Sunday, August 14, 2011

3,000

Ay ay ay
Already on the 3k $ mark :D
My Magic collection has grown quite alot. But i still only have 2 playable decks and not that many good cards to trade. arguably i have tons of valuable cards in the collection but those are a no-go! I recently got 2 Shards of Alara boxes and obviously got almost all the cards from the set. It was interesting for me to find out that Oblivion Ring was a common in that set but now in M12 its an uncommon. There were some good cards in the shards of alara but most of them are just good commons that you can use in some legacy decks. The rares overall are mediocre and not that expensive. There is the Etherium Master that i so much love and im planning to build an artifact deck based on the one from the first Duels of The Planeswalkers game.
I still do as many drafts as i can. Altho because im usually at the store mid-day i miss the first 1-2 and can never do too many even if i want. Still its tons of fun. Im getting better but the first place is yet to be mine.
Last draft i did was crazy. it was one Scars, Besieged and Phyrexia booster. So the carads and the decks were very weird. I took 7th place X_X I felt like the deck was good but maybe i misplaced some cards and later i realised i passed on some good cards that at the time i thought are useless in draft.
Drafting M12 even tho its a bit boring for me now is alot easier because i have more experience.
Im thinking of getting a legacy deck but they are oh so expensive and if i build one ill probably spend all my MtG funds on it. (i`ve set a budget of about 1,300$ per month as my limit). Yeah good Legacy decks are THAT expensive.

I should probably make a new standard deck. Im thinking some kind of white-blue control. Its more fun to play and the valakut is getting stale for me. But i really feel that Innistrad will be the time when i become a competitive standard player because it will remove the whole zendikar block from standard and we will only have scars block innistrad and M12 to play with. So alot less cards to use for decks and more time to level up and rack up some experience for the expansions.

I havent been posting here much because i am currently working on a Die2Nite blog and i was sick for a week aswell so i had no time to write stuff down here. You know how i am . . . i get hyped with one thing and then i move on to the next one. Ive never really been a regular poster here. Its always been spikes of posts and then couple of weeks/months of silence.
And due to my throat infection and girlfriend and playing magic my gaming average has dropped so low. I barely have time to play anything on my PC anymore. On steam right now i have played 4.1 hours in 2 weeks! TWO FUCKING WEEKS! Thats like 29 minutes of gaming per day X_X
And there already hints about the next WoW expansion sigh....i wish i had more time to play wow and otehr games. There still things i want to achieve over there :(

The old republic and diablo 3 are hopefully both coming by the end of the year and im very excited about those games. But ill probably end up just testing them out a bit on release and then just make em collect dust on my start up menu.
I have such a huge back log of books,games and manga. Its crazy.

Anyway i g2g.
Keep it real guys!

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Second Draft- Second Place

MAGIC THE GATHERING

Well well well . . .
After missing like 4 drafts i finally managed to sign up for my 2nd draft ever. Before that i was scouting the deck lists at wizards.com and decided to build myself a valakut deck because i always liked that nasty mountain. The deck costed me 147$ with 2 missing cards. Actually 6. . . because there were no overgrown battlements but i replaced those with rampant growth. And now im thinking of switching the growth for a Llonawar Elves because i kinda like having the option of blocking if the early pressure becomes problematic. The deck is fun still have to do some practice and figure out which hands are good to start with and which i should mulligan. On 2v2 however the deck performs really well. When you can afford to take some extra damage at the start of a match it becomes very easy to ramp up the mana and start dropping Primeval Titans like crazy + theres the insane Avenger of Zendikar that late game becomes just mindblowingly strong. I like this deck and i think its much better suited to compete at FNM than my current vampires. + Valakut i am given to understand has been one of the top decks for awhile so its a tested strategy and hopefully ill get some wins this friday.

Now lets talk about the draft.
First of all the draft was really rich on rares. We had a Chandra and 3 Sorin Markovs (1 of which was FOIL) + a whole bunch of other cute cards. One guy said during the end pickings that 7th pick Inferno Titan will never ever happen again in a draft. Not sure how good the Inferno is but ill take his word for it, Couple of the guys even took picture of the cards before we started picking.

So we cracked open the boosters and on my first one i had a Gideon Lawkeeper and i have already experienced the awesomeness of that card and since there were no other cards that i really liked in the pack i passed it. Then i got passed another white card Gideons Avenger so i thought hey this is a good white card. . . and in the next few passes i kept getting alot of nice white cards. I took a couple of Griffins and Stonehorn Dignitary and it was like everything was arranged for me to get the white cards. Then during the 2nd pack i kept getting more and more cards. I got a Pacifism another Lawkeeper and Oblivion Ring and until the end of the 3rd pack i had 3x Stonehorns also drew a Day of Judgement, Timely Reinforcements and couple of other cute cards. I had to put couple of black ards to fill the last spots of the deck and since i got a Sengir Vampire which is a great bomb for drafting i put him and a Doomblade + 2x Consume Spirits which . . .turns out is not that good of a card in a 2 color deck. I never had too much black mana to spend on the spell so its efficiency was reduced for me. And for a good measure i dropped 2 Emperor Scepters which proved to be a very very good choice as that card pretty much helped alot in winning my games later.

So Round 1 Me (2) vs (0) Jeremy

He was playing a black deck i think he had some white cards but he never really got the chance to use them. At the start of our first game i managed to drop a lawkeeper and 2 defenders with 0/3 stats that kept his creatures at bay because everytime they block id get 3 life. He dropped down a Blood Seeker vampire and for a moment i was worried that this might bite me in the ass but next turn i drew my Personal Sanctuary and totally nullified the vampire`s effect. After that i was slowly chipping away his HP with 3 griffin an kept tapping his one flying insect so he cant atk me. He managed to drop a nasty blue creature that for 1 mana put the top 2 cards of my deck in my graveyard. And even tho he removed some lands for me which was cool later on as the turns kept rolling i lost some good creatures. Eventually i drew my 2nd lawkeeper and then started tapping that remover too. Chipping away with a scepter and a griffin until i finally got my sengir vampire and it was pretty much GG so he surrendered.
Second game went alot faster as i got better draws. I dont remember exactly how that played out but i got him early on again and this time i had more creatures to use. In retrospect beyond my Sengir i didnt really have a bomb creature in my deck. Tho i had alot of good defenses and a bunch of flyers i guess i was kinda betting on the flying damage to win me my games.

Round 2 Me (2) vs (1) Francis

This baby won me the match against Francis
Now Francis beat a guy that ive seen win alot of drafts and alot of my decisions in the deck were made with the idea of defending against Kam`s aggresive black-red bloodthirst builds. But he got eliminated by Francis in the 1st round so  i was like yay great...maybe i have a chance now.
The 1st game went really bad for me. I was trying to hold on and i managed to draw my creature control spells but everytime i took care of one of his bombs he just summoned another one. He had fat green creatures a big fat vampire, he had the Inferno Titan and even Chandra was in his deck. So the first game he completely smashed me and i was kind of losing faith. I got intimidated by his big bombs and saw no real way to handle him.
2nd game however he had to mulligan so he had a smaller starting hand. It was very close and i barely stole that game. The Emperor Scepters were a big part of my vinctory and i even forgot to hit him couple of times.  But eventually i won.
3rd game was rather epic. First turns it was going slow and i even managed to do some damage. And then he started unloading his big bombs again. But i had a doomblade, pacifism and oblivion ring in my hand i was confident ill hold the line. I killed one of his fatties with the doomblade  and then i drew my day of judgment and the very next turn he dropped his big vampire and i cleared the board with a big smile on my face. But he had put the inferno titan in his hand with the ability from the vampire and summoned him the very next turn. I dropped my pacifism on that i had countered pretty much all his finisher now. I was getting the upper hand and i was trying to do some damage with the scepters. He got his chandra X_X But again my oblivion Ring came to save the day. There was some punching between us and then a lucky timely reinforcements and one consume spirits won me the game. I was very excited and happy. Only my second draft and i was going to face Byron to fight it off for the first place!

