Vintage Masters Sealed Deck Premier Event 7211778

I  like the Vintage Masters limited format a lot. I have played Magic for a long time and Vintage Masters appeals to me.

So I decided to play a Premier Event and spend 45 tickets for your entertainment and for a chance to particpate in the Power 9 lottery.

This is the deck building portion:

Having just read in an excellent article (link at the end) that WR aggro was the deck with the highest win ratio in the draft format, I decided to go aggro! Flametongue Kavu, Battle Screech and Goblin Trenches sure looked sweet.

8 Mountain
8 Plains
1 Forgotten Cave

2 Aftershock
1 Kindle
1 Kindle
1 Flametongue Kavu
1 Goblin Patrol
2 Solar Blast
1 Goblin Trenches
1 Jareth, Leonine Titan
1 Gustcloak Harrier
1 Chain Lightning
1 Hulking Goblin
1 Deftblade Elite
1 Battle Screech
2 Phantom Nomad
1 Devout Witness
2 Soltari Emissary
1 Radiant, Archangel
1 Radiant's Judgment
1 Chartooth Cougar


My relevant sideboard cards were 2 Gilded Light (though there was probably no real Storm decks in a Sealed tournament), 1 Renewed Faith, 1 Astral Slide and 1 Wheel of Fortune.

These are the first four matches. They were very uneven. Only the first one was exciting.

I was 2-2 after these matches and quite discouraged. The format seemed so slow compared to the draft format I have heard was so quick. UG Madness seemed very overpowered if you can get it (just like Briang Wong said on Limited Resources).

Well, 5-2 could still theoretically make the top 8. So lets get there!

In my fifth match I faced WU Control, which is one of the ten archetypes Wizards talked about when they released the format.

In my sixth match I was up against WGr big buys. WG is the Little Kid's Deck (as stated by Wizards) but it is also the second most winning deck in the draft format. Armadillo Cloak would be quite hard for me to handle.

Check out the action here.

A lot of boosters was up for grabs in this last match. I faced a WG Aggro deck that was very fast, just like my own deck was supposed to be.

(Round 7 video)

If you just want to know what happened, here is my two minute final statement about the Premier Event and the final result.

And here are some relevant links regarding the Vintage Masters Limited format:

This is my 3-0 VMA draft with White Weenie: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2014/06/my-initial-vintage-masters-limited.html

My buddy VaultBoyHunter plays VMA Draft: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__LXlH0UoTE&list=PL2jQrD9SkZONa7pjkuut4JGD1MSOYMIdr

My friend Julien plays VMA Sealed Deck: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eIOxV2tpXA&list=PL2jQrD9SkZOPhyWVolttCf5w5b7vuKBK8

A very good article about the draft format that includes hard statistics about what decks are actually winning:  http://puremtgo.com/articles/ars-arcanum-vintage-masters-draft-overview

A good article about the draft format: http://www.quietspeculation.com/2014/06/unlocked-insider-winning-in-vintage-masters-draft/


Contact Info:

YouTube: MagicGatheringStrat, sngprop, Fan of History (Ancient History)
Twitter: @MagicGathStrat
Web: magicgatheringstrat.com
blog: mtgolibrary.com
Facebook: facebook.com/MagicGatheringStrat

M15 - promo cards to choose from during prelease

Cards are prioritised, starting with the best card and ending on the worst choice for the prelease event.

Siege Dragon  - 5RR
Creature - Dragon
Flying
When Siege Dragon enters the battlefield, destroy all Walls your opponents control.
Whenever Siege Dragon attacks, if defending player control no Walls, it deals 5 damage to each creature without flying that player controls.
5/5

Indulgent Tormentor   - 3BB
Creature - Demon
Flying
At the beginning of your upkeep, draw a card unless target opponent sacrifices a creature or pays 3 life.
5/3

Resolute Archangel  - 5WW
Creature - Angel
Flying
When Resolute Archangel enters the battlefield, if your life total is lower than your starting life total, it becomes your starting life total.
4/4

Phytotitan  - 4GG
Creature - Plant Elemental
When Phytotitan dies, return it to the battlefield tapped under its owner's control at the beginning of his or her next upkeep.
7/2

Mercurial Pretender  - 4U
Creature - Shapeshifter
You may have Mercurial Pretender enter the battlefield as a copy of any creature you control except it gains " : Return this creature to its owner's hand."
0/0

