Was anyone really saying legends is a bad set? It's iconic as hell and has tons of powerful cards, maybe only second to alpha (although urza's saga puts up a good fight).
Not sure I'm convinced the legends rule is good (I don't even really see an argument that it is). Flavor-wise, it is (or at least used to be) a big win. These days...idk man. Having both versions of jhoira is fine, but having 2 of the same version isn't? Maybe it's supposed to be a multiple timelines thing, but then why can you and your opponent have one, but one poofs as soon as one switches sides? It feels like a top-down rule that's proven to be bad for gameplay, and at this point wotc is just trying to pay lip service to the flavor motivations while essentially destroying everything mechanically important about it.
I've had many times in similar situations. In some groups my winrate has been well over 50%. That'd be using my own decks, which admittedly have a very high budget, but I also try to temper them significantly by avoiding lots of different things that I don't think make for fun games. Sometimes I'll play precons to avoid winning via budget, but I still usually have a pretty solid winrate with those as well. Being a strong player gives you lots of little advantages throughout the whole game.
I see three options though:
1) Git gud. Personally my own path to being gud was paved through playing the game for almost 20 years (commander for 11 of those). I think the best thing you can do is try to analyze your games, and maybe talk to the other players about what they think you should have done (especially the good players). But more than anything else, just play tons and tons of magic. Might also be worth watching people play the format on twitch or youtube and trying to find good plays.
2) Git upset. Probably not a great option ofc.
3) Giv up. You don't need to be good at commander, it's just a game, and one that takes a lot of effort to git gud at. It's totally reasonable to just accept that your winrate isn't going to be very high, and that's ok.
Look, you asked why people think they’re a problem. I answered that question. You can disagree with the reasons - and to be clear, I disagree (or at least don’t feel strongly) about some of them - but those are the main reasons why. You want to argue about it? Sure, I’m game. You want to dismiss me? Fine. But if you’re going to claim my points are wrong, then at least have the common courtesy to explain why you think so.
And please feel free to report me if you feel I’m in violation of the forum rules. That’s what the button is there for.
I think you're a bit confused on what a straw man is. Straw manning would mean that I was attempting to refute an argument but ignoring the strong points, while refuting a point that either wasn't even argued, or altering the argument that was actually made in order to refute it. Even if you disagree with me and think I'm totally off-base, that's not even possible in this scenario because I'm not refuting an argument here, I'm creating my own.
I don't know why you think this is irrelevant to commander - it's clearly us that WotC is preying on with these products. This is a product designed to exploit us. Now, as I already said, the predatory model isn't relevant to the gameplay of commander, which is arguably the RC's purview, and I believe why they didn't choose to ban them. A banlist isn't really the appropriate way to handle the situation. But I don't think the appropriate way is likely to work, unfortunately. So in this situation I would prefer an improper solution to one that will fail.
As far as cards already being hard to acquire - much harder than these will ever be - yes that's true, but for the most part that has occurred by accident. WotC didn't go out intending to make dual lands expensive. They don't make any money off how expensive dual lands are. This situation is completely different because wotc is actively trying to exploit the system. It's the difference between getting killed by a natural disaster and getting murdered.
As far as proxies, I'm personally fine with them, but nevertheless people almost always acquire the cards because otherwise it's not "real". I almost never see proxies, and when I do there's usually a big apology beforehand. There's surely some interesting things to talk about as far as the psychology that motivates people to spend so much on cards rather than proxy - and as someone with a very expensive collection, I 100% fall into it. There's something satisfying about knowing that your deck is as real as possible, and that no one can deny the legality of it. Part of why I also very rarely consider making anything in silver-border - and clearly why wotc made these black border to circumvent that icky feeling. But to circle back around to the actual point, while in theory the format is proxy-friendly, in my experience proxies are actually exceedingly rare.
Beyond saying inaccessibility isn't necessarily a problem for the format - which I largely agree with, I think inaccessibility is a fairly minor problem with this product, your first "point" doesn't really make much of an argument. Let's got sentence-by-sentence through your "counterpoint".
"Irrelevant to Commander."
ok, clearly not an argument, just stating the point.
"The format is littered with cards that are largely unaccessible and yet the format continues to grow and do well."
