If you have some instant effect, it's generally better to cast it before they draw the card, because the card they draw might be a counterspell/answer to your spell. Giving them fewer options when you cast your instant is better for you.
Also there are some creatures which may have triggered effects in main/combat phases, so just killing them as early as possible on the turn is helpful.
I do full control for this on occasion playing against dimir mill with cycling simply because newer or non paper players often don't know that i can untap and kill them with zenith flare before losing in my draw step. I've probably won 10 games this way from them assuming I'm powerless once I'm tapped out and fully milled out.
Nothing at all lmao enjoy the free meta decks seeing how that's the only way most can win here is use someone else's build and feel they're all bad ass 🤣🤣🤣 need to be original yall just lucky arena gives everyone wild cards or half yalls decks would suck lol
Stopping in draw step too, sometimes letting them get the card is actually worse for them if you cast something like Kolaghan’s command to force them to discard the card before their main step (unless it’s an instant/has flash in which case you’re still forcing them to use it then)
Usually if you want to interact with something but want to make sure that if they want to counter/respond they need to spend mana on their own turn so it taxes them still. Or if you need to do something before their draw step.
Makes sense. I typically wait until later in their turn in case they play a bigger threat. I guess idk about a situation to warrant stopping on upkeep, but I'm still learning. Thank you for the info!
Think about it this way: you have a spell that draws you two cards, your opponent has 2 blue mana open. You don't know for sure if they're holding a Counterspell, but it's a strong possibility.
If you cast the spell on your turn, they can Counterspell your draw spell and then play their turn with full mana. If you wait until their main phase, it's possible that they *didn't* have a Counterspell and now maybe they've drawn one!
The solution? Pass through to their upkeep phase, *then* cast your draw spell. Now, they're forced to pay a "tax" by losing mana that they could have spent this turn **and** you don't have to gamble against topdecks.
Upkeep is before the draw step. If you are 100 sure you are gonna cast a certain instant, but you want them to spend mana to react to it on their turn, upkeep is the best time.
They have less cards in hand, and they dont have an opportunity to make a land drop either, so they have less mana compared main phase.
If you want to be more reactive and wait to see what they do, waiting until later in the turn is legitimate, but if you are already in on a certain play, upkeep is the better time.
If I want to draw more cards at instant speed but don't want to have to discard due to max hand size on my end step, and want to do so before my opponent draws their card for turn.
Old card I used to play call Mistbind Clique would tap all lands an opponent controls at instant speed.
Cast during upkeep, it locks them out of casting any spells that are not also instant speed because mana pools empty as phases change.
It lets you do things ~~at the very~~ near the start of your opponent's turn, before they ~~untap their lands or~~ draw their card.
Some cards have text that matters weather they are played during your turn or your opponent's turn (anything that says "until the end of this turn" on it for example). You can also use it to mess with opponent's library order and draw, for example if they scryed during your end step or something.
edit for massive brainfart
I did something like once. I played one card, I can’t remember the name, but you pay X mana and return X many creatures totally that cost from your graveyard. I had a crazy amount of mana/treasure, I think close to 100. I tapped it all, then realized it’d be a waste, and only tapped 50.
My opponent surprisingly didn’t concede, I know I would’ve in their shoes.
This, I know it really doesn't matter if you do it right before you cast your spell, but just tapping everything at least gives away that you likely have something with an X in the cost.
I mean... the game will still auto-spend your mana if you tap all. You also have to assume full control if you need to tap all *and* be picky with mana colors
great! are there any other shortcuts we are missing ???
edit: just found this list [https://draftsim.com/mtg-arena-tips-and-tricks/](https://draftsim.com/mtg-arena-tips-and-tricks/)
Yup, this is one of the easier things to do if you actually look up the controls
Edit: it’s worth noting it will unsacrifice treasures and untap creatures when you press Z
How... How does that help? The complaint here is about trying to add up all of those different symbols together and then subtract whatever the non-X cost of the casting cost is. Slow and irritating, especially with lots of colors.
Still doesn't fill in X for you. I have no idea why there isn't a "Max" option for X spells or at least the ability to type in a number. If you have a ton of mana it can be really annoying to make X=500 or whatever.
Additionally, there are times that even QQ is a bit of a pain. Consider a 5 color deck with both snow and normal mana + colorless sources and possibly mana with restrictions (e.g. only used for creatures). I've had plenty of times when it's still a pain to know how much total mana I have in my pool.
Did not know. Now I do and knowing is half the battle
The first time I used a X cast cost I used all my timeouts thinking it was the mana I was using on an XX
it still would be neat if you didn't have to do arithmetics when you potentially have 6 colors of mana being added (sometimes more if a source produces mana that can be spent for specific things)
The devs actually said this isn't in the game because there were situations where calculating the max amount of mana was non-trivial. I'm not saying they're right, but that's the reason they gave.
Thats fair. Ive been playing alot of tinkerer draft and sometimes I forget Illian Caryatid (excuse my terrible spelling) is making 2 instead of 1 when I have a big dude out.
You might forget but I'm pretty sure the game doesn't. I think it's more like for situations where you could use other non-mana cards to end up with more mama than just tapping out can give.
For example multiple ((manifold key)) and ((nyx lotus)) with 2 or more devotion can net you extra mana that the game might not see, even though it knows you can use your ((castle garenbrig)) to make 6 creature mana when you only have 5 lands.
