Dragon's Den Players of the Year for Magic Update

We have been running a Player of the Year for Magic in the store since the beginning of the year.  We have broken the this award into four different categories: Free Standard, Competitive Standard, Legacy, and Limited.  As we have been running this almost 2 months, I thought I'd post a quick little standing of the top 8 players so far for each category.  So with 10 more months left to be a part of the Player of the Year here at the Dragon's Den, you should come in and play!

Free Standard: Top 8 of 136

Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Elijah Vanaver	118	50
2	Niko Peone	96	40
3	Mike Cox	72	37
4	Scott Fish	72	43
5	Evan Odden	72	53
6	Dave Oppenheimer	66	34
7	Alex Sherman	58	28
8	John Franczak	57	31

Competitive Standard: Top 8 of 37

Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Steve Carpenter	39	19
2	Kevin Jones	36	15
3	Doug Kimball	29	11
4	Alex Sherman	25	16
5	Scott Fish	21	16
6	Carl Naumann	19	12
7	Will Cuttler	18	8
8	Daniel Stockton	18	11

Legacy: Top 8 of 32

Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Paul Lake	45	19
2	James Rynkiewicz	38	15
3	Frank Kick	30	14
4	Casey Madrick	30	15
5	Janene Andersen	24	14
6	Darryl Moss	21	12
7	Rich Cali	21	14
8	Nicholas Albonese	15	8

Limited: Top 8 of 129

Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Paul Lake	27	10
2	Alex Sherman	26	10
3	David Haass	24	8
4	Marcos Martinez	22	14
5	Kevin Jones	21	7
6	Mike Cox	21	10
7	Brooke Schieffer	19	9
8	Doug Kimball	18	7

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

MtG Dark Ascension Pre-release Weekend

This weekend was the Pre-release of the latest set of Magic the Gathering from Wizards of the Coast called Dark Ascension.  We had so many players for the last Pre-release that we set ourselves up for the players and even got the empty store next to us for our Saturday events.  We had 4 events on Saturday starting at Midnight.  We always get a good crowd for the Midnight events and having an empty location to use made it feel open and spacious for the players.  Here is a list of our times on Saturday and Sunday with how many players we had for each.

As is our normal Midnight fun, we got pizzas and sodas for all the players to enjoy before the event began.  We ended up about 16 pizzas and not a single slice was left when it was game time! The drinks normally last a little longer, but even they were gone before the end of the event. 

 

Saturday
1. Midnight: 88 players
2. 11:00am: 32 players
3. 3:00pm: 15 players
4. 5:00pm: 16 players
Saturday total: 151 Players

Sunday
1. 11:00am: 8 players
2. 3:00pm: 15 players
Sunday Total: 26

Total players for the weekend: 177

This was a great weekend with lots of players having a great time and playing tons of Magic.  We did a few extra things this pre-release that we have not done in the past.  We had our resident Magic card painter, Marc, altering cards for players as they played.  He also did a few for us to use as random door prizes for each round of the Midnight.  He also did a full art of Sorin for a player... and it might have been the first to be altered.  We also rented several table and chairs so we would have extra and everyone would have more room to play.

Next pre-release I'm hoping to see if one of the local Magic artists would be willing to come in during one of the time slots and do some signings or custom alters for players.  I know that there is one guy very local and several closer to the city, so it would be great for the players to meet some these great artists.

Don't forget about the Launch Party for Dark Ascension this Friday night at 6:00pm.  It will be a Draft for $15 and the first players on the list will be guaranteed a promo card.  What to check out the rest of our calendar of events?  Check out our calendar! We run many Friday Night Magic events, Monday Night Magic, and now Star City IQs!

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Welcome Dark Ascension to the Dragon's Den

Today is the day before the Dark Ascension Prerelease for Magic, and people are already quite excited…none more so than certain coworkers of mine, who get to see and hold the new product ahead of everyone else!  For those of you not working in a hobby store, here’s a peek at the newest products from Wizards of the Coast.

Here you can see every Magic item we received today; Booster Packs, Intro Decks, and even our store’s new and improved Land Station. Fat Packs are only available for the Release, so that update will have to be next week.

Hopefully, since this new Land Station has an open top and can hold about 200 of each color Mana/Land, this will make it far easier for players to grab what they need. Previously, we used 500 ct. cardboard boxes.

The Booster Boxes are fairly standard, with there being 36 packs per box, and 15 cards per pack. The only difference seems to be that they have only chosen 3 illustrations for the boosters, whereas usually they have 4-5 separate cover illustrations.

