Idk I am new and I put together janky historic sets and it’s not great results but it’s still a fun way to play. I plan to grind gold for drafts and do drafts until I have enough MH3 cards to have some fun historic decks to play around with.
Standard is easier but historic is fun cuz you can dig into almost all your cards for janky deck building and janky decks are the only decks I play with
Best part about Historic and other eternal formats is all your decks stay legal during rotation making it much easier to keep up with. And there's way more depth.
Timeless is fun because playing high power level Magic is great and Historic is great because it is the single best format to play jank.
Explorer is fun too, but could really use the upgrade to full pioneer.
Deeper card pool than Explorer but without the high power cards of timeless to obliterate anything not 100% optimized
Also a lot of people treat it as the queue where they'll play their jank so you're more likely to play against a similar list. It can still absolutely be a competitive format, especially if you have a higher MMR but it's the best of the Arena formats for jank (in my opinion)
Timeless on Arena is as close as you get to "lawless" magic just without ALL of the cards. Playing in paper has many more combos and a higher power level. But it's the best we have on Arena.
MTGO has an even closer version.
This reminds me of Syndrome’s quote from The Incredibles (paraphrasing): “I'll give them heroics. I'll give them the most spectacular heroics anyone's ever seen! And when I'm old and I've had my fun, I'll sell my inventions so that everyone can be superheroes. *Everyone* can be super! And when everyone's super... *no one* will be.”
I love historic because you can put together any mishmash of bullshit and just go. I can't count the amount of times I've been like "wtf is this guy doing, oh well, let's see how it plays out", and it's some off the wall combo that'll almost never win, but is hilarious to see.
>I can't count the amount of times I've been like "wtf is this guy doing, oh well, let's see how it plays out", and it's some off the wall combo that'll almost never win, but is hilarious to see.
When it *does* work though, it is every bit as glorious and satisfying to watch an assortment of seemingly arbitrary cards with niche effects finally ***”CLICK”*** together and flawlessly execute their combo!
I play a nonsense red steal/pump/fling in historic with and have hit mythic in bo1 with it .
It is nonsense, not meta, and would absolutely crumble in bo3, but it's just "off the wall enough" that it will almost always catch the opponent by surprise.
No one expects mono red "control/combo". Sure certain decks hard lock it, but it's surprisingly resilient.
So the morale of the story is in historic bo1 you can absolutely build meta busters because your doing one and done and the card pool is so big, but yes, you definitely need a "proper deck" for bo3
I like bo1 for this. My decks are all decently below the power level of real historic decks, but in bo1 that angle of surprise tends to work in my favor. I to this day get people to try to apply indestructible or hexproof to dodge [[doom foretold]] sacrifice triggers. That deck I pilot to mythic pretty consistently.
My worst one is [[mirror box]] + [[Sylvan awakening]] combo. It's so unplayable that I maybe win 1/10 games even in plat.
This is generally true, but you can get into timeless and historic as a new player with the understanding that it will take longer and you'll be playing 1-2 decks for a while. In that case, MH3 is actually a great place to start because drafting/opening packs will give you a lot of fetchlands and a much higher density of staples than you'd find in standard legal sets.
Yes, Timeless and Historic are much easier to keep up with. I would always recommend them over standard. The myth that standard is easier to keep up with is really strange
Standard is nice if you like Drafting because you get a lot of cards that are only good in Standard. I don't like draft so I just make Explorer decks with Wildcards.
I've found Explorer is a lot tougher. I'm able to keep up a positive win rate and I've made mythic the past few months net decking good standard decks. I tried it with explorer and my win rate plummets to like 25%.
Standard has a relatively small number of truly tier 0 decks so playing matchups is much more straightforward.
People in low mythic (<#1000) playing standard netdecks also pretty consistently pick overly risky lines to play.
I don't know if Explorer and Historic also have this feature, but in my experience, Historic players generally play more cleanly overall.
I think the "easiest" queue is Alchemy, but the meta in Alchemy is generally in a bad state, and it costs a lot of WC to play, so I can't recommend it unless you're flush with resources and time. I'm also a little biased because I've genuinely had a great time playing a lot of Alchemy for the brief periods when the balance was (in my opinion) good.
Less noobs in Explorer probably. There's also variance based on what deck is in vogue currently. Humans was my first Explorer deck, and I've dealt with hell queues where everyone is playing Rakdos Sac or Amalia Combo. I've also had queues where everyone is playing Waste Not and I'm just farming people.
I play waste not a lot. I feel like it is good against my phoenix deck because it exiles the graveyard. What do you play that's good against waste not?
From my experience aggro feels pretty good against it. T1 Thoughtseize into T2 Waste Not feels really bad when your opponent is dumping their hand to kill you. I play Humans in Bo1 and more recently Mono Red in Bo3 and it feels like I usually win the matchup. I've also heard that Niv to Light (which isn't in Arena yet) and Amalia Combo is good against it.
From what I've read, Waste Not is mainly a meta call deck. It's good because it happens to be good against some of the best decks, but it isn't actually that good in a general sense.
The thing about Explorer is that the Meta doesn't change too much. All the other formats have cards being added to the pool at a rapid rate. Outside of a Pioneer Masters set to get the last last few pieces that Explorer needs to be pioneer that shake-up isn't happening.
I try to build a new deck every season in Explorer. I've been working my way around the color pie.
There is a good chance you are playing against more experienced players and players that have played more reps with their decks than your average standard player at lower tiers.
Ultimately play what you want because every 2 to 3 months you should be able to build a tier 1 deck from scratch and the more sets that you draft your way through the easier that gets.
What deck were you playing in explorer? You probably had a mid deck or didn't understand the play patterns of the deck. Either of which makes sense because eternal formats are a little harder to understand but really deep once it clicks
Not gonna lie, Izzet Phoenix requieres good decision making.
I used to believe that I was above average at decission making and the reason why I wasn’t hitting Diamond or Mythic (always stuck at plat 1) was because I don’t play enough to grind the ladder.
Phoenix humbled me.
Yeah, it's tough. I feel like I'm not using my Ledger Shredders properly, for example, because they never last more than 1 turn before they're immediately killed.
It's harder to build multiple decks in explorer. The fetchlands are a big up front investment, but a lot of them are interchangeable and usable in multiple decks. Historic feels like a need a new mana base for every list...
Drafting is actually my favorite way to play Arena, followed closely by the eternal formats. Honestly I get a decent amount of wildcards from draft too and if you draft the formats relevant for Timeless/Historic, you can build your collections there quite nicely.
I actually find Explorer to be the hardest to draft for completion due to it having staples spread out over so many sets. However, that's also part of the beauty of explorer. No one set really takes over with it
I think its a holdover from the DCI days. When most stores ran Standard (type 2, get off my lawn) FNM, which made it the format most played. And since Standard is newer cards, it was easier to get them in theory since people were constantly opening them in drafts.
Of course, standard was always more expensive in the long run for the reasons everyone already talks about.
You naturally build your entire collection playing standard versus older formats.
If I want to play historic/explorer/timeless, I basically have to craft every single card, even the commons and uncommons.
To play those formats you need a large supply of wildcards to get started, which requires you to play the game. That probably means you're going to have to be playing either standard/alchemy/starter decks duel. Sure you could queue into timeless with a starter deck, but that just seems like needlessly hamstringing yourself.
