Flame Fusilade + Time Vault no longer functional on Monday, 4/24/06

[Smmenen]

I already told everyone, it's:

mark.gottlieb@wizards.com

If you want to email anoyone else at wizards, same dealio - just put thier first.lastname@wizards.com

[Liam-K]

Someone dredge up that article on wizards.com that basically said that while they didn't notice the combo at first, they did BEFORE THE RELEASE OF THE SET and were going to sit back and see what happened.

They sat back, saw it see play but cause no metagame distortion... and decided this was a bad thing?  That's perfect (albiet unintentional) card design.  Playable, useful, but not overpowered.

This is bullshit and we all know it.  They decided that they didn't like flame/vault and axed it, just because they happened to think creative use of cards is uncool.  Next from Wizards: using Forest as a coaster banned in tournament play.

[Draven]

I have been folling this thread since this morning when I cam to the site to post what I saw on Wizards. However, my fellow Mana Drainers were diligently at work posting before me.

I am not going to agree or disagree with anything said by Wizards or you guys, however, I do have a question. A month ago or so, the day before the Banned/Restricted list came out, did people sell off their TimeVaults "just in case it got nerfed/banned/restricted"? The answer is obviously no.

So my question is, why is the timing of now verse a month ago relevent?

[mongrel12]

I know the Eternal community is all up and arms about this (for good reason), but I honestly can't see at all why this is a bad decision for Wizards on the corporate and profit end.

By creating distrust in the secondary market for and curbing speculation on very old cards, they are hurting the secondary market. HOWEVER: hurting the secondary market in old cards will not cause any damage to Wizards profits, and in fact, a very convincing argument can be made that drawing the secondary market focus away from older, expensive speculative cards and back onto newer cards will in fact increase Wizards' booster and pack sales. I'm not going to offer this argument, as I'm not qualified to discuss the effects of the secondary market on Wizards sales (and for any non-Wizards/Hasbro employee to claim any conclusions regarding the effect of the secondary market of old cards on Wizards sales would be nothing but speculation), but I'm fairly sure that someone at Wizards made this argument convincingly, thus the errata decision.

Lets move on to the "precedent" issue, one that Smemmen in particular has highlighted. Given that these erratas are now in current wizards policy (or so we can assume), if someone is going to provide a convincing argument at all for a reversion of this policy, they are going to have to show twothings:
1. That there is an issue with the policy (eg arbitrary erratas for "intention reasons") that hurts Wizards sales and profits corporately,
2. That a return to the status quo is going to prove beneficial for Wizards profits and sales,

The main issue with any argument against Wizard's new policy is in the first step: issuing arbitrary errata on OLD CARDS THAT NOBODY BUYS FROM WIZARDS ANYMORE is not going to hurt Wizards sales (primarily/almost exclusively in the paper world from T2 and Limited). Period. The fact is that the Vintage and Legacy community may be extremely vocal, and Mark Gottlieb may recieve a fair amount of hate mail, but guess what: this policy change isn't going to hurt Wizards outside of the Vintage and Legacy communities (which are not very large, and the amount of profit WIzards gets from them is exceedingly low). I think from this it is easy to conclude that this isn't a bad move at all for Wizards in terms of their profits, and in fact may prove beneficial to them in the long run.

[Yare]

I have been folling this thread since this morning when I cam to the site to post what I saw on Wizards. However, my fellow Mana Drainers were diligently at work posting before me.

I am not going to agree or disagree with anything said by Wizards or you guys, however, I do have a question. A month ago or so, the day before the Banned/Restricted list came out, did people sell off their TimeVaults "just in case it got nerfed/banned/restricted"? The answer is obviously no.

So my question is, why is the timing of now verse a month ago relevent?

Because at that time Time Vault was never, in any sense, in danger of being restricted and certainly not banned.  When cards become too degenerate, players know that holding on to these cards is potentially dangerous.  Some unload, some do not.  However, in this case, the players were blindsided by what was effectively a banning.  I say blindsided because nobody could have seen this coming; the combo was not degenerate or even close to being so.  In fact, it was fun, which is really what this game is all about.

(Note: not meant to be hateful toward you; this is more rage toward Wizards than anything else).

Edit: I sent a letter to Gottlieb as well.

