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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Oct 7, 2023 1:38:58 GMT
PROLOGUE(Contains a setup for a punchline)I can't tell you how
Have I found everybody a fun assignment to do today?
I knew - but I did know that I had crossed
The border. Everything I loved was lost
When you're here, everything that we do is fun for them anyway
But no aorta could report regret.
A sun of rubber was convulsed and set;
And blood-black nothingness began to spin
I'll leave you be--INTERLINK--(Fr_Antunes)YAWN. I go through all that effort making a fun little show for you and your big fancy breakout plan is asking nicely?Maybe you should've asked someone crazy enough to use all your stupid stuff in gross, illegitimate ways then. You invoke the old rank, you get to hear things getting done my way. Wow, we should give you a medal, Superman! I regret being asked to put you in charge of this episode already. --INTERLINK--(Irvinemarketingservice)...so what are you anyway, "Zephyr"? A talking frog prince? A walking Keter-class anomaly?How about anything that isn't "ζ" or a rushed plot twist? Awwww, sweetheart, you wound me. I just want to know all your dirty little meta-temporal crossover ties! Maybe you travel around in a perfectly blue phone box - ooh, is that why we're here? To break time for one teensy little breakout?That'll depend on our commenters - now shut up so we don't say anything odd on whatever monitoring's already in place. All your exposition bores me. Give me some material to blackmail you with!I'll give you the one you knew already - I'm no Doctor. VIDEO LOG - SITE 06-3(Contains questions for Planeswalkers of Interest - dangerousdice , Daij_Djan , sdfkjgh )DATE: 10/7/XX NOTE: Negotiation offer with former affiliate of organization █████ [BEGIN LOG] Former subject previously documented as D-3527-jA ζ is seated in a meeting room, accompanied by {DATA EXPUNGED}. On the other side sits Dr. Kilian Braun, representing the foundation.D-3527-jA ζ: It has been a pleasure to negotiate with you, gentlemen. What'll it be to pay you back? Investigation into the 1943 case? A little help with the recent outbreak of 2884s? Agents specialized in handling 706? We'd take 3356 off your hands, but- ({DATA EXPUNGED} appears to react in disgust at D-3527-jA ζ's overly theatrical tone.)Dr. Braun: ζ, if you don't mind me calling you that still, we wouldn't be able to accept that help without additional screentime, even at this low a level. D-3527-jA ζ: That is a shame, good friend! Is there really no way I can help lobby for the early release of D-3527-jA β? Like providing information on the whereabouts of certain other cooperative entity that doesn't like being inside any box outside their own little blue one? ({DATA EXPUNGED} now appears to be extremely irritated, as Dr. Braun converses with observation personnel.)Dr. Braun: ...we would be interested. Could you provide some proof before we continue this discussion? D-3527-jA ζ: Passphrase: The Doctor Who Commander decks do some creative reimagining of past mechanics, like The Foretold Soldier, Exterminate!, Time Travel, and “Doctors you control have horsemanship.” What's your favorite instance of Magic re-imagining a mechanic for a different setting? Now, if they're listening, ladies, gentlemen, and variations thereof, dangerousdice , Daij_Djan , and sdfkjgh 's answers will play back on this little sonic tape recorder I've got here... [END LOG] --INTERLINK--Psssst, kiddos, this two-faced brown-noser is boring the sh*t out of me with his stolen ideas. I've slipped you all one time travel device, free of charge, maaaaybe a little highly volatile. Design a card with Time Travel or Paradox that tells me how you'll attempt to break out with it. Or are you going to be a nice little test subject and wait for em to rip you up? P.S. I heard non-responders will get dissected. No pressure!
