If its triggered ability makes -1/-1 counters, you would be self-milled in a heartbeat if you had the other two out as they are mandatory. Locust makes a token, Scarab puts a -1/-1 counter on the token and it dies, Scorpion notes the death and draws you a card, repeat into infinity.
Yet with the other two, the scarab god likely has some synergy.
After a bit of thought, I am putting Solemnity in Zedruu for the Glacial Chasm/Mystic Remora/Delaying Shield, mostly as a secondary measure. Sure, it's powerful, but probably the more powerful side is the amount of opponents' counter-mayhems it severely hampers. (Hello, Atraxa.)
Also I will laugh my ass off if someone else wins riding their Glacial Chasm or Dark Depths and my Solemnity to victory.
I can imagine it now. Like you doing something like Lotus Petal + Sol Ring + Plains to hinder the Atraxa player and then the second player just casually drops a Dark Depths and now has their Marit Lage token out on their turn 1.
I read the article, its only in violation of rule #2 in that it doesn't create mana. I personally disagree with MaRo's antiquated design philosphy from fourteen years ago on the matter of the second rule because it cuts out actual creativity in order to have a more uniform approach to the land cards being designed because of an honestly bizarre fear that it would be too much like an artifact or enchantment. When what comes out that same year, months after that post? Artifact lands.
I want to entertain you and others with a bit of a thought experiment. Did you even read what you actually typed? As you are saying that this:
Remote Spring
Legendary Land (MR)
~ enters the battlefield tapped. U, T: Scry 1.
Is how it should be designed according to your instructions if you removed the Trek ability, slapped on legendary and bumped it up needlessly to mythic rare. In what sane world would this ever see the light of day as an official card?
Not only does it not provide mana resoruces to your pool, not only does it require a second land/mana dork/mana rock to use, not only is it 1:4 possible mythics in your booster box, not only does it come into play tapped but its also a legendary meaning you can only have one out at a time.
What a newbie draft trap card that would end up being. It would be one of the worst feelbad cards to crack from a pack as instead of a planeswalker or strong creature as your bomb, you cracked this land instead. Its monetary value alone would be dollar bin on the day it was spoiled from a leak or the mothership. It would create vitriol on the forums because of how terrible it rightfully was.
Good points. As I honestly can't see it being printed with those drawbacks. At best it would be a really janky card that would more likely end up as a coaster for someones drink.
Old Frames (1993-2002)
I love these the most. Honestly if WOTC did a single block in this style with black borders they would probably sell a lot more.
New Frames (2003-2014)
I was and am still upset that these became the norm for how frames looked for a decade.
Current Frames (2014-Present)
Frankly they look downright hideous design-wise.
Hopefully the game gets ironed out. There was a lot of complex artifacts in the game.
As someone who has played MTG, MTG is not as needlessly complicated with certain aspects when compared to L5R like attacking for starters.
FoodChainGoblins, why did you use to win/lose 100% against different strenght people? Was it beccause they had better cards, or because they were better at the game? And in the second case, was it about deck building or about playing?
I'm asking this because I have the impression that TCGs are a lot more building the deck than playing the game, so there's no much strategy involved.
If it's about deck building, also today there is the internet so deck-building principles are common knowledge.
Part of it was that they knew how to metagame and pilot their own decks flawlessly. They had more experience, including going to more PTQs, Pro Tours, and other high level Competitive REL tournaments than I did. I had only just started on Competitive REL. They chose better decks, yes, that was a big part.
But the other part was that they outplayed me. When they had good hands, they beat me to a pulp. It got to a point where I actually assumed that they had something, when in reality sometimes they just had nothing. This hesitating gave them time to get back into the game. They knew what decks were good, what matchups beat what, and so on. They just spent much more time in the game while I just casually play tested against myself and played at FNM, with a PTQ every 6 months or so.
