I just could never get into the collecting aspect of MtG.

You don't really need to collect if you're a tournament player. I basically draft a lot, and tend to borrow cards as necessary for constructed tournaments. Of course, you do need a good network of people to be able to do that.

2) Where were all of you when I talked about booster drafting Revised and got roundly mocked on a thread here this winter? Too chicken to get my back, or what? Surely there is some overlap between D&Ders;and ex-MTGers.

We were probably in the Lounge talking about whether or not an zombie brain hooked up to a neuro-interface controlling a robot is considered undead.

Biff, you're much better than I ever was. I played off and on for years (nothing more competitive than a PTQ or store tourney). Recently I got together with a bunch of high school friends and spent a whole weekend at Lake Tahoe drinking, skiing, going to casinos and, oh yeah, booster drafting incessantly. It was a blast. We bought a whole bunch of sets we'd never seen and got to experience the same feeling of wonder that was opening a Shivan in junior high all those years ago.

Funny you say that, Monty - we didn't end up drafting revised (for that reason). Instead we went with the new set (shards of alara) and the lorwyn/morningtide block. Amazing.

I was really disappointed not to qualify this season. I intended to hit up about 6 PTQs, but schoolwork forced me to miss the last 3. In the 3 I did manage to go to, I went 6-2, 8-2 (losing in semifinals), 6-2. Sigh.

I was also disappointed not to qualify the previous season, when I definitely had the best draft deck in the Top 8 but played very badly in the semifinals and lost because of it.

I've seen the newer rules to MtG and I don't know if it is because an old fogey now or what but I found them to be much more complex than the old revised edition I used to play. Sure there were some grey areas and the occasional argument but the rules were really easy and quick to pick up on and you could start playing with the rest of the group almost immediately. Nowadays? I have no idea if I could play MtG and know what the hell I was doing.

I personally wouldn't mind getting a hold of a few starter sets and some old booster packs and playing a few revised edition games right now. Unfortunately nobody likes to admit they played these games when they were younger in the real world. They only do so on the internet.

See, that's what you think, but it's because you were used to them. If you want to see what the timing rules were really like, read this and laugh. The new rules are a lot more streamlined.

This is definitely true. I played at both points and the rules make a lot more sense now. As long you're not dealing with Mirrorweave. Man, is that card ever confusing.

Monty, what do you mean? What does "In the Know" mean? The packs we were going to draft were purchased new in 1995 and had been sitting in my friend's office for the past thirteen years.

If you want to see what the timing rules were really like

Timing was pretty much where all the arguments would come from but they would get resolved pretty quickly and we would all figure out a proper sequence to follow. Obviously it isn't practical if you are traveling around playing strangers but we were a pretty tightly knit group so we resolved those problems pretty quickly.

I haven't really read all of the rules, more like I have looked at a few of the cards and the instructions seem confusing as all hell. It kind of reminded me of how video games from the late 80's and early 90's had simple controls and nowadays the controls are so complicated. It used to be "look in hole" and now it is toggle this part of the gamepad while pressing a triangle, and oh year with your other finger tap this button at the top of the pad and then massage this little stick down here and then quickly press this square button.

I like basic games that have a multitude of outcomes and numerous ways to get there but do not have laborious and or tedious upkeep or ways of playing. Old simcity and civilization games perfectly capture the level of complexity I want out of a game and old MtG was a really simple game to play that allowed you to come up with many various and entertaining ways to play without getting overly complex. Frankly once they added counters it all seemed to go downhill.

Monty, what do you mean? What does "In the Know" mean? The packs we were going to draft were purchased new in 1995 and had been sitting in my friend's office for the past thirteen years.

like baseball cards there were patterns in the packs and it was possible to see a card or two without opening the pack. By doing so you could figure out what was inside the pack.

As for buying packs I was a total idiot when it came to that. I didn't realize that booster packs had a higher ration of uncommon and rare cards when compared to starter sets. Because of that I thought the starter sets were a better deal and so I bought tons of starter sets and consequently I received less rare cards than other people who spent the same amount of money as I did.

