Holiday results

It's been a holiday two weeks. Lots going on, including an auction result and even managed to play in a mini legacy tournament.
I've also been playing some of the closed Arena beta. The worst part of Arena is that it's Ixalan. Gawd I dislike that set. Bleh.

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First the auction. I was super pumped to get the cards in. The box actually showed up earlier than expected, a Christmas miracle!

I opened the deck boxes first, and they were all full of land. I was smacked. Shafted.

As it turned out, there were no rares or mythics. Sigh
After going through the cards, I wound up with over $120 in value. Mostly trade stock.
Lesson to self, what you see is not always what you get in the positive sense.

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I'll likely never own the duals or City of Traitors.

I got out last night to Titan for some legacy play. I took my Omni Tell build of Sneak and Tell. It was a very interesting night. All three rounds went three games.

Round 1 vs Grixis, not Delver: Honestly I am not entirely sure what the guy was trying to do. I didn't see much of his deck at work. I know he had Snappy, and some lite removal. I was a bit nervous to be honest. First game I dropped a Omni, then Sneak Attack, then a Griselbrand. He scooped.
Second game I found myself screwed in terms of threats, he had all the answers to things I could produce. He took me down. I did show the Leyline of the Void, because I thought he had more graveyard materials. Between Snappy and such... I removed the Leylines, and put in Blood Moons instead for game three. I dropped a turn two Emrakul, and that was match. Nice.

Round 2 vs Miracles: I mulled to 5 because of complete land hose. I popped a Probe, he showed a ton of control and I scooped before I embarrassed myself. I brought in Blood Moons hoping to keep him off fetches and duals. Also two red blasts, which is about all I had in terms of Miracles answers.
Game 2 I went first, popped a Probe, saw no FoW, and first turned an Emrakul. Scoop to game three.
Game 3 was tedious. I had a VERY small window to produce an threat and I swung and missed. I dropped a Blood Moon, and instead of cracking his fetch he Brainstormed... which allowed me to hold on for about 5 turns. I got an Omniscience down, but I could not draw a threat before he blew it up and he took control after that. I proceeded to have all three of my sideboard Blood Moons as well. (seriously?) Live by the combo, die by the combo. I had the pieces in place, but I could not find the answers. Oh well.

Round 3 vs Dredge: Once again, I mulled to 5 with no land... He proceeded to do what Dredge does. I had no answers and I scooped fairly easily.
In comes the Leylines of the Void. Oh boy oh boy oh boy... I seriously thought about putting Blood Moons in, but decided against it.
Game 2, I draw the nuts... I popped out a first turn Emurkal again. I knew he had no counter magic, so I felt safe there. He scooped after that. The funny thing was, his top card was an Ashen Rider. If I had waited one turn I likely would have lost. Ouch. Double ouch. Whew.
Game 3, I drew one the Leylines. He said keep, I said keep and dropped the Leyline. His face went slack. He should have scooped, but played a bit and I knew without his graveyard his entire deck was pointless... I gave him props for playing it out a bit.

Paid $8, won $12. Not the worst, not the greatest. But glad I played.... I still love combo. Doing broken things with broken cards.

Impressions:

• Probe is awesome.


• My sideboard build was pretty darn on par, no dancing around... blunt force.


• The current meta at the LGS was tilted towards fancy Grixis


• My first games in round 2/3 was just obnoxious. Seriously... 6 draws and 1 land in all of those. WTF deck?!


• No long drawn out games for Combo, either you got it or you don't. Its not honest thinking man's magic, but for the most part that's a part of Magic you need to figure out.


• If I go back, I would likely run change some of the build. I love broken things, but I realized a couple things.


• Need a 4th Griselbrand


• Need something to deal with Miracles... hmmm 


• I played ONE Sneak Attack, but pretty much with the game in hand


• Never played a City of Traitors

Hoping to play some more Thursday and draft some more Unstable on Friday evening. Good Holiday Magic to me.

Results

Found a small auction recently which had three different MtG lots in it. I was unaware that the on-line portion was absentee bidding, and there was a live function of it last night. Seriously, that was discovered right after the time ran out. Still, I felt pretty good about things. Fairly large auction in Albuquerque, I had "won" the internet side of the auction... I doubt people show up on a Tuesday before Christmas to bid in person for some magic cards. I was right!

I won each auction for under $15.
#1
#2
#3

Why is that interesting? Each one has a Premium Deck Series in it. Assuming that they are at worst lightly played, each are at least $50 in value.  (going off TCG sealed numbers)

Sealed each is:
Graveborn: $80
Slivers: $140
Fire & Lightning: $55

Plus there are many other versus decks and other stuff... I think I might have committed some more highway robbery.


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I did finally draft Unstable on Friday. I honestly based my entire draft after my pack one pick one. I also had zero clue what was good or not. Not the best strategy, but meh. The first two rounds I didn't realize my deck had no ways to assemble contraptions. Whoops. Newb alert. I swapped in a couple "Pulling a Double" and problem solved.
I wanted to do a different deck style, but meh. Whatcya gonna do?
I wound up going 1-2. However, because of the things at the LGS, I got a bonus pack which contained a foil Spike, Tournament Grinder. As of Friday when I opened it, it was clocking in at a robust $21. Not too shabby...
The rest of the cards, minus lands and tokens, went in to a community box for a cube someone was building.

