The classic example of goodhart's law is medical surgeons. By tracking surgery success rates you creat a sort of "surgery score". Since a surgeon wants a higher surgery score, they start to refuse to perform risky surgeries.
The issue that I (and I'm guessing many 1v1 veterans) have with "designing around Commander" is when they pretend that they're not doing that and it affects the 1v1 experience. We got explicit confirmation yesterday that Nadu was designed for Commander, and it broke the most popular 1v1 format. I'm fine if Commander pays the bills and 1v1 gets the leftovers, but don't stick Commander designs in 1v1 sets and act like we're the ungrateful ones for not wanting to play with toys we never asked for in the first place.
Designing for commander is a scapegoat for wizards printing OP cards to push pack sales. Or maybe a facet of it. Basically magic is fucked and premodern is its only hope.
The MTG designers pretend they are doing good faith community responses. In reality, if they cared, they would slow WAY WAY down and test their cards THOUROUGHLY! As you said, these pushed cards create necessity to purchase to stay relevant. TL;DR: don't reward WOTC for their money grab policies. They don't care about your experience, they care about THEIR money.
I can't comprehend how the old Nadu was less acceptable in commander than the new one. I unironically think the "we changed it for commander" is just a way to cover their asses with the change.
@@thengine7you assume the designers made that decision and not the suits. Most of the time deadlines are management decisions and most corporate managers are not very known for listening to employees suggestions compared to pushing unrealistic deadlines to earn favor with the bosses
The thirst to maximize metrics (profits/purchases) also ties into the monetization of commander via introduction of cards to try to force rotation or disruption of the format. The whole idea of original EDH was "make a fun deck using the chaff you have at home" and it benefitted immensely from the fact it was a non-rotating eternal format. However, the power level for a meta-disrupting EDH card tends to be notably higher than a meta-disrupting standard or even Modern card, and so by tossing the pebble of "let's add new, powerful, splashy cards to encourage deck disruption/upgrades in our most-played format," it ends up avalanching into mistakes like Nadu. Personally, I'd really appreciate if they stopped trying to "shake up" EDH with the latest Vantablack Jeweled Sanguine Lotus that slots into immense swaths of decks and commands triple-digit price tags, and instead if we saw more of what MaRo calls "lenticular design" or cards that reframe or expand existing niches. More cards like Fynn the Fang-Bearer, fewer cards like Hullbreacher or Thassa's Oracle...
This reminds me of a phrase in social sciences, all models are incorrect. Models are just abstractions of something more complex, as such there will always be some instances in which the model's predictions goes against reality.
One great example of this are standardized college entry tests. Especially in developing countries they tend to select for who can afford to study the material instead of who is more proficient at these topics
A ) I love these departures into more general game design. B ) There's a lot of parallels with other measures of productivity in business settings. The metric becomes the goal so you min/max around that and ignore other needed but "not productive enough" items.
I think you give competitive magic way more credit than it deserves. The most important decision is made before the tournament (what deck to play). The more modern develops the less interactive it is because the amount of hard to interact with elements becomes so high that you need to go very streamlined.
Perfect that this video comes out right after the Nadu bannings, where the lead designer said that they last minute changed the original design of the card for commander purposes and then didn't test appropriately. I love commander and 1v1. I do think the tables have turned to Wizards paying too much attention to commander and as a result other aspects are suffering and failing.
To think Vedalken Orrey on a 3/4 flying stick that also protects and enables your flashed creatures by using ramp and card draw for THREE MANA wasn't considered pushed enough for commander. The simic legend, in 2024, wasn't considered good enough.
It's called a law because it's a predictive postulate rather than describing some novel mechanism by which a process occurs. The law is that people will game the system if you provide them with metrics to try and score them. It's a weird semantic thing from theory of science, but this is why stats is full of laws and biology is full of theories.
The funny thing is most of the videos in my feed are more specifically about game design and until you guys, I never watched videos about the game design of Magic despite playing it. Then you guys would show up in my feed with the occasional interesting breakdown on MTG and it wasn't until I subscribed and went to your channel I realized you did videos on game design that wasn't magic. Which was crazy to me that none of these videos were ever suggested to me as I like exclusively watch game design videos that aren't about magic and I don't know why the algorithm didn't think I'd be interested in your other discussions.
For the record, I would watch regardless of what game you guys talk about. Though MGT is what led me to you, I love your discussions around game design in general. I want y'all to talk about whatever you're passionate about!
Please refrain from messing with the terminology of logic itself. Law - a "rule of thumb" for what is going to happen. Usually known to be a massive simplification. See Kepler's laws of planetary motion, Ohm's law, etc. Hypothesis - a testable guess of what might generally be true. Usually not known to be true or false. See Collatz conjecture and many more Axiom - a thing that we take for a fact as a starting point. Usually really simple, but exploring what happens for other sets of axioms is interesting. See the axioms of Euclidean geometry and non-Euclidean geometry that followed a few millenia later. Theory - a collection of axioms and theorems proven from them. All of Euclidean geometry is a theory. Newtonian physics is a theory (that we know to be a simplification). Number theory exists. Universal gravity is a theory.
Tbh to fix the bosses get ignored problem you could have just required all bossed spawned to be dead for the final boss to spawn, buy you can still progress missions untill then
Honestly the discussions about things non-magic are the most interesting parts of these vids. "Commander Bad" could only be said in so many different ways before it became tiring.
