Gay Marriage

I’m a fan of calling it “gay marriage”. It’s my prefered term because I find it hilarious that we need to be more specific when people of the same sex get married. I marry a woman, I’m “married”. I marry a man, I’m “gay married”. Even if the balls don’t touch.

I also find it baffling that people even care. I really don’t understand what’s so upsetting about balls touching. I, too, think it’s gross, but that’s why I don’t partake. Just like I don’t eat food I dislike. I’m not gonna make it illegal for someone else to eat mushrooms, though.

We humans and the shit we take too seriously… We’re hilarious.

WoW and leveling

When discussions of leveling in World of Warcraft come up, it’s usually unanimous that it’s best to do a DPS build to get max level the fastest. The theory is perfectly sound, and I agree with it for the most part. The faster you kill enemies, the faster you get XP for killing them, gather all 20 bear asses, and turn in your load of quests. It works, and the math agrees.

I have two toons I commonly play whenever WoW drags me back in, and it’s a Fire Mage and a Prot Warrior. I have a hard time deciding which is the alt and which is the main, but I also don’t really care and find such labels to be pretty meaningless concerning the two. They’re both super fun to play, and they’re as different as night and day, and I love them both like primaries.

When leveling up, the Mage would make quick work of any enemies he had to fight. What else would you expect? His job is to deal damage. Another role isn’t even an option. There are nuances, though. My Mage would kill one enemy at a time, because pulling more than that meant one of the multiple enemies would make it to him before it died, and he’s a glass cannon. Getting near the mage is a no-no. He could handle an extra add here or there in a pinch, but that’s only when he  had to deal with more than one. The more adds he has to deal with, the less DPS he does (because he has to spend proportionally more resources just surviving), the slower he progresses. I wouldn’t even attack enemies if I could get through an area, and to an objective of some kind, without pulling anything.

The Warrior is altogether different. The Warrior could be wreckless when going to objectives. Anything attacking him won’t hurt him enough to worry about, and then he can just kill it and get a bit more experience and vendor trash. When killing mobs for a quest (whether the quest wants you to kill them or simply get loot from them, you gotta kill them either way), the Warrior would mount up, round up as many as possible, and then kill them in a big pile. Now, if the Warrior dealt significantly less damage than the Mage, this wouldn’t mean anything. It would make up for the time between the fights, especially with the ten to fifteen seconds it takes to round them all up into a worthwhile pile. He does deal less damage than the mage, but not by all that much. In fact, at some points during leveling, I’d say the Warrior was dealing a touch more  than the Mage.

What does this mean, and why does that make leveling as a Prot Warrior a good idea?

This means that the Warrior can kill more enemies simultaneously, clearing the same number of mobs in less time because there’s no time in-between the fights. Further, with the right selection of talents, you do more DPS the more mobs you have rounded up, which means you kill them faster still. The Warrior isn’t worried about being attacked without a plan, because he can handle it without problems if it happens. Because the Warrior has more survivability, he’s going to spend less time dead and, thus, running to his corpse instead of leveling. He’s also going to spend less time running when a mob he didn’t plan on fighting joins in. The damage difference isn’t significant. The Warrior may kill things a touch more slowly, but rounding them up and killing them all at once makes it happen all that much faster total. The fact that the Prot Warrior’s DPS increases with more adds and the Mage’s DPS decreases (at least, when there’s not a tank keeping them away from him) mean the Warrior’s DPS can increase beyond the Mage’s if he rounds up enough enemies, mitigating DPS as a factor entirely. Add in a few self-heals and the Warrior is a non-stop murder machine.

Really, the only thing the Mage has going for him is a few tricks, but those are usually used to leave combat and otherwise avoid dying. The Mage is more mobile, in theory, from teleporting and such, but there’s no difference between teleporting to Stormwind and Hearthing there. It’s a cool utility which I love, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t think it helps gaining experience enough to even factor in. There are plenty of Mage utilities, and there’s kiting, but, ultimately, you’re still just a glass canon. If you press the wrong button in a tight situation, you’re probably about to die. If a Prot Warrior hits the wrong button when soloing, no bigs. Just hit the right button next time global cool-down cools down.

