With damage on the stack: 1 correct line of play. Stack damage, then get a land.
Without damage on the stack: 2 decisions to weigh. Trade or get a land.
Sure, the first 10 times you stack damage then sacrifice a guy you might feel kind of clever, but after that play goes on autopilot. Not stacking damage creates more decisions for the player.
I think he meant on a more complex board-state, similar to a limited game.
I miss ninjutsuing things in after first strike damage going on the stack, but aside from that meh
Someone tried to convince me that it still existed a few weeks back in a draft. What made it more confusing to comprehend is that he hadn't even played before M10...
Activate ninjutsu in the First Combat Damage step, bouncing a creature with First Strike to pay the cost? Yeah, that works under current rules. You don't need DotP to do that, so don't try to make it into an example of why DotP was "better" (which it wasn't).
I'm going to add a Vorthosy opinion. Saying "damage on the stack" injected sceptic rulespeak into combat. And I REALLY felt like a dingleberry saying it to a new player.
From a flavour standpoint, I always saw damage on the stack as the point where the creatures were fighting and injuring each other but not actually being dead yet. So for the example of the Eager Cadet and Sakura-Tribe Elder, the Elder whacks the Cadet with his sticks enough to cause fatal injuries, then does his sacrificial land-search magic while fatally wounded by the Cadet's sword.
Anyway, there are all kinds of situations I run into these days where damage on the stack would've made a huge impact to strategy, but instead just kind of wind up with there only being one simple choice rather than a more complicated optimal choice out of a bunch of ways to handle the situation. Damage on the stack was an important strategical element that got removed solely because simplifying combat is better than encouraging real strategy.
Then again, their stated reason for removing certain kinds of activated-ability combat tracks and drastically lowering the incidence of others is that new/bad players "feel stupid" when they walk into them, and catering to people who don't want to learn is apparently better than making them get better at the game.
dots just made combat more complex and was responsible for many creatures being as powerful as they were (ghost council, mogg fanatic, sakura tribe elder). Removing it wasn't the end of the world but it was another small step towards a "hurr durr i atak u with my mans"-style game.
Except it wasn't. Again, damage on the stack didn't take skill in the vast majority of instances. It takes more skill to decide between a trade and a sac ability than just doing both the trade and the sac ability. Yes, it made some old cards worse; so? There are tons of old cards that were made worse by the sixth edition rules changes, are you going to forego those?
Claiming that the removal of DotS moved Magic to a more creature-based game is like claiming that the loss of pirates caused global warming. There were some terrible rules choices in recent years (Conga line of doom, anyone?), but no more DotS isn't one of them.
With damage on the stack: 1 correct line of play. Stack damage, then get a land.
Without damage on the stack: 2 decisions to weigh. Trade or get a land.
Sure, the first 10 times you stack damage then sacrifice a guy you might feel kind of clever, but after that play goes on autopilot. Not stacking damage creates more decisions for the player.
That's just one scenario. You could design situations where there is an additional choice either way (w/ or w/o dots). Having dots allows both players to do more things, there are still plenty of meaningful decisions in a game of magic. I don't think something as simple as one instance of "block or don't block" (which I'd consider the most basic decision in magic) is the important difference between damage-on-the-stack rules and m10 rules.
(as bone doc already said for me) I'm just saying that dots made the game of magic more complex and that I liked it. It had very big effects on how things like blinking/bouncing/sacrificing worked and I really preferred how they used to be. New players that never played with those abilities might not miss them because they never used to use them but I really enjoyed how versatile those effects were.
Think of how much more interesting AVR and all it's blink cards would have been if there were still damage on the stack. That would have been a TON of fun imo but instead we have these cards that are gimped by the new rules.
Then again, their stated reason for removing certain kinds of activated-ability combat tracks and drastically lowering the incidence of others is that new/bad players "feel stupid" when they walk into them, and catering to people who don't want to learn is apparently better than making them get better at the game.
I just miss my Sakura-Tribe Elders and Mogg Fanatics. I'm fine with it being gone, but these cards not functioning like they did before is kind of sad to me.
Many of the fond DOTS memories relate to cards that existed BEFORE DOTS. Several cards like Mogg Fanatic, Phyrexian Ghoul, Goblin Bombardment, Liberate, Boomerang, Unsummon, etc. were not designed in a DOTS environment. Carnage Altar and sorcery speed sac effects (like that red ALA block elemental) were.
