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This week I decided to do one last MD5 Walkthrough since the format will still be up and running on Magic Online for quite some time. This time I used a different approach to the draft though, since some people have been claiming that I’m “handpicking” drafts that are too powerful or something. For this draft, I decided that it’d be more of a “Live” draft, since I’m just sitting down on MTGO, covering the draft, and then writing about it.

I don’t remember who said it, but someone claimed that a multiplayer group with varying levels of players will invariably find itself being held down by the poor players or being dominated by the good players. A rift will be created and the group will suffer. I’m here to put that theory to rest.

Despite the fact that I fully planned to hate Champions, the gameplay was surprisingly palatable. It had a unique feel – that happy feel of equipment ported from Mirrodin, the ridiculous bomb critters of Onslaught but without the generic morph-o-rama dope mana curve, and a reliance on weird burn and enchantments that was uniquely its own. There was no auto-save if you built a crappy mana base, as there had been in Mirrodin’s colorless approach and Onslaught’s 2/2 for three.
I had a bunch of very tense and close races – that feeling that good deckbuilding skills really mattered, which I haven’t had in any set since Invasion.

Ben has repeatedly taken Wizards of the Coast R&D to task for their failure to boost the power level of White, easily the worst color in Magic. White’s the worst color in Vintage, the worst color in Extended, the worst color in Onslaught Block, the worst color in Mirrodin Block, and arguably the worst color in Standard. How bad was White this past year? It was so bad that Ben devotes an entire column bemoaning the fate of his favorite color.

During the Extended season of winter and spring 1999, Jamie Wakefield made a rather interesting observation. The dominant decks of the time was of course High Tide, but there were other decks of comparatively brief lifespan that also won very quickly; all of which were capable of a fourth turn kill. The thing is, during this extremely fast and high-powered format, even the mono-Red beatdown decks were getting into the act. Jamie’s observation? The burn decks were playing like combo decks. They had fast kills too, but they had to draw a certain way in order to get them.

Now, my butlers tell me the prerelease is this weekend, so I’ll be gearing my card analyses with that goal in mind. Not only will I provide you feedback on all the preview cards from the last week, I will also be discussing the strengths of the various colors that the spoiler has shown this far, and I have devised a prerelease Choose Your Own Adventure story to help round out your weekend. If you are looking to get a leg up on your Champions prerelease experience, you’ve come to the right place.

So after last week’s fake-out, Tater-Hatin’ Tim Aten is back this week to tell you why Japanese players are tough opponents, how nice guys finish (at least against him) and to fill you in on almost all of the happenings at the 2004 Magic World Championships. Hop on board, kids – it’s going to be a wild ride.

I think Ken’s Top Ten Mistakes aren’t really mistakes at all. He simply misjudged a few bombs, or was not paying attention to the same website he writes for. Let’s take a look at a few of his points and some of his Top Ten”mistakes”, along with some of my own recommendations before I tell you the things you really need to learn about MD5 Limited.

I was thinking about building a spelunking theme deck, and thinking about spelunking brought me to remembering my scouting days, which brought me to merit badges and “Voila!” I had an article idea. Sometimes it really is that easy. Let’s take a look at five decks inspired by Boy Scout Merit Badges. Each of these decks is designed to be halfway decent, and yet also gives plenty of room to the theme, and not competition.