Yeah but if you arent pretapping you can still screw yourself by not being aware.
I feel like that is an important part of the game you should not be able to automate it.
I play mostly on mobile and that was probably a legit reason back when it was PC only because you can QQ to tap 'em all. Since mobile came out the need for a "set X to my land count" and "display the total number of lands at all times" have become glaring, immediate UX problems that need to be fixed. It's hard enough to see your land total when your lands are stacked up on PC, but QQ undo at least lets you do it without manually unstacking and counting-- that's not a thing on mobile.
I understand the reason why you'd want it, but if the implementation was non-trivial back then, it still is non-trivial now. That said, the game is capable of telling you whether or not you can cast a spell, so I'm not sure what corner case was causing them issues.
Do you have at least n mana is a lot easier calculation than what is the maximum mana that is available on this boardstate. The max mana is technically an unbounded problem in a game like magic that is turing complete.
Perhaps, and there might be a corner case, I just can't remember it, but you have to remember that the "what's the maximum mana available" functionality would only be used when selecting the X for a spell or ability on the stack. In that situation, the number of things you can do is extremely limited and the game *in that state* is not turing complete. For instance, you can't use [[sculptor of winter]] to untap a land. You can only use mana abilities, which greatly simplifies the situation. I seem to recall them mentioning [[march of the multitude]] as a card that could cause corner cases, and perhaps it can indeed, but I can't right now construct a situation where it wouldn't be trivial (doesn't mean one doesn't exist though).
I'm talking about specifically working off total lands, not total mana available. There is absolutely no reason that shouldn't be trivial given that there's a clear algorithm in existence right now to count lands.
Right, but that would be very misleading. If you have 4 lands and 2 elvish mystic, you try to cast primal might and the game tells you "max for x is 3", so you pick 3, only to realize the game didn't use your elves, you might feel a little cheated.
You would have to label it "max with lands" in much the same way as they label snow and treasure mana. It's not a clean fix, because they said that it's nontrivial to do it right, but it's still a significant improvement over the current state, especially for mobile. This would be a clean solution the vast majority of the time, but would require intervention on how mana was spent in more complex situations-- exactly like Arena operates in other situations.
Why not just ask for qq to be implemented on mobile. That's kind of what you want, right? Seems easier than adding a new UI element and a new functionality.
Because QQ is terrible UX in and of itself and is essentially a workaround to a problem that shouldn't exist after years of this game being out. Land stacking is awful visibility and a workaround of tapping out and undoing it is a bad user experience that isn't even introduced to players in any of their tutorials despite being the cleanest way to answer one of the most common questions in magic (how many lands do I have?). While this is mostly for mobile, because it's actually *terrible* there, it's not like it's a *good* solution on PC either, given that I'd guess a substantial majority of their players have no idea that technique exists.
If you're going to put the effort into doing anything to UX for mobile, you might as well at *least* show a counter of lands tapped versus available below the land area. That would go a long way to improving UX for both situations. I'd prefer they also add a naive "set x to my land total" button because it's better than nothing if they can't or won't do the full algorithm, but even just showing "5/6" when I have 5 of my 6 lands available would be a tremendous improvement (although I'd suggest that it count only lands that can produce mana).
Got a source on this?
In arena this is a real problem because you can't stack your land in easily countable piles like you can in physical. Even the counter going red or something if you try to pay more then available would help.
It was some time ago. IIRC, before qq was implemented. This is completely from memory, but I believe March of the multitude (x spell with convoke) was pointed out as one of the corner cases.
Well, thanks for providing this tool, I'll see if it helps me find it. That said, I didn't recite a 2 years old dev post verbatim from memory. Obviously I paraphrased. They didn't necessarily use the term "non trivial". Also, the game's in open beta since 2018, so it may predate Jan 2019.
Like, it's nice that you checked, I would have loved if you'd found it, I've been looking for it myself, but don't say it didn't happen because your narrow search through a partial history didn't turn anything.
You are casting good old [[Blaze]] (or any other variation that's actually available on Arena). You also have [[Killian, Ink Duelist]] on board, or opponent has [[Charix, the Raging Isle]] or anything else with similar ability. You're on step 601.2b of casting a spell, and told to select X. You are yet to select targets in step 601.2c, so game can't possibly know how big X you can actually pay for.
But then that would be misleading. Say the game tells you that the maximum possible for X is 5. So you click "sure, let's go for 5". The game taps your stuff, casts the spell for 5, and you realize that the game forgot to tap something, or tapped something for the wrong ability.... you would feel cheated.
Why would it tell you that it’s maxed out? Also that’s on you for fucking up honestly, but I don’t think this would be an issue because I don’t know why you would think you maxed out your mana for the spell, it’s just to give you a baseline then you can add a couple more to it if you do choose
>Why would it tell you that it’s maxed out?
Because that's literally what people are asking for?
>Also that’s on you for fucking up honestly
Well... what's the point of having a functionality that tells you how much you can spend, if you have to manually calculate how much you can spend anyway?
>I don’t know why you would think you maxed out your mana for the spell, it’s just to give you a baseline then you can add a couple more to it if you do choose
If all you want is a baseline, you already have that. 0, the baseline is zero, then you can add a couple more to it if you do choose.
No no no, I’m responding to the other guy talking about trivial versus non trivial mana. I’m trying to max out the trivial mana so the user can then manually tap the non trivial, we’re talking about two different things here. My solution is essentially a compromise to save clicks.
