In an unsurprising update, MTG Arena has just announced the banning of 18 cards before the official release of Modern Horizons 3. The banning will affect the Historic and Brawl formats.
The banned cards from Historic are:
- Harbinger of the Seas
- Winter Moon
- Endurance
- Fury
- Grief
- Subtlety
- Solitude
- Flare of Fortitude
- Flare of Denial
- Flare of Malice
- Flare of Duplication
- Flare of Cultivation
- Enemy fetch lands
The banned cards from Brawl are:
- Disruptor Flute
Prior to the release of MH3, MTG Arena announced their intention to pre-ban up to 20 cards. These bans are being implemented due to MH3’s introduction of unprecedented power levels to the eternal MTGA formats, rivaling those seen in carefully curated Anthology releases.
MTG gave the following official statement as the reasoning behind the bans.
Modern Horizons 3 introduces the largest change to Historic to date when it comes to card power. We want to take as many cards as possible in the format while keeping true to our typical banning strategy. We have been cautious of cards that can be cast for free with alternative payments as we believe they are too fast for this format. So, it should not be surprising that we are banning the Evoke Elementals and Flare cycle for Modern Horizons 3, but they will be playable in Timeless.
We believe the other two cards, Winter Moon and Harbinger of the Seas, are above the power level threshold for Historic. Both cards affect the opponent’s lands in a way we are cautious of in this format and will likely slow the game down.
Finally, we want to prevent cards in Brawl that can shut down a player’s commander completely, so Disruptor Flute is banned in Brawl.
MTG ARENA JUNE 3, 2024 BAN ANNOUNCEMENT
It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that the evoke elementals were banned. Rakdos Evoke had been dominating Modern with cards like Fury and Grief paired with blink effects such as Not Dead After All.
The deck was so powerful that Fury ended up being banned in the format. Despite this, the deck continues to be a force to reckon with in Modern.
While pre-banning the MH2 evoke elementals is an obvious decision, MTG Arena is adopting a cautious stance towards the format by also pre-banning the new MH3 free spells.
We have yet to see the power level of any of the flares, and some of them appear fairly reasonable. The MH3 elementals were particularly good because you could double their ETB with blink effects and end up with the creature in play without paying their full cost.
Unlike evoke elementals, the flares require you to sacrifice a non-token creature. This means, your deck will have to run some amount of creatures to benefit from their alternate casting costs, and they’ll need to be ones you are willing to sacrifice. It isn’t clear yet exactly how pushed or playable they are.
Even if you won’t be able to play these cards in Historic, you will be able to use them in Timeless on MTG Arena.
MH3 will release on MTG Arena next Tuesday, June 11.
MH3 Prerelease events at your local game store begins on June 7 and the set releases on paper June 14, 2024. It will be featured in Pro Tour Modern Horizons 3 at MagicCon Amsterdam June 28-30.
READ MORE: The Most Expensive MTG Cards From Modern Horizons 3 So Far
