Thanks for these reviews, Alex! I enjoyed your take on the Goblin Freerunner best, and wonder about its future utility.
As someone who enjoys Standard Pauper, I must now assume this format is largely dead, except for its small resolute pool. Even rremedio bemoans this new set, and sees no clear winner aside from WotC. Other reviewers refers pauper formats sans the standard inclusion, I suppose due to the loss of the filter. This means advice about pauper cards' uses in this set get little attention for this format, or are presented as flat when new cards are referenced.
It seems like nobody is excited about Standard Pauper, anymore.
I would hope to see how you may use your favorite new common is a zombie token deck, with Undead Servant and Corpse Churn.
From only what you know off the top of your head, Alex- what commons do you see having an impact in Standard? Surely, nothing like duress resides in the new set, but it did get at least sideboard (and sometime maindeck) in Standard decks. Will there be a run on certain commons, do you expect? I don't know what to expect about the availability of commons, now, due to the state of Standard, Standard Pauper, and the new smaller sets' cards.
The only side that's said that is Wizards; none of the people in the group are talking.
You say Wizards hates leaks, while virtually everyone else assumed Kozilek+Wastes (the leak people were banned for, not the mythic+land leak which should have been a much bigger deal, yet will probably never get punished "publicly", if at all) was an intentional leak by Wizards to start the spoiler season off with a bang.
If this was the first time leaked cards were discussed in the social media group, no one would have been banned.
After seeing cards that are not spoiled anyplace else *for several sets*, you have to know that you are dealing with a leak. If Wizards was actually supplying the information, you would have signed a confidentiality agreement. And that agreement would have been supplied by Wizards. NO ONE gets early information without direct contact with Wizards.
You also have to be a complete idiot not to know Wizards hate leaks.
Harder, most likely. A lot of bots only allow a certain number of copies to one account. A lot also look for signs of a buy out and either raise the price or pull the card.
Last, online prices at the bots are, presumably, algorhythymicly checked and updated, so staying ahead long enough would be hard.
He's the one that appeared to take my remarks for his own ends, effectively putting words in my mouth. I called Berserkers the baseline for the Underdog format, and then he took credit for this, as if I were endorsing his build. This puts me in an awkward position, as I have long believed his particular Berserker build to be poor (though I kept my mouth shut before on this point), and so I felt I had to respond in the interest of truth lest others take up the deck on an apparent tacit recommendation from me. By quoting success stats (or lack thereof), and pointing out that others revolutionized the tribe before he did, I tried to help others see that I was, in fact, not endorsing him. I also tried to be helpful, as per your suggestion, to critique his build by pointing out that he needs a lower curve to hang with Legacy-level finishers, pointing out faster builds (mine or Lord_Pipas's builds both accessible in Gatherling). I felt no desire or need to go more in depth.
Consistent compared to where he started. He's a good player. As for your "stupidity" I think you could use more thought with your words for sure. I think it is fine to critique the deck list without making it a personality issue. If something you see in list a) does not work as well as it did in list b) that's perfectly fine to point out. Berserkers have ranged from insanely bad to winning throughout the history of the format which stretchs back to 2009 and there is probably still plenty of room for tweaking the winning decks. I'd recommend just listing what you'd change and leave it at that.
The worst myth I saw about these bannings is that Wizards didn't know what they were doing. For a company that has made an insanely successful, and long-lived, card game, it seems absurd to think that the ban decisions weren't heavily thought over.
Yeah Prices always fascinate me, like this week it's easy to see why stuff like Delay, Wasteland Strangler, Eldrazi Temple and Eye of Ugin are going up in the paper world.
Gaddock Teeg a few weeks ago was harder for me to figure out
Well, we'll have to leave rude for external appearances only and go with stupid for my internal mindset since I honestly didn't know how to make my strong disagreement with his preferred build without coming off as rude. I obviously could have chosen to say nothing, but that had no chance of being helpful (i.e., to get him to play better versions of Berserkers). I think the evidence is pretty strong against him. I have no wish to be hurtful, but can at least recognize my words above for being blunt. As far as being a "consistent winner" though, there is some dispute there as he hasn't had a winning record with his last five times playing the Berserker tribe, while the latest five other pilots are 16-5 combined.
