I didn't forget about it, but I wrote this with a newer player in mind, so cost was a factor when choosing formats. With that said, I probably should've said something about Standard Pauper, but I don't know enough about that format to suggest decks. But yes, everyone should check out Legacy Silverblack!
this argument isn't solely about tournaments, so there's that. Obviously people play tournaments to win, and win alone, they don't pay entry fees just to have funsiewunsy time. So yeah, thanks for being captain obvious.
Most standard tournaments nowadays don't have much land destruction compared to olden days, so you guys can tell me how how awesome and viable and great an idea Land destruction is until you're virtually blue in the face, but guess what? Wizards seems to be agreeing with folks like me a lot more than folks like you, otherwise we'd see a lot less 5cmc land destruction spells in recent sets, if you wanna get all tournamenty on me.
People have been making generalized comments all day. I'm not saying that one dude proved ld lovers are all jerks jeezus. Paul you just left me a semi dicky semi cranky response to something I posted in one of cottons articles and it seems a lot of your comments are just arguing with ther folks comments so I'm not sure what you think you are proving to me.
Land destruction vs anti ld = republicans vs democrats = redsox vs Yankees = Xbox vs Ps3
Everyone has valid and invalid opinions And we aren't going to see eye to eye. I should have just removed myself from this thread once it got ridiculous and people whom love griefing started getting all uppity about some of us like the fun aspect obte game and don't equate winning by any means needed as fun
Except Boosh you know better. I haven't left any cranky antisocial commentary yet my basic arguments equate to the same thing (Without the get off my lawn part.) Same thing with Fred though he admits to cackling gleefully (for shame!) he hasn't indicated any malice other than that.
His comment doesn't prove LD is anti-social. Of course, I could choose to interpret his comments as, "People who complain too much are anti-social." Sounds like a winner to me!
I gotta side with Paul Leicht on this one. There are many strategies in the game and more than one way to win. When they start saying, "LD hurts people's feelings, so let's get rid of it," where does it end?
"Mill strategies hurt people's feelings, so let's get rid of 'em." "Decking strategies hurt people's feelings, so let's get rid of 'em."
I have encountered a bunch of people who think the only "fair" way to play the game is to throw a bunch of creatures together, toss in a few Giant Growths, and call it good. Not everyone thinks turning Grizzly Bears sideways is the only way to have fun with the game.
By the way...if you show up at a tournament and you don't like/get mad because of the deck choices people make, then I recommend that you stay home. People play in tournaments to win and they don't care if you think their strategy is unfair; they just want to win.
you can always do something about people who leave jerky comments too. You can ignore them. Then you can make the correlation that he/she is pro-LD and also leaving hostile cranky comments telling people to get the hell out of here, and suddenly your whole Land destruction-is-antisocial argument is proven for you...
I forgot how terrible unmodified Zedruu was. When I was playing the precon deck over a year ago my playgroup was all pretty casual and left me alone long enough to durdle into an Insurrection win now and then. Nowadays with the format so much more competitive and primordials are format staples beside sol rings, the poorly designed zedruu precon has no hope.
Great article. I appreciate the torture you went through to get this done.
There are lots of Europe friendly PREs during every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. You can check these following tournaments at the Gatherling; Friday Night Standard EU (Friday), Standard Heirloom (Friday), Eurodrive! (Saturday), Tribal Apocalypse (Saturday), Rotating Block Heirloom (Saturday), Sunday Commander (Sunday), WAFTT (Sunday), Classic heirloom (Sunday)... I'm sure that I'm missing some others suitable for EU zone.
You can always do something against "non-interactive" combo decks. It starts in the deck editor. Saying that playing against land destruction is even worse, is just more nonsense. The MTG community is better off without people who hold these types of opinions. You going to cry about getting your land blown up? Get the hell out of here.
Are there any PRE on Euro-friendly hours anywhere? I just checked pdcmagic and could only find middle-of-the-night tournaments. I would love to play some PREs. In the best of worlds, I would love some tournaments that took place during office hours GMT+1
There's a point in playing the game where you can cross the line. You go too far in advancing your strategy. Playing against a non-interactive combo deck is tough because there's nothing you can do (and I'm a huge combo player myself). Playing against a land destruction deck is even worse. During the time when Boom/Bust decks got popular in Modern, I found other things to do- not because I have never succeeded in that format. I simply did not want to start playing derpy things like Terra Eternal just because land destruction stopped me entirely too much.
