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According to this article by WotC, Magic Duels is being discontinued. Amonkhet will be the last set released on the platform, with Hour of Devastation being the first since its release not to be. It will remain playable and free, apparently, but will receive no further updates.

Here's the pertaining part of the article, quoted for your convenience:

In order to make room for the next generation of Magic digital products, Amonkhet will be the last new content update for Magic Duels. Hour of Devastation will not be released on the platform.

Magic Duels is still downloadable and playable, but our digital teams are focused on the next generation of Magic digital gaming. We're proud of what Duels accomplished, and we'll be using what we learned from that game to make even better Magic experiences in the future.

I was expecting that, sooner or later: the gains were probably lower and lower since the "hardcore" players were always saving enough gold to get the next expansion for free.

One thing surprises me: digital teams? I know only Stainless. Maybe they finally understood that Stainless isn't up to the task and are evaluating other options?

We can hope, right?

EDIT: Of course, that might mean better protections...

Well they are also making an MMORPG so I guess teams is the right term. I am so disappointed though, I really wanted to use the Nicol Bolas card. Anyone know how I can mod it into the game? Been away for some time but this is the end of an era, rip Duels of the Planeswalkers.

thefiremind wrote:One thing surprises me: digital teams? I know only Stainless. Maybe they finally understood that Stainless isn't up to the task and are evaluating other options?

Based on what I understand, Duels & its predecessors (DotP series) were strongly championed (pet project, maybe) by Wizards former CEO, Greg Leeds. His departure last year basically spelled the end.

On the bright side, the cessation of any future updates means we now have a settled version of Duels that may be modded. No more concern of wasted time to decode stuff only to have the next update wipe out the work. Perhaps this is a good time to invest the time to mod Duels.

Unfortunately, I think we were a release or two away from them being forced to raise the card number limit. But I wasn't following closely enough to be certain.

Xander9009 wrote:Unfortunately, I think we were a release or two away from them being forced to raise the card number limit. But I wasn't following closely enough to be certain.

If I recall correctly, we were just under 1023 cards in Deck Builder with the AER expansion. The Amonkhet expansion definitely broke the 1024 card barrier in Deck Builder. I'm uncertain what the new limit is though.

Nice. Then yeah, it might be time to get it all figured out. Frankly, if we managed to release Hour of Devastation on time, then it could actually draw in new users when they realize it's missing and go looking for it...

petercal wrote:I'm uncertain what the new limit is though.

It should be 2048 now, if I remember correctly from my tests with spirolone's tool. Anyway, before they changed the card file format, I made a few tests modding the campaigns: I just want to point out that it's a viable option if someone wants to code matches with predefined decks on both sides (like Elves vs Goblins and all that paper Magic series, for example).

petercal wrote:On the bright side, the cessation of any future updates means we now have a settled version of Duels that may be modded.

That's true, but managing the card files as Lua tables is still a big hassle. I won't put my hands on it again, at least for the time being.

In addition to the obvious things that bother me about this announcement, is the fact that the AI will be stuck playing AKH cards for the most part. I figured it was Stainless' way of advertising the new cards by making the AI almost exclusively play them, but it really limits the variety.

With the modded version, are two human players able to play against each other?

Any chance we could get a post with a streamlined set-up for the Duels mod? I've looked at what's there a few times and it doesn't seem clear to me.

They handled this horribly, I mean, they did not even complete the circle, that's disgusting. But yeah, as the firemind said, duels was going to it's end; hardcore gamers had already too many coins and new players... well, have you seen new players in the last year? Not at all. They never made a serious and big discount on the first expansions or the basic pack and you know, you can't really expect someone to spend 400 euro on a game like this. After EMN and KLD came out new players would have to spend too much money and/or time to get a decent amount of cards.


p.s. the new Bolas is quite simple to code, I actually had more troubles with the old one (second ability in particular). Other cards like Cryptic Command are truly a pian to code but at the end of the day it is totally unnecessary, the power level of magic duels cards and decks is way too low to play such a powerful card.

Splinterverse wrote:In addition to the obvious things that bother me about this announcement, is the fact that the AI will be stuck playing AKH cards for the most part. I figured it was Stainless' way of advertising the new cards by making the AI almost exclusively play them, but it really limits the variety.

I totally agree, that's the most boring thing and it makes sense only as long as they keep releasing new expansions. At least they could have done a patch to create decent AI decks with all the cards in duels. Unfortunately with these new lol files it is much harder to edit AI decks.
I actually went back playing magic 2014, at least I can play vs good decks. Hopefully modders will find a way to edit AI decks in duels, that would be nice!