I looked up from my book, and saw the kid. Early 20’s? Something like that. It made him an anomaly in this room of Vintage players at Rip n’ Ship Gaming in June of 2023. It made him an anomaly in most rooms of Vintage players.

“Yeah, how are you doing?”

“Good! My name’s also Nick, but everybody calls me Ramos. Do you want to jam some Vintage?”

You know I did.

I’d been jamming Vintage for a long time now. Magic, but specifically Vintage, had occupied a place close to my heart for basically all of my adult life. Way back in the spring of 2000, I picked up my first Black Lotus from Mark Aronowitz at Mark’s Comics. I remember sitting at the counter, trying to figure out how to work up the last bit of $300 in trade that I needed to pick up that Lotus. I emptied out my binders, then took apart my Standard deck. Morphlings, Gaea’s Cradles, Masticores, they all went out.

Black Lotus came in.

Once you have a Lotus, what do you do with it? It’s a wonderful thing to have, but I didn’t want to just have it sitting in a binder somewhere. I wanted it sleeved up, in a deck, battling.

I built Keeper, then BBS (Blue Bull Shit for the uninitiated, or those not ravaged by time). I slowly picked up a set of Power. I wanted to play more Vintage, especially once Affinity took a wrecking ball to Standard. There were a handful of Vintage players at Mark’s Comics back then, but there were no events.

The only place where you could find Vintage tournaments back then was Neutral Ground, the most mythical game store in the world for us New Yorkers. Taking the train into Manhattan, and jamming Vintage was a special thing. I would test with Dave Kaplan, Christian Grim, and others. I got run over a bunch, but just playing the cards, being able to experience Magic’s (then, early) history, there’s something indescribable about it. There was a youthful innocence and joy to it, where the world was still new, and Magic was magic for that first time.

It took a couple of years, but I wanted more than the games I got with friends, and the only way to do that was to push for events to be run. I asked Mark if he’d be willing to let me run Vintage events at his store. In 2002 we ran the first Vintage event at his store; $20 entry, Alpha Time Walk to first, English Legends Mana Drain to second, and some credit for the top four. Somehow, despite the decades, that English Mana Drain isn’t much more than it was then. The Alpha Time Walk, however…

I loved all of it, and I ran events straight through until 2005. Our little Vintage community grew. Aaron Rubinstein, Corey and Jared Mann (with an honorable mention to Chris Mascioli), and many others all joined our crowd.

I went off to school in upstate New York in January of 2005, and didn’t come back to Long Island until July of 2008. I thoroughly enjoyed playing Magic in upstate New York, but there wasn’t much more than Limited and Standard to be had, and I sorely missed playing Vintage with friends.

I slowly began working my way back in to Vintage, attending events, and testing with friends when I came home in 2008. It was incredible to come back, and recognize what had been absent the last few years.

I came back at an interesting time. The June 2008 Banned and Restricted List announcement was an all-timer, as Brainstorm, Flash, Gush, Merchant Scroll, and Ponder all hit the Restricted List. This was an earthquake that hit the format, and the perfect time to get back in – the meta had completely reset. Everyone was sent back to the starting line.

I played a lot of Vintage as 2008 became 2009. I wanted more and more. But every event was a road trip. Vintage on Long Island had withered, as our community slowly atrophied over time due to the lack of events. Additionally, we lost our anchor, as Neutral Ground, the famed store that was the epicenter of our Magic experience, closed its doors.

When I started running events again in 2009, it was easy enough. Power, along with all the other staples, were affordable. At that point in time, we thought that the prices were high, and given where they’d been just a few years prior, they were. A $500 Unlimited Black Lotus may seem obscenely cheap now, but when your price memory is $100-300, maybe it is. Still, for $40-$50 you could play in an unsanctioned Vintage tournament, and win a piece of Power.

A random aside – I believe every Black Lotus tournament that I ran gave away a Timetwister to second. Can you imagine what those who are unfamiliar with that era would think when reading old tournament reports? “They gave away a Lotus to first, and a Timetwister to second?!?” If they only knew.

Winning always feels good, but winning a piece of Power felt different. It was special in a way that cash prizes just aren’t. I knew many players who would win an event, and immediately remove a proxy from their deck in order to play with their prize. Many others would win credit, slowly build that up, trade in more to the stores/dealers, and pick up the cards that they needed to play.

I don’t know if any of us recognized it at the time, but we were playing in a Golden Age of Vintage. Yeah, we were mostly 20-somethings who didn’t have a great deal of disposable income, but the ratios between the cost of cards, our wages, and the cost of everything else was just about perfect. We’d meet up early on a Saturday morning, drive out to an event (potentially 3-4 hours away), jam Vintage all day long, and have a great time out at dinner with our friends (near and far) until far too late. We’d come home exceptionally late. We were exhausted, but rejuvenated.

I dove headfirst into organizing Vintage tournaments. Pick a month in 2010, and you could play Vintage weekly at Mark’s Comics, bi-monthly at The Comic Book Depot, or monthly at Brothers Grim. Credit, format staples (duals, Libraries, Workshops), Power, they were all on the line, every month. I loved all of it, but by the time 2012 rolled around, I was tired. We had built up the New York Vintage community again, and we had over 100 players in the NYC/Long Island region. I knew I couldn’t keep running events like this, and that I needed to back off to focus on the other areas of my life that had been neglected. That said, I’m a tournament organizer at heart. There are times in my life where I haven’t run Vintage events, but it always felt like something was missing. After about a year of not running any events, the itch was there again.

I couldn’t do what I had done in the past, I didn’t have it in me to run all those events every month. I didn’t want to run a monthly event either – it wasn’t too much work, but it was consistent in a way that I wasn’t crazy about. I wanted to be able to take a break, and not think about running anything for months at a time. So what was left?