Look, Pete's explanation is perfectly fine. A I read it then the condense version is:
Pete has been too busy to read the comments. The price file was somehow corrupted. Pete did cross-check a sample of cards which seemed to be ok.
Having a mistake in the price data for one week is not a big deal. Repeating the mistake (without explanation) after you have been notified is a bigger deal. However, not having had the time to read the comments/notifications is perfectly fine. I dont 'require' that you or Pete use time to check the prices.
I read SotP each week and I enjoy each part of it. I enjoy the price summary section because a) it would take me forever to do it on my own b) I have no idea why the prices are moving like they do. So I highly enjoy reading Pete's take on the various trends.
I'd go with rude since that is your standard way of typing here. That said ML Berlin has come a long way from when we (he and I) were playing in the wilds of Juff. He's gone from having no cards and no decks worth noting to being a consistent winner. Keep that in mind when you are being your usual overly critical unnecessarily unkind self.
Well, four people ran Berserkers to an X-1 record or better before you even played your first game with them (at least in the Gatherling era), so it's hard to take too much credit. While your typical build is probably better in the mirror for having bigger dudes, overall I think your build is poorly positioned, as the essence of Berserkers should be to beat the unfair decks before they can get set up with their powerful Legacy combos. Thus the speed inherent in a lower curve is usually essential. Your slower version doesn't accomplish this so much, as somewhat evinced by your -3 overall record with them over 78 matches (in Gatherling).
I'm tempted to brag about my lone Berserker build (as I did once in the past), but I have to admit that there's a lot of power in the Price of Progress version (for example, that Lord_Pipas used). I'll remain agnostic for now.
I know this probably comes off as pretty harsh; it's not really my intent, so much as to try and educate. To the extent I'm either wrong or rude, I apologize.
For instance, to back pete up, today's article was submitted 30 minutes before deadline. I try my best, and pete tries his best, and sometimes, a short lead to a deadline keeps my fact checking low. Pete has a wonderful real life that includes bowl games and important jobs, and has done an admirable job stepping in for hammy.
I can't fact check prices though, because I do not check them at the same time, and as much as I would like to adjust things when I get them, I can't, I'm terrible at maths, and I would more than likely mess up percentage changes :D
Even if Pete were to stop doing prices, the State of the Program is a really important article, and we thank you for stopping by the check it out. Your words and criticisms are appreciated and truly taken to heart.
It was great hearing Josh again and wow that was a really long podcast. If you guys weren't having so much fun doing it I'd have been tempted to put it on pause halfway through. :p
I'm proud that, at least, I have set the new standard for Underdog events:-)
I do remember critical comments and disbelief when I started with Berserkers. After I won with them, suddenly Berserkers were en vogue:-)
If you want to go with the godbook analogy, the "reveal to the public" was in an IRC chat. By the logic of these scattershot bannings, everyone in that chat should have been banned, and that's obviously a joke. As soon as it gets to a group of people that isn't via 1-to-1 communication, you end the chain right there--end of story. Anything else causes much more harm than good in the fear it causes among your most dedicated fanbase (or if it actually dissolved the judge program like it should have, instead of being forgotten in five minutes like Zach Jesse).
Heck, the main reason the private Facebook group existed is to discuss sensitive stuff in the region, as such it was basically required by Wizards and its concerns over privacy (which is also the reason why we've had to deal with the awful state of reporting software for so long, despite multiple offers to fix it in something much shorter than Wizards time).
Each week for the last four years I have pulled down the data from the MTGOTraders.com site, checked a couple big ticket, high fluctuation cards, then started cranking numbers. About two hours later I have the tables that appear in this article.
If there was a glitch in the data somewhere, I apologize. The data on previous week's prices is pulled form the previous week's data. If something is off, and I don't spot it, it promulgates. Sorry, but that's life. Each article takes 4-6 hours to produce and upload - and I generally get that uploaded just before deadline. I hate making mistakes, and I hate having things wrong, but eventually I have to stop editing and upload the ^*$@#* article.
BTW, I'm not "pretending" anything. The prices in the articles for the last couple weeks match the prices in the download file, which match the prices in the interim .csv, which match the prices in the five excel worksheets used to produce the price tables, big number, etc.