Round 3 Me (0) vs (2) Byron
Well i knew i had a pretty good deck and i was hoping to give Byron a run for his money but i couldnt handle him. He even made me an offer to draw and just play for fun to see who gets first pick because sometimes one of us might end up in 3rd place instead of 2nd which i think has something to do with % win rates and whatnot during the report. But i wanted to fight it off and just have fun with it. I lost but it was all good. It would not have felt right to just get that draw and try to secure a card pick. At the end i still got my 2nd place and i got the foil Sorin Markov as my first pick so i was pretty happy. I also drew the day of judgment and 1 land that i was missing from my collection of M12 and then the personal sanctuary enchant simply because there were not any other good cards to pick up. All in all it was a great event i had fun and i got better and hopefully ill keep improving and one of these days ill get to be the winner and get the first pick :D

Well thats it for today.
Keep it real and ill see you guys next time.

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Booster Boxes

Magic The Gathering

+240 AU$
Wah okay so after the M12 booster box i got a new phyrexia and i got to say that + the fat pack i got 2 weeks ago it almost got me the whole set. Which is really cool. On one hand if i just ordered 1 card of each i would have probably saved some cash BUT considering i already got all the top and expensive rares its not much of a deal. And by cracking boosters i get to keep alot of cards including rares  for trade. Im sorry i didnt post the booster list but it does take time and i was lazy.
All lands in the set are gorgeous.
Yesterday i spent the entire day with my gf driving around Sydney and chilling out on the beach and eating sushi. Then later that night i made a very quick stop to the store and shocked Norman with 2 boosoter boxes from Zendikar. I was really itchy to get my hands on that set because he found me the Rise of the Eldrazi expansion but not the core set from the block. So now from my last count i need 12 cards from Zendikar which i think again is pretty good. I got 3 foil rares!!! Uber lucky :D Overall the set doesnt have that many expensive or good cards. But it does have shit loads of strong lands which are used in pretty much all competitive decks. Wherever its standard, extended or legacy we are talking about. So yeah that was cool and also Zendikar has those super pretty full sized basic land cards which are kinda hard to get. Couldnt draw a single foil tho :(

I think i kinda rushed this month with my Magic purchases and i think ill lay back a lil bit. Do some more drafts when i can and plan out my artifact deck. I know im close to collecting the entire standard but there is no real rush and i still got to send some extra $ to my mother in order for her to finish the kitchen in the unit.

Got a GPS too because recently i am having alot of trips to places i dont know so i decided now is a good time to get one. The brand name is Garmin and is really an amazing toy. Shiny and sleeck. . . . reminds me of an iPhone lolz. The navigation is amazing tons of info on the display including speed limits and camera locations + on tricky roads it actually shows me an image of the road and points to me which street to take. And in the city has a 3D map with buildings and stuff. And the best part is that its a national gps so i can use it all over Oz. AAAAND it even has a map of New Zealand for a good measure. It will come in handy when i go to visit Peter Jackson for coffee one day :D

So thats it for todays post. Keep it real and ill see you guys next time!
Yours Azzy

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Drafting and Zombies

Lal the new season of Die2Nite has finally started. The update got delayed for 24 hours but its now here. There is obviously a huge public outrage because of the meta  cap. Even tho we had weeks of whining on the world forums. Still the cap is 20 instead of the french 15 so hey...cheers for the small victories eh?
On the other hand the construction tab is not working so now new towns cant build. However Epoq posted that the issue has been fixed and should be ok tommorow morning. There alot of new features and i think the game will become very dynamic this way. I made a quick jump even tho there only 3 hours before argh because i want to try some stuff and i need 7 more days to unlock another rucksack slot which is probably the best skill in the game.
We have a new hero power called architect but i have no idea when that will get unlocked. I think the new blueprint mechanic will be awesome and will really push players to go out and take advantage of auto-searching. Rulesy`s map app is being taken down not sure why but i wont be surprised if he got upset with the update.
There is some kind of unique special power called "Pre-war camera" which you only get if you subscribe for 6 months of hero time.....i want it but i will hold onto my money for now until somebody else gets it and says what the bloody hell does it do.


Also in the Magic world i did my first draft today which was super fun. I made a green/white deck with enchants as some kind of a semi-winning combo. I had a draw on my first game but i was winning the 3rd match so i was very upset we didnt have the time to finish :(
I won my 2nd round rather easily and then got my ass whooped by the eventual winner and his damn agro bloodthirst deck X_X
Drafting proved a very interesting and fun format. The challange of making deck by being passed cards from other players is exciting indeed. I think i did fairly good but more practice is needed. I wanted to do a 2nd draft but i was just soo hungry so i went out to buy myself some food and because of that my spot got taken by another player. I did however get a New Phyrexia booster box and with the draft and 100 basic sleeves for the deck i spent another 180$ on MtG. So i think ive reached my cap for the next 30 days. Maybe 100$ more for some cards for my standard deck or something but yeah...ill try to avoid spending alot of cash on the collection.
Considering how much i enjoyed the draft today i really hope i can attend the FNM event tommorow. Who knows what kind of crazy decks people will bring on the battlefield. xD

Also went to my GFs place and watched a new movie by Donnie Yen. But it turned out it was 2nd part and she had seen the first one so it was i who was left in the dark wondering exactly what was going on. The movie was pretty good the fighting sequences were great but the story was a bit hard for me to understand. Too many historical movies in chinese cinema lately. I guess its a big thing right now but for outsiders like me it makes relating to the characters a bit hard. On the other hand i got 2 other movies. 1 from singapore and 1 japanese both seem promising. Maybe ill post reviews after i see them.

Yours Azzy

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

MtG Collection Vol. 1

1,830.80 AU$ laying on my bed :D
Hehe here`s the pic of my whole collection :D I reckon its pretty impressive for under 1 month :P
Im planning to attend my first FNM event tommorow night. Lets hope nothing unexpected happens at work. And also doing some research for my next deck. Im going to GGS today too to do some practice with my vampires and test some of the new card ideas i have.
And to brag about my foil Jace hehe ^_^

Since i was sick i decided to skip training this week and relax and get my strenght back. Next week im hitting the gym hardcore again and will go to check out the Gracie academy that is much closer to me and will be a better place to train BJJ. Also going to get some new weights for home so when im busy i can still do workouts.
And i should probably try and go to the bookstore to see if there some new releases. Im hoping for some Gantz and if im lucky maybe the missing Berserk volumes that prevent me from continuing my collection.

Keep It Real Guys and ill see you next time :)

Monday, July 18, 2011

Rise of the Eldrazi

MAGIC THE GATHERING

Cast Emrakul and its a GG baby!
Yay what a wild weekend i had. Every now and then i got overwhelmed by the amount of work i have. Sometimes things overlap and i have couple of days in a roll where i got to take care of tons of shit. Im pretty much used to this kind of thing now but this time i also managed to get a bit sick due to the unfriendly to astma weather. I missed the M12 release and i made up my mind that as soon as i find the time ill make a quick jump down to the store and try to get a booster box. Well i couldnt do that on monday as i had to write some reports and etc. But Today i checked what time the store will open and i was there like 10 minutes later. My homeboy Norman was on shift which was great and he also had a very very very pleasant surprise for me. A full Rise Of The Eldrazi set. And even tho that it is actually the 2nd expansion in the Eldrazi block it has whooping 248 cards in it! So i decided to  break tradition and buy it right away (even tho he could have saved it for me) and just get the Worldwake and Zendikar later. BUT i also wanted to go tru with my own plan to get a booster box from M12. . . .so that ment that ill have to cough up alot more $ than i originally anticipated.
So yeah.... X_X menu update on money spent: +503AU$     sigh . . . i think ill hold a bit on the collectors side and try to get some cards for another deck to play with. Im considering some new cards for my vampire deck aswell.

