I think I disagree with your premise about fun. Winning is almost always going to be more fun than losing, but that doesn't mean losing should make you feel miserable. It's right there in that quite from Aaron Forsythe, actually: "One of the most damning statements that can be made about a game is that it is not fun. [...] Not just 'I lost' unfun, but 'Why did I even come here to play?' unfun." It's basically a question of power level. Against Trinisphere in Vintage, you could effectively lose the game on turn 1 before you'd had a chance to make a single play - that's extremely unfun. Jitte never beat anyone on turn 1, and any reasonably built deck should have some kind of outs against it, so while it might be frustrating, you don't get the "why did I even bother to show up" feeling. You could apply the same reasoning to creatures almost never getting banned while turn 1/2 combos always do.
To be picky, IPA-forward would be an etneral format in the sense that nothing would ever rotate OUT of it. Everything legal in the format remains in it forever, hence, eternal.
However, I get what you mean to say, in that it also doesn't contain all the possible cards/sets like the paper eternal formats do.
Kinda cool seeing a rogue deck make top 8 every now and then. Creativity is a good thing. Just want to clarify though on your statement about izzet guildmage combo. It requires BLUE mana to copy instants, therefore you can only gather mana for as much "BLUE" as you can spend. The combo I think you are referring to is the Lavaspike Spliced with Desperate Ritual combo that deals infinite damage as everytime the lavaspike resolves you get your RRR back to recopy the spell.
All in all, I enjoy reading your extended articles as I myself play in ext tournaments every now and then. I like to see what's been winning and what not. Lately though, been sticking to just the 8 mans though.
I would like to see the list for the U/R/G Rock Variant. Is it any good? I agree with the above comment though, I do miss Karsten, but this takes the place.
"They've never said that there would be an eternal format for IPA forward (the first eternal format on MTGO, Classic, was created just so that pre-IPA cards could be played)."
As a pointed out in one of the threads, IPA forward is not an Eternal format.
Because it reduces the need to buy into Classic sets, almost down to zero for the current sets in Classic, and I think reduced need is more of a problem than increased prices.
Who would choose for example, Mirage Block, for one of their CYOS sets? I can't imagine that many people would. If there was a way that someone could play their current Extended cards while ignoring all the Classic sets, the need to use the Classic format would drop drastically. And right now, it can't take that type of hit. If Classic gets usurped now, the demand for MED2 and Tempest coming out this year will suffer, which will in turn make it less interesting for more people to play, and so on.
When we have more powerful Classic sets like Tempest and Urza's then I don't see a problem with bringing CYOS into the mix. Right now Classic is trying to grow. I'm of the opinion that it can survive high priced cards. Especially since most of the high priced cards are Extended cards anyway. What it can't survive is a complete removal of the necessity of the format. That would truly kill it before it has a chance to take off.
A word not mentioned in this article is "power." Comparing Jitte to full on Affinity in terms of bans is silly. Affinity warped the entire format around it. The deck is very powerful and requires hate for a non-combo deck to beat it in Legacy or Classic. Now think about the fact it was pretty much all Standard (and Block) legal.
Jitte was a warping card, all aggro decks started with 4x Jitte. That said Jittie didn't invalidate other decks, you could still play control or combo.
Trinisphere is another example of something that was banned due to fun and powerlevel. An unanswered Trinisphere on turn one in Vintage was game over. However it wasn't a turn on kill game over, it was lets play a long slow game and at some point I'll win game over.
Also I don't know if WOTC ever thinks that winning must be fun but doesn't matter if loosing is.
Traumatized looks like hybryd of two decks from japanese finals - UB traumatize-reanimator (3rd place at finals) and UBW shapeshifter deck (4-1 on standart part of finals and second place on one of qualifiers). And by time it fits). Looks like traumatized and reanimator burst is a sort of finals impact.
I know that the Brand Manager is aware of the dial-up issue. The thing of it is, the game is playable on dial-up (from what I've heard), but downloading definitely isn't.
I've suggested to WotC to make two installers: one with the art and one wihout the art. I don't know if that's feasible for them to do or not, but it would allow for more users to keep playing, and that's a good thing for all of us...
I have dial-up(sux to be me). Is wotc going to come out with a V3 disc to be purchased in stores? or am i screwed...sentenced to the 72 hour download/update or whatever you want to call it?
