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Magic: the Gathering |OT13| Ixalan - Port to Sideboard

Justin

Member
Might be a good idea to pick up hostage takers now if you intend to play some, they are vanishing before my eyes on magiccardmarket.

They are in stock at Card Kingdom for $7. Not sure what they were on the the site that is sold out.

Looking at some of the other price changes in the last few days

Carnage Tyrant now at 30
Itlamoc down to 15 from 20
Huatli down a few bucks
Ripjaw Raptor is up to 10 from 7
 

ZealousD

Makes world leading predictions like "The sun will rise tomorrow"
Paper Magic is expensive enough. Established players won't play Arena if you don't give them huge bonuses for playing Paper and new Arena players won't move to Paper if you aren't generous with the codes.

Price competitively in the digital-only space and go 1:1 on the codes from Paper. Arena should be a way to get new players into Magic and be an energy-boost for established players in the paper scene. Synergize. One leads into the other. Don't make each playerbase an island.
 

kirblar

Member
They are in stock at Card Kingdom for $7. Not sure what they were on the the site that is sold out.

Looking at some of the other price changes in the last few days

Carnage Tyrant now at 30
Itlamoc down to 15 from 20
Huatli down a few bucks
Ripjaw Raptor is up to 10 from 7
Feels like the Dinos are getting casual-inflated because they're Dinos.
 

Farside

Unconfirmed Member
Paper Magic is expensive enough. Established players won't play Arena if you don't give them huge bonuses for playing Paper and new Arena players won't move to Paper if you aren't generous with the codes.

Price competitively in the digital-only space and go 1:1 on the codes from Paper. Arena should be a way to get new players into Magic and be an energy-boost for established players in the paper scene. Synergize. One leads into the other. Don't make each playerbase an island.

I like this. And it reminds me to beta Arena.
 
I don't buy that it is an essential archetype that warrants this type of support and to make limited worse. If they at least made mill viable in limited every now and then.

I've played kitchentable for 16 years almost exclusively and not one of my various crappy deck got new cards every set.
Close but not even every set has a pinger, but every set has one to a couple mill cards.

Best guess is that it's a trap to make new players feel bad.

I've had a lot of new players I've introduced to card games express that they thought mill cards are good because they're "taking those cards away from their opponent", and when I tried to explain the game theory behind it having little to no actual value they responded with an anecdote about the time they milled their opponent and the card he happened to have on top just happened to be the one that would have won the game.

It's, I suppose, a sort of rite of passage (particularly for very young players) to learn that these are bad cards in anything but the most purpose-built decks.
 

Joe Molotov

Member
Best guess is that it's a trap to make new players feel bad.

I've had a lot of new players I've introduced to card games express that they thought mill cards are good because they're "taking those cards away from their opponent", and when I tried to explain the game theory behind it having little to no actual value they responded with an anecdote about the time they milled their opponent and the card he happened to have on top just happened to be the one that would have won the game.

It's, I suppose, a sort of rite of passage (particularly for very young players) to learn that these are bad cards in anything but the most purpose-built decks.

There's a kid that plays at the shop I do that jams Altar of the Brood into every deck. I'm like, my dawg, this is not good what you're doing. This is a sickness. He's like, no man it's just value. No, no it isn't. You need to stop it. Get some help.
 
Also an important lesson to learn not to excessively mill opponents in EDH unless you have GY hate or can quickly end it.
I really need to get myself an OG Ulamog.

Also funny that you mention trap cards when Blizzard just released the first true mill card in Hearthstone and people made all sorts of fallacies evaluating it, experienced players no less.
 
the other tcg i play (hex) has legit support for a blue/black mill archetype in the current limited block

having that option definitely adds more variety and skill to the game

it's kind of like the asymmetry of having a burn deck in constructed, but they can't actually put a bunch of decent burn cards in limited blocks because those cards would have an actual use outside of dedicated burn decks
 
In the comments there, the amount of people that assume MTGO for this stuff is weird.

People are flat-out delusional about what MTG Arena is supposed to be and how big it'll be if it's successful.

My 2 cents on the idea of codes in packs: Don't do it. It's not worth it. Make the packs $1.50ish like they are in Hearthstone instead.

The Arena people would have to be complete idiots not to put codes in paper packs.

I'd be surprised if packs translates 1:1 to digital packs, positively surprised.

They won't do packs because it's too granular. You do gold because then you can make the value in every pack (or every "average" pack, you could have some rare special codes as well) equal without having to necessarily do a whole pack-per-pack. That said, a pack online is gonna be like a buck and they can do a lot to add value to their product by putting a digital pack or close thereto in every paper pack.

Paper Magic is expensive enough. Established players won't play Arena if you don't give them huge bonuses for playing Paper and new Arena players won't move to Paper if you aren't generous with the codes.

