A renaissance in Magic: the Gathering right now

[Replay]

That's not a set name, just my opinion.

The new Modern format fixes a host of the old problems with Constructed (losing the ability to play cards every year) and Vintage (the old "Type I" where anything went) by splitting the difference; almost any card printed or reprinted since roughly 2004 is playable. I'm playing a very nice combo deck based around these cards:



I also got $40 off the bat for a lot of old cards I thought were worthless, almost on stepping into the cardshop. Those of you who have old cards might want to get an appraisal whether or not you play again.

Anyone else been playing again? I know Flip said he was.

[Flip]

Yeah ive been playing a lot of Modern lately, too. When i posted a while back that I jumped back into the tournament Magic scene, most of that was the Standard format for me to get re-familiarized. As you pointed out, though, sets come out fast and furious now so Standard is constantly rotating and I got tired of keeping up. Its expensive to do so, for sure.

So, i built a few Modern decks and have been having a blast. There is still a large tournament scene for Modern in my area and the last few i went to (horn tooting time) i've been doing very very well with a Reb/Blue/Black aggressive Delver of Secrets deck. Burn, efficient creatures, and counter magic, whats not to love?

I'll still play Standard from time to time if a buddy has a deck or i can tweak what i do own, but I am def having more fun with Modern. The card pool is just huge and there are still a lot of unexplored ideas out there. If you want to use ALL your old cards, there are Legacy and Vintage formats, too, but they arent as popular.

I simply enjoy tournament competitive Magic. Playing 8 rounds of round robin style, cutting the field to the Top 8, then playing that out is pretty exciting and not a bad way to spend a Saturday or Sunday if you dont mind being in a room full of smelly nerds.

[Replay]

Lucikily, my last Magic binge was ten years ago, Kamigawa Block, and that's means all my stuff is pretty much Modern-legal. I beat a former Top 20 player in the state yesterday in a pickup match with my new deck and felt nice about it.

Infect is a problem though! I need to pick up four of the anti-poison-counter card.

[Flip]

A better card for your sideboard might be Spellskite versus Infect, but that card is used heavily and is not cheap, unfortunately. You basically redirect all their pump spells to your Skite, so they cant really do a whole lot.

Hopefully your shop didnt screw you over on your cards. $40 for a stack isnt even really all that much, cards prices are pretty crazy sometimes.

But anyways, Spellskite is worth it since you can also bring it in against Bogles, Burn, Twin, and some other matchups. It is a very flexible sideboard card.

[Replay]

No, I'm pretty sure Melira is a better anti-Infect card for Green than Spellskite.

[Don]

I remember playing a game of magic and I forgot how long the games take when played in real life, and it's easy to lose track of counters and all the other stuff out there.

[Flip]

I remember playing a game of magic and I forgot how long the games take when played in real life, and it's easy to lose track of counters and all the other stuff out there.

In tournament Magic you get 50 minutes per match, and a match is best 2 out of 3. You really dont go to time all that often, unless you play a slow deck or a slow player.

No, I'm pretty sure Melira is a better anti-Infect card for Green than Spellskite.

Well yeah, of course, but you are wasting valuable sideboard slots for only one matchup if you go with Melira. You only get 15 possible sideboard cards to bring in inbetween games, you want them to be as flexible as possible so they can help in more than just against one particular match. What if you play 10 matches and never see an Infect opponent, but you ran into Burn twice and Twin once? Melira doesnt help at all in those matches, but Skite would have been very good.

[Replay]

A valid point, Skite is playable in any deck.

[Replay]

Anyone still playing Magic? Flip?

I actually won the local tournament two weeks in a row with my Worship deck. I'm running it full five-color control - Bringers plus Oblivion Rings - and Ghostly Prison wins more games for me than anything. And Genju of the Realm is my killcard. It's amazing how well it actually works, and it's not even optimized.

[Flip]

Enchantment hate doesnt seem to exist in people's sideboards all that often, so playing an enchantment style deck is in good position right now for the meta if you can survive long enough. As i think about the top decks in the format, i cant think of one in particular that would stomp all over your deck idea. Although, i play Blood Moons in my sideboard and that would win the game on the spot against your deck. A lot of the combo decks, like Splinter Twin, is probably faster than you, too, but if you have Prison down, then they cant do too much.

