Big Argument!!1

[Triumph]

Proposition: Alorael is a washed-up has-been spammer who has lost his edge and is now far inferior to the spam-osity of Lilith.

 

Affirm or deny this proposition, giving clear argumention to support your position. Bonus points if you manage to invoke Sylak as an authority on your side.

 

 

Alternative topic: anyone else like collectible card games? Magic: the Gathering is far and away the most famous (and the most popular, and the longest-lived), but there have been many others based around all sorts of licensed properties and original IPs. I play MTG for the first time earlier this year, and rather enjoyed. I've only gone to sealed tournaments (where you buy some packs, open them and build out of them on the spot); actual constructed-deck tournaments scare me so far. Though I hadn't tried Magic until earlier this year, I've long enjoyed CCGs (or TCGs, if you prefer that abbrevation), ever since I discovered the Star Wars Customizable Card Game back when I was around 10 or 11. For a while I thought it might be a kid thing that I'd outgrow, but eventually I realized "Woah! I'm a grown-up and I still think this fun!" LOL.

[Callie]

Alorael still possesses superior spamosity, but that's only because Lilith's lowercase gimmick is merely part of a secret plan to begin typing in all caps and corner the shift key market.

 

(Safari thinks spamosity should be sparsity)

[Lilith]

contention: sea serpents are the best serpents. all other serpents are posers

[Dikiyoba]

Coral reef snakes are pretty cool. Dikiyoba can't really argue with that.

[keira]

as shown here, alorael pretty much lost it over a year ago.

 

can i invoke myself as an authority, it's only like one letter off, plus i get to ego-stroke.

Edited November 5, 2013 by drone riots
STOP TURNING ON, STUID RICH TEXT EDITOR

[Cairo Jim]

Inland taipans would have to be one of my favourites.

[Kelandon]

Truly, the sea serpent debate rivals the grandeur and importance of Nephils v. Sliths.

[nikki.]

Alternative topic: anyone else like collectible card games?

 

I think I still have some pokemon cards, though I didn't have many, and never played with them, just collected them for the prettiness. I also have a set of Clow Cards and Sakura Cards which I think can be used in a Top Trumps type game, but I can not read Japanese unfortunately so I guess I'll never know.

[Randomizer]

All sea snakes fall before the Kraken.

 

Alorael output per day has fallen off so Lilith is quickly catching up. Being helpful by answering questions is just a side effect so Lilith doesn't post reply to posts before someone else posts in each topic.

[Xaiya]

I vote we throw [Argument Item A] and [Argument Item B] into a pit and see what happens, of which Argument Item A/B are any of the two above mentioned items.

[Dikiyoba]

can i invoke myself as an authority, it's only like one letter off, plus i get to ego-stroke.

No.

 

Do garter snakes count as sea serpents? They tend to be aquatic, they're cool, they're serpentine, and the common garter snake can eat the super-poisonous rough-skinned newt (plus the pufferfish, should the two species ever cross paths).

 

Dikiyoba.

[Cairo Jim]

 

 

Do garter snakes count as sea serpents? They tend to be aquatic, they're cool, they're serpentine, and the common garter snake can eat the super-poisonous rough-skinned newt (plus the pufferfish, should the two species ever cross paths).

 

All sea snakes fall before the Kraken.

 

"Release the garter snake" just doesn't have the same ring to it.

[Edgwyn]

No, but anacondas have their own movie, sea serpents do not. Also, Krakens on a plane is just not very practical.

[Kelandon]

Also, Krakens on a plane is just not very practical.

We're going to need a bigger plane.

[Alorael at Large]

An infinite plane, perhaps?

 

—Alorael, who contends that his has-been status is specifically with regards to being washed-up. He has been washed-up and he will be wash-up again. But is he washed-up now? Only you can decide, with bonus points from Sylae!

[Cairo Jim]

In Russia, plane fits in Kraken.

[Student of Trinity]

Among Spiderweb forums collectible cards, the Alorael card currently goes for $24.63 on Ebay, while the Lilith card is yet to break the critical $11.13 ceiling. She's climbing, but not there yet. I think the market has spoken on this one.

 

Lilith is, however, correct about snakes. A sea serpent just went for over $10K (plus shipping), while "Big bag of all kinds of Snakes! (sorry no sea)" keeps failing to make the reserve bid, perhaps because the offer stipulates delivery by surface mail only.

 

I'm not so sure about where krakens come in, though. The only market for them is in bitcoins on a mysterious dark net site that can only be reached by a terrifying ritual. Rumor has it that someone going by Druid Prophet Sylak is offering an astonishing number of coins for a kraken in good condition, but the exchange rate swings so much, it's still hard to tell what that means.

