Month: October 2014

Burn-ninating Your Opponents in Cube

Welcome back, brewers. I know I write a lot of articles to make you a better Magic player. These articles are often focused on playing better, understanding your outs, and grinding out matches to understand what cards are important. I love to play this way. I love to learn and get better with a deck….

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Brainstorm Brewery #120 – #Ray4Rookie

Ray Perez Jr. is back on the cast, and we have important business to get down to. There is a possibility that Jared Boettcher may have cheated in his bid for Rookie of the Year. These claims are unsubstantiated and are currently being investigated by the DCI. In the event that Jared does receive disciplinary…

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Conjured Currency #37: Cheating 101, The Finance Edition

As you may be aware of, a recent cheating scandal has rocked our beloved game in the most recent weeks. Trevor Humphries was suspected of (and admitted to in a subsequent Facebook rant) cheating  at the SCG Open in Worcester, and the well-known Alex Bertoncini got thrown in the cell for another three years. As I…

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On the Rookie of the Year Race and the World Championship

Given the recent events that have taken place, I wanted to express my personal views and opinions on the Rookie of the Year situation. This will not be an article talking about the incidents that took place, but rather about the aftermath that could happen—depending on what the DCI decides in the near future. This is my story….

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Weekend Magic: 10/24 – 10/26

We continue to dive deeper into the Standard metagame this week with three Standard tournaments. This weekend there was a Star City Games Open in Minneapolis, MN, in addition to Grand Prix Stockholm. We can’t discount the Legacy being played on Sunday at the Star City Open, so I will cover that as well. In…

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Pitt Imps Podcast #91 PT Khans

First off, let me apologize for the bad sound quality this week. After multiple editing attempts, I was unable to fix it and still missed things. I’m sorry. We go over the PT, because really, there is nothing else worth covering. Between the actual play and all the news that gets dropped at these things,…

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Privileged Perspective 2: A Fistful of Bullet Points

No time to chit-chat, we’ve got a lot to get to. What are you doing?! Go to the next paragraph, hurry! FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS I’ve lived through a lot of changes to Organized Play. I saw the fall of the Junior Super Series, the old States, Regionals, Player Rewards (I’ll mention these again later!), and…

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Brainstorm Brewery #119 – Reunited

Corbin’s back, and he shows no signs of having any willingness to listen to last week’s episode. He still has time to use the code word (cricket) and not lose the bet, but we sure would love it if no one told him. He can almost be forgiven for his absence last week, as he…

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Conjured Currency #36: Battle Plan

What’s the first thing you decide to do when you cement plans to attend a grand prix? If you’re a player and not a financier, the answer might be “figure out what deck I want to play, and start testing for various matchups.” If the event is local and within your home city, you might…

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Vengeance Shall Be Mine (in the Form of Cooperating with an Investigation): Playing Trevor Humphries in a Top Eight Last Weekend

This past week has been a whirlwind of good luck and bad fortune all tied into one. On Saturday morning around 1:00 a.m., I was in a car accident driving my friend Barrett home from a night of Magic at Stomping Grounds in Hatboro, Pennsylvania (yes, that was a shameless plug for a good store)….

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Weekend Magic: 10/17-10/20

As Khans of Tarkir continues to showcase itself across all of Standard, more results keep coming in that will solidify the decks we will continue to see over the next year. Last weekend Star City Games: Worcester (MA) and Grand Prix Los Angeles added more excitement to Standard by showcasing the power of new decks…

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Pitt Imps Podcast #90 Sealed Talk

Let me start by saying sorry for the late appearance of this on Brainstorm Brewery. This week, Ryan returns from making dat money and helps us go over the two GPs this past weekend. We try to dissect the Sealed format as much as we can. After a long discussion about that, I call on…

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Privileged Perspective 1: Genesis

