Hey all. With spoiler season getting ready to ramp up I thought I’d pre-empt it with a few points about it. Let’s go:

5)The spoiler season

I haven’t formally made a ranked list of things that make me salty, but if I did I know for sure, spoiler season would be up there. There’s just so many things that people do during spoiler season that put me on tilt that my daily sodium levels go through the roof.

First off, people trying to predict what’s being printed. No I’m not talking about people organising collector numbers and all that to make some generic predictions like another flip card is coming. I’m talking about people who are attempting to predict reprints or cards that will fix a problem in a format, usually modern. “Surely they’ll reprint snapcaster mage and Liliana , their prices are way too high for modern”,  “They only printed Rending Volley to tone down twin in modern”, “Instead of banning Eldrazi Temple and Eye of Ugin, they’re just going to print some answers in SOI”. No, that’s now how this works, that’s not how any of this works. Sometimes I wish these people would take a step back and actually listen to what they’re saying. Do you think high level WotC executives sit around a board room with take-out chinese food discussing what cards are too expensive in modern? Honestly I wouldn’t be shocked if these same people told me that the only reason they revisited Innistrad at all, is to get modern staple prices down. I’m not sure if it’s the same group of people, but it’s equally tilting when something doesn’t get reprinted and everyone is furious. “No serum visions reprints? Wow thanks WotC for the $15 common”.

 

4) People attempting to evaluate cards with super strong opinions.

Literally 10% of the set can be spoiled and people are running around saying “This will be insane in standard, what was wizards thinking?” Or “Unplayable trash”. Everyone is horrible at evaluating cards, it’s pretty much a fact by now. Did you think squadron hawk was going to be a 4 of in a dominating standard deck when it was spoiled? Probably not, and I’m sure someone called it unplayable trash. It’s like people don’t even consider the context for the format cards will be played in. Have you ever seen the MTGSalvation thread for Bob when he was spoiled? It’s depressing to read. I think it would be way less tilting if people we’re not confident in their opinions which statistically speaking are likely to be wrong. Nope, everyone has a PhD in Card Evaluation and speaks in absolutes. Where are all these people that pre-ordered infinite Aurelia’s Fury? Probably living in the slums after dumping their life savings into (unplayable) cardboard.

 

3) What might be worse though is people not accepting that their deck is dead when sets rotate out.  

I remember when Innistrad rotated out and Theros was coming in, kids were popping off about what new cards Jund is getting, what Jund is “going to look like going forward”, and how to adapt to the new Theros “meta” (See last weeks article on my opinion of “meta”). Listen pal, you’re not gonna like this.. Jund is dead. Huntmaster is RIP, Olivia is RIP, Bonfire is RIP (But Kibler is happy), and the list goes on. Your deck is dead, it happens nearly every time sets rotate, deal with it. Or you know, keep making hot piles of trash and wondering why you’re dropping games to the 11 year old at FNM with the intro deck he got for his birthday.

 

2) FNM Hero’s

You know the guy, he laughs at the new players “un-optimized” build of temur aetherworks. After every round win, he goes to the back of the room with the rest of team “4-5ed a GP” and snickers at the dog he just took to school. Referring to Pro’s by their first name, chanting about how Reid’s latest article has called black underrated in Kaladesh limited so how does he continue to wheel these unbelievable cards at his 5 person draft table.

When people talk about getting more people to Standard events, or to FNM, I rarely believe it is about the format or the area, because every Local LGS has at least a table of these winners. And, if they turn a seasoned player like me off, I can’t imagine how they make, actual regular people feel.

 

1) Bad combo players.

One of the worst things to sit across the table from is a person who just sleeved up their combo deck, and you know you’re probably dead, they might know you’re dead but who knows what they’re thinking about because they haven’t even gold-fished a single game with their deck and they’re trying to fumble through the interactions while the round clock ticks down to an unfortunate unintentional draw. The worst part is most of the time it isn’t even hard to figure out, had they literally just watched one video of someone else playing the deck and then played a practice game against their infant nephew they could get through this excruciating experience with the W, but nah screw that they lost to this deck and it’s stupid broken mechanics for a long time so now they’ve built it for themselves and are ready to terrorise their opponents in return. The only thing they’re really doing though is making me praise Wizards of the Coast for banning cards like summer bloom because I’m not sure how much longer I can watch someone ponder which lands to get from their library turn 2 like they’re doing mental thermodynamics calculations only to finally figure out oh right it’s the same two lands that give my primeval titan haste so that I can spend another 10 minutes trying to figure out which other 2 lands I can pull from my deck while you pull hair from your scalp.

 

As a little Christmas present, we have a nice screenshot from my pal Danny Martens of an MTGO Burn player (in cube no less) being salty due to some crisp topdecks:

topdeck-king

 

 

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4 Responses

  1. falcomaster420

    Somebody tell “Danny Martens” there is a print screen button on his computer so he can stop taking photos of his screen with whatever potato he was using.

    Reply
  2. Frustrated Small Town Spike

    What’s wrong with trying at FNM? That’s the only place I get to play magic because MTGO is such a trap!

    I’m competitive deal with it.

    Reply
  3. xXxquickscopexXx

    Although I agree with most of your points. As a master speculator I have found myself right about both Skirsdag High Priest and Great Sable Stag. I believe Wizards should tell the Magic community which cards will be playable before a sets release. This will help avoid the preorder of any cards such as Skaab Ruinator or Time Reversal.

    Reply
    • Anonymous

      Holyyyyy shiiiiiiit. Did you not just read the damn article? The first thing you come down here to say is you’re a ‘master speculator’ and you brag about being right about TWO cards? Both of which came out what, 3-6 years ago? Which means you have been wrong about how many thousands of cards since!?!? BUT YOU JUST HAD TO POINT OUT THAT YOU WERE RIGHT ABOUT THOSE TWO!!!!
      And you obviously should be working for WotC! You know exactly what they should be doing! Like jeez man, really?

      p.s. Literally ANY nickname would be better than ‘xXxquickscopexXx’. What are you, 12 years old?

      Reply

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