Off the Wagon

I live in a small town (population, 75). One of the problems I have is finding anyone to do any gaming with. The best I can usually do is maybe get up a rousing game of Monopoly or Risk with some of my current or former students at the rec center.

HOWEVER... the boyfriend of one of my former students came over the other night to play some crib. We started talking about video games and stuff, and I mentioned how I used to be a big nerd, playing D&D and Magic and stuff.... At the mention of Magic, his eyes lit up. "Magic? Like, Magic the Gathering? You play Magic?" Turns out, he was a HUGE Magic geek, who had quit playing because his friends had all graduated up to poker.

Long story short..... my sickness has returned.

I started playing Magic with ALPHA. Yes, I had 5 of the power 9. I continued to collect and play through university, and finally quit just after Homelands, when I sold my entire set to buy a new personal computer (when a good new personal computer still cost about $2700). I would buy the occasional booster pack or starter deck after that, just to see where the game was. I even bought a Deck Builder's Toolkit last year, and got my old Magic buddies back home to do the same, for a one-day old school throwdown (which annoyed me, because an old friend had a bunch of UNHINGED and UNGLUED cards he used in his deck, which messed me up. I subsequently bought 4 World Bottling Kits 8). I NEVER quit playing my original "Duels of the Planeswalkers" PC game though, and had the new game on Steam.

It hasn't taken me very long to get back into the swong of things. I'm still learning some of the new mechanics, and I STILL prefer the older cards, but I am adapting to designing Modern-legal constructed decks. We have mostly been playing Booster Drafts so far, although I discovered that you can buy 10-card packs of Magic repacks from the Dollar store for a buck, so I bought about...... 60? 80? 100? packages over the past couple months to rebuild my "library". I'd forgotten how addictive Magic was.

Anyway, I have now been scouring online resources for advice on deckbuilding. It's interesting to see how playing has changed over the years. I used to be a good player (not great, but I could hold my own), but I doubt I could really compete anymore. Nonetheless, I'm going to try, and try to have some fun. So far, I have assembled 4 constructed decks I'm messing with... Gobbo Gobbo Hey 2K12; Mean, Green and Ready To Blow; Shutdown Touchdown; and What's A War Without An Army? I am also toying with making a few QL Magic decks with my older cards, and maybe trying out a constructed Modern Allies deck, once I look at what I need for it.

So, anyone out there in my small audience play? Anything I should know about modern Magic? I'm listening. 8)