Is there any money to be made trading online cards for $$$? Also, is that allowed?

All the cards are tradable for mtg online tickets (which are basically currency and worth between 0.95-1.05 each) or through stars/fulltilt if someone's trustworthy.

anyone sign up using paypaL? It doesn't let me do it for some reason

No seriously guys the smell in that sweaty card shop was palpable. The air was thick with broken dreams.

Agreed, scope is bonkers! As is the machete.

I played 5 drafts in a pretty competitive environment. Obviously this is the first weekend so there was probably more rare drafting than normal. I plan on drafting much more of this set when it hits modo and refining these first impressions.

D1: Messy. Green is a trap color! Everyone drafts green. Mediocre naya deck. He casts obsidian fireheart g1, 2, 3. I have the removal game 1 and game 3 but he also has bounce g3 to save his guy.
D2: Insane UW deck. Curve full of evasive flyers (5 2 drop 2 power flyers, 4 of the amara raptors (really good) and 2 looters, 3 journey to nowheres, 2 whiplash traps. Lost in first round to t1 goblin guide backed up by the red pump first strike cry spell while on the draw g1 and 3 being punished by my own flying kor guy that outtempod myself.
D3: UR. Living Tsunamis, windrider eels, geyser glider, and teetering peak=awesome. Combined w/ 3 raptors, 3 looters, 2 lightnings, and the loremaster, and a few of the red 2/1 ally means I dont lose a game. 3-0.
*Lived the dream curve-t2 geopede, t3 looter, t4-6 raptor, t5 Loremaster, t6-if he hadnt already scooped---draw 5/discard 1

D4: Very very good rb aggro deck. Gobling guide, 2xlacerator, 3x guul daz (very good), 3 goblin shortcutters, 4 intimidate 3/2 boars (very very good),a couple red ball lightnighg expiditions and some disfigures. Lost to a Gr deck. G1 I win t5, g2 i mull to 6, no 1 drops, on the draw, i miss my double black to cast infest target player spell and loose to his green rare land putting a +1+1 on every green creature (he missplayed and used it on every creature every turn and I didnt read it, didnt matter probably).
*G3 epic game: I mull to 5 w/ no 1 drops, eventually get him to 11 w/ a 1/1 vamp out that will become a 3/2. I have two other 2/1 dorks vs his 5/6 and 2/2 green guy that gets big w/ forests. Im holding the +3/0 pump spell, he has one card. I draw the red deal damage=to mountains sorc, burn him for 2 (only have 2 mountains out), then attack him to 6. He topdecks the hasty dragon, knocks me to 15, next turn he can have two attack phases and kill me. I go to pump for lethal on my turn and he vines of vastwood my own creature making it untargettable essentially countering my pump spell for the win.

D5: Draft a great Bw aggro Deck. two drops-hexmage/2x surrakur marauder, 2x kor skyfisher, nighthawk, 4(!!) hookmaster (Very good), sanctifiers, 2xdeathtouch scorpions, mosquitor, specter, shade, 3xhideous end, 1 journey to nowhere. Just very consistent with lots of removal/deathtouch/evasion and utilty. No bombs really. 2-0, 2-0, guy in the finals has a ridic monored deck that everyone is hyping up and he doesnt want to split. I win a close 2-1 after some bad play on both our parts (he played a land to trigger geopede and instead made my specter a 5/5 flyer...i of course didnt see this and didnt block...but i did realize enough to attack back for 5).


Take homes. Unimpressed with the G/U card advantage expeditions as they seem a bit slow and are bad draws late although people liked the U one. The black ones and the red ball lightning one are both pretty good. Harrow is obviously awesome, especially with windrider eel although GU will have literally 0 reliable removal and so make sure to get your tricks.

Allied themed decks can be good as there is enough fixing to go 3 colors and reach a critical mass. The green/red 2 drops, umara raptor, the black 4 drop, and the red 5 drop are all decent enough on their own. The white first striker is very very good but requires a greater commitment.

Blue: Living Tsunami/windrider are both insane. The Blue ally is also underdrafted and almost first pickable. 3 mana looter is still a looter. Aether figment and merfolk seastalkers went way later than they should have. Oh and right of replication/roil elemental are both as insane bombs (obv), saw a kicked right of replication on a umara raptor.)

White: was unimpressive although underdrafted...the only reason I went white in the last draft was my only white card in the pack (a skyfisher) tabled in pack 1. Hookmaster was very underrated. The white minioverrun sorcery is also great. The best white cards are splashable-shephard of the lost and journey to nowhere.

