[MCD] Wishes

[cryogen]

Literally the only time there was any inconsistency and a rules change was for companion, and even that was debated about internally (at least amongst the CAG, I don't know if anyone on the RC publicly made an individual statement).

It's still a black eye on the rules to be able to pay to get your companion "from outside the game" but you can't pay for a Living Wish and get your companion "from outside the game".

100% agree. I half-jokingly said that I'd house rule you to use wishes that was in addition to bringing dungeons into the game (before I took the two seconds to realize they're not actually cards).

But yeah, I would think that from a rules standpoint you *should* be able to use a wish to grab your companion. Why you'd want to waste a deck slot when there is already a built in way to do it is another matter though.

[Sinis]

100% agree. I half-jokingly said that I'd house rule you to use wishes that was in addition to bringing dungeons into the game (before I took the two seconds to realize they're not actually cards).

But yeah, I would think that from a rules standpoint you *should* be able to use a wish to grab your companion. Why you'd want to waste a deck slot when there is already a built in way to do it is another matter though.

I mean, Living Wish (if it worked on Companions) is basically a lotus petal only for companions. A very small functionality adjacent Jeweled Lotus. Maybe if you had a very companion-centric deck it would be worth it (after Lotus Petal, Elvish Spirit Guide, etc.). I mean, we are sometimes willing to exchange one card for one mana; Skirge Familiar exists and is played.

It will likely never be (hypothetically) worth it because the companions are too restrictive rather than it not being worth a card for a mana, but that's beside the point about how ugly rule 13 is.

[cryogen]

I don't view the rule as ugly. Like I said earlier, the intent has largely remained the same from the early days of the format, and companions were a crossroads for them. Reevaluate the rule in general (whether it was still something they wanted in the format), and then see how companions fit in. And since they liked the idea of the mechanic and it required a very minor wording tweak to allow companions while keeping the spirit of the rule intact, they did as we saw.

Perhaps there will be some future mechanic that will cause the RC to have to reevaluate it once again.

[RxPhantom]

Are we talking rule 11, or is there an unspoken two rules appended to the rules? Or has the official site just not been updated in a while?

Anyway, I think the debate around wishes, which is kept alive by small number of diehards, is settled.

I understand the consternation of what is essentially a card type being banned. I know that pain. I look at my Bronze Tablet and Jeweled Bird with such pain and longing. "One day, my babies," I say spiritedly, but I walk away with my head in my hands, knowing that day will never come.

[BeneTleilax]

Companions were a mistake, but there is no sense in repeating a mistake just for consistency.

[cryogen]

Are we talking rule 11, or is there an unspoken two rules appended to the rules? Or has the official site just not been updated in a while?

Anyway, I think the debate around wishes, which is kept alive by small number of diehards, is settled.

I understand the consternation of what is essentially a card type being banned. I know that pain. I look at my Bronze Tablet and Jeweled Bird with such pain and longing. "One day, my babies," I say spiritedly, but I walk away with my head in my hands, knowing that day will never come.

Rule 11, old rule 13. Sinis just misspoke.

[onering]

After playing AFR, at least online, I can say that the dungeon mechanic is really nothing at all like wishes. Its treated more like a new kind of token that uses the CZ. In mtgo, they aren't even represented as cards you have to own, everyone automatically has access to all 3.

[Sinis]

Having said all I want to say about whether wishes are a threat to the format, or unfun, or whatever, can I just say that their rule is becoming so unwieldly that they could just make them legal with some described limits and that would be more succinct, permit lessons, etc.

It's become absolutely absurd, and they really should let Rule 0 sort out the Flashfires players of the world.

[onering]

Having said all I want to say about whether wishes are a threat to the format, or unfun, or whatever, can I just say that their rule is becoming so unwieldly that they could just make them legal with some described limits and that would be more succinct, permit lessons, etc.

It's become absolutely absurd, and they really should let Rule 0 sort out the Flashfires players of the world.

I still don't get this attitude. It seems like people just insist its absurd or unwieldy but haven't been able to make convincing arguments that it is the case. The gist of the rule is that in game effects can't fetch cards from outside of the game. Companions are the biggest stretch, and honestly the problem with them is all on WotC being stupid and not making them use the CZ (Having something outside the game and technically outside the deck care about the deck is absurd), To be honest, I don't see why the dungeons couldn't have just hung out in the CZ doing nothing unless ventured into, with the rule that you can only venture into one at a time. Dungeons are a lot more like emblems or tokens, or even glorified progress trackers, than cards. You don't play them, you don't put them in your deck, you always have access to them (you don't have to draft them, for instance, in order to venture into them in a draft deck).

