Limited Resources - Questions for the Show Today!

For Marshall, what's your go-to move in bball?

Kevin D Robinson

2019-10-16 17:33:19 +0000 UTC

Hey Marshall and LSV. First, I want to extend my appreciation for your work. It is so much fun to listen to two who have as much passion for my favorite way to play magic. I get to live out draft formats that I miss while out on contracts onboard my cruise ship. That is right...y’all have made it from the open air to the open sea. Anyway, to my question, from the handful of LGS store drafts I have done, I seem to notice that the mill strategy in Eldraine is not so much a full deck than it is a side win plan to a number of control decks in the format. Compare this to the “draw second card” deck where I have most of my spells geared towards taking advantage of this strategy, the milling strategy commonly seems to be 2-5 cards in a control deck that presents a back foot. It maybe that the mil strategy is cute and everyone tries to go into it that I shy away knowing that most people at the table will go for it and I will find my win conditions with other playables like Vantress Paladins. Does this line of logic make sense or am I supposed to be taking cards like “merfolk secretkeeper” higher like picks 4-5?

Cory Enriquez

2019-10-16 16:57:36 +0000 UTC

This is for LSV, adobada fries or carne asada fries when you’re in California?

Peter Tran

2019-10-16 14:11:52 +0000 UTC

Hey y’all, thanks for the awesome content. This show is what brought me to limited and I can honestly say that it is my favorite way to play magic, so thank you! I know it is late and you have probably already done the show but I just saw the CFB schedule announcement for all the 2020 magic fests, and I noticed that there is a limited one in NJ the day that new Theros is released and I wanted to know how do you prepare for a tournament when it is on release day? I know it will be out on modo and there will be pre-releases but what is a good strategy to maximize my prep time?

Thackdaddy 3000

2019-10-16 10:35:29 +0000 UTC

Hey guys! Lords of Limited is beginning to call ELD the best draft format of all time. Do you think that is a completely ridiculou statement or have you found your selves agreeing? Personally, I do think it is REAL good, especially the draft portion because you have so many lanes. It does feel like some decks fold to others in-game, but that has only been close-to-extreme-situations for me.

Thomas Bang

2019-10-16 08:17:41 +0000 UTC

Hi Luis and Marshal! Mainly a question for Luis. A friend and I are currently in talks with a publisher who are interested in producing a board game we have developed. Any tips for dealing with Publishers, and how we should approach negotiations if it gets to that stage?

Chris Fisher

2019-10-16 07:21:31 +0000 UTC

Recently I had a R/U draw 2 deck in ELD with 7 discard/draw cards and a lot of other card draw. I eventually decided to run 20 lands because I could always get rid of extras but couldn't afford to miss land drops. Do you ever think that running 20 lands is the right call?

Eric Pegors

2019-10-16 04:29:26 +0000 UTC

With Wizards shaking up modern a lot, what’s a good modern deck to invest in where most of the cards should hold value over time and the deck should still be competitive over time (maybe with tweaks)?

Luther Miller

2019-10-16 04:02:42 +0000 UTC

How should I make sure my collection is properly insured? I recently found out regular insurance (renters/homeowners) would cover the collection well and not at all when taking decks to events:

Luther Miller

2019-10-16 04:01:45 +0000 UTC

How should I organize my collection and what should I do with my collections of commons and uncommons going back a few years?

Luther Miller

2019-10-16 04:00:51 +0000 UTC

After so many misses this year with white, what sets have hit with white as a good color to draft in a format? What lessons can be taken from those sets to make it good again?

Brandon Housman

2019-10-16 01:21:27 +0000 UTC

Would limited be better with a built-in mulligan? That is, instead of starting with seven cards and mulliganing from there, you instead draw eight and then put one card on bottom.

Jonathan Montgomery

2019-10-16 01:02:06 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, if you could play one spell for the rest of your limited career a la "Epic" from Saviors, which would it be? Remember this has to work as a "wincon" somehow or you just lose from here on out. And don't say "Merfolk Secretkeeper" ;p

Anthony Morgan

2019-10-16 01:01:30 +0000 UTC

Hey, would love to hear a bit more from Marshall on his poker career and one or two learnings that helped when learning high level MTG. Thanks guys for all the sweet content!

Matheus de Almeida

2019-10-16 00:14:51 +0000 UTC

Hi Marshall and Luis, I have recently struggled to keep up with everything going on in MTG. How do you manage to be on par with everything in the game but still have an healthy life ouside of it? Thanx :) Joël

Joël Boismenu-Lavoie

2019-10-15 23:56:47 +0000 UTC

Any tips for how to sell people on cube draft? I recently built a peasant cube (River Hoopoe included, Marshall!) and have 5 friends that are interested, but I'd like to have 8 people draft it. Unfortunately, there are no limited players at my LGS. How do I convince them that cube is as sweet as it is made out to be, enough so that they'd be willing to substitute it for an FNM? Keep up the amazing content!

