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[michaelius]

The preconstructed Eternal Thirst B/W deck is monstrously satisfying. Feels like it would be a bitch to play IRL with all the buffs, tokens and health shenanigans.

I was checking if you can farm dailies with those preconstructed decks and they pretty solid way of clearing quests and getting some daily wins in the process.

Also that blue temp deck I'm using with grand total of 4 rares is amazing for early stage of collecting.


Now if only I knew what to put together next - mono red, izzet , boros angels all look really interesting.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

I'm playing it since a few days now and must say that this game is at the moment extremely bare bones, but has incredible potential.

The biggest flaw by far is their focus on only 1vs1 duels.
While some form of multiplayer (2 headed giant, at least) is planned for later on, the current open beta doesn't even have a friend list.
That's right, an accessible MTG game for an online audience and you can't even play against your friends. Friend list is the next feature they're working on, but I think you can say that they really got their priorities all wrong.

You also get showered with free decks as you play and fulfill your daily/weekly quests.
Problem is, about half of them are just terrible decks - while the other half are surprisingly good. I don't know why they have such a variance in free deck quality, what's the point of that? In some decks, almost every card synergizes with almost every other card while in other decks, there's barely any synergy at all. A bit of an oddity.

I think the prices for attending sealed events or drafts are bit too high, but at least not fully unacceptable. It does suck that you can attend some events only for real money and not the "earnable" money, though.

One thing I find commendable is how they deal with duplicates. Having more than four copies of a card doesn't make sense, so when you get more from a booster, what happens is that they go to the "vault". As the vault fills, you are awarded wildcards. There are wildcards of every rarity and you can permanently exchange a wildcard for ANY card of the same rarity - really a good idea to not force people to buy endless boosters just to get a certain card. There's no trading in MtG Arena (it was never meant to replace MtG Online).

The meat of the game, though, is without a doubt the best MtG experience I ever had on the computer. The flow is fantastic, you have all the control you need and want, they are offering a great overview over castables (even if in graveyard, for example), you always know in which phase you are, etc. There is fantastic potential here and I hope they won't drop the game like they did all those "yearly" Duels of the Planeswalkers games.

At the moment, I'm playing my daily stuff and basically wait for the game to receive some more game modes and finally some multiplayer to actually play WITH friends and not just against them - though, to play against them would be at least something and as I said is coming soon.

Now if only I knew what to put together next - mono red, izzet , boros angels all look really interesting.

What I do is make a deck in which I put all the cards I'd find interesting to build a deck around. Kind of an "ideas" deck. Makes it easier than just looking at all rares/mythics at once.

 

[michaelius]

I think a lot of those issues comes from not big enough development team - game could have used few more months before being released but rotation forced their hand and they had to release it now.

But still since gameplay is here I can forgive it a lot.

 

[michaelius]

So i was playing Momir a bit and I have to ask is there any actual strategy to it other than

start spamming creatures on turn 3 when first or turn 2 when second - get to 8 lands spam 8 cost till you get Zetalpa ?

And of course praying that opponent doesn't get better fliers on their way to 8 lands.

 

[Strife In a Teacup]

I'm always claiming the "Your Go" message

Geez, I need to start using that. Some people today are seriously

 

[TheSHEEEP]

Geez, I need to start using that. Some people today are seriously

Yeah, it is a bit weird how long people take to think about simple stuff.
On the other hand, there are a lot of new players in Arena, so that could explain some stuff.

I've also definitely been "victim" of a few people who deliberately stall in hopes that I'd give up. (Why would anyone be so desparate?)

So i was playing Momir a bit and I have to ask is there any actual strategy to it other than

start spamming creatures on turn 3 when first or turn 2 when second - get to 8 lands spam 8 cost till you get Zetalpa ?

And of course praying that opponent doesn't get better fliers on their way to 8 lands.

There is no strategy to Momir - it really is mostly meant to be a funny thing to do and raise awareness for the cause, I guess.
The only strategy I could think of is to get all colors out ASAP in case some creature has activated abilities with them - and to balance activated abilities with spending mana for new creatures.
Other than that, the first 4-5 creatures are likely to determine if you win or lose.

 

[Esteban5XG]

I've been playing Magic cards since I was only 7, and I have to say there is no better sensation than suffle your library and take the top card of your deck with your own hands. I know is easy to play at home, but I really connect with people when I go to places where I can play phisically. And it's been a lot of time since I started playing this card game.

