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Ground Chuck And The Death Of A Legend: A Response To Bennie Smith’s Article

In Bennie Smith’s most recent article,”The Legend of Chuck,” Bennie discusses a player in his multiplayer group named – not surprisingly – Chuck. Most every multiplayer group has at least one Chuck, and just about everyone would like to get rid of Chuck – or at least see him change his style. Bennie asked for suggestions to help him deal with his reputation as a strong player with solid decks that can kill everyone on the board quickly. I’m here to show you how to”ground” Chuck, and dump the reputation that is putting a damper on the win totals.

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You CAN Play Type I #96: The Control Player’s Bible, Part IV.2 – History, 2003 (Part 2)

This year’s GenCon will be held on July 23-26 at the Indianapolis Convention Center, and the Tenth Anniversary celebration will feature a Type I Championship sponsored by Wizards. As such, I think it’s about time I discuss what The Deck will look like in a July environment… And discuss how stupid Mind’s Desire still makes the environment.

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You CAN Play Type I #96: The Control Player’s Bible, Part IV.2 – History, 2003 (Part 1)

Oscar’s article is so long today, it broke our format – so we had to break it into two parts. And speaking of broken, Oscar discusses Mind’s Desire and how it’s still warping the Type One metagame, even from beyond the grave of restrictions…

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The Real Story Behind The Dark

Generally, my”Real Story Behind” series deals with the most recent expansion’s storyline and its relation to the flavor texts of the cards. However, there’s no reason not to take advantage of the other books that Wizards of the Coast has released. This first book in the Ice Age Cycle novels takes place during the time between the final battle between Urza and Mishra and the oncoming of the Ice Age – a time dubbed by historians as”The Dark.” It was a time in which the world was becoming colder and darker, yet magic was becoming more understood – and feared.

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The Art Of Retaliation

If you are going to lose, make sure you take names and numbers and get to work on paybacks! Be the alpha male – or female! The next time someone takes you out or performs an otherwise despicable act, do your best”Godfather” imitation and kiss them on the cheeks! Pull out pennies and stick them in their eyes! Rub garlic on your dice! And above all, let me show you how to do it!

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Mixed kNuts: Five Things I Learned From Nationals And Euros

1) Psychatog is finally dead in Standard. It will be up to 8th Edition to revive him; otherwise, we can kiss Dr. Teeth goodbye until Extended season. And there was much rejoicing…
2) Mind’s Desire is still note quite ready for Prime Time. Olivier Ruel went 6-1 with it, but Kai went 2-5. However, their versions were radically different, and as of right now I haven’t completed the overall numbers for the decks.

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Playtesting Gabriel Nassif’s Amazing B/W Deck

This deck was the real surprise to come out of the Championships, and is actually a lot more powerful than I initially felt it was. It feels very similar to Wake, with you tapping out for insanely powerful effects like Decree of Justice and Decree of Pain… But considering the deck’s eight Wrath effects punish you for playing creatures, encouraging you to hold them right in your hand where you can Therapy them out, it works really well together.

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Mining the Crystal Quarry: You Make The (Lousy) Card 2

I’ve expressed my disdain for the weakening of blue overall. I agree very much with the sentiment that the other colors should be brought up to Blue’s former power levels. But instead, the masses bitched and whined. I don’t know if it was a result of public outcry, or an internal decision by Wizards, or (most likely) a combination of the two, but the people got what they wanted. Half of the You Make The Card mechanics were blue hosers. The question is, who are these people?

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Rare X

You know what is nice about Rorix besides all his other, obvious, attributes? It is the fact that he is a rare. I know it sounds dumb, but it’s true. People don’t play as well against rares. They don’t expect to be facing rares. They aren’t accustomed to playing against rares, so they are more likely to play poorly when facing rares. Entire Limited articles are written sometimes as if rares barely existed. How can you account for this in your Limited playtesting?

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The Legend Of Chuck

Everyone at the shop fully expects me to have the ability to kill everyone at the table at any point in the game, and I’m a threat that needs to be eliminated regardless of what I have in play and how friendly I’ve been so far… So I find myself the target of”random kills” all the time. The watchword is if someone can take me down, they will, no questions asked… Because they figure they may not get a second chance.

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Ten Ways To Overcome The Limited Plateau

Bob goes to a lot of tournaments, and usually goes 3-3 or 4-3, but rarely makes the Top 8 except for occasional lucky days. He’s trying everything he can, but he just can’t seem to make that next big leap… And it is now far harder for Bob get help. Most articles on the net won’t help him get any better. But there are ten facets of his play that Bob can look at in order to help him leap ahead, as I have.

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My Almost All-Land Deck, And How It Did In Serious Play

When I read Pascal Schumacher’s article”Un-Seriously Casual: Searching for the All-Land Deck,” it brought back an amusing memory of a deck I came up with on a bet. A student bet me $50 that I couldn’t win a single match at an Extended tournament with my Seismic Assault deck, which won via twenty-eight cycling lands and Lightning Rift. And the results were surprising…

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Multiplayer Is An Art, Part 25: Princes Of The Universe

My highlander deck has been highly entertaining. Do you know how I once saved all my creatures from a Savage Twister with X=6 with Glory? “How’s that special?” you ask. “That’s what she’s for. Just activate her. What a boring anecdote!”

Ah, but Glory wasn’t at all in my graveyard when the Twister was put on the stack. No siree! In response to the twister, I…

Activated Winding Canyons
Cast Glory
Sacrificed Glory to Infernal Tribute, netting me a card
Activated her ability to give all my men protection from green

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Casey At The Draft

The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the triple J’s that night,

Their draft sets were exhausted, with no chance of help in sight.

And so when many sharks sat down, surrounding each good man,

A pall-like wave of pessimism was felt throughout the clan.

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You CAN Play Type I #95: Sifting Through Scourge, Part V – Sorceries and Instants

Decree of Annihilation’s cycle effect is incredibly powerful, but that makes you ask which deck it fits in. Obviously, it’s not something aggro, aggro-control and combo need. As for control, Armageddon was used in Type II to keep an opponent’s mana count down while a big creature beat down or an artifact-based lock held him tight. The 7-mana price tag attached to uncounterability precludes this. That leaves you with blue-based control decks with a red splash, but why would these mana-intensive decks want to wreck their own mana and hurt themselves more? Thus, I don’t think you’ll need to be sideboarding Stifles anytime soon.

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