I understand what the writer was trying to convey, but the article meandered a fair bit here and there and everywhere and I think IMO that he missed making an actual clear point to his future daughter.  I would have been impressed if he made a point that men are children if left to their own devices, and that a real man will "man up" and learn compromise.  I have a 7 month old daughter, I had to cut back on my beloved hobby for her.  I've also been happily married to a non-gamer for 10 years, we found balance.  Not all gamers are like the ones the writer protrays us to be, some of us function quite normally in the real world (non gamer/hobbyist world) and have learned balance, because there is what? like 1-3% of the gamer population that actually relies on Magic for an income, thus most of our time. And the sooner the other 97-99% of us realize that the sooner we can actually balance play with a relationship. IMO he failed to puncuate the need for gamers to step back and understand what it is some women are looking for in dating/relationships, obviously AB wasn't feeling what JF brought to the table (her article was a poor way to convey this though).  Sure some are looking for a partner to sling cardboard with, but most are looking for some one to share time with that doesn't involve cards (or whatever).
I had high hopes from the opening paragraph but those soon evaporated.

Try Rite of Replication kicked on Hamletback Goliath....You can have 20,000 plus power on the board for 6 creatures.  The math will make your head explode.

Is there a home for Aether Vial?  It seems this type of deck would benefit from turn one vial to open up an early creature while leaving mana open for disruption.

Regarding Unearth, personally I love the card and use it frequently in Legacy, but I think that it would be coming out every post board.  If you were running Therapy I could see Unearth being pretty savvy tech.

Have you considered Imp's Mischief as Super Secret Tech to highjack an opponent's spell.  It is a little better then people credit it for.

I really think Wotc needs to get some more annihilator.

Hammer of Annihilation 
equip: 
Equip only to Red or Artifact creatures.
Equipped creature gains annihilator 2

I made a mess in my pants when I saw Memnite.  For a tier 2 deck he will be so much fun to sac for tinker and not your mox, or to run with glimpse of nature. 

The biggest thing I see with Memnite is possibly making Thoughtcast playable in Vintage at least in a tier 2 deck.

The drawback being you can only wrath once, since it destroys all non-land & non-token permanents.  He kills himself.

EDIT: oops I missed the word "other"...guess he is pretty solid.

If I am going to shift the deck to the Bazaar engine, Drains would be cut for black discard, I think something along the lines of Dawn of the Dead (likely) control suite or Parfait (remote possiblity).

@Killane 
I will try and have it built in the next couple of weeks for us to play test....I'ld have it done sooner but life is pretty busy.

Thanks for the feedback guys.  I agree if there were one or two more Leylines with the same power level as Void and Sanctitiy it could get nuts.  I like the idea of Raven's Crime, especially if I went the Bazaar route with replenish.  Leyline of Anticipation is tempting because there are so many sorcery speed spells that would be great at instant speed, but there is only so much room.  I forgot all about Serra's Sanctum, definetely worth a try.

So Killane and I are sitting around at FNM the other night discussing Bruizars deck, the new Leylines and how Dredge seems to be insanely good right now.  It dawned on us that a Leyline based deck might be a little to much hate for Dredge to deal with as well as TPS and some other decks.  So this is the bones of what we thought of and I will try to find the time to build it and test it.  The idea is to drop a few turn zero leylines then power out Opalescence and swing for the win.  Any ideas would be welcome because this really needs work.

The Bones x15
4x Lot Void- Good against almost every deck
4x Lot Sanctity- Good against Combo
4x Lot Singularity- Better then it looks against so many decks that need permanents in play.
2x Opalescence  - Make those Leylines work for you
1x Helm of Obedience- D'uh

The Control x14
4x FoW
4x Mana Drain
1x Misdirection
4x Standstill
1x Hurkyl's Recall

Tutoring x9
1x Brainstorm
1x Ancestrall Recall
1x Demonic Tutor
1x Vampiric Tutor
2x Enlightened Tutor
2x SDT
1x Ponder

Acceleration x22
5x Moxen
1x Black Lotus
4x Tundra
4x Underground Sea
3x Flooded Strand
3x Polluted Delta
2x Mishra's Factory

Optional Cards
Greater Auramancy
Orim's Chant
Academy Rector
Dark Tutalage
Jace, The Mindsculpter
Dark Confident
Enduring Ideal (seems to want to be in but need a hard lock to justify the risk and cost)
Solitary Confinement


Even if this ends up being a deck for fun I think maindecking leylines in the current meta is not out of the realm of possiblity. 
And if you got a laugh out of this that is cool too.

I think this deck is absolutly brilliant.  Good job! I look forward to the evolution of this deck.