[Smmenen]

I have been folling this thread since this morning when I cam to the site to post what I saw on Wizards. However, my fellow Mana Drainers were diligently at work posting before me.

I am not going to agree or disagree with anything said by Wizards or you guys, however, I do have a question. A month ago or so, the day before the Banned/Restricted list came out, did people sell off their TimeVaults "just in case it got nerfed/banned/restricted"? The answer is obviously no.

So my question is, why is the timing of now verse a month ago relevent?

Because, the results of the Grand Prix led everyone to believe that TIme Vault would not get banned in legacy.

If Time Vault put 3+ players in the top 8 of either grand prix, i would have sold mine immediately after the grand prix. 

Price is an issue because the real problem is the intergity of the game as a collectible card game. 

Look, consider how much wizards has pissed and whined about proxies and their stance about no reprints.

They won't even print fucking gold bordered vintage championships decks because they are afraid of printing gold bordered power.

Think about that.

They can't do that, but they can ban a card in every single format simulteously through an unnecessary errata?

[wardo]

I've been focusing a lot on Gottlieb's given excuse for the last few hours, and I came to the conclusion that it's just too lame to be genuine. Cost of an activated ability ? Original intent of the card ? More smells like bullshit to me. I mean, how did they come to discuss that "problem" doing their work time to the point that they are actually going to errata it ? What kind of people are so irritated with that sort of issue that they come to make some of their best customers lose hundreds of dollars ?

The excuse is lame, the timing is awful and the announcment itself looked stupid (an Ask Wizards ?). There's either a better reason for them to do this, or the whole thing is a joke.

BTW, the Eternal community is reacting with class from what I've seen yet. Heck, I discovered that I myself have a Flame Fusillade and I'm pissed off...

[Smmenen]

I feel sorry for Brassman. 

Not only did they nerf his deck.  They nerfed him.

[GrandpaBelcher]

I've been following this conversation for a while too, and I haven't seen anyone post a response from Gottlieb.  I got one from him a little while ago via email.

I errata lots of cards (the Oracle update that's getting implemented this weekend has a couple dozen cards that are getting fixed), and usually nothing at all is posted about it. (Do you really need to be alerted that Whippoorwill is getting its wording changed from "remove the creature from game" to "remove the creature from the game"?) We in R&D felt that the Time Vault change was high-profile enough that we wanted to alert players to it, and we also felt that it was important to make that announcement *before* the change was made. We wanted players to hear about it from us first. If we were trying to hide it, we simply wouldn't have said anything.
 
We debated how and where to disseminate the information. A Feature Article felt wrong; it's an extremely relevant topic to a small subset of players, but the majority just don't care. We thought about taking up some of Forsythe's article on Friday, but he was already done writing it, and it was about a completely different subject. Scott Johns, Randy Buehler, Aaron Forsythe, and I were all involved in figuring out the best way to communicate with the public, and we felt that Ask Wizards -- an informative column on the front page of the website -- was a reasonable forum for me to explain what the Time Vault change was and why it was happening. I'm surprised that this came off as surreptitious because it was quite the opposite:
 
***We were actively and openly sharing information on the front page of our own website before the change actually happened.***

It made me feel a lot better, though admittedly I had very little at stake in the matter.  I still would have liked to have seen the announcement come in a bigger forum with a little more warning, but we did get it beforehand and, hey, what're ya gonna do?

I, for one, am going to stop worrying about it now, other than to troll this conversation.

Good luck.

[Yare]

I errata lots of cards (the Oracle update that's getting implemented this weekend has a couple dozen cards that are getting fixed), and usually nothing at all is posted about it. (Do you really need to be alerted that Whippoorwill is getting its wording changed from "remove the creature from game" to "remove the creature from the game"?) We in R&D felt that the Time Vault change was high-profile enough that we wanted to alert players to it, and we also felt that it was important to make that announcement *before* the change was made. We wanted players to hear about it from us first. If we were trying to hide it, we simply wouldn't have said anything.
 
