Something to keep in mind is that sometimes the text of a card in another language, when translated, does not necessarily always match the Oracle text, so I believe it is fundamental to ask for it whenever possible.
Oracle text (and hence what you see in English) states that its ability triggers whenever any player casts a non-creature spell. Well, guess what - its Spanish text says that it triggers only when an opponent does so! Quite the powerlevel jump, eh?
Look at the top decks: Gifts Storm, Grixis Shadow, Eldrazi Tron, Scapeshift, Affinity, Jeskai Control, Collected Company, BGx
Out of these Punishing Fire is really only very good against Affinity and Collected Company. Against Eldrazi Tron and Scapeshift it doesn't do much. Against Grixis Shadow, you can use Grove to mess with the opponent's life but Fire itself isn't so good. Against Jeskai and BGx its just ok.
Now out of these decks, only Valakut or Jund would play it but Valakut can't afford to play lands that are not mountains for its combo, and Jund hasn't been doing so well lately anyway. Jund Shadow wouldn't play it because it's not a land that makes you lose life
I think it's no better than the Thopter/Sword combo and look how well that is doing.
From what I remember last time somebody suggested this, unbanning Punishing Fire is essentially equal to banning creature decks...
Lauer: Modern is a format created by players, not developers. So we tend to be hands off, although we try to avoid adding turn-three kills. With Legacy, we sometimes design "answer cards" such as Abrupt Decay being an answer to Counterbalance. When appropriate, we might do that with Modern. But we haven't had to yet.
Note this was from late 2012, hence the "we haven't had to [design "answer cards" for Modern] yet" (which is likely no longer true).
Big thanks, I was trying to remember and coming up with nothing.
In other news, MaRo has confirmed that Faithless Looting is at the time of writing impossible to reprint into Standard because of how Red now has to discard prior to drawing. (Source)
This, however, opens up for the possibility of a version colorshifted into Blue! Would any deck want it? Would it help the format?
Thank you for your work, this is very interesting and will hopefully be of use to the community. The detailed methodology being laid out is highly appreciated as well.
Maybe if you replaced the basic land searching with creating a basic land token of their choice for both you and the player with the exiled land? Can the magic rules allow that?
Strictly speaking land tokens should be possible but MaRo has repeatedly stated that the chance of them ever being made borders on non-existent.
I really hope this new path board wipe helps vs etron/aggro decks but that just makes mana leak look even worse sooner.
It's not any faster to cast than Wrath of God, not uncounterable like Verdict, and putting all your opponent's basics on the field is pretty awful. I'd say the only time that spell will ever be good is if you already have lethal on board; something that rarely happens for a deck wanting to beat in with Colonnades.
I'm not sure what Containment Priest would do in Modern, other than mess up Griselbrand and Dredge decks. The biggest creature problems are almost always cast.
I would also like to see a land that allows you to tap and sacrifice a land to nuke a non-basic with no basic land types. Being able to sac a tapped land would help offset the tempo disadvantage that comes from using lands as lando devices.
I suggested Containment Priest for exactly that reason, it means the player of the Dredge deck would have to respect the card. They can't just dredge it all away and absolutely go for it if their opponent has the mana up. It adds a little more nuance to dredge without someone just playing Rest in Peace and dredge auto-losing and it's potentially even maindeckable as a 1 or 2 of in DnT type decks. I just think it's a really cool card.
Priest is a cool card indeed. It also does work against CoCo...
Unfortunately, the development article detailing the creation of Sand Strangler mentioned Kavu specifically and citing it as unfun to play against and the mirror coming down to who pulled the trigger first, disavows it ever making it to Standard.
I am most pleased with this story. That said, it might have to do with how I enjoy a particular subset of fiction... and this definitely felt like reading about what happens after an Imperium colony wakes up a Necron Tomb World.
The most important (for us) is probably the first one, which refers specifically to Modern and cites the Pro-Tour's existence as directly causal to card bannings. Posting the others for completeness' sake. I know MaRo isn't the be-all end-all but it's not like we have anybody else to go to for additional info/perspective regarding things.
Case in point - you guys know Ruric Thar, the Unbowed?
Oracle text (and hence what you see in English) states that its ability triggers whenever any player casts a non-creature spell. Well, guess what - its Spanish text says that it triggers only when an opponent does so! Quite the powerlevel jump, eh?
From what I remember last time somebody suggested this, unbanning Punishing Fire is essentially equal to banning creature decks...
Big thanks, I was trying to remember and coming up with nothing.
In other news, MaRo has confirmed that Faithless Looting is at the time of writing impossible to reprint into Standard because of how Red now has to discard prior to drawing. (Source)
This, however, opens up for the possibility of a version colorshifted into Blue! Would any deck want it? Would it help the format?
Yes, it was created to fight Counter-Top.
This almost word-for-word the description of Ugin's mind in Revelation at the Eye.
Strictly speaking land tokens should be possible but MaRo has repeatedly stated that the chance of them ever being made borders on non-existent.
Probably from the Ixalan leaks.
Priest is a cool card indeed. It also does work against CoCo...
Unfortunately, the development article detailing the creation of Sand Strangler mentioned Kavu specifically and citing it as unfun to play against and the mirror coming down to who pulled the trigger first, disavows it ever making it to Standard.
The most important (for us) is probably the first one, which refers specifically to Modern and cites the Pro-Tour's existence as directly causal to card bannings. Posting the others for completeness' sake. I know MaRo isn't the be-all end-all but it's not like we have anybody else to go to for additional info/perspective regarding things.