People seem to really enjoy this topic, so I thought that there should be a sequel. One person commented that Mark Rosewater (big-shot Wizard guy) wrote a very good article about this subject, When Cards Go Bad. One of his explanations is that "Magic is a game of discovery." Cards that you thought were bad can be very good in the right deck. I think that Forge should have less powerful cards so you can enjoy the really powerful ones. Mark Rosewater says, "Ancestral Recall is only very good unless we print a card that lets you draw 4 cards for U". If you never used less powerful cards, you would have no idea that such-and-such card was really powerful.
I love so called "bad cards" because they provide variety. In quest mode I have enjoyed using a variety of mediocre cards because those were the best cards that you had at the time. In the right deck a "bad card" magically transforms itself into a pretty decent card.
Shimmering Barrier is a good example of a fairly weak card, "1W, 1/3 defender, first strike, and cycling 2". This type of card was very good in my last quest deck because I had some flyers and he helped me jam up the ground attackers. Inner-Chamber Guard seems weak at first glance, "1W, 0/2, bushido 2 (When this blocks or becomes blocked, it gets +2/+2 until end of turn"). I half-heartedly threw this guy into my deck but he is an awesome 2/4 blocker that only costs 2 mana, wow.
Samurai Enforces is a little generic looking, "4WW, 4/4, bushido 2" but he works very good as a finisher. Patrol Signaler is a little 1/1 that has an untap ability, " 1W, Untap: Put a 1/1 white Kithkin Soldier creature token into play". Creating tokens for only 1W is very cheap and when the computer's deck was slow, this little guy dominated the field by generating a ton of chump blockers. Icatian Priest is a 1/1 that costs W and has a nice pump ability, "1WW: Target creature gets +1/+1 until end of turn" which dominates the game in the later turns.
And the list of crappy cards could go on and on. I remember thinking how bad Tarmogoyf was when Future Sight was first printed but he turned on to be a pro-tour winner in the right deck. Forge has Tarmogoyf, so go and have yourself some fun. :+]
what about all the other cards that havent been added, and the new set rise of the eldrazi?
ReplyDeleteSome cards are actually very tricky to add (or nearly impossible).
ReplyDeleteA large amount of cards are possible but they still require a lot work and time, it's not a matter of 'just adding them'.
As for cards in the new set, the next version of Forge will have some of them.
Forge will have some of the cards from Rise of the Eldrazi but nothing too tricky. Forge is limited but it lets you experience a wide variety of cards even though it doesn't have a full card set, like M10.
ReplyDeletejust wondering cause i want to be able to test out my decks and still cant make it exact cause some of the older cards arent in it yet lol
ReplyDeleteForge isn't really good at deck testing, I would suggest Magic Workstation or one of the programs that doesn't enforce the rules.
ReplyDeleteI just used Arctic Nishoba in my quest deck and had a great time with this trampling 6/6 from Coldsnap. Magic has some great cards even if the overall set stinks a little.