You are right about nowadays. There are so many articles and so much is "common knowledge" that these little advantages are far fewer than long ago. I still remember during Tempest, going online and seeing what decks were performing on the Pro Level. Then I built the decks exactly and took them to FNM and crushed. Many people were just not willing to do this time online or purchase all of the play sets of cards that they needed. This, in combination with not being the best skilled players meant that their inferior deck would lose to my well-tuned deck, even if I didn't pilot it well. These kinds of advantages in Magic are mostly gone, apart from someone who hasn't really "done their homework" in the format.
Well Vintage is kind of dumb since games can end before you get to do anything.
False Claim. Go ahead watch a Vintage Tournament, it can last for quiet a few turns.
Vintage is not really an ideal competitive format since its way too explosive and games are extremely one-sided.
Yet that is what makes it more interesting to watch. Explosive and quick plays. You have to keep in mind the attention span of your audience, especially when filmed live for an audience.
This isnt to say that Vintage is always a one turn format...
Like you implied earlier within your same post?
...but games where people win usually involve them going off with Yawgmoth's Will or Oathing out a Griselbrand or something broken.
Yes, and there is also this thing called silver bullets aka Tech. Where you use specific cards to shut down specific strategies that you expect to face.
Legacy is nice since its balanced out enough to where both broken and non broken decks can exist and both be competitive.
Did you really just use the B-word? There is nothing "broken", all cards are working as intended. I will also say in advance, please don't use the O-word because a card or deck is strong. There is this thing called "Tiers", decks within that category are just frankly stronger than others. Don't be shocked if a janky Legacy deck you bring to a tournament doesn't do well.
In Legacy you got creature decks and non creature decks, there are legit choices in terms of strategy sides just doing one thing.
Yes as opposed to Vintage and its legitimate creature decks and non-creature decks or frankly for that matter commander or highlander pauper or peasant or modern or standard or draft or any other format for that matter. Certainly only Legacy.
Standard is sometimes okay, but I am not really loving how they have yet to cycle Mono Red out of standard for at least one season.
Now that is a facepalm-worthy statement. You are aware that in order for that to occur, the very color Red has to go against its own ethos. Red is and always has been about Speed and Destruction at its very core. If, metamphorically speaking, Mark Rosewater would have died yesterday he would be spinning in his grave right now if Red had went against that very ethos.
Fast games are not always good for Magic.
Says who? And that is just your opinion frankly.
If I want fast games, I'll play vintage or Yugioh, which neither I find to be a terribly good idea.
Behold as I lite your strawman argument on fire and then stamp it out with reason!
Your argument makes no sense as EVERY FORMAT in MTG has fast decks and slow decks. Have you ever actually played Modern or Legacy? Those formats tend to be dominated by fast decks. Even Commander and Highlander has fast decks.
What drew me into Magic in the first place was how long a game can go.
Yes as opposed to EVERY OTHER GAME in the HISTORY of MANKIND Where you can make moves and plays that can elongate the length of a game. Likewise you can make certain moves or plays that shorten the length of a game.
Legacy has plenty of fast games...
Oh now you acknowledge that Legacy has fast games which makes your previous argument involving Yugioh and MTG's Vintage an irrelevant point.
...but also many where players do nothing for a long time until one player can play around the others spells.
Playing lands and drawing cards isn't doing nothing.
That kind of variety is what makes magic good.
Are you backpedaling? I think you are. You were complaining earlier within your same post about how you wanted variety when it came to certain formats, colors, tournaments and decks. Which is it? Now your happy with the variety in the game? Then that makes say your previous point about Mono Red in standard a moot point.
Without that kind of variety takes away some of the soul of the game...
What variety are you talking about?
Decks? Formats? Colors? People? Local Game Stores? Tournaments?
You are being absurdly vague. This game has had many of these variety qualities since its conception since it was invented in 1993.
...which literally kind of kills the spirit of why the game was decent to begin with.
