Influence of Magic the Gathering on POE design

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CharanJaydemyr wrote:

Pay to play carries with it a basic assumption of a set price, be it a one off price or a subscription.

And yes, I know people who have eventually broken even or turned a profit with MtG.

But not many.

Same with any form of gambling, really. Those who immerse themselves in the game will claim there is skill, but to most it's just a money sink. It is as the latter that MtG makes the majority of its profits.

Be careful not to wax apologistic here.

Ohh, I absolutely agree that Magic is a huge money sink for a lot of players and that the game has been developed over the years into a product that intentionally hides how expensive it is and emphasizes styles of gameplay that have a high cost of entry. I'm not defending those practices but merely arguing that categorizing them as "pay to win" isn't the right frame, I think.

If you look back at the way that Magic was initially designed, Richard Garfield envisioned a game in which players might buy a few packs and play with the cards they had, trading with friends and what not. You could easily still play Magic this way if you wanted, but relatively few players do because the designers have taken the game in a radically different direction.

Your example of gambling, I would argue, supports my point. Most casino games are pay to play, and not all even have a set price. Many games (especially table games) give the player a degree of control over how much they bet. And yet the amount of money often has no influence on your likelihood to win. Casinos are the textbook example of games that are the most unethical brand of "pay to play". I find it despicable, but it's not pay to win.

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CharanJaydemyr wrote:

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swarmofseals wrote:

Really interesting stuff! I didn't realize the connections to Weissman and Garfield. The skill tree/color system makes sense.

I do disagree a bit regarding Magic epitomizing pay to win. To me, the archetypal pay to win game is a game wherein financial resources are essentially fungible with player skill. Essentially, a person with enough money can just spend and make up for almost any skill deficit. In Magic, having access to a broader collection definitely confers advantages but it doesn't really make up for being skillful at all. You can hand a bad player a ridiculously expensive deck and they'll still lose all the time. This dynamic is especially true at the most competitive levels.

Path of Exile, on the other hand, is actually more pay to win from a certain perspective -- it's just that you are paying in game rather than IRL (assuming you are following the rules). Having access to more in game resources gives you a tremendous advantage over less rich players to an extent which likely eclipses player skill to a greater degree than is true in Magic. There is certainly an element of player skill in PoE (especially in races), but the skill aspect is dwarfed by the skill aspect of a game like Magic.

I think the real extreme examples would be something like a simplistic MMO where you can buy gear directly from the cash shop and gear is basically the only factor that determines outcomes. That would be the most extreme example of pay to win. The opposite end of the spectrum involves games like Chess or Starcraft which are mostly skill and basically ensure that both players have equal access to resources within the game itself. Of course even then you can pay to take lessons and such, which muddies the waters a bit.

I can tell you're not stupid but the amount of money I and many other MtG junkies, both past and present, have spent just to remain competitive, just to keep up with the metagame, refuses your rationalization.

No, you cannot pay your way to victory with MtG. But good luck staying in the game without buying boosters in relative bulk and then trading for/buying singles to fine-tune your deck.

Compared to PoE, which provides essentially free and unlimited booster packs, MtG is absolutely pay to win.

I can agree somewhat to your logic when it's casual MTG like "Friday Night Magic".

But when playing on the Pro Tour (or even PTQ), Grand Prix or Worlds, it's a whole different ballgame and not even close to being p2w.

Yeah, this side discussion is definition off track.

Back to the original question -- I wonder what other Magic concepts POE might borrow from in the future?

Magic has had a lot of success with their semi-regular "You Make The Card" feature, in which user generated card designs are proposed and voted on by the community, ultimately resulting in an actual card that sees print. POE could easily mimic this feature with an occasional community designed unique. This would of course be different from the uniques that are designed by supporters in which one person provides the design. In this case, the devs would hold votes to pick the basic properties of the item (item type, item base) and then either provide or solicit basic conceptual designs which would then be voted on. Each further stage of the voting might nail down a specific property of the item. I bet the community would go nuts for that.

When I heard Chris say "joy of loot finding is at wondering its value to other people" I thought "in arpg? such a weird idea..".

But now it all makes sense. In MtG if you want to make a specific deck you cant get these cards by opening boosters or even boxes of them. You got to sell/buy/trade. I guess that's also where his ideas about avoiding an established trade system in an economy based game comes.

Though I completely dislike the system, at least now I understand root of his point of view.

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swarmofseals wrote:

Yeah, this side discussion is definition off track.

