Quote from Ferret »
If you want a good reason to not do a CGI movie based on a game, take a good hard look at "Warcraft"...
The reason Warcraft was only okay at best was not because of the CGI, it was them doing a story that didn't work as a movie combined with the humans being lackluster characters. They took a 15 hour game and tried to condense it into 2 hours, that won't work. The CG on the orcs and the orc characters are easily the best things about that movie.That's is like saying Pixar shouldn't do CG because Planes exists.
People want a Magic movie to see the parts that stuck with them for years, things like Elspeth dying, much of the Brother's War, or (in my case) seeing stuff from Odyssey & Onslaught stories. The WoW movie would have worked if they chose the Lich King story, as much as I hate to say thanks to it being easier to understand and being straight forward of a good guy becoming a right bastage. We've seen many series come back that have done great, same can be said about terrible, but to say CG is the reason something does poorly is downright asinine and lacks the greater context.
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I actually have a rather different view.. well at least of the game... well mostly just the last line... else i am mostly in agreement with the bait tactics.
It is very strange, but i think it is the high value that keeps people in the game. Take away the value, the system surviving on it falls (lgs, scg, artists, ermm cosplay?) and easy access to other humans playing falls and the player base dwindles.
The players will likely all leave. Well most of them, but there will always be a core group left.legacy proved this. There was a time when most cards are worthless and lotus was a couple of hundreds. The price spike overall is a recent thing, it is an anomaly. It can die. Not that it will, but it can.and playerz will likely leave in droves. But the game will still live, regardless of the company that spawned it or whether it has equity. Which is why i am oki with them printing equity to the ground, or not. I know the game will always be around.
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Hehe they could reprint it and ban it if too strong, they have banned stranger cards
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That alone will not kill the price. Given those conditions LGS will just soak up the quantities and charge market value. Which is what happen with mma. Thats just a reload button for price gorgers. (Thats partly the effect of a high msrp, It cost LGS more to soak up the stock).
What will do the trick, is to have unlimited print to demand run + distribution to mass market channel (to remove the effect of LGS artificially ordering less). That should kill the prices of those 15 cards (assuming ftv). Now if we want to kill swathes of cards, Standard print run is your man. I am actually all for it
And no. People will still not be happy.
I think the 25 dollar manamorphose is symptomatic of a bigger problem. Scalpers. I think the only solution is to print better cards in Standard at all rarities, especially common. The problem is us. We are the ones paying the ridiculous prices (assuming the 25 dollar manamorphose sticks). The problem is why is it even a problem? Should'nt most people have manamorphose already? It was a 4 dollar card not too long ago. Then i realised at 4 dollars it might not be very palatable just to complete a set. I got my manamorphose when they were like 1 dollar or less.cos i collected over the years. So what is the solution? I actually think wotc is doing a great job with the printing at least with standard. They print so much of it, it is actually really cheap, and post rotation BAM. There is just too much stock for scalpers to consume. So in addition to the massive print run, they should print more and better cards that are minimally competitive in modern, maybe throw a bone to legacy and vintage; be it an entirely new card or a reprint. Then, if there are enough cards such that competitive decks can be built in modern with cards post RTR, at that point in time, if scalpers still have a hold on you... its really on you.
(Oh yay me 1000th post)
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This. I can never understand why players/consumers do not want more info. Especially after getting screwed over set after set. I am happy to see the spoilers, at least this time it was not disappointing. well done wotc! ... i think.... we haven't seen the whole thing yet
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I hear ya
The thing about legscy and vintage is that collection wise it is done over the years.
Standard decks tend to be built like instant noodles. You build everything from a more limited pool, there is nothing wrong with that. Its fun and you get to play with snazzy new cards. It is very accessible. For legacy tho, decks or rather the collection is built over time, so its less stressful on the pocket, it also rewards the casual brewer looking to break less regarded cards. This creates a perception for initial entry players that legacy is expensive. It is expensive if you must have the deck quickly, it is less so if you are just dwardling and building your collection.
