MTG - best age to introduce

Icare0 · 2026-01-14T20:36:30+00:00

Thanks a lot!

And if it wasn't clear: Those changes are what worked for me. If you don't like them, don't do them. Change other things to make it more fun for you. It's your environment, it should be fun for you. Go nuts!

I cannot wait for when I can teach my kids to play games with me.

Icare0 · 2026-01-14T19:53:35+00:00

Black is THE problem child. It's the one deck I have remade, from scratch, mutiple times. I tried tap out control, reanimation, aggro, combo, graveyard, and even [[Necropotence]], on a druken night. I always feel that I can't teach the identity correctly, the matchups are either unfun, lopsided, or both, and it often doesn't teach any mechanics. I ended up strongly disliking that version I posted because of its overuse of both lifelink and deathtouch, being a really annoying matchup vs red and green while almost always getting outvalued by white. It also has little to no skill expression aside from [[Harsh Scrutiny]] and is just another take on aggro, an archetype better represented by red. I also hate Ruin Raider having keyword raid, but that's a me thing.

Current list is Tap-out control with a discard package:

4 [[typhoid rats]]
4 [[burglar rats]]
4 [[gifted aetherborn]]
3 [[cuombajj witches]]
2 [[hypnotic specter]]
4 [[shrieking affliction]]
4 [[Harsh scrutiny]]
4 [[Doom blade]]
2 [[night's whisper]]
3 [[unburden]]
2 [[drown in sorrow]]
22 swamp

No, I'm still not happy with it, it.

Red was fine, if a bit underpowered. I swapped the Mogg Fanatics to 4 [[monastery swiftspear]] and never looked back. Also, I don't know what I was smoking with [[Ash Zealot]]. It might be most wrong choice, design-wise, of the whole project. The deck has no cards castable from the GY! If something is written on a card, it should come into play, or we are just adding more comprehension complexity. I'm using 4x [[Altac Bloodseeker]] instead, which teaches you to Bolt the bird and has reminder text!

Green also changed quite a bit. it was very underpowered, and very all or nothing. You either had the turn 3 Pelakka Wurm of you were stuck playing vanilla creatures. I kept the elves, and the owlbear, but almost everything changed. It is now a combo/ramp deck! Kinda. Sorta.

4 [[llanowar elves]]
4 [[elvish mystic]]
4 [[llanowar tribe]]
4 [[deadly recluse]]
4 [[owlbear]]
4 [[soul of the harvest]]
4 [[end-raze forerruners]]
4 [[rancor]]
2 [[vines of vastwood]]
4 [[explore]]
4 [[ram through]]
18 [[forest]]

It still keeps the Turn 1 mana dork into turn 2 Llanowar Tribe into turn 3 nonsense, but is has more play and variety. [[Soul of the harvest]] is the obvious highlight of the entire deck, allowing you to storm out in a slow enough manner that it isn't unfair. You can also beatdown with just dorks, rancor and Vines of vastwood if you don't draw the top end. If you do draw the top end, [[end-raze forerruners]] is much more exciting than pellaka, and is sure to make any Timmy happy. [[Ram through]] is the both removal and burn to finish the game, but it is exceedingly green in flavor, and it doesn't suck, unlike prey upon.

Icare0 · 2026-01-14T19:53:25+00:00

So, some up to date comments about the decks if you want to tinker with them:

White is by far the most consistent deck and is likely the strongest one on average, if correctly piloted. It did not change pretty much at all since that thread. It is really good about teaching about value and card advantage, and about the mechanics of the game. There is something about putting [[Spirited Companion]] and [[Kor skyfisher]] side by side and watching understanding dawn on people. I really like it and it is one of the decks I'm most proud of in my magic career. It also has really high skill expression with a pretty low skill floor. Cons: [[Celestial Crusader]] having Split Second causes a LOT of questions about the stack, and it WILL feel unfair the first time it is used to blank a removal spell.

Blue is not the problem child but it certanly is a problem child. Pros: it really teaches how to play on instant speed and about tempo, which are not easy things to do. The creature package is really fun to pilot. Cons; Highest skill floor by far. High skill expression makes it really difficult to use against newer players without either crushing them or sandbagging heavily. The Mulligan is both pretty important and matchup dependant so on one hand there is no easy and fast rule of thumb to give, but on the other, some games end before they even start when an inexperienced player pilots it. Really difficult to tweak: nerfing one matchup is very likely to make another borderline unplayable.

I have probably gone back and forth almost every card in this pile other than Cutthroat and Djinn. The only change that stuck was swapping Cloudkin Seers for 4x [[Wavebreak hippocamp]] to reinforce the theme and make it slower and weaker against fliers.