 

[michaelius]

Right but realistically if you grown up you can go to LGS 1-2 per week and play few games each time. With Arena you can play several games each day.

 

[Esteban5XG]

Right but realistically if you grown up you can go to LGS 1-2 per week and play few games each time. With Arena you can play several games each day.

Totally agree. Despite of that, I rather play phisically.

 

[MisterBrimstone]

So i was playing Momir a bit and I have to ask is there any actual strategy to it other than

start spamming creatures on turn 3 when first or turn 2 when second - get to 8 lands spam 8 cost till you get Zetalpa ?

And of course praying that opponent doesn't get better fliers on their way to 8 lands.

No, there is no other strategy. Momir is a failure with standard pool.

The game lacks a lot of stuff and will be protected by its Open Beta status for a long time.

 

[Bolivar687]

I agree there's no substitute to holding the cards in your hand, picking up something you've never seen before and playing a real person in front of you. For a returning player like me though, I can't make it to scheduled events regularly, and Arena is a great way to understand where the standard and limited format are at and playtest homebrew decks. Arena is fun to play and watch and look at and, if anything, it's a gateway for me to buy some singles and start playing at the LGS.

 

[Strife In a Teacup]

Okay enough. Seriously, Fire the person who created the shuffling algo. Fire them. This is seriously the worst shuffling I've ever seen, ever.

Start with 1 mana, mulligan, no mana, mulligan, no mana, mulligan, no mana. Seriously. Who tried that and thought it made sense?

I have nothing against the people I play. The AI deck shuffler is the worst enemy EVER.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

Okay enough. Seriously, Fire the person who created the shuffling algo. Fire them. This is seriously the worst shuffling I've ever seen, ever.

Start with 1 mana, mulligan, no mana, mulligan, no mana, mulligan, no mana. Seriously. Who tried that and thought it made sense?

I have nothing against the people I play. The AI deck shuffler is the worst enemy EVER.

Yeah, the shuffling is rather terrible. I have lost more games due to mana screw (in both variants, too much and too little) than to other reasons.

I am beginning to think they made the shuffling really just entirely random. As in, every card gets a totally random position within the deck prior to draw, leading to truly absurd stuff.
But that's not how people actually shuffle a magic deck.

What I've seen whenever I played Magic with friends was that you put 1-3 non-lands and one land together in a pile. Now you repeat that for every land you have and then put them all together. This creates a basically an "optimal" situation of 1 land every 2-3 draws. Then you shuffle. The shuffle will randomize things, of course - to prevent cheating. But it won't totally mess up the general land distribution if you don't shuffle for two hours.
I haven't seen mana screws in real Magic NEARLY as often as I see it in MtG Arena, including myself and opponents. Which is especially terrible for the modes you need to spend money on to join.

Afaik, MtG Arena draws two hands in secret and already just shows you the best, but even with that, their shuffling is obviously messed up.

 

[Klart]

As there any news about this game coming to consoles?

 

[Strife In a Teacup]

Yeah, the shuffling is rather terrible. I have lost more games due to mana screw (in both variants, too much and too little) than to other reasons.

It also does this thing I've noticed on several games (has nothing to do with how much mana I have alloted total in the deck) where if you get a decent optimal starting hand (3-4 mana and some decent starter cards) then about midway into the game it gives you nothing but mana. I've seen this several times. You can be winning and then it's like "nope, time for nothing but MANA!"

The only way to get around this is to basically have some form of Draw Cards in your deck, even then.

 

[Bolivar687]

Play with friends!

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articl...na-streamer-events-playing-friends-2018-10-25

Step one in giving you ways to play with friends is Direct Challenge. Seriously, we're building it right now and we know it can't come fast enough. It's coming soon. How soon? "Hopefully" November.

Here is how Direct Challenge will work:

1. You and your friend open the Direct Challenge option.
2. You type in each other's username and five-digit code.
3. You hit "Battle."
4. You play a match against each other.

We're working on more robust friends list features for down the line. We're going to see how the community plays against each other using this and build from there.

... wtf?

