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Several things to Sblargh:

First off, I wouldn't recommend drafting to try and get colors, just do it to win. It sounds like you want to do that solely to supplement your current "deck" but the thing is, you might find you enjoy how a certain color plays currently over say blue/black. Hell when I started playing my very first deck was green/white deck, then a blue/black, but my first actual "competitive" deck was Black/Green. Plus playing to win is more fun.

Next, assuming you decide to take my advice, remember this Acronym -
BREAD

B - Bombs. Simply put these are cards that can quite obviously change the course of a game. Really powerful creatures (usually not spells though occasionally they may be) that will put the game in your favor.

R - Removal. In limited removal is huge, since its harder to get reliably countered. So what if your opponent just dropped a 6/6 flyer with trample. You cast something like doom blade and its gone.

E - Efficient or Evasion. I've heard both and they're both valid. Efficient - Does this card provide a good effect and/or power/toughness for its mana cost. Does it work well with other cards you have, etc. Evasion - Can this creature get past other creatures easily? For example a 2/2 flyer may not seem like much, but when an opponent has no fliers of their own to block it, it adds up.

A - Aggro. Cards that tend to be cheap and incredibly efficient/powerful. Stuff like Reckless Waif, Stromkirk Noble, Elite Inquisitor, or Champion of the Parish (Just some random innistrad examples of the top of my head) are some great examples of powerful/efficient and aggressive early game creatures. Getting cards like this out in the early turns of the game can be big. Thats not to say that bigger creatures can't be quite aggressive as well, but don't forget about the early part of the game either.

D - Dregs, Duds, etc. - The crap cards you're left with.


When looking at cards make sure you ask yourself some questions - Will this fit with the cards I've already chosen, will this card be easy to cast (For example a 2RRRR card may look impressive, but may end up being a bit difficult to cast since you *usually* need to go two color in drafts), will this card save me in a tight spot, etc.
 
The problem with "drafting to win" is that drafting requires a very different mentality than that of constructed play. It's hard to win drafts unless you're serious about it and for a new player passing up big cards that aren't in line with your picks at all can be a hard choice.

That and drafting costs a lot of money, if you can't make it back with prizes it'll be steep.

I would suggest buying a common/uncommon box, if your game store has those.
 
Thanks for the recommendations, I'll try to do both. Will buy some commons and uncommns and will try to "draft to win", even if I don't win, at least I'm trying new stuff which sounds pretty cool. :)
Real thanks for helping me out here, dudes.
 
Sblargh said:
Thanks for the recommendations, I'll try to do both. Will buy some commons and uncommns and will try to "draft to win", even if I don't win, at least I'm trying new stuff which sounds pretty cool. :)
Real thanks for helping me out here, dudes.

Let us know how you do. The BREAD thing is definitely something to have in the front of your mind. Try to stick to 2 colours and prioritise picks like that and you should be fine.
 
OnPoint said:
The first box I ever bought was Scars of Mirrodin. I was so discouraged after that box. But a few boxes later and I can tell you that it isn't a regular occurrence to get stonewalled like that.

If you're doing boxes, make sure that you find a creative way to use them so even if you get a shit box you still had fun. Buy a box and draft it with your friends. Even if you keep the cards at the end (you know, if you paid for the box), you'll still have a good time drafting. That's what we've been doing.

Yeah, we normally do draft if we get a box. This time we had the urge to just open them all and yeah, we got those results lol.

I've been playing with a ghetto version of Solar Flare with the cards I have available and it's been a beast deck against my buddies whom's decks aren't shabby by any means. I had this loop combo going of using Forbidden Alchemy to discard Sun Titan or Sheoldred Whispering One, using Unburial Rites to cast them out 1 or two turns earlier (3 if I'm able discard Unburial Rites), and just continue to bring back Ather Adept to bounce their creatures back to their hands. and attack. If Ather Adept dies, oh well. Next upkeep they got to sac a creature and my upkeep I get to bring Ather Adept right back to bounce anything else and get dmg through. Unless they straight exile my creatures, it's this never ending loop (almost). There's also so many options for control too it just seems unfair at times lol. I will definitely try to tweak this deck.
 
