General Other News

[Onderzeeboot]

Unfortunately I feel it's a little inevitable, as I feel like WotC has started to hit a dangerous exponentiation in peak power levels, or maybe in power level ranges. A near-necessary evil of their own expansion system, pushing boundaries and searching for new territory in a kinda game of one-ups-manship designed to maintain sales interest, not necessarily play interest.

I don't think this is a necessary evil at all, nor is it inevitable. Magic has so much depth that they could keep a consistent power level for decades more. It's not a lack of ideas that forces them to push the boundaries, it's an acknowledgment of them that safe sets are just boring to play. Their implementation of the FIRE philosophy in combination with the introduction of the play design group means a higher average of cards have some use outside of limited, which just increases the chance something goes wrong each set. It has led to some unfortunately pushed cards, but it's a pendulum that will swing back again. I'ld argue that Kaldheim is mostly fine, and actually includes a high number of underwhelming designs at rare and mythic rare. Even though Tibalt's Trickery was an unfortunate inclusion, it's not actually a pushed design per se.

 

[sigh]

I don't think this is a necessary evil at all, nor is it inevitable. Magic has so much depth that they could keep a consistent power level for decades more. It's not a lack of ideas that forces them to push the boundaries, it's an acknowledgment of them that safe sets are just boring to play. Their implementation of the FIRE philosophy in combination with the introduction of the play design group means a higher average of cards have some use outside of limited, which just increases the chance something goes wrong each set. It has led to some unfortunately pushed cards, but it's a pendulum that will swing back again. I'ld argue that Kaldheim is mostly fine, and actually includes a high number of underwhelming designs at rare and mythic rare. Even though Tibalt's Trickery was an unfortunate inclusion, it's not actually a pushed design per se.

Unfortunately, as long as WotC is tied to the shareholders of Hasbro (really, to any profit* motive), Magic could have literally infinite depth and they will still be forced to deep six their own success before then due to shortsightedness. Keeping things fresh is one thing, working with increasing desperation to constantly grow interest to an ever wider sales base, that's a different thing. The pendulum might swing, but I see it swinging like this:

Just my cynical opinion. Working in a fast-dying industry will do that to you.

*profit as in the capitalist notion of ever-increasing economic gain out of ownership of some production. I'm not talking like, paying for employees' livelihoods.

 

[Velrun]

In case anyone wants to get an understanding on how shareholders think when it comes to pushing cards or not, you can watch these two funny little videos explaining it:

https://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/khm-kaldheim-official-previews.3196/page-14#post-95903

 

[sigh]

Yeah, nice video (the first one. they are both good, but the second is more just clarifying a definition). It's almost entirely from a game design perspective, but I suppose the zynga section does highlight how outside parties (shareholders, umbrella companies, etc) see the player sales gain but maybe not the design consequences. This (IMO) is not a fluke but an ingrained feature in a shareholder economy. it's just varying degrees of obvious.

Still (and unfortunately), MtG and it's creep will eventually overpower the safeties WotC has put in place, and I think that process started circa 2017. Their "type 2 fix" has had relatively few bans until recently. Now they are commonplace, almost every set, or at least 0nce per year since 2017. That shows to me that their "type 2 fix" is slowly coming apart at the seams as the power peaks creep above what the format can generally handle. Maybe some of it is they are trying to more actively monitor standard than they might have done in the 2000s, but that's not the whole story.

Type 2 bans timeline
90's-early 00's: they didn't have all their "tools" in place (the first type of creep per the video, design quality creep).
04: mirrodin block. still an echo of them learning the ropes. Artifacts are real good. they learned the hard way here.
11: Jace and stoneforge were banned
11-17: nothing that I can remember or saw in the article below.
17-Now: many standard bans across at least 5 B&R announcements.

They already have their tools in place. They've learned the fundamental mistakes as of the late 90's/early 00's. IMO, this ('17-now) is now the second type of power creep overtaking the relative amount of balance standard offered in the interim. This is spilling over into other formats too.

Info from here. Note the raw length of B&R announcements over time. An inverse bell curve with lots of errors in the 90s and recently, but relatively few announcements throughout the majority of the 2000's and 2010's: https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Banned_and_restricted_cards/Timeline

 

[LadyMapi]

I honestly don't think we can blame this on normal power creep.

The problem here is that FIRE design lines up distressingly well with "print GRBS", because the consistent meme in Magic design is that "fun is a zero-sum game". No, fuck that. You can't think that way when you're the designer, because ideally you want all of your players to have fun. Both from a "making people happy gives me the warm fuzzies" standpoint and a "happy players buy more product" standpoint.

