heartwithnobeat asked: I have to be honest, after the CoCo, Emrakul and now this format, esp when combined with you missing an infinite combo you should have seen in, I have lost all faith in R and D to create a functioning standard format. Can you give me a reason to believe in you going forward? Not trying to hate or be mean, just very disillusioned ring now.

Design’s job is to take a blank piece of paper four times a year (more if you count supplemental products) and find new and exciting design space we haven’t found in the first twenty of years of making this game and then satisfy a giant audience that all want different things for a wide variety of ways to play.

And between design and development, I think we have the easier job.

Building a constructed environment that’s complex enough that millions of players won’t crack it in a hour yet robust enough that it creates a variety of options is difficult. Development can’t solve it because then it wouldn’t be complex enough. They have to make something with the potential to become something bigger.

And if they miss one thing, one card interaction, one combo, one rules trick, the dominoes start to fall because future testing is building from a faulty premise.

And that’s not taking into account that they’re doing this with card sets that are constantly evolving and for many interactions of Standard all at the same time. Plus all the while also watching over Sealed and Draft.

Development works very hard to bring you balanced and fun formats. And yes, there’s the occasional stumble, but that’s only because what’s being asked of them is so incredibly difficult.