I learned a long time ago that complaining about WotC and their arbitrary rules does nothing except piss yourself off and everyone in the conversation. At this junction, you have a few choices:
1. You can stop playing MtG altogether, quitting cold-turkey.
2. You can take up MSE and make your own set where you are the master of the universe (No, really, you are.)
3. You can stop buying new cards and/or cards from the B.S. sets.
You can also pick/choose from these, but keep one thing in mind: complaining about it isn't one of the choices :).
Dahammer4
Artifact - Equipment (R)
Choose one - Equipped creature gets +4/+0; or Double Strike; or "When this creature deals combat damage to a creature, exile that creature"; or t, unattach ~ from this creature: ~ deals 5 damage to target creature." t: Equipped creature gains flying until end of turn.
Equip 3
out of curiousity, what would you think about an ambush card that causes two creatures to fight if one is attacking i.e:
Ambush Tactics 1W
Instant (c)
Target creature you control fights target attacking creature.
Seems like green gets fighting for predators, red gets brawls, and white would get combat tactics and skirmishes. Black might even get assassination-like fights, or a fight where it has the upper hand. something like this:
Assassinate the Sickly BB
Sorcery (U)
Put two -1/-1 counters on target tapped creature. Another target creature you control fights it.
Fighting is a good way to focus removal on creatures. Green, with efficently costed big creatures for limited, will naturally play well with this mechanic. Other colors should enjoy using the green cards, but I would love seeing amazing green control cards coming out of creature centered green decks. think cool mass creatue based kill like:
Predators Selection 2GG
Sorcery
Choose a creature you control and target player chooses a creature he or she controls. The chosen creatures fight. You may repeat this process. No creature may be chosen more than once for this effect by its controller.
Right now, the game is fun to play. There are cool mechanics, and a variety of playstyles to choose from. Even though Blue may seem like it has a lot of abilities right now (and white recently), those abilities only truely shine in completely different decks, providing for a variety of gameplay options, which is ultimately even more of a defining factor in the enjoyment of a game than actual variety of colors being played. Do I wish that blue didn't have some capabilities, yes. do I expect wizards to be perfect? no. Is Magic in its current state fun? ABSOLUTELY.
Other colors should enjoy using the green cards. - This right here is a good reason to limit any mechanic to a few colors, this allows you to pick and choose what mehcanics you use by choosing colors approprately.
Now for the specifics...
Ambush Tactics 1W
Instant (c)
Target creature you control fights target attacking creature.
While I do like this card, this honestly should be a ranged strike ability.... I.E.
Target creature you deals damage equal to it's power to target creature.
Reason being, an ambush isn't fair. They are often very one sided, and just that leathal. "Fights" is a 'fair' form of removal. I.E. it's trading a card for a card.
Assassinate the Sickly BB
Sorcery (U)
Put two -1/-1 counters on target tapped creature. Another target creature you control fights it.
This isn't nearly as elegant of a card as ambush tactics. While flavorwise it almost works, it really doesn't. I see it more as a "Destroy target creature with a -1/-1 counter on it."
Remeber black already gets plenty of "Destroy target creature" effects.
I'm totally with you on the 'inconsistent rules' complaint. Wizards makes a lot of absolute statements about the design of Magic: "Blue doesn't get good creatures", "Shock is the standard red damage spell", "Cards shouldn't mention the stack", "Shroud is obsolete and won't be seen again", "Mythics shouldn't be 'utility' cards", etc. The way those statements are presented seems like Wizards has a clear vision of how the game should look. It's comforting to know that Wizards has a plan for the game, even if it's a plan that we don't agree with 100%, so it's disheartening every time they break one of those rules that were stated so matter-of-factly in the past.
I'm totally with you on the 'inconsistent rules' complaint. Wizards makes a lot of absolute statements about the design of Magic: "Blue doesn't get good creatures", "Shock is the standard red damage spell", "Cards shouldn't mention the stack", "Shroud is obsolete and won't be seen again", "Mythics shouldn't be 'utility' cards", etc. The way those statements are presented seems like Wizards has a clear vision of how the game should look. It's comforting to know that Wizards has a plan for the game, even if it's a plan that we don't agree with 100%, so it's disheartening every time they break one of those rules that were stated so matter-of-factly in the past.
