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0 Subject: OT: Magic the Gathering

Posted by: Khahan
- [12432113] Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 12:34

Since the subject came up in a baseball topic and I don't want to take up space there w/ OT, I started it here.
Anybody who has old cards looking to unload, let me know. I"m more a collector than player, so they'd be taken care of.
1James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 13:25
Khahan, I sold all my cards a number of years ago. Wish I was selling them now, needless to say -- I thought I was making off pretty good then, but I know they'd be worth a lot more now. :) Many old-school bombs -- Shivans, Forces of Nature, and on and on. For some reason I think I might have hung onto a couple of cards, a Beserk and a Juzam IIRC, because they weren't in the box for some reason when I went to sell. If I come across them I'll let you know. Also have quite a few of the first edition Middle Earth: The Wizards game cards, if you know anyone who's interested. Some real good stuff that I haven't even had out in a long time.
2Dobbler
      ID: 61381111
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 13:39
To continue with the theme of this thread, I know this game has been dead for a while, but I would be interested in buying the Overpower CCG if anyone still has any of these cards.
3James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 13:42
LOL! I think I actually have some of those too. Nowhere near a complete set, but will check when I'm home.
4Khahan
      ID: 12432113
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 14:51
hey Pres. You may have been better off selling many of those cards when you did. A lot of the old bombs have been made obsolete by cards from the last 2 blocks. They've also re-released a lot of the old uncommons as rares in 7th ed and rumor has it that they are going to do something special for 8th ed since its the 10 anniversary.
I'd be interested in anything you find.
contact me at: khahan@mindspring.com
5Dobbler
      ID: 61381111
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 14:57
Yes, you can contact me about Overpower at g_dawg38@yahoo.com
6James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:02
I try to keep up a least a little by reading some of the MTG websites now and then, although it's been awhile. Some of the new mechanics they've introduced sound interesting. And I'll bet you're probably right about banning, etc., having an effect on what the value of my cards would have been today. Hymn to Tourach? :) Always loved that demoralized look on my friend's face after a Swamp, Hymn, Hippie play on the 1st turn.
7quik_ag@work
      ID: 12432289
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:08
now, pres.. surely you must be thinking of the dark ritual ;-)
8James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:09
Doh! Was just coming back to post that ...

How embarassing :)

The eternal Ornithopter combos were also fun to try for in casual play.
9Khahan
      ID: 12432113
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:11
There's always the channel/fireball on turn 2.
Great fun.
10James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:16
We used to try to top each other for the goofiest combo decks. My crowning glory was the Death by Creature Bond deck that dumped Holy Armors, Unholy Strengths and Blessing's on one of my opponent's creatures until I could double- or triple-Bond it, then nail it with a Terror. Verrrry slow, but a real pisser if you lose to it, since you know what's coming for several turns.
11Khahan
      ID: 12432113
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:18
I'm going to have to try that one. Should slap it together tonight and try it out this weekend.
12James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:25
It's fun to play as long as you don't really expect to win with it. The good part is watching your opponent's surprise the first time you dump a Holy Armor on his creature, then the recognition when you lay down the first Creature Bond. It's kind of a pain because you need a three-color deck, and you've got to fit in enough defense to survive long enough to get that key creature up to 20 toughness. The pumpable Holy Armor and Blessing helps quite a bit (and there are probably some new cards that add toughness that I'm not aware of). Getting 2 or 3 Bonds on the same creature is sweet. Cuts down his clock a lot.
13Khahan
      ID: 12432113
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:45
Easy now. There is a common card from the last block: enchanted creature gets +2/+2 for each other enchantment in play.
Slap that and a creature bond or two on it and its already getting big.
14James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 15:49
I guess with new cards, you might even be able to get it down to a 2-color deck.
15Eustacio
      ID: 51729258
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 16:47
Nastiest combo I ever used on an opponent was Animate Land, Eradicate, Grindstone. Turn the land into a creature, use Eradicate to remove that creature from play and all copies of that card from the player's hand, library, and graveyard. Imagine playing a mono-colored deck and suddenly being down to the two mana left in play. Then imagine a Grindstone coming into play.
16Sludge
      Sustainer
      ID: 24914721
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 18:25
Ahhhhh... table crack.
17James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 18:27
LOL, you play(ed) too Sludge?
18 Rogue's Strikers
      ID: 21539413
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 18:29
Khahan, I wouldn't mind seeing what I could get for my cards. I believe I started collecting when the 'Revised' edition came out (Force of Nature was one of the top forest cards), so let me know if thats too new to interest you.

