The game used to be far more diverse, explosive, and interesting. Dark Ritual, Exhume, Memory Jar, Turnabout, Swords to Plowshares, and Lightning bolt were built to be high impact cards that could swing the tide of the game when used with creatures and other spells. Those certainly would break the game as it is now, but that's only because they tried to turn this game into an over complicated mid-ranged affair with walkers.
"Those certainly would break the game as it is now." That's ignoring the fact some of them broke the game as it was back then. Dark Ritual was eventually banned in Extended, and Memory Jar got banned pretty much everywhere. Weirdly, Memory Jar might actually be safer in Standard nowadays because the mana acceleration isn't as powerful and there isn't Megrim (or the better Megrim, Liliana's Caress) to combo with, but you throw out the name as if Memory Jar didn't break the game in its original environment.
And while Lightning Bolt and Swords to Plowshares didn't break the game back then (then again, they wouldn't now either--heck, Bolt came back for two years in Standard), even back then they did recognize the fact the cards were a bit above the power level they'd normally want and discontinued them.
Exhume would be kinda crazy today, but that's largely because creatures are better than they used to be and has nothing whatsoever to do with planeswalkers. Turnabout would probably be perfectly fine as long as they didn't put something like High Tide in the same environment, which was the main reason that card was good back then.
Your statement gets even weirder when we consider the original environments some of those cards were printed in. Turnabout, Exhume, and Memory Jar were from the Urza's Saga block... is that really a time we're supposed to be nostalgic for? The time period where things were so utterly broken that, in the space of one year, they had to ban/restrict 10 cards in Standard, 10 cards in Extended, 7 cards in Block Constructed, and 23 cards in Vintage/Legacy?
There is one principal which would resolve these disputes: if enough "op" cards are reprinted such that everyone has op cards, no one has op cards, because being op would simply be the new normal, there'd be nothing wrong with being nostalgic then. Those cards are only op relative to the bulk of crappy cards that are printed now, but the urza cards would only be average compared to the core cards from the alpha/beta editions. Every legacy player knows 90% of the cards in the game will never get played in a tournament-worthy deck in a million years anyway, so players really don't have anything against op combos unless they're on the losing side of them.
Then you get where Yu-Gi-Oh is right now, with having to print even more powerful cards every set to keep up with the crazy powerful cards they printed last set. Then ban the old stuff.
Some people don't like the wax and wane style of power creep/power seep in Magic. I prefer it over out of control power creep.
Or they don't "have" to print more op cards, they could just keep printing cards that are exactly as op but simply in different ways, offering more strategies and mechanics. I tend to favor this because it means usable cards compared to the whole of noteworthy cards would appear much more often, but with current trends, only the oldest cards are the most powerful and expensive which favors the much more limited and ironically more expensive standard format.
The game used to be far more diverse, explosive, and interesting. Dark Ritual, Exhume, Memory Jar, Turnabout, Swords to Plowshares, and Lightning bolt were built to be high impact cards that could swing the tide of the game when used with creatures and other spells. Those certainly would break the game as it is now, but that's only because they tried to turn this game into an over complicated mid-ranged affair with walkers.
"Those certainly would break the game as it is now." That's ignoring the fact some of them broke the game as it was back then. Dark Ritual was eventually banned in Extended, and Memory Jar got banned pretty much everywhere. Weirdly, Memory Jar might actually be safer in Standard nowadays because the mana acceleration isn't as powerful and there isn't Megrim (or the better Megrim, Liliana's Caress) to combo with, but you throw out the name as if Memory Jar didn't break the game in its original environment.
And while Lightning Bolt and Swords to Plowshares didn't break the game back then (then again, they wouldn't now either--heck, Bolt came back for two years in Standard), even back then they did recognize the fact the cards were a bit above the power level they'd normally want and discontinued them.
Exhume would be kinda crazy today, but that's largely because creatures are better than they used to be and has nothing whatsoever to do with planeswalkers. Turnabout would probably be perfectly fine as long as they didn't put something like High Tide in the same environment, which was the main reason that card was good back then.
Your statement gets even weirder when we consider the original environments some of those cards were printed in. Turnabout, Exhume, and Memory Jar were from the Urza's Saga block... is that really a time we're supposed to be nostalgic for? The time period where things were so utterly broken that, in the space of one year, they had to ban/restrict 10 cards in Standard, 10 cards in Extended, 7 cards in Block Constructed, and 23 cards in Vintage/Legacy?
There is one principal which would resolve all disputes related to this: if enough "op" cards are reprinted such that everyone has op cards, no one has op cards, because being op would simply be the new normal, there'd be nothing wrong with being nostalgic then.
I'm very confused about what you're talking about here. I think it's supposed to be the "if everything is overpowered, nothing is overpowered" as a defense to the problems of the Urza's Saga block, and that if everything else has been made more powerful, it would've balanced out. Two problems. First, that wasn't the case back then, so you're speaking of some hypothetical alternate past, which seems a lousy way to resolve a dispute; it's being nostalgic for a time that didn't exist. Second, introducing more overpowered cards wouldn't have fixed up the problems, because the only way to beat those degenerate decks was to be even more degenerate, so you'd basically end up with the exact same problems that they had before.
Every legacy player knows 90% of the cards in the game will never get played in a tournament-worthy deck in a million years anyway.
The game used to be far more diverse, explosive, and interesting. Dark Ritual, Exhume, Memory Jar, Turnabout, Swords to Plowshares, and Lightning bolt were built to be high impact cards that could swing the tide of the game when used with creatures and other spells. Those certainly would break the game as it is now, but that's only because they tried to turn this game into an over complicated mid-ranged affair with walkers.
"Those certainly would break the game as it is now." That's ignoring the fact some of them broke the game as it was back then. Dark Ritual was eventually banned in Extended, and Memory Jar got banned pretty much everywhere. Weirdly, Memory Jar might actually be safer in Standard nowadays because the mana acceleration isn't as powerful and there isn't Megrim (or the better Megrim, Liliana's Caress) to combo with, but you throw out the name as if Memory Jar didn't break the game in its original environment.
And while Lightning Bolt and Swords to Plowshares didn't break the game back then (then again, they wouldn't now either--heck, Bolt came back for two years in Standard), even back then they did recognize the fact the cards were a bit above the power level they'd normally want and discontinued them.
Exhume would be kinda crazy today, but that's largely because creatures are better than they used to be and has nothing whatsoever to do with planeswalkers. Turnabout would probably be perfectly fine as long as they didn't put something like High Tide in the same environment, which was the main reason that card was good back then.
Your statement gets even weirder when we consider the original environments some of those cards were printed in. Turnabout, Exhume, and Memory Jar were from the Urza's Saga block... is that really a time we're supposed to be nostalgic for? The time period where things were so utterly broken that, in the space of one year, they had to ban/restrict 10 cards in Standard, 10 cards in Extended, 7 cards in Block Constructed, and 23 cards in Vintage/Legacy?
There is one principal which would resolve all disputes related to this: if enough "op" cards are reprinted such that everyone has op cards, no one has op cards, because being op would simply be the new normal, there'd be nothing wrong with being nostalgic then.
I'm very confused about what you're talking about here. I think it's supposed to be the "if everything is overpowered, nothing is overpowered" as a defense to the problems of the Urza's Saga block, and that if everything else has been made more powerful, it would've balanced out. Two problems. First, that wasn't the case back then, so you're speaking of some hypothetical alternate past, which seems a lousy way to resolve a dispute; it's being nostalgic for a time that didn't exist. Second, introducing more overpowered cards wouldn't have fixed up the problems, because the only way to beat those degenerate decks was to be even more degenerate, so you'd basically end up with the exact same problems that they had before.
Every legacy player knows 90% of the cards in the game will never get played in a tournament-worthy deck in a million years anyway.
I have no idea what relevance this statement has.
In terms of all players that includes casual and short-term players who don't really care, that time didn't exist, but in terms of the official state of the game, in tournaments where players always only had the best cards among the players who decided the best strategies, it did exist. And again, variety over indefinite overpoweredness. They don't have to print things that are perpetually more powerful, they can simply print cards that are as effective but in different ways. The current trends were dictated more by economics though. Not every player was interested in investing the money or time to strategize and buy the best cards for their desired strategy, so the economics favored easier and less powerful cards as time went on, especially for younger people who continued to be a growing demographic. But, that's only because WoTC had started off with the trend that only a few cards were op among the bulk anyway. If by that point in the game, if every card was as efficient as lightning bolt or dark confidant, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
In terms of all players that includes casual and short-term players who don't really care, that time didn't exist, but in terms of the official state of the game, in tournaments where players always only had the best cards among the players who decided the best strategies, it did exist.
I was talking about tournament results. Urza's Saga wasn't as problematic to the casual or short-term player because it was mostly in the tournaments where people actually put the degenerate stuff together.
And again, variety over indefinite overpoweredness. They don't have to print things that are perpetually more powerful, they can simply print cards that are as effective but in different ways. The current trends were dictated more by economics though. Not every player was interested in investing the money or time to strategize and buy the best cards for their desired strategy, so the economics favored easier and less powerful cards as time went on, especially for younger people who continued to be a growing demographic. But, that's only because WoTC had started off with the trend that only a few cards were op among the bulk anyway. If by that point in the game, if every card was as efficient as lightning bolt or dark confidant, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
Because that wouldn't have been possible. You can't have every card be as efficient as those cards, unless you're committed to releasing only 10 cards a set.
What does this have to do with my original point anyway?
