What the game mechanics should be

[Chinook]

Cards with no answer just aren't fun.

Yep, you clearly have this MtG way of looking at Elements.

There are many "answers" to immortal creatures.
- Kill the opponent faster than he kills you
- Shields
- Healing
- Sundial
etc.

Just because you cannot kill immortal characters doesn't mean there are no "answers" to those cards. Winner is not the player who has more creatures, winner is the player who kills the other player.

No, I don't "clearly" have a M:TG way of looking at anything. M:TG is one of dozens of card based games I played before even beginning to try any of the now many online "card" games so I have no idea why you have fixated on it, other than it is probably the best known\most popular.

None of your "answers" to Immortal creatures are actual answers, they are work arounds.
If for example, "kill the opponent faster than he kills you" was an acceptable design element, then we could simply create solitaire decks with no interaction and simply clock out who kills on the fastest round.
It can be done, but we'd all soon get bored of that.

If we're giving each other advice on how to deal with an Immortal deck, then your answer is perfect, but if we're discussing the design of the game, your answer is sorely lacking.
Perhaps you are the minority though that enjoys a dynamic that has no counter-measure, and if so, we'll have to agree to disagree.

[chriskang]

M:TG is a turn-based real time game.

Man.
This is your first post here and I already love you.

[chriskang]

Looks like a huge buff for decks that don't rely on creatures (like speed fire or poison)

[cipher_nemo]

I think the 'real time' some people are referring to is the client-server communication, which has nothing to do with how the game itself plays.  An example: chess is a turn based game, regarding the game mechanics.  But it can be played over the internet (on yahoo for example) which would be real time, or it can be played via e-mail which would not be real time.  Real time client-server communication and real time game play are two different things.

Thank you very much. Someone who understands my posts. SG would have us believe she knows what I was talking about better than I do, lol.

[cipher_nemo]

I think that Cipher_Nemo has been trying to say two things. 1.) Both Elements and MtG are turn based, and 2.) Elements refreshes for each player on a turn-by-turn basis, while MtGO refreshes on a card-by-card basis. I think the argument was caused only by a breakdown in communication, but either way, the entire point is moot and off-topic entirely.

Thank you.

I think the communication breakdown was when I was talking about Magic Online then referred to it as MTG in later posts. Instead of SG following my posts, she thought I was talking about MTG gameplay, when I was talking about MTG client.

[cipher_nemo]

I'm talking about this:

Give it up, please. You're talking about MTG game-play and I'm talking about Magic Online's client (comparing it to Elements.) We're talking about two different things.

Something more like Magic Online has would be "real time". When someone plays a card, you should see it being played. Instead in PvP with Elements, a player does everything for their own turn, then ends the round. The server queues all of this up and then spits it out in one shot.

[cipher_nemo]

You might actually wanna READ my post. I know you talk about the online version but so what? It's not no more "real time" than the original MtG. They are both turn based and that fact won't change even if you keep denying it until the end of time.

Like I said, you have created your own definition of "real time gameplay" which is why this discussion is pointless.

Nope, you're still not getting what I mentioned earlier in this thread. The client (client-side software that talks with the server software) is "real time" in that it shows players exactly what their opponents are doing, when they're doing it. I agree, the gameplay is not "real time".

[cipher_nemo]

I think that Cipher_Nemo has been trying to say two things. 1.) Both Elements and MtG are turn based, and 2.) Elements refreshes for each player on a turn-by-turn basis, while MtGO refreshes on a card-by-card basis. I think the argument was caused only by a breakdown in communication, but either way, the entire point is moot and off-topic entirely.

Whatever, SG. There are plenty of other forums for arguing purely for the sake of arguing. This is not a place for it.

[cipher_nemo]

Oh, now you are just getting desperate, lol.

CB! is absolutely right, and explains the reason why you got confused. You mixed up real-time gameplay and "seeing things on screen real-time".

p.s. I'm still waiting for your reply on my previous post (you've dodged it three times now). You know, the one where you said MtG gameplay is real-time because it has "instants".

