New Illusionary Mask oracle wording

[Akuma]

I really don't care about original intent or whatever you want to call it, the bottom line is that Vintage has effectively lost another option for good. There is no upside here, Illusionary Mask is useless now, and we get nothing in return.

It would not have killed WotC to leave the use of Illusionary Mask an artifact's activated ability. Paying colored mana is fine, it weakens the card but does not kill it. Making the ability counterable is both confusing and completely castrates the card. Why?

[urweak]

So you cant cheat Dreadnaught into play with this anymore? Do you have to sac stuff to it now?

[wiley]

It still follows the face down rules.  You can still cheat the phyrexian, but now they can counter it, so it is basically no better, and in many cases worse than stifle.

Personally I am glad that they are bringing more and more cards closer to original wording.

[zeromancer]

It still follows the face down rules.  You can still cheat the phyrexian, but now they can counter it, so it is basically no better, and in many cases worse than stifle.

Personally I am glad that they are bringing more and more cards closer to original wording.

I really feel different about this. The errata of time vault warped the format (nobody can deny that one) and this errata is no good either, effectivly eliminating another archetype, even though one not seeing play at the moment. In my opinion power level errata is not a bad thing in itself, if it helps to make the format more interesting. If cards were designed crappy, it doesn't help a bit to restore their original dysfunctionality.

[TheWhiteDragon]

As the guy who created "Riddler" this really hurts.  I had actually adapted a newer version of the Riddler that was quite T1 competitive.  Now it appears my critters can be countered, and my chalice actually COUNTERS my welders and naughts I play via mask when set @ 1 as well.

Let me see if I am catching this right....

I have option A:  Pay 3WW to cast Serra Angel that can be countered

or now option B:  Cast an artifact for 2 mana, then Pay 3WW to cast Serra Angel that can be countered, but now Serra comes into play as a vanilla 2/2 that can be killed with "shock" before I can do anything about it???

Yes, this seems like a totally awesome change.  Way to make my 4 $70 cards worth $0.07 each

Why couldn't they leave the card alone in that it was a fun, viable card that enabled innovation rather than a completely useless pile of crap.  As it is now worded it is in every conceivable way worse than just flat out casting a creature

[moxpearl]

or now option B:  Cast an artifact for 2 mana, then Pay 3WW to cast Serra Angel that can be countered, but now Serra comes into play as a vanilla 2/2 that can be killed with "shock" before I can do anything about it???

Yes, this seems like a totally awesome change.  Way to make my 4 $70 cards worth $0.07 each

Why couldn't they leave the card alone in that it was a fun, viable card that enabled innovation rather than a completely useless pile of crap.  As it is now worded it is in every conceivable way worse than just flat out casting a creature

The shock wouldn't kill it as it would be flipped up in response.   Infest would kill it.    One remaining advantage is that creatures with negative come into play effects (dreadnought) can avoid them.    While the prior oracle wording did allow for some cool combos, the new wording is arguably closer to the original.    My main gripe is that you can't flip the card on your own anymore.

[MirariKnight]

You can still flip the card on your own with Dreadnought by attacking (what you would do with Nought anyway).
It's still considerably worse and I'm not happy with this, or with the fact that Time Vault remains as is.

[TheWhiteDragon]

Since I am "casting" spells now to use mask, and it checks for the true casting cost, does this mean that my dreadnaught now costs 3 when trini and mask are both in play?

Really, the ability for a spell to be countered just makes the card essentially worthless.  I was just wondering if, along with negative interactions with chalice, if spheres mess up my creatures too now.

And, does anyone know if I pay extra, like 2 to cast a dreadnaught, will it dodge chalice @ 1?  Or will chalice still counter it based on its "real" casting cost??

[vroman]

Since I am "casting" spells now to use mask, and it checks for the true casting cost, does this mean that my dreadnaught now costs 3 when trini and mask are both in play?

