magic-the-gathering.bigb

= Magic: The Gathering
{c}
{tag=Good video game to watch}
{wiki}

Magic is the best card game of all time. <Ciro Santilli> agrees with this fact, and this <games young Ciro Santilli played>[has nothing to do with the nostalgia factor of having played it while being a teenager].

It is also the one with the most cumbersome name possible, containing even a <bloody> colon punctuation in it!

However, besides that, Magic has another major flaw: the cards of old formats (Legacy and Modern), which are the only really interesting ones, are <fucking> expensive: <Magic: The Gathering is too expensive>{full}.

Like in <mathematics>, the most beautiful decks are those that do <Ciro Santilli's self perceived creative personality>[crazy things]:
* infinite combos
* semi-infinite combos that allow you to likely draw your entire deck or deal 20 damage
* all-in decks that either win or lose on turn two
* and lands
All of this comes to a certain extent from the deep https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symmetric_game[asymmetry] that permeates the game.

It is also really interesting to watch as new sets as spoiled and try to guess if certain cards will have any impact on the Modern or Legacy metagame.

Here are some cool decks:
* Cheerios, Modern. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WkjY7VWZC3o[Meryn MTG, 2019]
* Lands, Legacy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9Pxen2CZlg[Channel Mengucci, 2019]
* Belcher, Legacy, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajJG11AI88o[Jeff Hoogland, 2019], https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egGw0aWYsdc[Channel Mengucci, 2017]
* Ops All Spells

  \Video[http://youtube.com/watch?v=uFHtX4Agv4U]
  {title=Ops All Spells - Legacy | Channel Mengucci}
* Gyruda Cannon - Legacy - April 18th, 2020 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PefRTsRRi6w

If Ciro were to ever overcome <Ciro Santilli's cheapness>[his cheapness] and play the legacy forma (which will never happen), he would likely play one of the following decks when trying to be able to win at all:
* https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/turbo-depths[turbo depths]
* https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/sneak-and-show[sneak and show]
Both of this decks focus on cheating a huge creature into play in one go, and both have combo protection methods (discard for turbo depths, and counterspells for sneak and show). Ciro believes that those decks reflect his personality well, notably <Ciro Santilli's self perceived creative personality>. Related decks that don't appeal as much to Ciro:
* https://www.mtggoldfish.com/archetype/reanimator[reanimator]: you have to worry about graveyard hate all the time, worrying is bad
* https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/2888239[storm]: you have to play too many spells, it's tiring. Ciro would rather put a fattie into play and swing once.
And above all, Ciro would never play a fair deck. Grinding victories is not for him. He'd rather quickly decide win/lose status and move on.

Competitive commander is also interesting, although matches tend to be much more random so the format is harder to digest, see for example this channel; https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCum8N4KUUC0l_NK_mybvilg[Playing With Power MTG channel].

In Ciro's mind, https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Urza%27s_block[Urza's block] is the most epic of all, followed by the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masques_block[masques block]. Those sets had a ridiculous power level and epic art, and they happened just before <Ciro Santilli> started playing during https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_(Magic:_The_Gathering)[Invasion], which had an extremely low power level in comparison. So Ciro saw some cards from those slightly older formats floating around, but not many, and they felt so mystical and awesome.

\Video[http://youtube.com/watch?v=pdmODVYPDLA]
{title=I Built a COMPUTER in Magic: The Gathering by Because Science (2019)}
{description=Shows an explicit Turing complete Magic The Gathering setup with real cards in a standard "extremely lucky" 2 player game.}

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVmqfvWsKeFaMGY68CbcVVQ[ChannelFireball] is one of the best Legacy resources out there, but they have too much crap filling in between legacy videos unfortunately.

The following creators share many of Ciro's interests and output large quantities of interesting content covering all memes/overpowered combos of new sets:
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u5yzmta2oA BoshNRoll (Brian Coval) is basically <Ciro Santilli>'s favorite MTG streamer of the early 2020's very good Legacy focused content, with occasional Modern and Pauper, good spicy deck selection. And he says nice and intelligent things the hole time, it's the type of person Ciro would be good friends with in real life. It sometimes makes Ciro said to see such a person wasting their lives with Magic. Twitter: https://twitter.com/BoshNRoll
  * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eKSg5HAfC4 UNDEFEATED BRAIN POWER! Legacy Hive Mind Combo 5-0 Trophy! Sudden Substitution Show and Tell. That's fire!
* <Magic Aids>
* https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChw6Y6UYf6fIipBEWg6iEaw[Squa Chief]. He does a lot of cool decks.
* https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0OFObRNMjSsnuEMGA-K29Q[Jeff Hoogland]. Not Ciro's favorite personality though, too rambly/matter-of-fact. Also was going too much into MTGA.
* https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2hkmJr2x--IiMfozqj6VdQ Meryn MTG. She's too much on the jank side for Ciro's taste, but for that reason she covers some decks of interest that others don't. She's cute, and a Timmy at heart. Which makes you feel really sorry for her as she gets crushed by more competitive decks.
* https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLYO-CiS0e8Yhs-U1k6ZmXQ[CalebD]. Legacy and Modern. Too much drafting in the middle of actual videos. Sometimes decks slightly too janky/experimental. Amazing channel soundtrack.
* https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYwlc3jRrZqNNTPw3Lyl6wQ[Nikachu] has some decent commentary. His endlessly rambly persona is a bit annoying, but the content of the commentary is still good.

