Magic: Alpha in M14 Reprints, part 2

In case you missed it and are interested, I analyzed the first 6 of the 12 Magic cards (by collectors' number) from the original Alpha set that were reprinted in the newest Magic 2014 core set. Let's get right back to it with the second batch:

I never truly understood Sengir Vampire's name until I saw an interview with Levon Helm, drummer for folk rock group The Band. The laid-back Tennessee native was talking about Richard Manuel's role, and said that, although several members of the group perform vocals on various songs, they always considered Richard their singer. But because of his southern drawl, the phrase came out sounding like "sengir." And then I realized: Sengir Vampire is perfectly suited to be the lead singer in a band made of vampires. Look at his M14 reprint (whose art first appeared in Torment, the only expansion set in which Vampire appears) - he's dressed just like a 70's era rock star, and he has the face and body language of someone who's launching into the chorus of an epic power ballad. (His off-screen hand is totally holding the mic stand.) Even his original artwork could be a shot in an avant-garde music video. He hasn't been a core set staple (he was on the bench from Fourth thru Ninth editions, and has been in only every other set since Tenth), but he's a flavor win (just ask all his homies in the Homelands set) and I'm glad he's back.

Dragons are a staple of any game based on fantasy (as opposed to hard sci-fi) - there was even a whole half of a Duel Deck and a From the Vault set based on these mythical creatures. Most Dragons have an ability colloquially known as firebreathing (named for the card), which means they work best in a mono (or very heavy) red deck to ensure they have access to enough red mana to adequately pump them up. But I find them useful in any deck, not only for the huge flying bodies they provide, but also because of the pure morale swing that happens when an opponent sees one of these guys enter the battlefield on your side.

Every review of a set that includes Fog (or Fog-like cards) that I've ever read says the same thing: It's one of the worst cards in the game, only playable if your deck is extremely tempo-focused, and even then it's usually not worth using up one of your precious card slots for the effect it provides. I've never ran one of these in my deck, but when I played with the White version of Fog, it invariably ended up doing nothing if I was winning and at best offering a one-turn reprieve from utter destruction otherwise. Don't get me wrong, the card does belong in a very real and very annoying deck archetype, but I don't recommend either playing one of these decks or playing against one.

Giant Growth is the last of the "3-for-1" cycle from Alpha Edition that still gets reprinted. The other four are Lightning Bolt (last tournament legal printing was Magic 2011), which deals 3 damage, Healing Salve (Eighth Edition), which heals 3 life or prevents 3 damage, Dark Ritual (Mercadian Masques), which adds 3 black mana, and the ludicrously O.P. Ancestral Recall (which was discontinued before even Revised Edition), which lets target player draw 3 cards... for 1 mana. That's why even the cheapest version of this card goes for nearly $900 on the open market. But back to Giant Growth: it's simple, it's straightforward, and it's remained nearly unchanged since the very beginning (gains vs. gets is a trivial wording change in my mind, although I'm sure the R&D folks at Wizards would disagree with me). Flavor Fail Note: This is the only Alpha reprint not to feature flavor text.

Giant Spider is the Sub-Zero of Magic sets - the only core set this guy has missed since the very beginning was last year's M13. It even showed up in the Portal starter set, from which it gets its current art. Reach is a very important mechanic for green decks, since they have a famous vendetta against flying creatures, thus they don't have a lot of dudes that can answer threats in the air. Other than its resemblance to a Lord of the Rings villain, it's just a solid, fat butt blocker that's considerably better in Limited than Constructed play.

Despite having a relatively low-upside ability with an expensive cost to activate, the Rod was in every core set through M10 before taking a three-year break until this year. The cheapest "pinging" creatures cost exponentially less to use, as their CMC is just 3, and then they deal their damage by tapping alone without requiring an activation cost. The facts that the Rod requires only colorless mana and that it can't get pinged itself are points in its favor, but there aren't a lot of one-drops that require seven total mana to kill, and a 20-turn clock starting on turn five is not an effective endgame strategy. Props to this card being the only artifact on this list, but other than that, there's not much to recommend this... thing.


