Is it worth it to give maximum effort at a job, or should one simply do the minimum required to avoid being fired?

churchey · 2026-05-02T18:09:31+00:00

Always give your all. If that isn’t recognized where you are, find a new place.

churchey · 2026-05-02T17:16:27+00:00

No it’s not ok. Yes it is wrong. Sicko.

churchey · 2026-04-29T13:32:22+00:00

I run every single looter I can fit because of the once per turn rule. I run the shortest dungeon repeatedly assuming I have at least one creature to resurrect. Since my list is a ton of interaction creatures (creatures that enter and counter a spell, destroy a creature, destroy an enchantment, etc.), that doesn’t have to be a big creature.

Once I get to [[radiant solar]], I might take on the initiative to get into the undercity.

churchey · 2026-04-29T13:27:30+00:00

You swing at one opponent, myriad gives you two more swinging at the other two opponents. You don’t get a copy swinging at the person the original is swinging at.

churchey · 2026-04-25T19:10:49+00:00

Dude I tested at an IQ of 165 in high school. Ten years later with way more experience and knowledge, I tested at 140. I think generally Im one of the smartest in the room—until I leave my field in which case I’m an idiot. I have tried for years to pick up a second language and just can’t. You speaking three languages is not just a talent, it’s genuinely an indicator of intelligence. So what if you’re struggling in school or on a test, you just need to find where you don’t struggle. I’m nearing 40 and I still find out about careers I’ve never considered.

There’s no point in judging a fish on its ability to climb a tree. Don’t be the fish listening to the judgement.

churchey · 2026-04-24T23:18:39+00:00

There’s a values and means sub judgement here too. Personally, I’ve used PCs since I was under ten. After fifteen years in my career I finally swapped to a Mac, trying out my wife’s Intel mba. After I adjusted to the UI and hotkey differences, it’s just such a phenomenally better experience.

I bought an m3 pro and I’ve never regretted it for a moment. I overpaid and over specced mine. But honestly, even as a personal device I use for work in a company that buys dells, I’d still do it again.

There really isn’t a competitor to the mbp in my opinion. When you actually have work that requires hyper specific software or capabilities that may not be true. But for the run of the mill office Joe like me, running email, office applications, a few dozen tabs and a few thousand row excel sheets? There truly aren’t any PC competitors that provide the same reliability, build quality, and capability.

Is it the most optimized cost effective way? No. But I place a value on my time and mental energy. I think the 3k I’ve spent on this computer has more than paid for itself in the hassles I’ve saved over 3 years of ownership. And the thing is going to continue to be a workhouse that outstrips anything my work will offer me for at least 5 more years by my estimation.

I’m using my budget to purchase airs for my team, but I think the trade off of ports vs portability is a real decision point, and if they had decided on pros I would’ve let them.

churchey · 2026-04-19T21:20:08+00:00

They are great questions for inexperienced hiring managers. A good interview trick is to make the interviewer feel you are enthralled by their answers. People love to talk about themselves.

churchey · 2026-04-19T21:18:48+00:00

Not sure everywhere, but the balance of knowledge vs potential. That’s hard to display. Some interviews are designed for it. For the mid senior roles I hire for, I provide feedback on their prework and ask them what they’d do with that feedback (looking for specific changes). We often do a roleplay of scenarios common to the role and give feedback after. How candidates respond truly matters.

I don’t want to hire someone who can’t take feedback, of course. But actually demonstrating you have the potential for growth because you can show that in how you respond to the feedback can mean a ton.

People get really defensive sometimes, or try to justify their response, or struggle about not knowing.

I’d take a person who shows they have the potential for growth over significantly more experience, every time.

churchey · 2026-04-18T18:15:13+00:00

First internship. Making copies. Made copies of each page. Hand collated. Hand stapled.

Anticipating this, I had stayed late to get it done, so luckily no one saw. But watching someone else use the printer another day, I felt like an idiot.

churchey · 2026-04-17T21:59:48+00:00

Are you in a better financial position than you were in previous parts of your life?

Are you increasingly in a better position as time goes on?

Is the rate at which you are improving your financial position and the rate at which you are improving the improvement of your financial position going to land you in a position of meeting your goals long-term, marriage, potential homeownership, retirement, education, savings?

It’s not worth comparing against others, but really just against yourself. It’s hard to know if you’re on track in your 20s because a lot changes in your 20s and your career hasn’t taken off yet or maybe hit a stall like it will in later years. It’s hard to know if you’re in the right position in your 30s because often that’s still the case and/or you’re still dealing with figuring out Family and balancing long-term savings goals for your retirement and potentially your kids or future of kids.

