Effect on Vintage of retracting power-level errata?

[jro]

Way back in 2003, Aaron Forsythe wrote an article called "Type 1 Players Speak Out" in which he responds to a request for errata on Worldgorger Dragon by saying that cards would no longer be issued errata for power reasons, and gives compelling arguments for why not.  This raises a question that as far as I can tell hasn't been widely discussed in the Magic community: Should R&D consider retracting errata on cards that were issued errata for power reasons?  I'd argue that they should, for reasons that are largely not of direct relevance to the Vintage format, but I'm not posting here to debate that question.  What I would like to know from Vintage players is: what impact would retracting errata given for power reasons have on the Vintage format?  Would new tier one strategies become available?  Would some of the "unfixed" cards, or cards that support them, have to be restricted?

Below is a list of the more notable cards that retracting errata would affect.  I'm assuming here that the cards would be "played as written" as much as possible, except for being given modern wordings.

• Time Vault - This would go from unplayable to extremely powerful, almost surely necessitating restriction.
• Basalt Monolith - You could untap itself with it, so Power Artifact would give you an arbitrarily large amount of colorless mana.
• Rukh Egg - Since this was reprinted in Eighth, its newer wording would prevent you from discarding it from your hand to get the Rukh.
• Phyrexian Dreadnaught - I think the combo that got this errata'd was with Pandemonium, although Greater Good might be more powerful today.
• Lotus Vale and Scorched Ruins - Certainly the most dangerous of any potentially retracted errata.
• Mox Diamond - You could use it as a Lotus Petal.
• Urza Block "free" creatures (Great Whale, Palinchron, etc.) - Any two of these plus Recurring Nightmare plus at least four lands gives you arbitrarily large amounts of mana.
• Karmic Guide - Unlimited damage with Goblin Bombardment when you have multiple Guides.

And I'm sure there are many more cards that would be affected.  If you think of any that might be significant in Vintage play, please post them to this thread.

[Machinus]

I think time vault is the only one that would be good. The others aren't powerful enough to affect anything in Vintage. Voltaic Key is still restricted so actually maybe even time vault would still suck.

[Whatever Works]

Aether Vial with dreadnaught would be hilarious if the changed the errata on the card. However, it is an interesting concept with some of the cards, but most of them make sense which goes to the saying. If it aint (too) broke... Dont fix it...

[Godder]

A good pile of errata were issued relatively recently to a lot of cards to make them use charge counters instead of whatever other counter type they were using (do a Gatherer search for charge counters and you'll see what I'm talking about). That goes well with Mirrodin effects that interact with charge counters e.g. Coretapper, but while Magistrate's Scepter now uses charge counters, Time Vault still uses time counters. If it was going to happen, that was the opportunity.

[Komatteru]

Mox Diamond would be suitable for inclusion in Long if it functioned like a Lotus Petal that you had the option of keeping in play.  In 2-land Belcher, it would be utterly sick, since you could tap it for mana, and then weld it out of play with the comes-into-play ability still on the stack.

Lotus Vale would also most certainly make it into Long as well (perhaps in multiples, if it weren't restricted), since the deck is always looking for ways to produce three mana of one color for free.  The one-shotness of the mana is hardly an issue at all.  The fact that the Vale is uncounterable and unaffected by things such as Trinisphere, Sphere of Resistance, and Chalice of the Fucking Void is even bigger.  The Vale turns Crop Rotation + a land you most likely can live without into another Dark Ritual, albeit one that can produce blue or red as well.

Scorched Ruins in combination with Crucible of Worlds would be absolutely outrageous for Workshop decks.

[wardo]

Aether Vial with dreadnaught would be hilarious if the changed the errata on the card. However, it is an interesting concept with some of the cards, but most of them make sense which goes to the saying. If it aint (too) broke... Dont fix it...

What ? Dreadnought's wording as it is on the card doesn't allow any kind of synergy with Aether Vial...

[jpmeyer]

Well, with regards to actual power-level errata (like Karmic Guide or Basalt Monolith), it's an interesting idea once the rest of those cards leave Extended.  However, a lot of these cards though are less about power level errata and more about making pre-6th Edition cards work under 6th Edition rules.

[sampling_percus]

Just wondering, is there a summary anywhere of cards that were erratad for power level reasons? I think this is something I'd encourage, but are any of the cards become objectiley more powerful than, say, yawgmoths will or balance?

[Revvik]

Aether Vial with dreadnaught would be hilarious if the changed the errata on the card. However, it is an interesting concept with some of the cards, but most of them make sense which goes to the saying. If it aint (too) broke... Dont fix it...

I would love to start a decklist with:
4x Illusionary Mask
4x Phyrexian Dreadnought
4x Aether Vial

That said, it's not like these changes would be objectively better than what we're seeing now.  I'm even thinking that this would open up the field for new innovations on existing archetypes / new archetypes.  Or maybe I just miss the days of attacking with two face-down Birds of Paradise and one face-down Phyrexian Dreadnought