Irony of MtG similarity: We fall to the same traps

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=mtgcom/feature/234

What do you think? Do we fall into the same traps as the ones magic the gathering players do?
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I think so. I used to play Magic the Gathering, before playing Guild Wars. The skills system is what brought me here and to this day skills in Guild Wars are what prevent me from ever jumping to another game.
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After reading the article, think: what kinds of skills can be used differently than how everyone else uses them?

EVERY time a chapter is released with an extra class, another 2 rows and columns is added to the character combinations. It grows by a large amount when 2 classes are added. I encourage you all to reflect on this thought.

I used to play MtG myself for a couple of years but stopped awhile ago. It would be weird if you had a build that put positive skills on enemies, and negative effects on yourself. Can't think of many current situations like that. But thanks for bringing this topic up.

Firestorm or any scattering-aoe as defensive skills; to scatter the mobs away and the more they run, the less they could attack.

Contemplation of Purity on D/Mo; Losing enchantments is a good thing.

Draw Conditions

Infuse Health

Any of the HP-sac necro skills

etc.

the more gw becomes closer alike to MtG the bigger urge i have to quit

Indeed...I played MTG for quite a long time too.

1. Bigger is better;
Me: I like what it said, this is the mental block people in GW is suffering too. Mesmer > Elementist !! hoho!

2. Rare cards are superior.
Me: Same thing happens to GW players. Many people blindly think any build must have an Elite skill in them. The truth is...many good builds doesn't require an Elite skill to be good, example include the core skills for boon prot.

3. One card have one use.
Me: Same thing happens in GW. "Frenzy" is a perfect example. Frenzy have 2 uses: it's increase in attack speed and it's increase in damage taken. The first part is very commonly used, but the second part is also used the build in spirit bond tanking.

4./5. Positive buffs on enemy or negative buffs on ally.
Me: This...is something GW doesn't have. Why can't I cast mind wreck on the tank while I use another shatter hex to do damage? This is one thing that place limit on many builds and is why GW can NEVER be as flexible as CCGs.

6. Don't forget the order.
Me: This doesn't happen that often in GW. Only one build so far that I know need to cast in specific order. The frag mes.

7. I have to (hold on to) or (use asap) my card
Me: Happens to GW newbies a lot (those with less than 3 months of experience). Many skills that they bring with them end up not using it. This is a big waste and have to be avoided.

8. I have to hit my opponent
Me: How often do you see this in AB now? Probably never, but think about what was happening when AB was first introduced to us.

9. I shouldn't sacrifice things
Me: How are you going to play Nec without this? Or how can you play black cards? Necromancer's skills is built on sacrificing, so is black cards in MTG. To win, you need to first hurt yourself, then your enemy.

10. All I need is life.
Me: 55 (or runner, or any other invincible builds) in RA? I'm sure many people have seen this, it just doesn't work...

MtG has a long history and is directly connected to the foundations of GW. If you look at the Dev articles from GW you will notice they make numerous references to MtG.

"It would be similar to building a deck in Magic: The Gathering: The more cards you own, the greater the number of different playing decks you can choose to play. When you buy the chapters of Guild Wars, you will acquire a larger collection of skills and abilities from which to build your skill set, but you will not gain more power."
is one of the quotes I remember often.

Sever-Gash requires an order...as does KD-Crushing or Evis-Rake/Twist.

He's saying he doesn't like M:tG, for whatever reason.

Neat article. Even if you're not a Magic fan, Rosewater's articles are always a great insight.

I wonder why you started playing GW at all, tbh.

it's broader then that. it's Meteor Shower vs Fireball. It's picking that big warrior armor instead of picking energy armor for warrior automaticly.

you do realise that every boon prot uses elite energy management? I can't think of a single top build that runs without elite. There are however debatable issues. For example:
Why pick Poison Arrow if Apply Poison often does the job of spreading conditions just fine?

I prefer the example of water hexes, which can be used aggressively (snare target) or defensively (snare enemy warriors).

It's Just a flesh wound + Plague Touch?
somewhat wacky: Energy Burn + Power Return

and then there are ranger spirits that swing both ways...

there are countless examples of this. RtW + Fav Winds. QZ + EW. Shelter + Union.

from pvp perspective: keeping skills ready for spike / opportune moments.