This is a really important point that so many people overlook. When someone says it sucks that they nerfed Mogg Fanatic, or says "Imagine how great Restoration Angel would be with DotS", they're missing that so many of those cards only exist as they do because they were printed in a world without DotS. Most of the cards that gained the most from damage on the stack were only that good because they weren't intended to have that functionality, and the cool blink/sac/bounce effects we've seen in the last three years that would have been amazing with DotS just wouldn't exist if it were still around.
I preferred damage on the stack and believe it was better for the game. I agree that without DotS, players have to make more difficult decisions, and I understand the argumens for why that's good for the game. However, with DotS players were rewarded for understanding a non-intuitive rule (i.e. "How can the creature still do damage if it's dead?!?"). I believ that such a level of rules knowledge and understanding should be rewarded. Understanding the simple rules lets you play the game, but understanding the non-intuitive ones (of which there are still plenty) lets you edge out games against players with only rudimentary understanding.
Think of how much more interesting AVR and all it's blink cards would have been if there were still damage on the stack. That would have been a TON of fun imo but instead we have these cards that are gimped by the new rules.
Cloudshift would certainly be better, but I still can't see how, in the most common situation that DotS mattered in, it would make combat more complex. If you are holding Cloudshift then there's no reason to not stack damage before blinking your guy as you maximize value, whereas now you have to weigh doing combat damage with your guy surviving/getting an etb.
I loved my Fanatics and miss getting all the value out of them, but I do feel that combat is now more interesting because we can't have our cake and eat it too.
Damage on the Stack was one of the worst things about magic, a 1/1 should never be able to trade with a 2/2. Plus it allows for to much easy cheating against players who don't really understand how it works. That and the fact that it narrowed what wizards could do makes it all the better that it's gone.
Do you think this can be expounded to a global level, or do you believe this is a rare localized event? Is it something that the group comiserated and decided together?
For instance, I knew a guy when 6th Edition came about (ironically because he thought DOTS was dumb), but he was on the verge anyway. Without a doubt though, I didn't see a large 6th edition exodus from MTG.
I have no idea but it is my experience so I'll definitely say it if that guy is going to argue that no one left because of the rule.
Damage on the Stack was one of the worst things about magic, a 1/1 should never be able to trade with a 2/2. Plus it allows for to much easy cheating against players who don't really understand how it works. That and the fact that it narrowed what wizards could do makes it all the better that it's gone.
And for the longest time I was in the camp that removing DoTS = more skillful combat step, but after reading this topic I've come to the conclusion that Combat with and without DoTS are equally skilled, but the skill set is different
DoTS requires the skill of rule knowledge
no DoTS requires the skill of planning ahead.
The problem I think that lies, is people that know their rules, and therefore see it as a minor detail and the planning ahead skill seems "harder" or more skillful.
On the other side I believe a lot (not all, but most [and this is not meant to flame]) of players on the DoTS side cannot plan ahead, or do not think it is important.
If you are a player than thinks DoTS is a good think, but cannot play a deck like delver, this is a perfect example of being able to plan ahead is a huge skill, and the only reason I made my claim is the number of players who cannot play a deck like delver (leg,mod, or std version) correctly. Now maybe you can plan ahead and still prefer DoTS, well that is the exact same thing as the anti-DoTs people, who because they know how to do the skillful part, the otherside seems more skillful instead.
I think the end result is your ethics to the game though.
DoTS as stated has always been a tool used against new players.
I think a great correlation to this is when Modern first came out for the PTQ season. And the whole gifts ungiven as a double entomb interaction (which was a deck I played)
Now it was PTQ level so I did abuse my opponents lack of rule knoledge on the interaction to my advatage ( I know a few raged and titled because they thought it was BS) But I never prefered winning because I know rule A and you don't. I prefered winning because we both know the rules, but I outplayed you in the end.
I think DoTS falls under that, which I feel most spike players prefer (win by any means nessacary). So while both forms of DoTS require skill, I feel winning by out playing someone vs winning by knowing more than someone, out playing is "more prideful". This is not saying Jedi Mind Tricks are bad, I think giving all my legal targets fear is acceptable, but winning because my opponenet doesn't know about the interving-if clause on bride from below to stop my zombie, not so much. (though if its his deck and he's missing Interving-if clauses, well then I have no regrets as he doesn't know how to play his own deck, which is different than not knowing how to play magic. Maybe a vague line, but a line none-the-less
When people say that removing damage from the stack makes combat decisions more complex, they are in fact not completely right, because it goes two ways:
1. With the removal of damage from the stack, you can no longer have your cake and eat it with cards like Sakura Tribe Elder. You now have to choose between dealing the damage or geting the land when you block with it. This is a change that has made combat decisions harder to make and more complex.
