Comments on all of Pod One provided by Patrick Chapin! Eliminations for both Pod One and Pod Two will be revealed at the end of the article.
Patrick Chapin
Jon Corpora
Why, oh why would you choose this title? There are few worse titles I can think of, despite you being a Limited writer. Yes, Limited is your field, but
that doesn’t mean that Limited articles are magically going to be sexy to a wide audience. This title scares away all but the Limited players, which
you then provide a non-Limited article, despite the title. Please do not take this as a bias against Limited articles; it’s just that if you want to
try a more difficult position, you have to realize it’s going to be more difficult. As it was, your article was read by fewer people than anyone else’s
was (surely because of the title), and that makes it hard to win the vote.
As for what the article actually did provide, I guess I didn’t really get the takeaways. I appreciated the tone and stories, but they didn’t entertain
me enough to carry the article without any meat. Sharing your personal history can be great, but what is the reader supposed to take away from it? Jon
Finkel’s life story already has context for why we would care. If it is entertaining ENOUGH or teaches something, presents some change that is
interesting, then anyone’s can be a success. I guess I would have just liked it spelled out for me a little more, why any of this matters to me. If you
advance, you gotta step it up next week!
Jeremy Froggatt
Now we are talking! As you know, I have been one of your harsher critics in recent weeks, wondering if you could expand your subject a bit to not only
hit a wider audience but also to deliver new and interesting content week after week. This week’s article was a home run! You listened well to the
judges’ feedback from the previous round. Your article was interesting even for a non-fan of the subject, such as myself. You kept the eye candy
coming, but also found new experiences to share that were of interest. You gave helpful tips that your hardcore, central audience would appreciate. You
kept it fun, and I’m actively looking forward to your next week’s article. I’m not the only one who feels this way, either, as you dominated the
voting. Awesome job, man!
Jon Agley
A solid submission covering a few less-than-enticing topics, but pulling it off with good writing, good use of visuals, a nice touch of humor, and
actual Magic discussion. This was a tough article to pull off, as far as Constructed tech articles go, as a result of the subjects. I know how hard you
worked on this one, but I thought you also did a good job of pulling off the feat of not rubbing it in your readers’ faces, instead making it look
easy. You finished second in the voting, as Jeremy had a very strong week, but you have some momentum going, and I look forward to seeing what you do
next week!
Pedro Alvarado
What are you doing? You are talented! Maybe you are talented? I don’t know. All I know is that you sure looked good early on, but you have gone about
systematically alienating your entire audience and from what I can tell, the judges. It isn’t even just your articles but also your forum personality.
If you want to do all this crazy, challenging-the-way-we-think-about-the-way-we-think-about-Magic-article-writing, meta stuff, build rapport first! If
you want to explore the space outside of strategy, awesome! Rizzo is one of my favorites! The difference? I couldn’t help but love Rizzo, long before I
ever met him. You seem to really dislike people that read Magic articles. Do you imagine article writing to be like the plot of Saw?
Did you not heed the judge’s words from last week? You knew that people were unhappy, both judges and the public. You should’ve spent this week winning
over the hearts and minds of those looking for an excuse to throw you out the door. Instead, you gave them one. You managed to avoid elimination last
vote by using sex in the title of your article, but the problem with using cheap tricks without being able to back them up with substance is that
people figure you out and remember you. You finished dead last in the voting and by a mile. You have a sharp mind, but if you’re ever going to be a
regular Magic writer, I imagine a paradigm shift is necessary. Kold.
Ted
Pedro: Congratulations, sir, you choked yourself out. You have officially given SCG its first instance of auto-contest asphyxiation. I don’t know if
you were trying to impress some suicide blonde or if it was the devil inside, but your continuance of being confrontational and obnoxious in articles
and community interactions mystifies me. I wasn’t so sure after the last round, but this week’s submission solidified my desire that you disappear.
The thing that’s really disappointing is that I know you can produce entertaining, fun work — work that engages the reader and leaves them
feeling like you’re somebody they want to cozy up with every single week. Instead, it seems like you chose a tactic to make sure you won in the last
week of your group (it probably wasn’t close enough that you needed to, but whatever) and then continued along those lines in the Top 8. By doing this,
you alienated the judges (Chapin and guest JVL first; me this week), the editors, and most importantly, your readers. Magic readers are smart enough
that they can remember you were a d-bag months or years later (see also: Scott Johns and the Hall of Fame), and changing your tone week to week
probably wouldn’t matter, but you didn’t even give them a chance to forget. As Geordie Tait told me, it’s become clear that ‘appealing to the lowest
common denominator is not without its perils.’
You took the guy who wrote this outstanding article and turned him
into an unredeemable villain. I counted myself a huge fan of the guy who wrote the first piece. This new guy, well, he just sucks. I would’ve voted you
off this week even if you’d won the category.
You like sports analogies, right? Then I guess I have to wish you the best of luck in taking your talents to South Beach.
Ferrett
Pedro, the best StarCityGames.com writers have always had a somewhat tenuous relationship with our readers — because StarCityGames.com readers
are a large part of the Magic community, and sometimes the Magic community has problems. So when Geordie Tait or Rizzo ( or even, uh, me) pull the trigger on
something stupid that the Magic community is doing, there’s going to be some hurt feelings.
But in the end, what saves us is that we really love Magic and the people in it. To quote the wisdom of Stitch, “This is my family. I found it, all on
my own. Is little, and broken, but still good. Yeah, still good.” So for every time feelings are bruised, there’s a lot of love out there to kiss the
boo-boos of the readers. That love flows through in a wave that we can sense through the cold mystery of our browser window.Â
Pedro, I think you do good work — but I’m not sensing a lot of love here. I’m sensing a kind of Andy Kaufman-esque toying with the audience,
seeing what kind of reaction you can squeeze from them, and particularly in the forums, you come off as arrogant and condescending. (And when I say that, Houston, we have a problem.) What you’re writing doesn’t rub me the wrong way as much as it does Teddy K, but it
does vaguely leave me feeling like I’m a lab rat, and you’re the quiet guy with a scalpel. And I wonder how long it’s going to be before you cut deep
enough that someone really gets hurt.Â
You lost the vote by a wide margin (seven points behind the next-lowest competitor), and as such, I’m going to echo Teddy. I like you. I like the way
you push boundaries. But I think there’s an element in there that people — including me — are finding a little too discomfiting to have you
in there, still.Â
Pedro Alvarado, having acquired the least votes from Pod One, has been eliminated!
As for Pod Two…?
No one got eliminated on account of an unfortunate incident leading to Colin’s dropping from the contest (to the thief who stole his computer, you
suck!). Pod Two, you’re on your own for this week. Good luck in the rest of the contest!Â