Will Rudy do it again? Wasteland edition

In the most recent video, Rudy comments on Tempest Wastelands. He believes they are too cheap right now at $30 a piece. (surprisingly, does not comment on the EM reprint, clocking in at $27)

Everyone who needs them, needs four. You can't go 1-2 in a deck. You need four if you run any.


While I agree that if you are serious, you need these... I don't know if they should be classified in the same realm as his speculation on Mox Diamonds.

Lets keep an eye on things here!

Screen capture of Tempest Wasteland from MTGstocks.com as of 12/8/17 @ 0730

Update as of 12/11/17:  The price of a Tempest Wasteland, after Rudy's video, actually went down a smidge according to MTGstocks. Like 50 cents!
Well, there goes my theory about the influence of Rudy on card speculation. I am sure he still has it, but maybe the market is softer that we thought.


Update as of 12/20/17: The price has "soared" to $31.49 according to mtgstocks. Sorry Rudy, this round did not work out as planned. I guess there were just too much supply and not enough demand. You still won Mox Diamond investor of the year.

Trade aquired

I traded my foil Mana Drain for the cards displayed.

Would I liked to have gotten more? Oh sure, who wouldn't... but over all, I think I still won out. I am officially going after a play set of Force of Wills. I have one here, I have a second lined up with another trade. I have a third on the hook, though nothing is certain. (likely to be part of the Scalding Tarn from the photo)


I realize that getting any dual lands at this point is a pipe dream. Completely. Underground Seas are now clocking at over $400 per.


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I think the USPS has it out for me. The recent package that disappeared was a bugger. Then this week another thing happened.
I ordered over 50 foil Modern Masters 17 from a vendor on TCG. Super cheap at less than $4. The vendor gave me a tracking number, and I plugged it in. Nothing, never entered the USPS system. I waited, knowing things happen. Still nothing after a week. I write, they say they sent it...
Then yesterday I found out that the USPS returned the package to the vendor with most of the mailing label ripped off, and a couple cards damaged. Seriously, I cannot make this stuff up.

They re-shipped the package, minus the two damaged cards. I feel bad for the vendor, he will likely have spent twice the cost of the actual cards trying to get them to me.


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Gonna try to draft Unstable this Friday. I honestly have no clue how this will go, I am just mostly hoping to find a foil land.  :)

The land is where the value is at in the set, and I will attempt to win an extra pack or two in order to acquire more. If the store drafts it again the following week, I will try it again... but I vow no more Ixalan drafts while it is a stand alone set. Maybe when the next set comes out.

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If you like to up your game for Legacy, I don't know how I missed it- but there is a podcast devoted to it: Leaving a Legacy.
They are something like 163 episodes in! How on earth has this gone under my radar?

Traded

My current Deckbox.org trade queue

(no FNM drafting last night)

I've had more trades at one time right now than ever before. (see image)

If you notice, I have the Mana Drain queued up for shipment. Gonna plop it in the mailbox today.

Let me breakdown what I got here in order:

- 2 Stoneforge Mystics
- Fetid Pools (I like the cycling dual lands)
- Leyline of the Void, Defense Grid
- FoW (Alliances), Karakas (EM), Lotus Petal, 2 Monastery Mentor, Scalding Tarn (MM)
- 2 Flooded Strand (Kahns), Gonti, 2 Polluted Delta (Kahns)
- Unmask (Vault), 2 Dismembers

That's a lot of cards, good solid cards. And I am happy to get them to be honest. I need them for the various decks I enjoy. The Force of Will and Karakas are firsts, need to round out a play of FoW and at least 2 more Karakas. I don't need the Scalding Tarn so I am hoping to involve that in a trade for a Cavern of Souls, another FoW, or Karakas, etc.
The Stoneforges complete my playset I need. The Leyline completes my playset- god I hate dredge, HATE IT.
The Lotus Petal will replace a non-English language version I have.

I will say this now- I really like the dual lands from Amonkhet which cycle. I believe these will be a solid Modern card. The cycle ability is a powerful mechanic. Will it stand the test of time- I have no clue.

The funniest bit is that I wound up with 5 Flooded Strands. I have no clue how that happened. One back in to the trade binder for something else. Maybe I can find another Sneak Attack. That would be nice to land.


I still have no delusion about making a real Legacy deck, I just don't have the fire power to get the dual lands. $300 a shot for the prime ones is a road WAY too freaking far. If I can get the chance to play in a real tournament, I will have to count on friends to lend me thiers.

Until then- more trades to fill out my sub-$100 cards I need.


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Small note- thanks TCGplayer for finding me a storefront where I was able to purchase 65 MM17 foil commons for a grand total of $3.36 shipped! I discovered that the Iconic Masters foil cards are not as easy to wipe for creating home made foils. Off to buy more MM17 while the prices are super duper cheap!