Opinion section:
The blue card is the weakest card due to possibility of coping only your creature card.
The green card comes next, it allows you to kill one creature of opponent choice every two turns. No trample and spending six mana for this effect doesn't make this card a bomb.
It was quite difficult to judge the white card while we do not know the full spoiler, wheter it is fast or rather slow environment, but still it is solid flyer.
The demon card is a flying draw engine, however your opponent will probably not allow you to get one extra card.
During combat the red card blasts everything, what is touching the ground, out of its way

Our plans for the switchover

So, we are finally there. Mtgo v3 will be switched off 16th July and Mtgo v4 will become the only client for Magic Online.You can read the full announcement from Wizards here: http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/magic-online-v3-date-and-new-client-update-2014-06-26

Mtgo v3 served us well during the years, but now it's time to move to Mtgo v4! What will you need to do that? First of all, please note that v4 won't work on Windows XP: Wizards infact decided not to support xp:

"One of the decisions we recently made that will help us deliver a better and more performant user experience is the elimination of support for Windows XP at our minimum spec level. Like Microsoft, we have decided to discontinue support for the nearly 13-year-old OS in order to make better use of the upgrades provided by more recent operating systems."

You will then need our new bot for Mtgo v4 (that will be release starting next week) and you will need some more RAM: mtgo v4 uses more ram than v4 and it is computationally more demanding, hence you'll probably need to upgrade your machines a bit. Please install Mtgo v4 on your machine and all that comes with it (NET 4.0 and WPF).

We expect the market to slow down a bit, more or less like what happend with the switch from v2 to v3, but this will recover in a couple of weeks.

Pauper Gauntlet Competitor #2 Love Train

The Pauper Gauntlet is coming to mtgolibrary. You can submit your Pauper brews starting August 31st right here. Please do not submit any decks yet.

10 decks were prequalified for The Gauntlet by doing well last year. They will be presented here.

Deck #2 is Love Train, a Freed from the Real combo deck that can play both aggro and control as well. It ended up in 3rd place in the first season of the Pauper Gauntlet in 2013, which was quite a suprise.

This deck has a lot of interesting angles. Its creator is master brewer Jphsnake, also known under his first name "Jack" as a competitor in the TV show King of the Nerds (season 2)

Love Train by jphsnake

4 Wall of Roots
3 Viridian Longbow
2 Seat of the Synod
1 Tree of Tales
4 Trinket Mage
3 Freed from the Real
2 Drift of Phantasms
2 Train of Thought
2 Terramorphic Expanse
4 Mulldrifter
3 Vines of Vastwood
4 Overgrown Battlement
6 Forest
6 Island
3 Gatecreeper Vine
4 Axebane Guardian
4 Simic Guildgate
3 Counterspell

Sideboard
3 Hydroblast
3 Nylea's Disciple
4 Aurochs Herd
2 Wickerbough Elder
3 Deadly Recluse

Read more in the original article by jphsnake: http://mtgostrat.com/2013/07/my-train-of-thought-decks-im-thinking-of-abusing/

Mean_Duck also created a Modern version of the deck: http://mtgostrat.com/2013/10/bullettrain-pauper-love-train-goes-modern/


Contact me
Facebook: facebook.com/magicgatheringstrat
Web: magicgatheringstrat.com
Blog: mtgolibrary.blogspot.com

My YouTube channels
Fan of History: My ancient history series
MagicGatheringStrat: My MTGO channel

John Avon - Kickstarter

Kickstarter is a crowdfunding platform. The company’s stated mission is to help bring creative projects to life. People who back Kickstarter projects are offered tangible rewards and special experiences in exchange for their pledges.

John Avon, who is celebrating his 30th anniversary of producing fantasy art for books, record covers and card games, is putting together his the best pictures into book 'Journeys to Somewhere Else'. Everyone who contributes to this campaign will be thanked by name in the books. Additionally, some rewards are provided, including a Deluxe Limited Edition book, some original Magic: the Gathering sketches and various paintings from John's 20 years of painting in oils and acrylics, dedicated books, smaller sketch bundles (single sketches), T-shirts and playmat dinner in Brighton witth him or Adobe Photoshop lesson with John.

By now, John raised over 18000 from 24000 GBP. 27 days left.
Will you make a contribution to this project?

