Every Way MTG Arena Cheats You, Known or Suspected - A Documentary
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- Опубліковано 23 лис 2023
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Happy holidays! Documentary time. This video shows of all the known, past and current, ways that Arena is "less than random" to put it lightly. Then we move on to widely observed but not technically "proven" issues with the game. And then we move into the theorized but no hard, direct evidence issues with Magic the Gathering Arena, everyone's favorite rigged platform. Everything from the shuffler issues, rigged matchmaking, and downright exploits are covered in this one!
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My favorite thing about the shuffler is the absurd number of times my starting hands includes all spells of one color and all land of another.
That and the same starting hand over and over
This happens just as often on paper as arena for me 😂
Yea bad luck irl vs rigged mtga lol
@@ekiM2K
@@ekiM2K hard but very true‼️
Just play mono red or white 😂
I love how if anyone mentions the shuffler on Reddit, people will jump to its defense as though you attacked their family...
Company shills or genuine idiots
Tbf Reddit will do that over literally anything
@@hookah6579 not just reddit 🤣 I swear most of the internet is like that
Mods delete anything that they consider "complaining" now.
I get instantly banned or suspended from interacting on comments on certain UA-cam and discord channels when I say the shuffler is fucked up. I don’t understand why people defend WOTC and arena saying the shuffler is fine.
So you're telling me the shuffler problem has been fixed? Because I haven't noticed it. The pattern is still there.
Thanks for your research on this Des. I've stopped caring about winning and I am just interested in jank and goofy decks. I've had a few games where my opponent allowed me to crank up my life total or counters just to see how ridiculous we could get it. Arena is just a slot machine.
Same, also makes me think twice these days when considering buying gems for a sealed. I just think why spend money on this rigged game? Ill just casually farm gold and build my collection that way.
I just enjoy ruining days in low platinum with mono black discard. In best of 1.
That. When you're about to pop off and your opponent surrenders. When I see something like that I stop trying, just say "Good game" and LET HIM COOK. Watch what happens.
I built a deck with 100% saccing lands like Lotus Field and Gateway Plaza. One of my opponents built up his entire board and intentionally decked himself because he knew I was just being silly. Then a couple months later, I was playing against a monoblue control deck, but all he did was discard, so I did the same for him. I intentionally decked myself for the lolz.
@Dj87887 I've had way more fun playing goofball decks with direct challenge or the occasional nice opponent then I ever did grinding to mythic.
If my opponent has been playing fast and I see he has a cool combo I'll let it happen instead of concede.
People are way friendlier in paper. Any compliment emote in arena starts off the toxicity lol
After a couple of years of playing 100% free to play and constantly going 2nd, I decided to start tracking my go first/second. I tracked 557 games and went first just under 18% of the time. I also started paying attention to the decks I would be paired with and realized after a span of 8 out of 9 games being against the deck that hard countered mine, I changed to a deck with a much better matchup and then the next 15 games were against a completely different hard counter. They intentionally try to push ppl into spending money on the game by rewarding whales and punishing free to play players.
Yugioh Master Duel has this same problem.
According to untapped GG I have played 604 games since it last started tracking. I won 304 and lost 300, which rounded down gives me a 50% winrate. What are the odds of being at almost EXACTLY 50% wins after that. Anyone who denies this game is rigged on all sorts of levels lives lala land. I Often create a new deck, have a 90+ % win rate on it for 8 to 13 games and then the next day, that same deck all of a sudden starts getting 9 game losing streaks but it miraculously starts giving me some wins again once the overall winrate dropped to around 56%
This is exactly my experience as well.
this is truth to the max... I've tracked thousands of games and can totally agree. Super crazy how when I play creatureless nobody is ever left holding a bunch of removal.. when I play elves they always burn my dorks, when I play combo they always have Duress...
People say that same thing about EVERY single digital card game lol. I really don't think they're putting you against hard counters, that's in insane theory. Shuffler is definitely messed up though
All I know is when I play my white weenie deck, for some reason I'm placed against all kinds of red or red green aggro decks, the VERY SECOND I switch to my mill deck, suddenly all of the decks are 120 cards plus and almost entirely black or black/red removal.
Ik, I have a mono blue mill deck and EVERY TIME I QUE
It's a 250 card deck with EVERY BROKEN CARD AT EVERY TIME
I'm still trying to figure out why this game crashes at least once every time I play.
Servers are running on bulk
still beta version. WOTC is the most corrupt company I know of, few tech$ investments and woke revenue 24/7 mentality.
it crashes because of all the algoritm software to script your play as hard as the elections of Russia
@@dreesdaman does only Ruzzia rig, or us also?
With me is my battery of the computer.. i play ranked and when i reach platinum 4 my computer goes off (like the charger isnt working) wtffff
Arena really does just feel like "did my opponent draw enough removal or can I have fun?"
Here's my biggest beef lately with the shuffler: *every* opening hand I get is guaranteed to include at least 2 special lands, like Field of Ruin, Mirrex, Eiganjo, Otawara, etc. It happens so much I'm just sickened by it.
Right, you could have 80-90% basics and still always get a nonbasic that you have 1 copy in 3 games straight easy.
Just stop playing Arena, bro. You'll be much happier.
true!!
The times I drew 2 world trees in a 26 land deck with ... 2 world trees is just obnoxious.
This does happen all the time. It is annoying with the channel lands, since you'd prefer their utility late. However it's absolutely maddening when they jam the colorless utility lands in your hand. Good luck playing 3 field of ruin in a deck.
Arena often ends up being unplayable and frustrating. The game just feels bad.
And now that I've seen your video they won't get an extra penny from me.
