"A Parallel Future? Red Dawn"

"A Parallel Future? Red Dawn"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

Movie review : Red Dawn

Starring: Chris Hemsworth , and that guy from Hunger Games...

Plot: A small town in America wakes up to foreign Paratroopers dropping in on their Neighborhood. As it turns out it is a hostile take over by the North Korean Army who is backed by the Russians. The Story follows a ragtag band of Patriots called The Wolverines as they wage war against a menacing North Korean Army.

The good:

- It is good to see the Americans fighting on their own turf.

- Chris Hemsworth driving through 2  burning cars when there was space good enough for 3 cars to pass through in the other lanes...

- Chris Hemsworth dying everytime he appears with a movie that has a Cabin in the woods

- The exciting Guerilla tactics that you think everyone can pull off but are surprisingly hard in real life

- The Asian guy who always looks like he was from Fresno uttering Korean words to distract the guards in the precint battle.

- The Prefect Cho being killed by the gun that was owned by Chris Hemsworth's Dad  in the movie.

The Bad:

- Though I like the premise of an Asian army invading America , if the Japanese could not do it how can the North Koreans do it?

- I don't believe that the entire East Coast could be swallowed up just like that by an army that had to travel a very long distance from its support bases.

- Snipers and good shots always die. (Happened in Saving Private Ryan , Happened here too)

The Ugly:

- The North Korean prefect Cho , who is the main baddie of the film looks like a spitting image of the pre-BB Gandang Hari Rustom Padilla which makes you wonder.

- Chris Hemsworths Headshot before making out with the cute girl.

Over all the movie was great and it opens itself to a sequel because there is a lot of ground to cover. It is refreshing to see Americans battling it out with other races other than Middle Eastern types or as in the act of Valor swearing Filipinos. 

"EDH: Memnarch Rules"

"EDH: Memnarch Rules"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

As an original Mirrodin boy , one of my most sought after cards was the caretaker of the whole plane. Memnarch . He was left in charge by Karn when he traversed the planes. Over time though Memnarch was driven mad which resulted in a lot of wrong things in Mirrodin. Story wise aside his card representation was a very strong one. He continues to be a feature in many EDH decks as a commander that acquires artifacts.

With a casting cost of 7 Generic or Colorless mana he can be put in any deck but it is actually the mono blue decks that would maximize his abilities. In an expansion that was 70% artifact Memnarch reigned supreme. The Lands were artifacts , the creatures were artifacts and there were even things that made the organic into artifacts.

Memnarchs abilities are to make artifacts out of permanents permanently at the cost of 2 Blue Mana and One Colorless mana. His 2nd ability is to Acquire artifacts for 3 colorless mana and 1 Blue mana permanently as well. So if he could turn anything into an artifact , he could potentially Acquire everything for 4 mana and in a world made of metal he truly is the master.

"I'm turning to metal....Cooooool...."

Of course if you want to build a deck around the former Caretaker of Mirrodin you need to have things that make things into artifacts. Cards Like Neurok Transmuter and Liquimetal Coating are shoo ins in a deck like this. Myr landshaper is also a good fit if you want to grab those lands 2 at a time in partnership with Liquimetal Coating.

Imagine what the battlefield would look like with a Mycosynth Lattice (it makes all permanents into artifacts) also in play...everything will be up for grabs for a metal lord gone mad. The particular pieces of this spectacular combo comes in play one by one with cards like Fabricate or Treasure Mage included in the deck.

The next frightening thing with a Lattice in play is a March of the Machines. Since Memnarch has literally grabbed all of the other permanents from the other side. A March of the Machines is the final nail in the proverbial coffin of your opponents life. Since all permanents will become artifact creatures with power and toughness equal to their converted mana costs , all Lands will now go Kabloom! (They do not have converted mana costs so they die) ensuring that there would be no further resistance from anyone.

In preparation for this Machine + Lattice combo , you should also include little Talismans , Trinkets and other alternate mana producers like Myr and Stones or even Khalni gem. Darksteel Ingot and Darksteel Pendant are staples of this deck back in standard and are a must have here as well.  It ensures that you have creatures that would go unopposed in the late game. Imagine a reanimated Lattice , an Ingot and a Pendant. This trio already constitutes 11 points of damage and with your opponents unable to do anything for the next 4 turns then it is time to move on to the next game.