I love commander. I've played some 1v1 magic but I love commander as a format for so long, and while I agree with SO MANY points made, there's really only so many times I can sit down and listen to two people rip into every aspect of it's game design and calling it wanting :/ I would love to see some content that isn't mtg or commander focused .I love the discussion, but at some point you feel scolded for enjoying a game 😂
Training machine learning models runs into this problem too. The thing you're telling the model to optimise for can't be the same way you measure the success of your model. Otherwise you are deluding yourself and won't be able to see the blind spots your metric misses. We also have the cobra problem you described. ML models will gladly cheat to achieve a good result on your metric. It is a huge art form and takes a lot of work to come up with metrics and regularisation functions where the path of least resistance for the model is not to cheat.
good news is the past month Standard is having a resurgence like some of us are a bit tired from all the commander circle jerking since the covid days and Bloomburrow (and rotation) seems like a fresh start for us and maybe some of us will go to the pro scene
Maybe i'm in the minority here but.. talk about all kinds of game design not just magic! (Although i do love magic) Edit: whoops didnt look at the comments before commenting, maybe i'm not in the minority.
As a 1v1 player, I can't help but think... are we the NIMBY's? Is Commander bad for Magic, or is it just bad for our idea of Magic? Standard has been in a fantastic spot for around a year, and Nadu aside most problems in other formats have come from Constructed focused cards (Grief in particular). There's definitely some product fatigue, but how much of the sense that Magic is being lost just comes from 1v1 players not being the favorite child anymore?
Reading the Nadu article changes the story to me. It's not that some cards are designed with their primary home being Commander, it's that Commander cards aren't considered worth testing. It sounds like they thought the card was probably mediocre, which was acceptable since the players will balance the environment. I have not heard Commander players say that the card is well balanced and fun for their style of play; usually the opposite. To your point, I do remember some moaning about pulling Commander designs in Bloomburrow limited. In my experience so far, it's not really a problem. Some rare+ cards are designed for constructed only, be it Standard or Commander, but it doesn't affect your draft much.
I'd say that Commander in general is bad for Magic because of how the product design has shifted pretty much the entire game's design: Standard power level is designed to go up and down around the core baseline power level. In Theros enchantments are strong (above the curve), in Innistrad recursion is strong, in Mirrodin artifacts are strong, etc. There is no "true" power creep, because it is contextual (in theory). The entire game experience across all formats is respected by this ebb and flow. This is especially true because Standard was the core entry point for all cards to enter all formats. If Commander products are the core entry point for new cards or Standard sets also focus on Commander focused design, then what matters more is not the ebb and flow of thematic card power... instead it is about making everything new better than everything old. All formats are disrupted. All other product design (Modern Horizons for example) also push this type of power creep. Long term players from all formats require new cards instead of there being a split between old and new staples. Too many new things invalidate the old. Returning players also feel like they are playing a different game. There is no longer an appropriate space for new players to experience something powerful and old players to still have their version of powerful. They solved power creep with the way that Standard used to be designed thirty years ago. Now we have replaced it with straight power creep because the core product and format does not rotate. Plus the core tenets of Commander are antithetical to many of the mechanics of Magic. Removal is weak because there are too many opponents and the core threat (the Commander) are impossible to answer permanently. The differences between certain core strategies by speed does not matter because diplomacy invalidates them (aggro vs control). Combo is too powerful because removal is too rare/weak... etc. etc. The incentives of Commander erase or ignore a large number of the entire rest of the game's checks and balances so the metagame is less about the Rock Paper Scissors of the game's organic design over the last thirty years and it has become instead a discussion about what things everyone at the table is comfortable with (everyone wants to play a different version - their version of the game - instead of just the game itself as it is). In order for the power level of certain types of those effects to be viable in Commander they end up being completely over-tuned in every non-Commander format. This also makes so many modern card designs feel completely overwhelming on their own. The entire game feels more swingy.
I'd say it's a little of both. It does run counter to some aspects of what I like about Magic more than outright being bad, but in a broader sense in some ways it is bad for Magic more generally. At least if you think that a healthy version of Magic is one in which both tournament and non-tournament play are doing well, and both are being played in a variety of ways, not primarily one format. If you don't agree with that premise, then Magic is probably in a fine place, since it's more popular than ever as a whole (that whole just happens to be largely one format moreso than in the past). If it's bad for formats to slowly start shifting away from their intended underlying philosophies, then Commander is in a precarious spot. If not, then it's probably ok, overall.
Haha well… I would think if 1v1s were the NIMBY’s we would have some kind of system to keep commander out. It’s not really up to us. Obviously we feel like commander has some serious systemic issues, most notably in its competitive environment. Are these issues enough to collapse the game? We don’t really know. How much complexity and power creep is too much? We won’t know until it is.
@@cheeseitup1971 The odd part is that I don't think a single commander player would have called the last iteration of Nadu bad. Sure, maybe he wouldn't be commander-good, but in the 99, he would be a power house. We've had some insane Simin and Sultai commanders come out lately and Nadu would have been a great addition. I don't know who decided he 'wasn't enough' before, but it was SUCH a dumb choice
This could be an interesting topic. I don't know about it current state, but the first set or two or Lorcana has limited removal, and you can only 'attack' your opponent's players if they were utilized in some way on your opponent's turn. At a certain point every game I watched came down to "You have a bunch of unexhausted (untapped) characters I can't interact with, guess you'll win next turn no matter what". I wonder if removal has been added and how it shifts the play
I work in the mental health field, and I see this all the time. I see people come up with metrics to gauge how people are doing to try and gather large data on large swaths of people. The end effect, ironically and tragically, is dehumanization and reduction in efficacy of treatment.