Red: The tools for a very aggressive deck are there although its helpful to bring in black for some one drops to combine with shortcutter. Geopede/burst lightning are both first pickable (teetering peeks, attack w/ 5/3 firstsriker). The red allies are all playable on their own. Geyser glider is a red air elemental and nobody seemed to understand that yet. Obsidian fireheart is unfair.

Green is unexciting imo but everyone else loves it. I just dont like beating w/ 6/6s as much as I like flying over/intimidating w/ 2/2s and bouncing 6/6s. I first picked a scut mob in two drafts and was cut both times. The best cards other than obvious bombs are the 2 utility kicker 3 and 4 drop guys (kill flyer and non land perm). I even liked what I saw from the elf that taps for 2g as it accelerates you into the 6 mana range necessary for green. The green 5 mana sorcery that kills art/enchantments is almost maindeckable.

Black is very good but requires a large commitment with all the best cards being BB. Hideous end and infest target player are great. Disfigure is also very good. The guul daz vamp is pretty bad but great in the right deck (ie combined w/ red expeditions/boars/burn. Nighthawk is criminally good.

Agreed. Gamers have a stigma for a reason. Shower, cut your hair and quit eating chinese food every meal.

Wanted to add that it is very easy to end up short on a playable curve of creatures (especially in sealed) and so rate them higher than you normally would vs avg removal or utility expeditions. Every draft saw decks getting punished that lacked a good curve.

3+ color decks with weak mana fixers isn't perfect limited imo

Most of the people at my prerelease (24 people I think out on Long Island) were typical gamers. There were 2 decent looking chicks however, both with dudes of course.

ACR had weak fixing?!

Between a possible tricolour land, the land cycling spells, and 1-2 land cycling creatures in each draft deck, I found 3 colour was shockingly easy to win with. Especially Jund/Naya where the cycling cards are pretty good anyways and great setups for stuff like vengeful rebirth.

Edit: and that's with me not even mentioning decent 24th cards like exploding borders and the 2cast artifact that lets you get 2 lands. Even the posts are fantastic if you have a slightly below average deck or somehow got a sledge/bituminous that needs a splash.

With AAA, or AAC, tri color or 5 color decks were more than competitive. The only decks capable of really doing the aggro thing well were WG and WU to some extent. WIth ACR came blades and one less pack of trilands. Splashing a third color was still very reasonable but esper decks were dominant-UW aggro and UB tempo. I also think RG or RB aggro were pretty competitive but didnt have the early evasion or late game stability that the esper decks had (gargoyles/sludge strider/thopter foundry/glassdust hulk). Burning people with breath of malfegor/exploding borders/vengeful rebirth was pretty sweet though.

-JP

did you just call armillary sphere a 24th card

loved the card in AAC, barely played it in ACR, couldn't really spend most of 2turns fixing mana when there are so many good 1-2drops

exactly. Sphere was my favourite noob trap card in ACR second only to obelisks. Oh and vithian stinger. If you see anyone playing these chances are you're about to win.

Also once people caught on to the power of GWr/UW aggro i switched over to jund/naya and never looked back. I'll take putrids and brutes over all but the absolute best esper decks (i.e. 2+ stormblades and a couple cormorants). Once the new rules took effect the bounce cards and foundry became trashy so RGb efficient fat and burn became king. Still is, imo.

it's not fun because you're 3 colors and you have neighbors on each side sharing 2 of your colors. And in sealed you're not getting enough mana fixers

M10 is nix tix right now, so that's kind of nice. Just drafted this R/B in an 8-4. Heh @ 4x Canyon Minotaur. Seems OK I guess.

Lol did you open the 2x fireball and the earthquake?

holy crap. that is sick. i don't think 2 deathmarks is maindeckable

I never thought deathmark would be either, but Olivier Ruel loves it and stuck 3 in the last draft report of his I read.

i think u should play 18 lands and its not close
u have 3 X spells and infinite 4 drops

edit: should be a swamp,

8 swamps basically means u wont play sign in blood on t2 most of the times

I like to find out about stuff I dont know anything about. Reading this with absolutely no knowledge of the game was pretty funny though .

Thoughts?

play mostly monoblack.

pyroclasm was/maybe is overrated

it's not overrated it just needs to be built around. you can't just throw it in any deck and expect it to be extremely good. it's also very matchup dependent. there are some decks that just can't beat you when u draw it.