I once heard someone describe boxing as being the literal imposing of one man’s will over another. Certainly this is a very eloquent way of describing two men (or women) punching the crap out of each other. I see poker as being a similar contest, albeit one involving only a battle of mental will. However, poker can also be seen as the exact opposite of boxing, because in boxing eventually you actually need to have it. Sure, you can prevent actual fighting via sheer avoidance to a certain extent, provided that a draw is your objective, but in order to win, you actually need to fight. The best fighter might not always win, but the winner needs to have some ability to fight.
In poker, many – and in some instances, most – of the hands that you win, you don’t need to have it. What you have is totally irrelevant. All that matters is what your opponents think you have. In a manner of speaking, your actions are creating the reality of those two cards, which could in fact be totally blank on the front. Unless you show down, your cards don’t really matter. Only the impression you present, the potential that those cards represent, is what matters.
In this way, comparing Magic with Poker is actually incorrect on many levels. Magic is more like boxing in that the best player doesn’t always win, but you need to have it if you’re actually going to win a match. Yes, yes, I know, you can come up with examples where that isn’t the case, Prosbloom, or that guy that you knew that played Dragonstorm without any Hellkites, etc. Most of the bluffs that one can run in Magic are tools so that what we have is sufficient to win, or to buy time to find what is needed to win, but very rarely is the bluff the actual win; rather than being the win itself, it leads to the win. For ease of my purposes, being mana screwed is an easy example. If you keep a one-land hand on the draw and don‘t hit a second land by your second draw step, it becomes obvious pretty quickly that you are, in fact, mana screwed, and not running some elaborate bluff that involves purposefully falling behind to spring a trap. No amount of “bluffing” on your part can make up for the fact that your deck is unable to function correctly. Being mana flooded does provide an opportunity to bluff if one is playing a control deck, but even that ruse is easy to see through for most players, past a certain point.
I remember quite vividly playing in States in 2008. I was 1-1 in round 3 with Faeries, having been crushed by Merfolk the first round and winning a mirror match the second round. In the third round, I was up against a Ramp deck, and won the first game easily. During the second game, I hit a patch of six consecutive lands. My opponent was on the play and was casting spells with reckless abandon, with no regard for whether or not I had counter-spells of any kind. It became somewhat obvious that he had sided in Guttural Response. In the third game, my opening hand was Thoughtseize, Bitterblossom, Jace, Faerie Conclave, Secluded Glen, Mutavault, and Island. Obviously, I kept. I proceeded to draw eight consecutive lands off the top of my deck, and lost. The most frustrating part of this game was that for at least four or five turns, I knew my opponent was convinced I was sandbagging Cryptic Command, and kept trying to bait it out while waiting to hit a Guttural Response. Eventually he realized I had stone-cold nothing, but I had so many turns to actually draw gas, and that’s what made it frustrating.*
If what I’ve stated above regarding poker and Magic is accurate, then what is the source of this romanticism toward poker displayed by so many Magic players? What is the cause of this incessant need to link the two games? The answer isn’t really that complicated: specific skills from poker are easily, and effectively, ported over from poker to Magic. Magic is a mentally intense game, one with complicated decisions at every turn. Once they decide to try and become more competitive players, most people start by attempting to master the game itself – the rules, learning the cards, the relevant interactions. They then turn to the meta-game, and all it entails: deck building, networking, match-up analysis, sideboard construction, and so on. Most Magic players spend the majority of their time tweaking and tuning their abilities in these two areas… but there is another skill at work in this game, one which is integral to poker, but tends to be a factor only at the highest level of Magic play. This isn’t only the much-celebrated bluff, but rather exhibiting control over your opponent through the use of physical and mental deception.
Why do the best Magic players tend to play control and combo decks at high level events? Combo is easier to explain, because a well-positioned combo deck can be a powerful weapon in the hands of the right player at the right time (see Dragonstorm at Worlds 2007, Elves at PT: Berlin, TEPS at GP: LA, and Swans at GP: Barcelona for recent examples). Of course, playing combo is always a gamble, and one that can backfire easily if the field is prepared (see Dredge at PT: Valencia, most builds of Elves at Worlds 2008, and the furious comeback of Faeries at GP: Seattle). Why, then, do the best players tend to choose control?