Blessed are those who could brew and play. Keep on doing so. Until next time. 

"Planeswalker Awakenings: Cersei Lannister Awakens"

"Planeswalker Awakenings: Cersei Lannister Awakens"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

In a different plane , a different time , a spark awakens and a new planeswalker is born...

The temple is filled with worshippers this day and they all look to the One Goddess who has saved them from ruin and death. She emerges from her alcove and pulls back her black shawl to reveal the blonde curls and attractive face that has endeared her to the men and women of Innistrad. They weep at the sight of her beauty. Cersei Lannister raises her arms to the adulation of the crowds.

It was not an easy path to ascend this throne. Vampires , Werewolves , Geists and even those of the Avacynian church resisted her. All with a futility she did not even imagine possible. The loss of their Angelic guardian Avacyn was enough to bring them to their knees. It was so easy to manipulate Griselbrand into fighting the angel and the simple trapping of them to the Helvault.  She was able to turn these creatures into fighting each other easily and when the church grew desperate there she was offering herself to lead them.

Black: Court Intrigue and Lies. Dark Machinations and Dark Dealings are the hallmarks of Cersei Lannisters moves in the Game of Thrones. She has often said that what is between her legs could also be used to achieve  power. And she has put this principle into good use. Power at any cost. She is black and she loves it.  She is not above manipulating others with her charm and sex or her threats and coin.

White: Cersei Lannister dreams of being Queen of all Westeros and she believes that she is the only one who can bring order in a world that needs it. She does mean well. Only she means well only to herself . She wants to rule so that there will be a better world for her children and herself. It is a selfish desire but one that is White all the way through no matter how misguided it appears. 

On the One Hand Cersei Lannister raises her hand and those of the blessed chosen come forth to bring her tribute. She revels in all the praises that are thrown at her. Merciful One!!! Beautiful One!!! Cersei our Queen!!!

On the other Hand Cersei Lannister slashes with a downward motion in the air and the enemies that are laid out in front of her are decapitated. Their heads falling off amidst the cheers of her adoring crowd. Cersei smiles and swears that this is the plane for her , far from the pain and memories of Westeros.

_____________________________________________________________

Writers Note:

Planeswalker Awakenings is like a "what if" series...where we try to put a character from a Book , TV series or movie into the context of a planeswalker from Magic:The Gathering.

"The Doubt of Doubt"

"The Doubt of Doubt"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

     During my daughters 7th birthday celebration one of my friends said something that almost moved me to tears.He said something about Him just using the things that I have taught him when we were in med school together.

     This guy has been my friend for years and he is now on the verge of becoming the Chief Resident for our schools Surgery program and he goes and says that he still uses the things that I have taught him in medschool when we were still together? It made me want to beam with pride because coming from someone who will almost  finish a program that we both wanted to enter. The sentiment  means a lot to me. It made me want to cry because unlike him who is almost at the end of his journey , I have not even started mine and might not be able to.

     It begins and ends with the board exams this August. I have been far removed from Medicine for the last two years due to life getting in the way of anything. I am now a husband and a dad and the requirements of those two things certainly takes up a lot of my time. I am not about to make my loved ones as an excuse but that's just how it has been for the last 2 years. I have been working and I have been trying to feed and clothe and educate these important people in my life.

     I am happy that my parents decided to extend to me another chance to take the Boards this August , knowing full well that I may or may not pass it. I have not given up on my dream of fixing people up from the inside out its just that right now it is a very daunting task. It has been 2 years since I have read a medical text book or given into tackling any clinical problem(aside from the normal coughs and colds). I have my doubts and I will be coming up against the creme de la creme of all the Medical schools this August. I may not be ready and I guess that is what everyone thinks in their heads going into the Boards. My doubts have a much stronger voice than all these other voices combined but at least there is one voice of doubt to this Large voice of doubt. Its the one that kept on saying..."If he could do it . then why cant you?

If he is ending his journey soon , whats stopping you from reaching out for yours? Whats your excuse now?"

     I find myself listening to this voice more and more each day and this Doubt of Doubt seems to be convincing me. Its roar is getting stronger in my ears. Come August we would know if this little voice of Doubt of doubt was right. In the mean time my nose will be buried in books and my hands will be full of markers and my ears will be plugged to a set of earphones to drown out everything else in the world.

