Yeah that is basically how I became acquainted with AJ. I kept pestering him for advice and deck testing that we ended up testing a lot together and I got to know his quirks and building style fairly well. AJ is the TW guru and has enabled me to enjoy the format more thoroughly through his expertise.
Haha thanks Xaos. Well the idea here is all about the community. By the way I introduced some players tonight to Rule Zero in a 4 player commander game and was able with their help to keep AJ from winning by knocking him out of contention as he started in with a 15/15 Maga commander. (I took the life loss there.) Thankfully I was positioned as his vanquisher to handily take out my 2 opponents soon there after so I totally get that bit about your friend. :P
I look forward to doing more articles like this in the future... Just need to stalk another vic...er find another subject to write about and interview. :) Any suggestions will be considered.
I really like these community spotlight type articles, reminds us the game is about people and not just little dancing digital denominations.
AJ certianly carries a lot of weight in the PRE world, it's nice to hear the perspective of the entrenched gladiator. I was a little discouraged in regards to his early misgivings about Heirloom, in the end he was still balanced in his dealings with it, nice enough to give me a game or a few when prompted and joining an event to be the PRE participator we all know him to be. It's rare to find people these days that can find personal dislikes with aspects of something but still be willing to try it out.
I used to know a guy that I had marked with rule zero. Everyone liked him but he always managed to politic himself into being treated more or less like other members of the group game, and more often than not he'd go off with an infinite combo at some point and kill everyone. I tried to get people to adopt the rule zero and it worked for awhile until that just wound up letting me win most of the group games since after he was dispatched I usually had the next most devious deck at the table lol.
I look forward to more of these sorts of articles. I'm a little tired of hearing from the pro-tour guys all the time in other venues, I'd rather hear about people like AJ personally.
Thanks! I'm sure next time I'll find a totally *different* mistake to make instead. ;)
I might be getting a full-time job again soon, so you'd probably see me in more 4-3-2-2s or 8-4s rather than swiss at that point. Although I won't be able to write up drafts for here as often, either. Still, one thing that also bothers me a little about single-elimination events is when your time is under a variety of constraints, knowing how big a chunk of time you will/won't be spending on something helps too. A swiss draft is always about the same length of time. The other queues you can play anywhere from 1 round to 3, which is a huge variation. If I have time for a swiss free, I might get knocked out of a 4-3-2-2 without enough time to play a second. On the other hand, if I have time for 2 rounds only, or 1 round only, I can't go in those queues 'cause dammit, I might win too much and not be able to stay around to finish it!
I do enjoy 4-3-2-2s when I can earn 3 or 4 packs in one, and even when you win 2 packs you won 'em an hour quicker than you would have by going 2-1 in a swiss. When I have a somewhat flexible amount of time open they're not bad. I'll enjoy the challenge of the 8-4s when I can tell myself every day "I am a winner because I can't believe how much money I have in the bank", since the "I'm a winner because I won some rounds in this swiss" will be even less significant to me then. Not that I try to base my whole life around it now. ;)
Normally I consider myself as a good deck builder but I have to admit that I asked AJ's opinion more than just a few times for decks. Like "Do you think this is good?", "Should I run this?", "I'm not sure about that one, do you have any other card in mind?". And his responses always helped me.
Oh and AJ, is that a Spurs sweater you're wearing :)?
I recently talked to a friend who occasionally dips into the pro end of the pool and he said he tends to 4-3-3-2 for a couple reasons, time being only one. Another is they tend to be filled with less expert players than 8-4 while being less time consuming than swiss. I couldn't very well argue with his reasoning despite the 1 pack difference. After all everyone values their time differently and also only he could really say what his win/loss ratio is.
Sorry about the SoB&M lapse there. Equipment does tend to fuzz the math a bit. Next time you will not make that mistake.