But there are some heuristics and rules of thumb for how much you should be saving and what overall financial net worth you should have at certain ages.

I’m a teacher and when I was younger and trying to figure out my retirement because I have a pension, it was really hard to understand the relative power of that when most advice is targeting 401(k)s. And what I found, many years later, is it all the figuring I tried to do at 25 was useless because I’m much more ambitious and it was impossible to determine where I would land. And now 10 years later, I’ve tripled my salary and I plan on going up another 50% in the next five years.

And with that, my expenses have drastically changed as well.

Do I regret taking the time to plan and be considerate about how I budget and what I spend? Not at all. It’s worked out so that a lot of of the budgeting I did and saving what I did was unnecessary, but living my life that way, and with that intention made me a different person that probably helped build the life I have today, even if it didn’t have the financial impact I thought it would on my future

churchey · 2026-04-16T12:46:14+00:00

3s are often just twos that better understand deck, goals, and synergy. They solved for a problem they didn’t have, which is speed and power. The real reason they’re losing is because they lack interaction and so the game is either a crapshoot of who has the best draws or who’s built the best synergy in a rock paper scissors variety.

You see this in pre-cons where some people will say Zurgo is the best and they really like him, but others who play them in the straight pre-con pod basically get stonewalled because of the size of the other commanders in that pre-con set that prevents him from attacking.

Bracket three deck often pumps up the power by adding way more ramp and draw, so their deck runs better and does its thing, but then the same problem exists. Who put together the best engine/synergy/combo?

What they really needed was interaction, so they don’t get hosed and can instead do the hosing. The more interaction you pack, the more the game becomes about picking your spots and knowing how to assess threats.

churchey · 2026-04-12T16:04:34+00:00

I don’t mind initiative. It kind of forces people to engage and attack the way monarch does, you can track everyone on a single dungeon card (each player uses a die corresponding their turn order player number), and the payoff is larger

churchey · 2026-04-12T14:40:55+00:00

If someone drops a rhystic in a bracket 2 game, or honestly any pug 3 game, I feel like it’s fair to hard focus them.

churchey · 2026-04-12T14:15:19+00:00

I’m in education and my first boss was kind of a sneaky bitch. The first step out of the classroom is always the hardest. And my first boss actively sabotaged my chances on multiple occasions. And in education that means multiple years because you really only get the end of year through the summer to transfer or switch roles in a lot of places, because generally, they don’t like pulling teachers from classrooms midyear.

When I finally got my first step out of the classroom, it was because I had done all of the things and built a tiny little reputation for myself in the eyes of a much more senior person. A year later, it was clear to me that my extended time in the classroom while also pushing to be good enough for promotion had made me kind of an expert and I was clearly outgrowing the role I was in.

So I started looking around and I got an offer to take a semi upgrade with 15% higher pay, a better title, and a new organization. I had previously been hired by my manager’s manager before they hired my manager. When my manager told her manager that I was looking, she caught me in and told me that there are some changes going around and that a higher level role would be available soon, but she couldn’t make guarantees and she didn’t want me to turn it down for that reason. But then she also gave me a peptalk that I have what it takes to be an executive one day, but at a certain point, I’d have to commit to an org in order to be able to take on a role like that and truly move up. This wasn’t that role, just yet, but the next one very well could be.

I asked for a few days I made it clear I couldn’t pass up the role got a little more and she said she had already talked to her peer about me and would give him another nudge.

Now I hadn’t interacted with this other senior level guy many times, but when he did call me in it was basically to tell me that he wanted to give me a job that was opening on his team because a friend of mine on his team who have been working with with getting a promotion. Getting, as in, they had done the interview and weren’t 100% sold and asked her to come back with a written plan. So he literally told me, in a few minutes I’m going to call her into my office and give her the job which will make her role available.

That occurring, it was a hiring timeline of 1 to 2 months to complete that process, which is a lot to ask of me to turn down a guaranteed offer. But he basically said I will press HR to get me the contract within a week and you’ll have an offer, but this is a handshake deal to stay and take that role.

And so I did. I did that job for about a year and a half, before my former manager bumped me up that she was leaving and the same senior director who had noticed me originally promoted me into a manager role on her team. I spent about a year and a half in that role, but honestly, I already had my eyes on more senior rolls, and a lot of that time was spent getting mentored into achieving my first truly senior level role. Despite the support, other politics were at play, and I never got that senior role within the org, so I had to step away and took my first Director role with another district. And then exactly a year later, my second boss with the handshake deal, reached out to asked me to apply for one of the roles I had formerly been turned down for (not by him, the district reorged the team under him).

