A bunch of judges, including level 3 (big enough to head a GP) got banned. Some of them are podcasters... So did someone say about hurting podcasters???
Take care, spoiler heroes. I'll miss your great contribution.
And it appears WotC took the most draconian route available to them, so that's cool I guess.
I really like that adjective. Draconian. It just sounds so dire.also yes, most companies are pretty protective of their IP.
The premise that you are affected by marketing even if you go out of your way not to be is a completely ridiculous logical fallacy. Marketing is basically just the art of BS'ing people into doing what you want. There isn't really a nice way to put this, but, it's really only effective on people dumb enough to buy into it. The same marketing can just as easily sell you a terrible product built up on hype as it can a good product, regardless of whether you want and/or need it. The way to defeat marketing influence (and yes it can be done) is with a healthy amount of skepticism. When you start relying hard facts instead of BS slogans like "It's #1 in summertime fun!", you can wade your way through marketing slapped on top of a shoddy product and avoid wasting your hard earned dollars.
Marketing only cares about your experience if it's going to somehow generate more sales. Do not ever fall for the assumption that it is for your benefit; it is always for the company's benefit. Usually financial, sometimes for PR, but it always in some way will benefit them. Your experience being positive is almost always going to be mostly based on how good the actual product is vs how well it was marketed.
This is why I don't care if Wizards hates spoilers like this. Their intention is to get my dollars for their boosters by trying to BS me into thinking "the new set" is going to be another Return To Ravnica or Khans with basically nothing but their own assurances, even when it's more like Homelands. If the end result is that I am lied to less, then I'm perfectly ok with that.
Now here is somebody making some sense. Hey Wizards, are you listening?
Produce a set with SOME powerful, but not necessarily broken, cards in all 5 colors. Ensure the powerful cards are distributed throughout all rarities. Include cards that further the ends of a highly competitive tournament scene and casual play alike. Support multiple formats in each new set because, let's face it, not everybody plays limited, standard, or even modern. Minimize the attempts to prevent power creep in favor of allowing power ebb. Finally, eliminate the urge to tell us what we want. No amount of "Marketing" can ever replace customer satisfaction with a desirable product that provides exceptionally fun experiences, repeatedly, over an extended period of time.
I think they do an ok job of supporting multiple formats. There's only so much they can do realistically. They don't have the resources to test every format and most of the cards they've aimed at eternal/modern have either flopped hard or been banned due to that lack of testing. They have about the size of a small FNM actually working on testing, so it could be a lot worse. Now, the other thing they could do is reprint in standard, but some things would warp the format like Thoughtsieze and some things would be worthless like Grim Lavamancer or Nantuku shade and would tank into the bulk bin. I actually wouldn't be surprised if Dark Confidant and Tarmogoyf fall into the latter and they don't want to completely obliterate the value of incredibly high dollar cards just to do it. I mean really, the last time Goyf was in standard, Watchwolf was a legacy staple and now superior Watchwolves are standard bulk. I'm not really sure it could compete with Siege Rhino. I mean really, a 5/4 flier for 4 with an extra ability that can gain lifelink and haste is bulk nowdays. A splashable 5/3 for 3 with dash is also bulk. Confidant would have to deal with the higher mana curves of standard as well since there isn't a huge about of low mana power in a more restrictive card pool. There's really only so much they can do.
I don't read anything in my post that is incongruent with your post nor do I disagree with any of your general ideas. My main point was that a wide range of fun, powerful cards should, in my opinion, be the primary focus of any set, and then all other concerns can be addressed. Marketing being the least of all of them.
As an enfranchised player, I agree with you from the same perspective, but I still need to point out some unfortunate truths that have to be addressed that goes against that opinion.
As much as we (enfranchised) player are a skeptical bunch pretty immune to Marketing's efforts now, we still need to realize that ultimately, we are not the target market of marketing (at least, not the core intended recipient). The game contains a lot of casual players that don't receive information other than the channels that Marketing uses (let alone discuss the cards or marketing strategies like we do here) and that is what Marketing works on.
