltron decks (This last comment is more of a personal reason).
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Consider Prophet of Kruphix. I can achieve virtually the same thing with one less color if I combine Winding Canyons and Seedborn Muse, yet neither of those cards is banned. Prophet wasn't banned because it had a never before seen ability - it was banned because it combined multiple powerful abilities into one card and was so broken that the game revolved around it.
Karakas is the same way, only far more extreme. It has five powerful uses (you forgot to list #5 - generates mana), including one that interacts poorly with the format, without costing an actual card slot (it takes the place of a Plains or any other less powerful utility land). Prophet had two uses, required two specific colors and a card slot, and wasn't even run in every UG deck - just the creature heavy ones. Karakas would fit in every deck that ran W, regardless of general or strategy, simply because in every game, it can serve at least 2-3 of its purposes. There is practically zero drawback to running it. Of the 32 color identities available for a Commander deck (5 mono, 10 guild, 10 tri, 5 quad, five color, colorless), half of them run white. That means potentially 50% of all decks in the game could run this card. And aside from price, there's very little reason not to.
I see no reason to unban this card, ever. I would love to see a fixed version. But the original is too powerful. It is too oppressive, too versatile, and would completely devolve the game.
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I don't know what your metagame was like, but every deck I ever saw that could run Prophet did run Prophet. Like Karakas, there's not many reasons not to.
A wide range of cards can potentially be used politically. That is irrelevant as to whether or not a particular card is somewhat broken in the format, and talking about a specific sort of hypothetical political situation that might occur is particularly irrelevant, since any number of such situations might - or might not - occur.
Not at all. A card which is simply oppressive and which does nothing else is obviously noxious, and while it may or may not be played depending on exactly how oppressive it is, nobody is fooling themselves about what the card does. In contrast, a card which provides its user with lots of advantages and is also very oppressive can be very tempting if a person cares more about gaining advantage than they do about making for miserable games. The other advantages can actually encourage the use of a very oppressive card.
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Not to over simplify but what I just read was, once per turn rotation remove a threat/value generator that costs X mana (Where X is usually greater than 1), for one mana. Not to mention, it is a land (taking only a land drop). This means, you need removal that targets permanents, targeted land destruction, or mass land destruction. It can't be countered (only stifled, once or twice), it isn't swept in traditional sweeps, and it can't be targeted by traditional removal. I feel like just because it is multiplayer, doesn't decrease the overall problem enough to be anywhere close to consideration. It's feels like a 0 mana cost Tsabo Tavoc, that takes less mana, generates mana, is harder to remove, is less restrictive in terms of color identity, and has more utility. Tsabo Tavoc is a must answer commander, whereas Karakas is a must answer land except multitudes better.
I acknowledge that Tsabo is not banned, and I am using her as an example of un-fun play rather than an example of abusive play.
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Since when is having fair uses a reason for banning a card? Should we also consider Riptide Laboratory and Crystal Shard for a ban because bouncing your own creatures is just too powerful?
Like, I think Karakas should probably stay banned because people would be likely to use it in a not very good way and bounce someone else's general over and over, which would lead to some awkward problems in the format. But saying that the self-uses of the card are oppressive is wrong.
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How problematic do you consider it to be that Karakas could more or less single-handedly shut a voltron deck (other than Uril/Thrun/Sigarda, of course) or other highly commander-centered deck out of the game?
Hold up. Didn't you say that the price jump Library would take is something you'd consider if you were thinking about u banning it? I realize that a $40 ubiquitous card getting unbanned is not the same as a $800 ubiquitous cards getting unbanned, but still.
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When did I say anything about fair use or self uses being the reason to ban it? I quoted and was responding to a comment that we keep complaining about just the oppressive anti-commander use when it has even more. I say if just that one aspect is so bad that we think it's banworthy, adding additional utility is not a favorable argument. I never said it should be banned because it can be used fairly. I stand by the statement that it should be banned on the one oppressive use alone because of how poorly it interacts with the format.
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How "good" something is will of course depend how you define that, but generals like Godo, Daxos I, Rafiq or Sram can be good voltron generals without having hexproof of their own, depending on getting it through other sources. Some other generals, like Ruhan, more or less depend on the voltron route to be effective at all. Karakas single-handedly removes that strategy from consideration unless one is going with innately hexproof generals like the ones I already mentioned, or Geist of St. Traft. Seems pretty limiting to me, especially since voltron is already a pretty limited strategy.
Similarly, Karakas would effectively neuter a lot of generals that need to be on the board for a bit to do anything. Hanna, Ertai (either version), Sisay.... really anything that has a tap effect and doesn't have built-in haste is rendered effectively non-viable by adding Karakas to the mix.
Not as far as I recall, and least not in recent years. We have to be aware what potential bannings/unbannings would do to a card on the secondary market, but using the market as a decision criterion is setting ourselves up for a world of hurt.
Understood. I am a big advocate for playing white though so assuming it would ever be unbanned.... I would probably need like 3-4 of them. I also own a few other banned cards with a "just in case" standing on them.
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Yeah, I know you don't think about how banning/unbanning a card will impact the price of card for the most part, but I swear I remember when we discussed LoA you said that because of the extreme price it's at now and how it would likely double at least, that it was something you would take into consideration.
I don't suggest that you worry yourselves with price of a card since that has never been a criteria for banning a card, but given the expected ubiquity of Karakas and the relative price now compared to if it were to be suddenly unbanned, I would think that the associated "feel bad" for anyone who didn't already have a copy for Legacy/cube/collecting would be left high and dry for missing the boat should be something to consider.
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This is a format that is defined by having access to your legendary creature. It encourages you to build a deck around it, because you are more or less guaranteed acces to it. In decks that can run it, Karakas would be an even bigger auto-include than Sol Ring and Mana Crypt together. In my meta, every multiplayergame at least one player plays a deck with white so it would be present in every single game. I know it can help some commanders to be more efficient, but it would basically invalidate any commander with CMC 5 or more without an ETB effect. At least that is what it would do in my meta, your meta may vary.
Let wizards print a Ruins of Karakas card that can be used only on a creature you control. That would be a powerful but fine card to have. But Karakas? No. It's the biggest anti-spirit-of -EDH card I can think of.
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