So I know I'm avoiding standard until bfz and shadows rotates, but I'm curious about everyone else. Also, this has nothing to do with buying cards but rather if you are going to play the format.
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
i quit standard when skullclamp was legal so long ago.. i'd like to come back but the last set aren't really interesting and i see no point in buying them if not a couple of singles per block.. same with amonkhet
Actually yes. I really like the Embalm mechanic. Problem is I am going in with an intro pack. I play EDH too much to invest in something that will rotate out and Modern-Legacy kind of gets stale for me.
Yeah, my own feelings are this just isn't going to get me into playing standard again even on a casual basis. The main issue is BFZ still being legal means 8 Gideon will be a thing, and the set just strengthened the heck out of Saheeli combo thanks to the new cards it gets.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
No. Until MaRo et al shove their "its not fun for newbies" mentality up where the sun does not shine, I won't be playing standard. Hand destruction, land destruction, taxes and countrspells are all neutered under the "not fun" banner, so Mtg becomes "planeswalker and critters: the gathering", where its PWs, creatures and removal spells, and the best 2-3 decks are known in seconds, and completely unanswerable because you can't hit their hand or mana. The whole things stagates and every match is jund v jund- souless, grindy garbage and the unanswered planeswalker wins. Again.
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People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
I won't even consider it as long as Gideon, Ally of Zendikar is legal. That card is head and shoulders above the competition.
Shamefully SOI and EMN rotate with him so there will be a lot of very interesting cards that never had a chance.
No. Until MaRo et al shove their "its not fun for newbies" mentality up where the sun does not shine, I won't be playing standard. Hand destruction, land destruction, taxes and countrspells are all neutered under the "not fun" banner, so Mtg becomes "planeswalker and critters: the gathering", where its PWs, creatures and removal spells, and the best 2-3 decks are known in seconds, and completely unanswerable because you can't hit their hand or mana. The whole things stagates and every match is jund v jund- souless, grindy garbage and the unanswered planeswalker wins. Again.
Exactly. Its awful. They need to take a long, hard look at what made Ravnica standard so popular. 30 viable decks ranging from blistering aggro to grindy control to combo. A little something for everyone and in almost any color(s) you could want to play. THAT was Magic.
I won't even consider it as long as Gideon, Ally of Zendikar is legal. That card is head and shoulders above the competition.
Shamefully SOI and EMN rotate with him so there will be a lot of very interesting cards that never had a chance.
I never got a chance to even play the zombies deck because eldrazi and delirium basically killed them. Did get to play spirits for a while, though.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I am still playing standard but without any passion. My deck sucks against mardu vechicals and there is nothing I can do about it. It is good against everything else no real point putting the money into another deck because none of them are really any better against mardu vechicals.
It will spark my interest again in that I will start looking at how i can change my deck with the new cards then keep an eye out for a new deck that might be possible.
Nope, looks like another creature/planeswalker snooze fest ahead. They really do need to clean house with their development and design teams. They can cite their 'research' all they want, but I hope this is another flop for standard so they don't have any excuses with their control/combo are 'unfun' for players. It's not fun for others to just get rolled by power creep creatures with zero decent answers.
Nope, looks like another creature/planeswalker snooze fest ahead. They really do need to clean house with their development and design teams. They can cite their 'research' all they want, but I hope this is another flop for standard so they don't have any excuses with their control/combo are 'unfun' for players. It's not fun for others to just get rolled by power creep creatures with zero decent answers.
The trouble with these latest sets is that they aren't just badly designed with many mistake cards, they also went out of their way to make the magic story more apparent and then didn't have a very good story to tell at all. They turned planeswalkers into super heroes because god help us we don't have enough Marvel and DC in theaters already, threw legendaries around without any build up or explanation for who these characters are via a prior set, and are pushing planeswalkers as centerpieces for the set instead of something that actually fits the setting.
This may be a horrible example, but I'd have preferred it if they had some God Pharaoh Ramses knock off as the pushed mythic of the set instead of yet another Gideon Planeswalker card.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Would I play Standard due to this set? Not yet. You gotta have a power level closer to RTR/Khan's block to make it worth playing, and why would I play standard when I could jam Turns Modern?
Until such time as Control is a viable archetype and we dont have to stomach mindless creature games EVERY game, no thanks.