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Post by Daij_Djan on Oct 8, 2023 18:08:29 GMT
Hi everyone, nice to be.. back..? Maybe..? Or not, maybe I'm just talking to myself nowadays..? Maybe trying to leave all those hints behind wasn't such a great idea afterall? Well, let's not think about any of this for the moment and rather think about Magic the Gathering as a distraction. Sure, this technically got me into this mess in the first place – but how high are the chances this would happen again (scine it only happened like twice so far^^), right? Right..?! To start things off, there are two different ways to tackle this challenge imho. On the one hand, there are the one-off twists WotC uses in Commander products or Master sets. While these can be really, really cool (and also I'd argue are very similar to what we do here on the forum for the contests and similar), I honestly don't remember many of these. Ironically Damn might be the one I remember most – not due a flavorful reimagining or something but purely for solving a personal pet peeve of mine, that being all of the original Overload designs having been all-upside WotC reusing mechanics on a larger scale, as-in as a returning mechanic(al theme) for a set however tends to be more memorable – and two instances come to mind in particiular for me. The first one is Proliferate – while it wasn't such an unimaginable concept that came out of nothing, the way WotC did a complete 180 with it was nethertheless quite cool. First introduced alongside -1/-1 and poison counters used to punish your oppoenent's and their creatures – it later returned alongside tons of planeswalkers and their loyalty counters as well as +1/+1 counters and armys in particular, allowing you to buff your team. The second one was MDFCs. While WotC could have spaced it out a bit maybe rather than making it a theme for that year, I liked how their design space was explored nicely. From simply having a land on the back to fit Zendikar's themes, to the Deans as well as spell backsides of Strixhaven, to Kaldheim's Gods and weapons.. Again, they could (should?) have spaced the sets out a little, bt it nicely showcased the potential flavor and/or mechanical ties MDFCs offer. {unimportant stuff noone should waste their time to read} Not gonna lie, ever since I read Der letzte Tag der Schöpfung around two decades ago I haven't really been that find of time travel anymore.. But still: Even if I'm unsure about using it on myself, there's alwas the option to call forth something else – even if it's just something to hide in.. Can't catch what you cannot see, right?
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Oct 12, 2023 17:38:20 GMT
Dr. Braun: We appear to be waiting on some of your evidence, ζ. And please refrain from using the term 'Doctor' - it will confuse the staff reviewing this footage. D-3527-jA ζ: Don't sweat it, old chap! dangerousdice should be responding anyyyytime soon now.... and for the last time, I'm not a Doctor! ({DATA EXPUNGED} appears to be rolling its ocular appendages.)
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Post by dangerousdice on Oct 14, 2023 3:09:40 GMT
I really liked it when they reimagined kicker as devour! Or maybe them reimagining kicker as cleave! Or them reimagining kicker as- I #@*&ing swear, if you mention kicker one more time, I'll "Kicker" Your teeth in. Let's Skedaddle. *A thrumming fills the air as a sleek knife of stygian blue cuts through Dice's restraints*Aether Kris Enchantment - Aura {R} Enchant creature Enchanted Creature gets +2/-1 and Haste. Paradox — Whenever you cast a spell from anywhere other than your hand, if that spell was a creature, you may attach this card to that creature from the graveyard or the battlefield. OH! Thanks! *Alarms begin blaring as a tremor runs through the facility.* Are the alarms because you cut me out or..? As it turns out, while most of the facility is actively preventing interplanar powers, the master computer was not.I see. Let's go help the others.
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Oct 15, 2023 4:30:38 GMT
(Pouyakhani)So much for your brilliant negotiations. And what the **** was up with that fake Doctor act?I already told you, I'm not the Doctor. And you're the reason the negotiations failed in the first place! Dream on.Really? Because the responders being passed time travel devices like candy is a 'dream'? Being shot at is a dream? If you at least care so much about your precious prospect fodder, why don't you deal with the grunts shooting at us. Nonviolently. Echoing Flare-Strobe Instant Paradox — Whenever you cast a spell from anywhere other than your hand, create a copy of ~. You may choose new targets for the copy. Target creature can't block this turn. Now, you don't see me. And now, you still won't be seeing me.
I find that I'm a fan of the one-off Time Spiral-esque designs that take old mechanics and reimagine them in creative ways - power level issues aside, this is why I like that Modern Horizons carried on the torch. *BAM*Sorry, excuse the *BAM* interference there. I think the different forms of revisiting have their ups and downs, as Daij_Djan and dangerousdice have described well. If I had to pick a particular favorite mechanic I liked seeing reimagined though, I think Poison counters had a pretty impressive turn around from being a one-off gimmick to describing extremely well how New Phyrexia differed from both old Phyrexia and regular combat. *BAM* Granted, they are tough to balance, but we've had some incredibly unusual designs like Phyrexian Unlife also come about because of them. There's some kind of paper here. Hey, what do you think of WOE's new Role mechanic? We'll answer that in a bit, but I assume everyone's being pursued now that the jig's up for all of us, so I might need descriptions of what's pursuing you.... preferably in the form of a card you've made. Of maybe you were lucky and slipped away undetected, if you used your sneaky sneaky cloak - in which case, maybe make a card about the local scenery you'll be hiding in instead for a bit.