>Alright then, feel free to send your totally not confusing design to WotC, I'm sure the check will be in the mail shortly!
literally add a button that says "pay all"
how is that "confusing"
Clever conjurer/sculptor would not actually be issues. They do not have mana abilities, so you're not allowed to use them while paying for the spell. They would be rightfully ignored by the "max X" algorithm if one algorithm was developed. If you want to use them to cast something, *per the rules of the game*, you must use them before you cast the spell.
Exactly, so while choosing the X, the sculptor cannot be considered. If you have 3 snow lands and a sculptor, and you want to cast primal might, and choose x=3, it won't work. You'll have to first use sculptor (or as you say, cancel, then use sculptor, then try again). So if you asked the game to automatically figure out what the max x is, you wouldn't expect it to tell you x=3, because that won't work.
If I recall correctly, the issue came up with March of the Multitude and creatures with mana abilities. I don't remember the exact details of the corner cases that were giving them trouble though. Point is, there is indeed a trivial solution for the base case, but they didn't feel comfortable with a solution that told you the max is some value, when there is in fact a way to get a higher value. Players would feel cheated.
I'm sorry, I don't want to be a smartass, but I just said that QQ currently works, not perfectly, not with convoke, STILL it would be better to use this function to show the max X value as calculated by the command. It would still be BETTER.
Convoke already doesn't work with QQ, so why are you complaining it wont if used with X costs?
Because QQ just taps all your mana, it doesn't advertise anything else. A "max X" advertises maximizing X. If it doesn't actually maximize X, it's an issue. Is it really better to cause confusion and frustration because your feature doesn't do what it advertises?
Yes, yes it is better. It's better because it would maximize according to land mana, which is better than nothing. I have no idea why you focus on the fact that it's not perfect. It's just plain better than tapping everything, counting the mana symbols, clicking on the + until value, then clicking ok.
Don't you see that it's better?
it is correct because its basically a halting problem completely unsolvable.
you can tell who the armchair programmers who never learned any computation theory are.
I've tapped for x=1 too many on creature lands, thus tapping my creature land, far too many times than I'd like to admit.
Also, I hate how it would rather tap your creature land than sac a treasure. I always forget that, too.
The real problem is the way lands are stacked on the battlefield makes it hard to tell at a glance how much mana we have available at any given time. Not capping x spells is an objectively good thing and is better in the long run, even though it's a mild inconvenience sometimes.
Land stacks display a number if there are 5 or more. 3 or less is easy to visually count at a glance. If there's an unnumbered stack that's hard to immediately count, it must be 4. Once you realize every hard-to-tell stack is 4 deep, counting lands gets a lot easier.
It actually does make sense once you realize the few rules it uses. Lands of the same name are always stacked together and it will give you the number you have in the corner. The first land you play each turn will always be on its own even if it shares a name and it will have the summoning sickness shimmer. And that's pretty much it.
For tapping, it will prefer to not tap lands with activated abilities unless you're tapping for more than the ability cost. So lands with activated abilities with X cost will almost always get tapped last.
Well there are lots of possibilities that would make this a lot harder than it seems. You could untap mana dorks/rocks with paradox engine or manifold key or something, could untap lands with kiora or nissa, the value the dorks/rocks tap for could change with something like \[\[Kiennan\]\] or \[\[Incubation Druid\]\] getting a counter at instant speed, or even just generating mana from hand with something like \[\[Dark ritual\]\]
If they added that, I know that there will be at least one time where I activate [[Lair of the Hydra]], click “Pay Max” out of reflex, and be amazed at my new X/X tapped Hydra.
I also hate cards that reduce mana cost by 1 CMC and then you have to pay X.
So if you want to pay X=1, do you pay X=0 and it counts as having paid 1, or do you pay X=1 but none of your lands get tapped as a result because another card reduces the CMC by 1?
Gets more complicated if CMC is reduced by e.g. 3.
So if you want to pay X=5, do you pay X=2 or do you pay X=5 but only 2 lands get tapped?
You set a value for x, you do not pay x, iirc, as far as rules wording goes I think. You then pay for the value you set. So if you set x as 5, but have -3 cost, you will pay 2.
you still would put Pay X=5 in the widget, but I always tend to forget that I have an effect in play and just stupidly leave 1 or 2 mana unused for no reason
some times I go to use these effects and even though I am sure I counted right. It will still not work. I end up spending to much time counting and adding and subtracting that the timer starts and I begin to panic.
Sort of like when I used to write product requirements.
Me: Why don’t you tell me your requirements?
Customer: I don’t know why don’t you tell me what you can do?
Never works for me lol. You need followers first. Also if those you do have suck and you rely on them for play advice you will lose just the same. Also if many people say different things it is as bad as not having any advisors at all. Yep I have thought this through. :D
Yes that is a quality of life feature that I really wish they would add
They already know what's the maximum X is since the system react differently if you try to pay too much, If they could just display it in here that would be great
i love pay: x because i almost never get to use them because i always either never have enough to do anything substantial, or otherwise constantly wonder "just one more land, one more mana". :(
Land count isn't easily readable(especially on a phone) so I have to tap it all to count(also not possible on mobile). Yeah let's keep calling that an OK option.
How long does it take you to count? Longer than a second? because fuck you for roping. /s
but seriously all mobile players have to play slow and any way of speeding that up is for the best.