We debated how and where to disseminate the information. A Feature Article felt wrong; it's an extremely relevant topic to a small subset of players, but the majority just don't care. We thought about taking up some of Forsythe's article on Friday, but he was already done writing it, and it was about a completely different subject. Scott Johns, Randy Buehler, Aaron Forsythe, and I were all involved in figuring out the best way to communicate with the public, and we felt that Ask Wizards -- an informative column on the front page of the website -- was a reasonable forum for me to explain what the Time Vault change was and why it was happening. I'm surprised that this came off as surreptitious because it was quite the opposite:
 
***We were actively and openly sharing information on the front page of our own website before the change actually happened.***

I don't see how this really changes anything.  The fact is, they needlessly destroyed a perfectly acceptable card and its corresponding combo.  Besides, three days is only barely in the "before the change happens" threshold.

[sean1i0]

This is the email that Gottlieb sent back to me:

I'm not going to apologize for making Time Vault work the way it was meant to work, and the way its printed wording indicates it should work.
 
There's a difference between an unintended interaction and an erroneous interaction. When a card's Oracle wording doesn't reflect reality, that's a problem. Let me make a hyperbolic example. Let's say that one night, after a severe whack on the head, I edit the Oracle record of Forcefield and add the line "At end of turn, you win the game." The secondary market goes into a frenzy at the sudden game-winning power of this card. People spend lots of money to acquire Forcefields. Then I notice the error. Are you arguing that in a case like that, I shouldn't correct it because the card is now valuable? If I find an error in Oracle, I'm going to correct it. My responsibility is to the integrity of the cards. My job is to make sure the cards, and the game, works the way players think it would -- in fact, the ideal situation would be that no one ever has to consult Oracle or the Comp Rules.
 
Let me give you another example -- a real one. If you read this before the Oracle update goes live, check out Darkpact in Gatherer. Compare the printed wording to the Oracle text. I have no idea what went wrong there (it happened before I became Rules Manager and no one's noticed until now), but that's getting fixed on Monday too. It's getting fixed because the card should work according to how it was printed, not according to a randomly erroneous Oracle wording. Time Vault is no different. Its price tag doesn't mean it gets special treatment.
 
You seem to be under the mistaken impression that I made this change to kill the combo, and that I'll do it again. Worldgorger Dragon? Its Oracle text is *exactly the same* as its printed text. Why would I change that when it works exactly like it's supposed to? Illusionary Mask? That's a different story. Its whole last sentence ("As soon as a face-down creature receives damage, deals damage, or is tapped, you must turn it face up.") is completely missing from its Oracle functionality. If I can find a good way to restore that, I'd love to do so. Does that affect the Phyrexian Dreadnought combo? No, but then again, that's not my concern.
 
I'm sorry you feel betrayed, but Wizards of the Coast is 100% uninvolved with the secondary market. Anyone who bought Time Vaults didn't do so from us. And there's a flip side to this. Let's say someone sold their Time Vaults last year, shortly before Ravnica was printed. Then Flame Fusillade came out, which made those Time Vaults suddenly valuable. Did those collectors have a grievance with Wizards for altering the market by printing new cards? We're certainly not going to stop doing *that*.
 
In summary, the secondary market is speculative by definition, and I will continue to make my decisions based on common sense, player intuition, printed wordings, and the integrity of both the individual cards and the game as a whole. If I started to make my decisions based on cards' secondary market value, *then* players would have a reason not to trust me.
 
I understand your thoughts. I hope you understand mine.
Mark

I personally don't agree with any of his arguments and/or think that they make any sense.  The part that especially got to me was where he tries to imply that Wizards does not care about the secondary market; Mark Rosewater brings up their no-reprint policy quite a bit and I know that it's in place specifically because of the secondary market.

[Smmenen]

Also, his whole point about speculation is way off. 

People expect that cards could get restricted or new cards could get printed.  People KNOW when those risks could mature so that they could buy up a card or sell off a card.  We DO NOT expect that an important card will get effectively banned through errata.  That shouldn't happen. 

[wardo]

Let's say that one night, after a severe whack on the head, I edit the Oracle record of Forcefield and add the line "At end of turn, you win the game." The secondary market goes into a frenzy at the sudden game-winning power of this card. People spend lots of money to acquire Forcefields. Then I notice the error. Are you arguing that in a case like that, I shouldn't correct it because the card is now valuable? If I find an error in Oracle, I'm going to correct it. My responsibility is to the integrity of the cards. My job is to make sure the cards, and the game, works the way players think it would

It's only after reading this that you understand how important this guy is. I mean, what would this game be if Wizards didn't have a guy who's paid to look at every single card's oracle text and add the word "the" to whippoorwill ?(also, he notices about that kind of meaningless detail that nobody cares about, while nobody in the entire fucking Ravnica design team noticed that Flame Fusillade somehow interacted well with Time Vault ?)

