When a new set of Magic: The Gathering comes out, it creates an exciting frontier where everything is surprising and experimental. The metagame of Standard play is constantly changing dramatically because of set releases. A format in flux is full of possibilities and upsets. Cards are only legal for so long, so competitively minded players have to follow which decks work and which don’t an be prepared to change up their playstyles every few months. That’s very healthy for Magic‘s meta, since overpowering and dominant decks won’t be playable in Standard forever.
However, there’s more than one way of keeping Magic: The Gathering a healthy gameplay experience, and that’s bans. Sometimes, a card is just too strong overall or facilitates a deck that’s so strong that nothing else can compete with it. Bans are unfortunate to have to turn to, but sometimes it’s necessary. That’s what just happened with Uro, Titan of Nature’s Wrath, a mythic rare legendary creature that released nine months ago with Theros: Beyond Death. This remarkably efficient threat and draw engine now won’t be playable in Standard decks.
However, does the ban actually solve the problems that have been ailing standard? Uro was a core piece of a particularly powerful deck that’s risen to power since the release of Zendikar Rising, but the deck might not be down for the count without Uro to help it along. Sometimes losing one crucial card really is all it takes to make a deck fall from glory, but will that be the case? Was Uro really the heart and soul of one of the strongest decks in Standard? Looking closely, it’s hard to say.
One of the best things a Magic card can be is flexible. Players always admire cards that are highly versatile, serving multiple functions and playable in multiple ways. That informs all kinds of interesting strategies and has made powerful cards like Cryptic Command go down as important pieces of Magic history. Flexibility is definitely one of Uro’s greatest strengths. Even though he’s tied to two colors, his mechanics make him valuable to a lot of playstyles and a serious threat in all of them.
The ability forcing Uro to be sacrificed if he didn’t enter the battlefield through his escape mechanic might look like a drawback to newer Magic players. However, it’s reminiscent of the old Evoke mechanic and demonstrates just how good that ability to play a creature like a sorcery is. Uro gives the player three incredibly valuable effects when he enters the battlefield: life gain, card draw, and an extra land. That’s all for only three mana. Those benefits are good for everything from mana ramp decks to late game decks needing life to survive. All that comes on top of a strong creature that can be played later as a significant threat.
Clearly Uro’s ban on Zendikar Rising‘s release is far from unjustified. A highly efficient deck can get this 6/6 Elder Giant onto the battlefield by turn four while reaping all the benefits of letting him enter the battlefield multiple times and attack, and that’s only in a deck built around him. In Standard he’s been played as a supplement for other decks as a source of rapid land ramp, accruing tremendous amount of mana that can be poured into game-ending spells. However, even though such a powerful tool is out of the meta, is it enough to balance things?
Up until the ban, Uro was a great part of an extremely competitive Magic deck called Four-Color Omnath. It’s a Landfall and mana ramp deck named after the brand new legendary elemental that only entered Standard a few days ago with the release of Zendikar Rising. This is the deck that’s been an absolute terror over only a few days since Zendikar cards arrived. However, as the name implies, the deck isn’t build around Uro — it’s build around Omnath. This elemental can generate tremendous amounts of mana both by encouraging the use of its Landfall ability multiple times and through that Landfall ability producing a surge of mana. Any Magic player feels powerful with upwards of twenty mana available.
Uro is certainly important to the Omnath deck, since he’s so good at accelerating Omnath’s access to lands. However, it’s not like the elemental champion of the deck relies solely on him to get the lands. There’s still a ton of other ways to fish up lands in the deck, such as Escape to the Wilds and Genesis Ultimatum. Admittedly, these alternatives aren’t quite as quick and cheap as Uro, but their power shouldn’t be underestimated. Even in a vacuum, Zendikar Rising‘s Omnath is a very flexible and powerful creature that is as flexible as Uro is. It’s a damage threat, a source of life advantage, and a veritable fountain of mana.
Overall, odds are that the Omnath deck hasn’t been completely defeated by Uro’s abrupt disappearance from Standard. By Wizards of the Coast’s own admission, it didn’t intend to destroy this deck — if it wanted to, it easily could’ve knocked Omnath out of the meta for good. The problem is that Uro is just one of a ton of tools that Uro has to play with. Four-Color Omnath is already being built in all kinds of ways by virtue of being a very new deck. Because it’s so new, the deck’s fans don’t even have much playtime with Uro to get out of their system before making the deck work without him.
A ban so shortly after the release of a set is unorthodox, as Wizards of the Coast also admits. It’s understandable that they’d rather ban a relatively old card in Standard instead of banning a card that’s only been out for a few days. The problem is that taking away one of Omnath’s weapons doesn’t mean that the Magic deck has been completely disarmed. It has a broad arsenal and it’s sure to restrategize very quickly. Uro’s ban is bound to prompt a sigh of relief from a lot of Magic: The Gathering fans playing Standard right now, but they should be wary. There’s a good chance that Omnath will be back with a vengeance.
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