General Jumpstart, Historic Horizons spoiler thread

[TrainmasterGT]

Not wanting to hear Boomers complain about the online-only cards is the exact reason why I decided not to start a new thread even though i wanted to discuss Davriel's Drip. But since I'm here...

Seriously, mask man got some Style in between printings!

Also, I think Arena is going to die long before paper magic does. WOTC can charge way more money for paper cards than digital cards (especially because of Arena's free-to-play elements) and all of the design and development costs of the paper side of the game are still required for the digital side of the game. Even if paper stops being the only focus, it's never going anywhere because Paper can make tons of money with minimal extra costs outside of production.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Apart from calling people boomers, agree with everything there I will note that Hearthstone seems to be able to generate money as an online only game though, but yes, I think paper Magic makes them way more money.

 

[sigh]

Actual boomers: like 70+ years old. Literally the generation from after World War 2. Boomers according to "the young folk": somebody (perceived as) older than them.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Yeah, I know, the word just has this dismissive, gatekeepy ring to it.

 

[LadyMapi]

It's... look, including your ageism in a comment about how some nebulous class of people disagrees with you because they're "old" and "out of touch" is a pretty bad take.

...

As for the designs themselves, I feel pretty ambivalent about them. On the one hand, it's a good thing that they're finally acknowledging that they're designing some cards purely for digital, instead of faffing around with stuff like Crystalline Giant. On the other hand, the cards they've spoiled so far have felt pretty uninspired.

 

[MilesOfficial]

I originally wrote up a big rant about not wanting Magic to be "two separate games" but the more I researched numbers to back up my argument and thought about it, the more I realize this is dumb but fine.

I personally don't want Arena and paper Magic to be two different games, but hell, paper Magic is a dozen different games already. Historic may be Arena's "Premiere" format, but there's no "main" format on the platform at the moment, and I can just...not play it. The person who's playing kitchen table Magic exclusively from their rips from boosters at Target is playing an entirely different game than a Modern player, etc. etc.

I'm still a little upset because I like the idea behind a lot of these cards and think they could be workable in paper with very minor tweaks. They seem uninspired and like they were maximizing only for "what could we ABSOLUTELY not do on paper" instead of "what interesting opportunities does this open up for us that we've wanted to do?". But, while I like the precedent for this less than anything else Magic has thrown our way since I started playing in 2006, it's fine. It's whatever. That said, please make a good 4-mana Davriel for paper too pls

 

[japahn]

Just realized that Cockatrice won't work for digital mechanics. And Arena is way too restricted for playing cube.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

As for the designs themselves, I feel pretty ambivalent about them. On the one hand, it's a good thing that they're finally acknowledging that they're designing some cards purely for digital, instead of faffing around with stuff like Crystalline Giant. On the other hand, the cards they've spoiled so far have felt pretty uninspired.

I don't disagree, except I <3 Lumbering Lightshield. This is a really neat defensive tool for white. I like that this keeps affecting the spell, so it can really mess with, for example, flashback spells.

 

[Zoss]

I'd guess that, like with a lot of WotC's forays into new territory like Secret Lairs or Mythic Editions (lol, remember those things?), there's an intent to make the first generation kind of mediocre. I've not found any of these cards to be particularly inspiring, and like @MilesOfficial said it feels like most of these designs were just the first things people could think of. Which is good for us paper-playing farts who would be disappointed if there were nifty cards we couldn't realistically make work in paper without a lot of bookkeeping! For now. If this becomes a regular thing I might start to worry.

 

[blacksmithy]

I originally wrote up a big rant about not wanting Magic to be "two separate games" but the more I researched numbers to back up my argument and thought about it, the more I realize this is dumb but fine.

I personally don't want Arena and paper Magic to be two different games, but hell, paper Magic is a dozen different games already. Historic may be Arena's "Premiere" format, but there's no "main" format on the platform at the moment, and I can just...not play it. The person who's playing kitchen table Magic exclusively from their rips from boosters at Target is playing an entirely different game than a Modern player, etc. etc.

I'm still a little upset because I like the idea behind a lot of these cards and think they could be workable in paper with very minor tweaks. They seem uninspired and like they were maximizing only for "what could we ABSOLUTELY not do on paper" instead of "what interesting opportunities does this open up for us that we've wanted to do?". But, while I like the precedent for this less than anything else Magic has thrown our way since I started playing in 2006, it's fine. It's whatever. That said, please make a good 4-mana Davriel for paper too pls

this right here, THIS RIGHT HERE. magic has practically NEVER been “one game,” it is a set of rules and game pieces that allows players to participate in a wide variety of games. that’s why it has the staying power it has.
and i wouldn’t worry about paper magic going anywhere. if you look at WOTC’s latest sales numbers, their revenue doubled in the most recent quarter, DRIVEN BY PAPER SALES OF STRIXHAVEN AND MH2. Meanwhile, Arena “is a profitable product” that they intend to continue investing in. you can read between the lines there pretty easy.

 

[Rusje]

I don't disagree, except I <3 Lumbering Lightshield. This is a really neat defensive tool for white. I like that this keeps affecting the spell, so it can really mess with, for example, flashback spells.

Does the perpetual work with alternative casting stuff like flashback, will it add one to that?

 

[Humpty_Dumpty]

Even if online-only cards do create two separate games, won’t that mitigate the effect of formats being solved before they hit paper magic?

I’ve been ignoring aspects of Magic for decades. I don’t see any reason to stop now.

Also, the art for Davriel looks like it should be on a Netrunner card.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

Does the perpetual work with alternative casting stuff like flashback, will it add one to that?

Yes. Anything that mentions casting or playing is affected.