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Post by Daij_Djan on Oct 25, 2023 0:01:13 GMT
(Sorry for the delay everyone, spent the last week of school vacation with my family - will respond either tomorrow or the day after) There's some kind of paper here. Hey, what do you think of WOE's new Role mechanic? As often, there are two different sides to this question. As far as its flavor is concerned, I love this mechanic. It brings the different typical roles / stereotypes of fantasy stories into the game nicely, and I could totally see it being expanded in future environments. How about a Butler role for a detective setting? An Outlaw role for a western? But then there's the purely mechanical level. Technically speaking, roles aren't even anything new, just another type of predefined token the game has seen quite a few of recently. But this is different – because it's seven different versions of roles introduced at once – six from the main set, one in the Commander product. And sure, at the very least at common and uncommon all the cards have the specific reminder text – except a few commons don't even have enough room to fit the „single role clause..“ Wait no! Price of Beauty only has the Adventure reminder text as I've literally just now noticed while typing.. So yeah, while I assume this obviously is a lesser issue on Arena – it feels like it'd get really confusing in paper.. At the very least, I think the main set shouldn't have six roles – maybe divide them up like four main, the other three ones in the Commander set only? As a final note, I do think Bargain was a nice choice for an additional mechanic to be combined with the role tokens.
Echoing Flare-Strobe Instant Paradox — Whenever you cast a spell from anywhere other than your hand, create a copy of ~. You may choose new targets for the copy. Target creature can't block this turn. Now, you don't see me. And now, you still won't be seeing me. How exactly does the Paradox ability work? While the card is in the graveyard? While it's on the stack..? We'll answer that in a bit, but I assume everyone's being pursued now that the jig's up for all of us, so I might need descriptions of what's pursuing you.... preferably in the form of a card you've made. Of maybe you were lucky and slipped away undetected, if you used your sneaky sneaky cloak - in which case, maybe make a card about the local scenery you'll be hiding in instead for a bit.Not sure how long I'll continue to be able to keep hiding, the scenery is looking rather hostile..
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Post by dangerousdice on Oct 25, 2023 18:01:23 GMT
Well, while I wasn't able to play with them, I think Roles have a decent amount of potential design space, flavor and design-wise. I hope they carve out more enchantment tokens in the near future! As for what's chasing me... Ash-Blood Revenant Creature - Human Spirit Warrior {R} Menace When Ash-Blood Revenant dies, if it has no role, return it to the battlefield with a Wicked Role. " You really thought stabbing a person who bleeds literal brimstone would kill them?" 2/2 He seems to be immune to stabbing, but his arm did fall apart a bit after I sicced a raccoon on him? I dunno. Does anyone else have a suggestion on how to kill this guy? Preferably in card form?
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Oct 25, 2023 19:10:22 GMT
Responses coming in faster than your average MVC3 match (which is now also a thing at the rate Secret Lairs are going), huh. I'll give my full commentary and responses later but Daij_Djan - Intended to work on the stack, I was trying to jank out Paradox wording in a clever way. I guess that still works though without disrupting the wording.