For now, the targeted land destruction is five cmc or greater. Even then, it has very limited uses (ie, sealed play). People can (and do) play whatever they like, such as abusive Sinkhole/Stone Rain decks. However, while these decks may win, they also discourage other people from coming back to try again. This, I believe, is one of the primary reasons why people don't play Legacy online: Wasteland and Rishidan Port. The experience simply is not fun. Never mind the cost of entry.
The ultimate result of players using successful, consistent land destruction deck will be that people will find other stores or other formats to play. Events will not fire. Suddenly, the player with the best deck will find themselves showing up alone. They won't win any prizes. In the case of paper play, they'll likely have driven a long ways for nothing. The store won't make money by holding the event. They may even feel discouraged from hosting another event in that format (ie, Legacy/Vintage). All this because one player played a non-interactive, abusive and trolling one-sided deck.
The social contract is another thing entirely and is separate from what you feel about strategies. I enjoy using Armageddon and other ld effects that are efficient but I would never consider using them in a group where I know the players dislike those strategies and in general I have not done so on MTGO because the majority of players have a consensus about why not: Armageddon and the like really slow games down unless you can kill everyone quickly afterward. Long games are a considerable waste of time when the majority aren't having fun.
Now in one vs one games social aspects tend to be ignored unless you arrange for something else. Also every player has their own idea of what is acceptable and what isn't. "Casual" magic has a range of definitions from no "griefer" strategies to "no holds barred". (CF:About 19 years of arguments over the definition.)
Sure you can argue that Land destruction is anti-social but the same can be said of any strategy that frustrates your opponents. For example, if you play Meddling Mage naming a combo piece you know I am playing with you are stymieing my ability to play the game. I will have to top deck some removal to win now.
If I play a combo that wins on turn 2 I am stymieing your ability to play the game because you didn't have time to stop my combo with your meddling mage idea. If you counter my turn 2 combo with Force of Will... If I hit your Force of Will turn one with a Duress... If you counter my Duress with a Mental Misstep... and it goes on and on.
All kinds of ways of playing magic may be considered anti-social given the right social rules. If two players are not in agreement about what the social rules are then neither can be said to be anti-social. At most they can be said to be a-social. And this is the normal state as I said unless agreed upon prior to the match.
Now, all that said I believe the best way to play Magic is with people whom you enjoy playing against. For different people that will mean different things but my personal goal is not to merely enjoy the game but to make it enjoyable so I forgo some of my pleasure in playing mass destruction cards by not doing so around those I know who are offended by it.
I also go out of my way to chat and be sociable in the game so that my opponent does not feel they are merely in a video game. But this is my personal way. There is no one way. The way is as individual as each blade of grass and each snow flake and each person.
My apologies for the dissertation but I wanted to make sure your misapprehension of what I was saying was cleared up.
there's a huge difference between bramblecrush - which no one woud have any problem with - and stuff like turn 1 dark ritual into braids into turn 2 sinkhole into strip mine etc. etc. In the former, the land destruction is just an tool which might restrict your opponent's options after they've already had a chance to get into the game. Nothing wrong with that. In the latter you're executing a game strategy which just stops the opponent from doing anything and ensures that they have a miserable game. If your plan works, your opponent doesn't play a game. If it doesn't, you don't play a game. There's no interraction, it's just stupidity.
It's not a question of passing a moral judgement, but playing those kind of decks is in a very real sense anti-social. You're saying to your opponent "i don't care about your experience in this game". In some settings, particularly competitive ones, that's par for the course and within social expectations. but in a casual environment, eg. commander, I would suggest that most people would disagree. If you are just trying to take away my ability to play a game with you then I have no reason to play with you.
Bruce richard wrote a good article on the subject recently:
Nice article by the way, romellos. I think the mana base could be seen by some as non-budget, but really, I think everyone should be buying playsets of shocks right now anyways. They've been ridiculously cheap as of late.
See I think this is where players diverge into demographics. Timmy hates LD because it stops the player from having fun. Spike uses it because it works (when it works) and is another tool in the box and Johnny ignores it for being boring and not really an inventive way to play. (And usually LD is pretty boring.)
Each will justify their position because everyone likes to feel they are right. But being right is beside the point in M:TG. Did you win? Good. No? Examine what you can do to fix that. If winning doesn't matter then did you achieve whatever goal you do have? No? Fix it.