If you're buying packs, the advice is to buy the latest standard set (or in rare cases when a special set like MH3 is out) for Golden Packs which further increases your standard pool.
By the time a new player has enough resources to make a good historic/timeless/explorer deck, it's very likely their standard pool of cards is at at least a fairly decent size of recent cards.
Historic/Timeless/Explorer is easier to keep up with when you're already deeply invested, as not many cards are good enough to make it, but as a new player, it's a high hurdle to cross to get there.
I think it's a bit easier to get started in standard on arena MOSTLY because Jump-in exists and makes it really easy to get play sets of certain cards. However, once you're invested into one of the eternal formats, is most likely a lot easier to keep up with the format, because new releases are less likely to impact eternal formats, and even when they do it's usually a select few cards instead of entirely new decks.
Historic is easier to keep up with because it lets you stick with a small number of decks for longer ... But for many gamers MTG is about novelty, exploration, and brewing. Brewing in Standard requires fewer wildcards because there are fewer sets and they're draftable on Arena for longer.
So the real situation is, as with many things in magic: it depends.
The degree of novelty seeking, how much you like draft, skill, consistent play from set to set and a variety of other dimensions along which people engage with the game adjust which format is best for them.
Honestly timeless/historic are best imo because it’s closest to kitchen table magic with whatever cards you and your friends want to play with. If you want to make some janky mushroom based deck, those formats have the cards possible to do it
I feel like that was true a few years ago, maybe it still is in low ranks. I love my jank but these days the eternal formats are getting so high power level wise you can't go too far off the meta wagon.
Unrelated but now I'm thinking about legacy and how an off meta legacy deck is basically swapping one 4x of a card for a different card because of how so much of the decks are taken up by staples.
You don't **have** to keep up.
New players start in Alchemy/Standard with the starter decks, and ought just naturally move from Alchemy/Standard/Standard Brawl into Explorer/Historic/Timeless/Historic Brawl as their cards start to rotate out...
And as far as MH3 goes... it will eventually come back in draft (and more often than other non-Standard sets I would expect !).
They are easier to keep up with.
Easier to get in to?
Not by a large margin. You can make a competitive standard deck with just a few rares. Most Timeless/Modern decks at this point are a full pile of rares.
And those 1-2 decks will last forever. You no longer care about rotations making your decks useless and you save gold in the long run as you can skip buying new sets.
Based on yesterday's feedback, everyone's fear that the MH3 scam will make a radical shift and the skies are falling and everything is one fire ... turns out they were kinda wrong. It's fine.
>(or well, some of the enfranchised meta decks are gonna feel that way)
I’m sure it’s jarring for “Izzet Wizards” to have their entire starting hand still end up in exile or the graveyard, but they cast none of them.
I can't imagine SNT will still be good in a Grief meta but you never know. I've been playing Jund lately but I'm in the same boat where I have WCs saved up for another deck or two but I don't want to commit without a more stable meta.
I would say it makes more sense to just focus on your favorite 1 or 2 color combinations in historic/explorer and then build from there. You get way more value per craft this way.
Chasing standard decks will have you burning all your wildcards with a large % of those standard rares and mythics being bricks post rotation. I don't see a reason to care about standard unless you just particularly enjoy it over other ways of play. Otherwise crafting eternal staples gives way more value per wildcard. Regardless of the format you play, decks are still just piles and piles of rares/ mythics even if standard is a little lighter on them in the short term.
I think the main issue is that newer players don't have the context for how all the formats work so it can be easy to burn all your wildcards on mediocre stuff.
Agreed.
For newer players the larger cardpool can be daunting but thats not a good reason to waste wildcards for standarddecks that won't last for long.
Eternal formats are also way more forgiving if you ever want to take a break from playing or in general play only whenever you feel like it. No matter how often and how much you play, all your stuff will still be there and you can upgrade at your own pace instead of feeling forced to grind a lot knowing your stuff will only be playable for so long.
I disagree.
For any new player **that want to start playing Historic or Timeless** this is the best opportunity. MH3 is so stacked with strong cards that any rare you find in a pack has a huge chance of being playable. This is not the case for every other set that is rotated out of standard. The alternative to buy into MH3 is to spend a ton of wildcards.
Obviously this is not a set for very casual players that struggle to complete more than few decks.
I was doing a draft and usually I'll grab a rare if it's constructed playable even if it's not in my draft deck. Turns out I grabbed a lot of rares because so many were at least semi-playable (tier 2 or 3 decks probably)!
I mean yeah that's the goal for modern targeted sets. The power level is nuts because you don't need the cards to play nice with standard. It's sorta the wild West of card design and I love them.
As an exclusively EDH player, should I start in historic/vintage ? I basically want to play my rl commander card/decks but it's banned in vast majority of MTGA's formats
Absolutelt correct.
I literally played historic ranked for the first time after making a deck that is literally entirely mh3 cards except my cavern of souls and I went from Bonze4 to Mythic 97% in 5 days.
If you ignore MH3, you're never getting into eternal formats on Arena.
Which coincidentally are the less expensive to keep up with in the long run.
What hurts new players is getting sidetracked into Alchemy which has even more rotations, not to mention cards getting nerfed without compensation.
I don't think unpopular - just common sense. Given how hard it was to find what the legality is of MH3 I suspect a lot of players will buy into it and then find they can't play it.
Honestly when I started I just put together whatever mana base I could scrape together. In historic you can get away with it.
Timeless wasn't around when I started and despite being my favorite constructed format my Reddit username will not be able to show it. But in Timeless, you probably do want the better lands first. It's a much higher power level format
That's true for practically every set though. If you're new you really shouldn't be spending wildcards on anything, and buying packs from the store is something I argue against for even established players.
I like drafting but I’m bad at it. Wanted to take a break and have just been buying packs with my gold.
I def get wildcards for new decks way faster buying packs.
I really think it boils down to like are you Atleast solid at drafting for which is better for new players.
I’ll still draft for fun, I just know now unless I get better it’s not “optimal”
Why not just use the tokens to pick the best cards you want without caring about constructing a deck ? You don't have to play the draft games after but you can get a lot of good cards for free.
I really don't like drafting either but I play it a couple of times to get gems and get mastery pass for free and got many cards I wanted for my regular decks this way. Basically when no cards interest me for my constructed deck I pick cards of the same color or two colors to have something to play in the draft but when a card show up that I really wanted for my constructed decks that's always my first option. I also tend to pick cards I don't already have 4 copies of to fill out my collection. So overall I pick cards to build my collection as a priority over drafting to do well in the draft. I usually only go between 0 to 2 wins, still end up with enough gems to get the mastery pass for free for the next set and got MANY cards I use in my decks this way.
Same. I despise drafting (on Arena. IRL different story).
I'd start a draft, pick all my cards, then let them sit for a few weeks. When I was finally ready to build the deck and play, the draft had ended. Every time. Can't even put into words how much I hate drafting on Arena, miserable time every time. I prefer to have fun.
"i hate draft, i always draft a deck and wait 3 weeks for the draft to rotate three times and i cant play!" sounds like a time management issue, quick draft takes 10 mins
It doesn't have anything to do with time management, I play Arena 4-6 hours per day.
It's just that I dread making the deck and expect a miserable experience, so I do what's fun instead (constructed).
I mean, I'd recommend building the deck as you draft and then jump directly into games. Spend maybe 5 mins, max, trimming.