Great question with so many potential answers. 
First, how much of the metagame is Deck X.
2nd how comfortable is Player A with deck X & deck Y because personal play styles are a huge factor in how well a player performs with a deck.
3rd why not play Deck Z (where Z will never = Oath) and come out of left field and no one is expecting it.

I will always choose Deck Z, although I admit I would crash and burn most spectacularly.

I like the new look guys.  Good Job, keep it up!

@Killane
Remind me to slap you with Webster's Dictionary on Saturday, you're smarter then you're letting on with that atrocious spelling.

I don't see why tinker & tinker target can't be in the board or just out right cut.  It seems to me that Iona & Terastodon are more than a formidable pair on their own, and I appreciate the strength of Tinker but it seems like a bit of overkill.  I would replace them with something like another draw spell and a silver bullet.

Countryside Crusher seems obvious to me, but how that translates to Vintage I dunno.

oops my bad.  The card is still great tech in Stasis though.

imho you should make the following cuts:
-3 Scute mob
-1 Timetwister
-1 Garruk Wildspeaker
-1 Cunning Wish

+1 Gilded Drake (neat tech w/Stylus)
+1 Echonig Truth
+1 Stasis
+2 Tel-Jilad Stylus
+1 Timewalk

Remember with Stasis your opponent will 95% scoop once you have a lock in place (even a soft lock), and you want to drop Stasis fast and often.  Cunning Wish really doesn't do much for you considering the control you have in place already, if you are worried about game 1 vs. dredge you have lots of things to hold them off, root maze and early stasis are your friends here.
Hope this helps.

I love Stasis and all forms of it.  I think you have a pretty cool idea here.  With the amount of card draw and lock pieces, have you considered Tel-Jilad Stylus from Mirroden.  It allows you to put stasis on the bottom of your library at the end of your oppenents turn to give you an untap, then play a new stasis.  It is one card I include in every stasis build, it is also effective against opponents permanents.

Hey all I am saying is Wotc has left a door open for them to do something like that.  It's not perfect but it's an idea, and I'ld bet dollars to donuts they would do something like that (see Time Spiral).

Of course if they banned power it would solve all our problems. we could just play Legacy.

I realize that it doesn't bridge the gap but it sure as hell closes it up a bit.  With the Reserved List as it is now, there will always be the Haves and Have Nots but the distance between them doesn't have to be so drastic.  A little parity when proxies are not permitted would be nice.

@Troy

I read your blog and like your ideas and your approach.  I think Wotc could go one better with the GenCon idea and hand out new P9 to all registered players.  This would probably increase attendance and allow for some P9 to hit the market.
One sentence in the Wotc Reserved List Policy made me think, the part of not reprinting with identical functionality.  Could this mean reprints of the shock lands? (which all players should be pointing new recruits to for a starting point)  Maybe shock P9 could be in the works?

@Everyone bitching about prices.
I personally don't care if my undergrounds drop in value, I couldn't care less if my foil Tarmo dropped to $50.  What I care about is more players being able to get in the eternal formats without having to proxy a dual land.  IMO prices of the old stuff would not and will not drop drastically regardless of reprint policy just because of pimp factor and collectors, and I could careless what reprints looked like (white bordered ass art) as long as they are legal.

Just what are you trying to say?  Your point makes no sense.  When I purchased my Wii I fully understood that I will never recoup that money with money, I will get value for the pleasure it brings.  No one plays video games for profit do they? 

Yes, Singles are an important aspect of Wotc's bottom line, but I bet if you asked any dealer out there, and I have made this point before in other posts, they would rather sell 10 black lotuses at value X then having 1 black lotus sit in the showcase for 3 months at value Y.

@TheWhiteDragon
I could get behind the proxy thing if it was the only solution.  Where it falters though is you may as well reprint the cards if you are going to go through this much trouble for a handful of people that are concerned about their card values (or as they like to put it their "investment").   Consider this for a moment, Wotc reprints P9, duals and some other hard to obtain Eternal staples only once and do not reprint for another 15 years. What do you think will happen to your P9 value in the long term?  I think it would more than likely go up.  Think of it as a stimulus package for wotc and the Eternal formats.

