MTG Arena General Discussion

[Barook]

Arena is probably going to be the main recruitment tool for MTG (similiar function Duels once had) that makes some money on the side instead the future of MTG. The current business model is way greedier than Hearthstone and HS already had the problem that their business model was way too greedy. Once the honeymoon phase is over, it's going to be a rude awakening for many players when they get 5th copies left and right that never amount to anything. That, and the still unresolved rotation problem.

It also depends alot on how Artifact turns out, but Valve probably shot themselves in the foot by pricing it at 20$ instead of being F2P.

[Fallen_Empire]

Yeah, i think the mtgo model will still be with us until the death of MTG. I will never play Arena unless i can buy exactly the cards i want up front. I don't care for collecting or opening boosters to slowly build a deck. I want a way to play paper mtg on the internet and MTGO gives me that (or at least close enough). It might not be that MTGO the client will remain, but i think the model that closely follow how paper magic works will remain. Hopefully an eventual replacement for MTGO will keep the collections, but i don't think Arena ever will be that replacement. Arena will be a f2p version of MTG.
The absolute worst thing that could happen is that they start to "dumb" down paper mtg to be better suited for online play, like removing some phases or removing some priority shifts. That would really annoy me.

You mean like changing the rules on blood moon so it's easier to code online?

[JosefK]

You mean like changing the rules on blood moon so it's easier to code online?
Was that really to make it easier to code online? I have no issues with that change anyways, the new rule feels a lot more intuitive to me. Isn't that how humility and etb effects always worked? Anyways, small rule changes like that is not what i'm afraid of, more on the scale of removing the draw step or even one of the main phases.

[Phoenix Ignition]

Was that really to make it easier to code online? I have no issues with that change anyways, the new rule feels a lot more intuitive to me. Isn't that how humility and etb effects always worked? Anyways, small rule changes like that is not what i'm afraid of, more on the scale of removing the draw step or even one of the main phases.

Those are already hard coded into MTGA so would take way more work on their part to remove than just leave in there. Strange thing to be afraid of.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

You mean like changing the rules on blood moon so it's easier to code online?

Professional developer here: changing code requires more work than not changing code.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Was that really to make it easier to code online?
Maybe! But not if you already had a blood moon coded...

[the Thin White Duke]

I've always suspected the combat and regeneration changes made for M10 had a lot to do with mtgo. Was this ever proven?

[colo]

I've always suspected the combat and regeneration changes made for M10 had a lot to do with mtgo. Was this ever proven?

I don't know if you're trying to argue this from an ergonomics/"UX" perspective, or from an implementation difficulty perspective... Any problems with the latter should have been fully resolved with the 6th Edition rules update that introduced the concept of the stack.

[TsumiBand]

I don't know if you're trying to argue this from an ergonomics/"UX" perspective, or from an implementation difficulty perspective... Any problems with the latter should have been fully resolved with the 6th Edition rules update that introduced the concept of the stack.

Agree. Isn't the stack actually roughly based on a literal computer stack? Magic card text is practically pseudocode.

[MorphBerlin]

Arena is probably going to be the main recruitment tool for MTG (similiar function Duels once had) that makes some money on the side instead the future of MTG. The current business model is way greedier than Hearthstone and HS already had the problem that their business model was way too greedy. Once the honeymoon phase is over, it's going to be a rude awakening for many players when they get 5th copies left and right that never amount to anything. That, and the still unresolved rotation problem.

It also depends alot on how Artifact turns out, but Valve probably shot themselves in the foot by pricing it at 20$ instead of being F2P.

Wow the amount of pure negativity towards anything in all of your posts is really stunning.

Anyhow I don't really see why their model is so greedy? You do know that you get rare and mythic wild cards every xth pack so you will eventually get any card you want after a certain time. If you rotate the sets you are buying packs from it will be quite some time until you run into getting your 5th rare/mythic of anything. Any rarity below that really doesn't matter. So where are you getting 5th copies left and right?

As for rotation you can just store your wildcards and turn them into cards from new sets and your old cards will be playable in the new upcoming non-rotating format. Also the cards are not rotating for another year, why should they implement something for the people who only wanna play standard and have a bunch of useless cards after rotation now? They can easily implement dusting old cards into wild cards then.

Did you see twitch viewer numbers rising with mtga? Just look at JeffHogland. This is definitely the digital future of magic but obviously they will still milk the cash cow mtgo is as long as it's profitable.

[mistercakes]

Agree. Isn't the stack actually roughly based on a literal computer stack? Magic card text is practically pseudocode.

yea i thought about that as well. anyone know what that batch method was based off of?

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Objects, event handlers, and a call stack? Sounds like .NET to me.

[apple713]

They're digital objects, if you use supply and demand everything would be free because the supply is infinite.

false. The supply has to come from somewhere and WOTC is the only source. If they only release supply when items are purchased that would limit supply. So supply is not infinite...

[morgan_coke]

The big Arena crash on MODO appears to be over, at least for now. The price of a complete MODO collection finally went up $300 this week. Since Arena launched that number has dropped by over $10,000.

[jmlima]

The big Arena crash on MODO appears to be over, at least for now. The price of a complete MODO collection finally went up $300 this week. Since Arena launched that number has dropped by over $10,000.

Yeah, I got really happy of having bailed out when I did. When / If, they find some form of dealing with rotation in Arena (ie, a format for you to use cards leaving the rotation) the crash will probably come back.

[Poron]

Of they don’t allow free portability of the cards I would feel scammed.

[Barook]

https://twitter.com/PlayArtifact/status/1068959077990981632

While Artifact's gameplay is nothing for me (too slow, too limited), I have to say that Valve knows how to monetize the shit out of it (in a positive way). The auction house integration into the marketplace is flawless. And the ability to convert any of 20 cards into an event ticket (which is worth 1$) makes sure to get rid of chaff, as you can buy them from other players (and it's slightly cheaper than buying event tickets). And with each transaction, Valve takes a cut.

Color me impressed.

Meanwhile, WotC is still flailing around how to solve the 5th card problem or the Standard rotation due to incompetence and greed. I wouldn't be surprised if Valve's earnings would be higher than Arena's, even with a much smaller playerbase.

[Tylert]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAc7Z3u78L8

I was not able to Watch the video behind the link (Beware you'll perhaps be rickrolled) but from the few information i received from others, there will be a duplicate protection (Once y'ouve opened a rare / mythic 4 times you cannot open it anymore) and if you have a full set, duplicate rares/ mythic will give you gems.
Also, best of 3 in ranked.

This sounds better than before!

Discuss

[Humphrey]

not much to discuss. for some player it will turn out better for others not so much.

for a f2p user you are unlikely to get a full collection to profit from the changes. if anything it will take longer to open the vault now, so less wildcards and more craprares

also getting 20gems back for a pack that costs 200gems is pretty bad. a fifth mythic should refund the whole pack and a 5th rare maybe 100gems. mind that you already need a full set to get any gems in the first place.

at the same time they reduce prices, before you could "buy" rarecards for 500gold in the events, which is better than buying packs once you own all the neccessary commons and uncommons

they basically reduce payout and found a way to switch stuff around in a way the playerbase doesnt notice

[Barook]

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=205065

So with the new update, they gave Ajani's Pridemate a functional errata (in Paper, nonetheless) by making its ability non-optional - probably to speed up gameplay on Arena. Wouldn't be surprising to see similiar changes in the future, or more cards designed with Arena in mind, like Rakdos, Showstopper.

[morgan_coke]

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=205065

So with the new update, they gave Ajani's Pridemate a functional errata (in Paper, nonetheless) by making its ability non-optional - probably to speed up gameplay on Arena. Wouldn't be surprising to see similiar changes in the future, or more cards designed with Arena in mind, like Rakdos, Showstopper.

I'm in mid-platinum and I would honestly say about 20-30% of games are decided by the interface fucking up, both for and against me. Just incredibly simple things like not giving you a chance to cast a spell after you hit "End Turn" to set off Teferi's untap trigger. Or the fact that you can't see the lands highlighted by autotap because the card/effect is taking up the whole screen, etc. etc.

That stuff is going to be a real problem whenever they try to run a tournament on Arena and it happens LIVE.

EDIT: of course, caveat about Platinum, I'm winning games here with a deck I named 4 color trash and a Guildgates deck, soooo, not necessarily the most competitive scene.

[Finn]

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=205065

So with the new update, they gave Ajani's Pridemate a functional errata (in Paper, nonetheless) by making its ability non-optional - probably to speed up gameplay on Arena. Wouldn't be surprising to see similiar changes in the future, or more cards designed with Arena in mind, like Rakdos, Showstopper.

Wow. That is a real departure from policy for at least the past ten years. They had been removing errata from most cards to make them work like they appear. Wotc will have to slide a reprint into a set coming up.

On a different note, a friend of mine who certainly knows what he is talking about tells me he thinks Arena is the future of Magic. How do you all feel about that statement?

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Wow. That is a real departure from policy for at least the past ten years. They had been removing errata from most cards to make them work like they appear. Wotc will have to slide a reprint into a set coming up.

On a different note, a friend of mine who certainly knows what he is talking about tells me he thinks Arena is the future of Magic. How do you all feel about that statement?

He's wrong.

[Lemnear]

On a different note, a friend of mine who certainly knows what he is talking about tells me he thinks Arena is the future of Magic. How do you all feel about that statement?

I think the classic tabletop is doomed anyways due to various factors ranging from time/money investment to participate in decent sized tournaments, the overall state of formats like Vintage or Legacy in local scenes, cheating, venue size, etc.

Moving MTG in all its forms online is the games future, but for pretty much all other compeditors in the market its already the present. WotC biggest fail is that the game in its current form isnt really accessible or designed for the online world and WotC being totally incompetent to grasp the potential of online gaming for a fucking decade so they are now entering a market already flooded by better digital card games.

So in general, i would agree with your friend, but i would also claim that MTG is also too clunky and inferior by todays standards to compete with Hearthstone & Co.

[Ace/Homebrew]

I disagree. EDH is one of the most popular ways to play, and it doesn't play well without a table.

I'll concede that Arena may be the future of Standard.

[Poron]

Everything that doesn’t need the fisiology of the body will go online.

The only question is: will they gift us the cards we own in MTGO or they are just wasted money?

[Barook]

The only question is: will they gift us the cards we own in MTGO or they are just wasted money?
100% wasted money. They have shown with their past Duels of the Planeswalker products that they do not give a single fuck. Why else would they make you pay for the same card multiple times?

The better question is how big the fallout from this is going to be.

[Poron]

Prices have already super dropped on MTGO because of this.

I am not sure I am going to invest anymore in MTG in case they give me such a default.

[morgan_coke]

100% wasted money. They have shown with their past Duels of the Planeswalker products that they do not give a single fuck. Why else would they make you pay for the same card multiple times?

The better question is how big the fallout from this is going to be.

Price have already crashed more than 50% on MODO since Arena hit. The fallout already happened, and it wasn't much.

[MGB]

Wow. That is a real departure from policy for at least the past ten years. They had been removing errata from most cards to make them work like they appear. Wotc will have to slide a reprint into a set coming up.

On a different note, a friend of mine who certainly knows what he is talking about tells me he thinks Arena is the future of Magic. How do you all feel about that statement?

MTG Arena is the best Magic the Gathering software that has ever existed.

It's more fun for me than playing MTGO or even paper magic.

If Legacy and Modern were available on Arena I would sell off my MTGO account and delete MTGO from my computer. As it is, I play about 50% Arena and 50% MTGO (only for Modern and Legacy). I have more fun playing Arena most times than playing MTGO and I was NEVER a big Standard player.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Price have already crashed more than 50% on MODO since Arena hit. The fallout already happened, and it wasn't much.

a 50% loss in value seems at odds with "wasn't much"

[Megadeus]

I don't understand the MTGA love. Like all the viewers want to watch it but at the end of the day it's magic. And it's standard at that. I don't get the difference between that and MTGO honestly.

[MGB]

I don't understand the MTGA love. Like all the viewers want to watch it but at the end of the day it's magic. And it's standard at that. I don't get the difference between that and MTGO honestly.

The software is just much higher quality than anything we've ever seen before. Playing MTGO can feel like a chore or a grind sometimes, but playing Arena is a breeze and feels like a real video game.

Now, the downside to this is that basically, Magic has become just another video game. It's like a Hearthstone clone with the superior Magic game mechanics. But the upside is that Magic is much more fun to play on Arena. It's beautiful and engaging and expedites everything in the game smoothly.

[Fuzzy]

MTG Arena is the best Magic the Gathering software that has ever existed.

Not counting Shandalar, right?

[taconaut]

I don't understand the MTGA love. Like all the viewers want to watch it but at the end of the day it's magic. And it's standard at that. I don't get the difference between that and MTGO honestly.

If you haven't tried it, give it a shot - I find it much more palatable to play than MTGO, at least in terms of interactions. The actual physical experience of MTGO feels like more of a chore, whereas MTGA feels closer to playing in paper. It's not perfect (for instance, I'm not a huge fan of the deck-building interface, which feels more like hearthstone, where the names are listed and you mouse over to see the cards, rather than dragging them into a visual list; the rope is kinda annoying too), but it just "feels" better than MTGO in a way that's difficult to describe without actually playing it.

That being said, it is a bummer that it doesn't support eternal formats. I have enjoyed the drafts I played, though. You draft against bots, which admittedly does have some issues, but for the most part all it does is get rid of the tedious waiting between picks, and lets you start a draft, go get your mac and cheese you started making or whatever, and come back to it. It's nice to not have to play all your games at once.

[mistercakes]

Not counting Shandalar, right?

agreed, shandalar was the greatest.