To top all of that, dungeons are a phenominal way to gain xp and decent gear, and a Prot Warrior tanking hardly has enough time to summon a mount before his dungeon’s ready to go, while I wait upwards of half an hour to get in with my Mage. This makes the dungeon finder and the experience and loot that comes with it better for leveling a Prot Warrior as well!

Now, this also got me wondering: Am I maging wrong? I mean, back in WotLK, my Mage unambiguously dealt far more damage than my Warrior. I mean, it was only something like 25-40% more when comparably geared, but it was certainly more. It made maging feel powerful. Also, they’re both only recently maxed at 100, so maybe the end-game gear will make up for the difference? I don’t know, but I do know my Warrior leveled to 100 faster than the mage, because he killed more mobs, faster.

Also, wasn’t mana something you had to occasionally replenish? I remember running out, now I regenerate it too fast to even look at it. I get a full bar every time my global cool-down cools down, so what the hell? Is that by design? I can’t even burn it down when I get curious and spend as much as possible just to see if I can, so… yeah, I thought that was weird.

Deck v Deck: Weenie v Genesis

So I recently created a deck based around Enter-Battlefield effects. It was originally a Green/Red big-creatue/enter-battlefield/burn deck, but all decks evolve from their original form as I get more cards and figure out what would serve the deck better. The deck still has the same problem of being weak in the first handful of rounds, but it’s rounds thereafter see swift recovery leading to overwhelming force. That’s partly why it’s named “Genesis”. It starts slowly, but then explodes into action. I still only rate it at about a 4.5 out of ten, even though play-testing has shown it to have become effective.

Next up is a deck you’ve seen a lot of; Weenie. It’s only very slightly modified since last time, and is still my best deck in general, rating a solid 6 out of ten.

Round One
Genesis
Genesis won the roll, and so goes first. It plays a Forest, followed by a Font of Fertility.

Weenies
Nothing but a plains, then pass.

Round Two
Genesis
Genesis plays a Mountain, then sacrifices the Font for another Mountain.

Weenies
Calmly, Weenie plays an Island and passes turn.

Round Three
Genesis
One Forest is played, then Purphoros, God of the Forge is summoned.

Genesis tries to pass turn, but Weenie casts a quick Sound the Alarm first.

Weenie
Another Plains and Weenie plays Thassa, God of the Sea, keeping the two tokens on standby in case Genesis tries any Haste shenanigans.

Round Four
Genesis
Genesis plays a Mountain and then a Voyaging Satyr, dealing two damage to Weenie via Purphoros, and passes turn.

Weenie
Weenie plays a Plains and casts a Paragon of New Dawn.

Then Weenie attacks with the two tokens, which go unblocked and deal four damage.

Round Five
Genesis
Genesis taps some Forests and a Mountain, then untaps and retaps the Mountain to cast Forgeborn Oreads, dealing 1 damage from the Oreads and 2 damage from Purphoros to Weenie.

Weenie
Weenie plays a Plains and goes straight into the attack.

Genesis does not block, since it wants to keep the one blocker it has. Weenie whips out Dictate of Heliod, increasing the damage done from 4 to 8.

Round Six
Genesis
Genesis plays another Mountain, then plays a Spawn of Thraxes, dealing four damage to the Paragon, killing it, and Purphoros does 2 to Weenie.

Weenie
Foreboding, Weenies passes turn immediately after drawing.

Round Seven
Genesis
After drawing, Genesis plays another Voyaging Satyr, followed by Xenagos, God of Revels. They’re both creatures as they enter play, thus Purphoros deals four damage to Weenie. Since Xenagos is also an enchantment, the Oread triggers and deals one more damage to Weenie.

Weenie
Weenie is drawing a poor hand, apparently, as it passes turn after drawing once again.

Round Eight
Genesis
After Drawing, Genesis taps all of it’s mana producing cards, then casts an Eidolon of Blossoms, triggering the Oread and itself. One damage to Weenies and one freshly drawn card, and then he plays a Roaring Primadox. Both creatures activate Purphoros, dealing four more damage to Weenie.

Weenie plays another Raise the Alarm before Genesis closes out his turn.

