Hmmm... trample. No, it's definitely not one of my Top 10; I'm not even sure if it's in my Top 20.
If I was only ranking the best keyword abilities that were originally printed as such in Limted Edition Alpha, trample would probably take 2nd, 3rd or 4th place, but that's only because the competition is weak. It's a useful ability that, unfortunately, is also needlessly confusing and unintuitive. I'll have more to say about trample in a future blog!
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Feb 12, 2010Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #1 and Wrap-UpPosted in: Improbable Things
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Jan 14, 2010Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #1 and Wrap-Up@Orim's Thunder: I didn't forget about kicker. For now I will just say that it wasn't really in the running for either the Top 10 or the 5 Worst. I have a very wordy opinion about it. At some point I'd like to discuss kicker in some detail. Maybe after Worldwake and multikicker settle into Standard a bit.Posted in: Improbable Things
To both of you - thanks for reading! I hope you'll check back in the upcoming weeks. -
Jan 14, 2010Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #2@metamind - I love imprint! I certainly didn't mean to slight it, but it was ineligible for the keyword ability countdown because it's an ability word rather than a keyword ability. I know the distinction seems trivial, but introducing ability words into the mix would have introduced a lot of problems into my evaluation scheme. Ability words, individually, don't behave as homogeneously as keyword abilities, so they're harder to evaluate. I just didn't want the headache.Posted in: Improbable Things
I think you are correct when you say that imprint made use of exile zone in a very unique way. But, I maintained at the time (Mirrodin block) that there were other ways to skin that cat. There still are, IMO, if WotC ever wanted to flesh out the idea of a local zone.
But that's really neither here nor there. The point I hoped to make was that suspend was the game-changer. Suspend ended the argument. Even if imprint could only be done with exile / RFG, as cool as it was (or at least could be) it could still be argued that it wasn't worth the clutter of this bizarre non-zone messing up the game's mojo. Then suspend came and nobody could say that anymore. -
Jan 14, 2010Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #2Heh. I guess I threw you for a loop, there, Icatia! I think a lot of people are going to be surprised by my #1 choice, but I will stand by it completely. It's a great keyword ability.Posted in: Improbable Things
But so is flying! And, ranking flying as the #2 keyword ability ever is no slight... it really deserves all the praise you can give it.
@Nis: there's bound to be a difference of opinion regarding my suggestions for flying here. You are right about green wanting to encourage creatures to fight each other - but green wants just about everything for creatures as long as it is a positive effect. So I think the color has room for both ground and air troops.
Thanks for reading, guys! -
Jan 8, 2010Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #4Awesome. I'm glad you've enjoyed it!Posted in: Improbable Things
I'll be very interested to see what people think about my Top 3. There's at least one fairly big surprise in there. -
Dec 21, 2009Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #5That's a good one!! Didn't mean to overlook it... maybe I'll edit and put it in there.Posted in: Improbable Things
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Dec 18, 2009Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #6Hey, Excise, glad you're enjoying the countdown! I'll have my Top 5 ready to go very soon.Posted in: Improbable Things
The reason that I "only" gave Changeling a B+ innovation grade was because the ability itself was almost exactly what was printed on Mistform Ultimus, so changeling as a keyword was really a victory of innovative implementation, and of R&D seeing a very elegant, pre-existing mechanic and giving it a more prominent role.
In contrast, I gave flashback higher marks for innovation because it took a hint of something good from Yawgmoth's Will and made something totally different and awesome out of it, which totally changed the status of an entire zone in Magic. And splice, my highest rated mechanic for innovation (so far - it might end up in a tie ;)) was really completely and totally new on every level.
But it should be said, anything on this Top 10 list is among the best of the best in all three categories! -
Dec 16, 2009Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #6Hi again, Alacar!Posted in: Improbable Things
I appreciate that you're following the countdown here. I addressed some of the issues you brought up in the #8 entry, so go check that out.
