Topical Blend #2
| List A - Magic Related (Choose One) | ||
|---|---|---|
| What happened to Pestilence? | 463 | 7.8% |
| Pros and Cons of Introducing a Sixth Color | 463 | 7.8% |
| Impossible things to do in Magic | 342 | 5.7% |
| Biggest changes in Magic that never happened | 255 | 4.3% |
| Possible ways to make Magic more appealing to women | 194 | 3.3% |
| Why Skeletons are not just really, really rotten Zombies, despite what Cohen the Barbarian said to Ghaak in "The Last Hero" by Terry Pratchett | 148 | 2.5% |
| Angels | 148 | 2.5% |
| 6th Color Pros and Cons | 147 | 2.5% |
| Stories about banned cards I've designed | 145 | 2.4% |
| Poison Abilities in Magic (Why was it abandoned? Will it come back in a new set? Etc.) | 137 | 2.3% |
| Original Decisions in Magic (Why five colors? Why those basic lands?, etc.) | 135 | 2.3% |
| Cards That Failed To Get Through Design | 126 | 2.1% |
| The Power Nin | 124 | 2.1% |
| Impossible things to do in Magic | 116 | 2.0% |
| Frogs | 115 | 1.9% |
| Why Magic cards seem better now than they used to | 106 | 1.8% |
| Ooze Creature Types in Magic | 100 | 1.7% |
| Advantages for adding a 6th color | 95 | 1.6% |
| What Would Magic Be Like Without Rarity | 94 | 1.6% |
| What would early Magic (Arabian Nights through Fallen Empires) have been like under the block system | 92 | 1.5% |
| Math and Magic | 91 | 1.5% |
| Faeries | 91 | 1.5% |
| Zero-Cost Spells | 90 | 1.5% |
| Magic Legends From R&D's Secret Lair | 89 | 1.5% |
| Legacy (the format, as opposed to the collection of artifacts that Gerard was responsible for) | 88 | 1.5% |
| Counterspells | 82 | 1.4% |
| Drafting | 80 | 1.3% |
| Game Theory and Battle of Wits | 77 | 1.3% |
| History of Grizzly Bears (and other 2-drop 2/2s) | 74 | 1.2% |
| Alpha/Beta | 73 | 1.2% |
| Enchant Worlds (aka World Enchantments) | 73 | 1.2% |
| Most embarassing moments of the Pro Tour | 70 | 1.2% |
| Player Evolution (I personally think everyone (who isn't influenced a lot by others) goes through stages in their magic experience) | 69 | 1.2% |
| Popular Cards vs. Good Cards (And How We Design Each) | 67 | 1.1% |
| People who don't like new sets | 64 | 1.1% |
| Most Comical Day in R&D | 63 | 1.1% |
| R&D's reflections about the Urza Block (with Multiverse comments, maybe?) | 56 | 0.9% |
| Top Magic Cards Inspired by Real People/Items/Events | 54 | 0.9% |
| Un-set design | 53 | 0.9% |
| The coolest color combination | 52 | 0.9% |
| Coin Flip Cards | 49 | 0.8% |
| The color red | 48 | 0.8% |
| Storyline Development | 47 | 0.8% |
| Deck Milling throughout history (Altar of Dementia) | 45 | 0.8% |
| Balancing/Creating New Countermagic | 45 | 0.8% |
| Magic Art | 42 | 0.7% |
| Three color cards | 41 | 0.7% |
| Your top regrets in Magic | 41 | 0.7% |
| Abilities that could be made into keywords (e.g., "Whenever this creature deals damage, you gain that much life.") and why you haven't done so | 38 | 0.6% |
| The race-class system | 37 | 0.6% |
| The Role of Chaos Inducing Cards | 36 | 0.6% |
| The Role of Chaos Inducing Cards | 30 | 0.5% |
| Design of vanilla creatures (!) | 27 | 0.5% |
| How to know the game has been stretched too far | 27 | 0.5% |
| Exploring virgin territory in design | 26 | 0.4% |
| Choosing Set Themes | 22 | 0.4% |
| Why cats in Magic have creature type Cat but dogs in Magic have creature type Hound (instead of Dog) | 22 | 0.4% |
| Expansion symbols and logos | 21 | 0.4% |
| How Magic decks are similar to and different from openings and opening positions in other games (e.g., chess and Stratego) | 20 | 0.3% |
| How the internet has affected Magic | 20 | 0.3% |
| Creature Types | 19 | 0.3% |
| How Sixth Edition Rules Affect Design | 18 | 0.3% |
| How has magicthegathering.com affected the game? | 18 | 0.3% |
| Recent changes to the color pie | 18 | 0.3% |
| Set Superdesign (amount of cards, amount of cards per color, amount of sets, release dates of sets etc) | 17 | 0.3% |
| Removal | 17 | 0.3% |
| Why Urza's is a Land Subtype rather than a Land Supertype. | 16 | 0.3% |
| The importance of Eternal formats | 15 | 0.3% |
| How the Public Impacts Magic | 14 | 0.2% |
| Ways you've changed cards to make it harder for players to cheat with them | 13 | 0.2% |
| Creature Types: Where do They Come From? | 12 | 0.2% |
| The design and economy of Fat Packs | 11 | 0.2% |
| How to successfully lead a design team | 10 | 0.2% |
| Self-sacrifice cards and forced sacrifice | 10 | 0.2% |
| The Reduction of the number of X Spells in Magic | 9 | 0.2% |
| Interconnectivity of sets | 9 | 0.2% |
| Cards with Flying | 8 | 0.1% |
| Does Rules Lawyering Detract from Magic | 8 | 0.1% |
| Designing Enchantments | 7 | 0.1% |
| Themes outside Magic affecting Magic design | 6 | 0.1% |
| Magic's Resource System | 4 | 0.1% |
| Internal set structure | 2 | 0.0% |
| Cards that change controller whenever something specific happens (as with, e.g., Fractured Loyalty) | 2 | 0.0% |
| Total | 5948 | 100.0% |
The winner was Pros and Cons of Introducing a Sixth Color. Note that there were accidentally three different versions of that topic and, as such, all three were counted as a single topic. But what lovely non-Magic topic would “Pros and Cons of Introducing a Sixth Color” get to share space with?
