In this final installment of Ben’s interview with the King of Fatties, find out what games Jamie has been playing recently, what he thinks of his old arch-nemesis Geordie Tait, and the answer to the question,”If I were to pay entry for you and Mare, would you two consider playing in the Champions of Kamigawa Prerelease?”
If Shared Triumph doesn’t win the vote this week, Ben Bleiweiss will eat the card. Or maybe he already has!
Ben’s interview with the reclusive Jamie Wakefield continues! Find out how Jamie got the nickname King of Fatties, why he always played 62 cards in a deck, and the woes of the color Green inside!
Years ago, Jamie Wakefield was the most popular Magic writer anywhere. His books still go for $100 on eBay, and and when Mike Flores pretended to be Jamie on April Fool’s Day, we were flooded with emails from disappointed fans who thought that the King of Fatties himself had returned.
Well, this is the real deal! Ben Bleiweiss has finally tracked Jamie down. Find out what Jamie has been doing for the past five years, and hear his thoughts what he thinks about Green these days! Plus, an update on the lovely Mare!
There have been a plethora of changes in the Magic world over the past week – Wizards of the Coast released a new banned and restricted list, MagictheGathering.com began previewing Champions of Kamigawa cards, and the entire Legends rule was changed. Last things first, shall we?
Pro Tour: New York ‘99 took place on the weekend of April 31st. The format was Urza Block Constructed, with Urza’s Saga and Urza’s Legacy being the only two sets released in the block thus far. Team Tulane had been hard at work practicing the format with the inclusion of Legacy, and we felt very confident in our abilities to win so we made a bold decision: we would fly up to New York with the sole intent of money drafting pros on the side.
Bleiweiss tries on a new sales pitch in his latest attempt to either get you to vote his way or drive you all criminally insane. You have to see this one to believe it!
The highlight of the weekend, and one of the highlights of my Magic playing career, came on the Sunday after the Pro Tour ended. We arranged a four-on-four draft between some Texan/Lousiana players versus a Pro Tour ringer team which included Jon Finkel, Brian Hacker, Hammer, and one of Brian’s regular draft partners.
This is it, the moment you’ve all been waiting for. The crack staff at StarCityGames.com has designed the ultimate gamer party game: Brian Kibler Bingo! Amaze your loved ones and laugh along with your friends as you play what is obviously the greatest game of all time. Get your copy of Brian Kibler Bingo now, because supplies are limited and when we run out Brian Kibler Bingo will be gone, gone, gone!
I’m horrible with directions. I get lost going from my house to work at StarCityGames.com, and I live right around the corner. The stories of me losing my way on the road are legendary, and so it’s imperative that I have a good navigator to get me to where I need to go. Here are a couple of stories about trips to Magic tournaments where my own navigational skills have let me down
The road trip. It’s a time honored tradition in which you get a bunch of your buddies together, cram into a small car, and talk about Magic for several hours while you drive to the PTQ/Grand Prix/Pro Tour/bathitorium. Road trips are part of the reason many people play Magic – it’s an opportunity to travel with your friends for several hours, with nothing to do but shoot the breeze. Friendships are formed on these drives, tech is distilled, and many a fast food meal is consumed. Every now and again, you’ll get a minor inconvenience, but it’s those truly horrific road trips that not only stick out in the mind long after the tournament has ended, but also make for good stories and bonding experiences.
For this week’s dilemma, we have the earth-shaking choice between two amazing spells: Animal Magnetism and Weird Harvest. Let me tell you that this is, without a doubt, the hardest choice we’ll have to make as a community during the entire Selecting 9th Edition promotion.
I liked playing this deck so much more than Affinity. It had game against every deck in the field – it could burn away Affinity creatures, wasn’t very vulnerable itself to the artifact hate of Freshmaker and U/G Shard, could counter key spells again Tooth and Nail, Ironworks, and B/G control, and could out-creature and out-counter Big Red. I began winning again – although I had dug myself into a huge hole with my Affinity venture, Cheesequake was the meal which nourished me back to a non-embarrassing 1650. Please, do not ask how badly I had fallen. Let’s just say that breaking 1600 was a cause for celebration.
Ben’s taking the day off today, but Blog Fanatic will return tommorrow. In the meanwhile, Ben was kind enough to put together a fully indexed list of all his previous Blog Fanatic columns!
One day at Neutral Ground, Hashim and Jon (Finkel) were playing a game of Magic. Jon was a bit of a rapscallion back then, and was in the habit of tossing pens at people, just to bother them. On this occasion, he threw a pen at Hashim. The pen went past Hashim’s glasses, and hit Hashim right in the eye. Both of them froze. Jon had a look of panic in his eyes…
