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[The Technomancer]

I changed the link, but Culling the Weak is 1 black mana and sacrifice a creature to add 4 black mana to your pool.

Speaking of which, they also got rid of mana burn which was probably a good idea. There also seems to be a much bigger focus on artifacts compared to the old days.

That's probably just this block. Mirrodin is an artifact themed block, so half the cards are artifacts. In most sets you'll have...a dozen, if that.

EDIT: You played Alara? Same thing, Esper was specifically artifact themed.

 

[Yeef]

That's probably just this block. Mirrodin is an artifact themed block, so half the cards are artifacts. In most sets you'll have...a dozen, if that.

EDIT: You played Alara? Same thing, Esper was specifically artifact themed.

Alara had a big focus on artifacts 9Esper Shard) as well, so did the Shadowmoor (Scarecrows) block. Those three are really the only three of the recent sets I've looked at, so maybe it's just a coincidence.

 

[The Technomancer]

Alara had a big focus on artifacts 9Esper Shard) as well, so did the Shadowmoor (Scarecrows) block. Those three are really the only three of the recent sets I've looked at, so maybe it's just a coincidence.

Yeah, sounds like it. Hardly any artifacts in Zendikar, same with Lorwyn. *shrug*

 

[siddx]

Play mostly EDH and Type 4. Although I enjoy going to a few Legacy and Sealed tournaments here and there. I went to Mirrodin Besieged pre-release yesterday. About 60 people packed into a small card shop, most of whom had questionable hygiene practices. Very unpleasant but I couldn't pass up playing with the new set ahead of time. I feel myself more and more disconnected with the game though. So many uber dorks whose only realm in which they have "the power" is playing magic. Some of them are obnoxious beyond belief.

Black Sun Zenith, Creeping Corrosion, Decimation Web, and Massacre Wurm were huge bombs in limited and owned face.

If anybody else happened to go to a pre release and get a Tezzeret planeswalker card, here's a hint, sell it now. You could get 30-35 bucks for it now. In 2 weeks you'll be getting 10 bucks for it. And in a month it will be a 5 dollar card. Its complete junk.

 

[The Technomancer]

Play mostly EDH and Type 4. Although I enjoy going to a few Legacy and Sealed tournaments here and there. I went to Mirrodin Besieged pre-release yesterday. About 60 people packed into a small card shop, most of whom had questionable hygiene practices. Very unpleasant but I couldn't pass up playing with the new set ahead of time. I feel myself more and more disconnected with the game though. So many uber dorks whose only realm in which they have "the power" is playing magic. Some of them are obnoxious beyond belief.

Starting to feel the same way. I don't even play in public outside of pre-releases anymore, its just a group of a dozen or so close friends in a conference room every Friday night.

 

[bucklam66]

I play Pauper on MTGO, it is a fun and cheap way to play Magic. Commons only makes for interesting deck building. There are a good amount of free player run pauper tourney's on MTGO as well.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Hope the comic shop by me isn't too bad since I have no friends that play it anymore.

 

[siddx]

Starting to feel the same way. I don't even play in public outside of pre-releases anymore, its just a group of a dozen or so close friends in a conference room every Friday night.

Yeah the vast majority if my play is friday get togethers with a handful of other friends. It's really just an excuse to get drunk and high and talk shit while we play type 4 or multiplayer edh.

 

[dschalter]

Any good/exciting professional matches that you guys recommend watching?

all of the links here are to past pro tours, at the top you can download videos of the entire finals match of each pt and parts of the semis and qfs (they usually go back and forth between matches for the semis and qfs).

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/ptcol05/welcome : canali's run of incompetence on full display.

http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/events.aspx?x=mtgevent/worlds06/welcome: mihara vs. nassif and the parts of nassif v. tiago chan they show are INCREDIBLE. two of the best matches ever, in completely different ways. the finish of the mihara v. nassif match is particularly amazing.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/pthon06/welcome : ruel v. craig jones. most famous topdeck in magic's history.

http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/events.aspx?x=mtgevent/worlds07/welcome : chapin v. nassif in the semis is fucking amazing.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/ptcha06/welcome : the finals, in particular saito v. pvddr. an underappreciated, but amazing team match that included two of the best ever squaring off (lol saito though).

also, i completely forgot to mention the greatest magic format ever: fivestar.

here's how it works, step-by-step. 1-5 are optionally, but add a ton of 'flavor' to the experience (what i mean is that the format can be done with players using any decks, but it is best done with sealed product).