Also it appears that people can redeem cards from Magic Online and get a full set (1 card each) when they get enough cards or pts (i didnt ask for details). So that got me thinking on the way home....if i get a super old set in the game would they print a set and mail it to me aswell? Ill have to ask in the store next time i go. Because that might be one of the ways to obtain some of the tricky old cards. Oh boy i bet that will cost a fortune to do.

I also took some pictures of my MtG collection before putting the set into the folder pages or opening the boosters. Actually ill open the boosters now and will put a list of each rare i draw lets hope for some cool stuff and maybe 1-2 planeswalkers ^_^ (I mean google up the prices of Chandra and Jace. . . JEEEZUS!)
M12 BOOSTER BOX
1)  Birds Of Paradise
2)  Cemetery Reaper   (FOIL: Garruk`s Companion)
3)  Angelic Destiny 
4)  Phantasmal Image 
5)  Sundial of the Infinite 
6)  Reverberate 
7)  Solemn Simulacrum 
8)  Gideon Jura 
9)  Rites of Flourishing  (FOIL: Fireball)
10) Saturated Ghoul       (FOIL: Swamp)
11) Mind Unbound         (FOIL: !!! JACE, MEMORY ADEPT !!!) EPIC WIN
12) Warstorm Surge
13) Arachnus Spinner
14) Garruk`s Horde
15) Garruk, Primal Hunter
16) Cemetery Reaper
17) Adaptive Automaton
18) Skinshifter
19) Quicksilver Amulet
20) Throne of Empires
21) Dragonskull Summit (LAND)
22) Grand Abolisher
23) Dungrove Elder
24) Worldslayer
25) Visions of Beyond       (FOIL: Zombie Goliath)
26) Chandra`s Phoenix
27) Flameblast Dragon
28) Personal Sanctuary
29) Jace`s Archivist
30) Sunpetal Grove (LAND)   (FOIL: Azure Mage)
31) Rootbound Crag (LAND)
32) Day of Judgement
33) Time Reversal
34) Sun Titan                           (FOIL: Ice Cage)
35) Sphinx of Uthuun
36) Archon of Justice

There we go.....maaan that was alot of opening and alot of praying to the gods for cards :D Obviously everybodys eyes have already fallen on that mind blowing foil Jace. I mean shit Jace is already worth 40$ and even a foil one :D :D Garruk is 45$ and most of the rares are pretty good and valuable. Sadly this aint for sale or trade because most of the cards i dont have yet in my M12 collection. I mean until now the only cards i hard were from the pre-release events. I was planning after opening the packs to check out their prices and see what value i got out of the box. But unfortunately i do not have the time right now. Maybe ill do it later tonight at the office. And out of 36  rares i got only 1 twice. But then i got the foil Jace so its like i got a full set of 36 witheout repetition. Pretty cool huh :P
Buuut now im stuck with an awful lot of commons and ill have to sort them out at some point to figure out which one of them i need in the collection...sigh....that will be a bit frustrating.

Oh and i got 4 copies of manic vandal :D exactly what i needed. 1 for the collection and 3 for the vampire deck cant wait to test them and see how they work.

And thats about it. Going to replace March of the Machines with a new card on the sidebar menu and then im off to work (and eat).

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

The Fall Of Troy

Remember, Remember the 24th of April! 

The war originated from a quarrel between the goddesses Athena, Hera, and Aphrodite, after Eris, the goddess of strife and discord, gave them a golden apple, sometimes known as the Apple of Discord, marked "for the fairest". Zeus sent the goddesses to Paris, who judged that Aphrodite, as the "fairest", should receive the apple. In exchange, Aphrodite made Helen, the most beautiful of all women and wife of Menelaus, fall in love with Paris, who took her to Troy. Agamemnon, king of Mycenae and the brother of Helen's husband Menelaus, led an expedition of Achaean troops to Troy and besieged the city for ten years because of Paris' insult. After the deaths of many heroes, including the Achaeans Achilles and Ajax, and the Trojans Hector and Paris, the city fell to the ruse of the Trojan Horse

One of the greatest stories ever told. I love the War of Troy. As a kid this was one of my favorite myths and to this day it remains. I have always loved Greek Mythology so rich so colorfull so AWESOME. They say Tolkien invented the fantasy genre maybe in a way he did. But most of the creatures we now know and love in our fantasy books were already invented by the greeks. And their stories are so amazing and alive. Truly a masterpiece never to be matched.  
Odysseus and Achilles  two of the greatest heroes ever. As a kid i was so inspired by Odysseus`s adventures after the war of Troy. The smartest of them all the guy who won the war and then had to suffer for 10 more years before finally returning home to his family and his wife (that remained faithful for 20 years!!! id like a wife like that lol). And sadly in the end perished by the hand of one of his own sons! 


So yeah this post is just a reminder for all of you guys:
NEVER FORGET THE TROJAN HORSE!

Sunday, July 10, 2011

M12 Pre-Release

Yay its finally here! Magic The Gathering Core Edition M12. That means M11 now goes away and M12 is put in its place in standard. The prelease event runs 1 week before the actual release so we still cant buy boxes or boosters. Still with the cards we get from the event we get a nice glimpse of things to come. Altho i have no doubt alot of players have already found out the entire list of the cards in the set. The Planeswalkers are super awesome especially Jace and Chandra. Ofc...i couldnt draw any X_X

Friday July 8 Midnight Event

So my gf was working Friday night so i decided to attend the midnight pre-release because i knew i wouldnt be able to go to the saturday events and i wasnt sure for today (Sunday). So first pre-release for me. I knew the basics of the format but i had no actual experiance so i was very excited about it. I arrived early - around 7 o`clock and had bunch of games with my vampire deck. I must say blade of the bloodchief is performing very well. Not to mention the deck overall gets more wins than loses. Im very eager to do so research later and build a strong legacy deck. Altho that might be very expensive to achieve.
So about 30 minutes before the event started i stopped playing and was just chilling on my laptop and actually managed to get 1 player to sign up as my sponsor in D2N :)- So now i got another Golden Boy distinction and i am the current N:1 on the oval office ranks.

Anyway i went to register and i was kinda worried how would i play because i used to have a DCI number like 8 years ago back in the old country. But i was not sure if it will be still active after all these years. But it was it took about 2 minutes for one of the Good Games employes to find it for me. So everything was well i was signed and i took my seat on 1 of the tables. Everybody got their 6 booster packs and the premium foil M12 card (Bloodlord of Vaasgoth).