The Vintage community announced events, talked strategy, and more on TheManaDrain.com. In 2025 this isn’t a url that I expect everyone to be familiar with due to its age (those of us who remember/used BeyondDominia may be legally dead), but it became the online hub/hangout that connected all of us. Every year the Americans on TMD would jealously see another Bazaar of Moxen tournament announced, and run. I can’t speak for everyone, but I can speak for myself when I say that I deeply wished I could have had that experience in the States. The entry fee was high, but the prize support that was given out was surreal. Power up and down the standings, Beta Power, multiple pieces of Power going to the winner. Multiple Lotuses going out. It defies belief nowadays.

But it was real.

What would a sustainable version of that event look like? I spent a good amount of time thinking about that in early 2013. You could find events in the States that awarded multiple pieces of Power – usually a Lotus to first, and a Timetwister to second. Sometimes you’d find an event where the organizer gave away a couple of Moxen. But they were increasingly rare.

So what about an event that gave away eight pieces of Power, headlined by an Unlimited Black Lotus, to the top eight? It was a start. I started talking about the idea of an event like this with friends. Visna Harris (one of the true gentlemen of Vintage) brought up the idea of a trophy that was worthy of an event with that kind of prize support. I thought about ways to tie the event into my deep love of New York, and thought about how altered Karn, Silver Golems would be a unique giveaway. I wanted more, and started thinking through what giveaways I could hand out on the day. I wanted everything to feel like a callback to what Magic was when we were younger, when we met our first friends through the game, and then embarked on that journey with them one battle at a time.

NYSE Open I fired in June 2013, and was just about everything that I had wanted it to be. The core group of players were Vintage locals, but there were so many others who surprised me by coming out. All the major Vintage hubs in the U.S. were represented at that event.

There are many things that I love about this event, but chief among them was that it represented an opportunity to work with some of my closest and oldest friends. Nick Coss was my dealer for the event at the beginning, later joined by Calvin Hodges. Greg Fenton, another one of my closest friends began producing an incredible image to go with every event. The playmats that Greg produced just further added to the nostalgia.

Visna Harris helped find and make the trophies happen. I truly believe that the NYSE trophy is the best trophy in all of Magic.

Earl Grant De Leon did magnificent work with altered Karns featuring NYC icons.

The giveaways were an opportunity to add to the event, as I spent months looking for Magic nostalgia incarnate. It was a chance to give away cool things from Magic’s past that the players today may not have been familiar with.

NYSE Open IX was another great day, and I’m happy to say that the videos for the event will be available here on Eternal Central.

Vintage is Magic at its purest. It is a chance to celebrate Magic’s history with other fans of the game. I look forward to doing just that at Eternal Weekend North America this year.

So…do you want to jam some Vintage?

Yes, Ramos, I do.

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Pairings and Standings

Pairings and Final Standings
The event featured 5 rounds of Swiss, which was plenty more than required for numerical purposes, because the wizards convened to test their mettle. Carter Petray was the lone undefeated mage on the day, vanquishing all on-comers with his 5 color Stasis deck.

First Place Prize

Your Lone Madison Offensive 2024 Undefeated (and Winner), Carter Petray!

The Decks (Alphabetically, by Last Name)

Tim Baran (5C Trolls)

Grant Castleton (RUG Channel)

Lorien Elleman (UWB Aggro Control)

Jaco (UWB Workshop)

Jeremiah Mohr (Dreams Aggro BRU)

Matt Moss (RUG Aggro)

Carter Petray (5C Stasis Combo)

Matt S (4C Aggro)

Shane Semmens (Reanimator)

Robert Vincent (Mono Green)

Michael Walker (Mono Green)
NO DECK PHOTO

Tournament Action and Wrapup

Local Conditions

Warming Up to Play for the Day

Legendary Greenbush Bakery Apple Fritters

Group Signing Some Cards, Per Usual

Castleton (RUG Channel) vs. Baran (Troll)

Semmens (Reanimator) vs. Vincent (Mono Green)

Baran (5C Trolls) Vs. Mohr (Dreams Aggro BRU)

Walker (Mono Green) vs. Castleton (RUG Channel)

Matt S (4C Aggro) vs. Baran (5C Trolls)

Petray (5C Stasis Combo) vs. Jaco (UWB Workshop)

Castleton (RUG Channel) vs. Semmens (Reanimator)

Moss (RUG Aggro) vs. Elleman (UWB Aggro Control)

Vicent (Mono Green) vs. Petray (5C Stasis Combo)

Matt S (4C Aggro) vs. Jaco (UWB Workshop)

Walker (Mono Green) vs. Mohr (Dreams Aggro BRU)

Semmens (Reanimator) vs. Elleman (UWB Aggro Control)

Moss (RUG Aggro) vs. Baran (5C Trolls)

Castleton (RUG Channel) vs. Petray (5C Stasis)

Walker (Mono Green) vs. Vincent (Mono Green)

Essen Haus Afterparty

As has become tradition, after the Madison Offensive main event, many of the wizards would go on to later convene in the evening at Essen Haus for dinner, and to duel in contests of Old School 95 and other games of choice. Essen Haus is a lively evening haunt, known for its German food and beer, live music, and rambunctious crowds. We didn’t get many pictures here, but the Old School 95 games were very entertaining.

Essen Haus Afterparty Power Gaming

Matt S (OS95 Lumberjack Channel-Fireball Combo) vs. Semmens (Llurgoyf Reanimator)

Semmens (OS95 Llurgoyf Reanimator) vs. Baran (Necropotence)

Petray (OS95 5C Stasis Combo) vs. Matt S (OS95 Lumberjack Channel-Fireball Combo)

The Malort Build

Thank you to everybody who came out to play, and we hope to see you again soon. As we move forward experimenting with more changes we hope to make each event more unique and fun. Catch you soon.

