Let's be clear on this: proposing to unban artifact lands is just crazy talk.
Even with all the artifact hate that's already played and is present in the format Affinity is one of the top tier decks, has been for some time in fact, and is the best aggro deck by a wide margin. Personal disregard aside, the deck is about as fair as it is now as it can be allowed to be in Modern and now we are talking about giving them the artifact lands back?!?? Just forget it...
Don't take my word for it, look up Caleb's video.
His conclusion was that Affinity in its present form (Wux metalcraft aggro) is stronger with its present manabase of artifact manlands than it would be with the artifact lands.
Amulet Bloom has proven itself to be dangerous but inconsistent. Its good draws have fundamental turn 3-3.5, which is too fast for the format. However its median draws are fundamental turn 4-4.25, which is fine.
I would vote against bannings but with a very clear statement that they were considered but deemed unnecessary for now, and that the deck is being watched closely.
That said the people that make this call know what hate cards and/or synergies for the deck are coming in Oath and SOI. If Oath included Abolish or something similar, there would be no consideration of a ban. OTOH if SOI is slated to include a new land that would be obnoxious in the deck, then that might make them lean more toward a ban. (And yes, Abolish is better than it looks against ABC).
My expectation is no bannings and maybe some unbannings of the less dangerous cards on the list, with the artifact lands the safest candidates. Caleb from ChannelFireball streamed games where he was playing a hypothetical Modern with artifact lands unbanned, and he was not able to break them.
All that said, I would not be shocked to see a larger banlist, aimed at smashing all the stronger combo and lock decks in the format. I don't think it's likely, but it is possible that we will wake up and see Splinter Twin, Blood Moon, Ensnaring Bridge, Amulet of Vigor and Goryo's Vengeance ALL given the banhammer.
I don't think it's a permanent decline, but the present Standard is just not a good format.
Jace doing exactly what the mythic rarity was always designed to do leaves a bad taste in a lot of people's mouths. But the most powerful manabases since Vivid land/Reflecting Pool/Filter ones mean every deck can play him.
The format has too damn much midrange. I'm a great fan of midrange in moderation but by god do we need a Standard format with a 4 mana hard sweeper again just to give us a break from all the midrange.
The final thing that's missing is decks that attack from a totally unexpected angle, like the Theros-Khans Jeskai Ascendancy deck, or the Scars to Dark Ascension Standard Spirit Tribal Tempo decks (the ones that tried to get two of the 'your other Spirits have hexproof' lord down; this deck became Delver when people realised the Geist/Delver plan was better than the Spirit one). Something you need to quickly recognise your opponent was playing and totally change how you played your deck to beat them. A combo deck with fundamental turn 5 is, IMO, exactly the thing Standard needs right now.
4/4s for 4 in green were never good. Onslaught had the first all-upside one (Ravenous Baloth) and it saw play because of the lifegain and tribal synergies. Coldsnap and Dissension had all-upside 4/4s for 4 in green that were bulk rares.
This card isn't rubbish but it isn't great either.
Erhnam Djinn (a 4/5 not 4/4, but still) was a staple in an early Vintage World Championship list as I recall.
It (like Nettletooth Djinn) were run because they were so strong alongside Armageddon. That says more about Armageddon's power than anything else.
Also, Magic deckbuilders were just bad then (compared to today). Every piece of the Cocoa Pebbles (Enduring Renewal - Goblin Bombardment - 0 mana creature combo, using Necropotence to draw the combo) deck existed when Tempest was released - it wasn't "found" until about 2 years later. Ernham would see a lot less play if the metagame of the day had been subject to as much playtesting as happens now.
I feel old. I remember when a 4/4 for 4 in green, the giant creature color, was good with very little in the way of abilities. Now you get it in colorless (not even a high colorless requirement), and it has a black effect. And you get "green" 5/5s for 5 in colorless with a mainly red (haste is tertiary green I believe, though it may be secondary) and a blue ability (the counter if targeted clause). I realize that it is harder to splash these than the usual generically colorless cards, just like splashing green in a red deck for some finishing beaters, but it seems weird that their answer to colorless's color pie is to just take aspects of all the other colors and mix them in ways you couldn't get outside multicolor normally (ie: a "green" body and cost with a "blue" (maybe crossed in black?) ability tacked on) and at a great value price. For the pricing they basically take the value of if these had been multicolored it feels like the 5/5 for 5 which would not have felt out of place in Timur as 2GUR.
