The General Magic: The Gathering Thread

[Lord Hosk]

Did anyone else notice a lot of repeats in cards? I had 4 cards I got 3 ofs, and a dozen 2 ofs. A lot of people were saying the same thing. one guy got 5 of something in black.

I saw the same thing at midnight. and not just commons but uncommons and a few double rares popped up.

[Lurkon]

I got a bunch of two ofs at common and opened four Stymied Hopes. Didn't see a bunch of repeats, else. Guy next to me DID open two Fabled Heroes, though.

[Duckay]

I got three Gray Merchants, which was a real cornerstone of the deck, but not a whole lot else of interest.

[Volafortis]

My pool was decent, pulled Erebos and an Underworld Cerberus.

Side note, I swear, like, half of the people at the event pulled the Whip of Erebos.

[Juliamon]

I had three Sedge Scorpions and Boon of Ereboses, but not many two-ofs. I saw someone with two Ashioks (not in his deck) but I don't know if he had one of them from an earlier prerelease. I did notice a lot of people pulled the normal version of their promos, but when you're dealing with rarities there's only so many of a given color so the odds of getting it in your seeded pack are actually pretty good. (Three of my non-seeded packs did give me on-color rares though....)

Every person I played had pulled a god. They usually had to splash for it.

[ZePancakes]

I had 3 skullcleavers and 2 deathbellow's, in fact I won a lot pairing my minotaurs with the warcaller.

[Kapol]

For multiples, I ran into people who had up to 3 Read The Bones, and I had two Anger Of The Gods. So yea... multiples weren't uncommon where I was.

[ZePancakes]

Oh oh I forgot, my friend got two thoughtsiezes in his pool. Talk about crazy.

[Dix]

I'm seriously hoping I get some crazy nuts awesome pull in my box when I go to my LGS this afternoon... somehow I feel like I'm gonna get hosed.

Oh and I still have no idea if I want to roll green, blue or white.

[phlip]

they offered 0 prize support below top 8 who split over 100 packs.

I really don't get this... I know my LGS has much more egalitarian prize structures than many, and I know many people prefer the prizes focused at the top end... But really, for a pre-release, the one event that's most supposed to be attracting new players, the prizes should go down a hell of a lot further than that, in my opinion. Sure, for your normal weekly tournaments, run, like, 8-4s, or just give everything to the winner, or whatever you want, if that's how you want to roll, but a pre-re is supposed to be inviting to new/inexperienced players. My LGS runs 4 rounds, 2 packs per round win (1 per draw), and even if you go 0-4 you still get a consolation pack. Sure, if you 4-0 you only get 8 boosters, as opposed to the 17 boxes you could be getting if the prizes were more heavily weighted, but come on.

[Lurkon]

they offered 0 prize support below top 8 who split over 100 packs.

I really don't get this... I know my LGS has much more egalitarian prize structures than many, and I know many people prefer the prizes focused at the top end... But really, for a pre-release, the one event that's most supposed to be attracting new players, the prizes should go down a hell of a lot further than that, in my opinion. Sure, for your normal weekly tournaments, run, like, 8-4s, or just give everything to the winner, or whatever you want, if that's how you want to roll, but a pre-re is supposed to be inviting to new/inexperienced players. My LGS runs 4 rounds, 2 packs per round win (1 per draw), and even if you go 0-4 you still get a consolation pack. Sure, if you 4-0 you only get 8 boosters, as opposed to the 17 boxes you could be getting if the prizes were more heavily weighted, but come on.

My store gave prizes to the top 4.

[ZePancakes]

they offered 0 prize support below top 8 who split over 100 packs.

I really don't get this... I know my LGS has much more egalitarian prize structures than many, and I know many people prefer the prizes focused at the top end... But really, for a pre-release, the one event that's most supposed to be attracting new players, the prizes should go down a hell of a lot further than that, in my opinion. Sure, for your normal weekly tournaments, run, like, 8-4s, or just give everything to the winner, or whatever you want, if that's how you want to roll, but a pre-re is supposed to be inviting to new/inexperienced players. My LGS runs 4 rounds, 2 packs per round win (1 per draw), and even if you go 0-4 you still get a consolation pack. Sure, if you 4-0 you only get 8 boosters, as opposed to the 17 boxes you could be getting if the prizes were more heavily weighted, but come on.