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Tournament Structure and Prizing

As usual, with most local events we try to keep things moving quickly so people can have fun and get in and out, and then go hang out with friends at night afterwards. We often do Swiss+1 with no draws allowed, to encourage people to actually play Magic rather than draw matches.

This month’s event featured 16 competitors (and a couple of other watchers), and a nice smoked pulled pork and brisket barbecue spread, courtesy of Lord Jaco and Lord Greg, with a nice cornbread by Lord Agra, and various accoutrements and beverages donated by other Lords.

As usual, there was a large stack of Middle School staples that people could choose from before the tournament, or people can bring their own card, and each card was stamped, dated, and group signed as part of the prize pool from a memorable day.

Final Standings After Swiss+1

Jaco was the winner of this event, piloting a 5C TaxRack Control deck to the only undefeated record on the day, for a clean 5-0 finish.

Decks

After a heavy presence of Goblins and other aggro and aggro control decks tilting the field the past few events, this field featured a few different varieties of Oath and control decks, as well as a few different Enchantress combo decks to try to take advantage of the prior aggro tune. But Goblins was absent this day, and instead replaced by some wild decks like Zach Zurawski’s Fluctuator combo, Chet Miller’s LED-fueled Quiet Spec Madness, Lil Greg’s Invitational Wizards, and our Most Creative Deck Winner, David Velasco’s 5C Coalition Victory deck, featuring both Natural Order and Coalition Victory. Even in a relatively small field, there was a pretty wide variety of decks this month.

Bob Agra – Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW

Matt Braun – The Rock BG

Mike Chavez – Red Deck Wins

Graham Dickson – Land Destruction Sligh

Enrique Flores – Mono Black Necro

Jaco – 5C TaxRack

Ben Jones – Mono Black Grave Pact

Greg Kotscharjan – UWB Invitational Wizards

Andy MacDougall – Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW

Jimmy McCarthy – OathStill UGW

Caleb Mikolajczyk – Enchantress GW

Chet Miller – LED Speculation Madness

Carter Petray – Full English Breakfast

Rich Tomek – Landstill UW
DECK PHOTO MISSING

David Velasco – 5C Burning Cromat Coalition *Most Creative Deck Winner*

Zach Zurawski – Fluctuator

Tournament Action

Pregame Prep the Day Before, Smoking Some Meats

McCarthy (OathStill UGW) vs. Agra (Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW)

Petray (Full English Breakfast) vs. Braun (The Rock BG)

Chavez (Red Deck Wins) vs. MacDougall (Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW)

Mikolajczyk (Enchantress GW) vs. Velasco (5C Burning Cromat Coalition)

Jones (Mono Black Grave Pact) vs. MacDougal (Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW)

Agra (Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW) vs. Kotscharjan (UWB Invitational Wizards)

McCarthy (OathStill UGW) vs. Flores (Mono Black Necro)

Jaco (5C TaxRack) vs. Petray (Full English Breakfast)

Thanks for reading, and we’ll catch you next time.

Tournament Structure and Prizing

As usual, with most local events we try to keep things moving quickly so people can have fun and get in and out, and then go hang out with friends at night afterwards. We often do Swiss+1 with no draws allowed, to encourage people to actually play Magic rather than draw matches. This month’s event was Old School 93-94, and run as 5 rounds of Swiss.

As usual, there was a large stack of Old School staples that people could choose from before the tournament, or people can bring their own card, and each card was stamped and group signed as part of the prize pool from another memorable day.

This month’s event featured the Wisconsin Special Olympics, which all proceeds and entry fees were donated to.

Final Standings After Swiss+1

Lord Petray continued his recent string of Old School successes piloting aggro decks featuring Scryb Sprites, and was the only undefeated player in this event. His RUG Aggro deck featured the customary Kird Apes and Argothian Pixies, but eschewed more costly threats like Serendib Efreets and Erhnam Djinns in favor of a lower mana curve package of Scryb Sprites, Llanowar Elves, and Elvish Archers. Giant Growths helped pump and protect his puny creatures all the way to the top on this summer day, earning him a well fought victory, and continuing to prove that he can triumph with 3-4 complete blanks in his main deck on any given day.

Decks (Alphabetical, by Last Name)

The field was ripe with aggro decks of all flavors this time, some Workshop Aggro builds, as well as some combo Underworld Dreams variants, and a few control decks like UR, Troll Disco, and The Deck.

In the Mad Style Department there were a few memorable outfits, led off by Lord Shane, who sported a siq Banshee Tower deck, utilizing the Land Tax + Ivory Tower engine to gain life, which he could then channel in to large life drain with Banshee. Ali from Cairo, Circle of Protection: Black, Sylvan Library, and Spirit Link also provided other siq synergies.

Lord Vincent brought a new Mono White Workshop Aggro deck with the regular robots, buttressed by Argivian Archaeologists and Angelic Voices, as well as a peppering of singleton heaters throughout.

Lord Jones was seen rocking a unique aggro-combo deck, with the URB Underworld Dreams package, backed by a triple threat blend of Serendibs, Juzams, and Sedge Trolls, for additional angles of attack. The sideboard control package provided more combo mirror tactics.

