….with a fifteen-inch spike! I can live with the Game Loss™ but I think you’ll find that I occupy the moral high ground!
You know, it seems like four years since I last put an electronic crayon to the virtual coloring book that is the Internet (I ran out of flesh-tone a long time ago) and, being so out of practice, I found it quite difficult to stay within the thick black lines. What, in the name of Juzam, Maro, and Crosis have I been doing with all that accumulated time? What strange and wondrous pastimes have occupied by evenings, haunted my mornings, and squatted right through my weekends?
Well, I did have quite a lot of letters to write – to family, to friends, to neighbors, to friend’s neighbors, to the families of neighbouring friends and, unusually, to the cats of neighbors (expressing my intentions concerning my boots and their arses if they failed to cease and desist in their faecal-scattering, night-yowling, smug-faced general “being” in my sodding, and be-sodded, garden). I also took up extensive Charity Work™; every alternate weekend would find me in YMCAs, sheltered accommodation and railway arches:
Giving away Mirrodin block commons as an accompaniment to hot broth;
Teaching self-wetter mendicants* to “riffle shuffle” (snigger);
Coaching reformed drug-users in the art of constructing a solid mana base (with particular reference to mana fixers such as signets, “replacement lands”, Farseek etc); and,
Helping “ladies of the night” improve their technique (giving them Magic Fingers™, so to speak)
All the above and, of course, work. Work, work, work. Four years pumping end-users for “requirements” rather than pumping 1/1s for lethal damage. Still, this New Year™ sees me striding the leafy avenues and highways of London, Englandshire and, in the evenings, returning to my old M:tG Stomping Grounds (Ha – an up-to-date card pun!) with a renewed vigor for the old game.**
In an effort to bring myself up to speed, I spent a furious (frantic) week “boning up” on the Internet…
…and discovered that a great many interesting and admirable feats of Magical heroism have been achieved during my quattrannual absence; a new “book of records,” if you will. I felt it only appropriate that I celebrate my own return to this hobby with a celebration of those brave souls who have achieved so much for the sake of the game they love.
Fastest (Velocity – Not Duration) Game
(March, 2004) Two wing-walkers from Petit-Derriere, Montana (Felton Nougat and Markwell Mess-Geyser) decided to play their State Championship “grinder” final strapped to the fuselage of a Gypsy Moth flying three thousand feet above the tournament venue. Markwell, utilizing magnetized deck protectors, and took the match comfortably with a 2-0 result. Unfortunately, he was later disqualified (and banned for six months) when it transpired that the pilot, a close friend of his, was sky-writing the contents of Felton Nougat’s hand while the match was being played, thus giving Markwell a distinct advantage!
Slowest (Velocity – Not Duration) Game
(July, 1959) Sherpa Leashling, from the Kingdom of Nepal, holds this record by virtue of his reaching the summit of Everest and then kicking off an unsanctioned draft at the top of the world. Unfortunately, there was an avalanche when time was called on the round (somewhat exuberantly by the Level 2 Judge), and the five extra turns had to be played out in a glacier. Leashling and his opponent reported a draw thirty-nine years later when they re-appeared at the bottom of the mountain in the Moraine.
Most Dangerous Game
(Scourge Prerelease) Circus performer Vagina Antipasto leapt straight into the record books (and the Emergency Room) when she completed a Rochester draft while her head was placed in the jaws of a lion.***
Lowest Audience For Any Single Game
(January, 2005) Audience = Zero – even if you included the two players themselves: Tessa Derbavills and Mannfred Allseasons. Both were located in (separate) isolation tanks so that neither player knew
a) Whose turn it was;
b) What cards they had in hand;
c) What deck they were playing with;
d) What deck they were playing against;
e) How much time was left in the round, and;
f) Which tournament they were entered in.
The Assistant Chief Judge declared the whole debacle a draw when both Tessa and Mannfred transcended their physical forms, journeyed the Astral plane, and may (or may not) have been able to see each other’s cards in hand. Further controversy ensued when Mannfred mutated, under the influence of powerful hallucinogenics, into an amorphous, fleshy blob.
Most Damage Delivered In A Single Turn
(December, 2002) As Infinity™ is not permitted in any recursive Magical situation, it fell to Blaena Von Rugbyclub to set the benchmark for finite damage when he delivered 18,439,274,363 points with an unblocked, combo-ed Ornithopter. The weight of Community opinion is that this figure will be one nigh-on impossible to beat.
Least Damage Delivered In A Single Turn
(September, 2005) Connifer Thrustweasel committed the ultimate Magic faux-pas when, after setting up a near-infinite life-gain loop, she mistakenly named her opponent as the target of that gain. Luckily for the hapless Connifer, her opponent, Lars D’Hoevre, was equally dim-of-mind and nominated himself as the target of a recursive High-Tide/Braingeyser “draw 100,000 cards” effect and lost in the next turn because he’d been decked.
Most Surreal Game
(The Month of Sneeze, 1492) Salvador Dahl and Khorma Chameleon played an exhibition “fish” format draft over 633 rounds at Origins, 2003. The cards were scanned on to melted clocks; the matches were played with, and on, a variety of severed and mutilated human torsos, stick-legged giraffes, and the anthropomorphic representation of bar codes. All rulings were announced in Esperanto, by a tutu-clad Franz Kafka look-alike in an elephant’s-foot hat, and “the dream I had last night” was used for life counters.
