40 Card Deck?

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  • Brigby
    Brigby ADMINISTRATORS Posts: 7,757 Site Admin
    edited May 2017
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    (Disclaimer: I'm not a designer, nor are my comments representative of the design team)

    What is everyone's opinion of mill mechanics in paper MTG, such as a Jace's Erasure combo deck? It seems like were it not for the win mechanic from milling an opponent's entire deck, then mill mechanics in paper MTG would be considered useless as well.

    Ignoring the win mechanic, my perception of milling is that it's high-risk, high-reward where you let rng decide if the next card you mill is a measly Bellows Lizard (gets opponent closer to strong card) or a Dark Ritual. (reducing the effectiveness of their win condition)

    When it comes to the appended cards, my understanding of their explanation is that those cards aren't accessible until the prior 40 cards are drawn or exhausted. Milling 4 copies of a card still means you need to go through the rest of the deck until you can access a new set of 4 (with the exception of fetch cards, of course)

    //Edited Because Spelling -Brigby
  • toastie
    toastie Posts: 119 Tile Toppler
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    Brigby said:

    What is everyone's opinion of mill mechanics in paper MTG, such as a Jace's Erasure combo decks? It seems like were it not for the win mechanic from milling an opponent's entire deck, then mill mechanics in paper MTG would be considered useless as well.
    Milling your opponent in paper does 2 things:

    1. Wins you the game (slowly and terribly, but people enjoy it)

    2. Puts cards in the graveyard for you to interact with (say to reanimate their creatures).

    Outside of those reasons, it is, as you said, useless. Neither of these is possible in MTGPQ, so it is kinda worthless. Additionally, milling into exile only does the first.

    Brigby said:

    Ignoring the win mechanic, my perception of milling is that it's high-risk, high-reward where you let rng decide if the next card you mill is a measly Bellows Lizard (gets opponent closer to strong card) or a Dark Ritual. (reducing the effectiveness of their win condition)

    As far as the RNG aspect of it, yes it technically does increase variance, but it will work out to be such a minimal effect that it will be almost entirely unnoticeable (and almost certainly will not affect your win rate). And if you can't even see what cards you are milling you don't even get the "YAY" moment of milling off one of their best cards. 

    Brigby said:

    When it comes to the appended cards, my understanding of their explanation is that those cards aren't accessible until the prior 40 cards are drawn or exhausted. Milling 4 copies of a card still means you need to go through the rest of the deck until you can access a new set of 4 (with the exception of fetch cards, of course)
    Technically true, but ignores the other half of the equation. If you hit all 4 copies of their best card, they do have to wait longer to get one. If you miss all 4 copies of their best card, not only do they get those 4 sooner, they get to copies 5-8 sooner.
  • Corn_Noodles
    Corn_Noodles Posts: 477 Mover and Shaker
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    Mill is a viable strategy in paper, especially in limited environments.

    I'd like to see a 40 card deck PERIOD in MTGPQ, none of this extra decks created **** for infinite cards. That's not Magic.
  • span_argoman
    span_argoman Posts: 751 Critical Contributor
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    A fixed 40 card deck is madness in MtGPQ. 4 copies of Lost Legacy is 45%-60% of your deck gone. Liliana 1's first ability becomes vastly more damaging to both herself and the opponent. Add 4 more copies of Infinite Obliteration for another 20% of the deck gone. Forgotten Creation becomes useless among other stuff.

    The cards were designed with an unlimited deck in mind. Changing such a mechanic would require much more work than just tweaking deck generation parameters.
  • Thuran
    Thuran Posts: 456 Mover and Shaker
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    The fix is just stop having mill cards like that. They could have worked if processing worked same as on paper, but that ship has sailed :/
  • THEMAGICkMAN
    THEMAGICkMAN Posts: 697 Critical Contributor
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    Here's one for ya devs, MILLING IS USELESS IN MTGPQ. Have you got it now? The only times milling would be useful is when it can actually, reliably win you the game or so you can do other things with the cards you mill. Eg, reanimate them. 
  • Sarahschmara
    Sarahschmara Posts: 554 Critical Contributor
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    Brigby said:
    (Disclaimer: I'm not a designer, nor are my comments representative of the design team)

    What is everyone's opinion of mill mechanics in paper MTG, such as a Jace's Erasure combo deck? It seems like were it not for the win mechanic from milling an opponent's entire deck, then mill mechanics in paper MTG would be considered useless as well.

    Ignoring the win mechanic, my perception of milling is that it's high-risk, high-reward where you let rng decide if the next card you mill is a measly Bellows Lizard (gets opponent closer to strong card) or a Dark Ritual. (reducing the effectiveness of their win condition)

    When it comes to the appended cards, my understanding of their explanation is that those cards aren't accessible until the prior 40 cards are drawn or exhausted. Milling 4 copies of a card still means you need to go through the rest of the deck until you can access a new set of 4 (with the exception of fetch cards, of course)

    //Edited Because Spelling -Brigby
    Great question!

    I love playing mill decks because I have a bit of a mean streak and I enjoy the look of disappointment and helplessness when one grinds a key card off the top of someone else's deck. The despair grows with their graveyard and there's an impending feeling of doom as their library shrinks. It's a beautiful thing.

    While the denial aspect is similar in MTGPQ, the reward (seeing which useful card was milled and how upset your opponent is about it) is gone and, with an infinitely regenerating decks, there is no way to win the game. Remember, they don't lose because their library is empty, they lose because they cannot complete the draw step (because the library is empty). So a deck that forces mill & draw can get through a 40 card deck (or a 50 card tiny leader deck) pretty quickly... but I've been unable to make it work in commander.