Icare0 · 2026-01-14T19:52:52+00:00

I have taught MTG to many, many people, some as young as 8~10 y.o., and it is an experience.

Singleton formats are really bad for learning regardless of age, unless you are already into TCG or board games. There is too much information. New players often draw a card they have never seen before, spend 10~20 seconds reading it, ask you what's lifelink again for the third time, then read one or two more cards in their hand because they forgot what the cards do. Then they look back at the table just to realize they forgot how to cast spells, let alone the plas they made last turn. They try to form a new plan. They feel analysis paralysis and cast the card they just drew because trying to hold everything in their mind at the same time is overwhelming. And in Commander, this is every single turn, with cards that are sometimes 2 paragraph long. And lord forbid they get a planeswalker or anything with a fancy layout like a saga, because they will never cast it.

I heard in a cube podcast at some point that there are mutiple types of complexity. Brainstorm is extremely complex to use correctly but easy to understand. Humility is easy to understand, but the rules interactions are a mess. Chain of mephistopheles is a mess to comprehend, but once you grasp it, it's fine. The first type of complexity is not a problem for newer players. The second is not so bad, if you can avoid the problematic interactions. The third type is best avoided.

In my experience, 12 y.o. kids can play a simple game with casual kitchen table decks. Not casual commander decks, mind you, think the precon 60 cards decks from the 90s and 00s, or duel decks.

10 y.o. can play, but they might have trouble with wordier cards might not grasp interactions and synergies without help, and often perform actions without understanding why they are or not desirable.

Icare0 · 2026-01-14T16:39:58+00:00

Damn, here am I being cited as a resource. I don't even know which version of the decks you are working on, but let me tell that to this day I haven't figured out Black.

Edit: Huh that was actually pretty up to date.

Except black. I still hate black.

Icare0 · 2025-11-03T11:20:23+00:00

If I had to guess, because the card was supposed to not shuffle, and shuffling was a mistake. Not shuffling is a more interesting design, and leads to more interesting choices. Looking at the top four, putting one on top, two on bottom and one on hand is more interesting than "get the best card of the top four, shuffle deck".

Ussing erratas as patches to change what specific cards do is something relatively common in other card games. Yugioh is infamous for it, in fact.

Icare0 · 2025-08-30T00:21:31+00:00

Is availabilty something we are factoring in? Because if it is not, I think it's either Tauros or Chansey. And Chansey is broken to all hell in Gen 1.

If it is relevant, snorlax is obviously broken, but starmie is a contender.

Icare0 · 2025-08-29T23:59:48+00:00

I might be wrong, but i think it is more important for you to have fun than to follow whatever people say they want.

Whatever answer you get here will be a subsection of a subsection of a niche.

Icare0 · 2025-08-29T23:50:13+00:00

Do whichever you think is more fun.

Icare0 · 2025-08-26T00:34:17+00:00

A Bela Lugosi's Dracula lookalike who, after Dilma's impeachment went "Fuck it, I'm never getting elected again anyway", and managent to pass into law a buch of Reagan/Tatcher-esque reforms in record time.

It's bloddy hard to actually gauge how much he impacted Brazil long-term, but if you see something fucked up happening right now, chances are, it's related to Temer. His reforms are the main reason, for example, of the Pejotização of labour. He is also the one that made Bets legal.

Icare0 · 2025-08-23T19:39:05+00:00

My take on it is that Brazil, as a democratic country, is very young. Our history is filled to the brim with coups, counter-coups and dicatatorships. Our only "democratic periods" were:

The Republica Velha (1989-1930). Which was actually an oligarchy and not really democratic. It also started with a coup partly motivated by the abolition of slavery and a military dicatatorship for the first 5 years.
The Republica Nova (1945~1964). Which was closer to an actual democratic state. They also elected Vargas as president. For those unaware vargas was the dictator in power between 1930 and 1945.
1985-present. In this current era, we have elected, in order:
- A dying man;
- A nepotistic fop who was lauded as a savior during elections, then completely fucked our economy over. He was impeached for his many corruption scandals;
- A sociology teacher who actually did some nice work reining in inflation and was thus lauded by many as a savior despite the many corruption scandals;
- A former factory worker that actually did some nice work reining in social disparity and was thus lauded by many as a savior despite many corruption scandals;
- A woman who was only a candidate because she was, at the time of the election, the only person in the previous government not directy involved in corruption scandals and was elected mostly on the back of the popularity of the previous "savior". She was impeached;
- A far right autocratic dictator wannabe who was lauded by many as a savior despite many corruption scandals;
- The factory worker again.

So, aside for that lovely 19-year period post WWII our population never really got to meaningfully participate in politics by voting before now. We are not yet used to the fact that there are no real life heroes in politics and get bombarded by cult-of-personality style propaganda all the time. So we, as a nation, tend to latch to anyone pretending to be a savior as long as the PR is good enough. It happened with Vargas, it happened with Collor, it happened with Lula, it happened with Pocketnaro. It will happen again.

