MAGIC THE GATHERING ONLINE status at a glance: Week ending 2/21/09
Drafts Shards of Alara (4-3-2-2): 5
Match Record (Draft): 2-5
Queues played this week: 7
Constructed pauper 2player:1
Constructed (
Constructed (Extended):13
Constructed (Standard):15
100 card singleton:1
Daily events std: 2
2 player: 1
Total Queues played: 71
Match Record (pauper mono-red):0-1
Match Record (extended Death cloud):2-0
Match Record (extended Death cloud2):0-3
Match Record (extended Dragonstorm): 2-1
Match Record (extended UR Storm): 0-1
Match Record (extended Ad Naseum): 2-0
Match Record (extended Affinity): 5-3
Match Record (extended mono red ext): 0-2
Match Record extended Zoo):0-1
Match Record (Bant ext): 0-2
Match Record (Bant Block): 5-9
Match Record (Bant std): 1-1
Match Record (Glenn Jund Block):2-6
Match Record (Rich’s Jund Block):0-2
Match Record (Rich’s Naya/Jund Block):18-15
Match Record (Rich’s Naya Block):0-1
Match Record (Naya Block2):0-1
Match Record (Naya Block3):0-3
Match Record (Mono-White Block):
Match Record (Esper Block):0-1
Match Record (BR tokens std):1-4
Match Record (WR reveillark weenie std):2-4
Match Record (WR reveillark weenie std version 2):4-3
Match Record (Cruel control std):5-5
100 card singleton(white): 0-1
Overall Match Record: 49-63
Packs won this week: 11
Packs won total: 53
Tickets from packs this week: 51
Tickets from packs total: 203
Net ticket gain this week: +48
Net ticket gain total: +65
Money spent this week: 3
Money spent Overall (Started on 1/1/09): 139
WHOA! Do you see that! Positive 48 this week and positive 65 overall. It was a great two weeks tournament wise, but funny enough I generated all that profit on the last day. I didn't play any magic the week I was away because I was busy hanging out with my friends. The day I got back however, I managed to read about the comeback of affinity in the extended format and the lastest tech used in the deckbuilding. So I headed to the extended queues and played this new affinity deck:
4 Seat of the Synod
4 Tree of Tales
4 Great Furnace
3 Darksteel Citadel
3 Blinkmoth Nexus
4 Arcbound Ravager
4 Arcbound Worker
4 Frogmite
4 Ornithopter
4 Delay
3 Myr Enforcer
3 Tarmogoyf
4 Chromatic Star
4 Springleaf Drum
4 Cranial Plating
4 Thoughtcast
Sideboard:
4 Ancient Grudge
4 Pyrostatic Pillar
3 Relic of Progenitus
3 Trickbind
1 Tarmogoyf
The deck is very resilient to the common affinity hate. Tarmogoyf and Darksteel Citadel are in there as a non-artifact finisher and indestructible land source respectively. The Darksteel is especially nice when someone tries to Ancient grudge your land after sideboarding. Delay actually was the all-star card of the night. Even though I got criticized by one of my opponents for running it, the "bad" counterspell from future sight got me more then 1 or 2 wins. Just by intercepting that crucial Damnation or Hurkyl's Recall when I needed 1 or 2 more turns to secure the victory. While it's not a standard "affinity" card that the deck normally plays, it was a useful bit of tech. This deck was really good against the majority of the extended metagame. Oddly enough, I had the most trouble with the mirror. I chock this up mostly because I never drew my sideboard cards in either matchup. I'll continue to see if this or the Master of Etherium version is better, especially given that the extended environment just changed radically yesterday with the addition of conflux being made legal.
Ch-Ch-Ch-CHANGES!
Some changes have occured on Magic Online, this blog's structure, and with the core sets this week. There is change in the air, and I'm here to embrace it. First, Magic Online's constructed queues. 8-player queues, once the only queues available have now been replaced by 2 and 4 player queues. Now this comes as a very little surprise to me as I have been playing the 4-player queues almost exclusively almost since they came out. The reason? Value of course!