 

[michaelius]

What I've seen whenever I played Magic with friends was that you put 1-3 non-lands and one land together in a pile. Now you repeat that for every land you have and then put them all together. This creates a basically an "optimal" situation of 1 land every 2-3 draws. Then you shuffle. The shuffle will randomize things, of course - to prevent cheating. But it won't totally mess up the general land distribution if you don't shuffle for two hours.
I haven't seen mana screws in real Magic NEARLY as often as I see it in MtG Arena, including myself and opponents. Which is especially terrible for the modes you need to spend money on to join.

Afaik, MtG Arena draws two hands in secret and already just shows you the best, but even with that, their shuffling is obviously messed up.

This is cheating and is forbidden in any level of tournament play. You need to shuffle sufficiently so any kind of pre existing setup of cards is destroyed.

Play with friends!

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articl...na-streamer-events-playing-friends-2018-10-25



... wtf?

Shadowverse uses same system

 

[TheSHEEEP]

This is cheating and is forbidden in any level of tournament play. You need to shuffle sufficiently so any kind of pre existing setup of cards is destroyed.

Nonsense. Not in a single tournament I have witnessed, including official ones.
If you wanted to truly guarantee full randomness in the card draws, you would have to shuffle for a VERY long time.
The setup of the cards prior to shuffling does matter and nobody shuffles for a very long time following that setup.

How much of an effect that setup then has is debatable, but it has nothing to do with cheating.
Cheating is trying to put a certain card in a certain place, which is already prevented by the usual cutting.

 

[Strife In a Teacup]

And yeah...synergy.

Where's slivers?

Where's more first/double strike?

Where's this, where's that?

I mean, glad it's "Open Beta", but hell it's missing a lot.

There is very little synergy in decks going on right now.

There isn't even really that much deck burn at all. I mean at least Duels had some solid goblin, vampire, deck burn, etc decks. This is a random jumble of shit. Some is good, some is MEH as all.

Edit: Stuff like the Eternal Thirst deck is nice, but I'd like a more Vampire focused deck. And a lot of people lean on decks like that or mono Green and it really limits the 'meta' I guess you'd say.

 

[Bolivar687]

There's a lot of tribal synergy in the Ixalan block with Pirates, Merfolk, Dinosaurs and Vampires and the Core set has a lot with Goblins and Dragons. If you're looking for more with Vampires, you should check out your uncollected cards in the filter and trade in your wildcards for some.

Dominaria has a really interesting use of Historics, where you're constantly retrieving them from your graveyard or returning them to your hand to keep triggering their enter/leave the battlefield abilities.

Ravnica necessarily has a lot of synergies with each faction's mechanic. It took a lot of playtesting but I've pulled off some pretty spectacular stuff with each of the factions.

I think there's a lot of room for creativity, as well. I've been running a black-red sacrifice deck where I'm casting spells and activating abilities that sacrifice creatures who in turn trigger an ability when they exit the battlefield.

As a returning player, I gotta hand it to Wizards, I really like the current cycle of expansions in Standard.

 

[djp6]

why does the pass turn button do nothing

 

[TheSHEEEP]

why does the pass turn button do nothing

Works for me. It passes the current turn.

 

[djp6]

Works for me. It passes the current turn.

wher you select it you have to toggle it at every phase of your opponent and how is that better than just clicking through the turn

 

[iHaunter]

It's alright.

Not a fan of Dual Land. Pretty bare.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

wher you select it you have to toggle it at every phase of your opponent and how is that better than just clicking through the turn

That's not how it works for me. I select and then it skips through the current turn, not just phase. I have to select it again for the next (mine or opponent's) turn.
Sounds like you found a bug

 

[vpance]

Is there no mana burn in this? I've seen people tapping and not casting with no damage. Weird.

 

[michaelius]

Is there no mana burn in this? I've seen people tapping and not casting with no damage. Weird.

Yes - they removed mana burn from MTG at one point of time.

No idea when precisely since I stopped playing at Urza block rotating out and only returned for Dominaria this year.

 

[vpance]

Ahh I see. Haven't played since the 2014 DotP release. Guess it was just a minor and rarely applied mechanic anyways.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

Ahh I see. Haven't played since the 2014 DotP release. Guess it was just a minor and rarely applied mechanic anyways.

That's not the only thing that changed in recent years.