I guess the word I'm looking for is 'hexing'? To bland remark of Rosewater to go deep in...

it's broader then that. you can take a death in pvp if it gets you some strategic advantage. you can sacrifice your energy with Glyph of Essence, which was used by iQ (or was it recharge sacced with Glyph of Sacrifice?) in the recent GWFC.

nice example. there is no sure way to keep yourself alive. any defensive construct can be taken apart.

I think so. I play both games avidly right now and I can draw some similar traps that players can fall into. I can think of many subtle references and similarities between both games.

ever heard of assassin?

Both are goods games tbh.

They compare pretty well, as well.

Only one thing is missing, you cannot cast negativ spells on friendly targets.

But again, there is no kiting nor positionering in MtG.

You titled this thread: "Irony of MtG similarity: We fall to the same traps." I must point out that that is not Irony. That is coincidence. The difference between Irony and coincidence in any situation is that Irony occurs when something you didn't expect to happen occurs and Coincidence happens when something you did expect occurs. In this case, "We're falling to the Same traps." So that's coincidence.

For there to be Irony in this topic, the "traps" discussed in the article you linked in your post would have to be common, tried and true routes to victory in Guild Wars. That way, we'd be falling for the same "traps" found in M:tg strategy, in Guild Wars, but they'd be giving us wins instead of losses.

Sorry for the lesson, but I see this sort of mistake made all the time and it bugs the hell outta me.

I still play MtG, and have some things from the article to relate to Guild Wars
In Guild Wars, 99% of the skills have one use, because 99% of them are too broken offensively to use for any other purpose. Also, you can't target allies with damage, and can't target opponents with heals (heal area excluded).
How many of you have ever run a pvp build without an elite? I think I've run maybe 2. In 1 year, I've run 2 builds without an elite because elites are apparently much better than normal skills.
I see this in IWAY and Random Arenas most of all. A team will stay at their spawn point forever until the other team engages them. It's Player vs Player, not Player Sits for 5 Minutes and Reads Cosmopolitan. The only build that should not engage an opponent is vim, which will lose anyway.

There are 2 major differences between MtG and GW.
1: In MtG, you start with nothing, and build up your power. In GW, you start will full health and energy, all skills charged, and buld down. So, in GW, there cannot be balance before the timer starts.

2: MtG carefully playtests and balanced their cards. Only very rarely will they ban a card for its power. Guild Wars does NOT playtest its skills, nor do they fix them if they are too powerful or too overused.

MtG is my #1 card game.

1. "Bigger Is Better"
I dunno. A Kodama of The North Tree is pretty superior to Grizzly Bears, though its not as cuddly. *lol* You have balance cost vs. effectiveness. Paying 8 mana to plop down an Akroma, Angel of Wrath is only a worthwhile investment of your opponent doesn't play Wrath of God the next turn.

2. "Rare Cards Are Superior"
In some cases. There are some Elite skills that are complete jank in most situations. But there's always that Johnny, the combo gamer, who'll find some eccentric but devastating use for it.

3. "A Card Has One Use"
Only someone with no imagination would take a skill at face value. I always buy every skill I can, partly for the skill title, because what might seem useless now might be what saves you later on.

4. "I Can't Play Positive Cards On My Opponent"
I've never played any positive stuff on any bad guys. I can with my Mesmer skills but the casting times are abyssmal. I usually heap on Suffering and Shadow of Fear. Maybe Chaos Storm.

5. "I Can't Play Negative Cards On Myself"
I'm a N/Me. Necros have to sac health alot and if you don't like it then maybe being a Necro isn't for you.

6. "Don't Forget The Order"
I've died so many times because of this. I get stuck in the standard order sometimes and end up getting beaten to death by Snow Ettins. *lol*

7A. "I Must Use My Cards As Soon As I Can" or
7B. "I'd Better Hold Onto My Cards As Long As I Can"
Everyone is faced with the choice to act now or later. If you act too soon you won't have enough energy to do anything. If you act too late it won't matter how much energy you have.

8. "I Have To Hit My Opponent"
As a Necro my range of damage is pretty limited. I'm half reliant on negative effects to help finish off bad guys. Doing 11...22 damage per hit to a lvl. 24 monster ain't gonna finish him off.