Ok, I went to the store, talked to the guy so he could help me build a viable cheap deck. While talking possibilities, I noticed I didn't like the idea of a pure control deck; it irckes me to direct the entire game so one of my 3 big creatures can arrive, so I went for a Infect deck which I am actually very happy with. I imagine I won't be winning anything big, but it was on my budget, it used a lot of what I already had and I like the controlling some and aggroing some.
Here it is:

Artifacts
4x Corpse Cur
1x Darksteel Axe
1x Tumble Magnet
2x Plague Myr

Creatures
1x Massacre Wurm
2x Phyrexian Crusader
4x Phyrexian Vatmother

Land
11x Island
13x Swamp

Spells
2x Go for the Throat
1x Spread the Sickness
2x Cancel
4x Mana Leak
2x Negate
2x Doom Blade
4x Mind Rot
4x Think Twice
 
I would suggest getting Inkmoth Nexus though it's not really budget lol. I think Blight Dragon is now $5 which is a solid card. It sucks that black infect lost most of its pump spells in this rotation like Vampire Bite and the black and blue rebound spells (can't recall the name). You could possibly splash green for Mutegenic Growth or just pay the two life to do additional damage. Contagion Clasp is cheap and allows you to proliferate. If they run a lot of 1/1s, Virulent Wound can easily take them out and give them a poison counter on top.
 
Built this blue control deck where my only win condition is using an Invisible Stalker with swords and other equipment attached to him. It runs OK, but if he gets neutralized (i.e. Surgical Extraction, Meddling Mage) I'm dead in the water. I need to figure out another, decent creature to add. It's mono-blue, and I'd prefer something as hard to kill as he is... if anyone has any suggestions.
 
OnPoint said:
Built this blue control deck where my only win condition is using an Invisible Stalker with swords and other equipment attached to him. It runs OK, but if he gets neutralized (i.e. Surgical Extraction, Meddling Mage) I'm dead in the water. I need to figure out another, decent creature to add. It's mono-blue, and I'd prefer something as hard to kill as he is... if anyone has any suggestions.
Possibly Slippery Bogle or Aven Fleetwing? Fleetwing has evasion too which would be fantastic with swords.
 
I see every blue deck running a Consecrated Phoenix. The card is like $15 though. Blight Agent is pretty evasive, just gotta protect him with counter spells or give him hexproof.
 
y2dvd said:
I would suggest getting Inkmoth Nexus though it's not really budget lol. I think Blight Dragon is now $5 which is a solid card. It sucks that black infect lost most of its pump spells in this rotation like Vampire Bite and the black and blue rebound spells (can't recall the name). You could possibly splash green for Mutegenic Growth or just pay the two life to do additional damage. Contagion Clasp is cheap and allows you to proliferate. If they run a lot of 1/1s, Virulent Wound can easily take them out and give them a poison counter on top.

Blight Dragon actually came up and I'll maybe get it on the near future, but on the budget I was, I couldn't do it (I had to buy a lot of the smaller stuff like the Vatmothers, the Mana Leaks, the Think Twice).
Consecrated Phoenix would be a life saver and I'm feeling Mind Rot is just a filler; between saving mana for counters and summoning the infected creatures, I hardly feel like I have the opportunity to make him discard something.
As for the Inkmoth Nexus, I'll keep an eye out for them. Thanks. :)
 
OnPoint said:
Built this blue control deck where my only win condition is using an Invisible Stalker with swords and other equipment attached to him. It runs OK, but if he gets neutralized (i.e. Surgical Extraction, Meddling Mage) I'm dead in the water. I need to figure out another, decent creature to add. It's mono-blue, and I'd prefer something as hard to kill as he is... if anyone has any suggestions.

