Communication is key, in both casual and competitive play. She should have been more detailed in her question, but you should also have been more forthcoming with your answer. Kitchen Table play I would say you didn't break any rules, but that won't stop you from sleeping on the couch tonight. In the future I would be more detailed in asking and answering questions. If this was FNM I would explain when mana leaves the pool and passing priority of stuff.
The devil's advocate in me loves hearing and reading about these scenarios so I feel compelled to share my personal insights, opinions, and interpretation...
While it's courteous and good sportsmanship to do so voluntarily, it technically isn't and shouldn't be your responsibility to remind opponents (at fnm and other levels of sanctioned play) when mana leaves pools as timing restrictions are among the earliest and arguably more important rules one learns (or is supposed to learn) when they first start playing.
For reference this is included in the rules about mana itself:
106.4. When an effect produces mana, that mana goes into a player’s mana pool. From there, it can be used to pay costs immediately, or it can stay in the player’s mana pool. Each player’s mana pool empties at the end of each step and phase.
...and is repeated again for thoroughness in the rules pertaining to turn structure:
500.4. When a step or phase ends, any unused mana left in a player’s mana pool empties. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack.
Suffice it to say that players should know this or know to ask/confirm if and when you're advancing to the next phase/step during a turn after any player has floated mana and there's a lingering sense of ambiguity since mana floating usually implies the controller has one or more plays pending prior to the phase/step advancement.
500.2. A phase or step in which players receive priority ends when the stack is empty and all players pass in succession. Simply having the stack become empty doesn’t cause such a phase or step to end; all players have to pass in succession with the stack empty. Because of this, each player gets a chance to add new things to the stack before that phase or step ends.
Some could argue that the very nature of her question indicated that she was passing priority in her desire to have your mana "go away" after which you failed to acknowledge that you were doing the same by answering her question with intentional vaguery (essentially a tactical delay of game which works to your advantage).
However (this is directed at the OP), this was at the kitchen table with family where your poor communication earns a symbolic poor sportsmanship warning in my opinion.
Furthermore, in your wife's defense, if she (or both of you) started playing way back when mana burn was still a thing (which I assume was the case based on you having a library to play with casually), only play at the kitchen table (or stopped playing for a long time while the rules for mana changes), it's reasonable to assume that she may not fully understand the adjustment (seeing as how she wasn't oblivious to the emptying of mana pools), which is a husband's responsibility to explain and clarify which you failed to do. Does it make you a malicious or cheating player looking to exploit an opponent's ignorance? Not technically though I suppose that's a matter of perspective albeit no more up for debate than whether or not you're a nice husband.
All that aside, you were exploiting by your own admission. You knew she had nothing but land in play and presumably couldn't/wouldn't attack, then you were asked asked about your mana leaving the pool (indicating or at the very least suggesting her intent to pass priority and advance to the next phase), therefore you should reasonably assume it was her intent to cast that *** during her second main phase after short-cutting to skip over the combat phase at which point you no longer had that mana floating.
For more information regarding tournament setting, the Rules on Player Communication (Section 4.1) can be found here.
More specifically, here's the relevant paragraph is about "free information":
Free information is information to which all players are entitled access without contamination or omissions made by their opponents. If a player is ever unable or unwilling to provide free information to an opponent that has requested it, he or she should call a judge and explain the situation. Free information includes:
Details of current game actions and past game actions that still affect the game state.
The name of any visible object
The type of any counter in a public zone.
The physical status (tapped/flipped/unattached/phased) and current zone of any object.
Player life totals, poison counter totals, and the game score of the current match. The current step and/or phase and which player(s) are active.
Really? I hate draft but prerelease is fun if you skip spoilers.
I'm curious... Why skip the spoilers entirely and be less prepared for prerelease events when glimpsing them in advance gives you a better understanding of the mechanical interactions, effectively saving you time during the deck building process and allowing you to play more efficiently? Do you derive more satisfaction and entertainment from the on-the-spot discovery process of seeing new game pieces and being forced to improvise with less time and information than other competitors who are well versed on the set in advance?
I certainly enjoyed the mystery of discovering new cards when sets were released way back in the day before the era of internet spoilers, but now that so much information is readily available, neglecting to review spoilers in advance only puts one at an inherent disadvantage against those who do when it comes time to build and play.
So, uh... is Flusterstorm iconic? I badly want a Flusterstorm reprint.
See, this is the problem with this set, we have no idea what to make of it. Might as well have called it Random Crap Masters 2017. Iconic is not a property that goes hand in hand with need for a reprint, are we supposed to expect Shivan Dragon and Serra Angel in this thing?
