The Baral Nerf.

Gunmix25

shteev said:

Gunmix25 said:

AngelForge said:

I wonder what happens, when he enter the battlefield. I haven't noticed any comment on that or have I overseen it?

Nothing happens when he hits the battlefield. 

Whoah, wait a second! Read this carefully: It doesn't say anything about changing what happens when he hits the battlefield.

From the update thread: We are making a change to Baral, Chief of Compliance: He now gives 4 mana to each spell in your hand at the beginning of your turn, instead of giving mana to a spell when you draw it. This change will remove the infinite cycling ability Baral has while keeping his strong affinity for spells.We also explored removing the card draw from it, but it would change the card too much. We still want it to be a major spell driver and help you cycle your spells, and if we removed the draw it would lose a lot of it’s potential.

The card’s cost will remain unaffected.

Actually the omission thereof says that it no longer exists. For example, why state that the cost will not change or emphasize that the drawing effect will remain the same if nothing was going to be changed? In short, by your theory they simply needed not to say a word to imply that there were no changes made to those facets of the card. But they didn't, and took the time to clarify what was going to change and what didn't by stating what the card was going to do when it was played. But in all fairness of this discussion, could Brigby or someone else post what the final text of Baral 2.0 will be? Sorry, I have no idea how to tag someone in here. Apologies.  

shteev

Gunmix25 said:

shteev said:

Gunmix25 said:

AngelForge said:

I wonder what happens, when he enter the battlefield. I haven't noticed any comment on that or have I overseen it?

Nothing happens when he hits the battlefield. 

Whoah, wait a second! Read this carefully: It doesn't say anything about changing what happens when he hits the battlefield.

From the update thread: We are making a change to Baral, Chief of Compliance: He now gives 4 mana to each spell in your hand at the beginning of your turn, instead of giving mana to a spell when you draw it. This change will remove the infinite cycling ability Baral has while keeping his strong affinity for spells.We also explored removing the card draw from it, but it would change the card too much. We still want it to be a major spell driver and help you cycle your spells, and if we removed the draw it would lose a lot of it’s potential.

The card’s cost will remain unaffected.

Actually the omission thereof says that it no longer exists. For example, why state that the cost will not change or emphasize that the drawing effect will remain the same if nothing was going to be changed? In short, by your theory they simply needed not to say a word to imply that there were no changes made to those facets of the card. But they didn't, and took the time to clarify what was going to change and what didn't by stating what the card was going to do when it was played. But in all fairness of this discussion, could Brigby or someone else post what the final text of Baral 2.0 will be? Sorry, I have no idea how to tag someone in here. Apologies.  

I think you're making an assumption there. I have learned not to make assumptions about d3 announcements. Remember how we all interpretted this rather hilarious summation of the 1.10.2 update?

Cthulhu said:

Hey all,

Overall we have been listening to everyone's comments and are trying some new things out in an attempt to address the great feedback we have been accumulating. We play Magic a lot at the office both the cards and the app, and we have added some Magic TCG related things to the app that we are excited to finally talk about.

First we have the Masterpiece cards for high level players, that are both devastating and a new fun thing to chase. The new currency is there to help with the collection of Rares, Mythics and now Masterpieces. This new currency mirrors Planeswalker tokens from the card game events. Not only will the Masterpiece cards be purchaseable with the new currency, but they are also rewards in events etc, so keep an eye out for these cards!!

Second we have made improvements to events to the rewards and we have reduced the amount of players in each event to give players more opportunities to achieve high ranks in the events.

Third the card packs we have done some balance tweaking to help reduce the amount of duplicates and give the player a higher chance at obtaining rare cards.

We will be monitoring the feedback coming in for anyone that has any questions today. Feel free to comment in the forums, and we will do our best to provide answers.

Thank you!
Cthulhu

Mainloop25

Still waiting for masterpieces to be event rewards... 

Gunmix25

shteev said:

Gunmix25 said:

shteev said:

Gunmix25 said:

AngelForge said:

I wonder what happens, when he enter the battlefield. I haven't noticed any comment on that or have I overseen it?

Nothing happens when he hits the battlefield. 

Whoah, wait a second! Read this carefully: It doesn't say anything about changing what happens when he hits the battlefield.

From the update thread: We are making a change to Baral, Chief of Compliance: He now gives 4 mana to each spell in your hand at the beginning of your turn, instead of giving mana to a spell when you draw it. This change will remove the infinite cycling ability Baral has while keeping his strong affinity for spells.We also explored removing the card draw from it, but it would change the card too much. We still want it to be a major spell driver and help you cycle your spells, and if we removed the draw it would lose a lot of it’s potential.

