so, i'll probably only draft this set two or three times because of time and money reasons. and, unlike in doing my mtgo phantom sealed events, i'll likely draft to have my style of johnny-timmy FUN.
so i was poring over the spoilers, and the one card [albeit a rare] that jumped out at me was Whims of the Fates. i know if i open this first or second pack, i'll just HAVE to move into red and use this card!
my question is: what kind of deck makes the best use of this card, either
- for the lulz (if there's some really funny interaction that can be had with it), or
- trying to actually make best use of the card to /win/ with?
On a typical six mana board you and your opponent will each have roughly six lands and three non-land permanents. So typically this will destroy two lands and one of something else for each of you. The main considerations are therefore:
1) This must be at the top of your curve, because it's important that your deck continue to operate after you cast it.
2) You don't want to be playing much Bestow or other auras, since having to sac your powered-up creature would probably be a game-losing event.
I don't yet know what the BTT decks are going to look like exactly, but assuming the Theros decks haven't changed too much then W/R Humans is probably a good choice. Lots of cheap stuff, has an interest in disrupting the opponent's lands and doesn't usually run 6+ drops.
(The card is terrible in Limited, of course, but I expect you know that.)
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
--
(I'm on on this site much anymore. If you want to get in touch it's probably best to email me: dom@heffalumps.org)
Forum Awards: Best Writer 2005, Best Limited Strategist 2005-2012
5CB PotM - June 2005, November 2005, February 2006, April 2008, May 2008, Feb 2009
MTGSalvation Articles: 1-20, plus guest appearance on MTGCast #86!
<Limited Clan>
thanks for the ideas! (and yep, you're perceptive that i know it's terrible :P)
so if i'm trying to maximize effectiveness of this card in a RW heroic deck, i'm imagining that i split my creatures up (and my lands up) evenly between the three piles?
also -- is it so bad to sac the body of my voltron, if the other bestowed auras on it survive?
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
----------------------------
Goblins have poor impulse control. Don't click this link!!
some of my favourite flavour text:
Wayward Soul "no home no heart no hope"
—Stronghold graffito
Raging Goblin He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.
is it so bad to sac the body of my voltron, if the other bestowed auras on it survive?
Yeah, it's fairly bad. Suppose you have something with a Spearpoint Oread bestowed onto it - you go from a large first striker (which is a game winning threat) to a 2/2 first striker (which probably can't attack at all into most boards).
It won't stop you picking bestow creatures, you just want to aim a little more towards the swarm plan and away from the voltron plan when you have a reasonably close choice.
If you're losing you could always put everything in one pile to present a nice quandry for your opponent.
That's probably quite a strong play, actually!
The other sneaky split which might come up quite a bit is to put all your lands into the same pile if you have one or more expensive drops in hand but the game doesn't look like it's going to last long.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
--
(I'm on on this site much anymore. If you want to get in touch it's probably best to email me: dom@heffalumps.org)
Forum Awards: Best Writer 2005, Best Limited Strategist 2005-2012
5CB PotM - June 2005, November 2005, February 2006, April 2008, May 2008, Feb 2009
MTGSalvation Articles: 1-20, plus guest appearance on MTGCast #86!
<Limited Clan>
===
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dolphan View Post
If you're losing you could always put everything in one pile to present a nice quandry for your opponent.
That's probably quite a strong play, actually!
The other sneaky split which might come up quite a bit is to put all your lands into the same pile if you have one or more expensive drops in hand but the game doesn't look like it's going to last long.
===
*mischievous laughter* heeheehee, these two situations fill me with such glee, it's delightful!
here's an example of people using very analytical thought (ie you two) helping me have more fun with cards geared towards non-Spikes. thanks for the brilliant plans!!
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
----------------------------
Goblins have poor impulse control. Don't click this link!!
some of my favourite flavour text:
Wayward Soul "no home no heart no hope"
—Stronghold graffito
Raging Goblin He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.