Back to the original question -- I wonder what other Magic concepts POE might borrow from in the future?

http://wiki.mtgsalvation.com/article/The_Deck

Expect to see an ARPG interpretation of that ^_^

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CharanJaydemyr wrote:

the amount of money I and many other MtG junkies, both past and present, have spent just to remain competitive, just to keep up with the metagame, refuses your rationalization.

That's why my trick was always to find someone with an excessively large collection, befriend them, and borrow cards from them prior to Constructed tournaments (in exchange for a portion of prize if I was successful). After devising this strategy, I eliminated my cardboard cost for participation completely, with the exception of Limited events, where at least I could resell the singles later.

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symban wrote:

When I heard Chris say "joy of loot finding is at wondering its value to other people" I thought "in arpg? such a weird idea..".

But now it all makes sense. In MtG if you want to make a specific deck you cant get these cards by opening boosters or even boxes of them. You got to sell/buy/trade. I guess that's also where his ideas about avoiding an established trade system in an economy based game comes.

Though I completely dislike the system, at least now I understand root of his point of view.

I, on the other hand, agree with it. I've actually been trying to come up with a more concise way to express my opinion, and I find that quote to be utterly beautiful. Any chance you could link the precise source?

This is a large part of the reason why I've been against searchable buyouts (such as those found at poe.xys.is, although I'm not against searchable affixes). Knowing the price of an item utterly destroys the mystique of wondering what other players value items at.

However, I'm starting to wonder about my position, especially in light of this recent analogy. The value of Magic cards is by now a very static quantity; you can look up the values in all sorts of search engines if you don't know it. Even in the early days of Magic before the internet made everything searchable, you had price guides such as InQuest (in the US, anyway).

So if I was in the card shop at some PTQ and ran into a raving zealot who decried that price guides were antithetical to the mystique of wondering how much something was worth, would I agree with him? Probably not.

But the reason I would disagree with him is because I knew that popular opinion regarding card valuation was, in general, wrong. Sure, you could know what the price guide said... but you couldn't trust it. I admit that modern Magic card pricing is far more accurate, due in part to extensive online tournament coverage, but I feel this effect is even further magnified with Path of Exile. I feel it's too easy to just eyeball a rare and determine its worth. As such, the difficulty in valuation is too low, and it's far too easy for the frothing masses to come in perfect agreement with a seasoned deck build designer. Thus, you can trust the price guide... which is an undesirable state of affairs.

But if that's the case, aren't I blaming poe.xyz.is for something which isn't its fault? Isn't the core problem, in fact, the affix system, which allows rares to be evaluated too easily? And then I suddenly realize: I've been scapegoating poe.xyz.is, not for a fault of its own, but for simply calling attention to a glaring flaw already existing in the game. What I really should be focusing on is the affix system, and how rares are too easily evaluated.

So, although symban probably couldn't have imagined it, as a result of his post specifically, I've completely reversed my position on whether poe.xyz.is is a good thing or not.

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Isn't the core problem, in fact, the affix system, which allows rares to be evaluated too easily? And then I suddenly realize: I've been scapegoating poe.xyz.is, not for a fault of its own, but for simply calling attention to a glaring flaw already existing in the game. What I really should be focusing on is the affix system, and how rares are too easily evaluated.

It's good to hear that from you -- because most rares in this game (not rings and amulets) are universal and boring, which valuation reflects -- but I'm surprised at your experiencing an epiphany in the first place. I was inclined to think that, having written a fairly good post on these forums about how Diablo 2 positively distorts the sense of reward by having diverse itemization, you had already arrived at this conclusion.

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ephetat wrote:

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ScrotieMcB wrote:

Isn't the core problem, in fact, the affix system, which allows rares to be evaluated too easily? And then I suddenly realize: I've been scapegoating poe.xyz.is, not for a fault of its own, but for simply calling attention to a glaring flaw already existing in the game. What I really should be focusing on is the affix system, and how rares are too easily evaluated.

It's good to hear that from you -- because most rares in this game (not rings and amulets) are universal and boring, which valuation reflects -- but I'm surprised at your experiencing an epiphany in the first place. I was inclined to think that, having written a fairly good post on these forums about how Diablo 2 positively distorts the sense of reward by having diverse itemization, you had already arrived at this conclusion.

I still content that poe.xyz.is' existence does amplify issues related to affix balance, which eventually lead to oversimplified valuation. However, hating on xyz in any way a moot point, because if we chop him down, some other third party will rise up in his place. Thus, this idea of "if only there wasn't a poe.xyz.is!" is foolishness. You can't escape the inevitable by running from it; you must prepare yourself to be able to withstand it. The way of withstanding it is an affix system robust enough to defy not only agreement between two peers, but even a truly community consensus.