Because that wouldn't have been possible. You can't have every card be as efficient as those cards, unless you're committed to releasing only 10 cards a set.
Well except you can, you'd simply have to put the effort into just thinking of a different strategy or mechanic.
What does this have to do with my original point anyway?
Colt had a couple points or implications I agreed with, like that there are an increasing number of formats which favor only newer cards, despite the fact that the older cards were more "explosive" but could have continued to be printed as such without damaging the integrity of the game had they been printed with a high enough frequency and enough diversity.
Moreover, the current trends show that older cards tend to be more powerful, so a card like dark ritual would actually be pretty overpowered in a much more limited format like standard today where a lot of cards are less efficient, but you also indicated that you disliked the older sets because there were more op cards. However, those cards are only op relative to standard cards today, and furthermore, if op cards were more common, then they wouldn't actually be op, they would just be average.
The game used to be far more diverse, explosive, and interesting. Dark Ritual, Exhume, Memory Jar, Turnabout, Swords to Plowshares, and Lightning bolt were built to be high impact cards that could swing the tide of the game when used with creatures and other spells. Those certainly would break the game as it is now, but that's only because they tried to turn this game into an over complicated mid-ranged affair with walkers.
"Those certainly would break the game as it is now." That's ignoring the fact some of them broke the game as it was back then. Dark Ritual was eventually banned in Extended, and Memory Jar got banned pretty much everywhere. Weirdly, Memory Jar might actually be safer in Standard nowadays because the mana acceleration isn't as powerful and there isn't Megrim (or the better Megrim, Liliana's Caress) to combo with, but you throw out the name as if Memory Jar didn't break the game in its original environment.
And while Lightning Bolt and Swords to Plowshares didn't break the game back then (then again, they wouldn't now either--heck, Bolt came back for two years in Standard), even back then they did recognize the fact the cards were a bit above the power level they'd normally want and discontinued them.
Exhume would be kinda crazy today, but that's largely because creatures are better than they used to be and has nothing whatsoever to do with planeswalkers. Turnabout would probably be perfectly fine as long as they didn't put something like High Tide in the same environment, which was the main reason that card was good back then.
Your statement gets even weirder when we consider the original environments some of those cards were printed in. Turnabout, Exhume, and Memory Jar were from the Urza's Saga block... is that really a time we're supposed to be nostalgic for? The time period where things were so utterly broken that, in the space of one year, they had to ban/restrict 10 cards in Standard, 10 cards in Extended, 7 cards in Block Constructed, and 23 cards in Vintage/Legacy?
I'm nostalgic for cards that are powerful, easy to understand, and make interesting games at the game table for players who may not be the best deck builders in the world. For example, bringing back Dark Ritual in a deck builders toolkit with other cards like Exhume, Swords to Plowshares, etc, is perfect because those cards are fun, powerful, easy to understand, and let new players have fun at the table with decks that can easily keep up with a tournament players deck if they go to the LGS and run into someone playing modern or legacy. Swords to Plowshares is a very good newbie card because it not only acts as good removal, it can teach players that some cards are not as obvious as they seem. People used to swords their own creatures to gain life, and that is an important lesson when graduating to cards like Goblin Guide, Path to Exile, etc. Heck, put Polymorph in there as well. There is no such thing as too powerful for casual, only too complicated.
My take is, print the powerful cards for casual so that everyone has them and if a card works in standard once in awhile just reprint it there. Printing everything from Dark Ritual, Path to Exile, Counter spell, Lightning Bolt, Exhume, etc in deck builder products and casual sets is a great way to support both modern and casual play. Heck, Tarmogoyf would be great in casual products.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Nostalgia should never be used to inform current policies. Nothing good comes of it. Nostalgia is a seeping poison that corrupts the mind and muddles the senses. It's rarely accurate, and it frequently leaves out crucial details.
Nostalgia should never be used to inform current policies. Nothing good comes of it. Nostalgia is a seeping poison that corrupts the mind and muddles the senses. It's rarely accurate, and it frequently leaves out crucial details.
That's not necessarily true. If someone was nostalgic for something that means it provided some benefit to them over a long time. If someone was nostalgic for older cards, it would likely mean those older cards were more fun or there were more people playing with more fun decks that utilized those cards.
Nostalgia should never be used to inform current policies. Nothing good comes of it. Nostalgia is a seeping poison that corrupts the mind and muddles the senses. It's rarely accurate, and it frequently leaves out crucial details.
That's not necessarily true. If someone was nostalgic for something that means it provided some benefit to them over a long time. If someone was nostalgic for older cards, it would likely mean those older cards were more fun or there were more people playing with more fun decks that utilized those cards.
Sometime, but not always. The key pitfall of nostalgia is that everybody tends to notice external changes much more than internal ones. Comments on how much the game has changed are very common. Comments on how much individuals enjoy playing the game changed over time are much rarer, but they are equally, if not more, important as whatever changes the game sustained. Preference for one's early days playing the game are often entirely independent of how healthy the game actually was at that point in time. The not-always-true equivalency you stated hides serious negatives.
Nostalgia should never be used to inform current policies. Nothing good comes of it. Nostalgia is a seeping poison that corrupts the mind and muddles the senses. It's rarely accurate, and it frequently leaves out crucial details.
That's not necessarily true. If someone was nostalgic for something that means it provided some benefit to them over a long time. If someone was nostalgic for older cards, it would likely mean those older cards were more fun or there were more people playing with more fun decks that utilized those cards.
Sometime, but not always. The key pitfall of nostalgia is that everybody tends to notice external changes much more than internal ones. Comments on how much the game has changed are very common. Comments on how much individuals enjoy playing the game changed over time are much rarer, but they are equally, if not more, important as whatever changes the game sustained. Preference for one's early days playing the game are often entirely independent of how healthy the game actually was at that point in time. The not-always-true equivalency you stated hides serious negatives.
But the point of playing the game is to have fun, for entertainment, correct? If people enjoyed the game more with those cards, it would stand to reason that cards of a similar effectiveness should be printed. If the game is unhealthy, then inherently people wouldn't enjoy the game.
But the point of playing the game is to have fun, for entertainment, correct? If people enjoyed the game more with those cards, it would stand to reason that cards of a similar effectiveness should be printed. If the game is unhealthy, then inherently people wouldn't enjoy the game.
Again, your logic is flawed. In an earlier post you stated confidence in keeping power levels constant, but that task is far more difficult (and ineffective) than you describe. Power level is often difficult to measure in this game because the game can be played in so many different ways. How, specifically, would you design a set at the same power level while feeling unique? If you can't, who can?
Additionally, your assertion that player want power levels to be stable want is flat-out wrong. What people want is power creep; consumers want to buy a new product because it is better than whatever came before. The problem is that power creep risks sending a game into a death spiral that makes it hard to keep up with. The theoretical solution is to have an MC Escher-style infinite staircase in which new products create enough of an illusion of power creep to be effective, but the success of that policy's implementation has been mixed at best recently.
Your connection between enjoyment and a health is overly simplistic. Standard being unhealthy right now doesn't affect the enjoyment of modern players, who have a superbly healthy format right now. A bad limited format only bothers those who play draft or sealed. EDH communities self-police problems. Many people only play casual "kitchen table" Magic can have fun even if Wizards makes a mistake that turns every competitive format into a tire fire.
But the point of playing the game is to have fun, for entertainment, correct? If people enjoyed the game more with those cards, it would stand to reason that cards of a similar effectiveness should be printed. If the game is unhealthy, then inherently people wouldn't enjoy the game.
Again, your logic is flawed. In an earlier post you stated confidence in keeping power levels constant, but that task is far more difficult (and ineffective) than you describe. Power level is often difficult to measure in this game because the game can be played in so many different ways. How, specifically, would you design a set at the same power level while feeling unique?
Simply by using your brain to come up with an idea, and running simulations to make sure the win rate is on average 50% against a variety of decks.
What people want is power creep; consumers want to buy a new product because it is better than whatever came before.
Not necessarily because it's better overall, but simply because there is one aspect of it that is better for a specific strategy. If what you're saying was true, everyone would always have Progenitus out by turn 1 by this point in time. You might have one card that cost little mana with a power of 2 and has haste, or in turn there might be a big card for 5 mana that has 5 power and haste and trample. One card is meant for a quick burn deck, the other is meant more for mid range. They're both valid strategies, they're just different. There's an inconceivable number of combinations of mechanics and strategies and combos that a card could be advantageous for. The goal of printing new cards should be to introduce new strategies and cover the gaps or flaws of preexisting ones, which aren't mutually exclusive, and thus become closer to letting anyone make any deck they can imagine.
Your connection between enjoyment and a health is overly simplistic. Standard being unhealthy right now doesn't affect the enjoyment of modern players, who have a superbly healthy format right now. A bad limited format only bothers those who play draft or sealed. EDH communities self-police problems. Many people only play casual "kitchen table" Magic can have fun even if Wizards makes a mistake that turns every competitive format into a tire fire.
So what you're saying is the game can be "unhealthy" while players are still happily playing it, but if that's the case, there's no actual problem then. Healthy from the perspective of what WoTC might arbitrarily decide as probability of getting an op card is different than players actually enjoying the game by having he freedom to explore any strategy they want, relying on skill and creativity to win, instead of dreading it.
Because that wouldn't have been possible. You can't have every card be as efficient as those cards, unless you're committed to releasing only 10 cards a set.
Well except you can, you'd simply have to put the effort into just thinking of a different strategy or mechanic.
