Zac Hill enjoyed the Standard portion of the Pro Tour in a unique and deeply rewarding way! He’s a born educator, and we’re honored to bring him on this week to teach you an amazing way to understand and tackle formats!
In this exclusive and fascinating report, Zac Hill talks about the wild experience that is covering Magic’s biggest stage! He discusses the nuances, the benefits and detriments, and speaks a little about the next step in his Magic journey.
Need a deck to play in an upcoming PTQ? Zac Hill doesn’t think his deck choice is the best in a vacuum, but that it nonetheless might be the best deck to actually play in an event – no one lives in a vacuum anyway!
Need a deck to play in an upcoming PTQ? Zac Hill tells you about his Grixis Delver list and why he thinks it’s one of the best decks in Modern right now.
Zac Hill, former R&D member, worked at Wizards of the Coast for about 3 years before leaving for The Future Project in NYC. Why? is the question on everyone’s minds.
Wednesday, July 8th – For his final article for StarCityGames.com, Zac Hill waxes lyrical over his self-made transformation from student to Wizards of the Coast employee. He also shares his Top 4 Standard list from Malaysian Nationals. Thanks for all the great articles, Zac!
Wednesday, July 1st – The best advice ever given to anyone about Magic is the statement, “Focus on what matters.†Of course, that’s cheating, though, because clearly if you know what matters already then you don’t really need to worry about figuring out what to focus on.
Wednesday, June 24th – I feel like most Constructed decks are terrible. This is not meant in the same way that a lot of articles repeatedly emphasize that most players are terrible. Nor is the point to make some objective like declaration about power-level by saying that people play too many ‘bad cards’ or that most decks do ‘bad things.’
Wednesday, June 10th – How do you talk about something like this while remaining fully honest? With yourself, with the people who take the time to read you? I ran hot. I played well, but I don€™t want to claim that I attained some newfound mastery. Bloodbraid Elf was clearly the best card in the format, so we played more and better Bloodbraid Elves.
Wednesday, May 27th – I am known to hate a spot removal spell. Occasionally you get something like Skred, sure, that is just so unbelievably good that I’ll swallow my pride and mark a 4 next to it on the deck-reg sheet. But even then I have to suppress a chuckle when people are talking about it as ‘the best card in the format.’ It kills a dude. Awesome.
Thursday, May 21st – I was talking with Anna a few days ago about a big part of my Magic game that bothers me: I get really sloppy when I’m winning. She was interested to note, she said, that almost never was a guy fully on top of his game when he played against a girl…
Wednesday, May 13th – I do not employ hyperbole when I say that the positioning of a Booster Draft deck is one of the least-understood, least appreciated, least talked-about skills in Magic amongst your average PTQ-level players.
Wednesday, May 6th – Today, we’re talking about the mechanics of how people are affected by space. This article is about how we can most effectively manipulate the tournament environment – or, more commonly, how we can best accommodate the realities of that tournament environment by changing some of our own habits – to be most conducive to our success.
Wednesday, April 29th – The reason I hate the term ‘answer’ for cards like Plumeveil is threefold. One, it makes it seem like once you’ve answered a ‘question’ you’re somehow at parity, when in reality you’re pretty far ahead. Three, the term ‘answer’ makes it sound like every card in your deck is supposed to resolve a specific question, when in reality the whole value of cards like Counterspell or Plumeveil is their inherent versatility; that is, they don’t care what question you’re asking.
Monday, April 20th – I had a great conversation earlier this week about why certain types of people play certain decks. I myself will play anything that wins, of course, but I feel tremendously uncomfortable playing the style of midrange Green deck that a lot of people seem to enjoy immensely. I can theorize all day about why it is I don’t usually find those decks suitable, but much of the preference certainly comes down to ‘feel.’
