Welcome back to Magic Puzzles. Before I throw this week’s challenge at you, let me tell you about the unique gift that I got for my most recent birthday. Imagine being able to take a piano lesson from Mozart, or perhaps being given Wushu instructions by Jet Li. The gift I received was in the same vein, but perhaps not so mainstream. So in honor of that, this week’s puzzles will be all about this particular art form…
The Ferrett is laboring under intense dental pain today, so in his place we have Eli Kaplan! He brings us a feisty TSP Sealed cardpool, and invites us all to play along at home. Do you agree with his card evaluations?
Grand Prix: Columbus is next week, and the format is Legacy. With all the talk of Hulk Flash, will the Legacy Community rise to the occasion and champion their format in a positive light? In this week’s edition of The Real Deal, Ben gives some tips about how to make the Grand Prix and the format appealing to non-Legacy regulars!
Plus, in Ben’s Corner: StarCityGames.com is bringing what to Grand Prix: Columbus?
Hello everybody, and welcome to a special guest host edition of The Magic Show. This week I’m on vacation at the beach with my family. Instead of leaving you high and dry, two avid fans of the show – Nick Miller and Reuben Dresler – are here to provide you with some viewing entertainment.
Sean has been steadily preparing for Grand Prix: Columbus for six months… only to see his plans dashed upon the hideous altar of Hulk Flash. Still, all is not lost, and today’s Magical Hack looks to update his deck of choice in the face of the possible turn zero kill. Is there anything that can be done to slow the ascent of the diabolical green menace? Sean certainly hopes so… read on to find out if he is right!
Countdown to Grand Prix: Columbus! Kevin Binswanger dispels some of the hype and myth about Flash, and tries to talk strategy and metagaming for Grand Prix: Columbus. Decklist? Discussion of policy for errata’ing and banning? It’s all inside.
I’m not the biggest fan of “opinions articles.” I was not hired to talk about how Green got hosed, or how Mike Long does not even belong in the conversation for the Hall of Fame. Still, there are some issues out there that casual writers need to chime in about. Today I have several mini-rants in me. Instead of writing them up, and putting them at the front of each of my next several articles, I am going to just toss them all out here at once, and then we can move on. Everybody ready?
This article is just about art, flavor text, and color. Seriously. If you want to read about mechanics, or casual decks, or the like, this isn’t for you, sorry. If you want the rant… well, it’s coming. But for now, we must make do with what we have. At the time of this writing, Future Sight was fully spoilered yesterday. This means I’m writing three weeks in advance — and that means that Future Sight is probably purchase-and-play legal right now. So it’s only five more articles from here before I can play with the cards myself. What better time, I suppose, to spout off angrily about things that matter the least in the game to the tournament scene?
Zac, it appears, has achieved the impossible. He’s gone infinite on Magic Online playing 4-3-2-2 Ninth Edition drafts! If you’re looking for some Limited Magic but you’re tiring of Time Spiral, maybe Ninth Edition is the format for you. It’s certainly been good to Zac. The secret of his success? You’ll have to read the article to find out!
Rivien takes a new look at a fringe Extended strategy today, utilizing two cards that he claims are criminally underused. While the deck won’t make waves on the tournament scene, it’s certainly some food for thought. Sadly, today’s Magic Grab Bag sees Rivien hanging up his metaphorical boots, and moving on to new challenges. I’ll let the man himself reveal why in his final article… good luck, fella! Don’t be a stranger!
Bennie brings us a potpourri of topics today, including the uselessness of Steamflogger boss, the etiquette behind Internet Messaging, and some Two-Headed Giant decks. He also shows us a draft deck that, quite frankly, made my eyes bleed… one that not even Craig Jones would play.
Protean Hulk. Flash. Those two cards strike fear into the heart of all Legacy fans planning the trip to Grand Prix: Columbus. However, all is not lost! In a refreshing departure from the recent barrage of Hulk Flash articles, Josh looks at the problem from the other side: if you’re not joining ‘em, how are you gonna beat em? Josh attempts to analyze the weaknesses in the Hulk Flash deck, and shows how it can — and WILL — be beaten.
The Ultimate Extended Tourney was a trial by fire of 32 of the top Extended decks of all time. It’s over, and we have a winner. That’s nice, but the winner in a format that never existed is not really relevant. Examining how and why decks did well in this format is relevant to anyone building decks for a new format, including Legacy for Grand Prix: Columbus, or Time Spiral Block Constructed for the PTQs.
Regionals is coming, so it’s time to knuckle down! Today’s Beautiful Struggle sees Mark in a reflective mood. In order to maximize our successes at the approaching National Qualifiers, we need to squeeze the most out of our prospective deck choices. By looking at some successful decks from tournaments past, Mark examines the strategies and thought-processes that propelled the winners to the final table…
E-mails, forum posts, and private messages in my StarCityGames.com mailbox provide me with some of my best inspiration. For example, one person recently asked me, in so many words, “Why do you hate Block Constructed with only two sets?” Because the Block’s not done yet. Sure, the Pros get to play a tourney with the two-set Block, but us regular folks don’t. So why should I waste time on the decks? Especially when the third set becomes legal on May 20th, and I have about ten million Standard decks to work on?
