What control really needs now is a solid 2cmc removals spell or counterspell. Last Breath is kills courser, Grey merchant and a slew of others, but is dead late game. Bile Blight cant kill courser, Brimaz or merchant. That IMO is the biggest problem that needs to be addressed. I would love a Terminate reprint, seeing as there are 10 unspoiled lands, it could potentially work in a 4+ color control deck.
At first, I thought it dealt X to creature or player and I thought it was amazing. Then I decided to read the card again. A pretty big letdown for a rare.
What control needs is exactly what its got. You actually have to make decisions and choices both in deckbuilding and gameplay due to your limited resources and options. Control having hard counters and hard removal widely avalible at 2cc is what pushes any other strategy out of the meta. Control is highly skillful to play today and is still a valid option in the meta and has been for years despite the constant whine of control-only players wanting to just mindlessly cast spells and assume they win.
^ A thousand times this, wizards has eliminated any alternate way to play the game, no combo, no LD, no good counters, very little good discard, and now decent removal is at a premium and wraths start at five mana. All because entitled little brats complain about losing resources and only want to turn dudes sideways.
LD as a deck is stupid and kills the fun of the game for new players. Some LD is fine, LD doesn't ever need to be a strategy ever again.
Combo needs a comeback, but i always feel that most combo decks are results of R&D mistakes, not purposeful design. It needs to be neutered in standard anyway because a powerful combo deck can always destroy a standard season a moment's notice.
There are good counters in the format. Just because you can't jam 20 of them into a blue shell anymore doesn't mean they are not there.
Discard is as powerful right now as it has been since Alara. Can you build a discard only deck? Probably not but then again see LD comments.
TL:DR : Control players don't want to have to think about choices for their deck, they just want to jam the same 60 cards every week because that's how you used to do it.
This card is amazing in limited and i'm sure will find a home in standard somewhere. Depending on the speed and tempo of the format, it could vary from a 1 to a 4 of. Card would be a tad better if Elvish Mystic wasn't in the format though.
I don't mind having 14 teams in the league but if we do we should probably tweak the roster rules a bit. With 12 teams it was already kind of pushing it with the Flex option but with 14 I doubt we can support having a true flex. There are just not enough QBs and RBs to fill out 14 flexes (I am afraid if there are enough RBs to fill out 14 teams with 2 slots since you need that backup, but that's more of a personal concern at this point). Is it possible to switch the flex to a WR/TE only flex since those positions are the most numerous.
IMO, the more teams a league has the more important it is that the flex spot is versatile. You barely want a flex spot in an 8 team league but in a 16 team league you almost want 2 flex spots so that the talent in one position isn't dried up and over-valued by round 5.
Blue is where hexproof makes the least sense to me flavorwise. Blue mages rarely care about enhancing their own meager troops, they only care about stopping the opponents from doing so. Shroud makes sense in blue, hexproof does not.
I have run multiple tournaments every single week since Guildpact was released. I have done everything I can to run these events well, and have received innumerable compliments from our players. However, there is not a L2 judge or higher that comes to the store. Not counting social media as those people have never seen me judge, I am not friends with any L2 judges. For what possible reason could I, or any other local judge, ever expect to receive recognition? How are local judges supposed to recognized for work that no one actually sees them doing?
You say this is designed to reward efforts for local and lower-level efforts, but you have to understand why this comes across to us as just a way for all the L2 and higher judges to just nominate their friends and be nominated in return. You can claim that there are measures taken to prevent abuse of the system, but how? Posting the reasons for selecting someone publicly does nothing: these people who are friends and like each other have most likely worked events together, so it's not really suspicious to nominate each other.
The promo rewards system has never been designed to reward those who only support their own local store. Nor should Wizards really push to reward every judge who only judges at their own store. This change isn't for you. This change is to promote more judges leaving their stores for PTQs and other large events that are done locally. There are plenty of judges who have thanklessly worked PTQs and other events for many years and generally the only thanks they ever got was what they were paid. It is because of those traveling local judges that the PTQ and SCG scenes have thrived and grown along with the playerbase. It doesn't seem right to only reward those players who travel to GPs or are lucky enough to have a local GP. Of course local l2's are going to nominate the people they see working these events, that is the intent of the system. You all are acting like every l2 or higher you know is just a selfish and petty person who only cares about friends, where my interactions with almost any judge have always been the polar opposite.
If you feel un-rewarded because you've worked on your store and only your store, you should speak to the owner. If you're like the many judges who venture outside their own LGS, this change at the very least is an improvement over the absolute nothing from before.
Being all in on Fries in this analogy would like be supporting Legacy and Modern, you know, the formats that don't actually make them money? It makes sense for Wizards to advertise the formats that make them the most money every year.
