how would you balance up the beanstalk

[ʍolɟ ǝɥʇ ǝsɹǝʌǝɹ]

should it not replace itself?
should it cost 1 more?

[Shiku]

I don't care about Beanstalk for as a long as the whole meta is dominated by red aggro.

[Mr.Black]

Considering the already high power creep...why would you specifically target up the beanstalk?

[Malvastor]

What do you mean replace itself? You mean the initial card it draws on coming out? I don't see how that's unbalanced to begin with.

[nul]

Originally posted by Guzu:

I don't care about Beanstalk for as a long as the whole meta is dominated by red aggro.

red aggro is only dominant in best of 1. you can sideboard and mulligan against it in bo3.
beanstalk is an issue in best of 3, at least in decks that have a lot of things that technically have the manavalue to trigger it's ability, but the person didn't actually spend that mana to cast it. it ends up drawing the person a ton of cards for just a 2 mana enchantment.

as for balancing it, i think making it not have an enters trigger would make it unplayable. so that wouldn't be good.
but it also might be too expensive at 3. and wouldn't fit the curve of the decks it gets played in anymore. which also kind of makes it unplayable.
giving it a once per turn restriction like caretaker's talent might be a good middleground. It still replaces itself, it still generates value by paying reduced costs on high mana value cards. but it wont draw them like 3 cards a turn in the mid-late game.


BUT! this would only be reasonable with a monstrous rage and this town rebalancing.

[Kurt Angle's Neck]

Originally posted by nul:

decks that have a lot of things that technically have the manavalue to trigger it's ability, but the person didn't actually spend that mana to cast it.

If this is the main issue with the card, it could be balanced by changing the text from:

When this enchantment enters and whenever you cast a spell with mana value 5 or greater, draw a card.

to:

When this enchantment enters and whenever you spend 5 mana or more to cast a spell, draw a card.

Personally, I'd just leave it alone, it's not that big of an issue and can be dealt with.

[Winter Wolf]

How would I balance Up the Beanstalk? Id print a card called Sheoldred, the Apocalypse and let it be in Standard for the same period of rotation.

[Shiku]

Originally posted by nul:

red aggro is only dominant in best of 1. you can sideboard and mulligan against it in bo3.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzZPm1Ie4Bs&t=22s

Even in BO3, red aggro (when you include all of its variations) is THE number one in terms of popularity and is also high in winrate. Dying turn 2 because you drew a tapped land or didn't get one of your 10+ removals is the most unfun experience ever. The power creep for red aggro is all over the place with he mice package, Rage, Screaming Nemesis etc. I can live with my opponent drawing as much as they want but at least I can actually play a game of magic.

Originally posted by nul:

as for balancing it, i think making it not have an enters trigger would make it unplayable. so that wouldn't be good.
but it also might be too expensive at 3. and wouldn't fit the curve of the decks it gets played in anymore. which also kind of makes it unplayable.
giving it a once per turn restriction like caretaker's talent might be a good middleground. It still replaces itself, it still generates value by paying reduced costs on high mana value cards. but it wont draw them like 3 cards a turn in the mid-late game.


BUT! this would only be reasonable with a monstrous rage and this town rebalancing.

I can't remember a single time when the cmc or text of a card was changed retrospectively (except for really old cards or the companion mechanic). The game is based on a physical TCG so it would cause wild confusion if they did so. They can ban a card or not be but no changes to the card will be made.

[nul]

Originally posted by Guzu:

I can't remember a single time when the cmc or text of a card was changed retrospectively (except for really old cards or the companion mechanic). The game is based on a physical TCG so it would cause wild confusion if they did so. They can ban a card or not be but no changes to the card will be made.

Pretty sure this thread is only for hypothetical balancing. But thank you for the explanation for those who might be unaware.

[ʍolɟ ǝɥʇ ǝsɹǝʌǝɹ]

yes, free casting gives too many exploits. Balance it like memory deluge or mockingbird would be good. as it is, the black avatar horror, overlord of balemurk draws cards off it. for 2! whats the other good ones? affinity? costs less for creature in graveyard? alternate casting costs?

Originally posted by Guzu:
I can't remember a single time when the cmc or text of a card was changed retrospectively (except for really old cards or the companion mechanic). The game is based on a physical TCG so it would cause wild confusion if they did so. They can ban a card or not be but no changes to the card will be made.

yes, they only rebalance digital formats, alchemy or historic i believe. timeless is a way to play without having to worry about these.