Most people that spend money mostly are UA-camrs that pay so they can show off decks
If you've ever played magic in real life consistently (tournament or not, doesn't matter), you can tell when something is janky
The shuffler is so broken that I just played a game where at points in the game I was 9 draws from the deck (51 total cards left), I had 6 lands. Then 19 draws in, 10 lands. Finally at the end, I was 28 draws 11 lands (2 more lands in my hand).
My deck only had 22 total lands. The shuffler is bullshit.
Edit* I know this particular game is anecdotal but it's remarkable how similar every game is.
Like you've been playing a guitar for a long time, then this you played and it's very out of tune.
Facts
True that. I can't even stack my deck on Arena, like wtf, how am I supposed to win several tournaments?
I have a 60 card deck with 19 lands, I can go 25 cards in and get at least 15-17 lands
So I play mostly Historical Brawl
In decks with 100 cards, it’s phenomenal how often I see certain cards be in the opening hand or at least within the first five turns.
Play against someone with white and watch how often they have Esper Sentinel, Authority of the Consuls or Swords to Plowshares.
Someone splashes green? Watch how often they have Gala Greeters by turn 3.
I just built an H Brawl deck around Koth the other day. Watch how often, after using his +2 to thin your deck of mountains, you keep drawing mountains two or more turns in a row
My mill deck ALWAYS get matched against green with a Gaea's Blessing. Never fails
Bruh that feel when it takes until 33 minutes in to get out of the confirmed section. That is a ludicrous amount of proven shenanigans Arena is doing
The first issue is definitely not gone. I run into it all the time. So many times I start with 1-2 mana in hand and I never get the chance to draw another, it's infuriating...! Or the other way around, having 3-4 mana in hand at the start and almost exclusively getting mana during the draw phases.
"shuffler is fine"™
That’s all within random deviation though, to be fair. If you’ve played in paper you’ve probably had it happen the same way.
@@r4v4g3r yeeep
I've gotten that at times but I see it happen with paper magic as well. I haven't had this issue often enough to say it's that big of a problem. But I do recognize it as an issue. However, most of the time, I think my hands land right in the middle of playability.
@@r4v4g3rexactly this. Thank you.
I've def experienced everything in this video. Hand spy, 200 card deck that drew perfect with EVERY answer turn for turn, being able to call out when you are going to draw a land instead of ANY spell to win the game...etc. It really does come down to profits, game retention (the more you lose, the more you have to play to get that mission reward done) and just pure lazy coding. Ain't nothing "random" about draws. Too many times have I said to myself 'if this was paper, this wouldn't happen or happen as much etc.'
The thing that drives me crazy the most is when your deck is scanned by the system and you get intentionally paired up with someone that 'counters' your deck. You can make a brew and never see a meta deck, just other "brews" that happen to have all the main deck answers to what you're playing! Too often for it to be a coincidence...
I swear that cards have distinct %chance to draw built within the cards themselves because there's no way I should draw certain things as often as I do (despite deck count)
@tgatt5759 oh it's 100% true. Certain cards do have a higher chance of being drawn.
Arena actually drove me BACK to paper and I made my own Cube. So, GJ Hasbro for supporting the secondary market I guess?
@@tgatt5759 I was also going to mention that, but forgot. Build a deck and put a very high mana cost card in best of one. Almost 90% you'll have it in your opening hand. (Colorless lands included... you'll get your one of colorless utility land instead of the other 23 colored lands)
Matching with counters does not happen and is not a real thing. Because for that to happen there would need to be a huge ass database for what counters what and its just not feasible
If you never want to play against mill in historic, just play Gaea’s Blessing
And if you never want to run into gates, play land destruction.
I just built a mill deck. One of my first few opponents was a mono green with that in it, then 7 100-200 card deck opponents
The ironic thing is, I play Gaea's Blessing (the best card in MTG! prove me wrong) for recursion, so I can play spells extra times. I get a few games here and there against mill decks. I like to think of it as the algorithm trying to punish the person I'm playing against with an autoloss against me if they've been winning too much.
If you only want to play against 200 card moneypiles, play mill
Perfect example of the match making bubbler. :)
Nothing could get me to come back to Arena at this point, and I see I made the correct decision.
I haven't been able to log in since October. WOTC doesn't even want us back
That drafting tool you theorized? Already exists in Hearthstone, there was a draft assistance tool for their draft mode (Arena) years ago. Told you the best card by pick/win percentage out of the 3 presented to the player. Definitely possible. Could be done in MTG:A very easily, though the result would often not be as straightforward as 90% or 70% pick/win as it was in Hearthstone's tool.
It's called Arena Tutor on Overwolf, google it. It's based on the data from Draftsim. It's not a secret cheating tool Des makes it out to be, it's well known
There already is one, each card has a rating and the rating is weighted up or down based on if it's in your colors. It's not as good as hearthstone's arena tools, but hearthstone is a much simpler game with fewer options per draft action
If Hearthstone didn't change it, it's because of a log file that can be read out. Magic Arena doesn't have that anymore (to stop deck trackers) and therefore it's harder to implement with AI stuff.
The random 200 card opponent thing is so real
It's actually very funny everytime I get that because you can sorta game the system if you know they'll always have it, can be a challenge run
Arena is the toxic abusive relationship that is just convenient enough for me to lose couple hours every week
I enjoy me a bruvac + cut your losses mill deck and that's the more likely times I face those 200 card decks.
I was just recently starting out and I hadn't faced anything but basic 60 card decks until that mill deck. Then I ask around and people just said "oh well because the game shuffles the deck people do that."
And yet all of magic I was taught getting as close to minimum was the most reasonable and viable strategy. Not including people messing around(like me), but against my mill deck?
