Pauper: Revisiting the Banlist - What could be unbanned?

The year 2025 brings many possibilities for Pauper. Today, its Metagame has stabilized and approximately five decks are at the top of the competitive chain: Affinity, Kuldotha Red, Broodscale Combo, Mono Blue Terror/Faeries and Gruul Ramp.

The discussions about the format today revolve around what could come in the next expansions to shake up the Metagame, or even whether some banning would be necessary to give a little more diversity to Pauper, even though no archetype currently presents numbers and results that put them on the role of oppressive decks.

There is another discussion that can and should also be had: unbans. Pauper has a large list of banned cards, some of which have been there for over a decade, and it is only natural that power creep changes the formats and makes something previously seemed unacceptable at competitive tables gain a second chance in the Metagame - it happened with Modern, where Splinter Twin, Mox Opal and Faithless Looting were recently unbanned, and their impacts continue to be measured, but none of them immediately broke the format.

In this article, I present my analysis of the current Pauper banned list, measuring which cards could be unbanned for some reason, and which should remain away from the format's competitive tables in the coming years.

Rather than go straight to every card that could have some potential for unbans, let's revisit the entire banned list for the format to understand which pieces are on there and why they could be brought back into the Metagame, and why others will remain banned for a long time.

Storm spells that do anything useful are too easy to exploit in a format with access to every cheap ritual ever released in Magic, plus Lotus Petal and a dozen cheap cantrips and draw effects.

No matter how much Wizards tries to reprint this mechanic, 98% of the commons that come out with Storm will be broken in some way, so there's no reason to unban any of these cards.

The Initiative didn't seem to differ much from Monarch in theory, but playing either card with this ability as early as turn one proved too strong even for Legacy, and like Storm spells, the abundance of rituals and accelerators available in the format make it much easier to cast any of these creatures early.

One day, perhaps, Initiative won't be so oppressive by Pauper's power level standards and where better removal or more efficient answers against this strategy would put them in check. But that day is still a long way off.

Free Spells are always a problem and blue has a long history in Pauper that led to the famous Blue Monday where Daze, Gush and Gitaxian Probe were banned.

Gush has a “combo” with Foil that makes any blue Tempo deck very efficient because it has its own version of Force of Will, and one that feeds cards like Gurmag Angler and Tolarian Terror, so unbanning it would be a horrible choice at this point.

The same logic applies to Treasure Cruise. Despite being counterintuitive to Horror decks, Faeries and other blue-based archetypes could get the most out of the card without any problems, and since it's an easy splash, other archetypes like Affinity, or other blue decks like Familiars, could get the most out of it without much compromise.

If it were the only source of cheap card advantage for blue, perhaps an unban would be worth it to balance resource parity when compared to Deadly Dispute or Thoughtcast, but it's not: Ninja of the Deep Hours, Moon-Circuit Hacker and other cards would be part of the set and would end up putting Blue-based decks in a position they've been in for many years and that, perhaps, would no longer be beneficial to the Pauper Metagame.

Gitaxian Probe offers too much information, for free, and replaces itself in its owner's hand - and it does all of this for any list. It seems interesting to have this spell in combos like Inside Out, or in Izzet Blitz variants, but it wouldn't be any fun to take a Probe from a Broodscale Combo, Dredge, or any other archetype that is easier to hit the free win button, so it's healthier for Pauper if it stays on the banned list.

And then we have the curious case of Daze. Many argue that blue should have access to a free spell that holds off explosive first turns and forces plays around it every turn.

In theory, this would make Kuldotha Red slower, Affinity less greedy, and strategies like Jund Broodscale or Gruul Ramp would have to think twice before tapping out to play Writhing Chrysalis - one of Faeries' biggest nemeses today - so Pauper would gain a lot in terms of balancing the format's speed by releasing Daze.

However, every benefit involving a dangerous card can, one day, turn against those who asked for it. Today, blue decks are not at the top of the format and compete for the Tier 1.5 spot, but like every Metagame, Pauper is cyclical and, one day, they may be the best deck again. And when that happens, would Daze still be healthy? If there is a new blue combo that is as efficient or even a little slower than Broodscale, would Daze still be a good card to have in Pauper?

It's fair to say that, yes, Daze would serve to police the Metagame today, but what cards and/or decks would police Daze when it becomes too efficient? Just as Affinity has a long history of bans, so too has blue, and releasing cards to respond to the format today without considering what it might be tomorrow is creating risks that could harm not only Pauper in the long run but also the confidence of players to invest in the format.

That's why Daze seems like a maybe to me: it would be a useful unban in today's circumstances, but it could go very wrong in the future.