I dunno that this card doesn't actually have some potential. Unlike most ridiculous chaos cards, this one puts a lot of things in your control and is best when you're losing.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
Let's crunch some numbers. We're going to play Whims of the Fates at the best possible time -- when your opponent is ahead and your odds of winning are approaching zero. You're playing this card to introduce some randomness and try to get back in the game thanks to a roll of the dice.
You can't do the 3 equal piles approach. You're losing. You're not getting back in this game by sacrificing 1/3 of the permanents on each side. (Also presumably your opponent is not an idiot, because you can't assume he's going to do something that favors you.)
You go with the extreme approach: 1 pile of all your permanents, 2 empty piles. Your opponent now has a decision to make.
If he copies you and goes extreme
44% chance that nothing happens -- you both get all your permanents back and you've just wasted a card and a turn so you're dead.
22% chance you blow up your own stuff and lose.
22% chance he blows up his stuff and you win.
11% chance you blow up the world and start the game over which is basically a crap shoot but you have technically improved your game state from inevitably losing to randomly topdecking stuff.
It's a 33% chance that your position improves. Assuming you were already losing badly, this is an acceptable deal.
If he goes with equal piles
33% chance you blow up your own stuff and you're dead
66% chance you keep your stuff and he loses 1/3 of his permanents. You've improved your game, but is it enough to win?
Strictly by the math, your opponent should probably copy you rather than go with 3 equal piles and give himself a 66% chance of losing the deal. If he's way ahead he might just go with the 3 piles, on the assumption that even 2 of his piles can still beat you. It's not something we can model with certainty.
Now the question becomes, when do you want to run a card that is only playable when your chance to win is <33%? Is that worth hurting you the times you draw it when you're ahead and it's a dead card? Bottom line: you only really want to play it in a complete trainwreck of a deck that you don't think can win most matchups anyway. In that kind of deck, at least it gives you a chance to randomly steal wins. It should never go in a good deck though, the odds just aren't in your favor since you have to make your piles first and your opponent gets to react.
I can't really imagine a deck that you can build around this, because it all comes down to the roll of the dice. You're not exactly making it "good" by putting it in a deck that will lose often. That's basically just playing the role of griefer where you'll lose most of your games and win a small percentage of them on nothing but a dice roll. If you think that's fun ... I guess go ahead and enjoy? But really you're just having fun at the expense of the other player who wanted to play a strategic game and you said NOPE I'M ROLLING A D10 TO SEE IF I WIN.
I think that Pull the Goalie is great. Not in a competitive sense of course, but it looks really fun. The game within the game! I don't think there is really any support to truly build around this card though. Maybe in conjunction with Tymaret, the Murder King? Of course, in draft, you would never be able to reliably arrange that.
However, if you think your deck has a win rate below 33%, it might make sense to run this. If you open a putrid sealed pool, then why not? I think that any time you are going to play this card, you want to choose 2 empty piles. After all, you're never going to want to play with this if you're ahead. Even if you're slightly behind, you might want to wait until true crunch time. Just like pulling the goalie in real life, even if you completely get bashed on the gambit, you were going to lose the game anyway.
The funniest scenario is pulling multiples of this in draft. At that point, just like with Door to Nothingness, it's an obligated build-around and you have to just go ham and may the odds be ever in your favor.
I have not put much thought in this card but pulled a foil and started to think how does this card actually work? On the face its straight forward but says nothing about what happens after the effect. I can put my auras in one pile and creatures in another pile. Afterwards can I put the auras on different creatures? What about a bestowed creature, does it stop being an aura when it goes into a pile even if the creature it was on is in the same pile? Or does it remain an aura and can go on a different creature when it comes back into play? Either wayThe Cheese Stands Alone would be a funny way to play this card.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
first turn
Nick: I lay a swamp, tap, dark ritual...
Me: If you cast a hypnotic specter I'll punch you in the face
Nick:...ahh I take 3 points of mana burn
The reason I play black according to CrovaxtheCursed:
You don't have to first pick whims of the fates. Unless your table is nothing but savages who rare-draft all of the time, it'll probably wheel. Even if you are drafting with goldbugs who infrequently pass rares, they'll likely take a pass on this one.