I think the font of the problem with the creature/planeswalker overfocus is that they're concentrating on excitement. At a guess, the new players they're trying to make the game fun for are looking for an excitement fix, and that's most easily attained with creature/planeswalker combat. The novices (at least, the greater part of the ones who mark green and red as novices' favorite colors; blue still seems to be the favorite of experienced players) aren't interested in a sedate experience. Which is what anything that tends even remotely towards the draw-go end of the spectrum may look like to them.
The trick is going to be to find the overlap point between novice and experienced, and focus on that. I'm wondering why in the world they're focusing so much on new players, though, at the expense of retaining the experienced.
For the record, my favorite colors are green and blue. Have been since the time of The Dark. Green's effective creatures, blue's stealth operations and counterspells...I like the combination. I also have to confess that my primary Commander design is a Yasova Dragonclaw deck whose red aspect partly focuses on messing around with who's blocking whom (Stand or Fall, Balduvian Warlord, Disharmony, etc.). Point being, I might be creature-focused myself...I will say that the burn themes in red bore me to undeath. There's a reason why, when I started, red was a decisive last place in my colors ranking. (My favorite card, by the way? Mystic Snake.)
As for the point about already having plenty of superhero-themed media in the cinemas...You do realize that's what inspired the Gatewatch conceit in the first place, right? WotC is trying to capitalize on that particular pop culture wave.
Short answer: given the spoilers so far, no. I played part of this standard season with various tower builds (I even experimented with seasons past) and they were fun for a while; but after the millionth game vs vehicles/catcombo I got really bored really fast.
I think there might be chances that the set helps nerf these decks. GY hate is somewhat interesting in order to battle scrounger, as does magma spray, but yet nothing to kill gideon or Heart of Kiran (currently, only the green cycler is an answer to HoK). Unfortunately, cat-combo did get some help, so I'm a bit underwhelmed at that.
The cartouches, for instance, are a missed opportunity. They would make sense as artifacts (they are jewelry after all), and they seem playable enough that it could have been the shot in the arm that the improvise mechanic needed. Maybe the temples help out with imprvise but...
I had hopes for amonkhet nerfing the top two decks, and so far it's not paying off. I expect that they'll ban nothing before the tour (if they were going to, they'd have done it already), but after the PT they might have no other option. I still hold out hope for the second half of the spoilers but...
As for the point about already having plenty of superhero-themed media in the cinemas...You do realize that's what inspired the Gatewatch conceit in the first place, right? WotC is trying to capitalize on that particular pop culture wave.
Two years old and stale "pop culture".
Don't be surprised if we have our "Suicide Squad" show up next year, and Elspeth coming back two years from Wonder Woman's premier if it's anywhere near successful.
WotC is the guy who tried to encore a joke fart, forced it for too long and pooed their pants.
I'll still play but I'm not going to invest much on this release. The new set is the same old bull***** - why do you think they had to toss Invocations *and* full art lands at higher rarity in there?
I like how the hivemind has caught up to what I've been saying since BFZ released. Lazy ******* designers.
I'll still play but I'm not going to invest much on this release. The new set is the same old bull***** - why do you think they had to toss Invocations *and* full art lands at higher rarity in there?
I like how the hivemind has caught up to what I've been saying since BFZ released. Lazy ******* designers.
Well yeah, and we still have Aron saying how wizards works on a two year cycle and how that is somehow an excuse for the problems we are seeing across the game as a whole. The entire management, distribution, and design of MtG is turning into a laughing stock of the entire games industry. They can't make modern affordable and available to the player base to the point that Hareyuya had to create a format to cater to their region to avoid millionaire pay to win scenarios. Constructed play has been a disaster ever since they tried moving to a format that has no core sets and just 2 set blocks. The new emphasis on story instead of good flavor is a travesty, as I'd rather have cards like All Hallow's Eve in flavor than cards like Chandra's Ignition.
The trouble is there is literally no stop to the things people can go into rants about with magic. The game didn't need a lot of the extra clout they are trying to cram into it, but the people in charge seem to think this is the only way to market to the next generation of players. The entire original idea of Magic is that it was a universe where in the center we had the core world of Dominaria (hence the core set), and then had spin off planes around it with unique mechanics, which would eventually bubble into Dominaria (hence the core set).