If fast or free mana is the issue that breaks Storm and Initiative, cards that can be played for free to generate positive mana will be a problem, as they enable time-consuming loops and infinite combos, and with effects like Ephemerate and Ghostly Flicker still available, Cloud of Faeries and Peregrine Drake are certainly a no-no at this point, although I have doubts that Peregrine Drake would still be as effective as it was in 2016.

Frantic Search is a special case. Since it's a spell, we can't blink it to generate positive mana, and it's a one-shot effect unless we have recursion with Mnemonic Wall or Archaeomancer. The problem, as with other free spells, is that there will always be a way to extract a lot of value from the extra mana it can generate, or from the looting it provides, and with Terror decks on the rise in the Metagame, it doesn't seem like an unban is necessary today.

Affinity is the best deck in the format, and we've seen what happens if we gain any Cranial Plating strand, even if Affinity wasn't at the top. To unban any of these cards, you'd have to ban all artifact lands.

Atog, Disciple of the Vault and Sojourner’s Companion are cards that greatly help Affinity execute its strategy and gain other means of winning games. Today, its position as best deck is because it's a very efficient Midrange in terms of bodies on the board, card advantage and cost reduction. Add any combo potential and it breaks again.

Arcum’s Astrolabe is a weird card: never in Pauper's history has it been so easy to build five-color decks as it was when this artifact was legal in the format, and strategies like Jeskai Astrolabe, the dozens of three-color deck variants, and even the success of some Infect lists made the era in which it was legal one of the most fun to play.

However, it has the same problem here that it has in all other formats where it was banned: it makes access to colors too easy and, consequently, removes any deckbuilding restriction and concessions that players would make to add a splash.

Today, these are less restrictive due to access to Gates and other cards like Cleansing Wildfire and Bridges that guarantee easier splashes. Still, the potential for Arcum’s Astrolabe to break Pauper’s restrictions is too great to ignore, and if even Prophetic Prism was banned for similar reasons, it seems unlikely that it will ever return to the format’s tables.

Bonder’s Ornament was banned at a time when Pauper was very attrition-oriented, where Tron was the best deck in the format, accompanied by Faeries and Monarch. Every list needed a source of card advantage, and this artifact not only made access to colors easier, but also generated recurring draws that were effortless to take advantage of with the extra mana from Urza’s lands.

Today, Pauper is a much faster format than it was back then, with more efficient answers and a clock that can win the game one turn after Bonder’s Ornament coming into play, in addition to the responses against artifacts being very high due to Affinity - not to mention that the main cause of its ban, Tron, is at an all-time low in the Metagame.

The problem is that Ornament doesn't only see play on Tron, and any archetype could use a copy of it for attrition games that, in turn, would make other decks need a copy of it to keep up with the opponent's card advantage, homogenizing the deckbuilding or forcing at least one slot in the maindeck and/or sideboard dedicated entirely to "countering" the opponent's Bonder's Ornament.

All things considered, Bonder’s Ornament falls into the maybe category for early 2025. Decks like Gruul Ramp or Dimir Faeries, as well as Tron, could benefit from this card in the long run, but keeping up with Kuldotha Red’s speed and Broodscale Combo’s combo-kill potential would make turning to cast this card too risky in the current metagame.

On the other hand, like Daze, this card has the issue of what could happen to it eventually. If the Metagame were to revert to being more attrition-oriented, or if Tron—which really needs a boost right now—were given the tools to stall explosive turns, Ornament would once again be a risk to Pauper’s health.

The only way Cloudpost could be unbanned is if Glimmerpost was banned instead to prevent life gain from accumulating too quickly and thus preventing Aggro from putting Big Mana in check - and if that happened, there would be no reason to play Cloudpost instead of Urza's lands.

In that case, it's better to keep Cloudpost banned.

It's possible to argue that Fall from Favor gets the same benefit of the doubt as Bonder's Ornament: Pauper is faster, losing Monarch is much easier today than it was when the card was released, and three-mana removal is an absurdly negative Tempo when your opponent is playing multiple 2/2s for or putting a free 4/4 on the board.

The problem is that Fall from Favor is not only a guaranteed removal for Monarch, it's also the cheapest Monarch effect among common cards with the mechanic, and it's in a historically troublesome color in Pauper. In theory, yes, this would be a terrible card against Kuldotha Red, very average against Affinity, and almost irrelevant against Broodscale Combo or Madness Burn, but there are a dozen other archetypes in the lower tiers that would be even more limited by the presence of this enchantment in blue decks.

Also, like Treasure Cruise, this card wouldn't be a problem if it were the only source of value and advantage that blue offered, but we're far from that situation, and it would only complement an already solid core of powerful two-for-one cards and effects available in that color.

High Tide is a peculiar case because it was never in the format and was pre-banned at the time Wizards decided to unify digital and tabletop Pauper - and out of all the cards in this batch of bans, it's the only one where it's not explicitly clear to anyone why it's out of the format.