Fwiw you have to divide up your permanents *first*, which unfortunately makes the card even worse. I mean, still unplayable-other-than-for-lulz the other way around, but at least you would get to have a fun mind game of seeing how they divide and getting to decide how to respond.
You guys are missing a pretty big point. This card can blow up lands above everything else.
Because of that, if you build your deck in a way that you can keep playing stuff even after sacrificing 1/3 of your lands, the symmetrical effect benefits you. Imagine you're RG ramp and because of that when you and your opponent both have 6 manas in play you will have much more land and land searches cards in your hand then the opponent. Because of that, after loosing 1/3 of your lands you will quickly drop more and move on, while your opponent might get mana stuck.
Another application for this card is the Grixix control decks that play a lower count of permanents. In Grixix you will probably loose 2 lands or 2 lands + mnemonic wall or something like that, while your opponent will probably loose much more then that. It's super wild and unreliable but wonky decks are the best sealed decks - no one have a critical mass of good cards to kill fast or control consistently and you have a fixed pool of cards to freely explore synergy.
Really, it's pretty much like Wildfire. It's a lot weaker because this card give way too many options and way to many chances to be lucky but it follows the same principle of being more prepared to the land screw then your opponent's.
Which is all well and good, but that pesky randomness element means that no matter how prepared you are, sometimes it'll just do nothing to your opponent. It's a rare board where the opponent will be better off doing anything but just putting all his cards in the same pile and going all in, and in that case the card is a 6-mana effect that gives you a 1/3 chance to accomplish something like winning or stabilizing, and the rest of the time it'll be worse than useless.
Cards that manage to help less than 50% of the time are just not ever going to be playable.
Cards that manage to help less than 50% of the time are just not ever going to be playable.
This is completely false. Take this exercise:
Counter Argument R
Sorcery
Flip two coins. If you twice, win the game.
It only helps you 25% of time, but that's probably enough to be 4x in all Legacy decks, ever.
Six mana for 1/3 of winning the game, no matter what, is just huge, it's better chances then most bombs in the format except for stuff like Elspeth. Gladly, it's not what Whins of the Fates does, as dividing in three equal piles is the correct move by your opponent, if his winning.
Your arguments assume that both you and your opponent split your permanents into 3 equal piles. Problem is, you don't need to follow that rule. If you go with 3 equal piles first, then your opponent can go with 2 empty piles and the odds are in their favor.
The card you're analyzing is "Each player sacrifices 1/3 of their permanents." I agree that card might have some applications, but Whim is much worse than that card.
Also "1/3 chance of winning the game" is not correct. See my math above. If both players go with 2 empty piles, you still only have a 22% chance of winning because 1 out of 9 times you'll blow up everything. If you both go with equal piles, then it's tough to put any kind of odds on winning -- too many variables. Broadly speaking though, nobody wins because presumably you can both balance your piles in such a way that the penalty on each of you is equal.
I strongly disagree that a card with a ~20% chance of winning the game (at best) and a ~80% chance of being a 6 mana sorcery that does nothing good for you is a playable card. It's a really bad idea to play sorceries that, most of the time, don't have text.
I don't find Counter Argument very convincing, actually. It might be an interesting experiment for someone to proxy it up and build some decks with it, but I suspect Counter Argument would turn out to be pretty bad... you're ignoring that 75% of the time it costs one mana and puts you down a card in exchange for absolutely nothing.
Six mana for 1/3 of winning the game, no matter what, is just huge, it's better chances then most bombs in the format except for stuff like Elspeth.
It's really not. It's better than Lich's Mirror, I'll give you that. "If you would lose, instead you lose ~70% of the time" is certainly better than "If you would lose, instead sit around doing nothing for a couple turns, then lose." Neither is something you want, though, and there are plenty of cards that are probably as good or better at digging you out of holes without being uncastable the rest of the time.
Cards that manage to help less than 50% of the time are just not ever going to be playable.
This is completely false. Take this exercise:
Counter Argument R
Sorcery
Flip two coins. If you twice, win the game.