So there you have it: 12 of the game's most enduring cards that call back to the very beginning of Magic's storied history. Sometimes I think that if I spent less time thinking about the game's history and more time learning about how to build the best decks from the best cards, I might be a little better at the game. But then I remind myself that every Magic card is at least half flavor (sometimes more if italicized text accompanies the picture), and it's okay if I lose a few more matches as long as I have a more complete game experience.

Magic: Alpha in M14 Reprints, part 1

Serra Angel = Anita Ekberg /boggle

Those of you who have been following the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering since its inception in 1993 will have noticed that the overall look of the cards has changed several times over the years. Well, not the backs of the cards, otherwise you couldn't shuffle older and newer cards into the same deck without giving vital information away. Although if you can show me someone with 20-year-old cards in good enough condition that they wouldn't be immediately distinguishable from cards out of a just-opened pack, I'll show you someone who can sell those cards for A LOT of money.

The first major visual changes to a Core Set corresponded to the first major rules changes of Classic Sixth Edition (which welcomed the stack), six years after the release of the first (Alpha) edition. Card types were clarified ("Creature" spells replaced "Summon" spells), expansion symbols and collectors' numbers were added, and basic lands had everything in their text box replaced by a gigantic mana symbol. Four years later, corresponding to the tenth anniversary of Alpha's release, Eighth Edition became the first core set to be printed with the "modern" layout: the font was changed from the ornate Goudy Medieval to the more standard Matrix Bold, the border was reduced, and each text box got a clear border. Tenth Edition in 2007 was the first core set since Beta to be printed with black borders, and that visual style has persisted ever since, even when Wizards started releasing a core set every year instead of every other year.

There is purportedly another change coming up with the release of Magic 2015 in July of this year - I know the math doesn't quite add up, but I guess you just have to think of Magic sets like new car models. From what I've heard, the font will change (to an in-house one this time, called Beleren, after the original Blue Planeswalker) and the border will shrink. Just when I had planned to take a break from the game after the Theros block resolved, Wizards had to put just enough change on the stack to keep me interested. You see, I'm what you might call an amateur Magic historian. So in light of this upcoming never-before-seen layout change, I'd like to take a look back at the most enduring cards in the game, by analyzing (in a two-part post) the 12 cards from the original Alpha set that have been reprinted in the most recent and (for the moment) still active Core Set - Magic 2014.

M14 marked the first reprint of Blessing beyond the Alpha-Beta-Unlimited-Revised-Fourth Edition situation (I know that's technically five editions, but again with the confusing math), which means it gets its first ever new artwork. (Side note: based on my admittedly non-comprehensive research, none of the artwork from the original Alpha cards remains in any modern legal reprint. I don't know off the top of my head what the oldest art is to still survive - my guess would be Pacifism, originally from Mirage - but that's definitely a project I'd be excited to take on at a later date.) The M14 version of Blessing is also its first printing to include rules text that clearly defines what the card does - according to the Alpha rules, you should be able to tap one white mana (abbreviated as {W}) to give ANY target creature +1/+1. The Fourth Edition text was close, but still needlessly complicated: "Target creature Blessing enchants gets +1/+1 until end of turn." More importantly, the reprint introduces us to a new character via flavor text, Ardanna of the Angelic Council, who will surely take the Magic world by storm.

Ah, the original Serra Angel, arguably the hottest chick ever represented on a Magic card (see comparison with La Dolce Vita above). Not much has changed on this card except for the addition of the Vigilance keyword ability to replace "Does not tap when attacking" or "Attacking does not cause Serra Angel to tap" as it appeared in Revised and Fourth edition. In contrast to Blessing, the first ever Creature with the Angel subtype has been reprinted in every edition since Seventh (she got her current art in Ninth Edition, with Seventh and Eighth using an alternate version), plus the Divine vs. Demonic Duel Deck and the first Commander casual supplement.

