Really?

Phillmoore

OMN can someone explain why when cast if one of the next cards is Reason the cards get drawn and they get full mana but then don’t get cast and the mana drains away.  Doesn’t mention that in txt.  Or have I missed something? 

Mainloop25

Cards don't get full mana. Their mana cost is reduced to zero. There is a big difference. When cards are drawn, they come into your hand with zero mana. 

Kinesia

I know everyone else hates it, but...


I want a limite of 1 MP per deck. 3 Mythics per deck. 5 rares per deck. Force people to use at least _one_ common/uncommon!

This does not fix the overall balance problem, but it's _faster_ than balancing everything by mana instead of rarity which is the true longterm solution we need.
Mythics and MPs can be -slighty- better by cost but it should be more about they give you options you don't otherwise have, instead of cheating the power curve.

Bought cards should be things like the Green Cat Lord, flashy things that some types of people would love, but doesn't make you automatically win.

Mainloop25

I actually think that's a pretty good idea, but I would only have such restrictions in certain PvP formats, not a hard rule across the game. 

ElvaanStride

Another option to what @Kinesia said is to give each rarity a value (1-5) and give Decks a limit.

You could adjust the limit (or ignore it) based on Event

shteev

Kludges and quick fixes is how over the last two years is how we've ended up where we are.

Kinesia

Absolutely shteev, but we've also asked for _different_ restrictions and options consistently. Peolpe have asked for pauper and a bunch of other things.
So people (here) are saying they like potentially having these restrictions but they'd prefer them limited to specific events, which makes it a new event limit _rather_ than a quick fix.

And, you will note, that I never said have this _instead_ of across the board balancing, I said do this and then still keep doing the long term balancing because that is the important part.

(But if pricing "polciies" are developed the balancing things by cost becomes "ok, 80 percent of the cards are now costed, lets look at the last 20 individually and tweak them" and you can still be guided by paper, the policies won't be identical but when a particular type of card is costed different in paper there is usually a reason and that _reason_ might follow over even if it's not identically transferable. But costing things properly, not 1 by 1, but by working out proper general prices for effects, then suddenly a large amount of the work in adding new sets is simplified.)

I'm not asking solely for quick fixes. I'm asking for a board long term project with defined long term benefits and cost reductions, and sure, something quick and easy on the side. But I will absolutely not give up the long term project.


But in terms of current event design you couldl have nodes with "Play 5 commons" and/or "Play 1 or less Mythics and Masterpieces", and that wouldn't be very hard at all, it probably wouldn't be the same people who have to do the design work to balance the cards.

Ohboy

shteev said:

Kludges and quick fixes is how over the last two years is how we've ended up where we are.

Very meta. 

shteev

Ohboy said:

shteev said:

Kludges and quick fixes is how over the last two years is how we've ended up where we are.

Very meta. 

Maybe I shouldn't post on the forums when I've just woken up in the morning

sutoLkcalB

@bken1234
No I am talking about my match - because if I have to look at a cascade of gem combination and the opponent playing card after card - I am not playing anymore but watching. This is not gaming anymore.
And that is my point.

All,
MTGPQ has many differences to paper MTG - one is the gem combinations for mana production.
So a strategic item is left out - because we depend more on luck here. Still in paper Magic you could have bad luck  and draw not enough land cards. But most times - because certain mana producing cards are banned/restricted/whatever - in paper magic you will have time to react to what your opponent is doing.
This missing strategic item in MTGPQ is countered by giving the human player the first move, making the "AI" dumb and deliberately avoiding 5 gem combinations. This will let the human players win very often - but I think that is the wrong way. Where is the fun when I know I will win. And I will be even more angry in the rare cases where I lose, because I am not used to lose a match.

There are other missing features - for example there are no instants in MTGPQ which allows more combinations to result in loops or similar. You can not simply counter cards. (For good reasons - the game play would probably slow down drastically) 

Bottom line is that MTGPQ starts off with some drawbacks regarding game play. The ideas and proposals regarding deck restrictions or special formats of events should be considered by the persons responsible for the overall game play.

Kinesia

sutoLkcalB said:

@bken1234
No I am talking about my match - because if I have to look at a cascade of gem combination and the opponent playing card after card - I am not playing anymore but watching. This is not gaming anymore.
And that is my point.

All,
MTGPQ has many differences to paper MTG - one is the gem combinations for mana production.
So a strategic item is left out - because we depend more on luck here. Still in paper Magic you could have bad luck  and draw not enough land cards. But most times - because certain mana producing cards are banned/restricted/whatever - in paper magic you will have time to react to what your opponent is doing.
This missing strategic item in MTGPQ is countered by giving the human player the first move, making the "AI" dumb and deliberately avoiding 5 gem combinations. This will let the human players win very often - but I think that is the wrong way. Where is the fun when I know I will win. And I will be even more angry in the rare cases where I lose, because I am not used to lose a match.

