Bonus Show for Next Week - Interview Questions Needed for MTG Arena Executive Producer
Added 2020-04-30 18:27:47 +0000 UTCHey All!
As you know I've been trying to come up with extra quarantine content for our LR community and I have a line on an interview with Chris Cao from Wizards of the Coast. Chris is a big shot on the Arena team and I'm in the process of scheduling an interview with him for a bonus LR episode next week.
The main topic will be human drafts on Arena, but I asked if other Arena topics were ok as well, and they said sure, so that's cool.
I'd like to know what you want to know from him.
I also will say that these interviews from WotC are pretty curated — I'll be sending in potential questions to them ahead of time — so we can't really go too hard with the questions. As much as I would rather just be able to ask whatever I want, we won't get an interview if that's the case, so we have to play nice :)
Anyway, with that in mind, what kind of stuff do you want to hear from Chris about human drafts on Arena or even just Arena stuff in general?
If you comment with the questions here I'll add them to the ones I came up with :)
THANK YOU!
Marshall
Comments
They already did! It was sealed only on release a few weeks ago but everyone assumes that with human drafting now functional we'll get it there too :)
Limited Resources
2020-05-02 21:51:09 +0000 UTCThank you for getting human drafting out so quickly. It has greatly increased my enjoyment of the game. I appreciate the moves being made for large scale tournaments being hosted on arena. What are your thoughts on the future of this?
Matt Sada
2020-05-01 16:00:03 +0000 UTCI'd love to hear, directionally speaking, how relevant draft is as a format on arena. Does drafting comprise 20% of total arena games played? 30%? Would be super interesting to hear how that's evolved over time - maybe not arena specific, but for the game. Is there a goal in mind for the arena team to make drafts X% of games played? Excited for the interview! Thanks!
Andrew Shapiro
2020-05-01 15:22:52 +0000 UTCThanks for your time, Chris! I know the Arena team is working on remastering old sets and blocks to introduce older sets to Arena. Are these sets being designed with limited in mind, a la Tempest Remastered? It would be so sweet to revisit the draft formats of those sets too.
Andy Richmond
2020-05-01 14:06:41 +0000 UTCHi Chris! Thanks for coming to the show. I have two questions for you: 1. Will we ever be able to join the same draft pod with one of our friends through Arena? 2. How far are we from the deck sharing that you guys wanted to incorporate in direct challenge? Thanks again!
Evangelos Spyridakis
2020-05-01 13:42:44 +0000 UTCHi Chris and Marshall, thanks for this interview and BIG thanks for getting human drafting on Arena! Is there any plan or possibility to have Limited Mythic Qualifiers? Like many LR listeners, I'm primarily a Limited player with slight Constructed experience. However, the payoff to laddering to Mythic is entry to a Constructed tournament, the Mythic Qualifiers. Because I have limited time to play Magic, I know I'd be outclassed in such a tournament, and thus I haven't felt compelled to put in the time & gems needed to reach Mythic in draft. However, my motivation would change dramatically with a Qualifier structured as Sealed Deck or pod Drafts (okay I know that's unlikely, but dang it'd be sweet). So, any chance we get a Limited Mythic Qualifier at some point?
Seth Fellenstein
2020-05-01 04:59:10 +0000 UTCExcellent job with the human drafts. The system seems to be working very smoothly and it's impressive you got it out so quick. This isn't exactly a question but two really great things to try for would be an in game mechanism for tournament play and a way to spectate games (see both hands). Hopefully the pandemic ends well before you get the chance to roll this out:)
Ryan Glinski
2020-05-01 01:41:58 +0000 UTCOh, or importantly printing all physical cards with arena codes for redemption!
Chris Kepert
2020-05-01 01:19:36 +0000 UTCAccumulating wildcards is time consuming. Crafting cards to test out new deck ideas is risky if it turns out the deck doesn't work. E.g. I am hesitant to craft a playset of yorvo, for example, when I could equally get a playset of Teferi. This could be mitigated by a) allowing loaning/trading cards between friends (not for gems, only for other cards); b) a between friend challenge not limited to card pool. c) allowing purchase of wildcards directly with gems(at a better rate than equivalent to buying packs). Are any of these options? If not, players may be forced onto other platforms to play test. In the past a felt pen had been good enough to change a Serra Angel into a Lyra for testing, but that's not an option with covid :)
Chris Kepert
2020-05-01 01:18:11 +0000 UTCAbsolutely adore the human drafts, and it's a great set to launch them with. However, with the ranked queues, I found myself (gold 4 at the time) frequently matched against mythic players (one of whom I think was PVDR himself). Are the rankings something that had to go out the window for human drafts, or is it just something that needs more time to implement fully?
