David_3000z

Can you please explain the rationale behind the 10,000 gold entry fee for the brawladays event. In addition, is this something your team plans to keep in place long term?

WOTC_CommunityTeam

Chris Cao here borrowing a community account.

To answer Brawl, we need to go back in time a bit. We originally built MTG Arena for Standard players. Now we’re moving beyond Standard, and that means going places which aren’t exactly balanced for our Standard-focused rewards structure. That means we need to experiment to find the right balance, which is what we’re doing with Brawl.

We haven’t found the right balance between availability/entry fees/rewards with Brawl. That’s why we’re testing all three right now. Direct Challenge play is outside of daily rewards and the most social and casual way to play Magic in the game currently. The Wednesday Brawl queue is testing availability balance. Brawl Hall is testing earn vs rewards balance. In fact the 10K cost was set after simulating earn rate vs consumption rate of an average player. We haven’t gone down the path of a permanent queue with no entry fee that limits daily rewards, but it is something we’re exploring. What do you think?

– Cao

Sunyveil

Agreed, people seem to love this new format but its growth is stifled by this entry fee. I honestly believe this would be the most popular way to play on MTGA if it didn’t feel like WotC was trying to prevent people from playing it

WOTC_CommunityTeam

We know there’s a lot of folks who love Brawl. Arena is for Brawlers, but it’s also for a lot of other player types. If we made Brawl available 24/7 with full daily rewards, it would impact other players by shifting the focus away from the other experiences we offer. And if Brawl became the focus, the fundamentals of Arena’s economy would have to change, and players may feel forced to play Brawl to play most efficiently.

– Cao

Correl We originally built MTG Arena for Standard players. Now we’re moving beyond Standard, and that means going places which aren’t exactly balanced for our Standard-focused rewards structure. I am honestly curious why something like Brawl, which utilizes the standard card-pool, requires a separate reward structure? What makes it fundamentally different than “normal” standard play that dictates a different reward structure? WotC_Jay

In Ranked Standard, the goal of most players is to play the most-effective decks, which change nicely as the meta develops. In Brawl, many players are looking to play the decks they find fun, which change much less. For example, I Brawl as Vraska, and it’s going to take something pretty massive to move me off of that.

Tharob

I would personally like a free queue as well, but limited daily rewards really puts a damper on that concept.

If that is the alternative, a paid queue might be better, but it would be nice if the ‘Brawl Hall” at least gave some rewards beyond the single card. Paying 10k just for the privilege of playing feels extremely bad; even just some minor further rewards would reduce the sting there.

WOTC_CommunityTeam

When we were looking at an entry fee for Brawl (to balance it with Standard), we saw that 10k was about 40% of the rewards an average player would earn over 4 weeks of play. We are continually analyzing the usage at that price point. So far, about 75% of the number of Wednesday brawlers are playing Brawler’s Guild Hall all the time. We are still looking for other answers that maintain the game’s balance. One thing we haven’t tweaked yet is changing the daily rewards for Brawl. Also, a Brawl-specific Mastery Pass is something that we’ve been talking about together here, but it isn’t on the roadmap.

– Cao