Etc.
I agree that LD is about locking down a player's board position. The analogy of equipment destroying seems very emotional and evocative but not very reasonable. After all a land screwed player CAN get out of it. The land destruction player may run out of gas, and or just not have enough to begin with.
"Griefing" is hard to apply to M:TG as a concept because it really mostly refers to MMOs where the idea is to make players quit playing and honestly if you quit playing because of LD or Hand Denial or counterspells etc you might not have learned enough about the game to really enjoy it for what it is.
Lots of people think they know what M:TG is all about and obviously it isn't about certain things anymore that it used to be: anté for example. So the game does morph and change. Land Destruction has not been relevant at a professional tier for a really long time. (Ponza is the last deck I can think of that was super successful with this strategy.)
Partially the reason for this is because of the emotion outcry of players who don't like having to wait for a top deck to start getting their game plan in motion. And also the large Timmy contingent that typically are the majority of starting players and thus represent an important voting block for Wizards.
Obviously some mana screw is inherent to the game already (cf: the great mulligan debates) so it is perceived as unnecessary to add to the pain of those who hate being locked down. I think this is a bad thing because a good player should be able to at least acknowledge all parts of the game and know how to deal with them without tilting or feeling put upon.
But to say that someone who enjoys locking down their opponents is somehow less moral than you who employ creatures to beat on them or cast spells at their dome is just ludicrous. If they were tearing up your cards and laughing, I would be the first to condemn them. Just the same as if they were hitting you or otherwise doing things to make you unhappy outside of the game itself.
Comparing blowing up lands to destroying the other team's equipment so they can't play football is ludicrous. Want a football comparison? How about making a coffin-corner punt so that the other team is backed up so far they have no room to operate. That's what landkill does: it locks them up so they have no room to move.
There is no moral implication to landkill. How about counterspells? Is a player "morally pure" for countering his opponent's spells? What about burn? Does that make one morally pure?
Right now, landkill is great. So many people run greedy manabases that it's not even funny. I saw where someone earlier said Bramblecrush is useless. Wrong answer. Every deck runs targets for Bramblecrush. Got a planeswalker? Have a Bramblecrush. Got a Rakdos Keyrune? Eat a Bramblecrush. You've only got one source of white mana? Chew on this Bramblecrush. The days of being able to blow up every land they play are long gone. But, if they come out slow and stumble on their land draws?
MWAHAHA!
I am 100% behind this sentiment. Mana is the tool in which your entire game hinges on using to build a strategy. Removing it from your opponent takes all the strategy out of trying to win by using your wits. If you are playing football you don't destroy the other teams helmets and shoulder pads before the game and then declare yourself a super awesome winner.
"The look of pure despair when my opponent is discarding because he is totally and irrevocably mana starved" pretty much sums it up for me. i have no issue with land destruction in the abstract, but actively enjoying executing pure lockdown strategies like that is simply anti-social, there's no two ways about it. If your idea of a good game is strip mine into life from the loam then you're not interested in playing a game with another person, you're just trying to grief them.
Land destroying does not make one a horrible person. Unless you are actually out there blowing stuff up for real.
Griefing may be unpleasant but lets not confuse morality with role playing.
Personally I love Armageddon. Does that make me evil? I really don't think so. If you do perhaps your perspective is a tad bit bound up in the game and not so much in the world.
and this is why wotc doesn't print land destruction at a competitively viable cost anymore (good luck beating naya blitz with your 4 mana do nothing sorcery). Griefers/trolls/horrible people exist, they don't want to give them the tools to ruin their opponent's games...
There are people who cry about the nerfing of countermagic. I cry about the nerfing of land destruction.
My favorite card in Standard is Bramblecrush and my favorite creature is Acidic Slime. I love to destroy
lands and burn cities to the ground! Mwahaha! The look of pure despair when my opponent is discarding
because he is totally and irrevocably mana starved! Mwahaha! Sphinx's Revelation for one so that you can maybe draw a land? Mwahaha!
That's a lot more fun to me than to say, "Counter that," "No, you may not," "Dissipate that."
Pete said:
"The change makes Clone weaker, but blue is not supposed to have a way to destroy permanents. Bounce, yes. Counter, yes. But Vindicate an opposing permanent, even one with Shroud, no. That's out of flavor for U."
