Mana Burns

So we had a little miracle...

Fri, 04 May 2012 23:44:39 -0500

http://packofgnolls.blogspot.com/2012/05/of-miracles-and-soulbonds.html

Yeah, we had a little miracle on tuesday. Oh, and I went to the Avacyn Restored pre-release and totally soul-bonded with my step-daughter.

Oh, and I’m running a little Avacyn Restored sealed-deck league for my kids, here at home. I’ll be posting match updates as they occur. Me and Alex are keeping our packs from the pre-release; the other three kiddos each got their six packs today :) and immediately started building. We’ll see how they handle a very small local metagame lol.

ihititwithmyaxe: mtgfan: mtgthings: Being known as “- guy” in...

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 23:03:58 -0500

ihititwithmyaxe:

mtgfan:

mtgthings:

Being known as “- guy” in your playgroup

Tribe Guy - someone who loves playing with Tribes

Artifact Guy - someone who loves playing with Artifacts

Combo Guy - Only constructs decks with combos

etc.

In my early days, I was Mill Guy. As I evolved, I went to Esper Artifacts Guy, to Rules Guy (still am), and to general Control Guy. =)

I was the red guy. Then I was the dragons guy.

I was the Fungus Guy! Swarm of thallids/saprolings FTW! And before they even printed token cards! I had to use pennies lol

I wanna start a Death Metal band and name all of our songs after MTG cards...

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 21:31:19 -0500

core-born-cultist:

thechapelfire:

Featuring neck-snapping hits, such as…

Black Lotus

Gravetiller Wurm

Blightwidow

Horrifying Revelation

Gravepurge

Jace’s Erasure

Dark Ritual

Sol Ring

Demonic Tutor

Necropotence

My old Gamertag was Suicidal Charge. I’m feeling you on these :D

Album must be called ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE

Pretty nice pulls on the six packs of Innistrad I opened this morning! Sulfur Falls, Gavony...

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 10:39:36 -0500

Pretty nice pulls on the six packs of Innistrad I opened this morning! Sulfur Falls, Gavony Township, Kessig Wolf Run, Manor Gargoyle, Evil Twin, foil Creepy Doll, Angelic Overseer and Garruk Relentless! Love opening boosters!

purpleymagic: sullymtg: purpleymagic: been selling these at...

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 14:50:04 -0500

purpleymagic:

sullymtg:

purpleymagic:

been selling these at my wal-mart. 2 booster packs plus 8 bonus cards. not bad, i rather enjoy them :)

I would love to be able to pick these up, but I much prefer giving my money to my FLGS, the Fantasy Shop in Florissant. That, and being a unionized construction worker, we don’t do wal-mart. Ever.

i actually went to a card shop yesterday, and they were all out of boosters and anything of that sort. it was disappointing. and wal-mart is closer to my house than comic book stores, so thats why i buy magic there. also tried target, but they were out too. very weird.

Bummer! It def sucks when you’re forced to shop Wal-Mart because everyone else is out. I’m pretty lucky to have some great local gaming/comic shops nearby. It would actually be more of a pain in the ass for me to get to a wal-mart! And my local Target is always stocked as well. Was able to grab an Innistrad fat-pack at my local Target on Saturday. One of those things I just couldn’t pass up!

queenofrage: Mars Volta, Skyrim, blogging, and a delicious...

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 22:59:22 -0500

queenofrage:

Mars Volta, Skyrim, blogging, and a delicious sandwich.
Oh man, today is the best.

Mars Volta omg. So awesome. I only got to see them once, opening for Red Hot Chili Peppers and Queens of the Stone Age in like 2003, and nobody knew who they were except for that one hipster dude we knew, and nobody was paying any attention when they were playing (cuz, duh, QOTSA AND RHCP OMFG!!!) and so they trashed the set, busted guitars and amps, total fucking rock star style.

purpleymagic: been selling these at my wal-mart. 2 booster...

Wed, 11 Apr 2012 22:55:14 -0500

purpleymagic:

been selling these at my wal-mart. 2 booster packs plus 8 bonus cards. not bad, i rather enjoy them :)

I would love to be able to pick these up, but I much prefer giving my money to my FLGS, the Fantasy Shop in Florissant. That, and being a unionized construction worker, we don’t do wal-mart. Ever.