9. "I Shouldn't Sacrifice Things"
see #5

10. "All I Need Is Life"
Life is one of the more forgotten resources in GW(and MtG). People only pay attention to it when it gets low and thats a mistake. If everyone on your team is dead having a full life bar won't matter.

I absolutely love the article, very nice find OP.

It's funny, but this is exactly what I've been stressing in many different threads - the evolution of the "cookie cutter" build and how people become extremely narrow-minded as to other combinations and possibilities. The reason is that it is simply easier to copy someone else's thoughts and use them as your own, without thought to deviation, even in the slightest.

The problem with this is that innovation tends to trend downwards, other than incorporating new skills from new campaigns. Innovation is even punished in both PvE and PvP, as groups look for those cookie cutter builds to give themselves a sense of security.

"I Can't Play Positive Cards On My Opponent"

I haven't tested this but Reckless Haste is hex and if you cast it to IW mesmer, he actually gets positive effect by increasing his attack speed even further and ignore the miss part because he never hits anyway.

Resilient Weapon becomes useful when small degen hexes or other "weaker than the bonus effect" hexes are used to the wielder. Enemy has to spend some energy to gain this effect but using such hexes will only benefit him.

If enemy attackers are using attack skills which give other effects if the target will block or evade them, using defensive stances or similar enchantments will only benefit attackers even more.

"I Can't Play Negative Cards On Myself"

Some builds like 55 hp rely on low health but if you use skills which increase your maximum health, you are actually using negative skill on yourself.

Nature Spirits would in some cases be more negative to your party than enemy if you use them. Party member(s) can harm the party with these skills.

Using block/evade skills when attackers will gain other effects if you block/evade their attacks will make your life even shorter.

Some hexes will punish you if you use certain or any skill and the enemy will also gain something.

The simularities are very clear. Yet its not much use comparing the games at the moment because there are some very significant differences:
-GW is real time. You need to react very fast.
-Compared to MtG GW has mainly denial decks. Counter spells and disenchantments rule.
-Basically you play 1/8 of a deck and your team mates play the rest.
Together these 3 differences make the usages of GW skills completely different from the usage of MtG spells.

As for simularities: Yes, you may be able to 'build' better skilldecks when you have more chapters. But its only 8 cards, a very small part of the total 'deck'. I wonder if in future old skills wil be banned to make place for new skills (and rules) like it happens in MtG.

Were you around for the Black Summer, when Saga Block ruled? Within a month of release, multiple cards were banned for being "overpowered" - Memory Jar, Yawgmoth's Bargain, Yawgmoth's Will... Ah, those were the good old days of Tempest-Saga Type 2

Anyway, I think the similarity between GW and MtG is limited majorly to the skill selection and build planning, where choosing from hundreds of skills for your 8-slot skill bar is indeed like choosing from thousands of cards for your 60-card deck. But as for the actual gameplay... if you insist on describing GW in MtG terms, your skill bar is your opening hand which is also your deck and it never goes away. That's the major difference - there is no limitation to your actions beyond what you bring with you, and the important MtG tradeoff "use it AND lose it" (meaning you won't have the card any more) does not take place. Even the Dervish forms recharge eventually.

Gameplay similarities only exist because of similar player mentalities. The MtG article may describe some GW player behavior accurately because some MtG players also play GW, and gaming behavior observed in MtG is not exclusive to MtG.

EDIT: Completely off-topic, a friend of mine brought me a button from a convention he went to. It was round, yellow, and said "Any sufficiently advanced card game is indistinguishable from Magic"

ooh, dont forget quivering blade/plague touch
nothing new... remember the good old days of signet of midnight/plague sending?

Well I thought it is ironic that guild wars aspires to provide a slew of varied skill sets, but like in Magic the Gathering, some players fail to see use of skills til they are used in FoTM builds and such.

Basically the irony is no matter how hard they (game skill makers) try people will fall back into comfort zones of FoTM and cookie cutters like in how MtG they have the white weenies, counter decks, direct damage, etc that are cookiecutters.

But that's just my interpretation, so sorry for the not so great use of the word "irony" .

Again, that's not Irony, that's Coincidence. People falling back into the comfort zones provided by cookie cutter builds in both games is an expected similarity. At times, things like this may seem odd, but that doesn't make them ironic.

