The way I'm going to do it is to use the checklist as proxies in my deck, and keep the actual transformers in a clear sleeve in my deck box and only swap the transformer in when I actually play it. Piece of cake.
WotC hates humans, I mean they don't even employee any. Rosewater is a hobbit, Gottlieb is a gremlin, and Brian David Marshall is apparently some sort of sexy beast.
Attitudes like this are what is killing Magic: The Gathering:
I agree that transform seems clunky to me, but that doesn't mean I'm not intrigued by it. From a purely Vorthosian worldview, though, this mechanic does exactly what it's supposed to do. It's meant to show a creature that is at once one being and another. Two parts of the same whole. This is especially interesting to me, as a card-holding philosopher, though I don't consider myself to be an accurate representation of the general M:tG community.
Will it prove to be a headache for judges everywhere? Probably. But, on the whole, I feel transform will be a successful mechanic, much in the same way morph was.
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""Te Occidere Possunt Sed Te Edere Non Possunt Nefas Est"
(They can kill you, but the legalities of eating you are quite a bit dicier).
So my understanding, and I hope I get this right is that the checklist and or taking the card out of the sleeve and flipping it over are both not required, but are tactics to make the double sided card work.
So If I have my card sleeved face up, and I play it then it transform, I have a choice to either using the checklist with the checked card, and place it on top of the card just as I would a token. The only rule is that I would have to have a checklist for each of the transform cards in my library for me to do it that way, or I can just take the card out of the sleeve and flip it over. I am not required to do both am I right?
The checklist is what is confusing me a little.
Other than that, I am kind of mehh on the double sided cards. Not because of the inconvience but the mechanic is clunky as all hell and it will involve keeping a counter on the side to keep track of the spell count like a psuedo Storm, which to me is not very fun.
If you're playing without sleeves, you basically have to play with the checklist card in your library and hand, then when you cast the checked card, you bring in the actual dual-sided card like you would a token, and it takes its place.
With sleeves, you have more freedom of choice. You can put the dual-sided card in the sleeve itself, and just manually flip it in its sleeve.
IF you use the checklist card, you must use them for ALL transform cards in your deck.
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Quote from Ninja Caterpie »
I expect with this [Transform] mechanic that everyone playing a Werewolf tribal deck will say "Autobots, rollout!" whenever the majority of their army transforms.
Literal flip cards are a dangerous slippery slope. It's an interesting idea, but I truely hope to never see it again. Honestly, what the hell are they thinking? Magic is a game about information, even during drafting. Sure I can hide it, but I can't hide it well 100% of the time, someone will see it and know much more than they should know. This just toys with the idea of a randomized card game. They had to make a checklist? The fact they had to do that should show how stupid this idea is.
Not to mention multiples muddle the game space up, and will make it confusing what is flipping now and what not. It's going to be fun, but will quickly lose it's appeal. I thought they didn't make level up instant because it was going to be too confusing, this game state is going to be super screwed up. How am I supposed to get checklists? Do they come in packs? Or are handed out at tournaments? I have troubles getting two or three token cards for my decks, how am I supposed to get 4+ for a playset or 2 of transform cards in a single deck?
Still, I'm optimistic, and won't complain too much out of this post. But I'm severely disappointed in WotC for pulling such crap on us, and I hope to never see it again.
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"I've always been a fan of reality by popular vote" - Stephen Colbert (in response to Don McLeroy)
This is literally the first time a mechanic has made me scared for the existence of Magic. Making such a complicated mess of things just seems gratuitous and I'm never worried about the state of the game.
I'm with you on this.
Transform (well, the dual-faced cards associated with transform) just sound like a horrid idea.
Even when I was playing Pokemon however many years back, the differences between the Japanese and the English backings of cards was a hassle to deal with; one that required sleeves.
By removing the standardized (or near it) appearance of cards, Wizards has eliminated consistency in the game, and will by that have messed with the random nature of the game.
While I don't mind the mechanic of having two 'sides' to a card - two forms that it can take. The implementation of such will not work well with the general population.
It creates many more problems than it needs to, and is not something I want to have to fuss with.
Sleeving my double-sided cards, then having to pull them out of the sleeves to 'flip'. Having to ask my opponent for permission to see the backside of his cards. Drafting. Confusion with proxy sheets. Etc, Etc. All bad things I don't want to deal with.
That's not to say I won't though -.- ~ I (and most of the community) will just adapt to it, or suffer through it as might be the case.
Like I said, not just flipping cards around in sleeves but the act of switching them out is going to get really annoying if there are more than a couple playable ones.
