I disagree strongly with your complaints, particularly "never put huge stats on fliers". Big fliers are strong, but they're often slow, expensive, and much easier to interact with than noncreatures like Citadel Siege, Loxodon Warhammer, or the worst planeswalkers. If you lost to Dromoka alone, it's not because your opponent had it in the top 15 cards of their deck, it's because you didn't give yourself a way to beat it in top 18 of yours.
Did you miss the part where I said "without one of the few removal spells that can deal with it"?
If I have a relevant removal spell in my top 18 cards I have an answer to something that will win the game on its own, but the removal spell won't win the game on its own. Dromoka will win the game on its own, easily. It's not an equitable situation. I understand that Dromoka is mythic, but it's just not fun to play with, period. I don't know why they haven't made a card yet that says something like, "7: If your life total is higher than your opponent's, you win the game". Wouldn't that card be alot of fun to play against? Not at all, right? So someone would point out how un-fun it is, and someone else would come along and say, "you were supposed to have a counter spell, [dumb card that is no fun to play against] is fine".
I think it sucks that they make cards like Dragonlord Dromoka. I hate beating my opponent down with a good curve and good play, and then having it not matter when they drop their huge bomb at 6 mana that just simply cannot be beaten without one of a few removal spells that could deal with it. One thing I can never understand is why Wizards feels the need to put huge stats on flyers. They're just so un-fun to play against. Go ahead and make a flyer with lifelink and "opponents can't cast spells during your turn", but for crying out loud, make it a 3/3 tops. It's like they have to push the cards on every possible dimension (casting cost, power, toughness, and multiple abilities). Yeah I know it's mythic but I don't like playing games where nothing that happens in the first 7 turns matters if my opponent had Dromoka in the top 15 cards of their deck.
Anyway, I still find red to be ridiculous, paired with black, or even better, green. The number of efficient removal spells available in those colors, combined with dash and beef, is just so strong. Sabertooth Outrider is a house and it's really easy to pick up at least one and usually more. I've noticed that people seem to be aware of this as red seems to be often drafted, but when it's open, it's imperative to go into it.
I have played two MTGO friendly sealed thus far. Wow what a difference from KTK/FRF. Everyone was playing 2 color or maybe a light splash. My decks were highly focused around two drops. It felt really static and boring after my KTK/FRF experiences with tons of crazy decks coming together in all kinds of weird ways. This is one of those formats where you just pick your two deepest colors and then pick all the 2/3 drops and then you're kinda done. Obviously there's more to it than that but it feels so much less intricate than KTK/FRF deck building was.
And the mulligans. I think I've seen at least 2x as many mulligans (from my opponents as well as myself) as compared to KTK/FRF. Part of it is because everyone knows that you have to start fast or die. And also there's the fact that since most of your deck is 2/3 drops you're fine mulliganing something mediocre in hopes of that perfect fast opener. The power is all loaded at the front end unlike KTK/FRF where so much power come online at 5+ mana.
All in all I am not liking this format. I realize that this format is probably exactly what some people want, especially after KTK/FRF, but I'm not a huge fan after an admittedly limited experience of two events.
Good card, terrible flavor. How does coating your weapon with venom make you tougher? It would make more sense flavor wise if it gave the creature +2/+0.
Well having just won a round 3 that I had no business winning due to Mob Rule pulling a win out of nowhere in games 2 and 3 ... I'd say yes, Mob Rule is unfair. It's a card that should not have been printed if you ask me. I think someone in design wanted to be cute and create an act of treason with a choice clause. The card is just dumb though.
Don't feel bad to losing to it because there's almost nothing you can do to beat a card like that. If things line up for your opponent to cast it, you will likely lose, no matter how well you designed or played your deck. It's that simple.
what's the healthiest attitude to have when you lose all of a sudden to Mob Rule? [the turn before you would have won, actually]?
is Mob Rule fair?
Blinding Spray blanks an awful lot of alpha strikes. I've run it on occasion when my opponent had a Flying Crane Technique or had a build that went wide and relied on mass pump after that. It is hard to use it though because you have to keep so much mana up for it.
