PHOTO ESSAY – Backstage at Pro Tour: Fate Reforged

Ever wondered what it’s like to peek behind the curtain at the Pro Tour? I was afforded a peek at the incredible efforts undergone by Wizards of the Coast to broadcast all the excitement of the event to the players watching from home. Take a look!

Theft in the Magic Community – A Message from Justin Parnell

As many of you are already aware, Justin Parnell had his cube stolen from him at GP Baltimore a few weeks ago.

For those of you that haven’t yet read it, I urge you to head over to Eric Klug’s site to read a statement from Justin himself (posted yesterday).

It’s difficult to comprehend everything that Justin lost, and hopefully this incident will motivate the community to band together against theft. We need to look out for each other.

Theft in the Magic Community

Please share this link freely.

Photos from Worlds 2011

Wow. Worlds in San Francisco was a blast. It’s a shame that this event may be the last we’ll ever see of its kind, due to the recent changes to Organized Play. However, I’m hopeful that Wizards will get it right, even if it takes some time.

Until then, enjoy these photos from the End of the Worlds as we knew it.

See the slideshow below or view the photos on Flickr here.

Photos from Magic Weekend Philadelphia!

I had a fantastic time seeing everyone and meeting some new faces last weekend at Magic Weekend Philadelphia. Can’t wait to do it again at the World Championships in San Francisco in November!

See the slideshow below or view the photos on Flickr here.

Musings: Tarmogoyf in Innistrad?

Several weeks ago, Bigheadjoe mentioned to me that he thought there was a possibility that Tarmogoyf would be reprinted in the upcoming Innistrad block. At the time, my reaction was along the lines of, “Sure, anything’s possible.” (I learned a long time ago to never say “never” when it comes to WotC.)

Since then, my mind goes back to that conversation every time someone mentions Tarmogoyf. So, yesterday morning I posed the question on Twitter.

Not surprisingly, I got a wide range of answers. Points against the reprint were that ‘Goyf was a “mistake” and would be “overpowered” and “format-warping.” @leet32 mentioned “Time taken to determine p/t. Awkwardly bounces off other copies.”

(Also not surprisingly, most all of those who seemed absolutely sure that Tarmogoyf would not be reprinted offered zero support for their argument. I’d guess these are the same people who shot down the idea of time-shifted cards in Time Spiral and the “priceless treasures” of Zendikar. Like I said before: Never say “never.”)

Don’t get me wrong—I’m not saying there’s a good chance Tarmogoyf will be reprinted. I’m not guaranteeing it, predicting it, or vowing to eat my hat or eat a Jace if Tarmogoyf doesn’t show up in Innistrad block. I’m just saying, if ‘Goyf is ever getting reprinted in Standard, this seems like a swell time to do it.

First, let’s address the naysayers. In the four years since Tarmogoyf first appeared in Future Sight, we’ve seen some of the strongest creatures ever to be printed in Magic’s 18-year history. Wild Nacatl. Goblin Guide. Baneslayer Angel. Knight of the Reliquary. All five Titans. Pro Tour Hall of Fame hopeful Mark Herberholz remarked recently in an interview on the Top 8 Magic podcast that while he was active on the PT the game was spell-based, but now, “creatures are king.” A Tarmogoyf in Standard in 2011 would not be the same Tarmogoyf we knew in 2007 (which, by the way, was not deemed so powerful as to be ban-worthy). Wizards has shown us that they want creatures to be good. Tarmogoyf may have been stronger than was intended for the time (rumor has it that it was originally costed at 1GG instead of 1G), but in the context of today’s creatures, it fits right in. Overpowered? Hardly. Not in 2011.

Time taken to determine power/toughness? Creatures with variable P/T are fun and have been staples of the game since its inception. The time it takes to determine P/T is negligible in my opinion. People made the same “time” argument against the reprinting of fetchlands, but current Standard has those, plus a ton of other shuffle effects that add to the time a game takes. Squadron Hawk, Ponder, Primeval Titan, Birthing Pod…just to name a few off the top of my head.

Awkwardly bounces off other copies? Consecrated Sphinx has a pretty awkward interaction with other copies too, and not only because it bounces off itself. That didn’t stop Wizards from printing it. According to this argument, Wizards should never print creatures with toughness greater than power. You know, because it’s awkward.

In fact, the best argument that I could come up with myself (and I’m a little surprised no one mentioned it) is that Tarmogoyf is a Creature—Lhurgoyf. Not Creature—Werewolf, —Vampire, —Zombie, —Spirit, or —Human. “Lhurgoyf” isn’t “classic horror,” which is Innistrad‘s apparent theme. Then again, I don’t recall seeing any Planeswalkers hanging out with Frankenstein or Dracula, either.