It only helps you 25% of time, but that's probably enough to be 4x in all Legacy decks, ever.
Six mana for 1/3 of winning the game, no matter what, is just huge, it's better chances then most bombs in the format except for stuff like Elspeth. Gladly, it's not what Whims of the Fates does, as dividing in three equal piles is the correct move by your opponent, if his winning.
Firstly, if Counter Argument cost 6 mana, it would never be played in Legacy, or anywhere. Even as is, only a few Legacy decks would be willing to sacrifice that many cards on something that will probably do nothing. Certainly not every Legacy deck ever. But fine, I'll concede that, given an obscene and unprintable power level, a card that has a positive effect less than 50% of the time could be successful.
Secondly, you have a 1/3 chance on the card doing something positive, not a 1/3 chance of it winning the game. There's only a 22% chance of that. More importantly, the card does nothing if it misses, and you will still have blown a card and your whole turn. You can say "maybe your opponent will split his cards differently than two empty piles" but the fact is that that's his choice, and if it's the correct choice, it's going to be because it gives him even better than a 67% chance to come out smelling like roses. The 2/3 chance of complete failure is the best-case scenario.
The more I think about this card, and as much as I hate spending time thinking about this card, I realize that even the 22% chance of a positive outcome is too high. From a game theory perspective, whichever player is winning wants to do 3 equal piles and whichever player is losing wants to take the 1 pile gambit.
If you're winning: you're giving your opponent a chance to win the 1 pile gambit and get back in the game, which is just stupid and the card should never be played when you're winning.
If you're losing: you can try the gambit, but your opponent will probably do 3 piles just to ensure he's still in the game no matter what. After all, you were already losing and you just wasted 6 mana, so even down some permanents your opponent has a good chance. He doesn't have to agree to play Russian Roulette with you. So you're giving yourself a 33% chance of suicide and a 67% chance of destroying some number of permanents but with no control over whether that actually gets you back in the game or is not enough.
The card probably does something positive about 5% of the time it's drawn: when you're not winning, and you don't kill yourself with it, and it destroys enough to get you back in the game.
Okay, I'm pretty down on this card, but that conclusion is fairly over the top. First, if you're winning, who cares what a card does? If we're looking for when the card makes a difference, then considering cases where we're already winning is irrelevant. Second, I have serious doubts that splitting three ways is a good idea ever, unless you're so far ahead that practically nothing would stop you. Doing so means that you're guaranteeing that the spell gives your opponent value, and that seems like a really improbable way to optimize your chances of winning.
The card is bad. Unplayably bad, even. But that doesn't mean that some significant chunk of games it gets played won't result in getting good value out of it. I'm pretty sure 22% is the absolute lower bound for how often this card is going to actually be played for value. Somewhere between 22% and 33% of the time, it will be good enough not to regret running.
I disagree: winning now doesn't mean winning the game. Having a dead card in hand reduce your future prospect. I also doubt losing 2 lands a few creatures, if you were winning, will suddenly put you that far back. It's a big blow but probably not an auto-loss since the player casting it was desperate enough to risk 33% auto-loss. Obviously, you need to make your piles intelligently. I'd put fewer lands in the piles were I put my best creatures.
First, if you're winning, who cares what a card does?
It doesn't help you close out the game in any way, therefore playing it over just about any other Magic card could cost you a game you were winning. Sure lots of cards are good when you're winning, but Whim definitely isn't. It's a liability. Including it in your deck is a good way to lose games you could have won just by closing out the game.
Winning now may not mean winning the game, but it does mean you aren't losing the game. If you do start losing the game, then suddenly the card becomes relevant and the discussion is moot.
Complaining that a card isn't win-more enough, is silly. The card is bad for a myriad of reasons. Do we really have to make up ones that don't make sense?
Okay, this is turning into a different discussion, but no. Cards that put you further ahead when you're already winning matter only in the case where they allow you to play around possible outs from your opponent. Winning by a lot isn't functionally different from winning by a little bit. It is typically an actively bad idea to play cards at all when you're definitively winning, because all you're doing is increasing the resources you have exposed to being answered somehow. This is where the concept of win-more comes from. If a card does something really impressive and wins you the game, it might seem good, but if the reality is that you were going to win anyway, it didn't actually do anything. At all. You would have actually been better off not playing it, from a strategic point of view.
