Since it's gotten almost no discussion at all the times I mentioned it, it probably deserves a thread. Sure, it's powerful, but it's also 15 mana.
Mod edit: Adding the announcement and simultanous SCG article - cryogen
Quote from Sheldon »
This is one on which we listened heavily to what the community was saying, and nearly without exception, everyone hates Emrakul. It’s a card that makes the game devolve into a war over a single card whenever it hits the table. Add to that the fact that its combination of abilities made is seriously unfun to play against. We had already had our eye on it, and when the community spoke, we listened.
This is one on which we listened heavily to what the community was saying and nearly without exception everyone hates Emrakul. It's a card much like Kokusho that makes the game devolve into a war over a single card whenever it hits the table. We had already had our eye on it and when the community wailed and gnashed its teeth we listened.
Personally I loved and hated Emrakul both when playing him (fortunately I never had to sit down with anyone running him as a General although I stared down his tentacles a few times). I mean as a player who wouldn't want a nearly uncounterable take-an-extra-turn kind of impossible-to-deal-with “I win” card at their disposal? But that was also the real downside. You just drop him on the board and win (don't get me started about Intet/Djinn of Wishes shenanigans) and while that might be fine in competitive formats it's not the EDH/Commander I want. While there might be a great rare story of how a few ragtag heroes ganged up to defeat the evil creature of the elder days for the most part it's “Emrakul—game's over.”
I did find amusing the post that said something like “If you're losing to too much Emrakul you're not playing enough Bribery” but that very post illustrated the point. If not just individual games but entire environments (note the avoidance of the over- and misused term 'metagame') are devolving into the battle over Cthulhu then we've made the right decision.
I can't say much as I have yet had anyone ask us if it was ok to run Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, but I feel she'd fall under similar lines of banning that Primeval Titan did, though probably less than PrimeTime because of the aforementioned 15 mana cost.
Since it's gotten almost no discussion at all the times I mentioned it, it probably deserves a thread. Sure, it's powerful, but it's also 15 mana.
Could come off the ban list to test it for a few months. The thing that seems insane is the extra turn, but you need 15 mana to do that! At that point you deserve something epic. I can however see the issue being the very limited interactivity there is with Emrakul compared to her brethren Kozilek and Ulamogg.
As far as I can tell, the big reason it was ever banned was because it was new and too many people were playing it because it was the prerelease card and colorless. I was never for an Emrakul ban and have never objected to the card in my group in all this time. Yeah, it's strong, but it's 15 mana. I run it as a commander and my brother runs it in animar. It's just too expensive for what you get and I'm the Worldspine Wurm guy. Of course, I don't really run it much because I don't like annihilator much either. I'm not really sure it would see as much play as Kozi or Ulamog anymore since there aren't a million people with a copy and no other giant eldrazi dude. The way I remember it, Emrakul wasn't really complained about as much as hate for the whole annihilator mechanic. Wizards put a super unfun mechanic on a bunch of timmy fat you can play in every deck. It was more a ban annihilator thing than just Emrakul. I don't really see people going out of their way to track down a $25-30 mythic rare to annoy their group anymore with the stigma annihilator still holds. It's also a little closer to just another eldrazi fat dude now with the flash Journey to Nowhere and the instant exile target permanent on top of the edicts and blue answers. Remember when Wizards apologized for Darksteel Colossus and a few years later, it was reprinted to a chorus of why bother with that useless garbage (2 sets BEFORE Blightsteel) after answers to Darksteel became commonplace? Back in the day, -X/-X effects were really bad and exile was almost nonexistant other than graveyard removal. I'm really not convinced if you printed Emrakul for the first time today, that it would be banned. It's probably more it's banned because it's banned like a lot of the legacy/modern stuff that comes off and flops as bad as a fish out of water. Now, obviously, Emrakul is a really strong card, but people certainly aren't going to be running Bribery just to get it anymore since it's probably not going to show up that much.
Could come off the ban list to test it for a few months. The thing that seems insane is the extra turn, but you need 15 mana to do that! At that point you deserve something epic. I can however see the issue being the very limited interactivity there is with Emrakul compared to her brethren Kozilek and Ulamogg.
