Planeswalker Ajani, Invigorate Leadership changes.

Magic:PQ Support Team

We are planning to make two changes to Planeswalker Ajani, Invigorate Leadership (PMA) via Data Push soon and would like to let everyone know before this change takes place:

1- Loyalty costs will be changed. Originally, Ajani, Invigorate Leadership (PMA) Abilities cost 4, 6, and 8 Loyalty respectively. It will now cost 6, 8 and 10, respectively.

Abilities cost before the change:
Blessed Leadership - Cost 4
Fierce Leadership - Cost 6
Unscathed Leadership - Cost 8

Abilities cost after the change:
Blessed Leadership - Cost 6
Fierce Leadership - Cost 8
Unscathed Leadership - Cost 10

2- Ajani, Invigorate Leadership (PMA) passive will be changed. Originally the passive Cats Assemble! was: "At the end of your turn: If you have full life —Create 2 Ajani's Soldier tokens. Otherwise: You gain 3 life."
Now it will change to: "At the end of your turn: If you have full life —Create an Ajani's Soldier token. Otherwise: Enlist 1 gem."

BongoTheGrey

THANK YOU! Amazing news!

BongoTheGrey

Also, thank you for sending this message to everyone's in game inbox. This is something that everyone has to know and as you are aware, not everyone checks this Forum

Techg

I am on the team of leave the kitty alone.

Ajani helped newer players be competitive

Helped veterans to not be complacent

Allowed you to quickly do your daily event grinds

Helped leveling cards that were junk

He is going to be a neutered kitty with the update. I wish you would not push this.

jtwood

Techg said:

He is going to be a neutered kitty with the update. I wish you would not push this.

I think you are overestimating how much of a hit he's taking here. He will only need a turn or two more to make everything into a lifelinking, doublestriking, damage prevented monstrosity. His mana gains are intact. The cards that make him great are still available. He's still going to be tough to face and great to use.

Stormcrow

This seems like a very reasonable adjustment. Not too heavy-handed, but should bring him more in line with the power level of other planeswalkers.

Julie71

@Oktagon_Support thank you for listening to the mass majority of the player's it seems like a very good adjustments that your making and appreciate the heads up. 

Uiriam

@Oktagon_Support Thanks for this much necessary change, specially for newbies that don't have enough arsenal to neutralize such a menace.  Likewise, will help balance the mono white field that players can choose. 

810Bourne

The evergreens should be temporary or only apply to the free cats. The cats should not be free. 

This fix fixes nothing, just delays the already boring long match to make it longer. 

Fireguy

Thank you! Very much appreciated and needed changes! Thanks for listening to the community. Facing Pajami every other match gets boring. 

Tremayne

Interesting tweak. The fundamental design remains unchanged, free creature every round and any creature can become a powerhouse, just slightly slower than before. We’ll have to see if that actually makes a noticeable change to how the cat plays.

fox1342_2

I think this will be a balanced change. Thanks for listening to everyone.

FindingHeart8

Personally I'm not a fan of this, especially since he was paid content that probably pushed many players to spend additional money chasing the mastery white packs.

I still remember the outrage over the Gilded Lotus nerf back in the day, and the Lotus wasn't even the main attraction to the purchasable content.  Ajani was the main attraction here in a real money purchase that will now no longer be as it was originally advertised.

BongoTheGrey

PMA Ajani is paid content like ANY other Planeswalker only if you want it before it hits the vault for mana crystals. No Planeswalker has ever been paid content exclusive. You basically pay just to get them a couple of weeks earlier

FindingHeart8

BongoTheGrey said:

PMA Ajani is paid content like ANY other Planeswalker only if you want it before it hits the vault for mana crystals. No Planeswalker has ever been paid content exclusive. You basically pay just to get them a couple of weeks earlier

It was the exact same situation with Gilded Lotus, it was part of the Karn package that was nerfed after purchasing.  You could acquire Guilded Lotus through packs but people back then were still outraged and felt tricked.

Some people saw this new Ajani as an amazing new PW because of the abilities as advertised when it was for sale with real money and justified the expenditure because of how good it was.

This sets a precedent that any card can be sold for cash then nerfed afterwards for "balancing," when it might really have been a cash grab.

BongoTheGrey

Well, I see no one "outraged" about this. You are the only one that has mentioned that subject.
I purchased PMA Ajani for real money and I was constantly asking for a balance

Tremayne

@BongoTheGrey - @FindingHeart8 has a valid point, something that was purchasable with real money, was nerfed afterwards. Is it an outrage, perhaps not, but I’m not wasting any energy on this when I know Oktagon will stay completely silent and never acknowledge anything on this kind of subject.

As you bongo states above, pmajani was a prime candidate for nerfing when it was launched, so you can certainly argue why be surprised that the nerf happened. Regardless, It is still bad form from Oktagon to release such a bad design (for money or otherwise).

Tezzeret

Maybe this will Jumpstart octy into buffing the original 5 (for new players sake) can you imagine being a new player and trying to take down PMAjani when your starting out... lol

I know they won't. But hey an artificer can dream right!

Falkyrk

While I too grew tired of playing Ajani every other match because a large number of players can't build a good deck, it became easy to defeat because everyone uses the same predictable deck. What's a bother is watching Octagon purposfully introduce more loop cards with every deck and be fine with PWs who've been broken for years. After a week, this nerf seems to have made little difference... people still crutch on this PW and it's the same predictable fight. 

Techg

I went from jamming Ajani in all my daily events to shelving him. He is dead to me now.

jtwood

Techg said:

I went from jamming Ajani in all my daily events to shelving him. He is dead to me now.

I still play him in Legacy quite a bit, and I still use him for events where we need to summon creatures or activate abilities. He's still plenty useful.