And, does anyone know if I pay extra, like 2 to cast a dreadnaught, will it dodge chalice @ 1?  Or will chalice still counter it based on its "real" casting cost??

this is an excellent question, and shows how the hidden information part is still broken (ie nonfunctional).
my instinct is that trinisphere does make drednaut cost 3 via mask now and that chalice@1 should counter it, and thus the only solutions are
1. ban illusionary mask for intractable rules quagmire
2. go back to aether vial type effect, despite total divorce from printed text. bc fuck it, its illusionary mask

[dragzz]

Since I am "casting" spells now to use mask, and it checks for the true casting cost, does this mean that my dreadnaught now costs 3 when trini and mask are both in play?

And, does anyone know if I pay extra, like 2 to cast a dreadnaught, will it dodge chalice @ 1?  Or will chalice still counter it based on its "real" casting cost??

This is really confusing.

I think that it would now cost 4 to play Nought via mask with Tirni in play.
First you pay 1 to activate Mask.
Then you'll have to pay 3 for trinisphere, since you would still have to cast it. (ala having to pay 3 when playing FOW's alternate CC)

However,
It could also cost 6 depending on how you would interpret

{oX}: You may choose a creature card in your hand whose mana cost could be paid by some amount of, or all of, the mana you spent on {oX}.

Since we are looking at the Mana Cost, then activating Mask would cost 3 since trini makes nought cost 3.
Then we still have to pay another 3 when we cast the nought as a 2/2 facedown creature.


I would think that the CC of the creature is 0 when it hits the stack just like morph.

[Duncan]

I think it's affected by Trinisphere but not by Chalice.

I'm sad wizards ruined such a cool but not overpowered card. It was one of my favorites.

[ShawnTheDoctor]

Guys, it gets even worse. Wonder why this change to Illusionary Mask just came up out of the blue? Wizards just "printed" this card in their new Magic Online "Masters Edition 3" set. My guess is that it was more convenient to program the card this way, or they couldn't correctly handle the card under the old wording for some reason. MTGO developers can't program their way out of a paper bag so it's really no surprise.

Can't program a 15 year-old card correctly? Just change the way the card works, nobody will notice except those Vintage guys. Who cares about them anyway.

[TheBrassMan]

seriously guys?  *this* is what you have a problem with?

People countering creatures off a Mask has never been a problem, even if Mask were seeing play.  Mask hasn't been playable for almost a decade,  and it wasn't even good when people used to play it.  This does not change vintage.

[TheWhiteDragon]

Change Vintage?  It most certaintly does.  It cuts out a viable deck type.  Even if nobody played the card much, it doesn't make it okay that a whole strategy got nerfed for no good reason.  As I recall, nobody played mask in 2004 or 2005 either...it somehow made it into the top spot and 4th respectively in fairly large SCG tourneys.  Just because a card isn't popular doesn't make it unplayable, and anytime a viable yet fair strategy gets nuked while bigger problems go unchecked, then, yes, Vintage does indeed take a hit in the nuts.  Ill Mask was very fun to play and totally fair to play against.  It served to help artifact decks dodge the FoWs of big blue and allowed a very fast clock to make decks pressured to answer quickly.

Dream halls is a card that doesn't see play, but it COULD be good if the right cards came along and if a good deck came out around it....so to reword it to say something like "remove a card AND pay it's casting cost" (or something equally nuetering) would be a hit to vintage in that it quashes a deck choice with no reason at all.  Wotc took a very fair and fun card and just made it as useful as helm of chatzuk.  Way to look out for "fun" in Vintage.

I admit too, that I had a personal vested interest in this card as updated forms of the Riddler kept it competitive (even though I didn't bring it out to any tourneys).  But my point is destroying a card that was perfectly fine is not a good move.  Changing it "to approach its written text" and then oracling it to something not even that close to the text but making it completely useless was awful imho.

[T00L]

To be fair vintage in 2004 and 2005 was much different from vintage today. Tournaments were much more casual and decks much less fine tuned than by today's standards. So I don't think saying Wizards killed a viable archetype by saying you did well with it 4 or 5 years ago is a solid defense.

