1) Istvan, due to him reducing all Creature Based damage, is immune to Infect, correct?
2) Assuming you deal six damage with Istvan to a Blightsteel Colossus (or any Indestructible creature) and then Dismember it, does that cause the creature to die?
This is probably better left for the Rulings section, but here I go.
1) You're correct, like Wither, Infect replaces how damage is recorded. Something that prevents that damage from occurring doesn't care how the damage will be dealt.
2) No, it will live. When you reduce the toughness of the creature, it'll be a 6/6 with 6 damage marked on it. Since it's indestructible, that won't cause it to die (despite what Duels of the Planeswalkers tells us, damage doesn't reduce toughness).
3. Blue has seriously hefty card draw. By hefty, I mean cubeworthy. You have Brainstorm (prioritize landcycling with it), Compulsive Research, Fact or Fiction, and Breakthrough all at common and uncommon. That said, the rest of the color looks pretty low-powered, so I'd make it a priority support color.
Having done a couple of 4 person drafts of the set so far, I just wanted to reiterate this. Caveat: a 4-person draft is going to be already warped fundamentally. In both draft, blue was fairly open and had someone really decided to move all in on it, they could clean up (including me one game). When discussing afterwards, we decided that that was in large part due to the fact that the "excitement level" of the blue cards was pretty low. The power level was pretty high but it was focused pretty much on the card draw side of the spectrum. As such, it looks to be better as a supporting color (with the exception of the U/W flyers deck).
Dethrone seems like it got more focus than you would have thought. People were constantly checking life totals in order to hit the "dethrone target," or taking various lines to keep themselves from being that guy. Among other things, one player got the Treacherous Ogre up to a 5/6 before it got neutralized and used its ability to keep himself from being the target and cast his spells.
I'll go ahead and add my success at Game Day to this thread. I've been sick of playing nothing but Esper control since October, so I borrowed someone else's Mono Blue Devotion for FNM this past week. Due to the regular crowd of Mono Black players going to GP: Atlanta, I pretty much wrecked house with it, so I got permission to borrow it again for Game Day (the owner was going to be out of town anyway). The list was pretty much bog standard for Mono Blue, just about the same list everyone comes up with when they slam it together, except he could only loan me 2 Mutavaults. I filled those spots with an Island and a second Nykthos and went to town. Only 10 people showed up because the Grand Prix was all of 90 minutes away from the store (I couldn't have spared the time or money to go, so I was stuck with just Game Day).
Round 1- RDW- This guy rarely shows up, but he's a decent player and builds solid decks. He tries to keep me off devotion by killing my early plays, but had no answers for 3 Nightveil Specters in a row, who were conveniently large enough to hold off his whole team. Had he been a little more aggressive in trying to get past my Specters, he'd have probably gotten me. Game 2 started quickly for him with a multiple Burning-Tree Emissary draw, but petered out as soon as I was able to drop a Master of Waves for 3 tokens, followed by another the next turn for 4 more.
1-0
Round 2- Mono-Blue, splashing White- Fairly regular player around the shop, but tends to make rash decisions. He took down Game 1 by taking the control route with Supreme Verdicts and Detention Spheres to keep my creatures in line. We both had to mulligan to 6 for Game 2, and his was pretty sketchy. I was able to curve out perfectly and tie it up. Another double mulligan started game 3, but I kept the sketchier hand this time around: just one island. I topdecked pretty perfectly and was able to use 3 sideboarded Gainsays to keep him in check. Even so, we traded blows and were both low heading into a board stall. I managed to make it through with a Nightveil Specter and hit a Thassa off the top of his deck and he conceded.
2-0
Round 3- Boros Aggro- She was a player visiting from another store a town over. I knew her in passing, but hadn't played against her before. This was the second toughest match I played all day. Had she been better about remembering her Soldier of the Pantheon triggers, I'd have been toast. I had to mulligan to 6 in Game 1, and kept a mediocre hand. I was hoping to stabilize based on a couple of Master of Waves, but Banishing Light took each away as they came out. Game 2, I got lucky and she never drew a 3rd land while I ran over her. Game 3 got interesting, as I was able to blunt her early aggresion with Frostburn Weird and Tidebinder Mages. She was able to stop my Thassa and Domestication on Brimaz with Banishing Lights. I was falling behind on the race, until I blocked a lethal Boros Charm with a Dispel and followed it up with an overloaded Cyclonic Rift which was able to allow me to swing for the fences and the win.
