Magic: The Gathering

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Sophia
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Magic: The Gathering

Post by Sophia »

Split from http://www.dungeon-master.com/forum/vie ... 60#p140798 -b.
Chaos-Shaman wrote:it wasn't until MTG cards came out before we thought cards were worth playing again, there was mental strategy in the game, it is to me the best game ever invented beyond computers.
Since this thread is about the commercial corruption of things, this comment is oddly appropriate. (I'll put this here for now, but I or another admin/mod will probably end up splitting the thread if it gets into a big tangent...)

Magic itself is based on a really fun and infinitely extensible core mechanic. However, to be honest, I don't actually play it a lot; what I don't like is the whole metagame that seems like it has come up around the arms race of bigger, better, and rarer cards that keep coming out; it's no longer just about the strategy of building your deck, but the fact that some people just can't afford certain strategies. If you just play casually with friends you can get around all this, of course-- print your own proxies, use a computer program like Apprentice or Cockatrice, etc.-- but this feels sort of like it's diluting the fun of the original game, and, of course, in the "official" sphere WotC encourages a "pay to win" game to their economic benefit.

Their own online offering, Magic Online, even has the same "booster packs" approach, so now you're paying them to buy cards that don't even actually exist. To me this is absurd, but also not surprising. Virtual items are big business as anyone who knows about MMORPGs can tell you. In the 1990s there was a computer game for Magic that just gave you a bunch of the best cards that were available at the time and just let you build your deck with whatever you want. Good luck getting anything like that now!
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Re: DRM and you

Post by Chaos-Shaman »

anything you say Sophia. considering that the forum is quiet and all, i know i wander, neat and clean i must be. so as i was saying in the last message, it's not all bad. i played the computer game MTG, didn't like it that much. i also didn't buy it either, but they had a good idea about purchasing those cards in a way, but it didn't work out. because it went online, it kinda destroyed the game somewhat, money gets involved and it is just as you say Sophia, how much does one have to spend and how bad do they want it.

and just for a fun statement if i may, my best deck had no rare cards. it cost 20 bucks.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by beowuuf »

I did it, so I could comment :D


I got in to magic in 4th edition, faded out during the mirage expansion. Have got back in to it off and on because a friend started re-playing it, though all he really had were the duel decks.

Magic hasn't changed in that the core game does need that 'get the best cards', but there are certainly more variants kicking around now that support various types of play. There is the Elder Dragon Highlander variant where you have a commander (like an elder dragon) that is the basis of the deck, - and that it's called highlander because you can only have one of each card. Of course that still invites rare cards, etc to mean something, so there are agreed 'bugetlander' versions where you limit the card values you can have too. And commander tends to be a longer form game, and invites fun decks built aroudn a theme that maybe use some of your weirder commons to boost the deck.


There's also the ability to draft - where you get sealed packs and basically construct decks handing those around. That takes the edge off of needing to be competitive by buying packs, it's more a case of you knowing the tactics and synergy of the boosters used, and then constructing a deck intelligently against other people doing that at the same time. Of course, even online I believe there is a buy in though :( So unless you win you will lose money on that, even if you get to keep the cards you get for home games or resell.


As Sophia says, if you want to play cheaply you can, but I guess it does still come down to money in the end :( Still, I do like that community variants that have Wizard support have sprung up where tactics and card knowledge count for more than your wallet.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

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I'm not interested in those collectible card games (CCGs) myself. I do have a few Magic cards that I got...I dunno, maybe fifteen years ago, something like that? It was a starter pack thing with a CD containing a computerised version of the game which was a tutorial plus you could play versus a computer AI.
I don't like those games where you have to keep buying more and more stuff to be able to play it properly. I prefer those games where everything you need is in the box and you don't need to keep buying booster packs constantly so that you've got every card. Between the two of us, Ja'Ph' and I have got several non-collectible card games. Well, he owns most of them (Ascension, Chrononauts, Braggart), but I own the one which we play every week (literally, we've played it multiple times every weekend since I got it last September). True, this game is no longer a single boxed game as it now has three expansions (with a mega-expansion due out in October and two more to come after that), but you don't need the expansions to be able to play the base game. It's not a deck-building game, that's why - every character has their own deck, and you choose which one you want to play and their 40-card deck contains everything you will need to play them versus whichever villain you're going to be fighting.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by beowuuf »

There were stand alone packs called 'duel of the planeswalkers' that you could fight with, containing a plainswalker and decent set of synergised cards. But yes, Magic definitely puts the capital C in CCG, as opposed to other games.

Speaking of which, the Kingdom of Loathing non-CCG should be coming out any time now! I believe there was printer fun happening that's delayed it, like all Kickstarter things get delayed.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by Bit »

There were books which each card printed - and I had a scanner... cheap cards for the backside and go...
Today I'd suggest a romme-cardset, which is even cheaper per card :P
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

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Not all Kickstarters get delayed - the most recent expansion for Sentinels of the Multiverse (the card game I mentioned above) was released about a month early ;).
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

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Witches! :D
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by beowuuf »

I played in a couple of tournament games while at Sn Diego, Two-headed giant where you play in teams of two, with a shared life pool and attack / defend phase, but you otherwise played your decks separately (While speaking to each other), having formed them from 8 booster packs.