Doesn't matter anyways because bruvac + cut your losses = 1/2 * 2, so goodbye 200 cards.
@@Loki-There's a special place in hell for people who play mill decks ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
This was the first time I heard about about the 200 card opponent who draws the perfect counters, I just thought I was somehow unlucky, but I can definitely confirm I have encountered it as well. I don't really follow any social media around this game, I just google "mtg rigged" when I obviously get rigged and come here to see I am not alone.
And then you start beating them so they fucking stall till the end of fucking time
I don't know about the shuffler being fixed. You still see a lot of grouping of cards and other cases where it seems to ignore certain cards in your deck for multiple games.
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Also I cannot believe I didn't mention that the devs outright admitted that all Brawl matchmaking is rigged based on what commander you choose.
I quit playing arena 6 months ago because i can spent whole night playing with only go first for less than 20% of the games(BO1) and this situation continued for about 10 days. you can cheat anything else, just at least give me a 50-50 play/draw ratio.
Same for me
I think I’ve gone first twice the whole time I’ve been playing Arena, about two weeks now.
Thanks for this, really cathartic to hear someone else saying the same things I've been suspecting. Also it's 100% in WotC interest to control win rates based on EOMM research as well as controlling gems since that's their ROI. Anyone who doesn't think there's some shady shit going on after learning about the MM algorithms and hand smoothing (which prove they can do a lot of other things since systems are already in place) is crazy.
I will be adding this as I watch along. I’m not any sort of official source but I do have my own site that I run so I should be considered at least a reputable source on this since I’ve been playing for a long time now- in arena since I’m not able to play paper magic in person.
******EDITING******
1:18- I have known that there were issues with shuffler since I have quit affectively 70 to 80% of all of the games that I have ever played on Arena due to issues, to constant bad hands or to just being put on a turn 4-5 clock from my first or second turn. While that sucks- some decks just get precisely what they need to win early. There were just too many times when I had taken a Mulligan and had gotten the exact same cards back in my hand that I shuffled away. This happened too many times unfortunately.
13:15 I have noticed that as well, but my ratio is a little bit different than yours. Either way I am still going second significantly less than 50% of the time.
39:00 I’ve noticed issues with the matchmaker system as well since I consistently play monoblack zombies and five color slivers. I’ll try my five legendary deck, which is my favorite from time to time but that’s completely random right there. Usually the opponents are four or five color decks.
What's funny is even after this and everything else, there will still be people that defend this nonsense, just build fun decks on Arena and hope you don't get fucked over, that's what I do.
I really liked doing that, but the power level is so high that you can't have any fun in Arena. YOu better win turn 3 or you get steamrolled.
How I know the shuffler is fixed is because you can update ANY deck and your first game will ALWAYS have those cards in your first hand. I’m not one to call cheats when I’m loosing and I’m aware or mana flooding but how you can just feel your next draw will be a land while your opponent so happens to pull a card then have a perfect combo happens way more to be a coincidence
I've experienced a significant number of topics you covered. I've played MTGA since its release. I'd get frustrated and quit, forget about all the issues, and then come back.
One thing you didn't mention that I've experienced many, many, many times is: I'd construct a completely random jank deck and my very first game would almost always be a mirror match. (This happens even if I net deck, but it's more obvious that it isn't a coincidence with jank) Historic, explorer, standard... doesn't matter. I'm highly convinced there is matchmaking based on specific cards as well as overall rarity. I will say this happens more frequently outside of ranked play so it could just be a really weird coincidence.
I've also taken a new strategy to playing my draft games. If I don't get matched with an opponent within 10 seconds, then I cancel the queue and go play a different format and try again later. My theory is the matchmaking, while broken, prioritizes your ELO/MMR but if it can't find a good match for you then it will force a less desirable match up to keep players from waiting too long. Since starting this strategy, I've had significantly more 5, 6, and 7 win drafts.
I will try that
That is CRAZY! I also have the ten second marker for the same reason... this is a little creepy.
Here is a hint for you, you can affect the game in a way that will control the match up, forcing a "more" honest match up... not telling exactly how. Up to you to experiment.
Good luck!
@NemoNihil Why not just tell us? The more of us that can combat arenas cheating the more pressure we put on them to make changes.
@@ryanbowman2708 It may or may not be paranoia to think that Wizards has people paying attention to the comments on videos like this one. If they find the solution here (whether or not they knew about it before), they probably will do something about it, perhaps even taking action against those observed to be doing the thing.
You also presume that players doing things to combat Arena's cheating means that the changes made will benefit players. I'm more inclined to believe that the changes will merely make fighting back more difficult. After all, they control the entire ecosystem. Really, the only practical means users have to combat problems like this video exposes are 1)to stop spending money and 2)to stop playing the game entirely. Everything else fails to properly address the power dynamic in ways that matter to the decision-makers at Wizards/Hasbro.
You're absolutely right about the draft matchmaking queue. If you wait more than like 10 or 15 seconds, there is a high chance that you'll be paired against someone who's an entire rank above you. I've had it happen to me so many times that I just hit cancel at the 10 second mark like you do and try again. I notice this starts happening really frequently once you get to 3 wins. I remember one time I was in bronze or low silver and I legit got paired against a numbered Mythic level player after letting the matchmaker take around 20 seconds to find an opponent. Be careful though, there's a bug where if you hit cancel right as it connects you to an opponent, you'll automatically be rewarded a game loss but it won't tell you until you finish your next match. That happened to me twice in a couple hours the other evening. Fortunately Wizards instantly refunded me (hooray, free gems/cards) but I've heard there is a hard cap on the number of times they will refund an account and after so many times they will just refuse to or even ban you for abusing the refund system.
