Magic The Gathering Discussion

Cafe Society
1

I was going to start an “Ask The MTG Pro Tour Player” but it’s now been a while since I’ve played. Instead, I thought I’d start a general discussion on the game. (Although if anyone wants to ask any questions of a former Pro Tour Player, feel free!)

So, how many of us dopers play the game?
What do you guys think of the latest expansions?
Who here plays DCI tournaments and who plays for fun?
Does anyone play for ante or play money games?

My history: I started playing just before Legends came out. I had nothing better to do. Started up a Magic club at the local comic shop twice a week and we got booster drafts going there.
I started going to sanctioned events in 98 about once a month and eventually managed to get our little card club at the comic shop sanctioned.
I’ve placed highly (i.e. made decent money) at 3 Grand Prixs and I’ve been to PT LA and got to the second day. After PT LA I gave things up for a while but I’ve recently found a Magic club nearby.
I’ve unbeatable at Limited, but lack the funds for serious Constructed play.
Out of maybe 500 booster drafts, I’ve won all but 7 of them. Kinda makes me think that there’s a lot more skill involved than luck.

2

Oh yes, the cardboard crack!
Though I play very little these days I played, and bought the heck out cards between Dark/Fallen Empires and Ice Age. Periodicly my Nephew who I tought to play and provided with cards brings me new ones in to jack up my Merfolk deck (I think the use of that deck concept alone dates me). I can’t nor do I want to undestand updated rules/abilities that came along after 3rd edition, so he gets highly irate when Flanking/Phasing/Provoke (or whatever) abilities show up in his cards and I won’t let him use them.

My favorite combos are still the oldest and best. Phantasmal Terrains with my Lord of Atlantis. Regenerate/Lure/Venom in the green deck. and Rainbow Vail/Fellwar stone in the NFL deck

A debate we’ve been having lately is how exactly the protection from a colour works in a blocking situation. IE: Black Knight attacks, blocked by a White Knight. Block goes off but neither can damage the other. Correct? Sad, I can’t remember these things.

Another practice that has popped up in recent play that makes me nuts is players showing up with unimaginably large decks. I hate playing a deck bigger than 80 cards. Usualy I stick with the sanctioned 60 card deck. Yes, I know there are bunches of spells/abilities/artifacts that allow one to get through the deck quickly, but Damn when someone shows up with a 150 card monster and then gets irate when the cards they need don’t show up.

I also stick with the single coloured decks. Though I own a few multi coloured cards they sit in the box and collect dust.
My Blue/Merfolk deck has no cards that cost more than 5 to cast, and most are 3 or less. Fast is good!
I’m still trying to get my NFL deck (my only multi colured/no basic land) viable. I’ve been tweeking it for a long time. Fun to play, but pokey as all get out.

I play a basic game for basic fun.

3

Creatures of *colour cannot block creatures with protection from *colour, so you’re above situation cannon come about. :slight_smile:

Around the time in my magic career that theme weenie decks, like merfolk decks, were popular I was playing a goblin deck. Kicked butt in a big way! (Thanks to Blood Moon and the prevalence for dual lands at the time)

If I’m playing for fun then I’ll usually play green/blue creature + control. If I’m playing constructed in a tournament then it’ll usually be red burn or black pox. That way, games are quick and I have a chance to relax between matches.

I haven’t played a deck over 63 cards in a long, long, long, long time. Gets hard to shuffle after 60 anyway!

4

Ah, memories.

I got in during … Beta, was it? The black borders, but not rounded like Alpha. Then I bought a load of Unlimited, Arabian Nights, Antiquities, Legends, and quit when Dark came out. Sold off all of my cards, paid for a bunch of college expenses.

Had I only known, I would have sold a kidney to buy as many cards as I could back then.

5

I’ve been playing since Unlimited, but stopped actively collecting after the Legends distribution fiasco. I stopped playing after about Homelands, then came back around Invasion, I believe. I missed out on several expansion sets. I also went from 4th edition to 7th edition.

I buy to play, now (and I buy relatively rarely, since I have a gazillion cards as it is). Since I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m probably never going to recoup anything near what I’ve spent on cards, I’m just going to use them. Heck, I’ve got a Time Walk in a play deck. Eh. It’s just cardboard.