| List B - Non-Magic Related (Choose One) | ||
|---|---|---|
| Mark Rosewater is $%^# insane! | 869 | 11.5% |
| Dungeons & Dragons | 504 | 6.7% |
| Family Guy | 413 | 5.5% |
| Monty Python | 356 | 4.7% |
| Mark Gottlieb | 323 | 4.3% |
| Chaos theory | 225 | 3.0% |
| Richard Garfield Anecdotes | 218 | 2.9% |
| The Matrix | 206 | 2.7% |
| Star Wars | 196 | 2.6% |
| The concept of Zero | 178 | 2.4% |
| Heavy Metal | 175 | 2.3% |
| Why Canada spells things differently | 145 | 1.9% |
| Throat Wolf | 142 | 1.9% |
| Norse Mythology | 140 | 1.9% |
| Things new employees at have to go thru at Wizards | 136 | 1.8% |
| End of the World (or mankind) | 133 | 1.8% |
| Muppets | 131 | 1.7% |
| Video Games | 126 | 1.7% |
| Dragons | 121 | 1.6% |
| Ramen Noodles | 118 | 1.6% |
| World War II | 116 | 1.5% |
| How to argue and win (you always say there's lots of arguing and debate there and as team leader you often need to settle these I assume) | 111 | 1.5% |
| Gophers | 111 | 1.5% |
| That gunk that gets into your mouse | 110 | 1.5% |
| The movie Twelve Angry Men | 108 | 1.4% |
| Idiots and the Internet | 105 | 1.4% |
| Time Travel | 97 | 1.3% |
| The life and works of William Shakespeare | 95 | 1.3% |
| Richard Garfield vs Houdini | 94 | 1.2% |
| Sigmund Freud | 93 | 1.2% |
| Puppies and Kittens: Cute Pets, or Intergalactic Invaders? | 88 | 1.2% |
| My top regrets in life | 81 | 1.1% |
| Comic Books | 81 | 1.1% |
| How to keep a marriage together | 78 | 1.0% |
| Dr. Seuss | 77 | 1.0% |
| Are Tomatoes Fruit? | 74 | 1.0% |
| My favorite riddles and their answers rewritten in the context of whatever the other topic is your blending | 73 | 1.0% |
| Sir Isaac Newton | 72 | 1.0% |
| Pet Peeves (aka Rants) | 58 | 0.8% |
| College | 58 | 0.8% |
| Artificial Intelligence | 57 | 0.8% |
| Geek figures in history | 56 | 0.7% |
| Lies in the Media | 51 | 0.7% |
| Old Cartoons | 46 | 0.6% |
| Spandex | 45 | 0.6% |
| Art | 42 | 0.6% |
| Music | 40 | 0.5% |
| Soap opera and the proletariat color conflict | 40 | 0.5% |
| My favorite game | 37 | 0.5% |
| Eating out | 37 | 0.5% |
| Giant Turtles | 37 | 0.5% |
| Chicken and the Egg | 35 | 0.5% |
| Magic (you know like rabbits out of hats and such) | 34 | 0.5% |
| My Personal Life | 33 | 0.4% |
| Anatomy | 32 | 0.4% |
| My production assistant days | 30 | 0.4% |
| Experiences in school | 28 | 0.4% |
| Gameshows | 22 | 0.3% |
| TV shows you like | 20 | 0.3% |
| Superstition | 19 | 0.3% |
| Sleeping | 18 | 0.2% |
| Bad injuries | 17 | 0.2% |
| Clarence Darrow | 16 | 0.2% |
| Pets | 15 | 0.2% |
| My fans | 14 | 0.2% |
| My favorite recipes | 14 | 0.2% |
| Writing for television | 13 | 0.2% |
| Hairstyles | 12 | 0.2% |
| Dancing | 12 | 0.2% |
| Inspirational Sources | 11 | 0.1% |
| Office Supplies | 9 | 0.1% |
| Hotel reservations | 9 | 0.1% |
| Boredom | 8 | 0.1% |
| Colleagues | 5 | 0.1% |
| Singing | 3 | 0.0% |
| Famous People | 2 | 0.0% |
| Snack Foods | 1 | 0.0% |
| Total | 7555 | 100.0% |
“Mark Rosewater is %#@$ Insane” won in a landslide. I’m not sure how many people that voted for the topic realize this but it comes from a reoccurring thread in the forums on a humor Magic website. Every time I would write a crazy column (and a few times when the columns weren’t so crazy), there was always a thread started with some variant of this title. (%#@$ is a synonym of the word guano. Look it up.)
So what happens when a Sixth Color in Magic crosses paths with my insanity? You will see. Oh yes, you shall see.