Oh my God thank you so much for making this video so many of my suspicions have been voiced in this video and it makes me a little bit happier to know that I'm not alone
Just clucked in your channel looking for a rant, didn’t expect this, though! And brand new!
Merry Christmas indeed
Going first disparity is so bad that I only play Bo3 on arena except when I draft. I never used a tracker, I just paid attention to how often it happens. It started getting worse and worse on the Bo1 ladder so I only was farming events. Then after a certain number of events(maybe a couple dozen of so) I started going second an unusually high amount. I then stopped playing events. I suspect it is tied to win rate, and people that say it isn’t a thing don’t have a 60%+ win rate.
I have not noticed a huge disparity in going first in Bo3 even when I am in the top 1,000 of mythic. Not sure if it happens in draft since I draft so sporadically.
Great video by the way. It is a very controversial topic but I am glad you made it anyway.
I’ve been playing Arena for like two weeks and have only gone first a couple of times.
This is such great confirmation for many things I have experienced in Arena! The shuffler screwing you on colour happened so many times I stopped playing on Arena.
on an unrelated note and inconsequentially: you're pretty toxic with your emotes huh?
If you spam emotes, it generates the good or bad game survey at the end of the match.
@@DesolatorMagic I'm new to mtga and don't know its nuances; does filling out that survey do anything for you?
It likely tells them how to rig the matchmaking even more. It sure as shit doesn't let them know what cards to ban!
Sadly, mtga has just always been a huge pain, and I've experienced almost everything you've mentioned.
Win too much because you're using mono red aggro? Start getting land flooded turn 4 on your 13 land deck. So then I just swap from ranked to standard, lose a bunch on purpose, engine sees my deck is actually "bad" go back to ranked, miraculously, my deck performs as it should (win by turn 3), repeat until mythic, I hate it.
I just *wish* the game was fully random, I'd rather lose to rng, than have a guaranteed loss match 4 or 5 because my win ratio is at 50.00000000000000000000000001% due to my last win.
my friend tried to get me to play arena and i already was against playing MTGO strictly cause if im gonna throw money away on a hobby ima make it the IRL physical hobby lol... but digital magic just isnt for me.. paper magic 4Lyfe.
I downloaded mtga the other day but then delted it because i just cant do it anymore i have way more fun on mtgo due to the amount of cards and modes and it doesnt have all the bs manipulation
MTG Arena has a habbit of forcing you to play with only 2 lands the entire time
I have noticed I do significantly worse at quick drafts than I do at premier drafts. Was starting to wonder if there was something going on behind the scenes. Figured it was because they don't want me turning gold into gems. Would love to see the discrepancy of how many times I've ended quick drafts with 1-2 wins vs premier drafts where I have 4+.
Imagine a world, in where there is such a major diff between quick draft and premier draft as like drafting against AI or real People. But yeha it‘s the game that dosen‘t want you to gain gold. Sure it is.
This is weird to read because it’s the opposite for me. I can typically reliably go at least 4-2 in quick. In premier, if I start 2-0 or 3-0 I get put on the draw three times, flood two of the games, and have three generally bad matchups in a row from an archetype standpoint.
This can easily be appointed to the draft picks players make vs the AI bots. The bots always take the good cards, some players tend to draft ... interestingly.
@@meinfreundfranzimagine a world where you play against someone who drafted a MONO BLACK REANIMATOR DECK PERFECTLY CONSISTENT with... two mythics... Ulamog and Emrakul from MH3 btw... yeah is totally me overthinking i mean that guy is so lucky that he should be gambling not wasting his time on Magic
After I brewed a deck a started winning a few matches, magically, after entering an standard event paid 2500 coins, I only drawn lands for about 20 games (in a 24 land deck with 60 cards). It only stopped after getting away from the game for a few days.
But the worst for me was when I played against a gay with a 2/2 monster and a decayed zombie who took waaay more damage than his power 2. I blocked the decayed zombie with a 4/4, my monster died and I took damage as he had trample
I've experienced everything from this list! I've been playing magic since revised, so I can def tell a difference in the shuffler.
Been saying it since day one. Does not feel like paper Magic at all.
Awesome video man, that leaves me with a question though, given that the shuffler on MTGA works not fully randomized, what happens with MTGO? Is it the same algorithm? Or it works different? Would like to know if maybe would be better to move to MTGO instead of Arena.
I have noticed recently, I am matched with people with 250 card decks and they always top deck exactly the specific card they need to counter what I got or win. Every single time without fail.
Usually exactly when they need to draw it too
I love how the shuffler can make me sit in two damn mana. But let me make a one drop deck and suddenly I get ALL MY LANDS?!
Thank you for this video. Finally I am able to find comfort somewhere other than in my own rantings seeing how, only having 2 copies of one card (always expensive at that, of course), like Cityscape Leveler or Etali, I draw BOTH of them in the opening hand but, not only that, after taking a mulligan, I still draw one, if not both of them again. And I kid you not when I say this has happened multiple times in the course of not so many games, and there is 0 reason for that happening playing 23 lands and having a curve of barely over 3. Absolutely 0 reason other than, of course, a shuffler being rigged.
Just how many f*ing decks have I had to discard or rework almost entirely so that the curve would stay lower than 2.4 (from my experience, that's a threshold where the shuffler stops messing that frequently with your draws) and the deck could actually pull its tricks off. Man, I never copy decks from anywhere, I always come up with decks on my own (which probably have a twin somewhere, not trying to coin any of them) and spend the time and effort to test them and see how they do, and I have very strict and specific requirements for each metagame according to what's most threatening to the decks themselves and what's mostly played in it, like answers to artifacts/enchantments, ways to make certain cards uncounterable, etc., just to see all of that crushed and thrown away by a stupid shuffler who can't even give a REALISTIC hand not only in the opener, but after a mulligan or even two.