Thank you. Do I want to see fun and exciting cards, of course I do. I wouldn't play otherwise. I wouldn't be here, designing cards. Can this cards be made without breaking these "matter of fact" tennants that Wizards publishes everytime it releases a new expantion, or talks about design in general. yes.
They talk about why giving colors to much access to things outside of there scope, and why these are bad. And turn around, and with the exception of Black and Red Enchantment removal, have broken every one of them.
Can you give examples of WotC breaking those rules? Or, more importantly, can you give examples of WotC repeatedly breaking those rules? The only one I can think of is the Shock one, and I don't even remember WotC saying that. Even if they did (the probably did, I just don't remember), what's so bad about changing the rules? As the game evolves, WotC may discover that their old rules need to be revised, so they break them.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
Axe-Weilder Maniac | R
Creature — Human Barbarian 4, Sacrifice CARDNAME: CARDNAME deals 4 damage to target player. 1/1
He's my favorite Convoke enabler in red.
Alternatively:
Burning Bauble | 1
Artifact
When CARDNAME enters the battlefield, add one mana of any color to your mana pool. 3R, Sacrifice CARDNAME: CARDNAME deals 4 damage to target player.
I want single-use color fixers in Magic and this looks pretty playable. (Limited)
Can you give examples of WotC breaking those rules? Or, more importantly, can you give examples of WotC repeatedly breaking those rules? The only one I can think of is the Shock one, and I don't even remember WotC saying that. Even if they did (the probably did, I just don't remember), what's so bad about changing the rules? As the game evolves, WotC may discover that their old rules need to be revised, so they break them.
There's a very big difference between the game evolving to match player attitudes and changing the rules just for the heck of it. Blue Aggro has no rationale behind it as to why it should exist. That's less evolution and more printing whatever Wizards feels like. I'll work on putting together a list of all the statements Wizards has put out regarding game design and how long it took them to go back on those statements, because I'm currently loving Innistrad so it's hard for me to think back to other formats.
There's a very big difference between the game evolving to match player attitudes and changing the rules just for the heck of it. Blue Aggro has no rationale behind it as to why it should exist. That's less evolution and more printing whatever Wizards feels like.
1) Blue aggro has existed for a long time (Fish, fliers in limited)
2) WotC isn't really supporting blue aggro in any noticeable way. Cards like Blighted Agent and Invisible Stalker still fit blue because they represent blue's sneaking, cunning side, and they're not even that good. (Agent dies to everything, and Stalker is only good if you've got an aura/equipment to put on him.) Phantasmal Bear is a single creature created to give blue options in one of the most agressive limited formats ever created. What blue aggro are you talking about?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
So, if this is such horribly aggressive a NONcreature color gets a 2 power drop t1, were is greens?
A creature that can be killed by any spell that targets, be it beneficial of detrimental, and as such, outside of it's lords, cannot be pumped directly.
So, if this is such horribly aggressive a NONcreature color gets a 2 power drop t1, were is greens?
1) Green is the creature color. It gets big powerful creatures. That doesn't mean that green will always have the best creature in every possible situation. In fact, green's not supposed to have the best creatures, it's supposed to have the biggest creatures, and it cares about creatures the most. That's it.
2) Green has other ways of dealing with agression. It plays big creatures mid game that stabilize and allow green to pull ahead, and it has bloodthirst creatures to put it back on the offensive. Compared to blue, who has mostly small utility creatures, or slightly late defensive creatures.
Green is known for it's powerful mid and late game creatures, so its one drop is a creature that allows it to ramp. Blue is known for having really small creatures, so its one drop is a more agressive weenie. The idea that green should have the best creatures all the time doesn't even fit with WotC's stated plan, so I don't see how that's relevant.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
1) Green is the creature color. It gets big powerful creatures. That doesn't mean that green will always have the best creature in every possible situation. In fact, green's not supposed to have the best creatures, it's supposed to have the biggest creatures, and it cares about creatures the most. That's it.
2) Green has other ways of dealing with agression. It plays big creatures mid game that stabilize and allow green to pull ahead, and it has bloodthirst creatures to put it back on the offensive. Compared to blue, who has mostly small utility creatures, or slightly late defensive creatures.
Green is known for it's powerful mid and late game creatures, so its one drop is a creature that allows it to ramp. Blue is known for having really small creatures, so its one drop is a more agressive weenie. The idea that green should have the best creatures all the time doesn't even fit with WotC's stated plan, so I don't see how that's relevant.
