Why White? Design Choices
Commander (EDH) forum
Posted on March 9, 2020, 9:38 p.m. by Jester_Gren
Hello fellow kids. There seems to be an idea floating out there that white is a bad EDH color. Here's a video from the Command Zone that mentions some of these ideas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttGjuNXWxpY
I'm sure this idea has been stated multiple times all over the interwebs. MaRo and others have commented on Wizards' designers intentionally trying to give white more access to card advantage tools, and it seems to be largely graveyard based, with cards like Teshar, Elspeth and Sevinne's Reclamation being printed recently. There are also cards like Happily Ever After, which mostly seem to fall flat.
Apparently, white statistically loses more in EDH. The most common reason cited is that it has narrow conditions for card advantage and ramp (both also cited as absolutely necessary parts of deck building in EDH).
I would like to add, it does not help that white is not subtle about its game plan. It is very easy to tell when white is ahead with go-wide strategies. The alternative, white's control style (equality, hug, and tax) gets ganged up on, and rightly so. Taxes are annoying. they stop others from doing what they want. White control is also very hard to fight one-on-one when that person is ahead, so the correct plan is often to eliminate them.
Although potential solutions, Rhystic spells are no longer printed and everyone hates land destruction. These factors combined seem to point toward the idea that white is just not good or fun to play against.
I'm wondering how common this thought is and if anyone has ideas for what could be fixed (or even if you think anything needs to be fixed).
There have been many posts about "fixing white in commander" over the years on T/O. And I'll say what I've said many times before - the biggest problem with white is not the cards, it's the players.
The attitude that white should get focused for playing stax "and rightly so" is the problem. Stax is a viable form of play and people need to normalise themselves against versing it. Yes, you have to deal with stax to get your strategy through, but just ganging up on a player because they don't play the way you like is a dick move. It's the same as maliciously hating out combo players becuase you don't like combos.
And again, the fix here is not to give whie a bunch of extra ramp/card draw. If anything, white needs better, more scalable to multiplayer removal. But looking in white's arsenal, it already has the best equipment tutoring in the game, it has a lot of land fixing (so while not ramp, you can hit land drops, though it still does have some ramp) and the card advantage is ok when supplimented by artifacts.
March 9, 2020 11:04 p.m. Edited.
for reference, I created a thread about this a few months back which covers a bunch of key points:
White doesn't need ramp or card draw
I would recommend having a look through that.
March 9, 2020 11:15 p.m.
MagicalHacker says... #5
In response to TCC's recent video, I tweeted this:
"It's okay, I think, if there's something that white doesn't do well... but give it something else that it does well." - @TolarianCollege
In my opinion, there are two nuances to this issue that I think give one exception to this otherwise great rule:
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Card draw is the most important thing for commander decks (It doesn't apply to cEDH though). Any deck running less than 6 card draw effects can usually be immediately improved by putting card draw in the deck. It lets you draw more of what you want, so it's absolutely vital.
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In fact, it's so vital that every other color already has a version of card draw that fits well. Since it's impossible to unprint those cards, the only way that white can be involved in the first and most important effect in commander is if it too gets its own version of draw.
So the question is this, is there a way to give white card draw? 100% yes. Here's an example:
"Courthouse of Kenrith (1)(W)(W)
Enchantment
At the beginning of your upkeep, if an opponent has more cards in hand than you, draw a card."
It has great flavor and solves THE problem
March 10, 2020 1:05 a.m. Edited.
MagicalHacker: There's a problem with your statement though. Your argument says that card advantage in a deck is super important (which I agree with) however then follow up with the statement that white needs more card draw.
But the issue here is that you can't say that because a deck hasn't got much card draw, white needs more options available. I have seen pletenty of decks (outside of white) who omit card advantage to try and fill their lists with more big, stompy creatures, despite the clear availability of draw card.
Same thing goes here - just because people don't run the card draw available to them doesn't mean that the card draw doesn't exist. White has both strong equipment and enchantment tutoring and has sufficient cantrip style effects avaiable. In addition to this, there are plenty of artifacts available to help suppliment white in card draw (just like how one would suppliment Blacks's enchantment removal).
In addition to this, if there is such a problem, adding a single spell to White's arsenal shouldn't be able to fix the problem (as to be a problem there would be such a divide that you would need multiple cards to solve it).
March 10, 2020 1:42 a.m.
Honestly, I’ve said a bit about this in the past in similar threads and while enpc uses completely different reasoning we arrive at the same conclusion: the problem with white doesn’t come down to what it lacks compared to other colors. The problem with white in multiplayer is that what it does do isn’t viable in multiplayer competitive settings. Stax effects are largely indefensible against the resources of 3 opponents, go wide strategies are largely indefensible against the resources of 3 opponents, controlling the state of the board is largely irrelevant against the resources of 3 opponents that all can all potentially win from an empty board state via combo. Focusing too much on giving only white access to the same tools the more effective multiplayer colors have actually damages the format by simply trading the current most powerful color(s) for white to become the new most powerful color that would have access to both all it’s old tools as well as the dominant tools of the other colors.
The real solution is to do one of two things. A, do nothing. Or B, completely overhaul the color pie and give all colors access to all tools and merely make certain colors utilize certain tools more efficiently to keep them distinctively unique in terms of flavor and style.
March 10, 2020 8:09 a.m. Edited.
Giving white some form of card advantage that fits it's color identity won't break the color pie or unbalance White. Look at Red for example, it has just in the last 4ish years started to get card advantage and it has helped Red a lot and non of it has felt outside Red's color identity.
The question is how to give White card advantage and not break the color pie or over due it.
To not over due it that is easy, you start slow and add a card here and there (one per set/every other set) and make them not make them strong effects that risk breaking. I think as of now WOTC has been doing this with cards like Dawn of Hope in the last few years. They have also missed with Happily Ever After.