Sure? But that doesn't really address my point. I never said that the accessibility of these cards was a problem. Besides which, having inaccessible cards does not equate to a predatory business model - not that it's relevant to the question of "is this product irrelevant to commander?" anyway. I guess it might if I was saying that the accessibility what WHY this is relevant to commander, but I didn't. The product isn't particularly inaccessible, it's just really scummy and deliberately targeting commander players - which is why it's relevant to the health of the format. If I feel the company producing the cards for the format is trying to exploit me, I'm going to have less fun playing the game. That's already true for me, at least, and I'm guessing others as well since many people have quit the game in the wake of this (though who really knows how many)
"Further to this point, Commander is an incredibly proxy friendly format for this very reason."
Besides this being mostly false - at least where I've played (or at best "true in theory but not in practice") - it's not really relevant to whether this is predatory or targeting commander players. Even if there's a way to circumvent wotc's overpriced product, the product still exists to attempt to exploit us. Sure, some people will avoid the trap and proxy these cards (or better yet, not play them at all) but some people will fall in, and that's what wotc is counting on. But I think the fact that wotc is laying out the trap to begin with - regardless of whether anyone falls into it - is what's so worrying about this whole thing.
"Whether or not this is a "Predatory business model" is irrelevant to Commander"
Ok, you've now stated this point twice without making an actual argument for it.
"specifically when it comes to the discussion of "Should these cards be banned?""
Debatable - but I don't wholly disagree (see above). But regardless of whether I disagree, there's still no WHY here, no explanation. You're just stating your points without backing it up. All the points you've tried to make are not related to this argument at all.
"which I will remind you, is kind of the centerpiece of this entire thread."
The initial argument of this thread is whether we should make a whole new RC over this - which is a dumb, bad idea that I'm not trying to defend. In fact I argued against it.
Uh, yes, obviously the point would be to make the default-illegal in commander. For the record I'd be happy to play against someone running one of these in silver border, but I don't think they should be default-legal.
I have no clue why that would run contradictory to the suggestion the problem is that they're legal everywhere. That seems to match up 100% perfectly, tbh. I don't think they should be legal by default, and that making them illegal by default would resolve the problem. Why is that confusing for you?
Again, restating your point about this not being relevant to commander without explaining why. Getting kind of tired of that.
I'd say borders(/alt-art) is completely relevant to the playability of the format, and largely irrelevant to the collectable aspect. Borders exist to define how the cards can be played, not how they can be collected. If you feel my distinction it's "rather arbitrary", kindly explain why - but I think I've made enough points as to why this product is different than others, and ideally wouldn't be default-legal in the format.
NO. STOP STRAW MANNING ME. I never said these cards were rare - not ever, not once. Accessibility has NEVER been my argument. WotC said they would print as many of these are people wanted to buy (ignoring the fact that we're past the window now), so in theory the supply is infinite. The way they're marketing them has some elements of trying to instill the fear of potential future rarity, but during the buying window rarity is a 100% non-issue. And realistically, I doubt these will ever be TOO hard to get your hands on. Certainly not as hard as reserved list staples.
Now, how often do I think these will come up in an actual game? Probably not super often, though Rick might become popular (in the 99 most likely) for humans decks. But even if I never sit down across from one, having them in the game does still hurt the immersion a little, I think. They're going to come up on scryfall, they're going to get recommended in decklists, they're going to have decklists in the subforum, people are going to talk about them. Hell, we're already doing that and I hate it. I hate that I'm talking about the walking dead in a forum dedicated to magic the gathering.
Now, are those huge concerns? Not for me, tbh, aside from TWD specifically and how I think it sucks balls. But that's why I made it clear within that point that I was mostly relaying other people's concerns, and less so my own. I'm just passing on the information, not really arguing super strongly for it. But there are a lot of people who argue this point, so I felt it was worth conveying.
How is that irrelevant to commander? We may have nowhere to PLAY commander. I can't think of anything more relevant than that.
I'm afraid I don't see how this is related to point #4, but I will reiterate that this is not a point I personally make or particularly care about. I also don't think it'll be THAT hard to get these on the secondary market even for people living in those countries. But people do make this argument, so I'm just relaying it.
You asked why people care about them being legal. This is one reason many people bring up, even if I don't particularly agree with it.
The surge of "on-brand" product? You mean...everything wotc has ever made in black border (and arguably silver border) besides literally this one product? Um, ok? I agree that wotc has been dumping products on us at a pretty alarming rate. I don't think that's a sign that they're "protecting their brand", though. I think it's a sign that they're trying to milk us for every last dime that we're worth.