Near the end of my playing tenure I had a pretty stacked all-black deck, so the chances are good of my top cards being black...

OT: I also collected some of the Star Trek playable game for a bit, and have some of the top cards from the 1st set. If anyone is interested in those let me know.
19Sludge
      Sustainer
      ID: 24914721
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 18:32
No, but I had a friend who quite literally declared bankruptcy because of Magic and other card games. Now his crack of choice is Warhammer. Gimme my 5 or 6 $30 D&D books and an occasional $15 module, and I'm good to go for a long time. He's up to his 7th army in Warhammer, and at about $300 a pop, he's looking at a divorce this time.

Actually, I played Magic once, and found it completely devoid of any creative thought, so I have never played it or any other similar game since. Maybe I just wasn't playing it right.
20James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 18:37
Thank God he hasn't found Everquest!

Magic can be devoid of creative thought, but it doesn't have to be. Many players simply copy the great, efficient decks they've seen on the Internet, then play them like they're supposed to be played, which probably will win you games but won't provide much fun beyond that.

However, creating a cool deck, or finding good synergy between unrelated cards, is quite creatively satisfying.

Boy, D&D ... you play currently? I haven't done that in too long. Always had a good time once I discovered that character and plot development was a lot more fun than going balls to the wall Monty Hall. (No wonder I was an English major, eh?)

My friends and I in college resurrected Star Frontiers though, rejiggered it, and had a really good time with it. Every try that one?
21Khahan
      ID: 567232217
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 20:05
Wow, I never would have guessed I would find all this here. Did the D&D for about 15 years. Only gave it up really because of my 1st born. I just can't give that much attention for that long anymore.
I'm still playing/collecting MTG, so if anybody has anything they are looking to offload, shoot me an email. Let me know approximate amount of cards you have (and don't think the collection is too big, I've currently got in the 30,000-35,000 range, actually one of the single largest private collections I've ever seen).
and some of the highlights.
Email is in post 4.
AIM = Khahan Gunn
Yahoo = khahan_gunn
22YOUNGBUCK
      ID: 15556517
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 20:34
magic cards are for nerds!


seriously!
23rage_22
      Donor
      ID: 41301611
      Wed, Jun 05, 2002, 21:55
I thought you were joking Youngbucker.

But seriously Khahan, I used to play MTG as well, I'm gonna try to scan through my cards and I may let you know if I have anything that might be considered "worthwhile" to you. I started around the time of Revised...I might have a few older cards than that, including Berserk, etc.
24The Left Wings
      ID: 760719
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 07:24
I think I still have a couple thousand Magic cards... Don't remember if I had a Berserk, but I do have a Fork somewhere. I started when they had a big promotion for the 4th Edition, and I stopped playing after Alliance, so 95% of my cards are from the sets between those two. I traded for several 3rd Edition cards.

I wonder how much these cards go for after five years of dust-collecting.
25Adam H
      ID: 3714347
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 10:59
"magic cards are for nerds!


seriously!"


Stealing basketballs are for thieves...
26Baldwin
      ID: 4261155
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 11:36
Thank God he hasn't found Everquest! - Polk

Heh, I hear they call it EverCrack it is so addictive. I am actually afraid to try it being somewhat on the addictable side myself.