But...
2. Looking at it from the other perspective, with the new rules, you can usually attack your opponents without much worry. No longer can you fear them boomeranging their guy in response, or saccing their dude and killing both of your guys. Taking away damage from the stack has only made it easier to "atack with your mans" as it were. The decisions of whether to attack have become easier and less complex now.
I think the end result is your ethics to the game though.
DoTS as stated has always been a tool used against new players.
knowledge of any rule is a tool used against new players. To be a new player someone has to have an incomplete knowledge of the rules. It doesn't matter if it's dots or something else (like the ridiculous rules for assigning block damage with multiple blockers an trample), players that know the rules have an advantage over players that don't know the rules. I don't care about that part of the rules change because I don't think it is a significant difference.
2. Looking at it from the other perspective, with the new rules, you can usually attack your opponents without much worry. No longer can you fear them boomeranging their guy in response, or saccing their dude and killing both of your guys. Taking away damage from the stack has only made it easier to "atack with your mans" as it were. The decisions of whether to attack have become easier and less complex now.
This argument doesn't work. Players had equal access to the plays you describe... if DotS made attacking into two open blue mana (boomerang) or creatures with sac abilities riskier, it also made BLOCKING in those scenarios riskier, and attacking with those creatures/tricks safer than they are now.
Damage using the stack increased the variety of effects that could create blowouts in combat (e.g., bounce was more powerful mid-combat), but it's logically inconsistent to claim that this made it harder to "attack with your mans", because these effects were no more available to the defender than they were to the attacker.
In fact, because many of the effects you're talking about have mana costs, decreasing their power by ending DotS advantages the DEFENDER if it advantages anyone (because the attacker on average has more mana available during combat). So while the argument that DotS made "attacking with your mans" harder does not hold water, the OPPOSITE argument, that it used to be easier and is now more difficult, actually may have some merit.
The fact the loss of DOTS killed off certain deck types and didnt really make any decks extremely more powerful should explain a lot. Changing a rule that nerfs only certain cards means less thinking involved in deck building and then playing that deck.
Activate ninjutsu in the First Combat Damage step, bouncing a creature with First Strike to pay the cost? Yeah, that works under current rules. You don't need DotP to do that, so don't try to make it into an example of why DotP was "better" (which it wasn't).
You totally gloss over the fact that for the card to work as you mentioned you HAVE to play a first striking creature, which you didnt have to before. Without first strike in the equation, all damage happens at the same time and you dont get a chance to ninjutsu in the guy.
You totally gloss over the fact that for the card to work as you mentioned you HAVE to play a first striking creature, which you didnt have to before. Without first strike in the equation, all damage happens at the same time and you dont get a chance to ninjutsu in the guy.
Even with Damage on the stack all combat damage in a step was dealt as 1 game action. If you waited for it to go on the stack before bringing in your ninja, the newly arrived creature would not deal any damage in that step so would not fire its ability. The only thing it would allow you to do would be save the attacking creature if it was going to be blasted by some spell or ability.
For the trick to work as described you have always needed a creature with first or double strike.
For the benefit of dopes like me, can someone please explain DOTS? How did it work before, how does it work now?
Previous to the M10 rules change the combat damage game action that takes place at the start of each combat damage step used the stack and could be responded to like spells and abilities.
With some creatures like Sakura-Tribe Elder and Mogg Fanatic this would allow you to assign damage to a creature and before it was dealt damage in return sacrifice it to activate its ability gaining you a dead attacker and a land in the case of STE or potentially destroy 2 creatures with the mogg fanatic.
With the M10 rules you don't get priority during the combat damage step until damage has been assigned and dealt so any creatures that have been dealt lethal damage will be destroyed before you can activate any abilities so if you want the land from a STE you have to chose between doing 1 damage or getting the land. Same with the fanatic you can only destroy 1 x/1 as opposed to 2 and with out help it can't destroy an x/2.
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Not really, no. If changing the way damage worked had made some decks "extremely" more powerful it'd either be a bad decision or a correction of a vast amount of underpowered creatures. There wasn't a loss of thinking in deck building in general, either. Some individual card choices just lost functionality. The desirability of some choices in some formats simply changed. If there are three playable creatures but one great creature, that's not real choice. You pick the great one. If the great one suddenly shifts down to decent, though, you've got four creatures to choose from.
