[Article] Repairing the Broken Building Blocks of Magic

[Dr. Sylvan]

I was planning to let Tony start the thread for this, because it's his baby and I'm just the sidekick this time, but since he's idle I figured I'd get the ball rolling.

http://www.starcitygames.com/php/news/expandnews.php?Article=7273

What did the Vintage crowd think of the treatise on Block?

[mrieff]

As I already PM'ed, very strong and in-depth article about an issue which is in much need of attention.

[walkingdude]

I thought it was a really good article. I agree with most of what you said.My only worry is that I think you may have chosen some examples that will hurt your persuasiveness with R&D. When you highlight tempest as an excellent block and list shadow as one of the good mechanics because of its nature of only going to a few colors and creating real tension with buyback you alienate Randy Buehler who has gone on record
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/daily/rb51
as saying shadow is the worst mechanic ever made.

The one thing I disagree with was how much you bashed UBC. It may have been crazy for a while, but after the banning had all settled it was one of the best and most varied block constructed environments ever. You had a huge variety of decks from stompy, to covetous wildfires, dangertron (artifacts with welders), to accelerated blue, to baddotdeck (RG LD with exploration and lots of big spells), to suicide black, and a few others all of which were viable and did well. The reason it was such a good environment was the same reason tempest was, lots of good interesting powerful effects in different colors that pulled in different directions.

[Ric_Flair]

As for the shadow mechanic itself, Buehler may have been right, but the point was not that the mechanic was good, but that formats with diametrically opposed abilities and themes are a good idea.  

Re: Urza's Block.  This was an unmitigated disaster.  MaRo and all of the MTG staff have admitted as much.  There were TWO waves of bannings in a format that lasted four months.  That alone is proof that it was the worst format ever.  Combo decks that went off turn 2 in Block is NOT healthy.  Saying that it was a good format AFTER all the bannings is like saying murder isn't that bad without the killing.  IT SUCKED.  The whole block was a HUGE design mistake.

[walkingdude]

I know that LSD block was a terrible mistake. I’m just saying it was fundamentally fixable. The reason I feel I can say that is that it was fixed, fixed far too late and after too much trouble, but still fixed. I don’t know if a lot of the other blocks you mentioned are even theoretically fixable. You could have banned the 8 best cards from odyssey block and I think the best decks would still have been mono black and UG. In urza after 8 banning you had a bunch of decks that were viable. My claim isn’t that urza wasn’t terrible, but that it wasn’t innately terrible. It was a fun high powered set that was ruined by a huge number of overpowered design mistakes.

[Vegeta2711]

Nono, the sets as a whole may of been horrible, but the block format after the bannings was VERY good. It really doesn't matter how fucked up the enviroment before the bannings or how much a design mistake the majority of the cards were. Fact was, it really worked well after.

I mean the Tier1 decks were Stompy and Sneak Attack. ^_^

[Matt]

You can certainly tell you're a lawyer from reading this: you fashion your arguments to be convincing first, and accurate...third. ;D

I really think the number of banned cards has little or no correspondence with a block's health. The number of viable decks, which is the true measure of a format's health, has only rarely been higher than in post-banning UBC, and never so diverse in their makeup.

You have a very shifty double standard here: you lambast UBC by saying that post-banning health doesn't count, yet you tout Rath Block as being great...after banning Cursed Scroll. What gives?

The biggest problem in your article was that you blast OBC and MirBC and pre-banning MBC for their lack of diversity (and rightly so!), yet you irrationally apply an entirely different standard to UBC, which was one of the MOST diverse blocks, and the one that LEAST felt like "twelve-pack limited."

Not to mention that each of the archetypes were very distinct, unlike, say, control affinity vs aggro affinity or u/g madness vs u/g threshold, or rebel beatdown vs control rebels vs Rebels/splash.

Oh yes, and I hasten to add that UBC was also rather well balanced between the colors. Honestly, it fits every single qualification you ask the other blocks to have, yet you come WAY out of left field with this Saga-bashing.

Really, I think you have a huge bias against Saga Block, and so whenever I see you mention it I really just chuckle and sigh, and sit back to enjoy some quality fiction.

[Dr. Sylvan]

See Tony? I toldja that UBC paragraph was trouble waiting to happen. ;P

One of my PTQer friends (the one namedropped in the first part of the article, Matt Katz) has raised the concern that OdBC and OnBC were actually much more diverse than the article construes them to be.

For one of the "Quick Interview" questions that appears on the front page of the coverage, I asked several pros what the "third best" deck in Odyssey Block Constructed was. The assumption was that mono-black and blue/green were the two best decks, but what was the third? Several people answered some version of green/white, others said aggro black/blue, and a few even named combo-ish decks like Solitary Confinement ans Mirari's Wake/Time Stretch.

