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2 years ago ::
Oct 28, 2011 - 1:52PM
#1
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Date Joined:
Jun 24, 2008
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This thread is for discussion of this week's Making Magic, which goes live Monday morning on magicthegathering.com.
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2 years ago ::
Oct 30, 2011 - 9:12PM
#2
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Date Joined:
May 18, 2002
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Too bad all we seem to get out of "flavor, dammit!" is added complexity - you know, for flavor. The last third or so of the article (where it discusses top-down edicts for whole blocks) is the same sort of build-decks-for-them mentality that made Balduvian Shaman's textbox a small novel. Let's take a look at Rise from the Grave  . If we whack away the complexity of turning stuff into black zombies, it becomes a much simpler card to understand and correctly play, and only loses the edge-cases of Fear and the corner case of the small hanful of cards that reference Zombie. It would still be functionally nigh-identical in its practical purpose (reanimation), and not have the added "memory issues" (I thought those are "bad", aren't they?).
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2 years ago ::
Oct 30, 2011 - 9:26PM
#3
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Date Joined:
Aug 25, 2010
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Well, half the card face is text box, one might as well fill it up. Good stuff, Takkelmaggot and co.
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2 years ago ::
Oct 30, 2011 - 9:34PM
#4
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Date Joined:
May 24, 2011
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Too bad all we seem to get out of "flavor, dammit!" is added complexity - you know, for flavor.
The last third or so of the article (where it discusses top-down edicts for whole blocks) is the same sort of build-decks-for-them mentality that made Balduvian Shaman's textbox a small novel.
Let's take a look at Rise from the Grave . If we whack away the complexity of turning stuff into black zombies, it becomes a much simpler card to understand and correctly play, and only loses the edge-cases of Fear and the corner case of the small hanful of cards that reference Zombie.
It would still be functionally nigh-identical in its practical purpose (reanimation), and not have the added "memory issues" (I thought those are "bad", aren't they?).
The interesting thing about that is that Innistrad is supposed to be all about flavor but I've seen people on the forums complaining that limited is too vanilla. And there are a lot of vanilla commons, but I think it still works. And I really appreciate the cards that add a few words for flavor, like Rise from the Dead, and recently Olivia. I can turn my opponents creatures into vampires by sucking their blood and then get them to work for me. How cool is that? Seriously. Vorthos matters.
Also, turning a creature black like Rise does will never really be a corner case as long as Doom Blade and the like are around.
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2 years ago ::
Oct 30, 2011 - 9:50PM
#5
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Date Joined:
Apr 16, 2011
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More vanilla cards in a flavor block means less negative impact from being distracted by pictures/flavor text/names on cards. :P
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2 years ago ::
Oct 30, 2011 - 11:32PM
#6
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If we whack away the complexity of turning stuff into black zombies, it becomes a much simpler card to understand and correctly play, and only loses the edge-cases of Fear and the corner case of the small hanful of cards that reference Zombie.
What the extra text does is avoid giving black access to a card that can get around black's inherent weakness of being black. You can't just dig up an answer to a White Night or Northern Paladin. It's subtle, but it feels "right" to me. YMMV.
The last third or so of the article (where it discusses top-down edicts for whole blocks) is the same sort of build-decks-for-them mentality that made Balduvian Shaman's textbox a small novel.
I figured you were probably referencing some other white enchantment in the Ice Age block that worked nicely with the shaman, but I couldn't recall the card. Which is weird, because I remember puzzling over the Shaman and figuring there was probably an enchantment out there that worked with it. Then I realized that Ice Age came out before I (or most of the other people in my home town) were on the Internet, and I couldn't just look up a spoiler and figure it out ... the card remained a mystery to me. Ye gods, Magic has been around for a long time.
~ Patch
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2 years ago ::
Oct 30, 2011 - 11:48PM
#7
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Balduvian Shaman was meant to change the color your Circle of Protection protected against, in case your opponent was playing a different color than what you brought, or you didn't draw the right one.
Apparently, that was too "brokenly powerful" an effect, so they added the cumulative upkeep cost.
I've also heard Shaman was meant to be rare but was printed on the wrong sheet.
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2 years ago ::
Oct 31, 2011 - 12:52AM
#8
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The "change a color word" card that is printed in about every other set is one I'd be happy to see the end of. I always seem to open them as my rare. I agree with Qmark's statement - not necessarily that those things are bad - but that they are contradictory. You can't take away words that create balance, add words that create flavor, and end up with a simpler set.
Off Topic: It would be nice to get a topic to discuss the Event Coverage in - the fact that Geist of Saint Traft was O-ringed twice in feature matches annoyed me to no end.
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2 years ago ::
Oct 31, 2011 - 4:34AM
#9
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Date Joined:
Aug 14, 2003
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While we're going off topic: The example of Stone Rain  reminded me of the beautifully elegant cards with three-words-text like Time Stop  and Divination  , and I wondered about the smallest possible number of words on a spell. Then I found a perfectly playable but nonexistent one-word spell. Can you guess it?
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2 years ago ::
Oct 31, 2011 - 4:40AM
#10
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Date Joined:
Aug 13, 2001
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While we're going off topic: The example of Stone Rain reminded me of the beautifully elegant cards with three-words-text like Time Stop and Divination , and I wondered about the smallest possible number of words on a spell.
Then I found a perfectly playable but nonexistent one-word spell. Can you guess it?
"Proliferate."
Jeff Heikkinen
DCI Rules Advisor since Dec 25, 2011
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