In Command; or, Color Pie, Speculation, and You

If you were paying attention to San Diego Comic Con this weekend, you may have seen this image:

You read that right. Planeswalker Commanders. And not just any Planeswalkers - old ones. If you follow the Magic storyline, you might know that Teferi gave up his spark to seal one of the time rifts endangering Dominaria. But this is Teferi as a planeswalker, meaning that these cards aren't limited to the current Magic storyline. That means that any Planeswalker is on the table. Even pre-mending ones.

As of now, the only hard fact that I can find is that there is a cycle of Planeswalkers that can be Commanders. Many are saying that they will all be characters from Magic's past, but I haven't seen that confirmed anywhere. It's possible that some of the planeswalkers appearing in this product are going to be entirely new characters, but how cool would it be if we got to see new versions of old, pre-mending Planeswalkers? [Editor's Note - since writing this, MaRo clarified that some of the Planeswalkers might not be old characters.]

Well, how about a little thought experiment/speculation. Who are the remaining 4 Planeswalkers, if we pick from old Planeswalkers from Magic's past?

Whelmed

Kiora waited.

Mostly patiently.

When the great beast the locals called Tromokratis had emerged from the depths - shark teeth gnashing, crab claws snapping, various unattributable appendages.... noodling - she had been decidedly nonplussed.

Journey into Darkness; Or, Out of the Shadows

Forget what your teachers/parents/authority figures might tell you. Magic is good for you. It's kept me healthy and whether you know it or not, it's probably doing the same for you.

I have not been playing very much Magic lately. This fact may or may not be correlated to the increase in minor panic attacks I have been having. Both of these facts are definitely causally linked to the fact that I recently moved out of New York City and haven't had (1) as much free time and (2) a place to play. (Social anxiety can make it hard to try new places/meet new people, it turns out.)

Dark Wishes; Or, All I Want For MtG-mas is a Combo Piece

The trick (if there is a trick) to deckbuilding (by which I mean more coming up with new decks than crafting a deck with a specific purpose) is wanting something. Really, really badly.

There's more to it than just wanting, of course. There's knowledge of cards, knowledge of rules, a good intuition for card selection, openness, etc..., but the way I see it, wanting something (and knowing exactly what it is that you want) counts for a lot. And there is no better time to want something than spoiler season, because chances are good that (if you want the right things) you will get what you want.

Random Decklists: Blue Man Group and Goblin Grenade Launcher

Trying something new for a little while since my life's a little crazy just now. Gonna post some rapid-fire decklists every day or so, with minimal testing and maximum whatever happens to come to mind at the time.



Standard Human Fish

4 Grand Architect
4 Aether Adept
4 Delver of Secrets
4 Invisible Stalker
2 Snapcaster Mage
2 Adaptive Automaton
2 Cackling Counterpart

4 Mana Leak
2 Dissipate
2 Runechanter's Pike
4 Ponder
4 Vapor Snag

22 Island

This is a fun little aggro-controlly blue deck. An archetype that I have noooooo positive experience with. On the other hand, I wanted an excuse to use Grand Architect again, because I realllly like Grand Architect.

---

Standard Chandra Brimstone Goblins, Uh... okay I am having some trouble classifying this one. TO THE DECKLIST!

2 Signal Pest
4 Goblin Arsonist
4 Spikeshot Elder
2 Perilous Myr
2 Hero of Oxid Ridge

4 Chandra, the Firebrand
4 Kuldotha Rebirth
4 Mortarpod
4 Brimstone Volley
2 Goblin Grenade
4 Infernal Plunge
2 Curse of Stalked Prey
2 Past in Flames

4 Inkmoth Nexus
16 Mountain

This one is a bit out there. Its primary focus is to get the most out of Chandra's copy ability. To some extent, I'm seeing how far it can go. In this case, it can double up on a Kuldotha Rebirth (6 goblins for 1 mana? sounds good) or drop a Goblin Grenade or Brimstone Volley for 10 if properly prepared. Infernal Plunge ties in with the sacrifice fodder and can set up a turn 2 Chandra if you're lucky. It also rolls nicely into a Past in Flames turn, much in the same way that real rituals do in real decks in real formats formats other than Standard.

