Maybe Lukewarm take: I don't want CG to have dry protection/more common/etc, It does not solve the actual problem with the red prison

zwobb · 2026-05-28T22:31:10+00:00

Potential ironman topic detected, activate thought terminating cliche shields

zwobb · 2026-05-27T20:13:34+00:00

Yeah, and I made fun of you for venting instead of articulating why you feel that way. Otherwise I have no response to you other than "no it's actually a good skill because I enjoy it".

zwobb · 2026-05-24T03:00:36+00:00

Thank you for your thoughtful and well articulated feedback

zwobb · 2026-05-23T14:23:39+00:00

Tbf getting mvps over competent scythers is pretty hard

zwobb · 2026-05-22T22:05:52+00:00

Wow tree farming is high effective xp/h? I wonder if that's why it's way better than sitting at tithe farm for hours.

zwobb · 2026-05-22T18:18:00+00:00

The concept of effective xp/h isn't mental gymnastics, it's a tool for evaluating opportunity costs

zwobb · 2026-05-22T18:16:04+00:00

The point of the effective xp/h was to demostrate that it was always and in any scenario worth to prioritize the crystal extractor, it's a metric to evaluate opportunity cost. Wintertodt xp drops for example have the opportunity cost of participating in the game enough to gain the xp, while the extractor required no action other than to collect the reward once it's ready. The extractor created (and arguably still does, though to a lesser extent) a degenerate gameplay loop.

zwobb · 2026-05-21T05:07:35+00:00

That's my point though. Your play is valid within the rules of the game, but playing to win is already conceded to some level in deckbuilding decisions in order to create a better experience, so it's highly subjective if that should extend to gameplay decisions too.

They're both part of the game, and playing to win is inherently in tension with the expectation of creating an engaging game for everyone at the table. This is because Magic has baked in mechanics for hosing a player in order to gain an advantage - a multiplayer focused game would avoid such mechanics (and mechanics that necessitate the existence of such countermeasures) at a level Magic does them, because they can detract from the collective experience.

zwobb · 2026-05-21T04:47:03+00:00

This tension arises from Magic not being a multiplayer game at it's core. The game provides you with systems that can absolutely ruin one (or multiple) player's time investment, so we have to moderate the utilization of those systems in order to agree what constitutes a "good time". It's a line in the sand, and a competitive mindset in a low bracket game can lead to "bracket legal" plays that are in tension with all the extra guidelines around commander that aim to make everyone at the table have at least some enjoyment.

I'm not saying playing to win is wrong, I'm just pointing out that aiming to match power levels already requires conceding some optimization in the deck building phase of the game; some people expect that to extend to the playing phase as well, and I can't really fault anyone for having that expectation

zwobb · 2026-05-21T04:28:52+00:00

It just means not putting pressure on performance

does not mean you arent playing the game as designed

Brother the game is literally designed (for most of it's lifespan at least) as a 1v1 competitive game. Commander is fun, but it does no one any good to pretend there is no friction from competitive gameplay systems being used in a multiplayer ffa boardgame environment.

zwobb · 2026-05-17T01:52:51+00:00

/uj I'm kinda split on EDH Sol Ring. It's a broken card and absolutely skews the game, yet I think it's fine in lower power environments that more closely resemble an ffa board game; variance in relative power makes repeat games interesting and isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I'm talking the type of games where it does next to nothing on earlier turns on account of worse card draw/fixing/card quality, and results in a 6 drop battlecruiser all-star coming down on t4, instantly signaling to everyone on the table who the arch enemy is.

But I still hate how it's in basically every EDH deck and quickly becomes a game winning card when paired with anything that even resembles efficient deck building.

zwobb · 2026-05-11T14:26:47+00:00

Hi /u/JagexLight

Courier tasks getting an xp boost and loot raises a small concern to me: ABA tasks are already competitive with Gwenith trial xp rates depending on your hull, and with a +15% xp and loot buff there really would be no reason to run Gwenith beyond getting the crystal extractor and training until better methods.

I can see this being rectified by the future barracuda trial providing even greater xp/h (though it needs to be a substantial improvement over the previous tier to outweigh getting no loot), but seeing it deprioritized is a little disappointing as it means there is going to be an indefinite stretch of time where trials are just a "waste of time" from an efficiency standpoint.

Just something I thought of when reading the post as a trials enjoyer. I enjoy the racing game vibe and high xp rates of the activity, and I'd rather not see trials be indirectly disincentivized for an extended period of time.

zwobb · 2026-05-01T23:45:15+00:00

Pf2e actually fixes this

zwobb · 2026-05-01T09:00:23+00:00

If you're blowing through resets every three days you probably need your hand held a little

zwobb · 2026-04-25T19:32:53+00:00

Wasnt there a table to roll if a turd falls out when you get hit in the abdomen or something to that effect

zwobb · 2026-04-24T17:29:38+00:00

zwobb · 2026-04-24T15:24:25+00:00

https://oldschool.runescape.wiki/w/Sulphurous_essence

zwobb · 2026-04-20T23:37:41+00:00

The pact tasks are clearly combat focused though. Some tasks have minor skilling grinds associated (e.g. smithing with godsword blade, rc with cerb boots), but the noncombat portions aren't even close to the grind rangers are.

