thestorywewrite

[thestorywewrite]

I love stories.

After a few false starts, I got into magic properly around 7 years ago now. I'd abandoned the TCGs Id played before a few years before, but there had been some online buzz about the commander format, and I'd been itching to do some deckbuilding.

And I fell in love with magic. The characters, the lore. Years and years of it! Every card told a story, no matter how small. I built decks around characters, or decks around weird cards. Sometimes there were stories about the stories! The real life lore that had gathered around strange sets like P3K and homelands.

Some of my commander decks are just built around cool mechanics. Its a game first, afterall. And it's casual, so I didn't have to splash out on the best cards, just cards I liked.

But even then, being able to make jokes about Urza or link weatherlight charachters as they come up... Magics more than just any of the 50+ boardgames in my cupboard. It's alive with its own living, breathing tales. And everyone has their favourites.

I've let magic take up a lot of my board gaming. I play at least once a week with my wife, if not more. Commander or Jumpstart or a 2-player draft. I upgrade all these things regularly with each new set. Even favourite weird draft chaff I try to find a home for if it resonates.

I attend every prerelease, I try draft each set in my LGS at least a few times (I'd like to do more, but there's only so many Fridays I can spare and the sets go by so quickly these days. My old LGS used to draft mondays too, but it shutdown.)

When I see some friends who live a city away a few times a year, we play massive commander games to show off what we've changed or built. Or draft all evening long.

In summary, Wotc can definitely afford to lose me.

My problem with UB is it just fails to resonate as a magic card to me. Or a lot do. I dont play enough DnD to notice some of those cards as off. The Clue lands looked fun.

But seeing something I know from LotR next to something from Kamigawa or Dominaria fails to emotionally resonate with me. It's not part of this story, this rich lore.

It's just another game piece. And if I *just* wanted to play a game, I could play another boardgame.

And don't get me wrong, there have been UB cards of some of my favourite stories already. But they did nothing for me in magic. They werent magic cards. Just a game piece for a Princess Bride game using magic rules. Weird. Disconnected

But it's fine. I curate my experience pretty heavily already. My friends can continue to fail to get me into modern, I can shelve the pauper lists I was looking at. I've got cube, I've got commander, I've got draft.

As much as SL does nothing for me, it's not the end of magic for me. Not even close. Clearly a lot of people like it. I know people who do.

Then the 3 UB set announcement came and I've not been mad, just... deflated?

Like, I'm hype for Foundations, I'm excited for my corner of magic. I've been blowing up groupchats with previews and speculation and...

And I'm not going to get that soon. 3 spoiler seasons I'll feel nothing for. And it's not like I get longer with those sets I do like. I can't get my drafting friends together on a random Friday just because we're knee deep in Final Fantasy at my LGS.

Do I go anyway and give away the cards after? The draft will still be good I'm sure. But driving all that way after work, buying something greasy at 11pm after the draft, heck, the fact I could be doing something else with my wife or friends... it's a lot of effort for something thats *just* a game. That doesnt feel like magic.

It's not the end of magic for me, and magic can afford me for sure, it's just sad that something I've put a lot of love into will be less so.

Magic stands by itself, and I worry that UB won't be another leg for magic to stand strong on, but a crutch thats going to atrophy those legs the more its leaned on.

Or it won't magic will live strong and I'll just have half as much to play this year than in the last, because I can't conceptualize Captain America as part of the same game whose unique selling point to me all those years ago was that every card was part of a grand story told over years.

The game is allowed to change and evolve but a very core part of the appeal of magic, what makes it different from every other TCG has tangibly been lessened. While Im' not stopping now, I wouldn't have come here if this is where we were when I started.

And maybe I'll come round.

But as a closer: when my FiL, having heard my wifes and I's love for the game, wanted to dip his toe in, it wasnt his lifelong love of LotR that suckered him in. He was indifferent to that. He saw Vivien Reid in a boardgame shop and started looking up all her cards and bought a bunch from ebay.

I’ve always felt the core role of this blog has been one of information. We make a lot of choices in design, and I try to use my various communications, including Blogatog, to walk the players through what we were thinking when we made key decisions.

The challenge with this approach is that it’s very logic-focused. It uses intellectual justifications to explain actions. But the problems I’m often responding to are emotional in origin. I have a good friend who’s a psychologist. He refers to this (using the words of author Robyn Gobbel) as an owl brain solution to a watchdog brain problem.

When someone is hurting, hearing about why the thing that is causing them pain is the result of intellectual decisions falls flat. That’s what has been causing some tension lately here on Blogatog.

It’s clear that for some Question Marks changes over the last few years represent the loss of something key to what makes Magic special to them. To them, the game is losing its heart.

While I can’t necessarily do anything about that, I want to better understand what you’re going through. So I’m using this post to ask players who are concerned with the recent changes to help me understand their feelings. Let me hear your stories about how your lives have been affected by these changes.