Challenge: Explain Pongify and Rapid Hybridization. I suppose you could quantify Pongify by saying it's in a set that specifically played around with the color pie (Planar Chaos), but that does not explain it's recent inclusion in the new Ravnica block.
I assume they reprinted Pongify as a sly attempt to insert some blue removal into the game knowing that they would ultimately be lessening clone's effectiveness; but the fact that Rapid Hybridization exists at all, in standard, completely nullifies your statement "but blue is not supposed to have a way to destroy permanents." Regardless of the fact that your opponent gets a Frog Lizard, whatever nonshroud nonhexproofy creature you just hosed.. is, well, hosed.
This is just the whole "elimination of mana burn" argument all over again, in a different form. Some people will be angry, some folks may even hang up their Commander spurs because they can't hose a Thrun, but ultimately, like the Simic Guild, we will adapt and continue to plod through and play the game regardless. Yeah blue is a little weaker, but blue has always been infuriating, and I'm still gonna groan when my opponent perpetually has two islands untapped, regardless of this change.
If you are very very concerned about this change, blue mages, start packing some Glaring Spotlights alongside your Pongifys.
I am looking forward to enjoying my legend at the same time my opponent or my teammate does. I am not looking forward to people flush with them internet monies buying 4x Gaea's Cradle just so they could produce 57 million mana in one turn, or this potential Thespian's Stage / Dark depths Combo but we already face folks who have the hexmage combo or for the former, folks with 4 elves out, one of them being Priest of titania, and an Umbral Mantle. so Ya know, it's just more of the same.
As for all the other comments on here. Land destruction SUCKS. Yes many of you play competitively, and I consistently feel like the representative of the voice of the casual player (Sort of like the Mouth of Sauron); I have a kid, a wife, two jobs, and freelance work. To find time to play Magic is difficult for me (for example I am writing this on a break at work); If I load up a game and turn two is sinkhole, turn three is stone rain, then I concede, and 10 minutes of my life is irrevocably taken away. I am not a tourney player on a daily or monthly basis; I am a casual fun player. The shift and trend of less and less land destruction pleases me. Again, you may say this dumbs down magic-- I say it makes you think harder about how to deal with an opponent. Anyone can hose a land, it takes finese to hose your opponent without destroying their manabase. People applaude the victories ar amries when armies meet armies; when strategy clashes with alternate strategy. Not many people applaude starving out your enemy's city for months while your amry is fine. It's just not sporting. I digress a bit here but the bottom line is find somewy to win besides hosing my lands!
Wizards need to realize that pandering to their (admittedly wide and diverse) group of players who only show up for the pre-releases, who only buy boxes to construct 74-card decks to play in the comfort of their living rooms will, in the end, lead to the opposite of their intended result.
Let's be honest here. Magic: the Gathering is a cash cow for Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro. They have no other goal than to make money through this hobby. To increase their profit margin, they want to market their product to the players with the lowest level of skill. In the short term, it's a good strategy because they want people showing up to FNM's, even with their Giant Adephage decks.
In the long term, however, it's bad because the players who decide to stick around are continual source of income. These people have the greatest influence upon the game of magic, as demonstrated by the standard season of Caw Blade when people just stayed home rather than facing mirror matches of the same kind of deck over and over. Tinker with the product too much, and there's a danger that these people vote with their feet to do something else.
This is where I am at currently. I've sold/given away my magic online collection because the program is primarily designed for standard. Multiplayer formats don't get as much consideration. This, to me, has always felt like pandering. While standard is the most played format in the game, there are plenty of other formats people play which don't get the support that standard does.
Moreover, Wizards of the Coast sucks at communication. I've more or less given up learning about anything they want to say. I check Star City Games and my local store's facebook page for relevant news. How pathetic is that? Here is a company with a large following who can't figure out how to market their own product in a way that ensures that people know when things are coming out. The lack of communication is worrisome for me as a consumer. I interpret this as Wizards of the Coast truly does not care about what I want to get out of the game, as long as I keep buying boxes.
The resultant behavior (for me at least) has been that I engage in the secondary market, supporting businesses like MTGO Traders who actually do care about their customers- as opposed to Wizards, who can't even be bothered to give timely, consistent updates about their perpetually crashing online client.
I didn't forget about it, but I wrote this with a newer player in mind, so cost was a factor when choosing formats. With that said, I probably should've said something about Standard Pauper, but I don't know enough about that format to suggest decks. But yes, everyone should check out Legacy Silverblack!
