Good Games?

Today I am going to share a habit I have started when it comes to Magic, and try and convince you to give it a try. Every game/match of magic I play, I make sure I avoid using any iteration of Good Game/s and now I say something to the effect of, “Thank you for the games, good luck moving forward.” This came about over the past year when there seemed to be an explosion of community and sportsmanship related articles, and a backlash against these articles.

Mulligans, Goats, Gameshows, and you

Introduction:

In this post I am going to discuss a trick for not letting the mulligan tilt you. Granted it won’t always work, we’re all susceptible to cognitive and emotional biases. However, I find the underlying logic of the Game Show Door Problem helps me avoid negative thoughts when I see a hand post-mulligan. I don’t write this article to make you feel better about a crappy hand you get to ship away, but hope to help you feel at ease with the new hand you are dealt. Now, on to our scenario!

Decisions and Improvement

Introduction:

I have been mulling over what I wanted to talk about for my first post of the New Year. I’ve had suggestions to just keep sticking with talking about picks in draft, and K. suggested to discuss decision making, and though processes when it comes to the mulligan, and the issues we run into as human’s when it comes to making these decisions. I think that is a great idea, but before I can discuss that I think I need to discuss my approach when it comes to improving, and decision making in general. 

How to improve in Magic:

Last week Limited Resources (lrcast.com) devoted their weekly podcast to answering email, and I really think Brian (@brian_LR) and Marhsall (@Marshall_LR) hit the nail on the head when it comes to the three important steps in improving. Paraphrasing them, the steps are experience, reflection, and studying. Experience is playing the games, drafting, and generally just putting the time in to play MtG. Reflection is taking a look at your play, your decisions, and evaluating them to improve. Studying is consuming other MtG content, whether it is draft videos, podcasts, blogs, or articles. I try and do all three of these things, and I don’t try and have a specific breakdown of how much I do each of these, but I try and do them each week.