Colt I can see you get it but several posters were talking about power creep and creatures in a general way instead of pointing right at the source of the problem.
That's kind of beggingvthe question, because there is no consensus as to what the source of the problem is. This is all speculation.
I believe it is a possibility that "power creep and creatures In General" (more so the nerfing of everything else) might in fact be the source of the problem. Yes, it worked in the past, but it's not 2013 anymore. The player base is now more established (a lower percentage of the players are new), plus the whole model of a 90%+ midrange meta is no longer fresh.
They can develop a set however they want, really. If they wanted to make a game more about spells and not creatures it's actually rather strait forward, but they got into a rut and didn't want to get out of it with focusing so much on creature combat. The problem that they will hopefully be solving with big sets is the need to make so many draft only cards to fill out holes in strategies due to having only some of the cards in the first set. Also assuming they do this right, a single large set will force them to downshift rares to uncommon to fill all the slots. The same with uncommon to common. If they do this wrong we will just have draft chaff for days and the most expensive rares since probably pre RTR.
Private Mod Note
():
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!
Colt I can see you get it but several posters were talking about power creep and creatures in a general way instead of pointing right at the source of the problem.
That's kind of beggingvthe question, because there is no consensus as to what the source of the problem is. This is all speculation.
I believe it is a possibility that "power creep and creatures In General" (more so the nerfing of everything else) might in fact be the source of the problem. Yes, it worked in the past, but it's not 2013 anymore. The player base is now more established (a lower percentage of the players are new), plus the whole model of a 90%+ midrange meta is no longer fresh.
I’m not sure I can definitively identify what the issue is, but I think I can say when. This seems to have really begun with Battle For Zendikar and has continued through to the present.
If there is power creep in the creatures, it’s relative to spells. The creatures currently in Standard IMO are weaker than the average for the Modern era.
Oh, if you want to see what is going on the best way is to take a look back before they created mythics and compare the power level of the spells in the first modern border sets vs now. They had a gradual transition from strong spells and moderate creatures -> moderate spells and moderate creatures -> weaker spells and stronger creatures. They also started really messing with the game when they introduced planeswalkers. That was probably the worst thing they ever did from a game perspective, but it was done because of the marketing potential. We're also going through a "fast mana is bad" phase in magic, which is rendering a lot of cards unplayable that otherwise would see more play.
Private Mod Note
():
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!
Oh, if you want to see what is going on the best way is to take a look back before they created mythics and compare the power level of the spells in the first modern border sets vs now. They had a gradual transition from strong spells and moderate creatures -> moderate spells and moderate creatures -> weaker spells and stronger creatures. They also started really messing with the game when they introduced planeswalkers. That was probably the worst thing they ever did from a game perspective, but it was done because of the marketing potential. We're also going through a "fast mana is bad" phase in magic, which is rendering a lot of cards unplayable that otherwise would see more play.
I’ve heard you say this about Planeswalker cards several times, but I don’t see them having a significant negative impact on any current format. They aren’t anywhere near the heart of what’s wrong with Standard, and you barely see them in Legacy, Modern, or EDH. I’m not really sure what the problem you see with them is.
As for the rest, we’ve had almost 10 years of “modern” cards. They don’t seem to be poisoning the Modern format, and if that change was what was ruining MtG it would have done so long before now.
I’m not sure I can definitively identify what the issue is, but I think I can say when. This seems to have really begun with Battle For Zendikar and has continued through to the present.
But did the problem come because people didn't like how Standard changed, or because the had gotten tired of the ways it didn't change? BFZ may have been merely the "last straw" for players who were already losing patience with a format devoid of answers.
Even if the problem did only start with BFZ, the backlash might be too much. Popular opinion is like a pendulum. If you push it too hard in one direction (aka, widening the gap in power between creatures and answers), the reaction is typically a strong push back in the other direction.
In other words, maybe MTG could have continues in the style of Theros and Kahns, but that doesn't mean we can go back that way after WotC "took it too far" and players want a change.
So maybe a core design philosophy that wasn't a problem before has become a problem now.
If there is power creep in the creatures, it’s relative to spells. The creatures currently in Standard IMO are weaker than the average for the Modern era.
That's it exactly. The answers are too weak relative to the threats. People are vexed and bored with this I think. But it's anyone's guess if people are newly unhappy with this because it has gotten worse, or if the malcontent has been stewing for longer.
we’ve had almost 10 years of “modern” cards. They don’t seem to be poisoning the Modern format, and if that change was what was ruining MtG it would have done so long before now.
You've said this before, but you are ignoring a few relevant points:
Players have changed. At the time WotC started really having success with the post NWO design philosophy, the game industry was itself exploding and many players were newer than your typical player is in recent years. "Modern design" has never actually proven that it can sustain an experienced audience over time.
A cancer can fester for years before a person realises they are sick. If players are leaving during BFZ, that does not mean they weren't already losing interest before that.
Design has not been constant for the last 10 years! It's only been a few years since Doomblade, Llanowar Elves, Supreme Verdict, etc have been considered oppressive. Fun policing has been a slippery slope for a long time.
TLDR - you can't say modern design isn't a problem just because it wasn't a problem in the past. Conditions have changed across the board.
That's kind of beggingvthe question, because there is no consensus as to what the source of the problem is. This is all speculation.
I believe it is a possibility that "power creep and creatures In General" (more so the nerfing of everything else) might in fact be the source of the problem. Yes, it worked in the past, but it's not 2013 anymore. The player base is now more established (a lower percentage of the players are new), plus the whole model of a 90%+ midrange meta is no longer fresh.
I don't have the willpower to go and find all the quotes from Maro and the articles that show Maro's design paradigm (fewer answers, nerf control, make sparkly creatures people want to buy as well as the admissions of 'mistakes made'). We are here because they purposefully made these changes in design. Maro takes his questionnaires data and thought he could make them more money by changing the way they make MTG. The price is wrong.
