And playing by the rules doesn't mean that new players won't continue to play, in fact, about half the new players I encounter don't even ask for a take-back when something like that happens. Playing without takebacks is not something that's unique to magic. Even new players grok it.
Are shouting matches standard behaviour at your LGS?
The word "Shouting match" is incredibly vague. It means nothing. If the girls were the only ones shouting except for when the spikes shouted "Judge", then one might still describe it as a shouting match.
My point was that even though what the spikes did was described as bad and unsportsmanlike-like, no actual allegation against them has been made.
You would have to personaly know the players to understand how unreasonable it would have went down. I don't feel I need to go into great detail about it. Community comes before 1 pack to experianced players.
Since playing by the rules is the still the only allegation against them in this thread, my opinion that they did nothing wrong still stands. Vague "trust me, it was really bad" statements hold no water with me.
Spikesquared were unnecesarly rude to the newer players and probebly turned them off of magic in our community for good.
Rules and rules so for the two girls playing, they would know from then on that Hixus is played differently, but given the nature of the event and the huge amount of skill difference between the players, I would have thought Spikesquared could have handled the situation much better then they did.
In a small community like ours, its hard to even have enough players to make things sanctioned sometimes and to have players that want to punish newer players and go home with packs is not healthy.
Thanks for all the responses!
What did they do other than not allow the takeback?
Here's what you have to do to solve the problem that you described
Host some unsanctioned/casual events. That way, you haven't agreed to abide by a specific set of rules that Wizards has set up, and you can modify the rules to allow things like rewinding/takebacks
Host events that don't have prizes for winning. That way, you'll be in better standing to encourage players to sometimes do things that harm their chances at winning, such as allowing rewinds and takebacks.
I.E. if you want players to play casually, then host casual events.
As far as I can see, you didn't describe anything specific that the spikes did wrong. There was this vague "shouting match", but that doesn't tell me much.
The person who was in the wrong is the judge. Technically, the judge shouldn't allow rewinds even if the spike team wants to rewind too. Allowing a rewind in that situation represents the judge looking the other way in the face of a minor rules violation. Encouraging the rewind, however, is quite un-judgelike
I'm programming a small game for my own enjoyment at the moment. I might or might not release it to the public - I'm not concerned that it'll sell well (I am sure the public will have no interest in it whatsoever, I'm about as amateur a game designer as they get) but something struck me when I considered publishing the thing.
I think the ordinary good versus evil fantasy dichotomy is dull. (The D&D alignment system is leagues better but more on that in a bit.)
On the other hand, I quite enjoy the elegance of Magic's philosophic color structre in the abstract, and I've been ever since I read the first article on it. This is why I plan to implement it in my game.
The question is - now, I know that Magic has copyrighted the mana symbols, the game mechanics, and all art - but does Wizards of the Coast have rights on the color philosophy in the abstract? Will they punish me for applying the philosophies in my own game world? And what about the D&D alignment system?
Now I know that Wizards have sued before, shutting a few custom card creation programs down and suing the Hex TCG, which was basically a clone of Magic.
But this is not the territory I'm trespassing on: I will not use the mana symbols at all, my game mechanics have no connection to TCGs at all.
The question is whether the abstract philosophical framework of Magic: the Gathering's background world is copyrighted, or whether it is what it is: an abstract philosophical framework, that can't really be copyrighted, as it's just a grouping of different ideologies created for the game.
Here is a shorthand example of what I could write out somewhere in the game:
"You are a black mage. You embody greed and ambition, and you know that nobody has the right to stop you. This makes you an enemy of white mages, who believe that you should be hindered by petty laws and morals, and green mages, who damn your flowering powers as experimental and unnatural."
If you know about the Battle for Wesnoth game, you know that they use an alignment system of Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic, where good and evil weren't alignments, but could arguably be analyzed from how the different characters in the game acted (they later added the "Liminal" alignment to the game). Battle for Wesnoth was not sued by Wizards, and I'm sure other games have used the system.
I also know that the five colors line up with certain mage archetypes in older fantasy games and fantasy settings.
And lastly - who should I ask in Wizards if I decide to eventually publish the game?
I don't personally expect moral frameworks to be copyrightable, especially something as general as colors and ideals, and I know that Wizards really care about their public relations, but you never know in this day and age.
It absolutely is copyrighted, but whether or not you violate the copyright depends on to what detail that you draw influence from it. (remember that you don't actually have to file for a copyright in order for copyright to exist. The copyright exists the second you publish the work.)
If you simply use the color Green for nature, black for death and evil, white for law and religion, red for passion and aggression and fire, and blue for thought, intellect, and water, then you'll be fine. Those concepts are used outside of magic, and you're not in danger of violating the copyright.
but if you also copy the exact concept of enemy pairs and allied pairs, and/or if you represent it with the same color pallet that appears on the card backs, then you might be violating the copyright, as it becomes more and more clear that you're just copying what Magic has done.
The problem is, that if R&D decides to include it in standard, and if for some reason, it does end up being too good, it would be very easy for all the Monday morning Quarterbacks to place more blame on WotC R&D. Much more easy than it would be to blame them for things like JTMS and Skullclamp
I'm talking insider trading. I could be a junior designer with WOTC. I find out Batterskull is being printed, so I go ahead and buy out Stoneforge Mystic and wait for the spike. That's not a entirely false story by the way. Someone I know told me they did exactly that, because one of his friends affiliated with the company told him of the living equipment being printed. Of course there's no proof, however he's unemployed and plays all pimped out legacy decks using money from his "specs". So take it how you will.