So, your saying that a color that is known for being creature weak, and has plenty of other utility at it's disposal to counter aggro, should be able to beat early aggro at its own game?
And, for the record, Almost every "Skulking" creature to date has shown up in top decks for it's respective format. yes, it can't be enchanted. However, they are super effective aggro creatures.
Just because Blue has always been creature weak is not relevant to how they have viewed in the last few years. Red and Blue are the metamagic colors, meaning they care about spells more than creatures. That does not mean they do not care about creatures and should not have creature game. If your view of the situation was true then Red weenie would not be appropriate for Red, but it's been one of its defining features. There's no reason Blue should not have a creature strategy, or that the strategy must be a late game strategy. It simply has to attack in a manner that is very Blue. Blue aggro decks almost always have a large tempo game to offset the smaller creature sizes it has had. The last two years have been no different.
So, your saying that a color that is known for being creature weak, and has plenty of other utility at it's disposal to counter aggro, should be able to beat early aggro at its own game?
Blue has a single agressive one drop. Coral Merfolk and Skywinder Drake are the extent of blue aggro. Black and red have reallygoodbloodthirstcreatures, and reallygoodenablers, not to mention a plethora of other agressive creatures. Are you really telling me that one one-mana 2/2 is more agressive than all of that?
And, for the record, Almost every "Skulking" creature to date has shown up in top decks for it's respective format. yes, it can't be enchanted. However, they are super effective aggro creatures.
As far as I know, the only illusion that has seen any serious play is Phantasmal Image, for obvious reasons. The rest made a very small splash in an illusion tribal deck, but that died off pretty quickly and only worked because of Lord of the Unreal.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
There's no reason Blue should not have a creature strategy, or that the strategy must be a late game strategy. It simply has to attack in a manner that is very Blue. Blue aggro decks almost always have a large tempo game to offset the smaller creature sizes it has had. The last two years have been no different.
So, green should be allowed a fast early game strategy as well, should it not? This is by your logic. Green like blue, has worked traditionally in the mid/late game. Green's strategy is to ramp up early game, while blue is to slow everything down, but they both have always been late game colors.
So, green should be allowed a fast early game strategy as well, should it not? This is by your logic. Green like blue, has worked traditionally in the mid/late game. Green's strategy is to ramp up early game, while blue is to slow everything down, but they both have always been late game colors.
This is why Phantasmal Bear is actually not an agressive creature. Its agressively costed, but its true function is to ward off early attacks. Bear does one of two things, it either eats one of your opponents early drops or eats one of their turns in which they waste a removal spell on it. Either way, the bear buys time, which is exactly what blue wants to do.
In most sets, this kind of "defensive" creature is a wall like Armored Skabb or Fortress Crab, but in m12 the most agressive starts are unblockable or unavoidable, so the only way to "defend" is to apply pressure yourself. Unlike other colors, blue doesn't usually have any way to follow up the agression applied by the bear, so its early damage usually just serves as a primer to a late game finish, rather than the start of a fast beat down.
Also, green does have agressive starts. Garruk's Companion trades favorably with most early drops and turns on bloodthirst. Lurking Crocodile and Sacred wolf are both good agressive creatures for green. Most importantly, unlike blue, green has very effective late game beat down options.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
Elves is an extremely aggressive deck, though it accomplishes its aggressive strategy in a slightly more round about manner; usually, an Elf deck aims to hit a Lord on turn 2 off a mana elf (of which there are many) and then move between attacking or building more board presence, or both. It aims to make its early creatures eventually outsize its opponent's ones on the virtue of sheer weight of effects, multiple Lord creatures stacking their pumps one on top of the other. Just because many of its creatures do not go into the red zone until turn 3 does not make it any less an aggressive strategy than one that plays Goblin Guide.
No color should be inherently prohibited from playing a short game, mid game, or long game. Some will preiodically do certain of these better than others, but that's what Magic is about. It is pendulum of power, that swings back and forth, in order to constantly the limitations of the colors.
Elves is an extremely aggressive deck, though it accomplishes its aggressive strategy in a slightly more round about manner; usually, an Elf deck aims to hit a Lord on turn 2 off a mana elf (of which there are many) and then move between attacking or building more board presence, or both. It aims to make its early creatures eventually outsize its opponent's ones on the virtue of sheer weight of effects, multiple Lord creatures stacking their pumps one on top of the other. Just because many of its creatures do not go into the red zone until turn 3 does not make it any less an aggressive strategy than one that plays Goblin Guide.
