Part of being a good game designer involves knowing when to do things your players don't like. Sometimes this is because your responsibility is to give players enough challenges that they have fun while suffering at the same time; sometimes this is because you genuinely know better than your players in how to give them a fun time. There are many cases where you can't give players what they say they want because it will make the game worse for them in practice: In this article, I argue that although people say they want more control and decision points in
Magic,
Magic's lack of them compared to other trading card games is what has made the game both highly accessible and long-lasting.