Personally, I would find it hilarious if they just reprinted Revised without the RL cards in modern or frontier borders (with their original arts obviously).
What Magic player today wouldn't want to draft something so nostalgic and win games with a craw wurm for ol' time sake?!
Ironically, while Shivan Dragon and Serra Angel may be remembered as the best beat-sticks of their time, I can't help but feel that no card image from that era was more iconic than Hurloon Minotaur. It may be vanilla, but suffice it to say that if that Minotaur somehow doesn't make the final cut for Iconic Masters, those designing the set haven't been playing long enough or don't even know what the word 'Iconic' means.
You're very welcome. I've seen many stores rise and fall in this city over the years for different reasons, the saddest of which was the Black Lotus Cafe (previously known as Triple Overtime before it moved around the corner from it's original location in CDN and expanded with a larger showcase, an area to play and lounge out which included a 60" projection tv for satellite movies, movies for rent, comics for trade, a dedicated arcade room in the back, and a kitchen for freshly baked pizza and other food service). When this store cafe closed in the late 90's, it was my favorite venue to play Magic and one of the reasons I took a long hiatus from the game.
In hindsight the owner may not have been the best businessman, but he was incredibly nice, a good role model who motivated many clientsincorrigible youths to stay out of trouble, and very fair in his pricing (whereas most stores often lowball players with their buylist prices). There was a decent congregation of players most days, and to my knowledge the owner never even objected once to people loitering (often for hours) even though many teenagers came solely to play after school but not purchase any product. Admittedly I was one of them one or two days per week because I was still very young and barely had any money to spend, but I always bought the singles, packs, sleeves, etc that I wanted from him whenever I had disposable income from gifts, allowance, or part-time jobs like cleaning and dog-walking (granted there weren't many alternative stores selling Magic to shop at near my parents' place back then regardless). I also regularly split pizzas with friends and pumped plenty of quarters into the arcades with friends. The location was also easily accessible within walking distance from Plamondon subway station, so it's hard to understand why the location failed. Did the store sell other products? There were other card games for sale (which failed miserably to attract followings like Magic's), but no shelves for board games and other merchandise.
So what was the problem? After the store's long-awaited, highly-anticipated expansion, the cafe was too big to support itself in the long run with its existing client demographic while seemingly being unable to attract enough new ones to pay for the added rent, utility, and insurance costs. Why? Unlike today, very few adults played (or even knew about) Magic back then, and let's be honest...when the great majority of your customers are adolescents (albeit mostly private school students), how much business revenue (let alone profit) can one reasonably and realistically expect at the end of the average business day? Furthermore, there was no delivery option for the pizza, and virtually no advertising in the window (at least none that I can recall) to even state that there was pizza available to passersby, so to the untrained eyes walking by, the venue looked like an obscure darkly-lit gaming lounge which served coffee.
The memories are bittersweet, because alas, as previously stated by others, it was simply too good to be true.
I'm tempted to buy and play zombies but Gideon, Ally of Zendikar is still preventing anything else from shining in Standard, and it rotates at the same time as many great zombies.
So no, I'm not buying any.
Agreed. Aside from the full-art lands, Plague belcher was one of very few cards which caught my eye this set, especially with a new self-recurring 1-drop and relentless dead still in standard. Unfortunately as you've already pointed out, the archetype simply isn't good enough to be viable in a competitive sense, not yet anyway. Who knows...maybe we'll get unholy grotto back or another interesting zombiesque reprint in the next set. One can hope, right?
My personal solution to satisfy my zombie craving in the interim (admittedly it's a difficult time right now with TWD Season 7 done and FTWD Season 3 yet to start)? Well, I still had tons of gravecrawlers and geralf's messengers lying around among other cards (inquisitions of kozilek, thoughseizes, fatal pushes, death barons, gray merchants, and cemetery reapers), so I put together a mono-black modern zombie deck instead (with one erebos to draw cards if/as needed in dark confidant's absence, and also to keep soul sisters and kitchen finks combos in check). Relentless dead is still proving decent, and I'm even running mutavaults to get back the gravecrawlers more easily, though I might replace the two zombie infestations I'm testing with black cats instead since that enchantment is underperforming Zombies FTW
Think of it this way..
Some people would rather buy a book on the day it gets released in stores while some would rather wait a few months to borrow a copy from the library for free.
This is essentially the same thing and a matter of time-sensitivity.
Those who want the information about cards/decks/etc (be it factual statistical data or merely opinions and speculation) at the first available opportunity will often pay. In your case (and most for that matter), if the information isn't urgently needed desired, simply don't pay for it.
