Look, up in the sky…

It’s a bird!

It’s a plane!

No, it’s Superman!

75 Years ago, a small comics publisher named DC released Action Comics #1 featuring, among other stories, the first appearance of Superman, that strange visitor from the planet Krypton with powers and abilities beyond those of mortal men.  Disguised as Clark Kent, a mild mannered reporter for….Well you all know the story.

Yes, Superman is 75 years old and while he doesn't look a day over 35, he has become a worldwide icon and the first true “super” hero to exist.  Love him, hate him or just not sure which way to go, he is the original and in my opinion, still the best Superhero there is.  I know all the arguments about him:  he is too powerful, he has too many abilities, no one would ever be that “good” or “noble” if they had all that power, Batman can always beat him, and his costume, really, red underwear on the outside and a cape?  Don’t get me wrong, I love Spidey and Lynda Carter will always be the perfect Wonder Woman, and The Avengers movie is the best superhero movie yet filmed, but Superman is still, to me, THE Superhero.

DC seems to agree as they are turning June 12-14, 2013 into a Superman tribute.  We have the new Man of Steel movie landing in theaters on June 14, and I think it is fair to say that it is the movie that I hear the most buzz about.  I am so mad that I’ll be at a conference during the premier that even now I am plotting as to how soon I can see the movie and if I will wait to see it with my sons or just go and see it and then take them so I can see it twice!  I know, tough choices.  However, on Wednesday, June 12, 2013, Superman Unchained #1 will be available at your friendly neighborhood comic shop.  You will, of course, stop by the Dragon’s Den and Gamer’s Gambit to get your copy, but you have several options to consider.

Written by Scott Snyder and illustrated by Jim Lee and Scott Williams, Superman Unchained is DC’s love letter to the comic BOOK fans of Superman.  Besides the talented main creative team, DC has lined up a host of other top notch artists to provide variant covers highlighting Superman throughout his 75 year career.  These covers are iconic images from the different ages of comic books.  They are a great collection of Superman images from the Golden Age, the Modern age, new 52 and many more.  I've included them below so you can see just how fantastic they are.  Some, like Bruce Tim’s 1930s cover is a younger artist creating a period piece of Superman, while Neal Adams is a Bronze Age icon who was actually drawing Superman during that time.  All of them are a fitting tribute to Superman in the many decades he has graced the covers of a comic book.

Superman Unchained #1 variant copies are available for preorder here!

I hope you will take the time to stop by and pick up a copy of Superman’s Birthday Present to you.  Forget what you think you know about the character and take some time to meet the first and still the best Superhero!  And if you need some recommendations about other Superman stories to read, look for me around the stores.  I’ll be the guy wearing one of my many Superman T-Shirts lurking near the 4 foot Superman S shield on our wall…

David

Worlds Collide

*This article may contain spoilers*

Hey people who read comics and stuff! This blog doesn’t post often (not my fault), but now it will post significantly more, thanks to me! I’m not the usual person who posts stuff—I’m new. I’m only 12 years old, but I love comic books and video games. In the past, I gave interviews on my review of Pokémon videogames for the DS; you may have read them.

But enough about me, let’s jump right in to the topic of this post: Worlds Collide, a twelve-part, action-packed crossover event between Sonic the Hedgehog and Mega Man comic books! The first three issues (Mega Man #24, Sonic Universe #51, and STH #248) have already arrived and there are more on the way! Now, if anyone has read a crossover before, you know the drill: villains team up, heroes fight, heroes team up, defeat villains together. So far, that’s what’s happening in this crossover. Eggman and Wily have teamed up via Chaos Emerald and tricked Sonic and Mega Man into fighting. Also, Sonic’s friends have been roboticized, so he won’t be getting any help in fighting Mega Man or the Doctors. So that’s the basic plot, now let me tell you about the characters from each franchise that will be appearing. Everybody that’s anybody will be in this story arc, so longtime readers of Mega Man or Sonic will recognize a lot of characters. Some of my favorites from STH are Shadow, Scourge, Silver, and Metal Sonic. I also look forward to seeing MM characters like Bass, the Robot Masters, and Proto Man.