My initial Vintage Masters Limited experience

In Sweden we celebrate Midsummer in a very unique way. It is a holiday as big as christmas and we spend our time dancing around a gigantic phallos symbol pretending to be frogs (I am not making this up). That important holiday gave me precious little time to try out Vintage Masters but I decided to get a draft in before I left to spend a week with my in-laws celebrating Midsummer.

I was poorly prepared for the format, having only listened to the Limited Resources episode on Vintage Masters and browsed a couple of articles. All I heard was that Battle Screech was a hidden gem. So I was looking for Battle Screeches.

This was my draft. I went for a Swiss Draft as I wanted as much play for my money as possible (I always go for Swiss drafts).

My preference for Battle Screeches had placed me in a Mono White Weenie deck. Mono colored decks are rare in limited but when the color was given to me in this generous way, they are usually good.

This is the list I decided to play

16 Plains
1 Secluded Steppe
3 Battle Screech
2 Afterlife
1 Radiant's Judgement
2 Brilliant Halo
3 Deftblade Elite
1 Benevolent Bodyguard
2 Phantom Nomads
2 Soltari Emissary
2 Benalish Trapper
3 Gustcloak Harrier
1 Pianna
1 Mistmoon Griffin

There were a couple of nice combos in the deck, such as Deftblade Elite + Brilliant Halo and Phantom Nomad + Brilliant Halo. I felt slightly positive about the deck. Doing a 2-1 draft with a Tundra would be positive value, so that was my goal.

Match 1 vs some four-color pile of cards

Match 2 vs UG Big Monsters
I thought this guy was playing the dreaded UG Madness deck but there really wasn't much madness going on.




Match 3 vs GR Lightning Rift
Up to this point, Battle Screech was very good. Somehow, I found myself in the finals against this slick GR Lightning Rift deck. This guy could take out a full Battle Screech with just two cycling activations in duel one. Pretty impressive.

In the end, Battle Screech performed above expectation (even thought expectations were high). I will be looking for Battle Screeches in my next draft as well.

Bonus Draft with my buddy Sam

Bonus Sealed with my buddy Julien

Overall impression of the format
My initial impression is that the format is much like Modern Masters - totally awesome! I will be doing more drafts when I get back from my crazy countrymen.


Contact me
Facebook: facebook.com/magicgatheringstrat
Web: magicgatheringstrat.com
Blog: mtgolibrary.blogspot.com

My YouTube channels
Fan of History: My ancient history series
MagicGatheringStrat: My MTGO channel

MTGO Library Bot 7.01

ML Bot 7.01 has just been released. It is a maintenance build fixing a few minor bugs:

• zombie curl.exe processes in the task manager will now expire automatically in 15 minutes
• reading of the chat before entering Selling or Buyer mode is now slower and more reliable
• Autotransfer trades used to cease after 1 failed trades. Now the stop happens after 2 failed trades, not 1

The new MTGO v4

Two days ago Wizards of the Coast released an update for Mtgo v4. The update mainly addressed the  trading interface, changing old features and adding new ones. You can read the full article here: http://community.wizards.com/content/blog/4102121

We are happy with this update - this is probably one of few updates that really improves the trading system and that will benefit traders. The v4 trading system is now very close to the v3 one. We had to change some things our v4 bot to adapt it to the new interface but this is a work we were happy to do.

Among the most notable changes, the new mtgo v4 introduces the good old wishlist: you can now load a .dek file and mtgo will automatically grab the cards for you. The chat is now automatically docked to the right and, in case you lose it, you can simply click the "Chat" button on the bottom-right. Finally, the trading interface is in a new windows: this means that you can access the Classified Boards while trading and change your BUSY / OPEN message easily.

Here at mtgolibrary we think that the update was much overdue and we are happy it has been delivered. Our faith in mtgo v4 is now a little higher!

Pauper Gauntlet Competitor #1: Illusory Tricks

The Pauper Gauntlet is coming to mtgolibrary. You can submit your Pauper brews starting August 31st right here.

10 decks were prequalified for The Gauntlet by doing well last year. They will be presented here.

Deck #1 is Illusory Tricks, the runner up in the first season of The Pauper Gauntlet.

The basic idea is to play a mono blue tempo deck that can beat Delver.