1) get five people.
2) get a bunch of packs of a set that doesn't have too many artifacts or multicolored cards (5 packs per player is reasonable, possibly 4).
3) everyone chooses a color. you do that by secret selection; once preferences are revealed people who chose the same color will have to roll off to see who gets what they want.
4) open all the packs and give people the cards that correspond to their colors. artifacts and multicolored you can distribute randomly, but fairly.
5) build your decks.

6) arrange the seats. the seating is simple: look at the back face of an mtg card. each person's position on the color pentagon corresponds to a seat. if you are doing it with any old decks, just pick colors/seats randomly.
7) so what is the goal: simple- beat your two "enemy colors". if you are red, beat white and blue. if you are black, beat white and green. you can only attack your enemies, not your allies, and you can't target your opponents permanents with spells or counter their spells (this rule can be altered, but you CANNOT change the rule about not attacking you allies).
8) have fun. the politics involved are fucking amazing as people will be manipulating others and trying crazy schemes nonstop. go for it!

 

[Pandaman]

The Phyrexian invasion is continuing.

what?
i might have to get back into magic.

Still blows me away how powerful cards are these days, these would be like super rares back then and now they're uncommons. Crazy.

the last strong card i can remember was skullclamp.

are there more now?

 

[TheSeks]

are there more now?

Just take a look are current cards, hell there's a few in that preview of the OP.

Protection from Black/Green, Trample.

There's waaaay too many effects and protections on creature cards for my tastes now a days. It's really insane to look at the cards and see a bunch of effects that weren't there two-one decade ago. :/

 

[Pandaman]

Just take a look are current cards, hell there's a few in that preview of the OP.

Protection from Black/Green, Trample.

There's waaaay too many effects and protections on creature cards for my tastes now a days. It's really insane to look at the cards and see a bunch of effects that weren't there two-one decade ago. :/

i usually run blue decks, so alot of those secondary effects aren't that big of a deal to me.

the sword is a decent sideboard card, but thrull is really the only one there that would be scary in any deck and its a legendary so it'll either be a rare draw or waste slots.

 

[Haly]

Phrexian Rebirth is pretty loltastic. I'd run it in a white weenie deck just to troll.

 

[Fragamemnon]

[Edit] They should have color-shifted it to red then. Much like the did from Prodigal Sorcerer to Prodigal Pyromancer. Seething Song isn't nearly as useful.

Seething Song/Rite of Flame are pretty balanced cards that see play in the formats where they are legal. Red Dark Ritual would just get played alongside Black Dark Ritual in some deck that is keen on doing terribly unfair things. The card just can't be printed unless you ban it right off the bat in eternal formats, which means that the card honestly shouldn't be printed.

Also, would likely create some kind of degenerate standard combo deck and assuredly power an extremely degenerate Exstended combo deck.

Fast mana that is usable immediately is dangerous. That's why you see all the green ramp either be on creatures or come into play tapped.

 

[Fragamemnon]

If anybody else happened to go to a pre release and get a Tezzeret planeswalker card, here's a hint, sell it now. You could get 30-35 bucks for it now. In 2 weeks you'll be getting 10 bucks for it. And in a month it will be a 5 dollar card. Its complete junk.

Yeah it's way overvalued at the moment. It's the only flashy Planeswalker in the set and the secondary market is trying to get what they can out of it now before it tanks due to lack of play.

Green Sun's Zenith is the real deal and the best card in the set, but it's only a rare. It's like Fauna Shaman, will be valuable but nothing you can really speculate on. I am looking forward to playing it in Bant aggro for Dryad Arbor/Natural Order shenanigans.

 

[zoukka]

Great game but I recently quit due to not having a sanctioned tourney place in my town and then there's the free-time aspect of it. I ended up designing decks I'd never use...

 

[Lumine]

I used to play Magic. I got really into it together with a couple of high school friends like 12-13 years ago which was around the time urza's saga/legacy released. We each played a different coloured deck which we would improve from the meager amount each of us had and we would play almost every break or free period we had in high school. It was a blast, I loved it.