Secondly, Marketing has to do its job whether the product is good or bad, because it's their job. Yes, its true a quality product will do the marketing for itself (because we skeptical players are analyzing by ourselves for our own decisions) and also make their job much more easier (since their marketing now also has our support) to their core target (the casual players). But what if the product is bad? Marketing cannot be like us even if they do agree with us themselves - it's still their job to hype the product because that's what they have to do. In an ideal world, every product (not just MTG) is quality and needs no marketing, but we have to face that in the, it isn't so in the real world.
Bluntly put, Marketing puts a lot of effort (that enfranchised players don't care for, honestly, but we aren't the target group) to "cover" for the product that R&D produces, regardless of quality. Even if a set was very good, honestly us enfranchised players will be complaining that marketing is working so hard to cover that awesomeness for the suspense/hype we don't care for. The poor thing for Marketing is that mostly enfranchised raise their concerns in feedback and since we're pretty much on the opposite side and Casual players seldom/don't do that, the arguments here are mostly anti-Marketing.
Few people will "defend" marketing because the people who come here to debate/state their opinions/give feedback are mostly the enfranchised group that doesn't support Marketing, neither does Marketing target them. Even my "defense" here is simply more of attempting to see the scenario in its entirely and in practice, I'm also one of those who don't care for Marketing's antics.
We can blame R&D for constructing lackluster sets, we can blame the higher management for seeing the situation as okay because Marketing is covering well enough for MTG to still sell well (Yes I know there no numerical facts for that, but a company as large as Hasbro definitely won't release sales data due to competition and considering they're mostly conservative when things are fine, I'd say it's a safer assumption than the other way round) but can we seriously blame Marketing for doing its job "too well" that it has permitted quality to "drop" without affecting sales? Remember, ultimately Marketing is a separate own group of people who have minimal influence over R&D and definitely hardly any decision-making power over the higher management.
Yes, perhaps hypothetically removing Marketing will reveal the flaws of the product itself more blatantly, forcing R&D to improve on its job, but in practice the very idea of removing Marketing is just ridiculous (that's literally removing an entire department and firing most, if not all the people in it strictly speaking). It may be less ridiculous in theory to "reduce emphasis on marketing" to promote product quality from the overalll perspective, but internally in the company it's pretty much the same as "punishing Marketing despite Marketing doing a fantastic job" from the perceptive of the higher management and that's not exactly a great Company Culture to cultivate.
I'm not saying "don't do anything", but all this hatred and emphasis on "reduction/punishment" on Marketing when its actually doing its job well objectively speaking (since I already mentioned from our enfranchised perspective they will pretty much never actually do well) is just outright silly. The leaks harming them is pretty much that (silly) sentiment brought to action and while as a enfranchised consumer I will still take any information provided (Marketing jolly well knows that hype seldom affects me in MTG), I still understand why it undermines the effort they put in, even if I don't care for it. The article is still considered a PR disaster to me though, because to me it's still representing the company and harping on the facts I already understand isn't doing them any favors.
A bunch of judges, including level 3 (big enough to head a GP) got banned. Some of them are podcasters... So did someone say about hurting podcasters???
Take care, spoiler heroes. I'll miss your great contribution.
And it appears WotC took the most draconian route available to them, so that's cool I guess.
I really like that adjective. Draconian. It just sounds so dire.also yes, most companies are pretty protective of their IP.
As an enfranchised player, I agree with you from the same perspective, but I still need to point out some unfortunate truths that have to be addressed that goes against that opinion.
As much as we (enfranchised) player are a skeptical bunch pretty immune to Marketing's efforts now, we still need to realize that ultimately, we are not the target market of marketing (at least, not the core intended recipient). The game contains a lot of casual players that don't receive information other than the channels that Marketing uses (let alone discuss the cards or marketing strategies like we do here) and that is what Marketing works on.