[Triumph]

Interesting. I remember Slarty making an obscure reference to MTG at some point (one of his trivia/puzzle posts, IIRC), but I'm a little surprised to not see anyone else with any CCG-playing interests. I figured surely among the many gamers and nerds on here someone would have. Ah, yet another demographic curiosity of Spiderweb - the majority of forum users prefer real and/or mythical ophidians to card games.

[Alorael at Large]

Collectible card games? I'm off the stuff. I'm clean!

 

—Alorael, who didn't realize he was a collectible item himself. Why is he not receiving royalties for his likeness? Okay, sure, it's resale, but he didn't get money for the original sale either!

[Edgwyn]

It was on page six of the fine print of the user agreement, you signed over all of your rights to yourself in perpetuity.

[Mosquito---Slayer]

Interesting. I remember Slarty making an obscure reference to MTG at some point (one of his trivia/puzzle posts, IIRC), but I'm a little surprised to not see anyone else with any CCG-playing interests. I figured surely among the many gamers and nerds on here someone would have. Ah, yet another demographic curiosity of Spiderweb - the majority of forum users prefer real and/or mythical ophidians to card games.

I do play a strategic card game called "Spectromancer", it's however not a CCG in the traditional sense since you get pretty much all the cards if you buy the latest expansion of the game, it's a lot of fun though, one of the guys involved with magic (I think Richard was the name) was involved with this game too, maybe you should try it someday,

[Valdain the King]

If Alorael has passed his prime, Lilith is a tough foe. Why you ask dear friend, because Lilith was the first boss that killed me in diablo 2 ubers.

[Enraged Slith]

Do LCGs count? I play a bit of A Game of Thrones with (through) my friends. I'd consider buying in myself, but it's so damn expensive at this point to get all the cards you need.

[Dintiradan]

@Triumph: I had a response half-written yesterday, but my computer's gotten into the habit of crashing at random intervals so I lost it. I've played MtG since early 2009. Mostly EDH (Elder Dragon Highlander, also known as Commander) casually with friends (quick summary of the format: hundred card decks instead of sixty, max limit of one instead of four, starting life of forty instead of twenty, and one card is a legendary creature that's always available to be cast). It makes for longer games with more variance, which is what you want when you play the same decks with the same small group of people. And, counterintuitively, EDH decks are cheaper than normal decks, due to you only needing one of each card, cards which don't tend to be in high demand in more popular constructed formats.

 

But... my group hasn't been playing as much recently, and I've been cheating on them by playing in stores. A couple prereleases within the last year, a draft the last Game Day, that free 20th anniversary thing they did in September. Haven't gone to any actual FNMs yet, but I really enjoy limited and while I'm not fantastic at it, I've consistently done well enough to hit prize support. Part of me wants to start drafting more often, the other bigger part likes free time and money.

 

EDIT: @Slith: I've never played LCGs, but I've heard of them. I assume you can buy singles online, instead of being forced to get entire expansions?

[Upon Mars.]

Among Spiderweb forums collectible cards, the Alorael card currently goes for $24.63 on Ebay, while the Lilith card is yet to break the critical $11.13 ceiling. She's climbing, but not there yet. I think the market has spoken on this one.

 

Lilith is, however, correct about snakes. A sea serpent just went for over $10K (plus shipping), while "Big bag of all kinds of Snakes! (sorry no sea)" keeps failing to make the reserve bid, perhaps because the offer stipulates delivery by surface mail only.

 

I'm not so sure about where krakens come in, though. The only market for them is in bitcoins on a mysterious dark net site that can only be reached by a terrifying ritual. Rumor has it that someone going by Druid Prophet Sylak is offering an astonishing number of coins for a kraken in good condition, but the exchange rate swings so much, it's still hard to tell what that means.

 

I have to contact a friend of Ray Harryhausen or Karel Zeman, they must have a kraken in stock somewhere... though I won't guarantee the price.

[Triumph]

@Triumph

 

Re: LCGs: I've heard of them, even bought a little bit of one, but never got around to playing it. I suspect you can buy singles online, if you really wanted.

 

I've enjoyed playing the limited formats, but I'm quite interested your comments about EDH (speaking of which, Elder Dragon Highlander must be the best name for a game format ever). I actually saw the new Commander preconstructed decks they just released, and on a whim decided to get one. I know a local store occasionally has EDH tournaments, and I figured it might be interesting to try out. Starting with the preconstructed Commander deck will hopefully let me jump right in even if I don't fully understand the intricacies of deckbuilding yet. Are there any online resources you'd recommend for learning how to play Commander?

