The Gathering’s December 2024 Bans and Unbans Explained

Posted by By our-little-miss-is-home December 17, 2024 2 Views 6 Min Read
The Gathering's December 2024 Bans and Unbans Explained

Summary

  • MTG’s December 2024 Banned and Restricted post had a mix of big and small bans, as well as unbans.
  • Modern had the most changes, with cards like The One Ring banned, shifting the meta significantly.
  • Unbanned cards like Mox Opal and Green Sun’s Zenith aim to add diversity to the Modern format.



Anticipated with a mix of fear that one’s decks may be bricked and a sense of novelty for a meta shift, Magic: The Gathering‘s December 2024 Banned and Restricted post came out just a day ago. While one of the latest posts sparked a massive controversy with bans on some of Commander’s most played and expensive cards, the announcement for December 2024 is a mix of big and small bans and also a series of unbans. Lifting bans in Magic: The Gathering is no small feat, so it’s good to see some cards returning to the meta as others leave.

Unsurprisingly to those who play the format, Modern saw the highest number of changes across the board, as the ban of Nadu, Winged Wisdom created ripples that affected the meta significantly, making other cards emerge as the dominant options. On the other hand of the spectrum is Standard, which is in a good spot after the release of Magic: The Gathering‘s Foundations set as well as Duskmourn and Bloomburrow before it. The list of affected formats in the December Banned and Restricted post is as follows:


  • Pioneer
  • Modern
  • Legacy
  • Explorer

For reference, the December 2024 Banned and Restricted post can be found
here
.

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Magic: The Gathering Bans The One Ring

Magic The Gathering The One Ring Card Art GR

The elephant in the room is that The One Ring is now banned in Modern. This is huge for many reasons, both from a financial standpoint for fans (and Wizards of the Coast itself) and from a gameplay perspective. Banning The One Ring in MTG‘s Modern format was something that many fans saw coming due to the card’s dominant presence in most competitive decks, where some games would boil down to the gamer who played The One Ring first winning the match.

The deck that will be hit the most by the ban of The One Ring is Boros Energy in Modern.


More MTG Modern Bans and Jegantha Ban in Pioneer and Explorer

Other bans in Modern include Amped Raptor and Jegantha, the Wellspring. The former is another ban issued against the dominance of Boros Energy, specifically. The latter, on the other hand, was also banned in Pioneer and Explorer, and the main reason is that Jegantha’s restriction on building decks in Magic: The Gathering is arguably nonexistent, to the point that one can get a “free” 5/5 creature. The result is a samey meta where deck diversity is not high enough to justify keeping Jegantha, and it’s the main reason it was banned in Pioneer and Explorer as well as Modern.

MTG’s Modern December 2024 Unbanned Cards Explained


Finally, MTG‘s Modern format bans were followed by four unbans, balancing things out. These include the following cards:

  • Mox Opal
  • Green Sun’s Zenith
  • Faithless Looting
  • Splinter Twin

Mox Opal was first banned in 2020 because it made up for some explosive starts, but the logic behind its unban is that it may now grant access to more artifact-centric combos within Modern. Green Sun’s Zenith was dominant before its 2011 ban, but given that Green decks revolving around big creatures are very much out of the meta, the idea is to reintroduce this card to provide another tutor options for those lists. Faithless Looting is being unbanned because it was originally a casualty of the Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis meta in 2019. Similarly, Splinter Twin was first banned in a very different meta, so the ban being lifted is a way of testing the waters and seeing if it affects the original Pestermite combo.


MTG’s Legacy December 2024 Bans Explained

The final format on the list is Legacy, which saw two bans in the form of Psychic Frog and Vexing Bauble. Psychic Frog was banned mainly to keep Dimir Reanimator in check, as it was still dominating the meta after the Grief ban. As for the final MTG ban in 2024, Vexing Bauble ended up on the chopping block for granting free countermagic, meaning that players could play the 1-mana artifact and not worry about no-cost spells. It remains to be seen how all these bans and unbans will affect the meta, but Modern is likely in for a big shake-up.

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