5 ms·

Magic and Loss, Part 1: Magic in the Cards

63 points by cybersoyuz 3y ago

mproud 3y ago
See the cards in the original printed glory: https://scryfall.com/sets/leb https://scryfall.com/sets/leb
cainxinth 3y ago
Just want to say, I don’t follow or play this game at all (tried it once or twice years ago but that’s it), but that was a fascinating read! Very interesting from both the ludology and business perspectives.
tedunangst 3y ago
3 mana vanilla 2/2. Yeah, this is definitely some vintage magic.
cstuder 3y ago
Getting another turn? Two blue mana sounds about fair. Back in my day: https://web.archive.org/web/20220529033205/https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/my-day-2009-08-17 https://web.archive.org/web/20220529033205/https://magic.wiz...
Dwedit 3y ago
All screenshots are from Microprose Magic.
- thom 3y ago
  Excited if the next article is about Shandalar. Every few years I find myself coming back to that (and building some unbeatable version of The Deck).
  - pavlov 3y ago
    The next article is definitely about the Microprose computer game version because the writer alludes to Sid Meier’s involvement.
  - mathgeek 3y ago
    Will always be one of my favorite games. Perfectly combined my love of computer strategy games with CCGs and was just weird enough to keep me coming back.
    - thom 3y ago
      Also the one place you can play Contract from Below, so technically the format is even more powerful than Vintage!
- solardev 3y ago
  Lol thank you for the clarification! And here I thought, "Man, that's not how I remember those cards. I didn't realize 90s printed cards were so pixelated, with Arial and bad border control everywhere. I must really be getting old." Makes me feel better that it was just a video game :)
tanepiper 3y ago
In my entire life (I'm 41) I only ever shoplifted once, and was caught - and it was for Magic: The Gathering cards from the Virgin Megastore in Edinburgh in 1998. Yes, it was crack for kids.
smurda 3y ago
In ‘94 I was 11 and Magic was blowing up in my hometown - the 3rd (or Revised) edition had just come out. The local comic book stores would have Magic tournaments on Friday nights. Turnout would usually be 30-50 people and it was mostly grown ups. You would play a number of 1:1 matches and whoever had the best records at the end got to a final four. The winner of the tournament would get a high value card. I played with an all red deck with quick spells to inflict major damage (Fireballs, Lightning bolts, etc…) and Forks to double the power of those spells. The grown ups didn’t like it because “it was a cheap strategy”. I sold all my Magic cards in college - I really wish I would have kept those.
- daniel-cussen 3y ago
  [dead]
- evanelias 3y ago
  > I sold all my Magic cards in college - I really wish I would have kept those. It could be worse! I started playing in Dec 1993 when 2nd (Unlimited) and Arabian Nights came out, but sold all my best cards by the late 90s. As a teenager I was pretty happy with the profit. It was probably a grand or two if I recall correctly, from selling my mint unlimited Lotus, multiple moxes, 40 dual lands, 4 Juzam Djinn, Time Walk, Chaos Orb, etc...
jdmoreira 3y ago
Just in case someone here gets nostalgic for the "old" game… Search for "oldschool 93/94" and "Premodern"
- thom 3y ago
  Yeah, I could read those deck lists all day. Wonderful stuff.
the-dude 3y ago
Totally unrelated to the Lou Reed album? : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_and_Loss https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_and_Loss That is a really captivating album.
- mproud 3y ago
  Probably intentional, as a pun
2-718-281-828 3y ago
apparently there is an open source version of mtg based on a standard deck of cards which has been around since the 70s and possibly was the inspiration for mtg. https://www.pagat.com/combat/cuttle.html https://www.pagat.com/combat/cuttle.html
- r00fus 3y ago
  Fascinating. While my elderly dad is amazing at competitive card games he doesn’t like any game that doesn’t use the standard 52 card deck. I’ll give this a shot! It’s really possible that Cuttle was the predecessor to Magic.
  - 2-718-281-828 3y ago
    It's amazing how many different games you can play with one or two standard decks. It's also an amazing conversation catalyst as it takes off the pressure to constantly talk and introduces opportunities for unusual spontaneously arising subjects. Current favorites are Spite and Malice and Gin Rummy - pretty much everybody seems to enjoy those games. Cuttle I haven't tried, yet, and it's obviously not a game you can learn within ten minutes and just play. But I keep it on the radar.
thom 3y ago