Irony is actually very rare. But it's ok. I just felt like commenting on the situation because, like I said in my previous post, things like that bug me when I see them.

Well, actually i have to agree that GuildWars Players are getting caught in the exact same traps but they refuse to see it.


1. Bigger is better
This one is a hundred percent true story. It's the reason why people think that Echo Nukers for example are so powerful. They see all those triple digit numbers in the skill and are like "omg wtf, big damage so it has to be good". But in the end, their "big" damage backfires upon them in terms of spellcost, exhaustion and Armor Level of the enemies.


2. Rare cards are superior.
I wouldn't say this is part of the skillsystem in GuildWars as pretty much every Skill is normally easy to get (unless they forgot to include a boss for it *cough* promise to not do it again or i will send an assassin:P). But it is true for rare weapons in the game. Take two identical weapons with the exact same stats. One is a golden crystalline and another one is a collectors weapon.
Players think that the Crystalline is superior to the collectors weapon even though they're identical. So yes, they fall for that one as well.


3. One card have one use.
Don't know about this one.


4./5. Positive buffs on enemy or negative buffs on ally.
This is something you currently can't really do in GuildWars as the game mostly prevents you from hampering with your own team or buffing your enemy. Spirits are an exception here but you still use those to mainly buff your own team.
Would be funny if you could put enchantments on an enemy. Put down Symbiosis, get his hitpoints high, spike him down with grenths and then kill the spirit. No one will do it though as it is too complex to pull off.
Another Spell is Reckless Haste which increases the Attack Speed of the enemy but also causes him to miss more often.


6. Don't forget the order.
Aye. Many many players mix up their skillbar tremendously. They fire their echo after their nuke. They put their enchantments on a partymember instead of them, etc etc etc.


7. I have to (hold on to) or (use asap) my card
Dunno. Something you mostly experience with newbies learning the game. But can be also seen with the celestial skill in the end missions of cantha. Many a two times i've seen people not using their skills "i'm saving them for trouble". Same goes to ressurection signet "i'll save it instead of ressing that monk so we might win that fight..."


8. I have to hit my opponent
A question of direct and indirect damage. Also a question of Elementalists wanted for every party and mesmers kicked from every party. Players just love seeing things hit the enemy. Those tiny purple sparkles the mesmer causes with his powerful spells they don't see. And thus "Mesmers suck omg kick him kick him!!!".
All because the Mesmer Class doesn't hit the enemy directly but with indirect attacks and control of the battlefield.


9. I shouldn't sacrifice things
Most just say "nay" to this one because the Necromancer sacrifices health for some of his spells. But that isn't really a sacrifice it is moreover an increased spellcost. What a sacrifice however for example is: Your party loses the battle, everyone retreats. Now if everyone retreats you can be sure that a lot of people will die during the retreat. But if a single person sacrifices himself by standing still, the enemies will kill him - no doubt but the party can easily get away without further losses.
Sacrificing is about fast decisions. Who do i heal? Will we lose much power if that ritualist channeler dies? Won't we lose more power if the Warrior dies? I could keep healing both but the pressure is too high currently... if i sacrifice one of both i could keep the party up, safe and healed without a problem...
These types of decisions.


10. All I need is life.
Very true for GuildWars. Take the 605 Build for example. It's more effective on lower health levels but most just try the 605 hitpoint variant, going as far as to even name it the 605 Build for some reason. You'll also see this with the warriors and necromancers which will often spam their health or energy before a battle starts.
This is also the reason the +30 hp mods cost about 10x more than the Armormods. And that even though the Armormods are a lot more effective.

Well, I guess they have learnt something during all these years.
When my partner took me to a Magic-evening to teach me the game (in -97), one of the players had brought a printout of rule/card changes - a massive stack of 250 pages! In addition, a long list of banned and restricted cards.

I think GW does a pretty good job in fixing unbalancing PvP skills. If they had tried to also do frequent fixes on PvE skils, the uproar among the farmers would have been deafening.