Im with you on the price jumping Jace the mind slayer. I don't really care so much about not being able to get one much less for as that it warps the market so much. Seems really broken in a meta sort of way. One thing is it right highlights why the Mythic rarity is bad for the game at least from a casual perspective. Mythics probably make economic sense for WotC but they segregate the player population pretty dramatically. Will we have castes next? There is already somewhat of a divide between pro players and non pros. The mythics issue widens this gap even more and creates new ones. And people who play with them are not wrong for doing so. They are for the most part great cards. They're really just a lottery system rigged against the average player.
In related news: The two legacy decks have been postponed indefinitely (No new date was issued.) I assume because they are hoping to bring them in after MED4 is released next year.
Unfortunately, this announcement also includes the information that the set release is being pushed back to January 10th. So, ignore all my raving about December 11th!
Welcome to puremtgo. Aside from language problems it is a fine start. Also grats on pulling lessons from your mistakes and having the courage to air them for us to read about. A lot of players would not care for doing that. One of the main things about drafting that seems to elude even expert players is that every set has a learning curve. (Some greater than others.) And some sets match your play style better than others. For instance I excelled (for a mediocre drafter) in ACR drafts but haven't even tried M11 or Scars or Zen/WWK/ROE because I didn't feel as comfortable in those sets. (Also my friend helped me get into ACR by subsidizing my drafts as long as I won which was a great incentive to learn and become good. (I gained his secondary account a good 100 rating points in one sitting and that was against decent drafters.) I think it is important that people starting out see where they may stumble without feeling like they are being condescended to or that the lessons are too hard to absorb. So good job.
That's a good come back to writing but maybe you could show us some matches (reports) on any of the lists next time. Let's see how you work on infect on wider card pools like Extended or Classic.
I agree that infect is such a strong ability thanks to combining an alternate win condition with some great removal on legs. I'm testing an Black-red list in classic right now and it's really fun to win on poison.
I actually played some games both as Infecter and Infected, but always in the cozy hall of my clan. I think there will always be some whining about strategies that involves some kind of "unfair" abilities; I still have to find a player who did not encounter a sudden-quitter while playing land destruction, counterspells or poison based deck. And sometimes that happens even with more straightfoward yet unexpected tactics (just remember the damage stack + (Momentary Blink) shenanigans of some time ago...). So, well, I would not be surprised if Infect becomes the new LD in the casual room. :)
I feel excited about Infect as well, and it really makes me want to play it in every possible format... however, I haven't put together any decks/lists mostly because Infect seems like the flavour du jour and has created a backlash in the whining brigade. There's a lot of discussion/whining about the inability to remove poison counters. So, I was wondering, have you had a chance to play Infect decks in the cas/cas or TP rooms and have you experienced whining about your deck?
In my opinion the themes are like handicaps in golf. They can make the tournament more evenly matched when we're dealing with players with vastly different budgets/collections. When you accept a challenge or theme, you are going to make it harder on yourself in terms of winning, but in the end, it makes the game itself more enjoyable.
If you want to win with a theme challenge, you're going to need to have a bit of a spikey attitude towards deckbuilding and give your deck some teeth. You can't really expect to win if you're playing a casual version of a deck built on a casual tribe.
I have to say that the prizes for taking on the challenges are not that appealing to me. However for me at least, the theme challenges appeal to my desire to win in a unique and unexplored way.
It's a nice change of perspective. I'm a fairly new player myself and like to read of others stumbling along as they learn. I have yet to try a draft myself, and just may give it a go this weekend. :-)
@radman99: I understand that the article is not intersting for every one. Maybe i should have made it clearer in the title and short description. I think there are enough new players struggling in their start with their MTGO career. And even if you learnt nothing new from my article it is sometimes a relief to know that there are others out there which are not Pro's from the start. :)
@rpitcher: Thank you for your positive feedback. English is the third language i learnt (after German and French). I try my best to improve it. I guess I should try to get someone to edit my article if I write another one. (I learnt during writing this article that "i" is not corret for "I". *lol)
I think you need to have more accessible prizes for people that stick to theme. For the dragon event you have to go 3 and 0 to get the special prize, which means you have to win the entire tournament. How about a prize for everybody who plays theme, or a special door prize for theme players, or a prize for the theme player with the best record.
