Highlander Magic

Rules for this thread (plz read before posting)

* everyone in the community is allowed to post once in this thread (i want no discussion, your second post will deleted without any further warning, for reasonings please continue posting on Thoughts about the current HL-Situation (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=882.msg8364#msg8364))
* plz let me know which mulligan you prefer:
A) current hl "spoils-mulligan" (also known as "poker-mulligan")
B) free mulligan (u may reject your hand and draw 7 new cards)
C) "road to paris" (official mulligan, draw one card less each time)
D) anything else (+ description)
E) you don't care
* reasons for your decision voluntarily

___________________________________

part of Watch List Changes Season II - 2013

Mulligan:

Current "spoils-mulligan" (also known as "poker-mulligan") has been a subject of a discussion lately, namely in these threads:

Thoughts about the current HL-Situation (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=882.msg8364#msg8364)
The Spoils-Mulligan Problem (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=913.msg8845#msg8845)
Banlist changes I. of 2013 (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=908.msg8768#msg8768)

Main arguments gathered from the feedback have been:

1. With spoils-mulligan interaction starts earlier and games are decided more often on the first turns, making the format too fast
2. Aggro benefits from spoils more by being able to aggressively "curve out" whereas combo/control can't establish in same efficiency with answers their fundamental turn
3. Mulligan is exploited solely for mana-fixing by lowering the amount of lands in a build, and as a standard strategy "deep mulligan" is then used
4. Designing mana bases requires currently little to no thinking, as restrictions set by color wheel don't apply due to mulligan mana-fixing in place; people can play in Bant Eternal Witness as well as Cryptic command with ease
5. Spoils-mulligan is no longer needed as available mana producing lands printed since 2007 is sufficient now
6. Spoils mulligan is not in line with official DCI-rules making the tournaments "non-sanctionable" and harder for new players to enter

The original spoils-mulligan was borrowed back in 2007 from the same name card game to improve the old mulligan rule to make Highlander games more interactive and address the "mana screw & flood" issues, which were observed to be more common in Highlander due to larger deck sizes (see: faq #12). This was the main motivation for the new mulligan as the games were viewed to be decided by a random chance caused by an outdated mechanic rather than any real interaction or play choices happening. In time this was viewed also to result in more card variety and deck diversity.

This was also ultimately the viewpoint of the council in which we looked at the big picture of pros and cons (spoils mulligan vs. regular paris mulligan) and though not unanimously, we decided to keep the current spoils mulligan without a need to open a trial for the regular mulligan at this point (as was the case with 3 month transition period in 2007). We viewed that the mana flood/screw happening is such a turnover for the game, that minimizing it for HL-format is a benefit outweighing the above points.

However, this does not mean that the verdict is final for mulligan as we're constantly monitoring the state of the game. This said, we encourage players to test the format in local tournament play with regular paris mulligan, and we'd appreciate if you can then report back to forums the findings whether regular mulligan compared to spoils improved the play experience.

edit by pyyhttu: Linked the mulligan thread that should be used for discussion.

C) Keep it close to the official Formats. Punish the greedy manabases.

 A)

Obvious, grow a pair!

I hope we get _a lot_ posts here.

Quote from: Vazdru* everyone in the community is allowed to post once in this thread (i want no discussion, your second post will deleted without any further warning

Want to remind: So that your second post won't get deleted, please use for discussion about mulligan the earlier opened thread: Thoughts about the current HL-Situation (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=882.msg8364#msg8364) (or we can merge too...)

I've leaned lately more and more on:

C) "road to paris" (official mulligan, draw one card less each time)

For reasons, this post (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=882.msg8547#msg8547) sums my thoughts quite well.

c) > b) > rest imho

as already mentioned get closer to the oficial formats, and punish greedy manabases. A 'free' mulligan is not too bad as well but I'd prefer c) over it.

One free mulligan to get a second chance, if you are manascrewed.

B > C >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> A

C)

I think option B might work pretty well too, but simple "paris" - mulligan gets a nod from me because of its simplicity.

Vazdru summarized the biggest reasons for the change pretty well. Only thing I want to add: Nobody would propose a change like this just because they can. Please, try it out or give it a reasonable thought yourselves before dismissing it. I think Spoils was a very good mulligan rule when it was needed, but I honestly feel we can do better without it.

EDIT: Just to clarify:

C > B >>>>>> A

A)
Adds more depth to the game.

A ... if you want the official formats, just play those (and enjoy the total randomness that 40 card limited draws have)

B) > C) >> D) (Commander X-1) >>> A)

I expect this will eliminate a couple of problems HL currently has (cheat mana/curve) and the flaws Magic has in general (flood/screw). Enough food for thought in the mentioned topics.

C) No more cheating for land count, aggro decks no longer have - or need to have - perfect curve every game.

