I was joking about eggs kinda like how people want dredge banned out of existence. Your list unbans problematic lands and bans cards that deal with them. You go on to basically ban infect as a deck too and then I stopped reading after just looking at the bans.
Many people seem to think the Artifact Lands are problematic, but they rarely want to expound upon that. They just take it as a given, as gospel. It makes me really wonder if any of them have actually played with them in a wide format before!
I actually addressed that point - in what way are Artifact Lands "problematic" in the current Modern? There are two specific decks that could seriously abuse them - Affinity and KCI Eggs. I don't think Modern "Robots" as it stands now would really gain much benefit from the lands, even losing Inkmoth - they'd just replace the Inkmoths with Great Furnace, and Ravager and Plating get a tiny boost, while they lose their ability to Infect someone out with the manland. Oh, and they'd have the opportunity to replace Memnite with Frogmite, but I doubt they would - it would weaken Springleaf Drum openings. It would be far from a huge change!
KCI is another deal, and one which I addressed in the "cards to watch" section. I actually tried to make the deck work in a "No Ban Modern" setting, and it really wasn't as effective as you'd think - it gains around half a turn over current eggs builds, at the expense of having a bigger weakness to artifact removal (getting a land blown up).
So again I ask, what about the Artifact Lands is really so "problematic", as you put it? They do, after all, have an inherent drawback.
As far as banning Stony Silence, I'm not going to repeat myself - basically, I don't feel that the card is very healthy, because it isn't an "answer", but a "punishment". It isn't interactive, and in any case, the Artifact Lands biggest weakness is vulnerability to destruction, something that non-static-enchantment cards do fine. Getting your T1 land drop Nature's Claimed isn't exactly going to lead to a successful game!
Also, how did I "basically ban Infect as a deck"? I want to make it less consistent and more vulnerable, not ban it out of existence. Inkmoth is their "catch-all" card, the one that pushes the deck from a risky all-in strategy into "near-OP" territory. Become Immense is problematic for other decks, as well. Taking those two away would injure the deck, but it would far from ban it out of the format - it would still be a viable strategy! If you wanted to ban the deck, you'd ban Glistener Elf and/or Blighted Agent. Banning Inkmoth just means they have to run more infect creatures (Ichorclaw Myr being the most likely candidate), reducing their consistency further. It drops the deck down to a reasonable power level, that is all. It basically becomes comparable (still better than, but more similar) to the current Prowess/Kiln Fiend + pump spells deck, which is far from broken.
You don't think affinity being able to focus on more colored sources would matter? Infect would not survive not having inkmoth.
Not really, because it isn't for "free". There is a tradeoff - with my list, they'd lose one "combo kill" (losing Inkmoth Nexus), but potentially gain another (Disciple of the Vault). The thing is, they just don't have that much room - they'd effectively go from ~12 sources of colored mana (all of any color) to ~14-18 (4-8 of single colors), which isn't really much of a change at all. So they can cast Master of Etherium (which has gone out of favor in any case) and Galvanic Blasta little more consistently. Big deal. They can't infect you out anymore. Don't get me wrong, it is a change, but on the whole I think it is a wash - they are trading one set of advantages for another.
The thing is, I actually played affinity back in Old Extended, and Standard, and Block, back in the day. I remember the deck at its most broken - the Skullclamp days (a card you'll note I didn't even bother with explaining why I wouldn't unban). I've played it in Modern, and current Legacy versions. The Artifact Lands are good in it, and they do add a little bit of color consistency, but they also aren't really that OP in the deck. They are good. They are also an occasional liability (Ancient Grudge your land on the draw).
Ever since the printing of Springleaf Drum, color consistency hasn't been a huge issue for Artifact Aggro decks (I'm including Tempered Steel variations in this category), and Mox Opal made it even less of an issue. If Inkmoth wasn't banned, I don't think they'd even run more than 4-6 of them in current builds, replacing the Darksteel Citadels with Furnace or Seat for that little bit of extra consistency. It wouldn't speed the deck up, or even make it appreciably more powerful. It would make it better, but marginally so!
I didn't come up with that list lightly. There are a lot of moving pieces involved - for instance, banning Stony Silence to make the Artifact Lands playable in decks other than Affinity/KCI, banning Blood Moon so that Affinity can't abuse it like they used to (the Artifact is a supertype thing), unbanning Chrome Mox and SFM to give tempo/control decks a bit of a boost, and so on. The changes work together to make more decks viable, and to make the obvious decks (Affinity, Dredge, and Infect chief among them) easier to combat through careful strategy rather than single-card-reliance. Is it perfect? No. I just feel that it would be better than the current format, where super-hyper-uber-linear decks are by far the most capable, and where certain sideboard cards negate entire classes of strategies!
Infect would not survive in the current format, in its current incarnation, at its current power level without Inkmoth. I agree. So what. It isn't exactly an interesting deck. If you wanted to play it, you still could, and it would still work - it just wouldn't be "one of the most powerful things" anymore. It would be relegated to what it really is - an all-in strategy with high risk-reward - rather than to what it has become - one of the banes of an interactive format. Do you really LIKE what Infect is right now? It is basically old-school Stompy, but with a permanent Berserk on every creature and a manland to back it up. It is not a "skill testing" deck or strategy. It isn't interactive. Is that a good thing for format health?
Because they want a diverse format without over powered decks that dominate the only deck I didn't see for for banning was twin everything else was op
Twin wasn't banned because it was too powerful, it was banned because it was the best thingUR could do, and would always be. There is nothing inherently wrong with Twin. The problem is that you simply won't see any other UR decks as long as it is around. It was banned for diversity, and it worked!
Bans aren't just for power. They are also for format health. Twin is unhealthy, like it or not, just as Pod was, just as Green Sun's Zenith would be, just as Deathrite was, just as Bloodbraid was. Those cards aren't banned for "brokenness". They are banned because they aggressively eliminate competition by being just a bit better than anything else those colors could do. The format is better without them, because you can play other things now!
I was joking about eggs kinda like how people want dredge banned out of existence. Your list unbans problematic lands and bans cards that deal with them. You go on to basically ban infect as a deck too and then I stopped reading after just looking at the bans. Then your watch list has ssg and mox opal after unbanning chrome mox like huh? The linear decks will still be there you just swapped them. Ban sideboard cards like rip, stony, and bloodmoon? Really?? Why shouldn't people be able to punish others for greedy builds? Affinity currently would love these changes (EDIT: except they lose inkmoth)! Now they can get colored mana with less cost to the build and not worry about stony??? I don't know most of it even with your explaining makes no sense to me.
Unpacking, a bit at a time, now that you've gone back and added things:
SSG and Opal are on the watchlist because they serve different functions than Chrome Mox. They act differently, and go in different decks. Not all fast mana cards are made equal! I feel I must ask if you've ever actually played in a format with those cards, because it seems clear to me that you don't understand how they actually work in real formats. Chrome Mox simply isn't a combo card, at least not in formats lacking draw 7's. Combo decks struggle for card advantage, and Chrome Mox is more disadvantage than SSG. Chrome Mox is a midrange/tempo/control card, allowing them to "catch up" (gain tempo) with proactive decks at the cost of card advantage. There are of course exceptions (Belcher in Legacy is the most obvious), but they are rare and usually require some form of extreme draw effect that doesn't exist in Modern. All-in-Red, for instance, is the archetypical "Chrome Mox Deck". It was a control/tempo deck. Chrome Mox can enable degenerate things with cards like KCI, true, but I don't think that is nearly as big of a risk as you seem to - most likely because I've actually played with the cards before. SSG is risky because it is both instant speed and because it gives a potential "critical mass" of fast mana that could enable something like Belcher. I think Chrome Mox is a more interesting, more diverse card, and if the combination of SSG and Chrome Mox is too much, I'd rather see the Ape go!
Bloood Moon, Stony Silence, and Rest In Peace don't "punish greedy decks". They define what the qualities of what a potentially successful deck can be. They also don't do a very good job of policing linear decks that use the cards they are targeting - Blood Moon doesn't auto-beat Tron, Stony Silence doesn't auto-beat Affinity, RiP doesn't auto-beat Dredge - because those decks can get under them. They limit artifact and graveyard decks to aggressive ones, because those are the ones that can win through the hate. They reduce diversity while not actually being all that effective at stopping the things they are nominally supposed to stop. They are also far from the only options to police, and by far the least interactive options. They don't "police" the format, they define it. That isn't a good thing, in my mind!
I've already gone into why Affinity wouldn't benefit nearly as much as you seem to think, above. There was Affinity hate before Stony Silence, and there are plenty of ways to combat it now even banning it. All banning SS does is allow non-Affinity artifact decks a chance to compete, because they don't have to risk an auto-loss to a card that isn't even that amazing against the deck people keep it in their sideboard to hate!
I think my explaining isn't making sense because you are trying to look at each change in a vacuum, to look at it from the point of view of what things are currently like, not to what they would be with the changes. For instance, Faeries is not a good deck right now, because it is half a turn too slow to really compete with Infect (basically gone) and Affinity (largely the same), but Chrome Mox (especially combined with Ancestral Visions) could easily change that. It would have a very good game against Affinity, just as it always has. URX Control would gain both a good card advantage spell (Thirst for Knowledge + Artifact Lands + Chrome Mox) and a solid finisher (Jace), and it has always had a lot of tools against Affinity (Electrolyze). KCI would become a real deck. Ad Nauseum would gain consistency and perhaps a bit of speed (around .25 turns). Tron would gain meta share, just because Blood Moon wouldn't be a risk, which would counter the Fae/UX rise, seeing that it naturally preys on those decks. Dredge would have to reconfigure, but would probably stick around in some form. CoCo wouldn't have to risk RiP anymore, but otherwise stays the same - but has trouble with U control, again. WX Stoneforge decks would be a wildcard. And so on.
My changes would be a tectonic shift in the format, but one that would favor the kinds of decks that modern has never really seen successful yet. It would slow the format down considerably, but also open it up to a number of strategies that are currently suppressed by the dominance of super-linear decks and overpowered hate cards.
I don't have time to write books on my phone with my 3yo so yeah I finished my post when I could. Your first paragraph there states mox is card disadvantage for control/midrange/tempo. I tend to stay away from card disadvantage in those builds but to each their own. How it's used in legacy matters none as the other cards legal in that format aren't legal in modern. My point is you say unban this but then watch this and this because we unbanned this to enable these other cards needing bans. You're just changing things on list not making things better. Maybe we ban 2 full blocks and rotate them every year for diversity too, or we could look at what we currently have and just try to open it up.
I've been on Skred the last two fnm's for modern and you can't tell me blood moon doesn't punish people for greedy mana bases and I'm not even talking Tron. I'm crushing jund, jeskia, eldrazi... I see no reason why one shouldn't be able to play moon in modern when when people are on 3-4 color mana bases and counting on fetches/shocks. You want to change up the format ban fetches and see where you're really at.
I don't have time to write books on my phone with my 3yo so yeah I finished my post when I could. Your first paragraph there states mox is card disadvantage for control/midrange/tempo. I tend to stay away from card disadvantage in those builds but to each their own. How it's used in legacy matters none as the other cards legal in that format aren't legal in modern. My point is you say unban this but then watch this and this because we unbanned this to enable these other cards needing bans. You're just changing things on list not making things better. Maybe we ban 2 full blocks and rotate them every year for diversity too, or we could look at what we currently have and just try to open it up.
Sorry if my attention to detail and attempt at clarification irks you. I write on a computer, not a phone, in any case, and will fully admit that I can ramble on a bit on occasion...
In any case, the card disadvantage aspect of Chrome Mox in control/midrange/tempo has to be offset. It requires a certain way of building the deck to accommodate the CA loss. The best example of this is probably the old Dark-Depths-Thopter deck - it ran Dark Confidant to make up for the CA loss. Chrome Mox is a "tradeoff" card, trading CA for tempo, which makes it quite different to SSG and Mox Opal - they are purely tempo cards, with no inherent disadvantage other than their transience and deck building limitations. That is why I think it is interesting!
The decks I see it being most successful in (other than Ad Naus, where it is replacing a lesser version of a similar effect) are ones that run Ancestral Vision. The two cards play off nicely against each other - AV trades tempo for CA, and CM does the opposite. Also, additional AV's are perfect to imprint on the Mox. That's how it was used in Old Extended, which was basically Modern through Alara, and it was not widely played in any case until DDT destroyed that format. I get that it is hard to see how the card works if you have never played with it before - it looks much stronger than it actually is - but the sort of CA/Tempo/Deck-building tradeoffs it encourages are exactly what is needed to widen Modern from the "mutual goldfishing" format it has become.
Oh, and All-in-Red is another reason to get rid of Blood Moon if you are to introduce Chrome Mox. That was a control deck that depended entirely on the disruptive power of Blood Moon to make up for its complete lack card advantage. Seeing T1 Blood Moon off Chrome Mox and SSG is not something anyone really wants. I'd rather see Chrome Mox in the format than Blood Moon, because it allows for lots of interesting things, but I'm sure there are some who'd disagree.
As far as having to swap one ban for another, that isn't actually a problem. There is a definite goal to it - it isn't that I'm just "shuffling things around to get to the same place", it is that I'm trying to move the format towards one where there is room for both linear, proactive strategies and nonlinear, reactive ones. Most of the cards on the "watch" list will not be problems, but the ones that are - if any - are more damaging to the format than the unbans. Artifact Lands, for instance, fit into many decks and lead to interesting deck-building tradeoffs, as does Chrome Mox, while KCI, SSG, Cranial Plating, and their ilk really only fit into singular decks with a super-linear method of operation. I'd prefer to see the "WIDE" cards unbanned and the "NARROW" ones banned, if it comes to that - but honestly, I don't really think it would come to that. Encouraging and supporting control and midrange strategies naturally fights linear ones, limiting the damage they can do. Right now, those types of decks don't have the tools to keep up with the linear decks. I believe my changes could improve that situation.
As far as your last suggestion, that was a format that existed. It was called Extended. I've referenced it numerous times. They killed it, twice - once by moving it to a "double standard" format, then again by introducing Modern. It isn't coming back. Modern is now, and will remain, a non-rotating format. So we have to look at it now and try to open it up - which is what my changes would do, or at least so I'm arguing. Bans open up formats just as well as unbans (Twin proved that, albeit with the Eldrazi hiccup), but they sometimes require tradeoffs.
I guess the real question is: "What is your definition of opening the format up?" What would you, KTROJAN, change to move the format away from the "linear decks passing in the night" nonsense it is right now?
I've been on Skred the last two fnm's for modern and you can't tell me blood moon doesn't punish people for greedy mana bases and I'm not even talking Tron. I'm crushing jund, jeskia, eldrazi... I see no reason why one shouldn't be able to play moon in modern when when people are on 3-4 color mana bases and counting on fetches/shocks. You want to change up the format ban fetches and see where you're really at.
See, that is basically the same deck as old All-In-Red, at least in strategy. You seem to be laboring under the misapprehension that you are "policing the format" by "punishing them greedy manabases" (by which I take it you mean expensive). You aren't. You are playing a high-risk "bully" deck that leans on ONE CARD for its entire ability to interact with the majority of opponents. You are playing, in essence, a combo deck with a single-card combo. If you take Blood Moon out of Skred Red, the deck ceases to exist. It is a boring deck!
If it were easy to maindeck cards to deal with Blood Moon, that would be another thing, but it is an ENCHANTMENT. It makes all mana RED. Which means that it makes all non-basic mana unable to deal with it. It inherently limits its own options to counterplay. The card was designed in 1995! It is from THE DARK! There is a good reason they don't make cards like it anymore - they aren't good cards for diversity. It comes down, and you get to play as though you were mana screwed the rest of the game. So your choice is either play a deck that doesn't fold to Blood Moon - inherently weakening your deck against all non-BM decks - or to hope you drew your instant-speed way to remove it in time...
Decks like Skred Red exist at odds with the nature of the format as a whole. They are inherently unhealthy, because they aim to stop their opponent from playing not through skill, but through spite. I do see why some people find that attractive, but really, can you honestly say that you were playing the same game as your opponents when you played that deck? If not, then there's your answer about Blood Moon. It is either too powerful, or it does nothing, and by its very existence it allows for a degenerate type of play. Kinda like Dredge, but without the potential interactions and inherent limitations of being creature-based.