Tim Baran – Troll Disco URB

Ian Blank – Dreams Combo 5C

Matt Braun – Atog RUG

Mike Butzen – URW Aggro

Lorien Elleman – Pink Weenie

Jaco – Naya Bazaar Zoo 2023

Ben Jones – Dreams Aggro Combo URB

Jimmy McCarthy – Atog RUG

George Murphy – Naya Big Zoo

Jay Peine – Black White

Carter Petray – RUG Aggro Pump Sprites

Dan Piquard – Naya Zoo

Dan Rech – Workshop Aggro URB

Shane Semmens – Banshee Tower

Jeremy Seroogy – UR Control

Mike Smare – The Deck

James Tork – Goblins Mono Red

Robert Vincent – Workshop Aggro Mono White

Tournament Action

Breakfast at Uncles Mike’s

Semmens (Banshee Tower) vs. Rech (Workshop Aggro URB)

Braun (Atog RUG) vs. Elleman (Pink Weenie)

Jaco (Naya Bazaar Zoo 2023) vs. Elleman (Pink Weenie)

Murphy (Naya Big Zoo) vs. Rech (Workshop Aggro URB)

Vincent (Workshop Aggro Mono White) vs. Jones (Dreams Aggro Combo URB)

Baran (Troll Disco URB) vs. Piquard (Naya Zoo)

McCarthy (Atog RUG) vs. Petray (RUG Aggro Pump Sprites)

Tork (Goblins) vs. Petray (RUG Aggro Pump Sprites)

Blank (Dreams Combo 5C) vs. Jaco (Naya Bazaar Zoo 2023)

Rech (Workshop Aggro URB) vs. Semmens (Banshee Tower)

Murphy (Naya Big Zoo) vs. Braun (Atog RUG)

Elleman (Pink Weenie) vs. Seroogy (UR Control)

Blank (Dreams Combo 5C) vs. Rech (Workshop Aggro URB)

Piquard (Naya Zoo) vs. Petray (RUG Aggro Pump Sprites)

Vincent (Workshop Aggro Mono White) vs. Butzen (URW Aggro)

Braun (Atog RUG) vs. Murphy (Naya Big Zoo)

Peine (Black White) vs. Smare (The Deck)

Murphy (Naya Big Zoo) vs. Jones (Dreams Aggro Combo URB)

Jaco (Naya Bazaar Zoo 2023) vs. Smare (The Deck)

Alpha 40 Action – Castleton (RW) vs. Semmens (Mono Black)

Dinner at the Milwaukee Public Market

The Malort Stands Alone

Thanks for reading, and we’ll catch you next time.

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Lion’s Eye Diamond is now unbanned in Middle School

In terms of categories that cards tend to fall in to when landing on a Magic format’s Banned or Restricted List, a recurring theme is fast or abusable mana. Cards that provide outsized returns in terms of mana investment to what they provide have often landed on a Banned or Restricted List if they proved format warping.

Lion’s Eye Diamond is a card that provides outsized mana return (3 mana of any color) for the investment (0 mana, and sacrificing your hand when tapping and sacrificing to activate). It proved too powerful for Vintage when especially combined with Burning Wish and/or Yawgmoth’s Will. It was a natural inclusion and mana engine when combined with the Storm mechanic. Along these same lines, it has been a powerful and useful card in Legacy since Legacy’s official creation in 2003, mostly finding a home in various Storm combo decks, along with decks like Dredge.

Middle School is a similarly positioned “deep pool” card format, home to many powerful cards from Magic’s history that aren’t even legal as 4-ofs in either Vintage or Legacy. So why would we ever think about unbanning Lion’s Eye Diamond in Middle School?

While the card pool is undoubtedly deep, it is also underexplored. In our very limited testing Lion’s Eye Diamond has shown potential, but is not necessarily any more powerful as a strategy lynchpin than existing heavy hitters like Necropotence, Land Tax, Standstill, Entomb, Survival of the Fittest, and so on.

Management of any format’s Banned and Restricted List is a duel between allowing more and more chances to play with our favorite cards, versus maintaining a healthy and holistic balance of the format, and preventing any card or strategy from becoming format warping. Most of the realistic shells for Lion’s Eye Diamond that we have seen (Storm Tendrils, Eggs Tendrils, Doomsday, Iggy Pop/Ill-Gotten Gains, Burning Wish-based decks like Tinker Devourer, or Turtle Splash) will get another tool to potentially incorporate, and this will potentially make them more powerful or viable, without pushing combo decks to be too dominant or format warping (as some other potential unrestrictions may have been).

As with the unrestriction of Tinker in Middle School three years ago, we will await any evidence that this unrestriction of Lion’s Eye Diamond would push these or other decks past the most powerful cards and strategies already existing in Middle School. Lion’s Eye Diamond can now be more fully tested and put through its paces by the full Middle School community at large, rather than just hubs of local playtest groups. And just like any other card(s), we will continue to monitor this format and changes closely, and if Lion’s Eye Diamond proves to be problematic to the holistic health of the format, doing more harm than good, it will quickly be addressed again in the future.

Go forth, and brew.

Tournament Structure and Prizing

As usual, with most local events we try to keep things moving quickly so people can have fun and get in and out, and then go hang out with friends at night afterwards. We often do Swiss+1 with no draws allowed, to encourage people to actually play Magic rather than draw matches.

This month’s event featured 20 competitors, a full taco bar lunch break. On the day, 9lb of carnitas, 5lbs of Thai peanut chicken, 5lbs of guacamole, 70 tortillas, and copious amounts of slaws, Donkey Chips, and hot sauces were consumed. Not to mention the cocktails crafted by Lord Semmens and Lord Agra throughout the day. Around this time we also enshrined a handful of new Lords of the Pit members.

As usual, there was a large stack of Middle School staples that people could choose from before the tournament, or people can bring their own card, and each card was stamped, dated, and group signed as part of the prize pool from a memorable day.

Final Standings After Swiss+1

Tim Baran was the winner of this event, piloting a Goblins list utilizing Ancient Tomb, for powering out Goblin Matrons and Goblin Ringleaders faster, primarily. He narrowly edged out a couple of consecutive GW Enchantress players in the last couple of rounds to go undefeated on the day.

Decks

There was a pretty interesting field this go around. Goblins was the most represented deck, in a variety of flavors, and Enchantress, Sligh, and UW Control were the only other broad strategies that were represented by more than a single player each. There were plenty of other strange brews present though, so feast your eyes on these gems below.

