All Cards Errata'd because of 6th Edition's rules

[Dune Echo]

I'm curious, what are all the cards that got errata because of 6th Edition making them extremely good? I want to make a list for curiousity's (When enchanted creature deals damage, draw a card. ) sake. Also, do you agree with errata for these cards even though 6th Edition's rules were supposed to make changes like this and WotC used that fact as part of their marketing and advertising? I voted for the 4th choice.


I can think of the following:
Lion's Eye Diamond
Lotus Vale
Scorched Ruins
Waylay

 

[Hetemti]

In the interest of balance (All players must discard enough lands, cards in hand, and creatures so that everyone has the same number as the players with the lowest number of cards of each.) they needed the eratta.

But I don't think it would have made a major difference. Just as combo would have been fueled by the fast mana, so could have creature strategies:

Turn 1: Mountain, Random 1cc artifact.
Turn 2: Drop Scorched Ruins, bury effect triggers, Tap, add (4), bury Ruins, tap Mountian, cast Covetous Dragon.

Tighter than Mana Vault if you ask me.

Or...
Turn 1: Drop Lotus Vale, bury triggers, Tap, add RRR, bury Vale; cast Ball Lightning, swing for six.
Not bad for not (initally) costing $400 to acquire.

Notice that these are Red plays. Yes, other colors could do things too...but R&D wants NOÖNE to EVER play RED AGAIN!!!

Basicly...if they didn't erratta these cards, they would have restricted/banned them, so rather than curtail them, they depowered them...and instead of our having bought usible cardboard, WizCo decreed that into the Dime Box they shalt go.

 

[EricBess]

Phyrexian Dreadnaught

There was one other issued similar errata, but I don't remember which it was. Another red trick: Dreadnaught, Fling.

Another one with Fling is the one that gets +x/+x when you peel a card from your library and dies if it is ever has more than 7 power. Don't remember the name, but there's another one for your list.

 

[superguy]

EricBess - I think you mean Phyrexian Devourer.

 

[Zadok001]

He does mean Phyrexian Devourer. In my personal opinion, cards should be left alone. And I don't mean that they should never be errataed - I mean their affect on gameplay should remain static, regardless of rules changes. When the rules change, cards should (IMHO) retain their various uses, not earn new ones or lose old ones. Waylay was a failure in that regard (should have been errataed to "Remove those tokens from the game at the beginning of any player's Upkeep"), but the others were all done properly from my point of view. They lost nothing, and gained nothing - The work just like they used to, or as close as realistically possible. I like that.

But then, I'm infamous for sticking myself in very permanent ruts.

 

[Dune Echo]

Everyone: Before this degenerates into an arguement over what errata such and such cards got and what it should have been, let's just try to stay with the idea of listing cards that have been given errata for 6th Edition and whether or not you agree with giving cards errata or not and why. If anyone feels I need to add a voting category to the list, please say so.

Zadok: I don't say the above as a personal insult. I just know that I, for instance, feel very strongly against any errata for Waylay or for any of the cards listed so far. I agree that cards need to be reworded for clarification some times as the rules are updated and tweaked (nothing comes to mind off-hand though).

However, I truly disagree with Zadok on the idea that intent of cards should be maintained, unless there's a severe rules conflict that needs to be fixed (Lifeline and Ball Lightning for example). Merchant Scroll and Avoid Fate are two examples of cards that have been radically changed by 6th Edition rules and there wasn't a massive outcry over that fact. [Edited by Dune Echo]

Also, errata like that for Goblin Grenade where the card's functionality is completely unaltered doesn't bother me. That kind of errata is simply rules clarification to me and someone who has never looked at the latest Oracle can still understand how the card functions under 6th Edtion rules. [Edited by Dune Echo]

I say it for this reason, Magic is a game of finding card interaction to your advantage. It's a game where cards bend the rules and finding those bends are a challenge and reward. To use an old example, Necropotence was considered crap at first, and now look at it's power because of the way it bends the rules of typical card drawing. [Edited by Dune Echo]

Also, errata is confusing and disruptive to players outside of the tournament scene, new or experienced. To keep track of all the errata alone for the cards would take carrying around a manual.