I opened my boosters as quickly as possible and started checking out my cards. Almost from the start i realised i was drawing too many red spells so i knew my main color would be red for sure. I got couple of good green,black and white spells but not enough to really want to put them in my deck. The blue i got some decent drops in terms of : Mana Leak, Ponder and 2 other draw card spells. I had also Sphinx of Uthuun which i put in the deck as a nice end game finisher (tho i never got to play him).
I love dragons. And i got this one twice!
I had 21 red spells in my deck with my badass Flameblast Dragon and i also got Grim Lavamancer, Circle of Flames (that card was almost all the time in play for me hah) , Volcanic Dragon i had also some good removal in the face of incinerate, fling, shock, art trail and couple of other cards.
So yeah i went with a 43 card deck with 18 mana. Which now i know was a bad decision. Later i found out i didnt really need couple of spells and that it was much better to have a 40 cards deck to play with.
My first game i dominated and won 2-0 with big game finishes. First one my flame blast dragon smacked my oponent for 11. And 2nd game i dropped him with 10 but with other cards.
The 2nd round one of the guys who i played earlier with my vampire cards dropped out of the tournament so 1 player got to get a "BY" which means a free win. And by chance i got it. ^_^
3rd round i faced a green/white deck and this is where my mana problems started. Still it was a pretty close fight 2-1 loss. He managed to drop alot of his creatures and the big ones were a lil bit hard to burn with my limited removal. I needed a bit more luck to take that game.
4th I dont remember exactly how that played out. I remember i played against Alex but what exactly went down is a blur. I believe he had some very small creatures and was chipping me away and i had a bad draw or something....i cant recall.
Anyway at the end of the day i got a 2W-2L rating and turned out for each win you get you receive 2 free boosters. Something i was not aware of so it was a very pleasant surprise for me. So i got 4 boosters but didnt draw any super rares. I did get 2 mythical rares in the face of Sun Titan and Frost Titan but they are not that powerfull. Still nice addition for my collection :P

I learned alot and it was extreamly fun. Met alot of great players and generally everybody is sooooo friendly. I loved the athmosphere. Its interesting to note that most people use an app for their phones that keeps track of our lifes. And whats even more interesting is that everybody has a different version of it :D I find that very amusing.
During the event btw when i was not playing i was texting my gf alot and told her what i was doing. So she was kinda curious what exactly im playing and said she wants to see sometime. So today i called her and i gave her 2 choices:
-She comes with me to another pre-release event to see what im playing.
-Go chill in the park.
She picked the game even tho i warned her it might take 2+ hours. But on the other hand im so tired of separating my life because of others. If a girl cant handle my gaming side then she isnt exactly cut out to be my girlfriend in the first place. So i was like sweet lets see how she will react to the whole MtG thing :D And lets face it MtG is alot more geeky than PC gaming so if she didnt mind that ill be ok. And yeah she was okay with it. It was funny to her (obviously) but she was also kinda curious. She said i looked very happy while i was playing and i was so excited that she got hyped too, but she couldnt understand what we were doing. Still after 1 hour of watching she whipped out the iPhone and went to facebook. kewl i dont blame her. Anyway it was very cool of her to join me.

So for today`s report:
I opened my 6 boosters and again i had a very established set of cards. This time green was the main color and red the secondary. I got 3 green rares, 2 red an 1 artefact. Thinkin about the other people`s decks i got to say they seem more complex with just 1-2 small combos and stuff. But alot faster aswell. I decided to go with awhole lot of heavy creatures. Bucause on friday it was that fat monster on the field that got me killed.
So here my rares:
Adaptive Automaton
Flameblast Dragon (Yes AGAIN), Warstorm Surge (this is super strong :O)
Never got the chance to play this :(
Skinshifter and Primordial Hydra (Two of the best green cards i have ever seen and i never drew the Hydra to try it :X ), Doubling Chant (at first i thought this was a good idea but later i removed this from my deck).
So as you can see i got to use all my rares in the deck.
I also had 2x Volcanic Dragons and 2x Vastwoof Gorger and a Cudge Troll and 2x Act of Treason. And couple of other good cards. I made a mistake in putting too many fat creatures so i had almost nothing for early in the game and i payed for it.
1st Round vs Moon (or Mon)
A Korean guy beat me 2-1. I fucked up in the 3rd game when i started with 1 mana in my hand and thought ill be lucky enough to draw some more.
2nd Round vs Simon (very cheerfull fella btw)
Dominated him 2-0 . He got mana blocked at the first game and the second i just had a very strong starting hand and once we got to the mid game i unloaded alot of my heavy creatures.
3rd Round vs Mathew (He did something very interesting, he put his deck in Pokemon Sleeves X_X)
I lost 2-1 again. First game i smashed him witheout giving him any chance. 2nd one i could have won if not for 1 stupid flying creature that had hexproof. I actually needed just one of my dragons to stop it and turn the game around but alas fate decided to put the dragon 1 turn away from me and i lost.
the final game i had my mana and my big finishers but by the time i got to my 6th mana he had me dropped to 8 and after that it didnt matter his rush was too hard to handle. He had like 5 creatures on the board.
4th Round vs Anthony (The Pacifism guy X_X)
1st game he had no chance. Mana block at 2 the entire time he did manage to hold on for a bit because he had that tap knight that kept my attackers at bay for a bit but in the end there was no way for him to win after i had unloaded my mana and he discarded an awful lot of cards. The third game was super bitchy i had a decent draw but he just had all his best cards to counter mine and at the final turns he put the big Sphinx of Uthuun and killed me. Those pacifisms were just unbelievably well timed for him. Luck was on his side. So i lost again 2-1.
Total: 1W 3L

So to sum it all up i had a worse record than friday but on the other hand i never lost by 2 and all my 3rd games were pretty close. And all my wins were total domination. My decks were strong everybody said so but still could have been planned a little bit better. Switch couple of cards and put more lands. I learned alot. The best way to get better is practice so ill just keep playing. Ill do some drafts whenever available and hone my skills on limited formats. Friday i went with a very quick burn deck with unsufficient mana. And Today i went exactly 40 cards with enough mana but too many fat creatures. Even after replacing the wurms and removing the Chant i still didnt manage to squuze a victory but the fights were close. Next time hopefully ill do better. Ill have to pay more attention to what my oponents are playing and try to see what is the thinking behind their tactics.
I got 2 boosters from todays event and got:
Grand Abolisher and Goblin Chieftan both of which seem like very solid and good cards. Not sure if they are expensive tho.

It was very, very, very fun and if i was having any doubts (wherever ill be playing magic again or it was just another short lived whim of mine) they are all gone now. Azzy is back and will be kicking ass!!!! I even saw that there is a Grand Prix in Brisbane later this year. And if i have the cards and experiance ill probably team up with some players from the store and go there and give it a shot. Its still months away so ill have plenty of time to practice.

Tuesday, July 05, 2011

Rise of the Vampires

Magic The Gathering

So collecting the Scars of Mirrodin set was fun! But i still needed a deck to get back into the game with. I mean sure i got that infect pre-made deck and it was so lame that even i knew it sucked and i havent played the game in 8 years or so. Ya i`ve clocked some 30 hours on Duels Of PLaneswalkers but that dont count. + they only use cards from the D12.  So i got my boy Norman (who`s my personal assigned card dealer) to start gathering me the Mirrodin Besieged   set and on the pick up day after some pretty extensive research of the mtg site i sat down with my laptop and picked up a deck i liked and told him "i want this deck...NAY".