There are, however, still 5 different Intro Decks. Each contains a 2-color 60 card deck, a foil card, a Dark Ascension booster, a learn-to-play guide, and a strategy insert that shows the deck-lists of all the Intro Decks. Below I have put the name of the Intro Deck, which 2 colors it has, and what the foil card is.

Dark Sacrifice has a foil "Fiend of the Shadows", and is a Black/White deck.

Monstrous Surprise is a Red/Green deck, and has a foil "Flayer of the Hatebound".

Grave Power contains a foil "Ghoultree" and is a Green/Blue deck.

The Relentless Dead deck is Blue/Black and it's foil is a "Havengul Runebinder".

Swift Justice is a White/Red deck, and has "Requiem Angel" as it's foil card.  

Now, I know what you're wondering; what about all the other great Dark Ascension themed products that I can actually buy this weekend? Don't worry, they're here too!

Once again, Ultrapro has created numerous items for those Magic players who love the illustrations from the new sets. Not only do we have an 80 pack of sleeves and vertical deck box for "Sorin, Lord of Innistrad"...

...but we also have the beauty from "Deadly Allure" gracing her own 80 ct. sleeves and horizontal deck box. Each of the deck boxes are $3.99 and the sleeves are $9.99.

As for playmats, we have 2 wonderfully illustrated ones available. Sorin graces one with his picture from the Prerelease cardboard standup...

...and here we see the mysterious woman from the "Fires of Undeath" card. Both are wrapped in a nice plastic hanger, and are $21.99.

That's pretty much it for now. Be sure to check back for our other posts on Saturday, when we tell you about how our Midnight Dark Ascension Prerelease event went. We're offering free soda and pizza, have lots of prizes to give away, and expecting over 140 players, so check our Twitter and Facebook accounts for hourly updates!

Stasi "Dengirl" King

Grand Prix Trial Baltimore 1/21/12

Today we ran our Grand Prix Trial (GPT) for Baltimore.  We ended up with a pretty good turnout even with the snow falling all morning and keeping many players at home.  So we got 10 players, which ends up being 4 rounds with a cut to 4.  Here is the standings going into the Top 4:

1. Paul Lake
2. Casey Madrick
3. Doug Kimball
4. Jonah Acosta
5. David Haass
6. Carl Naumann
7. Alex Sherman
8. Nick Langella
9. Dave Oppenheimer
10. Evan Odden

In an effort to help more players with deck construction and play, I've decided to publish the top 4 deck lists here on our Blog.  I've listed them:

Doug Kimball
5x Swamp
7x Forest
1x Mountain
2x Kesig Wolf Run
4x Inkmoth Nexus
1x Dragonskull Summit
1x Rootbound Crag
1x Glissa the Traitor
1x Olivia Voldaren
4x Solemn Simulacrum
1x Acidic Slime
4x Primeval Titan
4x Grave Titan
2x Geth's Verdict
3x Doom Blade
2x Green Sun's Zenith
2x Black Sun's Zenith
2x Ancient Grudge
1x Ratchet Bomb
4x Sphere of the Suns
4x Rampant Growth
Sideboard:
1x Go For The Throat
2x Ancient Grudge
1x Ratchet Bomb
2x Garruk, Primal Hunter
3x Curse of Death's Hold
2x Batterskull
3x Nihil Speelbomb
1x Black Sun's Zenith

Casey Madrick
4x Delver of Secrets
4x Snapcaster Mage
3x Giest of Saint Traft
3x Invisible Stalker
2x Merfolk Looter
2x Runechanters Pike
1x Sword of War and Peace
1x Sword of Feast and Famine
4x Ponder
4x Mana Leak
3x Vapor Snag
3x Gitaxian Probe
2x Gut Shot
2x Midnight Haunting
1x Plains
9x Island
4x Glacial Fortress
4x Seachrome Coast
3x Moorland Haunt
Sideboard
3x Dissipate
2x Oblivion Ring
2x Flashfreeze
1x Vapor Snag
2x Mental Misstep
1x Phyrexian Metamorph
2x Celestial Purge
1x Negate
1x Dismember

Jonah Acosta
UW Delver
4x Glacial Fortress
9x Island
3x Moorland Haunt
1x Plains
4x Seachrome Coast
4x Delver of Secrets
4x Giest of Saint Traft
3x Invisible Stalker
4x Snapcaster Mage
4x Gitaxian Probe
3x Gut Shot
4x Mana Leak
1x Oblivion Ring
4x Ponder
2x Runechanters Pike
2x Sword of War and Peace
4x Vapor Snag
Sideboard
2x Dismember
3x Dissipate
2x Divine Offering
1x Mental Misstep
1x Oblivion Ring
2x Phantasmal Image
3x Timely Reinforcements

