Magic: The Gathering C/D

haha yeah I would play drafting: the gathering

so flashback drafts are 3tix + packs, or 15tix if you don't have them, with no uptick in prizes. that's kinda shitty.

the old flashback drafts pre-cube-era were 15 tix too, this isn't some new thing, though it does seem to have offended a lot of people this time around

still, their inability to come up with events appealing enough to appease angry modo players rather than generate more invective is pretty uncanny

I thought the old flashbacks were nix tix??

old ones were either nix tix or nix pax - the nix tix ones you needed to have the packs which were often hard to find during the week they were up and would end up costing you at least 2 extra tickets anyway to buy. nix pax ones were 15 tix to enter.

either way kind of a raw deal considering that there's only a small handful of cards worth anything in sets that aren't in Standard. like I can see doing it just for kicks but IMO the Cube is a lot more fun and is cheaper, too. these really should be just the cost of the packs, or at least the same as normal drafts, adding that 3rd ticket in a time where everyone's pissed at MTGO is really off putting

those awesome sealed queues are still up though. I really don't know how they determine the structure of anything anymore.

well there goes my infinite, 1-14 in my last 15 matches. I can't think of any more ways I can lose.

DE/PEs coming back up in a couple weeks barring any unexpected server crashes before then

powered cube is back again too for the holidaze

Had an absolutely ridiculous sealed pool today that included Nighthowler, Disciple of Phenax, Gray Merchant, Insatiable Harpy, Keepsake Gorgon, Hythonia, Abhorrent Overlord, and Ashen Rider. It was very unfair.

http://i.imgur.com/nvlHG5W.jpg

just won back-to-back standard 8-man queues with this, it's pretty decent if you're looking for something playable that isn't mono-blue or mono-black.

hoping that the next set will shake up standard significantly because i am super bummed that really strong multicolor cards like fleecemane lion and ghor-clan rampager are essentially unplayable. this is probably my least favorite standard season since i started playing competitively.

BRAGGIN': went 8-1 during day one of gp toronto, p psyched for tomorrow, have a legit shot at top 8 maybe possibly if i play well &c &c

cool, good luck

nice one lamp, let us know how you get on

Awesome, good luck!

Way to go Lamp!

i went 11-4, 3-3 on day two. i 0-3'd my first draft pod going 1-2, 1-2, 1-2 with a really, really good deck in big part thanks to variance. got a game loss for dropping a card in-between matches and presenting a 39 card deck which was sort of a dagger. but i still probably couldve played tighter and pulled at least one of those matches out. i then proceeded to savagely money draft (got passed two planeswalkers!) and somehow went 3-0, 6-0. really disappointed in my result because i think i drafted exceptionally well and put myself in a position to top 8 and kinda just threw the chance away. anyway it certainly more fun/exciting than top 8ing a mtgo ptq which was my previous best result at a magic event.

That's still quite a good result - did you finish in the money?

no my breakers were pretty bad - my only loss day one was to someone that didnt even make day two. i actually scooped to my opponent round 15 after i beat him because he had a decent chance at top 64 whereas i had none. finished 90th. tbh everyone was kinda sour since this was the last gp under the old payout structure - the same result at a similar sized gp this coming wknd would've netted me $250 :(

also sorry for blogging :(

No need for sorries, I love reading tournament reports! The same thing happened to me at GP Charlotte, where I started out awesome day 1, but lost my first four rounds day 2. I dropped because I couldn't finish in the money anymore, but under the new payout, I think I would have had a shot at money still.

mogis has been kind to me lately, won back-to-back drafts with these eerily similar decks

http://i.imgur.com/xUCLd2a.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/ruUFY19.jpg

those both look insane, though I'd cut a land and the Stoneshock for the Akroan Crusader and the Baleful Eidolon on that first one

i hate crusader without a bunch more ordeals etc than i have there

i think it's fine with 2 dragons mantle

those decks are p nuts but can i say i like the idea of calling color pairs by their respective deities quite a bit

yeah for some reason using the rav guilds and alara shards as names for decks that aren't built with/around cards from those sets has always bothered me

Haha, I thought you meant Fanatic of Mogis. Didn't realize that people referred to decks using deity names at all

Not even sure I know what all the deity names are!

they've all been mentioned on cards already

WU = Ephara
WG = Karametra
WB = Athreos
WR = Iroas
UB = Phenax
UR = Keranos
UG = Kruphix
BR = Mogis
BG = Pharika
GR = spoilers

Did not know that. I suppose just analyzing cards in Theros you could figure it out

when you said Mogis I thought you meant a deck with 2-3 Fanatics as main kill mechanism

that said I find B/R in Theros very intriguing. it seems like one of the few decks that can stay ahead of a good U/W heroic build

you can even figure out most of their subtitles from flavor text & context & the temple names, like karametra = harvest, keranos = mischief, iroas = war, ephara = wisdom, etc.

current rumor based on anonymous sources who have supposedly seen cards from the next set is that U/W, G/W, and B/R temples are in it and then the B/G and U/R are being slowrolled until the 3rd set which i'm not a fan of but at least i'll get my GW temple.

Yeah I guess I knew the names except Keranos but had no idea what colors went with who. I'm sure the names will get used more when we get the actual god cards for them.

I'm bummed that the B/G temple isn't coming in the next set, that was the one I was really anticipating.

is it a good idea to horde temples right now?

if you want to make a few bucks, they seem like a good candidate, but it's hard to imagine them hitting 10

http://magiccards.info/mr/en/269.html

i was thinking like 5

i horded a bunch of the RTR duals, Abrupt Decay, and Deathrite Shamans and have no idea when to sell them. I feel 4 is probably high end for Abrupts, RTR duals maybe 7-8, and Shamans I'll just hold onto since they'll probably be good in Modern for a real long time

the scars of mirrodin duals hit 10 the following year and the blue ones hit 15, those were better lands than the scrylands though and there were only 5 of them. not really sure what to expect for these. some of the innistrad ones hit 10 but just barely iirc.

I dont know what to make of the supply though. INN duals hovered around 8-10 while the M10 ones were barely a buck b/c so many of those were out there. And both RTR and THS seem to have been drafted a lot.

sorta depends on how good the next set's duals are also, but it's hard to imagine them going worse than scrys

oh wait are you talking about MTGO

if so then i don't bother hoarding stuff like that usually, i don't expect any of the temples to ever break 3 tix and most will be 1-2 for the entire run in standard

I still feel that you're underrating the scrylands iatee

boros reckoner is a card that could easily go up into the double-digits on mtgo and its floor is not much lower than it is right now. it's standard-only though unless there's a straight-up combo kill with it in modern at some point.

abrupt decays i would hold for a while, and buy in paper if they're really available for 6 bucks which is what i'm seeing.

some of my friends went in on pack rats at 0.15, unfortunately i didn't share their pessimism about the future of standard but they're 2 tix now and i want to die

As soon as Theros got spoiled I went in on Tidebinders at about .80 and Nightveils at .27. Cashed out Nighveil at $2 and maybe should have held a little longer. My 60 Mana Blooms are looking fairly useless though. I am shocked on Pack Rat too. I still don't know what kind of decks those are going in.

its in the monoblack deck. as it turns out, constructed decks can't beat t2 pack rat either unless they have removal on turn 2 (thoughtseize is good at preventing this) or have supreme verdict or detention sphere.

looking at the price for sphere and supreme verdict it seems people are not playing those cards as much as I thought