Bans are nothing new in Magic: The Gathering, but rarely are they as hotly debated as when it came to banning one particular artifact, The One Ring.

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This incredibly powerful card has been on the watch list since release, being both a bane to anyone playing against it and a boon to those with it. But why this book was banned and what it means for the game is what we are here to explore.
What is the one ring?
Coming out of the June 2023 Lord of the Rings: Tales of Middle-earth expansion, The One Ring was immediately identified as the strongest card in the set, and it's easy to see why.
This four-mana artifact has an enter-the-battlefield trigger that, as long as you cast it, gives you protection against everything until the end of the turn. This doesn't stop everything from happening to you like a Teferi shield might (and even then, there are ways to avoid it), but it does prevent you from being directly targeted by anything from cards to attacks on Planeswalker abilities.

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As if that wasn't enough, The One Ring also has another ability that catapults you ahead of your opponent very quickly. You can tap the Unique Ring to put up a very themed Burden counter and then draw a card for each Burden counter on it. Each turn you choose to do this nets you another card each turn.
Of course, there is a downside. As the ring and power of a malevolent ancient Ainur, you lose one life point at the start of your turn for each burden counter on it.
Why was The One Ring banned?
The unique ring in every pack and there is literally no downside. For slower decks, it can provide some early game protection against more aggressive decks, giving you a turn to gather your resources or cast a spell that doesn't directly impact the board. You can then use it to draw even more cards to help catch up.
For other decks, it can give you a lot of extra draw every turn to keep your hand full so you never run out of gas. While not every deck will want to play The One Ring, it has been enough to slowly and steadily outpace many other cards in the format.

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With a card like The One Ring, it very easily eliminates other cards in the modern format that players would otherwise use. This reduces variation in decks and the entire meta as a whole. For example, with the legal One Ring, there's very little reason to run cards like Jace, Sculptor of the Mind or Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, because you can do everything a little better with Isildur's Bane.
What package was the single ring using?
However, with the release of Modern Horizons 3, the power of The One Ring took a bit of a turn. A little deck popped up around the time called Boros Energy. This deck has everything you need to counter any disadvantages you might suffer from The One Ring.
While the One Ring can technically fit into any deck due to its pure generic mana cost, and many people have done just that, there are few viable decks that can deal with a steady stream of life loss from those mana counters. burden.
Boros Energy has multiple ways to gain life, between Ocolot Pride that pumps tokens and Guide of Souls that provides both energy and life gain, you have a pretty consistent way to counter and even overcome life loss from Ring.

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Then, if the load counters become too much to bear, all you have to do is cast another copy of the legendary artifact to sacrifice the original and reset those counters to zero. Since you probably drew quite a few cards from the first one, you'll have plenty of opportunities to draw in that second or third copy of The One Ring. Not to mention, you'll get another turn of protection when you roll the extra rings.
Will the One Ring ever be unbanned?
While it's impossible to know what Wizards of the Coast will decide in the future, it seems highly unlikely that Wizards will cancel The One Ring. You can still play with the powerful Commander, Legacy, Vintage and Magic: The Gathering Arena exclusive artifact, Timeless.
The overwhelming power of the card twists the format a bit too much to ever be released back into the wild. Like its literary counterpart, you can't wield it, The One Ring answers to Sauron alone.