In Goodhart' terms, I suppose the most frequently played type of magic would be the measure/target. Seeking to match that measure in the playsets then jukes that stat as more players want to play with their commander specific cards. If the sets are then increasingly tested to how the cards perform in Commander, the players will then find that game better tuned and migrate to playing this. As you say, Commander is technically a less good game so though profitable, it could appear myopic in hindsight when it was all unintended. E.g. MTG could be supplanted by a purer 4-player TCG that has worked out the flaws.
Regarding Magic specifically, I don't think data will destroy the game by any means, but it's certainly possible that it will destroy a version of the game (and in fact, I think it probably will). The reality is that WoTC almost certainly has data pretty clearly showing that the things they are doing are bringing in more and more people. It's hard to argue against raw numbers showing that an approach is successfully expanding the community (without even getting into the obvious profit increase that represents), in favor of subjective things like the feel of the ludonarrative, or maintaining distinct identity of the base game as its own setting vs fully integrating Universes Beyond into it, or that designing things for Commander (at least outside of commander-specific products) is in tension with the premise of the format.
The sad thing is wotc/hasbro has the financial resources to put off profit now for great long term benefits later, but the smaller teams with more creative freedom likely need the cash now
For me what gets me so annoyed about this stuff, is like bro commander is a direct response to a overly competitively designed game. Magic is great, I love magic. But every single card is designed to be that card. Regardless of what it is. Like look at shit like death's shadow, its a super funny card that can do a really powerful thing but is super easy to understand and doesnt necessarily fit in a deck. Now it did find a home, but it took sooo many years until it became a proper deck that wasnt just a somewhat sus oneshot strat with doublestrike. Then look at fountainport bell or Heirloom epic or even Head of the Homestead. All of these are super decent cards, that are obviously good. If I was playing a casual deck with these in them id be mroe than happy to draw them. But they are unplayable. Games too fast, even something like fountainport bell is such a potential weakness. Like standard, modern and pioneer all feel like turn4 formats right now. Modern ofc on the more consistent and faster end of that, but still. It sometimes just gets me like why am I playing standard, if I am playing around the same turns in pioneer just with slightly better cards. My idea of standard is a turn 5 format or something. And sure standard is for sure a slow-er format. But it aint slow, look at shit like old jund or something. Shits fucking slow as a snail compared to these decks. This leaves no home for a more slowerpaced enjoyable game, that you can be ofc hoping to win and play competitively without a deck hyper optomized.
I mean hell look at shit like Fecund Greenshell. This card is so exciting at first, but then you just get super bored of it by the end of reading it. Like a card that says "Draw 1" and a card that says "Draw 1, then gain 1 life if you control an artifact" I think both cards are good, but id likely just rather play the draw 1 unless im playing an explicit artifact deck. Its completely wrong to do so, i might have artifacts or whatever, but simple cards to let you do complicated things is dope. I love dragonspeaker shaman, I never play it but it and OG scute are just so fuckin simple and so exciting. These cards make me happy to play. I would never build a deck around fecund. I have built decks around og scute and waiting in the woods. Thats how dope those cards are, you just do something and get a super simple fun deck out of it. Blossoming tortoise, is pretty dope but it feels like it should be a boss monster. And to some extent it is, but like its just an engine since its so crept. And thats kinda sad. -------------------- I like 8 turn games, and the only way I get to do it is by being the blue/x player so that is what I must do. But I wish other colors had options to do so. Even white removal and black exile leaves you so vulnerable to big boss monsters just rando 1shotting u (like a shivan devestator).
It’s easier to teach someone magic one on one with a deck of cards that only includes a single copy of each card. Early games were combat matches, so no combo, just straightforward play land, cast creature, go to combat. That is a very predictable outcome.
There's a trend of moving away from 1v1 games?... That's honestly shocking to me, given the TCG resurgence in recent years and my personal disdain for playing games that are not 1v1... I think a perfect strategy for Wizards would be to officially separate commander from the rest of Magic and start producing separate product lines for Commander Magic and regular Magic. This way the designers would have the freedom to explore designs specifically catering to commander without them stepping on regular Magic's toes and vice versa. Yes, the player base would be divided but it's divided now so it wouldn't be that different. However this would solve the problem of commander specific cards taking up slots in regular set releases and would hopefully prevent Wizards from pumping out fucking commander precons for every single set (they can still release waves of precons corresponding to current sets but that would not interfere with the actual sets. It's just a simple branding trick but would be sooooo beneficial to the game overall and everyone will receive exactly what they want.
Monster Hunter is one of my favorite series, and there's so many min-maxers and cheaters that ruin the game. Normally I don't care if people cheat offline solo, but that's never the case in Monster Hunter because once you cheat at any point, playing online ruins other player's experiences. -Too many skill slots without penalties or bad skills just lets min-maxes build around a really boring meta. -Some weapons are just way overtuned for requiring less skill to use compared to others. -Too many people cheating in a PvE game, usually to min-max.
I'm over here dying to hear you guys talk about anything besides MTG! Specifically Sorcery TCG, please and thank you. (Honestly it has enough MTG synergy that it shouldn't disrupt your algo too much.) Also Netrunner. Still Richard Garfield!