The other major problem is the planeswalkers and the whole idea of the "spark". Urza, the original planeswalker, gained his ability through one of the most devastating events in the entire story of magic, which was the brothers war. The reason he got to become a planeswalker is that magics and artifice used were so world shaping that the end result morphed Urza himself. The newer walkers all basically earned their abilities through personal crisis, so I suppose that means that the universe just happened to grow sentient and decided that if some random joe has a serious mental break down and is a mage that is good enough to be a walker? Or they just really like to hunt a lot?
There just isn't any other game out there that has lost it's sense of vision as much as MtG, and that isn't going into the financial side of things with the company having made promises that are the poison to the game as a whole. Their inability to react fast enough to address issues in combination with the prior points has brought the same passive bitterness that exists right now in World of Warcraft.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The other major problem is the planeswalkers and the whole idea of the "spark". Urza, the original planeswalker, gained his ability through one of the most devastating events in the entire story of magic, which was the brothers war. The reason he got to become a planeswalker is that magics and artifice used were so world shaping that the end result morphed Urza himself. The newer walkers all basically earned their abilities through personal crisis, so I suppose that means that the universe just happened to grow sentient and decided that if some random joe has a serious mental break down and is a mage that is good enough to be a walker? Or they just really like to hunt a lot?
Arguably, the problem you speak of predated the planeswalker card type. Remember that the players themselves are taking the role of planeswalkers. Have been since the game was conceived of, before Urza was written to have become one. And I don't think you can come up with enough Brothers' War-caliber crises to explain the numbers, not without wrecking the Blind Eternities themselves. (Now, had they let the players take the role of more modest mages...Then again, I wonder how much distinction Garfield put between mages and planeswalkers.)
As to the financial issues...{sigh} I never was a fan of the mythic rarity, but that one isn't entirely WotC's fault. I think I remember Rosewater saying that it was impelled upon them by Hasbro, as a way to catch up to the industry standard of more than three rarities (a train of logic I still can't fathom. What's so important about being standard?). Although I think my objection was/is more on the unique side, that it reduces the number of cards a set can have (q.v. how rares and mythics are laid out on the rare card sheet). Now, regarding the dispelling of the core sets...I'm not sure why its sales were lower than expansions', or if it was so much lower that it would really justify changing to the new format (although, I'm not convinced creative was having that much trouble extrapolating new mechanics into three-set blocks. At least, I didn't see anything to suggest it. Maybe I wasn't looking hard enough?). Were Hasbro's shareholders threatening to jump ship?
EDIT: Now I remember the situation with the changing of the nature of the spark--WotC's writers were finding it difficult to write planeswalkers in a way players could identify with, so they lowered the spark's potency. (I still don't get why vicariousness is something to assign importance to...) Although given that the Kamigawa and Ravnica storylines did just fine without a planeswalker in sight, I suppose they could have just made planeswalker appearances more sparing, instead.
I'll toss this out there - Magic isn't a speedboat, it's a supertanker. And the reversal in the trend of growth to stagnation (maybe even decline) should be worrisome to everyone. As that trend will not reverse overnight.
I'll toss this out there - Magic isn't a speedboat, it's a supertanker. And the reversal in the trend of growth to stagnation (maybe even decline) should be worrisome to everyone. As that trend will not reverse overnight.
Winter is coming.
This is where that 2 year cycle really kills them. The challenge logistically is that they need a contingency plan if things fall through and right now given how they have done the set releases they don't seem to have the flexibility to deal with bad design issues in a timely fashion. They basically time capsule themselves and pray to the gods that whatever Q&A testing they are doing is good enough to catch troubles before products hit the shelves and while counters for the current standard did show up in Amonkhet, this was planned before ever seeing or knowing about some of the problems Kaladesh was going to cause.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
The other major problem is the planeswalkers and the whole idea of the "spark". Urza, the original planeswalker, gained his ability through one of the most devastating events in the entire story of magic, which was the brothers war. The reason he got to become a planeswalker is that magics and artifice used were so world shaping that the end result morphed Urza himself. The newer walkers all basically earned their abilities through personal crisis, so I suppose that means that the universe just happened to grow sentient and decided that if some random joe has a serious mental break down and is a mage that is good enough to be a walker? Or they just really like to hunt a lot?
