mtgo

Mono Brew #2 – Ignoring Reality

It’s been a few months since the first edition of Mono Brew, which I ended with the promise that my next article would be a primer on my Modern pet deck, “Bringing Gifts” (five color [card]Gifts Ungiven[/card] with [card]Bring to Light[/card]). Much has changed in the world of Magic since then, as the release of Oath of the Gatewatch turned Modern season into “Eldrazi Winter”. I’m sure that most of…

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Magic Online Standard – Down with Atarka Red!

Last weekend, with the StarCityGames Open at Indianapolis, we saw our first glimpse into what the new Standard format looks like.  There were a lot of really interesting decks that performed well and we saw some card choices I hadn’t anticipated.  I thought Brian DeMars did an incredible job of tuning his Atarka Red list…

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Casually Infinite – About the MTGO Closed Beta with Chris Kiritz, MTGO Business Manager

In early December, Wizards of the Coast posted that it will be moving forward with leagues on Magic Online and began testing them during December in the closed beta environment. Along with this, the company posted the link to sign up for the closed beta. If you haven’t applied for it yet, you should do so here….

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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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Casually Infinite – Where’s the Money in Modern?

Six months ago, Pro Tour Valencia was on the scene and it looked like Modern cards couldn’t be any hotter. We were approaching $100 fetch lands and it looked like any Modern card was bound to spike if it saw even moderate play. Corbin has a great article about what has changed over on Quiet…

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Forced Fruition Episode 12: Tribal Cube Angels

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD5bqyn6vroWK-yjZRSEO3J7&w=640&h=360] Divine Favor This week I’m pleased to welcome my good friend Jan (pronounced “Yawn,” he’s a dude) to the show to help take me through an MTGO Cube draft! As the title indicates, we wound up with most of the angel cards in the cube and played them to great success. This week…

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Forced Fruition Episode 11: Stunted Jund

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD5XqEP7eLdk_UliPFAkct5e&w=640&h=360] Cube’s Back! Everyone’s favorite online format, the MTGO cube, is back online! Making a blanket statement like that might not be entirely accurate, but you cannot deny that the variety of games and decks generated by the cube is unparalleled in the MTGO universe. This time around, I drafted a Jund deck featuring…

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Forced Fruition Episode 9: Black Sheep Wall

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD5QRnOIQU0HvsrL2NMVKfW7&w=640&h=360] Food for Thought If I were to describe this draft with one phrase: Staying Alive. Right from the get go, our strategy started to form, mostly due to a couple sheepish picks that wound up dictating the rest of our draft. Adding in the Journey pack to this format helps even out the…

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Forced Fruition Episode 8: Grixis Cube Adventure

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD4K0f7xZAy6wqfKdBxdhI_O&w=640&h=360] Magic is Difficult And I have a lot to learn. If you’ve been following the series, you’re aware of this fact. I won’t try to hide it—there it is, out in the open. My friend Cory is a much better Magic player than I, so I enlisted his help to run through another…

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Forced Fruition Episode 7: Devotion to Cube

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD6dLhiofdGdf4zkIBkn0lQv&w=640&h=360] Intro Cube drafting as a format is wonderful because you get to make all kinds of crazy things happen. You get to play with powerful cards that span the entirety of Magic and use them to crush your opponents mercilessly. This week on Forced Fruition, join me as I power through an un-powered cube…

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Forced Fruition, Episode 5: Sealed PTQ Practice

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD5WVijeszmqqm3j_YdC0BCI&w=640&h=360] ‘Tis the Season It’s that time of year when we get to play Sealed PTQs. The format has its upsides and downsides and you’re certainly going to increase your odds of winning by practicing as much as possible. I like Sealed because it evens the playing field to a degree by emphasizing deckbuilding….

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Forced Fruition Episode 3: Down the Drain

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries?list=PLs4gxqbLAAD7PPPlJC8S-6BJ3dFbse9yJ&w=640&h=360] Today’s Lesson The third installment of Forced Fruition takes us on a journey of discovery and trying to slow roll our way to victory. In this BNG-THS-THS draft, a theme of slowly draining our opponent quickly develops out of pack one. We employ some drafting strategy to fill out the rest of our…

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Casually Infinite – Understanding Bots

On MTGO, interacting with bots ends up being a mandatory endeavor at some point. While trading between players is often the most profitable, sometimes you need to interact with a vendor with a large number of cards in order to pick up what you need. Bots drive the MTGO economy in very significant ways. We…

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Casually Infinite – Understanding EV, Part 2

In my last article, I discussed all the parts that play into estimated value (EV). This article is going to have lots of terms and math from the previous article, so if you haven’t read it yet, I’d recommend going back and doing that first. Picking a Queue The math behind picking a queue takes…

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Marc DeArmond – Casually Infinite: 10 Rules for Profit, Part Two

Today, we’re picking up where we left off last time, with rules six through ten of my 10 rules for profit. Check out last week’s post for rules one through five. Rule #6 – Understand Estimated Value (Don’t Play 4-3-2-2) When it comes to prizes, the 4-3-2-2 format has the very worst payout for the…

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Marc DeArmond – Casually Infinite: 10 Rules for Profit, Part One

Below are the 10 rules that I follow to be able to play infinitely on Magic Online. Many of these rules will probably garner their own articles to fully explain the reasoning behind them and how I enact them. But the first step is to give tips that will help you to stop making decisions…

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The Recession

Author’s Foreword Due to the news of Premier Events returning to MTGO, the main premise of the article, that the MTGO market may not yet be at its bottom, has become outdated. Certain parts of the article have been rewritten to fit with the new information. However, I feel that the thrust of the article, that…

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Marc DeArmond – Casually Infinite: Introduction

Did you say Infinite? I did say infinite. By this I mean playing MTGO without having to constantly visit the store or purchase tickets from vendors. My form of infinite isn’t being able to draft back to back all night, dual queue, or even playing a queue every day. I am infinite by earning my…

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