Clayton T. Carlson

2019-10-15 23:45:21 +0000 UTC

With Mill and control being as dominant as they are so far in ELD, I’ve been wondering about the correct strategy to take when you find yourself in a Mill/Control mirror. Specifically, if you find yourself in a mirror where you probably have the worse of the two decks for your strategy, how do you adjust post-board? Are you supposed to hope you draw better and stick to a control/mill strategy or do you try to side down into a more aggressive build to win before the other deck can set up? This seemed especially relevant when you find yourself as control with mill as a bonus win condition and find yourself facing down the turbo mill deck. Thoughts?

Eric Lynch

2019-10-15 23:21:48 +0000 UTC

Can confirm. BootCamp is great. Much better than any VM that is running at the same time as MacOS

Eric Lynch

2019-10-15 23:17:59 +0000 UTC

Any tricks or tips to discover holes in your game? It's an easy trap to fall into to think you're doing better at an aspect of the game than you really are. How can one figure out when that's happening?

Joe

2019-10-15 23:07:11 +0000 UTC

If you were in charge of designing a specialized set for draft, what would you do differently if the target was the FNM crowd, the GP crowd, professionals, versus you specifically? How would removal vary between the formats? Bombs? Build-arounds? Archetypes?

Joe

2019-10-15 23:05:08 +0000 UTC

What cards from ELD that you think printing more like them would make the draft experience better on average (not just for you)? What cards from ELD do you think printing less of would improve the drafting experience?

Joe

2019-10-15 23:00:49 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, I always struggle with sideboarding in limited, except for obvious things like colour hosers. When do you lower your curve, or add more slow but powerful cards?

Fingal Plumpton

2019-10-15 22:54:15 +0000 UTC

Thanks for the show as always. What are the characteristics that make a limited format good for Pro Tour level play?

Atipong Pathanasethpong

2019-10-15 22:48:31 +0000 UTC

GENTLEMEN! Two questions: 1. In best of one Eldraine draft, would you ever consider maindecking artifact and/or enchantment removal (ie Return to Nature, True Love's Kiss)? 2. Are non-adventure combat tricks worth maindecking in Eldraine? If so, what ones stand out as being worth a card, and in what deck do you find yourself wanting it? Love the show guys, thanks for the consistently amazing content!

Michael J Gradassi

2019-10-15 22:23:46 +0000 UTC

Hi Marshall, can you please give us an update, or perhaps a post-mortem on Constructed Resources? I’d be curious to hear your reflections on why it never hit the same stride as LR, and whether it’s likely to come back in future in a different form.

Andy Skinner

2019-10-15 22:15:07 +0000 UTC

LSV: Can you speak to a time in your career where life was pushing you in a direction other than professional Magic? Being a professional Magic player is something that took an immense amount of work to make a viable life choice and for most players it's a pipe dream. Are there any key points in your life that really tested you as a person to chose between the game and a more traditional career path?

Nicholas Ayd

2019-10-15 22:06:21 +0000 UTC

Hey Marshall! It was great meeting you at basketball a few weeks ago. You are, in fact, as tall as advertised! How is fall league going for you and team Chef Lur? Any particular basketball skills you've been working on? Thanks, and good luck! See you on the court!

Jaeger

2019-10-15 22:03:57 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, thanks for all of your knowledge. After listening to your show, I went from being the worst player in my friends' limited league to winning the whole thing! So my question pertains to visibility/content. If you had to speculate, what does content creator need to do to get their name out there? Theres little things here or there, but what's a way you could see breaking through the abyss of the internet? If it's tough I totally understand. Thanks again guys!

Noah Sanchez de Tagle

2019-10-15 21:56:23 +0000 UTC

Hello! I very agree with the adage that almost every limited deck is some flavor of midrange, at least compared to what's possible on constructed formats. But what is the most control or aggro deck archetype you've even seen/played in limited?

Jason Kopplin

2019-10-15 21:54:00 +0000 UTC

For Marshall: did you ever attempt or aspire to be a pro/high-level competitive Magic player? Is this something you may consider in future?

Christopher F

2019-10-15 21:38:16 +0000 UTC

Hey guys - love the show! I do a board game podcast (Bonehead Podcast), and I have a question about changing co-hosts. My first cohost is struggling to be available and I’m working through moving in a replacement - how have you organised changing cohosts? Any useful tips?

Ben Greenman

2019-10-15 21:34:55 +0000 UTC

Hey! Been leveling up with the show for a while now and feel comfortable with the basics, so now I don't have to stare at only my cards now to figure out what I can do. What information tends to be the most important when you pay attention to your opponent's gameplay? I.e. do these priority holds indicate a combat trick? Do three white lands in a row mean monocolored or color screwed? Where can I put the extra analysis capacity?