Quote from: Nastaboi on 14-07-2013, 11:09:58 AM
C) No more cheating for land count, aggro decks no longer have - or need to have - perfect curve every game.

This and what i wrote in my thread.

After more thinking, i think B) is the best solution. B > C > A.

I think we need to avoid "no land" punishments from C and avoid a cheated land count/perfect curve from A.

A) personally

but as council member i won't ignore the feedback of the HL community - a clear majority will definitely influence my vote in October

as you can easily discover already two council members have voted C, so it's no secret that there could be a change concerning mulligan rule next ban-season

my personal view:

A) spoils	C) trip to paris
adds a another strategic element to the game	-
reducing randomness of the game	-
= better players and deck buiders have higher chances to win	-
higher chance to get a competitive opening hand	-
lower chance to have a mulligan to 6, 5 ...	-
= higher chance to take part in the game	-
= higher chance to have the deck to do what its built for	-
reduce the number of land cards you have to play = more slots for some "exotic" cards	-
-	lower number of brutal openings
-	mana fixing becomes more important, less multicolor-decks
-	less special hl rules

imo B) could be some kind of compromise but i can't see the necessity for a change
C) looks horrible for me as I played Singleton for about one year...and the official mulligan was quite stupid and frustrating all the time ... you will understand that feeling if you have to mulligan to one-lander 4-card hand in a deciding 3rd game

A)

absolutely A)! i believe this is one reason why i love this format so much. it delivers "games". mulliganing is frustrating for the person who does it and when happening more than once then it becomes weird for the other person too: he either feels bad or acts like he does. no game of magic then. AND it adds another very interesting dimension to the game. i see people spoil mulliganing soo wrong very often, which is sometimes baffling but at the same time, it just proofs, that its a skill thats gotta be developed and strengthened. spoil mulliganing is not a no-brainer, it can be complex.

A)

Makes the format more Unique and less fustrating then mulligan to 4 :/

Really hard to decide, I vote for
A)

although I could accept B) as an alternative

A) has all been said.

A

B > C >>>>>>> A

A)

A

A) because reasons.

C > B > A

All reasons have already been mentioned by others.
On a sidenote i think it's interesting that many Finish players vote C, while many Berlin-bsed players vote A. Wonder why this comes...

D)

I like the commander mulligan which is a mix out of A) and C)
You put away X cards and draw X -1


Edit:
PS: Im also a Berlin-bsed player.

B)

A > B >>>>> C

Reason behind this is well summed in Vazru's post. Our group used old mulligen two more years, since the new mulligen rule was established. Transition to new rule was percieved as a major update by most players. It delivered more interaction, less mana screws and less color screws.

Nothing is more boring, than situation when one player is flooded and can't do anytnihing, while the second player strugles to get to three mana, to be accually able to play what he wants.

Even now it can happen, that player does not find his lands after spoil mulligen. Taking mulligen to 5 is almost guarantied loss. These type of games brings nothing but boredom and frustration to both players. When playing casually, these games are lost time. It is worth to let the oponent draw to 7 in order to enjoy the game. Spoils mulligen solves this issue better than any other form of mulligen.

Some myths:
It is confusing to new players - we repeat HL rules to every attendant at the beginning of every tournament that we organise. More experienced players should be also able to help to new players and explain the rules. After few games, the new player gets used to it. It will cause him more problems to adapt his deck to metagame and learn how to play against all the archetypes, that he can face.

Less shuffling - when opening hand is bad with either mulligen, you have to shuffle. It is almost guarantied to take more mulligens with paris.

More cards gets played with paris - more lands = less spell slots. Obviously mixed logic applied here. There will be more tension to get rid of more high casting spells in non agro builds (agro doesn't play those cards). Getting something that cost 6 mana on opening hand is almost mulligen.

D or B, cause A) is just a fishing for that one card that will win you the game

A)

The spoil-mulligan makes games more interactive, less random and adds a new level of depth to the game. You need skill to determine which cards to keep against which opponents. Both players get to keep a decent hand. The format would suffer from the regular mulligan, as it would reward decks with a high level of redundancy, mainly one- or two-color aggro decks, and thus lessen the variety of decks played. It might be true that some people exploit the spoil-mulligan, but that's a small price to pay compared to all the benefits it brings to the format. The spoil-mulligan is good for the format and should be preserved.

A)It brings far more strategy ino play and it reduces the screw probability. With 3-4 less lands to play there is also more room for rarely played cards.

A) We have a nice Meta. Lots of good different decks are possible.

A

Quote from: phyrexianblackmetal on 15-07-2013, 01:17:43 AM
[...]The spoil-mulligan makes games more interactive, less random and adds a new level of depth to the game. You need skill to determine which cards to keep against which opponents.[...]

