Timeless: Does the format need Fixing?

When announced in December 2023, the Timeless format gained the spotlight from players who wanted a space in Magic Arena to play without almost any restrictions and/or card changes. Its proposal is to be the pinnacle of the digital platform's power level, a place where anything goes - even banned staples from Legacy and restricted from Vintage like Necropotence, or recently broken cards like Lurrus of the Dream-Den.

A year later, the Metagame has changed considerably. The inclusion of cards from Modern Horizons 3 and the Special Guests series caused the format to increase its power level. Decks like Titan Field or Yawgmoth Combo no longer exist because they are slow compared to other archetypes and, in the end, the Metagame today is more polarized towards very specific strategies.

Timeless is currently divided into three categories: Aggro with Mardu Energy, Tempo with Dimir Frog and a dozen combos involving Show and Tell, Goblin Charbelcher, Storm, among other options. There is less room for other strategies, even if they are present, so is it time for Wizards to intervene? Or is the format better without needing any regulation? Would Timeless be able to solve itself?

One of the attractions of Timeless is a giant sign on it: no banlist. Many may not admit it, but when they don't involve large prizes and heavy investment, players like formats with few to no restrictions, and Timeless was born from this taste for Magic Arena.

Today, the format only has three restricted cards:

It’s a bit funny, but Channel and Tibalt’s Trickery are restricted for the same reason: to avoid promoting excessive anti-game patterns. That is, games that don’t even start because players mulligan too aggressively and/or win too quickly.

Demonic Tutor is restricted for consistency purposes: it’s too strong to have access to any card for without concessions. Assemble the Legion and Diabolic Intent are restricted and are pillars of the format’s combo decks, so it’s easy to imagine what the format would be like without this restriction.

Timeless is also the only environment besides Vintage where restrictions are a way to mitigate the damage. For formats like Modern, Legacy, or Pioneer, the idea of ​​limiting a card's use to one copy seems absurd, but it works under these rules because, ultimately, Wizards wants players to be able to enjoy all the cards available in Magic Arena.

However, if the Power 9 were to ever make it onto the platform, it's unlikely that they would be fully legal on Timeless. If Strip Mine were to make it available, it would be too risky to leave it free, since it would affect the enjoyment of matches. So, could the same be said for the following cards?

Yes, it is also necessary to address the case of Energy, but for now, let's talk about these three: Show and Tell stars in the most famous combo in Timeless today where it is played with Atraxa, Grand Unifier and Omniscience, Dark Ritual is the most efficient free mana engine in Timeless and one of the main ways for combo decks to win the game early or cast bombs like Necropotence too soon, the same effect is applicable with Sacrifice if used with the right interactions.

What happens in Timeless today is proof of what we have known since the beginning of Magic: free mana and cheating on mana costs create broken environments. And there needs to be free and efficient ways to get the combos and other broken strategies that have come out of them—we're no longer in a format where Dark Ritual for Necropotence leads to a second-turn Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, but one where Dark Ritual leads to a win with Tendrils of Agony or Goblin Charbelcher and with even greater consistency.

In that case, would it be ideal for Wizards to restrict Dark Ritual and Sacrifice to slow down Timeless's speed?

Show and Tell is an odd case. Ideally, the format has enough answers to deal with its combos, and it requires good setups that perhaps more interactive archetypes could adapt to and win the game before Omniscience comes into play. In practice, it is too consistent, but this problem could be mitigated by restricting cards like Assemble the Team.

But while we spend time debating whether Timeless is too unfair for having very fast combos, the best deck in the format is an Aggro, perhaps the best that has existed in a long time: Mardu Energy uses the already known Boros Energy shell from Modern - which has just been banned - and adds cards that are disruptive enough to delay combos and beat them in speed.

The Boros variatns aren't far behind, but Mardu offers cards like Thoughtseize and Juggernaut Peddler to control the opponent's hand, while having Lurrus of the Dream-Den and Chthonian Nightmare as its attrition tools.

If Mardu Energy is the best deck, and it suppresses the other Aggro in the Metagame, and following the logic presented above about restrictions, it would also need to lose access to four copies of some card. The problem is that the Energy package in Modern Horizons 3 is very efficient.

Modern banned Amped Raptor because it was part of the Energy attrition engine and the only card in the list that doesn't share slots with other decks. The same logic could be applied to Timeless, but in a format with Lurrus of the Dream-Den and access to several more powerful staples - would it really make a difference to restrict Raptor?

Another option, which I advocate banning in Modern, is Guide of Souls, but the logic doesn't apply in Timeless: Energy may be the best deck, but if the format is a place for you to play whatever you want, restricting the heart of the archetype seems overkill. Energy wouldn't survive without Guide of Souls.

That leaves Ajani, Nacatl Pariah, which has a clear design mistake with its ETB effect and trigger that transforms it. It would make sense to restrict it, since it does something that wasn't originally intended to do, but wouldn't we then be dictating the fate of cards like The One Ring that have the same problem?

Maybe the solution for Energy will be found when other archetypes can stop focusing so much on combos and play more with the board. Fewer Thoughtseizes and cheap, conditional counterspells in favor of more removal and board interaction. Or perhaps the format would just remain polarized around an archetype with even more situational answers to the most resilient Aggro of all time.

Another solution would be to introduce better answers to Timeless through a Magic Arena bundle, with lessons to be learned from formats like Legacy and Vintage: understanding what makes Energy not as competitively viable there, knowing which answers against Combos are viable to diversify the Metagame and understanding which pieces could increase the number of viable strategies.

The insertion of these cards is no guarantee that Timeless would be better, just as restricting it does not guarantee a more diverse environment. It seems to some extent a mistake to “Legacify” the format and give it the same answers that could create an environment between Blue-Based, Combo, Energy and the rest. The format may need these cards, but would it be preferable for it to find other solutions, or just follow the same steps as its older brothers in the real world?

The appeal of Timeless is that you can play with anything that has ever been released on Magic Arena, and of course cards like Show and Tell or Dark Ritual were not introduced to the platform with the idea of ​​how strong they would be in the format - they are banned from Historic because that is the format in which this management is necessary, Timeless is the place for those who want to play with everything that MTGArena has to offer.

In a “rules-free” format, it is clear that combos and over-efficient archetypes will be the best choice. There is no “middle ground” and diversity comes from the self-regulation of the environment as new cards enter. Perhaps restricting it would only harm the format's appeal, or the restrictions are what it needs to be a little more popular with some demographics.

There is no correct answer to this dilemma today: it depends more on the community than on Wizards, as their proposal has already been announced and remains the same - to establish a format where players can go all-in with every card released on MTGArena without any nerfs or bans.

Thanks for reading!