After a while I got bored of it though. So did most of my friends and we all just kinda quit. Then I realized how much money I spent buying boosters and I really regret it. It was way too expensive for just a bunch of cards and I spent way too much on them. I also started to dislike that they would release a new series less than every few months which brought new sets of rules to the game and sometimes even better cards. Like the ones in the OP, they almost seem too good. I had a nice collection though. Lots of neat rares and a couple of nice decks. Most of it is still stored away somewhere in my room actually.

Coincidentally I played a few games for old times sake with a friend a last week. Ironically I made a simple red deck out of many crappy commons in about 20 mins but ended up litterally destroying every other deck he and I ever made. It was fun to play again, but I vowed to myself never to spend any money on this game again.

Except that last week I noticed that thread in gamingside that keeps popping up and that game actually looks really neat. Then I read that you can't even properly change or build your own deck. How useless, that's one of the best parts about this game.

 

[pseudocaesar]

I have almost the entire set of core set 2011, I dont play though, I just like to collect them.

 

[Risible]

all of the links here are to past pro tours, at the top you can download videos of the entire finals match of each pt and parts of the semis and qfs (they usually go back and forth between matches for the semis and qfs).

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/ptcol05/welcome: canali's run of incompetence on full display.

http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/events.aspx?x=mtgevent/worlds06/welcome: mihara vs. nassif and the parts of nassif v. tiago chan they show are INCREDIBLE. two of the best matches ever, in completely different ways. the finish of the mihara v. nassif match is particularly amazing.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Events.aspx?x=mtgevent/pthon06/welcome: ruel v. craig jones. most famous topdeck in magic's history.

http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/events.aspx?x=mtgevent/worlds07/welcome: chapin v. nassif in the semis is fucking amazing.

Getting an article not found error on those, do I need to be a member or something?

 

[orion434]

I've always been a huge fan of MTG, was there from:

Beta - Urza's Saga
Invasion - Mirrodin
Scars of Mirrodin - present

Not a big fan of Mythic Rares, some of the prices of the most wanted cards is obscene. I made a nice Black / Green Infect deck. Mimmic Vat is amazing, and the Green Pump can end a game when creatures are not blocked. The mana-base is a bit unstable... just have Enemy-fetches and Birds.

Magic Highlights, played a game against "Meddling Mage" Chris Pikula, really nice guy.

 

[The Technomancer]

I've always been a huge fan of MTG, was there from:

Beta - Urza's Saga
Invasion - Mirrodin
Scars of Mirrodin - present

Not a big fan of Mythic Rares, some of the prices of the most wanted cards is obscene. I made a nice Black / Green Infect deck. Mimmic Vat is amazing, and the Green Pump can end a game when creatures are not blocked. The mana-base is a bit unstable... just have Enemy-fetches and Birds.

Magic Highlights, played a game against "Meddling Mage" Chris Pikula, really nice guy.

Aw man, you missed out on Ravnica, IMO the best block in Magic history.

 

[dschalter]

Getting an article not found error on those, do I need to be a member or something?

you need for me not to be be an idiot who posts poorly formatted links (the colons are not actually part of the url). now fixed.

 

[jl4855]

 

[cooljeanius]

Aw man, you missed out on Ravnica, IMO the best block in Magic history.

Agreed, Ravnica was great.

 

[The Technomancer]

Agreed, Ravnica was great.

I mean, awesome design aside, just the fucking art direction:

Sooooooo gooooood.

 

[dschalter]

ravnica was sweet. personally, my favorite block is invasion, because i am a big fan of the old storyline and invasion represented the culmination of that, but i can't deny the awesomeness of ravnica, for drafting especially (that being said, the shocklands were fucking expensive. twice as expensive most other neo-dual lands).

 

[Fragamemnon]

The art for Ravnica, the overall upped card power from previous sets (especially creatures), and the fact that everyone had cards just for their pet color pairing has always made it a fan favorite.

Looking at the chase rares for MBS, I'm amazed at how few cards are either good lands, sorceries or instants with CMC <=3 , or efficient creatures with CMC <=3 . If you're not playing with four to six drops you aren't playing MTG apparently.