I also have no desire to play in a tournament. I play for fun in a group which all started around the same time. I have several 100+ card decks, and they do well, depending on the theme. We don’t play for ante or money. We usually play some sort of team variant since there are four of us.

6

I have told this story before but it is always worth repeating…

My friend Dave bought a couple of starter decks and maybe half a dozen boosters or so back when Revised first came out. He called me up and gave me half and we muddled our way through the rules for a couple of hours. He then told me that he had bought the cards on a whim while he was our local gamers store. His quote - “They had a whole box of these Arabian Nights cards but I wasn’t sure if they were for the same game or not so I didn’t buy any.”

The magnitude of that statement haunts him to this day!

Anyways, I haven’t bought any cards since Ice Age and rarely play anymore although last Christmas my brother and his friend were over and we had a good long session. I figure when my kids get a little older I will introduce them to the game even though it might be a little healthier if I just get them hooked on crack instead.

BTW, when my friends and I used to play regularly, we always played for an ante and it couldn’t be a land. If we got really crazy, we would ante three cards face down so you never knew if your lethal Lure/Basilisk combo was going to come up!

7

I first started playing around Antiquities, and bought several thousand dollars worth of cards between then and Fallen Empires - when the game began to suck. I still have a binder full of rares from Legends and Ice Age, in mint condition, hoping that some day they’ll have value. (Yeah, I know, not likely.)

Actually, the game began to suck when they introduced the “Type 1” and “Type 2” tournament, and despite the repeated begging from loyal old timers like me, there was no balanced “Type 1A” tournament that eliminated the most broken cards from Alpha/Beta days, but still was otherwise unrestricted.

I started playing again for a while during the “Urza’s Cycle” expansion, and picked up some cool cards that helped my old deck ideas that still kick some butt. In fact, some cards like “Darkest Hour” made an otherwise unviable deck into a real winner, although boring to play.

We still play occasionally. We’ll dig out our cards and have mini tournaments, or multiplayer games. I have decks specifically for different kinds of multiplayer games, for one-on-one, and etc.

In fact, I’ll still get deck ideas and sit down and go thru all my old cards and put together new decks, testing them in “draw contests” against my older winners.

Too bad Wizards ruined the game for the people who made them so much money in the beginning… I don’t give them money anymore.

8

I got into it for about a year, but burning through $700 buying Boosters, Expansions, and the precon decks was not the best idea. And I didn’t even start developing a strategy or anything, I was just hording cards. I still have mine, but I’ve forgotten how to play and don’t know anyone to play with. And I’m kinda leery of getting back in, considering how much I spent the first time.

Mercadian Masques here, mostly. I should get rid of my cards.

9

I started when Revised was out for a while and the Fallen was the hot expansion. Played a lot of 3 and 4 player free fall alls on my lunch hour in high school.

We always played weird variants and such. My friend and I would take all of our cards of a color plus lands and just play with that huge pile of mostly junk. (We didn’t have a huge amount of cards anyway).

My favorite is playing bad decks on both sides. There’s just something fun about squeezing power out of pathetic and random cards.

I still have my collection, and I’ve bought a few packs of them over the years, but most of my cards are revised, four edition, fallen and ice age.

The new cards explain the rules better it seems.

10

Before I say anything else, I want to point out that Magic is a truly fun game. It’s a blast. I’ve been playing it for 8+ years, I’ve done just about everything that one can do while playing magic, and I still have a great time playing it 3-4 times per week.

The newest card set, Mirrodin, is very very good, imho. It includes lots of creative ideas never before seen on a magic card. One of my favorites is a legendary artifact called Mindslaver, which you can sacrifice to take control of your opponent’s entire next turn. You make all decisions for them, etc. It’s like Word of Command, but way way way better, and it doesn’t have rules problems. What could be more fun than actually running your opponent’s turn for them? (The only drawback is that you can’t make them manaburn… but that wouldn’t be much fun anyhow).

It also includes a cool new card type, equipment, which does what enchant creatures should have done from the beginning, namely, enhance your creatures in useful ways without wrecking you if the creature gets destroyed.
So, what all have I done?

-I’ve qualified for 4 pro tours, and made the second day of one (ended up winning $800+)

-I play in 4 to 5 booster drafts per week.

-I’ve been ranked #2 in limited on Magic Online (which is a fine product, although very slow in adding new card sets).