No, you can't. It's not possible to have sets with hundreds of cards and somehow have all of them be on the same power level. It doesn't work that way. Some cards are inevitably just the best at doing a particular thing.
What does this have to do with my original point anyway?
Colt had a couple points or implications I agreed with, like that there are an increasing number of formats which favor only newer cards, despite the fact that the older cards were more "explosive" but could have continued to be printed as such without damaging the integrity of the game had they been printed with a high enough frequency and enough diversity.
Moreover, the current trends show that older cards tend to be more powerful, so a card like dark ritual would actually be pretty overpowered in a much more limited format like standard today where a lot of cards are less efficient,
Dark Ritual was overpowered originally. It just took people a while to finally realize that Dark Ritual was the major problem rather than the cards it would put out quickly (well, okay, Necropotence was kinda crazy on its own, but Dark Ritual took it to a new level). That's why you had weird bans like Hypnotic Specter, because people just saw Hypnotic Specter was beating them down and blamed it rather than the card that allowed it to be played on the first turn.
but you also indicated that you disliked the older sets because there were more op cards.
No, I was saying that pointing to a bunch of cards from the Urza's Saga set was a weird place to try to say was a great time for Magic when it clearly wasn't.
However, those cards are only op relative to standard cards today,
Uh, no, they were kinda OP back in their original environment too. That's why they discontinued them (or in the case of Dark Ritual or Memory Jar, banned them outright).
and furthermore, if op cards were more common, then they wouldn't actually be op, they would just be average.
No, all that'd do is create problematic degeneracy where all the decks are winning in the first few turns when you crank the power level up that high. Extended circa 2003 seems to be the kind of format that'd be the result of what you're advocating, where you technically had diversity of decks, but thanks to the high power level all of them are just based around doing stupid things on turn 2 or 3 which is why they had to go on a bit of a banning spree towards the end of the year.
And your argument has another problem with it: Even if we grant it as correct, one can just as easily turn it around and say that the answer is not to bring everything up to the level of the overpowered cards, but bring the overpowered cards down to the power of the rest of the game, which is what they did (or at least attempted to do) with such cards.
Also, the idea of "make everything as good as them and they'll be fine" is thwarted a bit when you consider the fact that some of those cards get better based on other cards being better, like Exhume. I remember thinking about how good a creature would have to be to be as good as Ancestral Recall, but quickly realized the impossibility of such a thing because the stronger you made such a creature, the stronger you make Ancestral Recall because it makes you draw better cards.
The game used to be far more diverse, explosive, and interesting. Dark Ritual, Exhume, Memory Jar, Turnabout, Swords to Plowshares, and Lightning bolt were built to be high impact cards that could swing the tide of the game when used with creatures and other spells. Those certainly would break the game as it is now, but that's only because they tried to turn this game into an over complicated mid-ranged affair with walkers.
"Those certainly would break the game as it is now." That's ignoring the fact some of them broke the game as it was back then. Dark Ritual was eventually banned in Extended, and Memory Jar got banned pretty much everywhere. Weirdly, Memory Jar might actually be safer in Standard nowadays because the mana acceleration isn't as powerful and there isn't Megrim (or the better Megrim, Liliana's Caress) to combo with, but you throw out the name as if Memory Jar didn't break the game in its original environment.
And while Lightning Bolt and Swords to Plowshares didn't break the game back then (then again, they wouldn't now either--heck, Bolt came back for two years in Standard), even back then they did recognize the fact the cards were a bit above the power level they'd normally want and discontinued them.
Exhume would be kinda crazy today, but that's largely because creatures are better than they used to be and has nothing whatsoever to do with planeswalkers. Turnabout would probably be perfectly fine as long as they didn't put something like High Tide in the same environment, which was the main reason that card was good back then.
Your statement gets even weirder when we consider the original environments some of those cards were printed in. Turnabout, Exhume, and Memory Jar were from the Urza's Saga block... is that really a time we're supposed to be nostalgic for? The time period where things were so utterly broken that, in the space of one year, they had to ban/restrict 10 cards in Standard, 10 cards in Extended, 7 cards in Block Constructed, and 23 cards in Vintage/Legacy?
I'm nostalgic for cards that are powerful, easy to understand, and make interesting games at the game table for players who may not be the best deck builders in the world. For example, bringing back Dark Ritual in a deck builders toolkit with other cards like Exhume, Swords to Plowshares, etc, is perfect because those cards are fun, powerful, easy to understand, and let new players have fun at the table with decks that can easily keep up with a tournament players deck if they go to the LGS and run into someone playing modern or legacy. Swords to Plowshares is a very good newbie card because it not only acts as good removal, it can teach players that some cards are not as obvious as they seem. People used to swords their own creatures to gain life, and that is an important lesson when graduating to cards like Goblin Guide, Path to Exile, etc. Heck, put Polymorph in there as well. There is no such thing as too powerful for casual, only too complicated.
My take is, print the powerful cards for casual so that everyone has them and if a card works in standard once in awhile just reprint it there. Printing everything from Dark Ritual, Path to Exile, Counter spell, Lightning Bolt, Exhume, etc in deck builder products and casual sets is a great way to support both modern and casual play. Heck, Tarmogoyf would be great in casual products.
Well, i belive Dark Ritual would keep more new players away from the game than in. I at least remember the times of first turn ritual into ritual into Hymn to Tourach into Necropotence. Those cards may be fun if used to cast your 7-Mana-Demon one turn earlier, but more experienced players would use it to do more broken stuff.
Yeah, sounds like fun. Also, back when Tarmogoyf was printed, no casual had intrest in him. He is only intresting nowadays because he is proven to be powerful and very expensive.
Truth is, powerful cards are passed up today because they are readily availible at low prices.
Dark Rit has never kept more new players away than in. It took six and a half years to ban the card in Extended because of Trix and Magic absolutely would not have grown within those six years if Ritual did what you said.
You can, literally, and very very very easily, which is exactly what writers get paid a salary to do. You think every single card WoTC comes up with is the only idea they ever had for that set? There's thousands of more ideas behind the scenes backlogged, but they choose the ones that are most likely to maximize their profit with the current state of the game.
And then what if every color had it's own dark ritual? It wouldn't be over powered then. Or, what if there were more ways to counter it? Like a leyline that said "players can only gain mana equal to the number of lands they control" in addition to something else useful.
No, I was saying that pointing to a bunch of cards from the Urza's Saga set was a weird place to try to say was a great time for Magic when it clearly wasn't.
But, it would only be a bad time for magic if the crazy combos took you by surprise. If everyone knew about them and had them, it wouldn't have been a big deal, which is a matter of marketing and information. Or alternatively, if the price was lower, anyone could easily buy the cards to compete.
Uh, no, they were kinda OP back in their original environment too. That's why they discontinued them (or in the case of Dark Ritual or Memory Jar, banned them outright).
I would say a card being overpowered for standard is somewhat different than a card being overpowered compared to every card. If they're really that over powered, how come so few established legacy decks use them? Unless uh, no, cards aren't overpowered when there's lots of other powerful cards to choose from.
No, all that'd do is create problematic degeneracy where all the decks are winning in the first few turns when you crank the power level up that high. Extended circa 2003 seems to be the kind of format that'd be the result of what you're advocating, where you technically had diversity of decks, but thanks to the high power level all of them are just based around doing stupid things on turn 2 or 3 which is why they had to go on a bit of a banning spree towards the end of the year.
All decks cannot possibly win in the first few turns, someone has to lose. Generally decks that try to win in the first few turns, when pitted against each other, struggle against each other or against control decks. An elf deck would definitely have trouble against a burn or delver deck. If everyone has an op deck, then everyone really just has an average deck. They're only op relatively to the bulk of crappy cards. The problem is the definition of op that you're using isn't actually op, it's broken.
And if you haven't noticed, winning as fast as possible isn't exactly uncommon, it's the goal of most decks. Openly, all the best players use all kinds of extreme or cheap and kniving tactics with things like reanimate or natural order or show and tell which only shows that players are comfortable with those strategies and openly advocate them when they actually have access to them. And yet, despite what you say, there's no deck that has a 100% win rate, because op isn't op when every opponent's deck is just as op. When everyone has "op" cards, it's about the player's skill and sideboarding. The only reason people complain is because the prices of cards limits their own access to those same kinds of strategies.
Op just means "ahead of current standards" but broken means "breaks the game," you refer to every card being broken, I simply refer to every card being op relative to an average card right now. Dark ritual is certainly more efficient than an average card, but it doesn't really break the game. Swords to plowshares or force of will are certainly better cards than the average card, but they don't break the game. Why? Because there's thousands of other op cards of diverse strategies that are just as powerful.
Also, the idea of "make everything as good as them and they'll be fine" is thwarted a bit when you consider the fact that some of those cards get better based on other cards being better, like Exhume.
Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, the specialization of strategies is exactly what people want. More cards developed means better chances of focusing on a specific strategy that people can imagine.
Dark Rit has never kept more new players away than in. It took six and a half years to ban the card in Extended because of Trix and Magic absolutely would not have grown within those six years if Ritual did what you said.
You have a valid point otherwise, but really.
Thats is true for back then, but i don´t remember people calling for banings back then like they do today. I don´t remember people crying over blue being too good like they do nowadays. And i don´t remember strategies cut out of the game because they are unfun.
The mentality of the people who play the game has changed drasticly, and that does affect new players coming in. I do believe something like Ritual would be seen way different today. Just look at modern: Seething song banned, rite of flame banned (ok, that one i understand), and still people talking about banning the 2 rituals that are left.
