Sort of an end of the year mishmash today. I played in Lorwyn PTQ. I can do a mini tournament report. The leagues I was monitoring ended. I have stats. The two topics fit together like toothpaste and differential equations, so it’s all good.
I went. I participated. I lost a total of two matches in five days. That would have been amazing, if I had been a competitor. I was a judge. Let me tell you about that. I’ll even explain how I became Lithuanian for an hour, and about the single best job a judge can have. Oh, and some people played Magic. I may mention that, too.
I was curious about how the lag time and various MTGO problems have affected league play. I decided to join some leagues and check out the quality of the competition, how long I have to wait for games, how often new leagues spawn, the number of players, the payout, etc. I might even open some useful cards.
I spent last weekend at a Vintage tournament. This week, I read that Masters Edition One will stop being sold online in January, Weatherlight will be released online in December, and that Masters Edition II is coming. All of this raises the question: are these old sets worth anything at all? The simple rule is that the more cards a format has, the fewer cards that are actually playable.
Last weekend I went from the newest format to the oldest, and back again. Both went pretty well. The old stuff: I judged the StarCityGames.com Vintage event in Chicago. The new stuff: drafting Lorwyn online. I’ve got some comments, some observations and some anecdotes. Enjoy – I did.
I have looked through a fair number of the Top 8 decklists from States, and I haven’t found the combo decks. I haven’t seen any. Am I just missing something, or are they really not present? More importantly, is there a combo deck people just haven’t seen yet? Hint – I think so.
Wisconsin States was last weekend. I have decklists. I was Head Judge, so I have a few anecdotes from the event, plus decklists. I have a few thoughts on the format, plus decklists. I also compiled stats of the Top 16 decks. Most importantly, I have even more decklists!
For a variety of reasons, I will be judging this coming weekend, not playing. I’ll babble a bit about what I would have played, then list five sure-fire ways to lose at States (in addition to playing my decks.) Everybody should them already — but I’m sure I will watch at least a ten percent of the field lose to one or more of these on Saturday. [Editor’s Note: Congratulations on article 200, Pete! Here’s to article #300!]
Pro Tour: Valencia is over. The results are in. Where does Extended go from here? What does Lorwyn do to the format? Should we care — and is it worth the price? Let’s look at some numbers…
I don’t really want to reopen the ideological debate. Debating beliefs is pointless — debate is a rational exchange of data attempting to prove something, while beliefs, by definition, are idea held despite a complete lack of proof. Instead, I’ll look at data, and let people draw their own conclusion. It’s also a retrospective — I’ll look at creatures every few sets from Alpha to Lorwyn.
Ravnica, for all practical purposes, has rotated out of Standard. People are working on new-Standard decks for States, which is just a couple of weeks away. A few staple cards will be leaving — but the biggest change will be to manabases. Let’s look at what goes, and what stays…
Like most of the Magic world, I have been looking forward to Lorwyn. I have the spoiler. I also have written a lot of set reviews over the years — and I tend to get them wrong as often as right. I’m not going there. Instead, I’ll look at Magic Online’s old school, throwback set, and try an old school, throwback deck design to use those cards.
Last week, I wrote about how Masters Edition was probably not cost effective. It was a long weekend, doing a lot of non-Magic stuff, so I ended up kicking back and playing in a couple MED events anyway. I’ll look at those a little, then talk about online Extended. Online Extended is not quite Bizarro World Extended, but it is not quite Paper Extended either.
Two and a half years ago, I first downloaded MTGO, started playing and wrote my Diary of an OnLine nOOb series. I’ve been playing ever since — a lot. I want to step back and see what the online game is like, how it has affected my paper play, and where it is going.
A lot of players, many forum trolls, and some judges have a lot of misconceptions about what Magic judges are, and what their job is. I want to talk about that a little — about what a judge should do, and should not do. I’ll also look at issues like burden of proof and judicial certainty – and explain why they don’t apply to judging Magic. I’ll also throw out a couple scenarios, to illustrate how these principles apply.