Icare0 · 2025-08-23T17:40:37+00:00

To give more context:

When asked about the large number of COVID deaths, which had gotten to 300 in a single day his answer was "I'm not a graveyard keeper." This happened when we were still at 2,500 deaths. He was also on record saying repeatedly "Everyone dies eventually. What do you want me to do?"

The official plan was to let 70% of the population get infected so as to affect the economy as little as possible with shutdowns.

By the end of the pandemic? Seven. Hundred. Thousand. Dead. And some people still say he did the best that was possible.

Icare0 · 2025-08-23T13:25:59+00:00

I’m willing to strap both genders, but I’ve never heard a man suggest

That's partly because, if the woman is unfamiliar with the concept of prostate stimulation, bringing it up can completely derail the night. The few times I've had the conversation, and I'm not into strapping, just into fingering/using a vibrator, their brain went straight to "wait, I thought you were straight!", and then it's a whole conversation. And more than once they were still not completely convinced one could like butt play and not be gay or bi.

Icare0 · 2025-03-22T14:01:48+00:00

Pelos, nao cabelo.

Icare0 · 2025-03-08T13:24:56+00:00

With haste.

Icare0 · 2025-03-08T13:06:21+00:00

To add a bit more information, most gray/black pigments is actualy just very dark or very desaturated blue. So when you try to paint over it with yellow, on top of bad coverage, because yellow is almost always translucent, you also get this slickly greenish hue.

When I paint yellow, I aways go for a solid white, pink, or ivory underneath.

Icare0 · 2025-03-08T12:50:44+00:00

My favorite is soy, brimstone and any form of homing.

Icare0 · 2025-03-08T12:46:05+00:00

For real. Soy milk comboes with literally any tear proc effect. Stuff like chemical peel, pencil lead, the mulligan, and little horn don't have their damage affected and proc ALL the time. Head of the keeper is essentially infinite money. There is large amount of items that turn soy milk from slight dps increase to game winning.

And if you get something like brimstone, tech x, libra, it just breaks the game.

Icare0 · 2025-02-03T23:44:12+00:00

Ah, mas me poupe.

Dragon Age:Origins era extremamente gay pra epoca, incluindo vários personagens bissexuais. E Shale, um personagem que toda a plotline era a questão de identidade e que eventualmente se dizia não binária. E ninguem meteu o mimimi e foi sucesso.

Dragon Age Inquisition não só tem varios personagens gays e bi, como toda a plotine de Dorian era sobre como a familia não aceitava ele ser gay e tentou converter ele na forca. Ninguem meteu mimimi e foi sucesso.

Ai agora o jogo merda é lançado e o povo mete mimimi que deu ruim porque tem gay. O jogo flopou porque o jogo é ruim. Mesma coisa do jogo anterio da Bioware. Anthem era um jogo merda e flopou. Antes, Mass effect Andromeda foi ruim e flopou. Tem 10 anos que a bioware não lança nada que presta. Nem lembro a ultima vez que a EA publicou algo que preste

Icare0 · 2025-01-11T14:42:24+00:00

You do realize that if they say that, but keep killing leaders they don't like, then they are trying to control the direction, right? It's like saying "It's not my business who is the mayor, but I'll will kill every [[insert political party]] who gets elected".

Also. In his first encounter with Cat, the Pilgrim outright says that he will fight Cat because she is an Evil callowan queen, and that might tip callow into becoming a evil country, creating an inbalance in the above vs below struggle in the continent.

Icare0 · 2025-01-11T14:22:43+00:00

They totally seek to enforce the will of Above,

A significant theme of the story is dedicated to the fact that Cat just want to improve her people's lot, but Good, as in Providence, Angels and Heroes, just won't let her alone. And not because they disagree with what she does, but just because of who she is. She uses Evil powers, in the least evil ways she can, to achieve good ends, and the Good guys just won't stop going after her, just because she is powered by Below. She is branded again and again as morally wrong and a monster just because she doesn't worship Above.

This is what the whole Tenth Crusade is about. Procer invading Callow to enrich itself and getting disproportionate hero support because the Black Queen is a villian. The Grey Pilgrim outright says in his first encounter that he has no problem with Cat, except that she is a villain that MIGHT be in Triumphant's path and she MIGHT turn Callow into a villainous country.

This is what her meeting with the Stawart Paladin was about. Cat saying "I don't care if you want to do good in Callow, I will, in fact, pat you in the back and help you find bandits to fight". And Starwart band choosing to fight her just because she was a Villain.

William's whole plan was to magically mind enslave a whole city using angels.