However, no matter what you do, never forget that information (generally speaking, albeit not necessarily information pertaining to Magic) will always be the world's most valuable resource.
I wish to site EDH for this, Sol ring likely the best "free mana" ever printed that is within peoples budget, EVERYONE plays it, I don't see people going "man we need to ban sol ring in EDH".
Well, there are lots of people who say that actually. Thats one of the reasons it is banned in duel commander.
It seems ridiculous for them to even consider banning a staple like sol ring in Commander when it was printed in the first and every subsequent commander set (albeit with inferior art) specifically so everyone (especially new players) would have easy, equal, and affordable access to it. If anything, they should ban mana crypt first which is much less affordable and more broken in a high-life format, and should really only be legal in vintage (and for the record, I'm not saying this as a "have-not" as I already have five mana crypts to help boost some of my slower commander decks which need want it more than others).
I don't know about the rest of you, but every time I touch a Power-9 card I instantly get that epic "By the Power of Grayskull...I Have the Power!" feeling deep inside
Glad to hear you're enjoying the game and thinking about turning it into a full-time lifestyle.
However, while I admire your ambition, you should have a very strong game plan from the start and know in advance that Montreal already has a highly competitive Magic market which caters to its equally strong player base, both in terms of retail stores as well as individual collectors and players selling cards to one another online sites like Craigslist, Kijiji, Ebay, etc...
To elaborate, just off the top of my head I can think of at least a few stores in the downtown area which are already well established including but not limited to: Tour de Jeux, Chez Geeks, Valet D'Coeur, Capitaine Quebec, Three Kings Loot, and then you'll have to also compete with various other stores including Face to Face Games (The largest MTG store in Canada), Carta Magica (which has multiple locations), Gamekeeper (which also has multiple locations), and various stores in the west island, east end, and on the south shore. I'm not trying to discourage you by any means as not all new stores fail, but you should know that your venture will be an uphill battle as some like Chimera Games didn't just struggle to survive and stay open, they weren't prepared from the beginning so they never really had a chance.
Lastly, I certainly agree with Lithl that you'll need to sell other non-MTG merchandise. All the stores that survive or thrive do.
EDIT: Just realized I somehow completely omitted Gamer's Vault in Snowdon from the list which is right across the street from a subway station and relatively close to downtown, as well as Palais des Cartes (aka: Card Palace) in Ville Saint Laurent which is also easily accessible via the subway, and is one of very few stores left in the city to keep most sealed products at MSRP instead of inflating them excessively, which is why I preorder my set of Commander decks from them every year there's enough in the set to pique my interest.
@Firevine: If the chain-smoker below you is the main issue, I would highly recommend moving somewhere else where you and your family feel safe. It's not worth losing sleep over, not worth the risk, and that should be the top priority more so than insuring the value or personal possessions. Meanwhile, I would try petitioning with the other tenants to have that individual evicted (if discussing the issue and subsequently warning them personally hasn't produced results), that way you don't have to make the difficult last resort decision of abandoning your home. Smoking in your domicile may be one's legal right. However, if such an individual displays a pattern where they are knowingly and regularly putting other people's lives and livelihoods at grave risk as a direct result of their willfully dangerous and irresponsible behavior (smoking perpetually even whilst dozing off certainly qualifies), the rights of those innocent potential victims supersede the rights of the person who is known to be a liability. In the interim, I suggest getting a fireproof safe for your more valuable binders and decks. Lastly, I feel it necessary to point out the irony that a firevine would even be so concerned about a fire (alarm) in the first place. Isn't it entirely plausible that you inadvertently set off the alarm yourself?
@Stevenus: I'm curious... How can the insurer know with any degree of certainty at the time of the claim that your collection was exactly as it was documented online? Do you regularly have to submit proof by providing photos, scans, or other signed documentation that all the cards listed are still in your physical possession, still in their listed conditions, and haven't been traded or sold? Do you continuously update your online list any and every time you open something of value in a pack, buy, trade, or sell singles of value, or acquire singles which will presumably appreciate in value? Does a notary or some other third party have to authenticate that in doing so each time you're being completely honest? What's the minimum threshold value for such cards to be added to such a list (for you or the insurer)? Any additional information would be helpful and much appreciated.
I almost wish they just unbanned Emrakul and Reflector Mage
You're my new best friend.
I swear, every time they ban something in whichever format, I'm almost always left confused and wondering why they can't open up an equally strong previously banned option for another color to balance the power in the format by raising it overall instead of always lowering it. Realistically, couldn't they have just unbanned say ponder or preordain in modern instead of banning pod, bbe, dts, or twin? dts was the perfect card to keep opposing goyfs in check which everyone agrees is overpowered in virtually every green deck. I get why decks like eggs get banned as do cards like sfm and jtms, but do we really need several cards in standard now, especially when they rotate out and new cards to compete against them rotate in so regularly, even quicker for some sets than previously? Maybe I'm just getting old or being nostalgic, but Magic, especially standard surely ain't what it used to be.
