( - SOE) - A Welcome Back Letter from Mark Tuttle - 05-18-2011 04:10 PM
A Welcome Back Letter from Mark Tuttle
Welcome Back!!
We appreciate your patience with the downtime as a result of the issues we faced over the past couple of weeks.* I’m sure the big question on everyone’s mind is what has the team been working on during this downtime?* Quite a bit, actually…* Let’s look at some stuff from the most recent patch and then we will look to the future!
Free Stuff!
We looked at bringing the game back up this past weekend as a second launch party, and what kind of party would it be without presents?* When you log in, you will find a special grant of 500 Station Cash and three new Set One promo spells in your delivery window.* The three new spells are Angelheart Vial, Ivory Mask and Duress.* Let’s look at them one by one.
Angelheart Vial is an artifact that gives you health whenever your opponent gains health.* I think you’ll find lots of good uses for this one!
Ivory Mask is a White spell that prevents a Planeswalker from being the target of spells and abilities. Tired of direct damage?* Put on the mask!
Duress is a Black spell that is just plain mean.* When we added Instants into the game, it allowed you to get key spells out of your hand sooner.* Now with the threat of Duress, you’ll want to get your strategies in play even faster or your opponent might just be able to pick them out one by one.
All players who had set up a Magic : The Gathering – Tactics™ account prior to the downtime will receive these spells.* For new players, we’re going to put these spells in the single store very quickly.
As for players with live auctions at the time we went offline, the deposits for those failed auctions have been refunded.
You’ll also find that we have added some new spells to the prize structure for Open, Constructed and Draft.* There’s a blue spell, a red spell and a green spell to round out the six (6) new spells we’re throwing your way.*** Hop into a tournament and check them out!
Because You Asked For It
We’re always watching the forums and listening to your feedback.* Thus, we have changed how critical hits and crushing blows work.* 1×1 creatures will now only crit.* 2×2 creatures, because of their larger size, will deliver only crushing blows.* Flanking still guarantees more damage.
We changed the seed values of summoned creatures’ initiative to ensure both Planeswalkers place their creatures in the initiative order in the same way.
We have also lowered the Open tournament time down to 2 hours for a full event.
You Didn’t Ask, But We Did It Anyway
With spells like Hymm to Tourach and (now) Duress targeting the opponent’s hand, we’ve added the opponent information box (upper left hand corner) to the single-player missions where you have an opposing Planeswalker or Spellcaster.* Now you’ll know how many spells they are holding and how much mana they have prior to your casting.
Enchantments that once said “enchant enemy creature” or “enchant ally creature” can now target any creature.* If you want to drop a weakness on your own guys, we support that decision.* This means many enchantments that could not be moved from creatures belonging to one player to another by Aura Finesse now can.* Feel free to shift that pretty Oakenform from your opponent onto your own creatures.
We also fixed a number of bugs and added more stability into the game.
So, Let’s Talk About The Future…
We have been working very hard on our first expansion.* We hope to be able to show you some really cool stuff in June around E3.* This set will build heavily on previous strategies and offer some incredible new tactical game play.
I would again like to thank everyone for their patience.* The team is working very hard on making this game live up to the Magic name and your continued feedback is important.
See you in game!
Mark Tuttle
Executive Producer
Magic : The Gathering – Tactics
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