As far as banning fetches go, that isn't going to happen, and it would actually only make the Blood Moon situation worse. A format with Blood Moon and without a reliable way to get basics into play would be a nightmare! If you banned fetches AND Blood Moon, it could be interesting, but in the end I don't think you'd really see much of a difference - you'd see a fair amount more of Mana Confluence, and you'd see fewer single-card splashes, and you'd see far less basics in general (just Path to Exile and Ghost Quarter fodder), but the mana would be very similar. Well, and Burn would take a hit, with everyone starting on 16 rather than 14!
Twin wasn't banned because it was too powerful, it was banned because it was the best thingUR could do, and would always be. There is nothing inherently wrong with Twin. The problem is that you simply won't see any other UR decks as long as it is around. It was banned for diversity, and it worked!
This is true! Instead of several variants of a good deck and an additional collection of competent and competitive decks, we have a whole bunch of bad decks and a handful of OK decks!
Pia's revolution, a new card that says "when an artifact you control is but into the graveyard from the battlefield you may return it to your hand unless an opponents pays three damage" is going to be banned for time reasons. And also it will be fun to watch a modern deck get infinite mana as two stubborn players refuse to stop cycling through the same two mox opals.
good point. It doesn't even have the "you control" but yeah I never realized how broke that is.
So Krark-Clan Ironworks + Pia's Revolution + any 0 mana artifact = either infinite mana or infinite damage? Fun! Not really broken or banworthy though. Someone will eventually draw Emrakul and win or something.
Affinity already runs mox opals. and would welcome a card like this that lets them redump their hand after a board wipe. If I'm an affinity player having these cards means I can always force the following choice: pay three life or the game ends in a draw. It's the kind of interaction that ruins a tournament. Players shouldn't have to decide if they are enough ahead to take 3 damage for the right to keep playing.
My idea of what the Banned List should be is a bit different than what I feel most think it should be. I don't think it should exist merely to "police the brokenness", or to reign in overpowered interactions, or to limit the power level of the format. Instead, I think it should exist to foster a fun, interactive, and most importantly WIDE deck building environment, where a lot of different strategies can exist. That means it shouldn't just keep all the overpowered combos out, merely the ones that are hard to interact with. It shouldn't get rid of all fast mana, merely the fast mana that directly leads to degenerate strategies.
On that note, I also feel that it should also contain cards which directly counter entire strategies in an non-interactive way. That will become clear below, in my explanations for my bans. In addition, I feel that powerful cards which may enable some degenerate strategies, but are otherwise interesting from a deckbuilding and interaction point of view, should be kept off the list if at all possible.
Enough of that, here is my list - hopefully my meaning becomes clearer through it. I've hidden them behind Spoiler tags, because I'm afraid it went a bit long. I'm quite sure I am going to receive a lot of flack for these opinions, but thats how such things go - I actually hope to hear some of the disagreements, as I'm sure I've missed some interactions...
Artifact Lands: I know, I know, it seems crazy - but really, think about the decks that would really play them!!! I don't know how many of you remember the old Extended, prior to the advent of "Super-Standard-Extended" and well before Modern. In a lot of ways it was not too dissimilar to what Modern is now, albeit with around a decade's less worth of cards. The artifact lands were legal in it, and Affinity (which was really AFFINITY still) was a very good, albeit risky, deck in that format. That was before Vault Skirge, and Steel Overseer, and Signal Pest, so the deck was essentially still a Mirrodin Block Constructed deck with Master of Etherium thrown in. The point is that it was just about the same power level as it is now, probably weaker - the Artifact Lands aren't a problem because of Affinity!
Do you know what decks really benefitted from them? Control/midrange decks that could run Thirst for Knowledege. What is the single biggest problem with U-based control in Modern right now? No, it isn't Counterspell, or the lack thereof. It is the poor state of instant-speed card advantage and selection effects. The legalizing of Seat of the Synod would do a lot to alleviate that problem!
There is also the neat deckbuilding counterplay that the non-Darksteel Citadel Artifact Lands bring to a format - namely their weakness to spot artifact removal, notably Ancient Grudge. There is a definite drawback to having lands that can be blown up by common sideboard cards! On that note, I don't think the interaction with Mox Opal is nearly as strong as it first appears - any deck interested in running Opal already runs Citadel, and the artifact lands don't really allow for much quicker starts, merely more consistent ones. Opal's drawback is real, as well - something that brings me to the next card...
Chrome Mox: Also going back to that Extended format, does anyone recall the decks that actually played it? It wasn't the degenerate combo decks! It was mostly control/midrange decks (TFK again), All In Red (to speed in Blood Moon, a card I'll get back to in a sec), and various other decks that needed a tempo boost. The Imprint cost is real, and a big limiter to the overall power level of the card. The only "broken" deck I can think of that really jammed 4 Chrome Mox was DDT (Dark Depths / Thopter-Sword), and the only reason they did was to enable a T1 Dark Confidant! That deck was broken for reasons other than the Mox...
Basically, the card is unquestionably powerful, but in actual deckbuilding it has real drawbacks. Think about it in the current Ad Nauseum deck, for instance - it would certainly go in the deck, but it would not speed it up (run some realistic hands)! It would likely just displace the Lotus Blooms, adding a little bit of consistency while also leaving them even more vulnerable to Artifact/Enchantment removal than they already are.
What decks would really play the card? Likely the same midrange/control decks that are interested in the Artifact Lands. Faeries, for instance, would play it to power out T1 Bitterblossom - hardly a backbreaking play, and it would leave them very vulnerable to Abrupt Decay, for instance. It would make that deck much better, but with a drawback - that deck, and those like it, would be able to compete much more readily with the higher-tempo aggro decks in the format, but at the cost of both card advantage and post-board consistency. In other words, it enables more interesting strategies.
Stoneforge Mystic: I'm not going to go on about it, but T3 Batterskull seems fine to me. It has all the vulnerabilities that strategy has in Legacy, without the advantage of Force of Will to protect it. Kolaghan's Command is a card in the format, and will continue to be, after all! My only worry is that it becomes the "default U strategy", stymieing deck construction by being the most powerful midrange/tempo thing to do. That is a real concern, but it is worth unbanning just to see how it shakes out in an actual metagame.
Jace, the Mind Sculptor: The only argument I can think of for keeping this card banned is that it becomes the default U finisher. The only real interactive challenge to that is that it is a "tap-out" card, by nature, and most U decks are loath to tap out and lose their counter-war advantage. That may be enough reason to keep it on the list, but personally I'd like to see how it plays out, just like SFM, before jumping to conclusions. After all, JtMS has a lot of similarities to Bitterblossom in actual play - it is a recurring card advantage engine that requires a reactive deck to tap out to utilize. Bitterblossom isn't unsuccessful in Modern because it isn't powerful enough, but because the best strategy for it can't really afford the tempo loss of playing it - and Jace presents a similar conundrum, albeit one that is both more expensive and more powerful.
Become Immense: I just see this card becoming more and more degenerate as time goes on. I don't think that Infect is the real reason to get rid of it - the next card on the list is what I would ban out of that particular deck - but instead the various "pump to kill super-fast" strategies, most notably Death's Shadow Zoo. The card does too much for too little, and enables too many games that aren't really interactive at all. I feel it should go, just to make building such decks more interesting than currently. The various other pump spells all have their own advantages and disadvantages, and having any "auto-include" tends to dilute the impact of choosing the remaining ones. Once you also consider that it is the only card in those decks that really allows for non-magical-christmas-land T3 kills, it really should go.
Inkmoth Nexus: I don't personally feel this card is overpowered, per se, but instead that it gives certain aggressive strategies an unfair advantage over reactive ones. Both Artifact Aggro and Infect would be injured by its loss, but hardly "banned out of the format". Right now this manland acts as a "catch-all backup plan" for both decks, giving them a consistency and resiliency that undermines interactivity. If the format is to be WIDER something has to be done to knock those two down a peg, and Inkmoth is the card that they share. It is an insidious little beast, and a very interesting card that I'll be sad to see gone, but I really do believe that it is the key enabler of the two most prominent "OP" linear strategies right now. Removing it would give more opportunity to interact with those decks, and that is all that is needed to stifle their dominance.
Prized Amalgam: For all the talk about Bloodghast and the dredge mechanic cards in this thread, this is IMHO the real reason for Dredge's meteoric rise. Compare the card to Vengevine, a card that used to be the paragon of free graveyard value - in order to effectively use Vengy, you have to actually cast creature spells. In order to recur Amalgam, you have to, what, play lands? The closest comparison is to Ichorid, which is really the only other truly "free from graveyard" creature with an appreciable attack stat ever printed. I want dredge to be in the format, as I find it an interesting strategy to combat, but the UB Zombie is always going to be a problem, because it has no drawbacks!
With Prized Amalgam, Inkmoth Nexus, and Become Immense gone, the most powerful linear decks in the format would be knocked way down in power level, but importantly also all still be playable. IMHO, it is important not to just ban whole strategies out of a format - which brings me to my next set of bans, which are all on this list because they effectively do just that...
Blood Moon: Here is the big one, to me, and I'm sure a lot of people will disagree with me on it. I do not think that Blood Moon is too powerful! Quite the contrary, I think that it is a perfectly fine card in a vacuum. The thing is, a format IS NOT A VACUUM!!!
In my experience, Blood Moon (and certain other cards like it) does not act as to "police the format" as so many like to say. Wastelanddoes act like that in Legacy/Vintage, but because it is a single-use effect. You can interact with and play around Wasteland - that card leads to interesting decision trees and more interactive games, albeit ones that may be a bit more tedious than optimal (I am not a huge fan of Wasteland, either, just using it as a comparison). Blood Moon, by being a card that just says "No, you can't play the game anymore" when played to its fullest, encourages/enables NON-INTERACTIVE PLAY. If you have a typical multi-color mana base in Modern, and a Blood Moon is played against you, there is a better than even chance that you simply won't have an answer to the card. The worst part about it is that it makes all non-basics Mountains in particular, and R is the color that simply cannot remove enchantments!
In short, it is a "Griefer" card that only leads to un-fun, un-interactive, and un-WIDE games. The format is weaker by its inclusion, just because there are decks that may be reasonable but will never see play because the card is in it. It leads to certain proactive strategies that are immune to it being better than all others by default (Affinity including it in sideboards, for instance, or Twin's usage of it), while simultaneously suppressing entire classes of potential decks that could prey on those strategies but can't due to a weakness to the card. It also leads to "gotcha" games, where you lose to imposed mana screw - those games are about as fun as games where you get actually mana screwed, and no one enjoys that...
As I said in the intro, I think the purpose of the Banned List should be to foster a wide, fun, and interactive format. Blood Moon manages to put a dent in all three, and has no appreciable advantage I can see by its inclusion. Anyone who has lost to Tron after dropping a T2 Blood Moon can speak to that! Personally, I feel that "punishment" cards should have an "out", if they are to be fun cards - whether that be being single-use or single target (Wasteland, Ancient Grudge, Pithing Needle), being an easily-dealt-with card type (Creatures, mostly, but also Artifacts to a lesser degree), or having built-in limitations (Ensnaring Bridge, Ghostly Prison), it doesn't matter. Blood Moon doesn't fit that criteria - it disables its own interaction (R can't kill enchantments), it is the single hardest card type to remove, and its only limitation is playing basics and R. Good riddance.
Choke, Flashfires, Boil: No one really plays these, but they should go for the same reason as Blood Moon: They are uninteresting "griefer" cards, and don't add any depth or complexity to the format. They are boring and spiteful, and have no business being around.
Chalice of the Void: Same reason as Blood Moon, really, albeit in a far lesser way. The thing is, Modern is always going to be a pretty fast format, leading to the best interactive cards naturally being the cheapest ones. You're not going to play Naturalize if Nature's Claim is available! That also means that the majority of proactive decks (mostly aggressive, but also combo) are going to be riddled with one drops. Like Blood Moon, Chalice can often read "Target Opponent Can't Play The Game". After board, it disables its own removal as well! In the end, it is another "Griefer" card that leads to "Gotcha" games, which are inherently un-fun.
All that being said, of the griefer cards on this list, Chalice is the most interesting and least offensive. The only reason it rises to the level of problematic to me is my insistence on unbanning Chrome Mox, which is a sequence of plays I hope to never see on T1 ever again! I feel that if you unban the Mox, you must ban the Chalice.
Stony Silence: Another "griefer" card, Stony Silence basically acts like Blood Moon for artifacts. I have three main issues with this card. One is that it is not nearly as effective against Affinity as it could be, meaning it doesn't really suppress that linear deck effectively. Two is that it disables Artifact Lands, which would keep them from being playable in anything but combo decks as long as it is a common sideboard option. Three is that it fully suppresses any non-aggressive artifact-based deck, as they are immediately shut down by it. Taking those qualities together, all Stony Silence really does is ensure that the only viable artifact-focused decks are Affinity and Lantern, the latter only because it relies on static qualities more than activated abilities.
The card's mere existence narrows the format, and it is far from the only option to attack such strategies. Removal can be interacted with, counterspells can be played around, and creatures (Kataki, War's Wage) are far easier to deal with than enchantments. Stony Silence is a "NO, STOP PLAYING" card, and those aren't really all that healthy. I think it should go, just so that other artifact decks can exist!
Rest in Peace: First off, if this were the ONLY graveyard hate card in the format, I'd have no issue with it. It isn't. It is merely the most, shall we say, "final". Much like Stony Silence, Rest In Peace pretty much ensures that the only viable graveyard decks will be aggressive ones. By having both the trigger and the static ability, it manages to completely eliminate the use of the graveyard as a resource - which is fine, in a vacuum, but in reality what it does is punish decks that try to set things up ahead of time in the graveyard. Like Blood Moon, it isn't nearly as effective at fighting against its obvious foil - anyone who has played RiP against Dredge knows it is far from an auto-win, just as Blood Moon isn't an auto-win against Tron.
But people play RiP to fight Dredge, even though it isn't really that effective, and that has the side effect of suppressing other graveyard decks. Unlike every other option (except Leyline of the Void, which is fine due to its inherent weaknesses), it can't really be played around. You can't bait the crack like with Relic of Progenitus or Nihil Spellbomb, you can't rip it out of the hand proactively like Ravenous Trap, and you can't overload it like Scavenging Ooze or other single-target graveyard removal. It just says "NO". It is by far the least interesting grave hate in the format, mostly because of its finality. It can't be interacted with, other than by being removed, and by then it has already done its damage. Oh, and it really doesn't hurt the most linear graveyard deck!
Like Stony Silence and Blood Moon, it narrows the format without really giving anything else in return. The format would be better off without any of them, simply because it could be wider without them. They can't be interacted with effectively, they don't do their jobs very well against the most flagrant offenders, and they suppress innovation and interaction. We'd all be better off without them.
Krark-Clan Ironworks: It is possible that the combination of Chrome Mox and the Artifact Lands could push a KCI strategy into broken territory. I built a few decks with them legal, and watched/read about such lists in "NBL Modern" tournaments, and from what I could tell it isn't really an issue - the weakness to Ancient Grudge and countermagic/discard is real, and the deck is a T3.5 one at best. That being said, it is a card to watch.
Disciple of the Vault / Myr Enforcer / Cranial Plating: Disciple and Plating were both banned at various points in previous formats with the core Affinity cards, and for a good reason. There is a chance that they'd still be a problem here. I don't see it really happening - Disciple is an "all-in" card that can be played around, and Plating is really no more powerful with the Artifact Lands than it is without (we're talking about 4-6 more artifacts in the deck, at one a turn max), but they are definitely worth watching. It is possible that the "vomit Myr Enforcer" strategy (otherwise known as "All In Affinity") could become good as well, so I included it, but that seems even less likely than the other two cards. IMHO, the only reason people are really scared of these cards is residual memory of getting burned out T4 by block Affinity back in the day - and the deck that would exist in this format would look very different to that one, not to mention that it really didn't happen nearly as consistently as people remember (Atog, anyone?).
Mox Opal: The last of the "Artifact Land Dangers", I went into this a bit before, but I thought it deserved just a tad more explanation. Yes, it can allow for some truly busted acceleration, but it doesn't do it all that consistently. It does it in an interesting way, and it does it with a serious deckbuilding limitation. The legendary thing - making each Mox beyond the first into a de facto Lotus Petal - is also more of a limitation than it initially appears to be. I don't believe that many "degenerate" decks could really take advantage of the acceleration, with the one exception being KCI (covered above). Affinity is around the same speed with or without Artifact Lands, so KCI is the other big concern. What it could do is enable "big mana" artifact decks - Kuldotha Forgemaster, for instance, or Lodestone Golem, could actually see play with both Mox and the Artifact Lands around. I could also see some Thopter-Sword decks making good use of it, for instance. The thing is, all those decks are T4 decks! They are very powerful, yes, but they are also on par with what the format is otherwise capable of. They also have the same weakness to Ancient Grudge that Affinity does, albeit even more so due to the higher mana investment involved.