Perhaps not the cheapest but still awesome, definitely should be on the list.
-Ztrman
this argument isn't solely about tournaments, so there's that. Obviously people play tournaments to win, and win alone, they don't pay entry fees just to have funsiewunsy time. So yeah, thanks for being captain obvious.
Most standard tournaments nowadays don't have much land destruction compared to olden days, so you guys can tell me how how awesome and viable and great an idea Land destruction is until you're virtually blue in the face, but guess what? Wizards seems to be agreeing with folks like me a lot more than folks like you, otherwise we'd see a lot less 5cmc land destruction spells in recent sets, if you wanna get all tournamenty on me.
People have been making generalized comments all day. I'm not saying that one dude proved ld lovers are all jerks jeezus. Paul you just left me a semi dicky semi cranky response to something I posted in one of cottons articles and it seems a lot of your comments are just arguing with ther folks comments so I'm not sure what you think you are proving to me.
Land destruction vs anti ld = republicans vs democrats = redsox vs Yankees = Xbox vs Ps3
Everyone has valid and invalid opinions And we aren't going to see eye to eye. I should have just removed myself from this thread once it got ridiculous and people whom love griefing started getting all uppity about some of us like the fun aspect obte game and don't equate winning by any means needed as fun
Except Boosh you know better. I haven't left any cranky antisocial commentary yet my basic arguments equate to the same thing (Without the get off my lawn part.) Same thing with Fred though he admits to cackling gleefully (for shame!) he hasn't indicated any malice other than that.
His comment doesn't prove LD is anti-social. Of course, I could choose to interpret his comments as, "People who complain too much are anti-social." Sounds like a winner to me!
I gotta side with Paul Leicht on this one. There are many strategies in the game and more than one way to win. When they start saying, "LD hurts people's feelings, so let's get rid of it," where does it end?
"Mill strategies hurt people's feelings, so let's get rid of 'em." "Decking strategies hurt people's feelings, so let's get rid of 'em."
I have encountered a bunch of people who think the only "fair" way to play the game is to throw a bunch of creatures together, toss in a few Giant Growths, and call it good. Not everyone thinks turning Grizzly Bears sideways is the only way to have fun with the game.
By the way...if you show up at a tournament and you don't like/get mad because of the deck choices people make, then I recommend that you stay home. People play in tournaments to win and they don't care if you think their strategy is unfair; they just want to win.
you can always do something about people who leave jerky comments too. You can ignore them. Then you can make the correlation that he/she is pro-LD and also leaving hostile cranky comments telling people to get the hell out of here, and suddenly your whole Land destruction-is-antisocial argument is proven for you...
I forgot how terrible unmodified Zedruu was. When I was playing the precon deck over a year ago my playgroup was all pretty casual and left me alone long enough to durdle into an Insurrection win now and then. Nowadays with the format so much more competitive and primordials are format staples beside sol rings, the poorly designed zedruu precon has no hope.
Great article. I appreciate the torture you went through to get this done.
There are lots of Europe friendly PREs during every Friday, Saturday and Sunday. You can check these following tournaments at the Gatherling; Friday Night Standard EU (Friday), Standard Heirloom (Friday), Eurodrive! (Saturday), Tribal Apocalypse (Saturday), Rotating Block Heirloom (Saturday), Sunday Commander (Sunday), WAFTT (Sunday), Classic heirloom (Sunday)... I'm sure that I'm missing some others suitable for EU zone.
You can always do something against "non-interactive" combo decks. It starts in the deck editor. Saying that playing against land destruction is even worse, is just more nonsense. The MTG community is better off without people who hold these types of opinions. You going to cry about getting your land blown up? Get the hell out of here.
Are there any PRE on Euro-friendly hours anywhere? I just checked pdcmagic and could only find middle-of-the-night tournaments. I would love to play some PREs. In the best of worlds, I would love some tournaments that took place during office hours GMT+1
Re: land destruction.
There's a point in playing the game where you can cross the line. You go too far in advancing your strategy. Playing against a non-interactive combo deck is tough because there's nothing you can do (and I'm a huge combo player myself). Playing against a land destruction deck is even worse. During the time when Boom/Bust decks got popular in Modern, I found other things to do- not because I have never succeeded in that format. I simply did not want to start playing derpy things like Terra Eternal just because land destruction stopped me entirely too much.