Why ask questions to which you already know the answer?
Isn't it obvious?
He's a bad player, and you by your own admission being consistently unable to beat him despite his deck's clear inefficiency makes your deck(s) inadequate and you even worse of a player.
It's nothing to be embarrassed about, especially if you're relatively new to the game which I'm assuming is the case. Maybe you should look at what some decent decks look like online and learn to pilot them.
If you still can't beat him with established top-tier builds, then perhaps both of you should look into a simpler game like Hearthstone since mastering MTG is evidently far off the radar. No offense, a friendly suggestion is all.
At 180+ cards, his deck's card choices create unnecessary variance and/or redundancy which either way creates counter-synergy and slows the speed at which it looks to combo out or beat down the opponent(s). Maybe you can try cards like bribery, acquire, and grinning totem in your deck to use his own cards against him. You'll certainly have a lot of options to choose from!
It's important to learn lessons in brevity when debating, so if all else fails, explain it to him simply that very often less is more.
Use tautology or pleonasms as examples.
Good luck
Wow indeed!... Godwin's Law strikes with fewer than 75 posts? Seems a bit premature to say the least given the title and nature of this thread. In my opinion Leovold isn't even an oppressive card or hard to deal with. The very comparison alone is actually quite offensive and completely inappropriate. Is that really who this fictional cardboard game character reminds you of first and foremost? You should be ashamed and take a history lesson along with a sensitivity training class because I think you're spending too much time playing cards while not fully understanding and ignorantly minimizing the events and objectives of the third reich. How anyone could imply or even facetiously suggest that losing a card game under any circumstance is even remotely comparable to being rounded up, relocated, dehumanized, tortured, enslaved and used for forced labor, then slaughtered en-masse genocidally is beyond my comprehension. Alas, I digress. *sigh*
Back on topic...Even if I could understand how you could ever draw such a parallel, I probably still couldn't understand what the problem apparently was with Leovold to begin with. Talk about a banning decision that was capricious and arbitrary! Should I even bother to ask "Was he really that bad?" As per who or whom? What playgroups? which judges weighted in with their opinions? Confused, I'm so curious. What opposing Generals seemingly had the most difficulty against him? And were there sufficient attempts to understand why and adapt? Was one (or more) poll(s) taken before making a final decision? I certainly never got to vote, play as much commander as the next Magic player if not more, and wouldn't be biased in my oversight or dismissal of his potential. I never even built him despite getting my copy early on but wanted to eventually (my current bug deck is Mimeoplasm, I like all my decks optimized, and I only have so many duals). My friends and I also aren't intimidated to play against him (albeit with some decks more than others). I suppose we still can, but it's annoying that I could never play it outside my own living room if I were to build it. So yeah, what was the issue again? Can someone enlighten me? It's not like he's indestructible or has hexproof making him difficult to remove. Can't run prophet. Could he enter on turn 1? Sure, but it's unlikely without a perfect opening hand and still can't do too much damage (literally or metaphorically) before he's taken off the field as far as I'm concerned. Hell, I've had Kaalia in play with greaves and a big friend attacking on turn 2, not to mention various other equally powerful opening turns with other decks when starting which make it extremely difficult for opponents to catch up and gain tempo (if at all possible). Call me naive, but I don't even see how their justification for banning Leovold holds water when Grand Arbiter Augustin iv (amongst others) is much more annoying to play against, especially when he comes out on turn 2 after a turn 1 sol ring or mana crypt + medallion. Ever play a 3-color deck well against a turn 2 Purphorus or blood moon? It's usually a much quicker scoop-fest. What about players who drop an early mishra's workshop or cheat in an early Vorinclex? Those dropping ban-hammers should see how broken countless other generals can be are (when playing first) with ideal opening hands while opponents' hands are only good to average. EDH has so much variance and politics as a singleton multiplayer format that I think people all too often seem to forget that circumstantially, virtually any (finely tuned) deck can beat any other. Top-deck tutor a terminus or use a chaos warp, problem solved. My point is that every deck should have a 'plan b', or at the very least a few answers to deal with almost every type of threat, disadvantageous situation, or general, because let's face facts...if all your deck does is focus on its own strategy while completely ignoring what your opposition might be doing, you'll always get caught being helpless in situations which are fairly easy to anticipate and should be just as easy to react to and neutralize at least some of the time. My personal conclusion can only be that an omission of sufficient removal or otherwise inability to deal Leovold is careless negligence at best if not intentionally poor deck building by his opposition. If anything, they should only have banned him in duel commander as a test since players in multiplayer games naturally team up against presumably more threatening generals/decks to offset and counterbalance their strengths.