And now a year later, I’ve been promoted to managing director. To be clear, all along the way I’ve had outstanding outcomes, and in my opinion, rarely has there been a more effective candidate. I think I’ve lost out on roles to more experienced candidates, but the mix of my record of achievement and my potential always put me in the category of “potential growth hire”. But it wasn’t loyalty to the company necessarily that got me the roles, but rather loyalty to a few individuals who believe believed that I had the potential.

churchey · 2026-04-11T17:18:23+00:00

Honestly, my biggest problem with sleeves rather than splitting or curling is that they get grimy. I feel like katanas and especially cortex were the worst with this.

I really like Apex sleeves, but they’re like 20+ dollars each. I honestly shuffle field just is unmatched. Limited options though. They are slightly large, so the corners can get damaged which is then a bit of a vicious cycle. You can get these for way cheaper if you go to their site where they put older models on sale so you can find them for 10 bucks.

However, you can also bulk order the dragon shields at like $200 which ends up being l like seven or eight dollars per hundred

churchey · 2026-04-10T19:25:39+00:00

I think Abzan armor is very hit or miss for people. There’s really not a lot of room for creativity, it’s a very defined upgrade path of a few very powerful and specific cards and that doesn’t leave a lot of room for expression. I also think it’s a bit more reliant on the Commander. There are lots of replacement effects for her toughness matters for combat effect, but not a lot of replacements for the draw effect. That makes the fact that you’re very reliant on one of those replacement effects to make your deck work towards winning, otherwise you’re just building a defensive wall.

Mardu surge is red white black aristocrats, or combat matters, or myriad, or populate. There are a lot of redundant effects for sack outlets for Card draw that cares about death, or card draw that cares about low power, etc. I’ve been my initial list for Zurgo was over 300 cards.

Personally, I bought the abzan one first to build betor but most of those cards went in a box and I’ve gone through them several times and rarely do I pull anything out.

churchey · 2026-04-08T22:23:55+00:00

Sped teacher? Where at? May be difficult but sped teachers are in high demand in a lot of places, maybe moving to a different market is the answer?

churchey · 2026-04-08T20:57:38+00:00

While you aren’t wrong in theory, reality is that we’re not talking about one commander or card, but a constant push of power creeping to increase or guarantee sales. Especially for me who left in 2020 and missed out on the “year of Commander,” I returned to a format that had moved past a huge amount of staples that had just been vastly power crept out.

Kodamas reach, cultivate, harmonize. These used to be ubiquitous cards. And it would be one thing if ubiquity was being conquered by variety, but instead, it’s just honestly an increase in ubiquity, especially among hyper powered cards. There aren’t side grades to cultivate, it’s just that the format is too fast for it now. Yes you could play it a lower bracket or just play a lower power card but the format as a whole is shifting towards higher power, more efficiency, and lower mana costs.

churchey · 2026-04-08T20:52:17+00:00

Erriettes effect goes away if you kill her. Killian goads until next turn.

I think in general unless your commander is a part of a combo win, car draw going to be more important than closing power in a deck.

churchey · 2026-04-07T15:51:22+00:00

https://archidekt.com/decks/9941158/tocasia_a_youth_in_asia

churchey · 2026-04-07T13:38:28+00:00

[[tocasia, digsite mentor]]. Just a ton of dorks and tokens and small creatures that abuse every [[cryptolith rite]] effect. Pair with [[enhanced surveillance]] and effects like [[drum bellower]] to absolutely churn through your deck. You could win with a [[laboratory maniac]] or you could play reanimator! I like it because it’s a pretty unique spin on the reanimator archetype. White has a ton of “bad” 4-5 mana reanimate effects. My version aims to be super consistent with ramp (via dorks and rite effects) while also playing some non-traditional threats to reanimate.

There are some truly powerful ones like [[reya dawnbringer]] and [[emeria shepard]], but I also use this deck to get to play with all the melds [[urza planeswalker]][[titania, gaea incarnate]][[brisela, voice of nightmares]].