I really hate the fact that they made the shuffler this way to prevent newcomers from quitting out of frustration and whatnot. Man, if newcomers are not aware of how randomisation works in real life (which is what the shuffler should be mimicking), that's on them. Me, as a semi new player (joined Arena in 2021 but "played" the game as a kid), joined the game, suffered the absurdities of the shuffler without ever knowing for certain it was rigged, and here I am. If in WOTC they're not smart enough to keep newcomers hooked to the game by what it is on paper, that's them being bad at their job, and none of us, including the newcomers that stay, should suffer the consequences by having the game being manipulated in such a way that it encourages and discourages certain draws when real randomisation has nothing to do with that. Just disgusting to be honest
I remember the shuffler algorithm in MTGO being a Knuth shuffle which can have some issues with it. While it is good for poker/blackjack if you know the seed (usually the server time) you can "predict" the hand/cards of not only yourself but other players (playing on the same deck). The only way to really get a Fisher-Yates or Knuth shuffler to be random is to have the seed be external to the machine running the algorithm (something like a rotating fob that rotates every second or faster). With decks that have 4 of or more (lands) it is hard to really "predict" if you know the seed but actually it is somewhat easier with a poker deck you have a 1/52 shot (1 of card) of each item.
If I hear something is "random" i question it always unless an external device is feeding the seed to the randomization algorithm. If it isn't and you can figure out the server time (Pacific time for servers in washington state) and then use an algorithm to go through the different seeds for that hour minute second and millisecond. The PC should come up with the different combos in a matter of seconds (100,000 +) and then using the opening hand and next draw can figure out the next draws (about 100 possible) and then keep feeding the cards into the algorithm to get the next set of cards drawn. It basically can go to about 5 possible draws. (Me and a few friends broke the shuffler algorithms for online poker prior to black monday and it is the same algorithm used in MTGO).
Most stuff like that would use unix time for the timestamp anyway? You wouldn't use the real location time on the server right? If you put your server somewhere else or use several different servers across the world, it could screw up a lot of stuff if you use local timezones.
One thing that I have noticed is that I'll make a few different historic brawl and maybe a standard deck or two where I do not have all of the cards. I do notice that when I start opening packs, I never pull any of the cards that I need and am forced to open enough packs to get a wild card or two. I'm not sure if there is anything in the system for it, but I can't recall a time i've ever pulled a card I've needed for any of my pending decks.
YES it always gives x4 jank or the other 2 rares to complete for cards you've already got!
I somteimes go t luck with that actually. I think the amount of rares in one set is high enough so it's not that strange to not get the 2 single cards you look for.
The chance that you pull exactly what you need is by far lower than that you get anything else, even if you pull like 10 packs. That's not really any proof of any tampering.
Sources man, sources, would love some links to investigate further
I have a "don't help any other current or potential youtubers copy a video" policy on this channel so I purposely don't cite my sources.
@@DesolatorMagici see but it feels kind of awkward when you report on matters like that and don’t show any of the mentioned research
@@DesolatorMagic while I understand this concern. if we can't check your sources who's to say you didn't just make it up and are claiming it's true. not to say you would of course, but it would be very east for someone to do so. in other words, sources keep journalists honest
I’d love to see the tracking spreadsheets you created so I can create something similar.
@@DesolatorMagic That's a really really dumb reason to not cite your sources
8:35
Ohh, so that's why I keep getting 2 lands, I have around 5% more chance to have less land than I want
I recently joined a premier draft with a token. I drafted a decent golgari value pile with good sac synergies etc. I basically never draft in arena but used to draft nearly every week for years in paper. The deck I built for this event was decent, quite strong actually, and heavy on removal. The very first game I played I was up against some three or four color bullsh*t and somehow managed to mulligan to 5, brick on Lands, then exclusively draw non of my removal+wincons all the way down below 10 cards in library! In all my years of drafting, I've never had a deck that solid where I've lost SO BADLY game 1.
It's totally anecdotal and also a laughable sample size but I agree they use some sort of algorithm to rig draft games based on deck composition. (I am currently and was at the time of that draft bronze in limited ranking lol) I just stopped playing the event because it truly left a sour taste in my mouth.
I was really sick the other day and played magic arena for nearly 8 hours, to have something to focus on, I played the same deck the whole time, it was a mono black, made as a hard counter to the historic wizards deck, I only played wizards twice in all those hours, twice, one of the most played historic bo1 decks I only played twice in 8 hours. What would you make of that?
yeah arena is trash for sure. I quit over a year ago. Got sick of the shuffler and the going 2nd 60% of the time. The other thing that pissed me off was the servers couldn't handle the big damage big life gain or big numbers of counters or tokens... the fix they used was to just prevent the triggering of the abilities. i.e. scute swarm. I shouldn't lose the game because i made 400 scute tokens with a cathar's crusade in play just because your servers cant handle it and times me out.
As long as you play this game on a computer, there will be limitations. Memory, your upload speed, everything is limited on a computer. So there always will be a limit when your pc will crash/ disconnect/ time out. If they allow 400 tokens, the next one will come and complain that he can't make 800 tokens, 2000 tokens, 3 million tokens. Grow up.
Ever since I added more Praetors to my Brawl deck to make Realmbreaker more useful, I draw it in my opening hand/free muligan so often it's spooky.
