ideal losing conditions

[Hermes_]

So, this

On the other hand, while expropriate on turn 6 is worse than one on turn 8, I still have a bad time when it gets cast regardless. A lot of the big top-end wincons that wotc has printed are, imo, obnoxious on any turn. Losing to the same combo I've seen a thousand times, losing to a 1-card-wincon, losing to some tedious storm combo that takes 15 minutes to resolve - these aren't good experiences, not on any turn.

got me wondering what does a "good" experience when it comes to losing look like for you? (you in general)

For me, I think it comes down to if it's something new to me or not, or something that makes me go "ooh cool, I didn't know about that."

[NZB2323]

One time a guy beat me by playing Rise of the Dread Marn on his end step after I cast Damn on my 2nd main with Rotlung Reanimator on the battlefield. I figured it made sense to board wipe and then I would still have zombies, but he managed to gain more zombies from my board wipe than me.

That made me smile and I had to give him props for that.

[DirkGently]

For me, I think it comes down to if it's something new to me or not, or something that makes me go "ooh cool, I didn't know about that."

I think that's true. Anything that's original is usually going to be good.

Also anything relatively low power is never going to be a problem. Somebody beats me to death with moderately-sized creatures, fair enough. Any time I lose to a precon it's always a handshake moment.

At the end of the day, I want to be able to say "damn, I could have stopped that if I'd played better". When someone puts omniscience into play and then draws their deck with 5 counterspells up it can feel like I just never had a chance (depending on the deck - obviously expectations are key).

[materpillar]

Depends a little on the time frame. If we're on turn 4, it better be a hilarious combo I've never see before. If we're on turn 18, anything that wins is a-ok with me. If we're around turn 7-10 I'm pretty ok with anything that has been on board for at least a turn, preferably two so that there was a window of interaction.

I prefer to lose to chunks of ~10 points of damage over several turns by opponents who are out politicking me.

[ISBPathfinder]

Removing all my things and grinding the whole table to dust slowly over multiple turns is my favorite way to go. It might sound odd but this sort of loss often involves a lot of time where you attempt to stop the slow pressure and it often involves a lot of back and forth.

I really hate when I am fully healthy with a good board and then someone who has done nothing all game assembles a haymaker or combo out of nowhere. Things like this push me to play a lot more evil control because I freaking hate dying to %$#% like this.

[pokken]

If I have multiple points in the game that I was pretty sure who was going to win and I was wrong. The more times I was sure it was over and wrong the better.

[Sinis]

got me wondering what does a "good" experience when it comes to losing look like for you? (you in general)

The best games are the ones where everyone has a chance to play, and it wasn't just one person in first place that didn't get set back ever. I am not completely indifferent to winning/losing, but, I want people to have had a chance to play the game and to shine. Most people have something in their deck that's going to make me go "heck yeah!" even if I've seen it before.

I also would like to say; there are games I would rather lose than win. Last night in particular, I played a Grand Abolisher while everyone was tapped out, made my attacks, and then lobbed a Teferi's Protection out. It was a three player game, and one player eliminated another, and I was in a position to kill either of them. I phased back in, leveled Paladin class to 3 to general damage the remaining player out while their hands were tied by the Abolisher, but, I felt like they should have won in the way they played and how their deck was designed.

[Jemolk]

Had to think about this for a while, but I think the big one for me is that there's some amount of back and forth. If someone just gains a dominating position early, is never knocked off that pedestal, and then wins, that's really disappointing. Likewise, if someone never does anything threatening for the whole game, and is thus never interacted with or on anyone's radar at all, and then just wins in a single turn, out of nowhere, that's also bad. Something in between those two, please. Coming in from behind is great, but let it be over several turns, or at least let it be something that comes up on our threat profile, and is stopped, once or twice before actually winning. Likewise, if someone is arch-enemy in the beginning, falls off, but then late-game recovers and wins, that's okay too.

Basically, I want it to feel like even the players who didn't win managed to influence the course of the game. Like it was actually a 4-player game, rather than solitaire with three people watching who thought they were doing more than that.

[Dunharrow]

I am fine with any losing conditions, except:
1. Win from nowhere (one card kills or something like casting nothing but tutors all game, then playing a combo to win)
2. Incorrect Threat Assessment knocking me out and letting someone else win.

Best way to go is obviously the unique combo/strategy. But I also love losing to well executed play.

[folding_music]

I like to lose to Cyclonic Rift

edit: sorry to be flippant, but I don't think we can wish for our preferred size of grave in a format where everyone jams staples like crazy and the rules body encourages it lol

[TheAmericanSpirit]

If I have multiple points in the game that I was pretty sure who was going to win and I was wrong. The more times I was sure it was over and wrong the better.

This is it for me too. I hate hate hate blowout games where one player dominates start to finish and I hate it more if I can see it coming like the freakin' OOT Moon. I like shifting balances, unexpected twists, and a high degree of interaction in all my games, but especially if I'm gonna lose.

[PrimevalCommander]

I like my deck to get to do what it want's to do. If my deck is functioning properly, then I generally feel like I have a chance to win, and that is enough to get my satisfied in that game. I also strongly dislike compact infinite combos and aggressive tutoring for said combo's. Though it's not always my opponent's fault that I don't do much. This weekend the amount of ramp spells I played by turn 4 across 4 games combined was only 2. Could not draw ramp to save my life. As expected I stumbled out of the gate and got outclassed in short order.

