Vanguard

In 1997, a series of oversized cards were released called “Vanguard”; up to 1999, this was followed by three more series. For those who are not familiar with the series, Vanguard cards modify the game. They’re chosen before the game starts, adjusting the players starting life and the maximum hand size. The ability printed on the card, are played just the same as any other in the game of Magic: The Gathering. The damage dealt by the Vanguard is colourless and isn’t considered to have the same effect as damage dealt by a permanent. 

A Vanguard card, is not a Magic card per se, therefore it cannot be affected by spells of the various other abilities out there. 

A brief description:

· Your starting life may be higher or lower than 20 (depending on the card). 

· your starting and maximum hand size may be higher or lower than seven (also depending on the card). 

· Here is the fun part: Each Vanguard card gives you some benefits that might be considered, such as "ba-roken" in normal Magic play. For example, your creatures are unaffected by summoning sickness, or you draw an extra card each turn.

Now, I’m a fan of all formats that modify game-play, and I would like to see it revived into modern forms of game-play; or at least effectively recycled. 

Character cards are to be played as if they are you, and as I understand it you are a planeswalker, which means that the characters within the character cards are planeswalkers. 

I would also like to see a limited event where you get the planeswalker cards; of course you won’t have them from the start of the game, you will have to draw them from your deck, and they won’t affect your life total or the hand size either, unless that was one of the effects. 

These are just a few of my ideas. A lot of it I have simply adapted from existing, but hey! I’m no card designer. I’ve also improvised with what abilities to give the planeswalkers, but I’ll let you guys be the judges of it all...

With ‘Ertai’, his main effect on his character card is down played, merely because I thought in the planeswalker format it was a bit weak.

All the abilities on this card revolve around the effect “shadow”, as if played right it can be very strong. Now I think ‘Lyna’ would be far more effective as a planeswalker than a character. 
The shadow effect is one I feel is something you do not want all of your creatures to have, especially not all of the time. If for some reason you have a bad drawn and cannot summon any creatures to deal damage, and the ones already out won’t be able to block because of their shadows, you have used the effect in the wrong way... instead you should give them “shadow” during your turn only, therefore there will be a defence when your opponent attacks. 

This is all about mana. Staying true to the character card I think.

Of course, there are tweaks that need making when transferring from character to planeswalker; but again I feel I have to remain as true as I can.

With ‘Tahngarth’ I kept the casting cost low in order to get him into play quickly, because we want haste as quick as we can.

Without a doubt, I had to include ‘Urza’. However I could not think of anything original, so I borrowed a few abilities.

It has to be said that I am not a great fan of ‘Slivers’, but wouldn’t it be interesting to have a Sliver Planeswalker?

Now, I understand that they might not all work, some might be over-powered or potentially under-powered. I said earlier that I am no card designer so further tweaks may be necessary, but this is just a blue-print of what I would like to see; even just as a one off collective set, perhaps even integrated into a core set.

This isn’t the only way I could imagine to recycle old ideas... What if we made current planeswalkers into character cards? This would essentially mean that with the realm of game-play you could not use the same planeswalker card in your deck; this would be a paradox (see legendary creature rule).

Life gain was the name of the game in ‘Ajani Goldmanes’ planeswalker form, so I too kept it that way.

Here I have kept to the idea of dealing damage. Perfect for a burn deck.

Again, I feel I have kept true to the original ability of the card.

Increasing hand size a good move I think.

If I’m honest, I’m not completely sure whether this card is too fair.

I think ‘Sarkhan the Mad’ is my favourite in terms of planeswalkers into character cards. I would look forward to using this one.

I found it was far easier to change “Planeswalker to Character” as I felt it was easier to play down the abilities in a fair way, rather than boosting the abilities into something more powerful.

Though not all of the cards are realistic, I think it is a fun idea that could have some potential in working, and to collectors like me it would make a wonderful gift!

The new [unnamed] red and black artefact deck

I finally got my hands on the cards required to make this deck. The idea is probably about half a year old by now. But I have done it!

The idea started simple enough. ‘Wheel of Torture’, ‘Viseling’, ‘Lavaborn Muse’ and ‘Wound Reflection’.

With these cards in particular, your opponents need to keep an eye on the size of their hands; if they have a deck which draws a lot of cards, the game-play will slow down, or cause them to pay out on a lot of life. Though what drew me to these cards was the ability to deal damage without having to do anything (and to all opponents), and, if you manage to draw “Wound Reflection” then you will be dealing twice as much damage without moving a muscle.

If you read my blogs then you may have noticed I play a lot of multi-player games. These cards are just what you need for a multi-player game!

With these cards in mind, I was going to make a blue and red deck. Blue was chosen for the knowledge of cards that make other players draw cards and discard them to control the size of their hands, as such with every turn you are guaranteed to be dealing damage. But alas, I would lose ‘Wound Reflection’ unless I had three colours... However this would slow me down in what I wanted to do with this deck, so I put Blue to one side; for now. I did put in ‘Temple Bell’ in the deck though.