I've had this same complaint for some time. I think I noticed it around maybe 2016 or so when it, to me at least, it started feeling like all commander decks were so similar, excluding basic lands commander decks are anywhere from 10-20 percent predetermined by the fact that there are just some auto include cards independent of the deck. Coming from many years of "kitchen table multiplayer" commander took over our group pretty quickly maybe a year or two before it was made official. I feel like the deckbuilding space is limited compared to how it used to be. One thing that has made it better for me is to take a several year break. Stop following what's put out and just come to peace with the FOMO. Then coming back it doesn't feel as bad.
@@mcdevstation8666 But what is the value in playing different cards that are just worse than the auto include cards? I agree with you that some deck building space has just been taken up with powerful ubiquitous cards, but for every card they replace there is a tangible decrease in how often the deck will be competitive in a game. Are we just asking players to lose more often to satisfy a desire for novelty? Why would they do that, and how would you get your average commander player to do so?
10:23 this statment is ironic, and that makes me frustrated. (Make product and measure succes by earning capital. Turned into forget product just make capital. Neo-Liberalism vs. Liberalism economic theory split)
This is what has happened to 40k. The game feels designed for only tournament players. Too much focus on adjusting the meta based off tournament results.
Would it be a good idea to just explicitly design cards that are only legal in commander? I remember the discussion that rush doesn't work in commander... What if there were commander rush cards (that would be totally busted in standard).
Dungeonborne devs nerfing a class cause people played it too mucj during an event that revolves around that class... also making it shittier cause people werent dying enough cause they avoid fights where they were totally rolled over...
There's to much player data on the best builds in games and the best decks, cards, draft picks and it make balance paramount and lowers diversity Commander has some built in resilience by increasing deck building diversity but it is overly burdened by unbalanced Legendary's and consistency like Tutor/ramp/universal answers.
Multiplayer magic is like a political food fight. Real magic is like a chess match but better. I don’t hate that people have fun with commander but I am a bit sad that it’s the premier format.
Reminds me of the Diablo3 RMAH where for a long time due to the RMAH the best way to get items was to be a wizard stacked to the gills with gold % generation item and just run through dungeons and AOE pots for gold. As getting gold was better than farming bosses for getting optimal loot
This discussion reminds me why I stopped playing some games or changed the way I play games. I decided that games are meant to be a fun use of my free time/money, if I can't see the fun in it I stop playing. The only metric I care about for a game is "did I have fun playing?" If I'm playing a casual board game with friends/family I do sub optimal stupid stuff just so it's not a stomp or extend the game. Min maxxers can go jump off a cliff, unless they are the professional minority that make the game their job and can earn a living playing a game. MTG I can only play on Arena right now. I play a few games when a set drops look at the shiny new stuff and move along. League of Legends and Starcraft 2 you have to play "the meta" or the latest busted thing even in low tiers or the community says "you suck" so stopped playing LoL and stick to beating up AI in Starcraft 2. Played some chess online and started actively ignoring my ELO number, still kick myself over blunders though. Started playing more single player games where a large part of the game is just exploring the game world and "winning" isn't necessarily the core focus. Stopped playing retail WoW, went back for Wrath of the Lich King and realized I don't care if I'm doing the "optimal" thing as long as I'm having fun and not harming another player's fun.
You seem to think your way of playing is the correct way to enjoy a game. Other people have other ways of enjoying games, and they aren't wrong for that.
@@heyimbilliejean where did I say other people were wrong? I pointed out my way of enjoying games and my opinion on min maxxing. If you wanna "optimise" and have fun with that go ahead, just don't be toxic toward others who may not be doing the optimal thing.
@@NicholasBalanta "Min maxxers can go jump off a cliff,.." That statement is about the people and the way they play, not on how you engage with that mode of play. And with a fair bit of vitriol, I'll add.
Corporate world says hi. Apparently everyone here interpreted it as "it's a law so we must follow it or something, right? Let's fill our walls with lines about our user numbers. That's what the law says. _Right?_ "
The classic example of goodhart's law is medical surgeons. By tracking surgery success rates you creat a sort of "surgery score". Since a surgeon wants a higher surgery score, they start to refuse to perform risky surgeries.
The issue that I (and I'm guessing many 1v1 veterans) have with "designing around Commander" is when they pretend that they're not doing that and it affects the 1v1 experience. We got explicit confirmation yesterday that Nadu was designed for Commander, and it broke the most popular 1v1 format. I'm fine if Commander pays the bills and 1v1 gets the leftovers, but don't stick Commander designs in 1v1 sets and act like we're the ungrateful ones for not wanting to play with toys we never asked for in the first place.
Designing for commander is a scapegoat for wizards printing OP cards to push pack sales. Or maybe a facet of it. Basically magic is fucked and premodern is its only hope.
The MTG designers pretend they are doing good faith community responses. In reality, if they cared, they would slow WAY WAY down and test their cards THOUROUGHLY! As you said, these pushed cards create necessity to purchase to stay relevant. TL;DR: don't reward WOTC for their money grab policies. They don't care about your experience, they care about THEIR money.
I can't comprehend how the old Nadu was less acceptable in commander than the new one. I unironically think the "we changed it for commander" is just a way to cover their asses with the change.
@@borklazer5907the only plausible explanation is that it didnt hit for casuals the way they wanted to so it gor scrapped
@@thengine7you assume the designers made that decision and not the suits. Most of the time deadlines are management decisions and most corporate managers are not very known for listening to employees suggestions compared to pushing unrealistic deadlines to earn favor with the bosses
The thirst to maximize metrics (profits/purchases) also ties into the monetization of commander via introduction of cards to try to force rotation or disruption of the format. The whole idea of original EDH was "make a fun deck using the chaff you have at home" and it benefitted immensely from the fact it was a non-rotating eternal format.