Now, you’re probably wondering: why is this kid so enthusiastic? Well, I’m a longtime reader of both series, and I’m interested in seeing Sonic and Mega Man fight. I want to see how Mega Man deals with Sonic’s extreme speed and agility, and how Sonic deals with Mega Man being a tireless robot with an arm cannon. Also, Sonic calls MM a “blue boy” and MM calls Sonic a “pincushion,” so there is fun banter in this so far. Well, “blue boy” isn’t that impressive, especially for Sonic, but I’m betting we’ll see some improvement with Archie Comics writer, Ian Flynn, in future issues. I’m also surprised at Eggman and Wily’s perfect teamwork. You would think that they would disagree a bit, but no, only on minor things.

This story arc spans five months and encompasses 3 comic titles. Here is the Worlds Collide release schedule:
April
Mega Man #24
Sonic Universe #51

from Sonic the Hedgehog #248

May
Sonic the Hedgehog #248
Mega Man #25
Sonic Universe #52

June
Sonic the Hedgehog #249
Mega Man #26
Sonic Universe #53

July
Sonic the Hedgehog #250
Mega Man #27
Sonic Universe #54

August
Sonic the Hedgehog #251

So yeah, Worlds Collide is a HUGE event. There will also be a flip book comic that is a prelude to this epic given out at Free Comic Book Day! Look for it at your friendly local comic shops, a.k.a. Dragon's Den and Gamer's Gambit, on Saturday, May 4! While you’re there, if you haven’t already done it, make sure to subscribe to all three titles (SU, STH, and MM) to get all the awesomeness! I’ll be back with another post on this before the last issue comes out so stay tuned. This is your new blogger, signing off!

Q-Scourge

International Table Top Day 2013

We were very excited to be a part of International Table Top Day this year, which was its first year.  We ran a bunch of different demo games and offered sales on all the games we demoed. The following pictures were from the event.  If you could not make the event this year, then you should check out Table Top Day on our site and on other social media sites to see everything you missed out on.  We are hoping to have the chance to continue to be a part of this fun filled day.

If you would like to see the other photos, then click and dear more below!  We also ran several other demo games including Dixit, Kanzume Goddess, Zombie Dice, Cthulhu Dice  and Munchkin!

2012 Magic Player of the Year

So we got in our player of the year awards for Magic 2012.  Time to show them off... which the players who won them.

Don't forget to click on the "Read More" to see all the great pictures!

MTG Sealed and You: The Basics

Hey everybody! If you are reading this, pat yourself on the back –stumbling through the labyrinth of the internet, feet weary and sore, you have found Dragon’s Den blog for all things Magic: The Gathering. My name is Lyon, and if you’ve played much Magic at the Den, chances are you’ve spotted me. Today, we’ll be discussing the ins and outs of Sealed. Since Sealed is the primary format of a prerelease (and prereleases are super duper fun), knowing this format is essential to participating in one of the best casual tournament settings Magic has to offer. We’re going to discuss the basics: what Sealed is and how you can best tailor your deck to not only have a blast at the prerelease, but also hopefully take home some additional packs while you’re at it!

At its core, Sealed is a very basic concept: you are given 6 packs. You open these packs and make a 40 card magic deck (lands are provided, so don’t worry about that). That’s it. Like many things in gaming, the nuances of it are what can give it more depth, and knowing those nuances is the difference between staring down handfuls of unorganized cards and preparing your weapon of destruction for the tournament.

The upcoming Dragon’s Maze prerelease is going to function a little differently, but it’s not cause for alarm. In fact, it should be pretty fun! When you sign up, you will only receive 4 regular packs of Dragon’s Maze instead of the usual 6. The other 2 packs will be 1 pack of a guild of your choosing (any of the 10 bicolor combinations in Magic), and 1 pack of a guild allied with the one you chose. These packs will have cards only belonging to those guilds in them, so it’s important to pick guilds that have colors you think you might want to use.