The drop in quality also happens to roughly line up with the point where they really started going after EDH players. And that's not like seeding a card for (I dunno) Modern in a Standard set, where it's just a matter of power-level or synergy with older cards — EDH is pretty much an entirely different game that just happens to use the same pool of cards. And, since EDH doesn't really have a competitive scene to drive card sales, WOTC has to print cards that are too good to pass up instead.

 

[sigh]

That is effectively "normal" power creep. You are just putting good context to why it's happening in WotC at the moment. Hadn't even thought about commander, but it probably does play a role since it's such a bomb-hungry high-octane format with relatively little regard for overall format health.

 

[LadyMapi]

Normal power creep is a slow process. It's a side effect of the fact that only a small-ish subset of your provided options are actually usable, so the designers have to aim slightly above the average if they want people to use their designs. Over time, this pushes the average upwards — it's like how creatures have gradually gotten bigger over time:



This... isn't that. Or, if it is, it's happening at a vastly increased rate (like the difference between a piece of iron rusting and a bonfire — both of those processes are oxidation, after all).

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If I seem overly finicky about the terminology here, it's because I see "power creep" as a really defeatist way to put it. Because that implies that what's happening is normal or inevitable, and it really isn't.

 

[sigh]

By the definition in game design there is no set speed of power creep. The zynga example in the video was basically "instant" (widespread creep caused by just one new set releasing). It happens as fast as the parties involved in the game's creation allow it to happen. Ideally it's slow, but it's not necessarily that way.

further, in my mind it is inevitable. Games don't have infinite design space no matter how complicated. It could take 1 year or 100 for creep to become a significant problem, but it's still happening unless you simply stop making changes or you over-complicate via differentiation (a totally different axis of "creep"). You can call that defeatist if you want, but it is inevitable.
The outside forces of marketing and business management will only make it faster. Just look at the raw quantity of cards they are putting out each year, especially now with all the random side products they've made a yearly thing.

 

[LadyMapi]

The part I'm arguing against isn't that power creep is somehow inevitable, it's the feeling that Zynga-style "burn everything in one go"-style "power creep" is inevitable. Because it really isn't, and it gives people with predatory business practices way more leeway than they deserve.

If I heat a pot of water from 15° to 100°, there's a world of difference between me doing it over the course of a half-hour and me doing it over the course of half a second, even if the end result (a pot of boiling water) is arguably the same. Calling both processes "heating up a pot of water" is technically correct, but it isn't a very useful description of what happened.

I mean, yeah, some of the bans are due to slow power-creep. Simian Spirit Guide and Mystic Sanctuary are prime examples — Modern hit a point where the monkey was just too much acceleration for combos, and Mystic Sanctuary was problematic in Modern because that format is essentially purpose built to make lands as powerful as possible (thanks to the presence of powerful land tutors and weak land destruction), and they picked an ETB that got pushed past the boundary.

But Uro? Oko? Those cards were good old-fashioned design mistakes that didn't get caught, Skullclamp-style, and the fact that the number of those mistakes seem to be increasing says more about corporate pressure and flaws in the the creation process than it does about "power creep".

---

On a different note, I look forward to getting a bunch of broken, ban-worthy White cards in a few years, thanks to all of the complaints from EDH players.

 

[Velrun]

I just want to say I fully enjoy reading this discussion <3 Keep up the good work!

Also yes to some stronger white cube cards.

 

[sigh]

The part I'm arguing against isn't that power creep is somehow inevitable, it's the feeling that Zynga-style "burn everything in one go"-style "power creep" is inevitable. Because it really isn't, and it gives people with predatory business practices way more leeway than they deserve.

If I heat a pot of water from 15° to 100°, there's a world of difference between me doing it over the course of a half-hour and me doing it over the course of half a second, even if the end result (a pot of boiling water) is arguably the same. Calling both processes "heating up a pot of water" is technically correct, but it isn't a very useful description of what happened.

I mean, yeah, some of the bans are due to slow power-creep. Simian Spirit Guide and Mystic Sanctuary are prime examples — Modern hit a point where the monkey was just too much acceleration for combos, and Mystic Sanctuary was problematic in Modern because that format is essentially purpose built to make lands as powerful as possible (thanks to the presence of powerful land tutors and weak land destruction), and they picked an ETB that got pushed past the boundary.

But Uro? Oko? Those cards were good old-fashioned design mistakes that didn't get caught, Skullclamp-style, and the fact that the number of those mistakes seem to be increasing says more about corporate pressure and flaws in the the creation process than it does about "power creep".

---

On a different note, I look forward to getting a bunch of broken, ban-worthy White cards in a few years, thanks to all of the complaints from EDH players.