TLDR, I think it is worth the experiment - in all likelihood, KCI would be the card to get the axe, but Mox might be too much, as well. I think the tradeoff is worthwhile, if Mox has to go to keep the Artifact Lands, mainly to give control the TfK option I mentioned above. I'm sure more than a few will disagree, but that is my personal take!
Karn Liberated: If the format slows down a bit due to the "reigning in" of the linear decks that prey on Tron, then it is possible that the deck could become oppressive. Karn is the card that makes that deck oppressive, mostly because it fits so neatly in with completing Tron T3. Ergo, if Tron becomes dominant, take a look at banning Karn. There are other things they could be doing with their 7, anyway!
Bloodbraid Elf: This card is fine in power level, but just isn't a "healthy" card. It is too RNG-centric, for one thing, and it also has the tendency to push all GX strategies in the same direction just by being the best source of card advantage they can reliably use. Basically, it is more like Green Sun's Zenith than Deathrite Shaman - the former is kept banned because every G deck runs 4 by default, limiting strategic depth, while the latter is the one and only 1-mana planeswalker ever printed. Personally, I say keep it banned, but that isn't because it is OP!
Gitaxian Probe: I don't really see this card being a problem - the sorcery speed and life loss drawbacks make it a "fair" card. That being said, it does both limit deck diversity (auto-4-of in U tempo decks and Storm) and enable a problematic mechanic (Delve). If Delver strategies, UB Delve, or Storm become problems, then this should be the card to go. I wouldn't be sad to see it gone - it really is a pretty boring card...
Ensnaring Bridge: I actually have no beef with Lantern Control, and have had a lot of success with Bridge-based decks in the past. I like the card, and its drawbacks (costing 3, the hand size limitation, being a hatable card type) generally make it fine. That being said, it bears a lot of resemblence to the cards I wanted to ban for limiting the breadth of the format, and if my changes had the desired effect of slowing it down, then there's a chance that Bridge strategies could become oppressive. I don't see that really ever happening (Abrupt Decay says "Hi"), but I thought it was worth mentioning as a "watchable" card.
Simian Spirit Guide: It is possible that Chrome Mox + Spirit Guide would enable something truly horrific, albeit unlikely due to their inherent conflicts with each other. There's only so much card advantage you can reliably trade for tempo in any given game, after all! If something truly degenerate were to emerge using both, I'd rather see the Ape go, as it is a less interesting, more niche card than the Mox. In other words, you can play Chrome Mox in a control deck for a bit of a tempo boost, but you'd never do that with the mana monkey, so if one has to go, then get rid of Harambe. He only goes in degenerate decks, while the Mox goes in others as well...
Dig Through Time: This card has never really been given a fair shake in Modern. It is very, very powerful, don't get me wrong, but it isn't Treasure Cruise! The UU cost and one less card is a real drawback, which would keep it out of the linear decks for the most part. I do worry about it in linear non-aggro decks (combo/lock), but that is exactly the type of deck that Modern is sorely lacking, so it may, MAY be worth the risk. To be fair, it is the one card on this list I am least convinced would be "safe", but I think it is worth discussion and exploration.
Glimpse of Nature: Sort of the same thing as with DTT, I think that the card is undeniably powerful, but also inherently slower than it initially seems. Elves make for a good deck, but in the end they have always had a weakness to certain types of interaction, and Glimpse actually intensifies that weakness in some ways. For instance, Anger of the Gods didn't even exist in the same format as Glimpse Elves, EVER! I think there is a good chance that it is a safe card, but it may also be the type of card that makes Elves the de facto best G creature deck, limiting deck diversity. I'm not afraid of its power level as much as I am introducing another "obvious possible best deck" into the format. Worth consideration, albeit that of the careful kind.
Splinter Twin: I just had to mention this card, because I just know someone will bring it up. Personally, I'm fine with keeping it banned. Why? Not because it is too powerful, that is for sure. The real reason is that Twin the deck is by default the best tempo-combo deck in the format, simply because it requires so few cards to implement. What is the point in running any other UR combo deck when Twin is just better? There isn't one, and that isn't a good thing. The deck is fine, really, but it is too easy to fit into an obvious shell for my tastes. I'd rather see a format with 2-5 differentUX combo-control decks than one with just one, but Twin will always be that one...
Let me get this straight. You want to buff affinity by giving them artifact lands AND take away stony silence. Cmon man... Does this make any sense?
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Well, for what I read everyone is on the Dredge ban boat. Too hard to beat of a deck, I tell you. Hahaha, ok let's kill the new deck because it's too powerfull. What do you want out? Amalgam, Mom Hug or Troll? Also, to be fair, I think if they ban anything it will be until april, not january.
As far as your last suggestion, that was a format that existed. It was called Extended. I've referenced it numerous times. They killed it, twice - once by moving it to a "double standard" format, then again by introducing Modern. It isn't coming back. Modern is now, and will remain, a non-rotating format. So we have to look at it now and try to open it up - which is what my changes would do, or at least so I'm arguing. Bans open up formats just as well as unbans (Twin proved that, albeit with the Eldrazi hiccup), but they sometimes require tradeoffs.
I guess the real question is: "What is your definition of opening the format up?" What would you, KTROJAN, change to move the format away from the "linear decks passing in the night" nonsense it is right now?
The Splinter Twin ban didn't prove that it could open up the format, because it just sent the format into even greater linearity than before.
You are correct on Extended, however. Rotation really only works for Standard. Especially because two of the purposes of rotation that apply to Standard do not apply to Extended:
1) It allows them to better test cards. When you have a smaller pool, it's easier to catch potentially problematic interactions. This is not the case for Extended, which they didn't test for anyway.
2) It reduces the need for bannings if they do underrate some interaction. Something is a little overpowered? Not to worry, it'll be gone soon enough anyway. Extended could take much longer to get rid of the troublesome cards via rotation.
Sure, those two problems also apply to Modern (lack of testing, no rotating out of problematic cards) but Modern also doesn't suffer from the disadvantages of rotation that Extended did (well, unless you count some of the bannings as an artificial rotation). Extended was taking the things people don't like about rotation in Standard (e.g. not getting to keep your deck for that long) but striking out some of the things that were good about rotation in Standard.
I've been on Skred the last two fnm's for modern and you can't tell me blood moon doesn't punish people for greedy mana bases and I'm not even talking Tron. I'm crushing jund, jeskia, eldrazi... I see no reason why one shouldn't be able to play moon in modern when when people are on 3-4 color mana bases and counting on fetches/shocks. You want to change up the format ban fetches and see where you're really at.
See, that is basically the same deck as old All-In-Red, at least in strategy. You seem to be laboring under the misapprehension that you are "policing the format" by "punishing them greedy manabases" (by which I take it you mean expensive). You aren't. You are playing a high-risk "bully" deck that leans on ONE CARD for its entire ability to interact with the majority of opponents. You are playing, in essence, a combo deck with a single-card combo. If you take Blood Moon out of Skred Red, the deck ceases to exist. It is a boring deck!
If it were easy to maindeck cards to deal with Blood Moon, that would be another thing, but it is an ENCHANTMENT. It makes all mana RED. Which means that it makes all non-basic mana unable to deal with it. It inherently limits its own options to counterplay. The card was designed in 1995! It is from THE DARK! There is a good reason they don't make cards like it anymore - they aren't good cards for diversity. It comes down, and you get to play as though you were mana screwed the rest of the game. So your choice is either play a deck that doesn't fold to Blood Moon - inherently weakening your deck against all non-BM decks - or to hope you drew your instant-speed way to remove it in time...
Blood Moon can be played around and even if it does lock you out (which is not a problem in and of itself, I think prison decks have a right to exist), you still have the chance of drawing a basic land, unless you have zero basic lands in which case that's your own fault.
I'm not sure why a card being designed back in 1995 is a strike against it. Ball Lightning was printed in that set originally, but no one would claim Ball Lightning is a problem. Besides, I consider a major part of the appeal of a larger format to play with cards they wouldn't print nowadays due to a different design philosophy, and in fact am disappointed Modern doesn't go back further for that reason.
As far as banning fetches go, that isn't going to happen, and it would actually only make the Blood Moon situation worse. A format with Blood Moon and without a reliable way to get basics into play would be a nightmare!
Which is why Blood Moon completely dominated when it was Standard legal in 9th Edition, when there weren't fetchlands... oh wait, no, it actually didn't see that much play. See, it turns out that while Blood Moon may hose the opponent more easily if they don't have fetchlands, it makes it way harder to actually use it effectively. Most decks that run Blood Moon are in multiple colors and rely heavily on the fetchlands in order to prevent themselves from getting screwed out of the game by Blood Moon. Without fetchlands, you'll actually see a dramatic reduction in Blood Moon usage because so few decks would be able to actually use it. Skred Red is one of the few that would retain it, but by limiting yourself to one color you bring in a lot of your own weaknesses, which is one of the reasons you generally don't see that much from Skred Red.
By greedy mana bases I meant exactly what I said multiple colors. Skred doesn't fold if it doesn't see moon. It has real threats that must be answered. It's not ok to have enchantments main board now because they're hard to deal with? You can't just pick the decks to be around that you want and build your ban list off that.
Opening up all artifact mana and getting rid of stony just allows all decks to try for meatalcraft. We really want a bunch of mox opals and etched champions everywhere? Then we can have all decks run artifact hate main yet we can't expect decks to have to deal with enchantments?
Maybe a plus would be that puresteel and some equipments could see play. That sounds fun artifact lands, opals, chrom mox, puresteel, shikari's, etched champs, dispatch (gets much better), thopter sword combo (gets better), swords, who knows maybe some thoughtcasts/thirsts, and stoic rebuttal (a modern counterspells for UU seems nice with 8+ extra artifacts to make it happen). Who knows with mox opal and Glimmervoids maybe you can even get the red splash going.
EDIT: I forgot you wanted SFM unbanned too! So def a 4 of with a Batterskull there for another amazing t2 play!
In response to a rash of reports in this thread today:
Guys, yes, this thread has rules. Yes, they exist for a reason. That reason is not to prevent reasonable and clearly-written discussion of the banlist, the reason we have them is to prevent blatant trolling and flame-wars. We're not going to be infracting some of the completely content-less posts in response to some of the suggestions people have made today, but we're not going to remove their posts either. The point of the banlist thread is to have civil discourse over what people believe the banned list should be and how it should change to improve the format, and that supersedes legalistic interpretation of the rules.
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Primary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
My idea of what the Banned List should be is a bit different than what I feel most think it should be. I don't think it should exist merely to "police the brokenness", or to reign in overpowered interactions, or to limit the power level of the format. Instead, I think it should exist to foster a fun, interactive, and most importantly WIDE deck building environment, where a lot of different strategies can exist. That means it shouldn't just keep all the overpowered combos out, merely the ones that are hard to interact with. It shouldn't get rid of all fast mana, merely the fast mana that directly leads to degenerate strategies.
On that note, I also feel that it should also contain cards which directly counter entire strategies in an non-interactive way. That will become clear below, in my explanations for my bans. In addition, I feel that powerful cards which may enable some degenerate strategies, but are otherwise interesting from a deckbuilding and interaction point of view, should be kept off the list if at all possible.
Enough of that, here is my list - hopefully my meaning becomes clearer through it. I've hidden them behind Spoiler tags, because I'm afraid it went a bit long. I'm quite sure I am going to receive a lot of flack for these opinions, but thats how such things go - I actually hope to hear some of the disagreements, as I'm sure I've missed some interactions...
Artifact Lands: I know, I know, it seems crazy - but really, think about the decks that would really play them!!! I don't know how many of you remember the old Extended, prior to the advent of "Super-Standard-Extended" and well before Modern. In a lot of ways it was not too dissimilar to what Modern is now, albeit with around a decade's less worth of cards. The artifact lands were legal in it, and Affinity (which was really AFFINITY still) was a very good, albeit risky, deck in that format. That was before Vault Skirge, and Steel Overseer, and Signal Pest, so the deck was essentially still a Mirrodin Block Constructed deck with Master of Etherium thrown in. The point is that it was just about the same power level as it is now, probably weaker - the Artifact Lands aren't a problem because of Affinity!
Do you know what decks really benefitted from them? Control/midrange decks that could run Thirst for Knowledege. What is the single biggest problem with U-based control in Modern right now? No, it isn't Counterspell, or the lack thereof. It is the poor state of instant-speed card advantage and selection effects. The legalizing of Seat of the Synod would do a lot to alleviate that problem!
There is also the neat deckbuilding counterplay that the non-Darksteel Citadel Artifact Lands bring to a format - namely their weakness to spot artifact removal, notably Ancient Grudge. There is a definite drawback to having lands that can be blown up by common sideboard cards! On that note, I don't think the interaction with Mox Opal is nearly as strong as it first appears - any deck interested in running Opal already runs Citadel, and the artifact lands don't really allow for much quicker starts, merely more consistent ones. Opal's drawback is real, as well - something that brings me to the next card...
Chrome Mox: Also going back to that Extended format, does anyone recall the decks that actually played it? It wasn't the degenerate combo decks! It was mostly control/midrange decks (TFK again), All In Red (to speed in Blood Moon, a card I'll get back to in a sec), and various other decks that needed a tempo boost. The Imprint cost is real, and a big limiter to the overall power level of the card. The only "broken" deck I can think of that really jammed 4 Chrome Mox was DDT (Dark Depths / Thopter-Sword), and the only reason they did was to enable a T1 Dark Confidant! That deck was broken for reasons other than the Mox...
Basically, the card is unquestionably powerful, but in actual deckbuilding it has real drawbacks. Think about it in the current Ad Nauseum deck, for instance - it would certainly go in the deck, but it would not speed it up (run some realistic hands)! It would likely just displace the Lotus Blooms, adding a little bit of consistency while also leaving them even more vulnerable to Artifact/Enchantment removal than they already are.
What decks would really play the card? Likely the same midrange/control decks that are interested in the Artifact Lands. Faeries, for instance, would play it to power out T1 Bitterblossom - hardly a backbreaking play, and it would leave them very vulnerable to Abrupt Decay, for instance. It would make that deck much better, but with a drawback - that deck, and those like it, would be able to compete much more readily with the higher-tempo aggro decks in the format, but at the cost of both card advantage and post-board consistency. In other words, it enables more interesting strategies.
Stoneforge Mystic: I'm not going to go on about it, but T3 Batterskull seems fine to me. It has all the vulnerabilities that strategy has in Legacy, without the advantage of Force of Will to protect it. Kolaghan's Command is a card in the format, and will continue to be, after all! My only worry is that it becomes the "default U strategy", stymieing deck construction by being the most powerful midrange/tempo thing to do. That is a real concern, but it is worth unbanning just to see how it shakes out in an actual metagame.
Jace, the Mind Sculptor: The only argument I can think of for keeping this card banned is that it becomes the default U finisher. The only real interactive challenge to that is that it is a "tap-out" card, by nature, and most U decks are loath to tap out and lose their counter-war advantage. That may be enough reason to keep it on the list, but personally I'd like to see how it plays out, just like SFM, before jumping to conclusions. After all, JtMS has a lot of similarities to Bitterblossom in actual play - it is a recurring card advantage engine that requires a reactive deck to tap out to utilize. Bitterblossom isn't unsuccessful in Modern because it isn't powerful enough, but because the best strategy for it can't really afford the tempo loss of playing it - and Jace presents a similar conundrum, albeit one that is both more expensive and more powerful.
Become Immense: I just see this card becoming more and more degenerate as time goes on. I don't think that Infect is the real reason to get rid of it - the next card on the list is what I would ban out of that particular deck - but instead the various "pump to kill super-fast" strategies, most notably Death's Shadow Zoo. The card does too much for too little, and enables too many games that aren't really interactive at all. I feel it should go, just to make building such decks more interesting than currently. The various other pump spells all have their own advantages and disadvantages, and having any "auto-include" tends to dilute the impact of choosing the remaining ones. Once you also consider that it is the only card in those decks that really allows for non-magical-christmas-land T3 kills, it really should go.