Also, I'm pretty sure most people aren't going to want to play with checklist cards anyways. Even if they do, it doesn't minimize the annoyance by much.
Again, not gonna kill us but this mechanic really sucks.
Yeah, it's going to be tedious but I think the Werewolf mechanic of counting the number of spells and remembering if people played spells may end up being worse.
It's inelegant. It will make for sucky magic. Everyone likes to "slam" (not necessarily literally) a game-changing card, and this just slows down and makes the game clumsy. Oh look, a checklist card. Here, let's look at which one it is. Oh, it's the mayor, hold on a sec while I go in my deckbox and get the card.
I mean I realize that process will be streamlined a bit over time, but it just makes for crappy gameplay. I know I won't be using any of these in constructed at all so I guess I have that to be thankful for. I can't be bothered sharpieing a checklist. I'd have to get decent proxies printed, and I don't really want to go to that much trouble for this thing.
The way I'm going to do it is to use the checklist as proxies in my deck, and keep the actual transformers in a clear sleeve in my deck box and only swap the transformer in when I actually play it. Piece of cake.
Exactly how i'll go about it as well. I see no hassle in this.
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Quote from Ninja Caterpie »
I expect with this [Transform] mechanic that everyone playing a Werewolf tribal deck will say "Autobots, rollout!" whenever the majority of their army transforms.
Honestly, it feels like they were trying to be clever and failed by half. The mechanic is just, well, dumb. It doesn't add anything to the game, it's just a clunkier take on an existing mechanic. Sleeving and resleeving cards midplay, having to use a proxy then pull out a card from outside the game during the game, it just feels.... dumb. MaRo once again got his way of changing somehting for changes sake, I know he's had a hard on for changing the card backs since it was the last part of the card he couldn't smear his ego onto. That man seriously needs to get out of that job.
And having to keep track of things that happened in previous turns: yech.
Also, drafting will now all be done under the table.
I don't really get all the madness about them. Just use sleeves and there isn't a problem. If you are in some situation where you don't have sleeves, just use the checklist card. If they are as common as the eldrazi spawn tokens, you'll have a stack per draft for the taking.
The only other way you could do this sort of thing is to have token cards for every guy with transform, which is even worse because you can't include 3 different tokens in one pack. So you'd end up having situations where you'd have to either have the transformed side memorized or carry around a stack of tokens for every draft just in case.
Literal flip cards are a dangerous slippery slope. It's an interesting idea, but I truely hope to never see it again. Honestly, what the hell are they thinking? Magic is a game about information, even during drafting. Sure I can hide it, but I can't hide it well 100% of the time, someone will see it and know much more than they should know. This just toys with the idea of a randomized card game. They had to make a checklist? The fact they had to do that should show how stupid this idea is.
Not to mention multiples muddle the game space up, and will make it confusing what is flipping now and what not. It's going to be fun, but will quickly lose it's appeal. I thought they didn't make level up instant because it was going to be too confusing, this game state is going to be super screwed up. How am I supposed to get checklists? Do they come in packs? Or are handed out at tournaments? I have troubles getting two or three token cards for my decks, how am I supposed to get 4+ for a playset or 2 of transform cards in a single deck?
Still, I'm optimistic, and won't complain too much out of this post. But I'm severely disappointed in WotC for pulling such crap on us, and I hope to never see it again.
Checklists will come in most packs, and will be provided to your local game store by Wizards to provide to players during drafts. They thought about this already.
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Quote from Ninja Caterpie »
I expect with this [Transform] mechanic that everyone playing a Werewolf tribal deck will say "Autobots, rollout!" whenever the majority of their army transforms.
Given a little more thought, I think the only thing that bothers me mechanically is the exclusion of the word "may". This makes a play mistake that neither player spots immediately a potential disqualification, depending on the tournament level. Again, flavor-wise this is spot-on, as in a majority of fantasy canon werewolves don't choose when they can transform. Just more headaches for judges.
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""Te Occidere Possunt Sed Te Edere Non Possunt Nefas Est"
(They can kill you, but the legalities of eating you are quite a bit dicier).
Honestly, it feels like they were trying to be clever and failed by half. The mechanic is just, well, dumb. It doesn't add anything to the game, it's just a clunkier take on an existing mechanic. Sleeving and resleeving cards midplay, having to use a proxy then pull out a card from outside the game during the game, it just feels.... dumb. MaRo once again got his way of changing somehting for changes sake, I know he's had a hard on for changing the card backs since it was the last part of the card he couldn't smear his ego onto. That man seriously needs to get out of that job.