What's absurd is "Outside of the game" as a concept, with the exception of wish effects themselves. As it is, the only downside to rule 11 is lessons not working (which themselves could have been made to hang out in the CZ, or Wizards could have made a "study zone" to hold them, or just had them start the game in exile).

[Sinis]

Companions are the biggest stretch

That you can't Living Wish for a Companion is a blight on the rules. It demonstrates that the the prohibition on Wishes is arbitrary and just because the RC doesn't like them, much like how they once felt about Kokusho. Full stop. If you don't agree, I don't think I can explain it more clearly to you.

What's absurd is "Outside of the game" as a concept, with the exception of wish effects themselves.

I agree. The exile zone used to be outside the game. It would be great if the 'sideboard' zone or whatever became an official game zone (in EDH).

[onering]

That you can't Living Wish for a Companion is a blight on the rules. It demonstrates that the the prohibition on Wishes is arbitrary and just because the RC doesn't like them, much like how they once felt about Kokusho. Full stop. If you don't agree, I don't think I can explain it more clearly to you.

There's nothing to 'explain' Sinis, I understand why you feel that way I just think you're wrong, because you wrongly dismiss their problems with Wishes as unfounded. Its not a blight upon the rules, nor is it contradictory. WotC served up a rules %$#% sandwhich with Companions, and the RC made the most of it. Companions work because they allowed cards that bring themselves into the game from outside the game to function. That was a completely new mechanic that had no prior precedent. Rule 11 is written to prevent cards in the game from bringing in other cards from outside the game. They are related effects, but significantly different. Its similar to Devoid cards being colorless but still having a color identity. Without belaboring the point, wishes not working is a feature, not a bug. They promote styles of gameplay that go against the spirit of the format. The current state of the rules surrounding companions isn't great, but its the best that can be done considering how badly Wizards screwed the mechanic up. Its a compromise that allows the mechanic to exist in commander without letting it force changes the RC disagrees with. If something must be sacrificed in the name of consistency, I'd much rather see it be the companion mechanic (which would have the side effect of freeing Lutri).

I agree. The exile zone used to be outside the game. It would be great if the 'sideboard' zone or whatever became an official game zone (in EDH).

You just have a very different view of what the format should be from the RC. Sideboards would move the format further away from its casual origins, and I firmly disagree with making that change.

[Impossible]

Sideboards would move the format further away from its casual origins

You mean the origins that included an optional sideboard? From the link:

Optional rules for Commander

Sideboards

Rather than filling every deck with banal responses, it is preferable to allow some flexibility in the composition of a deck.

Players may bring a 10 card sideboard in addition to their 99 cards and 1 Commander.
After Commanders are announced, players have 3 minutes to make 1-for-1 substitutions to their deck.
Any cards not played as part of the deck may be retrieved by "wishes".

Reasoning:

Highly tuned threats piloted by skilled opponents mandate efficient answers. The minimum number of response cards required to ensure they are available in the early turns can easily overwhelm the majority of an EDH deck's building space.

Sideboards allow players to respond to the "best" strategies in a timely fashion . They should be strongly considered as a necessary defense against brokenness and degeneracy in an environment where no gentlemans agreement on style of play exists.

[onering]

Hey, notice that part that says "optional"? That's pretty important!

[tstorm823]

I agree. The exile zone used to be outside the game. It would be great if the 'sideboard' zone or whatever became an official game zone (in EDH).

Why just in EDH? Why not put some more blame on wizards for making a mess of wishes? The wishes are a mess in M:tG, full stop. In a sanctioned event, they pull from sideboards, but in casual play, they pull from collections. There are multiple sets of rules for wishes before any format specific choices are made. Never mind that wishes used to grab exiled cards, but now they don't. And rather than think "maybe we should stop making a mess of this" or "maybe we should make wishes pulling from sideboards a more explicit rule", they're actively leaning into outside the game mechanics that function differently in casual play. If you play learn cards in a tournament, you get a maximum of 15 lessons to fetch. If you play learn cards casually and set up some sort of loop, you could fetch 300 copies of Environmental Sciences, shuffle your hand in with Time Reversal, and win with Battle of Wits.