[thestorywewrite]

I feel like there's a lot of the 'Holy Cow' discourse from OTJ, or Enormous Energy Blade from NEO in this.

Which is partly a "new thing feels weird" phenomenon (NEO has settled in very nicely in the greater Magic opinion), but is mostly just 'thing that is one degree removed is magic' but 'thing I see the reference for' isn't.

I also feel like this is linked to the 'all the survivors look like they're from Duskmourn even though they shouldn't'

Regarding Unsettling Twins vs Twins of Maurer Estate - Although there are definitely other reasons, a big one could simply be a matter of volume. It's no secret we've been getting a whole lot of trope-based sets lately, and that they've been getting much more heavy-handed than they were in the past (including SOI). While I get that that might be a good thing for some, others could simply be getting burnt out by it, hence more complaints.

I don't think the sets individually are more heavy handed or of higher volume than the past, but having numerous sets of that volume next to one another is unique to this year.

[thestorywewrite]

DIamonds have been pretty powercrept out of the format, they were in a lot of my deck around 2017. Not anymore. And I steictly play budget.

Same as the mana myr outside of decks with direct synergy.

If Arcane Signet is too strong, and the Diamond cycle is too weak, then what is the middle ground? I feel like there is no good answer here, especially with the format always having access to the "strictly better" cards

Are the Diamonds too weak?

Commander is not my area of expertise.

[thestorywewrite]

It's not too strong, it's just annoying that it's always going to be the best choice over any other rock.

For most budget 2c+ decks the mana rocks are just Arcane signet + guild signets + sol ring without thinking.

Wheras once a budget 2c deck would go sol ring + guild signet then have choices. The diamond cycle from mirage? Myr? 3 drop rocks with extra utility?

It just crept out the variance while being completely uninteresting itself.

To offer a counter opinion from the previous OP: I think Arcane signet is fine, but I think a 2MV signet which produces a color would warp the format because; even if technically its colorless, a ‘White Arcane Signet’ would effectively be white and it would benefit multicolor decks disproportionately because they can play many different versions of effectively the same card

Let’s do a poll.

[thestorywewrite]

Loved the Kamigawa album.

Preffered tracks that didn't feel overstuffed with magic or story terminology, but still listen to my favourite tracks from it.

What are your thoughts on the New Capenna and Kamigawa albums? Is there a chance we'll see them again?

What did you all think of them?

[thestorywewrite]

Thanks Mark, thats really insightful (and will perhaps quiten a few of the more pessimistic voices)

Hi Mark! Can you discuss the metrics of success/ failure for magic products outside of sales? Enfranchised Magic fans tend to have worry (have strong opinions) about the long term health of Magic. Issues like standard bannings, one set blocks or product fatigue are discussed as things that, some players posit, may be a long term detriment, even if they produce short term sales . --with the (amazing) return of short stories, it seems sales arent everything- what else do you look at?

Other than sales, the two other big things we track are engagement and impressions. Engagement is about are people playing the game (looking at things like sanctioned and digital play) and are people talking about the game (looking at metrics of internet usage). Impressions are how do people like what we’re making (which is tracked through market research, digital data, and other various sources).

[thestorywewrite]

The bulwark of clouds cleared. A calm night for covert thoughts.

The rules: http://thestorywewrite.tumblr.com/post/149414629460/the-tumblr-story

[thestorywewrite]

The Tumblr Story

What is the tumblr story?

The Tumblr Story is a piece of collaborative fiction that takes advantage of the unique nature of tumblr to turn one line into great works.

 What are the rules?

There aren’t any real rules to the tumblr story. Reblog what you like, add what you want, to whichever but you want.

It doesn’t matter where in the story you add! Or what! Do what you feel like.

You can re-write, change direction, genre. Whatever! Go for it!

 Why tumblr?

The reason for tumblr is the reason the rules are so loose.

Have you ever seen those comment chains on tumblr, the nuggets of pure comedy, that are almost too perfect, too pure to be true?

The kind of perfect quips that would be deemed unrealistic for actual script writing (unless you’re writing Frasier).

Well, that’s because of how tumblr works! It’s an interesting system that allows popular posts to be passed around. Any unpopular replies don’t get reblogged, so don’t get seen beyond the repliers own followers. But good responses? Well, they’ll get reblogged and exposed over and over again.

Like a particularly cute baby photo.

But that isn’t contained to just the first response. The more solid gold replies, the more the alchemy of tumblr will spread it. The sub-par ignored. The par onwards.

 Would this work with a story? Maybe! If people add what they want, and people reblog it, and more people add, and more people reblog… we might make something truly interesting.

Or more than one thing! We’ll probably end up with a load of different popular additions, responses and directions. We can only wait and see.

 Why start this on its own tumblr?

I thought a hub to review and repost might be cool. We’ll see!