What I can't understand is why counterspell is banned but daze and force of will aren't. Otherwise, I'd say if those people who complained had the money for cards that were just as powerful, they wouldn't complain. New players are always going to complain when they come up against an experienced player, but that's only because they don't know 90% of cards are crap.
Here is the canundrum I keep seeing on this forum: everyone immediately goes to how xyz will unbalance the game, yet they always imply with relation to a format. Magic the Gathering does not require formats to be played. That happened because the company pushed competitive play at game stores more than casual events and created an imbalance of power across all levels of play due to the change in rarity system. While Urza's Saga was bad for tournament play, it was amazing for casuals who wanted and needed powerful, simple to understand cards. It was thanks to that hilariously overpowered block that many people in my school district began playing Magic again, and hardly anyone played DCI tournaments (was DCI a thing back then?). Right now, a casual player can't match anyone who plays on a tournament level with their casual decks because wizards pushed all the power cards to rare / mythic in standard sets due to the secondary market. They tried printing good cards in a normal commander product and then had supply issues all over the place, which is why now they are too afraid to reprint anything of value except in an overpriced luxury set that just serves to maintain the high prices in the long term.
And anyone saying otherwise on the power cards not being the most expensive cards on the second hand market, a power card is one that finds a home easily. There are tons of "powerful" cards in the game, but that doesn't matter at all if those cards do not have any support or are very narrow. Shadow of the Grave is powerful, but is it going to be as ubiquitous as Noble Hierarch, or basically queen of all mana dorks? Uh.. no, no it isn't. If a card is ubiquitous in power that is a card that needs to be printed constantly to keep it in check because players across all forms of play are going to be looking for them. Something that wizards notably has not been doing because of being scared of the secondary market and scalping. A problem they created themselves and refuse to clean up.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
You can, literally, and very very very easily, which is exactly what writers get paid a salary to do. You think every single card WoTC comes up with is the only idea they ever had for that set? There's thousands of more ideas behind the scenes backlogged, but they choose the ones that are most likely to maximize their profit with the current state of the game.
When you have a Lightning Bolt, it isn't really possible to make all of the direct damage spells as good. You can try making variations, like one that deals 4 damage to a creature but 2 to a player, but then one still tops it all.
And then what if every color had it's own dark ritual? It wouldn't be over powered then.
Uh... yes, it would. Giving all colors access to an overpowered card doesn't mean it's not overpowered. Do you think that Ancestral Recall somehow becomes of an acceptable power level if you gave one to each color? I mean, heck, Black Lotus was sort of what you were talking about, that didn't make it okay.
Or, what if there were more ways to counter it? Like a leyline that said "players can only gain mana equal to the number of lands they control" in addition to something else useful.
Which then has the general problem that narrow hate cards do.
You're acting like all of this can be micromanaged but it's not really possible when there's so many cards.
No, I was saying that pointing to a bunch of cards from the Urza's Saga set was a weird place to try to say was a great time for Magic when it clearly wasn't.
But, it would only be a bad time for magic if the crazy combos took you by surprise. If everyone knew about them and had them, it wouldn't have been a big deal, which is a matter of marketing and information. Or alternatively, if the price was lower, anyone could easily buy the cards to compete.
Except all the tournament players did know about them back then. People knowing something is broken doesn't somehow make it not broken.
Uh, no, they were kinda OP back in their original environment too. That's why they discontinued them (or in the case of Dark Ritual or Memory Jar, banned them outright).
I would say a card being overpowered for standard is somewhat different than a card being overpowered compared to every card. If they're really that over powered, how come so few established legacy decks use them? Unless uh, no, cards aren't overpowered when there's lots of other powerful cards to choose from.
Few established Legacy decks use Memory Jar because the card is banned. As for Dark Ritual, yes, it's not as overpowered in Legacy, but we were talking largely about Standard (and to a lesser extent Expanded), were we not?
However, it is worth pointing out that the reason Dark Ritual is okay in Legacy is because they banned a bunch of the cards that it was particularly degenerate with, such as Necropotence or Yawgmoth's Bargain.
Also, now you're changing your argument. Before you were claiming that every card could somehow be of about an equal power level. Now you're saying that an overpowered card isn't as overpowered if there are other such cards around, which is a quite different claim. There is merit to the general idea that "if everything is overpowered, nothing is" but there is a certain level at which that sort of fails.
No, all that'd do is create problematic degeneracy where all the decks are winning in the first few turns when you crank the power level up that high. Extended circa 2003 seems to be the kind of format that'd be the result of what you're advocating, where you technically had diversity of decks, but thanks to the high power level all of them are just based around doing stupid things on turn 2 or 3 which is why they had to go on a bit of a banning spree towards the end of the year.
All decks cannot possibly win in the first few turns, someone has to lose. Generally decks that try to win in the first few turns, when pitted against each other, struggle against each other or against control decks. An elf deck would definitely have trouble against a burn or delver deck. If everyone has an op deck, then everyone really just has an average deck. They're only op relatively to the bulk of crappy cards. The problem is the definition of op that you're using isn't actually op, it's broken.
Dodging the point entirely. The point was that when you get the power level up that high then you end up with decks just trying to win faster than the other so you end up with the whole game/format being such decks, which is exactly what was happening in that format.
And if you haven't noticed, winning as fast as possible isn't exactly uncommon, it's the goal of most decks. Openly, all the best players use all kinds of extreme or cheap and kniving tactics with things like reanimate or natural order or show and tell which only shows that players are comfortable with those strategies and openly advocate them when they actually have access to them. And yet, despite what you say, there's no deck that has a 100% win rate, because op isn't op when every opponent's deck is just as op.
Of course no deck has a 100% win rate because every deck has the possibility of just getting mana screwed or simply getting an awful hand. Eldrazi didn't have a 100% win rate, that doesn't mean the deck was okay.
When everyone has "op" cards, it's about the player's skill and sideboarding. The only reason people complain is because the prices of cards limits their own access to those same kinds of strategies.
Or maybe because they just don't like what you end up with when you get the format's power level up that high. You've been making the contention that it was just prices that made people dislike Urza's Saga Standard, when it was the actual environment that was the problem.
Op just means "ahead of current standards" but broken means "breaks the game," you refer to every card being broken, I simply refer to every card being op relative to an average card right now. Dark ritual is certainly more efficient than an average card, but it doesn't really break the game.
Yes, it absolutely did. That's why it got itself or got other cards banned in various formats.
To be fair, Dark Ritual probably could be okay in Standard if they made a point to stress multicolor cards, because getting BBB isn't all that impressive at that point. Still, it's a highly risky card to have around because of its propensity for breaking things.
Swords to plowshares or force of will are certainly better cards than the average card, but they don't break the game. Why? Because there's thousands of other op cards of diverse strategies that are just as powerful.
Huh? I said that I thought Swords would be fine in Standard.
Also, the idea of "make everything as good as them and they'll be fine" is thwarted a bit when you consider the fact that some of those cards get better based on other cards being better, like Exhume.
Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, the specialization of strategies is exactly what people want. More cards developed means better chances of focusing on a specific strategy that people can imagine.
Missing my point. I was mentioning how your claim that every single card could somehow be of the same power level doesn't really work in the case of Exhume because its power level is reliant on other cards' power levels (specifically, creatures), meaning that if your goal is to make all cards, including creatures, as good as Exhume it's a paradox because an increase or decrease in their power level, at least those of the expensive creatures, affects that of Exhume.
Also, all of this rambling of yours is still largely incidental to my original point.
You can, literally, and very very very easily, which is exactly what writers get paid a salary to do. You think every single card WoTC comes up with is the only idea they ever had for that set? There's thousands of more ideas behind the scenes backlogged, but they choose the ones that are most likely to maximize their profit with the current state of the game.
When you have a Lightning Bolt, it isn't really possible to make all of the direct damage spells as good.
So don't make every single spell a direct damage spell that does exactly that thing...
Except it wouldn't because possessing it wouldn't give you an advantage. You don't seem to be grasping this concept of relativity. Op is only op relative to something less effective. If everyone card is efficient, then no one has any particular advantage.
Which then has the general problem that narrow hate cards do.
You're acting like all of this can be micromanaged but it's not really possible when there's so many cards.
If it wasn't possible then hate cards wouldn't already exist. There's still millions of strategies that can be imagined that have yet to be implemented in the game.
Except all the tournament players did know about them back then. People knowing something is broken doesn't somehow make it not broken.
They knew about after they suddenly lost to it by surprise...or were mad because they couldn't afford it like all the richest players could. If every had the same access to all of the same cards, then no one would have a particular advantage.
Few established Legacy decks use Memory Jar because the card is banned. As for Dark Ritual, yes, it's not as overpowered in Legacy, but we were talking largely about Standard (and to a lesser extent Expanded), were we not?
But not dark ritual, right? I don't see it on the banned list. For the most part, and it should exceptionally obvious by how I frequently say "all cards," I'm not talking about standard, I'm talking about legacy.
However, it is worth pointing out that the reason Dark Ritual is okay in Legacy is because they banned a bunch of the cards that it was particularly degenerate with, such as Necropotence or Yawgmoth's Bargain.
Necropotence would still be broken regardless of if dark ritual was banned or not.
Also, now you're changing your argument. Before you were claiming that every card could somehow be of about an equal power level. Now you're saying that an overpowered card isn't as overpowered if there are other such cards around, which is a quite different claim.