Here is the meta game breakdown online for Modern: http://www.mtggoldfish.com/metagame/modern#online. I am currently on Grixis Delver and doing great with it. I know, i know, its listed as the most played deck online, but i have to get hipster for a second about that and say that a few months ago, when i started to play Grixis Delver, this deck was not even in the top 20. Its been a pretty interesting rise for this deck, and the community has noticed. When i play in live paper tournaments i'm usually the only one playing this deck, so the paper meta hasnt quite caught up to the online meta yet.

Magic has been a fun adult hobby for the last few years that i got back into it, but who knows if it'll keep my attention forever. I went from playing the shit out of StarCraft to Skyrim to Diablo III to now Magic. I tend to overplay whatever i'm currently into and then move on eventually.

[Replay]

Sorry for the long delay in response - lot of work this week!

I'm in it to stay. I felt so wonderful playing the last few times; just the kind of sheer joy I used to feel when I was a kid.

I "got out of Magic" several times in my life because I felt it was too geeky; and I wish I hadn't. My old dual lands and Mox Sapphire and Ancestral Recall that I once sold for a few hundred dollars back in 1996-1997 would probably be worth $10,000 today if I'd kept them.

I hear you about Delver and the rise of "rogue" metas. Congrats on helping a deck rise. I'm excited to be playing a deck that literally doesn't exist as a top-level meta yet - and to be winning with it. A local former champion laughed out loud in surprise after hearing I'd been winning and had won two local tournaments with the "Bringing Worship" deck I showed him. I'm considering going to the Vegas Grand Prix this year for the Modern Masters release and actually playing it!

[Replay]

By the way, Blood Moon does indeed win against my deck if you get it out unopposed; however I sideboard Scour and other enchantment removal spells, so it would be a tradeoff for sure. My local shop is pretty low-level play so far so I haven't seen Moons; I did get rocked by a Sowing Salt in a causal match though.





Four things beat my deck consistently that I know of: 1) land destruction, 2) enchantment removal, 3) turbo infect, 4) black lifeloss.

As you said, it's all about the meta, though, and only one of those things is actually being played consistently right now. The meta at least around here reminds me of Tempest in the old days - just a lot of brutal, not-very-hard-thinking fast decks, lots of red - RDW/Sligh and Goblin - then Infect too - and then the combo decks are usually graveyard-based things like Delver or Goyf or other selfmill, plus some Sliver decks. Infect is the only thing out of that which gets around my Worship/Prison defenses easily so thus far I have a meta advantage and it's been nice.

[Replay]

The nice thing about my deck is that it's surprisingly fast for what it is. On a top draw without opposition it puts down a third turn Bringer or Genju of the Realm. First turn Birds, second turn Sakura-Tribe Elder or Sylvan Caryatid, third turn all five colors.

This guy is still a bedrock of any five-color green mana ramp.

[Flip]

Tribe Elder is probably one of my favorite magic cards of all time. Cards like that and Solemn Simulacrum quitely provide so much value, people dont seem to realize that the reason they lost was probably due to those cards. I'm all about value. There's nothing better than drawing cards, or two-for-one'ing your opponent. Cards like Electrolyze, also one of my personal favorties, can be such a blow out at times. Kill two of your 1 toughness dudes AND draw a card.. thanks for the 3-for-1, have fun catching up. More than anything, using your mana each turn and getting ahead on cards is the way to win.

I am going to GP Vegas this year, its already booked, and i won a local tournament last month where the prize was 2 byes in the main event. I have never started off such a huge tournament automatically 2-0, so hopefully i get hot after that and make it deep into the tournament. The main event is Modern Masters 2 sealed, which means you get 6 booster packs of Modern Masters 2 and can only make your deck out of the cards in those packs (they give you free basic lands of any type you want). I feel like that levels the playing field, but someone is bound to open up a few packs that have bombs in them, which will take them pretty far. Sometimes, you just have to get lucky with the cards you get.

