Vintage 101: Unrestrict This! Part 1
Howdy folks! It's time yet again for another edition of Vintage 101! I'm your host, Joe Dyer, and this week we're going to be diving head first into the Vintage Restricted List and what things look like as of 2025, and what we think could be unrestricted. This is definitely a two-parter because there's a fair amount of stuff to cover. We've also got some Challenge data from this past week.
Without further ado, let's dive right in!
The Vintage Restricted List in 2025
I did a very similar thing to this with Legacy the past two weeks where I looked at the Banned list of that format, just to see how things looked in 2025. We're doing the same with the Vintage Restricted list, with some major caveats. Obviously there is no plan to look at cards that are actually banned in Vintage (because there a bunch of obvious reasons why those cards are there), and for sheer time sake we will not be covering anything like the Power 9 or anything like Mana Crypt / Sol Ring. I think we all know what would happen if those cards were unrestricted. Part of this on the Legacy side also examined whether or not such a change would be exciting to players much like the Modern unbans recently, so we'll be keeping that in mind as well.
Other than that, everything else is fair game, so let's go through card-by-card and see what things look like in 2025!
Balance
Balance is effectively one of those cards that can be considered slightly dangerous when you have four of them versus just one of them. At one of them, the card is only very barely playable at best, and only shows up in minor occasions. Four of them? I'm not sure, but it would likely be somewhat obnoxious. Balance is like a Mind Twist that you can cast for two mana off artifact mana and no lands and just demolish your opponent's hand at every instance it gets played. I don't think too many players would be signing up to have that experience.
Brainstorm
Brainstorm is tricky. It's restriction was greatly divisive among players at the time, and it is a very powerful card that enables a lot of consistency in decks in a format. Legacy has long been founded as the 4x Brainstorm format, and while I think there's a subset of players who would be excited to have back 4x Brainstorm in Vintage, ultimately I think the format's identity of not being the 4x Brainstorm format is genuinely fine. We were able to get back Ponder however, so there is some precedence for unrestricting a cantrip, but Brainstorm is so much more than that, that it would likely upend Vintage in so many ways.
It's probably fine this one stays for now.
Chalice of the Void
Chalice was restricted mainly on the basis that it interacted very well against "Vintage: The Format." Primarily the format's ability to cast spells like Lotus, Moxen, etc was one of the big reasons Chalice went from a 4x to a 1x. And honestly, it's probably fine that they never unrestrict this. Wizards has firmly stated the format's philosophy about how Vintage is the format where Moxen and the like are cards that can be cast, and they've even recently stuck to that philosophy with the restriction of Vexing Bauble. Chalice is strong, but it's probably just fine where it is.
Channel
Channel is a weird card to evaluate because it pretty much sees zero play in 2025 Vintage as a restricted card. Most restricted cards are generally incredibly swingy when you cast it as a restricted card, but Channel just doesn't really have much going for it right now. That being said, going from 1x to 4x in this case does allow things to be more consistent, and a good Channel deck could show up. There was a sweet Channel + Lich's Mirror deck that existed at one point, albeit amusingly enough that deck could be pretty easily answered with Force of Vigor or Boseiju, Who Endures before Channel could hit.
The cool thing about the Mirror deck at least is that Channel is a mana ability, so it doesn't use the stack. Would Channel be exciting? It might be. It would certainly give players incentive to play around with the card, and may invent something old or new again, and it's certainly an unrestriction I'd be okay with.
Demonic Consultation
The existence of Thassa's Oracle probably makes this about the most consistent combo deck of all time, so that's gonna be a nope from me.
Demonic Tutor
4x D-Tutor would likely be the backbone consistent application across all combo decks in Vintage. Probably not a good idea, like ever.
Dig Through Time
Dig is a weird card. Yes, it's very powerful and there was a brief moment in time where it was unrestricted while its other Delve counterpart, Treasure Cruise, was restricted. Even then it was still good, but that was also 2015. Is Dig good enough for 2025? Honestly, the answer is probably still yes, but Dig is generally considered a more interesting card to resolve than Cruise because it has a lot of choice to it.
To further complicate this matter, we now have Atraxa, Grand Unifier which is basically Dig Through Time for 10 cards that gets more than two cards. If Atraxa is legit as a 4x, could Dig then be a thing that could happen? I'd be curious to see what would happen with it around, for sure. Would it be exciting? It could be to a number of players, and could certainly drive some interest in Vintage as well as shake things up a bit.
