Another excellent vid by Sam. As somebody who enjoys watching speed runs and tuning decks, I found the comparison between the two delightful.

Part one of my Cube first impressions for Marvel's Spider-Man is here! This week I go over the themes of the set as well as new mechanics, highlighting cards that fall under those umbrellas. Spiders, Web-Slinging, transforming MDFCs, and Mayhem- oh my! www.buzzsprout.com/2524885/epis...

Trying out a new format for Cube reviews for the podcast where I do one episode on the set's themes and mechanics highlighting cards with those mechanics, and a second episode focusing on individual designs. I have part 1 ready to go for Spider-Man and I'm thinking this will be a good approach!

It's so funny to see companies learning that most people will act in accordance with their values but most of us just aren't as annoying about it as conservatives are

Spider-Man prerelease was a good time. I think that there are a lot of fun designs in the set, even if it does suffer form being a little too legendary. Despite having two in my deck, it does strike me as very reasonable to give Man-o'-War this kind of drawback.

I've been playing a lot with the Omniscience Stack, way more multiplayer games than two player games, and it's been fun to feel out which shapes of cards are fun. A lot of it ends up being "things that were playable in EDH 15 years ago" which is great for nostalgia. cubecobra.com/cube/overvie...

Trans rights are not the rights of a tiny minority, trans rights are everyone’s rights to self-determination, control of our bodies, and a society where opportunity and aesthetics are not restricted by sex assigned at birth You should support and defend trans people because trans people are people

I've been plugging along in Final Fantasy V- I enjoy the silliness of the game and the gameplay is generally fine. My most significant gripe is that boss fights that provide 0 experience are extremely dissatisfying. To feel good about "number go up", number must go up.

Oh, you don't think coin flips belong in Magic? Then explain this:

Beyond stoked to be sharing the booth with Carmen again! I'll see y'all at #SCGHouston

It's new podcast day! Got a little weird with it this week and took a look at the deck that's dominating Standard to highlight what's fun and what's not fun in the Vivi Cauldron deck to provide some food for thought for Cube curation. Hope you like it! www.buzzsprout.com/2524885/epis...

"Church had a canned sermon this week" yes that's what church is

It's been years since Legacy felt like the format that I used to like, but seeing Burn win the NRG event today hit exactly right. I never played Legacy Burn, but the deck's general viability correlates heavily with the things that I like about, well, Magic in general.

Here is some non-satire for you: Trans rights forever.

reposting with alt text because this feels incredibly significant. the right-wing disinfo machine means a lot of the people grieving Charlie Kirk never heard any of the things he said that would have tarnished his brand as Guy Who Just Wants to Have Dialogue Across the Aisle

Spiked an RCQ with this 75 today, beating Cauldron on the draw in the semis and the finals. That deck is clearly stronger than this one, but Slickshot still has legs.

Podcast is edited and ready to go for next week, in which I say the word "egregious" an egregious number of times.

i think the @wsj.com should pay every trans person's rent this month

It is becoming clearer and clearer that Being Extremely Online is profoundly unhealthy with basically no offsetting benefits.

Rhystic Studies x Goldsabertooth T-Shirts Preorder now: stitcherssupply.com/products/rhy... More info: rhysticstudies.substack.com/p/rhystic-st...

That match did get me to more critically look at how many Vivis I wanted to play in my deck. If you want to optimize you play 4 and you just play the Cauldron deck, but this list is fun and got me to Mythic again.

Let me tell you a little story 😊 You are a normal person, and you have a beautiful dog that you love. One day, you hear about some guy who wants all dogs to be beaten to death.

Just recorded next week's podcast, in which I go over the individual cards in the Standard Izzet Cauldron deck in pursuit of what's fun, what's not, and what we can learn about all of that in the context of Cube. I think there's a lot of good food for thought- we'll see how it lands!

This quote from Dana Gould came to mind today.

