Devil Rant
General forum
Posted on May 19, 2022, 8:12 p.m. by Stardragon
Devils.
A chaotic force that I think wizard dropped the ball on BIG TIME. For one thing almost no devils deal with chaos with Wildfire Devils and to a much lesser extent Sin Prodder and Vexing Devil being the exceptions. Instead they went with yet another Aristocrat/Sacrifice playstyle I mean come on we have enough of those already it just feels uninspired and lazy on wizards side and with lore of devils being agents of pure chaos and at least on Innistrad servants of demons sent to sow guess what more chaos. And with the half devil walker Tibalt in his first card Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded he is also chaotic in his card effects even if it wasn't the greatest it was memorable at least to me (and not just for being a terrible walker in general) for cementing in my mind that devils are chaos would that way in the future boy was I wrong.
I think they should of went hard on the chaos aspect with things like Chaos Warp and Warp World effects as an etb or boss devil effect as well as Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded's first effect or a Gamble like effects or hell just making search for random from your library without letting you see what one you picked, make people discard cards at random, or dealing damage to a random target (something like when this deals damage to player choose a player, creature or planeswalker at random and deal damage to it instead) and all these effect could be targeted at random players as well: Example when X enters the battlefield choose target player at random (including yourself) that player may search for a random card from library and put into their hand (or where they put is also random be hand, graveyard, exile, battlefield tapped, battlefield untapped, top of library or bottom ect.) than shuffle their library or When X is target of a spell or ability choose a target a random this target becomes the new target of the spell or ability, thing like that.
Would it be good...debatable, would be more interesting and fun I think so, I also think they should add a small amount of anti-instant and sorcery as devils seem to be a wizards bane in ways that punish players for playing those types of spells so such as life loss or random redirection for the effect or something else that just as wacky.
I also feel like they stay away from coin flip aspect since
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I feel like there can be more than one style of chaos and
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The coin thing is more luck than chaotic so it isn't the same for me. (and yes ik you can manipulate the tosses but that brings farther from chaos and being a more roundabout and less reliable control deck all things considered)
I don't mind the devil token for what they are and think they are fine as is just need more support to make them a bit more...spicy
But what do guys think?
Do you agree with me that they should of made devils chaos?
Do you think Sacrifice was the right way to go?
Or do you think they should of taken devils in different route from either Chaos or Sacrifice?
Stardragon says... #3
wallisface No i'm talking about the devil tribe as whole not just one set
For an entire set, you can’t have a whole faction focused entirely around random effects, for multiple reasons. As well as the massive time-sink selecting random targets can create, people generally don’t like games being entirely dictated by chance (theres no point in playing if you can’t influence the outcome). Is wrong, yes MOST people don't like it if they can't control the outcome... But than what do call the coin flip cards? even with all the second chances from other cards you can't control the outcome and yet chaos deck while not prominate are still popular in EDH. As for time sink fuck there are plenty of combo decks that just as time consuming if not more and people still play them that argument holds no water. AND I NEVER said it had to the whole set either did I?
From a competitive standpoint, players generally dislike random/chaotic effects, because reliability/consistency is always more useful for formulating a plan. People won’t competitively play cards that are just as likely to hurt them as they are to help them. WotC generally want their cards to get played.
Not everything revolves around competitive play nor should it and also who cares? Devils have never really seen competitive play over all with a few exceptions so they were never a real competitive tribe to begin with and thats fine. And people do play with cards that are not competitive all the time. This is your weakest argument
creatures can be portrayed very differently on different planes.- I mean kinda but wizards doesn't really do that once they set a style for a tribe almost all other creatures from that tribe act the same even from different planes. Human tribe is the biggest that does follow any specific rules but most do. BUT you are right that they can be.
If you read the whole thing you would of saw that simply stated that i disagree with wizards on the direction they took the devil tribe as a whole and put my 2 cents worth in and what I believe the direction they should've taken since they kinda hinted at it with the earlier devils and flavor texts
May 20, 2022 2:28 a.m.
wallisface says... #4
Stardragon Your response feels pretty combative, especially when my initial comment didn't know the context you were talking about. It's probably not a healthy way to discuss a conversation. Anyway, I'm going to respond to each para in order
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"But than what do call the coin flip cards?" - They are used super sparingly in sets, and are pretty universally unpopular.
