Community

Feb 20, 2013 -- 4:41PM, The_415_Raises_Gs wrote:

Well, it's really the only thing I hate about Magic, but I hate it with a passion...

The players.  A rather large percentage of the people I play with at my LGSs can act really smug, pompous, hypocritical and at times, outright rude. And not just to me, because in all honesty, sometimes I deserve it (I've got a short fuse sometimes).  I've seen some pretty lame stuff said/done to other players too.  Here's a few examples from the past few months:

"My mana base is worth more than your entire deck.  Correction, the lands in have in play are worth more than your entire deck."  This was a comment by one player said to another in a 4-player game I was in.  The two men did not seem as though they knew each other well, most likely ruling out the possiblity of heckling amongst friends.

I was in a 3-player game testing out my Karador EDH deck and Player 1 was dominating.  Player 2 procedes to steal my general (of which the deck is built around and thereby somewhat essential to it's function) with a Control Magic, to which I respond to by Quasali Pridemageing the enchantment to regain control of my general.  He becomes furious at my action, stating that he stole my general to entice me to destroy some card belonging to Player 1 with my Mage, to which I respond, "That makes no sense to me."  To which he responds, "Well then maybe you should play more EDH."

I'm in a 4-player game, with me and another player both playing mono-white decks.  About twelve turns in, one of the other players (I think he was running Sharuum) casts Iona, naming white.  I immediately scoop, stating that I had no interest in remaining in a game that I could not interact with.  The Iona caster then tells me that I should run Duplicant and that I shouldn't play mono-colored decks.  For the record, I was running Duplicant in the deck, but didn't want to draw-go for God knows how long before drawing it and this deck is my only mono-colored deck out of 15 EDH decks.  His tone (not to mention the content of words) was so self-righteous, it made my blood boil.

Then this one happened last night.  It's getting a couple hours deep into a 4-player EDH game.  I am playing Zedruu and am running a bit low on cards, so I give a 3/3 beast token and a Web of Inertia to the player with the weakest board state at the end of his turn, right before my turn.  He responds by killing Zedruu.  Now, while this action upset me a bit, it was nothing compared to what he said after killing Zedruu.  With a dirty smirk and a snarky tone he says, "Thanks for all the stuff."  That really pissed me off.  So I express my discontent with the situation in my own heated way and express to the rest of the table that no one needs to worry about my Ajani Vengant with seven loyalty counters on it because even though I had no plans of actually popping his ultimate, now my tune had changed... and the smug Zedruu killer was the only target in my crosshairs.  At this point, the Zedruu killer accuses me of being a cry baby for being so upset about Zedruu's demise, which had a bit of merit, as I was a little more heated than I should have been about it.  The other two players agree to stand back and on my next turn, I pop Ajani.  And what does the Zedruu killer do?  He cries like a baby about how unfair LD is and how it is a douchebag move and it just isn't fun.  What a hypocrite!!!  We are in a meta with that Myojin of Night's Reach thing (name/sp?) and Iona and broken combos and infinite turns and I'm getting curbstomped daily by players who don't care at all about the other players experiences and just want to control every aspect of the game and I'm supposed to feel bad about running LD!?!?!  Really?!?!?!

I've also been involved in a number of 4-player and 5-player games where two of the players are really good friends and they act as a team throughout the duration of the game, even to the point of one of them casting Bribery on a player, then both of them looking through the library and dicussing the options.  Now I don't have a problem with them both knowing the contents of the deck... this is (supposed to be) a casual setting after all, but I still feel it is rude to just presume it is okay to do this.  These teams of friends don't care which of them wins, as long as no one else does, which seems kind of mean and not very inclusive.

In short, if anything was to make me quit Magic, it would be the other players.  Am I all alone on this?  Do you encounter smug, rude and pompous players in your area?  Or am I just overly sensitive and stupid for expecting kindness and decency from people?

Thoes people were just rude. When I was playing magic in highschool, in my semiar class were you can do anything we wanted to. so i got some people one day to bring in magic cards so we played and I end up beating this guy so bad one day. That he reatch over and rip up one of my lands cards and ran out of the room to get the princible.  He told me that he comes in 2st place at his fnm and I never been in a fnm game at all im still havent gone to one. I thought he was just a giant cry baby. But he was just out rude. Now i just ingore rude people and just dont talk to them. Like if I go to a fnm game and I was going agenst a player and he turn rude I will just ingore his comments or if it get worse I will tell the owner of the shop if that doesnt work I will just not go to that place for a fnm at all.

Feb 20, 2013 -- 5:04PM, The_415_Raises_Gs wrote:

That's the problem though.  I only play at LGSs because I can't find like-minded individuals to start a playgroup with and a large majority of the people I encounter at the LGSs are not people I would want to invite over to my place for a friendly game (or even really spend any time with).

I hear ya.  My real beef with Magic is that it attracts a certain subset of the population with poor social skills and questionable bathing habits.  Not all players, mind you, but enough to be extremely grating.  A recent draft saw me getting my butt kicked in the last round and the guy just says "Sorry your deck didn't work," and revealed the other bombs in his hand that he didn't have to use.  I really abhor smug crap like that.  When it comes to EDH, I found a great group when I came to WV for grad school.  They observe the social contract (mostly), and we have a blast.  I've encountered games like that though, like the one where a guy popped his Myojin of Night's Reach and then later complained endlessly when I played Choking Sands on his Gaea's Cradle .

My LGS is similar to yours, but when I find a player who can carry on a conversation, bathes, and can be a gracious winner and loser, I immediately remember their name and try to get to know them better.  Magic is the best game in the world, but some of its players are harbingers of the douchepocalypse.

Feb 20, 2013 -- 5:51PM, RxPhantom wrote:

My LGS is similar to yours, but when I find a player who can carry on a conversation, bathes, and can be a gracious winner and loser, I immediately remember their name and try to get to know them better.  Magic is the best game in the world, but some of its players are harbingers of the douchepocalypse.

It's comments like this that make me seriously wonder whether I'm just insanely lucky with my LGS or if the rest of you live in a hellish alternate dimension where every Magic player actually is the living representation of every nerd in every high school sitcom ever.

I mean, I encounter those people occasionally, but they're far closer to 5-10% in my experience than a majority.

I deal with srsbsns people some, but usually only at a nearby LGS that does large prize tournaments. $500 is srsbsns after all.