But was none of them said was blue/white Birds. [...] Tomi Walamies went 6-0 with it, Finland's Tuomas Kotiranta used it to cinch a Top 8 spot, and Anton Jonsson was one win away from the Top 8, and had he used his Spurnmage Advocates correctly against Ken Krouner, he would have pulled it off.

Anyway, if the normal range of 6-0 players is two to four in formats that are widely held to be quite skill-testing, then a truly random format should produce less. Since yesterday's "experiment" produced fully 9 undefeated players, that's a lot of evidence that the format is not actually a bunch of coin flips.

To me, it looks like Odyssey Block ended up with with a higher level of diversity than strictly bipolar: Madness+variants (including WG), MBControl, and UW Speculation. Onslaught's PT was deceptively interesting, with at least three archetypes in evidence, then Scourge crushed it into a bipolar Goblins vs. White paradigm (even if there were several variants on the white deck).

If anything, I regard this as validation of the article's themes. OdBC's evolution into a 3+ archetype metagame required Judgment. A larger cardpool yields diversity and makes it more difficult for entire colors to be useless if and only if it doesn't contain helpers for the prexisting, automatic strategies of the first two sets. The T8 at Osaka was Black vs. UG, even if there was a Tog deck there. OnBC was much better before the concentration of oversynergetic cards made Goblins insane. These conflicting influences of Judgment (better meta) and Scourge (worse meta) say to me that the solution isn't just holding the PT so that it always includes the last set. It's changing to Standard and following Tony's design recommendations so that these disasters can't happen.

[Ric_Flair]

For everyone's benefit that is not Matt, Matt and I had a HUGE debate via PM about the design aspects of UBC.  The debate promptly ended when MaRo publically stated it was the worst design mistake ever.  Matt, I think it is fair to say that you have a slight undue bias towards UBC.  I like the set, but some things you say are stretching logic to the extreme.  For example:

I really think the number of banned cards has little or no correspondence with a block's health.

WHAT?!?!?!

How is this possible? If a mechanic or theme is so inherently bad (aka the Tolarian Academy ability or the free mechanic) then the Block designed around those themes is also tainted.  Not every card is tainted, but the Block in general is besmirched at least a bit.

As far as the TBC v. UBC.  TBC had ONE CARD BANNED.  UBC had SEVEN.  In two waves, no less.  

I know that I am overly harsh on UBC, but there was a real concern, at least in my playtest circles, that the game was going to end.  I even remember Tom Guevin's article on changing the fundamental rules to stop combo.  But Matt, as far as I am one way, I think you are the other.  But reasoned debate such as the one we had showed me that I was overly strident.  

The reason I included the UBC section was for completeness.  I just wanted to let everyone know that we had thought about the issue and simply that UBC sucked in ways that reasoned analysis could not address.

[Matt]

I'll spell it out, nice and simple:

Second-most diverse block format ever*: seven banned cards.
Least-diverse and most widely-acknowledged as the worst block format ever (OBC): ZERO banned cards.

Plain as the nose on your face. There is no correlation, or if there is one, it is exactly opposite to what you state.

How is this possible? If a mechanic or theme is so inherently bad (aka the Tolarian Academy ability or the free mechanic) then the Block designed around those themes is also tainted.

I think you've spent a little too much time in the more recent block-mindset, because you seem to forget that Saga was not designed around ANY of the banned cards' mechanics. It was SUPPOSED to be the enchantment block, but they were not very aggressive in pushing this, and people only remember Tinker and so on.

And I have to wonder if implementing the changes you mention in your article won't produce blocks with similarly forgettable themes. Is the theme of each block only memorable BECAUSE Wizards pushes it so hard? Definitely the enchantment theme in S/L/D was overshadowed by the power cards, but even after the bannings the theme never came up in constructed play for even the block constructed format itself (much less T2 or Extended), because - and get this - they didn't print enough 'helper' cards. Come to think of it, I can't think of more than one or two helper cards AT ALL. Argothian Enchantress springs to mind, and technically Replenish.





*And frankly, since most IBC decks were "choose N colors and add all the gold cards for those colors," I found deckbuilding in IBC less interesting than in Saga - everything before Rebels, really, was free of that "Wizards is building our decks for us!" stigma (which in Tempest's case is kind of funny because they had made a conscious decision to ramp up red's power level).

[jpmeyer]

I've always thought that a revisionist article back at IBC would be really interesting.  Everyone remembers it fondly, but it really did seem like "choose two colors to go with blue and add all the gold cards from those colors" until Domain really arrived.  And as Domain was the "mechanic" of the block, it ended up being the best deck.