And what deck i chose u ask? VAMPIRES!
First of all i love me the vampire tribal theme. Also on Duels the vampires are my favorite deck and maybe the strongest. At least ive clocked most of my wins with it. So i kinda knew some of the cards from the deck i decided to pick up from the "Top Decks" coloumn. I was checking it out. . . . not really getting it. All creatures were 1-2 mana dwarfs so i wasnt sure how the deck works. But hell that deck one some big tournament recently so cant argue with the pro players right :D
So here it is:

Matthew Landstrom's Vampires
Standard StarCityGames.com Open in Indianapolis, IN
Main Deck

Vampire Royalties are powerfull
60 cards 


Dragonskull Summit                                        4  Go for the Throat

Lavaclaw Reaches                                            4  Lightning Bolt
Marsh Flats                                                       ____________________
Swamp                                                              11 other spells
Verdant Catacombs

23 lands                                                                 Sideboard
Bloodghast                                                        2  Act of Aggression
Gatekeeper of Malakir                                      4  Arc Trail
Kalastria Highborn                                           2  Batterskull
Manic Vandal                                                    2  Crush
Pulse Tracker                                                    2  Dark Tutelage
Vampire Lacerator                                            1  Doom Blade
Viscera Seer                                                      2  Skinrender

26 creatures                                                          15 sideboard cards
  
Actually some of the cards were missing so ill have to wait until Norman can find them for me:
3x Manic Vandal, 3x Dismember, 1x Arc Trail and 1x Batterskull. But even with those missing and with me adding 3x Blade of the Bloodchief (3$ each) the deck ended up costing a whooping 281.80 AU$ i still dont entirely understand the reasons behind the rare lands especially since they can easily be replaced by basic ones. But hell the guy won the tournament with this right. . . might aswell take his word for it. Besides most of them will probably end up in my future decks so its not that bad of an investement. Still god damn rare lands cost a ton. Not to mention batterskull X_X and i still need to get the 2nd one. So yeah if i had assembled the deck as listed it would have passed the 300AU$ mark easily. It costed me more to make this than for me to get a full set of besieged. . . .
I played some games against 2 guys and their standard decks and actually my vampire babies did really well. Obviosuly it would have been better if i had the full set but still the deck works great. And i need more practice because i was pointed out couple of mistakes and opportunities that i missed in my games. Ill be going to the store after i finish this post. . .and after i have some breakfast. Actually i have to pick up some shirts from the dry-cleaner aswell X_X sigh

So yeah. Im very excited to be back in magic and hopefully ill have more fun with it than i did as a kid. Not to mention that now i can afford to get cards and build decks i want. :) 
I intend to attend the pre-release of D12 and try my luck at the FNM this week. :D I dont think ill win but hey practice makes perfect.


Took a relationship advice from Shinji recently. Because i wasnt sure if i was in one but on the other hand i didnt know how exactly to initiate "the talk". Jeez its alot easier to sweet talk a girl to sleep with you than to talk relationship and stuff o.O Not to mention i`ve never been with a girl longer than a month or so. But yeah i didnt manage to go as smooth as Shin adviced but on the other hand it ended up with a win. I guess i knew and me and pakki were already a couple but just had to seal the deal with a verbal acknowledgement. She actually has seen my MtG cards because i had one of my folders in my backpack but i dont think she is put off by that part of me. I think she finds my geek side kinda cute haha. Which is truthfully told very good. Because i am a big gamer and pretty nerdy since im into comics and manga and as of now TCG again so it is important to have a girl that wont bitch about that. But then again i dont think any girl would mind a geeky guy who can fuck her the way i fuck haha :D

Blogger

Okay so i tinkered a bit with my menu. The followers sidebar got pushed down a bit. Because lets face it anybody who spends time reading my blog will scout the menu at some point and random people wont follow. Altho its been hard to even get ppl i know to follow me. Not to mention noone knows his google account password because they are auto-logging in to YouTube. Well to be fair im auto-logging aswell and the only reason i remember my password in google is because of this blog.
I also removed the "Im reading. . ." sidebar. Its been awhile since i red a book and im not reading anything and i dont think ill be reading that much anytime soon. So no more of that for now. Instead im placing a Magic card im thinking of changing it everytime i post or maybe once a week not sure how that will play out. But the true reason behind that is that i intend to keep track of the amount of $ ive invested in Magic and my cards. Im counting card sleeves and deck boxes and folders because lets face it. . . nobody will buy those unless he collects and plays Magic.

Thats it for today and ill see you guys next time.

Sunday, July 03, 2011

UFC 132

UFC 132 CRUZ vs FABER
 Oh my god that was one hell of a card!!!!



It was a spectacle full of submissions and knockouts and major upsets! This just has to be one of the greatest UFC cards to date. Absolutely awesome. Everybody who didnt buy this totally missed out on an amazing show.
I didnt watch all the prelims so ill review what i saw:

Sotiropoulos (L) vs (W) Dos Anjos
The Aussie George had a bad beating in his last fight from Denis Siver who is also fighting at UFC 132 and needed a win to get back on track. But a quick shocking knockout by Dos Anjos screwed his plans. 2 Loses in a row is not a nice place to be and especially when you lose so badly. Hope he recovers and gets back stronger. After all we got to support our fighters no? :P

Guillard: Let me introduce you to my knee
Guillard (W) vs (L) Roller
That was a one sided fight. The Young assassin Guillard dominated the fight. Controlled the pace and felt very confident and relaxed. And obviously when Roller opened his guard Guillard punished him with 2 brutal punches and then a flying knee that took him out....the final couple of punches were just for a good measure. It was a great knockout cant wait to see Melvin again.

Siver (W) vs (L) Wiman
This fight was good. But the win decision of the judges is very questionable. Honestly maybe Wiman didnt do that much during the fight and a loss on points seems plausable BUT! Wiman did win the 2nd round there was just no doubt about that. So then how did the judges manage to score the fight unanimously? X_X Win by split decision would`ve made more sense. But this . . . i dont know. Even Siver didnt look very convincing in his post fight interview with Joe Rogan. Im pretty sure he wasnt expecting a win. He totally got dominated on the ground by Wiman. And i think Siver would do well to improve his ground skills because next time the judges might not be on his side.

Carlos Condit (W) vs (L) Dong Hyun Kim

I dont know these 2 guys. But apperantly Kim was on an unbeaten 16-0 record and was expected to win the fight. Well Carlos had something to say about that when midway in the 1st round he dropped the South Korean with a flying knee to the face. I mean that was just a devastating knee. Kim dropped instantly and was probably half way into the other world dreaming about ice-cream when Condit dropped couple of extra punches to seal the deal. As i said alot of spectacular knockouts that night.

Tito Ortiz (W) vs (L) Ryan Bader
If you guys remember i attended ufc 127 in Sydney and i was sitting ring side with Ryan Bader himself and he was such a great guy so naturally im kind of a big fan of "Darth" Bader. So after the shocking knockout by Tito i was obviously upset. I mean Ryan`s only loss was to Jon Jones who after that went on to beat Shogun and become the new LHW champion. So that was bearable but losing like this by Tito that must have devastated him. Tito has no wins for like 5 years or something . . . and then in his what was supposed to be his last fight in the UFC he knocks Ryan out. Jeezus talk about upsets. Im sure Dana White`s jaw dropped after that KO. Because we know that he and Tito are not vest friends and he was eager to get rid of him. I wonder how many more fights will Tito receive after this.
But honestly i just hope he gets his ass beaten badly by whoever is his next opponent.