This is not just speculation. The evidence and the results are plain to see. Just look through the pro articles on TCG or Channel Fireball and you will see excellent pointed criticisms. There is a consensus. It's willful design failure.
I've played Standard and staid on top of this horrible fall of Standard at my LGS from 30+ every FNM to firing at most once a month.
The 90% midrange meta you speak of was never fresh. It's how we got here.
I’m not sure I can definitively identify what the issue is, but I think I can say when. This seems to have really begun with Battle For Zendikar and has continued through to the present.
But did the problem come because people didn't like how Standard changed, or because the had gotten tired of the ways it didn't change? BFZ may have been merely the "last straw" for players who were already losing patience with a format devoid of answers.
Even if the problem did only start with BFZ, the backlash might be too much. Popular opinion is like a pendulum. If you push it too hard in one direction (aka, widening the gap in power between creatures and answers), the reaction is typically a strong push back in the other direction.
In other words, maybe MTG could have continues in the style of Theros and Kahns, but that doesn't mean we can go back that way after WotC "took it too far" and players want a change.
So maybe a core design philosophy that wasn't a problem before has become a problem now.
If there is power creep in the creatures, it’s relative to spells. The creatures currently in Standard IMO are weaker than the average for the Modern era.
That's it exactly. The answers are too weak relative to the threats. People are vexed and bored with this I think. But it's anyone's guess if people are newly unhappy with this because it has gotten worse, or if the malcontent has been stewing for longer.
I’m missing some pieces, as I only started playing again during Eldritch Moon, but I’ll try to answer your questions/points as best I can.
1. I call attention to BFZ because I see a major difference in the cards. The cards are weaker than in previous sets, to a significant degree, and this change has continued in subsequent sets. An argument can be made that the three previous blocks led into this somewhat, but there was a more drastic change starting with BFZ. I wasn’t around at the time, so I can’t comment on people’s attitudes at the time, but I look at the cards and there is a difference. BFZ was the break point.
2. There hasn’t been a reaction on WotC’s part. The change in design philosophy I see looking at the cards between earlier Modern era sets and BFZ-present has continued unchanged. As for the reaction of the players, it’s less clear. The problem I hear most often is that there aren’t enough decks in Standard, or that the dominant deck is too dominant. In other words, the biggest complaint is the meta. What I also hear often, and most often in person when talking to the Modern players at the FLGS, is that they don’t like the power level of Standard. This isn’t a specific complaint of the dynamic between creatures and spells, but an overall complaint. Cards and decks are a lot weaker than Modern, and they prefer the power level of Modern. I don’t think the creatures vs spells complaint is as big as you think, because its also true of Modern and the people who like Modern and have made it into the dominant competitive format seem mostly comfortable with it. That issue is more significant in Standard, but it’s not the complaint I’ve been hearing from Modern players, and what I do hear is usually that the answers in Standard are too weak/expensive, and that alone.
3. I’m curious what prompted the change with BFZ-present. I wasn’t part of the community at the time. I would think if BFZ was a response to feedback, that feedback would have to be from 2 years before given the lead in times.
4. Anecdotally, a significant thing I saw was at the Ixalan rotation. A lot of the competitive regulars at the FLGS were still playing Standard during Amonkhet/HoD. When the rotation happened and Ixalan dropped, most of them stopped. I was just starting to play Standard at the time and asked why. The impression I got was that they were playing Standard mostly because they had already made the investment and already had the cards. When the rotation hit and they had to come up with new decks, possibly with new cards they didn’t have, they just didn’t bother.
Oh, if you want to see what is going on the best way is to take a look back before they created mythics and compare the power level of the spells in the first modern border sets vs now. They had a gradual transition from strong spells and moderate creatures -> moderate spells and moderate creatures -> weaker spells and stronger creatures. They also started really messing with the game when they introduced planeswalkers. That was probably the worst thing they ever did from a game perspective, but it was done because of the marketing potential. We're also going through a "fast mana is bad" phase in magic, which is rendering a lot of cards unplayable that otherwise would see more play.
I’ve heard you say this about Planeswalker cards several times, but I don’t see them having a significant negative impact on any current format. They aren’t anywhere near the heart of what’s wrong with Standard, and you barely see them in Legacy, Modern, or EDH. I’m not really sure what the problem you see with them is.
As for the rest, we’ve had almost 10 years of “modern” cards. They don’t seem to be poisoning the Modern format, and if that change was what was ruining MtG it would have done so long before now.
The deal with planeswalkers is that you can build a game successfully around them and that is exactly what WoTC did. It's just that people who played before they were introduced remember the older balance of enchantment vs artifact vs creature vs instant/sorcery/interrupt. When they introduced walkers it added a new layer of complexity to the game and threw the balance out of whack since suddenly we now have a trading post style card that is more fragile than an enchantment, but could put someone behind on a turn if they had to deal with it. So it's not like it made the game worse that they got introduced, it just took the game in a direction that some of the older crowd didn't necessarily like. Others are perfectly happy with the walkers being added. I tend to think of it like some people love strawberry ice cream and others like smores ice cream cones.
Private Mod Note
():
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!
Oh, if you want to see what is going on the best way is to take a look back before they created mythics and compare the power level of the spells in the first modern border sets vs now. They had a gradual transition from strong spells and moderate creatures -> moderate spells and moderate creatures -> weaker spells and stronger creatures. They also started really messing with the game when they introduced planeswalkers. That was probably the worst thing they ever did from a game perspective, but it was done because of the marketing potential. We're also going through a "fast mana is bad" phase in magic, which is rendering a lot of cards unplayable that otherwise would see more play.
I’ve heard you say this about Planeswalker cards several times, but I don’t see them having a significant negative impact on any current format. They aren’t anywhere near the heart of what’s wrong with Standard, and you barely see them in Legacy, Modern, or EDH. I’m not really sure what the problem you see with them is.
As for the rest, we’ve had almost 10 years of “modern” cards. They don’t seem to be poisoning the Modern format, and if that change was what was ruining MtG it would have done so long before now.