In a nutshell, going to a point system (like 8.5, 9.7, etc.) would just be deceptive - my grading system isn't that sophisticated, nor could it ever be. Not to pull rank here, but I actually have a graduate degree in this stuff - testing, scaling and measurement - and I can reasonably assure you that people opting for a decimal system (X.X) aren't fundamentally incorporating more information into their scores than I am. They just have the appearance of doing so. I like to be upfront about my limitations. -
Dec 10, 2009Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #8Nis, thanks for that tip! I will go back and edit my posts to make use of that trick.Posted in: Improbable Things
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Dec 8, 2009Guesswork posted a message on The Top 10 Keyword Abilities Ever - #9@Alacar Leoricar: remember that the comprehensive rules list 81 different keyword abilities, and I'm picking the best 10 out of those. So, I'm starting with the higher grades! You won't see anything that scores below a B in any category on this list. Now, when I get to my 5 worst keyword abilities list, you'll see some D's and F's there!Posted in: Improbable Things
Thanks for reading! I hope you'll come back for #7 - #1. - To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Magic: corrupting your children into realizing that male corsets and black women exist, since 2011.
There's simply no point of view behind the creative elements of the set, here. Just a bunch of unrelated references, callbacks, and tropes in another shallow bid to build yet another high-concept, "resonant" setting. Wizards needs to get off this train.
It sure is a good thing this set has a decent mechanic or two. And some compelling singles, such as this one. Because Eldraine is shaping up to be a major creative low point. Maybe the customer service team that created Homelands should've been brought in to consult?
Player psychographics refer to the reasons players play Magic. It's mostly a marketing concept -- Wizards wants to design cards that players will want to buy, so what do players want to buy, exactly?
Traditional answer: cards that allow players to express themselves (Johnny), cards that allow players to have a novel experience (Timmy), cards that can be played competitively (Spike).
I actually agree with you that psychographics are kind of an overplayed concept (how many people bought BFZ because they wanted to play it, vs. how many people bought BFZ because the packs were full of golden tickets and Magic is turning more and more into legalized gambling?)
But none of that has anything to do with why this card is red and not green.
Add in two other upside abilities, one of which is a repeatable card advantage ability, and hell yes, this is a contender for "red 'goyf" status.
ROE wasn't an unmitigated success, but it proved that battlecruiser Magic worked, and battlecruiser was the freshest thing to come along in Magic since the 90s. But they got a little pushback from new players who didn't get it, got spooked, and decided to serve up a steaming hot turd sandwich with BFZ/OGW. The whole Eldrazi thing is irrevocably tainted because of it, but it didn't start off that way. You can't blame ROE for this.
I'm in the same boat as you: ROE was my favorite set of the Modern era. After BFZ and OGW, I'm out. WotC has shown no sign that they understand why those sets were as bad as they were, and I have zero faith that they can rekindle interest in Zendikar.
I'm fine with a return to Theros, though. The first trip didn't exactly set the world on fire, but there's plenty of room for improvement.
But I'm kind of bummed at how much better every one of these cards would feel if the creature hit the battlefield first, and the adventure effect could somehow be cast later. This mechanic has echoes of bestow in how painful it's going to be to wait to cast the overcosted adventure effect before you can get the card onto the battlefield as a creature.
The XXTREME MOTHER GOOSE flavor does not bode well for my interest in this set. I miss Lorwyn.
Mechanically, I have no idea how this works. Sorcery / creature split seems like the cleanest idea, and the one that fits with the flavor of this particular card the best, but the way the sorcery has been placed in the text box space, that feels unintuitive.
If there aren't meaningful differences between the colors, then there aren't meaningful differences between the colors.
There's room for occasional bends, and even infrequent breaks, but if there's no baseline understanding of what a color can and can't do, or if that baseline shifts whenever it's convenient for you, you're undermining maybe the most significant system that makes Magic Magic.
Now, did development cost it into a deep, dark hole where only a few niche combo decks dare to follow it? Looks about right.
But if this thing were broadly playable, it would be banned faster than Black Lotus.
I can't think of a mechanical theme that:
That said, I'm going to guess that any major mechanical themes will be subordinate to a more top-down approach to world creation. Kind of like how tribal was a cornerstone for Ixalan but not the entire building. That seems to be the way they do it these days.