Lots of good points. A corporate cash-grab-power-creep scenario is certainly not inevitable at the speed that particular case happened. I'm also not arguing that it is inevitably that fast in all cases, just calling out that it can happen that fast while still being power creep. It's a one-variable definition: is the game-piece power vs. cost going upwards? Time doesn't play a factor, even though I do really like the water boiling analogy. I would probably call the second one "explosive vaporization (of water and pot and possibly the pot-observer)"


One thing though. A "design mistake" (in the too-high direction) and "power creep" are virtually indistinguishable at the end of the day. It doesn't matter how the crept cards comes into existence, the result is the same. If it is too far above the bar for any reason, it creeps the bar irrevocably if the game pieces are permanent which they are in MTG*. Straight from video 1, power creep is often accidental (aka a mistake). that doesn't mean it's not creep.


*at least in eternal formats and casual formats, the latter of which is the lions share of all actual paper mtg play.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

One thing though. A "design mistake" (in the too-high direction) and "power creep" are virtually indistinguishable at the end of the day. It doesn't matter how the crept cards comes into existence, the result is the same. If it is too far above the bar for any reason, it creeps the bar irrevocably if the game pieces are permanent which they are in MTG*. Straight from video 1, power creep is often accidental (aka a mistake). that doesn't mean it's not creep.

*at least in eternal formats and casual formats, the latter of which is the lions share of all actual paper mtg play.

I think an important distinction between power creep and design mistakes is that power creep is a process that affects a whole class of cards, while design mistakes are individual cards that cause problems. We've experienced a slow and gradual power creep on creature stats in general since the start of this century, but it looks like we've hit a plateau there. High cmc creatures are still experiencing a little bit of power creep, but the P/T cap of low to mid cmc creatures is more or less consistent nowadays. FIRE design did introduce a new power creep, namely one of the lower boundary of the power band. However, both have caused problems (looking at you, Cauldron Familiar and Growth Spiral).

 

[LadyMapi]

That's valid, but I don't think solely looking at cost vs. power as a one-variable thing is particularly useful. But now we're getting into my disagreements with how EC (and other venues) define "power creep" .

I'm also not sure that "high-power mistakes irrevocably creep the average power up" is a fruitful stance to take. Game pieces are not permanent, thanks to bans (like the one that caused this conversation), and I'd argue that banned design mistakes actually help slow power creep (since they give the designers a benchmark for whether or not a given design is OK).

A bit of a swerve: I think power creep isn't necessarily bad. The primary reason is that power creep looks at the average power level of your option pool, and not the variance within that pool. If you tighten the variance in power level while you creep up your average power level, you're effectively just iterating on and improving your design. If I print a 1/1 flyer for in one set and then print a 2/1 flyer for , that is power creep... but at the same time, that 1/1 flyer wasn't playable in the first place. I've effectively just figured out, over time, that my earlier design was aimed too low.

When we replace an underperforming card in our cube with a more appropriate one... that's power creep. But it's good power creep.

 

[sigh]

We are obviously getting lost in the weeds of semantics here...... I've got nothing better to do if that's not apparent already.
One card getting introduced can influence an entire class of cards. A single vanilla 3/3 printed in a set will outclass every grizzly bear variant before it, and most 1C 2/2s around the color pie. I don't think one would argue that that isn't power creep, so why the argument against my point about design mistakes? It's the exact same. Every simic card in the entire class of simic multicolored cards that is being considered for a deck slot, especially at , now has to be weighed against the two individual design mistakes WotC has made in that slot. That slot and multicolor slice has been crept the same the 1G slot would be crept by a vanilla 1G 3/3. Design mistake or not. Like, yes the term "design mistake" is a useful one to use in evaluation of a card's potential, but that doesn't invalidate the results* of making those mistakes.

EC literally used a one card example for a good part of his hearthstone video, so again, I'm really struggling to see how we are trying to split a hair here.

Bans can assuage certain constructed players, but the majority of magic players aren't playing constructed, and it still hurts players that already made the choice towards "yes I'll run this". Rosewater has confirmed this on numerous occasions that kitchen table magic is ruler of paper magic. So every card printed ever is permanent unless all the casual players individually figure out their own banlists, which is frustrating. We are literally a forum focused on building non-sanctioned-kitchen-table-draft-machines. Uro and Oko now stand heads and shoulders above most other simic options, and we have to weigh if they are proper for our cube power levels (whether or not to "ban" them).
Besides all that, WotC's now diminished the potential to excite those kitchen table players that do run the cards because they have those standouts in their casual decks to weigh any new card against. Bans are important, don't get me wrong. But I hope it's obvious they aren't the same level as a game that can literally delete a mistake from existence, or fundamentally re-balance the entire game piece (looking at LoL here, same as EC did). You can't send the Uro's back to the printer for a re-do. Errata doesn't even really work any better. Kitchen table players are then burdened with remembering every post-hoc patch note....