Arguably, the problem you speak of predated the planeswalker card type. Remember that the players themselves are taking the role of planeswalkers. Have been since the game was conceived of, before Urza was written to have become one. And I don't think you can come up with enough Brothers' War-caliber crises to explain the numbers, not without wrecking the Blind Eternities themselves. (Now, had they let the players take the role of more modest mages...Then again, I wonder how much distinction Garfield put between mages and planeswalkers.)
As to the financial issues...{sigh} I never was a fan of the mythic rarity, but that one isn't entirely WotC's fault. I think I remember Rosewater saying that it was impelled upon them by Hasbro, as a way to catch up to the industry standard of more than three rarities (a train of logic I still can't fathom. What's so important about being standard?). Although I think my objection was/is more on the unique side, that it reduces the number of cards a set can have (q.v. how rares and mythics are laid out on the rare card sheet). Now, regarding the dispelling of the core sets...I'm not sure why its sales were lower than expansions', or if it was so much lower that it would really justify changing to the new format (although, I'm not convinced creative was having that much trouble extrapolating new mechanics into three-set blocks. At least, I didn't see anything to suggest it. Maybe I wasn't looking hard enough?). Were Hasbro's shareholders threatening to jump ship?
EDIT: Now I remember the situation with the changing of the nature of the spark--WotC's writers were finding it difficult to write planeswalkers in a way players could identify with, so they lowered the spark's potency. (I still don't get why vicariousness is something to assign importance to...) Although given that the Kamigawa and Ravnica storylines did just fine without a planeswalker in sight, I suppose they could have just made planeswalker appearances more sparing, instead.
I tried to cut out text but my phone isn't cooperating with me. Sorry.
Isn't Mythic Rare a direct result of the Yu-Gi-Oh nonsense with its ultra-rare and secret-rare and double secret rare garbage they foist on collectors? I perceive some of the more recent power creatures like Eldrazi as spin offs from YGO's super mega triple monsters that refuse to die under any circumstance as well. In addition, didn't YGO break some world record with the highest attendance at a tournament? Not sure when that was.
All of these must be influencing WotC more than anyone cares to admit.
The company isn't living in a vacuum so they probably did get influenced by the success of other games. On the upside they haven't done any fanservice pandering like in Force of Will where over 50% of the cards are a-typical scantily clad / skin-tight suit women. That's basically a sure fire sign the game in Japan is being targeted at male teens and it's probably one of the big things holding that game back in the states. The USA is less averse to blood and gun violence than nudity and sexually suggestive artwork, and people here favor angry / aggressive looking characters vs the cheerful / happy characters of Japan and Europe.
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I would honestly like to go to the prerelease or at least a sealed event of Amonkhet. Exert by itself is reason enough for me to try out a new deck. I like to make one at least once per block and it will probably center around that mechanic.
That being said I still don't have the time or money to invest in Standard tournaments.
I agree with the "people will rant about anything" comment.
Magic hasn't completely lost its goal, have you seen Pokemon printing out pokemon with the same name, art, and attacks but with stronger attack? I have. If mark rosewater tried to update old cards like that players would be at the office with pitch forks and torches.
Worse yet, on the topic of losing way: are we really crabbing about Invocations? Sure, I feel bad that the collection was not just instants and sorceries, but about time. I also agree that the font could have been better and that I also preferred the Kaladesh Inventions' border over Amonkhet's Invocations', but I'm not going to cry like a toddler just because it looks slightly different on cards I will probably never open. We survived Future Sight, we'll survive this too. Egyptian borders aren't game-changing. Unreadable font might be, but even with my widescreen monitor, these pictures are smaller than the actual cards AND I could still read them after getting used to the characters.
I strongly agree with the confusion of losing a core set. I THINK that the masters sets released in the summer are supposed to be not just a money grab but a way to give newer players a chance at getting older, higher grade cards. That being said, we still need a strong place to get common staples like two mana creature removal, mana dorks, and artifact/enchantment removal. My fix for this would be to continue with the hidden M16 Wizards created for the Magic toolbox to include such staples as well. These common cards were originally created to be massively available to the gamers to level the playing field and provide the help needed.