Okay, so that’s the easy stuff. The most challenging part of Sealed for many players is what to do once you’ve opened all of your packs. Let’s cover some sound advice and also discuss what to avoid! Note that there are no 100% foolproof formulas for victory. If there were, the game wouldn’t be fun at all! The following advice is merely to better your chances of having a fine-tuned deck that will play in a way that (hopefully) won’t make you pull your hair out in frustration and curse your “bad luck”.

• First thing first: lay out your cards in a way that is organized and makes sense to you. Just like writing an essay, having an “outline” for your deck can be really helpful. Some useful ways to organize your cards are by color, by casting cost, and by usefulness. Before you begin building, it’s important to see how many actually playable cards you have in any color (or combinations of colors). You’d be surprised how much you might “see” about your cards and options simply from doing this!

• Make sure that you know have an idea for the ‘proper’ amount of cards vs. lands. While this may vary depending on the player or card selection, there are a few general guidelines for your spells / lands ratio for Sealed (and Draft) decks. First, no matter how tempted you are to go over, you should try your hardest to keep your deck to 40 cards. Statistically, it will give you the best chance to draw the cards you want. Second, my base rule is 23 cards / 17 lands for an average deck. If you have mostly cards with very low mana costs (and few, if any, cards with higher mana costs), 24/16 is your best bet. Similarly, if your deck has a lot of high mana cards and not a lot of “mana ramp”, 22 /18 should be fine. Deviating too far from these ratios may result in too many games of either drawing too few or too many lands. You don’t need me to tell you why this is frustrating!

• Make sure your deck has a ‘plan’, but also that the plan is good. While a little bit of everything is a good thing, your deck should really fit one a few archetypes, or things you want your deck to be doing. This decision should have less to do with what you “want” to do when you build decks ‘normally’ and more to do with what your packs are telling you. Did you open up a lot of fast, aggressive creatures? Aggro might be your plan. Did you open up a lot of counterspells, creature removal, and a few larger creatures that can finish up a game? Control is probably the way to go. What do both of these things have in common? You are evaluating your deck based on ALL of the cards, not just a few (or one that you really like). It is better to have a deck full of cards that all work together than a deck with one or two REALLY good cards and a bunch of . . . “meh” to support them.

• Don’t feel like you have to use the guild you chose a pack from. If you chose Rakdos (red and black) as your guild for the prerelease, but the rest of your packs had very few playable red and black cards, that color combination might not be right for your deck. Instead, look to see which colors have the quality and quantity you will need to succeed.

• You don’t have to include every rare you open! While it can be tempting to fall back on a formula like rarity = power level, it’s more important to play with cards that can functionally win a game of magic. For example, in a Gatecrash Sealed tournament I would include  a Disciple of the Old Ways (common) over an Unexpected Results (rare) almost every time. One is an aggressive creature that beats many others in combat, while the other is a sorcery that will not function better than simply drawing a card that affects the game directly.

• Don’t include cards in your deck simply because they are “on-color”. Even if your deck has a lot of powerful cards in any given color, don’t put in bad (underpowered or very little use) cards to fill in those last 2-3 slots you need to make your deck 40 cards. If you have enough good cards in a 3rd (or sometimes 4th) color, it is often better to “splash” (put in lands to support) for that color for 4-6ish strong cards. In Dragon’s Maze and other sets where you will have access to lands which tap for more than 1 color, this is particularly powerful if you have the special lands (like guildgates and the rare shocklands) to support it.

There’s certainly a lot more to say about both deck-building and playing in Sealed (and other formats), but these core basics can take you a long way. Future articles will talk about other formats, more specific strategies for formats, and Magic theory. Most importantly, future articles can discuss whatever you want to know more about, so please leave comments, feedback, and suggestions! I hope to see everyone at the Dragon’s Maze prerelease, ready to kick some butt and have a great time. Remember, the most important rule of Magic is to have fun 

See you next time (but not really because I can’t see you through the computer – I’ll have to trust you’ll be there),

Lyon, Golgari Lich Lord

FCBD Sales

...oh, you want to know about the sales we're having?

We thought so:

* BACK ISSUES

- Buy any bagged and/or bagged-and-boarded comics priced $2.99 or less, get any comic $2.99 or less free

OR

- Fill a small box full of $0.99 bagged and/or bagged-and-boarded comics for $29.99 (small box included in the price).