It was legal for awhile, so the data is in. with the new support for colorless cards, yikes.
'Ramp to Ema before someone casts Bribery was far too common a deck.
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
Could come off the ban list to test it for a few months. The thing that seems insane is the extra turn, but you need 15 mana to do that! At that point you deserve something epic. I can however see the issue being the very limited interactivity there is with Emrakul compared to her brethren Kozilek and Ulamogg.
It was legal for awhile, so the data is in. with the new support for colorless cards, yikes.
'Ramp to Ema before someone casts Bribery was far too common a deck.
I wasn't aware of that, but if it has already been tested, then I guess it should be off(?). As for what cards that pushes it Emrakul I can think of Conduit of Ruin as well as Sanctum of Ugin, but that is more in terms of finding her. Personally I think if you let it stay for a while the meta would flow back and forth with people putting it and people answering with cards like bribery causing people to take it out until the answers think out, rinse repeat. But again, wasn't there when it first was tested so what do I know.....
What do you mean by "off(?)"? It was legal for a while, then banned because the whole game revolved around it. Pro colors makes answers pretty rough, especially after the person most likely to answer just lost 6 permanents
If people are sick of reading about stuff just stop taking part. You have 100% control over what you read. Simic Ascendancy isn't going to get banned just because you didn't tell someone to shut up on the internet.
What do you mean by "off(?)"? It was legal for a while, then banned because the whole game revolved around it. Pro colors makes answers pretty rough, especially after the person most likely to answer just lost 6 permanents
Was more a queston mark to regard me not knowing. Haven't played with it ever, so can't talk from own experience.
I've edited the OP to include the 2010 ban announcement and the Star City Games article where Sheldon went into more detail. I looked for additional quotes from the Rules Committee on the official forum, but the card almost never came up since being banned.
Yeah, it's been banned for almost as long as I've played the format. It was only legal for a couple months back when it was new, flashy, and everyone had one. Now it's a high dollar card with a lot of stigma attached. I seriously doubt it is going to wreck the meta again when people would have to go out and obtain it.
I was not playing during the time where Emrakul, the Aeons Torn was legal so I'm not sure how it would play out in practice but I have a hard time seeing why he is banned while other cards are not. If he is being played predominately fairly, such that he is being cast sometime around or after turn 10, I do not see how he is a huge problem. Sure he may get to crap on one player's board a bit but he is not nearly as difficult to deal with as he once was. ETB effects can kill him, Planeswalkers with creature removal kill him, sweepers can kill him, there is even a limited amount of instant speed removal for him now with cards such as Stasis Snare and Scour from Existence. Sure these aren't heavily played cards but in a heavy Emrakul, the Aeons Torn meta they might see an additional level of play.
Now, if he's being played unfairly well he could be a huge problem but a ton of currently legal cards are brutal when played unfairly. Tooth and Nail is legal and I have rarely seen anyone not get an utterly game ending setup from that and the few times I have seen it pull other cards I wished they had just gotten a game ending combo because they got things like Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir and Prophet of Kruphix (back when that card was legal). As far as "feel bads" are concerned I have a hard time seeing why this card is banned when Mindslaver isn't. Having to sac 6 permanents and potentially take 15 damage to the face sucks but having my opponent play my turn is worse and that is still legal and easily looped.
I will say that I am one of the few players that really likes the Eldrazi because I love the Lovecraftian feel of them and would love to try out Emrakul, the Aeons Torn in a few EDH decks but I can understand if I'm in the minority.
Emrakul, the Aeons Torn being consistently cast on turn 6 was a common occurrence. Simply being 'put onto the battlefield', while not as crippling due to the missing extra turn, frequently happened by turn 3.
The card is extremely difficult to deal with, and will commonly effectively remove the player most capable of dealing with it from the game.
In environments where Emrakul was expected, games often became 'get Emrakul first, or lose in a very frustrating manner'.
