Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been tagged as “Tom Anderson”
It’s that most magical and idealistic time of year, when most of us are fortunate enough to see our loved ones, relax, eat amazing food and even savor the feeling of ripping open a few choice gifts! Christmas cheer is infectious and I’m sure any number of other articles on this blog will be telling you how to lean into …
Modern fans around the world are woke up to an early Christmas present on Monday, as the latest Banned & Restricted announcement made some huge and widely-anticipated moves to shake up the non-rotating format. While there was some light attention paid to cards in Pioneer and Legacy, it’s clear that rebalancing Modern was the #1 priority for this ban cycle. …
Over the years, Magic has invented a multitude of mechanics to build decks around, each with its own unique advantages, dedicated support cards, and memorable payoffs. But when all of those archetypes are thrown together into the grand melting pot of Commander, a few top-tier choices stand out. They offer versatile deck building options, consistent performance across different areas of …
It’s the season when we as writers often take a step back and review the most exciting beats of the year just gone. But from a Standard perspective, it feels like most of the year was just a buildup to the excitement of the last few months. The first rotation in years has been exactly the kind of watershed players …
As the name implies, Foundations aims to redefine and reaffirm the “default” gameplay and ideas of Magic. This modern take on a Core Set definitely seems like a Constructed-first product – understandable, given Standard players will be living in its shadow until 2029! But that also implies that Foundations sealed product will have a long run in stores, and that …
Foundations is bringing Core Sets back to Magic (again), and so far it seems to have been a really good idea. I’ve seen many players celebrate that there’s some hard-to-define “classic” feeling to how the set plays, even extending to the parts of the set that aren’t reprints. Part of that might be the power of branding, but Core Sets …
If we’re only to judge by the historical facts, Magic isn’t really sure if it likes having core sets. Nevertheless, it’s about to try and have one again for the first time in several years. Foundations is different in some ways from the classic core sets. It’s got more new cards than reprints, and looks to be a lot more …
For almost 20 years now, Planeswalkers have been central to Magic’s identity as a game. The Gatewatch (along with other notables like Sarkhan, Ral, Vraska and Sorin) established a recurring central cast for the game’s storyline. They created marketable, consistent mascots for their respective color combinations and home planes. By these business-centric measures, Planeswalker cards have been an unmitigated success. …
I touched on this last week, but isn’t it crazy to think back to a time when white decks could legitimately complain about not getting good cards? While we were in the middle of that era it felt truly interminable, but now it already feels like the distant past. Yet even back in that before-time, there were still some fringe …
Caretaker’s Talent has been taking hold in multiple formats, becoming a cornerstone of multiple decks that Tom dives deep into here! The cycle of rare Talents have been frontrunners for Bloomburrow’s best constructed cards right out of the blocks. In the first week after the set released, I wrote about a string of upstart Standard decks that were already emerging …
