General CBS

[Jason Waddell]

I guess it's hard for me to say because my personal cadence in life is to fall into deep obsessions with hobbies and then out of nowhere snap out of them like I've been de-hypnotized. I've done periods of MTG articles, blogging, jogging, Starcraft, eSports articles, MTG Standard, cube videos, stand-up comedy, blackjack, poker, board game design, board game nights, organizing Halo LANs. I played Hearthstone every day for 4 months and all of a sudden haven't played this week.

Currently the thought of trying to 'catch up' on my cubes is so daunting. I haven't even been away that long and they've already printed multiple sets with the Domain keyword.

To me it's part of life for a hobby to lose its (ahem) magic. I enjoy posting here and talking with all of you, but, cards on the table, come spoiler season I mostly just blur my eyes and scroll past the cards. I don't even know what a necron is.

Where I currently stand with regards to most of my hobbies is that I'm firmly 'casual competitive'. I don't want to win (or even enter) tournaments, but I like the grind to reach a game's "highest" rank category (Onyx in Halo, Legend in Hearthstone, Masters in Starcraft... I've accepted I'll never reach the 'super-high' Grandmasters Top 200 thingy if a game has it... I'll never reach Grand Champ in Rocket League). I like a game to take itself seriously.

To me what started a while back was a slow deterioration of quality control in MTG that came with not taking itself 'seriously' anymore. By this I mean, cards started being designed that weren't designed for Standard. They weren't vetted and tested with the same quality control of the game's history. They didn't feel real.



Before this point, there was a certain identity of the game to me. All players, whether you're in a Pro Tour Top 8 or playing at your kitchen table, were using cards from the same stream. There was some shared life force to it. I started with a second-hand shoebox collection, and it was so neat to find out how all these cards I had fit into the ecosystem.

At first it was a trickle. But it was kind of unnerving. Things felt off in ways that were hard to vocalize. "I guess Scavenging Ooze is pushed, but it has some interesting play to it" or "True-Name Nemesis is the dumbest card I've ever seen and now I don't even want to watch LSV play Legacy anymore" or "Hallowed Spiritkeeper isn't objectively broken, except when it is? I don't want it in my cube but it's hard for me to say why".

These days the floodgates are well and truly open. Even Standard sets are filled with EDH-leaning designs. MH1 and MH2 both feel absurd to me, and did to my interest in Modern what True-Name Nemesis did to my interest in Legacy.

To me the product feels cheapened. I remember reading articles from 10-15 years ago where Rosewater talked about WOTC dialing back the number of cards printed per year because the average player couldn't keep up. It's hard to see the last five years of changes and line them up with those quotes.

 

[sigh]

To me the product feels cheapened. I remember reading articles from 10-15 years ago where Rosewater talked about WOTC dialing back the number of cards printed per year because the average player couldn't keep up. It's hard to see the last five years of changes and line them up with those quotes.

I would strongly guess that MaRo also did not see it coming those 10-15 years ago :\. Feels like WotC has really let Jesus Hasbro take the wheel on direction (profit) recently. Which as a subsidiary I guess they basically have to do.

 

[inscho]

My overall interest in Magic has definitely waned independent of release schedule, but the constant bombardment of new cards isn't helping. I recently moved away from a playgroup that was very unique and special to me, and I'm prioritizing some other interests over attempting to recreate that community in a new city. I'm likely done with limited altogether.

Fortunately, my cube has a pretty solidified identity and has fewer and fewer design gaps. With recent printings, I'm finally at a power level that feels appropriate to my goals. Moving forward, I'm really only looking for things that fill the gaps rather than reinventing my cube. So I'm feeling less of a need to go over spoilers with a fine-toothed comb these days....it's becoming 99% white noise.