Bob Agra – Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW

Tim Baran – Goblins Mono Red

Ian Blank – Mono Black Pox

Matt Braun – Tax Rack Aggro WR

Graham Dickson – Stasis Land Denial Prison *Most Creative Winner*

Lorien Elleman – Hermit Naught

Jack Holt – 8 Rat Tendrils

Jaco – Goblins RGB

Ben Jones – Mono Black Grave Pact

Greg Kotscharjan – UW Control

JP Lamp – Insidious Draco Explosion

Jimmy McCarthy – Madness UG (Tempo)

Chet Miller – Nether Spirit Control BG

Matt Moss – Tinker Devourer

Kyle Oakley – Sligh

Shane Semmens – Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW

David Velasco – Goblins RB

Michael Walker – Sligh

Zach Zurawski – Pyrostatic Oath

Anthony Zinni – Landstill UW

Tournament Action

Oakley (Sligh) vs. Zinni (Landstill UW)

Miller (Nether Spirit Control) vs. Baran (Goblins Mono Red)

Braun (Tax Rack Aggro RW) vs. Zinni (Landstill UW)

Velasco (Goblins RB) vs. Braun (Tax Rack Aggro RW)

Baran (Goblins Mono Red) vs. McCarthy (Madness UG Tempo)

Zinni (Landstill UW) vs. Elleman (Hermit Naught)

Zurawski vs. Kotscharjan (UW Control)

Jones (Mono Black Grave Pact) vs. Holt (8 Rat Tendrils)

Moss (Tinker Devourer) vs. Dickson (Stasis Land Denial Prison)

Semmens (Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW) vs. Baran (Goblins Mono Red)

Miller (Nether Spirit Control) vs. Kotscharjan (UW Control)

McCarthy (Madness UG Tempo) vs. Braun (Tax Rack Aggro RW)

Baran (Goblins Mono Red) vs. Agra (Enchantress SquirrelCraft GW)

Jones (Mono Black Grave Pact) vs. Walker (Sligh)

Thanks for reading, and we’ll catch you next time.

Final Standings

Decklists, Alphabetically, by Last Name

Bob Agra – UWB Aggro Control

Tim Baran – All American Maze Control

Robert Beedle – Berserk Stompy

Ian Blank – Dreams Combo 5C

Matt Braun – Atog RUG

Lorien Elleman – UWB Aggro Control

Dave Gura – Dreams Prison BW

Scott Hawksworth – Ernhamgeddon GW

Jaco – TwiddleVault 5C

Ben Jones – Counter Burn Troll URB

Andy MacDougall – RUG Channel

Ray Mattson – Atog BerserkerNaut

Chet Miller – Ankh Merfolk

Dan Piquard – TaxEdge 5C

Nick Rohr – RUG Flyers

Shane Semmens – 5C Swedish Pizza

David Velasco – Twiddle Turns Tog

Robert Vincent – Atog Mono Red

Michael Walker – DECK PHOTO MISSING

Tournament Action and Wrapup

Semmens vs. Piquard

Baran vs. Rohr

Beedle vs. Velasco

Gura vs. Vincent

Semmens vs. Elleman

Braun vs. Rohr

Piquard vs. Jones

Beedle vs. Gura

Mattson vs. Baran

Semmens vs. Agra

Hawksworth vs. Piquard

Thank you to everybody who came out to play, and we hope to see you again soon. Thanks for reading!

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Show Notes

– The Brothers’ War visual spoiler

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Show Notes

– October 10 2022 Banned and Restricted List Announcement
– Magic 30th Anniversary product announcement
– Magic 30th Anniversary product ordering
– What Happened at Magic 30?

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

On October 8, 2022 in South Bend, Indiana, 28 mages descended upon Tippecanoe Place (the Studebaker Mansion) for the first annual Midwest Old School Thrash Bash Tournament. Players represented several regional Old School clubs, including Lords of the Pit, Cleveland Rocs, The Ebon Hand (Cincinnati), Columbus Kobolds, Water Elementals, and Indy Djinns, as well as several unaffiliated hessians who came to thrash.

Tournament Structure and Prizing

Hessians vied for dominance in 5 rounds of Swiss using Eternal Central 94 rules throughout the day. Each participant received a stamped Hymn to Tourach to collect signatures, and several prizes and alters were donated by the community. Special alters were awarded for First Registered (K. Wells), First Blood (K. Wells), Winner (J. Stacko) + Top 4 Swiss (D. Gura, M. Folk, K. Ballantine), and the Most Hesh Deck (B. Limbacher). Two special Hymns were signed and mailed to the two St. Louis Rivermen who were struck by Covid prior to the event and had to withdraw. Thrash Bash participants also had access to a custom food menu and Tippe’s fully stocked bar.

Final Standings After Swiss

In the end, Joe Stacko won 1st Place with a gnarly, quadruple-sleeved Shops brew, taking home the signed Thrash Bash Trophy donated by Brian Limabacher and signed by all participants. Congratulations Joe!

