A quick note to all of you who submitted States Reports: Due to covering the Pro Tour in Columbus, I’m running a little behind getting them up on the site, but all of the ones that we will be publishing will go up early next week. Thank you for your patience, now on with the show!
Jamie Wakefield will forever be associated with Verdant Force. Jon Finkel and other invitational winners each have their own face literally printed on a card. If you could choose (or create) a Magic card which would indelibly be associated with you, what would it be?
Peace,
Zeph Ragland
Sadly, I’ve never made enough of a dent in the Magic world to have a particular card be associated with me. That said, I can imagine people asking me to sign some of the Asses from Unhinged after the set premieres…
Okay, so let’s say my roommate had just recently purchased a Beta Black Lotus. Keeping in mind that this is ENTIRELY hypothetical, what would the moral/ethical ramifications of booby trapping our home to facilitate his early demise be if my intention was to appropriate his collection in the event of his passing? Do you have any experience with this sort of a dilemma, and if so, what advice could you offer to someone grappling with this paralyzing conundrum?
Craig Weir,
goodrat on the SCG forums, and elsewhere
violator of moral principles since 1983
“Paralyzing Conundrum” eh? I don’t think I can answer this one on the grounds that I already wrote one column dealing with illegal activities already this week, and that’s most certainly my quota. Right? However, if I were not not answering your question, this would be my answer: It’s completely dependent on what kind of roommate you have.
Personally, I hate roommates. Always have. That’s why I made a rule a long time ago that said I’m only living with people if a) I don’t hate them (you’d be surprised how rare this is), b) they are female, and c) they are sleeping with me. This kind of narrows down the field a bit and makes it much easier for me to deal with living with another human being, because presumably there are perks. (Those of you making jokes about narrow field and the amount of women who would actually sleep with me can go stand in the corner now. You are not funny.) You, obviously, do not have these rules, which is your first mistake.
Moving along… if your roommate is really baggy, dirty, or always pees on the toilet seat and doesn’t clean it up, I can see a cleverly arranged series of booby-traps as a convenient solution to two problems – you get the cards and *poof* no more roommate. However, if your roommate is actually pretty cool and you are simply greedy, then you are the bag in this scenario, and it may incumbent upon you to off yourself and give your own Magic collection to your roomie. Ethics is a dual-edged sword.
For more on this topic, I suggest contacting one Brian McCormick Kibler, who is a graduate of Emory University in Philosophy and Religion and highly trained for just this sort of scenario. He can currently be found in the basement of some university Psychology Department, testing hot raver chicks for ESP.
P.S. Also, I would be interested in any tips you may have on how to quickly construct a pit spike trap in a basement with a concrete floor. Specifically, would I need to rent a jackhammer?
Watch Arsenic and Old Lace with Cary Grant and go from there.
P.P.S. Have you ever used the “Ice” half of Fire/Ice?
Yes, of course. I’ve even drawn cards off of it. There are plenty of times where Icing someone’s land during their upkeep (particularly in control mirrors) where casting Ice is the difference between a win and a loss. In fact, while I was watching a match in Columbus, I made some of the players there draw their own cards off Fire/Ice multiple times, because they were in a hurry and kept forgetting to do so during complicated stacks.
Last on the day, we have a list of ten questions from /Erik, which I will try to answer in lightning round fashion.
1. How did you become an internet writer?
I was bored at my job and wanted to try my hand at writing more. Magic writing seemed like an area with a lot of space to cover. I won back-to-back contests over at Brainburst when I first started, and it was all over from there.
2. Why did you start writing for Starcity and did you write for some other site before that.
I’m pretty good friends with Beenie Smith, a local Virginia guy who saw my writing on Brainburst and wondered why I wasn’t writing for StarCityGames.com instead. I told him that I thought the owner was “Little Hitler”, and I wasn’t really interested in producing content for them. Oh how wrong I was… Eventually Bennie wore me down, Pete turned out to be a cool guy, and I decided that writing for The Ferrett seemed like a swell idea.
3. I’ve read the article but I guess many people wonder how you became editor of this here sit…
I Magoo’d my way into it (which implies I stumbled blindly and wound up standing in a rather fortunate scenario). Basically, my writing is pretty clean, and since I’ve been writing here, I’ve always been a pretty big evangelist for site. I actually recruited a bunch of writers before I was editor here, so I guess Pete and Ferrett figured I’d recruit more after they gave me a job. Few people had any idea who I was when I took over the editing duties here, and come to think of it, I still get a few e-mails a week starting with “Hey Ferrett.” The more things change…
4. Do you like working for Wizards on the side, if they made you an offer would you jump ship?
This one is a tough one, because it would involve a whole bunch of variables and I’m not sure how any of them would play out. As it stands, I love working for SCG and for Wizards, so my current arrangement is actually quite good.
5. Mike Longs, “free deck help” that looked like a real internet scam, was it serious or a joke?
I’m sure Mike Long’s free deck help was about as sincere as he gets, but not having taken part in this particular offer, I can’t actually answer this one.
6. Nick Eisel and Ken Krouner seem to have issues, does this have to do with Eisel’s alleged cheating or someting else?
This one is a long story, but my understanding is that it involves cutting some cards in a Rochester draft, cheating, and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
7. Are you and Pugg Fuggly really the same person (I understand if you don’t want to answer this but it can be a good question non the less)?
A girl can’t tell all her secrets.
8. I took a long break from magic after “Ice Age” and came back around “Scourge” I have been reading a lot of old articles since then but I would still want your opinion on something. Has there been a standard deck as “strong” as affinity since Urza block?
Actually there has been, but most people don’t realize this because it existed just before a rotation and didn’t see play during States or Regionals. The Burning Tog decks (and Psychatog in general) back when Carlos Romao won Worlds were practically unstoppable, and they dominated Standard for a few months. Thankfully, the strongest part of that deck besides Psychatog rotated out relatively quickly when Invasion made way for Onslaught, or else you would have heard a lot more bitching about bannings.
9. Have you ever met Kai Budde, if so did you ask for his autograph and did he recognize you, could you even say you know him?
The first time I met Kai was in Atlanta during Dragon*Con. I came up to introduce myself and I could tell he sized me up immediately, because he needed to figure out if I was just some fool wasting his time or if I was actually someone he wanted to talk to. He obviously had no clue who I was. Since then, Kai and I have talked on numerous occasions at Pro Tours and the like, and occasionally online. He usually gives me sh** about editing mistakes I make, and I kid him about having to buy his own flights now. He actually has a very cutting sense of humor, so he delivers good beats to friend and foe alike. In short, yeah I know him. He’s a good guy.
10. What happened to “The Magic University” did all the flames scare you?
I’m a slacker who lost his way on this one. All the research has been done for a year now (though it needs to be updated), but I got too busy to write the damned articles. I apologize to everyone I let down here and hope to resurrect them around the turn of the year. Don’t hold your breath though, as each article is more work than I usually put in for an average article, and that’s a lot. As for the flames, the series actually got a very positive response – it’s my own standards of high quality and wanting to make my analysis as complete and flame retardant as possible that keeps me from writing more. I have far more good ideas to write about than I have time to pursue them.
Alright kids, that’s it for today. Have a good weekend.
Teddy Cardgame
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