Last weekend, I played in the online Rise of the Eldrazi Prerelease. Between rounds, I skritched the dogs, made lunch and otherwise killed time. I thought about past prereleases and release events. After some quick math, I realized that this was probably my fiftieth set release event. That’s a decent excuse to get nostalgic, so come with me while I wander through history.
I didn’t play I the first prerelease. I started playing Magic after Revised, I’m not sure how much. I remember buying Chronicles, but just for play at home. I started playing in store tournaments around the end of Tempest / early Saga, and my first sanctioned events were spring of 1999.
I know — that’s so last century.
Urza’s Destiny
My first release event was a four-round unsanctioned sealed tourney, held at midnight the day the product went on sale. We each got several — four or five, I forget — boosters of Urza’s Destiny. We did not get a mix of Saga and Destiny, just Destiny. All I remember about that event was how stupid all Destiny was. The set had lots of enchantments and artifacts — and Destiny had remarkably few ways of killing either. I lost to Opposition — once it hit, it was game over. On the other hand, my Treachery was golden, and the opponent with Masticore was really unhappy when I stole it.
That event convinced me never to draft triple small sets if I could avoid it. Online, however, I have ended up drafting triple small set, since it is an easy way to get cards.
Starter 1999
To the best of my knowledge, Wizards didn’t have an official prerelease, or any sort of release event, for Starter. We had an informal one. It was not exciting. I think seeing Vizzerdrix beating down hard — and realizing it was about the best card we had opened — soured us on the idea. We abandoned sealed play and shifted back to Constructed or something after two rounds at most.
Starter wasn’t black bordered, just boring.
Mercadian Masques
This was the first actual prerelease Ingrid and I attended. We drove up to the Twin Cities — the first time we had travelled over 300 miles to a Magic event. It was also our first Legion event — but certainly not our last. Legion Events rocked. The line was long, but it moved. The crowd was huge, and we got to play in a couple events. Almost everything about the event was great — although the cards were not at all impressive. It was Masques, after all. I remember a lot of 3/3s for five mana, and having nothing that could stop fliers. I also remember that Rebels seemed much better than the Mercenaries I had.
I knew, after that first big event, we were hooked on prereleases. The events were a blast. The competitiveness was far less than what we had been used to (admittedly, the store were we usually played was not typical. In my first Standard event, in four rounds, I play three players with pro points, with several qualified for Worlds, and one future Hall of Famer). Whatever – the prereleases were just a ton of fun.
Nemesis
Our first prerelease was amazing, and we really had intended to travel to the next one, but we had a blizzard that weekend. Driving 350 miles through the snow, to play for a bunch of hours, then drive back that night — it seemed a bit much. We missed this one. Ingrid and I just bought a bunch of boosters when the set was released and played pack wars. We missed out on playing — and facing — Lin Sivvi. Can’t say I missed that. I played against that Legend far too much at the PTQs.
We made it to this prerelease, and I had a fine deck. I had plenty of stuff to stall the game long enough to get Avatar of Woe into play. Yes, that was a bomb, and yes, I did win. I also had Rhystic Study, and I played against several people who didn’t want to pay the extra mana. I have loved playing Rhystic Study in multiplayer games ever since.
On the down side, the prerelease foil for this event was Avatar of Hope.
Starter 2000
We had learned our lesson. I don’t know of anyone that played a prerelease or release event for this thing. Not surprising — Starter was not aimed at established players.
Invasion
We played at the Chicago prerelease for this one. The venue was not quite as nice, but the drive was a couple hours shorter.
I had learned to draft competitively in Masques block, but Masques really wasn’t all that much fun. Rebels, Rebels, and more Rebels, if you fought for them, or annoying ground pounders and silly cards. Masques was just boring, and everyone was thrilled to have a new block to play with. The fact that cards like Recoil, Fact or Fiction, the pro-color bears, Armadillo cloak, etc. etc. etc. were all interesting, and the fact that we were playing a multicolored format with adequate mana fixing, was great. Old timers talk about how Invasion saved Magic. After Combo Winter and Pro Tour: Rebels, that’s not just hype. At the very least, Invasion was like coming inside to air conditioning, a shower, and a cold drink after a long, hot, hard day’s work.
Planeshift
We were back in the Twin Cities for this release, and loving it. I got one of the most insane sealed decks I have ever seen at this event. I had pretty much every good removal spell in the set, most in multiples. Here’s a quote from my report.
