Why is Skullclamp banned from Legacy?
Legacy forum
Posted on July 21, 2013, 7:09 p.m. by TheAmazingSalsa
It's been bugging me for a while now, I can understand why it's banned from the 100-singleton, but why ban it from Legacy?
Bonus Question: Why is Mental Misstep banned as well?
KrazyCaley says... #3
Imagine if Skullclamp were an artifact that read: "1: Draw two cards."
In Legacy, this is what it is.
July 21, 2013 7:59 p.m.
If by 100 card singleton you mean EDH aka Commander then no it isn't banned in it. Also Skullclamp is ridiculous for the reason that ]KrazyCaley said.
July 22, 2013 12:35 a.m.
jan2692wal says... #5
when skullclamp was in standard, the deck in modern that is now called Affinity was the deck everyone played. it was retardedly overpowered and you either played affinity or you lost.
July 22, 2013 2:30 a.m.
Ah, good ol' skullclamp, it was the card to abuse. I imagine if it's was somehow unbanned it would see a lot of new home.
July 22, 2013 3:36 a.m.
I like the stat that they realised Skullclamp needed banning in standard, when at a big event, the top 16 decks contained 58 of a maximum 64 copies of skullclamp.
July 22, 2013 4:03 a.m.
Unforgivn_II says... #8
Because pairing it with Bloodghast and Grave Pact is freaking retarded. There was a guy who ran that deck once in archenemy and we all hated on it so bad that he dumbed it down for us. The fact is, banned cards are banned cuz they're broken, or have combos that make them broken. Wizards tries to keep it fresh by not allowing the same old combos stay relevant. Same with our playgroup :P
July 22, 2013 5:33 a.m.
Schuesseled says... #9
I thought cards got restricted in legacy, not banned....
July 22, 2013 7:09 a.m.
Smith_and_Tonic says... #10
Schuesseled cards will be restricted in Vintage, not legacy.
July 22, 2013 7:14 a.m.
Mental Misstep got banned in Legacy because it was just really poorly designed for what it was seemingly intended to do (stop combo). It did very well at stopping combo to the point of basically pushing ANT, High Tide, and Elves out of Legacy. That should have allowed aggro decks to fluorish...except that Mental Misstep stopped them too! Merfolk, Goblins, Zoo...all of them suffered. Having your turn 1 AEther Vial countered even though you were on the play was just unfair.
At the height of MM's dominance, the only decks that had any realistic chance of winning were Stoneblade and NO decks, because they didn't have a lot of one-drops and were capable of running MM themselves to stifle any other strategy. We began to see lots of SCG Legacy Opens where 15 of the top 16 decks ran MM. There even began to circulate the conspiracy theory that Wizards printed MM specifically to kill Legacy, especially when rumors of Modern began to spread. That's how bad the card ruined the format while it was legal.
Heck, it would have even kept Skullclamp down if it hadn't already been banned.
Devonin says... #2
Mental Misstep was created to give non-blue a chance against combo by having a counterspell they could run, and be able to work against blue decks. Instead of seeing a wider range of decks in legacy, there were just even more blue decks.
July 21, 2013 7:35 p.m.