[Megadeus]

If you haven't tried it, give it a shot - I find it much more palatable to play than MTGO, at least in terms of interactions. The actual physical experience of MTGO feels like more of a chore, whereas MTGA feels closer to playing in paper. It's not perfect (for instance, I'm not a huge fan of the deck-building interface, which feels more like hearthstone, where the names are listed and you mouse over to see the cards, rather than dragging them into a visual list; the rope is kinda annoying too), but it just "feels" better than MTGO in a way that's difficult to describe without actually playing it.

That being said, it is a bummer that it doesn't support eternal formats. I have enjoyed the drafts I played, though. You draft against bots, which admittedly does have some issues, but for the most part all it does is get rid of the tedious waiting between picks, and lets you start a draft, go get your mac and cheese you started making or whatever, and come back to it. It's nice to not have to play all your games at once.
I mean I get it if the interface is better then that's great. I don't enjoy drafting (non cube that is) or standard so it's a no go for me personally. I guess my real gripe is that there seems to be a million people watching and streaming arena and no one really streaming modern or legacy anymore

[Tylert]

I mean I get it if the interface is better then that's great. I don't enjoy drafting (non cube that is) or standard so it's a no go for me personally. I guess my real gripe is that there seems to be a million people watching and streaming arena and no one really streaming modern or legacy anymore

It's all about new players watching Arena only because they don't know anything about eternal formats.

[morgan_coke]

a 50% loss in value seems at odds with "wasn't much"

The fall in value was great. The fallout from that fall was small.

How many up in arms rage posts and threads on Reddit were there? Social media freakouts? etc. etc. The value of MTGO collections dropped by half and the reaction was a big shrug. Given that, I don't think Wizards is too worried about eventually killing the system.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

The fall in value was great. The fallout from that fall was small.

How many up in arms rage posts and threads on Reddit were there? Social media freakouts? etc. etc. The value of MTGO collections dropped by half and the reaction was a big shrug. Given that, I don't think Wizards is too worried about eventually killing the system.

Not a clue, but I'm also over 30 posting in a BBC forum so I don't think it's a secret I'm bad at modern social media.

What's the point here? That because you didn't see enough hate that it isn't happening?

[morgan_coke]

Not a clue, but I'm also over 30 posting in a BBC forum so I don't think it's a secret I'm bad at modern social media.

What's the point here? That because you didn't see enough hate that it isn't happening?

My point is that whatever hate wizards is getting for slowly/quickly killing collection values or the entire client on MTGO isn't enough to make them care.

[JosefK]

My point is that whatever hate wizards is getting for slowly/quickly killing collection values or the entire client on MTGO isn't enough to make them care.

Well so far there is no sign of them killing of the client. My guess as to why there is not a lot of complaining regarding collection values is that most players who actually have spent a lot of $ have done so just to be able to play, and not seen it as an investment. If the prices go down, that's good because it gets cheaper to try out new things.
If they were to kill mtgo entirely anytime soon, well then i would be angry/sad/upset/complaining, not because i lost money but because i could no longer play the game.
I think you can get most decks for ~ 500$, that's not a lot of money for a grown up with a job to spend on a hobby. There are very few hobbies where you can expect to get all money spent back.
I do hope MTG Arena is really successful and that wizards huge investment in it will pay off for them. It's not for me, but neither is standard/limited on MTGO. If in the end eternal formats will go to Arena(my guess is that this will never happen) and MTGO killed off, then i will probably go to Arena instead. If that will cost me another 500$ it's not a big thing. It's still cheaper than golf :)

[Ace/Homebrew]

Given enough time, there will be Arena 'eternal' formats. But they may only go back as far as Amonkhet (or whatever the first Arena set was).

And given enough time, there may be interesting and exciting decks in those formats. It happened in Modern...

[Backseat_Critic]

Given enough time, there will be Arena 'eternal' formats. But they may only go back as far as Amonkhet (or whatever the first Arena set was).

And given enough time, there may be interesting and exciting decks in those formats. It happened in Modern...

Legacy will always be my favorite, but I've been playing a lot of arena. It's convenient, fast, and fun. I love playing UW draw-go, so I'm happy to jam my control brew every day.

As someone who has spent a lot of time in arena, my impression is that arena modern will be more fun than regular modern. Here's why:

- the current standard format had more strategic diversity than modern. Modern had too many aggressive linear decks that attack from unorthodox angles. Answers have trouble keeping up and sideboards are paramount.

- the play test team had given us a plethora of flexible answers. It's easy to pack main deck outs to any permanent. I'm sure arena bo1 contributes highly to this philosophy. They can't allow even one 'modern' style linear deck to sneak through these safety valves. It would greatly harm their new revenue stream.

- expect good, flexible answers alongside appropriately costed threats up and down the curve. As always, the cards sightly above rate will define the format, but there seems to be a lot hanging around that power level. All large group of cards and packages are viable.

- I believe the new format will start with kaladesh, but I doubt it will be a problem. They'll likely be safe and keep the standard bans. Given a much deeper format, I doubt the strategies from kaladesh will be broken. Just look at modern. None of the pet standard decks of that time made an impact.

- I love fetchlands as much as any brainstorm aficionado, but I would also be interested in an eternal format where the Mana isn't so good. There's also not really any non-basic hate in standard, making fetching for basics unnecessary. The third color is a real cost, which I feel is a sweet spot for a format's deck construction. (Wasteland performs this function in our favorite format.)

- I'm eager to give this a shot. Would anyone be interested in a thread to discuss speculation and brews?

[apple713]

Does no one think they are going to develop eternal cards in MTGA format and then slowly release them like the did for mtgo?

Additionally, once they've developed all of the cards in the MTGA format why wouldnt they port all of the MTGO cards and accounts to the new MTGA platform. This would allow them to capture all the profits from both a F2P model and the MTGO model. Once the cards are on the same platform maintaining both would be super easy.

MTGO has a HUGE barrier to entry. It's very difficult to get people to invest in an online game like MTGO without really ever playing the game. A F2P model is the perfect way to introduce players to the game and then get them hooked into something like mtgo, assuming that MTGO has the same platform.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Does no one think they are going to develop eternal cards in MTGA format and then slowly release them like the did for mtgo?

Additionally, once they've developed all of the cards in the MTGA format why wouldnt they port all of the MTGO cards and accounts to the new MTGA platform. This would allow them to capture all the profits from both a F2P model and the MTGO model. Once the cards are on the same platform maintaining both would be super easy.

MTGO has a HUGE barrier to entry. It's very difficult to get people to invest in an online game like MTGO without really ever playing the game. A F2P model is the perfect way to introduce players to the game and then get them hooked into something like mtgo, assuming that MTGO has the same platform.

What benefit is there to porting cards to arena, from wotcs prospective?

[apple713]

What benefit is there to porting cards to arena, from wotcs prospective?

you would be able to play with cards released before the first set on MTGA... Eternal formats on the MTGA platform and interface...

[Ronald Deuce]

What benefit is there to porting cards to arena, from wotcs prospective?

It lets them violate their Reserved List policy with impunity again.

[apple713]

It lets them violate their Reserved List policy with impunity again.



Its not a voilation since it is spelled out in the policy that it doesnt include digital cards... and why would it there is nothing collectible about digital stuff. Furthermore what good is a game that only an extremely limited number can play...

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

you would be able to play with cards released before the first set on MTGA... Eternal formats on the MTGA platform and interface...

That's a benefit from a players prospective.

[Ronald Deuce]

Its not a voilation since it is spelled out in the policy that it doesnt include digital cards... and why would it there is nothing collectible about digital stuff. Furthermore what good is a game that only an extremely limited number can play...

Just to make sure everyone's on the same page, if they've said their policy doesn't include digital cards, that means they've changed the "promise" they made in 1996. (N.B.: It wouldn't be the first time.) If they've gone back on their "promise" by changing the terms thereof, it holds no weight—moral, legal, or otherwise, in part or as a whole.

It's a shame you still have to pay for legal representation to get frivolous suits thrown out of court.

[apple713]

That's a benefit from a players prospective.


Not sure why you pointed out the obvious


Just to make sure everyone's on the same page, if they've said their policy doesn't include digital cards, that means they've changed the "promise" they made in 1996. (N.B.: It wouldn't be the first time.) If they've gone back on their "promise" by changing the terms thereof, it holds no weight—moral, legal, or otherwise, in part or as a whole.

It's a shame you still have to pay for legal representation to get frivolous suits thrown out of court.

Not sure what you are referring to but the only change im familiar with is the addition of permium cards to the reprint policy. Im sure digital cards were added at some point because back in 1996 it might not have been foreseeable that digital cards needed to be specified in the policy.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Not sure why you pointed out the obvious

Because it's not what I asked for.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

and why would it there is nothing collectible about digital stuff.

According to whom?

[Backseat_Critic]

I have some thoughts vis-a-vis arena and the reserve list.

I don't believe there is any real intention to implement any sets older than standard plus on arena (kaladesh forward would be my guess). The first reason is we know there will be a standard plus. There has to be or people would be less likely to put money into the system.

I've seen a lot of talk that eternal formats would be a 'cash cow' on arena, but would they? I've played a ton of arena since release. I think it's good software. The reality is the vast majority of players are f2p (or close) and overwhelmingly favor bo1.

Here are what I consider the reasons. Bo3 is behind a toggle. It's much longer to finish a match. It requires more wildcards. Sideboards are not noob friendly. More enfranchised players accuse wizards of goosing the stats, but there are tangible reasons why players choose bo1.

A lot of players struggle to make one meta deck for standard. Often times they are 'forced' to play mono color aggro to grind rewards. They struggle to make more than one meta deck. I don't see this population, which I'd contend is the overwhelming majority, suddenly deciding to drop a lot of money on an older format where most of the cards from reward packs and free drafts are useless. Conversely, any modern cards are useless in the most popular format. This dilemma exists no matter how they choose to add old cards. As an aside, this is why I believe standard plus will be kaladesh forward. It gives people to chance to spend money, but doesn't totally lock out f2p. Whales need f2p to have fun too.

The second problem is the bo3 issue. People already don't favor it. Could you imagine playing modern bo1? How does anything beat dredge? Matchups are already swingy and sideboard dependent. It would be a dumpster fire to play bo1. That wouldn't be a problem if most people preferred bo3, but that just isn't the case.

This also makes me think standard plus will be the new modern as far as level of support. Modern will be relegated to legacy level. The obvious reason is that it is playable on the shiny new software. The less obvious reason is because it will be palatable in bo1. Saheeli cat will be banned. If combo is more in line with reclamation/Nexus, most decide have a fighting chance of winning any match. Bad matchups will be closer to 60-40 preboard. Wizards will curate the new format with this philosophy in mind.

Another huge issue with adding more formats beyond standard plus is the fragmentation of the player base. Right now we have several flavors of standard and limited queues, with a dollop of special weekend formats. Wait time is low for pretty much everything. I'd imagine we'll have a permanent bo1 and bo3 standard plus queue next fall. If the queues are diluted further with modern, there could be a real risk of long wait times. The most vulnerable format would probably be modern itself.

The programming cost to implement it would be considerable. The return on that cost would be sketchy in my opinion. The queues would have the worst wait time of all. Lastly, I just don't think modern lines up well with current design sensibilities. Even if there is a vocal population asking for it, I just don't see it at any point in the foreseeable future, if at all.

Standard plus could be fun too. I'm going to give it a shot.

I also mentioned related thoughts on the reserved list and mtgo. I have a weird theory on what wizards might do if the can no longer support mtgo (if by conscious choice, or because it dies more naturally). They can't really port the cards into arena, because the formats won't be there to support. I also think no compensation could hurt the perception of buying into arena. There is one option that will let them make one last pile of money on their dead software, make the mtgo players not just whole but happy, and not hurt any of their other bottom lines. Crazy, right?

I think a strong course of action would be to allow a one time redemption for all mtgo cards for paper. They could charge a fixed amount to print any card and tack on a shipping cost like normal redemption. At all points along the cost curve, wizards would make a decent amount of money from a dead product. Mtgo players would be sad to see the platform go (that would likely be inevitable anyway), but would be overall satisfied with the exchange.

One thorny part of this plan is the reserved list. Wizards could skirt the issue by not showing redemption of these cards. They could release them, but with a special border. Or they good go whole hog, allow them to be redeemed normally, and close the issue forever as a one time injection of these cards into the economy. I think the last option would be as good a compromise as any on the reserve list. I don't even think much inventory exists of rl cards in mtgo. The prices would go down, but would hardly crash. Wizards has shown with treasure chest and masters sets that they don't mind making their profit off of collection equity of players' collections.

Crazy? Maybe. Maybe not.

[Backseat_Critic]

I don't think they're likely to end the reserve list. It doesn't really come with any benefit to wizards. I think if they do, it will probably be on some kind of self limiting basis that doesn't crash the market. Honestly, they are best served by having a healthy price Gap between formats. A lot of anti reserve list folks think breaking it would be 'printing money.' If so, why haven't they done it? My guess is because that would actually cut into their bottom line (standard). Who knows?

[Ronald Deuce]

I don't think they're likely to end the reserve list. It doesn't really come with any benefit to wizards. I think if they do, it will probably be on some kind of self limiting basis that doesn't crash the market. Honestly, they are best served by having a healthy price Gap between formats. A lot of anti reserve list folks think breaking it would be 'printing money.' If so, why haven't they done it? My guess is because that would actually cut into their bottom line (standard). Who knows?

They haven't ended it because they assume an interminable queue of shitters would form to sue them for "breaking their promise" and costing them an indeterminate amount of money on their "investments," regardless of the fact that the "promise" was broken when they decided to reprint Feroz's Ban because it was "accidentally" put on the list, and again when they decided to remove all commons and uncommons from the list (in direct contravention of the "promise"), and again again when they reprinted Phyrexian Negator, and once more (with feeling!) when they put RL cards on MTGO, and—

Like I said, it's a damned shame they need [EDIT: TO PAY] a legal team to tell idiots to go home.