The deal with planeswalkers is that you can build a game successfully around them and that is exactly what WoTC did. It's just that people who played before they were introduced remember the older balance of enchantment vs artifact vs creature vs instant/sorcery/interrupt. When they introduced walkers it added a new layer of complexity to the game and threw the balance out of whack since suddenly we now have a trading post style card that is more fragile than an enchantment, but could put someone behind on a turn if they had to deal with it. So it's not like it made the game worse that they got introduced, it just took the game in a direction that some of the older crowd didn't necessarily like. Others are perfectly happy with the walkers being added. I tend to think of it like some people love strawberry ice cream and others like smores ice cream cones.
So what you’re saying is that MtG is in a bad place right now, and that you prefer the MtG of 10 years ago and before. I don’t see that the two are necessarily connected, and I say this as somebody who has played more pre-“Modern” Magic than I’ve played the new stuff.
Oh, if you want to see what is going on the best way is to take a look back before they created mythics and compare the power level of the spells in the first modern border sets vs now. They had a gradual transition from strong spells and moderate creatures -> moderate spells and moderate creatures -> weaker spells and stronger creatures. They also started really messing with the game when they introduced planeswalkers. That was probably the worst thing they ever did from a game perspective, but it was done because of the marketing potential. We're also going through a "fast mana is bad" phase in magic, which is rendering a lot of cards unplayable that otherwise would see more play.
I’ve heard you say this about Planeswalker cards several times, but I don’t see them having a significant negative impact on any current format. They aren’t anywhere near the heart of what’s wrong with Standard, and you barely see them in Legacy, Modern, or EDH. I’m not really sure what the problem you see with them is.
As for the rest, we’ve had almost 10 years of “modern” cards. They don’t seem to be poisoning the Modern format, and if that change was what was ruining MtG it would have done so long before now.
The deal with planeswalkers is that you can build a game successfully around them and that is exactly what WoTC did. It's just that people who played before they were introduced remember the older balance of enchantment vs artifact vs creature vs instant/sorcery/interrupt. When they introduced walkers it added a new layer of complexity to the game and threw the balance out of whack since suddenly we now have a trading post style card that is more fragile than an enchantment, but could put someone behind on a turn if they had to deal with it. So it's not like it made the game worse that they got introduced, it just took the game in a direction that some of the older crowd didn't necessarily like. Others are perfectly happy with the walkers being added. I tend to think of it like some people love strawberry ice cream and others like smores ice cream cones.
So what you’re saying is that MtG is in a bad place right now, and that you prefer the MtG of 10 years ago and before. I don’t see that the two are necessarily connected, and I say this as somebody who has played more pre-“Modern” Magic than I’ve played the new stuff.
No, I was just pointing out that if someone wanted to see the difference in creature vs spell balance the best way to do it is to go back and look at the sets before they introduced the walkers and look at the changes that happened from then to now. Honestly, it's not really our job as players to judge what the problem is in a game like Magic the Gathering. What is important is that we point out the game has issues or things we don't like and WoTC takes that feedback properly. It really doesn't feel like they have been listening to the right people for at least the last five years.
Private Mod Note
():
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 feedback can also be conflicting. I know a lot of Modern and EDH players who are perfectly happy with MtG right now, and see the same online. Standard sets being bad don’t affect them, and even might be beneficial in steering players who would otherwise be playing Standard into their formats.
I’m missing some pieces, as I only started playing again during Eldritch Moon, but I’ll try to answer your questions/points as best I can.
I've actually pointed you at the pieces I think you've not heard about. Maro's design philosophy change for all of MTG.
1. I call attention to BFZ because I see a major difference in the cards.
BFZ was more of a normal reset which happens to counter power creep. It's not the set you need to pay attention to it's the meta and design's overarching card creation. What does end up being played?
2. There hasn’t been a reaction on WotC’s part.
Banning is a reaction. They've been devastating standard with over pushed cards that cannot properly be answered because they stopped making answers efficient enough. They stopped making counters efficient enough. Midrange slapfest is what all of MTG because so of course you had a 1-2 deck meta which sucked.
3. I’m curious what prompted the change with BFZ-present. I wasn’t part of the community at the time. I would think if BFZ was a response to feedback, that feedback would have to be from 2 years before given the lead in times.
Mark Rosewater's flawed data collection and genius idea to make more money.
4. Anecdotally, a significant thing I saw was at the Ixalan rotation. A lot of the competitive regulars at the FLGS were still playing Standard during Amonkhet/HoD. When the rotation happened and Ixalan dropped, most of them stopped. I was just starting to play Standard at the time and asked why. The impression I got was that they were playing Standard mostly because they had already made the investment and already had the cards. When the rotation hit and they had to come up with new decks, possibly with new cards they didn’t have, they just didn’t bother.
This is likely when your locals just got fed up and stepped away from standard. It's happening all over. Boring metas are metas that don't have variety and don't have the balance of agro-midrange-control. Standard will still not have it after Rivals drops.
The card pool for magic is getting massive, Legacy and Modern now seem to be flagships which is very bad. People are looking to cards to fill in for those formats which they have to keep competing with top tier cards. They are reprinting those cards at faster rates in “speciality” sets which is depreciating confidence and card values. I believe wizards needs to bring a rotating extended format back, start commander as an official tournament format and of course have standard with staples being reprinted in it. Modern, legacy, need to be just be a once a year tournament or sadly, eliminate them. Modern is killing their ability to print more powerful cards, rotating formats solve it and diversify your playing field. They could then reprint cards from legacy era and not worry about them forever affecting a format like Modern. Modern I think is the root problem as the years go by.
They actually have chosen to not print those modern staples because their power is 'too great' for standard which doesn't make sense when you're printing one or two in a set/block.
They are cannibalizing their own sales by only printing Modern cards in Modern Masters. The Modern players don't look to new sets for much of anything anymore.