-My friends and I frequently play magic card trivia games of various sorts

-I’ve been a sanctioned judge

-I’ve beaten the reigning world champion

-I’ve designed my own card set

-I’ve purchased packs of Legends for $25 just to open in a booster draft. They all sucked

-I own seven beta birds of paradise, and one alpha

-I’ve invented, and played, numerous fun and unique draft formats

-My friends and I have our own local ratings system just so that we can come up with fair teams for booster drafts. I’ve played in 366 matches since March or so of this year

-I’ve played in every prerelease ever. Except for Alliances, when I was a judge.

Oh, and brainfizz, you claim that you’ve won 493 out of 500 booster drafts? You lie like a stinking dog. The greatest player in the world couldn’t win 493 out of 500 booster drafts, unless he was playing against drowsy 3-year-olds.

11

How the hell is an amateur like me supposed to follow a player like Max?! :slight_smile:

We picked the game up last November, in time to catch the Torment expansion. It was my roommate’s (KKBattousai) idea to start playing; I wasn’t a card gamer before. We have several thousand cards between us now-- a confirmation of the “cardboard crack” appellation if there ever was one.

We only started playing tournaments around the time Legions came out. We’ve since played a couple DCI tourneys and attended the prereleases for Eighth and Mirrodin. Other than that, we play for fun.

As for Mirrodin, both myself and the roommate like it a lot. The new mechanics are good, and I especially like how the resurgence of artifacts have let me bust out my older, previously designated-for-the-giveaway-pile cards, like Shatter, Artifact Ward, Control Artifact, etc. And equipment have made weenie decks much more viable.

My decks tend to be either 40 or 60-cards big, though when I first constructed a deck it had about 80. I played a lot of white, and based my attacks off fliers. Lately, I’ve been playing tribal decks (Zombies, or Clerics) and using red, blue, and black, colors I didn’t touch much before. My favorite new deck, for example, is a green-blue-black Elf/Insect-powered evasion weenie.

My best deck is a monowhite flier. It’s got fun defensive moves like Mirror Strike (damage back to attacking creature’s controller), Humble (creature becomes an 0/1 with no abilities), and Vengeful Dreams (discard X cards to remove X attacking creatures from game).

MtG’s good for the collector whore in me. I’ve got all my foils and rares in a display binder, and I’m honestly happier having them there than in a deck. I also like collecting nonbasic lands.
Enough rambling. Any tips to help keep a draft tourney newbie from leaving hating both herself and the game? What cards should I keep an eye out for?

12

What format?

Generally, the most important thing in draft is ways to kill creatures, followedy by big flying creatures, followed by smaller flying creatures. If it’s your first draft, take whatever the best card is in each of your first 3 or so packs, with no regard for color. After that, settle on two of those colors, or maybe two with a splash, and just keep taking whatever card you think is best. Synergy and balance can come later.

But it’s far more complicated than that.

Anyhow, I’m road tripping down to LA tomorrow to play in the PTQ in Costa Mesa on Saturday… wish me luck.

13

Perhaps I’m exaggerating with 500, but I played twice a week for 3 or 4 years and definitely only lost 7 that I remember. Most weren’t sanctioned.
I first lost at PTLA which was a Rochester draft, then lost a couple of times at my home club, once at GenCon, once at the nationals, and twice at GP London (i was having a bad day).
At our local club we made the prizes for our drafts first pick of the rares, so nobody really lost anything. Everyone went home with 3 rares.

Max, I assume you prefer Limited? I’ll have to get this Magic Online thing (I normally use Apprentice - but then, it’s been a while) so that I can prove I’m not some scrub and rescue my good name from that slur!

14

Perhaps I’m exaggerating with 500, but I played twice a week for 3 or 4 years and definitely only lost 7 that I remember. Most weren’t sanctioned.
I first lost at PTLA which was a Rochester draft, then lost a couple of times at my home club, once at GenCon, once at the nationals, and twice at GP London (i was having a bad day).
At our local club we made the prizes for our drafts first pick of the rares, so nobody really lost anything. Everyone went home with 3 rares.

Max, I assume you prefer Limited? I’ll have to get this Magic Online thing (I normally use Apprentice - but then, it’s been a while) so that I can prove I’m not some scrub and rescue my good name from that slur!