I went 0-2 at Iconic Master draft, but won.

 There, I can't hold it in any longer. I pulled a foil Mana Drain. THE money card from Iconic Master.

*pant*

I pretty much don't remember much after that. What is really amazing, at our pod, which was from ONE box, someone else pulled a regular Mana Drain. Now THAT is an amazing box of value. I believe there was one other Mana Drains from 26 people playing. Crazy! (3 total)

Value-town.

Would I draft this set again? Likely not. I am not a big fan of the Masters sets for draft. I do like the value it brings, and how it drives some prices down for cards I need though. So I call it a win.

Here is my deck from the night. It should have done well... but then again, I lost. So, there is that. It felt like a decent deck, just that I am not a great drafter, and am learning. Every learning...

Plenty of life gain in there, plenty of upside to it. However, it helps to find the land you need. I have been on a HORRIBLE run of not finding lands. Like, life sucks being stuck at 3 lands sort of horrible. Not much I can do about that other than completely trashing my deck by going to 20 lands or something stupid. I ran 17 lands last night in a 40 card deck. It should have been good enough. Oh well.







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Trade updates- life continues on the trading front. So far so good. Got my first Aether Vial in yesterday. Nice. It showed up with three Primeval Titan friends. Sweet!

Even found some folks who really enjoy the foil proxies I made. Nice to share work with others.  :)

Drafts, trades, and auctions....

Went to the LGS last Friday to take my brain off stuff, wound up doing a random draft of some left over product they had. It was interesting... which is to say, I didn't have a clue what I was doing with the cards. Ha!
I went 1-2, which is fair considering I still don't understand some of the mechanics from the sets used.


The more important part is the LGS is hosting a $25 Iconic Masters draft this Friday, WITH prize support. Super excited. Everyone is hoping to pull the Mana Drain, so we shall see... I am just hoping for a winning record. We shall see.
As LR says- look towards the uncommon gold cards for the themes you should be looking at. So that's what I will review before hand, then go in, and forget it all. Its usually how these things go for me. Who knows, I might draft some sort of sweet R/W agro deck, or even B/R dragons... its all possible.


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Trades, trades, trades

Been a little more active on DeckBox recently. I traded 6 standard lands, and two other things for a signed Emrakul and a Pithing Needle. Sweet.
I also finally found someone interested in my Inkmoth Nexus cards... I was able to trade all 3 at once. Landed an Aether Vial, and 3 Primeval Titans. And yes, I am fully aware the Vial will drop maybe 20% when Iconic Masters rolls out in force. Same with the Titans. Honestly, the Inkmoths were SUPER slow to move. I don't know why they are valued at $17 per after trying to drop them for months.


And now for my EPIC trade that was lost, found, and such.

Back on Oct 17 I drop a package in a USPS mailbox, it had tracking. On Oct 21st, the other person asked where it was. I looked it up, not in the USPS system. Kept waiting... his cards showed up to me. I kept checking the online tracking and nothing. On 26 Oct I called the post office responsible and they said they clean out that box every single day, but they would double check that day to make sure it didn't get trapped or something.
On Oct 29th I mailed his cards back, it as only fair. I had to caulk up the cards to lost. The frustrating part is that I couldn't prove that I had actually mailed it, only that I had created a mailing label from PayPal.
On Halloween, on a whim, I checked the original package... AND THERE IT WAS. TWO WEEKS after I had dropped it off, it magically showed up in Boston with no other tracking information. It was like it dropped through a riff in time and space.
Comical. The LONGEST trade ever for DeckBox. Ugh.


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My auction bug just about died when I saw this auction.

• 2 Sealed boxes of Revised Boosters
• 1 Sealed box of Revised Starters
• 1 Sealed box of Revised gift box (2 starters, which could be errors and be all rares)
• 1 Sealed box of Mirage
• 2 Sealed boxes of Fallen Empires
• 1 Sealed box 4th Edition starters
• 1 Sealed box of Ice Age starters
• 1 Sealed box of Ice Age boosters
• 1 Sealed box of Homelands

When I saw the items, they were at 1700. Seriously, you can't find a sealed Revised booster for that much, never mind that much stuff. Anyone want to split the cost with me?