[Bithlord]

I don't think they're likely to end the reserve list. It doesn't really come with any benefit to wizards. I think if they do, it will probably be on some kind of self limiting basis that doesn't crash the market. Honestly, they are best served by having a healthy price Gap between formats. A lot of anti reserve list folks think breaking it would be 'printing money.' If so, why haven't they done it? My guess is because that would actually cut into their bottom line (standard). Who knows?

I've always beleived that a mass violation of the reserved list will happen as a last grasp for cash right before canceling the game. Hopefully that doesn't happen for decades, but as with all things the game will die at some point.

I could *easily* see them release a final "thanks for playing" set that includes all the cash money grabs at once.

[Backseat_Critic]

Maybe a small cash grab to end mtgo is also possible. I agree with your premise, a mass end of the reserved list would signal the game is done.

[Tylert]

They will find at some point a way to capitalize on the fact that they have thousands of cards to be added to MTGA.
There is some money to be made with MTG old cards.

They can for example Give all cards available before kaladesh for a fixed amount of money and add events with gem costs for an eternal format.
At some point an hasbro executive will remember that people were paying to play on MTGO and ask himself if those people could pay also on MTGA :)

I'd love wizard to do something along those lines because i don't care if my eternal card's price crashes... all i want is to be able to play.

[Bithlord]

They will find at some point a way to capitalize on the fact that they have thousands of cards to be added to MTGA.
There is some money to be made with MTG old cards.

They can for example Give all cards available before kaladesh for a fixed amount of money and add events with gem costs for an eternal format.
At some point an hasbro executive will remember that people were paying to play on MTGO and ask himself if those people could pay also on MTGA :)

I'd love wizard to do something along those lines because i don't care if my eternal card's price crashes... all i want is to be able to play.

honestly, I'm shocked that they aren't planning on rolling out a "buy it in paper, get a code to have it in Arena" cross promotion for all fixed card products. So, buy a challenger deck? Enter this code now you have those exact cards in arena! by a planeswalker deck? Enter the code. Now you have your shitty precon and precon walker in arena too!

[Lord_Mcdonalds]

I don't think they're likely to end the reserve list. It doesn't really come with any benefit to wizards. I think if they do, it will probably be on some kind of self limiting basis that doesn't crash the market. Honestly, they are best served by having a healthy price Gap between formats. A lot of anti reserve list folks think breaking it would be 'printing money.' If so, why haven't they done it? My guess is because that would actually cut into their bottom line (standard). Who knows?

The potential legal rammifications, whether or not they’d lose they inevitable law suit (there would be I’d imagine) you’d ultimately be in a legal pissing contest with your consumers. Something I don’t blame them for not wanting to get into

[Phoenix Ignition]

I'm a FTP Arena player but only because I can't justify actually finishing any Standard decks due to the format being so much less fun for me than Modern.

If they put Modern on there I wouldn't hesitate to fill out a few decks, which would definitely require me to use money. I think they'd make a killing on that because adding more formats doesn't increase the amount of Daily free money they give out, but it increases the number of rares/mythics the average person would need to buy to play all the decks/formats they want.

I don't think they'll do it for a few years since they don't have their shit completely together yet, but all things considered Arena is much better than I expected and overall pretty fun to play.

It also wouldn't be hard to motivate people to play Bo3's instead of Bo1's if they just added some higher buy-in/pay-out events that were only Bo3's. Then we'd have to spend rares to fill out our sideboards as well. I mostly play Bo1 draft since it's easier to stay close to infinite and you don't have to play against/with crappy decks for as long a time period. Bo3's can take an hour and most of the time the better deck is going to win anyway in a draft, be it Bo1 or Bo3.

[MGB]

I'm a FTP Arena player but only because I can't justify actually finishing any Standard decks due to the format being so much less fun for me than Modern.

If they put Modern on there I wouldn't hesitate to fill out a few decks, which would definitely require me to use money. I think they'd make a killing on that because adding more formats doesn't increase the amount of Daily free money they give out, but it increases the number of rares/mythics the average person would need to buy to play all the decks/formats they want.

I don't think they'll do it for a few years since they don't have their shit completely together yet, but all things considered Arena is much better than I expected and overall pretty fun to play.

It also wouldn't be hard to motivate people to play Bo3's instead of Bo1's if they just added some higher buy-in/pay-out events that were only Bo3's. Then we'd have to spend rares to fill out our sideboards as well. I mostly play Bo1 draft since it's easier to stay close to infinite and you don't have to play against/with crappy decks for as long a time period. Bo3's can take an hour and most of the time the better deck is going to win anyway in a draft, be it Bo1 or Bo3.


I'm actually finding Standard right now far more fun than Modern.

Modern is a coinflip. In Standard I built Jeskai Niv Mizzet Control and it's given me a pretty crazy win rate because I can actually metagame against the field unlike in Modern where you face 20 vastly different decks every round.

[Backseat_Critic]

I agree with standard being better than modern now. Legacy is still King of course.

The problem with modern isn't that there are 20 decks, it's that all of the aggressive decks choose to attack at different angles that modern doesn't have the card pool to address with main deck answers. Ironically, standard has versatile main deck answers to a ton of problems. Almost none of them are a good enough rate for even sideboard play in modern.

There's a very real possibility they can ruin standard again, but I sure hope not. Standard plus looks like it will be more fun than modern if they can keep up the good work.

[Phoenix Ignition]

Fair enough, my point wasn't that Modern > Standard. I just said I like it better; it is a fruitless errand to attempt to argue anything other than Legacy is the best format on this site, not that it matters because play what you like.

The point was that more formats = more decks people are going to want to fill out, and with limited free daily coins you're not going to be able to do that so more people will have to pay. If they had vintage + legacy + modern + standard, you'd better believe I'd put enough money on there to get all the fetches, duals, force of wills, etc I'd need to flesh out at least 1 fully competitive deck per format. With only Standard as an option I just don't care to make more than 1 full deck, which was easy enough to do with daily rewards.

They could even make the old chase cards like dual lands Mythics to make it more lucrative for them.

[jmlima]

...
There's a very real possibility they can ruin standard again, but I sure hope not. Standard plus looks like it will be more fun than modern if they can keep up the good work.

Am I right in thinking that this standard is pretty unique because it has a much larger card pool due to the rotation changes and counter-changes?

I must say last time I logged into MTGO I saw, for the first time, leagues for modern and standard running in the lower hundreds in terms of participants. Not looking good for it's continuity.

[jmlima]

...

The point was that more formats = more decks people are going to want to fill out, and with limited free daily coins you're not going to be able to do that so more people will have to pay. If they had vintage + legacy + modern + standard, you'd better believe I'd put enough money on there to get all the fetches, duals, force of wills, etc I'd need to flesh out at least 1 fully competitive deck per format. ...

There's a person for each POV. I wouldn't. I would play the best format that would allow me to quickly build a legacy deck and that would be it.

[Phoenix Ignition]

There's a person for each POV. I wouldn't. I would play the best format that would allow me to quickly build a legacy deck and that would be it.

Right, but you wouldn't be costing them any real money. Whereas people like me would be giving them money. So overall they still will make money.

[jmlima]

Right, but you wouldn't be costing them any real money. Whereas people like me would be giving them money. So overall they still will make money.

No doubts about that.

[jmlima]

Well, this bodes well... splitting your players over a multitude of different platforms with no crossover in collections.

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/b37w5b/magic_arena_has_no_plans_to_expand_to_other/

I guess that as long as there are people falling for this they will keep milking it.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

This game is super mismanaged

[Barook]

this company is super mismanaged
ftfy

[morgan_coke]

True, but credit where it's due, Arena has been shockingly less of a cluster than expected ever since they hit open beta (closed beta is another story), and I can't believe I'm saying this, but I look forwards to Arena+ or whatever the new extended format they put on there next fall.

Well, I mean, unless Modern Horizons includes Astral Slide, 'cause if so, that's what I'll be playing until the end of time.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

ftfy

Up half a point over a month, and seven since the beginning of the year.

[apple713]

ftfy

Hasbro or wotc? Wotc i cant believe has not destroyed the game. The fact thats uts still around adter being run like a cluster f is just a testament to how amazing the game is.

[Lemnear]

Hasbro or wotc? Wotc i cant believe has not destroyed the game. The fact thats uts still around adter being run like a cluster f is just a testament to how amazing the game is.

Alternatively it might tell more about the community than the game quality. I wonder about the games active player demography tbh.

[jmlima]

... and I can't believe I'm saying this, but I look forwards to Arena+ or whatever the new extended format they put on there next fall.
...

I'm beginning to feel doubtful about that. I'm more inclined to think they will have special events where 'you can use all cards in your collection' rather than a new format with it's own daily and monthly events, etc.

[Tylert]

I'm beginning to feel doubtful about that. I'm more inclined to think they will have special events where 'you can use all cards in your collection' rather than a new format with it's own daily and monthly events, etc.

That seems too harsh. You paid for something that is quite expensive, and now you can't use your cards except when you pay again?
They need some queues to handle unique games in this new format (at least in 1vs1, if not also a "traditional play" Queue).
If they don't do that, lots of people who like to play with the same deck that they will upgrade over time will quit.
It's not a lot of developpement and a good investment.

[Phoenix Ignition]

That seems too harsh. You paid for something that is quite expensive, and now you can't use your cards except when you pay again?


But this is the exact MTGO business model and people on here seem to love it.

[Tylert]

But this is the exact MTGO business model and people on here seem to love it.

it's a new free to play model :)

[jmlima]

'Chris Clay, Game Director of MTG Arena, has parted ways with WOTC' and multiple theories are debated:

https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/bulluc/chris_clay_game_director_of_mtg_arena_has_parted/

[jmlima]

Goodbye MtGO my old friend...


Core Set 2020 gets five, and each one has a foil planeswalker card not found elsewhere, one M20 booster pack instead of two (so that, hopefully, you can offer them at a more inviting price), plus a code to unlock the entire deck on Magic Arena.


North American WPN members who have signed up for M20 FNM will receive Magic Arena code cards to hand out to players on their August 16 FNM. Around that time, Arena will feature an ad driving players to FNM.

https://wpn.wizards.com/en/article/m20-15-changes-every-retailer-should-know

[Begle1]

]
Well, I mean, unless Modern Horizons includes Astral Slide, 'cause if so, that's what I'll be playing until the end of time.

So how's your new Astral Drift deck going?

[MGB]

Goodbye MtGO my old friend...





https://wpn.wizards.com/en/article/m20-15-changes-every-retailer-should-know

Why does this mean MTGO is going away exactly?

Arena and MTGO cater to two different crowds. Until they get Pauper/Legacy/Modern/Vintage on Arena, MTGO probably isn't going anywhere.

[jmlima]

WOTC hits peak 21st century and joins the 'fake viewers numbers' brigade:

https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/c4cgcn/127k_peak_viewers_on_2019_mythic_championship_iii/

[theillest]

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-digital/mtg-arena-state-beta-june-27-2019

Ranked draft for the current set
Multiple draft formats
'Historic' format

[Phoenix Ignition]

Interesting. As a predominantly Modern player now I worry Historic will be a planeswalker nightmare fest of epic proportions. Standard is already mind-numbingly bad right now and they typically don't print good answers to planeswalkers, at least ones that are better than just playing planeswalkers yourself.

I'll be happy to have a more consistent choice of draft formats at least. The way they've been running them lately have been a cash grab.

[HdH_Cthulhu]

How often can you guys draft on arena? The quest rewards let me draft like 3 times a week.

It just feels sooo grindy if you cant draft once a day...

[ubernostrum]

How often can you guys draft on arena? The quest rewards let me draft like 3 times a week.

It just feels sooo grindy if you cant draft once a day...

I recently found time for online Magic again, and downloaded Arena to give it a try.

First, I had to Google for how to escape from the mandatory however-many-games-long tutorial. Then I decided to draft, and accidentally joined a best-of-one. Then I finally managed to get into a best-of-three WAR draft and went 1-2 (I know basically nothing about WAR limited, so I'm surprised I won even a single match). Now I have... some "gems" and some "gold" and I have no idea which one does what.

So I closed it and opened MTGO and did some more Modern Horizons drafts. Maybe when M20 lands I'll give it one more try since I usually enjoy core-set draft formats and I don't think I'll need to get any M20 cards on MTGO for Legacy use.

[Smuggo]

Interesting. As a predominantly Modern player now I worry Historic will be a planeswalker nightmare fest of epic proportions. Standard is already mind-numbingly bad right now and they typically don't print good answers to planeswalkers, at least ones that are better than just playing planeswalkers yourself.

I'll be happy to have a more consistent choice of draft formats at least. The way they've been running them lately have been a cash grab.

I'm quite enjoying standard. It is PW-heavy of course but that makes it kinda interesting for now at least (might well be bored of it by the end of the year), but mainly I am enjoying being able to draft for free. The game doesn't rly feel like a cash grab, it's pretty generous compared to other F2P games.

[Humphrey]

tze client drives me crazy.

[jmlima]

tze client drives me crazy.

You're not alone:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/can5mu/the_current_performance_problems_are_inexcusable/

[morgan_coke]

You're not alone:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/can5mu/the_current_performance_problems_are_inexcusable/

I'd say I lose around 3 games a week to the client. That said, I could solve 90% of those issues by running in full command mode all the time, but honestly, I'd rather take the losses than deal with that much nonsense.

The biggest change I'd love to see is some kind of chess clock added to the timeout system. That would be enough to punish the slow players (and idiots looping Nexus for 7 turns without ever advancing their board state or in some cases, even including any wincons in their deck).