I don't mean to be the bearer of bad news, but flash made classic completely and utterly non-amusing. Almost to the point that I was fed up with classic. The two types of people were the ones playing flash and the anti-flash - that fact is without contestation. Thus, by your definition of having a deck and an anti-deck, the meta and the format was completely rubbish in terms of entertaining myself.
Great article but try to add a real picture if you can. I require it because it makes the site look more professional. If it's a problem feel free to wear a hat/sunglasses or whatever else or msg me in game if you have any further questions. Thanks again for the great article and I hope you keep writing for us!
Shocklands are ok. The 2 life per loop is negligible unless you are worried your opponent is about to burn you all the way. I take 2 damage when I get lazy and try to squeeze more mana per activation. The biggest problem with this deck is that you need to loop multiple times before you actually win. It's very tedious to perform online. You may sometimes need to force out the win asap to give you more time. The shocklands are not the best lands around but they fix your mana pretty well. Same goes to the city but city is more powerful as it can let you play what you have in hand which might actually be a problem.
As for the kill condition, I'm more than happy with just the dragon as it kills the most efficiently and effectively lets you have multiple cards have access to it without actually needing it to be in the yard unlike Vintage plays. The churning out of mana is the greatest concern. Infinite mana kills are technically too difficult to pull off when you get to squeeze only 2-5 mana per loop. The less steps made, the more game you have. Hopefully you don't have to geyser kill cos you need cunning wish mana + geyser mana. 3+22 Dragon kill is gifts=>flashback teachings+dragon = 4+6+8=18 at maximum. It can cost 8 if dragon, 12 if teachings into dragon or 14 if flashback teachings into dragon.
Sorry for the unregistered replies. I didn't realise I was no longer logged in.
Anonymous: I didn't mean losing/winning an entire tournament, I meant losing/winning an individual game. (Actually I'm not sure what I meant, I just meant losing in the abstract, but I think now that individual games is what I was thinking. Anyway, I'm confusing myself.)
As for what makes them (including me) keep coming back, it's the potential that they'll win.
urzishra: As long as there's a chance of winning and having fun, you don't need to have fun losing. The connection you're not making is the difference between any given tournament and/or game and all tournaments and/or games. That is, just because I lose and fail to have fun in rounds 3, 4, and 5 of a tournament doesn't mean I wasn't having fun winning rounds 1 and 2, and also doesn't mean I wasn't having fun when I made top 8 two tournaments ago.
I recommend not running shocklands; they can't be used during the loop as they cost 2 life/mana. Similar for city of brass, although the rainbowness is enough that it might be worth one life/mana, even though it only works with another land
As for the post that got double-posted....
?!?!?! This is singleton, which uses the Magic Online card pool. Bazaar isn't online, original duals aren't online yet, and plenty of other stuff in that list which I just skimmed. Also, this is PureMTGO, an online-based site.
Also, I think it's a bad idea not to include something like Flamewave Invoker or Ambassador Laquatus, a. k. a. something that wins the game with infinite mana and can be gotten by moving the Animate Dead/Necromancy onto it. That, or specifically Laquatus, was the most common win condition in Classic Dragon builds. (In my doomsday/dragon build, I used flamewave as a primary win and laquatus when the flamewave wouldn't work.)
The most fun I've ever had in a tournament was when I was playing in a Vintage Sanction event I had went 4-0 needed one more win for "T8" style prizes.. Had a guy drop all his money (IE couple moxes a lotus a birds and a forest) next turn I dropped a powder keg blew up all his power.. but anyways I had enough leathal damage the next turn and all he had to do was draw one card (he was playing MaskNaught) and he drew it..
sometimes losing is fun.. some of the worst magic ever was when I played durring Ravager Affinity Standard (OLS - MD 8th) for reginals.. it just wasn't very fun.. even if you played a deck that beat affinity and you were playing affinity and you lost because of it.. it wasn't a very fun format.. even when you lost..
epic games mean a lot to a lot of players but I can also see the advantage of fast win/not fun formats.. nothing right now in my opinion is completely unwinnable.. but losing has to be at least fun for the player that lost.. i love formats where i feel I have a chance till the very end.. i imagine my view is the majority of the magic playing community..lets face it no one wants to feel like they had no chance from the very beginning.
(EDIT for future reference my security code was 316 .. how cool is that!)
