Hello, fellow mages! I continue to scour the interwebz looking for knowledge to further my ascent to tournament glory! I have decided to try a different approach to my writings and format in the hopes of attracting more readers and providing those who do read my articles with a more useful and informative experience.



As I read lots of articles each week and draw much of my knowledge from these writings, I have decided to provided a "best of segment" from the articles I read each week (well, since it ends up looking like I will be publishing bi-weekly, from the articles I have read over the course of two weeks). I plan on continuing to interlace my own ramblings into my articles (and the information I gain from own play testing). I hope to help guide those whose amount of reading time remains slim.


First up,

PV's Playhouse - The Art of Writing (Magic Articles), by Paul Vitor Damo da Rosa

Well, this should tickle my reader(s) pink! I can hear you guys (and gals) now, "Finally, his articles will be readable instead of that rubbish he has been producing!" Come on, everybody loves self-deprecating humor (unlike Raymond)! Ok, bad humor aside (don't worry I won't quit my day job), why this article? As PV mentions in his article, "Know your limits," and boy is he spot on, he even gives great examples, that and I have always found his writings to really just flow. He also reinforces the single most important fact in writing, well at least in my opinion, add some character. He also lays out a good outline for what to include in the different styles of Magic articles and the dos and don'ts of each style.

What I think that everyone should take away from this article is a willingness to inject a bit of ones-self into their writings. Here is my example, consider the act of injecting a bit of yourself into your writings the same as adding good character development to a story, and if you do any amount of reading or watching of movies, then you are probably aware of how important character development really is to a story. I think most of us can agree that is the problem with many movies these days, a lack of character development. Think about it, when reading articles which ones pull you in and which ones do you end up just skimming, and if you take the time to write an article, you want people to read ever juicy sentence. When they skim, it is like they have skipped dinner for desert, I mean desert is good, but they sure did miss out on that fantastic steak you cooked.


Alright folks, lets keep walking this way,

Breaking Through - Brewing for a Wide Open World, by Conley Woods

I love this article! What I like, is that a well known brewer took us through his approach on how he decides when he is going to brew, when he is going to go stock, and if he is brewing what steps he takes for successfully brewing up a deck for a format. To me, this is information that any competitive Magic player should incorporate into their tournament preparations, especially since we all love to brew. And he even follows PV's advice, his article definitely adds a feel of him to it.


Last article for this segment,

The Number One Rule, by Brian Kibler

First thing, you have to have to be a Starcity premium member to read this article. While we are on that subject, I personally find the price of premium to be fair and I gladly pay it. I use to read Inquest all the time, and that magazine covered all kinds of junk that I could care less about. Starcity premium is all Magic articles all the time and exactly what I want to read. I think, in my humble opinion, if you are going to play Magic at any level of competitiveness the cost of this is a no-brainer, but hey that is my opinion.

Alright about the article, I like this article because I feel it picks up where Conley left off in his article on brewing. Kibler talks about meta-gaming and how to do it appropriately, and you will find some similarities in suggested thought processes between the two articles. To me, when you find similar thought processes between high level players then you have found a grain of truth that you need to make sure you incorporate into your game. Out of respect for Brian and Starcity, I won't delve any further into the article, but let's just say I recommend it and feel it is worth the time investment to read it.


Lies, here is an honorable mention for this week,

Standard Primer, by Sam Black

Another premium article, but I am sure you know the old saying, "you get what you pay for," except in the case of this article, it's free, and good...

This article is a great starting point for the upcoming PTQ season and it has some really good evaluations from one of the best deck-builders in the biz. The article also contains sideboard notes, cards that are troubling for the deck, and the decks strengths/weaknesses. Despite how comprehensive the article it is, it still only scratches the surface of the current standard environment, and no matter how good an article is, it is no substitute for good play-testing time, but it sure helps to focus it and make it more efficient. I mean really, who wants to re-invent the wheel each time?


Bonus Section - Starcity Games Birmingham Classic *16th* place tournament synapsis 

I was excited for this tournament. I had played in the Louisville Classic a couple of weeks back and after dropping rounds 4 and 5 in succession to back to back Jund mirror matches, I dropped and headed home. But for this tournament, I had upped my online collection so that I could get some massive play-testing in and I was going to make it count. I posted on Facebook that I was going and had room for 3 more people in my new Altima (oh yeah!). After much hoopla, and back and forths, it ended up just being me and Jessie heading into the heart of 'Bama country to play some cards.

I love road-trips! You get to catch-up with friends and talk about all kinds of things. Needless to say, Jessie and I talked a bunch on the trip down, listened to music, and prepped mentally for the tournament. Unfortunately for Jessie, he had a stomach bug in the works that was going to rear it's ugly head. Also, the convention center that was hosting the event was also hosting a gun show, and here I am in my bright, UT orange shirt surrounded by 'Bama loving fanatics carrying guns. Yeah, hindsight is 20/20 and maybe it wasn't the best decision, but it was done.

The deck-list for the record:

Jund

4x Huntmaster
4x Thragtusk
3x Olivia
2x Arbor Elf

2x Garruk, Primal Hunter
2x Liliana of the Veil
1x Underworld Connections
2x Rakdos's Return
2x Bonfire of the Damned
2x Mizzium Mortars
1x Dreadbore
1x Murder
4x Farseek
2x Tragic Slip
1x Ground Seal
2x Abrupt Decay

4x Stomping Ground
4x Overgrown Tomb
4x Blood Crypt
4x Woodland Cemetery
3x Dragonskull Summit
2x Rootbound Crag
2x Forest
2x Kessig Wolf-Run

Sideboard:
2x Slaughter Games
1x Underworld Connections
1x Staff of Nin
2x Rakdos's Return
1x Bonfire of the Damned
1x Pillar of Flames
1x Dreadbore
1x Bramblecrush
1x Acidic Slime
1x Golgari Charm
2x Rakdos's Charm
1x Ground Seal

There was tons of reanimator present at the event. I had expected that it would pick-up, but man even I was surprised at the sheer amount present. The meta-game was close to what I expected and that was good as my deck was tuned to do better against the midrange matches and the main deck seal was a concession to reanimator (I should have had 2 main deck).

Needless to say, I played against the gauntlet of decks. However, I never did play against the Jund mirror (which I was really prepped for it). In a streak of irony, I once again lost round 4 and 5, but unlike the last time, I stayed in and was going to play until my third loss (which never came). My 2 losses were, reanimator and R/G aggro. The R/G aggro match I felt I lost to variance, but the reanimator player got me with acidic slime and resto-angel for the re-buy in game 3.

Going forward, I am adding a second main deck ground seal, and I am going to tweak the numbers on certain cards again and re-work the board. I will post the changes later this week to the comments section.

Thanks for reading!

Matt Norton
Twitter - @Magog29
Mtgo - Magog29