Currently I think a lot of Stalker blade decks are U/W with Geist of St Traft.
 
So no one is interested in Cockatrice game nights. :(

Guess I need to figure out a way to play MtG:Online on that initial $10 fee only.
 
So my blue/green monster mulch deck is good, but it is boring.

I switched over to a Blue/White human tap/flashback deck and it is so much more fun to play.
 
I am as well, but only 2-3 people isn't enough is it?
 
Sblargh said:
I'm in for Cockatrice!

That's 4-5ish.

I'm willing to set it up or at least get some of the ground-work done. Maybe posting a thread on Gaming side (since it is "game" related) would bring some people that don't play the paper and card version in.
 
TheSeks said:
That's 4-5ish.

I'm willing to set it up or at least get some of the ground-work done. Maybe posting a thread on Gaming side (since it is "game" related) would bring some people that don't play the paper and card version in.
I would be down, depending on the day.
 
One thing I've noticed with This ghetto draft function is that spectators/admins can't seem to view the decks/picks. I was thinking of making a "collection" spreadsheet for players so we could have "collection nights" kinda like MtG:Online, but it seems we'd have to do an honor code system. Pretty sucky.

I'm curious if anyone has decent ideas for that.
 
I think honor code is the simplest way of doing this. It's not like MTGGAF is filled with super competitive drafters who'd hack in Garruks and Lilianas into their decklists (at least I hope not).

Since there aren't a lot of people showing interest in this we should keep the barriers to entry as low as possible. CCGDecks + Cockatrice is already kind of pushing it.
 
I'd be down, used to run Apprentice draft tournys via IRC back in the day (Read: 7 years ago.) I play MTGO but would totally be down for a sealed deck night with GAFers.

Don't be suprised if I pull two Geists though, it happened to me during a sealed pre-release last on Friday, sold the Geists that night for 13.5 a piece and now they're down to 9.

See, there is value in participating in the Pre-Release.
 
r - b - x said:
what is this cockatrice thing? as far as can understand, it's online magic that's not mtgo nor dotpw?

Yeah. The thing about it is that the program doesn't read the rules of the cards, it is just does the barebone (like; this is your hand, this is the graveyard, this is library, etc.); but it is up to the players to keep track of how much life is lost, how much mana something costs, etc.
The good thing about it is that is free and let you build any deck you want. I'm currently using the exact one I have in real life (the one posted above), but you can really do anything.

What is CCGDeck?
 
In case people haven't seen it, Channel Fireball posted an article today that has sparked a huge amount of discussion. It is an open letter written and signed by 5 of the best players ever: Zvi Mowshowitz, Jon Finkel, , Kai Budde, Bob Maher, and Luis Scott-Vargas. It's a great read, and watching the talk unfold has been awesome.

An Open Letter Regarding Planeswalker Points
 
(Checking formatting and posting it here for comments and critique before I post it over at Gaming)

I'm new to Magic: The Gathering and don't know where to start
I've got you covered but it hasn't been updated in two months. Not sure how well it holds up currently.

What is Saturday Night Magic?

It's a day of the week (obviously, Saturday) where the posters of NeoGAF get together on Cockatrice to play Magic: the Gathering!

B-B-BUT SEKS! THERE IS OTHER DAYS OF THE WEEK FOR THIS!

Correct. There is Thursday Night Magic for Magic: The Gathering: Online. There's also Friday Night Magic for the real card-game.

What is Cockatrice?

http://cockatrice.de/index.php?a=project said:
Cockatrice is an open-source multiplatform software for playing card games, such as Magic: The Gathering, over a network. It is fully client-server based to prevent any kind of cheating, though it supports single-player games without a network interface as well. Both client and server are written in Qt 4.

That made my brain hurt!

Okay, um... Program for card-games that is *NIX/BSD, Windows, OS X compatible with no rule policing. Watch for cheaters otherwise the card police will VROOM VROOM to your place to beat you down for cheating. BEEP BEEP.