Just curious what the groupthink is on this card. I'm curious about what people who really liked Pressure Point think of Glaring Aegis. Glaring Aegis doesn't cantrip, but it does cost 1 less, and if you squint you can make Glaring Aegis look like "Tap target creature. Draw an enchantment that gives a creature +1/+3 and cast it for free". Meaning that the tap target creature part of Pressure Point and Glaring Aegis is the same, so comparing the other effect, Pressure Point allows you to draw another spell to cast (or maybe land, getting you 1 card closer to drawing a spell to cast), whereas Glaring Aegis draws no cards but has an effect as if you had drawn a +1/+3 enchantment and got to cast it for free.
Glaring Aegis has the downside of being counterable by removal. Also it can only be used on your turn. But adding 1 power and three toughness to your board position for just 1 mana seems like a good deal. But then, "enchantments are bad", right? I just don't know how to feel about this card ...
My final win percentage was 79.9% for draft and 67.7% for sealed (78.2% weighed).
79.9% win percentage over 52 drafts? That's insane. That's like winning every single match that you weren't mana screwed out of. Over 52 events. Just insane.
Also, that qualifies for going infinite, does it not? Maybe not if you're running in swiss queues. But with card sell back, maybe so.
It's so nice to be on a roll instead of on a losing streak. My last events went 3-0, 3-0, 2-1, 3-0, 3-0, 2-1, 2-1, 3-0. That's 21-3 over 8 events, for an 87.5% win percentage. I expect to start losing horribly any minute now though ...
Just got blown out by a deck that played not only [[Crux of Fate]] but also [[Death Frenzy]] when I had opponent on the backpedal the entire game with Jeskai tempo prowess. Perhaps I played too greedy but I was not expecting to get blown out by the only two sweepers in the format, especially when I had the opponent in one turn.
Those are not the only two sweepers of the format; I can think of at least two more. Still, I understand your feelings. Having both of those, drawing them both, and having the board state be set up so that both are profitable to cast, those are some stars aligning right there.
How many people quit MTGO because the learning curve is too high or they just get beat so much they give up? I'm relatively new to it but it seems the curve is EVE Online style. I can understand why people quit shortly after starting due to not being able to compete with those with endless supplies of cash/time. At least that is my perception. As someone that enjoys the game but has a life, it seems pretty hard to catch up.
Thoughts?
If you win half your games you are doing decently. Are you winning half your games?
Even the best players are going to only win somewhere between 6 and 7 games out of 10. Meaning that 3 or 4 times out of 10, they'll lose too. You should expect to lose alot in Magic, it's just the nature of the game. Sometimes you will go through bad luck streaks where you lose constantly (happened to me over a two week span a couple of weeks ago), and sometimes everything you touch will turn to gold (this week I went 3-0, 3-0, 2-1, 3-0, 3-0, 2-1).
I personally only play swiss events because the cost of playing single elimination events is way too high, as is the frustration. I recommend you play swiss drafts only. Also you should keep track of what happened in each game and analyze your play to see what you might have done better. It helps to have screen recording so you can review your game, as Magic Online's game playback is dreadful and terribly buggy.
I have to remind myself that I might beat him 7 out of 10 matches, but we only get to play one.
And yes, at this point in the history of Magic, considering the resources freely available, someone building some greedy, horrible mana base is not really trying to be good. They're basically goofing around. That's fine, they're entitled to it, but putting in the effort to hone strategy is supposed to pay off.
You just said it yourself. Your deck will win 7 out of 10 matches. So your "putting in the effort to hone strategy" does pay off. It just doesn't win you every match, nor should it.
Why is luck so streaky? Last week I couldn't win anything, with constant mulligans, bad draws, outclassed in the early game, outclassed in the late game, just nothing I did worked for me and everything my opponents did worked for them. I don't often 0-3 but I 0-3'd like three times last week.
Suddenly I'm on fire this week. Having played 5 events, I've gone 3-0, 3-0, 2-1, 3-0, 3-0.
I just don't understand variance. Does it have to be so ... varied?
I play pretty much only phantom sealed, because I have a large supply of phantom points, and I think it's about the most luck based limited format there is, if that means anything in the discussion.
And yeah, sometimes games go long and 7 mana spells come into play. Not sure why you think that nobody should be frustrated except by games that only get to 6 lands on the board for either player.
If it wasn't for luck I would never lose.
If it wasn't for luck, nobody would ever lose this game that we (or at least I) love to hate.
