Magic is better when environments have answers, so an anti-discard, anti-counter card that's not otherwise terrible sits just fine with me. I did, however, double-check that you guys didn't also throw in Hexproof as you've been wont to do.
Free MTGO Tournaments you should be playing: Pauper (all commons) - Tuesday Nights, prizes by MTGOTraders Peasant (Pauper + 5 uncommons, with paper rarity) - Sunday Nights, prizes by MTGOTraders Silverblack (Modern-era Commons and Uncommons - Most Wednesday nights, prizes by MTGO Bazaar Heirloom ("Cheap" cards only, e.g. rares under 20 cents) - Sunday afternoons, sponsored by MTGOTraders Check the superbly-made Gatherling site for more.
Other games you should try: Spectromancer - Online card game by Richard Garfield, available cheap on Steam. DC Universe Online - action-based MMO. Free to play. Surprised me how well designed it is. Simunomics - Free-to-play economy simulation game.
i can understand where the uncounter part is coming from, but even if it was vanilla isnt 4/4 for 3 really powerful?
Almost every other 4/4 for 3 requires you to sacrifice it at the end of turn.... or has other draw backs....
This is a 4/4 for 3 with not only without drawbacks, but protection of sorts....
Not really meta warping, but it seems like creatures are racing back to Urza power level....
It is a vanilla 4/4 for 3. It has no in play benefit to you, aside from size. That said, it is two colors, edging out the efficiency of Woolly Thoctar , while for one colorless mana more with an increase of rarity you get a Watchwolf with two abilities that impair two colors methods for keeping it from dropping. It's still killable. It's no Great Sable Stag as the Blue/Black killer. It just helps.
Magic is better when environments have answers, so an anti-discard, anti-counter card that's not otherwise terrible sits just fine with me. I did, however, double-check that you guys didn't also throw in Hexproof as you've been wont to do.
It's not blue, therefore cannot have hexproof. Note that blue is getting the lion's share of creatures with "hexproof" printed on them.
"Possibilities abound, too numerous to count."
"Innocent, unbiased observation is a myth." --- P.B. Medawar (1969)
"Ever since man first left his cave and met a stranger with a different language and a new way of looking at things, the human race has had a dream: to kill him, so we don't have to learn his language or his new way of looking at things." --- Zapp Brannigan (Beast With a Billion Backs)
The first problem is it takes way too long to resolve-basically as Tom noted. The person who casts it is at the mercy of the other players to actually put up with all the time it takes to resolve and having everything they've done up to that point invalidated. If opponents become bored or annoyed trying to resolve this card, they can just scoop. As the article states, these cards aren't cast in tournaments. They are cast when nothing but the enjoyment of the participants is on the line. These cards have to be engaging enough for the other players, who may strongly dislike these effects, to still be willing to go along with it and let the caster have his fun. Scrambleverse is too likely to induce scooping. It is more like casting Obliterate for no reason than it is Warp World. People just say 'screw it-call me when the next one starts.' I guess the caster of scrambleverse then technically wins, but the spell never actually resolved nor did any of the desired craziness take place. That's not really a win in my book.
Second, you can't game it. With warp world, you can play a bunch of tokens so you'll get tons of stuff compared to the other players once warp world resolves. By not being able to trick the card, scambleverse misses a decent chunk of the audience that likes wild red cards. Guild Fued is a far superior card on both fronts. So, while you may like it and perhaps you have very accomodating friends, it misses on keeping other players engaged enough to put up with your shenanigans, and it doesn't serve the population of playes that want to try and game the card. The first one being the biggest strike because if you can't find anyone to let you have your fun, what is the point of the card? Inducing wins by scooping to 'stupid' cards isn't a rewarding game night.
I agree Scrambleverse is a very niche card. But as long as there are playgroups that like it, like mine, it fulfills its purpose. There are groups where I shouldn't cast it, because they don't find it fun, sure. But that's the same with you complaining about the preview card. Casual magic is all about moderation. All about NOT playing the most powerful/most random/most wacky cards, but all about playing the cards that give everyone in the group a good time. I have a very easy time finding people who all love resolving a Scrambleverse.
Warp World being abusable is making that card unfun. What happens with Warp World decks, is that they have Eternal Witness -like cards and Palinchron -like cards to chain multiple Warp Worlds in 1 turn. Now that is a pain to resolve. It's like how Mindslaver is almost never used in a fun way, only in a lockout way.
