Energy is Bad for the Game. Here's Why.

[@ctomsky]

Magic has been doing this a lot lately, especially in Commander. What originally made Commander great was building decks around weirdold cards that wouldn't work in other formats, like Shrines or Gates. But now we have 17 shrines and 28 gates and Commanders like Go-Shintai that are so pushed that they are the strictly best option, forever. I want more cards like Flubs with downsides and weird payoffs that can be built a hundred different ways and thays the whole point.

[@drew8235]

I don't play Commander really, but I'm sad for those that do. Very sad to see someone's preferred format go the way it seems to be going.

[@nzephier]

I feel like commander is gonna get a branch format called new vs old, like edh will legit be cards pre-commander pushing, then "commander," will be faster meta focused decks lol just a theory

[@georgebaines562]

​​@@nzephierI thought about suggesting this to my playgroup recently 😂

[@TheLarch]

​@@nzephierPreDH already exists

[@stuartbaxter-potter8363]

I'm building a Flubs deck myself. Most of the decks I've seen favor landfall, but I'm planning to ramp fast early on before even casting Flubs, then riding the topdeck and cascade for the rest of the game. He's here for a good time, not necessarily a long time XD

[@michaelpatalano9884]

Please start making cards with drawbacks, it’s so much fun

[@feritperliare2890]

It would've been fun before the issue became not which bad cards to slot into the deck because they still work well but which busted cards you can't include cause there are more busted cards. We need a reset find some spot in time idk 2019 maybe maybe just before secret lair and reevaluate everything after

[@g.n.s.]

Even Energy costing life per tick I think would help.

[@g.n.s.]

Like accumulate as much as you want but using it has to be taxed somehow. Energy should equal an even amount of Wizard Hats, that’s all I’m sayin’.

[@marcoottina654]

drawbacks makes people cry people crying do not buy packs __power creep will make people chase cards, therefore buying packs__ and Hasbro is looking for short-sighted profit and people want easy htings and people don't want to deal with the responsibility of the drawbacks and paying for things (except for **$money€** ) what could you deduce?

[@TheLordSorin]

Also, stop designing with commander in mind it ruined what made it great.

[@Cecekcz]

Before straight-to-modern sets, all the cards playable in modern were a part of one or more of these categories: former standard all-star, balancing mistake made by WotC, a combo/synergy with cards from a different standard era. I thought that was the most exciting aspects of modern and other eternal formats and straight-to-modern absolutely destroeyd that. Now they just print and sell you the cards that are good enough.

[@Xoulrath_]

And yet, it's largely been cards OUTSIDE of MH sets that made the MH sets broken. 😂

[@edwardbishop3150]

Also being a standard player, I miss those days...

[@TheEvolver311]

First off direct to format cards started when the first Commander decks came out with cards being made directly for Legacy with True Name Nemesis being the first one of note. Modern players started demanding WotC give us direct to Modern sets since the birth of the format.

[@shuttlecrossing1433]

@@TheEvolver311 Modern players didn't realize how bad a format of True-Name Nemeses would be. That's not entirely their fault, the idea that we could print directly into modern would have been great if it was done tastefully and extremely rarely, with a small number of cards that really impacted the format. But WotC doesn't want to design more Bloodbraid Elves or Thopter Foundries - cards that we have to find creative ways build around to make viable in advantage engines, they want to make the next Griselbrand or Birthing Pod - one card engines or cards so busted we HAVE to play with them.

[@TheEvolver311]

@shuttlecrossing1433 actually again you are making assertions from what? Maro explicitly told fans in public q&a widely watched online at the time that it would forever alter the format and that the only way to add such a product to Modern world in the form of a full sized set marked explicitly for playability in the format that wasn't just a reprint set because reprints already had the ruling that only previously legal cards would be valid in format i.e. you can't reprint legacy cards into Modern via a masters set. The response from fans was "WotC is lying" "they just want to treat Modern players like little kids by not giving us our own True Name Nemesis" which at the time was a card that spiked the average Legacy Delver deck price by $600-800 so the idea it would be expensive wasn't flag against it to most, player complained "this is WotC trying to force Modern players to buy standard sets while giving Legacy players individually crafted powerful cards." People literally complained the opposite of what you are saying it was literally the opposite True Name Nemesis warped Legacy around it to the point you had to buy at least 3 of a card at the time only available in a Commander pre-con so no they knew this was a possible outcome. Again go watch the celebration from Pleasant Kenobi or MTGoldfish at the announcement They both mention that they are aware that the product the players demanded and WotC finally caved in after almost a decade because it was as early as 2012 that Modern players were starting to demand a direct to Modern product. So no you are wrong

[@6ThreeSided9]

But Vince! If we let people innovate the meta using all of magic across history, why would anyone buy our new cards?!

[@marcoottina654]

also also, if we (WotC / Hasbro) allow older cards to become synergistic and powerful, why would people buy all the new cards? Just cut them out with the power creep!

[@Xoulrath_]

The irony of your statement is that there are old cards that can still compete. People simply choose to go the easy route and netdeck. 😂

[@TheEvolver311]

Perhaps you should go back in time and tell the players who harassed WotC into making MH

[@fastpuppy2000]

@@Xoulrath_ I hope WotC boots taste as good as you expected, bud

[@Xoulrath_]

@@fastpuppy2000 what a stupid, uninspired comment. Get a brain. Then maybe you can git gud.

[@AssimilateAndChill]

It’s interesting because this is kind of how Yugioh works. Konami prints cards and it’s like: “This card says Lunalight and is good so you play it in the Lunalight deck”

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

This isn't kind of how yugioh works, it is *exactly* how yugioh works.

[@joaogrrr]

Yeah, it's why I used to play YGO. Emphasis on used.

[@brianmattei7134]

It's always been the worst part of that game, outside of them not understanding balance. I always hated it in MTG too. Tribal is the same exact thing.

[@Kylada-o5t]

to be fair there are often unforeseen synergies or mixes that, despite archetype-centric nature of yugioh, create conglomerates that no one could imagine. Not all of these conglomerates are fun tho, but some sure are.