 

[NovemberMike]

As someone who played Magic up until about 2001, the main thing I noticed about the game looking at these newer sets is that the cards are so much better.

I played for a few years but the creatures maintained about the same power toughness, mana curve, etc. as older cards.

I would have freaked out if some of these cards had been introduced when I was playing. It's probably because I played casual with a large room of people.

No offense, but anyone saying this generally isn't evaluating the cards correctly. The most abusive thing you can do in this game is break the resource system, so cards like the Urza free creatures (untap x lands, where x is cmc), frogmite, Myr Enforcer etc were all far more broken than anything new that has come out.

 

[The Technomancer]

The art for Ravnica, the overall upped card power from previous sets (especially creatures), and the fact that everyone had cards just for their pet color pairing has always made it a fan favorite.

Looking at the chase rares for MBS, I'm amazed at how few cards are either good lands, sorceries or instants with CMC <=3 , or efficient creatures with CMC <=3 . If you're not playing with four to six drops you aren't playing MTG apparently.

Yeah its definitely slower then Zendikar last year. Then again Zendikar limited was one of the fastest formats I've ever played.

 

[LegendOfGood]

Just finished catching up on Lorwyn, actually. Built some tribal decks. I also tweaked my own version of the infamous Grapeshot Elves deck. SO GOOD.

 

[Keru_Shiri]

Started with Fifth Edition and played till Nemesis. Haven't gotten back seriously until M10 came out when I heard they reprinted Ball Lightning and Lightning Bolt (always been a mono red guy), plus the new planeswalkers are pretty sweet.

I personally don't mind the power creep, and the general slowing down of the game. Makes Sligh decks that much more special.

Also, EDH is a lot of fun. I recommend any jaded Magic players to at least give a few 4-5 man matches a shot. Best new format in a while.

 

[An-Det]

Yeah its definitely slower then Zendikar last year. Then again Zendikar limited was one of the fastest formats I've ever played.

It really was, the only one faster that I can recall was triple Eventide drafts, since turn 4-5 kills were fairly consistent. What a broken limited format.

 

[Fragamemnon]

No offense, but anyone saying this generally isn't evaluating the cards correctly. The most abusive thing you can do in this game is break the resource system, so cards like the Urza free creatures (untap x lands, where x is cmc), frogmite, Myr Enforcer etc were all far more broken than anything new that has come out.

As a whole, the average creature efficiency has gotten much better over the last four or five blocks. What you get now in a creature per mana is, on average, way way more than what you used to get.

If you dropped a creature with a power curve up there with Qasali Pridemage, Vendilion Clique, or Goblin Guide into one of the way older sets, it would very much stand out as an aberration.

I do agree with you that breaking the resource system is the most abusive thing you can do in the game. When you break the resource system to either deny your opponent the ability to do anything ( Legacy tempo decks, Vintage workshop lists ) or create massive amounts of mana (Dark Ritual, Yawgmoth's Will, Urza's Block, etc.), the game's basic rules literally break down.

 

[siddx]

Ravnica was a neat set but nothing has (and nothing probably ever will) come close to the awesomeness that was Urza's block. So ridiculously good.

I keep buying every single worldwake booster I happen to stumble across. Opening a foil Jace Mind Sculptor (worth nearly 200 bucks) would make my day.

The great thing about EDH is that because you can only have one of each card, the costs for building a good deck is actually quite a bit lower than with say a legacy deck (which will run you anywhere from 300-1000 bucks for something competitive). It's also filled with a lot more variety and options so you don't end up with 800 people all playing the same crap like UW control, fairies, and tendrils. I have a 100 dollar vampire EDH deck and an 75 dollar wizards EDH deck that goes toe to toe with some of my friends far more expensive EDH decks.

 

[Fragamemnon]

I'd play EDH around here but I would get run off the table for breaking their numerous house rules on things the players think are "unfun". They just want to play their fatty boom-booms until someone runs out of sweepers.

 

[siddx]

I'd play EDH around here but I would get run off the table for breaking their numerous house rules on things the players think are "unfun". They just want to play their fatty boom-booms until someone runs out of sweepers.

