What is Kitchen Table Old School?

I have been thinking a lot recently about what I want this blog to be about.

I think it will not only be about my journey through Old School Magic but also have a main focus on non-tournament events.  What I mean by that is I want this blog to be for those who aren't necessarily interested in Deck Tech or tournament reports. 

I really enjoy the game but I am not a "Spike" and I am more interested in the gameplay and in alternate forms of game play besides one-on-one competitive tournament play.

I remember fondly of when I was in junior high and high school and I played Magic with my friends around a kitchen table or dining room table or even on the floor.  Most of the games I played were multiplayer.  I remember one game at a friend's house where the game had 8 people and it was just total chaos, anyone could target anyone and the game lasted the whole afternoon.  I also distinctly remember my friend's mom bringing out a plate of homemade cookies for us at one point.

These memories are why I am interested in Old School.  Playing with the cards that got me into the game in the first place is really why I am into this format. 

I want this blog to be about multiplayer and alternate ways of playing magic, from Two-Headed Giant to Emperor to custom Battle Boxes and custom Cubes even to a Solitaire variant I remember reading about in an old Duelist (or maybe it was Inquest) magazine.

With the above being said I have three projects I am working on.

I will make a post for each of these in the future but here are the basics:

- Old School 95 Cube: I have assembled a cube which I will post the list of in a future blog post.  I will also be evolving the cube as it gets played.  This weekend may be the first time I get to try it out!

- The Brothers War Vanguard Battle Box: I am in the process of assembling 5 mono-colored decks with an emphasis on Artifacts and the Antiquities Expansion.  This will include a specific Vanguard card for each deck.

- Scryings Expansion Cube: I will assemble the Scryings Expansion that Magnus has put together and create a custom Cube with the contents of the Scryings expansion. 


I will probably have a blog post about the OS 95 Cube after I test it out this weekend, supposing all goes according to plan.

Magic In Madison

Last weekend my wife and I traveled to Madison for a conference.

We stayed for a night at my good friend PenDull's house.

I had talked with him about Magic many times but we had never played a game and he didn't know how to play and neither did his wife.

On Saturday night we decided to give it a try.  I busted out my 6 basic mono-colored Old School decks and we had a go.

Everyone was allowed to pick the deck they wanted to play.

The decks I brought were:
- Mono-Red Goblins
- Mono-Brown Artifacts
- Mono-Blue Merfolk
- Mono-Green "Go Green"
- Mono-White Soldiers
- Mono-Black Thrulls

His wife had first pick and she picked the Artifact deck.

He picked the Goblin deck.

My wife picked her favorite color with the Thrull Deck.

I picked last and went with the Soldier deck.

We busted out some beer and some munchies and had a very fun couple of hours playing a 4-player free-for-all game.

Good times.

I brought the decks but I also brought play mats, and counters and tokens and plenty of spin-down dice for life counters.

The next day we had some time before the conference so we walked down State street and stopped in a game store called the Power9.

They had lots of singles and packs from way back in Magic's history.

I picked up 2 packs of Fallen Empires and one pack of Chronicles.

I didn't pull anything crazy, but I was able to add some nice cards to the collection.

There are some nice cards in there.

When we left Power9 we noticed on the street there was a Black Lotus!

I have never seen one in the wild!

We had fun in Madison and hopefully I will get to play more Magic with them in the future.

Until then.