I'm too old and grumpy to bother with the 17 different partial quotes needed to pull all of the references on just this page out of the thread but...
Can we PLEASE not literally encourage our art and cultural content creators (such as they are) to cater to the dumbest person's impression of history/art/civilization/literature? That'd kinda exactly the opposite of what they're supposed to do.
Tend to agree. It's one thing to acknowledge the reality of marketing and business decisions. That doesn't mean we have to lean into it or be overly accepting of the sorts of tendencies that result from that reality. Businesses churning out ever-more generic products is not a particularly desirable outcome. One of the few ways we can push against art and cultural content being diminished by this process is by cultivating a consumer culture that appreciates fine details. And that starts by not being automatically dismissive of every appeal for finer detail with the point that, under capitalism, dumbing down is inevitable. Don't give away all your power for free.
and why do people think he is bad or underwhelming.
It's certainly not bad, just not very flashy for a planeswalker. He can't protect himself, though creating a second copy offers a bit of cushion. "All he does" is scry and draw cards, which I don't think anyone can dismiss as useless, it's just not game winning on its own. Consistency and card advantage in a cost-effective package is always going to be appealing, if in some cases underwhelming.
Effective utility will win games, even if it doesn't have much wow factor.
Mm, absence of an ultimate seems to contribute to a lack of flashy "punch," although the kicker does somewhat substitute for that.
This is a bit more subtly designed than a lot of the "draw a card" effects that get printed. Which is to say, "draw a card" has become so commonplace that it's begun to feel a little boring (especially in blue and green), which I sense from what you're saying. But I like this design even though it doesn't wow right away. Certainly it would be a shame if every planeswalker started to look like this though.
As far as the view that the site is leaning in one direction or another - there have always been allegations of various viewpoints that the site leans in a direction opposite of where the user feels they personally stand. This is often the case when trying to hold a centrist or non-partisan position. We have been accused of being anywhere and everywhere on the political spectrum, from allegations of far-right, to allegations for far-left extreme liberalism. The hope is that the balance of these allegations shows that we do hold that central line. Historically speaking, I believe that the majority of the staff has tended to lean slightly to fairly liberal, all things considered, however the staff has had representation from the full spectrum of political beliefs. We have never had any sort of "official" survey on the matter, however our off topic chats, as well as various discussions on how to handle certain tickets (especially political) has shown that we are a fairly diverse group in terms of beliefs.
Hello,
I'd like to clarify what is being stated in the quoted content. It is not necessary for the site overall to be leaning in a particular direction, or for specific staffing on the site to being leaning toward particular views, in order for one of the site's policies to in practice have biased results. What I'm describing here is a type of bias in the true sense of the word, in which the sorts of discussions that get represented are disproportional to the views of the community and/or disproportional to their epistemic merit as an effect of the moderation policy. In other words, a policy which is actually biased, because it is intended to dispel the appearance of bias (according to popular perception which is self-reinforcing). The latter is what you're describing vis-à-vis holding a "central line," a position which makes it possible for those on the political right to feel comfortable in the community here by virtue of implicit approval. If there's middle ground to be had, neither side can be considered to have gone beyond the pale, and thus there are "good people on both sides." I think this is a pragmatic calculation about maintaining the largest possible audience, but the long term effects of the social dynamics within that audience are something I would consider to be unfortunate.
I respect the difficulty you mention of determining how to best moderate in these cases. I hope that you consider the criticism I have offered as reflecting on the value that this community holds to me, which has been cultivated over many years of work by the staff here. If I felt it were fruitless to continue to engage in discussion here, I would refrain from doing so.
Well, no one cares about your feelings about Theros, either. That's never stopped you from expressing them.
Oh yes, my opinions on Theros are inappropriate on a Magic the Gathering forum.
I didn't say they were inappropriate, I said no one cares about them. They are only of real interest to you. You could improve your content by reflecting more carefully about the world and maybe even intellectually grasping political theory among other things. This would help you to express your feelings with more substance.
