I bought the starter deck and a deck builders kit. Total cost came to around $40 - I've been buying my cards at imaginary games and will probably grab a fat pack when he gets more in on Friday.
Played for the first time this weekend in about 10 years. It was actually pretty fun.
Looking to buy a box of 2014 core. Is there a good site online? Local shops are charging $130 plus sales tax. Seems a bit steep.
When I've ordered in the past I've used an ebay store. Look up mirajtrading. They're good and I've never had an issue with them. I think core 2014 booster boxes were $108.63 with free shipping.
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After watching #### Magic again, I thought about giving MtG a try. I've never played it before, and truth be told, I thought it was the dorkiest thing in the world. Pogs were where it was at.
Nevertheless, is it hard to learn? Are the electronic versions of the game as good as the old fashioned board game? I saw the board game in a Target last week too, but my wife won't play with me so I didn't buy.
EDIT: I watched the Southpark episode of MtG with Chickens. Can't use the actual word without getting censored haha.
Magic is easy to learn, hard to master, and bloody expensive if you buy either real cards or use MTG Online.
But as with the start of this thread, Duels of the Plainswalkers is cheap and covers the basics.
This.
@CroFlames:
A basic starter deck is like 15 bucks I think. It's a playable deck but untweaked. Costs may sky rocket depending on how you want to customize it. HOWEVER, the biggest issue with MtG is often finding someone to play with you. They too would have to incur this cost.
As others have noted, just paying a little less and playing with virtual cards off the get go would be cheaper and probably be the better idea if you want to learn the game. If you like it, consider grabbing starter decks so you have a functional deck to play with prior to grabbing booster packs. You could even purchase multiple starter decks of differing colors and recombine them in different ways.
I just realized I think the last time I played MtG was exactly a decade ago.
Last edited by DoubleF; 10-06-2015 at 10:24 AM.
Reason: Edit price.
It sounds like you can simply outspend your opponent and win in the traditional method of playing?
Yes and no. For instance in a group of friends, if only one guy is playing competitive outside that group, it can become an issue BUT the game has always had it set up so some simpler decks can remain competitive, getting wins with the right draws.
I might give it a whirl on Steam then to try it out.
It sounds like you can simply outspend your opponent and win in the traditional method of playing?
A deck is about synergies and efficiencies. If you're basing your plan on playing a rare card that has nothing to do with the rest of the deck, you spend lots of turns doing nothing.
As a metaphor:
The Oilers may have more high end rares, but since they don't work well with each other and the make up of the stack has very obvious weaknesses, winning may be difficult. Half the deck is full of plugs. What happens if McDavid and golden boys are sitting on the bottom of the deck? What if the other team keeps checking you and you can't deploy your super Hall and Eberle? In such a case, the opponent often might have the appropriate response to defeat you before you defeat him. You'll be lucky to be happy winning the face off.
The Flames may not have as many high end rares, but the commons/uncommons jive well with the ones that are there, thus creating a stronger stack than the sum of its parts. Sometimes you have a bad draw, but realize Jooris can/will do good work for you while you wait for Johnny to be drawn.
Don't get me wrong, rares can be a great addition to a deck. But if you take too long to set up, you'll probably lose. If you have a great start but no finish, you'll also probably lose. Having a common theme may help with synergies. Having a mishmash of random everything (regardless of pieces) will make it hard to get the full potential of your cards into play.
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DoubleF has it right, but I wanted to toss in some extra thought
If you play for fun and/or don't play in sanctioned events, what you spend doesn't matter.
When you are ready to take the next step up (either to Friday Night Magic or MTGO), your budget decks will be at a disadvantage some of the time. BUT there are decent quality decks you can build on the cheap that can hold their own. Any deck can win in any matchup given the right draw - the more expensive decks are just more consistent and finely tuned. A random mashup of cards might win 20% of the time, a solid budget deck 50% and a highly tuned deck 60% of the time.
All that being said, my preferred method of play is "limited." There are two formats of limited - draft and sealed. Either way, you build a deck out of cards that you open... no pre-constructed decks here! It generally puts everyone on the same level card wise and is very much a skill testing format (card evaluation and selection, deck building, etc). Only problems with it (for new players) are that you have to buy packs ($15 to draft at a game store, chance for prizes) and that you will suck for your first few cracks at it.
I really enjoy all aspects of MTG, but prefer draft the most. So much so, in fact, that I stream it on MTGO one or two nights a week and upload the occasional draft video to youtube. And when my MTG friends get together, it's always to draft the latest set.
Don't they usually run sealed draft at Friday Night magic? That's the best option then its more about knowledge and deck creation and everyone has a chance to win theoretically.
Don't they usually run sealed draft at Friday Night magic? That's the best option then its more about knowledge and deck creation and everyone has a chance to win theoretically.
Depends on what store. The Sentry Box does draft and sealed on friday night
