More errata issues: Transmute Artifact

[dicemanx]

Transmute Artifact:

Card text:  Search through your library for one artifact
and immediately place it into play; also, choose any artifact in play that you control and place it in its owner's graveyard.
If the new artifact has a casting cost greater than that of the discarded one, you must pay the difference or Transmute Artifact fails and both artifacts are discarded.
Shuffle your library after playing this card.

Oracle text: As an additional cost to play Transmute Artifact, sacrifice an artifact.
Search your library for an artifact card. If that card's converted mana cost is less than or equal to the sacrificed artifact's converted mana cost, put it into play. If it's greater, you may pay the cost difference. If you do, put it into play. If you don't, put it into its owner's graveyard. Then shuffle your library.


According to the card text, the artifact you fetched is *immediately* put into play. However, the oracle wording prevents this from happening if you cannot pay the difference in casting costs. I was actually caught by this unintuitive oracle wording when building Transmute Artifact based decks in the past that utilized Sundering Titan. If WotC wishes to ensure that older cards do not confuse players and adhere to the printed text as much as possible, should Transmute Artifact not be a candidate for change?

Compare this to another card recently errata'd: Flash.

[vartemis]

Transmute is one of my favorite cards.  I've had a playset forever.  The added advantage of having it come into play would be amazing, but Im curious as to how the card would have worked pre6th.

Example:  Transmute a tapped mox into a SuChi.

Pre6th, would you have still gotten the 4 mana fom Chi?  That would turn Transmute into a pseudo colorless dark ritual: -> .

It's still good as is.  It can act as a tinker, and an entomb, which is great for a UR welder deck.

j

[Smmenen]

Peter: I think you caught another one.   Send it to Gottlieb. 

[Zherbus]

Good catch there.

[Katzby]

I actually spoke to Lee Sharpe in #mtgjudge on IRC's efnet about this one a couple of months ago when I first noticed the problem with this card's errata.  I was able to supply archived usenet posts and information from old issues of The Duelist to support how this card used to work.  He told me that he would add it to his file of cards with errata that needs to be updated, so AFAIK, there's no need to report this further.

On a side note, Lee Sharpe has put out the call to be informed of cards that have problematic errata.  I believe that that is still in the current #mtgjudge channel topic.  I suspect that we will see the errata get updated on several cards when the next Oracle update goes into effect.  I further suspect that this will happen the day of the Eventide prerelease (12:00 AM EST), or, at the latest, on the day of the prerelease of a set to come soon.

Obviously, old, outdated errata is in Vintage's wheelhouse.  If there are any other cards out there that need to be fixed, we should take charge and identify them.

Katzby

[dicemanx]

Peter: I think you caught another one.   Send it to Gottlieb. 

Will do - does he accept e-mails directly, or do I just send it to WotC?

[Mr. Nightmare]

So the intention with respect to Transmute Artifact is to allow it to turn a Mox into a  Armageddon-Like effect with Sundering Titan?  IE - CIP and LP abilities both trigger, and the Titan and Mox end up in the bin?

[Shock Wave]

So the intention with respect to Transmute Artifact is to allow it to turn a Mox into a  Armageddon-Like effect with Sundering Titan?  IE - CIP and LP abilities both trigger, and the Titan and Mox end up in the bin?

Yeah, that's pretty much it. That doesn't seem like such a great play when compared to a notorious two-card combo that we're all well aware of.

[Matt]

I actually noticed this last night, while building a casual U/R deck. I had to jump to Gatherer to see if it let me Flash a titan, but Gatherer said no.

So yeah, Transmute Artifact ought to be updated along with Mox Diamond. That's two changes which may impact Legacy! So excited!

[vartemis]

I actually noticed this last night, while building a casual U/R deck. I had to jump to Gatherer to see if it let me Flash a titan, but Gatherer said no.

So yeah, Transmute Artifact ought to be updated along with Mox Diamond. That's two changes which may impact Legacy! So excited!

It's still awesome.  I have a casual deck that uses it to entomb a titan.  Usually I end up transmuting a chromatic star into a titan, and then welding it in.  The other fun ability is transmuting one of the capsule creatures, like SuChi or Cathodian.  A suchi can get you anything up to , and Cath can get you .

j

[dicemanx]

In case Steve doesn't check back in this thread, does anyone know the ideal way to notify Gottlieb, either directly or indirectly? I checked the wizards.com website and was unable to find any contact info apart from customer service, but even then it prompted me to register and log in to send a question. I'm not sure if the thread creators that brought our attention to Mox Diamond and Null Rod/Abeyance (Harlequin and TAL) have contacted anyone from WotC yet, but I suppose that is the next logical step. We can point them to our forum threads on the matter.

Suggestions?

[ix-ir]

Would it not be a good idea to gather a brief version of the errata discussions in a sticky thread, that would help in keeping track of the errata debate cards and in providing a clear link for Wizards?

[Nefarias]

In case Steve doesn't check back in this thread, does anyone know the ideal way to notify Gottlieb, either directly or indirectly?

I know all of the article writers' email addresses were first.lastname@wizards.com , but they were getting too much spam so they changed it to just a direct link at the end of the articles. Unfortunately, there is no such link at the end of the most recent Gottlieb feature article. You could try mark.gottlieb@wizards.com, but I have no clue if that'll work.

Good Luck.

[Chill79]

Now that we are getting time vault "fixed" this should be next on the list