Tribal Thriftiness #66 – Double-Action Cascade
Tuesday, April 28th – Fresh off the Prerelease, Dave gives his opinion of Alara Reborn’s new Cascade mechanic, and looks at ways to minimize the inherent randomness of this cool new toy.
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Innovations – Developing Shortcuts for Thinking About Magic
Monday, April 27th – Magic Is perhaps the most complex game ever conceived. At any given point, players have a wealth of information to check and recheck. How can we maximize our ability to mine this information for strategic insight? Patrick explains the concept of shortcuts, allowing us to rewire our minds to help increase our chances for success.
So Many Insane Plays – Alara Reborn: A Vintage Set Review
Monday, April 27th – Multicolor cards and Vintage are not always compatible; the chances of them hitting the board on turn 1 is slim. However, Alara Reborn does offer up a couple of exciting Vintage playables, and a host of cards that could cause a splash under the right conditions. Stephen shares his thoughts on the stronger Vintage contenders in the new set…
Drafting With Olivier – Shards/Shards/Conflux #23
Monday, April 27th – Hall of Famer Olivier Ruel takes us through an 8-4 draft queue on Magic Online. He shares some comprehensive thoughts about both the picks and the games, and talks us through each step of the way! If you’re looking to improve your Limited game, this is the article series for you!
Constructed Criticism – The Pulse of Standard: Prepping for Regionals and PTQs
Monday, April 27th – The entire spoiler is out for Alara Reborn, and everyone seems ravenous for new technology for whatever format their heart desires. Pros rummage through articles and articles from various websites looking for Alara Block Constructed ideas, while average Joes pillage material for upcoming Pro Tour Qualifiers for PT: Austin, as well as Regionals. With all of this in mind, I figured I would begin by focusing on Standard, since this is the format most relevant to me.
Removed From Game – The Birth of Reborn
Monday, April 27th – Like most Magic players who were breathing last weekend, Rich went along to the festival of Prereleaseness. Having Deck Doctored and Gun-Slung his way to inordinate quantities of victories, Rich sets us a challenging pool, and gives some helpful advice to those of us who don’t have Shuuhei Nakamura on speed dial.
The Long & Winding Road – The Power Registry and Other Eternal Musings
Monday, April 27th – While it is true that Vintage contains the best of every piece of acceleration ever printed, it also contains every answer. The existence of Null Rod, Gorilla Shaman, Pithing Needle, Wasteland plus Crucible of Worlds, Magus of the Moon, Chalice of the Void, and so on not only allow “slower†decks to be played in Vintage, but they slow down the format as a whole.
Insider Trading – The Financial Value of Alara Reborn
Friday, April 24th – The Alara Reborn prerelease is here! Find out which cards Ben thinks are underpriced, which cards Ben thinks are overhyped, and which cards are the true sleepers of the set! Which Time Spiral card is going to be hot, hot, hot because of Alara Reborn? The only way to find out is to read Ben’s thoughts about the Financial Value of Alara Reborn!
PV’s Playhouse – Mulligans
Friday, April 24th – The art of correct mulligan decisions, alongside sideboarding, is one of our fair game’s forgotten skills. Today’s PV’s Playhouse sees Paulo tackle the subject with his usual rigor. He presents some handy tips on how to judge those sketchy hands, and brings us some interesting mulligan decisions to debate in the forums!
Drafting With Olivier – Shards/Shards/Conflux #22
Friday, April 24th – Hall of Famer Olivier Ruel takes us through an 8-4 draft queue on Magic Online. He shares some comprehensive thoughts about both the picks and the games, and talks us through each step of the way! If you’re looking to improve your Limited game, this is the article series for you!
The Magic Show #140 – Alara Reborn Arrives!
Friday, April 24th – Hello everybody, and welcome to another edition of the Magic Show. This week we’re going to be delving into Alara Reborn spoilers, and what can I say? This looks to be the best set in years to play and purchase. Future Sight-level goodness all around, we’ll look into just how good Cascade really is, and my favorite cards from the set. Let’s go!
Magical Hack – Alara Reborn Prerelease Primer
Friday, April 24th – Whenever Prerelease time rolls around, I like spend my column on the before taking a look at the ins and outs of that upcoming format, taking advantage of the fact that my weekly deadline is usually a day or two after the complete spoiler is compiled by mtgsalvation.com. As of the time of this writing it is Wednesday afternoon and we have 145 out of 145 cards spoiled, and while there is no guarantee that each and every card has the exact correct text it is still more than enough to work with in order to figure out how Shards of Alara-Alara Reborn Limited is going to feel.
You Lika The Juice? – Alara Reborn Conversations
Friday, April 24th – Hello, everyone – I’m here to announce that Happy Bennie is back! I know over the last few columns my attitude may have been a bit of a downer given that the metagame was stinking and stagnant once you peeled back the veneer of so-called diversity. What a difference a week makes!
The Kitchen Table #282 – Divine Vs. Demonic
Friday, April 24th – Hello folks, and welcome back to the column that investigates various aspects of the casual world. Today I want to discuss the Divine Vs. Demonic decks after having played with them after I got the set from my order with StarCityGames. Luckily, I have a few staff who like the occasional game of Magic, so I was able to get some games in with the new decks, facing off against each other.
Reflecting Ruel – Discussing Draft #1: Esper, Grixis, and Jund in Shards of Alara
Friday, April 24th – In the first of a four-part series on Shards Block Draft, Olivier Ruel and Manuel Bucher discuss the top common and uncommon picks in each set, for each archetype, helping us build the strongest decks we can. For part 1, Oli and Manu take us through their personal Top 20 lists in Esper, Grixis, and Jund. This excellent series is a must-read for anyone serious about forty-card play.