3-0
Round 4- Boros Burn- This was actually the 8 year old son of my opponent from Round 1, and if he won, we'd have had to play again in the finals next round. I wasn't about to give in to him, since the matchup looked to favor him, and I'd rather have had 2 chances to beat it than 1. This was by far the match I had to get luckiest to win. I got a great hand Game 1 and was able to capitalize on his inexperience and reluctance to be as fully aggressive as he could have been. Judge's Familiar actually managed to counter a clutch Lightning Strike against Nightveil Specter that would have actually worked if he'd played a land first that turn. Game 2 gave me no such opportunity for advantage. I kept a weak hand, light on early creatures and he stomped me into the ground before I could possibly recover. Perhaps the best game the whole day was Game 3. We both got off to strong starts, I ended up at 8 life and had to use Domestication to steal one of his Soldier of the Pantheons, which turned out to be a good choice when he showed double Boros Charm. Nevertheless, he'd committed so many resources to the plan of burning me out that he was out of cards and showing a Dispel in hand got me the concession. I told the kid that I really hoped to see more of him, and that he'll be a heck of a player with just a little more experience under his belt.
4-0, and since there were only 10 people we skipped a Top 4 and headed straight for the Finals
Finals- RDW- My round 1 opponent went on a serious tear after I'd beaten him and came back to be in second place, so we had a rematch for the finals. Game 1 went to him as my inexperience with the deck led me to keep a hand that looked okay, but wasn't as good as expected. He eventually won via Purphoros triggers and burn spells. Game 2 wasn't really a thing that happened, since he mulliganed to 5, kept 1 land and never saw another. Game 3 saw me keep the sketchiest hand imaginable (1 Island as the only land, no 1 drops, and lots of double blue costs) and then proceed to rip the best possible card at every turn. I even agreed with my opponent and spectators that it was amazing. The deck decided it wanted to win, and only criminal misplays from me would have allowed that. I walked away with the Game Day playmat, but gave my own (the SCG Pandas one) away to 2nd place for his two kids and in recognition of how well he played.
TLDR: Some days, all the stars aline and you get as lucky as you could ever hope to be. My best opponents were out of town. The meta was almost uniquely weak to the deck I brought. I topdecked spectacularly all day. And my opponents made key errors. I was sickeningly lucky.
I've seen the poster in person, but didn't think to take a picture of it. I'd assumed someone else would have done so and posted it.
I like this challenge deck, and look forward to seeing what will happen with it. Looks like main-decking Ratchet Bomb is a pretty good catch-all plan for neutering it, same as the previous two. I look forward to trying to kill Xenagos with a Far//Away.
I did 2 prereleases, and did well in both of them with pretty excellent pools and good prize packs.
Went for the White promo at the midnight event. Got an Ajani and a fairly solid WG deck, splashing U for Sudden Storm and Sea God's Revenge. I was sorely tempted to make an attempt at the Chromanticore deck, but decided not to risk a solid pool on something like that. Ajani won me every game I drew him except one, which was beyond saving anyhow. That cat pulled me to victory through some rough resistance, and only ever bricked on his top 4 cards +1 once. Honestly though, the Sea God's Revenge won me more games over the course of the day. Went 4-0-2 into the top 8 (ID'ed the last few rounds because I was already locked and was getting tired), wherein I swiftly lost to double mana screw (also it being 6am). Pulled Keranos and Iroas in prize packs.
Vote for most surprisingly effective card for this one goes to Deserter's Quarters. I knew it was colorless pseudo-removal, but not whether or not that would be good enough or if I could comfortably get to 6 mana with it regularly. I was pleased with how often it did good work, though it did spent a couple of games doing nothing while I died at 4-5 mana.