Decks

AJ Kelley

Andy Hagans

Andy Smith

Ben Revell

Biagio DeCioccio

Brian Limbacher Most Hesh Deck

Byron Seabolt

Chad Frazier

Colin Moser

Dan Piquard

Dave Gura 2nd Place Swiss

Eric Westfall

Erik Limbacher

Forest Walton

Greg Cummings

Jaco

Joe Stacko 1st Place Swiss

John Knerr

Jonathan Guillen

Jon Brne

Jon Revell

Kevin Ballantine 4th Place Swiss

Kyle Wells First Blood

Matt Folk 3rd Place Swiss

Matt Moss

Mike Twombly

Scott Hacksworth

Stephen Moore

Tournament Action

Thrash Bash 2022 Participants

Kyle Wells displays First Blood + sandwich

Brian Limbacher accepts the Most Hesh Deck award

Jaco vs. Walton

Moss vs. Seabolt

Gura vs. Piquard, when Sandstorm hits

Chad Frazier takes home a custom Thrashin’ Deck Box made by Brian Limbacher

Guillen vs. Hawksworth

Ben Revell vs. Knerr

Prize Selection

Ballantine comes out of retirement for a Top 4 finish

Signing of cards

Friday Night’s Secret 7 pt. Singleton Hesh Sesh

Till Next Year, Hessians!
-Dave

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Tournament Structure and Prizing

As usual, with most local events we try to keep things moving quickly so people can have fun and get in and out, and then go hang out with friends at night afterwards. We often do Swiss+1 with no draws allowed, to encourage people to actually play Magic rather than draw matches. In the pandemic era of regular last minute cancellations we were left with 13 ballers, and this event ended up being 5 total rounds. This month featured a taco bar and other refreshments.

There was a large stack of Middle School staples that people could choose from before the tournament, or people can bring their own card, and each card was stamped and group signed as the prize pool.

Final Standings After Swiss+1

Decks

Brandon Adams – Survival Elves RG
DECK PHOTO COMING SOON

Ian Blank – Mono Black Pox

Matt Braun – Tax Rack Aggro WR

Lorien Elleman – Necro Rock BG

Graham – Burn

Jaco – Goblins RGB

Ben Jones – Mono Black Pox

Andy MacDougall – Goblins R

Jimmy McCarthy – Survival Elves RG

Matt Moss – Tinker Devourer

Shane Semmens – Enchantress SquirrelCraft

David Velasco – Wizards UWB

Zach Zurawski – Slide Rift RW

Tournament Action

McCarthy (Survival Elves RG) vs. MacDougall (Goblins R)

Braun (Tax Rack Aggro RW) vs. Graham (Burn)

Elleman (Necro Rock BG) vs. Zurawski (Slide Rift RW)

Jones (Mono Black Pox) vs. Graham (Burn)

Moss (Tinker Devourer) vs. Jaco (Goblins RGB)

Zurawski (Slide Rift RW) vs. Elleman (Necro Rock BG)

Braun (Tax Rack Aggro RW) vs. Semmens (Enchantress SquirrelCraft)

Blank (Mono Black Pox) vs. Adams (Survival Elves RG)

Velasco (Wizards UWB) vs. Elleman (Necro Rock BG)

Jones (Mono Black Pox) vs. Braun (Tax Rack Aggro WR)

Zurawski (Slide Rift RW) vs. Blank (Mono Black Pox)

Jaco (Goblins RGB) vs. Braun (Tack Rack Aggro WR), a topdecked Firestorm for 7 (exactly lethal) in Game 3

McCarthy (Survival Elves RG) vs. Adams (Survival Elves RG)

Jones (Mono Black Pox) vs. Velasco (Wizards UWB)

Semmens (Enchantress SquirrelCraft) vs. Zurawski (Slide Rift RW)

Velasco (Wizards UWB) vs. McCarthy (Survival Elves RG)

MacDougall (Goblins R) vs. Braun (Tax Rack Aggro WR)

Blank (Mono Black Pox) vs. Graham (Burn)

McCarthy (Survival Elves RG) vs. MacDougall (Goblins R)

Afternoon Carnitas Taco Bar, by Jaco

Shortbread Cookies with Campari Frosting, by Jimmy McCarthy

Thanks for reading, and we’ll catch you next time.

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

Contact us at @ManyInsanePlays on Twitter or e-mail us at SoManyInsanePlaysPodcast@gmail.com.

There was also a special cocktail menu crafted for the event by yours truly, and the beverages were flowing throughout the day, pizza was ordered, and a memorable day was had by all.

The Teams (and Decks)

Team FFE

Brandon Sanders (Old School 95 – Necro Lich)

Ben Jones (Middle School – Pox)

Dane Malone (Vintage – Depths BG)

Team Necro

Greg Kotscharjan (Old School 95 – Atog)

Lorien Elleman (Middle School – UW Control)

Bob Agra (Vintage – Oath)

Tactical Briefcase Nukes

Jaco (Old School 95 – Necro Dreams)

Jimmy McCarthy (Middle School – Elves RG)

Brandon Adams (Vintage – Doomsday)

Overlords of Bloodfield

Greg Cummings (Old School 95 – Necro Mirror)

Mike Twombly (Middle School – Elves)

Joe Stacko (Vintage – Tinker Breach UBR)

Hellfire Club

Chet Miller (Old School 95 – Mono Green)

Anthony Zinni (Middle School – Battle of Wits)
DECK PIC MISSING

Ray Mattson (Vintage – Oath)

Steely 3

Matt Moss (Old School 95 – Reanimator BUG)

Carter Petray (Middle School – Mono Red)

Tim Baran (Vintage – Zenith BUG)

All City

James Tork (Old School 95 – UR Burn)

Dan Rech (Middle School – Mono Red Midrange)

Brad (Vintage – Tinker Breach UBR)
DECK PIC MISSING

Results

After the dust settled on a full day of round robin matches, one team was left with an unblemished 7-0 record, and TACTICAL BRIEFCASE NUKES were crowned the victors.

