Old School Mtg

*Rod Serling voice* A word to the wise. Whether their concern be pediatrics or geriatrics, whether they crawl on hands and knees and wear diapers, or walk with a cane and comb their beards: There's a special Magic to the battle royale. An uncanny sensation reserved for the motley crews who engage in its ravaging diplomacies. Our destiny is not to sit in the rubble of our making but to reach out for whatever perfection that is to be had. Submitted for your approval: Mr Dyan de Rochemont. A citzen of Alkmaar walking a path of revelry and invocation few of us dare imagine. And there be Elder Dragons. It is my great pleasure to introduce the musings of Dyan de Rochemont and his  stories of 93/94 Commander /Mg out “WAT IS DEZE?!?” 93/94 seems to be thriving. There are tons of reports and pictures out there of masses gathered playing Old School.  I couldn’t help but notice that it all seems aimed towards one-versus-one matches. In an era where Commander is immensely popular...

  "So Mg", the voices say, "why not write something about last weekend in Trollhättan? Still have a blog, y'know."   "Well," I answer myself. "I just invented the sport Soccer Punch, and I'm trying to read a driver's license book filled with what the kids call 'microaggressions'. I don't know how much time I have to write something good."   "So you think because you write less frequently now, whenever you do it has to be some kind of masterwork? Get over yourself. Prefection is the enemy of done. Yes, I know that's a typo. See how much I care. Just write some shit so we can collect our PW points."   "Ok, fuck it." Soccer Punch is a one-on-one sport. You set up small goals with whatever lies around, find something round enough to be excused as a ball, and strap on your gloves. The goal is to avoiding getting punched out by the other player while winning either via scoring or TKO. It's kinda ...

Those extra hours away from the keyboard each week add up. Since last, the wedding planning is in full form, I found myself in the Arab Emirates, and I've kicked up my mentor work a gear or two. And I've had the time to read a book for just the joy of it, without the hidden agenda of trying to learn something. Activating Jalum Tome with an empty hand if you will. I wouldn't call this one a proper post either by the way. I do have a couple in the pipeline, but this is more of a status update. Some things are exciting enough to just shout along as a messenger, and what's going on in the Skype community right now is one of those things. Last weekend, the Skype community held the elimination rounds in their n00bcon 9 qualification tournament. The guy joining us in Gothenburg this Easter is renowned Skype player (and, from what I've heard, all-round good guy) Gregory from Switzerland. That also gets us up to 13 or 14 nationalities at the Championship, which is bra...

According to scientific consensus, the causality dilemma of the chicken and the egg has a clear answer. The egg came first as most of the arthropods, vertebrates and mollusks in the history of known life have been laying eggs. At some point a "not-quite-a-chicken-bird" laid an egg containing the first chicken. So what came first of the playing card and the playing card sleeve? Back in the dark ages of 93/94, we ain't had no fancy ass sleeves. We played our cards straight on packed snow while eating soup with our hands. When night fell we used the least water damaged ones as kindling to keep playing until the soup ran out. It was a simpler time, apart from the banding rules. I'm getting there. In early 1994, Japji Khalsa and Jeff Brain came up with the idea of making play mats . That turned out well. But sleeving playing cards was still under the radar for a long time. The closest thing were the "top-loader" and the penny sleeve created for...

2016 showed the highest literacy rate in history, the lowest percentage of people living in extreme poverty every, and it looks like the lowest child mortality rate we've ever seen. People are healthier, more educated and have more opportunities than any time before in history. We also flew a thing to space and had it land back here again . On the flip side, it has been the warmest year since anyone started measuring these things, and much of the political debate is very divided. All in all, I guess I would grade 2016 at 'B-'. Though flawed, a very decent year if we zoom out to the global scheme of thing. But let's zoom in to our community. Looks like a solid 'A'. This is the fourth time I do a retrospective post (click 2013 , 2014 and 2015 if you're interested in revisiting previous ones). Every year I am surprised by the steady growth of the community and how much the players create and bring to the format. Skype Magic is a thing now. There are old...