[@kritikverloren1814]

The goal of a game should never be to copy the engines of other games - same counts for poison counters who were copied from Pokemon

[@NotFinalTillVinyl]

My problem is that in doing these straight to modern products is they've jumped the shark. Sets used to compete with one another in standard, outlier cards from standard made their way into modern/legacy. But to release directly into modern, and more importantly to sell well, the sets have to compete with modern as a whole. Each and every time they do this it has to be "better" than before and compete with each previous direct to modern set. They've locked themselves into this insane power creep death spiral, which itself might not be so bad if not for the rate at which WoTC pushes new product these day.

[@arvidsteel6557]

MH1 and MH3 are like night and day. MH1 called back to weird mechanics but putting a twist on them that had people asking how and where to paly them, making strange card like Hogaak that can't even be cast for mana (which during spoiler season some people unironically though was gonna be a 2-of in dredge), with the most obviously pushed design being Urza, Lord High Artificer, a callback to a 20 year old character and a card that pointed to blue control shells that could put enough artifacts into play (ThopterSword). MH3 meanwhile is just the equivalent of "Design a standard set at a modern power level", with Energy and Eldrazi decks being printed into existence almost wholecloth in a single set, with commons and uncommons that make it the fastest limited set in the games history just from raw power level, and mythics that scream "play me in your X deck" harder than Eldrazi Temple.

[@TheEvolver311]

MH 1 invalidated just as much if not more of the Modern Cardpool prior to its printing

[@arvidsteel6557]

​@@TheEvolver311 Maybe the one pro tour when Hogaak was legal? But Astrolabe modern involved playing less MH1 cards than Jeskai Energy plays MH3 cards. In MH1 every deck got a new card, in MH3 every strategy got a new shiny replacement deck.

[@TheEvolver311]

@arvidsteel6557 Astrolabe alone invalidated everyone's mana bases lol I know shocks were only running $15+ at the time but way to disregard half of everyone's deck. So literally a single MH1 card invalidated most everyone's collection for thousands of dollars in value which is why it was banned. And no not everyone deck got something Yaw a new deck didn't exist before MH1 Wren and Six birthed a new archetype also It was in reality just as warping and drove more cards out of playability.

[@arvidsteel6557]

@@TheEvolver311 I never said MH1 wasn't powerful and format warping. You're arguing against no one. The Yawgmoth deck is a prefect example of my point, containing 2 MH1 cards, Yawgmoth and a singleton Nurturing Peatland. How many MH3 cards are in Jeskai and Boros Energy? How many MH3 cards are in these new eldrazi decks? The designers of MH3 created entirely new decks from scratch, very intentionally. The two cards on the banlist from MH1 are a rare everyone thought was going to be a 2-of in dredge, and a piece of draft chaff that wound up being too good with fetchlands against blood moon. The cards that might wind up on the banlist from MH3 are a card everyone knew was busted in half as soon as it was spoiled, and a series of crowning jewels of decks that were non-existent before MH3 brought them into being.

[@TheEvolver311]

@@arvidsteel6557 They created the same kinds of stuff in each MH set it just happens that this time the Energy deck actually took. Snow I would argue actually did it is just incestuous in a different way than Energy is so it's not as obvious. Goblins, Blink themes in MH1 also made new MH decks. MH2 also had similar impact with lots of its cards. The MH sets must by definition out preform nearly all traditional sets because MHx sets are designed for the Modern format. It would be like saying a Standard set should only be created with a block format in mind to suggest the type of "design" people pretend they wanted.

[@styfen]

Yeah, it seems like even Pauper, Legacy and Vintage can't avoid the creeping talons of WotC's forced "rotation" of eternal format sets. I've mentioned it before, but Premodern has become my respite from this. Dozens of viable decks, a massive amount of classic cards and no ability for WotC to create a Premodern Horizons set because it is not a format run by them. Come on over, give it a go people.

[@tahlialysse]

I think the problem with something like energy is that you really need to have it in all colors rather than mostly nestled in only some. Sure, some set of them is probably gonna wind up as the "best" option, but one of the big reasons why a lot of the kaladesh cards aren't seeing play is because so much of that set had energy in green, a color with basically no energy support in MH3. So, either you go into green *for* those cards...or you just play the better things in your colors. I think energy is just one of those types of things that they either need to go heavier on with a lot more total, or should mostly retire. This "very seldom getting any" middle ground leads to it being so "deck built for you" feeling when they make a few of them above the curve.

[@Xoulrath_]

They've been making paint-by-numbers decks for decades now.

[@Izelor]

Another issue is that cards have grown exponentially stronger during the last decade, especially after 2020. Older energy cards are simply too weak to compete with recent sets. What's worse is that cards of today will be too weak to compete with cards that will be released in 3-4 years from now.

[@tahlialysse]

@@Izelor that's only about half accurate. Power creep, even across a decade, is more complex than that alone. While you can easily find individual cards that have eclipsed another in the way you are saying, there's also plenty of room for things to be shifted sideways in a way that sometimes lines up better...but it could shift back to where the other assortment of qualities lines up in the future. So like, galvanic discharge is in the "completely eclipsed" category, while tune the narrative is more of the shifted sideways category. Right now, not playing basics and not playing green with energy makes it a lot more appealing than attune with aether. But there's certainly conceivable worlds where a deck might want attune over tune (say, because it is playing green and not blue), or where a deck might play both. So a lot of my point is that basically all the sideways shifting into Jeskai for MH3 has meant that anything in G or B from kaladesh is already behind at the starting gate. And then combine that with the eclipsing for other cards and you end up with the current situation. That's why putting support in all colors would have at least actually given the older cards a shot (since much of the good energy stuff was in UG).

[@Tuss36]

Energy was the top deck at the time, and took a lot of coaxing to get made in the first place, thus why it took so long to make more and also likely why it was in Modern Horizons rather than Standard. And it's not the only mechanic that's been forever since we've seen. Heck, it took how long to see Investigate again after its debut? And even if you filled the set completely full, you'd still run into the problem of every deck using cards from the same set.

[@SHUTTHEFUUU]

I'm almost convinced that when August rolls around, WotC will be like "well people didn't buy into Nadu because it was so good in the pro tour. Because it is now not a very large part of the meta, we don't find it very problematic. No bans lol."