Finally, some legacy

After taking the week off from drafting Ixalan, I gladly busted out the Legacy material and rolled over to a friends house. We played for about 3 hours, and gosh knows how many games we got in. I rolled through a couple different deck, here are the ones I know I played with comments on each:

• Reanimator Depths- while a fun idea of mashing up two decks, it was extremely inconsistent in the draws. I mark this one up as a fun legacy deck, maybe a curveball at best. Would not play if I was serious, but something interesting to keep around.
• W/U Topless Miracles- With Sensei's Divining Top being banned in Legacy, the control deck is reborn under some new triggers. I was fairly happy with the performance, and it is a fairly powerful build. Keeping the deck stacked correctly is likely the most difficult thing to master just like under the Top version. If I had to run a serious deck, this would be in my top 5 right now.
• White Eldrazi- It feels like it needs an update to the build. The main engines are between the two different Thalias. Those two really do a number to many different Legacy builds, between non-creature spells costing more, and non-basic and creatures coming in tapped, its a massive pain in the butt. Plus it has some Eldrazi shenanigans to really get things hopping.
• Czech Pile- The version I ran is a different build that what is listed on The Source. All about card advantage, efficient repetitive removal, and countering stuff... its a pain in the backside to play against. It might take a little to get going, but that's the plan. Just slowly grind your opponent down, lock them out, and swing with a Goyf.
• OmniShow- I tweaked my all time favorite combo deck- Show and Tell to squeeze in the current trend of Omniscience. It was boom or bust, though I think sideboards would be very telling against it. Every time I got Omniscience out, I had an Emrakul handy to go along with it. Bing-bang-boom. Its still a massive hoot to cheat Emrakul out. 

I took a Lands deck, did not play it, also did not play the Death and Taxes with a splash of Red for Blood moons. That might be fun.

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Deckbox update- I managed to trade some standard lands for another Emrakul. Even go a Pithing Needle in the trade. I'll take it!

Did lose out on two Collective Brutality. My copy of Greater Auramancy was a little too beat for his liking. Odd note about it though, TCG pricing for a NM and a MP are about the same. Very strange range on that card.

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Interesting investment video from Alpha Investments. Many Modern players are getting to the point where they are fed up with the environment. They think something will increase in value, and Wizards just reprints them. Doh! In response players are either just dumping their collections, or either getting out of Modern entirely or re-investing in Reserve List cards because they know they won't be reprinted.  Huh.

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I don't understand Magic investment, but check this chart out

Yup- Beta Island. Currently clocking in at over $23 a card. A B.A.S.I.C. island. Sure they are cool, but they should never be over $10. Good lord.

The B Version is currently sitting at $23 per, and the C Version is at $15. Still super happy I got my 10 in the vault.

The Beta Forest is still cheap, Alpha isn't too much. Same with Mountains.

Looks like Plains are experiencing an upshot now as well: A, B, C 

I picked up 3 NM Beta C Swamps from TCG player in August for $7.41 each. Currently valued at $16.22. *smh* I bought them because at the time they were the cheapest Beta swamp to be had. Now the most expensive by $7.

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Lastly- REALLY good video on what to look for on cards, if you are worried about fakes. I honestly wasn't aware of some of the features revealed in the loop tests.

What happened here?

Can anyone help me understand what happened here?

By which I mean, why did this particular card go from a respectable $7-8 just in July, to about $20 now? Seriously.

The card in question is an Alpha Island. I don't actually own this particular Alpha, I have a set of the other ones signed. The B Island has been all over the place too... going from $7-8 to $30, back down, back up, and currently back down. The market place is mad.

Beta Islands are maintaining the spike a bit better. (A, B, C) I guess I just got my Beta land set at the right time... gesh. This is crazy.

I asked a friend what he thought the spike was due to, and his theory was the growing popularity of 93/94 Magic. While very possible, I think he was a bit biased as that's pretty much all he plays now. So, I am not sure if that is an accurate assumption. Possible, not probable.

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Cool, fun, and a bit disturbing photos from the first Magic World championship at GenCon in 1994. I fully recognize the fashion decisions there, I have divorced myself that I attempted to dress anything like anyone in those photos.

Notes- no sleeves, no playmats, Beta Mox played on naked hard worn tables. Very likely, that event likely held the greatest concentration of Power cards since the sets were printed and shipped. Prison and Zoo, that was the name of the game back in the day. Starter decks were the place you put your deck, that's how you kept the deck together. Yup- that was a major thing.

Keep in mind, Magic was about one year old at that point. (released to the public at GenCon, August 1993) So all people had were power and amazing cards, in retrospect.

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No draft for me tonight, and I am utterly fine with that. Wife is out for the evening, I am sick of Ixalan drafts, which mean I am gladly home with the kids for the night! Maybe I can convince one of them to play a duel deck with me. Not likely, but I'll try.

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If I don't injure myself doing home improvement stuff tomorrow, I am going to play Legacy with some friends. I haven't done that in a fairly long time. I've got two new decks to throw in to the fray, my pet project of Reanimator Depths and one I am not sure I want to throw the brain power behind to tackle- Topless Miracles.

A little too testy

I am about done with Ixalan draft. I'd rather do sealed with it to be honest.

Marshall Sutcliff summed it up best in Limited Resources podcast #412. He summed up the format as something you pick your tribe and either you get the sweet cards you need and trample your opponent, or you don't get there and just lose. I think the overall best decks, if you get the sweet cards, are either Merfolk or Vampires. Either one can just slam the crud out of you and beat down... I've been on the wrong side of each version in draft.

This week, I am taking off from draft for multiple reasons. I thought about it last week, but after getting slapped in the face with "the good stuff," and not being able to play magic... I need a break from losing.


