Subject: Re: The Dojo/Boring Decks Discussion Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1998 05:06:36 -0500 From: Stuart Kahler Cards Karsten Dürotin wrote: > One Volcanic doesn't do much good. For playing Extended, you would really > need 30-40 multilands, that's a $300 investment at least. Too expensive for > many players. I sold off all my multilands, and made a fortune on them when > I stopped Magic, and now I don't need them, since I play Type II only. > Still, I think they exclude many players from extended tournaments. And the > Power9 - try winning any major Type I tournamant without them. Nearly > impossible. Hardly! If you can't join 'em, hose 'em I say. Try the following: 4 Gorilla Shaman 4 Dwarven Miner 4 Ruination 4 Wasteland 1 Strip Mine $25 easy. Easily hoses many $1000+ type 1 decks. Salt to taste. Maybe a little Green alongside for Kird Ape/Elfs. A few stormbinds for permission and black weenie, and lots of burn. The common idea that type 1 is so expensive confuses me a bit though. Yeah, a set of nice condition multilands will cost you around $300 to pick up, but at least in a year or two, they will still be worth that much. A set of P-9 could easily set you back $1000, but unlike Time Warp, your Time Walk is going to hold it's value. How many people paid $20+ for Balduvian Hordes, only to see them plummet to $5 now. If you pay $100 for a Library of Alexandria today, you KNOW that you won't have to take $25 for it in a year. When you buy solid type 1 cards, you don't have to worry about the value of them plummetting like type 2 stuff. Competitive type 2 players _have_ to spend $1000 per year to keep up with all three expansions that come out, or they get left in the dust. And what happens to the sets they invested in once they are rotated out of type 2? They plummet to 1/4th of their cost to assemble. The only way to play in type 2 cheaply is to rape high school kids for their Tradewinds, Mox Diamonds, Scrolls, Reflecting Pools, Gemstones, Blessings, Oaths, Hatreds and all the good cards that you _need_ 4 of to play effectively. The only type 2 cards that you can really count on to hold up their value are stuff like Birds, Wraths, Geddons, Disks, Ball Lightnings, Necro(?), and maybe Shivan. Type 2 has actually made it cheaper in the long run for type 1 players. As soon Alice left type 2, my friends and I started picking up Thaws, Posts, FoWs and other cool stuff dirt cheap. Perfectly good, abusable cards that were previously expensive all of a sudden being cast off as unplayable. We can't wait for MirViLite to get rotated out by Urza's Saga so we can pick up dozens of Gemstone Mines, Blessings, Hammers, UDPs, Frenetics, Abeyances, Tithes and other cream for pocket change. Heck, in a year or so, ProsBloom could easily become a $30 deck. Also, in reference to the people who want almost every card to be tourney viable... No matter how high WotC sets the curve, there will always be a curve; and it will have cards at the top, and cards at the bottom. The cards at the top will get played and the rest ignored. Also, it is very important for sets to be playable in sealed tournaments, and even more important for playable decks to be buildable by someone who only spends $30 on each set. If a group of friends only want to spend a total of $100 per set, then they are entitled to get a game just as playable as if they spent the money on some other game. Stuart Kahler