My LGS does the same (2 packs per round win). Is this an Australia specific thing?

[Dix]

I'll be headed out in 30 minutes to my LGS. Gonna get there early because they're the only one of 3 game stores in the area open on Sunday and they have 26 slots for the prerelease today.

[Kapol]

Did anyone go white for the prerelease who isn't doing the whole hero thing? I'm looking for 'The Protector' hero card, since it's the last of the 5 I need.

[korvys]

Played a 2HG sealed with my girlfriend at the pre-release yesterday. For some reason, our store does 2HG with 12 boosters per team, rather than the usual 9. It makes for some crazy decks.

As the TO reads out the team names for pairings every round, we decided to go with a team name of "Nobody", for humour and flavour.

Other team names included "Generic Team Name", "Brave Knaves without Glaives", the classic "Scry Me a River" and "Tony Abbott, Minister for Women's Affairs", the last causing coke to come out of a player's nose (disclaimer: joke probably not funny if you don't live in Australia).

[Kapol]

Played a 2HG sealed with my girlfriend at the pre-release yesterday. For some reason, our store does 2HG with 12 boosters per team, rather than the usual 9. It makes for some crazy decks.

As the TO reads out the team names for pairings every round, we decided to go with a team name of "Nobody", for humour and flavour.

Other team names included "Generic Team Name", "Brave Knaves without Glaives", the classic "Scry Me a River" and "Tony Abbott, Minister for Women's Affairs", the last causing coke to come out of a player's nose (disclaimer: joke probably not funny if you don't live in Australia).

Two things:

I think it's normally supposed to be 8 per person, but I'm not sure about that since RTR block has made 2HG 12 packs (related to point two).

The reason it was 12 packs was likely due to the fact that they just are supposed to use to 'path to x' boxes, one for each person. It kinda sucks since it's made my local 2HG prerelease cost more.


Also, I really like the 'two packs per win' method of prize distribution. It seems a lot funner to me overall. My normal shop only pays out to top 8 too, and even then not very well. Get Your Game On, which is where I go to midnight prereleases, at least goes to top 24.

[korvys]

They actually ran out of the Path boxes after 1 day. All of the other events ran with just 6 boosters, with the few remaining Path boxes (minus boosters) being given to people who hadn't played in any other events, which was nice.

They ended up going through every booster they had over the weekend (2 cases (12 boxes), the TO tells me). I can't even get the prize we got for coming 3rd until this weekend when they'll have more.

The prize structure at my LGS is a bit weird. It's almost always 1 or 2 boosters per person, plus some more if you're Top 4. But of the boosters that everyone gets, one is opened per person, and the rares pulled to the top and laid out, and you each pick one (and maybe get a sealed one) in order of standings.

On the one hand, it means a nice gradient of prizes, with 1st place getting whatever the best money rare is, probably, which lets them give everyone a booster, and lets the worse/new players at least get some boosters so they can bulk up on commons. Plus if you're in the middle of the group, you can probably get that card you need for your deck, if it's not a money card, rather than hoping for it in a sealed booster.
On the other hand, it does reduce that awesome feeling of doing poorly, but still pulling something great.

[Lord Hosk]

I wouldnt mind packs only to top 8, if it was a smaller event, but when you have more than 60 people pay outs get silly.

The other store paid out to top 16, and then because there were like 70 people, they also paid one pack to anyone with 1 or 0 wins.

[korvys]

I used to live in a city where each prerelease was run by a TO who was unaffiliated to any store, and was held in a big bridge club.

They used to get 40 - 50 people per event, running 2 events at a time simultaneously. One of the events was run as 1 booster per win (and a booster for 0-X) and the other event was pretty much a booster for top half, 5-10 for top 8, and ramping up all the way to a box for 1st.