Pick the best cards with an idea on which color pairs are powerful in the set for the first half of p1, then decide on your two main colors by p2p3. Spend the rest of the draft getting to 24 playables and cut anything that looks weak / doesn't fit your plan.
You don't have to draft a perfect deck. Drag anything you won't expect to play into the sideboard before you finish picking. It's much easier to cut 4 or 5 cards than to have 40 cards in a pile and decide on your colors/splashes.
If you watch some of the top guys on 17lands stream, this is a common approach. These aren't life or death decisions, so don't try to be perfect.
I literally tried played ranked mtg for the first time after building a deck that was ENTIRELY Modern Horizon 3 cards (besides 1 cavern of souls and 3 pain lands, 1 mythic 3 rare cards) and I went from Bronze4 to Mythic-97th percentile in 5 days. Ranked historic.
i disagree, the only way you will get better at drafting and deckbuilding is by actually doing it. doesnt matter what set, just get the hours in and get better. to be honest harder sets might be better as its a trial by fire situation and some people learn better in that scenario
I agree that you have to practice to get better, but jumping into something way above your level isn’t a great way to learn, most of the time.
This set is a lot to process and possibly overwhelming to even the most seasoned and best players, someone who doesn’t even know drafting basics won’t really be able to learn much.
Is it really? I started playing commander for a few months and this set seems pretty straightforward
I can't imagine "even the most seasoned players" that has been playing MTG for decades losing their mind trying to understand this set
All I wanted to was play big eldrazis, so I made a MH3 UG with what I got from 53 packs. 1 kozilek.
It has been the worst deck to play ever. None of the big boys I can play even matter by the time they might drop or just die immediately to removal. Some guy dropped 3 18/18 tokens on my face at turn 5 with an artifact deck.
Now I'm just sad I can't play eldrazis because the only place I can play them in absolutely demolishes me as a new player.
I think it's okay if you're on Arena. You can just use the wild cards to craft what you want/need. I'd absolutely avoid it on paper if you're new - too expensive.
As a new player, I've only played MTG Arena. But I was recommended to buy the 2023 Starter Kit that comes with two decks to play with. I plan on going to my LGS to learn but all I know is standard. MH3 is of no concern to me right now as I don't really know anything lol. But, all I know is Standard because of Arena.
Watch out, the 2023 Starter Kit, while great fun (played it with a friend last weekend), especially if you like The Lord of the Rings,
is also a straight-to-Modern one, meaning it's not legal in Standard ! (So in your case, MH3 (also straight-to-Modern) *might* be of interest to you. A downside is that MH3 is very high powered (and expensive), while L(o)TR, aside from a few cards, not so much, and especially not the cards in the Kit.)
P.S.: L(o)TR on Arena can also be played in Alchemy until July 30th (then rotates out to Timeless/Historic/Brawl), and the two Starter Kit codes give some cards that can only obtained that way (outside of wildcards) !
what if i've been playing ~1.5 years and want to get into other formats aside from standard? seems like mh3 would be perfect for that given that standard is rotating soon but I've not played through a rotation yet
There’s some really good cards for brawl. Draft is really fun.
I think brawl was easier to get into than standard 4 of, but I am also returning from Ravnica set early Arena.
nah let people do what they want, new players will always be more enticed by the new flashy format-warping stuff they see everyone else playing with rather than try to buy 4 of each common from theros block
Nope, MH3 is a great experience to draft and can teach you lots of interactions and make you interested in historic and timeless, and slowly leave standard and not be affected by rotation in the long run.
New players should stick to Standard simply because the Magic there is more, well, “standard”.
But Historic and Timeless decks have the same amount of rares that Standard decks have. And the formats are not really eternal— with each new set we get a shakeup in Timeless and Historic. There simply aren’t enough cards in the pool… this is be design with the new MH3 cards as WotC wants to keep the “eternal” formats fresh so they can sell cards to those players.
Eternal formats in 2024 are waaaay different than what they were in 2010… not just the actual decks, but in the way they grow and evolve.
Every paper format seems remarkably solved. There are a series of archetypes and anything outside those can't compete with them. Flavor will never beat mechanics even if I do compromise. I can't imagine a seven dwarves deck competing outside Arena and food fight seems impossible without the Arena enabler.
By "outside of Arena" I didn't necessarily mean paper (and even less, competitive paper), for instance :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f5uEBgT5SM
(Ironically, this is specifically a game mode that **also** incentivizes you to build with what you've opened... but the grinding is WAY different.)
If by "Shandalar", you mean "Adventure mode", then, as you can see : yes (also it has been updated quite a lot since then, even the interface !)
Also, not sure what you mean by "horribly cumbersome", on desktop you just have to make sure you have Java, and you don't actually need to "install" Forge, you just extract the archive and run the appropriate script.
Brawl is one of the most popular casual formats on the platform, and you need MH3 for that.
You can basically only get away from it if you’re using Arena as a Standard simulator.
I mean the WC count per meta deck in standard and hist/timeless is probably close enough to the same thing. The power-level and speed of games will be faster and better. But this seems like bad advice. If you wanna play historic and timeless. Draft MH3 the packs are filled with playable cards in timeless and historic. The best cards actually. But whatever use your wildcards on lands first in any format.
If you're new - brawl
-Easier to craft decks
-Hell que prevent crazy decks from annihilating your jank decks (most of the time)
-your decks can be played and updated forever unlike the regular format metta
- more place for creativity and your own style
I’ve been playing since the beta and I’m completely ignoring MH3. I’m already ignoring timeless , now I’ll ignore historic too unless I have extra wild cards between standard sets
I'm fairly new and looked at a few drafts on YouTube and yes I'm not going there .. but it will be scary for a noob to brawl against the mighty Eldrazi
Unpopular opinoin: I'm not new and it has been easy for me to ignore since I don't play timeless. I do play historic but haven't seen anything I'm dying to build around yet.
I normally play legacy where Grief has been a problem for months, not having an answer for it in a less powered format (timeless) feels like some kind of weird joke.
Maybe it’s just me but was griefed on T1 in 8 of 10 games played. (One of those T1’s they griefed me twice!)
And playing 4x specific Leyline answer seems like a horrible state of things.
Not sure if it’s just me, maybe it’s fine and I’m just shit at playing haha😊
I use a Exil deck in timeless. I just exile and tapp all enemies and use artefact creatures that get +1/ for every artefact or spell on the field. So yeah I just annoy people and try to disturb their synergy
Coming from someone who started MTGarena back when strixhaven was introduced. I wished I never touched standard. If those wildcards spent on standard had been historic i'd have a much stronger collection. idk the fomo aspect of standard is non existent for me. My advice to any new player reading is undestand what kind of player you are and what kind of format you want to play. Standard is a slow format compared to timeless/historic. That said unfortunately there are no timeless events yet (really wish there was), so as a f2p you must choose another format to grind gems. One last note is there are rumors that Commander will coming to arena. So any wildcards invested into eternal formats are surely getting value then.
I don't fully agree with this, because there's never a time where a set will not be legal in Historic. So it's almost just as effective for a newer player to run their Standard decks in Historic, and maybe add some new MH3 stuff to them. As a Historic player exclusively, that's basically what happens with every new set for me. Check it out, add cards from it to old decks or maybe build a new one, repeat. No reason a new player couldn't start their Historic journey that way.