Went for Black at the Saturday afternoon event. Ended up with 2 King Macar, the Gold-Curseds and a Whip of Erebos. After some debate with myself, I decided to go with UB over the GB that would fully utilize my scryland. I was able to make great use of the various instant speed untapping tricks (Crypsis, Triton Tactics, Thassa's Ire) with Macar to grind out ridiculous advantage. Went 3-1-1 into Top 8, where the general exhaustion and illness levels were sufficient to convince everyone to split. Only thing of note in prize packs was a Prophetic Flamespeaker.
Most consistent card in the deck was easily Thassa's Ire. Not only did it allow me to virtually lock some opponents out of creatures with Macar (even at 8 mana, repeatable instant speed removal is still excellent), but it won several games for me by keeping bombs tapped down while I flew over the top for the win. The fact that it often came down on Turn 1 when I usually didn't have another play was a nice bonus.
Edit: I did notice that aggro was doing very well for itself. Even control decks cannot afford to do nothing for the first few turns. 2/3s for 3 are looking pretty good right now.
As a fringe benefit, you can use this to sacrifice in response to a split second effect (mana abilities can still be used when split second is on the stack). I've used it to get around having my commander taken via Take Possession.
Most often I just use it to power out an early Primal Surge.
I like this idea, but then I thought, if 2 is good enough, why not 1? But then I remembered I don't really like singleton formats. But it got me thinking, what if you stayed with the 60 card deck but imposed deck limits based on rarity, commons you can run 4, uncommons 3, rares 2, and mythics 1.
That actually sounds like a great format!
Perhaps it might be fun, but it's not a great idea for widespread play. It's sure to cause headaches at every turn. How do you decide what the "official" rarity of a card is that's been printed at different rarities. The highest? The most recent? Will you have to look at all the reprints in each set to see what reprints will do for deck limits? Even putting aside other concerns, do you have any idea how much more work it would be to do deck checks at events if judges had to take into account varying card limits (aside from the obvious basic lands and the 2 other exceptions)?
For example, look at Aether Vial. Will the number you run be decided by which copies you own? Because depending on which printing it is, it could be an uncommon (Darksteel), a rare (Modern Masters), or a mythic (FTV: Relics). It would be rectifiable by rules, but not especially elegantly, and almost impossible to have it be easily grokable to newcomers (a big thing for Wizards).
Not to mention that this would pretty solidly neuter various deck possibilities. As just one example, the Maze's End deck in Standard is a real deck, but not tier 1. Under those rules, it would only have 1 copy of its namesake card and win condition instead of 4.
Rarity isn't supposed to be used to balance deck power in any official format outside of Limited.
Oh man. It's not often you see a Storm player get an active Ascension and lose. His deck didn't really do him any favors, and his opponent put him under too much pressure to wait.
Agreed. If the deck had coughed up a cantrip instead of running lands, that'd have pretty much put the game away.
I'll add my experience on this one. I spent two days at Dragon-Con teaching players (both new and returning after a long absence) how to play Magic, and as the local judge I'm the guy that people at the shop send random people to for learning how to play. Most I've taught are adults, but there's been quite a few kids as well. Everything that follows is my own experience, so your mileage will certainly vary.
1) Be rock solid on your own fundamentals and general rules knowledge going in. I'm making no assumptions about your own skill level, just saying that you need to remember that people are more likely to respond better to a person who seems really confident in their answers. Also, this helps make sure that they don't get taught bad habits that you may or may not have picked up along the way.
2) If at all possible, let them have some choice in what they're playing, i.e. let them pick the color for their deck that interests them most. This helps them feel more invested in learning how to play it.
3) Related to the previous point, my first lesson is about the color pie: the colors and their general attributes (ex: Red is aggressive, generally wants the game to go fast, likes to burn things, and has creatures like goblins.). I usually pull out the five basic lands and put them next to one another as illustration for this. This also gets them used to the mana symbols and what they mean.
4) I don't know what your personal exposure is with kids of that age, but don't underestimate them. The ones attracted toward this game are more likely to be at least above average intelligence. Respect your audience by trying to hit the right level of explaining things without treating them like idiots. The quickest way to make a kid of that age stop listening to you is to start talking down to them. This leads nicely into...