I figured pureMTGO means people want to make decks to play online so the list was made to reflect how you don't have to have all the power to actually mimic a Vintage deck while still in the Singleton format. I play Singleton online so there are many restrictions regarding the card choices but I believe that the card pool available now is resonable enough to pull it off. (Thanks MED!) Sorry for not making it clear.
Storm is sick. I've tried the UG version and the TEPS version once I heard of them in extended. I can't generate decks out of a void but I can implement strategies used in other formats quite well. (with tons of testing of course) I've always been reading about Vintage and I love Vintage tec. It's the part of the world people tend not to see unless they are into it.
My best storm score is 22 on turn 4. =) I used to consistently pull of turn 5 wins but turn 5 was a little slow against aggresive decks. Jitte used to mess the maths alot too. I stopped playing these storm decks in favor of very blue based storm decks that hid itself as a UB control once I read about remanding brain freezes in Vintage. That was before high tide was available online but I have yet to make a better version yet.
Ah.. Actually a turn 2 kill goes like this : You turn cast turn 1 entomb, turn 2 animate dead and hopefully have a gifts/taechings/hellkite. And you need lands that can produce red/black in this scenario. To be honest, my own worldgorger deck managed to pull it off before but it does look wierd having to loop through 2 lands. Singleton decks tend to be play slower games and it's tough to anticipate that you're losing next turn no matter what you are playing. The best way to play this deck is to build your hand and win when the opponent least expects. The best part about this deck is that you can actually win when your blue opponent is tapped out by using necromancy as an instant. Therefore, it would be better if your worldgorger went into the graveyard at the very last moment.
You guys are good at filling part. I guess making these decks wouldn"t be too tough at all. =)
That aside, I hope this would not be a fix the worldgorger deck discussion as I used this example to illustrate my points. I made the decklist as generic as possible to show how there are rooms for improvement that can be made by testing and not to have too much conflict in the game plan. For now I would still prefer winning unexpectedly before that has to change. Personally, I am not using this exact build but I'm toying around other tools to figure out what helps. This deck has a very high potential but for now, I'm looking at how weatherlight cards can go into decks.
-- Other 1 Time Walk 1 Yawgmoth's Will 1 Regrowth 1 Darksteel Colossus 1 Sins of the Past
-- Non-land mana 1 Elvish Spirit Guide 1 Simian Spirit Guide 1 Chromatic Star 1 Chromatic Sphere 1 Cabal Ritual 1 Dark Ritual 1 Hurkyl's Recall 1 Seething Song 1 Rite of Flame 1 Black Lotus 1 Lion's Eye Diamond 1 Lotus Petal 1 Mana Crypt 1 Mana Vault 1 Memory Jar 1 Mox Emerald 1 Mox Jet 1 Mox Pearl 1 Mox Ruby 1 Mox Sapphire 1 Chrome Mox 1 Mox Diamond 1 Sol Ring
-- Land 1 City Of Brass 1 Forbidden Orchard 1 Gemstone Mine 1 Tolarian Academy 1 Polluted Delta 1 Flooded Strand 1 Bloodstained Mire 1 Underground Sea 1 Volcanic Island 1 Tropical Island 1 Island
Sideboard 1 Pyroclasm 1 Balance 1 Empty the Warrens 12 other cards
I disagree with your last point. I think that losing does need to be fun, and that's the secret to a healthy environment that people flock to.
In any tournament, there is only 1 winner (or 8, if you define T8 as a 'win'. So why on earth would people who have never and perhaps will never keep coming back to lose again and again. Clearly there is something about playing magic that does not 'win' that makes it worth it to them.
I think I disagree with your premise about fun. Winning is almost always going to be more fun than losing, but that doesn't mean losing should make you feel miserable. It's right there in that quite from Aaron Forsythe, actually: "One of the most damning statements that can be made about a game is that it is not fun. [...] Not just 'I lost' unfun, but 'Why did I even come here to play?' unfun." It's basically a question of power level. Against Trinisphere in Vintage, you could effectively lose the game on turn 1 before you'd had a chance to make a single play - that's extremely unfun. Jitte never beat anyone on turn 1, and any reasonably built deck should have some kind of outs against it, so while it might be frustrating, you don't get the "why did I even bother to show up" feeling. You could apply the same reasoning to creatures almost never getting banned while turn 1/2 combos always do.
