May 2012 FNM Card - Ancient Grudge with Picture

Coming off from an awesome April Friday night magic foil card, May 2012's Friday Night Magic Premium foil card is not of the same level but a pretty good card that is played in almost all formats.

Ancient Grudge was first printed in time spiral. But ever since its time in Time Spiral, Ancient Grudge has seen decent amounts of play time, mostly appearing in almost all Red deck sideboards.

In standard, Ancient Grudge is the only reason why , sometimes, Mono Red decks tend to run Rootbound Crags. The green mana isn't used in the main board but is only used in the Sideboard for Ancient Grudge copies. Ancient Grudge is an Instant. Allowing you to play it along your burn spells at the end of your opponent's turn. With a flashback cost of only 1 green mana, it is a very efficient spell. Making it very worthwhile to splash some green mana sources - of course your green mana sources should also produce red mana since red tends you to commit to cards with two red mana in their cost - such as Tibalt, Chandra's Phoenix, Koth etc. For life gaining artifacts that prove to be a problem for Red decks, like Sword of War and Peace, Chalices, Batterskull and Wurmcoil Engine, Ancient Grudge is the perfect answer for them. Especially Wurmcoil Engine, the strongest in the group in my opinion. Ancient Grudge deals with the Wurmcoil Engine and you can flashback it to deal with the lifelink Wurm token.

So here it is, although I'm a fan of the Innistrad artwork, May 2012 FNM Card is Ancient Grudge.

Magic101 : Tournament Preparations - Sideboarding 101

For a week, I have been trying to figure out what topic I will be writing about. I didn't want to write something that will seem very generic and plain such as my FNM decklist. So to add a twist, I will write about a very basic skill in Magic: the Gathering. So basic, that most of us take it for granted and sometimes overdo it - Sideboarding.

Sideboarding is basically perceived as bringing in cards that will help your deck perform better and giving you better chances of winning the game. As a pilot of UB Control for so long, I will take a typical UB deck as an example. You might notice that control decks try to put a lot of options in their main decks. In the UB list for example, Doomlade, Go for the Throat, Ratchet Bomb, Curse of Death's Hold, Black Sun's Zenith, etc. When you look at these cards, their power level is not very great compared to , let's say a Planeswalker card like Gideon Jura that punishes aggro, or Oblivion Ring to answer everything. UB uses all these good, specific but sub-optimal cards (that are only applicable in some match-ups) in the main decks, and rely on card advantage (Think Twice and Forbidden Alchemy) to give you the chance to draw those specific cards and use them at the right time. And my point is that UB practically survives winning the round through Sideboarding. In a matchup against tokens for example, you side-out the Doom blades and Go for the Throats and put in cards that deal with tokens better such as board additional board sweepers and ratchet bombs. In the case of fighting against other Control decks, you might want to choose either Doom Blade or Go for the Throat, but you need to side out Curse of Death's Hold and Black Sun's Zenith since they are not good against control and are too mana-intensive. When you pilot UB, you always feel like doing sideboards to improve your chances in winning the game by cutting cards in the main deck that do not perform well against your opponent.

What I discussed above is the basic idea of sideboarding. However, I want you to understand that there is another dimension in replacing your main deck cards from the side. This is sideboarding to anticipate your opponent's sideboard. Last FNM I brought this decklist into the tournament.

Spirit Delver

Lands: 4 Darkslick Shores 4 Glacial Fortress 2 Moorland Haunt 6 Island 1 Swamp 3 Plains 2 Evolving Wilds Creatures: 4 Delver of Secrets 4 Drogskol Captain 4 Phantasmal Image 3 Snapcaster Mage 2 Dungeon Geists Sorceries: 4 Lingering Souls 4 Gitaxian Probe 4 Ponder 1 Revoke Existence Instants: 3 Mana Leak 4 Vapor Snag 1 Surgical Extraction

Sideboard: 2 Negate 2 Dissipate 1 Surgical Extraction 2 Dungeon Geists 2 Celestial Purge 2 Divine Offering 1 Revoke Existence 2 Gut Shot 1 Timely Reinforcements

In sideboarding to be able to cope up with your opponent's sideboard, you need to have a better understanding of the current meta game and anticipate what cards your opponents may have put in the deck to beat you. Basically, you get to develop this skill by playing more and more games and getting to know the top decks and how people tend to play with these top decks. For rouge decks, you can apply this skill against them by simply playing with them multiple times.

In my last FNM for example, when I was playing against a semi midrange-control deck, I sided-out my Mana Leaks, for additional Sugrical Extraction and 2 Dungeon Geist. Although it might not make sense that you side-out your only counter spell, when you get to play with control decks and when people see you have mana leak in game 1, they somehow tend to play around mana leak by ramping up until they can pay the cost for mana leak before playing their spells. They do this so often that having mana leak in your hand will simply be a dead card for you. And since they always think you have a mana leak in your deck, it is better to let them think that you have it and you can put more cards that can give you more chance of winning the next game.