Pro tours have zero effect on the price or Wizards profit based on card sales. A pro tour being standard only effects prices of cards because pros tend to break them at pro tours for the first time. Modern isn't dead because of this, it died because of the lack of a PTQ Modern Season. Wizards barely stands to profit from whatever format the Pro Tour is, because 300-500 people for one tournament don't effect sales in the slightest.
People are not going to drive much over 2 hours for a tournament that they have to win that only qualifies them for another tournament that they will have to top 4/8. It's not economically feasible for most people. There will be plenty of local PPTQs to attend without having to travel, especially in a place like Chicago which probably has 5+ stores and more in Rockford/Springfield.
Springfield is over 3 hours of a drive from Chicago, on a good day. Rockford is 1.5 hours.
I wont be PTQ'ing in Chicago anymore with this change. The EV isn't worth the drive. That's the thing most people neglect, the EV of winning any PTQ before was a trip to the Pro Tour. It was something to get excited about and was worth the travel. Winning a ticket to yet another tournament that you must travel to as well just adds to the loss your going to take to try and get on the wagon. This change might actually strengthen stores in areas with a strong competitive playerbase by keeping them home and possibly running more events at their local store. I know i'm looking at ways now to get my local store a QPTQ.
Honestly, for the PTQ grinders in the Midwest US, this is a welcome change. I've spent countless hours driving through the middle of the night from PTQ to PTQ every season. More recently there have been lots of local PTQs but i'm still hitting the road for 4-5 hours at a time for every PTQ i could. I can now focus on winning one of the 10 or so local ptqqs and save myself lots of time and money hitting the grinding road. Hopfully that money can go towards attending more GP's farther away.
I do think this is the wrong answer to PTQ's getting too large. Regionalizing PTQs period would have worked, I.E. You must live withing X hours/miles of a PTQ to play, but the logistics of it and the burden it places on TO's isn't possible without huge upgrades to wizards software. Or, why not put a limit on the # of PTQ's a player can attend if PTQ's are getting too large. There has to be a better way for the Non-Midwest US to work.
I don't believe at all they are trying to reduce the number of players attending the Pro Tour, they added a ton of slots through the GP circuit.
I also think this might be a death knell to modern prices for the time being. Very few stores will want to run PTQqs of modern, as it currently has the lowest appeal to those not invested in the format.
Yes, he does! It's right on his goddamn shoulder! It's the exact same goddamn symbol! There's two goddamn pictures showing it! Are you blind? Are you one of those people that refuses to admit that you're wrong even when shown photographic evidence? It's the Temur symbol on his shoulder. It's as plain as day. Anyone that says that they aren't the same symbol is either delusional or an idiot, probably both.
Yes, they are clearly the same. They are clearly EXACTLY the same.
Even if they are the same, there is no law that states every clan member has to use or be all the colors of the clan. Just like Elspeth was never bant colored. Just like Gideon being a member of Boros. Clan/Khan/Shard alliances mean nothing when it comes to the colors of the walkers.
My opponent has a Jorubai Murk Lurker in his graveyard that choose to exile with Rotfeaster Maggot. If my opponent controls a swamp, do i gain 4 life instead of 3? Thanks.
This is a highly misleading post that implies giving a player one point solves the problem of slow play. One point is of little consolation to an excellent player performing at a reasonable pace who nonetheless winds up with a draw on round one and finds himself with several more later on because he is in "draw bracket control mirror" territory. Everyone knows that draws breed more draws, so a draw in round one is a highly undesirable outcome either way (I've seen Adrian Sullivan play game 3 of a UW control mirror at a blistering, almost inhuman pace just to avoid it).
Furthermore, the length of the game is determined by the pace of both players as well as their deck choices. Each player has complete control over his half of that equation, and if the opponent is playing too slowly there is a recourse: calling a judge to watch for slow play.
Professional players understand the importance of not drawing. Grinders playing Local Joe Schmoe with his lifegain deck at a PTQ shouldn't be punished because their opponent is not a higher caliper player and causes them to go to time. I'd rather conceed to avoid a draw in certain metagames. Does that mean that all draws should yield zero points? I've taken draws and sat down between 4 tables of mono-red aggro players in the draw bracket. It took me all of 5 minutes to realize that draws getting points are a nessisarry evil because of the legal pace in which some players casually play the game in a higher level tournament.
Your conclusion is that all draws need 0 points because players will play slowly on purpose to gain a point. Any player who does that is not a player playing at a high level anyway. Your conclusion is flawed because not every player plays magic, nor can they, at a professional pace. Not every deck can be piloted to a 10 minute win. There are situations which any player, high or low skill, needs time to consider.
