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AuthorDan Paskins

Dan is credited with having co-created the deck now known as "Blue Deck Wins". Through his articles, Dan hopes to encourage even more players to discover the fun of playing Islands and attacking with little Blue men.

Study and Grow Strong – Tournament Reports

I will read most articles about Magic on the internet. From strategy for formats which I shall never play to theory I don’t understand, I find them all fascinating. But my favorite kind of article, by far, is the tournament report. I understand from my editor that tournament reports aren’t the most popular kind of article, but whether you are a Pro Tour wannabe or a casual player interested in good stories about the game we all enjoy, a well-written report has got to be at least as much worth a read as yet another of those boring strategy articles about Red Deck Wins or a discussion about Magic ethics.

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Making Sure Your Red Deck Wins

Every year, there is one deck which does much better in the Pro Tour Qualifiers than it does in the Pro Tour. Two years ago, only two people played it at the Pro Tour and in the following qualification season it won a Grand Prix and qualified dozens of players for the following Pro Tour. Last year, its highest finish at the PT was 9th, and yet again, despite all the powerful decks, it was one of the dominant decks in the qualifiers. And this year it was one of the best decks at the Pro Tour. All of which means that even if you have no intention of playing the Red Deck, this is still a deck which you need to know all about.

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How To Win In Every Tournament You Enter

Last week, I had a very upsetting experience. I sat down to read the daily articles on StarCityGames.com, and the first one that I read was just simply wrong. From reading the forums, it seems that quite a number of you folks had comments to make about the article I mean. Here’s my take on this issue, and as an incentive to read it, I’ll throw in a free guide at the end on to how to win at every tournament you enter.

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Autopilot

I’ve always been a believer in the idea that you learn more from defeats than from victories. Which means, over the years, that I’ve learned an awful lot. There’s a particular problem which I’ve known about for years, and which I’ve seen cost players a lot of games, but which I’ve found hard to explain properly. It’s when you lose because you are on autopilot. Let me try to explain what autopilot is.

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Preparing for States: What would Dave Price and Jamie Wakefield Do?

Magic: the Gathering Champs logoDan is back to deliver you not just one, but two different decks, just in time for States. He starts off by channeling Jamie Wakefield to deliver you the best Green deck he could come up with for current Standard, and then tells you what deck he will be playing on Saturday. This article is an absolute must read, because even if you already know what you are playing this weekend, your opponents might not, and Dan’s decks have a habit of changing the metagame.

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The 2004 Championship Deck Challenge: FireblastFireblast

Red week continues for our deck challenge, with renowned Red Deck master Dan Paskins (along with playtest partner John Ormerod) chiming in with his take on a viable Red monstrosity for States. In addition to championing a deck of his favorite color, Dan also takes a look at an unexpected deck that he says just might have some potential in future Standard environments. Curious as to what the mystery deck is? The answer is only a click away.

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Ha Ha, Dead Elf

Magic: the Gathering Champs logoI thought it might be interesting to detail how I started from scratch to test a new format, and which decks I am currently testing. In the course of this article, I will present three different decks for your consideration. None of these decks are the finished article, they have all received some testing and seem to be based on sound principles, but you’ll need to test and adapt them further before they are tournament ready. Oh, and I’ll also explain the rules of the game “All Elves Must Die!” a classic tournament subgame that’s fun for Red Mages the world over.

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My Mistake at English Nationals and the New Decks to Beat

Rather than write a narrative report about how I did at Nationals, which would be a short and bitter report, this article will invite you to identify the mistakes that I made, and hopefully use that as a way of discussing how to choose a deck in situations just after the release of a new expansion set, when the metagame is harder to predict. As a bonus, I’ll use the results of English Nationals to put together a”Decks to Beat” compilation, to use as reference when choosing which decks to test against (or play, if you lack the time or motivation to test).

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Translating Testing to Results

Success or failure in a Magic tournament is not decided over 1,000 games played in your living room before the tournament. Success or failure will depend on a very small number of games, and on one or two incidents during those games – choosing whether or not to mulligan, choosing which cards to sideboard in or out, deciding which creatures to attack with or which spell to cast on your fourth turn, little things like that. Your testing, therefore, needs to focus on preparing you to make those decisions.

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Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Circle?

Today, the story of why I am not afraid of Circle of Protection: Red, Silver Knight, Worship, Pulse of the Fields, or any other stupid White cards.

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Sitting Dead Red for Regionals

Basically, this deck takes the best deck from Onslaught Block and improves it significantly with powerful cards from Mirrodin Block. In contrast, both Goblin Bidding and Ravager Affinity are basically decks constructed from one block. In addition, if you read about the Bidding decks, you’ll see over and over again that even the people who play them admit that the Bidding itself is rarely that good in important matchups. I know it is cool to bring back lots of Goblins, but leave the ever so clever combos to decks which need to rely on such tricks to win. Red decks don’t need that nonsense to win.

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