Regards,
Cloudbunny

It's not that the Crystalline is superior. It's that Crystallines are incredibly rare and one with collector stats is like a unicorn in the middle of a field of four leaf clovers. You can get collector items no matter what. It's not a matter of "superiority", just of sheer rarity.

i play MtG and enjoy the endless possibilities of the decks that can be created. i love looking at the cards and thinking about the different combinations that can be made and finding unique ways of winning the game.

i believe GW does a great job in capturing this concept. over the last few days i have been reviewing over skills that at first seem useless and finding how to work them into a build.

i love collecting too. i collect MtG cards and i like collecting elite skills.

that 205 page rule change is called the Oracle, and it is not a rules change. It contains the full text for all 7000+ cards in magic. Half of those were printed before the current textbox templates were made, and that's why they seem like new rules.

As for the banned cards, in the past 2 years, 7 cards have been banned. Many of the cards in the banned list make you ante, flip them on the table, or do something odd that the rules can't measure. The rest of the banned cards are from the first sets, before WotC knew how powerful the cards are. Unfortunately, you can't recall trading cards like you can change skills in GW.

Heal party used to heal everyone for 184. Imagine if that was still around nowadays.

I will say that Anet does a relatively good job of fixing skill bugs or mistakes in their programming (like the spirit that drained 11 energy whenever someone attacked.) Although they could handle them quickly, one hour of playtesting would have revealed those bugs and fixed those problems before they happened.

2. Rare cards are superior.
People still believe that lower req. weapons do more damage.

Lower req. weapon does do more damage if you think about it more.

If you only have a certain amount of attribute point left and you can only get your mastery level to 7. Which do more damage now? The req 7 or the req 13?

theres much truth in it but the thing with putting positive skills(enchantments )on opponents would be fatal.illusion of weakness-->OOB-->gg
there is good reason why some are hexes and others are enchantments

btw:there are skills that do dmg but remove conditions from enemies so thats nearly the same effect

edit2^^ob first.but the question is:does illusion of weakness trigger when the sacrificing costs would kill you first?dont think so

Well, this was 1997. The paper stack was a printout of a "card errata" text file, so it did not come from the Oracle. At least I'm sure it had some 2-page text blocks to explain changes and rulings of certain cards like "Clone". I'm a bit uncertain if the Oracle actually existed back then. I know I used it a couple of year later, though. I have not played with expansions from the last 5 years. So I know very little about the current state of the game.

Back then, it happened that a few weeks after a major release they had to ban several cards (especially during the Urza serie, I guess that one is legendary). If ANets "nerfs" upsets some people, I guess they would have been enraged to find that just when they got their Magic Uberdeck together (might cost a couple of $100 in some cases), the keycards were banned and the deck was almost worthless.


Regards,
Cloudbunny

Seriously is there any warrior, ranger, sin, etc would run 7 weapon mastery? Not to mention with lower weapon mastery means lower chance of critical hit of that weapon and lower damage attack skills.

I use divine spirit more for it's ability to make deny hexes useful then for the reduced energy it gives.

Seriously, the only character that would ever run only a 7 in the mastery attribute is an IW mesmer using daggers for the double-strike possibility. And in that scenario, weapon req doesn't matter because IW is going to be doing the damage, not the daggers.

I think there are more possibilities than that.
I sometimes run a "combat trapping" Ranger (oath shot-throw dirt-traps) with high WS and expertise, a low req. + energy bow is a very nice addition then.

But I guess that it is still few builds that actually benefit from low req. items.

Regards,
Cloudbunny

You can do some obscure things to use negative effects on allies in Guild Wars. Take a Me/N and do something odd like this for example:

Malign Intervention (on enemy) -> enemy dies for some reason -> neutral bone horror spawns -> hex bone horror with Parasitic Bond -> charm it with Verata's Gaze and send it into enemies -> Shatter Hex your Parasitic Bond -> Boom!

Just an oddball example!

If you're running a trapping build, you'd be better off using a staff or wand + focus, than you would trying to get random shots in with a bow that is wielded by a character with a below average marksmanship attribute. The damage your trapper does should be entirely from the traps...

And in response to Cirian: That seems awfully complex and inefficient.

I know, Shadowstorm, but it is not as fun!
I have never bother about maximum effiency, anyway.

Combat trapping is a very funny build to use.
You put out traps before the battle, using Staff. Then when the battle start, you shift to energy bow and sneak around among the survivers, either go behind them and trap or throw dirt before trapping. Oath shot, rinse and repeat. Occasional distracting shot to interrupt major threats.

Not a focused build, but way funnier to play imho.

regards,
Cloudbunny