As to LadyMapi's paragraphs 3 and 4, totally agree. EC covers this too (and me in my original posts ). This is design creep, where you are still figuring out the proper placement of game pieces, improving your design toolbox, etc. etc. IMO Wizards largely got over this phase in the early-mid 2000's, besides minor improvements since then.

Spoiler: Footnotes. Yes really.

*Maybe calling them "indistinguishable" was a little improper**. One is a cause, one is an effect. But they can't be separated from each other. Maybe that's what I meant to say. If you make the mistake, the creep will be a result of that mistake. The mistake is the flint striking the steel, the creep is just the spark. The mistake was the dough, the power creep is the resulting bread? I'm running out of ways to try to clarify myself here.

**but if this is truly root cause, this forum expects me to be orders of magnitude more precise in my wording than my customers do when negotiating their 7-figure*** contracts .

*** I do not get the resulting 7-figure money. God, imagine.

 

[LadyMapi]

My counterargument (which ain't great) is that the observable difference between "we started printing 3/3s for in our sets" and Oko/Uro is that the latter are much greater outliers.

If I want to use cards printed after "monogreen Watchwolf" is printed in my cube, I'm going to have to accept that that's part of the new standard for creatures. With something like Uro, I can safely disregard that card because it's wildly unlikely that the class of future creatures that overtuned will be all that large. It's like how most of us don't factor in Skullclamp when we're building an equipment package. I dunno — I guess, to me at least, "this option is the result of power creep" and "this option is a design mistake that might result in power creep" are blatantly distinct issues.

I'll also say that they've started design-creeping again. Every single non-core set since WAR has been messing with the design space for the game in ways we really haven't seen since the mid-2000s.

(I'm going to bow out at this point — I'm not a professional negotiator, and I feel like I'm outclassed Also, I'm at a disadvantage because I haven't (and kinda can't) actually watch the EC video. Stupid anxiety issues.)

 

[Onderzeeboot]

We are obviously getting lost in the weeds of semantics here...... I've got nothing better to do if that's not apparent already.
One card getting introduced can influence an entire class of cards. A single vanilla 3/3 printed in a set will outclass every grizzly bear variant before it, and most 1C 2/2s around the color pie. I don't think one would argue that that isn't power creep, so why the argument against my point about design mistakes?

I'll bite then. When a single vanilla 3/3 outclasses all other options at that price point, that's a design mistake. When a vanilla 3/3 becomes the norm, that's power creep. You are right that in both cases the vanilla 3/3 sets the benchmark for what is and what is not playable, but in the case of a design mistake, WotC can course correct by banning the 3/3, whereas in the case of power creep that tool is no longer as potent because other cards were designed against that 3/3 vanilla benchmark. I think it's debatable whether Oko and Uro set a design benchmark, as WotC themselves admitted that both were design mistakes. I expect them to not be the new norm.

All of this discussion about semantics doesn't detract from what I feel is your main complaint, namely that the frequent number of bans needed to course correct at the moment is very problematic. Even though Standard has grown considerably more affordable over the past decade, Magic is still an expensive hobby, and getting a deck you invested in effectively neutered by banning one of the more expensive cards in it is gut-wrenching for people with a tighter budget. In that sense I feel Magic is shifting from a game for teenagers to a game for more or less affluent middle class people. As the people who grew up with Magic got older and started to earn money, WotC has been increasing the ways that money can be spent.

By the way, I love your footnotes. Wish your job would make that 7-figure money, but alas

 

[Jason Waddell]

(I'm going to bow out at this point — I'm not a professional negotiator, and I feel like I'm outclassed )

I just want to say, I think your contributions to this discussion have been really interesting and enjoyable to read. I wouldn't worry about any concept of being outclassed, we're all here to just have fun discussing design, and even though people's views don't always align perfectly, I think there are only winners here.

 

[Erik Twice]

The problem here is that FIRE design lines up distressingly well with "print GRBS"

I agree. In fact, I would argue both power creep and printing GRBS are the inevitable result of Wizards's design philosophy.

Why is Oko busted? Because Wizards:

- Intentionally makes Planeswalkers stronger for marketing purporses
- They didn't want Oko to die the turn it came to the table (Hence, 6 loyalty)
- They want Planeswalkers to be special and hence unkillable for two mana in the same way an enchantment or creature is.
- Considers snowballing your opponent into submission to be acceptable or fun
- Intentionally keeps the game highly random so "everyone can win".