If your friend is telling the truth, What he might not be telling you is that he wouldn't have made very much money on that deal, since Stoneforge Mystic didn't actually "spike" after batterskull was spoiled
Yes, the Mozilla guy should have resigned. Not only was he a bigot, he made public statements that led to his company getting a ton of negative press and people threatening to boycott. It was a dumb move for an executive to make. Replace gay marriage with interracial marriage. Now would we care if he was forced to step down? I think not.
Some people actually do want people to be able to voice their opinions without fear. If Brendan Eich made a comment saying that practicing religion should be banned, then many of the same people would still be defending him in the same way.
Further, you ARE making a ridiculous hypothetical slippery slope. One guy got banned for having been convicted of rape and there being press about it. This doesn't mean the next logical step is that the Wizards Gestapo is knocking on your door demanding to see your voter registration and entire history of opinions. Don't be absurd. And yes, obviously some positions SHOULD get you banned from magic. If you were a brazenly outspoken white supremacist, or Islamic terrorist supporter, or some other equally horrible thing, wizards could and should ban you. We may not be quite there yet with gay marriage, but we will be in 20 years, when (thankfully) expressing such a backward, bigoted viewpoint about equal protection under the law WILL be grounds for public mocking and being forced to resign. No one makes you be a bigot.
It's a slippery slope argument when you say that legalization of homosexuality will lead to christian priests being forced to perform the service at their weddings.
It's a slippery slope argument when people are saying that this will lead to background checks for magic players.
But it is not a slippery slope argument to say that when Wizards makes an executive decision to ban one person because he's undesirable, that they might make an executive decision to ban other people because they're undesirable.
I would also add, (at least in crimes of gain) that society plays a huge role in relapsing. People who were not directly affected by the responsible party (I would never argue that Jesse's victim hasn't the right to have hostility towards him if she chose) who decide to vindicate him all over again. I would never justify rape, but for me to judge someone for a past decision that had zero influence on myself would be absolutely ridiculous.
I would imagine that if I lost my job, had no other income, and no one would ever hire me, I might have to eventually resort to crime if the choice was between being homeless or being a criminal. I realize rape doesn't really fall in the "crime of gain" territory, but still.
1) As you said he is new, he only debuted in the Theros block.
2) There has not been a story need for him to show up again.
Planeswalkers are slighty different to the rest of the cards as they are primarily driven by Creative not Design and Development. The more important the Planeswalker is to the Story the more likely we are to get a card for them.
Taking the example of Jace, he was one of the first 5 Lorwyn planeswalkers and has had and important impact on the storyline of several different blocks so he gets several different versions.
Koth on the other hand has only been relevant in a single block so we only have 1 version. Likewise with Ashiok he has only had an impact on Theros so unless we return there or Creative has a compelling reason to move him we aren't going to see him return.
Well, Karn as important to the story if not more important than any of the Lorwyn 5. Why does he only have 2 cards?
living wish
The word "Shouting match" is incredibly vague. It means nothing. If the girls were the only ones shouting except for when the spikes shouted "Judge", then one might still describe it as a shouting match.
My point was that even though what the spikes did was described as bad and unsportsmanlike-like, no actual allegation against them has been made.
Since playing by the rules is the still the only allegation against them in this thread, my opinion that they did nothing wrong still stands. Vague "trust me, it was really bad" statements hold no water with me.
What did they do other than not allow the takeback?
I.E. if you want players to play casually, then host casual events.
As far as I can see, you didn't describe anything specific that the spikes did wrong. There was this vague "shouting match", but that doesn't tell me much.
The person who was in the wrong is the judge. Technically, the judge shouldn't allow rewinds even if the spike team wants to rewind too. Allowing a rewind in that situation represents the judge looking the other way in the face of a minor rules violation. Encouraging the rewind, however, is quite un-judgelike
It absolutely is copyrighted, but whether or not you violate the copyright depends on to what detail that you draw influence from it. (remember that you don't actually have to file for a copyright in order for copyright to exist. The copyright exists the second you publish the work.)
If you simply use the color Green for nature, black for death and evil, white for law and religion, red for passion and aggression and fire, and blue for thought, intellect, and water, then you'll be fine. Those concepts are used outside of magic, and you're not in danger of violating the copyright.
but if you also copy the exact concept of enemy pairs and allied pairs, and/or if you represent it with the same color pallet that appears on the card backs, then you might be violating the copyright, as it becomes more and more clear that you're just copying what Magic has done.
The problem is, that if R&D decides to include it in standard, and if for some reason, it does end up being too good, it would be very easy for all the Monday morning Quarterbacks to place more blame on WotC R&D. Much more easy than it would be to blame them for things like JTMS and Skullclamp
If your friend is telling the truth, What he might not be telling you is that he wouldn't have made very much money on that deal, since Stoneforge Mystic didn't actually "spike" after batterskull was spoiled
Some people actually do want people to be able to voice their opinions without fear. If Brendan Eich made a comment saying that practicing religion should be banned, then many of the same people would still be defending him in the same way.
It's a slippery slope argument when you say that legalization of homosexuality will lead to christian priests being forced to perform the service at their weddings.
It's a slippery slope argument when people are saying that this will lead to background checks for magic players.
But it is not a slippery slope argument to say that when Wizards makes an executive decision to ban one person because he's undesirable, that they might make an executive decision to ban other people because they're undesirable.
"Vindicate"
I do not think it means what you think it means.
Well, Karn as important to the story if not more important than any of the Lorwyn 5. Why does he only have 2 cards?