There isn't less thinking going on and the game is now slightly more intuitive. That was a pretty safe change, if you ask me.
Have you played blinkriders lately? How about any deck that relied on the blink/flicker ability? Add in sac creatures and yeah, they hurt a nice chunk of cards and lowered their power level while not raising any on cards in return. Look how narrow deck building has become from the days of RAV/TSP, when it was actually fun to build different decks. Today its just about a smaller card pool with in a larger one build decks with. When everyone is building the same deck, because of power level issues, the game is simpler by nature, not harder.
Even with Damage on the stack all combat damage in a step was dealt as 1 game action. If you waited for it to go on the stack before bringing in your ninja, the newly arrived creature would not deal any damage in that step so would not fire its ability. The only thing it would allow you to do would be save the attacking creature if it was going to be blasted by some spell or ability.
For the trick to work as described you have always needed a creature with first or double strike.
Previous to the M10 rules change the combat damage game action that takes place at the start of each combat damage step used the stack and could be responded to like spells and abilities.
With some creatures like Sakura-Tribe Elder and Mogg Fanatic this would allow you to assign damage to a creature and before it was dealt damage in return sacrifice it to activate its ability gaining you a dead attacker and a land in the case of STE or potentially destroy 2 creatures with the mogg fanatic.
With the M10 rules you don't get priority during the combat damage step until damage has been assigned and dealt so any creatures that have been dealt lethal damage will be destroyed before you can activate any abilities so if you want the land from a STE you have to chose between doing 1 damage or getting the land. Same with the fanatic you can only destroy 1 x/1 as opposed to 2 and with out help it can't destroy an x/2.
Thanks! Still a little confusing, but thread makes a little more sense now.
Look how narrow deck building has become from the days of RAV/TSP, when it was actually fun to build different decks. Today its just about a smaller card pool with in a larger one build decks with. When everyone is building the same deck, because of power level issues, the game is simpler by nature, not harder.
RAV/TSP was pretty awesome, but keep in mind that Raffinity happened in the two blocks before those.
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DOTS was unintuitive and added needless complexity. If there was a rule that said, "whenever a white creature blocks a black creature or vice versa, they each gain first strike," and WotC removed in with M13 and said that the rule was unintuitive (why is my elephant suddenly striking first now that it's been blocked by a hound?) and adds needless complexity (no way to see the rule on the card, no cohesion with other similar scenarios), hoards of players would clamor on the internet exclaiming, "My infect deck was so much better against humans back when my guys had first strike when they blocked me or I blocked them. How could you take away my rules, Wizards? I'll never play Magic again!"
I'm glad it's gone. Sure, Sakura Tribe-Elder is worse now. Who cares? Either kill the Bob or get the land. Magic is more fun when you have to choose between options, not when you get everything just by knowing unintuitive and needlessly complex rules.
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Like I said, I can only go by my own experience, which is now 18 years. Kind of disheartening when you think you know something and you find out that you're a notch below a low grade moron.
From my perspective, part of why people miss DotS so much is that in many ways, it made blocking a lot better. When you attack with something like Sakura Tribe Elder or Mogg Fanatic, you have very limited options. If your opponent blocks, you stack damage and hit something for 1 or get a land. If they don't, then you most likely leave your creature alive. However, when blocking, you can almost always get full value from your creature. Removal of DotS, then, can at least in part be to blame for the rise in aggro decks, as the best way of beating an aggro deck is outlasting it with 2 for 1s, which cards like STE made easy. Now, there are very few, if any, cheap 2 for 1s to punish aggro decks in creature combat.
I think he meant on a more complex board-state, similar to a limited game.
Activate ninjutsu in the First Combat Damage step, bouncing a creature with First Strike to pay the cost? Yeah, that works under current rules. You don't need DotP to do that, so don't try to make it into an example of why DotP was "better" (which it wasn't).
From a flavour standpoint, I always saw damage on the stack as the point where the creatures were fighting and injuring each other but not actually being dead yet. So for the example of the Eager Cadet and Sakura-Tribe Elder, the Elder whacks the Cadet with his sticks enough to cause fatal injuries, then does his sacrificial land-search magic while fatally wounded by the Cadet's sword.
Anyway, there are all kinds of situations I run into these days where damage on the stack would've made a huge impact to strategy, but instead just kind of wind up with there only being one simple choice rather than a more complicated optimal choice out of a bunch of ways to handle the situation. Damage on the stack was an important strategical element that got removed solely because simplifying combat is better than encouraging real strategy.