And having to keep track of things that happened in previous turns: yech.
Also, drafting will now all be done under the table.
How dare they make player think a little more, that's terrible for Magic, just like Modern, and PW, and tutor, and instants, and the stack, and flying....
If you can play with tokens or used Wishes this really isn't that hard.
Hey thanks guys. But any ideas about the fact that it still reveals what colors youre going in draft?
Hide your cards?
Sure it reveals what colors you're going, but so what? Sure someone may "hate-draft", but then that just makes them miss out on the cards they could use to make their deck better. Dont worry about it.
Besides, who knows if you'll even be playing against them during the draft?
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Quote from Ninja Caterpie »
I expect with this [Transform] mechanic that everyone playing a Werewolf tribal deck will say "Autobots, rollout!" whenever the majority of their army transforms.
How dare they make player think a little more, that's terrible for Magic, just like Modern, and PW, and tutor, and instants, and the stack, and flying....
If you can play with tokens or used Wishes this really isn't that hard.
Yes, because the complaints are all about people having to think more and have nothing to do with how clunky and pointless this new mechanic is.
Hey thanks guys. But any ideas about the fact that it still reveals what colors you're going in draft?
You adapt to the situation and strategize your win accordingly. Your opponents seeing cards in your deck is the same if they made you reveal you hand, library, etc. It's nothing new short of them knowing exactly what card is coming. However the other 35 some odd cards that aren't insta-spoils should be able to back up everything you do. Basic tactics.
WotC hates humans, I mean they don't even employee any. Rosewater is a hobbit, Gottlieb is a gremlin, and Brian David Marshall is apparently some sort of sexy beast.
Attitudes like this are what is killing Magic: The Gathering:
Also, drafting will now all be done under the table.
Yeah, I can't really think of a decent way to handle them in draft. It's super against to rules to draft under the table. You'll probably just have to hold the cards so nobody can see them, and then slip a tranny under your drafted pile.
I know the title of the thread is "Transform, Dangerous for MTG", but attitudes like this....
....are what is really dangerous to this game.
This man speaks wise words.
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Quote from Ninja Caterpie »
I expect with this [Transform] mechanic that everyone playing a Werewolf tribal deck will say "Autobots, rollout!" whenever the majority of their army transforms.
Given a little more thought, I think the only thing that bothers me mechanically is the exclusion of the word "may". This makes a play mistake that neither player spots immediately a potential disqualification, depending on the tournament level. Again, flavor-wise this is spot-on, as in a majority of fantasy canon werewolves don't choose when they can transform. Just more headaches for judges.
You need 3 warnings before even getting a game loss for something like this. If you're getting 3 warnings for forgetting mandatory triggers, you're probably not going to be winning, anyways.
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There are two types of people in this world: people who think that countermagic is the most powerful effect in the game and people who aren't morons.
My color is Purple. I value diversity, smashed color pies and obsolete Inquest articles. At my best, I can redefine MTG in a new and wonderful way. At my worst, I can end up as an Unhinged joke. My symbol is not defined. My enemies are 5 old and bureaucratic angry colors.
Given a little more thought, I think the only thing that bothers me mechanically is the exclusion of the word "may". This makes a play mistake that neither player spots immediately a potential disqualification, depending on the tournament level. Again, flavor-wise this is spot-on, as in a majority of fantasy canon werewolves don't choose when they can transform. Just more headaches for judges.
So far, it seems like werewolves are the only one that isn't a may. And that makes sense because I've never seen a werewolf just be like "nah, I'm not gonna change this time". All the other transform cards are flipped by a activated ability, or a triggered ability with a may. There are quite a few more trannies to be spoiled though, so I may be wrong, but based on current cards it seems to make sense.
You need 3 warnings before even getting a game loss for something like this. If you're getting 3 warnings for forgetting mandatory triggers, you're probably not going to be winning, anyways.
Probably not. But it still means more headaches for those involved.
Also, why not use the fact that those drafting with you can see the back of that card to your advantage? It would make bluffing those colors a little easier, until you get passed another one and don't take it.
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""Te Occidere Possunt Sed Te Edere Non Possunt Nefas Est"
(They can kill you, but the legalities of eating you are quite a bit dicier).
Oh geeze the whining. I have a few things to say about this:
1. What is stopping you from putting the checklist card in your deck and subbing it out for the transform card when you play it? I mean, if you aren't required to have your sideboard in sleeves, you shouldn't be required to have your Transform cards in sleeves. (and the rules primer says "you'll want to", not "you have to") It won't break the game flow too much and it prevents you from having to unsleeve and resleeve cards continuously.