Quite fun, though nervewracking the first time since it was the Ravnica block (I think) of cards added to our first time in a tournament!


So I now have a huge pile of cards, as the second time due to drop outs, etc we managed to place well enough for additional boosters! :D
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by Chaos-Shaman »

called highlander
i made a few highlander decks, they are fun because it is hard to establish a theme...

my best deck used the most common cards in an unusual way, like try a blood lusted unstable mutation mishra factory, it kills fast in three turns, but the player has to wait for the precise moment, better they use their mana first so it can't be swords or something like that. i won tournamnets with it.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

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I don't like those games where you have to keep buying more and more stuff
it is a way to make money, i actually liked the new cards, forced me to come up with new strategies to beat these new cards with the old ones, and being a strategists it just pissed the other players off that even though they have all these new and some rare cards that a simple deck still beats them with a good playing skill set. i held tournaments for many kids as well, i had a whole school of them tripping over to my house to play all the time, eager to show me their new decks and try a hand at beating me. it was excellent training for them, i showed them how to plan, be patient to defeat their competitor, then the school stopped them from brigging the cards, some dipshit thought it was evil and teachers hated that they were only interested in the cards. i taught them more with those cards in a short time than they did while in school, but they did not see it that way. i would have formed a chess club if i thought it was possible, these kids don't want that kind of mindless thinking with no cool pictures. i wonder if those teachers knew how that game trained their minds to think ahead, too bad, they just didn't know how to use the game to teach.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by beowuuf »

The funny thing about chess, of course, is there is no random component to it. So the better you get at it, it seems the more that you simply treat your opponent as a complex problem, or you are simply moving through the established plays.

With magic, not only do you have an ever evolving set of cards, but also the random element means it is about reacting in the moment. Your plans can change with an unexpected card or without an expected card to yourself. You can also bluff an opponent or otherwise interact with them, without it simply being the 'nasty psychology to make them make a mistake' that is the only social metagame play in chess.

Plus some of the cards are just plain fun - from a mechanics or flavour point of view!
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by Chaos-Shaman »

there is a lot to learn from magic cards, some of them have a story, it really is a mind builder. chess is extremely hard on the memory, a great exercise in logic and the only play i had when i was learning was to get my dad drunk before i played him if i wanted to win, he was in real tournaments with players from EU and such. it runs in my family to play that game. i think MTG, although not as memory intensive is a far better game to exercise the mind but it does have the problem of cheaters that with the slight of hand can easily set up a deck to win. i have run across this on a number of occasions.
what was your favourite deck\colour\card\theme beowuuf?
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

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Used to be black/white back in the day, but I had quite a fun time running a green/blue deck under M14. Under old magic I used to like running black's dangerous stuff with white balancing it - like spirit linking a banshee or COP Black, that sort of thing. Cab't recall a good theme deck I made back then... used to just play with good cards and not think of a theme nor synergy.

I must admit to really living the scavenging ooze in the new set. A 2 drop with the ability to clear out graveyards of nasty cards, and also pump if you get rid of critters.


Saw a draft game online recently that was quite fun. A serious player and podcast host was being challenged by one of the more casual podcast peopel to run a deck that could not attack - simply use milling / inevitability (with a essense of whatever that shuffles your deck back in hand) as the win condition. It was funny to see him at first chafe against the limitation and the fact he passed so many good cards, then see how well he did with that deck up until he faced a deck of the same colours that got the second flask and a few other good cards that synergised with it!
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

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ha, you played what my spouse loved to play, black and white hymn decks with kill cards like swords to plowshares, i hated the hymn decks!
green and blue deck, hohoho, not exactly friends in colour, green had huge creatures, blue with counters. a good acid rain\tsunami deck if you hack them to destroy lands. it's been so long i am forgetting the names, then again there are thousands and it's hard to remember them all. it may be possible with DM to simulate the idea of alignment with colour, skeletons being black, tough creatures being green, fire related being red, the wizards being associated with water type spells, and the white guys related to good. it's an idea???

i loved the millstones, i hunted them down in all the stores across Toronto at the time, it really pissed the opponent off to see their best cards being milled, heh. they have so many cards that work out of the graveyard now that the millstone has become maybe too powerful.

i didn;t know you were such an avid player beowuuf, i thought i was the only one here who played the game in the past, i have mentioned this more than a few times here with no reponse.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

Post by beowuuf »

My first hayday was 1995 - 97, and I've only recently started getting back in to it more than playing a planeswalker deck against my friend once a year :)


MAgic colour and DM monsters might be fun to connect in a dungeon, always worth a try.
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Re: Magic: The Gathering

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it is a good game, and i'll get back to it one day when the grandchildren are old enough to play, i'll give them my cards to learn with.

wizards blue, priests white, fighters green, hellish red, death side black... for fun? maybe
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