End of Year Schedule PLUS Christmas Tournament Announcement

As we approach the end of the year, we need to get the schedule of events that help round out our upcoming festive month.

DECEMBER

4th: Casual Day

11th: Christmas Tournament! See the rules below. Also, last league of 2010!

18th: Off Day

25th: Christmas Day!!!! I hope you enjoy the day with friends, family, and loved ones.

JANUARY 2011

1st: Casual Day. Show off any new cards you got over the Christmas break. :)

Rest of Month: TBD

Okay, so the big thing here...THE CHRISTMAS TOURNAMENT!

If you can guess by now, you're gonna build Red- and Green-themed decks. But if I leave it completely open, I'm afraid I'll get some Jund variant that's not really a lot of fun to play. So let's help the fun factor a bit:

1) Legacy format

2) Singleton, meaning only one copy of any card unless it's a Basic Land.

3)  Un- cards are okay except for Granny's Payback.

4) The only legal colors are Red and/or Green. No Colorless cards, and no multi-colored cards that you cannot use Red and/or Green mana exclusively to pay for any and all costs on the card (including mana cost).

5) You may only make Green and/or Red mana from your mana sources. If you make any other color, you get 1 Colorless mana instead for that color.

6) Your deck cannot be mono-colored: You must have a mix of Red and Green (and/or Red/Green multicolor) cards in the deck. I have no mandated ratio of Red-to-Green cards, but be honest with yourself: If 99% of your deck is Red, chances are it's gonna come across as a mono-Red deck splashing Green for one or two cards.

7) "Christmas Gift" 1: If you run all Snow-Covered Forests and Snow-Covered Mountains as your lands, you may start the game with 1 extra card in hand and increase your maximum hand size by 1.

8) "Christmas Gift" 2: If you include Goblin Snowman in your deck, you may start the game with 1 extra card in hand and increase your maximum hand size by 1.

NOTE: The "gifts" accumulate, so having all Snow-Covered Forests and Snow-Covered Mountains PLUS Goblin Snowman will give you 2 extra cards in hand at the start of each game and increase your maximum hand size by 2.

I will do some kind of hand-out, but I'm not sure what I'll do. I've got promos left over, so I may do that but I'm not sure which ones to use. Regardless, I'll do something.

Oh, did I mention? Cost is free! Who can argue with that in the month of Christmas? ;)

Cube Draft Version Poll #1: Lotus Bloom vs. Lion's Eye Diamond

Here's the first in a series I'm hoping to do to help us with keeping the Cube going strong and healthy.

Every so often, usually once a week, I'll post a poll asking about either A) preferred versions of cards in the Cube, B) Replacements vs. what's in the cube currently, or C) preferred "proxies" of cards that should be in the Cube.

This first poll takes the last option: The preferred proxy for a card that should be in.

I don't have a Black Lotus...yet. But we can get awful close to it with a few cards in the game.

The card I've got in right now is Lotus Bloom:

Lotus Bloom is literally the Suspend version of Black Lotus. Suspend it, and 3 turns later you get a Black Lotus. The only problem is speed: In the late game, Lotus Bloom could be a dead draw.

On the other hand, we've got this to consider for replacement...

Lion's Eye Diamond has the same "get into play QUICK" speed as Black Lotus, but at a steep cost early: you have to discard your entire hand.

BUT...with enough good mana-costing abilities on permanents you've got, and late in the game, it could be worth the hand discard, especially when you could use it the turn it comes down.

So what do you all think? Does Lotus Bloom stay, or do we want to try Lion's Eye Diamond?

Put up a post below and I'll count up the responses in the next week or two.

Until then, take care!

Opinions Wanted: Cube Draft Changes?

Hey guys!
  I want to get some feel on what you feel our Cube needs in order to move it forward and get some variety into the format.

  Currently, blue reigns supreme. The reason it wasn't supported too well this last draft? Because we all had to make a conscious decision to pass up Blue cards. It seems like it didn't matter what Blue cards went around, we had to force ourselves into other colors.

  So what I want, using specific card examples, is:

  1) How can we punish Blue a bit more?
  2a) Is control in general (not just in Blue) too much of an influence? If so, what control-type cards always seem to make it in?
  2b) What aggro/combo cards would you suggest adding to the Cube to help combat control cards?
  3) Is there any effect that's normally "off color" (i.e.: Not normal for that color) that you'd like to see? If so, what is an example(s) of it?


I'm already planning changes for the next cube, including:

1) Taking out cards that never hit the Main Decks. There's no point in including cards that always get put off to the side.
2) Adding Scars of Mirrodin cards, including all 3 Planeswalkers, Molten-Tail Masticore, and Mimic Vat.
3) Replacing Lotus Bloom with another 0-mana artifact that makes 3 of any one color. (sorry to get your hopes up, but it's not that card. Though I am shooting to get one eventually. :)  )
4) Upgrades to current cards, like an original Rorix Bladewing, foil Urza's Saga Avalanched Riders, and a fairly nice upgrade to a dual land.


