New Mulligan Rule

[rufus]

Am I the only one who wonders whether letting people scry *before* they re-mulligan might be a good idea? (I'm probably missing something obvious.)

[bruizar]

The issue with the cantrip cartel is that it makes 70% of Legacy decks run 50% of the same cards. Obviously this is the case because those cards are both powerful and consistent (reduce variance). This problems with the cantrip cartel are completely unrelated from the change in mulligan rule. Yes, variance is important but reducing games where 1 player fishbowls while the other player draws the wrong half of their deck is more important. This change reduces variance slightly, and basically equally for all decks in all formats. Its not like the printed another busted blue cantrip. Not at all.

This mulligan change is pretty much all upside and if you are against it because in 1 in 100 games a specific deck (delver), in a specific format (legacy) gets a slight advantage you missing the point entirely. Also, I cannot back up this claim with numbers at this time, but I bet that this change helps non-blue legacy decks more than blue ones. Your 1st draw is much less important when you have brainstorms and other library manipulation and decks like Maveric, D&T, elves, MUD, Lands, etc would love being able to scry after having to mull. But people here will complain about any change because they are scared of change, so go ahead assume this change is horrible before you look at any data or test it out yourself.

Don't get me wrong, I'm FOR the change. I play MUD almost exclusively so for me it is a godsent. I'm just saying that it is a gift with a cautionary note attached to it. We should be critical at ANYTHING related to variance reduction.

[TheArchitect]

Don't get me wrong, I'm FOR the change. I play MUD almost exclusively so for me it is a godsent. I'm just saying that it is a gift with a cautionary note attached to it. We should be critical at ANYTHING related to variance reduction.

I agree that varience is very important to making magic a good game, but this change is mostly just going to be reducing the downside of a variance game: having games that are not really even games. It's being able to reduce variance so low that every game looks the same that's bad (omnitell).

[(nameless one)]

Maybe this will encourage people from playing anything other than Brainstorm.dec.

[Barook]

Maybe this will encourage people from playing anything other than Brainstorm.dec.

Doubt it. A single scry after a mulligan doesn't help much to filter crappy draws afterwards.

They would need to print more cards that would allow to scry whenever a condition is met that blue can't easily fulfill, e.g.

"Whenever a white creature enters the battlefield under your control, scry 1." slapped onto a white weenie creature, for example.

[Finn]

Rufus, my figuring on why they did not do that is simply because it would be too good. Stoddard took pains to tell us they were looking for a balance.

[jrsthethird]

Am I the only one who wonders whether letting people scry *before* they re-mulligan might be a good idea? (I'm probably missing something obvious.)

The extra information lets you mulligan slightly more aggressively, especially if you're searching for a particular sideboard card. The goal is to reduce overall variance (mostly concerning mana curve/density), not to increase your chances to draw into your trump card for that matchup.

Not to mention it creates a lot of unnecessary decision trees and time consumption with multiple mulligans. Draw 6, scry. If you like the 7 you see, great. If you don't like the scry, put it on the bottom. Maybe your hand is still playable, then no different outcome than the new rule. But if your hand depended on the scry card to work out, you tucked that one away for a 1/52 shot at a relevant card to make your fringe hand playable. You're probably better off going to 5 anyway, then taking another chance at a random card. So you draw 5 and scry, and replay the whole thing.

Find a playable 6 or reasonable 5 and you get one scry to make it better. Simple and clean.

Doubt it. A single scry after a mulligan doesn't help much to filter crappy draws afterwards.

They would need to print more cards that would allow to scry whenever a condition is met that blue can't easily fulfill, e.g.

"Whenever a white creature enters the battlefield under your control, scry 1." slapped onto a white weenie creature, for example.

Shadows of the Past isn't quite there yet, but something with a more versatile trigger may work.