However, the power level for a meta-disrupting EDH card tends to be notably higher than a meta-disrupting standard or even Modern card, and so by tossing the pebble of "let's add new, powerful, splashy cards to encourage deck disruption/upgrades in our most-played format," it ends up avalanching into mistakes like Nadu.
Personally, I'd really appreciate if they stopped trying to "shake up" EDH with the latest Vantablack Jeweled Sanguine Lotus that slots into immense swaths of decks and commands triple-digit price tags, and instead if we saw more of what MaRo calls "lenticular design" or cards that reframe or expand existing niches. More cards like Fynn the Fang-Bearer, fewer cards like Hullbreacher or Thassa's Oracle...
I think of you guys as a game design channel that talks design through the lense of MTG (usually), more than an MTG channel.
This reminds me of a phrase in social sciences, all models are incorrect. Models are just abstractions of something more complex, as such there will always be some instances in which the model's predictions goes against reality.
Specifically, they are leaky abstractions.
All models are wrong, but some are useful - George Box
Except in math and physics
I would still watch if you guys just talk about games in general, not just MTG
Please I want to show y’all to my friends but they don’t play magic but love games
The Strategy Circle videos are easily your best so far. More videos about Guns and Butter!
Came for the Magic. Stayed for the theory around game design. Love it!
One great example of this are standardized college entry tests. Especially in developing countries they tend to select for who can afford to study the material instead of who is more proficient at these topics
A ) I love these departures into more general game design.
B ) There's a lot of parallels with other measures of productivity in business settings. The metric becomes the goal so you min/max around that and ignore other needed but "not productive enough" items.
One of Commander's biggest flaw is one few people think about. Combat is a one v one system in a four player game
I think you give competitive magic way more credit than it deserves. The most important decision is made before the tournament (what deck to play). The more modern develops the less interactive it is because the amount of hard to interact with elements becomes so high that you need to go very streamlined.
Perfect that this video comes out right after the Nadu bannings, where the lead designer said that they last minute changed the original design of the card for commander purposes and then didn't test appropriately. I love commander and 1v1. I do think the tables have turned to Wizards paying too much attention to commander and as a result other aspects are suffering and failing.
To think Vedalken Orrey on a 3/4 flying stick that also protects and enables your flashed creatures by using ramp and card draw for THREE MANA wasn't considered pushed enough for commander. The simic legend, in 2024, wasn't considered good enough.
Literally helldivers 2. Released an amazing game and focused so much on data they made the worst follow up updates I’ve ever seen
It's called a law because it's a predictive postulate rather than describing some novel mechanism by which a process occurs. The law is that people will game the system if you provide them with metrics to try and score them. It's a weird semantic thing from theory of science, but this is why stats is full of laws and biology is full of theories.
The funny thing is most of the videos in my feed are more specifically about game design and until you guys, I never watched videos about the game design of Magic despite playing it. Then you guys would show up in my feed with the occasional interesting breakdown on MTG and it wasn't until I subscribed and went to your channel I realized you did videos on game design that wasn't magic. Which was crazy to me that none of these videos were ever suggested to me as I like exclusively watch game design videos that aren't about magic and I don't know why the algorithm didn't think I'd be interested in your other discussions.
This is the third video I have watched in a row. I think I might stick around. :3
For the record, I would watch regardless of what game you guys talk about. Though MGT is what led me to you, I love your discussions around game design in general. I want y'all to talk about whatever you're passionate about!
Please refrain from messing with the terminology of logic itself.
Law - a "rule of thumb" for what is going to happen. Usually known to be a massive simplification. See Kepler's laws of planetary motion, Ohm's law, etc.
Hypothesis - a testable guess of what might generally be true. Usually not known to be true or false. See Collatz conjecture and many more
Axiom - a thing that we take for a fact as a starting point. Usually really simple, but exploring what happens for other sets of axioms is interesting. See the axioms of Euclidean geometry and non-Euclidean geometry that followed a few millenia later.
Theory - a collection of axioms and theorems proven from them. All of Euclidean geometry is a theory. Newtonian physics is a theory (that we know to be a simplification). Number theory exists. Universal gravity is a theory.
Tbh to fix the bosses get ignored problem you could have just required all bossed spawned to be dead for the final boss to spawn, buy you can still progress missions untill then
Honestly the discussions about things non-magic are the most interesting parts of these vids.
"Commander Bad" could only be said in so many different ways before it became tiring.
I love commander. I've played some 1v1 magic but I love commander as a format for so long, and while I agree with SO MANY points made, there's really only so many times I can sit down and listen to two people rip into every aspect of it's game design and calling it wanting :/ I would love to see some content that isn't mtg or commander focused .I love the discussion, but at some point you feel scolded for enjoying a game 😂
By designing for players who dont currently play Magic, WotC has driven me away from Magic. I haven't bought cards since 2016. I just use my old ones
Training machine learning models runs into this problem too. The thing you're telling the model to optimise for can't be the same way you measure the success of your model. Otherwise you are deluding yourself and won't be able to see the blind spots your metric misses. We also have the cobra problem you described. ML models will gladly cheat to achieve a good result on your metric. It is a huge art form and takes a lot of work to come up with metrics and regularisation functions where the path of least resistance for the model is not to cheat.
good news is the past month Standard is having a resurgence
like some of us are a bit tired from all the commander circle jerking since the covid days and Bloomburrow (and rotation) seems like a fresh start for us
and maybe some of us will go to the pro scene
Maybe i'm in the minority here but.. talk about all kinds of game design not just magic! (Although i do love magic)
Edit: whoops didnt look at the comments before commenting, maybe i'm not in the minority.