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Oct 30, 2023 7:09:47 GMT
Well, while I wasn't able to play with them, I think Roles have a decent amount of potential design space, flavor and design-wise. I hope they carve out more enchantment tokens in the near future! As for what's chasing me... Ash-Blood Revenant " style="max-width:100%;"] " style="max-width:100%;"] Creature - Human Spirit Warrior {R} Menace When Ash-Blood Revenant dies, if it has no role, return it to the battlefield with a Wicked Role. " You really thought stabbing a person who bleeds literal brimstone would kill them?" 2/2 He seems to be immune to stabbing, but his arm did fall apart a bit after I sicced a raccoon on him? I dunno. Does anyone else have a suggestion on how to kill this guy? Preferably in card form? *BANG*Containment Team Creature - Soldier Adamant — If at least three black mana was spent to cast this spell, when this enters the battlefield, target creature gets -3/-3 until end of turn. Adamant — If at least three white mana was spent to cast this spell, when this enters the battlefield, exile target creature until ~ leaves the battlefield. 2/2 "Elk team has come to graze. Your orders?"Superb, these agents have even come prepared to handle nonviolent and violent entities! Wipe that goddamn grin of your face. You're making a fool of me in front of my clientelle because I can't butcher these meatbags. This was your plan all along, wasn't it?I don't need a sonic anything to engineer things like that. I suppose this is where we part! Toodles! Oh no you don't. I will create a VOID if it means salvaging this contract.Dimension Swallower Creature - Horror When ~ enters the battlefield, exile target land an opponent controls until ~ leaves the battlefield. 2/2 Huh, both bears. Would you look at that. Hypersonic transport comes bundled, too! Quit your you-know-who impression before I rip your guts out.Ah, but you can't do that, can you? Because you need me alive to actually do things for this contract. Like running this show! Ye gods, it's absolutely fun to be actually driving it around. ...alright. What do you want.Hmmm, hmmm.... oh, how about this? What am I, your glorified contestant? If you're going to strike a deal, get on with it.Not so cocky now that I've got the other shoe, huh? Well, I need everyone to make a card representing what "ancient" Magic cards would look like. Be creative! We'll need to be escaping to a time where those hadn't quite existed yet, hint hint... P.S. - Oh, right, the question! I think this design space was inevitable - I remember MSE has had at least one discussion about a what-if of auras being the -1/-1 or +1/+1 counter equivalents before, and it makes for some interesting flavor wins related to stageplays and writing. A cinema or game-themed set could use some of the roles quite well too and I think like dice said there is a lot of future potential. As for complexity, re:Daij, I feel like I can at least say "Well, at least they're not dungeons." That's not a particularly high bar to clear, but I agree it's obnoxious that the cards clearly haven't been designed with the idea of needing to describe them via reminder text in mind. WoTC is very much taking token complexity for granted these days, especially with with every new token that comes out (I was wondering with some friends yesterday if we'd eventually get a token for every basic action, and Map tokens only seem to push that bar a little further). I think the mechanic itself is good in other words but it doesn't hurt to keep cards simple, at the same time.
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Post by Daij_Djan on Nov 7, 2023 17:15:32 GMT
As for complexity, re:Daij, I feel like I can at least say "Well, at least they're not dungeons." Fair enough – even if this indeed is a rather low bar to pass Plot Twister by Idea in CoTW 479 demonstrates that even new mechanics often have unexplored design space. Do you think there are places we can go in custom magic design that WoTC cannot? (Or won't yet?) OK, first of all the elefant in the room: There are different types of us custom designers out there. Some don't care at all about WotC's rules & guidelines, the color pie or whatever. Obviously everyone can abide by „the rules“ as much as they want and still have fun – but as I am me, I'll tackle this question from my own design standard, which is trying to come as close to real cards whenever possible. To me, there are four possible reasons I can think of a specific design space might not have been explored by WotC yet – and these four lead to three different responses: - WotC intentionally leaving design space open to be explored at a later stage.
WotC opening up new design space by doing something new in a different area (think of Hexproof from X (or whatever the first one was ) resulting in other submechanics).
Obviously there is absolutely nothing wrong with us doing what WotC is gonna do at some time anyway. This design space is a simple free-for-all buffet to choose from. . - Cards that flat out don't work within the rules (like the question inspiring Plot Twister, or a small pet peeve of mine: watermark mechanics).
What doesn't work, doesn't work – for the most part. Yes, there's the option of adapting the Comp. Rules, but I'm not a big fan of that (other than adding to them – which we all do constantly with new mechanics, subtypes, etc obviously).. The big exception is however silver-bordered (technically I guess I should say „acorn“ nowadays – yeah, no..) cards, where we have the absolute freedom of being able to do as many standalone designs without having to come up with a whole set to fit them into. . - Designs contradicting guidlines or restrictions WotC has (like don't put +1/+1 and -1/-1 counters in the same set).