"Suddenly...Telepathy"

"Secrets? What Secrets?"

"Suddenly...Telepathy"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

     There is one particular enchantment that causes a lot of annoyance may it be in regular or casual games or when it was still in standard rotation. It is a 1 Blue mana costing enchantment called Telepathy and true to its name it does allow you to peer through your opponents thoughts , their plans and their current predicaments.

     Telepathy makes your opponents play with their hands revealed as early as the first turn. This tends to ruin all those long term plans as well as their current condition. The amount of knowledge exploitation is limitless. You would literally see all of the cards they would draw! As the caster of telepathy your opponents would never know your hand but you know all about theirs. How many lands they have , how many creatures they can cast in the next turns , can they remove your threats? can they counter your spells? If your opponents have no way of dealing with your plans then it won't be long before you could set in motion a lethal strategy to defeat them.

     Regardless if you play this enchantment in the early , mid or late game it would still offer you the same advantage. Knowing what your opponents plan to do. This is a double edged sword however and you have to be somewhat of a poker player when you play telepathy otherwise your opponents could also read you. Do not be too happy when you see that they are utterly defenseless because they might draw a card to turn the tide at any time. Do not show off nervousness as well when you see that you have no possible way of thwarting their plans. Play it calm. Play it cool and you too could come out on top.

     In conjunction with certain mechanics , let us say  , if you are the sort of player who could fetch with Transmute or Tutors then this knowledge of the opponents hands could always be exploited.

     Telepathy is just one of those cards that are fun to play. Fun for the caster but real annoying for everyone else around the table. 

"Red EDH:Zirilan of the Claw"

"Red EDH:Zirilan of the Claw"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

     One of the first things I liked about Magic is that it had dragons in it and when I was starting out I wanted to have a Zirilan of the Claw so I could power out Massive Dragons to Vanquish my enemies. It never happened. Becasuse 1) I didnt have enough contacts to know where to get one and 2) because during those times Zirilan seemed very expensive.

     So when I saw a post in the MTG Tambayan Group about a 150 peso Zirilan I just had to get him and build an EDH deck around him. It was obvious with him around that you actually need Dragons in your deck so I sought out the baddest Red Dragons that magic has to offer and put them all in there (mostly they were already just lying around in my room because I was already collecting them and most of them were already a part of several Modern Decks that I had before I went into my EDH Craze).

    The next thing that would be added would be protection. For an EDH deck who's strategy really revolves around the commander being alive ( as opposed to other EDH decks that only use the commanders color Identity and not really involve it in any combination at all.) then we would need lots and lots of it. The logically choice is to have a Lightning Greaves and a Swiftfoot boot. They not only add protection from spells and abilities but they also add Haste into the mix which allows you to use your Commander right off the bat. You could add a Darksteel plating and Whispersilk Cloak to toughen Zirilan even further making sure that he gets to serve you for a long time.(Or at least more turns than he could with out the armor)

   Now for 2 Red Mana and 3 Colorless Mana Zirilan can be cast in an EDH setting pretty easily because everyone is still setting up in the early turns and your opponents will be counting your mana thinking that you won't be able to summon anything up with just 5 mana. Of course they would be wrong in that assumption because red has a lot of ways of creating mana in a hurry. Seething Song , Extra Planar Lens and Koth of the Hammer  are all there to give that extra boost of mana to power out a dragon. With 7 mountains in play your opponents won't suspect that you could use Zirilan to summon a dragon just yet.  Playing Koth and using his second skill allows you to cast Zirilan and with Lightning Greaves preferably in play , you could attach it to Zirilan and then use this ability with the extra mana and attack with a Dragon! All Dragons that are summoned this way have haste or can attack the moment they hit the battlefield.(Or as I like to say , hit the ground running...only they fly...)

This deck is actually a utility deck and there is a dragon that is included in the deck for a lot of possible scenarios.These are some of the dragons that you could include:

Hellkite Tyrant -" All your artifacts are mine"  Almost all EDH decks use a healthy amount of Keyrunes and Signets and Talismans for mana fixing and these are just the small things that are ripe for the picking on your opponents side of the battlefield.