So, back to my original point. If WOTC is taking the time to test silver bullets to use against a mythic rare that might be very powerful in tournaments, it seems like they could take a few minutes to create scenarios where a deck has casual rares in strong positions. Again, using deadeye navigator as an example, play deadeye navigator with access to say, eternal witness, mystic snake and shriekmaw. Then see if 1U isn't a little too good. Based on grumbles on casual message boards about how good the navigator is, I think they'd have found 1U to be too low. I don't get the sense that development does anything like that. They work very hard on the tournament side, but seem to just give an 'OK I guess' to stuff where people do a lot of screwing around instead of reducing life totals to 0 as quickly as possible.
Casual power creep is very real, but there's nothing you can do about it. I remember a time when Akroma, Angel of Wrath was the scariest creature you could cheat into play, one that could kill you in 4 turns! Casual magic is simply way more degenerate these days than it used to be. Again, it all comes down to moderation. House rules. Gentlemen's agreements about what kind of cards not to play, and what kind of power level of decks to pursue.
Deadeye Navigator has been fringe playable in Bant Pod in standard, that makes it awesome. It's costed exactly how it should've been costed.
First, I am not complaining about the preview card AT ALL. I have no real opinion on it because it isn't in my wheelhouse. I am lamenting that cards like the preview card get a ton of attention and cards I feel are aimed at me don't. It seems to me like deadeye navigator is aimed at me, and it is too good. It doesn't get the right level of attention. If it has other applications, I was unaware. But it seems aimed at me and should be fun, but it isn't. I really wish there was a step that controlled for that in their processes.
To your last point, I think it is fair to request that they try not to enable casual play to become blatantly degenerate. Supposedly we are a big market share from what I read. I am the only person I play Magic with that even reads these articles let alone tries to give feedback. Supposedly we are a silent majority, but when I talk, I just get run over.
I play with guys that like wild red cards like scrambleverse, and it doesn't work out the way they want because it is too tediuos for the rest of us in cases like scramblevese. I am willing to go through the motions for warp world, but not the more extreme waste of time ones-and scrambleverse, which is the worst of them all. I think it is fair to say that card missed the larger mark. You really must have one of the most laid-back-groups to put up with all that effort that blantantly undoes everything that happened before you could resolve that card.
Ultimately the power creep occuring here is eroding my fun because cards like scrambleverse paint me into a corner of feeling I need to play counterspells to protect the game from not being destroyed by stupid crap like this. I don't want to always play that way, and the neglect of development kind of paints me into that corner. That more than anything is my biggest gripe with development other than they never really tried to balance casual cards in the first place. I am really not trying to be rude. The process on the preview card is freaking sweek. I just wish it happened for stuff aimed at me.
To your last point, I think it is fair to request that they try not to enable casual play to become blatantly degenerate. Supposedly we are a big market share from what I read. I am the only person I play Magic with that even reads these articles let alone tries to give feedback. Supposedly we are a silent majority, but when I talk, I just get run over.
I play with guys that like wild red cards like scrambleverse, and it doesn't work out the way they want because it is too tediuos for the rest of us in cases like scramblevese. I am willing to go through the motions for warp world, but not the more extreme waste of time ones-and scrambleverse, which is the worst of them all. I think it is fair to say that card missed the larger mark. You really must have one of the most laid-back-groups to put up with all that effort that blantantly undoes everything that happened before you could resolve that card.
Ultimately the power creep occuring here is eroding my fun because cards like scrambleverse paint me into a corner of feeling I need to play counterspells to protect the game from not being destroyed by stupid crap like this. I don't want to always play that way, and the neglect of development kind of paints me into that corner. That more than anything is my biggest gripe with development other than they never really tried to balance casual cards in the first place. I am really not trying to be rude. The process on the preview card is freaking sweek. I just wish it happened for stuff aimed at me.
For what is is worth, I agree with you completely. But here's the real problem you face: the majority of players like you (not you in particular) prefer degenerate casual play. They love overpowered (but overcosted for constructed) effects to death. I (and I suspect you) are not like that, but we're a minority within that majority.
It's not blue, therefore cannot have hexproof. Note that blue is getting the lion's share of creatures with "hexproof" printed on them.
Green is perfectly capable of getting hexproof. There's one creature in all of M13 with hexproof, and it's a green common.
I did not single M13 out for my statement. I said "So far..." by which I referred to the totality of things.