[Ric_Flair]

Matt excellent comments about the theme issue.  I am not sure how they can avoid the bland feeling, but clearly they need to dial back the mechanics.

As for this comment:

I'll spell it out, nice and simple:

Second-most diverse block format ever*: seven banned cards.
Least-diverse and most widely-acknowledged as the worst block format ever (OBC): ZERO banned cards.

Plain as the nose on your face. There is no correlation, or if there is one, it is exactly opposite to what you state.

Two things.  First, there were lots of different decks because the format essentially changed THREE times, pre-ban 1, post ban 1, and post ban 2.  That is a good deal of diversity.  Second, given the incredible amount of tinkering with the format, if they weren't, in the end able to make something halfway playable, then Wizards seriously screwed up.  They got three takes at UBC, of course the final result would be semi-decent.  I just would prefer if they beta testing didn't cost me my hard earned money, then take away 28 cards I worked hard and spent money to get.  

Suffice to say, Matt, I am afraid nothing I could say (or what MaRo said) could change your mind.  I am sure that you feel the same way about my position.  Let's just agree to disagree, though certainly please respond to my point, should you feel it necessary.

[walkingdude]

They got three takes at UBC, of course the final result would be semi-decent.

Ban 8 cards from odyssey block (I’ll give you 1 more than Urza block needed despite a far lower power level) and you will still have a bad format. You could try three times and after each try the format would still be bad. Urza after the banning was good because the sets themselves were good sets with lots of bad (overpowered) cards thrown in. Odyssey was fundamentally bad because there were only 2 really good strategies and if you could ban enough cards to nerf them there would be no good strategies, just lots of draft decks.

I know LSD had some bad cards. I know a lot of people got financially burned when cards they invested in were banned. But holding exploration, goblin welder, and rancor responsible for academy is like refusing to hire any Russian because you hate Stalin. Regardless of what the bad eggs did most of the cards were unique interesting and powerful enough to make decks that were good but not broken.

[Vegeta2711]

First, there were lots of different decks because the format essentially changed THREE times

Count the number of viable decks after the last ban, guess what? They outnumber nearly every other block and certainly every block in recent memory. Hell, pretend the banned cards never existed and then look at it, you have one of the best block formats ever.

[Ric_Flair]

Vegeta, you missed my second part of that comment.  I said:

Second, given the incredible amount of tinkering with the format, if they weren't, in the end able to make something halfway playable, then Wizards seriously screwed up. They got three takes at UBC, of course the final result would be semi-decent.

I realize lots of people in the Vintage community LOVE UBC because it had a power level that, short of ABU, impacted Vintage like no other sets.  The problem is that it has wrecked nearly ever other format in the game: Block (requiring bannings), Standard (requiring more bannings), and Extended (requiring EVEN more bannings).  I am not sure how many times Wizards themselves has to say it:  the set was a huge design mistake.  

But here is my real point, as opposed to regurgitating my arguments, from the perspective of PURELY Vintage players, Urza's Block was not a bad set (though there were a lot of restricted cards, which, from the point of view of PURELY Vintage players, isn't a bad thing).  In fact it was a pretty cool set.  But, once you step out of this point of view you realize that Urza's Block nearly killed the game.  Still, the more I like Vintage, the more I like Urza's Block.  I just can't shake that lingering sense of "damn this set it almost killed MY favorite hobby."

[Matt]

The thing is, for every design mistake, there were at least three cards that could not have been more perfectly designed. You make a false assumption when you say that we like Saga because of the restricted cards. NO ONE likes broken decks in the environment for more than a few weeks - NO ONE. When I think of the cards I loved from Saga, the ones that come to mind are:

Persecute
Acridian/Cradle Guard/Albino Troll
Exploration
Cathodion
Claws of Gix
Contamination
Fog Bank
Humble
Waylay (yes, even post-errata)
Priest of Gix
Sanguine Guard

and so on. I could name fifty or a hundred more cards that I LOVED just in Saga alone, none of which are even close to being dangerous (and many of which are at a distinctly lower power level, to the point of not even being tournament-viable - stuff like Spined Fluke).

It really is the case that a few bad apples ruined the barrel. Some cards were mistakes at the time (Spiral), some only became mistakes after the printing of new cards (Lackey). Only the cards in the first category are truly worthy of shame, because the others represent Wizards' willingness to move the game into new areas, and that's the price you pay for not having a stale game - sometimes, even an innocent card like Goblin Recruiter has to go, because there was no way they could have predicted Charbelcher way back in 1997 when they printed him (or 1996 when they designed him).

[Vegeta2711]

I didn't miss it, I just can't see how that's a factor in determining the final state of the block format.