September 11th, 2001. A shocked nation grieves as the World Trade Center is destroyed in the largest terrorist attack on American soil. Unsure of what else to do, GameFAQs user BoredGamer collects their thoughts and begins to work on a plain text walkthrough of Tail of the Sun

My mother died because she couldn't get the mammograms she was told by a doctor to get yearly, and her cancer returned. Public policy decisions killed her. THAT'S political violence. But it was quiet, and slow, so America doesn't care.

I mean, the fascists are going to lie and say whatever they want to say, regardless. I think that’s actually part of fascism.

the "tax the billionaires" political refrain is Good Actually in part because it is a call for the people at the top to actually be constrained by rules informed by the public interest, a virtue that fingerwagging correctives about how much revenue such taxes would *really* generate doesn't address

Oh god Final Fantasy V uses jobs whyyyyyyyyy

This all makes sense to me. I also want to say that when I went to RCQ last week I was expecting to play like a 15-person Swiss+1 event, but it was 32-players even just playing for promos, pins, and invites. The format is clearly unhealthy, but people play it and there are good games.

I put together a sketch for a Spider-Man Set(-ish) Twobert that utilizes the non-Standard cards from the release as well. In general it looks like it has a nice curve with fun play patterns on paper! cubecobra.com/cube/list/2a...

One gripe I've heard about the Spider-Man set is that New York is just a real place you can go to, but I'm honestly feeling that I would like a little more mundane New York in the set. The file is teeming with super-powered individuals and I could go for more everyday world-building stuff.

Finished Final Fantasy IV today. I know I've played it before, but I think this was the first time I played it all the way through? There are some aspects of the game that are silly and some that are frustrating, but generally the game marks a lot of improvements across the board.

New podcast ep is here, in which I go over Minneapolis Drafting with two players and drafting with four players: www.buzzsprout.com/2524885/epis...

ME: team rocket will never steal these rare Pokémon! Not unless they wanna take on me and my fully evolved Miss Cigarettes! MISS CIGARETTES: miss cigarettes

Slept like shit. Gonna RCQ in a Standard format that only sickos and freaks have any interest in playing at all. The kind of stuff that makes me feel young again.

Give me Monastery Swiftspear back, cowards

There are some incredibly vital issues at this moment in time that go beyond like, oh we disagree on marginal tax rates but we can still be friendly. Trans rights are one of those issues. Trans rights are human rights and those are not negotiable. (see also: genocide; fascism. not unrelated!)

The only conclusion I an draw from Urza's Saga and Throne of Eldraine polling so highly is that some responders interpret "best" as "strongest".

Supportive Parents are uncommon, but shouldn't be. Love your children for who they are. Help them become the best them that they can be.

Doctor Octopus should be a Cephalid

I'm not trying to get hung up on numbers with this project, but I do want to express gratitude to the folks who have been listening. The show hit 500 cumulative downloads yesterday, and I appreciate everyone who has taken the time to listen to my ramblings!

I would strongly encourage my cis friends to read these. I am not exaggerating when I say the last ~6 months or so has been an endless cycle of watching things become materially worse/more harmful every week or so and just having to go to work or whatever and go make small talk.

This is not dating at all, so it is not common; it is impossible. It is gaming. Which is fine, but nobody wants you to believe they are "dating" Wario just because when they push the buttons, he does stuff, which makes it a RELATIONSHIP.

Episode 4 is here, in which I go over my general methodology for designing 180-card Cubes and discuss the most recent updates that I've made to The Original Recipe Twobert: www.buzzsprout.com/2524885/epis...

I don't get how people don't realize that a technology that replaces junior and entry level positions in a field destroys that field. There's no skipping steps. You have to be a junior before you can be a senior, and if you don't have senior people, you don't have a field.

"The Republican Party wants to pull YOUR teenage daughter's pants down in the middle of gym class if they think she's too good at lacrosse, this is vile and depraved and only the start of their intrusive government overreach" should be the party line and I don't think it's a heavy lift

Been working on a Cube that emulates Omniscience Draft on Arena for about a month. I posted about it here when I started exploring the idea and folks expressed concerns, but I was never deterred, and playing this has been a blast! cubecobra.com/cube/list/91...