Category: mtg

  • Consumer Electronics Show

    This week Las Vegas was host to the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show, which wrapped up yesterday. There were some great new technologies and products revealed, as well as Bill Gate's great retirement speech/video. We here have made a few additions to next years' Christmas wish list – TVs, Monitors, Cars. Ok, so they're BIG WISHES, but hey we could always win the lottery, right?

    So while there's a laundry list of great stuff to be shown at the show, here's our Top 6 picks for best of the best, coolest of the coolest, and stuff that we wish was hanging from our wall, or plugged into our sockets. Sure they'll put a dent in your wallet, but the latest and greatest toy on the market is worth it!

    Alienware Curved Monitor

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    The Good: Holy crap! It looks like a monitor out of a sci-fi movie, and what else would you expect from Alienware? This 2880×900, LED screen is comprised of 4 (nearly) seamless screens for a gaming experience that is ALMOST 180 degrees! Imagine what all that porn you watch will look like on it.

    The Bad: Well you'll almost have to devote a room to this mammoth monitor. Good luck finding a desk that can support it's weight, or decorating a room around it. Turn that computer room into the deck of the Starship Enterprise (assuming you haven't already turned your parents' basement into a replica).

    The Ugly: The price is yet to be determined, but you can rest easy knowing this will set you back a pretty penny. Nowhere near as expensive as some of the other items on our list, but the luxury of a gaming experience like this won't come cheap.

    Pioneer 9mm Ultra-Thin Plasma TV

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    The Good: Ok, so it's just a concept right now, but wow is that ever slim! It balloons out to a *whopping* 18mm in the center, which still leaves it thinner that your boss's hair, or the lies you tell your wife.

    The Bad: It's ulta-slim, and ulta-light, so at worse it'll make you look fatter than you already are. You girlfriend or wife might get jealous and ask if you want her to be that thin. And you might lose it in a stack of papers.

    The Ugly: Sure, LCDs and Plasmas are coming down in price lately, but you can be sure that the thinner your TV gets, the more expensive it'll get. Expect it to take more than a chunk out of your spending money.

    Panasonic 150" TV

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    The Good: Well, it's WAYYYY bigger than the puny 103" TV Panasonic debuted last year. Hell, this is bigger than most of the walls in your apartment we'll assume. The first step to virtual reality, and exactly what Wile E. Coyote would have needed to trick the roadrunner into running into that Fake Tunnel. It's 4096×2160 resolution will have you trying to reach into the screen.

    The Bad: Good luck getting this monster INTO your house. It'll require knocking out a wall or removing a portion of your roof. And if you thought Rosie O'Donnel looked huge on a regular TV…

    The Ugly: Well we already mentioned Rosie, so it comes down to price. You WON'T be able to afford this, unless you're Bill Gates or NASA. So if you wipe your ass with $100 bills, this will continue to be a dream. A WET dream.

    Whirlpool Plug-and-Play Refridgerator

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    The Good: With an iPod dock, TV, Laptop Dock, Picture fram, speaker system, and food storage (duh) all you're missing is a comfy chair and a toilet and you've got an all-in-one system for lazyness. Watch the game with a supply of beer an arm's length away, have your laptop and iPod ready to go, and if you're missing them from your hours and hours of seclusion, digital photo-frame dock for pictures of your family and other people you've alienated by living against your fridge.

    The Bad: Having a fully-stocked fridge inches away from you is definately a downside. Snacks, drinks, and everything that'll balloon you to a lardass so close you can smell them. With no need to leave the fridge for your media needs, you'll be installing a toilet in the kitchen in the future.

    The Ugly: Showering with the water dispenser.

    Mitsubishi Laser TV

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    The Good: This 65" Rear Projection set debuted with a cavalcade of hot dancing girls demonstrating how PURE the color can be when using 'frickin' lasers'. The darkest blacks and brightest primary colors ever seen will all be available on this amazing piece of tech. Expect it and a special 3D version (requiring glasses!) to hit the market later this year.

    The Bad: The constant fear of the lasers breaking through the screen and boring a hole in your forehead. Sharks getting a hold of said lasers. End of the world ensues. Colors so bright the rest of the world seems dull.

    The Ugly: Let's face it, this TV will always be brighter than you. The resulting inferiority complex will probably lead you to sell the TV you just spent several thousand dollars on.