Inkmoth Nexus: I don't personally feel this card is overpowered, per se, but instead that it gives certain aggressive strategies an unfair advantage over reactive ones. Both Artifact Aggro and Infect would be injured by its loss, but hardly "banned out of the format". Right now this manland acts as a "catch-all backup plan" for both decks, giving them a consistency and resiliency that undermines interactivity. If the format is to be WIDER something has to be done to knock those two down a peg, and Inkmoth is the card that they share. It is an insidious little beast, and a very interesting card that I'll be sad to see gone, but I really do believe that it is the key enabler of the two most prominent "OP" linear strategies right now. Removing it would give more opportunity to interact with those decks, and that is all that is needed to stifle their dominance.
Prized Amalgam: For all the talk about Bloodghast and the dredge mechanic cards in this thread, this is IMHO the real reason for Dredge's meteoric rise. Compare the card to Vengevine, a card that used to be the paragon of free graveyard value - in order to effectively use Vengy, you have to actually cast creature spells. In order to recur Amalgam, you have to, what, play lands? The closest comparison is to Ichorid, which is really the only other truly "free from graveyard" creature with an appreciable attack stat ever printed. I want dredge to be in the format, as I find it an interesting strategy to combat, but the UB Zombie is always going to be a problem, because it has no drawbacks!
With Prized Amalgam, Inkmoth Nexus, and Become Immense gone, the most powerful linear decks in the format would be knocked way down in power level, but importantly also all still be playable. IMHO, it is important not to just ban whole strategies out of a format - which brings me to my next set of bans, which are all on this list because they effectively do just that...
Blood Moon: Here is the big one, to me, and I'm sure a lot of people will disagree with me on it. I do not think that Blood Moon is too powerful! Quite the contrary, I think that it is a perfectly fine card in a vacuum. The thing is, a format IS NOT A VACUUM!!!
In my experience, Blood Moon (and certain other cards like it) does not act as to "police the format" as so many like to say. Wastelanddoes act like that in Legacy/Vintage, but because it is a single-use effect. You can interact with and play around Wasteland - that card leads to interesting decision trees and more interactive games, albeit ones that may be a bit more tedious than optimal (I am not a huge fan of Wasteland, either, just using it as a comparison). Blood Moon, by being a card that just says "No, you can't play the game anymore" when played to its fullest, encourages/enables NON-INTERACTIVE PLAY. If you have a typical multi-color mana base in Modern, and a Blood Moon is played against you, there is a better than even chance that you simply won't have an answer to the card. The worst part about it is that it makes all non-basics Mountains in particular, and R is the color that simply cannot remove enchantments!
In short, it is a "Griefer" card that only leads to un-fun, un-interactive, and un-WIDE games. The format is weaker by its inclusion, just because there are decks that may be reasonable but will never see play because the card is in it. It leads to certain proactive strategies that are immune to it being better than all others by default (Affinity including it in sideboards, for instance, or Twin's usage of it), while simultaneously suppressing entire classes of potential decks that could prey on those strategies but can't due to a weakness to the card. It also leads to "gotcha" games, where you lose to imposed mana screw - those games are about as fun as games where you get actually mana screwed, and no one enjoys that...
As I said in the intro, I think the purpose of the Banned List should be to foster a wide, fun, and interactive format. Blood Moon manages to put a dent in all three, and has no appreciable advantage I can see by its inclusion. Anyone who has lost to Tron after dropping a T2 Blood Moon can speak to that! Personally, I feel that "punishment" cards should have an "out", if they are to be fun cards - whether that be being single-use or single target (Wasteland, Ancient Grudge, Pithing Needle), being an easily-dealt-with card type (Creatures, mostly, but also Artifacts to a lesser degree), or having built-in limitations (Ensnaring Bridge, Ghostly Prison), it doesn't matter. Blood Moon doesn't fit that criteria - it disables its own interaction (R can't kill enchantments), it is the single hardest card type to remove, and its only limitation is playing basics and R. Good riddance.
Choke, Flashfires, Boil: No one really plays these, but they should go for the same reason as Blood Moon: They are uninteresting "griefer" cards, and don't add any depth or complexity to the format. They are boring and spiteful, and have no business being around.
Chalice of the Void: Same reason as Blood Moon, really, albeit in a far lesser way. The thing is, Modern is always going to be a pretty fast format, leading to the best interactive cards naturally being the cheapest ones. You're not going to play Naturalize if Nature's Claim is available! That also means that the majority of proactive decks (mostly aggressive, but also combo) are going to be riddled with one drops. Like Blood Moon, Chalice can often read "Target Opponent Can't Play The Game". After board, it disables its own removal as well! In the end, it is another "Griefer" card that leads to "Gotcha" games, which are inherently un-fun.
All that being said, of the griefer cards on this list, Chalice is the most interesting and least offensive. The only reason it rises to the level of problematic to me is my insistence on unbanning Chrome Mox, which is a sequence of plays I hope to never see on T1 ever again! I feel that if you unban the Mox, you must ban the Chalice.
Stony Silence: Another "griefer" card, Stony Silence basically acts like Blood Moon for artifacts. I have three main issues with this card. One is that it is not nearly as effective against Affinity as it could be, meaning it doesn't really suppress that linear deck effectively. Two is that it disables Artifact Lands, which would keep them from being playable in anything but combo decks as long as it is a common sideboard option. Three is that it fully suppresses any non-aggressive artifact-based deck, as they are immediately shut down by it. Taking those qualities together, all Stony Silence really does is ensure that the only viable artifact-focused decks are Affinity and Lantern, the latter only because it relies on static qualities more than activated abilities.
The card's mere existence narrows the format, and it is far from the only option to attack such strategies. Removal can be interacted with, counterspells can be played around, and creatures (Kataki, War's Wage) are far easier to deal with than enchantments. Stony Silence is a "NO, STOP PLAYING" card, and those aren't really all that healthy. I think it should go, just so that other artifact decks can exist!
Rest in Peace: First off, if this were the ONLY graveyard hate card in the format, I'd have no issue with it. It isn't. It is merely the most, shall we say, "final". Much like Stony Silence, Rest In Peace pretty much ensures that the only viable graveyard decks will be aggressive ones. By having both the trigger and the static ability, it manages to completely eliminate the use of the graveyard as a resource - which is fine, in a vacuum, but in reality what it does is punish decks that try to set things up ahead of time in the graveyard. Like Blood Moon, it isn't nearly as effective at fighting against its obvious foil - anyone who has played RiP against Dredge knows it is far from an auto-win, just as Blood Moon isn't an auto-win against Tron.
But people play RiP to fight Dredge, even though it isn't really that effective, and that has the side effect of suppressing other graveyard decks. Unlike every other option (except Leyline of the Void, which is fine due to its inherent weaknesses), it can't really be played around. You can't bait the crack like with Relic of Progenitus or Nihil Spellbomb, you can't rip it out of the hand proactively like Ravenous Trap, and you can't overload it like Scavenging Ooze or other single-target graveyard removal. It just says "NO". It is by far the least interesting grave hate in the format, mostly because of its finality. It can't be interacted with, other than by being removed, and by then it has already done its damage. Oh, and it really doesn't hurt the most linear graveyard deck!
Like Stony Silence and Blood Moon, it narrows the format without really giving anything else in return. The format would be better off without any of them, simply because it could be wider without them. They can't be interacted with effectively, they don't do their jobs very well against the most flagrant offenders, and they suppress innovation and interaction. We'd all be better off without them.
Krark-Clan Ironworks: It is possible that the combination of Chrome Mox and the Artifact Lands could push a KCI strategy into broken territory. I built a few decks with them legal, and watched/read about such lists in "NBL Modern" tournaments, and from what I could tell it isn't really an issue - the weakness to Ancient Grudge and countermagic/discard is real, and the deck is a T3.5 one at best. That being said, it is a card to watch.
Disciple of the Vault / Myr Enforcer / Cranial Plating: Disciple and Plating were both banned at various points in previous formats with the core Affinity cards, and for a good reason. There is a chance that they'd still be a problem here. I don't see it really happening - Disciple is an "all-in" card that can be played around, and Plating is really no more powerful with the Artifact Lands than it is without (we're talking about 4-6 more artifacts in the deck, at one a turn max), but they are definitely worth watching. It is possible that the "vomit Myr Enforcer" strategy (otherwise known as "All In Affinity") could become good as well, so I included it, but that seems even less likely than the other two cards. IMHO, the only reason people are really scared of these cards is residual memory of getting burned out T4 by block Affinity back in the day - and the deck that would exist in this format would look very different to that one, not to mention that it really didn't happen nearly as consistently as people remember (Atog, anyone?).
Mox Opal: The last of the "Artifact Land Dangers", I went into this a bit before, but I thought it deserved just a tad more explanation. Yes, it can allow for some truly busted acceleration, but it doesn't do it all that consistently. It does it in an interesting way, and it does it with a serious deckbuilding limitation. The legendary thing - making each Mox beyond the first into a de facto Lotus Petal - is also more of a limitation than it initially appears to be. I don't believe that many "degenerate" decks could really take advantage of the acceleration, with the one exception being KCI (covered above). Affinity is around the same speed with or without Artifact Lands, so KCI is the other big concern. What it could do is enable "big mana" artifact decks - Kuldotha Forgemaster, for instance, or Lodestone Golem, could actually see play with both Mox and the Artifact Lands around. I could also see some Thopter-Sword decks making good use of it, for instance. The thing is, all those decks are T4 decks! They are very powerful, yes, but they are also on par with what the format is otherwise capable of. They also have the same weakness to Ancient Grudge that Affinity does, albeit even more so due to the higher mana investment involved.
TLDR, I think it is worth the experiment - in all likelihood, KCI would be the card to get the axe, but Mox might be too much, as well. I think the tradeoff is worthwhile, if Mox has to go to keep the Artifact Lands, mainly to give control the TfK option I mentioned above. I'm sure more than a few will disagree, but that is my personal take!
Karn Liberated: If the format slows down a bit due to the "reigning in" of the linear decks that prey on Tron, then it is possible that the deck could become oppressive. Karn is the card that makes that deck oppressive, mostly because it fits so neatly in with completing Tron T3. Ergo, if Tron becomes dominant, take a look at banning Karn. There are other things they could be doing with their 7, anyway!
Bloodbraid Elf: This card is fine in power level, but just isn't a "healthy" card. It is too RNG-centric, for one thing, and it also has the tendency to push all GX strategies in the same direction just by being the best source of card advantage they can reliably use. Basically, it is more like Green Sun's Zenith than Deathrite Shaman - the former is kept banned because every G deck runs 4 by default, limiting strategic depth, while the latter is the one and only 1-mana planeswalker ever printed. Personally, I say keep it banned, but that isn't because it is OP!
Gitaxian Probe: I don't really see this card being a problem - the sorcery speed and life loss drawbacks make it a "fair" card. That being said, it does both limit deck diversity (auto-4-of in U tempo decks and Storm) and enable a problematic mechanic (Delve). If Delver strategies, UB Delve, or Storm become problems, then this should be the card to go. I wouldn't be sad to see it gone - it really is a pretty boring card...
Ensnaring Bridge: I actually have no beef with Lantern Control, and have had a lot of success with Bridge-based decks in the past. I like the card, and its drawbacks (costing 3, the hand size limitation, being a hatable card type) generally make it fine. That being said, it bears a lot of resemblence to the cards I wanted to ban for limiting the breadth of the format, and if my changes had the desired effect of slowing it down, then there's a chance that Bridge strategies could become oppressive. I don't see that really ever happening (Abrupt Decay says "Hi"), but I thought it was worth mentioning as a "watchable" card.
Simian Spirit Guide: It is possible that Chrome Mox + Spirit Guide would enable something truly horrific, albeit unlikely due to their inherent conflicts with each other. There's only so much card advantage you can reliably trade for tempo in any given game, after all! If something truly degenerate were to emerge using both, I'd rather see the Ape go, as it is a less interesting, more niche card than the Mox. In other words, you can play Chrome Mox in a control deck for a bit of a tempo boost, but you'd never do that with the mana monkey, so if one has to go, then get rid of Harambe. He only goes in degenerate decks, while the Mox goes in others as well...
Dig Through Time: This card has never really been given a fair shake in Modern. It is very, very powerful, don't get me wrong, but it isn't Treasure Cruise! The UU cost and one less card is a real drawback, which would keep it out of the linear decks for the most part. I do worry about it in linear non-aggro decks (combo/lock), but that is exactly the type of deck that Modern is sorely lacking, so it may, MAY be worth the risk. To be fair, it is the one card on this list I am least convinced would be "safe", but I think it is worth discussion and exploration.
Glimpse of Nature: Sort of the same thing as with DTT, I think that the card is undeniably powerful, but also inherently slower than it initially seems. Elves make for a good deck, but in the end they have always had a weakness to certain types of interaction, and Glimpse actually intensifies that weakness in some ways. For instance, Anger of the Gods didn't even exist in the same format as Glimpse Elves, EVER! I think there is a good chance that it is a safe card, but it may also be the type of card that makes Elves the de facto best G creature deck, limiting deck diversity. I'm not afraid of its power level as much as I am introducing another "obvious possible best deck" into the format. Worth consideration, albeit that of the careful kind.
Splinter Twin: I just had to mention this card, because I just know someone will bring it up. Personally, I'm fine with keeping it banned. Why? Not because it is too powerful, that is for sure. The real reason is that Twin the deck is by default the best tempo-combo deck in the format, simply because it requires so few cards to implement. What is the point in running any other UR combo deck when Twin is just better? There isn't one, and that isn't a good thing. The deck is fine, really, but it is too easy to fit into an obvious shell for my tastes. I'd rather see a format with 2-5 differentUX combo-control decks than one with just one, but Twin will always be that one...
I am sorry to say this but your propositions are absurd and completely inconsistent. First and foremost having "fun" as a ban criteria is dangerous. Fun is inherently subjective and banning because of someone's subjective perception of what is fun is dangerously arbitrary. States have abolished arbitrary jurisdiction for good reason and reinstating that into a game you expect others to have faith in is very narrow minded. But on weg go.
You basically ban every fast aggro deck to death to make the format slow down, then buff Affinity to unknown levels of broken and carry on unbanning Chrome Mox. That card does a lot but slowing down a format is certainly not one of them. You want to unban it to make midrange etc even with the fast aggro decks which you conventienly just banned out of the format except for Affinity. You also state that Mox would go into basically every midrange, control and tempo deck, which kind of makes this a 56 card format. You seem to not notice or care, but having a card that is obligatory to every deck to compete is format warping and extremely unhealthy. Having Mox in your opening hand is also such a great advantage over others who do not that games often come down to exactly that. Games become more luck based and being on the play with a Mox becomes the most powerful play of Modern.
Banning cards like Stony Silence also doesn't achieve anything for other artifact decks. When Affinity runs rampant people will play artifact hate and other artifact decks will get to feel that. It doesn't matter if that's Stony Silence, an abundance of Ancient Grudges, Shatterstorm or Creeping Corrosion. Artifact decks will fold to that either way. It's similar with graveyard hate. Dredge is strong, and all graveyard decks will suffer from the hate. If Rest in Peace isn't that good against Dredge people will stop playing it anyway. No need to ban it. Also, being all-in on one strategy is generally a high risk - high reward play. You narrow down the ways you are vulnerable, but if someone packs the right hate you lose. That's why it is important to have multiple ways to win and the reason why decks like Jund aren't easily hated out through sideboard cards.
You seem to be stuck in the ages of Extended and ignore a lot of what has happened since then. The plans you have for Modern would not lead to the vision you have for it.
Also:
Skullclamp [...] a card you'll note I didn't even bother with explaining why I wouldn't unban
Maybe a plus would be that puresteel and some equipments could see play. That sounds fun artifact lands, opals, chrom mox, puresteel, shikari's, etched champs, dispatch (gets much better), thopter sword combo (gets better), swords, who knows maybe some thoughtcasts/thirsts, and stoic rebuttal (a modern counterspells for UU seems nice with 8+ extra artifacts to make it happen). Who knows with mox opal and Glimmervoids maybe you can even get the red splash going.
I like puresteel paladin, one of my favourite cards in standard back then. But it won't be good regardless even with artifact lands. The deck's engine and power is based on having a 2/2 creature surviving for a turn or more. There's a guy at one of the LGS I go to that plays puresteel. It's nice to see the deck work when the paladin somehow manages to dodge removal but it just falls flat on its face when it's killed right away. Artifact lands don't do anything to help puresteel paladin in that regard.