5) Don't make the starters TOO simplistic. Your audience can and should handle other cards than just lands and creatures. Make sure that there are both instants or sorcerys to change up gameplay. Combat tricks and removal are good places to start. The "Learn-to-Play" decks from Wizards are really good at this and if you could find a way to just get a ton of those, it'd be pretty ideal (fair warning: I found the black one to be on a slightly higher power level than the others).
6) In my experience, you want to get them into actually playing the game fairly quickly. You could easily spend 10-20 minutes just explaining rules at them before they touch a single card. That's not really what you want to do. I've had a lot of success explaining the very basics: the parts of a card, how to cast a spell, and how combat works. Maybe walk them through a couple of sample turns, then turn them loose on games. You can generally have them playing on their own (with you on hand to answer questions) inside of 10 minutes. To quote Nathan Fillion's recent tweet: "Learning to play Magic the Gathering. The only game with more rules than game." Try to minimize that experience for them.
7) If you've got any sort of inclination to use any props (other than cards), something with the turn order on it where everyone can see it or easily refer to it is generally appreciated by new players. This might also be doable by giving them a small piece of paper with the same thing printed on it. Allowing players to reference this is pretty helpful for people just starting.
8) You have a great resource in having players who know how the game plays already. Even if they're not especially proficient at the game, they'll be able to guide the newest players through the game. Don't let these more experience players group up amongst themselves right away. Make sure you spread the experience around as much as possible.
9)If you want to, for outside of your sessions, you can recommend the Duels of the Planeswalkers games to them (XBox, PS, iPad, and Steam). They've got a pretty good tutorial/tips mode that's pretty effective in teaching the way things work. Plus it lets them see the variety of decks that can be built and many of the cards from around Magic's history. It's also a fairly inexpensive way for them to get in a lot of practice on their own.
10) If you don't pay attention to anything else I say, please take away this one: Your most important task there isn't to teach them how to play the game well, it's teaching them to play the game functionally. Strategic advice will often be wasted when they're still figuring out how the game works in the most basic sense. While you can occasionally give some help and hints in this direction, it shouldn't be a primary objective, and that time can probably be better spent. Keeping this in mind will help protect your sanity.
Note that there's a useful thread about this stickied in the Magic Rulings sub-forum on here. I suggest checking it out.
While looking at the regular Comp Rules is handy, I highly recommend making use of YawgAtog. It has the CR hyperlinked for easily navigation and reference.
Except you can use Switcheroo or something like that to swap your Goat for a big dude, and then use Goatnapper to get back your Goat. Can't do that with Kobolds.
Thank you for introducing me to Goatnapper, which comes with the most amusing Gatherer ruling I've seen yet.
Quote from MTG Gatherer Ruling »
Yes, target Goat. Goat is a creature type. Keep in mind that each permanent with changeling is a Goat, as is any permanent affected by a spell or ability that gives it every creature type.
Pasture is a card that's much more fun to play than it is good, though I like the suggestion of using it and Mirror Entity as a mass sac outlet. If only the cost to make the goats were more reasonable, it'd see much more play.
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Casual EDH Player
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This is probably better left for the Rulings section, but here I go.
1) You're correct, like Wither, Infect replaces how damage is recorded. Something that prevents that damage from occurring doesn't care how the damage will be dealt.
2) No, it will live. When you reduce the toughness of the creature, it'll be a 6/6 with 6 damage marked on it. Since it's indestructible, that won't cause it to die (despite what Duels of the Planeswalkers tells us, damage doesn't reduce toughness).
Casual EDH Player
Having done a couple of 4 person drafts of the set so far, I just wanted to reiterate this. Caveat: a 4-person draft is going to be already warped fundamentally. In both draft, blue was fairly open and had someone really decided to move all in on it, they could clean up (including me one game). When discussing afterwards, we decided that that was in large part due to the fact that the "excitement level" of the blue cards was pretty low. The power level was pretty high but it was focused pretty much on the card draw side of the spectrum. As such, it looks to be better as a supporting color (with the exception of the U/W flyers deck).
