Strictly better than tranquility, but also strictly less flavorful.
sethddickess
★☆☆☆☆ (1.1/5.0)(7 votes)
worst card ever printed.
HairlessThoctar
★★★★☆ (4.2/5.0)(8 votes)
This is so absurdly powerful.
Interesting that the closest artifact equivalent to this, Shatterstorm, costs twice as much and works at sorcery speed.
Lateralis0ne
★★☆☆☆ (2.8/5.0)(2 votes)
I see Seth's living up to his latter parts.
Mindbend
★★☆☆☆ (2.0/5.0)(2 votes)
i'm glad this is back although they should have just reprinted tranquility but i suppose if tere going powercreep everything else they should power creep this is too
lorendorky
★★★☆☆ (3.0/5.0)(1 vote)
This card is greens way of dealing with leylines, any of the 2 drop planeswalker specific enchantments, spreading seas and eldrazi con***ion.
AlphaAngel
★★★☆☆ (3.6/5.0)(7 votes)
There goes my enchantment based deck against my friend's monogreen ._.
Kryptnyt
★★☆☆☆ (2.5/5.0)(2 votes)
Enchantress can go suck it. At INSTANT SPEED eh wot.
Johnald
★★★★☆ (4.2/5.0)(4 votes)
So much for Tempest of Light.
UltimaCenturion
★★☆☆☆ (2.5/5.0)(1 vote)
This will probably see play because of the leylines. Especially since one of the colors least likely to run its own leyline is green, meaning this won't be much of a double-edged sword.
JWolps
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Ralph Waldo Emerson quote? Sweet.
Selez
★★☆☆☆ (3.0/5.0)(11 votes)
This card and its kin, rather than the absurdly powerful mythics of the set, anger me the most. Not only does it cost less than tranquility, but it's also instant speed whereas its predecessor was a sorcery. They could have done one or the other to make the card better while still being balanced, but doing both is an insult to the once staple tranquility. This is power creep at its worst - not crazy good cards (every set has those. I agree that many have been too overpowered in recent sets, but I digress), but incremental powerups on the most innocuous of cards.
Personally, I think that the flavor on this card makes more sense than tranquility. Enchantments are not part of nature (though I bet the enchantresses would disagree), and so going "back to nature" means leaving such modifications to nature behind.
Temple_Garden
★★★★☆ (4.2/5.0)(6 votes)
A nice upgrade from Tranquility but I don't see a current dire need for this card. With a potential artifact block (Scars of Mirrodin) coming up, this will have to compete with Naturalise for a place on the side board.
Should the need arise for this card however, it looks to be very good at what it does. Maybe this is a sign of enchantments getting a buff in the future?
Wow! That would be nice for sb especially for those who play with expeditions... Or Sigil of the empty Throne decks...
Troutz
★★★☆☆ (3.0/5.0)(1 vote)
LOVE this as a sideboard card. Seriously. One of green's most powerful effects at Instant speed in standard.
holgir
★☆☆☆☆ (1.0/5.0)(1 vote)
@Selez: Thank you for your comment from a serious casual player.
cdela12345
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
NO FAIR, this ruins my enchantress deck lol ::sadface:: =(
Auteur
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Very strong. This doesn't do much to promote the use of auras or enchantments in general. A very strange choice of card type for a hoser this strong.
Xaxas
★★★☆☆ (3.9/5.0)(5 votes)
@Selez
Wizards attempts to make an effort to reprint cards as better versions of previous cards. However, this does not mean the cards are better, unlike this one. Back to Nature is a card that while not absurdly good, is good enough to see marginal play in eternal formats. I'm sorry, but if you feel that a card like Tranquility deserves not to be 'insulted', then you should not play with cards like this if you feel they disrespect older cards.
Cyberium
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
I agree with Selez on this card. The power up is too obvious, too much, it's hardly a fair adjustment.
Ameisenmeister
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Selez is absolutely right. Power Creep which makes new cards strictly better than all of their kind from older sets. (I have the same opinion about Lightning Bolt) Back to Nature kills aura-decks at instant speed and for just two mana.
By introducing totem armor I hoped auras would finally get the power boost they needed and deserved but with this in the actual main set no aura deck has great chances in standard.
Keiya
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
@HairlessThoctar: That's because Artifacts also come in the form of creatures and certain deck types are mainly comprised of Artifacts. Being able to wipe an opponent's board for two mana would be absurdly broken.
