I understand both sides of this argumentation, and I was actually about to build a deck with this card before learning that they changed the rules, too bad :(.
By the way, there was odd behaviours even before the change, like voluntarily taking mana burn to reach a specific amount life... Cough! fateful hour Cough!.
I've been thinknig for another way to solve this issue: There is already a lot of situations where players are unable to take actions whithout a proper use for this action.
-Can't regenerate a creature that is not going to the graveyard
-can't cast a spell that target something without a valid target, even if it would let you draw :(
-can't discard without a reason...
So why the heck can we tap lands for mana without the intention of using it?
Posted By:
Nashcoil
(4/6/2012 6:52:08 PM)
They should have errataed this card to make it cause manaburn to work as part of its effect, same as they did with some artifacts back when they changed the rules to make tapped artifacts continue to work.
Posted By:
Aquillion
(4/24/2013 6:30:26 AM)
Rest in Binders, Power Surge, so sad.
Posted By:
holgir
(8/4/2009 5:08:22 AM)
You can still use it with Manabarbs. Bad combo, yes, but it can do something.
Posted By:
Rainyday2012
(7/28/2009 1:19:18 PM)
manabarbs and land sacing costs.
Posted By:
Dragon5911
(5/26/2011 9:28:51 PM)
Wizard knew that removing mana burn will not just nerf, but only kill some cards. (Those were also stated in their rules change article)
What where they thinking? O.o
Of course new players often didn't know about that since it does not become relevant in most simple games...but was it correct to remove a game element just because it was rather unknown?
I don't miss it that much, but i hope cards like this will get an errata for new use, though.
Posted By:
Mode
(8/10/2009 3:14:13 PM)
with Mana Burn gone after Magic2010 this is a functionally dead card... BOOOOO!!!!!!!
Posted By:
ChaosDruid
(6/9/2009 10:41:27 PM)
It is not the worst card... I don't see why it is rated so low....
Even without mana burn it still does the damage.... Could someone explain why removing mana burn nerfed this card so badly?
It still says "At the beginning of each player's upkeep, Power Surge deals X damage to that player, where X is the number of untapped lands he or she controlled at the beginning of this turn."
Get pro Red or go all aggro with haste weenies and some equipment. After about 3 turns with this out your opponent should not be able to do anything with the right aggression. I'm just a bit lost as to why it is considered so nerfed...
Posted By:
Amorgan
(7/5/2011 8:14:59 PM)
This card does nothing without mana burn (removed in Magic 2010), Citadel of Pain has more potential (though not by much).
Posted By:
Dragon_Bloodthirsty
(8/6/2009 2:18:59 PM)
Bust this... if you're playing casually with your friends, you CAN play with mana burn, returning relevance to the cards you love.
Posted By:
SonOfSamus
(7/31/2010 5:02:42 PM)