Dethrone seems like it got more focus than you would have thought. People were constantly checking life totals in order to hit the "dethrone target," or taking various lines to keep themselves from being that guy. Among other things, one player got the Treacherous Ogre up to a 5/6 before it got neutralized and used its ability to keep himself from being the target and cast his spells.
Casual EDH Player
Round 1- RDW- This guy rarely shows up, but he's a decent player and builds solid decks. He tries to keep me off devotion by killing my early plays, but had no answers for 3 Nightveil Specters in a row, who were conveniently large enough to hold off his whole team. Had he been a little more aggressive in trying to get past my Specters, he'd have probably gotten me. Game 2 started quickly for him with a multiple Burning-Tree Emissary draw, but petered out as soon as I was able to drop a Master of Waves for 3 tokens, followed by another the next turn for 4 more.
1-0
Round 2- Mono-Blue, splashing White- Fairly regular player around the shop, but tends to make rash decisions. He took down Game 1 by taking the control route with Supreme Verdicts and Detention Spheres to keep my creatures in line. We both had to mulligan to 6 for Game 2, and his was pretty sketchy. I was able to curve out perfectly and tie it up. Another double mulligan started game 3, but I kept the sketchier hand this time around: just one island. I topdecked pretty perfectly and was able to use 3 sideboarded Gainsays to keep him in check. Even so, we traded blows and were both low heading into a board stall. I managed to make it through with a Nightveil Specter and hit a Thassa off the top of his deck and he conceded.
2-0
Round 3- Boros Aggro- She was a player visiting from another store a town over. I knew her in passing, but hadn't played against her before. This was the second toughest match I played all day. Had she been better about remembering her Soldier of the Pantheon triggers, I'd have been toast. I had to mulligan to 6 in Game 1, and kept a mediocre hand. I was hoping to stabilize based on a couple of Master of Waves, but Banishing Light took each away as they came out. Game 2, I got lucky and she never drew a 3rd land while I ran over her. Game 3 got interesting, as I was able to blunt her early aggresion with Frostburn Weird and Tidebinder Mages. She was able to stop my Thassa and Domestication on Brimaz with Banishing Lights. I was falling behind on the race, until I blocked a lethal Boros Charm with a Dispel and followed it up with an overloaded Cyclonic Rift which was able to allow me to swing for the fences and the win.
3-0
Round 4- Boros Burn- This was actually the 8 year old son of my opponent from Round 1, and if he won, we'd have had to play again in the finals next round. I wasn't about to give in to him, since the matchup looked to favor him, and I'd rather have had 2 chances to beat it than 1. This was by far the match I had to get luckiest to win. I got a great hand Game 1 and was able to capitalize on his inexperience and reluctance to be as fully aggressive as he could have been. Judge's Familiar actually managed to counter a clutch Lightning Strike against Nightveil Specter that would have actually worked if he'd played a land first that turn. Game 2 gave me no such opportunity for advantage. I kept a weak hand, light on early creatures and he stomped me into the ground before I could possibly recover. Perhaps the best game the whole day was Game 3. We both got off to strong starts, I ended up at 8 life and had to use Domestication to steal one of his Soldier of the Pantheons, which turned out to be a good choice when he showed double Boros Charm. Nevertheless, he'd committed so many resources to the plan of burning me out that he was out of cards and showing a Dispel in hand got me the concession. I told the kid that I really hoped to see more of him, and that he'll be a heck of a player with just a little more experience under his belt.
4-0, and since there were only 10 people we skipped a Top 4 and headed straight for the Finals
Finals- RDW- My round 1 opponent went on a serious tear after I'd beaten him and came back to be in second place, so we had a rematch for the finals. Game 1 went to him as my inexperience with the deck led me to keep a hand that looked okay, but wasn't as good as expected. He eventually won via Purphoros triggers and burn spells. Game 2 wasn't really a thing that happened, since he mulliganed to 5, kept 1 land and never saw another. Game 3 saw me keep the sketchiest hand imaginable (1 Island as the only land, no 1 drops, and lots of double blue costs) and then proceed to rip the best possible card at every turn. I even agreed with my opponent and spectators that it was amazing. The deck decided it wanted to win, and only criminal misplays from me would have allowed that. I walked away with the Game Day playmat, but gave my own (the SCG Pandas one) away to 2nd place for his two kids and in recognition of how well he played.
