Would Mental Misstep have been less game breaking if it had cost 2 phyrexian mana instead?

It wasn’t an effect we should have done. Magic is not better for every color having access to counterspells.

When you designed Mental Misstep, did you imagine it would have such a big impact on Vintage?

Not only did I not make it. I tried very, very hard to kill it. Unsuccessfully, obviously.

What are your thoughts on Mental misstep? I feel like a phyrexian counter was a good idea but feel like it was poorly implemented. a U/P U/P counter with downside might have been a better idea and would have not thrashed the meta in legacy and extended.

I didn’t want us to do a counterspell as it’s a good example of something we wouldn’t do with a colorless cost.

Today is my birthday! Can you tell me what was the thinking that was put into mental misstep and why it banned in legacy?

“We think players will like this.” and “Oops.”

We sometimes hear about how you fought tooth and nail against something only to lose and you think it was a mistake to this day or have been proven right (re: Mental Misstep, which prompted this question), but are there any examples where you fought against something tooth and nail, were beaten, then it turned out your were totally wrong and the thing was awesome?

I tried to stop Akroma as I thought her abilities didn’t match her flavor in the story and were a bit boring for such a high profile card. I tried to get it changed, failed and she has gone on to be wildly popular.

I know banning's not in your jurisdiction, but... the modern playerbase as whole feels that Development is going about balancing the format the wrong way. Nobody wants to play an eternal format where you're not allowed to play the powerful, iconic cards - such as Bloodbraid Elf, that was in no way broken. The format would've been better served by unbanning cards necessary to other archetypes, like mental misstep or ancestral vision.

The people who make the banning decisions do not make this decision casually or without a great deal of thought. Banning a card is the last thing we want to do. We want people to be able to play with their cards, but even worse is an environment which is unfun and players don’t want to play.

You lamented the Urza era "free" spells that gave you back the mana or untapped the lands. Affinity drove more players from the game than almost any other degenerate environment. Cascade bordered on being broken and dominated two formats in its hey-day. Phybrid mana cards like Mental Misstep caused problems in most formats and even made banned lists. Storm is always much better than intended. Can you talk about instances when free spells worked out well? What keeps a free spell mechanic fair?

The pitch cards from Alliances, with the poster child being Force of Will, proved to be strong but not broken. (Okay, maybe Force of Will is too strong but its done good work.)