Pattern Recognition #276 - Eternal Issues

Features Opinion Pattern Recognition

berryjon

30 March 2023

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Good day everyone! My name is berryjon, and I welcome you all to Pattern Recognition, TappedOut's longest running article series. I am something of an Old Fogey and a definite Smart Ass, and I have been around the block quite a few times. My experience is quite broad and deep, and so I use this series to try and bring some of that to you. Be it deck design, card construction, mechanics or in-universe characters and the history of the game. Or whatever happens to catch my attention each week. Which happens far more often than I care to admit. Please, feel free to talk about my subject matter in the comments at the bottom of the page, add suggestions or just plain correct me.

And welcome back everyone! I hope you're enjoying the day, because I know I am! Well, actually, I'm going to be at work when this goes live, but you can't win them all, can you?

Also, fair warning. I've got a soap box, and I'm going to use it. This post is very much definitely leaning on the Opinion tag.

Anyways, today's article comes to us, not from the weather, but rather because I'm going to be approaching a subject that I've touched upon before, but this time from a.... Well, it's a less pleasant perspective. You see, I've argued in the past in favor of the Extended and Brawl Formats, and why they should be supported. Yes, Extended. Those of you who played that, raise your hand?

crickets chirping

Thought so.

But today is not about positive thoughts! Today is not about the good things that happen to us and our game! Today? Oh... today, you're not going to like me one bit. Today, you see, I'm going to turn my attention to you, you players of Magic (and myself to some small degree. Backdraft is a thing (wtf?!?!), and your Feedback is just as vital to me.

Today, I'm going to talk about Modern, Commander, and the sheer arrogance that we, the player base have in order to cause these formats to happen, and the damage they have caused to the game. Yes, Commander is a Problem. With capital letters. And I would add a (TM) or (C) if I could get away with it just to emphasize this.

You see, Modern and Commander share a similar aspect to them, one that is commonly lauded as an advantage to these formats, something to help players in them and to maintain their integrity. What this is, is that they are Eternal Formats. Which is to say, these are formats that have a set start date for cards to come into the format, and those cards never expire. A card that is Modern Legal will still be Modern Legal 15 years later (unless Banned). Same with Commander. And yes, Vintage and Legacy, but for some reason, those two don't earn my ire as much as more recent ones (relatively speaking) do.

Actually, step back. Eternal is a very specific format type that only describes Commander, Vintage, Legacy and Pauper. Not Modern. Or Pioneer/Frontier. Eternal starts at the beginning of the game, and goes until the end of the game. What I meant to say, and this is still accurate to the theme, is that the formats I am laying my Baleful Stare on, they are Non-Rotating. And this is a problem when combined with their insidious popularity.

So, what is it about this type of Format that annoys me? Well it's simple. It's the advantage that people used to get them - especially Modern - into existence first, and that advantage which has killed off attempts to spin off variants. Because they don't Rotate, the deck you built years ago is still perfectly legal. It might need some tune ups, but the same deck still works perfectly.

Some of you may not realize where I'm going with this, and truth be told, I know where I want to go, it's how to get there in an appropriate manner that is annoying me. So let me start with Modern, and a repeat of some of the history I talked about in the aforementioned case for Extended. It was created and supported by the player base, and formally recognized by Wizards - as a format that took Extended and said "Fixed start date of 8th Edition, no more rotating, so 7 years of cards please." And given that Wizards had been screwing around with Extended for some time leading up to that point, this switch to Modern was a self-justified decision of "Hey, look, Extended isn't working, so we're going to go with Modern instead! And all will be happy."

Let me start with one aside here as to why I accuse Modern of being sourced in the arrogance and greed of we, the Magic Players. Did you know what block was about to be rotated out of Extended-7 years, and was the real driver of the format for so many years? A Block that people wanted to play just that badly?

Don't let the excuse of "the Modern Card Frame" fool you. They, and I am proud to say I wasn't one of them, wanted Mirrodin.