Then again, their stated reason for removing certain kinds of activated-ability combat tracks and drastically lowering the incidence of others is that new/bad players "feel stupid" when they walk into them, and catering to people who don't want to learn is apparently better than making them get better at the game.
Except it wasn't. Again, damage on the stack didn't take skill in the vast majority of instances. It takes more skill to decide between a trade and a sac ability than just doing both the trade and the sac ability. Yes, it made some old cards worse; so? There are tons of old cards that were made worse by the sixth edition rules changes, are you going to forego those?
Claiming that the removal of DotS moved Magic to a more creature-based game is like claiming that the loss of pirates caused global warming. There were some terrible rules choices in recent years (Conga line of doom, anyone?), but no more DotS isn't one of them.
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That's just one scenario. You could design situations where there is an additional choice either way (w/ or w/o dots). Having dots allows both players to do more things, there are still plenty of meaningful decisions in a game of magic. I don't think something as simple as one instance of "block or don't block" (which I'd consider the most basic decision in magic) is the important difference between damage-on-the-stack rules and m10 rules.
(as bone doc already said for me) I'm just saying that dots made the game of magic more complex and that I liked it. It had very big effects on how things like blinking/bouncing/sacrificing worked and I really preferred how they used to be. New players that never played with those abilities might not miss them because they never used to use them but I really enjoyed how versatile those effects were.
Think of how much more interesting AVR and all it's blink cards would have been if there were still damage on the stack. That would have been a TON of fun imo but instead we have these cards that are gimped by the new rules.
amen
This is a really important point that so many people overlook. When someone says it sucks that they nerfed Mogg Fanatic, or says "Imagine how great Restoration Angel would be with DotS", they're missing that so many of those cards only exist as they do because they were printed in a world without DotS. Most of the cards that gained the most from damage on the stack were only that good because they weren't intended to have that functionality, and the cool blink/sac/bounce effects we've seen in the last three years that would have been amazing with DotS just wouldn't exist if it were still around.
Cloudshift would certainly be better, but I still can't see how, in the most common situation that DotS mattered in, it would make combat more complex. If you are holding Cloudshift then there's no reason to not stack damage before blinking your guy as you maximize value, whereas now you have to weigh doing combat damage with your guy surviving/getting an etb.
I loved my Fanatics and miss getting all the value out of them, but I do feel that combat is now more interesting because we can't have our cake and eat it too.
3 of my friends and I left the game because we were unhappy with the new rules. I was the only one that got back into magic and it wasn't for 2 years.
The concept of DOTS sounds illogical especially the ability to both deal damage and sacrifice a creature at the same time.
Regardless of how anyone feels about DOTS: The designers can make better cards given the current restrictions.
There arent any good reasons for anyone to support DOTS.
I have no idea but it is my experience so I'll definitely say it if that guy is going to argue that no one left because of the rule.
"cheating" seriously?
And for the longest time I was in the camp that removing DoTS = more skillful combat step, but after reading this topic I've come to the conclusion that Combat with and without DoTS are equally skilled, but the skill set is different
DoTS requires the skill of rule knowledge
no DoTS requires the skill of planning ahead.
The problem I think that lies, is people that know their rules, and therefore see it as a minor detail and the planning ahead skill seems "harder" or more skillful.
On the other side I believe a lot (not all, but most [and this is not meant to flame]) of players on the DoTS side cannot plan ahead, or do not think it is important.
If you are a player than thinks DoTS is a good think, but cannot play a deck like delver, this is a perfect example of being able to plan ahead is a huge skill, and the only reason I made my claim is the number of players who cannot play a deck like delver (leg,mod, or std version) correctly. Now maybe you can plan ahead and still prefer DoTS, well that is the exact same thing as the anti-DoTs people, who because they know how to do the skillful part, the otherside seems more skillful instead.
I think the end result is your ethics to the game though.
DoTS as stated has always been a tool used against new players.
I think a great correlation to this is when Modern first came out for the PTQ season. And the whole gifts ungiven as a double entomb interaction (which was a deck I played)
Now it was PTQ level so I did abuse my opponents lack of rule knoledge on the interaction to my advatage ( I know a few raged and titled because they thought it was BS) But I never prefered winning because I know rule A and you don't. I prefered winning because we both know the rules, but I outplayed you in the end.