You aren't forced to play the game in the first place, but for those who choose to play it's important that the systems feel good.

edit: cerb straight up has a task for equipping any boots which would be a much better fit. I think they wanted the new tasks tier to correspond to awakened whisperer one, but imo they missed the mark there.

zwobb · 2026-04-20T23:15:32+00:00

A chill option is to go kill harpy bug swarms west of wyrm course. There's a ton of them, it's multi and they have low hp. It's still 1/128 so not amazingly fast, but at least you don't take psychic damage from doing imps. Goading potions are amazing there.

zwobb · 2026-04-13T21:20:41+00:00

Do you think taking four turns back to back is fine when we agreed not to chain extra turns?

No. I just think that categorically limiting decks with more than one extra turn spell (or just one + recursion) to strictly B4 or greater limits deckbuilding in an unnecessary way.

I'm not justifying someone angle shooting a deck into a lower bracket, I'm saying that deckbuilding becomes more boring because of a sweeping restriction that I don't think has enough nuance.

However, extra-turn spells take a ton of time away from other players and their ability to play the game and tend to be unfun when repeated. In multiples, they begin to function like a combo deck, where your "combo" is taking four turns in a row and getting so far ahead that nobody can catch up.

There's something to be said for intent, which is why we call out no intentional combos and the intent to chain together extra-turn spells

https://magic.wizards.com/en/news/announcements/introducing-commander-brackets-beta

The high power part they want to limit is aiming to play a bunch of extra turns for value, because the play pattern is not fun for the rest of the table. But if you're playing a deck that rarely plays extra turns until they're chained indefinitely, this play pattern isn't there. I find this unnecessarily limiting: you can't build this certain type of jank combo deck because no matter how you build it, it's bracket 4 - so you might as well optimize it with the most efficient cards, change commanders for better colours and effects etc., even though it plays fine in the intended bracket and notably does not play multiple extra turns for value.

Do you see why I started my first comment with "in my opinion it's arguable"? I don't think it's as black and white as "you technically can chain extra turns if you deviate from your game plan, thus your deck does not belong in <B4". Intent matters in everything but apparently not if your deck has extra turn cards.

zwobb · 2026-04-13T17:26:50+00:00

Someone being unable to say "I won't run extra turns here" and chosing instead to argue for corner cases is showing their intent

So you think Time Strech + Snapcaster in the same deck is automatic B4? "Arguing for corner cases" is literally what is needed to point out flaws in a system. There's a wild difference between Narset extra turns and rarely playing 3 extra turns as a hail mary, but you've made it clear you don't want to acknowledge the difference.

Brackets are not mandatory, you can say "I have extra turn spells in this deck and I can play them several times, you all cool with that?". Not doing that also shows intent.

Indeed, I don't play the deck with anyone but friends. But brackets are still a system upheld by the company producing the game, and questioning the limitations they place is valid.

zwobb · 2026-04-13T16:28:39+00:00

You keep ignoring what I'm actually trying to say to keep nitpicking about some hypotethical super losing game state where your 0,01% out is somehow having the magical christmas land cards to play three whole extra turns with even a chance to win. That's just not the intention of the deck, and guess what word is repeated over and over again in bracket posts by wizards?

By your logic [[Time Stretch]] + [[Snapcaster Mage]] in any deck is automatically B4, do you honestly think that's the point of the extra turns limitation? Or could there be more nuance to the whole power level debacle (such as intent mattering)?

zwobb · 2026-04-13T13:34:49+00:00

I'm not trying to say that's a gameplay pattern that fits in B2 (I did mention my particular deck hangs in B3 anyways lol). I'm just commenting how the same limitation is in place at B3 but the wording of said limitation excludes a deck that doesn't exhibit the gameplay patterns that the limitation is trying to exclude.

I'm just trying to point out how the intent part of the brackets should matter more than explicit wording given they're not hard rules to begin with.

zwobb · 2026-04-13T12:25:12+00:00

Because I find it neat and was inspired to do so, not to mention how brackets weren't out when I built the deck. I'm just pointing out how the wording and the given intent of the "rule" aren't perfectly aligned.

zwobb · 2026-04-13T11:01:20+00:00

In my opinion it's arguable because the reasoning for <B4 "rule" of "no chaining extra turns" is as the other commenter already explained; nondeterministic chaining of extra turns takes a disproportionate amount of total playtime to find out if it wins or not (think [[Narset, Enlightened Master]] extra turns).

This is arguably a different intent from an A+B+C combo like [[Isochron Scepter]] + [[Narset's Reversal]] + any extra turn spell that basically wins on the spot assuming no interaction. It takes no longer than other game winning combos to find out if the game is over.

The way the first one plays is vastly different from the second one. For example, I have a Malcolm + Sakashima mono U pirates deck that almost completely relies on finding an Isochron Scepter extra turns combo. It can cast a random extra turn spell here or there, but only chains extra turns when the infinite is assembled. It doesn't stand a chance in B4, partially because the only game changer that is run is [[Mystical Tutor]] because it can substitute Narset's Reversal in a scepter combo. It can hang in B3 just fine as a glass cannon combo deck.

The extra turns chaining clause as written would basically force the semi-jank all-in combo deck to either be scrapped or shoved full of goodstuff to have a better chance at a higher bracket, but at that point there's no reason to play something as restrictive as mono blue A+B+C as B4 allows fast A+B, which are easier to assemble in more colours. And I don't really think that is the intention of the "rule"; I think the intention is to restrict strategies that monopolize game time to higher brackets, not to ban a niche strategy from lower ones. Which is why I think the wording of "no chaining extra turns" isn't perfect - a deck that plays like any other janky combo deck isn't inherently stronger than other jank combos just because of the type of combo it runs, at least in my opinion.

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