No color should be inherently prohibited from playing a short game, mid game, or long game. Some will preiodically do certain of these better than others, but that's what Magic is about. It is pendulum of power, that swings back and forth, in order to constantly the limitations of the colors.
And, currently green has no short game, it never has. Not in the terms of decks like RDW, or W.Weenie. As I stated before, Greens short game is typically building Tempo.
And, currently green has no short game, it never has. Not in the terms of decks like RDW, or W.Weenie. As I stated before, Greens short game is typically building Tempo.
Aren't you the one complaining that wizards doesn't follow it's rules? Why would green have as good of an early game as red or white, the colors considered the most agressive?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
This is why Phantasmal Bear is actually not an agressive creature. Its agressively costed, but its true function is to ward off early attacks. Bear does one of two things, it either eats one of your opponents early drops or eats one of their turns in which they waste a removal spell on it. Either way, the bear buys time, which is exactly what blue wants to do.
In most sets, this kind of "defensive" creature is a wall like Armored Skabb or Fortress Crab, but in m12 the most agressive starts are unblockable or unavoidable, so the only way to "defend" is to apply pressure yourself. Unlike other colors, blue doesn't usually have any way to follow up the agression applied by the bear, so its early damage usually just serves as a primer to a late game finish, rather than the start of a fast beat down.
Also, green does have agressive starts. Garruk's Companion trades favorably with most early drops and turns on bloodthirst. Lurking Crocodile and Sacred wolf are both good agressive creatures for green. Most importantly, unlike blue, green has very effective late game beat down options.
Ok, your looking at 2 and 3 drops, as being comparable, to red/whites 1 and 2 drops.
Now, I just find it ironic, that green the "creature" color, has the absolute worst creatures in the game for any sort of constructed environment, yes it does have it's bombs that are pretty ridiculous. But outside of thoes, greens creatures are very lacking.
Balance comes when all things being equal, all options give the same opportunities, this is not saying that all colors should have equal access to everything. In fact, they shouldn't. You say blue is justifying a 1 drop 2/2 because it trades with a first turn aggressive creature, and for that reason I disagree that blue should get such a creature. Blue does have other options for first turn disruptions. Bounce being the primary form. unsummoning there first turn drop is akin to a U time walk, is it not? Green can trade an elf for whatever, sure. But why are you going to take the tempo loss, and suck up the 2 damage, blue makes that trade with a bear, and it's a tempo gain. Not every color should have available first turn aggressive plays, Every color has a 2/* for 1 currently, except for green. Why?
Aren't you the one complaining that wizards doesn't follow it's rules? Why would green have as good of an early game as red or white, the colors considered the most aggressive?
if they are going to allow for starts that are that sort of aggressive, then every color should have access to those early starts, Both Black and Blue have been given 2/2 1cmc creatures, one at common, with a negligable drawback, if you can honestly call it a drawback, it's almost the same as giving red another 2/2 for R, and saying ~ can't block.
this is not saying that all colors should have equal access to everything. In fact, they shouldn't...
Every color has a 2/* for 1 currently, except for green. Why?
Well, as you just said, it's because not every color should have equal access to everything. Red, White, and Black have 2/*'s because they're agressive colors. Blue has one 2/* for one because it helped balance in a super agressive format. Note that this creature hasn't made any kind of relevant impact in any other format.
Green simply isn't an agressive color, so it doesn't get 2/* for one. If green didn't have other ways of dealing with agression, maybe it would have gotten one in m12 for support. But, because it has other methods of coping with the hyper agressive format, it didn't receive any. Blue got one as an exception to the rule that's only relevant in limited. It, like green, doesn't get these kinds of creatures often. that's why bear is the exception.
I just don't see why the existence of a single agressive blue creature (that, again, wasn't relevant other than in limited) means that WotC has been breaking its own rules and that green deserves one too.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"In the beginning, MTG Salvation switched to a new forum format.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
It was at that moment that I realized: I'm kinda just making these things up. We can just write the rules the way we want them to work. People will have fun, and people will get it.
The differance being, Blue already has effective early game tactics for dealing with aggressive starts. The bears feel more like attempting to give more mechanics to blue that it doesn't need. Green, acually is in need of more mechanics, but isn't getting them, green needs early aggresive defensive tactics (Since everybody everybody else gets it...), green currently is the only color that doesn't have it's own unique to itself mechanic. Everything green does, is shared with at least one other color.
