The Balance Team is back with information about what is to be expected in 2026. While a month has already gone by, I wanted to take the time to inform you of what is to be expected this year and moving forward.
As you have probably noticed, there were no Restricted List in January as per usual. This decision is not because we didn’t have time, but because we are taking a new approach to the Restricted List in terms of the number we do per year. In the last few years, you could expect 4 Restricted Lists per year, with one being released every 3 months. I strongly believe that while this allowed the team to react quickly to problematic cards following new releases, it didn’t give the time for the community to adjust and adapt to said problems by trying to solve the issues. Furthermore, for the third consecutive year, we will be having a full cycle of 120 cards released, and those releases alone can create a shift in the meta or certain answers can be released that could help solve a problem in the meta. On top of all of these reasons, the Balance Team would only have 2 months to analyze the way the meta was shaping to then start working on the next one for a month to be able to release everything on time. I once again strongly believe that in a time period of 2 months, there isn’t enough time to really know how things will shape up with the releases of new cards and creations of new decks.
Therefore, we are moving to a model of 2 Restricted Lists per year. This shift in our approach will give the community more time to create decks to try and counter popular options in the meta, while also giving the Balance Team more time to monitor how the meta grows and shifts. With that said, if a combo or card is way too problematic, we can always react quickly with an emergency fix if needed. The goal is to release a new Restricted List early January and July, giving time to the community to create new decks or adapt old ones leading up to Online Worlds and Stahleck respectively. With that said, do not expect a new Restricted List until July, as a big List was released prior to Stahleck 2025.
Next up for this year is the subject of redesigns. We know that these can be something that is not appreciated by some in the community, so we’ve been working on finding a compromise between having many Redesigns (like the first batch back in 2020) and having no cards being changed. For a card to be redesigned, it will have to fall in 1 of the following 3 criteria:
1- Banned cards. We don’t want cards gone forever, and strongly feel like a card that is banned worthy should be changed to be more balanced. This will also help the balance team when a certain card is continuously seen as a problem even if it is restricted and podded. Queensguard was banned for this specific reason.
2- A card is Restricted and Podded, and yet is continuously picked. When a card falls inside this category but doesn’t end up banned, usually it creates issues and discussions every single time we reach the time of a new Restricted List. Furthermore, these cards tend to hurt the design process as every new card released that could interact with one of these cards usually end up being nerfed or podded with said card. Aegon Targaryen (TSC) and Nightflyer are both prime examples of cards falling in this category.
3- Podded cards that never see play. While these cards are never strong enough to be chosen in a deck, they usually end up as a binder fodder card for simply having 1 really strong interaction, but never good enough to be taken over the other card(s) it is podded with. Our goal is to bring back those cards slightly modified to make sure that it can be played again. A good example here would be Ser Balon Swann, who seems to never see play ever since it has been podded, but without the pod is way too efficient to let it go free.
Rest assured, the cards that are considered eligible for Redesigns will be hitting the playtesting server for a period of time and will be monitored to make sure that they can be rereleased in a way that keeps the essence of the card but a bit toned down to make sure that it is not problematic. A card that has been redesigned previously is also not off the table to be redesigned a second time, as the goal of using this tool is to make sure that a fair balance is kept. Looking at you, Victarion.
The current goal is to have a first wave of Redesign be playtested and released with the next Restricted List. A list of cards has already been targeted for a while now, but has been put on the backburner because Stahleck was looming.
You can expect a new Restricted List for July 1st, for both Melee and Joust, and expect it to have quite a bit of changes as we will have been playing with the same Restricted List for 9 months, on top of having Redesigns hopefully ready and trying to remove certain cards from the List at the same time. The balance team will appreciate all constructive feedback on these changes, and hopefully we can see some new decks hitting the tables with those said changes.