DOUGLAS R GREER

2019-10-15 21:29:49 +0000 UTC

Hi guys. Really appreciate your take on the various formats and guidance that you try to help us find our own path forward. I've heard a lot about mono-x colored decks in ELD. With the number of cards that have multiple pips of the same color at common and uncommon I wanted to get your read. It almost feels like there is an advantage from having a hyper consistent mana base and the ability to cast all your spells on curve and not be looking for that "second mana source" of a given color for a true two color deck.

Swordsman

2019-10-15 21:26:13 +0000 UTC

Can you address the subject of "hate drafting"? A lot of players at my shop proudly proclaim that they took a powerful card that wasn't in their colors, just so someone else didn't get it. Sometimes they do this early in the draft and I want to say "well, that's not hate drafting, that's taking a card from a color you probably should of been in!" My opinion has always been that when people hate draft, there is probably a playable in their colors that they should be taking instead. Am I wrong?

Joey Hall

2019-10-15 21:25:26 +0000 UTC

Hello! Question for Luis. Have there ever been decks in a Pro Tour draft that over- or underperformed extremely? For example a deck you had a really bad feeling about but went 3-0 anyway, or a deck you considered amazing but got crushed in the games. Any particular examples? Love the show, keep up the amazing work, you brighten my day every week!

Erik R

2019-10-15 21:22:48 +0000 UTC

After a strong day 1 finish, going 9-0, at GP Utrecht I went in to the first day 2 draft with high spirits. After first-picking a Witch's Vengeance and second-picking a Epic Downfall a stream of good white cards started coming and I ended up with a decent looking BW Knights-deck. Sadly, aggressive X/1:s is not a great place to be in this format and I finished 0-3. How do you evaluate when it's correct to go/not go into the open colors if the archetype/gameplan of that color combination isn't well positioned in the format? Thank you for all the content! I wouldn't have gotten to experience such an amazing GP without your help!

Jens Aldén

2019-10-15 21:18:48 +0000 UTC

I disagree. I want to hear the best limited minds/players on the podcast. I'd hate for LR to start chasing "diversity points" rather than guests that are best or most interesting. The implication that LR hasn't been doing a good job of choosing guests denigrates the guests that they have had on: I think they've been doing a great job overall.

Nicholas Weber

2019-10-15 21:17:25 +0000 UTC

Hello Gents! This question is primarily for Luis. I’m curious how you would suggest organizing and running a flavor draft for Throne of Eldraine. There are several strong but disconnected themes in ELD, ranging from fairy tales to Arthurian legend...and items outside those realms as well. How you you define a “good” deck in such an environment? Would the cards need to be thematically related, or just tell a great story regardless of their inspiration?

Kevin Bopp

2019-10-15 21:13:09 +0000 UTC

After playing with Eldraine for a bit, how highly do you value trying to draft a good mono-color deck (or near-mono-color with a light splash)? Are mono-color decks with the strong hybrid cards and good artifacts (Golden Egg, Cauldron, Clockwork Servant) that much better than two-color decks that you actively try to sculpt your draft around them and take those hybrid and colorless cards higher than normally?

Jürgen Mayer

2019-10-15 21:11:57 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, love the show. Are there any Limited books you recommend for Nuts & Bolts Spike players? I'm familiar with Reid Duke's Level One series. I feel like there's such a wealth of articles and videos about Magic, but would love to see a concentrated tactics and strategy guide that would cover everything from the mental game to tips like when to spend your removal or when it's correct to run 16/18 lands. If you don't have any book suggestions, why don't you write one yourselves? I bet people would love it!

Vaughn Koch

2019-10-15 21:09:46 +0000 UTC

Hey Marshall and Luis. This is a question for Luis. I have found myself burned out with constructed magic, which is part of how I got into limited and found your awesome show. I have been a modern player for a long time, but I am a “fair” modern player, and the unfair combo metagame was present for so long that I stopped playing. Do you see a trend that is happening towards a change in that type of metagame? It seems that “fair” decks are getting more powerful. Thank you. You guys are awesome.

Nathan Potratz

2019-10-15 21:09:14 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, do you think Arena makes you a worse overall drafter? I often find after drafting on Arena I end up with weaker decks when I draft live. I recently consulted with a friend after a draft and he pointed out several picks where he believed I passed up a strong card and selected a worse card. Each time I responded by saying "Oh, you can pick up the better card later" which is true on Arena. How do you avoid this pitfall if you don't have the budget to draft on mtgo as often as Arena?

Greninja42

2019-10-15 21:07:18 +0000 UTC

Hey Marshall and Luis. The topic that's on my mind is diversity in the Magic community. It's especially close to me because as my group at the LGS is very "stereotypical" and we're finding it hard to expand. Do you have any thought on how to attract broader audience, on both local level and in global picture? Bonus question - I absolute loved the "let's stump Vargas" sign-offs. Any chance for more of these?

