Party of Five, as you may or may not recall, was a notoriously horrible American television show which aired long ago and was cancelled with extreme prejudice due to its utter inability to do just about anything right, insofar as actually being entertaining was concerned. Today, we are going to look over some things which have been similarly cancelled, or well should be. I refer to these as “Parties of Five.”
It takes a special kind of writer to write a daily series about a subject, then spend three days before he even mentions the subject. It takes an even more special kind of writer who would have that section of the series being the smallest of the five daily articles. The good news is that all the “serious” readers are tuned out by now. Enjoy your ham sandwich, sir.
Evan beat me last week, so badly that I couldn’t muster the energy to write my follow-up article. I mean, he even recorded my humiliation… this week, he leaps into the fray with a cheap Red burn deck that plays eighteen land. An excellent deck and article, accompanied by an entertaining video…
And of course, here’s the reason I wanted to win so badly last week… this week’s challenger is none other than Billy Moreno! As one of the premier Constructed minds on the planet, what did Billy do with his 25 tickets? Read on to find out!
Last week, facing down a lack of questions, Jeroen sent out a cry for help. It seems that people responded kindly, and Jeroen’s inbox is bursting at the seams once more! This week, Jeroen looks at how a player can improve from adequate to exceptional, and gives a nod to the Japanese deckbuilding masters with a fan’s-eye look at the Conterbalance deck thet destroyed the field at Japanese Nationals.
Billy’s experience at Grand Prix: Phoenix was a good one. Not for the playing – he performed hideously – but for the company, the side events, and the good times. Today’s rollercoaster article chronicles each high and each low in the customary Moreno style, and shares his GP cardpool for those who wish to play along at home. “Moreno Monday” comes two days late this week… but we forgive him!
Once again, the incomparable blisterguy brings us the lowdown on the MTGO metagame and marketplace. This, the thirtieth article in the series, is also a fitting tribute to Australia’s finest son, the late Steve Irwin…
Welcome back to Talen Lee telling amateur card designers they suck. Amusingly, I know there’s at least one professional in this field who will almost assuredly be telling me I’m full of crap. But that’s just because he’s an old grouch. Anyway. So far we’ve discussed both what you want to do — make a set — and then, what you’re going to use to do that — the themes and mechanics of a set. Today, we’re going to talk about how everything sits together.
As you may have heard, Wizards of the Coast are hiring a new designer. The first stage of this was an essay competition. Many of you may have entered it, or at least thought about what answers you would have given. Wizards of the Coast were swamped with the number of entries. To give some idea of the scale, there were over 1,000 entries, each of an average of 3,000 words — a total of 3 million words, or 0.68 of a John Rizzo article.
Martin Dingler, winner of Grand Prix: Cardiff, turns his attentions to the icy wastelands of Coldsnap… and injects a little fire into game! The notorious “draft the Big Green Monsters” guy has turned his back on the high-cost goliaths, favoring instead a mono-Red draft strategy that is both powerful and fun. Full pick orders, strategies, and sample builds, all available with a single click…
Rich continues his excellent series of Coldsnap Draft walkthroughs, presenting each pick as it happened and highlighting each card chosen. He shares his final decklist, and gives us a brief overview of his results and processes. As usual, for more detailed draft deconstruction, come visit us in the forums!
One of my favorite things about Magic: The Gathering: Online: The Colon Game is that people remind me of cards that I’d forgotten were even Standard legal. Like the other day. I was working on this White (with a little Blue) deck when I faced off against another player working on W/u. On his fourth turn, he dropped Ballista Squad…
For this tenth Standard Tribal article, I knew that I wanted to focus on Coldsnap. I wanted a tribe or feature card that spoke to Coldsnap’s central themes and that resulted in a very Coldsnappian deck. I wanted to look at the final decklist and immediately think “cool,” or “snappy.”
Triple Coldsnap draft continues to divide the community in equal measure. Some love it, some hate it… but no-one can ignore it. Today, Nick takes us through a sample draft, one in which he eschews his usual strategy of “force Red/Green,” with mixed (and interesting) results. Do you agree with his choices and evaluations?
For those of you who just tuned in, yesterday I insulted basically everyone who does amateur card designs and set myself up as an authority enough to tell them how to do it right. Surely nothing bad could come of this degree of hubris.