First of all: Insert obvious sidejab at WotC themselves ignoring many design guidelines they upheld for decades recently. That aside, I know many designers don't mind going all-in here just like with the first category, but I disagree. Which doesn't mean I don't think this design shouldn't be explored by us at all either though. For me, these guidelines have a reason – WotC doesn't shackle themselves for shits and giggles. So whenever I want to dabble here, I try to think about why WotC doesn't use this design space in the first place – and then try to fix „the issue“ to the best of my abilities. One example would be my Penada set. It features two +1/+1 counter mechanics – but also Mimic which originally used shape counters (let's ignore me realizing the mechanic can be done without counters at a later revision^^) despite back then WotC being against using different types of counter on creatures at all (one-off rares maybe aside). Why was WotC against this? Since players rarely had any official counters lying around, they might just use sheets of paper or coins and this might result in them getting the counter types mixed up. I really wanted to have these three mechanics together in one set however, so I thought of a solution: The set contained not a single card being able to put a +1/+1 counter on just any creature – there was no way to end up with a creature haing both types counters on it in Limited. So in the end, while I do think this design space is fair game, I think it should be used carefully and only after thinking about WotC doesn't do so.
Not so cocky now that I've got the other shoe, huh? Well, I need everyone to make a card representing what "ancient" Magic cards would look like. Be creative! We'll need to be escaping to a time where those hadn't quite existed yet, hint hint... Not sure if this counts as creative.. Also I'm well aware cuneiform doesn't have much to do with cavemen, but oh well {readable version}
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Nov 11, 2023 5:22:36 GMT
We'll give dangerousdice a few more days before we assume that they have been killed by the evil ash-men from Nomekop.
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Nov 18, 2023 12:06:46 GMT
Sacred Harvest Instant Put three grain counters on a Plains you control, then you gain life equal to the number of grain counters on target Plains you control. Egads! I'm free! I'm really, truly, free, from that meddlesome devil! I guess my sanity has gone down the drain a little, but you try having a shady deal sales...thing over your shoulder every waking moment of your life. Oh, and for the design - I think one way to do ancient Magic cards with modern templates would be to emphasize cultural aspects in way Magic doesn't typically do it. The existence of farming, in this case, would be far more important to ancient people than some silly tale about a dinosaur. Now, where were we- *ROARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR*Okay, speedanswertime! ThisiswherewritingquestionsinadvancecanbereallyroughasIhonestlyfeellikeIhadananswerinmindwhenIfirstwrotethisquestionbut...forgot it....several months later. Whew! Thank goodness these dinosaurs seem confused by these incredibly convenient and massive wheat fields. That said, I think Daij actually covered all I would say for this, in that aside from the practical cases, WoTC sometimes gets fresh ideas when they come back to a mechanic later with new people, keywords, and flavor to look at something. Kicker -> Multikicker to work with Zendikar's slowly building big mana themes comes to mind here. First of all: Insert obvious sidejab at WotC themselves ignoring many design guidelines they upheld for decades recently. I think this is the most interesting thing to come out of this answer though, that some of these guidelines have been broken due to how Arena changes the 'culture' of Magic. It seems like a lot of design at WoTC has now pivoted to the idea that playing online is the norm, and with that, conveniences like tracking many counters and extra side game pieces have become much more common. Whether it was a good idea or not may be subjective but to echo some of the previous episodes we've had, I can't help but wonder if WoTC also thinks it's okay for Magic players to enter expecting to digest more stuff on the whole while computers or other players in your pod manage the rest - or is it inevitable that every card game that accumulates too many mechanics enters a Yugioh like state of "Only read my own cards, don't read enemy cards until they mess up mine?" Food for thought. *ROARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR**ROARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR**ROARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR*...oh, bugger. Here's a question to keep you all distracted - What do you think about our first peak into The Lost Caverns of Ixalan/UB Jurassic World? And Daij_Djan, do you happen to have a recipe for dealing with three dinosaurs? Or are you going to sit there and tell me what wacky abilities these things have to have latched onto my time travel to this ancient farm to begin with? (Heck, maybe they're even farming dinosaurs. That's a thought.)