Price competitively in the digital-only space and go 1:1 on the codes from Paper. Arena should be a way to get new players into Magic and be an energy-boost for established players in the paper scene. Synergize. One leads into the other. Don't make each playerbase an island.

Yeah, and as successful as paper Magic is now, the potential ceiling for digital players is much, much higher. They're gonna way to do everything they can to get players into both ecosystems wherever possible.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Ew, Ixalan seems pretty horrible in limited. Just too many cards that suck and feel like shit to play. I'll give it another go, but I had a pretty open BW Vampires deck and it still felt weak and pretty boring.
 
i have very low hopes for the sealed format in ixalan

it might be okay in draft. i'll get a better idea of that after a couple weeks of real drafting (in actual draft pods)

the mtgo draft leagues tend to warp formats into garbage even though they might be ok in a real draft setting
 

Justin

Member
Ew, Ixalan seems pretty horrible in limited. Just too many cards that suck and feel like shit to play. I'll give it another go, but I had a pretty open BW Vampires deck and it still felt weak and pretty boring.

Your sample size seems pretty small. I had Kenji in in the background all day at work and it didn't seem like he was having any trouble drafting good playables.
 

HK-47

Oh, bitch bitch bitch.
Your sample size seems pretty small. I had Kenji in in the background all day at work and it didn't seem like he was having any trouble drafting good playables.
People draft tribal too hard but I can't blame them when it feels like you should be priortizing synergy
 

The Technomancer

card-carrying scientician
the other tcg i play (hex) has legit support for a blue/black mill archetype in the current limited block

having that option definitely adds more variety and skill to the game

it's kind of like the asymmetry of having a burn deck in constructed, but they can't actually put a bunch of decent burn cards in limited blocks because those cards would have an actual use outside of dedicated burn decks

Mill is like Infect though, its useless as a half measure. What they would really need to make it strategically interesting, IMO, would be a set with a proper set of supporting mechanics around it so that you still gained benefit from the occasional mill hitting your opponent even if you weren't going for a mill victory

You know, what they sort of tried to do with Ingest and Processing, but not...shitty
 

Firemind

Member
the mtgo draft leagues tend to warp formats into garbage even though they might be ok in a real draft setting
Exactly. Drafting bad formats can actually be fun (see chaos draft). Unfortunately draft leagues skew the format towards people who have opened bombs or are in pods who aren't cannibalizing each other's colours. It'd be like drafting in a Pro Tour and being able to get paired against people from different pods. It'd be stupid.

If the cost of drafting in Arena is low enough I'm sure people would shrug leagues off. It is more convenient since you're not potentially stuck for three matches. In the meantime, I'm boycotting draft leagues on MTGO. Shit's not worth the price of admission.
 
Draft leagues are a fucking joke.

We know for a fact that there are squads of players who will sniper draft queues during during off-peak hours to collude on getting the best decks possible.
 
Random thought.

Not-Alpha Wanderlust - 3BG
Sorcery
Target player discards his or her hand, then searches his or her library for up to that many basic land cards, reveals them, puts them in his or her hand, then shuffles his or her library.
 

DrArchon

Member
Best guess is that it's a trap to make new players feel bad.

I've had a lot of new players I've introduced to card games express that they thought mill cards are good because they're "taking those cards away from their opponent", and when I tried to explain the game theory behind it having little to no actual value they responded with an anecdote about the time they milled their opponent and the card he happened to have on top just happened to be the one that would have won the game.

It's, I suppose, a sort of rite of passage (particularly for very young players) to learn that these are bad cards in anything but the most purpose-built decks.

I used to be that kind of player. The kind that looked at a "mill for 5" card and thought it has to be better than Mind Rot because it gets rid of 3 more cards and costs less.
 
Yeah, limited hasn't grabbed me yet. 3-0'd a league with B/R pirates but it wasn't pretty and I'm not chomping at the bit to try the archetype again. G/R and Naya dinosaaawrs is... there. So far the most interesting looking archetype I've seen is actually Merfolk but so much of it is at uncommon/rare that I'm not sure you can reliably draft it. I've come up against a couple people running it (with a splash of black) and it seemed pretty fun.
 
Last night I went with my friend to a game store to play.

Keep in mind, I've only played 4 times. Last time i played was 6 months ago.

My deck was built entirely out of cards I thought looked awesome. Previously you guys said my deck sucked.

I got into a five player match. I was expecting to lose quick. To my surprise, i won!

It wasn't skill. They ignored me and focused on each other. I was allowed to stumble into some shitty monsters and had some instances that delt direct damage
 
Last night I went with my friend to a game store to play.

Keep in mind, I've only played 4 times. Last time i played was 6 months ago.