Not to mention many players left standard to play Modern because standard was costing too much and has been getting to be less and less fun for 2 years now.
They actually have chosen to not print those modern staples because their power is 'too great' for standard which doesn't make sense when you're printing one or two in a set/block.
They are cannibalizing their own sales by only printing Modern cards in Modern Masters. The Modern players don't look to new sets for much of anything anymore.
Not to mention many players left standard to play Modern because standard was costing too much and has been getting to be less and less fun for 2 years now.
Going to modern or just leaving the game entirely. The problem is the game isn't even fun to play casually because the game has been marketed heavily through competitions and online deck listings. People often don't so much as build a deck as much as try to find the closest official archetype they can find and copy it. The game basically needs EDH because it's a format that forces people to use more than just the best few cards available.
Private Mod Note
():
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!
They actually have chosen to not print those modern staples because their power is 'too great' for standard which doesn't make sense when you're printing one or two in a set/block.
They are cannibalizing their own sales by only printing Modern cards in Modern Masters. The Modern players don't look to new sets for much of anything anymore.
Not to mention many players left standard to play Modern because standard was costing too much and has been getting to be less and less fun for 2 years now.
Going to modern or just leaving the game entirely. The problem is the game isn't even fun to play casually because the game has been marketed heavily through competitions and online deck listings. People often don't so much as build a deck as much as try to find the closest official archetype they can find and copy it. The game basically needs EDH because it's a format that forces people to use more than just the best few cards available.
Online deck listings have been around since Tempest block or even before, almost as old as the game. Back then, I was a 60-card casual player, which is what I would like to be now if I wasn’t more or less alone. I’m a Standard player these days after being a Limited player for a while, then added Standard to play more because I disliked Standard less than I dislike EDH and Modern. You do have a point that high level tournaments are a bigger part of their advertising than was true 20 years ago, but most of the people I was playing back then were net decking so that’s not something I consider new.
What is new is that 60 card casual is mostly dead, and EDH has replaced it. The problem I see with this, aside from my personal dislike of EDH, is that it’s just not the same game. There really isn’t any overlap between it and competitive formats. Back in the day, I could take a 60 card casual deck and play decent games against lower tier competitive players. On the odd occasion I can find that sort of game, I still can. When 60 card casual was a thing, you could go from noob to casual to scrub to competitive on a linear, evolutionary path. In addition, casual decks were usually built under a gentleman’s code, which included a stigma against net decking. 60 card casual players were once common enough that if you didn’t want to net deck, it wasn’t that hard to find players who weren’t doing it.
They actually have chosen to not print those modern staples because their power is 'too great' for standard which doesn't make sense when you're printing one or two in a set/block.
They are cannibalizing their own sales by only printing Modern cards in Modern Masters. The Modern players don't look to new sets for much of anything anymore.
Not to mention many players left standard to play Modern because standard was costing too much and has been getting to be less and less fun for 2 years now.
Going to modern or just leaving the game entirely. The problem is the game isn't even fun to play casually because the game has been marketed heavily through competitions and online deck listings. People often don't so much as build a deck as much as try to find the closest official archetype they can find and copy it. The game basically needs EDH because it's a format that forces people to use more than just the best few cards available.
Online deck listings have been around since Tempest block or even before, almost as old as the game. Back then, I was a 60-card casual player, which is what I would like to be now if I wasn’t more or less alone. I’m a Standard player these days after being a Limited player for a while, then added Standard to play more because I disliked Standard less than I dislike EDH and Modern. You do have a point that high level tournaments are a bigger part of their advertising than was true 20 years ago, but most of the people I was playing back then were net decking so that’s not something I consider new.
What is new is that 60 card casual is mostly dead, and EDH has replaced it. The problem I see with this, aside from my personal dislike of EDH, is that it’s just not the same game. There really isn’t any overlap between it and competitive formats. Back in the day, I could take a 60 card casual deck and play decent games against lower tier competitive players. On the odd occasion I can find that sort of game, I still can. When 60 card casual was a thing, you could go from noob to casual to scrub to competitive on a linear, evolutionary path.
Edit: forget what I said a moment ago. I need to stop trying to post on two boards at once.
Private Mod Note
():
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!
What is new is that 60 card casual is mostly dead, and EDH has replaced it. The problem I see with this, aside from my personal dislike of EDH, is that it’s just not the same game. There really isn’t any overlap between it and competitive formats. Back in the day, I could take a 60 card casual deck and play decent games against lower tier competitive players. On the odd occasion I can find that sort of game, I still can. When 60 card casual was a thing, you could go from noob to casual to scrub to competitive on a linear, evolutionary path. In addition, casual decks were usually built under a gentleman’s code, which included a stigma against net decking. 60 card casual players were once common enough that if you didn’t want to net deck, it wasn’t that hard to find players who weren’t doing it.
This is why imo they should replace the PW decks with Standard pool EDH decks. You might have a Merfolk themed Ixilan Commander deck, or a vehicle themed Kaldesh Commander deck, etc.
This way a new player (or an established EDH player) can buy that deck and get a taste for the Standard mechanics - and several staples to boot. That way they can at least knd of go from newb to casual to competitive a little smoother. It won't be as easy a transition as with 60 card casual, but that's not coming back and this could be the best compromise.
Meanwhile your Standard players will already have on-theme cards to augment these decks with. They may even see such products as a home for (at least some) of their cards post rotation.
Maybe this is a terrible thing to say but part of the problem is the player base. Net decking is a very evil thing nothing worse than showing up and playing the same 2-3 decks. The last few years I have abandoned standard due to all the net decking. Seems like innistrad and before there was diversity locally with lots of home brews but as the pros dial in how to win the most they limit the options as certain decks push the brews out of competition for all but the best of players.
WotC could fix that problem if they didnt make single cards so much stronger than the rest of the set.
A set that has a more or less fairly balanced powerlevel across its cards (including commons and uncommons, not just rares and mythics) would produce a much more equal playing field, even for casual brews, as the difference between a net-deck pushed constructed deck isnt as huge.