Magic has been such a huge part of my life. At my lowest point after moving to a new town, we were gifted a pile of cards from one of my dad’s coworkers. It was the only thing keeping me going and more or less saved my relationship with my dad. It’s still, for me, the best game ever designed and in my 40s with 3 kids I still play and watch hours of content every week. Heck, we even have some hall of famers on our cap sheet at my current startup which somehow fills me with pride. My son has introduced me to Yu Gi Oh and Pokémon but they both lack the fundamental elegance of MtG. It’s probably not fair to call Magic simple given the size and complexity of the rules at this point, but at the lowest level it really is just about combining simple things to achieve infinite variety. The best cards have short text and chime nicely with the theme of the card and wider story. The worst are like Yu Gi Oh, a page of complex tiny text that tries to do too much. One of the saddest things is that, as you become better at the game with a deeper grasp of the rules and the cards, you never really recapture that feeling of the early days, when every card was exciting. Draft comes close (picking cards from random booster packs to try and piece together a deck) and Cube certainly captures the nostalgia (drafting with packs made of your favourite or most powerful cards). But still the smell of an opened booster takes you back. Wizards has made many mistakes over the years and but Magic is extremely healthy and several recent sets have been all-time greats. Both Magic Online (the ugly but fairly complete online client that has _every_ card) and Arena (the more modern client that’s a bit simpler and easier to play but only has recent stuff) are actively maintained so you can play anything, anytime. My only sadness now is that I never really made it to the pro tour, but there’s always time.
- pavlov 3y ago
  > “as you become better […] you never really recapture that feeling of the early days” It’s the same with everything, isn’t it. There’s a stage in life when you’re relatively young and it makes sense to go deeper into whatever inspires you. But as you grow older it’s probably good to make an effort to try more new things, to get back some of that feeling of discovery. It may not work out quite like that but it’s worth to keep trying.
  - thom 3y ago
    Yeah, same with programming certainly - the feeling as a kid of just pushing through to get something done no matter what the code looks like. Now you’re second guessing everything and trying to do a professional job. But it’s rare as an adult to be able to throw yourself into a new pursuit without judgment. With the internet everyone knows what ‘good’ looks like, everybody’s hustling, everything’s professionalised. The ability to experience raw, messy joy is something you’re not taught to cherish.
fcatalan 3y ago
I'm glad to find my sentiment reflected in the article: I was interested in RPGs and wargames in the early 90s. Even in my relatively backwater hometown there were events, stores or clubs were I could socialize over them. It was all swept away by MtG within a few months, and I had the misfortune of not "getting it" myself and suddenly being left without anyone to play anywhere. So I'm still repelled by card games to this day.
- solardev 3y ago
  Have you tried rejoining the scene? These days I see my local game store having wargame nights, Magic nights, tabletop nights, etc. I think the market for all of those has exploded over the last decade and there's sooooo much gaming of all sorts now. Truly a nerd's paradise :D
  - fcatalan 3y ago
    In a way yes, an important part of the appeal of the games were the miniatures, and during the pandemic I got back into collecting and painting them and it's become my main hobby since then.
    - solardev 3y ago
      Cool! I'm always impressed by other people's miniatures work. I never had that sort of patience... little grey men it is.
remram 3y ago
I really enjoy MtG, even though I only got into it very late. The commercial aspect really irks me however. I don't think a game should be both competitive and collectible. After playing with printed cards for a while, I went shopping for games with a similar vibe but a smaller pool of cards. Epic Card Game has been a lot of fun, especially in a draft format. I am not sure why it was never popular, though I assume the ridiculously un-googleable name has something to do with it. https://www.epiccardgame.com/ https://www.epiccardgame.com/ 120 unique cards for $15 was hard to beat, and I was since able to acquire the entire collection of cards for less than $100 (whether that's a good thing or a bad thing is up to you). Other more eclectic mentions are Mindbug, Riftforce, Superjack (regular cards), Arcmage (opensource).
toobeary 3y ago
I spent a lot of years after, trying to recapture the wonder 11 year old me felt those first months of Magic, where every card seemed a literal portal to another realm. I’ll probably never find that feeling again.

