Wizards of the Coast (WotC) took action in three formats in today’s scheduled Banned and Restricted list update, tackling Underworld Breach in Modern, hitting two cards in Legacy, and shaking things up with five changes in Pauper.
Modern
The most played and often highest win-rate deck in Modern has been Grinding Breach (usually just Temur, but also stretching into splashing white as well) for most of the time since Mox Opal’s unbanning. The deck can kill on Turn 2, has a consistent gameplan, fights through sideboard hate at a unparalleled level, and can diversify its win conditions to sidestep disruption. After its dominance at the two US Regional Championships and continued success despite being the No. 1 target in Modern, Underworld Breach has been banned in Modern.
The Magic Play Design team is happy with the rest of Modern and didn’t want to take any action when there was so much pressure on the format from Breach. The team will keep an eye on the format, specifically with Energy decks, but will let things evolve now that the apex predator of the format has been removed.
Legacy
Troll of Khazad-dum, the almost-no downside mana fixing and reanimate target, is the latest banning to attempt to tone down the Dimir Reanimator deck in Legacy. WotC continues to look to reel in the power level on the midrange/combo deck that has had a stranglehold on the format for close to two years.
Sowing Mycospawn is the second ban in Legacy, taking away the land denial angle from the Eldrazi/Ancient Tomb decks of the format. By being able to target basic lands and also dig up additional land destruction in the form of Wasteland, Sowing Mycospawn is a bit too powerful and flexible as it can tutor up lands that help find win conditions once mana denial is no longer needed.
While the meta is mostly balanced in play rate and win rate these changes should make the format more enjoyable and lead to more interesting games. Play Design will still monitor the format and keep a close eye on the many Ancient Tomb decks.
Pauper
Pauper is making major changes, hitting three cards from the three most powerful archetypes: Basking Broodscale, Kuldotha Rebirth and Deadly Dispute. Basking Broodscale is simply too oppressive to the format and not a fun experience to play against, according to Gavin Verhey, while the other two bans reduce the power level of certain decks but doesn’t render them obsolete.
The unbans of High Tide and Prophetic Prism are considered “trial bans.” These unbans are an experiment that takes beloved and formerly problematic cards and gives them another shot in the format, with the expectation that if they prove be an issue once again, they will be re-evaluated during the next schedule B&R update. Pauper has evolved a lot since these cards were originally banned, so they will receive a new lease on life for the time being.
Read more about the thought process behind the Pauper changes in Verhey’s writeup where he summarized the Pauper Format Panel’s actions.
All other formats will remain the same for now, with Standard and Pioneer appearing healthy despite the Mice package from Bloomburrow putting up strong numbers in both formats.
The next scheduled B&R update is set for June 30.
Read the official announcement on all formats from WotC.