My deck was built entirely out of cards I thought looked awesome. Previously you guys said my deck sucked.

I got into a five player match. I was expecting to lose quick. To my surprise, i won!

It wasn't skill. They ignored me and focused on each other. I was allowed to stumble into some shitty monsters and had some instances that delt direct damage
Haha, yeah, that is something that happens when you're known to have a weak deck.
 
Mill is like Infect though, its useless as a half measure. What they would really need to make it strategically interesting, IMO, would be a set with a proper set of supporting mechanics around it so that you still gained benefit from the occasional mill hitting your opponent even if you weren't going for a mill victory

You know, what they sort of tried to do with Ingest and Processing, but not...shitty

Yeah, it's sort of the case that instead we've had the opposite: multiple sets with "Graveyard Matters" themes that actually make getting milled beneficial. The closest we've ever had are a few zombie cards that care when creatures enter an opponent's graveyard in old Innistrad, I guess.
 
Project Architecture team announced - They're basically supervisors.

Magic Story - The Shapers
* Kopala is one of the nine shapers of the River Heralds, who lead the nine tribes. He reflects on how the merfolk existed before the land-dwellers, and how they used to control everything.
* Shapers take the name of the river that chose them; he was chosen by the Kopala River. He is the youngest of the shapers, and is mentored by Tishana, who is the eldest of all merfolk.
* He meditates in the Primal Wellspring, and feels the power of Orazca, the golden city. He feels a distortion, likely caused by a planeswalk attempt.
* Kumena approaches them. He is the second most powerful shaper, and will obviously turn evil.
* He brings them a captive soldier of the Sun Empire, who tells them of the pirate captains and Vraska's compass. He also mentions how Huatli cast a spell to see Orazca.
* Among the shapers, only Tishana knows the location of the city. Kumena demands its location so they can better protect it, but she refuses.
* Kopala is the tie breaker and sides with Tishana. Kumena kills the captive in rage.
* A spell alerts them to intruders approaching the shore. Kumena goes to deal with them, but he says this isn't over.
* Tishana follows after him, knowing he will try to team up with one of the other factions to find the city.
* Kumena and Tishana destroy ships, but while she's distracted, he punches her in the face to knock her out.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Magic Story

Hi would you like to hear about some merfolk? No? Too bad.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
New characters need an introduction.

If the plane natives were ever relevant, it would be one thing, but they almost always just get demoted to extra by the visiting, familiar characters. I don't think Arlinn ever even interacted with the off-world characters, and neither did Samut (at least not meaningfully).
 
If the plane natives were ever relevant, it would be one thing, but they almost always just get demoted to extra by the visiting, familiar characters. I don't think Arlinn ever even interacted with the off-world characters, and neither did Samut (at least not meaningfully).

Oh, that's not because they're natives, it's because they're Gruul Planewalkers.
 

Angry Grimace

Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Oh, that's not because they're natives, it's because they're Gruul Planewalkers.

Same thing with Narset, really. They always have a native character/planeswalker who never meaningfully does anything but gets a bunch of chapters. I get why they do it, it's just not as funny as Vraska trying to get Senpai Jace to notice her.
 

Farside

Unconfirmed Member
There's a kid that plays at the shop I do that jams Altar of the Brood into every deck. I'm like, my dawg, this is not good what you're doing. This is a sickness. He's like, no man it's just value. No, no it isn't. You need to stop it. Get some help.

Hahaha. That's a funny card. Some cards to manipulate your graveyard would be a good counter to that annoyance...
 

Ashodin

Member
"No one can use the immortal sun"

"This land has been rekt by it before"

"The Last Guardian"

Sounding real like the Mirari here
 
Arena stream and Q&A about to start.

https://www.twitch.tv/magic


News:

- Will have weekly update streams, next one will be at World Champs.
- Closed beta will start in November, first phase will be under NDA.
- Plan is to let people start streaming the beta at the beginning of next year.
- Emails will go out next week letting you know if you're in the priority queue.
 

Justin

Member
- Designed to completly free to play. There are modes without entry fees
- There might be cosmetics that can only be bought with money
- Doubled down on "no trading", "we have MTGO for that"
- They are working on ways to make it easy to create decks (presumably without grinding or opening packs)
- Kind of confirmed 8 player "pro tour" style drafts. Called it a "core" feature.
 

Ashodin

Member
- Designed to completly free to play. There are modes without entry fees
- There might be cosmetics that can only be bought with money
- Doubled down on "no trading", "we have MTGO for that"
- They are working on ways to make it easy to create decks (presumably without grinding or opening packs)
- Kind of confirmed 8 player "pro tour" style drafts. Called it a "core" feature.

Sounds like you can borrow cards for decks. Seems neat
 
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