You can broaden the argument. If creatures must have ETBs so it doesn't feel bad when your opponent deals with them, you are inherently creating a creature that is more powerful. If getting your big fatty countered is "not fun", then that leads to a more powerful creature, as it has less drawbacks. And so on.

 

[Velrun]

I don't care about likes. But can someone explain to me why Jason got so many likes and why I got none? Did he say what we both wanted to say with better words and I, as a non-native English speaker, need to learn the language a little better?

(I'm not being totally serious)

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

I don't care about likes. But can someone explain to me why Jason got so many likes and why I got none? Did he say what we both wanted to say with better words and I, as a non-native English speaker, need to learn the language a little better?

(I'm not being totally serious)

No I think you just slipped through the cracks. I didn't see your comment!

 

[sigh]

My counterargument (which ain't great) is that the observable difference between "we started printing 3/3s for in our sets" and Oko/Uro is that the latter are much greater outliers.

If I want to use cards printed after "monogreen Watchwolf" is printed in my cube, I'm going to have to accept that that's part of the new standard for creatures. With something like Uro, I can safely disregard that card because it's wildly unlikely that the class of future creatures that overtuned will be all that large. It's like how most of us don't factor in Skullclamp when we're building an equipment package. I dunno — I guess, to me at least, "this option is the result of power creep" and "this option is a design mistake that might result in power creep" are blatantly distinct issues.

I'll also say that they've started design-creeping again. Every single non-core set since WAR has been messing with the design space for the game in ways we really haven't seen since the mid-2000s.

(I'm going to bow out at this point — I'm not a professional negotiator, and I feel like I'm outclassed Also, I'm at a disadvantage because I haven't (and kinda can't) actually watch the EC video. Stupid anxiety issues.)

I gotchu (for video one) . I hope my alt-text is enjoyable to read, and let me know if I can format it better or anything like that. This dude has a penchant for talking in rambles, so apologies in advance for that. I also want to say, if you didn't know already, that you can open transcripts of any Youtube video directly in Youtube. But they are not nearly as clearly formatted, and don't describe any visuals. They are a play-by-play of captions without any punctuation and that's it:

Spoiler: transcript of 'Power Creep - The Trouble with Expansions and Time - Extra Credits'

[Plain text in the middle of a white field: Power Creep]

[Extra credit now stands alone at his podium and begins to speak]

Extra Credit: All right, so Alison’s taking a few weeks off to get a much-needed break and to settle into her awesome new job, so we got a few guests and special surprises lined up for you guys over the next month. First up, I’m very pleased to present today’s guest artist Scott DeWitt. He’s the artist behind the webcomib Fanboys and all-around cool person…

[A cartoon figure of Scott appears and waves/gestures to the audience]

EC: …and he’s here to help us talk about the issue of power creep as videogames move more towards perpetual experiences through online play, persistent worlds, or just constant patching.

[Cartoon Scott is accosted by a blue blow monster with big teeth and anger in it’s eyes. Several images of persistent video game experiences flash on the screen]

EC: Power creep is an issue that comes up more and more as this persistent online play becomes a bigger and bigger part of how games monetize.

[Cartoon scott becomes surrounded by more and more blue blobs, the little persistent play images begin multiplying and taking over the screen.]

EC: The issue of power creep becomes more and more of a consumer issue, so what is power creep?

[Cartoon Scott stands in front of the blob monster doing ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

EC: Power creep is the concept that elements introduced to a game over time grow in power as compared to the original elements of the game.

[Mario appears, followed by a taller Mario. The frame pans out and a whole graph of ever-taller Marios is shown. Cut to a buff Mario flexing on a sad and wimpy Mario]

EC: We saw it happen with World of Warcraft. Many of the items that were great at level 60 at launch aren’t even worth looking at today.

[An orc stares lovingly at an axe, but then throws it aside as EC mentions it’s unworthiness]

EC: Many of the pre level-cap dungeons are no longer really on the to-do list as they’ve been outmoded by dungeons that are faster that give more experience and give better loot.

[A montage of a dungeon being outmoded is shown. Cut to EC, back on his podium]

EC: And you may view this is a natural part of design, but as a designer you have to separate this into two different factors.

[Cartoon first place award appears]

EC: First, a natural evolution. As the creators of a game get more tools available to them and get more experience making levels for that game, they’re naturally going to start making better levels than before, thereby rendering some of the initial designs obsolete.