Illusory Tricks by Bava

Land (19) 18 Island 1 Quicksand Creatures (23) 4 Krovikan Mist 4 Dream Stalker 4 Cloudfin Raptor 2 Phantasmal Bear 3 Fathom Seer 3 Spire Golem 2 Stormbound Geist 1 Mulldrifter Spells (16) 4 Counterspell 4 Vapor Snag 4 Preordain 2 Piracy Charm 2 Deprive Artifacts (2) 2 Bonesplitter

Sideboard (15) 2 Stormbound Geist 4 Hydroblast 2 Coral Net 2 Curse of Chains 3 Mulldrifter 2 Serrated Arrows

Sideboard Plan

Affinity: +4 hydroblast, -1 oona's grace, -2 stormbound geist, -1 piracy charm

Delver and Muc: +2 serrated arrows, +2 stormbound geist, -4 vapor snag

Stompy: +4 coral net, +2 serrated arrows, -1 oona's grace, -2 stormbound geist, -1 piracy charm, -2 fathom seer

Elves: +4 coral net, +2 serrated arrows, -1 oona's grace, -2 stormbound geist, -1 vapor snag, -2 fathom seer

Burn: +4 hydroblast, -4 vapor snag

Goblins: +4 hydroblast, +2 serrated arrows, -4 vapor snag, -2 stormbound geist

Mbc and UB control: +2 serrated arrows, +2 stormbound geist, -4 vapor snag

UR fiend: +4 hydroblast, -1 oona's grace, -2 stormbound geist, -1 fathom seer

Read more in this article by Bava: http://magicgatheringstrat.com/2014/06/illusory-tricks-better-than-second-place/


Contact me
Facebook: facebook.com/magicgatheringstrat
Web: magicgatheringstrat.com
Blog: mtgolibrary.blogspot.com

My YouTube channels
Fan of History: My ancient history series
MagicGatheringStrat: My MTGO channel
Atlassolutions4: My life (and my puppy)

Cards I bought this weekend

While waiting for Vintage Masters to drop I looked for other things to invest in. I am trying to invest every week - if you don't buy, it is hard to make a good monthly earning on MTGO Finance.

Some general trends

As stated before, now is the time to invest in Theros block with the intention to sell during the first Standard PTQ Season in 2015. More about that here: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2013/11/when-to-invest-in-fall-set-theros-for.html 

Pauper is under a lot of pressure right now and I can't believe that Wizards intended it to lose this much popularity. I think they have a plan for saving Pauper and that it has already been announced - Constructed Leagues (scheduled to launch along with the relaunch of Limited Leagues this year). Generally, all Pauper staples are risky but good pickups. Having said that, I did not invest in them yet - still waiting for VMA to fall.

The cards I bought this weekend

As always I am looking for 200% return within 12 months. Some of the below investments are riskier than that but I expect their return to be greater if they hit.

Agent of the Fates (0,05): He just needs a deck and then we are off to the races.

Boon Satyr (0,11): Massive supply has bottomed out this card.

Champion of Stray Souls (0,25): This is very cheap for a Mythic and should be a good target for a sell-at-redemption pickup.

Chained to the Rocks (0,1): If there is a RW deck after rotation, this card will be in it even without Shocklands.

Clifftop Retreat (0,15): I actually bought all the ISD lands. The flashback drafts hit these cards hard when they were already trending down. This seems very cheap.

Donate (0,42): At a low point still due to the flashback drafts. Should return to old price levels eventually.

Elvish Archdruid (0,05): I picked up a couple of hundreds of these. It has been printed four times but if it becomes standard legal again it will still give a lot more than 200%. Just look what happened to Chandra's Phoenix that used to be a penny rare.

Gild (0,05): Gold just looks like a mechanic from the next block that will be more relevant come Khans of Targir.

Gods in general (x): I am getting playsets of all the gods at this time. Only going deep on Purphoros though (and possibly Kruphix).

Hive Mind (0.05) :There is even a deck named after this card and it is getting old. Is this really a penny rare forever? I doubt it.

Mistcutter Hydra (0,11): Could easily be 0.5 or 0.6 this fall.

Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx (0,46): Immediatly went up after I bought it. I think this card will get its time to shine before it rotates out in October 2015.

Prophet of Kruphix (0,05): Wont be a penny rare forever.

Purphoros, God of the Forge (2.54): If Targir block is all about small creatures this guy should be quite powerful. Already seeing play in Standard, I feel it can only go up.