Weenie
Weenie attacks with all four tokens immediately after drawing. Genesis blocks with both gods, the Spawn, and the Primadox.

Weenie raises the bar with another Dictate of Heliod, making all his tokens 5/5. This kills off the Spawn and the Primadox, and all but one token.

Weenie passes turn.

Round Nine
Genesis
Unfortunately for Weenie, Genesis had another Spawn. Playing it with Purphoros in play totals six damage to Weenie.

Weenie obviously had bad luck with cards drawn, but that Genesis even competed was unprecedented, let alone won! I was so surprised that I played another game after this one. Genesis won that one too, even though Weenie had better luck drawing. I’m still loathe to move Genesis’ rating up, though. Like Plus Ones, it needs time to build up momentum, so a deck that starts out faster might utterly dominate the early game and win.

Next time, I’m thinking it should play Minotards. With a decent hand, Minotards packs a lethal punch by turn five, which is about when Genesis gets up to speed. The two decks work with opposite strategies. Minotards packs as much punch as possible as soon as possible, granting it has a decent hand for it. Genesis, on the other hand, builds up momentum in order to crush the opponent in mid to late game, and is mostly defenseless before then.

Oddly, Weenies is built to do both. It has several cards to allow early game effectiveness, and it gains power with time as well, through numbers AND strength. I guess its early game punch simply doesn’t outweigh Genesis’ momentum.

I also think it would be weak to control decks. If you burn Genesis’ mana ramp and kill anything that allows it to draw/put-into-play extra cards, it’s going to flounder. Just imagine if Weenie got more of its blue cards. Or if Purphoros wasn’t drawn on turn one, there would be much less damage flying at Weenie. Genesis is reliant on keeping it’s creatures around. I may try it against my Blue/Black control deck and see if it’s as effective. Without being allowed to accelerate it’s library consumption, or somehow making it mill itself, it’s no powerhouse in late game.

Well, I guess we’ll see next time!

Deck v Deck; Weenie v Minotards

On the right, we have Weenies, only slightly modified since its last game against Plus Ones. That game disheartened Weenies, because they only lost due to their opponents strategy instead of their own awesomeness. They will play against them again, just not quite yet.

On the left we have Minotards, an angry, red/black, tribal deck based on Minotaurs. It earned it’s nickname through being stupid enough to mana-screw. The minotaurs think they’re tough and don’t need mana. It’s been their downfall since day one, but when the mana flows properly they’re a very solid, relatively fast-paced deck.

Turn One
Minotards
Minotards wins the roll and goes first. They drop a Temple of Malice, keeping the scry card on top.

Weenies
Being a weenie deck, Weenies drops a Plains and taps for a Favored Hoplite.

Turn Two
Minotards
Playing a Swamp, casting a Nyxborn Rollicker, and smiling evilly, Minotards passes turn.

Weenies
A tad miffed about something, Weenies scratches his head, plays an Island, then attacks with his Hoplite.

Minotards doesn’t want to lose his Satyr just yet, so he takes the damage.

Round Three
Minotards
After drawing, Min plays a Mountain, taps his lands, and plays a Ragemonger, his anti-tard. These are specifically in this deck to prevent the mana-screw the minotaurs are so fond of. He then attacks with the Rollicker, dealing a damage to the poor sap on the other side of the table.

Weenies cannot block.

Weenies
After playing an Island, Weenies pops out his Preeminent Captain, his answer to mana-screw.

Turn Four
Minotards
Slyly grinning, Min taps his Swamp for another Ragemonger.

Then Min taps the temple for a Rageblood Shaman.

Then Min taps his Mountain for another Rageblood Shaman!

Those two Ragemongers sure are paying out in allowing this kind of shenanigan! Min follows it all up by attacking with a 4/5 Ragemonger.

Weenies has a plan for his soldiers, though, and he takes it.

Weenies
Weenies hides his plan well, as he plays an island and passes turn.

Turn Five
Minotards
Knowing the key against a 1/1 token deck is to keep its numbers down and remain aggressive, Min jumps right into action, attacking immediately after playing a Kragma Warcaller.

