FieryBalrog
Member
This garbage pop-psych word sure is popular nowadays.
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Magic: the Gathering |OT4| Izzet Me; Izzet You? A Love Story
- Thread starter The Technomancer
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This garbage pop-psych word sure is popular nowadays.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
So are passive aggressive shitposts like this. C'est la vie.
T
Transhuman
Unconfirmed Member
A better descriptor of the misfits in the mtg community would probably be amoral/ antisocial/ asocial. Nothing wrong with any of those in moderation, either.
Sequence Six
Member
I think you could say that those are negative qualities especially in a community that depends on human interaction.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
You're probably right. I looked it up in my mail order DSMV and apparently not only could that not apply, but I once described a play made on camera as "crazy." According to the medical criteria laid out in the manual, flashing in Snapcaster to flashback Kolaghan's Command in order to destroy a potentially lethal Cranial Plating isn't technically any form of psychopathology.
He briefly admitting being involved in an "incident" before patting himself on the back for several paragraphs for all the nice things he's been able to do since he got an absurdly small punishment. Watching the reactions on reddit these past few days has made me change my opinion slightly from feeling a little sorry for the guy to being happy he's banned even if WOTC did it for image above anything else. People are actually outraged that a violent criminal is banned from competing in a highly social game. #letzachplay campaign is some of the dumbest shit I've ever seen. The only real cause of outrage should be WOTC not having it clear that certain criminals aren't welcome in sanctioned play.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
It....kind of sounds exactly like you believe Jesse over Rush. Which everyone does because the collective MTG community has Jesse Mason's balls in their mouths for some reason.
His set reviews are on point like half the time and he clearly doesn't know anything about art. There's no real reason to believe Harkey's take over all the other artists, not to mention Mason's opinion that she is the the "best" art director is pretty suspect. I think its a valid criticism to say that she didn't understand what MTG art is supposed to do, which affected her skill at her job.
charlequin
Banned
Good, Cascade sucks and Bloodbraid Elf sucks.
Venters has always been a class act and I'm still disappointed that he's not involved in the game anymore.
Poor baby. It must be so hard for him to have people asking him pointed questions about the time that he violently sexually violated a woman who was too drunk to know what was going on.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
There are a lot of people in Chris's post that back up his side of the story though. There seems to be a lot of agreement that Harkey was a big pain in the ass (which seems to be why they take such issue with saying she's the greatest director).
Sandra Everingham's clarification that Harkey didn't even recruit/hire Terese Nielsen or Rebecca Guay (despite that being basically the premise of the article) makes that entire article a bit suspect on the facts being presented, though.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
I'll take the side of whoever hires Terese Nielsen and Rebecca Guay as the primary artists for every set moving forward.
I can agree to this.
Angry Grimace
Two cannibals are eating a clown. One turns to the other and says "does something taste funny to you?"
Guay hasn't done art for MTG since Lorwyn block, I think. She does gallery art now.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
Well, that's a shame. Still, artists got to eat and Hasbro has got the money.
blindrocket
Member
I'm thinking about trading out of Modern and into Legacy Stoneblade.
Bad decision or terrible decision?
Bad decision or terrible decision?
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
I got yer Stoneforges right here.
Sequence Six
Member
Depends. Why are you making the switch? If you're doing it to stick with a single deck and cut your budget it can be a good move. If you're simply sliding from one format to another then I'm less sure.
e: re: artist discussion I try to fit in a card per artist I like when I make a new casual deck. My only current regret is the lack of useful green-identity Richard Kane Ferguson cards.
Terrible decision unless your local scene is amazing. Even then modern has much more of a future than legacy on basically every level.
But how will I ever be able enjoy modern without Jace-kun?
At least the value of legacy staples is stable.
Per Pete whatshisface, her rates now are really high, wotc would have to shell out a ton to get her time.
blindrocket
Member
Oh, really?
Yes, I'd like to stick with basically one deck that I can change from time to time. Modern is so vast and with the ban threats, price spikes, etc. it just gets tiring for me.
I've said for a long time that Modern is my "favorite" format, but that was ignoring Legacy all together.
My local scene is standard, draft, hey, more standard, hey more draft. There are some players that are into Legacy and Modern but the shops don't support it. That's with three LGS that splits the player base that apparently is too poor to do anything but standard and draft in any good amount of numbers.
I so hoped that the Modern Event Deck and Modern Masters to some extent could spur some other formats but I don't think it's really worked on my local level.
