Energy Mechanic is slow/dull

mrixl2520

After saving up for Dovan and putting together an energy deck, I am very unimpressed/dissapointed with the way it played. Granted, my pull of good energy cards is pretty lackluster, but what is more distressing is that I could build a better white/blue deck out of non-energy cards. The Energy mechanic is simply not explosive enough. A card that puts 2 energy on the board does not give you a very good chance of reaping the energy, and there are a couple of reasons I’ve noticed:

1) The AI tends to go for it. This is doubly bad because…
2) The energy rarely lands on your planeswalker colors.

These two issues basically mean your opponent is getting better mana then you while disabling your strategy. If you’re lucky enough that some of your energy survives the AI’s turn, you have the option of going for mana or going for an energy. In my experience, it seems going for mana is the better choice as you will get out creatures and spells rather than rely on the existing cards in play. And if I’m not going for the energy, why would I play those cards in the first place?

One of my biggest gripes with the game is when cards stray too far from their paper counterparts. I was happy to see the PQ Kaladesh cards match pretty close to paper (Except for poor Thriving Rhino!), and I thought the sameness of the energy yields would be fine. However, after playing with the energy cards for a few games I found energize 2 does almost nothing to an empty board. Its not until 4 or 5 energy are available that you might get a cascade of energy. Overload 1 is somewhat do-able, overload 2 I’ve done only a small handful of times. I don’t even play with overload 3, that just seems impossible, considering.

I think cards that energize need to energize significantly more, possibly twice as much. Or they should only land on your colors so that if the AI grabs them they’re maybe getting cut on mana.