    Additionally, there is a lot of confusion regarding exactly when the extra cards are generated in MTGPQ. I *think* that there is a 40 card deck and when the 4th copy of any card is drawn/fetched, a new stack is added to the bottom. Whether it's a stack of 10 cards (one of each, randomly ordered) or a new stack of 40 is confusing.
  • madwren
    madwren Posts: 2,229 Chairperson of the Boards
    edited May 2017
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    This reminds me of how everyone thought that Dredge would be a drawback in paper, instead of one of the best/most powerful mechanics ever.  "But you have to take cards off your library!" they said, not realizing that it doesn't matter what cards you take off your library because it's all random anyway.
  • shteev
    shteev Posts: 2,031 Chairperson of the Boards
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    shteev said:
    Ohboy said:
    How is everyone interpreting this a different way than I. This is the trials entry fee all over again. 

    Brigby appears to be confirming that a deck is 40 cards, ie. You can't get 5 copies of wrath of God before the deck cycles. 

    Actually this is laughably easy to prove for anyone has doubts and want to highlight this with solid proof instead of "this happened to me before!" . Just build a cycle deck and run a quick 40 card cycle and document what comes out, in video form if possible. 

    Shteev, I choose you! 

    Shteev, use science! 
    I could, and I've thought about it, too.

    The thing is, tho, this isn't my job.
    I got bored.

    I drew my 5th Hieroglyphic Illumination on turn 5 (my turn 3). It was the 24th card I drew in that game. No fetching used. Screenshots and decklist available on request.

    Brigby said:

    Hi Everyone. Yes. Decks are in fact maxed out at 40. There was a bug with Saheeli causing it to go to 50, but it should be fixed in 2.1

    When it comes to any other Planeswalkers, the development team will be sure to investigate.
    Things that would make the player base less hostile towards you

    1. Playtesting / QA.
    2. Not just making stuff up to see if you can get us to be quiet.

  • hawkyh1
    hawkyh1 Posts: 780 Critical Contributor
    edited June 2017
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    I had 5 demolish cards by my turn 3. I was playing
    as saheeli and cast new perspectives twice (from
    memory) I exiled 3 of the 5 cards... who wouldn't?
    so didn't have them all in hand at the same time.
    I cycled hardly any cards so would have likely drew
    less than 15 cards at that point.

    (can't prove what I saw though)

    HH
  • shteev
    shteev Posts: 2,031 Chairperson of the Boards
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    hawkyh1 said:
    I had 5 demolish cards by my turn 3. I was playing
    as saheeli and cast new perspectives twice (from
    memory) I exiled 3 of the 5 cards.. who wouldn't?
    so didn't have them all in hand at the same time.
    I cycled hardly any cards so would have like drawn
    less than 15 card at that point.

    (can't prove what I saw though)

    HH
    The Battlelog records how many of each card you drew. That's what I used.
  • Steeme
    Steeme Posts: 784 Critical Contributor
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    In the Terror in the Shadows event I'm pretty sure I hit my 5th Inner Struggle quite early in the game.  I was a little miffed at how kludgy the deck distribution of cards have become lately.

  • hawkyh1
    hawkyh1 Posts: 780 Critical Contributor
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    shteev said:
    hawkyh1 said:
    I had 5 demolish cards by my turn 3. I was playing
    as saheeli and cast new perspectives twice (from
    memory) I exiled 3 of the 5 cards.. who wouldn't?
    so didn't have them all in hand at the same time.
    I cycled hardly any cards so would have like drawn
    less than 15 card at that point.

    (can't prove what I saw though)

    HH
    The Battlelog records how many of each card you drew. That's what I used.

    I went through the battle log and counted how many
    occurrences of card draw demolish there was. didn't
    realise there was a better way.

    HH
  • wereotter
    wereotter Posts: 2,064 Chairperson of the Boards
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    span_argoman said:
    A fixed 40 card deck is madness in MtGPQ. 4 copies of Lost Legacy is 45%-60% of your deck gone. Liliana 1's first ability becomes vastly more damaging to both herself and the opponent. Add 4 more copies of Infinite Obliteration for another 20% of the deck gone. Forgotten Creation becomes useless among other stuff.

    The cards were designed with an unlimited deck in mind. Changing such a mechanic would require much more work than just tweaking deck generation parameters.
    "Wheel" effects like how Lost Legacy works here, and how Wheel of Fortune and the like work in paper magic are entirely for the purpose of both refilling your hand, and taking cards from your opponent's library, getting you closer to winning the game. It's only stronger here because of the smaller deck size, something that could be fixed by changing them to discard your hand, then draw 4 or 5 instead of drawing to a full hand.

    As far as mill as a mechanic in this game, I wouldn't hate to see it as a win condition now that so many cards are being released with mill mechanics on them. Of course, I'd have to see it in action to know if it's worse, but I do get really annoyed by these "I only have one creature" Kiora decks that just use Gather the Pack, Dubious Challenge, and her second ability to get 15 copies of that same creature into play. Being able to say "once you've gotten four of that creature out, you're done" would neuter that exploit people have into the unlimited deck.
  • Phillmoore
    Phillmoore Posts: 207 Tile Toppler
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    Why can't we just play with a 40 card deck - no refresh.  You could have a card counter showing how many cards left etc.  That way milling works and stops cards like cycling and baral being overplayed 

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