Secondly I never cared about the card's $ value so I wasn't afraid to trade a Shivan dragon for some green card I didn't have yet. My quest was to obtain every green card that existed and by the time I quit I had almost done it. There were probably only about 4 or so green cards I didn't have but in trying to do this I gave away a ton of rare cards from other colors. I probably had 5 or 6 Shivan Dragons and gave almost all away along with the Vampires, Nightmares, Sera Angels, and what was the big rare blue cards from the revised edition? Wasn't it a ship and a Djinn?

I'm just waiting for somebody to start posting those "fffffffffffuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu..." comics on this thread.

I played Magic when I was in middle school, which was far too late to start getting Vampires, Sera Angels, Djinns and all that other good stuff, but still early enough to argue about the timing rules. We used to play in the cafeteria at lunch, and occasionally in our Biology class. I remember feeling so proud of myself when I figured out the Channel - Fireball trick, and getting mad when one of my friends told me that it had already been banned. We all stopped playing when High School started, and I sold all my cards (probably about 1500 in all, mostly extremely common) to a classmate for $80. That was in 2000, I think. Sometimes I regret it -- I liked my discard deck -- but I've never really run into any MtG players since.

I've thought about getting back into it, but, like McCoy (assuming I read your post correctly), I've found the rules to be too specific and tedious for my tastes. As far as video games are concerned, I'd still play Civilization II over any other game in an instant, much for the same reasons he lists. My favorite RPG is Dragon Warrior IV, mostly because I tire quickly of playing games with 3D engines. As you can guess, I was really into the emulation scene back in the late 1990s, back when you couldn't just download all the ROMs you wanted with a torrent file.

Concerning counters -- did / do you guys use the "official" counters, those little green pebbles or whatever they were called? We used to use pennies, little bits of paper and stuff like that. I only remember having to use it for "The Hive," and that card cost too much mana to get out anyway.

EDIT: Sorry for the double post, by the way.

Wow -- we never thought of using dice. That would have made it a lot more simple, actually. We used to argue about exactly how many counters there should have been on the card, and it always got messy if somebody nudged the table. Wish I could go back in time.

We had one guy use little stones and others would use pennies. Fortunately for us counters was a relatively new creation and the expansion set that started this stupid phenom. was a pretty weak set so it didn't come up often. We used to hit the table on purpose just to piss of the guy who would build thallid armies.

I play, but mostly dealt magic to pay my way through college in the mid-90s.

I started in Revised/Legends, and didn't really buy any cards at all--just a few packs and started trading. After trading up awhile, I traded a Shivan, Djinn and Colossus for two boxes of Legends when they first came out and things took off really quick from there. The other master stroke was identifying Mana Drain immediately and trading all of my crap rare legends for all of the mana drains from that card shop.

We had some weird deck construction rules and principals--no direct damage, no creatures with power great than 1 unless they were a special case (Old man of the Sea) and no duplicates of any cards except multilands and birds.

I walked around with a 60+ card deck that was mostly draw cards, and defense (especially counterspells).

My partner and I would play two-headed or more often emperor and draft a random newbie to join our squad and then put some weird obscure tricks into the deck templates to try to drum up interest in selling the cards. For example, we sold about 30 sets of 4 each of martyr's cry and heaven's gate in one night.

It was good times, but most of the stereotypes of magic players were true in our area, so we spent a lot of time just amusing each other so we wouldn't just see it as another job.

At the end, we sold our decks for a combined 5 grand, which I suppose is well underpriced for today, but I used the money to help pay for my first car and first time in Japan, (which was a dumb way to purchase as the car sat with my folks for a year) so it was worth it.

Someday I wish we had kept copies of some of the most powerful cards--not really the moxes and lotus, but the Library, Mana Drains, Candlelabra, and especially the more unsungs like Recall, Timetwister, Balance and the like.

We especially thought the intuitive win combos like Channel Fireball, and timing cheat cards were stupid, and would favor weirder #### like Magus+Ashnod's+Goblin Artificer or Field of Dreams, Petra Sphinx (too high power but bah!) that only worked if you had the infrastructure to stall the other squad.