Just a few things to consider.  There are probably many reasons why Wotc is considering reprints and why the Vintage community should embrace reprints. 
1) They have seen how many proxy tournaments are going on and Wotc is cut out of the income.  Remember when they tried to crack down on people selling hand drawn proxies.
2) The mass increase in Legacy players shows Wotc that there is interest in the Eternal formats.
3) The sharp increase in the price of Duals, Wasteland, etc. because of the Legacy numbers going up.
4) How better to bolster interest in the Vintage then to have some kids crack a Mox or Lotus in a booster.
5) How better to boost core set sales.  (see Zendikar)  Profit is bottom line for Hasbro.
6) If printed in a core set, the cards in question will no doubt be immediately banned in all other formats, thus negating the "official, sanctioned, proxy idea".
7) Having no clear idea on Wotc's intentions, the reprint may only happen with Magic Online (does it still exest, because I honestly don't know), and have players redeem the cards.
8) I don't know about the rest of you but when I invested money in magic, I consider that money gone.  If somehow I profit it is a bonus.
9) Sports cards are considered collectables and have you seen how the bottom has fallen out of those, and the tactics those companies had to employ to start selling cards again.
10) Finally this directed at the gripers.  You guys are the exact reason Vintage is failing. Because you have an elitist attitude about who can and can not play Vintage.  It's a game, get over yourselves already.

I maybe wrong but the bulk of players in magic that push attendance numbers tend to be in Sanctioned play (draft, Standard, Legacy, etc..) and unless Wizards recognizes proxies (which it never will because they generate no profit) we have only one big (and I use big loosely) tourney a year sanctioned.  Wizards is also probably  looking at the number of proxy tournaments and is realizing the amount of profit they are missing out on. 

Really boo-f'n-hoo if your cards lose value (which they probably won't), I have been playing magic since '94 and have never owned power because of the investment it requires,  that isn't to say I wouldn't love to own power, but I have a family to think about first like many other players do.
It's players like you with this sense of entitlement to the format are holding Vintage back.  If Vintage is to survive it needs to drop this exclusive, elitist attitude that is attributed to it and welcome new players in with some fresh cardstock.

IMO the metgame with reprints (and possibly unrestrictions) will open up a huge new world. 
Is the current metagame really that exciting? IMO NO.  It is a series of variations of 3-4 decks.  Some people call this the golden age of Vintage, I don't think we have truely made it to that point yet.

I read this and thought to myself "WOW, Can I sell this guy some magic beans?"  Seriously, are you for real.  Either you need a new financial advisor or you have the biggest balls out there.  Have you already apoligized to your children that they will be going to McDonald's College of Microwavable Foods instead of Harvard (or where ever).

On the topic at hand, I really do hope they do some reprints to stimulate the community growth.  Card design really doesn't matter to me because a legal card is a legal card.

I think somethings should be looked at with these arguements about proxy vs. non-proxy. 
Who supports  proxies?  The Have Nots.  (generally)
Who doesn't support proxies?  The Haves.  (generally)
Who benefits from proxies?  TO's, new players, the have nots, and some of the Haves.
Who doesn't benefit from proxies?  Wizards and some of the Haves.

So if there was a survey conducted on how many players had power and how many don't, it should indicate where the majority lies and how much of an impact a non-proxy environment could have in the competitive field of vintage.  (assuming that P9 are the majority of proxied cards)

I do think that proxies are okay, but should be limited to certain cards such as the P9, bazaars, workshops.  Cards like Platty, Yawg, Drain, etc... should be the real deal as they really aren't hard to come by and easier to save for. 
For those of you who do not have major financial commitments should understand that those of us that do have budgets to maintain and simple household economics would dictate that if I saved $400 for 1 mox sapphire I could get 4 drains instead thus more bang for my buck and a more justifable expenditure.  (just some made up prices) And adding more commitment to Vintage.  Also you try explaining to your wife that you dropped hundreds of dollars on one little piece of cardboard.

These are just my opinions and nothing more.

I thought of sullivan Solution as well, but it would require a complete retool to be the metagame predator it once was.

Seriously, trying to compare this to Oath is a waste of time, they are different decks altogether.

Mis-D might be a very good protector to the combo if you run enough blue, but really I think with the BB requirement of Hexmage a strong black suite is going to help this deck further.  I'm thinking of this deck along the lines of B/G Rock, with a splash of U or W for some instant protection.

Fair enough.

In a mono b or b/g build with Dark Depths, I would seriously entertain Imp's Mischief or lightning greives as protection from bounce.  This maybe the chance for Imp's to shine as it is versatile but never had the right deck to be run in.

@nhk

I kind of agree with you.  The problem with misdirection is it is narrow and drain is better, FoW is better.  I tend to think of MisD as a 9th counterspell.  Personally I would prefer Stilfe over MisD (but that is just me).  Also with the increased restriction of blue cards getting 17 relevant blue cards to support FoW is sometimes a challenge, with more MisDs I think I would want my blue count up to 20ish.


I don't agree wholly with this statement.  I believe some cards are just not good in multiples.  Just because a card is not worth running 2of doesn't mean it's not worth running. I do agree I would take any of the cards you listed for slot #60.

Really though it comes down to the deck, and the player to make this choice.