I was talking about the MTG client, not the gameplay. Because it has instants (interrupts) the game needs a real-time client for its online version.

But whatever, not going to bother with you anymore SG if all you want to do is argue about what I meant in my posts.

[Daxx]

Perhaps it's useful to come at the Immaterial creatures question in a different way - that is, why do people want RoF to be able to hit Immaterial creatures, ignoring for now the preferred flavour of those who don't? Is it because Immaterial creatures are completely immune to everything and people want a way to damage them? Or is it because RoF not hitting a creature (regardless of what flavour spin you put on the ability) doesn't seem right? Or is it because they just disagree with the premise that immaterial creatures should be unhittable even by indiscriminate attacks?

If it's the first, this raises a second question. Could there be a way to affect Immaterial creatures? If so, what form could that take?

Also, point of inquiry: what happens to immaterial creatures when they hit a Fire Shield?

[Daxx]

That is how I use those terms when talking about games.

That's not helpful. You can't just unilaterally redefine terms to suit your argument when it is clear that other people use a different interpretation of their meaning. If you want to argue definitions then that is fine, but you should state that first and make everyone aware before you start using them.

The entire problem with this argument is one of semantics, so I'll explain how real-time and turn-based are traditionally used in game design theory (you might want to disagree with me, but at that point we'd be merely arguing over definitions). When we define real-time as a game mechanic, we are necessarily setting it in opposition to the concept of turn-based. In a real-time play mechanic, you are not required to wait for another player to pass you priority (in some games this may be one of the tacit rules). In a RTS game, you are playing and carrying out actions independent of the other player. Your pieces might conflict but if he suddenly drops his mouse it doesn't stop you from playing.

I have pointed this out earlier in the thread, but M:TG operates on the granular scale in terms of passing priority - this is turn-based. I understand this may be confusing in the context of a game which has formalised "turns" which operate as a superstructure to the game's priority passing turn-based mechanic; it does not mean, however, that simply because you can act within your opponent's "turn" (the game construct), that the mechanic is real-time.

[Daxx]

I have pointed this out earlier in the thread, but M:TG operates on the granular scale in terms of passing priority - this is turn-based. I understand this may be confusing in the context of a game which has formalised "turns" which operate as a superstructure to the game's priority passing turn-based mechanic; it does not mean, however, that simply because you can act within your opponent's "turn" (the game construct), that the mechanic is real-time.

It's only confusing if you insist on forcing a hybrid system into one box or the other.
M:TG clearly has a turn based structure, but it is not limited by that. It contains phases when any player can act, react, react, etc to the limit of their resources, not entirely dissimilar to how Baseball functions as both as I mentioned to SG.

Forcing a system into a box is unnecessary when it is not a hybrid system in the first place. A truly hybrid system would be like your excellent example of baseball - well defined structures of steps taken within the game, and then real-time action between those steps. M:TG has no such real time aspect within those steps - it is fundamentally a turn based game only. The phases of action and reaction are completely described by the formalised structure of the priority system. I'm not sure why you're ignoring this point.

An interesting (not necessarily good or complete) test of whether a game is truly a turn-based game is whether you could in theory play it by mail. Baseball you couldn't, because there are periods where real-time interaction are necessary. M:TG or Elements, on the other hand, can be and are played without time being an issue. This is why, for example, there is a time limit in Elements PVP, precisely to get away from a situation which crops up regularly for me - playing a game against a False God and being interrupted by something. You can leave the game indefinitely and go away and do something else, considered somewhat rude in PVP.

This is only a problem if you refuse to accept the generally understood meaning of the words we are using. Now, you can in theory call turn-based games real-time because they incorporate action and reaction in their superstructure, but that doesn't actually further the discussion in any way because it dilutes the descriptive utility of the term. This discussion is ultimately futile anyway, and the original seed of this particular branch of the discussion was answered and abandoned long ago, so I don't feel the need to continue explaining this to you if you refuse to acknowledge that you are talking in terms of semantics rather than argument.