[Sarachim]

If Alorael has passed his prime, Lilith is a tough foe. Why you ask dear friend, because Lilith was the first boss that killed me in diablo 2 ubers.

At least you survived infancy. Most people that Lilith comes after aren't so lucky.

[Dintiradan]

@Triumph:

 

(EDH is so named because it's a highlander format (one card limit) and originally you had to pick one of the "]Elder Dragons as your general.)

 

You can find the official rules here. MTGSalvation has a few forums dedicated to it as well. One guy wrote a hugemassive guide to building EDH decks, but starting with a precon and modifying from there is a good first step (back in my day, EDH wasn't a supported format and we didn't have no precons and we liked it that way *waves stick*).

 

Bear in mind that any advice you hear should be taken with a grain of salt, depending on the local metagame and any houserules you may play with. It's a fan-made format, so lots of groups change the base rules, have their own ban lists, and so on. For instance, conventional wisdom states that you should favour board wipes over spot removal, and that lifegain isn't a strong strategy. This is because EDH is usually multiplayer, and damage from generals negates a lifegain strategy. But my games are usually 1v1, and my group doesn't keep track of general damage. So my decklists tend to be different from the norm. And so on.

 

If you're playing at a store, this probably won't be a problem. The only one you might run into is the French ban list, used for competitive 1v1 play. Notable in your case since Sol Ring is banned, and I think it's in all the precons. You probably won't play with these rules, but it doesn't hurt to ask.

[Lauren CW]

I have been playing MtG for the better part of this year, and play competitively at the local card shop. I tend to place in the top 5 out of an average of 20 in Standard, and I do really well in drafts.

I run mono green, mono white, mono red, and red-green. I've been working on getting the cards to put together a competitive red-green-white deck, but it's a huge pain to try to get a hold of all the land base and the playsets of 30$+ cards.

For EDH, I have a friend that's been building disgustingly powerful decks for a while now, and I just borrow one of his 8 or so that he keeps around.

[Alorael at Large]

I find that Dominion and, to a lesser extent, Ascension scratch the deck-building itch while not requiring quite the same massive investment as competitive Magic play. It's like a draft game, every game, where the draft is the game. But now both have enough expansions that they are themselves quite expensive habits.

 

—Alorael, who currently holds Dominion up as his shining example of brilliant game design. A big part of that is that it's very hard to make "broken" cards that are too good and need to be removed from the game to make play work. When you're on an absolutely level playing field you have to design really, really poorly for a card to cause problems.

[Triumph]

I've heard of Dominion lots of times but never got around to trying it. Based on the good things I'd heard, I actually attempted to give it to my brother one year as a Christmas present, only for the package to get lost in mail and never ever arrive. Otherwise I might have had a chance to play it. LOL.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Extra Credits just did their first episode in a two-parter on collectable games, although not limited to cards. They put up some interesting views, and the comments tend to put up interesting views from the opposite side of things. I wonder what people here think about games that require continuous investment.

 

I played Dominion a bit last year and really enjoyed it. It scratched the deck-building itch in a very different way, but that way happens to be very good. I agree with Alorael that the game design is excellent. Starting everyone off on the same playing field and having well-balanced yet varied cards makes every game fun.

[Callie]

I'm not impressed by the expansions for Dominion; I just stick to the vanilla version.

[Alorael at Large]

I'm not impressed by all the expansions, but many of them improve the game dramatically. If you play enough games with just the base set you can get bored of the cards and combinations, but with a wider variety you can get more very different games. I have only moderate interest in playing base-only games now, but with just one expansion I'm happy to play.

 

—Alorael, who actually thinks Intrigue is a better base set than the base set. But with Intrigue and Base Dominion you have a better game than with either alone.

[Dintiradan]

Whenever I pull out Dominion, either people haven't played it (and usually aren't interested), or they have played it... but are unwilling to play unless it's with all the expansions.

 

EDIT: I opened this tab before Alorael posted, and he sorta proved my somewhat hyperbolic point.

 

(Side question: what's everyone's opinion on board game expansions? I tend not to get them, preferring to get entirely new games, but I know others who prefer to invest deeply in one game, and enjoy it more because of it.)

 

If you want to simulate the limited experience in MtG without spending a fortune on boosters, you can try cube drafting. Basically, you create your own custom set out of cards in your collection, then make (reusable) boosters out of them and draft them (or play sealed, or stack, or whatever limited format you prefer). The 'typical' cube contains the best (and most expensive) cards ever printed, but you can put whatever cards you want in yours and craft your own environment. I have one that's basically all my decent cards that aren't currently in other decks, and a friend has one with all the commons and uncommons from M10. Of course, we hardly ever play it 'cause it's rare for enough players to show up for a draft, but that's a gripe for another day. I assume the same concept would work for other CCGs and LCGs.