Remember the legendary rule? It used to say that there can only be one card of any single legendary on the battlefield.
As soon as another same legendary enters the battlefield, both would go to the graveyard. It made sense, kind of a "paradox" if there are two supposedly unique things.

Imagine my surprise when I tried to kill off a Niv-Mizzet with my own Niv-Mizzet, but nothing happened.
Turns out, that rule got changed in 2013 (I definitely played until 2017 with the old rule and so did many of my friends! whoops) so that now, this restriction only counts per each player's battlefield and that player keeps one of the legendaries if two should appear.

To be honest, I vastly prefer the old rule. "Countering" a legendary with another one or by cloning it was a nice little trick that now doesn't exist any more.
Besides, it just feels wrong to have a supposedly "unique" creature or object on both sides of the battlefield. Another small piece of uniqueness and immersion removed. Makes legendaries a lot less legendary, if you ask me.

I also preferred the old mana burn rule, it made you think a bit more about what you do.

In general, I do prefer the Magic of 10-15 years ago, when there were no handful of new sets coming out every year.
Oh, well, it still beats other TCG by a long margin, so I guess it could be worse.

 

[CrazyCultist]

Just wanted to say: fuck planeswalkers. Some level 3 x-factor grade bs.

 

[Bolivar687]

Just wanted to say: fuck planeswalkers. Some level 3 x-factor grade bs.

We need more like buttons.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

Just wanted to say: fuck planeswalkers. Some level 3 x-factor grade bs.

Power creep. Indeed very unfortunate.
A constructed deck almost has to have one, and if there isn't a specific Planeswalker for a specific kind of deck, then that deck type is most likely not the most powerful.

I do hope they will at some point introduce a casual league or game mode in MtG:Arena. My favourite thing to do (Magic-wise) was always to build decks around unusual ideas.
They wouldn't necessarily be strong, but interesting to play.
My favourite is probably my deck consisting exclusively of pink cards (as in, the actual card art contains sufficient amounts of pink).

 

[vpance]

^Yeah I like to play jank/random decks too, with some synergy of course. The funnest matches I've had are against other non-netdeck players.

 

[Bolivar687]

Dominaria draft lives up to the hype. I built a UW artifacts deck that played with the historic mechanic and went 5-3 in some of the most intense games I've had since starting Arena.

edit: and just had my first 7-win quickdraft! Only lost one game, going BW Knights:

https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/visual/1439774

 

[michaelius]

Direct challenge is already implemented in today's patch.

 

[Strife In a Teacup]

I wonder if they put in the same code as the Duels games. Where once you play for a while you just get screwed. That was in the previous Duels games.

Except now, it's "oh you played a few games? Time for the AI shuffler to screw you, go do something else for a bit. But be sure to buy more cards later!"

The shuffler is so bad. It's really the worst enemy in this game. The game itself is pretty good, the shuffler is utterly terrible. If their intent is to drive people away for a while, it works, maybe too well.

 

[Bolivar687]

I wonder if they put in the same code as the Duels games. Where once you play for a while you just get screwed. That was in the previous Duels games.

Except now, it's "oh you played a few games? Time for the AI shuffler to screw you, go do something else for a bit. But be sure to buy more cards later!"

The shuffler is so bad. It's really the worst enemy in this game. The game itself is pretty good, the shuffler is utterly terrible. If their intent is to drive people away for a while, it works, maybe too well.

There's more info out if you search for it but it appears you have a visible rank (how high your color tier is) and an invisible rank based on whether or not you're on a win or losing streak. In quick play, there's also a deck ranking which I believe is based on rarity and how many wildcards you e spent building your deck, which I think is absurd and punished experimentation.

I think their solution is problematic, as I can't tell whether the insane run I went on over the weekend is because my Dimir aggro brew is actually that good or because I wasn't doing so well leading up to that.

As far as the shuffler, I've made peace with it. I've read the quick play shuffler makes two hands and gives you the most advantageous one, which seems to match my experience of having three or four lands in both colors most of the time. Also, getting mana screwed and flooded is a part of Magic. At the Pro Tour a week ago, a finalist lost game 5 and the entire tournament after he mulligan'd down to four cards after a series of bad hands. It happens and you just have to move on.

 

[Strife In a Teacup]

There's more info out if you search for it but it appears you have a visible rank (how high your color tier is) and an invisible rank based on whether or not you're on a win or losing streak. In quick play, there's also a deck ranking which I believe is based on rarity and how many wildcards you e spent building your deck, which I think is absurd and punished experimentation.