The problem becomes even more stressed if the format has very fast decks, that simply means your deck is not allowed to stumble at all, otherwise you just lose, no matter what your deck is actually trying to accomplish, its simply too slow.
If a format is intentionally slow overall and the powerlevel is more flat, your options increase and a net-deck isnt just way over the top stronger.
----
They will not do that, and it just spirals into all of these issues (which they ultimately dont care for, for as long as sets sell, only money speaks for them, as all statistics they use really only look at "how much boosters did you buy of the last set? and will you buy more or less of the current one?", thats all they care for.
I thought about the absence of casual decks latly, too. But i actually like commander/edh, but some things are just missing from it. I thought if it would help to reduce Commander back to 60 card-singleton-decks. I belive people like singleton, because even if you play with liliana of the veil, you need just one instead of 4, and thats true for all expensive cards. But a smaller deck might make it more reliable, and would reduce the average mana curve, making for more balanced games. But i might be wrong about this, it was just an idea of the top of my head.
The initial idea of singleton was that it should make games not the same over and over, by reducing consistency.
As of right now, WotC keeps reprinting cards that are exactly the same, just with a different name, and/or cards that do very similiar things which makes them redundant, and kinda "cheat" around the singleton idea.
----
In a smaller format like standard, you dont have that, which makes games even less consistent and much more random and a coherent game plan cannot be build, simply because there arent enough redundant cards for a 60 card deck.
Singleton has its own charm, but a lot of it gets more and more blurred by the amount of cards printed (Combo decks work around the problem with tutors, and if tutors are banned, at some point a combo deck simply cannot work reliable enough, and becomes more of a coin-flip if you just find the cards by card draw alone).
In all honesty the problem is environmental for the game more than anything else. The game of magic is one of the oldest TCGs if not the oldest and it's facing the inevitable situation of overprinting. They can define all the formats they want and try to enforce these borders with tournament play, but players will still use older cards if they have them and people can still forge their own playgroups to use whatever set they feel like. It's not even about modern, legacy, or standard: it's the very simple fact that if someone has a better card from ages ago they aren't going to find a weaker version appealing even if it was done so because the current sets are balanced differently.
So as a result Legacy became what it is, vintage is a dice toss as to who wins based on who is on the play, modern is basically a creature centric format more than a spells format just as much as standard is now, etc. Investors and speculators are a symptom of the problems the game faces in that WoTC isn't willing or maybe isn't capable of supporting the full library of cards they brought to the table. In addition, the development issues with new sets are probably another case of this. Unfortunately, the marketing side has made the problems worse by driving prices on masters sets instead of letting the company freely use older power cards to drive standard sales.
So two things on what Wizards is doing that I find intriguing:
1) they are moving to bigger sets, so this could mean they are trying to address the two deck format issue by making more strategies viable in a given season.
2) They brought back core sets, which likely can act as a glue to put basic, non-set specific answer cards into standard.
Private Mod Note
():
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 wasn't aware that Commander had sanctioned events anywhere.
It doesn't that's why Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro needs to officially sanction it like they recently did with Pauper.
There are 2 major problems with sanctioning EDH:
Multiplayer games are poor for competitive play because collusion is a big problem. They would therefore have to sanction 1vs1 EDH only, and there is a very small base to build on as most Commander players are casual and prefer multiplayer.
Competitive EDH decks are easily as expensive as Modern decks, and there are tonnes of RL staples. To make this a flagship competitive format, they would need to vastly expand the banned list, or else rule out old sets altogether to divide EDH ala "type one" and "type two" back in the 1990s. Neither of those would likely go over well with the Commander base.
It is always dangerous to "fire someone" for several reasons. But, and there is always a but, the direction from the top- i.e. Maro- who was responsible for Energy, let us not forget- is so off where it should be that I could get behind his removal. I would love to have an hour with the guy, with a bunch of decks from Legacy, Modern. I can play a match of Legacy where the game is over t3 in all three games, or effectively so- where the match takes 20-30 mins and each turn is full of decisions-and great fun is had by all, I would like to show him that. If he came back with the "new players don't like x" argument I would give up hope. There is the devil you know argument. I was certainly happy that Stoddard has been taking out of the firing line, his pronouncements made me want to throttle him-and I am concerned that people like Melissa DT are going to want an environment that pros like, which is the other end of the spectrum from designing for casuals/edh. Many a pro whines about Blood Moon and Bridge in Modern, and frankly they can sod off.
If you like the speed of Legacy or Modern, more power to you, but it’s not for everybody. You should realize that the speed of these formats is largely not by design but a result of a card pool consisting of dozens of sets and 3-5 color mana bases. I personally think both formats are way to fast, and prefer a pace where 4-6 cmc cards are viable.
There are plenty of 4-6 cmc cards in Legacy that don't get cheated though- I only gave one example of the stuff that WOTC do not like that actually produces reasonable games, not the stuff they do like that is also in the format anyway. Nic Fit is full of 4 5 and 6c stuff- Merren, Rhinos, Gravetitans etc, the archetypal toolbox style deck. Its Nyx Fit mate runs Academy Rectors as the key card. The Eldrazi and Dragon Stompy decks (and their other colour equivalents using similar engines) have plenty of stuff at that level of cost, although both run Sol-land acceleration shells to make them faster, whilst the big Eldrazi abusing deck using colorless loci and its UG variants also run enormous dudes fairly cast like Tron. There is a bit of mana acceleration to cast them- Vet Explorer and GSZ into Forest man-land, but nothing outrageous. Midrange is there. It is not simple midrange where you just throw dudes down and just play kill cards/creatures taking what your deck gives you, mainly because you can tutor/filter and can attack hands/lands, but clearly it is midrange.
Deadguy, Jund, Stoneblade, Pile variants and new Miracles and shardless BUG also operate a shade under that with average costs a bit cheaper than that but certainly do things in that spirit (counting FOW as 0cc, not 5), often with little acceleration beyond Death-Rites in the BG-X decks. They certainly are not super fast.
