The Big Three

wickedwitch74

Sarkhan (III)
Tamiyo
Nicol Bolas (I)

There are other threads out there discussing the merits of updating/improving old walkers, and I am very much on board with this. 

My thread, however, is a question to the game designers, and those that help implement Sarkhan & Tamiyo.

Last week, I played 44 matches in Trial of the Planes (I lost four games on my way to completion). In those 44 matches, I was paired against one of these "Big Three" 37 times.

We all have our favorite walkers, and many of my favorite decks are designed around some of the lesser played PWs. I certainly try to mix it up during Training Grounds and most of the PvE events.

However, my opponents in the most demanding and competitive events have become pretty familiar faces. The "Big Three" show up a lot.

My question is, how do you intend to balance future mono-color Planeswalkers to give them a fighting chance against these three monsters? Having access to a third color, and especially blue, makes Tamiyo, Sarkhan and Bolas far more powerful than other walkers. 

It seems to me that competitive balance needs to be addressed. Koth and Elspeth approach this by producing huge gains for their single color identity. Scaling up the power of their abilities might also make these PW's more attractive and competitive.

Ampersand

Funny this came up, because I was one of those people running Tamiyo, Sarkhan3, and Bolas1 during the last event. I'm in a competitive Coalition that aims for top 25 finishes but regularly is on the fringes of the top 10 in most events, occasionally breaking into the top 10. Like @wickedwitch74 , some of my favorite decks use "lesser" PWs, but it's hard to NOT use one of the Big 3 ( I would add Bolas2 aka Boris to this mix) in competitive coalition events. The only two-colored PWs I regularly see run by top players are Kiora and Teferi. Add to this that there is a THIRD BOLAS coming with this set, and soon it will be feasible to run all tri-colored walkers in a 5 node event.

Something needs to be done to make the dual and ESPECIALLY mono PWs more attractive. The game gets stale when the meta gets stale, and this glut of powerful tri-color PWs is contributing to this state.

wickedwitch74

Agreed, and I'm not immune either. I shamelessly run those PWs all the time. The only anomaly is that I use an old Ajani HUF/Deploy deck in TotP on Mondays and Thursdays. 

Mburn7

The issue is the way multicolors are handled in MTGPQ.

In paper, the more colors you run the more complicated your mana base is, making it more difficult to make work.
In paper, the more colors a card has the harder it is to cast, allowing it to be more powerful at a cheaper cost.

In MTGPQ, a multicolor card can be used by any walker with any single one of its colors, and the manabase is the same for everyone.  That eliminates the checks on multicolor power from paper and allows you to use the increased power level multicolor cards without downside.

Unfortunately, there's no real way to balance this without inherently changing the nature of the game.  Increasing the mana gains of all mono colored (and to a lesser extent dual color) walkers would be a start, but certainly not a perfect solution.  Really, multicolor walkers should have been designed to have weaker abilities and mana gains the more colors get added to maintain balance.  Instead, they were given stronger abilities to maintain sales.

Since we haven't had any walker adjustments since the Kiora Nerf (or the Sorin re-do, I can't remember which was first) years ago I highly doubt that anything is going to change going forward.  This game is just becoming a nuclear arms race where we're all given the same more powerful nukes every few months.  Just strap in and enjoy the ride.

DumasAG

Mburn7 said:

The issue is the way multicolors are handled in MTGPQ.

In paper, the more colors you run the more complicated your mana base is, making it more difficult to make work.
In paper, the more colors a card has the harder it is to cast, allowing it to be more powerful at a cheaper cost.

In MTGPQ, a multicolor card can be used by any walker with any single one of its colors, and the manabase is the same for everyone.  That eliminates the checks on multicolor power from paper and allows you to use the increased power level multicolor cards without downside.