Piotr Berlowski

2019-10-15 21:05:42 +0000 UTC

Hi Marshall and Luis, I have a fairly random question. I understand that decks from 8-player draft pods tend to more powerful than 6-player pods, because with more packs opened there's more scope for synergy. My question is, have either of you ever tried a 14-person pod where there's no cards wheeling at all? Do you think it would lead to much more powerful decks, or would diminishing returns kick in?

Robert Hanton

2019-10-15 21:04:51 +0000 UTC

I've found with adamant, good artifacts, and powerful cards with heavy colour requirement (such as the Syrs and hybrid cards) there has been a push towards mono-colour decks in Throne of Eldraine. And that even in two colour decks choosing the manabase for limited decks is more complicated then ever before. Could you go over what factors besides just the number of each mana-symbol of your cards casting cost that affect what lands you choose to play. Additionally, When do choose to go mono-colour vs splashing a 2nd colour. And with eldraine's limited mana-fixing do you ever choose to splash a 3rd colour for anything besides a A-level bomb?

Carter S.

2019-10-15 21:03:39 +0000 UTC

Why does Marshall always make such bad picks in his draft videos? Shouldn't you have schooled him like a 100 episodes ago Luis? For a real question though, what patreon level do I need to be to hang out with Luis if I visit Denver? I would obviously bring Icelandic delicacies to sample with me if that matters(it should!).

Hákon Gunnarsson

2019-10-15 21:00:23 +0000 UTC

Who do you think would win a fight; 1 Ben Stark sized Julie, or 3 Julie sized Ben Starks?

Ian Salewski

2019-10-15 20:58:20 +0000 UTC

Hi Marshall & Luis, This message is more for Luis, unless Marshall visits to Denver sometime :). Have you ever been to D-Bar Denver on 494 E 19th Ave? Either way I want to recommend it. You guys talk about food so much I wanted to send a great restaurant your way and hear your take. If you end up going and are able to let me know I can make sure you're well taken care of :)

Ryan Love

2019-10-15 20:58:20 +0000 UTC

Last week on the show Luis was down on the common land cycle, except for Mystic Sanctuary. All the reasons Mystic Sanctuary is good seem to me like they apply to the Witch's Cottage as well. Why value one differently than the other?

Mediocre Magic Man

2019-10-15 20:54:54 +0000 UTC

Thanks to this show, I have seen marked improvement in my game play over the years. However, I'm now at the point where I have difficulty identifying whether or not some of my losses were my fault or random chance. If you don't have enough time to amass a professional-player sample size of games, what's a good way to identify when a loss was due to your misplay vs. your opponent just drawing the right thing at the right time?

Spencer St. James

2019-10-15 20:54:32 +0000 UTC

Woah, all of this is super helpful. Thank you! Yeah, I know a lot of this will just come with time and repetition, but both of those applications will be super helpful in expediting the process.

Kyle Merriman

2019-10-15 20:48:00 +0000 UTC

Good question. And to pile on a more direct question, why doesn't LR feature more women on the podcast? I know you're aware of them out there, but it seems like when a guest host is needed to spot for Luis, it's always some dude that fills the seat. Would love to hear more diversity represented on this podcast.

Brian Jackson

2019-10-15 20:47:50 +0000 UTC

I'd like to hear about your thoughts on managing time taken per turn for IRL Magic in the face of new digital approaches. When we play on MTGO or Arena, the clock for each player is perfectly managed so that it's a fair division of time. If one player takes too long, they suffer the consequences. IRL, both players share a 50 minute clock and if they use it all up, they both must accept the result of a draw. I used to play IRL a few years ago, but I found that too many players took to long to make decisions, especially when in a losing position. This often resulted in having to accept a draw scenario in situations I felt I should have won. Do you think this is a factor that puts real world Magic at risk? And I know judges can address this issue, but find it is unrealistic in many scenarios for judges to force the issue since there's no actual clock tracking the time used for each player.

Brian Jackson

2019-10-15 20:45:58 +0000 UTC

I often hear “I really want a copy of X card” when watching Luis draft (which invariable is in the next pack), what’s your thought process for this when drafting? A single copy of one card seems like it’s so unlikely to make a significant difference, but your reaction is often that it has saved your draft.

William Standen

2019-10-15 20:44:57 +0000 UTC

Hey friends! My question is about mana bases. I feel like I’m often just guessing when deciding how many of each basic I should add when building a two color deck, but folks like Ben S and LSV almost seem to count and know exactly how many based on PIPs, activated abilities, etc. With Eldraine draft messing around with more single color focused decks as well, are there any heuristics y’all use when making your mana base? Thanks!