When you play aggro, there is little room to bluff. Certainly opportunities to bluff exist, especially in aggro versus aggro or aggro versus midrange, where blocking actually can come into play. Yet, in order for an aggro deck to win, it must lay its cards on the table. It must have it. There isn’t nearly as much subtlety when it comes to aggro decks. A control deck doesn’t care if you hit three mana and represent Boggart Ram-Gang – it only cares if you actually put the creature into play. But control decks – that’s a whole different story.
What does it mean to play “control”?
What made Faeries in its heyday so scary? Potential. Your Faeries opponent has access to one Black and one Blue mana on turn 2, and doesn’t play Bitterblossom – yet they kept the hand. What does his or her hand contain? Spellstutter Sprite? Broken Ambitions? Remove Soul? Agony Warp? On three mana, they could have Scion of Oona (a combat trick, a counter-spell – it does it all), or Vendilion Clique. On four mana, is it Cryptic Command? Mistbind Clique? Sower of Temptation? Faeries was, and remains, a tremendously powerful deck, but its power is exponentially increased because we don’t play with perfect information. This is precisely what make Vendilion Clique and Thoughtseize so incredibly good in the Faeries mirror (and similarly, Duress and Thoughtseize in Tezzeret mirror-matches in Vintage). As much as anything else, when playing against Faeries, you have a high likelihood of making the incorrect play because you don’t know what your opponent has in hand.
So why did so many great players choose to play Faeries? Power level is unquestionably part of it, but that isn’t the only reason. What great players look for is a deck that gives them a window to “outplay” their opponents. But what does this mean exactly – does one deck actually give a player an ability to play “better” than their opponents? Possibly. Here is where we can make a link to poker: Faeries lets a good player become great by dictating the way the game is played. A great player can use a deck like Faeries to literally control their opponent’s actions. Playing Faeries gives you an opportunity to bluff at nearly every turn of the game. It gives you the chance to set up your opponent for repeated two-for-ones and tempo loss. The more certain your opponent is that you have Mistbind Clique, the better your Cryptic Command becomes, and vice versa. Agony Warp is so strong specifically because it provides an opportunity for a two-for-one in a deck already packed with these types of plays. It allows great players to function at their best in the game behind the game, the mental battle of wills, and allows one player to impose his will over the other through a series of mental and physical maneuvers, through intentional deception. This is the link to poker. Through purposeful revealing of information, a control player can influence the decisions of the opponent in a way that an aggro deck cannot. Often, when faced with this type of opponent, aggro players will make what they think is an optimal play based on “playing around” a card of their opponent’s, when in fact the opponent doesn’t have that card in hand (or sometimes, even in their deck).
Poker games involve a complex and deliberate series of actions on the part of the players to mislead, deceive, and control the other players. Unlike in Magic, where you usually have only two or three games against an individual opponent, poker provides players with many opportunities to project an image over the course of a game session. Some players play tightly, only playing in a hand if their hole cards meet whatever their baseline requirement is. Other players will mostly play tightly, but will allow themselves to play a hand if they have the right odds. Other players will play moderately tight but will play certain “pet” or “lucky” hands, and of course you can continue through the spectrum to players who will play nearly anything. Good poker play generally involves a combination of these approaches, applied at the right time. For example, when playing in a tournament setting with a smaller number of people, it can be wise to play intentionally loose early on, trying to catch a flush or an inside straight, even for mediocre returns. If you show down and win the pot, the other players will note the hand and play differently in the future when a similar possibility presents itself later and you‘re in the hand; if you’ve already made your hand, they might think you’re chasing again. Or, you might be able to bluff in this situation more effectively. Similarly, if you’re caught bluffing early on, the other players may consider you a loose player – something you can use to your advantage later on.
There are clear applications of this skill-set in Magic. Obviously, purposely allowing a significant spell to resolve when you are holding a Cryptic Command, possibly throwing a game to promote a certain image of how you play the game, doesn’t work in Magic, where you usually only have three games to work with. So how can we apply the idea of purposeful tells and a “poker face” to Magic?