He writes about himself like without him it would be anarchy or something.

[Methuselahn]

My responsibility is to the integrity of the cards.

Yes, apparently your responsibility is not to the customer.  The black and white here is that MtG, as a game, was not improved at all here with this move.  The reasoning of "oh, I just noticed that the errated wording of Time Vault is wrong and it should be changed (again)" is bullshit.

***We were actively and openly sharing information on the front page of our own website before the change actually happened.***

Oh gee thanks, how considerate of you.  :shock:

As for original intent goes, this is how I see it:  The card was created to generate a huge tempo boost for control decks by holding back online counters, untapping Vault at ~end of turn~, casting spells during your opponents' next ~end of turn~ (tapping them out), then effectively doubling your mana by Time Vaulting.  No where on any of my copies does it say 'upkeep' or 'once per turn.'

Also, I have to laugh at this 'original intent' B.S. because it all went out the proverbial window with the interrupt window, which has been noted previously here.

[Machinus]

As for original intent goes, this is how I see it:  The card was created to generate a huge tempo boost for control decks by holding back online counters, untapping Vault at ~end of turn~, casting spells during your opponents' next ~end of turn~ (tapping them out), then effectively doubling your mana by Time Vaulting.  No where on any of my copies does it say 'upkeep' or 'once per turn.

This is the heart of the hypocrisy. WotC claims that they care so much about the "integrity" of their cards, but Gottlieb is just making up his own ideas about what the cards should say. There is absolutely no consideration for previous rules management teams. He professes no concern for the secondary market, but this is contradictory to other policies WotC holds: Rosewater claims that they do care about the ideas of previous brand management teams, which implies significant consideration for the secondary market.

[Anusien]

Actually, I don't see how anyone can criticize them for making this move.  He's dead-on with his Forcefield analogy.  The move had to be made, and no look at the price tag should be done to do it.  I don't necessarily believe the new wording is the right one (he's grouping it in with Brass Man and Island Fish, when it really should be done more like Chronotog, with a once-per-turn effect).  Like, I'm glad he gave us warning and didn't just spring it on us when we might not notice until you get to GP Samite or something and try to use the combo and find out it doesn't work.

Now, the way the card works is fundamentally changing, and I don't like that.  But if you read the card and put it in comparison to Mana Vault (look at the Alpha wording of Mana Vault), their untap clauses are written exactly the same.

[Komatteru]

/Semi Off Topic

As for the whole Fusillade not being noticed, I am surprised that no one in R&D did a search of Gatherer for cards that can be untapped outside of the untap step.  It wouldn't have taken very long to find cards that can untap for no mana, or a small mana cost.  Given the volume of cards in extended and that no one person (or small group of people even) could possibly remember ALL the cards, I'm surprised that they didn't search to make sure there was nothing in there that could untap for free and create problems with the Fusillade.  There really aren't that many cards that untap outside the untap step (a gatherer search for "untap" revealed 474 matches -- not very many).


I'm too lazy to make this into a paragraph:
The Great JD 02: to be honest, about a month ago, I made the realization about my mana vault
The Great JD 02: I was reading it (it's beta)
The Great JD 02: and after reading the card, I had no idea when you should untap the vault
The Great JD 02: it sounds like you pay during your untap step
The Great JD 02: it says
The Great JD 02: "does not untap during your untap step; to untap it, you must pay 4 mana."
The Great JD 02: the mana vault and time vault match
The Great JD 02: so basically, why they decided the vault gets paid any time during the upkeep I have no idea
The Great JD 02: the 5th ed. one lets you untap it anytime during the upkeep
BigKingFrg: well, it have to fit mana vault
The Great JD 02: however, the original wording makes it sound like you need to do it when you untap
The Great JD 02: but that would be nonsense
BigKingFrg: and they have to give it some sort of cost
The Great JD 02: if you have 4 mana, the vault would untap!
The Great JD 02: so the new wording mirrors about how it should work it seems
The Great JD 02: so I guess the time vault update does make sense
The Great JD 02: even if the timing is terrible
BigKingFrg: yeah

[orgcandman]

Now, the way the card works is fundamentally changing, and I don't like that.  But if you read the card and put it in comparison to Mana Vault (look at the Alpha wording of Mana Vault), their untap clauses are written exactly the same.