Spear of Heliod (0,05): If Khans is indeed about weenie hordes, this card should be useful.

Soldier of the Pantheon (0,15): The next block could be all about weenie hordes and/or be multicolored. If one of these two things happen, Soldier should be fine.

Spirit of the Labyrinth (0,05): Just way too good to be a penny rare.

Sylvan Caryatid (0,35): Good Theros pickup.

Swan Song (0,05): One mana counterspell will not be a penny rare forever.

Whip of Erebos (0,05): The legendary nature and huge supply of the divine weapons make them risky but I can't resist picking them up at this price.


What do you think are good Theros pickups? Remember the 200% rule. I am being conservative here as VMA just will be a lot better with higher returns so I am saving cash for that and for the Modern collapse in September.

I know I am much too fond of penny rares but they are the cards with the highest potential. Last year, this was the time I was involved in picking up 300 Nightveil Specters at 0,05 tix. If just one out of three penny rare specs hit the return is usually much better than going deep on Kiora or Ajani (who both are unlikely to yield 200%).

Waiting for Vintage Master prices to drop

What am I waiting for? I am waiting for supply to make the high demand cards bottom out. Here are my thoughts on the matter: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2014/05/vintage-masters.html

Contact me

Facebook: facebook.com/magicgatheringstrat
Web: magicgatheringstrat.com
Blog: mtgolibrary.blogspot.com

My YouTube channels:
Fan of History: My ancient history series
MagicGatheringStrat: My MTGO channel
Atlassolutions4: My life (and my puppy)

How to draft Conspiracy?

I think some of you play also paper Magic and especially for these players this article is dedicated.

The question for today is how to draft Conspiracy? I have analyzed Conspiracy and pointed out few Archetypes. Then, I featured some flagship cards of it. Please take into consideration fact, that I focused only on flagship cards of the specific deck and good common or uncommon cards, which suits there really well. Cards, such as Pernicious Deed are always welcomed in your deck.

WR walls:  Wakestone Gargoyle, Vent Sentinel, Sentinel Dispatch, Kor Chant, Swords to Plowshares, Vow of Duty, Brimstone Valley, Volcanic Fallout, Deathforge Shaman, Flamewright.

UW fliers: Favorable Winds, Sky Spirit, Air Servant, Apex Hawks, Swords to Plowshares, Crookclaw Transmute, Cogwork Spy, Rousing of Souls, Doomed Traveler, Brago's Representative, Fact or Fiction.

UBG reanimator: Victimize, Gamekeeper, Extract from Darkness, Pelakka Wurm, Compulsive Research, Reckless Scholar, Shoreline Ranger, Twisted Abomination i Elvish Aberration, Sakura-Tribe Elder, Breakthrough, Fact or Fiction, Smallpox, Double Stroke,

GW tokens: Intangible Virtue, Predator's Howl, Sevala's Charge, Squirrel Nest, Doomed Traveler, Rousing of Souls, Swords to Plowshares, Echoing Courage, Sentinel Dispatch, Double Stroke.

UB control: Compulsive Research, Assassinate, Reckless Spite, Extract from Darkness, Tragic Slip, Dream Fracture, Reckless Scholar, Screaming Seahawk, Typhoid Rats, Air Servant, Fact or Fiction, Jetting Glasskite, Double Stroke, Iterative Analysis.

UR deathrone: Marchesa's Smuggler, Marchesa's Infiltrator, Orcish Cannonade, Marchesa's Emissary, Treasonous Ogre, Wind Dancer, Grenzo's Cutthroat, Brimstone Volley, AEther Tradewinds, Traveler's Cloak, Immediate Action, Muzzio's Preparations, Power Play.

BRG morbid: Morkrut Banshee, Deathreap Ritual, Plagued Rusalka, Tragic Slip, Wakedancer, Brimstone Volley, Volcanic Fallout, Assassinate, Reckless Spite, Spontaneous Combustion, Victimize, Liliana's Specter, Pitchburn Devils, Sakura-Tribe Elder, Howling Wolf, Elephant Guide, Predator's Howl, Relic Crush.

MTGO Library Bot(s) 6.98 - 7.00

Today we released 3 updates, fixing some minor bugs with Vintage Masters and the P9 (Power 9).



If you are using ML Bot 6.97 you are perfectly fine, there is no need to update immediately.