Could they all be wrong? Sure. It's possible the download was messed up, or something. I did not think to check the prices against the prices from a couple weeks ago, or from March, 2008. Given that the article was published and I cannot go back in time to fix it, it seems kinda pointless to check now. If you say it's wrong, fine, I'll accept that. I'm sorry for screwing it up.
As for not acknowledging it, I did not have time to read comments during the month of December at all. Looking back, I see that Cauchy did point is out then. Lacking a time machine, I cannot fix the more recent article. Sorry that this error invalidated two articles for you, but that's the problem with deadlines. Maybe better writers than me can be both accurate and timely, but I can't do both.
Yes I make errors. Sorry. I do my best, but )^*$ happens. Most every article is submitted late, so Joshua can't bail me out every time. Sometimes I fat finger a price. Sometimes I use the wrong wurm. Sometimes I use too many commas (okay - almost every time I use too many commas.) That's, just, going, to, happen.
FYI: I download the price data, convert commas to ampersands, convert bar marks to commas, save a .csv, move into excel, strip out foils, DKAs, promos, known database glitches, mismarks, cards with price=$0, cards with collector number =$0, booster packs, full set prices, etc. Then I copy and create four additional worksheets, one each for main data, big number, over $25, special calcs and redemption. All of those get special processing. Then I copy the "this week's prices" into last week's prices for all four pricemaker tables and enter in the new prices. Next I extract the four tables from excel and load them into the article and format them. Then I check a price or two against MTGOTraders and call it good. Only after that point do I get around to looking at the trends and writing the blurbs heading each table. It is sort of my reward for crunching all the numbers. Downside, of course, is that if I still managed to GIGO the whole mess, and I don't find it with the last price check, then it's gonna be wrong. Best I can do.
I enjoyed the 8th edition draft. I have no real expectations about the coming weeks' formats. I guess that I am looking forward to the unpopular formats so that the competition is fierce.
Thanks for these reviews, Alex! I enjoyed your take on the Goblin Freerunner best, and wonder about its future utility.
As someone who enjoys Standard Pauper, I must now assume this format is largely dead, except for its small resolute pool. Even rremedio bemoans this new set, and sees no clear winner aside from WotC. Other reviewers refers pauper formats sans the standard inclusion, I suppose due to the loss of the filter. This means advice about pauper cards' uses in this set get little attention for this format, or are presented as flat when new cards are referenced.
It seems like nobody is excited about Standard Pauper, anymore.
I would hope to see how you may use your favorite new common is a zombie token deck, with Undead Servant and Corpse Churn.
From only what you know off the top of your head, Alex- what commons do you see having an impact in Standard? Surely, nothing like duress resides in the new set, but it did get at least sideboard (and sometime maindeck) in Standard decks. Will there be a run on certain commons, do you expect? I don't know what to expect about the availability of commons, now, due to the state of Standard, Standard Pauper, and the new smaller sets' cards.
Thanks, Alex.
The only side that's said that is Wizards; none of the people in the group are talking.
You say Wizards hates leaks, while virtually everyone else assumed Kozilek+Wastes (the leak people were banned for, not the mythic+land leak which should have been a much bigger deal, yet will probably never get punished "publicly", if at all) was an intentional leak by Wizards to start the spoiler season off with a bang.
If this was the first time leaked cards were discussed in the social media group, no one would have been banned.
After seeing cards that are not spoiled anyplace else *for several sets*, you have to know that you are dealing with a leak. If Wizards was actually supplying the information, you would have signed a confidentiality agreement. And that agreement would have been supplied by Wizards. NO ONE gets early information without direct contact with Wizards.
You also have to be a complete idiot not to know Wizards hate leaks.
Probably the same people playing Old School...
People still play Tiny Leaders?
Harder, most likely. A lot of bots only allow a certain number of copies to one account. A lot also look for signs of a buy out and either raise the price or pull the card.
Last, online prices at the bots are, presumably, algorhythymicly checked and updated, so staying ahead long enough would be hard.
