Ok, so apparently WOTC is actually making statements while we are just complaining about mjerk mjack.
So I wanted to leave this here so you don´t have to search through that awful forum... -you might find some familiar names tho-

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Hi Folks,

Thanks for your patience with the delays this week. We've been working hard on the next major update, and we're really looking forward to sharing it with you!
- Yay!-

The Economy. Nick has covered where we're at here.


June is Coming. Look out for more info next Wednesday on what is coming in our June update.

GP Vegas 2018. MTG Arena, Nate Price,and I will be at GP Vegas June 14-17th! If you're going to be there, please swing by and we can chat about the game in person!
-Nevah!-

Matchmaking. There has been a bunch of discussion around matchmaking and how it works in various places on the forums. I've touched on this in the past, but I wanted to take a little time to solidify where we'll be at for June.

Ranked Constructed – Will remain the same as straight MMR matchmaking.
-Match Making Ranking I suppose-
Entry-Fee Events – Will switch to exclusively win-loss matchmaking for June. In July we will likely bring back the slight MMR skew for Quick events, depending on how the data shakes out.
Placement Matches – Everyone's MMR and Ranking will be reset. Your first ten matches will determine your initial MMR/Ranking.
Ranks – Will be more fluid with this update but will also reflect your opponent's and your actual MMR with in a range.
yes please do
Best-of-One Mulligan System. There have been a number of theories on how the system works, and we wanted to leave it alone to see how far perception drifted from reality. Ramora had a post recently that we wanted to add some additional information on to aid the discussion. Namely, the actual opening hand numbers we see with 17 lands in a 40 card deck. (This is over 100,000 opening hands)
-Braze your selves... math is coming-




*: These will happen on occasion, but they're rare.

A special guest appearance here from Senior Game Designer "Godot" to go into more detail:
Hey All,

I wanted to make a few of points on this topic.

First, there seem to be a lot of misconceptions about the system that I'd like to clear up. My original post on the current starting-hand system states:


The system draws an opening hand from each of two separately randomized copies of the decks, and leans towards giving the player the hand with the mix of spells and lands (without regard for color) closest to average for that deck."
Hhhhmmmmmmm....

Many in the community have interpreted "leans towards giving" in that sentence as a strict "gives," when that is not how the system works. We have not told the community exactly how the "leaning" works, but the deterministic charts and graphs in the OP are not an accurate reflection of the system.

The goal of the system is to reduce the number of mulligans and "non-games" in Bo1 matches without significantly altering optimal deck construction
-HHHHHHMMMMM!!-
, such that there is no need to maintain a best-of-one (Bo1) and Bo3 version of the same deck. In particular, we want to reduce the number of new-to-Magic players that bounce off the game due to frustrating mulligans and mana issues early in their experience, especially those coming in from other games where there is no variance in the mana system.
The point emerges

Most suggestions I've read for this system tend to be for safeguards against bad openers that would alter optimal deck construction or favor certain deck types too much given our goals or for removing the protection entirely.
Please don't mess with this ever again

Many that want it removed entirely have expressed dislike for the idea of the system making a choice between two hands for them; that *they* should have that agency, or it shouldn't happen at all.You got that right! The point of the system and the "leaning" clause is to make the obvious choice when it presents itself (e.g., the system will never choose a zero- or seven-lander over a three- or four-lander), but to have the choice be increasingly fuzzier as it is increasingly less obvious. In the fuzzier cases, maybe you got the hand you would have chosen between the two, maybe you don't, but both players are operating under that same situation,then its all goood? NO! both players are getting a hand randomized from their deck, and both players are taking mulligans a lot less often in a match structure where it is extra painful to do so. I believe players who are unhappy with the idea of the system choosing from between two hands would be even unhappier with a significant increase in their mulligans and the resulting non-games.
well you got me there... bastard!

We are continuing to look at data, and the system is likely to change again before the end of the Closed Beta, but if I had to choose between what we have now and removing it entirely, I would keep what we have now. Mulligans and non-games happen much less often, and optimal deck construction isn't significantly different from what it would be without the system in place. It is certainly less significant than implied in the linked topic, and on a personal level, it doesn't alter my deck construction at all.

If and when anything changes about the Bo1 starting hand system, we will of course let everyone know.
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Hmmm... so their mulligan rules are exactly as dumb as I thought they were. Total black box.

I don’t know what that means

It means that they hate being stuck with the old mana concept... when Heartstone and others have found a better way to set the beat of the game -apparently, coz I never played any of those games- but all the geeks and smartypants of the MTG fauna -and me- see clear bias on any form of intervention on those RGN. Even if they make the experience statistically better.
Like DJ says this is a pandora box if they are messing with this the ramifications are huge.
Smartypants and geeks hate that kinda of BS.

I actually have no qualm with the mull algorithm.
Sure, they could just give you the free muligan like Duels, but I Hardly ever see any no Land/all Land first hands any more and I don't see that as bad (I do see a few no Land hands after mull though).
People who don't like it can always play best-of-3 and get the "real" Magic experience anyway (when they finally decide to Implement it).

