Community

Oct 14, 2011 -- 12:07AM, Jakusotsu wrote:

Big random red effects like Scrambleverse work much better on MTGO. That card particularly reminds me of the Astral set in Shandalar. Ah, sweet memories...

Hey, totally understand what you're talking about. Every time I see Scrambleverse or, say Confusion in the Ranks , in my mind I hear that rattling metallic sound that Power Struggle (2UUU, Enchantment, At the beginning of each player's upkeep, that player exchanges control  of random target artifact, creature or land he or she controls, for  control of random target permanent of the same type that a random  opponent controls.) made.

While normally I agree with Aaron Forsythe, this is one time I definitely don't.  Defensive Stance and Evil Presence practically serve no purpose.  If there were a bunch of man-lands in the set or rare lands like in Innistrad, okay, then maybe Evil Presence could belong.  But Defensive Stance is just plain bad.  Cards that are that bad shouldn't exist.  They need to be good enough that you sideboard them often enough.

For example, M11's Dryad's Favor is another one of those crappy cards.  You won't include it in your deck, not even most of the time if playing against a green player.  The card could have given reach and +0/+1 as well as forestwalk, for the same mana, and it still wouldn't be included in a maindeck.  But you'd sideboard it in more often, as it would give you an answer to flyers.  Bad card, but useful enough that it would see play more than rarely.

To say "we need it to balance the colors" is laughable.  If the other cards are stronger, the weaker card isn't going to get played anyway, even if it is borderline playable.  How does that really solve anything?  Wouldn't the proper solution be to, oh, I don't know, maybe trim from the top part of the color, the part that makes it too powerful, rather than the bottom part, which players will trim themselves anyway?  And wouldn't it make more sense to just print one less card of that color, to print another card of a color that is considered underpowered, and thereby help that color?

The human processible bit falls flat as well.  When there's lots of cards, you pick the best in your color.  You don't need bad cards to help you with that, as you eliminate most of the average cards as well.  And once you trim those out, your colors become key, which eliminates a good chunk.  Matter of fact, by having basically worthless cards in the pack, it hurts things, since rather than picking the black card because you are in black, you pick a card of a color you aren't playing because Evil Presence is not going to get played anyway.

Now, I'm not saying that all cards need to be constructed playable power levels.  I don't believe that, that would just lead to more potential for broken cards, for power creep.  Most cards should be limited playable.  But every set has cards that are pretty obviously complete junk, the ones left for last in every draft, the ones people pick lands or checklist cards over, that aren't useful in limited or constructed.  And design knows what they are if they've tested the sets at all.  And it is those cards that should be given some love, so that the last card in a pack is not always one of the same couple of cards.

Overall, some pretty foolish logic on WotC's part.

Oct 13, 2011 -- 11:31PM, bateleur_ wrote:

Amused to see that Cube - a  format agreed by pretty much everyone who's ever played it to be awesome - is used as an example of the dire consequences of not having bad cards!

Put it this way, then - do you want everything to be, or feel like, Cube?

Tom

You've come under some heavy scorn for some of your recent articles, but you deserve credit for this one. It was a refreshingly honest read and I suspect pretty much speaks the truth of the matter.

Couple of observations:

1) You mention warp world and scrambleverse in the same breath, but I find warp world has a far better design. By all means make these cards, but note that there is still room for good and bad within that category.

2) I think any exposition of 'bad cards' also needs to examine 'relative bad cards' - cards which are bad when compared to other cards. Eg. Inferno Titan vs Flameborn Viron . The bigger the gap between mythic power and the rest of the card stock, the more cards will seem crap. Of course we understand that swingy cards need to be at higher rarity in order that limited functions, but that doesn't fully explain the rarity power creep of the last few years.

So cumbersome effects like the randomization in Scrambleverse and, to a lesser extent, Warp World are generally avoided.

Please explain the random graveyard effects in Innistrad, the idiotic "flavor first" Cellar Door (bottom of the library is relatively cumbersome as well), and the development of Werewolves, in terms of the annoyance of desleeving or sideboard consultations mid-game.