Optimism is nice but we should also be realistic. If artifact lands make anything good, it won't be puresteel paladin. I highly doubt it'll be any sort of fair deck.
Guys please opinions on japanese cards. Lost a 3/3 creature against Japan celestial colonade. This guy played all creatures and spells in english cards, but some cards in his manabase was japanese. I dont registrated this really ( my brain say its all fine and all english to me lets attack his empty board)...and i am sure it is a Kind of legal cheating. It is not ok, but i know legal. I Hate such people. I never forget colonade normally, but with this Tricks it can happen one time in 3 years and such people take advantage of this
If I am a customer spending premium amount of dollars, I expect a premium service. Jund falls into the category of a premium deck costing more dollars than a majority of the rest of the format. I'm not getting the desired performance ratio per dollars spent out of the Jund deck because WOTC decided to make the format more diverse.
Twin wasn't banned because it was too powerful, it was banned because it was the best thingUR could do, and would always be. There is nothing inherently wrong with Twin. The problem is that you simply won't see any other UR decks as long as it is around. It was banned for diversity, and it worked!
This is true! Instead of several variants of a good deck and an additional collection of competent and competitive decks, we have a whole bunch of bad decks and a handful of OK decks!
Twin's existence precluded any other UR tempo deck's existence. The only argument for its inclusion is power level alone, which isn't why they banned it. This comes off as just sour grapes - you liked Twin, so you wanted it around. The fact that twin could run ~12 non-land cards different between build is exactly why it discouraged deck diversity - it was effectively a one-card combo that forced you to run suboptimal threats otherwise. Most combos require far more than 8 slots to implement. Yes, I see the "cavalcade of so-called mediocre decks" as an improvement, because they don't all operate the same.
Affinity already runs mox opals. and would welcome a card like this that lets them redump their hand after a board wipe. If I'm an affinity player having these cards means I can always force the following choice: pay three life or the game ends in a draw. It's the kind of interaction that ruins a tournament. Players shouldn't have to decide if they are enough ahead to take 3 damage for the right to keep playing.
This is the same fallacy that Athreos, God of Passage and Karmic Justice engendered. Because the opponent gets to choose what cards you keep and which to take damage from, they will keep you from "redumping your hand after a board wipe". It works in magical christmas land, but in reality such cards never actually make any impact.
Let me get this straight. You want to buff affinity by giving them artifact lands AND take away stony silence. Cmon man... Does this make any sense?
I'm not going to repeat myself - did you actually READ any of what I wrote, or just look at the list and jump to conclusions? TLDR, Affinity isn't the deck that Artifact lands are dangerous in (they'd only run 4-8 of them, replacing the existing one and Inkmoth if it were banned), and Stony Silence isn't the best way to fight Affinity. All SS does is suppress non-aggro artifact decks while not sufficiently punishing aggro ones, leading to a narrowing of the format. See previous posts for a better explanation. Feel free to disagree, but don't jump to conclusions based upon gut instinct - think it out, please.
This deck doesn't even have Song or Rite and it's busted.
"OK, ban SSG then". Won't happen, they don't do swap bans. It's a lot easier to leave things the way they are now, given that SSG is not destroying the format, instead of unban Mox, ban SSG, then worry if some other combo deck slipped through the cracks.
The Splinter Twin ban didn't prove that it could open up the format, because it just sent the format into even greater linearity than before.
You are correct on Extended, however. Rotation really only works for Standard. Especially because two of the purposes of rotation that apply to Standard do not apply to Extended:
1) It allows them to better test cards. When you have a smaller pool, it's easier to catch potentially problematic interactions. This is not the case for Extended, which they didn't test for anyway.
2) It reduces the need for bannings if they do underrate some interaction. Something is a little overpowered? Not to worry, it'll be gone soon enough anyway. Extended could take much longer to get rid of the troublesome cards via rotation.
Sure, those two problems also apply to Modern (lack of testing, no rotating out of problematic cards) but Modern also doesn't suffer from the disadvantages of rotation that Extended did (well, unless you count some of the bannings as an artificial rotation). Extended was taking the things people don't like about rotation in Standard (e.g. not getting to keep your deck for that long) but striking out some of the things that were good about rotation in Standard.
The Twin ban wasn't what sent it into greater linearity than before - the format was already well on its way there - it was the printing of new cards for a Standard environment that interacted with the old cards in such a way to create this super-linear environment.
Look at what pushed Infect and Dredge into T1, and enabled Shadow Zoo - Blossoming Defense, Become Immense, Temur Battle Rage, and Prized Amalgam. Those were all printed in the last 14 months, so only two of them were actually legal along with Twin. Affinity hasn't changed since then, other than minor adaptations for the meta.
As far as the two "Standard Problems" you stated, those apply even more to Modern than they would to Extended if it still existed. Why? Because it is a WIDER, Non-Rotating format! The two most contentious cards on my list - the Artifact Lands and Blood Moon - are from the oldest and fourth oldest sets in the format, respectively. The Artifact Lands are kept banned for the same reason Bitterblossom was - reactionary memory of prior Standard dominance - not due to any actual testing. Blood Moon is kept legal for much the same reason, except in reverse - it "hasn't been a problem card before" (except it has, in Old Extended, and was under ban discussion then), so it "isn't a problem now"...
I'm not advocating for the return of Extended, merely some of the more positive aspects of Rotation - namely that single-card strategies from early sets in the format can suppress the creation of new strategies as long as they exist. Modern is a much wider format than Extended, really - right now, Extended would be, what, Zendikar to Kaladesh? That sounds like a much less interesting format!
Blood Moon can be played around and even if it does lock you out (which is not a problem in and of itself, I think prison decks have a right to exist), you still have the chance of drawing a basic land, unless you have zero basic lands in which case that's your own fault.
I'm not sure why a card being designed back in 1995 is a strike against it. Ball Lightning was printed in that set originally, but no one would claim Ball Lightning is a problem. Besides, I consider a major part of the appeal of a larger format to play with cards they wouldn't print nowadays due to a different design philosophy, and in fact am disappointed Modern doesn't go back further for that reason.
As far as banning fetches go, that isn't going to happen, and it would actually only make the Blood Moon situation worse. A format with Blood Moon and without a reliable way to get basics into play would be a nightmare!
Which is why Blood Moon completely dominated when it was Standard legal in 9th Edition, when there weren't fetchlands... oh wait, no, it actually didn't see that much play. See, it turns out that while Blood Moon may hose the opponent more easily if they don't have fetchlands, it makes it way harder to actually use it effectively. Most decks that run Blood Moon are in multiple colors and rely heavily on the fetchlands in order to prevent themselves from getting screwed out of the game by Blood Moon. Without fetchlands, you'll actually see a dramatic reduction in Blood Moon usage because so few decks would be able to actually use it. Skred Red is one of the few that would retain it, but by limiting yourself to one color you bring in a lot of your own weaknesses, which is one of the reasons you generally don't see that much from Skred Red.
Once again, reactionary thinking. Blood Moon is hardly the only prison card available, it is merely the most powerful one (other than arguably Ensnaring Bridge, which I addressed before), the least interactive one (by supressing its own interaction and acting as a one-sided Armageddon), the oldest one, and the one that acts on an axis that attacks the very nature of the format. It isn't just that it was designed in 1995, it is that it is a HATE CARD designed in 1995. There were no fetches, there were no utility non-basics, and there was no such concept as "deck diversity" when it was designed. It was originally designed as a pure FLAVOR card, without thought to interactions! It is one of what, 3 cards from The Dark to ever see non-forced play? There is a reason for that!
Limiting yourself to one color is the very reason Blood Moon is a problem - it can't REALLY be played around if you are to have a significant non-basic mana base. The format is one where power trumps simplicity, so trying to advocate for decks with more basics is a lost cause - in order for a deck to be powerful enough to really compete, it must be multi-color (or at least run utility lands), leaving it vulnerable to Blood Moon. In order to be consistent enough, it must rely on those non-basics to cast its spells, leaving it even MORE vulnerable. When BURN of all decks is one of the most vulnerable to Blood Moon, that tells you a lot about the silliness of the card!
There is also the budget issue, which I am loathe to address, but Blood Moon does make it much worse. One of the biggest financial problems of Modern is the cost of mana bases, mostly due to the Fetch-Shock thing. The thing is, Fetches are the only way to reliably get basics into play in most decks. It is more than possible to build a much cheaper, almost-as-effective mana base without them, but then you fold to Blood Moon. In other words, Blood Moon is pushing the format even harder into the very thing the "ban the fetches" folks think is a problem!
Oh, and it wasn't a problem in Standard because Standard WASN'T MODERN!!! It wasn't a format dominated by a large number of non-basics, because there simply weren't that many non-basics available to play! That being said, it did see play in that Standard, and a lot of it. Why? To fight Tron and Cloudpost. Which decks played it? Mostly Affinity and Goblins! At the time, there were a lot of complaints about the card, even in Standard. It was too good at what it did, and didn't support much interaction - they only out was Oblivion Stone, since the majority of decks played one-mana artifact-only hate instead of Naturalize. In other words, it was a problem in Standard, just not as big of one. That hardly matters when discussing its position in Modern...
By greedy mana bases I meant exactly what I said multiple colors. Skred doesn't fold if it doesn't see moon. It has real threats that must be answered. It's not ok to have enchantments main board now because they're hard to deal with? You can't just pick the decks to be around that you want and build your ban list off that.
Opening up all artifact mana and getting rid of stony just allows all decks to try for meatalcraft. We really want a bunch of mox opals and etched champions everywhere? Then we can have all decks run artifact hate main yet we can't expect decks to have to deal with enchantments?
Maybe a plus would be that puresteel and some equipments could see play. That sounds fun artifact lands, opals, chrom mox, puresteel, shikari's, etched champs, dispatch (gets much better), thopter sword combo (gets better), swords, who knows maybe some thoughtcasts/thirsts, and stoic rebuttal (a modern counterspells for UU seems nice with 8+ extra artifacts to make it happen). Who knows with mox opal and Glimmervoids maybe you can even get the red splash going.
The problem isn't enchantments mainboard, it is that particular enchantment that precludes interaction with itself, by making all non-basics produce the color that cannot interact with enchantments. I'm hardly "picking and choosing which decks to allow" (I'm not even fond of Affinity, in spite of prior personal success with it), just trying to get rid of cards that linearize the format and stifle innovation. As far as Skred goes, Mono-Red-Control has been a thing before in many formats, and it will be again. That doesn't make a one-sided Armageddon a good thing to have around!
Artifact Lands are at odds with multi-color decks by their very nature. That's why they didn't see that much play outside Affinity in Extended. That being said, U-based midrange decks DID play them, to enable Thirst For Knowledge and Trinket Mage. They are interesting to build decks around, when not broken, and even in "busted" decks have an innate vulnerability to one-mana LD. I sincerely doubt you'd see many decks without a heavy artifact focus using them at all, much less "all decks trying for metalcraft" for Mox Opal.
Puresteel is exactly the sort of deck they'd enable, albeit one I doubt would be good, for reasons GoST addressed. That's my point with the unbanning - to enable creativity, not to push some Affinity-is-god agenda. The deck that actually worries me with them is KCI, not Affinity, in any case! Even with that worry, that they enable things like Puresteel, Tezzeret, Thopter-Sword, Artifact-Stoneforge-Blade, and so on is a good reason to give them a try in the format. We really don't know how it would shake out, because they have never been legal in the format!
Maybe a plus would be that puresteel and some equipments could see play. That sounds fun artifact lands, opals, chrom mox, puresteel, shikari's, etched champs, dispatch (gets much better), thopter sword combo (gets better), swords, who knows maybe some thoughtcasts/thirsts, and stoic rebuttal (a modern counterspells for UU seems nice with 8+ extra artifacts to make it happen). Who knows with mox opal and Glimmervoids maybe you can even get the red splash going.
I like puresteel paladin, one of my favourite cards in standard back then. But it won't be good regardless even with artifact lands. The deck's engine and power is based on having a 2/2 creature surviving for a turn or more. There's a guy at one of the LGS I go to that plays puresteel. It's nice to see the deck work when the paladin somehow manages to dodge removal but it just falls flat on its face when it's killed right away. Artifact lands don't do anything to help puresteel paladin in that regard.
Optimism is nice but we should also be realistic. If artifact lands make anything good, it won't be puresteel paladin. I highly doubt it'll be any sort of fair deck.
I agree that Paladin is an unlikely deck to be actually good, for the reasons you mentioned. That being said, Artifact Lands do give it a bit of a boost, and that is a good thing for deck diversity.
What unfair decks could utilize the Artifact Lands, really? Is any Tezzeret deck "unfair"? Time Sieve? Thopter-Sword? KCI is a concern, of course, but has a self-limited timer by requiring a critical mass to operate (it is a Turn 4 deck without Second Sunrise). Think about it, and try to come up with some card or interaction that really breaks them. I couldn't, and I have been playing this game competitively for a very long time.
This deck doesn't even have Song or Rite and it's busted.
"OK, ban SSG then". Won't happen, they don't do swap bans. It's a lot easier to leave things the way they are now, given that SSG is not destroying the format, instead of unban Mox, ban SSG, then worry if some other combo deck slipped through the cracks.
That deck is far from busted. It won off the back of Blood Moon as often as not (a card you'll notice I banned in my list), and is very vulnerable to targeted discard, Spell Pierce, Abrupt Decay (on Mox), and many other things, not to mention inconsistent. It is a glass cannon, like Goryo's, and those are never as "busted" as they seem in a vacuum.
In any case, I mentioned it in my original post for a reason - SSG is a very different sort of conditional acceleration than Chrome Mox, and a far less interesting one (IMHO, of course). SSG really only goes in busted combos, or to accelerate out busted lock pieces (Blood Moon, Chalice). Chrome Mox has a far greater drawback than SSG and can go in a far greater range of decks. If having both is a problem - which I doubt, as the CFB video shows, given that deck's weaknesses without having Blood Moon to fall back on post-board - then I'd rather see T1 Bitterblossoms (and I hate Fae!) than SSG-SSG-SSG-Lightning-you-in-end-step...
Because they want a diverse format without over powered decks that dominate the only deck I didn't see for for banning was twin everything else was op
Twin wasn't banned because it was too powerful, it was banned because it was the best thingUR could do, and would always be. There is nothing inherently wrong with Twin. The problem is that you simply won't see any other UR decks as long as it is around. It was banned for diversity, and it worked!
Bans aren't just for power. They are also for format health. Twin is unhealthy, like it or not, just as Pod was, just as Green Sun's Zenith would be, just as Deathrite was, just as Bloodbraid was. Those cards aren't banned for "brokenness". They are banned because they aggressively eliminate competition by being just a bit better than anything else those colors could do. The format is better without them, because you can play other things now!
I hate to admit it as a former twin player myself, but i truly agree with your comment as to why twin was banned and should remain banned. Ever since its banning i can see the cancer like effect it had on the format both locally and at bigger tournaments. I have seen more ur/x decks now then i ever have before and it truely has been more enjoyable to me as a player.
I also hate to say a lot of decks twin suppressed have now started popping up. Some of these decks while extremely creative are just as unhealthy and cancerous one of which is lantern control. Anyone who has either played it or plaued against it should understand my reasoning as to why. I only named this deck as my friend recently lost and raged to it so it was fresh in my mind and playing against a new player who has not tested properly with it is unbelievably annoying imho. I feel without the fact modern used to have "can this deck beat twins turn 4 or stall it enough to win" we will continue to see it both evolve to greater heights and see new and creative decks. While at the same time promoting some greater number of unhealthy decks to prosper then there used to be.
Also i would like to see stoneforge mystic unbanned. I feel it would promote more decks with white to pop up as a more dominant color then just as a splash. Maybe though im just hoping to see mardu and esper decks to take advantage of it. Does anyone think this could get unbanned?
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Standard: No Time
Modern: Jund Midrange BRG
Legacy: Shardless Bug BUG
In response to a rash of reports in this thread today:
Guys, yes, this thread has rules. Yes, they exist for a reason. That reason is not to prevent reasonable and clearly-written discussion of the banlist, the reason we have them is to prevent blatant trolling and flame-wars. We're not going to be infracting some of the completely content-less posts in response to some of the suggestions people have made today, but we're not going to remove their posts either. The point of the banlist thread is to have civil discourse over what people believe the banned list should be and how it should change to improve the format, and that supersedes legalistic interpretation of the rules.