4/4s for 4 in green were never good. Onslaught had the first all-upside one (Ravenous Baloth) and it saw play because of the lifegain and tribal synergies. Coldsnap and Dissension had all-upside 4/4s for 4 in green that were bulk rares.
This card isn't rubbish but it isn't great either.
Clique is enormously better. Flash is a big deal on higher cost creatures, and the rate of the creature is better (a 4/4 is worth 3 mana, and a 3/1 flier about 2.5).
But that doesn't mean this card is bad. After all Brainstorm is the best card in Legacy despite being strictly worse than another card.
My feeling is that this card will be pushed out of Standard and Modern in the short term by all the 4/5 creatures (Tasigur, Siege Rhino and the slightly bigger Gurmang Angler) but once they rotate out of Standard, and/or fall out of favor in Modern, this card should be playable in both formats.
Land is basically 2UR to become a 4/4 that is worse in creature combat. Not great, but it is still an ETB tapped UR land with an upside.
Nissa's Oath will miss more often than people think, though it is solid.
It hits lands, creatures and walkers. It will hit land quite often. Its a green ponder.
It is not a Ponder. It will miss more than you think.
If 60% of your deck are hits, it will still miss 6.4% of the time.
It's also fairly dead lategame if you are in a boardstate where lands are dead.
It's ETB trigger is of a similar power level to Sleight of Hand, which was never a particularly good cantrip. Playable yes, but not actively good and certainly not something to ever compare to Ponder.
This is a painland that can't ever tap for colourless, but counts as basic.
There are not nearly enough basic synergies in Standard to even consider this, IMO. I'd rather play a single-on-colour painland (e.g. Shivan Reef in a RW deck) than Wastes, and single-on-colour painlands are pretty terrible.
Sylvan Library would be cool card. It is good mostly against control when you need specific card let it be some kind of answer or threat as it offers nice library manipulation.
It has way too many rules issues - all corner cases, but the card kinda doesn't work if there's instant speed card draw in the format.
I don't like the idea of refusing to play with him - that only breeds negative feelings. My personal suggestion would be to tell him that you guys do respect the banlist and ask him that when he plays multiplayer EDH with you he abides by the list too. You could also, though, build a deck containing proxies of banned cards and tell him that if he would like to play with those sorts of cards you're happy to play him 1v1 using that deck.
I will say, though, that I get where the guy is coming from - there are some cards on the banlist I don't agree with and there are cards I really want to play in EDH. I'd love to be able to put my Panoptic Mirror, Balance, Mox Pearl and Time Vault in a mono-W deck and EDH to me is a format where things like that should be possible. I know that I'm in the minority on that, though.
Time Vault is probably the card that most needs to be on the banned list. (Agree with you on Pearl and Balance though, both are fairer than Sol Ring).
Mirror is OK to keep banned as the games it is relevant are only fun for one person (even if it's not very good overall).
1) To count your library
2) To create the illusion that you are randomizing your deck, while you are actually intentionally cheating, or fooling yourself that you are randomizing your deck.
Banning it as a practice would make cheating more difficult, and have little impact on the legitimate use (you can count your library without pile shuffling). It wouldn't need to be clamped down upon hard, just a statement "this isn't an acceptable practice, please don't do it again", maybe with a higher penalty at Professional REL.
The unreliability of mana is a key factor in why Magic is fun.
Assuming you have the right amount of lands, the worst 5% of draws are generally pretty unplayable and those games are ruined. Then 60% of the time you get exactly the mana you need or very close to it.
But what is critical is those ~35% of games where you get enough lands and spells to function, but NOT an optimal amount. These are usually the best games of Magic you will encounter.
Anything that fixes the 5% of bad games will ruin the 35% that make up the best games. The price is too high.
I think people are assessing Karlov under the same assumptions we made when (mis)assessing Tarmogoyf.
Back then people said "7/8 for 1G is busted, but it's too much work to make it happen". They didn't consider the scenario that by turn 3 Goyf was often a 1G 3/4 with no effort, or a 4/5 with just a little effort.