[A montage of a cartoon game designer building a game, leveling up, and building better levels for that game, depicted as a staircase the designer is building upwards]

EC: and that’s a great thing to happen to a game, but the second thing is power creep.

[A cartoon 2 appears. Cut to the blue blob monster chasing a video game box. Back to EC and his podium.]

EC: Now designers are human beings with real jobs to do and when you’re dealing with perpetual online experiences there’s never enough time to do that job.

[Cut to an image of a stressed game designer thinking about their game design.]

EC: Sometimes it’s very easy as a designer to say “you know, If I just give the fans better loot or more XP for the same general experience, they’ll be happy.” And it’s true. People like bigger guns and faster level. We like to feel powerful.

[A quick montage showing a happy game-player holding a comically large gun, being sonic the hedgehog, and posing on a pile of rocks being very buff]

EC: Many of these games are predicated on this fact, but this is a dangerous slope to tread. This leads to the rapid abandonment of old content, and an unsustainable growth in power.

[Cartoon game player slides down a steep slope looking displeased. Next shown hiking and looking at a trail sign reading “abandonment”. Cut to cartoon Scott trying to feed blue blob monster, but it grows to tremendous proportions. Scott looks displeased. Cut. A cartoon figure cuts a wire on a bomb leading to a building going poof]

EC: this is a design time bomb for any company looking to make a perpetual game. There are plenty of games that have long ago fallen apart due to this issue, but it’s becoming an even greater problem now that we’ve changed how we plan to monetize games.

[A video game cartridge falls to pieces on the ground. A cartoon Scott carrying a blue blob monster is suddenly flattened when the blob becomes enormous and then transforms into a big money sack]

EC: …Because for many games it might now be more than just the path of least resistance. It might be something they choose to do.

[A video game cartridge paints over a trail sign that read “least resistance” so it says “choice”]

EC: Probably the best example of this is the game Warstorm after it was acquired by Zynga. This was an interesting little online CCG that was purchased by Zynga in 2010. At the time of purchase it had a host of issues and some trouble with power creep, but it’s fundamentally a sound take on how to do an asynchronous collectible card game.

[A montage of company logos and card players being varying degrees of happy and sad illustrate the above sentences. EC returns to his podium to continue the discussion below]

EC: After Zynga got it, well the next expansion was radically different. Now I don’t know if it was the fault of Zynga, but for any of you guys that play Magic, pretty much every card in that expansion essentially read “protection from every card made before this set”. I know that sounds silly but someone somewhere must have said “All right I got a brilliant idea. People like cards that are way more powerful, right? We’ll just make the next set a lot more powerful and it’ll get everyone to buy tons of cards”

[A cartoon figure pantomimes the person with the bright idea above]

EC: But of course this plan backfired completely, because collectible card games are designed around the idea that part of what makes them sticky (a part of what makes them so hard to give up) is that as a player you’re invested in your collection and the bigger your collection gets the harder it is to walk away.

[The above bright person is torched by a “backfired” flame. Cut to a card collector enjoying having a card collection, and agonizing about throwing them away, eventually kicking the trash can and not getting rid of the cards]

EC: so in this case since all the cards people had previously bought were suddenly rendered worthless, a lot of them simply said “well maybe now’s a good time to quit instead of starting over from scratch”.

[A card collector at a cashier has their cards turn to mush. They get sad and toss the cards to the ground and walk away from the cashier without buying anything. Cashier is now sad]

EC: if any of you quit World of Warcraft for a year or so and then went back only to realize that all the time you’d invested in getting the best gear for your character was now worthless and so you quit again, you’ve experienced one of the negative effects of power creep, and you understand why it’s fundamentally bad for business.

[An orc opens their eyes, excited to begin conquering again, only to realize that the dark elf’s gear is way better than theirs. They toss the gear in frustration and walk away]

EC: but this doesn’t stop people from thinking it might be a way to increase monetization to get you to pay to keep up with everybody.

[A cartoon businessman is sad his money sack is empty. His greedy little eyes see blue blob monster and he realizes he can use it. Cartoon player is now stuck competing in Track and Field while holding cash]

EC: now the designers behind WoW are good enough that they are well aware of this process, and they’ve created all sorts of release valves, such as heroic difficulty for the dungeons; to stop the loss of old content. It was a brilliant decision; it improved play while helping to address an ever-growing issue with their game.

[A Blizzard designer shows the orc a series of valves, one labeled “heroic difficulty”. The orc is now running around happy, holding his old gear again. His gear even grows in size to combat a blue blob monster]

EC: but often even the best designers have a hard time really creating content that doesn’t slowly creep up in power, so what can be done to keep power creep at bay?