Also, if enough people seem interested in this topic still, I plan on writing an article for this site. I have some ideas of what I want to say, I just want to see different viewpoints before I start writing.

P.S. These are all the cards listed so far, plus another that I remember:
Debt of Loyalty
Lion's Eye Diamond
Lotus Vale
Phyrexian Devourer
Phyrexian Dreadnought
Scorched Ruins
The Rack
Waylay

 

[Spiderman]

I can't vote because I agree with both one, two, and maybe four if it didn't say "No."

And plenty of cards changed and got errata; it looks like you're asking what cards were good BEFORE the errata and are mediocre now. Hence Waylay (to name one). Because I think most people would argue that it pretty much lost something in the errata and is no longer "extremely good." Same with the others, probably (they have "As an additional cost to play", right?)

And Zadok confused me: Unless he's saying cards need to maintain their original intent through various rules changes. Which means to me that some errata is going to have to be necessary (The Stack was a fundamental change).

So I think Dune Echo also got confused by Zadok, because it looks like he's saying the opposite: Cards shouldn't be errata'd and whatever changes occur with the rules, so be it.

Which I disagree with. "Reworded for clarification" is basically errata, in of itself.

And the Moxes are definitely bad examples . Magic came out in '93 and the Revised set where they were dropped came out in middle of '94, thereabouts. That's less than a year that the Moxes were "available" (although still in the environment). Type II didn't come until around '95 with Ice Age.

Nowadays, cards are more "readily" available and are in the environment longer AND have different tourney formats to be considered (Constructed, Sealed, Draft). The cards that DID need errata back then were issued it almost as fast, such as the Rukh Egg.

Dune Echo: If you ARE listing cards that lost something, you probably should add The Rack, as rakso might say

 

[Zadok001]

"And Zadok confused me: Unless he's saying cards need to maintain their original intent through various rules changes"

That's exactly what I mean.

 

[EricBess]

I guess I'm not sure what you mean by "original intent". The bottom line is that there is a rules change. If you mean that all cards should behave the same way they did before the rules change, that is fundimentally impossible. If that is what we are after, then the rules change shouldn't have happened (Okay, I know some feel that way - save if for another discussion ).

For example, wasn't the original intent of Counterspell to be able to stop a spell before any other spells are cast? In changing the rules, there will necessarily be cards that change in functionality. That's pretty much by definition and I don't think we can go around casting errata on every card to try to maintain its previous functionality.

Of course, there are those cards that become unexpectedly powerful all of a sudden due to loopholes that exist under the new system, but that didn't under the old. If you mean that the original intent of the card should be kept in mind in issuing errata to these sorts of cards, I agree with you. But as long as the card remains in balance, I don't see the need to issue errata in the first place. We all knew there would be changes with the new rules, after all...

 

[Spiderman]

"For example, wasn't the original intent of Counterspell to be able to stop a spell before any other spells are cast?"

I don't get it...

 

[EricBess]

Really, you don't remember how interrupts worked? The whole interrupt window and everything?

It used to be that if you didn't respond to a spell immediately with a Counterspell, it was too late to do so. Even if an instant was put on the stack, it was too late to counter a previously cast spell because the interrupt window on that particular spell had closed. Then, once the stack started resolving, it finished resolving.

Now, you can cast 5 or 6 other spells, let a few resolve, cast some more, etc., and then decide to counter the first spell cast.

Counterspell became more powerful with 6th edition rules. No more Amageddon/Orb combos without the risk. Granted, it wasn't as bad as some predicted, but there is no question that Counterspells in general became slightly more flexible, and therefore more powerful (okay, with the noted exception of Power Sink, which got weaker).

 

[rkoelsch]

now. That fact that you can dig for a counter just makes the counter strategy so much stronger.

 

[Spiderman]

how the interrupts worked; you couldn't respond with other instants but you could with other interrupts. So in that regard, other spells are still being cast after that inital Counterspell...

but it is true that being able to SEARCH for a counter after it has been cast has been added...

