Hi, Michael, I’ve enjoyed reading your rants every so often – and as a one-time infamous ranter myself, I take pleasure in seeing other people letting out some steam and attacking what they think is stupid. But I think you’re going in the wrong direction on this one.
You say you don’t trust Wizards and want them to send you all their info to”prove” themselves to you. You understand that this is a ridiculous request, right? After developing unique market research techniques and spending large amounts of money and time, they aren’t just handing that information out to the public (and potentially to their competitors). They also don’t want to set a precedent wherein every time someone demands they send them the backup information to an article that they posted, they are forced to do it. It would be unwieldy, costly – and quite frankly, they’re in the business of games not”sending out marketing research to anyone who asks.”
Over the years, lots of people have criticized Wizards and decided that Wizards doesn’t have a clue and makes lots of mistakes. But as someone who often complains to Wizards about policies, rules and events, I can tell you one big secret that shouldn’t be so big…
Wizards thinks about issues a lot more than we do!
It’s their business! It’s what they do! They would be foolish if they made rash decisions without looking at all angles and trying to figure out the ramifications are. There are many times I’ve gone to Randy or Jeff with an issue, and they say,”We looked at that, and we thought about your idea… But then we realized it would result in X, Y and Z.”
And I think to myself”Wow, I never thought of that!” And I spend a lot of time thinking about Magic.
Most of the time that people complain about something it’s because they don’t consider all the angles and all the stakeholders and all the issues – Wizards does. And what they sometimes have to do is sacrifice one area for the benefit of the others. Individuals are often too preoccupied with their own narrower view of things without looking at the broader picture.
In the past few weeks, I’ve been trying to teach people how to play Magic using Odyssey and Torment cards – and just like Wizards has told you, it’s extremely difficult. Magic is very confusing for beginners, and I have newfound appreciation for vanilla creatures that don’t involve explaining regeneration when new players are still trying to work out how combat works.
You say that you don’t trust Wizards and you want all their info. But if they bring you in and show you everything and you say”everything is good, Wizards is great!” then there will be the next guy who comes up and says,”I don’t trust you; you’ve become a corporate pawn. I want to see it myself!” And they’re back at square one.
How do I know this? Because I used to be you. I ranted, I caused trouble, and I wrote articles that attacked policies and procedures. And now that I’ve had a look at the inside, now that I’ve been invited to Wizards to talk over these issues, what can I say?
I can say that I trust Wizards.
They know what they’re doing and their employees – especially the high-visibility ones – really want to do what is best for the game and the company. So sometimes they’re going to say”Trust Us” and you’re just going to have to accept it because either they can’t tell you, they won’t tell you, or it’s just none of your business.
And if you don’t want to do that, then trust me. I have worked with Wizards, I have viciously attacked Wizards, and over the past nine years I’ve discovered that Wizards generally knows what they’re doing and they’re getting better at it all the time.
Does this mean you should stop ranting? Not at all – Wizards does read rants and it keeps them on their toes and sometimes has them take a second look at something. And they do make small mistakes once in a while. But don’t expect them to jump up and answer your every whim. And sometimes, no matter how much you hate it, you’re just going to have to trust them.