starfall said: Stormcrow said: starfall said: The more recent system in practice makes Greg an easier opponent than the older system did, and experienced players (one might argue, the majority of players?) do not want an easy opponent. I feel like this is only true for Nicol Bolas 1, Elspeth, and maaaybe Koth or Vraska 1 in certain matchups. Definitely isn't the case for, to name a few examples, Ob Nix, Karn, Saheeli, any version of Tezzeret, or Brokhan. Again, maybe my lack of fear of Greg is largely a function of how easy the game is now. BSZ is so ridiculous that it's easy to find the answer for a single card threat that Greg drops on the board, like Karn's ult, Tezz2's ult, Tezz3's ult, Ob's ult, and, probably Saheeli, as she's only going to be running multiple types of vehicles in EO or FIRF (aside: I really, really, REALLY hate the way I can't play Parhelion II with her!!!). Even BTB is ridiculous enough to let you keep the board clear of supports and creatures at all times. In any sane world BTB would be too powerful for MTGPQ Brokhan, I'll give you. That can be a nasty one. Still, even if Greg happens to get enough loyalty for his ult, there's only a 33% chance he'll use it, isn't there, because he might randomly pick another ability to use. In practice, I don't think new Greg uses his ult much more than old Greg did. At least with old Greg, when he got an enormous cascade (and we all know how often that happens!), he'd then proceed to use his ult 100% of the time.Pictured: Old Greg.
Stormcrow said: starfall said: The more recent system in practice makes Greg an easier opponent than the older system did, and experienced players (one might argue, the majority of players?) do not want an easy opponent. I feel like this is only true for Nicol Bolas 1, Elspeth, and maaaybe Koth or Vraska 1 in certain matchups. Definitely isn't the case for, to name a few examples, Ob Nix, Karn, Saheeli, any version of Tezzeret, or Brokhan.
starfall said: The more recent system in practice makes Greg an easier opponent than the older system did, and experienced players (one might argue, the majority of players?) do not want an easy opponent.
starfall said:Randomness has taken tactical depth away from the game, and I can give you a concrete example of it; you used to be able to predict with (almost) certainly what move Greg would take on the gemboard, and that allowed you to play one move ahead...
Volrak said: starfall said:Randomness has taken tactical depth away from the game, and I can give you a concrete example of it; you used to be able to predict with (almost) certainly what move Greg would take on the gemboard, and that allowed you to play one move ahead... Predicting specific gem moves is still sometimes possible now, but sometimes it's not clear-cut. There was a period some time ago when Greg avoided taking match 5s, and I admit it was fun to try to set those up for yourself in your next turn. So I agree it's a fair example of randomness in general not always adding tactical depth (and I think that happens when the number of possible random outcomes is too many to consider all of them).
Mburn7 said:@Volrak I remember at some point in the past you did a big investigation into gemfall randomness, is it possible that the programming has changed since then? I find it really hard to believe that this keeps happening due to luck
Tremayne said: @Mburn7 - I don’t want to stump on Volrak’s impressive work but I have to say that to me his work seems to be purely anecdotal, no matter how thorough it is done (unless he has a developer access that I’m not aware of).I have questioned the random generator numerous times, but I have never been able to come up with anything conclusive. Typically, my observations have been disregarded as “observation biased”.As long as the devs. do not own up and explain or provide proof of their method for generating randomness, all the player base can do is hope the devs have not made a mistake in their code. Any perceived irregularities have been explained as statistical abnormalities within the reasonable realm of possibilities.Lately, someone described a scenario with a 1/250000 chance (if I recall correctly) and the explanation was that the user probably didn’t register his booster pack drops correctly.I have learned that you shall not question the random generator in MTGPQ.I wish you good luck in your attempt.