Yes, you read that right. For $29.99, fill a small box of $0.99 comics!

* GRAPHIC NOVELS

- We're putting out over 100 GN's on clearance. Each of these specially marked titles will be BUY 1, GET 1 FREE!

AND

- Buy any regularly-priced, get a free #1 comic! Which #1's are we giving away? Guess you'll have to come in and find out.

* STATUES

- We're going to be marking down many of our high-end collectibles.

* TOYS

- We'll be marking down a lot of these, too!

....and then.

 The first 30 people through the door will each get a coupon for ONE FREE GRAPHIC NOVEL from the Clearance box.

Yeah ,that's right. Be one of the first people to come through, and you get a free GN (worth $19.99 or less)

Phew.

It's going to be a crazy day. Click here for more on the activities and guest artists appearing at the event!

Free Comic Book Day!

Saturday, May 4th!

Every year, all the comic publishers print up special comics for comic stores to give out on the first Saturday in May. This year, The Dragon's Den is proud to be giving away comics, hosting local creators, doing mega-sales (soon to be announced), running game demos and having a great time.

From 10 am, until whenever we run out of comics, we're going to have THOUSANDS of free comics available for you. Want to know what titles we've got coming?

I thought you would.

Aphrodite IX #1
Atomic Robo & Friends
Avengers Assemble Hulk Agents of Smash #1
Bleeding Cool Magazine
Bongo Free-For-All
Buck Rogers
DC Nation Super Sampler #1
DH Mass Effect Killjoys Ripd
Dh Star Wars Captain Midnight Avatar
Disney Fairies
Dragon Ball & Rurouni Kenshin Restoration
Marvel Infinity
Judge Dredd Classics
Sonic The Hedgehog Mega Man Flipbook
Spongebob Comics Freestyle Funnies
Steam Engines of Oz
Superman Special Edition
The Smurfs
TMNT New Animated Adventures
Valiant Masters Showcase Ed
Walking Dead Special (MR)
World of Archie Digest

... and much, much more!

People are welcome to grab 4 books but we do ask that if you want to take more than 4 that you make a $5 donation to our charity fundraiser!

In addition to all these comics we'll be giving away, we've also got several local creators coming in to do signings, show off their wares, and promote their awesome creator-owned product.

* FRANCO from TINY TITANS!

Local creator FRANCO will be in-store, doing free sketches and signing copies of TINY TITANS and SUPERMAN FAMILY ADVENTURES. 

Stop by on Saturday, May 4th!

Standard Top 8 as of 11/28

FREE Standard			11/28/2012
Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Evan Odden	370	240
2	John Franczak	351	176
3	Mike Cox	301	175
4	Will Shost	251	107
5	Dave Oppenheimer	245	110
6	Scott Fish	235	136
7	Carl Naumann	213	116
8	Scott Yager	199	122

Limited Top 8 as of 11/28

Limited			11/28/2012
Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Paul Lake	170	72
2	Will Shost	134	64
3	Douglas Kimball	109	50
4	Daniel Stockton	93	46
5	Alex Sherman	90	44
6	Carl Naumann	87	42
7	Mike Cox	83	45
8	Lyon Kressner	79	39

Competitive Legacy Top 8 as of 11/28

Legacy			11/28/2012
Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Rich Cali	154	81
2	Paul Lake	145	64
3	James Rynkiewicz	138	57
4	Casey Madrick	138	74
5	Janene Andersen	122	81
6	Steve Carpenter	118	58
7	Darryl Moss	97	74
8	Frank Kick	94	60

Competitive Standard Top 8 as of 11/28

Competitive Standard			11/28/2012
Rank	Name	Points	Matches
1	Scott Fish	111	81
2	Alex Sherman	109	64
3	Doug Kimball	103	52
4	Nick Langella	99	46
5	Steve Carpenter	89	46
6	Mica Buchanan	81	55
7	Kevin Jones	75	45
8	James Rynkiewicz	71	27

Magic Player of the Year, Competitive Legacy Update

As we are getting closer to the end of the year, I thought more players might like to know the Top 8 standings in each area of our Magic Player of the Year here at the Dragon's Den. If you are curious about the whole list, I posted last month complete lists. I'll also have a hard copy printed out in the store if you really want a look and hate being online...

