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A staggering amount of Magic content is published each day each day on a plethora of content sites, blogs, podcasts, and discussion forums. No matter how honest an effort you make, it's easy to fall behind and miss incredible articles because there just isn't enough time to read everything.
To that end, we've collected some of the best articles of the week covering a broad range of topics. If you're looking for articles, these are the ones you don't want to miss!
On Deck Selection
The deck you choose to bring to a tournament can be the single most impactful decision you make going into the weekend. This is especially true in Legacy, where your ability to maximize small edges and play tight for round after round is absolutely critical. This week, Caleb Durward breaks down the things you consider when you're choosing a Legacy deck to invest in.
ChannelFireball.com: Caleb Durward (@CalebDMTG) - The Legacy Weapon Guide to Deck Selection
Deck selection has been written about, talked about, and practiced by thousands of players every day, but that doesn’t make it easy. We have misinformation flying at us—advice from well-meaning friends, sales pitches from passionate deckbuilders, and community-learned errors like the overemphasis on Top 8 lists.
If you don’t have time to test for a tournament, listening to a friend is an easy way to get information. Heck, even if you do test, you should be information swapping to check your results and make sure someone didn’t miss something. However, just because your buddy found the right deck for himself doesn’t mean that it’s the right deck for you, and most friends won’t consider that. They are caught in a sort of high from finding the holy grail, and they want to share that passion.
Writers are generally helpful. That’s the job, after all. That said, no one is correct all the time, and it can be hard to stay unbiased in the wake of recent success. A tournament winner has a lot of creditability with the archetype he won with, and his report will (hopefully) contain lots of useful data about matchups and important cards. However, when he writes that the deck is the best of all time and should be played by everyone in every format ever, the advice should be considered in the context of a player flush from victory.
Bad advice holds up the winners of yesterday like a singular ideal that we should all copy. Good advice looks past that to the next tournament, to the next ideal.
On Dragon's Maze
Matt Watkins is the author of one of the most mind-blowing series of articles about Magic. His Ars Arcanum series on PureMTGO take an analytic approach to Limited and generally take two forms. Matthew either breaks down the set by the characteristics of the cards - rarity, power, toughness, and converted mana cost, for example - to get an idea of what the format will look like or he looks at the decks and cards that tend to win based on the results of hundreds of Magic Online Drafts. If you want to have a leg up going into Drafts with Dragon's Maze, Ars Arcanum provides all the information you'll ever need.
PureMTGO.com: Matthew Watkins (@oraymw) - Ars Arcanum: Dragon's Maze Limited Primer: Part I
As I mentioned earlier, I’m going to focus this first part of my limited primer on the ten guilds. For the rest of the article, I’ll be looking at the statistics for the creatures in each of the ten guilds. For this section, I’ll be using the combined data for the guild from all three sets, which will give us an idea of how the guild will perform in draft, but will also help us decide which guilds will be strongest for the prerelease. I’ll also discuss my perception of how that guild will be affected by the release of Dragon’s Maze. Once I have gone through all ten guilds, I’ll take a moment to discuss which guild will be best for the prerelease, as well as a couple of tips for how to succeed in that tournament. Without further ado, the Guilds of Ravnica!
On Tonkatsu Taco
What is Tonkatsu Taco? It's the new Magic comic on LegitMTG.com drawn by none other than Polish Tamales of tumblr fame. Polish Tamales is an awesome artist, and this new comic has a ton of potential. Polish Tamales loves to explore the human aspect of our favorite characters from the Magic multiverse. He does a great job of giving them personalities and background, and creating deep characters that we love to follow along with.
If you want more Polish Tamales goodness, head over to his tumblr, where he tries desperately to keep up with the fan requests in his inbox!
LegitMTG.com: Polish Tamales (@PolishTamales) - Renegades of Junk
On John Avon
Jon Avon is the artist of some of the most gorgeous and well-known landscapes in all of Magic art. In this interview with Josh Krause he discusses his style of art, why he prefers to draw landscapes, and the process of moving to digital art from a more traditional medium. This is a great opportunity to get a look behind the canvas of one of Magic's most popular artists.
StarCityGames.com: Josh Krause - Artist Spotlight: Interview With John Avon
Among Magic players and collectors, John Avon has become well known for his beautiful landscapes and his incredibly detailed and inventive style. With over 200 images to his credit, John has been deeply involved in shaping how we all experience the game of Magic: The Gathering.
In an effort to learn more about his process and his recent transition to entirely digital production, I reached out to his business agent, Guy Coulson, and was able to secure an interview.
On Planeswalker Names
How important are names? That's the question that John Dale Beety is looking to answer in his article this week. Names are how we distinguish characters from one another; it gives them a unique identity. John looks at the names of our favorite Planeswalkers: where do they come from? What do they mean? Do they match the characters that we've come to associate them with?
StarCityGames.com: John Dale Beety (@jdbeety)- Names With Character: Planeswalker Edition
After twenty years (more or less), Magic has built up a large list of "names that matter." When last week's Uncharted Realms column popped up as "Barrin's Tall Tale," I had an almost Pavlovian reaction. "Barrin! Barrin! Barrin's back!"
Alas, this Barrin wasn't that Barrin—instead of a master wizard, I was reading about a half-entrepreneur, half-drunk who thought he could take on everybody's favorite* planeswalker Jace Beleren and got a mindwipe for his trouble.
"Barrin's Tall Tale" was a good story. Adam Lee can write. Even so, I felt as if my Vorthos chain was yanked a little with the use of "Barrin" as the protagonist's name, and I let him know that. To his credit, Mr. Lee owned up to the slip—official confirmation for every Vorthos out there: the naming was coincidental—and I came away from our e-mail exchange with a smile and an idea for my next column: character names, with a focus on planeswalkers. What goes into naming a planeswalker, and how do planeswalker names help shape (or unshape) a world?
On Dragon's Maze Rules
New sets bring new interactions and new interactions can be rules headaches. Judge's Corner is a weekly Magic video series where David Greene walks you through different parts of Magic's rules. From Double-Faced cards to new Dragon's Maze interactions, this is a great way to make sure you know how the game works.
GatheringMagic.com: Judge's Corner - Dragon's Maze, Part 1
On Quinton Hoover
Quinton Hoover was one of Magic's first and most iconic artists. Sadly, he passed away last Saturday. Glenn Godard took this opportunity to pay tribute to one of the great Magic artists. For those who have never played with a Quinton Hoover Magic card, this piece really highlights how unique and iconic Quinton's art has been. For those of you who remember playing with Quinton's Wrath of Gods and Illusions of Grandeurs, this piece is a retrospective of one of the artist who defined early Magic sets. One thing is for certain: Quinton left his mark on this game, and he will be missed.
GatheringMagic.com: Glenn Godard (@SunmesaGlenn) - The Life and Times of Quinton Hoover
Quinton Hoover died in the early hours of this past Saturday. It came as a great surprise. He was just 49 and there were many signs he was about to embrace a professional renewal. That sense of hope amplified the shock of his departure. My purpose in speaking for Quinton is to give his fans perspective on his life and legacy. For those who never shuffled up a card illustrated by Quinton I hope to provide historical depth and appreciation to why he was so important to the game we love. Feels like a tall order, wish me luck.
If you have suggestions for next week's recap you can send them through to us on Twitter, or share throughout the week in the comments below.
