Community

Oct 28, 2012 -- 2:17PM, Shadowchu wrote:

If you want to play chess, why don't you just go play chess? 

I don't want to play Chess.

Oct 28, 2012 -- 2:30PM, silentbobus wrote:

Oct 28, 2012 -- 2:16PM, orin02 wrote:

Bob, you really need to find another hobby. What percentage of your posts concern mana screw issues in one form or another?

It's primarily because I win 80% of my games where I have no mana issues, and only 30% of my games where I do have mana issues and I am curious what the game would be like without them.

Uhh... Really? So if you win the 80% of the games where you have no mana issues and you win 30% of the remaining 20% even with mana problems, what would you do if you had zero mana problems? Is that really your question? Because if it is, then it might be one of the most egotistical questions I have ever read.

You obviously are one of "those" Magic players. You know. The guys who can't stop himself from shuffling his hand over and over and over again. I admit, sometimes you say things that are intuitive and insightful. Other times you just come off as someone who wants to brag about his latest 3-0 deck and complain that you lose because of mana "problems". I don't know if you have low self esteem and just need Magic to make yourself feel good . I don't really know anything personal about you. But I do know that I am likely not the only person who sees your name at the beginning of a thread and thinks "Oh man. Not that again."

Do yourself a favor and just enjoy playing the game.

Oct 28, 2012 -- 2:47PM, orin02 wrote:

You know. The guys who can't stop himself from shuffling his hand over and over and over again.

What does that have to do with anything?

Oct 28, 2012 -- 4:48PM, EyeHunter wrote:

You should track when your opponent has mana trouble, then only consider the games in which neither of you have mana trouble, my guess is you win about 65% of those, but that's a very loose estimate.

The real problem here is the tradeoff between mana troubles and power. Without a standard level of power vs. mana consistentcy, the Stats are meaningless. I would only look at win/loss ratio, and cause of losses. That's the best way to improve your game.

That is a very good point, tri-color decks are inherently more risky than dual-colored decks, but they also tend to perform better when they don't hit mana issues. So their non-mana issue stats are surely inflated. But still, I am hopeful that a generalized formula can be found.

I've already looked at win/loss ratio and cause of losses. The losses all come in games where I've muliganed, had mana issues, my opponent has played a bomb rare/mythic or some combination of the above. The majority of these were unwinnable -- the ones lost solely to bombs could not have been won prior to the bomb coming out, nor could they be won after the bomb hit the table because the removal that could have removed the bomb was never drawn or was uncastable at the point it was necessary. The ones lost solely to mana short were ones where I played every card in my hand that I could play, and would still have lost playing them in any other order, with any set of attacking/blocking decisions. The ones I lost solely to mana flood are a little harder to rate, some of the close ones were probably winnable, particularly if I knew the flood was coming, but the ones where I am drawing 3-5 more lands than spells were likely not. The muligan losses are primarily due to other factors, mana issues or double muligans, I still have a positive win percentage when I muligan and that's the only thing that goes wrong, but in RtR those games are few and far between. I've seen x->1->mana short losses, x->2->mana short losses, x->0->double muligan losses and the x->3 muligans often end up as mana flood losses. It's really quite ridiculous how few games in RtR has been standard, non-mana issue, non-muligan games.

And my estimate is that I win between 70-75% when neither me nor my opponent have mana issues. Unless my opponent has played a lot more spells than me over the course of the game, or played a bomb like Growing Ranks  that is worth several cards on its own I can generally grind out a win.