MTGO Library Bot 6.97 - Vintage Masters

ML Bot 6.97 has just been released, supporting the new set Vintage Masters (VMA) and Duel Decks: Jace vs Vraska (DDM).

The updated pricelist and bot are already available online for download. LITE bot uses should upgrade too because the pricelist is used as reference for the name of the cards, even if it is not used to price the cards.

Enjoy!

The Pauper Gauntlet is coming to mtgolibrary

Pauper is in quite a sad state right now. The Daily Events are gone. The Premier Events are not firing. Pauper prices are falling. But I think Wizards did not intend Pauper to fall this deep and will do something about it.

My guess (and thats only a guess) is that they will revive Pauper through Constructed Leagues that are supposed to be released when Limited Leagues finally return to Magic Online. That has been promised to happen during 2014. On the other hand, Wizards promised that Leagues would return in 2011 as well.

If you don't know what Leagues are, you may be in for a pleasant surprise later this year.

I still think Pauper is an excellent casual format at this time and to underline this I have decided to run something I did in 2013: The Pauper Gauntlet.

Everything will start on August 31st here on mtgolibrary.com.

If you want to know more, here is my video announcing The Pauper Gauntlet season two:

Coming to you on mtgolibrary.com and MagicGatheringStrat.

I hope to see a lot of interesting brews.

The end of the Modern Noob

The Modern Noob has ended.

Lets summarize it. But first - what was The Modern Noob?

The Modern Noob was my series about learning Modern. It started in October 2013.

Learn more about the Modern Noob here: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2014/04/the-modern-noob-finale.html

Statistics summary
I played ten decks in The Modern Noob. Here are their match scores  (wins-losses and win%)

Soul Sisters 48-13 (79%)
Gruul Blood Moon 13-6 (68%)
Tron 16-8 (67%)
Taking Turns 10-5 (67%)
Hartford Red 40-23 (63%) including 3-1 in a Daily before the Modern Noob started
Goblins 13-8 (62%)
Mono Black Infect 5-5 (50%)
Death and Taxes 6-7 (46%)
Elemental Combo 2-8 (20%)
Restore Balance 1-4 (20%)

I played four of these decks in tournaments. Lets check out how I did.

My biggest success was with Taking' Turns in this PRE



I played Gruul Blood Moon in an 8-mans


I failed totally with Soul Sisters in an 8-man and 0-2:d the final Daily Event.

The big final event was my Daily Event with RG Tron.





What did I learn?

I learned that Modern is fantastic. I had so much fun doing this.
I learned that you guys loved Modern and I had many more viewers than I ever expected.
I learned that Modern is a format that rewards focused practice
I learned that my old rule of playing 100 matches with a deck before taking it to a tournament was a good rule which I broke here.

Finally, what could I do differently next time? Let me know in the comments below or in the comments to this video.




This video also contains some ideas about what I want to do differently next time, including spending way more money on cards (thanks bots for making this possible).

Some of the deck lists: 
Soul Sisters http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2013/11/decks-of-modern-noob-soul-sisters.html
Tron: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2014/03/a-new-deck-for-modern-noob.html

Thank you all for watching and reading about the Modern Noob. 

Mechanics of Conspiracy

Conspiracy is a combination of traditional draft with the multiplayer game. Each of the eight players draft 3 Conspiracy packs. Afterwards, participants are divided into two groups of four and each group plays one multiplayer free-for-all game. In multiplayer games, you draw seven cards rather than six the first time you take a mulligan. You may attack whomever you want to, multiple players or planeswalkers targets during one combat are also allowed. Play proceeds clockwise until each other player has been eliminated. Conspiracy introduces a new mechanics as follow:

- Conspiracy: a card with Conspiracy starts the game in your command zone, what means that we don't need to play them, they are activated since the very beginning. However, such card doesn't count toward your deck size so you still need a deck with a minimum of forty cards in it.
- Hidden agenda: it is variation of Conspiracy. The main difference is that, hidden agenda comes into play face down and you secretly name a card before the game starts. Whenever, you play the named card you get some bonus, for instance haste.
- Dethrone: triggers whenever a creature with dethrone attacks the player with the most life or tied for the most life. Such creature gets some boost.
- Will of the Council: whenever you play a card with this ability each player votes, then you sum up the votes and do what the card says to.
- Parley: each player reveals the top card of his library. For each nonland card some effect happens. Later, everyone moves revealed card into his hand.