So this means it can play Yugioh!/Pokemon Card Game/Legend of the Five Rings/...!?

In theory, yes. You edit the Oracle/"card database" program and it's theoretically the same thing.
---

Okay, with that out of the way: I'm looking to do weekly or bi-weekly Saturday meetups sometime in the evening for the US and possibly slightly earlier in the afternoon to let UK/EuroGAF join us.

There's no ability to draft unless we use CCGDecks.com's draft utility for easy importing to Cockatrice. This also means I/others don't have the active ability to police people. So...

Code of Honor:

I trust that GAF aren't made of douches that are going to slap 4 Black Lotuses into a draft deck to play with us. But I can't stop people from cheating unless people make notes of what cards they got and what other cards were available during the draft to sort-of "police" during the drafting. But I'm not going to ask people to do that and as such the major rule is don't be a douche, we're all playing casually so losing games and learning to draft and other stuff is just part of the experince.

Gametypes:

Obviously some of GAF is wanting to do card drafting and that means using CCG up above this paragraph. But I also want to do other gametypes like (possibly) Archenemy, Zombies, Unhinged/Unglued cards and decks only and the like during the month or during the meets to shake things up. I don't want this to be "strictly draft/sealed/blah, blah, blah" tournament fodder. Magic: The Gathering: Online already has that part covered if you want to be a tournament player and can go practice there.

*ahem*

Okay, what is drafting!?

This has pretty little pictures and can show you what they mean. I'm not going to hot link and I'm too lazy to put these pictures on an image host for GAF to hammer them so you can read up there.

The short gist is:

What is Booster Draft? said:
Have a group of friends who want to enjoy playing a format together? Booster Draft is exactly the format you're looking for! Instead of just opening your cards and building a deck, you and the other players at the table (four to eight total) have to draft the cards for your decks.

...

Once all the packs have been drafted, players build decks from the cards they selected, adding as many basic lands (Plains, Islands, Swamps, Mountains, and Forests) to their decks as they like. Each deck must have at least 40 cards.

Each pair of players then plays a match, which consists of the best two out of three games.

It seems Wizards (of the Coast) has made a "drafting simulator" available for solo use if you want to practice drafting.

There's also Magic Draft Sim.com which does the same thing for more than Magic 2012.

But we'll be using CCGdecks.com for drafting actually during the event because it is multi-user and thus an actual draft! Plus it allows exporting via Copy-paste into Cockatrice's "import via copy/paste" function or saving it as a Cockatrice deck as well!

There's also a demo for Magic 2009 edition that is basically a cut down version of "Duels of the Planeswalkers" 2009 edition if you want to learn to play by yourself before joining us. But it's completely okay if you don't know how to play because I'm sure most of GAF is willing to help you learn to play as you/we go! Plus we could use the free wins. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! *ahem*

Anyone interested in playing? I've got about 7-8 people interested.

---

Note: Saturday isn't really the "day" just a placeholder and I honestly think Saturday works because 1) It's the weekend and 2) Everyone would be free to play that day after Thur/Fri Night Magic events.

But bicker amongst yourselfs about a set day and I can work with it.
 
So I had built this new deck with a card combo in mind, what do you guys think?

This is the deck:
4x Trepanation Blade
3x Undead Alchemist (I'd like a 4th more, but hey)
4x Stitched Drake (mostly for blades)
4x Selhoff Occultist (I figure a shit ton of zombies are gonna die!)
4x Makeshift Mauler
4x Diregraft Ghoul
2x Unbreathing Horde (only have 2!)
4x Walking Corpse
2x Endless Ranks of the Dead (only had 2, I figure with 4 this is gonna be insane)
4x Moan of the Unhallowed
1x Nephalia Drownyard (as a way to waste mana)
12x Swamp
12x Island

Basically the goal is to abuse the hell out of Undead Alchemist to pump out a shit ton of zombies - that + Trep Blade on someone who's attacking also ensures a ton of milling (which is a mechanic I absolutely love!)

