Wizards of the Coast has announced its latest Magic: The Gathering ban and restricted update today, and as expected, several Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths cards are getting banned from various formats, including Vintage, Legacy, and Brawl.
Here are the Ikoria cards banned in these formats:
Brawl
Drannith Magistrate
Winota, Joiner of Forces
Legacy
Zirda, the Dawnwaker
Lurrus of the Dream-Den
Vintage:
Lurrus of the Dream-Den is banned.
The changes are effective on tabletop and Magic Online in May 18, and on Magic: The Gathering Arena in May 21.
It's not surprising to see Lurrus banned in Legacy. Wizards explained why Lurrus was banned: "Because of the nature of Vintage's wide card pool and powerful restricted cards, the deck-building cost imposed by Lurrus is less restrictive relative to the payoff of having Lurrus as a companion," WOTC's Ian Duke said. "As a result, the win rates of several archetypes using Lurrus have surpassed 55% in Magic Online league play, and collectively decks using Lurrus are representing too large of a portion of the metagame with no indication of a shift away from this trend."
As for Zirda's banning in Legacy, WOTC is seeing high win rates among decks using Zirda, the Dawnwaker as a companion in combination with Grim Monolith.
In Brawl, Wizards explained that Winota was banned because it reduced the diversity of the metagame while Drannith Magistrate "takes away from the fun and self-expression that come from building around a commander in Brawl."
Wizards went on to say that they are watching the metagames of other formats such as Standard, Pioneer, and Modern, saying that they are aware of players' concerns on the dominance of decks with Companion cards in the formats: "While we're not currently seeing problematic win rates in Standard, Pioneer, or Modern from decks using companions, we are looking at overall metagame share and potential for repetitive gameplay," Duke said. "If we see signs of long-term health issues resulting from high metagame share of companion decks, we're willing to take steps up to or including changing how the companion mechanic works. For now, metagames need more time to evolve before we can determine whether changes are necessary."
Do you think Wizards made the right decision to ban these Ikoria cards in these formats? Do you think they should ban more cards in other formats? Let us know in the comments section below.
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