Yeah I thought I had implied Lava Spike when I used the combo, I will go in and make that a little more clear. Thank you.
To be picky, IPA-forward would be an etneral format in the sense that nothing would ever rotate OUT of it. Everything legal in the format remains in it forever, hence, eternal.
However, I get what you mean to say, in that it also doesn't contain all the possible cards/sets like the paper eternal formats do.
Kinda cool seeing a rogue deck make top 8 every now and then. Creativity is a good thing. Just want to clarify though on your statement about izzet guildmage combo. It requires BLUE mana to copy instants, therefore you can only gather mana for as much "BLUE" as you can spend. The combo I think you are referring to is the Lavaspike Spliced with Desperate Ritual combo that deals infinite damage as everytime the lavaspike resolves you get your RRR back to recopy the spell.
All in all, I enjoy reading your extended articles as I myself play in ext tournaments every now and then. I like to see what's been winning and what not. Lately though, been sticking to just the 8 mans though.
You could also have a friend with broadband access download it, then burn it to a CD.
Maybe your local library would allow this too.
I would like to see the list for the U/R/G Rock Variant. Is it any good? I agree with the above comment though, I do miss Karsten, but this takes the place.
"They've never said that there would be an eternal format for IPA forward (the first eternal format on MTGO, Classic, was created just so that pre-IPA cards could be played)."
As a pointed out in one of the threads, IPA forward is not an Eternal format.
I also wonder how CYOS hobbles Classic.
Because it reduces the need to buy into Classic sets, almost down to zero for the current sets in Classic, and I think reduced need is more of a problem than increased prices.
Who would choose for example, Mirage Block, for one of their CYOS sets? I can't imagine that many people would. If there was a way that someone could play their current Extended cards while ignoring all the Classic sets, the need to use the Classic format would drop drastically. And right now, it can't take that type of hit. If Classic gets usurped now, the demand for MED2 and Tempest coming out this year will suffer, which will in turn make it less interesting for more people to play, and so on.
When we have more powerful Classic sets like Tempest and Urza's then I don't see a problem with bringing CYOS into the mix. Right now Classic is trying to grow. I'm of the opinion that it can survive high priced cards. Especially since most of the high priced cards are Extended cards anyway. What it can't survive is a complete removal of the necessity of the format. That would truly kill it before it has a chance to take off.
A word not mentioned in this article is "power." Comparing Jitte to full on Affinity in terms of bans is silly. Affinity warped the entire format around it. The deck is very powerful and requires hate for a non-combo deck to beat it in Legacy or Classic. Now think about the fact it was pretty much all Standard (and Block) legal.
Jitte was a warping card, all aggro decks started with 4x Jitte. That said Jittie didn't invalidate other decks, you could still play control or combo.
Trinisphere is another example of something that was banned due to fun and powerlevel. An unanswered Trinisphere on turn one in Vintage was game over. However it wasn't a turn on kill game over, it was lets play a long slow game and at some point I'll win game over.
Also I don't know if WOTC ever thinks that winning must be fun but doesn't matter if loosing is.
Traumatized looks like hybryd of two decks from japanese finals - UB traumatize-reanimator (3rd place at finals) and UBW shapeshifter deck (4-1 on standart part of finals and second place on one of qualifiers). And by time it fits). Looks like traumatized and reanimator burst is a sort of finals impact.
Why do you think Choose Your Own Standard will "hobble Classic more than high priced cards"?
I know that the Brand Manager is aware of the dial-up issue. The thing of it is, the game is playable on dial-up (from what I've heard), but downloading definitely isn't.
I've suggested to WotC to make two installers: one with the art and one wihout the art. I don't know if that's feasible for them to do or not, but it would allow for more users to keep playing, and that's a good thing for all of us...
I have dial-up(sux to be me). Is wotc going to come out with a V3 disc to be purchased in stores? or am i screwed...sentenced to the 72 hour download/update or whatever you want to call it?
my email is pablo_69@juno.com
Sorry bout that. =x I don't have a picture here cos I'm writing outside home so I used a tarmogoyf. I'll get one up soon. =)
I don't mean to be the bearer of bad news, but flash made classic completely and utterly non-amusing. Almost to the point that I was fed up with classic. The two types of people were the ones playing flash and the anti-flash - that fact is without contestation. Thus, by your definition of having a deck and an anti-deck, the meta and the format was completely rubbish in terms of entertaining myself.