[@Kakerate2]

:p

[@crondog]

Here's a wild stat: of the top 5 decks in Modern, two are about 1/3 MH cards and the other three are about 1/2. That's just so far beyond "mad because my pet deck got powercrept" territory.

[@MrPiotrV]

it's actually worse than that, it's only lands that make it seem less bad than it actually is.

[@Bobzonthejob]

The thing that impresses me is that they printed new powerful energy cards in such a way as to have no need for the old energy cards that went through standard (and have no ability to make them more money).

[@zacharythorp6095]

The design philosophy is called "Design by Landfill". That is, pave over the old stuff with newer and/or better stuff, then never go back to improve or fix issues with the older stuff. Any game that prints expansions, but especially RPG's with their new Editions, does this in spades.

[@Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhlb]

As a proud owner of a lifegain deck, soul of guides in not strictly better. Triggering off of all creatures is hugely different than just triggering off of your creatures

[@SilverAlex92]

Yeah thats true, but if we're talking 60 card formats with bowmasters then the 2 toughness ends up becoming better than the extra life. Maybe there is an argument for the "stricty" not being there, but guide of souls is a powercrept soul sister, not only is it fatter in the butt side, but its also its own mini payoff, because of course, in 2024 magic everything has to do the thing and then reward you for doing the thing.

[@TheEvolver311]

​@SilverAlex92 Still not "strictly better" situational

[@SilverAlex92]

@@TheEvolver311 Yeah, so long the situation isnt EDH or tabletop magic xD Im a soul sisters player, and on every format were its allowed, guide of soul is better. Like there I dont see literally any reason you would play a soul sisters deck in a format with guide of soul and not start your deck with 4 guides as one of your soul sisters.

[@TheEvolver311]

@SilverAlex92 idk I'll confess I've only ever played against soul sisters like a few hundred any '1cmv soul sister effect + half decent ability' would seem to meet that bar of quality

[@yummines]

Honestly this situation is really weird since wotc already solved the issue of power-creep with the rotation system in standard. Now that they are printing cards into eternal formats, they're running into the same issue that Yugioh faces where they have to print stronger and stronger cards to justify the purchase, since it would be pointless to buy worse new cards. Commander is the exception as always since it is by nature a non-competitive format, so people will buy new worse cards to play simply because they are fun or personal reasons(notably Arthur, Marigold Knight is worse than Winota, Joiner of Forces but people will play Arthur for a myriad of reasons). But this is a video about Modern and not edh.

[@TheEvolver311]

WoTC never fixed power creep in the way you say We still power creep Tarmogofy out of viability by 2015 lol

[@Reluxthelegend]

Commander is definitely not the exception lots of power creep going on there too even on casual tables.

[@Nephalem2002]

@@ReluxthelegendDepends heavily on your POD. I’ve been playing Commander for almost 3 years now and besides my own improvements the power levels of the people I’ve played with have stayed the same.

[@petrri323]

Commander is the most powerful magic format by FAR. You need a whole discussion before you play about how you’re “not gonna be too mean” and LITERALLY have to play worse. You have to go out of your way for a balanced experience. It’s stupid. It’s also crazy how commander players think their format is “casual” when you can use more unique cards than ANY OTHER FORMAT. Commander is only “casual” because everyone just pretends it is. Wizards doesn’t think about other formats when making commander sets either, that’s the bigger issue. So they are making cards that are balanced for the Game that is Commander, but not the other versions of MtG. So other versions break.

[@D_A_D_]

MH is having a warping effect on commander as well though, which is entirely unwelcome by much of the commander playerbase, yet some people don't think about it or don't care and now all the sudden the format that used to be all about big expensive things is getting leaner and leaner.

[@xyryyn]

As much fun as drafting Modern Horizons is, they should not be designed for limited like a standard set. Modern Horizons sets should be what my YuGiOh-playing friends call "legacy support" - boosting old archetypes to bring them up to competitiveness with the current ones or to reenable archetypes killed by the banlist. (YGO has its own power creep/parasitic design problems, but that's not the fault of legacy support) The downside to that is that the set will feel like an incoherent mix of random stuff when you try to draft with it (kinda like drafting old core sets).

[@brianmattei7134]

.... Isn't this exactly what MH3 is? Energy isn't new. It's an "old" mechanic. They're boosting it. That's exactly as you describe. The problem is that they're targeting mechanics specifically, rather than making generically good cards that slot into decks organically. Snapcaster Mage is a good card in tempo decks, control decks, etc. LOTV is a good card in any black-based midrange strategy, regardless of what else is going on. Wrenn & Six same deal for Gruul-based decks. Make more cards like that. Less Tribal/mechanic-based support.

[@FatalLordAce]

Technically guide of souls isn’t “strictly” better because the life gain is limited to creatures you control but it is a better card

[@alexstaysgold]

As someone who won a game a couple weeks ago because an opponent scute swarmed it up while I had a soul warden out, I don't think it's even better in a general sense

[@jonathanfagerlund976]

Came here to make sure someone said this. Lol

[@uptherockies]

I hate that if you save your creature with a trick Vs a Galvanic Blast, they just get to choose to save the Energy

[@tomcadden8054]

"You remember that time when we printed energy into standard and it totally messed the format up while it was in rotation? Yea, we're bringing it back, but breaking a different format with it."

[@isaacthek]

Easiest way to "fix" the dominance of energy: create cards that are energy antagonistic. Deal damage to target opponent equal to the amount of energy they have, Creatures getting +1/+1 for each energy the defending player has, dealing 1 damage whenever a player uses energy, etc. This could be coupled with an ability that gives any player energy, so it's relevant regardless of your opponents deck but much more powerful if they're leaning into energy.

[@JordanGrayson00]

I really don’t like that they do this. I like seeing cool synergies between old and new archetypes that make a cool new deck. For me, I noticed this when the adventures deck with innkeeper and clover and then the dimir rogues deck dominated standard. It felt like WOTC just decided those decks should be good and you just play all the cards that care about rogues or milling opponents and you’ve got a tiered deck. I also don’t like that they’re doing this more in commander. I don’t want a commander that builds itself by playing all the cards that do x. I want interesting commanders that can be role players in multiple archetypes or have unique synergies.