Easter Cards

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 21:22:29 -0500

So, we wound up playing FluxxOz and Munchkin instead of Magic today. But we had fun anyway. My ten-year-old son won Fluxx on a forced play by my eleven-year-old daughter, and I won Munchkin. Had a rough start with Munchkin, being stuck having to help everyone fight monsters and not take any treasure for a few rounds, but I kicked the curse and eventually powered my gnome up to +38. I was lucky that the turn came back around to me, because pretty much everyone was at level 9+ and could have won and we were all out of the “screw you” cards.

Really would have preferred Magic, though. Oh well. Good times had by all.

Magic Easter!

Sun, 08 Apr 2012 08:36:36 -0500

Not sure I can think of a better way to celebrate Easter than playing Magic with my kids all day!

The Ultimate D&D Room

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 00:17:00 -0500

The Ultimate D&D Room :

queenofrage:

literaryfirearms:

Dude. This would be so fun. Just cause.

Oh my fuck!

Is jealous…

W/r/b Humans

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 21:51:20 -0500

Okay, so this is my current Standard brew. White humans/tokens splashing red and black for fun. Not that I’m ever gonna really find the time to actually play in Standard events, but I like seeing what I can come up with, considering the cards at my disposal.

Creatures

Champion of the Parish

3x Doomed Traveler

Gideon’s Lawkeeper

Alabaster Mage

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

2x Unruly Mob

Thraben Doomsayer

2x Mentor of the Meek

Elgaud Inquisitor

Hero of Bladehold

Geist-Honored Monk

Requiem Angel

Mikaeus, the Lunarch

Manic Vandal

Torch Fiend

Hellrider

Skirsdag Flayer

Onyx Mage

Village Cannibals

Spells

Rally the Peasants

Bonds of Faith

2x Lingering Souls

Increasing Devotion

4x Gather the Townsfolk

Sudden Disappearance

2x Burning Oil

Morbid Plunder

Artifac

Silver-Inlaid Dagger

Planeswalker

Sorin, Lord of Innistrad

Land

8x Plains

4x Swamp

4x Mountain

3x Evolving Wilds

Clifftop Retreat

Isolated Chapel

This is the kind of fast, aggro deck I like to play. Most of the creatures and spells are 1-3 CVC, the outliers being Sorin, Mikaeus, the Angel, the Monk, the Hero, the Inquisitor, Hellrider, Increasing Devotion and Sudden Disappearance. I can usually cast Sudden Disappearance for the win if I get it, and with all the tokens being created, I can hold off most attacks until I can find it. Extra card draws from the Mentors, and bringing back dead stuff with the Plunder can be clutch. I don’t usually have the mana to flashback Increasing Devotion, but I don’t usually need it all the much either, with all the other token producers.

Oh, and Doomed Traveler plus Skirsdag Flayer = awesome. Yes, I’m more than happy to sacrifice this guy and make him a flier, just to kill your big bad monster.

Hellrider is a game-ender if he shows up to play.

All in all, there’s a lot this deck can do, with just little bits of mana, that definitely make it fun to play.

You don't have an EDH deck? Jeeez! You need to make one!

Sat, 31 Mar 2012 00:15:11 -0500

Lol yeah I have yet to get that deep into it. I mostly play with my kids and they’re still getting the hang of building regular decks. I’d like to try it though. My card collection is weird though… A shoebox from 1995-98, and only just got back into Magic last fall, so lots of M11, M12, Scars and Innistrad.

Friday Night Magic

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 23:57:00 -0500

So I finally managed to swing having a free Friday night, and I went to the Fantasy Shop in St. Charles for Friday Night Magic. My very first one. I did the draft and wound up with a pretty aggro black-red concoction that looked like this:

Faithless Looting

Forge Devil

Village Ironsmith

2x Ashmouth Hound

Harvest Pyre

Talons of Falkenrath

2x Bloodcrazed Neonate

Fires of Undeath

Kessig Wolf

Pyreheart Wolf

Into the Maw of Hell

2x Bump in the Night

Ghoulcaller’s Chant

Diregraf Ghoul

Victim of Night

Manor Skeleton

Altar’s Reap

Black Cat

Wakedancer

Farbog Boneflinger

Bloodgift Demon

Haunted Fengraf

8x Mountains

7x Swamps

My sideboard looked like this: Manor Skeleton, 2x Wooden Stake, Altar’s Reap, Maw of the Mire, Rotting Fensnake, Night Terrors, Executioner’s Hood, Skeletal Grimace, 2x Scorch the Fields, Sharpened Pitchfork, Harrowing Journey, Furor of the Bitten, Altar’s Reap, Curse of Thirst, Burning Vengeance.

