When they announced Pioneer I was quite excited. Frontier was a format created by the players that was essentially new card frame forward; essentially a big Standard-plus variant that was inherently broken. Getting to play Aetherworks Marvel and Copycat and Jeskai Black led to a lot of degeneracy and very few fair decks. This format stretches even further beyond that but accomplishes something wonderful by banning Fetchlands to lower the absurdity of the power levels available.

Even past that there's still a ton of room for degeneracy and I'm going to list out my watch list for the format moving forward. Taking a look at past banned cards or cards that made impacts in Eternal formats will give us a big clue into where to start building.

Sam Black nailed it recently saying that if your deck isn't getting something banned from it you're not trying hard enough. Break the format early so we can fix it!

This card has always been an enabler of absurd combo decks and I expect nothing less moving forward. Urza, Lord High Artificer is the new hotness to help make the card busted in Modern but the secret reason the deck is so good is Emry, Lurker of the Loch. The format will also have Mox Amber, so you have a piece of the core that makes the Modern combo deck so good. There's plenty of ways to build this deck to do some supremely broken things and so many directions to take it in. You'll also be able to tear through your deck thanks to Dig Through Time and Treasure Cruise, making the deck more consistent and able to fight through hate. Getting access to Jeskai colors also gives you access to the best protection cards and hate cards. I expect Teferi, Time Raveler to be a menace to the format.

Speaking of Teferi, I think it has a high potential to get banned, not because it's stupidly powerful but because of how it stifles creativity and limits the decks you can play. Any Blue control deck immediately gets smashed and midrange decks can struggle to keep up. Being able to interact is needed in this format as it veers toward degeneracy and Teferi just won't let that happen.

This card sucks. It sucked in Standard and will continue to suck in Pioneer. It eats up a ton of time and is inherently unfun. Having even more cards lets the deck morph and shift to something that can match the format and always keep pace. Getting to play an efficient and lean combo machine that is quite consistent is going to lead to a lot of headaches.

While Mox Amber had no real spot in Standard for quite some time, it spiked immensely when it became part of a combo deck at the end of its Standard life and has been a staple in every Emry list in Modern. For Mox Amber in Pioneer there is no other option for this card besides a broken combo. Whether it be Jeskai Ascendancy, Paradoxical Outcome, or Kethis, the Hidden Hand everything Mox Amber does is ridiculous. While Mox Opal in Modern tends to be in a multitude of different decks, Amber here only facilitates combo. Because of this I would not be surprised to see Amber hit the bin in the first wave of bans.

CopyCat is a combo that has started picking up in Modern and seems a bit harder to interact with in Pioneer. It was the best deck in Standard during its time and has all the potential to dominate again. Either way, a cheap combo you can play at sorcery speed only looks too slow on paper and in reality forces players to build and play differently to respect it in those matchups. Being a flexible engine means we can build our deck to be great against creature decks or control decks alike, all while having a combo that you can win with in one turn.

I'm also going to include a list of cards that will likely be fine but should be on a watch list.

Despite the absence of Fetchlands to power these cards out, there's a new swath of cheap cards to help fill your graveyard. Fabled Passage does a good impression in some of these decks but is probably not enough by itself. Both Dig and Cruise are banned in Legacy for facilitating combo decks and fair decks alike and make Blue the best thing to be doing.

With the addition of Surveil cards into the format, and ways to self mill, it's entirely possible that you'll manage to cast them even without fetchlands or cheap cantrips. Having these cards legal means there is a restriction to what can be printed in the future to keep these cards in check. It is very likely we would see something in the future to break these cards again and again.

This is a card that has to struggle through the likes of Karn, the Great Creator, Sorcerous Spyglass, and Pithing Needle at a minimum. In addition there are faster combo decks that are more resilient that could take this out. Because you want to be an energy deck, you have to play Green which makes Planeswalkers and go wide strategies rough to deal. If you're trying to Emrakul, then Delirium decks may just be a better path. However if the format changes a bit, slows down, or produces better answers, then Marvel is incredibly consistent and powerful and that is scary.

While certainly less obscene then Birthing Pod this limits the kind of creatures printed in future sets as it will eventually start breaking everything with chains into combos while being a fine creature deck as is. Playing multiple colors gives you access to the best planeswalkers and best sideboard cards so the deck becomes efficient and deadly across all its modes. At the moment this card is fine but has a lot of potential to be broken.

A graveyard based combo deck isn't the scariest with all the hate available, but also has the same concern that as creatures get better the deck gets faster, more efficient, and contains the ability to fight through hate and still be a consistent combo deck. Not something I'm currently worried about but definitely is in the back of my mind as something to keep an eye on.

What are you thinking gets banned in Pioneer? Anything you hope does I didn't list? Let me know!