And it was the 'just a little effort' side of Goyf that made the card so strong that it is a Modern format pillar and is at least viable in Legacy.
Karlov in Soul Sisters is the 7/8 or 8/9 version of Goyf. Karlov in an Abzan Attrition Legacy port, however, which runs DRS and (maybe) one or two Soul Warden effects might just be a reliable 2 mana 4/4.
2 mana for a 4/4 in hatebear colours is definitely playable in Legacy.
The difference is that goyf gets bigger for just playing magic, playing cards makes goyf stronger. For Karlov you have to play in an exact way, one which doesn't necessarily benefit you all that much.
DRS and Scavenging Ooze are already Legacy viable cards (DRS is the most played creature in the format and the 4th most played card overall, Ooze is fringe playable).
Clearly Karlov hasn't found a home yet but I will continue to watch him. If the tools aren't there now, it's possible that a future printing will get him over the line.
Edit: Ooze sees more play than I thought. 1 copy per 10 decks; higher than Lord of Atlantis and a sliver behind Phyrexian Revoker.
My excitement level at seeing Coastal Tower and friends reprinted with new names for no very good reason makes me want to dub these new CiptT lands "Fartlands."
Agreed. Uncommon? After three years of Guildgates and Refuges? Somebody wants OGW Limited to be about something other than mana-fixing.
I guess the only reason we're seeing them with new names is that the new ones are more generic. Shivan Oasis and Urborg Volcano pretty much limited them to Dominaria.
It is interesting how many cards these manage to be strictly worse than.
Guildgates (there are absolutely no cards that punish the Gate subtype)
Refuges
Checklands
Three unique trilands each (e.g. UB one is worse than the Esper, Grixis and BUG trilands)
Fastlands
I'd add shocklands, tangolands and Revised duals, but sometimes you play one of those and Choke when your opponent brings out a hoser that makes you Boil inside.
In practice, they are also worse than (but not strictly worse than) Vivid lands, filterlands and more.
Still uncommon is the right rarity for them. Common they would appear too often in boosters. Uncommon they only impact Limited but they have the desired impact there.
Don't take my word for it, look up Caleb's video.
His conclusion was that Affinity in its present form (Wux metalcraft aggro) is stronger with its present manabase of artifact manlands than it would be with the artifact lands.
I would vote against bannings but with a very clear statement that they were considered but deemed unnecessary for now, and that the deck is being watched closely.
That said the people that make this call know what hate cards and/or synergies for the deck are coming in Oath and SOI. If Oath included Abolish or something similar, there would be no consideration of a ban. OTOH if SOI is slated to include a new land that would be obnoxious in the deck, then that might make them lean more toward a ban. (And yes, Abolish is better than it looks against ABC).
My expectation is no bannings and maybe some unbannings of the less dangerous cards on the list, with the artifact lands the safest candidates. Caleb from ChannelFireball streamed games where he was playing a hypothetical Modern with artifact lands unbanned, and he was not able to break them.
All that said, I would not be shocked to see a larger banlist, aimed at smashing all the stronger combo and lock decks in the format. I don't think it's likely, but it is possible that we will wake up and see Splinter Twin, Blood Moon, Ensnaring Bridge, Amulet of Vigor and Goryo's Vengeance ALL given the banhammer.
Jace doing exactly what the mythic rarity was always designed to do leaves a bad taste in a lot of people's mouths. But the most powerful manabases since Vivid land/Reflecting Pool/Filter ones mean every deck can play him.
The format has too damn much midrange. I'm a great fan of midrange in moderation but by god do we need a Standard format with a 4 mana hard sweeper again just to give us a break from all the midrange.
The final thing that's missing is decks that attack from a totally unexpected angle, like the Theros-Khans Jeskai Ascendancy deck, or the Scars to Dark Ascension Standard Spirit Tribal Tempo decks (the ones that tried to get two of the 'your other Spirits have hexproof' lord down; this deck became Delver when people realised the Geist/Delver plan was better than the Spirit one). Something you need to quickly recognise your opponent was playing and totally change how you played your deck to beat them. A combo deck with fundamental turn 5 is, IMO, exactly the thing Standard needs right now.