I think DoTS falls under that, which I feel most spike players prefer (win by any means nessacary). So while both forms of DoTS require skill, I feel winning by out playing someone vs winning by knowing more than someone, out playing is "more prideful". This is not saying Jedi Mind Tricks are bad, I think giving all my legal targets fear is acceptable, but winning because my opponenet doesn't know about the interving-if clause on bride from below to stop my zombie, not so much. (though if its his deck and he's missing Interving-if clauses, well then I have no regrets as he doesn't know how to play his own deck, which is different than not knowing how to play magic. Maybe a vague line, but a line none-the-less
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1. With the removal of damage from the stack, you can no longer have your cake and eat it with cards like Sakura Tribe Elder. You now have to choose between dealing the damage or geting the land when you block with it. This is a change that has made combat decisions harder to make and more complex.
But...
2. Looking at it from the other perspective, with the new rules, you can usually attack your opponents without much worry. No longer can you fear them boomeranging their guy in response, or saccing their dude and killing both of your guys. Taking away damage from the stack has only made it easier to "atack with your mans" as it were. The decisions of whether to attack have become easier and less complex now.
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knowledge of any rule is a tool used against new players. To be a new player someone has to have an incomplete knowledge of the rules. It doesn't matter if it's dots or something else (like the ridiculous rules for assigning block damage with multiple blockers an trample), players that know the rules have an advantage over players that don't know the rules. I don't care about that part of the rules change because I don't think it is a significant difference.
This argument doesn't work. Players had equal access to the plays you describe... if DotS made attacking into two open blue mana (boomerang) or creatures with sac abilities riskier, it also made BLOCKING in those scenarios riskier, and attacking with those creatures/tricks safer than they are now.
Damage using the stack increased the variety of effects that could create blowouts in combat (e.g., bounce was more powerful mid-combat), but it's logically inconsistent to claim that this made it harder to "attack with your mans", because these effects were no more available to the defender than they were to the attacker.
In fact, because many of the effects you're talking about have mana costs, decreasing their power by ending DotS advantages the DEFENDER if it advantages anyone (because the attacker on average has more mana available during combat). So while the argument that DotS made "attacking with your mans" harder does not hold water, the OPPOSITE argument, that it used to be easier and is now more difficult, actually may have some merit.
You totally gloss over the fact that for the card to work as you mentioned you HAVE to play a first striking creature, which you didnt have to before. Without first strike in the equation, all damage happens at the same time and you dont get a chance to ninjutsu in the guy.
Even with Damage on the stack all combat damage in a step was dealt as 1 game action. If you waited for it to go on the stack before bringing in your ninja, the newly arrived creature would not deal any damage in that step so would not fire its ability. The only thing it would allow you to do would be save the attacking creature if it was going to be blasted by some spell or ability.
For the trick to work as described you have always needed a creature with first or double strike.
Previous to the M10 rules change the combat damage game action that takes place at the start of each combat damage step used the stack and could be responded to like spells and abilities.
With some creatures like Sakura-Tribe Elder and Mogg Fanatic this would allow you to assign damage to a creature and before it was dealt damage in return sacrifice it to activate its ability gaining you a dead attacker and a land in the case of STE or potentially destroy 2 creatures with the mogg fanatic.
With the M10 rules you don't get priority during the combat damage step until damage has been assigned and dealt so any creatures that have been dealt lethal damage will be destroyed before you can activate any abilities so if you want the land from a STE you have to chose between doing 1 damage or getting the land. Same with the fanatic you can only destroy 1 x/1 as opposed to 2 and with out help it can't destroy an x/2.
- H.L Mencken
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All Religion, my friend is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination and poetry.
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Have you played blinkriders lately? How about any deck that relied on the blink/flicker ability? Add in sac creatures and yeah, they hurt a nice chunk of cards and lowered their power level while not raising any on cards in return. Look how narrow deck building has become from the days of RAV/TSP, when it was actually fun to build different decks. Today its just about a smaller card pool with in a larger one build decks with. When everyone is building the same deck, because of power level issues, the game is simpler by nature, not harder.
Thanks! Still a little confusing, but thread makes a little more sense now.
RAV/TSP was pretty awesome, but keep in mind that Raffinity happened in the two blocks before those.
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I'm glad it's gone. Sure, Sakura Tribe-Elder is worse now. Who cares? Either kill the Bob or get the land. Magic is more fun when you have to choose between options, not when you get everything just by knowing unintuitive and needlessly complex rules.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=341469