The Alpha set included 10 creatures of the Wall subtype, three of which have been reprinted in the yearly core set era starting in 2010: Wall of Bone (M10), Wall of Fire (M10 and M13), and Wall of Swords (M14). Originally it was a characteristic of the type Wall that it could not attack, but starting in Tenth Edition (the last set in which Angelic Wall appeared, the first time with its current art), that characteristic was removed, and each Wall was errata'd to include the keyword ability "Defender" in the rules text, with a parenthetical reminder. This change likely happened so that a creature could be a Changeling (i.e. every creature type at all times, introduced in Lorwyn, the block immediately following Tenth Edition) and still attack as normal.

Speaking of Changelings - all of which have the Shapeshifter creature type - Clone was errata'd in Ninth Edition (where it also got its current art) to be a Shapeshifter, after being referred to merely as "Clone" even through its Onslaught printing, after "Summon" had been replaced with "Creature." Of all the cards on this list, Clone is possibly the best example of how the expression of Magic's rules have evolved over time. The card's ability seems pretty basic, but in the game's infancy it took a lot of complicated verbiage to explain - 47 words in all. The new errata'd version has been streamlined to 16 words that actually cover more situations than the original (i.e. the possibility of Clone working in multiplayer matches) AND allow enough space for some cool flavor text.

Remember Classic Sixth Edition that I referenced before? Well, that's the last time Spell Blast was reprinted, which means it was one of the first card types to be changed from "Interrupt" to "Instant" in the big time rules change. I once read (and agree with) the criticism that you don't want to be paying MORE mana to counter an opponent's spell than the player paid to cast the spell to begin with, but sometimes it's better to have the option to make a spell not to come into play than not, even at an exorbitant cost. Also, I have the suspicion that Wizards just put this card in the core set to have an excuse to explain the concept of converted mana cost in a parenthetical reminder (cf. Strionic Resonator and triggered abilities). Rules Change of Note: the change from the passive voice ("Target spell is countered") to the imperative ("Counter target spell...").

Nightmare is one of those cards where a pun seemingly unsuspectingly became an official part of the game's rules, although now it's a little less pointed with the addition of Horse to its creature type. The first of the 21 creatures with the same type that now exist is back from a three year absence after not missing one core set since the very beginning! He definitely went out on top, being the featured foil rare in a Magic 2010 intro pack, but now he's back and with new artwork to boot. With mono black devotion being a working archetype these days - the Born of the Gods event deck was based around the Gray Merchant of Asphodel ability.

Back next time with the final six!

Thoughts About Game of Thrones and Magic

Sunday's episode of Game of Thrones, "The Laws of Gods and Men," aired on Sunday, which means that, according to industry jargon, watching it on Monday (as I did) would technically be a "live-plus-one viewing," since I watched it one day after it had aired. So then if I review it on Tuesday, that review goes up on Day Live +2. But before I start getting confused by how they measure those TV ratings, all those +'s got me thinking of Magic: The Gathering (as in +1/+1 counters). And also the term God is used in both tonight's GoT episode and MtG's most recent expansion block, which takes place on the plane of Theros. I've paid devotion to three Theran Gods in my time in the Planeswalker Program, each representing one or a pair of the five colors of mana (abbreviated WUBRG). I noticed that some characters on Game of Thrones also correspond to the same color wheel (if not the same pantheon) as used in the game of Magic.

#ImpressiveVisualEffects

The first mention of color I noticed in "Laws of Gods and Men" (or, for more industry jargon, Episode 406) is when a jovial pirate (with very good taste) tells an old joke involving a ship's captain and a red shirt - a joke that my father and I had been telling since the holiday parties of my childhood. Suffice it to say, he joins up with Stannis Baratheon, the possibly rightful heir to the eponymous throne, who is himself very well acquainted with red mana. After all, his most trusted and most powerful ally is known as the Red Woman. And he lives in Dragonstone, and dragons usually cost red mana to summon in Magic. Speaking of Magic colors, the Iron Bank is clearly colorless, since I'm pretty sure Stannis and Davos's skiff (Is skiff appropriate?) sailed right past the Colossus of Akros.

