Karn's Sylex prevents players from paying life to cast spells or activate non-mana abilities. Is this just to counter fetches and phyrexian spells? I see online that people seem to say it works with Æther Storm. Does this work to make cards like Norn's Annex or Temporal Extortion or Dash Hopes into being really good cards?
Notes: Edited Æther Storm's name for tags to work (putting in the Æ)
Karn's Sylex does prevent players from activating Æther Storm's ability, because that is an actual activated ability of the form [cost]:[effect], which you can see by reading the card's Oracle (official, up-to-date)'s text. Norn's Annex, Temporal Extortion, and Dash Hopes won't be affected in any way, however. Temporal Extortion and Dash Hopes have triggered abilities, that you can recognize by the fact that they start with the word "when"; they ask for a life payment upon resolution of the ability, but that doesn't make them activated abilities. As for Norn's Annex, its ability is of yet another category: it is a static one, and the payment is made as the action of declaring attackers is taken. It's not an activated ability either.
I'm a former judge (lapsed), who keeps up to date on rules and policy. Keep in mind that judges' answers aren't necessarily more valid than those of people who aren't judges; what matters is we can quote the rules to back up our answers. When in doubt, ask for such quotes.
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Karn's Sylex / Norn's Annex