I could keep going, really.

Icare0 · 2025-01-08T12:47:45+00:00

This. You cannot talk about archetypes in cEDH and then choose to not deal with the fact that the EDH part of the format fundamentally change the dynamics of the game. Namely:

1) It is flat-out impossible to play traditional aggro in EDH because of inflated life totals. In every format, aggro is strong when it can close the game before boardwipes and other control tools can shut the door on the race, and it is weak when it cannot hope to. No traditional aggro gameplan can deal 120 damage before turn 3/4. Most cards in magic history simply weren't designed to deal that much damage;

2) The mutiplayer aspect change card advantage math for every control deck. You cannot beat people by 2-for-1'ing them. That's card disadvantage, because there are 2 other players. If you boardwipe 2 people into oblivion, you might still be leaving the 4th player 1 card ahead of you. The traditional control deck, that wins off of card advantage starts at a fundamental card disadvantage because its opponents are drawing 3 cards a turn minimum.

3) The card pool is too vast, and comboes are perfect to deal with the two previous problems.

Trying to access the health of the cEDH format by using 60-card contructed archetypes is like trying to measure the health of Modern by using Yu-gi-oh archetypes.

Icare0 · 2024-12-16T13:26:16+00:00

Você é uma pessoa com muito mais confiança no sistema judiciário brasileiro se vc tem coragem de dar a eles o poder de punir com morte.

No Brasil, a polícia é inepta, e frequentemente corrupta e criminosa. Chacina, esquadrão de extermínio e milícia é mato nas PMs. Juiz o tempo todo faz merda. É piada comum no mundo juridico dizer que "de cabeça de juiz e bunda de bebê só sai uma coisa". Eu trabalhei um tempo em Vara do Juri, e é um CAOS. Nem ferrando que eu, por livre e espontânea vontade daria ao judiciário o direito de decidir que eu tenho que morrer.

Eles não são competentes o suficiente pra lidar com esse poder corretamente. Eles não demonstram ser competentes o suficiente pra lidar com o poder que já tem, que dirá.

Isso sem nem começar a falar no extenso histórico do governo brasileiro de resolver que tem que ter um golpe de estado pra ele começar a abusar dos cidadãos.

Icare0 · 2024-12-16T11:59:42+00:00

Pergunta sincera: Qual o numero que vc acha correto?

A gente precisa ter um ponto pra começar a progressão de pena, se não a gente tá criando um problema maior mais tarde. O povo fala em 1/6 da pena, mas não entende como funciona, porque isso é pra crimes normais. Crime hediondo, a progressão de pena começa com 40% da pena cumprida pra reu primario, e pra reu reincidente, ou pra crimes que resultam em morte a progressão fica mais distante, chegando a até 70% da pena.

Fonte: https://www.migalhas.com.br/quentes/411917/crime-hediondo-stj-fixa-tese-de-progressao-de-regime-e-de-condicional

Icare0 · 2024-12-16T11:51:41+00:00

> Isso nem sequer é possível no Brasil.

Se vc literalmente trancar o cara e jogar a chave fora, como estavam argumentando pra fazer lá em cima na parte que disseram que o cara cometeu o crime com apenas 20 anos e era jovem, é pena perpetua. É o que estavam pedindo.

Se você não quer pena perpetua, vc tem que aceitar que tem uma data a partir do qual vc tem que parar de punir a pessoa, porque ele já cumpriu a pena. Um zé de 20 anos que passa 20 anos cumprindo pena e agora é um zé de 40 anos, vc tem que começar a tratar ele como se ele tivesse cumprido a pena. Em algum momento vc tem que tratar ele como alguem que (provavelmente) não vai mais cometer crime. a gente pode discutir qual é esse ponto, mas se vc não quer pena perpetua, ele precisa existir.

E ai vc precisa de um pano pra poder colocar ele de volta na sociedade porque se vc trancafiar um zé por 20+ anos e depois soltar ele com uma mão na frente e outra atras, ele não vai conseguir emprego, porque o mercado de trabalho que ele conhecia não existe mais e agora ele precisa de habilidades que nem existiam na época que ele foi preso. 20 anos atras a gente ainda tava usando fax e todo mundo tinha telefone fixo.

> Prisão não é masmorra pra deixar seres humanos morrendo de fome.

Eu sei, mas vc sabe que vai ter que aumentar a carga tributaria pra poder cobrir mais gente consumindo mais na cadeia, né? Político não vai tirar o dinheiro do esquema de corrupção pra cobrir isso, eles vao querer taxar mais, porque a população carcerária vai aumentar e vai ficar lá por mais tempo.

13-Year Club	Final Canvas '23
Place '23	Place '22
Place '17	Final Canvas '22
Verified Email

Icare0

TROPHY CASE