 

[Dom Harvey]

My feelings on this are complicated. The game does feel different in a lot of ways and is clearly marketed at a different crowd now but how much of this is that the game or some aspect of it is worse rather than personal priorities and circumstances changing? I remember posting here in the 2013-2014 low point where Dragon's Maze/Born of the Gods/Journey to Nyx/M14 were 4/5 main set releases for 18 months and shuffling around older cards was all we had to go on for a long time. That Standard format gets cited fondly now (usually on reddit threads complaining about what Magic is like these days) but as someone who watched those SCG Opens every weekend the monotony of Black Devotion and Blue Devotion crashing into each other while Sphinx's Revelation raised an eyebrow got old quickly. Scavenging Ooze is an interesting example - it was introduced via a Commander product and I had concerns about it when it joined Standard/Modern via M14 but it quickly proved to be an interesting and fun card there that doesn't feel out of place now and I wish more cards got an 'audition' via the extra sets that way.

I think Magic took a poorly timed turn for the worse with War of the Spark but COVID would have destroyed any lingering trace of paper Standard if that still existed at that point. The eSports experiment was a disaster but that didn't have much to do with the game design in that phase (also a disaster, mostly).

Put all that against a backdrop of COVID warping our lives and massively restricting social contact (as well as the infrastructure that goes into something as low-level as FNM), a deluge of bizarre/alarming global news, all of us being older and having more responsibilities (up to and including kids!) than we had years ago... I think whatever form of Magic we look back on fondly would feel less satisfying these days too.

 

[MilesOfficial]

I've had two kids over the course of the pandemic and recently moved 8,000 miles away from my playgroup of 10+ years, but I still love Magic as much as ever. I certainly relate to many of the feelings you all describe, particularly the disappointment at the gradual decline in design principles that started with the notion of making money explicitly from EDH, but these last few years have exacerbated all the issues I've had.

At the same time, though, the incredible deluge of new cards, new design philosophies, new basic lands, and all that has acted like a massive experiment in throwing various kinds of pasta against the wall. Some of it has really stuck. While I can't help but find things like Transformers cards in a Brothers War expansion celebrating the history of Magic of all sets to be distasteful beyond belief, we've also gotten an incredible amount of cards I'm eager to cube and A+ basic lands just from the first teaser of the same expansion.

I also remember excitedly looking at the Kiora spoilers over Christmas, but it was also so exciting because so much of the prior year had been so disappointing for me from a Cube perspective, with RTR being multicolor focused and Theros being Theros. I am so happy we don't have to wait a year beyond compelling new designs and have the 6.5 spoilers per day or whatever to keep my brain a buzz. WotC's never going to hit the goldilocks zone here, so I'd much prefer the lean be towards too much than too little.

Magic is certainly not the game it was 10 years ago, and I do miss the charm it had when it felt like it was developed by humans with a through-line that was anything other than "expanding the bottom line", where designers seemed to resist against corporate pressures to the extent they could. But I still love what Magic is today, for all its many many warts.

 

[ravnic]

I don't really share those feelings most if you seem to have. Yeah, I don't want Walking Dead magic cards or 250$ booster packs. But I can just ignore those. For me, the biggest throw off in magic's history is still how they disfigured the modern frames in 2014. Between Magic 2015 and Throne of Eldraine I barely bought any new magic cards per set actually, the advent of showcase frames and retro frames has increased this a little bit.

But I think the reason while the many releases don't overwhelm me, is twofold. First, I just ignore many of those. Weird BU stuff? Pure reprint set? Commander decks? I don't feel any pressure to check those cards out. Second, I like keeping my cube consistent and don't add cards just because they're new. I add cards, mostly, when I feel the need to change something. The desire to keep the amount of 2014 frames low is a factor too.

Seriously, I still can't believe they came to the conclusion that those frames are an acceptable design choice for a game called magic or just in general for fulfilling a standard in design. The 2003 frames already looked a little bland, but at least they still had color to them. New magic cards are barely more colorful than a tax declaration. The 2003 frames were less flavorful than the older versions, but at least the textures (marble/water/leave...) we're visible, now they almost disappeared completely. Up until 2014, the frames went all around the card, they felt "whole" and visually balanced. Now they are weirdly top heavy with almost no color in the bottom half of the card. And that's not the worst part.