I'm sorry if I am the instigator of such strife. I hope I am being appropriately cordial in my responses and attempt at a civilized discussion - I don't mean to take things off the proverbial rails, but I must admit I may have some trouble if such reactionary responses are the only thing I see.
EDIT: Wait, reading between the lines, have people been reporting me (I assume it is me, based upon what has been said by whom in the last day) for violations? What did I violate, even in a legalistic reading of the guidelines? I'm genuinely curious as to what their motivations of reporting me would be...
Oh, I see, there is a relatively new "dramatically increasing bans" clause that didn't exist in prior such discussions. My bad. I guess I did violate that, in the letter, but I feel I did not in the spirit - my actual bans were only 3 cards targeting specific strategies and a class of cards that only come as one, and my unbans were two relatively uncontroversial ones and two controversial ones. In other words, while I do freely admit to violating the letter of the "no more than 2-3" rule, the only way my particular take on what the banlist could be could work is by doing so, so it doesn't violate the spirit of the rule.
I am sorry to say this but your propositions are absurd and completely inconsistent. First and foremost having "fun" as a ban criteria is dangerous. Fun is inherently subjective and banning because of someone's subjective perception of what is fun is dangerously arbitrary. States have abolished arbitrary jurisdiction for good reason and reinstating that into a game you expect others to have faith in is very narrow minded. But on weg go.
What I mean by "fun" is that there shouldn't be cards that simply prevent the opponent from playing the game. I mean it in the same way WotC did when they made the design decision to weaken land destruction as a strategy. I don't mean it in the sense of "Johnnies gone wild" or anything like that! It isn't really as arbitrary as it seems - it basically means that cards which stifle diversity by suppressing whole strategies while being otherwise ineffective are suboptimal.
The "unfun" bans on my list were really Blood Moon, Chalice of the Void, Stony Silence, and Rest In Peace. The reason is that they suppress most strategies utilizing their respective resources, making it so only one or two decks that do utilize them can actually be viable, and that they have very limited counter-play and interaction by their very natures. Blood Moon and Chalice prevent their own interaction (R can't kill enchantments, Chalice on 1 stops the most commonly boarded removal for itself), while Stony Silence and Rest In Peace make it so only aggressive decks that get under them can effectively utilize artifacts or the graveyard consistently. It is their mere presence in the format that suppresses diversity, whether they are actively being played or not. They are format warping in an insidious way, and I feel that their absence - and replacement by more interactive ways of dealing with their respective realms (Relic, Grudge, Fulminator) - would allow a lot more diversity than is currently viable.
Oh, and Chalice is mainly on the list due to Chrome Mox, Blood Moon also being made more problematic by it (though I feel it should go in any case, as one-card-combos are dangerous).
You basically ban every fast aggro deck to death to make the format slow down, then buff Affinity to unknown levels of broken and carry on unbanning Chrome Mox. That card does a lot but slowing down a format is certainly not one of them. You want to unban it to make midrange etc even with the fast aggro decks which you conventienly just banned out of the format except for Affinity. You also state that Mox would go into basically every midrange, control and tempo deck, which kind of makes this a 56 card format. You seem to not notice or care, but having a card that is obligatory to every deck to compete is format warping and extremely unhealthy. Having Mox in your opening hand is also such a great advantage over others who do not that games often come down to exactly that. Games become more luck based and being on the play with a Mox becomes the most powerful play of Modern.
I didn't "buff Affinity to untold levels" at all!!! I'll say it one more time - ARTIFACT LANDS DON'T REALLY CHANGE AFFINITY AT ALL. THAT IS NOT THEIR DANGER. STOP THINKING IT IS. THAT IS JUST INEXPERIENCE TALKING! I feel that banning Inkmoth Nexus is a far bigger nerf to Affinity - removing one of its potential avenues of attack - than the lands are a buff, and that Stony Silence is far from the only, or most effective, way to fight that deck.
Chrome Mox hardly goes into EVERY midrange and control deck. You are the one saying that, not me. It doesn't even go into many of them! That being said, it does go into more of them than it does combo, and it does give those decks a fighting chance against super-fast linearity - which opens up the "scissors" of the rock-paper-scissors for other, even slower control decks to prey on the Mox-toting decks!
Seriously, what you say makes me doubt that you've ever actually played with Chrome Mox. Not only is it virtually never a 4-of (except in fast mana decks, which lack essential tools in this format in any case), the card disadvantage aspect places a serious constraint on its utility. Mulling to 4 every game is not going to be very good against many decks in a format! Being on the play with a mox, dropping (for instance) a Bitterblossom or Bob, and either getting Thoughtsieze'd or the thing dropped Abrupt Decay'd is going to be very, very bad for most Chrome Mox decks. There will be plenty of times where not playing the Mox is the optimal play!
Why do I say this? BECAUSE I'VE ACTUALLY PLAYED WITH THE CARD IN A NON-LEGACY ENVIRONMENT. Chrome Mox saw virtually no play in Standard and very little play in Extended for a reason. For a long time, the only deck that played it in the latter was All-In-Red, which did so to abuse the silliness of another card that I'd see banned (BM). It only really started seeing play at the very end of that Extended format (before the "Super-Standard" change), and that was in DDT, to accelerate out T1 Bob and to make up for that deck's inherent mana problems (not enough colored sources because of DD itself, old legend rule).
What decks do I think would actually [successfully] play it? UB Tezzeret (with or without Thopter-Sword and/or Bridge), Faeries, UWX midrange, possibly some Stoneblade-type deck, Ad Naus (which is only marginally better, because they can't really play both it and Bloom), and some version of all-in combo (Belcher or otherwise). Four midrange decks, one combo deck, and one existing deck. Those were exactly the decks that played it in Old Extended, and Modern isn't different enough to expect differently - mostly because of the design philosophy change that has prevented additional fast mana from being printed. It won't "speed up the format", because the decks that can best utilize it are inherently slowing forces. It won't be "the best T1 play" because B-based midrange (which won't really play it, outside the aforementioned decks) can really punish that greed. Chrome Mox is a GREEDY card, one which is easily preyed upon!
In other words, I believe your fears to be unfounded, based upon prior [competitive] experience in a similar environment.
Banning cards like Stony Silence also doesn't achieve anything for other artifact decks. When Affinity runs rampant people will play artifact hate and other artifact decks will get to feel that. It doesn't matter if that's Stony Silence, an abundance of Ancient Grudges, Shatterstorm or Creeping Corrosion. Artifact decks will fold to that either way. It's similar with graveyard hate. Dredge is strong, and all graveyard decks will suffer from the hate. If Rest in Peace isn't that good against Dredge people will stop playing it anyway. No need to ban it. Also, being all-in on one strategy is generally a high risk - high reward play. You narrow down the ways you are vulnerable, but if someone packs the right hate you lose. That's why it is important to have multiple ways to win and the reason why decks like Jund aren't easily hated out through sideboard cards.
There are no there cards likeStony Silence. That is the point of the ban. It is the only card that actually completely shuts down artifacts, and only artifacts, in an ongoing and hard-to-interact-with way. The closest comparison is Suppression Field, but that card has its own counterplay built-in (fetch interaction, the ability to pay). Other artifact hate is much less damaging than Stony Silence, because it is targeted - Pithing Needle and Ancient Grudge are both much more limited in scope and much more interactive by forcing a choice. They can be misplayed. They can be played around. Stony Silence (and Rest In Peace) just say "NO", with no such potential interaction.
It isn't about being all-in on one strategy, it is about eliminating entire categories of strategy. Why would you play any graveyard deck other than Dredge (which can win around it) if Rest In Peace is a commonly played sideboard card to combat dredge? Why play any other artifact deck when Stony Silence can shut down your ability to make mana? Those cards are format warping whether they are being played or not, because of their finality and lack of meaningful interaction. They limit the decks that can utilize their respective resources to the most linear, degenerate ones, and they aren't particularly good against those. Their presence creates a feedback loop of non-interactivity, and getting rid of them would dispel it, encouraging the sideboarding of narrower, more interactive answers to the issues.
I don't think anyone wants Dredge to be the only graveyard-based deck, or Affinity the only artifact deck, but that is exactly what these broad catch-all answers do. The graveyard is a resource in this game, and using that resource is an interesting part of the game. Rest In Peace discourages that, whereas Relic, Spellbomb, Trap, and others do not to nearly the same degree, being single-time-use effects that can be played around and interacted with. Same goes for Stony Silence and artifacts. Ongoing "NO" enchantments simply aren't healthy for the game, because they limit what can be done with those resources. They are format-warping. That is bad, in the same way Twin was bad.
As far as "multiple ways to win" goes, I agree, but the truth is that dedicating yourself to a graveyard or artifact strategy is going to severely limit your options as far as alternative win methods go. The 60-card limit ensures that. Jund is the paragon of a "fair deck", in that it is archetypical good-stuff-midrange. A format that is made of nothing but good-stuff decks is just as degenerate and boring as one dominated by hyper-linearity - Alara standard anyone? I believe that getting rid of the most egregious ongoing effects that affect diversity - that limit the resources one can effectively utilize while simultaneously being extremely difficult to interact with - acts as a bulwark against the format becoming nothing but a "good stuff" one. That's pretty much the whole point of the bans and unbans - limit the linearity while suppressing the ability of good stuff to dominate what remains...
You seem to be stuck in the ages of Extended and ignore a lot of what has happened since then. The plans you have for Modern would not lead to the vision you have for it.
Not at all - I did play a lot of Extended back in the day, but that format had its own issues. I just use my experiences there as a point of comparison for the actual power of the cards I wish were available.
I still see no coherent argument from you as to why my changes would cause the problems you state. How, exactly, am I mistaken in my interpretation? Give me some solid examples, and I'll change my mind. I am far from personally convinced that I am completely correct in my assessment. That being said, the only responses I have seen thus far are "No, Affinity Broken" and "Chrome Mox will be speed city", both of which my personal experience tells me would certainly not be the case!
Skullclamp [...] a card you'll note I didn't even bother with explaining why I wouldn't unban
Good for you! *slow clap*
Now that is just rude, dismissive, and generally in poor taste. How about you actually consider what I wrote, rather than slyly dismissing it as being beneath you?
Many people seem to think the Artifact Lands are problematic, but they rarely want to expound upon that. They just take it as a given, as gospel. It makes me really wonder if any of them have actually played with them in a wide format before!
I actually addressed that point - in what way are Artifact Lands "problematic" in the current Modern? There are two specific decks that could seriously abuse them - Affinity and KCI Eggs. I don't think Modern "Robots" as it stands now would really gain much benefit from the lands, even losing Inkmoth - they'd just replace the Inkmoths with Great Furnace, and Ravager and Plating get a tiny boost, while they lose their ability to Infect someone out with the manland. Oh, and they'd have the opportunity to replace Memnite with Frogmite, but I doubt they would - it would weaken Springleaf Drum openings. It would be far from a huge change!
KCI is another deal, and one which I addressed in the "cards to watch" section. I actually tried to make the deck work in a "No Ban Modern" setting, and it really wasn't as effective as you'd think - it gains around half a turn over current eggs builds, at the expense of having a bigger weakness to artifact removal (getting a land blown up).
So again I ask, what about the Artifact Lands is really so "problematic", as you put it? They do, after all, have an inherent drawback.
As far as banning Stony Silence, I'm not going to repeat myself - basically, I don't feel that the card is very healthy, because it isn't an "answer", but a "punishment". It isn't interactive, and in any case, the Artifact Lands biggest weakness is vulnerability to destruction, something that non-static-enchantment cards do fine. Getting your T1 land drop Nature's Claimed isn't exactly going to lead to a successful game!
Also, how did I "basically ban Infect as a deck"? I want to make it less consistent and more vulnerable, not ban it out of existence. Inkmoth is their "catch-all" card, the one that pushes the deck from a risky all-in strategy into "near-OP" territory. Become Immense is problematic for other decks, as well. Taking those two away would injure the deck, but it would far from ban it out of the format - it would still be a viable strategy! If you wanted to ban the deck, you'd ban Glistener Elf and/or Blighted Agent. Banning Inkmoth just means they have to run more infect creatures (Ichorclaw Myr being the most likely candidate), reducing their consistency further. It drops the deck down to a reasonable power level, that is all. It basically becomes comparable (still better than, but more similar) to the current Prowess/Kiln Fiend + pump spells deck, which is far from broken.
Not really, because it isn't for "free". There is a tradeoff - with my list, they'd lose one "combo kill" (losing Inkmoth Nexus), but potentially gain another (Disciple of the Vault). The thing is, they just don't have that much room - they'd effectively go from ~12 sources of colored mana (all of any color) to ~14-18 (4-8 of single colors), which isn't really much of a change at all. So they can cast Master of Etherium (which has gone out of favor in any case) and Galvanic Blast a little more consistently. Big deal. They can't infect you out anymore. Don't get me wrong, it is a change, but on the whole I think it is a wash - they are trading one set of advantages for another.
The thing is, I actually played affinity back in Old Extended, and Standard, and Block, back in the day. I remember the deck at its most broken - the Skullclamp days (a card you'll note I didn't even bother with explaining why I wouldn't unban). I've played it in Modern, and current Legacy versions. The Artifact Lands are good in it, and they do add a little bit of color consistency, but they also aren't really that OP in the deck. They are good. They are also an occasional liability (Ancient Grudge your land on the draw).
Ever since the printing of Springleaf Drum, color consistency hasn't been a huge issue for Artifact Aggro decks (I'm including Tempered Steel variations in this category), and Mox Opal made it even less of an issue. If Inkmoth wasn't banned, I don't think they'd even run more than 4-6 of them in current builds, replacing the Darksteel Citadels with Furnace or Seat for that little bit of extra consistency. It wouldn't speed the deck up, or even make it appreciably more powerful. It would make it better, but marginally so!
I didn't come up with that list lightly. There are a lot of moving pieces involved - for instance, banning Stony Silence to make the Artifact Lands playable in decks other than Affinity/KCI, banning Blood Moon so that Affinity can't abuse it like they used to (the Artifact is a supertype thing), unbanning Chrome Mox and SFM to give tempo/control decks a bit of a boost, and so on. The changes work together to make more decks viable, and to make the obvious decks (Affinity, Dredge, and Infect chief among them) easier to combat through careful strategy rather than single-card-reliance. Is it perfect? No. I just feel that it would be better than the current format, where super-hyper-uber-linear decks are by far the most capable, and where certain sideboard cards negate entire classes of strategies!
Infect would not survive in the current format, in its current incarnation, at its current power level without Inkmoth. I agree. So what. It isn't exactly an interesting deck. If you wanted to play it, you still could, and it would still work - it just wouldn't be "one of the most powerful things" anymore. It would be relegated to what it really is - an all-in strategy with high risk-reward - rather than to what it has become - one of the banes of an interactive format. Do you really LIKE what Infect is right now? It is basically old-school Stompy, but with a permanent Berserk on every creature and a manland to back it up. It is not a "skill testing" deck or strategy. It isn't interactive. Is that a good thing for format health?
This is modern
Why banned any cards....
I would like to retract my statement. Lol
Twin wasn't banned because it was too powerful, it was banned because it was the best thing UR could do, and would always be. There is nothing inherently wrong with Twin. The problem is that you simply won't see any other UR decks as long as it is around. It was banned for diversity, and it worked!
Bans aren't just for power. They are also for format health. Twin is unhealthy, like it or not, just as Pod was, just as Green Sun's Zenith would be, just as Deathrite was, just as Bloodbraid was. Those cards aren't banned for "brokenness". They are banned because they aggressively eliminate competition by being just a bit better than anything else those colors could do. The format is better without them, because you can play other things now!
Unpacking, a bit at a time, now that you've gone back and added things:
SSG and Opal are on the watchlist because they serve different functions than Chrome Mox. They act differently, and go in different decks. Not all fast mana cards are made equal! I feel I must ask if you've ever actually played in a format with those cards, because it seems clear to me that you don't understand how they actually work in real formats. Chrome Mox simply isn't a combo card, at least not in formats lacking draw 7's. Combo decks struggle for card advantage, and Chrome Mox is more disadvantage than SSG. Chrome Mox is a midrange/tempo/control card, allowing them to "catch up" (gain tempo) with proactive decks at the cost of card advantage. There are of course exceptions (Belcher in Legacy is the most obvious), but they are rare and usually require some form of extreme draw effect that doesn't exist in Modern. All-in-Red, for instance, is the archetypical "Chrome Mox Deck". It was a control/tempo deck. Chrome Mox can enable degenerate things with cards like KCI, true, but I don't think that is nearly as big of a risk as you seem to - most likely because I've actually played with the cards before. SSG is risky because it is both instant speed and because it gives a potential "critical mass" of fast mana that could enable something like Belcher. I think Chrome Mox is a more interesting, more diverse card, and if the combination of SSG and Chrome Mox is too much, I'd rather see the Ape go!