Here is what every set needs: good aggro, good midrange, good control. The problem (as I mentioned in other posts, and someone at channelfireball mentioned as well, i forgot who he was) is that wotc blurred the lines between these and now its all just flavors of midrange.
Let me give an exampel of what I meant. First, some definitions. You might not agree 100% with them, but broadly spekaing an archetype is defined by how it transforms one resource ot another.
1) Aggro are decks focused on turning cards into damage asap. Typically you have high/low P/T ratio, hasty dudes for 1 or 2 mana (basically, every card that is not an actual shock/bolt is a 2 or 3 power creature with haste... "a bolt on a stick" if you will). Tops curve at 3 mana. Gets no card advantage. It either kills on turn 4 with the top 11-12 cards from its library, or loses the game.
2) Midrange is the archetype that trades its own life points and mana for resilient permanents; then it uses those permanents to end the game asap. Generally it has the most efficient dudes in P/T terms, and can grind out many 2-for-1s (generally in the form of creatures that trade favorably with removal, or permanents that provide a slow, but steady, stream of cards). Since midrange accures card advantage "drop by drop", it wants to go long vs aggro but end the game quik vs decks that can get massive bursts of CA.
3) Control is about trading all it resources (life points and mana) for card advantage. whereas midrange gets CA "by the drop", control generates ever increasing waves of CA (compare, for instance, phyrexian arena to sphinx's revelation: arena provides 1 card per turn, for a certain numebr of turns, Rev can provide all those cards at once.)
Look at mardu vehicles. Is it control? Hell no! It's not focused on trading its life and mana for extra cards in hand. Is it aggro? Not really, since its plan is not "trade my cards for your life points" its plan is solidly midrange: trade my mana for resilient permanents (vehicles, gideons) and slowly start churning out card advantage via scrounger, inspector clues, and gideon tokens. It is an agressive version of midrange, but if you analyze the resources it trades, it is asquarely a midrange deck.
Same for copycat. It is a combo version of midrange, but it is midrange nonetheless. Early on, the copycat player trades his life points for a board position that provides a slow, steady stream card advantage (virtuosos, refiners and oaths, copied by saheeli or blinked by guardian). It then kills you with that stream of CA (pumping out thopters, or running you out of gas by copying refiners, and beating you down with whatever is left over). The combo is actually just a side-effect.
The problem with standard is not the lack of variety in decks. Its the lack of variety in archetypes. Bring back blazing fast aggro and glacially slow control, and let them share the stage iwth midrange. That will really make the environment more interesting and attract players back.
I have never played standard in any serious way, but I've been around forever, and people are always complaining about the current environment. Then again, I've seen more than the usual amount of complaining, and it may be an indicator of deeper problems.
I've always thought their concept of printing flagship cards that are immune to traditional principals of balance was poor, and led to some abysmally designed cards that were very bad for their respective formats. Jace, the Mind Sculptor is the most obvious example. But these cards aren't always problematic: Grave Titan is very poorly designed, and gives absolutely no respect to principals of card balance, but it didn't really hurt the format (if memory serves).
The current issue seems to this onlooker to be a repetition of this trend. We have a few poorly designed cards that are overpushed to the point of excluding everything else, and ... nothing else. Would the format be better if every mythic were banned? If so, then they should reexamine how they approach printing powerful cards.
So then, what was the last healthy standard environment? When was the last time a large number of decks were viable? Is it possible you're asking for too much? Or is it possible your asking for all the wrong things?
We can point to some obvious mistakes, but the principals behind the mistakes are the bigger problem. The real problem may simply be that they are a year too slow. Then again, that slow nature is what allows for the testing that keeps power in check, and keeps things like misprints and errors to a minimum. Notice that we never get things like the Serendib Efreet error anymore.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
URW PillowFort Stasis (costruction)
modern:
U Taking Turns combo
pauper:
UB Servitor Control
xenob8 : you know you are going to have a bad time when opponent starts with snow covered island
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Shamefully SOI and EMN rotate with him so there will be a lot of very interesting cards that never had a chance.
I never got a chance to even play the zombies deck because eldrazi and delirium basically killed them. Did get to play spirits for a while, though.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
It will spark my interest again in that I will start looking at how i can change my deck with the new cards then keep an eye out for a new deck that might be possible.