Secondly, Marketing has to do its job whether the product is good or bad, because it's their job. Yes, its true a quality product will do the marketing for itself (because we skeptical players are analyzing by ourselves for our own decisions) and also make their job much more easier (since their marketing now also has our support) to their core target (the casual players). But what if the product is bad? Marketing cannot be like us even if they do agree with us themselves - it's still their job to hype the product because that's what they have to do. In an ideal world, every product (not just MTG) is quality and needs no marketing, but we have to face that in the, it isn't so in the real world.
Bluntly put, Marketing puts a lot of effort (that enfranchised players don't care for, honestly, but we aren't the target group) to "cover" for the product that R&D produces, regardless of quality. Even if a set was very good, honestly us enfranchised players will be complaining that marketing is working so hard to cover that awesomeness for the suspense/hype we don't care for. The poor thing for Marketing is that mostly enfranchised raise their concerns in feedback and since we're pretty much on the opposite side and Casual players seldom/don't do that, the arguments here are mostly anti-Marketing.
Few people will "defend" marketing because the people who come here to debate/state their opinions/give feedback are mostly the enfranchised group that doesn't support Marketing, neither does Marketing target them. Even my "defense" here is simply more of attempting to see the scenario in its entirely and in practice, I'm also one of those who don't care for Marketing's antics.
We can blame R&D for constructing lackluster sets, we can blame the higher management for seeing the situation as okay because Marketing is covering well enough for MTG to still sell well (Yes I know there no numerical facts for that, but a company as large as Hasbro definitely won't release sales data due to competition and considering they're mostly conservative when things are fine, I'd say it's a safer assumption than the other way round) but can we seriously blame Marketing for doing its job "too well" that it has permitted quality to "drop" without affecting sales? Remember, ultimately Marketing is a separate own group of people who have minimal influence over R&D and definitely hardly any decision-making power over the higher management.
Yes, perhaps hypothetically removing Marketing will reveal the flaws of the product itself more blatantly, forcing R&D to improve on its job, but in practice the very idea of removing Marketing is just ridiculous (that's literally removing an entire department and firing most, if not all the people in it strictly speaking). It may be less ridiculous in theory to "reduce emphasis on marketing" to promote product quality from the overalll perspective, but internally in the company it's pretty much the same as "punishing Marketing despite Marketing doing a fantastic job" from the perceptive of the higher management and that's not exactly a great Company Culture to cultivate.
I'm not saying "don't do anything", but all this hatred and emphasis on "reduction/punishment" on Marketing when its actually doing its job well objectively speaking (since I already mentioned from our enfranchised perspective they will pretty much never actually do well) is just outright silly. The leaks harming them is pretty much that (silly) sentiment brought to action and while as a enfranchised consumer I will still take any information provided (Marketing jolly well knows that hype seldom affects me in MTG), I still understand why it undermines the effort they put in, even if I don't care for it. The article is still considered a PR disaster to me though, because to me it's still representing the company and harping on the facts I already understand isn't doing them any favors.
In summary, Marketing has it's place (minimal for WotC from my analysis) in a big-picture cooperate strategy. A sentiment I can let stand without further debate.
Are we really still on this? None of us need to feel bad because we saw the spoiler and that wasn't the article's intent, WotC is addressing the issue publicly because it does affect both their marketing efforts and the player base and they are gonna take whatever measures they see fit against whoever broke both their signed NDA and the law, end of story.
Draconian? They have broken confidentiality agreements. They were trusted by WOTC and have broken that trust. Suspension and not ever being given access to information early again seems like a pretty reasonable response.
Draconian? They have broken confidentiality agreements. They were trusted by WOTC and have broken that trust. Suspension and not ever being given access to information early again seems like a pretty reasonable response.
It actually seems extremely unclear what the judges did. Some of them have claimed little to no involvement, and one claims that he actually did report it. Yes, they could be lying to play victim, however, they deserve to be believed as much as WotC deserves to have their statement believed.