While there are other cards that I would rather be banned, if for some reason I was limited to a choice between them, Emrakul was, and remains a problem. I assure you, Mindslaver is nowhere even remotely close to as aggravating and problematic as Emrakul was, and trying to make a comparison to Tooth and Nail - a card that is often debated, should be banned, and has a very different effect - is not an effective way to support your argument.
While I was not an active proponent of Emrakul being banned at the time, I do still agree with the banning.
If you really want to understand why Emrakul is disallowed, get your group to both allow its use, and proxy any cards they are missing to appropriately adapt their decks to it. Play this way for a few months, and see what happens.
On a final note, a cards scarcity should never be a factor on if it is banned or not; just because you don't have to deal with it, does not mean other games will not be ruined by it. Side note: Of the nine cards where scarcity is portrayed as a (minor) factor in their banning, every one of them is justified even if the Perceived Barrier to Entry is removed.
Emrakul may not be bannable in pure power level, but it is pretty uninteractive. You can technically prevent the player from casting emrakul by playing mana denial or simply killing him before he even casts emrakul (keep in mind that mana denial or combo kills that can kill a player or table by turn 6 - as Muspellsheimr said, emrakul could be consistently cast by turn 6 if you tried - are likely done in competitive circles, which the RC has explicitly stated they don't give a ***** about). But when he actually casts emrakul it's almost impossible to stop at that point. When the player attacks, the defending player usually just loses the game. I mean maybe one player has a bunch of stuff he's okay with sacrificing, in which case the emrakul just attacks someone else who will be taken out of the game (instead of attacking that Karador player that has a bunch of useless critters to bin, he attacks the monoblue player with a bunch of islands and nothing else).
I really doubt casting it turn 6 is likely unless you build your deck around it. Even if you could do such a thing, I don't see how it's any different than the whole turn one Jin Gitaxias, turn 3 Tooth and Nail/Ulamog/Kozilek, or anything else high teir commander players do.
Emmy is a card that I feel has shares attributes with another highly debated card Iona, Shield of Emeria. They both kind of seem like really awesome, cool creatures, but they end up screwing your opponents out of actually playing the game.
Basically what I'm saying is that if someone lands Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, unless they have a way to remove it immediately, the game has been irreparably warped. (Annihilator 6 on a Flying 15/15 is kind of a lot to deal with even once for any player.)
Iona does something similar, but she is just better at keeping her opponents from playing at all, and though she may not be a 15/15 annihilator, she's just plain not as fun as she seems, imo.
I'd like to see both of these names on the banned list, tbh.
Spoken as someone who has very clearly never played with or against Emrakul, the Aeons Torn.
First, the biggest difference. Emrakul is largely immune to instant removal. Kozilek & Ulamog are not.
You can deal with a haste Kozilek. You cannot deal with Emrakul attacking on the additional turn.
Next, Annihilator 6 is vastly more damaging than Annihilator 4, so much so that they are not comparable.
Finally, an additional turn is far, far superior to simply giving something haste, especially when you have access to 15 mana.
Yet again, if you do not think Emrakul is a problem, play with it. Allow your group to proxy any cards they want to accommodate and/or deal with it. See what happens after a few months.
I have played with Emrakul. I've had an eldrazi titan commander deck for years now. It's also in an animar deck in my meta. Even in the super slow meta, 15 mana is just too much unless you really got at it with the ramp or play Coffers doublers, or Boundless Realms. Sure, you could cast it turn 6 if your deck is mostly ramp and you tap out for Realms/a doubler, but whatever. Yeah, it is a sweet ramp target (although less for me since I don't really like annihilator much and would prefer trample or more power on Eldrazi Conscription) but I still don't think it's a whole lot more horrible than Blightsteel, Phage, Ulamog, Kozilek, etc. A greaves/boots will do a great impression of emrakul without the huge 15 mana cost. Honestly, I kind of think it might be overcosted like Progenitus. 10/10 pro all colors isn't worth WWUUBBRRGG Maybe emrakul is worth 13. Progenitus should be like 2WUBRG.
