It has been over a year ago since the modern all-star Splinter Twin was banned in the Modern format. Last Monday there was another banned and restricted announcement and once again my fingers were crossed in the potential twin unban but once again they did not.

Firstly, let’s look at the reasons Splinter Twin was banned in modern.

One of the main reasons was the Modern Pro Tour. To keep spectators and players alike interested in the format before most Modern Pro Tours they would usually ban or unban a card that would be dominating the format and usually the deck associated with that card/cards. This was seen as the worst part of the modern pro tours to some players and the best to others as they could play with newly unbanned cards or finally play a deck that couldn’t beat the best deck. So, for the last Modern Pro Tour they decided to ban Splinter Twin as it had performed so well at the last two Modern Pro Tours. The previous Modern Pro Tour was won by Antonio Del Moral Leon with a pretty stock twin list which featured no new cards from the recent set; Fate Reforged.

Antonio Del Moral Leon-Splinter Twin

Pro tour Fate Reforged 1st Place Finish

So, with this deck winning not one but two pro tours in a row the DCI wanted to make sure this didn’t occur again to keep the format ‘’fresh’’. So, it was announced 5 weeks before the pro tour that Splinter Twin would be banned in Modern at all DCI sanctioned events. 

Another reason twin was banned in Modern was of course the oppressiveness and power of the deck. A deck that can win out of nowhere as early as turn 4 with two cards and one of the pieces having flash naturally places some pressure on other decks in the format. Also, it required most decks to have dedicated sideboard hate to attempt to disrupt the combo which is usually seen as a sign of a deck being too powerful.

Now we go on to the reasons why it should be unbanned and why it would be safe.

Twin was commonly known as a policing deck in the modern format. What does this mean? Well it’s self-explanatory it’s a deck that caps the craziness of the format and forces players to play reliable strategies against twin or have play main deck disruption for the combo. I believe that every healthy format needs this kind of deck as it caps the amount of decks in the field and sets a base for the format. But without this stability that twin brought modern is all over the place, with many decks that don’t really attempt to interact with their opponent such as Titan Shift and Ad Nauseum. Twin would either reduce the playability of this kind of strategy or force them to dilute their own game plan with answers.

Additionally  Twin would be safe to unban due to the printing of Fatal Push. Acces to another efficient one mana kill answer to the combat makes the format more resilient to the deck. All you have to do is hold up a fetch land which is reasonably easy most of the time. 

How a twin deck could look now if it was unbanned tomorrow.

Thanks for putting up with my dream of the unbanning of Splinter Twin hope you enjoyed and see you next time.