Regarding Cluestones...

I'm not alone:

Cardboard Crack - Halloween (http://cardboard-crack.com/post/101390631864/halloween)

In a couple years, Mr. Cardboard Crack can rerun this comic replacing Cluestones with Banners.

As a side note, is "Ad Cards" what other people call them? I've always said "Tips & Tricks" (but with a heavy dose of irony), because I believe that's what they were labeled the first time they appeared.

Happy Halloween!

And now a word from our sponsor...

(I'll update about my MTGO drafting experiences after just one more turn. Stupid alien wolf beetles!)

One Drop, Two Drop, Red Drop, Blue Drop

One of my big memories in drafting M15 was how it was defined by one toughness. With so many one power creatures running around, whether or not a creature could profitably interact (e.g. win) was a major defining valuation. Recall the sad fate of the Oreskos Swiftclaw. Well Khans is clearly defined by morphs: 2/2 creatures landing on turn three with extremely high reliability. As such, the efficacy of your creatures boils down to 'how does this interact with a 2/2 bear?' Does it win, lose, trade, or draw? This analysis can be brought into sharp relief by the batmobile:





On the surface this looks like a great value play: three abilities, one of them evasion, with a reasonable mana cost. Sign me up! But the bat is basically useless against 2/2s, It can't block them and the 1 power puts basically no pressure on the Villain. Imagine the Swiftwing in a set with tons of enchants floating around, like Theros. The 'French Vanilla' test (accounting for the bargain trio of abilities) would bestow a generous grade reflecting its high performance as two-drop with good upside. But here in Khans? What am I going to do, drop a Siegecraft on it? Gross.

Or to look at it another way, we have solved the mystery of not one but TWO Elmers in the set.

 

Let the 2/2s beware!

Seriously Kotaku, get your act together

So Kotaku decided to rip off our recent post about ranking names. They chose to rank the leaders from civilization V. Here's the link to their article. Their rankings are wrong.

"Harald Bluetooth" at number 18. What planet are they on?

Khans Sealed Deck #1 - Deck Construction

For the first time in quite a while, I fired up the old MODO machine and hopped into a Khans of Tarkir sealed deck release event. Let's get right to the pool:

Sweet fetch, bro

In this format, the first thing I'm going to look at is the fixing. I included the banners because they are cards if just barely. If we want to go full 5 color, then we have 5 red, 5 green, 3 blue, 3 white, and 2 black, plus 10 basics to split up. That doesn't feel like quite enough for my taste, although if the pool pushes us that way, it might be possible. By clan, there are 4 Temur fixers, 3 Mardu, 2 Sultai, 2 Jeskai, and 2 Abzan. Essentially our fixing is spread out across all colors.

On to the real cards...

The L is Silent - 00001

It's been a long time coming but we finally have our first podcast ready for prime time. On today's episode Pete and Jed do a crack a pack from the new set Khaaaaaaaaans of Tarkir. Enjoy! 

• Subscribe to The L is Silent at http://feeds.feedburner.com/thelissilent-magicanotes
• Some sound effects and music courtesy of  freesfx.co.uk

That's actually super charming.

Just opening up an old starter pack of Alpha. Man those cards were terrible... Feel free to skip to the 8 minute mark.


http://www.avclub.com/article/guy-opens-old-magic-gathering-pack-finds-card-wort-210484