You actually what mate? The only thing that has been killing the game is the moaning and complaining from players who call out certain things within the game as "unfun" and goes against their perception of "the spirit of the game." You got to accept the good* with the bad*.
*: Good and bad are purely subjective in a card game such as MTG and not everyone will agree with your opinion on what is good or bad.
1) Except for Khans of Tarkir, every limited format since Gatecrash is getting too tempo based. They make removal cost too much mana and creatures way too good and bomby. The issue with these limited formats is that games end way too quickly. If you miss land drops, you are totally screwed. There isnt a lot of cheap cantrips anymore or cheap card filtering to balance out bad draws. I do not like how the R/D really believe that these are acceptable draft formats while testing since it makes me believe that they either A) have no clue what they are doing b) know that its bad and put it in the shelves anyway or c) they know that higher variance format sell better and design them inspite of how unbalanced they are.
As opposed to all those past Limited Formats like Odyssey or even Timespiral how missing a land drop can spell doom for you as your behind on tempo?
Bombastic creatures have always been a thing in Limited. The only thing that has changed is the power level.
This next point I agree with. In that there is not enough filtering and cantrips.
2) Legacy is becoming nonexistent. Legacy events barely fire on MTGO and they are not on every weekend on SCG. Wizards seems like they want to have nothing to do with the format. 3 GPs a year and 0 PT formats is a joke since it means that you can almost never play the format competitively outside of whatever your LGS decides to do. There is also the obvious price barrier. It is sad that MTG is so overpriced since even though it would be fun to play Legacy, I can do way more fun things with that kind of money.
Legacy is not becoming nonexistent as you put it, its becoming actually less popular. Legacy meet Vintage.
That is because they are promoting Modern aka Extended 2.0 which is a new and popular cash cow.
Modern isn't that far off from being overpriced either as it feeds into the supply and demand.
You can try to convince your LGS to host Legacy. As long as enough people show up for attendance it will be a hit.
Likewise, JacetheMindFoo. I can do more fun things than spend my money on overpriced Standard or Modern staples.
3) Modern is not a good competitive format. Wizards only bans cards to "shake up" the format since the ban list makes absolutely no sense and cards get banned always once a year. I cannot stand this and these were the reasons why I decided to quit Yugioh since cards should not just get randomly banned. I hear some pretty bad arguments about cards like JTMS or Deathrite of Bloodbraid banned. Jund was a solid deck when Modern first started, but it would not be the only good deck now. In a format where you can tap out and die on turn 4 to twin, these cards are far from "too good". Modern is not in a good place when they have Storm legal, but Ponder and Preordain legal. There is no good logic in making two cards that would help the rest of the format dramatically get banned, while keeping one random archtype lying around. Also, similar to Legacy, Modern is too damn expensive. Since Modern isnt even a good competitive format, its horrible to think of wasting more than 200 dollars on a deck, which is sad since any "competitive" Modern deck starts at 500+ dollars.
The banlist makes perfect sense. Plenty of the cards on that list tend to warp the format around itself.
Again, supply and demand, that is the reason certain cards cost so much.
lolwat? You know many of the staples you can use in Modern or Standard can also be used in Legacy/Vintage/Commander and vice versa.
4) Standard is fine but its obnoxious how hard WoTC is starting to push it. I dont mind playing the format once a while since sometimes its fun, but when they make Standard with such low power cards, its extremely boring to play. Similar to the same issues with Modern, when Standard only makes creature beatdown fests and doesnt print enough cards to make games much closer, its a garbage format to play. I dont get either why WoTC thinks Mono Red should be in every format, yet UW control shouldnt be. Apparantly 3-4 turn games are good for spectators, but 20+ turn games arent. Again, similar to why I quit Yugioh, I hate games that end by turns 3 to 4 just because Mono red gets the perfect draw. If I wanted a quick card game, I just play Yugioh again, which I wont ever do.
Standard is meant for new players as its the most likely product they will end up picking up.