I played arena when it was first coming out and releasing to the public, i felt a weird balance in my hands, and my matchups. Never went back, and now I definitely dont regret it
When you know your card game's resource design is flawed, so you cheat it in your digital version so new players won't rq.
I KNEW IT LMAO It's like you said Des after hundrends of games you just notice things off about the shuffler and I knew I wasn't crazy. Thanks for the info
I played all plains and won once
Also, question: do new players get the 3 pack in the mail system for all of standard?
If not the change from the "play*set*" codes to the mail system cheats players out of packs.
Recently it has gotten worse for me. No matter what kind of deck I play I get always either specific card counters or mana-screwed to keep my WR around 50%. When I see some youtubers playing the exact same decks it's night and day difference how they seem to always draw their combo, I go dozens of games without seeing the both cards in my hand. I don't pay for cards so I think it treats us plays-for-free players as some sort of glorified bots giving wins for paying customers.
The clumping problem still exists. I’ve noticed after I mulligan, the draw is way better. It doesn’t always clump, but often enough to be really annoying.
Yeah I noticed this too. That's the whole reason I've looked up videos on this topic. I've played other card games, namely yugioh. And I've never had such severe and horrifically terrible draws. Mulligan is almost always the only way you get a decent time playing. It's like they punish you for wanting seven cards.
I notice this not just with me but with my opponents as well. We can never make any damn moves because we draw shit we can't use CONSTISTENTLY.
We need your video on the deck weighting discovery. But like don't rush it because your tirades are a form of calming energy for me.
This is the huge issue with chance that many may not realize.
It is math and numbers so it is extremely easy to fudge around and still be within legal bounds.
This is best shown with an example and Des presents one, as well, in a similar fashion.
Something has a stated drop rate of 1 in 15. In actuality it is a sliding chance with the 1st attempt being 5% and the 15th attempt being 100%. In reality it does work out to 1 in 15. Guaranteed. Here is the rub, though. They want the chances but they don't want the luck. 1 in 15 could streak out to several dozen failed attempts. Who wants to do that?!(they think from a business perspective)Too easy to lose money that way.
So, how do you give the house an advantage and stay within "realistic" boundaries? Sliding chances as shown above.
Begins as outright fraud for the first who knows how many attempts. Then they give you a "deal" later and it is supposed to make up for the initial dishonesty? 😒
This was a ... meaningful video on MTGA. That's so brutally rare for me since the firehose of what cards are coming has sometimes worthwhile channels turning into hypebeasts. Thanks a million for putting this together. It pisses me off when a game I'd enjoy becomes nakedly punishing for anyone who won't cheat and the Greek chorus of the subreddit's losers scream denials about what's happening. Definitely subbed.
I have had bo1 drafts while in hi-plat where I have been matched up against top-50 mythic opponents after my first few wins.
Sooo many shuffler "anomalies" during games of limited that don't occur in paper.
Anything to peg you to a 50% wr and try to take your money.
I'm currently 9-0 in explorer platinum with UW spirits and I have gone first 8 of those games. What is happening?
Arena is trash anymore. I can’t count how many times the games has crashed because it can’t handle triggers adequately or if there’s too many triggers, the token cap issues etc
Ok, either the game is incompetently made on the lowest rushed budget OR they have a godlike ai that can recognize your deck and match you with a counter so you cant win. Only one of those is possible at a time, which is it?
Could you provide some sources?
I havent been able to find over half of what you're claiming here.
not saying you're wrong, just asking for some sources.
I hate when I build a new deck and they throw me at life gain or something completely similar, like a dragon deck vs dragon deck, or toxic vs toxic or tokens vs tokens, life steal vs life gain it all feels counter productive to why I play it.
You can throw toxic up against my mutate deck at least im not fighting myself
Other channels frame such remarks as madness, frustration or conspiracy theory. For me, I answer, as a "popular" game it should at least have the "feel" of a fair match. I know that in chess tournaments we have the construction of ranks and choosing opponents through these means but nothing to the point of interfering in the game itself. In magic arena, I always had the feeling of finding the perfect opponent for the moment I should lose and for the moment I should win and the shuffle as an accomplice to this. I wrote exactly on another channel how far the magic arena shuffle was from the real shuffle, as I never got that feeling in the paper game. When you threw the "odds" statistics in your video, I shouted "in your face". Many arena advocates downplay the "feelings" players have that something is wrong compared to what it was on paper. I spend all my time playing as if I hadn't had a real victory, or a REAL DEFEAT; because when you really lose, you get the feeling that something is wrong with your strategy. Magic Arena takes away from the player the factor of revisiting his collection, an important moment, of revisiting his small box of cards through defeat, of seeking to create better strategies... What's the point of creating strategies and the most different decks, if for each modification the system finds a way for you to win or lose? And worse, not only the illusory feeling of victory and defeat, but that is facing more of a system than necessarily an adversary, regardless of the discussion about "virtual" and "reality". You fight the player selection and shuffling system much more than a real opponent. Is this feeling a conspiracy theory? So why has someone who has played on paper since the third edition never experienced this feeling? It wasn't because it was in person and not virtual. When you have these sensations and compare them to the experience with the paper, everything is lost. They don't question that in the end, you didn't have a real victory, nor a real defeat, beyond your ego, contaminated with needs for which you say you don't have time, I need my daily victories quickly. Your comparison to Odds was everything I hoped to see. While others are too busy with daily victories and how get them quickly or even how to achieve the shuffle, instead of questioning whether for each match I played I had a real match (even in the virtual one) within a satisfactorily fair system (I'm not saying perfect ), so in the end, my experience with magic arena would have been as satisfying (or at least close) as playing on paper? It's a wonder that whoever created magic arena didn't take or will take these issues seriously (because the feeling I have that it was not created to take them into consideration, anything, just make excuses, as the magic players themselves currently make in their place)
There was one night a few days ago I went second 5 or 6 games in a row, I got so frustrated with that alone that I just quit the game before my opponent decided to keep their hand and haven't logged back on since to play. Regardless if I would have won or not, it's frustrating when you just can't go first at all
I think going first is based on how much you spend. My friends that cash often seem to go first a lot. I F2P and I definitely have long runs where I'm going first 30-40% of the time. I've tracked hundreds and thousands of games with different decks and it is especially true when I use draft tokens.