Now how to make the card advantage feel White? Well look at what White does already and lean into it more. Taxes are unpopular but cards like Smothering Tithe is a tax card that doesn't get hated on so this I think is one way to lean into it and give card advantage via taxes. You could like stated above even make it reward the rest of the table as White also plays on the fair play angle.
I do feel that Green gets way too much love for creatures; what I mean is Green gets cards like Beast Whisperer that rewards you for all your creature draw. I think this should have been a Green/White card and divide this ability into two separate abilities for Green and White where Green gets big creatures (Power/Toughness/CMC 4+) and White gets small creatures (Power/Toughness/CMC 2-) and both get limited at 3. This I do think still fits White as we have seen before with Mentor of the Meek and Bygone Bishop and doesn't make Green just better at creature draw. And yes make the player pay to get the card draw in White at least early on in design to make sure it's not just broken.
March 10, 2020 10:39 a.m.
Jester_Gren says... #9
Thanks for all the comments! I will try to address some of them with some additional questions.
Gleeock, yes I think that is a good point. One of the problems white runs into is that they are designing for a standard environment. White typically does fine there, so they don't always press for more interesting effects in white. I think generally the response to your question is that white does have the advantage, in being able to exile things and remove artifacts and enchantments. I think the main problem with this argument is anything white wants to do in EDH, green does better. Are there any other cards you think could have been printed in white that would be fine in eternal formats?
enpc, there is a lot to unpack here. I think the attitude you have about game design is lacking some information. "[T]he biggest problem with white is not the cards, it's the players." Not going to lie, this statement set me off on the wrong foot reading the rest of your comments. I think you have a lot of valuable insight to provide about this topic, but you are discounting reasons why people play the game. (I would recommend reading this article from MaRo, it's a good read! https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/other-peoples-shoes-2019-02-18 )
I think people generally expect all colors to be balanced in every format that they play magic. EDH was not conceived by Wizards, but they have acknowledged it, and are now actively trying to support it. In the video I referenced above, the Command Zone goes on to mention that just having white in a deck reduces your likelihood to win by about 5%. I think you acknowledge this in one of your comments on the link you provided: "In no way am I claiming that mono white is viable at the competitive level, because as you stated, it lacks consistency. However my argument is that this is done by design, as giving mono white that consistency would make it too strong." Card design is largely based on principle. This is a slippery slope, and if they start designing some white cards that offer consistency, they will start printing more, and this could cause balancing issues with white in all sorts of formats. I'll come back to this later, because this seems to be the real problem with providing white additional tools.
To clarify, I think I disagree with this statement: "Yes, you have to deal with stax to get your strategy through, but just ganging up on a player because they don't play the way you like is a dick move. It's the same as maliciously hating out combo players because you don't like combos." The ethereal 'social contract' is a very important part of EDH. We... live.. in... a society... :P. If someone comes to my game and is a dick, there is no reason I shouldn't be a dick back. Not saying that there is anything inherently dickish about playing combos and stax (anyone want to watch me play my land destruction deck?), but it is fairly widely known that these are not supported/acceptable in a lot of playgroups. If a majority of players do not find this fun or find it worth hating out, then who are we making white cards for? Also, just because someone in my playgroup says they like playing combos, does that mean I will ban them from playing? No, but if I let them go off, I lose. It is "right" to target the player in this sense. Stax and tax effects function similarly, where if that player gets ahead, their game plan is to lock others out. It is fine in cEDH, but a lot of players want to enjoy playing their decks they have made. Ironically, cEDH is the only place where white can hardly even function.
One of the design challenges of white is that its only way to get card advantage has been to search libraries. This is another thing Wizards is moving away from because it is not necessary and slows down game play (again, it's not as fun). As other colors get more and more tools, white HAS to make some sort of pivot, the way I see it. I don't see any reason why we can't allow players to have tools to make "fun" white decks in commander if they are not scaled down to be too weak to consider outside the color.
I think your have established that white can do things that are outdated or reactive, but it just doesn't have the richness of other colors. Being able to answer things is certainly a form of card leverage, but when white has to be played in a purely reactive way, it loses its flavor as one of the five colors of Magic.
Do you have an example of "more scalable to multiplayer removal" that isn't Staxy?
March 10, 2020 6:29 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #10
MagicalHacker, I appreciate the comment. I am leaning more towards your understanding of the color here. Card draw is certainly a major component, as draw and ramp are what lead to high land counts, and, as addressed in the Command Zone Episode, the player with the most lands at the end of the game is about twice as likely as any other player to win.
I wouldn't go so far to say that the card you designed "solves" the problem, but it certainly addresses it. I will say that I have thought of a similar card, but it reminds me too much of Rhystic Study, which I think shows poor play patterns. Honestly, in white it would probably be fine, but in blue it just feels like a lazy way of blue getting even more card draw because its color identity is counter, draw.
Since every color has some sort of card advantage, Wizards seems to be pushing for white to get gy recursion. I honestly don't see why drawing cards is unfathomable to the "Jack of All Trades" color though. Why not attach card draw to a convoke spell and call it white? Why not give some sort of proactive tool to white?
March 10, 2020 6:41 p.m.
RNR_Gaming says... #11
White has great support cards but makes for an awful main color. Its inconsistency is enough to drive anyone piloting it nuts. It offers very little in the way of manipulating rng and most of the "fun/stax" cards are unacceptable to most "casual" groups. No one likes MLD or a grindy stax game except the player who can break symmetry. Mulliganing to the correct stax for the table is skill intensive and a gamble. Relaying on a good top deck sucks; I personally like bring proactive and tactile in my play but only a few commanders in white offer me that option and they're not very appealing to build around due to their narrow scope.