That sums it up pretty good.

B

B

B > C >>>>>>>> A

Personal preference is B (> C >>> A).

You can make three main 'arguments' for A:

- it does require some skill to make good use out of it (granted, this adds a new element to the game)
- more room for (pet) business cards (everyone loves to run more business, but this isn't really an argument in my eyes)
- gives players the chance to keep an otherwise unplayable hand thus ensuring interactivity (but that's what other mulligan rules can provide, too).

However, I see them getting outweighed by two really crucial disadvantages the spoils mulligan causes:

- enabling super greedy manabases, even in control decks (my main concern: in 4 colour decks an important fetchland in the opener is almost guaranteed while keeping the land count as low as possible; no reason to run less than three colours)
- curving out a perfect hand (which strenghtens proactive strategies more than reactive ones).

I'd like to test option B for maybe half a year just to try it out. If people don't like it, it can still be reverted via another poll or something.

Einige Überlegungen zum Mulligan.

Zunächsteinmal bin ich dankbar dafür, das jemand mir zuvor gekommen ist über Neuerungen beim Mulligan nachzudenken.
Ich bin seit dem ersten Hl Gp dabei und habe seit etwa einem Jahr den Eindruck, dass der Mulligan eine
Überarbeitung benötigt.

Ich versuche mich kurz zu fassen:
Ich finde das Argument alle anderen Formate haben einen regulären Mull....Highlander muss auch ....nicht relevant.
Das Format sollte so gut wie möglich und nicht so angepasst wie möglich sein.

Ich finde der Muligan bedarf einer Reform, da einerseits genügend Länder zum fixen der Manabasis
zur Verfügung stehen Land/colorscrew war das zentrale Argument für die Einführung des HL Mullis.

Und anderserseits der Mulligan wie er jetzt ist einige sonderbare (ungünstige) Effekte generiert.
Z.B. begünstigt er Combodecks. Er lädt dazu ein sonderbare Goodstuffmulligans zu nehmen/ und Decks schlechter (unkonstanter)zu bauen als möglich, weil es den Muli gibt (Bei all meinem echten Respekt Denke ich an Patriks Decks) und an Aggrodecks die viel viel zu wenig Länder spielen aber der Mull Ihnen diese Kühnheit erlaubt.

Vorschlag: 1 Highlander - Eine Karte spoilen.
Regulärer Mull ist möglich.

Mfg Wasser

;)


 

A

A

C.) Good ol' road to Paris. Spoiling is nice, but sometimes a little lame.

C

Don't leave it as it is please.

C is good

C) It makes deck building more interesting and follows official line.

E. The format needs diversity, both for archetypes and card selection in deck construction. I don't feel strongly for any of the options.

I strongly recommend A.).

I posted my reasons http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=882.105 (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=882.105)

B

A > B >>>>>> C

Sorry, but road to paris is the number one bug in traditional magic.. first you got only lands, then you got no lands, then you got no chance.

A>B please not C

C > B >>>>>> A

A>B. Not C

D) As a Highlander we spoil "one" Card.

If I had to choose from abc I dont like ABC. But choose C.

Try to think about my Idea of spoiling one Card!

D) The EHD Mulligan as I proposed it and explained my reasons here: http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=913.new#new (http://www.magicplayer.org/forum/index.php?topic=913.new#new)

Imho B) and C) also would be acceptable. But A) is a no (more) go!

C) "road to paris"

B 

One free Mulligan and then the "Road to Paris".

I think the greedy manabases should be punished. Too many 4 to 5-color decks nowadays and they constantly have good mana due to the spoiled mulligan.

Quote from: NerfHerder on 22-07-2013, 03:00:25 PM
Hi all,

Achim from Germany//BW here. Maqi asked me to register and to "vote".

I have to admit I don't care, if about a Free Mulligan or a Paris Mulligan, but from my point of view, the Spoils mulligan is getting more and more powerful with each set. I also have to say, I'm really a kind of person which likes to see the most variety of cards possible.

The spoils mulligan makes every deck more consistence. POINT. I guess thats a fact.

Without that mulligan, all deck designer have to go a step backwards, away from the super-greedy manabases. I'd like to see this...

So my vote is: against the spoils mulligan, with a small favour to a the free mulligan [edit =B) (THG-style - so with the chance of a mulligan to 6, to 5 and so on afterwards).

Laters!

NerfHerder

I think the right Way to go back to Normality is "C". All other Formats has the same Form of Mulligan, and for myself is this the best Way to "restart" the Game.

B

A!

A>>B>C

Vote for B) free mulligan

A!!!

C

A! For more variability in the format. If we would change the mulligan to B or C many people will change their decks into one or two colored decks because of the solid manabase they don't have to mulligan as much as a multicolored deck.

