States is over. Everybody is probably a little tweaked over U/G posting such excellent results in the face of such hatred. And I've heard a lot of stories from whiners, such as,"Dude, he got so lucky," etc., etc.

(Note:"etc." really means you're pretending to know more than you are. So if you're naming presidents, you might say, Clinton, Reagan, Bush, etc., etc., that's really all the presidents that come to mind. It doesn't fool me!)

Don't get me wrong; this is not a tournament report. Don't email me and say this is a bad tournament report - because it is a bad report, and it's definitely not intended to be a tourney report.

As for me? Not so good, 6-2 and no top 8. However, I did get a box and a quarter because I'm *cough* 15. (I'm holding my driver's license as I'm reading this). At the last second, while playtesting with my friends, I decided to play UZI over my beloved Wizard deck - the reasons being that Wizards loses rather badly to Sligh and Neo Punisher and BUG Braids in game one. The reasons for playing it were that UZI creams any control deck, and has a pretty good handle on U/G.

To my dismay, right after I handed in my decklist, I discovered there was exactly one (singular) Sligh deck and two (!) Neo-Punisher decks... Meaning I was better off with my first deck. Surprisingly, that one Sligh deck went all the way.

Well, maybe not so surprisingly. The metagame was so whacked up that the stuff geared to beat U/G would lose to Sligh. Sighs. Here's what I played against:

Round one versus lucky scrub #1: I hear getting a Haunting Echoes off when I'm tapped out is some good. Game 2, I hear drawing seven lands in a row isn't very good.

Round two versus U/G: I creamed him, I drew every single one of my many removal spells. Game 2, I went off on turn 8 (which is the earliest turn possible).

Round three versus Mirror with Infiltrators and 'Togs instead of Infestations: Quite easy. I've found that, in the mirror, more threats is bad - and wow, it didn't seem likely that this would ever happen.

Actually, it's good to have fewer threats - and even better if they can't be killed by Innocent Blood, Chainer's Edict, or Smother. That's why Zombie Infestation is better than Psychatog; all I did was bait every one of his counters trying to remove his creatures- and when I eventually went off, he didn't have one counter.

Game 2, he was land screwed.

Round four versus Lucky Scrub #2: I kept a bad hand; I don't know why. Well, it was decent when I drew it - but not drawing any counters is bad. He cast a Centaur Glade and had a Glory in the graveyard, and I couldn't outrace him with my tokens. Game 2, I went off, and he dropped a Circle of Protection: Black, and proceeded to not miss nine land drops.

Round five versus Mirror with Togs instead of Infestations: See round three.

Round 6 versus Thoren's version of Wake: I should lose to this deck... If Jens Thorens was playing it. The guy playing? He was hopelessly out of his league. I just sat there, smacking my hand on my forehead while I watched him on autoplay mode. The deck was twice as good as he was because he was playing fast effects on his main phase, etc. etc.

One time he had Mirari and Mirari's Wake in play, and he Cunning Wished for some card drawing spell. 'Nuff said.

Round 7 versus U/W Mobilization: I wish I could have played this deck all seven times. All I have to do is run on autopilot and I win. Mobo is so bad, it's almost sad.

Round 8 versus Astral Slide: All I had to do was counter the Lightning Rifts when he cast them. I did. Not once did he drop one on turn 2; he always went for Astral Slide first. Shrugs.

Well anyways, I drafted that box...

And it brought me to a few conclusions: Draft green. The green fat, combined with elf synergy (Wellwisher, Wirewood Savage, the enchant land that adds mana per elf in play, ever sometimes Wirewood Pride) makes a very potent deck.

Because there's really only one removal spell - and that's Cruel Revival. Yeah, there are those stupid charms, and Visara, and then there's Sparksmith - but to kill a beast with that, you'd have to have six goblins in play, and by then you've been overrun or you've already won.

But just running fat isn't going to win. The pros say draft R/W - or whatever's not being drafted. That makes sense - but you have to understand that at the low levels, people will raredraft. People will go right into your colors, even if its blatantly obvious, they will draft with a predisposed choice of colors. People will make bad picks. People will hate draft.

I'm in an eight-person draft when somebody passes a Future Sight. This person isn't playing U and it's the fourth pick of the third pack; I can really use that Future Sight. But the scrub to my right decides to snag it because he wants it for a casual/vintage deck. D'oh!

In a perfect world, where everyone's Limited rating is over 1800, and the scrubs are around 1700 in Constructed, drafting R/W wouldn't be a bad idea. Also, this is generally in an eight-person draft. If you play at a small store, you might do a six-person draft, or even a four-person draft. Where I come from, eight-person drafts are very rare. I'm lucky if I get one six-person draft a weekend - and I love to draft.