One of the most busted blocks in Magic's History, and Modern used it as an anchor point to its existence. Because "serious players" and I use that quote with all the scorn I can muster, just couldn't live without their Affinity and worse. An archetype, I must remind you, is still considered viable in Modern, though with different key pieces as the Lands are banned.

So here's the first problem. Players refused to let go. The 'Advantage' of Modern, and later Commander as popular formats, is that you don't have to spend money, and what money you do spent is an iterative improvement on your already existing cards. Find a card that's just an edge-slice better? In it goes! It's just 4 copies of one card, and nothing compared to the 8 sets that came out since the last time you changed the deck list. You, the player, have saved money!

Commander is in much the same boat, though I single it out because it is far more popular overall that Legacy or Vintage. It has a start position, and it has no end to it either. But there are two different factors in play here, and Commander is actually pretty much innocent here, because it treats deck construction differently.

To whit, Commander has Commander. That single Legendary Creature (and a handful of Planeswalkers) that anchors your deck acts as a way to help differentiate decks of similar design, or unify decks of disparate design.

At this point, I would like to say that the proliferation of Legendary Creatures is a completely different subject matter, and is at best, tangential to what is at hand. It's there, but we don't have to talk about it. It's an effect, rather than a cause.

But the second factor is that both of these formats have, by their very nature, actively stifle attempts to not only replace them, but to support them through more entry-level formats that would allow and act as gateways to Modern and Commander.

I've talked a bit how Brawl does this for Commander, and make one of my annual Standard Rotation Time articles about my new Arena Brawl deck and how to turn that into a full Commander deck as not only an example, but a desperate plea to Wizards to actually support their damned format!

But because Brawl didn't instantly replace Commander, it was dropped like a hot hand grenade. And one of the reasons why the players refused to buy into it was because it Rotated. Brawl wasn't Commander, and the players of Commander didn't like the idea that they would have to buy new cards every year to play their singleton format.

I wish I was joking.

Now, you may be thinking that this is a reasonable thing. Money can be tight, and a player might not be able to afford buying a new deck, or iterate on an existing one every year. Hell, I've spent years not playing the game or buying cards because I was unemployed, so I can't complain about that at all.

But this logic applies to people who can't, for whatever reason, spend money on Magic. And to those people, I say this. Don't buy Magic Cards. It's just a game, people. You do what is best for you, and if that means not buying cardboard crack, then don't buy it. Buy groceries and pay your rent instead.

Yet, these weren't the people making this sort of commentary. The people who were most vocal about rejecting the idea of buying new cards annually were the ones that, in the words of Wizards, are the enfranchised players. The ones who are committed to the game as a lifestyle choice, and not as a hobby or casual interest. The people who were most complaining where the people who could most afford to not complain.

Human nature, folks.

"We don't want to buy new cards!" says the players who spent ridiculous amounts of money on a certain deck, and refused to accept that it would depreciate in value over time, and, hey, maybe you should move on? Yes? No?

But you know what? I could live with this. I have learned to live with this, even as the years have gone by and I try to keep myself at arms distance from these things. Except for two things. One historical, the other... more recent. And I'll cover the recent first.

Horizons. Legends. Two suffixes applied to sets that printed cards directly into their relevant formats while skipping Standard. And we're getting another one this summer! Look, I can understand a set that bolster format specific mechanics, like Eminence - on the short list, I assure you - because they can't fit into any other set or format, but at the same time, bypassing regular sets, and ignoring Standard? Oh, that's bad.

One of the hidden safety catches of the game has always been Standard. It's a filter to limit cards from being too disruptive in a larger format - or so it is hoped - and as a way to help review and get feedback about cards and archetypes, allowing Wizards to plan their responses into Future Future Standard (no, that's not an accident) to account for how these cards affect larger formats.

But cards that are designed strictly for these larger, non-rotating formats? They skip that safety check entirely. Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis and Urza, Lord High Artificer, both from that set, both 'designed for Modern'. One got banned. The other is practically top tier, if I cared. Arcane Signet - couldn't be printed into a Standard set, and well.... look at that card for an example of Printed into ~~Brawl~~ Commander for how well it went over.

