By Mandi Danae – Staff Writer
(Mandi is a long time expert at Magic: The Gathering, and she joins our staff to give her thoughts on this newest release for the popular game)
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Magic 2014 is Here
2013 marks the 20th year of Magic: The Gathering, and this month ushers in the Magic 2014 or M14 set.
Official launch date is Friday July 19th, 2013. This core set is like many others before it in that it is, for the most part, simpler in its mechanics and a way to ease new players into magic helping players grasp the concepts before introducing complicated guilds and multicolored cards which make deck construction challenging.
However, the down side seems to be a general lack of enthusiasm for a core set among more advanced players of the game. Don’t be fooled though, M14 does seem to have some decent playability in limited format to keep the excitement through the summer.
Slivers are back in a new and exciting way for M14 in that their effects are specific to slivers that you control. This change improves a sliver deck dramatically since now you won’t be helping your opponent kill you when you play your beastly slivers!
There seems to be a few color combinations right from the start which saw a fair amount of play at prerelease events. Blue/white has some good playability since in limited flyers are always a good option (Jace, Memory Adept milling 10 cards a turn doesn’t hurt to have either, in my experience). Green/red was also a popular choice with power houses backed by burn spells.
All the planeswalkers seem to have played well at the sealed event I attended and were more commonly opened than expected. I was fortunate enough to open both a green and a blue planeswalker in my first sealed pod and two other people at my table also opened white and black planeswalkers. There was much disappointment that the red planeswalker did not make an appearance at our pod. Secretly I think all the boys want her because she is so cute.
As the set plays more some cards may increase in popularity and I am excited to see this set play in draft format but anticipate a free for all on green that may strategically call for snatching up a mono black deck that everyone else overlooks. Either way, this set looks to have plenty of spice to keep us all entertained well into the fall.
-Mandi Danae aka Velvetwench
Magic facts about myself:
-Been playing Magic: The Gathering since Mirrodin set in 2003
-Always play events with bright pink sleeves for my cards.
-Own over 11,000 cards almost all obtained via Draft and Sealed events.
