Magic: The Gathering in Iasi: September 2008 recap

Notice: Looking for the Magic: The Gathering community in Iasi? Be sure to check the dedicated blog and forum: www.planeswalkers.ro.

It’s been a while since I last blogged on the happenings of our starting Magic: The Gathering community, so here’s a recap.

Results for Standard Constructed

The second constructed event so far, and people got to bring those Time Spiral cards to the table one last time before they roll out of standard. Of course, we’ll play the Extended format in the future as well.

See the results ›

Results for the Lorwyn/Lorwyn/Morningtide draft

The second draft so far and we’ve decided to put that Lorwyn block to the test. Alex Mîrza was probably the luckiest of us, because he opened Garruk Wildspeaker in the second Lorwyn booster. Regarding the draft, it seems very few people are confident enough to draft Blue. Not even my friend Diesel(Iulian Avasiloaia) who’s the rarely playing anything else but blue. What was most drafted in this run were Goblins, and it’s also a Goblin deck that won.

See the results ›

Alexandru Diaconu, the winner of the event, received a From The Vault: Dragons box, sponsored by LEX Copy Center. The rest of us will have to practice drafting a little more. You can practice drafting with 10th edition boosters for free on the new Magic: The Gathering website.

Upcoming events

Next Saturday we’re holding the launch event for Shards of Alara. Remember the tournament fee this time is 100 lei, and you will receive a Shards of Alara Tournament Pack, 3 Shards of Alara Booster Packs and a Mythic Rare foiled card named Ajani Vengeant.

Starting Sunday October 4 Shards of Alara products can be purchased from LEX Copy Center. Other products are also available, including Tenth Edition theme decks (best deck to introduce new players to the game) and Lorwyn, Morningtide, Shadowmoor and Eventide products.

For more information about product availability contact lexcopycenter on the Yahoo! Messenger network, or you can visit the shop directly.

Starting with Shards of Alara all the local events promotion will move to www.planeswalkers.ro and I’ll take back my blog. The website hasn’t been updated yet, but will soon be, to support event announcements (in a blog-style), tournament standings and reports and a forum. Also, don’t forget to add the public calendar to your Google Calendar or other calendar software.

For more information about future events contact simitus on the Yahoo! Messenger network or write me at alexandru.m.birsan at gmail.com.

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Many thanks to LEX Copy Center, our cards supplier, and Amnesia Crem Caffe, our host. These events wouldn't be possible without their support.

Grapefruit Menger Sponge

Even find yourself with too many business cards? Maybe a big pile of them came with defects from the print shop and you’ve no use for them. Or you might have just moved like we did at Grapefruit and all of a sudden hundreds of business cards have just become unusable.

You can find a few more photos of this Menger Sponge on  Flickr

The Menger Sponge

 The Menger Sponge has it’s roots in fractal Mathematics, and it’s the three dimensional analog of the Sierpiński Carpet.

I’ve got the idea to create a menger sponge out of our business cards from an article on Arcana from a while back. That article itself was inspired from The Institute For Figuring.

Make your own

Personally, I wouldn’t use Magic: The Gathering cards to create a Menger Sponge just yet. My floor’s not crawling with commons, so I guess I’ll have to wait. But if you’re in the same situation Wizards R&D is in, you might want to create your own Level 2 Menger Sponge of Commons. Or maybe you’ll just build it from business cards!

Here’s an excerpt of the instruction PDF provided by The IFF.

This image is an excerpt. You can find the original full document on The IFF website.

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I’m waiting until the new business cards ship, and then I’ll collect all the remaining old business cards to see if we can make a Level 2 Grapefruit Menger Sponge.

We want to teach you Magic

Notice: Looking for the Magic: The Gathering community in Iasi? Be sure to check the dedicated blog and forum: www.planeswalkers.ro.

Tomorrow we’re gathering in the usual location for free Magic play.
Also, some of us will bring decks to teach others how to play.
(There’s no tournament/competition tomorrow, just free play.)

New player?
Come and learn to play Magic

We’ll have everything but the drinks. We’ll show you the basics, get you started on your first game and help you chose a color or pair of colors in order to buy your first deck!

Already a player?
Come and test your decks or trade cards

Since we’re meeting for free play, there won’t be any pairing. You can play against whoever you want! Bring your deck and wrestle! It’s also a good time to trade cards or talk about future events, deck strategies, combos and what-not.

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We’re gathering in Amnesia Crem Caffe in the civic center around 11am and we’ll probably be there for around 4 hours (that’s what we usually spend). If you want to buy Magic: The Gathering products, like theme decks and booster packs, visit LEX Copy Center in Păcurari.

See you there!

Magic: The Gathering Constructed results (Iaşi, September 6)

Notice: Looking for the Magic: The Gathering community in Iasi? Be sure to check the dedicated blog and forum: www.planeswalkers.ro.

Last weekend we played a standard constructed tournament in the same setting as the draft. Performing my duty for the community, here are the results and some information about upcoming events.

Results

Although somewhat similar in design to the “Elvish Predation” theme deck, Bogdan’s deck of elves really whooped the llama’s ass last Saturday. The second place was a deck of fairies featuring a playset of Scion of Oona. The third place was a deck of rot and cinders, featuring more -1/-1 counters than you can take.

Pl	Name	R 1	R 2	R 3	R 4	NBW	SOS	SOSOS
1	Bogdan Solca	5=	7+	2=	6+	13	58½	279
2	Alexandru Mirza	4+	0=	1=	5+	13	57	274½
3	Dan Diac	6=	4-	9+	7+	12½	56½	277½
4	Alex Diaconu	2-	3+	7-	8+	12	58	278
	Mircea Cretu	1=	9=	8+	2-	12	58	278
6	Iulian Avasiloaia	3=	8+	0=	1-	12	56½	272
7	Mihai Birsan	0=	1-	4+	3-	11½	57½	273
8	Dan Ignat	9+	6-	5-	4-	11	57	278
9	Ana Patache	8-	5=	3-	0=	11	55½	271½

Each round column has the following information: player number against which this player has played; "+" if this player won; "-" if this player lost; "=" if it was a draw. If the player number is 0, it means this player was a bye player for that round. (This player means the player on the row you're reading.)

Photos

You may check out the photos on  Flickr.

Upcoming events

I've setup a public calendar of events on Google Calendar, and you can grab the latest information from there. We're also working on a community website to gather all this information, and we hope to have it online soon.

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Things look awesome so far: we have around 12 active players, which means we usually get at least 8 players participating in the event every Saturday; there are a lot of enthusiasts who want to learn the game, and now we're offering an opportunity for them to learn from experienced players. And we're only getting started. And of course, we wouldn't be here without the help of LEX Copy Center, our cards supplier, and Amnesia Crem Caffe, our host.

The next goal with this is to have sanctioned Friday Night Magic events with foiled cards won in every event.