It's obvious that anon is clueless and making shit up, but what gets me about things like this is that it's not hard to have a conversation with a child if they do feel this way. "At your age, there are no surgeries. But if you want, you can pick out clothes that feel nice, you can use pronouns that feel right, and you can even pick a different name for us to call you. When you're older, if you still feel like it's the right choice, we'll talk about it then."

I have a kid who lived as a girl for a while because he thought he was trans. It was for like a year. I spoke about the ignorant reaction from the education system at a government committee, but that was the only downside. Nothing bad happened. He wore dresses, grew his hair out, took the name I would have given him if he was born a girl, and then said "I think I'm a boy after all" and we changed it all back. He wasn't hurt by it. And if he really was trans, this would have made him feel confident and safe and loved.

Now, years later, his sister and he openly talk to me about everything. Just a few weeks ago they happily opened up to me about if they like girls or boys or both, and I didn't have that with my parents as a queer kid.

Transphobes are scared of made up problems. Just nothing.

The big issue I see with making standard rotate with every set launch is that it would further exacerbate the already significant issue of standard being an expensive format to follow by forcing people to buy new decks even more often.

I'm not quite sure I follow. Aren't a lot of multicolored cards things that couldn't exist in either one of their colors alone? I understand that you have to be careful about that with hybrid cards, but I'm not sure what the issue is with non-hybrid multicolored cards doing it.

Unfinity is honestly my most anticipated set of the year. Unstable was one of the  most fun draft environments I ever played in.

**cough, cough** Add purple as a sixth color. People can either just get used to it or be mad about it. Eventually, a sixth color will need to be added, especially with questions like these and the fact that there are only so many permutations of abilities without coming up with something completely new and different. Besides, everything needs a counterbalance and five of anything automatically means one of them isn't balanced.

The main issue I see with adding a sixth colour is trying to find a way to make it stand out from the other five. What mechanical identity would purple have that wouldn’t just be taking abilities from the existing colours? 

They did? I completely missed that in the story. I thought that Giada was the last angel and that with her gone, there were no angels anymore.

I’ll admit, I didn’t realize the new art was showing a cephalid until I saw someone pointing it out. I thought it was just a merfolk. They look so different compared to past cephalids that I didn’t make any connection between them.

I'm not saying destroy the creature, just put it on the bottom of the player's library without giving the option to put it on top. I said I understand that most cards that do this have the card go to the bottom of a library if it's coming from the graveyard. Putting a creature on the bottom of a library from the battlefield is not destroying a creature. Can we see cards that do this?

Mark’s point was that putting a creature on the bottom of it’s owner’s library is “functionally” destroying it. You are removing it from play in a way that will likely prevent your opponent from getting access to it again without using another card to retrieve it.

I would probably have to say B. I think that a lot of the cards from MH2 were fine power-wise, but I think the higher power cards from the set were pushing things a bit too far.

Personally, I loved that the Mystical Archive cards were in draft boosters. It made some otherwise expensive cards a lot more accessible. It was also fun getting to play with some high power old cards in limited without having to pay $20 per booster.

Inquiries and Assistance

During the week, the current judge (hi, it’s me, Abelzumi!) is usually around the workshop to answer some questions and clarify statements. Sometimes that’s great, and sometimes other things come up. I’m curious about some stuff, so lemme know: when should the current judge intervene with an entry? I have my opinions and ideas, but input is always welcome.

Always: When there’s no artist credit

Self-explanatory. We’ll remind you via Tumblr PMs. If you’re unable to be reached and we know you’re on Discord, we might ping you there. If you don’t respond, well, sorry, your entry won’t be counted.

Always: When the card/art is directly offensive, bigoted, NSFW

This has never come up. Thank goodness. If it does, we’ll tell you, and if you don’t reply and/or you double down, we’ll have to have a serious conversation.