Action

Round 1 Action
Rech (Mono Red Midrange) vs Elleman (UW Control)

Malone (Depths BG) vs Stacko (Tinker Breach UBR)

Cummings (Necro Mirror) vs Sanders (Necro Lich)

Agra (Oath) vs Brad (Tinker Breach UBR)

Baran (Zenith BUG) vs Adams (Doomsday)

Sanders winning Chaos Orb flip in overtime as the match tiebreaker

Round 2 Action
Agra (Oath) vs Malone (Depths BG)

Jaco (Necro Dreams) vs Miller (Mono Green)

Cummings (Necro Mirror) vs Tork (UR Burn)

Stacko (Tinker Breach UBR) vs Brad (Tinker Breach UBR)

Round 3 Action
Jaco (Necro Dreams) vs Moss (Reanimator BUG)

Round 4 Action
Moss (Reanimator UBR) vs Elleman (Atog)

Agra (Oath) vs Baran (Zenith BUG)

Stacko (Tinker Breach UBR) vs Mattson (Oath)

Sanders (Necro Lich) vs Jaco (Necro Dreams)

Round 5 Action
Stacko (Tinker Breach UBR) vs Baran (Zenith BUG)

Moss (Reanimator BUG) vs Cummings (Necro Mirror)

Agra (Oath) vs Mattson (Oath)

Brad (Tinker Breach UBR) vs Adams (Doomsday)

Round 6 Action
Jaco (Necro Dreams) vs Cummings (Necro Mirror), and McCarthy (Elves RG) vs Twombly (Elves)

Moss (Reanimator BUG) vs Sanders (Necro Lich)

Team FFE vs Steely 3

Prizes

The 4-of-a-unique-card limit was a formative rule for constructed Magic issued on high with the first mandatory tournament rules, along with 60 card minimums and 15 card sideboards. Together, these rules create a kind of “speed limit” for Magic, even more fundamental than Banned and Restricted Lists. They interact to minimize or constrain the ruthless consistency that a big baller, high rolling deck can attain, creating a diversity of gameplay that helps make Magic an enjoyable experience for continued replayability. Magic would not be nearly as enjoyable if every game were the same, especially between the same decks. But these rules also permit a certain degree of consistency in game planning and play, such that decks are not just a completely random agglomeration of powerful cards, but can actually constitute “strategies.”

The 60 card minimum and 4 card maximum was a brilliant balancing of these elements, replayability and consistency, that has helped Magic endure for decades. Some forces have pushed constructed Magic towards greater consistency, including, but not limited to, the mulligan rules (and especially the London mulligan), the massively expanded card pool with many functional variants or copies of existing cards, and the greater efficiency of deck manipulation (especially with the advent of cantrips and fetchlands).

While hyper consistency may be undesirable for some facets of constructed Magic, it is worth remembering that the original formulation of the game contained only a 40 card minimum, and no individual card maximums. The real constraint was a very small card pool (Limited Edition, Unlimited Edition, and Arabian Nights), and card availability. Richard Garfield and his playtesters assumed that ordinary players would make do with a very limited card supply.

But in this original equation, card rarity loomed much larger than it does for competitive constructed Magic today. While players might have few rares, they might have several or even many copies of key commons. An examination of the Limited Edition set reveals this design intent. Plague Rats, most obviously, is non-functional in a context of 60 card minimums and 4 per card maximums, but is hilarious and brutal in a 40 card minimum environment where an opponent may have a dozen or so Rats.

Similarly, the distribution of tribal cards like Merfolk of the Pearl Trident (the only Merfolk in the set) relative to Lords like the Lord of Atlantis, or Goblins to Goblin King, make very little sense unless players would have access to many more copies of the commons than a 4-card cap would suggest. A Merfolk strategy would obviously rely on more than just 4 Lord of Atlantis and 4 Merfolk of the Pearl Trident. Even if a player scrounged together just a few Lords, they should be able to get far more copies of Merfolk of the Pearl Trident.

More obscurely, mechanics like Banding, where are featured on just three creatures in Limited Edition, Benalish Hero (a common), Mesa Pegasus (a common), and Timber Wolves (a rare), makes very little sense outside of the context of rarity. The Banding mechanic tends to rely on having all but one of your creatures with Banding. Thus, it rewards deck design that includes mostly creatures with Banding. Since Timber Wolves is a rare, that’s nearly impossible to accomplish unless you have ample copies of either Heroes or Pegasi to work with. Out of a set of roughly 300 cards, the inclusion of Banding as a mechanic only makes sense if the designers thought that some players would be able to play many banding creatures out of those two commons.

Even less obviously, but no less important, is the fact that many key creatures are common or uncommon. There are many odd and marginal cards in Limited Edition. If the designers thought that cards would be roughly equally accessible, then the distribution and density of creatures is grossly insufficient. But the designers assumed that players would play many more Scryb Sprites than rares like Thoughtlace.

In short, it is not simply that unique 4-card caps did not exist, but if they had existed at the time Limited Edition was released, they would have rendered large swaths of the set unplayable in 1993. Instead, rarity served as a soft cap, allowing players to accumulate far more commons than rares, while preserving the design intent of the set.

Wonderfully, Alpha League rules mimic and approximate this dynamic nicely, sharply constraining rares to 3-copies per card (unless restricted or super-restricted), uncommons to 6 copies per deck, with no limit on commons. This creates a small space to explore what I call “gimmick decks” in the Alpha League, a design space generally that does not exist anywhere else in constructed Magic (although, on occasions, can occur in Limited contexts, which obey the original rules of Magic: 40 card minimums, and no unique card caps).

A “gimmick deck” is a deck that is designed around a large quantity of a single or few cards. A great example is a deck I profiled last year, Joel Mick’s Alpha “Elves.”

At its essence, this deck is just three unique cards: Forests, Llanowar Elves, and Giant Growths. This deck is fast, brutal, and fun. On the first turn, you play an Elf. On the second turn, you play two more Elves. On the third turn, you could play 6 Elves, but instead you are probably attacking with some.

Probably the most powerful gimmick deck built for the League has been the Orcish Artillery combination decks, which run about 10 copies of the Artillery (this was prior to the institution of a 6-card cap for uncommons), and a half dozen copies of Circle of Protection: Red.

