You just made my day! I literally just posted a request in the suggestions thread about Dead branches and the Azoth (and the Hylozoist card) - and Hocus Pocus, wherein I begged to see those brought back in their original form (allowable on regular map zones). You have no idea how happy I'd be to see these allowed in the game again.
In fact, if you guys do this, I will personally see to it that I bring back at least 10+ old players and encourage them to do the same.
4. Eventually dead branches will be working again. But to be clear we will never be okay with any user using it to harass another player suspected bot or not. Because monsters don't care and they will kill real players. If we enable them and you use them to close down maps in this manner we will ban you.