Hello fellow Looters! Long time no see! I would talk about it but I feel the topic of my article this week is actually very relevant to me disappearing for a few weeks. I am here today to talk about balancing life and Magic.
Now, we all love Magic. Many people call it the greatest game ever made and I would not disagree. I’ve spend lots of time playing, watching, researching, and talking about Magic. I have attended almost every type of Magic tournament even aside from the Pro Tour (And with any luck, I will eventually get there too). Just like my goal is to eventually make the Pro Tour, we all have our personal Magic goals. Some may just want to dominate their local FNM, some people want to build fun EDH decks, and some people like to play the finance game (Steamflogger Boss? Really?). Either way, Magic is almost like a second life for most of its enfranchised player base.
That being said, we all still have regular lives. Most of us have jobs that require 30 to 60 hours of our time each week. We have girlfriends and wives (hopefully not both…) that we’ve promised portions of our life to. For some of us, Magic, while it may be a big interest of ours, is not our only interest. There are many other hobbies and activities you want time to do. Not all my friends personally play Magic either. Even reading this article is time spent not playing Magic! (I’m a monster…) I could go on and on about the things in life that are not Magic and it would waste way too much room on this page so I will stop there. The main point being, there are a lot of things that can stop you from completing your Magic goal. In this article I want to go over ways that you can meet your Magic goals.
This step may seem simple but it is very important. Your goal must be two things: achievable and well defined.
Achievability is important especially when trying to balance Magic (or anything for that matter) with real life obligations. Additionally, you need to take a one step at a time approach. Stick to more short term goals. The reason being is, if you set a goal like “win worlds,” it is not very realistic if you haven’t even taken down an FNM or Game Day. Not saying it’s impossible but it is much more likely that you will complete an achievable goal and you can set a new one after that. A lot of people like to dream big (me included) but it is important to focus on the steps or you may get discouraged. Give yourself battles you can win!
Defining your goal down to the letter is also important. Skipping this step can make you feel lost in the woods and take away some of the accomplishment when you reach it. If your goal is win an event, winning a draft and winning a PPTQ are completely different things.
My current Magic Goal is to make it to an RPTQ. I have made the top eight of the last three PPTQs I have been to but I have not been able to break the threshold yet. My goal is very well defined and achievable. I have the time to attend a PPTQ every other Saturday and the means to build the deck I want to play.
Now that you have your goal, plan the details. The stricter you make it, the more likely you are to follow it. If you plan is, “I will watch more videos of drafting in order to get better.” Well…there is not much accountability there. Try something like, “Twice a week, I want to spend an hour a day watching someone draft and I want to draft once per week.” You can even plan what days of the week. I tend not to go that far as life will sometimes throw curve balls at you but if you can set aside a set day, that is even better!
Now, if you remember, my personal goal was to make it to an RPTQ. The best way I found to do this was to make a list of PPTQs within a certain distance (achievable) that I would attend in order to have a reasonable chance of winning one of them. During the week I research decks, listen to Podcasts, and watch people play other standard decks in the meta. I wish I had more time to play test but this is just more of knowing how much time you have and how to spend it.
Out of all of the steps, this is the most important as it is what so few people actually do. All of the previous steps were all to help make this step easier. Now that you have found your path, walk it! Attend the PPTQs you said. You only put them on your list because they were close and you could afford them and they were on days you were free. Make the plunge and start listening to the Magic content you wanted or reading more articles (like the lovely ones available on this site =D).
I have been going to the PPTQs on my list and so far it has caused me to get better at playing these events. My play has gotten tighter, I make less mistakes, and I have a good Magic rhythm going.
In all reality, these steps can be used to tackle anything in your life. From other hobbies, to work, to something else you have always wanted to do. If you wanted to lose weight. Set a goal weight, plan how you will lose the weight, and then execute.
Now Roy, you didn’t really cover much about planning your life around these steps. Well, this part is so specific to each person that will read this that it wouldn’t really provide much value for me to do so. You are going to know your own limitations so use that as a baseline for your goal. Use it as a restriction and an obstacle to overcome in your planning. Finally, make sure life does not stop you from following through. You wouldn’t have made the goal if a part of you didn’t really want it to happen.
With that being said, that is all I had for you this week! I hope you found this helpful and I hope it motivated you to chase after one of your Magic goals. Feel free to comment what your goals are as I would love to hear them. I will keep you guys posted on achieving my goal and maybe write articles about more future tournaments I attend. Thank you for reading and I see you next time! (Don’t think it works like that…)
Roy Anderson
@Sockymans on Twitter
One of my favorite things about Magic: The Gathering players is our unwavering interest in what lies ahead. No sooner is a new set spoiled than speculation begins for the next one, and the next, and the next.
I’m right there with all you speculators. To me, there’s nothing more fun than trying to guess the theme of the next set, or which mechanics they might use, or whether we’ll see yet another version of Jace.
So, without further ado, let the Speculation begin…
I hate to start with a downer, but I’m pretty certain of this one.
Why? Well, for one, let’s think of the enemy fetches from a marketing standpoint. Wizards is trying to make as much money as they can with their new products, which means they’re more likely to print cards that they know people will want to go out and buy.