No, it does not present any cutting edge Magic tech.
No, it does not contain the best writing ever.
It does, however, provide something that seems to be lacking online: articles for newer players from the newer player's perspective.
The net is PACKED with serious articles with serious Magic tech for the experienced player.
The net has some articles for newer players, but those are mostly written by serious, esperienced players.
This article illustrates humbling learning experiences by a newer player, for newer players.
I think the bulleted strategy points are terrific, particularly how they evolved as he learned tough lessons. There's more than just the suggestion to run more land. I see mention of sticking to two colours, checking that colours are open, finding syngeries, using bombs, using evasion, use your deck building time, and more. All good info for less experienced players.
Seeing Magic mistakes presented in this manner might be more useful for some new players than reading a "how to" article by an experienced player.
I think some of the people who replied missed the title: "A noob story."
hey, you drafted my deck <_< so far i've never drafted green/blue without getting one reins. must be nice rite? well, they are normally 5th or 6th pick pack 3... people hate blue
the only difference i'd have made is probably picking up scrap melter, but i'm a much greedier man than you are. having lost multiple times with turn to slag sitting in the hand of my 3 colour deck perhaps i don't just windmill slam arc trail and scrapmelter every time i see them, pack 3... riddlesmith is, after all, insane (and only the 3rd best smith. what a cycle)
Yeah that is basically how I became acquainted with AJ. I kept pestering him for advice and deck testing that we ended up testing a lot together and I got to know his quirks and building style fairly well. AJ is the TW guru and has enabled me to enjoy the format more thoroughly through his expertise.
Haha thanks Xaos. Well the idea here is all about the community. By the way I introduced some players tonight to Rule Zero in a 4 player commander game and was able with their help to keep AJ from winning by knocking him out of contention as he started in with a 15/15 Maga commander. (I took the life loss there.) Thankfully I was positioned as his vanquisher to handily take out my 2 opponents soon there after so I totally get that bit about your friend. :P
I look forward to doing more articles like this in the future... Just need to stalk another vic...er find another subject to write about and interview. :) Any suggestions will be considered.
Nice one Paul,
I really like these community spotlight type articles, reminds us the game is about people and not just little dancing digital denominations.
AJ certianly carries a lot of weight in the PRE world, it's nice to hear the perspective of the entrenched gladiator. I was a little discouraged in regards to his early misgivings about Heirloom, in the end he was still balanced in his dealings with it, nice enough to give me a game or a few when prompted and joining an event to be the PRE participator we all know him to be. It's rare to find people these days that can find personal dislikes with aspects of something but still be willing to try it out.
I used to know a guy that I had marked with rule zero. Everyone liked him but he always managed to politic himself into being treated more or less like other members of the group game, and more often than not he'd go off with an infinite combo at some point and kill everyone. I tried to get people to adopt the rule zero and it worked for awhile until that just wound up letting me win most of the group games since after he was dispatched I usually had the next most devious deck at the table lol.
I look forward to more of these sorts of articles. I'm a little tired of hearing from the pro-tour guys all the time in other venues, I'd rather hear about people like AJ personally.
X-
Thanks! I'm sure next time I'll find a totally *different* mistake to make instead. ;)
I might be getting a full-time job again soon, so you'd probably see me in more 4-3-2-2s or 8-4s rather than swiss at that point. Although I won't be able to write up drafts for here as often, either. Still, one thing that also bothers me a little about single-elimination events is when your time is under a variety of constraints, knowing how big a chunk of time you will/won't be spending on something helps too. A swiss draft is always about the same length of time. The other queues you can play anywhere from 1 round to 3, which is a huge variation. If I have time for a swiss free, I might get knocked out of a 4-3-2-2 without enough time to play a second. On the other hand, if I have time for 2 rounds only, or 1 round only, I can't go in those queues 'cause dammit, I might win too much and not be able to stay around to finish it!