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"even with all the second chances from other cards you can't control the outcome and yet chaos deck while not prominate are still popular in EDH. As for time sink fuck there are plenty of combo decks that just as time consuming if not more and people still play them that argument holds no water." - from a competitive standpoint, events have timers. the people that make sets have to be conscious of not introducing mechanics that will bog the game down too much. Combo decks are generally pretty to-the-point from my experiences, but maybe it gets a lot more convoluted in commander. I would still assume each individual card in a combo resolves quicker than any individual "random-target" card.
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"AND I NEVER said it had to the whole set either did I?" - you didn't stipulate what you were referring to, so I took a guess. My bad, but don't shoot me down for working with limited information.
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"Not everything revolves around competitive play nor should it and also who cares? Devils have never really seen competitive play over all with a few exceptions so they were never a real competitive tribe to begin with and thats fine. And people do play with cards that are not competitive all the time. This is your weakest argument" - This comment was made assuming we were talking about a set. If Wotc is designing a set with factions, they generally want each of those factions equally powerful. They're not going to punt one of those factions into uselessness to fill some kind of obscure niche.
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"I mean kinda but wizards doesn't really do that once they set a style for a tribe almost all other creatures from that tribe act the same even from different planes. Human tribe is the biggest that does follow any specific rules but most do. BUT you are right that they can be." - there are a lot of good examples of tribes being entirely different between sets. The example that springs to mind for me is Ixalan, where both goblins, merfolk, and vampires were pretty heavily reimagined.
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"If you read the whole thing you would of saw that simply stated that i disagree with wizards on the direction they took the devil tribe as a whole and put my 2 cents worth in and what I believe the direction they should've taken since they kinda hinted at it with the earlier devils and flavor texts" - I did read the whole thing, but it wasn't the easiest to grasp what you were trying to convey, as it read pretty heated. I understand you don't like where Wotc has directed devils, but I assumed this thread was to get a discussion going on around that, not just having a place to hear your own voice?
May 20, 2022 2:58 a.m.
Stardragon says... #5
They are used super sparingly in sets, and are pretty universally unpopular. While your right and they are use super sparingly and are universally pretty unpopular with competitive players and most causal player once again so what? Its fine to have niche tribe that only a few play because the tribal mechanic is weird a different not every tribe needs to a elf, goblin or merfolk where they played because they lets be real super bland but power. Devils could of very well of a fun niche tribe that spreads chaos like there lore states (at in Ravainca and Innistraid).
from a competitive standpoint, events have timers. the people that make sets have to be conscious of not introducing mechanics that will bog the game down too much. Combo decks are generally pretty to-the-point from my experiences, but maybe it gets a lot more convoluted in commander. I would still assume each individual card in a combo resolves quicker than any individual "random-target" card.
Yes while there plenty of 2-3 card combos in EDH there also up words of at lest 8 that take a full 3-4 minutes to complete to pull off (there maybe more but that was the most I personally have seen). But you do have point that overall each individual combo piece completes it's effect fast than each individual chaos card, but since once again competitiveness doesn't matter to me here does it really matter I a choas devil take 30 seconds over an individual combo piece taking 4 seconds but the overall combo take 30+ or more?
you didn't stipulate what you were referring to, so I took a guess. My bad, but don't shoot me down for working with limited information. 1. Im not shooting any one down let me make that clear 2. After reading om original statement again I only talked about the tribe as whole not individual cards and never about a specific set so i don't how the information was limited in that regard
This comment was made assuming we were talking about a set. If Wotc is designing a set with factions, they generally want each of those factions equally powerful. They're not going to put one of those factions into uselessness to fill some kind of obscure niche.
You are absolutely right about that to point. They only care if it a standard set but not so much a supplemental set from what I've seen. And while it would be fun and great if did that lets be unless devils just explode in popularity (which is unlikely but could) they will never be more a filler/support tribe and never have a set where they are one if the major tribes since than why just go either the much more popular demons instead and risk the set not selling as the same can be said about drakes vs dragons (different topic altogether). But since they will almost never be a mainstream tribe why could they fill a super niche that few would play but some would? I mean that would show that care about the all players playstyles not just the biggest loudest and most popular ways to play and would create a richer and probably healthier play environment (and to be clear im not a huge fan chaos as a whole but I do think it's fun every once in while that's why I also love planeschase and archenemy it adds spice and randomness to the playing field), and think devils should have been the showcase tribe for it.
here are a lot of good examples of tribes being entirely different between sets. The example that springs to mind for me is Ixalan, where both goblins, merfolk, and vampires were pretty heavily reimagined. But were they really? At lest going back to Ixalan Goblins every though they were now monkeys they still had the whole goblin tribe thing go for them, I.E disposable tokens low power but fst attacking cards and some minor burn and artifact hate. The same is true for the vampires mechanically there still care about life with lords and tokens to support them (gaining and spending life) as there core. Merfolk while they a pretty generic tribe that from what i've seen has little identity (other being evasive) to it, just plenty of support throughout that made super popular so i can;t say if Ixlan truly reinvented them
I did read the whole thing, but it wasn't the easiest to grasp what you were trying to convey, as it read pretty heated Was it heated i was just stating my opinion and personal disappointment with they way they took devils and were i personally thought they should taken them. And it maybe writers bias but i thought i was pretty clear what what I was trying to convey
but I assumed this thread was to get a discussion going on around that, not just having a place to hear your own voice? And yes that exactly what i wanted as I did ask everyone there thoughts and weather or not you like the way they took the devil or if agree/disagree with that they should leaned/go all in on the chaos theme there were hinting at in the beginning or if you think they should've taken the tribe on a whole different route from what either is stated (for example maybe you think devils should of been red/green and been a weird gruul control or maybe red/white aggro ect. or maybe they shouldn't of been red or black to begin with and been white/blue sacrifice or something.) Please let me know im genually interested in peoples thoughts on how they think devils should be.
May 20, 2022 9:15 a.m.
Grubbernaut says... #6
In my experience, most people loathe chaos effects, so it doesn't surprise me that they'd avoid it.
May 20, 2022 10:42 a.m.
plakjekaas says... #7
If Devils in Magic are akin to Devils in D&D (both distributed by Wizards of the Coast) then they are the Lawful Evil counterparts to the Chaotic Evil entities that are Demons. Contracts, deals with the devil kind of stuff, not being evil for the sake of evil. Which is kinda weird to translate to the color pie of Magic, red doesn't embody the lawful alignment very well. But that could be why Devils in Magic aren't the Agents of Chaos you think they ought to be.
May 20, 2022 11:07 a.m.
So far, Devil creatures show up in just three planes with any regularity: Ravnica, Innistrad, and New Capennaland. Philosophically, they represent or are aligned with random chaotic destruction on the first two, and work as construction and demolition in the last.
I believe this isn't mechanically represented by randomized effects because the player-planeswalker is assumed to be directing their actions, and not letting them run rampant and act on their own.
I think randomizer cards are best in small doses, or when directed to a goal of finishing the game. On one hand, a Scrambleverse led to one of my most memorable game moments, and Wild Evocation + Possibility Storm + Grip of Chaos holds a place in one of my Horde Magic designs (where it's almost always publicly announced). On the other hand, these effects make it more difficult and unwieldy for the person using them to win, and often the winner comes down to whoever gets the best/least bad random effects. If you enjoy that playstyle, go for it! Just expect that not everyone will, and some people will be actively opposed to it.
May 20, 2022 12:17 p.m.
wallisface says... #9
Personally from a gameplay perspective I think any chaotic effect should be 7+ mana - they’re typically very big-risk-big-rewards effects, so they need to be costed at a point where they don’t mess with competitive play. So, from a design-perspective, i’m fine with Devils doing whatever chaotic nonsense they want at those higher cmc amounts.
As far as “realistic casting costs” go, I’m much more in favour of Devils maintaining their sacrifice-matters identity. I think Mayhem Devil is a great card and example of a Devil done well. Its effect is controllable, but also can incidentally really mess with what at opponent is doing.
May 20, 2022 5:20 p.m.
