Summary

Effective Date: Monday, April 20th, 2026
Next B&R: May 11th, 2026

Summary: Baby Green Slime, Grim Pastiche, and Carpsong Coda are moving to category 3 (banned). Ranger Strides and Baby Gray Slime are moving to category 2. The Duchess’s Thornes is added to Proxia’s Vault, and Mantle of the Abyss has been updated in Proxia’s Vault. On the effective date(April 20th), Index will be updated to reflect the changes within this post.

The watchlists only contain cards that were either previously legal in that format's watchlist or are currently legal for that format. There are currently two watchlists: Standard and Pantheon.

See the entire list of banned cards here.

Proxia’s Vault

The Duchess’s Thornes has been added to Proxia’s Vault, and Mantle of the Abyss has been updated.

The Duchess's Thornes: This card aims to help diversify the decks in the aggressive category of this meta by supporting the fire Suited archetype. It pushes more damage, gets around stealth, and synergizes with Cardistry abilities. We’re excited to see how players adjust their fire Suited decks to include higher number Suited cards and take advantage of the Cardistry ability cost reduction this new regalia provides!

Mantle of the Abyss: This card is a bit of a miss in terms of power level compared to other cards in Proxia’s Vault, so we’re buffing it. We’ve added a way to activate this card from your material deck by paying the cost of sacrificing a Specter ally.

Standard Watchlist

Category 3

This category will contain all cards that are banned and restricted, proving to be too powerful or too impactful and limiting tournament deck diversity and meta health in Standard. Currently, Baby Green Slime, Carpsong Coda, Crystal of Empowerment, Corhazi Outlook, Dissonant Fractal, Erupting Rhapsody, Grim Pastiche, Icebound Slam, Lost in Thought, Sword of Avarice, Reckless Conversion, Rile the Abyss, and Unmake Duality are banned.

Baby Green Slime: In line with the reasoning given for putting this card into category 2, we are now moving it to category 3. Due to its usability as an engine piece as well as interaction, the low opportunity cost makes the wind element value engine outshine others. It’s possible that a slightly different shade of the Baby Green Slime will come in the future, this time with less potency.

Grim Pastiche: This card has allowed Ciel players to resolve the same card more than six or seven times. This redundancy to certain effects has an exponential scaling that Grim Pastiche enables very efficiently. Even though Ciel has not been highly represented in the meta recently, we still feel this was a worthwhile change to this B&R update due to this update’s larger scale.

Carpsong Coda: We understand the frustration that players have been conveying to us regarding the aggressive Water Aetherwing Diana deck. However, when looking at the format as a whole, we believe that this deck has a healthy place in the meta—for now, that is. Currently, we are not confident that decks of the aggressive speed will be properly represented going into the Nationals season if Water Aetherwing Diana disappears. Without aggressive decks in the mix, other deck types become much more greedy in deck construction, which can lead to less interactive games.

That being said, we are banning Carpsong Coda, a card that allows the Water Aetherwing Diana deck to be a potent mixed damage deck. Aggressive decks should be easier to interact with than the current Water Aetherwing Diana, and with this ban, players should be able to focus more on combat damage interaction and have better results in this matchup. For other decks, this card is also unhealthy due to its low deckbuilding cost and elusive Skill-based targeting.

Category 2

This category contains cards that we consider very problematic and are heavily watched for potential future legality changes and category shifts. This category currently has five cards: Baby Gray Slime, Chalice of Blood, Crystalline Mirror, Mercenary's Blade, and Ranger Strides.

Baby Gray Slime is moving (down) to category 2. With the banning of Baby Green Slime, the existence of more card economy engines than ever, and the low representation of Slime decks in the metagame, we are comfortable in unbanning Baby Gray Slime. We’ll keep it in category 2 for now.

Ranger Strides is moving to category 2. This card enables the aggressiveness of the Water Aetherwing Diana deck (and other Ranger decks). It can enable some spiky turns in conjunction with Cheshire Cat, which can be a bigger burst of damage compared to what other aggressive decks are capable of. It is very likely that we will ban Ranger Strides eventually, during a different meta where aggressive decks are more represented.

Category 1

This category consists of cards that we don’t consider problematic in the current environment, but are unhealthy for future balance and game design space. This category currently has four cards: Alkahest, Dream Fairy, Incandescent Reliquary, and Topsy Decree.

Carpsong Coda is moved from Category 1 to Category 3.

Pantheon Watchlist

Category 3

This category will contain all cards that are banned and restricted, proving to be too powerful or too impactful and limiting tournament deck diversity and meta health in Standard. There are no cards here yet! Hooray!

Category 2

This category contains cards that we consider very problematic and are heavily watched for potential future legality changes and category shifts. There are no cards here yet! Yahoo!

Category 1

This category consists of cards that we don’t consider problematic in the current environment, but are unhealthy for future balance and game design space. There are no cards here yet! Yippee!

That's all for this B&R update! The next B&R will be May 11th, 2026.