No more mana burn?

[Nehptis]

Edit: for those who think the flavor of this rule is the problem, what about losing the game when you can't draw any more cards?

I know that your intention was to use this as a counter-arguement for the Mana Burn Discussion.  But, I think this is an interesting point you make.  I actually may use it to post my first Thread in the Adv Forum.  (I'll credit you!)

Why should you lose the game if you run out of cards?  From a flavor perspective you are still on the "Battlefield".  You've just run out of new resources to "fight" with.  But, you still have the resources that are in play, in your GY and in your hand to Duel with.  It's not over yet!

If WOTC is assessing all the MTG rules.  Then maybe "decking", like Mana Burn needs to be analyzed, as well.

Let me attempt to pre-emptively address the nay-sayers.  Removing "Decking" as a Win condition doesn't negate all the milling cards / strategies.  It diminishes them.  But, if I cut off all your new resources (e.g., library) quickly then you still have a huge uphill battle to fight against me.  For, example today a turn 3 or 4 Grindstone play ='s game over.  Without the decking rule you are faced with whatever cards you have in hand, perms in play and GY.  I say that's still pretty difficult to recover from.  But, my point is that you still should have an opportunity to Fight On!

[Qube]

I do not think, to remove some of this rules makes magic more fun to play...

I just scared, that magic will change to much, that the "idea" of the start is going to fly away. I think rules are rules and should not be broken unless they are such stupid. I think about the matches, which I just won, because my opp can't use the drainmana and die or make alot mana, I countered the importent spell, they lose some life.

Or another sample:
I played against Ichorid, he starts (game1) and mull,mull but can not win in turn 2. He has 18 cards left in library. In my turn, I play all I can, play cunning wish (storm 5), brainfreeze (storm 6). Ok he's on the draw and can't draw. so he lose the game...

What I want to say with this is, would it be fair if he still can win, even he can't draw? or on the otherside, would it be fair, that I lose the game even I play the hole goodness I can at the moment and kill him with an unexepted move?

I think those rules make sense in vintage...

[FlyFlySideOfFry]

Edit: for those who think the flavor of this rule is the problem, what about losing the game when you can't draw any more cards?

I know that your intention was to use this as a counter-arguement for the Mana Burn Discussion.  But, I think this is an interesting point you make.  I actually may use it to post my first Thread in the Adv Forum.  (I'll credit you!)

Why should you lose the game if you run out of cards?  From a flavor perspective you are still on the "Battlefield".  You've just run out of new resources to "fight" with.  But, you still have the resources that are in play, in your GY and in your hand to Duel with.  It's not over yet!

If WOTC is assessing all the MTG rules.  Then maybe "decking", like Mana Burn needs to be analyzed, as well.

Let me attempt to pre-emptively address the nay-sayers.  Removing "Decking" as a Win condition doesn't negate all the milling cards / strategies.  It diminishes them.  But, if I cut off all your new resources (e.g., library) quickly then you still have a huge uphill battle to fight against me.  For, example today a turn 3 or 4 Grindstone play ='s game over.  Without the decking rule you are faced with whatever cards you have in hand, perms in play and GY.  I say that's still pretty difficult to recover from.  But, my point is that you still should have an opportunity to Fight On!

My point is that it won't end at mana burn. Mana burn is just a slight tool used to make people pay attention and punish play mistakes. Once you start attacking rules you have to do a complete overhaul of all of them. The problem is that most of the arguments raised against any one rule can be used to knock down another dozen as well. I agree with what Qube said that the rules make sense in Vintage and we should leave them as they are.

[Troy_Costisick]

The loss of mana burn is a minimal change to the game compared to what happened with 6th edition.  The loss of mana burn now will not cause the kind of upheaval those changes did back then.  If damage from mana burn goes away, I'll be fine with it.  And if that causes people to play sloppily against me, all the better.  I'll be happy to win more games.

[FlyFlySideOfFry]

The loss of mana burn is a minimal change to the game compared to what happened with 6th edition.  The loss of mana burn now will not cause the kind of upheaval those changes did back then.  If damage from mana burn goes away, I'll be fine with it.  And if that causes people to play sloppily against me, all the better.  I'll be happy to win more games.

I don't think that is the attitude people should be taking. You shouldn't be happy that bad/average players won't be improving. Taking mana burn away isn't going to help you top 8 more often, it is just going to ensure that the top 8 will always be the same few people from back in the days where the rules actually forced you to pay attention. I'm still yet to see an advantage to taking away the mana burn rule or even a solid reason. The best one is probably the programming effort for MTG online but that is about it and it doesn't really matter much.

[Harlequin]

Removing mana burn opens two design spaces:  Life Total and Mana Pool.  Think about how much better Threshold, Madness, Flashback or Hellbent would be if there was some random ability called "Card Burn" which allowed you to just discard cards at the end of any phase.  In Alpha and Beta when the rules were being made up, Card-Burn would not have been a problem.  But that means these graveyard mechanics would not have existed.  Card-burn ultimately would have been a design-space closing drawback.