All aggresive decks build tempo in the early turns, some just do it differently. Tempo can be entirely related to damage done over time, be over 3 turns or all on the 3rd turn, it's only a matter of degrees. And ultimately, none of this is relevant to the point you tried making at the start of this thread, which is Wizards constantly lays out design rules breaks them (which is partly true) and that somehow that is enough to make you believe you are a better Magic card designer than Wizards by complaining about power creep and some colors being too good/bad at something. Ie: the same arguments peole make everytime Wizards has done something they don't like for nothing but personal reasons.
If you wanted to call Wizards on some possible design failures in the last year, at least call them on the ones that actually mattered. Jace was a fair mistake because it was the first overpowered Planeswalker, which was very new ground at the time. Stoneforge Mystic looked very innocous but is broken because it is both a tutor and an enabler, like a Tinker on legs. Phyrexian Mana was not entirely ill conceived, but has led to some colors being able to access some card effects in what might be called an overly efficient manner (I, personally, love Phybrid mana, even if some of the cards they made might have been mistake individually).
The place where bad design and development is going to the most adverse effect on Magic is in competitive play, and most prominently Standard. As such, if you wanted to talk about proper design and card pitfalls, why not critique the actual mistakes Wizards has made as far as individual cards go. You could dissect Bitterblossom and argue about what can be learned from the mistake of its creation, but instead you rail about Wizards not knowing what they are doing and then you go and make some adequate if generally underpowered designs, which only marginally supports your argument because while cards are more powerful, it is only overpowered cards that should be considered development mistakes.
Ultimately, the thing about Magic design you seem to grasp the least is that it is continually in flux, and as a result what the colors are good at will oftimes vary. Why does Phantasmal Bear exist? Because Wizards wanted to create a faster Core Set Limited format, and they needed to find a way that was balanced for Blue to have a 2/2 for U. The fact the card made the splash into Standard should be seen as nothing but an upside, as it gives Wizards new ideas as to how to make the occasional Blue weenie as to promote an aggressive strategy in a typically slow color for the purpose of Limited. Instead of decrying this as some sort of heresy, consider it a moment of innovation that might allow them to explore new tempo oriented aggressive strategies in Blue while another color is slowed down and given a more prominent late game strategy (I hear people are howling for Monoblack control to finally come back, so why not?).
1. You can stop playing MtG altogether, quitting cold-turkey.
2. You can take up MSE and make your own set where you are the master of the universe (No, really, you are.)
3. You can stop buying new cards and/or cards from the B.S. sets.
You can also pick/choose from these, but keep one thing in mind: complaining about it isn't one of the choices :).
Sigpic by Rivenor
Artifact - Equipment (R)
Choose one - Equipped creature gets +4/+0; or Double Strike; or "When this creature deals combat damage to a creature, exile that creature"; or t, unattach ~ from this creature: ~ deals 5 damage to target creature."
t: Equipped creature gains flying until end of turn.
Equip 3
Courtesy of Crepes
[OMC] Omerium's Collapse
Other colors should enjoy using the green cards. - This right here is a good reason to limit any mechanic to a few colors, this allows you to pick and choose what mehcanics you use by choosing colors approprately.
Now for the specifics...
Ambush Tactics 1W
Instant (c)
Target creature you control fights target attacking creature.
While I do like this card, this honestly should be a ranged strike ability.... I.E.
Target creature you deals damage equal to it's power to target creature.
Reason being, an ambush isn't fair. They are often very one sided, and just that leathal. "Fights" is a 'fair' form of removal. I.E. it's trading a card for a card.
Assassinate the Sickly BB
Sorcery (U)
Put two -1/-1 counters on target tapped creature. Another target creature you control fights it.
This isn't nearly as elegant of a card as ambush tactics. While flavorwise it almost works, it really doesn't. I see it more as a "Destroy target creature with a -1/-1 counter on it."
Remeber black already gets plenty of "Destroy target creature" effects.
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
Thank you. Do I want to see fun and exciting cards, of course I do. I wouldn't play otherwise. I wouldn't be here, designing cards. Can this cards be made without breaking these "matter of fact" tennants that Wizards publishes everytime it releases a new expantion, or talks about design in general. yes.