So, yeah WotC was well within their legal rights to do what they did. It may not have been a terribly brilliant way to handle the situation, and so far has only put then in a more unfavorable light. Not for the bannings necessarily, but for the inconsistency involved. It's more than a little annoying to see Wizards put themselves in a position where they should defend the ethics of their banning. Of course, it is not the first tone, and if the last time is any indication, they will not even attempt to defend their decisions. Whole this may protect then legally, it doesn't do a lot for how the community interprets the event, which is apparently poorly.
Draconian really is the word. Not only are they throwing the baby with the bathwater, they're ******* over Florida LGS' on their events schedule.
Because they best thing you can do for the game is hurt the stores where people buy and play your GAME.
This really goes to show how far out of it WotC has become. Normally they **** over the player by not giving us the necessary access to cards, we complain and some dimwits with emotional issues related to their socioeconomic standing call us poor whiners who should get out of their rich people hobby.
Now they're hurting stores through situational blindness or outright disregard. What will those people say now to justify? "lol **** the SE"?
At what point does the capitalist realize elitism is loosing them money?
Will they ever realize leaks would hurt less if sets weren't so top-heavy?
Will they understand this shitty drumming for spoiler season just doesn't work so well anymore? That this isn't movies? That they need to do something about the "dry season"?
I do think the public has the right to take the fight to Wizards if there's some gross injustice.
By widespread banning a bunch of judges, even though they have given their innocence/truthfulness on the case, shows that Wizards do not trust them. If Wizards, who entrusted the policing of the game to these people, cannot be trusted, what chance do normal magic folk have???
These suspensions/bannings are as good as a death sentence on their careers. The black mark is permanent.
Over recent years, there have been small teething problems, and increasing in volatility as time passes. This leak is surely just one of them, and now have erupted against the Makers. Increasing entry fees, watered down prizes, reduction of promos/rewards, reduced quality of card printings, erosion in art quality, erosion in set development, terrible storyline writing, spikes in card prices (even obscure ones), price memory (WTF), speculation, hoarding, articles on how to hoard, to sell, to buy. Problems like these will manifest into leviathans that people cannot control one day. IMO the golden generation of Magic has ebbed away.
Things will never be the same again, that's for sure.
Draconian isn't really the right word. If I'm reading this right, some judges were involved in leaks and got punished fairly proportonately and wizards is taking legal action against them, thats not draconian, they deserved harsh suspensions and bans, and wizards is protecting its rights. Some judges, who were uninvolved and did nothing wrong at all, and in fact, did some things proactively right, were also harshly punished. The phrase you are looking for is "Miscarriage of justice"
And wizards should immediately repeal any actions against the judges who didn't do anything wrong, and that should be the end of this debacle. If they don't, then everyone should carry on their hissy fit quite justified.
When you bring up something like
spikes in card prices (even obscure ones), price memory (WTF), speculation, hoarding, articles on how to hoard, to sell, to buy
I think its almost telling that theres no big funstorm going down over the spoiler of kozilek's return at mythic rarity as an obvious cashgrab utility, because theres so many other big fiascos at the same time and people are just getting numb to the gouging at this point.
As someone who exclusively studies this game for its design and doesn't play it at all, I must say that these issues external to R&D are starting to become big enough to threaten the game, and wizards aren't getting a handle on it. I could personally care a fig less about card prices or judge drama or leak scandals, but its getting to the point its interfering with this games stability
Let's just add that to the list of things that are "unfun" for new players.
I believe the rate it will show up is so low its impact on limit won't be a real problem.
Actually, the ruling on expeditions says that the card is only in limited/standard/modern/whatever/ if th actual card (be it the original or a re-print) is on that format already. So only if we get an actual re-print of Strip Mine in OGW
Let's just add that to the list of things that are "unfun" for new players.
I believe the rate it will show up is so low its impact on limit won't be a real problem.
Actually, the ruling on expeditions says that the card is only in limited/standard/modern/whatever/ if th actual card (be it the original or a re-print) is on that format already. So only if we get an actual re-print of Strip Mine in OGW
You're wrong. All expeditions are limited legal. For constructed purposes, they're only legal if they're already in the format, e.g. you can use a expedition Cinder Glade in standard, but not a Stomping Ground.