Is that example a minor thing to complain about? Sure. But the thing is, Magic's rules are like legalese. The phrasing they use for the rules text on cards is formalized and standardized so that a person with sufficient knowledge can know exactly what they mean by reading them. Except "outside the game". That one phrase gets to mean different things in different places. That's not the Rules Committee doing that, Wizards did that. If Wizards said "outside the game now means from a set zone containing up to X cards in all environments", the RC would likely go with it. As of right now, if wishes were allowed to follow the same logic as 60 card magic in this format, there'd be sideboard rules for tournaments, but most of the time you could actually just buy the card you need to win a game from someone right before casting the wish, and that would be legal play. That is how those are meant to function in 60-card casual play. Even as someone increasingly ok with the idea of wishes in Commander, I'd say it is 100% reasonable for the RC to say "yeah, we're just not dealing with that crap".

[onering]

I agree. The exile zone used to be outside the game. It would be great if the 'sideboard' zone or whatever became an official game zone (in EDH).

Why just in EDH? Why not put some more blame on wizards for making a mess of wishes? The wishes are a mess in M:tG, full stop. In a sanctioned event, they pull from sideboards, but in casual play, they pull from collections. There are multiple sets of rules for wishes before any format specific choices are made. Never mind that wishes used to grab exiled cards, but now they don't. And rather than think "maybe we should stop making a mess of this" or "maybe we should make wishes pulling from sideboards a more explicit rule", they're actively leaning into outside the game mechanics that function differently in casual play. If you play learn cards in a tournament, you get a maximum of 15 lessons to fetch. If you play learn cards casually and set up some sort of loop, you could fetch 300 copies of Environmental Sciences, shuffle your hand in with Time Reversal, and win with Battle of Wits.

Is that example a minor thing to complain about? Sure. But the thing is, Magic's rules are like legalese. The phrasing they use for the rules text on cards is formalized and standardized so that a person with sufficient knowledge can know exactly what they mean by reading them. Except "outside the game". That one phrase gets to mean different things in different places. That's not the Rules Committee doing that, Wizards did that. If Wizards said "outside the game now means from a set zone containing up to X cards in all environments", the RC would likely go with it. As of right now, if wishes were allowed to follow the same logic as 60 card magic in this format, there'd be sideboard rules for tournaments, but most of the time you could actually just buy the card you need to win a game from someone right before casting the wish, and that would be legal play. That is how those are meant to function in 60-card casual play. Even as someone increasingly ok with the idea of wishes in Commander, I'd say it is 100% reasonable for the RC to say "yeah, we're just not dealing with that crap".

That's one of the reasons I like the idea of a small wish board. The primary function of Wishes is to grab narrow answers they play a unique role in competitive magic by functioning as a way to get specialized hate game 1. If there's a format with a number of decks that demand specialized hate, a wish lets you have a better chance of winning the first game against any of them, rather than main decking the hate for one deck and conceding that you'll probably lose game 1 against the others. Even so, this is a limited benefit, and I doubt there have actually been many such metas. Legacy was once the poster child of "pack narrow hate in the sideboard" formats, and I never saw wishes used for that purpose. In any case, since sideboards aren't actually used in commander, you would never need to dedicate any slots to cards you'd want to side in. No cards meant to make your deck slightly faster, no spells that are just good but better against certain matchups (like siding in extra removal), no extra copies of main decked spells, no need to dedicate 4 slots to a specific hate card (like gy hate whenever a format has Dredge in it). No, just 15 slots that can each be dedicated to hating out a deck hard. A 3 wish board would greatly reduce the ability of this to be abused and make deck builders more careful about what sort of cards they include.

As for the search anywhere version in casual, I never want to wait 20 minutes for someone to flip through binders. That's just a bad mechanic that makes for bad games, not for being unfair but for monopolizing time and grinding it to a halt. It doesn't have to be that way, but without any built in mechanism to restrict it the mechanic shouldn't exist.

In my eyes wizards should really clean up what they want "Outside the game" to be before they continue to utilize the design space. They should think hard about whether a mechanic actually needs to use "outside the game" to work before using it. There's been a concerted effort to minimize time wasting effects like shuffle effects and tutors in the game, yet they've drastically increased the occurrence of the mechanic that is most likely to waste time in the most dramatic fashion (outside of subgames).

[pokken]

The ultimate problem I have with any wishboards is that they will become mostly the default if allowed. I'd rather not have 105 card decks. 100 is plenty.

Cunning wish burning wish and living wish would be automatic in too many decks.

Fyi the reason most legacy decks don't play wishes is that they are so good at finding cards with cantrips that you'd rather sideboard stuff in. Force of will is basically a trump sideboard card anyway that you get to main deck. It's less tempo pain to cantrips into stuff.