March 10, 2020 6:42 p.m.
@ Jester_Gren In regards to:
"I don't see any reason why we can't allow players to have tools to make "fun" white decks in commander if they are not scaled down to be too weak to consider outside the color."
I actually agree with this completely. I think this is actually already happening. Perhaps the single best example I can think of is Smothering Tithe. This card provides white with some pretty solid ramp, stays on theme with the current alignment of the color pie, and is a card that has a solid power level that is highly competitive in functionality without going overboard. There's no reason more cards like this can't exist and no reason to think more cards like this aren't already in the works. This type of card does all the things you and many people want for white when it comes to providing a ramp tool. The key to seeing more of these types of things is going to be patience. Introducing too many of these tools all at once would be disruptive to too many formats and taking it slow introducing one or two every couple of sets gives time for WotC R&D to learn how their introduction affects things to improve potential future releases before they come out. I stated earlier that there were really two options, do nothing, or spread the tools of every color around to all the colors and have certain colors utilize certain tools more efficiently. The second option is clearly the option WotC has chosen and I think it's the right choice, but change can't happen all at once, it has to happen incrementally.
March 10, 2020 6:43 p.m.
In my experience, is a Force Multiplier. It makes other colours better, but by itself it has serious gaps that can be exploited by the opponents easily. So in multi-colored decks, it provides much needed utility and redundancy, but those same factors aren't present when there is no other colour to bounce off of.
This, of course, said by the guy currently tweaking a Eight-and-a-Half-Tails deck.
March 10, 2020 6:57 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #14
jaymc1130, thank you for the comment. I think you provide a very concise and strong statement of white's problem in EDH: "The problem with white in multiplayer is that what it does do isn’t viable in multiplayer competitive settings..."
I am not sure I agree with your assessment of how balancing works though. "Focusing too much (emphasis mine) on giving only white access to the same tools the more effective multiplayer colors have actually damages the format by simply trading the current most powerful color(s) for white...". Sure, doing it too much will do that, but what about doing it just enough?
I think your all-or-nothing approach to solving the problem is based on lack of expectations. You stated that the only real solution is to "completely overhaul the color pie and give all colors access to all tools and merely make certain colors utilize certain tools more efficiently to keep them distinctively unique in terms of flavor and style", however, Wizards is coming out with new cards every day. Even if they stick with an overarching design philosophy, that does not mean each new card needs to be based on a specific existing card. Red's recent coming-into impulse draw is great evidence of that. There does not seem to be a reason why white could not have some other sort of similar mechanic.
The question I pose to you is this: Do color identities primarily differentiate themselves in using different core deck building principles, or by using the same principles differently?
March 10, 2020 7:01 p.m.
I think the color identities used to differentiate themselves by wanting to build decks in totally different directions. This was WAY more true 25 years ago than it is today. Wizards kind of held onto that philosophy when it came to design for a long time but the past decade has been seeing that philosophy shift to what I personally feel is the more balance healthy state of simply giving every color access to all the same tools and instead encouraging different colors to use those same principles and tools in different ways to remain unique and distinctive.
Back to Smothering Tithe; giving white access to ramp (which it didn't do much of at all for 15-20 years) in the form of producing artifacts that generate mana (white has thematically always liked artifacts) from an enchantment (white loves it's enchantments) while allowing counterplay to opponents in the form of a tax they can choose to pay or not (white should remain the best taxer) while having the treasure tokens produce any color mana (to help white play nice with other colors and give it a strength as a mana fixer, some nice additional power) is just absolutely perfect. It does ramp in a distinctly "white" way that's different from red and black's rituals or greens extra lands but a bit like blue with tax and "artifacts matter". It's exactly the type of card needed to create a more universally enjoyable experience in my opinion and WotC seems to be doing this for all the colors the last couple of years. I fully expect more of it in the future and I think it's the right solution to a difficult problem.
March 10, 2020 7:15 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #16
Peravita Thank you for the comment. I have a hard time disagreeing with most of your points.
I think the main problem I see is that getting taxed feels bad to a lot of players too. This type of effect can be seen as not having your own game-plan, but trying to punish others for playing the game at the expected speed. In a competitive meta I find this effect very compelling. I love D&T, but would not play a D&T commander deck, even if it was viable.
I am mostly interested in cards that would see play in non-cEDH decks, although I expect some would sneak their way up the line. Your example of Beast Whisperer and Mentor of the Meek is spot on, and I think this confirms one of my suspicions from an earlier response.
Do you think that white faces these problems because it is largely designed for standard, and the color's big-game potential has been passively ignored for a long while?
March 10, 2020 7:19 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #17
RNR_Gaming Thank you for the comment. According to your first comment: "White has great support cards but makes for an awful main color."
I will not argue, certain cards like Swords to Plowshares and Enlightened Tutor are pretty dang good.
If you have seen the video above, one of the statistics I reference is that having white in your deck at all leads to a lower win ratio, not having white be the main color. Even in 3-color decks this seems to be the case. They even surmise that the reason why 3-color decks do worse than average could be because more of them are playing white and cant lean heavily enough on other colors!
Please watch the video if you have not already and let me know your thoughts. Do you agree with their interpretation, or do you think there is some other reason, like white getting hated out by other players before the game's end?
March 10, 2020 7:50 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #18
jaymc1130, after reading your other comments, your view makes more sense to me. I still think that the way you are talking about color identity tools vs fundamental card game resources is where I would push the boundary.
I absolutely agree about patience though. Looking at what Eldraine did to green (Oko, OUaT, Veil) it is pretty clear that making too many strides at once will probably cause things to trip over themselves.
Since you really enjoy Smothering Tithe, can I ask your opinion on a white-colorshifted Rhystic Study? If white can tax for mana, it might be slightly less on flavor, but why not tax for card draw as well?