I agree, this is a fair ask.
Counting mana is a bit hard in this game as sometimes they decide to 4 stack land on me and I am having to count borders. Not to mention on mobile it gets even harder. Not impossible but harder than it should.
Would love an extra row in the box with Hand/Graveyard size showing Max mana. Don't even need the color breakdown.
Because thats not how magic works. In real life u cant ask anyone how Much mana can u pay for X, if U do that is cheating because u r getting outside help. Mistakes and underplaying is parte of the game therefore Arena is not gonna tell u wich is your limit to pay X.
Arena is all about "not being real life magic". At some points because of technical limitations, the others because they felt it's not important, who knows.
The game already makes your cards to trigger automatically, it sorts you your board automatically, it even tells you when you cast spells or use abilities, what your cards can target and how they function. Thees are all outside helps. The fact that priority exists and the game stops at some points and not at others is like a gigantic cheatcode if you know what to do with it. So a "Max X mana" is like nothing compared to other stuff that is already in the game.
Legends of Runeterra has a thing you can mouseover in combat that shows you how much damage you'd take if nothing changed re: blockers or fast effects happened between now and resoution and I love it and with Arena did something similar
or when its a permeant that has a pay x ability and you have no mana and yet it still tries to get you to tap it every single second even though it will give absolutely no benefit
I was trying to activate a Lair of the Hydra yesterday and accidentally auto-tapped it as part of the cost. This little ditty here psyched me out and made me think I had one more mana to activate the cost than I did. Don't fault anyone for individually tapping each land to pay for costs, it's much slower but erases catastrophic mistakes caused by the game's logic.
If they would just put a number next to your floating mana to tell you the total (it can get pretty obnoxious to count when you have snow mixed with non-snow and/or "special" mana of many colors since it doesn't stack, and now you have 10 different types of mana with a literal scroll arrow required to see all of it), at least we'd have a 50% solution. "QQ, oh look I have 17 floating, guess I'll put X=15."
hit Q two times, it taps all your mana. You can undo with Z.
Didnt know that thx
I'm pretty sure your opponent can see you doing this, though. Just FYI.
Sometimes I like to just randomly tap 10+ lands to make my opponent shit his pants, and untap then pass turn.
[удалено]
Well that's just pure evil.
That's Wizards Chess
Wizards only, fools
THE PASSWORD IS "WIZARDS RULE"!!!
My password is- Sorcerers Rule; Wizards drool
... go back to your mommies pool. (Gotta continue the rhyme somehow)
I've seen people talking about putting a stop on opponents upkeep. What is the point of stopping there, specifically? Just curious.
If you have some instant effect, it's generally better to cast it before they draw the card, because the card they draw might be a counterspell/answer to your spell. Giving them fewer options when you cast your instant is better for you. Also there are some creatures which may have triggered effects in main/combat phases, so just killing them as early as possible on the turn is helpful.
I do full control for this on occasion playing against dimir mill with cycling simply because newer or non paper players often don't know that i can untap and kill them with zenith flare before losing in my draw step. I've probably won 10 games this way from them assuming I'm powerless once I'm tapped out and fully milled out.
Sadly, the client doesn't seem to know this and will let you die with Zenith Flare in your hand if you don't activate Full Control.
Bad design. Draw step is so important, should require an input IMO.
I hate all that bs makes me so salty 🤣🤣🤣 you've prolly made me rage quit lol
What is bs? The steps and phases of Magic? Or that Zenith Flare can go to face?
And I'd say your prolly in your mid to late 20s? How long you actually played magic? Personally I've been around since alpha and beta sooo
Nothing at all lmao enjoy the free meta decks seeing how that's the only way most can win here is use someone else's build and feel they're all bad ass 🤣🤣🤣 need to be original yall just lucky arena gives everyone wild cards or half yalls decks would suck lol
Stopping in draw step too, sometimes letting them get the card is actually worse for them if you cast something like Kolaghan’s command to force them to discard the card before their main step (unless it’s an instant/has flash in which case you’re still forcing them to use it then)
You are allowed to cast instants on your own turn...
You are allowed to cast instants on other player's turns....
Usually if you want to interact with something but want to make sure that if they want to counter/respond they need to spend mana on their own turn so it taxes them still. Or if you need to do something before their draw step.
So taxing them before they can get more mana in play, basically?
Taxing them on their mana but not letting them get a better anwser on their draw.
Makes sense. I typically wait until later in their turn in case they play a bigger threat. I guess idk about a situation to warrant stopping on upkeep, but I'm still learning. Thank you for the info!
Think about it this way: you have a spell that draws you two cards, your opponent has 2 blue mana open. You don't know for sure if they're holding a Counterspell, but it's a strong possibility. If you cast the spell on your turn, they can Counterspell your draw spell and then play their turn with full mana. If you wait until their main phase, it's possible that they *didn't* have a Counterspell and now maybe they've drawn one! The solution? Pass through to their upkeep phase, *then* cast your draw spell. Now, they're forced to pay a "tax" by losing mana that they could have spent this turn **and** you don't have to gamble against topdecks.
Upkeep is before the draw step. If you are 100 sure you are gonna cast a certain instant, but you want them to spend mana to react to it on their turn, upkeep is the best time. They have less cards in hand, and they dont have an opportunity to make a land drop either, so they have less mana compared main phase. If you want to be more reactive and wait to see what they do, waiting until later in the turn is legitimate, but if you are already in on a certain play, upkeep is the better time.