Nick Stelzer

2019-10-15 20:44:54 +0000 UTC

Someone else has asked this in the comments earlier, but I was also just thinking about it: how do you know when to play 16/18 lands instead of 17?

Tanner Wiltshire

2019-10-15 20:42:28 +0000 UTC

Hey! I've been playing magic for a long time, I play almost only limited and I still enjoy the game very much. A problem I have is; in the beginning of a draft format I usually run pretty good and win a lot of matches, but as the format goes on I usually do worse and worse in my results. I don't know why that happens ( I don't re-evaluate cards enough as the format goes on perhaps?), do you have any advise on what to do to better my results in the later parts of a format? /Peter

Peter Rosin

2019-10-15 20:42:22 +0000 UTC

If you want a little help, install a companion app like untapped.gg (https://mtga.untapped.gg) or Lotus Tracker (https://www.mtglotusvalley.com/lotustracker). Both will not only track your games, but have an overlay with LSVs set review grades for each card. Once you get a handle on the format you'll lean on the grades less because you'll have an idea on your own how you value cards, but its a nice place to start and make sure you're not missing something.

Ryan Jones

2019-10-15 20:42:08 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, thanks for your Podcast and all the effort and passion I / we (the listeners) are able to experience. Here my somewhat Magic related question: Do you guys have some advice to get a stronger mindset? Played a MCQ on Magic Arena in August (pretty much thanks to your Podcast) and had some serious trouble to keep kalm / fully focused / dont get to nervous. Is this just something you have to get used to or is there a way to "train my mind"? I hope my question is not confusing, english is not my native language. Keep Up that awesome and inspirational work. Greetings from Germany!

René Schnelle

2019-10-15 20:40:14 +0000 UTC

Luis, how do you reconcile your new found appreciation of burritos with no rice and beans vs your love of Chipotle?

Ryan Jones

2019-10-15 20:38:00 +0000 UTC

because everyone at your opponent's draft table listened to the show too and let them have all the white cards.

Bryan Rockenbach

2019-10-15 20:35:04 +0000 UTC

What are your thoughts on the MPL split shows? What would you change about them? Is there any way to make them actually be live instead of pre-recorded?

Evan

2019-10-15 20:34:28 +0000 UTC

I'm newer to magic in general, but especially new to limited. I'm feeling somewhat overwhelmed. Usually, when drafting on arena I keep a browser open with LSV's card reviews and I kind of just base my picks around the reviews. Are there any other best practices for a beginner or any specific web-based draft simulators that you would recommend? There are a lot of options out there.

Kyle Merriman

2019-10-15 20:34:27 +0000 UTC

How do you appraise scry decisions (and other top-of-deck manipulation) when the top of the deck has card draw spells? For instance, if I cast Opt and the top of my deck is a Divination, should I treat that Divination as "draw 1" (as it gets me 1 card deeper than Opt would have)?

Grayson

2019-10-15 20:33:09 +0000 UTC

Jude and I drafted a seemingly sweet mono blue/artifact deck with Emry, a couple of Scauldrons/Eggs and half decent artifact creatures. We did well until we were up against a mill deck. Is it just not a good idea to draw a bunch in this format? Does that kill the Izzet deck entirely, or do we draft it and hope to fade the mill match up?

James Shearer

2019-10-15 20:32:09 +0000 UTC

I really appreciated your cube show. Convinced me to jump in and I loved it. Have now made a modern horizon cube and it's serious fun. One problem is getting enough people to draft though. Would a cube for sealed be any good and how would you construct it?

Oli Withers

2019-10-15 20:31:53 +0000 UTC

What sort of differences have you noticed between sealed and draft for TOE? My anecdotal experience has been that aggro has actually been a bit better in sealed than draft since the grindy draft decks tend to rely on synergies that are less present in sealed, but im curious of your take

Max AR

2019-10-15 20:31:34 +0000 UTC

This! Maybe we are due another mulligan episode? The last one with... wow was it Loucks?... was one of my favourites and I still use those strategies all the time!

Chris Diffin

2019-10-15 20:30:33 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, I made top 4 of GP Indianapolis which got me an invite to MC Richmond. Any advice for my first MC/PT? James

James Moskal

2019-10-15 20:30:26 +0000 UTC

yea I was considering using boot camp, im currently using the parallels free trial, thank you for the suggestion though!

william morreto

2019-10-15 20:29:22 +0000 UTC

I've been listening for about 9 years, and I love the work you both do for the game and the community. What do you feel is the importance of diversity and inclusion in the game and the community, and how can we all work toward a more diverse and inclusive environment?

