Mechanical Color Pie 2021 Changes
General forum
Posted on Oct. 19, 2021, 8:44 p.m. by DemonDragonJ
Here is Mark Rosewater's long-awaited article about changes to the color pie in recent years.
I do not have time to comment about every change, but I must ask: why is WotC no longer printing creatures that can block additional creatures in combat? Is that mechanic too complicated?
I also severely dislike how white is being limited to drawing one card per turn; I understand that white has the least emphasis on card advantage of all the colors, but conditions under which white may draw cards are already so narrow and specific that it does not need to have that drawback.
What does everyone else say about this article? Do you find it to be informative? Do you like the changes that have been made recently?
wallisface says... #3
To your 3 points:
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Creatures that can block additional creatures in combat is probably too narrow an ability to bother with. its uses are fairly narrow, and i'm assuming WotC had play-design-concerns. But in any case, I don't see why most of us would care about this mechanic going, it was never particularly popular anyway
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White is already a massively powerful colour, and I suspect your gripe about it not getting repeating card draw comes from a Commander background. Personally I'm fine with white not getting card-draw at all, because in modern it's already a colour that shows itself to be a powerhouse (and one of the few colours that can compete very well on its own (i.e. without being a 2+ colour deck)). People trying to constantly skew colours towards their own particular format-preferences irks me a bit, so apologies if this rant comes across as dismissive, but I really don't get the constant push by the community to mess with White.
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There is no mention that I could see of "green turning non-artifacts into artifacts". The closest reference I could find in the article is this: "Blue is the color most likely to turn a non-creature artifact into an artifact creature. Green is second most likely to do it." - which is mechanically VERY different, as its making something that was already an artifact, into an artifact-creature, which feels very in-theme of Greens colour-pie to do big-stompy things.
October 19, 2021 11:16 p.m.
wallisface says... #4
Having just read/skimmed through the article myself, my big takeaways are:
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It looks like Black is getting a lot of new opportunities to do things, which is great, as (for me at least) it's been feeling like it's been getting left-behind for a while now. It's also good to see Blue getting removed from being able to do particular interactions, as it gives other colours a chance to shine in those respective areas (anybody playing old eternal formats can see pretty quickly how over-time everything skews-blue).
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I'm also a big fan of the way they're planning to implement the White card draw. From the wording they used in that space, it looks like the card draw should be more impactful for white in multiplayer games (where several turns happen before it comes back to your own turn), while solidly keeping them as the last-place card-drawing colour for the purposes of any competitive 1v1 format.
(edit: I also just noticed that my 3rd bullet point on my last comment was addressed towards TypicalTimmy's comment, and not the OPs. Oops!)
October 19, 2021 11:29 p.m. Edited.
I don't like green interacting with artifacts in a positive way, however, if it's to make it a creature that makes sense to me. Green likes creatures. Hates artifacts. Is lukewarm to artifact creatures.
October 20, 2021 7:24 a.m.
plakjekaas says... #6
Lifecraft Awakening is how green can already do the artifact creature thing, and why it's the most likely secondary color to do so.
October 20, 2021 8:17 a.m.
TypicalTimmy says... #7
Green is supposed to be about the natural order, natural life, evolution, biology, nature, etc. The reason green has the most number of artifact and enchantment removal is because green is supposed to view the constructs of man and fae as abominations to it's own core philosophy.
So giving green the second most likely spot to animate artifacts feels strictly against what it intends to do. I could easily see this given to red, as red is about ambition, fervent exchange of ideas, erratic behavior and discorce. Red has the second most amount of artifact removal, but also has a dense handful of returning artifacts from your graveyard to your hand, as well as caring about artifacts in play.
Red LOVES artifacts, as we see time and time again with Izzet, the pairing, being the predominant artifact-matters pairing in every set.
Second place should have absolutely been red, and never green.
October 20, 2021 2:38 p.m.
wallisface says... #8
TypicalTimmy just to try and narrow down your concerns, what issues do you have with the beforementioned Lifecraft Awakening? To me that reads as a very “green” card, giving life to something and making it a big-swole-creature.
Printing that card in red would feel wrong. Even ignoring the +1 counter stuff, changing something from one form to another is just something red hasn’t really ever done (whereas green has constantly achieved, normally with lands).
October 20, 2021 2:54 p.m.
TypicalTimmy says... #9
wallisface, Lifecraft Awakening is fine for what it does. But an outlier does not define a rule.
I am at work now so I can't do a complete breakdown, but there are 326 cards attributed to red for artifacts. And 124 of them to destroy. Meanwhile, green has 241 with 125 being to destroy.