And speaking of dragons, we got a good look at one of Daenerys's's dragons, which used its firebreathing ability to burninate / barbecue some sheep. Seeing as firebreathing is a red card, Dany definitely costs red, but she's all into justice too, so white makes sense. Plus Jorah Mormont and Barristan Selmy (JR and BS for short) are knights, which are usually white. Plus her rule wsa forged in the Dothraki plains and all. Should there be a third color, since she's a contender for the throne? Probably blue, since she wears blue, and also based on the way she gains control of all these armies...

See the resemblance?

I think a character who definitely wields three colors well is Tywin Lannister, one of the few people actually fit to be king, as evidenced by the fact that he's basically acting king. Right away I pegged House Lannister as identifying with White, Red, and Black, based on both their standard and the way they act -- and if they all three go with Tywin, it allows his three offspring to each get a different two-color combination (also known as "guild" in the nerd jargon). Jamie, the Kingslayer, inherits red and white: he's got a sense of honor, but his passion and incendiary nature  often get the better of him. Tyrion, also referred to as Kingslayer this episode, seems a good fit for black and white: he was master of coin at one point, so he fits in with the coinsmiths and the users of the extort ability word. Cersei is black and red: referred to as the "mother of madness," need I say more? Also this way it allows the late King Joffrey (before he was placed in the Lannister graveyard, so to speak) to go back to the three-color-combo, since he inherited all three colors from his true parents, heyo!

I thought a lot about what colors the rest of the houses might be, but when you go up north, things start to get so that you almost have to venture into Dungeons and Dragons alignment territory: Wildlings are Chaotic Evil, the whole Bolton/Frey contingent is Neutral Evil. If Targaryen (or House Stormborn, for easier spelling, but not to be confused with House Swarmborn) is Chaotic Good while the Lannisters are probably Lawful Neutral, with a little bit of all the spectrum mixed in throughout the bloodline, then House Stark is Neutral Good. But as none of them appear in this episode, let's go to some other random musings to end today's thoughts:


- Back to Magic: The Night's (Knight's?) Watch is obvi mono Black (hello, Castle Black, duh), but who cares, since we didn't see any of them in this episode anyway.

- Prince Oberyn, whom we did see, pretty clearly embodies the precepts of the Red Green combination. I mean, the trademark RG Planeswalker Xenagos is named "der Hedonist" in German. Not that its name has any bearing on game play...

- I could picture a good Duel Deck: Ramsay Snow (mono black, Human Berserker) vs. Yara Greyjoy (mono green, Human Scout). Each side would have an Alfie Allen card: one would be Theon of the Iron Islands and the other would be Reek of Dreadfort. #FlavorWin

- Theon/Reek went deep with his personal identity crisis this episode. Maybe it was the scars, or the performance, or the pale and drawn look, but I kept equating his relationship with Ramsay to what would happen if there were a Good-aligned Gollum and an Evil-aligned Frodo.

- More Magic: idea for King's Landing mirrored pairs: Varys, White/Black, Human Advisor with lifelink. Grand Maester General Veers, White/Black, Human Cleric with deathtouch. Maybe they both have extort? Maybe neither?

- And finally the last line of HBO's blurb about the episode referenced a Throne Room, which I equated not to the throne on which the game is based, but on the music from the Throne Room stage in the Genesis port of Mortal Kombat, even though that music is really based on the theme that appears in The Pit stage of the arcade game. #VideoGameBGMTrivia

Astrology Baseball: Checking in for May

The stars have shifted, we're in the throes of Taurus, and it's time to check in with my astrology baseball league. Last year I sunk a lot of time into this project, tinkering with each team's roster every week, subbing out slumping and injured players for more relevant ones. This year I was not nearly as ambitious, only periodically checking the standings and only making the odd change here and there. However, today, as I was checking the fantasy stats of the top players in the leagues to determine my first round of All-Star voting, I saw that some of said best players were not being fully utilized by their starry affiliates. And given that today's the first day of a matchup that begins in a new month, I thought it was a fine milestone to do some lineup adjustments. Whether this will turn into a monthly thing, who can know, but for now, here's what I've gleaned from the state of major league baseball through watching the stars.