I just want to have fun at this point.
I know that Modern has more of a future, due to cards not getting reprinted for Legacy.
One LGS was doing some Legacy stuff and allowed a certain amount of proxy cards. And I was talking to an LGS owner a few weeks back and he was interested in letting players organize some Modern events because his FNM participation was dropping and was willing to try something different.
T
Transhuman
Unconfirmed Member
Lets burn him, lets burn him on a mountain!
charlequin
Banned
Are you seriously comparing not letting someone play a children's card game with murdering them for vengeance? What the fuck is wrong with you? Like, as a person?
Nah, it'll never get taken seriously cause it inherently sucks as one.
It seemed pretty obvious he wasn't being serious, just using hyperbole for a situation that is very polar. The latter seems entirely unnecessary.
T
Transhuman
Unconfirmed Member
You're basically saying there's a perfect level of torment this guy has to live with for his entire life, anything less and he's getting away with it, and anything more would just be cruel.
The pro tour and organized play are explicitly promotional tools of the game. They do not want him promoting it.
charlequin
Banned
No, I am not "basically saying" that. I am actually saying that there are pleasures and conveniences that he neither deserves nor should particularly be afforded anyway, like being able to participate in leisure activities despite the effect his mere presence has on other participants, or being able to avoid the awkwardness and frustration of having to talk to people about the violent crime he committed (and, at least in regard to this current situation, has shown little remorse or contrition about.)
On the question of WotC's action, yes, there are all kinds of thorny issues. Society has to balance the need to deal with anti-social behavior with the need to protect people's rights and dignity. Instituting eternal, systematic punishments for crimes risks entirely alienating people from society and making the justice system itself a fundamental perpetrator of injustice. Making a habit of banning people without an underlying rule or an announcement is very problematic for the transparency and consistency of the competitive format. That's certainly all true, and plenty of people were reasonably concerned about WotC's specific non-communicative and arbitrary approach to this situation.
But the idea that nobody should ever be subject to any long-term consequences for their actions is absurd and abhorrent. If you punch a waiter, you might get banned for life from the restaurant. If you plagiarize, you might get kicked out of grad school and never be able to get into another one. Hell, just in Magic directly, if you cheat, you could (and should, according to most people posting here) get banned for life, with no possibility of revocation. In order to maintain the integrity of what they do, organizations need some ability to (even permanently) exclude people for problematic things they represent, even if that exclusion isn't the single most strictly correct and accurate "punishment" for what they did -- because the primary goal isn't punishing the person, it's making it so no one else has to interact with them.
Just in general, when your reaction to a story is "well I really feel like the rapist is getting inconvenienced and judged unfairly here," I think it's worth stopping and thinking about whether maybe something fucked up is going on.
This is one of the most well thought out and put together responses to this whole thing and I agree 100%.
I think it's silly that someone convicted and tried of a felony suddenly cannot partake in the 'professional' aspect of a HOBBY has some people up in arms. That society hasn't further shunned him and placed more dire inconveniences in his life means he should be happy about what he got away with. I personally don't feel like he's ever shown remorse or apology to the victim.
The only thing I will say about WotC is they should be more transparent about what constitutes lifetime bans moving forward. And also they should ban people that are shown and proven to be cheaters for life.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWLJZw9Ws-g
You do not want hard and fast rules explicitly because some people on that list have absolutely no business being on it.
charlequin
Banned
I definitely agree. It's a pretty big mistake to spook your pro players by calling attention to the fact that you can technically just ban them for any arbitrary made-up reason at any time. For a company that makes a big deal about "keeping its promises" over nonsense like the Reserved List, it should try to apply the same principle to organized play and have bans emanate from a specific part of the rulebook, even if that part is "we can ban you if your behavior reflects badly on the company and the game."
Oh I agree in terms of what WotC does (in terms of how specific and immutable they should be -- they do need some general-purpose we-can-ban-you rule), the type of concrete policy we have around sexual crimes is a mess and a travesty (and generally disagreed with by even anti-sexual-violence advocacy orgs.) That's more the "do I really want to get passive aggressive in a forum argument about how people are being mean to a sexual abuser?" kind of question.
"God's Beard!"
