MTG thread

  • Guest, it's time once again for the hotly contested and exciting FoH Asshat Tournament!



    Go here and fill out your bracket!
    Who's been the biggest Asshat in the last year? Once again, only you can decide!

Therage

Vyemm Raider
875
3,969
Yea if anyone has an arena beta key I would love one too. Looks good. I play duels all the damn time. Refuse to buy cards on that game and mtgo my cards suck haha.
 

yimmien

Molten Core Raider
877
667
Hate to turn this into a code begging thread, but would love one too. No shops near me where I moved so been out of paper magic a couple years, looks fun.
 

Heylel

Trakanon Raider
3,602
428
Lol, sounds like the typical MTG mook yea. "I only go to XYZ store because their prize support is 5% better" is such a fucking backwards ass idea. Like, you could work your normal job an extra hour per week and make x10 more than any prize EV you're getting playing locals, why turn your fucking hobby in to another grind?

I'll never understand the grinder thing. It's like applying WoW grinder logic to a paper card game. I used to judge for fun quite a bit, but I've pretty much quit entirely since moving. It is VASTLY more profitable to try a little harder and work my way up the bonus ladder than to judge on the weekends, and frankly it's less work. It's even worse for players who are paying to attend.
 

Enzee

Trakanon Raider
2,197
715
I'll never understand the grinder thing. It's like applying WoW grinder logic to a paper card game. I used to judge for fun quite a bit, but I've pretty much quit entirely since moving. It is VASTLY more profitable to try a little harder and work my way up the bonus ladder than to judge on the weekends, and frankly it's less work. It's even worse for players who are paying to attend.
As someone who had a grinder mentality, its often people who dont like their day job, day job doesnt pay well, or are making a living at magic (like a backpack trader) that perpetuate the mindset. I was a backpack trader and had my own tcg store. Friends of mine who were competitive, but had decent paying day jobs, apply the grinder mindset because they naturally min/max and were hanging out with people like me.

Now, we were never so crazy as to goto a shop we hated because prize support was '5%' better. But, if one was offering 1.5 pack per player and another was 2? And we didnt mind either store? Hell yea you goto the 2 pack place. That often meant 1st was like 12 packs instead of 6-8 (depends how they break it down) and we had a good shot at getting 1st every week. So, for the same time investment, you got 4-6 extra packs.
 

Wantonsoup95

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
1,143
4,542
The grinder mentality is what caused me to stop playing FNM.

Had a group of 4 every night that always took the draw if facing each other. Or rare drafted and dropped. Didn't matter what format, split it all between them.

Turnout was always about 15 to 18 people 3 months ago every night. 2 weeks ago 4 people other than myself.

The group completely destroyed the casual crowd.
 

Enzee

Trakanon Raider
2,197
715
so.. they purposefully handicapped themselves by taking draws, and this caused others to get upset? If you go 4-0 and one of them goes 3-0-1, they have a worse record. The intentional draw thing is what friends do, not grinders, and it helps the more casual players there, if anything. ONLY Rare drafting and then dropping is also something casual players would do. That's the opposite of a grinder, who would then try to play it out for more prize support.
 

Wantonsoup95

Ahn'Qiraj Raider
1,143
4,542
Those 4 always brought the competitive net decks, split the prize between them, always took the draws. I understand that's part of it.

It wasn't me that got rustled by that, that came from consistent drop in player base with people having complaints about that group.

What does suck is going 3 -1 and being bumped out of 3rd by someone who's 3-0-1 and that's what drove the more casuals away. I didn't draft, was just vocal complaints about the group
 

Enzee

Trakanon Raider
2,197
715
You must have had the most casual of casual stores.. drawing to split 1st and 2nd is common practice at every place ive ever been. Most stores use a prize support that makes the difference betwen 2nd and 4th too big to not do it. Its basic game theory, like the prisoner's dilemma. If its something like 12, 10, 8, 8 packs for 1st-4th. You can both draw to guarantee 11 packs (splitting 1st and 2nd). Or, play to get 12 if you win, or 8 if you lose. On average, you lose a few packs playing it out. The same thing happens in 90% of draft pods on mtgo.

You made it sound like they were drawing EVERY time they played each other, even in round 1.

If there were complaints about them, im guessing its cause they were just dicks. If it was literally just that they were winning all the time.. then everyone was being whiny bitches, sorry. You are paying to enter a tournament with prize support. If you want to bring your pile of jank and expect to win, you are delusional. Play for fun, play commander, whatever. A tournament is intended to be a competitive event, even FNM. That isnt a 'grinder' mentality, thats just being a spike.
 

Valorath

Trakanon Raider
903
1,429
Not up on this thread at all. Occasionally skim.

My brother and a few of his buddies did the Nicobolas vs three thing tonight. Lots of QQ from the guys that weren't Nico. They only played two games, but got waxxed apparently. Surely the three have a chance. They just need my superior battle-field command (which stems from reading lots of fantasy battles, etc).

I'm pretty jealous, because it sounds like a lot of fun. Hopefully I'll get a chance to play soon, was at work tonight. Usually when we play it's Commander.
 
  • 1Solidarity
Reactions: 1 user

Kuro

Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
8,210
20,735
Yeah, they said they're working with the idea of putting codes in physical booster packs like Pokemon did, which would make it significantly easier to maintain two collections.
 

Punko

Macho Ma'am
<Gold Donor>
7,912
12,563
they also said there will be no trading

no trading + no support for older formats + cards rotating

seems fun
 

Chris

Potato del Grande
17,982
-481
I assume they'll add Frontier as a format when they have their first rotation, and eventually work backwards for Modern. Then you'd hope they would work backwards to legacy and merge it with MTGO. Depends how successful it is I guess. I wouldn't mind it if they stuck to Khans onwards for the full Frontier sets though, wouldn't want a online only variant format.

Yeah, they said they're working with the idea of putting codes in physical booster packs like Pokemon did, which would make it significantly easier to maintain two collections.
That would be great, even if it's just a seperate virtual booster and not those exact cards.

I think it would be weird having the physical cards you traded for and not being able to get the ingame ones as they already got claimed, or online only cards you won online and can't transfer to paper. Do something with physical boosters though.
 

Punko

Macho Ma'am
<Gold Donor>
7,912
12,563
if they had any such intentions they should have made them clear

i can't ever see them take the effort to make all the strange older cards work in an online game, its just not worth it from a financial perspective

even mtgo misses certain hard to implement cards
 

Lendarios

Trump's Staff
<Gold Donor>
19,360
-17,424
they would take $10 from me every month if they let me use every card and draft and do tournaments with friends.

Or simply just play with those cards, charge for tournaments.
 

Vaclav

Bronze Baronet of the Realm
12,650
877
they also said there will be no trading

no trading + no support for older formats + cards rotating

seems fun

The phrasing on all three of those is "for now". They're trying not to kill MTGO but at the same time, they know the writing is on the wall and eventually it will replace MTGO for such things.