Be back later this week! (really, this time)

One Year Later; or, Back to the Brink

What a long strang- no no no, we're not doing that old line. Let's start over at the beginning:

I started this blog a year ago in the wake of the Great Designer Search. At the time, I wasn't entirely sure what I wanted to write about, but I knew that I wanted to write. I wanted to be something. I wanted to build myself up, and at the time, I saw three ways to go about it - as a writer, as a player, or as a deckbuilder.

Playing was out of the question. I just didn't have the time or freedom. And as for deckbuilding, it remains something that I'm passionate about, and it's something that I enjoy sharing. What I hope to bring to the table in deckbuilding is the enthusiasm for innovation and fun that I think gets lost all too often in the drive for victory. But that is an essay for another time.

Which brings us to writing - I've not been particularly prolific, and I attribute that somewhat to not knowing where exactly I'm taking this blog. I did call it Journey to Nowhere, after all. But I'm proud of most of these posts, and excited to be starting a new year of them.

And to start that new year, I'd like to go way back to the very start of things - my world of the Great Designer Search, Atheram (which I am going to rename "Athera" because I like the sound of it better. No promises that it won't change again).
If you need a refresher, check out my GDS2 post-game from last year.

And with that, a destination (if only a temporary one), I'll begin what I hope is an interesting series of posts - this Journey to Athera!

Doubt

There is a point where doubt sets in...

Can I really take this Burning Vengeance (or Furnace Celebration or Raid Bombardment... I have an unnatural fixation with 3 mana build-around-me enchantments). I know that I want to, but can I really justify it? It's so early in the draft... do I really want to force this archetype? Again?

Life in Ravnica; or, The Basics of Non-Basic Basics

There comes a time when every mage must refresh his or her mana-bonds. To return to the places that are meaningful around them and draw energy from the land. For some mages, this is as simple as a meditation on a mountain peak, or a hermitage in the deep forest, or any number of suitably unspoilt pastoral venues. But for others, it is not so simple. What do you do when none of the land around you is "basic"?

There's been a lot of talk lately about a return to Ravnica. And why not? It landed squarely in the sweet spot of great design and gameplay tied to a very evocative creative premise. But that key creative conceit poses a striking problem: How do you have plains, islands, swamps, mountains, or forests when the entire plane is a city? The fact that Ravnica is one of the most beloved planes in Magic is very telling of how successful the creative team was solving this problem, hmm?

The Great Wave off Kamigawa; or, Let's Get Kraken

Two weeks ago, an article on Joystiq unveiled a deck from Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012 belonging to a brand-new planeswalker character: Kiora Atua. Then just last week, at the end of Doug Beyer's Savor the Flavor article we got our first real peek at her, and this blurb:

"Kiora Atua is a merfolk planeswalker who commands the powers of the depths. Kiora venerates the huge creatures of the sea—krakens, leviathans, and other denizens of the inky depths—because for her they are evidence that even the most persistent forces can be endured: time, water, predation, and darkness. Kiora is a blue- and green-aligned Planeswalker. She seems calm and wise, but her dreams are bizarre beyond imagining."

Now tell me you don't get a little Lovecraftian shiver down your spine from that last line.

So. A new planeswalker? This is the sort of thing that gets Vorthos going anyway, but this one is particularly exciting for me for several reasons:

1. She's U/G! New planeswalker color-combination ahoy!
2. GIANT OCTOPUS
3. She is deep. Really, really, deep. No, deeper than that. She is deep! Even with so little revealed, I feel like I could go on forever talking about her.
4. KRAKENS-KRAKENS-KRAKENS
5. Just look at that art! In fact, dive in and look at that art after the jump.

Evening Out an Odd Couple; or, Melvin, Vorthos, Legendary, and YOU

I've been quiet for a while, mainly due to being busy for other reasons, but let's just jump right in the deep end. In his article this week, Mark Rosewater outlines the design issues with the legendary rule, but also asks an open question:

How can the Legend rule be better?

With a question like that, how can I resist attempting a little freelance game design?

Choose a Side!

A few weeks ago, it was "Choose a Side" week on the Mothership. For those who have been under a rock, it refers to the war occurring on Mirrodin during Mirrodin Besieged between the Mirrans who remained on Mirrodin after Memnarch's fall and the Phyrexians who built themselves up from a singe drop of oil brought inadvertently to Mirrodin by Karn.