 

[Chaos Turtle]

It was my understanding that the Comprehensive Rules would change a number of cards, making some weaker and others stronger. Okay, fine. Wonderful, in fact. I looked forward to the coming of 6th Edition, gleefully anticipating all kinds of exciting new card interactions.

I even thought making interrupts into instants was a grand idea (Counterspell fan here).

Nevertheless, there were some cards that unexpectedly became broken. All of the wanna-be Black Lotus cards were among them. The new rules made them as good as the original, and totally defeated their purpose.

Waylay is a more complicated issue. I nearly (literally) fell out of my chair when I read that Waylay could be played during th opponent's end step, allowing the tokens to attack the next turn. Cool, and brutal with Crusade.

I openly and vehemently opposed errata for Waylay, since it didn't seem all that broken to me (particularly, in retrospect, considering what R&D foisted upon us during the Artifact Cycle). Later, I felt that an errata might be warranted, not because the card had suddenly become so powerful (I loved it, myself) but because it was "out of flavor" for white to have what amounted to a remarkably versatile Ball Lightning.

I was sorely disappointed when the errata came out, citing something like "not the card's intended use." So what? If they had seen Trix coming, using Illusions of Grandeur for what couldn't have possibly been its intended use, I doubt they would have even batted an eyelid at Waylay.

(Apologies to Dune Echo, by the way, for debating when he asked us not to, but I really do have an on-topic point. )

My point is this:
Errata to maintain a card's functionality is fine. Lion's Eye Diamond and its cousins were meant to be crappy versions of Black Lotus. Without errata, they might as well have just been Black Lotus, and errata was the only option, other than banning.

Errata to make a card behave the way you want it to (and I'm still baffled as to why they "fixed" flagbearers with errata that will rarely make any difference) is not okay. Waylay was suddenly a great card, and fixing it was unnecessary (and the final errata was just stupid).

Finally, I'd like to offer up a whole class of cards that changed under the Comprehensive Rules. Almost none of them received errata. The artifacts. I think that every single artifact where the shutoff-when-tapped ability being lost fundamentally changed the card's strategy should have gotten errata, or none of them should have. Two got it right away (Winter Orb and Howling Mine, if I recall correctly) but others (notably Static Orb, until much later) did not.

In summary, errata to fix something that is genuinely broken due to rules change or oversight is okay. Errata to "fix" something that isn't broken, but simply works in an unexpected way, is not.
In my opinion.

 

[Spiderman]

Not sure if my position is clear, on re-reading this...

I think errata should be issued to maintain the card's original intent. Hence, I see no difference between Lion's Eye Diamond or Waylay. The card operated fundamentally different under 6th (or sometimes under old rules and 6th cleaned them up) and needed to be tweaked.

New card interactions that arise because of the new rules are fine, such as the new uses of searching for a counterspell and the Stack.

 

[Dune Echo]

I don't think you're going off topic, Chaos Turtle. I think you're just providing support for your side of the argument.

I'm in complete agreement with this statement by Chaos Turtle and is the basis for how I feel about all errata spawned by 6th Edition's Rule changes:

It was my understanding that the Comprehensive Rules would change a number of cards, making some weaker and others stronger. Okay, fine. Wonderful, in fact. I looked forward to the coming of 6th Edition, gleefully anticipating all kinds of exciting new card interactions.

The following quotes are all from http://www.wizards.com/magic/advanced/6e/6E_Letter.asp.

First, no more interrupts.

Okay, so this changed the intent of many cards, Merchant Scroll for instance. Wow, no one complained about getting an extra tutor, now did they? Merchant Scroll was NEVER meant to be able to search for anything except for counterspells and the other random blue interrupt spell.

Next comes the stack. The stack was created so that activated abilities, instants, damage prevention, and triggered abilities could all work the same way.

Okay, fine, works for me. Healing Salve is more manageable and the stack is really easy to work with.

Here's where the article gets really funny especially since I feel Bill Rose was eating these words later by the large amount of errata that had to be issued later. Edited by Dune Echo.

...The short-term pain is that players using the new rules with older versions of some cards will need to know some errata. So what else is new? One goal of these rules changes is to reduce the amount of errata issued on future cards.