Makes me glad I found a group of players who 1. are not massive nerds, only minor ones. And 2. know how to separate casual magic from "serious" magic. We don't draw down for mulligan, cut decks, ban cards, or have any sort of rules really. Save that shit for judges and DCI numbers.

 

[Ravager61]

My old EDH group was a bunch of competitive magic players. Most had 5 color decks and just crammed as many game winning combos that they could into their deck. We followed the official banned list but didn't have any house rules or anything. Surprisingly, it was still really fun to play.

My general is Zur, the Enchanter and is actually really powerful.

 

[The Technomancer]

My old EDH group was a bunch of competitive magic players. Most had 5 color decks and just crammed as many game winning combos that they could into their deck. We followed the official banned list but didn't have any house rules or anything. Surprisingly, it was still really fun to play.

My general is Zur, the Enchanter and is actually really powerful.

Zur is really powerful. Around my table the usual EDH suspects are Zur, Rhys the Redeemed, Treva the Renewer, Experiment Kraj, Azami, Jaya Ballard, and a deck that contains Uriel the Mistwalker and nothing but enchantments.

I used to run Sen Triplets but everyone just tried to kill me right away.

 

[Ravager61]

I love playing mono blue EDH decks like Venser. Anytime anyone plays a spell the whole table looks at you to make sure its ok.

 

[siddx]

I run a mono blue Azami deck that is ridiculous. Card advantage is an understatement. If I can stall with counters until I get Azami out, by turn 7 or 8 I have the board under my control. I have on more than one occasion had half the deck in my hand and been able to look through all the remaining cards in the deck and reorganize them anyway I see fit and draw them at will. Speed is it's only weakness as any kind of mana acceleration would kill the balance between card draw and counters.

Also, one friend runs Azusa and the deck is ridiculous as far as mana. Being able to drop 3 land a turn plus with land fetch and elves, he'll drop multiple eldrazi on the board while we are still trying to afford our generals.

 

[Fusebox]

I used to love MtG, I don't think I was still playing it when they started doing the expansion packs but it killed university for me. We'd get baked, put on Conan the Barbarian OST and tap cards for days.

 

[Keru_Shiri]

I had a Scion of the Ur-Dragon deck for EDH, but scrapped it. Now I'm working on a Jhoria of the Githu deck and just loading it down with wacky red and blue spells to mess with the other players. I'm going to combine this with stuff like blue Braids and universal card draw so the other players won't hate me too much. EDH is all about politics, I love it.

 

[siddx]

I've seen Niv-Mizzet wreck face too as far as blue/red generals go. Just load up on burn, counter and draw.

 

[Ravager61]

Also, to people out there wanting to start playing or get back into playing, I highly recommend you seek out your local Friday Night Magic and learn how to draft. Drafting is by far the best way to get better at the game and it doesn't require a huge money investment building up a stockpile of cards. You get to keep the cards you draft and you learn the basic concepts of how to play the game well at the same time.

You really should never be cracking packs unless you just want to waste money. If you want to open packs, draft them with your friends instead. To me, buying and cracking packs is really just a waste of money when you could actually be playing the game with them.

Also, if you are nervous about going to FNM because you are new to the game, don't be. I guarantee that there will be people there that will happily show you the ropes.

Just my 2 cents

 

[siddx]

Also, to people out there wanting to start playing or get back into playing, I highly recommend you seek out your local Friday Night Magic and learn how to draft. Drafting is by far the best way to get better at the game and it doesn't require a huge money investment building up a stockpile of cards. You get to keep the cards you draft and you learn the basic concepts of how to play the game well at the same time.

You really should never be cracking packs unless you just want to waste money. If you want to open packs, draft them with your friends instead. To me, buying and cracking packs is really just a waste of money when you could actually be playing the game with them.

Also, if you are nervous about going to FNM because you are new to the game, don't be. I guarantee that there will be people there that will happily show you the ropes.

Just my 2 cents

Cracking packs is fun. It's the gambling aspect to the game. Yes its a waste of money in the long run and most serious collectors spend most of their money on individual cards and only a small about on packs (buying some boxes when a set first releases) but to me, I get a lot of enjoyment out of opening a pack and seeing what I got for a rare.