[@williamsmith7083]

Yugioh does this... Printing cards manufactured to inclusively synergize... One of the reasons deckbuilding is much more restricted in that TCG, as Konami just prints the next top tier decks in randomized boosters...

[@Elliot9120]

It's very reminiscent of contemporary yugioh design where the latest set/mechanic basically comes pre-packaged with the next t0 metadeck

[@brianmattei7134]

It's just lazy-ass design.

[@Automaconfuso]

Another thing that should be noticed is that bloomburrow too gas this kind of "fixed package" design. I mean, you have the otter cards, the lizard cards, the rabbit cards... and some sinergize so strictly with each other that there is no point in creative deckbuilding. No strage interaction to think about. Basically you take the good cards in the package and if It works, good, otherwise just move on to the next group of cards. And that can be really boring.

[@12Fakeaccount]

Yugioh exemplifies this, somewhat. I'm not sure which is worse though: when the best thing you can do is just the logical conclusion of your desired main engine package, or when the best thing you can do is also the card that is so spread in requirement and effect that it's the best thing *anyone* can do.

[@AlluMan96]

For what it's worth, these issues preside mostly in it's limited environment, because ultimately, the mechanics we're playing with in Bloomburrow are general enough that you can still still feasibly play them elsewhere. Like, the lizards like doing damage, the bats like your life total changing, the frogs blink, the rats like things in the graveyard and the raccoons want you to play big(ish) spells. Valiant is just for targeting things, forage pays off for either food or GY and offspring is just silly. All of these cards are playing with mechanics that you can still tinker with outside of the narrow set of cards that interact with their specific mechanic and can find homes in more decks than the one and it's fistful of variants. The issue with energy is that there are so few use-cases for energy doing anything but the very specific thing they were intended to. The most you can do to "interact" with energy is to proliferate it. It's so stuck in it's small corner of the world, that only the truly ridiculous ones among them would see play as individually strong cards.

[@AlluMan96]

​@@12Fakeaccount Well, as far as Yu-Gi-Oh is concerned, this kind of design is just how the game is built. It makes up most of it's design ethos and is one of the defining factors of it that made it distinct from games like Magic, allowing it to escape it's shadow. This kind of stuff doesn't really work in Magic, because like Kenobi said, the more free-form, emergent game design is alot more pivotal to it, whereas Yu-Gi-Oh has leveraged this design for years and has just made it part of it's identity. The issues Yu-Gi-Oh specifically faces are actually precisely the same ones as Magic is now struggling with. Broken to hell designs that completely invalidate whatever else you could be doing with that slot in the name of selling more packs now.

[@TheEvolver311]

That has been WotC design since 2010

[@joeshmoe9204]

Your just describing tribal synergy. It’s a tribal set. Most of the cards don’t even care about their tribe, but rather have a general game plan. This is much different and more open than past tribal designs.

[@turgid4391]

yea there was no real deckbuilding puzzle for the energy deck. you literally just take all the mh2 energy cards and then just cards that are above rate and play them. wow such deckbuilding, many fun

[@902496]

I was talking to a friend recently about something similar happening in EDH. People talk about the "homogenization of the format" and I think the image that brings is of "format staples that need to be in every deck of those colors", your sol rings, dockside extortionists, smothering tithes. But I think the bigger issue is the homogenization of archetypes. WotC is releasing commander decks at a blistering pace, on top of these horizons and masters sets that add a bunch of new cards, often to under-supported archetypes and mechanics. Its gotten to a point where if your idea for a commander is remotely conventional, ie "I want to build an energy deck in some combination of white, blue, and red", or "I want to build an enchantment deck in literally any specific combination of colors", the deck practically builds itself. Theres a good chance, unless you are doing unconventional colors for your archetype or a really niche tribe, that WotC has released a commander deck for your exact idea, using some or all of the same colors. There will already be an obvious best choice for commander, and it already has the engine, or the payoff, or both built in. To that end, specific deck archetypes have become extremely homogenized, to the point that for something like a GW enchantment deck, I bet what I would come up with on my own would be multiple other people's exact list. Its hard to build janky or unique these days, because it just ends up being you deliberately neutering yourself and being underpowered at a casual table.

[@KeoaruboruOfficial]

As someone who plays Yu-Gi-Oh, seeing "engines" pop up in MtG is both interesting for me and also terrifying, for balance.

[@shuttlecrossing1433]

Magic has had engines for most of it's lifespan, the difference is that the engines of MtG's past were mostly slow, methodical beasts (aside from combos that would get banned) and today's engines in MtG are pretty close to the equivalent of YuGiOh combos - one-card engines, overpowered cards with way too much text, that sort of thing.

[@andrelanca2700]

Soul warden was an engine card. A card that whenever X happens, do Y. You combine it with other payoffs and you haven an archetype. Now, an "engines card must net you life, net you energy AND be its own payoff. Giving cards both roles is what pisses me off the most.

[@KeoaruboruOfficial]

I'll correct myself so people can stop telling me things I already know: I meant Yu-Gi-Oh-style engines, where the payoffs are either tutored outright during engine setup or are stapled onto the card doing the engine work.

[@kylegonewild]

Splice onto Arcane is such a cool mechanic imo but the Kamigawa block was so intentionally underpowered and over costed only like 2 cards with it are even remotely playable and those cards are never used in that manner. The problem is if they revisit the mechanic like I want them to their only options are very pushed cards that somehow make the old ones good or a new set of objectively superior Arcane spells that won't cause the old cards with the mechanic to see play. If number stops going up as much as it did before someone will scrape the bottom of the barrel and resurrect Arcane spells.

[@edhdeckbuilding]

competitive modern decks made up of primarily mh3 cards i think says it all.

[@tinfoilslacks3750]

This reminds me of the LoR design philosophy that kneecapped that game for the first 2 years post beta. They would release archetypes made of AB mechanics, and then they would divide the A and B cards across regions (colours) so the two regions had to be played together. Imagine an MtG set released where discard was a primary mechanic, but all the cards- without exception- that discarded cards were red, and all the cards that were a payoff for being discarded were black. So discard decks *had* to be BR. That's what this energy stuff reminds me of.