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Post by Daij_Djan on Nov 24, 2023 1:12:24 GMT
I think this is the most interesting thing to come out of this answer though, that some of these guidelines have been broken due to how Arena changes the 'culture' of Magic. It seems like a lot of design at WoTC has now pivoted to the idea that playing online is the norm, and with that, conveniences like tracking many counters and extra side game pieces have become much more common. Whether it was a good idea or not may be subjective but to echo some of the previous episodes we've had, I can't help but wonder if WoTC also thinks it's okay for Magic players to enter expecting to digest more stuff on the whole while computers or other players in your pod manage the rest - or is it inevitable that every card game that accumulates too many mechanics enters a Yugioh like state of "Only read my own cards, don't read enemy cards until they mess up mine?" Food for thought. Yeah, I think there's a lot of truth to this. Arena and Commander (where more complex board states already have been the norm anyway) together have warped Magic quite a lot around them in these recent years.. What do you think about our first peak into The Lost Caverns of Ixalan/UB Jurassic World? Not gonna lie, I haven't really been that interested in the set so far. To be fair, as mentioned a few times recently I've been burned out a bit from all the Magic releases anyway, but this is a bit differnt still. I know literally nothing about the story for once this time – and the cards didn't really make it clear to me why were returning to this plane. Honestly, I'm rather confused the set got paired up with Jurassic World but not with Minecraft.. I mean, am I the only one? That aside, looking at the mechanics: - Explore is.. ok, I guess? Not gonna lie, the mechanic never really clicked for me for some reason – this might be because I never played with it though. Not that I ever heard something negative about it either, I'm just rather indifferent about it.
- As such, I don't care much about Map tokens either beyond being slightly unhappy with them having an expert level mechanic used in reminder text. Also the implications ZephyrPhantom already mentioned about getting predefined tokens for all basic actions at some point.
- Craft is quite interesting, even though it took me a moment to wrap my head around the mechanic after reading The Enigma Jewel first Also, again: Minecraft, Wizards - come on!
- Discover N while being an intersting twist / fix to Cascade nethertheless is an annoying mess of a mechanic that should not exist and I'll probably never acknowledge existing. Why yes, of course I'm completely unbiased here and have no personal petty vendetta against it
- And finally, there's descending, Descend N and Fathomless Descent.. I mean, I do like the concept of it, but having three differnt twists on it (basically) feels a bit much to me – even though even I have to admit especially fathomless descent sounds pretty cool and is a clever twist on the numerical version. Still, I would have preferred dropping at least one of these three iterations – or at least outsourced it to the set's Commander section..
Or are you going to sit there and tell me what wacky abilities these things have to have latched onto my time travel to this ancient farm to begin with? (Heck, maybe they're even farming dinosaurs. That's a thought.) Not gonna lie, I really had no idea how to respond with something I could actually get some art for – but then actually made a last-minute image search and found this: What dangerous predators these have turned into do you happen to have a recipe for dealing with three dinosaurs? Well, dinos aren't really known to handle cold climates well, right? So I guess it's time to expand the cycle:
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Nov 26, 2023 21:55:08 GMT
(I'll respond to this properly eventually, but it might be in about a week or so due to IRL crunch. I do want to talk about burnout and what it means as a Magic player in a world where everyone else seems to keep up just fine and I really love the cards you designed to play off my own.) ( dangerousdice - Feel free to respond to either of the questions in the meantime.)
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Post by sdfkjgh on Nov 27, 2023 8:24:28 GMT
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Nov 27, 2023 14:22:34 GMT
Yes, but they weren't farming dinosaurs, see. They've lost their natural predatory instincts in favor of mastering one of the many things Daleks never could.