Agreed that Historic is going to be a shitcan format. They desperately need to start printing more answers to 'Walkers in all colors, and those answers honestly need to generally come with some kind of benefit - either cards or life or mana or something attached to them.

[Humphrey]

my main problem is not the performance, but the controls. skip turn avtually either does nothing or skips my turn or. often i lose track whose turn it actually is.
also the timeout system is shit. do you really need 30sec to decide to mulligan?

[Smuggo]

I'd say I lose around 3 games a week to the client. That said, I could solve 90% of those issues by running in full command mode all the time, but honestly, I'd rather take the losses than deal with that much nonsense.

The biggest change I'd love to see is some kind of chess clock added to the timeout system. That would be enough to punish the slow players (and idiots looping Nexus for 7 turns without ever advancing their board state or in some cases, even including any wincons in their deck).

Agreed that Historic is going to be a shitcan format. They desperately need to start printing more answers to 'Walkers in all colors, and those answers honestly need to generally come with some kind of benefit - either cards or life or mana or something attached to them.

They've already added a chess clock.

The big issue is the performance which is shonky as hell, particularly when you get disconnected or the client crashes it takes so long to get back into the game that you've already lost most of the time.

[morgan_coke]

They've already added a chess clock.

The big issue is the performance which is shonky as hell, particularly when you get disconnected or the client crashes it takes so long to get back into the game that you've already lost most of the time.

Where the hell is it? I'd happily go do something and let "30 turns with no action" Nexus guy play with himself while timing out, but I don't see a clock anywhere on the interface.

Agreed the last patch seems to have added a very large amount of performance issues. It's like MTG v.2.0 when they would hit max players after a release dropped.

[jmlima]

...
Agreed that Historic is going to be a shitcan format. They desperately need to start printing more answers to 'Walkers in all colors, and those answers honestly need to generally come with some kind of benefit - either cards or life or mana or something attached to them.

Historic, without ranked support, is DOA. To start with, it will be irrelevant for anyone starting arena since they have zero incentive to play it as opposed to standard that actually gives them some rewards. New people will have to either grind insanely to get new cards or pay top dollar for a non-competitive nor ranked format. Without ranked play and rewards, existing players will have zero incentive to play it since they are effectively wasting time they could spend grinding rewards for standard decks or advancing in the standard ladder.

In summary, they did the bare minimum they could get away with to be able to say 'look, you can still your old cards in this format!'.

[Smuggo]

Where the hell is it? I'd happily go do something and let "30 turns with no action" Nexus guy play with himself while timing out, but I don't see a clock anywhere on the interface.

Agreed the last patch seems to have added a very large amount of performance issues. It's like MTG v.2.0 when they would hit max players after a release dropped.

Yeah it's not displayed in the UI for some totally unknown reason (classic WotC really) but if you use a tracker with an overlay it will show you the clock.

[Smuggo]

Historic, without ranked support, is DOA. To start with, it will be irrelevant for anyone starting arena since they have zero incentive to play it as opposed to standard that actually gives them some rewards. New people will have to either grind insanely to get new cards or pay top dollar for a non-competitive nor ranked format. Without ranked play and rewards, existing players will have zero incentive to play it since they are effectively wasting time they could spend grinding rewards for standard decks or advancing in the standard ladder.

In summary, they did the bare minimum they could get away with to be able to say 'look, you can still your old cards in this format!'.

Doesn't even need ranked initially just some sort of 5-win tournament structure with gold and ICR prizes like they already have for Standard. Hopefully they will see sense and at least do that before it goes live.

[MGB]

They need to allow people to make real money playing Arena outside of the Top-8 players in the world or whoever is qualified for the MPL based on it.

I can make $8-$16 an hour playing Magic Online Modern/Legacy leagues. That may not be good enough as a full time job but it's an excellent way to monetize my hobby because I have fun playing the game even when it's not making me any money. But the secondary market on MTGO and the ability to convert prizes into US dollars makes MTGO so much better, in my eyes, than Arena. And if you spike any big tournament on MTGO (like a Challenge, or a Playoff, or MCQ, or a Qualifier, etc), the payout is in the hundreds of dollars for the top8 and sometimes even the top16.

You can grind Arena for hours every day for months and have absolutely nothing to show for it. You can grind MTGO for hours every day and if you're a even just a semi-decent player you can actually have a positive cash flow to show for it, and if you're a good to great player you can make hundreds of dollars every month playing it.

Right now in my eyes, Arena only has one thing going for it: pretty graphics and nicer UI. That's it. MTGO has better formats and actual cash incentives to play.

If Arena had a similar secondary market or even just some Wizards designed payout system that lets you convert wins into tickets that could be sold for cash, then I'd go back to playing it. But even though I sunk $200 into Arena when it first came out, I haven't touched it in months. Life's too short to throw away time on something that really doesn't net you much in the end.

[mistercakes]

Mtg is a hobby. It doesn't need to be a "job". This previous post is just absurd.

[Smuggo]

Right now in my eyes, Arena only has one thing going for it: pretty graphics and nicer UI. That's it. MTGO has better formats and actual cash incentives to play.


What MtGA has going for it is that you can play online without having to spend a ton of money, even if it is only Standard and Drafts at the moment.

I never really got into MTGO because I just don't want to be spending a ton of cash on database entries when I could buy real cards instead and play in a social environment for basically the same cost. But I have played a ton of MtGA and done maybe 100 drafts for a grand total spend of $20.

Maybe you were making money out of MTGO but that's not the case for the vast majority of players and most people don't want to be spending hundreds of pounds every few months to keep up with standard in virtual cards, or to draft virtual cards.

[Tylert]

They need to allow people to make real money playing Arena outside of the Top-8 players in the world or whoever is qualified for the MPL based on it.

I can make $8-$16 an hour playing Magic Online Modern/Legacy leagues. That may not be good enough as a full time job but it's an excellent way to monetize my hobby because I have fun playing the game even when it's not making me any money. But the secondary market on MTGO and the ability to convert prizes into US dollars makes MTGO so much better, in my eyes, than Arena. And if you spike any big tournament on MTGO (like a Challenge, or a Playoff, or MCQ, or a Qualifier, etc), the payout is in the hundreds of dollars for the top8 and sometimes even the top16.

You can grind Arena for hours every day for months and have absolutely nothing to show for it. You can grind MTGO for hours every day and if you're a even just a semi-decent player you can actually have a positive cash flow to show for it, and if you're a good to great player you can make hundreds of dollars every month playing it.

Right now in my eyes, Arena only has one thing going for it: pretty graphics and nicer UI. That's it. MTGO has better formats and actual cash incentives to play.

If Arena had a similar secondary market or even just some Wizards designed payout system that lets you convert wins into tickets that could be sold for cash, then I'd go back to playing it. But even though I sunk $200 into Arena when it first came out, I haven't touched it in months. Life's too short to throw away time on something that really doesn't net you much in the end.

MTGA is for casual players, MTGO for grinders.

[MGB]

Mtg is a hobby. It doesn't need to be a "job". This previous post is just absurd.

Any time you can monetize your hobby it's not a bad thing, imho.

Would you rather play Magic completely for free or be compensated (in any way) for playing the game? Why do people play in Magic tournaments for cash prizes when they could just be playing at the kitchen table instead?

[MGB]

What MtGA has going for it is that you can play online without having to spend a ton of money, even if it is only Standard and Drafts at the moment.

I never really got into MTGO because I just don't want to be spending a ton of cash on database entries when I could buy real cards instead and play in a social environment for basically the same cost. But I have played a ton of MtGA and done maybe 100 drafts for a grand total spend of $20.

Maybe you were making money out of MTGO but that's not the case for the vast majority of players and most people don't want to be spending hundreds of pounds every few months to keep up with standard in virtual cards, or to draft virtual cards.

I haven't put any money into MTGO in years.

Whereas with Arena, to keep playing competitive Standard decks I'm going to inevitably have to buy the latest packs, or play like 8+ hours a day to get enough crystals to buy packs. I can't just build a deck with prize winnings, I have to keep buying packs. On MTGO with all of the event tix I've saved up, if I want to tune a deck or build a new one, I can just hit the tradebots for the cards I need and I don't have to really invest any more money into it, and then when I'm through with those cards I can just re-sell them. There exists no way to regain lost value in Arena.

[Tylert]

I haven't put any money into MTGO in years.

I haven't put any money in MTG Arena at all and I can build at least 1 top tier deck at the release of a new extension although i'm only playing until i reach 4 daily wins (1 hour per day, essentially drafting). I'm pretty sure a good player would be able to build 2 or 3 decks because he could have way more better results than me, WITHOUT PAYING ANYTHING.

I never played MTGO because you had to pay to play.

(If MTGO was free, i'd play MTGO just to be able to play History drafts, Modern and legacy... :( )

[H]

I haven't put any money in MTG Arena at all and I can build at least 1 top tier deck at the release of a new extension although i'm only playing until i reach 4 daily wins (1 hour per day, essentially drafting). I'm pretty sure a good player would be able to build 2 or 3 decks because he could have way more better results than me, WITHOUT PAYING ANYTHING.

I made an Arena account just to "collect" any free things I could find.

How does one do this though? As in, what deck do you start with that can even get to 4 wins? Sorry for super-noob questions.

[Smuggo]

I haven't put any money into MTGO in years.

Whereas with Arena, to keep playing competitive Standard decks I'm going to inevitably have to buy the latest packs, or play like 8+ hours a day to get enough crystals to buy packs. I can't just build a deck with prize winnings, I have to keep buying packs. On MTGO with all of the event tix I've saved up, if I want to tune a deck or build a new one, I can just hit the tradebots for the cards I need and I don't have to really invest any more money into it, and then when I'm through with those cards I can just re-sell them. There exists no way to regain lost value in Arena.

At some point you will have put money into MtGO, and probably a substantial sum of money, wheras you don't need to put any money into MtGA to play.

And I've got several standard decks and do loads of drafts and, as mentioned, have only spent $20 on two intro bundles. I don't play even close to 8 hours a day, maybe 1 hour two or three times a week as I have a small baby. The cost required to play MtGA is tiny compared to MtGO in almost all cases.

[MGB]

At some point you will have put money into MtGO, and probably a substantial sum of money, wheras you don't need to put any money into MtGA to play.

And I've got several standard decks and do loads of drafts and, as mentioned, have only spent $20 on two intro bundles. I don't play even close to 8 hours a day, maybe 1 hour two or three times a week as I have a small baby. The cost required to play MtGA is tiny compared to MtGO in almost all cases.

3 or so years ago I invested enough money in MTGO to build my main Legacy and Modern decks (all Ancient Tomb variants, Tron & Humans in Modern) - about $1000? - and since then I've made back that money and made more than double that in profit, and now have enough play points and tickets that I will never need to spend money on MTGO ever again and I'll still be able to enter any tournament or league I want.

And while I consider myself to be an above-average player, I'm nowhere near a Top-8 or even a top-32 Modern/Legacy player. But I've managed to play for free and even make a profit. Whereas if I was playing Standard on MTG Arena, I'd literally have to be one of the top EIGHT players in the whole world for that season to get anything out of the game other than a few hazy memories. Sure, if you're literally the best of the best it might be worthwhile to grind it all day, but if you're just a "good" player you can get far more out of MTGO than Arena.

[Tylert]

3 or so years ago I invested enough money in MTGO to build my main Legacy and Modern decks (all Ancient Tomb variants, Tron & Humans in Modern) - about $1000? - and since then I've made back that money and made more than double that in profit, and now have enough play points and tickets that I will never need to spend money on MTGO ever again and I'll still be able to enter any tournament or league I want.

And while I consider myself to be an above-average player, I'm nowhere near a Top-8 or even a top-32 Modern/Legacy player. But I've managed to play for free and even make a profit. Whereas if I was playing Standard on MTG Arena, I'd literally have to be one of the top EIGHT players in the whole world for that season to get anything out of the game other than a few hazy memories. Sure, if you're literally the best of the best it might be worthwhile to grind it all day, but if you're just a "good" player you can get far more out of MTGO than Arena.

Still, you have to be a good player to get a return, and you need to invest some money.
And on MTGA i have a good return, i can play the game i love for free!!

[Smuggo]

3 or so years ago I invested enough money in MTGO to build my main Legacy and Modern decks (all Ancient Tomb variants, Tron & Humans in Modern) - about $1000? - and since then I've made back that money and made more than double that in profit, and now have enough play points and tickets that I will never need to spend money on MTGO ever again and I'll still be able to enter any tournament or league I want.

And while I consider myself to be an above-average player, I'm nowhere near a Top-8 or even a top-32 Modern/Legacy player. But I've managed to play for free and even make a profit. Whereas if I was playing Standard on MTG Arena, I'd literally have to be one of the top EIGHT players in the whole world for that season to get anything out of the game other than a few hazy memories. Sure, if you're literally the best of the best it might be worthwhile to grind it all day, but if you're just a "good" player you can get far more out of MTGO than Arena.

Okay but your experience of making money will not apply to most people, and even if it did most people will balk at the idea of investing $1000 in digital cards as an upfront cost.

I play MtG because I enjoy it and MtGA is a way to do that in the comfort of my own home for very little cost, I don't need to make money out of it and I suspect that applies to most people.

[MGB]

Still, you have to be a good player to get a return, and you need to invest some money.
And on MTGA i have a good return, i can play the game i love for free!!


But it's not really free if you want to play competitive decks.

I'm a good player and I've found that even though I was playing pretty frequently on ranked ladder, to stay competitive and build the best decks I'd have to buy packs with real money when new sets rotated in. There was no way around that that I could see, barring playing alot more which is not very feasible if you have a full-time job and other responsibilities. And then if certain decks were no longer good, there was no way for me to trade unused Mythics and Rares in for new ones - they just rotted in my collection when I had to move to a better standard deck. Whereas with MTGO I can play as little or as much as I want and I still get a return on my investment and stay competitive in Eternal formats with the decks I've built, and if I no longer like a deck I can sell off the pieces and invest in a different deck with the tickets I received, or just keep it as cash.

