Cybit wrote:
Or, they say "no ban, but we have lots of ways to deal with it already coming in the next set."
Which is OK, if it really ends up being true. Again, Rob and Co. figured GOWK was OK to start with, that's why the produced him the way he is. There's been times in the past where Rob designed a 'counter' to something, but it in the overall meta, it was too weak against other things in order to really be effective (or there were other better choices which kept it from being useful enough).
The problem with this though, is that it makes for a mess for this year's GenCon. There have already been quite a few top-level players who didn't participate last year at GenCon because of the PAX stuff, and there have been several who have said they'll likely not play this year either if GOWK is still around, including the defending champion. That's not healthy for the game either, IMO. Plus, you still have to consider that there's the time between when the errata went live, and when the counters become realized in the Galaxy at War or Dark Times set, and if that gap in between there is long enough for people to get bored/frustrated with GOWK and stop playing the game. It's tough to tell people "Just wait, it'll get better" when there's not really any history to directly support that. We've never had something like this before, so we've never had experience with waiting to see if the WOTC design team can accurately come up with a fix. So it's tough to just "wait and see", because that's asking a good deal of faith.
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But see to me that's the issue. What happens if is becomes no longer their issue to fix? I think they have already made their decision. I believe there have been warnings all along. Rob saying he knew nothing about an intiative rule change therefore putting all the community pressure back on Dean and Jason. I am thinking Rob and WOTC are standing by the rule book and anything outside of that is less of a priority for them. We already know that GOWK is the way Rob wants him. WOTC and DCI have already kicked the Rules Advisory test out. The judges test will only be on SWMRAC.org (if it comes to fruition), how long before DCI pulls out all together? At this point in time this theory is a stretch, but that doesn't make it any less plausible. All I know is that the community is divided already. If DCI pulls the plug on competive play and it becomes the Dean show then whoa baby, I will have my popcorn ready cause it will be one heck of a show!
Heh, yeah, that will get interesting. But you know what, if WOTC washes their hands of it, then DCI will be free to do whatever they want, which is just fine, IMO. If people want to continue to fuss and such about DCI, then they'll have one of two options: 1) start stepping up and helping out with DCI, and get themselves to a point where they can be on the RAC or part of the DCI leadership, etc., or 2) come up with their own plan for sanctioning events, a la, what we'd discussed here on gamers a couple times a while back.
I don't see WOTC walking away from gamers in terms of DCI though. WOTC will still use DCI for tracking MTG and RPG stuff. So if anything, there's always the possibility that DCI will drop SWM altogether. But I think WOTC is smart enough to know that doing that could kill the game just as easily as anything else.