So now that we’ve got that out of the way, why would Tarmogoyf be a good fit for this block? As mentioned, Wizards has been pushing creatures lately. They’ve also been upping the power level of green as a whole (a color that revolves around beefy creatures). With both the Zendikar fetchlands and the Worldwake manlands rotating out, mana fixing is taking quite a hit. While Innistrad will likely give us something to replace them, there’s a possibility that splashing for ‘Goyf won’t be so easy, thereby forcing more of a commitment to the color.

Innistrad is rumored to be a graveyard-based block. We already know that the flashback mechanic is returning, and we’ve seen several “plants” in M12 that will play nicely with graveyard strategies. Wizards loves to create tension in their designs. Cards like Visions of Beyond and Tarmogoyf want cards in the graveyard, and they want them to stay there; Grim Lavamancer and flashback also want cards in the graveyard, but work against Visions and ‘Goyf by emptying the graveyard. Jace, Memory Adept has synergies with all of them. If Innistrad is all about interacting with graveyards, Tarmogoyf is a great fit, as all its strength comes from what resides in that zone. Every time a Grim Lavamancer is activated or a card is cast for its flashback cost, there is the potential to change a ‘Goyf’s effect on the board.

Mark Rosewater and company have told us that Innistrad has a tribal sub-theme. This being the case, there’s a good chance we’ll be seeing some Tribal card types, even if it’s only a small handful like we saw in Rise of the Eldrazi. This would make it so that all cardtypes are present and relevant to boost a Tarmogoyf in Standard (unlike ‘Goyf’s first few months of existence, when there was no such thing as a Planeswalker card type, and only one Tribal—Bound in Silence).

Tarmogoyf is also legal in the recently-announced Modern format, and if Wizards wants to give this format a push, helping players get into the format by reprinting what will likely be a format staple seems like a splendid plan of attack. Tarmogoyf’s price is currently hovering in the $55-$70 range. A reprint would go a long way towards changing that, giving newer players easier access into a format which is likely to replace Extended.

And don’t forget, Tarmogoyf was a future-shifted card from Future Sight, a set whose timeshifted cards were intended to give us a look at potential futures.

Future Sight is not a peek into a single future but instead glimpses into a myriad of possible futures. Some of these futures are going to come to pass, while some of what you see in this set you’ll never see again. (- Mark Rosewater, April 2007)

While it’s perfectly possible that ‘Goyf falls into the latter category, it is always exciting to get cards from the former. With every new set, people clamor to find out if any cards from Future Sight have been reprinted. Since 2007, we’ve only seen 5 future-shifted cards show up (Rites of Flourishing and Foresee don’t count, as they weren’t actually future-shifted), and only Graven Cairns saw any serious play. There’s a sort of joy and satisfaction in discovering what sort of world the future-shifts originated from, at least on the flavor side of things.

So, while it may be unlikely, I think it’s entirely possible that we get Tarmogoyf back at some point in the next year (for those wondering, I’d expect it to be a Mythic, although I wouldn’t be too surprised to see it at Rare). To quote Matt Kranstuber of In Contention, ‘Goyf is “on theme, not overpowered by today’s standards, and [will] sell packs.”

I, for one, would welcome the return of our little green buddy.

Special thanks to everyone who shared their input on Twitter!
@_timmclaren
@Fenaris
@triforc3
@wortwelt
@NicholasAtSCG
@simongoertzen
@magnusmagicus
@dustyg013
@kstube
@vicious_bomber
@AllSunsDawn
@shameless_geek
@setzerg
@CapnTopDeck
@BigPReilly
@RealEvilGenius
@mikelinnemann
@BoltTheBird
@herodotusjr
@A_Magrini
@travishall456
@inSketch
@norbert88
@Antknee42
@dastels_mtg
@leet32
@ThaGatherin
@drsylvan
@thewachman
@chrisrossdipd
@Waldolio
@mixedknuts
@Kengy5
@WillieGMyPrez
@beardsonfire
@Daiches2
@mlanier131
@Schaf1
@TheCravenOne

Follow me on Twitter @affinityforblue.

Photos from SCG DC!

Bigheadjoe and I had a blast covering the StarCityGames.com Open Series in Washington, DC for SCGLive this past weekend. Check out some of my photos below!

For photo descriptions, see the photoset on Flickr.

Follow me on Twitter @affinityforblue.

Photos from Magic Weekend Paris!

Last weekend’s Player of the Year playoff between Brad Nelson and Guillaume Matignon will go down as a huge milestone in MTG history—it has never happened before, and is potentially something that will never happen again. I was lucky enough to not only be there, but also to cover the event.

See my photos below:

Also, a few shots of Patrick Chapin testing his quarterfinals matchup:

Follow me on Twitter @affinityforblue.