Sorry about missing that this is an online only format.
I still think that some storm/renewal based deck seems pretty good.
Great article but try to add a real picture if you can. I require it because it makes the site look more professional. If it's a problem feel free to wear a hat/sunglasses or whatever else or msg me in game if you have any further questions. Thanks again for the great article and I hope you keep writing for us!
Shocklands are ok. The 2 life per loop is negligible unless you are worried your opponent is about to burn you all the way. I take 2 damage when I get lazy and try to squeeze more mana per activation. The biggest problem with this deck is that you need to loop multiple times before you actually win. It's very tedious to perform online. You may sometimes need to force out the win asap to give you more time. The shocklands are not the best lands around but they fix your mana pretty well. Same goes to the city but city is more powerful as it can let you play what you have in hand which might actually be a problem.
As for the kill condition, I'm more than happy with just the dragon as it kills the most efficiently and effectively lets you have multiple cards have access to it without actually needing it to be in the yard unlike Vintage plays. The churning out of mana is the greatest concern. Infinite mana kills are technically too difficult to pull off when you get to squeeze only 2-5 mana per loop. The less steps made, the more game you have. Hopefully you don't have to geyser kill cos you need cunning wish mana + geyser mana. 3+22 Dragon kill is gifts=>flashback teachings+dragon = 4+6+8=18 at maximum. It can cost 8 if dragon, 12 if teachings into dragon or 14 if flashback teachings into dragon.
Sorry for the unregistered replies. I didn't realise I was no longer logged in.
Anonymous: I didn't mean losing/winning an entire tournament, I meant losing/winning an individual game. (Actually I'm not sure what I meant, I just meant losing in the abstract, but I think now that individual games is what I was thinking. Anyway, I'm confusing myself.)
As for what makes them (including me) keep coming back, it's the potential that they'll win.
urzishra: As long as there's a chance of winning and having fun, you don't need to have fun losing. The connection you're not making is the difference between any given tournament and/or game and all tournaments and/or games. That is, just because I lose and fail to have fun in rounds 3, 4, and 5 of a tournament doesn't mean I wasn't having fun winning rounds 1 and 2, and also doesn't mean I wasn't having fun when I made top 8 two tournaments ago.
I recommend not running shocklands; they can't be used during the loop as they cost 2 life/mana. Similar for city of brass, although the rainbowness is enough that it might be worth one life/mana, even though it only works with another land
As for the post that got double-posted....
?!?!?! This is singleton, which uses the Magic Online card pool. Bazaar isn't online, original duals aren't online yet, and plenty of other stuff in that list which I just skimmed. Also, this is PureMTGO, an online-based site.
Also, I think it's a bad idea not to include something like Flamewave Invoker or Ambassador Laquatus, a. k. a. something that wins the game with infinite mana and can be gotten by moving the Animate Dead/Necromancy onto it. That, or specifically Laquatus, was the most common win condition in Classic Dragon builds. (In my doomsday/dragon build, I used flamewave as a primary win and laquatus when the flamewave wouldn't work.)
The most fun I've ever had in a tournament was when I was playing in a Vintage Sanction event I had went 4-0 needed one more win for "T8" style prizes.. Had a guy drop all his money (IE couple moxes a lotus a birds and a forest) next turn I dropped a powder keg blew up all his power.. but anyways I had enough leathal damage the next turn and all he had to do was draw one card (he was playing MaskNaught) and he drew it..
sometimes losing is fun.. some of the worst magic ever was when I played durring Ravager Affinity Standard (OLS - MD 8th) for reginals.. it just wasn't very fun.. even if you played a deck that beat affinity and you were playing affinity and you lost because of it.. it wasn't a very fun format.. even when you lost..
epic games mean a lot to a lot of players but I can also see the advantage of fast win/not fun formats.. nothing right now in my opinion is completely unwinnable.. but losing has to be at least fun for the player that lost.. i love formats where i feel I have a chance till the very end.. i imagine my view is the majority of the magic playing community..lets face it no one wants to feel like they had no chance from the very beginning.
(EDIT for future reference my security code was 316 .. how cool is that!)
I figured pureMTGO means people want to make decks to play online so the list was made to reflect how you don't have to have all the power to actually mimic a Vintage deck while still in the Singleton format. I play Singleton online so there are many restrictions regarding the card choices but I believe that the card pool available now is resonable enough to pull it off. (Thanks MED!) Sorry for not making it clear.