The effect that a card has while you're winning is almost completely not a consideration, for any card, no matter how good or bad it is otherwise.
so, i'll probably only draft this set two or three times because of time and money reasons. and, unlike in doing my mtgo phantom sealed events, i'll likely draft to have my style of johnny-timmy FUN.
so i was poring over the spoilers, and the one card [albeit a rare] that jumped out at me was Whims of the Fates. i know if i open this first or second pack, i'll just HAVE to move into red and use this card!
my question is: what kind of deck makes the best use of this card, either
- for the lulz (if there's some really funny interaction that can be had with it), or
- trying to actually make best use of the card to /win/ with?
Goblins have poor impulse control. Don't click this link!!
some of my favourite flavour text:
Wayward Soul
"no home no heart no hope"
—Stronghold graffito
Raging Goblin
He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.
1) This must be at the top of your curve, because it's important that your deck continue to operate after you cast it.
2) You don't want to be playing much Bestow or other auras, since having to sac your powered-up creature would probably be a game-losing event.
I don't yet know what the BTT decks are going to look like exactly, but assuming the Theros decks haven't changed too much then W/R Humans is probably a good choice. Lots of cheap stuff, has an interest in disrupting the opponent's lands and doesn't usually run 6+ drops.
(The card is terrible in Limited, of course, but I expect you know that.)
(I'm on on this site much anymore. If you want to get in touch it's probably best to email me: dom@heffalumps.org)
Forum Awards: Best Writer 2005, Best Limited Strategist 2005-2012
5CB PotM - June 2005, November 2005, February 2006, April 2008, May 2008, Feb 2009
MTGSalvation Articles: 1-20, plus guest appearance on MTGCast #86!
<Limited Clan>
so if i'm trying to maximize effectiveness of this card in a RW heroic deck, i'm imagining that i split my creatures up (and my lands up) evenly between the three piles?
also -- is it so bad to sac the body of my voltron, if the other bestowed auras on it survive?
Goblins have poor impulse control. Don't click this link!!
some of my favourite flavour text:
Wayward Soul
"no home no heart no hope"
—Stronghold graffito
Raging Goblin
He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.
Yeah, it's fairly bad. Suppose you have something with a Spearpoint Oread bestowed onto it - you go from a large first striker (which is a game winning threat) to a 2/2 first striker (which probably can't attack at all into most boards).
It won't stop you picking bestow creatures, you just want to aim a little more towards the swarm plan and away from the voltron plan when you have a reasonably close choice.
That's probably quite a strong play, actually!
The other sneaky split which might come up quite a bit is to put all your lands into the same pile if you have one or more expensive drops in hand but the game doesn't look like it's going to last long.
(I'm on on this site much anymore. If you want to get in touch it's probably best to email me: dom@heffalumps.org)
Forum Awards: Best Writer 2005, Best Limited Strategist 2005-2012
5CB PotM - June 2005, November 2005, February 2006, April 2008, May 2008, Feb 2009
MTGSalvation Articles: 1-20, plus guest appearance on MTGCast #86!
<Limited Clan>
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dolphan View Post
If you're losing you could always put everything in one pile to present a nice quandry for your opponent.
That's probably quite a strong play, actually!
The other sneaky split which might come up quite a bit is to put all your lands into the same pile if you have one or more expensive drops in hand but the game doesn't look like it's going to last long.
===
*mischievous laughter* heeheehee, these two situations fill me with such glee, it's delightful!
here's an example of people using very analytical thought (ie you two) helping me have more fun with cards geared towards non-Spikes. thanks for the brilliant plans!!
Goblins have poor impulse control. Don't click this link!!
some of my favourite flavour text:
Wayward Soul
"no home no heart no hope"
—Stronghold graffito
Raging Goblin
He raged at the world, at his family, at his life. But mostly he just raged.