March 10, 2020 8:01 p.m.
Not only do I think a color shifted Rhystic Study type card should happen, I think it's extremely likely to happen in the relatively near future.
March 10, 2020 8:08 p.m.
As I said, at the very least a Rhystic Study/Commrade kitty hybrid. Green does this with Heartwood Storyteller - (without a tax) & it always chaffed me that that card is not white. I just think more creativity in MULTIPLAYER game design is called for. Conditional draw with a condition that is not too difficult to meet. I mean white loves weenies right? Make a global "whenever creature power >2 ETB that player pays or owner draws". Or not even draw, but lets acknowledge that multiplayer has a whole ton of Parity-based design space that white can play on.
March 10, 2020 8:27 p.m.
So you give an optional tax to players playing non-weenie decks...& again this isn't stopping anyone from playing. Although, some white players would argue that the color is too locked into the weenie archetype or equipment subtype...Which I agree with, but just an example of the creativity available to a multiplayer/scaling setting.
March 10, 2020 8:29 p.m.
I'm not a big fan of locking white into the GY for advantage either. Seems like something black is superior at & also has a plethora of death-trigger advantage effects to boot.
March 10, 2020 8:39 p.m.
Jester_Gren: I get that my tone off the bat was fairly aggressive. Though the main reason for this is that I have seen the same arguement made which is easily enough debunked but argued so vehemently. And becasue I have also been accused of "being a cEDH player so basically I wouldn't understand casual" (I'm paraphrasing there).
I had a skim through the MaRo article you linked (which ties back to a lot of the "soft skills" articles I've read in the past) and I think what he is saying is very good. But generally my arguement (though being presented as a bit coarse) is that the issue actually lies with a lot of the lower end casual players. Let me elaborate.
There is a strong attitude that I have seen coming from a lot of people who are quite strongly rooted in their particular casual setting playgroup (and no, this isn't a casual vs competitive thing). Said playgroup has house rules of "no infinite combos" and most of the decks look kind of samey. We have all heard of or seen first hand playgroups like this. The issue I have with them is that they are very comfortable.
Carl has his big stompy green deck and steve has his naya dinosaurs deck. Rob's Kruphix deck runs more counterspells than the rest of the group would like (though there's really only 5 of them) and Charles is building some new Janky deck every week.
Everybody knows what everybody else is running, knows how the decks play and all love building up big board states before slamming creatures into creatures (though poeple complain when Rob resolves his Ulamog - that's no fun to be on the receiving end of).
As I said, comfortable. Comfortable and stale (even with Charles' new decks). And because of this, people get into the mindset that this is how fun magic should be played, because after all, they're having fun.
But here, nobody is challenging each other. If a new person turned up with a faster deck, everybody would start complaining. If all of a sudden they were dealing with board wipes that wrecked their big, slow decks (which only worked becasue everybody else was playing big, slow decks), they would be put out. But instead of being challenged and going back to make their decks better (whcih would mean taking some of the big, dumb creatures out for more ramp), we see more haouse rules being imposed.
Now that's fine for that playgroup. but it means that you have a very insular set of players who instead of playing the game in a broader sense, just decide that they are either going to toxicly hate out something new that challenges them.
So, where am I going with all of this? Well, that's why I made my original statement - the issue with white is not the colour, it's the players. And it goes way past hating on the stax effects that are shutting you down. It goes into being snarky to the player, gunning for them from the second turn one comes around (despite some of the stax effects actually being beneficial to you), rather that looking at your deck and making it better.
I'm not sayign that having somebody blow up all your lands is a boatload of fun. But what I'm saying is that people need to A) get comfortable with the idea that there are decks that want to do this and B) learn to build around it more rather than immediately lashing out at the stax player. And yes, I am aware that this might mean packing more removal to deal with the stax threats. But again, this is still different than just outright gunning for the player.
I have played in a bunch of playgroups over the years, and I have to say that my current one (where one of the guys in it loves to play stax) has actually pushed me in my deckbuilding and game playing the most. And here is the clincher - that person enjoys playing stax. The arguement that stax isn't fun is a bad one, becuase it goes back to the example I had before - fun in entirely relative. So while some people don't like to play agianst stax, it's just as much of a dick move to house rule out an entire archetype becuase somebody doesn't liek playing against it.
So then, white has stax. We can't ignore this, and we shouldn't house rule against it. But then what does this mean for the colour. Well, white having stax AND card draw and ramp makes it incredibly powerful. Giving stax consistency and speed is terrifying. That's why the faster stax decks generally flex more than one colour.
But what if I don't want to play stax but still want to play mono white? There are still options available. White has some decent ramp even outside Smothering Tithe (have a look at the white ramp available, you might be surprised).
And in addition to this, white can easily suppliment itself with artifacts. When I bring up artifacts, I have heard people kick up all kinds of stink about this; "artifacts don't count - every colour has access to them!" Yet this complaint doesn't come up when building any other mono coloured deck, or even quite a few dual coloured decks. It seems like some casual players have an aversion to running artifacts in mono white decks and only mono white decks.
On the topic of card draw - I would also make the arguement that white has a decent enough draw package (even discounting artifacts). the issue with white's card draw/tutoring is that it's not the same as say blue or black's draw which has to jump through a lot less hoops. White forces you to play small creatures, or gain life, or some other effect. But that's ok - white shouldn't be known for its draw power. But the point of the arguement is that it still exists.
"Ok, but I don't want to play within those bounds" you might say. Well at some point the game has to have limitations. You can't just do anything in any colour, that defeats the purpose fo the colour pie. And again, I see this arguement come up a lot. People wanting to play mono white decks with little to no interatction (what white is really good at) and wanting lots of non-artifact ramp and draw. Yet I don't hear poeple complaing about being unable to build their mono-red control deck with lots of counterspells. Sure, red has a bunch of counterspells (and copy spell effects) but trying to build a control deck around it is silly - that's not what the point of those cards is. But it's the same logic I see applied to mono-white time and time again.