Modern has often had decks that can take forever to win that can fairly cast big things with no acceleration at all- Martyr Proc and its Sun Titan for example. 4cc dudes/Spells have always done well in the format in non combo modes- Resto Angel, Rhino, Company, Supreme Verdict etc. Turn 4 rule exists in Modern to make 4 cc viable.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
People with belligerent signatures are trying to compensate for something....
In all honesty the problem is environmental for the game more than anything else. The game of magic is one of the oldest TCGs if not the oldest and it's facing the inevitable situation of overprinting. They can define all the formats they want and try to enforce these borders with tournament play, but players will still use older cards if they have them and people can still forge their own playgroups to use whatever set they feel like. It's not even about modern, legacy, or standard: it's the very simple fact that if someone has a better card from ages ago they aren't going to find a weaker version appealing even if it was done so because the current sets are balanced differently.
Hit the nail on the head, Talk to people who have used lighting bolt and ask them if they are excited to have shock (or ANY of its many 1 mana 2 damage +block gimmick varraent). You won't hear anyone saying "Hell ya I want to play THAT shock varrent over bolt any day!. Ask people who love their 2 mana creature kill or 4 mana wraths or 1 mana, mana dorks how much they LOVE the new more expensive less powerful ones... Same answer, No one wants to use day of judgment when wrath of god is also a choice. If a format has both cards legal the better card will always get picked first. Sometimes they accidently do it right and the weaker card becomes a great card all on its own (LED looking at you) but 99% of the time you know which card you want to play .
So as a result Legacy became what it is, vintage is a dice toss as to who wins based on who is on the play, modern is basically a creature centric format more than a spells format just as much as standard is now, etc. Investors and speculators are a symptom of the problems the game faces in that WoTC isn't willing or maybe isn't capable of supporting the full library of cards they brought to the table. In addition, the development issues with new sets are probably another case of this. Unfortunately, the marketing side has made the problems worse by driving prices on masters sets instead of letting the company freely use older power cards to drive standard sales.
Leave poor vintage alone its a very "thinky" format.... However I agree with you, frankly spicing up sets with afew legacy/ventage cards has never hurt a standard set... take a look at 3sphear and chalace of the void, fetchlands all were great eddtions to sets that help sell it by attracting multi format players
So two things on what Wizards is doing that I find intriguing:
1) they are moving to bigger sets, so this could mean they are trying to address the two deck format issue by making more strategies viable in a given season.
2) They brought back core sets, which likely can act as a glue to put basic, non-set specific answer cards into standard.
Number 2 is somethign the community has been yelling at them to do for a while (alterantively they could post a list of "legal cards for standard" on the site that are legal but may not currently be in print (but can be at any given point or any given set at their dissension. Number one sounds good as long as its an actual format... I want some combo, I want some Hate I want REAL control along side all this agro midrange fests.
You get plenty of spell based decks that can be successful when you have a balanced game.
Aggro > control > midrange > aggro etc. With enough hate that the underdog decks in this pecking order can sideboard strategically and have a good chance of winning. This was what we had more or less prior to the oppressive year of CoCo and midrange slugfest they've designed into the game.
Seek balance and you also get flavor of the week decks that can sweep in predicting a meta and win. Right now that's just not possible. The math is against anything but the pushed over designed mechanics so the pros don't play anything else and the FNM for fun don't get to have fun. BALANCE gets you the 10 deck format. All control and combo would kill Standard just as fast if not faster that what we have now.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Maximum Effort
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
They can develop a set however they want, really. If they wanted to make a game more about spells and not creatures it's actually rather strait forward, but they got into a rut and didn't want to get out of it with focusing so much on creature combat. The problem that they will hopefully be solving with big sets is the need to make so many draft only cards to fill out holes in strategies due to having only some of the cards in the first set. Also assuming they do this right, a single large set will force them to downshift rares to uncommon to fill all the slots. The same with uncommon to common. If they do this wrong we will just have draft chaff for days and the most expensive rares since probably pre RTR.
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’m not sure I can definitively identify what the issue is, but I think I can say when. This seems to have really begun with Battle For Zendikar and has continued through to the present.
If there is power creep in the creatures, it’s relative to spells. The creatures currently in Standard IMO are weaker than the average for the Modern era.
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!
As for the rest, we’ve had almost 10 years of “modern” cards. They don’t seem to be poisoning the Modern format, and if that change was what was ruining MtG it would have done so long before now.
So maybe a core design philosophy that wasn't a problem before has become a problem now.
That's it exactly. The answers are too weak relative to the threats. People are vexed and bored with this I think. But it's anyone's guess if people are newly unhappy with this because it has gotten worse, or if the malcontent has been stewing for longer.
You've said this before, but you are ignoring a few relevant points:
TLDR - you can't say modern design isn't a problem just because it wasn't a problem in the past. Conditions have changed across the board.
https://fieldmarshalshandbook.wordpress.com/
RUGLegacy Lands.dec
RUGBLegacy Lands.dec
RGLegacy Lands.dec
WUBRG EDH Lands.dec
UBR EDH Artificer Prodigy
B EDH Relentless Rats
I don't have the willpower to go and find all the quotes from Maro and the articles that show Maro's design paradigm (fewer answers, nerf control, make sparkly creatures people want to buy as well as the admissions of 'mistakes made'). We are here because they purposefully made these changes in design. Maro takes his questionnaires data and thought he could make them more money by changing the way they make MTG. The price is wrong.
This is not just speculation. The evidence and the results are plain to see. Just look through the pro articles on TCG or Channel Fireball and you will see excellent pointed criticisms. There is a consensus. It's willful design failure.
I've played Standard and staid on top of this horrible fall of Standard at my LGS from 30+ every FNM to firing at most once a month.
The 90% midrange meta you speak of was never fresh. It's how we got here.