In edh you can't really run the 20 cantrips it'd take to equal legacy decks filtering power. So wishes become functionally an extra copy of vampiric tutor/demonic tutor mostly.


Edit: another thing I wanted to say is that a lesson I have learned from programming is that a concept can be both easy to understand and difficult to make into a simple algorithm. The rules about wishes may be marginally unwieldy but what they boil down to is easy to understand - you can't play these cards that do this specific thing in this way. No one has a hard time understanding it.

Complaining about rule elegance is so pointless when what we care about is the functional reality and that reality is wishes are a guaranteed dumpster fire for the format.

[Sinis]

Why just in EDH?

In kitchen table magic, its' either an absolutely gamebreaking thing that everyone I've ever spoken to is utterly silent about or not a problem at all. So, they could be legal in EDH, or they could have an 'outside the game zone'. I prefer the latter.

I only have an opinion about EDH because it's basically the only format I play.

That's one of the reasons I like the idea of a small wish board.

I'm going to be real with you, my group allows 3-card wishboards and nobody uses them. Wishes are bad (like actually awful, even the 'good' ones like Burning Wish) in some mechanical sense (at 3 cards); it's much easier to maindeck things and play the billions of tutors that have been printed than to hum and haw over a sideboard. Obviously even moderate people would object if it was like, a 100 card wishboard. So, there's some number between 3 and 100 that would be acceptable with caveats (like maintaining singleton integrity across the main deck and wishboard).

---

But again, being real, my group is literally the only one I've ever heard of that's experimented with wishes, so the broader audience either doesn't know or doesn't care, and between that and the RC's only-ever-hostile-takes on it when they aren't silent on the matter, it makes this thread kind of moot.

It's kind of why I don't really put any effort into it anymore, or go out of my way to rebut anything here. We could have a real conversation, and debate about whether it's bad or not, or whether people will wishboard Flashfires, or if WotC will make more outside-the-game mechanics like Lessons, or if it really impugns the hundred card limit (which was a very popular argument on the original forums until they blew up and then Companion was released), or what real rules would look like, or if it's a threat to casual gaming everywhere like some RC members insist, where people are going to carry around wishboards but no wishes 'just in case'. But, I've already had those conversations, well under the eyes of the RC (presuming they have eyes at all, here or elsewhere), and they're (presumably) unconvinced because they're silent about it except when they post "no way Jose" or make 'rules updates' contorting the rules around permitting companion (just this once!) or Dungeons (they're not really cards!).

Honestly, I'm tired, and this fight isn't winnable, and never will be. Replying to anything in this thread in earnest feels like signing up to be a punching bag; people demand an overwhelming (and frankly, insurmountable) burden of proof. I'm not even interested in debating what amounts as 'proof' anymore.

Realistically, it feels like there are around 5 people in the world who want Wishes 'unbanned', so, why even bother. Can we lock this thread already?

[Jemolk]

Well, it sounds like it's time for me to come out of lurk mode, then. I've been planning to create an account here for a few days at least, but this definitely merits a more immediate response.

Sinis -- You've convinced me. I don't know if anyone else has been lurking and saw these arguments and was persuaded by them, but I certainly am. And perhaps more critically, you've given me the argumentative tools to try and convince other people. I've been leaning favorable to wishes for a while, but the arguments here have pushed me fully out of ambiguity and to the point where I'm prepared to argue in their favor, and try to convince my group to accept them. So... maybe getting the RC to change its official stance is pretty hopeless, and they're always just going to be a hard 'no.' But then, they're also a hard 'no' on proxies, and many people's opinions there have shifted to something much more favorable, so I don't think that's insurmountable problem for wishes to overcome.

And to add some argumentation of my own, there are distinct benefits to allowing wishes, like letting people play more weird cards that are too narrow to be used generally and too weak to be worth playing for the times when they apply, but which are awesome flavor for a deck. Is anyone really inclined to try to tell me a Nicol Bolas theme deck running Cower in Fear would be anything but flavorful -- or at all overpowered for the inclusion of the option to fetch it with a wish? What about Blood Reckoning? As the space for on-flavor cards gets more cramped, some of the fun options get pushed out in favor of efficiency, but I'd rather see more weird pet cards than have the same nonsense happen every game.