Standard is always the most expensive format in MTG because pros who want to be competitive need to pony up more money for standard staples.
Mono Red is always a thing in Standard like other formats because: Its cheap, efficient and easy to pilot.
So I guess I shouldn't tell you how there is still OTK and Turn 2 Kill decks still in Yugioh and they are competitive?
5 Magic Online is pretty much dead. I used to love grinding out events on there and making a few bucks for sitting around and wasting some of my time. I would always get 35 QPs, play in the Premier Events, win a few other big events, even tried a few PTQs and came close, it was great. I wasnt trying to become a millionaire off MTGO sinice I have a job and go to school and am not all in on MTGO, but I enjoyed how good the competition was online. With the change in daily events, Wizards doesnt want smart people to waste their time on MTGO anymore. Wizards doesnt want MTGO to be competitive either, since when your prizes are bad, you arent going to draw the best competition. Wizards just wants stupid people to light their money on fire with MTGO. I just dont get why they dont want grinders on their program. Grinders put money back into the game with all of the Event Tickets they use and they also made the initial investment of buying the cards to get into it. Those grinders now will also tell other people that MTGO is a piece of garbage and not to use it, which if Wizards was worrying about something being "new player friendly", well they failed that goal already. Neutering daily events on MTGO was the worse thing they ever did and all its going to do is make less people interested in MTG in general.
Yes it is a shame that Wizards did that to daily events and tournaments.
Most communities involving a game tend to be toxic on some level.
6) "Magic Duels" is a pathetic excuse for a video game. I get that WoTC wants to copy Heartstone's business model, but Heartstone just sucks. I find it ironic when people say "Heartstone is better than MTGO since it has a better UI and I play it way more than MTGO." The reality is more like "I like Heartstone since its free and it makes my brain melt away." Similar again to why I dropped Yugioh, I do not like games that are too easy. I play games to exercise my brain. What drew me to Magic was how interesting and strategic it can get. Magic Duels really feels like I was playing Yugioh again. So much repetition and button mashing which is a shame.
Although it is semantics, Hearthstone copied the earlier iterations of Duels.
Hearthstone is a simpler game than MTG that is in fact on a lower power level when compared to MTG...its not Hearthstone outright sucks and is brain melting.
Magic Duels is for newer players who want to get into MTG. Its to get them hooked. You are already hooked on MTG.
7) Most of the Magic tournament structure is awful since it incentives you to play in a billion tournaments just to qualify for other tournaments. The SCG IQs at my LGS are a joke. All you win is a travel voucher to another tournament and a box and the entry fee is like 25-30 dollars. Oh boy, I can get a voucher so I can go waste 2 days to play MORE Magic, spend tons of Money on Hotels and eating out junk food, to possibly win something! How fun. I do not like how PTQQs have replaced PTQs. I loved when I could just travel to one tournament and maybe get into the PT or play in one MTGO tournament and spike a win. Now, its just play billions of rounds of Magic and get lucky, especially with Standard and Modern having more variance now more than ever, its either you been grandfathered into competitive MTG, or the flip of the coin you get to be on the Pro Circuit. Also, GPs are way too big and way too overcrowded. I just dont get how any sane person could be a "pro" since it sounds awful. I read an account of the guy who was on Avalanche Riders and he summed up his Magic career as one big trap that basically blanked his whole life. Granite, the guy wasnt totally upset, but he was not that happy that he spent his life on the game.
Well you enjoyed MTGO which serves as an alternative to traveling from place to place as you compete in tournaments.
Yeah that is kind of the point of a tournament. To knock out players so only the cream of the crop can rise.
Most tournaments can be considered a trap as you are spending literal Time and Money on a hobby. The difference is there are people who enjoy it and those whose candle has effectively burned out, their flame for the game is gone or has waned greatly. That is natural and that is human. It is just a sign you need to take a vacation from your hobby and pick up a new one so later on you can come back to the game with renewed interest at a later point.