Thing is, because of the success of original Innistrad, Wizards of the Coast (WoTC) already knows that the sequel will sell, regardless of what they put in there. So why would they add must-have items to an already must-have set? I think it’s much more likely that these cards will appear in a new, unfamiliar world, similar to what they did in Khans of Tarkir. That way, WoTC can be sure that players will buy the new set, even if the world is unfamiliar.
Furthermore, they’ll never allow all ten fetches to be in Standard at the same time. I mean, at that point, you’d have to think of a reason not to play five-colour good-stuff…
Wouldn’t you want to see the story behind Karn‘s creation of Mirrodin, or a set exploring the formation of Ravnica‘s original guilds, or the true story behind Nicol Bolas‘s summer reading projects? Enter the prequel block.
This is not totally unprecedented. Just look at Fate Reforged, which depicted Tarkir 1,200 years before the Khans, or Magic Origins, which told the stories of the core planeswalkers before they were planeswalkin’. Personally, I think a prequel block would be super fun–so long as there’s no equivalent character to Jar-Jar Binks, that is.
The fact that Emrakul wouldn’t appear in the new Zendikar block was probably the worst kept secret since Oath of the Gatewatch (because of all the leaks…get it?). It seemed like every other flavor text on Battle for Zendikar cards read something like, “Hey, haven’t seen that freaky jellyfish in a while. Wonder where he is.” Also, it’s been hinted that he has the ability to travel to different planes.
We get it. He’s not on Zendikar. Which would mean he’s on another plane. Which would mean he’s a planeswalker.
Well, not so fast. Wizards has said that Emrakul isn’t actually a planeswalker. But if the dude’s walking from plane to plane, how else do you express that in-game if not with a planeswalker card?
Was Gandalf really dead? Or Captain Barbosa? Or any character in any comic book? The only thing more fun than killing a beloved character is bringing them back in glorious fashion, which is exactly what they’re going to do with Elspeth. ‘Nuff said!
WoTC has already played with this aesthetic a little bit with the Izzet guild of Ravnica, but I think there’s still plenty of interest among players. I mean, ever since William Gibson’s Neuromancer, this has been a popular subgenre of speculative literature. Who wouldn’t want to see a set full of cities in the clouds, airships, complex contraptions, and ridiculous goggles? If enough players are interested, they’ll make it.
Of all the predictions on this list, this one’s my favourite.
First of all, let’s look at this from a story standpoint. We’ve already established that gods can be made and gods can be destroyed––just ask Xenagos. So when we return to Theros, what if we find that all the previous gods have been overthrown and replaced with new gods, gods that represent not just one or two colors of magic, but three?
Come on. You know this would be awesome. They’d have something like 10 devotion in order to turn into creatures, and then another bunch of wacky abilities to go with it.
Furthermore, players love the wedge theme. Head Designer Mark Rosewater said in his podcast that a wedge set was one of the most requested sets around, which is why they made Khans of Tarkir. Plus, the original Commander set featured wedge commanders, many of which are still very popular today. This prediction might not pay off for a while, but I’ve got my fingers crossed.
The new two-block paradigm proves one thing to me: we’ll see a lot more return blocks. Heck, we’ll already have back-to-back returns this year alone. And that’s awesome––with so many amazing worlds in the backlog, why not revisit them?
But you might be wondering this: why Kamigawa? That block wasn’t quite so amazing.
I’d have to agree with you there. It was sort of a train wreck, only with ninjas, samurais, and weird anthropomorphic rat people. The cards don’t play well outside of the block, and there are so many legendary creatures that it almost ruins the whole point of legendary creatures.
However, purely from a worldbuilding standpoint, there’s a rich template there. And, just when you thought they’d abandoned that world altogether, Kaseto comes along in the new Commander product. To paraphrase the great Bill Engvall: “There’s your sign.”
Sigh. This is probably my least favorite prediction on the list, but also the most likely. Actually, when asked about this very subject on his blog, Mark Rosewater wrote, “the question is ‘when’ and not ‘if.'” They did enemy colors in 2015, so I’m guessing they’ll do allies for 2016, and then off to four colors.
EDH is my favorite format, so I’ve got to admit, I’m a little nervous for this one. The flavor for quad-colored cards seems exceedingly difficult to get right. Case and point: the Nephilim from Dissension. In my opinion, the Nephilim kind of capture the feel of three of their colors, but there’s always that fourth color that might as well not be there.
On the bright side, I think we’re in a golden age of Magic. Design and story have never been better than they are now, which gives me hope for this one. Let’s see what happens.
I’m talking Lorwyn versus Zendikar, New Phyrexia versus Ravnica, Dominiaria versus Innistrad––stuff like that. War of the Worlds, Magic style.
Okay, I know it’s wacky. But this sort of thing isn’t totally unprecedented in Magic’s history, either. Time Spiral block played with older sets and planes converging. With New Phyrexia, we’ve also seen that old planes can reappear in new places.
And come on. Wouldn’t you want to see Squee take on Grimgrin? You know you would.
Just to troll us.
Hope you enjoyed this article! Am I a visionary genius or simply insane? Let me know what you thought of the predictions in the comments below! And remember… always Play the Ten Drop.
By Kyle A. Massa – Play the Ten Drop
You can reach Kyle at @mindofkyleam on Twitter or through his site www.kyleamassa.com
