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Magic players are notorious for complaining about bad luck and wishing that skill was a bigger factor in determining the winner of the game. What’s that old expression?”Be careful what you wish for”? Team Rochester Draft is the most skill-intensive format Magic has to offer. That’s great news if your team is better prepared than the opposing team, and really bad news if you’re not. There are no excuses. If you want the edge (and in this format, it can be a big one), you’re going to have to work for it – and I’ll show you how.

My U/G Threshold deck had all sorts of torturous ways to get cards into the ‘yard, including the card-disadvantageous Breakthrough and the non-threatening Hapless Researcher. Not coincidentally, with all of those cards taking up slots that would rather be used to put giant Wurms into play, the deck went 3-3-drop at Regionals. But now, all you have to do is have 1U open when anyone plays a spell, and bingo! Instant threshold… And a lot of freed slots that can make it similar to other U/G builds. And what’s that about a card that might break Extended Tinker?

Of course, I was prepared to play a normal match, but I got the vibe that things might be a little skewed when he dropped every land in his hand on the first turn and motioned for me to do the same. Then he attacked me with his lands. I took three. I played some guys and passed the turn. He played a Remove Enchantments and said”go.” I attacked with some creature and he played Gaseous Form to block. I complimented him on thinking outside the box.

If there’s one thing Magic players hate, it’s landscrew. Both morph and cycling greatly decrease the luck factor involved in Limited Magic, and give drafters plenty of ways to make their deck more versatile in the late and early game respectively. Unfortunately everything cannot be completely good news in terms of set design, and as always, a certain something managed to sneak through the cracks. We’re all overly familiar with this illustrious evil – a piece of cardboard known as Sparksmith.

I envy the little kid. I wish I had that sort of balance in my hobbies. No, for me, Magic has eclipsed all others. Not so the little kid, sunburnt in the summer with red patches obscuring identical freckle fields under his eyes and skin peeling off the top of his ears, buying Fallen Empires packs at the discount price because Thrull Champion is, in his limited but noble domain, the nut high. Tomorrow he will shoot hoops.

Ambush Commander is master of the alpha strike. Instead of throwing all your creatures at your adversary in one last-ditch effort to break through, you’re throwing all your creatures and a good portion of your lands. Both times I’ve seen this in play, it happened to be instant death because its controller also had what amounted to a superpowered Timberwatch Elf; however, the Timberwatch is clearly not necessary to make this card insane. You can even send forests into the red zone if it makes sense from a mathematical perspective.

Little did I realize that I was quitting Magic just in time to miss the Limited format that was most likely to favor my style of play, since my style of play could best be defined as intuitive (or at least that’s the best polite way of describing it). Starting with two unknowns presents a lot of options, and includes the element of gambling and daring to the game… Things which follow intuitive modes of thought rather than simple rationale. And since morph combat is going to be important, I’ll give you a spreadsheet of all the morph creatures and some thoughts on intuition.

The response to the idea of a Magic Writer’s Hall of Fame has been exceptional, and while most everyone has quibbled about who was selected or how the Hall is constructed, in general the feeling for this topic from the public has been that it’s an excellent idea that deserves to happen now. After taking a great deal of advice from all parties concerned, I therefore propose that we back up a bit from the original way I had things laid out, and create the Hall properly.

I’ve already said that Cabal Interrogator is stronger than you might think, so let’s talk about a card I actually had: Unburden. Man, did I mess this card up. In this format, there’s a lot of expensive stuff cluttering peoples’ hands and discard can take out their biggest threat before it hits the table. I cycled this one more than I cast it, and had it cast against me many times to good effect, so I’m going to say I played it wrong. Draft this one, and cast it as often as you can.

Two friends of mine were looking through their meager collection to see what kind of sickness they could put together with what little they had, when whatever they were smoking gave them a vision of the seventh plane of hell. I mean, look at that steaming pile! Only four rares, and the only good ones are the Balthors. Cabal Ritual? Morality Shift? Overeager Apprentice?! Ha!!!! Hey, don’t laugh. It works.