Member
Like what? Dragging him out of his home and beating the shit out of him? Setting his house on fire? Plastering notices around his neighborhood with his face on them? The idea that he "got away" with anything is something you're making up just to be a jackass to someone on the sex offender registry. He went through the legal system and was turned out when his sentence ended. He didn't "get away" with anything, and the desire to continue to punish him is bullshit just to satisfy yourself. This sort of sentiment is why so many people on the sex offender registry and their relatives are subject to acts of vigilantism.
Nobody in Magic should have even known this stuff about him. It never would have been an issue if Drew Levin didn't drag out his past for no reason other than spite. Wizards' hand was forced because of that and I don't necessarily disagree with their final decision, but don't go around implying Zach Jesse should receive more punishment in his daily life.
[QUOTE="God's Beard!";171019157]Like what? Dragging him out of his home and beating the shit out of him? Setting his house on fire? Plastering notices around his neighborhood with his face on them? The idea that he "got away" with anything is something you're making up just to be a jackass to someone on the sex offender registry. He went through the legal system and was turned out when his sentence ended. He didn't "get away" with anything, and the desire to continue to punish him is bullshit just to satisfy yourself. This sort of sentiment is why so many people on the sex offender registry and their relatives are subject to acts of vigilantism.
Nobody in Magic should have even known this stuff about him. It never would have been an issue if Drew Levin didn't drag out his past for no reason other than spite. Wizards' hand was forced because of that and I don't necessarily disagree with their final decision, but don't go around implying Zach Jesse should receive more punishment in his daily life.[/QUOTE]
So just to make sure I got this correctly, you're taking my stance of saying that if the only thing external to his sentencing is that he can no longer participate professionally in a children's card game he's getting away lightly and turning it around to saying that I think he should be beat up or his house on fire? Get your head out of your ass.
Nobody in Magic should have even known this stuff about him. It never would have been an issue if Drew Levin didn't drag out his past for no reason other than spite. Wizards' hand was forced because of that and I don't necessarily disagree with their final decision, but don't go around implying Zach Jesse should receive more punishment in his daily life.[/QUOTE]
So just to make sure I got this correctly, you're taking my stance of saying that if the only thing external to his sentencing is that he can no longer participate professionally in a children's card game he's getting away lightly and turning it around to saying that I think he should be beat up or his house on fire? Get your head out of your ass.
divisionbyzorro
Member
1) Everybody has their own, personal perspective on how to "forgive" different crimes. For some, it's a rolling window - you are judged by your actions in the past X years, and everything before that is "forgiven." For others, it's every action taken past a certain life milestone - you are judged by actions taken since you hit puberty, or turned 18, or turned 21, or some other point. And for others, it's based on whether "the debt to society" was payed - once you served your time or otherwise made up for what you've done, you're forgiven. This last has a couple of different factions in this case - it's hard to argue that Zach didn't get off light for what he did, and for some that means that his debt will never be payed.
In truth, most of us are some mishmash of the above. So really, this is all to say that some people look at Zach and think he "is" a rapist, while some think he "was" a rapist. Honestly, neither of these viewpoints are unreasonable, which has a lot to do with why this case has so many different and emotional responses from the community.
2) So then the question of "Should Hasbro/WotC ban Zach from playing Magic?" It's important to remember that WotC is playing two different roles here: one of the "brand manager" and one of the "community manager." From the perspective of brand management, I can't fault them at all for banning Zach. Can you imagine if he managed to win the Pro Tour? Do you want to see the headlines on Gawker/Reddit/HPo? "Convicted Rapist Takes Top Prize at Hasbro's Top Magic: The Gathering Tournament." Of course you don't. They don't want to have to explain why there's a photo of them shaking hands with a convicted rapist and handing him a trophy. It doesn't really matter how good of a reason you have for it or how well you can justify it - it's just going to look bad. So you're going to take action to stop it.
So what about the perspective of community management? This goes back to (1). I don't think Zach posed an actual threat to the community (which betrays pretty clearly where I stand with respect to "is vs was"), and banning him doesn't actually make the game any "safer." But I don't know where you draw this line. 10 years feels like enough of a buffer to me, but what about 7? 5? 2? I can't find the right line here.
3) So yeah - writing a personal conduct policy is really hard. All major organized sports have had been struggling with this issue for decades, and honestly, none of them have got it right yet either. I think it's somewhat absurd that Ray Rice will be allowed to play in the NFL this year, for example. So it would be kind of crazy to think that Magic could suddenly get right what nobody else has managed to get right. The difference is that the NFL isn't going to be ruined by one bad egg - they don't have to be as protective of their brand w.r.t. personal conduct as Hasbro does. So it's natural to expect Hasbro to take a more conservative approach.