I'd experiment with it, at least.
You can't do the 3 equal piles approach. You're losing. You're not getting back in this game by sacrificing 1/3 of the permanents on each side. (Also presumably your opponent is not an idiot, because you can't assume he's going to do something that favors you.)
You go with the extreme approach: 1 pile of all your permanents, 2 empty piles. Your opponent now has a decision to make.
If he copies you and goes extreme
44% chance that nothing happens -- you both get all your permanents back and you've just wasted a card and a turn so you're dead.
22% chance you blow up your own stuff and lose.
22% chance he blows up his stuff and you win.
11% chance you blow up the world and start the game over which is basically a crap shoot but you have technically improved your game state from inevitably losing to randomly topdecking stuff.
It's a 33% chance that your position improves. Assuming you were already losing badly, this is an acceptable deal.
If he goes with equal piles
33% chance you blow up your own stuff and you're dead
66% chance you keep your stuff and he loses 1/3 of his permanents. You've improved your game, but is it enough to win?
Strictly by the math, your opponent should probably copy you rather than go with 3 equal piles and give himself a 66% chance of losing the deal. If he's way ahead he might just go with the 3 piles, on the assumption that even 2 of his piles can still beat you. It's not something we can model with certainty.
Now the question becomes, when do you want to run a card that is only playable when your chance to win is <33%? Is that worth hurting you the times you draw it when you're ahead and it's a dead card? Bottom line: you only really want to play it in a complete trainwreck of a deck that you don't think can win most matchups anyway. In that kind of deck, at least it gives you a chance to randomly steal wins. It should never go in a good deck though, the odds just aren't in your favor since you have to make your piles first and your opponent gets to react.
I can't really imagine a deck that you can build around this, because it all comes down to the roll of the dice. You're not exactly making it "good" by putting it in a deck that will lose often. That's basically just playing the role of griefer where you'll lose most of your games and win a small percentage of them on nothing but a dice roll. If you think that's fun ... I guess go ahead and enjoy? But really you're just having fun at the expense of the other player who wanted to play a strategic game and you said NOPE I'M ROLLING A D10 TO SEE IF I WIN.
However, if you think your deck has a win rate below 33%, it might make sense to run this. If you open a putrid sealed pool, then why not? I think that any time you are going to play this card, you want to choose 2 empty piles. After all, you're never going to want to play with this if you're ahead. Even if you're slightly behind, you might want to wait until true crunch time. Just like pulling the goalie in real life, even if you completely get bashed on the gambit, you were going to lose the game anyway.
The funniest scenario is pulling multiples of this in draft. At that point, just like with Door to Nothingness, it's an obligated build-around and you have to just go ham and may the odds be ever in your favor.
Nick: I lay a swamp, tap, dark ritual...
Me: If you cast a hypnotic specter I'll punch you in the face
Nick:...ahh I take 3 points of mana burn
The reason I play black according to CrovaxtheCursed:
Because of that, if you build your deck in a way that you can keep playing stuff even after sacrificing 1/3 of your lands, the symmetrical effect benefits you. Imagine you're RG ramp and because of that when you and your opponent both have 6 manas in play you will have much more land and land searches cards in your hand then the opponent. Because of that, after loosing 1/3 of your lands you will quickly drop more and move on, while your opponent might get mana stuck.
Another application for this card is the Grixix control decks that play a lower count of permanents. In Grixix you will probably loose 2 lands or 2 lands + mnemonic wall or something like that, while your opponent will probably loose much more then that. It's super wild and unreliable but wonky decks are the best sealed decks - no one have a critical mass of good cards to kill fast or control consistently and you have a fixed pool of cards to freely explore synergy.
Really, it's pretty much like Wildfire. It's a lot weaker because this card give way too many options and way to many chances to be lucky but it follows the same principle of being more prepared to the land screw then your opponent's.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras
Cards that manage to help less than 50% of the time are just not ever going to be playable.
This is completely false. Take this exercise:
Counter Argument R
Sorcery
Flip two coins. If you twice, win the game.
