Cuddly Bear Tim Aten shows his smoother, softer side, as he pleasantly recounts the events that took place at Pro Tour: San Diego. He sends this 17th place report out to all the lovers in the room…
Which three cards in MTG history would you consider to be Wizards’s biggest overall mistakes?
Back in 2003, Aaron Forsythe wrote an article explaining how R&D looks at the Banned and Restricted list. One of the pearls of wisdom in the article was when Forsythe said,”in general, if a restricted card isn’t showing up in decks, its status probably deserves some scrutiny by the DCI.” I happen to be an expert on what cards are played and not played in Type One, so I figured I should get around to looking at the list right before the June 1st announcement.
Today’s question is answered by Ghetto Fabulous – man’s man, ladies man, and man about town.
Last week, we looked at how to send signals in draft. This week we’re going to look at receiving them, both how to do it, and how much you should be swayed by them.
For Article #100, I decided to write about my 100 favorite Magic cards. It’s self-indulgent — so sue me. I include some multiplayer goodies, some fond reminiscences and — in a couple cases — some near trash for which I have an unreasonable attachment. In those cases, I’ll tell you why they are worth getting
What is the correct way to pronounce Pikula? This is relevant when playing decks full of Invitationalists, so that one can call each by name.
A recent example of how Wicker Man deck theory has seeped into tournament play is the presence of Disciple of the Vault in Clerics decks running very few artifacts. Here, Disciple of the Vault is made to negate one of Ravager Affinity’s win conditions. In the Clerics v. Ravager Affinity matchup, the Affinity player has to go to all the trouble of setting up a pseudo-combo kill only to discover that the Clerics player has been preparing for her own win condition and can take advantage of Affinity’s exertions. Over all, however, Clerics is not a Wicker Man deck, if only because Disciple of the Vault is a secondary (and exceedingly narrow) win condition.
I’ve always had a burning desire to win and an equal, no less fiery desire to improve. The culmination of almost ten years of heartburn has finally started to pay off, with some top 8’s, a trip to the Pro Tour, and a near-miss at Regionals with yet another deck that no one believed in but me. These are some of the things that I’ve learned over those ten years while continually striving to improve.
After many weeks of playtesting, I couldn’t find a rogue deck that pleased me. My G/R Urzatron Tooth and Nail deck promised to be the most fun. But an important part of fun for me is earning a winning record and coming as close to qualifying for Nationals as possible… so Tooth was a bad choice. I eventually settled on Paskins Red, and this is my tale.
I’m playing in a sealed deck league. I have a Blue/Black evasion deck with two Nims and a (but no other affinity guys). I also have two bomb equipment in Sword of Fire and Ice and Specter’s Shroud. Should I play Welding Jar?
As I type this sentence, I’m getting married in 104 hours. There are a ton (literally) of things to move and a ton (figuratively) of little things to do. So, I’ll have to give you a form that you can fill in to write your own column.
[Congratulations to Chris Romeo, who either got hitched this weekend or was shot and killed as he tried to escape the bonds of holy matrimony. StarCityGames.com would like to wish him our very best. – Knut]
Even with the hundreds of hours of play testing underneath my belt, I have yet to actually do particularly well at any Regionals, with this year’s 6-3 record being far from qualifying. What you came here for was a decklist, and a story explaining how after starting the day with five straight match wins, it all came crashing down around me, so let’s get started.