[tito del monte]

Sad as it is to see a fun card nerfed, we can't have it both ways - Clamour for Time Vault to be restored, then complain when they tidy up Mask.

Hopefully, they'll sort out Transmute Artifact next!

[Tha Gunslinga]

To be fair vintage in 2004 and 2005 was much different from vintage today. Tournaments were much more casual and decks much less fine tuned than by today's standards.

Are you just making this up, or do you actually have some sort of factual basis for this?  Because I can see this being true in 2000, but 2004 and 2005 Vintage was just as serious as today's.

[policehq]

I don't really think Illusionary Mask has changed much except that casting costs matter (which is awkward in tournament play, hard to get rulings on, and probably going to cause difficult judging interactions). If your opponent was holding a counter before, he just countered the Illusionary Mask. Now he has the option to let the Mask resolve but counter the creature, but in either case, the ideal situation is not that you run the combo out blindly. You still have Duress, Force of Will, etc. etc.

Why isn't the deck still viable?

People countering creatures off a Mask has never been a problem, even if Mask were seeing play.  Mask hasn't been playable for almost a decade,  and it wasn't even good when people used to play it.  This does not change vintage.

So we might as well restrict Plateau, Hatred, and Demigod of Revenge, too, right? I mean, it doesn't hurt anything, they aren't competitive...

[TheWhiteDragon]

Mask has changed a LOT due to the new wording.  True, if your opponent had FoW they'd just counter the mask, now they'll wait to counter the critter.  But think of the differences this now makes.  If you dropped a turn 1 mask, and they didn't draw into opening 7 FoW, it made ALL your critters uncounterable.  Now if you drop a turn 1 mask and draw into drednaught 2 turns later, they can still stop it by drawing into a counter after the first couple turns.  HUGE difference.  Also, before they could counter the mask, and I'd still have my welder to cast and do broken stuff (often welder came in under a mask as uncounterable and for 1 non-red mana if I had off color moxen).  Now they will gladly let the mask resolve (since it functionally does NOTHING), and just counter the welder or whatever later on.  Thanks Gunslinga for recognizing that Vintage has been competitive for some time.  I agree the meta is different now, but I don't think I was exactly picking on 90 or so "scrubs" at the 2004 SCG.  My own tourney performances aside though, nerfing a viable, fun, yet non-format-warping combo for no reason is a bad move.  I am not even sure they needed to bring time vault back to it's original wording since it enables a 4 mana combo that fits in ANY deck.  I think the whole "original wording" crusade is a stupid one myself, but I don't work for WotC so my opinion is fairly irrelevant.  To reatate the point though, mask didn't need this and it is just the fallout nerfing of an unnecessary campaign that will warp or nerf great cards and I think overall hurt Vintage by cutting off viable, fun lines of play.

[LotusHead]

You all got what you wanted (mostly) with Time Vault re-worked to basically original functionality.

Not Illusinary Mask is a lot closer to it's printed functionality.

Get over it.

<------ doesn't own a Mask or Vault. Wants one tho! (or 4!)

[TheWhiteDragon]

I don't see how mask is that much closer to its original functionality.  The 2/2 thing is no more reasonable than the 0/1.  Not being able to flip it at any time takes away a lot too.  It seems that mask's original wording was so poorly done, that it really HAS no original function.  The point is, as the card was, it was fun, viable, and a decent option.  Now it goes with my Benalish Heroes, a.k.a. in the trash.  Vintage seems to be in a slight uproar about "fixing" vault or making it a less broken, cheap, and universally useable combo.  If people are wanting Vault to be fixed and now upset about mask being destroyed, then why is there this whole "original functionality" crusade and not just trying to make Vintage fun and diverse with a variety of good, yet not uberbroken, cards???  

As it is, I've been selling off my power and am about to dump all my cards.  Not just because of mask, but WotC truly seems to not care at all about Vintage, and since this is the only format I play, why bother.  Soon enough, the format will be reduced to a bunch of jacked-up singletons with no fun cards and blue + time vault ruling the world (except the few "anti-vault" decks that hate it [and probably still use the combo themselves]).