First of all, it seems to me to be a contradictory statement to say that older versions of some cards will need errata, while in the next breath stating the rules changes are supposed to reduce the amount of errata, even though Bill Rose does say future errata. This just doesn't seem to be consistent with the next quote about the casual player, which is without a doubt WotC's biggest source of income for this product. Edited by Dune Echo.

"End of turn" posed some of the most interesting rules questions. What does it really mean to do something at the end of your turn? ...What the new rules do (using lots of legal-type talk) is make sure that the last things you do at the end of your turn are clear all nonlethal damage and discard down to seven cards. Tournament players will learn the new rules and use them to their advantage in the one game in a hundred in which they apply. Casual players will go on playing the way they always have. It's just that now the casual player will be playing the game correctly.

I'd like to put emphasis on this statement right here: "Tournament players will learn the new rules and use them to their advantage in the one game in a hundred in which they apply. Casual players will go on playing the way they always have."

Well, tourney players found a way to use the new rules in multiple cases, by George! And in response, they go ahead and put errata on the cards, which in turn hurts the casual player. How? In general, I think the casual player is not going to be as dedicated to keeping up on the latest rulings on the various and sundry cards this game has to offer like tournament players are. And not everyone can or will feel like hopping on the Internet whenever a rules questions pops up in the middle of a game. Because not everyone is going to be forced or can be forced to the exact same rules in less rigid environment like a tournament, some players are going to argue over rules and lose enjoyment in the game I think.

These changes to the Magic rules will have some impact on the game. Casual players will feel only a little change. Tournament players will need to adjust their decks and play styles slightly to account for the new rules. The impact these rules will have on the tournament environment will be far less extreme than the impact of a new set. Tolarian Academy changed the tournament environment far more than Sixth Edition rules ever will. The Magic environment is designed to accommodate change--in fact, Magic would become stale without change.

The DCI and 6th Edition rules designers expected changes to cards and that some cards would be more powerful. They encouraged it by the last statement alone! And yet, but issuing errata, they tried to make the game back to the way it was before! Many people here have argued about intent of the card being important in regards to errata. I can see that point of view. But let me point out this: Illusions of Grandeur is apart of a combo that helped get Necropotence banned and was pretty much impossible to pull off until Donate was made, which one can argue means that the card was never intended for its current use. No errata has ever been issued for this card, yet Waylay, which can only do a maximum of 9 damage on the 4th turn with a Crusade in play and leaving yourself without having played a threat on turn 3 (I use this because that would be the most common scenario for a white weenie player). Yet, Illusions of Grandeur, an enchantment which a blue kill card via life loss (very out of flavor for blue), was never banned, restricted, nor errata'd. How much more hypocritical can the DCI possibly be?!

If you've read this far, thank you. These are just my thoughts on the state of errata caused by 6th Edition rules. I know you all have your own opinions too.

 

[Zadok001]

While I agree with you in general, Dune, I think you misinterpretted one of those lines...

"...The short-term pain is that players using the new rules with older versions of some cards will need to know some errata. So what else is new? One goal of these rules changes is to reduce the amount of errata issued on future cards."

To which you replyed...

"First of all, that is a contradictory statement to say that older versions of some cards will need errata, while in the next breath stating the rules changes are supposed to reduce the amount of errata. Yes, he does say future errata, but that doesn't seem to be consistent with the next statement about the casual player, which is without a doubt their biggest source of income for this product."

That's not what Mr. Rose said at all - He said the older cards (pre-6th sets) would need some errata to match with the new rules. He then went on to say that the final goal was to set up the rules so that less errata would be required in the future. You seem to have interpretted that as saying "More errata and less errata," which obviously isn't correct. Mr. Rose said that there will have to be errata on older cards, so that we can have less on newer cards. I don't see any complain to that statement.

(No offense intended, of course, I just don't quite see how you read that statement as meaning such things.)

 

[Spiderman]

Dune Echo: I disagree with your last two quotes.