Ciao, babies,
Tony Boydell
* – Tramps, hobos, wanderers, itinerants and “Kings of the Road” (trailer for sale or rent, rooms to let – 50c)
** – Much to my wife’s disdain! She thought I’d left all this cardboard nonsense behind and dreads having to endure a new era of interminable anecdotes concerning people she’s never met doing things she couldn’t give a stuff about in a place she’ll never visit at a time she’d rather be Making Poverty History or ironing my shirts.
*** – What a silly bitch.
Bonus Section (The Magic Equivalent of Special Features):
PARROT
(First published in the UK four years ago!)
A customer approaches the Cutting Edge Cards stand at Grand Prix Bourton-On-The-Water.
Customer: ‘Ello, I wish to register a complaint.
(Chad does not respond)
Customer: (raising his voice) ‘Ello, Miss!
Chad: What do you mean "Miss"?
Customer: I’m sorry, I have a cold. I wish to make a complaint!
Chad: We’re closin’ for lunch.
Customer: Never mind that, my Chad, I wish to complain about this pre-constructed deck what I purchased not half an hour ago from this very boutique.
Chad: (taking the proffered deck and casting a cursory glance over it) Oh yes, the, uh, Prosperous Bloom… What’s, uh, what’s wrong with it?
Customer: I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it, my lad. It’s dud! That’s what’s wrong with it!
Chad: No, no, you just haven’t shuffled it properly.
Customer: Look, matey, I know a dud deck when I see one, and I’m looking at one right now. (Looks Chad straight in his one good eye)
Chad: No, no, it’s not dud; you just haven’t shuffled it properly. Remarkable deck, the Prosperous Bloom, isn’t it, eh? Beautiful combo.
Customer: The combo don’t enter into it. It’s a total dud.
Chad: Nononononono, no, no! ‘E’s in need of a good riffle and maybe a couple of pile sorts.
Customer: (leaning back) All right, then! If it’s not sufficiently randomized, I’ll mix it up! (Shouting at the deck as he throws the cards all over the display cabinet in a frenzied sixty-card pick-up) C’mon, then, Squandered Resources and Natural Balance! Drain Life? I got a shed-load of mana to use on you right here!
(Chad secretes a Drain Life from a nearby folder so that it’s face up in front of the customer)
Chad: There you go – Drain Life! Now you can combo for the win!
Customer: No I can’t – you just put that there!
Chad: (indignantly) I never!
Customer: Yes you did!
Chad: I never, never did anything.
Customer: (dealing himself seven cards repeatedly) ‘Ello, combo! Testing! Testing! Testing! I’ve done over a thousand hours of Testing! This is your turn 3 alarm call! (Lays his cards on the table as he illustrates time and time again that the deck refuses to go off.) Now that’s what I call a dud deck!
Chad: No, no – you’ve just miscalculated the mana base at your disposal!
Customer: Miscalculated the mana base?
Chad: Yeah! You tried to go off without the appropriate pieces and it fizzled. The Prosperous Bloom fizzles easily.
Customer: Um…now look…look, mate! I’ve definitely ‘ad enough of this. That deck is definitely missing the required configuration – and when I purchased it not half an hour ago, you assured me that its total lack of game wins was due to it bein’ tired and shagged out after a long tournament.
Chad: Well, it’s, it’s…ah…probably pining for the old days of Type 2 and Extended
Customer: Pinin’ for the old days? What kind of talk is that? Look! Why did it lose to a sixty-card, land-only deck the moment I got it ‘ome?
Chad: The Prosperous Bloom is a solitaire Magic deck – it prefers to interact with itself until the last spell is cast, and if you misjudge the combo you’ll probably deck yourself or not do enough damage to your opponent. Remarkable deck, the Prosperous Bloom deck – took Pro Tour: Paris by storm, didn’ it?
Customer: Look, I took the liberty of examining the deck when I got home and I discovered that the only reason that it had beaten me during your demo was that you’d been palming the right cards!
Chad: Well, o’course I’d been palming the right cards. If I hadn’t made sure that the combo activated…Voom! Feeweeweeweee! (makes sign of throat being cut)
Customer: Voom?!? Mate, this deck wouldn’t voom if you gave it to Kai Budde! It’s bleedin’ ‘opeless!
Chad: No, no – it needs de-sideboarding.
Customer: It doesn’t need de-sideboarding – it’s badly built! This deck is no use! It has ceased to perform! It’s expired from the major environments and ended up in your trade folders! It’s a stiff – bereft of many of its integral components due to restrictions and bannings, it lies in pieces! If you hadn’t rigged the sales demo, it’d be in the bargain bucket! Its legendary invincibility is now ‘istory! It’s off the “Decks To Beat”! It’s out of the metagame; it’s shuffled (ha!) off the Tournament Reports and joined the Turbo-Necros! This – is an ex-deck!
Chad: (pause) Well, I’d better replace it, then (he takes a quick peek behind the counter) I’m sorry, Squire, but I’m right out of Pros/Bloom decks.
Customer: I see, I see, I get the picture.
Chad: I got a High Tide? Or a Megrim/Jar?
Customer: Is it tournament legal?
Chad: Nnnnnnot really.
Customer: Well, it’s hardly a bloody replacement, then, is it????!!!!???
Chad: (Holds up something in a Deck protector sleeve; assumes hushed, conspiratorial tone) Well …There’s always one of these.
Customer: Right. I’ll have that then.
END