It worked really well, as all the newish players, or younger players, or people who wanted to just have fun would play in the first event, and the more competitive players (there was a sizeable contingent in my region) would play in the second, more cut-throat event.

It only really worked due to the number of people, but I liked the idea.

The only event I've ever won was a competitive prerelease. Planar Chaos I believe.

[Juliamon]

As much as I prefer my current LGS over the one I went to for the Gatecrash prerelease, only giving prizes to top 6 in an event with over 50 people kinda sucks. The other LGS gave you one pack per win. I did better this weekend but got less out of it.

At least the environment is less toxic (the bathroom too).

[Volafortis]

Played in a second prerelease today, took 7th out of 50-something. Opened a Purphoros and Elspeth, so that was a win, and wow, it sounds like some LGSs are horrid for prize support.

For both days at my LGS, everybody in the lower two thirds of the rankings got a single Theros booster as a "consolation prize," top third got at least 3 Theros packs, with the top 10 scaling higher and higher. I think first got like 10 or so. I got 4 packs in 7th today.

[Utilitarian]

Woke up at 10am. Ate a bagel wit Hummus and some water.

Went to a pre-release event at noon (my third this weekend)

3-1 going G/R mainly off the back of 2 Polis Crushers.

About to pack up and leave with my winnings when someone asks me if I want to be their partner for the 2HG at 4:30. I decide that would be fun, and use my winnings to pay into the 2HG.

We go 3-1 for third place with me running U/G and him running B/R. Lose to crazy mono-black (hint- Grey Merchant is utterly insane in 2HG)

Thinking about heading home... get asked if I'm staying for the 9pm sealed. Think about it. I'm weak. Use my winnings to pay into the final release.

3-split for first place going U/G. Opened an Ashiok and splashed for him (?) but never resolved him.

Now I've got a nice pile of store credit and from my openings and trades my new Simic deck is very nearly complete.

I have now chosen Green in five pre-release events and been in prizes in 4 of them. NEVER. ABANDON. GREEN.

It has been 14 hours since I last ate. I will now devour a pot of pasta and then collapse.

[Lemegeton]

picked white for PR. got a second celestial archon and Heliod so def played white. went with green as also pulled a fleecemane lion. and it was a disaster.
i had no cheap creatures and my curve was very high. mostly 4 and 5 drops so ran 18 land and never made it past 5 land all day and in most games got stuck on 4 for ages. any decks with cheap creatures or cheap bestow destroyed me. and in 4 rounds never saw the fleecemane lion once.

went 1-3 and dropped. i can't REALLY complain though as i pulled a FOIL Xenagos in my pool Cha-Ching

[korvys]

So for release weekend, on the Sunday evening my LGS is running what they are calling a box-box tournament.

$200 entry (for context, a box is $160 here). Each player gets a box, opens all 36 boosters, and constructs a 60 card deck from the cards. Winner gets another box. Top half get their money's worth in boosters.

I was already going to buy a box, so this seems interesting. I'd be wagering $40 on my abilities, to get my money back, or a box, or nothing. The smart thing would be to not.

On the other hand, when else would I get to play such a ridiculous format? Can I really pass that up?

[Lord Hosk]

picked white for PR. got a second celestial archon and Heliod so def played white. went with green as also pulled a fleecemane lion. and it was a disaster.
i had no cheap creatures and my curve was very high. mostly 4 and 5 drops so ran 18 land and never made it past 5 land all day and in most games got stuck on 4 for ages. any decks with cheap creatures or cheap bestow destroyed me. and in 4 rounds never saw the fleecemane lion once.

come here, its ok... (big hug) you'll get them next time champ, Shhh shhh its ok (strokes head)


Also I sold the cards from my two Prereleases, and got $41 in store credit. (entry fee was $25 per event with free food and a "free soda") so I paid $9 for a dozen games, two meals and Another deckbox I won in a raffle.

Oh yeah I have won 6 deck boxes now, I use the two I bought, one for land and one for the deck of the event. The raffles will normally be like 3 or 4 play mats, a deck box, a set of sleeves. I refuse to buy a playmat because I am convinced that at some point I will win one which probably means I wont ever have one.