TLDR: Some days, all the stars aline and you get as lucky as you could ever hope to be. My best opponents were out of town. The meta was almost uniquely weak to the deck I brought. I topdecked spectacularly all day. And my opponents made key errors. I was sickeningly lucky.
Casual EDH Player
I like this challenge deck, and look forward to seeing what will happen with it. Looks like main-decking Ratchet Bomb is a pretty good catch-all plan for neutering it, same as the previous two. I look forward to trying to kill Xenagos with a Far//Away.
Casual EDH Player
Went for the White promo at the midnight event. Got an Ajani and a fairly solid WG deck, splashing U for Sudden Storm and Sea God's Revenge. I was sorely tempted to make an attempt at the Chromanticore deck, but decided not to risk a solid pool on something like that. Ajani won me every game I drew him except one, which was beyond saving anyhow. That cat pulled me to victory through some rough resistance, and only ever bricked on his top 4 cards +1 once. Honestly though, the Sea God's Revenge won me more games over the course of the day. Went 4-0-2 into the top 8 (ID'ed the last few rounds because I was already locked and was getting tired), wherein I swiftly lost to double mana screw (also it being 6am). Pulled Keranos and Iroas in prize packs.
Vote for most surprisingly effective card for this one goes to Deserter's Quarters. I knew it was colorless pseudo-removal, but not whether or not that would be good enough or if I could comfortably get to 6 mana with it regularly. I was pleased with how often it did good work, though it did spent a couple of games doing nothing while I died at 4-5 mana.
Went for Black at the Saturday afternoon event. Ended up with 2 King Macar, the Gold-Curseds and a Whip of Erebos. After some debate with myself, I decided to go with UB over the GB that would fully utilize my scryland. I was able to make great use of the various instant speed untapping tricks (Crypsis, Triton Tactics, Thassa's Ire) with Macar to grind out ridiculous advantage. Went 3-1-1 into Top 8, where the general exhaustion and illness levels were sufficient to convince everyone to split. Only thing of note in prize packs was a Prophetic Flamespeaker.
Most consistent card in the deck was easily Thassa's Ire. Not only did it allow me to virtually lock some opponents out of creatures with Macar (even at 8 mana, repeatable instant speed removal is still excellent), but it won several games for me by keeping bombs tapped down while I flew over the top for the win. The fact that it often came down on Turn 1 when I usually didn't have another play was a nice bonus.
Edit: I did notice that aggro was doing very well for itself. Even control decks cannot afford to do nothing for the first few turns. 2/3s for 3 are looking pretty good right now.
Casual EDH Player
Most often I just use it to power out an early Primal Surge.
Casual EDH Player
Perhaps it might be fun, but it's not a great idea for widespread play. It's sure to cause headaches at every turn. How do you decide what the "official" rarity of a card is that's been printed at different rarities. The highest? The most recent? Will you have to look at all the reprints in each set to see what reprints will do for deck limits? Even putting aside other concerns, do you have any idea how much more work it would be to do deck checks at events if judges had to take into account varying card limits (aside from the obvious basic lands and the 2 other exceptions)?
For example, look at Aether Vial. Will the number you run be decided by which copies you own? Because depending on which printing it is, it could be an uncommon (Darksteel), a rare (Modern Masters), or a mythic (FTV: Relics). It would be rectifiable by rules, but not especially elegantly, and almost impossible to have it be easily grokable to newcomers (a big thing for Wizards).
Not to mention that this would pretty solidly neuter various deck possibilities. As just one example, the Maze's End deck in Standard is a real deck, but not tier 1. Under those rules, it would only have 1 copy of its namesake card and win condition instead of 4.
Rarity isn't supposed to be used to balance deck power in any official format outside of Limited.
Edit: Grammar revision.
Casual EDH Player
Casual EDH Player
I did not expect that game to end that way either. Who needs Splinter Twin?
