Must every event be playable by every player?

Tremayne

Based upon the discussion in the thread about Doomskar Claiments, I wonder about this question. I think that the lack of set-specific events is detrimental to the deck-building side of MTGPQ.

When previously set-restricted events (non-coalition) are relegated to legacy - a huge part of the enjoyment of the event disappears. The player focus often changes to just clear the event as quickly as possible, this restricts the puzzle aspect.

Often the defending side argues that set-restricted events are punishing to newer player, because these players library is not deep enough to participate. It is a fair point, I just don’t think that when the outcome is that old sets becomes irrelevant. Why should anyone chase cards from a legacy set, if the set is irrelevant to play events?

What are your thoughts?

ArielSira

Some events should be set-restricted and possibly not relevant to all players

When I started in 2016 I could not defeat a lot of the bosses in Avacyns Madness for some time. A bit frustrating but I think it's how it should be. You play what you can and with the booster packs you get you build for the next time.

Every event is still playable, you just won't score all points when you start. And that's ok, it brings a sense of improving and growth.

Janosik

Some events should be set-restricted and possibly not relevant to all players

What I want to see in the game more than anything is variety of play. Magic is an expansive game, with thousands of cards, and it should give me a wide variety of play experiences, and that's something I don't feel I've been getting for quite a while.

As far as coalition events go, that's been equally true for Standard coalition events as for Legacy coalition events.

Standard coalition events, for the last couple of years, were designed by Oktagon using a cookie cutter system, and that's allowed us to play the same deck in all of them with little or no changes. I can't be the only player playing the same 9 or 10 cards in THT, MAT (whatever happened to that one?), TKR, BTP, FB, OMAP and SoFT (Kudos to Webcore for finally designing WTK with a black/white node where I can't event select my usual PW Ral!). Oktagon seemed to spend the most time when designing events making funny little supports that began in play, all full of rules text, most of which has little to no effect on gameplay.

I don't know how many players like me are playing the same deck week in/week out, but if it's a lot, it can't be much good for generating revenue. Sure, we can build a bunch of different decks, if we want to, but we're not incentivised to at all, and I can remain extremely competitive while barely spending any resources on new cards.

(A quick aside: Usually when I say something like this, the usual rebuttal is "If you think the game has no variety because you play the same deck all the time, you should play something different!". My answer to that is that I *do* play different things; I play games other than MTGPQ. There are plenty of games out there that curate challenges for their players, and I play those, and I usually spend my money on those rather than this one)

Most Legacy events also allow you to play the same deck everywhere. So many of us play the same loop-de-loop decks in many Legacy events (Wizard Class and Prism Array are popular engines), and depending on the event, we'll swap out, say, a single draw spell for a draw spell which creates Snow gems, or a gem conversion spell for a Reclaim if we need to kill X creatures.

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So to return to the topic at hand, I don't particularly mind if there are 'more Standard events' or 'more Legacy events' currently in rotation, so long as I get a variety of play experiences. I do however think that designing a new Legacy event which creates a unique play experience is a formidable challenge, one that generally isn't overcome with restrictive objectives. In the Doomskar Claimants thread, I suggested that that DC become a Legacy Block Constructed event, and I can see how some players might find Legacy Block Constructed events difficult to build for. To the players who brought this up, I'd say: Fair point! Let's not have a lot of Legacy Block Constructed events. But maybe... let's have a few Legacy Block Constructed events? And, oh! Here's an idea: lets maybe have some Standard Block Constructed events! Current Standard with it's 3 years worth of sets is a bit large and unwieldy, IMO.

Maybe, let's have one new Legacy Block Constructed event. We're all pretty bored of Seize the Day now, aren't we? It's not a bad event, really, but it's been running for years in exactly the same format and it's gone stale. Perhaps let's retire Seize the Day for a while, and introduce a new Legacy Block Constructed event, perhaps featuring... ZNR+KHM+STX, or maybe even BFZ+SOI+EMN (is picking those sets a bad idea? I don't know. I don't think designing fun new events is easy, but I do think that if you _don't _create new content, players will get bored).

Tremayne

@ArielSira - I agree, I also think that defeat is necessary to progress initially. You need to learn what you can do with your limited library.

@Janosik - I know I have suggested, asked, pleaded for some variety over the years. I hope Webcore will consider a different path that Oktagons hopeless event supports that are completely irrelevant as you could ignore them. I do not understand why it takes so long to design an event, which have so little variety. In PVE you could make ten levels focusing on a creature type, say dwarf, (or dragon or orc or zombie or …), make it a requirement that only dwarfs can be used as a creature. In PVP restrict the colour (through the nodes colour) then mix it up with some standard objectives and it would be a start.

But would this put off new players?

ambrosio191

I’m neutral on the question

I do not think Coalition events should have any card restrictions beyond the standard/legacy distinction. Coalition events have that distinction of people "having" to play them for their team. Forcing them to play at a major disadvantage is no fun. I'm all for more non coalition restricted events. I personally dont enjoy them, but more variety during the week is always welcome.

madwren

Some events should be set-restricted and possibly not relevant to all players

I've played a ridiculous number of mobile games. The common perception is that new players shouldn't be able to walk in and immediately compete in all content/formats.

Tremayne

@madwren - I think originally, the story mode was meant as the introduction (might explain why story mode has been in the cooler for all these years) when a player had completed that, they ready to progress to the PVP/PVE.

I still wish for more story mode though.

Janosik

Some events should be set-restricted and possibly not relevant to all players

A thought occurs: A while ago, Oktagon announced a feature which would have allowed players to craft Legacy sets individually, which they immediately mothballed, hilariously blaming the changes in Standard rotation from 2 to 3 years.

