Announcement 16/11/2025

First of all, we would like to introduce (although you probably already know him) Clair, aka Sylke, the newest addition to the Peasant Committee.

Let’s give him the floor!

“Hello everyone,
Who am I?
My name is Clair, known online as Sylke. I’m 33 years old, from Saint-Nazaire in western France, and president of a Magic association with a small Peasant community. You can find an interview in the articles if you want to know more about me. Otherwise, you can find me on Cockatrice from time to time — I’m always open to discussion.

Why did I want to join the committee?
First and foremost, I want to give my time to support this community and this format that I appreciate enormously. I don’t want to see it fade away in favor of Pauper, and nothing beats personal involvement to achieve your goals. I believe that having a committee member from the northwest can help grow the small community around Saint-Nazaire.

What can I bring to the committee and to the format?
As an almost regular online player, with what I believe is an acceptable level, I think I can bring interesting insights to the current members. The more of us there are, and the more varied our opinions, the better our discussions will be, helping our community thrive. My main goal is to help offer our beloved format the most enjoyable metagame possible, with as many opportunities for interaction as possible. Since I’m not a crazy deckbuilder, my contribution to deck diversification won’t be my strongest point, but you can count on me to help the committee with all its other tasks.

Thank you.”

So let’s welcome him! We hope you will treat him with all the respect and kindness he deserves! (Plus, he’s handsome and smells great!)

The Coupe de France offered a unique metagame, which some players did not enjoy. Several archetypes managed to perform well, but no deck stood out as particularly problematic in terms of power level, redundancy, or representation.

However, not everything is perfect.

We generally agree on several observations:

• Strong dominance of aggro and aggro-combo, with very fast pressure and limited interactivity.

• Near-total disappearance of control, and difficulties for slow midrange decks (Black Gardens, UW Blink, Jeskai…).

• A polarized format with limited strategic diversity: tournaments are dominated by optimized, already-established lists.

• The metagame does not seem to be naturally shifting toward interactive gameplay, despite the high number of online events.

Overall, the results observed during the French Championship confirm the decisions made in the previous banlist update:

• Kuldotha Burn did deserve a nerf;

• The successive unbans for blue allowed the color to reappear in competitive play;

• The nerf to Broodscale Combo reduced its disruptive potential.

After analyzing the data, player feedback, our internal discussions, and the performances at the French Championship, we identified several topics for debate:

1. Running unban trials;

2. Potential unbans.

As indicated in our schedule, the committee’s next public announcement will take place between late January and mid-February, unless an exceptional situation requires an earlier communication.

Until then, we will continue gathering and analyzing tournament data, with particular attention to:

• the actual diversity reflected in results,

• the competitiveness of midrange and control decks,

• the evolution of aggro-combo in the coming weeks.

In our view, unbans would neither solve the current polarization nor the speed of the games, and the cards still on the banlist carry higher risks than the potential benefits an unban might bring.

Our priority is to observe how the format evolves in a stable environment rather than introduce additional variables. We are already seeing early signs of a slight resurgence of control decks with the arrival of Avatar’s lessons.

A huge thank you once again to the entire Peasant community for its passion, constructive feedback, and the positive energy that keeps this unique format alive. Keep testing, innovating, sharing… and above all, enjoying the game!

See you soon at the tables,