In four parts, I will analyze Magic coverage[1] as if I were a consulting team brought in to increase the value of the Pro Tour to Wizards. To be fair, I wasn't a media consultant; my job was analyzing the tax and intellectual property ramifications of proposed changes to the tour broadcasts and structures. That said, I read the work of those consultants often for five or six years. I believe that the easiest way to break this down is in four parts:

Part One: Analyze current coverage from a statistical standpoint to see if there is even a problem to be fixed.

Part Two: Analyze long-term perspective shifts that need to occur at Wizards of the Coast to fix Organized Play and coverage.

Part Three: Without any additional monetary investment from Wizards of the Coast, I will describe what I would recommend to improve Organized Play and coverage in 2014.

Part Four: I will present a series of "quick-hit" fixes that would drastically improve coverage in the short term even without the structural and perspective changes I'm calling for in the first three parts of the article.

My goal with this series is twofold. First, to totally change the perspective on Magic coverage; second, to get discussion in terms of coverage evaluation focused on numbers rather than intangible goals. Please note that this entire approach will be how we approached it during a consultancy—by the numbers. The viewership statistics and related other data will tell us what needs to change if we listen to what those statistics have to say. As the old saying goes:

If you can't measure it, you can't improve it.

I’ve been doing text coverage for Wizards of the Coast for a few years now and been doing it regularly for the last two. I’ve covered tournaments from Japan to Brazil to Philadelphia. I’ve been stranded during Grand Prix Hurricane (Philadelphia) and was witness to the first ever Players Championship. I’ve had beers with Pro Tour Champions and gamed for meals with, well, other Pro Tour Champions.And last weekend, I covered the largest trading card tournament ever held.

Grand Prix Las Vegas was, in some ways, exactly like every other Grand Prix. We called feature matches, wrote some analyses, interviewed pros, and tracked down stories. We wrote articles, and when we finished one, we started working on the next. It was more or less business as usual.

But in many ways, some of which you can read about on the official coverage page, Grand Prix Las Vegas was like no tournament I’ve ever been to before.

Obviously, the size was the big story. I’m used to large Grands Prix, having covered several two-thousand-plus-person tournaments. The throbbing masses that make up those spectacles and the organization necessary to keep things running smoothly have always been something to behold.

Vegas, however, was something else.

I remember when Talrand, Sky Summoner was first spoiled. At the time, I had some small hope it would be Eternal playable, and even tested a copy in Vintage Gush combo, where it served as a reasonable backup win condition when Tendrils of Agony wasn’t an option. Even there, with all of the format’s fast mana and card draw, it was too clunky.The problem with Talrand in Legacy is that any deck full of spells that wants a 2UU finisher is better off with Jace.

While Young Pyromancer doesn’t pitch to Force of Will, it does come down early enough to be useful. Imagine casting a Cabal Therapy or Punishing Fire with this guy on the board. Historically, cheap creatures with unimpressive stats have seen play if they provide some crazy value. Unlike Dark Confidant, Pyromancer doesn’t draw a card every turn, but a free 1/1 in play is better than a random card if your deck is able to convert that board presence into a win.

I have listened to the Magical voices on deep nights, after the worst of calls, through long hospital stays with my daughter, and while soaking in the sunshine. I am a better player because I listen. I’m a happier person when I am surrounded by people who love our game so much they decide to take time out of their lives to record their thoughts, knowledge, and friendship. I can’t tell you what podcast you should listen to. I don’t know if you play Cube, Commander, if you want a little rebel in your earbuds or prefer something more refined. You might just want to laugh. Maybe you are more scholarly. But whatever you are after, I promise there is at least one MTG podcast out there for you.

A seeming eternity of struggling through the savagery of a benighted land at last brought me to the borders of the territory I had sought for so long. Ragged, starving, and harried by bloodsucking vermin of every description, I no longer resembled the bold adventurer who had set out to find glory and fortune in the wide wilderness. Shelter and sustenance were my primary needs now.

I surveyed my surroundings. I had come at last to the shores of the Eastern Sea, an ill-starred realm that had seen much conflict in past ages. The echoes of ancient mage wars still rang here, preserved in weird formations of unnatural stone and amber shapes that sprouted like some unholy forest from the wave-battered cliffs. Every rock, it seemed, held ancient monsters birthed in a primordial chaos, now preserved as eternal shadows in the tortured earth.

Strange marks scarred the stones and the thin, sour soil. They resembled the scars left by beasts to mark their territory, as bruins claw the trees. But these bore no resemblance to any spoor I had encountered in my many expeditions, and I began to fear I was among beings unlike anything familiar. The scoring seemed to change midway through an individual's passage, growing deeper and farther apart, then nearly vanishing as they became finer and smaller. I had crouched down by a cliff to examine a set of tracks more closely, reaching to extract my notebook and pen so as to record them with as much exactitude as I could, when a sound from above alerted me to danger. I started to look up.

Too late.

I was struck with all the weight of a basher's cudgel, and all sensibility fled for a time.

Heather Lafferty isn’t just an Angel, she’s a Magic the Gathering Hero.

If you’re as immersed in the online community for Magic the Gathering as much as I am you’ll know Heather as the Community Manager for the website LegitMTG.com, inventor of the article series “20 Tweets”, or most likely as @Revisedangel on Twitter. She’s one of the nicest people on Twitter so if you’re not following her, you should be.

Like most of us, there are many facets to Heather. The two that attracted me to following her Twitter account was her love of the Magic community, and her job. Heather loves Magic. It’s something she’s really passionate about. More than that though, it’s clear that she loves the community as well. That’s something I can relate to. I’m very passionate about community building. I can also relate somewhat to her job. Heather is an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician). As someone who also wears a uniform for a living, there is an unspoken bond that exists.

Being an EMT in Las Vegas, is no doubt a tough job. Recently, Heather shared a bit of just how bad it can be on her Tumblr account. Working as an EMT is obviously not just mentally stressful, but physically as well.