First, it's no wonder that the Rockies are doing as well as they are given the monsterful performance of Troy Tulowitzki (fantasy's top hitter, according to my point system) and the unforeseen breakout of Charlie Blackmon (who has already equaled his 2013 HR, RBI, and BB totals, but in 50 fewer games). I was astute enough to grab Blackmon off the waiver wire for my own fantasy team, but I was also foolish enough to draft Yasiel Puig (currently day to day having crashed into ANOTHER wall) in front of fantasy's number 2 hitter Giancarlo Stanton, who's putting up the types of numbers he couldn't produce for me last year when I picked him first. I think I've officially changed my draft day stance from "once bitten, twice shy" to "he couldn't possibly disappoint so severely two years in a row."

Tulo and Stanton's performances have helped put their respective astrology teams (Libra and Scorpio) at the tops of their respective divisions (Air and Water). Capricorn, meanwhile, is leading the Earth division, and they got to that point without the help of the game's top relief pitcher Francisco Rodriguez. I obviously hadn't been paying enough attention to the Brewers' closer situation (to be fair, MLB.com's rankings indicated that Jim Henderson would get the first crack at the job), and the veteran has been reaping the benefits of his club's hot streak to start the season. It looks like the old Sea-Goats are climbing back to the powerhouse they were in 2012 rather than the .500 mediocrity of 2013.

The two best starters in the game right now - Johnny Cueto of Aquarius and Jose Fernandez of Leo - have yet to lead their teams to a winning record. But possibly the changes I've made - getting Julio Teheran and Nate Eovaldi in the AQU rotation, and swapping out the slumping Pablo Sandoval for Mark Reynolds and hoping Jesse Chavez's brilliance as a fill-in starter for the A's continues on the LEO side - will improve their fortunes. The only other active starter to average more than 100 points per game is another dude I picked up on waivers, Tim Hudson. Funny how my two big pickups this year both play for the Cancer astrology team, yet they currently are ahead of only the winless Pisces Fish in the standings. I just hope they can turn things around by birthday, otherwise we'll both be in for a long summer.

Liveblogging: Astros vs. Mariners, 5/3/14

As I look at the lineup from MLB.tv's free game of the day, featuring Mariners 2013 co-ace Hisashi Iwakuma in Houston, I notice that there is no sign of top prospect George Springer in the Astros lineup. Springer made his major league debut last month and thus has never faced Iwakuma, who is making just his 2014 debut this afternoon. Mariners fans (or at least their broadcasters) sure are happy to see the Tokyo native return to the mound, as he missed the first month of the season with a sprained finger tendon on his pitching hand. Top 6 2B Jose Altuve (who  has always done well against Iwakuma, according to a reminder from the Astros broadcaster) got another strong hit against him to start the game, but didn't end up coming around to score.

I noticed right away that the starting lineup graphics from the CSN Houston broadcast (again courtesy of MLB.tv) reminded me a lot of the graphics from MLB 14 The Show on PS3, but interestingly enough, so did the strange "ghosting" I sometimes see on especially strong throws by fielders. What I once attributed to a flaw in the programing of the game might be an inherent issue in how the console presents the game of baseball...

King Felix Hernandez's partner in crime last year ran into some trouble after a Marwin Gonzalez "curved" an infield single into a Jonathan Villar triple for the first run of the game. With his appearance at no fewer than five positions this year, I think Gonzalez has earned a UT in front of his name, in the old All-Star Baseball style, which makes him that much valuable to roster-building. Altuve, the pitcher's old nemesis, produced another run with a sac fly, making that a H and an RBI for him, although it took him two different plate appearances.