Wanderlei Silva (L) vs (W) Chris Leben   *Co-Main Event*
The Axe Murderer vs the Crippler that fight was always going to be awesome. Both fighters have crazy fighting styles and are extreamly agressive. And they delivered. Silva went in berserk with a wild barrage of punches but obviously witheout any defense up. Chris shook him with a powerfull left hook and after Silva tried to hold him with a Muai Thai clinch the "crippler" just started loading left uppercuts in his face until the axe fell down and gave a kiss to the ground. After that it was just a matter of couple more punches to make sure silva stays down and the fight got stopped by the judge.
It was another amazing KO and honestly i think this fight should have gotten the KO of the night award. Not only because it was a big upset but also because it was such a great way to finish the Murderer. Instead they gave the honor to Tito Fucking Ortiz X_X

Dominick Cruz (W) vs (L) Urijah Faber  *MAIN EVENT*


Cruz celebrates his victory and receives his blue belt

The bantamweight kind defends his title for the 1st time since joining the UFC. Not only that but Cruz gets to fight Urijah Faber the only person to have ever defeated him. Cruz and Faber are famous rivals from the WEC and the champion was very eager to clean his name and get revenge. Tensions were up and during the entire 5 rounds you could see both were very eager to KO the other one. Cruz was dominating the entire fight. His crazy style and unorthodox movement and combos kept Faber most of the time at bay. The california kid dropped some pretty big shots couple of times and even managed to drop Cruz on the ground (altho i believe he just went off balance) but was unable to finish him. Cruz was punching and kicking more. Controlling the octagon and just being everywhere and doing everything. There were couple of scraps on the ground but both of them very very quick to get up on their feet. in the 4th round it appeared that Cruz might be getting a bit tired since he was taking very deep breaths and kinda slowed down. But in the 5th round he exploded and really pushed Urijah wanting desperately to finish his nemesis. He couldnt do it but he got a decisive win, got his revenge and proved he deserves to be the champion. Honestly tho the way the fight went. I wont be surprised if there is a rematch soon. Because if there is one i dont believe it will go the distance as both fighters now have 25 minutes worth of fighting experience against each other.


All in all that was one of the BEST UFC events to date and if you got some extra $ instead of buying a dvd just go to UFC.TV and watch this event its worth every cent!!!
p.p: Justin Bieber and Rihanna were attending the event :D :D I thought that was kinda funny :D I mean Lil Jon was no surprise and Kevin James is a known long time fan. But Bieber and Ri? O.o LMAO Is the bieber even old enough to attend such things X_X Altho ive never seen any age restriction.

Steam Summer Sale:
Got myself some cheap games :D
Hoard, Bioshock and Titan Quest (+expansion)

Thursday, June 30, 2011

Transformers: Dark Of The Moon

Transformers: Dark Of The Moon 

 IMDB has a 7.0 rating for the movie. BUT FUCK THAT! That was a fucking 8.5
I was very weary and didnt have my hopes up too much. . . i mean after the "Revenge of the Fallen" who could blame me. But obviously i was gona go watch the bloody movie.
I was talking with my girlfriend last week and she said she wanted to go watch the movie which was even better for me cuz if it sucked i could always go bang her in the bathroom to realease the stress caused by the disappointment. Anyway i was driving on friday and i heard on the radio that Event Cinemas are having a midnight release of the movie and i was like...hey thats perfect. Obviously i decided to flex some mussle for my girl and got us the GoldClass tix :P 75$ but what the hell you watch a movie on a fucking bed...if it is really bad you could always sleep (rofl).
So we go there on Tuesday night and actually there were alot of people in the cinema. One thing i do love about the G.C is the fact that there like 30 people in the whole place. Aint nobody bumping into me or some 2 m. tall guy sitting infront of me to screw my view :D

So anywy the movie starts and...ITS FUCKING AAAAWESOME. I could  tell right from the bat. The way the movie started and that massive build up that it produced. And from there on it was just up-hill.
The Best Transformers movie so far!
There wasnt mindless acton in this movie and the mind blowing special effects this time were carefully scripted and didnt make you yawn (like in the Fallen) because they were too long.
The story was great and it was crafted very well. It connected all the dots and made alot of sense. There nice plot twists in the movie that will make you go "HUUUH?"
I loved how Megatron was shown as weaker and beat down robot due to his last movie`s  injuries. I guess it makes sense it would be hard for him to get repaired but . . . how do the other robots got themselfs fixed? Still it was interesting. However i do dislike how all decepticons are shown as mindless red eyed savages. They are quite intelligent in the Animated Series and have their own personalities. But i guess exploring 30 robots in detail would take too much time. And the movie is already  two and a half hours!
Btw did i mention we have fucking John Malkovich in the movie? Hell yeah baby and you can bet he delivered some very very awesome scenes! Also we had another cameo appearance from Hangover star Ken Jeong who had 1 "piss your pants" scene with Shia in the bathroom. But i wont go ahead and spoil things for you. But ....dont drink when you see the asian guy show up or you might spit on the person infront of you. :D

I loved the cars :D That new ferrari daaaaamn !!!  SPeaking of ferrari there was ALOT..... and i mean ALOT of brand advertising in this movie. I guess that joke that its not a Michael Bay movie because there not enough brand ads in it is true.
I mean we got the bossy CIA women suddenly putting on NIKE high tops wtf that...the shoes were great but really...thats how you promote NIKE? With CIA agents X_X Even NIKE`s rival Adidas had a go when Sam`s family showed up in a green kit. Then there was the Mercedes and phones and all kind of shits. I mean every sponsorship got literraly smacked in your face. I do think they could have done a better job and made the things a bit more fluid. Or im assuming...noone cared on the production crew. Or maybe Michael Bay likes this way of promoting.
But that was pretty much my only beef with the movie.
The ending was solid. I dont think we will see another transformers movie any time soon. I know  Shia LaBeouf is not going to make more of these. And honestly he shouldnt as an actor he needs some good story movies to make otherwise his current star might fade. And he is a damn good actor in my opinion too. Of the newcomers i think Shia is much better than Channing Tatum who is getting all sorts of hype. But on the other hand Channy got more diverse roles and the ladies love him. So yeah . . . go Shia show us what you got. But i digress. . . the ending was solid and kinda of making sure for now there wont be another Transformers movie why is that Jimmy you ask? Ill tell you why,...because alot of the main characters died :D Okay not that many...but when main characters start dying. . . . you know there aint gona be a 4thquel coming anytime soon.

Still the movie was GREAT! 8.5/10!
And pls go watch in the cinema those special effects and massive fights arent made for your small ass TV at home X_X

STEAM
Man how can you not love Valve. Those awesome jerks just released their summer promotion and it is OFF THE HOOK! I meant it. . .. massive slashes on prices. Like -75% of games. And a small competition where you can try to earn yourself some phat loot. I got myself Borderlands and its 4DLC for just 8$ and who knows how many games ill be tricked into buying. Damn you Gabe Newell!! X_X

Magic The Gathering
Finally i managed to beat all the archenemy missions. Damn Nicol Bolas the last boss was really fucking tough to beat. And his deck was fucking retarded. I honestly kept dying just because of the scheme cards. His deck in itself had no power at all. Also a trick for everybody out there who is struggling with handling the bosses. Use your favorite deck and put the AI team to go with the ELF deck. The massive amount of creatures they dish out will eat alot of the enemy`s removal. So you have more chances to use your kill combo creatures. Some games even i used the Elf deck. I mean imagine 3 elf decks and then dropping couple of Heedles One`s . . . now that is some big big fat creature right there and they have trample so the AI is forced to start blocking with more than 1 creature. All in all i think it was the 1st archenemy and the final boss that gave me any real trouble. The other decks just dont work that well with the schemes i guess.
The Ancient Depths deck is great i see the winning combos but it is too messed up to be competitive. Too easy to screw the plan with just couple of removals or counterspells. And even with all that massive mana gain it is still a very slow deck. I hope the next expansion brings more cards for it. Because right now that deck is like the lamest.