Notice how in this thread FlossedBeaver wasn't even discussing politics and people brought it up, in order to try to demonstrate his hypocrisy and then just to complain about him. The first is the logical fallacy ad hominem tu quoque, the second is irrelevant.
It's a forum for discussing MTG. Your argument is inherently flawed to call out my on-topic discussions of Theros, while quoting my post criticizing off topic content. You shouldn't need that explained.
It's not flawed, because I am generally in support of open and free discussion rather than rigid adherence to being on topic. Your posts may be on topic, but they are of such low quality as to be regarded as nothing more than spam. And spam is actually against the forum rules.
Well back on the topic of wallet fatigue on this product, I'm inclined to agree that people are free to elect not to buy products that don't interest them. Of course, I think there's room for some nuance about the phenomenon of wallet fatigue that's worth exploring. Seeing an increased volume of product that doesn't interest you conditions you to lose interest in the brand. The products which succeed in their appeal have to overcome this tendency, otherwise wallet fatigue is experienced. This is especially true if a number of products do partially appeal, but their relative mediocrity and overabundance interferes with evaluating priority for purchase.
Ironically, Elostirion's suggestion of increasing staffing would most likely usher in an era of the game flourishing. But it would be an investment to do so.
Well, no one cares about your feelings about Theros, either. That's never stopped you from expressing them.
Oh yes, my opinions on Theros are inappropriate on a Magic the Gathering forum.
I didn't say they were inappropriate, I said no one cares about them. They are only of real interest to you. You could improve your content by reflecting more carefully about the world and maybe even intellectually grasping political theory among other things. This would help you to express your feelings with more substance.
Notice how in this thread FlossedBeaver wasn't even discussing politics and people brought it up, in order to try to demonstrate his hypocrisy and then just to complain about him. The first is the logical fallacy ad hominem tu quoque, the second is irrelevant.
Sure! Let me know when you see Hasbro capitulate to the whims of some random forum-goers whining about wallet fatigue, will you?
Above quotes posted next to each other to give context to my interpretation of this discussion. Elostirion, it appears you made a somewhat sarcastic remark which you intended to be light in tone and FlossedBeaver's response in turn escalated the discussion into hostile territory. My impression however is that FlossedBeaver's intentions were likewise light in tone, resulting his his expressed confusion in your exchanges. This is a situation which I think can be mediated.
Trolling doesn’t require that you make purely antagonistic statements—
it’s entirely possible to use valid points in an antagonistic manner.
If we were to count up all of the threads that have been locked in the past year,
I wonder how many of them feature you prominently?
I’d be willing to bet it’s over 75%.
And no, I’m not going to take this to PM.
You’ve become a problem for everyone on this site.
You actively stifle engagement here,
and you’re almost certainly costing MTGS viewership
(and more importantly to some, ad revenue).
I think both Elostirion and FlossedBeaver are good posters on this forum who have consistently made valuable contributions. I appreciate both of them. I do think that FlossedBeaver might be a tad aggressive at times (though I am probably much worse, for what it's worth), but a lot of the threads you mention being locked got started because people on the political right posted off topic and heinous comments. We've been directed by the mods to just ignore these posts and not talk about politics at all, then in different instances been told it's okay so long as it stays respectful, which is of course impossible if one side's view is inherently disrespectful. If the policy is to ignore these types of posts, then in practice the effect is that people make these remarks, they're eventually deleted or snipped, and the other side's point of view is not expressed. In other words, the policy is actually not neutral and unbiased; right-wing narratives will continue to be expressed and the counter points will not. Locking threads does not actually solve the problem so it continually recurs, leading to an overall forum community annoyed with political posts. But there's another reason why this is the approach used. Right-wing players are a sizeable audience on this site. Locking threads does not threaten their continued ad-viewership, but keeping threads open might.