Update on MTGA being rigged. Made a mill deck, my first opponent was a player named ‘Sean’ with a 200 card deck. I’m leaning towards that was a bot. Updated. Got 5 more 100+ card deck opponents against my mill deck.
I just played a game where on my last draw any of 42 (85%) of the 49 cards I had left wins me the game. So of course I draw one of the seven cards that I cannot play.
If shuffling and pairing isnt random, wouldnt it be that way for everyone? Which kinda negates the argument.
I am glad someone is finally confirming arena is trash. When arena was in its early stages i played it quite a bit in conjunction with playing standard locally and modern. I can tell you right now that playing locally with good players was way different than mtg arena and I knew it was rigged. I would get no landers to the point i would have to concede games before they started. Something I have never had to do in paper.
Yeah, because you spred your lands between every 2 cards... That's why it never happens on paper... If cards were coming random of course this would happen to you sometimes... use ur brain
Something I just saw this week, playing some midrange life gain deck. 10 times out of 10 that I played full control, I had 2 creatures in my opening hand, then drew nothing but lands and removal for the rest of the game.
Also love, playing on a weaker computer, that every time you experience some lag, there's a 10% chance that Arena just completely shits itself. Your turn gets skipped even when you still have time, your lands gain summoning sickness or you can't attack and block properly.
Arena cheats, I have done my own research with this and the matchmaker. If you play Brawl with specific commanders you only see certain ones within a win/lose rate ratio. Then if you switch decks with a different commander you will never see the first batch ever. I have gotten 2 of my friends to try this with me over about 1000 games and yeah there is no diversity when playing online
@me: boy howdy, I sure do seem to be playing against Mill a whole bunch. I'll add a Gaia's Blessing, just in case.
And then suddenly I never see mill again.
This is the MTG youtube video of the year right here. Thank you
I have 100% seen them literally match me with the counter to the deck ive picked loads of times, if I play mill, I magically play against players who have 100+ card decks with gaea's blessing, I switch decks magically never see those decks again, same if I play elves, 8 out of 10 matches will be mono red, if I switch to white, I don't see mono red at all.
This is the most frustrating thing. "Oh your winrate with UW Flyers hit 60%? Have fun playing 15 straight games against angels."
I have a clip somewhere on my pc that is me giving my cycling deck a spin after not playing it for a while, just to match literally 3 people IN A ROW playing card draw hate (ALL of them ran mono black underworld dreams, ob nixi the hate twisted and sheoldred. While sheoldred isn't too uncommon, those other two are extremely niche)
i KNEW this was a thing. Getting crushed by aggro one hour straight, and the moment I switch decks, I can't find one anymore. Only true for best of 1 though.
My theory: if you win you are happy and when you lose you are sad. So if they notice that you win too much, they will artificially drop your win rate. Because if you're habing fun, it means the others aren't. I think they just try to maximize the happiness among the players. I noticed kinda the same in other 1v1 games. For a dev who wants to make profit, the best win rate is 50%
Yep, this is a big issue in Bo1 play queue. Back when I played something other than Historic Brawl, I had a mono black Waste Not deck built for Historic. You know what discard decks are terrible against? Low curve aggro decks that shit their entire hand onto the board in like two turns. You know what two decks I faced 90% of my matchups when playing Waste Not? Elves and Mono Red/Goblins. I got steamrolled by elves so many times that I removed half of my discard spells and put in a bunch more spot removal and board wipes. Brought in Languishes, Ritual of Soots, a full set of Fatal Push. Got rid of Thoughtseizes, Davriels...know what decks I faced as soon as I did this? Well, somehow every Elf and Mono red/Goblin player in the entire world disappeared and I faced nothing but Azorious and Esper control decks every match, or mono black removal tribal decks. So, considering that half my deck was dead removal in these matchups and I was facing them every game, out went the sweepers, in came the Thoughtseizes again. Also threw in a Thought Distortion or two to really stick it to the control decks I was facing every match. Well what do you know! The second I removed my sweepers and Fatal Pushes, everyone is magically playing Elves and mono red aggro/burn/goblins again! And I've had similar matchup anomalies happen so many times. I remember one time I was playing A GW Auras/boggles style deck and I somehow just kept matching against people who were playing maindeck enchantment hate. In Bo1. Literally ran into some dude who had FOUR copies of this sorcery that exiles 3 enchantments. Their deck was tailor made to beat my deck and my deck alone, in a format with no sideboarding. I also remember the time where I was playing a Rakdos Kroxa graveyard deck and my opponent just randomly mulled to 4 into Leyline of the Void with NO way of possibly knowing I was playing a graveyard-centric deck.
One more unconfirmed: Getting a starting hand with more tap lands than statistically possible. Several games in a row.
There is at least 2 different queues in bo1 events. People with less than 5 wins and people with more than 5 wins. I have played thousands of drafts and usually end up in diamond or mythic at the end of the season, depending on how much I draft and there is a significant jump up in gameplay skill, deckbuilding skill and/or number of game winning cards at the 5 win mark.