Paul Lake
U/W Delver
4x Delver of Secrets
4x Snapcaster Mage
3x Giest of Saint Traft
3x Invisible Stalker
2x Merfolk Looter
2x Runechanters Pike
2x Sword of War and Peace
4x Ponder
4x Mana Leak
3x Vapor Snag
3x Gitaxian Probe
3x Gut Shot
2x Midnight Haunting
9x Island
4x Glacial Fortress
4x Seachrome Coast
4x Moorland Haunt
Sideboard
2x Divine Offering
2x Dissipate
1x Negate
1x Phantasmal Image
2x Oblivion Ring
1x Vapor Snag
1x Mental Misstep
2x Timely Reinforcements
1x Ratchet Bomb
1x Celestial Purge
1x Marrow Shards

Heading into the first Round of Top 4, we saw Paul Lake vs Jonah Acosta and Casey Madrick vs Doug Kimball.  They all played well, and with no time limit still finished in about 50 minutes.  Paul Lake and Casey Madrick moved on to final 2 players after winning the first round.  Paul Lake and Casey Madrick then sat down to play the final round of the GPT Baltimore, the winning of this event would then recieve a 3 round bye at the Grand Prix in Baltimore.

In the last round, Paul Lake emerged victorious and won the 3 round bye for Baltimore!  We are excited to see Paul head down to Baltimore and we are hoping he does well! 

There is another GPT for Baltimore tomorrow at our sister store in Fair Lawn NJ, The Gamer's Gambit.

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Plans for Magic at the Dragon's Den for 2012

Well 2011 is almost over and it has been a fantastic year!  I have been so pleased with the number of players and the level of play I've seen develop at the Dragon's Den over the past year.  We have seen many of our players head off to big events and do very well.  Well now it is time to try and step it up, and offer some new incentives to our players. 

Hang on to your hats as this might be a long post from me, but I think you will like what you read! Read on and help us get excited for Magic in the new year here at the Dragon's Den!

Player of the Year at the Dragon's Den

We are going to start a program to name several players of the year here at the Dragon's Den.  We will be keeping track of points earned during matches played in the store.   The points will be broken down by Competitive Standard, FREE Standard, Legacy, and Limited.  We will be taking the top 8 players of each event per week and adding them into the list.  We will be using the points that you earn during the game: 3 for a win, 1 for a draw, and 0 for a lose.  The total from the event will be added to the total from previous events. 

We will begin this on January 1st, so the Monday Night Magic event on January 2nd will be the first chance to earn points.  We will be ending the points on December 14th and we will award the Players of the Year at the Dragon's Den after Magic on Friday 21st.  If players are curious as to how they stand in the running, then you might want to read about the Leader Board next. 

Leader Board

Every week will be posting a Leader Board in the store for the 4 different Player of the Year categories.  These boards will contain as many players as we can fit on the form, but I'm hoping for at least 20 names.  It will list the ranking, name, number of points earned, and number of events played in.  We will attempt to update and post the Leader Board weekly on Tuesday or Wednesday. 

Events, Events, Events

We are planning so many great events for the year.  We will have GPTs as they become available.  We will also be run PTQs as soon as Wizards approves a location between NYC and Albany.  We are running the maximum number of Prerelease and Launch Party events for every new release.  We have now begun looking at running Star City Games invitational events as well.  We will continue to run FNM events, Drafts, Sealeds, Standard, and so much more.

We are also planning a special deal.  If you play in the 3:00pm FNM Standard event and win, you will get a FREE entry into the Competitive $5.00 FNM Standard at 6:00pm.  This is a special weekly deal to help get more players playing Competitive!

I'm very hopeful that adding in these cool add-ons will help bring in players and keep all other players excited to play weekly.  Ohhhhhh.... I did not mention what you will get if you are the player of the year.  That was intentional, you will have to play, come in, follow us, or read the blog for more information!

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Gamers for the Greater Good

 Gamers for the Greater Good (G4GG)

As the holidays are approaching I know that many of the recent storms have left people in our area wanting for some basic needs.  We at the Dragon's Den have decided to plan a week of events that will help the local food banks in the Poughkeepsie area. Here is what we are hoping to do:

Every event you come in and play during this week we are asking you to bring in several non-perishable food items as a donation.  To help sweeten the deal we are going to ask several vendors to make donates and we will have raffles on the last day of the event.  To be entered in the raffle you will need to bring either 5 canned items or 3 boxed items of food per event you play in.  Even if you do not want to play in any events, you can still make a food donation and be entered in the raffles.