So that's it in a nutshell. I am hppy to discuss further, but that's the crux of the arguement. And I haven't touched on other formats and the interation there - again, happy to elabroate this further if required.
March 10, 2020 8:46 p.m.
White feels to me as the color that has explored the least creative design space over the years, particularly in the multiplayer environment. I would actually argue that ALL colors benefit from cards that scale well to multiplayer & this also helps further blur the lines between "competitive" & "casual" which I view as a good thing. White has plenty of global effects with the caveat of being parallel, which I think is something that can be explored further, whether this is draw options, or something as-of-yet unseen. Why argue in absolutes from a concrete perspective? The game benefits from incremental creative changes white probably most of all. I don't really TRULY care what white does, because I am Rakdos or Jund at heart, my one mono white deck being Sram, Senior Edificer - which is not exactly breaking new ground in . I can tell you any one of my favorite colors opens up a plethora of UNIQUE building options compared to the pithy selection available to white. I don't hear complaints about the kickass new directions mono has gone.
March 10, 2020 9:40 p.m.
But red's design brief hasn't actually changed all that much. WotC have explored new mechanics to enable red in this endeavour, however red still does what red always did.
I don't fundamentally have an issue with WotC giving white new mechanics as more sets come out. And as I've said in previous posts (and threads), giving white cards that scale better to a multiplayer setting is not a bad hting.
But I do have an issue with people blatantly disregarding what white does and instead try and play it like green. And the comlpaining when it's not as good as green.
March 10, 2020 10:01 p.m.
Worthwhile to also mention that it can be frustrating to see people demanding immediate and drastic changes for a certain color. That always ends with stuff like what happened with Eldraine, blue gets access to some graveyard recursion for artifacts in Emry or flexible removal and life gain in Oko and both cards turn out to be so ridiculously powerful that the power creep undermines the intent to give access to all tools to all colors as a means of bringing balance for all colors closer to parity. Now non blue colors will need even more powerful new cards to catch up to the power creep. It’s like taking a step forward and then taking two steps back. While I believe overhauling the color pie is the right direction to move in, doing it in a fashion like that is counter productive.
March 10, 2020 10:18 p.m.
Oh sure, (ragging on a micro-example here) but something like Heartwood Storyteller being a unique effect feels like was reaching into territory that would be best reserved for something that should be more common (or explored) in - to tax noncreatures by gifting for the color of altruism. I mean a color doesn't truly expand until the boundaries are expanded. Also, white is often meant to be played via parallel effects, just that most people use this in a staxy & subtractive way. But additive parallel effects could certainly use more love in . I mean I've made Earnest Fellowship, Crescendo of War, & Absolute Grace do some serious work in a very white way. I just say they should keep the parallel additive effects coming, just maybe include card advantage or something else that scales well to multiplayer.
I would say has broken new ground, exile & play until next turn, Furious Rise, play from opponent's library. These were things that were very narrowly limited to maybe corner case cards & now extremely expanded Etali, Primal Storm,Stolen Strategy are expansions to something like Grenzo, Havoc Raiser -- where any other similar effects were previously temporary at best, play from opponent's library became a subtype of advantage for red now, done in a new way that isn't gamebreaking & is considered "red" now but would not have been strictly defined as "red" a few years ago - it would have been more "Grenzo" or "sounds like red could explore that"
March 10, 2020 11:40 p.m.
I know that Heartwood Storyteller has kind of become the poster child for some of the discussions here, but I have to say that the card definitely feels green, not white. Like I get the whole "white is about equality" but the modus operandi is more along the lines of: "hey, you've got stuff, I don't. That's not going to fly there, buddy!" (basically just stax).
Storyteller defineitely has that classic green "hey, that guy's playing non-creature spells, we should all jack him up good!" feel (which is exactly why it's green :P). Same kind of thing as Dosan the Falling Leaf with that whole "Now now now, you had your turn to stomp with your creatures, now it's my turn. Fair is fair, pal."
March 10, 2020 11:52 p.m.
MagicalHacker says... #29
enpc There's definitely a lot of nuance when it comes to this discussion, and for me, I think strategy-independent sources of card draw are what white is lacking, as it definitely has plenty of strategy-specific card draw, even ones that are actually really good! But yeah, anyways, it needs cards that are just in general good for drawing cards with the color identity of mono-white (because people forget colorless counts lol).
March 11, 2020 12:32 a.m.
enpc I would say is a color for jacking up noncreature play as well. Particularly with the Thalias & whatnot, but usually Green MO is more destruction-based for noncreature play & white is permanent-incremental stuff. Heartwood Storyteller is functionally unique but it feels like an incremental "tax" of-sorts by rewarding which seems like it should be more , its a design space that could be explored more but should be done in . I already gave examples of using parallel additive effects, not just stax, & there are much more than that. I know the game has been leaning to more creative gifting strategies now, has been creature gifting along with . Then or have been tutor or freeplay gifting Scheming Symmetry. It feels like could have the equalizing draw MO
March 11, 2020 7:58 a.m.
I guess to summarize: for all its well known staxy Stony Silence elements to try to hold back the top-dog at the table also has its' lesser-known Oath of Lieges abilities to bring more desperate players to parity in a global way & allow for more competition with whatever table archenemy is ahead of the game. It feels like if could use some more advantage or just plain creativity this would be a valid avenue (in a way to do so).
March 11, 2020 8:23 a.m.
