Today’s ban announcement has been a very long time coming. Following the Final Fantasy set’s release, Vivi Ornitier has been a problem plaguing Standard. Players have been asking for bans for literal months, and now, finally, that day has come. Wizards of the Coast may have taken their sweet time, but Vivi has finally been banned.
Beyond just banning Vivi Ornitier, Wizards of the Coast went above and beyond in this ban update. In an attempt to curate the Standard metagame, two other cards have also been banned in Standard. Hopefully, this latest ban announcement can finally put the format on the right track after being troubled for so long.
Vivi Ornitier Banned In Standard
Wizards of the Coast
- Vivi Ornitier is banned in Standard.
As one of the most dominant and prolific Standard decks in a long time, it’s no surprise that part of the Vivi Cauldron deck has been banned. Wizards of the Coast even outright told us this would happen back in September, which is almost unheard of. The only real question is which card would end up being banned.
Both of the deck’s titular cards were undeniably problematic. Agatha’s Soul Cauldron is capable of causing all kinds of combo shenanigans across multiple formats, after all. Vivi Ornitier, meanwhile, is similarly a multiformat powerhouse that is incredibly easy to build around and exploit.
Ultimately, Wizards of the Coast decided to ban Vivi, which is definitely the right choice. While Agatha’s Soul Cauldron facilitated Vivi’s antics, it was clear that Vivi was the major problem that needed to be squashed. If the Soul Cauldron was banned instead, there was a decent chance that VIvi would break out before too long once again.
Thankfully, by banning Vivi Ornitier, Wizards of the Coast has ended the card’s reign once and for all. Beyond this, it also leaves Agatha’s Soul Cauldron in play for future combo shenanigans. Looking ahead, we can only hope that any future Soul Caldron combos aren’t nearly as oppressive as Vivi Cauldron was.
Two More Standard Bans
- Screaming Nemesis is banned in Standard.
- Proft’s Eidetic Memory is banned in Standard.
As we predicted, Wizards of the Coast didn’t just ban Vivi. Instead, both Proft’s Eidetic Memory and Screaming Nemesis have also been banned today. For better or worse, this feels like the least Wizards of the Coast could have done to set up the new Standard metagame.
Once Vivi’s banning was effectively guaranteed, MTG players started pushing toward Proft’s Eidetic Memory as an alternative game plan. Worryingly, these decks have already proven to be incredibly powerful and could have potentially taken over the meta without action. Beyond this, Proft’s Eidetic Memory is simply a true value machine of an MTG card.
As Wizards of the Coast noted in their announcement, the abundance of potent draw effects has made Proft’s Eidetic Memory overly powerful. Due to this, banning the card felt like the only option to increase room for future innovation. Similarly, this was a large part of the reasoning behind Screaming Nemesis’ ban.
Despite the dominance of Vivi Cauldron, Mono-Red Aggro was already capable of beating the deck in major tournaments. With Vivi now gone, this archetype was poised to become even more dominant, potentially shifting the entire format’s landscape. As Wizards notes, when an aggro deck is the best in the format, deck diversity is majorly impacted.
Hopefully, Screaming Nemesis being banned will give midrange and control-focused decks a leg up. That said, this archetype certainly still has potential, as the Leyline of Resonance one-shot kill line is still open. Even beyond this sub-archetype, Dimir Midrange hasn’t been touched at all, and could easily now take over the format. Whether or not this will happen, however, remains to be seen.
A Surprise Pioneer Ban
- Heartfire Hero is banned in Pioneer.
We really didn’t expect a Pioneer ban to happen today, yet here we are. In a very surprising turn of events, Heartfire Hero has been banned in Pioneer in order to improve the format’s diversity. While saying this, however, Wizards of the Coast bizarrely noted that “From an outside perspective, things look pretty good!”
According to Wizards, this is only on the surface, as much of the format is actually built around beating Mono-Red Aggro. The deck’s win rate is supposedly the highest in the format, and it’s especially prevalent in Best-of-One on MTG Arena. Due to this, banning Heartfire Hero should clip the deck’s wings somewhat, allowing the metagame to shift away from beating it.
Technically, all this reasoning from Wizards makes sense, but shaking up a format, especially now, is wild. It might just be the “outside perspective” talking, but Pioneer is absolutely fine at the moment, and the metgame has been developing nicely. Not only is deck diversity already pretty good, but new archetypes have even been popping up recently.
Hopefully, these bans will actually improve things, allowing decks to focus more on their own game plan. While this would be a positive for the format, the risk feels unnecessary at the moment. Considering this MTG ban announcement was meant to be one of the smaller ones, shaking up the format like this is definitely a surprise.