27Mattinglyinthehall
      ID: 1832399
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 11:36
JKP
I was something else of a D&D dork growing up, AD&D really. Just recently was persuadeded to throw away all my manuals after seeing that they really aren't worth much any more. I played the first edition of AD&D, I think they were putting out a 3rd edition last I saw, a few years back. The editions are not really compatable. I looked into the Star Frontiers game and bought the starter pack, but felt it was nowhere near as interesting as AD&D. Though I am curious about what you did to tweek it to effictively make it better.
Everquest intrigues me, but I know how I can be about this stuff. Not that I'd wind up like this guy or anything, but considering how my girlfriend took my slow Yahoo draft in March, I think it best for me and my romantic health to stay away.
28Mattinglyinthehall
      ID: 1832399
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 11:47
From what I understand about Everquest (I didn't actually read the link I posted above but am familiar with the story), since the game continues while your computer is off, the EverQuest "world" continues while your character is inactive. You have to spend considerable time stashing your "artifacts" and other valuables where people won't find them and then finding a servicable place to hide yourself while your character is defenseless. Also, I understand that players form "guilds" for protection and strength. Supposedly, these guilds pressure their members to stay on for as long as possible to be more productive or stay ahead of rival guilds. I can see how some who start off with too much time on their hands and might otherwise be predispositioned to do so could develop a serious addiction to this sort of game.
29Seattle Zen
      Donor
      ID: 554192913
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 13:36
MITH and Baldwin

In EverQuest, 99% of the people play on servers where you cannot be killed by other players. Furthermore, unless you are logged on, your character is not vulnerable.

My neighbor/friend is sickly addicted to the crack of video games. He has spent thousands of hours playing in the past two years. One month, when he was trying to impress the best guild in his realm, he spent over 12 hours a day logged in for over 30 days straight. He's played 40+ hours straight. To put it mildly, he has issues. He dropped out of college four quarters in a row simply because he'd rather be playing this game. However, if it wasn't EverQuest, it'd be something else, he needs help, and believe me, I've tried.

Baldwin, the gameplay is SO BORING! The geniuses who invented the game made it very time consuming simply to appeal to social parriahs who are loath to maintaining a heathly realtionship with reality. The VAST majority of your time is spent walking around looking for creatures to kill and then hitting a button to try and kill it. You do this for months. They give you rewards, like leveling up with all its attendant goodies and skills. The game's appeal is the chatting capabilities. Groups of characters can team up and kill more efficiently. So you get these groups of social misfits from all over the world to make "guilds" and they meet every night for 4-6 hours and play together, each character fulfilling certain roles, soldier, healer, magician etc... The rub is you have to play a RIDICULOUSLY long time to get to a level where a guild would want you, I mean hundreds and hundreds of hours.

I know far too much about this game, watching my friend descend into a serious depression over this obsession. He is a very intelligent guy and makes a great player, the game is intellectually challenging enough to be all consumming, but only for the truly sick.

It's not that great of a game, plain and simple.
30Seattle Zen
      Donor
      ID: 554192913
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 13:45
MITH

Wow, I just read that story you linked to, way too close to home. My friend has tried to quit before, but has never successfully left.

I'm sorry, but warning labels wouldn't change a thing.
31Mattinglyinthehall
      ID: 1832399
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 14:00
SZ
I'd think Woolley was very much like you say your friend is - in that if it wasn't EverQuest it would just have been something else. The NY Post ran their story last week. I can't find it on line, but here's an excerpt from where I got the character vulnerability stuff:

"Those familiar with the game say peer pressure is one of the key elements of EverQuest, since logging off may hurt a guild's chances of advancing.
And even when a player does want to quit a session, they say it can take hours to stash extra protective gear and weapons earned in the game and find a hiding spot in which to "safely" log off".


To my knowledge, I don't know anyone who plays and I've never seen the game except in a few advertisements and pictures of it in one or two articles before I heard about Shawn Woolley.
32James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 14:18
Do a search for "Everquest" at Wired.com, there's lots of interesting stuff there. They're usually at the forefront of covering issues like this. Here's a link on the quest to end game addiction.
33Seattle Zen
      Donor
      ID: 554192913
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 14:23
I absoultely agree with the guild peer pressure. When my friend is logged on during a "hunt", he literally will not peel himself away from the screen. I'd say to him, "Hey, the Mariners have the bases load with no outs and their down by two in the eighth, you've got to see this." Even though he is a HUGE M's fan, he can't leave because it is his duty to cast spells while others are hacking monsters up. He lived next to me for two years and just moved last week. I'm glad he did, it was emotionally taxing seeing him throw away his life.