Spencer St. James
2020-04-30 23:03:02 +0000 UTCWill we be able to play pod drafts within the friend list at some point? If yes, when? After we have real people draft now, will we get a draft cube before core21?
Christian Gienger
2020-04-30 21:35:02 +0000 UTCHi Chris, huge fan of human drafts - couldn't be more stoked to have them on Arena. Thank you! One thing I noticed immediately was that humans are seemingly far less prone to rare drafting than bots. Was this surprising, or expected and factored into the value equation for determining entry fees? Thanks for coming on!
Jaeger
2020-04-30 21:23:00 +0000 UTCHi Chris, thanks for coming on the show! Can you tell us anything about updates, goals, or aspirations for integrating tournament play onto arena?
Jaeger
2020-04-30 21:20:14 +0000 UTCAre there any plans to introduce cube to Arena? Probably something like Standard Cube until the older cards can be programmed. Getting bots to draft something so complicated would be hard, but now that human drafting is available...
Drew Acquaviva
2020-04-30 21:15:05 +0000 UTCThank to all the work that must have gone in to getting us human drafts! I really don't want to downplay how awesome that is, but I do want to ask if there are any plans to improve the limited deck building interface? I find myself missing MTGO features like saving multiple builds, auto-sorting cards in the deck by color/type and easy ways to move multiple cards. Thanks again!
james anderson
2020-04-30 19:56:06 +0000 UTCI'm an enfranchised player who started with back in Tempest, so I've ridden lots of waves with Magic. With the cost/prize structure of human drafts, I found that it's super-punishing to go 1-2. Now I have to grind forever to get back up to the 10,000 gold needed for another draft, with no cheaper options. This is one of the more memorable feel-bads that I've had in this game, and it's turning me off from the newest set (especially since I can't play Ikoria in paper). Can we get a mix of cost/prize options here?
Ben Clifford
2020-04-30 19:45:07 +0000 UTCHow much dev time did it take to program human drafts and how much (if at all) was the process expedited by the Coronavirus?
NicolaiBolas
2020-04-30 19:37:21 +0000 UTCWould love to learn more about how they plan to broaden Arena's card base. When they are trying to backfill, will there be options to draft these older sets? Would love to see Khans, HOU, EMN on arena draft!
Nick Stelzer
2020-04-30 19:37:18 +0000 UTCIn the long term, does WotC hope to have Arena/digital become the new face of Magic in place of paper? I ask because a variety of different signs seem to point to this. For example: the world championship moving to Arena, plans for older cards and formats to be added to Arena, promoting Arena with advertisement cards in booster packs. I know this may be a touchy subject in the community, but I think a little candor from someone like Chris would go a long way. Thanks!
awcheese
2020-04-30 19:27:31 +0000 UTCWhat was the hardest aspect to making human drafts work on Arena?
David
2020-04-30 19:11:17 +0000 UTCCurrently the prize structure is somethings similar to the 6-2-2-2 cues on MTGO. If you win 3 games out of 3 you get enough gems to enter two drafts (six boosters would also let you enter two drafts on MTGO) and if you win 2 games you get 2/3 enough gems (1000) to enter another draft similar to how you would get 2/3 boosters needed to enter another draft on MTGO. However, the card now have no real life value. If you play at FNM or on MTGO- those cards have actual real life value. You can literally sell them for real money. Since there is no connection to real life economy on arena and you can't sell excess cards to help get gems for drafts- the prize structure should reflect this. I would argue for a prize structure more similar to phantom events on MTGO or more similar to previous events on Arena. Paying 1500 gems, winning a game and getting nothing (1 pack??) back for your trouble feels really bad for the user and winning 2/3 games and not even getting enough gems back to play again feels even worse. If you look at the cost for the 8 drafters entering the draft (1500 x8 = 12000) vs the amount of gems paid out (3000+1000+1000+1000= 6000). They are profiting 6000 gems off of each draft. That's crazy! They could at least go to 8000 or 10000 payout for each draft and still be making a good amount of money on each draft. This prize structure payout is hosing users. WOTC know they can get away with it because we have been clamoring for real human drafts on MTGA forever. However, this current prize structure is bad news for the players on arena.
Tyler Barr
2020-04-30 19:10:58 +0000 UTCAre there any interesting differences between the data you've seen between Traditional and Premier Draft on Arena since human drafts were introduced? Any interesting differences in the data between Arena human drafts and MTGO drafts?
David
2020-04-30 19:10:47 +0000 UTCNow that you have human drafts, does this diminish the importance of improving bot drafts? ( e.g. incorporating something like the model Ryan Saxe built -- https://draftsim.com/ryan-saxe-bot-model )
David
2020-04-30 19:08:22 +0000 UTCThe recent State of the Game teased an Amonkhet Remaster releasing this summer, along with other Pioneer-focused sets down the road. Will there be an option to draft these sets, and if so what will that look like (human vs. bots, etc.)?