I think their solution is problematic, as I can't tell whether the insane run I went on over the weekend is because my Dimir aggro brew is actually that good or because I wasn't doing so well leading up to that.

As far as the shuffler, I've made peace with it. I've read the quick play shuffler makes two hands and gives you the most advantageous one, which seems to match my experience of having three or four lands in both colors most of the time. Also, getting mana screwed and flooded is a part of Magic. At the Pro Tour a week ago, a finalist lost game 5 and the entire tournament after he mulligan'd down to four cards after a series of bad hands. It happens and you just have to move on.

Hmm, interesting. The invisible rank sounds a lot like the method they had in Duels.

And yeah, I just grumble about the shuffler a lot because I like MtG quite a bit, but damn if that shuffler doesn't piss me off. So I mostly just end up playing a few games until I hit that shuffler wall and then stop for the night.

And yeah that Mulligan scenario happens to me far too frequently. Maybe that part you mentioned about using too many wildcards is what's got me.

Either way, interesting post. I don't know if I'll ever make peace with it, but I'll try to keep my shuffler grumbling to a minimum from now on.

 

[michaelius]

Use the code GAME AWARDS to receive following cards in game:

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• 4x The Eldest Reborn
• 4x Lava Coil
• 4x Merfolk Branchwalker
• 4x Sinister Sabotage

 

[Strife In a Teacup]

Okay. I've stopped whining about the pathetic AI shuffler.

But fuck, c'mon people THINK faster than a fucking traffic light in L.A.

My god. It's some serious HMMMMMMMMMM What do I do next?!?!? Let me think for the next 5 minutes.

and I've heard/seen that's a tactic to discourage people. So I've done it to some people screwing with me. Just straight up turned off my PC and played Xbox, let them wear out the countdown.

But my god, some people really seem like they're taking their sweet fucking time on every goddamn card.

It's absolutely mind numbing.

I think you should be penalized for that. Sure, you won? But you took 5 fucking hours to actually do it, so your score goes down because your brain thinks at -mach 1.

Sorry, but that shit is straight up annoying as fuck.

I could give a shit about losing, but I absolutely hate wasting my time on people that think at the speed of a snail.

Edit: Just to clarify, I'm an asshole.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

But fuck, c'mon people THINK faster than a fucking traffic light in L.A.

My god. It's some serious HMMMMMMMMMM What do I do next?!?!? Let me think for the next 5 minutes.

and I've heard/seen that's a tactic to discourage people. So I've done it to some people screwing with me. Just straight up turned off my PC and played Xbox, let them wear out the countdown.

But my god, some people really seem like they're taking their sweet fucking time on every goddamn card.

It's absolutely mind numbing.

I think you should be penalized for that. Sure, you won? But you took 5 fucking hours to actually do it, so your score goes down because your brain thinks at -mach 1.

Sorry, but that shit is straight up annoying as fuck.

I could give a shit about losing, but I absolutely hate wasting my time on people that think at the speed of a snail.

Oof, yes, unfortunately true.
I've met quite a few of those as well.
You've got two creatures on the battlefield, two cards in your hand, I'm tapped out, WHAT THE FUCK are you thinking about so long?! UUUUNNNGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

Though recently, as I gained ranks (I don't play THAT much so I'm just gold rank 2), it has gotten rarer. Maybe a good sign?

Either way, there really should be a speed setting you can choose before queueing for a match: Normal timeout vs fast play.

On the other hand, sometimes the timer does a countdown too fast.
There are some cards that simply take a lot of time to resolve, for example Wand Of Vertebrae or other cards that require selecting many things from a bigger amount of cards.
In addition, that selection from a bigger group of cards if finnicky as hell (very often, it selects the wrong card, so you have to deselect the wrong one and select the right one again)...
And then the timer goes off in a situation where you really WOULD need that time... not optimal, to say the least.

And the game also direly needs a function like MTGO to "always resolve this card". For example, some decks are just super heavy on triggering, e.g.. multiple Ajani's Welcome as well as Ajani's Pridemate are out and some spell that creates 3-6 tokens is played. Fucking hell...
Yes, you can press enter to "resolve everything this turn", but that is often not what you actually want to do. You just want to resolve SOME cards always, and the game to remember that setting across turns...