I’m missing some pieces, as I only started playing again during Eldritch Moon, but I’ll try to answer your questions/points as best I can.
1. I call attention to BFZ because I see a major difference in the cards. The cards are weaker than in previous sets, to a significant degree, and this change has continued in subsequent sets. An argument can be made that the three previous blocks led into this somewhat, but there was a more drastic change starting with BFZ. I wasn’t around at the time, so I can’t comment on people’s attitudes at the time, but I look at the cards and there is a difference. BFZ was the break point.
2. There hasn’t been a reaction on WotC’s part. The change in design philosophy I see looking at the cards between earlier Modern era sets and BFZ-present has continued unchanged. As for the reaction of the players, it’s less clear. The problem I hear most often is that there aren’t enough decks in Standard, or that the dominant deck is too dominant. In other words, the biggest complaint is the meta. What I also hear often, and most often in person when talking to the Modern players at the FLGS, is that they don’t like the power level of Standard. This isn’t a specific complaint of the dynamic between creatures and spells, but an overall complaint. Cards and decks are a lot weaker than Modern, and they prefer the power level of Modern. I don’t think the creatures vs spells complaint is as big as you think, because its also true of Modern and the people who like Modern and have made it into the dominant competitive format seem mostly comfortable with it. That issue is more significant in Standard, but it’s not the complaint I’ve been hearing from Modern players, and what I do hear is usually that the answers in Standard are too weak/expensive, and that alone.
3. I’m curious what prompted the change with BFZ-present. I wasn’t part of the community at the time. I would think if BFZ was a response to feedback, that feedback would have to be from 2 years before given the lead in times.
4. Anecdotally, a significant thing I saw was at the Ixalan rotation. A lot of the competitive regulars at the FLGS were still playing Standard during Amonkhet/HoD. When the rotation happened and Ixalan dropped, most of them stopped. I was just starting to play Standard at the time and asked why. The impression I got was that they were playing Standard mostly because they had already made the investment and already had the cards. When the rotation hit and they had to come up with new decks, possibly with new cards they didn’t have, they just didn’t bother.
The deal with planeswalkers is that you can build a game successfully around them and that is exactly what WoTC did. It's just that people who played before they were introduced remember the older balance of enchantment vs artifact vs creature vs instant/sorcery/interrupt. When they introduced walkers it added a new layer of complexity to the game and threw the balance out of whack since suddenly we now have a trading post style card that is more fragile than an enchantment, but could put someone behind on a turn if they had to deal with it. So it's not like it made the game worse that they got introduced, it just took the game in a direction that some of the older crowd didn't necessarily like. Others are perfectly happy with the walkers being added. I tend to think of it like some people love strawberry ice cream and others like smores ice cream cones.
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!
So what you’re saying is that MtG is in a bad place right now, and that you prefer the MtG of 10 years ago and before. I don’t see that the two are necessarily connected, and I say this as somebody who has played more pre-“Modern” Magic than I’ve played the new stuff.
No, I was just pointing out that if someone wanted to see the difference in creature vs spell balance the best way to do it is to go back and look at the sets before they introduced the walkers and look at the changes that happened from then to now. Honestly, it's not really our job as players to judge what the problem is in a game like Magic the Gathering. What is important is that we point out the game has issues or things we don't like and WoTC takes that feedback properly. It really doesn't feel like they have been listening to the right people for at least the last five years.
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've actually pointed you at the pieces I think you've not heard about. Maro's design philosophy change for all of MTG.
BFZ was more of a normal reset which happens to counter power creep. It's not the set you need to pay attention to it's the meta and design's overarching card creation. What does end up being played?
Banning is a reaction. They've been devastating standard with over pushed cards that cannot properly be answered because they stopped making answers efficient enough. They stopped making counters efficient enough. Midrange slapfest is what all of MTG because so of course you had a 1-2 deck meta which sucked.
Mark Rosewater's flawed data collection and genius idea to make more money.
This is likely when your locals just got fed up and stepped away from standard. It's happening all over. Boring metas are metas that don't have variety and don't have the balance of agro-midrange-control. Standard will still not have it after Rivals drops.
They are cannibalizing their own sales by only printing Modern cards in Modern Masters. The Modern players don't look to new sets for much of anything anymore.
Not to mention many players left standard to play Modern because standard was costing too much and has been getting to be less and less fun for 2 years now.
Going to modern or just leaving the game entirely. The problem is the game isn't even fun to play casually because the game has been marketed heavily through competitions and online deck listings. People often don't so much as build a deck as much as try to find the closest official archetype they can find and copy it. The game basically needs EDH because it's a format that forces people to use more than just the best few cards available.
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!
Online deck listings have been around since Tempest block or even before, almost as old as the game. Back then, I was a 60-card casual player, which is what I would like to be now if I wasn’t more or less alone. I’m a Standard player these days after being a Limited player for a while, then added Standard to play more because I disliked Standard less than I dislike EDH and Modern. You do have a point that high level tournaments are a bigger part of their advertising than was true 20 years ago, but most of the people I was playing back then were net decking so that’s not something I consider new.
What is new is that 60 card casual is mostly dead, and EDH has replaced it. The problem I see with this, aside from my personal dislike of EDH, is that it’s just not the same game. There really isn’t any overlap between it and competitive formats. Back in the day, I could take a 60 card casual deck and play decent games against lower tier competitive players. On the odd occasion I can find that sort of game, I still can. When 60 card casual was a thing, you could go from noob to casual to scrub to competitive on a linear, evolutionary path. In addition, casual decks were usually built under a gentleman’s code, which included a stigma against net decking. 60 card casual players were once common enough that if you didn’t want to net deck, it wasn’t that hard to find players who weren’t doing it.
Edit: forget what I said a moment ago. I need to stop trying to post on two boards at once.
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!
This is why imo they should replace the PW decks with Standard pool EDH decks. You might have a Merfolk themed Ixilan Commander deck, or a vehicle themed Kaldesh Commander deck, etc.