Magic Player of the Year, Competitive Standard Update

As we are getting closer to the end of the year, I thought more players might like to know the Top 8 standings in each area of our Magic Player of the Year here at the Dragon's Den. If you are curious about the whole list, I posted last month complete lists. I'll also have a hard copy printed out in the store if you really want a look and hate being online...

Magic Player of the Year, Limited Update

As we are getting closer to the end of the year, I thought more players might like to know the Top 8 standings in each area of our Magic Player of the Year here at the Dragon's Den. If you are curious about the whole list, I posted last month complete lists. I'll also have a hard copy printed out in the store if you really want a look and hate being online...

Magic Player of the Year, Standard Update

As we are getting closer to the end of the year, I thought more players might like to know the Top 8 standings in each area of our Magic Player of the Year here at the Dragon's Den.  If you are curious about the whole list, I posted last month complete lists.  I'll also have a hard copy printed out in the store if you really want a look and hate being online...

October Dragon's Den Magic Player of the Year: Free Standard

This month I'm going to post the full list of everyone who has played Free Standard in the Den so far this year. We have currently had 293 unique players this year... some of whom have played in a lot of Free events. Click on the "Read More" link below to see the full list!

Thanks for playing at the Dragon's Den

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

October Dragon's Den Magic Player of the Year: Competitive Standard

This month I'm going to post the full list of everyone who has played competitive Standard in the Den so far this year. We have currently had 125 unique players this year... some of whom have played in a lot of competitive events. Click on the "Read More" link below to see the full list!

Thanks for playing at the Dragon's Den

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

October Dragon's Den Magic Player of the Year: Limited

This month I'm going to post the full list of everyone who has played limited in the Den so far this year.  We have currently had 359 unique players this year... some of whom have played in a lot of limited events.  Click on the "Read More" link below to see the full list!

Thanks for playing at the Dragon's Den

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

October Dragon's Den Magic Player of the Year: Competitive Legacy

This month I'm going to post the full list of everyone who has played Competitive Legacy in the Den so far this year. We have currently had 69 unique players this year... some of whom have played in a lot of Competitive Legacy events. Click on the "Read More" link below to see the full list!

Thanks for playing at the Dragon's Den

Sean "Striderlotr" Banks

Commander on a Budget with Ashling the Pilgrim

Between Vintage cards that cost hundreds of dollars a piece and some of the strangest deck building rules in Magic: the Gathering, Commander can be a tough format to break into. It’s also some of the most fun you can have with the game. Here’s a way to get started for under $75.

Marvel Now! - New #1's

Marvel is relaunching a significant number of their titles with new #1's over the next 5 months. Here's a list of what's available on Comixology, for your perusal.

October

Uncanny Avengers #1 -Half X-men, Half Avengers, by Rick Remender.
A Plus X #1 - 2 stories, one comic!
Minimum Carnage #1 - Carnage, Venom & Scarlet Spider come together.
AVX Consequences #1 - the 5-issue mini-series that trails the fallout from AvX!
Punisher War Zone #1 - The 5-issue mini-series that wraps up Greg Rucka's recent Punisher Run.
Daredevil End of Days #1 - Bendis and David Mack team up with Klaus Janson to write an epic, 8-part story about "how it all [would] end" for DD.
Wolverine Max #1 - The Max line puts out some terrific mature stories. This looks gritty.

November

Deadpool #1 - A new relaunch for the hooded'n'crazy one!
Fantastic Four #1 - Matt Fraction takes the FF on a wild ride outside time and space.
FF #1 - And then there's this.. Mike Allred returns to Marvel for a new FF series. His work on X-Statix 10 years ago is considered a cult classic. This might be a surprise hit.
X-Men Legacy #1 - This is different, a book about Xavier's crazy/powerful son, Legion.
Captain America #1 - By the Allmighty Rick Remender of Uncanny X-force.
Thor God of Thunder #1 - One of two Thor titles, this one written by Jason Aaron
Iron Man #1 - Kieron Gillen and Greg Land take over the adventures of Tony Stark.
Indestructible Hulk #1 - Mark Waid (DAREDEVIL) joins Lenil Francis Yu for a new volume of Big Green.
All New X-Men #1 - Bendis brings the original 5 X-Men to the future, to see the havoc brought on by the events of Avengers vs. X-Men.

