Tuesday, May 29, 2012

"The Principle of the Empty Hand"



"The Principle of the Empty Hand"
by:
Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

     In the game of Magic: The Gathering , your hand or the number of cards that you have represents your potential power , your ability to cast spells both big and small or to increase your mana base to cast more powerful spells.  One of the most crippling tactics in magic is to disrupt your opponents plans by making them discard cards from their hands , faster than they could recover. 

     Without a hand  , a player has no threats to counter or remove your creatures on the battlefield , they have no way to react and they simply will be open for lethal damage in no time.  Some of the most classic  decks feature this great tactic and standard decks who want to control the opponent always make sure that they have a set or two of cards called discarders. Sometimes a player doesn't even need to remove all of the opponents hand, they just have to remove the "key" cards that they cannot take care of or something that will disrupt their own plans of  victory later on.

     Planning to go lethal poison damage with your Skithiryx? Then be cautious enough to use a distress to scope out your opponents hand to rid them of any spot removal like Go for the Throat or Vapor Snag . With these out of the way then you can just swing away without any hindrances. Are you playing a deck that cannot handle planeswalkers? Then if you see one the logical choice is to have it discarded where it has no means of harming you.

     This ability of spells or creatures to discard cards is also extremely important to predict your opponents next turns.A double edged sword if you will. While choosing what you would want them to discard you could get a full view of whatever it is that your opponents are hiding as well. There are many ways to exploit this knowledge.

      A hand full of Lands ensures that they do not have any threatening spells , a hand full of just spells means that your opponent will have to wait for mana and will obviously miss a couple of land drops while you go ahead and develop your own. If a person has too many counters and he can already cast them with his mana base then the obvious ploy is to "bait" the player in using up these said counters , you can summon threats that are easy to cast and won't affect your plans for later , you can reserve your best spells when you really need them. Sometimes the last two cards in a players hands aren't necessarily a pair of counters , sometimes it can just be 2 lands that they are bluffing with. Some people are really with good with bluffing but its nothing a timely Gitaxian probe or Despise cannot reveal.  

     It is important to know the enemies hand and it is more important to have them have no hand in the late game so that you and your creatures can do the damage to put them out of their miseries. To paraphrase the Romulans of Star Trek. "To be Unknown is to be invincible but with the knowledge that one garners after having so many peeks at a players hand or lack thereof means that victory is only a few card draws away."

Friday, May 25, 2012

"The Ghostly Particles in the Air"





"The Ghostly Particles in the Air"
by:
Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

    I have recently been moved to a new cubicle at work that my team and I share with another team. We usually don't interact because we are on the opposite ends of the shifts. We are night shift and they are day shift and except for 2 hours each day we never would even see each others faces. I have no problem with them and they have no problem with me except that one of them has been coughing a whole lot in the last week that I have been in this cubicle. Its not even your normal cough that you can just excuse away from like "Nasamid ako" or "malamig lang kasi" , this is the kind of cough that is constant and comes deep from the lungs.Its a barking cough that you cannot help but notice.

   I dont know this person so I dont approach him/her about this cough but it has been a constant concern for me. Infectious particles have been known to be spread in a 4 feet radius from the infecting person...I am obviously in that radius , just a few feet from the offending person in fact. I could just imagine the ghostly particles of bacteria and viruses landing on my skin , my key board , my clothing , an endless assault as this person continues to cough and cough. As I'm writing this the coughing rhythm that has been established has been in the back ground , some of this persons team mates have even joked about it  , a slight nudge to have himself/herself checked. This person just shrugs these jokes aside and continues to go on overtime though he/she really needs the downtime to heal. I pity my team mate who has to use this persons PC station during the night. All those infectious particles just waiting to catch another victim. I surely hope its not me. I see more Vitamin C in my immediate future.