fbpx

Search Content

Blog Fanatic: Adventures in Urza Block (Part 2 of 2)

Pro Tour: New York ‘99 took place on the weekend of April 31st. The format was Urza Block Constructed, with Urza’s Saga and Urza’s Legacy being the only two sets released in the block thus far. Team Tulane had been hard at work practicing the format with the inclusion of Legacy, and we felt very confident in our abilities to win so we made a bold decision: we would fly up to New York with the sole intent of money drafting pros on the side.

Crucible of Worlds and You

First off, I am going to say that I don’t think that Crucible of Worlds should be restricted right now. I just want to make sure to get that out of the way nice and early. I also want to level a formal outcry against the top 8 of GenCon. That top 8 was totally illegitimate, as it did not consist of 17 Four-Color Control decks, 9 Fish decks, and 6 GroAtog decks. In all seriousness, I thought that the top 8 was great and couldn’t have asked for a better one.

It Works! Mono-Black Cloud in Type 2

Everyone wants to play with Death Cloud. I mean, just look at the card. It just screams”I Win!” Unfortunately no one has been able to make a Cloud deck work very well in the metagame, so its potential has gone unrealized… until now.

CHK It Out! Legendary Confusion

As expected, the Champions of Kamigawa previews started off without a hitch and everybody was happy. Look at what all the satisfied people had to say!
[Bleiweiss] it’s absolutely stupid
[copernicu] legends suck
[Yawgatog] sux

Metagames

Preparing for a Limited format is easy. The reason it is so easy is that, by and large, players find drafting more fun than Constructed. The more players you have enjoying the times, the more enjoyable the times will be. Testing Constructed always felt like work to me. While draft felt like a honing of skills, Constructed testing felt more like mapping. So what are the Constructed players mapping? Matchups. But there is more to Constructed than matchups. Think of decks as areas of a continent. Matchups are the paths between them. What I want to talk about today is the entire landscape.

Blog Fanatic: Adventures in Urza Block (Part 1 of 2)

The highlight of the weekend, and one of the highlights of my Magic playing career, came on the Sunday after the Pro Tour ended. We arranged a four-on-four draft between some Texan/Lousiana players versus a Pro Tour ringer team which included Jon Finkel, Brian Hacker, Hammer, and one of Brian’s regular draft partners.

From Right Field: Every Time We Say Goodbye…

Whenever a block is about to rotate out of Standard, I like to look back at some of the cards that saw little or no play but, dadburnit, it seems like they should have. Since Champions of Oompa-Loompa will be released in just over a month and will be tourney-legal in less than two months, Onslaught, Legions, and Scourge will be going the way of the dodo, the carrier pigeon, and common sense, taking with it some sadly overlooked cards.

CHK It Out! – And So It Begins

A few hours ago, I was browsing some website and I thought,”wouldn’t it be keen if someone looked at each new Champions of Kamigawa card MagicTheGathering.com rolled out on a daily basis and wrote about his or her gut reaction about that card for the entire world to read and if that person was me?”

Blog Fanatic: Brian Kibler Bingo!

This is it, the moment you’ve all been waiting for. The crack staff at StarCityGames.com has designed the ultimate gamer party game: Brian Kibler Bingo! Amaze your loved ones and laugh along with your friends as you play what is obviously the greatest game of all time. Get your copy of Brian Kibler Bingo now, because supplies are limited and when we run out Brian Kibler Bingo will be gone, gone, gone!

Ask Ken, 08/27/2004

I just lost an 8-4 draft in game three of round 2 on Magic Online and I’m trying to decide if I made the correct play and just lost, or made an error, and wanted to get your view.