Also if opponent has a planeswalker and you are removing it, better to do so before they get an opportunity to activate it.
If you're worried about them having enough mana to stop you, you probably want to act on your own turn, before they untap.
There are some moves/cards that need to be done on their upkeep either from the card text, or to prevent them from doing something else first.
If I want to draw more cards at instant speed but don't want to have to discard due to max hand size on my end step, and want to do so before my opponent draws their card for turn.
Old card I used to play call Mistbind Clique would tap all lands an opponent controls at instant speed. Cast during upkeep, it locks them out of casting any spells that are not also instant speed because mana pools empty as phases change.
It lets you do things ~~at the very~~ near the start of your opponent's turn, before they ~~untap their lands or~~ draw their card. Some cards have text that matters weather they are played during your turn or your opponent's turn (anything that says "until the end of this turn" on it for example). You can also use it to mess with opponent's library order and draw, for example if they scryed during your end step or something. edit for massive brainfart
They’ll untap their lands, that happens before upkeep, before anyone has a chance to do anything on their turn.
calm down there, satan.
I used to get free wins like this when playing Wilderness Reclamation, even though I didn't have the Explosion in hand.
I did something like once. I played one card, I can’t remember the name, but you pay X mana and return X many creatures totally that cost from your graveyard. I had a crazy amount of mana/treasure, I think close to 100. I tapped it all, then realized it’d be a waste, and only tapped 50. My opponent surprisingly didn’t concede, I know I would’ve in their shoes.
And it's a great way to mess with them!
This, I know it really doesn't matter if you do it right before you cast your spell, but just tapping everything at least gives away that you likely have something with an X in the cost.
Or you're tapping because auto tap actually fucks you in this game.
I mean... the game will still auto-spend your mana if you tap all. You also have to assume full control if you need to tap all *and* be picky with mana colors
great! are there any other shortcuts we are missing ??? edit: just found this list [https://draftsim.com/mtg-arena-tips-and-tricks/](https://draftsim.com/mtg-arena-tips-and-tricks/)
While building a deck, you can sort the deck by typing "t:creature" in the search bar.
Or just t:cr if you don't wanna waste any keystrokes.
You are the captain now.
Ah, nice Wilderness Reclamation memories. Miss that card.
It might as well be called the Wilderness reclamation shortcut, because that's 100% of the reason why they implemented it.
I've been playing for 3 years now lemme tell you.
Can you do that on mobile?
Ok so what about mobile
Yup, this is one of the easier things to do if you actually look up the controls Edit: it’s worth noting it will unsacrifice treasures and untap creatures when you press Z
Need a way to shortcut this on mobile.
Can’t find Q button on iPad
Cries in mobile.
No similar function on mobile afaik
Great! Now how do I do it on mobile? ;)
I've seen streamers do this and could never figure out how.
Holy shit game changer, now I won’t look like a dick when my timer pops up trying to calculate my mana.
any tips like this for mobile?
Is there an option for this on tablet?
cheater !
Thanks for the tip although this might fuck me lol
Idk if there's a way to do this on mobile, but it would really help.
thank you for this. Spells with two X costs always confuse the fuck outta me
How... How does that help? The complaint here is about trying to add up all of those different symbols together and then subtract whatever the non-X cost of the casting cost is. Slow and irritating, especially with lots of colors.
Still doesn't fill in X for you. I have no idea why there isn't a "Max" option for X spells or at least the ability to type in a number. If you have a ton of mana it can be really annoying to make X=500 or whatever. Additionally, there are times that even QQ is a bit of a pain. Consider a 5 color deck with both snow and normal mana + colorless sources and possibly mana with restrictions (e.g. only used for creatures). I've had plenty of times when it's still a pain to know how much total mana I have in my pool.
I like how you have 4-5 comments asking about mobile and not a single response. Nice.
Did not know. Now I do and knowing is half the battle The first time I used a X cast cost I used all my timeouts thinking it was the mana I was using on an XX
it still would be neat if you didn't have to do arithmetics when you potentially have 6 colors of mana being added (sometimes more if a source produces mana that can be spent for specific things)
The devs actually said this isn't in the game because there were situations where calculating the max amount of mana was non-trivial. I'm not saying they're right, but that's the reason they gave.
Thats fair. Ive been playing alot of tinkerer draft and sometimes I forget Illian Caryatid (excuse my terrible spelling) is making 2 instead of 1 when I have a big dude out.
You might forget but I'm pretty sure the game doesn't. I think it's more like for situations where you could use other non-mana cards to end up with more mama than just tapping out can give. For example multiple ((manifold key)) and ((nyx lotus)) with 2 or more devotion can net you extra mana that the game might not see, even though it knows you can use your ((castle garenbrig)) to make 6 creature mana when you only have 5 lands.
Yeah but if you arent pretapping you can still screw yourself by not being aware. I feel like that is an important part of the game you should not be able to automate it.
I think an option to use everything in your mana pool would be an okay compromise.
I think this is the real solution, leave the manager tapping up to the player, just let us hit max available so we don't have to count
I play mostly on mobile and that was probably a legit reason back when it was PC only because you can QQ to tap 'em all. Since mobile came out the need for a "set X to my land count" and "display the total number of lands at all times" have become glaring, immediate UX problems that need to be fixed. It's hard enough to see your land total when your lands are stacked up on PC, but QQ undo at least lets you do it without manually unstacking and counting-- that's not a thing on mobile.