Stardragon says... #10
plakjekaas no devils from D&D and magic are not the same. MTG devil revel in chaos and destruction more so than demons as they have little intelligence and are more living aspects of depravity and are servants to demons and are used to spread chaos and fear they don't care about concracts or stuff like that... i wouldn't go so as to call chaotic evil since they are just following they natural instincts which just so happens to be destruction and pain but they are far from the lawful evil devils of D&D (That being said Streets of New Capenna threw a wrench in how devil are portraited, they still serve demons but seem to less chaotic and civil even if they still do dirty work)
May 20, 2022 6:56 p.m.
Stardragon says... #11
wallisface I disagree with with the every chaos effect need to 7+ mana as if that was a thing even i would play chaos as it just to unrealistic to a deck that every needs at lest 7 or more. As for cheaper chaos card affecting competitive magic (which seems to what you focus on exclusively) I've never herd of Chaos Warp make any splash and disrupting competitive even though it less than 7 mana nor any other "chaos" card (which is more like gambling than actual chaos since it based on coin flips) being played in competitive with the exception being and i not 100% sure on this Ral Zarek and Stitch in Time for the extra turns gained. So cheaper chaos effect are completely fine.
But you like the sacrifice heavy devils that's fine im not say your right or wrong
May 20, 2022 7:08 p.m.
wallisface says... #12
Stardragon The problem with printing hyper-chaotic effects at lower mana is that it has a high risk of messing with a lot of formats. I get that you (as far as i've gathered) just play casual EDH, but there are a lot of other formats which could be severely impacted by highly chaotic effects at low mana. Stuff like Burning Inquiry can shut down games completely on turn 1 - and effects like that which can end a game immediately by pure chance aren't healthy for a large majority of the formats. I get that you don't play those formats, but it doesn't make the argument any less valid.
As for cheaper chaos effects affecting the format, I'll reference modern specifically for this (as it's the constructed format I play). Yes, there are a lot of chaotic cards that see no play - but that's because they're garbage cards. Whenever wizards prints a "chaos card" that is even remotely close to being powerful, it quickly finds ways to get abused. Tibalt's Trickery was basically insta-banned in modern because it's toxic AF. Likewise, we've seen other "chaotic" cards do very well - Glimpse of Tomorrow and Burning Inquiry are both very "pushed". Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer is a sudo-chaos effect (in that it gives you random access to an opponents cards), and we can see that have massive swings in games (while it's mostly harmless, getting the right card fro its trigger can be pretty game-ending, and isn't a good game-feeling).
Any competitive format with a large selection of "strong" chaotic cards is going to suffer for having them, and be a worse environment to play in, in general. I get that you don't play competitive formats, but that doesn't take away from the point here - Wotc have to be very careful about how they print these kinds of effects (and so far, they mostly have-been). If they enforced that the devil creatures had to be chaotic in nature, I think all that would result in, is them printing very, very few Devils (faar less than what you're seeing at the moment). They would be nigh-non-existent in standard sets, and even in supplemental sets would be extremely rare (as anything printed there could warp Legacy etc)
May 20, 2022 7:44 p.m.
Stardragon says... #13
wallisface your right i only play casual EDH and personally dont care about competitive magic as it warps card prices making things harder to get for people with less income because the secondary market is just a pack of vultures really (also doesn't help that Wizards are shit when comes to meaningful reprints on cards that should be reprint a lot more often but that what this discussion is about)...buuut I get what your saying and that wizards has to be careful with all formats and I had no idea that Tibalt, Glimpse and Inquiry hit the meta so hard (again no surprise seeing as i dont care). So putting that in mind even if they couldn't make devil pure chaos they didn't have to make them yet another sacrifice based playstyle we have enough of them already and they could of done something for interesting with them and given them more a of a identity instead of just weaker demon
May 20, 2022 8:08 p.m. Edited.
Hmmm. Hard to say. I think devils in MtG have a lot of room to be further defined beyond that initial narrow Ravnica viewpoint. IMO a good difference would be: wanton & destructive evil vs. calculated badness. One place I would agree on is that Devils have alot of space for improvement. I think your peon-level devil tokens are fine as representations of agents of wanton destruction & I've actually done alot with them. I think Zurzoth, Chaos Rider deserves more credit BTW.