While the 2003 frames added more shapes, they were consistent. Name bar, type bar and p/t box had the same round shape. Because that's like a 101 in design, you just can't throw wildly different shapes together, it looks busy and unpleasant. The 2014 frames added 4 more round shapes for rares, 2 for un/commons.
1) The bars and p/t box.
2) The end of the colored part disappearing left and right from the text box.
3) The super ugly gap eating into the text box for the holo foil stamp.
4) The holo foil stamp.

What also drives me crazy: Many cool showcase frames have shown us, that they are able to design good looking frames, that meet their requirements. They were just too scared to create something new in 2014, instead they cutted off various parts from the previous frame, so today magic cards look like a 7-year-old's selfmade hair cut.

 

[Dom Harvey]

Yeah, I remember being told in 2014 that I would get used to the new frame. Still haven't, doubt I ever will, give me some thicc 8th Edition borders anyday

 

[spicewitch]

Maybe we should consider merging set threads and their accompanying commander product threads going forward, as well as having a single dedicated (pinned?) thread for all of the secret lair stuff, just to keep the discussion on new cards a bit more manageable and focused.

I wonder, maybe we could have a voteything? The pauper cube puts ALL the cards from a set in front of you and actually asks you to rate them all, which is arduous. But like, if we had the past X sets thrown into a blender, and a page offered only two cards at a time with "as a cube designer, would you be jazzed to replace an existing card with card a, card b, or neither? ; as a player, would you want to draft A, B, or neither?"

or something like that where we could just like, rate a few cards while we're bored, and it contributes to some riptidesourced labmind. Then tired people could just look at the top handful of well-liked cards or smth!

 

[TekLazar]

I mostly lurk, and sometimes I actively forget that there even is a Commander based product and am like, "oh yeah"
So personally I "like" the separate threads, but I can see why they would cause confusion/desensitization*.

*The, "wait there's more cards that I "have" to evaluate for a Cube that I may play every six months?" Feeling.

 

[Jason Waddell]

 

[LadyMapi]

Maybe instead of coming in attached to a 2/2 white cat, the come in attached to an x/x (colour) where x is the mana cost of the aura and (colour) is the colour of the aura? So Aqueous Form is an unblockable 1/1 that scrys, Blessing of the Nephilim is an Isamaru, etc.
Is this the mythical cube where you run Arcanum Wings?

Is this an enchantment only cube, or would you consider stuff like Aura Graft? Can you attach the aura to an existing creature and skip getting the token?

I... completely forgot that my brain off-gassed the Aura idea. I think the idea was that I'd essentially be running creature auras instead of creatures, and seeing what happens.

Looking at it again... I'm not sure it'd actually be all that interesting? The problem is that vanilla token + Aura basically just gives you a bunch of vanilla or french-vanilla creatures to build your cube around. Stuff like Aura Graft or Arcanum Wings would be cute, but there are only a handful of tricks like that, and they mostly just shuffle around/blend your french vanillas.

 

[Dom Harvey]

How would you react to this Cube house rule: the Day/Night cards work as usual except that you 'freeze' the time if there are no day/night cards in play e.g. I play [[Graveyard Trespasser]], it's now day; my opponent does nothing and it now becomes night; I sacrifice it on my turn, it now stays night; several turns later I reanimate it and it's still night

(in other words I really want an excuse to let me Cube Trespasser without the cumbersome daybound/nightbound 'offline mode')

 

[Jason Waddell]

How would you react to this Cube house rule: the Day/Night cards work as usual except that you 'freeze' the time if there are no day/night cards in play e.g. I play [[Graveyard Trespasser]], it's now day; my opponent does nothing and it now becomes night; I sacrifice it on my turn, it now stays night; several turns later I reanimate it and it's still night

(in other words I really want an excuse to let me Cube Trespasser without the cumbersome daybound/nightbound 'offline mode')

I'm cool with that.