2. I'm... okay with this. This is really about the best solution for what they wanted: Cards that could turn from one form to another, with one or both forms having effects unrelated to causing them to transform. Let's look at a few other options:
- Flip Cards: Yes, the easiest way to do this, but look at the flip cards. Notice how they don't go over 4 lines of text? Now notice how most flip effects (and revealed transform effects) take up most of those 4 lines? This leaves little room for abilities besides those used to trigger the flip. So in order to keep The Mayor and The Alpha flipping back into each other, you would have 2 french vanilla cards, due to the Lord effect they both provide taking up 2 lines each, and their Transform trigger taking up 3.
- Put tokens into Play: So what about making all the cards into Sengir Nosferatu? See Previous Argument on Text boxes, but imagine fitting two cards worth of text into one. Tiny Text a Go Go!
- Separate Cards: Because everyone likes having to buy two cards to essentially play one, right? No? ... Yeah, i got nothing else really, just in case someone had thought this would be an idea for them to go for over this XP.
3. Yeah, Drafting with these'll be a bit tricky. they are understandably not gonna penalize you game-wise for revealing them, but you are allowed to take reasonable steps to hide the identity if you choose... Is it me, or does this mean you could reasonably play mind games and employ some misdirection in a new way? I'm pretty unused to drafting so i probably don't know what i'm talking about...
geeze this took entirely too long to go over and double check everything :/ I'll have to remember to limit my arguments in the future, but there's my 2 cents.
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Seems like a lot of hassle for very little reward, and the implementation just feels very sloppy and forced.
The way I'm going to do it is to use the checklist as proxies in my deck, and keep the actual transformers in a clear sleeve in my deck box and only swap the transformer in when I actually play it. Piece of cake.
Attitudes like this are what is killing Magic: The Gathering:
Will it prove to be a headache for judges everywhere? Probably. But, on the whole, I feel transform will be a successful mechanic, much in the same way morph was.
(They can kill you, but the legalities of eating you are quite a bit dicier).
If you're playing without sleeves, you basically have to play with the checklist card in your library and hand, then when you cast the checked card, you bring in the actual dual-sided card like you would a token, and it takes its place.
With sleeves, you have more freedom of choice. You can put the dual-sided card in the sleeve itself, and just manually flip it in its sleeve.
IF you use the checklist card, you must use them for ALL transform cards in your deck.
Amazing banners made by Brofaux.
Not to mention multiples muddle the game space up, and will make it confusing what is flipping now and what not. It's going to be fun, but will quickly lose it's appeal. I thought they didn't make level up instant because it was going to be too confusing, this game state is going to be super screwed up. How am I supposed to get checklists? Do they come in packs? Or are handed out at tournaments? I have troubles getting two or three token cards for my decks, how am I supposed to get 4+ for a playset or 2 of transform cards in a single deck?
Still, I'm optimistic, and won't complain too much out of this post. But I'm severely disappointed in WotC for pulling such crap on us, and I hope to never see it again.
"I've always been a fan of reality by popular vote" - Stephen Colbert (in response to Don McLeroy)
GPolukranos, Kill ALL the Things!G
I'm with you on this.
Transform (well, the dual-faced cards associated with transform) just sound like a horrid idea.
Even when I was playing Pokemon however many years back, the differences between the Japanese and the English backings of cards was a hassle to deal with; one that required sleeves.
By removing the standardized (or near it) appearance of cards, Wizards has eliminated consistency in the game, and will by that have messed with the random nature of the game.
While I don't mind the mechanic of having two 'sides' to a card - two forms that it can take. The implementation of such will not work well with the general population.
It creates many more problems than it needs to, and is not something I want to have to fuss with.
Sleeving my double-sided cards, then having to pull them out of the sleeves to 'flip'. Having to ask my opponent for permission to see the backside of his cards. Drafting. Confusion with proxy sheets. Etc, Etc. All bad things I don't want to deal with.
That's not to say I won't though -.- ~ I (and most of the community) will just adapt to it, or suffer through it as might be the case.
[Developing] 430+ Peasant Cube Thread --- [and on Cube Cobra]
Yeah, it's going to be tedious but I think the Werewolf mechanic of counting the number of spells and remembering if people played spells may end up being worse.
I mean I realize that process will be streamlined a bit over time, but it just makes for crappy gameplay. I know I won't be using any of these in constructed at all so I guess I have that to be thankful for. I can't be bothered sharpieing a checklist. I'd have to get decent proxies printed, and I don't really want to go to that much trouble for this thing.