Next week how to draft this set.
Reminder: Conspiracy is available only in paper Magic.

MTGO Library Bot 6.96 - update your prices wherever you are

Market moves fast and you need to change a price immediately? Are you away from home and you realize that you set some wrong prices on the pricelist? That can really be a nightmare and I bet this happened everyone at least once.
If you have teamviewer you can fix this, but now, more easily, you can upload a pricelist in the format of "PersonalPrices.txt" directly from the Online Control Panel: the pricelist will be uploaded and automatically delivered to your bots in few minutes. You don't need to restart the bots, they will automatically recognize the update and use it.

Once uploaded, mtgolibrary.com server will send you an email to confirm the upload: just click on the link provided in the email. The price list page (image below) will show all the pricelists (confirmed and not confirmed) and, as soon as the bots update, their names will change from "gray" to "blue" - so you'll know which bots received the update and which still have to get it.

We designed the upload with a cloud approach so you can review the old pricelists and download them by clicking the name in the table ("Filename" column).
Everything should be pretty easy to use and self-explanatory but if you have any doubt please don't hesitate and write us at staff@mtgolibrary.com, or chat us on LiveChat or on Skype (we are "mtgolibrary.support").

The time to pick up your Theros block cards for the fall is soon

I wrote about this before so this is just a friendly reminder. Pick up your Theros block cards in June.

If you want to know why you should pick up the Theros block cards you want for Khans of Targir standard now, check out this blog post:

http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2013/11/when-to-invest-in-fall-set-theros-for.html

Short version: Its the summer slump. Very soon interest will switch to Vintage Masters and M15. Be sure to pick up all the Theros block cards you need for play in september AND all the cards you want to speculate on.

This was the time you could pick up Jace, Architect of Thought at 14 a year ago and then sell it six months later for 38.

MTGO Library 6.95

ML Bot 6.95 has been released. It fixes a problem with the Autotransfer handshake of the "Get tixs from you until X" mode. The problem was that the passive bot was not able to recognize the command and thus it did not confirm the trade.

The Modern Noob Finale

You voted Goblins off the island. Only Soul Sisters and Tron remain and I will play a Premier Event and/or a daily with one or both of them. I will do that before next Sunday and then I will report how everything ended.

The Modern Noob is my series about learning Modern. It has been going on since October and is scheduled to end with me choosing a deck to play in a Premier Event in the first week of June (June 2nd-3rd, I am getting my first dog ever on the 4th, so I better be finished by then).

Learn more about the Modern Noob here: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2014/04/the-modern-noob-finale.html

We are almost done.

Statistics update
Soul Sisters 48-13 (79%)
Tron 13-6 (68%)


Deck Lists: 
Soul Sisters http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2013/11/decks-of-modern-noob-soul-sisters.html
Tron: http://mtgolibrary.blogspot.se/2014/03/a-new-deck-for-modern-noob.html

Recent Matches

Soul Sisters vs Boros Burn and Death's Shadow
I played two different opponents

Tron vs BW Tokens

This is normally an easy matchup

The Modern Noob on mtgolibrary
I will report on my progress in The Modern Noob every Sunday here on mtgolibrary until June 8th, when I will report how the Premier Event/Daily worked out and then sell all my Modern cards when they peak like crazy during Modern PTQ Season. I will start playing the format again in September after rebuying everything I need.

Wizards of the Coast sues Cryptozoic

After Cryptozoic stopped producing the World of Warcraft Trading Card Game company tried to raise money in Kickstarter, which is a crowdfudning platform. They collected $2.2 million for a new digital card game named Hex. Such success hasn't been missed by the biggest player in TCGs. Wizards of the Coast is suing the creators of a game called Hex: Shards of Fate for ripping off its popular card game. The suit calls out the “blatant and willful misappropriation and infringement of some of Wizards’ most valuable intellectual property assets pertaining to its Magic: The Gathering trading card game and trading cards”. Wizards is seeking all of the money made by Hex so far, which is estimated at over $500,000, for pilfering the “look and feel” of Magic and its “mechanics, plot, actions and elements”.

Watch video explaining Hex rules and decide on your own: here
The same rules, even some cards. Indeed, it is the most blatant copy of TCG game I have ever seen.