Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Game

Phasing's back??

It's back!

Not having exactly had a stellar record as far as being a drawback, this newest offering instead focuses on one of phasing's better aspects: as a defensive maneuver! Teferi's Protection phases out all of your permanents, keeping them safe and sound from any removal imaginable, while likewise enchanting you with Progenitus's Embrace so nobody can lay a finger on you while your stuff isn't there to protect you. In essence, YOU phase out as well.

Now, being able to skip out on things for a turn is nice, but it's a shame how all good things must come to an end. You really want to play it safe? Just opt out of the game!

Enter the rather unique Lethal Vapors, which allows you to skip as many turns as you please. Remember the infuriating Chronatog and Stasis lock from way back when? Same idea, but it's arguably an even harder lock to break. Simply activate Lethal Vapors's ability right after you play it, then without passing priority, activate it again in response to the last activation an arbitrarily large number of times. The destroying of Lethal Vapors is part of the effect, not the cost, so you can stack as many time skips as you could possibly want this way. Having skipped your next 500-odd turns, play Teferi's Protection. You have Protection from everything until your next turn, which remember, is not going to be for a very long time. You can now sit back and watch.

At this point your opponent will play out the rest of the game with an opponent whom he can't damage, target, or generally affect in any way. Probably most players will concede at this point rather than face a slow death by decking. Especially interesting, however, is if you pull this in a multiplayer game - it's functionally the same as being the guy kicked out first, except after everyone else is done slugging it out, you're still declared the winner no matter what. This could be a cruel bit of fun if you're in the mood to play on your 3DS but still win a big Magic game while you're at it. Heck, you could go play another Magic game while silently winning that first one!

Important note: if your opponent is wise to what you're about to do, he can unfortunately answer every turn-skip you activate with one of his own. That's where our friend Grand Abolisher comes in, preventing anyone but you from activating the Vapors the turn you play it! Another alternative is Claws of Gix - since you always gain priority right after adding something to the stack, you can immediately follow up your 500 turn-skips by sacrificing the Vapors. Seeing as the sacrifice is the activation cost on Claws of Gix, nobody can respond to that either! Who knew not playing Magic could be so much fun?

All Rise

White weenie is a classic decktype, and it's always getting new tools to work with. That said, it's always got its classic weaknesses, too. White's great at coming in fast with efficient weenies, cheap combat tricks and the best removal you can find. In a slower paced setting, however - such as any multiplayer game - suddenly that might not cut it. In my experience, white can have trouble closing out these sorts of games; I'm all for hashing it out with creatures and removal for a while, but games do have to end at some point and I'm not exactly itching for a three-hour standstill. I don't like resorting to an "I-win" combo, but I do like the option of something above and beyond turning dudes sideways and hoping for the best. The big finishers you can find, citing Akroma as a classic example, can knock some heads in... but mass removal is the classic weakness of aggressive decks, and your big finisher makes you no more resilient to one than any of your cheaper guys. Can't we rely on some metric a little deeper than just being a fat flyer?

The Game of Life

Building off the last article, this is a quick Multiplayer variant that can add spice to an otherwise tepid game.

In this variant, life never disappears; it is passed between the players. Instead of a life total, each player begins the game with 20 poker chips, counters, whatever. (Using "fingers and toes" as a symbolic unit not recommended.) Whenever you deal damage to another player with a spell, effect or creature, that player must give you a number of chips equal to the damage. For example, if you cast Lightning Bolt on a player, he loses three chips, you gain three chips. (Even better than Lightning Helix!)

When a player has zero chips, he is out of the game. If one of your cards deals damage to you or causes you to lose life, you lose chips to the "bank," which is empty at the beginning of the game. Whenever you gain life from a spell or effect, take chips from the bank. If there aren't enough chips - as will usually be the case - you're outta luck. In addition, you may attempt to bribe other players by giving them chips, but a player who takes a bribe is not required to keep his word. Likewise, a player who promises a payment is not required to follow through on the pact.

Parting advice: with this variant, seriously watch out for Transcendence decks.

Multiplayer Madness

You and several of your friends sit down to play a big game of "chaos" multiplayer Magic fresh and full of enthusiasm. Three hours later, nobody is willing to do anything offensive, except for the guy who attacked early on - and he was ganged-up on and killed two-and-half hours ago. Now it's down to whoever played the least card-drawing and is decked last. Or maybe you got mana-screwed with only one land. For the first seven turns, your opponents took pity on you. Eventually, when you still had no land, they decided to put you out of your misery. Now, you've got to sit around for two hours - relegated to watching reruns of NBC's Saturday night "Thrillogy" - while your friends have fun.

Sound like your multiplayer games? If you've ever tried playing a large game with five or more players, you've probably run into these problems, and quite a few other ones as well. Fortunately, there are ways you can improve your multiplayer experience. Here are some of the common problems players encounter and a few solutions: