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At the beginning of this semester I started to get into Magic (entirely because of the LRR MTGO streams I stumbled across following Checkpoint into Checkpoint Plus). I remember playing a little back in highschool, and by playing I mean borrowing a deck and getting stomped repeatedly by people who never bothered to explain how the cards they were playing worked except to say how much damage I took. When my english course assigned an ethnography to "Participate and Explore a subculture" I immediately though "Hey! An excuse to talk about magic with people!"

I'm curious how and why other people got into this hobby, and I get the feeling that there are some interesting stories here.

Boy Scout camping trips, back in the days of Ice Age. I fell out during Weatherlight, and I came back in during Mirrodin, when they had mostly Artifacts, and I thought that would be so cool, and easy to play.

LRR kept talking about it, and I finally cracked and tried it. Bought my first intro pack the day Mirrodin Besieged came out (though it was from Scars.)

Pretty much was Jam said. LRR kept talking about it, and I enjoyed the Friday Nights series. I'd played it before from buying every DotP game they came out with (Just regret never redeeming the bonus codes for most...). I've always loved card games, but I live in the middle of nowhere, so finding other players is normally hard.

Though what really pushed me to actually playing the card version over the game was the BS AI finally broke me down. IT made me tilt hard enough to invest a bunch of money into playing the 'fair' version.

I came in via Decipher's old Star Wars CCG. I was playing that with some friends, when another friend mentioned this game Magic that he also played. He introduced me to it. This was around Mercadian Masques or Sixth Edition or so. I got into it and played a bit through to Apocalypse. After that, I really stopped playing. Still collected the cards a bit though.

Years later, LRR started talking about it and I went and found my old cards. Then I discovered many of my friends in my karate class played. I started playing again and teaching my Sensei's son the game. This was around the start of Innistraad. I've been back playing ever since.

I was home from college on winter break and a highschool friend of mine visited with his cards. It was right after Arabian Nights came out.

LRR was the one that sparked interest but it wasn't until my friends planned a triple RTR draft back when that set just came out that I finally had my first taste of the game (I was a Yu-Gi-Oh! player during middle school). It was a teaching experience for not just me but for three other friends who wanted to see what MtG is all about.

A good funtime draft that included events such as one of us newer players taking all the guildgates because he figured lots of mana fixing was a good thing, and one of the more experienced friends screaming in surprise when he got a pick 7 Pack Rat thanks to no one else knowing how to use the card effectively (or at all really).

Originally picked it up in middle school during Mirrodin, played through Kamigawa, then quit, but came back during Alara block when my friends picked it up.

In high school-ish, I got a deck of Magic cards for Christmas, or a birthday, or something. Less a cohesive deck and more just every card I owned in one big pile. Never bought any boosters or really changed the deck at all, aside than one or two terrible trades (I seem to remember trading away something to get Healing Salve).

Not sure what the cards actually were... most of them were around the vintage of 4th or 5th edition... I remember the "target creature CARDNAME enchants" wording from 4th edition on a couple of cards. And the rulebook that came with the deck didn't use the stack, so it was definitely pre-6th. I can't remember whether it was actually some 4th-edition starter pack, or just some random collection of cards I was given, it was too long ago.

But yeah, I was pretty terrible at the game. I read in the rulebook that you lose the game if you run out of cards, so I didn't want to take anything out of my deck, in case that happened... so I just ran every card I owned. It was a fair bit later that I learned my friend had multiple decks, in different colours, and my reaction was "why would you build a deck with only some colours in it? Then there'd be spells you wouldn't be able to cast! Why would you restrict your options like that?" because I really had no idea about this game.

The only cards I actually bought at any point was a single Portal starter set.

I returned to the game (and started actually doing it properly, for the first time) during M12, because of LRR.

I observed all the LRR videos on the subject and was getting mildly curious. Then I was at a shopping centre and saw a "learn to play MtG" booth, but (and now I feel silly about this) felt too embarrassed to stop and look because I figured I'd suck at it. Then I came home one day and found my house mysteriously full of Magic cards, which I subsequently realised was because my brother's friends had gotten him into playing. I bought an intro deck at one of the LoadingReadySydney events and tried to learn how to play, then took it to casual night at my LGS. I was so uncertain that I panicked on arrival and bought a book to read just in case no one wanted to play with me. The rest is history. I realise in hindsight how lucky I was to have chosen that store to start playing, because I've looked around since then and I honestly believe that it's the best environment we have locally to learn the game.

Started playing in high school due to some friends playing it in chess club (I am the quintessential nerd) and wondering what the heck that game was. The newest block out was Onslaught so I started with all the "cool" tribal decks. Played until Time Spiral came out (all my friends stopped playing and then I moved away for college).

Started playing again around M14 mainly because my roommate at the time asked me to help him run a business selling magic decks on eBay. Having LRR stream all they do actually helps a lot since I've moved from mostly playing the game to the "game" of making usable standard decks. Watching them play helps stem the cravings to play since we can only get people over once every 2-3 months. So glad they stream and record as much as they do.

Combination of Duels of the Planeswalkers for cheap, which led to me hunting for MtG videos, which led me to It's Magic (also my first proper LRR video!) which led me to getting my first M13 intro pack.

First series of Friday Nights > Duels of the Planeswalkers > MTGO > GOD DAMN IT WHERE HAS ALL MY MONEY GONE

My half-brothers gave me their collection when I was very young, I don't even remember exactly when but that had cards going back to Revised. I really started playing in seventh grade under the tutelage of my science teacher, who hosted a gaming afternoon activity. She had one of the Beta power 9 (though she never brought it out), and one of those absolutely unstoppable Squirrel extended decks when extended was a thing.

Became mildly interested via LRR content, but never knew of anywhere I could buy cards. Then, during my second week of university, went to my university's Roleplaying & Wargaming Society and saw a bunch of people playing, the first time I'd ever seen it played. A friend lent me a deck, we played a hideously unbalanced game with two oversized decks that I didn't know how to use, and he and I did a 'mini draft' (with just the two of us) that weekend so I could pick up some new cards. That, combined with one of the starter decks (white, for the record) and a bunch of old commons he was surprisingly willing to just straight up give me as we messed around one evening, formed the basis of my first deck- and now it's 6 months later...

You know... I honestly can't remember... too long ago...

It must have been seeing some of the guys at my school playing the game or something. I do remember fondly opening up my first booster and learning to play the game... But that's about it.

I don't remember exactly how it happened, but I know Friday Nights played a crucial part. I have a foil Japanese Knowledge Pool that I'm saving to give to Graham at a convention or something.

At any rate, a coworker of mine (who I still see at FNM and get Magic advice from to this day) gave me the commons and uncommons from a box of M12, which I used to cobble together some hideous red-green monstrosity that had a (ugh) Fog in it. At which point I learned the rules of Magic on the business end of my coworker's Tempered Steel deck.

Also, I pulled a Snapcaster Mage at my first draft, which was neat. I took a picture of it with my phone.

I was visiting Utilitarian at the end of September, and though I'd managed to avoid it for twenty-odd years, he suggests "hey, you wanna learn to play Magic?", aaaaaand... now I'm drowning in cards, down at a LGS at least twice a week to play, and even dragged myself to five BNG prereleases.

I think it's pretty safe to say it's got me, now.

I remember pretty vividly how I got in to magic...

Edit: tldr/bad engrish or grammah: Pokemon > MtG > Mageknight > quit > VS. > Heroclix > MtG > quit > Heroclix > MtG.

I left almost all the other games out, but that sums up most of my collectible gaming history. Somewhere in there was star wars mini's played as the actual mini's game.

my friend had gotten me in to the pokemon videogame and so my bday and following christmas(they're fairly close) My mom got me pokemon red and blue, I had blue first because my friend had red. This lead in to a serious nerd spiral downwards. I was addicted to the show and found the card game not long after it came about. I stuck with pokemon from 6th grade to 8th grade.

At the start of my 8th grade year i moved up to my dads a few hours away from my home town where I got to party at a kids club and hang out with my dad at his favorite adult private club(lots of fun for an 8th grader). Well there was a comic book store near by the club he frequented and I would occassionally have monies to buy some pokemon.(my dad wasn't as well off as my mother was.) The owners of the small shop would constantly see me come in so they offered me an under the counter job. Great deal at the time since I got paid in boosters.

Well they were magic players and eventually convinced me to check out magic where I learned the game with the portal set. Now I was a dual hobbiest consumed by two card games though pokemon was slowly dwindling with me by that point. The club my dad was like a vice pres at had plenty of space so we got to host tournaments there(I learned the game pretty well.) I ran the pokemon tournaments and played in the magic tournaments the shop had.(I was only 13 lol). I remember my first real competitive deck was mono blue mill control using millstone and control spells to mill an opponent. don't remember much in between getting to mono blue control and what happened afterwards.

after that first 9 weeks of school I moved back home to my mother's(life was better there lol) I continued to play ccgs and even briefly got in to mageknight in it's earlier form. I quit I want to say around prophecy's block. Got back in briefly during the first ravnica block, but just was to preoccupied with other gaming though I liked ravnica's block. Then I found out about RTR and jumped back in but only in the kiddy pool because I don't have the finances to play mtg like I used to. Not to mention my schedule greatly conflicts with all mtg regular gatherings locally. Though I go to as many prereleases I can. I have to miss like 2 Prereleases this year, though I got BNG and will get the first one of the next block definitely.

edit 2: Unlike, what seems like most, MtG got me in to LRR. I was reading an article on Wizards site and thought oh this seems interesting. Watched Friday Night's Returns and got hooked.

THIS SITE.

Some friends of mine in computer class back in 5th and 6th grade were playing and I borrowed a deck to play and I was hooked for basically the Rath and Urzas cycles then I stopped when some of them moved away and only restarted playing thanks to the LRR crew getting me hooked with their draft videos.

i actually had friends try to teach me back in like middle school with like small amount of cards but i just couldn't get into it. (was a major Yu-Gi-Oh fan at the time) skip ahead to about the release of M12, i forget how it came up but i ended up talking to a coworker at the time about wanting to learn it, and with a paycheck broke down and bought a mono red intro deck (i think. it had Volcanic Dragon as the holo if i remember correctly) and i just play started playing a bit from with my one coworker. with the little interest with friends i ended up dropping it almost completely till last year. and after that i started playing more and more. mainly with my sister's Bf, who had confiscated(given) my Ajani duel deck i had gotten for Christmas and he's been adjusting it since. i love this game, and LRR has been a major influence in this.

ive been into magic for about five months now. i got into it from hearing some of my soccer teamates talking about how they used to play magic the gathering. and i kinda got intantly hooked from there i went home and got on youtube and watched a ton of magic the gathering stuff. and then later that week i went out and bought the gruul intro pack for dragons maze and startd playing with some friends that conveniently also just started playing the game. (ruric thar, the unbowed is my favorite card)