Colonel_Kink says... #32
The answer is, why "not" white? and the answers become obvious.
green does everything the other colours can do except counterspells
blue does everything and draws cards better with counterspells.
black does everything with limited enchantment and artifact removal, but has tutors.
red can do some busted stuff, but lacks the everything factor. and it has card draw
white... has the best stax, tax and removal. it also has good weenies and lifegain!!!
so you see, white just does less. what it can do it does better then most other colours, but it does so little on its own as a colour, and when you play white, your card draw tends to come at a severe drawback. infact most card draw in white comes from colourless artifacts.
example, when you think card draw in white, the best card draw combos include, scroll rack and land tax. or skull clump and weenies.
those require artifacts. lets just look at some single cards in each colour. blue has... consecrated sphinx, black, griselbrand"in 1V1 edh, use necropotence otherwise" green has... say... beast whisperer for creature go wide decks, rishkars expertise for go tall decks... greater good... fecundity... ok what about red, the worst card draw in years... oh wait, Wheel of fortune.
March 11, 2020 12:50 p.m.
RNR_Gaming says... #33
@gleeok while Stony Silence is a great card its ability isn't exclusive to white; Karn, the Great Creator may cost a bit more but it's the same effect just asymmetrical. Also, group hug cards typically do more damage than good; they expedite the winner by pushing them further head; someone can be behind on mana but still behind on lands giving that player an additional resource is just adding another nail in the coffin.
March 11, 2020 3:58 p.m.
RNR_Gaming says... #34
*ahead on mana and behind on lands; was half asleep when I posted.
March 11, 2020 6:36 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #35
berryjon, I'm also curious what you think of my comment #17
March 11, 2020 7:27 p.m.
But, I am not arguing about harm versus "good", more about valid design spaces for to explore. Also, to evaluate harm versus good you would need more trials & experimentation with an effect that is relatively rare...Stax has been done to death so there is plenty of eval. there. Have you personally played alot of gifting and semi-parallel effects? Particularly what I am talking about is not complete symmetry... It does catch the table up to the head competitor usually but is not really benefitting the head player, when done right they do not "push the leader farther ahead" when you account for deckbuilding as well. Marisi, breaker of coils would be an example that can successfully keep a table interfighting, supply resources to players in the dumps, & I have won several times with this strategy, like anything it takes more options & repetition to make it a valid winning strategy.
March 11, 2020 7:37 p.m.
Colonel_Kink: Except that in your arguement, you've failed to mention that while white deos like to leverage equipment like Skullclamp, white also has THE BEST equipment tutoring in the game. Stoneforge Mystic, Stonehewer Giant, Open the Armory, Steelshaper's Gift, etc.
And on top of that, white has a bunch of solir and repeatable card draw in the form of:
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Alms Collector: not only do you get extra cards but also limit the draw potential of others
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Bygone Bishop: Card advantage you can stockpile for later
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Mentor of the Meek: stupid good card advantage
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Dawn of Hope: both card advantage and a token generation effect
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Kor Spiritdancer: get cards for playing enchantments. Oh yeah, white can tutor enchantments too
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Mesa Enchantress: see above
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Puresteel Paladin: Remember all those equipment, now you draw cards from them too
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Sram, Senior Edificer: See above, but more flexible again
And this doesn't count all of the cantrips white has like To Arms!, Scout's Warning, etc which are all very strong effects in addition to cantripping for a cheap cost.
Yes, I get that a bunch of the forementioned cards are conditional on you playing a particular strategy. But if you're commited to playing mono white, chances are you're playing one of the strategies that white excels at anyway. And if you're determined to not playing one of the strategies that white plays into, then sorry but that's on you.
March 11, 2020 8:05 p.m.
RNR_Gaming says... #38
enpc they're great cards for a narrow archetypes as you've stated. That narrow scope just won't hold its' own in a competitive environment. Great for casual play and derpy voltron/enchantress builds but if we're talking raw power; Brainstorm out performs any cantrip white has access to and Demonic Tutor and Vampiric Tutor out perform any tutor white has access to. Granted, the equipment tutors couple nicely with a few choice equipments but things like Skullclamp provide you 0 advantage if you you're not already ahead or don't have fodder to sac for it; sure, you can build around this type of effect but now you're wasting slots and being inefficient instead of just playing cards that are good on their own. As a side note I'm referring to edh specifically; I'm well aware of how busted Skullclamp was in modern and limited.
March 11, 2020 8:25 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #39
enpc, Thanks! I will not discount your opinions. I believe that everyone has their own experiences with the game and our expectations are shaped around them. I know people don't always want what is best for the game as a whole. Clamor for specific effects and house rules reflect different wants from the norm and are in many ways less scrupulous. It sounds like you've seen a wide range of different groups, whose ideas of fun don't always align with yours.
This is where I linger on what you said:
"_I'm not sayign that having somebody blow up all your lands is a boatload of fun. But what I'm saying is that people need to A) get comfortable with the idea that there are decks that want to do this and B) learn to build around it more rather than immediately lashing out at the stax player. And yes, I am aware that this might mean packing more removal to deal with the stax threats. But again, this is still different than just outright gunning for the player.
I have played in a bunch of playgroups over the years, and I have to say that my current one (where one of the guys in it loves to play stax) has actually pushed me in my deckbuilding and game playing the most. And here is the clincher - that person enjoys playing stax. The arguement that stax isn't fun is a bad one, becuase it goes back to the example I had before - fun in entirely relative. So while some people don't like to play agianst stax, it's just as much of a dick move to house rule out an entire archetype becuase somebody doesn't liek playing against it._"
So, I have multiple thoughts here. However, the one that I think is most important to bring up is that I say "it isn't fun to play against land destruction" I don't mean that no one finds this fun. I am saying that most people don't. Similarly, even if fun is relative, that does not mean that Wizards should just print every single possible combination of effects because "fun is relative" and people will figure out what they like. There is some discretion here, one of the points of this discussion is how to direct that discretion.