One can't help but wonder if perhaps the players (who were) having trouble against Leovold just weren't starting games as often, had sub-par cards in their own decks or opening hands, have bad match up pairings against him at no fault of their own (as some generals and archetypes inherently have slight to moderate advantages and/or disadvantages compared with others), poor luck (not drawing the right answers in time as needed while opponents seemingly hit theirs more often), and/or simply need to upgrade their sideboards with better suited and more versatile top-tier staples. Regardless, he's certainly not "Rofellos broken", and honestly, protean hulk combos still seem more degenerate that I wouldn't be at all surprised if they reverse their decision within the year. I'd have sooner unbanned Braids.
As for the Top ban in legacy, I'm not sure how to feel yet. I have many copies already, want more for edh, but don't even anticipate much of a price drop if any. Of course as time goes on we'll have a better picture of it's impact on the game and market price as the meta adapts. Sorry, I wrote a bit more than I initially anticipated. Thank you for your patience and understanding.
I personally have no doubt that Smokespew Invoker outsmokes any other Magic Character to date.
Also, thank (the various) god(s) Canada is finally ending the failure of arbitrary prohibition and the demonizing proliferation of outdated "reefer madness" fear-mongering propaganda. Suffice it to say this inevitability was a long time coming, and now it's only a matter of time before the rest of the so-called self-proclaimed civilized world follows suit so we call all progress together towards a better future where scientific facts supercede unfounded fears and sterotypes.
While it's courteous and good sportsmanship to do so voluntarily, it technically isn't and shouldn't be your responsibility to remind opponents (at fnm and other levels of sanctioned play) when mana leaves pools as timing restrictions are among the earliest and arguably more important rules one learns (or is supposed to learn) when they first start playing.
For reference this is included in the rules about mana itself:
106.4. When an effect produces mana, that mana goes into a player’s mana pool. From there, it can be used to pay costs immediately, or it can stay in the player’s mana pool. Each player’s mana pool empties at the end of each step and phase.
...and is repeated again for thoroughness in the rules pertaining to turn structure:
500.4. When a step or phase ends, any unused mana left in a player’s mana pool empties. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack.
Suffice it to say that players should know this or know to ask/confirm if and when you're advancing to the next phase/step during a turn after any player has floated mana and there's a lingering sense of ambiguity since mana floating usually implies the controller has one or more plays pending prior to the phase/step advancement.
500.2. A phase or step in which players receive priority ends when the stack is empty and all players pass in succession. Simply having the stack become empty doesn’t cause such a phase or step to end; all players have to pass in succession with the stack empty. Because of this, each player gets a chance to add new things to the stack before that phase or step ends.
Some could argue that the very nature of her question indicated that she was passing priority in her desire to have your mana "go away" after which you failed to acknowledge that you were doing the same by answering her question with intentional vaguery (essentially a tactical delay of game which works to your advantage).
However (this is directed at the OP), this was at the kitchen table with family where your poor communication earns a symbolic poor sportsmanship warning in my opinion.
Furthermore, in your wife's defense, if she (or both of you) started playing way back when mana burn was still a thing (which I assume was the case based on you having a library to play with casually), only play at the kitchen table (or stopped playing for a long time while the rules for mana changes), it's reasonable to assume that she may not fully understand the adjustment (seeing as how she wasn't oblivious to the emptying of mana pools), which is a husband's responsibility to explain and clarify which you failed to do. Does it make you a malicious or cheating player looking to exploit an opponent's ignorance? Not technically though I suppose that's a matter of perspective albeit no more up for debate than whether or not you're a nice husband.
All that aside, you were exploiting by your own admission. You knew she had nothing but land in play and presumably couldn't/wouldn't attack, then you were asked asked about your mana leaving the pool (indicating or at the very least suggesting her intent to pass priority and advance to the next phase), therefore you should reasonably assume it was her intent to cast that *** during her second main phase after short-cutting to skip over the combat phase at which point you no longer had that mana floating.
For more information regarding tournament setting, the Rules on Player Communication (Section 4.1) can be found here.
More specifically, here's the relevant paragraph is about "free information":
Free information is information to which all players are entitled access without contamination or omissions made by their opponents. If a player is ever unable or unwilling to provide free information to an opponent that has requested it, he or she should call a judge and explain the situation. Free information includes:
Details of current game actions and past game actions that still affect the game state.