Gavrilo
★★★☆☆ (3.2/5.0)(2 votes)
I don't get it. Enchantments were overpowered and dominant lately? Good ol' Tranquility was too weak for such a marginal effect ? This card screams powercreep, just like nightawk or bolt. And it's absolutely unnecessary powercreep this time. 0.5/5
capitalR
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
great... just they spoiled this right after i got the pieces to my enchantress deck.
Rainyday2012
★★☆☆☆ (2.5/5.0)(2 votes)
Clearing the board of an entire card type shouldn't cost just two mana, especially not at instant speed. Sure, sweepers should punish players for committing too much to a single card type, but this is ridiculous.
Another issue is that I think the effect is white. Red kills artifacts, white kills enchantments and green kills both. Just like Shatterstorm shouldn't be green, this shouldn't either.
The card's good of course, it only hates on one aspect of the game a little too much for my tastes.
Curious card - few Top 8 decks run many enchantments. In the 2010 Worlds, the only enchants in Top 8 decks were Spreading Seas and one deck running Dark Tutelage.
I love enchantments - one of my first decks was an Urza's Saga deck based around Argothian Enchantress and the various sleeper enchantment-creatures.
This card is unnecessary. It addresses no problems in the current meta-game and nips potential enchantment-based decks in the bud.
Fadingstar
★★★☆☆ (3.2/5.0)(8 votes)
/sigh, absolutely no card should read, "Destroy ALL ______." and only cost 2 mana. The fact that it's an instant is sort of a kick to the midsection. Some designer lost to an enchantress deck and this is his revenge. Sadly, with stuff like this we can't undo/unsee it, so now we're stuck with it.
Hydr0
★★☆☆☆ (2.5/5.0)(2 votes)
Remember those three months in 2010 when aura decks were good? Yea, me either. They weren't good. But at least they were fun.
Fun for wiping out O-rings, Arrests and Journey To Nowheres right as your opponent declares her attack.
dragonking987
★☆☆☆☆ (1.0/5.0)(2 votes)
This card and its kin, rather than the absurdly powerful mythics of the set, anger me the most. Not only does it cost less than tranquility, but it's also instant speed whereas its predecessor was a sorcery. They could have done one or the other to make the card better while still being balanced, but doing both is an insult to the once staple tranquility. This is power creep at its worst - not crazy good cards (every set has those. I agree that many have been too overpowered in recent sets, but I digress), but incremental powerups on the most innocuous of cards. IT comments like this that made me go to half the cards in Mirrodin Besieged and point out worse versions of them and say their was a powerleek. Wile I was just having fun being a trolling people who complain about the power creep and there is defiantly not a powerleek I did have a point. Wile many of the new cards are better versions of old cards, many old cards are also better versions of the new ones.
jfre81
★★☆☆☆ (2.8/5.0)(3 votes)
Tranquility for 2 CMC as an INSTANT? Outrageous. And it's not even a rare!
@scumbling1, I get entirely what you're saying. I've never, ever thought of Tranquility as overpowered though, and along with Naturalize green has gone from a color that could do a mass enchantment kill but spot enchant removal was more or less reserved for white (Disenchant). People splashed white just for that. Maybe I'm more dismayed as a Magic veteran at what I see as green in general getting a bit too powerful (look at all the ridiculously cheap and big green creatures in Standard right now!) and white getting its turf stepped on a bit.
scumbling1
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(12 votes)
"This card and its kin, rather than the absurdly powerful mythics of the set, anger me the most. Not only does it cost less than tranquility, but it's also instant speed whereas its predecessor was a sorcery..."
There's nothing wrong with fixing mistakes. Since the power level of one type of card relative to another is never static, answers to them need to be adjusted in every new set. Did the designers in Alpha somehow have the clout to make appropriate enchantment removal for cards sixteen years later? Of course not. Cards are made staples only within the context of a format. Staples from the early sets were born out of an absence of alternatives. You can't just assume that a card like Tranquility will always be adequate to address modern times.
@ jfre81: As a veteran player myself, I like giving green some aspects of removal to excell at. White has long been the best color for almost every type of removal, and for seemingly no good reason. I'm glad to green get the edge in this one small category; the color still can't handle creatures directly to save it's life. Furthermore, I think it's nice to see green get some love in Standard, as the color has not always been the most powerful throughout Magic's past. But this is just Standard, and it will all change with time. Giving colors roughly equal time in the spotlight is only fair.
Sothasil
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
This card eliminates mono red's biggest weakness (no way to touch enchantments most of the time) and is super easy to splash, play rootbound crag, etc and watch your opponent cry when all his crazy white enchants go bye bye.