For now, the targeted land destruction is five cmc or greater. Even then, it has very limited uses (ie, sealed play). People can (and do) play whatever they like, such as abusive Sinkhole/Stone Rain decks. However, while these decks may win, they also discourage other people from coming back to try again. This, I believe, is one of the primary reasons why people don't play Legacy online: Wasteland and Rishidan Port. The experience simply is not fun. Never mind the cost of entry.
The ultimate result of players using successful, consistent land destruction deck will be that people will find other stores or other formats to play. Events will not fire. Suddenly, the player with the best deck will find themselves showing up alone. They won't win any prizes. In the case of paper play, they'll likely have driven a long ways for nothing. The store won't make money by holding the event. They may even feel discouraged from hosting another event in that format (ie, Legacy/Vintage). All this because one player played a non-interactive, abusive and trolling one-sided deck.
The thought occurs that Clone effects are NOT weaker. 'I now have a GosT/Thrun/Lady of the Mountain for 1U.' The net effect of parity is the same.
The social contract is another thing entirely and is separate from what you feel about strategies. I enjoy using Armageddon and other ld effects that are efficient but I would never consider using them in a group where I know the players dislike those strategies and in general I have not done so on MTGO because the majority of players have a consensus about why not: Armageddon and the like really slow games down unless you can kill everyone quickly afterward. Long games are a considerable waste of time when the majority aren't having fun.
Now in one vs one games social aspects tend to be ignored unless you arrange for something else. Also every player has their own idea of what is acceptable and what isn't. "Casual" magic has a range of definitions from no "griefer" strategies to "no holds barred". (CF:About 19 years of arguments over the definition.)
Sure you can argue that Land destruction is anti-social but the same can be said of any strategy that frustrates your opponents. For example, if you play Meddling Mage naming a combo piece you know I am playing with you are stymieing my ability to play the game. I will have to top deck some removal to win now.
If I play a combo that wins on turn 2 I am stymieing your ability to play the game because you didn't have time to stop my combo with your meddling mage idea. If you counter my turn 2 combo with Force of Will... If I hit your Force of Will turn one with a Duress... If you counter my Duress with a Mental Misstep... and it goes on and on.
All kinds of ways of playing magic may be considered anti-social given the right social rules. If two players are not in agreement about what the social rules are then neither can be said to be anti-social. At most they can be said to be a-social. And this is the normal state as I said unless agreed upon prior to the match.
Now, all that said I believe the best way to play Magic is with people whom you enjoy playing against. For different people that will mean different things but my personal goal is not to merely enjoy the game but to make it enjoyable so I forgo some of my pleasure in playing mass destruction cards by not doing so around those I know who are offended by it.
I also go out of my way to chat and be sociable in the game so that my opponent does not feel they are merely in a video game. But this is my personal way. There is no one way. The way is as individual as each blade of grass and each snow flake and each person.
My apologies for the dissertation but I wanted to make sure your misapprehension of what I was saying was cleared up.
there's a huge difference between bramblecrush - which no one woud have any problem with - and stuff like turn 1 dark ritual into braids into turn 2 sinkhole into strip mine etc. etc. In the former, the land destruction is just an tool which might restrict your opponent's options after they've already had a chance to get into the game. Nothing wrong with that. In the latter you're executing a game strategy which just stops the opponent from doing anything and ensures that they have a miserable game. If your plan works, your opponent doesn't play a game. If it doesn't, you don't play a game. There's no interraction, it's just stupidity.
It's not a question of passing a moral judgement, but playing those kind of decks is in a very real sense anti-social. You're saying to your opponent "i don't care about your experience in this game". In some settings, particularly competitive ones, that's par for the course and within social expectations. but in a casual environment, eg. commander, I would suggest that most people would disagree. If you are just trying to take away my ability to play a game with you then I have no reason to play with you.
Bruce richard wrote a good article on the subject recently:
https://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/sf/244
Does o2 Media sell this stuff?
Nice article by the way, romellos. I think the mana base could be seen by some as non-budget, but really, I think everyone should be buying playsets of shocks right now anyways. They've been ridiculously cheap as of late.
See I think this is where players diverge into demographics. Timmy hates LD because it stops the player from having fun. Spike uses it because it works (when it works) and is another tool in the box and Johnny ignores it for being boring and not really an inventive way to play. (And usually LD is pretty boring.)