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Thanks to Target for letting me buy the Draconic Domination commander deck for about $28. How did I do that? First, you have to find a store that has the commander decks available. That's a bit tricky. Second, this week only, Target has a 25% off one toy deal. You need to text 827438 'toy' and receive a mobile coupon. Third, go find that commander deck, or the bundle you want, and check out for 25% off MSRP. I went with commander because on TCG, Draconic Domination is at least $41.

Deckbox.org

I joined DeckBox.org in the hopes of finding a bigger trading base, and so far it has been. I am not going to write a critical review of the site, nor a how-to use it. Not my intent. I just want to give some impressions and things I have learned. In my typical fashion, it comes via a bulleted list!

Result of largest trade to date

• Read a trader's profile, it will help
• Trust is earned
• Don't be afraid to ask questions
• Be honest and accurate with your card grading
• People love free stuff, and in my case foil proxies
• Largest trade to date- $80
• I've lost things in the mail, even with tracking
• I am still trying to sort out one right now
• Keeping LGS trades straight vs on-line availability has come down to me taking photos of cards I am trading away to sort out later at home
• Offers will be rejected for many reasons, don't be offended
• Don't feel offended for rejecting someone's trade
• On-line trades almost always want lightly played cards or better, your LGS friends likely don't care as much
• Be sure to poke about in the other person's trade list, you might find something else you are interested in
• The initial entry for your trade list can be daunting
• I've culled A LOT of cards from my trade list
• I'll likely never get most of the cards on my trade list

Would I recommend deckbox? Heck yes. Be patient, be respectful, and be a good trader.

Latest auction results, oh rats.

I got the latest box in today, which was a surprise. Was not expecting it until Thursday- thank you USPS.

First off, the one card I was gambling on- Bartel Runaxe, was not in the condition I was hoping for. Honestly, it is LP- in condition. I might be able to get $20-25 for it. If I am lucky. Which is not what I was gambling on.  *sad face*

However, I got my moneys worth at least. No money loss, even with shipping. The photo from the auction, which showed the better cards, were exactly that- the only better cards found.

Highlights:

• Rhystic Study
• 4x MM Brainstorm
• white bordered Exhume from Battle Royale Box set 
• Propaganda
• Goblin Charbelcher

Nothing huge, nothing worth over $10, other than the Bartel.

Odd find- 3 Unlimited Dwarven Demolition Team. (I hadn't realized they were printed in 8th edition. Huh)

Last note from this buy- the collection was most from the Apocalypse set. Nothing of real value was found though. The other odd thing was that the collector was very interested in creature types and having four of each. For example, there was a run of rats. These are all playsets, x4

• Ravenous Rats
• Razortooth Rats
• Rats of Rath
• Rabid Rats
• Diseased Vermin
• Disease Carriers
• Lab Rats
• Pestilence Rats
• Sewer Rats
• Crypt Rats
• Plague Rats
• Muck Rats

They were all found near each other in the box. Weird. There were some other animal types found together, but not nearly a complete creature type as Rats.

Yea, no.

Well, that didn't work. Not at all.

I attempted a strategy I heard about, but once again I missed out on the bomb or two I needed to complete the strategy.
I drafted black/blue pirates, with treasure to cast off color stuff. Well, in theory it worked. Seriously. I as able to cast the off color- two red damage, and two Hammerskulls. Not the ideal off color 'bombs' I had hoped for.

Not the results I was hoping for.

As per my typical spiral- I was super competitive the first match, completely steam rolled in second, and I should have just dropped in third. It was ugly. I didn't get tilted, just didn't do well. Didn't misplay anything, the deck just did not perform.
It happens. I had outs on several games to pull my butt out of the fire and take wins, but the draws were literally one turn too late. It was painful, the topdeck gods were not in my favor last night. It happens.

Sidelight- I got very little value from the packs. That also happens.

I made minor trades, nothing worth writing home about.

For the record, I still do not like Tribal themes.


On the other side of the coin, I did like the white bordered lands being easier to "spot" or feel out when drawing. Just gave a different feel from everything else being black bordered.

Draft land set

After acquiring my nearly complete set of pre-sleeved draft lands in Beta... I am thinking about another set. It was after watching Marshall Sutcliff's Ixalan pre-release video. Specifically this point. He mentions being able to just glance at an opening hand and knowing what land you have, how familiar the lands are. While he talks about having Beta basics, I think I wanted to try a different try.

Three sets of draft lands- full art, beta, and revised.

All ready for my whims. ;)

All Magic sets are black bordered now, that was not always the case. Back in my day, which is to say when I learned in the 90s, only expansions were black bordered. Core sets were white bordered. Unlimited, revised, 4th edition. It wasn't until 10th edition (2007!) that all frames would be black bordered.

I think it might be fun, to try an all white bordered land set for draft... I might try some revised lands first. (still the WORST printing of all time, in terms of color and vibrancy) Though I am thinking that getting 10 lands of each type, the same image, in Unlimited might be the best compromise in my book. Old school, great quality image, and white bordered.