It also coincidentally the point where you start generating gems. And all of Arena is designed to make you not go infinite. So it would only make sense for them to give you harder opponents at that point so either of you lose.
To clearify I do not believe your exact score matters for matchmaking as you described it. There is 2 seperate queues one for 4 or less wins, one for 5 or more wins.
I've had this same feeling since I returned to the game about a month ago. It's like you have a daily boost to your ELO at 5 wins and again at 10 wins. I don't recall ever noticing it last year.
Bro, thats not even a secret. You will play agaisnt palyers that have a similar win count as you. If you have 5 wins, it means you went at least 5-2, so will your opponent. Ofc people with 5-2 aren't the cave man brains in the game. Has nothing to do with 2 seperate queues, it's more like 6 different queues for every win count possible. This theory of yours is some real consiracy theory stuff instead of using common sense.
Nice Video. 👍
I've made a Facebook threat a while ago in the german MTGA group about this topic.
And got mostly backlash from players with way less gaming experience.
The 200+ card deck thing happens to me a lot too, when I'm using a mill deck or my turbofog deck.
You seemed to have missed 1 thing.
Occasionally, when you join a match, Arena will glitch and match you against someone in the wrong format.
I've been matched against historic decks when playing standard. I've been matched against standard decks when playing timeless.
I've had it in draft where I have bottomed a singleton, only to draw it a few turns later without any shuffle effects.
enjoyed the video, I have wondered more than once why they would not actively cause parity in going first by showing where a player is at on a particular day plus minus zero on going first, awarding the go first to the player with the relative disadvantage. When the two are equal either randomize at that point or use longer term data. It is in their interest to do this. The total dissatisfaction from going second too often is greaater than the positive feelings from going a similar disparity to the go first end. Going second is a major problem with the game in general, and they have chosen not to address it
You can definitely tell (at least in Stand Bo1) if your opponent is new to the game because the algorithm will try to shaft you at every turn. First, itll make sure you need to mulligan at least once. Then, youre going second, of course. Lastly, youll flood or drought depending on which is worse for your hand. You can feel it happen sometimes and you just have to move on, it sucks.
game made by predominately math nerds... for a player base predominately math nerds and they say "they'll never figure out we are messing with the math" sigh
The game today is not made by math nerds. It's made by dumb buiness school graduates that want to maximize profit and don't understand or play the game they make decisions on.
I don't know who you play Magic with but 99% of the people I've played magic with (from friend groups to LGS to events) have ZERO math ability (let alone be proficient, let alone be a math nerd), just like the general population.
Excellent video Dez. I have been a fan since WotS. Thanks for the quality content! ❤
Theory/Whining -
They have started adding weights to wins and losses.
Concede Win/Loses don't count as much toward the "balancer" and stacked count even less so.
I don't have the sample size to prove this, but in my experience, I have basically run through 25+ matches where I concede vs 25+ where I intentionally throw the game by mulligan down to 0 cards and just not playing to win to trigger make a non concession loss.
What I have observed (biased) is enough for me to speculate that when you lose without concession the system tries to net you better draws and worse draws for your opponents (doing a lot of speculation on that end).
I have not yet done this by playing friends or staging games myself to validate the opponent draws.
Just don't mention any of this stuff on reddit unless you like seeing your karma melt away and possibly get a ban ontop of it.
Yeah, major denial and WotC interference being run over there. I tried talking about some of the rigging last year and got into a bunch of arguments with people. Even after I posted videos with links to proof, and even after the MMR manipulation trick got leaked, people will still deny the existence of rigging. WotC's ass > the truth.
It's refreshing to see someone actually address the issues with Arena instead of coping and telling everyone they're wrong and delusional for suggesting that maybe there's something not quite right behind the scenes. Most of the large Arena UA-camrs are guilty of this, and I'd be willing to bet that it has something to do with their sponsors.
the shuffler issue and the smoothing is still the most feels bad man tho. there are even documents online for other online games that explain exactly what they're doing to encourage interaction and motivation and when you pointed that out to people you'd still get called a shuffler conspiracist. I guess that's the timeline we live in tho. just like with the rona .. cough
Magic is a VERY high variance game. If you play enough games over enough time you will notice VERY weird things happen. Once, IRL, my opponent and I rolled the exact same number combination on 2d6, 6 times in a row. Could that have been the devil at work? Or is it just variance...
Play control for 10 games vs mono red aggro 10 games. Play mono red aggro 10 games, vs boardwipe tribal 10 games. I hate how you have to WIN the games to do the daily then they just pair you against your kryptonite to maintain player retention.
Today I drew 16 lands (of the 18 of my deck) in the first 24 round (something similar for my opponent). It was incredible.
If you want to do the calculation of the probability, it results much more probable to be hit by a meteorite.
I started one week ago. In the first 3-4 days I won almost all the matches, then I started to lose. I created for purpose a deck that it is incredible weak against red, an something like 70% of my opponents has now red.
I actually have been an unaware but suspected the win rate vs rank issue you mentioned at 21ish minute mark. Couple sets back, Neon Dynasty was flashback for draft. I drafted the craziest red black artifact aggro and went the fastest 6-0 in my life. Mind you I was in high silver after the wins, immediately paired with a mythic player in top 150. Still won but next draft I went blue red same strat and lost to the mythic player and beat a diamond for the 7th win. It felt good even though I was very confused.
I rarely ever earn gems on arena. Play a fair bit. Can't ever join any events because of it. But I'm not gonna spend money on non paper cards. Especially when I was already suspicious of a rigged system in the arena. Shameful
Hey Des I was just wanting to say they do have something like that for the draft on hearthstone, It'll tell you what's the most picked card out of the three that you're choosing from and the one with the most win percentage