No one cares. We're here for cards. 2020 is an awful year and everyone is sick of politics everywhere. MTG or go away. Take all your values, intellect and political crusades to political forums. Or social media, like just about everyone else but me, evidently.
Well, no one cares about your feelings about Theros, either. That's never stopped you from expressing them.
People on both sides of the political spectrum go after people who don't think like them. Let's not get tribal in these forums and believe that "my side in innocent and your side is evil"
Therese shouldn't have been let go. Outside political views should have no bearing on your work, period.
Disagree if you want, it's an extreme and Fascist view to disagree with issues of free speech.
Liberalism FTW.
The blatant hypocrisy in this post is seriously cringe.
Maybe the problem is that you take the idea of a "political spectrum" a bit too literally. The empirical data doesn't really support the existence of a model of political ideologies which fall along a spectrum from left to right. In practice, ideologies held by people are more like constellations of various beliefs which may be more or less coherent within themselves. For example, some early fascist philosophers advocated for a system in governance which included representation for labor unions, which almost sounds leftist if you forget all the other fascist stuff. This also means that liberalism, a centrist ideology, isn't actually literally in the "center" of anything. It's not an impartial and unbiased view on politics and doesn't have claim on the basis of its moderation to be more rational than either of the "extremes," since moderation isn't necessarily the best approach depending on the issue to be resolved. You don't use half-measures when the full measure is called for, and you treat causes not symptoms. If the cause is fundamental within the system in which the symptom occurs, methodological radicalism is required.
I don't have much of an opinion on Therese Nielsen's business relationship with WotC. It seems to me they made a very liberal decision to cut ties with someone who associated with fascists because they thought it could negatively affect their profits.
Kind of amazing how they gave us new shrines, created a new "shrine lord" and yet somehow found a way to make the white shrine not fit with the others and not work with the shrine lord ability. I tend to think people bend themselves into contortions to prove that "wotc hates white" or whatever, but this just seems like a slap in the face.
Notice that the other card in the cycle that got this treatment is the red one.
Maybe it's time to start asking for more fresh blood on design?
Tend to agree. It's one thing to acknowledge the reality of marketing and business decisions. That doesn't mean we have to lean into it or be overly accepting of the sorts of tendencies that result from that reality. Businesses churning out ever-more generic products is not a particularly desirable outcome. One of the few ways we can push against art and cultural content being diminished by this process is by cultivating a consumer culture that appreciates fine details. And that starts by not being automatically dismissive of every appeal for finer detail with the point that, under capitalism, dumbing down is inevitable. Don't give away all your power for free.
Mm, absence of an ultimate seems to contribute to a lack of flashy "punch," although the kicker does somewhat substitute for that.
This is a bit more subtly designed than a lot of the "draw a card" effects that get printed. Which is to say, "draw a card" has become so commonplace that it's begun to feel a little boring (especially in blue and green), which I sense from what you're saying. But I like this design even though it doesn't wow right away. Certainly it would be a shame if every planeswalker started to look like this though.
In other news, smiling Jace is nightmare fuel.
Hello,
I'd like to clarify what is being stated in the quoted content. It is not necessary for the site overall to be leaning in a particular direction, or for specific staffing on the site to being leaning toward particular views, in order for one of the site's policies to in practice have biased results. What I'm describing here is a type of bias in the true sense of the word, in which the sorts of discussions that get represented are disproportional to the views of the community and/or disproportional to their epistemic merit as an effect of the moderation policy. In other words, a policy which is actually biased, because it is intended to dispel the appearance of bias (according to popular perception which is self-reinforcing). The latter is what you're describing vis-à-vis holding a "central line," a position which makes it possible for those on the political right to feel comfortable in the community here by virtue of implicit approval. If there's middle ground to be had, neither side can be considered to have gone beyond the pale, and thus there are "good people on both sides." I think this is a pragmatic calculation about maintaining the largest possible audience, but the long term effects of the social dynamics within that audience are something I would consider to be unfortunate.