Hi! My name is Ross. I typically prefer to keep these initial introductions pretty short, since you will hopefully learn more about me through my writing than a ham-fisted miniature biography. Perhaps you are familiar with some of my many award-winning tweets? Haha, you’re right, that WAS a good one! Take that, status quo! The…

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Post-Pro Tour Finance: Khans of Tarkir

As I’m sure all of you are aware, the pro tour was last weekend and with it came an bunch of unsustainable spikes.  What does that mean exactly?  I’m glad you asked! The Hype Many cards spiked over the PT weekend based on the amount of play and success they saw. Among them are [card]Pearl…

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Casually Infinite – Learning to Better Assess the Power of Our Decks

With the exception of drafts that occasionally go truly awry, we frequently find ourselves playing with an unimpressive pool of cards, only to do very well in a tournament. On the other side of this coin, I frequently come out of a draft very happy with my cards only to pull off a mediocre finish….

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Brainstorm Brewery #118 – Corbin’s True Value

The Pro Tour is over, but you wouldn’t know it because Brainstorm Brewery is a man down after sever jet lag, and some procrastination-related complications sideline everyone’s fourth-favorite cast member. With one fewer person to fill awkward silences, his true worth on the cast becomes apparent to everyone. Will the entire gang manage to get…

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Conjured Currency #35: My Story

Welcome back! I’m going to preface this week’s rant by mentioning that there’s a low likelihood of Magic finance material ahead. If you’re here solely for your weekly dose of new tips on collection buying, buylisting, or value trading, you’ll probably have to wait until next week. To be completely honest, I’m not 100-percent sure…

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Unified Theory of Commander: Threats

What kind of deck do you really want to build? This question is at the starting point of every Commander deck, isn’t it? There’s no sense in building a deck that won’t be fun to pilot. So EDH players need to start with this question and then continually revisit it to make sure that the…

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Weekend Magic: 10/10-10/12 (Pro Tour KTK Edition)

Welcome back, guys! I have some very exciting things to share with you today thanks to Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir happening last weekend. Many Magic players believe that the Pro Tour solidifies the decks that we will be seeing until the end of January, so based on the results, cards that were previously undervalued spike…

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Brewing with Khans of Tarkir

Welcome back! Today we’re brewing with Khans of Tarkir. For those of you who don’t know, this article is a little later than usual—because I’m prepping for Pro Tour Khans of Tarkir in Honolulu. As I’m finishing up this article, it’s Sunday October 5th, the day after States and the day before I leave for…

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What Wizards Wants: Reprints

Magic players can be selfish. When Wizards of the Coast makes a decision or a change to the game, most people talk about how it affects them. Standard players talk about how it affects Standard, Cube enthusiasts talk about possible inclusions from the new set, Modern and Legacy players look for playable eternal cards, and so…

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Conjured Currency #34: One More Card

Hey there. How have you been? I hope you’re having an excellent Thursday, and that your Magic finance life has been at least slightly improved by reading my articles. I genuinely enjoy writing each week to try and teach at least one person something new, even if I have to stay up until 3 a.m….

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Let’s Play Standard – Jeskai Tempo Breakdown

Welcome back, brewers. Today we are going to be talking about Standard. Were you as sick of the last Standard format as I was? See ya later, [card]Lifebane Zombie[/card]. Thanks for making life miserable for us GW mages. Anyway, I was an avid GW player in the old format. I loved the beef of my…

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Pitt Imps Podcast #89 New Standard Decks Finally

This week, we go over the SCG Standard events and Magic, Magic, Magic. You know the program and what to expect.   Host Angelo Twitter @ganksuou Co-Host Will Co-Host Ryan Twitter @brotheryan Show Email   [email protected]

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Brainstorm Brewery #117 – Shout It Out

Goblin Rabblemaster is approaching $20, Mantis Rider is approaching $10, and nothing seems right in the world. What’s going on? Someone has been bitten by the Cube bug and won’t shut up about his Cube. I won’t say which host it is, but it’s Marcel. Cube fever caused him to go on a shout-out rampage,…

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