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04-10-2000
 Theory Behind Magic: Is Magic a game of Luck?
Personally, I hate it whenever someone says that I am just lucky or that they are just unlucky when
they lose a game. Sure, unlike Chess, Magic has factors where good luck can win you the game. Factors such as
top decking a key card, and your opponent having to mulligan. The question is, did luck win you every game in
a tournament?
Rather then luck, I would like to think of Magic more as a game of percentages and calculations. Instead of
depending on luck to give you good card draws, you will maximize your chances of drawing certain cards by
including 4 in your deck. If you just had a mulligan, then do a table shuffle to ensure that your lands are
not piled up together. Whatever the reason, there is always a way to get around it if you have a good deck.
This may sound all good and merry in constructed format, but what about in a draft? Has it ever happened to
you that you seem to be opening crap cards and being passed more crap cards? What can you do in such a
situation? Should you make a phone call to God? Well if you were in such a situation, you were probably
drafting the same colour(s) as the person sitting next to you. Your choice of drafting the same colour(s) has
decreased your chances of being passed good cards in that colour(s).
What if the opponents you play have a Predator Flagship and a Troubled Healer in his/her deck? First of all,
what are the chances of them drawing their bombs? There are always cards to deal with both those cards. You
may want to consider your options before throwing your hands up and saying "His deck is too good for me to
beat." I have seen people lose with an insane deck, which included 4 Blastoderms and a Blinding Angel. (I
think that was me).
Even if they have the bomb cards and manage to draw them every game, it still takes skill to hold you off and
beat you down before those bombs come out. I remember playing Dan Turner (who is a really cool guy and a
great player with the favourite saying of "I'll Counter it"... being an innate Blue player and all.) in one
of the drafts once in Games Paradise. He pulled a Rupture (he only had 1 in the deck) on me 2 games in a row,
killing me with it both games, the turn before I could kill him. Sure I was upset at the time and probably
started screaming like 6 year-old kid when I lost, but if you read further, he out-played me in both games.
Firstly, he managed to put me within the Rupture range and secondly, he managed to keep himself out of it. To
top it off, he had the right creature to Rupture just enough to kill me. There is definitely more to it then
just drawing the Rupture.
I am not saying that luck is none existent in the game of Magic, but for an uncontrollable factor, you should
not spend so much time thinking about it. If you are drawing too many lands most of the time, maybe you
should cut down on lands instead of complaining about having bad draws. If luck is so important, then why do
the same players keep winning in tournaments? Is it because they are lucky all the time? I think not!
Minga Wong |