I do enjoy 4-3-2-2s when I can earn 3 or 4 packs in one, and even when you win 2 packs you won 'em an hour quicker than you would have by going 2-1 in a swiss. When I have a somewhat flexible amount of time open they're not bad. I'll enjoy the challenge of the 8-4s when I can tell myself every day "I am a winner because I can't believe how much money I have in the bank", since the "I'm a winner because I won some rounds in this swiss" will be even less significant to me then. Not that I try to base my whole life around it now. ;)
Well spotted. :D This picture was taken at White Hart Lane.
Normally I consider myself as a good deck builder but I have to admit that I asked AJ's opinion more than just a few times for decks. Like "Do you think this is good?", "Should I run this?", "I'm not sure about that one, do you have any other card in mind?". And his responses always helped me.
Oh and AJ, is that a Spurs sweater you're wearing :)?
LE
I recently talked to a friend who occasionally dips into the pro end of the pool and he said he tends to 4-3-3-2 for a couple reasons, time being only one. Another is they tend to be filled with less expert players than 8-4 while being less time consuming than swiss. I couldn't very well argue with his reasoning despite the 1 pack difference. After all everyone values their time differently and also only he could really say what his win/loss ratio is.
Sorry about the SoB&M lapse there. Equipment does tend to fuzz the math a bit. Next time you will not make that mistake.
Im with you on the price jumping Jace the mind slayer. I don't really care so much about not being able to get one much less for as that it warps the market so much. Seems really broken in a meta sort of way. One thing is it right highlights why the Mythic rarity is bad for the game at least from a casual perspective. Mythics probably make economic sense for WotC but they segregate the player population pretty dramatically. Will we have castes next? There is already somewhat of a divide between pro players and non pros. The mythics issue widens this gap even more and creates new ones. And people who play with them are not wrong for doing so. They are for the most part great cards. They're really just a lottery system rigged against the average player.
In related news: The two legacy decks have been postponed indefinitely (No new date was issued.) I assume because they are hoping to bring them in after MED4 is released next year.
Ah much appreciated. I completely lost track of where those were.
No worries. The landless Progenitus deck is here: http://puremtgo.com/articles/art-tribal-wars-protection-what
Archenemy is detailed here:
http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/feature/91
Planechase is here:
http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/feature/51
Sadly M E 4 release has been postponed till January and the Legacy Decks are also not coming out any time soon.
And, of course, just after I submit this we got our first Master's Edition 4 announcement:
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/ProductArticle.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/mastersed...
Unfortunately, this announcement also includes the information that the set release is being pushed back to January 10th. So, ignore all my raving about December 11th!
Apparently I missed a few of my own cues to add links to the article. My apologies.
Welcome to puremtgo. Aside from language problems it is a fine start. Also grats on pulling lessons from your mistakes and having the courage to air them for us to read about. A lot of players would not care for doing that. One of the main things about drafting that seems to elude even expert players is that every set has a learning curve. (Some greater than others.) And some sets match your play style better than others. For instance I excelled (for a mediocre drafter) in ACR drafts but haven't even tried M11 or Scars or Zen/WWK/ROE because I didn't feel as comfortable in those sets. (Also my friend helped me get into ACR by subsidizing my drafts as long as I won which was a great incentive to learn and become good. (I gained his secondary account a good 100 rating points in one sitting and that was against decent drafters.) I think it is important that people starting out see where they may stumble without feeling like they are being condescended to or that the lessons are too hard to absorb. So good job.
That's a good come back to writing but maybe you could show us some matches (reports) on any of the lists next time. Let's see how you work on infect on wider card pools like Extended or Classic.
I agree that infect is such a strong ability thanks to combining an alternate win condition with some great removal on legs. I'm testing an Black-red list in classic right now and it's really fun to win on poison.