Exactly how i'll go about it as well. I see no hassle in this.
Amazing banners made by Brofaux.
And having to keep track of things that happened in previous turns: yech.
Also, drafting will now all be done under the table.
The only other way you could do this sort of thing is to have token cards for every guy with transform, which is even worse because you can't include 3 different tokens in one pack. So you'd end up having situations where you'd have to either have the transformed side memorized or carry around a stack of tokens for every draft just in case.
WRBoros
RKuldotha Red
Checklists will come in most packs, and will be provided to your local game store by Wizards to provide to players during drafts. They thought about this already.
Amazing banners made by Brofaux.
(They can kill you, but the legalities of eating you are quite a bit dicier).
How dare they make player think a little more, that's terrible for Magic, just like Modern, and PW, and tutor, and instants, and the stack, and flying....
If you can play with tokens or used Wishes this really isn't that hard.
Hide your cards?
Sure it reveals what colors you're going, but so what? Sure someone may "hate-draft", but then that just makes them miss out on the cards they could use to make their deck better. Dont worry about it.
Besides, who knows if you'll even be playing against them during the draft?
Amazing banners made by Brofaux.
Yes, because the complaints are all about people having to think more and have nothing to do with how clunky and pointless this new mechanic is.
You adapt to the situation and strategize your win accordingly. Your opponents seeing cards in your deck is the same if they made you reveal you hand, library, etc. It's nothing new short of them knowing exactly what card is coming. However the other 35 some odd cards that aren't insta-spoils should be able to back up everything you do. Basic tactics.
....are what is really dangerous to this game.
Attitudes like this are what is killing Magic: The Gathering:
Yeah, I can't really think of a decent way to handle them in draft. It's super against to rules to draft under the table. You'll probably just have to hold the cards so nobody can see them, and then slip a tranny under your drafted pile.
WRBoros
RKuldotha Red
This man speaks wise words.
Amazing banners made by Brofaux.
You need 3 warnings before even getting a game loss for something like this. If you're getting 3 warnings for forgetting mandatory triggers, you're probably not going to be winning, anyways.
So far, it seems like werewolves are the only one that isn't a may. And that makes sense because I've never seen a werewolf just be like "nah, I'm not gonna change this time". All the other transform cards are flipped by a activated ability, or a triggered ability with a may. There are quite a few more trannies to be spoiled though, so I may be wrong, but based on current cards it seems to make sense.
WRBoros
RKuldotha Red
Probably not. But it still means more headaches for those involved.
Also, why not use the fact that those drafting with you can see the back of that card to your advantage? It would make bluffing those colors a little easier, until you get passed another one and don't take it.
(They can kill you, but the legalities of eating you are quite a bit dicier).
1. What is stopping you from putting the checklist card in your deck and subbing it out for the transform card when you play it? I mean, if you aren't required to have your sideboard in sleeves, you shouldn't be required to have your Transform cards in sleeves. (and the rules primer says "you'll want to", not "you have to") It won't break the game flow too much and it prevents you from having to unsleeve and resleeve cards continuously.
2. I'm... okay with this. This is really about the best solution for what they wanted: Cards that could turn from one form to another, with one or both forms having effects unrelated to causing them to transform. Let's look at a few other options:
- Flip Cards: Yes, the easiest way to do this, but look at the flip cards. Notice how they don't go over 4 lines of text? Now notice how most flip effects (and revealed transform effects) take up most of those 4 lines? This leaves little room for abilities besides those used to trigger the flip. So in order to keep The Mayor and The Alpha flipping back into each other, you would have 2 french vanilla cards, due to the Lord effect they both provide taking up 2 lines each, and their Transform trigger taking up 3.
- Put tokens into Play: So what about making all the cards into Sengir Nosferatu? See Previous Argument on Text boxes, but imagine fitting two cards worth of text into one. Tiny Text a Go Go!
- Separate Cards: Because everyone likes having to buy two cards to essentially play one, right? No? ... Yeah, i got nothing else really, just in case someone had thought this would be an idea for them to go for over this XP.
3. Yeah, Drafting with these'll be a bit tricky. they are understandably not gonna penalize you game-wise for revealing them, but you are allowed to take reasonable steps to hide the identity if you choose... Is it me, or does this mean you could reasonably play mind games and employ some misdirection in a new way? I'm pretty unused to drafting so i probably don't know what i'm talking about...
geeze this took entirely too long to go over and double check everything :/ I'll have to remember to limit my arguments in the future, but there's my 2 cents.