Chains, simplified

[Titanium Dragon]

Chains of Mephistopheles is a very cool card, but it has several issues. First off, it is on the reserve list, and secondly, its wording is extremely convoluted - people seem to get lost somewhere in the middle and don't understand that the whole thing is a single replacement effect. It is a neat effect though, and I thought it'd be neat to see again.

Enter this idea for a simpler version of Chains:

Chained Memories

Enchantment (Rare)
At the beginning of each player's draw step, that player puts the top card of their library into their hand.
If a player would draw a card, instead they don't.

Its very short and concise, and acts similarly to chains without all the ugly wordiness. I was thinking about changing the replacement ability to "If a player would draw a card, instead they put the top card of their library into their graveyard" but was concerned it would enable dredge too much (also, at this length, it doesn't even require microtext). Is this costed appropriately? Would this cause problems?

EDIT: Oops. I simplified the card a bit before I posted it, then realized what I'd done made this card really broken in a dredge deck. Changed back to how I had it originally; I thought I could skimp out on skipping the draw step and have them pseudo-draw during the draw step, but forgot the reason I had it skipping the draw step in the first place was to prevent dredge from being abusive with it (a one sided howling mine for 1B, but only for dredge decks, tha also acted as chains on their opponent? Perish the thought).

Current Wording:
Chained Memories

Enchantment (Rare)
Players skip their draw steps.
At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player puts the top card of their library into their hand.
If a player would draw a card, instead they don't.

[ELD]

That is a very strong effect, even better than Chains of Mephistopheles.  Vs my current Gift's list, it is basically a Chalice set on one, as the only cards that actually "draw" cards are Ancestral Recall, Brainstorm and Library of Alexandria.  The fact that it shuts off Library of Alexandria is important, as Library is amazing vs the original Chains, and hate decks in general.  The fact that it misses some fast mana, Chain of Vapor, Mystical Tutor, and Vampiric Tutor is probably a fair trade off.  With the current state of Combo/Control, Tutors are on par with card drawing.  Grim Tutor, Gift's Ungiven, Merchant Scroll, Demonic Tutor, Mystical Tutor, Vampiric Tutor and Imperial Seal all get the answer for this card, or a card to end the game.  The first brainstorm can often happen before this card comes down, but if this is accelerated out it could certainly kill many good hands in a similar fashion to Trinisphere or Null Rod. 

The original Chains is good enough to occasionally see play in Vintage and this seems to be a stronger version.  Dredge decks would be able to drop this and ignore it's drawback, but they are not currently built to cast 2cc spells.  Overall, this would appear to be another hate card to drop on the table and say "Work around this in order to beat me."  The current crop of top decks could probably work around this more often than not.  If they do restrict Gift's Ungiven and Grim Tutor, then I would be very concerned.  Switching back to Thirst For Knowledge as a main draw spell would make this card much stronger. 

[andrewpate]

This might encourage Fact or Fiction to make a comeback, as well, since it supplies lots of card advantage without drawing any cards.  In addition, this would favor Fish builds that look more like SS, since Dark Confidant skirts the drawback while the cost fits pretty well into the curve.  Overall, I think it's interesting.

In non-Vintage formats, I don't even really see it being an issue.  I guess it's a pretty good hoser in Standard and Extended with all the Tron decks that abuse Thirst for Knowledge and Compulsive Research, but that just makes it playable, not problematic.  I'm a fan of this card as written.

[Anusien]

Needs power level adjusting; feels slightly too cheap.

[Matt]

More to the point, should not be splashable. if you want to push it, if not.

[Liam-K]

Is this definitely a black card?

[Titanium Dragon]

Is this definitely a black card?

To be honest, I don't know what other color it would be. Black gets weird stuff like this, and the original chains was black. Its somewhat akin to discard in that it shuts down extra cards, and black is really the color of actually messing with the drawing process, as far as I can tell.

More to the point, it should not be splashable.

Why wouldn't you want a card like this to be splashable? Its purpose is to shut down dangerous card draw; it might be undercosted, but it seems to me that this is an ability that doesn't really -do- anything but hose others, and even then it doesn't do so in an agressive manner. The worst I can come up with is using it in conjunction with Eon Hub to deny your opponent cards while you have another mode of getting cards into your hand, or just locking a game down while you're ahead. It obviously works well with Dark Confidant, but I'm pretty sure this + bob isn't going to break the game in half, and it punishes decks focused on "going off" with little ability to affect permanents.

[Liam-K]

I guess black got Words of Waste somewhat recently, that's a close-ish effect, but it's the only black enchantment containing the word "draw" that's even a little bit comparable to chains.  Still, this card isn't discard, it minds me of things like Solitary Confinement and Island Sanctuary, and it feels very "rules" to me, particularly since it's symmetrical.  It's definitely colour-pie ambiguous.  I'd almost be tempted to make it an artifact and kick the cost up to 4 or so.