Weenies lacks any signs of anxiety as he declares that he blocks both Shamen with his puny soldiers.

Min raises his finger to declare the soldiers dead, but notices Weenies tapping two Islands and a Plains. Then he tosses a card on the table; Polymorphist’s Jest just turned all of Min’s creatures into 1/1 blue frogs.

Min lowers his finger, surprised and sad for his own shenanigan being blown off by such a shenanigan.

Two damage still got through, though, and Min is hardly defeated, so he sits back and waits. His Warcaller is fine. He has next turn’s attack, yet.

Weenies
Proud of his silly, blue trick, Weenies plays an Island, then passes turn.

Turn Six
Minotards
A tad humbled by that last trick, Min decides to remain aggressive to reduce the risk of Weenies drawing another such trick. After casting a Gnarled Scarhide for free, an Oracle of Bones is cast. Weenies pays the tribute, making it 5/3.

Min jumps into the attack all his golden minotaurs.

Weenies blocks the Warmonger with his Captain and a Ragemonger with the Hoplite.

Then casts Polymorphist’s Jest.

One of Min’s frogs gets through.

One damage to Weenies.

Weenies
Weenies smiles at his fortune, having two Jests in hand on turn one. Remaining defensive, he taps the Hoplite to help cast Obelisk of Urd, then passes turn.

Turn Seven
Minotards
Min finally draws a new Swamp, but has nothing to cast. None of his minotaurs can get by the 4/4 Captain, so he tries to see what playing defensively is like.

Weenies
Weenies finally has the opportunity to be aggressive. He starts off by casting another Captain.

He then casts Launch the Fleet on both the Hoplite and his first Captain. The Holpite gets a +1/+1 token and takes no damage this turn.

Weenies attacks with both. Thanks to Launch the Fleet, two attacking 1/1 soldiers pop onto the board, and the Captain wants help from the Paragon of New Dawns that was in hand.

Min has sone decision-making to do, since the Paragon and Obelisk mean each of Weenies weenies is at least 4/4. He blocks the Captain with the Satyr and the Paragon with his Oracle.

The Oracle and the Paragon kill eachother, and the Satyr dies horribly.

Unfortunately, all damage is assigned simultaneously, so the Paragon’s bonus adds to the damage that was not blocked.

Turn Eight
Minotards
Min finally has his full dose of five mana with the drawing of a Swamp, but he chooses to remain defensive and passes turn.

Weenies
Straight into the attack, Weenies has a good idea the one card Min’s holding won’t be enough to save him.

Min admits he has nothing and doesn’t block.

Conclusion; Weenies operated almost exactly the way it’s supposed to operate when forced into a defensive posture. However, while Minotards gained momentum quickly, it was still Minotarded. It had Rollick of Abandon since turn one, but couldn’t afford to cast it until it became more harmful than beneficial. You can always rely on Minotards to hold out on mana. If Minotards had five lands on turn five, the game would have gone undeniably in its favor by casting Rollick, destroying both of the soldiers in play then and empowering his attack. It didn’t, though. Weenies is only slightly iffy on this win, but does not deny it’s status as a true win, since luck is a factor of the game.

Deck v Deck; Weenie v Plus Ones

So I’ve recently gotten back into Magic; The Gathering. I was into it almost twenty years ago, and started again about 4 or 5 months ago. As I get more cards and new expansions come out, I make new decks. With the last expansion, my reintroduction to the game, I had three primary decks going. Now that we have M15, it’s time for new decks. How do we determine the new deck’s worth? Well, defeat of the old ones, of course!

Weenie;
On the rookie side of the table we have Weenie, a white/blue soldier deck. Originally designed around creatures with effects on entering the battlefield, it’s momentum quickly switch towards soldiers with a few blue tricks as it was modified for increased effectiveness. It’s strengths are numbers and trickiness, with the weakness of decreased speed compared to other weenie decks.

Rating; 7/10

Plus Ones;
The returning champion is a green/white/blue deck which focuses on +1/+1 counters, also with a particular trick provided by blue. It’s strengths are stamina and raw power, but its weakness is an extremely slow startup, and we can’t ignore the problem three colors may cause.