Each will justify their position because everyone likes to feel they are right. But being right is beside the point in M:TG. Did you win? Good. No? Examine what you can do to fix that. If winning doesn't matter then did you achieve whatever goal you do have? No? Fix it.
Etc.
I agree that LD is about locking down a player's board position. The analogy of equipment destroying seems very emotional and evocative but not very reasonable. After all a land screwed player CAN get out of it. The land destruction player may run out of gas, and or just not have enough to begin with.
"Griefing" is hard to apply to M:TG as a concept because it really mostly refers to MMOs where the idea is to make players quit playing and honestly if you quit playing because of LD or Hand Denial or counterspells etc you might not have learned enough about the game to really enjoy it for what it is.
Lots of people think they know what M:TG is all about and obviously it isn't about certain things anymore that it used to be: anté for example. So the game does morph and change. Land Destruction has not been relevant at a professional tier for a really long time. (Ponza is the last deck I can think of that was super successful with this strategy.)
Partially the reason for this is because of the emotion outcry of players who don't like having to wait for a top deck to start getting their game plan in motion. And also the large Timmy contingent that typically are the majority of starting players and thus represent an important voting block for Wizards.
Obviously some mana screw is inherent to the game already (cf: the great mulligan debates) so it is perceived as unnecessary to add to the pain of those who hate being locked down. I think this is a bad thing because a good player should be able to at least acknowledge all parts of the game and know how to deal with them without tilting or feeling put upon.
But to say that someone who enjoys locking down their opponents is somehow less moral than you who employ creatures to beat on them or cast spells at their dome is just ludicrous. If they were tearing up your cards and laughing, I would be the first to condemn them. Just the same as if they were hitting you or otherwise doing things to make you unhappy outside of the game itself.
Comparing blowing up lands to destroying the other team's equipment so they can't play football is ludicrous. Want a football comparison? How about making a coffin-corner punt so that the other team is backed up so far they have no room to operate. That's what landkill does: it locks them up so they have no room to move.
There is no moral implication to landkill. How about counterspells? Is a player "morally pure" for countering his opponent's spells? What about burn? Does that make one morally pure?
Right now, landkill is great. So many people run greedy manabases that it's not even funny. I saw where someone earlier said Bramblecrush is useless. Wrong answer. Every deck runs targets for Bramblecrush. Got a planeswalker? Have a Bramblecrush. Got a Rakdos Keyrune? Eat a Bramblecrush. You've only got one source of white mana? Chew on this Bramblecrush. The days of being able to blow up every land they play are long gone. But, if they come out slow and stumble on their land draws?
MWAHAHA!
I am 100% behind this sentiment. Mana is the tool in which your entire game hinges on using to build a strategy. Removing it from your opponent takes all the strategy out of trying to win by using your wits. If you are playing football you don't destroy the other teams helmets and shoulder pads before the game and then declare yourself a super awesome winner.
"The look of pure despair when my opponent is discarding because he is totally and irrevocably mana starved" pretty much sums it up for me. i have no issue with land destruction in the abstract, but actively enjoying executing pure lockdown strategies like that is simply anti-social, there's no two ways about it. If your idea of a good game is strip mine into life from the loam then you're not interested in playing a game with another person, you're just trying to grief them.
Land destroying does not make one a horrible person. Unless you are actually out there blowing stuff up for real.
Griefing may be unpleasant but lets not confuse morality with role playing.
Personally I love Armageddon. Does that make me evil? I really don't think so. If you do perhaps your perspective is a tad bit bound up in the game and not so much in the world.
and this is why wotc doesn't print land destruction at a competitively viable cost anymore (good luck beating naya blitz with your 4 mana do nothing sorcery). Griefers/trolls/horrible people exist, they don't want to give them the tools to ruin their opponent's games...
There are people who cry about the nerfing of countermagic. I cry about the nerfing of land destruction.
My favorite card in Standard is Bramblecrush and my favorite creature is Acidic Slime. I love to destroy
lands and burn cities to the ground! Mwahaha! The look of pure despair when my opponent is discarding
because he is totally and irrevocably mana starved! Mwahaha! Sphinx's Revelation for one so that you can maybe draw a land? Mwahaha!
That's a lot more fun to me than to say, "Counter that," "No, you may not," "Dissipate that."