This product is a totally new direction for them - they don't know what will happen to the popularity of the format with the release of TWD, but I'd bet that they're watching very attentively to find out. If SLxTWD brings in a bunch new customers, you can bet they'll start pushing this sort of thing a lot harder, if they aren't planning to already. They're not trying to remove the releases that have already hooked so many people - they're just trying to add to them. For that matter, the Godzilla cards are still very new, too. I'm sure WotC was watching the response to those.
I think it's really funny that this is the one point that's pretty self-evidently irrelevant to commander, and yet it's the one you didn't claim is irrelevant. Also you didn't really argue against it? Just because they're making a lot of "normal" products doesn't mean that a card from SL couldn't become a powerful staple. It's a point brought up often, but it was only the second unique BaB that became a powerful tournament staple. The same could easily happen here. WotC has proven that they don't have very tight controls over the power level of their products. They try to make fun exciting cards (usually targeted towards commander players) but frequently end up creating problems in other formats. Although this is somewhat speculative - maybe WotC always wanted TNN to become a powerful legacy staple, who knows.
I don't know why you think you're dunking on me when it's clear that I'm merely relaying other peoples' points, not making my own (in this case). Also from what I gather Negan was a rapist on the show. But again, this is not a point I really care about. That said, it's clearly getting used - iirc one of the digital commander environments banned Negan (and only Negan) for this reason. So even if I don't agree with it, it's part of the conversation.
You asked why people care about them being legal. I've tried to be thorough in relaying not just my own points, but also the points others have made. I'm not particularly interested in debating points like this one, though. I'm just answering your question for why some people, at least, don't like them.
I don't think printing a bazillion products a year - which is already an annoyance in itself - is a solution to this problem. If one of the items on your menu is poisonous, you don't resolve that problem by making a the menu bigger.
To be clear, I don't think players should try to find an alternative to the RC. I'm still in this thread because you asked why people didn't like them, and I answered your question. Not because I'm advocating a change in leadership.
To address something specific though - "none of your points are specific to commander" - sure, it's true that this business model could be predatory to legacy/vintage players too - if this product was targeted towards those players. But it isn't. It's targeted towards commander players. That's why this product is relevant to us specifically. If you actually think that this is a product that's equally relevant to all eternal formats then I guess we can discuss it, but that seems like a very tenuous position to me.
I've responded to everything you've said (at least from a cursory look through prior posts). If you think I've missed something, please, let me know what you think I've missed.
The rest of what you've said is some really tedious ad-hominem garbage that I won't address. Keep it civil.
If you’re not interested in engaging with the substance of the discussion then I’m not interested in trying to communicate with you.
Definitely not going to defend the actions of those people, but I think it's incorrect to say they don't care about magic.
yes.
I don't think this particular product is the end of magic, obviously. But I do think that it's very emblematic of some very serious problems with how upper management is treating magic. They're focused entirely on making money ASAP, and not on creating an enjoyable game that can sustain long-term. This product itself happens to be particularly odious, but as far as the existential threat to the game it's a lot bigger than just SLxTWD. And that threat is what I think people are freaking out about, and trying desperate measures to try to correct the direction the ship is heading before it smashes into an iceberg.
That said, this was a huge uproar before there were any YouTube videos about it and it would have been huge without any. Mitch and co rode the wave of anger, they didn't start it. They probably increased it a little, but this was going to be a PR nightmare no matter what they did.
The difference between these and grimlock/mlp is that these are fully-legal cards. The difference between these and godzilla is that there were normal versions widely available in normal boosters. These have the problem of ONLY being available in cross-IP form, being fully legal, and only being available via a predatory, overpriced product. I agree these aren't incredibly exciting, but if they were and I wanted to play them, I'd have to pay their exorbitant prices that cut out the LGS and prey on FOMO, and I'd also have to play with whatever IP they've whored themselves out to. Although I can't imagine many franchises I have less respect for than the Walking Dead. If they wanted to cross-IP with something more respectable, like lotr, then I'd at least be less bothered by the cross-IP bit.
If wotc had done them silver bordered, or godzilla-style with the normal versions in packs, I wouldn't have cared a bit.
should probably be in the rules forum though.
Hopefully that makes sense. Anyway, it's a definite no.
Btw this is the wrong subforum for rules questions. The correct subforum is here: https://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/magic-fundamentals/magic-rulings
By all means, tell me which part of what you've said you think I'm straw manning. Unless that's just another fun buzzword you like to throw around so you can avoid making any actual arguments.
I'm fairly certain no one has said that any of them are broken as a reason for disliking/banning them. Ergo, I think one could reasonably surmise that isn't the problem people have with them, and you don't have to keep bringing up that they aren't. We all know they aren't.