As a 1v1 player, I can't help but think... are we the NIMBY's? Is Commander bad for Magic, or is it just bad for our idea of Magic?
Standard has been in a fantastic spot for around a year, and Nadu aside most problems in other formats have come from Constructed focused cards (Grief in particular).
There's definitely some product fatigue, but how much of the sense that Magic is being lost just comes from 1v1 players not being the favorite child anymore?
Reading the Nadu article changes the story to me. It's not that some cards are designed with their primary home being Commander, it's that Commander cards aren't considered worth testing. It sounds like they thought the card was probably mediocre, which was acceptable since the players will balance the environment. I have not heard Commander players say that the card is well balanced and fun for their style of play; usually the opposite.
To your point, I do remember some moaning about pulling Commander designs in Bloomburrow limited. In my experience so far, it's not really a problem. Some rare+ cards are designed for constructed only, be it Standard or Commander, but it doesn't affect your draft much.
I'd say that Commander in general is bad for Magic because of how the product design has shifted pretty much the entire game's design:
Standard power level is designed to go up and down around the core baseline power level. In Theros enchantments are strong (above the curve), in Innistrad recursion is strong, in Mirrodin artifacts are strong, etc. There is no "true" power creep, because it is contextual (in theory). The entire game experience across all formats is respected by this ebb and flow. This is especially true because Standard was the core entry point for all cards to enter all formats.
If Commander products are the core entry point for new cards or Standard sets also focus on Commander focused design, then what matters more is not the ebb and flow of thematic card power... instead it is about making everything new better than everything old. All formats are disrupted. All other product design (Modern Horizons for example) also push this type of power creep. Long term players from all formats require new cards instead of there being a split between old and new staples. Too many new things invalidate the old. Returning players also feel like they are playing a different game. There is no longer an appropriate space for new players to experience something powerful and old players to still have their version of powerful.
They solved power creep with the way that Standard used to be designed thirty years ago. Now we have replaced it with straight power creep because the core product and format does not rotate. Plus the core tenets of Commander are antithetical to many of the mechanics of Magic. Removal is weak because there are too many opponents and the core threat (the Commander) are impossible to answer permanently. The differences between certain core strategies by speed does not matter because diplomacy invalidates them (aggro vs control). Combo is too powerful because removal is too rare/weak... etc. etc. The incentives of Commander erase or ignore a large number of the entire rest of the game's checks and balances so the metagame is less about the Rock Paper Scissors of the game's organic design over the last thirty years and it has become instead a discussion about what things everyone at the table is comfortable with (everyone wants to play a different version - their version of the game - instead of just the game itself as it is). In order for the power level of certain types of those effects to be viable in Commander they end up being completely over-tuned in every non-Commander format. This also makes so many modern card designs feel completely overwhelming on their own. The entire game feels more swingy.
I'd say it's a little of both. It does run counter to some aspects of what I like about Magic more than outright being bad, but in a broader sense in some ways it is bad for Magic more generally. At least if you think that a healthy version of Magic is one in which both tournament and non-tournament play are doing well, and both are being played in a variety of ways, not primarily one format. If you don't agree with that premise, then Magic is probably in a fine place, since it's more popular than ever as a whole (that whole just happens to be largely one format moreso than in the past). If it's bad for formats to slowly start shifting away from their intended underlying philosophies, then Commander is in a precarious spot. If not, then it's probably ok, overall.
Haha well… I would think if 1v1s were the NIMBY’s we would have some kind of system to keep commander out. It’s not really up to us. Obviously we feel like commander has some serious systemic issues, most notably in its competitive environment. Are these issues enough to collapse the game? We don’t really know. How much complexity and power creep is too much? We won’t know until it is.
@@cheeseitup1971 The odd part is that I don't think a single commander player would have called the last iteration of Nadu bad. Sure, maybe he wouldn't be commander-good, but in the 99, he would be a power house. We've had some insane Simin and Sultai commanders come out lately and Nadu would have been a great addition. I don't know who decided he 'wasn't enough' before, but it was SUCH a dumb choice
Can you talk about the design of removal effects and how they shape a card game meta => cheap/ expensive/ specific removal, board wipes, exiles etc.
This could be an interesting topic. I don't know about it current state, but the first set or two or Lorcana has limited removal, and you can only 'attack' your opponent's players if they were utilized in some way on your opponent's turn. At a certain point every game I watched came down to "You have a bunch of unexhausted (untapped) characters I can't interact with, guess you'll win next turn no matter what". I wonder if removal has been added and how it shifts the play
9:50 oh thank goodness, you saved my bingo board
I work in the mental health field, and I see this all the time. I see people come up with metrics to gauge how people are doing to try and gather large data on large swaths of people. The end effect, ironically and tragically, is dehumanization and reduction in efficacy of treatment.
In this episode once again Gavin and Forrest discuss how capitalism is slowly killing Magic the Gathering
mtg is a gimmick of the capitalist system. It operates in a very similar way reflecting it's periods.
In Goodhart' terms, I suppose the most frequently played type of magic would be the measure/target. Seeking to match that measure in the playsets then jukes that stat as more players want to play with their commander specific cards. If the sets are then increasingly tested to how the cards perform in Commander, the players will then find that game better tuned and migrate to playing this.