Your concern that ID's are unfair to people who lose early is not a valid reason to have some players tournaments completely totalled if they run into a casual playing. Not to mention that i'm sure a decent amount of times, X-1's who ID would make it on breakers regardless. The ID, at a maximum, can only benefit 2-4 players a tournament. I'd say that maximum is far better than players getting irate at opponents when they take a 30 second turn, because if they don't play faster, they both lose. It's moronic to think that a hostile room like that is conducive to a better tournament enviroment.
It's not how many people get punished. It's what they get punished for. 1-point draws punish people based on who they get paired against and in what order (something they have no control over) and creates incentives to play slowly or even not play at all. 0-point draws punish players for not being able to complete their games (something they have some level of control over) and encourages players to play quickly and continue competing in the final round.
A player has zero control over an opponent who is terrible at piloting his deck. He has no control over how fast or slow his opponent want to play the game. A player should never be punished by receiving 0 points simply because he was paired with someone without a grasp on proper tournament play. You want to make the 1 point from any round other than the last important, it's not. A draw anywhere other than the final 3 rounds is as good as a loss. Why is that? Because the players and decks that GET DRAWS always lead to more draws and longer rounds.
Does losing in a early round suck in the prospects of winning? Yes. It sucks that your entire day can be dictated by the people you play and if they win after you beat them or get beaten by them. Anyone who has PTQ'd or other premier MTGO events can attest to the clear tension of playing out 10 hours and having your final spot dictated by others because you cannot draw. I've gone x-1 in a mtgo event and missed top 8 because of the lack of being able to draw. I've also made top 8 because of it.
If you want to disallow ID's you need a better tiebreak system other than a system dependent on you playing other players who win. Messing with draws is not the answer.
I've seen the X-0s play it out and the loser drops to like third place. It might not be guaranteed, but it can certainly happen.
I've seen a the only 4-0 drop to 6th and out of prizes when he lost the last round. At FNM tonight, the finals got played out and the loser dropped to 5th. Swiss without a cut to top 8 isn't a conductive way to pay out prizes in a non-competitive room. There have been cases at my semi-competitve FNM where the pairing simply kept the established grinders in one side and the casual budget players in the other til the finals. I've seen countless weird X-1 situations. If you truely want to rid your FNM of the ID, paying out based on wins only is the only way. Yet you can still have players conceed for a prize split which is the same as the draw. They cannot be fully rid of and its unfortunate that at any level of MTG, sometimes that 1 loss is just gonna mean your outta luck to win.
What control needs is exactly what its got. You actually have to make decisions and choices both in deckbuilding and gameplay due to your limited resources and options. Control having hard counters and hard removal widely avalible at 2cc is what pushes any other strategy out of the meta. Control is highly skillful to play today and is still a valid option in the meta and has been for years despite the constant whine of control-only players wanting to just mindlessly cast spells and assume they win.
LD as a deck is stupid and kills the fun of the game for new players. Some LD is fine, LD doesn't ever need to be a strategy ever again.
Combo needs a comeback, but i always feel that most combo decks are results of R&D mistakes, not purposeful design. It needs to be neutered in standard anyway because a powerful combo deck can always destroy a standard season a moment's notice.
There are good counters in the format. Just because you can't jam 20 of them into a blue shell anymore doesn't mean they are not there.
Discard is as powerful right now as it has been since Alara. Can you build a discard only deck? Probably not but then again see LD comments.
TL:DR : Control players don't want to have to think about choices for their deck, they just want to jam the same 60 cards every week because that's how you used to do it.
This card is amazing in limited and i'm sure will find a home in standard somewhere. Depending on the speed and tempo of the format, it could vary from a 1 to a 4 of. Card would be a tad better if Elvish Mystic wasn't in the format though.
IMO, the more teams a league has the more important it is that the flex spot is versatile. You barely want a flex spot in an 8 team league but in a 16 team league you almost want 2 flex spots so that the talent in one position isn't dried up and over-valued by round 5.
The promo rewards system has never been designed to reward those who only support their own local store. Nor should Wizards really push to reward every judge who only judges at their own store. This change isn't for you. This change is to promote more judges leaving their stores for PTQs and other large events that are done locally. There are plenty of judges who have thanklessly worked PTQs and other events for many years and generally the only thanks they ever got was what they were paid. It is because of those traveling local judges that the PTQ and SCG scenes have thrived and grown along with the playerbase. It doesn't seem right to only reward those players who travel to GPs or are lucky enough to have a local GP. Of course local l2's are going to nominate the people they see working these events, that is the intent of the system. You all are acting like every l2 or higher you know is just a selfish and petty person who only cares about friends, where my interactions with almost any judge have always been the polar opposite.