You all got what you wanted (mostly) with Time Vault re-worked to basically original functionality.

Who exactly asked for this anyway?  I thought this was some WotC whim like usual.

[BruiZar]

On a second thought, I support the change of this card. Even though its not cool that it got worst, it turned to what it originally intended to do. Lets hope they return more cards to their original function, because there is still alot that can get fixed.

[policehq]

If Illusionary Mask was part of a big movement to restore original functionality based on text, fix creature types, etc. etc. I would be happy. As it is we get all the loss of Mask's old function without any of the gain of anything interesting, like Lotus Vale, Scorched Ruins, Mox Diamond, etc.

[hitman]

If Illusionary Mask was part of a big movement to restore original functionality based on text, fix creature types, etc. etc. I would be happy. As it is we get all the loss of Mask's old function without any of the gain of anything interesting, like Lotus Vale, Scorched Ruins, Mox Diamond, etc.

Exactly.  There was no reason to piss off the three Mask players in the world.  This whole garbage argument about returning cards to their original functionality is asinine.  No one cares except some dumb-ass purists.  Everyone knows the DCI isn't going to change Lotus Vale to its original functionality so why this farce that just continues to piss off the existing player base?  I really wish who ever got in charge of the DCI and Wizards would knock off messing around with Magic.  Every couple months they're doing something so stupid someone's talking about quitting.

[miguelmatix]

Hi everyone.

This is my first message in the forum and i just have to say that i will play my masks, with friends and in non official events, as if this "evolution" never happened. I will NEVER play in DCI or any other "official" event again.

The game belongs to the players, not to someone that don't know exactly what is doing.
If the mask has to be changed to the original text, i say that lotus vale, mox diamond, scorched ruins MUST be changed too. They must choose one path and follow it for EVERY card.

Best reagards to everyone.


Now in portuguese:

Esta é a minha primeira mensagem neste forum e só tenho a dizer que vou continuar a jogar com as minhas mascaras como se esta evolução nunca tivesse acontecido. Nunca mais vou jogar em eventos oficiais.

Este jogo pertence aos jogadores a não a alguem que não sabe bem o que está a fazer.
Se a mascara tem de ser mudada para o texto original, então eu digo que o vale de lotus, a mox diamante e as ruinas devastadas também têm de ser alteradas. Eles têm de escolher um caminho e segui-lo para todas as cartas.

Cumprimentos a todos.

[Anusien]

Illusionary Mask was always sort of a train wreck that was only ever vaguely understood.  I can't figure out why anyone is surprised the card is being cleaned up.

Edit: I think you're all missing something crucial here.  It's not the Rules Manager's job to care about tournament viability or not.  It's his job to make the game work as best as possible.  Sometimes this nerfs a card (Illusionary Mask, Time Vault) and sometimes it makes a card insane (Time Vault, Flash).  The Rules Manager and the DCI have different goals in this regard.

[PETER FLUGZEUG]

well, there are not many good excuses left to not remove errata from transmute artifact and zodiac dragon...
as well as making mox diamond a lot better (i.e. you can respond to discarding a land by lotus petaling the mox...)

(prepare for more insanity...)

[reaperbong]

^^^ I have a feeling they wouldn't fix Mox Diamond because then it'd be strictly better then Lotus Petal and thus warrant a restriction. If they could unrestrict Lotus Petal it'd be great but I don't see that happening either. Would you rather have Mox Diamond errated or restricted?

[PETER FLUGZEUG]

well, i don't care if it's restricted. I'm talking about cleaning the cards up. (also, transmute artifact and zodiac dragon could be restricted if they'd work like printed...)

[saspook]

well, there are not many good excuses left to not remove errata from transmute artifact and zodiac dragon...
as well as making mox diamond a lot better (i.e. you can respond to discarding a land by lotus petaling the mox...)

(prepare for more insanity...)

But Mox Diamond works as originally printed.  As does Lotus Vale in the Weatherlight FAQ.