I was looking at stuff I could replace some stuff with -
Grave Titan (only had 1)
Skaab Goliaths (Pretty expensive)
Rooftop Storm (although, well, expensive and doesn't seem worth it)
Grimgrim, Corpse-Born (I really am thinking about replacing my special land with him - with all those zombies that I should spawn it would be easy to untap him)
Ghoulraisers (Although I don't know that I need to get zombies back that much)
Army of the Damned (13 zombies? Sure, it's hella expensive, but that's insane)
Ghoulcaller's Chant (again, do I need to get zombies back?)
Grimoire of the Dead (for the lulz)

What do you guys think? I have a weird feeling that I could go all black instead and just do a straight up zombie breeder deck but I like the milling aspect of this deck. There's just.. something about it. :)
 
I'll admit that Cockatrice is kind of masochism. Today I played a guy that used a sword that had a million different properties, like, 3 turns after the guy was writing on all caps THE SWORD DON'T LET YOU DO THAT!
So I quit. :(
BM and all; can get kind of stressfull making mistakes (like buying twice or skipping something) with people you don't know.
 
Sblargh said:
I'll admit that Cockatrice is kind of masochism. Today I played a guy that used a sword that had a million different properties, like, 3 turns after the guy was writing on all caps THE SWORD DON'T LET YOU DO THAT!
So I quit. :(
BM and all; can get kind of stressfull making mistakes (like buying twice or skipping something) with people you don't know.

What sword?
 
Since he's playing UB, I'm going to guess either SoFaF or SoBaM.
 
Halycon said:
Since he's playing UB, I'm going to guess either SoFaF or SoBaM.

And that is in English for those of us that aren't IDKMYBFFJILL?
 
Sword of Feast and Famine (Green Black) and Sword of Body and Mind (Green Blue).

I'm going to guess the former since it sounds like Sblargh was trying to blow up the guy with the Sword.
 
I guess it was this Sword of Feast and Famine. These cards with very unique texts are hard to deal when you find them for the first time on a cockatrice game; maybe I'm just stupid, but there's just a mental freeze when you try to put new rules into the game.
On one of my first games there, a guy did a frost titan. For some reason, during the game, it wasn't that easy to assimilate what he could do. He is basically a walking mana leak, but again, during the game, there's just this brain freeze.
 
Use the DEBT mnemonic for determining protection (from a specific color, from artifacts, or from creatures) rules.

Damage
Enchant/Equip
Block
Target

This means that if creature X has "Protection from Y", it cannot be damaged by Y, enchanted or equipped by Y, blocked by a creature that is Y, or targeted by a spell or ability from a Y source.

Note: Protection from Artifacts doesn't grant you immunity to a Sword's bonuses. For all intents and purposes, when an equipment or enchantment is attached to a creature, all its bonuses are appended to the creature's rule text, rather than being part of the artifact.

Exceptions to this rule include stuff like Blazing Torch. Since the text says "Blazing Torch deals 2 damage", it means the damage is coming from the Torch itself, not the creature. On the other hand, Protection from Artifacts will not save you against Mortarpod, because the damage from the effect is specified as coming from the creature.

These nuances are complicated at first but as you'll play you'll learn to differentiate them. One of the hallmarks of a good player is, in fact, an advanced grasp of rules and how to take advantage of them.
 
Speaking of rules: Equipment "unequips" at the untap stage, doesn't it? My memory is fuzzy and I'm curious what "swapping equipment" rules are. Equip goes back to the "artifact" area until equipped again, or stays on a creature until the equip cost is paid and then hops?
 
TheSeks said:
Speaking of rules: Equipment "unequips" at the untap stage, doesn't it? My memory is fuzzy and I'm curious what "swapping equipment" rules are. Equip goes back to the "artifact" area until equipped again, or stays on a creature until the equip cost is paid and then hops?

It stays on until the creature leaves play or is moved to something else (or made a creature).
 
