Magic: the Gathering

[Zee^]

I just wanted to see if anyone else is interested in Magic: the Gathering. Its one of the most popular card games in the world, and it IS the most popular card game here in the Philippines. I just thought some people here might be interested. The pre-release tournament is on Saturday, Im still thinking about joining, but i havent made up my mind yet.

www.magicthegathering.com

[TaiDaishar]

Sadly in Israel this game is hardly known so I can't really play it, except at my computer, I wish there was a new M:TG game...

[jms]

Tai,

There's always MTG:O--unfortunately, both it and the physical game are about as expensive as hobbies get these days.

Even so, Magic's the best B)

[Jedi Knight]

I started playing M:TG in 1995, and stopped last year, because I had nobody to play with and my money was better spent elsewhere. I miss those days, though... too bad M:TG online is at least as expensive as the cards, else I'd be playing a lot !

[Zee^]

There are tones of new features and expansions that came out since 1995. You are right, it is an expensive hobby, but only to those that are really adicted to the game. Personally i would never spend so much on a piece of carboard, but occasionally when theres nothing else to do i play with my friends. I dont really buy a lot of boosters i just trade the cards i dont use with my friends.

The new 8th edition has a new border and a new look, lots of old bugs and confusions have been cleared up. I cant wait to see the new cards when they come out here.

[Caesar]

I'll start playing again as soon as they bring back the Power Nine. <_<

[jms]

Unfortunately for me, I only know one way to play games--rip their insides out, analyze them, and then try to put them back together as best I can. I try to stay away from the term addiction...dilligence has a nicer ring :)

Just playing when I had nothing else to do wasn't an option for me. I lived at tournaments. I played very heavily for a few years, and then I realized that to hit the next level (to really get good), I would have to shell out money to do some real traveling (across country/perhaps even other countries), start teaming up with people other than my close buddies, and so on. So I decided that the amount of money and time I was spending to stay current with the game was getting outrageous. And college was the nail in the coffin. Other games can offer one a similar amount of enjoyment for a smaller monetary cost (though not necessarily a smaller temporal cost).

But! I don't mean to paint addiction Magic in a negative light :) The money I spent on Magic wasn't for cardboard, it was for comradery; and maybe more importantly, for competition. It stings me a little bit when I see people posting about having fun playing Magic--because it really is fun--and because one of these times I'm just going to figure "the hell with it!" and jump back in :)

-Thought just occurred to me....the friend that originally taught me the game is of Phillippine descent B)

EDIT: GL at Prerelease. Hope you decided to go!

[Count Duckula]

When I started high school, my guy friends usually had a Magic game going before classes. The players ranged from 2 to 20. The rest of us played Rummy. :P

I learned how to play last year, and it was a habit I couldn't feed. (I'm already feeding a bead addiction.) Then Yu-Gi-Oh came out, and pretty much replaced Magic around here. I remember when the local gaming place used to be THE place for D&D and M:tG. Now it's THE place for Warhammer and YGO.

Someone here at the LL writes reviews and strategy for www.starcitygames.com, a great gaming store that's ~5 minutes away from where I go to college. I'm tempted to play a sealed deck there. But I'm way out of practice. -_-

[DeeBye]

Damn, I am WAY out of date.

I used to play M:TG quite a lot. My wife even has a mint collection of 3rd ed. cards tucked away in plastic (she collected; I played). It's 100% complete, and she might even accept offers on it (PM me).

Plus, I think I have a plastic shopping bag full of Beta Lands kicking around somewhere.

Also, I love Flying Men.


-DeeBye

[Zee^]

My wife even has a mint collection of 3rd ed. cards tucked away in plastic (she collected; I played). It's 100% complete, and she might even accept offers on it (PM me).

Plus, I think I have a plastic shopping bag full of Beta Lands kicking around somewhere.

wo, 3rd ed. that must be worth a fortune r ight now. If your planning tosell them you should check the website for the card price. I know a few collectors, real adcits, who would pay lots to get those cards.

Right now im really interested in the story, ever since the invasion cycle novels have been written to complement the card. I havent read the invation cycle but i did finsih the onslaught cycle. Great story. I cant wait for the next cycle.

[TaiDaishar]

Right now im really interested in the story, ever since the invasion cycle novels have been written to complement the card. I havent read the invation cycle but i did finsih the onslaught cycle. Great story. I cant wait for the next cycle.

There are books in the M:TG world? That can be quite interesting (oh the countless of times I've read the descriptions of the cards [note: not abilities/effects] and I have a pretty big box of cards).

[Zee^]

yeah are books on MTG, everything from the extinction of the slivers to their revival in the riptide labratories. Every cycle has a story thats why its called a cycle. Actually before i knew magic was a game i used to read the books, thats how i got adicted. Legends are characters in the story like Karona the false god, Phage the untouchable, Kamal the barbarian pit fighter or Ixidor the Reality Sculptor. Its makes the game more fun and collecting more exciting.

If you want to know more check the products section of the MTG website.

[Zee^]

yeah are books on MTG, everything from the extinction of the slivers to their revival in the riptide labratories. Every cycle has a story thats why its called a cycle. Actually before i knew magic was a game i used to read the books, thats how i got adicted. Legends are characters in the story like Karona the false god, Phage the untouchable, Kamal the barbarian pit fighter or Ixidor the Reality Sculptor. Its makes the game more fun and collecting more exciting.