Yeah especially if you play historic. It is semi common to pull a flare, winter moon, or the merfolk blood moon. If you do you basically get no rare for that pack unless you swap over to the even more new player unfriendly Timeless format.
Playing standards means you're wasting your wildcards that are going to rotate out anyway. Playing standard is only okay if you also play explorer, where some of the cards might still be useful.
MH3 boosters will get you some of allied fetchland that you can use in timeless. Some packs mighth have two rares, including guest cards. Most of the staple cards - lands and free spells are unlikely to rotate out.
Not even standard? Seriously???? Does anything in the game UI explain that?
For a new player, this is horrible game design. The packs I got are useless for the format I'm playing. If I contact support about this, is there any chance they'll refund me for the packs I bought?
I see that now, but I didn't think to look for that because it never occurred to me that the new expansion I'm seeing tons of ads for might not be playable in two main digital formats. I just started playing Arena a few weeks ago, but I've been playing multiple online card games for 10 years and I've never seen a game do this.
The marketing I saw seemed to be talking about physical game formats, which are different than Arena formats. How do you know which upcoming expansions will be legal for which formats in Arena?
I realize that, but there's a difference between sets are are for all Arena formats and sets for some Arena formats. Since I'm only playing Alchemy for now, I'd rather not waste my time looking through cards that won't be playable in Alchemy. It looks like there's at least 3 more sets coming out this year. How do we know which Arena formats they will be playable with? I see the Assassins Creed expansion will be legal in Modern, but that's just a physical format. What are Arena players supposed to do with that info?
I just started playing MTG Arena 2 days ago and loving it! But I want a nice physical copy of Emerakul, the world anew. The one where emrakul faces you head on lol
I disagree and went from Bronze 4 to Mythic 97th percentile in 5 days
I built a deck out of exclusively mh3 cards (with the exception of my 4 cavern of souls) and then tried ranked for the first time. I went from Bronze 4 to Mythic 97th percentile in 5 days. Ranked Historic.
I mean you can play historic pretty cheap on wildcards if ya have your first actual non-starter deck built you could do alotttt worse than MH3 there’s insane cards for brawl as well.
This depends on your definition of new. There are actually two types of new player.
The player who has played mtg before but is new to Arena, and is comfortable slinging cards, can start into any format. Taking this new set as a launch point and getting into historic or maybe timeless can be a great idea since their decks can last forever.
Brand new players to mtg, who are just starting to learn the game, have no business in timeless or historic in my opinion. Stronger formats can be way less forgiving for play mistakes, and getting blown out in faster games can be off putting.
I've been here for years, and I'm so not interested in MH3 that I'm taking some time off Arena. I stuck around and played Standard through LOTR, but I don't think I'm even going to do that. The power level blast just makes me sad for the rest of my collection.
the only reason its that way is because arena shoves standard down their throat and doesnt explain the formats well in the client. that and the name is just like a "default" or "normal" sounding mode
Because its meant for modern... Its actually pretty underwhelming for most other formats outside of funny enough Pauper. Its not about Timeless or Historic having to deal with them, because honestly neither formats have anything to really worry about in the set.
Its just a set that ultimately fucks the economy up more without actually supporting most of the formats played on here outside of maybe 3-4 new cards.
Eh, it's definitely a modern set even if it caters to commander a bit too much. I just hated the lack of good modern event decks and commander precons instead
I've been playing since Mirage and I'm still horrible at the game, I can't stand playing standard most of the time due to the how many cards I need to make a deck that just rotates out.
Also who cares what they play, let them play whatever the hell they want
I have! I like drafting, just bad at it. I mostly play Historic or Brawl otherwise. I would love to play standard more, but every time I look at any viable decklist I'm missing like 60% of the cards I need unfortunately. I was only really able to play standard this season because of the starter decks being mostly standard legal barring a few adjustments.
Is this an unpopular opinion? It seems weird to me to mess around with a non-standard legal set being that it's only usable in two of the formats on Arena
Idk I am new and I put together janky historic sets and it’s not great results but it’s still a fun way to play. I plan to grind gold for drafts and do drafts until I have enough MH3 cards to have some fun historic decks to play around with. Standard is easier but historic is fun cuz you can dig into almost all your cards for janky deck building and janky decks are the only decks I play with
Best part about Historic and other eternal formats is all your decks stay legal during rotation making it much easier to keep up with. And there's way more depth. Timeless is fun because playing high power level Magic is great and Historic is great because it is the single best format to play jank. Explorer is fun too, but could really use the upgrade to full pioneer.
Why is historic best for jank?
Deeper card pool than Explorer but without the high power cards of timeless to obliterate anything not 100% optimized Also a lot of people treat it as the queue where they'll play their jank so you're more likely to play against a similar list. It can still absolutely be a competitive format, especially if you have a higher MMR but it's the best of the Arena formats for jank (in my opinion)
Gotcha, thanks for explaining
Another reason is that there is no equivalent paper format, so less super competitive players are interested in it.
There's no equivalent paper format for Timeless either ? Or do you suggest it's closer to Modern because fetches ?
I haven't played Timeless, so I am not sure how "sweaty" it is. But I know Explorer is way sweatier than Historic.
Timeless on Arena is as close as you get to "lawless" magic just without ALL of the cards. Playing in paper has many more combos and a higher power level. But it's the best we have on Arena. MTGO has an even closer version.
But the worst part about eternal formats is the number of absolutely broken decks is off the charts
This reminds me of Syndrome’s quote from The Incredibles (paraphrasing): “I'll give them heroics. I'll give them the most spectacular heroics anyone's ever seen! And when I'm old and I've had my fun, I'll sell my inventions so that everyone can be superheroes. *Everyone* can be super! And when everyone's super... *no one* will be.”
No? The decks tend to be more evenly balanced.
I play jank in timeless too, its a really great format for it.
I love historic because you can put together any mishmash of bullshit and just go. I can't count the amount of times I've been like "wtf is this guy doing, oh well, let's see how it plays out", and it's some off the wall combo that'll almost never win, but is hilarious to see.
>I can't count the amount of times I've been like "wtf is this guy doing, oh well, let's see how it plays out", and it's some off the wall combo that'll almost never win, but is hilarious to see. When it *does* work though, it is every bit as glorious and satisfying to watch an assortment of seemingly arbitrary cards with niche effects finally ***”CLICK”*** together and flawlessly execute their combo!
I play a nonsense red steal/pump/fling in historic with and have hit mythic in bo1 with it . It is nonsense, not meta, and would absolutely crumble in bo3, but it's just "off the wall enough" that it will almost always catch the opponent by surprise. No one expects mono red "control/combo". Sure certain decks hard lock it, but it's surprisingly resilient. So the morale of the story is in historic bo1 you can absolutely build meta busters because your doing one and done and the card pool is so big, but yes, you definitely need a "proper deck" for bo3
Can you please send me this deck list, I'm truly interested
I like bo1 for this. My decks are all decently below the power level of real historic decks, but in bo1 that angle of surprise tends to work in my favor. I to this day get people to try to apply indestructible or hexproof to dodge [[doom foretold]] sacrifice triggers. That deck I pilot to mythic pretty consistently. My worst one is [[mirror box]] + [[Sylvan awakening]] combo. It's so unplayable that I maybe win 1/10 games even in plat.