It (like Nettletooth Djinn) were run because they were so strong alongside Armageddon. That says more about Armageddon's power than anything else.
Also, Magic deckbuilders were just bad then (compared to today). Every piece of the Cocoa Pebbles (Enduring Renewal - Goblin Bombardment - 0 mana creature combo, using Necropotence to draw the combo) deck existed when Tempest was released - it wasn't "found" until about 2 years later. Ernham would see a lot less play if the metagame of the day had been subject to as much playtesting as happens now.
4/4s for 4 in green were never good. Onslaught had the first all-upside one (Ravenous Baloth) and it saw play because of the lifegain and tribal synergies. Coldsnap and Dissension had all-upside 4/4s for 4 in green that were bulk rares.
This card isn't rubbish but it isn't great either.
Clique is enormously better. Flash is a big deal on higher cost creatures, and the rate of the creature is better (a 4/4 is worth 3 mana, and a 3/1 flier about 2.5).
But that doesn't mean this card is bad. After all Brainstorm is the best card in Legacy despite being strictly worse than another card.
My feeling is that this card will be pushed out of Standard and Modern in the short term by all the 4/5 creatures (Tasigur, Siege Rhino and the slightly bigger Gurmang Angler) but once they rotate out of Standard, and/or fall out of favor in Modern, this card should be playable in both formats.
It is not a Ponder. It will miss more than you think.
If 60% of your deck are hits, it will still miss 6.4% of the time.
It's also fairly dead lategame if you are in a boardstate where lands are dead.
It's ETB trigger is of a similar power level to Sleight of Hand, which was never a particularly good cantrip. Playable yes, but not actively good and certainly not something to ever compare to Ponder.
Nissa's Oath will miss more often than people think, though it is solid.
There are not nearly enough basic synergies in Standard to even consider this, IMO. I'd rather play a single-on-colour painland (e.g. Shivan Reef in a RW deck) than Wastes, and single-on-colour painlands are pretty terrible.
It has way too many rules issues - all corner cases, but the card kinda doesn't work if there's instant speed card draw in the format.
Let Legacy judges deal with that pain.
Time Vault is probably the card that most needs to be on the banned list. (Agree with you on Pearl and Balance though, both are fairer than Sol Ring).
Mirror is OK to keep banned as the games it is relevant are only fun for one person (even if it's not very good overall).
1) To count your library
2) To create the illusion that you are randomizing your deck, while you are actually intentionally cheating, or fooling yourself that you are randomizing your deck.
Banning it as a practice would make cheating more difficult, and have little impact on the legitimate use (you can count your library without pile shuffling). It wouldn't need to be clamped down upon hard, just a statement "this isn't an acceptable practice, please don't do it again", maybe with a higher penalty at Professional REL.
Assuming you have the right amount of lands, the worst 5% of draws are generally pretty unplayable and those games are ruined. Then 60% of the time you get exactly the mana you need or very close to it.
But what is critical is those ~35% of games where you get enough lands and spells to function, but NOT an optimal amount. These are usually the best games of Magic you will encounter.
Anything that fixes the 5% of bad games will ruin the 35% that make up the best games. The price is too high.
DRS and Scavenging Ooze are already Legacy viable cards (DRS is the most played creature in the format and the 4th most played card overall, Ooze is fringe playable).
Clearly Karlov hasn't found a home yet but I will continue to watch him. If the tools aren't there now, it's possible that a future printing will get him over the line.
Edit: Ooze sees more play than I thought. 1 copy per 10 decks; higher than Lord of Atlantis and a sliver behind Phyrexian Revoker.
It is interesting how many cards these manage to be strictly worse than.
Guildgates (there are absolutely no cards that punish the Gate subtype)
Refuges
Checklands
Three unique trilands each (e.g. UB one is worse than the Esper, Grixis and BUG trilands)
Fastlands
I'd add shocklands, tangolands and Revised duals, but sometimes you play one of those and Choke when your opponent brings out a hoser that makes you Boil inside.
In practice, they are also worse than (but not strictly worse than) Vivid lands, filterlands and more.
Still uncommon is the right rarity for them. Common they would appear too often in boosters. Uncommon they only impact Limited but they have the desired impact there.