The name of any visible object
The type of any counter in a public zone.
The physical status (tapped/flipped/unattached/phased) and current zone of any object.
Player life totals, poison counter totals, and the game score of the current match.
The current step and/or phase and which player(s) are active.
Bottom line: I hope your couch is comfortable
I'm curious... Why skip the spoilers entirely and be less prepared for prerelease events when glimpsing them in advance gives you a better understanding of the mechanical interactions, effectively saving you time during the deck building process and allowing you to play more efficiently? Do you derive more satisfaction and entertainment from the on-the-spot discovery process of seeing new game pieces and being forced to improvise with less time and information than other competitors who are well versed on the set in advance?
I certainly enjoyed the mystery of discovering new cards when sets were released way back in the day before the era of internet spoilers, but now that so much information is readily available, neglecting to review spoilers in advance only puts one at an inherent disadvantage against those who do when it comes time to build and play.
Personally, I would find it hilarious if they just reprinted Revised without the RL cards in modern or frontier borders (with their original arts obviously).
What Magic player today wouldn't want to draft something so nostalgic and win games with a craw wurm for ol' time sake?!
Ironically, while Shivan Dragon and Serra Angel may be remembered as the best beat-sticks of their time, I can't help but feel that no card image from that era was more iconic than Hurloon Minotaur. It may be vanilla, but suffice it to say that if that Minotaur somehow doesn't make the final cut for Iconic Masters, those designing the set haven't been playing long enough or don't even know what the word 'Iconic' means.
storecafe closed in the late 90's, it was my favorite venue to play Magic and one of the reasons I took a long hiatus from the game."Daniel / Protoman" on ManaDeprived described it as: "One of those “Too good to be true” anime/card arcade places of that era." as well as: "The ultimate hang out and paradise". As someone who frequented the location first hand, I can concur that description as accurate.
In hindsight the owner may not have been the best businessman, but he was incredibly nice, a good role model who motivated many
clientsincorrigible youths to stay out of trouble, and very fair in his pricing (whereas most stores often lowball players with their buylist prices). There was a decent congregation of players most days, and to my knowledge the owner never even objected once to people loitering (often for hours) even though many teenagers came solely to play after school but not purchase any product. Admittedly I was one of them one or two days per week because I was still very young and barely had any money to spend, but I always bought the singles, packs, sleeves, etc that I wanted from him whenever I had disposable income from gifts, allowance, or part-time jobs like cleaning and dog-walking (granted there weren't many alternative stores selling Magic to shop at near my parents' place back then regardless). I also regularly split pizzas with friends and pumped plenty of quarters into the arcades with friends. The location was also easily accessible within walking distance from Plamondon subway station, so it's hard to understand why the location failed. Did the store sell other products? There were other card games for sale (which failed miserably to attract followings like Magic's), but no shelves for board games and other merchandise.So what was the problem? After the store's long-awaited, highly-anticipated expansion, the cafe was too big to support itself in the long run with its existing client demographic while seemingly being unable to attract enough new ones to pay for the added rent, utility, and insurance costs. Why? Unlike today, very few adults played (or even knew about) Magic back then, and let's be honest...when the great majority of your customers are adolescents (albeit mostly private school students), how much business revenue (let alone profit) can one reasonably and realistically expect at the end of the average business day? Furthermore, there was no delivery option for the pizza, and virtually no advertising in the window (at least none that I can recall) to even state that there was pizza available to passersby, so to the untrained eyes walking by, the venue looked like an obscure darkly-lit gaming lounge which served coffee.
The memories are bittersweet, because alas, as previously stated by others, it was simply too good to be true.
Agreed. Aside from the full-art lands, Plague belcher was one of very few cards which caught my eye this set, especially with a new self-recurring 1-drop and relentless dead still in standard. Unfortunately as you've already pointed out, the archetype simply isn't good enough to be viable in a competitive sense, not yet anyway. Who knows...maybe we'll get unholy grotto back or another interesting zombiesque reprint in the next set. One can hope, right?
My personal solution to satisfy my zombie craving in the interim (admittedly it's a difficult time right now with TWD Season 7 done and FTWD Season 3 yet to start)? Well, I still had tons of gravecrawlers and geralf's messengers lying around among other cards (inquisitions of kozilek, thoughseizes, fatal pushes, death barons, gray merchants, and cemetery reapers), so I put together a mono-black modern zombie deck instead (with one erebos to draw cards if/as needed in dark confidant's absence, and also to keep soul sisters and kitchen finks combos in check). Relentless dead is still proving decent, and I'm even running mutavaults to get back the gravecrawlers more easily, though I might replace the two zombie infestations I'm testing with black cats instead since that enchantment is underperforming Zombies FTW
Some people would rather buy a book on the day it gets released in stores while some would rather wait a few months to borrow a copy from the library for free.