To make the raffle even more potent, we will add a raffle ticket for EACH group of donations you bring in! So yes that means for ever 5 canned items or every 3 boxed items you will get your name entered again!  YES, that means that every event you play in can get you an extra raffle entry. 

We are also planning some extra special events just for the week and we will have some super special offers to tie to those.

The dates for this event will be: December 5 until December 11.

Monday: Magic Modern 6:00pm

Friday: Magic Sealed 2 Headed Giant 6:00pm $20 entry plus the food donation! 5 boosters and build 2 decks. Also, if you bring a new player (one who has never had a DCI number, the top teams with a new player will win a special prize!)

Sunday: Yu-Gi-Oh Structure Deck Challenge:  Legend of the Six Samurai, $8.00 entry plus food donation!

We will update this page often as we plan more events and get more fun and fantastic information.  Stay tuned and we hope that we can help local families and have a lot of fun while doing it!

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Mordenkain's Magnificent Emporium

Alright you old time "I started playing D&D with the boxed set..." fans out there, the coolest magic item collection has arrived.  Mordenkain dug deep into the vaults at Castle Greyhawk or where ever he keeps his really good stuff to give us 4E stats on some of my personal favorite magic items from all the old editions.  Here are just a few of the items listed in MME:

Armor; Mostly new stuff but we get Plate Mail of Etherealness and Robe of the Archmage

Weapons; Flame Tongue, Frost Brand, Giantslayer, Greater Dancing, Greater Luckblade, Maul of the Titans, Mighty Dwarven Thrower and more

Implements;  Candle of Invocation, Necklace of Prayer Beads plus others
ROD OF ABSORPTION!!
Greater Staff of POWER! (Now, if they just did the Staff of the Magi I could happily convert my 3.5 Epic Level evoker to Paragon)

Wands; Fire, Frost, Lighting and yes, the best wand ever, the Wand of WONDER

AND SO MUCH MORE....including Cursed Items

All right, I could keep going but the best thing I can say is that this book brings to current 4E D&D a lot of my personal favorites and best loved magic items from many of the past editions.  MME also adds some feats, new weapons and armor, a section on henchmen and hirelings, and a random magic item generation table for all the items in the book.  I felt like I was back in AD&D 2E for a while!

Mordenkain's Magnificent Emporium is only available, at least right now, in hobby and gaming stores so if we aren't your Friendly Local Gaming Store, drop by yours.  Of course, we can always get you a copy!

Dave

Innistrad Magic Events at the Dragon's Den

Innistrad

As we are getting closer to the release of Innistrad for Magic the Gathering, we wanted to post some quick information about the events we will be running over the next few weeks.  We have events at the Dragon's Den for the pre-release, the launch, and a games day all set and ready to go.  So read on and learn about all the different Innistrad events that are coming up!

Pre-release:

We have 4 different Sealed events that are coming up for Innistrad.  All the sealed events are $30.00 and include 6 packs, plus the promo card (while supplies last).  Prizes will be determined by the number of players that sign up for the events.

Sealed #1
Midnight 9/24/2011
Special at the midnight only: FREE pizza and soda!

Sealed #2
Noon 9/24/2011

Sealed #3
Noon 9/25/2011

Sealed #4
5:00pm 9/25/2011

Launch Party:

The official Launch Party for the release of Innistrad will be held Friday night on 9/30/2011.  We will be running a draft at 6:00pm as the official event!  The cost of the event is $15.00 and will include 3 packs and a promo card (while supplies last). Prizes will be determined by the number of players that sign up for the events.

Game Day:

Game day is a constructed event so it is open for players to try and build the best deck.  The event will be run on Saturday 10/29/2011 starting at noon. Everyone who players will get a promo card and the top 8 will get a special promo card. The cost of this event will be $5.00 and prizes will be determined by the number of players who sign up.

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Wizards Ban announcement 6/20/11

Ok, so Wizards of the Coast (WotC) has finally added new cards to their ban list, the first time in Standard in a very long time.  What does this mean for the game, and what does it mean in general.....

Well it does make me wonder why? Why did they make this announcement with only a few months before rotation and both Jace and Stoneforge would leave Standard anyway? Why did they put Stoneforge in the Event Deck when they had to know what the format was doing before they created the decks? Why did they allow the format to stagnate for so long?

Wait a minute.... are you saying you have no idea what I'm talking about??? Well you need to read what WotC has to say about the new banned cards!

New Phyrexia Releases

So after a very rocky start with retail stores being told that the name would not be spoiled until the pre-release (which oddly enough the cartoons are all labeled "Action") and the massive early spoil of the entire set list (thanks pro guys for that), New Phyrexia has released!