15

You’re obviously not some scrub if you’re a PT player, but winning 493 out of 500 drafts (or even 93 out of 100) is virtually impossible, unless you’re playing with absolutely idiots who use 10 lands in a 50-card draft deck or something. The way ELO ratings work, if you’re rated 200 points higher than someone, you will beat them only 75% of the time; to win at a 98.6% rate for drafts, your match win rate must be over 99%, and your rating would have to be much much higher relative to your opponents than even that huge difference of 200. If that’s the case, why are you playing with these people? Shouldn’t pro-tour players be playing with people of reasonable ability? Why haven’t these people gotten better such that they would have a chance with a good draw?

Also, I’d like to note that many pro-tour players on Magic Online have limited ratings around 1800-1900 (I believe I know Kai’s current screen name, and the account has a limited rating that is hovering around 1850 online), which means that they do in fact lose to 1600-1700 players 25% of the time. Are you that much better than these other pros? Or are you playing people whose ability would put them at astoundingly low ratings?

I think you’re exaggerating a lot…

16

Now, now…easy-up kids! If he wants to exaggerate, let him. Does no harm.

Anyway, my name is Mike and I have been playing MtG since 4th-Ice Age. I was clean from Urza’s Legacy-Scourge and I have relapsed. I need to get a play group in Dallas, but I haven’t been able to make the booster drafts (my favorite format) and I don’t have the cards to get back into constructed yet. I don’t like just buying boosters. I’d rather play drafts and at least play the cards once :slight_smile:

I play almost exclusivly WGR with very little B or U. I don’ t know why I never got into them, but it worked out in highschool when I started playing because my friends played a lot of black and blue and I played the other three so we shared a lot of cards. Good times then.

I know Steven (MTGman) is going to show up here soon enough. (sorry I skipped the game last weekend, but I was able to get back to Houston afterall!)

I have Magic Online, but I don’t want to buy virtual cards so I only have the “Heavy Hitters” precon deck from 8th. It’s a fun little deck, but I can’t play anything but open games and against other precons. Anyone want to provide some commons or somesuch as a hand out? :slight_smile:

17

I’ve been playing for a while (since The Dark or maybe even Legends was new), but I only play a few times a year, any more. Don’t know too many who play. I’ve never put down much money: I have about 12 or 14 inches of cards total, and a lot of those were gifts or trades. The last cards I bought were (I think) a couple of boosters of Fallen Empires, but just this summer I happened to stop by WotC headquarters, and they gave me a couple of freebie Invasion preconstructed decks. Usually, I play either red-green weenie (and yes, I still have a few Kurd Apes) or green-white weenie. Both are pretty strong, considering how little I’ve spent: The red-green deck once managed to overwhelm a pair of circles of protection to win the game within 6 turns.

18

Ah, Magic the Gathering…

I had lots of fun playing in the the later 90’s. I mainly played 4th edition, ice age and homelands. I played with a few other friends that lived nearby. I introduced my my wife to the game. Unfortunately, the game got too competative between us and I went back to playing with my other friends. =)

I particularly enjoyed using a black deck that had a nasty habit of draining cards off my opponents deck. Some of the cards in that deck later became illegal for tournament use. (Black ritual?)

Speaking of tournaments, I went to three of four sanctioned tournaments. I liked playing in sealed deck tournaments, like when 5th edition came out. It put everyone on close to even ground. I didn’t make any money and I had lots of fun playing.

I eventually stopped playing MtG. I’ve got a few large shoe boxes with my cards. Perhaps I will pull them out again when my son’s are old enough to play.

I wanted to start playing online, but sadly WotC never produced a Mac version. Is MtG online still flourishing and fun? Is it playable on a 56k modem? If so, I would cosider picking up vitual PC and trying MtG out again.

Colin

19

Actually, this is kind of unusual. I very rarely read Cafe Society. Not sure what made me do it today, but it is kind of a spooky co-incidence. Glad to hear that you were able to get to see your family. I’ll keep you in the loop for next time. I was strongly tempted to pick up a bunch of Mirrodin boosters and play a booster draft, but since I didn’t know exactly who all was coming or not I decided against it. We had two players who were definites, but two others who were maybes. I decided to skip drafting for that night. We can plan a draft for some other night though.