Granted, Limited isn't my specialty - I'm by far a better Constructed player - but in Limited, I have a much better time playing because it's a level playing field (almost). It's where the good players really shine, and stand out from the scrubs who hide behind their T1 keeper deck. (I know you guys have one person like that - they never draft, call all of your decks internet decks, and claim you have no skill.)

So back on the subject: If you draft G, you need backup. Let's evaluate. U? No. Nothing in blue has anything that boosts green beasts.

W? Maybe. There are lots of white cards that prevent damage or make creatures bigger - and there are white fliers, and those cards that kill attacking/blocking creatures. It seems good... But most of those techy white cards cost four or more to cast - meaning that if you draft the bomb, you're gonna have a slow deck on your hands.

R? Also probable. With this, you get to draft the hands-down best common, Sparksmith - then you can take stuff like Slice and Dice, and Shock - and then there's Erratic Explosion, which works really well with a lot of beasts. Red is a definite good choice.

The bad news: Red is good and fun, but unless you get a lot of removal, it's not going to be friendly. Sparksmith is great, but it's not good by itself, you need a few goblins... And there are only a few more goblins to play that still maintain the deck's integrity (drop a bomb or fat every turn until the opponent dies).

That leaves us with one choice: Black.

Drafting black/green will almost always dominate the table. You get to run black removal like Cruel Revival - I almost always get two or more of these. Then you can play Swat, which is okay... And definitely don't forget Smother. And then there are all kinds of cool zombie mechanics, so in addition to your fat, you have plenty of recursion and evasion.

While drafting G/B, a few cards should be taken a lot higher:

Black

• Severed Legion. This is an early pick. Don't feel bad if you take it early; they won't go around.
• Haunted Cadaver. I take glee when I attack with my morphed guy, and see the look on my opponent's face when I flip him over.
• Gluttonous Zombie. Another evasion creature. When it's cast, the game is probably heading in your direction.
• Boneknitter. Now all your fear guys have regenerate. Enjoy.
• Frightshroud Courier. Turns any random zombie into a serious threat.
• Prowling Pangolin. Throw in the fact that it's a beast and now you have some serious fat to round out your black creatures. At worst, you kill two creatures; a good deal.
• Anurid Murkdiver. Better than you think. 'Nuff said.
• Nantuko Husk. I've won several times with this by using the Courier to give it fear, then sacced all my creatures to it and attacked with one unblockable monster.

(Wait a minute - where's Wretched Anurid? You have no idea how often this card killed me. It's quick, but it's no bomb in this archetype.)

Green

• Elven Riders. Bomb. I can't remember how many times I've won with those.
• Krosan Tusker. This card is my friend. With Wirewood Savage in play, no matter how I play it, I'm drawing cards. I take this card earlier than you'd think; I'll take this second pick, and happily.
• Primal Boost. Card advantage in a can. I pick these early, too.
• Snarling Undorak. This card throws your opponents' math way off.
• Wirewood Savage and Wellwisher. Duh.
• The rest of the beast/elf tribal stuffs. Pretty basic.

My highlight of the weekend was this. I'm in a draft. First pack, I open Arcanis. I go,"Woohoo!" Nobody drafts blue on top of it.

I didn't realize that Scrub 1 is on my right and Scrub 2 is on my left. I waste three picks and somehow, get sent Oversold Cemetery.

(As your jaw drops and you say,"Wasn't the guy on your left taking blue?" Indeed he was I later heard he thinks if you draft blue, you gotta go U/W, nothing else.)

So I have this, and then I get passed another bomb: Wirewood Savage. I proceed to get three Cruel Revivals, and Smother, and Elvish Guidance. Second pack I opened Grinning Demon. Second pack, I got Snarling Undorak, Venomspout Brackus, some more random Beasts and a few elves. 3rd pack I opened Silvos, and I just started laughing. I get passed a Prowling Pangolin, then proceed to get passed a Riptide Replicator.

I now cannot control my laughter - because I realize by then, Scrub 3 is sitting two seats to my left, opened Visara 1st pack, and I can't seem to understand what he's drafting if he's passing me all this stuff. Fourth pick, I picked up Gluttonous Zombie.

In the end I got, get this, every card on my list of bombs for G/B, and a Riptide Replicator, and a Silvos, and a Grinning Demon, and an Oversold Cemetery!! Wow. I haven't had a draft as good as that in two years. Well, I feel I was due for it, I ended up getting drafted out of my colors by the second pack two times earlier that weekend, because of Scrubs. Well it seems if you're patient, scrubs will come through for you.

I didn't lose a game that draft, by the way.

However, in a perfect world, this would never have happened. According to the pros, the way to go is R/W. In the real world, G/B is the way to go.

Now for my second topic: Though I'm a blue player at heart, I think type 1 is getting out of control. Every new set R&D makes, no matter how good the beatdown is, no matter how crappy the card drawing and counters are, blue will find a way to win. Every time a new counter/card drawer comes out, that's one more weapon for the Keeper deck. Its brings me to a simple conclusion: Islands are better than Forests. Islands are better than Swamps. Islands are better than Plains. And finally, Islands are (of course) better than Mountains.