I've continuously made both statements and they're not mutually exclusive. It still stands that in the presence of many strong cards, no single card actually stands out as being powerful, they simply accomplish different specific strategies more efficiently than each other, but on the average still have a 50% win rate all against each other. For instance, you might think swords to plowshares is better than lightning bolt. However, if something is removed from the game, a card like tarmogoyf wouldn't be able to take advantage of it.
Or maybe because they just don't like what you end up with when you get the format's power level up that high. You've been making the contention that it was just prices that made people dislike Urza's Saga Standard, when it was the actual environment that was the problem.
If "environment" is the problem, then that's simply an issue of diversity, which is what I've already been advocating, of course along with the prices. I don't agree with their methodology that they only made a few cards ultra strong. They should have made many cards moderately strong or should have brought them down to a level of op. There could have been other cards that were as effective but gave players a different strategy, but, instead of leveling the playing field like I'd suggest, by printing something that was relatively op instead of broken among many other cards that are op in today's standards, then it wouldn't have been any problem at all.
Huh? I said that I thought Swords would be fine in Standard.
And that's fine that you think that, but it doesn't circumvent the fact that it's already been shown players are comfortable with and openly advocate a wide variety of cheap "win as fast as possible" strategies using all kinds of "op" cards. The only problem with the urza block was that there were only a limited number of ways to do that compared to today's culmination of strategies which would both force players to spend money to stay on a level playing field, even though there probably weren't enough printed, and the number of strategies wasn't diverse. But then again, that's just for standard, which today you can easily see they are making a much greater effort to make diverse.
At this point it really seems like it's you who's missing the point. The generalization of power is simply how effectively a card accomplishes a specific strategy. If something has really good unique synergy with a particular set of cards that allows certain cards to win the game and turn the tide, then it can still be just powerful a card as lightning bolt. It is only that you are confusing versatility for power. There are more kinds of decks that something like lightning bolt can pair with, but that doesn't mean the culmination of those decks are automatically guaranteed to be more likely to win over a deck that can effectively use exhume, and vice versa.
You can, literally, and very very very easily, which is exactly what writers get paid a salary to do. You think every single card WoTC comes up with is the only idea they ever had for that set? There's thousands of more ideas behind the scenes backlogged, but they choose the ones that are most likely to maximize their profit with the current state of the game.
When you have a Lightning Bolt, it isn't really possible to make all of the direct damage spells as good.
So don't make every single spell a direct damage spell that does exactly that thing...
Sure, obviously not every card is going to be Lightning Bolt-esque. But you end up with a best in every category. So it's not possible, as you claimed, to have every single card be at the same power level. One could maybe do that if there was a small quantity of cards, but with hundreds of new cards each year that isn't possible.
Except it wouldn't because possessing it wouldn't give you an advantage. You don't seem to be grasping this concept of relativity. Op is only op relative to something less effective. If everyone card is efficient, then no one has any particular advantage.
And if everyone's cards are too efficient you end up with highly problematic games like the ones I was discussing during Urza's Saga (both in Standard and in the larger formats).
If they were to print a card that cost 0 mana and said "when you cast this, you win the game" and could play any number of copies in your deck, that per your logic wouldn't be overpowered because everyone could play it and everything would be of an equal strength, with everyone having a 50% win rate. Somehow, I doubt many people would be interested in the game if that were around, even though it wouldn't be overpowered because everyone can play it and everyone can counter it by doing the same thing.
Except all the tournament players did know about them back then. People knowing something is broken doesn't somehow make it not broken.
They knew about after they suddenly lost to it by surprise...or were mad because they couldn't afford it like all the richest players could. If every had the same access to all of the same cards, then no one would have a particular advantage.
You're being completely silly here. People hated the format because it was way too high powered. No, it wasn't because they "couldn't afford it" or they "lost to it by surprise." People went into tournaments knowing about these decks, and that's exactly why people were losing interest, because it wasn't at all interesting to play in that kind of environment. You're engaging in this weird revisionist history that just makes you look silly.
If we were talking about something like Caw-Blade I could buy your argument (as the high prices of Jace and Stoneforge were a turnoff but you had some people who did have those cards who really liked the format), but that wasn't the case for Urza's Saga.
Few established Legacy decks use Memory Jar because the card is banned. As for Dark Ritual, yes, it's not as overpowered in Legacy, but we were talking largely about Standard (and to a lesser extent Expanded), were we not?
But not dark ritual, right? I don't see it on the banned list. For the most part, and it should exceptionally obvious by how I frequently say "all cards," I'm not talking about standard, I'm talking about legacy.
And the original discussion of Dark Ritual was Standard, not Legacy. The claim was that it would be too powerful for Standard now but wasn't too powerful in its original environment, and I made the contention that, no, it was kind of too good even in its original environment. Again, you're bringing up points that are largely irrelevant to what I was originally trying to say.
Also, you seem to dodge the point about Memory Jar by redirecting the subject onto Dark Ritual without further saying anything about it. Are you arguing, therefore, that Memory Jar isn't broken in Legacy? Or are you conceding the point regarding it?
Or maybe because they just don't like what you end up with when you get the format's power level up that high. You've been making the contention that it was just prices that made people dislike Urza's Saga Standard, when it was the actual environment that was the problem.
If "environment" is the problem, then that's simply an issue of diversity, which is what I've already been advocating, of course along with the prices. I don't agree with their methodology that they only made a few cards ultra strong. They should have made many cards moderately strong or should have brought them down to a level of op. There could have been other cards that were as effective but gave players a different strategy, but, instead of leveling the playing field like I'd suggest, by printing something that was relatively op instead of broken among many other cards that are op in today's standards, then it wouldn't have been any problem at all.
Again, no. All trying to make more cards at the same level of power as the game was during Urza's Saga would have just kept it needlessly degenerate because the game doesn't work properly on that level of power.
Huh? I said that I thought Swords would be fine in Standard.
And that's fine that you think that, but it doesn't circumvent the fact that it's already been shown players are comfortable with and openly advocate a wide variety of cheap "win as fast as possible" strategies using all kinds of "op" cards.[/quote]And it's been shown how...?
If you wish to point to Legacy and Vintage, I should point out that the reason people are "comfortable" is because a lot of the problematic cards have gotten banned or restricted rather than following your idea of just trying to raise the power level high enough that things like Black Lotus or Ancestral Recall are of reasonable power level.
The only problem with the urza block was that there were only a limited number of ways to do that compared to today's culmination of strategies which would both force players to spend money to stay on a level playing field, even though there probably weren't enough printed, and the number of strategies wasn't diverse. But then again, that's just for standard, which today you can easily see they are making a much greater effort to make diverse.
No... that wasn't the only problem. The stuff was just plain too good and trying to put more "diversity" on that level of power wouldn't solve the problem.
Although it's a bit amusing you say "you can easily see they are making a much greater effort to make diverse." In what way? By the fact Standard clearly isn't and hasn't been diverse for quite a while? Granted, you said "effort" rather than saying they actually did it, but even there I'm not sure how someone is supposed to "clearly see" that.
At this point it really seems like it's you who's missing the point. The generalization of power is simply how effectively a card accomplishes a specific strategy. If something has really good unique synergy with a particular set of cards that allows certain cards to win the game and turn the tide, then it can still be just powerful a card as lightning bolt. It is only that you are confusing versatility for power. There are more kinds of decks that something like lightning bolt can pair with, but that doesn't mean the culmination of those decks are automatically guaranteed to be more likely to win over a deck that can effectively use exhume, and vice versa.
And, hey, this is still not relevant to my original point!
Sure, obviously not every card is going to be Lightning Bolt-esque. But you end up with a best in every category. So it's not possible, as you claimed, to have every single card be at the same power level. One could maybe do that if there was a small quantity of cards, but with hundreds of new cards each year that isn't possible.
It's possible if you simply diversify the strategies. No one advocates a game where one set contains 4 damage for one mana, thne 5 damage for one mana the next set, then 6 damage for 1 mana the set after that...which is an unlikely and undesired scenario you're referring to.
You're being completely silly here. People hated the format because it was way too high powered. No, it wasn't because they "couldn't afford it" or they "lost to it by surprise." People went into tournaments knowing about these decks, and that's exactly why people were losing interest, because it wasn't at all interesting to play in that kind of environment. You're engaging in this weird revisionist history that just makes you look silly.
Some people knew about the cards, not everyone played the deck that utilized them, but if the problem is environment, the issue is montonoy. So if the problem is power in only a few cards, then two exceptionally obvious solutions are simply to make every card as powerful or bring the broken cards down to a power of the rest of the cards.
And the original discussion of Dark Ritual was Standard, not Legacy. The claim was that it would be too powerful for Standard now but wasn't too powerful in its original environment, and I made the contention that, no, it was kind of too good even in its original environment.
And I made the contention that, no, if the efficiency of the cards was simply leveled, DR wouldn't have been considered op, which is true in any format. DR itself wasn't broken, it was the limited array of cards it was used for at the time. Again, the issue was monotony. One or two strategies become too powerful, so people get frustrated and bored. This only supports my points.
Again, no. All trying to make more cards at the same level of power as the game was during Urza's Saga would have just kept it needlessly degenerate because the game doesn't work properly on that level of power.
Unless you simply have a really wide variety of cards that are as effective, then using that card doesn't actually have an inherent advantage over all other decks. But, again, this is not mutually exclusive with my point because with broken cards banned, they can simply make relatively strong cards rather than the 90% of total crap cards they normally make. It is with no less than 100% certainty that they could make more than enough varieties of cards that are very strong, the only limit is literally imagination, and even that limit will be surpassed once the next generation of computers becomes ubiquitous.