Tells, Intentional and Otherwise
Often when I hear Magic players discussing poker, they start to talk about one’s “poker face” in the sense of intentionally concealing their reaction to the cards they draw, or the plays of their opponent. Obviously this is part of poker, but this is relatively basic. The best players know how to intentionally mislead their opponent not by being stone-faced, but through purposeful deception. You think you have a read on your opponent – they have an Agony Warp. You attack in a way that minimizes the effect of Agony Warp, and they in fact do have the removal spell. In the next game, your opponent gives you that same “tell” and you know, you know they have Agony Warp again, and so you play around it. But what if they don’t have the removal spell this time? What if, in fact, they’re purposefully misleading you into attacking more deliberately or at a slower pace precisely because they don’t have it and need to buy time? What about the opponent that takes a mulligan to six, then to five, and sighs and says, “Guess I have to keep this one.” Is this an honest or deceitful reaction, or is your opponent just playing Ichorid?
These are obvious applications of intentional tells, but this strategy can also be subtle. For example, many players have nervous “tics” that they unintentionally use to pass the time during slower parts of the game (such as when their opponent is “in the tank” or searching their library). One of the most common is the shuffling of cards in their grip. If you have this habit, pay attention to it – your opponent might be. When do you do start doing this, and when do you stop? What changes in the game state cause you to engage in this habit? Are you unintentionally revealing something about your hand or the state of the game? Furthermore, if you repeatedly play Magic in the same store or geographic area and run into the same players repeatedly, can you use this previously unintentional tell to your advantage? Similarly, often discussed practical applications of this theory involve things like how long you read the card you’ve drawn.
Disruption
It can also pay dividends to intentionally disrupt the internal monologue of your opponent. Magic is a very complicated game, and most players need to keep a running thought process to focus themselves on the game and the lines of play they expect to see. Most players are familiar with the typical question, “Cards in hand?” Think about how these questions and statements can purposefully disrupt your opponent’s thought process:
“I just one more mana…”
“May I see your graveyard?”
“How cards are left in your library?”
“How many lands do you have untapped?”
“Let’s see if I can get the one more turn that I need…”
“This would be the perfect time to draw X.”
“Might as well try and attack here.”
“Obviously you’re going to counter this.”
“It’s a good thing that I don’t have card X in my sideboard.”
“I’m definitely keeping this hand if you don’t have X in your opening seven.”
Just as important as the disruption is the read that you can get on an unprepared opponent based on their reaction to the questions you ask. Obviously certain questions pay the most dividends when the question or action carries some weight. For instance, deliberately checking your graveyard when you play Makeshift Mannequin or Yawgmoth‘s Will in your deck, or checking your opponent’s graveyard when you play Jund Charm, can lead to a specific response from your opponent. Weaker players will immediately look through their graveyard when they draw Makeshift Mannequin. Average players will draw Makeshift Mannequin and already know what’s in their graveyard. Good players will purposefully check their graveyard when it would be strategically beneficial to have a Makeshift Mannequin whether they have it or not. A great player will engage in all of the above purposefully, and further is able to determine whether or not their opponent is actively engaged in this level of play. Remember that not every player is actively participating at this level, and many engage in it at some times but not others.
Calling Stations
In poker, some players will get into a hand and call all the way down regardless of how the board has changed. If they had the best hand (or, importantly, what they thought was the best hand) before the flop, or after the flop, they’ll refuse to believe they no longer have the best hand and will call any bet regardless of anything else going on. Many people play Magic the same way. It doesn’t matter if you’re telegraphing Cryptic Command, and that walking into Cryptic Command would be a complete blow-out – they’re going to play a certain way regardless of what you do. When you encounter this type of player, it is very important to recognize it and adapt your play accordingly. Similarly, you need to be able to differentiate when a player’s tells are exactly that: legitimate tells. You need to be able to figure out when your opponent really wants to know what’s in your graveyard because they’ve drawn something relevant, and when they’re doing it to throw you off your game or to get a read on you.
