David has much to report on the metagame from his local game store’s Store Championship event. How can this knowledge prepare you for your next Modern event?

As January comes to a close, it’s time to start looking forward to the new Modern. Kaldheim hits shelves next Friday, and while its impact on Modern will be muted, there will be new brews and deck adjustments which will cause some turbulence. The only question is whether there will be a major change, either from a […]

Alright, now. Everybody exhale. Last week is over. We can all try to grind our way through the rest of the year. We’ve been through enough already. Now it’s time for some lighter fare, especially the kind that used to be my bread and butter. Then, the lockdown rendered then impossible. I am of course […]

The competitive season has come to an end, but that doesn’t mean that Magic just stops in December. Local tournaments and MTGO never end. And some competitive scenes don’t have official Wizards support or the backing of a massive store. Some are built by and for the local players. The Colorado Magic scene, deprived of Star City […]

This is an odd feeling for me. For all its flaws, the PPTQ system meant that grinders like me always had competitive level events to grind and keep our skills sharp. The MCQ system is functionally the same as the old PTQ system, which means very few events and very spread out. Since I’m a […]

The competitive drive always burns, no matter how many setbacks I suffer. After all, what’s the point in doing anything unless you strive to improve and grow? So, it’s once more into the breach for the last PPTQ. I failed to win a PPTQ this year, but that didn’t mean giving up on making the […]

After a lengthy hiatus from playing the deck, I brought Colorless Eldrazi Stompy to SCG Regionals last weekend, and duked it out with around 250 players over nine rounds of Modern. I ended up finishing in 9th place. Despite my Top 8 miss, it was exhilarating to again play Colorless at this level. This report […]

And so, the season comes to a close. While I didn’t get there, I can’t say that this season was a complete bust. As a consummate grinder, the near misses just fuel the competitive fire and are a stark reminder to keep pushing myself. In the meantime, Guilds of Ravnica spoilers roll on. While there are […]

I definitely peaked too soon. There’s no possible way to follow up to last week’s Jurassic Park intro and not look pale in comparison. I can’t even go for the ironic method of pointing out this out, I’ve done that before. My remaining option is to just awkwardly forge ahead and feel relief that the qualification system […]

The article must always have an introduction, and it has to be fresh: the essence of column writing. The short version is you have to draw in the reader’s attention with something new, but that’s a big ask. You have this article series which has a repeating topic area but each article’s content never repeats […]

Another week, another failures to qualify. Yes, plural. Spoiler alert: I didn’t win either PPTQ last weekend. Fortunately, there are still plenty of chances ahead. And more opportunities to find novel introductions for this series. In lighter news, Spirits had a very good weekend. The fact that SCG Baltimore was won by UW Spirits while […]

And now, back to the grind. I skipped last week due to the travel distance involved, but I wasn’t about to miss this week. That said, I want to call out that both PPTQ’s last week were at stores that I didn’t know existed, and one was in a town that as far as I […]

After a week off, it’s time to get back on the grind. While there were PPTQ’s last week, they were well outside my willingness to travel. I instead used that time to refine my decks and  get a feel for where the metagame was going. I intended to hit both Modern PPTQ’s this weekend, but […]