We had five players and played two big multi-player games and then a couple had to go. We played a third game under Blitzkreig rules off of my massive multiplayer deck and it was good fun as well. I got eliminated early in game 1, I think Balance still had a bit of a grudge from the last time we played and I kind of toyed with him(kind of like I toyed with you by hanging at 1 life for so long ;)). So I ended up elected to put the baby to bed.

Anyway, game 2 was a blast because we all spread the damage around a bit and then Balance popped a Crypt Rats which took me to 3 life, him to 4, Moxmaiden to 7, and our other friends to 3 and 4 respectively. Now, one of our friends had a Meteor Storm on the table and the critters were pretty much all wiped out. I whacked Moxmaiden for a few points to put her in Meteor Storm range and a classic “mutually assured destruction” scenario came about. Lots of tension and diplomacy ensued and I bluffed my way to a win.

Game three was as bizarre as can be expected when everyone is playing Blitzkreig off of my(~500 card) five-color multiplayer deck. Moxmaiden kind of shafted herself in the early turns by keeping a hand with only one land(it was a good one though) and she struggled for a bit after I Wastelanded it on the first turn. Balance struggled with mana balance issues, and I got a bit shafted in being unable to mount much of an offense. Balance escalated the hostilities and I had to kill him. This left me a little vulnerable and I had to tutor for something to kill Moxmaiden, or she would have killed me next turn. All in all it was a fun evening and we’ve talked about doing it again fairly soon.

Anyway, I don’t have the professional credentials of some of our illustrious fellow dopers. I’m mostly a theorist and collector/player. I’ve been playing since Legends(hard to believe it has been nearly a decade) and I’ve got a fairly good sized closet dedicated to card games(M:tG, L5R, [sub]Wyvern[/sub], and a few others). I’ve been writing about M:tG for quite some time and I was part of a couple of “think tanks” for a while. Had some articles published on the Dojo back in their heyday as well as a few decks they culled off the newsgroups.

I never much cared for the tournament scene, although I enjoy pre-releases and the occasional draft. My main interest is large-scale multi-player games. Half-dozen and up. Primarially Vintage(type 1), although occasionally a new set will tickle my fancy and I’ll play some block constructed. I played the Microprose game way back and was a fairly regular player there(that’s where I first made up my screen name). My wife(Moxmaiden) and I both played there and we beta-tested MTG:Online. Neither of us were thrilled at the idea of paying for virtual cards though. I used to play occasionally with Apprentice, but found it kind of clunky. I mostly used it to help virtual teammates playtest their decks.

These days I mostly take care of the family and play M:tG relatively infrequently. I still keep up with the game to a certain extent, but the Onslaught block didn’t do much for me(although I liked Legions). I have tons of engrams dedicated to the cards, rules, and mechanics of the game and have some reasonably formidable deckbuilding and playing skills. My underlying goal is to have fun and to help others have fun as well. Although M:tG is a zero-sum game, I play to enjoy more than play to win. This philosophy has, unsuprisingly, lead to a number of losses. :slight_smile:

My first suggestion would be DON’T TRY TO LEARN DRAFT WITH MIRRODIN. Mirrodin is a unique set, over half-artifact, and the principles of draft play as applied to Mirrodin are a bit skewed. Plus the set’s mana curve is whack. Find some friends who don’t have some cards from the older sets and draft with them. Make up your own “draft packs” by making stacks of rares, uncommons, and commons, shuffling them up and then pulling one(facedown) rare, three uncommons, and eleven commons. The advice Max gave is generally good, but it doesn’t work well with Mirrodin either. Mirrodin’s common/uncommon flying creatures are, for the most part, fairly bad and other types of evasion or just plain fatties may be preferable. Equipment makes even crappy creatures somewhat good in Mirrodin.

Anyway, creatures are the key to draft. Get what you can, but try to keep it within a couple of colors. Resist that really good card that doesn’t fit with the other cards you drafted unless it could really hose you in the hands of another player and then just take it for safekeeping and don’t try to incorporate it into your deck if it doesn’t fit without too much effort. Keep it focused.
Enjoy,
Steven

20

Yeah, you did bluff me the last time. I’ve learned and I’ll get you both the next round! (shoulda taken out Moxmaiden last, grumble…) Course I was playing a mono-white deck that was untested and not what I would have chosen for multi player :slight_smile: excuses, excuses…