DCI Banned and Restricted List Announcement

Announcement Date: September 1, 2003
Effective Date: October 1, 2003

Standard

No changes

Extended

Goblin Lackey is banned
Entomb is banned
Frantic Search is banned

Onslaught™ Block

No changes

Type 1

No changes

Type 1.5
(All cards on the Type 1 Banned and Restricted Lists are banned in 
Type 1.5.)

No changes

Here is an explanation of the changes from Magic R&D:

BAN

Goblin Lackey
The Extended Constructed format has gotten too fast. One of the 
biggest culprits is the Goblin deck and Goblin Lackey is the most 
egregious offender. The introduction of the Onslaught block (and 
especially the Scourge set) has given Goblin decks some extremely 
high quality Goblins and the Lackey’s ability to put them into 
play for free is simply too good for a first turn play.

Entomb
Entomb is also an extremely powerful first turn play that speeds 
up the format too much. Entomb serves as a “tutor” for Reanimator 
decks, putting a card into the graveyard where it’s easy to get 
into play very quickly. That’s simply too much power for a 
one-mana spell.

Frantic Search
We’ve known for years that the “free spells” from the Urza block 
were a mistake. This whole class of spells keeps showing up in 
combo decks that need only a few turns before they can “go off” 
and win the game in a highly noninteractive manner. 
Frantic Search was contributing significant power and speed to 
multiple combo decks in the Extended environment, so it had to 
go.