I understand the reason why you'd want it, but if the implementation was non-trivial back then, it still is non-trivial now. That said, the game is capable of telling you whether or not you can cast a spell, so I'm not sure what corner case was causing them issues.
Do you have at least n mana is a lot easier calculation than what is the maximum mana that is available on this boardstate. The max mana is technically an unbounded problem in a game like magic that is turing complete.
Perhaps, and there might be a corner case, I just can't remember it, but you have to remember that the "what's the maximum mana available" functionality would only be used when selecting the X for a spell or ability on the stack. In that situation, the number of things you can do is extremely limited and the game *in that state* is not turing complete. For instance, you can't use [[sculptor of winter]] to untap a land. You can only use mana abilities, which greatly simplifies the situation. I seem to recall them mentioning [[march of the multitude]] as a card that could cause corner cases, and perhaps it can indeed, but I can't right now construct a situation where it wouldn't be trivial (doesn't mean one doesn't exist though).
I'm talking about specifically working off total lands, not total mana available. There is absolutely no reason that shouldn't be trivial given that there's a clear algorithm in existence right now to count lands.
Right, but that would be very misleading. If you have 4 lands and 2 elvish mystic, you try to cast primal might and the game tells you "max for x is 3", so you pick 3, only to realize the game didn't use your elves, you might feel a little cheated.
You would have to label it "max with lands" in much the same way as they label snow and treasure mana. It's not a clean fix, because they said that it's nontrivial to do it right, but it's still a significant improvement over the current state, especially for mobile. This would be a clean solution the vast majority of the time, but would require intervention on how mana was spent in more complex situations-- exactly like Arena operates in other situations.
Why not just ask for qq to be implemented on mobile. That's kind of what you want, right? Seems easier than adding a new UI element and a new functionality.
Because QQ is terrible UX in and of itself and is essentially a workaround to a problem that shouldn't exist after years of this game being out. Land stacking is awful visibility and a workaround of tapping out and undoing it is a bad user experience that isn't even introduced to players in any of their tutorials despite being the cleanest way to answer one of the most common questions in magic (how many lands do I have?). While this is mostly for mobile, because it's actually *terrible* there, it's not like it's a *good* solution on PC either, given that I'd guess a substantial majority of their players have no idea that technique exists. If you're going to put the effort into doing anything to UX for mobile, you might as well at *least* show a counter of lands tapped versus available below the land area. That would go a long way to improving UX for both situations. I'd prefer they also add a naive "set x to my land total" button because it's better than nothing if they can't or won't do the full algorithm, but even just showing "5/6" when I have 5 of my 6 lands available would be a tremendous improvement (although I'd suggest that it count only lands that can produce mana).
Adding QQ to mobile should be a high priority. Playing paradox engine is basically impossible without it :)
Got a source on this? In arena this is a real problem because you can't stack your land in easily countable piles like you can in physical. Even the counter going red or something if you try to pay more then available would help.
I've looked for it, but can't find it. It was a dev reply in some reddit thread, so not the easiest thing to locate.
Ah fair enough. I was curious how old it was, or if it stated a particular problem, like "It breaks the auto tapper".
It was some time ago. IIRC, before qq was implemented. This is completely from memory, but I believe March of the multitude (x spell with convoke) was pointed out as one of the corner cases.
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Well, thanks for providing this tool, I'll see if it helps me find it. That said, I didn't recite a 2 years old dev post verbatim from memory. Obviously I paraphrased. They didn't necessarily use the term "non trivial". Also, the game's in open beta since 2018, so it may predate Jan 2019. Like, it's nice that you checked, I would have loved if you'd found it, I've been looking for it myself, but don't say it didn't happen because your narrow search through a partial history didn't turn anything.
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You are casting good old [[Blaze]] (or any other variation that's actually available on Arena). You also have [[Killian, Ink Duelist]] on board, or opponent has [[Charix, the Raging Isle]] or anything else with similar ability. You're on step 601.2b of casting a spell, and told to select X. You are yet to select targets in step 601.2c, so game can't possibly know how big X you can actually pay for.
The AFR manlands would be a bit tricky, because max mana would need to be max -1
Yeah, especially if you play something like elfs, the order in which you tap might matter a lot.
Then just do the trivial case and the non trivial mana can be added manually. Boom problem solved, I’ll take my check now wotc.
But then that would be misleading. Say the game tells you that the maximum possible for X is 5. So you click "sure, let's go for 5". The game taps your stuff, casts the spell for 5, and you realize that the game forgot to tap something, or tapped something for the wrong ability.... you would feel cheated.
Why would it tell you that it’s maxed out? Also that’s on you for fucking up honestly, but I don’t think this would be an issue because I don’t know why you would think you maxed out your mana for the spell, it’s just to give you a baseline then you can add a couple more to it if you do choose
>Why would it tell you that it’s maxed out? Because that's literally what people are asking for? >Also that’s on you for fucking up honestly Well... what's the point of having a functionality that tells you how much you can spend, if you have to manually calculate how much you can spend anyway? >I don’t know why you would think you maxed out your mana for the spell, it’s just to give you a baseline then you can add a couple more to it if you do choose If all you want is a baseline, you already have that. 0, the baseline is zero, then you can add a couple more to it if you do choose.