They talk about why giving colors to much access to things outside of there scope, and why these are bad. And turn around, and with the exception of Black and Red Enchantment removal, have broken every one of them.
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
I regularly achieve a similar effect by declaring a creature as a blocker.
Assassinate is a lot less complicated (creature can be any size, don't need to already control a creature).
He's my favorite Convoke enabler in red.
Alternatively:
I want single-use color fixers in Magic and this looks pretty playable. (Limited)
Older Magic as a Board Game: Panglacial Wurm , Mill
There's a very big difference between the game evolving to match player attitudes and changing the rules just for the heck of it. Blue Aggro has no rationale behind it as to why it should exist. That's less evolution and more printing whatever Wizards feels like. I'll work on putting together a list of all the statements Wizards has put out regarding game design and how long it took them to go back on those statements, because I'm currently loving Innistrad so it's hard for me to think back to other formats.
1) Blue aggro has existed for a long time (Fish, fliers in limited)
2) WotC isn't really supporting blue aggro in any noticeable way. Cards like Blighted Agent and Invisible Stalker still fit blue because they represent blue's sneaking, cunning side, and they're not even that good. (Agent dies to everything, and Stalker is only good if you've got an aura/equipment to put on him.) Phantasmal Bear is a single creature created to give blue options in one of the most agressive limited formats ever created. What blue aggro are you talking about?
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
A creature that can be killed by any spell that targets, be it beneficial of detrimental, and as such, outside of it's lords, cannot be pumped directly.
Just for the record.
The creator of Maro's Magic 8-Ball!
1) Green is the creature color. It gets big powerful creatures. That doesn't mean that green will always have the best creature in every possible situation. In fact, green's not supposed to have the best creatures, it's supposed to have the biggest creatures, and it cares about creatures the most. That's it.
2) Green has other ways of dealing with agression. It plays big creatures mid game that stabilize and allow green to pull ahead, and it has bloodthirst creatures to put it back on the offensive. Compared to blue, who has mostly small utility creatures, or slightly late defensive creatures.
Green is known for it's powerful mid and late game creatures, so its one drop is a creature that allows it to ramp. Blue is known for having really small creatures, so its one drop is a more agressive weenie. The idea that green should have the best creatures all the time doesn't even fit with WotC's stated plan, so I don't see how that's relevant.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
So, your saying that a color that is known for being creature weak, and has plenty of other utility at it's disposal to counter aggro, should be able to beat early aggro at its own game?
And, for the record, Almost every "Skulking" creature to date has shown up in top decks for it's respective format. yes, it can't be enchanted. However, they are super effective aggro creatures.
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
Blue has a single agressive one drop. Coral Merfolk and Skywinder Drake are the extent of blue aggro. Black and red have really good bloodthirst creatures, and really good enablers, not to mention a plethora of other agressive creatures. Are you really telling me that one one-mana 2/2 is more agressive than all of that?
As far as I know, the only illusion that has seen any serious play is Phantasmal Image, for obvious reasons. The rest made a very small splash in an illusion tribal deck, but that died off pretty quickly and only worked because of Lord of the Unreal.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
So, green should be allowed a fast early game strategy as well, should it not? This is by your logic. Green like blue, has worked traditionally in the mid/late game. Green's strategy is to ramp up early game, while blue is to slow everything down, but they both have always been late game colors.
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
This is why Phantasmal Bear is actually not an agressive creature. Its agressively costed, but its true function is to ward off early attacks. Bear does one of two things, it either eats one of your opponents early drops or eats one of their turns in which they waste a removal spell on it. Either way, the bear buys time, which is exactly what blue wants to do.
In most sets, this kind of "defensive" creature is a wall like Armored Skabb or Fortress Crab, but in m12 the most agressive starts are unblockable or unavoidable, so the only way to "defend" is to apply pressure yourself. Unlike other colors, blue doesn't usually have any way to follow up the agression applied by the bear, so its early damage usually just serves as a primer to a late game finish, rather than the start of a fast beat down.
Also, green does have agressive starts. Garruk's Companion trades favorably with most early drops and turns on bloodthirst. Lurking Crocodile and Sacred wolf are both good agressive creatures for green. Most importantly, unlike blue, green has very effective late game beat down options.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
No color should be inherently prohibited from playing a short game, mid game, or long game. Some will preiodically do certain of these better than others, but that's what Magic is about. It is pendulum of power, that swings back and forth, in order to constantly the limitations of the colors.