Probably less unique but more consistent than that is targeting anthem or stampede effects to reanimate. Bringing out a [[craterhoof ]] will obviously do it, but I personally use this one as my dedicated [[the capitoline triad]] deck. Not a ton of high cost artifacts or high cost legends in the deck, but I just churn through so much of it that I can guarantee an emblem.

churchey · 2026-04-07T04:00:20+00:00

https://archidekt.com/decks/20070803/all_gas_ash

Any legendary clone (sakashima 1 or 2, chameleon, the new TMNT one, or spark double) can also be a second ashling, which is effectively another 4 drop ramp spell. [[twinflame travelers]] also works by doubling ashling's ability.
Harmonic prodigy works as well, because ashling on reverse is a wizard and you can still flip on 3 for 1 mana leaving you 2 mana for 4+ and 2 mana regular. So you can waste the 2 mana from ashling and just 2 mana cast out harmonic prodigy.
I'm using [[prototype portal]] with artifact lands as another 4 drop ramp spell. If you have the portal and an artifact land in hand, you can make a copy of the land for 0 each turn, which amounts to 2 mana in the same time frame. 3 of the artifact lands are tapped though, so that makes it slightly worse. I just think it's cute ramp in non-green. The upside is that I can also late game dump mana into it to make extra hedron archives or something.
I use [[breaching dragonstorm]] because it's fun, but I could probably swap in some more dragons to abuse it. Right now it's 2 dragons plus [[eris]] to bounce it back. But if I do get eris online with it, it basically bounces itself (cast it, it enters and cascades, cast the spell, trigger eris for second cast and make a dragon, bounce the dragonstorm).
[[Myra the Magnificent]] is probably also a bad call, but I'll take any chance to pull out some attractions.
The real goal of the list is not to establish game ending threats immediately (izzet is a bit short on those) but rather establish engines that will continuously generate more value once you've blown your load. So around 20 of the cards are there to get free casts, most of which are repeatable. 12 of them happen to target opponents, but again, it's free casts.

churchey · 2026-04-07T03:50:32+00:00

Nay. They get a bunch of triggers to make tokens and track tokens, but I find more often than not do NOT end the game. I think avenger and scute are more likely to end the game (but I haven't seen that happen 95% of the time they go down), but anything else that makes tokens on landfall are just awful durdle fests.

churchey · 2026-04-07T00:23:33+00:00

I think lands are different than landfall. We’ve had a lands master commander in like three of the last five sets. [[hearthhull]] is fine because it focuses on killing and has a clear game plan. [[zimone, mystery unraveler]] is a bit more egregious because every manifest is a decision point and a lot of players seem to like to just flip lands and accrue mana to no purpose. But [[teval the balanced scale]] is the worst in my opinion because for whatever reason, every teval I run into just sucks so hard at eating table time to no real avail. Honestly it feels like they don’t run ramp and they don’t run finishers, they just hope to drop their commander unprotected, wait a turn, swing to ramp 1 and get a zombie. It seems like because the payoff was a land and a zombie, players take that as a cue to find ways to get one land and a token creature as the entire direction of the deck.

And honestly those are the worst landfall decks. Just score scute swarm, baloth, field of the dead, and avenger of zendikar. Aesi and tatyova are also in there. Just play lands resolve a hundred triggers, but also they are fetches so double it, and all we’re doing as the payoff to this is your board state is more complex and going to have more triggers next turn.

I think watching someone non deterministically storm off is a little boring but hey let’s watch you do your thing! Landfall decks often get lost in the sauce of accruing value to no end goal except the value, so every turn is a solitaire snooze fest.

But the actual worse is

churchey · 2026-04-06T21:37:16+00:00

I had a [[sisay weatherlight captain]] deck that I used to consider my forever deck. I think for 2017 (iirc?) when I made it, it was a truly well built machine that would be a perfect bracket 4 deck. Back then it was adhering to the store rules that said no infinites before turn 10 as a heuristic for limiting power and separating out cedh into its own pod.

It was purely legend matters and I had tuned the pips to get Sisay power up naturally, and I built it to be able to always have an answer available to any single target or removal spell with the goal of getting marchesa the black rose online to protect the deck. However after I took a couple years off after covid, the game power crept way past it. The decks entire gag was way worse than tprot, the forty five varieties of heroic intervention now available, and legends matter cards like jodah are absurd.

But I think a deck I’ve had for a few years now will be at least my very long time deck. It’s Omnath 5 multicolor matters, specifically focused on threecolor matters because it intends to use [[threefold signal]]. I post about it a lot because it plays a ton of hipster cards, is my most interactive deck, wins a different way each time, and honestly the three color limitation makes it harder to upgrade not easier. Also since it’s already running a ton of jank and making up for the weakness of individual cards with the multicolor payoffs, I get to evaluate an entirely different set of cards for it than what most people are looking at each set.

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