The Banning and Reviving of Jace

Last Sunday night, the standard world of Magic: The Gathering witnessed the banning of Jace, the Mind Sculptor and Stoneforge Mystic.  There had been rumors and speculation for some time, but when it became official, I personally breathed a sigh of relief. You see, I'm one of the players that Wizards spoke of who had stopped showing up for Friday Night Magic as well as other more casual days because I was tired of seeing him.

You can't really blame me, though

For the last year or so, Jace has been a staple for many decks.  Super Friends.  Black Blue Control.  RUG.  White Blue Control.  Caw Blade.  These are just some names of top tier decks that I've faced him in.  He always fits in perfectly, and he's always an immediate threat when he hits the board.  When he comes down, you begin to enter a locked board state that is very hard to come back from, and this is why he is so powerful.

Not everybody can wield such power, though.  The types of decks that Jace appears in require a knowledge of Magic that typically only a more seasoned player could possibly understand.  It took knowledge of when to let the Goblin Guide be cast, and when lightning bolt was the biggest threat in your opponent's deck.  You had to understand how a Valakut deck worked so you knew what were your important targets.  I admire the players who wielded him with skill.  Even so, however, over time, seeing the same threat hit the table over and over became demoralizing.  It was either shell out the money for a play set, try to find a way to counter it, or stop playing standard.

Alright, I play this Orcis.... oh, you played Jace. Well, GG

I actually had my own play set of the Mind Sculptor.  I used him in a white/blue ally mill deck that I was particularly proud of coming up with on my own.  Jace made it better by leaps and bounds.  I'll admit, I tried my hand at some of the control variants with him, but i'm too aggressive of a player these days for a control mind set.  I was even told once that they didn't lose to me, they lost to Jace.  That's one heck of a card that allowed him to supersede my skill and win the game on his own.

So since I didn't have the mindset for control, my next step was finding a deck that could combat him.  This is so much easier said than done, because you needed to be fast to gain board control that couldn't be taken away with a four drop.  Quest, Kuldotha Red, White Knights, Soul Sisters and a homebrew Myr deck all stood up to the challenge that is Jace, and all of them won.. for a while.  Once my opponents figured out the tricks needed to stop me, they easily countered my key spells, and stopped me from drawing what I needed to regain control.  It was like fighting the Borg, having to reset the signal of my deck to get past their shields for a few quick wins.

Yeah, I'm not an image guy, just pretend that he looks kinda like Jace

Finally, I had had enough.  Playing Magic wasn't fun anymore because I either had to constantly seek out the latest aggressive deck to throw my opponents off balance, or suffer the same losses every week.  Being a 30(ish) years old, I did what any mature, adult gamer would - I took my cards and went home.  And from what I witnessed in my playgroup as well as other stores, I wasn't the only one.  Not by far.  The only ones who liked Jace were the ones who were using him to win.  And they weren't changing up their decks unless they also included their $400 investment. 

Jace has since left my collection, and my love for the game has been rekindled with EDH.  I was staying away from Standard, but now maybe it's safe to come back again.  Maybe I don't have to worry about seeing Jace sitting across the table from me anymore in a control deck.  Maybe standard can be fun again.

Oh shi-