I think the MtG community is way too narrow on their scope of how chaos has to function in the game. As you said Stardragon coin flips are easily manipulated into an inefficient control concept, I barely consider them chaos, in that, the end result is typically just manipulated so much. I think polymorphing is an example of a form of chaos that could be explored further with lord-level devels (which we've had very few of so far). The DnD set has been strong at exploring dice-roll types of chaos with variable effects that benefit you in chaotic ways. The Wand of Wonder is the best kind of chaos that could be explored. The Deck of Many Things is chaos that could be explored further. Oath of Druids again, is chaotic as hell, but is not chaos by traditional MtG community definition. I think it is not fair to say "chaos is hated", when chaos has been poorly-defined & only just being explored in new ways. I also do not carry the same hate for say: Wild Evocation as some of those other examples.
I so want a Devil-lord of transformation that causes a forced polymorph for everyone.
May 20, 2022 10:55 p.m.
Stardragon says... #15
Gleeock I agree that Zurzoth, Chaos Rider is great and overlooked and is actually my favorite devil..but the problem is he mono red (not a problem with me personally, i never agreed with wizards making devils rakdos in color and wish they stuck with mono-red) but unfortunately wizards did make devils rakdos so and some of the best devils (other than Zurzoth) are mono black like Stone-Throwing Devils, Asmodeus the Archfiend and Lorcan, Warlock Collector or are in rakdos colors like the new spoiled Mahadi, Emporium Master and Raphael, Fiendish Savior (which will be the go to commander for tribal now) and Mayhem Devil. Now they are great mono red devils to but unfortunately not enough to warrent a mono red build at this time (particularly the lack of good boss level mono red devils and decent low level devils)
May 21, 2022 10:32 a.m.
Haha well Stardragon You can see me scattered across threads here & there talking about how devils should be expanded upon particularly in relation to the aspect of the color identity. Raphael, fiendish Savior will be a good one (though again in the DnD type of way...not very chaotic). Lifelink stapled across multiple hell-tribes will be pretty good. I wish Kardur, Doomscourge was a Devil, seems like a missed opportunity to not make him a lord-level devil with that ability & aesthetic.
May 21, 2022 5:19 p.m.
plakjekaas says... #17
Zurzoth, Chaos Rider is to devils what Chatterfang, Squirrel General is to squirrels. A tribal commander that doesn't need any members of its own tribe in the deck yet still feel like a tribal deck.
May 22, 2022 5:26 a.m.
Stardragon says... #18
Gleeock your right Kardur, Doomscourge could have been a devil i should add him to my devil deck i got 2 demons in there atm a third won't hurt
May 22, 2022 8 a.m.
Stardragon I found it pretty comical that after this conversation the upcoming set has Balor - who is the exact statline of the type of Devil MtG should have... with chaos/punishment..... Except he is a demon in Tear eyed laughing face
To be fair though, DnD "Demons" are basically the kind of MtG "Devils" that you are looking for.
May 28, 2022 10:03 a.m.
Stardragon says... #20
Gleeock he would be great even if he is a demon if they add random to ability like
target opponent draws 3 card and discards 3 cards at random
target opponent sacrifices a non token artifact
Balor deal damage to a random target opponent equal to the number of cards in another ramdom target opponents hand
would be true chaos but this most likley the closest to what i want that Wizards will print
wallisface says... #2
I assume you’re referring to Capenna?? If not, i’m not sure where this is coming from - so my response is assuming we’re addressing that set.
Some thoughts:
For an entire set, you can’t have a whole faction focused entirely around random effects, for multiple reasons. As well as the massive time-sink selecting random targets can create, people generally don’t like games being entirely dictated by chance (theres no point in playing if you can’t influence the outcome). While devils don’t encompass any one faction, there’s many reasons why making them do ultra-chaotic effects in-bulk is unrealistic.
From a competitive standpoint, players generally dislike random/chaotic effects, because reliability/consistency is always more useful for formulating a plan. People won’t competitively play cards that are just as likely to hurt them as they are to help them. WotC generally want their cards to get played.
creatures can be portrayed very differently on different planes. That being said, many of the devils on capenna still capture the “trickery” and “mischief” aspects of devils well, imo.
May 19, 2022 10:55 p.m.