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Post by gabochido on Jan 13, 2012 0:59:53 GMT -5
Some people complain that MTG is expensive. It is if you want to play competitively in the big formats: Standard, Modern and Legacy. However, most of the other formats can be very cheap. Pauper is of course, one of them. Its the cheapest way to play a competitive constructed format, but there are many other ways to play and enjoy the game of magic for very little. I'll use this thread to post a few examples of ways you can milk MTGO to its fullest.
Planeswalker Format.
Just for creating an MTGO account you have access to a few hundred cards, including various rares and a couple of mythics with which to create some fun and powerful decks. You can purchase a few expansions (each with about 200-300 cards) for about 4 or 5 dollars from the store though the initial cards you get are deep enough for a few fun decks. In MTGO its only really geared towards newer players but you will often find people with interesting decks playing this format.
Beware though, these cards are gold bordered and are not tradable so once you buy them, they are stuck in your account forever. They are also not usable in any other format in MTGO, not even casual non-sanctioned events. This is because they are supposed to be part of a single, exclusive package that works on its own. This format turns MTG into a living card game, as opposed to a collectible one. A living card game is the term used to describe card based games that just have fixed boxed expansions so that everyone can easily be at the same level in terms of cards and its only up to skill, not money, to decide who is the best. If you haven't given this format a chance, I recommend at least trying it out.
HINT: the Jund decks with ascetic trolls are the strongest!
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Post by gabochido on Jan 13, 2012 1:09:17 GMT -5
Phantom Events
These are weekly limited events that let you play a draft or a sealed event for just 2 or 4 tix respectively. The catch is, you don't keep your cards. Its like going to a friends house and playing a sealed event with the cards from the box of boosters he or she bought. For those 2 or 4 tix you get to win prizes though: In the draft, you pay 2 tix, play 3 rounds and get 1 M12 booster for winning 2 rounds and 2 boosters for winning 3. In the 6 booster sealed you play for rounds and also get 1 booster for 2 rounds won, 2 for 3 rounds and 3 for 4. Most people that play these events are very casual, so the competition level is relatively low so the chances of wining at least 1 booster are high.
There is another big catch actually. The boosters are made up of cards from the planeswalker format. The problem with this is that its not a format really made for limited play, so you'll often have very cluncky decks with little synergy. Mind you, I don't think its much worse than the Masters Edition sets which were supposedly created with limited in mind or any of the older sets that were printed before limited was really part of the development process (Mercadian Masques comes to mind).
The bottom line is that for very cheap you get to enjoy a few hours of sealed or draft and even have a chance to make a small profit if you do well enough.
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Post by gabochido on Jan 13, 2012 1:16:27 GMT -5
Joining the Beta test for the new client. If you request access to the Beta client (see here: www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/other/12062011d) and are selected to help test it, you are allowed to play in any number of limited events for completely free (though there are no prizes either). The cards you get from these events are only valid within the beta test framework so you don't gain free cards from them but the formats are very interesting. They vary from month to month but they are most often quite fun, including some formats that include a large number of rares and mythics in each booster. The caveats are that its an unfinished product so there will be bugs and some games won't go as smoothly as you would like and also that you have to be willing to actually help in improving the interface. This means you should be posting in their forums thing on how they can improve and sending bugs when you encounter them. If you like limited events and you like ranting, this is a great opportunity for you!
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Post by gabochido on Jan 13, 2012 2:41:20 GMT -5
Player Run Events (PREs) You can find a variety of free events for cheap formats sponsored by various bots or just organized for fun. There are multiple pauper variants, including standard and modern pauper or peasant (adding 5 uncommons to a pauper deck, which can allow for whole new strategies). One format I find particularly appealing is the Heirloom format which is based on the cost of cards. Only cheap cards are allowed in this format, which basically means no generally powerful cards but also encourages new and interesting strategies. Most of these events are organized through the MTGO forums found here: community.wizards.com/go/forum/view/75846/135082/Magic_Online_Player_Run_Events and almost all of the pauper related events are found at the PDC site (http://pdcmagic.com/) For me the one big limiting factor is time. While there are some leagues, these are mostly scheduled events that don't usually fit my particular schedules so I find it hard to participate in them but I'm sure others will find them convenient.
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Post by gabochido on Jan 13, 2012 2:48:21 GMT -5
Create Preconstructed decks from your draft/sealed leftovers.
This also works in real life but is even easier in MTGO. Whenever there is a new set, Wizards releases preconstructed boxed decks to promote the set to newer players. These precons are fun, varied, balanced, have interesting themes and make excellent decks to play in the new player room. They are definitely not worth buying from the store but you automatically get the deck list by looking in your tournament folder and you can usually fill up the majority of the cards after a Release/pre-release event and a couple of drafts. From there, it should be easy to match the remaining cards for less than a tix (I will often use up unused credit from bots to get the remaining cards of any given precon). Note that these decks are made to be modified so there will usually be 2 or 3 cards that are just plain bad and useless. To keep the essence of the deck I usually just swap them out for something similar and then go into the new player room for some fun, lighthearted games.
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ANZ
Raging Brainstorm
Posts: 90
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Post by ANZ on Feb 7, 2012 18:33:03 GMT -5
You know what, gabochido, you're making a pretty good contribution here, and even tough i have no MTGO, thanks.
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Post by gabochido on Feb 7, 2012 21:42:08 GMT -5
Glad to see someone found it interesting . I also know of a few ways to get a little bit more out of paper magic (some casual formats that let you play with more of your cards) that I might post later on.
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