 

[michaelius]

Yeah some people take slow playing to the level of art in Arena

But since it's again sealed season I had tons of fun last few days. I also went to paper event yesterday and since they were giving code for traditional draft I played it in Arena - and I have to ask - why would I ever want to play it again with reward structure it has ? I got 1 win - so that gave me 2 booster packs - if this wasn't "free" I'd have payed 1500 gems for total of 5 boosters.

PS. If someone haven't seen it yet - code PlayAllegiance gives 3 boosters again

 

[mike23]

Nonsense. Not in a single tournament I have witnessed, including official ones.
If you wanted to truly guarantee full randomness in the card draws, you would have to shuffle for a VERY long time.
The setup of the cards prior to shuffling does matter and nobody shuffles for a very long time following that setup.

How much of an effect that setup then has is debatable, but it has nothing to do with cheating.
Cheating is trying to put a certain card in a certain place, which is already prevented by the usual cutting.

Nobody responded to this for some reason and it annoys me.

What you're suggesting is 100% cheating. If you do this in paper magic to get better draws, you are cheating.

There are only two outcomes of mana-weaving.
1. You do enough random shuffles afterwards, in which case you're wasting your time.
or
2. You don't sufficiently shuffle afterwards, in which case you've stacked the deck in a non-random order.

https://blogs.magicjudges.org/rules/mtr3-9/

Decks must be randomized at the start of every game and whenever an instruction requires it. Randomization is defined as bringing the deck to a state where no player can have any information regarding the order or position of cards in any portion of the deck.

Note: "Any information" doesn't just mean the location of a single card, it includes knowledge of the distribution.

The rule is that the deck has to be random at the start of the game. If you manipulate the final state of the deck in a non-random way, then you are cheating.


http://epicstream.com/news/JakeVype...Player-Reveals-How-He-Cheated-in-A-Grand-Prix

 

[TheSHEEEP]

Nobody responded to this for some reason and it annoys me.

What you're suggesting is 100% cheating. If you do this in paper magic to get better draws, you are cheating.

There are only two outcomes of mana-weaving.
1. You do enough random shuffles afterwards, in which case you're wasting your time.
or
2. You don't sufficiently shuffle afterwards, in which case you've stacked the deck in a non-random order.

There are not only two outcomes here.
The space between 1. and 2. is rather large, and what "sufficiently" shuffle means is almost entirely subjective.

As I said in the very part you quoted, it is debatable just how much of an influence this setup still has after shuffling.
Personally, I do not think that players typically shuffle long enough after such a setup to completely erase its effect, but they do shuffle long enough for it not to be considered cheating.

https://blogs.magicjudges.org/rules/mtr3-9/

Note: "Any information" doesn't just mean the location of a single card, it includes knowledge of the distribution.
The rule is that the deck has to be random at the start of the game. If you manipulate the final state of the deck in a non-random way, then you are cheating.


http://epicstream.com/news/JakeVype...Player-Reveals-How-He-Cheated-in-A-Grand-Prix

What is described there is the player doing that setup and then only pretending to shuffle.
To be fair, the tournaments I witnessed were all prior to 2015. And there, simply nobody complained - except of course if one wouldn't shuffle at all after doing such a spell-spell-land distribution (which is exactly what that player in the article did).
Had he done a few rounds of actual shuffling afterwards, would that still be cheating? I don't think anyone would have taken an issue.

And honestly, I think it shouldn't be considered cheating.
The most annoying moments in MtG happen if you get mana-screwed or -flooded. Shuffling in a way that does not guarantee the drawing of any specific cards in any order and only lowers the chances of mana-screws/flooding... that sounds like a clear improvement to the game experience to me.

 

[mike23]

There are not only two outcomes here.
The space between 1. and 2. is rather large, and what "sufficiently" shuffle means is almost entirely subjective.

As I said in the very part you quoted, it is debatable just how much of an influence this setup still has after shuffling.
Personally, I do not think that players typically shuffle long enough after such a setup to completely erase its effect, but they do shuffle long enough for it not to be considered cheating.


https://blogs.magicjudges.org/rules/mtr3-9/
What is described there is the player doing that setup and then only pretending to shuffle.
To be fair, the tournaments I witnessed were all prior to 2015. And there, simply nobody complained - except of course if one wouldn't shuffle at all after doing such a spell-spell-land distribution (which is exactly what that player in the article did).
Had he done a few rounds of actual shuffling afterwards, would that still be cheating? I don't think anyone would have taken an issue.