This war has real consequences, exemplified by the mystery surrounding the third set of the block, codenamed Action. Yes, even still, we know only the codename of the set. But what we do know is that it's either going to be Mirrodin Pure or New Phyrexia, and it all depends on who wins this war.

Who's going to win? What is the ultimate fate of Mirrodin? And what about Karn, held in the core of Mirrodin and being manipulated by the five Phyrexian Praetors to be the new Father of Machines?

No one (at least, no one outside Wizards of the Coast) knows the answers to these questions for sure, but I've certainly heard a lot of smart people making some very confident assertions.

Stay with me, dear readers. I'll tell you everything.

Today on Journey to Nowhere, we'll look at the facts, I'll give you my thoughts and conclusions, and you can decide for yourself if you want to be on the winning side (whichever one you think that may be).

Well, Durrrr!

I'm excited.

Which is to say, I'm always excited when I get to do any new deckbuilding, and th release of a new set is a prime time to do so. As I've said, one of the best feelings that I get in Magic is that of exploration. That's why I enjoy playing Limited and why I enjoy building decks.

Let's focus on the latter today, as we take a look and a half at a guy I mentioned in my spoiler review...

Spoiler Alert!

So, back to actually writing about Magic. How's about that?

This week, let's take a look at the cards already spoiled for Mirrodin Besieged. One of the things I love about Magic is the exploration. These spoiler seasons are a great time to be in deckbuilding. Possibilities are basically endless, you get to see all the ways to improve your current ideas, see if any strategies are going to get that little push over the edge into competitiveness, and try to figure out the absolute coolest (if not the smartest) things to do with the new stuff.

So, let's try and see which new Mirrodin Besieged cards I'm excited about so far:

Games for Gamers Who Like Games Like Magic, Part 2!

Yeah I'm back, what?

So it's been a while. My bad. Things got a bit crazy between work and holidays and such, but here I am talking to you about Spectromancer. Spectromancer is both a card game and not a card game, just as it is a tabletop game without really being a tabletop game. Meaningless drivel, you say? You'd be right. But I stand by that drivel.

Games for Gamers Who Like Games Like Magic (Part 1)

 Christmas! Time for a little Christmas break.

Since I won't be playing a lot of Magic until next year, I'd like to take a quick break from writing about Magic to talk about some things that were..... well, sprouted from my love of Magic.

So, less of a break, I guess.

It goes without saying that Magic attracts Gamers, being, well, A GAME. But it does attract a certain type of gamer. The type who optimizes and strategizes and likes THINKING not only about playing the game he or she is in, but about how the game is played, how it works, and why it works. To be brief about it, it attracts a startlingly high proportion of designers, strategists, and game-mechanics junkies.

To use some Magic design vernacular... Melvins.

"Ah," I hear you say. "This is going to be one of THOSE articles."

Well, yes and no. Bear with me here.

Ooze on First

So, those of you who were checking out Worlds coverage may have seen something interesting, and a little familiar.

Something a little like... this.

The Infinity Gauntlet

I love infinity. The concept of something stretching out forever is just too enticing. Something that you will learn in math is that there are many types of infinities - an infinite amount of space, an infinitely series of numbers, both countable and uncountable. There are orders of infinity too; as a computer scientist, I became aware of the way we approach infinity: racing towards it exponentially or more, or slowly but inevitably reaching it.

But in Magic, I enjoy a different kind of infinity.

"Thanks!"; or, A Quick One, While He's Away

As I write this, I am several states away from New York City, at my parent's home in Delaware. Ah, vacation! Ah, not having to work! Aaaah, my blog! Okay, so I'm not actually super stressed about updating this, but I don't really have anything new deckbuilding-wise to talk about this week. Well, that's not entirely true, but... we'll see.

Admiring the Architect-er

As promised! A Builder!

I've seen a couple lists around the internets with this guy. I'm sure you've all seen it too. The deck that powers out a turn 3 Wurmcoil Engine or Myr Battlesphere or whatever. These will not be those decks. Nothing against them, but you can find those anywhere. I want to show you something new.

Retracing My Steps

After taking a little time off for some much needed rest, I've had some more time to think about my GDS2 submission. On this, the eve of the 8 finalists moving into the most exciting part of the competition, I'd like to take a quick moment to go over my designs and talk about exactly why they weren't quite up to par.