Another example takes me back to the time of Scars of Mirrodin, when I tried to pilot a UB Mimic Vat Deck. The deck was pretty insane when you get to have the Mimic Vat in play as you can have an endless Grave Titan or Wurmcoil Engine every turn, or steal your opponents' creatures after killing the creatures. When sideboarding came, I was almost sure that by how game 1 went, my opponent will put cards to deal with the Mimic Vats, usually spells like Naturalize can do the job but these cards specialize only in dealing with artifacts or enchantments (in this case for your Mimic Vat). So my move was to remove the Mimic Vat in anticipation for his sideboard moves, giving me extra spaces for cards that will improve my deck against my opponent, while at the same time, making his sideboard moves dead and not helping him at all. Honestly, I have also been a victim of this a few times in my current local shop, but ideally, your opponent has no choice but to add answers to your main board threats giving you the option to this any time you want.

Always remember, do not overdo sideboards. The main deck is listed as "main" for a reason and there is a reason why sideboards are named "side" boards. Main decks are supposed to be centralizing on how you would like to win and what your strategy is. So main decks tend to be more "focused" on your goal and how you will achieve that goal. Sideboards may give you better chances to "react" and "deal" with your opponent's deck but putting in sideboard cards will lessen your chances to achieve your goal and stick to your strategy since you are removing some of the core cards in your deck.

As a summary before I end this article, sideboards are important and they can be a double edge sword as they can help you deal with your opponents better but take you away from your core strategy. Sideboarding can be done mostly to improve your deck against a specific opponent but it can also be done by anticipating your opponent's moves against you.

I hope you have learned something through this article and try to apply these in your next tournament.

Lady Antebellum - Just A Kiss

Wow, just wow. A few hours ago, my friend Brent and I were talking about doing a cover and I was kind of thinking that this song might be perfect, we'll just need a girl to perform with us. :D Such a great song. I wanted to share this to you all. I hope you all will like it too. Give it a try! I have attached the video and lyrics so we can sing along with the vid. :D



Lyin' here with you so close to me
It's hard to fight these feelings when it feels so hard to breathe
I'm caught up in this moment, caught up in your smile

I've never opened up to anyone
So hard to hold back when I'm holding you in my arms
We don't need to rush this, let's just take it slow

Just a kiss on your lips in the moonlight
Just a touch of the fire burning so bright
No I don't want to mess this thing up
I don't want to push too far

Just a shot in the dark that you just might
Be the one I've been waiting for my whole life
So baby, I'm alright with just a kiss goodnight

I know that if we give this a little time
It'll only bring us closer to the love we wanna find
It's never felt so real, no, it's never felt so right

Just a kiss on your lips in the moonlight
Just a touch of the fire burning so bright
No, I don't want to mess this thing up
I don't want to push too far

Just a shot in the dark that you just might
Be the one I've been waiting for my whole life
So baby, I'm alright with just a kiss goodnight

No, I don't want to say goodnight
I know it's time to leave
But you'll be in my dreams
Tonight, tonight, tonight

Just a kiss on your lips in the moonlight
Just a touch of the fire burning so bright
And I don't want to mess this thing up
I don't want to push too far

Just a shot in the dark that you just might
Be the one I've been waiting for my whole life
So baby, I'm alright

Oh, let's do this right with just a kiss goodnight
With a kiss goodnight, kiss goodnight

Avacyn Restored Release Card - Restoration Angel - with picture

The Avacyn Restored Launch Party is on May 4, 2012. Remember that starting from Avacyn Restored, Release Promos will be given out to the FNM scheduled during the release of the set. So if you go to the May 4th Friday Night Magic (FNM) tournament, you will get the premium promo card Restoration Angel, while supplies last.

The foil release card is an Angel that costs 4 (3W) and has the ability to blink out a non-Angel creature you control. The exiled creature returns to battlefield at the next end step. So this creature can trigger enters the battlefield effects of non-Angel creatures so that is a plus. 2nd point at 4 mana you get a 3/4 flying creature, that is another plus! However, for me the best ability added to this card is the Flash ability. With Flash, you might be able so save your creatures from removal spells! You can save them from destroy/damage effects. For control decks, you can also cast this angel during the end step of your opponent to go aggro on you opponent next turn. For me, this is one of the must have utility cards in this set.

Click here to see the Pre-Release Promo card.

Avacyn Restored Pre-Release Card - Moonsilver Spear - with picture

The Avacyn Restored Prerelease is April 28-29, 2012.

The foil pre-release card is an equipment that grants your creature the ability similar to Geist of Saint Traft that upon declaration of attackers, you put a 4/4 white Angel Token in the battlefield but the Angel token is not attacking. However, the token is not exiled at the end of your turn.

Click here to see the Release Promo card.

【AVR】 Avacyn Restored Gameday Promo Cards - Latch Seeker and Killing Wave

The Avacyn Restored Game Day date will be on May 26-27, 2012. Everybody who registers for the game day will receive an extended art Latch Seeker. Note that the extended art gameday cards now have inner borders, which are quite cool in my opinion.

If you fared well in the game day, the top 8 will receive a foil extended art Killing Wave! Killing wave is a very good black removal spell that gives your opponent the choice to save the creatures. A pretty decent card for a prize for your game day efforts.