Yes. From what I've read of the situation, draconian is the only way to describe it.
Yeah, they lost their access to play and judge in sanctioned tournaments of a card game. That certainly rises to the level of draconian, a word used to describe things like the laws during the Spanish Inquisition.
If Wizards is truthful that these judges knew who was leaking information, then they should man up and just accept their temporary suspensions. Sure it sucks, and sure they probably thought all the while that these were minor things and not worth ratting on other judges they may consider as friends, but that's life.
It's like riding in a car with a friend that goes over the speed limit. Are you going to call the cops? No. Are you guilty of letting a minor offense go by? Sure. Could you get scold at by a cop if he gives your friend a ticket? Maybe. Should you put up a sissy fit? No.
The only point of contention is who knew what, when and for how long. From what we've heard so far, most sanctions seem deserved. Only a few are saying that they were completely out of the this story and got punished for nothing at all. Time will tell if they were really completely innocent or knew a few things but were looking the other way. (Again, I don't blame them for doing that. But once the **** hit the fan, accept the consequences and move on. It will be over in three months.)
Spoiling a card ahead is essentially spoiling the product before the company want you to know about it.
Do anyone calling mtg dragonian be willing to share what the companies they are working for is doing that is not announce to the public yet? I hope not.
Yes. From what I've read of the situation, draconian is the only way to describe it.
Yeah, they lost their access to play and judge in sanctioned tournaments of a card game. That certainly rises to the level of draconian, a word used to describe things like the laws during the Spanish Inquisition.
It's a Greek word derived from Draco's law code, generally meaning unreasonable punishment for slight offenses. Banning every member of a Facebook group where the leak was initially posted, including the person who reported it to WotC, fits that term quite well.
Yes. From what I've read of the situation, draconian is the only way to describe it.
Yeah, they lost their access to play and judge in sanctioned tournaments of a card game. That certainly rises to the level of draconian, a word used to describe things like the laws during the Spanish Inquisition.
It's a Greek word derived from Draco's law code, generally meaning unreasonable punishment for slight offenses. Banning every member of a Facebook group where the leak was initially posted, including the person who reported it to WotC, fits that term quite well.
The underbelly of this site never ceases to amaze.
The amount of support for people 100% wrong and scorn for those of have been wronged is astounding.
And we wonder why humanity is doomed, just look at yourselves: claiming that those who actively harm the people who make the game they love are saints to be shielded from corporate greed.
Y'all should just go back to stealing other people's decklists.
Public Mod Note
(LouCypher):
Flame/Troll warning -LouCypher
Yes. From what I've read of the situation, draconian is the only way to describe it.
Yeah, they lost their access to play and judge in sanctioned tournaments of a card game. That certainly rises to the level of draconian, a word used to describe things like the laws during the Spanish Inquisition.
It's a Greek word derived from Draco's law code, generally meaning unreasonable punishment for slight offenses. Banning every member of a Facebook group where the leak was initially posted, including the person who reported it to WotC, fits that term quite well.
How is it unreasonable to ban someone from playing/ judging in sanctioned tournaments? Its not like they burned the peoples' cards, or deleted their MTGO accounts. All of the people in that group knew that the leaks were the result of illegal activities, let it continue unreported, and many even took active parts in the illegal activities. Being banned from the professional parts of a hobby is the least draconian thing they could have done. Besides nothing, I guess.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
MTGSalvation; Where the whining is a time honored tradition, and enjoying the game is trolling.
Yes. From what I've read of the situation, draconian is the only way to describe it.
Yeah, they lost their access to play and judge in sanctioned tournaments of a card game. That certainly rises to the level of draconian, a word used to describe things like the laws during the Spanish Inquisition.
It's a Greek word derived from Draco's law code, generally meaning unreasonable punishment for slight offenses. Banning every member of a Facebook group where the leak was initially posted, including the person who reported it to WotC, fits that term quite well.
