Re: the Magic card game
 

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http://images.poquer-red.com/noticias/minieri-magic.jpg

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Never have I wanted so much to punch someone in the face.

Re: the Magic card game
 

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Does anyone still play? Anyone play online? I was never interested in playing online until i found out if you want you can exchange your online cards for real ones within 4 years of purchase which is pretty cool. I read the online community is pretty small though with only 2-4k playing online at most times.

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I still play online. It's only worth doing if you win enough to not have to pay to play, imo.

Re: the Magic card game
 

I wish I had the link to DS's article from a few months ago, "Saddle Points For Tournament Mana Values in Split Pot Magic Games."

Re: the Magic card game
 

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Does anyone still play? Anyone play online? I was never interested in playing online until i found out if you want you can exchange your online cards for real ones within 4 years of purchase which is pretty cool. I read the online community is pretty small though with only 2-4k playing online at most times.

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I still play online. It's only worth doing if you win enough to not have to pay to play, imo.

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How much do packs cost online? Same as real world? I saw just signing up costs 10 bucks, do they at least give you a starter deck to start with? Are one on one matches free? Or do you have to pay for every match? Can you buy singles directly from the game?

Re: the Magic card game
 

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Does anyone still play? Anyone play online? I was never interested in playing online until i found out if you want you can exchange your online cards for real ones within 4 years of purchase which is pretty cool. I read the online community is pretty small though with only 2-4k playing online at most times.

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I still play online. It's only worth doing if you win enough to not have to pay to play, imo.

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How much do packs cost online? Same as real world? I saw just signing up costs 10 bucks, do they at least give you a starter deck to start with? Are one on one matches free? Or do you have to pay for every match? Can you buy singles directly from the game?

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The word bucks is stupid. Stop using it.

Also, I think it's free for the most part signup fees/deck costs aside.

Re: the Magic card game
 

I know tournaments cost money or tokens or something which are worth money, but i just want to make sure i can play random people heads up for free. If not f it.

Re: the Magic card game
 

You can play for free with the beginners decks or whatever in the new players area but that's it. When you pay the $10 to join they give u a $10 coupon for the store, which is almost enough to draft.

Re: the Magic card game
 

If you just want to throw a deck together and play, thats free to do once you get the cards. Earlier, I was referring to the draft queues.

Re: the Magic card game
 

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my primary circle of friends and I are all old magic pros/players who are now pro poker players, and there are tons of us. Hanging out at the WSOP was like a reunion of old magic pros...

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Who? I hung out with a lot of old magic pros past two WSOPs.

Off the top of my head: Gary Wise, Bob Maher, Dave Williams, Neil Reaves, Geddes Cooper, Ben Stark, Billy Stead, Marco Blume, Dirk Baberowski, I also saw a lot of the northeastern guys like Brock and Baby Huey.

I just missed Kai Budde, and heard rumors that Sven Geertson and Sigurd Esklund were there, but missed both of them. I'm sure I haven't remembered even half of the MTGers I saw.

Re: the Magic card game
 

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Personally, my first experience with Texas Hold Em was playing with other MTG Pros at a Pro Tour event.

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Same with me.

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Same here.

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Re: the Magic card game
 

As another mtger/poker pro, I figure I might as well chime in.

The first time I played holdem was also at a mtg pro tour (wow there's a lot of us for one OOT thread). My play was awful at first, frankly because the real money on the line intimidated me. Magic was more like a freeroll to me; for the poker players, basically I won satellites to get in to the big money tourneys constantly. Side gambling in mtg eventually cured me of this problem.

I agree with Rutang and others that there's a distinction between Mtg attracting and training the type of people who would be good enough to play poker professionally, and Mtg being a tool to improve a poker player's game. However, I still play Magic as well as other games such as backgammon and chess for more reasons than just to have a good time. For one, it's healthy to sometimes be able to play a similar game just for the love of it rather than to make money. This is a lot more financially prudent than burning poker energy playing smaller stakes. Also, perhaps it's just me, but playing only one game can really make one start to play on autopilot or get frustrated at the simplicity of it all. It's just human nature to want to do something different when you've done the same thing 2000 times, to try to unlock a new piece of the puzzle, but sometimes that's counterproductive. Whenever I'm not playing poker that well, I find that playing another game for a while until I excel again will energize my poker game.

FWIW, as far as the correlation between skill at Magic and poker, I don't know a single person who is very proficient at Magic that isn't at least sufficiently profitable at poker. I'd be shocked if the opposite didn't hold true, it's just a theory that goes unrealized because Magic is intimidating to learn.

One thing I've found particularly educational about playing Magic is the education on tells. In poker, although your opponent might be making the wrong play due to not seeing the layers of complication that exist, it's not exactly difficult to play the game. In Magic, there is so much information to process that it requires a ton of skill to play rapidly and with a poker face. One logs a ton of hours watching people think about their decisions in a very revealing fashion. If you can learn to not reveal information while playing Magic, poker is a breeze.

For those that haven't played, it's a really fun game. I would argue it has benefits to a poker player, and it makes a great gambling game over drinks with your friends.

Re: the Magic card game
 

I used to be a master magician back when I could dominate JSS's. I don't think that a lot of specific magic skills are useful in poker, but magic players are usually fairly analytical in their decision making processes which helps in poker.

The problem with magic is that the game changes so fast that if you don't stay with it there is a significant re-entry barrier of having to learn many new sets. In poker you can take a few months off and pick it up again playing the same game. But on the other hand poker has more potential to get old.