December

Cable and X-Force #1 - 1 of 2 X-Force books, this is Cable and his team... on the run.
Avengers Arena #1 - Battle Royale meets the Runaways/Young Avengers/Avengers Academy & more.!
Avengers #1 - Jonathan Hickman, fresh off his epic Fantastic Four run, takes over Avengers!
Thunderbolts #1 - This is a team of dangerous misfits, led by Red Hulk Thunderbolt Ross.

January

Dexter #1 - Written by the creator of Showtime's hit show!
Uncanny X-Force #1 - The return of Mohawk Storm makes this awesome on it's own.
New Avengers #1 - A book featuring the team of the Illuminati. 
Superior Spider-Man #1 - Who is the new Spider-Man? What happened to Peter Parker?
Savage Wolverine #1 - Frank Cho writing AND drawing? This should be interesting.
Young Avengers #1 - A strange mix of heroes, including Loki. Looking forward to this.
Morbius Living Vampire #1 - The famous vampire gets his own series!

February

Guardians of the Galaxy #0.1 - The cosmic heroes return!
Nova #1 - A new Nova, a new Series.
Uncanny X-men #1 - Cyclops' team is together, and so is his school.
Fearless Defenders #1 - Misty Knight and Valkyrie together? Awesome mix.
Secret Avengers #1 - Nick Fury leads a new covert team.. including Phil Coulson?

(Now I want one of those Coulson Lives t-shirts)

March

Age of Ultron #1- The next great Marvel event starts here!
Wolverine #1 - Logan gets his own ongoing, yet again.

Kaijudo Review Part Two

As promised, this is the second part of my Kaijudo review. Today I will talk about how to play the game, and discuss the different aspects of the cards themselves. As before, please feel free to ask questions or make comments!

Kaijudo Review Part One

Kaijudo. You may have heard this word recently, and wondered exactly what it was. Perhaps you saw an episode on the HUB channel, or your children have asked you for the cards, or you listened to a commercial for it online. Or, just maybe, you're one of the many gamers who are eagerly awaiting an opportunity to prove your skills at one of our tournaments starting in September.

Regardless of which category you fit into, I'm sure that this review will help to answer some questions about this exciting new CCG from Wizards of the Coast. I'll divide it into two parts; Part One will detail all the current releases for Kaijudo, whereas Part Two will be about the gameplay, and card types.

When You Play The Game of Dice, You Crit or You Die

"Geek Chic" is everywhere these days.  From t-shirts to movies, "geeky" stuff has taken the world by storm.  From zombies to comics to swords and sorcery, it's what people are talking about...and most, if not all, of it has either a direct root in gaming or has been turned into a popular game of its own.

Take a look at "Game of Thrones".  Here's a wildly popular TV show, based on some award-winning books written by George R.R. Martin.  One of his early books in 1977 contained the inspiration for the classic D&D monster known as the githyanki. Now, Game of Thrones has a Living Card Game, a board game (now in its second edition), two different roleplaying games, and a video game of its very own.

As he relates in this podcast interview, Martin got his start in the 50's playing chess and monopoly. After he got out of college, he made his living as a chess tournament director.  In the 80's, he started playing Call of Cthulhu, Paranoia, the Morrow Project, and other RPGs...and then he ran Superworld, a superhero RPG.  He'd play with them 'til 4AM, getting hugely addicted to the game--and then, with the people he played with, he went on to write the Wild Cards superhero series of novels based on the characters and stories in his game.

So, the next time you run into someone who looks down on gamers, let them know that without them, we wouldn't have a Game of Thrones.  Do you know any other famous folks who are gamers?  Let us know!