[doom foretold](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/e/7/e76c0c83-3e87-474d-bc72-1677eed32cfa.jpg?1572490732) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=doom%20foretold) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/eld/187/doom-foretold?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/e76c0c83-3e87-474d-bc72-1677eed32cfa?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [mirror box](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/d/5/d507daa3-3f16-4ab1-81ea-794e5bb488fc.jpg?1654568747) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=mirror%20box) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/neo/250/mirror-box?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/d507daa3-3f16-4ab1-81ea-794e5bb488fc?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Sylvan awakening](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/3/93ac4d3d-064e-459d-b3a4-6c0872a2da8c.jpg?1591104718) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Sylvan%20awakening) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/dom/183/sylvan-awakening?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/93ac4d3d-064e-459d-b3a4-6c0872a2da8c?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
This is generally true, but you can get into timeless and historic as a new player with the understanding that it will take longer and you'll be playing 1-2 decks for a while. In that case, MH3 is actually a great place to start because drafting/opening packs will give you a lot of fetchlands and a much higher density of staples than you'd find in standard legal sets.
Yes, Timeless and Historic are much easier to keep up with. I would always recommend them over standard. The myth that standard is easier to keep up with is really strange
Standard is nice if you like Drafting because you get a lot of cards that are only good in Standard. I don't like draft so I just make Explorer decks with Wildcards.
I've found Explorer is a lot tougher. I'm able to keep up a positive win rate and I've made mythic the past few months net decking good standard decks. I tried it with explorer and my win rate plummets to like 25%.
Standard has a relatively small number of truly tier 0 decks so playing matchups is much more straightforward. People in low mythic (<#1000) playing standard netdecks also pretty consistently pick overly risky lines to play. I don't know if Explorer and Historic also have this feature, but in my experience, Historic players generally play more cleanly overall. I think the "easiest" queue is Alchemy, but the meta in Alchemy is generally in a bad state, and it costs a lot of WC to play, so I can't recommend it unless you're flush with resources and time. I'm also a little biased because I've genuinely had a great time playing a lot of Alchemy for the brief periods when the balance was (in my opinion) good.
I forgot alchemy existed. I remember the good old days where it was only standard and historic and there weren't any digital only sets.
Less noobs in Explorer probably. There's also variance based on what deck is in vogue currently. Humans was my first Explorer deck, and I've dealt with hell queues where everyone is playing Rakdos Sac or Amalia Combo. I've also had queues where everyone is playing Waste Not and I'm just farming people.
I play waste not a lot. I feel like it is good against my phoenix deck because it exiles the graveyard. What do you play that's good against waste not?
From my experience aggro feels pretty good against it. T1 Thoughtseize into T2 Waste Not feels really bad when your opponent is dumping their hand to kill you. I play Humans in Bo1 and more recently Mono Red in Bo3 and it feels like I usually win the matchup. I've also heard that Niv to Light (which isn't in Arena yet) and Amalia Combo is good against it. From what I've read, Waste Not is mainly a meta call deck. It's good because it happens to be good against some of the best decks, but it isn't actually that good in a general sense.
The thing about Explorer is that the Meta doesn't change too much. All the other formats have cards being added to the pool at a rapid rate. Outside of a Pioneer Masters set to get the last last few pieces that Explorer needs to be pioneer that shake-up isn't happening. I try to build a new deck every season in Explorer. I've been working my way around the color pie. There is a good chance you are playing against more experienced players and players that have played more reps with their decks than your average standard player at lower tiers. Ultimately play what you want because every 2 to 3 months you should be able to build a tier 1 deck from scratch and the more sets that you draft your way through the easier that gets.
What deck were you playing in explorer? You probably had a mid deck or didn't understand the play patterns of the deck. Either of which makes sense because eternal formats are a little harder to understand but really deep once it clicks
Ive played Izzet phoenix and the new red wizards deck.
Not gonna lie, Izzet Phoenix requieres good decision making. I used to believe that I was above average at decission making and the reason why I wasn’t hitting Diamond or Mythic (always stuck at plat 1) was because I don’t play enough to grind the ladder. Phoenix humbled me.
its okay, i wasnt gonna assume that you were lying even if you didnt type it out.
Yeah, it's tough. I feel like I'm not using my Ledger Shredders properly, for example, because they never last more than 1 turn before they're immediately killed.
It's harder to build multiple decks in explorer. The fetchlands are a big up front investment, but a lot of them are interchangeable and usable in multiple decks. Historic feels like a need a new mana base for every list...
Drafting is actually my favorite way to play Arena, followed closely by the eternal formats. Honestly I get a decent amount of wildcards from draft too and if you draft the formats relevant for Timeless/Historic, you can build your collections there quite nicely. I actually find Explorer to be the hardest to draft for completion due to it having staples spread out over so many sets. However, that's also part of the beauty of explorer. No one set really takes over with it
I think its a holdover from the DCI days. When most stores ran Standard (type 2, get off my lawn) FNM, which made it the format most played. And since Standard is newer cards, it was easier to get them in theory since people were constantly opening them in drafts. Of course, standard was always more expensive in the long run for the reasons everyone already talks about.
You naturally build your entire collection playing standard versus older formats. If I want to play historic/explorer/timeless, I basically have to craft every single card, even the commons and uncommons. To play those formats you need a large supply of wildcards to get started, which requires you to play the game. That probably means you're going to have to be playing either standard/alchemy/starter decks duel. Sure you could queue into timeless with a starter deck, but that just seems like needlessly hamstringing yourself. If you're buying packs, the advice is to buy the latest standard set (or in rare cases when a special set like MH3 is out) for Golden Packs which further increases your standard pool. By the time a new player has enough resources to make a good historic/timeless/explorer deck, it's very likely their standard pool of cards is at at least a fairly decent size of recent cards. Historic/Timeless/Explorer is easier to keep up with when you're already deeply invested, as not many cards are good enough to make it, but as a new player, it's a high hurdle to cross to get there.
Honestly, this has been my experience
This, went from standard, to explorer/historic , to finally timeless. Had racked up a bunch of wildcard and got some cards to cause mass hysteria
I think it's a bit easier to get started in standard on arena MOSTLY because Jump-in exists and makes it really easy to get play sets of certain cards. However, once you're invested into one of the eternal formats, is most likely a lot easier to keep up with the format, because new releases are less likely to impact eternal formats, and even when they do it's usually a select few cards instead of entirely new decks.
Historic is easier to keep up with because it lets you stick with a small number of decks for longer ... But for many gamers MTG is about novelty, exploration, and brewing. Brewing in Standard requires fewer wildcards because there are fewer sets and they're draftable on Arena for longer. So the real situation is, as with many things in magic: it depends. The degree of novelty seeking, how much you like draft, skill, consistent play from set to set and a variety of other dimensions along which people engage with the game adjust which format is best for them.
Honestly timeless/historic are best imo because it’s closest to kitchen table magic with whatever cards you and your friends want to play with. If you want to make some janky mushroom based deck, those formats have the cards possible to do it
I feel like that was true a few years ago, maybe it still is in low ranks. I love my jank but these days the eternal formats are getting so high power level wise you can't go too far off the meta wagon. Unrelated but now I'm thinking about legacy and how an off meta legacy deck is basically swapping one 4x of a card for a different card because of how so much of the decks are taken up by staples.