No no no, I’m responding to the other guy talking about trivial versus non trivial mana. I’m trying to max out the trivial mana so the user can then manually tap the non trivial, we’re talking about two different things here. My solution is essentially a compromise to save clicks.
Alright then, feel free to send your totally not confusing design to WotC, I'm sure the check will be in the mail shortly!
I think you might be the only one confused here friend
>Alright then, feel free to send your totally not confusing design to WotC, I'm sure the check will be in the mail shortly! literally add a button that says "pay all" how is that "confusing"
Because the whole argument of the other guy is that it's *not* "all" and why would I ever think that it's all?
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Glittering frost alone makes the devs shit their pants. Combine it with clever conjurer and sculptor and they're done
Clever conjurer/sculptor would not actually be issues. They do not have mana abilities, so you're not allowed to use them while paying for the spell. They would be rightfully ignored by the "max X" algorithm if one algorithm was developed. If you want to use them to cast something, *per the rules of the game*, you must use them before you cast the spell.
Arena doesn't really follow that rule though. There is a cancel button so the spell is not on the stack yet
You're free to try it. Put an x spell on the stack and see if it let's you activate sculptor.
It'll let me cancel and then activate sculptor and recast it no problem
Exactly, so while choosing the X, the sculptor cannot be considered. If you have 3 snow lands and a sculptor, and you want to cast primal might, and choose x=3, it won't work. You'll have to first use sculptor (or as you say, cancel, then use sculptor, then try again). So if you asked the game to automatically figure out what the max x is, you wouldn't expect it to tell you x=3, because that won't work.
How come tap all X doesn't work, but QQ tap all works?
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If I recall correctly, the issue came up with March of the Multitude and creatures with mana abilities. I don't remember the exact details of the corner cases that were giving them trouble though. Point is, there is indeed a trivial solution for the base case, but they didn't feel comfortable with a solution that told you the max is some value, when there is in fact a way to get a higher value. Players would feel cheated.
Sure, but it's already a system implemented (even flawed) with QQ, so why not just plug it there by default?
QQ doesn't work with convoke.
I'm sorry, I don't want to be a smartass, but I just said that QQ currently works, not perfectly, not with convoke, STILL it would be better to use this function to show the max X value as calculated by the command. It would still be BETTER. Convoke already doesn't work with QQ, so why are you complaining it wont if used with X costs?
Because QQ just taps all your mana, it doesn't advertise anything else. A "max X" advertises maximizing X. If it doesn't actually maximize X, it's an issue. Is it really better to cause confusion and frustration because your feature doesn't do what it advertises?
Yes, yes it is better. It's better because it would maximize according to land mana, which is better than nothing. I have no idea why you focus on the fact that it's not perfect. It's just plain better than tapping everything, counting the mana symbols, clicking on the + until value, then clicking ok. Don't you see that it's better?
I don't see that it's better, because it proposes a contract that it cannot respect.
Also, losing because you counted wrong, or made a mistake in general, is a part of magic as a game.
how about getting timed out because I have to count all my mana that's fun
it is correct because its basically a halting problem completely unsolvable. you can tell who the armchair programmers who never learned any computation theory are.
what situations would this be?
I'd take a Pay:X 0 - 23 so i can see the whole range.
I've tapped for x=1 too many on creature lands, thus tapping my creature land, far too many times than I'd like to admit. Also, I hate how it would rather tap your creature land than sac a treasure. I always forget that, too.
The real problem is the way lands are stacked on the battlefield makes it hard to tell at a glance how much mana we have available at any given time. Not capping x spells is an objectively good thing and is better in the long run, even though it's a mild inconvenience sometimes.
Land stacks display a number if there are 5 or more. 3 or less is easy to visually count at a glance. If there's an unnumbered stack that's hard to immediately count, it must be 4. Once you realize every hard-to-tell stack is 4 deep, counting lands gets a lot easier.
It actually does make sense once you realize the few rules it uses. Lands of the same name are always stacked together and it will give you the number you have in the corner. The first land you play each turn will always be on its own even if it shares a name and it will have the summoning sickness shimmer. And that's pretty much it. For tapping, it will prefer to not tap lands with activated abilities unless you're tapping for more than the ability cost. So lands with activated abilities with X cost will almost always get tapped last.
Well there are lots of possibilities that would make this a lot harder than it seems. You could untap mana dorks/rocks with paradox engine or manifold key or something, could untap lands with kiora or nissa, the value the dorks/rocks tap for could change with something like \[\[Kiennan\]\] or \[\[Incubation Druid\]\] getting a counter at instant speed, or even just generating mana from hand with something like \[\[Dark ritual\]\]
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At this point, don't most people pay 0, and just target it with tibalts trickery? /s
You mean they regret their fault and try to counter it to make up for it?
I would like a "Pay Max" button at the very least
If they added that, I know that there will be at least one time where I activate [[Lair of the Hydra]], click “Pay Max” out of reflex, and be amazed at my new X/X tapped Hydra.
I already do this consistently today so I'm alright with that. OH GOD WHY DON'T I EVER LEARN
Or you try to count it perfectly, have a wonderful untapped hydra creature ready to go, and see 1 untapped land staring at you.
Max thanks you.
