Magic: The Gathering,GO TEAM MS!

[popsofctown]

I draft on cockatrice, people randomly open up 8 man rooms and draft using ccgdecks. ccgdecks is easier than netdraft in general, I don't know why it isn't more popular.

If you guys need an eighth for a draft or something I might be in, depending on how much effort it would be for me to download mws sets.

[redFF]

If I wanted to learn, what would be the easiest way? I don't really wanna spend $10 off the bat, is there a good free place to play online, or would it be best to just buy an account.

[xRECKONERx]

If I wanted to learn, what would be the easiest way? I don't really wanna spend $10 off the bat, is there a good free place to play online, or would it be best to just buy an account.

Depends on if you want to play online, or in real life. Honestly, as far as learning the rough BASICS go, you can dick around with Elements... it's similar to Magic in basic play and rules.

If you want to get rolling on it, honestly, a starter kit on MTGO is probably the best bet. Or you can do what I did and go to a local game shop... most of them have these Magic 2012 base sets for free that give you a certain amount of starter cards in a certain color. You can then buy an intro pack or an event deck just to get the basics down and play some practice games.

I don't know many other ways to learn other than just doing it. But coming to Magic from Elements helped me understand a lot of things better

[Haze]

If I wanted to learn, what would be the easiest way? I don't really wanna spend $10 off the bat, is there a good free place to play online, or would it be best to just buy an account.

Probably fastest is to grab a friend who knows how and play IRL.

Next best is to go on to Magic Workstation or Cockatrice and get someone here to teach.

Or play Elements as Reck suggests. I played a friend I met on Kongregate who was an Elements pro and he raped me the 2nd time I played him on cockatrice. Apparently they're really similar and if you're good at one you're good at the other.

TSQ Have you gone infinite or something? I've been thinking about getting onto MTGO since none of my friends play that much anymore...but isn't it really expensive to play in tourneys/make decks to keep up with the standard rotations every time?

Unless you have some Modern deck you have to donate? lol I prefer playing eternals.

[popsofctown]

If you download Cockatrice I'll teach you for $0.00.

Yaw taught me a large part of the rules on mws. So it would balance my karma.

[Thestatusquo]

I'm not good enough. I win the occasional 8-4 and then glut on the free drafts for a while but then have to go back to paying. playswithsquirrels, who used to be on this site did for a while.

I'm actually just not a particularly good magic player.

[SensFan]

If I wanted to learn, what would be the easiest way? I don't really wanna spend $10 off the bat, is there a good free place to play online, or would it be best to just buy an account.

Probably fastest is to grab a friend who knows how and play IRL.

Next best is to go on to Magic Workstation or Cockatrice and get someone here to teach.

Or play Elements as Reck suggests. I played a friend I met on Kongregate who was an Elements pro and he raped me the 2nd time I played him on cockatrice. Apparently they're really similar and if you're good at one you're good at the other.

TSQ Have you gone infinite or something? I've been thinking about getting onto MTGO since none of my friends play that much anymore...but isn't it really expensive to play in tourneys/make decks to keep up with the standard rotations every time?

Unless you have some Modern deck you have to donate? lol I prefer playing eternals.

Pauper is a really cheap format to get into (obviously), and you can get some very high winrates if you know the format well. I really enjoy playing it, too (except for against URPost, but that's mostly due to deckchoice).

[bv310]

If I wanted to learn, what would be the easiest way? I don't really wanna spend $10 off the bat, is there a good free place to play online, or would it be best to just buy an account.

If you've got 5 bucks to spend and you want to learn the rules, Duels of the Planeswalkers is on sale on Steam this weekend. Really good for learning the game, and the Challenges really get you to start thinking about your cards in different ways.

[PJ.]

I believe Shea was right on Ravnica. Gruul.

I believe Solar Flar was super popular around than though?

[Thestatusquo]

Solar flare was good, but that was slightly after gruul was good, planar chaos. Also, solar flare wasn't a guild deck so much as it was a UBW aggro-control deck straight up.

[Haze]

lol Someone give me a breakdown on the new sets and what they do.

I feel so old when It comes to MTG.

Also @Sensfan: do pauper tourneys require tickets too? Or is it just a casual room where you go around playing randoms for no prize?

[SensFan]

lol Someone give me a breakdown on the new sets and what they do.

I feel so old when It comes to MTG.

Also @Sensfan: do pauper tourneys require tickets too? Or is it just a casual room where you go around playing randoms for no prize?

There are Casual and Tournament Practice rooms where you can play people with no stakes. But I was talking about the 2-man Pauper queues that cost 2 tix and pay out a pack; I think it's M12, but don't quote me on that.

[DRey]

I strongly suggest anyone who want's to learn to try "duels of the planeswalker" for steam, ps3 or 360. It's an awesome little app. Easy, cheap and fun way to learn magic. Magic Online is too complicated and clunky for newcomers.

[bv310]

lol Someone give me a breakdown on the new sets and what they do.

I feel so old when It comes to MTG.