[@hircenedaelen]

I've just put together a bat's deck in historic, and there was a moment of "damn, most of the old Bats are shit" a couple are good, mostly ones with lifelink, but it would've been nice if more of them were useful

[@Masterinferno47]

The reason the mardu list is running ob nixilis is because you can a. Flip an ajani with it and b. Ocelot pride will make copies of the causalty copy

[@funmaker77]

funnily enough, because of the reason you brought up, izzet generatorium is - even in draft - almost unplayable

[@RPGFanboy14]

Direct to modern printing was a mistake honestly. You get some cool cards, but the warping around whatever the newest set is constantly is insane. The monetization of modern should have stayed around reprint sets.

[@thealanwrencher]

Your last point really resonates with me. I very much would prefer it to be a tapestry of the games history that represents “eternal” formats. It’s perfectly fine to make new fun bombs for those decks, but a whole sale deck manufactured in one set just feels… boring? I’m not sure what the word I’m looking for is. But it’s not as interesting.

[@mircodurrbaum9064]

,,, but heres abzan falconer "WHAT A CARD!" , you got me with that one mate ^^

[@micaellerbeck4358]

Thanks!

[@FrankFerret]

It's funny, I left magic before the first of the extended I.P sets came out after having played for over 20 years straight. Every time i check in I realize "i made the right decision, I would never have enjoyed magic like this."

[@NotQuiteAllHere]

I still feel like there could be something for Aethergeode Miner and Aether Revolt with stuff that gives you energy on enter.

[@aR0ttenBANANA]

At this point WotC should just sell pre-built decks ifstg 😂

[@gordonramsayfanatic]

Abzan Falconer mentioned!

[@hinatasninetailedfox]

Yeah, I actually missed lower power formats and commander for the most part before cards were designed for it. It feels more interactive when one card doesn't snowball and not knowing what to expect in your opponents decks was awesome it's rare to be surprised anymore.

[@shorv]

you hit the nail on the head with your immersive gameplay point. it's extremely frustrating when the design and development teams essentially print a deck or tools for decks that already exist that they feel ought to exist in a given format. death's shadow, amulet titan and kci were all decks that had the necessary pieces available for years before someone figured out how they fit together, and to me, that's an extraordinarily enjoyable thing about magic. let the players develop the metagame rather than have design and development steer formats to where the think or feel they should be.

[@seandun7083]

Once again really want to point out that whole Guide of Souls is often more powerful than Soul Warden, it is very much not strictly better. Soul Warden triggers off of any creature while Guide only triggers off of your own creatures.

[@marcoottina654]

which counts to basically nothing it you can rush towards wins like 2-3 turns earlier thanks to those energy bursts aaaaaaand for the combat related ability

[@seandun7083]

@@marcoottina654 of course, hence why I mentioned it is generally the more powerful card. The term Strictly Better just implies that there isn't any part of the card which is worse than the one it is compared to.

[@marcoottina654]

@@seandun7083 ah yes, technically speaking you are right.

[@hammycan]

I agree with the sentiment, I don't think archetypes should be prescribed to the players. also, funny how Attune to Aether got banned out of Standard, but Galvanic Discharge is better in every way (instant speed, 3 energy instead of 2, main effect has a greater impact). The consequence of making straight-to-Modern cards is that some of those cards could never have been Standard legal, which is what Modern used to be; cards that were once in Standard.

[@WhipLash42o]

Remember when people were crying that the Eldrazi were going to be too good? Always fun to go back and read those.

[@snowsource13]

Magic has fully transitioned to an archetype focused meta like YGO, and I for one mourn the death of traditional meta games in MTG. We kept power creep at bay for a very long time, but post pandemic did away with old design that pushed against runaway power creep

[@petrri323]

I remember bears, do you remember bears? Now we have Ragovan… I remember bears… 😢 Edit: also calling the Kaledesh iteration of energy “popular” is like calling the current version of Nadu “popular.” Sure everyone’s playing it (because they have to), but everyone hates it too. Energy was WILDLY unpopular during Kaledesh because of how hard it was to stop. It was initiative before initiative existed in a way. Impossible to interact with, and WAY too strong to be impossible to interact with. And the fact that these cards are now viewed as objectively “bad,” Shows just how insane the power creep has become. Eternal formats are going to die off if they keep over saturating them with new cards. What’s the point in being able to play cards from old sets if they will ALWAYS lose to new cards. Formats aren’t really “eternal” anymore, but just a different colored slice of the same Modern Horizons Pie.

[@omegavulture8379]

As long as the booster-precon method makes money it ain’t changing. It’s shitty but thems the breaks.

[@dracish123456789]

If a card wants to enter modern it should be playable in standard. I've had this open since Mh1 and every modern horizon set has proven to me that this is true.

[@otterfire4712]

I'm of the mind that Modern Horizons sets should have been a reprint set of major modern staples for the time. Money picks would be rare alt arts and the immediate accessibility for new players to the modern format, with subsequent sets replenishing new high rarity prints.

[@dracish123456789]

@@otterfire4712 That's what the master sets are.

[@otterfire4712]

@@dracish123456789 it's a shame they have too much bulk that isn't relevant to Modern

[@mrskittles6486]

When your the titanshift player who plays the energy removal spells because the aggro energy deck dunks on you usually you energy sweep there board. Too much stupid energy everywhere

[@Awesomesausages]

The efficiency difference between one- and two-mana spells is so great (two-mana spells cost literally twice as much, you can double-spell a full two turns later), that I feel that one-mana spells probably shouldn't exist except for very few exceptions. Yet, power creep mandates that half a deck costs one mana now. Power creep on the other hand led to Guide of Souls and Ocelot Pride, which are like two entire spells for one Mana, each.

[@Friedensp4nzer]

This is basically the whole problem I have with having Commander Decks every set and 'designed for commander' in general.