The prize structure worked out like this.
8-player:4-3-2-2 (6 tickets to enter)
4-player:2-1 (3 tickets to enter)
In 8-player queues, if you lost first round you were out 6 dollars, and if you won, you got 8 dollars off the packs that you won. So a profit of 2 dollars.
In 4-player queues, you only risked 3 dollars, and if you won the first round you made a 1 dollar profit. Here's the kicker though. If you played 2 4-player queues and only won the first round on both...then you make the same profit for the same money, but at a slightly less risky upfront cost. Once people figured this out, 8-player queues almost never fired. Wizards of the Coast noticed, and decided to change the format. The new constructed queues are:
4-player 4-2 (6 tickets to enter)
2-player 1 (2 tickets to enter)
I think that these queues are a better value in general. For 2 tickets now, I have the ability to get 4 dollars, so an upgrade from the previous 4-player queues. The four player queues improve on the 8-player by allowing 2 wins to equal a 10 dollar profit rather then a 6 dollar one. All in all I'm going to play alot more 2 player queues now, cause the value to risk ratio is just nuts. The 4-players aren't bad either, and I actually might play them more then I played the 8 player ones. So my verdict on the change is : IT'S GOOD!
Another change was that Wizards of the Coast announced yesterday that the format of the Core Set was changing. The bi-annual set was all reprints of past cards, and generally set the base and support cards for standard during it's "reign". Well, if you head over to www.magicthegathering.com, you can check out Aaron Forsythe's full article on the changes. I'll summarize them for you here, my reactions and comments will be in pararentheses.
-The Core set will no longer be called "Nth" edition, like the current 10th edition, but will be in a new yearly format. The next Set will be called Magic 2010 Edition or M10 for short.
-M10 will for the first time contain NEW never before seen cards. Almost half of the 229 non-land cards in the set are brand spanking new.(As a fan of the game I like this. As a collector that was finally at the level where the core set would contain almost everything I already had just with new art....I'm slightly peeved that I'll have to get new cards now. However, it is a smaller set, and new cards are always good.
-M10 will have more classic fantasy flavor to pull in newer players. Highly flavorful cards such as Serra Angel and Black Knight will return. (Yay, black knight is back, I hope it's part of a cycle or at least paired with white knight)
-M10 will have Mythic Rares for the first time. Of the 15 mythics, 6 will be new cards. Of the 9 reprints, 5 of them will be the Lorwyn Planeswalkers. (Oh good, they are sticking around another year. If i get the new ones in draft that would be neat, but I already have 4 of each, so no biggie)
-Core sets will now be yearly and will rotate out with the block that preceded them. What this means is that M10 will rotate out of standard with the Shards of Alara block, and for three months in the fall of 2010, both M10 and M11 (Magic core set 2011) will be legal at the same time. Another first. (I like this, 2 years was a bit too long, and I was not a fan of the "fourth sets" like coldsnap.)
-Of the 16 cards that have been in every core set...only half will be returning...will Wrath of God skip a year?
-The Core set will receive Pre-launch parties, and release events just like expansion sets.
-Some Tournaments will use M10 drafts
-There are new "pain-free" duel lands in M10. No fetch lands, painlands, or Ravnica Shocklands. (My guess is a cycle based on either Grove of the Burnwillows, Nimbus Maze, or River of tears from future sight. My money is on Grove. I also hope they aren't rare, as that will be sick on the wallet. Come to think of it, with all the land type things in alara block, we might be looking at a Grove/Mumuring Bosk hybrid)
New Format: Conflux has rotated in.
So the chief complaint I have had about the weekly results have been:
Having just the deck name doesn't reveal the build of the deck
So I will now link the builds I use to the deck names. Also, I have retired the shards of alara decks from the three major formats, and replaced them with Conflux era decks. I have retained the win/loss records from the previous block, and will hopefully give me a better view of the Magic Online metagame as it evolves. See you guys at the end of the week.
until next time remember...all work and no play
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