We ran many events last week-end for the pre-release events, including 85 players at midnight.  That brought the total number of players on Saturday to 140 for the day.  Now some of those players played twice, but it is still impressive to see so many players come in and enjoy the game.  Sunday was very light, but with the fact it was Mother's Day... I'm glad to see so many players visiting with their moms.  We ran many different sealed events so the players could enjoy as much of the new set as they possibly could before the official release. Many players really enjoyed getting the promo, Sheoldred, Whispering One.

The launch party was a success as well. With 34 players drafting the new set, there are many players opening some great cards. The promo card Phyrexian Metamorph is a cool card, and why would you not want to copy a Sword of War and Peace with it.

Many players went crazy when they saw that Surgical Extraction would be the buy a box promo.  This is the most expensive rare, not mythic, in the set.  We ended up selling out boxes so fast so players could get one... This was the best buy a box promo, in my opinion, so far.

So as far as I can see, the events and the set it self have been wildly enjoyed! I'm personally looking forward to drafting one of each from this block as I think they will please really well together... better then other expansions did.

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Magic: Knights vs Dragons Duel Deck

Now that the new Duel Deck from Wizards of the Coast, Knights vs Dragons, is out and it's time to take a look at what you get in the box.

Dragons: This is a mono Red deck featuring dragons and their goblin allies. The deck involves a foil alternate art Bogardan Hellkite. It also includes the following rares: Thunder Dragon, Shivan Hellkite, Kilnmouth Dragon, Mordant Dragon, and Voracious Dragon. It also includes several other alternate art cards, including Punishing Fire and Seething Song.

Knights: This is a twin color deck using White and Green knights.  The deck involves a foil alternate art Knight of the Reliquary. It also includes the following rares: Loxodon Warhammer, Kinsbaile Cavalier, Knight of the White Orchid, Knotvine Paladin, and Knight Exemplar. It also includes several other alternate art cards, including Silver Knight and Loxodon Warhammer.

Both decks include some great cards that are useful in current decks as well as EDH... soon to be called Commander.  We have the decks in stock and priced competitively. Stop in and check out the latest Duel Deck from Wizards. Get them while they are in stock as the Duel Decks move quickly and the prices tend to go up eventually.

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

GAMA Updates: Wednesday!

So if you are not lucky enough to work in the gaming industry or able to make it to GAMA to see and hear all the news about the Gaming/Hobbies industry, I'll continue to compile the posts from Dave who is sending us some small Tweets about the show. Yesterday we had some info from Wizards of the Coast and AEG, today we have some more from Wizards.

We will have a whole collection of posts to add on tomorrow about Yu-Gi-Oh and what Konami has to say about up and coming releases!

Wizards of the Coast:

D&D minis LE Set this year DRAGONS!


Conquest of Nerath 2-4 players large scale "Risk" style board game coming in June.

D&D New in Sept. Lair Assault A scenario that has high level of difficulty and can be played until "solved" 3- 4 hours of play.

Legend of Drizzt board game is part of the Neverwinter 2011 theme

D&D Encounters 9/10 starts The Lost Crown of Neverwinter right after D&D Game Day where you will build PCs for Encounters

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

GAMA Updates Tuesday!

So we have several employees at GAMA in Los Vegas! They are posting updates as to cool new games and information that they see. If you are following us on Twitter or Facebook you may have seen some of these posts, but I thought it would be great to have them all in one place... and posted per day of the show (as it runs all week)!

Wizards of the Coast:

October's MtG name is Innistrad and will be previewed in From the Vault Legends.

Innistrad poster child is Lillian-expect a dark tone to set with"resonant fantasy theme"


New Program: Magic Celebration on September 10, 2011 aimed at newer players.

Magic 2012 will launch on 360/PS3/PC at same time as paper cards with Garruk like promo card redemption 7/11!

AEG:


War of Honor is a board game based version of L5R and great intro to new L5R arc.

Nightfall from AEG is a new deck building card game that promotes interaction between players set in a Blade or Underworld world. 

We will have a demo copy of Nightfall on Saturday, 3/19.


Thanks Dave for keeping us all in the loop as to what you see and what is going on at GAMA!

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Magic Commander Format

So WotC has been giving out information at PAX East tonight.  I know not everyone can make it out there, so I thought I'd take a minute and compile some of the tweets that they have posted about this newish format. If you did not know, Commander is a twist on EDH (Elder Dragon Highlander) which is a casual format that is played with a 99 card deck and 1 legendary creature that is your commander; making a 100 card deck.

Got the answers for the questions here that we asked and that we gathered from Twitter. This will release soon, and we will have some events for it in the store.