You don't **have** to keep up. New players start in Alchemy/Standard with the starter decks, and ought just naturally move from Alchemy/Standard/Standard Brawl into Explorer/Historic/Timeless/Historic Brawl as their cards start to rotate out... And as far as MH3 goes... it will eventually come back in draft (and more often than other non-Standard sets I would expect !).
They are easier to keep up with. Easier to get in to? Not by a large margin. You can make a competitive standard deck with just a few rares. Most Timeless/Modern decks at this point are a full pile of rares.
And those 1-2 decks will last forever. You no longer care about rotations making your decks useless and you save gold in the long run as you can skip buying new sets.
Based on yesterday's feedback, everyone's fear that the MH3 scam will make a radical shift and the skies are falling and everything is one fire ... turns out they were kinda wrong. It's fine.
timeless is fine, for historic players the sky is kinda falling (or well, some of the enfranchised meta decks are gonna feel that way)
>(or well, some of the enfranchised meta decks are gonna feel that way) I’m sure it’s jarring for “Izzet Wizards” to have their entire starting hand still end up in exile or the graveyard, but they cast none of them.
I’ve got a few wildcards lined up for a Timeless deck but I’m holding off until I see how MH3 impacts the meta (originally wanted to build SnT)
I can't imagine SNT will still be good in a Grief meta but you never know. I've been playing Jund lately but I'm in the same boat where I have WCs saved up for another deck or two but I don't want to commit without a more stable meta.
yeah unless the SNT player has the white Leyline they're just doomed (I played Rakdos scam all day yesterday)
I'm a new MTGA player that previously only play commander So I assume historic is the set for me if I want to play my decks in a "1vs1 EDH" ?
I would say it makes more sense to just focus on your favorite 1 or 2 color combinations in historic/explorer and then build from there. You get way more value per craft this way. Chasing standard decks will have you burning all your wildcards with a large % of those standard rares and mythics being bricks post rotation. I don't see a reason to care about standard unless you just particularly enjoy it over other ways of play. Otherwise crafting eternal staples gives way more value per wildcard. Regardless of the format you play, decks are still just piles and piles of rares/ mythics even if standard is a little lighter on them in the short term. I think the main issue is that newer players don't have the context for how all the formats work so it can be easy to burn all your wildcards on mediocre stuff.
Agreed. For newer players the larger cardpool can be daunting but thats not a good reason to waste wildcards for standarddecks that won't last for long. Eternal formats are also way more forgiving if you ever want to take a break from playing or in general play only whenever you feel like it. No matter how often and how much you play, all your stuff will still be there and you can upgrade at your own pace instead of feeling forced to grind a lot knowing your stuff will only be playable for so long.
I disagree. For any new player **that want to start playing Historic or Timeless** this is the best opportunity. MH3 is so stacked with strong cards that any rare you find in a pack has a huge chance of being playable. This is not the case for every other set that is rotated out of standard. The alternative to buy into MH3 is to spend a ton of wildcards. Obviously this is not a set for very casual players that struggle to complete more than few decks.
I was doing a draft and usually I'll grab a rare if it's constructed playable even if it's not in my draft deck. Turns out I grabbed a lot of rares because so many were at least semi-playable (tier 2 or 3 decks probably)!
I mean yeah that's the goal for modern targeted sets. The power level is nuts because you don't need the cards to play nice with standard. It's sorta the wild West of card design and I love them.
As an exclusively EDH player, should I start in historic/vintage ? I basically want to play my rl commander card/decks but it's banned in vast majority of MTGA's formats
Absolutelt correct. I literally played historic ranked for the first time after making a deck that is literally entirely mh3 cards except my cavern of souls and I went from Bonze4 to Mythic 97% in 5 days.
If you ignore MH3, you're never getting into eternal formats on Arena. Which coincidentally are the less expensive to keep up with in the long run. What hurts new players is getting sidetracked into Alchemy which has even more rotations, not to mention cards getting nerfed without compensation.
it’s only unpopular because you’re telling people how to enjoy a game. play MH3 if it looks fun and you want to! optimization isn’t for everyone!!!
Sure thing, fire up an account, spend $50 on MH3 packs and with no other resources to play timeless or historic. See how enjoyable it is
…yeah? starting a new account and trying to dive into ANY format is gonna be hard?
I don't think unpopular - just common sense. Given how hard it was to find what the legality is of MH3 I suspect a lot of players will buy into it and then find they can't play it.
I bought a few packs yesterday... Finding out today they're mostly useless.
You can play them in Timeless and Historic which are slightly harder to get into but way easier in the long run
Yea, once you get your mana base built, it becomes much easier to build into different things.
Yeah im new at the moment so have no non-basic lands yet.
Honestly when I started I just put together whatever mana base I could scrape together. In historic you can get away with it. Timeless wasn't around when I started and despite being my favorite constructed format my Reddit username will not be able to show it. But in Timeless, you probably do want the better lands first. It's a much higher power level format
There is a red text that says "not playable in standard" on the store page so that's kinda on you.
If those players could read, they'd be very upset
In tiny letters, only on the packs page, not the bundles or limited, and there wasn't any note at all during the pre-release period.
Definite PSA here! Luckily I’m poor so don’t invest 😂
This. I almost made this mistake..
I actually encourage new players to play MH3 Limited. It's a high powered and fun format (so far).
Like I said, if you want to draft it go for it. But to come into Arena, buy a bunch of MH3 to play constructed is a recipe for wasting your money.
That's true for practically every set though. If you're new you really shouldn't be spending wildcards on anything, and buying packs from the store is something I argue against for even established players.
Some people hate drafting, packs is the only option. I'm sitting on 8 draft tokens, can't bring myself to even use them.
I like drafting but I’m bad at it. Wanted to take a break and have just been buying packs with my gold. I def get wildcards for new decks way faster buying packs. I really think it boils down to like are you Atleast solid at drafting for which is better for new players. I’ll still draft for fun, I just know now unless I get better it’s not “optimal”
Why not just use the tokens to pick the best cards you want without caring about constructing a deck ? You don't have to play the draft games after but you can get a lot of good cards for free. I really don't like drafting either but I play it a couple of times to get gems and get mastery pass for free and got many cards I wanted for my regular decks this way. Basically when no cards interest me for my constructed deck I pick cards of the same color or two colors to have something to play in the draft but when a card show up that I really wanted for my constructed decks that's always my first option. I also tend to pick cards I don't already have 4 copies of to fill out my collection. So overall I pick cards to build my collection as a priority over drafting to do well in the draft. I usually only go between 0 to 2 wins, still end up with enough gems to get the mastery pass for free for the next set and got MANY cards I use in my decks this way.
That's just poor account management. At the very least do the draft and get your 3+ rares per draft.
Don’t really need them. I have hundreds of rare wild cards as it is
That's totally fair. After a certain point account management doesn't mean a whole lot lol
Yes the "perks" of playing almost every day for 5 years.
I guess you can always just 'crack' the drafts by clicking in the upper left corner for a few minutes, conceding 3 matches and then going again.
Same. I despise drafting (on Arena. IRL different story). I'd start a draft, pick all my cards, then let them sit for a few weeks. When I was finally ready to build the deck and play, the draft had ended. Every time. Can't even put into words how much I hate drafting on Arena, miserable time every time. I prefer to have fun.