Chris Burnside

2019-10-15 20:28:56 +0000 UTC

Long time listener, first time caller. Did you have a chance to try drafting aggro decks in ELD yet as you mentioned last show? Been enjoying white + other (because of fairy guidemother)

Harry

2019-10-15 20:28:11 +0000 UTC

It seems to me that aggro goes under-appreciated because their cards are individually weak / unexciting when viewed in a vacuum, and that it leads to people passing up important aggro cards early. Do you have any thoughts on this, and on whether it's reasonable to more aggressively pick up "less powerful" cards that are needed in large quantities when looking to draft aggressive strategies? Examples include Rimrock Knight, Faerie Guidemother, and Youthful Knight. Thanks, love the show as always.

SevenDeadlySins

2019-10-15 20:27:28 +0000 UTC

I took the 'play aggro' challenge from last week and it has been really interesting, since I usually am much more of a slow-deck player. The hardest decision points (many of which I only realized I erred later) were those that involved taking the fast move over maximum value - i,e. playing a 2/1 for 2 on turn two even though it has an adventure, or discarding more expensive cards to the 'Fear the Reaper' since I am a couple of lands away. In limited, when you can't always rely on curving out, can you discuss these decision points a little bit?

Atticus D Graven

2019-10-15 20:26:44 +0000 UTC

I was planning on ordering an out of print box of a favorite set (Khans, Theros, etc) to draft and noticed there’s a few that stores have for a decent % less than original retail price, I assume due to extra stock as the set undersold (Born/Journey from Theros block, Dragons of Tarkir, and of course Dragons maze). So my question is, do you think I could still get enjoyment out of one of these cheap boxes? And if so, any tips for using them? Worth solo drafting a box of a small set just to see what happens?

Ryan

2019-10-15 20:26:38 +0000 UTC

What is the best way to "stay open" in this format? At the start of a draft, should I prioritize playable colorless cards, or take the best card in any color?

Forest Roberts

2019-10-15 20:25:32 +0000 UTC

You can download and install windows on your Mac for free. You can use Bootcamp assistant (built in to macOS) to install windows, which you can download from Microsoft for free. Just google “windows download” to get the installer. This is how I play arena currently! Does mean you have to restart into windows but it’s free so yeah? There was a wineskin that worked for me for a while, but one of the updates broke it for me at one point... Hopefully Mac version is inbound this month tho!

Chris Diffin

2019-10-15 20:25:23 +0000 UTC

Could you guys share your approach to building your manabases for limited? ex, when do I play 16, 17, 18 lands? How many sources of a color? How should I adjust my number of lands when the set includes mana rocks or spells that fetch lands? Thanks, love the show!

John Hitchings

2019-10-15 20:25:20 +0000 UTC

I listened to both Marshall’s and Luis’ Humans of Magic episodes, and I got to learn a lot about our beloved co-hosts. No, I’d like to know what a normal day is like for both of you. For example, in my case, I wake up, go to the office, answer some e-mails and attend some meetings. But I don’t think it’d be that boring in your cases. Congratulations on the LR 10th Anniversary! BTW, these past days my Arena crashes a lot. Is it the same for you?

Antonio Valdez

2019-10-15 20:24:35 +0000 UTC

Hey Marshall and Luis! I love the podcast, and I firmly believe it has helped me become not only a better player, but also a better human being. My question is this: What steps do you take to make sure commentary is entertaining? I always really enjoy watching coverage when you guys are on, and I’m wondering if there are any skills you consciously developed to be better at coverage or if it is just something you got better at with practice! What is your favorite part of coverage? It was awesome to meet you both at GP Vegas and thanks again for all that you do!

NicolaiBolas

2019-10-15 20:24:21 +0000 UTC

Related to the burrito discussion a couple episodes back, p1p1 which are you taking, garlic or onions?

Ben Horkley

2019-10-15 20:23:18 +0000 UTC

Hey Marshall and Luis. I’m sure you are going to address this but what’s your follow up on aggro in the format? Specifically, I have had mild success with mono red aggro (top curve at 4 and 16 lands type of deck). Thanks!

Paul Vidal

2019-10-15 20:21:45 +0000 UTC

What is your current strategy for building sealed? I'm prepping for GP Phoenix and I'm finding that 2 color decks aren't usually powerful enough in ELD sealed. I have a promising start, but then get overpowered in the end. I've started regularly splashing ~4 cards from a 3rd color so I can play higher quality cards, counting on the length of the game and a small amount of fixing to allow me to get all my colors.

Bo Brinkman

2019-10-15 20:21:45 +0000 UTC

Been back into MTG since Dominaria and have been playing mostly limited and commander. I’m looking to build out a Dominaria Set cube so that I can redraft the set without having to drop hundreds of dollars every time. I’m looking to make a 540 cube that focuses on the legends and has a 1 in 3 chance at a mythic. Any recommendations for cube creation or ways to make them more fun/consistent? What usually goes in the basic land slot? Thanks!

William Hopkins

2019-10-15 20:21:07 +0000 UTC

Now that the London mulligan has been around for a bit, what new heuristics or ways of thinking about mulling have you adopted?

