If you’ve played Magic for any length of time, you’ll be familiar by now with the sometimes annual and oftentimes more frequent cry that “Magic is dead!” Players who have been playing much longer than you and I will have rolled out this rhetoric many times, from the first reprints in Fourth Edition and Chronicles, to the introduction of Planeswalkers, …
What I Learned from my First Mythic Invitational
I’ve been playing Magic for over eight years now, and increasingly competitively for the last six. From Game Days to GP’s to PTQ’s, I’m really proud to say that my results have improved consistently over that time. But that all-important Pro Tour invite has always eluded me. Sure, there were some close calls — 12-3’s at Grand Prix, Top 16’s …
Balancing the Colors: An Interview with Ari Nieh
I’ve got something a little different for you this week, readers. For a while now I’ve been hoping to feature more regular interviews here on CK, so you can hear from other key figures in Magic instead of just me all the time. Today, I bring you the first (but not the last!) of these interviews! Ari Nieh is a …
Gamers Engaged with Food Lifeline
Community is at the core of our business at Card Kingdom and Mox Boarding House. Each year, we gather our fellow gamers around the table to raise money for good causes through charity events like The Gauntlet and The Chalice. Now, in the wake of COVID-19, our community needs us more than ever, and we’re bringing gamers together virtually to help. On …
B&R Predictions
The Magic community loves to speculate whenever Wizards of the Coast announces an update to the Banned and Restricted List, and I’m no different. Sometimes there is an obvious offender that Wizards wants to remove — Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis is a good example — but often, there is some room for interpretation. Speculation has some amount of competitive value as …
Conquest: A New Competitive Commander Format
Hello friends! I’ve got something a little different for you with this week’s article. We’re not discussing new cards, but a new format that’s gathered some momentum in the community — Conquest! Like the Gladiator format presented by impresario Benjamin Wheeler last month, Conquest has evolved from the community’s love of large-deck singleton formats. These formats capture many fun aspects …
5 Reasons to Start Playing Magic: The Gathering
I’ve been playing Magic for over 20 years (that’s still kind of surprising to read). During that time, I’ve learned so much that I didn’t know in the beginning. Tons of players seem to be picking up the game daily. If you’ve been considering learning to play Magic, I want to save y’all some trouble and share five things I …
A Letter to Our Community
We have remained silent on Black Lives Matter until now because historically we do not comment on issues, and we don’t want to participate in performative allyship. Rather, we’ve tried to participate in fundraising and creating a welcoming environment in our spaces. However, we now acknowledge that this is an instance where we need to voice our opinion and respond to …
Enter the Arena: The Official Gladiator Primer
While I can’t pinpoint the exact moment in time my aversion to multiples in Magic began developing, I’m forever grateful that legions of like-minded singleton players empathized with my predicament. It was comforting to know that my preference for “one-ofs” and decks of mammoth proportions happened to be shared among Commander players and competitive singleton formats alike. Yet for me, …
How Much Are Your Magic Cards Worth?
“How much are Magic cards worth?” “Which Magic cards are worth the most money?” “What makes Magic cards so expensive?” Believe it or not, these are the most-asked Magic: The Gathering questions on the internet. As experienced players dive deeper into Magic, we may lose sight of how unusual and unpredictable the price tags are on rare and staple cards. …