Red cares about some sort of interaction with artifacts a whopping 35% more than green, while green actually seeks to destroy artifacts with nearly 52% I'd it's cards, whereas red only seeks to destroy them with only 38%.
The fact is, red cares more and green seeks to destroy more.
So green is a terrible choice for this.
October 20, 2021 3:53 p.m.
wallisface says... #11
TypicalTimmy I think you’re getting too hung up on greens destruction aspect. For example, green also destroys enchantments on the regular, but also has a whole swath of green-enchantments. Similarly, white has a whole lot of creature destruction, but also cares a whole lot about actually having creatures.
There’s a big difference between how a colour interacts with an opponents cards, and how it interacts with its own, and to me it seems perfectly reasonable that green would want to make its own artifacts feel “more green” by making them creatures.
Conversely, red does do a lot with its own artifacts, but historically is not a colour to “creaturefy” anything, and generally-speaking is the least-flexible colour as far as giving cards additional abilities/rules-text. Reds big in-theme interactions with artifacts tend to revolve around destroying and artifact to rebuild another from the graveyard. I could very easily see red being able to sac an artifact to create a 3/3 Golem, for example. But i think it feels out-of-colour for red to make a non-creature artifact into a 3/3 creature.
October 20, 2021 4:06 p.m.
Omniscience_is_life says... #12
Green also has Titania's Song, as well as a some Metalcraft, artifact token creation, and other interesting artifact love.
But the main thing to remember here is precedent doesn't trump all; if an effect feels green (such as a gentle druid preferring to naturalize an artifact rather than destroy it), then there's no practical reason to veto it.
I personally don't care much about this area being broadened, since I doubt it'll have much practical application as destruction is almost always better than Frogifying--but I also don't see much argument against it.
October 20, 2021 4:33 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #13
I also was very pleased to see that WotC has decided that blue should not be able to destroy or exile creatures, making cards such as Pongify, Rapid Hybridization, and Ravenform color pie breaks, since destroying any type of permanent is against blue's philosophy.
October 20, 2021 6:48 p.m.
plakjekaas says... #14
The philosophy of blue cards like Pongify and Ravenform is that they do not destroy, they merely transform permanently, and destroying and replacing with a token is the mechanically best suited way to do so. Like Turn to Frog, but permanently. They've found flavorfully better ways to do it by auras like Ichthyomorphosis, enchanting the target to change its shape, but that enchantment can be broken, the transformation isn't permanent. When you lay down a Curse of the Swine, you lose the soldiers and gain the pigs, there's no way to get the soldiers back from the pigs. Ever since Polymorph this has been a blue effect, and only recently it is moving into red, with Transmogrify and Lukka, Coppercoat Outcast.
October 21, 2021 6:04 a.m.
FormOverFunction says... #15
Green also used to have (though I guess it still exists) Living Artifact which is an enchantment AND not anti-Artifact, but I totally get (and agree with) the notion. I just wish they would give us another poltergeist like Xenic Poltergeist. That was a MUCH more enjoyable animate-Artifact effect. Now that I think about it... I guess I’d like more Xenic things in general.
October 21, 2021 6:37 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #16
Why is it that mass damage prevention is green, when white makes more sense?
plakjekaas, I actually dislike Transmogrify, as well, because red is supposed to deal with creature by dealing damage to them, not exiling them; if that card shuffled the creature into its owner's library, I would have no problem with it.
October 21, 2021 8:30 p.m.
Fogs were tried out in white for a bit but WOTC realized White didn't really need it so they left in mono green.
October 23, 2021 10:35 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #18
JimHarber, why does white not need "fog" effects (i.e., mass damage prevention)? Does it already have sufficient amounts of single-target damage prevention?
October 24, 2021 8:42 a.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #19
I just noticed that green's card drawing is now related only to creatures, not to lands, which I think is unfortunate, since green is the color that cares most about lands, so it would make sense for green's card drawing to care about lands as well as creatures.
October 31, 2021 9:20 a.m.
DemonDragonJ Yeah between the life gain, wrath's, protection and other damage prevention dogs just came off as redundant in white.
October 31, 2021 1:57 p.m.
DemonDragonJ says... #21
JimHarber, did you mean to say "fogs" instead of "dogs?"
And how does damage prevention make sense in green, the color of ferocity and might? Is it due to the fact that green is also the color of tranquility and the peaceful aspects of nature?
TypicalTimmy says... #2
I completely disagree with green turning non-artifacts into artifacts. Green is strictly against enchantments and artifacts and boasts the most number of cards toward enchantment and artifact removal. To now actively care about turning permanents into artifacts is wholly wrong.
October 19, 2021 9:08 p.m.