63 points by cybersoyuz 3y ago

See the cards in the original printed glory: https://scryfall.com/sets/leb https://scryfall.com/sets/leb

Just want to say, I don’t follow or play this game at all (tried it once or twice years ago but that’s it), but that was a fascinating read! Very interesting from both the ludology and business perspectives.

tedunangst 3y ago

3 mana vanilla 2/2. Yeah, this is definitely some vintage magic.

cstuder 3y ago

Getting another turn? Two blue mana sounds about fair. Back in my day: https://web.archive.org/web/20220529033205/https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/my-day-2009-08-17 https://web.archive.org/web/20220529033205/https://magic.wiz...

Dwedit 3y ago

All screenshots are from Microprose Magic.

thom 3y ago
Excited if the next article is about Shandalar. Every few years I find myself coming back to that (and building some unbeatable version of The Deck).
- pavlov 3y ago
  The next article is definitely about the Microprose computer game version because the writer alludes to Sid Meier’s involvement.
- mathgeek 3y ago
  Will always be one of my favorite games. Perfectly combined my love of computer strategy games with CCGs and was just weird enough to keep me coming back.
  - thom 3y ago
    Also the one place you can play Contract from Below, so technically the format is even more powerful than Vintage!
solardev 3y ago
Lol thank you for the clarification! And here I thought, "Man, that's not how I remember those cards. I didn't realize 90s printed cards were so pixelated, with Arial and bad border control everywhere. I must really be getting old." Makes me feel better that it was just a video game :)

tanepiper 3y ago

In my entire life (I'm 41) I only ever shoplifted once, and was caught - and it was for Magic: The Gathering cards from the Virgin Megastore in Edinburgh in 1998. Yes, it was crack for kids.

smurda 3y ago

In ‘94 I was 11 and Magic was blowing up in my hometown - the 3rd (or Revised) edition had just come out. The local comic book stores would have Magic tournaments on Friday nights. Turnout would usually be 30-50 people and it was mostly grown ups. You would play a number of 1:1 matches and whoever had the best records at the end got to a final four. The winner of the tournament would get a high value card. I played with an all red deck with quick spells to inflict major damage (Fireballs, Lightning bolts, etc…) and Forks to double the power of those spells. The grown ups didn’t like it because “it was a cheap strategy”. I sold all my Magic cards in college - I really wish I would have kept those.

daniel-cussen 3y ago
[dead]
evanelias 3y ago
> I sold all my Magic cards in college - I really wish I would have kept those. It could be worse! I started playing in Dec 1993 when 2nd (Unlimited) and Arabian Nights came out, but sold all my best cards by the late 90s. As a teenager I was pretty happy with the profit. It was probably a grand or two if I recall correctly, from selling my mint unlimited Lotus, multiple moxes, 40 dual lands, 4 Juzam Djinn, Time Walk, Chaos Orb, etc...

jdmoreira 3y ago

Just in case someone here gets nostalgic for the "old" game… Search for "oldschool 93/94" and "Premodern"

thom 3y ago
Yeah, I could read those deck lists all day. Wonderful stuff.

the-dude 3y ago

Totally unrelated to the Lou Reed album? : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_and_Loss https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_and_Loss That is a really captivating album.

mproud 3y ago
Probably intentional, as a pun

2-718-281-828 3y ago

apparently there is an open source version of mtg based on a standard deck of cards which has been around since the 70s and possibly was the inspiration for mtg. https://www.pagat.com/combat/cuttle.html https://www.pagat.com/combat/cuttle.html

r00fus 3y ago
Fascinating. While my elderly dad is amazing at competitive card games he doesn’t like any game that doesn’t use the standard 52 card deck. I’ll give this a shot! It’s really possible that Cuttle was the predecessor to Magic.
- 2-718-281-828 3y ago
  It's amazing how many different games you can play with one or two standard decks. It's also an amazing conversation catalyst as it takes off the pressure to constantly talk and introduces opportunities for unusual spontaneously arising subjects. Current favorites are Spite and Malice and Gin Rummy - pretty much everybody seems to enjoy those games. Cuttle I haven't tried, yet, and it's obviously not a game you can learn within ten minutes and just play. But I keep it on the radar.