If you feel un-rewarded because you've worked on your store and only your store, you should speak to the owner. If you're like the many judges who venture outside their own LGS, this change at the very least is an improvement over the absolute nothing from before.
Springfield is over 3 hours of a drive from Chicago, on a good day. Rockford is 1.5 hours.
I wont be PTQ'ing in Chicago anymore with this change. The EV isn't worth the drive. That's the thing most people neglect, the EV of winning any PTQ before was a trip to the Pro Tour. It was something to get excited about and was worth the travel. Winning a ticket to yet another tournament that you must travel to as well just adds to the loss your going to take to try and get on the wagon. This change might actually strengthen stores in areas with a strong competitive playerbase by keeping them home and possibly running more events at their local store. I know i'm looking at ways now to get my local store a QPTQ.
I do think this is the wrong answer to PTQ's getting too large. Regionalizing PTQs period would have worked, I.E. You must live withing X hours/miles of a PTQ to play, but the logistics of it and the burden it places on TO's isn't possible without huge upgrades to wizards software. Or, why not put a limit on the # of PTQ's a player can attend if PTQ's are getting too large. There has to be a better way for the Non-Midwest US to work.
I don't believe at all they are trying to reduce the number of players attending the Pro Tour, they added a ton of slots through the GP circuit.
I also think this might be a death knell to modern prices for the time being. Very few stores will want to run PTQqs of modern, as it currently has the lowest appeal to those not invested in the format.
Even if they are the same, there is no law that states every clan member has to use or be all the colors of the clan. Just like Elspeth was never bant colored. Just like Gideon being a member of Boros. Clan/Khan/Shard alliances mean nothing when it comes to the colors of the walkers.
Professional players understand the importance of not drawing. Grinders playing Local Joe Schmoe with his lifegain deck at a PTQ shouldn't be punished because their opponent is not a higher caliper player and causes them to go to time. I'd rather conceed to avoid a draw in certain metagames. Does that mean that all draws should yield zero points? I've taken draws and sat down between 4 tables of mono-red aggro players in the draw bracket. It took me all of 5 minutes to realize that draws getting points are a nessisarry evil because of the legal pace in which some players casually play the game in a higher level tournament.
Your conclusion is that all draws need 0 points because players will play slowly on purpose to gain a point. Any player who does that is not a player playing at a high level anyway. Your conclusion is flawed because not every player plays magic, nor can they, at a professional pace. Not every deck can be piloted to a 10 minute win. There are situations which any player, high or low skill, needs time to consider.
Your concern that ID's are unfair to people who lose early is not a valid reason to have some players tournaments completely totalled if they run into a casual playing. Not to mention that i'm sure a decent amount of times, X-1's who ID would make it on breakers regardless. The ID, at a maximum, can only benefit 2-4 players a tournament. I'd say that maximum is far better than players getting irate at opponents when they take a 30 second turn, because if they don't play faster, they both lose. It's moronic to think that a hostile room like that is conducive to a better tournament enviroment.
A player has zero control over an opponent who is terrible at piloting his deck. He has no control over how fast or slow his opponent want to play the game. A player should never be punished by receiving 0 points simply because he was paired with someone without a grasp on proper tournament play. You want to make the 1 point from any round other than the last important, it's not. A draw anywhere other than the final 3 rounds is as good as a loss. Why is that? Because the players and decks that GET DRAWS always lead to more draws and longer rounds.
Does losing in a early round suck in the prospects of winning? Yes. It sucks that your entire day can be dictated by the people you play and if they win after you beat them or get beaten by them. Anyone who has PTQ'd or other premier MTGO events can attest to the clear tension of playing out 10 hours and having your final spot dictated by others because you cannot draw. I've gone x-1 in a mtgo event and missed top 8 because of the lack of being able to draw. I've also made top 8 because of it.
If you want to disallow ID's you need a better tiebreak system other than a system dependent on you playing other players who win. Messing with draws is not the answer.
I've seen a the only 4-0 drop to 6th and out of prizes when he lost the last round. At FNM tonight, the finals got played out and the loser dropped to 5th. Swiss without a cut to top 8 isn't a conductive way to pay out prizes in a non-competitive room. There have been cases at my semi-competitve FNM where the pairing simply kept the established grinders in one side and the casual budget players in the other til the finals. I've seen countless weird X-1 situations. If you truely want to rid your FNM of the ID, paying out based on wins only is the only way. Yet you can still have players conceed for a prize split which is the same as the draw. They cannot be fully rid of and its unfortunate that at any level of MTG, sometimes that 1 loss is just gonna mean your outta luck to win.
http://magic.wizards.com/en/content/magic-2015-core-set-card-set-archive-products-game-info
Other sets have their image gallery links on their related pages, so it will likely be here when its up.