TheSeks said:
Speaking of rules: Equipment "unequips" at the untap stage, doesn't it? My memory is fuzzy and I'm curious what "swapping equipment" rules are. Equip goes back to the "artifact" area until equipped again, or stays on a creature until the equip cost is paid and then hops?
Once you equip and Equipment onto a creature it will stay there until:

1) The creature leaves play
2) You equip the Equipment to another creature
3) The creature gets protection from artifacts
4) The equipment dies or becomes a creature.

Also, you can't choose to "unequip" a creature. The only way to take equipment off a creature is to move it onto something else.
 
One question: dude use a phantasmagorical image on a black creature (clone that creature and gains "whenever this is target of a spell, destroy it" or something), can I use a doom blade on it? Alternatively, if he clones something with "protection from red", can a red spell still destroy it? (because of the extra text the phantasmagorical image adds)
 
TimeKillr said:
So I had built this new deck with a card combo in mind, what do you guys think?

This is the deck:
4x Trepanation Blade
3x Undead Alchemist (I'd like a 4th more, but hey)
4x Stitched Drake (mostly for blades)
4x Selhoff Occultist (I figure a shit ton of zombies are gonna die!)
4x Makeshift Mauler
4x Diregraft Ghoul
2x Unbreathing Horde (only have 2!)
4x Walking Corpse
2x Endless Ranks of the Dead (only had 2, I figure with 4 this is gonna be insane)
4x Moan of the Unhallowed
1x Nephalia Drownyard (as a way to waste mana)
12x Swamp
12x Island

Basically the goal is to abuse the hell out of Undead Alchemist to pump out a shit ton of zombies - that + Trep Blade on someone who's attacking also ensures a ton of milling (which is a mechanic I absolutely love!)

I was looking at stuff I could replace some stuff with -
Grave Titan (only had 1)
Skaab Goliaths (Pretty expensive)
Rooftop Storm (although, well, expensive and doesn't seem worth it)
Grimgrim, Corpse-Born (I really am thinking about replacing my special land with him - with all those zombies that I should spawn it would be easy to untap him)
Ghoulraisers (Although I don't know that I need to get zombies back that much)
Army of the Damned (13 zombies? Sure, it's hella expensive, but that's insane)
Ghoulcaller's Chant (again, do I need to get zombies back?)
Grimoire of the Dead (for the lulz)

What do you guys think? I have a weird feeling that I could go all black instead and just do a straight up zombie breeder deck but I like the milling aspect of this deck. There's just.. something about it. :)

My friend made a similar deck. It's a double edge sword. I think your deck would be easily contained. My friend actually milled my entire deck one game, but I had a flashback before drawing a card at my next upkeep in order to do direct damage to him and win the game lol. The problem with your deck is you have no way of milling yourself a few cards to be able to exile creatures to cast the meaty guys. As long as I play evasive creatures, I won't even bother killing off your weaker 2/2 zombies. Also, Trepanation blade is pretty pricey. Add 3-4 Forbidden Alchemy in there. Maybe even Zombie Infestation so you can discard some creatures. My buddy had a nice combo of playing Zombie Infestation, then discarding Vengeful Pharoah and whatever else to get a zombie. Any creatures that attacks dies, VP goes back to the top of the library, next turn draw a card, discard VP and another card, get zombie, repeat.
 
Sblargh said:
One question: dude use a phantasmagorical image on a black creature (clone that creature and gains "whenever this is target of a spell, destroy it" or something), can I use a doom blade on it? Alternatively, if he clones something with "protection from red", can a red spell still destroy it? (because of the extra text the phantasmagorical image adds)

In both those cases you are trying to target a spell on an illegal target. You can't do that just to pop the if it becomes a target trigger. It's the same thing as trying to target an illusion that got Hexproof from a Lord of Illusion.

If they become an illegal target after the spell is targeted (through a Stave Off or something similar) the illusion will still die since the destroy it trigger will already be on the stack.
 
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