Yes, there are places in this game that you have to have a flotilla of high level characters in order to leave alive. Big guilds go on these quests deep into some dungeon or on some plane and cannot log off until they successfully emerge, or their character will be stuck deep with no chance of coming back, so there are instances where you get so deep into a place that it will take hours to extracate yourself. All part of the plan to get the $10/month out of you.
34Khahan
      ID: 12432113
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 14:39
I actually was addicted to an online game called a MUD. It was basically a text pre-cursor to Everquest. Spent my college years and a few years after completely addicted. Skipped classes etc.
Most everybody I started that game with (a good number of us have actually kept in touch despite living in different states/countries) have eventually stopped playing. Those kinds of games seem to attract the highschool and college crowd (because of time). No matter what is added to it, there is still only so much you can do. After a while (1 year for some people, 8-9 years for others), you do eventually lose interest.
I still play, but now its no occasion and more out of nostalgia.
You can't blame anybody but the player though for losing grip on reality. Some of the stories I have about that crap is just scary. People crashing ISP's to make somebody else drop link then killing their character. People being stalked in RL because of stuff that happened on teh MUD/game (this actually happened to me).
It can really get out of hand.
35James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 15:00
There are also a couple really interesting links in this old thread from the politics forum. Links about how seriously some people have taken their online lives.
36Purple Pimp At Work
      ID: 245912
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 15:02
Anyone see the new magic game that is coming out online? It looks pretty sweet. I believe it is launching on Jne 24th.
37Sludge
      Sustainer
      ID: 24914721
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 17:42
Tried posting this early this morning, but something was screwy.

JKP -

I haven't found a group in Lubbock to game with yet. After moving to a new city, having a kid, and buying a new house all within a year of each other, it's kinda taxing on your time. That's all settled down now, and I could easily find the time to do it. I'm not going out of my way to find people, though. We've run into some real weird ones by calling up people who post the "gaming group wanted" cards at the mall. :)

Khahan -

It's my guess that you'd find a surprisingly large overlap between the gaming community and the fantasy sports community.

Everyone else -

Evercrack... heh... Give me a good old fashioned MUD anyday. I ran one with a couple of friends from college for about 7 years. CajunMUD it was called. You can still find the connection information in some places. We started out on McNeese State University's computers. One of the friends worked in the lab and had the root password. One day the faculty member who ran the lab thought he was doing something illegal on the machines (he wasn't - she was just paranoid) and changed the root password on him. After she told him the new password he hard coded a password into the su command and told us all about it. It was a fun cat and mouse game hiding the game. Anyway, MUDs, although text-based, always seemed to me to hold more character than games like UO and Evercrack. Of course, I never played much. It was more fun to me listening to petty complaints, telling grown adults to behave, messing with spammers who were trying to crash the game, and trying to stay one step ahead of the players who knew how to exploit bugs in the game.

I saw some of the character types Khahan talked about. There were players who logged twice the game time that I did, and if I was online, I at least had the game in a window in the background. There was a time that we made a major overhaul in the experience system because it was too easy to move up, and several of the players made a huge deal about it. The threatened to leave permanently and take many of hte regulars with them. We made the change anyway, and lost quite a few players. I've never felt bad about being the "cause" of someone's addiction, and we've had this discussion on the mud before with the very players who were addicted. It's a simple diversion for most people, and is intended as such. Any such diversion can be turned into an addiction. Anyway, the one time I ever let the game become more than a game was when we promoted a loooong time player (he played most of the 7 or so years we ran the game) to an immortal and gave him access to the server so he could help us code on the game. We thought we could trust him. He split the cost for the server with us, and became an equal partner. The only condition to his working with us was that the code for the game never leave the server. It was less than 6 months and he was running a mud of his own using our code. It was shortly after that when I decided that there were too many muds and not enough players to justify keeping it up.