I respect the difficulty you mention of determining how to best moderate in these cases. I hope that you consider the criticism I have offered as reflecting on the value that this community holds to me, which has been cultivated over many years of work by the staff here. If I felt it were fruitless to continue to engage in discussion here, I would refrain from doing so.
Sadly, Chandler is the Verlaine to Joven's Rimbaud.
Personally, hexproof seems like a particularly white ability, and it should be primary with blue secondary and green tertiary.
Case in point.
I've offered you some constructive criticism, and I stand by it. Take it or leave it as you wish.
It's not flawed, because I am generally in support of open and free discussion rather than rigid adherence to being on topic. Your posts may be on topic, but they are of such low quality as to be regarded as nothing more than spam. And spam is actually against the forum rules.
Ironically, Elostirion's suggestion of increasing staffing would most likely usher in an era of the game flourishing. But it would be an investment to do so.
I didn't say they were inappropriate, I said no one cares about them. They are only of real interest to you. You could improve your content by reflecting more carefully about the world and maybe even intellectually grasping political theory among other things. This would help you to express your feelings with more substance.
Notice how in this thread FlossedBeaver wasn't even discussing politics and people brought it up, in order to try to demonstrate his hypocrisy and then just to complain about him. The first is the logical fallacy ad hominem tu quoque, the second is irrelevant.
Above quotes posted next to each other to give context to my interpretation of this discussion. Elostirion, it appears you made a somewhat sarcastic remark which you intended to be light in tone and FlossedBeaver's response in turn escalated the discussion into hostile territory. My impression however is that FlossedBeaver's intentions were likewise light in tone, resulting his his expressed confusion in your exchanges. This is a situation which I think can be mediated.
I think both Elostirion and FlossedBeaver are good posters on this forum who have consistently made valuable contributions. I appreciate both of them. I do think that FlossedBeaver might be a tad aggressive at times (though I am probably much worse, for what it's worth), but a lot of the threads you mention being locked got started because people on the political right posted off topic and heinous comments. We've been directed by the mods to just ignore these posts and not talk about politics at all, then in different instances been told it's okay so long as it stays respectful, which is of course impossible if one side's view is inherently disrespectful. If the policy is to ignore these types of posts, then in practice the effect is that people make these remarks, they're eventually deleted or snipped, and the other side's point of view is not expressed. In other words, the policy is actually not neutral and unbiased; right-wing narratives will continue to be expressed and the counter points will not. Locking threads does not actually solve the problem so it continually recurs, leading to an overall forum community annoyed with political posts. But there's another reason why this is the approach used. Right-wing players are a sizeable audience on this site. Locking threads does not threaten their continued ad-viewership, but keeping threads open might.
Well, no one cares about your feelings about Theros, either. That's never stopped you from expressing them.
The blatant hypocrisy in this post is seriously cringe.
Maybe the problem is that you take the idea of a "political spectrum" a bit too literally. The empirical data doesn't really support the existence of a model of political ideologies which fall along a spectrum from left to right. In practice, ideologies held by people are more like constellations of various beliefs which may be more or less coherent within themselves. For example, some early fascist philosophers advocated for a system in governance which included representation for labor unions, which almost sounds leftist if you forget all the other fascist stuff. This also means that liberalism, a centrist ideology, isn't actually literally in the "center" of anything. It's not an impartial and unbiased view on politics and doesn't have claim on the basis of its moderation to be more rational than either of the "extremes," since moderation isn't necessarily the best approach depending on the issue to be resolved. You don't use half-measures when the full measure is called for, and you treat causes not symptoms. If the cause is fundamental within the system in which the symptom occurs, methodological radicalism is required.
I don't have much of an opinion on Therese Nielsen's business relationship with WotC. It seems to me they made a very liberal decision to cut ties with someone who associated with fascists because they thought it could negatively affect their profits.
Notice that the other card in the cycle that got this treatment is the red one.
Maybe it's time to start asking for more fresh blood on design?