Keeping with the theme of dealing damage without doing anything, I looked for similar cards and found I had these:

‘Sulfuric Vortex’

 - With this card, as well as dealing damage to your opponent, damage is being dealt to you. So it’s one to play when you know your opponent is going to get more damage overall than you are.

‘Baneful Omen’

 - This card gives you a reason to play ‘Sulfuric Vortex’ as you’ll be dealing damage to everyone, meaning you will be losing the least every turn.

‘Hollowborn Barghest’

- Not only can this card deal damage every turn, but it can give you the option to attack head on.

‘Jinxed Idol’ and ‘Jinxed Ring’

- These two cards require you to sacrifice a creature. I’m never keen on sacrificing cards unless they have an effect which is triggered by going to the grave yard.

‘Goblin Arsonist’, ‘Mudbutton Torchrunner’, ‘Perilous Myr’ and ‘Mortis Dogs’ all deal damage when sent into the graveyard. There practically crying out to be sacrificed.

Now ‘Wound Reflection’, ‘Baneful Omen’ and ‘Hollowborn Barghest’ are big mana spells which lend themselves well to my next idea.

I have only played this deck two times as of yet, but needless to say it has worked, it may need tweaking but only time will tell.

Deck List:

                Red Creatures:

                                                Mudbutton Torchrunner x3

                                                Goblin Arsonist x2

                                                Furnace Scamp

                                                Prodigal Pyromancer

                                                Goblin Balloon Brigade

                                                Lavaborn Muse x3

                Black Creatures:

                                                Mortis Dogs

                                                Hollowborn Barghest x2

                                                Skeletal Wurm

                                                Dementia Bat

                                                Scourge Servant

                                                Zulaport Enforcer

                                                Whispering Specter

                                                Nested Ghoul

                                                Bog Raiders

                                                Death’s Shadow

                                               

                Artefact Creatures:

                                                Perilous Myr x2

                                                Palladium Myr

                                                Iron Myr

                                                Viseling x3

                                               

                Multi-Coloured Creatures:

                                                Manaforge Cinder x3

                Other Red:

                                                Sulfuric Vortex

                Other Black:

                                                Sign in Blood x2

                                                Baneful Omen

                                                Wound Reflection x3

                Other Artefact:

                                                Wheel of Torture x3

                                                Ashnod’s Altar x2

                                                Jinxed Idol

                                                Jinxed Ring

                                                Temple Bell

                                                Thran Dynamo x2

                                                Iron Maiden x3

                                                Viseling x3

                                                Iron Myr

                                                Palladium Myr

                                                Perilous Myr x2

                Land:

                                                Mountain x11

                                                Swamp x12

Deck Builder’s Toolkit

My uncle and I ordered ourselves an MTG Deck Builder’s Toolkit, as we both felt we needed to refresh our card collections.

So what do you get in it?

* 100 Basic Land
* 125 semi-randomized cards suitable for building several different Magic decks
* Four 15-card booster packs from a variety of recent Magic: The Gathering sets
* Full-art reusable card storage box
* Deck builder's guide with tips about building the best Magic decks
* Magic "learn to play" guide

Due to the semi- randomized packs of cards, we did get quite a few of the same cards, having said that is doesn’t necessarily mean we will build decks that are too similar; as you know all players have different styles and approaches to deck design. (Also, the four booster packs will help change the direction your deck building will go. You may even find that you got cards to improve your already exciting decks).

If you’ve been playing MTG for years like I have, then the “learn to play” guide isn’t needed; you might even feel the same with the “Deck builders guide”, but reading through the guide may remind you of things long forgotten or spark off a winning idea.

There are 6 steps to follow when building your deck, all of which I agree with strongly but DO NOT follow religiously, mainly because it all boils down to where your ideas take you. These 6 steps to a seemingly flawless deck are:

                Step 1: Sort your cards.

                Step 2: Find you key cards.

                Step 3: Explore your options.

                Step 4: Focus your deck.

                Step 5: Add your lands.

                Step 6: Play and refine your deck.

The guide simply gives you suggestions for Deck Themes; the main reason for the cards being semi-randomized is that with the cards you get, you can build every one of the suggestions. These are:

                Red Burn

                White Equipment

                Library Depletion

                Elves

                Mana Ramp

                Blue-White Fliers

                Vampires

                Black Discard

                Battle Cry

                Green-White Auras

                Metal craft

Upon first opening my “toolkit”, I was disappointed to say the least. But once I’d started actually making decks using other cards I own, I realised the toolkit had giving me a very useful boost, one which I had needed for my stagnating collection. I would recommend one to anyone who wants to give a new lease of life to decks and new cards, but don’t know where to start.

I can also see why this would be a very good pack to buy as a new player; you are given the cards to make suggested decks, it tells you the steps to take and gives you what might be your first booster packs.

I would only ever buy one from the time frame in which it was released as you would inevitably end up with a lot of the same cards. When the next one comes out I have a strong feeling I might be tempted to buy it...