It only helps you 25% of time, but that's probably enough to be 4x in all Legacy decks, ever.
Six mana for 1/3 of winning the game, no matter what, is just huge, it's better chances then most bombs in the format except for stuff like Elspeth. Gladly, it's not what Whins of the Fates does, as dividing in three equal piles is the correct move by your opponent, if his winning.
BGU Control
R Aggro
Standard - For Fun
BG Auras
Your arguments assume that both you and your opponent split your permanents into 3 equal piles. Problem is, you don't need to follow that rule. If you go with 3 equal piles first, then your opponent can go with 2 empty piles and the odds are in their favor.
The card you're analyzing is "Each player sacrifices 1/3 of their permanents." I agree that card might have some applications, but Whim is much worse than that card.
Also "1/3 chance of winning the game" is not correct. See my math above. If both players go with 2 empty piles, you still only have a 22% chance of winning because 1 out of 9 times you'll blow up everything. If you both go with equal piles, then it's tough to put any kind of odds on winning -- too many variables. Broadly speaking though, nobody wins because presumably you can both balance your piles in such a way that the penalty on each of you is equal.
I strongly disagree that a card with a ~20% chance of winning the game (at best) and a ~80% chance of being a 6 mana sorcery that does nothing good for you is a playable card. It's a really bad idea to play sorceries that, most of the time, don't have text.
It's really not. It's better than Lich's Mirror, I'll give you that. "If you would lose, instead you lose ~70% of the time" is certainly better than "If you would lose, instead sit around doing nothing for a couple turns, then lose." Neither is something you want, though, and there are plenty of cards that are probably as good or better at digging you out of holes without being uncastable the rest of the time.
Firstly, if Counter Argument cost 6 mana, it would never be played in Legacy, or anywhere. Even as is, only a few Legacy decks would be willing to sacrifice that many cards on something that will probably do nothing. Certainly not every Legacy deck ever. But fine, I'll concede that, given an obscene and unprintable power level, a card that has a positive effect less than 50% of the time could be successful.
Secondly, you have a 1/3 chance on the card doing something positive, not a 1/3 chance of it winning the game. There's only a 22% chance of that. More importantly, the card does nothing if it misses, and you will still have blown a card and your whole turn. You can say "maybe your opponent will split his cards differently than two empty piles" but the fact is that that's his choice, and if it's the correct choice, it's going to be because it gives him even better than a 67% chance to come out smelling like roses. The 2/3 chance of complete failure is the best-case scenario.
If you're winning: you're giving your opponent a chance to win the 1 pile gambit and get back in the game, which is just stupid and the card should never be played when you're winning.
If you're losing: you can try the gambit, but your opponent will probably do 3 piles just to ensure he's still in the game no matter what. After all, you were already losing and you just wasted 6 mana, so even down some permanents your opponent has a good chance. He doesn't have to agree to play Russian Roulette with you. So you're giving yourself a 33% chance of suicide and a 67% chance of destroying some number of permanents but with no control over whether that actually gets you back in the game or is not enough.
The card probably does something positive about 5% of the time it's drawn: when you're not winning, and you don't kill yourself with it, and it destroys enough to get you back in the game.
The card is bad. Unplayably bad, even. But that doesn't mean that some significant chunk of games it gets played won't result in getting good value out of it. I'm pretty sure 22% is the absolute lower bound for how often this card is going to actually be played for value. Somewhere between 22% and 33% of the time, it will be good enough not to regret running.
It doesn't help you close out the game in any way, therefore playing it over just about any other Magic card could cost you a game you were winning. Sure lots of cards are good when you're winning, but Whim definitely isn't. It's a liability. Including it in your deck is a good way to lose games you could have won just by closing out the game.
Complaining that a card isn't win-more enough, is silly. The card is bad for a myriad of reasons. Do we really have to make up ones that don't make sense?
I'm not sure where you got that from. I don't think anyone ever suggested the card was good under any circumstances.
The effect that a card has while you're winning is almost completely not a consideration, for any card, no matter how good or bad it is otherwise.