4.5/5
ScissorsLizard
★★★★☆ (4.8/5.0)(10 votes)
Forget about the power of the card- look at the flavor text! They brought back real literature quotes to Magic! I've been hoping for this for years! Well done, Wizards!
The latter looks like the better deal, especially considering all the style points you get and that you can threaten the destruction at instant speed.
And can you imagine if this got reprinted in M12 with all those enchantments around? That would be hilariously unbalanced for limited.
Concerned_Bystander
★★★☆☆ (3.9/5.0)(4 votes)
Compare with Tranquility to see power creep in action, probably one of the best examples there is.
Gabriel422
★★★★☆ (4.8/5.0)(5 votes)
I don't get all the hate; this isn't overpowered. Day of Judgment isn't broken because it wiped out five of your creatures. And Kor Firewalker isn't broken just because it kills a red deck dead. Back to Nature is way more situational than either of these.
1maketoilets
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
@HairlessThoctar
So far, there is only 1 enchantment creature and over 400 artifact creatures. That's why.
Shadoflaam
★★★☆☆ (3.5/5.0)(4 votes)
So. White has creature exile, with drawbacks or high cost, along with Wraths and artifact hate; Black has cheap creature destruction with limits; Red has creature and planeswalker damage/removal, typically quite powerful, along with LD; while green gets noncreature pwns that can pretty much hit anything, sometimes even lands, with no drawbacks, but can't touch creatures at all. And blue? WE DO NOT GIVE BLUE ANY MORE POWER EVER. BLUE HAD ITS CHANCE TO BE FAIR.
kiseki
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
I have heard some complaints about this card, but only from the same people that complain about Wrath effects.
It is a challenging card to use, but powerful. The deck needs to be designed around it, and it is often a dead draw. In comparison, wrath effects are rarely dead draws.
I own a playset, but after building 4-5 green decks, I often have a couple left over.
Kesth
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.5/5.0)(1 vote)
This is a godsend with all the White Enchantments pumping creatures and giving them vigilance in standard... Not to mention all those heartless decks nowadays
Salient
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(2 votes)
They fixed Tranquility here, and now they've fixed Shatter in 2013. It's pretty awesome to see that Wizards is committed to fixing overcosted staple cards right, right alongside fixing undercosted cards like Counterspell.
(Admittedly, I never thought Counterspell was undercosted back when it was a staple, but then again, back then I never really minded paying for Shatter either.)
Penguin_Master
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Run with Enchanted Evening and laugh yourself silly. Of course, if you want to save yourself 2 mana and not have to run green, you can alternatively run Patrician's Scorn and wipe the board clean for 5 mana.
TheWrathofShane
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Most of the time your not casting this turn 2 anyways. Instant speed is really nice, but this is still a sideboard card. Tranquility will probably end up being the same result as this card, your enchantment deck gets hosed and you scoop.
So whats all the grief about? Tranquility dates back to alpha, I don't mind a more powerful change.
Anzu-chan
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.5/5.0)(1 vote)
I think Shatter needed a updated card. 1R for destroying only artifacts is for me, overcosted. Naturalize or Disenchant could also destroy Enchantment for the "same" cost.
But I don't think that an updated version of Tranquility was necessary. It was perfectly costed for what it does. Maybe it was an error to powercreep this card.
Fenizrael
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(3 votes)
I must be going blind, I though for a moment that this card was an instant that destroyed ALL enchantments...
Continue
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Better than ever in Modern, where GW Hexproof is proving itself to be a top-tier deck.
planarsibling
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
I had to give this 0.5/5 solely based on the fact this lone card can screw my main deck solo and for 2 mana...
That said, I don't think it's overpowered. A lot of people don't play with enchantments, so those that sideboard against enchantments usually run Naturalize since it hits artifacts too. Usually don't see this guy pop up unless it's a deck tailored to beat enchantment decks.
MortisAngelus
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
Gave it 4/5 because it is brilliant at what it does.
However, personally I think it is overpowered. Thinking of Day of Judgment and Wrath of God, those cost 4 mana; and those I think are too cheap. The effects are so strong that they should be more expensive; especially when one thinks how much creatures cost.
Oh btw: This card is probably the best anti-Theros there is, with Theros focusing on enchantment-everything.
Comments (53)
Interesting that the closest artifact equivalent to this, Shatterstorm, costs twice as much and works at sorcery speed.
Personally, I think that the flavor on this card makes more sense than tranquility. Enchantments are not part of nature (though I bet the enchantresses would disagree), and so going "back to nature" means leaving such modifications to nature behind.
Should the need arise for this card however, it looks to be very good at what it does. Maybe this is a sign of enchantments getting a buff in the future?
