With his Level 5 status locked in before the event began, Tiago approached Worlds with a relaxed eye. Hours of pre-tournament testing was not for him – he knew his deck early on, and planned to run with the fun choice. Even so, his exceptional talent and dependable luck propelled him into the Top 8 after three gruelling days of play. Tiago shares the highs and the lows of the event today…
What better way to spend the holidays than drafting with one of the best players this game has ever seen? Indeed, the rest of the hallowed eight are no slouches… Paul Jordan shares some of his Drafting With Finkel experience, and brings us some interesting statistics regarding his personal performance in the format. All this, plus a full draft walkthrough!
After a short hiatus, Rich Hoaen returns to continue his daily article series! Each day, the grumpy Canadian draft master takes us through a Magic Online draft, from pick 1 to pick 45, and shares his insight into the cards, the deck, and the games themselves. For more detailed analysis, Rich answers your questions in the forums!
Blisterguy continues his French Odyssey with a humorous look at Days 1 and 2 of thus year’s World Championship. HE shares his personal deck of choice, and then shows us what he should have played. As if that weren’t enough, there’s also Premier Event statistics and funky photos!
In which our hero continues his faltering journey around the Pro Circuit. Battles are won and lost, but mainly lost. Watch as the bright light of a Sunday berth is shone on our hero, then cruelly blinked off as he leaps.
Paris is a city I have a little familiarity with already, but the prospect of the World Championships in the Louvre was still enough to make everything seem fresh and new. You couldn’t see any artwork from where you were playing, beyond that which was on the cards, but the venue itself was pretty impressive, and I couldn’t help but wonder how many of the stellar selection of artists at the event were actually there so that they could mention that they’d had some of their artwork on display there.
Recently, Stephen has faced a Vintage dilemma. As the leading voice for Magic’s broken format, discovering that all you ever knew about the strategy and the metagame now lies in tatters after some shocking in-game revelation… well, let’s just say that he’s a little peturbed by this. Today’s article tackles the issues faced, and also contains an exacting tournament report in Stephen’s signature meticulous style.
Continuing today’s Vintage theme, Patrick “The Innovator” Chapin lives up to his name in style. He throws down the gauntlet to the Powers That Be, and proposes some sweeping changes to the Banned and Restricted list… and includes some interesting new cards especially for Vintage play! However, he’s not content with mere specuation and theorizing: read on for exciting news of proposed “Vintage-Ultra” Tournaments!
After a short hiatus, Rich Hoaen returns to continue his daily article series! Each day, the grumpy Canadian draft master takes us through a Magic Online draft, from pick 1 to pick 45, and shares his insight into the cards, the deck, and the games themselves. For more detailed analysis, Rich answers your questions in the forums!
Take a bit o’ Blue, add a splash o’ Red, and what have you got? The world’s favorite color combination (allegedly). Everyone loves Steam Vents, or so it would seem, and it appears that Mr Romeo is no different. Today’s offering brings us two budget-centric Red/Blue builds, coupled with detailed game descriptions from Magic Online.
I have spent a lot of time telling you what decks to run, but I’ve abandoned you after the deckbuilding stage. I have examined metagames, brought forth the hot tech unto my readers and talked about how to build good decks. My failing was not realizing that not everyone plays as often as I am. Not everyone plays Blue control mirrors for hours at a time or knows how to optimize Brainstorm to see the most cards. Even the best deck in the world is worthless if you do not know how to play it optimally…
So when we left off yesterday I’d just won a Grand Prix in Birmingham with a random Red deck, beating Kai Budde in the final. Kai then went on to win the next three European Grand Prix tournaments, and the world trembled beneath the feet of the German Juggernaut. While I… I… uh…
While I sucked.
I stuck to my guns. And lost matches I shouldn’t have. What should I have done to win?
Worlds Extended saw a plethora of interesting and innovative decks… and a shedload of Boros. In today’s Extended offering, Josh looks at some of the Aggro builds available to the old-school spellslinger, with an examination of successful goblin and Zoo builds. He also casts an eye over the dying Affinity archetype, lest we forget the horror and let it creep back into the metagame.
Last week, Josh took a look at the Standard metagame both before and after Worlds 2006. Today, he expands on this theme and shares his own personal performance. Over six gruelling rounds, his Flores-designed deck took him to a 3-3 performance. What went wrong? What went right? Read on to find out…