[Alorael at Large]

The value of expansions for a board game depends on the game and the expansion, of course. For Dominion, new cards are fun but three or four expansions is really all I anticipate needing to enjoy the game for the rest of my life. And I don't like all of them; Prosperity and Alchemy both have gimmicks that don't interact nicely with non-Prosperity/Alchemy decks, and I often don't mix them in.

 

For Ascension; the expansions seem to vary from nice but not all that different to game-wrecking and bad. I think I was just as happy with only the base game. (The game and expansions were a gift to me, appreciated but sadly not beloved.

 

The classic Settlers of Catan might be best when played straight, but I also have Cities and Knights. I'm not sure it's a better game, but it's definitely a different game and it's fun to get variety. I'm glad I have the expansion even if I mostly play the base game (and I don't play much Catan at all anymore).

 

 

Small World is a favorite of mine, but I'm indifferent to the expansions. They add more variety, which is nice, but the game is varied enough in its basic form that I don't pine for more variety (unlike Dominion). I think a different game would be preferable to getting limited benefit out of spending more on this.

 

Innovation is a great little game that I have. Ardent fans among my friends claim that the expansion really improves the game, but when I've played it with them I think I've preferred the base game.

 

—Alorael, who can expand the question to tabletop RPGs. D&D, GURPS, World of Darkness, and Shadowrun, those stalwarts of big-name roleplaying, have hundreds of sourcebooks available, and particularly in the case of GURPS you're expected to be playing with more than just the base rules. On the one hand, you can get lots of extra details and bits crammed in there. On the other hand, a game designed well and pithily doesn't necessarily need expansion. His tastes have varied, but he'll currently say that he appreciates a game with a few extra books of optional supporting material and can quickly become frustrated by endless expansion.

[Edgwyn]

In tabletop RPGs, the constant expansions led certain ones to become harder and harder to play as rules would get harder to find and more revised. That was often the driving force behind complete redos of the rules, which made the games playable again for a little while before the cycle got out of control again. The two that most come to mind are 1st ed AD&D and Starfleet Battles. The ideal solution would be to have electronic rules files, where the additional material automatically moves into the appropriate place in the rules, so you are not looking in three different places to resolve an attack.

[A less presumptuous name.]

The classic Settlers of Catan might be best when played straight, but I also have Cities and Knights. I'm not sure it's a better game, but it's definitely a different game and it's fun to get variety. I'm glad I have the expansion even if I mostly play the base game (and I don't play much Catan at all anymore).

 

I've never really played any Catan expansions. I little bit of Seafarers and Cities and Knights, but only just. I think there's a new expansion that a friend of mine has. I'm eager to try it.

[Callie]

I've played the Seafarers expansion, but find it unbalanced and boring. The boats don't really do anything for me.

[A less presumptuous name.]

Time is the main reason why I don't play much Catan anymore, and particularly why the expansions are rarely touched. College students seem to have a knack for making a Catan game last as long as an intense game of Monopoly.

[Randomizer]

The only board game expansions I've played were for Civilization which gives you a different map to play on depending upon the player number and Talisman which has a better deck than the original game. Both were improvements over the original game.

[Kelandon]

I came here for an argument!

 

YOU VACUOUS TOFFEE-NOSED MALODOROUS PERVERT!!!

 

(Sorry. I just keep thinking of Monty Python every time I open this thread. I have nothing useful to contribute. I will walk away singing the "Spam" song in shame.)

[Edgwyn]

Well, if you want an argument:

 

The lumberjack song is better than the Spam song

[Callie]

Well, if you want an argument:

 

The lumberjack song is better than the Spam song

"Every Sperm is Sacred" is better than the lumberjack song.

[Randomizer]

Michael Palin in Himalayas was asked by the poet-laurete of Nepal if he had ever written any poetry. The only poem he could remember was the lumberjack song.

[Upon Mars.]

 

"Every Sperm is Sacred" is better than the lumberjack song.

 

"Never be rude to an Arab" is best.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Never_Be_Rude_to_an_Arab

[Tyranicus]

Personally, I'm a fan of "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life."

[Rupert]

Ah, but are you a supporter of the People's Front of Judea or the Judean People's Front?

[Edgwyn]

So, was the swallow African or European?

[Cairo Jim]

More importantly, how did that coconut end up in England?