2015 was when ugin was printed and at the time Sheldon said the following:



and Papa funk said this back in '13



and Ban Ki-moon said this

Maybe it's because I'm not a card guru but what were you all thinking of?

yeah, not going to lie, but unbanning painter's servant while banning iona makes the RC look massively incompetent given the obvious capacity for PS to do the exact same kind of lockouts as iona, just requiring an extra card.

Now am I saying the RC is actually incompetent like half of reddit seems to think? No I think Iona and PE were good bans and that the rewritten philosphy document was full of good things, but unbanning PS looks seriously oxymoronic when you stop and think about it for any length of time.

It is possible to change one's mind. Maybe they became convinced otherwise and decided to relent on the ban.

Will there ever be a point that the sky won't be falling in the format for some of you?

Take a breath, enjoy the fact that cards people have been pissing and moaning about for years have been banned and then resume running up and down the street naked, banging pots and pans together and screaming "THE END IS FUCKING NIGH!!!" at the top of your lungs.

Yeah, probably. A lot of people have asked for a long time to make the Iona/Painter's Servant swap... I think they're both kinda innocuous at this point. I'd be curious to hear someone elaborate on the, "Why now?" question though.

I'm glad Paradox Engine is finally gone; that shoulda gotten the axe ages ago.



Nah man. The internet's great at making noise, and poor at operating pants. There's gonna be half-dressed mobs screeching half-assed arguments for the rest of the 21st century (at least).

These are all very valid points, and the discontent on Twitter, Facebook groups and Reddit alike is enough to show that it's a heated topic. For Paradox Engine, not so much Iona, Shield of Emeria seeing as she saw little to no play by comparison.

Not that financial value should be a huge factor in the banning or unbanning of something, but it's been stated before that "Perceived barrier for entry" was a part of the reason some of the older cards aren't eligible for unbanning. An easy Million dollars was lost today in collection value, now that these 2 cards aren't legal in Commander. Where will Paradox Engine fall to? Previously $35-40, now to be what? $5-10? Outside of literally casual, kitchen table magic, when does this see play again with it on the banned list? Now Painter's Servant is $50-60 each in the blink of an eye.

What gets me the most is Sheldon's recent revision to "The Philosophy of Commander", where the criteria for banning consideration is more loose in that it's not the end all be all, but there are readily available examples of cards that, by the listing itself, are banning candidates...
"• Cause severe resource imbalances
• Allow players to win out of nowhere
• Prevent players from contributing to the game in a meaningful way.
• Cause other players to feel they must play certain cards, even though they are also problematic.
• Are very difficult for other players to interact with, especially if doing so requires dedicated, narrow responses when deck-building.
• Interact poorly with the multiplayer nature of the format or the specific rules of Commander.
• Lead to repetitive game play."

Of those Palinchron, Cyclonic Rift, Omniscience and many others of other colors, have the problems of 3 or more of the bullets listed above.

Banning a powerful, value engine piece that required multiple other pieces that enabled mana production and card draw to "get there" in lieu of Painter's Servant is a mistake. Engine is available in all colors in a format that is so easily broken by 2 card combos. Was it so ubiquitous that it overshadowed the usual offender boogeymen?
* Mikaeus, the Unhallowed + Triskelion
* Isochron Scepter + Dramatic Reversal
* Exquisite Blood + Sanguine Bond
* Leyline of the Void/Rest in Peace + Helm of Obedience
* etc.

Grindstone, Llawan, Cephalid Empress, Wash Out, and Hibernation are examples of cards that are easily abusable with Servant, and blue can tutor for 3 out of those 4 (with one being a commander option).

When that many of the Rules Committee members have been against Servant being unbanned, only for them to do a 180 years later when the only color hosing card to be banned before it got off the banned list was Iona? It doesn't add up.

Oh, it adds up. Let me break it down for you. As you said, many members of the RC have been highly vocal on the subject of Painter's Servant for many years. With the banning of Sensei's Divining Top in Legacy, PainterStone was greatly weakened, devaluing the Servant to about $10. It was then that the RC saw a big opportunity. A way to not only throw the playerbase in to an uproar, but to also enrich themselves. Secret meetings were held. Crypto-currency changed hands on the dark web, shell companies and dummy accounts created, all so that every copy of Painter's Servant on TCGplayer and Magic Kard Market were secretly in the hands of the RC.

I submit to you that RC has been carefully hoarding copies of Painter's Servant for years and finally, in July of 2019, they made their move. The unbanning of servant has made them rich. It adds up. All the way to bank.

if i could give an up vote or xp or whatever i would kirkusjones..I'm just mainly curious as to why and what exactly changed because until this morning I was under the impression that PS was never going to come off the list.

.sigged. Thank you sir

I usually see the logic of the ban list, but I'm really not seeing the logic this time. It's true that Iona can create a non-interactive or just plain unfun situation that might cause people to feel bad, but so can cards of similar mana cost in other colors that remain unbanned.

Painter's Servant enables a lot of really bad situations, many of which are worse than those created by Iona and its ability also tends to hit everything played by the entire table rather than just isolating one specific color. The Grindstone combo can also often be played on turn one, and the new mulligan rule won't make it any harder to do.

Bearing in mind that winning the game isn't actually the most important thing in EDH, can you point to some examples of "cards of similar mana cost in other colors that remain unbanned".

The fact that Painter hits everyone makes it less, not more, oppressive that Iona. I know that's strange but if Iona stops one person playing, that game continues and one person sits out. If a painter locks out everyone that game ends and a new game starts, no-one sits out.

I don't agree with your point that Painter causing the game to end means that it's less oppressive. There are many situations where the game just randomly-ending-out-of-nowhere is SO disheartening. It makes people not want to play the game anymore, and I certainly have seen it happen where the game quickly devolves into "who can get their combo out the fastest" among playgroups, which heavily discouraged new players (especially ones who were new to the game, not just to the group) from joining.

I mean... that makes more sense the more I think about it.(LOL)

Is iona actually worse than painter? Dont get me wrong, I've been turn 3 iona'd thanks to kalia. feels real bad, but I've never played against painter combos, anyone mind enlightening me?

Most cards with the potential to be similarly oppressive (e.g. Winter Orb, Overwhelming Splendor) make it obvious that that's their purpose. Believe it or not, some people do play Iona because it's a big Angel that seems fun, though most of them eventually realize that it's not.



Grindstone is a well-known combo with it that kills one player per turn. Other than that, cards like Deathgrip, Gloom, and Hibernation are probably the nastiest. Edit: also Llawan,.