FAQ

Beginning the format at The Dark retains a small but meaningful group of cards that would otherwise be lost by omitting later reprint sets (Blood Moon, Tormod’s Crypt, and Ball Lightning). It also adds Maze of Ith as a powerful tool for control decks.

Fallen Empires adds Hymn to Tourach, High Tide and Goblin Grenade, while the two Portal sets restore fundamental effects such as Wrath of God, Armageddon and Earthquake and contribute a handful of unique combo and card-selection tools.

The Dark is old enough to broaden the card pool meaningfully, but late enough to leave the most gameplay distorting early-Magic designs behind.

Antiquities

This is probably the most consequential set we’re avoiding. Strip Mine is undesirable as a four-of and would likely require intervention. More land destruction is unnecessary in a format that already has Wasteland and limited mana-fixing. Many other notable Antiquities cards are replaceable by deliberately toned-down effects in later sets.

Strip Mine · Mishra’s Factory · Urza’s Mine / Tower / Power Plant · Ashnod’s Altar · Ornithopter · Triskelion · The Rack · Ivory Tower · Feldon’s Cane · Hurkyl’s Recall · Shatterstorm

Legends

The Reserved List ban removes many of Legends’ infamous permanents, but the remaining cards are still exceptionally efficient. Mana Drain as a four-of would be untenable. Excluding Sylvan Library also opens space for later card advantage engines that are flavorful but less efficient.

Mana Drain · Land Tax · Chain Lightning · Sylvan Library · Karakas · Pendelhaven · Reset · Force Spike · Recall · Underworld Dreams · Concordant Crossroads · Land’s Edge

Arabian Nights

Arabian cards would mostly not be out of line on power level after Reserved List cards are removed, but they are excluded because The Dark provides a cleaner historical boundary.

City of Brass · Serendib Efreet · Kird Ape · Erhnam Djinn · Desert · Flying Men · Oubliette · Unstable Mutation · Cuombajj Witches · Rukh Egg · Ghazbán Ogre

The 4th–7th Edition core sets contain reprints from the earliest years of Magic. Including them would reintroduce many cards from Alpha, Antiquities and Legends even though those sets are outside the intended Scarwood card pool.

4th Edition adds cards powerful enough to significantly reshape the format: Mana Vault, Balance, Channel, Land Tax, Mind Twist and Strip Mine. It also includes cards generally seen as staples or archetype-defining in Premodern, such as Lightning Bolt, Stasis, Hypnotic Specter and Winter Orb.

Taken together these cards pull the format back toward the design assumptions of 1993–94 Magic, which later sets are trying to escape from. Excluding the core sets creates a cleaner format identity: Scarwood is built from the black-bordered expansion sets of the old-frame era rather than recurring reprints of early Magic staples.

Portal and Portal Second Age provide a useful exception. They restore several fundamental effects that would otherwise disappear entirely (most notably: Wrath of God, Armageddon and Earthquake) without carrying in the baggage of early-Magic design found in the core sets.

This is a frequent discussion topic that deserves a thorough answer.

1. The format identity would be taken over by 1993–94 designs because the earliest cards were often the most efficient versions of their effect.

Hypnotic Specter, Lightning Bolt and Winter Orb are played in many retro formats. Blazing Specter, Firebolt, and Rising Waters, less so. Mishra's Factory crowds out most of the later creature-lands. Scarwood can have a more distinct format identity when the obvious “best” cards aren't available.

2. A large number of older cards would have to be restricted for balance reasons, which conflicts with our principle of keeping the restricted list as short as possible.

Simplicity keeps the format accessible and avoids making deckbuilding into a clerical chore.

3. Singleton powerful cards increase variance and make tutors more unbalanced.

Including 1-of Land Tax in a deck is not really just one copy when Enlightened Tutor can find it, and Mystical Tutor can find Enlightened Tutor, which can be found by Merchant Scroll...

Tutors aside, having games decided because one player got luckier in drawing their 1-of card isn't the desired experience. A single Mana Drain isn't predictable enough to play around, but it can decide a game very early.

Scarwood tries to address variance by allowing in tutor effects that are banned in nearly every other 60-card format. Consistency, to better express both brewing and pilot skill, is highly encouraged in this philosophy. A restricted list full of power-outliers cuts against this goal.

The best way to communicate, and suggest new restrictions or unrestricted cards, is to chat with us in the Discord.