Quick Hits: Chapin Is (half) Right About Thrun

First, the card in question:

Pretty great creature, right? I personally love it, as it’s a throwback to one of my favorite green creatures ever, Troll Ascetic. My initial reaction was that I was a bit scared of it, being a control player. How do you answer this guy? Can’t target him. Can’t bounce him with Jace. Can’t tap him with Frost Titan or Tumble Magnet. Can’t Wrath him if they have mana to regenerate…etc.

Enter – Patrick Chapin:

Okay, so let’s think.

• Sacrifice effects will work. (Gatekeeper of Malakir & Consuming Vapors immediately spring to mind.) There are 109 nonland cards in the current Standard (pre-Mirrodin Besieged) that have the word “sacrifice” on them. While some of them don’t apply (e.g. Arc Runner, cards that create Eldrazi Spawn tokens), a good chunk of them are potential answers to Thrun.
• Anything that gives -1/-1 counters will work. This includes anything that has infect or grants it can answer Thrun. Here are 19 cards that fit that category, a list that will grow when Thrun & the rest of Besieged becomes legal. Also, don’t forget about the new black sweeper, Black Sun’s Zenith. Seems good.
• A Thrun of your own will take out an opposing Thrun. People have been doing this to Jace for nearly a year. Thrun’s legendary status is a liability. And you don’t even have to be playing green. If you’re able to copy Thrun (without targeting) with a card like, say, Clone, then the legendary rule will kick in to destroy all copies of Thrun in play.
• Or, you could just block it. Thrun is just a 4/4, so anything with 5 toughness will sit and block him all day. Here’s a list of 89 creatures in Standard (again, pre-MBS) that will make Thrun look a bit foolish. Token generators like Elspeth Tirel and Avenger of Zendikar will also keep Thrun from being very effective.

So yeah, when Patrick tweeted that there are 60 answers to Thrun in Standard, he was half right. Looks to me that there are at least double* that.

*=Obviously some answers will be better than others, but this is just a start to get the juices flowing.

EDIT: Just wanted to add this comment from Twitter, as it’s a good thing to keep in mind:

In other words, leaving an “incapacitated” Thrun in play (in Greg’s example, giving him three -1/-1 counters instead of four) will keep your opponent from easily playing another one. It’s quite likely that your opponent will just use the 1/1 Thrun as a chump blocker, so if that’s relevant to you (i.e., if you plan to win by attacking on the ground), you may want to factor in whether it makes sense to leave your opponent with a chump or to remove the Thrun entirely.

(This is why I love this game! So many decisions!)

Follow me on Twitter @affinityforblue.

Dragonstorm Inception

Last night on Twitter there was some discussion about the various Inception-themed trailers that have been popping up on YouTube over the past few months. Gavin Verhey suggested that someone try doing it with some MTG Pro Tour coverage, and Dan Barrett had the idea of using the classic Chapin-Nassif matchup from Worlds ’07.

I couldn’t resist.

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Musings: Mimic Vat

In the tradition of my “sleeper” pick post on Renegade Doppelganger a few months ago (which turned out to be correct!), I thought I’d write up a little something on a card that seems pretty under the radar right now.

It’s not getting much talk*, but Mimic Vat is a potentially potent offensive weapon in the right deck. Interestingly enough, it’s also a card that can provide some defensive measures against certain problem creatures that tend to come out of the graveyard. Vengevine giving you fits? Just destroy it once and Mimic Vat will exile it for you, requiring your opponent to find a second copy (so be sure to kill that Fauna Shaman too, while you’re at it!).

It’s one of only three cards (the other two being non-Standard legal) whose Imprint ability does not occur when it enters the battlefield. This is actually quite significant, as there need be no preexisting conditions for you to drop the card into play. So you can run it out there whenever you’d like.

The downside is that the card does nothing by itself. (Then again, Tarmogoyf was a 0/1 by itself, and that didn’t seem to stop it from being one of the best creatures of all time.) If you’re going to play the Vat, you need to be sure that creatures are going to be going to the graveyard from the battlefield. So you’re either playing creatures, or you’re playing creature removal. Doesn’t really sound too difficult, does it?

Consider the defensive implications of this card. With a creature imprinted, you’ve now got a potential blocker every turn. How about if your opponent attacks with two creatures, you destroy one with something like Doom Blade, and then use Vat to spit out a copy of that creature to block the second attacker?! BLOWOUT!!

Here are some quick ideas for cards that have interesting implications alongside Mimic Vat.