Most of our games would end with us playing about 6 cards a turn and the other folks just flipping up their draw card and having it countered, discarded, stolen or destroyed. This would continue until Marton Stromgald surfaced, I would place him on the table, my friend would shout, "Whassup!" and begin singing the Martin theme song, while I attacked for 900 or so with an army of caribou, birds and other random 0 power creatures.

If the other side was too strong, we would just spirit link the If-Biff and go cheapo.

Wow, I feel like I just went to confession or something.

I hated blue players and white players. CoP and all of those negate interrupts from blue annoyed the hell out of me, plus they had that dinky prodiga son that woiuld boink the hell out of you.

We had some weird deck construction rules and principals--no direct damage, no creatures with power great than 1 unless they were a special case (Old man of the Sea) and no duplicates of any cards except multilands and birds.

What the ####### ####?

Geeks! Get out of your mother's basement and fight some real dwarves!

Reverse gravity? I don't recall that one.

Doesn't Topps do MtG?

MtG is by Wizards of the Coast. I forget who bought them (Hasbro?).

Also, thanks Monty for the tip about being able to see through the packs. I won't touch any of the packs on eBay.

Wizards of the Coast bought out TSR, makers of D&D;, which pissed off the role-players to no end and then were bought out by Hasbro a couple of years later.

MtG hiked a D and D hiked a sabermetric website thread.

Well hell.

I thought my 6 lifetime protour points would make me tops amoung primates. I don't think I've played since 2003 or 04 though.

Rauseo, I first heard your name associated with mtg back in the dojo days.

I used to pretty well in most of the events, but had trouble winning the big ones. Designed a bunch of popular decks though. I think my decks were played in like 8 or 10 tours and at least that many GPs, and even one or two invitationals. I just would always make a bone headed play at the wrong time. God I sucked.

Unfortunately nobody likes to admit they played these games when they were younger in the real world. They only do so on the internet.

You say that, but I'm a lawyer and have three decks in my drawer hoping I'll eventually convince a fellow lawyer who has admitted he used to play to jump in.
I stopped in early 2000, when I moved away from the local comic book store, and all the people I used to play with. So I don't even want to think about the way the rules are now.
I played in quite a few tournaments and actually won a Mox Emerald after one of them. It was an addiction I'm glad I overcame... Now if only I could stop WoW.

Latnam, you actually have a reference to Magic in your handle if I'm not mistaken, right?

And Rauseo, you got 8th in MA states back in 1998 - congrats! That was Academy Winter, if I remember right...

To get into an extremely nerd-oriented thread very late, and at least trying to relate it back to baseball:

I was on my high school math team, and like all high school math teams we were all full of nerds (until my senior year, when half the freshman football cheerleaders joined--this was also the year where I found out that you could pack 6 cheerleaders into a Chevy Citation) and almost all of us except for the girly girl played MtG. (Then again, she wrote Star Trek fanfic.)

My junior year, we made the state tournament. For special occasions like this, we had to have an assistant coach--especially one with a sense of direction who could drive the Math Van to the tourney location. Our assistant coach was Don Arlich, math teacher and helpful opener of sticky freshman-hall lockers, who was awfully put out by us nerds trying to play MtG instead of preparing for the tournament. (Since he had Trek posters in his classroom, this was probably less a reaction to nerdery and more to our general lack of preparedness--but he'd been to enough of our practices; he should have known by then.)

Kyle: you're right about that. I've had this name for so long I don't even think about it anymore. But that's where it comes from. Ahh good times.

I feel like I'm reading a bridge column: I recognize most of the words, but the sentences still don't make sense.

And Rauseo, you got 8th in MA states back in 1998 - congrats! That was Academy Winter, if I remember right...

Ugh, Joe Kambourakis. That guy is a massive, massive cheater. There's actually one of those guys (Brian Lynch) who still plays PTQs and such in New England 11 years later, which is pretty impressive.

Quoting Dayn...

Not that I'm judging. I spent an alarming percentage of my youth playing AD&D;. I could still burn an hour or two if I ran across one of those Dungeon Master's books.