How is it unreasonable to ban someone from playing/ judging in sanctioned tournaments? Its not like they burned the peoples' cards, or deleted their MTGO accounts. All of the people in that group knew that the leaks were the result of illegal activities, let it continue unreported, and many even took active parts in the illegal activities. Being banned from the professional parts of a hobby is the least draconian thing they could have done. Besides nothing, I guess.
It's unreasonable to expect your players to be responsible for reporting your own supply chain failures, especially those who already donate a significant portion of personal time for free to doing something that frankly your company should be paying someone to do.
There is no way to create a rule that governs these situations without having to take every single potential card seriously and investing personal time into researching whether it *could* be a legitimate leak.
It isn't that the players were not reporting supply line leaks. They were not reporting criminal activities. And many of those players were judges; people given special responsibility and trust. Obviously they weren't screened thoroughly enough.
Why do you think that these people should get paid to participate in their hobby? Should I get paid by Thompson Center to go hunting?
And they do have a way of governing these things: NDAs. That, and any enfranchised player (ie all of the ones suspended) knows that these leaks are illegal. People are acting like this isn't a big deal. It is. If you cannot see how, you've probably never published something.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
MTGSalvation; Where the whining is a time honored tradition, and enjoying the game is trolling.
I loved getting the spoilers early. I'm excited to play with them. I'd like to see more.
<Wizards response? Whatever. I love the people that make the cards, but the corpo pin heads like Trick Jarrett can go jump off a building. No really, jump you f$@&s.> Talking about wanting someone to jump off a building is not warranted here.
Thanks judges. Taking one for the team. If I was a judge I'd walk out, but I'm not, so what I think is of little consequence.
Now we just need some more leaks, because the only one who likes the slow roll dance are the card shark websites and wizards. It's like three weeks away, get the show on the road.
I really like that adjective. Draconian. It just sounds so dire.also yes, most companies are pretty protective of their IP.
As an enfranchised player, I agree with you from the same perspective, but I still need to point out some unfortunate truths that have to be addressed that goes against that opinion.
As much as we (enfranchised) player are a skeptical bunch pretty immune to Marketing's efforts now, we still need to realize that ultimately, we are not the target market of marketing (at least, not the core intended recipient). The game contains a lot of casual players that don't receive information other than the channels that Marketing uses (let alone discuss the cards or marketing strategies like we do here) and that is what Marketing works on.
Secondly, Marketing has to do its job whether the product is good or bad, because it's their job. Yes, its true a quality product will do the marketing for itself (because we skeptical players are analyzing by ourselves for our own decisions) and also make their job much more easier (since their marketing now also has our support) to their core target (the casual players). But what if the product is bad? Marketing cannot be like us even if they do agree with us themselves - it's still their job to hype the product because that's what they have to do. In an ideal world, every product (not just MTG) is quality and needs no marketing, but we have to face that in the, it isn't so in the real world.
Bluntly put, Marketing puts a lot of effort (that enfranchised players don't care for, honestly, but we aren't the target group) to "cover" for the product that R&D produces, regardless of quality. Even if a set was very good, honestly us enfranchised players will be complaining that marketing is working so hard to cover that awesomeness for the suspense/hype we don't care for. The poor thing for Marketing is that mostly enfranchised raise their concerns in feedback and since we're pretty much on the opposite side and Casual players seldom/don't do that, the arguments here are mostly anti-Marketing.
Few people will "defend" marketing because the people who come here to debate/state their opinions/give feedback are mostly the enfranchised group that doesn't support Marketing, neither does Marketing target them. Even my "defense" here is simply more of attempting to see the scenario in its entirely and in practice, I'm also one of those who don't care for Marketing's antics.
We can blame R&D for constructing lackluster sets, we can blame the higher management for seeing the situation as okay because Marketing is covering well enough for MTG to still sell well (Yes I know there no numerical facts for that, but a company as large as Hasbro definitely won't release sales data due to competition and considering they're mostly conservative when things are fine, I'd say it's a safer assumption than the other way round) but can we seriously blame Marketing for doing its job "too well" that it has permitted quality to "drop" without affecting sales? Remember, ultimately Marketing is a separate own group of people who have minimal influence over R&D and definitely hardly any decision-making power over the higher management.