Storm is sick. I've tried the UG version and the TEPS version once I heard of them in extended. I can't generate decks out of a void but I can implement strategies used in other formats quite well. (with tons of testing of course) I've always been reading about Vintage and I love Vintage tec. It's the part of the world people tend not to see unless they are into it.
My best storm score is 22 on turn 4. =) I used to consistently pull of turn 5 wins but turn 5 was a little slow against aggresive decks. Jitte used to mess the maths alot too. I stopped playing these storm decks in favor of very blue based storm decks that hid itself as a UB control once I read about remanding brain freezes in Vintage. That was before high tide was available online but I have yet to make a better version yet.
Ah.. Actually a turn 2 kill goes like this : You turn cast turn 1 entomb, turn 2 animate dead and hopefully have a gifts/taechings/hellkite. And you need lands that can produce red/black in this scenario. To be honest, my own worldgorger deck managed to pull it off before but it does look wierd having to loop through 2 lands. Singleton decks tend to be play slower games and it's tough to anticipate that you're losing next turn no matter what you are playing. The best way to play this deck is to build your hand and win when the opponent least expects. The best part about this deck is that you can actually win when your blue opponent is tapped out by using necromancy as an instant. Therefore, it would be better if your worldgorger went into the graveyard at the very last moment.
You guys are good at filling part. I guess making these decks wouldn"t be too tough at all. =)
That aside, I hope this would not be a fix the worldgorger deck discussion as I used this example to illustrate my points. I made the decklist as generic as possible to show how there are rooms for improvement that can be made by testing and not to have too much conflict in the game plan. For now I would still prefer winning unexpectedly before that has to change. Personally, I am not using this exact build but I'm toying around other tools to figure out what helps. This deck has a very high potential but for now, I'm looking at how weatherlight cards can go into decks.
Was there any particular reason for dropping Bazaar of Baghdad from the list, or leaving Volcanic Island out?
I could see them being left out for budgetary considerations, but you don't mention this.
Also, do you think that Sol Ring is ridiculous enough to merit joining the other 4 on the ban list? It seems more broken than Jitte.
Here's a storm deck that seems pretty broken off the top of my head (based on long):
-- Broken Card Drawers
1 Ancestral Recall
1 Brainstorm
1 Necropotence
1 Yawgmoth's Bargain
1 Wheel Of Fortune
1 Windfall
1 Timetwister
-- Broken Tutors
1 Mystical Tutor
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Grim Tutor
1 Imperial Seal
1 Tinker
1 Personal Tutor
1 Burning Wish
-- Disruption
1 Xantid Swarm
1 Duress
1 Thoughtsieze
1 Chain Of Vapor
-- Storm
1 Mind's Desire
1 Tendrils Of Agony
-- Other
1 Time Walk
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Regrowth
1 Darksteel Colossus
1 Sins of the Past
-- Non-land mana
1 Elvish Spirit Guide
1 Simian Spirit Guide
1 Chromatic Star
1 Chromatic Sphere
1 Cabal Ritual
1 Dark Ritual
1 Hurkyl's Recall
1 Seething Song
1 Rite of Flame
1 Black Lotus
1 Lion's Eye Diamond
1 Lotus Petal
1 Mana Crypt
1 Mana Vault
1 Memory Jar
1 Mox Emerald
1 Mox Jet
1 Mox Pearl
1 Mox Ruby
1 Mox Sapphire
1 Chrome Mox
1 Mox Diamond
1 Sol Ring
-- Land
1 City Of Brass
1 Forbidden Orchard
1 Gemstone Mine
1 Tolarian Academy
1 Polluted Delta
1 Flooded Strand
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Underground Sea
1 Volcanic Island
1 Tropical Island
1 Island
Sideboard
1 Pyroclasm
1 Balance
1 Empty the Warrens
12 other cards
Why would this deck not mash everyone?
I disagree with your last point. I think that losing does need to be fun, and that's the secret to a healthy environment that people flock to.
In any tournament, there is only 1 winner (or 8, if you define T8 as a 'win'. So why on earth would people who have never and perhaps will never keep coming back to lose again and again. Clearly there is something about playing magic that does not 'win' that makes it worth it to them.