Bloood Moon, Stony Silence, and Rest In Peace don't "punish greedy decks". They define what the qualities of what a potentially successful deck can be. They also don't do a very good job of policing linear decks that use the cards they are targeting - Blood Moon doesn't auto-beat Tron, Stony Silence doesn't auto-beat Affinity, RiP doesn't auto-beat Dredge - because those decks can get under them. They limit artifact and graveyard decks to aggressive ones, because those are the ones that can win through the hate. They reduce diversity while not actually being all that effective at stopping the things they are nominally supposed to stop. They are also far from the only options to police, and by far the least interactive options. They don't "police" the format, they define it. That isn't a good thing, in my mind!
I've already gone into why Affinity wouldn't benefit nearly as much as you seem to think, above. There was Affinity hate before Stony Silence, and there are plenty of ways to combat it now even banning it. All banning SS does is allow non-Affinity artifact decks a chance to compete, because they don't have to risk an auto-loss to a card that isn't even that amazing against the deck people keep it in their sideboard to hate!
I think my explaining isn't making sense because you are trying to look at each change in a vacuum, to look at it from the point of view of what things are currently like, not to what they would be with the changes. For instance, Faeries is not a good deck right now, because it is half a turn too slow to really compete with Infect (basically gone) and Affinity (largely the same), but Chrome Mox (especially combined with Ancestral Visions) could easily change that. It would have a very good game against Affinity, just as it always has. URX Control would gain both a good card advantage spell (Thirst for Knowledge + Artifact Lands + Chrome Mox) and a solid finisher (Jace), and it has always had a lot of tools against Affinity (Electrolyze). KCI would become a real deck. Ad Nauseum would gain consistency and perhaps a bit of speed (around .25 turns). Tron would gain meta share, just because Blood Moon wouldn't be a risk, which would counter the Fae/UX rise, seeing that it naturally preys on those decks. Dredge would have to reconfigure, but would probably stick around in some form. CoCo wouldn't have to risk RiP anymore, but otherwise stays the same - but has trouble with U control, again. WX Stoneforge decks would be a wildcard. And so on.
My changes would be a tectonic shift in the format, but one that would favor the kinds of decks that modern has never really seen successful yet. It would slow the format down considerably, but also open it up to a number of strategies that are currently suppressed by the dominance of super-linear decks and overpowered hate cards.
I've been on Skred the last two fnm's for modern and you can't tell me blood moon doesn't punish people for greedy mana bases and I'm not even talking Tron. I'm crushing jund, jeskia, eldrazi... I see no reason why one shouldn't be able to play moon in modern when when people are on 3-4 color mana bases and counting on fetches/shocks. You want to change up the format ban fetches and see where you're really at.
Sorry if my attention to detail and attempt at clarification irks you. I write on a computer, not a phone, in any case, and will fully admit that I can ramble on a bit on occasion...
In any case, the card disadvantage aspect of Chrome Mox in control/midrange/tempo has to be offset. It requires a certain way of building the deck to accommodate the CA loss. The best example of this is probably the old Dark-Depths-Thopter deck - it ran Dark Confidant to make up for the CA loss. Chrome Mox is a "tradeoff" card, trading CA for tempo, which makes it quite different to SSG and Mox Opal - they are purely tempo cards, with no inherent disadvantage other than their transience and deck building limitations. That is why I think it is interesting!
The decks I see it being most successful in (other than Ad Naus, where it is replacing a lesser version of a similar effect) are ones that run Ancestral Vision. The two cards play off nicely against each other - AV trades tempo for CA, and CM does the opposite. Also, additional AV's are perfect to imprint on the Mox. That's how it was used in Old Extended, which was basically Modern through Alara, and it was not widely played in any case until DDT destroyed that format. I get that it is hard to see how the card works if you have never played with it before - it looks much stronger than it actually is - but the sort of CA/Tempo/Deck-building tradeoffs it encourages are exactly what is needed to widen Modern from the "mutual goldfishing" format it has become.
Oh, and All-in-Red is another reason to get rid of Blood Moon if you are to introduce Chrome Mox. That was a control deck that depended entirely on the disruptive power of Blood Moon to make up for its complete lack card advantage. Seeing T1 Blood Moon off Chrome Mox and SSG is not something anyone really wants. I'd rather see Chrome Mox in the format than Blood Moon, because it allows for lots of interesting things, but I'm sure there are some who'd disagree.
As far as having to swap one ban for another, that isn't actually a problem. There is a definite goal to it - it isn't that I'm just "shuffling things around to get to the same place", it is that I'm trying to move the format towards one where there is room for both linear, proactive strategies and nonlinear, reactive ones. Most of the cards on the "watch" list will not be problems, but the ones that are - if any - are more damaging to the format than the unbans. Artifact Lands, for instance, fit into many decks and lead to interesting deck-building tradeoffs, as does Chrome Mox, while KCI, SSG, Cranial Plating, and their ilk really only fit into singular decks with a super-linear method of operation. I'd prefer to see the "WIDE" cards unbanned and the "NARROW" ones banned, if it comes to that - but honestly, I don't really think it would come to that. Encouraging and supporting control and midrange strategies naturally fights linear ones, limiting the damage they can do. Right now, those types of decks don't have the tools to keep up with the linear decks. I believe my changes could improve that situation.
As far as your last suggestion, that was a format that existed. It was called Extended. I've referenced it numerous times. They killed it, twice - once by moving it to a "double standard" format, then again by introducing Modern. It isn't coming back. Modern is now, and will remain, a non-rotating format. So we have to look at it now and try to open it up - which is what my changes would do, or at least so I'm arguing. Bans open up formats just as well as unbans (Twin proved that, albeit with the Eldrazi hiccup), but they sometimes require tradeoffs.
I guess the real question is: "What is your definition of opening the format up?" What would you, KTROJAN, change to move the format away from the "linear decks passing in the night" nonsense it is right now?
See, that is basically the same deck as old All-In-Red, at least in strategy. You seem to be laboring under the misapprehension that you are "policing the format" by "punishing them greedy manabases" (by which I take it you mean expensive). You aren't. You are playing a high-risk "bully" deck that leans on ONE CARD for its entire ability to interact with the majority of opponents. You are playing, in essence, a combo deck with a single-card combo. If you take Blood Moon out of Skred Red, the deck ceases to exist. It is a boring deck!
If it were easy to maindeck cards to deal with Blood Moon, that would be another thing, but it is an ENCHANTMENT. It makes all mana RED. Which means that it makes all non-basic mana unable to deal with it. It inherently limits its own options to counterplay. The card was designed in 1995! It is from THE DARK! There is a good reason they don't make cards like it anymore - they aren't good cards for diversity. It comes down, and you get to play as though you were mana screwed the rest of the game. So your choice is either play a deck that doesn't fold to Blood Moon - inherently weakening your deck against all non-BM decks - or to hope you drew your instant-speed way to remove it in time...
Decks like Skred Red exist at odds with the nature of the format as a whole. They are inherently unhealthy, because they aim to stop their opponent from playing not through skill, but through spite. I do see why some people find that attractive, but really, can you honestly say that you were playing the same game as your opponents when you played that deck? If not, then there's your answer about Blood Moon. It is either too powerful, or it does nothing, and by its very existence it allows for a degenerate type of play. Kinda like Dredge, but without the potential interactions and inherent limitations of being creature-based.
As far as banning fetches go, that isn't going to happen, and it would actually only make the Blood Moon situation worse. A format with Blood Moon and without a reliable way to get basics into play would be a nightmare! If you banned fetches AND Blood Moon, it could be interesting, but in the end I don't think you'd really see much of a difference - you'd see a fair amount more of Mana Confluence, and you'd see fewer single-card splashes, and you'd see far less basics in general (just Path to Exile and Ghost Quarter fodder), but the mana would be very similar. Well, and Burn would take a hit, with everyone starting on 16 rather than 14!
This is true! Instead of several variants of a good deck and an additional collection of competent and competitive decks, we have a whole bunch of bad decks and a handful of OK decks!
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
Affinity already runs mox opals. and would welcome a card like this that lets them redump their hand after a board wipe. If I'm an affinity player having these cards means I can always force the following choice: pay three life or the game ends in a draw. It's the kind of interaction that ruins a tournament. Players shouldn't have to decide if they are enough ahead to take 3 damage for the right to keep playing.
Let me get this straight. You want to buff affinity by giving them artifact lands AND take away stony silence. Cmon man... Does this make any sense?
Decks I'm playing in Modern right now:
URB Grixis Reveler (http://www.mtgvault.com/supast4r7/decks/modern-grixis-reveler/)
UB Faeries (http://www.mtgvault.com/supast4r7/decks/ub-fae-2/)
UW Azorious Control (http://www.mtgvault.com/supast4r7/decks/modern-ojutai-control-2/)
The Splinter Twin ban didn't prove that it could open up the format, because it just sent the format into even greater linearity than before.
You are correct on Extended, however. Rotation really only works for Standard. Especially because two of the purposes of rotation that apply to Standard do not apply to Extended:
1) It allows them to better test cards. When you have a smaller pool, it's easier to catch potentially problematic interactions. This is not the case for Extended, which they didn't test for anyway.
2) It reduces the need for bannings if they do underrate some interaction. Something is a little overpowered? Not to worry, it'll be gone soon enough anyway. Extended could take much longer to get rid of the troublesome cards via rotation.
Sure, those two problems also apply to Modern (lack of testing, no rotating out of problematic cards) but Modern also doesn't suffer from the disadvantages of rotation that Extended did (well, unless you count some of the bannings as an artificial rotation). Extended was taking the things people don't like about rotation in Standard (e.g. not getting to keep your deck for that long) but striking out some of the things that were good about rotation in Standard.
Blood Moon can be played around and even if it does lock you out (which is not a problem in and of itself, I think prison decks have a right to exist), you still have the chance of drawing a basic land, unless you have zero basic lands in which case that's your own fault.
I'm not sure why a card being designed back in 1995 is a strike against it. Ball Lightning was printed in that set originally, but no one would claim Ball Lightning is a problem. Besides, I consider a major part of the appeal of a larger format to play with cards they wouldn't print nowadays due to a different design philosophy, and in fact am disappointed Modern doesn't go back further for that reason.
Which is why Blood Moon completely dominated when it was Standard legal in 9th Edition, when there weren't fetchlands... oh wait, no, it actually didn't see that much play. See, it turns out that while Blood Moon may hose the opponent more easily if they don't have fetchlands, it makes it way harder to actually use it effectively. Most decks that run Blood Moon are in multiple colors and rely heavily on the fetchlands in order to prevent themselves from getting screwed out of the game by Blood Moon. Without fetchlands, you'll actually see a dramatic reduction in Blood Moon usage because so few decks would be able to actually use it. Skred Red is one of the few that would retain it, but by limiting yourself to one color you bring in a lot of your own weaknesses, which is one of the reasons you generally don't see that much from Skred Red.
Opening up all artifact mana and getting rid of stony just allows all decks to try for meatalcraft. We really want a bunch of mox opals and etched champions everywhere? Then we can have all decks run artifact hate main yet we can't expect decks to have to deal with enchantments?
Maybe a plus would be that puresteel and some equipments could see play. That sounds fun artifact lands, opals, chrom mox, puresteel, shikari's, etched champs, dispatch (gets much better), thopter sword combo (gets better), swords, who knows maybe some thoughtcasts/thirsts, and stoic rebuttal (a modern counterspells for UU seems nice with 8+ extra artifacts to make it happen). Who knows with mox opal and Glimmervoids maybe you can even get the red splash going.
EDIT: I forgot you wanted SFM unbanned too! So def a 4 of with a Batterskull there for another amazing t2 play!
In response to a rash of reports in this thread today:
Guys, yes, this thread has rules. Yes, they exist for a reason. That reason is not to prevent reasonable and clearly-written discussion of the banlist, the reason we have them is to prevent blatant trolling and flame-wars. We're not going to be infracting some of the completely content-less posts in response to some of the suggestions people have made today, but we're not going to remove their posts either. The point of the banlist thread is to have civil discourse over what people believe the banned list should be and how it should change to improve the format, and that supersedes legalistic interpretation of the rules.
Yes, I am a local area mod.WELP. GOOD LIFE CHANGES ALL HAPPEN AT ONCE AND SOME ARE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVEPrimary Decks:
Modern: Esper Draw-Go
Legacy: RUG Lands
EDH: Sidisi turn-3 storm
I am sorry to say this but your propositions are absurd and completely inconsistent. First and foremost having "fun" as a ban criteria is dangerous. Fun is inherently subjective and banning because of someone's subjective perception of what is fun is dangerously arbitrary. States have abolished arbitrary jurisdiction for good reason and reinstating that into a game you expect others to have faith in is very narrow minded. But on weg go.
You basically ban every fast aggro deck to death to make the format slow down, then buff Affinity to unknown levels of broken and carry on unbanning Chrome Mox. That card does a lot but slowing down a format is certainly not one of them. You want to unban it to make midrange etc even with the fast aggro decks which you conventienly just banned out of the format except for Affinity. You also state that Mox would go into basically every midrange, control and tempo deck, which kind of makes this a 56 card format. You seem to not notice or care, but having a card that is obligatory to every deck to compete is format warping and extremely unhealthy. Having Mox in your opening hand is also such a great advantage over others who do not that games often come down to exactly that. Games become more luck based and being on the play with a Mox becomes the most powerful play of Modern.
Banning cards like Stony Silence also doesn't achieve anything for other artifact decks. When Affinity runs rampant people will play artifact hate and other artifact decks will get to feel that. It doesn't matter if that's Stony Silence, an abundance of Ancient Grudges, Shatterstorm or Creeping Corrosion. Artifact decks will fold to that either way. It's similar with graveyard hate. Dredge is strong, and all graveyard decks will suffer from the hate. If Rest in Peace isn't that good against Dredge people will stop playing it anyway. No need to ban it. Also, being all-in on one strategy is generally a high risk - high reward play. You narrow down the ways you are vulnerable, but if someone packs the right hate you lose. That's why it is important to have multiple ways to win and the reason why decks like Jund aren't easily hated out through sideboard cards.
You seem to be stuck in the ages of Extended and ignore a lot of what has happened since then. The plans you have for Modern would not lead to the vision you have for it.
Also:
Good for you! *slow clap*
My Modern Decks:
BGWAbzan MidrangeWGB
UWRJeskai NahiriRWU
BRUGrixis ControlURB
I like puresteel paladin, one of my favourite cards in standard back then. But it won't be good regardless even with artifact lands. The deck's engine and power is based on having a 2/2 creature surviving for a turn or more. There's a guy at one of the LGS I go to that plays puresteel. It's nice to see the deck work when the paladin somehow manages to dodge removal but it just falls flat on its face when it's killed right away. Artifact lands don't do anything to help puresteel paladin in that regard.
Optimism is nice but we should also be realistic. If artifact lands make anything good, it won't be puresteel paladin. I highly doubt it'll be any sort of fair deck.
Twin's existence precluded any other UR tempo deck's existence. The only argument for its inclusion is power level alone, which isn't why they banned it. This comes off as just sour grapes - you liked Twin, so you wanted it around. The fact that twin could run ~12 non-land cards different between build is exactly why it discouraged deck diversity - it was effectively a one-card combo that forced you to run suboptimal threats otherwise. Most combos require far more than 8 slots to implement. Yes, I see the "cavalcade of so-called mediocre decks" as an improvement, because they don't all operate the same.
This is the same fallacy that Athreos, God of Passage and Karmic Justice engendered. Because the opponent gets to choose what cards you keep and which to take damage from, they will keep you from "redumping your hand after a board wipe". It works in magical christmas land, but in reality such cards never actually make any impact.