[@51gunner]

I'm so tired of various legendary creatures (usually with UG in their identity somewhere) that are basically NEW COMMANDER - 2UG Legendary Creature - Popular Type Stats: on-rate if not slightly above Whenever you Unga, Bunga. Bunga-ing is twice as effective. Whenever some normal thing happens, Draw a Card. (Cheap cost): Unga. ----- Some of the OG Eldraine legends are THE examples of this (Korvold and Chulane are roughly equally guilty) but there's been plenty since. Hakbal the Value Merfolk comes to mind as one of the latest straightforward value engines: 2UG, draws cards, ramps, combat stats that are Fine and will get out of hand, and has a profoundly obvious way to build his deck.

[@Zanzibawrr]

Printing into modern was a mistake but everyone and their mother bought into it. You get what you deserve

[@blacktiger0095]

I've actually been working on brewing a commander, Lathiel the Bountious Dawn celesnia life gain deck with all the warden cards, guide of souls with primal prayers, pair those with a cloudstone currio and I figured out a way to make as much energy counters, as much life, and as much +1/+1 counters. They have "may" so you can keep going till like you're happy with whatever number of life and counters you want like for instance, 10 trillion life and +1 counters.

[@ianmcguire5231]

Agreed. Parasitic design elements, such as tribal archetypes; caring about keywords like flying, kicker, or cycling; poison; and charge counters, all leave a bad taste in one's mouth where the hand of the designer becomes far too visible. I've heard Yu-Gi-Oh! has it worse and, in an effort to improve deck diversification, almost all of their decks have become tribal, in one way or another. However, people like tribal decks and don't seem to recognise them among parasitic mechanics like energy. Most likely because of how long-standing these mechanics are and how the number of cards within them has reached such a critical mass, ensuring that deck-building "goblins" becomes far greater of a design decision than one would initially think. I don't see much difference between something like that and this new take on energy besides a lacking in the number of good synergistic energy cards. Though I can understand righteous anger in the case where these new cards were unrightfully pushed beyond acceptable power limits, I would not classify the energy mechanic, in and of itself, as bad game design.

[@mikeowens40]

That bad company bit brought back so many memories. That was such a great era of shooters

[@peasant_mindset4505]

It’s like hearthstone design. Every card is a guidepost.

[@adamdouce353]

Deck design and innovation have gone the way of the dinosaurs. Everyone just netdecks now

[@RyanEglitis]

Comments that could have been posted in 1998.

[@MrPiotrV]

that's missing the point entirely. someone still had to go through all the cards and find synergies and things that work together from all the sets. that doesn't exist when all the cards are from mh.

[@bretts3046]

12:46 Mad props for showing the original Deus Ex. It is one of the most immersive, exciting, and fantastically underrated/underappreciated games of all time.

[@PleasantKenobi]

I think its earned a lot of praise over the years. Unsure if I would call it underrated. Still, love it.

[@bretts3046]

@@PleasantKenobi that's fair.

[@TheShinyFeraligatr]

Came back and saw this video and quick note - Death's Shadow didn't get big because of Delver, it got big because Temur Battle Rage, Become Immense, and Monastery Swiftspear brought back a brief resurgence to Zoo decks in Modern, and Battle Rage turned out to work amazingly with Death's Shadow. It's only because DS Zoo hit the big time in 2016 that people started looking at it though, and that's when you started to see it in more controlling shells. You actually commented on this when you did that silly Varolz video back in 2017 where you did an early take on the deck, in fact, as by that point it had already shifted mostly to Grixis DS.

[@PleasantKenobi]

Everything you are saying is very fair - I meant more so that Deathshadow was an alternative to Delver, with often a fast clock and ended up playing very similarly. Shout out to an old school "classic" video though!

[@spark1128]

The energy cards did ruin historic, I think it’s the first time the format has had a tier 0 deck

[@greener_gaming2932]

You absolutely have to play board wipes to even stand a chance against a solid draw it’s pretty disgusting honestly lol. I feel like the rest of the set will have a good impact on the format but those energy cards are just bonkers.

[@aR0ttenBANANA]

I mean, historic is a shit format so there was nothing to ruin.

[@TrainmasterGT]

Soul Sisters was tier 0 when Historic was new. You had to have a plan for the life gain decks or you would lose.

[@abyssalAnalyst]

Honestly, since adding 4 Tainted Remedy to my sideboard, I rarely lose a game against life gain.

[@casbalt7763]

8:58 basically how yugioh works then.

[@rathlord]

Guide of Souls is insane, but it is not strictly better than "Soul Warden" who you had up next to it, because Soul Warden triggers on all creatures, not just yours. I know that's pedantic, but strictly better has got to mean strictly better! It is definitely *better* though, no question there. Edit to add: I think this is one of the best videos you've ever made, no joke. This is important to be said and a great way of putting into words what a lot of people have felt about what's happening to older "eternal" formats.

[@IneptCardCollector]

Please never stop making BF references! Great memories playing BFBC2

[@ThenewWereWolfGod]

what game was that at 12:46?

[@wouterk4864]

It seems Vince is showing his age there (and I am too) because that is Deus Ex.

[@zacharythorp6095]

I commented to a friend earlier this week about this issue. While I've recently come to the realization that so many interesting and niche Commander card designs wouldn't exist without the extreme overprinting of new Commander decks (with some support from Modern Horizon and similar non-Standard sets), there are still issues therein. For instance, just look at the WRU Energy design space. The first Energy commander, Dr. Madison Li, produces it very slowly and may as well just be a planeswalker; if you don't have Panharmonicon in play or other Energy creators, good luck using her 5E ability more than once. The second Energy commander, for 1 mana more, is overstatted, has double combat keywords, has a hidden text of "all creatures you control gain haste", and has a grossly overpowered line of "create an attacking Clone effect every turn". This card has no business being bigger than a 3/3 or 3/4, is far too good with haste attached, and the Energy clause on its text should be at the start of the ability (i.e., "pay XE to copy a thing of cost X") instead of the end of it ("i.e., after copying a thing, pay XE to keep it"). It also doesn't care if the creature copied is even attacking, which I think is mostly due to running out of text box. These two commanders aren't even in the same league as each other despite playing in the same design space and colors. Nor is the backup commander, a 3/3 for 4 with a single keyword and a slow, incremental value engine. Why is this true? Because the Energy commander was the face of one of the MH3 preconstructed Commander decks. It had to compete so they kept on pushing it. It's the reason that a few of the Doctors in the Dr. Who decks are just head-and-shoulders better than the rest, it's not even close (not that any of those cards were powerful; they're pleasantly downshifted in power level).