What it does is basically double the amount of mana your Islands generate until the end of the turn, and this ability stacks for each copy of High Tide you've cast. Obviously, this could be repurposed with combinations like Archaeomancer and Ghostly Flicker to generate infinite mana, or two copies of High Tide with the above combo and Sage’s Row Denizen would already be enough to establish infinite mill loops, or infinite tokens with Murmuring Mystic, or any other combination once an island starts generating for Ghostly Flicker.

When it was pre-banned, there didn’t seem to be a need for this because the amount of interactions with it was a bit more limited. Today, between Lorien Revealed and some dual Island-type lands available, High Tide seems to be in a very risky field and very similar to Familiars with more efficient means of protection and setup and even alternative plans - imagine a combo list that can change in Games 2 and 3 for a Tolarian Terror deck - put it in a very risky position to be worth the unban test.

Hymn to Tourach could be a powerful play against the torrents of card advantage that Deadly Dispute, Thoughtcast and other cheap cards provide today, but for every time it provides resource parity against Affinity, it also provides non-interactive games against archetypes that don't have good sources of card advantage and/or sets up an anti-play plan if it hits the right cards in the opponent's hand, such as lands on the first turn.

Because it costs , players would certainly mix it with Dark Ritual and other discard effects to maximize Hymn to Tourach's potential to extract what really matters from its controller's hand, and while this may not be a successful strategy in the long run, the mere presence of this category of deck would make Pauper a less fun format for many players.

Sinkhole falls into the same category of problems that Hymn to Tourach does, but with a worse feel bad because no one likes to lose mana in the early turns, and Sinkhole is still a guaranteed hit on an opponent's land as soon as the first turn.

Invigorate was banned because it is a free spell that made Infect too fast for Pauper over a decade ago.

Despite the changes that the format has undergone during this period and the quality of responses and deckbuilding has also improved, giving a spell that Infect can play for free and where two of them combined with a Snakeskin Veil already guarantee lethal damage is too risky even for an archetype that, today, is in the confines of Tier 3.

It would be preferable to have a Scale Up downshift instead of giving Invigorate back to Infect.

Kuldotha Red is one of the best decks in Pauper today and Monastery Swiftspear was banned for making it too fast and consistent to the point that most of the Metagame could not keep up with the pacing it added to the format, and the quality of responses since then has not improved to the point where it is worth bringing it back.

Mystic Sanctuary was banned for giving blue decks free recursion without many concessions to it, and with the recent rise of Mono Blue as the best option in this category, it doesn't seem like a card that would bring any benefit to putting back into Pauper in 2025, as it would "lose a turn", but bringing back any card you threw away with Thought Scour or Mental Note, or establishing card advantage loops with Accumulated Knowledge would only serve to further leverage the position of decks that are already great in the Metagame.

Prophetic Prism is perhaps the safest unban for Pauper at this point. Like the other cards we mentioned, the format has gotten faster, and paying for a manafixing piece that gives a draw might be a bit too high a price.

Additionally, one of the reasons for banning Prism was to reduce the consistency of color access that Affinity could access. Today, between Deadly Dispute and a solid mana base with multiple colored cards, it's difficult to imagine players wanting Prism over Ichor Wellspring, or any other core piece of the list because it only draws one card and only puts one artifact on the board while the rest do something else: Blood Fountain recurs creatures and puts two artifacts on the board, Ichor Wellspring turns Deadly Dispute into Ancestral Recall, and Refurbished Familiar provides more value as a threat and disruption.

Then we have the second category of decks that would like Prophetic Prism: Glint Hawk decks and, again, the artifact has become obsolete because Deadly Dispute does a better job as a manafixing in Mardu lists while Experimental Synthesizer is a better card as a draw effect.

Prophetic Prism would ultimately only have space in two of Pauper's most famous archetypes today: Gardens and Tron.

Gardens lists have been betting on a splash for Writhing Chrysalis and some Sideboard options that would justify including Prophetic Prism instead of another artifact to facilitate color access in a list that tries to use Defile while gathering a dozen splashes, in addition to not relying so much on Ichor Wellspring to generate card advantage since it has other resources.

Tron, in turn, could make better use of Prophetic Prism in its exchange for colored mana than the current versions using Energy Refractor, and this “extra turn” could help it reposition itself in the Metagame and have a little more space in the competitive scene.

Its problem, however, is defining whether having more Tron in Pauper would be healthy for the format. It was one of the most hated archetypes for many years due to the time it consumed in matches - especially in tabletop games - and putting it back on the radar could create a worse and less interesting scene for a category of players, but with the current main decks in the Metagame, it is difficult to imagine that Tron would conquer the position of predominant archetype again, or even that unbanning Prophetic Prism would be enough for it to return to Tier 1.

That's all for today!

If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment!

Thanks for reading!