\n\n\n\n\n\n\nOne thing I thought about while reading that series was how long it took for the creators to start thinking clearly about design, even on a very basic level.
\nThere\u2019s a clear pattern across many of the early sets where it looks like the designers only thought about a card in some hypothetical context they had in mind for it, and ignored how likely that context was. \u00a0An ability that only functions in a rare situation is, obviously (I would think?), much less valuable than the same ability without the restriction. \u00a0But the designers didn\u2019t seem to realize this, and would print cards that did mediocre things in rare situations while appearing to believe they were printing mediocre cards, not bad ones.
\nThe post on Ice Age block begins with a discussion of the card Balduvian Shaman, which I actually assumed was a parody\u00a0until I read the accompanying blog text. \u00a0Balduvian Shaman is a blue 1/1 for U with the following rules text:
\n\nPermanently change the text of target white enchantment you control that does not have cumulative upkeep by replacing all instances of one color word with another. For example, you may change \u201cCounters black spells\u201d to \u201cCounters blue spells.\u201d Balduvian Shaman cannot change mana symbols. That enchantment now has Cumulative Upkeep: (1).
\u201cWasn\u2019t Magic founded by a bunch of math Ph.Ds?\u201d I thought. \u00a0\u201cHow could they have not thought about probability?\u201c \u00a0Which made it especially strange to read, in the very next paragraph:
\n\nWhat sort of designer would think that such fiddly, bean-counting cards would be fun? If you guessed college guys studying math and physics, you\u2019d be right! Skaff Elias\u2019s feature article is pretty essential background material here, so go read that instead if you were looking for actual history.
Some versions of this problem was around at least as late as Weatherlight, which was supposed to be a graveyard-seemed set, but which didn\u2019t appreciate that players would only treat their graveyards differently\u00a0if the graveyard-related abilities were sufficiently powerful (creating an incentive to shift other behavior to accommodate them).
\nBalduvian Shaman is better than it sounds because of white\u2019s ten-ubiquitous Circle of Protection : [color] enchantments, you can maindeck Circles of Protection and then change them to the colors your opponent has
\nI mean it isn\u2019t GOOD, but it\u2019s not quite as much an edge case as you think
\nOh! \u00a0That\u2019s cool, the card makes some sense to me now
Even as I was writing, I realized\u00a0Balduvian Shaman wasn\u2019t an ideal example of the phenomenon I meant, because the necessary conditions are all things you can control. \u00a0The really bad cases are ones that only work if your opponent does something, especially something easily avoidable.
The clearest cases are where they introduced a mechanic on a few not-great cards and then added hosers for that mechanic (bands with other, snow-covered lands). \u00a0The mechanic never takes off because cards with the mechanic are always\u00a0\u201cmaybes\u201d for inclusion and the hosers mean they\u2019re slightly worse than the alternative\u00a0\u201cmaybes,\u201d and then since no one uses the mechanic cards, the hosers become totally\u00a0useless, so no one uses them either.
and the Ward enchantments, a cycle of one white mana “protection from X” creature enchants
I think I might have been at this even earlier than you guys, I remember the changes when the ideas of “card advantage” and “the mana curve” were first popularized
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