MTG Salvation

I tried something like this around Worldwake time using the man-lands. My only spell was Terra Eternal.Key lands were Ice Floe, Maze of Ith, Creeping Tarpit, and Celestial Collonade. Thought later about adding Glimmerpost, Cloudpost, and Kessig Wolf Run, but never revisited the idea.

this guy would make for fun interaction with Hive Mind!

It's OK to spend $10 on. I wouldn't bother with expansions though. Gameplay is very visually artistic, so that's a plus. Like many other games, its mechanic is to win duels to unlock cards that allow you to customize your decks and/or unlock other decks. The gameplay is not quite like real MTG though. It is very clunky about damage assignment in combat if you want to have a say in how to deal with multiple blocks. It doesn't pause before moving to the next step and often does silly things like assumes you don't want to Doom Blade that Inferno Titan before the attack step, for example.
Overall, it has been nothing more than some mild entertainment while in transit to and from work, so I guess I got my $10 worth.

Quote from Icarael

If this is the end of the world, then it's pretty disappointing as far as apocalypses go (aren't they all?). I can only assume some rag-tag bunch of misfits stopped the big bad whatsit in time. Most probably a bunch of Japanese high-schoolers with improbable hair colors and a ton of angst.

Then again, I got some new clothes and hung out with my family, so it's not a waste at all.

Rag-tag bunch of misfits, you say?
Must have been Scooby-Doo and Shaggy! Thanks to them, disaster has been averted for all mankind.

Perhaps you'd like to include Coalition Victory as a win condition.

Quote from Dracilic

The rules work as intended. Errata for single cards for a single format is complicated and unnecessary.

Phage is still more playable than some of the overcosted vanilla legendary creatures from Legends.

I agree whole-heartedly with this. We shouldn't be even trying to force cards to be more playable in a format. Just because it's legendary doesn't mean it has to be viable. There are a hundred of other extremely situational cards in MTG that people might wish were better, but the game can't be expected to change it's rules to accomodate them. I think your only road here is to come to some agreement with your casual play group and be happy with that.

Bottomless Pit can be crippling, since it's discard is random.

I have two thoughts to share about the points brought up by the OP.
Firstly, to do with the imagery of women portrayed in gaming materials. Most of the games that we play are herioc in nature (Fantasy and Sci-Fi especially). When these involve human portrayals, the characters are heriocally depicted in the image of what the artist perceives as the ideal man or woman. Just as women are depicted as svelt, toned beauties, clothed in a way to accentuate their figures, male heroes are similarly presented as large, square-jawed men wearing gear that allows them to display their musculature. Therefore, I don't perceive artistic portrayal as 'sexist', but simply as idealistic. Nothing wrong with this in a realm where gaming is fantasy, and fantasy allows us to dream idealistically.

Secondly, to address the topic of gaming being a male-dominated genre. This I have tried to understand for quite a while now, without any solid conclusion. Women are clearly less interested in ALL games it seems to me. Whether that be Magic, board games, video games, baseball, schoolyard tag, etc. they are just less involved. It makes me wonder what the difference in mentality really is between males and females?
It isn't an outlandish stereotype to say that women are largely more 'responsible' than men. Is that why they don't dedicate as much time to leisure activity as men?
Women tend to be more practical and pragmatic than men. Is that why they have trouble immersing themselves in fantasy for the sake of gaming?
Women can be more emotionally sensitive than men. Is this why there are not as many 'competitive' women that aim to win at all costs?
These are thoughts that help me justify why the gender bias in gaming. I would like to hear some feedback from other women as to why they think this happens.

The theory around here is that the world only ends for Mayans!

I think the overall tone of MTGO is that it's becoming as much a tool for competitive MTG than casual entertainment. I know that loads of players use this as a playtesting venue for real life pro tour events. They connect with each other accross the continent and the world, much like the rest of us do. Difference is they have greater voices in the community because of the time and money they dedicate to MTGO. It shouldn't be any surprise then, to the rest of us, that Wizards tailors thier product toward that group.

I have resolved to just accept it. I log into MTGO only when I have 2-3 hours to spare for some draft, then sit on those 'virtual cards' until I log in and do another draft a few weeks (or months) later.

Admittedly I have never thought of MTGO as an investment into product like real paper MTG. (Can't get my head around the idea of virtual objects as assets with value). Paying money for the online experience is , to me, the same as paying for a monthly subscription to an MMO. I expect nothing in return except for the entertainment of the experience.

Quote from demonium71

hi !!!

my second fow of this playset

Is that a very intense Robert Downey?

I do think you can work something out with token producers and Kresh. Green has loads of token generators, of course. Also has lots of ways to make Kresh trample in for the General victory. Some easy to get things might be Imperious Perfect, Jade mage, Avenger of Zendikar, and Verdant Force.

I see that we're all trying to wrap our heads around the redundancy of land types, so let me introduce a similar application to creatures...
Imagine that you have in play Conspiracy naming goblins. You then play a goblin cheiftain and conspiracy turns him into a goblin. Being that he is already a goblin, is it really reasonable to think that he is now 2 goblins? I don't think so, therefore it is not reasonable to think that Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth can turn something that is already a Swamp into 2 Swamps.

Did something like this last year in place of usual Arena League format. We started with any intro deck that the shop had in inventory, then added 1 booster of player's chioce after each week, for the duration of 4 week league. At first it was a great idea that gathered lots of interest. Unfortunately, some players made poor deck choices, or poor booster additions that left them entirely out of contention. For example, 1 guy chose an infect deck from Mirrodin as a starting point, but the store only had 2 boosters from New Phrexia left (and they sold those before he could claim them for Arena).
You may want to limit the intros and boosters to currently available stuff, but still beleive it is worth doing.

When I first started, my friend and just didn't really bother to read rules thoroughly. We didn't have any experienced player to learn from. We felt no reason to limit ourselves to 1 land per turn, for example. We also understood that we refilled our hand to 7 cards at the start of each turn.
Consequently, our games were QUICK.