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Dec 4, 2023 3:48:01 GMT
*rip*Where were we, where were we, we where were....ah, that's right! BURNOUT! A fascinating scientific phenomenon in human brains that is easily confused with boredom and not certainly something you feel fresh off a regeneration you snuck in while some evil space demon hurled you across time and space. I wanted to comment on this specifically, less about how burnout occurs from set releases, and I think more about the fact that the more of these kinds of products we see, the 'faster' Magic gets (in Standard power and releases alike), and the older we get, we have less time and 'patience' to take in the current state of Magic. If you're not part of some circle that plays a format like Commander or Cube that is well insulated from change, people will drift off and try different things, or update their decks, or get tired of Magic, and it becomes harder to stay personally attached to the game yourself because your social aspect of it has gotten weaker. I think this is why many people end up "quitting" (taking breaks) from Magic and getting back into it many years later - the game itself hasn't really changed per se (not in the bigger picture sense of it still being a game that constantly changes, if that makes sense in Human) - but rather, times change, and so do we. Sometimes, we change into someone who doesn't have a lot of incentives or reasons to play much Magic. (Things like loss of Magic's story is also kind of a problem here, because as laughably full of holes as it was, it also removed a common talking people could've had without being invested in the story too much. (Then again, is it really worth it if the story was that bad in the first place? More at 12 with Mx. TARDIS.)) I actually once again don't have much to add to your mechanics review, Daij, as you've covered all my general feelings on the subject. I think if I was a bit younger or at least in a place where more Magic actively happened, I'd be a lot more enthusiastic about Craft, if I had to guess. I thought I was really enthusiastic about Descent, but the nature of magic's content flood and this not being the first time we've seen an existing action become a keyword has sort of watered it down a little for me. I'm really curious when we'll finally get loot or rummage as an actual term, though. Like I said, love the dinosaurs, real shame we have to turn them into popsicles! Let's hope they don't get too aggravated when they thaw out... Incremental Fury Sorcery Put a first strike counter on target creature, a double strike counter on another target creature, and a triple strike counter on a third target creature. Really though, we've lost quite a lot of people in the last few murder pits we've been in, and I've had to regenerate as part of a last minute plot twist, no less, so technically I'm not even the same person that joined the show! Say, Daij_Djan, old chap, can we actually do one of these Episodes without sdfkjgh, or is it really his guidance that keeps things moving and together? (Pssst, wrong answers only. We don't want our host getting too excited about his importance to the plot.)
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Post by Daij_Djan on Dec 9, 2023 18:18:32 GMT
(Response has been written, but it seems like my image hoster has some issues tonight. Should hopefully be able to upload and then post tomorrow ) I wanted to comment on this specifically, less about how burnout occurs from set releases, and I think more about the fact that the more of these kinds of products we see, the 'faster' Magic gets (in Standard power and releases alike), and the older we get, we have less time and 'patience' to take in the current state of Magic. If you're not part of some circle that plays a format like Commander or Cube that is well insulated from change, people will drift off and try different things, or update their decks, or get tired of Magic, and it becomes harder to stay personally attached to the game yourself because your social aspect of it has gotten weaker. I think this is why many people end up "quitting" (taking breaks) from Magic and getting back into it many years later - the game itself hasn't really changed per se (not in the bigger picture sense of it still being a game that constantly changes, if that makes sense in Human) - but rather, times change, and so do we. Sometimes, we change into someone who doesn't have a lot of incentives or reasons to play much Magic. That most definitely is something I can agree with. Pretty sure I've mentioned this a few times in the past, but I started getting into Magic in the year 2000. Since then, I basically only had one single time period – spanning around five years maybe – where I really had an active RL playgroup I've spent tons of time with playing. And this was more than a decade ago. Not saying I haven't played at all since then (as mentioned I nowadays play with my son as well sometimes), but only really, really infrequently. MSE is pretty much what kept my interest in the game for all those years – but this also includes highs and lows (obviously). Great, now I feel old – which to be fair might be because I kind of am, at least for this forum xD Really though, we've lost quite a lot of people in the last few murder pits we've been in, and I've had to regenerate as part of a last minute plot twist, no less, so technically I'm not even the same person that joined the show! Say, Daij_Djan, old chap, can we actually do one of these Episodes without sdfkjgh, or is it really his guidance that keeps things moving and together? (Pssst, wrong answers only. We don't want our host getting too excited about his importance to the plot.) Here's the thing: It's not just sdfkjgh who decided to take a break. We also lost Jund, Mel and the many, many other facets of his personality – basically taking away like half of our entire cast at once. Of course this would lead to lots of open spaces and wreck our flow. We never had a chance
Great, I'm afraid my old image hoster will stop working soon – currently I've hosted nearly 2000 images there. Great..
