And yes, that's the new format. There are "shards" to draft:

Jund: R/G/B
Esper: U/W/B
Naya: R/G/W
Grixis: R/B/U
Bant: W/G/U

You certainly don't have to, but drafting outside of these colors is liable to make your deck subpar. There's tons of allied gold cards. Esper Aggro is probably the best deck in AAC.

Uh, he only takes 1 form ig, not 2?

Iguanar is "whenevr ANOTHER creature is put into a graveyard"

Manaplasm and Nacatl Hunt-Pride makes 2 anothers.
I still didn't really get the story though - doesn't he still have to block Manaplasm when Kyle plays Sprouting Thrinax instead?

Like Pyromantha said, it's Pride/Manaplasm.

And yes, he does have to block Manaplasm, but now he doesn't die. He cycled Resounding Roar or something on his other dude that had evasion and killed me on the next turn.

Lol I was drunk, oops.

I need Counterspells and Hydroblasts on MODO. Anyone here an avid TESTEX drafter that has a bunch? Paying .50 per.

How much variance is in mtg? I was pretty good at SSS and got my rating up to 1800ish. Since AAA came about, I dropped down to 1620 and since then have won my last 3 drafts, bringing me back up to around 1700. So, do I suck? Do I just suck at AAA? Is AAC really that different? Also, what is the best strategy in CCC? Are there any rares in the set worth any tix? Sorry for all the questions but I suck at mtg.

Well, you obviously are going to lose a ton of games when you first start drafting after taking time off. AAC is significantly different than AAA, since Esper and 5-color get way better.

CCC is just Esper or 5-color. It's a stupid format. And check the marketplace for rare prices if you are confused.

I just started playing but it seems there is a lot of variance.

Have mainly been playing Sealed Deck premier events and I made top 8 with a very mediocre deck, and only went 4-2 with an unbelievable ridiculous god deck.

The main source of variance seems to be in whether or not you get a reasonable mana draw. It sucks when you are playing two colors splashing 1, and don't draw one of your main two, and your opponent playing 5c plays the domain from the top of his deck without tutoring

I haven't played paper magic in literally 5 years but I was usually around 1900+ in that (probably still am if they didn't delete me!) and I'm around 1700 on MODO atm. Of course I only just started but it still seems to me that overall play is 'stronger' on MODO. I never seem to play against someone with just a hopelessly bad sealed or draft deck, and no-one really throws their guys away to onboard tricks that used to happen all the time playing live.

CCC I like Esper (b/u/w) a lot. You get a nice 2-drop in Zombie Outlander which is often hard for the base green decks to get past, and a bunch of flyers. It seems that the best 'other' decks are aggro, maybe Jund, but perhaps some deck with lots of Darklit Gargoyles and exalted guys could be insanely fast too. I've only done like 10 drafts so take that advice with a pinch of salt

Dear Kyleb,

Apparently you can fling the magical cards quite well. Your first impression wasn't so that you had such knowledge. Please accept this post as an apology for my douchebaggery.

Also in an 8-4 or 4-3-2-2, I know the point of drafts is to win, but there are certain "money" cards that you cracked and you just have to obv take (obv being like.. you're total esper pack 1, but crack sarkan vol in pack 2, you have to take it cuz it's 10+). However, where is the breakeven point where you can pass a good card for your deck to win for the "money card". Obviously the price for a 8-4 money card has to be greater than a 4-3-2-2.

As a rank beginner I have been playing the 'Swiss' drafts and the payout structure in those is so flat (and the opponents so bad) that I usually just take *any* rare, though there are a few that are worth less than 0.5 tix that I don't bother with if there's a card that will really help my deck

I guess the break-even point depends heavily on what the second best card is, unless it's a bomb I suspect taking even a 2 ticket card might be correct. That's half a pack, if you are insanely good I suppose your prize EV in an 8-4 might be 3 packs? Can 1 single card make a 1/6th difference in your prize EV?

I guess it depends on your rating too - if *I* played an 8-4 I might be best off taking every rare, then every uncommon then dropping after deck-building

I think this game answers a lot of the "magic luck" questions for me.

Need an answer? Just topdeck exactly what you need!


Rietzl was overjoyed to win a die roll, one of the few he claimed to have been victorious with on the weekend then kicked the match off with a Dark Ritual-fueled super turn. The first Ritual netted him Dark Confidant, and with the spare black mana he played a second Ritual, just enough for Hypnotic Specter.

“That’s...going to be difficult.” Luis deadpanned.

Still, LSV isn’t a super-pro for nothing. He had a Swords to Plowshares to nail the 2/2 Hyppie, but was a bit dismayed to see Paul’s second land drop in Wasteland. When Paul immediately used it on Luis’ Tundra, it became clear why the Pro Tour-Kyoto finalist was so dismayed; the dual land was his only source of mana, and he passed the turn with an empty board. Paul’s meager clock of Dark Confidant went on the warpath, and he used a Hymn to Tourach to keep Scott-Vargas further off balance.

Luis finally found a Polluted Delta, which fetched Tundra, then set up his next few draw steps with a Ponder. Rietzl’s Bob charged in to put Luis at 12, then Paul played Thoughtseize seeing triple Daze, double Counterbalance.