Probably the most explored area of comparison between poker and Magic has to do with odds and calculating outs. Playing to your outs is extremely important in Magic – just ask Craig Jones or Gabriel Nassif. Every hand you draw requires a tactical decision: is this hand good enough to win the game? Whether you consciously think about it or not, this decision is based on statistics, often related to the percentage of drawing lands or a specific card. Belcher is a deck that relies on a combination of these factors for maximum effect, in that it is set up to have a high likelihood of a powerful first turn play and it relies on the fact that even decks that play Force of Will have, on average, a lesser chance of access to Force of Will and a second blue card than the Belcher deck has of setting itself up for a win on the first turn**. Despite this, the technically proficient player is more likely to choose a deck like ANT if he or she wants to play this kind of strategy, because that deck provides both the opportunity to read an opponent and attempt to “go off” on the first turn, or to react and find the necessary pieces to combo out through resistance by way of Pact of Negation, Thoughtseize, or Orim’s Chant.
I’ve repeatedly stated that you “need” to know something in what I’ve written to this point, and I haven’t told you how, exactly, you’re supposed to know. There are two main ways to get better at these techniques. One is to watch people play, especially great players who engage in this type of activity. The other is to practice. The best way to do this is while playing a deck that you know inside and out, so that you don’t have to focus on the mechanical activity of the actual game and can use a larger percentage of your mental focus elsewhere. Again, this is what makes the great players so great – the better your shortcuts are, the less mental activity, the less “CPU %” needs to be used in the actual playing of the game, and the more attention you can pay to the information you and your opponent are intentionally and unintentionally providing.
You might think that you need to be a Pro player or a “Jedi Master” to use some of these skills, but in reality that’s not the case. These are simply additional tools that every player can add to their arsenal, and when combined with a thorough grasp of the rules and correct play mechanics, can yield immediate dividends for the right player. I know that much of this information has been covered in the past, but it seems particularly applicable during the current Standard PTQ season, where players are often on equal footing and minor advantages can sway a match. Hopefully I’ve given you something concrete and actionable for your next PTQ – let me know in the forums.
Until next week…
* One note on this: my initial takeaway from this tournament was that it was unlucky to draw that many lands in two consecutive games, and I was pretty upset. Once removed from the tournament itself, I actually tried to figure out what might have caused this to happen, as I felt (accurately or not) that I’d been experiencing significant issues with my mana in several consecutive events. When I say issues, I am referring specifically to mana flood and mana screw, not related to mulligan decisions but rather in my draws after those decisions were made, and not related to color issues due to incorrect deck-building. Rather than chalking this up to bad luck, I tried to figure out what factors under my control might be causing these issues to occur. I realized pretty quickly that I wasn’t experiencing this issue when playing draft, so what was the difference? I am terrible, just terrible, at shuffling cards, and sleeves exacerbate this problem. I hardly ever sleeve up my draft decks for small 8-man weekend drafts, and I can shuffle better without sleeves. At States, I used sleeves that weren’t all that old, but were definitely not new and exhibited some “stickiness” and were difficult to shuffle. Now, when I play tournaments, I do two things. One, I buy new sleeves, as they are easier to shuffle. Two, I shuffle a few times, and then I break my library in half and riffle shuffle the two halves, cutting between them and riffling together to make it clear I’m not running any shenanigans. This style of shuffling seems to give me more random results as I can more easily riffle thirty cards as compared to sixty. Luck exists, but so do bad habits and bad shuffling. Just something to consider.
** Related to this Belcher comment, understand that this isn’t to say that Belcher is that much more likely to resolve a first turn Empty the Warrens or Charbelcher than the opponent is to have Force of Will, but it is slightly more likely. This slight edge is small enough that in a long tournament like a Grand Prix, it is difficult to predict where you’ll land when it comes to statistical variance, which is beyond your control. This is what makes Belcher a great choice for a five-round event and not so great at a fifteen-round Grand Prix where you’re likely to have to play through Force of Will repeatedly on day 2.
Matt Elias
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Voltron00x on Xbox Live and SCG Forums