[Cartoon Scott looks confused, facing off against a blue blob]

EC: well, there’s only one real answer: the use of incomparables. Incomparables in design are gameplay elements that the player sees as having a non-numeric relation to each other. So for example, the ability to do a short distance teleport as compared to the ability to stun a single target are incomparable. It’s apples to oranges. So as a player, assuming neither ability is too out of balance, you can debate all day about which ability is better and you’ll never come close to an answer because the better choice depends on the situation and the player’s preferred play style.

[Various shapes, fruits, and cartoon players illustrate the above point in a montage]

EC: League of Legends is sort of the current reigning master on this front. They’ve managed to create over 90 champions and several years of play based on this principle, and they’ve managed to do it without power creep. In fact, those of you who play League of Legends probably know that some of the most powerful champions in the game were actually some of the first they ever built because they got better over time at judging the actual effect of new incomparables.

[Rammus, a turtle character from LoL is being shown off like he’s in a car dealership. Cut to him doing a body builder pose.]

EC: If you contrast this with something like World of Warcraft, where much of the gear simply has a set of numerical stats, by side-by-sding any new piece of gear that they create for the game with what you currently have, you can tell if the new gear is definitively better. If it’s not more powerful you end up disappointed because you’re never going to use it so might as well not be in there in the first place. But if it is more powerful, it forces the power level of the game to start creeping subtly upward.

[Our orc friend is comparing gear, tossing aside gear with weak stats, but then being captivated by a huge axe labeled “+15”. The blue blob monster slowly starts creeping up behind him]

EC: the other advantage to incomparables is that if you can build enough of them, over time you end up having a lot more wiggle room in what might be considered balanced for your game, as the number of possible combinations of your incomparables reaches a point where anything in the ballpark of a reasonable [item] that you put into your game can be countered by some crazy combination out there.

[various collections of random shapes demonstrate EC’s above point. A baseball field (ballpark) is shown. Image of random shapes getting blown up.]

EC: games like Ultima Online, Magic the Gathering, and to some extent even League of Legends count on this fact to allow them greater freedom when creating new gameplay elements. Unfortunately, the two major problems with incomparables is that they generally cost more to create and simple numerical systems (I mean, changing data ie. Numerical values is easy, but creating new feeling skills of abilities either require scripting of the manipulation of a very complex web of interacting numbers and flags, and incomparables and tend to force a game to be more skill-based, which isn’t always what you want when designing.

[A game designer is shown feeding shapes money. He then blasts lightning into the white background, but is quickly cowed by a complicated-looking screenshot of code, followed by a large spider web attempting to trap him. Mario appears looking out over a blank floor. A pitfall trap suddenly pops into existence and Mario is startled]

EC: of course, for paper games, such as MtG, this added cost for development isn’t there {editor’s note: I strongly contest this}, but incomparables also generally have a higher playtest cost as well. After all, it’s harder to make sure you’ve worded Ice Cauldron in anway that everybody understands, then to make sure the new grizzly bears are clear and not breaking your game.

[A WotC exec looks at a bag of money. Suddenyl the bag poofs into a much smaller bag. The exec is sad. A player is shown poring over a big tome, presumably Ice Cauldron, and a magic dev gives a thumbs up in the background. Cut to a grizzly bear. It turns transparent (clear) but then starts shooting flames from it’s mouth]

EC: There’s also a final option to keep power creep at bay it it’s really going to threaten your game, and that’s to artificially keep it in check. This is the option that MtG took by creating type 2 (or standard) tournament format.

[Cartoon Scott is weakly fending off a blue blob with a chair. Suddenly the blob turns into a robot. Cut to a black chess king being put into checkmate by a white queen and king.]

This allowed them to modulate power between blocks, and many hardcore magic players have probably noticed how every few lbocks the power of one of the newly introduced blocks is brought back down to around the magic mean of one mana per point of power for decent creatures without abilities. They then reintroduce old cards back into new sets thereby making them legal to play again, and not losing that content to power creep.

[A montage of magic cards, players putting cards into decks, and players pointing at a bar graph illustrate EC’s above point]

EC: Everquest also did this after a fashion with their legacy servers; they allow players to play the game as if it had just launched with none of the expansion pack content unlocked, and each time the players beat the most challenging monster in a given expansion pack of met some other specified goals, they would unlock the next expansion, thereby giving players the option to use and enjoy content that had otherwise been outmoded by those expansions.

[A small Everquest wizard and rogue are illustrated running around doing the things that EC describes as he describes them. Cut to EC on his podium finishing his point.]

EC: you’ll find almost any game that last long enough, especially if it expects new players to join, has to do something to this effect.