No... that wasn't the only problem. The stuff was just plain too good and trying to put more "diversity" on that level of power wouldn't solve the problem.
Well except that it is actually a possible solution, it is only that there would be a period of time where a few sets made all older sets obsolete, except perhaps alpha, and it would then only be a matter of time before there was enough card diversity. But, it that still does not rule out my point that you don't have to make all cards relatively broken compared to current average cards anyway, they simply could have been made stronger than the average card now but not as strong as the broken cards then.
Although it's a bit amusing you say "you can easily see they are making a much greater effort to make diverse." In what way? By the fact Standard clearly isn't and hasn't been diverse for quite a while? Granted, you said "effort" rather than saying they actually did it, but even there I'm not sure how someone is supposed to "clearly see" that.
How about you go to the thread in the mtgsalvation forums and look at the established standard decks...and then read the wide variety of cards in current sets. They clearly avoided the mistakes of the darksteel block where everything revolved around affinity when they made another artifact block too. It's just as many as you'd get for a style of legacy deck.
How has it possibly not been shown already? Have you ever heard of sneak attack? Or show and tell? Or natural order? Or reanimate? Or even tendrils of agony and force of will and ad nauseam? Those are all exceptionally powerful cards that decide the fate of the game well beyond what an average card does, allowing players to win potentially as fast as turn 3, even faster if they're lucky. You can easily see from the history of established legacy decks that players have clearly demonstrated comfort and open advocacy of extremely efficient, game-ending tactics over the entire history of magic that can even rival cards that are banned. The only problem you reference is one period where one or two tactics happened to be a little too strong and disrupt the diversity of winning strategies.
Case and point, players don't have a problem with relatively powerful cards as long as there's enough variety of them to compete with each other to avoid the situation of monotony that you reference. And that's because, as I already said, when there's a lot of "op" cards, no particular card is actually op. An elf deck might seem op to the bulk of 90% of cards that are crap, but when it's pitted against force of will and thoughtseize and pyroclasm, it struggles, it's not just an "I'm always going to win on turn 2" game anymore.
I'm kind of surprised the subtle saltiness that is building up in the mtg community as of late has become so prolific even outside this forum. There has been a number of people I've talked with who don't even come to this forum that seem to share the same dislike of masters sets and the way wizards is handling reprints. Normally this stuff is kind of contained to the internet.
I would love to know where you are seeing this. All 3 of the LGS I frequent sold out of MM17 by the second weekend it was out. I checks a few other LGS and there was very little product still on the shelves. According to the owners, players LOVE masters sets and buy it up faster then any other sets.
The game used to be far more diverse, explosive, and interesting. Dark Ritual, Exhume, Memory Jar, Turnabout, Swords to Plowshares, and Lightning bolt were built to be high impact cards that could swing the tide of the game when used with creatures and other spells. Those certainly would break the game as it is now, but that's only because they tried to turn this game into an over complicated mid-ranged affair with walkers.
The time you talk about in Magic I hated and is why I learned to draft better. I couldnt stand constructed formats back then. I personally dont like broken Magic and love the mid range fest its become. Even though I dislike Planeswalkers.
This is a perfect example of Wotc can not please everyone. No matter which way Wotc goes a portion of the player base is going to be unhappy.
I'm kind of surprised the subtle saltiness that is building up in the mtg community as of late has become so prolific even outside this forum. There has been a number of people I've talked with who don't even come to this forum that seem to share the same dislike of masters sets and the way wizards is handling reprints. Normally this stuff is kind of contained to the internet.
I would love to know where you are seeing this. All 3 of the LGS I frequent sold out of MM17 by the second weekend it was out. I checks a few other LGS and there was very little product still on the shelves. According to the owners, players LOVE masters sets and buy it up faster then any other sets.
The game used to be far more diverse, explosive, and interesting. Dark Ritual, Exhume, Memory Jar, Turnabout, Swords to Plowshares, and Lightning bolt were built to be high impact cards that could swing the tide of the game when used with creatures and other spells. Those certainly would break the game as it is now, but that's only because they tried to turn this game into an over complicated mid-ranged affair with walkers.
The time you talk about in Magic I hated and is why I learned to draft better. I couldnt stand constructed formats back then. I personally dont like broken Magic and love the mid range fest its become. Even though I dislike Planeswalkers.
This is a perfect example of Wotc can not please everyone. No matter which way Wotc goes a portion of the player base is going to be unhappy.
That is what tournament legality and casual products are for. If they put good old cards in deck builder products it gives a good first impression. Then those people can decide if they want to migrate to tournament play with more tuned and fair card pools or go commander or legacy. You can please both crowds and not step on toes.
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1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
FWIW EMA is lurking on the shelves of my LGSes, nobody is buying it and that is in LGS with very strong Legacy events.
MM17 sold better, despite the Modern scene being poor in both LGS.
I think its the card quality that causes the disparity, EMA was full of chaff at most commonalities, and had a couple of money cards (FOW) and a few high value rares. MM17 was better in terms of its rares and mythics, but had some decent pickups over all commonalities.
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People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
FWIW EMA is lurking on the shelves of my LGSes, nobody is buying it and that is in LGS with very strong Legacy events.
MM17 sold better, despite the Modern scene being poor in both LGS.
I think its the card quality that causes the disparity, EMA was full of chaff at most commonalities, and had a couple of money cards (FOW) and a few high value rares. MM17 was better in terms of its rares and mythics, but had some decent pickups over all commonalities.
What kills EMA is the fact that the format it supports has the reserved list holding a number of needed cards and the fact the boxes are overpriced. Making products that cost over 200 usd or even over 100 usd severely limits who is going to come around and buy them. Standard booster boxes are about the highest they really should be going on cost.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
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Or they don't "have" to print more op cards, they could just keep printing cards that are exactly as op but simply in different ways, offering more strategies and mechanics. I tend to favor this because it means usable cards compared to the whole of noteworthy cards would appear much more often, but with current trends, only the oldest cards are the most powerful and expensive which favors the much more limited and ironically more expensive standard format.
I have no idea what relevance this statement has.
In terms of all players that includes casual and short-term players who don't really care, that time didn't exist, but in terms of the official state of the game, in tournaments where players always only had the best cards among the players who decided the best strategies, it did exist. And again, variety over indefinite overpoweredness. They don't have to print things that are perpetually more powerful, they can simply print cards that are as effective but in different ways. The current trends were dictated more by economics though. Not every player was interested in investing the money or time to strategize and buy the best cards for their desired strategy, so the economics favored easier and less powerful cards as time went on, especially for younger people who continued to be a growing demographic. But, that's only because WoTC had started off with the trend that only a few cards were op among the bulk anyway. If by that point in the game, if every card was as efficient as lightning bolt or dark confidant, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
Because that wouldn't have been possible. You can't have every card be as efficient as those cards, unless you're committed to releasing only 10 cards a set.
What does this have to do with my original point anyway?
Well except you can, you'd simply have to put the effort into just thinking of a different strategy or mechanic.
Colt had a couple points or implications I agreed with, like that there are an increasing number of formats which favor only newer cards, despite the fact that the older cards were more "explosive" but could have continued to be printed as such without damaging the integrity of the game had they been printed with a high enough frequency and enough diversity.
Moreover, the current trends show that older cards tend to be more powerful, so a card like dark ritual would actually be pretty overpowered in a much more limited format like standard today where a lot of cards are less efficient, but you also indicated that you disliked the older sets because there were more op cards. However, those cards are only op relative to standard cards today, and furthermore, if op cards were more common, then they wouldn't actually be op, they would just be average.
I'm nostalgic for cards that are powerful, easy to understand, and make interesting games at the game table for players who may not be the best deck builders in the world. For example, bringing back Dark Ritual in a deck builders toolkit with other cards like Exhume, Swords to Plowshares, etc, is perfect because those cards are fun, powerful, easy to understand, and let new players have fun at the table with decks that can easily keep up with a tournament players deck if they go to the LGS and run into someone playing modern or legacy. Swords to Plowshares is a very good newbie card because it not only acts as good removal, it can teach players that some cards are not as obvious as they seem. People used to swords their own creatures to gain life, and that is an important lesson when graduating to cards like Goblin Guide, Path to Exile, etc. Heck, put Polymorph in there as well. There is no such thing as too powerful for casual, only too complicated.
My take is, print the powerful cards for casual so that everyone has them and if a card works in standard once in awhile just reprint it there. Printing everything from Dark Ritual, Path to Exile, Counter spell, Lightning Bolt, Exhume, etc in deck builder products and casual sets is a great way to support both modern and casual play. Heck, Tarmogoyf would be great in casual products.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
That's not necessarily true. If someone was nostalgic for something that means it provided some benefit to them over a long time. If someone was nostalgic for older cards, it would likely mean those older cards were more fun or there were more people playing with more fun decks that utilized those cards.
Sometime, but not always. The key pitfall of nostalgia is that everybody tends to notice external changes much more than internal ones. Comments on how much the game has changed are very common. Comments on how much individuals enjoy playing the game changed over time are much rarer, but they are equally, if not more, important as whatever changes the game sustained. Preference for one's early days playing the game are often entirely independent of how healthy the game actually was at that point in time. The not-always-true equivalency you stated hides serious negatives.
But the point of playing the game is to have fun, for entertainment, correct? If people enjoyed the game more with those cards, it would stand to reason that cards of a similar effectiveness should be printed. If the game is unhealthy, then inherently people wouldn't enjoy the game.