Did you miss the part where I said "without one of the few removal spells that can deal with it"?
If I have a relevant removal spell in my top 18 cards I have an answer to something that will win the game on its own, but the removal spell won't win the game on its own. Dromoka will win the game on its own, easily. It's not an equitable situation. I understand that Dromoka is mythic, but it's just not fun to play with, period. I don't know why they haven't made a card yet that says something like, "7: If your life total is higher than your opponent's, you win the game". Wouldn't that card be alot of fun to play against? Not at all, right? So someone would point out how un-fun it is, and someone else would come along and say, "you were supposed to have a counter spell, [dumb card that is no fun to play against] is fine".
Anyway, I still find red to be ridiculous, paired with black, or even better, green. The number of efficient removal spells available in those colors, combined with dash and beef, is just so strong. Sabertooth Outrider is a house and it's really easy to pick up at least one and usually more. I've noticed that people seem to be aware of this as red seems to be often drafted, but when it's open, it's imperative to go into it.
And the mulligans. I think I've seen at least 2x as many mulligans (from my opponents as well as myself) as compared to KTK/FRF. Part of it is because everyone knows that you have to start fast or die. And also there's the fact that since most of your deck is 2/3 drops you're fine mulliganing something mediocre in hopes of that perfect fast opener. The power is all loaded at the front end unlike KTK/FRF where so much power come online at 5+ mana.
All in all I am not liking this format. I realize that this format is probably exactly what some people want, especially after KTK/FRF, but I'm not a huge fan after an admittedly limited experience of two events.
Well having just won a round 3 that I had no business winning due to Mob Rule pulling a win out of nowhere in games 2 and 3 ... I'd say yes, Mob Rule is unfair. It's a card that should not have been printed if you ask me. I think someone in design wanted to be cute and create an act of treason with a choice clause. The card is just dumb though.
Don't feel bad to losing to it because there's almost nothing you can do to beat a card like that. If things line up for your opponent to cast it, you will likely lose, no matter how well you designed or played your deck. It's that simple.
Blinding Spray blanks an awful lot of alpha strikes. I've run it on occasion when my opponent had a Flying Crane Technique or had a build that went wide and relied on mass pump after that. It is hard to use it though because you have to keep so much mana up for it.
Glaring Aegis has the downside of being counterable by removal. Also it can only be used on your turn. But adding 1 power and three toughness to your board position for just 1 mana seems like a good deal. But then, "enchantments are bad", right? I just don't know how to feel about this card ...
79.9% win percentage over 52 drafts? That's insane. That's like winning every single match that you weren't mana screwed out of. Over 52 events. Just insane.
Also, that qualifies for going infinite, does it not? Maybe not if you're running in swiss queues. But with card sell back, maybe so.
Those are not the only two sweepers of the format; I can think of at least two more. Still, I understand your feelings. Having both of those, drawing them both, and having the board state be set up so that both are profitable to cast, those are some stars aligning right there.
If you win half your games you are doing decently. Are you winning half your games?
Even the best players are going to only win somewhere between 6 and 7 games out of 10. Meaning that 3 or 4 times out of 10, they'll lose too. You should expect to lose alot in Magic, it's just the nature of the game. Sometimes you will go through bad luck streaks where you lose constantly (happened to me over a two week span a couple of weeks ago), and sometimes everything you touch will turn to gold (this week I went 3-0, 3-0, 2-1, 3-0, 3-0, 2-1).
I personally only play swiss events because the cost of playing single elimination events is way too high, as is the frustration. I recommend you play swiss drafts only. Also you should keep track of what happened in each game and analyze your play to see what you might have done better. It helps to have screen recording so you can review your game, as Magic Online's game playback is dreadful and terribly buggy.
You just said it yourself. Your deck will win 7 out of 10 matches. So your "putting in the effort to hone strategy" does pay off. It just doesn't win you every match, nor should it.
Suddenly I'm on fire this week. Having played 5 events, I've gone 3-0, 3-0, 2-1, 3-0, 3-0.
I just don't understand variance. Does it have to be so ... varied?
I play pretty much only phantom sealed, because I have a large supply of phantom points, and I think it's about the most luck based limited format there is, if that means anything in the discussion.
If it wasn't for luck, nobody would ever lose this game that we (or at least I) love to hate.