Wizards attempts to make an effort to reprint cards as better versions of previous cards. However, this does not mean the cards are better, unlike this one. Back to Nature is a card that while not absurdly good, is good enough to see marginal play in eternal formats. I'm sorry, but if you feel that a card like Tranquility deserves not to be 'insulted', then you should not play with cards like this if you feel they disrespect older cards.
Back to Nature kills aura-decks at instant speed and for just two mana.
By introducing totem armor I hoped auras would finally get the power boost they needed and deserved but with this in the actual main set no aura deck has great chances in standard.
Another issue is that I think the effect is white. Red kills artifacts, white kills enchantments and green kills both. Just like Shatterstorm shouldn't be green, this shouldn't either.
The card's good of course, it only hates on one aspect of the game a little too much for my tastes.
I love enchantments - one of my first decks was an Urza's Saga deck based around Argothian Enchantress and the various sleeper enchantment-creatures.
This card is unnecessary. It addresses no problems in the current meta-game and nips potential enchantment-based decks in the bud.
Yea, me either. They weren't good. But at least they were fun.
Ruins quests. Very playable.
IT comments like this that made me go to half the cards in Mirrodin Besieged and point out worse versions of them and say their was a powerleek. Wile I was just having fun being a trolling people who complain about the power creep and there is defiantly not a powerleek I did have a point. Wile many of the new cards are better versions of old cards, many old cards are also better versions of the new ones.
@scumbling1, I get entirely what you're saying. I've never, ever thought of Tranquility as overpowered though, and along with Naturalize green has gone from a color that could do a mass enchantment kill but spot enchant removal was more or less reserved for white (Disenchant). People splashed white just for that. Maybe I'm more dismayed as a Magic veteran at what I see as green in general getting a bit too powerful (look at all the ridiculously cheap and big green creatures in Standard right now!) and white getting its turf stepped on a bit.
There's nothing wrong with fixing mistakes. Since the power level of one type of card relative to another is never static, answers to them need to be adjusted in every new set. Did the designers in Alpha somehow have the clout to make appropriate enchantment removal for cards sixteen years later? Of course not. Cards are made staples only within the context of a format. Staples from the early sets were born out of an absence of alternatives. You can't just assume that a card like Tranquility will always be adequate to address modern times.
@ jfre81: As a veteran player myself, I like giving green some aspects of removal to excell at. White has long been the best color for almost every type of removal, and for seemingly no good reason. I'm glad to green get the edge in this one small category; the color still can't handle creatures directly to save it's life. Furthermore, I think it's nice to see green get some love in Standard, as the color has not always been the most powerful throughout Magic's past. But this is just Standard, and it will all change with time. Giving colors roughly equal time in the spotlight is only fair.
4.5/5
The latter looks like the better deal, especially considering all the style points you get and that you can threaten the destruction at instant speed.
And can you imagine if this got reprinted in M12 with all those enchantments around? That would be hilariously unbalanced for limited.
So far, there is only 1 enchantment creature and over 400 artifact creatures. That's why.
White has creature exile, with drawbacks or high cost, along with Wraths and artifact hate; Black has cheap creature destruction with limits; Red has creature and planeswalker damage/removal, typically quite powerful, along with LD; while green gets noncreature pwns that can pretty much hit anything, sometimes even lands, with no drawbacks, but can't touch creatures at all.
And blue?
WE DO NOT GIVE BLUE ANY MORE POWER EVER. BLUE HAD ITS CHANCE TO BE FAIR.
It is a challenging card to use, but powerful. The deck needs to be designed around it, and it is often a dead draw. In comparison, wrath effects are rarely dead draws.
I own a playset, but after building 4-5 green decks, I often have a couple left over.
(Admittedly, I never thought Counterspell was undercosted back when it was a staple, but then again, back then I never really minded paying
So whats all the grief about? Tranquility dates back to alpha, I don't mind a more powerful change.
But I don't think that an updated version of Tranquility was necessary. It was perfectly costed for what it does. Maybe it was an error to powercreep this card.
That said, I don't think it's overpowered. A lot of people don't play with enchantments, so those that sideboard against enchantments usually run Naturalize since it hits artifacts too. Usually don't see this guy pop up unless it's a deck tailored to beat enchantment decks.
However, personally I think it is overpowered. Thinking of Day of Judgment and Wrath of God, those cost 4 mana; and those I think are too cheap. The effects are so strong that they should be more expensive; especially when one thinks how much creatures cost.
Oh btw: This card is probably the best anti-Theros there is, with Theros focusing on enchantment-everything.
Now... Where's my Avacyn when I need her....