Side note- you can tell I don't care much for this draft set as I am durdling around with draft land. lol.

Ixalan draft, another auction?

It looks like my gamble on Merfolk did not pay off last night, I went 1-2. I will admit I totally misplayed a critical moment in the 2nd round. *sigh*

I had gone in to the draft with a bit of knowledge. For some reason, I am not a big fan of tribal sets. Thus, this set has me on my back foot already. I did decently at sealed the other two times I played Ixalan. So that was nice. For my first and only draft so far, I had determined to stay open to what was available. Trying to remain draft agnostic.
We had 12 people, so it was 2 pods of 6. Made for a slightly higher rate of cards that could help you out. I went in to Merfolk off some early cards being passed my way. I durdlered around for the first 3 cards, and landed firmly in Merfolk after that. Post matches I realized I missed out on never saw a couple key cards that would have sent the deck in to hyper-drive. I had most of the gears in place to make the deck hum, just not the over the top cards to make it work. (e.g. Four River Heralds' Boon) I had zero removal, which REALLY hurt. I was gambling I could "sneak" in huge chunks via flyers or unblockable. It works the first match, but petered out in round two with a mana screw game 1, worked like a champ game 2, and a HUGE misplay in game 3.
The 3rd match was embarrassing against vampires, he went wide and I could just not deal. *sigh*
I drafted nothing of value, but did trade for a Growing Rites of Itlimoc. I have no real desire to keep it, just decent trade fodder for larger material. Honestly, almost no standard stuff appeals to me, I ought to just sell it all as a lot.


Auction update time:

I found another auction which had a TON of Magic material. I think this auction had a clue what was going on because they really broke it out well- for example- dual lands, Force of Wills, and Power Artifact were all separate auctions. I settled on bidding for 3 things, an Invasion version of Flooded Strain, which I was thankfully outbidded on because my bid was practically the value of the card. Second was a playset of Tempest Wastelands... I had that up to about 2 hours at the end of the auction. Lost out, didn't want to attempt more on it. Third, was a 700 card lot from a box. There were several of these lots with inviting cards laid out.
I quickly realized there was one card that most people likely didn't realize might help pay off the lot: a Legends Bartel Runeaxe. Thanks stupid Legends buyouts! There was about $100 worth of cards shown in front...I don't expect much else in the box to be honest, but I will report if anything else of note slips in.

Ixalan kickoff- sealed

My LGS hosted a kick off event for Ixalan- a sealed event. About 20 people showed up, and that's pretty good for the shop. Four rounds complete with door prizes- mostly packs. I actually won the second to last door prize- an FNM Fatal Push promo. Yes, I wound up getting three of them for various events at the store. I still have 2 of them.



Sealed is a fickle beast, mostly luck, some skill... and more luck. I was somewhat lucky in which I had a decent pool for R/W dinos. Turns out, it was pretty darn aggressive for the format. I was done my matches in pretty darn record time. I cleaned the board with the first two opponents in plenty of time to do some trading. w00t.



My third round proved otherwise, he had dinos and a slightly better deck... also, his lands showed up appropriately, mine did not. Mana screw is always a threat, but nothing much you can do about it but sit back and admire your playmat.



Fourth round was a bit tricky. I was playing a guy who was 3-0. If he won, he would have been first place... so we made a little decision to see how the games went. I wiped the playing field with him. Good grief... we played a third game for grins, and my lands disappear again.



In the end- I got 3 packs, a FNM Fatal Push, and some ok pulls from 6 packs. My 3 winnings got me a nice $7 rare to be traded off.




The bigger factor were the trades. I got myself a Dark Depths finally... the guy did want more things I had, so hopefully he is there again Friday so I can throw some more of my recently found collection his way to get another Dark Depths off him.
There were other possible trades, but the other person couldn't find the cards they wanted.... it happens.




Lastly, I decided to put my Leovold, Emissary of Trest up for trade. Just realized it can do me more good with other cards than I could ever use it in some random deck I will likely never really play outside of kitchen table games. Turn that $40 value in to usable stock!

Random buy results

I got home, and the 20 pound box of cards was waiting for me- w00t. I pretty much spent most of my free evening time sorting and figuring out what was what. Note before I even get started:

• The entire thing stunk, like moldy basement.
• One of the boxes had dryer lint through-out it
• Many of the cards were damaged from something
• pretty sure someone bit one of the cards from the marks
• something was spilled on some cards
• some water damage is evident on some cards, hence the mildew smell
• Found part of an Uno deck
• All of the sports cards, as suspected, were crap
• Found a single Pokémon card worth some value
• Found a dude's drivers license, a complete first. And yes, it was expired by about 4 years.
• TCGplayer's App was in INVALUABLE time saver

That all said, I went in hoping to pay for the entire thing from one or two big money cards, making

the rest just trade fodder. I wasn't even sure if I could find things I needed/wanted. Trade stock is trade stock.