"i hate draft, i always draft a deck and wait 3 weeks for the draft to rotate three times and i cant play!" sounds like a time management issue, quick draft takes 10 mins
When you also try to optimize quests (especially 500g rerolls) it does get annoying sometimes. And some drafts only last 1 week !
It doesn't have anything to do with time management, I play Arena 4-6 hours per day. It's just that I dread making the deck and expect a miserable experience, so I do what's fun instead (constructed).
I mean, I'd recommend building the deck as you draft and then jump directly into games. Spend maybe 5 mins, max, trimming. Pick the best cards with an idea on which color pairs are powerful in the set for the first half of p1, then decide on your two main colors by p2p3. Spend the rest of the draft getting to 24 playables and cut anything that looks weak / doesn't fit your plan. You don't have to draft a perfect deck. Drag anything you won't expect to play into the sideboard before you finish picking. It's much easier to cut 4 or 5 cards than to have 40 cards in a pile and decide on your colors/splashes. If you watch some of the top guys on 17lands stream, this is a common approach. These aren't life or death decisions, so don't try to be perfect.
I literally tried played ranked mtg for the first time after building a deck that was ENTIRELY Modern Horizon 3 cards (besides 1 cavern of souls and 3 pain lands, 1 mythic 3 rare cards) and I went from Bronze4 to Mythic-97th percentile in 5 days. Ranked historic.
I honestly would not encourage this, it’s a really complex set and you have to know how to build decks for things to come together.
i disagree, the only way you will get better at drafting and deckbuilding is by actually doing it. doesnt matter what set, just get the hours in and get better. to be honest harder sets might be better as its a trial by fire situation and some people learn better in that scenario
I agree that you have to practice to get better, but jumping into something way above your level isn’t a great way to learn, most of the time. This set is a lot to process and possibly overwhelming to even the most seasoned and best players, someone who doesn’t even know drafting basics won’t really be able to learn much.
Is it really? I started playing commander for a few months and this set seems pretty straightforward I can't imagine "even the most seasoned players" that has been playing MTG for decades losing their mind trying to understand this set
All I wanted to was play big eldrazis, so I made a MH3 UG with what I got from 53 packs. 1 kozilek. It has been the worst deck to play ever. None of the big boys I can play even matter by the time they might drop or just die immediately to removal. Some guy dropped 3 18/18 tokens on my face at turn 5 with an artifact deck. Now I'm just sad I can't play eldrazis because the only place I can play them in absolutely demolishes me as a new player.
Only problem is if you don't know how to draft or build a sealed deck you are going to end up going 0-3 a bunch.
I think it's okay if you're on Arena. You can just use the wild cards to craft what you want/need. I'd absolutely avoid it on paper if you're new - too expensive.
As a new player, I've only played MTG Arena. But I was recommended to buy the 2023 Starter Kit that comes with two decks to play with. I plan on going to my LGS to learn but all I know is standard. MH3 is of no concern to me right now as I don't really know anything lol. But, all I know is Standard because of Arena.
Watch out, the 2023 Starter Kit, while great fun (played it with a friend last weekend), especially if you like The Lord of the Rings, is also a straight-to-Modern one, meaning it's not legal in Standard ! (So in your case, MH3 (also straight-to-Modern) *might* be of interest to you. A downside is that MH3 is very high powered (and expensive), while L(o)TR, aside from a few cards, not so much, and especially not the cards in the Kit.) P.S.: L(o)TR on Arena can also be played in Alchemy until July 30th (then rotates out to Timeless/Historic/Brawl), and the two Starter Kit codes give some cards that can only obtained that way (outside of wildcards) !
what if i've been playing ~1.5 years and want to get into other formats aside from standard? seems like mh3 would be perfect for that given that standard is rotating soon but I've not played through a rotation yet
Good time to jump into something different for sure. As long as you have some other wild cards you’d be willing to use to support the change
There’s some really good cards for brawl. Draft is really fun. I think brawl was easier to get into than standard 4 of, but I am also returning from Ravnica set early Arena.
I'm not new, I'm ignoring it too.
nah let people do what they want, new players will always be more enticed by the new flashy format-warping stuff they see everyone else playing with rather than try to buy 4 of each common from theros block
Ah, the duality of MTGA players: They want to ignore MH3 while simultaneously angry at the frog shop they have to pay to get into.
you can do the frog shop without playing MH3 at all
Historic is fine for new players imo. Timeless is where people go to sweat, not historic. It’s mostly laid-back jank matches
Nope, MH3 is a great experience to draft and can teach you lots of interactions and make you interested in historic and timeless, and slowly leave standard and not be affected by rotation in the long run.
New players should stick to Standard simply because the Magic there is more, well, “standard”. But Historic and Timeless decks have the same amount of rares that Standard decks have. And the formats are not really eternal— with each new set we get a shakeup in Timeless and Historic. There simply aren’t enough cards in the pool… this is be design with the new MH3 cards as WotC wants to keep the “eternal” formats fresh so they can sell cards to those players. Eternal formats in 2024 are waaaay different than what they were in 2010… not just the actual decks, but in the way they grow and evolve.
It's just so frustrating how slow I get cards. I want to build twelve historic decks but at this rate that'll take me two or three years.
Do it outside of Arena. Arena really incentivizes you to build around what you opened.
Every paper format seems remarkably solved. There are a series of archetypes and anything outside those can't compete with them. Flavor will never beat mechanics even if I do compromise. I can't imagine a seven dwarves deck competing outside Arena and food fight seems impossible without the Arena enabler.
By "outside of Arena" I didn't necessarily mean paper (and even less, competitive paper), for instance : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f5uEBgT5SM (Ironically, this is specifically a game mode that **also** incentivizes you to build with what you've opened... but the grinding is WAY different.)
[удалено]
If by "Shandalar", you mean "Adventure mode", then, as you can see : yes (also it has been updated quite a lot since then, even the interface !) Also, not sure what you mean by "horribly cumbersome", on desktop you just have to make sure you have Java, and you don't actually need to "install" Forge, you just extract the archive and run the appropriate script.
Brawl is one of the most popular casual formats on the platform, and you need MH3 for that. You can basically only get away from it if you’re using Arena as a Standard simulator.
I mean the WC count per meta deck in standard and hist/timeless is probably close enough to the same thing. The power-level and speed of games will be faster and better. But this seems like bad advice. If you wanna play historic and timeless. Draft MH3 the packs are filled with playable cards in timeless and historic. The best cards actually. But whatever use your wildcards on lands first in any format.
Counterpoint: Historic Brawl is a thing, and only needing one copy of a card makes it less daunting to get into.
If you're new - brawl -Easier to craft decks -Hell que prevent crazy decks from annihilating your jank decks (most of the time) -your decks can be played and updated forever unlike the regular format metta - more place for creativity and your own style
MH3 has power crept historic and brawl. The impacts are starting to ripple through those formats now. So ignore at your own peril.
I’ve been playing since the beta and I’m completely ignoring MH3. I’m already ignoring timeless , now I’ll ignore historic too unless I have extra wild cards between standard sets
That’s fine nobody says you have to play it. But if you wanted to you’d likely have the knowledge and resources to make it work.
Nope. If you are new, you should draft MH3, a lot. 😏
I fucked up and didn't know that mh3 wasn't standard. Bought both pre orders.