Any help is greatly appreciated! Let's make the Cube something that's fun no matter when and how we draft. :)

Cube Draft 4 Next Saturday!

Well, apparently we just love the Cube. Yay! That means we get to do this more often, and I'm definitely not opposed to that.

November 13th will be our 4th Cube Draft. The rules are simple: I'll make "Packs" of 15-25 cards each built from certain cards from my collection. We'll draft with 3 "Packs" like we would if we had opened 3 packs of any set. We'll follow our normal draft rules (except no picking a card you "open").

The entry fee will be $2, and prizes will come from Scars of Mirrodin pack splits.


As always, I'll have some additions and replacements to the Cube. For example...

1) A special version of Lightning Bolt.
2) A red Mythic gets a foil upgrade.
3) The oldest, cheapest Black land destruction.
4) One new Mox...but which one??


Guess you'll have to play on the 13th to find out that and more. See ya then!

Necrotic Ooze Sees Legacy Play at Nashville

HA! I knew it was abuseable!

This weekend was the Star City Games Open Series tournament in Nashville. Today was the Legacy part of the event, with Magic 2011 and Scars of Mirrodin making their marks. Koth of the Hammer, Fauna Shaman (which apparently is not a worse Survival of the Fittest), Memnite, and more saw some decent play at the Legacy portion of the event. And you know how hard it is to make it into Legacy, whatwith all the powerful stuff that's as old as the game itself at times!


But Scars of Mirrodin made use of not only a new card from the set but also two fairly old cards, one of which hasn't seen print since Alliances 14 years ago!

Find out more...after the jump!

The Halloween Special Theme Week

Halloween is fast approaching! And because one of our days falls so close to Halloween I'm doing a special theme week!

(Name TBD)

The rules are simple: Theme up your deck for Halloween!

(...)

Alright, for a bit more clarification:

1) Your creatures must have Halloween-themed creature types or fit Halloween norms, whether that be in the card name or the creature's type(s) or even the flavor text. For example, Seedcradle Witch is fine since witches are a major theme of Halloween. Examples of Halloween-themed creature types include Wizard, Horror, Goblin, Zombie, Demon, Vampire, and Warewolf. (And they are just examples. If you have a question on if your creature type fits, feel free to ask.) I'd heavily suggest staying away from White and possibly Blue, since they don't really evoke that Halloween feel to them (White is a peace, harmony, and healing color, and blue is more a cunning and clever color,  hardly the themes of Halloween). However, if you can make it work go for it!

2) No creatures with the Changeling ability. (I feel that cheats the "specific creature type" rules of any interesting format.)

3) Non-creature spells need to have some scary or dark-themed artwork. For example, Animate Dead has some skeletons rising from the grave. Try telling me that's not spooky and/or Halloween-themed. EXCEPTION: If a card specifically mentions something Halloween-related in its flavor text or card name (examples: All Hallow's Eve or Season of the Witch), feel free to use it as it themes up.

3) Lands are fine. Don't worry about artwork or theme. Your deck needs to be playable, after all. ;)

4) Just because some powerful tribes are allowed, I advise you to not go for a deck that can just outright beat people to a pulp. Have fun with this! We don't do a lot of theme weeks and the fun of it is there's a bit of room to work but you don't just get all the power cards to work with. So for example, as much fun as it may be to build an all-Goblin deck with 4x Siege-Gang Commanders and 4x Goblin Sharpshooters and 4x (insert Goblin here), I'd suggest you bring them at most to 1 per deck in favor of some more interesting Goblins you don't normally use.

5) Unglued and Unhinged are okay, but don't go overboard. Keep the number of Un- cards fairly low relative to how many normal cards you've got in the deck.


For an incentive...I'm still working on that. It may be free Worldwake booster packs (I have enough left I think. I'll have to check). Or it may be leftover promos from the last few set releases. Rest assured, you'll get something for the effort.


That's it from me for now. Enjoy building to the theme!

Good Promo News, Bad Promo News...Which Leads to Semi-Good News

 We've had a bit of a promo mishap of our own.

I've got Steel Hellkite promos, so everyone will get one! WOOT!

I've got the Wurmcoil Engine extra that I personally bought on the off chance Morgan couldn't send any, so that will still go out to the highest finisher who did not get to a Pre-Release.

I've got the 3 Nissa Revane promos, so those will go out as I've detailed below.

I do not have the Liliana's Specter, Sylvan Ranger, or Syphon Mind promos...yet. A packaging mistake kept me from getting those promos on time. If you get to choose from one of these 3 promos, I'll write your name down and which promo you picked. I should have those promos next week.

Now you've got incentive to drop by again. See how Morgan and I work like that? ;)  lol.

See you all tomorrow! Remember, $2.75 for loose packs and an $8 entry fee for the draft. HINT: Bring LOTS of cash. ;)