Flashback <cost> (You may cast this card from your graveyard for its flashback cost. Then exile it.): Affected.
Madness <cost> (If you discard this card, discard it into exile. When you do, cast it for its madness cost or put it into your graveyard.): Affected.
Unearth <cost> (<cost>: Return this card from your graveyard to the battlefield. It gains haste. Exile it at the beginning of the next end step or if it would leave the battlefield. Unearth only as a sorcery.): Not affected.

For a convoluted scenario, let's say Lumbering Lightshield increased the cost of Lightning Bolt and the opponent puts the card back on top with Brainstorm second from the top. They untap, draw the other card they put back, then activate Djinn of Wishes. They reveal the Lightning Bolt, and can play it without paying the casting cost (which is ) only if they pay the additional imposed by the Lightshield.

 

[Velrun]

Again, nobody said anything about paper Magic actually dying. Train and Onde, you are once again blowing this out of proportions.

 

[Velrun]

The death of (paper) Magic has been foretold a hundred times by now, but it's arguably more popular than it ever was (aside from that pandemic thing), so I think agreeing to disagree is indeed the best option here. Only time will tell if this time someone was right

I wasn’t part of those people. And we are not talking about death. Just a step down.

And only if they keep favoring Arena with 3 weeks prior releases.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Davriel looks like a Disney antagonist.

 

[sigh]

From what revenue level did WotC's numbers double? I wonder how much of that is simply based on the continued adoption of vaccines and the lifting of restrictions, moreso than the particular merits or shortfalls of the recent sets themselves. I imagine WotC took a pretty big revenue hit on paper sales last year.

 

[LadyMapi]

Davriel looks like a Disney antagonist.

He looks like an evil cartoon capitalist, which means that he looks kinda like Walt Disney.

 

[MilesOfficial]

Managorger Phoenix is pretty interesting to me, but also exposes the flaws already discussed with this set and its design process. As a two mana phoenix with two power, its slower means of recursion feels like an incidental bonus rather than a core part of the card, especially considering it doesn't have any meaningful build-around or play pattern costs. I would expect in most two-color decks it would take a few turns to get this back online from the grave, but that can happen at instant speed, and the +1/+1 modifier is nothing to sneeze at. Without haste, it's easy to compare to the 3-mana 2-power phoenixes, but curving out with Managorger is going to feel really good.

At face value, this would be a reasonable include for me, especially at 720 cards. I love a recurring threat, fliers in red, cards that love being in graveyards, etc. It's almost enough for me to make a nice-looking proxy for it for paper play, in the case where we somehow got a high-resolution render. HOWEVER, I think I've got to avoid it because of the complexity creep it would contribute to cube. It's intuitive enough, but the flame counters not being perpetual but the +1/+1 ability being perpetual but not being a counter...like I said before, it's like they're throwing good design principals out the window to make cards specifically function in weird ways to justify them being digital-only.

I would happily play this card if its text box was:

Flying
Managorger Phoenix can't block.
Whenever you cast a spell, if Managorger Phoenix is in your graveyard, you get flame counters equal to that spell's devotion to red. If you have 5 flame counters, remove them all and return Managorger Phoenix to the battlefield with a +1/+1 counter.

Or something similar, I dunno. Poison counter technology would work within our existing paper Magic rules, and I'd like this card.

 

[sigh]

Your rewrite is basically what I was thinking for this if I were to make a paper version. It could also be extended a bit further with "...with a +1/+1 counter for each time a creature named managorger phoenix entered the battlefield from the graveyard this way". Not 100% necessary, but as it's currently written I think the perpetual counters can stack.

"Flame tokens" on the battlefield could also work and enable token shenanigans in the same way that poison-style counters could enable proliferate shenanigans.

 

[MilesOfficial]

You're right, giving it a +1/+1 counter for each time it returned would be right, but I was dissuaded from wanting to add more text to the card unnecessarily. However, I was trending into custom card territory, which....these really are? This is why it's frustrating, the effect is interesting and I want it in the game at this cost, but once I add it to my cube I might as well go full-on with custom cards.

 

[sigh]

It's frustrating to me in that this card could relatively easily be printed on paper. I do get the allure of doing "things only possible on a computer", but they aren't digging very deep for that IMO.

 

[sigh]

Some of these cards have the weirdest wording, even if it doesn't impact the functionality at all. "when the creature you control wins the fight" like ??? Why not go with the standard "When an opponent's creature dealt damage this way dies this turn, draw a card" or something. I'm assuming "winning" the fight means your creature has to live??

 

[alvoi]

It's frustrating to me in that this card could relatively easily be printed on paper. I do get the allure of doing "things only possible on a computer", but they aren't digging very deep for that IMO.

Exactly my same thought. Most of these cards seem like that they could easily be printed (in black or silver border), but they made them slightly different just to show “See? We can make unique digital cards that don’t work in paper!”

 

[Chris Taylor]

Some of these cards have the weirdest wording, even if it doesn't impact the functionality at all. "when the creature you control wins the fight" like ??? Why not go with the standard "When an opponent's creature dealt damage this way dies this turn, draw a card" or something. I'm assuming "winning" the fight means your creature has to live??
View attachment 4994

I think "Winning" means yours has to live and theirs has to die AS A RESULT OF THIS EFFECT which is a bit hard to actually explain in actual factual magic wording.

Which, while possible in paper takes a LOT of words.

This is a card that exemplifies the best of this set: people understand how this works, it can also work in paper, it's just not kosher within the "designed by lawyers" rules system of magic for tournament play

I think if we all just imagine these as slightly more straight laced silver border cards, we'll get out of these spoilers what we can: a few neat designs like blast from the past, and a bunch of cool ideas for somebody (if not you)