So thats about it for now. Oh and btw Darky i know you will see this:
GET YOUR LAZY ASS READY BECAUSE IM GOING TO NEED YOU IN D2N SEASON 3
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

The Game Setup

Okay inspired by Shinji i decided to take a new photo of my current gaming setup.
Okay so my PS3 is missing from the shot but thats due to the fact that im using it at work altho lately i spend less and less time on it so i may bring it back home.
Too much gaming tech? xD
One the other hand now i got my new Laptop. I had to cough up 2300 AU$ for that baby. As i mentioned earlier it has way too much storage space that i need but hey maybe now`s the time to download some porn movies hahah (im semi joking here). Btw the bluetooth mouse they gave me broke down haha. It suddenly stopped receiving signal or maybe it fails to connect i dont know which one is it but it aint working anymore. Good thing i still have my old mouse so i didnt have to go out and buy a replacement. I love that steel cover it keeps my palms cold and comfy :) I hated it when my hands get sweaty X_X Also on the picture i left the Die2Nite window open :P My current town might actually die tonight but its all good because i got the chance to repair a broken chainsaw and will get a rare distinction for it later :PPP Random towns may have short lifespans but at least you have the chance to get some good distinctions :P Who knows maybe ill get another LMS.

You can also see my Nintendo DS XL running Pokemon White. Man i`ve no idea when ill finish that game. And honestly im having doubts ill ever find the time X_X But the game is sitting quitely on my bookshelfs and is praying to the gaming gods that one day ill catch em all.

My beloved PSP is here aswell. I actually got a new game for it like a month or so ago. Its called Lord of Arcana and is the typical Jrpg grinder. I do use the PSP from time to time. Sometimes just to play some music or maybe a quick race on Need For Speed:Shift.  And unlike my PC games or the pokemon series i have completed almost all of my games on it.

Here you can see my brand new keyboard Razor Lycosa . I was thining for awhile to get the SC2 keyboard but i really didnt see the use of all those extra buttons. Im not that heavily involved with SC2 anymore and i never really play heavy macro on any of my games. Even in WoW im rellying on quick APM and just couple of extra shortcuts on my mouse. So i got the nice razor lycosa that has a cool blue blow too :P Actually . . . i think the StarCraft keyboard glows in blue too . . .  anyway this is what i chose.

On the pic you can also see my Shogun 2 statue from the collectors edition. He is guarding my necklace and wristband from Armani and also my favorite Magic The Gathering card!!! MARCH OF THE MACHINES!!!

Also under my screen we have a very special "Dark Magician" card from the Yu-Gi-Oh franchise. Why special you ask? Because it has an autograph from creator Kazuki Takahashi ^_^
And on the right side of the Magician is his bodyguard. Squall Lionheart from FF:Dissidia.

And above everything i have a gorgeous Final Fantasy XIII poster. Never played the game but one day at the bookstore i saw they sold some cool posters so i picked a pack. I also have a Marvel poster from the event Fear Itself that is going on right now. It looked amazing so i bought it. But that one is a bit more to the right so its not immediate to my gaming setup so i didnt took a picture. Maybe ill show it to you guys later.

So thats how i roll right now. I have some great ideas for a gaming room with a a library wall for my books,manga collections and high shelfs for the games and then a 3 screen gaming setup. + a fat cough and a TV+PS3 config to chill or for people to play while im on the PC. BUT i cant afford to do it right now. Mostly because the next room is not free for use yet X_X So hopefully ill be able to get it soon and start working on my dream gaming room :PpP

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Left 4 Dead 2

Hey everyone :)

First thing i got to say is. I finally got myself a new laptop to replace the old one. Its an "HP" and its pretty cool. 2294 AU$ And because i was getting some DVDs from the store aswell they gave me a free bluetooth mouse. Damn marketing tricks haha. I bet it didnt cost them anything to throw that mouse with the purchase. Not to mention since i sold my old laptop bag i had to buy a new one. But this time i got a backpack because i have the adidas bag to carry around.

Its again 17 inches but the body is bigger and the stainless steel cover is much cooler than the old laptops. I named my new baby Phyrexia :D in honor of the current block in Magic The Gathering. This one works well with my TV at work so i can hook it up with HDMI cable and dual screen it. I love it. The resolution on the TV kinda sucks or should i say the quality is not at 100%. I am not sure about the reason behind this but ill try to fix it. for some reason the laptop comes with 2x 1TB space and . . . its fucking alot. What the hell am i to put there X_X Its even got more space than my Aurora lolz. But then again i didnt buy more for the R2 because i knew i dont need that much. I have only played a bit of Duels of the Planeswalkers on Phyrexia so im not sure how good it will be on proper games. Will have to test later. Maybe Shogun 2.

Also got to send some money to my mom later this week. I dread the incoming phone call already X_X

Left 4 Dead 2

Downloaded the game yesterday after i got it for like 7$ on steam :D

It was such a great deal that i didnt really care whatever id like the game or not. Ofc i knew the reputation so it wasnt exactly a blind purchase. Anyway i just played for like 1 hour and a half and the game is MIND blowing. Fucking love it! It has a great apocalyptic feeling and the atmosphere is great. It keeps you on your toes not sure when the next zombie ambush will come from. The characters are cool and its very fast paced. Its pure fun. I completed 2 chapters on the 1st campaign so im very much a rookie. But ill soon dive into the action and hopefully will do some campaigns with real people on the online co-op mode.
Great game i highly recommend!!!!
p.p: I reckon i should buy this for Shinji he will enjoy it.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Return to the Magic!

Magic The Gathering

So even before i finished Duels of The Planeswalers the new Duels came out. DotP 2012. It is improved or so they say....i played just for an hour so i cant really say exactly how much of the game got changed and upgraded. Still it felt great. I should probably finish the campaign of the first one and beat the challanges. I hate to leave things un-finished.

The thing is the game is very fun to play on PC. It keeps reminding me of my childhood days when i used to play with my friends the actual TCG! I get this alot . . . . man i wish i wasnt so weak. Every month ill see something get excited about it and spend some cash X_X
Thats how i dumped around  600$ on Warhammer minuatures that i didnt even finish painting. It seemed like a good idea at the time but in the end i played like 2 games and quit that. Honestly id like to play some WH40k. But i just cant afford the time. I dont consider buying bunch of books and manga as a $$$ dumping since i enjoy it and it has been a long standing hobby of mine. But decoration figures on the other hand are not really neccesery yet everynow and then ill see one cool figure and buy it. Squall Lionheart from FF Dissidian being the last one i got. Dont get me wrong the figure is awesome and is proudly chilling next to my Berserk volumes but still . . . . did i really need it ?_?

I do the same thing with Clothes and Shoes. . . . thats why i got a dozen shoes X_X i get bored and i go do some shopping . . . . sigh. Its partly because i can afford it and partly because im so busy and i just need a break from all the pressure from work. But still it pisses me off that i cant control my urges better. Shit i got a girlfriend now and even with all the sex i get i still feel like getting geeky things X_X 
I guess my friends were wrong. . . being in a relationship wont save me from my nerdy addictions.


The reason im talking about these stuff is . . . well . . . plating the planeswalker games suddenly i thought HEY! I SHOULD PLAY MAGIC AGAIN! Now around 1 year ago (maybe longer) i had the same brilliant idea (sarcasm) and got some boosters and some kind of intro deck or something made a lame deck. Got my ass kicked and then i gave up. Still put the cards in a nice folder so i can enjoy em wherever i feel like it but thats as far as i went. It costed me like 70$ or so.
This time i felt like going back into collecting the cards. See the current running block in MtG is storywise happening in Mirrodin. Which is the same world on which i played when i started the game. And that was back in 2005. So i dont know. i guess nostalgia hit me. Ive always liked collecting the cards. Great art pieces especially the dragons and the multiple color cards. 
So yeah i went to the wizards website. Did some scouting and research. 2 days later i went to the Good Games shop in the CDB and . . .
I fucking ordered ONE COPY OF EACH CARD FROM THE "SCARS OF MIRRODIN SET" X_X I must have been out of my mind! It costed me 400$ with the folder and some protectors.

