Published November 19th, 2019
Ding dong, the witch is dead! If you play Magic, then you know why November 18th was a memorable day. Wizards banned what turned into the runaway card from their latest set, Oko, Thief of Crowns. It was a welcome change to the game, and I’m excited to see how the Standard meta-game shakes out (I’m expecting to see more cats).
But this isn’t about Oko. Many, much smarter Magic players are discussing those ramifications. Instead, I want to discuss an article that was published by Bryan Hawley (the head of the Magic Play Design team) alongside the ban announcement. If you haven’t read it, I encourage you to do that now.
Seriously, its right here. I’ll wait…
You’re back? Great. Here is what I find interesting; with the exception of Oko, Eldraine as a set is working as intended. Wizards is intentionally ramping up the power level of their standard sets. Even more surprising to me as a lapsed, recently returned player, is that Wizards was ramping down the power level before this.
I missed alot of standard seasons, so I can’t speak to the power level of sets for the past 8ish years. However, according to this article, I came back at the perfect time. I remember standards that were slow and uninteresting because the card pool just wasn’t very good. A handful of good synergies or combos ran away with the meta, and the Johnny’s of the world struggled to innovate. With Wizards turning up the dial though, we can expect the game to be both more interesting, and more erratic. I love both of those things…
There is one thing that was pointed out by the guys over at MTG Goldfish that I find bears repeating. If the intention of the design team is to keep the power level at a 5 or 6, then if you miss the mark, you end up with a good card. If the intention is to keep the power level at a 9 and you miss the mark, you end up with a completely overpowered card. So this starts the debate that I’m interested in; is this a healthy mindset for Wizards to adopt? Is more power better for Magic? What are the long-term ramifications of cranking up the power level and keeping it there? Is there more or less design space at the top of the power curve?
I don’t know the answers to these questions, but I’m damn curious to find out! What are your thoughts?