A Parent's Guide to having Smarter Children

You know why Magic isn't the world's most widely known game (that probably goes to monopoly)? It's because it requires a lot of thinking and information being transferred. Think about it, most people don't want to waste time doing anything. In fact, if I haven't grabbed your attention by now, there is a chance you would simply go to a new page. That was just 4 scentences (this being the 5th)! Here are some phrases you probably hear often without even thinking about it:

TL;DR (too long, didn't read)
Scanning the headlines
Sound byte
Newsflash
Tweet
Status update

All of those terms are common today. Why did I include those last 2? You really can't transfer much information with a 420 charecter restriction. Basically, we live in a world where we want information passed in as small as a form as possible. This creates problems as we lose the supporting details that can really make a situation make more sense or a story more realistic. We lose the chance to empathise and to get to know our story's heroes.

In magic an INSANE amount of information is passed each second by each card that is played. How each card is played. The time it took for each card to get played. And so on and so forth. On the board, the scene can be incredibly complex. Cards like Honor of the Pure in a GW deck can get confusing as your soldier tokens get buffs, but your elves don't. Maybe you are using a die rolled to "3" to represent a 3/3 Beast token made by your Garruk. Is it tapped or not? You can't actually tell, you just have to remember. Now you want to attack, but you play Overwhelming Stampede first. Now everything printed on your cards is a complete lie... (never mind if you had a Duress effect early in the game, so you have their hand memorized in the back of your head) But even before you go into interactive combat. Every single card in play has unique effects and abilities, even your land! No wonder even pros who have been playing the game for 15 years still make mistakes and miss triggers!

I firmly believe that Magic is one of the true reasons why I am such a calculating person, because by being acustomed to analizing rediculous amounts of information constantly, I can work more like a computer.

To demonstrate what I mean by the amount of information you have to process in magic compared to modern communications, I played a game vs Mark via txting. We were both at our own homes, and we only communicated via txt message. I was playing Valakut Ramp, and he was playing BUG. We both had sideboarded, as if it were game 2, and because it was a game 2, we had Mark go first, because Valakut should win G1. Here is our conversation (M = Mark, R = Ryan, which is me):

M - Island pass, kept my opening 7
R - Raging ravine pass

M - forest. cobra. island, forest in play tapped.
R - Mountain, overgrown battlement. all tapped out

M - misty rainforest. trigger landfall, add blue. use the floating blue mana to cast preordain. 2 cards to the bottom. then draw. pass turn. island,
M - forest, misty, and cobra all untapped
R - Casting cultivate
M - respond with mana leak.
M - tapping island and forest.
R - Spell is countered. Terramorphic expanse. pass

M - battlement is tapped, correct? if so attack with cobra for 2.
R - Yes, battlment is tapped. I go to 18
M - play creeping tar pit. pass turn. leaving island, forest, misty up.
R - EOT use terramorphic for mountain
M - yeap.
R - Terramorph, go. Battlement, 2 mountain, raging ravine, terramorphic all untapped

M - play a forest. landfall trigger. add black. use the floating black and a forest cast doomblade targeting the battlement.
R - You suck. Resolves
M - haha. attack with cobra for 2. pass turn. island, forest, misty, and tar pit open. i will assume you fetch for either a forest or a mountain witht the
M - expanse so just tell me which one.
R - Fetch for mountain. Cards in hand? I have 6 after draw for turn
M - 3
R - Ok, forest, pass. leaving 3 mountain, forest, raging ravine up

M - draw. cast preordain tapping island.
R - K
M - sac mistyrain forst. 19. fetch an island. trigger landfall. add blue. play a misty. trigger landfall add blue. Use the 2 floating blue and 2 forest plus
M - tarpit to cast frost titan.targeting raving ravine and attcking with cobra for 2. assuming titan resolves.
M - misty untapped.
M - 2 cards in hand.
R - Titan resolves. I take 2 go to 14
M - pass.
R - Valakut, pass. 3 mountain, forest, untapped

M - draw. declare attackers: attack with frost and cobra. trigger frost. targeting raging ravine.
R - Ok, just frosty attacking?
R - Never mind that... I take 8 go to 6
M - no its frost and cobra attacking with 2xforest, 2xisland, tar pit, misty up.
R - ok, cool
R - My turn?
M - pass.
M - yes.
M - 3 cards in hand.
R - Forest, prime time
M - cast mind break trap. tapping 2 islands and 2 forests.
R - I concede

So I broke the txts up by the turns that they happened. This very long set of txts (about 25 from Mark and 23 from Me) was only 7 turns worth! Imagine had we done a control mirror that takes 15 turns with every turn rechecking yor opponent's mana, cards in hand, et all? I unfortunately have to cut this short because it's past midnight and I have the pleasure of working full time during everyone else's school vacation, but you know where I was going with this all...

So until next time, stay classy!

By the way, check out this sweet card! This is the hidden card that will be the Mirran Pre-release card. Battle cry is a cool ability that I think will spawn a spawn deck (see what I did there?) that will have a ton of tokens crying for bloodlust. Also, this guy is comperable to Grave Titan in terms of game ending clock.

T4 - play Hero of Bladehorn
T5 - attack for 7 (13)
T6 - attack 11 (2)
T7 - attack for 15 (ded)

T6 - play Grave Titan
T7 - attack for 10 (10)
T8 - attack for 14 (ded)

Think about it...

peace out!