    Chevy Volt Hydrogen Car

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    The Good: So while the concepts for the volt were released months ago, CES-goers got the first look at the Hydrogen engine GM is using in this eco-friendly vehicle. We aren't tree-huggers around here, but anything that allows us to stop paying for gas is, in our books, AMAZING. Plus it looks like something out of a mad scientist's lab.

    The Bad: Will it sound like the purr we all love from our precious vehicles? What's the fuel efficiency like? How much will it cost? All these questions and more… can't be answered yet. Oh well, at least we got to look at something pretty (like going to the strippers).

    The Ugly: Being the invention touted as what will end our dependancy on oil, you've got imagine it's not going to be cheap. Selling your first born for this puppy sounds like a fair trade. Also, you risk being called a hippy for driving an eco-friendly car.

  • Roy Spires Wins Grand Prix: Vancouver!

    After two days of Tarmogoyfs, legendary Treefolk, and Counter-Top locks, we have a winner. Well-known internet Magic expert Roy “Random-Miser” Spires defeated Tomoharu Saito in the most lopsided match in Grand Prix history. Spires’ tech was so powerful we have omitted his decklist from the coverage out of respect for his innovation.

    “I just threw it together this morning……I wasn’t even planning on playing this event…..I was in the neighborhood and figured why not……” Then he made a face like this:

    :-9

    “When word gets out…….everyone will know [OMITTED] is good.” Then he squinted his eyes shut tight.

    >.<

    (Sorry for the ellipses, but when Roy speaks there is often a prolonged pause that is represented best by five or six dots in a row).

    Prior to this weekend Spires was best known as designer of Invincible Counter Troll, a Vintage deck containing some of the most broken cards ever printed and Sedge Troll. Earlier last year Sedge Troll was timeshifted into the Planar Chaos set as Hedge Troll in tribute to Spires. Roy has long been recognized as the smartest Magic player to have never accomplished anything significant in an event of any merit.

    “What can I say….my opponents get lucky…..”

    Dr. David Pask from the School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences at the University of Newcastle calculates the odds of Roy avoiding the pitfall of lucky opponents as a number too long for this article to one. In other words, nearly impossible.

    “Mister Spires has been the victim of luck so often it has become part of the fabric of reality. In fact, anyone sitting across from Spires in a tournament setting will automatically be exempt from mana screw and will often get his ‘God hand’ two games running. This places him on the opposite end of the scale from say, Kai Budde or Jon Finkel, two of the luckiest mages in Magic history. That is, until now.”

    Dr. Pask did not comment as to if internet coverage magnifies this lucky opponent phenomenon. It would seem so based on past events. From the Starcity Games Vintage tournament in July 2003 to Grand Prix: Dallas 2007, Roy’s opponents have been lucky enough to prevent the public at large who might not be familiar with his extensive library of apprentice logs detailing his victories or his domination of the Dallas FNM circuit from recognizing his genius.

    In addition to his trophy, Spires leaves Vancouver with the top prize of $3000 and the $1500 check for best finish by a player with no pro points. How’s that for luck! Roy is taking it all in stride.

    “For an event like this, I’m practically losing money…..I usually make tens of thousands trading cards at tournaments….I didn’t even have any cash for my entry fee yesterday…..good thing I had my American Express Black on me…..” Then he made a face too complex for an emoticon to represent.

    Upon hearing the news of the victory Stephen Hawking electronically uttered, “I have been wrong about everything”. Then he died.

    Congratulations to Roy “Random-Miser” Spires, Grand Prix: Vancouver Champion 2008!

  • Pro MTG Online #173

    Pro MTG Online #173

  • Pro MTG Online #172

    Pro MTG Online #172

  • Lorwyn Legend Art

    Every time we begin a Magic: The Gathering adventure in a new fantasy world, we try to populate it with interesting and original heroes and villians to make the new mythos come alive and bubble with energy. Today we take a look at some of the creative characters we've come up with for the Lorwyn world, which is likewise the setting for the upcoming Morningtide expansion.

    Kithkin: Gaddock Teeg

    Gaddock Teek is a Kithkin humanist, satirist, lecturer and writer. Teeg is most noted for his famous novels as well as his quotations. During his lifetime, Teeg has been friends with warlords, artists, leading artificers and Lorwynian royalty. Teeg enjoys immense public popularity, and his keen wit and incisive satire earned him praise from both critics and peers.