[Humphrey]

with xmage and cockatrice even modo around i see zero reason to invest a single penny in arena. besides all formats are crap with all those planeswalker around.
its not player vs player anymore, its just handling planeswalker now.

[jmlima]

To play a 'friendly , 'non-competitive' format, you will pay more than to play a competitive one. Yup. Makes total sense.

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/cx4b8k/petition_to_stop_historic_cards_costing_2/

[Smuggo]

To play a 'friendly , 'non-competitive' format, you will pay more than to play a competitive one. Yup. Makes total sense.

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/cx4b8k/petition_to_stop_historic_cards_costing_2/

Meh, Standard is meant to be the core of Arena. If they make its eternal format too tempting then they will detract attention from Standard.

[morgan_coke]

To play a 'friendly , 'non-competitive' format, you will pay more than to play a competitive one. Yup. Makes total sense.

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/cx4b8k/petition_to_stop_historic_cards_costing_2/

That's an incredibly wizards decision. Let's take our most accessible form of the game and fuck it up so it's hostile to new players.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

That's an incredibly wizards decision. Let's take our most accessible form of the game and fuck it up so it's hostile to new players.

"let's take what's going to be an intimidating format to new players and keep them out of it on Baby's First Online Magic.exe" seems like a good decision.

[Smuggo]

"let's take what's going to be an intimidating format to new players and keep them out of it on Baby's First Online Magic.exe" seems like a good decision.

Further to this, I asked redditors what old cards they'd like to see added to historic and loads of them said "nothing, I don't want anything that hasn't been in Arena standard" so it seems many of them only want to play super linear magic with no interesting interactions.

[PirateKing]

"let's take what's going to be an intimidating format to new players and keep them out of it on Baby's First Online Magic.exe" seems like a good decision.

This seems reasonable, since the few matches I've played online, opponents concede when the first creature removal gets played, guess they've crunched the data to find it's a better use of their time to shop for low hanging fruit then to slog out a game. Since there's no penalty for it (and no reward for winning really) it does make some sense I guess.
I haven't put any money into the game and hardly any time, so I've yet to experience the events behind the paywall, but I imagine once you pay to enter, you take your time inside a bit less callously.

[Humphrey]

wow, so legendary and artifact craftin prices have doubled? or what it historic? nvm googled it. pretty confusing name though.

[Smuggo]

wow, so legendary and artifact craftin prices have doubled? or what it historic? nvm googled it. pretty confusing name though.

Only doubled for stuff that has cycled out of Standard. Though given the copious amount of complaining about it I expect WotC will U-turn within a month.

[Humphrey]

why do ppl get upset. if you play a cashgrab expect your cash grabbed.

[Tylert]

why do ppl get upset. if you play a cashgrab expect your cash grabbed.

Because some of them play it for free and that this format is supposed to be more casual and not to need a lot of investement?

[Smuggo]

Because some of them play it for free and that this format is supposed to be more casual and not to need a lot of investement?

I think the bigger issue is they are creating a new format and, in the same breath, killing it off by making it excessively expensive to take part in.

But then, the fact people still play Legacy despite lack of interest from WotC and huge costs involved indicates that people will probably enjoy the format despite WotC.

[Purple Blood]

I think the bigger issue is they are creating a new format and, in the same breath, killing it off by making it excessively expensive to take part in.

But then, the fact people still play Legacy despite lack of interest from WotC and huge costs involved indicates that people will probably enjoy the format despite WotC.

Pretty sure the thought process is let's give them something to do with their MTGA cards that rotated out of Standard as opposed to let's give them a whole new format so they can ignore Standard. MTGA is built to draft Standard sets and play Standard constructive. This is just a nice side format to play with your older cards. I'm sure if it catches on it will be made more accessible.

[Smuggo]

Pretty sure the thought process is let's give them something to do with their MTGA cards that rotated out of Standard as opposed to let's give them a whole new format so they can ignore Standard. MTGA is built to draft Standard sets and play Standard constructive. This is just a nice side format to play with your older cards. I'm sure if it catches on it will be made more accessible.

Yeah I get that, but given much of the MTGA playerbase is fairly new to MtG and unfamiliar with set rotations and the generally high costs of paper magic it just seems like they're giving them a bad impression with this move.

[jmlima]

Yeah I get that, but given much of the MTGA playerbase is fairly new to MtG and unfamiliar with set rotations and the generally high costs of paper magic it just seems like they're giving them a bad impression with this move.

People are taking it really well:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/cyzye7/on_promises_and_breaking_them/

[Smuggo]

People are taking it really well:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/cyzye7/on_promises_and_breaking_them/

Aye, but OTT outrage at everything is pretty standard for that sub.

[jmlima]

Aye, but OTT outrage at everything is pretty standard for that sub.

How about this one:

https://forums.mtgarena.com/forums/threads/59603

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

People are taking it really well:

https://www.reddit.com/r/MagicArena/comments/cyzye7/on_promises_and_breaking_them/

Ok, now someone post that dumb article how breaking a pinky swear means they lose all the money.

[morgan_coke]

They undid the stupid 2:1 thing for Historic wildcard redemption. It's normal 1:1 now.

[Tylert]

OMG WIZARDS IS SO NICE TO US!!
(Is that exactly the kind of reaction they were looking for?)

[morgan_coke]

I don't know how many of you are on Arena, but the client is unplayable right now. Disconnects happening to at least one player at least once in every match. Whenever I start seeing the timer drag, I have to wonder, "did they DC? or did I?" the concept of them taking a while to make a move never even enters my mind at this point. It's kind of obnoxious on a personal level since this would have been a perfect month for me to grind to mythic as I'm off for another few weeks while I transition to a new job, but I guess I'll just play the Hearthstone auto-chess thing instead, because at least there I can finish a fucking game.

But honestly this is a huge problem for WotC. They've had a really shitty standard for a couple of months now, and if you add in the client sucking to that... they're going to see a lot more negative churn numbers than they'd like.

[Smuggo]

Can't say I've noticed any problems with disconnects for either me or my opponents. Judging from amount of reddit posts about performance I feel like that has got better too, though I've had few performance issues myself.

[Barook]

But honestly this is a huge problem for WotC. They've had a really shitty standard for a couple of months now, and if you add in the client sucking to that... they're going to see a lot more negative churn numbers than they'd like.
WotC ruining anything decent they've going on for them? Color me surprised!

[H]

Anyone trying out Historic? I've saved literally every wildcard I ever got, so I hunting for a Historic deck to make with them? Anyone noticed anything particularly interesting?

[Tylert]

Anyone trying out Historic? I've saved literally every wildcard I ever got, so I hunting for a Historic deck to make with them? Anyone noticed anything particularly interesting?

The format is wide open, but currently people are only playing RDW or Field of the dead / Golos decks.
I don't know if the kethis combo deck is still viable.

[H]

The format is wide open, but currently people are only playing RDW or Field of the dead / Golos decks.
I don't know if the kethis combo deck is still viable.
Yeah, so far I've seen people streaming those. I saw some interesting lists, like Dimir Spectors (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2524183#arena) which almost assuredly sucks, but appeals to my inner Timmy or UW artifact aggro (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2525336#arena) but that probably kind of sucks too.

I probably just need to see how many wildcards I'd need to use to get to a Golos deck. I know I have at least 2 Golos himself that I got in packs, but I don't recall what else.

[Tylert]

Yeah, so far I've seen people streaming those. I saw some interesting lists, like Dimir Spectors (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2524183#arena) which almost assuredly sucks, but appeals to my inner Timmy or UW artifact aggro (https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2525336#arena) but that probably kind of sucks too.

I probably just need to see how many wildcards I'd need to use to get to a Golos deck. I know I have at least 2 Golos himself that I got in packs, but I don't recall what else.

Dimir spectors. I mean i love to play some thief of sanity, but I also like to win :)

I've just checked the 20 cards that were added to the format, There is probably a good elf deck with the addition of elvish visionnary and imperious perfect! (Fauna shaman could also be played as a good tutor for lords or Beast whisperer) And Captain sissay could be a (slow) tutor in Kethis combo, adding consistency.
There is probably also a good artifact deck in the format. Between sai / emry / Tezzeret / mind stone / Saheli... etc... but that may be another "dimir spector" deck :)

[Smuggo]

Elfball definitely seems viable, blue "affinity" also seems to be getting some play.

I've got few wildcards left so just put together a super cheap U/R wizards deck for now but will see how the format develops. Probably worth buying the anthology bundle if you have the gems for it.

[jmlima]

Magic the Banning:

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-digital/historic-suspension-announcement-2019-12-10

[Tylert]

In Historic ranked, I'm playing Mono U artifacts with Emry and Saï and having fun.
Loads of people are playing Esper doom foretold.

[Smuggo]

In Historic ranked, I'm playing Mono U artifacts with Emry and Saï and having fun.
Loads of people are playing Esper doom foretold.

What's your Artifacts list?

[Tylert]

What's your Artifacts list?

I'll try to export the list tonight.

obviously, i'm playing the 4 emry + 4 sai.
Someting like 9 to 10 1 mana artifacts (cauldron as removal, well as card advantage).
4 mind stones
4 steel overseer + 4 2 mana 1/4 artifact creature for the obvious synergy (with emry also).
some 1/1 flyers that draw
2x traxos
1 karn and 2 karn the great.
in the sideboard, some artifact silver bullets and some counterspells.

it's fun to play. not sure it is competitive :) (although i'm winning enough)

[Smuggo]

Cool, i figured it would be something along those lines. Might give it a go as I think I should have most of the rares for it already but kinda low on wildcards at the moment and not sure whether to save them to keep grinding standard after Theros or switch focus to historic. Kinda want long-term decent queues for historic to be announced if I'm gonna start crafting decks for it.

Currently playing Golgari Adventure in Standard, the Lucky Clover version, and it is pretty enjoyable and I hope will survive rotation in some form.

[Tylert]

Forgot about one of the best artifact that should be played as a 4 of in the deck (but i'm playing only one because i Didn't want to spend the wild cards): Stonecoil serpent :)

[H]

Kinda want long-term decent queues for historic to be announced if I'm gonna start crafting decks for it.

What do you mean by this? What's wrong with the current Historic Ranked play? (Serious question, I honestly don't know what the difference would be.)

Historic does really seem very wide open. Mind you, I am not playing at some super high rank, I'm Silver. Still, I racked up some extra Wild Cards with a Historic mono-Red Cavalcade deck when I started playing. Now, using some of the cards I go from that Twitch Prime Liliana deck, I am playing a UB Control deck. Basically a ton of removal plus a few counterspells. I'm doing OK, but it can't compete with the 8-Teferi Esper decks, but that's fine, it has about 12 less Mythics, haha. I actually don't even have a full playset of Watery Graves, but I've only lost a few games from playing bad ETBT lands.

Honestly, the format mostly sucks, but for free it sucks a little less than just not playing Magic (to me).

[jmlima]

New historic anthology to be released:

https://mtgazone.com/historic-anthology-2-cards/

Of course, since Historic is mostly played Bo1, anything that does not slot into aggro decks can be ignored.

[jmlima]

The latest big news, human drafts are coming. That's another dent on MTGO.

[Tylert]

New historic anthology to be released:

https://mtgazone.com/historic-anthology-2-cards/

Of course, since Historic is mostly played Bo1, anything that does not slot into aggro decks can be ignored.

From time to time, they offer historic ranked and historic traditional ranked possibilities.
I've been playing UArtos lately in traditional ranked and been having a lot of fun. And it is absolutely not an aggro deck... And the best deck in the format seems to be UW control :)


The latest big news, human drafts are coming. That's another dent on MTGO.

Isn't it good news? :)
It's the end of the super good decks because you have finally understood the way bots draft... I hated loosing 3 times in a row to super good decks with 5 or 6 of the same common that is backbreaking in the archetype... It's going to happen less!!

[jmlima]

From time to time, they offer historic ranked and historic traditional ranked possibilities.
I've been playing UArtos lately in traditional ranked and been having a lot of fun. And it is absolutely not an aggro deck... And the best deck in the format seems to be UW control :)

Totally true, but I was coming from the perspective of F2P where you have to brutally maximize the number of games played and amount of fast wins...


Isn't it good news? :)
It's the end of the super good decks because you have finally understood the way bots draft... I hated loosing 3 times in a row to super good decks with 5 or 6 of the same common that is backbreaking in the archetype... It's going to happen less!!

It's very good news! Except for MTGO that will get another dent, but it's defo a very welcomed thing on Arena.

[Tylert]

Totally true, but I was coming from the perspective of F2P where you have to brutally maximize the number of games played and amount of fast wins...



It's very good news! Except for MTGO that will get another dent, but it's defo a very welcomed thing on Arena.

There are still way better formats on MTGO.
To be honest, I still play on mogg which has the worst interface in terms of magic software because it offers better formats

[the Thin White Duke]

Does anyone actually enjoy Arena at this point? I have two takeaways from my experience.
1. My dislike for planeswalkers is fully justified after playing current Standard.
2. The only use for Arena is a rules tool.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Does anyone actually enjoy Arena at this point? I have two takeaways from my experience.
1. My dislike for planeswalkers is fully justified after playing current Standard.
2. The only use for Arena is a rules tool.

It's even a garbage client that took me multiple days to install and still crashes about one s session

[Zoid]

Does anyone actually enjoy Arena at this point? I have two takeaways from my experience.
1. My dislike for planeswalkers is fully justified after playing current Standard.
2. The only use for Arena is a rules tool.

