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PT: Chicago Analysis: Why Is It So Limited?

The results are in! This weekend saw the culmination of Pro Tour: Chicago, the tournament that I had most hoped to attend. Alas, it was not to be; the closest I came to fame was finishing third in the Qualifier. Okay, the mandatory "my fifteen minutes of fame" moment is over with. The results are…

FINAL JUDGEMENT: Pro Tour Chicago Report

It came, it went, and conquered.  And I watched the whole thing from very close in. The DCI is developing what’s called the Judge/Reporter program.  There’s too little space on stage for a Judge and a reporter, so the idea is to combine the roles.  There are few people qualified and fewer consistently available.  At…

Force of Will: Sayonara, Dark Ritual

There were some things that I meant to talk about in my last article, which explored black as a possible metagame call in the current standard environment that I didn’t get to. Basically it is this… THERE IS NO DARK RITUAL IN INVASION! This probably means that there will not be any more of this…

Playing Devil’s Advocate: The State Of Standard After PT: Chicago

Thanks to the plethora of people who have been e-mailing me to add their names to the petition to start a Senior Super Series of some sort. Keep those e-mails coming (although I have a few logistical problems to work out, which I’ll save for another column). But on to the matter at hand. The…

The Community And The Humanity

You hear the term all the time: the Magic Community. But what is it, exactly? I’m not going to treat you as children and pretend like you don’t know. However, I am going to give you something to think about. The following article was written by : "Andrew Cuneo is a credit to this great…

Tonight Is The Night I Feel Asleep At The Wheel: Diary Of A Bad Magic Player

I guess my preparation for the Extended season started as soon as the Kentucky State Championships were over. I had the Master’s decklists everywhere I went, and was busy trying to figure out what the best decks could be. I thought Trix would be tough, and Trade Survival would be everywhere. I did, however, want…

Getting Up For The Down Time While Remaining Random

[Andrew Cuneo did the right thing. And still won. Read about it here: http://www.wizards.com/sideboard/article.asp? x=MASTERSCHI009010fm3gw There has been some discussion on the Star City mailing list that he might have done "the right thing" only because whatever he was using as a bird token was shaped in a manner that could lead to confusion about…

Back In Black

Black is down. So sayeth Chavez Domingo. I don’t disagree and have said so before, but for the most part, black looked down last season as well. Aside from the odd deck there wasn’t much going in black. was mostly black based but it got some real power from white, especially . It was a…

This, That And The Other

This week’s column isn’t exactly focused, and for that I apologize. But there are a lot of little things that I wanted to talk about, so bear with me while I skip around. STATE CHAMPIONSHIPS SHOULD MEAN SOMETHING This topic pops up each year after States, and each year nothing is done about it. But…

The Force Of Force Of Will: Why It’s Stagnating Extended And What We Can Do About It

Man, do I have a headache. I’ve spent the last few days continuing my work on the Extended metagame. I’m not sure if my rogue stubbornness is wise, but I simply cannot find it in my heart to play blue. As you can imagine, that results in numerous situations where I exclaim to no one…

More Of Everything Except Time

If you are hoping for my PTQ: Portland report, sorry – you’re not getting one. I, alas, did not go to Portland to play, due to several reasons, foremost being that my beloved Oregon State Beavers were playing bitter rival Oregon in our annual "Civil War" that Saturday (why "Civil War"? I dunno, maybe because…

Duplicitatious Strategory

Welcome back, my readers! Last week, I gave a card-by-card analysis of my new favorite deck. It’s a G/W deck that took me to a second place finish in a big tournament. If the Ferrett could provide a handy link here, then we can move right along to my second analysis of the deck: Overall…

A Convergence Of Ideas

CONVERGENCE IDEA #1: A DECK YOU CAN PLAY. Okay, so here’s the deal: I recently designed a deck that has gone 5-1 so far in multiplayer games. Big whoop. You can find a deck like that anywhere, especially if you’re looking at Jon Chabot’s evil multiplayer combo decks. The difference is, I won with ….

FINAL JUDGEMENT: True Colors

Before I head off to Pro Tour Chicago, I want to wing some rules stuff at you. I’ve been away from rules dissection for a few weeks, so it’s time to get back on track. Before we head in that direction, congrats to Jeremy A. Smith of Warwick, Rhode , who was the first to…

Price of Progress: Invitational Wrap-up And GP-Florence Report

It has been a while since my last article. Frankly, between Grand Prix – Dallas, the Magic Invitational in Sydney, Australia, and Grand Prix – Florence this past weekend, I’ve been plenty busy. Not only have I been to three continents in the past three weeks to play Magic, but somewhere along the way I…