[Legend]

Thanks to companions and dungeons, the logistics argument against WISHING in Commander can %$#% off forever. It's unfortunate that the RC is so stuck in 1999 that they recently passed on three golden opportunities to smoothly reintroduce WISHING into the format - companion, learn, and venture. What's so hard about syncing Commander with the rest of Magic anyways?
"In a sanctioned event, a card that's "outside the game" is one that's in your sideboard. In an unsanctioned event, you may choose any card from your collection."
Problem solved.

[pokken]

"In a sanctioned event, a card that's "outside the game" is one that's in your sideboard. In an unsanctioned event, you may choose any card from your collection."
Problem solved.

Or problem created, since following the unsanctioned pattern makes several wishes into autoincludes Toting around a binder full of wish targets becomes the default way to play commander.

Creating a rule for an official wishboard means picking a limit which is a very complex rules management decision. Not picking a limit forces people to play wishes because it becomes automatic.

Picking a limit that's too high makes them an autoinclude. Picking a limit that's very low potentially makes most of them bad, and then what's the point?

Figuring out what is the correct balance is years of trial and error that adds negligible value. You and 7 other people can now wish...and millions of other players now have to start following the wishboard crap and dealing with it.

It's not easy. It's a field full of potential landmines.

[tstorm823]

What's so hard about syncing Commander with the rest of Magic anyways?
"In a sanctioned event, a card that's "outside the game" is one that's in your sideboard. In an unsanctioned event, you may choose any card from your collection."
Problem solved.

The problem is, of course, that rule sucks.

[DirkGently]

@pokken

I think the optimal number would be "enough to make them good, but not so many that they become a must for competitive play". Admittedly that is a fine point to hit. I suspect the ideal number may be greater than 3, but I personally like 3 because it's aesthetically pleasing and plays pretty safe to avoid putting them into a must-include-to-be-optimal position.

That said, I think the majority of commander players, if the limit was say 6 and that turned out to be "must include to be optimal", would still probably ignore it. Most people aren't really trying THAT hard to optimize. Even if they were completely unbound (no limit) I doubt they'd each crack 10% on EDHrec, and the people on there are already pretty enfranchised. That's not to say I think it's a good idea, but I think the worry that they'll become ubiquitous is probably overblown. Less than 80% of EDHrec decks are running sol ring ffs, and that has zero cost or difficulty to play and makes (almost) every deck better. People are either self-limiting, or have some harebrained justification for not running it. Add the complexity of wishes and I really don't think they'd be that popular, even if they'd probably set people's brains on fire in the more competitive circles.

[Jemolk]

Less than 80% of EDHrec decks are running sol ring ffs, and that has zero cost or difficulty to play and makes (almost) every deck better. People are either self-limiting, or have some harebrained justification for not running it.

Convenient example, since I just took Sol Ring out of another deck because I wanted more room for my weird jank and detest the very concept of must-play staples. From a power level perspective only, it's definitely a downgrade, but for the kind of games I want to play, I'm quite certain I made the correct choice anyway.

To more directly address the topic -- wishes probably aren't a thing the cEDH crowd would want to deal with without very specific and explicit rules, but for more casual play, "just so long as what you get is thematic/flavorful and also makes the game more interesting rather than less for everyone involved" should be enough to avoid the "I wish for Flashfires" tryhards wrecking games, or at least doing so more than once. Or maybe I just have a particularly laid-back scene. Always possible.

[onering]

I mean, just run the thematic/flavorful cards instead of the wishes.

[Legend]

What's so hard about syncing Commander with the rest of Magic anyways?
"In a sanctioned event, a card that's "outside the game" is one that's in your sideboard. In an unsanctioned event, you may choose any card from your collection."
Problem solved.

The problem is, of course, that rule sucks.

Of course it does. Just kidding, Rule 11 sucks. Arguing for normality just got alot easier. Thanks.

Or problem created, since following the unsanctioned pattern makes several wishes into autoincludes Toting around a binder full of wish targets becomes the default way to play commander.

Regarding "autoincludes": Over two-and-a-half decades of evidence says otherwise.

And players already tote around boxes and binders full of cards, so *shrug*? Let Rule 0 deal with the rest of it by deciding sanctioned or unsanctioned before play begins.

,,,they'd probably set people's brains on fire in the more competitive circles.

Indeed. But even they would adjust just fine. I suspect, if WISHING were to remain so despised by them (the cEDH crowd), that they'd just opt for sanctioned games. It's even possible that cEDH would just become knows as sCommander, making the lines of deck power much sharper and therefore much easier to discern by players, making it easier for them to play decks that are closer in power level.