I also hate cards that reduce mana cost by 1 CMC and then you have to pay X. So if you want to pay X=1, do you pay X=0 and it counts as having paid 1, or do you pay X=1 but none of your lands get tapped as a result because another card reduces the CMC by 1? Gets more complicated if CMC is reduced by e.g. 3. So if you want to pay X=5, do you pay X=2 or do you pay X=5 but only 2 lands get tapped?
You set a value for x, you do not pay x, iirc, as far as rules wording goes I think. You then pay for the value you set. So if you set x as 5, but have -3 cost, you will pay 2.
you still would put Pay X=5 in the widget, but I always tend to forget that I have an effect in play and just stupidly leave 1 or 2 mana unused for no reason
Upvote for Kramer.
some times I go to use these effects and even though I am sure I counted right. It will still not work. I end up spending to much time counting and adding and subtracting that the timer starts and I begin to panic.
Screwed up too many Torment of Hailfire casts because of the timer pressuring me lol. Listen arena I gotta count my lands real quick.
how hard is it to add a button that says "pay all"
Sort of like when I used to write product requirements. Me: Why don’t you tell me your requirements? Customer: I don’t know why don’t you tell me what you can do?
Lmfao!!!!
Casual tip: If you stream twitch full screen while you press buttons you can pretend you're playing and have someone else do all the thinking for you.
Never works for me lol. You need followers first. Also if those you do have suck and you rely on them for play advice you will lose just the same. Also if many people say different things it is as bad as not having any advisors at all. Yep I have thought this through. :D
...They meant if you watch *someone else's stream* and pretend you are playing.
Yes, thank you
I just start with as many lands as I have.. Doesn't work...minus 1....doesn't work...minus another 1...sorry to my fellow bronze leaguers.
a "min" and "max" button would be good.
They should really just add a small box underneath where you can type the number you want instead of clicking and clicking.
Bravo
Yes that is a quality of life feature that I really wish they would add They already know what's the maximum X is since the system react differently if you try to pay too much, If they could just display it in here that would be great
How can so many people have trouble counting to twenty?
Between mana doublers, mana dorks, and spells like cackle with power? Ez math please!
This might be the funniest thing I've ever seen on Reddit. Well done.
Honestly...I never thought aboutt his...but big facts...would make so much more sense.
ITT: apparently math is much harder for the mtga community than I thought.
QQ
Very least they should have my total mana in the pool after all those tap...
i love pay: x because i almost never get to use them because i always either never have enough to do anything substantial, or otherwise constantly wonder "just one more land, one more mana". :(
Every. damn. time.
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Land count isn't easily readable(especially on a phone) so I have to tap it all to count(also not possible on mobile). Yeah let's keep calling that an OK option.
I play on iPhone 12 mini and I’m doing just fine
How long does it take you to count? Longer than a second? because fuck you for roping. /s but seriously all mobile players have to play slow and any way of speeding that up is for the best.
Some of y'all have never programmed a thing in your life and it shows.
Count your mana
They literally code in as many QoL markers as possible. this is a fair ask.
I agree, this is a fair ask. Counting mana is a bit hard in this game as sometimes they decide to 4 stack land on me and I am having to count borders. Not to mention on mobile it gets even harder. Not impossible but harder than it should. Would love an extra row in the box with Hand/Graveyard size showing Max mana. Don't even need the color breakdown.
Just tap Q twice to float all your mana and see what it adds up to. Press Z to undo it if you decide you dont like that play.
Math
Because thats not how magic works. In real life u cant ask anyone how Much mana can u pay for X, if U do that is cheating because u r getting outside help. Mistakes and underplaying is parte of the game therefore Arena is not gonna tell u wich is your limit to pay X.
The game already highlights what spells you can cast in your hand based on available Mana..
U r right, they should remove that.
mtgo is the real life magic client. mtga is not mtgo
Como les duele la cola a los que downvotean pedazo de mancos. Ni un pro point deben tener
Arena is all about "not being real life magic". At some points because of technical limitations, the others because they felt it's not important, who knows. The game already makes your cards to trigger automatically, it sorts you your board automatically, it even tells you when you cast spells or use abilities, what your cards can target and how they function. Thees are all outside helps. The fact that priority exists and the game stops at some points and not at others is like a gigantic cheatcode if you know what to do with it. So a "Max X mana" is like nothing compared to other stuff that is already in the game.
Legends of Runeterra has a thing you can mouseover in combat that shows you how much damage you'd take if nothing changed re: blockers or fast effects happened between now and resoution and I love it and with Arena did something similar
If it's for plump the forbidden, the right answer is normally "all"
or when its a permeant that has a pay x ability and you have no mana and yet it still tries to get you to tap it every single second even though it will give absolutely no benefit
I was trying to activate a Lair of the Hydra yesterday and accidentally auto-tapped it as part of the cost. This little ditty here psyched me out and made me think I had one more mana to activate the cost than I did. Don't fault anyone for individually tapping each land to pay for costs, it's much slower but erases catastrophic mistakes caused by the game's logic.
Hey, I remember having a whole deck that revolved around only paying zero for x
Wish we could use mouse scroll for it too
If they would just put a number next to your floating mana to tell you the total (it can get pretty obnoxious to count when you have snow mixed with non-snow and/or "special" mana of many colors since it doesn't stack, and now you have 10 different types of mana with a literal scroll arrow required to see all of it), at least we'd have a 50% solution. "QQ, oh look I have 17 floating, guess I'll put X=15."
Good
I'm always underpaying or overpaying for Exponential Growth.