Unfortunately, there's no real way to balance this without inherently changing the nature of the game.  Increasing the mana gains of all mono colored (and to a lesser extent dual color) walkers would be a start, but certainly not a perfect solution.  Really, multicolor walkers should have been designed to have weaker abilities and mana gains the more colors get added to maintain balance.  Instead, they were given stronger abilities to maintain sales.

Since we haven't had any walker adjustments since the Kiora Nerf (or the Sorin re-do, I can't remember which was first) years ago I highly doubt that anything is going to change going forward.  This game is just becoming a nuclear arms race where we're all given the same more powerful nukes every few months.  Just strap in and enjoy the ride.

Agree with this. I wonder whether applying mana cost increases to non-node-color cards could help to balance it a bit? 

wickedwitch74

Mburn7 said:

Since we haven't had any walker adjustments since the Kiora Nerf (or the Sorin re-do, I can't remember which was first) years ago I highly doubt that anything is going to change going forward.  This game is just becoming a nuclear arms race where we're all given the same more powerful nukes every few months.  Just strap in and enjoy the ride.

I joined this game just after the Sorin/Kiora changes, so, in my time, I have yet to see a walker get an adjustment.

That said, I sense that there is some motivation to tweak game play by adjusting cards (BSZ & Etali, for example). There is it least a willingness to admit a problem and adjust it.

Hopefully, going forward, they will see the problems associated with three-color (blue walkers) and also adjust accordingly. 

Punishing multi-color PWs with poor mana gains seems like a fair approach:

A simple formula as a starting point:

Single-Color: 5/3/2 (main color / secondary / tertiary)
Dual-Color: 4/4
Tri-Color: 2/2/2

If all things are equal from the standpoint of abilities, this kind of formula would level the playing field somewhat.

Bil

wickedwitch74 said:

Mburn7 said:

Since we haven't had any walker adjustments since the Kiora Nerf (or the Sorin re-do, I can't remember which was first) years ago I highly doubt that anything is going to change going forward.  This game is just becoming a nuclear arms race where we're all given the same more powerful nukes every few months.  Just strap in and enjoy the ride.

I joined this game just after the Sorin/Kiora changes, so, in my time, I have yet to see a walker get an adjustment.

That said, I sense that there is some motivation to tweak game play by adjusting cards (BSZ & Etali, for example). There is it least a willingness to admit a problem and adjust it.

Hopefully, going forward, they will see the problems associated with three-color (blue walkers) and also adjust accordingly. 

Punishing multi-color PWs with poor mana gains seems like a fair approach:

A simple formula as a starting point:

Single-Color: 5/3/2 (main color / secondary / tertiary)
Dual-Color: 4/4
Tri-Color: 2/2/2

If all things are equal from the standpoint of abilities, this kind of formula would level the playing field somewhat.

I would largely prefer (in fact i'd love) an improvement of monocolor walkers than a nerf on the dual/tri colored mana gains.

With less converters, slow mana generators and cards that cost generally much more than before in WAR, the game has become slow enough (or too slow already?).
I'm pretty sure we don't need any reduction on mana gains.

The advantage of being multicolored is a thing, but the price for buying/leveling is already a significant drawback for it.

However, making sure monowalkers have strong abilities and a decent amount of life, or more flexibility in  of the number of cards of each type they can handle could be another proper way to balance them. And of course, enhance old walkers mana gains to a total bonus of +9... To begin with.

Mburn7

Bil said:

wickedwitch74 said:

Mburn7 said:

Since we haven't had any walker adjustments since the Kiora Nerf (or the Sorin re-do, I can't remember which was first) years ago I highly doubt that anything is going to change going forward.  This game is just becoming a nuclear arms race where we're all given the same more powerful nukes every few months.  Just strap in and enjoy the ride.

I joined this game just after the Sorin/Kiora changes, so, in my time, I have yet to see a walker get an adjustment.

That said, I sense that there is some motivation to tweak game play by adjusting cards (BSZ & Etali, for example). There is it least a willingness to admit a problem and adjust it.