There is certainly a strategy to sealed, i'm just not sure if i'll be any good at it. We'll see! This GP will be very big. I also quit magic back in the day a few times, due to various reasons, but i'm finding the Colorado scene to be not so nerdy. Sure, there are some, but most people are older now and just chill about it all. My group are guys you wouldnt ever expect to play competitive magic just talking to them. And yeah, i started playing at Revised and wish i didnt dump most of my old collection. The dual lands alone are in the hundreds per. Even starting way back then, i think i only had a few moxes from time to time, but usually traded them. I just didnt understand the money value and playing value those cards had. A zero casting cost mana rock artifact just didnt seem exciting back then, but yeah, those cards are clearly absurd when you understand the game.

[Replay]

Huh! I may be going to GP Vegas too...I'll let you know here if it's happening! Good luck in either case with the main event, Modern Masters 2015 is a great exciting set with a LOT of power, won't be like most drafts where most cards are filler, that's for sure

[Flip]

Yeah, def let me know if you do go. Even if you dont want to pay the $75 registration for the main event, there are a shit ton of side events to do, too. Earlier in the year, there was a GP in Denver that we all went to. The main event format was Standard, and i did crappy and dropped out pretty early, but I had a lot of success playing in the side events and had a blast. GP Denver only had like 1,500 people, but Vegas is predicting like 10k, it'll be pretty cool, hopefully.

[Replay]

Yeah, I went to one of the early Grand Prixes in Urza Block - the main event is always brutal, but there are ALWAYS side events, people running pickup drafts, crazy trades and vendor stuff you can't get anywhere else, and parties outside of the main con to go to. It's a blast.

The main fees are not bad at all IMO, it's just paying for some crappy motel in Vegas for a few days that would be the bite.

It's like...do I go, or buy a box of Modern Masters 2015 instead for the same as the motels would cost? Always hard to know what one gets more out of.

[SineSwiper]

Haven't played MTGO in a while, and RL MTG in even longer. More of an Commander player myself. I love the four player format and crazy decks people come up with. I really didn't like the new client, especially since the n00b Magic games look so nice, and the professional client looks like it was spit out 15 years ago. Maybe it's gotten better since I last looked at it.

[Replay]

How was GP Vegas? I didn't go after all.

[Flip]

I had a good time. I went 4-3 in the main event, then dropped after my third loss. You need to only have 2 losses to make Day 2. Out of the 8 of my friends that went down together, only 1 of us made Day 2, so our results weren't all that great. My packs to make my deck sucked, so i think i made the best deck i could and played just fine with it.

I also didnt open anything of value all weekend. I played in a lot of side events (which i did do very well in, which made the trip worth it) but every pack i cracked didnt have the high value cards. A buddy of ours opened his main event packs and the rares were ridiculous. Since you are supposed to then pass those cards to the guy next to you, he decided to drop from the event right away, which was the right call. The event was $75 to play, but his packs has $300+ value of cards.

The talk of the tournament was when it finally got down to the Top 8. Once in the Top 8, they do a draft format, where you open a pack, pick a card, then pass the pack. You then received a passed pack, take a card, then pass again. I really like drafting, its a fun way to play the game, but anyways, some pro was in the Top 8 and after the first 15 picks he was obviously solidly drafting a red/white deck. Then they all opened their second pack and he saw a red card that would have helped his deck and a green card, that was foil and the most expensive card in the set. Since you get to keep the cards, do you take a card that is a few hundred bucks to keep or a card that will help you win the tournament you are currently in? If this was a Friday night Magic at your local shop, i would just pick the rare and be happy, but here we are talking about winning a GP... he ended up taking the foil rare and everyone was in a uproar about it. But, the story turned out ok, because he then sold that card on eBay for something ridiculous, like 15k, which is even more than winning a GP, so he got the last laugh i suppose (he ended up losing the GP).

My opinion... you are in the Top 8 of an 8,000 person GP, play to win and dont take the stupid card thats worth $200, but he certainly made out on it all.

https://news.yahoo.com/controversial-ma ... 02814.html

[Replay]

I think he made the right call, actually. $15k in the hand is worth a GP win in the bush anyday.