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    Merfolk: Sygg, River Guide

    Sygg is the frontman and long-suffering manager of the Merrow Lanes. Whereas Sygg is a happy, perky and somewhat avuncular character elsewhere, on the Lanes he tries to keep control of the varied, outrageous, kinetic merfolk characters (and his temper), as well as keep the non-merfolk guests happy and secure.

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    Goblins: Wort, Boggart Auntie

    Wort is a Goblin auntie who attracted realm-wide attention for her extended demonstration at a camp outside a Gilt-Leaf ranch garnering her both support and criticism. Two years later, Wort officially ended her involvement on the political front lines, saying, "I am going to go home and be a mother to my surviving younglings and try to regain some of what I have lost."

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    Elves: Nath of the Gilt-Leaf

    Nath is a controversial Elvish humorist, philanthropist, warrior, and talk show host.

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    Treefolk: Doran the Siege Tower

    PH'NGLUI MGLW'NAFH DORAN FOREST WGAH'NAGL FHTAGN

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    Giants: Brion Stoutarm

    Brion Stoutarm, commonly referred to by his surname, is the best friend and former roommate to the giant Kiel. He can frequently be seen engaging Kiel in childishly competitive games. Stoutarm is normally the victor of these games, and he enjoys rubbing it in Kiel's face. He normally does this by making Kiel say "I'm your biatch" after Kiel loses.

    Brion Stoutarm Image

    (Discuss this item in the forums!)

  • Doping with Dolphins I

    With christmas about to come after weeks of shoving its cock down consumers’ throats, it’s time to reflect on the little things that the year has brought us. Now I’m not going to lie, from hurricanes to music to magic, this year has been a load of shit, but I think if we pry a little deeper we’ll find that it’s full of tasty grubs and nitrogen, and if not we can post our attempt on the internet.

    The year of magic ended earlier this month when the Jews and Swiss took time out from taking our money and using it to make very precise watches to destroy us at Worlds in New York. And let me tell you, the snow outside didn’t stop the event from being hotter than a beach in Brazil. The finals came down to Uri Peleg, who once upon a time provided Nick Eisel with a rough list which Eisel fine-tuned into a killing machine that we look back on as Food Chain Goblins, defeating Patrick Chapin, the grouchy American boasting a decade of mediocrity, by a very prominent nose.

    Peleg piloted an innovative black-green-white deck which stood with history on its side as it vividly recreated the trope of a black caddy carrying a white man’s clubs on a golf course. Let’s take a look at the list:

    As you can see the deck runs the time-tested white:other proportion used by the British throughout their empire. Cards like Doran, Oblivion Ring, and Riftsweeper can provide guidance for the other, more powerful but less organized cards, as well as providing specialized services to pull the most possible out of an economy burgeoning with slave labor. Apparently Peleg went to the forest so that he could test deliberately prior to the tournament, and I’m going to give 10:1 odds that he did it on a raft in the Congo.

    Now let’s take a look at the deck he beat. Chapin showed up with the buzz of the tournament, a 75-card number with a plummeting neck-line bringing attention to mountains that could kill at a moment’s notice. Here she is, in all her glory:

    Chapin said that he based the deck on his ex-girlfriend, which is probably the best explanation for the snow-covered lands. And let me tell you, it made from some awkward chit-chat when he met Gabriel Nassif, who he had been quite close to leading up to the tournament, in the semi-finals only to find that Nassif was running the same deck with an up-to-date sideboard, although his maindeck looked like it’d put on a few pounds. The tension escalated further as Nassif made it evident that he’d been fucking all night with his abysmal play.

    The deck seeks to lure you into complacency with slow foreplay using the game’s most sexually enticing manabase, and then freak the hell out on you, throw your favorite models at the wall, and put four dragons into play. Unfortunately for Chapin, he returned home in the finals to find that Uri had had his friends over and they’d killed the cat with a shotgun.

    It was a great tournament, with plenty of celebrities attending and no crashes. But it was the exception for the year. MODO has gotten worse and one of the PTs was hosted in Spain.

    Take a moment to look back and be thankful for what we’ve had, and what we’re promised. Version 3.0 will probably be out sometime next year, and the next PT is in Kuala Lumpur.

    I mean, what could go wrong?

    Discuss this in the forums!