Well, if you don't have modo, then it's the only option currently.
At this point I would also rather not invest into modo.

A more general thing:
Does anyone else fell that their RNG is really bad.
I know that true randomness feels not random to humans but still.
It fells strange to have a lot of games drawing either no lands or flooding hard.
If I import a list, I cut 2-3 lands first.
I also get a lot of duplicates often in a sense that my hand consists of 2x same card + 3x other card.

As for the formats they, feel awful.
Cards are so powerful that you are so far behind if you don't handles them immediately, that you might as well give up.
The only "soothing" experience I have is playing mono B in Historic and imagining the opponents face once I drop an obliterator which know he can't handle.

[the Thin White Duke]

A more general thing:
Does anyone else fell that their RNG is really bad.
I know that true randomness feels not random to humans but still.
It fells strange to have a lot of games drawing either no lands or flooding hard.

100%
I was going to bring this up initially, but figured I'd be called a crack pot. I don't trust the RNG at all. Plus, I've heard that the game draws two opening hands and gives you the one with more land, or something to that effect.
I don't run into Mana screw often, but constantly get flooded.

[Zoid]

100%
I was going to bring this up initially, but figured I be called a conspiracy theorist. I don't trust the RNG at all. Plus, I've heard that the game draws two opening hands and gives you the one with more land, or something to that effect.
I don't run into Mana screw often, but constantly get flooded.

They only generate 2 hands in BO1. In BO3 it's just one.
You get the hand with a "better" land/spell mix.
That way they want to reduce non-games.

The whole crux of the game is that they want to make you play BO1 even though MTG is not designed to be played this way (so far).
In limited it more or less doesn't matter beside making you more susceptible to variance.
Since a lot of constructed strategies require dedicated hate, you either have to main stuff or just play decks that have at least a fair chance against everything.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

The ring in arena, I thought they admitted, is fixed to ensure you get a mix of lands and spells

[jmlima]

Does anyone actually enjoy Arena at this point? I have two takeaways from my experience.
1. My dislike for planeswalkers is fully justified after playing current Standard.
2. The only use for Arena is a rules tool.

Standard is what it is, it ebbs and flows with every rotation. Historic can become a pretty interesting format, but at this point in time it's totally in flux so who knows.

Overall I rate it as a positive experience, you can easily play what you want (from what is offered) for free and there are play modes to suit most people. It's also the only place where you get some form of compensation when you have cards that are banned (in the form of an equivalent number of wildcards and this, in the current ban-o-rama that MTG is, is a pretty good thing. I would dread to pay actual money for cards in MTGO and then see the decks banned and the cards reduced to a fraction of their value (been there a lot in modern). I'm also cheap, so the opportunity to have competitive play for free suits me just fine.

All in all, B+ so far.

As an aside, I think it gets a lot more flak than it deserves (as a client) but I also think the same thing from MTGO, so...

[jmlima]

The ring in arena, I thought they admitted, is fixed to ensure you get a mix of lands and spells

Not in Bo3. You can get mana flood and hands with no lands at all.

[jmlima]

Put Historic down as another great success story for MTG. After countless bans and suspensions we reach this stage:

'...With the format so warped around 2 archetypes, one necessitating main deck hate and another having no bad matchups over the course of the weekend when put to the test at the highest level, there needs to be changes. I am not qualified to make any suggestions on which cards need to be banned or what cards need to be added in an Anthology to help the format recover, but 60% of the metagame being held by 2 main archetypes isn’t healthy. A format requiring main deck hate cards and one deck making up 6 of the Top 8 spots isn’t great either. ...'

https://mtgazone.com/zendikar-rising-championship-meta-analysis-part-2-historic/

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

I finally got into playing Arena and holy shit is this client worse than mtgo. It's amazing.

[jmlima]

I finally got into playing Arena and holy shit is this client worse than mtgo. It's amazing.

I'm on the rather lonely side of actually liking the MTGO client, and of having done so since I started playing it some 6-8 years ago. I think arena has some advantages , but largely prefer the more professional application type of interface that MTGO offers. At this point though, you cannot really argue with free.

[mistercakes]

Been playing arena for a while. Only spent 5 bucks to start and have drafted more or less continuously. Sometimes I fall into a slump where I need to daily quest back up, but it's free and quick to play. Now I am pretty happy when I'm not playing paper and feel no need to play mtgo, which is a terrible client, even after 20 years.

[Tylert]

Been playing arena for a while. Only spent 5 bucks to start and have drafted more or less continuously. Sometimes I fall into a slump where I need to daily quest back up, but it's free and quick to play. Now I am pretty happy when I'm not playing paper and feel no need to play mtgo, which is a terrible client, even after 20 years.

It's pretty easy to go infinite indeed.
I draft once every two days and only goes 7-x two or three times during the season, but beetween the free drafts with gold and all the ones where you go 3/4/5-x You're never out of gems and the collection is growing.
When I don't draft I can allways go historic or standard.

[jmlima]

It's pretty easy to go infinite indeed.
I draft once every two days and only goes 7-x two or three times during the season, but beetween the free drafts with gold and all the ones where you go 3/4/5-x You're never out of gems and the collection is growing.
When I don't draft I can allways go historic or standard.

Indeed it is. There is still one thing that reached the point where I'm getting close to never again touching arena which is the fact that the engine coordinates your match-ups. Probably not a biggie when drafting, but in historic it makes it vile.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Indeed it is. There is still one thing that reached the point where I'm getting close to never again touching arena which is the fact that the engine coordinates your match-ups. Probably not a biggie when drafting, but in historic it makes it vile.

What do you mean?

[jmlima]

What do you mean?

https://draftsim.com/mtg-arena-matchmaking/#Exploits_and_Speculation_%E2%80%93_Is_it_Rigged_Broken_Does_it_Suck

[the Thin White Duke]

If anyone wants Kaldheim codes, send me a PM. I have 3 prerelease codes.

[jmlima]

Uro banned in Historic.

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/banned-and-restricted-preview-uro-banned-in-pioneer-modern-historic

All aboard the cats and cauldrons train!

[Tylert]

Uro banned in Historic.

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/banned-and-restricted-preview-uro-banned-in-pioneer-modern-historic

All aboard the cats and cauldrons train!

ANyway, I was bored getting my uro exile by the god of lies :)
But that seriously weakens the kinnan deck by removing an alt wincon

[TsumiBand]

I just started playing this on my phone today and I have noticed some things

1. The game needs to reconnect to the server a lot. It was smart of them to include this fact in the game's tutorial so I could be prepared for it to happen again later

2. There's no Lorwyn so there's no Kithkin. This bug almost caused me to delete the game but I held out

3. There are a bunch of active promo codes for free packs which I felt was pretty nice, not that 3 packs per set with 8 cards in each pack goes very far. I did get a couple mythics but since they aren't Kithkin I'm not sure what they do

4. Whoever decided that turning a card 15° was enough to indicate it's tapped needs to be defenestrated

I will keep playing because I'm a slut for f2p phone games and most other f2p TCGs have let me down (I can't get good at Shadowverse and Hearthstone lost its appeal when Baku and Genn totally fucked things up).

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

The glorious interface of arena kept taxing my graphics card (why?) so I finally uninstalled it from my phone. So far I bought a big RPG off steam to waste my time but we'll see if I reinstall once that finishes.

[Ace/Homebrew]

I just started playing this on my phone today and I have noticed some things...
I started playing last month, certain I would hate it. Turns out I love it...
Initially downloaded onto my wife's POS all-in-one, but it kept having thermal events and shutting down the computer. So I bought a tablet for $450... to play a free game... :confused:

I just about have Torbran fully built. I'll probably jump into Bo3 Standard when I'm finished. Also 40/60 cards towards Historic Izzet Phoenix, but someone decided Brainstorm and Faithless Looting are rares, so it'll take me a while to accumulate that many wildcards.

Mostly I'm just surprised how much I enjoy playing Standard. I'm positive it has more to do with the accessibility to play Magic than any real interest in Standard. I also think if I couldn't just play a pile of haste creatures and burn I would have dismissed it immediately.

[Purple Blood]

The glorious interface of arena kept taxing my graphics card (why?) so I finally uninstalled it from my phone. So far I bought a big RPG off steam to waste my time but we'll see if I reinstall once that finishes.

When I tried to play Arena on my laptop even on the absolutely lowest settings, it would eventually cause it to overheat and shutdown. Granted, its a relatively old device but you'd figure this application shouldn't be such a resource hog.

[Wrath of Pie]

When I tried to play Arena on my laptop even on the absolutely lowest settings, it would eventually cause it to overheat and shutdown. Granted, its a relatively old device but you'd figure this application shouldn't be such a resource hog.

It depends on your components, but the overheating is because the power settings are probably set at max performance.

I had to dig to find the system requirements:


Q. What are the system requirements to playing Magic: The Gathering Arena?

A. Minimum Requirements:
Processor: AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 5600+ or Equivalent
Graphics Card: GeForce GTX 8800 or Equivalent
RAM: 2 GB
Operating System: Windows 7

Recommend Requirements:
Processor: Intel Core2 Quad Q9300 @ 2.50GHz
Graphics Card: GeForce GTX 560
RAM: 4 GB
Operating System: Windows 10


Not exactly sure what the laptop equivalent to a desktop GTX 560 is, but that might be the issue.

[TsumiBand]

This game low- key reminds me of the Steam MtG game I played like 8 years ago, Duel of the Planeswalkers or some such. I always liked that game. After playing Hearthstone for a few years I've really come to appreciate a computer keeping track of the game state.

I think I found an issue with Foretell and disconnects though, I found I couldn't cast face-down spells for their Foretell cost if I exiled them prior to the disconnect. I'll have to see if it happens again I guess.

All in all this game is not too too bad. I think I plan on playing strictly little kid decks though, if there's one thing I can't stand it's a goddamned metagame.

I didn't see a way to play EDH yet, I will have to settle for Brawl I guess

[HdH_Cthulhu]

The glorious interface of arena kept taxing my graphics card (why?)

Happens alot for most card games. I thing there is some kind of bottleneck for all the HD images of the cards. Also the initial load time for the client with all their HD ads... Idk most of the time I alt+f4 and play something else.

But I played my fair share of Arena got to mythic330 but then I burnt out and never got into the grind again.

[morgan_coke]

I've ground up to Mythic a couple of times. It's really not worth it imho. Anymore I just play up to Platinum for the card styles then go mess around in the casual ques. Historic is a garbage town format right now, and Standard still suffers excessively from the last year of mistakes. It's just not remotely fun to play "who casts "i win" creature or spell first hur-dur-hur" in the ranked games.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

I've ground up to Mythic a couple of times. It's really not worth it imho. Anymore I just play up to Platinum for the card styles then go mess around in the casual ques. Historic is a garbage town format right now, and Standard still suffers excessively from the last year of mistakes. It's just not remotely fun to play "who casts "i win" creature or spell first hur-dur-hur" in the ranked games.

Good news about historic!

[morgan_coke]

Good news about historic!

That is good news. The article is kind of hilarious though. Like, the reason those decks "only" have a 51.5% winrate is because everyone is pre-boarded against them. I swear wotc isn't run by clowns, it's the entire damn circus.

EDIT: Honestly, half the shit in the strixhaven archive should have been pre-banned in historic. I mean, for fucks sake, Brainstorm AND Looting in a tiny format? And they're like "why is everyone playing red and blue?" Idiots is too kind a word.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

That is good news. The article is kind of hilarious though. Like, the reason those decks "only" have a 51.5% winrate is because everyone is pre-boarded against them. I swear wotc isn't run by clowns, it's the entire damn circus.

EDIT: Honestly, half the shit in the strixhaven archive should have been pre-banned in historic. I mean, for fucks sake, Brainstorm AND Looting in a tiny format? And they're like "why is everyone playing red and blue?" Idiots is too kind a word.

They have a 51% win rate because they play against other brainstorm decks 90% of the time. P Sully burst out laughing on the Odyssey episode of the resleevables when Cedric informed him that Brainstorm was legal but bolt was banned.

[Zoid]

That is good news. The article is kind of hilarious though. Like, the reason those decks "only" have a 51.5% winrate is because everyone is pre-boarded against them. I swear wotc isn't run by clowns, it's the entire damn circus.

EDIT: Honestly, half the shit in the strixhaven archive should have been pre-banned in historic. I mean, for fucks sake, Brainstorm AND Looting in a tiny format? And they're like "why is everyone playing red and blue?" Idiots is too kind a word.

Brainstorm only suspended while Time Warp is banned is hilarious.
Not to mention they didn't touch Looting which is a way worse for the meta.

The porting the mystical archive on arena was a stupid idea.
Most of the cards were either legal in historic anyway or are banned in literally every arena format so they are pointless.
I see the point of trying to keep parity with paper but some things just don't work and they should have just made those cards illegal in paper limited as well.
Probably they only did it to sell the cosmetic skins of the awful jap alts.

TBH I don't see were they are trying to go with historic.
With the collections they obviously try to force certain archetypes, they then introduce cards in the remasters that don't do the format any good either.
Not to mention it takes them ages to do something in the online only formats.
Maybe they want to get people back to playing standard by making historic and brawl suck ass ignoring that standards is even worse so people just stop playing all together.

[Purple Blood]

TBH I don't see were they are trying to go with historic.

Seems like its intended to be a curated, eternal format for their Arena client. Since its curated, the meta could end up being similar to Legacy, Modern, or Pioneer. They could also end up scrapping the entire format if and when they have all of Pioneer on Arena.

Its really anyone's guess but I like the idea of a curated non-rotating format. In theory, you could make an incredibly well-balanced meta game that way.

[Purple Blood]

It depends on your components, but the overheating is because the power settings are probably set at max performance.

