Magic Lunch #2

Derek and I squared off over lunch yesterday with 3 games of Zen (see my previous "Magic Lunch" for an explanation) with 7 card ante.

My first opener is shown here and I've lucked my way into the amazingness that is a 4/4 lifelink beating down turn 2. In other formats this fragile 'combo' could easily catch a Lightning Bolt or Swords to Plowshares, but in the randomness that is Zen, this is more than quite good!

(You could say that if Derek doesn't have an answer my 4/4 will Nip him into o'Gwillion.) heh heh heh

Nip Gwillion + Edge of Divinity is a lethal combination that has even seen play in some constructed formats. While fragile and susceptible to the 2-card-blowouts that dude+aura are so famous for; it was featured in "Orzhov Aggro" Pauper decks on Magic Online, and I even played against it in Wednesday night Legacy at Games by James a couple weeks back (though I wouldn't recommend that!)

After some turns Derek draws an answer to the Gwyllion in the form of Vampire Nighthawk - absolutely devastating in this format usually, by the way. Unfortunately, he's a little too attached to his Vamp and won't make the trade on my 4/4 (Twilight fanatic perhaps?)

He plays Naya Battlemage as another potential answer for Gwyl, but it's offline and he's low on life so he tries to trade it for my 3/2 Scrapbasket. If I were him I'd have traded the vamp for the 4/4 long ago and been in a good position to keep the battlemage alive and online next turn. But the way things played out he makes a bunch of blocks and I just Unnerving Assault for complete Derek-destruction: giving my entire team +1/0 and his -1/0. He's toast and it's onto game two. 1-0

My game 2 opener is pretty awesome as I'm always glad to see a land that can produce 3 mana. Note that the Island is actually a Forest (lacked Forests when putting this Zen deck together and haven't swapped 'em yet) so I actually have all 5 colors available - and in this format that's often all it takes!

Usually in Zen whoever draws the correct lands to play the majority of their cards will win. You might think this makes for a worthless format - but with the new mulligan rules we added you'll usually end up with something of a playable hand more often than not. And usually you'll even have several worthwhile decisions to make with all of these random cards, so I tend to think that playing this format can actually help you improve your game play.

I end up playing nearly all of my cards and whenever Derek thinks he has an answer I blow it out of the water with a better card. Pictured you'll see my team consisting of 4 1/1 Cenn's Enlistment tokens (retrace is pretty broken here) and a Tattermunge Duo against Derek's lone Meditant. He's already low on life at this point and my team of 5 is enough to get him in a couple turns even if he's killing some of my soldiers along the way. The game ends quickly. 2-0

Game 3 opens ok as any 3rd land allows me to play two semi-potent spells: Stonybrook Schoolmaster & Ethersworn Shieldmate.

My Shieldmate makes a surprise blowout on his Elite Duelist and I'm feeling confident until he follows with Aven Trooper, Knight of the Skyward Eye, Adventuring Gear and Bant Battlemage. I never get my red mana for Puncture Blast, and while I draw into an Oblivion Ring it's too little too late and I'm wrecked. 2-1

Each game's Ante (Derek Left, Me Right):

Thanks for reading! While I prefer to focus on competitive magic I hope that you find this bit of casual play interesting.

Magic Lunch

We have a small magic following at the office and we often play cards over lunch (pictured: Wayne [Left] & Derek [Right].) Due to the casual nature of our players we prefer the Zen format that puts us on a fairly even playing field. Note that Zen is NOT to be confused with Zendikar!

For those unfamiliar, here's a definition of Zen: Every player starts out with a tournament pack and 2 boosters, or 5 boosters + 6 of each basic land. These cards are the player's deck and they can't at all be added to or removed from. To play, shuffle up your deck and the player with the shortest stack chooses a # of cards to ante that is agreed upon by the other players. Each player sets aside their ante and draws their 7.

There are many variations of house rules for mulligans - everything from pitching your hand into the ante to draw 7 new cards as many times as you want, to more traditional styles like re-shuffling all land or no land hands. Our preference is a little more complex and seems to fit this sort of play well: 2 lands or more and you keep it, period. Less than 2 and you reveal your hand, put it on the bottom of your library and draw 7 new. Once you have your 7 you can pitch up to 3 cards from your hand into the ante and draw that many cards - you can do this only one time and you make your pitch all at once.

That's it - you're ready to play. We usually play traditional 1v1, two-headed giant, or free-for-all killing the opponent on one side first; but all formats are open including Emperor (usually not enough time or space for that over our lunch at the office though.)

After play the winning player takes all of the anted cards and adds them to their deck (again, nothing additional is added and nothing is removed.) For team play the winning team randomly splits up the won cards. Zen is a great format for players of all skill levels and I fully support it!

We played a two on two today with Felipe from Customer Service and Derek from Corporate IT against me and Wayne from Software Support. Wayne and I were victorious, largely from Wayne's Merrow Grimeblotter enchanted with my Reins of the Vinesteed. Gotta love Zen - you're forced to play with such random & obscure cards.

After our match I busted four booster prize-packs I'd been sitting on from an event last month. I'd been trading packs to Derek for random stuff and he'd pulled foil copies of both Misty Rainforest & Marsh Flats so far! He didn't want to trade for these so the spoils went to me. See right: I pulled a Lotus Cobra & Marsh Flats. An Oran-Rief & Kazuul Warlord were less impressive from the other packs, but they'll be saved for future Zen playing. The Flats & Cobra made for a pretty amazing 4 if you ask me!

I know many (myself partly included) are not fans of busting packs. But if the rares are crap I just keep their packs together to be re-used for future Zen deck setups for myself or friends (I should mention that when decks get low due to anteing, it's not uncommon to "play for deck equivalencies" and chance doubling up against having to make a new deck all together - note Wayne's giant stack in the first picture, he started with 5 boosters & 30 lands just like the rest of us. He's "Eaten" a few decks in his time!)