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Dec 10, 2023 1:03:55 GMT
That most definitely is something I can agree with. Pretty sure I've mentioned this a few times in the past, but I started getting into Magic in the year 2000. Since then, I basically only had one single time period – spanning around five years maybe – where I really had an active RL playgroup I've spent tons of time with playing. And this was more than a decade ago. Not saying I haven't played at all since then (as mentioned I nowadays play with my son as well sometimes), but only really, really infrequently. MSE is pretty much what kept my interest in the game for all those years – but this also includes highs and lows (obviously). Great, now I feel old – which to be fair might be because I kind of am, at least for this forum xD I generally haven't ever found an active LGS scene in meatspace, so that makes me one of the people that digital magic is great for, in theory - a way to keep playing Magic and trying out decks to better understand the game and enjoy interesting strategies. Something I've learned though, especially as my playgroups have splintered off and tried different games over the years, is that remembering how to play a card game well can be hard, and doubly so as you get more busy in life. It puts me in the weird spot of struggling to play on a level friendly to new players while being too far out of touch with players who are still grinding the game competitively for fun. I still get the occasional game in (just played with some Doctor Who cards yesterday, actually - was surprisingly fun stuff), but it's nowhere near what I used to do. I think for me, I would say it's less about "feeling old" and more "feeling tired" - you're always young at heart and all that, but starting over seems tougher than starting with something new. I wonder if that makes sense translated out of its native Toclafanian - oh well, who knows. Here's the thing: It's not just sdfkjgh who decided to take a break. We also lost Jund, Mel and the many, many other facets of his personality – basically taking away like half of our entire cast at once. Of course this would lead to lots of open spaces and wreck our flow. We never had a chance . You're right! We've practically undergone a whole split personality slaughter! (Not a decimation, mind you, that would be mathematically incorrect.) And Then There Were None Sorcery Destroy all creatures. Each player who controlled a creature that died this turn investigates. I do think introducing more roleplay elements like cards and our own little puppets are useful to filling in that empty void, though, so maybe we can keep this setting going to some extent. Who knows, maybe we'll done one in the format of Deckbuilder's Challenge someday.
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Dec 13, 2023 4:13:13 GMT
Oh, wait, that didn't kill us all? Well, so much for next episode's murder mystery. I think I'll call that my farewell for the episode - on a less facetious note, hosting an episode like this is a bit harder than it looks when you're busy. I went in expecting to take this very not-seriously but it'd be nice to do something more structured and serious if I ever get the time. Once Daij_Djan 's signed off for the ep, we'll call it a wrap and then it'll presumably be sdj who's blaring out some kind of wild New Year's Special.
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Post by dangerousdice on Dec 15, 2023 17:53:17 GMT
Sorry it took so long, but between the holiday season, my new drawing tablet arriving, and work, I forgot to respond! As for TLCoI, I'm happy with how it turned out. I thought Craft was a fun idea, and I'm intrigued by the idea of crafting with gem counters/tokens, even if it got cut. Descent seems like a good way to represent going deeper into caves, even if I kind of wish it tracked how deep you are beyond 4, 8, and the occasional X. Map tokens look interesting, but they might have a bit too much complexity for reminder text? Regardless, I'm enjoying tinkering them. I think that piloting without Sdggsrthtdhbsh has had... hiccups, but I think things went fine! Signing off, Dice!
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Post by Daij_Djan on Dec 18, 2023 21:23:15 GMT
Yeah, sorry for that. I sat down at my computer last Monday to eat a little snack and then start doing my rounds on the forum, when I received a message (if you've seen my previous status, you know) out of nowhere and needed a week off afterwards.. I do think introducing more roleplay elements like cards and our own little puppets are useful to filling in that empty void, though, so maybe we can keep this setting going to some extent. Who knows, maybe we'll done one in the format of Deckbuilder's Challenge someday. Oh, I definitely enjoyed designing the cards – then again, no big supprise there, I guess – not sure what personas I could adept, though.. I guess I could try to use my forum avatar's origins technically – name and artwork being based on two different properties.. Anyway, for now / for today it's finally time to say goodbye to everyone – see you soon!
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Post by ZephyrPhantom on Dec 19, 2023 2:41:59 GMT
And on that note (and a strangely alive pair of dice), ALLONSANONIMO!(BBC)...that didn't sound right.
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Post by sdfkjgh on Dec 19, 2023 6:37:19 GMT
Gents, you've got to hide me! Some strange people are after me, I don't know whom they are, and I don't know why, but they seems to've been forewarned and forearmed against my every tactic. I'm terrified. For the first time in my entire existence, I, Jund, the embodiment of the savagery of nature, the true heir to Darwinism, am terrified for my continued existence! Please, help me!!! They've even got things with them that either won't or can't die. Not the usual mindless Zombies we know and, shall we say, tolerate, no! These are things that can't even have the decency to stay damaged when I manage to tear chunks out of them! HELP ME!
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