Ciro was pleased when he learnt that <Steve Wozniak plays magic the gathering>.

Magic's competitive play became a mess in the late 2010's. They had a clear tournament structure, but they decided to start changing things every 6 months, and give tournaments meaningless names like "Mythic championship", and it just became impossible to follow what is what.
* https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/disorganized-play-and-the-magic-pro-league
* https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_PT_events
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXUHaXiZ0HI The Moment Professional Magic Came to an End by Nikachu MTG (2021) has a good perspective. Magic is never going to have enough viewers to actually allow pros to make consistent ammounts money. And Magic's variability is just way too high for anyone to consistently win few large prizes on annual contests. Therefore they just killed such contests.

The https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Card_frame#Original_frame is the best, much more epic all others (notably since 2003 update) ware <bullshit>, good overview https://medium.com/@raphaelaleixo/the-graphic-design-for-magic-the-gathering-card-frames-b3b6da4cd003

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hk3IOQiisg Crazy MTG Scandals That Changed The Game by Nikachu (2021). Good list:
* obviously wrong card named
* Dryad arbour camouflaging as a land
* go to combat

= Magic: The Gathering is too expensive
{parent=Magic: The Gathering}

Ciro thinks this is idiotic, and that Wizards should sell all cards individually with unlimited supply and all with the same prices, especially online where there are no printing costs. But because Wizards made the silly promise never to reprint certain cards with the https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Reserved_List[reserved list] in 1994, they can't even correct this mistake <legally>! (TODO maybe, see further discussion at: https://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/contract-from-below-promissory-estoppel-and-the-reserved-list[]). There is however one simple solution: create and promote a new no reserve list format, and let reserve list formats rot away:
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIq0NWSLAJA Magic TV - A Look at Non Reserve List Legacy by ChannelFireball (2015). Notably, they suggest the workaround of printing very slightly differently functional reprints, e.g. "Snow covered duals". Genius.
* https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/8gtoj4/no_reserve_list_legacy/
One interesting outcome of this would be to have card cost limited formats. https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Penny_Dreadful[Penny Dreadful] puts a super low limit, on individual cards, but it would be cool to have a max cost per deck version of it.

A cool thing is when they printed http://www.magicspoiler.com/mtg-spoiler/garth-one-eye/[Garth One-Eye], which allows you to make imaginary copies of some of those restricted list cards during play. This is the type of "flirting with the rules", that <Ciro Santilli> admires. The introduction of online-only cards such as XXX has pushed that even further as of 2021.

This was especially insane when Ciro was young and the Internet was not very widely available in <Brazil> yet, and Ciro did not know how to check the values of cards on online markets, and would trade cards with older much more knowledgable teenagers, based solely on his appraisal of a card's strength! Can you imagine how many young https://mtg.fandom.com/wiki/Timmy[Timmys] got ripped off in this manner, trading useless one million mana spells for ultra expensive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_Nine[black lotuses]?

Another option we could pursue would be to make governments consider TCG pack opening a form of gambling, which it obviously is:
* https://www.quora.com/Why-is-Pokémon-card-collecting-not-considered-gambling-when-the-pack-of-cards-one-purchases-is-a-game-of-chance
* https://www.reddit.com/r/boardgames/comments/7fx3no/are_trading_card_games_gambling/

There is however one good solution to Magic's insane cost: watch people who have nothing better to do in their lives play on <YouTube>.

And as Internet formats dominate more and more, if they have any brains at will they will migrate to a subscription model where you pay to play for a given period of time, and have immediate access to all cards. It could even be a tiered access, with older formats being more expensive (more bugs to fix on different cards), but you must get access to all cards of a format at once.

\Video[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtqraRFcG9M]
{title=The Tarmogoyf Scandal by Nikachu MTG (2021)}

= Magic: The Gathering content creator
{parent=Magic: The Gathering}

= Alpha Investments
{c}
{parent=Magic: The Gathering content creator}

https://www.youtube.com/@AlphaInvestments69

Very good channel that gives some idea of the behind the scenes of working with card stores and secondary market trading.