The first one uses the EOT with Waylay. How many casual players used Waylay BEFORE some tourney player figured out how to abuse it when 6th changed over? I would venture to guess that most people jumped on the "tourney" bandwagon once it became known. So in this case, I don't feel "casual" players can complain (or at least in this example) because they weren't a driving force behind it in the first place.

In the second, I think you're mixing "environment" with "cards". They wanted the environment to keep fresh. Cards make up decks, and decks make up the environment. It's that fine distinction I keep talking about.

And I do believe they should have errata'd Delusions; I don't know why they didn't. And it was a driving force for the banning of Dark Ritual, not Necro (that came later).

 

[Dune Echo]

Zadok: Yep! You're right, I did misinterpret that! Again, I'll have to edit myself! DOH! Still, that statement does nothing to address the changes to obvious card functionality changes caused by the rules changes.

Spiderman:

How many casual players used Waylay BEFORE some tourney player figured out how to abuse it when 6th changed over? I would venture to guess that most people jumped on the "tourney" bandwagon once it became known. So in this case, I don't feel "casual" players can complain (or at least in this example) because they weren't a driving force behind it in the first place.

Good point. I'm sure that Waylay was not used a whole lot before the loophole was found in any setting. It was a superb Limited-only card up until that point.

I guess that I feel everyone can complain because, for me personally, having a card that can be purchased or pulled from a pack that is powerful (Blastoderm is a prime example) or a card that was previously hiding in the back of your binders (Lion's Eye Diamond and Lotus Vale) suddenly becomes good, players should be allowed to capitalize on that.

Also, having more good cards in any environment allows for more variety. Who knows what metagame effects trying to psych-out your opponent into thinking you had a "Ball Knight-ling" in your hand on turn 3 would've had on the tournament AND casual scene? It is always easier to ban a card than cause mass confusion/outcry (your pick) and errata it IMO. And if Waylay had to receive errata to return it to it's original state, okay then, it was still done horribly, making it even worse than before.

Some may consider what I'm going to say in this paragraph shallow, but I picked up two Lotus Vales, one Scorched Ruins, and four Waylays because of the way they worked after 6th Edition and before errata. (I bought four Lion's Eye Diamonds later even after errata because I actually wanted to use them in an empty-hand deck.) The errata from the DCI essentially killed my own personal investment in those cards. WotC has repeated numerous times how they will not reprint the Power 9 for example because of the collector's investment. When they make a card powerful like the cases of Lotus Vale and Waylay and then turn around and ruin my investment. True, the singles market is not supposed to be stable and assured when you invest, but it still angered me as a collector and a player to lose that.

I consider environment and cards pretty much the same thing. I think you and I just have a difference of opinion on that one. Obviously we disagree on the errata for Illusions , I think it's not being used as originally intended, true, but that's how the game works IMO which of course is the basis for my arguement against errata. My question is, do you think that Delusions of Mediocrity is okay even though it does something similar? Does Delusions need to be changed because it's smaller version of a card in a very effective combo? Please don't take that insulting, I'm just wondering what about IoGrandeur needs to be errata'd when DoMediocrity is half as bad? Edited by Dune Echo.

I said Necro because it was a large part of a lot of combo decks, and losing Dark Ritual and Mana Vault did not kill the Trix deck which has caused so many problems. But yes, it did help get Dark Ritual banned, which previously to how I originally felt being a green player, really hurt black weenie decks.

 

[Spiderman]

I like pulling good cards along with the rest. I just don't like justifying that because there was a rules change, we should keep the new, altered-as-intent card. While Waylay was not "barrrroken", some case could come up where it is potentional game-altering and that shouldn't be. A card by itself should remain the same no matter what the rules change (Fog notwithstanding ) If interactions of cards due to rules changing make the usage better (or worse), then adjustments need to be made (such as searching for Counters while on the stack).

And they did do a bad job of errata-ing Waylay so it didn't even return to its original intent.

I wasn't aware there WAS errata on Delusions (or Illusions of Grandeur), at least of the sort that would cause Trix to not be viable. Although I could kinda see why they didn't errata it; the life gain and lose is based on the card itself, not by the player casting it. What they needed was a way to gain control of the card from the graveyard so someone could do a "reverse" combo.