And honestly, I think it shouldn't be considered cheating.
The most annoying moments in MtG happen if you get mana-screwed or -flooded. Shuffling in a way that does not guarantee the drawing of any specific cards in any order and only lowers the chances of mana-screws/flooding... that sounds like a clear improvement to the game experience to me.

If you stack the deck before a game that gives you an advantage after you shuffle, then you cheated. There is no middle ground. Either it didn't have an effect or it did, and you cheated. It's really as simple as that.

That you think stacking the deck should be legal is fine, it's your opinion, but it currently is not legal.

Imagine the dealer at a poker game takes a minute to stack the deck before shuffling once or twice and dealing out the cards.
"It's ok guys, it only gives me a little advantage, sometimes. Nobody likes losing by getting dealt shitty cards. I just want to make sure I don't get 7/2 offsuit."
You'd take your money and run the fuck away from that game, am I right?


edit:

Also, another thing your opponent is allowed to do is try to unstack your deck. If they see you doing this and you hand it to them to cut, they are allowed to do a 3 pile pile-shuffle to basically split your deck back into two nonland and one land pile if you didn't do a good job shuffling.
https://blogs.magicjudges.org/telliott/2014/02/03/born-of-the-gods-policy-changes/

 

[TheSHEEEP]

If you stack the deck before a game that gives you an advantage after you shuffle, then you cheated. There is no middle ground. Either it didn't have an effect or it did, and you cheated. It's really as simple as that.

Obviously there is a middle ground, because no one would be capable of knowing if you not getting mana-screwed/flooded is a result of the setup prior to shuffling or not. This isn't black & white. After all, even if you shuffled for millennia, chances that you get acceptable land draws aren't bad.
There is just a point when a judge, for example, would say the deck is now sufficiently shuffled. That is a subjective decision that cannot really be scientifically measured (and the opponent taking your deck and doing another shuffle is part of that). After all, we're dealing with randomness here, you can't guarantee anything, just increase or decrease chances.

All I'm saying is that the setup prior to shuffling has an influence on how the cards will turn out after the shuffle. Though I think the influence is very small (small enough not to be considered cheating) I think you'd end up with a different draw situation between a deck that had spell-spell-land distribution vs. a deck that had all the spells on the bottom, all the lands on the top, before shuffling. Even if you shuffle a usual amount of times. And neither situation I'd call cheating.
Which is because the human shuffling isn't 100% random. Cards that were close to each other before a shuffle are more likely to appear close to each other after a shuffle. And how often you'd have to shuffle to entirely remove that effect is... unclear.

 

[TheSHEEEP]

Btw... how often do you encounter people who "become unresponsive" as soon as they are losing?
I just had that happen again. It really doesn't happen often, but often enough to be considered "a thing"... I really don't get it. What's the point? Are they hoping that you give up by forcing you to wait a minute?

 

[Klart]

Still no News of this coming to any other platform whatsoever?

 

[SirKicksalot]

This game badly needs better sound design and an arbitrary resolution feature.

I'm playing it while working on a second 1280 x 1024 screen and I can't see shit. The only adequate resolution is 1280 x 720 windowed. Everything is tiny!

The sound design does such a poor job of alerting the player that I'd rather skip the whole damn turn. Hearthstone basically explodes when your turn begins, while MTGA barely makes a noise - that sounds like most other sounds. It's very difficult to play it while doing something else because the sound feedback is so bad you can't look away and be safe...

 

[TheSHEEEP]

The sound design does such a poor job of alerting the player that I'd rather skip the whole damn turn. Hearthstone basically explodes when your turn begins, while MTGA barely makes a noise - that sounds like most other sounds. It's very difficult to play it while doing something else because the sound feedback is so bad you can't look away and be safe...

Works perfectly fine for me.
What else are you doing that produces so much sound you can't hear the Arena ones?

Though I must say I disable the MtG:A music - to either listen to my own or watch something else. Disabling its music likely helps hearing its effect sounds better.
When doing so, I have zero trouble hearing the sound that it's my turn or I need to do something.