Hopefully, going forward, they will see the problems associated with three-color (blue walkers) and also adjust accordingly. 

Punishing multi-color PWs with poor mana gains seems like a fair approach:

A simple formula as a starting point:

Single-Color: 5/3/2 (main color / secondary / tertiary)
Dual-Color: 4/4
Tri-Color: 2/2/2

If all things are equal from the standpoint of abilities, this kind of formula would level the playing field somewhat.

I would largely prefer (in fact i'd love) an improvement of monocolor walkers than a nerf on the dual/tri colored mana gains.

With less converters, slow mana generators and cards that cost generally much more than before in WAR, the game has become slow enough (or too slow already?).
I'm pretty sure we don't need any reduction on mana gains.

The advantage of being multicolored is a thing, but the price for buying/leveling is already a significant drawback for it.

I can't believe people are saying the game is "too slow".  Sure its a little slower than it was with AMK/HOU in standard, but that was the fastest its ever been (especially with the "every event is enraged" thing we had then).

We could slow games down a bit and still have them be pretty damn fast.  Not saying we should, but definitely could.

Dologan

I agree that it can get rather tedious to always face the same old three over and over, but it's hard not to, especially on competitive events, as they are so strong and versatile.

Restricting some events to mono-colour walkers or imposing handicaps on multi-colour ones via special event supports (e.g. at the beginning/end of your turn, lose X mana where X is the number of gems of your planeswalkers colours divided by 4) would be a different way of bringing mono-walkers back into relevance without fiddling with the PW themselves.

Another kind of balancing measure could be adjusting deck or hand size based on number of colours on certain events, say monos could get +1 card and tri-colour -1.

Bil

   Mburn7 said:

Bil said:

wickedwitch74 said:

Mburn7 said:

Since we haven't had any walker adjustments since the Kiora Nerf (or the Sorin re-do, I can't remember which was first) years ago I highly doubt that anything is going to change going forward.  This game is just becoming a nuclear arms race where we're all given the same more powerful nukes every few months.  Just strap in and enjoy the ride.

I joined this game just after the Sorin/Kiora changes, so, in my time, I have yet to see a walker get an adjustment.

That said, I sense that there is some motivation to tweak game play by adjusting cards (BSZ & Etali, for example). There is it least a willingness to admit a problem and adjust it.

Hopefully, going forward, they will see the problems associated with three-color (blue walkers) and also adjust accordingly. 

Punishing multi-color PWs with poor mana gains seems like a fair approach:

A simple formula as a starting point:

Single-Color: 5/3/2 (main color / secondary / tertiary)
Dual-Color: 4/4
Tri-Color: 2/2/2

If all things are equal from the standpoint of abilities, this kind of formula would level the playing field somewhat.

I would largely prefer (in fact i'd love) an improvement of monocolor walkers than a nerf on the dual/tri colored mana gains.

With less converters, slow mana generators and cards that cost generally much more than before in WAR, the game has become slow enough (or too slow already?).
I'm pretty sure we don't need any reduction on mana gains.

The advantage of being multicolored is a thing, but the price for buying/leveling is already a significant drawback for it.

I can't believe people are saying the game is "too slow".  Sure its a little slower than it was with AMK/HOU in standard, but that was the fastest its ever been (especially with the "every event is enraged" thing we had then).

We could slow games down a bit and still have them be pretty damn fast.  Not saying we should, but definitely could.

It is mostly a matter of perception ... But with 30-40 nodes events ... I prefer faster games than longer games.

I also forced myself to get rid of the cards from xln to m19 to prepare for the standard rotation and the loss of good converters or mana generators is significant.

Besides, our perception of the game speed is a bit biased as we have access to most of (all?) The powerful cards of the standard environment.
Another aspect of the problem is the fact that we rarely can play our decks at full potential in events, because secundaries force us to play down to avoid killing too fast.