Nicholas Weber

2019-10-15 20:21:01 +0000 UTC

Hi! What is your Favorite Music that you Love but others know little about (rarely know What band it is etc). For me it would be Tesseract. I bet 3 boosters you dont know them. Cheers friends

Janusz Okoń

2019-10-15 20:20:52 +0000 UTC

Assuming you have 8 drafters: What do you think is the best size for a cube? 360 cards? Or more?

Jörn Bethune

2019-10-15 20:20:17 +0000 UTC

Hey guys, love the ELD content so far! This may be covered in a future show, but what cards in ELD go up in value in sealed compared to draft and why? What cards go down and why?

Bryan Rockenbach

2019-10-15 20:20:11 +0000 UTC

How on earth could I lose to monowhite aggro after listening to last week"s show today?? :((

Peter Szabo

2019-10-15 20:20:02 +0000 UTC

what would you recommend as a free alternative to parallels for playing MTG arena on Mac, love what you guys do, Billy

william morreto

2019-10-15 20:19:56 +0000 UTC

Hey Marshall and Luis, thanks for the great show you guys put on! What do you guys think is the best way to help White in limited? I'm a big fan of White in general and the Red/White color pair more specifically, but lately they've just been bad. I haven't had much fun in these past few sets because when I sit down at the table I know that it's a bad choice to draft White and Boros.

Alexander Jensen

2019-10-15 20:19:45 +0000 UTC

When I’m playing a deck in the UBER style, how do I know when I’ve got too much stuff that doesn’t affect the board, like card draw and ramp? Is this dependent on my other cards (like, if I have 6 good blockers and 5 good removal spells, I can play more card draw) or is there just some objective cap?

Nicholas Frega

2019-10-15 20:19:42 +0000 UTC

How do you manage your collection of cards? ( i.e. once you are done playing with them in Limited, and have decided to not sell them back to Channel Fireball :+)

David

2019-10-15 20:19:37 +0000 UTC

Do you guys play Commander? If so, what's the most fun you've had with the format, and if not, is there any particular reason why not? As a dumb follow-up challenge for Luis: Make me hungry in one sentence.

Star Bright

2019-10-15 20:18:32 +0000 UTC

Questions for the Show Today!

Comments

For Marshall, what's your go-to move in bball?

This is for LSV, adobada fries or carne asada fries when you’re in California?

Hi Luis and Marshal! Mainly a question for Luis. A friend and I are currently in talks with a publisher who are interested in producing a board game we have developed. Any tips for dealing with Publishers, and how we should approach negotiations if it gets to that stage?

Recently I had a R/U draw 2 deck in ELD with 7 discard/draw cards and a lot of other card draw. I eventually decided to run 20 lands because I could always get rid of extras but couldn't afford to miss land drops. Do you ever think that running 20 lands is the right call?

With Wizards shaking up modern a lot, what’s a good modern deck to invest in where most of the cards should hold value over time and the deck should still be competitive over time (maybe with tweaks)?

How should I make sure my collection is properly insured? I recently found out regular insurance (renters/homeowners) would cover the collection well and not at all when taking decks to events:

How should I organize my collection and what should I do with my collections of commons and uncommons going back a few years?

After so many misses this year with white, what sets have hit with white as a good color to draft in a format? What lessons can be taken from those sets to make it good again?

Would limited be better with a built-in mulligan? That is, instead of starting with seven cards and mulliganing from there, you instead draw eight and then put one card on bottom.

Hey guys, if you could play one spell for the rest of your limited career a la "Epic" from Saviors, which would it be? Remember this has to work as a "wincon" somehow or you just lose from here on out. And don't say "Merfolk Secretkeeper" ;p

Hey, would love to hear a bit more from Marshall on his poker career and one or two learnings that helped when learning high level MTG. Thanks guys for all the sweet content!

Hi Marshall and Luis, I have recently struggled to keep up with everything going on in MTG. How do you manage to be on par with everything in the game but still have an healthy life ouside of it? Thanx :) Joël

Can confirm. BootCamp is great. Much better than any VM that is running at the same time as MacOS

Any tricks or tips to discover holes in your game? It's an easy trap to fall into to think you're doing better at an aspect of the game than you really are. How can one figure out when that's happening?

If you were in charge of designing a specialized set for draft, what would you do differently if the target was the FNM crowd, the GP crowd, professionals, versus you specifically? How would removal vary between the formats? Bombs? Build-arounds? Archetypes?

What cards from ELD that you think printing more like them would make the draft experience better on average (not just for you)? What cards from ELD do you think printing less of would improve the drafting experience?

Hey guys, I always struggle with sideboarding in limited, except for obvious things like colour hosers. When do you lower your curve, or add more slow but powerful cards?

Thanks for the show as always. What are the characteristics that make a limited format good for Pro Tour level play?