Flash
The continued existence of 4x Atraxa probably makes this one that never comes off the list, but also just the myriad of combo decks it would enable is likely not worth it in the format.
Gitaxian Probe
Legitimately if I could ban this I would. Phyrexian Mana was one of the worst mistakes in a lot of ways. As it stands, I don't see it ever being unrestricted.
Golgari Grave-Troll
This is another card that I don't actually foresee Wizards ever unrestricting, for a lot of reasons. Dredge is still incredibly good with only one of these, and having four just absolutely increases Dredge's power level by a lot. Dredge cards are functionally impossible to balance by anything but the number after Dredge, so this probably just stays where it is.
Gush
Wizards has restricted this and unrestricted this more times than I think I can count, so don't expect it to happen anytime soon. Stop trying to make Gush happen!
Imperial Seal
I haven't really seen an Imperial Seal in Vintage in quite a while, mainly because it's incredibly slow compared to other cards like Vampiric Tutor. At 4x, it might be a bit much however, given that it adds some consistency. Still, there's a window of opportunity for interacting with this card that doesn't often happen with the other top deck tutors. Would it be exciting? Eh. I imagine it would be only really exciting to primarily combo players and not many others.
Karn, the Great Creator
Having played a lot when this card was legal as a four-of, it's never coming back. This operates similarly on the same basis that Chalice of the Void does, by preventing the format from functioning, but it as a 4x it also allows you to sidestep the Restricted List entirely with cards like Time Vault by just putting it into your sideboard. Definitely no, even if he does make a cute tree.
Library of Alexandria
Library is a weird duck. Vintage has definitely sped up quite a bit for it, and it doesn't really see much play overall in the format right now. Wasteland and Strip Mine are high usage, so there's ways to interact with this, but I still think 4x would be very good due to the fact that multiples in play are strong, and it's a solid effect. I also don't like the idea of adding something back that makes it so you have to play more Wasteland to begin to counteract it.
The other thing to consider with this is something we've already seen in Vintage, and that's the fact that 4x Library would not be a downside to any deck able to leverage Lorien Revealed, and that's extremely important. I don't see it ever happening, and it's not necessarily a card I want to see unrestricted in Vintage.
Lodestone Golem
Realistically, there's a wide subset of players that would be very excited for a Lodestone Golem unrestriction. It really only sees play in Shops decks, where having four of this effect would be pretty good. When your Sphere effect also attacks for 5 damage, it's doing a lot of work. It's definitely strong but it would be divisive, and for that reason alone I don't think Wizards would want to unrestrict this.
NEXT TIME
Next week I'll be covering the rest of the Restricted List. This one should be very interesting, since we get to look at cards like Monastery Mentor, Narset, Parter of Veils, and Thorn of Amethyst.
What card on this particular list today do you think would be fine unrestricted in Vintage? Let me know in the comments below!
Vintage Challenge 32 1/16/2025
The first Challenge event of the week was the Thursday event. This event had 39 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Vintage Streamer's Discord.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Esper Lurrus was the most popular deck of the event but despite a top finish it's win rate was slightly less than 50%. Dimir Lurrus on the other hand looked great at two players and one making Top 8. Jewel Shops also looked good, and the rest of the field had some good results but middling win rates.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Doomsday | 1st | Tsubasa_Cat |
| Dimir Lurrus | 2nd | _Batutinha_ |
| Initiative | 3rd | death_grips |
| Esper Lurrus | 4th | wiky |
| Jewel Shops | 5th | _Chamytinho_ |
| Dredge | 6th | RedandSnap1 |
| Eldrazi | 7th | Killah_SUV |
| Lurrus PO | 8th | Dr. Jon Osterman |
Some Lurrus, some combo, some Bazaar, some Initiative. At the end of the event it was Doomsday that won.
Not surprising to see Stillmoon Cavalier jump from a deck like Initiative to a deck like Doomsday in the sideboard. It pulls double weight in these slots because not only is it going to be good against Initiative, but it's going to be good against Psychic Frog and Lurrus as well. The nice thing about it in this deck is that you can cast it off Dark Ritual which is gross.