Just because the GP has many people competing doesn't make it a bad thing, it actually shows the interest and attendance of the fanbase.
8) WoTC's mentality towards modern MTG. To sum it up in a few words, Wizards thinks that MTG has to be new player and family friendly. Their rational is probably that more simple minded people will buy Magic cards than those who have a decent brain. Making a game dumbed down for other people to understand is just further fulling modern gaming's idea that we should baby the world and everyone is entitled to winning. It seems like this is more Hasbro's decision than WoTC since this idea that money is more important than anything else is just toxic and extremely ignorant. People buy what you believe in life, not what you have. A company's product is secondary to what they actually sell. More people are likely to buy MTG because they are under a certain belief, not because its a game with Dragons and Angels since there is only a billion of those out there in existence.
Sacre bleu! You can't be serious. Yes they are trying to get more players into the game because that allows the game to thrive and keep coming out with more products. As again, people tend to get burnt out so the fanbase is constantly fluctuating.
Yes they are trying to make it more family friendly because, and hopefully this isn't a surprise to you, there are people who have been with this game for awhile and also got married and created an offspring. This offspring they want to bring into the game so it becomes more of a family activity.
Ah yes, the "dumbed down" argument. Its fairly self explanatory why I will not delve further into this point.
News Flash: In order for Hasbro to keep the lights on for Wizards of the Coast, they need to make money. If the company didn't make money, Magic Origins would have been the last set and MTG would die there because its not profitable to maintain the franchise outside of copyright.
Yet with the other two, the scarab god likely has some synergy.
That new 4UU sorcery that is like a Cyclonic Rift for one opponent.
I love these the most. Honestly if WOTC did a single block in this style with black borders they would probably sell a lot more.
New Frames (2003-2014)
I was and am still upset that these became the norm for how frames looked for a decade.
Current Frames (2014-Present)
Frankly they look downright hideous design-wise.
As someone who has played MTG, MTG is not as needlessly complicated with certain aspects when compared to L5R like attacking for starters.
Knowledge is power!
False Claim. Go ahead watch a Vintage Tournament, it can last for quiet a few turns.
Yet that is what makes it more interesting to watch. Explosive and quick plays. You have to keep in mind the attention span of your audience, especially when filmed live for an audience.
Like you implied earlier within your same post?
Yes, and there is also this thing called silver bullets aka Tech. Where you use specific cards to shut down specific strategies that you expect to face.
Did you really just use the B-word? There is nothing "broken", all cards are working as intended. I will also say in advance, please don't use the O-word because a card or deck is strong. There is this thing called "Tiers", decks within that category are just frankly stronger than others. Don't be shocked if a janky Legacy deck you bring to a tournament doesn't do well.
Yes as opposed to Vintage and its legitimate creature decks and non-creature decks or frankly for that matter commander or highlander pauper or peasant or modern or standard or draft or any other format for that matter. Certainly only Legacy.
Now that is a facepalm-worthy statement. You are aware that in order for that to occur, the very color Red has to go against its own ethos. Red is and always has been about Speed and Destruction at its very core. If, metamphorically speaking, Mark Rosewater would have died yesterday he would be spinning in his grave right now if Red had went against that very ethos.
Says who? And that is just your opinion frankly.
Behold as I lite your strawman argument on fire and then stamp it out with reason!
Your argument makes no sense as EVERY FORMAT in MTG has fast decks and slow decks. Have you ever actually played Modern or Legacy? Those formats tend to be dominated by fast decks. Even Commander and Highlander has fast decks.
Yes as opposed to EVERY OTHER GAME in the HISTORY of MANKIND Where you can make moves and plays that can elongate the length of a game. Likewise you can make certain moves or plays that shorten the length of a game.
Oh now you acknowledge that Legacy has fast games which makes your previous argument involving Yugioh and MTG's Vintage an irrelevant point.
Playing lands and drawing cards isn't doing nothing.