Yes, perhaps hypothetically removing Marketing will reveal the flaws of the product itself more blatantly, forcing R&D to improve on its job, but in practice the very idea of removing Marketing is just ridiculous (that's literally removing an entire department and firing most, if not all the people in it strictly speaking). It may be less ridiculous in theory to "reduce emphasis on marketing" to promote product quality from the overalll perspective, but internally in the company it's pretty much the same as "punishing Marketing despite Marketing doing a fantastic job" from the perceptive of the higher management and that's not exactly a great Company Culture to cultivate.
I'm not saying "don't do anything", but all this hatred and emphasis on "reduction/punishment" on Marketing when its actually doing its job well objectively speaking (since I already mentioned from our enfranchised perspective they will pretty much never actually do well) is just outright silly. The leaks harming them is pretty much that (silly) sentiment brought to action and while as a enfranchised consumer I will still take any information provided (Marketing jolly well knows that hype seldom affects me in MTG), I still understand why it undermines the effort they put in, even if I don't care for it. The article is still considered a PR disaster to me though, because to me it's still representing the company and harping on the facts I already understand isn't doing them any favors.
They're draconian as Cylix.
Like I said before, if BFZ wasn't so bad, maybe podcasters/judges like them wouldn't be so desperate.
On a more serious note, Wizards should be looking at the gap between sets. I find them abit too long IMO. Can't blame people for being curious.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
In summary, Marketing has it's place (minimal for WotC from my analysis) in a big-picture cooperate strategy. A sentiment I can let stand without further debate.
UR Blue-Red Control
Modern:
UBR Grixis Control
UWR Jeskai Control
UR Blue-Red Control
Modern:
UBR Grixis Control
UWR Jeskai Control
It actually seems extremely unclear what the judges did. Some of them have claimed little to no involvement, and one claims that he actually did report it. Yes, they could be lying to play victim, however, they deserve to be believed as much as WotC deserves to have their statement believed.
So, yeah WotC was well within their legal rights to do what they did. It may not have been a terribly brilliant way to handle the situation, and so far has only put then in a more unfavorable light. Not for the bannings necessarily, but for the inconsistency involved. It's more than a little annoying to see Wizards put themselves in a position where they should defend the ethics of their banning. Of course, it is not the first tone, and if the last time is any indication, they will not even attempt to defend their decisions. Whole this may protect then legally, it doesn't do a lot for how the community interprets the event, which is apparently poorly.
Because they best thing you can do for the game is hurt the stores where people buy and play your GAME.
This really goes to show how far out of it WotC has become. Normally they **** over the player by not giving us the necessary access to cards, we complain and some dimwits with emotional issues related to their socioeconomic standing call us poor whiners who should get out of their rich people hobby.
Now they're hurting stores through situational blindness or outright disregard. What will those people say now to justify? "lol **** the SE"?
At what point does the capitalist realize elitism is loosing them money?
Will they ever realize leaks would hurt less if sets weren't so top-heavy?
Will they understand this shitty drumming for spoiler season just doesn't work so well anymore? That this isn't movies? That they need to do something about the "dry season"?
By widespread banning a bunch of judges, even though they have given their innocence/truthfulness on the case, shows that Wizards do not trust them. If Wizards, who entrusted the policing of the game to these people, cannot be trusted, what chance do normal magic folk have???
These suspensions/bannings are as good as a death sentence on their careers. The black mark is permanent.
Over recent years, there have been small teething problems, and increasing in volatility as time passes. This leak is surely just one of them, and now have erupted against the Makers. Increasing entry fees, watered down prizes, reduction of promos/rewards, reduced quality of card printings, erosion in art quality, erosion in set development, terrible storyline writing, spikes in card prices (even obscure ones), price memory (WTF), speculation, hoarding, articles on how to hoard, to sell, to buy. Problems like these will manifest into leviathans that people cannot control one day. IMO the golden generation of Magic has ebbed away.
Things will never be the same again, that's for sure.