If you want to know more check the products section of the MTG website.


EDIT - Really sorry about the double post i clicked the refresh button by mistake....

[Refrigerator]

Yeah, I learned how to play (sort of) this year. Neat game, very fun. I can see it becoming very expensive though. Haven't bought any cards in quite a while, so I'll probably treat myself soon. :D

I got started on it by a friend who comes from Alberta. He (almost) always whups me though. He does spend a lot more money and had a headstart on/than me though. Whoa, that last sentence didn't make a lot of sense. Nevermind, doesn't have to, it was just a lame excuse. :D

My friend is also VERY good at making decks. I think I'm OK too, for a newbie anyways.

I've beaten Matt 3 or 4 times (I think 3) out of the many many many times I've played him. He always ends up winning. The only one person who is a match for him is his slightly younger brother, who spends more money than my friend. (Hmmm, a pattern?) My friend's brother makes incredibly CHEAP decks though.

Speaking of cheap, the cheapest time I've ever beaten my friend was with Worship. Love it, saved my life quite a few times. Also caused table talk and teaming against me a few times. My friend was the only one who really realized how deadly it was and he got another player to make a decision that stopped Worship's power. Don't really remember what he did yet though.

Ok, typed enough for now.

Greetings,
Refrigerator

[Zee^]

Hey Ref, so what kinda deck do u use? Well, if u'd like to beat your friend, and u like using worship try using "Dawn elemental" its a 4 (plains) to cast flying elemental with PREVENT ALL DAMAGE, which means its almost imposible to kill, and if u have that in play with worship you'll never die... as long as u can prtect your enchantment. Just thought i'd help you out. I like to check the cool cards on the net once in a while. :)

Enjoy ;)

[tufchic]

hello all... i went to play MTG 8th Ed on Sunday. the set is some of the old tried and true cards with some nice comebacks like the necratal, blinding angel, rook egg, etc. didn't seem like anything was too broken in the set either. just played sealed and haven't really looked at the list.

the art is a reprint of some of the older sets with white borders and an occasional black border foil pops up which is sweet for all the collector fanatics.

i used to play all the time but got into doing other things because going to the card shop and spending all that money all the time got to be a bit much for me.

[o1d_dude]

Tragic: The Addiction

[Refrigerator]

Thanks. Guess what though? My friend has that card, really annoying. Could've beaten him that one time if he didn't have it. He was about to deck himself, and only had about 4 cards left. Ended up killing me. We've had a lot of close battles. I use a blue/white/green weird deck, a green creature/sort of deck, and this new red/black one that sucks.

I like to check the cool cards on the net once in a while.

Same.


O1d dude: So true. Lol.

Greetings,
Refrigerator

[Jonathon Spectre]

Man what an excellent game. Reading this thread brought back so many memories of my time playing Magic, and how much fun I had then... but I was definitely one of the aforementioned addicts, and about the time Visions came out I realized I had to stop buying hundreds of dollars of cards every time the game came out. An *extremely* dispiriting loss at a local tourney (my deck was set up almost specificially to beat my opponent's, 2 games in a row I drew one mana and he got literally a perfect hand) made me realize that no matter how much you strategize or spend time building that perfect deck, Magic is still 99.9% sheer luck.

That killed the game for me, and I haven't been back or really even looked at it since. I still have all my old decks and I still have a sealed box of Alliances that maybe will be worth some money someday.

It's too bad WotC decided to bring out an expansion roughly every month; Ice Age/Alliances was the Golden Age of Magic IMO. Still my favorite magic moment was going to a tourney in Tallahassee right after Alliances came out. Literally everybody there was playing black/red land destruction and talking about how land D was the new dominant deck. I was playing my old reliable red/green Jokulhaups deck. I swept the tourney and had most games well in hand by the 6th turn. I got some truly amazed "I don't believe this" looks that night.

"Oh, you're going to pillage my forest? OK, I'll Jokulhaups and wipe out everything on the board."
>opponent stares<
"And now that that's done, I'll toss down this lodestone bauble and put 4 lands on top of my library. I have a Lhurgoyf and a timber wall in my hand and there are about 15 dead creatures in this game, so you better get some defense up real, real fast."
>opponent looks at his hand and concedes<

The best part was, every one of my opponent's sideboards was set up to deal with people playing white. So even after they'd found out my deck's deadly secret, there was still nothing they could do but strip mine, pillage, and then die. Ah, memories.

JS
Who knows the true color of magic is green

[MonTy]

Hail JS,

Great post! Brings back memories of my MTG tournaments. I too played a Jokulhaup deck around that period of time, and loved every game with it. I also stopped because of incredibly bad luck I had with tournaments. I've been in dozens of tournament finals, and only draw one or two land in those matches.

I have bought a box of each new set that has come out, but nothing has sparked my interest. I just opened my 8th edition box, and love what I see. I'm definitely thinking about giving magic another try. But I might just stick to sealed, since I don't have the cash flow for anything else. Although sealed might get me fustrated, as it requires even more luck.

Though when I quit MTG, I looked for something more stable, and found chess. Been in love with the game since.