Standard helps keep cards from getting out of hand. Perfectly? Hell no. But it's a feature, not a problem to the format.

As a side note, Wizards, and the fandom, have attempted to create replacement formats that have the same fundamental philosophy as Modern (and Commander), only to be met with a failure of the player-base to really adapt to them. Frontier and Pioneer are formats designed to replicate the non-rotating nature of Modern, but starting with a more recent and limited card pool. You know, rotating the format after so many years, cutting out the old stuff to make way for the new stuff.

The Players don't want to buy new cards. They liked the fact that they still had Fetches and other older cards they could just keep playing with. Same problem, different coat of paint.

But the other problem. Oh, hell, the other problem.

Games that don't have a system for rotation for their core formats die. End of story. Magic can pin its survival on the existence of Standard, and not the money drivers of Commander and whatever else they're trying this week. A card game that doesn't rotate or allow old sets to fall out of focus runs into several problems, all interlinked to each other.

The first, and perhaps most fatal, is Power Creep. A subject I touched upon earlier this year. When old cards don't leave the game, or migrate to other, larger formats, players stop buying cards. They get what they want, and they sit on them (familiar?), and rarely get new stuff. But, the game's publisher and maker are in the business of making money, so they want to sell cards, sell packs, and sell product in general. So the easiest, fastest, and without fail, the stupidest method for doing this is to print better cards. Point out that, hey, this is the new hotness, and look how it's better than this card from two years ago. Buy, buy buy!

And do it again. To the same cards that you just printed to be better than the old stuff because people have stopped buying again. And then do it again, and again and again. You Power Creep your way out of the game because people no longer care about that cards that are being printed now when it'll be useless in a year. The lack of future proofing kills the game. And you know what helps avoid this in Magic? Standard.

Second is the issue of Reprints. My favorite game that I love to admit was horrible designed, that being the Star Trek: CCG made by Decipher Inc. This was a game that was utterly allergic to the notion of a reprint. If a card was printed in a set, that was it. No reprints, no functional reprints. You want a copy of Res-Q? Well, you better find packs of Premiere to buy and hope, or trade with someone who had one. The only time, in that game, when a card got reprinted, was either if the entire set got a reprint, or the card was reprinted into a preconstructed deck.

Imagine, if you will, that there was no reprint of a Shock Land. That the only way to get a copy of Hallowed Fountain was to get it out of a Ravnica pack. Not Return to Ravnica or Ravnica Allegiance. Only in that set.

Oh, and it was still considered a format staple. Good luck! No reprints, no justification for a card to be reprinted because it's still available in the wild. But with rotation, there's a baked-in reason to reprint cards. So they stay in the format even as they're leaving.

Which leads into the last, and least problem. Gatekeeping. Don't have the old cards? Sucks to be you. Why bother? Play something else. A non-rotating format encourages static deck design and entrenching yourself into your comfort zone. A rotating format is always moving, always mixing things up, and allowing newer players to enter into the game at a good starting point, with cards that everyone has access to, and lower expectations for what is or is not.

Modern and Commander... they embrace these problems as strengths. A rotating format is more than that. It is a constant challenge, and not an excuse to calcify. Rotation breeds challenges to the deck builders, it allows for experimentation and testing and fixes. You know, things that are conductive to the long-term health of the game?

And as long as Modern and Commander are driving the game, these problems will only grow.

And if you object? Do you think I'm wrong? Good. There's space below in the comments for you to make your case. I've made mine.

Join me next time when I talk about something more positive. What? I'm not sure yet.

Until then please consider donating to my Pattern Recognition Patreon. Yeah, I have a job, but more income is always better. I still have plans to do a audio Pattern Recognition at some point, or perhaps a Twitch stream. And you can bribe your way to the front of the line to have your questions, comments and observations answered!