This is an initiative in collaboration with Wizards of the Coast.
A couple of weeks ago, coming out of the absolute nothingness, Magic: The Gathering presented Alchemy, which in just a few days has already proven to be one of the biggest game changes in recent history. A change that, as often happens in these cases, has made the trumpets of the Apocalypse begin to sound for some.
Do not worry too much because I have no intention of freaking out with my opinion in these Magic Chronicles. We could lengthen it long and hard to generate tension to the last line unnecessarily, but you know what they say, do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you.
Alchemy seems like an excellent idea.
The need for Alchemy
Let’s recap a bit for those of you who have been locked in a cave for the past few weeks. Alchemy is a game mode that, unlike what had happened during all these years, for the first time will touch up the cards at will to shape the meta of Magic.
This, as you may have already imagined from the pifostio it would entail at the organizational level, only applies to Magic Arena. Featuring new exclusive cards for this mode, re-adjusted old cards, and a rotation that will go hand in hand with Standard mode, Alchemy it goes on par with what we have already seen so far. Come on, at the end of the day you are going to continue playing with the same recent collections that you were using now.
“Why create a new mode, then?”
In order to get where the physical format cannot. Although the work on the part of the designers is good enough that there are no major mismatches with superpower cards, in the end something always ends up leaking.
Either because a designer came up with the statistics, or because the players have found a combo that nobody of Wizards of the Coast It had occurred to him, the chances of breaking the game are almost nonexistent, but not impossible.
“What do you do with those letters?”
Well, ban them in certain formats. It is not the first time that we talk about letters like this here – the example of the Black Lotus is probably the best known of all – but it should be noted that it is not something so strange. Without going any further, the current standard format has a prohibited letter: Omnath, center of creation.
Alchemy is the answer to that problem. If something gets out of control, returning it to the fold is as easy as adding one more mana point or modifying the card’s text box to refocus its possibilities. In the time it takes for an update to roll out, every player in the world starts playing by those same rules.
However, despite how relieved the designers of Magic From now on, for me it is nowhere near one of the reasons why Alchemy I think it is a great addition. If I say that it seems to me an excellent idea, it is because it has under its arm more cards and a better meta.
More cards and an impossible design
That new cards reach our hands with which to tinker and create new decks is always good news, but that they also appear ideas that go beyond than what is permissible in physical format is even better.
Impossible not to remember here all those exclusive cards that we have been seeing in recent months in the few Magic video games that have been released over the years. As he Magic: The Gathering de Sid Meier like the one released for the Dreamcast they had exclusive cards whose abilities were too complex to carry over to physical play.
Cards that, due to the randomness or extreme of their mechanics, would be impossible on a table, but that do not pose any problem in a digital format like those of those video games or, as the case at hand, Alchemy.
The possibilities offered by such a leap at the design level are enormous. All those times that in Wizards of the Coast Someone had to put the brakes on – or resort to the funny Un-sets – they could now come to an end.
“How can you let a mechanic get out of hand like this?”
No, you are not going to do it, because you have the possibility of retouching everything you need from one day to the next if the idea turns out to be even more broken than it seemed. Here a huge road opens which any fan of card games should be excited about.
The great revolution is at the goal
But not only from more cards – and crazier – lives that illusion. In the few games that I have with the new format – the kids, teaching a puppy not to pee inside the house now that he can go outside … You know, life – I have only come across ideas and combos that I had not seen up to now.
Not because they didn’t exist before, they were undeniably there, but because new cards and fixes have forced players to look for more creative ways to earn a place in the meta. What until a few days ago were only angels, goblins, and infinite versions of our dogs and cats, are now ideas that go much further.
“And when the meta gets stuck in those four or five more powerful decks again?”
Well, it will be retouched again to give wings to cards that are not used and cut them to those who are taking over the game. Frankly, I find it hard not to imagine a scenario where this is not going to be tremendously positive for our online games.
Anyone who has faced Esika’s Chariot, Alrund’s Epiphany, or the Aspiring Luminarch in recent weeks knows for good how far. Magic I needed a revolution like that.
Especially in a digital format that, due to its accessibility – I hope you get together with friends at all hours to play, but I think it’s unfeasible – asks you to be more agile and dynamic to keep your attention.
And before the question of that vinegar side that has been accompanying us throughout the text resurfaces again, if you don’t like it you will always have Standard. Or Historical, or Commander, or whatever you really want.
If there is something that has dazzled me about these cards since I started playing them seriously a few months ago, it is that, in reality, it is such a great and crazy game that there is magic for everyone.