As you say, Commander is technically a less good game so though profitable, it could appear myopic in hindsight when it was all unintended. E.g. MTG could be supplanted by a purer 4-player TCG that has worked out the flaws.
Time to binge watch all of this
Regarding Magic specifically, I don't think data will destroy the game by any means, but it's certainly possible that it will destroy a version of the game (and in fact, I think it probably will). The reality is that WoTC almost certainly has data pretty clearly showing that the things they are doing are bringing in more and more people. It's hard to argue against raw numbers showing that an approach is successfully expanding the community (without even getting into the obvious profit increase that represents), in favor of subjective things like the feel of the ludonarrative, or maintaining distinct identity of the base game as its own setting vs fully integrating Universes Beyond into it, or that designing things for Commander (at least outside of commander-specific products) is in tension with the premise of the format.
15:47 the issues go away. And so do the players who raised those issues
Funny enough I watched this video because it wasn't about Magic.
The sad thing is wotc/hasbro has the financial resources to put off profit now for great long term benefits later, but the smaller teams with more creative freedom likely need the cash now
For me what gets me so annoyed about this stuff, is like bro commander is a direct response to a overly competitively designed game.
Magic is great, I love magic. But every single card is designed to be that card. Regardless of what it is.
Like look at shit like death's shadow, its a super funny card that can do a really powerful thing but is super easy to understand and doesnt necessarily fit in a deck. Now it did find a home, but it took sooo many years until it became a proper deck that wasnt just a somewhat sus oneshot strat with doublestrike.
Then look at fountainport bell or Heirloom epic or even Head of the Homestead. All of these are super decent cards, that are obviously good. If I was playing a casual deck with these in them id be mroe than happy to draw them. But they are unplayable. Games too fast, even something like fountainport bell is such a potential weakness.
Like standard, modern and pioneer all feel like turn4 formats right now. Modern ofc on the more consistent and faster end of that, but still.
It sometimes just gets me like why am I playing standard, if I am playing around the same turns in pioneer just with slightly better cards. My idea of standard is a turn 5 format or something. And sure standard is for sure a slow-er format. But it aint slow, look at shit like old jund or something. Shits fucking slow as a snail compared to these decks.
This leaves no home for a more slowerpaced enjoyable game, that you can be ofc hoping to win and play competitively without a deck hyper optomized.
I mean hell look at shit like Fecund Greenshell.
This card is so exciting at first, but then you just get super bored of it by the end of reading it.
Like a card that says "Draw 1" and a card that says "Draw 1, then gain 1 life if you control an artifact" I think both cards are good, but id likely just rather play the draw 1 unless im playing an explicit artifact deck. Its completely wrong to do so, i might have artifacts or whatever, but simple cards to let you do complicated things is dope.
I love dragonspeaker shaman, I never play it but it and OG scute are just so fuckin simple and so exciting. These cards make me happy to play. I would never build a deck around fecund. I have built decks around og scute and waiting in the woods. Thats how dope those cards are, you just do something and get a super simple fun deck out of it.
Blossoming tortoise, is pretty dope but it feels like it should be a boss monster. And to some extent it is, but like its just an engine since its so crept. And thats kinda sad.
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I like 8 turn games, and the only way I get to do it is by being the blue/x player so that is what I must do. But I wish other colors had options to do so. Even white removal and black exile leaves you so vulnerable to big boss monsters just rando 1shotting u (like a shivan devestator).
Modern being the most popular outside of the commander is surprising to be honest. Perhaps its mostly due to an older playerbase.
It’s easier to teach someone magic one on one with a deck of cards that only includes a single copy of each card. Early games were combat matches, so no combo, just straightforward play land, cast creature, go to combat. That is a very predictable outcome.
There's a trend of moving away from 1v1 games?...
That's honestly shocking to me, given the TCG resurgence in recent years and my personal disdain for playing games that are not 1v1...
I think a perfect strategy for Wizards would be to officially separate commander from the rest of Magic and start producing separate product lines for Commander Magic and regular Magic. This way the designers would have the freedom to explore designs specifically catering to commander without them stepping on regular Magic's toes and vice versa.
Yes, the player base would be divided but it's divided now so it wouldn't be that different. However this would solve the problem of commander specific cards taking up slots in regular set releases and would hopefully prevent Wizards from pumping out fucking commander precons for every single set (they can still release waves of precons corresponding to current sets but that would not interfere with the actual sets.
It's just a simple branding trick but would be sooooo beneficial to the game overall and everyone will receive exactly what they want.
You pretty much explained why the results of most statistics are subjective.
Monster Hunter is one of my favorite series, and there's so many min-maxers and cheaters that ruin the game. Normally I don't care if people cheat offline solo, but that's never the case in Monster Hunter because once you cheat at any point, playing online ruins other player's experiences.
-Too many skill slots without penalties or bad skills just lets min-maxes build around a really boring meta.
-Some weapons are just way overtuned for requiring less skill to use compared to others.
-Too many people cheating in a PvE game, usually to min-max.
I'm over here dying to hear you guys talk about anything besides MTG! Specifically Sorcery TCG, please and thank you. (Honestly it has enough MTG synergy that it shouldn't disrupt your algo too much.)
Also Netrunner. Still Richard Garfield!
Holy crap this is so weird… I was just talking about this last night! My main problem has been the raising of the floor and destruction of creativity.