He's the one that appeared to take my remarks for his own ends, effectively putting words in my mouth. I called Berserkers the baseline for the Underdog format, and then he took credit for this, as if I were endorsing his build. This puts me in an awkward position, as I have long believed his particular Berserker build to be poor (though I kept my mouth shut before on this point), and so I felt I had to respond in the interest of truth lest others take up the deck on an apparent tacit recommendation from me. By quoting success stats (or lack thereof), and pointing out that others revolutionized the tribe before he did, I tried to help others see that I was, in fact, not endorsing him. I also tried to be helpful, as per your suggestion, to critique his build by pointing out that he needs a lower curve to hang with Legacy-level finishers, pointing out faster builds (mine or Lord_Pipas's builds both accessible in Gatherling). I felt no desire or need to go more in depth.
Consistent compared to where he started. He's a good player. As for your "stupidity" I think you could use more thought with your words for sure. I think it is fine to critique the deck list without making it a personality issue. If something you see in list a) does not work as well as it did in list b) that's perfectly fine to point out. Berserkers have ranged from insanely bad to winning throughout the history of the format which stretchs back to 2009 and there is probably still plenty of room for tweaking the winning decks. I'd recommend just listing what you'd change and leave it at that.
Gaddock Teeg was something like that he is popular in tiny leaders and someone did a buyout from TCGplayer. The latter was probably the bigger effect.
I wonder if it is more or less difficult do a buyout of a card online compared to in paper?
The worst myth I saw about these bannings is that Wizards didn't know what they were doing. For a company that has made an insanely successful, and long-lived, card game, it seems absurd to think that the ban decisions weren't heavily thought over.
I did come really close to hanging up on Aj :D
Yeah Prices always fascinate me, like this week it's easy to see why stuff like Delay, Wasteland Strangler, Eldrazi Temple and Eye of Ugin are going up in the paper world.
Gaddock Teeg a few weeks ago was harder for me to figure out
Well, we'll have to leave rude for external appearances only and go with stupid for my internal mindset since I honestly didn't know how to make my strong disagreement with his preferred build without coming off as rude. I obviously could have chosen to say nothing, but that had no chance of being helpful (i.e., to get him to play better versions of Berserkers). I think the evidence is pretty strong against him. I have no wish to be hurtful, but can at least recognize my words above for being blunt. As far as being a "consistent winner" though, there is some dispute there as he hasn't had a winning record with his last five times playing the Berserker tribe, while the latest five other pilots are 16-5 combined.
Look, Pete's explanation is perfectly fine. A I read it then the condense version is:
Pete has been too busy to read the comments. The price file was somehow corrupted. Pete did cross-check a sample of cards which seemed to be ok.
Having a mistake in the price data for one week is not a big deal. Repeating the mistake (without explanation) after you have been notified is a bigger deal. However, not having had the time to read the comments/notifications is perfectly fine. I dont 'require' that you or Pete use time to check the prices.
I read SotP each week and I enjoy each part of it. I enjoy the price summary section because a) it would take me forever to do it on my own b) I have no idea why the prices are moving like they do. So I highly enjoy reading Pete's take on the various trends.
Plenty to say after a two-week hiatus during spoiler season. We should be resuming a more normal timeframe henceforth. :)
I'd go with rude since that is your standard way of typing here. That said ML Berlin has come a long way from when we (he and I) were playing in the wilds of Juff. He's gone from having no cards and no decks worth noting to being a consistent winner. Keep that in mind when you are being your usual overly critical unnecessarily unkind self.
Well, four people ran Berserkers to an X-1 record or better before you even played your first game with them (at least in the Gatherling era), so it's hard to take too much credit. While your typical build is probably better in the mirror for having bigger dudes, overall I think your build is poorly positioned, as the essence of Berserkers should be to beat the unfair decks before they can get set up with their powerful Legacy combos. Thus the speed inherent in a lower curve is usually essential. Your slower version doesn't accomplish this so much, as somewhat evinced by your -3 overall record with them over 78 matches (in Gatherling).
I'm tempted to brag about my lone Berserker build (as I did once in the past), but I have to admit that there's a lot of power in the Price of Progress version (for example, that Lord_Pipas used). I'll remain agnostic for now.
I know this probably comes off as pretty harsh; it's not really my intent, so much as to try and educate. To the extent I'm either wrong or rude, I apologize.
I've already forgotten half the puns :p
For instance, to back pete up, today's article was submitted 30 minutes before deadline. I try my best, and pete tries his best, and sometimes, a short lead to a deadline keeps my fact checking low. Pete has a wonderful real life that includes bowl games and important jobs, and has done an admirable job stepping in for hammy.