I nailed my hopes- the big money card was a FOIL Fifth Dawn Crucible of Worlds. Yup... Nailed it, can't be stopped. It was in VERY good condition, at worst slightly played. Easily $80. Next up, a FOIL Craterhoof Behemoth from Avacyn Restore, at least $25. Those two right there paid for everything. NAILED IT!
(edit: I already found someone to buy both of the cards at once for $100. Pretty good deal for both of us)




As for the rest of the cards? Oy, that took a while. I am still not 100% done going through them all. But my early TCG scanner card counter has the "value" at over $400. I doubt I will get that much in trade due to condition issues, but over all- completely worth the effort.


Odd note- many of the decent cards I was looking at were recently re-printed. I thought that was funny. I am not sure, but I might try to clean a couple of the cards with a q-tip and VERY light water on it, staying away from the edges. The storage conditions was not the best. I even found a large amount of mold in one sheet in a binder. Ick.

[Update: I am not very familiar with sets between 2002 - 2016. I just missed too much. I went through the boxes of cards with the TCG app and scanned as many as I could. I would up finding many other cards I had no clue had value. For example, Devoted Druid, or Ancient Den]
[Update #2: I went through the binder one final time- pulling out everything. Tucked behind another card was two Serra Avengers. Gesh.]


Couple note worthy cards:

• Zendikar Death's Shadow
• Foil Thragtusk
• Foil Memnite
• 2 Golgari Grave-Troll
• Rest in Peace
• non-foil Craterhoof Behemoth
• Master of the Pearl Trident
• Inkmoth Nexus
• Kor Spiritdancer
• Rings of Brighthearth, but at best played condition
• Life from the Loam

Reject photo! (those that did not make the cut for trading)

Random buy time

I found this Magic card auction via lastbidonline.com. I bid on it, pretty much on a whim the last day of the auction. I honestly didn't think I would get the items, because my wuss bid of $40 would easily be outbid. I did very little research on the cards, simply because the images were crap. It was hard to tell what some of the visible cards were.

I pretty much bid based on two cards I could identify- one in the photo on the right- there was an Inkmoth Nexus. Ok... about $15 in value. The other one I could identify was a Venser, the Sojourner from a Duel Deck. It was about a $10 value. So, $25 in visible value. Well, there are 4 'fat pack' boxes full of cards it seems. There are two different binders with gosh knows how many more cards. Oh, and a few random sports cards which will likely get tossed after discovering there is no value with them. (My opinion on them: over produced and nothing desirable)

I woke up Monday morning fully expecting to be outbid. Nope- my $40 bid held for all these cards.

Now for the shear panic mode- the auction side does not supply shipping. OH F*CK. Seriously.
I contacted a local UPS store, and they said they would have been super happy to go pick up the cards and ship them for me- $35 just for the privilege to ship them. I called the FedEx store- they would not pick them up.
OH NOES.
I called the auction house and they were SUPER nice about things. After I explained how the UPS store wanted $35, they offered to get things arranged for a fee of $10. After experiencing complete panic, I thought this was the best way to go. They even took it to USPS which is likely much cheaper than UPS or FedEx.
(side note- the auction house told me they were surprised at how low the auction went. They were told there was a bunch of value in the cards they put up)

Today I got the receipt for the tracking number, the cards should be here tomorrow. God I hope there is some good stuff in there. Oh, and by the way- the total weight for the shipment is 20lbs. Yup- that seems like a lot of cards and possibilities!

Ixalan pre-release

I am not sure how to sum up my experience with Ixalan so far. Its been, weird.

My promo for the pre-release

First off- I went to a 3 round only event at 7am. Woot.
Shout out to Dan L who usually goes to these early events. Thanks for shooting the crap with me.  :)

I went 2-1, 3 packs for my troubles.

The first iteration of the deck was 3 colors- Blue, Red, and Black. Black was in there for some removal and a couple critters. Red had some damage and triggers for damage. Blue was in there for card draw, flyers, and card draw. I think I didn't get the mana curve right after going back over the cards. 

The first round, the guy is a kitchen table player... he did not seem to know how to craft a decent deck from sealed. I felt bad for him. My deck played well. It had answers for everything he threw out there. 2-0

Second round, my deck completely left me high and dry. Land hosed both ways... it also got run over by dinosaurs. CRAZY. I lost 0-2. Crushed really. 

In between rounds I decided I needed to add some more dinos for the heck of it, so in goes a fourth color! My dinos were white this time. It made a difference. 

I had some color fixing, so ok.

Third and final round, the guy gets me good the first game. He played Fleet Swallower, and caused half my deck to disappear. Thank god he stopped attacking after that first, I would have not survived another round or two of him kicking my butt. I was able to stabilize and came roaring back.

Second game, I got the Sky Terror down, and it just crushed. I even threw on a Pirate’s Cutlass on him to seal the game.

Search for Azcanta was pretty darn sweet. It was a GREAT filtering engine to find the cards I needed. I even had to point out the may ability to get flipped to another player. He was very excited after that. 

Treasure Map was DARN good. I can see that being used in Standard and maybe Modern. Scry via an artifact, then get 3 artifact mana tokens?! Yes please!