In Second Place we had Dimir Lurrus.
Definitely a very stock looking Dimir Lurrus list here. There isn't much frills here to be had.
Vintage Challenge 32 1/17/2025
The second Challenge event of the week was the Friday event. This event had 39 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Vintage Streamer's Discord.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Initiative was very popular, but it's overall win rate was not so good. Dredge, Doomsday, and Eldrazi all looked great here.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Dredge | 1st | Munchlax446 |
| Dredge | 2nd | 2plus2isfive |
| Doomsday | 3rd | Tsubasa_Cat |
| Eldrazi | 4th | etoustar |
| Jewel Shops | 5th | Slasher21 |
| Doomsday | 6th | _INF_ |
| Esper Lurrus | 7th | Montolio |
| Jewel Shops | 8th | _Chamytinho_ |
This has a small spread of decks. At the end of the event the finals was split between two Dredge decks.
The differences here are primarily in sideboard construction, as the first list is using stuff like Tormod's Crypt as additional graveyard hate, while the second has some more traditional Wasteland + Strip Mine action for dealing with cards like Tabernacle.
Vintage Challenge 32 1/18/2025
The third Challenge event of the week was the Saturday event. This event had 50 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Vintage Streamer's Discord.
You can find the Top 32 decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Initiative again was very popular here, and it's win rate was much better this time. Dimir Lurrus looked good, while everything else kind of just rode the middle of the road line.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Initiative | 1st | LasVegasChaos |
| Oath | 2nd | TrueHero |
| Dimir Lurrus | 3rd | Dr. Jon Osterman |
| Dredge | 4th | RedandSnap1 |
| Dredge | 5th | ziofrancone |
| Ninjas | 6th | IamActuallyLvl1 |
| Oops! All Spells | 7th | Unifro |
| Jewel Shops | 8th | _Chamytinho_ |
Reasonable Top 8. We'll take a look at that Ninjas list in the Spice Corner for sure, but for now the end of the event was won by Initiative.
Devout Lightcaster is a sick card in the sideboard. Being able to get rid of a Lurrus cheaply is nice. Also one thing I think is worth mentioning here is that these decks have completely dropped Dauntless Dismantler, and it's largely because of the fact that Dismantler was much better when Saga was unrestricted, since it could cheaply wipe the board of any artifacts. Since then, the actual value Dismantler brings to the table is very low.
In Second Place we had Oath.
I really love the Pyrogoyf Oath deck. It's such a sick deck. And there's Fastbond in here too? That's so cool.
Vintage Challenge 32 1/19/2025
The final Challenge event of the week was the Sunday event. This event had 37 players in it thanks to the data collected by the Vintage Streamer's Discord.
You can find all of the decklists for this event here and the data sheet here.
Jewel Shops was super popular here by a lot, and it's win rate was reasonable. Dredge looked good and most of the field was just hovering just above or below that 50% mark.
Let's take a look at the Top 8.
| Deck Name | Placing | MTGO Username |
|---|---|---|
| Dimir Lurrus | 1st | Callenutg1 |
| Jewel Shops | 2nd | _Chamytinho_ |
| Jewel Shops | 3rd | toonbleu |
| Esper Lurrus | 4th | Navas |
| Dredge | 5th | SHAKELION |
| Doomsday | 6th | sixmp |
| Initiative | 7th | powered_by_VANYA |
| Lurrus PO | 8th | helvetti |
Reasonable looking Top 8. At the end of the event it was Dimir Lurrus that won.
This is definitely mostly stock here. I can't really see anything that sets it apart at this point.
In Second Place we had Jewel Shops.
The additions of things like Talon Gates of Madara are pretty cool. This list also has Simulacrum Synthesizer as another way to make Constructs with its big artifacts like Jewel. Kind of neat for sure.
Around the Web
- FiretruckModo is playing EIGHT BAZAARS* (Some hoops may be jumped through). Check it out here.
- Kindamtg is playing Mono White Belcher? Check it out here.
The Spice Corner
NINJAS.
Wrapping Up
That's all the time we have this week folks! Thanks for your continued support of the column and join me next week as we continue our journey into Vintage!
As always you can reach me at my Link Tree! In addition you can always reach me on the MTGGoldfish Discord Server and the Vintage Streamers Discord.
Until next time!
