It’s one week to the Extended Pro Tour, and Tiago has been busy honing his deck of choice for the upcoming battle. Of course, he’s tight-lipped regarding the hot Portuguese tech… instead, he shares his prerelease experience and takes us through a whopping three possible builds that sprang forth from his cardpool. If you’re looking for a Level 6 perspective on the new Sealed format, then look no further!
Hello everybody, and welcome to another edition of the Magic Show. This week we’re visiting Nashville, TN and Boston, MA to show you what real players think of the set, some thoughts from Magic artists Cyril Van Der Haegen and Rebecca Guay, and hopefully have some fun along the way.
Standard always does an interesting dance this time of year. Old favorites from the past two years march off into the mists of time to be forgotten with the rest. Old problems disappear just as abruptly, showing that even the most aggressively dominant decks come with an expiration date… I’m looking at you, Arcbound Ravager.
In a format as wide open as Legacy, there is a lot of room to find a deck you love and stick with it. This week, Adam discusses why this is a bad idea, and shares some insight into how this folly contributed to some serious scrubbing out. Plus, decklists!
Lorwyn, it seems, brings all the boys to the yard. Everyone wants to play with the new cards, and Steve Sadin is no exception. This coming weekend, he’ll be slinging spells in the Mockvitational, and invitation-only tournament that features a Lorwyn Standard section. Today, he shares some of his decks and preparations, plus a couple of Lorwyn Draft thoughts and ideas…
After a brief delay due to unforeseen circumstances, today we have Nick Eisel’s first look at Lorwyn! He walks us through his prerelease experience, sharing his card pool and thoughts on his eventual Top 8 build. He also highlights a few of the stronger cards in draft, and touches on the importance of the tribal theme, which will be a surefire cog in the Limited machine for weeks and months to come…
Chris Romeo takes a thoughtful stroll through the garden of Lorwyn, pointing out the cards and the combos that have recently piqued his interest. All the colors are trawled for hidden gems, and the flotsam is ritually derided in the signature Romeo style. Looking for the budget bombs in the coming Standard format? Chris has the article for you!
Brian David-Marshall caught up to me on Magic Online about a month ago and sent me a message: “How would you like to come up to NYC on October 6 to play in the top8magic Mockvitational?” Competitors? Lebedowicz, Chapin, and other luminaries will be turning out. Formats? Hey, I’ve always wanted to build my own block. Prizes? Amongst this crowd, what better prize could there possibly be than… bragging rights.
I am writing today’s article about some issues that I have with recent changes that Wizards have made, or chosen not to make, in light of Tenth Edition, Master’s Edition, and more. That’s all and well and good… however, Wizards had to go and change the nature of this article between its writing and its publication. I wrote about topics that have a resolution already. Well, some of them at least. That’s okay, because I can highlight some changes n places where they matter, and you can read my false predictions…
When a new set hits the shelves, Magic players the world over clamor for information on the strengths and weaknesses of the fresh cards. The Vintage crowd, of course, is no exception… except that their standards for possible playability are considerably higher. Today, Vintage World Champion Stephen Menendian takes a look at the highlights that Lorwyn has to offer our game’s most broken format…
The prerelease has passed, and we’re all eager to play both Draft and Sealed with the new cards. Benjamin Peebles-Mundy, fresh off a number of drafts with triple Lorwyn, introduces some of the strategies and synergies that we’ll come to embrace in the coming months. In order to lead by example, he presents a couple of successful Draft decks and explains why they put up a strong performance. There’s also a Sealed cardpool for us to investigate!
I love everything about this set. It was odd at first, because I hated Onslaught. The misapplication of the Morph mechanic made games too swingy, and I hate formats where you have to play eighteen or nineteen lands without too much to do with a flood. Then there was the fun “Commando-Craghorn-Zombie Cutthroat” debate which left you all-too-eager to slit your own jugular and drain into blissful oblivion, and all told I drafted a whole lot of Eighth Edition during that time period.
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…
Regular readers know I go nuts over every new set; I literally love each new Magic set, and for at least a little while, my favorite set of all time is the most recent Magic release. The reason why I’ve been a passionate fan of Magic year after year since I cracked open my first starter deck back in 1994 is the joy of discovering new cards, and brainstorming new card combinations and deckbuilding possibilities.
The Lorwyn Planeswalkers are extremely difficult to evaluate. Sure, they appear to be stupid in Limited… but how will their revolutionary new mechanics fare in the world of 60-card Magic? Will we have to rethink our strategies completely, or are they merely fuel for Tarmogoyfs? Adrian Sullivan attempts to guide us through the theoretical quagmire, breaking down the Planeswalkers into more manageable chunks…