This is essentially the same thing and a matter of time-sensitivity.
Those who want the information about cards/decks/etc (be it factual statistical data or merely opinions and speculation) at the first available opportunity will often pay. In your case (and most for that matter), if the information isn't urgently
neededdesired, simply don't pay for it.However, no matter what you do, never forget that information (generally speaking, albeit not necessarily information pertaining to Magic) will always be the world's most valuable resource.
Much more efficient
It seems ridiculous for them to even consider banning a staple like sol ring in Commander when it was printed in the first and every subsequent commander set (albeit with inferior art) specifically so everyone (especially new players) would have easy, equal, and affordable access to it. If anything, they should ban mana crypt first which is much less affordable and more broken in a high-life format, and should really only be legal in vintage (and for the record, I'm not saying this as a "have-not" as I already have five mana crypts to help boost some of my slower commander decks which
needwant it more than others).Glad to hear you're enjoying the game and thinking about turning it into a full-time lifestyle.
However, while I admire your ambition, you should have a very strong game plan from the start and know in advance that Montreal already has a highly competitive Magic market which caters to its equally strong player base, both in terms of retail stores as well as individual collectors and players selling cards to one another online sites like Craigslist, Kijiji, Ebay, etc...
To elaborate, just off the top of my head I can think of at least a few stores in the downtown area which are already well established including but not limited to: Tour de Jeux, Chez Geeks, Valet D'Coeur, Capitaine Quebec, Three Kings Loot, and then you'll have to also compete with various other stores including Face to Face Games (The largest MTG store in Canada), Carta Magica (which has multiple locations), Gamekeeper (which also has multiple locations), and various stores in the west island, east end, and on the south shore. I'm not trying to discourage you by any means as not all new stores fail, but you should know that your venture will be an uphill battle as some like Chimera Games didn't just struggle to survive and stay open, they weren't prepared from the beginning so they never really had a chance.
Lastly, I certainly agree with Lithl that you'll need to sell other non-MTG merchandise. All the stores that survive or thrive do.
EDIT: Just realized I somehow completely omitted Gamer's Vault in Snowdon from the list which is right across the street from a subway station and relatively close to downtown, as well as Palais des Cartes (aka: Card Palace) in Ville Saint Laurent which is also easily accessible via the subway, and is one of very few stores left in the city to keep most sealed products at MSRP instead of inflating them excessively, which is why I preorder my set of Commander decks from them every year there's enough in the set to pique my interest.
@Stevenus: I'm curious... How can the insurer know with any degree of certainty at the time of the claim that your collection was exactly as it was documented online? Do you regularly have to submit proof by providing photos, scans, or other signed documentation that all the cards listed are still in your physical possession, still in their listed conditions, and haven't been traded or sold? Do you continuously update your online list any and every time you open something of value in a pack, buy, trade, or sell singles of value, or acquire singles which will presumably appreciate in value? Does a notary or some other third party have to authenticate that in doing so each time you're being completely honest? What's the minimum threshold value for such cards to be added to such a list (for you or the insurer)? Any additional information would be helpful and much appreciated.
You're my new best friend.
I swear, every time they ban something in whichever format, I'm almost always left confused and wondering why they can't open up an equally strong previously banned option for another color to balance the power in the format by raising it overall instead of always lowering it. Realistically, couldn't they have just unbanned say ponder or preordain in modern instead of banning pod, bbe, dts, or twin? dts was the perfect card to keep opposing goyfs in check which everyone agrees is overpowered in virtually every green deck. I get why decks like eggs get banned as do cards like sfm and jtms, but do we really need several cards in standard now, especially when they rotate out and new cards to compete against them rotate in so regularly, even quicker for some sets than previously? Maybe I'm just getting old or being nostalgic, but Magic, especially standard surely ain't what it used to be.
Isn't it obvious?
He's a bad player, and you by your own admission being consistently unable to beat him despite his deck's clear inefficiency makes your deck(s) inadequate and you even worse of a player.
It's nothing to be embarrassed about, especially if you're relatively new to the game which I'm assuming is the case. Maybe you should look at what some decent decks look like online and learn to pilot them.
If you still can't beat him with established top-tier builds, then perhaps both of you should look into a simpler game like Hearthstone since mastering MTG is evidently far off the radar. No offense, a friendly suggestion is all.