I can't fact check prices though, because I do not check them at the same time, and as much as I would like to adjust things when I get them, I can't, I'm terrible at maths, and I would more than likely mess up percentage changes :D
Even if Pete were to stop doing prices, the State of the Program is a really important article, and we thank you for stopping by the check it out. Your words and criticisms are appreciated and truly taken to heart.
Well I hope it was an experience you'll never forget. :D
It was great hearing Josh again and wow that was a really long podcast. If you guys weren't having so much fun doing it I'd have been tempted to put it on pause halfway through. :p
I'm proud that, at least, I have set the new standard for Underdog events:-)
I do remember critical comments and disbelief when I started with Berserkers. After I won with them, suddenly Berserkers were en vogue:-)
If you want to go with the godbook analogy, the "reveal to the public" was in an IRC chat. By the logic of these scattershot bannings, everyone in that chat should have been banned, and that's obviously a joke. As soon as it gets to a group of people that isn't via 1-to-1 communication, you end the chain right there--end of story. Anything else causes much more harm than good in the fear it causes among your most dedicated fanbase (or if it actually dissolved the judge program like it should have, instead of being forgotten in five minutes like Zach Jesse).
Heck, the main reason the private Facebook group existed is to discuss sensitive stuff in the region, as such it was basically required by Wizards and its concerns over privacy (which is also the reason why we've had to deal with the awful state of reporting software for so long, despite multiple offers to fix it in something much shorter than Wizards time).
Each week for the last four years I have pulled down the data from the MTGOTraders.com site, checked a couple big ticket, high fluctuation cards, then started cranking numbers. About two hours later I have the tables that appear in this article.
If there was a glitch in the data somewhere, I apologize. The data on previous week's prices is pulled form the previous week's data. If something is off, and I don't spot it, it promulgates. Sorry, but that's life. Each article takes 4-6 hours to produce and upload - and I generally get that uploaded just before deadline. I hate making mistakes, and I hate having things wrong, but eventually I have to stop editing and upload the ^*$@#* article.
BTW, I'm not "pretending" anything. The prices in the articles for the last couple weeks match the prices in the download file, which match the prices in the interim .csv, which match the prices in the five excel worksheets used to produce the price tables, big number, etc.
Could they all be wrong? Sure. It's possible the download was messed up, or something. I did not think to check the prices against the prices from a couple weeks ago, or from March, 2008. Given that the article was published and I cannot go back in time to fix it, it seems kinda pointless to check now. If you say it's wrong, fine, I'll accept that. I'm sorry for screwing it up.
As for not acknowledging it, I did not have time to read comments during the month of December at all. Looking back, I see that Cauchy did point is out then. Lacking a time machine, I cannot fix the more recent article. Sorry that this error invalidated two articles for you, but that's the problem with deadlines. Maybe better writers than me can be both accurate and timely, but I can't do both.
Yes I make errors. Sorry. I do my best, but )^*$ happens. Most every article is submitted late, so Joshua can't bail me out every time. Sometimes I fat finger a price. Sometimes I use the wrong wurm. Sometimes I use too many commas (okay - almost every time I use too many commas.) That's, just, going, to, happen.
FYI: I download the price data, convert commas to ampersands, convert bar marks to commas, save a .csv, move into excel, strip out foils, DKAs, promos, known database glitches, mismarks, cards with price=$0, cards with collector number =$0, booster packs, full set prices, etc. Then I copy and create four additional worksheets, one each for main data, big number, over $25, special calcs and redemption. All of those get special processing. Then I copy the "this week's prices" into last week's prices for all four pricemaker tables and enter in the new prices. Next I extract the four tables from excel and load them into the article and format them. Then I check a price or two against MTGOTraders and call it good. Only after that point do I get around to looking at the trends and writing the blurbs heading each table. It is sort of my reward for crunching all the numbers. Downside, of course, is that if I still managed to GIGO the whole mess, and I don't find it with the last price check, then it's gonna be wrong. Best I can do.
I enjoyed the 8th edition draft. I have no real expectations about the coming weeks' formats. I guess that I am looking forward to the unpopular formats so that the competition is fierce.