I must admit that i do not feel games are too long when I'm playing training grounds or totp ... So i guess you're right in a certain extent, games can be fast under certain circumstances ... But i hope we don't want them being longer anyway.

Unknown

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Laeuftbeidir

I like the "convert to your pw colors" as a way to give the mono pws a competitive advantage over the multi colored pws and hope to see more in the future. The upcoming standard however will likely have the gates as best ramp options - this furtherly strengthens the tri colored walkers

Mburn7

Funny, I was watching Wimbledon today and "The Big 3" there refers to a very different trio.  They're a bit more dominant, and arguable much more fun to see all the time lol.

On topic:  Its no coincidence that the most feared walkers are almost all tricolor and are all blue.  Kind of says something about how the game balance is being done.  Just food for thought.

Narcoticsagent

Mburn7 said:

Funny, I was watching Wimbledon today and "The Big 3" there refers to a very different trio.  They're a bit more dominant, and arguable much more fun to see all the time lol.

On topic:  Its no coincidence that the most feared walkers are almost all tricolor and are all blue.  Kind of says something about how the game balance is being done.  Just food for thought.

I think you're probably right about the blue part but it would be interesting to see if a trip color with no blue was just as popular. 

Gabrosin

Narcoticsagent said:

Mburn7 said:

Funny, I was watching Wimbledon today and "The Big 3" there refers to a very different trio.  They're a bit more dominant, and arguable much more fun to see all the time lol.

On topic:  Its no coincidence that the most feared walkers are almost all tricolor and are all blue.  Kind of says something about how the game balance is being done.  Just food for thought.

I think you're probably right about the blue part but it would be interesting to see if a trip color with no blue was just as popular. 

The only existing card that fits that description is Lord Windgrace, and I doubt we see him in PQ anytime soon.  Then again, they clearly plucked Sarkhan and Tamiyo out of the history books specifically because they were three colors... so who knows, maybe Windgrace and Estrid and Aminatou are next!

James13

Huh.  I don't really use these "big 3" too often.

I use Bolas 2 way, way more than Bolas 1.  I use Teferi more than Tamiyo.  And I'm liking Domri or Kiora more than Sarkhan 3.  Probably because I don't often go full-out Giant creature smash.

*shrug*.

But generally I agree with earlier mentioned sentiment.  Tricolor is not penalized in any way and is just flat out more powerful.  Karn is a mainstay on my PvE events due to full card access.

Mburn7

James13 said:

I use Bolas 2 way, way more than Bolas 1.  

Really?  I agree his abilities are better, but that mana base is super iffy.  I find I get run over by blitz decks before I can get the lockdown setup if I don't get a lucky cascade or two early.

Unknown

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James13

Mburn7 said:

James13 said:

I use Bolas 2 way, way more than Bolas 1.  

Really?  I agree his abilities are better, but that mana base is super iffy.  I find I get run over by blitz decks before I can get the lockdown setup if I don't get a lucky cascade or two early.

Probably a few factors.  I tend to build low cost average efficiency decks.  And I often break out a gate/summit build on him as well.  I don't go for the lockdown too often, but rather overall control which his abilities play nicely into (free filp damage pings and creature recursion).

Gabrosin

Mburn7 said:

James13 said:

I use Bolas 2 way, way more than Bolas 1.  

Really?  I agree his abilities are better, but that mana base is super iffy.  I find I get run over by blitz decks before I can get the lockdown setup if I don't get a lucky cascade or two early.

But you can build to compensate for that.  His card-draw lockdown is so devastatingly good against nearly every other PW and deck that you can play a heavily defensive gameplan and expect to grind out a win eventually if you don't get combo'd out in a turn.

EvilDead

I think we need mono color PW events. That would force us to dust off some old ones. 

or.....perhaps make single colored nodes work with multi-color PWs the same way it works for Karn, Ted, etc. You can only use the color specified on the node. Still doesn't effect the mana advantage but it certainly eliminates the synergies from using cards of various colors.