At 180+ cards, his deck's card choices create unnecessary variance and/or redundancy which either way creates counter-synergy and slows the speed at which it looks to combo out or beat down the opponent(s). Maybe you can try cards like bribery, acquire, and grinning totem in your deck to use his own cards against him. You'll certainly have a lot of options to choose from!
It's important to learn lessons in brevity when debating, so if all else fails, explain it to him simply that very often less is more.
Use tautology or pleonasms as examples.
Good luck
Back on topic...Even if I could understand how you could ever draw such a parallel, I probably still couldn't understand what the problem apparently was with Leovold to begin with. Talk about a banning decision that was capricious and arbitrary! Should I even bother to ask "Was he really that bad?" As per who or whom? What playgroups? which judges weighted in with their opinions? Confused, I'm so curious. What opposing Generals seemingly had the most difficulty against him? And were there sufficient attempts to understand why and adapt? Was one (or more) poll(s) taken before making a final decision? I certainly never got to vote, play as much commander as the next Magic player if not more, and wouldn't be biased in my oversight or dismissal of his potential. I never even built him despite getting my copy early on but wanted to eventually (my current bug deck is Mimeoplasm, I like all my decks optimized, and I only have so many duals). My friends and I also aren't intimidated to play against him (albeit with some decks more than others). I suppose we still can, but it's annoying that I could never play it outside my own living room if I were to build it. So yeah, what was the issue again? Can someone enlighten me? It's not like he's indestructible or has hexproof making him difficult to remove. Can't run prophet. Could he enter on turn 1? Sure, but it's unlikely without a perfect opening hand and still can't do too much damage (literally or metaphorically) before he's taken off the field as far as I'm concerned. Hell, I've had Kaalia in play with greaves and a big friend attacking on turn 2, not to mention various other equally powerful opening turns with other decks when starting which make it extremely difficult for opponents to catch up and gain tempo (if at all possible). Call me naive, but I don't even see how their justification for banning Leovold holds water when Grand Arbiter Augustin iv (amongst others) is much more annoying to play against, especially when he comes out on turn 2 after a turn 1 sol ring or mana crypt + medallion. Ever play a 3-color deck well against a turn 2 Purphorus or blood moon? It's usually a much quicker scoop-fest. What about players who drop an early mishra's workshop or cheat in an early Vorinclex? Those dropping ban-hammers should see how broken countless other generals
can beare (when playing first) with ideal opening hands while opponents' hands are only good to average. EDH has so much variance and politics as a singleton multiplayer format that I think people all too often seem to forget that circumstantially, virtually any (finely tuned) deck can beat any other. Top-deck tutor a terminus or use a chaos warp, problem solved. My point is that every deck should have a 'plan b', or at the very least a few answers to deal with almost every type of threat, disadvantageous situation, or general, because let's face facts...if all your deck does is focus on its own strategy while completely ignoring what your opposition might be doing, you'll always get caught being helpless in situations which are fairly easy to anticipate and should be just as easy to react to and neutralize at least some of the time. My personal conclusion can only be that an omission of sufficient removal or otherwise inability to deal Leovold is careless negligence at best if not intentionally poor deck building by his opposition. If anything, they should only have banned him in duel commander as a test since players in multiplayer games naturally team up against presumably more threatening generals/decks to offset and counterbalance their strengths.One can't help but wonder if perhaps the players (who were) having trouble against Leovold just weren't starting games as often, had sub-par cards in their own decks or opening hands, have bad match up pairings against him at no fault of their own (as some generals and archetypes inherently have slight to moderate advantages and/or disadvantages compared with others), poor luck (not drawing the right answers in time as needed while opponents seemingly hit theirs more often), and/or simply need to upgrade their sideboards with better suited and more versatile top-tier staples. Regardless, he's certainly not "Rofellos broken", and honestly, protean hulk combos still seem more degenerate that I wouldn't be at all surprised if they reverse their decision within the year. I'd have sooner unbanned Braids.
As for the Top ban in legacy, I'm not sure how to feel yet. I have many copies already, want more for edh, but don't even anticipate much of a price drop if any. Of course as time goes on we'll have a better picture of it's impact on the game and market price as the meta adapts. Sorry, I wrote a bit more than I initially anticipated. Thank you for your patience and understanding.
Also, thank (the various) god(s) Canada is finally ending the failure of arbitrary prohibition and the demonizing proliferation of outdated "reefer madness" fear-mongering propaganda. Suffice it to say this inevitability was a long time coming, and now it's only a matter of time before the rest of the so-called self-proclaimed civilized world follows suit so we call all progress together towards a better future where scientific facts supercede unfounded fears and sterotypes.