Pioneer:UR Pheonix
Modern:U Mono U Tron
EDH
GB Glissa, the traitor: Army of Cans
UW Dragonlord Ojutai: Dragonlord NOjutai
UWGDerevi, Empyrial Tactician "you cannot fight the storm"
R Zirilan of the claw. The solution to every problem is dragons
UB Etrata, the Silencer Cloning assassination
Peasant cube: Cards I own
The trouble with these latest sets is that they aren't just badly designed with many mistake cards, they also went out of their way to make the magic story more apparent and then didn't have a very good story to tell at all. They turned planeswalkers into super heroes because god help us we don't have enough Marvel and DC in theaters already, threw legendaries around without any build up or explanation for who these characters are via a prior set, and are pushing planeswalkers as centerpieces for the set instead of something that actually fits the setting.
This may be a horrible example, but I'd have preferred it if they had some God Pharaoh Ramses knock off as the pushed mythic of the set instead of yet another Gideon Planeswalker card.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Until such time as Control is a viable archetype and we dont have to stomach mindless creature games EVERY game, no thanks.
Spirits
The trick is going to be to find the overlap point between novice and experienced, and focus on that. I'm wondering why in the world they're focusing so much on new players, though, at the expense of retaining the experienced.
For the record, my favorite colors are green and blue. Have been since the time of The Dark. Green's effective creatures, blue's stealth operations and counterspells...I like the combination. I also have to confess that my primary Commander design is a Yasova Dragonclaw deck whose red aspect partly focuses on messing around with who's blocking whom (Stand or Fall, Balduvian Warlord, Disharmony, etc.). Point being, I might be creature-focused myself...I will say that the burn themes in red bore me to undeath. There's a reason why, when I started, red was a decisive last place in my colors ranking. (My favorite card, by the way? Mystic Snake.)
As for the point about already having plenty of superhero-themed media in the cinemas...You do realize that's what inspired the Gatewatch conceit in the first place, right? WotC is trying to capitalize on that particular pop culture wave.
I think there might be chances that the set helps nerf these decks. GY hate is somewhat interesting in order to battle scrounger, as does magma spray, but yet nothing to kill gideon or Heart of Kiran (currently, only the green cycler is an answer to HoK). Unfortunately, cat-combo did get some help, so I'm a bit underwhelmed at that.
The cartouches, for instance, are a missed opportunity. They would make sense as artifacts (they are jewelry after all), and they seem playable enough that it could have been the shot in the arm that the improvise mechanic needed. Maybe the temples help out with imprvise but...
I had hopes for amonkhet nerfing the top two decks, and so far it's not paying off. I expect that they'll ban nothing before the tour (if they were going to, they'd have done it already), but after the PT they might have no other option. I still hold out hope for the second half of the spoilers but...
Two years old and stale "pop culture".
Don't be surprised if we have our "Suicide Squad" show up next year, and Elspeth coming back two years from Wonder Woman's premier if it's anywhere near successful.
WotC is the guy who tried to encore a joke fart, forced it for too long and pooed their pants.
I like how the hivemind has caught up to what I've been saying since BFZ released. Lazy ******* designers.
Well yeah, and we still have Aron saying how wizards works on a two year cycle and how that is somehow an excuse for the problems we are seeing across the game as a whole. The entire management, distribution, and design of MtG is turning into a laughing stock of the entire games industry. They can't make modern affordable and available to the player base to the point that Hareyuya had to create a format to cater to their region to avoid millionaire pay to win scenarios. Constructed play has been a disaster ever since they tried moving to a format that has no core sets and just 2 set blocks. The new emphasis on story instead of good flavor is a travesty, as I'd rather have cards like All Hallow's Eve in flavor than cards like Chandra's Ignition.
The trouble is there is literally no stop to the things people can go into rants about with magic. The game didn't need a lot of the extra clout they are trying to cram into it, but the people in charge seem to think this is the only way to market to the next generation of players. The entire original idea of Magic is that it was a universe where in the center we had the core world of Dominaria (hence the core set), and then had spin off planes around it with unique mechanics, which would eventually bubble into Dominaria (hence the core set).
