Let's talk Magic | Going to Open House events (especially as a beginner or lapsed player)

This past weekend I attended the Magic: The Gathering Open House Event at my local game/hobby shop and it was quite cool, for several reasons.

But let me do a bit of an introduction to the concept of an Open House Event.

What is an Open House Event?

These events are organized every once in awhile and they are meant to be a means of introducing people who are unfamiliar with the game, but interested in learning about it, to how Magic: The Gathering works.

They do this by having one of the shop employees sit you down and explain the basics of the game - mana colors, casting costs, creatures, spells, tapping etc. - and also by giving you a started deck to play with.

The starter deck has some rather basic and simple cards to use, so that makes it easier for someone new to get a grasp on the game. It also features a smaller number of cards than what a competitive deck would be. Again, in order to make playing the game a bit easier.

Also, you can and should take the starter deck home with you, those cards are yours, with no money down or anything of the sort.

The starter decks at this Open House Event were cool for two reasons. The first one being that the deck boxes that they come in actually contain TWO decks, in two different colors. Meaning that you can get one of those and play with your friend. And then you can exchange the decks and get to see how the other color feels.

I chose the Black starter box - because I have always been a Black Mage, at my core - and it contained a Black deck and a Red deck.

Not only are most of the cards very true to the flavor and feeling of each color, but they come already randomized. All you have to do is shuffle them and start summoning creatures and slinging spells at each other.

In order to help new players, each of the two decks come with helpful hint cards and with a basic and quick explanation of where the various cards have to be arranged and how the game phases work.

Great stuff to have when you’re a beginner.

The other cool thing about attending this particular Open House Event was that these starter decks were actually made up of cards from the next core set that is going to be released later this month - M19.

This was a great chance to not only see the new cards - which you can do by checking out the spoiler previews - but actually play with them.

You get a feel of not only how the set is made but also a great idea of what to draft. And since Drafting is my preferred way of engaging with Magic - besides playing with my friends in a casual manner - this information, I think, is going to be quite useful once I do get a chance to draft M19.

Playing with the cards allowed me to see what works and what doesn, in actual practice, not just theoretically.

For instance, M19 is definitely focused towards bringing back an overall tribal theme, with zombies being one of the “tribes”.

The black deck had these beauties, which by themselves aren’t that special, maybe with the exception of Tattered Mummy which is a chump blocker that still gets to damage the opponent, but if you put the Infernal Scarring on any of them, you get yourself a very large threat very early in the game. And for a black deck, getting something like a 4/2 on turn two - Diregraf Ghoul on turn 1 and Infernal Scarring on the Ghoul on turn 2 - is quite unheard of.

Then there’s the very wonderful removal that black has, again giving me great information as to what to draft and when.

Murder is just a great card altogether and Strangling Spores can kill quite costly creatures, relatively early on, so great choices for removal picks.

And as a finisher, not exactly what one thinks a finisher is - I’m not using that term correctly - but this sort of card will finish your enemy when you’re done witling their health down.

Of course, it won’t work always, but depending on the deck that you’re fighting against, this can win you the game, especially if you cast it when they’re all tapped out ;)

More on why I’m excited about M19, later this week I think ;)

As a lapsed player - such as myself - it’s also a great chance of getting in some playtime with the basics of the game, relearning the game phases and when to use combat tricks and the like. It shouldn’t be overlooked, especially because you can meet up with other players who frequent the shop and just have a nice deck testing session, if you or them are thinking of trying your hands at playing in Standard, Modern or any of the other formats :)

And the last cool thing about attending an Open House Event, even if you know how to play, is on the one hand, the cool foil card which you get for attending, which is great if you’re a card collector such as myself - and on the other, is that you can get to share the fun of playing some Magic with a newcomer and help introduce them to the world of plane-walking, and I think that’s great!

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