Q: Will the commander cards be over sized?
A: Yes.

Q: Can you use other Legendary Creatures as commanders or only the over sized cards?
A: Yes you can. The over sized cards are just a neat extra.

Q: What happens when an over sized card gets condemned?
A: There will be standard sized commander cards so that if they get shuffled into the deck you will be able to use them in EDH.

Q: How many Commander Decks can we expect?
A: 5 Decks. Each deck will be 100 cards, have around 18 rares, and 51 unique cards.

Q: When will the decks be available?
A: They will be in stores in June.

 

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Magic Players at the Den

Many people have asked us about the players here at the Dragon's Den for Magic. We have had many players who have come in and played some games of Magic at the store. We wanted to give future players an idea of what you can expect and who you might play against.

1. We have players from all walks of life, elementary school kids, teachers, lawyers, computer techs, high school students, college students, restaurant works, retail works, warehouse workers, and so much more.

2. We have had many female players as well. I've had several new players comment that we have had events with as many as 8 ladies playing.  So although we have many male players at any given event, we also almost always have at least one female player!

3. The level of play ranges from very new to pro!

4. DCI Numbers can tell you how long a player has been playing the game. We have many players who have DCI #s that are 10 digits long, which is the current length, but we have had many small numbers as well.  The shortest number is only 4 digits long!

Free Events at the Dragon's Den

So we run several different FREE events at the Dragon's Den. Several of these events are run every week and can be found on our calendar of events, but others events run once a year and fall about the same time every year.  Here are some of the BIG once a year FREE events we host here at the Dragon's Den:


FREE Comic Book Day: Diamond comics offers to stores a chances to be a part of FREE Comic Book Day. We can offer many different comic books for FREE that day including Mavel, DC, Dark Horse, and many of the other independent publishers.  There are also some other give aways that stores can get including Heroclix minis, grading guides, and so much more.  We have also had several different artists and authors who have come in to do signings during the event.  This lists includes:
Herb Trimpe - Artist for the Hulk, and many more Marvel Comics
Mark Texeria - Artist for Ghost Rider, Moon Knight, and more
JM Dematteis - comic book and TV writer (Kraven's Last Hunt!) 
Nick Tapalansky - Writer Awakening
Alex Eckman-Lawn - Artist Awakening 

We are hoping to make this years FREE Comic Book Day even better then ever! We have a few great ideas to make this year memorable and exciting... but I'm not going to ruin the surprise and tell you about them now! You will need to come back in the future and read the blog or check our website!

FREE RPG Day: Impressions Advertising and Marketing has created this fantastic event and gets some of the best FREE RPGs for players to check out and play.  We used to just have some of the RPGs for handing out, but last year we started running some of the adventures during the event for players to try a new game! Over the past several years Pathfinder (Piazo), and Dungeons & Dragons (Wizards of the Coast) have offered up some fantastic FREE suppliments or adventures. Here is a list of some of the fantastic games or companies that had product for FREE RPG Day:
Dungeons & Dragons (Wizards of the Coast)
Pathfinder (Piazo)
Hollow Earth
Call of Cthulhu
Chessex

This years sponsors for the event are:

• BlackWyrm Games
  Sample HERO Adventure
• Blue Panther
  Sample Card Tower
• Eden Studios
  Silver, All Flesh Quickstart & Adventure
• Fantasy Flight Games
  Gold, TBA
• Goodman Games
  Silver, DCC RPG Quickstart
• Green Ronin
  TBD, DragonAge Quickstart
• Guild of Blades Publishing
• Paizo Platinum
  TBA
• Pelgrane Press
  TBD, Trail of Cthulhu Adventure
• Pinnacle
  TBD, TBA
• Troll Lord Games
  Bronze, C&C Quickstart and Adventure
• Valkyrie Games
  Sample, Stellar Horizons Quickstart
• White Wolf Publishing
  Gold (10 per box), TBA
• Wizards of the Coast
  Platinum (15 per box), D&D Adventure 

 Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Gaming Store Logic: Magic

So we have had many different individuals come and go from the Dragon's Den as Magic players. I can honestly say that I have heard some of the craziest comments in regards to the collectible card game Magic. To give everyone a laugh, I thought I would jot some of them down for people to read and enjoy.

1. "Wow, you have a lot of players playing here. So none of them can be that good."
     Me: "What???"
     "Well I know that when a store has a lot of players, none of them are good."

So we may not have pro players... No wait we have a player who just won a PTQ and now has a pro-point, and we have at least one other player who was on the tour years ago.

Well maybe we don't have any big event Top 8 players... Just a few weeks ago we had several players Top 8 in different events.