Hi Marshall, can you please give us an update, or perhaps a post-mortem on Constructed Resources? I’d be curious to hear your reflections on why it never hit the same stride as LR, and whether it’s likely to come back in future in a different form.

Hey Marshall! It was great meeting you at basketball a few weeks ago. You are, in fact, as tall as advertised! How is fall league going for you and team Chef Lur? Any particular basketball skills you've been working on? Thanks, and good luck! See you on the court!

Hello! I very agree with the adage that almost every limited deck is some flavor of midrange, at least compared to what's possible on constructed formats. But what is the most control or aggro deck archetype you've even seen/played in limited?

For Marshall: did you ever attempt or aspire to be a pro/high-level competitive Magic player? Is this something you may consider in future?

Hey guys - love the show! I do a board game podcast (Bonehead Podcast), and I have a question about changing co-hosts. My first cohost is struggling to be available and I’m working through moving in a replacement - how have you organised changing cohosts? Any useful tips?

Who do you think would win a fight; 1 Ben Stark sized Julie, or 3 Julie sized Ben Starks?

Last week on the show Luis was down on the common land cycle, except for Mystic Sanctuary. All the reasons Mystic Sanctuary is good seem to me like they apply to the Witch's Cottage as well. Why value one differently than the other?

Woah, all of this is super helpful. Thank you! Yeah, I know a lot of this will just come with time and repetition, but both of those applications will be super helpful in expediting the process.

Someone else has asked this in the comments earlier, but I was also just thinking about it: how do you know when to play 16/18 lands instead of 17?

Luis, how do you reconcile your new found appreciation of burritos with no rice and beans vs your love of Chipotle?

because everyone at your opponent's draft table listened to the show too and let them have all the white cards.

What are your thoughts on the MPL split shows? What would you change about them? Is there any way to make them actually be live instead of pre-recorded?

How do you appraise scry decisions (and other top-of-deck manipulation) when the top of the deck has card draw spells? For instance, if I cast Opt and the top of my deck is a Divination, should I treat that Divination as "draw 1" (as it gets me 1 card deeper than Opt would have)?

I really appreciated your cube show. Convinced me to jump in and I loved it. Have now made a modern horizon cube and it's serious fun. One problem is getting enough people to draft though. Would a cube for sealed be any good and how would you construct it?

What sort of differences have you noticed between sealed and draft for TOE? My anecdotal experience has been that aggro has actually been a bit better in sealed than draft since the grindy draft decks tend to rely on synergies that are less present in sealed, but im curious of your take

This! Maybe we are due another mulligan episode? The last one with... wow was it Loucks?... was one of my favourites and I still use those strategies all the time!

Hey guys, I made top 4 of GP Indianapolis which got me an invite to MC Richmond. Any advice for my first MC/PT? James

yea I was considering using boot camp, im currently using the parallels free trial, thank you for the suggestion though!

I've been listening for about 9 years, and I love the work you both do for the game and the community. What do you feel is the importance of diversity and inclusion in the game and the community, and how can we all work toward a more diverse and inclusive environment?

Long time listener, first time caller. Did you have a chance to try drafting aggro decks in ELD yet as you mentioned last show? Been enjoying white + other (because of fairy guidemother)

What is the best way to "stay open" in this format? At the start of a draft, should I prioritize playable colorless cards, or take the best card in any color?

Could you guys share your approach to building your manabases for limited? ex, when do I play 16, 17, 18 lands? How many sources of a color? How should I adjust my number of lands when the set includes mana rocks or spells that fetch lands? Thanks, love the show!

Related to the burrito discussion a couple episodes back, p1p1 which are you taking, garlic or onions?

Hey Marshall and Luis. I’m sure you are going to address this but what’s your follow up on aggro in the format? Specifically, I have had mild success with mono red aggro (top curve at 4 and 16 lands type of deck). Thanks!

Now that the London mulligan has been around for a bit, what new heuristics or ways of thinking about mulling have you adopted?

Hi! What is your Favorite Music that you Love but others know little about (rarely know What band it is etc). For me it would be Tesseract. I bet 3 boosters you dont know them. Cheers friends

Assuming you have 8 drafters: What do you think is the best size for a cube? 360 cards? Or more?

Hey guys, love the ELD content so far! This may be covered in a future show, but what cards in ELD go up in value in sealed compared to draft and why? What cards go down and why?

How on earth could I lose to monowhite aggro after listening to last week"s show today?? :((

what would you recommend as a free alternative to parallels for playing MTG arena on Mac, love what you guys do, Billy

How do you manage your collection of cards? ( i.e. once you are done playing with them in Limited, and have decided to not sell them back to Channel Fireball :+)

Do you guys play Commander? If so, what's the most fun you've had with the format, and if not, is there any particular reason why not? As a dumb follow-up challenge for Luis: Make me hungry in one sentence.

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