Again, your logic is flawed. In an earlier post you stated confidence in keeping power levels constant, but that task is far more difficult (and ineffective) than you describe. Power level is often difficult to measure in this game because the game can be played in so many different ways. How, specifically, would you design a set at the same power level while feeling unique? If you can't, who can?
Additionally, your assertion that player want power levels to be stable want is flat-out wrong. What people want is power creep; consumers want to buy a new product because it is better than whatever came before. The problem is that power creep risks sending a game into a death spiral that makes it hard to keep up with. The theoretical solution is to have an MC Escher-style infinite staircase in which new products create enough of an illusion of power creep to be effective, but the success of that policy's implementation has been mixed at best recently.
Your connection between enjoyment and a health is overly simplistic. Standard being unhealthy right now doesn't affect the enjoyment of modern players, who have a superbly healthy format right now. A bad limited format only bothers those who play draft or sealed. EDH communities self-police problems. Many people only play casual "kitchen table" Magic can have fun even if Wizards makes a mistake that turns every competitive format into a tire fire.
Simply by using your brain to come up with an idea, and running simulations to make sure the win rate is on average 50% against a variety of decks.
Not necessarily because it's better overall, but simply because there is one aspect of it that is better for a specific strategy. If what you're saying was true, everyone would always have Progenitus out by turn 1 by this point in time. You might have one card that cost little mana with a power of 2 and has haste, or in turn there might be a big card for 5 mana that has 5 power and haste and trample. One card is meant for a quick burn deck, the other is meant more for mid range. They're both valid strategies, they're just different. There's an inconceivable number of combinations of mechanics and strategies and combos that a card could be advantageous for. The goal of printing new cards should be to introduce new strategies and cover the gaps or flaws of preexisting ones, which aren't mutually exclusive, and thus become closer to letting anyone make any deck they can imagine.
So what you're saying is the game can be "unhealthy" while players are still happily playing it, but if that's the case, there's no actual problem then. Healthy from the perspective of what WoTC might arbitrarily decide as probability of getting an op card is different than players actually enjoying the game by having he freedom to explore any strategy they want, relying on skill and creativity to win, instead of dreading it.
Dark Ritual was overpowered originally. It just took people a while to finally realize that Dark Ritual was the major problem rather than the cards it would put out quickly (well, okay, Necropotence was kinda crazy on its own, but Dark Ritual took it to a new level). That's why you had weird bans like Hypnotic Specter, because people just saw Hypnotic Specter was beating them down and blamed it rather than the card that allowed it to be played on the first turn.
No, I was saying that pointing to a bunch of cards from the Urza's Saga set was a weird place to try to say was a great time for Magic when it clearly wasn't.
Uh, no, they were kinda OP back in their original environment too. That's why they discontinued them (or in the case of Dark Ritual or Memory Jar, banned them outright).
No, all that'd do is create problematic degeneracy where all the decks are winning in the first few turns when you crank the power level up that high. Extended circa 2003 seems to be the kind of format that'd be the result of what you're advocating, where you technically had diversity of decks, but thanks to the high power level all of them are just based around doing stupid things on turn 2 or 3 which is why they had to go on a bit of a banning spree towards the end of the year.
And your argument has another problem with it: Even if we grant it as correct, one can just as easily turn it around and say that the answer is not to bring everything up to the level of the overpowered cards, but bring the overpowered cards down to the power of the rest of the game, which is what they did (or at least attempted to do) with such cards.
Also, the idea of "make everything as good as them and they'll be fine" is thwarted a bit when you consider the fact that some of those cards get better based on other cards being better, like Exhume. I remember thinking about how good a creature would have to be to be as good as Ancestral Recall, but quickly realized the impossibility of such a thing because the stronger you made such a creature, the stronger you make Ancestral Recall because it makes you draw better cards.
Dark Rit has never kept more new players away than in. It took six and a half years to ban the card in Extended because of Trix and Magic absolutely would not have grown within those six years if Ritual did what you said.
You have a valid point otherwise, but really.
You can, literally, and very very very easily, which is exactly what writers get paid a salary to do. You think every single card WoTC comes up with is the only idea they ever had for that set? There's thousands of more ideas behind the scenes backlogged, but they choose the ones that are most likely to maximize their profit with the current state of the game.
And then what if every color had it's own dark ritual? It wouldn't be over powered then. Or, what if there were more ways to counter it? Like a leyline that said "players can only gain mana equal to the number of lands they control" in addition to something else useful.
But, it would only be a bad time for magic if the crazy combos took you by surprise. If everyone knew about them and had them, it wouldn't have been a big deal, which is a matter of marketing and information. Or alternatively, if the price was lower, anyone could easily buy the cards to compete.
I would say a card being overpowered for standard is somewhat different than a card being overpowered compared to every card. If they're really that over powered, how come so few established legacy decks use them? Unless uh, no, cards aren't overpowered when there's lots of other powerful cards to choose from.
All decks cannot possibly win in the first few turns, someone has to lose. Generally decks that try to win in the first few turns, when pitted against each other, struggle against each other or against control decks. An elf deck would definitely have trouble against a burn or delver deck. If everyone has an op deck, then everyone really just has an average deck. They're only op relatively to the bulk of crappy cards. The problem is the definition of op that you're using isn't actually op, it's broken.
And if you haven't noticed, winning as fast as possible isn't exactly uncommon, it's the goal of most decks. Openly, all the best players use all kinds of extreme or cheap and kniving tactics with things like reanimate or natural order or show and tell which only shows that players are comfortable with those strategies and openly advocate them when they actually have access to them. And yet, despite what you say, there's no deck that has a 100% win rate, because op isn't op when every opponent's deck is just as op. When everyone has "op" cards, it's about the player's skill and sideboarding. The only reason people complain is because the prices of cards limits their own access to those same kinds of strategies.
Op just means "ahead of current standards" but broken means "breaks the game," you refer to every card being broken, I simply refer to every card being op relative to an average card right now. Dark ritual is certainly more efficient than an average card, but it doesn't really break the game. Swords to plowshares or force of will are certainly better cards than the average card, but they don't break the game. Why? Because there's thousands of other op cards of diverse strategies that are just as powerful.
Which isn't necessarily a bad thing, the specialization of strategies is exactly what people want. More cards developed means better chances of focusing on a specific strategy that people can imagine.
What I can't understand is why counterspell is banned but daze and force of will aren't. Otherwise, I'd say if those people who complained had the money for cards that were just as powerful, they wouldn't complain. New players are always going to complain when they come up against an experienced player, but that's only because they don't know 90% of cards are crap.
And anyone saying otherwise on the power cards not being the most expensive cards on the second hand market, a power card is one that finds a home easily. There are tons of "powerful" cards in the game, but that doesn't matter at all if those cards do not have any support or are very narrow. Shadow of the Grave is powerful, but is it going to be as ubiquitous as Noble Hierarch, or basically queen of all mana dorks? Uh.. no, no it isn't. If a card is ubiquitous in power that is a card that needs to be printed constantly to keep it in check because players across all forms of play are going to be looking for them. Something that wizards notably has not been doing because of being scared of the secondary market and scalping. A problem they created themselves and refuse to clean up.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Uh... yes, it would. Giving all colors access to an overpowered card doesn't mean it's not overpowered. Do you think that Ancestral Recall somehow becomes of an acceptable power level if you gave one to each color? I mean, heck, Black Lotus was sort of what you were talking about, that didn't make it okay.
Which then has the general problem that narrow hate cards do.
You're acting like all of this can be micromanaged but it's not really possible when there's so many cards.
Except all the tournament players did know about them back then. People knowing something is broken doesn't somehow make it not broken.
Few established Legacy decks use Memory Jar because the card is banned. As for Dark Ritual, yes, it's not as overpowered in Legacy, but we were talking largely about Standard (and to a lesser extent Expanded), were we not?
However, it is worth pointing out that the reason Dark Ritual is okay in Legacy is because they banned a bunch of the cards that it was particularly degenerate with, such as Necropotence or Yawgmoth's Bargain.
Also, now you're changing your argument. Before you were claiming that every card could somehow be of about an equal power level. Now you're saying that an overpowered card isn't as overpowered if there are other such cards around, which is a quite different claim. There is merit to the general idea that "if everything is overpowered, nothing is" but there is a certain level at which that sort of fails.
Dodging the point entirely. The point was that when you get the power level up that high then you end up with decks just trying to win faster than the other so you end up with the whole game/format being such decks, which is exactly what was happening in that format.
Of course no deck has a 100% win rate because every deck has the possibility of just getting mana screwed or simply getting an awful hand. Eldrazi didn't have a 100% win rate, that doesn't mean the deck was okay.
Or maybe because they just don't like what you end up with when you get the format's power level up that high. You've been making the contention that it was just prices that made people dislike Urza's Saga Standard, when it was the actual environment that was the problem.
Yes, it absolutely did. That's why it got itself or got other cards banned in various formats.
To be fair, Dark Ritual probably could be okay in Standard if they made a point to stress multicolor cards, because getting BBB isn't all that impressive at that point. Still, it's a highly risky card to have around because of its propensity for breaking things.
Huh? I said that I thought Swords would be fine in Standard.
Missing my point. I was mentioning how your claim that every single card could somehow be of the same power level doesn't really work in the case of Exhume because its power level is reliant on other cards' power levels (specifically, creatures), meaning that if your goal is to make all cards, including creatures, as good as Exhume it's a paradox because an increase or decrease in their power level, at least those of the expensive creatures, affects that of Exhume.