I still don't think it's a whole lot more horrible than Blightsteel, Phage, Ulamog, Kozilek, etc. A greaves/boots will do a great impression of emrakul without the huge 15 mana cost.
It still takes two cards to make any of the creatures you named as difficult to deal with as Emrakul, with the exception of Progenitus, who doesn't have any of the keywords to back up his protection.
Yeah, but they cost 10-12 mana and short of an instant speed answer, any haste granter will make them pretty devastating. Emrakul needs the full 15 mana to get the time walk, so saving 3-5 mana for a similar effect is a pretty big deal unlike the whole Teferi/Seedborn thing people brought up. Of course, it doesn't really matter whether you Sneak Attack/Through the Breach Emrakul or Blightsteel. Someone isn't playing this game. My point isn't that casting it is impossible. My point is that it costs so much mana it isn't really worth it and people mostly did it because it was big and flashy and they had one or more because they gave them out like candy. Win cons don't need 15 mana on any level. It really sounds more like a special league rules problem where they try and rule out all kinds of things and then maybe wrecking people with the spaghetti monster is the best strategy since it doesn't technically destroy lands, it doesn't really have to kill anyone now, and it doesn't need a bunch of turns to eliminate someone. Maybe it does deserve a house ban under some league rules, but I see no reason it should be regular banned anymore when there are far better things you could be doing than ramping to 15 mana. It does have its uses in metas where annihilator isn't stigmatized, though. Of course, I really like the new eldrazi titans better and might eliminate them from my titan deck's commander options after we get new emrakul. Yeah, I don't really want to play it. I just think it shouldn't be banned and have no problem with people playing it that actually like annihilator and want to deal with the hate it draws.
Emrakul is a powerful dude but not really worth 3 more mana than any other card in the game. (the other cards that high have cost reduction built in) I didn't really mean Progenitus is similar. I meant it is overcosted and one of the first super fat like Emrakul. Back then, they were debating whether Progenitus was too powerful. It would be a serious card if it costed 7 and had pro all colors instead of pro everything.
I'm pretty sure using Animar to create an infinite turn combo doesn't exactly fall into the spirit of Commander argument. If we don't care about Teferi-Pool, Mizzet-Curiousity, or any of the other combos, we don't care about Animar-Emrakul either. Of course, it's also not even the best way to generate infinite turns outside of that deck.
I'm pretty sure using Animar to create an infinite turn combo doesn't exactly fall into the spirit of Commander argument. If we don't care about Teferi-Pool, Mizzet-Curiousity, or any of the other combos, we don't care about Animar-Emrakul either. Of course, it's also not even the best way to generate infinite turns outside of that deck.
What reason do you have for thinking that Emrakul, the Aeons Torn is healthy for the EDH format? The reason I ask is that I see many reasons that Emmy is not healthy, but I am struggling with finding any positive notes for allowing her to see play again.
Since it's gotten almost no discussion at all the times I mentioned it, it probably deserves a thread. Sure, it's powerful, but it's also 15 mana.
Mod edit: Adding the announcement and simultanous SCG article - cryogen
Could come off the ban list to test it for a few months. The thing that seems insane is the extra turn, but you need 15 mana to do that! At that point you deserve something epic. I can however see the issue being the very limited interactivity there is with Emrakul compared to her brethren Kozilek and Ulamogg.
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'Ramp to Ema before someone casts Bribery was far too common a deck.
I wasn't aware of that, but if it has already been tested, then I guess it should be off(?). As for what cards that pushes it Emrakul I can think of Conduit of Ruin as well as Sanctum of Ugin, but that is more in terms of finding her. Personally I think if you let it stay for a while the meta would flow back and forth with people putting it and people answering with cards like bribery causing people to take it out until the answers think out, rinse repeat. But again, wasn't there when it first was tested so what do I know.....
Was more a queston mark to regard me not knowing. Haven't played with it ever, so can't talk from own experience.
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"While Emrakul is nice I feel Koz is still better for what this deck is trying to do"
We can see them as interchangeable but most any other hyper competitive EDH deck will blow Emrakul out of the water before he really gets going.
