Subject: Re: Response to "Nostalgia Revolution" Date: Mon, 10 Aug 1998 19:21:16 +0000 From: "Austin W. Shapiro" To: sagrillo@tiac.net CC: fkusumot@ix.netcom.com To DeAnn Iwan: Thanks for writing an answer to the question my article raises. I have some further comments in response... > First, when Magic first arrived to my world, lots of people > played. You could take a deck to work, school, the local > bookstore, etc. and find pick up games. People from 7 to 70 > played (and probably older and younger). Lots of women played, in > every age bracket (important to me as a female). Contrast this to > now where most players seem to be 15 to 30 year old males, perhaps > mostly 20 to 26 year old males. You got a broader approach to > games. This is true where I live also. I learned the game from friends in 6th grade, and it was introduced to my school by girls, not boys. As far as I know, none of them still play. I do know at least two "old" players (college graduates, that is), and both of them have remained involved in the game longer than their children have. However, it is likely that there are not many such players, as it is rather difficult to spend time and money on Magic while working for a living. I believe that the shift in the ratio of male/female players may have been caused not by a change in the nature of the product but rather by social factors. Magic now occupies part of the niche once filled by roleplaying games, as an activity which gives the guys an excuse to assemble, chat, and generally take a break from real life. Probably girls do this too (I admit a certain degree of ignorance here), but they do not have the benefit of a well-precedented stereotype, so they are more apt (with some exceptions!) to lose interest during the course of five years. > There was an exciting sense of discovery. I'm not talking just > about opening a pack to discover a powerful card like Giant > Growth, but in a more broad sense about discovering new decks when > you met someone new (be it thallids or THE DECK), discovering how > to make a concept work (like viable hand destruction permission), > discovering how to control a deck's flow by altering casting costs > and mana ratios, and all the other "new" things Magic and playing > Magic brought. Despite the Dojo, it is easier than ever to be surprised by new cards, players, and decks. Because of the Dojo, it is harder than ever to overcome the surprise. I have been recently intrigued by locally built decks using cards like Altar of Dementia, Tombstone Stairwell (with Bombardment!), and so forth. These decks are really built for fun and don't compete well once their secrets are well-known, but they are very intimidating when they first appear, and it's rarely easy to distinguish between a Piley Blast (weak) and an Oath of Rogues (strong). The casual player can react to these decks with either frustration or awe. When I have a deck on me, my reaction is, "I'll play, next game!" Of course, it doesn't pay to enter a tournament without knowing the field - but this has always been true. I took a red/green fat creature deck to my first tourney, saw Strip Mine and Hymn to Tourach played for the first time, and lost horribly. Net decks and spoiler lists have been available since the early days of Magic. Don't read them if you want to be surprised by new decks, but expect to lose games when you encounter competitive players. > The great breadth of players (with varying experience, card stock, > approaches to Magic, etc.) combined with the breadth of discovery > levels among those players meant that there was a vast range of > playable decks and viable decks. If you wanted to play thallids, > you could find somewhere/someone/sometime to play them viably (to > have fun and perhaps win). If you want to play power decks > (jewelry, chaos orb, etc), you could find a niche for that too. > No matter what your cards stock was, how good of a deck builder > you were, how good of a player you were, what kind of manner you > liked to play (whether winning was the only reason to play or > whether you liked theme or combo decks, etc.), you could find a > niche to play happily in, and to progress in. > Now, it's either play like you want to win the pro tour or don't > bother. It's buy cards by the case or don't bother (or accept > that losing is ok in a gaming world where only winning mattes). > Yes, this is a tiny, slight, minuscule bit of an > exaggeration....but I hope you get my point. > Magic has lost its diversity of players, diversity of decks, > diversity of ways to play. No, these aspects have not vanished > completely from the universe. But they have vanished from the > everyday world of lots of players. It is difficult to gauge the "breadth of players" in Magic. Most players who publish on The Dojo, and most players whom you'll meet regularly at hobby shops, are playing the field competitively. I know several people who have played Magic only among their circles of friends, but most outsiders know nothing of them. The chance of actually meeting such a person and discovering that he or she plays Magic is minuscule. Thus, if your friends have turned away from Magic, you may be fooled into believing that the only players left are the well-known tourney regulars in your area. Simply put, those who play Magic just for fun rarely go to the trouble to publicize. - Austin Shapiro "Disenchant that, and I'll be forced to swear an un-Druid-like oath."