And, currently green has no short game, it never has. Not in the terms of decks like RDW, or W.Weenie. As I stated before, Greens short game is typically building Tempo.
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
Aren't you the one complaining that wizards doesn't follow it's rules? Why would green have as good of an early game as red or white, the colors considered the most agressive?
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Ok, your looking at 2 and 3 drops, as being comparable, to red/whites 1 and 2 drops.
Now, I just find it ironic, that green the "creature" color, has the absolute worst creatures in the game for any sort of constructed environment, yes it does have it's bombs that are pretty ridiculous. But outside of thoes, greens creatures are very lacking.
Balance comes when all things being equal, all options give the same opportunities, this is not saying that all colors should have equal access to everything. In fact, they shouldn't. You say blue is justifying a 1 drop 2/2 because it trades with a first turn aggressive creature, and for that reason I disagree that blue should get such a creature. Blue does have other options for first turn disruptions. Bounce being the primary form. unsummoning there first turn drop is akin to a U time walk, is it not? Green can trade an elf for whatever, sure. But why are you going to take the tempo loss, and suck up the 2 damage, blue makes that trade with a bear, and it's a tempo gain. Not every color should have available first turn aggressive plays, Every color has a 2/* for 1 currently, except for green. Why?
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
if they are going to allow for starts that are that sort of aggressive, then every color should have access to those early starts, Both Black and Blue have been given 2/2 1cmc creatures, one at common, with a negligable drawback, if you can honestly call it a drawback, it's almost the same as giving red another 2/2 for R, and saying ~ can't block.
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
Well, as you just said, it's because not every color should have equal access to everything. Red, White, and Black have 2/*'s because they're agressive colors. Blue has one 2/* for one because it helped balance in a super agressive format. Note that this creature hasn't made any kind of relevant impact in any other format.
Green simply isn't an agressive color, so it doesn't get 2/* for one. If green didn't have other ways of dealing with agression, maybe it would have gotten one in m12 for support. But, because it has other methods of coping with the hyper agressive format, it didn't receive any. Blue got one as an exception to the rule that's only relevant in limited. It, like green, doesn't get these kinds of creatures often. that's why bear is the exception.
I just don't see why the existence of a single agressive blue creature (that, again, wasn't relevant other than in limited) means that WotC has been breaking its own rules and that green deserves one too.
This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."
Comic Book Set
Archester: Frontier of Steam (A steampunk set!)
A Good Place to Start Designing
Behind the eyes of truth, is a world of illustions.
Dragon Riderof a Mist Dragonn anyway with the Dragon Riders Clan.
If you wanted to call Wizards on some possible design failures in the last year, at least call them on the ones that actually mattered. Jace was a fair mistake because it was the first overpowered Planeswalker, which was very new ground at the time. Stoneforge Mystic looked very innocous but is broken because it is both a tutor and an enabler, like a Tinker on legs. Phyrexian Mana was not entirely ill conceived, but has led to some colors being able to access some card effects in what might be called an overly efficient manner (I, personally, love Phybrid mana, even if some of the cards they made might have been mistake individually).
The place where bad design and development is going to the most adverse effect on Magic is in competitive play, and most prominently Standard. As such, if you wanted to talk about proper design and card pitfalls, why not critique the actual mistakes Wizards has made as far as individual cards go. You could dissect Bitterblossom and argue about what can be learned from the mistake of its creation, but instead you rail about Wizards not knowing what they are doing and then you go and make some adequate if generally underpowered designs, which only marginally supports your argument because while cards are more powerful, it is only overpowered cards that should be considered development mistakes.
Ultimately, the thing about Magic design you seem to grasp the least is that it is continually in flux, and as a result what the colors are good at will oftimes vary. Why does Phantasmal Bear exist? Because Wizards wanted to create a faster Core Set Limited format, and they needed to find a way that was balanced for Blue to have a 2/2 for U. The fact the card made the splash into Standard should be seen as nothing but an upside, as it gives Wizards new ideas as to how to make the occasional Blue weenie as to promote an aggressive strategy in a typically slow color for the purpose of Limited. Instead of decrying this as some sort of heresy, consider it a moment of innovation that might allow them to explore new tempo oriented aggressive strategies in Blue while another color is slowed down and given a more prominent late game strategy (I hear people are howling for Monoblack control to finally come back, so why not?).