Rating; 6/10

Turn One
Plus Ones
The returning champion won the roll and takes the first turn. As I reported, the deck comes with a slow startup, so after playing a Temple of Plenty and placing the scry card on the bottom of the deck, it passes turn.

Weenie
While Weenie is faster than Plus Ones, it’s still slower than other weenie decks due to a notable lack of 1-casters. It plays a plains and passes turn.

Turn Two
Plus Ones
Having been given a turn without attack, P1s plays a Transguild Promenade to ensure variety of mana, then passes turn.

Weenie
Finally within its two-mana casting minimum on turn two by playing an Island, Weenie passes turn, which is a pleasant surprise for P1s.

Turn Three
Plus Ones
P1s gets to untap both tapped lands, which it likes. It plays a Temple of Enlightenment and keeps the scry card on top. It grins as it plays its favorite creature, it’s prize puppy; Sage of Hours.

Weenie
A tad impressed, Weenie plays another Plains, then casts Spear of Heliod. It either got a bad hand or is unconcerned about defenses just yet.

Turn Four
Plus Ones
Another Temple of Plenty and keeping the scry on top, P1s casts a Satyr Grovedancer and pops the +1/+1 counter on the Sage, then passes turn. Maybe the lack of an attack was due to not wanting to risk the Sage to the Spear, even though Weenies is tapped out, but whatever.

Weenie
Weenie plays no lands this turn, making that bad hand idea have more merit. It does, however, play a Preeminent Captain, then passes turn.

Turn Five
We can see the “slow” claims coming to fruition, but Weenie also seems to have suffered a bad hand. Turn five and not a single attack. Unusual.

Plus Ones
Another turn of basically nothing, and probable death for the Sage if P1s attacks, so the scryland scried card goes to the bottom of the deck and the turn is passed. This game is getting a tad boring, no?

Weenies
After drawing, Weenies plays another Plains and passes turn.

Seriously; Into turn six and I’m bored.

Turn Six
Plus Ones
P1s plays its first basic land, a Plains. It then casts a second Sage and a Reap What You Sow, giving both Sages two counters and one for the Satyr.

P1s then casts Aqueous Form on the first Sage, bringing his counter total up to four, then that Sage attacks. The Aqueous Form makes him unblockable, and Weenies takes 5 damage.

Just before P1s passes turn, Weenies casts Raise the Alarm, gaining a few 1/1 white Soldier tokens, which are 2/2 thanks to the spear.

Weenies
Weenies untaps, draws, then uses all four lands and the two tokens to cast Obelisk of Urd.

Weenies then attacks with his newly 5/5 Preeminent Captain, allowing him to put a Paragon of New Dawns into play, tapped and also attacking. The Paragon is 5/5 and the Captain 6/6.

P1s blocks the Captain with the Satyr and takes 5 damage from the Paragon.

Turn Seven
Plus Ones
Plus Ones casts Solidarity of Heroes right out the gate, Striving it to target both Sages. Since they’re both targets they each get another token, then SoH doubles the number on both. This gives the Aqueous Sage 10, and his buddy 6.

P1s attacks with the Aqueous Sage and takes Weenies down to 4 life.

Weenies
Weenies gets a sly grin on his face, curious why, and thankful, P1s did not attack with both Sages. He starts things off with a Launch the Fleet, striving it to target the Paragon as well as both tokens.

Weenies attacks with everything, spawning three attacking Soldier tokens and the Captain popping another Preeminent Captain.

With eight creatures of at least 5/5 charging at P1s and only one creature with which to block, that ends the game for P1s.

Conclusion; While Weenies was the victor even with a poor starting hand, P1s played far too conservatively, as well. One attack could have ended the game, but it wanted to keep a blocker around to be safe. Against a weenie deck, you can count on overwhelming numbers, though, so it needs to fall out of it’s conservative habits. Weenie also bided it’s time. It may be a functioning strategy against a slow deck, but it’s almost always a good idea to get creatures out as soon as possible. We also didn’t get to see any blue tricks from it, and P1s could have taken two extra turns before Weenies won. It appears the decks are about even, but P1s had a poor strategy which was ultimately responsible for its loss.