I'm not going to repeat myself - did you actually READ any of what I wrote, or just look at the list and jump to conclusions? TLDR, Affinity isn't the deck that Artifact lands are dangerous in (they'd only run 4-8 of them, replacing the existing one and Inkmoth if it were banned), and Stony Silence isn't the best way to fight Affinity. All SS does is suppress non-aggro artifact decks while not sufficiently punishing aggro ones, leading to a narrowing of the format. See previous posts for a better explanation. Feel free to disagree, but don't jump to conclusions based upon gut instinct - think it out, please.
http://www.channelfireball.com/videos/the-modern-banned-series-chrome-mox/
This deck doesn't even have Song or Rite and it's busted.
"OK, ban SSG then". Won't happen, they don't do swap bans. It's a lot easier to leave things the way they are now, given that SSG is not destroying the format, instead of unban Mox, ban SSG, then worry if some other combo deck slipped through the cracks.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
The Twin ban wasn't what sent it into greater linearity than before - the format was already well on its way there - it was the printing of new cards for a Standard environment that interacted with the old cards in such a way to create this super-linear environment.
Look at what pushed Infect and Dredge into T1, and enabled Shadow Zoo - Blossoming Defense, Become Immense, Temur Battle Rage, and Prized Amalgam. Those were all printed in the last 14 months, so only two of them were actually legal along with Twin. Affinity hasn't changed since then, other than minor adaptations for the meta.
As far as the two "Standard Problems" you stated, those apply even more to Modern than they would to Extended if it still existed. Why? Because it is a WIDER, Non-Rotating format! The two most contentious cards on my list - the Artifact Lands and Blood Moon - are from the oldest and fourth oldest sets in the format, respectively. The Artifact Lands are kept banned for the same reason Bitterblossom was - reactionary memory of prior Standard dominance - not due to any actual testing. Blood Moon is kept legal for much the same reason, except in reverse - it "hasn't been a problem card before" (except it has, in Old Extended, and was under ban discussion then), so it "isn't a problem now"...
I'm not advocating for the return of Extended, merely some of the more positive aspects of Rotation - namely that single-card strategies from early sets in the format can suppress the creation of new strategies as long as they exist. Modern is a much wider format than Extended, really - right now, Extended would be, what, Zendikar to Kaladesh? That sounds like a much less interesting format!
Once again, reactionary thinking. Blood Moon is hardly the only prison card available, it is merely the most powerful one (other than arguably Ensnaring Bridge, which I addressed before), the least interactive one (by supressing its own interaction and acting as a one-sided Armageddon), the oldest one, and the one that acts on an axis that attacks the very nature of the format. It isn't just that it was designed in 1995, it is that it is a HATE CARD designed in 1995. There were no fetches, there were no utility non-basics, and there was no such concept as "deck diversity" when it was designed. It was originally designed as a pure FLAVOR card, without thought to interactions! It is one of what, 3 cards from The Dark to ever see non-forced play? There is a reason for that!
Limiting yourself to one color is the very reason Blood Moon is a problem - it can't REALLY be played around if you are to have a significant non-basic mana base. The format is one where power trumps simplicity, so trying to advocate for decks with more basics is a lost cause - in order for a deck to be powerful enough to really compete, it must be multi-color (or at least run utility lands), leaving it vulnerable to Blood Moon. In order to be consistent enough, it must rely on those non-basics to cast its spells, leaving it even MORE vulnerable. When BURN of all decks is one of the most vulnerable to Blood Moon, that tells you a lot about the silliness of the card!
There is also the budget issue, which I am loathe to address, but Blood Moon does make it much worse. One of the biggest financial problems of Modern is the cost of mana bases, mostly due to the Fetch-Shock thing. The thing is, Fetches are the only way to reliably get basics into play in most decks. It is more than possible to build a much cheaper, almost-as-effective mana base without them, but then you fold to Blood Moon. In other words, Blood Moon is pushing the format even harder into the very thing the "ban the fetches" folks think is a problem!
Oh, and it wasn't a problem in Standard because Standard WASN'T MODERN!!! It wasn't a format dominated by a large number of non-basics, because there simply weren't that many non-basics available to play! That being said, it did see play in that Standard, and a lot of it. Why? To fight Tron and Cloudpost. Which decks played it? Mostly Affinity and Goblins! At the time, there were a lot of complaints about the card, even in Standard. It was too good at what it did, and didn't support much interaction - they only out was Oblivion Stone, since the majority of decks played one-mana artifact-only hate instead of Naturalize. In other words, it was a problem in Standard, just not as big of one. That hardly matters when discussing its position in Modern...
The problem isn't enchantments mainboard, it is that particular enchantment that precludes interaction with itself, by making all non-basics produce the color that cannot interact with enchantments. I'm hardly "picking and choosing which decks to allow" (I'm not even fond of Affinity, in spite of prior personal success with it), just trying to get rid of cards that linearize the format and stifle innovation. As far as Skred goes, Mono-Red-Control has been a thing before in many formats, and it will be again. That doesn't make a one-sided Armageddon a good thing to have around!
Artifact Lands are at odds with multi-color decks by their very nature. That's why they didn't see that much play outside Affinity in Extended. That being said, U-based midrange decks DID play them, to enable Thirst For Knowledge and Trinket Mage. They are interesting to build decks around, when not broken, and even in "busted" decks have an innate vulnerability to one-mana LD. I sincerely doubt you'd see many decks without a heavy artifact focus using them at all, much less "all decks trying for metalcraft" for Mox Opal.
Puresteel is exactly the sort of deck they'd enable, albeit one I doubt would be good, for reasons GoST addressed. That's my point with the unbanning - to enable creativity, not to push some Affinity-is-god agenda. The deck that actually worries me with them is KCI, not Affinity, in any case! Even with that worry, that they enable things like Puresteel, Tezzeret, Thopter-Sword, Artifact-Stoneforge-Blade, and so on is a good reason to give them a try in the format. We really don't know how it would shake out, because they have never been legal in the format!
I agree that Paladin is an unlikely deck to be actually good, for the reasons you mentioned. That being said, Artifact Lands do give it a bit of a boost, and that is a good thing for deck diversity.
What unfair decks could utilize the Artifact Lands, really? Is any Tezzeret deck "unfair"? Time Sieve? Thopter-Sword? KCI is a concern, of course, but has a self-limited timer by requiring a critical mass to operate (it is a Turn 4 deck without Second Sunrise). Think about it, and try to come up with some card or interaction that really breaks them. I couldn't, and I have been playing this game competitively for a very long time.
That deck is far from busted. It won off the back of Blood Moon as often as not (a card you'll notice I banned in my list), and is very vulnerable to targeted discard, Spell Pierce, Abrupt Decay (on Mox), and many other things, not to mention inconsistent. It is a glass cannon, like Goryo's, and those are never as "busted" as they seem in a vacuum.
In any case, I mentioned it in my original post for a reason - SSG is a very different sort of conditional acceleration than Chrome Mox, and a far less interesting one (IMHO, of course). SSG really only goes in busted combos, or to accelerate out busted lock pieces (Blood Moon, Chalice). Chrome Mox has a far greater drawback than SSG and can go in a far greater range of decks. If having both is a problem - which I doubt, as the CFB video shows, given that deck's weaknesses without having Blood Moon to fall back on post-board - then I'd rather see T1 Bitterblossoms (and I hate Fae!) than SSG-SSG-SSG-Lightning-you-in-end-step...
I hate to admit it as a former twin player myself, but i truly agree with your comment as to why twin was banned and should remain banned. Ever since its banning i can see the cancer like effect it had on the format both locally and at bigger tournaments. I have seen more ur/x decks now then i ever have before and it truely has been more enjoyable to me as a player.
I also hate to say a lot of decks twin suppressed have now started popping up. Some of these decks while extremely creative are just as unhealthy and cancerous one of which is lantern control. Anyone who has either played it or plaued against it should understand my reasoning as to why. I only named this deck as my friend recently lost and raged to it so it was fresh in my mind and playing against a new player who has not tested properly with it is unbelievably annoying imho. I feel without the fact modern used to have "can this deck beat twins turn 4 or stall it enough to win" we will continue to see it both evolve to greater heights and see new and creative decks. While at the same time promoting some greater number of unhealthy decks to prosper then there used to be.
Also i would like to see stoneforge mystic unbanned. I feel it would promote more decks with white to pop up as a more dominant color then just as a splash. Maybe though im just hoping to see mardu and esper decks to take advantage of it. Does anyone think this could get unbanned?
Modern: Jund Midrange BRG
Legacy: Shardless Bug BUG
I'm sorry if I am the instigator of such strife. I hope I am being appropriately cordial in my responses and attempt at a civilized discussion - I don't mean to take things off the proverbial rails, but I must admit I may have some trouble if such reactionary responses are the only thing I see.
EDIT: Wait, reading between the lines, have people been reporting me (I assume it is me, based upon what has been said by whom in the last day) for violations? What did I violate, even in a legalistic reading of the guidelines? I'm genuinely curious as to what their motivations of reporting me would be...
Oh, I see, there is a relatively new "dramatically increasing bans" clause that didn't exist in prior such discussions. My bad. I guess I did violate that, in the letter, but I feel I did not in the spirit - my actual bans were only 3 cards targeting specific strategies and a class of cards that only come as one, and my unbans were two relatively uncontroversial ones and two controversial ones. In other words, while I do freely admit to violating the letter of the "no more than 2-3" rule, the only way my particular take on what the banlist could be could work is by doing so, so it doesn't violate the spirit of the rule.
What I mean by "fun" is that there shouldn't be cards that simply prevent the opponent from playing the game. I mean it in the same way WotC did when they made the design decision to weaken land destruction as a strategy. I don't mean it in the sense of "Johnnies gone wild" or anything like that! It isn't really as arbitrary as it seems - it basically means that cards which stifle diversity by suppressing whole strategies while being otherwise ineffective are suboptimal.
The "unfun" bans on my list were really Blood Moon, Chalice of the Void, Stony Silence, and Rest In Peace. The reason is that they suppress most strategies utilizing their respective resources, making it so only one or two decks that do utilize them can actually be viable, and that they have very limited counter-play and interaction by their very natures. Blood Moon and Chalice prevent their own interaction (R can't kill enchantments, Chalice on 1 stops the most commonly boarded removal for itself), while Stony Silence and Rest In Peace make it so only aggressive decks that get under them can effectively utilize artifacts or the graveyard consistently. It is their mere presence in the format that suppresses diversity, whether they are actively being played or not. They are format warping in an insidious way, and I feel that their absence - and replacement by more interactive ways of dealing with their respective realms (Relic, Grudge, Fulminator) - would allow a lot more diversity than is currently viable.
Oh, and Chalice is mainly on the list due to Chrome Mox, Blood Moon also being made more problematic by it (though I feel it should go in any case, as one-card-combos are dangerous).
I didn't "buff Affinity to untold levels" at all!!! I'll say it one more time - ARTIFACT LANDS DON'T REALLY CHANGE AFFINITY AT ALL. THAT IS NOT THEIR DANGER. STOP THINKING IT IS. THAT IS JUST INEXPERIENCE TALKING! I feel that banning Inkmoth Nexus is a far bigger nerf to Affinity - removing one of its potential avenues of attack - than the lands are a buff, and that Stony Silence is far from the only, or most effective, way to fight that deck.
Chrome Mox hardly goes into EVERY midrange and control deck. You are the one saying that, not me. It doesn't even go into many of them! That being said, it does go into more of them than it does combo, and it does give those decks a fighting chance against super-fast linearity - which opens up the "scissors" of the rock-paper-scissors for other, even slower control decks to prey on the Mox-toting decks!
Seriously, what you say makes me doubt that you've ever actually played with Chrome Mox. Not only is it virtually never a 4-of (except in fast mana decks, which lack essential tools in this format in any case), the card disadvantage aspect places a serious constraint on its utility. Mulling to 4 every game is not going to be very good against many decks in a format! Being on the play with a mox, dropping (for instance) a Bitterblossom or Bob, and either getting Thoughtsieze'd or the thing dropped Abrupt Decay'd is going to be very, very bad for most Chrome Mox decks. There will be plenty of times where not playing the Mox is the optimal play!
Why do I say this? BECAUSE I'VE ACTUALLY PLAYED WITH THE CARD IN A NON-LEGACY ENVIRONMENT. Chrome Mox saw virtually no play in Standard and very little play in Extended for a reason. For a long time, the only deck that played it in the latter was All-In-Red, which did so to abuse the silliness of another card that I'd see banned (BM). It only really started seeing play at the very end of that Extended format (before the "Super-Standard" change), and that was in DDT, to accelerate out T1 Bob and to make up for that deck's inherent mana problems (not enough colored sources because of DD itself, old legend rule).
What decks do I think would actually [successfully] play it? UB Tezzeret (with or without Thopter-Sword and/or Bridge), Faeries, UWX midrange, possibly some Stoneblade-type deck, Ad Naus (which is only marginally better, because they can't really play both it and Bloom), and some version of all-in combo (Belcher or otherwise). Four midrange decks, one combo deck, and one existing deck. Those were exactly the decks that played it in Old Extended, and Modern isn't different enough to expect differently - mostly because of the design philosophy change that has prevented additional fast mana from being printed. It won't "speed up the format", because the decks that can best utilize it are inherently slowing forces. It won't be "the best T1 play" because B-based midrange (which won't really play it, outside the aforementioned decks) can really punish that greed. Chrome Mox is a GREEDY card, one which is easily preyed upon!
In other words, I believe your fears to be unfounded, based upon prior [competitive] experience in a similar environment.
There are no there cards like Stony Silence. That is the point of the ban. It is the only card that actually completely shuts down artifacts, and only artifacts, in an ongoing and hard-to-interact-with way. The closest comparison is Suppression Field, but that card has its own counterplay built-in (fetch interaction, the ability to pay). Other artifact hate is much less damaging than Stony Silence, because it is targeted - Pithing Needle and Ancient Grudge are both much more limited in scope and much more interactive by forcing a choice. They can be misplayed. They can be played around. Stony Silence (and Rest In Peace) just say "NO", with no such potential interaction.
It isn't about being all-in on one strategy, it is about eliminating entire categories of strategy. Why would you play any graveyard deck other than Dredge (which can win around it) if Rest In Peace is a commonly played sideboard card to combat dredge? Why play any other artifact deck when Stony Silence can shut down your ability to make mana? Those cards are format warping whether they are being played or not, because of their finality and lack of meaningful interaction. They limit the decks that can utilize their respective resources to the most linear, degenerate ones, and they aren't particularly good against those. Their presence creates a feedback loop of non-interactivity, and getting rid of them would dispel it, encouraging the sideboarding of narrower, more interactive answers to the issues.
I don't think anyone wants Dredge to be the only graveyard-based deck, or Affinity the only artifact deck, but that is exactly what these broad catch-all answers do. The graveyard is a resource in this game, and using that resource is an interesting part of the game. Rest In Peace discourages that, whereas Relic, Spellbomb, Trap, and others do not to nearly the same degree, being single-time-use effects that can be played around and interacted with. Same goes for Stony Silence and artifacts. Ongoing "NO" enchantments simply aren't healthy for the game, because they limit what can be done with those resources. They are format-warping. That is bad, in the same way Twin was bad.
As far as "multiple ways to win" goes, I agree, but the truth is that dedicating yourself to a graveyard or artifact strategy is going to severely limit your options as far as alternative win methods go. The 60-card limit ensures that. Jund is the paragon of a "fair deck", in that it is archetypical good-stuff-midrange. A format that is made of nothing but good-stuff decks is just as degenerate and boring as one dominated by hyper-linearity - Alara standard anyone? I believe that getting rid of the most egregious ongoing effects that affect diversity - that limit the resources one can effectively utilize while simultaneously being extremely difficult to interact with - acts as a bulwark against the format becoming nothing but a "good stuff" one. That's pretty much the whole point of the bans and unbans - limit the linearity while suppressing the ability of good stuff to dominate what remains...
Not at all - I did play a lot of Extended back in the day, but that format had its own issues. I just use my experiences there as a point of comparison for the actual power of the cards I wish were available.
I still see no coherent argument from you as to why my changes would cause the problems you state. How, exactly, am I mistaken in my interpretation? Give me some solid examples, and I'll change my mind. I am far from personally convinced that I am completely correct in my assessment. That being said, the only responses I have seen thus far are "No, Affinity Broken" and "Chrome Mox will be speed city", both of which my personal experience tells me would certainly not be the case!
Now that is just rude, dismissive, and generally in poor taste. How about you actually consider what I wrote, rather than slyly dismissing it as being beneath you?