Altuve's opposing 2B, and one of the most talked-about players of the offseason, Robinson Cano cut Houston lead in half with a bloop single that scored a Stefen Romero triple, but did not make it to scoring position that inning, proving that the sequence 1B-3B is inherently more valuable than 3B-1B. Matters of sequence and play order, which in baseball is most strongly reflected in lineup construction, are what's known in Magic as "tempo." Having a good tempo relies heavily on the "mana curve," which is industry jargon for making sure you have enough resources to make a strong play each turn. If you equate spots in the lineup with turns, and players in the lineup as individual cards, it's easy to see how one can be a microcosm for the other!

Iwakuma has remained sharp, unlike Dallas Keuchel (again, pronounced KAI-cull), who walked the bases loaded in the 7th. It was apparent to everyone, especially Seattle manager Lloyd McClendon, that Houston's Bo Porter hadn't correctly managed his resources in terms of pitching, as he was obviously stalling for time while the reliever who was obviously going to replace Keuchel needed an inordinately long time to warm up. The former outfielder who last managed the Pirates in 2005, stormed out of the dugout, fuming about something, which apparently not only scared Porter into making a pitching change, but also scared reliever Jose Cisnero into walking the next batter (yes, with the bases loaded) to tie the game. That's one of my favorite plays to watch, because it requires such good discipline: Not only from the batter, to lay off the tough pitches, but also from the fan, to remain interested for the immense amount of time it takes to develop.

But that was just the beginning for the Mariners, who really ramped into some serious damage with run-scoring base hits from Canadian representative Michael Saunders, the aforementioned Cano, and my starting fantasy 3B Kyle Seager, extending his hitting streak. This was all followed by a two-run home run by the not-quite fantasy relevant Justin Smoak, proving that the sequence of X-HR is always more valuable than HR-X, where X is any positive offensive play in the game.

The sequence of Gonzalez-Villar struck again for two quick runs, but this time following a solo shot from former A's prospect Chris Carter, playing his natural position of DH. Jose Altuve created another run with his heads up baserunning, but this time it wasn't even against Iwakuma, as low-leverage reliever Dominic Leone had come on mid-inning. But he was out after that play of what was all of a sudden a close game, giving way to lefty specialist Joe Beimel. You can see here that McClendon is setting up the classic LOOGY/Set Up/Closer dynamic, provided the M's don't break it open again.

Speaking of classic bullpen usage, I believe Bo Porter could have avoided some drama earlier in the game if he had been willing to revisit the often-overlooked concept of what I'll refer to as the Long Save. Some non-nerds might not know, but there are two conditions to earning a save: 1) pitch the ninth with a small lead, etc., and 2) pitch the final three innings of any game. Dallas Keuchel has had a pretty good season so far, with both primitive and advanced metrics pegging his ERA at right around 3 1/2, but he hasn't had the track record of a guy who can consistently pitch past the 6th inning effectively, and would be most effective when combined with a long reliever, or spot starter who could certainly pitch three innings effectively. Guys such as Jerome Williams or Paul Clemens both fit that mold on the Astros roster. Bringing in one such "Long Closer at the start of the seventh (or at least having one ready to go by then) would have been a much faster play, and would probably not have drawn such ire from the opposing manager.

On second thought, seeing as the seventh inning ended with a caught-stealing play, leaving lefty Jason Castro still at bat, Beimel will remain in the game for the lefty-on-lefty matchup only, forcing McClendon to waste time with a non-commercial-break pitching change  to bring in Yoervis Medina. At least he made the call quickly so as not to provoke a tantrum from the other bench. Medina's a classic middle relief, bridge to the closer guys, who you really want to see work quickly and drama-free if they're on your team, but are also not that surprised to see them get hit hard, since there is so much volatility among relievers. Like what just happened when 3B (and fellow Iwakuma-nemesis) Matt Dominguez, Chris Carter, and Alex Presley (batting in George Springer's future spot in the lineup) combined for big hits to put the Astros within one, with the familiar tough out Marwin Gonzalez (3-3 today) coming to the plate. Let's see what happens!

UPDATE: Right after I was going on about traditional bullpen use, Seattle's second-highest profile Dominican free agent signing, Fernando Rodney heroically came in to record the four-out save, but not without a lot of "heavy breathing" as the TV pundits put it. Another game in the books from the wild AL West!