[@rcflyingboy]

I think the part of problem currently is energy existS almost outside of the game like an emblem. There's no way to interact with it besides energy specific cards unlike how affinity or enchantress devloped from common parts that could interact. Would've been much better maybe as some sort of in game token artifact or enchantment? I think its okay though in that it's introducing something new to the game. The emergent part would normally take time but MH just went for juiced to get sales rather than a few sets from standard that introduced some strong things that came together with other options to be emergent.

[@pandapersonpersona4473]

magic gets closer to yugioh each day. this is literally the yugioh design philosophy they design the deck then put the cards in the deck.

[@imaqt3.14]

The way these energy spells resolves feels like they're going through the stack as in there should be a moment to respond but there isn't.

[@jacobhholt]

Cool idea for a mechanic, calling it "Mirror Shift", it's an idea for a drawback spell. It's a modal spell, let's call it an Emblem/Background from hand. It grants a player a powerful emblem ability like those given through Planeswalker. Example: TO THE SKY!!! (2)WWWW CONVOKE Creatures you control have +2/+2 When "To the Sky!!!" Enters put a MirrorShift counter on "To the Sky!!!" [MirrorShift] Creatures you control have flying if an opponent controls a creature with flying remove MirrorShift counter from this permanent.

[@peterd616]

There's quite a few examples of decks that were only "discovered" in the card pool of modern a long time. Amulet bloom is another example (I remember first seeing an article talking about this deck back in the day, with a super unrefined version (running lotus cobras and other nonsense) and goldfishing with the list and being super bewildered and impressed with the dazzling array of possible lines and nonsense that occurred. Eventually it got refined and the play patterns became quite easy, but those early versions were wild). Lantern control also (I couldn't believe codex shredder, of all cards, was suddenly modern playable. That card was a 15th pick in draft!) The joy of large eternal formats is that there is so much room to brew - if you don't mind your deck being 40-45% against the field, then you can play and try and test and refine a dizzying number of decks. Parachuted-in nonsense steals that joy imo. When I came back to magic and found modern full of ragavans and griefs and one rings and bowmasters I just couldn't be arsed, it's limited only for me.

[@enoeht]

As much as I love my Satya, Aetherflux Genius deck it's absolutely something that WoTC pre-built and then sold to me via a precon and some singles. Lucky for me, I like it! But the criticism definitely has legs and this shouldn't be the design norm.

[@theJmanStriketh]

Another weird part about energy is that there's no real way to interact with an opponent's energy, kind of like emblems. WOTC seems to be more careful with emblems than energy. This causes a system where you can get rid of energy producers, or payoffs, but if your opponent has an energy sink payoff, you can't easily interact with their energy bank. That gives them a consistent advantage. A specific hate card like Price of Progress that does damage or drains energy would be nice to see. On the "Pre-built deck" side, I remember hearing a WOTC play-design person talk about how they know with decent accuracy which decks will show up in a standard environment, and sometimes a deck they see isn't taken up by players. I'm not sure if they've kept up with that knowledge internally given the glut of cards published in the past few years. I also don't know if they have the same care around modern as they do for standard.

[@holstenmason]

I don’t think that energy is inherently bad design, I just think the synergy pieces need to be kept separate from the payoffs. Amped Raptor and Guide of Souls should each really be two cards.

[@djkatsuo]

Current modern is based on MH now. The brewers paradise format would have to be a community format that uses main sets from eighth onward. If commander can become a powerhouse then others could as well.

[@henryreinhold9097]

mark rosewatre said of death's shadow that the best cards are ones with a seemingly terrible drawback that forces the player to figure out how to use the card successfully.

[@drallore]

I feel like there's a conflict between the realm of exploring deck ideas and drafting and the inherent cost to participate in nearly any format. I honestly was more into the idea that 85% of a new meta deck happened to be a bunch of cheaper cards from a new set that should be easy for a new player to make a functional cheap version of, but I think that speaks more to how tight so many budgets have to be to keep funds for a 60 card format, edh format, community format, and draft/events worth participating in. Here we can't get people to come out to any event that isn't basically an RCQ, free play commander, prerelease, or practice night for whatever is in the RCQ season at the time. People don't draft, or experiment with fun decks or formats because they prefer to spend every possible dollar to make some new deck as viable as possible. So honestly, I feel like Wizards will constantly be doing stuff like this, not just to force us to buy new cards, but to always have a viable buy in for a format as they continue to cause surges in prices at the secondary market, which inevitably fall as those cards lose relevance two sets later.

[@LizaPlz]

the second I heard energy was gonna be a mainstay mechanic I'm like oh man they're running out of ideas

[@lordofthemound3890]

Remember the good old days when Modern was simply where you used your favorite old (and newer) cards that had gone through Standard?

[@autopsipath]

Cards like Abzan falconer not being playable any more except in one of your commander decks says it all really.

[@schraedera]

Energy has always had the Affinity Problem(tm): you either print it at such a power level, in such volume that it's format-definining and the deck builds itself, or you have a whole mechanic that nobody plays outside of Limited because there's no reward to committing to the mechanic when you could just play good cards instead. Maybe they should have just stuck to seeding cards for it a few at a time into Commander-centric products like Fallout, but instead they managed to bring back Block Constructed in Historic and Modern. You know, like the time somebody played a fully Mirrodin Block Constructed-legal Affinity maindeck and won an extended-format Pro Tour.

[@brandonbernard1570]

Guide of Souls is the main problem with these energy decks imo. God help you if the opponent gets multiple of them out at the same time.