Another one of my favorite examples, that is probably underappreciated outside of the Alpha context because its power is more subtle, are the Psychic Venom decks. Psychic Venom was clearly a menace in the early days of Magic, especially when combined with tapping effects like Icy Manipulator, Twiddle, or Power Sink. Load up an opposing land with 3-4 copies of Psychic Venom, tap it with Icy repeatedly, and see how long the game lasts!

But probably the most obvious examples are the Plague Rat and Benalish Hero decks.

What these decks wonderfully represent is a deck concept distilled to its core essence; no frills, fluff, or filler. But even more intriguingly, they raise questions about which kinds of linear strategies trump others, under what conditions or circumstances, and with what amendments can those outcomes shift.

For example, which strategy is strategically superior in a match, the Plague Rat deck, or the Hero deck? One could theorize and speculate (and believe me, I did!), but it is not until you build the decks and test them that the insights begin to flow.

In theory, the Hero strategy has a huge advantage of being able to deploy itself much more quickly than the Rat deck, which, in simplistic form, casts the first Rat on turn 3. But the Rats grow much faster, at an exponential rate, suggesting that, if the Rat deck can stabilize, it should be able to Alpha strike eventually.

But even this simple assessment belies some considerable complexities, which is what makes this experiment so interesting. For example, at what point, generally speaking, can the Plague Rat deck shift from defense to offense? And since the Hero deck is faster out of the gates and presumably can inflict some significant damage before the Rats are much use on defense, if the Plague Rat deck does eventually shift to offense, must it hold some of its forces back, and if so, how much? When the Plague Rat deck begins attacking, how much of the Hero army must be held back on defense, and at what cost?

Or, more broadly, which deck is naturally stronger or more favored? And what kinds of small tweaks or adjustments can shift that outcome? For example, what difference does adding Dark Rituals make to the Rat deck? Or what difference does adding Crusade make for the Hero deck?

These are simple questions that elude simple answers. But they reveal much more about the fundamental nature of the game of Magic than just two Alpha League decks paired up might imply. They begin to provide fundamental insights into the dynamics of Magic matchups, the relative value of speed versus consistency, how minor tweaks can produce large outcome differences, and suggest the rudiments of a metagame (e.g. what happens if we add cards like Northern Paladin or Black Knight?). Add in other decks into the picture, and the complexity multiplies.

In late July of 2021, I finally had an opportunity to explore these questions when a friend visited with me, and we played these two decks I put together just for this experimental purpose.

We played about a dozen games, and the dynamic became fairly clear. The Hero deck did indeed drop quick Heroes, but the damage did not stack up as quickly as I expected.

Here’s how it often played out, assuming the Hero deck curved out perfectly:
Turn 1: Plains, Hero, pass.
Turn 2: Attack with a Hero, play a Plains, cast two more Heroes (opponent at 19 life).
Turn 3: Attack with three Heroes, play a Plains, cast three Heroes (opponent at 16 life)
Turn 4: Attack with 6 heroes (opponent at 10 life).

And that’s with a generally perfect draw.

At this point, the Hero deck would begin to peter out of its supply of Heroes, and the Rat deck would begin to stabilize. With Dark Rituals, the Rat deck would often stabilize faster, such that – if it were on the play, by turn 5 it might have three or even four Rats in play before the Hero can press the Rat deck below 10 life.

And, once the Rat deck got 4 Rats in play, it threatened an imminent lethal strike. The incremental increase from 4 to 5 Rats is a leap of 16 to 25 damage on board. Putting an entire Band in front of just one of the Rats meant death from the other 4 with 20 points of damage. And in contrast to the Rats, more Heroes provided no significant left to the larger Hero band. Once the Hero deck mostly emptied it’s hand by turn 4 or so, then its luck was spent.

In addition to being faster out of the gate, the Hero deck also had one additional significant advantage over the Rats: it could operate well off of a single land. The Plague Rat deck would stall out on just one or two lands. It desperately needed to hit three land drops, even with a few Dark Rituals to help. At the same time, the Hero deck required fewer lands, which meant that the Rat deck was more likely to get mana flooded (by virtue of needing to build with more lands in the deck). This meant that variance slightly favored the Hero deck, which gave it a non-trivial percentage of game wins in the match.

In general, I got the impression that the Hero deck, in a streamlined design, won about 40 percent of its games against the Rats. But I also got the impression that small adjustments could easily tip the balance. For example, Pestilence would be an unbeatable trump against Heroes, wiping out the entire army at once. While I felt that Crusades would be a massive boost for the Heroes, accelerating the clock and helping even up the mid and late game. And spot removal, like Swords to Plowshares or Terror, would introduce considerably situational complexity, causing players to contemplate risks and make assessments on both offense and defense.

Calibrating both decks toward an even matchup did not seem far-fetched. It seemed like it could be done, but making the matchup worth playing over and over again would require diversifying the card pool, and including a larger number of singletons such that the experience would be worthwhile. But this could be accomplished without fundamentally changing the concept.

In general, I think such “Gimmick” decks can be built with the following parameters:

11-16 Lands
9-16 copies of Card “A” (Hero, Rat, Elves etc.)
4-8 copies of Card “B” (Dark Ritual, Crusade, Giant Growth)

Remaining cards are miscellaneous inclusions or singletons.

While the Alpha Card pool offers a limited number of options for these kinds of “gimmick decks”, they are fun as hell to build and try out. I would love to try this approach for other sets, perhaps like Arabian Nights (although Kird Ape might be a problem), and see what other interesting concepts may be possible.

Down the road, I would even perhaps enjoy playing a modern Magic constructed format along these lines. The synergies and play patterns possibilities that emerge from lifting the 4-card cap are something that is definitely worth exploring.

Until next time,
Stephen Menendian