Well yesterday i went to pick up my loot. I was semi-excited semi pissed the fuck off at myself for spending that money on the cards. So i got my stuff. It turned out that 3 of the rare cards were un-available and will take around a week for the shop to obtain them for me. I had a chat with the guy at the counter and i asked about how should i proccede about getting back into the game. And there were like a dozen or so players in the shop so he told me to go talk to 2 guys that were very casual players and they could give me a hand. So i go there say hi and one of the guys checks out my deck. Its "Standard" and he has nothing to fight me with (nothing that wont kill me in 1 turn) and then guy offers that i join him and his 2 friends in a something called Commander type of game where we play 4 FFA with 40 life at begining and he gave each of us a 100 card deck. I got a blue/red deck. Im not sure what kind of deck it was because i didnt see that many of the cards. but MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN that game was an amazing fun. First of all he had those decks duked with some crazy ass rare cards. Some of them from blocks so old i didnt even recognize their emblems. The game was insane and uber fun. At start was kinda slow then finally i got a funny creature that mind controls and then i got an enchantement that made copies of it and i started stealing creatures and spaming tokens. And that pretty much took out the fighting abilities of the Green/Red guy. But then the Mono Green player started dishing out some serious army while the black/blue deck was gearing up with alot of artefacts. Eventually i lost my copy powers and was left with like 1 creature. I had this 8 mana spell that takes control of all creatures and untaps them for 1 turn. So i was like omg i need one mana and i can kill the elf guy with the huge army . . . and kill him with his OWN army. So i draw a card i get the mana. I go like OOOO your so dead. And before i casted it i was like...oh wait...nah its ok...green doesnt have any couneter spells...So i cast it atk him with like 30 creatures from all of us and then he casts . . . . FOG! MAN that was so crazy! Everybody was laughing so hard. It was the ultimate screw up!
He was like...FOG OFF Mate hahaha i aint dying. I actually gave myself that finger since he said he was about to discard the card but when i said i can kill him he kept it just in case. X_X
After that he got called to play in a draft with bunch of other guys so we had to stop and i also had to rush out bacause i was late for a dinner appointement. But the game was just so so so much fun. I really think ill give it a shot this time and try to do some Magic everynow and then. I find that im enjoyed it too much. :)

Monday, June 13, 2011

UFC 131

UFC 131

Man last sunday morning was epic. UFC 130 was pretty dissapointing and i was a bit worried how this fight card will turn out. But my worries were quickly washed away. The very first fight between Beltran and Rosa proved to be an extreamly exiting fight. It was and let me quote Joe Rogan here: A pure rock-em-sock em robot fight! These guys were smacking each other HARD. Wild punches all the way. It was unbelievable we just dont see alot of fights like that. Most fighters are just so cautions that situations dont present them self for thing like that to happen. But here we got 2 crazy mother fuckers who just wanted to brawl it out.

I didnt watch the next 4 prelims so ill skip those as i cant really comment on them.

Stout (W)  vs (L) Edwards

Stout was behind in the fight until he delivered that amazing 1 punch knockout. Edwards was out cold i believe even before he hit the mat and remained there even as the winner was declared. It was just such an amazing punch. Great highlight reel addition for Stout.

Cerrone (W) vs (L) Rocha  
This was my personal favorite of all the fights.  Now often people speak about how kicks are underrated and that the fighters should really utilize them more. Well this fight was a master class in low-kicks. Cerrone landed some good low kicks to Rocha at the start of the fight and since Rocha didnt engage him in any punching exchanges Cerrone just remained calm and kept working his lead leg. After the 1st round was done Greg Jackson told Cerrone to stop playing with Rocha and finish him. Well he couldnt knock him out but what he did was in a way humiliate Rocha by devastating him with his low kicks. Even doing some kick takedowns. Rocha was completely out-classed and even tried to invite Cerrone for a fight on the mat but the Cowboy  just took a step back and called Rocha to stand up.
Its just awesome to see a different kind of fight and i hope others will see the true power behind low kicks and try to use them more. Also alot of the UFC fighters should train how to check those kicks as it can save them during a long fight where the opponent will try to punish those legs.
I know we have had recently some amazing kick knockouts by Anderson Silva and Machida but those are just standard random kicks gone lucky. Tactical kicks are much more rare and hopefully MMA will evolve and improve in that sphere.

Demian Maia (L) vs (W) Mark Munoz
Maia was in top shape for this fight. He started off great and really used his speed to shock and surprise Munoz. But his great performance didnt do him any good because the fight went the distance and to my big surprise the judges gave the fight to Mark. o.O
Honestly i thought Maia was winning so i was pretty confused as to what happened to make the judges make a uninanymos decision.

Jogn-Olav Einemo (L) vs (W) Dave Herman
This was my 2nd favorite fight. Great great fight....actually...maybe this was even better than the Cerrone/Rocha fight. What really got my eye at the start was that Herman was......well...smiling all the bloody time! It took until the 2nd round for Joe himself to make a note of that and he even asked him about it in the post fight interview. It was a great back and forth fight. Not that many wild exchanges as with Beltran and Rosa but still very good fight. The ending was amazing it looked like Herman was going to get knocked out and suddenly he made a great comeback. And all the while smiling like a 15 year old kid in the schoold yard that knows something that noone else does. xD Im looking forward to see more of Dave in the future.

CO-MAIN EVENT Kenny Florian (W) vs (L) Diego Nunes
Im not very familiar with these fighters even tho this was the co-main event of the night. Florian apperantly made a big cut down to featherweight and there were concerns if he would be able to perform to the best of his abilities. Well...he did. He dominated the fight and Diego Nunes was a bloody mess by the end of the fight. Props for the heart Nunes displayed.

MAIN EVENT: Junio Dos Santos (W) vs (L) Shane Carwin 
  The main event was a great battle. The reason it was not my favorite fight of the night is because it was totally dominated by Junior Dos Santos. Cigano really smashed Carwin at the end of the 1st round and his speed is just unbeliavable. Carwin was getting tagged by that left jab so much it was not even funny. I mean literraly Cigano was punching him between his guard finding that tiny hole in his defense and keeping Carwin no the defensive. Which costed him the fight because after that devastating finish at the end of round one Carwin just couldnt get back into the fight. He made  some attempts but the speed and amazing technique of Junior proved too much. Its crazy how a Heavyweight fighter can move so fast. Dos Santos was already the top contender for the HW title but because Cain Velasquez got that shoulder injury he had to fight Carwin instead. So yet again he proves why he is the top guy in line and his next fight now officially against Cain for the UFC HW Belt. And after the amazing performance he gave us i expect him to win yet again.
Did i mention Dos Santos has yet to be defeated in the Octagon? Yeah....dude is crazy!

Die2Nite
The meta my team was supposed to join forces with kinda screwed me over. After the final campers died they decided to make an imidiate jump after ARGH and since i was sleeping after a long night (look below) i was left my crew to they made the jump witheout us. So now we are in a random distant town with too many rookies and 8 citizens already dead. Sigh. . . . at least im racking up some hero days to unlock another power.
Im thinking maybe i should let Shinji and Vik rest for a bit and go join one of the big meta`s. I certainly have the Forum name for it and the Soul page stats. And ive always wanted to try and play in a town with Workshop.

P.P:
Had a ranchy night that Sunday. I`ve got this sex girlfriend of mine....but i think we might be making the full relationship transition if things keep going this way. Altho to be honest it was kind of always ment to go that way. We are almost dating just never really had any talk about it. Ugh....i hate relationship talks X_X