Casual EDH Player
Agreed. If the deck had coughed up a cantrip instead of running lands, that'd have pretty much put the game away.
Casual EDH Player
1) Be rock solid on your own fundamentals and general rules knowledge going in. I'm making no assumptions about your own skill level, just saying that you need to remember that people are more likely to respond better to a person who seems really confident in their answers. Also, this helps make sure that they don't get taught bad habits that you may or may not have picked up along the way.
2) If at all possible, let them have some choice in what they're playing, i.e. let them pick the color for their deck that interests them most. This helps them feel more invested in learning how to play it.
3) Related to the previous point, my first lesson is about the color pie: the colors and their general attributes (ex: Red is aggressive, generally wants the game to go fast, likes to burn things, and has creatures like goblins.). I usually pull out the five basic lands and put them next to one another as illustration for this. This also gets them used to the mana symbols and what they mean.
4) I don't know what your personal exposure is with kids of that age, but don't underestimate them. The ones attracted toward this game are more likely to be at least above average intelligence. Respect your audience by trying to hit the right level of explaining things without treating them like idiots. The quickest way to make a kid of that age stop listening to you is to start talking down to them. This leads nicely into...
5) Don't make the starters TOO simplistic. Your audience can and should handle other cards than just lands and creatures. Make sure that there are both instants or sorcerys to change up gameplay. Combat tricks and removal are good places to start. The "Learn-to-Play" decks from Wizards are really good at this and if you could find a way to just get a ton of those, it'd be pretty ideal (fair warning: I found the black one to be on a slightly higher power level than the others).
6) In my experience, you want to get them into actually playing the game fairly quickly. You could easily spend 10-20 minutes just explaining rules at them before they touch a single card. That's not really what you want to do. I've had a lot of success explaining the very basics: the parts of a card, how to cast a spell, and how combat works. Maybe walk them through a couple of sample turns, then turn them loose on games. You can generally have them playing on their own (with you on hand to answer questions) inside of 10 minutes. To quote Nathan Fillion's recent tweet: "Learning to play Magic the Gathering. The only game with more rules than game." Try to minimize that experience for them.
7) If you've got any sort of inclination to use any props (other than cards), something with the turn order on it where everyone can see it or easily refer to it is generally appreciated by new players. This might also be doable by giving them a small piece of paper with the same thing printed on it. Allowing players to reference this is pretty helpful for people just starting.
8) You have a great resource in having players who know how the game plays already. Even if they're not especially proficient at the game, they'll be able to guide the newest players through the game. Don't let these more experience players group up amongst themselves right away. Make sure you spread the experience around as much as possible.
9)If you want to, for outside of your sessions, you can recommend the Duels of the Planeswalkers games to them (XBox, PS, iPad, and Steam). They've got a pretty good tutorial/tips mode that's pretty effective in teaching the way things work. Plus it lets them see the variety of decks that can be built and many of the cards from around Magic's history. It's also a fairly inexpensive way for them to get in a lot of practice on their own.
10) If you don't pay attention to anything else I say, please take away this one: Your most important task there isn't to teach them how to play the game well, it's teaching them to play the game functionally. Strategic advice will often be wasted when they're still figuring out how the game works in the most basic sense. While you can occasionally give some help and hints in this direction, it shouldn't be a primary objective, and that time can probably be better spent. Keeping this in mind will help protect your sanity.
Good luck to you!
Casual EDH Player
While looking at the regular Comp Rules is handy, I highly recommend making use of YawgAtog. It has the CR hyperlinked for easily navigation and reference.
Casual EDH Player
Fair enough, but the Spider token left behind by Penumbra Spider is black. So there's that.
Casual EDH Player
I also have the Bant, Grixis, and Esper precons still unaltered that I play with on occasion.
Casual EDH Player
Thank you for introducing me to Goatnapper, which comes with the most amusing Gatherer ruling I've seen yet.
Pasture is a card that's much more fun to play than it is good, though I like the suggestion of using it and Mirror Entity as a mass sac outlet. If only the cost to make the goats were more reasonable, it'd see much more play.
Casual EDH Player