 

[Velrun]

I'd be cool with that too.

Thinking it maybe even should be how Wizards had done it. Easier for everyone not playing on Magic the gathering Arena.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Honestly, I'ld be fine with just removing the reminder card and start over at the daybound side. The way you propose it, you still have to remember you ended on the nightbound side.

 

[Karshtakavaar]

Both Doms and Zee's suggestions sound like they'd be way less of a hassle to play with than the actual Day/Night mechanic if you only have one or two Daybound cards in your cube, so I'd be all for them. It helps that I haven't played a lot of MID so I have no attachment to or rules-inertia about the official wording - drafters more familiar with the mechanic might have a harder time with the change.

 

[Brad]

I had an idea for a cube where you run one card of each color plus one other card from each set. The 6th card would probably be colorless, land, or multicolored, but I guess doesn't have to be. This way you're only allowed to pay attention to 6 cards per release.

Similarly, I've considered rarity and budgetary restrictions. There's too much to deal with these days.

 

[LadyMapi]

One restriction that would actually meaningfully reduce the amount of stuff you have to deal with is only using cards from Standard-legal sets. That's only, what, five sets a year?

 

[Rusje]

One restriction that would actually meaningfully reduce the amount of stuff you have to deal with is only using cards from Standard-legal sets. That's only, what, five sets a year?

Well, even less stuff would be to have only cards made by Pete venters.
Or only use sets on a certain plane
Or only use brushwags

 

[Velrun]

Or only use sets on a certain plane

This (Morgan Freeman ‘He’s right you know’ meme)

One of the things most cubes are missing is the feeling of unity when it comes to art and flavor. We do this because we don’t want to limit ourselves to only picking cards from very few sets.

Our Ascension set has cards almost strictly from settings that feels like Dungeons and Dragons (Zendikar, D&D and Ixalan plus to a lesser extend Ikoria and Strixhaven) It feels really nice but it also loses out on some cards.

 

[Rusje]

This (Morgan Freeman ‘He’s right you know’ meme)

One of the things most cubes are missing is the feeling of unity when it comes to art and flavor. We do this because we don’t want to limit ourselves to only picking cards from very few sets.

Our Ascension set has cards almost strictly from settings that feels like Dungeons and Dragons (Zendikar, D&D and Ixalan plus to a lesser extend Ikoria and Strixhaven) It feels really nice but it also loses out on some cards.

Yes, you gain some and you lose some. The complexity of cubes which uses all cards (and all abilities) is high. Yes, that werewolf is very nice, but do you need it? Can’t you make a custom without having the bother of night and day?

It all depends on your playgroup and how often the cube is drafted.

 

[Chris Taylor]

Yes, you gain some and you lose some. The complexity of cubes which uses all cards (and all abilities) is high. Yes, that werewolf is very nice, but do you need it? Can’t you make a custom without having the bother of night and day?

It all depends on your playgroup and how often the cube is drafted.

You can, and that knowledge is freeing and also scary

 

[LadyMapi]

Well, even less stuff would be to have only cards made by Pete venters.
Or only use sets on a certain plane
Or only use brushwags

Brushwagg cube would be too powerful. It'd burn your fingers clean off.

 

[Brad]

One restriction that would actually meaningfully reduce the amount of stuff you have to deal with is only using cards from Standard-legal sets. That's only, what, five sets a year?

I thought about that, but cards cost more in Standard, you'd be forced to redesign constantly, and you'd need to play rather frequently for it to be a meaningful restriction.

Or only use sets on a certain plane

Also thought about this, but entirely ignoring new releases didn't sound fun, either.

 

[Velrun]

There’s also the

Post Standard cube

Only cards that were in Standard and have now rotated out of Standard are legal. You will probably know all the cards by then and won’t get tempted by the new shiny shiny cards. Will probably lead to slower changes and financially cheaper decisions.