What is my point? What i am tryubg to say is that current standard players should be able to build on their collection, so that over time they can draw on their cardpool to build decks for a more "eternal" format, be it modern, legacy or vintage.
This brings me to two more points. 1) building a collection, ... to what??? 2) balance and design space.
1) by this i mean to what end are we building our collection to? Going completely bfz (sans dear gideon) will yield a block cube. Or the sets could contain modern potential nuggets or even legacy or vintage nuggets. Its really up to wotc/hasbro to decide how they want to develope the type and depth of longevity they want to build with the game.and it starts with standard. On this front i think they are doing oki with creatures and planeswalkers but stack based effects and in general other playstyles need some love. This is to help players build their collection, so that their collection has at the very least, play value if not monetory value.
2) balance and design space. As you have alluded, balance does not mean gameplay and power level has to be bland or weak. Even limited draft can be powerful yet balanced. However the thing is by printibg best of breed (i.e. powerful) of cards they reduce design space which mean they have to think harder to design laterally. Which is more difficult. Yet they want to sell more sets, so it creates pressure to keep printing stuff people will buy. Their current solution is to print weak cards and variate the strength to spread design over more sets. This is why they prefer balance through weakness. It is better for sales
3) oh yay i have a third point. Again i think you alluded to it. And that is attitudes and preferred gameplay style. Some people like powerful game plays some like midrangy some like fast paced games, some like prison some like control some like permission. There are currently 3 eternal formats for wotc to shape. I feel they present opportunities for differing preferences. There might even be one for power level akin to standard (perhaps with ample bannings so that it does not become modern 2.0 and remain at intended power. In a similar way they could reprint counterspell in standard, let it run in modern and ban it if its really bad or not the kind of modern they want)
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That is the very sad truth. Having litrerally lived through it. Except i still think its weak sauce its just everything got weaker while creatures and planswalkers went up. Which is fine in the grander schemeof things (eternal) since if you have the older cards, its just creatures finally stepping up to the plate. For more temporal formats like standard and arguably modern, the disparity between creatures and other types become more stark. Standard is amusing. They nerf stuff then things that were supposed to be be countered by the stuff that they nerfed become kings and they wonder why. Of couse the solution is to nerf more stuff
I mean we can already play that, just play bfz only without gideon. Its about there.
I still buy lots of magic. Enough to fuel a small shop. Its still oki because like i mention crits and planeswalkers are still powerful enough to match up to older cards. But once its bfz all the way, i'll just collect a little for block cube. Since thats all it really is by that stage.
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Totally agree it is a decade of this philoshophy that has gotten us here today unfortunately. Just look at which cards actually hold value. If the game were healthier the price disparity would be far less.
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This would be a step in the right direction to rebalance the game, not to weaken the creatures but to bring back answers.
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Totally this
Magic has lost its magic, at least in standard. Standard used to be the frontier from which other formats look to for new tech. These days we look for "mistakes". TBH it is not too different. In the past there were only a few gems and the rest was chaff. So that part has'nt changed.
what changed was power creep and simplification of the game. Power creep kills the game true. But power creep also fuels the game and makes it interesting and makes it Magic
What might allow standard to be the current weak-card simmer pool and yet pull in crowds would be different ways of playing magic. For instance all the various casual formats, cube drafts. Or sets being more strongly in flavor or mechanics such that a block cube brings something everyone likes to the table. Essentially new games using magic rules (which is possible because of the depth and breath of Magic's structure as a game - which is actually awesome). I believe they are already going in direction while throwing bones to the older 60 card constructed formats. It is not terribad, its just not old magic. Which is what I as an old fart is missing from the current standard
For the older style for making magic where they were more "careless", there is potential even from weak\currently-useless cards that may have potential. Now a useless card tends to stay useless.
I suspect it is to save design space so they can squeeze out more value out from one set, given that they want to churn out more sets they have to spread the design equity out thinner, hence we see more weak cards. Weak cards allow more gradiated and variated power creeping, useful when they want to make a "chase" card.
Standard magic is a different game today from what it was 20 years ago. Its not necessarily bad. But it is thinner.