I've had this same complaint for some time. I think I noticed it around maybe 2016 or so when it, to me at least, it started feeling like all commander decks were so similar, excluding basic lands commander decks are anywhere from 10-20 percent predetermined by the fact that there are just some auto include cards independent of the deck. Coming from many years of "kitchen table multiplayer" commander took over our group pretty quickly maybe a year or two before it was made official. I feel like the deckbuilding space is limited compared to how it used to be. One thing that has made it better for me is to take a several year break. Stop following what's put out and just come to peace with the FOMO. Then coming back it doesn't feel as bad.
@@mcdevstation8666 But what is the value in playing different cards that are just worse than the auto include cards? I agree with you that some deck building space has just been taken up with powerful ubiquitous cards, but for every card they replace there is a tangible decrease in how often the deck will be competitive in a game. Are we just asking players to lose more often to satisfy a desire for novelty? Why would they do that, and how would you get your average commander player to do so?
@@ContainsMultitudesare you asking what's the value of originality and diversity? ? Just don't print so many staples.
10:23 this statment is ironic, and that makes me frustrated. (Make product and measure succes by earning capital. Turned into forget product just make capital. Neo-Liberalism vs. Liberalism economic theory split)
This is what has happened to 40k. The game feels designed for only tournament players. Too much focus on adjusting the meta based off tournament results.
Would it be a good idea to just explicitly design cards that are only legal in commander? I remember the discussion that rush doesn't work in commander... What if there were commander rush cards (that would be totally busted in standard).
This would be a good solution. The issue is splitting products across player bases. Each product would sell half (or less) as well.
@@distractionmakers stupid fiscal reality getting in the way of game design!
Dungeonborne devs nerfing a class cause people played it too mucj during an event that revolves around that class... also making it shittier cause people werent dying enough cause they avoid fights where they were totally rolled over...
Why not Hearthstone format for mtg? Main deck and 10 card mana deck you draw from both each turn.
Because that would be absolutely busted? People have tried this before, more than once, and it has never worked so far.
Ah, the everything is edh goal
This is what 17lands did to limited too.
Turns out if your incentive is to get clicks you end up talking about Commander magic!
Haha funny enough…
Eating up games like Locusts.
Whose on the thumbnail? He looks epic.
Rules Lawyer by Dmitry Burmak. I try to put the artist credit in the description.
There's to much player data on the best builds in games and the best decks, cards, draft picks and it make balance paramount and lowers diversity
Commander has some built in resilience by increasing deck building diversity but it is overly burdened by unbalanced Legendary's and consistency like Tutor/ramp/universal answers.
If you dont have fun making the game, you aint making a fun game
A hammer can stop a lot of cobra-related deaths.
game= the best, hasbro/wotc= awful.
Multiplayer magic is like a political food fight. Real magic is like a chess match but better. I don’t hate that people have fun with commander but I am a bit sad that it’s the premier format.
Reminds me of the Diablo3 RMAH where for a long time due to the RMAH the best way to get items was to be a wizard stacked to the gills with gold % generation item and just run through dungeons and AOE pots for gold. As getting gold was better than farming bosses for getting optimal loot
100
This discussion reminds me why I stopped playing some games or changed the way I play games. I decided that games are meant to be a fun use of my free time/money, if I can't see the fun in it I stop playing. The only metric I care about for a game is "did I have fun playing?"
If I'm playing a casual board game with friends/family I do sub optimal stupid stuff just so it's not a stomp or extend the game.
Min maxxers can go jump off a cliff, unless they are the professional minority that make the game their job and can earn a living playing a game.
MTG I can only play on Arena right now. I play a few games when a set drops look at the shiny new stuff and move along.
League of Legends and Starcraft 2 you have to play "the meta" or the latest busted thing even in low tiers or the community says "you suck" so stopped playing LoL and stick to beating up AI in Starcraft 2.
Played some chess online and started actively ignoring my ELO number, still kick myself over blunders though.
Started playing more single player games where a large part of the game is just exploring the game world and "winning" isn't necessarily the core focus.
Stopped playing retail WoW, went back for Wrath of the Lich King and realized I don't care if I'm doing the "optimal" thing as long as I'm having fun and not harming another player's fun.
You seem to think your way of playing is the correct way to enjoy a game. Other people have other ways of enjoying games, and they aren't wrong for that.
@@heyimbilliejean where did I say other people were wrong? I pointed out my way of enjoying games and my opinion on min maxxing.
If you wanna "optimise" and have fun with that go ahead, just don't be toxic toward others who may not be doing the optimal thing.
@@NicholasBalanta "Min maxxers can go jump off a cliff,.." That statement is about the people and the way they play, not on how you engage with that mode of play. And with a fair bit of vitriol, I'll add.
Corporate world says hi. Apparently everyone here interpreted it as "it's a law so we must follow it or something, right? Let's fill our walls with lines about our user numbers. That's what the law says. _Right?_ "
Is it a law, a theory, or a razor?
Hmm probably a principle 🤔
Hypothesis
Adage
More of a heuristic
You guys are a magic channel?
Eww
I listen to you because I design Escape Rooms 😜
A law is usually a theory, at least outside of mathematics. You're welcome.
Why do you guys have a Commander video? You seem to dislike Commander and it sounds like you don't have legit competitive decks.
Magic is a collectible product with a game attached.
This is something Richard Garfield worried about the most.
Ignore what the other people are saying, I'm here for Magic and want to hear about Magic, not games in general.
Relevant XKCD: 2899
How is there always a relevant XKCD?