On 30th July 2024, the newly formed Discord Points Panel released a survey to capture the mood and views of the playerbase. The following is a report outlining the survey’s findings:
Overall Sentiment
Thank you everyone for filling out the survey. We received 167 responses filled with information and we feel that this confirms that Canlander has one of the best magic communities out there and the passion for this wonderful format was felt throughout the responses. Whether you had compliments or criticisms for how the format is run, it was all done with a great sense of love for the format and its community.
The main headline of this report is that Canlander is still an awesome format to play. 97.6% of respondents reported that they enjoyed the format, and 62% stated they were happy with the current state of the metagame, while 28% felt neutral about the metagame. Perceived deck variety is very high, with 76% of respondents stating they felt like they played against a variety of decks and many of those who reported otherwise clarified to say that this was due to having a small playgroup.
Size of the Points List and Frequency of Points Updates
The most divisive issue identified among responses was the desire to expand the points list. 53.3% of respondents believed the format would benefit from having more than 6 cards added to the points list, while a further 45.5% did not indicate a desire to specifically increase or decrease the size of the points list. Most of the latter group stated positively that they felt the size of the points list was ‘about right’ but 7.8% of respondents either did not answer or explicitly rejected the notion that the size of the points list was a relevant metric. It’s clear that the people who want an expanded points list are passionate about this issue and we will be closely monitoring it going forward.
Most respondents reported being content with the current rate of points updates being a maximum of 6 months between changes, although 25% voiced their desire to see more frequent changes.
Perceived Pain Points of the Format and Most Desired Points Changes
The most notable overarching theme among community responses is that one of the pain points of the format is the proliferation of 4c+ good-stuff piles. With the ability to ‘free roll’ an ever-growing caste of pushed threats and engines, many players feel that some of the ‘classic cards’ they enjoyed in the past have been forced out by current design trends. The community also seems to believe that artifact-based combo is the most dominant form of combo and has pushed aside spell-based, lands, and creature combo. While this is far from a consensus, the advocates for a change in pointing philosophy are clearly very passionate about it and their views are heard loud and clear.
The two cards that stand out as having the most consensus in the community for being added to the points list are Minsc & Boo, Timeless Heroes and Urza’s Saga. Both see play in many of the top decks in the format and can feel devastating for wide swaths of the metagame to combat. Other top inclusions are White Plume Adventurer for its ability to introduce initiative to the game early, Comet, Stellar Pup for its inherent randomness and The One Ring for providing access to nearly unparalleled card advantage with a perceived low deck-building cost.
There are three cards that stand out that the community would like for down pointings: Strip Mine, Survival of the Fittest, and Thassa’s Oracle. The community has seen the work that decreasing Strip Mine from 3 to 2 has done for combating 4c midrange/control and artifact combo and would like to see that go even further. There appears to be a desire to give some love to creature combo and Thoracle combo decks by decreasing the points of their tutors or key pieces. In addition, True-Name Nemesis was often cited as seeming out of place on the list given the current quality of unpointed threats in the contemporary Canlander environment. Notably, the number of people who did not want any specific cards decreased (54) was more than twice the number of people who did not want any specific cards increased (23), indicating a strong community sentiment for more, rather than less, regulation.
Conclusion
One notable issue that was not mentioned by any respondent was the price of participation. With the criticism that many eternal formats receive based on the high prices of their most powerful cards, we can be proud that proxy usage is so widespread among the community that it has essentially become a non-issue.
Our community is going strong, and there is an overwhelming stance that Canlander is one of, possibly the best, way to play Magic. We greatly appreciate everyone’s participation in the survey for helping us get a pulse on the current view of the format! We will be discussing these results internally and conveying our conclusions to the points council.
We plan to continue engaging with the community, so stay tuned for more!
The role of the Discord Points Panel is to gather data and capture community sentiment, assisting councillors by providing connections to Canlander sub-communities around the world.
Current members:
Feel free to DM or @ any of us on the Discord if you have any questions, thoughts or concerns.