The card’s cost will remain unaffected.

Actually the omission thereof says that it no longer exists. For example, why state that the cost will not change or emphasize that the drawing effect will remain the same if nothing was going to be changed? In short, by your theory they simply needed not to say a word to imply that there were no changes made to those facets of the card. But they didn't, and took the time to clarify what was going to change and what didn't by stating what the card was going to do when it was played. But in all fairness of this discussion, could Brigby or someone else post what the final text of Baral 2.0 will be? Sorry, I have no idea how to tag someone in here. Apologies.  

I think you're making an assumption there. I have learned not to make assumptions about d3 announcements. Remember how we all interpretted this rather hilarious summation of the 1.10.2 update?

Cthulhu said:

Hey all,

Overall we have been listening to everyone's comments and are trying some new things out in an attempt to address the great feedback we have been accumulating. We play Magic a lot at the office both the cards and the app, and we have added some Magic TCG related things to the app that we are excited to finally talk about.

First we have the Masterpiece cards for high level players, that are both devastating and a new fun thing to chase. The new currency is there to help with the collection of Rares, Mythics and now Masterpieces. This new currency mirrors Planeswalker tokens from the card game events. Not only will the Masterpiece cards be purchaseable with the new currency, but they are also rewards in events etc, so keep an eye out for these cards!!

Second we have made improvements to events to the rewards and we have reduced the amount of players in each event to give players more opportunities to achieve high ranks in the events.

Third the card packs we have done some balance tweaking to help reduce the amount of duplicates and give the player a higher chance at obtaining rare cards.

We will be monitoring the feedback coming in for anyone that has any questions today. Feel free to comment in the forums, and we will do our best to provide answers.

Thank you!
Cthulhu

No offense meant,  but i don't think this is a good comparison. I believe the "assumptions" you're referring to is masterpieces being rewards and the reduction of duplicates? While I know masterpieces have yet to be a prize,  they have taken steps to reduce duplicates in large packs.  But have yet to fix this problem on the low end, but honestly I think that's tinykitty to expect the latter,  whilst I get duplicates happen because they are emulating a card pack system similar to paper... I can guarantee you at any MTG event you're gonna see people gripe about dupes. It's part of the game and sadly it really bites for those who have literally 75% or greater of any set.  Chances not getting a dupes decreases with each and every gain of a non-dupe card. To me that's balance, to ask Devs to circumvent that is borderine cheating imho. 

Back to the comparison, your comparison still states what they planned to do but did not.. for Game format.  In my case I am simply providing the info there is about the new Baral CARD, there is no info given about entering a battlefield and the info given was to replace all text. There's nothing here to compare unless after the update Baral does something different from what they said, like only "provide mana once per spell at the beginning of your turn, when that spell receives mana from Baral it gains immunity from Baral and cannot receive any more mana this way." Well then, you sir, would be vindicated and correct.  That said,  let's just wait and see how things go. I'm game.  Pun intended

Volrak

Gunmix25 said:

While I agree that the present Baral with the loop needed fixing. But I vehemently disagree that his new version is weaker than many are believing him to be in other threads.  This 4 mana given to EVERY spell in hand at the beginning of EVERY turn  EVERY time makes him more of a powerful shotgun card, for almost every other turn a player can release huge amounts of 8 mana spells or even those with a little higher cost that are paid with the additional mana earned from swapping. This will essentially create small yet powerful loops of effects to occur in the hands of a good player. Baral being nerfed from a one time 3 mana to a spell to a 4 mana to a spell every turn is huge imho. Thoughts?

I've said it before - post-"Nerf" Baral is possibly the most powerful blue creature in the game.

Gunmix25

Volrak:

I've said it before - post-"Nerf" Baral is possibly the most powerful blue creature in the game.

With the potential to push out 28 mana at the maximum if 7 potential spells were in hand... and could do it again the next turn. Is powerful indeed

Matthew

Gunmix25 said:

Volrak:

I've said it before - post-"Nerf" Baral is possibly the most powerful blue creature in the game.

With the potential to push out 28 24 mana at the maximum if 7 6 potential spells were in hand... and could do it again the next turn. Is powerful indeed

Gunmix25

Apologies and thank you for the correction.  Regardless of the error. It's still a powerful effect.

Matthew

I completely agree. I think this iteration of Baral will be a better card. I'm glad they didn't make the money I spent on him a wasted expense.