Well maybe we don't have any state champions... But our judge is a former NY State Champ and we had several Top 8 players this year in multiple states. 

So I guess we might have a good player or two even though we have 40-60 players on a Friday night!

 2. "So I'm from the city, you guys have Magic Events?"
     Me: "Yes, every Monday, Friday, and some times on the weekend too."
     "Well I figure I can beat everyone here because I'm from the City, so I didn't bring my "A" game."
     Me: "Well... (see above comments)."
     "Oh really."
     Several hours later... 
     Me: "So how did it go?"
     "I should have brought my "A" game."

So I'm curious, why do you go to a tournament and not bring your "A" game? I mean if you are playing around the kitchen table, then sure play a fun deck, but when you go to an event wouldn't you want to play to win? Casual is a great format for playing for fun and we run that Tuesday nights, but for the other events bring your "A"game!

3.  "It is not fair that players go to big events and don't play net-decks."
     Me: "What???"
    "Well, it's not fair that we don't have a chance to prepare for a deck when it is not a net-deck."

Well I kind of thought that playing Magic was about building a deck and playing the game.  When did it just become using the internet and playing with someone elses idea and concepts. Have we sunk so low that we have no originality left or creativity???

4. "All the cards have to be spoiled."
     Me: "Why??"
    "Well all the Pro Players have to have all the cards spoiled. They are the reason all the cards are spoiled.  They need to know if they will buy any."

Really????? So what we are saying is that the small number of pro Magic players is more important then all the other players in the Magic community? So we need to show them all the cards to see if they want to purchase the cards? So we don't want players to have a little unknown in the game?  So we don't want to have any surprises?  Merry Christmas?!?!?

5. My all time favorite comment was not by a player or customer, but by a company...
     "We are going to start a GRASSROOTs program to make Magic work better for all stores and players. We will start with the large Professional TOs, who will then feed down to the smaller stores."

Ok, now I know I might be a little crazy, but really??? When did Grassroots programs work top down?? Can you even hear what your saying? Grassroots is a program to start small and have those small groups feed into bigger groups, that then feed into the largest groups. This would also be a great idea if the groups would talk to each other, but it appears that most TOs do not want to work with each other, especially the PTOs in this area who have never wanted to chat with us in the reverse grassroots program.

Agree or disagree...

New Paltz Gaming Convention (NPC)

The New Paltz University Gaming Society ran their annual gaming convention, NPC, last weekend. This was the first 2 day event for them starting Saturday and ending Sunday. They approached us (the Dragon's Den) and asked if we would be a vendor and if we would run some events at the con. So for the third year in a row we were a part of NPC. We ended up having a great booth and running several different tournaments and demos of some great games.

Saturday we ran a 14 player Scars of Mirrodin Draft! The players had a great time and we saw many great cards pulled during the event. The players were super excited to have a chance to win some exclusive con promo cards that we got from Wizards, foil promo Kor Skyfisher... if I remember correctly. We also played several demo games including Steve Jackson's Cthulhu Dice and Zombie Dice, Munchkin, Mayfair's Stationmaster, and Bandai's Resident Evil Deck Building.

Sunday we ended up running an 8 players constructed Yu-Gi-Oh tournament. We also had a small group for a second Magic event, this time Standard Constructed. We also ran demos of several other games including Ascension Deck Building, and D&D.

All weekend long the convention was running video game tournaments from retro systems to current. We also saw several pick-up games of Warhammer 40K in the hall we were located in as well as many other board games from the gaming society.

This is an event that more players should check out. Check their website for more details on last years event, and hopefully soon, this years events. http://www.wix.com/gamingsociety/new-paltz-gaming-society

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Dark Sun Setting for D&D 4E

So I have been playing D&D 4E since before it was released... yes I was a play tester, and I have also participated as a DM and a player with D&D 4E. One thing that I have enjoyed has been the different Campaign settings. Dark Sun really piqued my interest, especially after playing in the Wednesday Night D&D Encounters.  There have been some fantastic aspects to Dark Sun that I enjoyed in 2E and was disappointed to not see make it into 3 or 3.5. I'm going to hit on some of the points that I enjoyed and hopefully readers will find some of the concepts exciting enough to give Dark Sun a try.  There are 8 big changes when playing in Dark Sun:

1. The World is a Desert
2. The World is Savage
3. Metal is Scarce
4. Arcane Magic Defiles the World
5. Sorcerer-Kings Rule the City-States
6. The Gods are Silent
7. Fierce Monsters Roam the World
8. Familiar Races Aren't What you Expect

Races:

The races that are in the book are met with mixed response. The Thri-kreen are such a different race and offer players the chance to play something very different. I played one in Encounters, and then had to make a Thri-Kreen in a home game. I find them to offer a nice alternative to standard races. The Mul on the other hand just did not see as much love/respect... and I'm not sure why.  They are a very tough race, that can take a beating. They make great front line fighters to force the enemy to deal with.  Oh, and on a side note, who would not want to play in a world with halflings that are cannibals!

