Drenched in MTG

Last night I spent the evening getting my butt kicked at EDH/Commander format Magic the Gathering. S'ok though! I had lots of fun while getting my head handed to me. The people who hosted the gaming session are a married couple- nice folks, great deck builders, and they field all my noobity questions with patience and good humor. I explained to them that I collected more than played way back in the day (1997-2001). So I know the basic mechanics of play but beyond that- I have not a clue!

For those of you who don't know, Commander format uses a 100 card deck, you can only have one of each card except basic lands, and you can use any card from any expansion- EVER. There are thousands of cards in in MTG, so to build a truly formidible EDH deck you must have a great knowledge of the cards already or do a lot of time consuming research.

With the help of my good friend Charles I've managed to cobble together a functioning Green/Black Elves deck. It's a rough deck, needs about ten coats of polish, but it's playable- and it's mine dammit!

Througout the 3 games we played I had to read the effects of about 95% of the cards as each was played. I was content though that I was much better able to keep track of my 3 enemies' strategies and the general states of their fields than I was at my first session with the group. I made some more strategic plays, some better card and timing choices. Not that it made much difference to my life total! :)

I went in expecting to learn, not to win- and I'm satisfied with the evening's results. I can at least say that I've moved up from the easy-pickins weight class to the out-of-shape-but-going-down-swinging class. And it's become even more obvious:

So much to learn. So many cards to acquire!

My host, who is himself a veritable walking encyclopedia of Magic cards, came up with a fan-freakin-tastic analogy for the Commander format learning curve: "Trying to take a drink of water from a fire hose."

YUS

YUSSIR you are correct!

He also told me that once I've done my learning that I'm going to be a 'beast' Magic player.

Hope he's right about that too!