Magic 2013

I believe I've mentioned Games with Gold before, and I've diligently at least purchased every single title (whether I've actually downloaded/played it yet or not). So far, they've been an ok mix of things I've known about and other things I'd not considered, but this month, they've got me.

Stepping into the wayback machine, you may be aware that from 1993-95, I was in the U.S. Army Band as a trombone player (MOS Specialty 02E), and while I was in, I got hooked on a collectible card game called Magic: The Gathering. I played the crap out of this game and spent a ton of money on it. Thing is, Wizards of the Coast wasn't the recipient of most of my money. Instead, it was other players and card shops who got my hard earned cash because I wanted to get the coolest and rarest cards to complete my dream decks. My claim to fame was the ultimate discard deck that took down just about everyone it touched (except that one guy who played protection from black, though he conceded the first round when I made him discard his key card). Ah, those were the days.

Since then, I discarded every Magic card I owned (with the exception of some I placed in a binder as mementos such as a complete set of the Revised (otherwise known as the 3rd) Edition), declaring it far too expensive to play any longer. Time passed, but as time tends to do, old memories fade and sometimes, old friends come back. It worked for Doctor Who when I revisited that old friend a few years back, and now, Magic is back when it came up as a freebie in Games With Gold. I downloaded it and immediately set my completion percentage back 20 achievements (25 with the DLC I'll probably spring for).

The first thing it asked was how much Magic you've played: None, a little, or a lot. Well, I played a lot from 1994-1997, but none since, so I said a little. Overnight, I remembered how to play, learned the new terminology, and picked up 9 achievements. I've been pretty handily stomping the computer, and I'll have to take on those "beat a player on xBox Live" achievements here eventually. I figure I'll beat the campaigns and other "versus the computer" stuff first, and then hit up other players. Should be fun, and I'm kind of excited by the prospect. Since this is a free game to all Gold players, there should also be a ton of people out there playing it.

Where does that leave me on the original card game? Well, back in the day, the game was sold in starter decks of 60 cards and booster packs of 15. "Starter deck" is really a misnomer, since while you can play a game with a starter deck, it would be a royal mess of an attempt since the cards and lands are completely random. I've learned that modern magic is sold in intro decks, which are a complete pre-built decks that are immediately playable and require no real deck-building skill to just start. That was what always got people in the beginning. How do I start? How do I build a deck? Now that I have a zillion cards, what do I do with them?

Deck-building is a skill acquired through trial and error. You throw a bunch of like-minded cards together and hope for the best. When you're playing and find a card you hate staring back at you, you toss it and put in something else. The goal is to get a collection where you always have a card you like in your hand. Wizards of the Coast took care of that first, most difficult, step of the like-minded cards, and from there, it's up to you to change them out to make it your own.

Will I play the card game again? I'm tempted. I figured out while playing this computer version that I went about it the wrong way all those years ago. I obsessed over buying the best cards without playing the game for the fun factor and collecting whatever happened to be in the packs you can buy. Granted, I grabbed my share of random mixes, and oh yes, I bought entire boxes of boosters, but I was going for quantity as well as those precious rares instead of just using what I had on-hand to just play. If I went into playing again, I'd probably grab a couple pre-made decks of new cards, pick up some bulk randoms (Amazon has them in droves - 1000 cards for $20 and that sort of thing), and then set myself a periodic spending limit to not surpass for whatever else I wanted.

Who would I play? Same people I play all my other games with. Got the Princesses, the Queen, and the Engineer at the very least. I have my own CCG that I've been developing, and I know I'll need to take it into the world to show off, so having another game to tote with me to fit in would be useful. This is all musings at present, and I'm just playing the Xbox version for the moment, but the future is out there.