I’m playing a opponent with a lot of fliers and am getting beaten down by three medium-sized ones. I cast Flametongue Kavu, a 4/2 creature that does four damage to target creature, and blow out a flier. Next turn, I cast a Horned Kavu, bounce the Flametongue, then recast him to blow out another flier. My opponent winces, and his friend comments that the combo is pretty good. I agree, apologize, and do it again next turn, killing his last defender. This time the friend says, “That’s just wrong.”‘ Next turn I apologize profusely, Terminate a brand-new blocker, swing for a bunch, then cast Shivan Wurm and return the Flametongue yet again. Unreal.
Ingrid and I came home with plenty of packs.
Seventh Edition (end of Counterspell, Engineered Plague, Duress, etc.)
Seventh Edition, although we did not know it at the time, was the final outing for a lot of staple cards, like Counterspell and Engineered Plague. What we did know was that a lot of other Sixth Edition staples, like Enlightened, Mystical, and Vampiric Tutors, were already gone. On the plus side, we got some tools back — Opposition is one that springs to mind.
No release events — having Seventh go on sale really only impacted Constructed formats. We played a couple pack wars at home, but that is not the same.
By the time Apocalypse rolled around, we were used to multi-colored decks and cool cards. What impressed us during Apocalypse were the enemy color cards. Prior to Apocalypse, Wizards just didn’t do that. Enemy painlands, Vindicate, Pernicious Deed, Spiritmonger — the list of tournament staples from that set goes on and on.
The prerelease foil was Fungal Shambler. Not great, but it was actually playable in casual Constructed.
Odyssey
I have no real memory of playing at this prerelease. I have plenty of memories of the cards that Odyssey contained. I remember Psychatog. I remember Upheaval. I wrote a whole article b*tching about that card. I remember Wild Mongrel and madness. I just don’t remember the prerelease, and I didn’t write about it.
I do remember the venue the prerelease was held in. The TO had scheduled a decent one, but a few scant weeks before the prerelease, he was told that the scheduled venue had been double-booked, and he could not use that. After a bunch of scrambling and long-distance calls from Madison, a friend told our TO about an empty store that he could rent. However, the store wasn’t just empty, it was gutted. The floor tiles, the ceiling, even the plumbing and lighting had been removed. Light — what there was — came from trouble lights strung on the metal rafters. Worst venue ever — and I have seen some bad ones.
The prerelease foil for Odyssey was Stone-Tongue Basilisk. It was marginally more playable than the equipment from Mirrodin block, but not much. One notable feature, though, was that almost no one could read the foil. Wizards was highlighting the multinational appeal of Magic, and the prerelease card was printed in Hebrew or Arabic. Other prerelease foils from this era were printed in other languages.
It was Black. About all I remember was wondering if the TO was going to run out of Swamps. I vaguely remember that my pool was so short on Black that I ended up GW — which would have been far more appropriate in the next set. Looking at my match history, I went 2-1 in the first event, and 6-1 in the next. You’d think I’d remember that.
Judgment
I remember this event. In the main, I was smashed by Scalpalexis. I had nothing to deal with a flier in my entire pool, and it decked me in a couple hits. Game 3 he got Scalpalexis down on turn 5 again. I was so pissed off that I dropped and went to draft in side events — where my opponent dropped another turn 4 Scalpalexis and milled away my removal. All I remember about this prerelease is that I didn’t open any Wishes, and that I got killed by a stupid Blue flier. (I did a lot of ranting about Blue, back around that time. Scalpalexis is partly why.)
Looking back over my match history, it looks like this was when Legion Events started running multiple 32-man pods, instead of one big prerelease event. I like pods — I usually managed to play in at least two per day, even if I play all four rounds in each pod. More pods meant more cards — and more cards was the whole point of a prerelease, after all.
Onslaught
Ingrid was judging by now — had been a regular judge for Legion events since Odyssey — but I was still playing. That meant I had a foot in each world. I tended to hear behind the scenes stuff indirectly, and in bits and pieces. This was a two-day event, and Ingrid and I had a hotel room for Saturday night, but there was rumor that Sunday might be cancelled. Somehow the order had got screwed up, and Wizards had not shipped enough product. However, Steve Port had been working the phones and managed to borrow some product from Pastimes in Chicago, and then arrange transport. Someone drove that product to the Wisconsin / Illinois border, where someone else drove it halfway across Wisconsin, then turned it over to a third person for the last couple hundred miles. Disaster averted.
Legions
I remember enjoying this tournament. One play sums up why.
Me: “Play my foil Daru Stinger. Reveal two other soldiers and two more Stingers.”
Him: “What does that do?”
Me: “The Stinger gets a counter for every soldier I reveal, so it will be a 5/5. And it taps to deal four damage to any attacking or blocking creature.”
Him: “And next turn you’ll cast another one.”
Me: “Pretty much.”