There are other missing features - for example there are no instants in MTGPQ which allows more combinations to result in loops or similar. You can not simply counter cards. (For good reasons - the game play would probably slow down drastically) 

Bottom line is that MTGPQ starts off with some drawbacks regarding game play. The ideas and proposals regarding deck restrictions or special formats of events should be considered by the persons responsible for the overall game play.

There could be different things come up with that prevent some of the current unstoppable things. Marvel Puzzle Quest has some really weird power implementations, but some of them are potentially useful things to look at. (And since it's still D3Go hopefully we can talk about it).

Like, changing the chances of particular colours appearing from the top, or stopping gems from being changed except by matching, or all kinds of stuff.


Even here. the void gems annoyed me but they were _interesting_ and probably not fully explored as a design space. There are _other_ forms of control that can be added. Other supports or activated gems that can be added, like...
How about a blue counterspell on an activated green gem that says "If the enemy matches this their turn ends before playing any more cards", to stop green cascades.

There is far more design space here still. All the blue counterspells taking mana off the first card? That's _terribly_ boring and uncreative but it doesn't _have_ to stay like that.

blacklotus

@kinesia there are indeed many keywords introduced over the past sets that are not fully explored or implemented well.

A good example is Meld: except for Gisela, the other 5 cards with Meld aren't even worth to include in one's decks. And even the Melded critters aren't really better than the unmelded counterparts either.

So an important keyword for the SoI block has only 6 cards with Meld, 5 of which are useless, and their Melded entities are not that good anyway. 

Sirchombli

This is such a strange conundrum. Masterpieces, when rolled out in paper, were just super fancy chase variants. They weren't even standard legal unless they were already in the set. In this game they're either backbreakingly ridiculous or a waste of pixels. It's also weird that there's a pretty noticeable difference in power level between the two blocks. I like them because I like broken cards, but I think they were a mistake. They're not too common in the wild, and most really aren't that big of a deal, but some can swing the game on their own. I think they're the biggest offenders of being imbalanced. Not even compared to the base cards, but amongst themselves. Like, who did a happy dance when they pulled a gauntlet? I bet everybody did a little jig when they got omniscience, even if it was a mental jig. 

Ohboy

Thoughtlace vs black lotus.

For a real life experience, just open alpha booster. 

blacklotus

Sirchombli said:

This is such a strange conundrum. Masterpieces, when rolled out in paper, were just super fancy chase variants. They weren't even standard legal unless they were already in the set. In this game they're either backbreakingly ridiculous or a waste of pixels. It's also weird that there's a pretty noticeable difference in power level between the two blocks. I like them because I like broken cards, but I think they were a mistake. They're not too common in the wild, and most really aren't that big of a deal, but some can swing the game on their own. I think they're the biggest offenders of being imbalanced. Not even compared to the base cards, but amongst themselves. Like, who did a happy dance when they pulled a gauntlet? I bet everybody did a little jig when they got omniscience, even if it was a mental jig. 

I admit I did a little jig when I pulled my Omniscience.

Then subsequently I found I am better off running a simple cycling deck. As my football coach used to yell at me: KISS - keep it simple stupid. 

wereotter

blacklotus said:

@kinesia there are indeed many keywords introduced over the past sets that are not fully explored or implemented well.

A good example is Meld: except for Gisela, the other 5 cards with Meld aren't even worth to include in one's decks. And even the Melded critters aren't really better than the unmelded counterparts either.

So an important keyword for the SoI block has only 6 cards with Meld, 5 of which are useless, and their Melded entities are not that good anyway. 

Eldritch Moon was the only set in the block with meld and it only had 6 cards with the mechanic. They included all the cards that exist

The main issue, as I see it, was that the other 5 cards were over priced. Hanweir Garrison wouldn't have been so bad with a lower mana cost. 

Kinesia

wereotter said:

blacklotus said:

@kinesia there are indeed many keywords introduced over the past sets that are not fully explored or implemented well.

A good example is Meld: except for Gisela, the other 5 cards with Meld aren't even worth to include in one's decks. And even the Melded critters aren't really better than the unmelded counterparts either.

So an important keyword for the SoI block has only 6 cards with Meld, 5 of which are useless, and their Melded entities are not that good anyway. 