thom 3y ago

Magic has been such a huge part of my life. At my lowest point after moving to a new town, we were gifted a pile of cards from one of my dad’s coworkers. It was the only thing keeping me going and more or less saved my relationship with my dad. It’s still, for me, the best game ever designed and in my 40s with 3 kids I still play and watch hours of content every week. Heck, we even have some hall of famers on our cap sheet at my current startup which somehow fills me with pride. My son has introduced me to Yu Gi Oh and Pokémon but they both lack the fundamental elegance of MtG. It’s probably not fair to call Magic simple given the size and complexity of the rules at this point, but at the lowest level it really is just about combining simple things to achieve infinite variety. The best cards have short text and chime nicely with the theme of the card and wider story. The worst are like Yu Gi Oh, a page of complex tiny text that tries to do too much. One of the saddest things is that, as you become better at the game with a deeper grasp of the rules and the cards, you never really recapture that feeling of the early days, when every card was exciting. Draft comes close (picking cards from random booster packs to try and piece together a deck) and Cube certainly captures the nostalgia (drafting with packs made of your favourite or most powerful cards). But still the smell of an opened booster takes you back. Wizards has made many mistakes over the years and but Magic is extremely healthy and several recent sets have been all-time greats. Both Magic Online (the ugly but fairly complete online client that has _every_ card) and Arena (the more modern client that’s a bit simpler and easier to play but only has recent stuff) are actively maintained so you can play anything, anytime. My only sadness now is that I never really made it to the pro tour, but there’s always time.

pavlov 3y ago
> “as you become better […] you never really recapture that feeling of the early days” It’s the same with everything, isn’t it. There’s a stage in life when you’re relatively young and it makes sense to go deeper into whatever inspires you. But as you grow older it’s probably good to make an effort to try more new things, to get back some of that feeling of discovery. It may not work out quite like that but it’s worth to keep trying.
- thom 3y ago
  Yeah, same with programming certainly - the feeling as a kid of just pushing through to get something done no matter what the code looks like. Now you’re second guessing everything and trying to do a professional job. But it’s rare as an adult to be able to throw yourself into a new pursuit without judgment. With the internet everyone knows what ‘good’ looks like, everybody’s hustling, everything’s professionalised. The ability to experience raw, messy joy is something you’re not taught to cherish.

fcatalan 3y ago

I'm glad to find my sentiment reflected in the article: I was interested in RPGs and wargames in the early 90s. Even in my relatively backwater hometown there were events, stores or clubs were I could socialize over them. It was all swept away by MtG within a few months, and I had the misfortune of not "getting it" myself and suddenly being left without anyone to play anywhere. So I'm still repelled by card games to this day.

solardev 3y ago
Have you tried rejoining the scene? These days I see my local game store having wargame nights, Magic nights, tabletop nights, etc. I think the market for all of those has exploded over the last decade and there's sooooo much gaming of all sorts now. Truly a nerd's paradise :D
- fcatalan 3y ago
  In a way yes, an important part of the appeal of the games were the miniatures, and during the pandemic I got back into collecting and painting them and it's become my main hobby since then.
  - solardev 3y ago
    Cool! I'm always impressed by other people's miniatures work. I never had that sort of patience... little grey men it is.

remram 3y ago

I really enjoy MtG, even though I only got into it very late. The commercial aspect really irks me however. I don't think a game should be both competitive and collectible. After playing with printed cards for a while, I went shopping for games with a similar vibe but a smaller pool of cards. Epic Card Game has been a lot of fun, especially in a draft format. I am not sure why it was never popular, though I assume the ridiculously un-googleable name has something to do with it. https://www.epiccardgame.com/ https://www.epiccardgame.com/ 120 unique cards for $15 was hard to beat, and I was since able to acquire the entire collection of cards for less than $100 (whether that's a good thing or a bad thing is up to you). Other more eclectic mentions are Mindbug, Riftforce, Superjack (regular cards), Arcmage (opensource).

toobeary 3y ago

I spent a lot of years after, trying to recapture the wonder 11 year old me felt those first months of Magic, where every card seemed a literal portal to another realm. I’ll probably never find that feeling again.