Such lessons can have applicability in business and investment outside of the Magic The Gathering context as well. Yet another example that usefulness can come out of uselessness.

\Video[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOTFIvxIsEY]
{title=The Process of Opening a MTG Store by <Alpha Investments> (2016)}

\Video[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN7zpKoRXeg]
{title=Spending \$500,000 per month on Pokemon & Magic by <Alpha Investments> (2021)}

= Magic Aids
{c}
{parent=Magic: The Gathering content creator}

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClaWphnKi16UJxRdkmFpw3A

His combination of <politically incorrect> dirt talk with amazing <Ciro Santilli's self perceived creative personality>[quirky] decks captures Ciro's imagination.

Anonymous no face-reveal.

The videos are heavily edited with all pauses cut out, which makes them very quick to watch and saves viewer time.

Modern focused, with some occasional newer formats mixed in.

When Wizards publishes several useless sets in a row without a single modern playable card, he's just forced into Standard.

\Video[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjZPn6VEcVY]
{title=Magic Aids vs. Magic Rainbows by <Magic Aids> (2018)}
{description=In this amazing video <Magic Aids> makes fun of Wizards for forcing him to change is Magic Online handle from Magic Aids to something else due to the <AIDS> part. He claims the Aids is not meant as a reference to the disease, but just as in "memory aid". Ciro doubts this wasn't intentional. But the video is still amazing, and happens to involve a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_doll[sex doll] dressed as https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Liliana_Vess[Liliana Vess] squirting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glitter[glitter] from her <vagina>. Wizards must love this guy. It is also a good criticism of <political correctness> in general. This is a work of art.}

= Magic: The Gathering is addictive
{parent=Magic: The Gathering}

Paraprasing a friend of <Ciro Santilli>:
\Q[<Magic: The Gathering> is like <cocaine> in card form.]

Luckily, early teens <Ciro Santilli> was partly protected from this by <Ciro Santilli's cheapness>.

But Ciro distinctly remembers one day in his early teens that he couldn't sleep very well, and he got up, and the was decided that he would become the greatest <Magic: The Gathering> player who ever lived. Can you imagine the incredible loss that this would have been to humankind? And talk about the incredible lack of development opportunity present in poor countries, related:
* <Brazil>
* <what poor countries have to do to get richer/pick few good bets>

= Mathy Magic: The Gathering thoughts
{parent=Magic: The Gathering}

In 2019, https://arxiv.org/pdf/1904.09828.pdf[a paper proved] that MTG is <Turing complete> with a legacy <legal> deck. Live demo with some hand waving: <video I Built a COMPUTER in Magic: The Gathering by Because Science (2019)>. As <Ciro Santilli> comments at: https://github.com/cirosantilli/cirosantilli.github.io/issues/42 this was an interest addition to the previous "indefinite infinite loop" e.g. as found in a Four Horsemen combo deck

= Magic: The Gathering meta-based deck choice is a bimatrix game
{c}
{parent=Mathy Magic: The Gathering thoughts}

* <Nash equilibrium>
* <bimatrix game>

Ciro had initially <Googled> for the "4-card limit thought experiment" but he reached: https://www.channelfireball.com/articles/what-if-the-4-card-limit-was-abolished-in-modern/ "What if the 4-Card Limit Was Abolished in Modern?" by Frank Karsten (2018) and was much more pleased with the mathematical result. Like-minded people.

That links to https://www.channelfireball.com/articles/what-if-the-4-card-limit-was-abolished-in-modern/ the related article: "The Mythic Invitational's Duo Standard Format Game Theory Optimized" by Frank Karsten (2019) which explains well how Nash equilibrium is naturally reached: if there is any imbalance, someone can take advantage of it, and then it rebalances. Therefore once you've calculated the equilibrium, your best course of action is to pick a deck at random from a list of possible winners.

Of course, part of the beauty of Magic is that we can never really know the full matrix since deck choice is basically infinite. But at the very least it could give good archetype results.

= Wizards of the Coast
{c}
{parent=Magic: The Gathering}

= Magarena
{c}
{parent=Magic: The Gathering}

Open source MtG engine implementation written in <Java>.

Seems to have an option to download art from internet as well.

<Ciro Santilli> wonders how <legal> it is. They very explicitly do not mention the words Magic: The Gathering anywhere.

Their UI does a good job at being self explanatory. Space is the shortcut to skip phases.

No online play.

https://github.com/magarena/magarena

TODO it appears to parse card functionality out of the human readable text! That's genius, as it helps automatically get new cards working, and squirt around legal issues.