Eldritch Moon was the only set in the block with meld and it only had 6 cards with the mechanic. They included all the cards that exist

The main issue, as I see it, was that the other 5 cards were over priced. Hanweir Garrison wouldn't have been so bad with a lower mana cost. 

The main issue, as I see it, is that with no trading they lose the main appeal they had in paper, you can't be the type of person who really really wants to transfer them (like I am) and actually _chase_ them... I have half of multiples but alsmot _zero_ chance of getting the others, even back at the time.

They don't work here because this lacks one major part of paper.

Ohboy

Kinesia said:

wereotter said

blacklotus said:

@kinesia there are indeed many keywords introduced over the past sets that are not fully explored or implemented well.

A good example is Meld: except for Gisela, the other 5 cards with Meld aren't even worth to include in one's decks. And even the Melded critters aren't really better than the unmelded counterparts either.

So an important keyword for the SoI block has only 6 cards with Meld, 5 of which are useless, and their Melded entities are not that good anyway. 

Eldritch Moon was the only set in the block with meld and it only had 6 cards with the mechanic. They included all the cards that exist

The main issue, as I see it, was that the other 5 cards were over priced. Hanweir Garrison wouldn't have been so bad with a lower mana cost. 

The main issue, as I see it, is that with no trading they lose the main appeal they had in paper, you can't be the type of person who really really wants to transfer them (like I am) and actually _chase_ them... I have half of multiples but alsmot _zero_ chance of getting the others, even back at the time.

They don't work here because this lacks one major part of paper.

Melding didn't work because it was a penalty, not a bonus. I don't think there's any melded creature that's better than having the two halves stay separate. 

Kinesia

Ohboy said:

Kinesia said:

wereotter said

blacklotus said:

@kinesia there are indeed many keywords introduced over the past sets that are not fully explored or implemented well.

A good example is Meld: except for Gisela, the other 5 cards with Meld aren't even worth to include in one's decks. And even the Melded critters aren't really better than the unmelded counterparts either.

So an important keyword for the SoI block has only 6 cards with Meld, 5 of which are useless, and their Melded entities are not that good anyway. 

Eldritch Moon was the only set in the block with meld and it only had 6 cards with the mechanic. They included all the cards that exist

The main issue, as I see it, was that the other 5 cards were over priced. Hanweir Garrison wouldn't have been so bad with a lower mana cost. 

The main issue, as I see it, is that with no trading they lose the main appeal they had in paper, you can't be the type of person who really really wants to transfer them (like I am) and actually _chase_ them... I have half of multiples but alsmot _zero_ chance of getting the others, even back at the time.

They don't work here because this lacks one major part of paper.

Melding didn't work because it was a penalty, not a bonus. I don't think there's any melded creature that's better than having the two halves stay separate. 

Grin. But that just means you aren't completely the type of person it's designed for... Meld isn't made for people who want power or want to win, it's for people who want to do something really silly and/or cool!

For me _melding_ is the aim, if I lose the game after that then that is still just fine.

The problem is the cards can't get to the right people who that particualar type of card was designed for.

Ohboy

Kinesia said:

Ohboy said:

Kinesia said:

wereotter said

blacklotus said:

@kinesia there are indeed many keywords introduced over the past sets that are not fully explored or implemented well.

A good example is Meld: except for Gisela, the other 5 cards with Meld aren't even worth to include in one's decks. And even the Melded critters aren't really better than the unmelded counterparts either.

So an important keyword for the SoI block has only 6 cards with Meld, 5 of which are useless, and their Melded entities are not that good anyway. 

Eldritch Moon was the only set in the block with meld and it only had 6 cards with the mechanic. They included all the cards that exist

The main issue, as I see it, was that the other 5 cards were over priced. Hanweir Garrison wouldn't have been so bad with a lower mana cost. 

The main issue, as I see it, is that with no trading they lose the main appeal they had in paper, you can't be the type of person who really really wants to transfer them (like I am) and actually _chase_ them... I have half of multiples but alsmot _zero_ chance of getting the others, even back at the time.

They don't work here because this lacks one major part of paper.

Melding didn't work because it was a penalty, not a bonus. I don't think there's any melded creature that's better than having the two halves stay separate. 

Grin. But that just means you aren't completely the type of person it's designed for... Meld isn't made for people who want power or want to win, it's for people who want to do something really silly and/or cool!

For me _melding_ is the aim, if I lose the game after that then that is still just fine.

The problem is the cards can't get to the right people who that particualar type of card was designed for.

That was exactly the problem. I would meld and then lose. And I think I'm the target audience. I tinker with cards a lot. It's fun the first few times...then you remember the goal is to win.