[John-Silver]

Why not simply remove the bean stalk with interaction? And I swear if I get a "I shouldn't have to bring interaction" response it's your own damn fault, if you don't bring interaction don't complain when you can't interact.

[nul]

Oh my deck has absolutely no troubles with interacting with it. I run Season of Gathering. The amount of time I just take their beans, their lords, and their bindings off the table and watch them concede is funny.

But I also understand that not everyone is playing my deck or my colors.

The difficult part about "just remove it" is that it already replaced itself before you remove it. And yeah, I already said that it needs that to be a viable card at all. But, the problem is that the decks it gets run in. It starts replacing every card you play. Overlord of the hauntwoods? Draw a card. Flash in a leyline binding? Draw a card. Now there's 3 things you have to remove and your opponent already restocked their hand. There's a reason this deck was pretty prominent in the pro tour.

Not saying it's the best though. I would rather the other problematic cards get banned long before beans. But if I had a list, it'd be third after the other two cards I mentioned.

[John-Silver]

Originally posted by nul:

The difficult part about "just remove it" is that it already replaced itself before you remove it. And yeah, I already said that it needs that to be a viable card at all. But, the problem is that the decks it gets run in. It starts replacing every card you play. Overlord of the hauntwoods? Draw a card. Flash in a leyline binding? Draw a card. Now there's 3 things you have to remove and your opponent already restocked their hand.

Nope not at all, you can't rush the stalk onto the field as it costs two, so the earliest the card hits field is turn 2, if you don't answer it that turn, the most you opponent can do on turn 3 is draw 1 card or 2 in stretch scenarios, if you're losing/struggling to your opponent drawing 2-3 cards that's a your deck problem -not claiming you are-, now if you leave it uncontested for 5 turns and they hit all 5 land drops and ramp once for 6 total mana your opponent can still only get 3-4 draws AT MOST - most likely 3- and this is assuming you've just done nothing to interact. The card is not that powerful, all it needs is to be legendary as their's no true problem till 2-4 are on the field IMO, the problem with these cards is WoTC only care about commander, so cards are balanced with commander in mind where you can only run 1 copy of cards, so they don't use legendary as a balancing tool, they purely use it as a flavour mechanic on "named" cards since you're not going to be running a full set anyways in commander, more cards needed the legendary status, nothing more nothing less bean stalk is one of those cards, as legendary status would also give incentive for people to play less copies in their deck.

[nul]

Originally posted by John-Silver:

Originally posted by nul:

The difficult part about "just remove it" is that it already replaced itself before you remove it. And yeah, I already said that it needs that to be a viable card at all. But, the problem is that the decks it gets run in. It starts replacing every card you play. Overlord of the hauntwoods? Draw a card. Flash in a leyline binding? Draw a card. Now there's 3 things you have to remove and your opponent already restocked their hand.

Nope not at all, you can't rush the stalk onto the field as it costs two, so the earliest the card hits field is turn 2, if you don't answer it that turn, the most you opponent can do on turn 3 is draw 1 card or 2 in stretch scenarios, if you're losing/struggling to your opponent drawing 2-3 cards that's a your deck problem -not claiming you are-, now if you leave it uncontested for 5 turns and they hit all 5 land drops and ramp once for 6 total mana your opponent can still only get 3-4 draws AT MOST - most likely 3- and this is assuming you've just done nothing to interact. The card is not that powerful, all it needs is to be legendary as their's no true problem till 2-4 are on the field IMO, the problem with these cards is WoTC only care about commander, so cards are balanced with commander in mind where you can only run 1 copy of cards, so they don't use legendary as a balancing tool, they purely use it as a flavour mechanic on "named" cards since you're not going to be running a full set anyways in commander, more cards needed the legendary status, nothing more nothing less bean stalk is one of those cards, as legendary status would also give incentive for people to play less copies in their deck.

Legendary status seems like it would've been both appropriate (up THE beanstalk, not up A beanstalk) and fair. It would still be a good card with only one copy. While not going absolutely ridiculous with more. Probably the best point made in this thread.

[Mr.Black]

Originally posted by ʍolɟ ǝɥʇ ǝsɹǝʌǝɹ:

should it not replace itself?
should it cost 1 more?

At this point i think the most hypothetically fair and balanced state for it would be either:

- trigger once per turn for any spell cast from your hand worth 5 mana or more
or
- trigger once per permanent type worth 5 mana or more

It can sometimes go bit overboard with an overlords deck!

[anaris]

Originally posted by Guzu:

Even in BO3, red aggro (when you include all of its variations)

you understand that all of its variations are *completely different archetypes*