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
And wizards should immediately repeal any actions against the judges who didn't do anything wrong, and that should be the end of this debacle. If they don't, then everyone should carry on their hissy fit quite justified.
When you bring up something like
I think its almost telling that theres no big funstorm going down over the spoiler of kozilek's return at mythic rarity as an obvious cashgrab utility, because theres so many other big fiascos at the same time and people are just getting numb to the gouging at this point.
As someone who exclusively studies this game for its design and doesn't play it at all, I must say that these issues external to R&D are starting to become big enough to threaten the game, and wizards aren't getting a handle on it. I could personally care a fig less about card prices or judge drama or leak scandals, but its getting to the point its interfering with this games stability
Actually, the ruling on expeditions says that the card is only in limited/standard/modern/whatever/ if th actual card (be it the original or a re-print) is on that format already. So only if we get an actual re-print of Strip Mine in OGW
Yeah, they lost their access to play and judge in sanctioned tournaments of a card game. That certainly rises to the level of draconian, a word used to describe things like the laws during the Spanish Inquisition.
375 unpowered cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/601ac624832cdf1039947588
It's like riding in a car with a friend that goes over the speed limit. Are you going to call the cops? No. Are you guilty of letting a minor offense go by? Sure. Could you get scold at by a cop if he gives your friend a ticket? Maybe. Should you put up a sissy fit? No.
The only point of contention is who knew what, when and for how long. From what we've heard so far, most sanctions seem deserved. Only a few are saying that they were completely out of the this story and got punished for nothing at all. Time will tell if they were really completely innocent or knew a few things but were looking the other way. (Again, I don't blame them for doing that. But once the **** hit the fan, accept the consequences and move on. It will be over in three months.)
Do anyone calling mtg dragonian be willing to share what the companies they are working for is doing that is not announce to the public yet? I hope not.
My cube
My cube on Cube tutor
I'm OP_Forever. I'll be putting this in my signature for a while so everyone know I change my nickname.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bq5WkfG1r3k
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It's a Greek word derived from Draco's law code, generally meaning unreasonable punishment for slight offenses. Banning every member of a Facebook group where the leak was initially posted, including the person who reported it to WotC, fits that term quite well.
UR Blue-Red Control
Modern:
UBR Grixis Control
UWR Jeskai Control
The current statement (http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/statement-concerning-recent-suspensions-2015-12-21) says that this was not their first offense, if I understand it correctly.
The amount of support for people 100% wrong and scorn for those of have been wronged is astounding.
And we wonder why humanity is doomed, just look at yourselves: claiming that those who actively harm the people who make the game they love are saints to be shielded from corporate greed.
Y'all should just go back to stealing other people's decklists.
How is it unreasonable to ban someone from playing/ judging in sanctioned tournaments? Its not like they burned the peoples' cards, or deleted their MTGO accounts. All of the people in that group knew that the leaks were the result of illegal activities, let it continue unreported, and many even took active parts in the illegal activities. Being banned from the professional parts of a hobby is the least draconian thing they could have done. Besides nothing, I guess.
It isn't that the players were not reporting supply line leaks. They were not reporting criminal activities. And many of those players were judges; people given special responsibility and trust. Obviously they weren't screened thoroughly enough.
Why do you think that these people should get paid to participate in their hobby? Should I get paid by Thompson Center to go hunting?
And they do have a way of governing these things: NDAs. That, and any enfranchised player (ie all of the ones suspended) knows that these leaks are illegal. People are acting like this isn't a big deal. It is. If you cannot see how, you've probably never published something.
<Wizards response? Whatever. I love the people that make the cards, but the corpo pin heads like Trick Jarrett can go jump off a building. No really, jump you f$@&s.> Talking about wanting someone to jump off a building is not warranted here.
Thanks judges. Taking one for the team. If I was a judge I'd walk out, but I'm not, so what I think is of little consequence.
Now we just need some more leaks, because the only one who likes the slow roll dance are the card shark websites and wizards. It's like three weeks away, get the show on the road.