Here are a few cards that I made up for this post.  I'll intentionally leave the cost blank.  Think about what this card would cost both with and without manaburn...

No Pain No Gain -Enchantment
At the end of each turn, if you lost life this turn draw a card.

Empathy -Enchantment
If damage would be delt to you by another player, prevent 1 of that damage if your life total is within 3 life of thier life total.

Cannopy Cover -Enchant
Creatures controled by players with more than twice your life cannot attack you.

Noble Research -Instant
Draw a card. 
If you have less than 10 life draw an extra card.
If you have less than 5 life draw an extra card.

Thaumaturgist -Creature
0/1
Whenever you lose life, if there are less than four counters on Thaumaturgist put a +1/+1 counter on Thaumaturgist.
Remove two +1/+1 counter: add or to your mana pool.



There are also a ton of interesting mana pool cards you could use as well.  These cards would likely be terrible if your mana pool delt you damage:

Eyes of Dominance -Enchantment
Creatures with less than the amount of mana in your mana pool cannot attack you.

Eyes of Supression ?-Instant
If you have more mana in your mana pool that target player, that players emptys mana pool.

Eyes of Betrayal ?-Enchant Aura
At the begining of enchanted creature's controler's upkeep, the player with the most mana in thier mana pool gains control of that creature.

Eyes of Doubt -Instant
Counter target spell if that spells controler does not have 3 or more mana in there mana pool.

Eyes of Passion -Instant
Target creture gets +X/+X where X is the amount of mana in your mana pool.  And -Y/-Y where Y is the amount of mana in all opponents' mana pools.




Really the ONLY card that I can think of that has absolutly no application in a world without mana burn is Power Surge simply because it occurs "before the untap step."  Citadel and Port and whatnot still primarily serve to tap out a player durring your turn.  If anything those cards are now -Stronger- against bad players because now a bad control player may opt to foolishly tap out to avoid damage rather than leave open mana to control you. 

[Purple Hat]

there are already cards based around life total management.  Pulse of the Fields, Pulse of the Forge and Ghazban Ogre are just a few examples.

Also I think many of the cards you recommended for mana pool management are actually more interesting if you take mana burn than if you don't.  It's much more interesting to have players considering a tradeoff with a drawback than it is to have them just trying to see who has the most mana available.  Also, almost all of them work just as well as X spells as they do as mana in pool effects.

[urweak]

I am sick of hearing people talking about this opening up design space. We just got Planeswalkers, design around that, we just got tribal, design around that, we have artifact creatures and enchantment creatures do something with that. Then all the key words from rampage-conspire, do something with all that. Why cut mana burn to make design space. To me, its really foolish to say the removal of mana burn is good b/c it opens up design space, not to mention everyone who says its just blurts it out, then says nothing beyond that as to why it would be good.

I really hope that they dont remove it, the game has worked so well for so many years, dont fix it if it ant broken. Next, like mentioned above, lets just cut deck milling, or playing 1 land a turn, or lose of life vs damage, or any other fundimental of the game. If you dont like the game the way its been played for like 15 years go play pokemon or something. /rant

[oneofchaos]

Jeff- Isn't eyes of doubt a strictly better mana leak? 

[Kiriyuu]

Jeff- Isn't eyes of doubt a strictly better mana leak? 

Not if they have another spell to play, as they could respond by floating 3 mana, and not having their spell countered, but then use that 3 to play something, rather than spend it for the mana leak.

I hope that made sense. O_o

[LotusHead]

eliminating mana burn is stupid (by stupid I mean not what Magic has been about all these years).

Then again, I thought restricting Trinisphere was stupid (BEFORE I started playing shops).

Magic is a very complex game to learn (chess is simple, its the strategies that are complex.)

Mana burn is part of it, and part of what makes Magic a mental game.

If Mana Burn is eliminated, everyone will have to adapt, which is fine.  But I see no problem with mana burn at the moment.

[Bronson]

Well it's official:

http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/feature/42a

There are some other rules changes too: Token ownership, Deathtouch, Lifelink, Combat Damage. There are terminology changes listed below. Also a tournament procedure change with mulligans.

Terminology Changes:
In Play -> Battlefield
RFG -> Exiled
(to) Play (spell) -> Cast
(to) Play (ability) -> Activate
e.g "Cannot play spells or abilities" becomes "Cannot cast spells or activate abilities"
At End of Turn -> Beginning of End Step.

The rules changes for Combat Damage are most interesting.

Mana burn changes:

1. Mana pools will now empty at the end of every step, where it used to empty at the end of every phase.
2. Unused mana in a mana pool will not cause lose of life when it drains.

Potential impact on vintage cards?
1. Mana Drain will lose it's only draw back. Potentially climb a little in value. Unless this change is viewed as too over powered and it finds its way onto the restricted list (knock on wood).
2. Mirror universe based strategies (if they even exist any more) will become worse.

[Demonic Attorney]

This issue is already being discussed in another thread.  Please don't post in long-dormant discussions when an active thread exists.