Pete said:
"The change makes Clone weaker, but blue is not supposed to have a way to destroy permanents. Bounce, yes. Counter, yes. But Vindicate an opposing permanent, even one with Shroud, no. That's out of flavor for U."
Challenge: Explain Pongify and Rapid Hybridization. I suppose you could quantify Pongify by saying it's in a set that specifically played around with the color pie (Planar Chaos), but that does not explain it's recent inclusion in the new Ravnica block.
I assume they reprinted Pongify as a sly attempt to insert some blue removal into the game knowing that they would ultimately be lessening clone's effectiveness; but the fact that Rapid Hybridization exists at all, in standard, completely nullifies your statement "but blue is not supposed to have a way to destroy permanents." Regardless of the fact that your opponent gets a Frog Lizard, whatever nonshroud nonhexproofy creature you just hosed.. is, well, hosed.
This is just the whole "elimination of mana burn" argument all over again, in a different form. Some people will be angry, some folks may even hang up their Commander spurs because they can't hose a Thrun, but ultimately, like the Simic Guild, we will adapt and continue to plod through and play the game regardless. Yeah blue is a little weaker, but blue has always been infuriating, and I'm still gonna groan when my opponent perpetually has two islands untapped, regardless of this change.
If you are very very concerned about this change, blue mages, start packing some Glaring Spotlights alongside your Pongifys.
I am looking forward to enjoying my legend at the same time my opponent or my teammate does. I am not looking forward to people flush with them internet monies buying 4x Gaea's Cradle just so they could produce 57 million mana in one turn, or this potential Thespian's Stage / Dark depths Combo but we already face folks who have the hexmage combo or for the former, folks with 4 elves out, one of them being Priest of titania, and an Umbral Mantle. so Ya know, it's just more of the same.
As for all the other comments on here. Land destruction SUCKS. Yes many of you play competitively, and I consistently feel like the representative of the voice of the casual player (Sort of like the Mouth of Sauron); I have a kid, a wife, two jobs, and freelance work. To find time to play Magic is difficult for me (for example I am writing this on a break at work); If I load up a game and turn two is sinkhole, turn three is stone rain, then I concede, and 10 minutes of my life is irrevocably taken away. I am not a tourney player on a daily or monthly basis; I am a casual fun player. The shift and trend of less and less land destruction pleases me. Again, you may say this dumbs down magic-- I say it makes you think harder about how to deal with an opponent. Anyone can hose a land, it takes finese to hose your opponent without destroying their manabase. People applaude the victories ar amries when armies meet armies; when strategy clashes with alternate strategy. Not many people applaude starving out your enemy's city for months while your amry is fine. It's just not sporting. I digress a bit here but the bottom line is find somewy to win besides hosing my lands!
Wizards need to realize that pandering to their (admittedly wide and diverse) group of players who only show up for the pre-releases, who only buy boxes to construct 74-card decks to play in the comfort of their living rooms will, in the end, lead to the opposite of their intended result.
Let's be honest here. Magic: the Gathering is a cash cow for Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro. They have no other goal than to make money through this hobby. To increase their profit margin, they want to market their product to the players with the lowest level of skill. In the short term, it's a good strategy because they want people showing up to FNM's, even with their Giant Adephage decks.
In the long term, however, it's bad because the players who decide to stick around are continual source of income. These people have the greatest influence upon the game of magic, as demonstrated by the standard season of Caw Blade when people just stayed home rather than facing mirror matches of the same kind of deck over and over. Tinker with the product too much, and there's a danger that these people vote with their feet to do something else.
This is where I am at currently. I've sold/given away my magic online collection because the program is primarily designed for standard. Multiplayer formats don't get as much consideration. This, to me, has always felt like pandering. While standard is the most played format in the game, there are plenty of other formats people play which don't get the support that standard does.
Moreover, Wizards of the Coast sucks at communication. I've more or less given up learning about anything they want to say. I check Star City Games and my local store's facebook page for relevant news. How pathetic is that? Here is a company with a large following who can't figure out how to market their own product in a way that ensures that people know when things are coming out. The lack of communication is worrisome for me as a consumer. I interpret this as Wizards of the Coast truly does not care about what I want to get out of the game, as long as I keep buying boxes.
The resultant behavior (for me at least) has been that I engage in the secondary market, supporting businesses like MTGO Traders who actually do care about their customers- as opposed to Wizards, who can't even be bothered to give timely, consistent updates about their perpetually crashing online client.