In a group where people enjoy playing against stax (or at least tolerate it) there is a lot to be taken from it. It meshes in the overall game-play and you can learn to interact with it. You are pushed to play differently and explore different plans. There is nothing wrong however with a group that does not want to learn to play differently, and enjoys the way they know to play the game.
Similarly, a 4-player game of any type is largely political, and might not have as much to do with balance.
Now, I think there is a very real concern that part of the community is at danger of being marginalized because they enjoy the game for different reasons and will not be able to find others to play with. However, the best way to find new players is usually to appeal to the things that most people find fun. Amid other changes, I think one of the ways Wizards is changing their approach is to look for other ways this unappealing play style can be changed. Do you think this is a fair assessment? Also, what do you think about changes such as moving away from search library effect in all colors? Do you think there is a good way for Wizards to mesh old design with new?
March 11, 2020 8:40 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #40
enpc, Thanks! I will not discount your opinions. I believe that everyone has their own experiences with the game and our expectations are shaped around them. I know people don't always want what is best for the game as a whole. Clamor for specific effects and house rules reflect different wants from the norm and are in many ways less scrupulous. It sounds like you've seen a wide range of different groups, whose ideas of fun don't always align with yours.
This is where I linger on what you said:
"_I'm not sayign that having somebody blow up all your lands is a boatload of fun. But what I'm saying is that people need to A) get comfortable with the idea that there are decks that want to do this and B) learn to build around it more rather than immediately lashing out at the stax player. And yes, I am aware that this might mean packing more removal to deal with the stax threats. But again, this is still different than just outright gunning for the player.
I have played in a bunch of playgroups over the years, and I have to say that my current one (where one of the guys in it loves to play stax) has actually pushed me in my deckbuilding and game playing the most. And here is the clincher - that person enjoys playing stax. The arguement that stax isn't fun is a bad one, becuase it goes back to the example I had before - fun in entirely relative. So while some people don't like to play agianst stax, it's just as much of a dick move to house rule out an entire archetype becuase somebody doesn't liek playing against it._"
So, I have multiple thoughts here. However, the one that I think is most important to bring up is that I say "it isn't fun to play against land destruction" I don't mean that no one finds this fun. I am saying that most people don't. Similarly, even if fun is relative, that does not mean that Wizards should just print every single possible combination of effects because "fun is relative" and people will figure out what they like. There is some discretion here, one of the points of this discussion is how to direct that discretion.
In a group where people enjoy playing against stax (or at least tolerate it) there is a lot to be taken from it. It meshes in the overall game-play and you can learn to interact with it. You are pushed to play differently and explore different plans. There is nothing wrong however with a group that does not want to learn to play differently, and enjoys the way they know to play the game.
Similarly, a 4-player game of any type is largely political, and might not have as much to do with balance.
Now, I think there is a very real concern that part of the community is at danger of being marginalized because they enjoy the game for different reasons and will not be able to find others to play with. However, the best way to find new players is usually to appeal to the things that most people find fun. Amid other changes, I think one of the ways Wizards is changing their approach is to look for other ways this unappealing play style can be changed. Do you think this is a fair assessment? Also, what do you think about changes such as moving away from search library effect in all colors? Do you think there is a good way for Wizards to mesh old design with new?
March 11, 2020 8:43 p.m.
RNR_Gaming says... #41
Jeeze there's so much to read; so there's probably overlap. I think wizards just needs to push more cards like Smothering Tithe and Heliod, Sun-Crowned giving white access to more effects and remaining true to the color pie doesn't mean the design space has to be limited. White isn't always about fair play and balance; I'd like to see more asymmetrical hosers like whenever someone activates an artifact bury it lol
March 11, 2020 9:09 p.m.
I don't think balance is the only central design aspect to but I do think it can be pushed further to not only bring everyone low (then effectively built around to take advantage... stax) but can see more table balance effects that raise everyone else's play to optimal to be on par with whatever player is frequently dominating in some major game aspect. I would like to see it done to card draw-centric decks to take away the advantage by gifting that advantage to others. This could also fork into utilizing those punish for hand size/Sword of War and Peace effects in a new non-combat strategy for the much-malligned which has the same pigeon-holed strategy complaint.
RNR_Gaming so more Aura Shards but a little different for specific strategies for ? I guess I could get on board with that, though that requires more careful balance than focused semi-symmetrical effects.
March 11, 2020 9:37 p.m.
MindAblaze says... #43
I think subtle choices that don’t break the color pie would be the best direction for white and for the game.
Of course we want stuff for EDH, however we need to remember there are more formats impacted by this and if every color does the same things what is the point of the color pie at all? I like some of the examples given so far, like Bygone Bishop and Mentor of the Meek for weenies, Dawn of Hope for life gain, Puresteel, Sram and Spiritdancer for voltron and then Mesa Enchantress et al. (Which is really a GW strategy.)
Having generic good stuff isn’t really something that’s healthy for the game I think. There has got to be something that’s not generic, but still easy enough to use for what white wants to do. Like Feather, the Redeemed for example, or a Heroic or Exalted style trigger. Prowess is in white as well.
March 11, 2020 9:38 p.m.
RNR_Gaming: I wouldn't call them "narrow scope" as the effects align with what white generally wants to do. But yes, they are conditional.
I do also think that it's a bit unfair to compare white's draw power to something like Brainstorm or its tutor power to Demonic Tutor and then claim it's not as good. I get where you're coming from but I kind of hear "well no shit, Sherlock" in the back of my mind :P After all, cards like Brainstorm and Demonic Tutor are THE gold standard when it comes to those effects. In fact, forget gold, they are the diamond standard and are some of the the best effects in the game. The fact that Demonic Tutor is restricted in Vintage (which puts it in the same pool of cards as Black Lotus) should tell you something about its pure power.