• Paired with Day of Judgment, you can wipe the board and imprint the best of the creatures on the board, spit it out, and attack onto an empty board. You can continue this every turn until your opponent has a blocker or a way to deal with the Vat.
• What about with creatures that have enter-the-battlefield abilities? I hear the Titan cycle from M11 is pretty good. Let’s look back at that Day of Judgment scenario again. You wipe the board and unfortunately lose your Sun Titan in the process. No problem: imprint the Titan, use the Vat to spit out a copy, get back a Wall of Omens (or something) when the copy comes into play (due to the Titan’s ETB trigger), attack with Titan and get back another permanent!
• Or how about paired with something that can sacrifice itself, like Vampire Hexmage? Not only do you now have repeatable instant-speed planeswalker removal, but if proliferate and infect are prominent, don’t forget that a Vat/Hexmage has the ability to wipe counters of any kind from a permanent.
• Speaking of sacrifice effects, Jinxed Idol allows you to sacrifice any creature you’d like to imprint on the Vat, while also passing the Idol to your opponent. Now he/she has to choose between taking 2 damage per turn or sacrificing a creature (which gives you yet another option for the Vat). Here are some more cards that allow you to sacrifice creatures for imprinting on the Vat.
• One of my favorite ones to think about is Mimic Vat with Precursor Golem. An imprinted Golem means the Vat spits out three 3/3 Golems, and when the primary copy goes to the graveyard, it not only leaves the other two behind (netting you two 3/3s every time you activate the Vat), but it takes with it the clause that says, “Whenever a player casts an instant or sorcery spell that targets only a single Golem, that player copies that spell for each other Golem that spell could target. Each copy targets a different one of those Golems.” So while yes, all three are vulnerable to Lightning Bolt (or somesuch removal) while the primary copy is still in play, at the beginning of the next end step the primary copy is exiled, leaving two 3/3s that will each require separate removal until you decide to spit out another copy of Precursor Golem. WARNING: While this can get out of hand fast if your opponent doesn’t have removal, note that ALL Golems on the battlefield will be targeted if the primary copy is targeted with something (even the Golems left behind by previous copies). Still, it seems absolutely bonkers, and even if your opponent wipes the board of your Golems, you can just spit out three more with your Mimic Vat. Eventually they’ll run out of removal!
• The epitome of defense against an aggro deck, how about Sunblast Angel? Every time they declare an attack, you can Vat out an Angel to destroy all their tapped creatures!

So there are some ideas to get the juices flowing. There are undoubtedly a lot of other combinations that I failed to mention here; I’ll leave it up to you to find them. If you do decide to employ the Vat, it’s a good idea to know the rules intricacies. You don’t want to end up thinking the Vat does something that it doesn’t.

Arthur Halavais posted the following hints on playing with (and against) Mimic Vat on his Twitter:

1: Kill an Eldrazi on their turn, you get to keep it. On your turn, not so much.

2: If you and Evil both have a Vat, you (assuming proper play) will never get to imprint on your turn.

3: You can activate Vat during Evil’s end step, giving you two copies on your turn.

4: When you least expect it, Voltaic Key will come down to make an extra copy and blow you out.

5: If something dies after you activate the Vat, you (can) get a copy of the new creature instead.

6: You can imprint Celestial Colonnade, Chimeric Mass, etc. Neither of these are good for much though.

7: You can Imprint Gideon Jura. This is actually worth a bit.

8: If you make a copy of a copy (with Rite of Replication), the second copy sticks around for a while.

9: Mimic Vat has CMC 3. Sun Titan brings it back.

10: If the Vat is destroyed in response to the activation, the Imprinted card stays Exiled and you still get a copy.

If some of those are confusing, be sure you understand how “APNAP” works (that is, “active player, non-active player”). The jist of it is, when two triggers occur simultaneously (such as when an Eldrazi giant goes to the graveyard and a Mimic Vat is in play), their effects are placed on the stack in active player (the player whose turn it is), non-active player order. And of course, the stack resolves last-in, first-out. So if you have a Mimic Vat and you manage to block and destroy your opponent’s Kozilek, Kozi’s shuffle effect trigger goes on the stack first (since it’s your opponent’s turn, they are the active player), and then the Mimic Vat trigger goes on the stack. Therefore the Mimic Vat trigger resolves first, allowing you to imprint Kozilek. However, had it been your turn, the triggers would have been stacked in reverse, preventing you from imprinting Kozilek.

For more rules tips on Mimic Vat, you can download the official Scars of Mirrodin Rules FAQ here. Still have a question? The MTGSalvation Rulings forums are a great resource (but remember to search for your question before making a new post; chances are, the answer is already there).

*= Well, it wasn’t getting much talk when I started writing this on October 2, but I mentioned it on the podcast (Ep41), and it seems I’m not the only one who’s keen on this card. Evan Erwin has been working on a list, which you can see here, and it’s been getting some Twitter buzz as well (I’ve seen an interesting white list from @hamiltonianurst featuring Emeria, the Sky Ruin along with the aforementioned Sunblast Angel).

Follow me on Twitter @affinityforblue.