Bannings as of October 1st, 2008

[Vazdru]

http://www.highlandermagic.info/index.php?id=bannedlist

Banned:

    * Time Vault

Unbanned:

    * Mind over Matters
    * Library of Alexandria

Watchlist Changes:

    * -

Valid during October 15th, 2008 0:00 CET

Justification follows next weekend!

[Mythrandir]

was hoping for a banned stamp on BTB.

[pyyhttu]

I don't have anything to say about the bannings/unbannings as long as they are justified and documented, and most of all tested out. 

I'm sure they're just good but I'm interested itself about the banning process as it's still unclear: Who are the people that decide of these bannings and on what grounds?

I ask this only because there seems to be inconsistencies between the banning results and banning guide lines described at highlandermagic.info faq (faq number 4).

But let's wait and hear first what they say about the bannings later.

[Thibir]

was hoping for a banned stamp on BTB.

there is no reason for banning back to basics. it doesn´t break format. It is even helping to improve the diversity of decks. you know, without threat from btb, price of progress, blood moons almost everyone would play some 4-5 colour "best-of" decks. don´t you think, that would be boring?

[Mythrandir]

was hoping for a banned stamp on BTB.

there is no reason for banning back to basics. it doesn´t break format. It is even helping to improve the diversity of decks. you know, without threat from btb, price of progress, blood moons almost everyone would play some 4-5 colour "best-of" decks. don´t you think, that would be boring?

the more decks in a metagame the better the format IMO. But its quite annoying, frustrating, etc to have a complete control of the board and just die/lose the game because my oponnent plays a single 3 CMC spell. i dont believe its warping the format or its broken.. but it is indeed a hoser card (to 4/5 c decks). and to lose on turn 3 or 4 because of a single card is a bit boring, dont u think?

edited: btw. i made the remark in a humurous tone, i wasnt expecting them to ban the card. lol

[Sturmgott]

Banned: Time Vault

Time Vault had to go because of the Oracle Wording Change that WotC imposed on TV (<-lol) on Sept. 26, 2008. According to this functional change any untap effect gives you an extra turn in combination with TV. As we have an extremely cheap, permanent means of untapping TV every turn in the form of Voltaic Key, it was plain obvious that one of the two couldn't survive, since it is effectively the cheapest 2-card-victory combo since Flash/Hulk.
We decided not to ban the key, but the TV for the key is a versatile utility card and by itself by no means broken. TV would surely only see play to break it and go infinite turns - pure single player magic is the goal of that.

Unbanned: Mind over Matter

Ever since we banned Tolarian Academy this has been an overlooked candidate for unbanning. We correct that and allow MoM from October 15th on.

Unbanned: Library of Alexandria

We've been eyeing on the Library for quite some time, but never actually had the time to test it thoroughly. Several aspects led us to unban it nonetheless:
- It requires skill to use;
- it requires you to keep your hand on 6-7 cards at all times which means you've either got to have it in your opening hand or play control to be able to profit;
- apart from MoM, we see no potential for combo abuse.
Since most control decks already have multiple options to generate significant card advantage, we assume that the Library will be a strong card in these decks, but neither an autowin nor an autoinclude in every other deck. As such, please understand the unban as test-wise. We'll all see how much impact it will have on the format at the end of November on HL GP 6.