This way a new player (or an established EDH player) can buy that deck and get a taste for the Standard mechanics - and several staples to boot. That way they can at least knd of go from newb to casual to competitive a little smoother. It won't be as easy a transition as with 60 card casual, but that's not coming back and this could be the best compromise.
Meanwhile your Standard players will already have on-theme cards to augment these decks with. They may even see such products as a home for (at least some) of their cards post rotation.
https://fieldmarshalshandbook.wordpress.com/
RUGLegacy Lands.dec
RUGBLegacy Lands.dec
RGLegacy Lands.dec
WUBRG EDH Lands.dec
UBR EDH Artificer Prodigy
B EDH Relentless Rats
WotC could fix that problem if they didnt make single cards so much stronger than the rest of the set.
A set that has a more or less fairly balanced powerlevel across its cards (including commons and uncommons, not just rares and mythics) would produce a much more equal playing field, even for casual brews, as the difference between a net-deck pushed constructed deck isnt as huge.
The problem becomes even more stressed if the format has very fast decks, that simply means your deck is not allowed to stumble at all, otherwise you just lose, no matter what your deck is actually trying to accomplish, its simply too slow.
If a format is intentionally slow overall and the powerlevel is more flat, your options increase and a net-deck isnt just way over the top stronger.
----
They will not do that, and it just spirals into all of these issues (which they ultimately dont care for, for as long as sets sell, only money speaks for them, as all statistics they use really only look at "how much boosters did you buy of the last set? and will you buy more or less of the current one?", thats all they care for.
WUBRG#BlackLotusMatterWUBRG
👮👮👮 #BlueLivesMatter 👮👮👮
The initial idea of singleton was that it should make games not the same over and over, by reducing consistency.
As of right now, WotC keeps reprinting cards that are exactly the same, just with a different name, and/or cards that do very similiar things which makes them redundant, and kinda "cheat" around the singleton idea.
----
In a smaller format like standard, you dont have that, which makes games even less consistent and much more random and a coherent game plan cannot be build, simply because there arent enough redundant cards for a 60 card deck.
Singleton has its own charm, but a lot of it gets more and more blurred by the amount of cards printed (Combo decks work around the problem with tutors, and if tutors are banned, at some point a combo deck simply cannot work reliable enough, and becomes more of a coin-flip if you just find the cards by card draw alone).
WUBRG#BlackLotusMatterWUBRG
👮👮👮 #BlueLivesMatter 👮👮👮
So as a result Legacy became what it is, vintage is a dice toss as to who wins based on who is on the play, modern is basically a creature centric format more than a spells format just as much as standard is now, etc. Investors and speculators are a symptom of the problems the game faces in that WoTC isn't willing or maybe isn't capable of supporting the full library of cards they brought to the table. In addition, the development issues with new sets are probably another case of this. Unfortunately, the marketing side has made the problems worse by driving prices on masters sets instead of letting the company freely use older power cards to drive standard sales.
So two things on what Wizards is doing that I find intriguing:
1) they are moving to bigger sets, so this could mean they are trying to address the two deck format issue by making more strategies viable in a given season.
2) They brought back core sets, which likely can act as a glue to put basic, non-set specific answer cards into standard.
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!
https://fieldmarshalshandbook.wordpress.com/
RUGLegacy Lands.dec
RUGBLegacy Lands.dec
RGLegacy Lands.dec
WUBRG EDH Lands.dec
UBR EDH Artificer Prodigy
B EDH Relentless Rats
There are plenty of 4-6 cmc cards in Legacy that don't get cheated though- I only gave one example of the stuff that WOTC do not like that actually produces reasonable games, not the stuff they do like that is also in the format anyway. Nic Fit is full of 4 5 and 6c stuff- Merren, Rhinos, Gravetitans etc, the archetypal toolbox style deck. Its Nyx Fit mate runs Academy Rectors as the key card. The Eldrazi and Dragon Stompy decks (and their other colour equivalents using similar engines) have plenty of stuff at that level of cost, although both run Sol-land acceleration shells to make them faster, whilst the big Eldrazi abusing deck using colorless loci and its UG variants also run enormous dudes fairly cast like Tron. There is a bit of mana acceleration to cast them- Vet Explorer and GSZ into Forest man-land, but nothing outrageous. Midrange is there. It is not simple midrange where you just throw dudes down and just play kill cards/creatures taking what your deck gives you, mainly because you can tutor/filter and can attack hands/lands, but clearly it is midrange.
Deadguy, Jund, Stoneblade, Pile variants and new Miracles and shardless BUG also operate a shade under that with average costs a bit cheaper than that but certainly do things in that spirit (counting FOW as 0cc, not 5), often with little acceleration beyond Death-Rites in the BG-X decks. They certainly are not super fast.
Modern has often had decks that can take forever to win that can fairly cast big things with no acceleration at all- Martyr Proc and its Sun Titan for example. 4cc dudes/Spells have always done well in the format in non combo modes- Resto Angel, Rhino, Company, Supreme Verdict etc. Turn 4 rule exists in Modern to make 4 cc viable.
Number 2 is somethign the community has been yelling at them to do for a while (alterantively they could post a list of "legal cards for standard" on the site that are legal but may not currently be in print (but can be at any given point or any given set at their dissension. Number one sounds good as long as its an actual format... I want some combo, I want some Hate I want REAL control along side all this agro midrange fests.
Aggro > control > midrange > aggro etc. With enough hate that the underdog decks in this pecking order can sideboard strategically and have a good chance of winning. This was what we had more or less prior to the oppressive year of CoCo and midrange slugfest they've designed into the game.
Seek balance and you also get flavor of the week decks that can sweep in predicting a meta and win. Right now that's just not possible. The math is against anything but the pushed over designed mechanics so the pros don't play anything else and the FNM for fun don't get to have fun. BALANCE gets you the 10 deck format. All control and combo would kill Standard just as fast if not faster that what we have now.