Also @Sensfan: do pauper tourneys require tickets too? Or is it just a casual room where you go around playing randoms for no prize?

Here's a quick breakdown of the past 4 sets:

Shards of Alara: Wedge coloured theme, lots of gold cards (last set is entirely gold), each shard has its own theme (Esper is artifacts, Grixis has unearth, Jund has Devour, Naya has "power 5 or greater", and Bant has Exalted)

Zendikar: Adventure land. Has a "land matters" theme in the first two sets, "landfall" keyword is the big one. Last set was Rise of the Eldrazi, standalone large set. Annihilator mechanic, Eldrazi Spawn, and otherwise abandoning of the past themes

Scars of Mirrodin: Artifact-heavy block. Lots of decent equipment, strong artifact creatures. "Metalcraft" keyword and "Infect" keyword. Infect is on the Phyrexian cards only, and is a mashup of wither and player-wither (10 infect damage = 10 poison counters and GG)

Innistrad: Gothic Horror land. Tribal themes (Vampires, Werewolves, Zombies, Spirits, Humans), but it's "not a tribal block". Morbid and Undying are the two big keywords as of now, but Avacyn Restored (3rd set in the block) is adding a bunch of keywords, including Miracles, which look absolutely fun.





Unrelated, but I went on my MTGO account yesterday, sold off all my collection from drafts. Got 14 tix for the whole thing, played a Cube Swiss draft. Won 2 packs, opened them, pulled two mythics and a good rare. Sold those, and I now officially have a Standard deck to play on there.

[SpyreX]

I could do some drafts into cockatrice.

[TheButtonmen]

Miracles is my least favourite mechanic ever.

It's a failed design in every way that only serves to increase the random aspect of limited.

[xRECKONERx]

Miracles is my least favourite mechanic ever.

It's a failed design in every way that only serves to increase the random aspect of limited.

this

A card is either going to be REALLY FUCKING BROKEN or REALLY FUCKING USELESS

I kind of like Soulbound, but I don't quite get it yet

[AGar]

My understanding of Soulbond is "Card with Soulbond comes into play, is paired with another card you control in play. Both get buffed in some fashion as long as they are in play."

[bv310]

Yeah, Creature with SB enters play, pairs with an unpaired creature, both get a bonus.

[Haze]

THe new MtG mechanics just get weirder and weirder.

& Thanks BV it's mainly the lastest block (IE Innistrad cycle) that I don't know about.

And all their new keywords. Also is it just me or is there a massive powercreep going on recently?

[xRECKONERx]

My understanding of Soulbond is "Card with Soulbond comes into play, is paired with another card you control in play. Both get buffed in some fashion as long as they are in play."

Yeah, Creature with SB enters play, pairs with an unpaired creature, both get a bonus.

But it's not like... they become "lovers" where if one dies, the other does, right?

In which case, it's basically just a creature card with a buff for another creature that applies when it enters the battlefield.

Oh, and rules question: at the FNM I went to last week, I was playing this guy (who eventually won the tournament). He used Prey Upon to force one of his monsters to fight one of mine. I had Bonds of Faith on the creature he chose to attack me with, yet he said it didn't apply since BoF only works with "combat damage" and this was "Prey Upon damage", not "combat damage".

That just sounded like a load of bullshit, but the guy had been playing for years longer than me so I just shrugged it off.

[Sudo_Nym]

Soulbond appears to renew it's trigger every time a new permanent enters the field. That is, when the Soulbond creature enters, you pick who it's paired with, and then you can change that pairing any time a new creature enters the battlefield. Plus, it appears to have no downsides, meaning that it's basically just a creature that buffs itself and another, which could be neat.

Miracle just looks really gimmicky. "Heart of the Cards" bullshit. You can probably use things like Ponder to game it, but other than that, it's real luck based.

And Reck, that was bullshit. Technically, Prey Upon is not combat damage, but it specifically says "Each creature does damage equal to its power to the other", and Bonds of Faith gives a straight +2 bonus to power. It's a static bonus, so it applies at all times for all purposes, not just in combat, so it should have applied to Prey Upon. Next time, call a judge.

[Thestatusquo]

THe new MtG mechanics just get weirder and weirder.

& Thanks BV it's mainly the lastest block (IE Innistrad cycle) that I don't know about.

And all their new keywords. Also is it just me or is there a massive powercreep going on recently?

I'm pretty sure they're running out of design space, and they know it.

[GreyICE]

Miracle actually seems fairly non-random as long as you're not counting on doing massive card draws.

It's tech as hell with think twice and forbidden alchemy, and is going to way power up those decks.

[Thestatusquo]

I think its a fringe-y keyword that people like you will think is awesome and will therefore complain about when it doesn't work as well as they expected. I am reminded of the card browbeat. When it first came out everyone was scrambling to add 4 to any deck they had that contained red, but the problem was it does exactly what you don't want like 90% of the time. You were almost always better up with a straight up burn spell in the slot. These cards seem similar in the sense that people think they're going to work awesome, but they forget that they're going to be playing them as ridiculously overcosted spells probably most of the time.

Shrug.