[A grizzled old game cartridge is shown, surrounded by a happy player and a server, presumably a legacy one. Cut to EC and his podium for the closing statement]

EC: so there it is. Power creep. Why it’s terrible for business and can destroy the longevity of your game, along with a few thoughts on how to combat it. Hope that helps you create more fantastic online experiences and better understand them. Big thank you to Scott for helping us out today. We’ll see you next week.

[Funky electronic music cuts in. End title card pops up. End transcript]

Edit: see below for a reference of the art style used throughout, and also an accurate representation of RTL.

 

[LadyMapi]

Thanks for going through the trouble! Reading through, I'm not sure if the Zynga example really fits, since it's not a design slip. If WOTC sent someone to your house and they threw away all of your cards, I wouldn't call that power creep .

I did have a thought about your "Magic is permanent" argument, and I came the conclusion that, while casual players and eternal formats have access to the whole card pool in the abstract, in reality it's not a huge issue thanks to cost and availability. To pick an extreme example, my casual deck isn't going to be running four copies of Black Lotus, since that would be a little expensive.

On top of that, though, I noticed one thing in common between all of the games the EC video mentioned — they're all at least partially competitive, and they force you to play with strangers. I think those two factors are really important when considering whether or not design mistakes turn into power creep, because they eliminate any possibility of a social contract.

If I play Magic with five other friends, anyone who brings in a deck that isn't fun to play against is going to face social pressure to pick another deck. Since I'm just messing around with friends and because our overall skill level is probably pretty low, I also don't have pressure to get the best cards. And, most importantly, your group can ban interactions instead of cards, so if (for example) WAR Narset is mostly fine for your group except when wheels are involved, you can all just agree not to put the effects in the same deck with each-other.

If you move to competitive Magic (or Arena, or Hearthstone, or whatever), you are now competing with a much larger group of people. What's more, you don't give a shit about your competition, so we start getting toxic memes like "fun is a zero-sum game". If you don't play the best possible cards for your deck, you're going to get eaten alive by people who do, and they have every incentive to do so. Once you hit this scale, you need banlists, because otherwise everyone is going to just play the deck that wins. Uro isn't necessarily a problem at the kitchen table, since you aren't running a hyper-refined deck and your buddies will start turning down games if it gets egregious. It's very much a problem in the competitive scene, because it's the best possible mechanical option and you are punished if you go for the best mechanical option.

Honestly, F2P digital card games exacerbate this problem since (for some bizarre reason¹) they default to you playing competitively. Hearthstone (to give one example) isn't designed to be a game where I hop on and mess around with my friends with a deck I built for fun. It's a game that immediately drops me into the ladder as soon as I start playing. I ended up quitting Hearthstone shortly after starting because I hadn't realized how much I relied on the social/creative aspect of card games for my enjoyment — I have no patience for facing off against some faceless rando with a deck that I bashed together from literal trash just so that I can unlock cards that I might actually want to build decks with.

¹ It's money.

 

[sigh]

Lots of good points to mull over . Unfortunately I have virtually zero experience with any game mentioned in his video, or that I can otherwise think of. Lessens the impact of most of his examples somewhat. The only videogame I really play is Minecraft, which is... a weird gray area at least from what I can tell. They release consistent updates and additions, but you don't have to pay for any of the updating. Not sure exactly how that factors into what EC is laying out, and also unsure how you "power creep" a game about building castles and junk. Unlike MTG or bought game expansions like WoW add-ons, you aren't paying for the additional content. It just appears on your computer one day. Dunno. But yeah, good points. The whole deal is obviously a lot more nuanced than any one post could cover. MTG's a complex game with complex arrays of people working on it, consuming it, etc.

 

[LadyMapi]

If you wanted to power creep Minecraft, you could do it by adding things to the game that are strictly better versions of old things. For example, maybe torches made with oak are suddenly twice as bright, or they add a new way to get iron that involves just picking it up off the ground. But even then, that doesn't have the same impact as it would if you were competing with people to build the best castle. You can still play an entirely valid game of Minecraft where you still mine for all of your iron, because you aren't in a race to have the most iron.

 

[TrainmasterGT]

If you wanted to power creep Minecraft, you could do it by adding things to the game that are strictly better versions of old things. For example, maybe torches made with oak are suddenly twice as bright, or they add a new way to get iron that involves just picking it up off the ground. But even then, that doesn't have the same impact as it would if you were competing with people to build the best castle. You can still play an entirely valid game of Minecraft where you still mine for all of your iron, because you aren't in a race to have the most iron.

Netherite says Hi.

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