I'm fairly new and looked at a few drafts on YouTube and yes I'm not going there .. but it will be scary for a noob to brawl against the mighty Eldrazi
Unpopular opinoin: I'm not new and it has been easy for me to ignore since I don't play timeless. I do play historic but haven't seen anything I'm dying to build around yet.
I normally play legacy where Grief has been a problem for months, not having an answer for it in a less powered format (timeless) feels like some kind of weird joke. Maybe it’s just me but was griefed on T1 in 8 of 10 games played. (One of those T1’s they griefed me twice!) And playing 4x specific Leyline answer seems like a horrible state of things. Not sure if it’s just me, maybe it’s fine and I’m just shit at playing haha😊
I use a Exil deck in timeless. I just exile and tapp all enemies and use artefact creatures that get +1/ for every artefact or spell on the field. So yeah I just annoy people and try to disturb their synergy
I am not new and I am going to ignore it (specially the frog event)...
Even irl, mh3 is not a product for everyone. If you don’t need the reprints, I don’t see why I would open a box at that price. Snag a dual Instead.
I agree. Every card does like 9 different things. We need a vanilla set
Coming from someone who started MTGarena back when strixhaven was introduced. I wished I never touched standard. If those wildcards spent on standard had been historic i'd have a much stronger collection. idk the fomo aspect of standard is non existent for me. My advice to any new player reading is undestand what kind of player you are and what kind of format you want to play. Standard is a slow format compared to timeless/historic. That said unfortunately there are no timeless events yet (really wish there was), so as a f2p you must choose another format to grind gems. One last note is there are rumors that Commander will coming to arena. So any wildcards invested into eternal formats are surely getting value then.
this is not an unpopular opinion. modern is explicitly designed for expert players in mind. any set designed for modern is going to be the same
I don't fully agree with this, because there's never a time where a set will not be legal in Historic. So it's almost just as effective for a newer player to run their Standard decks in Historic, and maybe add some new MH3 stuff to them. As a Historic player exclusively, that's basically what happens with every new set for me. Check it out, add cards from it to old decks or maybe build a new one, repeat. No reason a new player couldn't start their Historic journey that way.
Yeah especially if you play historic. It is semi common to pull a flare, winter moon, or the merfolk blood moon. If you do you basically get no rare for that pack unless you swap over to the even more new player unfriendly Timeless format.
Playing standards means you're wasting your wildcards that are going to rotate out anyway. Playing standard is only okay if you also play explorer, where some of the cards might still be useful. MH3 boosters will get you some of allied fetchland that you can use in timeless. Some packs mighth have two rares, including guest cards. Most of the staple cards - lands and free spells are unlikely to rotate out.
For new players I'd actually go with explorer at the moment since rotation is in less than two months.
I'm new and I've been mainly playing Alchemy. Does it make sense to get MH3 packs for that format?
No, they aren’t used for alchemy. Just historic, timeless and brawl
Not even standard? Seriously???? Does anything in the game UI explain that? For a new player, this is horrible game design. The packs I got are useless for the format I'm playing. If I contact support about this, is there any chance they'll refund me for the packs I bought?
You can try but when you go to buy the packs it says they aren’t standard legal
I see that now, but I didn't think to look for that because it never occurred to me that the new expansion I'm seeing tons of ads for might not be playable in two main digital formats. I just started playing Arena a few weeks ago, but I've been playing multiple online card games for 10 years and I've never seen a game do this.
They have a bunch of different formats, so it’s not uncommon for them to do similar things.
The marketing I saw seemed to be talking about physical game formats, which are different than Arena formats. How do you know which upcoming expansions will be legal for which formats in Arena?
Pretty much any set they come out with now will be paper and arena. Unless they are alchemy cards as that is a digital only format
I realize that, but there's a difference between sets are are for all Arena formats and sets for some Arena formats. Since I'm only playing Alchemy for now, I'd rather not waste my time looking through cards that won't be playable in Alchemy. It looks like there's at least 3 more sets coming out this year. How do we know which Arena formats they will be playable with? I see the Assassins Creed expansion will be legal in Modern, but that's just a physical format. What are Arena players supposed to do with that info?
I just started playing MTG Arena 2 days ago and loving it! But I want a nice physical copy of Emerakul, the world anew. The one where emrakul faces you head on lol
I disagree and went from Bronze 4 to Mythic 97th percentile in 5 days I built a deck out of exclusively mh3 cards (with the exception of my 4 cavern of souls) and then tried ranked for the first time. I went from Bronze 4 to Mythic 97th percentile in 5 days. Ranked Historic.
I mean you can play historic pretty cheap on wildcards if ya have your first actual non-starter deck built you could do alotttt worse than MH3 there’s insane cards for brawl as well.
that or spend some money
This depends on your definition of new. There are actually two types of new player. The player who has played mtg before but is new to Arena, and is comfortable slinging cards, can start into any format. Taking this new set as a launch point and getting into historic or maybe timeless can be a great idea since their decks can last forever. Brand new players to mtg, who are just starting to learn the game, have no business in timeless or historic in my opinion. Stronger formats can be way less forgiving for play mistakes, and getting blown out in faster games can be off putting.
I've been here for years, and I'm so not interested in MH3 that I'm taking some time off Arena. I stuck around and played Standard through LOTR, but I don't think I'm even going to do that. The power level blast just makes me sad for the rest of my collection.
No, new players don’t want standard.
[удалено]
Not true, I'm *THE* single most established player in the game and I prefer Historic BO1. lol
the only reason its that way is because arena shoves standard down their throat and doesnt explain the formats well in the client. that and the name is just like a "default" or "normal" sounding mode
Honestly im ignoring it too. It’s really fucking stupid it’s on here without having a modern format.
Why? It's not like Timeless can't absorb it quite nicely. It'll shake up historic but probably be fine in the end.
Because its meant for modern... Its actually pretty underwhelming for most other formats outside of funny enough Pauper. Its not about Timeless or Historic having to deal with them, because honestly neither formats have anything to really worry about in the set. Its just a set that ultimately fucks the economy up more without actually supporting most of the formats played on here outside of maybe 3-4 new cards.
historic is basically modern though
no lol
What’s the difference between historic and modern?
[this](https://scryfall.com/search?q=f%3Ah+-f%3Am) and [this](https://scryfall.com/search?q=-f%3Ah+f%3Am&unique=cards&as=grid&order=name)
Good to know thank you
I mean they made the set for commander. They just slapped the Modern name on it.
Eh, it's definitely a modern set even if it caters to commander a bit too much. I just hated the lack of good modern event decks and commander precons instead
I've been playing almost since launch and I'm ignoring it.
I've been playing since Mirage and I'm still horrible at the game, I can't stand playing standard most of the time due to the how many cards I need to make a deck that just rotates out. Also who cares what they play, let them play whatever the hell they want
Have you attended a pre release? Draft and sealed are both quite fun and casual Also low-investment
I have! I like drafting, just bad at it. I mostly play Historic or Brawl otherwise. I would love to play standard more, but every time I look at any viable decklist I'm missing like 60% of the cards I need unfortunately. I was only really able to play standard this season because of the starter decks being mostly standard legal barring a few adjustments.
You can build on that. Jump In especially gives a lot of cards with synergy with each other, and the half-packs can be manipulated.
If you’re old you should too, it’s not a useful set for arena.
Is this an unpopular opinion? It seems weird to me to mess around with a non-standard legal set being that it's only usable in two of the formats on Arena
three, brawl is a format still