Oldtrees: It might hurt slightly less, but "much" is a bit of an exaggeration. Getting a single pillar, combined with high price cards, could easily set you back 5 turns. If you aren't already dead by that point, it is quite likely that the outcome has already been decided anyway.
Heh. Discarding is actually a major source of timeouts and desynchs. The point I'm trying to make is not "eliminate everything that is a potential issue", but rather "don't bother with things that cause more problems than they are worth". Besides, the interaction between players and server needs to be repeated in order to account for Mulligans, and since you want mulligans to work before starting the duel you are adding before the duel a heavy interaction between both players and the server (reshuffling the whole deck is a lot of informations). That stresses the connection and is potentially a cause of timeouts, as your analogy with discarding points out.
Yes, I already understand your point. I was using your point in that last post to show why that logic doesn't make sense. If the only difference between two mechanics is that one is in the game and the other isn't, then by definition the latter should be added to the game. The issue of synch, which would be a minor blip at best compared to all the other communications that happen in a match, does not hold more value than the positives.
There are a lot of very good tutorials in these boards. I recently started a new account and in less than 6 hours got over 9k electrum. Even if you consider my very early experiences with this game (before even knowing the forums or wiki), I managed to build an efficient AI3 farmer and then learned from the FGs how to make effective decks - in particular, I copied Rainbow's style to create an FG farmer, and slowly upped it. The amount of pain a mulligan function would have reduced is... well, pretty much insignificant, really.
As I mentioned to another person in this thread earlier, yes, I am aware that there is a largely uniform approach to making money. Boring. Allow people more freedom to experiment. If you want to be a button pusher, there are plenty of jobs out there for you, ones where you can make real money, and are equally challenging.
Again, I'm not saying your suggestion would be bad. I'm trying to point out that it has more flaws than praise.
According to the vocal group of core members. Good thing we ignore the frequent comments on this from the new players who have come and gone.
The main issues in this game are the presence of some predominant decks that kill many options (e.g. Firestall). This suggestion doesn't solve those issues. I'm all for more strategy and less luck, but I think there should be some different patches before we look for a mulligan system: patches that solve those problems instead of amplifying them.
I can agree with this to some extent, the first exception being that the balancing you are talking about is far more daunting. Mulligan is a simple mechanic to implement, especially when juxtaposed.
I'm also less sure of how much it amplifies it. While it would surely result quicker setup in the Firestall example you used, it would also allow opponents to set up faster. By introducing the mulligan, people may not be so inclined to include additional copies of a single card, thereby allowing them to adjust for more scenarios, and possibly even taking a mulligan in an attempt to draw better counter cards if you have anticipated the deck you are facing. The decks that dominate now will continue to dominate, but at least the matches would be interesting more consistently.
Anyway, I feel as if we are recycling a lot of this discussion. I'll read any further responses, but I'm not sure there is much more that I can add at this point.
Take care