Themes:

Choosing a theme for your character allows you to access more powers and to give the character more flavor.  There are 10 different themes offered in the book.  Each theme offers a wide variety of options for creating your character, including access to different feats and powers.  You do gain a power that is associated with the theme when you select the theme during character generation... which is really cool.

Psionics:

As magic is scarce, and illegal, on Athas you will find many players having access to psionics instead.  At the DMs discretion, players can chose a Wild Talent.  Wild Talents are minor psionic powers that characters can use in game that are similar to wizards cantrips.

Classes:

Several new classes were added based off of existing classes, including Wild Battlemind, Arena Fighter, Animist Shaman, and Warlock Sorcerer-King Pact.  These classes again add more of the Dark Sun flavor to your character and represent some of the differences in this very harsh world.

Equipment:

Maybe one of the most interesting pieces of the Dark Sun world is the lack of available metal. Most items are made out of more naturally occurring items.  Horn, bone, hides, stone, wood, crystal, and shells appear in a variety of forms from armor to weapons.  There are some metal weapons and armor, but they would be considered masterwork and difficult to find.  To represent the fragile nature of the weapons on Athas, DMs can use the optional weapon breakage rule.  The Reckless Breakage rule is the one I really like: If you roll a natural 1 you can choose to reroll the attack.  A non-metal weapon breaks with any second attack roll, but you might hit! A metal weapon will break if you roll a natural 5 or lower.  This can be a very useful tool as you might not mind breaking your item, but you really want to hit the monster!

So, if you have not tried Dark Sun out, or you were curious what the heck it is... give it a try! Dark Sun is a very harsh and gritty world full of danger, but offers a tremendous amount of fun to enjoy a new world to explore!

Who are the Planeswalkers in Magic the Gathering

In Magic you play as a Planeswalker. A being so powerful you can travel across planes of existence and summon creatures to battle for you. When reading through many of the different books, novels, and comics you may have stumbled upon many other Planeswalkers and wondered... How many planeswalkers are out there?

Well if you are playing Magic right now, you know all the current Planeswalkers. We have seen at least one for each color and some that are multicolored. Here is a list of the current Planeswalkers and what color they represent.

Jace Beleren- Blue
Tezzeret the Seeker- Blue
Jace, The Mind Sculptor - Blue
Ajani Goldmane - White
Elspeth, Knight Errant - White
Gideon Jura - White
Elspeth Tirel - White
Garruk Wildspeaker - Green
Nissa Revane - Green
Chandra Nalaar - Red
Chandra Ablaze - Red
Koth ot the Hammer - Red
Liliana Vess - Black
Sorin Markov - Black
Ajani Vengeant - Red, White
Venser, the Sojourner - Blue, White
Sarkhan Vol - Red, Green
Sarkhan the Mad - Red, Black
Nicol Bolas - Blue, Black, Red

But, there are many more that have apeared in books, comics, and graphic novels.  So many of these different Planeswalkers appear briefly, but several are referenced over and over again.  These are the more commonly talked about Walkers, some are even cards... just not Planeswalkers... Yet...

Urza
Ravidel
Bo Levar
Commodore Guff
Daria
Freyalise
Kristina of the Woods
Lord Windgrace of Urborg
Taysir
Tevesh Szat

Armada Comic created a number of different comic book runs based on Magic. They introduced new and used many existing Planeswalkers in their stories. They also introduced the concept of Battle Mages and Spell Squires, people that were aspiring to become Planeswalkers. There are way to many to list, but Ravidel is mentioned as both, before becoming a Planeswalker. Here is a list of the Planeswalkers mentioned in the comic books.

Ravi
Serra (Viewed as a goddess, but was aPlaneswalker in love with Feroz)
Feroz
Sandruu (Minataur Planeswalker trained by Feroz, and banished by Taysir)
Taysir (Jealous of Sandruu as he has won the heart of a woman Taysir wanted)
Ravidel
Freyalise
Tevash Szat
Kristina of the Woods
Leshrac
Faralyn
Jamil (killed his brother using Nightmare)
Altair (Was enchanted to not access his ability to Planeswalk, freed his people with the help of Nightmare, the enchantment was broken and he served Nightmare for 10 years)