Sorry for the length, but there's been a lot of extra messages to respond to since this morning.
38James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 17:45
Sludge -- I agree, it's darn hard to find "normal" gamers.
39James K Polk
      ID: 13516513
      Thu, Jun 06, 2002, 17:49
Although IIRC, I found a few decent systems of running campaigns online when I did some poking around quite a while ago. I'll bet you could dig up a few folks from around here and start a gaming group if you so desired.
40Khahan
      ID: 12432113
      Fri, Jun 07, 2002, 07:46
Sludge,
The stories we could probably trade about our years mudding. I spent about 7-8 years myself of mudding. Probably a good 5 years was pretty hard core. Some of the people are just scary though. I've had virtual stalkers which is almost more scary than the ex-girlfriend not wanting to let go type. The virtual ones..you just don't know where they really are and what they really know about you.
Some of the online antics of people in these communities is down right scary. But at the same time, most of my best friends were met through mudding.
A good sized group of us found out we live in the same general area and for the past 5 years have been great friends off line.
41Baldwin
      ID: 4261155
      Fri, Jun 07, 2002, 12:14
I sunk a couple years into MUDS. Maxed out a number of characters. Mastered maybe 6 or seven of them. My son ran one and talk about running into characters...he now has hate websites devoted to him, others have mirror websites talking about how green with envy they are that they never got a hate website devoted to them. The struggles to overthrow or otherwise harrass the owners of the MUD would make quite a college termpaper. He finally abandoned the MUD to his enemies and took his copy to a secret BETA site where his friends and allies tinker with the code.
42Baldwin
      ID: 4261155
      Fri, Jun 07, 2002, 12:23
Also I watched my son play Ultima Online and struggle with it's early bugginess. I imagine EverCrack is roughly the same?
43Rolodecks
      ID: 19418106
      Sat, Jun 08, 2002, 07:46
Just wait until Neverwinter Nights comes out. Yum.
44holt
      Donor
      ID: 308491916
      Tue, Mar 11, 2014, 20:44
Khahan - I must not have seen this thread when you originally started it - 12 years ago! Just curious - do you still play? Magic online maybe?
45R9
      ID: 41219518
      Wed, Mar 12, 2014, 01:20
I've dabbled in MGTO a bit. Its one of those things that hard to be any good at without putting a lot of time into it though.
46Khahan
      Donor
      ID: 39432178
      Wed, Mar 12, 2014, 12:41
Holt, i still have my collection and my old decks but I haven't played in years. I got into WoW and simply dont have time for both. Would love to play again. Even tried once about a year or so ago. I went to a pre-release event and just got embarrassed because i was so out of practice. But right now I pay $15 a month for my hobby. If I go back to MtG I can easly turn that into $150 a month. No need to do that right now.
47holt
      Donor
      ID: 308491916
      Wed, Mar 12, 2014, 15:31
I understand. I do some drafting on Magic Online every now and then but it gets expensive if you don't win most of the time. I don't remember the last time I bought any real cards. Still have tubs full of them though. Prob over 40K cards. I used to play tournaments a lot - like qualifiers, grand prixs, got a couple pro tour invites. At one point (in the 90's) I was ranked in the top 50 in the world, but I was working at a card shop and we lived and breathed magic. It was fun but it's a massive investment of time and you need people to practice with who are also willing to put in the time. Also, Wizards (Hasbro) puts out new sets so often that you fall too far behind if you stop following the game for a year.
48holt
      Donor
      ID: 308491916
      Wed, Mar 12, 2014, 15:38
R9 - I've done a lot of drafting on MTGO. It's fun (addictive might be a better word) but the packs and tickets are overpriced. You have to win all the time to keep the cost reasonable. The problem is, you have to play a lot before you start winning a lot. And, no matter how much you play, the stupid shuffler will still beat you more often than good play from your opponent will. I haven't done any drafts this year and I don't see that changing any time soon.
49blue hen
      ID: 4739168
      Wed, Mar 12, 2014, 15:46
Let's convince R9 to spend lots of time on Magic The Gathering, so he forgets about his baseball teams.
50Sludge
      ID: 210760
      Tue, Jan 06, 2015, 01:07
Holy crap!

This thing got resurrected last year?! That's freaking amazing!

I do have to take back what I said about Magic all those years ago. While I still don't play Magic, I have sunk some time into Hearthstone and have gained a much greater appreciation for the complexity and depth of those card games.

51Khahan
      ID: 3023612
      Tue, Jan 06, 2015, 13:24
I haven't played MTG for about 5 or 6 years now, but I miss it a lot. I have started playing Hearthstone and it is fun, but it doesn't hold a candle to MTG as far as complexity, depth and skill and strategy goes.
Sludge - khahan#1592 for my b-tag if you want to play hearthstone.
52holt
      ID: 38338181
      Fri, Jan 09, 2015, 03:02
Never heard of Hearthstone. Been mostly playing Carcassonne when I hang out with gamer nerd buddies the past year or two (a tile-laying strategy game).
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