Are you backpedaling? I think you are. You were complaining earlier within your same post about how you wanted variety when it came to certain formats, colors, tournaments and decks. Which is it? Now your happy with the variety in the game? Then that makes say your previous point about Mono Red in standard a moot point.
What variety are you talking about?
Decks? Formats? Colors? People? Local Game Stores? Tournaments?
You are being absurdly vague. This game has had many of these variety qualities since its conception since it was invented in 1993.
You actually what mate? The only thing that has been killing the game is the moaning and complaining from players who call out certain things within the game as "unfun" and goes against their perception of "the spirit of the game." You got to accept the good* with the bad*.
*: Good and bad are purely subjective in a card game such as MTG and not everyone will agree with your opinion on what is good or bad.
As opposed to all those past Limited Formats like Odyssey or even Timespiral how missing a land drop can spell doom for you as your behind on tempo?
Bombastic creatures have always been a thing in Limited. The only thing that has changed is the power level.
This next point I agree with. In that there is not enough filtering and cantrips.
Legacy is not becoming nonexistent as you put it, its becoming actually less popular. Legacy meet Vintage.
That is because they are promoting Modern aka Extended 2.0 which is a new and popular cash cow.
Modern isn't that far off from being overpriced either as it feeds into the supply and demand.
You can try to convince your LGS to host Legacy. As long as enough people show up for attendance it will be a hit.
Likewise, JacetheMindFoo. I can do more fun things than spend my money on overpriced Standard or Modern staples.
The banlist makes perfect sense. Plenty of the cards on that list tend to warp the format around itself.
Again, supply and demand, that is the reason certain cards cost so much.
lolwat? You know many of the staples you can use in Modern or Standard can also be used in Legacy/Vintage/Commander and vice versa.
Standard is meant for new players as its the most likely product they will end up picking up.
Standard is always the most expensive format in MTG because pros who want to be competitive need to pony up more money for standard staples.
Mono Red is always a thing in Standard like other formats because: Its cheap, efficient and easy to pilot.
So I guess I shouldn't tell you how there is still OTK and Turn 2 Kill decks still in Yugioh and they are competitive?
Yes it is a shame that Wizards did that to daily events and tournaments.
Most communities involving a game tend to be toxic on some level.
Although it is semantics, Hearthstone copied the earlier iterations of Duels.
Hearthstone is a simpler game than MTG that is in fact on a lower power level when compared to MTG...its not Hearthstone outright sucks and is brain melting.
Magic Duels is for newer players who want to get into MTG. Its to get them hooked. You are already hooked on MTG.
Well you enjoyed MTGO which serves as an alternative to traveling from place to place as you compete in tournaments.
Yeah that is kind of the point of a tournament. To knock out players so only the cream of the crop can rise.
Most tournaments can be considered a trap as you are spending literal Time and Money on a hobby. The difference is there are people who enjoy it and those whose candle has effectively burned out, their flame for the game is gone or has waned greatly. That is natural and that is human. It is just a sign you need to take a vacation from your hobby and pick up a new one so later on you can come back to the game with renewed interest at a later point.
Just because the GP has many people competing doesn't make it a bad thing, it actually shows the interest and attendance of the fanbase.
Sacre bleu! You can't be serious. Yes they are trying to get more players into the game because that allows the game to thrive and keep coming out with more products. As again, people tend to get burnt out so the fanbase is constantly fluctuating.
Yes they are trying to make it more family friendly because, and hopefully this isn't a surprise to you, there are people who have been with this game for awhile and also got married and created an offspring. This offspring they want to bring into the game so it becomes more of a family activity.
Ah yes, the "dumbed down" argument. Its fairly self explanatory why I will not delve further into this point.
News Flash: In order for Hasbro to keep the lights on for Wizards of the Coast, they need to make money. If the company didn't make money, Magic Origins would have been the last set and MTG would die there because its not profitable to maintain the franchise outside of copyright.