MTG thread

pharmakos said:

How do you explain the pros that consistently do
well in MTGO and MTGA?

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Agree with the above. The quantity of games a pro plays is going to keep them towards the top. It's why we are seeing non pros and random streamers hit top 10 mythic. They play 500+ games a month.

I'm still salty -

And that coupon...

Leadsalad said:

I'm still salty -

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We sure that's legit and not trolling? The sticker being placed at precisely the same spot on every box it's visible seems really suspicious to me.

'Tis the era of trolling and photo manipulation after all.

Since I was *too fast* with my order and it was just flat out rejected upon payment, I don't even get the $20 14 day coupon.

Bleh.

Got second place at our first MCQ today. Played Jeskai Sarkhan Friends and had an absolute goddamn blast. Spark Double may be a bad magic card, but it's just so god damn enjoyable. Took home a grand, so now I can almost afford a Masterpiece Edition on ebay yo!

Testing for events on MTG Arena has shown it has flaws tho. For instance, the two warnings I accrued for trying to bounce things Teferi3 can't actually bounce, because cards don't glow in real life I am mildly concerned that revealing the fact that I am white and possess fingers to the FoH Boards will somehow result in me being doxxed, but I love the picture. That's from the top 8 round, dude's deck was seriously cool, and Nissa had me under some insane pressure game 1. Deck is not built to withstand an endless stream of 3/3 hastey dudes.

Kuro said:

Got second place at our first MCQ today. Played Jeskai Sarkhan Friends and had an absolute goddamn blast. Spark Double may be a bad magic card, but it's just so god damn enjoyable. Took home a grand, so now I can almost afford a Masterpiece Edition on ebay yo!

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What list were you using? It seems like a million different ones...Is it a Urza Ruinious version? Or something else?

I had 2 Urza's Ruinous Blast, but after the tournament I'd just replace them with 2x Deafening Clarion main deck.

2 Mox Amber

4 Fblthp
2 Spark Double

1 Jaya's Immolating Inferno
4 Spell Pierce
2 Urza's Ruinous Blast

1 Dovin, Grand Arbiter
3 Dovin, Hand of Control
1 Karn, Scion of Urza
2 Kasmina, Enigmatic Mentor
4 Narset, Parter of Veils
4 Sarkhan the Masterless
4 Teferi, Time Raveler

4 Glacial Fortress
4 Hallowed Fountain
4 Interplanar Beacon
2 Island
1 Karn's Bastion
3 Sacred Foundry
4 Steam Vents
4 Sulfur Falls

The real question now is do I resell this Mythic edition or just open it and rub that sweet, sweet Jace all over my body.

I got to top 32 in a massive tournament like a decade ago (shit on second thought more than a decade ago I'm old), might've been a regionals or GPQ or states, I don't quite remember, and I just couldn't be bothered to play anymore, it was like 3 in the fucking morning. I tried to get the guy across me to coinflip for the win and he said no. Played one game, won, still offered a coinflip and he accepted and won 2 flips. Wasn't even mad, went to sleep.

pharmakos said:

Your belief is that literally all of the pros who consistently perform well are cheating, or?

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Speaking from 6 years on the Pro Tour/Worlds...There is a high level of shaving the odds at the PT and worlds. Cheating is not rampant, but it is present and mainly a crime of negligence and opportunity. A lot of mechanisms have been added over the years that have reduced this, but people are always looking to swing the odds. If you are trained/experienced, it is very easy to walk around the PT and watch people breaking bridges and stack sorting. The best thing you can do is to shuffle your opponents deck...No matter how tired and anxious you are.

Some of the most amazing things I've seen also revolve around the sheer charisma and hand skills of some of the best players...I once watched a pro point a plains at a creature and say "swords your creature" in front of a crowd of 30+. The opponent scooped his creature into the graveyard and went on. A few turns later, the same guy fireballed with a mountain and the opponent scooped. I can rattle off tons of incidents that I have seen over the years.

The thing is...The pros are better in every facet of their play than the average player. They make all the small decisions at every step that determine the game. They come prepared with a clear understanding of the meta, they mulligan, they predict and juke...At every turn the PT player will outplay anyone who slips.

MTGA is a more 'pure' version of the technical game, but to me the classic mtg is played live...There are simply lots of environmental and personal skills that elevate the great player above the good player. Mental endurance over multiple days is not to be ignored.

I don't doubt that there are cheaters at every big tournament, and that it was worse in the past. Heck, Finkel, Pikula, etc.. spearheaded that whole movement in the late 90s cause it was so bad, the judges didn't even know what to look out for.
These days, I think the rampant and extreme cheating is largely caught, but good mtg players are often very smart. They can constantly find very subtle ways to cheat that might only give them a 1-5% edge, but it's still technically cheating, or at the very least angle shooting. Like, noticing a card on the bottom of your opponents deck as they go to put it down after shuffling. That being an example of a very slight 'angle shoot' that most would overlook, though technically it's against the rules. All the way to things like this Watanabe sleeve debacle.

Now, while I think he's likely guilty, I actually could see a way those specific cards got marked as I've had a somewhat similar situation happen before. It was just an FNM, but I only had a 40pack of new sleeves with me to re-sleeve my 60 card deck. The sleeves weren't 'bad', but I prefer them new and clean, so I put those new ones on. Only later did I realize I had basically sleeved all the non-lands as I had the deck sorted when I did it, and there was like 21 lands. So, 39 spells and 1 land got new sleeves, and the others were ever so slightly worn. If this had been a big tournament, I would've just bought another pack and re-sleeved the whole thing, but I didn't even notice till the tournament was over. Once I saw it, it was possible to tell if the top card was likely a spell or land.

So, for Yuuya, maybe he had the deck sorted out and was showing someone it. Those specific cards could have been all in his hand when he banged the corner on the table to crease the corners, or just how he held them creased the corners. It's less likely than intentional cheating, but I can at least envision a way it could have happened accidentally.

Enzee said:

I don't doubt that there are cheaters at every big tournament, and that it was worse in the past. Heck, Finkel, Pikula, etc.. spearheaded that whole movement in the late 90s cause it was so bad, the judges didn't even know what to look out for.

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That you would show Finkel as one of the good guys is fucking hilarious (tbf though, he was super talented...truly one of the greats, but he knew how to break a bridge if the crowd was somewhere else). Pikula was a zealot about cheating though...And in general self righteous twat to the extreme.