This is why I applaud the Astroglide deck and the Wake deck: Control decks with no counters. That's the way control should be played. Hiding behind a decklist that includes 4x Force of Will, 4x Mana Drain, 4x Arcane Denial (which, in my opinion, is a bad card), 4x Counterspell, 4x Additional Counter (and it doesn't what it is) is not very entertaining to play. Throw a few moxen, an Ancestral Recall, a Time Walk, and a Timetwister and you've got yourself a T1 deck.

This is my cry for help: Do something to hinder blue in type 1! Restrict counters, for God's sake! They'll find some other counter to use! Me, I'm happy they fixed Extended. It was becoming rather problematic, basically everybody was playing some kind of keeper/combo deck with no Power 9. Now that the Invitational is played Online, I will bet all of you peeps that the Masters Series will be played online, too. That means there won't be any more important T1 tournaments.

Maybe a few stores get sanctioned T1. So what? That means when R&D prints a set, who about its effect on T1? It's frustrating when I see a new player, maybe even a little kid who plays mainly casual, goes to the local card shop and gets largely discouraged by some guy who's a loser, who needs to shower, who has a deck that's worth more than his car.

This kid gets very annoyed; whenever he plays his fat cost creature, the guy just says No. The game lasts about nine hours, 'til he can draw one of his two Morphlings. Then this kid, who hasn't heard of T2 or Limited, hears, that if he wants to beat that 400-pound fat blob, he has to buy those outrageously priced pieces of cardboard (But I'm Not Saying Don't Buy Power Nine From Our Friends At StarCity! You Nice Folks Go Right Ahead), and when his mother hears about this, says he can't play that stupid game anymore, because of people like that, it's a bad crowd.

Even if he plays Standard or Limited, he's going to be discouraged by those players with high ratings, and four of every card worth playing.

May I ask, how is this good for getting more customers? I say we all boycott Magic - who's with me?!

Now for my second rant: So you ask -"Justin, how can I get as addicted to something as I would crack, but not get in trouble with the law and spend more money?" Magic Online is the life for you, my friend.

Now Wizards has decided they made a mistake: That's right, they were giving us too many cards. If anything, they weren't giving us enough. Now if I want to draft for free, I have to make the finals. If I want to make a Standard deck, I have to win twenty-five drafts in a row.

This is all about the"squash the bad player" mentality. May I ask one more time - how is this good for more customers? I like the idea of having this like EverQuest: Just let us use our real DCIs, and have an account with four of every card - or make it like Apprentice, where we get to use as many of anything we want. So now, it's basically a monthly fee to get to play for a rating all you want.

I wouldn't suggest counting this towards Magic Player Rewards, because in one day we could have thousands of people eligible for the foil Wasteland. I'm playing around with the idea of having Friday Night Magic on Apprentice. You never know; I could convince the local storeowner. It's easy - just pay your $5 or whatever a day in advance, and then meet in a private channel and have your tournament. All of the records are recorded on a sheet of paper the store owner sends to Wizards, so, the guy running the tournament could just fill out the results from Apprentice on the paper, and everybody gets their foil cards and we all go home happy. Why not?

Oh, I know - because Wizards has the"Gouge the Bad Player" mentality. Not good at Magic? Don't have many cards? Don't trade well? If you answered yes to any of the above, we at Wizards feel that we should make the game as expensive as possible to your scrubby little self 'til you decide to get better.

Anybody remember when Magic was still fun? Now, don't tell me it's fun for you to spend too much time playtesting against the same old slop every day. I mean, think back - way back - to when it was just casual, not competitive.

Yes, you remember him - The Big Briefcase of Cards. The kid with that stupid binder. Whose dad was a lawyer - and when you maybe got one pack for being good, he got a box. It was hopeless to beat him; he had too many cards. It was aggravating, wasn't it?

That's how the game feels for new players.

Anything, even the slightest indication that R&D was on the lookout for bad players, would really make my day. Now don't argue with me: I read the articles on MagicTheGathering.com about how R&D is on the lookout for casual players. Well that's great, what about bad players? They are both considered scrubs by many, but are two very different things. What might be good for one is not good for the other.

We could do something like Thursday Night Magic, for players with ratings under 1700 only - or if you're new, as a bonus for getting a DCI, you get a discount on cards 'til your rating gets over a certain point. And don't tell me that's not fair: Come on - what's more exciting to you decent players? Money, or - dear God - more cards!

I think you can see where I'm coming from. Now, granted, there will be people saying they have bad ratings to get a discount... But I think we could tell if somebody is doing that, there'd be a pattern.

What does the future hold for us Magic faithful? We may never know.

Questions? Comments? E-mail me at ImperialBrak123@aol.com