I had to dig to find the system requirements:



Not exactly sure what the laptop equivalent to a desktop GTX 560 is, but that might be the issue.

Thanks. I only use the laptop when I travel but I'll have to remember to check into that setting next time.

[Wrath of Pie]

Thanks. I only use the laptop when I travel but I'll have to remember to check into that setting next time.
You might also have to make sure it's actually using the GPU and not the integrated graphics (I have had this problem with games before).


Seems like its intended to be a curated, eternal format for their Arena client. Since its curated, the meta could end up being similar to Legacy, Modern, or Pioneer. They could also end up scrapping the entire format if and when they have all of Pioneer on Arena.

Its really anyone's guess but I like the idea of a curated non-rotating format. In theory, you could make an incredibly well-balanced meta game that way.
Pioneer is unlikely to come on Arena because it would directly compete with Historic in the role of premier non-rotating format. (Also, they actually make money directly because of Historic, so why mess that up with Pioneer?)

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

You might also have to make sure it's actually using the GPU and not the integrated graphics (I have had this problem with games before).


Pioneer is unlikely to come on Arena because it would directly compete with Historic in the role of premier non-rotating format. (Also, they actually make money directly because of Historic, so why mess that up with Pioneer?)
They have said over and over their plan is for pioneer on arena

[Wrath of Pie]

They have said over and over their plan is for pioneer on arena
Do you really believe what they say?

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Do you really believe what they say?

Do I believe Wizards wants to put more products on their shiny flagship online money making tool? Yes.

[Wrath of Pie]

Do I believe Wizards wants to put more products on their shiny flagship online money making tool? Yes.
Pioneer and Historic likely can't coexist, so it's easier to pick one, and Historic it is. (Doesn't mean they won't add cards that are incidentally Pioneer-legal, but Pioneer also has the burden of the paper format holding it back. Doesn't help that Pioneer is effectively dead right now.)

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Pioneer and Historic likely can't coexist,

What is the evidence for this

[Phoenix Ignition]

I've been enjoying Historic to the extent that I don't hate it just long enough to finish my daily $$$ quests and then quit immediately after. Like most magic in the modern age, it's about finding a deck you enjoy playing and that's it. Can you play a deck you like? (y/n) Then you will/won't stomach playing Arena.

[Purple Blood]

What is the evidence for this

I think the implication is once Pioneer is on MTGA they cannot coexist. In any event, I disagree with that notion. Historic can be a curated quasi-Legacy format and Pioneer and be the eternal "FIRE" format. For obvious reasons, these could be completely different meta games.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

I think the implication is once Pioneer is on MTGA they cannot coexist. In any event, I disagree with that notion.
Yes that's what they're saying but there's no evidence of it being true.

[Wrath of Pie]

Magic historically has shown that the game can really only handle one high-prestige non-rotating format, and right now that's Historic.

Doesn't help that Pioneer is basically dead right now.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Magic historically has shown that the game can really only handle one high-prestige non-rotating format, and right now that's Historic.

Doesn't help that Pioneer is basically dead right now.

That isn't true and right now there two of them.
Commander and modern.

[Purple Blood]

Modern and Legacy coexisted for quite some time. Pioneer and Historic can easily become the MTGA version i.e. two non-rotating formats one being cards of the current design era and the other being the entire game's history.

And here's more evidence they are viewing Historic as the Legacy of MTGA:

https://i.imgur.com/jzqX10N.png

As an aside, this article was already taken down supposedly because it was meant to be published on Monday.

[Barook]

https://twitter.com/HipstersMTG/status/1419649764866641921

So Paper is still far more profitable than Digital. So no need to fear that WotC is going to abandon Paper for for Digital anytime soon.

[Zoid]

https://twitter.com/HipstersMTG/status/1419649764866641921

So Paper is still far more profitable than Digital. So no need to fear that WotC is going to abandon Paper for for Digital anytime soon.

There's actually so much in that 1 tweet, it's insane.

What kind of R&D do they need for a port to digital?
How is that more expensive then the R&D for paper/design in general?

What kind of clowns is running this whole operation?

[Zoid]

Also:

https://mtgazone.com/jumpstart-historic-horizons/

They are going to introduce all the crap nobody likes and can't be done in paper.
Congratz clowns of the coast.

[PirateKing]

Also:

https://mtgazone.com/jumpstart-historic-horizons/

They are going to introduce all the crap nobody likes and can't be done in paper.
Congratz clowns of the coast.

Ah those sweet sweet Microprose memories. I'm ready to cast Goblin Polka Band again!

[Purple Blood]

Also:

https://mtgazone.com/jumpstart-historic-horizons/

They are going to introduce all the crap nobody likes and can't be done in paper.
Congratz clowns of the coast.

All three of those mechanics are pretty cool. However, other than seek, I believe they could have effectively been paper mechanics as well.

[PirateKing]

All three of those mechanics are pretty cool. However, other than seek, I believe they could have effectively been paper mechanics as well.

Well, Perpetually tracking through zones would be impossible. A creature given Perpetual Deathtouch would still have it after a Terminus. Never knowing which one it is that you drew afterwards would be a challenge.

[Wrath of Pie]

https://twitter.com/HipstersMTG/status/1419649764866641921

So Paper is still far more profitable than Digital. So no need to fear that WotC is going to abandon Paper for for Digital anytime soon.

Paper is for Commander (prices even for Standard-legal cards are primarily influenced by Commander now, which is a sign) and Digital is for everything else, especially competitive Magic.

[Purple Blood]

Well, Perpetually tracking through zones would be impossible. A creature given Perpetual Deathtouch would still have it after a Terminus. Never knowing which one it is that you drew afterwards would be a challenge.

I agree. It's not that it could be executed exactly the same in paper but most of the time it would effectively be the same.

The only thing that can't be done effectively is do "random" this but who wants random anyway?

[wolfstorm]

Well, Perpetually tracking through zones would be impossible. A creature given Perpetual Deathtouch would still have it after a Terminus. Never knowing which one it is that you drew afterwards would be a challenge.

You would need a unique to the ability sticker that you could put on the front of the sleeve.

[Tylert]

I agree. It's not that it could be executed exactly the same in paper but most of the time it would effectively be the same.

The only thing that can't be done effectively is do "random" this but who wants random anyway?

By getting the first card in your library that does satisfy all criterias. Still abusable with something like brainstorm, so maybe starting bottom which is harder to do :)

[Barook]

http://mythicspoiler.com/jhh/cards/facelessagent.jpg

A shame this is an online only card. I would try that in Eldrazi Stompy otherwise since it works with Eye/Temple and generates card advantage. It could also grind value in combination with Displacer.

But since Seek pulls a random card that qualifies from the library without shuffling, we won't see it in Paper.

[Zoid]

http://mythicspoiler.com/jhh/cards/facelessagent.jpg

A shame this is an online only card. I would try that in Eldrazi Stompy otherwise since it works with Eye/Temple and generates card advantage. It could also grind value in combination with Displacer.

But since Seek pulls a random card that qualifies from the library without shuffling, we won't see it in Paper.

Seems like it's not revealed either, nor can you use "prevalent" in paper and expect anyone to believe you.

At least now we have an answer to the pioneer vs historic debate.
Historic gets the literal random garbage they pull out of their clown wigs.
Ironic given the names of the format.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

Because it's the computer doing it and not a person there's no need to reveal.

[TsumiBand]

As long as the effects are reasonable then I don't care if they need a computer to be executed or not. If it strays into the realm of effects like "bad Hearthstone RNG" where early game rng dictates the next several turns of board state then there is a real problem.

[Ronald Deuce]

Y'know, if you want to put mechanics into a physical AND digital game (mechanics that won't work in one of those versions), you can always design a new game.

[TsumiBand]

Y'know, if you want to put mechanics into a physical AND digital game (mechanics that won't work in one of those versions), you can always design a new game.

Meh, formats are an okay delimiter for these cards.

Historic was always intended to be Arena's clown fiesta format, as long as you can only play these cards in "non-serious" formats then it's not a big deal I don't think.

[morgan_coke]

As long as the effects are reasonable then I don't care if they need a computer to be executed or not. If it strays into the realm of effects like "bad Hearthstone RNG" where early game rng dictates the next several turns of board state then there is a real problem.

That's literally what Davriel's -2 ability is.

[theillest]

This feels like another cash grab at the expense of the game. I had hoped that Arena and paper would move towards unification as "remastered" sets are introduced. Jumpstart: Historic Horizons is a fork in that road so, short of banning the digital mechanic cards, that'll never happen.

[TsumiBand]

That's literally what Davriel's -2 ability is.

There is *some* randomness possible with his second ability but that is not what I am talking about. I really mean a very specific kind of RNG that a lot of HS players really despise and have been pretty vocal about.

It doesn't work the same way in Magic really, because the blocker generally has control over what blocks where, so it's hard to do a strict 1-to-1 comparison. The classic examples are things like early Knife Juggler or Flame Juggler using its ability to decide the board state. Since attackers choose blockers in Hearthstone, a well-placed Knife from either of those minions put the other player on the back foot for most of the early game because it means that you're either 2-for-1ing them early or trading in where you "shouldn't".

Davriel doesn't do this at all, it's a turn 4 play that has all of two random effects to choose from - return two random creatures from grave to hand and perpetually buff them, OR return a random creature with the highest CMC from your grave to the field. It has the word "random" in it but it isn't the kind of bad RNG I was referring to.

[jmlima]

...

At least now we have an answer to the pioneer vs historic debate.
Historic gets the literal random garbage they pull out of their clown wigs.
Ironic given the names of the format.

My .02$, I think we need to understand that Arena is supposed to be fun, randomness seems to be considered fun, crazy cards seem to be fun, etc. The last thing they want is a series of miracles styles decks fighting each other in a sea of boredom.

[Zoid]

My .02$, I think we need to understand that Arena is supposed to be fun, randomness seems to be considered fun, crazy cards seem to be fun, etc. The last thing they want is a series of miracles styles decks fighting each other in a sea of boredom.

The reason arena is not fun is the same why most more recent formats are not fun: They printed too many overpowered cards in the last years.
They've also done a shit job in regulating their formats with banning cards too late for ez$$$.

While magic has an intrinsic random characteristic (your lib/draw) most spells have a deterministic effect or at least one that can be skewed by deck building.
This keeps the probable board states in a reasonable and predictable set.
"True randomness" (effect literally does something random) gives both player little influence on the outcome.
While this seems more marketed to casuals who are "more likely to like randomness", I would doubt that that works.
Even casual players hate losing to an opponent who's just better at rolling dice instead of being a better player.
The only group I can see enjoying these mechanics are people, who secretly know that they are bad players but revel in the idea of taking games off better players by randoming them to death.

Another important point not yet brought up is the rules.
With a disparity between paper and digital maintaining a common rule set is going to be a nightmare.
You'd either have to make everything consistent even though cards are on different platforms or rules have to be updated every time cards are ported to arena.
Considering the quality of rules and wordings we got in the last years, I'm not looking forward to either.

[TsumiBand]

It's probably worth noting that the kind of RNG in Davriel at least is super easy to mitigate. "Return a random creature with the highest mana value" is dead simple to fix and if you were playing that card as a Spike then you already know how you'd attempt to maximize your returns. Returning two random creatures to your hand is first of all already an effect in the game on like two jank Innistrad green cards, so that's not even a new effect, the perpetual buff is definitely digital-only though.

If any of these effects revealed thus far are going to lead to the most pissing and moaning, it's going to be Tome of the Infinite. Only two things can happen off a card like this; the Tome player wins thanks to the effects they get and the opponent feels bad, or the Tome player gets a handful of junk that does nothing and they feel bad. Like, you're going to see games where the Tome player draws multiple Lightning Bolts and wins the game by going face, or because they staved off lethal thanks to drawing a Fog and turned the game around, and the opponent will say "I couldn't have played around that, fuck that card and fuck this game" and they'll be totally right.

[Zoid]

It's probably worth noting that the kind of RNG in Davriel at least is super easy to mitigate. "Return a random creature with the highest mana value" is dead simple to fix and if you were playing that card as a Spike then you already know how you'd attempt to maximize your returns. Returning two random creatures to your hand is first of all already an effect in the game on like two jank Innistrad green cards, so that's not even a new effect, the perpetual buff is definitely digital-only though.

If any of these effects revealed thus far are going to lead to the most pissing and moaning, it's going to be Tome of the Infinite. Only two things can happen off a card like this; the Tome player wins thanks to the effects they get and the opponent feels bad, or the Tome player gets a handful of junk that does nothing and they feel bad. Like, you're going to see games where the Tome player draws multiple Lightning Bolts and wins the game by going face, or because they staved off lethal thanks to drawing a Fog and turned the game around, and the opponent will say "I couldn't have played around that, fuck that card and fuck this game" and they'll be totally right.

You can literally play Momir:

https://mythicspoiler.com/jhh/cards/poolofvigorousgrowth.jpg

[Ronald Deuce]

Another important point not yet brought up is the rules.
With a disparity between paper and digital maintaining a common rule set is going to be a nightmare.
You'd either have to make everything consistent even though cards are on different platforms or rules have to be updated every time cards are ported to arena.
Considering the quality of rules and wordings we got in the last years, I'm not looking forward to either.

There's a mitigating factor, which is that Wizards already effectively does this by splitting the legal card pool into different formats both in paper and digital MtG. The trouble is that this set marks a sea change in the company's approach to new printings and the relationship between the two media. Rather than maintain cohesion, they'd rather print competing products. (I really shouldn't be surprised, I guess. Over the last two years Wizards has pretty much free-associated its product lineup.) Twenty-five years of failure to address the RL combined with digi-only "printings" that aren't complemented by paper-only printings makes it pretty clear which medium the company wants to maintain.