That's something I looked at this afternoon ~3 and have been wrestling with. One the one hand, I think the errata is totally correct for the card, and that it was only intended to be used on upkeep. However, the thing which bothers me is that this should have been solved 8 months ago. I think THAT is the crux of the issue. The fact that the R&D group of WOTC didn't bother changing this months ago.

[Anusien]

I sent you a fairly nasty e-mail earlier today, and I have to apologize.  I've done some heavy thinking, and I support you on your move.  I was initially crushed because I put dozens and dozens of hours into a Flame Vault deck only to see the combo dismantled but the entire core of the deck (Time Vault) disrupted.  However, here are my conclusions:
1) Your announcement was a good idea.  It is easy to read into it some conspiratorial motives, but at least it got publicity.  It coincides with the new set errata (so it's not really an emergency move), and it's better to find out now than screw it up in a week because the change wasn't publicized.
2) The new wording restores the old functionality.  Both Time Vault and Mana Vault are originally worded: "~this~ doesn't untap normally your untap phase; to untap it, you must <pay 4 mana/skip a turn>."  People are reacting badly because Time Vault was given functionally that didn't make sense within the context of the card.  If you compare the current wording of Time Vault to the other cards receiving the errata, like Brass Man or Island Fish Jasconius, it doesn't make sense to group them in with it.  If you read the original Time Vault, it makes perfect sense.
3) You're 100% right that cost and the secondary market shouldn't stand in the way of the rules.  This was my original sticking point; Brass Man clearly deserves the errata, so why shouldn't Time Vault be changed?  Everyone is really just pissed because Time Vault is a pet card or they want to use it in some deck.  It's how everyone but the Affinity players want affinity cards banned.  There's no reason why Time Vault should be different just because it costs $80.
4) I have to admit, your timing is off.  This is the main sticking point in the Eternal communities, so could you please clear that up?  The real concern everyone has is they feel sort of betrayed because they feel like you gave the impression that the card was "safe from bannings" because it survived two B/R, and implicitly, two sets of errata.  We can safely assume that the way the card works was known.  Did it just take this long to come up with an acceptable fix?

You do a lot of incredible work for the game.  Keep it up.
Kevin Binswanger

[Smmenen]

Kevin, the intergity of the game is not just more important than the integrity of a specific card - it's ALOT more important.  This peevish adherence to the fixing a card to restore its intregity to the exclusion of all other considerations is ludicrious. 

[freakish777]

I'm sorry you feel betrayed, but Wizards of the Coast is 100% uninvolved with the secondary market.

I don't feel betrayed over prices, I feel betrayed that a previous precedent has been overturned and that at any moment Wizards can with little to no warning Errata a card that is being used in a manner that wasn't it's original "intent".

Last time I checked, intent is a hard thing to establish.

[The Atog Lord]

New Wording is Up:

Time Vault comes into play tapped.
Time Vault doesn’t untap during your untap step.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you may untap Time Vault. If you do, put a time counter on it and you skip your next turn.
Tap, Remove all time counters from Time Vault: Take an extra turn after this one. Play this ability only if there’s a time counter on Time Vault

Pure Trash. The new wording does NOT sync up with the words on the cards -- its completely different from how the card is written. They didn't restore anything. They just replaced one made-up wording with another.

[Yare]

New Wording is Up:

Time Vault comes into play tapped.
Time Vault doesn’t untap during your untap step.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you may untap Time Vault. If you do, put a time counter on it and you skip your next turn.
Tap, Remove all time counters from Time Vault: Take an extra turn after this one. Play this ability only if there’s a time counter on Time Vault

Pure Trash. The new wording does NOT sync up with the words on the cards -- its completely different from how the card is written. They didn't restore anything. They just replaced one made-up wording with another.

I almost agree with you.  Considering that at the time this card was printed you could generally only untap stuff during the untap phase (since you could actually do things during that phase then) the wording does sync up a little bit.  Of course, Twiddle was printed at that time too so clearly that wording can't really be the "true" intent...