One of these days they are going to flat out fix the RNG to give you a minimum number of lands in your opening hand and then I'm going to make a deck with 2 Swamp and 58 Rat Colony. Maybe they'll reprint Relentless Rats and I'll have to consider my deck composition.

That's the reason people are upset with this. It's nothing as alarmist (well for most people it isn't) as thinking they might rig the game in favor of one player or the other because someone is F2P and someone paid to win. Incredibly benign changes can have horrible consequences.

In fact, the current 22 land and 26 land "rule" is already a Frankenstein's creation I'm not happy with.

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If they don't like mana screw and mana flood in 1v1, then they should have just made MTG Hearthstone set in the MTG universe and been done with it. It would have been incredibly successful, it would have made a lot of money, and they could have made new unique cards and mechanics for the online game instead of being chained down by card rarity affecting power level.

If I'm going to play Magic the Gathering on the internet, I want to play freaking Magic the Gathering. I don't want a sterile format where everyone always curves out and some deck/arch-type invariably gets an advantage out of manipulating the shuffling algorithm.

I also have no problem with it. They found a clever way to deal with everyone’s big complaint about magic.

A complaint that I’ve never had much since I play games of chance all the time and am an adult. Other CCGs I’ve played had players complaining about the same things , always on the design of the specific card game, never accepting that they’re playing with a deck of cards.

It’s just a new mullIgan rule, that’s all this is

I just don’t like it anymore than I’d like a poker game that ensured everyone got to play interesting hands. It just plays havoc with the math, and in this case it’s especially bad, because I don’t think they really tell us what their black box does.

It’s not a reason to avoid the game (on its own), necessarily, but it is, imo, yet another poor judgment call.

I agree with DJ just on the principle that it gives some validation to all those people who used to complain that the duels shuffler was rigged, now people will point to this as evidence when they complain the Arena shuffler is broken as well haha

Overall though it's not really been a noticeable thing for me, although i'll admit the economy disaster may be taking all of my hate haha

They are only admitting that they are messing with the RNG, they are nice guys I´m sure they are making the best calls -like they always have- and It´s not like they could mess with the RNG so they can somehow make the game more profitable.... oh wait!

they're not even messing with the RNG, they're just adding a new mulligan rule that applies only to Arena. Did people go nuts when the Vancouver Mulligan was introduced irl?

Hey, I can live with it... I just think it sends the wrong signal when you are trying to regain trust.
I tell you more If I could choose to turn this thing off... I guess I will leave it on, but the black box could be doing a lot of other things and that´s a snowball you don´t want.

Well at least they've stated that BO3 will have a normal shuffler, so that means the more competitively minded folks won't have to worry about it too much once it's implemented, while the casual players aren't really affected and probably appreciate having to mulligan less

it's funny cuz right after I posted yesterday about "playing games of chance and being an adult" I had to mull to 4 and never got a 2nd land. It was a terrible experience, lol

BO1 is normal shuffler, there's nothing changed it just draws 2 starting hands and picks one then shows it you.

But that messes up all the hyperboring calculators charts, thats why you should not run 23-24-25 lands.
I guess it’s blowing out of proportion, but it’s not innocuous by any means.
Edit: I kinda like it... I got mixed feelings with this stuff.

That’s really not the issue. We can rapidly recalculate the odds. The bigger problem is that with these changes we don’t actually know what the program will do, or why.

For example: suppose we have a deck with tons of draw spells, which wouldn’t mind a 2 land hand so long as the hand had action - e.g. a counter or perhaps some removal, sweeper, etc... a quality player might know what a good hand looked like and choose to keep it. From what I understand, this hand picker might prefer a 3 land hand with no action, which in many decks would be strictly worse.

Similarly, some decks just need to see 2 colors in their oppening hands, but this might pick 3 land hands with access to only the minor color. Again, a quality player may have kept the other hand.

Finally, and this was my biggest gripe: each player would have gotten more automatic wins. These are frustrating to immature players, but in fact they are beneficial to everyone and increase the overal amount of coins/gold/whatever everyone earns. Your seven land hand sucks for you, but it’s great for your opponent and it’s great for the overal economy.

your last point, in my opinion, is the only one that I think is actually important. For everything else, the player can just mulligan just like he did before to get the hand he/she wants. The player can still make those judgment calls.

I think your last point is excellent though since this action reduces the number of concessions which leads to slower gold earning.

I especially don't get the "we don't know what the program will do" since we never really knew what it was doing before or after this anyway.

Yeah, you’re mostly right, imo. Honestly, this system probably just grants a slight advantage to Aggro decks, which I’m happy to take. Raising the likelihood of a 2 land hand is pretty good for low land count decks. It’s just such a weird call for WOTC to make.

Should note at 12PM PT today we're getting the long awaited economy post, expect nothing and you'll probably still be disappointed haha