Tracy McGrath
2020-04-30 19:08:00 +0000 UTCHow is the team using the data from human drafts? Will it eventually be used to inform the bot drafts?
Michael Torres
2020-04-30 19:02:20 +0000 UTCIn my opinion the prize structure for these events should be more similar to phantom type events on MTGO since the cards on Arena have no real life value.
Tyler Barr
2020-04-30 19:00:34 +0000 UTCHi Marshall! Love the show. Here are my questions: 1) Why are human drafts more expensive than bot drafts? Is that to cover the R&D costs associated with human drafts? 2) Will new/current sets only be available as human drafts or will they also be available as quick drafts? Thanks! -Michelle
Michelle Valois
2020-04-30 18:55:39 +0000 UTCI suppose an interview is better than no interview. Thanks for being open about the circumstances. As for actual questions, I have two. Take whatever you can use. "I play a lot of limited, but love how easy Arena makes it to turn around and use the cards I've drafted to build constructed decks. I'm curious what your long term goals for the Historic format are? It's always interesting to see a new format develop, and am curious if we can expect to see big Historic events in the future." "What upcoming Arena release are you personally looking forward to?"
Matthew Taylor
2020-04-30 18:54:12 +0000 UTCThis one's probably not gonna pass the curation, but I'll just try my luck. Officially, Arena isn't available for SE Asian region yet because this region is under Tencent's contract. Most of the players here just have to say they are from other regions to play Arena, but the real salty part is that Arena code won't ever be included in any paper items sold in this region. And yes, that includes FNM from home during pandemic as well. It's just net negative for players and stores around here. Is there any news about this case or can you give us some idea when Tencent would finally start running Arena in this region?
Shanin
2020-04-30 18:52:30 +0000 UTC‚What took you so long‘ and, more importantly: ‚how did the seemingly sudden change to commit to human drafts so hard come about?‘
Simon Huhn
2020-04-30 18:52:00 +0000 UTCIs there any measures taken to match drafters with similar rankings? Seems like some pods have cards wheel that absolutely shouldn't. Wondering if it is because the other drafters were weaker players
Josh Valentine
2020-04-30 18:48:31 +0000 UTCReiterating what someone has already commented above, but why do you not get a reward for winning a match in a Bo3 draft (0 wins and 1 win counting for the same is a real feel bad)
Tanner Wiltshire
2020-04-30 18:48:27 +0000 UTCCould you explain a bit about the process of determining entry fees and prices for different events? How do you set the perfect cost and reward?
Søren Lahn Sloth
2020-04-30 18:47:47 +0000 UTCWhat are your thoughts on Arena players using limited decks in direct challenges, going forward now that human drafting is here? Would there be any interest in letting players run limited events through the client, such drafting and then letting users direct challenge their draft opponents and tracking results in the application? Rewards could be flat like in MagicFest commander events, to avoid abuse.
Ryan
2020-04-30 18:42:40 +0000 UTCHuman drafts have been great so far, but are there any changes that we might see going forward, or any problems you guys have seen with it so far?
Jackson McRae
2020-04-30 18:40:08 +0000 UTCHow did WotC get human drafting done so fast? It went from "this is an eventual goal" to "we are actively working on it" to "by the way player drafting is here" remarkably fast by a software development standpoint.
A.J. Frank
2020-04-30 18:39:59 +0000 UTCHey Chris and Marshall, been enjoying Ikoria on Arena in Player drafts but I can't get over the Godzilla skins being the standard. Every draft your opponent has one of those cards and the skin/style is the default. Any plans for this trend to continue? I don't think it's awful but it IS a bit distracting. Cheers, Tony
Anthony Morgan
2020-04-30 18:39:38 +0000 UTCHowever, what gives with the prize structure in best of three human drafts?
Tyler Barr
2020-04-30 18:36:12 +0000 UTCFirst- so happy that human drafting is on Arena!! It's amazing to finally have this feature!
Tyler Barr
2020-04-30 18:35:43 +0000 UTCWhat can they tell us about the forthcoming Remastered sets? Is Wizards RnD handling development?
Chris Diffin
2020-04-30 18:34:45 +0000 UTCWhy is it that draft picks are logged for bot drafts but not for human drafts? The ability to review your draft log and share it is a great way to improve at limited (an therefore play more).
Thomas Fleetman
2020-04-30 18:33:32 +0000 UTCHow likely is ranked best of three draft? Is the influx of players drafting enough to support two best of three queues?
Mark Conkle
2020-04-30 18:31:31 +0000 UTCI realize this is probably a long ways off, but can we ever expect player-driven limited content? Such as creating my own cube that I can host for friends, or organizing a private draft with 7 friends.
Grayson
2020-04-30 18:30:27 +0000 UTC
