MTG Salvation

I remember logging onto the Wizard's website on the first day of Planar Chaos previews. On the left sidebar was a Wrath of God, I bugged out because there was supposed to be a preview card. All the sudden my screen went through some Matrix stuff and on-screen the card turned into Damnation!!! WOW, Wizard's will NEVER be able to top that preview, it was perfect marketing.

I went to the Northern Californian regional pre-release in Burlingame; the event was smaller than usual, but still a blast. I did 3-1-0 in sealed and 3-0-0 in the draft, even though I didn't pull any chase bombs. I meet some cool people and got good insight.

In sealed I played a Black/Red aggro deck, my curve topped out with a single 5CC card, Halo Hunter; I played the usual 17 lands, even though in a different format I might have played 16. I had a ton of removal, 2 urges, 1 tomb hex, 1 smoother, 1 reckoning, 1 searing, 1 blazing torch, 1 torch slinger, and a cherry bomb on top, chain reaction. Multiple mulligans killed my first match, but I ended up ripping through everything else.

In Draft, I cracked a Luminacrch, then a Kabira Evangel, then ended up pulling a nice White/Red/Blue ally deck with 2 Join the ranks, some good removal and a Celestial Colonnade. Join the ranks came through every time even if it just killed a creature; it came through at the last match with a 4-for-0 with a Kabira out and I'm at 1 life. Allies were begging for a flash creature, let's see another one please.

Pligrim's Eye is my #1 card in the set, Creeping Tar Pits is #1 manland, Treasure Hunt's going to be NUTS!!! Allies are now constructed playable, and Smother (mmm... like gravy!!!)

So the word was Jace is so expensive because it will see play in eternal formats; isn't brainstorm restricted in vintage?

I also heard that Bajuka Bog is arguably the most disruptive card in the set because of the problems it's going to cause for Dedge and Threshold. What you think?

Quote from bateleur

Of course they're superior to the historical average. Historically, the creatures were simply too weak.

The open question is whether WotC have gone too far in attempting to redress the comical imbalance between aggro and control strategies.

Here's a great article from Finn on how moat ruined aggro strategy in Legacy and how the power creep of creatures just level out the balance of Magic.

So I finally broke down and did it, all the talks about the EDH fun got me interested. I don't play constructed paper magic no more; I only have MTGO card so I built a commander deck. I played my first game and it lasted close to 4 hours, shesh.

Mind you I don't mind long fun games, but MTGO makes the multiplayer experience grind to a slow hault. I understand the dynamic of building with cards that exploit multiple players, I like that aspect of EDH. The only problem I see is that there are a number of cards that are auto-include in any EDH deck that can support those colors. This leaves room for about 20-30 cards to differentiate your decks.

I gave up on commander till they get multiplayer working smoother, until then my deck goes to 100-card singleton and boy does it kick butt.

I Liked It

...usually I have an email for Beta in my inbox the day after pre-release, so when I didn't get one this time, I'm started to worry. I submitted a good number of bugs on the past few betas, so I worthy...

I give it to Wizrds, this is about as good as market can get, talk about a jackpot. There were shortages at my store for after pre-release, I wonder is if this is simular to the Wii strategy. If it is I don't like it if it last longer than a month. If you ant people to play, resistricting them is not healthy.

Goes well with the Treasure hunt Theme

Talk about taking the fun out of the game. I call for a boycott of Ed Beard Jr.'s cards.

Quote from urzassedatives

You can use the twitter feed for this.
The twitter feed posts an entry everytime a card is added, and twitter gives how long ago the card was entered.

That takes for granted that people want to use Twitter. I for one enjoy social networks, but I wouldn't touch Twitter with a 10 foot pole. I don't want to do a RSS feed either.

At the top of the spoiler is links for the 12 most recent additions, which works fine until more than 12 cards get spoiled at the same time. Why cant there be a recent changes page for situation when more than 12 cards get spoiled. It would be a improvement for the user experience.

Hive mind and a pact, never thought of that.

I'm looking at all the M10 rares and only a handful look like possible combo candidates (nothing that looks good), here's my thoughts:

Most Likely
Sanguine Bond - Plus a gain 20 point life spell.
Twincast - Plus a 10 point damage spell.

A Far Stretch (Very Unlikely)
Traumatize - Plus removing the other half of a deck.
Open the Vault - Plus some artifact or enchantment that wins game coming in from the graveyard.
Indestructibility - Plus some card the wins if indestructable.

Possible with Rumored 14/1 Token (Still Unlikely)
Might of Oaks - Plus a 14/1 token
Ball Lightning - Plus a 14/1 token

Any other ideas or comments?

What no Wrath of God, Noooooooooooo!

Quote from deadline

You can know the rules all you want, but you can't count on judges to listen to your story, or even believe you when they hear it.

From then on, when people miss their triggers against me, I just tell them, we resolve it, and we move on. It's breaking the rules, but unreliable judges are forcing my hand here.

Amen, Judges Suck

I read the first couple paragraphs and already got the feeling you might will article of the month!!! Check back when I finish