No Reservations II, pt. 12c: Weatherlight

{Well, obviously, it's not meant to be taken literally, it refers to any manufacturers of dairy products.¹}

Peacekeeper 213, downgraded from to .

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3-mana 1/1, with an upkeep cost of , why is this so scary? Oh, that's right, it's a , so therefore it must NEVER BE REPRINTED, EVAR, BECAUSE REASONS!!!

{Oh, Time Spiral block, you are time and again proving to be the ultimate argument against The Reserved List.}

Pendrell Mists 214

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I love how WotC took the mana cost of Pendrell Mists as gospel for the Magus. I'll gladly take that as a tacit mea culpa in re this damned List.

{Oh look, an actually difficult choice, because it's an actually interesting and unique card!}

Psychic Vortex 215, with an ultra-rare (pun intended) upgrade from to .

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So, by now, you all should be familiar with my biases against control decks. Thanks to marshmellow, I recently learned the proper name for my views on the subject – that fun should be maximized for all involved, not just for a few, and especially not for just a few at the expense of the rest. However, I'm not so naïve as to think that control isn't an important, necessary part of the game. I just wish it wasn't the go-to strategy for so many, especially since so many of those seem to think that the best place for tournament practice is outside of the more competitive events on MTGO & Arena. You're in the kiddie pool, leave your sharks behind, assholes!


Anyway, with all that in mind, you can understand my reticence towards Psychic Vortex, as it's as near a perfect card draw engine as possible without being completely game-breaking. The last ability is an excellent safety valve, even if it isn't even a real drawback to many decks. Am I worried that Psychic Vortex could break Standard? Of course I am, I'd have to be as insensate as trump to not be. But this card is just too interesting to languish in Listed obscurity, and we can always ban it if it breaks things.

{Isn't there a Jace that does this exact thing?}

Thran Tome 216, downgrade from to , because for 2 out of the top 3 cards of your library, plus an additional for each subsequent activation, is a pretty bad rate.

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Mini-FoF is powerful, yes, but that power is limited but decreased selection and massively increased price. If this proves to be a mistake, I'll happily eat crow live, in front of you all.

{Terry Gilliam, is that you?²}

Tolarian Entrancer 217, downgraded from to .

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It's been a few years since I last read Tolarian Entrancer, so I hope you'll excuse me when I tell you that at first, I thought it triggered off of blocking a creature. If it did that, it'd be infinitely more powerful than what it is now: a 2-mana 1/1 that disincentivizes blocking with anything that won't also die in combat with it. If we had something like Iroas-Blessed Battleaxe, it might be worth it, but as it stands now, on its own, it's in the same tier of cute fodder as Fblthp, the Lost.

{Hey, Erin Campbell, would this make a better Sweet Prince³? I mean, you already run reanimation, so that mana cost is just an easily-ignored suggestion.}

Tolarian Serpent 218

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Look, if I said yes to Psychic Vortex, then of course I'm saying yes to the card that skips the middlemanhand. And yes, Tolarian Serpent has all the same concerns in a graveyard-centric deck as Psychic Vortex, but again, we can always ban it if something breaks.

{Getting pretty fucking tick & sired with this shit.}

Urborg Justice 219

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I consider the Magic Comprehensive Rules, and their attendant Rules Committee, to be paragons, shining examples of how to properly create, maintain, and uphold a code of laws: regular, scheduled revisions, with excisions, repositionings, and tweaks or complete rewrites as needed to meet each new change to the current environment. The United States could learn a thing or 27,000 from them. I daresay there's a lesson in there for every country.


So it pisses me off to no end when WotC just ignores what it's been doing so successfully for over two decades, and sticks with this idiotic idea.⁵ Four examples of similar effects, and that's just off the top of my head! Why is Urborg Justice still Listed? Modern Horizons further proved that The Reserved List's prohibition against "print[ing] again in a functionally identical form" is a stupid, useless LIE!

{Just how scary can 1 damage every turn be? Ok, yes, the Chinese water torture, but that's dubious at best, especially the provenance of its name.}

Urborg Stalker 220, downgraded from to .

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So, why the downgrade, if Rumbling Slum is a ? 5/5 vs 2/4. Yes, Urborg Stalker has all of the same unequal matchup problems that landwalk, fear, and intimidate had, but, at the end of the day, it's just a 2/4 for 4 that plinks heads and faces. And, with the new rules about planeswalkers, it can't even tick them down, so that's just more decreased utility.

{I wanna see someone make Wave.deck.}

Wave of Terror 67

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So, why, if I called for a Standard reprint for Psychic Vortex, am I now going back to supplemental reprinting for another cumulative upkeep card? Well, if you'll notice, Psychic Vortex's cumulative upkeep cost not only doesn't require mana, it's also a benefit, making it almost completely unique. Remember, cumulative upkeep is normally a drawback mechanic, and those have largely been phased out of Standard, for good reason. It's hard to build excitement for a new set when the thing that makes it new also makes it worse than if it didn't have that thing. Also remember that unless there's some exceptional utility to the card with cumulative upkeep, my normal ruling has been to Pile it. Wave of Terror has that exceptional utility.

{DaaNz's comment wins. Errbody else should just go home.}

Well of Knowledge 221

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Well of Knowledge is fun, innocuous, and has the same "everyone cheers" big deck energy as Howling Mine.

{So, that's three now this episode. Great.}

Winding Canyons 222

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You wouldn't think it from all the constant repetition I do, but I really hate repeating myself, unless it's to prove a point.

{Of or relating to yellow or a yellowish color.⁷}

Xanthic Statue 148

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Xanthic Statue is only of interest for two reasons:

1) It's one of only a handful of cards whose name starts with X.

2) It's the origin of one of the lines Karn speaks on Arena.


That's it. It's overcosted garbage that stole a rare slot.

{Footnotes}