Fresh off a Top 4 finish at Pro Tour: Nagoya, Murray Evans is here to give you the skinny on how to draft the deck that carried him to another Sunday finish: Blue/Red. In addition to detailing how to draft it in Champions Limited, Murray also gives you updated information on what will be good for the archetype out of Betrayers and tells you whether or not he thinks the deck will still be viable when the new set rotates in.
Dear Doctor Mox,
Don’t you realize that TYPE TWO is the only true Constructed format? Who cares if there’s a PTQ season ongoing? FNM is the tournament that separates the men from the boys!
Come on, Mox! Pull your finger out! Give us the skinny on the Standard scene!
Aaron,
Renton, WA
Though he didn’t post a stellar record at Pro Tour: Nagoya, Ruud managed to bring back some interesting stories and solid strategy from his travels. Whether you are looking for opinions about ninjutsu or salsa dancing with Japanese hotties, this report has a little of everything.
Oscar takes a look at Betrayers Artifacts and Enchantments today as well as continuing the replay of “Oscar’s Greatest Misses.” Is there anything in the new set that will make a dent on Vintage, or does the whole set whiff when it comes to playable new cards? Only the Oscar knows…
Zvi begins to apply Betrayers of Kamigawa cards to Standard in order to gauge whether any of them will change both the current metagame and the post-banning one that will be coming in March. He also includes a new Red deck in Standard, weighs in on Aaron Forsythe’s announcement from Friday, and gives his opinion on the current Invitational voting.
Dear Doctor Mox,
I’m terrible at trading. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve handed over my valuable rares for a handful of diabolical tat. Once, I even traded away my packed lunch, my bus-fare and my trousers. I had to walk home hungry with my bits a-floppin’. Help me, Doctor Mox. I’ve Pale Moons in every pocket, Solarions on every surface, and Mudholes coming out of my mudhole!
How does it feel for a relative unknown to scrape and claw their way back into contention for a Pro Tour Top 8 only to finish 9th on tiebreakers? Tiago Chan now knows the feeling, and he shares the tale of his entire weekend with you in this report.
I can’t remember a time when Blue wasn’t my favorite color in Magic. I’ve heard a number of top-notch players say it is one of the worst colors in triple Champions draft, and while I believe they have some good arguments to back this statement, I simply cannot agree with it. It could be a matter of personal preference, my extreme dislike for Black, or a number of other things, but I still draft Blue quite often in CCC (on MTGO) and believe it to be one of the top colors in the format. With that in mind, it’s time to look at the impact that Betrayers will have on my beloved color.
We now return to our continuing saga of Chad Ellis, the young…well, the not old…okay fine, he’s really old, former Pro Tour player. Extended season now beckons – the format that took Chad to his first Pro Tour ever. Will he be able to continue his streak by winning GP: Boston? Will he even make Day 2, or will he have to try his luck at the Day 2 PTQ? Read on, and see things from Chad’s own perspective, as he writes both before and after the event.
Pip is back with all the latest statistics and trends in the Vintage world including Pip’s watch list, Type One Pro Points, and information about which cards just might be ripe for restriction.
In my last article, I wrote about the Blue/White Mind’s Desire deck that I plan on playing in the upcoming PTQ season. This article will focus on tournament pointers that I believe will help you play your optimal game at the PTQs. This guide is meant for the beginner to moderate level of Magic player, but most people could probably benefit from perusing the article once or twice as well.
A few days before the prerelease, Ted Knutson asked me if I wanted to play in the StarCityGames Richmond Power 9 event. My only experience playing Vintage at that point was one event at GenCon 2004, but I figured I wasn’t doing anything anyway, so why not give it a shot. If I scrubbed out, I could always hop in a prerelease flight, right? Sadly my day went too well to get any action with Betrayers, but I was rewarded with a Mox Pearl for my “inconvenience”.
Incensed by reader requests, Doctor Mox once again picks up his pen to tell you exactly what he thinks about Aluren, The Rock, and White Weenie for the current Extended season.
During 1999’s Extended PTQ season, a mistake by his teammate forced Michael Flores to ask the question “Who’s the Beatdown?” Six years later, another Extended format prompts him to re-examine the strategies he advocated in what may be the greatest single Magic article of all time. The Limit of Interactivity challenges Michael’s own conclusions, and, while it categorizes Extended decks into two distinct groups, this time they aren’t “beatdown” and “control.”
Wrapping up our Extended Mega-Event is none other than Brian David-Marshall. Instead of covering Solitary Confinement as he originally planned, today BDM brings you a staggering array of potential rogue decks that are already making their impact on this Extended season. If you are looking for something off the beaten path (and in some cases way off) to play this weekend, or maybe just trying to survey some of the randomness you might see at your local PTQ, then you must read this article.