[Smmenen]

I'm sorry you feel betrayed, but Wizards of the Coast is 100% uninvolved with the secondary market.

I don't feel betrayed over prices, I feel betrayed that a previous precedent has been overturned and that at any moment Wizards can with little to no warning Errata a card that is being used in a manner that wasn't it's original "intent".

Well put!  I forgot that Forsythe had written this:

"Issuing errata isn't even really a consideration anymore, as we feel that doing so is more damaging than it's worth. Casual players really, really hate errata  Way to go back on your words Aaron.

[cssamerican]

Sometimes in the past, a card was given errata to make it do what it was supposed to do, the card remained good enough to be played anyway, and everyone was happy. The changes to Parallax Wave, Thawing Glaciers, and Palinchron worked out like that in the long run. But what was more often the case was that cards were errataed from "This card is insane" to "This card is unplayable," which no one enjoyed. Great Whale, Karmic Guide, Waylay, Iridescent Drake, and Time Vault are among the cards relegated to the unplayable pile as a result of changed wordings.

We don't want to do that anymore. Clearly, the issuing of errata helps the greater good of that particular play environment, but it has lasting ramifications outside of it. I cannot tell you the number of emails I get from casual players asking about the interactions of some of the cards listed above, and it really sucks to have to say, "Your deck doesn't work the way you want it to because we changed the wording on that card." For players not plugged into the tournament scene, the idea of errata borders on repulsive.

My only question is now that WotC has obviously changed a published company policy on a whim, and admitted that they couldn't care less about the collector (Secondary Market) why should players/collectors believe any published policy? The way this action looks to me is that at any time WotC could announce that its reprint policy is no longer in effect and that they will reprint an eternal set because they believe it will make them money. What is stopping this from happening? They have admitted they they don't care about the secondary market which means they don't care about affecting the value of older cards not being directly sold by them.

[Burntgerbil]

What if wizards was testing a mechanic for one or two blocks down the road ? What if the mention of time vault came up and they decided to "fix it" like the rest of the cards that have the timevault mechanic in block X. This would be the only conceiveable reason to change the card that I can think of.

[Gaagooch]

I don't know how i view this as of right now, but i think i view it more as WoTC admitting to making a mistake, whether we believe that they care about the type one community or the cards that we are "supposed" to use in it they do, and as kyle said a while back in this post they have done a fairly good job keeping the format in check and not allowing one deck to rule.  That being said i think this is complete bullshit at best.  First they did not wait until the next banned and restricted announcement.  Second they have given us three days notice.  Third, they have, however much this matter to them or you, taken a piece of the secondary market, i am only glad that i do not own a time vault.  Why however errata the card and not just straight up ban it, i mean that is basically what they did, although they call it original intention.  Obviously they cant restrict the card, as tutors would still find it, but i did not view it as degenerative to the current type one format, or legacy for that matter, it was a damn good deck, but it was not winning everything that it was put into.  I am also an avid type two player and wizards admitted a mistake a while ago with skull clamp and affinity, they thought banning the clamp would make affinity suck, then it became the best aggro-combo deck in type two, it would attack you for about five or six in total, not too much, then it would shrapnel blast you out, or disciple combo you out.  Wizards realizing the mistake they made emergency bannings of artifact lands, arcbound ravager, and disciple.  However the difference between this and the "bannination" of time vault is that ravager and all the cards in it were degenerative on the format, and wizards then admitted their mistake in the printing of said cards.  So again i question is wizards admitting that they have again been wrong, and found that a combo is too "strong" for the game, although most of us view it as a non-degenerative combo.  Like everyone else has been saying this original intent stuff is just bull.  At least have the guts to tell me the real reason you do something, don't make up an excuse.


...rant over

[LotusHead]

If they did errata it this way, it would be even more powerful than it was before.

Quite right. However, I have to think that they are going to just make the card worse, instead of changing the theme completely.

Just had to put my 2 cents in before finishing another 2 full pages of replies.

I was shocked when I read the Questin of the Day, and it said Time Vault will be erratta'd.  I would have posted here, but I was to flummoxed to know what to say.  And I don't even know what Flummoxed means!

My love for Time Vault stems from the fact that this card was BANNED at one point (Twiddle? Animate Artifact, Instil Energy? Sounds like Vintage of today, actually (PANOPTIC MIRROR: You are NEXT!).

