Lurker > trdl23

pyresword posted...

Dryad Arbor

80/100

I love wacky designs like Dryad Arbor. It's a cool juxtaposition of two basic concepts with the upsides and downsides of both. I love traditional creaturelands, so I'm all aboard with a Land-owar Elf.

"But it can be fetched or Green Sun'd!"

That ain't Dryad Arbor's problem! I think being able to fetch a 1/1 is actually kinda sick. Green Sun's Zenith was a major problem, but that's all on Green Sun's design. Dryad Arbor is just being a neat card that showed the best of Future Sight.

Now, the people who would hide Dryad Arbor in their lands and try to "gotcha" players who couldn't discern it from the rest of the land stack? Fuck those assholes. I'm glad they changed the MTR to stop that shit.

xenosaga posted...

The Reserve List

20/100

Oh boy. Here we go.

I get it. The Reserved List was necessary for the game. Chronicles was an S-tier fuckup that spooked the secondary market that TCGs need in order to thrive, and Magic was the pioneer of this territory. It was the only way to keep retailers invested. An evil, certainly, but an evil to preserve everything else.

God, I am sick of players today paying for that fuckup over two decades ago. I am sick of seeing Eternal formats that feature fantastic and unique gameplay get abandoned. I am sick of #MTGFinance bros.

I don't think it can ever go away. We've seen retailers disinvest from Magic because of the constant glut of product releases now; repealing the list now will just cause the same issue that started it since HotC's goodwill to retails is in the trash.

ChaosTonyV4 posted...

Commander Precons

35/100

Fair warning: I am an EDH fossil. My mind of "what the format should be" is still a bunch of us Judges jamming our shitty Invasion-era legends the night before an SCG Open that we loved from the Weatherlight Saga, and the goal wasn't winning as much as "Can you play an obscure enough card to make the greybeards at the table need to read it, yet it makes sense in your deck?" When the first Commander precons came out, I got super excited.

If only I knew what they had been harbingers of.

Commander precons pre-pandemic were poisoning the format. Not only were they fucking up Eternal formats (not that HotC gives a shit about those anymore), they were also teaching new players, either to the format or to Magic in general, that Commander was designed to be competitive solitaire. Experience counters and Eminence are design atrocities that discourage or outright punish interaction and push for linearity. They've also constantly included Sol Ring, which I've come to recognize as antithetical to the fun of any given game where it gets played early -- and because it's in every single precon, it can never be banned.

Post-pandemic, I just haven't paid attention. The well's tainted. I rarely see a Commander game that ends with more than half the table being glad they played. I genuinely believe the awful design of most early precons are to blame for a lot of it.

Lopen posted...

The original Kamigawa block

75/100

I'm glad people have largely come around on OG Kamigawa. It had the unfortunate fate of being placed between Magic's most obnoxiously broken block since Urza (Mirrodin) and Magic's most beloved block (Ravnica). So many of the mechanics just didn't work: The hand-size stuff was too finnicky, Arcane was parasitic as hell, Soulshift was too insular and required you to play overcosted cards in order to get back other overcosted cards, and Bushido did nothing but discourage blocking in general. Legends-matter was neat in theory, but the iteration of the Legend Rule at that time made it awkward as hell. Jitte broke the game. Ninjutsu remains one of the coolest mechanics ever designed, but it's a diamond in a heap of trash.

But the world, the general design, the genuine effort they took to make it as Shinto as a game company based in Seattle could do, and many of the individual cards? C'est magnifique.

It was also the first time I'd gotten invested in Magic's lore. I'd enjoyed some of the Weatherlight saga but was too young to really "get it." The actual prose of the Kamigawa novel trilogy hasn't held up compared to when 13-year-old Trdl read it, but the story beats are a fantastic picaresque adventure with a self-described scoundrel protagonist who lies, cheats, and steals his way to begrudging heroism. Having a black-aligned protagonist and white-aligned antagonist was executed brilliantly.

I was too young for it at the time, but some of my fellow greybeards have told me that Kamigawa-Ravnica was the peak of Standard, and I believe it. There was enough spice in individual card designs that mixed well with the unique stuff Ravnica brought us.

I'm so glad Neon Dynasty was good. Kamigawa deserved to have another moment in the limelight.

redrocket posted...

Banding

62/100

I know it's a meme, and it was way too complex for Magic's infancy. It's honestly a cool mechanic that isn't too hard to wrap your head around once it's explained to you in plain English, and since Magic's combat system is inherently defender-favored (one of the best parts of it), a mechanic that shakes up combat math so much is a neat treat. If we can track Mutate, clearly we can do Banding in 2024. The main problem is that modern rules wording makes the mechanic read like a nightmare.

VintageGin posted...

Universes Beyond

52/100

Ever since Lord of the Rings and Doctor Who, it's grown on me. I still dislike Doctor Who being in Magic, but as a guy who used to really be into Who, I have to recognize that the actual card designs were absolutely brilliant.

My main issue besides "Does this UB fit Magic" (LotR is the only one so far that does, though Final Fantasy might work too. 40K is borderline.) is "how relevant is this IP in Current Year." The Walking Dead will always get clowned on not just because it was handled so sloppily but also because who gave a shit about the Walking Dead in 2019? That's what I'm wondering with the current slather of incoming UB. Fallout's relevance has been pissed away after 4 was the Mid to end all Mids, and Bethesda's goodwill has gone down the drain. Assassin's Creed also remains a joke since it's stagnated as badly as FIFA and Madden games. Any collab with Marvel in 2024 is firmly in shark-jumping territory.

LotR proved that UB works well as a dessert to a hearty meal of good standard sets. Hasbro, unfortunately, would prefer to cram as many calories into its diet as possible despite the inevitable diabetes in a few years.

pyresword posted...

MTG 30th Anniversary Edition

2/100

The only good thing about it is that it was so widely repudiated in both PR and sales that it actually made Hasbro of the Coast take an L

It's been a while, B8. I need to start a new project I'll abandon halfway through.

Ratings will be out of 100 because I know I'd use decimals in a 10-point system anyway.

Please don't post again until I get your first post rated

Ratings will continue until I abandon it

Train

Hardy

storm that is approaching

So it turns out I'm actually just sick lol

I think there actually is Korean market nearby! I'll look at that tomorrow.

TomNook7 posted...

What game?

Magic. Local store is getting into content and had a $1000 tournament yesterday. This was the first one they've had commentary for and we got 35 viewers at peak -- I know it doesn't sound impressive, but it's by far the best they've ever done so I'm proud. I got PMs from locals who watched and want to come out and play in the future too.

HaRRicH posted...

Vitamin C is your friend. Honey can be good too.

Sometimes gargling can help, but don't do it with salt water like some people do because they'll hurt the vocal cords more. Warm water is probably better than cold water.

Try not to be breathless before speaking, try to breathe through your diaphragm, try not to yell, try to massage your neck muscles before beginning...just odds-enhancers, I know being an announcer means it's hard not to ever yell as a reaction to something hype. Hope this helps!

Thanks a bunch. I'll avoid salt water, and honey does sound nice.

I can also post the VOD if people want to see. I'd love feedback on presentation since we're still new at it (obviously I don't expect you to watch all 9 hours).

Until yesterday.

I woke up this morning feeling like I'd taken sandpaper to my throat. Anyone do this as a hobby and have tips to make next time easier? I was guzzling water and using the bathroom frequently so it wasn't dehydration.