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I attended a local Legacy tournament recently on May 4th with a fantastic experience under my belt. I didn’t come in first place, the matches weren’t interesting, and there were only seven players in the queue. Doesn’t sound that exciting, does it? Well, it wasn’t terrible, but not nearly as good as previous experiences. It is still a nice, but rather short, story to tell. As you’ll see, the best part was the side event that three of us at the shop pulled together to make a lackluster day into something worth remembering.
- Published:
- Yesterday at 8:02 PM
- Views:
- 102
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 3
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This triple-threat dandy has really grabbed my attention. The flavor is cool, his ability is sweet, and he’s one of those special cards that can allow for you to build a deck in several different directions. He can be great in Vampire tribal, for sure. Any time you can load up on more soldiers in your army is a good time. Flipped he’s almost worth two copies of Captivating Vampire, just without the option of a repeatable Mind Control. Pair them together and you can play theft on a grand scale, nabbing a Mercedes or two.
- Published:
- 4/15/2013
- Views:
- 704
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 5
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When somebody is slinging cards in the Legacy format and they give an offhand comment like, “ I’m using Knights,” they aren’t talking about White Knight, Knight Exemplar, or even Northern Paladin. I can say with absolute accuracy that ninety-eight percent of the time they are talking about Knight of the Reliquary. I can also say with precision unmeasured that eighty percent of statistics are made up on the spot.
- Published:
- 3/25/2013
- Views:
- 851
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 6
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There is a group of cards enshrouded by an aura of power that many of us older players recognize. Maybe you’re like me and you have a few of them, but you have a long way to go before you can just build any deck you want with the best cards in print. In Legacy it would be Jace, the Mind Sculptor, Tarmogoyf, Force of Will, dual lands like Volcanic Island, and Show and Tell. If you aren’t into Legacy, maybe it’s a Modern cluster something like this: Dark Confidant, Thoughtseize, Cryptic Command, and Mutavault. Standard has these fabulous cardboard weapons of Thragtusk, Bonfire of the Damned, Restoration Angel, Sphinx’s Revelation, and Huntmaster of the Fells. Why are these cards so powerful, and furthermore, why do they have to cost so much darn cash? Sometimes it’s obvious why cards are good, but the intricacies of a card’s potential aren’t always well known, especially to the folks that don’t have experience using them.
- Published:
- 3/28/2013
- Views:
- 925
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 8
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Have you found yourself practicing for tournaments too often all by yourself? Do you know people you like to play with but getting together is always a big hassle? Maybe you only manage to get together with other players whenever you are all at the game store. Have you seen dudes at tournaments with t-shirts declaring their allegiance to some private Magic team or club? Maybe you’ve thought about starting a team of your own.
- Published:
- 3/8/2013
- Views:
- 1039
- Author:
- Zanman
- Comments:
- 4
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It’s been a while since I dove into the Standard format, long enough to make me feel embarrassingly unfamiliar with that format. I wanted to change that by digging into it online with Magic Workstation and build a deck that suits my style, and maybe win a game or two. I also picked the brains of a few Standard junkies that I know to get an idea for what the top decks are.
- Published:
- 3/1/2013
- Views:
- 1036
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 5
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In the words of Steven Tyler, I’m ‘back in the saddle again’, returning as promised with the second installment revisiting the fundamental basics of deck building. My wife asked me: ‘why do you get so excited about Magic? I mean, what’s so great about it compared to any other card game like canasta?’ I responded: ‘I get to pick which cards I want to play with, and so does my opponent.’ This simple fact, more than any other aspect of Magic, is why we all love the game. We get to express our personality and preferences with card choices and deck design. It isn’t as simple as playing ‘War’ with a traditional deck of cards where winning is a matter of simply drawing more aces or kings. Magic is full of potential variance, but we all get to pick how many aces we get to play.
- Published:
- 1/16/2013
- Views:
- 1294
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 6
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Here we are in 2013 with the world still turning. No zombie apocalypse, no cataclysmic shutdown of the world that the Mayans got stuck with predicting, and I’m still excited to play and write about Magic: the Gathering. Sometimes I trim back my Magic activity to only a few hours a week, enough to tinker with a few decks, post on the forums, and write something for all of you dedicated fanatics. Then there are weeks that I just can’t get the game out of my head, thinking about it constantly while I go about all of the mundane tasks of real life. Few events can trigger a near-obsessive fascination like meeting a new friend that just happens to be as fanatical as you are.
- Published:
- 1/10/2013
- Views:
- 1541
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 16
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Recently, a friend told me that she wanted to jump back into Magic. She has all kinds of street cred in board gaming and roleplaying, but only dabbled in the Magic-al arts many years ago.
- Published:
- 2/7/2013
- Views:
- 1213
- Author:
- Zanman
- Comments:
- 5
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I remember a time in my Magic-playing past when getting Birds of Paradise in my opening hand made me feel like I couldn’t lose. While the power level of Birds never came from combat, it was still considered the best one-mana creature in the game for most of Magic’s history. Fixing your mana was always its strongest attribute, closely followed by providing mana acceleration for turn two that so many aggro and midrange decks love. Several cards, though, have shown up that outclass Birds of Paradise in green.
- Published:
- 11/18/2012
- Views:
- 2464
- Author:
- Mr. Safety
- Comments:
- 24
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