“Innnnnnteresting...” Paul said, before binning one of the Dazes.
Luis Scott-Vargas maneuvers against a plethora of Dark Rituals.

Luis ripped a Swords to Plowshares off the top from his Ponder, but was still stuck on one land. Paul was having difficulty finding pressure, however, playing an Umezawa’s Jitte but unable to get an attacker to carry the pointy stick. Luis found himself a Sensei’s Divining Top, then a second source of blue to play Counterbalance. All of a sudden, Paul Rietzl was in trouble. Luis had established his deck’s soft lock, and Paul needed to find a threat he could stick quickly or risk falling out of the game.

Meanwhile, Luis was busy trying to spin his way into an improbable comeback. He worked his Top, finding a Flooded Strand to take him to three mana, and searched up an Underground Sea that enabled him to play Dark Confidant. Paul’s hand was growing larger and larger, but featured Snuff Outs, Dark Rituals, and Sinkholes, few of which were relevant at the moment. What he really needed was a creature that could resolve through Counterbalance.

Paul played Dark Ritual, which was allowed to resolve. He used two of the mana to play Sinkhole, which merited a Brainstorm from Luis, and the Sinkhole was countered as Scott-Vargas revealed a Counterbalance on top of his deck to the Counterbalance in play. “Burn for 1,” Paul said, failing to spend the last mana in his pool.

A second Dark Confidant joined the team for LSV, and Paul Rietzl found himself at 13 life against an opponent with Sensei’s Divining Top and Counterbalance, drawing three cards a turn! Unbelievably, Luis was turning the game around in monstrous fashion and, a few turns later, he landed Tarmogoyf. That let him send his entire team into the red zone and Luis Scott-Vargas had done it!

“I never drew a creature...” Paul lamented as he moved to his sideboard.

It's OK Sykes. Let us leave it at that.

In other news, I built my pauper classic deck, ready for the 2-man queues, only to find out that they pay a pack of Tenth rather than Shards. FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUU that is horse****. The pack of 10th sells for 3 tix while Shards sells for 4.5 tix. You have to win 67% of your matches to be profitable in pauper while you can win half your matches in Extended (or whatever pays in Shards) and profit .25 tix per match. Such bull****. I can't wait until Magic 2010 is released; they should sell for a ton.

New MTGO champs series looks pretty sik

Yes, wow. They are somewhat adopting the PCQ format from Vs. which is far superior to the current PTQ format.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazin.../other/031009a

Insane. MODO only and it's slightly different than the PCQ format, but it's a step in the right direction.

Yeah those look like fun events. Btw what it '2010 sealed', is it a fancy name for 11th edition basically?

edit. just googled it - seems strange for a core set to have *new* cards in it but I guess will get more people playing with the set.

I got tired of being beaten by a pauper 'ping' deck, so I built this quickly.

4x Nausea
4x Wail of the Nim (I really do like this card sadly)
4x Executioner's Capsule
4x Corrupt
4x Aeliopile (2 damage artifact)
4x Terror (other choices are probably superior here)
4x Ravenous Rats
4x Phyrexian Rager
4x Dross Golem
4x Vulshok Morningstar
2x Some silly 2B faerie that makes opponent discard
18x swamps

It's a pretty terrible deck, but can be amusing. I beat an elf deck when he had exhausted his library on turn 18.

I cannot count on two hands how many times I've wrecked my opponent with Wail of the Nim.

What is the most valuable full set on MODO? Invasion?

Master's Edition 2. Dual lands FTW

Are only half of the duals in ME2? Just allied ones?

Just allied ones, yes.

Has anybody run a Smartbot on MODO? It looks as though there is market saturation so profit would be almost non-existent, but then again I have a completely spare PC that I am doing nothing with at all. Any estimates on $ / day you could make with this?

I'm heading down to Portland on Friday night to crash at a motel, drink some beers, and play a ton of vintage games at Ground Kontrol. After that, I'll be sleeving up the following list to play in the PTQ:

4 Arcbound Worker
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Master of Etherium
4 Ornithopter
4 Frogmite
4 Myr Enforcer

4 Thoughtcast
4 Springleaf Drum
4 Cranial Plating
4 Chromatic Star
2 Fatal Frenzy

16 Artifact Lands (W/R/U/B)
2 Blinkmoth Nexus

SB:

4 Thoughtseize
4 Ethersworn Canonist
4 Path to Exile
3 Hurkyl's Recall

The typical metagame for the PacNW is:

30% Faeries
30% Affinity
20% TEPS
5% Zoo variants
20% Random garbage (Bant Aggro, Elves, whatever)

Fortunately for me, Zoo is few and far between. Faeries is quite a good matchup, and I've reversed thinking on Fatal Frenzy - I like it very much game one, and it comes out every game two/three. I like Hurkyl's Recall over Ancient Grudge - especially on the play - and Path to Exile is also good in the mirror and against Zoo.

I've never played MTG and It's been a long time since I've played MTG (I stopped back when Stronghold came out). I'm tempted to give this a go. About how much $$$ do people typically spend to get into this game these days?