4) I think the real issue here is the manner in which Wizards tried to sweep this under the rug. He can't play GPs, PTs, or even FNM. His MTGO account gets closed (this is particularly troubling, as they're literally taking product away from him). He wasn't just banned - they full-on blacklisted him, and tried to do it quietly. It doesn't instill a lot of confidence, and it's not unreasonable for others with checkered pasts to be super nervous about their future. And what's worse is how nobody cared until he actually won, which sends the message that rape is only a problem for Wizards once you start to see success. If they really cared, wouldn't they require a check against the sex offender registry when you get your DCI number? It seems super arbitrary (mostly because it is).
I just keep going back to Brian Kibler's comment: "If you want to make a statement about what you value, make an actual statement. Don't silently pass judgement and hide behind PR spin." This whole thing was mismanaged. There are plenty of good reasons to ban Zach Jesse, but to do it silently and hope nobody notices is the wrong way to go about it.
In truth, most of us are some mishmash of the above. So really, this is all to say that some people look at Zach and think he "is" a rapist, while some think he "was" a rapist. Honestly, neither of these viewpoints are unreasonable, which has a lot to do with why this case has so many different and emotional responses from the community.
2) So then the question of "Should Hasbro/WotC ban Zach from playing Magic?" It's important to remember that WotC is playing two different roles here: one of the "brand manager" and one of the "community manager." From the perspective of brand management, I can't fault them at all for banning Zach. Can you imagine if he managed to win the Pro Tour? Do you want to see the headlines on Gawker/Reddit/HPo? "Convicted Rapist Takes Top Prize at Hasbro's Top Magic: The Gathering Tournament." Of course you don't. They don't want to have to explain why there's a photo of them shaking hands with a convicted rapist and handing him a trophy. It doesn't really matter how good of a reason you have for it or how well you can justify it - it's just going to look bad. So you're going to take action to stop it.
So what about the perspective of community management? This goes back to (1). I don't think Zach posed an actual threat to the community (which betrays pretty clearly where I stand with respect to "is vs was"), and banning him doesn't actually make the game any "safer." But I don't know where you draw this line. 10 years feels like enough of a buffer to me, but what about 7? 5? 2? I can't find the right line here.
3) So yeah - writing a personal conduct policy is really hard. All major organized sports have had been struggling with this issue for decades, and honestly, none of them have got it right yet either. I think it's somewhat absurd that Ray Rice will be allowed to play in the NFL this year, for example. So it would be kind of crazy to think that Magic could suddenly get right what nobody else has managed to get right. The difference is that the NFL isn't going to be ruined by one bad egg - they don't have to be as protective of their brand w.r.t. personal conduct as Hasbro does. So it's natural to expect Hasbro to take a more conservative approach.
4) I think the real issue here is the manner in which Wizards tried to sweep this under the rug. He can't play GPs, PTs, or even FNM. His MTGO account gets closed (this is particularly troubling, as they're literally taking product away from him). He wasn't just banned - they full-on blacklisted him, and tried to do it quietly. It doesn't instill a lot of confidence, and it's not unreasonable for others with checkered pasts to be super nervous about their future. And what's worse is how nobody cared until he actually won, which sends the message that rape is only a problem for Wizards once you start to see success. If they really cared, wouldn't they require a check against the sex offender registry when you get your DCI number? It seems super arbitrary (mostly because it is).
I just keep going back to Brian Kibler's comment: "If you want to make a statement about what you value, make an actual statement. Don't silently pass judgement and hide behind PR spin." This whole thing was mismanaged. There are plenty of good reasons to ban Zach Jesse, but to do it silently and hope nobody notices is the wrong way to go about it.
"God's Beard!"
Member
I don't care about the wizards thing so much as that you feel he should be lucky that there isn't continued punishment in his daily life after he left prison. I even said I understand Wizards' decision.
Again, the part I quoted:
Which you just reiterated in your reply.
You're saying that he should expect to be further marginalized despite serving out his sentence. That's what I disagree with. Especially your phrasing of "dire inconveniences", which seems to imply vigilantism.
The sex offender registry is a massive failure that increases crime rates and promotes this attitude you're representing by painting targets on the heads of free citizens. He should never had to deal with this whole fiasco to begin with.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
Yeah. I'm never playing legacy in paper. I got 4 dust gathering Mystics.