The other major problem is the planeswalkers and the whole idea of the "spark". Urza, the original planeswalker, gained his ability through one of the most devastating events in the entire story of magic, which was the brothers war. The reason he got to become a planeswalker is that magics and artifice used were so world shaping that the end result morphed Urza himself. The newer walkers all basically earned their abilities through personal crisis, so I suppose that means that the universe just happened to grow sentient and decided that if some random joe has a serious mental break down and is a mage that is good enough to be a walker? Or they just really like to hunt a lot?
There just isn't any other game out there that has lost it's sense of vision as much as MtG, and that isn't going into the financial side of things with the company having made promises that are the poison to the game as a whole. Their inability to react fast enough to address issues in combination with the prior points has brought the same passive bitterness that exists right now in World of Warcraft.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
Arguably, the problem you speak of predated the planeswalker card type. Remember that the players themselves are taking the role of planeswalkers. Have been since the game was conceived of, before Urza was written to have become one. And I don't think you can come up with enough Brothers' War-caliber crises to explain the numbers, not without wrecking the Blind Eternities themselves. (Now, had they let the players take the role of more modest mages...Then again, I wonder how much distinction Garfield put between mages and planeswalkers.)
As to the financial issues...{sigh} I never was a fan of the mythic rarity, but that one isn't entirely WotC's fault. I think I remember Rosewater saying that it was impelled upon them by Hasbro, as a way to catch up to the industry standard of more than three rarities (a train of logic I still can't fathom. What's so important about being standard?). Although I think my objection was/is more on the unique side, that it reduces the number of cards a set can have (q.v. how rares and mythics are laid out on the rare card sheet). Now, regarding the dispelling of the core sets...I'm not sure why its sales were lower than expansions', or if it was so much lower that it would really justify changing to the new format (although, I'm not convinced creative was having that much trouble extrapolating new mechanics into three-set blocks. At least, I didn't see anything to suggest it. Maybe I wasn't looking hard enough?). Were Hasbro's shareholders threatening to jump ship?
EDIT: Now I remember the situation with the changing of the nature of the spark--WotC's writers were finding it difficult to write planeswalkers in a way players could identify with, so they lowered the spark's potency. (I still don't get why vicariousness is something to assign importance to...) Although given that the Kamigawa and Ravnica storylines did just fine without a planeswalker in sight, I suppose they could have just made planeswalker appearances more sparing, instead.
Winter is coming.
This is where that 2 year cycle really kills them. The challenge logistically is that they need a contingency plan if things fall through and right now given how they have done the set releases they don't seem to have the flexibility to deal with bad design issues in a timely fashion. They basically time capsule themselves and pray to the gods that whatever Q&A testing they are doing is good enough to catch troubles before products hit the shelves and while counters for the current standard did show up in Amonkhet, this was planned before ever seeing or knowing about some of the problems Kaladesh was going to cause.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
I tried to cut out text but my phone isn't cooperating with me. Sorry.
Isn't Mythic Rare a direct result of the Yu-Gi-Oh nonsense with its ultra-rare and secret-rare and double secret rare garbage they foist on collectors? I perceive some of the more recent power creatures like Eldrazi as spin offs from YGO's super mega triple monsters that refuse to die under any circumstance as well. In addition, didn't YGO break some world record with the highest attendance at a tournament? Not sure when that was.
All of these must be influencing WotC more than anyone cares to admit.
1. (Ravnica Allegiance): You can't keep a good esper control deck down... Or Wilderness Reclamation... or Gates...
2. (War of the Spark): Guys, I know what we need! We need a cycle of really idiotic flavor text victory cards! Jace's Triumph...
3. (War of the Spark): Lets make the format with control have even more control!
That being said I still don't have the time or money to invest in Standard tournaments.
I agree with the "people will rant about anything" comment.
Magic hasn't completely lost its goal, have you seen Pokemon printing out pokemon with the same name, art, and attacks but with stronger attack? I have. If mark rosewater tried to update old cards like that players would be at the office with pitch forks and torches.
Worse yet, on the topic of losing way: are we really crabbing about Invocations? Sure, I feel bad that the collection was not just instants and sorceries, but about time. I also agree that the font could have been better and that I also preferred the Kaladesh Inventions' border over Amonkhet's Invocations', but I'm not going to cry like a toddler just because it looks slightly different on cards I will probably never open. We survived Future Sight, we'll survive this too. Egyptian borders aren't game-changing. Unreadable font might be, but even with my widescreen monitor, these pictures are smaller than the actual cards AND I could still read them after getting used to the characters.