Also, all of this rambling of yours is still largely incidental to my original point.
So don't make every single spell a direct damage spell that does exactly that thing...
Except it wouldn't because possessing it wouldn't give you an advantage. You don't seem to be grasping this concept of relativity. Op is only op relative to something less effective. If everyone card is efficient, then no one has any particular advantage.
If it wasn't possible then hate cards wouldn't already exist. There's still millions of strategies that can be imagined that have yet to be implemented in the game.
They knew about after they suddenly lost to it by surprise...or were mad because they couldn't afford it like all the richest players could. If every had the same access to all of the same cards, then no one would have a particular advantage.
But not dark ritual, right? I don't see it on the banned list. For the most part, and it should exceptionally obvious by how I frequently say "all cards," I'm not talking about standard, I'm talking about legacy.
Necropotence would still be broken regardless of if dark ritual was banned or not.
I've continuously made both statements and they're not mutually exclusive. It still stands that in the presence of many strong cards, no single card actually stands out as being powerful, they simply accomplish different specific strategies more efficiently than each other, but on the average still have a 50% win rate all against each other. For instance, you might think swords to plowshares is better than lightning bolt. However, if something is removed from the game, a card like tarmogoyf wouldn't be able to take advantage of it.
If "environment" is the problem, then that's simply an issue of diversity, which is what I've already been advocating, of course along with the prices. I don't agree with their methodology that they only made a few cards ultra strong. They should have made many cards moderately strong or should have brought them down to a level of op. There could have been other cards that were as effective but gave players a different strategy, but, instead of leveling the playing field like I'd suggest, by printing something that was relatively op instead of broken among many other cards that are op in today's standards, then it wouldn't have been any problem at all.
And that's fine that you think that, but it doesn't circumvent the fact that it's already been shown players are comfortable with and openly advocate a wide variety of cheap "win as fast as possible" strategies using all kinds of "op" cards. The only problem with the urza block was that there were only a limited number of ways to do that compared to today's culmination of strategies which would both force players to spend money to stay on a level playing field, even though there probably weren't enough printed, and the number of strategies wasn't diverse. But then again, that's just for standard, which today you can easily see they are making a much greater effort to make diverse.
At this point it really seems like it's you who's missing the point. The generalization of power is simply how effectively a card accomplishes a specific strategy. If something has really good unique synergy with a particular set of cards that allows certain cards to win the game and turn the tide, then it can still be just powerful a card as lightning bolt. It is only that you are confusing versatility for power. There are more kinds of decks that something like lightning bolt can pair with, but that doesn't mean the culmination of those decks are automatically guaranteed to be more likely to win over a deck that can effectively use exhume, and vice versa.
And if everyone's cards are too efficient you end up with highly problematic games like the ones I was discussing during Urza's Saga (both in Standard and in the larger formats).
If they were to print a card that cost 0 mana and said "when you cast this, you win the game" and could play any number of copies in your deck, that per your logic wouldn't be overpowered because everyone could play it and everything would be of an equal strength, with everyone having a 50% win rate. Somehow, I doubt many people would be interested in the game if that were around, even though it wouldn't be overpowered because everyone can play it and everyone can counter it by doing the same thing.
You're being completely silly here. People hated the format because it was way too high powered. No, it wasn't because they "couldn't afford it" or they "lost to it by surprise." People went into tournaments knowing about these decks, and that's exactly why people were losing interest, because it wasn't at all interesting to play in that kind of environment. You're engaging in this weird revisionist history that just makes you look silly.
If we were talking about something like Caw-Blade I could buy your argument (as the high prices of Jace and Stoneforge were a turnoff but you had some people who did have those cards who really liked the format), but that wasn't the case for Urza's Saga.
And the original discussion of Dark Ritual was Standard, not Legacy. The claim was that it would be too powerful for Standard now but wasn't too powerful in its original environment, and I made the contention that, no, it was kind of too good even in its original environment. Again, you're bringing up points that are largely irrelevant to what I was originally trying to say.
Also, you seem to dodge the point about Memory Jar by redirecting the subject onto Dark Ritual without further saying anything about it. Are you arguing, therefore, that Memory Jar isn't broken in Legacy? Or are you conceding the point regarding it?
Again, no. All trying to make more cards at the same level of power as the game was during Urza's Saga would have just kept it needlessly degenerate because the game doesn't work properly on that level of power.
And that's fine that you think that, but it doesn't circumvent the fact that it's already been shown players are comfortable with and openly advocate a wide variety of cheap "win as fast as possible" strategies using all kinds of "op" cards.[/quote]And it's been shown how...?
If you wish to point to Legacy and Vintage, I should point out that the reason people are "comfortable" is because a lot of the problematic cards have gotten banned or restricted rather than following your idea of just trying to raise the power level high enough that things like Black Lotus or Ancestral Recall are of reasonable power level.
No... that wasn't the only problem. The stuff was just plain too good and trying to put more "diversity" on that level of power wouldn't solve the problem.
Although it's a bit amusing you say "you can easily see they are making a much greater effort to make diverse." In what way? By the fact Standard clearly isn't and hasn't been diverse for quite a while? Granted, you said "effort" rather than saying they actually did it, but even there I'm not sure how someone is supposed to "clearly see" that.
And, hey, this is still not relevant to my original point!
It's possible if you simply diversify the strategies. No one advocates a game where one set contains 4 damage for one mana, thne 5 damage for one mana the next set, then 6 damage for 1 mana the set after that...which is an unlikely and undesired scenario you're referring to.
So don't make them "too" efficient...
So make more than one strategy...
Some people knew about the cards, not everyone played the deck that utilized them, but if the problem is environment, the issue is montonoy. So if the problem is power in only a few cards, then two exceptionally obvious solutions are simply to make every card as powerful or bring the broken cards down to a power of the rest of the cards.
And I made the contention that, no, if the efficiency of the cards was simply leveled, DR wouldn't have been considered op, which is true in any format. DR itself wasn't broken, it was the limited array of cards it was used for at the time. Again, the issue was monotony. One or two strategies become too powerful, so people get frustrated and bored. This only supports my points.
Because you dodged the point about dark ritual...
Unless you simply have a really wide variety of cards that are as effective, then using that card doesn't actually have an inherent advantage over all other decks. But, again, this is not mutually exclusive with my point because with broken cards banned, they can simply make relatively strong cards rather than the 90% of total crap cards they normally make. It is with no less than 100% certainty that they could make more than enough varieties of cards that are very strong, the only limit is literally imagination, and even that limit will be surpassed once the next generation of computers becomes ubiquitous.
Well except that it is actually a possible solution, it is only that there would be a period of time where a few sets made all older sets obsolete, except perhaps alpha, and it would then only be a matter of time before there was enough card diversity. But, it that still does not rule out my point that you don't have to make all cards relatively broken compared to current average cards anyway, they simply could have been made stronger than the average card now but not as strong as the broken cards then.
How about you go to the thread in the mtgsalvation forums and look at the established standard decks...and then read the wide variety of cards in current sets. They clearly avoided the mistakes of the darksteel block where everything revolved around affinity when they made another artifact block too. It's just as many as you'd get for a style of legacy deck.
How has it possibly not been shown already? Have you ever heard of sneak attack? Or show and tell? Or natural order? Or reanimate? Or even tendrils of agony and force of will and ad nauseam? Those are all exceptionally powerful cards that decide the fate of the game well beyond what an average card does, allowing players to win potentially as fast as turn 3, even faster if they're lucky. You can easily see from the history of established legacy decks that players have clearly demonstrated comfort and open advocacy of extremely efficient, game-ending tactics over the entire history of magic that can even rival cards that are banned. The only problem you reference is one period where one or two tactics happened to be a little too strong and disrupt the diversity of winning strategies.
Case and point, players don't have a problem with relatively powerful cards as long as there's enough variety of them to compete with each other to avoid the situation of monotony that you reference. And that's because, as I already said, when there's a lot of "op" cards, no particular card is actually op. An elf deck might seem op to the bulk of 90% of cards that are crap, but when it's pitted against force of will and thoughtseize and pyroclasm, it struggles, it's not just an "I'm always going to win on turn 2" game anymore.
I would love to know where you are seeing this. All 3 of the LGS I frequent sold out of MM17 by the second weekend it was out. I checks a few other LGS and there was very little product still on the shelves. According to the owners, players LOVE masters sets and buy it up faster then any other sets.
The time you talk about in Magic I hated and is why I learned to draft better. I couldnt stand constructed formats back then. I personally dont like broken Magic and love the mid range fest its become. Even though I dislike Planeswalkers.
This is a perfect example of Wotc can not please everyone. No matter which way Wotc goes a portion of the player base is going to be unhappy.
That is what tournament legality and casual products are for. If they put good old cards in deck builder products it gives a good first impression. Then those people can decide if they want to migrate to tournament play with more tuned and fair card pools or go commander or legacy. You can please both crowds and not step on toes.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
MM17 sold better, despite the Modern scene being poor in both LGS.
I think its the card quality that causes the disparity, EMA was full of chaff at most commonalities, and had a couple of money cards (FOW) and a few high value rares. MM17 was better in terms of its rares and mythics, but had some decent pickups over all commonalities.
What kills EMA is the fact that the format it supports has the reserved list holding a number of needed cards and the fact the boxes are overpriced. Making products that cost over 200 usd or even over 100 usd severely limits who is going to come around and buy them. Standard booster boxes are about the highest they really should be going on cost.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!