[QUOTE="God's Beard!";171028055]I don't care about the wizards thing so much as that you feel he should be lucky that there isn't continued punishment in his daily life after he left prison. I even said I understand Wizards' decision.
Again, the part I quoted:
Which you just reiterated in your reply.
You're saying that he should expect to be further marginalized despite serving out his sentence. That's what I disagree with. Especially your phrasing of "dire inconveniences", which seems to imply vigilantism.
The sex offender registry is a massive failure that increases crime rates and promotes this attitude you're representing by painting targets on the heads of free citizens. He should never had to deal with this whole fiasco to begin with.[/QUOTE]
Dire inconveniences.
Dire. (of a situation or event) extremely serious or urgent.
Inconveniences. trouble or difficulty caused to one's personal requirements or comfort.
Explain to me how those two words imply that I believe he should be the target of vigilantism.
Things that are actually dire inconveniences for being a convicted rapist (or murderer, or insert any other type of criminal): Loss of job, ability to get future jobs, disowned by family and/or friends, prospective future significant others, potential academic admissions, etc. Things that ultimately don't really matter in the grand scheme of things for a convicted rapist: professionally playing a children's card game.
I also like how you say he shouldn't have had to deal with the "whole fiasco" to begin with. Because you know, so many of us human beings struggle with not raping another human being without thinking how that could possibly come back down the line to inconvenience us. Or were you referring to the fact that someone bringing his past under the spotlight shouldn't have?
Again, the part I quoted:
Which you just reiterated in your reply.
You're saying that he should expect to be further marginalized despite serving out his sentence. That's what I disagree with. Especially your phrasing of "dire inconveniences", which seems to imply vigilantism.
The sex offender registry is a massive failure that increases crime rates and promotes this attitude you're representing by painting targets on the heads of free citizens. He should never had to deal with this whole fiasco to begin with.[/QUOTE]
Dire inconveniences.
Dire. (of a situation or event) extremely serious or urgent.
Inconveniences. trouble or difficulty caused to one's personal requirements or comfort.
Explain to me how those two words imply that I believe he should be the target of vigilantism.
Things that are actually dire inconveniences for being a convicted rapist (or murderer, or insert any other type of criminal): Loss of job, ability to get future jobs, disowned by family and/or friends, prospective future significant others, potential academic admissions, etc. Things that ultimately don't really matter in the grand scheme of things for a convicted rapist: professionally playing a children's card game.
I also like how you say he shouldn't have had to deal with the "whole fiasco" to begin with. Because you know, so many of us human beings struggle with not raping another human being without thinking how that could possibly come back down the line to inconvenience us. Or were you referring to the fact that someone bringing his past under the spotlight shouldn't have?
Infinite Stars
Member
Ugh, this sucks. The deck I've been brewing for modern was looking so good until I saw about a third of the deck(Including Sideboards, it's about 16 cards costing $280ish)is stupidly high(I think because of speculators because there's been two spikes). Guess I'll stick to Cockatrice until I can afford it.
One Day, Devoted Sisters, you shall be mine.
One Day, Devoted Sisters, you shall be mine.
Master of the Feast would go against the deck, they draw during my turn so they would be getting double card draw. Also bloodsoaked champion's are in there to recur from my graveyard if they get discarded with Dark Deal. T1 I want to try to remove disruption/spot removal to try to get a deals off t3. I considered Waste Not, but I wouldn't want to top deck it after we already lost our hands, but it would give the deck more consistency as far as janky shit with dark deals is concerned.
It's far and away from being a Sword and it costs nearly as much although in a ramp deck the cost will be effectively much smaller.
Still, it doesn't do anything but ramp, and you need to risk your guys to do it.
Still, it doesn't do anything but ramp, and you need to risk your guys to do it.
I don't think it's on Sword of Blank and Blank power level at all, and it's also legendary. But I think needing to just attack to trigger the ability seems good, especially with Nissa needing lands. Plus we could see Landfall come in BFZ so it could be good with that as well. Elves could be a real thing, as well, and depending on how Elves works after rotation, this could be good.
I agree, but I'm wondering if it's not better to just drop more elf bodies. We'd have to see what Zendikar looks like to say I guess.
I haven't looked at Standard for a long time so I'm approaching it from a Modern mindset.
I haven't looked at Standard for a long time so I'm approaching it from a Modern mindset.
it triggers landfall; which is almost certainly coming back.
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