Two Legacy Bans
- Entomb is banned in Legacy.
- Nadu, Winged Wisdom is banned in Legacy.
While we expected to see an MTG ban in Legacy at least, we didn’t see this coming. At long last, Reanimator decks in the format are being dealt with after constantly skirting proper bans. On top of this, Nadu, Winged Wisdom is once again being taken out back and being shot thanks to being horrible to play against.
To deal with Legacy Reanimator decks, Wizards has finally banned Entomb. Previously, this was the deck’s perfect tutor, allowing you to put any card directly into the graveyard. From there, you only needed to spend one mana on a Reanimate, and then you’ve got any threat you need. The efficiency of this package was so over the top that it allowed Reanimator decks to focus on multiple game plans, making it very difficult to hate out with just graveyard answers.
In their announcement, Wizards was clearly hesitant to strike down this pillar of the format, but, in their own words, “It’s time.” Thankfully, alternative strategies are available in the format, which should keep the reanimation dream alive while keeping things interesting. Speaking of keeping things interesting, that’s very much the reason why Nadu received its third ban.
Much like in Modern and Commander, Nadu, Winged Wisdom combo turns are brutal to play against. The places to use interaction are unintuitive, and, while the game is basically over due to obscene amounts of card advantage. Despite this, opponents still have to sit around and die slowly, which turns games into a slog. Even when Nadu decks do win, the process is often especially grueling.
For this reason, Wizards has decided that Nadu simply isn’t a good fit for Legacy and has ultimately been banned. Hopefully, both of these Legacy bans we’ve seen today will open up a good amount of space in the format. Given the immense power level and razor’s edge many Legacy decks sit on, however, whether or not this will happen remains to be seen.
Nine MTG Arena Bans
- Force of Negation is pre-banned in Historic.
- Frantic Search is pre-banned in Historic.
- Mystical Tutor is pre-banned in Historic.
- Entomb is pre-banned in Historic.
- Dark Depths is pre-banned in Historic.
- Strip Mine is banned in Brawl.
- Mana Drain is banned in Brawl.
- Chrome Mox is banned in Brawl.
- Ancient Tomb is banned in Brawl.
Given the immense power found within the Avatar: The Last Airbender bonus sheet, a series of pre-bans is entirely unsurprising. Several of the bonus sheet’s cards don’t align with Wizards’ vision for Historic, so their banning is honestly expected. We already know that free spells aren’t suitable for the format, for instance, so Force of Negation’s pre-ban makes sense.
Additionally, prolific tutors, such as Entomb and Mystical Tutor, have been routinely excluded from the format. Dark Depths is a bit surprising; however, the clear combo shenanigans this card can cause are obviously concerning. Paired up with Thespian’s Stage, you can get Marit Lage in no time, especially when using Crop Rotation.
In a similar vein, Frantic Search has also been pre-banned to stop Historic’s combo decks from getting a free boost. So long as you can cast it, this spell is essentially free and allows you to filter your hand effectively. Considering this card is banned in Legacy, it being too strong for Historic isn’t that surprising.
What is very much surprising, however, is the choice to ban four cards in Brawl. These bans are reportedly part of a focus shift at Wizards of the Coast that aims to be more receptive to player feedback. In theory, this could lead to more careful curation of Brawl, which sounds great on the surface.
According to Wizards, each of the banned cards is too homogenizing, as each card sees play in every deck where possible. While this can be boring, ideally, the MTG Arena matchmaking system could have mitigated this problem. Unfortunately, without brackets being more visible in Brawl, building unoptimal decks is hardly the most enjoyable.
The Next MTG Bans
As usual, alongside this latest MTG ban announcement, Wizards also announced when the next bans will take place. Sadly, it seems MTG players have quite a wait in store, as the next bans won’t happen until February 9th. Notably, before this future announcement comes around, two sets will be released in the meantime.
Between Avatar: The Last Airbender and Lorwyn Eclipsed, there’s definitely the possibility that new broken cards will emerge. Hopefully, this hypothetical won’t turn out to be a problem, but Wizards doesn’t exactly have the best track record. Between Cori-Steel Cutter and Vivi Ornitier, 2025 hasn’t been the best year.
Ultimately, as is always the case post-bans, we’re just going to have to wait and see what happens. Hopefully, the new Standard metagame that emerges over the next few weeks will be balanced and incredibly enjoyable. Whether or not that will be the case, however, remains to be seen.
Thankfully, it does seem that Wizards of the Coast has learned their lesson somewhat. While future bans are almost three months away, future ban windows will supposedly be more regular. Ideally, this will prevent problem cards from ruining the format for great lengths of time, but the actual implementation remains to be seen.
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