URThe Joy of Painting with Nin, the Pain Artist!UR
Now, if he's being played unfairly well he could be a huge problem but a ton of currently legal cards are brutal when played unfairly. Tooth and Nail is legal and I have rarely seen anyone not get an utterly game ending setup from that and the few times I have seen it pull other cards I wished they had just gotten a game ending combo because they got things like Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir and Prophet of Kruphix (back when that card was legal). As far as "feel bads" are concerned I have a hard time seeing why this card is banned when Mindslaver isn't. Having to sac 6 permanents and potentially take 15 damage to the face sucks but having my opponent play my turn is worse and that is still legal and easily looped.
I will say that I am one of the few players that really likes the Eldrazi because I love the Lovecraftian feel of them and would love to try out Emrakul, the Aeons Torn in a few EDH decks but I can understand if I'm in the minority.
The card is extremely difficult to deal with, and will commonly effectively remove the player most capable of dealing with it from the game.
In environments where Emrakul was expected, games often became 'get Emrakul first, or lose in a very frustrating manner'.
While there are other cards that I would rather be banned, if for some reason I was limited to a choice between them, Emrakul was, and remains a problem. I assure you, Mindslaver is nowhere even remotely close to as aggravating and problematic as Emrakul was, and trying to make a comparison to Tooth and Nail - a card that is often debated, should be banned, and has a very different effect - is not an effective way to support your argument.
While I was not an active proponent of Emrakul being banned at the time, I do still agree with the banning.
If you really want to understand why Emrakul is disallowed, get your group to both allow its use, and proxy any cards they are missing to appropriately adapt their decks to it. Play this way for a few months, and see what happens.
On a final note, a cards scarcity should never be a factor on if it is banned or not; just because you don't have to deal with it, does not mean other games will not be ruined by it.
Side note: Of the nine cards where scarcity is portrayed as a (minor) factor in their banning, every one of them is justified even if the Perceived Barrier to Entry is removed.
A Dying Wish
To Rise Again
Chainer, Dementia Master
Muldrotha, the Gravetide
Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
WUBRGProgenitus
URGMaelstrom Wanderer
WUBOloro, Ageless Ascetic
WURZedruu, the Greathearted
BRGProssh, Skyraider of Kher ($100)
GWUDerevi, Empyrial Tactician ($100)
UGKruphix, God of Horizons ($100)(retired)UTalrand, Sky Summoner (French 1v1, $100)
Basically what I'm saying is that if someone lands Emrakul, the Aeons Torn, unless they have a way to remove it immediately, the game has been irreparably warped. (Annihilator 6 on a Flying 15/15 is kind of a lot to deal with even once for any player.)
Iona does something similar, but she is just better at keeping her opponents from playing at all, and though she may not be a 15/15 annihilator, she's just plain not as fun as she seems, imo.
I'd like to see both of these names on the banned list, tbh.
First, the biggest difference. Emrakul is largely immune to instant removal. Kozilek & Ulamog are not.
You can deal with a haste Kozilek. You cannot deal with Emrakul attacking on the additional turn.
Next, Annihilator 6 is vastly more damaging than Annihilator 4, so much so that they are not comparable.
Finally, an additional turn is far, far superior to simply giving something haste, especially when you have access to 15 mana.
Yet again, if you do not think Emrakul is a problem, play with it. Allow your group to proxy any cards they want to accommodate and/or deal with it. See what happens after a few months.
A Dying Wish
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Atraxa, Praetors' Voice
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Emrakul is a powerful dude but not really worth 3 more mana than any other card in the game. (the other cards that high have cost reduction built in) I didn't really mean Progenitus is similar. I meant it is overcosted and one of the first super fat like Emrakul. Back then, they were debating whether Progenitus was too powerful. It would be a serious card if it costed 7 and had pro all colors instead of pro everything.
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What reason do you have for thinking that Emrakul, the Aeons Torn is healthy for the EDH format? The reason I ask is that I see many reasons that Emmy is not healthy, but I am struggling with finding any positive notes for allowing her to see play again.