Blinded by the light
November 10th 2011 01:37
"I haven't committed a crime. What I did was fail to comply with the law."
-- David Dinkins, former mayor of New York City
Why exactly is Grand Abolisher a white card?
Yes, I know, blah blah setting rules, blah blah own vision of balance, blah blah color pie, blah. But the color that has historically had the most instant-speed abilities and that has been hurt the most by being forced by play during its own turn is blue. Shouldn’t an ability that hurts blue go to one of blue’s enemies? You know, red and green? The color that R & D people have described as being linear by its nature, and the color that never gets the sort of good creatures it’s supposed to get?
I’m all for flavor-based design, and I prefer it to purely mechanical-based design, as I’ve made clear many times in this space. But I find it very suspicious that said flavor-based design ends up giving so many of the possible Magic abilities to white and blue. It’s possible that there are still some definitions that could be redefined in the future, but the problem is in fact significantly deeper than this.
Whatever else may happen, Magic is still being made by people who are part of society; specifically, a society that aligns far more with the ideals of white than any of the other colors. Looking at Wizards of the Coast’s own descriptions of the color philosophies throws this into sharp focus. Blue is the color of intellectualism, which is currently heavily disdained in favor of vocational ability. Black’s worldview prizes ambition and personal success, which are looked down on outside of a few very specific situations. Red prizes individualism and emotion, which have often been seen as signs of an unstable or even dangerous personality. And green is about instinct and a connection to nature, both of which have been weakened by the modern era's near-religious faith in medicine.
But white’s ideals of community, law, stability, order, and conformity are, even when expressed in this shortened, simplified form, awfully similar to some of the buzzwords some individuals and groups cite as the “basis of Western civilization.” Despite the fact that most of these individuals and groups have a narrow view of history and a strong desire to maintain their own position and status, this general view is extremely pervasive. I could write an entire essay on this, but there’s not enough space for it here, and we need to get back to the topic of colors in Magic. Here goes:
I’m not saying that Rosewater and Forsythe deliberately make white overpowered and give it the best abilities consciously. But do they associate white with the concept of “good,” or at the very least consider it the color most likely to be “good?” There’s a good chance; many Magic players do, as you can confirm by visiting any forum and visiting a discussion on flavor. (Also, check the former’s articles about his children and the latter’s Twitter posts about political events: they drop a lot of hints that if they were a planeswalker, they’d be white.) If you associate these concepts with white, are you less likely to notice that white cards are blatantly overpowered in your new set? Surely you are: after all, good always wins, right?
The early years of Magic were much freer of this, but the early years of Magic were designed by very different people – they had a history with Dungeons and Dragons which, despite its often black-and-white morality system, also encouraged user discretion and preference and asked players to “make your [character] different from every other one like him.” Sets like Homelands and The Dark were much more comfortable portraying different facets of every color, including a version of white that could sometimes do evil, than modern sets, despite their distance from modern design philosophies. The problem, as such, isn’t flavor-based design in and of itself: the problem is the wrong flavor, and, on occasion, the wrong designer.
The Orb of Insight has a Twitter account. There's fewer pictures, but just as much insight.
-- David Dinkins, former mayor of New York City
Why exactly is Grand Abolisher a white card?
Yes, I know, blah blah setting rules, blah blah own vision of balance, blah blah color pie, blah. But the color that has historically had the most instant-speed abilities and that has been hurt the most by being forced by play during its own turn is blue. Shouldn’t an ability that hurts blue go to one of blue’s enemies? You know, red and green? The color that R & D people have described as being linear by its nature, and the color that never gets the sort of good creatures it’s supposed to get?
I’m all for flavor-based design, and I prefer it to purely mechanical-based design, as I’ve made clear many times in this space. But I find it very suspicious that said flavor-based design ends up giving so many of the possible Magic abilities to white and blue. It’s possible that there are still some definitions that could be redefined in the future, but the problem is in fact significantly deeper than this.
Whatever else may happen, Magic is still being made by people who are part of society; specifically, a society that aligns far more with the ideals of white than any of the other colors. Looking at Wizards of the Coast’s own descriptions of the color philosophies throws this into sharp focus. Blue is the color of intellectualism, which is currently heavily disdained in favor of vocational ability. Black’s worldview prizes ambition and personal success, which are looked down on outside of a few very specific situations. Red prizes individualism and emotion, which have often been seen as signs of an unstable or even dangerous personality. And green is about instinct and a connection to nature, both of which have been weakened by the modern era's near-religious faith in medicine.
Not to mention by cards that should cost four mana but don't.
But white’s ideals of community, law, stability, order, and conformity are, even when expressed in this shortened, simplified form, awfully similar to some of the buzzwords some individuals and groups cite as the “basis of Western civilization.” Despite the fact that most of these individuals and groups have a narrow view of history and a strong desire to maintain their own position and status, this general view is extremely pervasive. I could write an entire essay on this, but there’s not enough space for it here, and we need to get back to the topic of colors in Magic. Here goes:
I’m not saying that Rosewater and Forsythe deliberately make white overpowered and give it the best abilities consciously. But do they associate white with the concept of “good,” or at the very least consider it the color most likely to be “good?” There’s a good chance; many Magic players do, as you can confirm by visiting any forum and visiting a discussion on flavor. (Also, check the former’s articles about his children and the latter’s Twitter posts about political events: they drop a lot of hints that if they were a planeswalker, they’d be white.) If you associate these concepts with white, are you less likely to notice that white cards are blatantly overpowered in your new set? Surely you are: after all, good always wins, right?
The early years of Magic were much freer of this, but the early years of Magic were designed by very different people – they had a history with Dungeons and Dragons which, despite its often black-and-white morality system, also encouraged user discretion and preference and asked players to “make your [character] different from every other one like him.” Sets like Homelands and The Dark were much more comfortable portraying different facets of every color, including a version of white that could sometimes do evil, than modern sets, despite their distance from modern design philosophies. The problem, as such, isn’t flavor-based design in and of itself: the problem is the wrong flavor, and, on occasion, the wrong designer.
The Orb of Insight has a Twitter account. There's fewer pictures, but just as much insight.
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