EDHdad

As I understand it, the point isn't to Nerf Baral into the ground, but to prevent the AI from taking a 10 minute turn looping 3-mana spells.  New Baral is powerful, but you can also interact with him.  The decks playing new Baral are likely to be stronger decks.  They will have things like Engulf the Shore, rather than things like Artificier's Epiphany. 

morgue427

if we can get the update that is

Gunmix25

Better to wait for something that was triple checked for issues than not, IMHO. 

Gunmix25

Matthew said:

I completely agree. I think this iteration of Baral will be a better card. I'm glad they didn't make the money I spent on him a wasted expense.

This is my thought about the change too, and this also provides more value to those hard to play spells. So in essence he's a bit more valuable and definitely worth the price if you take that into account. 

Gunmix25

EDHdad said:

 The decks playing new Baral are likely to be stronger decks.  They will have things like Engulf the Shore, rather than things like Artificier's Epiphany. 

Bingo! And maybe we can see how paradoxical outcome card works! Lol

wereotter

Gunmix25 said:

EDHdad said:

 The decks playing new Baral are likely to be stronger decks.  They will have things like Engulf the Shore, rather than things like Artificier's Epiphany. 

Bingo! And maybe we can see how paradoxical outcome card works! Lol

It's a fun card. I made a deck around that, with creatures like Experimental Aviator and Whirler Rogue. Bounce them back to hand, give them mana, ETB for more thopters. Not hard to pull off, but the AI is unlikely to play it right. 

Mainloop25

I've seen a nasty deck with PaOutcome that used startled awake and a bunch of bounce creatures. It didn't do a lot of damage because the AI doesn't know how to use a deck like that, but it was hard to beat. 

Gunmix25

wereotter said:

Gunmix25 said:

EDHdad said:

 The decks playing new Baral are likely to be stronger decks.  They will have things like Engulf the Shore, rather than things like Artificier's Epiphany. 

Bingo! And maybe we can see how paradoxical outcome card works! Lol

It's a fun card. I made a deck around that, with creatures like Experimental Aviator and Whirler Rogue. Bounce them back to hand, give them mana, ETB for more thopters. Not hard to pull off, but the AI is unlikely to play it right. 

Huh, what do you know... serves me right for not taking a second look at that card.  I overlooked that non-token wording. Kudos for sharing your experience.  I think I will give this a try after the update

Gunmix25

Mainloop25 said:

I've seen a nasty deck with PaOutcome that used startled awake and a bunch of bounce creatures. It didn't do a lot of damage because the AI doesn't know how to use a deck like that, but it was hard to beat. 

I wish I had startled awake, but I try to make do without it.  So a question,  could you give an example of what a bounce creature is? Still kind of new to this forum's terminologies.  

morgue427

lashwood lurker or harbringer of the tides when it comes out it sends one of your creatures back to your hand, i tried pa outcome also hard to power but could be usedful to save your creatures in baral perhaps

Gunmix25

morgue427 said:

lashwood lurker or harbringer of the tides when it comes out it sends one of your creatures back to your hand, i tried pa outcome also hard to power but could be usedful to save your creatures in baral perhaps

Thanks for the clarification.  I was initially thinking that the act of "bouncing" was being applied to one's own creatures for one effect or another.... in truth PA Outcome kind of does that. But your explanation made it a ton more sense. Which got me thinking more about Baral 2.0. Due to his free 4 mana every turn for any spells in hand,  he essentially is a strategic 'failsafe' of sorts in deck builds. For example,  I've a deck I've created for Dovin to be used after the update that will have Consulate crackdown in the back ground being loaded round after round by Baral while I play other lower cost spells and creatures.  I can always shift the card more to the top to gather some mana from swapping to speed things along if needed,  (I REALLY wish I had startled awake here,  but pfft as if I'll ever get one.  Lol) and from my experience playing, the number of rounds in which supports can often begin to overwhelm a match leading to a lock against me usually occurs in 6 or less rounds when playing against the AI. So... C. Crackdown is turned on and played, wiping out all of my opponent's supports. Wash and repeat. Keep in mind while this is loading, he's loading other spells in hand at the same time. So my point is that I think we could see a lot of Baral 2.0 decks utilizing this concept of a high cost failsafe card being built into the deck. It's simple to do so and with the knowledge that Baral can assist in its activation freeing you up to pay for other and more immediate cards via swapping. I.e. of more failsafe cards: Engulf the Shore, Nissa's Renewal, Nissa's revelation, Season's Past, or more common cards that are turned off to build up their awaken cost, like Rolling thunder and etc.