And again with Skullclamp - sure it needs sacrifice fodder, but generally you wouldn't be playing the card if you weren't running weenies/tokens to feed to it.
I also think that it's not fair to look at mono-white with the lens of competitive here. Outside of mono-blue (who employs a crapload of artifacts, just like mono-white would), there are only a small selecetion of mono-coloured commanders in each colour who are actually competitively viable. I already admit that mono-white in competitive is going to leave you having a bad time. But that doesn't mean that mono-white in commander isn't viable.
Jester_Gren: I think that due to a combination of colour identity rules and the fact that it's a multiplayer format, I think that commadner players are in a unique position compared to most other formats (barring the commander "spin-offs" - looking at you brawl). Now combine this with that fact that the majority of poeple play commander on the very casual end of the spectrum.
Now in addition to this, commander players have been spoiled in the past with a bunch of "made for commander" big, splashy cards that do a variety of effects we haven't seen before.
Unfortunately however, all this has the effect that the average commander player acts the most entitled of any format. And look, most plaerys have talked about designing their own custom commander at some point or another and most people have at some point thought about trying to make some stupid rube goldberg machine of a deck.
But at the end of the day, we still need to impose some sort of boundary conditions on the game. I have seen people unknowingly break the rules fo the game and when they were corrected on it, the response was to just continue breaking the rules because they preferred to play that way. So then what's the point of having rules?
Same thing goes here too - white is designed to be the opposite of all the other colours in the game. Despite blue having counterspells, white is by far the most oppessive colour. It's just that it's proactive in it, not reactive. But now a bunch of poeple want to change that because they don't want to play white that way?
Without being too reductive, a big chunk of this arguement boils down to players saying "I want to build a mono-white deck with all of the big, fat creatures that mono-white offers. But I want WotC to make my bad deck design viable by printing a bunch of cards to compensate for my deck's huge lacking in multiple areas."
And again, I get that we need to take into account the general happiness of the player base. But pandering to a bunch of players who have no idea about game designs or the potential repercussions of their demands just becuase they're loud is a really short sighted idea. We've all seen what a dickhead the spoiled kid grows up to be.
March 11, 2020 10:08 p.m.
enpc There is a lot to that statement. Some of it I agree on & parts seem a bit reductive. Maybe your gist is that nothing is broken to require fixing? I agree to the extent that I don't feel is broken, but I have some faith that R&D can push the boundaries on a color that seems to be the stalest (they have done a pretty good job at doing so to this point) with a few corner-case bannings. I think a good place to push some of the creative scales-well to multiplayer cards would be this huge upcome EDH product push coming up, would this not be a fair place to push the envelope a little without impacting the other formats quite so much? Also, this avoids those formats feeling like mythic-slot pet-card guinea pigs which is a common complaint.
March 11, 2020 11:18 p.m.
Gleeock: Basically, yeah. Long and short is that I do not believe white is in a spot where it needs a bunch of card draw and ramp. I'm not saying that WotC shouldn't experiment with new mechanics, but basically I'm of the opinion that players should understand what each colour does rather than trying to play white as green 2.0
And at the end of the day, I'm not going to complain if WotC releases some nice new toys for white, however I don't think they will be along the lines of what a few loud (and in my opinion misinformed) EDH players are clamouring for.
March 12, 2020 8:14 p.m.
Jester_Gren says... #47
enpc, you said "commander players have been spoiled in the past with a bunch of "made for commander" big, splashy cards that do a variety of effects we haven't seen before."
Yup, that's also something that is set to increase this year. Wizards is planning to support this format more than ever.
Although I understand your complaint (and I think R&D is cognizant of it), they are ultimately still making cards that people will get excited for. I would be surprised if Wizards doesn't pander to this -increasingly vocal- group in some way this year.
It's really not out of flavor, in my opinion, to design commander set cards that will only see play in commander. If white had real finishers, it would be able to end multiplayer games. If it had some non-artifact reliance on consistency, I think more people would be fine with the way this color identity manifests in commander. They may try to alleviate this by giving white the best colored artifacts, but I don't think that is sufficient for what they will want to do for this format.
March 13, 2020 2:36 a.m.
Jester_Gren Well said. Now as for what they want to do for the format, we are seeing more decently scaling, political cards, parallel tutors, draw & freeplay for opponent, creature gifting. Each color seems to be sub-specializing in some exciting political cards, I think should join the party.
March 13, 2020 8:20 a.m.
mccabej140 says... #49
I'd like to see white adopt a mechanic similar to the +1 of Ugin, the Ineffable. It really captures the spirit of white in a few different ways. First, it has a delayed gratification feel that fits with white thematically. The mechanic also fits white mechanically since this kind of effect meshes with the things white is already known for (board wipes, tokens, small creatures). And lastly, this effect just FEELS white. Just like how the impulse draw developed for red feels very red.
March 19, 2020 1:52 p.m.
I like the ingenuity approach. You are right it does feel white in many ways.
Gleeock says... #2
They already have the: "tax noncreature spells" idea locked. They should get more equality-based taxes with upside. I think more things like: "for each card drawn past the 1st, that player may pay , or all opponents draw a card" would be a fun design space. This does not stop plays but promotes table balance. More things similar to Heartwood Storyteller but in white... Where you are punishing by gifting. That "share with the class" mentality is very white, majorly opposite of (which is a flavor win). I think should explore more advantage for noncreature permanent destruction as well. There is more creativity to be had in game design, just look at Gruuls Klothys, God of Destiny creative, but not game-breaking. has advantage for creature death in spades, I'm not sure why shouldn't gain advantage for some other destruction.
March 9, 2020 10:56 p.m.