Him: “Not against me.” *scoop*
It is a whole lot more fun when you are winning, and a winning is a whole lot easier with a broken deck.
Scourge
I was playing in this event, but it felt like I was judging. I kept having to explain things at great length to my opponent — simple things.
“Carbonize your dude.” “Okay.” “It’s removed from the game.” “Whut?” “Carbonize — if it kills a creature, the creature is RFGed.” “But doesn’t it kill the guy?” “Yes, then it removes it from the game.” “Oh. Okay.” “Right — so you need to take the dead guy out of your graveyard.” “Uh… why?”
I also remember that Nightmares had been around for a while now, but people kept killing them in response to the RFG trigger, then being surprised at the result.
Sure, it was a prerelease. Everyone always misunderstands cards at the prerelease. This time people just seemed far dumber that usual.
Eighth Edition
This was the first time that a Core set had a big, well publicized release event. Eighth Edition was scheduled to be released to correspond with Magic’s Tenth Anniversary. It was a celebration and retrospective. Eighth Edition was to have at least one card from every (tourney-legal) set ever released. The lead-up hype featured “You Choose,” where people could vote for cards on the flagship site. (This demonstrated the perils of democracy, when Glorious Anthem beat out Crusade, etc.) This was also the set where Wizards declared that two one-mana Green accelerants were too much, so we could choose either Birds of Paradise and Vine Trellis or Llanowar Eves and Utopia Tree.
Sigh. Wizards seems to have changed its mind, since we have four on mana accelerants at the moment: Llanowar Elves, Birds of Paradise, Arbor Elves, and Noble Hierarch.
We played in a couple of 8E release events at GenCon that year. We got little round life counters. I found one in the back of a drawer the other day. Beyond that, I don’t really remember much. GenCon kinda blends together, except for certain events that really stand out. For that GenCon, what I remember was declaring “I’ll take off all my clothes and learn to play the ukulele.” (That did not happen in a Magic event.)
Mirrodin
This was the first prerelease where I was officially judging. I had no choice — my multiplayer group had been playtesters for Mirrodin and we were not allowed to compete until a month or so after the set was released. Judging was better than staying home. I passed my L1 exam and put on a judge shirt.
The event itself was fun. The playtesters had included me, Ingrid, Barry and Chris Richter. We were all judging. We would keep coming together and talking about card we had seen in playtest, usually calling them by their playtest names. “Dude — he had Piggyback Helmet, and it was as good as we expected.”
I also got a complement on how well I understood the new mechanics. At that point, I was still negotiating with Randy Buehler on whether we could tell people we had been playtesters, so all I could do was smile and thank him for the complement.
Darksteel
I can’t remember whether I judged or played at this one. Frankly, I can’t remember the event at all. I do have a Prerelease foil, though, so I was there. Mirrodin block had a set of foils — the Sword of Kaldra, the Shield of Kaldra, and the Helm of Kaldra. If you got them all in play, you got a Kaldra token. I never saw these played outside of casual games, and very rarely in casual at that.
If you had the Helm, the Sword and the Shield of Kaldra all in play at once, you put a legendary 4/4 colorless Avatar creature token named Kaldra onto the battlefield and attached the Equipment to it. With the equipment, the token would be a 9/9 with Haste, First Strike, Trample, and have “if this deals damage to a creature, remove that creature from the game.” Both the equipped creature and the equipment would also be indestructible. Total cost of all three pieces of equipment: 9 mana.
The combo basically built an Eldrazi — a few years before the real thing.
Fifth Dawn
I judged this one. At this point, I had figured out two things. First, judging was not all that bad. Second, I tended to come home with more product received as judge payment than I could playing.
I remember having to explain how the stack worked. Darksteel came out in January, 2004. Sixth Edition rules — and the stack — were introduced in April, 1999. The guy was just a bit out of date on his rules knowledge.
Champions of Kamigawa
To paraphrase Sgt. Schultz, “I know nutting! I remember nutting!” I was playing a lot of Extended and Five-Color around this time, and the Kamigawa prerelease was just not that interesting.
Sometime around here Legion Events got permission to run a prerelease in Madison, in addition to the Minneapolis events. At that point, Chris Richter, who has relatives near the Twin Cities, would run the events up there, and Ingrid and I would run the Madison events. Later on, Steve got some more judges up north and Chris came back home, but Ingrid and I stayed with the Madison events. I was the bubble judge — if the number of players was high, I judged. If not, I would take off my judge shirt and play.
Worked fine for me either way.
I’m about halfway through this and I have a ton more events to talk about, but I’m past deadline. If I drag it out any further, Craig will shoot me. I’ll cut it off here and finish next week.
PRJ
“one million words” on MTGO.