[@mr.mammuthusafricanavus8299]

I would actually argue that MaRo is bad for the game. Back when Kaladesh came out WOTC released an article on the design/philosophy of Energy and it was mentioned that in testing they had cards that would interact with other peoples energy piles BUT were told to cut them because of *drumroll, MaRo. MaRo consistently has made BAD design choices. The more we can interact in a game the better off the game will be like I am still waiting to see some way to mess with Emblems yet we get more and more Planeswalkers. :P

[@veganeconomist7453]

Horizons sets aren't good, just say it. Once we admit that powerful isn't the same thing as good, we can assess sets appropriately.

[@langleyzor7547]

BF3 definitely saw folks tossing c4 onto Quads and then running them into enemies. What was worse was I think in an effort to prevent greifing they had added a measure where you couldn't destroy a friendly vehicle being driven by a teammate, and so you had (for a time at least) an indestructible C4 delivery vehicle (assuming the opponent didn't blow you up)

[@compacta_d]

Know what aluren DOESN'T have? A 2 mana creature that can cascade into it for free and is also a payoff for the aluren. Absolutely wild stuff.

[@andrewtaylor3167]

Out of Arcane, Ingest and Energy, give me Arcane. It's like they fixated so much on the parasitic aspect of Arcane, that they messed up other aspects. The optimal way to play Splice onto Arcane was to cast the same splice host card over and over in a loop (often involving Hana Kami in block constructed and Izzet Guilmage in a meme standard deck, but there's a lot of other options) and splice onto that card with the same splice card every go around. The main exception is if you were playing all the cantrip Arcane spells. The amount of space needed in a deck revolving around a Splice loop was usually pretty minimal (just host Arcane + splice Arcane + Loop enabler; more a package than a deck). That's just not the way people wanted it to play. Ingest took the critical mass style of play people wanted with Arcane and forced it while nominally making it less parasitic. In energy they tried to make the less "all in" version similar to how Arcane actually played, but ended up making another critical mass deck.

[@MusicoftheDamned]

This is just another lesson that they didn't care to learn really given that this isn't entirely divorced from the issues of Energy that popped in Kaladesh, down to Energy basically being impossible to interact outside of like two cards (that are too slow in current Modern): Solemnity and Suncleanser, both mono-White (and begging to die).

[@nickd6303]

Surprised that the bloomburough paw print cards didn't become an energy variant.

[@GodotGodfrey]

So while I wouldn't necessarily argue against all of this, I will say in Guide of Souls' defense that I think it ended up as a 1/2 because of Bowmasters which highlights an entirely different design problem and frankly probably makes a decent case for Bowmasters needing to eat a ban eventually. The last time I can think of where that was a serious consideration was back in, ironically, Kamigawa. The Zubera were originally supposed to be 1/1's but because Skull Clamp was still a thing and if anyone remembers that Era of magic then I think you can see where this is going. If something warps the game to the point where what would normally be 1/1s have to be printed as 1/2's something has gone terribly wrong.

[@TalonOfoalain]

Are tournament organizers able to just say ‘Modern Horizons cards are banned for this event’? Or do they rely on Wizards for the prize pool and would worry about push back? For that matter, Would players even want that or would that just split the community?

[@WCD_Media]

I love MH3 and I really enjoyed the Energy Mechanic. I was really excited about the new Eldrazi cards and Precons. Eldrazi are one of my favorite creature types. I wish I could afford to go online and buy each of the Eldrazi Precons that have come out. All 3 of them. Hey WOTC, make more Eldrazi Precons, and make them affordable. I hate having to buy singles only. I miss cracking packs and having sealed Precon only game nights with my Playgroup. Also go back to Kaledash. We need more Energy Cards that do more/different things.

[@Gusta_Gustav]

The problem I see that limits emergent game design in magic in particular is the fact that the game has and will forever be in this live service state. To gain a profit, sets need to sell good. For sets to sell better, cards need to be pushed more and more. Else we get sotuations where we have a set that no one wants to touch because 1: there is no cards that people need to keep up with formats, and 2: people are saving for when there is going to be another busted set. There are situations when we get well done thematics, but thise cards still need to be powerful enough to see any play at all. Its annoying, and it wont be the case every set. But when profits need to forever go up and up, demand and by extension card powers must follow suit as well

[@AzurielMist]

Love playing tron to remove ragavan to avoid a T2 blood moon, only for them to drop amped raptor and hit a T2 blood moon anyways :3

[@NMS127]

How would they have 3 energy on turn 2 if they played Ragavan turn 1 and didn't get in a hit?

[@AzurielMist]

@@NMS127 Aether hub? Since raptor gives them two energy on ETB, so that will total 3 energy.

[@NMS127]

@@AzurielMist Oh, yeah, that's a thing that could happen. Yikes.

[@anthonydelfino6171]

From a commander point of view, I like that they’ve finally given critical mass of energy cards to make an energy deck viable But I do see your position here too. I don’t want energy in my format to come at the expense of another

[@tricksonafixed]

When it comes to my disposition on Magic these days it’s more often negative. So when trying to “not be so negative” amongst my fellow peers I say things like “Boros Energy isn’t that bad” but honestly I hate these new fucking cards. 1.) you cannot interact with energy as a resource (fuck off I don’t play white for sun cleanser) 2.) each card synergies with each other so perfectly and so easily that each card becomes a threat you must kill on the spot. Ragavan once was that card but each other card in either Jund, UR, or BR weren’t immediate threats needing immediate answers for.

[@RyanEglitis]

Energy is what happens when you take a good mechanic (charge counters), and try to improve it, but mess up the assignment terribly. Now you have a whole new resource system to balance, instead of just balancing each card individually. And that's not even getting into the fact that you can't interact with opponents' energy stores.

[@mattadorno6452]

There's no way to interact with energy. You can't remove it and you can't punish people for having it.

[@RasmusVJS]

You can. That's why Suncleanser is seeing so much sideboard play currently.

[@florinalinmarginean1135]

I am positive the only reason wotc started pushing out the Modern Horizons sets was to functionally kill the format by introducing a rotation and, therefore, raising the entry price (since every deck needs these new broken cards) in order to bring standard back, where they sell more if the format is popular

[@yoshiman9521]

jeskai control list maindeck has 3 cards not from modern horizions outside of the lands. counterspell 4x, 1x spell snare, 2x t3feri