Let's start with M11, when the keyword is invented. We will ignore previous printings (including Privileged Position and the like, whose wordings have been "corrected" to "hexproof" -- but for functional concerns, other cards have not) for the sake of dealing with the policy going forward; and as I said "creatures," we'll deal with that card type alone:
Tallying these up, I get eight monogreen creatures with hexproof, and one multicolor, nonblue creature with it; five monoblue creatures with hexproof, and two multicolor, nongreen creatures with it (making that 8-7). So on this standard, I am incorrect. The total number of Green cards printed in this frame does also indeed invalidate my claim, were I not to restrict myself to, as several noncreature cards have been printed in Green which, indeed, have hexproof while Blue does not. Extending the frame further shows that this ability occurs with regularity in Green, and almost never in Green. It was a feature in Lorwyn/Shadowmoor blocks, but we're not considering those for this "test."
However, I counted Sacred Wolf twice. This would bring the total unique cards to 7-7 (even). Further, one Green card lacks hexproof itself, but so does one of those Blue cards although it gains it with another creature, suggesting that a creature "with hexproof" weighs more heavily in Blue's favor than it does in Green's, in large part due to the heavy focus on Innistrad's Spirit tribe focus to hexproof. In M11, as in Scars, hexproof was in Green 100% of the time; in M12, it was in Green 75% of the time; in M13, this dropped to 66.67% of the time, while in Innistrad hexproof was in Green only 29% of the time.
I am fairly comfortable thinking that there is too much hexproof in Blue, not enough in Green. Where the developers may be thinking thet Green is balanced by caring about hexproof more, this only enforces the disparity over time as Blue has gained more and more creatures with the ability (static) than Green has, in a shorter range of time than since Green first appeared with the ability (Portal: Three Kingdoms). Moreover, they may feel hexproof is better in Blue, while Green's creature identity has largely benefitted from the ability historically. I do not know the reasoning, and they've not been wont to share their exact, precise reasoning about where abilities go.
"Possibilities abound, too numerous to count."
"Innocent, unbiased observation is a myth." --- P.B. Medawar (1969)
"Ever since man first left his cave and met a stranger with a different language and a new way of looking at things, the human race has had a dream: to kill him, so we don't have to learn his language or his new way of looking at things." --- Zapp Brannigan (Beast With a Billion Backs)
I am fairly comfortable thinking that there is too much hexproof in Blue, not enough in Green. Where the developers may be thinking thet Green is balanced by caring about hexproof more, this only enforces the disparity over time as Blue has gained more and more creatures with the ability (static) than Green has, in a shorter range of time than since Green first appeared with the ability (Portal: Three Kingdoms). Moreover, they may feel hexproof is better in Blue, while Green's creature identity has largely benefitted from the ability historically. I do not know the reasoning, and they've not been wont to share their exact, precise reasoning about where abilities go.
Not sure I agree that the reasoning is going unshared, do you read MaRo's Tumblr regularly? One example here of an answer about what colors get hexproof:
While blue has a lot of spell space designwise, it’s actually the color that has the most trouble with creature keywords. Hexproof (and shroud before it) exists in blue because we’re desperate for creature keyword abilities that make color pie sense in blue.
To your last point, I think it is fair to request that they try not to enable casual play to become blatantly degenerate. Supposedly we are a big market share from what I read. I am the only person I play Magic with that even reads these articles let alone tries to give feedback. Supposedly we are a silent majority, but when I talk, I just get run over.
I play with guys that like wild red cards like scrambleverse, and it doesn't work out the way they want because it is too tediuos for the rest of us in cases like scramblevese. I am willing to go through the motions for warp world, but not the more extreme waste of time ones-and scrambleverse, which is the worst of them all. I think it is fair to say that card missed the larger mark. You really must have one of the most laid-back-groups to put up with all that effort that blantantly undoes everything that happened before you could resolve that card.
Ultimately the power creep occuring here is eroding my fun because cards like scrambleverse paint me into a corner of feeling I need to play counterspells to protect the game from not being destroyed by stupid crap like this. I don't want to always play that way, and the neglect of development kind of paints me into that corner. That more than anything is my biggest gripe with development other than they never really tried to balance casual cards in the first place. I am really not trying to be rude. The process on the preview card is freaking sweek. I just wish it happened for stuff aimed at me.
For what is is worth, I agree with you completely. But here's the real problem you face: the majority of players like you (not you in particular) prefer degenerate casual play. They love overpowered (but overcosted for constructed) effects to death. I (and I suspect you) are not like that, but we're a minority within that majority.