People are upset for a lot of reasons, of which I already listed out many but I could certainly list out more. Here's another one that bothers me more, the more I've thought about it - I don't hate these designs. They don't blow me away but I could see playing them. But if I wanted to do that, unless something changes, I would HAVE to play with a card themed around the walking dead, a show that sucks and I don't want to support, or be seen supporting. And frankly, I don't want to look at it when I play my deck either. And who knows what the next cards they might create could be. By branding unique cards around some other IP, they're basically saying "if you want to play these cards, you HAVE to support this IP". That's why godzilla didn't bother me (plus Godzilla doesn't reek of desperate marketing like the walking dead does). I could just choose not to use those versions of the cards. But not so, moving forward.
Largely speaking, there are 2 main problems with many facets: 1) people don't like the flavor, and 2) people don't like the distribution. For my money, #2 is the bigger problem but they're both real bad precedents imo.
Why does that have nothing to do with commander? If someone plays them, you're going to see that art/IP. If you want to play them because you think they're interesting mechanically, you're going to see that IP/art (unless you proxy them, which you absolutely should).
I mean sure, that's not traditionally a reason to ban a card. I'm not sure putting this at the feet of the RC is fair. But it's 100% relevant to commander as a whole.
1) I think most people assume these won't make an impact on legacy or vintage (I don't believe these are legal in modern). Granted, people are trying, so who knows. I hope they dominate the format and force wotc to address the problem, personally.
2) anyone who's seriously into legacy or vintage (I don't believe these are legal in modern) is probably too invested to want to quit very easily. So until these are actually making a big impact, it's probably not going to send people packing.
3) Tournament magic tends to be a lot less focused on things like flavor. Sure, pros will talk about how they like the flavor, but nobody who takes magic seriously at high REL is going to make any decisions based on the flavor of the card. If Pikachu is a good card in legacy, he's getting played.
Just because you don't agree with the reasons don't mean they aren't legitimate.
I don't think this is good grounds for harassing or hating on the RC. But if this is the direction magic is going, I have to admit I have my doubts that I'll want to stick around forever - as someone who's been playing a long time and has never felt that way before.
This armchair psychologist stuff is both insulting and absurd. Sure, there are people that complain a lot about the format, and maybe some that aren't actually enjoying it - but polls from reddit had something like 93% - with 30,000 votes iirc - in favor of banning these cards. And that's just BANNING, not even the people who dislike them but don't think banning is the right solution. Are you the only person who genuinely likes the format? Everyone else is just a bunch of whiners?
Seriously, cut this out. You sound ridiculous.
Even in open games with "randoms" (though there are certainly different degrees of randomness), players can absolutely still avoid decks that they aren't interested in, the majority of the time. It helps to have a discussion ahead of time about power level, and sometimes there are misunderstandings.
Back in 2011 or so, commander was rare enough that I usually had a dedicated group to play in. These days, it's popular enough that it isn't the default anymore, at least in my experience. If only a few people are playing a format, obviously you're going to need to stick with each other so you can actually play. When most players are all playing commander, you're no longer constrained to the same small group, and most people are happy to go out and meet new people when they play. But of course that can cause conflict when expectations differ. That's not unique to commander. It's true of most social interactions, tbh.
Stick to playing with the same people over and over and over if you want. Sounds terribly boring to me.
What a ridiculous use of the phrase "virtue signaling", a phrase that has already been abused so badly I'm not sure it has any meaning at all. I think people just like saying it to demean others. You SAY you love commander, but you don't REALLY, because only I know how to love commander PROPERLY.
Some people complain a lot, yeah. They complain because they care about the format, and that care is built from positive experiences. People don't get so angry about stuff that they don't care about. Maybe for some people those positive experiences are too distant and few, and they should let the format go. But staaaahhhp pretending like you're the one guy who truly loves commander, just because you're happy to accept this ugly corporate shillery from WotC. Or because you haven't gotten bored of playing the same people over and over.
It's almost like that's not the way many people play commander.
"I don't understand why people are upset about people cheating in video games - back in my day we only ever did LAN parties, so you could just talk it over with your friends!"
Yeah, ok, cool solution grandpa. Let's all pretend it's 2009 again. Best solution ever.
EDIT: Having thought it over some more, I think the "but you can just ban them with the 3 friends you've played commander with for the past decade" isn't so much an infeasible solution so much as a misdirect. These five/six cards are only a tiny part of the problem with this product and the signal it sends. It's a signal that wotc is going to become more predatory towards its customers, that it's going to sell out the aesthetics of the game to whoever it thinks stands to get it the most money. You can hide in a hole and ban those cards in a local group every time they come up, but that's the direction the game as a whole is going if this progress continues.
