Convocation Notes

Convocation Notes: 6/11/2020

June 23, 2020 /

Pacific Old School Council

Convocation 5  (Meet)

June 11, 2020

Attendees:

Beasts of the Bay (Mith)

Deep Spawners (Brian)

Desert Twisters (Justin)

Emerald Trolls (Shawn)

Fallen Angels (Brian)

Horde (Aaron)

Clerk (Jeremy)

Topic #1: WOTC Banning of Old School Cards

Trolls: Potentially some appetite to ban Invoke Prejudice… other cards maybe not, but Gypsies and Cleanse. But what about future bans? Concern about evaluating other cards that Wizards bans in the future. Possibly just ban the art and not necessarily the cards

Twisters: Unequivocal “No Ban”. The cards aren’t the issue (same as last week). Overall the members feel like we’re creating a issue and there is a slippery slope to connotations in variety of ways

Angels: Right now business as usual, don’t ban. But keep things open to discussion and keep an eye out. We are responsible adults and work through the issue, not necessarily by banning the cards

Horde: Wide range of opinions. Support for banning IP, but nothing else. All disappointed about the way this was dropped on behalf of WOTC. Seems like a corporate attention grab. Bulk of the people are okay as is. Potentially a deep dark hole if they keep banning cards. Old school is NOT political and we’re supposed to unplug.

Spawners: Deep discussion. Prefer to follow-suit across the other OS communities (ATL, EC, etc). Feels like the majority of Old School is going in the same direction… maybe IP is on the radar, but DFB is dealing with Invoke in the way that we would with other “bad faith actors”… all case-by-case. Harold McNeil in general art is suspect. So would we ban all his cards?? We don’t support the ban right now and don’t like what it’s doing to the community. Potentially damned if you do, damned if you don’t

Beasts: What’s the true action that we can do to make a real difference? WOTC is doing really just lip service. Really like what the Canadians wrote about the actions that we can actually take. Can we figure out a way to really impact the community in this way? Hard to bring new players into old school. 

Discussion Thoughts:

  • —> One of the Old School marketplaces put IP art as the banner and if we do make a statement, we should address that <—-
  • There’s real merit to the fact that there isn’t one solution that will please everyone. Lot of this is mob-mentality right now and they’re coming after Old School. 
  • Right now some people are revealing their true colors. They are showing they aren’t really a true part of the community. Cards are the problem, it’s the people behind the cards
  • An idea: like in the NFL the Walter Payton award… giving a PAC award to someone who’s doing something real for the community (diversity, charity work, women’s rights, etc). Prize could be something real meaningful like CE power 
  • Jeremy: I think the banning is the wrong message and a superficial way to deal with it. I personally think we don’t need to follow suit with bans, but we should be clear that just like cheating, this falls under the PAC conduct policy. We can and should make it absolutely clear that we have zero tolerance for racism and exclusion based on nationality, creed, color, culture, religion, or orientation.

Concrete Ideas for steps taking:

  • Focus our fundraising to BLM and other social justice clubs
  • Possibly interacting with the community. Teach some younger people in underprivileged communities how to play old school (give out decks of revised/chronicles, etc)
  • Be a strong message about behavior and don’t be an asshole

Vote: No bannings, we will watch IP and other cards as it unfolds, draft PAC statement to release

Aye: 6

Nay: 0

ACTION: Shawn will take a first cut at drafting the message.

Shahrazad:

  • Trolls would like to unrestrict. Thought it might have been hasty to restrict
  • Horde would like to keep it restricted
  • Twisters go either way
  • Deep Spawners
  • Angels want to unrestrict
  • Beasts had some wanted to restrict, but most wanted to unrestrict

Vote: Unrestrict

Aye: 5

Nay: 1 (Horde)

Next Convocation Votes:

  1. Restrict City in a Bottle
    1. Possibly do a functional errata where it’s a “sacrifice & destroy”
  2. Plague Rats as Zombie subtype
  3. Mana Clash as tiebreaker alternative
  4. Adding Andres Cermak to the crap list for cheating for in a Pre-Modern events