I actually played some games both as Infecter and Infected, but always in the cozy hall of my clan. I think there will always be some whining about strategies that involves some kind of "unfair" abilities; I still have to find a player who did not encounter a sudden-quitter while playing land destruction, counterspells or poison based deck. And sometimes that happens even with more straightfoward yet unexpected tactics (just remember the damage stack + (Momentary Blink) shenanigans of some time ago...). So, well, I would not be surprised if Infect becomes the new LD in the casual room. :)
I feel excited about Infect as well, and it really makes me want to play it in every possible format... however, I haven't put together any decks/lists mostly because Infect seems like the flavour du jour and has created a backlash in the whining brigade. There's a lot of discussion/whining about the inability to remove poison counters. So, I was wondering, have you had a chance to play Infect decks in the cas/cas or TP rooms and have you experienced whining about your deck?
In my opinion the themes are like handicaps in golf. They can make the tournament more evenly matched when we're dealing with players with vastly different budgets/collections. When you accept a challenge or theme, you are going to make it harder on yourself in terms of winning, but in the end, it makes the game itself more enjoyable.
If you want to win with a theme challenge, you're going to need to have a bit of a spikey attitude towards deckbuilding and give your deck some teeth. You can't really expect to win if you're playing a casual version of a deck built on a casual tribe.
I have to say that the prizes for taking on the challenges are not that appealing to me. However for me at least, the theme challenges appeal to my desire to win in a unique and unexplored way.
It's a nice change of perspective. I'm a fairly new player myself and like to read of others stumbling along as they learn. I have yet to try a draft myself, and just may give it a go this weekend. :-)
Thanks again for the feedback.
@radman99: I understand that the article is not intersting for every one. Maybe i should have made it clearer in the title and short description. I think there are enough new players struggling in their start with their MTGO career. And even if you learnt nothing new from my article it is sometimes a relief to know that there are others out there which are not Pro's from the start. :)
@rpitcher: Thank you for your positive feedback. English is the third language i learnt (after German and French). I try my best to improve it. I guess I should try to get someone to edit my article if I write another one. (I learnt during writing this article that "i" is not corret for "I". *lol)
I think you need to have more accessible prizes for people that stick to theme. For the dragon event you have to go 3 and 0 to get the special prize, which means you have to win the entire tournament. How about a prize for everybody who plays theme, or a special door prize for theme players, or a prize for the theme player with the best record.
Fantastic article!
No, it does not present any cutting edge Magic tech.
No, it does not contain the best writing ever.
It does, however, provide something that seems to be lacking online: articles for newer players from the newer player's perspective.
The net is PACKED with serious articles with serious Magic tech for the experienced player.
The net has some articles for newer players, but those are mostly written by serious, esperienced players.
This article illustrates humbling learning experiences by a newer player, for newer players.
I think the bulleted strategy points are terrific, particularly how they evolved as he learned tough lessons. There's more than just the suggestion to run more land. I see mention of sticking to two colours, checking that colours are open, finding syngeries, using bombs, using evasion, use your deck building time, and more. All good info for less experienced players.
Seeing Magic mistakes presented in this manner might be more useful for some new players than reading a "how to" article by an experienced player.
I think some of the people who replied missed the title: "A noob story."
We can certainly talk about them, yes.
hey, you drafted my deck <_< so far i've never drafted green/blue without getting one reins. must be nice rite? well, they are normally 5th or 6th pick pack 3... people hate blue
the only difference i'd have made is probably picking up scrap melter, but i'm a much greedier man than you are. having lost multiple times with turn to slag sitting in the hand of my 3 colour deck perhaps i don't just windmill slam arc trail and scrapmelter every time i see them, pack 3... riddlesmith is, after all, insane (and only the 3rd best smith. what a cycle)
But uhm, by the way...Are you possibly the same kumagoro that used to write on IAF? ^_^