I think you are right. From a business perspective though, that line of play ends in people not playing Magic anymore. This game is completely broken, but it is so much fun that it is worth working to make it fair. We have to work really, really hard to play Magic for fun though, and I don't feel like WOTC is helping us out. The first time I played EDH, I cast time stretch over and over again. Then I did it again the next game, and then the next. It's not hard to cast expensive cards repeatedly. My buddies and I could basically keep playing a game where that is a thing, or house-ban extra turns. So we banned them, and with cooperation, we continue to enjoy Magic a great deal. Other people never get over that hump, or have groups that like extra turns so much that they won't stop taking them. People quit over that. The ability to do that already exists so there is nothing development can do about it. However, there is no reason deadeye navigator needs to create discussions on the level of Time Stretch if WOTC'd just does a little work on navigator like they did on this elephant.
Not sure I agree that the reasoning is going unshared, do you read MaRo's Tumblr regularly? One example here of an answer about what colors get hexproof:
While blue has a lot of spell space designwise, it’s actually the color that has the most trouble with creature keywords. Hexproof (and shroud before it) exists in blue because we’re desperate for creature keyword abilities that make color pie sense in blue.
What a terrible reason!
"Hey Mark, we've got this powerful blue card but it doesn't have any keywords." "Eh, just give it Flash and Hexproof."
I still think it was a terrible mistake that they completely eliminated Shroud for the sake of Hexproof, and I believe they'll see that too one day and turn around on it. Geist of Saint Traft is a cool idea: all offense but easy to block and kill. With Shroud. With Hexproof, it becomes "equip a sword and win the game."
Free MTGO Tournaments you should be playing: Pauper (all commons) - Tuesday Nights, prizes by MTGOTraders Peasant (Pauper + 5 uncommons, with paper rarity) - Sunday Nights, prizes by MTGOTraders Silverblack (Modern-era Commons and Uncommons - Most Wednesday nights, prizes by MTGO Bazaar Heirloom ("Cheap" cards only, e.g. rares under 20 cents) - Sunday afternoons, sponsored by MTGOTraders Check the superbly-made Gatherling site for more.
Other games you should try: Spectromancer - Online card game by Richard Garfield, available cheap on Steam. DC Universe Online - action-based MMO. Free to play. Surprised me how well designed it is. Simunomics - Free-to-play economy simulation game.
First, I am not complaining about the preview card AT ALL. I have no real opinion on it because it isn't in my wheelhouse. I am lamenting that cards like the preview card get a ton of attention and cards I feel are aimed at me don't. It seems to me like deadeye navigator is aimed at me, and it is too good. It doesn't get the right level of attention. If it has other applications, I was unaware. But it seems aimed at me and should be fun, but it isn't. I really wish there was a step that controlled for that in their processes.
To your last point, I think it is fair to request that they try not to enable casual play to become blatantly degenerate. Supposedly we are a big market share from what I read. I am the only person I play Magic with that even reads these articles let alone tries to give feedback. Supposedly we are a silent majority, but when I talk, I just get run over.
I play with guys that like wild red cards like scrambleverse, and it doesn't work out the way they want because it is too tediuos for the rest of us in cases like scramblevese. I am willing to go through the motions for warp world, but not the more extreme waste of time ones-and scrambleverse, which is the worst of them all. I think it is fair to say that card missed the larger mark. You really must have one of the most laid-back-groups to put up with all that effort that blantantly undoes everything that happened before you could resolve that card.
Ultimately the power creep occuring here is eroding my fun because cards like scrambleverse paint me into a corner of feeling I need to play counterspells to protect the game from not being destroyed by stupid crap like this. I don't want to always play that way, and the neglect of development kind of paints me into that corner. That more than anything is my biggest gripe with development other than they never really tried to balance casual cards in the first place. I am really not trying to be rude. The process on the preview card is freaking sweek. I just wish it happened for stuff aimed at me.
Deadeye Navigator is aimed at casual players that do not mind its power level. Again, Wizards knows there are people like you that don't like it, but you are, as Spuuky says, in a minority and Wizards consciously doesn't change cards to accomodate you. The people that don't play magic because of that are more than made up for by the people who do because of it.
With Scrambleverse , there are people that like it and people that don't. This is not a flaw in its design. You can't please everyone. If you made it so that the haters don't hate it anymore, the likers likely don't like it anymore. If there are people in your group that don't like it, it simply shouldn't be played, depending on what the majority thinks.
Also, how can you name Scrambleverse and power creep in the same sentence? Actually, what would you like Development to have done to that card? What should they have done to satisfy you?