Mirroden and Ravnica (oh, and all those UrzaStax sets) have finally made Time Vault "playable" again. 

My specific gripe for this sudden "errataban" is the loss of the option to decide to skip my next turn at the end of your current turn, if I think the free turn you will get will be possibly worthless (Land, go...).

My experience with this is with Time Bandits (Staxish Lodestone Myr, Time Vault, Flame Fusilade fun).

I would have no problem (for the most part) with them erratta-ing Time Vault if Upkeep was at all specifically mentioned on the original text, or if Time Vaults Ruled The Metagame (which it doesn't).

I had less problem dealing with "Restrict Trinisphere because people don't like it..." as the reason.  Hell, I didn't like it. I played Combo. But we in Vintage STEPPED UP TO THE PLATE AND DEALT WITH 4 TRINISPHERE.DEC!!! (we played with basic lands. Tech). I understand WOTC's reasons for restricting Trinisphere (and I still don't miss it, I just wouldn't have cast my vote for restriction. We are hardcore in T1.).

To repeat, I had less problem with WOTC restricting Trinisphere for no SOLID SLAM DUNK reason, but more for PR reasons (they want new players to play the game, even Vintage). I have a serious problem with WOTC (or DCI or whoever is responsible for this) for making "Changes" when needed or relevent or fundamental.

Needed: Uh. T2, affinity: We need to nuke the site from Orbit. It's the only way to be sure. I bought that argument.
Relevent: LED, Burning Wish, Chrome Mox: Mike Long was a Dickhead (so I heard) and Long.dec was POTENTIALLY SUPERCRAZY and um...3 mana for 0 mana is insane no matter what. (3 mana of ANY THREE COLOR COMBINATIONS for the low low cost of 19 life: Meandeck IWINWITH1LIFELEFT!.DEC.)
Fundamental: Uh. Instants/Interupts= Instants and The Stack. This is Magic Now and Forever. Deal with it.

Errataing Time Vault is like:                 






for dramatic effect...






"maybe some timmy can possibly break friggin obscure only playable in VIntage, Legacy and ALPHA BLOCK Time Vault. Possibly now we should make an errata for the card to make Time Vault to work differently than it has in the last 13 years because MarJan, Mana Vault and Black Carriage need "cleaning up...". 

I admit, Black Carriage is different from Time Vault, but come on... Vintage? in a world of Yawgmoth's Will? Tinker? even BRAINSTORM???

This is the first time I have seen Wizards do something with 3-4 days notice that matters....

TimeVault is one of a hundred cards in Vintage (and say, 200 cards in Legacy) that matter on some remote level (as opposed to fundamental level like Island, Black Lotus, Ancestral Recal, Mana Drain, Force of Will, Mishra's Workshop, NULL FRICKIN ROD, and Yawgmoth's Will.).  Why fuck with it? Major "Magic: The Gathering Rules Overhaul?"

Null Rod. Yes, I said it.

One of the few cards that mess with Chrome Mox (or real moxes) because they are Mana Abilities.  Ready to erratta that yet? WTF? (WTF means Why This FORFUCKINGSAKESNOW?)

LotusFuckingHead: SlapJack2k6...I am pissed. (and slapjack doesn't even RUN TimeVaults....)

[Anusien]

Kevin, the intergity of the game is not just more important than the integrity of a specific card - it's ALOT more important.  This peevish adherence to the fixing a card to restore its intregity to the exclusion of all other considerations is ludicrious. 

So in otherwords, Time Vault should be given special consideration because you consider it playable, or because it's worth money?

I wonder if everyone bitched this hard about Abeyance when that card clearly didn't work the way it's supposed to.

And this discussion becomes funnier if you replace "Time Vault" with "mirage enchantments/substance".

[emidln]

Time Vault comes into play tapped.
Time Vault doesn’t untap during your untap step.
At the beginning of your upkeep, you may untap Time Vault. If you do, put a time counter on it and you skip your next turn.
Tap, Remove all time counters from Time Vault: Take an extra turn after this one. Play this ability only if there’s a time counter on Time Vault

WTF? Magic has no concept of debt, yet the rewording is debt! Which the fark is it? What is the excuse now?