Personally, even if I was in a situation where everyone I played with agreed not to play these cards, that still wouldn't fix the problem for me - not at all, really. Because the problem isn't the cards, the problem is that I don't want to support a company that cares so little about its customers that it will gouge them $50 for 6 cards and prey on their FOMO to sell it. I don't want to support a company that's so desperate to wring every last dollar from its product that it'll cut out LGSs, even if it'll hurt the game long-term. I don't want to support a company that will whore itself out to a trashy show like The Walking Dead to make a quick buck. I thought Magic had more integrity than that. And if WotC's message to its customers is "hey, we don't care about making a great game that will please our customers - we care about wringing money out of them no matter the cost", then I don't really want to support them anymore.
From what I know of smash, it's a format that is nothing BUT crossovers, so complaining about that seems fairly ridiculous to me. Maybe there's a line because it's microsoft instead of nintendo, but at least categorically there's nothing unusual about a crossover within that context, so that's a big strike one. And as far as being predatory, I don't see that either, unless they're selling Steve separately for a limited time only. I'm not saying it's unreasonable for fans to be unhappy with having a character they don't like in the game they love, but it's nowhere near "apples to apples" with this situation.
It's a major part of my life. If I think it's under threat, yeah, I'm going to take that seriously. And for the record, this is the only time I've felt this way, and I've been playing for 18 years. I'm not a constant "sky is falling" guy when it comes to magic. This is unprecedented. I'm sympathetic to BLM protesters (I went to one climate protest...It's not much, but tbh it really just wasn't my speed), but I'm a selfish guy and I focus on what affects me most, personally. Magic affects me a lot. And as someone who spends a lot of money on the game and a lot of time talking about it, I actually have a relatively loud voice compared to my opinions on police brutality and carbon emissions.
I never advocated removing the RC so please stop bringing it up - that's never been my argument. I disagree strongly with them but I don't have any intention to disassociate the format from them.
It pertains strongly to commander (and the reason why banning them would have likely been very effective) because these are clearly targeted at commander players. Remove them from the format and WotC will be disincentivized from producing similar products in black border, which is the goal. Is the banlist the "right" way to do that? Not really, but when somebody is trying to kill me, if I've got a fork at hand I'm not going to quibble over whether stabbing is the proper use of a fork.
(what a weird metaphor)
Yes, lots of mobile/VG companies pull similar stunts, because they've done lots of research on how to build perfect skinner boxes for separating people from their money. And yes, those companies are called predatory and rightfully so, and they do receive backlash. Forgive me if I'm not thrilled to see WotC taking a massive step down the same path.
Card availability has been a problem, yes, but say what you will about the reserved list - wotc doesn't benefit from it. If anything it hurts them, probably quite a bit. Intent matters. There's a big difference between something happening accidentally and something happening on purpose. A volcano killing someone is unfortunate, but it's not evil. When a person kills someone else intentionally, then it's time to start laying down the moral judgments.
When have I ever said that these were going to heavily permeate magic? Seriously, what is this insane straw man bull*****?
For that matter, I haven't really said much about it being exclusive - it's region exclusive, yes, but anyone who really wants to can certainly get one via the secondary market. It might get very expensive later, but it's hard to say.
Stop putting words in my mouth and then calling me hyperbolic. And I definitely didn't say anything even close to that in the part you quoted. If I said something like that elsewhere, then quote the relevant part, don't make me go hunt it down.
Because some of us don't live in the same city our whole lives. And not very many of my friends play commander, nor are my friends who DO play commander necessarily the most fun to play commander against, especially when I want more variety. If you're happy playing against the same people over and over over, then bully for you. I've gone through many, many playgroups, through both necessity and choice. This is now likely to be a discussion I have to have with every playgroup I join for the rest of my life.
Not a big fan of that.
These cards alone will probably not ruin the format single-handedly. But the trend of WotC printing commander-targeted cards for $10 each using scummy marketing tactics and cutting out LGSs is absolutely a bad road to walk down and I think could easily lead towards the eventual destruction of the format and magic as a whole. I've already seen quite a few people talk about quitting the game over this (though how serious they are, it's hard to be sure of course).
This isn't the end. But by the time we get to the end, it'll be way too late to do anything about it. This is a critical turning point in the game, and if we don't do something now before it gets worse, I think it might be too late.