Would this facility change anyone's mind about Legacy Block Constructed events? Or is the problem deeper than that, that building up BOTH a competitive Standard AND Legacy collection is just too difficult for anyone who joins the game now?

ambrosio191

I’m neutral on the question

@Janosik said:
A thought occurs: A while ago, Oktagon announced a feature which would have allowed players to craft Legacy sets individually, which they immediately mothballed, hilariously blaming the changes in Standard rotation from 2 to 3 years.

Would this facility change anyone's mind about Legacy Block Constructed events? Or is the problem deeper than that, that building up BOTH a competitive Standard AND Legacy collection is just too difficult for anyone who joins the game now?

My main issue with legacy block constructed events is the difficulty in getting cards from any given set. Set specific legacy crafting would go a long ways towards alleviating that issue. I still dont like heavy restrictions on coalition events.

It's truly a bad experience when you cant even partially compete in an event but still have that pressure to play it. It's not exactly equivalent, but when I first started AvM was such a bad experience for me that I quit coalition events and the game for months, and I wasnt even in a semi competitive coalition.

Part of what makes this game unique is you arent locked out of large portions of the game simply because you havent been playing for years and/or havent spent thousands of dollars. Every other mobile game I've played does exactly that, which is why I only play this game.

madwren

Some events should be set-restricted and possibly not relevant to all players

@Janosik said:
A thought occurs: A while ago, Oktagon announced a feature which would have allowed players to craft Legacy sets individually, which they immediately mothballed, hilariously blaming the changes in Standard rotation from 2 to 3 years.

Would this facility change anyone's mind about Legacy Block Constructed events? Or is the problem deeper than that, that building up BOTH a competitive Standard AND Legacy collection is just too difficult for anyone who joins the game now?

I think that this feature should be immediately implemented and was vastly disappointed when Oktagon walked it back.

Tremayne

@ambrosio191 - it is a fair point about coalition events, but then you are bordering on another issue, which is “you must win every match to get decent prizes”. I’ll not muddle the discussion with that particular can of worms.

@Janosik and @madwren - I agree that feature could alleviate the problem, but I’m not sure newer players would have the resources to actually utilise this efficiently. Considering a rare card is 500 orbs and a mythic is 3k a player would need about 100-115k orbs to get an entire set. I typically need 75k orbs when crafting after rotation, and that requires a lot of dedication to this app. I suppose a new player with VIP would quickly fill the coffers, but I’m not sure that this is the kind of new player you are thinking of?

ambrosio191

I’m neutral on the question

I guess a lot of this depends on what you mean by playable. Are we expecting every person to have a shot at placement rewards? Or is having a reasonable shot a progression good enough? Are we saying progression isnt easy either like Totp? Are we attaching entrance fees as well?

It's unreasonable to expect placement rewards for everyone. I personally believe you should be able to get all progression rewards by playing and winning every available charge. Secondary objectives should reduce the number of games you have to play, or allow for some losses. Once you attach an entrance fee any expectation of progression goes out the window. If we go by this standard than as long as progression rewards are attainable from just winning, then the set restriction aspect of an event isnt a big deal.

Having said that, I know another big complaint people have is facing just win decks instead of decks designed for the event objectives. I could see this becoming a bigger complaint if you add hard restrictions instead of just the soft restrictions of the event objectives.

Tremayne

@ambrosio191 - I must admit, I’m not sure I understand what you are trying to say.

Anyways, if [set-restricted events] means “only a limited subset of the available sets are playable (in this event)”, then it must follow that some players will not be able to gain progression prizes in a specific set-restricted event. F.ex. The newbie Joey, who has only Origins and a scattering of cards from standard (sets), will not have any eligible cards to enter into the event Emergency ordinances (assuming it was limited to aether revolt and Kaladesh).

(Note - You point about entry fee is valid to ensure players don’t feel “cheated”, but that is more a question for the UI/UX designer in my view.)

If the set-restriction was looser, say like any set-restricted event should be playable with Origins + the set-restricted sets, then win decks would most likely be designed, which would eliminate the purpose of set-restriction in the first place.

ambrosio191

I’m neutral on the question

@Tremayne What I'm trying to say is there are many ways to interpret what playable means, which is what you titled this post "Must every event be playable by every player".

My belief is, to be considered playable everyone, even Joey with his origins only collection, should be able to get progression rewards from just playing and winning every available charge in an event. Progression rewards are the backbone of this game. That's where people get the bulk of their resources without spending money. That's how people would get packs from the sets that the event is restricted to.

Im not saying it should be easy to win every charge, just that if you win every match without any secondary objectives you should receive full progression rewards. Right now most events do not meet that criteria of being playable.

If you are saying an event, so set restricted that Joey cannot make a legal deck (which we know is impossible because Origins is perma legal for everything), is considered playable, then we have two vastly different definitions of playable. I would not be in favor of this type of event.

I want to be clear, aside from coalition events, I'm not arguing against set restricted events. I personally dont like them and tend to not play them, but that does not mean they shouldnt exist. Those who do enjoy them should be able to play them, and players like me who dont should be able to skip them. That's my issue with set restricted coalition events. Even if I was in a semi competitive coalition, I cannot choose to skip the event without leaving my coalition for someone else who does want to play it. There are many reasons why someone would not want to leave their coalition, even temporarily.

By the way, most coalition events are not set up in a way where just winning every available match gets you progression rewards. I do not consider most coalition events playable by the entire playerbase.