Also you are correct, people are more than happy to show you the ropes at FNM, however you also risk sitting there while some guy prattles on endlessly until your brain melts. I took the girl I am seeing to the pre-release for Besieged and everyone was more than happy to help her out, but I had to save her from more than one guy who wanted to babble on for eternity while she sat there all glassy eyed trying to come up with excuses to gtfo and go have a drink at the bar between rounds. But yes, most people are happy to give you hints and for every jackass who you will want to punch in the head, there is someone who will be patient and understanding with a new comer. I played a girl in the first round who had only been playing for 2 days and made a lot of mistakes and took excruciatingly long to make every decision. I was very patient with her and did everything I could to make her feel comfortable.

I've been playing for 15 years and I went 3-3
The girl I am seeing has been playing for a month and went...3-3. Godamnit lol.

 

[dschalter]

No offense, but anyone saying this generally isn't evaluating the cards correctly. The most abusive thing you can do in this game is break the resource system, so cards like the Urza free creatures (untap x lands, where x is cmc), frogmite, Myr Enforcer etc were all far more broken than anything new that has come out.

imo, the "frogmite, myr enforcer" part of that statement is a common misconception. it wasn't those cards that were broken, it was disciple and ravager (and skullclamp, but skullclamp made every creature deck broken). the presence of those cards gave what was an aggro deck basically a combo kill if the aggro plan failed. that was the true brokenness of raffinity.

Ravnica was a neat set but nothing has (and nothing probably ever will) come close to the awesomeness that was Urza's block. So ridiculously good.

urza block might well have more cool cards than any other block (tempest, invasion and ravinca blocks are close), but it did huge damage to the game. the store i went to saw attendance for constructed tournaments plummet ridiculously, as did many other LGSs. as a result of the fiasco a bunch of people were fired and r&d had to work much more to balance cards going forward.

 

[Keru_Shiri]

I don't know, seems to me standard is in pretty good shape right now. The meta is fairly diverse, and while there will always be archetypes and "the deck to beat" it doesn't seem nearly as bad as when Jund was ruling to roost, and people are still complaining about how bad Faeries were in the Lorwyn days.

What are you guys' thoughts on Blightsteel Colossus? A lot of people are saying he's going to break the game, but I'm not buying it.

 

[siddx]

imo, the "frogmite, myr enforcer" part of that statement is a common misconception. it wasn't those cards that were broken, it was disciple and ravager (and skullclamp, but skullclamp made every creature deck broken). the presence of those cards gave what was an aggro deck basically a combo kill if the aggro plan failed. that was the true brokenness of raffinity.



urza block might well have more cool cards than any other block (tempest, invasion and ravinca blocks are close), but it did huge damage to the game. the store i went to saw attendance for constructed tournaments plummet ridiculously, as did many other LGSs. as a result of the fiasco a bunch of people were fired and r&d had to work much more to balance cards going forward.

Actually, if I remember correctly, the bigger issue was 6th edition, which came out right afterwards. The amount of rule changes included with it's release upset a huge portion of players. Namely the creation of the stack, forcing damage prevention to occur before and not after damage, and immediate death rather than player death at the end of combat (giving the player a chance to raise his life back up before combat ended) just to name a few. It wasn't the rules themselves I think so much as the sheer amount of rule changes that occured. I remember people being furious about it. And then Mercadian Masques dropped and was such a drastic 180 as far as power that it was just as broken because everything was shit.

 

[siddx]

I don't know, seems to me standard is in pretty good shape right now. The meta is fairly diverse, and while there will always be archetypes and "the deck to beat" it doesn't seem nearly as bad as when Jund was ruling to roost, and people are still complaining about how bad Faeries were in the Lorwyn days.

What are you guys' thoughts on Blightsteel Colossus? A lot of people are saying he's going to break the game, but I'm not buying it.

Blightsteel Colossus wont break the game but it's going to make Eldrazi ramp, which is already owning face in standard, that much more nasty. I have a simple ramp deck without primeval titans than can drop an emarkul or other eldrazi by turn 4. Which ends the game in the next turn or two. Now your opponent also has to deal with a potential 11/11 trample indestructible infect creature coming out that early.

 

[Grady Durden]

Old school.

New school!