I don't play MTGO. I don't play Arena. I play the game my friend showed me in 1998. I play that game because I like that game; if they want me to play vidya instead, I'd rather play Total Annihilation, which remains unsurpassed.

If you want a game to be a different game, design a new game. It's not like it's Wizards of the Coast's job, or anything. They keep printing more and more elaborately useless cards. They print those cards on ass-paper nowadays. They ban cards whenever they see play for more than a weekend. Now, they're splitting cards between distinct and mutually exclusive platforms. I'm going to keep being That Guy and reiterate that the templating on Forgotten Realms: the Forgetting is slow-roasted festering dogshit. All these things show complete ignorance of lessons they claim they learned between 1993 and 2001.

[Zoid]

There's a mitigating factor, which is that Wizards already effectively does this by splitting the legal card pool into different formats both in paper and digital MtG. The trouble is that this set marks a sea change in the company's approach to new printings and the relationship between the two media. Rather than maintain cohesion, they'd rather print competing products. (I really shouldn't be surprised, I guess. Over the last two years Wizards has pretty much free-associated its product lineup.) Twenty-five years of failure to address the RL combined with digi-only "printings" that aren't complemented by paper-only printings makes it pretty clear which medium the company wants to maintain.

I don't play MTGO. I don't play Arena. I play the game my friend showed me in 1998. I play that game because I like that game; if they want me to play vidya instead, I'd rather play Total Annihilation, which remains unsurpassed.

If you want a game to be a different game, design a new game. It's not like it's Wizards of the Coast's job, or anything. They keep printing more and more elaborately useless cards. They print those cards on ass-paper nowadays. They ban cards whenever they see play for more than a weekend. Now, they're splitting cards between distinct and mutually exclusive platforms. I'm going to keep being That Guy and reiterate that the templating on Forgotten Realms: the Forgetting is slow-roasted festering dogshit. All these things show complete ignorance of lessons they claim they learned between 1993 and 2001.

I still maintain that arena should have been anything else then a port of paper.
The unique thing about magic is the many points of interactions you can take which translates horrible to digital.
They even killed of their decently successful line of duels of the pws for this.
Had it been something that just uses the magic IP and is decently related enough it would have probally fared better.
Maybe they concluded from the mtg:Tactics (anyone remember that lol?) stillbirth that it only works if it's paper but in digital.

I suppose the suits thought that the brand alone would carry it, which seems to be a fair assessment, but the question seems to be for how long.
If they move closer to Hearthstone, then why not play that (excluding Blizzard being a huge dumpster fire atm)?

Post covid the competition between paper and digital will also be a huge issue.
Why should you spend Friday nights in usually overcrowded rooms with people with dubious hygiene to play standard if you can do that any day of the week any time?
For people who want to play competitive, there's little reason to go to an LGS anymore.
Then the casual scene has to support their LGS completely because they also need the LGS.
Fragmentizing the community even further doesn't seem like a smart move.

[Purple Blood]

There's a variety of reasons why they will likely push competitive play toward digital; a primary reason being that its infinitely easier to watch a digital match as compared to a paper match.

[TsumiBand]

You can literally play Momir:

https://mythicspoiler.com/jhh/cards/poolofvigorousgrowth.jpg

I really think this will be less problematic than Tome, if only because Tome draws (conjures) cards while Pool here requires a card, and also, the whiff rate is probably way higher with Pool? Unless the random pool of creatures is known and curated to behave at a certain power level (Hearthstone does this, for better or for worse) then I'd say the Pool player is far less likely to profit.

Whiff rates and stolen games aside though these kinds of cards are generally terrible for the players because they always just leave someone feeling like they're on the wrong side of RNG and that their choices didn't matter. Like when someone loses because they're at 7 and their mono-green opponent gets (for example) Blistering Firecat off of Pool, that's just a stupid way to lose and there was probably nothing they could have done about that, especially in a Best of 1 game. It's random of a whole different order than luck-of-the-draw and it always feels bad for one player.

[Wrath of Pie]

Momir with actual cards rather than basic lands is interesting, although I am pretty sure that the appeal is for Momir Basic.

(BTW, Island is historically the worst basic in the format.)

[TsumiBand]

Looks like 100-card Historic Brawl is coming to Arena. So basically "we have EDH at home".

Also, lulz, since Perpetual effects are bad in a format where you're meant to have access to your commander, cards with perpetual effects are being monitored and cards with Davriel's name on them are already b&. Good.

I still think formats as delimiters for "only online" effects are fine and if they are smart enough to keep the stupidest ones out of formats that they just roflstomp, great. Tome of the Infinite is still gonna piss people off though, bet

One of the true things about these "Arena only" cards is that since there is no physical medium to consider, they will all almost certainly be subject to errata/nerfing/buffing. I foresee this to be the power level moderation of choice with whatever cards they introduce in this way.

[Zoid]

Probably wouldn't have noticed it earlier if a friend hadn't told me:

You can't search for cards from MH2 unless by name/text since it's not listed as expansion nor are the cards listed under the new jumpstart.
The interface just gets worse with every 15GB update.

It's also absolute clown shoes to introduce perpetual effects just after Historic Brawl, just to ban some of them and probably more later.
But Drannith Magistrate is too much.
How can anyone be expected to deal with a 2 mana 1/3?
It's double funny since they haven't even cared about the arena only formats since forever or there would be many more cards banned.

If Historic turns shit again and none of the Brawl formats are enjoyable in any form, I'm probably uninstalling.

[jmlima]

...
The interface just gets worse with every 15GB update.
...

Still cannot understand this, but the other card game is the same so I guess it's a unity thing.

[Zoid]

Still cannot understand this, but the other card game is the same so I guess it's a unity thing.

I think in this case it's general incompetence.
It seems like at least the desktop version buffers almost everything on startup which takes forever and requires that you have everything on disk.
Then they add all the stupid graphic effects over everything.
To me the also seem to have an issue with separating front-end from back-end.
For the longest time a new FNM game mode or shop change required an update instead of being a back-end thing.
Quality programming at it's finest.

[Zoid]

Little "exploit" I found for free wins:

Play something obviously counter heavy in Historic Brawl.

After being tired of losing to Golos all the time, I switched to Mono counters Baral.
Since the share of Golos has only increased, this was very good.
It appears, a lot of people who play Historic Brawl are: a) bad and b) only want to masturbate using their commander.
Most Golos players instantly concede before keeping a hand.
Generally, a lot of players concede after enough spells have been countered to run out their patience.
I had people concede who were ahead on the board while I was hellbent after using my last counter.
Almost every other deck I encountered was Winota and 5feri which are both winable.

[morgan_coke]

historic brawl has turned to shit remarkably fast, every time i que up with some fun commander casual thematic thing i just run into nothing but esika/golos idiots who win through sheer power differential. Would love to see those, teferi, the enchantress guy, and baral banned.
make it casual-ish again

[Zoid]

historic brawl has turned to shit remarkably fast, every time i que up with some fun commander casual thematic thing i just run into nothing but esika/golos idiots who win through sheer power differential. Would love to see those, teferi, the enchantress guy, and baral banned.
make it casual-ish again

Would be totally on board if Winota and Kinnan go to.

However, they didn't even ban Kennrith in regular Brawl until he rotated so my hopes are slim.
Even regular commander managed to ban Golos and is considering banning Kennrith.
Considering that Arena is tailored to casuals, it's amazing that they don't care about the casual formats at all.
Then again, it's WotC so eh.

[TsumiBand]

Golos is dumb as fuck, I can't believe it didn't get banned in Brawl.

I have no idea what is going on with Brawl but the last time I queued up people just conceded after 4-6 turns if it wasn't a blowout.

I'm a little kid so I'm playing Trelasarra right now, I've no idea if there's a broken version of the deck that people assume I'm playing so they concede or what, but people act like if the game hasn't been won on-board by turn 7 then it's best to flip the table. I guess I'm okay with that but I kinda prefer playing games out v0v

[TsumiBand]

Can I double-post to bitch about Tergrid? Cool, Tergrid sucks.

Had a match where half my deck was in my hand and I timed out while trying to scroll thru my 40ish card hand looking for an answer to the board state. I don't even know if I had one, if it was a real game of Magic I would have been able to evaluate the spell-to-shake ratio and try to get rid of Tergrid before her ability triggered off my discard. It's stupid that the UI can't handle a 40-card hand, I will never know if I needed to lose that game or not.

Like it's one thing if someone puts their own deck in their hand and had to suffer the trash UI to pull off a combo, but to get fucked over by it feels really bad. I'm actually not sure if this is a "fuck Tergrid" or "fuck the UI" post. Both I guess.

[Zoid]

Can I double-post to bitch about Tergrid? Cool, Tergrid sucks.

Had a match where half my deck was in my hand and I timed out while trying to scroll thru my 40ish card hand looking for an answer to the board state. I don't even know if I had one, if it was a real game of Magic I would have been able to evaluate the spell-to-shake ratio and try to get rid of Tergrid before her ability triggered off my discard. It's stupid that the UI can't handle a 40-card hand, I will never know if I needed to lose that game or not.

Like it's one thing if someone puts their own deck in their hand and had to suffer the trash UI to pull off a combo, but to get fucked over by it feels really bad. I'm actually not sure if this is a "fuck Tergrid" or "fuck the UI" post. Both I guess.

The interface sucks major ass.
Somehow they manage to make it even worse as time goes by.
Like how half of the tabs on the top left were disabled when you were in certain parts of the interface.
As you said, having lots of cards in hand/castable is a nightmare.
After 3 years they still haven't managed to make time limits for actions dynamic.
I remember in the beginning where you could time out while the game was resolving your triggers.
Quality programming.

[TsumiBand]

The interface sucks major ass.
Somehow they manage to make it even worse as time goes by.
Like how half of the tabs on the top left were disabled when you were in certain parts of the interface.
As you said, having lots of cards in hand/castable is a nightmare.
After 3 years they still haven't managed to make time limits for actions dynamic.
I remember in the beginning where you could time out while the game was resolving your triggers.
Quality programming.

I don't usually care tbh. It borrows a lot from Hearthstone, which is probably smart because IMHO I always liked how that game played. I don't even switch to Full Control mode, I don't care, most of the time I have no complaints about the interface.

A distant second complaint to my 40+ card hand issue might be that X spells/effects feel weird to get right. I had to cancel out the first couple of times I did an X spell, like I didn't believe I was casting it right or something. I think I also have doubts about exactly how to divide attackers between players and planeswalkers, like I think I've done it right and then the game is like "you must pick a thing to attack, fucko"

Any issues I have with the UI are pretty small next to losing because I literally can't sort the cards in my hand though

[the Thin White Duke]

How is Tibalt's Trickery still legal in Historic? This deck is so f'n mindless and I'm getting sick of playing against this 75% of the time.
Sorry, let me ask a better question; what kind of retard plays Tibalt's Trickery?

[Zoid]

How is Tibalt's Trickery still legal in Historic? This deck is so f'n mindless and I'm getting sick of playing against this 75% of the time.
Sorry, let me ask a better question; what kind of retard plays Tibalt's Trickery?

Half the decks in historic are mindless combo decks.
Since Historic isn't currently relevant for the "pro" circuit, WotC couldn't care less.
In classic WotC-style they have created a new cash cow just to mismanage or not-manage it to death.
Just like other online only formats like the Brawl formats or Pauper.

[jmlima]

It's just great, you don't play for 2 weeks then you open it up and:

new 52mb update, closes.
re-start, new 180mb update, closes.
re-open, new 1.4gb update, closes.
re-open, finally good to go.

[H]

It's just great, you don't play for 2 weeks then you open it up and:

new 52mb update, closes.
re-start, new 180mb update, closes.
re-open, new 1.4gb update, closes.
re-open, finally good to go.

I'd don't even want to think of how long it would take for me, I haven't opened Arena since the start of the year. I've gone in on board games this year, so I really don't spend any time on a computer at home.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

It's just great, you don't play for 2 weeks then you open it up and:

new 52mb update, closes.
re-start, new 180mb update, closes.
re-open, new 1.4gb update, closes.
re-open, finally good to go.

Same, lol. I picked it back up last week because I had an itch and after like two gigs of updates it turned out the deck I wanted to play needed like 8 more wildcards than I had and your can't turn mythic wc into rare so I ended up just grinding the dailies and logging off

[Wrath of Pie]

It's just great, you don't play for 2 weeks then you open it up and:

new 52mb update, closes.
re-start, new 180mb update, closes.
re-open, new 1.4gb update, closes.
re-open, finally good to go.

It's pretty sad that a 1.4 GB update seems normal nowadays, but that's the world we're in right now.

[jmlima]

It's pretty sad that a 1.4 GB update seems normal nowadays, but that's the world we're in right now.

Today's update: 4.94gb.

[Zoid]

Today's update: 4.94gb.

Low price for the banning of BS and Tibalt's Bullshit in Historic.

Also we really need the shitty hats and animations in the game otherwise it would be unplayable.

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

4 fucking gigs? I hope it remembers to delete itself when it's done. Sheesh..

[Wrath of Pie]

Low price for the banning of BS and Tibalt's Bullshit in Historic.

Also we really need the shitty hats and animations in the game otherwise it would be unplayable.
Also we have to make it look like we're working really hard, and we know that everyone just wants to see bigger numbers.

[Zoid]

Also we have to make it look like we're working really hard, and we know that everyone just wants to see bigger numbers.

5 gig has to be some real content, right? Right?

[PirateKing]

5 gig has to be some real content, right? Right?

Oh man, those particle effects when you cast that planeswalker, just.. wow, I mean, what else can be said? Sublime... and when it drops to 10 fps, I can really enjoy each moment like the living painting it was designed to be!

[FourDogsinaHorseSuit]

They really made a client worse than mtgo