Dragonmage -  "Sorry to spoil your plans" - Discarding your hand and pulling in a fresh 7 cards is sometimes not bad but not when you have been mulling on what to do for about 3 turns now. The guy is a double edged sword

Utvara Hellkite - "Doubling Dragon" - Whats better than having 1 dragon in play? Why having 2 dragons of course !!!and with this guy attacking you can double what you have each attack phase that passes. Its not uncommon to have 4 6/6 Flying Dragons with this dragon around.

Bogardan Hellkite - "Damage all , Damage one" - Among the important things to have is spot removal in an EDH deck. This guy takes care of 5 pesky 1/1 creatures of 1 5/5 creature or if your opponent has no creatures or near critical then you could just spend that damage burning him away.

Kilnmouth Dragon - " Strength from your hand" - In the scenario that you have a lot of dragons in your hand but can't cast all of them but can have Zirilan summon a dragon then its this guy that you should be looking for. I once played a game where I had 5 Dragon cards in my hand and Kilnmouth dropped into play. With the amplify 3 mechanic( it gets 3 +1/+1 counters for each dragon in your hand as it comes into play) and 5 dragon cards...It quickly became a 20/20 Flying Monster that reduced my EDH opponents life total by half!

There are a lot more Dragons in the deck but these by far are my favorites. As an added note these dragons when summoned this way has to be sacrificed by the end of your turn however there are ways to bypass this and there are even combos involved.

Sundial of the Infinite -  "End the turn" - Ending the turn at your 2nd main phase means that the dragon will not be sacrificed since there would be no "End Turn".

Tel-Jilad Stylus - " Down to the bottom"  - It allows you to put a dragon to the bottom of your library to be searched and used by Zirilan again and again.

Carnage Altar + Mimic Vat - "Death Draw Combo" - You could sacrifice a Dragon , Draw a card , and Imprint it on the Mimic Vat .This way you could cast an Utvara Hellkite until end of turn via the vat , use the vat again on your turn and voila! you have 2 6/6 Dragon tokens left on the field even if you have to exile the dragons created by the vat at the end of the turn. Or you could just end the turn with the Sundial again and have 4 6/6 Flying dragons on your next turn where they can turn into 8 .hahahahha (this is my best maniacal laugh). 

Safe haven and Synod Sanctum - "Keeping them away for a rainy day" These 2  follow the same principle , Keep the dragons that were about to be exiled , return them at the end of your opponents turn and smack them with the creatures that were exiled there on the next turn.

So here we have it. One of my dream EDH decks and I got to play with it. The strategy is a bit risky but then again there is much to be gained by risking much. When the strategy works expect a lot of Fire and Brimstone to rain on your enemies.

"The Deranged Hermit in my house"

"The Deranged Hermit in my house"

by:

Virgilio F. De leon Jr.

     My family has a curse. Well its not an evil curse , its the kind of curse that a lot of families also have so its not really unique to just my family. It is a curse still and it is the curse of vanishing hair. When a male in our family comes to a certain age then the curse begins. It starts out as a thinning on the top the head. A papal crown. Then it gets progressively worse until it becomes Shaggy. "Shagilid lang ang buhok"... I always wanted to write that in a blog.

     All I have to do is look at my dad and I would have predicted the future which would be my new hairstyle. Any attempts to actually shave my hair bald is met by violent rejection from my wife and my daughter who are in agreement that I look like some thug who would shake some money out of people. I don't think that that is actually a bad thing because when I was still in UP Baguio , I had an Uncle Fester haircut and people feared me just fine.

     Well I guess things are different when you have the 2 most important people in your life ganging up on you about your hair. So in reverse I have decided to wear it long and I have decided against cutting it until I have finished with my board exams this August.

     I want to look like a deranged hermit while I study and then when I am being inducted ( Hope hope hope) I want to look like someone Suave like Tony Stark. I wanted to grow a beard but could not for the life of me grow a single respectable stubble. So I would be a clean-shaven deranged hermit which would further rumors that I am both losing it and not losing it. People would be so confused. My parents would have me cut it but I wont. It's not to defy them I just feel like I should be able to enjoy my hair before I hit 40 and then lose all of it.

     So in the meantime I am  stocking up on Shampoo and Conditioner and gearing up for the hot March and April Months. I wonder if looking like a pineapple is the way to go during the summer months. Well there are a lot of options because there are people who would tie my hair. So until the boards are done I will be the resident Deranged Hermit in my house.