I’m not sure if 16 lands was too many, but it felt right. When the deck actually worked, it ran great. But the hands I kept when I should have taken a mulligan… not so much. I didn’t win any matches, and only one game, mostly due to getting mana-screwed. I know it sounds like a cop-out, and it is. I should have taken a mulligan, but I thought for sure there’s a mountain just under the top of the deck… screwed myself over. Oh well. I may go try again tomorrow at Newcastle Comics and Games.

By the way, the Fantasy Shop was packed. I don’t know how many people were there for FNM, but it was a lot. I had no idea it got that crazy. We had 16 people for the draft, and there had to be close to a hundred playing Standard. Hell of a scene!

People keep asking, “what’s on side 6?”Got to...

Sun, 25 Mar 2012 13:26:15 -0500

People keep asking, “what’s on side 6?”

Got to be the most important symbol in Magic.

Tap!

The Friend of my Friend is my Enemy

Fri, 23 Mar 2012 09:24:07 -0500

When I first started playing Magic with my friends (and our parish priest!) in the seventh grade, we played almost exclusively multiplayer games around a big table. This was back in the Ice Age, so there was no such thing as Commander or Two-Headed Giant yet, just big multiplayer slugfests. Occassionally we would play a star game; each player takes on the role of one of Magic’s colors and tries to eliminate the diametrically opposed players. This was always interesting because half the game was Magic and the other half was playing politics with your neighbors; they are both your “allies”, but they are each other’s enemies!

These days, my playing group is significantly different: I play with my kids almost exclusively, except for the casual Saturday night gathering at my friendly local gaming store, the Fantasy Shop in Florissant, MO.

We have a lot of decks at home for me and the kids to play with. There are some store-bought decks, and a bunch more that I’ve built. Last night I finally put the finishing touches on a mono-blue Delver/Humans deck, which means we have a mono-color deck of each color (I still need to build a straight artifact deck, just for fun though). Each one is halfway decent, though I’m sure they could all be tweaked a bit.

Red: Prodigal Pyromancers, Priests of Urabrask, Fiery Hellhounds, Lightning Bolts, a Chandra’s Phoenix and some Dragons.

White: this is the white weenie human deck I bought for my youngest son, from Dark Ascension. Champions of the Parish, Gideon’s Lawkeeper, Gather the Townsfolk, etc.

Green: Elf ramp. Llanowar Elves, Joraga Treespeaker, Baloths and a Tellaka Wurm.

Black: Vampires!

And Blue: put this together last night so it’s still fresh. Three Delvers, two Snapcasters, one Invisible Stalker, three of those human wizards that let you search up a 6+ cost artifact. Basic strategy is to control board with counters and creature removal until you find Elbrus, the Binding Blade, hit with it, transform it, and smash. There’s four of those human wizards that return a target creature to its owner’s hand, which gives Snapcaster a lot of repeated value. A couple of bigger blue creatures are snuck in there in case Elbrus doesn’t do the trick.

Definitely looking forward to having a five-player star game with these decks, randomly determining who gets which deck each time.

And for my next trick, I’ll be digging through all my old cards and see what kind of Vintage contraption I can come up with!

Monogreen Thumper

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 07:44:56 -0500

Turn 1: forest, llanowar elves
Turn 2: forest, tap three green for a 5/4 Leatherback Baloth.

My kids love to hate this.

monstrouscontent: There is no school like the old...

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 21:42:20 -0500

monstrouscontent:

There is no school like the old school!

Original Art:

Shivan - Melissa Benson

Lord of the Pit - Mark Tedin

Force of Nature - Douglas Shuler

Last night my 8-year-old daughter beat me 20-0 with her red-green wolfrun deck. It would have been...

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 21:37:55 -0500

Last night my 8-year-old daughter beat me 20-0 with her red-green wolfrun deck. It would have been more embarrassing if I hadn’t built it for her and taught her how to run it :) we still need some Huntmasters to round it out though.

taterblane98: Soooo much want.

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 14:43:30 -0500

taterblane98:

Soooo much want.

thisisenough: Liliana Vess

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 17:33:15 -0600

thisisenough:

Liliana Vess