With this site's trouble with ampersands, I read this as "I spent an alarming percentage of my youth playing accidental death and dismemberment..." which struck me as funny and then as not so terribly different than what he meant.

[FWIW, I've never seen the appeal of any of these games, but I got my own issues - I'm not judging either...]

Kambourakis

I'm convinced he cheated in that Tournement. He had 1 too many cards around turn 25, and which he couldn't account for. Judge ignored it, and said he couldn't acocunt due to the mechanics of the cards involved... bs.

If you see Lynch tell him Matt Rauseo says hi. We used to have a pretty good money draft rivalry.

I'm convinced he cheated in that Tournement. He had 1 too many cards around turn 25, and which he couldn't account for. Judge ignored it, and said he couldn't acocunt due to the mechanics of the cards involved... bs.

If you see Lynch tell him Matt Rauseo says hi. We used to have a pretty good money draft rivalry.

I would be more surprised if Mouth didn't cheat than if he did.

I see Lynch and money draft against him pretty regularly, so I'll mention you next time it comes up.

What is the difference between money drafting and regular booster drafting? Do you win money instead of just packs?

Essentially, yeah. You organize teams, almost always either 2v2 or 3v3, and bet money on the outcome of the draft. Winning team gets the money and all of the cards.

We generally did teams. 2 on 2 or 3 on 3 or 4 on 4. And you would draft for money and play round robin versus the other team. It was interesting strategicly because you trying to influence what your partner would get and your opponents while drafting and combining info after.

For example if you opened a pack with 3 powerful cards say a pestilence, a terror and lighting bolt. The correct pick is probably the pestilence because if you pick the bolt the the opponent next to you and your partner next to him are both going to be playing black and with your partner is getting fed by your opponent his deck is likely to be worse. While if you take pestilience you can cut black if you choose. In this case pestilence is the best card regardless, but the example is what im talking about.

This is probably old news to Biff, but when we started money drafting in 95 these theories weren't well know. I was always much better at theory than in application because I would be caught up in doing something neat.

full plate and packing steel!

full plate and packing steel!

Baldur's Gate is an all-time top-five computer game. What a game.

That sounds great. Even more interesting if you combined it with rochester -- I've still never done a rochester draft but always wanted to.

What a game.

I'm running thru the original now for the first time in years. Still really fun, but it's tough to find enough time as a married 9-to-5'er (was in grad school when it came out). Minsc is still awesome.

Minsc is still awesome.

I always outfit him in the Ankheg armor that's hidden in a farmer's field in the village where you find him.

The downside to Minsc is that the mage that he's attached to isn't really that great a character. I always try to get her killed off.

I just cleared the Nashkel mines and am undecided about who to keep in the group. I already killed off jaheira's hubby. It's probably been 8 years since my last run thru BG1 so I only remember the main characters. which mage should I go with? I have xzar and dynaheir now. I've already burned the bridge with Edwin.

That sounds great. Even more interesting if you combined it with rochester -- I've still never done a rochester draft but always wanted to.

Unfortunately you probably won't get much opportunity to, certainly not Wizards-sanctioned. You'd have to be able to gather the group together yourself.

which mage should I go with? I have xzar and dynaheir now.

I think they're pretty similar - it's been a while. I liked Xzar, because he had a neat sword.

I actually usually drop the druid once I find the cleric who's been turned to stone - she's a better fighter, and the dwarven cleric you find later on is even better.

Homer: We played Dungeons & Dragons for three hours! Then I was slain by an elf.
Bart: Listen to yourself, man! You're hangin' with nerds.
Homer: You take that back!
Marge: Homer, please! These boys sound very nice, but they're clearly nerds.

I'm looking forward to the new Blood Bowl video game this fall. The fact that they didn't incorporate experience points and customizable rosters in the original video game was a complete fail in my view.

Blood bowl was one of those great little fun games we used to play in the days before MTG.

What the ####### ####?

We were playing in a money saturated, low competitive environment--Champaign-Urbana. We had to amuse ourselves.

Hitting a ball is an intentional act, so it should be at least a skill check, opposed by pitcher skill.