I strongly agree with the confusion of losing a core set. I THINK that the masters sets released in the summer are supposed to be not just a money grab but a way to give newer players a chance at getting older, higher grade cards. That being said, we still need a strong place to get common staples like two mana creature removal, mana dorks, and artifact/enchantment removal. My fix for this would be to continue with the hidden M16 Wizards created for the Magic toolbox to include such staples as well. These common cards were originally created to be massively available to the gamers to level the playing field and provide the help needed.
Let me give an exampel of what I meant. First, some definitions. You might not agree 100% with them, but broadly spekaing an archetype is defined by how it transforms one resource ot another.
1) Aggro are decks focused on turning cards into damage asap. Typically you have high/low P/T ratio, hasty dudes for 1 or 2 mana (basically, every card that is not an actual shock/bolt is a 2 or 3 power creature with haste... "a bolt on a stick" if you will). Tops curve at 3 mana. Gets no card advantage. It either kills on turn 4 with the top 11-12 cards from its library, or loses the game.
2) Midrange is the archetype that trades its own life points and mana for resilient permanents; then it uses those permanents to end the game asap. Generally it has the most efficient dudes in P/T terms, and can grind out many 2-for-1s (generally in the form of creatures that trade favorably with removal, or permanents that provide a slow, but steady, stream of cards). Since midrange accures card advantage "drop by drop", it wants to go long vs aggro but end the game quik vs decks that can get massive bursts of CA.
3) Control is about trading all it resources (life points and mana) for card advantage. whereas midrange gets CA "by the drop", control generates ever increasing waves of CA (compare, for instance, phyrexian arena to sphinx's revelation: arena provides 1 card per turn, for a certain numebr of turns, Rev can provide all those cards at once.)
Look at mardu vehicles. Is it control? Hell no! It's not focused on trading its life and mana for extra cards in hand. Is it aggro? Not really, since its plan is not "trade my cards for your life points" its plan is solidly midrange: trade my mana for resilient permanents (vehicles, gideons) and slowly start churning out card advantage via scrounger, inspector clues, and gideon tokens. It is an agressive version of midrange, but if you analyze the resources it trades, it is asquarely a midrange deck.
Same for copycat. It is a combo version of midrange, but it is midrange nonetheless. Early on, the copycat player trades his life points for a board position that provides a slow, steady stream card advantage (virtuosos, refiners and oaths, copied by saheeli or blinked by guardian). It then kills you with that stream of CA (pumping out thopters, or running you out of gas by copying refiners, and beating you down with whatever is left over). The combo is actually just a side-effect.
The problem with standard is not the lack of variety in decks. Its the lack of variety in archetypes. Bring back blazing fast aggro and glacially slow control, and let them share the stage iwth midrange. That will really make the environment more interesting and attract players back.
I've always thought their concept of printing flagship cards that are immune to traditional principals of balance was poor, and led to some abysmally designed cards that were very bad for their respective formats. Jace, the Mind Sculptor is the most obvious example. But these cards aren't always problematic: Grave Titan is very poorly designed, and gives absolutely no respect to principals of card balance, but it didn't really hurt the format (if memory serves).
The current issue seems to this onlooker to be a repetition of this trend. We have a few poorly designed cards that are overpushed to the point of excluding everything else, and ... nothing else. Would the format be better if every mythic were banned? If so, then they should reexamine how they approach printing powerful cards.
So then, what was the last healthy standard environment? When was the last time a large number of decks were viable? Is it possible you're asking for too much? Or is it possible your asking for all the wrong things?
We can point to some obvious mistakes, but the principals behind the mistakes are the bigger problem. The real problem may simply be that they are a year too slow. Then again, that slow nature is what allows for the testing that keeps power in check, and keeps things like misprints and errors to a minimum. Notice that we never get things like the Serendib Efreet error anymore.
Low-power cube enthusiast!
My 1570 card cube (no longer updated)
My 415 Peasant+ Artifact and Enchantment Cube
Ever-Expanding "Just throw it in" cube.