B or C

This will kill my LD Deck but i think it's interesting to test someone new ...

C would help highlander to come closer to dci-rules.

A.

Definitely.

And both of my HL-playing sons agree with me.

Although the arguments advanced in favor of the other options are mostly logical, I point out the following:

1. The current mulligan rule has been a defining characteristic of the game, and removing it will fundamentally change its identity.
2. Everybody who builds a deck understands the pros/cons of the mulligan, and can therefore choose and design his deck accordingly. In other words, the playing field is already level. (Example: if I am building a slow deck, and I understand that an aggro, or perhaps combo, deck might be too fast against me, I can choose to (a) try a different archetype, OR (b) select more cards that will keep me in the game until my deck starts to click.)

• B
  
  Why not A? Well, there are some weird decks around that exist just because of the spoils mulligan. Very greedy... and I do not like it.
  
  C? Why should we care about the DCI??? HL is a format completey run by players, the community has some kind of influence which cards get the ban hammer and which get unbanned. You can talk to and play with the people that make these decisions. Why should we throw away this advantage? I don't get it.
  
  (+ more a personal thing: I like to play golden bordered cards and cards from Collectors / International edition... it saves so much money!)

B

preliminary result:

                                    

NO.	A) SPOILS	B) FREEMULLIGAN	C) ROAD TO PARIS	B) over A)	D) OTHER
1	W0lf (Ger, Berlin)	Payron (Ger, East)	pyyhttu (Fin)	Payron (Ger, East)	Goblin-Diplomaten (Ger, Berlin)
2	berlinballz (Ger, Berlin)	guru (Ger, East)	Tiggupiru (Fin)	guru (Ger, East)	Firestorm Hellkite
3	tonytahiti (Ger, Berlin)	hitman (Ger, BW)	Nastaboi (Fin)	hitman (Ger, BW)
4	Tabris (Ger, Berlin)	mox-fanatic (Ger, BW)	Lightstorm (Fin)	mox-fanatic (Ger, BW)
5	dynagfx (Ger, Berlin)	NerfHerder (Ger, BW)	kasta (Fin)	NerfHerder (Ger, BW)
6	Absolem (Ger, Berlin)	orca- (Ger, BW)	oze (Fin)	orca- (Ger, BW)
7	Vazdru (Ger, BW)	Doks (Ger, NRW)	SirGalahad (Ger, NRW)	Doks (Ger, NRW)
8	Maqi (Ger, BW)	MMD (Ger, NRW)	MarcMagic (Ger, NRW)	MMD (Ger, NRW)
9	goblinpiledriver (Ger, BW)	LasH (Ger, NRW)	Wasser (Ger, NRW)	LasH (Ger, NRW)
10	Orkpopper (Ger, BW)	coldcrow (Ger, NRW)	Pennywise (Ger, Berlin)	coldcrow (Ger, NRW)
11	peeler (Ger, NRW)	ChristophO (Ger, North)	cagain (Ger, BW)	ChristophO (Ger, North)
12	WitH-FuLL-Force (Ger, BW)	JohnnyComboplayer (Ger)	Syras (Ger, BW)	JohnnyComboplayer (Ger)
13	effect (Ger, East)	~fenry~ (Ger)	helle (Ger)	~fenry~ (Ger)
14	BallLightning (Cze)	crazy_malamute (Ger)	Assariah ()	crazy_malamute (Ger)
15	Thaddeus (Cze)	carte_blanche (Ger)	Lancelot ()	carte_blanche (Ger)
16	nahkampfhamster (Ger)	azmotus (Fin)	cron ()	azmotus (Fin)
17	phyrexianblackmetal (Ger)	so_not (Fin)		so_not (Fin)
18	haju (Ger)	eliitti ()		eliitti ()
19	flashfreeze (Ger)			MarcMagic (Ger, NRW)
20	Madsam (Ger)			SirGalahad (Ger, NRW)
21	EntenMagier (Ger)			helle (Ger)
22	oschmael (Ger)			kasta (Fin)
23	JK (Ger)			Firestorm Hellkite
24	rdyl (Ger)			Nastaboi (Fin)
25	meteora (Ger)
26	grizzledmage (USA)

                                    

A > D (commander one) > B > C


I´m from SVK :-)

C

A

B > C >>>>>> A

A. Among few other things, the Spoils mulligan is what made this format unique and so much better than others.

I think we should close this poll for now and reopen it couple of months later, when everybody has actually played with both and metagame has adapted to free mulligan.

Quote from: Nastaboi on 22-10-2013, 05:14:58 PM
I think we should close this poll for now and reopen it couple of months later, when everybody has actually played with both and metagame has adapted to free mulligan.

right, decision has been made for next months
Poll will be relaunched in time