“Costs have to be something you can pay yourself” invigorate would like to have a word with you mark

You give the opponent life in place of paying the mana cost, which, I believe, means you’re not technically paying a cost. Again, I’m not saying we can’t template giving your opponent a resource; it’s just not written as a cost.

What encouraged the seemingly abrupt banning of Grapeshot, Empty the Warrens, and Invigorate in Pauper? Did Wizards recently decide that it would be best to reduce the impact of combo on the format? If so, does this mean that Pauper will be undergoing a paradigm shift? Did I ask that last question just so I could find an excuse to use the phrase "paradigm shift?"

The banning team got a lot of input from people playing Pauper as well as looking at the data from Magic Online, one of the places where the format is the most popular. The general feeling, as well as what data crunching showed, is that storm was a little too dominant, so they did what banning teams do, they corrected.