Perhaps: When we need clarification

Spelling errors, formatting weirdness, questionably relevant entries—I’ve reached out before when there’s stuff that doesn’t seem quite right. Now, I don’t ask about other judges’ private messages, so I don’t know if I’m alone in that, but that’s the gist. I can’t recall a specific example, but it’s happened. Is this something for which you, yes you, as a fairgoer, would like a judge to reach out? Let us know!

Perhaps: When a card doesn’t meet the criteria

This is a tough one. I’ve had common contests before where people submitted uncommons, where the specifics aren’t reached. And, well, that’s a problem, but… Do you want us to tell you? We’re all at least thirteen if we’re on Tumblr, and I’m way past that, and, well, we assume you have reading comprehension if you’re playing this game. But if you misread or if there’s miscommunication and the entry doesn’t fit what we’re after, would you like to be reminded?

Never: When we do/don’t like a card

I’ve had to bite my tongue a few times giving feedback on entries over a week. Like, in the workshop, people have seen me talk about cards when I’m not judging, but during the week I’m only here for clarification and the like. I do like some entries and I don’t like others. I think some cards are good and that some cards definitely need improvement. And what do we say until judgement? Nada. This is a standard of the Fair and something really, really hard to do sometimes. Gushing feels bad and judging comes later. Impartiality is important for even footing.

So with that in mind, as participants, when would you like the current judge to reach out? What are you worried about/confident in with your entries? As always, we strive to improve, as we know you do as well, every day.

— @abelzumi​

I can definitely see the benefits of reaching out if the intent behind someone’s design is unclear or if they seem to have missed a detail of the challenge.

“Two Mechanics” Commentary: It All Comes Together

Well, this was a surprisingly popular contest. I know there was a fair bit of hype for it, but we got enough entries that I had to worry about shutting people out. That’s unusual to say the least, but quite pleasing to know that so many people are engaging.

I’m going to take a lesson and look at these from the lens of intention rather than explicit nit-pickiness. There will be a “nitpicks” part at the end, but that’s just for minor improvements if need be. I make small mistakes like that all the time, and if you wanna ignore that and focus on the commentary, feel free to do so. However, the nitpicks are reflections of polish. The extent to which something has nitpicks does affect judgement. 

Additionally! If you’re reading this, we’d like to know: do you read your own commentary, all the commentary, or do you skip it entirely? And if you’re skipping some or all of the commentary, what would help you engage with it? I would like to point out that reading the comments on everyone’s cards can potentially help with your own experimentation in the future and help with design choices. However, if that’s not what you’re after, we would like to know how to improve that experience.

Some cards are marked as “JUDGE PICKS,” which are cards that were close to being runners-up or winners but, for lack of space, are presented here as examples instead.

Let’s get to your wonderful blends.

Keep reading

I’ll admit, this was my first time entering one of these, and I didn’t even think about the rarity of the card. If I had, I probably would have put the card at rare.

We’ve got a new survey up for Zendikar Rising! Let us know what you think of the set.

Help us make Magic better.

I just finished filling it out.  For the most part, I quite like the set. It’s just some of the choices that have been made around it that I’m less in favour of.

I've been doing some thinking over the last couple of days about why so many of the recent Magic products have rubbed me the wrong way, and why I've been having a harder time getting excited to build new decks lately after playing this game for over 15 years. Over half of the products released in the last year were things that I was told were "not for me". It's starting to feel like what I'm really being told by Wizards of the Coast is that this game isn't for me.

I’ve been getting a lot of feedback today. I’d like to ask the following two questions:

1) Would you like to see Magic have cards with other IPs on them, yes or no?

2) If, yes, how would you like us to do them?

I’m not against seeing other IPs on Magic cards.

I’d prefer if cards that feature other IPs were available as alternate arts/names of regular cards. For example, I would be fine with the Walking Dead cards if we were going to be getting regular Magic versions of the cards in Commander Legends. Then the Secret Lair is not the only way to get these cards. It becomes something more akin to how Duel Decks used to let you get access to a few cards from a new set before launch.