My current playgroup absolutely LOVES infinite mana combos. Small group of local guys I found a couple years ago. I see an infinite mana combo almost every other game. Fortunately they are bad at capitalizing on said infinite mana and doesn't always lead to a win. I express my disappointment and play enough removal to keep me in the game. Though it does put much more stress on me when I'm not playing the same compact win conditions and never knowing if I'll get another turn to close out the game. That's almost become part of the challenge, since I still regularly win through commander damage, creature combat, or non-infinite direct burn/drain.

Edit to answer the OP. My ideal losing conditions would be where my deck gets to participate meaningfully in the game, and even do something cool or powerful at least once, and be beaten by either a combination of multiple opponents in an opportunistic assault, or to a non-infinite splashy play from one opponent.

[Crazy Monkey]

I agree with others above; The back-and-forth of the game matters more to me than exactly how the game ends. I like to be interacting/pressuring throughout the game, and the most memorable games generally have all players approaching a win at some point. Even if a player is in the lead all game, if I feel like I'm in a position to stop/survive their endgame/wincon and end the game myself afterwards then it's still a satisfying game. Placing my political position in "second place" and holding an interaction, response, or counter offer to turn the game around is great; and it doesn't matter if the game is ending via combo, aggro, control or stax lock. How the win happens is sort of secondary to how we got there and how active I felt that I could be in that game.

Similarly, if I lose because I overextended or got too greedy that game was also fun, because in general I'm satisfied that my deck "did the thing". This happens somewhat often, because I really enjoy the More of snowballing decks and tend to add more ways to snowball than any way to protect it. Effectively, any game is a good game as long as I felt like I was a part of that game.

A brief caveat about losing: my only really comment of substance is that I don't like to lose to the same thing a lot. One of the things I personally like about EDH is the available variety, so even very back-and-forth games against a player who tutors/digs for the same wincondition every game will get a bit monotonous to me. If I know a player is going to go for a Thassa's Oracle win every single game, I don't really want to be limited to the 15% of my decks which are prepared to deal with that axis of winning. At least include Laboratory Maniac so that removal is a viable interaction axis and I'm not stuck with Stifle, counterspells, or instant speed draw. Sometimes I'd like to play tribal knights or something.

Although, contrary to all of the above, I can also enjoy losing when I bring a significantly underpowered deck out and it offers enough of a threat axis that it needs to be interacted with. Bringing tribal knights into a cEDH, pod example. Those games I'm not really interacting with the important spells or critical combo pieces, but offer enough of a threat that much higher powered decks have to really consider my speedbumps or my slowly snowballing threat.

[BlackbirdPlaysMTG]

I am fine with any losing conditions, except:
1. Win from nowhere (one card kills or something like casting nothing but tutors all game, then playing a combo to win)
2. Incorrect Threat Assessment knocking me out and letting someone else win.

Best way to go is obviously the unique combo/strategy. But I also love losing to well executed play.

Yeah, I can ascribe to this comment. Games in which everyone gives it their best are most enjoyable. I dislike incorrect threat assessment, but it happens to the best of us sometimes.

I would add a third to this list though: kingmaking. It is no fun when a player is handing someone else the win on a silver platter.

[Dunharrow]

I am fine with any losing conditions, except:
1. Win from nowhere (one card kills or something like casting nothing but tutors all game, then playing a combo to win)
2. Incorrect Threat Assessment knocking me out and letting someone else win.

Best way to go is obviously the unique combo/strategy. But I also love losing to well executed play.

Yeah, I can ascribe to this comment. Games in which everyone gives it their best are most enjoyable. I dislike incorrect threat assessment, but it happens to the best of us sometimes.

I would add a third to this list though: kingmaking. It is no fun when a player is handing someone else the win on a silver platter.

I almost never see it happen, but agree that kingmaking is pretty unfun.

[toctheyounger]

Its been stated already but for when everyone has had a fair chance for glory or its been a pretty good arm wrestle and someone pulls away. I like games with good lines of play, good threat assessment, even pegging on decks across the pod, all that stuff. If I get that I mostly don't care how the game ends, I'll say gg and tell you I had fun, and thats almost always true.

I'll buy a craterhoof win mid to late game, games do have to end. Its not the most exciting way to win but whatever. I don't even mind Rift either. Thoracle gets me though. I don't cedh so I don't see it too often but its always underwhelming when I do. It's just so non-interactive. If you don't splash blue and don't have countermagic thats it, case closed. Most of the time its a big bummer. (I should say though I get it in cedh, the play is different, there's a ton more stack interaction and its justifiably efficient for very high level play)

What i really don't like is treating the format like a drag race and just getting to the finish line as soon as possible. Anything with Kinnan involved seems like this, and the specific deck I really just despise is Godo/Helm. I do not see the point. Either you go off turn 1 or 2 or you're dead in the water. So damn ridiculous. Again, non cedh player so I don't see it that often, but every now and then. And it's just a waste of time, guy either goes 9ff abd the game lasts less time than it took to shuffle up and grab 7, or he flops the first few turns and scoops and the game state warps for losing a player at instant speed.

I'll also agree with Dirk regarding folks making big splashy plays with a ton of counter magic in hand. It gives the feeling that no one ever had a chance. I've also found it to be quite telling for an unbalanced pod; usually when someone is clearly at the forefront and the outcome is just a matter of time they've got a deck that is way too strong for the rest of the table, either intentionally or unintentionally. You give people the benefit of the doubt and assume they just called it wrong, the only other option is to get salty and that never ends well really. But I guess there are times people just want an easy win.

[BeneTleilax]

Ideally a game where everyone plays to the board a bit, and there's some politicking about who should be the threat. I get targeted either for being the threat or by something I saw but did not, or was not able to, prioritize. Often, this is through creature combat and damage over time, because I find those the wins that play to the board the most, and so are most assessable. The other players continue to build, politic and answer each other until someone else pulls ahead.