My true mvp was Angrath’s Marauders. Sure it was a 7 drop, but at 4/4 it was vastly over costed. HOWEVER, when any source deals damage, it deals double it is a huge thing. It usually sealed the deal when it dropped either by killing off their biggest creatures or causing havoc in the blocking world. 

Pre-release, time to unleash the Betas!

Ixalan pre-release is THIS weekend! I do enjoy pre-release weekends. I am doing something new this time- playing at 7am for only 3 rounds. Due to family obligations, I cannot do the normal 5 rounds and free lunch. Oh boo! It happens, life happens.
I am not entirely sure I care for the flavors of this set. Dinosaurs? Really? Melfork, ok. Pirates, alright. Vampires... ummm ok. But then Dinosaurs? Ouch. Meh.

The mettle of this set will be in how well it drafts in my opinion. Thats all I really care about these days with new sets- how does it draft?
Next week my LGS is having an Ixalan kick off party next friday! Free packs, playmats, lots of goodies, and homemade chili for anyone who wants it. I am looking forward to it- my LGS has been very good to its players. Its a small place, but devoted group. Thats what it takes... a group to grind it out. I've been going for 5 months, and I am impressed with the steady group that shows up week after week.


Now for the big news- I am going to unlease my Beta basics for draft. I had been using BFZ full art basics for flair, but this is gonna be awesome. I've been slowly acquiring them since I rejoined the Magic world. I am still a couple short of the full 50, 10 each of each basic, but it is close enough that I am ok with sleeving them all up and putting them out there as my personal flare. I got a bunch signed, and I will not get a full set of Forest versions signed. I have a 'set' (all three versions) signed, which is "good enough."

Here they are, a class photo if you will. I am extremely happy with them.

Notes about the set-

• All the islands are signed
• All of the mountains are signed
• 7 of the swamps are signed
• 3 of the plains are signed
• 3 of the forest are signed
• 3 of the forest are alpha
• 2 of the islands are alpha

I am working on getting the last 2 mountains I need and 2 forest. I am in no hurry yet... keeping an eye out for a decent deal. If you have any laying about and want to work out a trade, let me know!

I am using UltraPro Matte Eclipse sleeves. They are a joy to shuffle with. 

Note- when you double sleeve, things seem to "puff up." I would say 1.25-1.5x the size of a single sleeved card. Very frustrating.

The Rudy effect

Rudy from Alpha Investments has put out a lot of videos regarding the financial side of Magic. He is a character, he does a lot of showmanship. Good on him. He is a force to be reckoned with when it comes to investing in Magic, or any other CCG for that matter.


He has a background in high finance, and applies a lot of that insight in to investing in Magic cards. He shows off what it takes to open a brick and mortar store. He shows off what it takes to keep lines of credit open if you want to take advantage of deals that someone else will. He gives insight to what he believes is the world of Magic investing is like. He created cute characters like the Greed Monster. Fans of his have made him art, and mailed it in to him. Not to mention thousands of proxies/fakes for him to "check out."


From all accounts, Rudy is a very nice guy in person. There is YouTube Rudy, and there is the guy who deal with Rudy. I've never met the guy, and I doubt I ever will. However, he has MASSIVE influence in the Magic investment world. He has the long term view on things. One prime example- it is his personal goal to buy every single graded 10 alpha Magic card out there. He wants to control the entire market for that area. He believes there are so few out there, that any time he can find one, he is willing to pay a premium for that card. Why? Because in the long run- he will win out on investing in it. It is more secure than any bond, mutual fund, or otherwise.
[Update on the Alpha cards, there were only 1700 Alpha rares printed of each card. Rudy estimates there are 7-800 still in existence, and MAYBE 100 unplayed. That's why he is buying whatever he can find]


Side note- I've heard that investing in a Black Lotus gets better returns than investing in the stock market. Now, that's all hear say, and I am sure you can back it up with some fancy graphs... but that could be truth, or it could be just rumors. There is a lot of dollar figures that would have to be applied to get to the truth on that.


Back to Rudy. On September 15th, Rudy posted a view entitled: Analyzing a Unique Magic Collection. At the 7:41 mark, he comments on a Mox Diamond in the collection that it would not be put up for re-sale. He believed that Mox Diamonds are currently undervalued.


On September 14th, the value of a Mox Diamond was about $93.50. (thanks MTGgoldfish)
Today, September 19th, the value of a Mox Diamond went up to $125.


See the snipped chart from MTGgoldfish below:



Thanks to Rudy, just mentioning the possible investment potential in this card caused a $25+ increase. I am sure it is going to increase more as people sort out what it should be valued at.


Good on you Rudy... you are able to sway entire markets with a comment now. I just ask you to be careful out there!


Next up- a massive buyout on Mox Diamond. I predict by end of year, it will be over $200.


[Update: as of September 21st, the Mox Diamond is up to $140... trending upwards.]
[Update: as of September 22nd, the Mox is up to $167, still going up]