Hey all, it's been awhile for the old blog. I need to get some thoughts off my chest about a game that played a significant role in my life, just as much as video games have. That game is Magic: The Gathering. I was turned on to this game in 1994 by a friend, about when The Dark was released. I started off meeting more players and playing late nights at a local club, making some ever after life long friends from it.

As time went on, I began playing tournaments, mainly sealed deck tournaments, which is where I really enjoyed the challenge of building decks from random, limited card pools. I was ranked top 20 in the state of Indiana on the DCI tracked leaderboards at one time. Though, I never went to compete nationally or anything, but a player like me can build up a decent rank just through regular play and winning here and there. 

By playing all these sealed deck tournaments, and purchasing booster boxes sometimes, and through lots of trading, I've managed to acquire a very nice and old collection. What I've been struggling with very recently is whether it's time to sell. The stuff is worth money, I will get thousands of dollars. How many thousands? I don't know, I would like $10,000 but unless I do all the legwork myself will have to settle for probably half that (or even less!). 

My problem is that I still love to play this game! However, all of my 'Magic' friends sold their cards a long time ago, and that only leaves me with having to go back to the club to play. Do I want to start going to the club again to play Magic? Well, that means I'll want to start playing Sealed/Draft again, and that means spending money on the product, AGAIN. It's weird, but I feel like I could have 'one more run' in me before I divest myself of this collection. But, that one more run is just sinking money into the game when I should be spending that money here at home, on my home. 

What is going on with me and Magic is that I feel like I have 'unfinished business' with the game, because I have constructed almost 20 decks for EDH/Commander and Casual that I just haven't had a chance to play against random opponents, or any of my friends. I want to play all these decks against people just to see if what I created with my brain was worth all the time I spent on it. Some of these decks I have played against people because they are older ones that I have developed over the course of 20 years, but some of them are new and I haven't had the opportunity. 

I am extremely apprehensive about selling off my cherished Magic collection without fulfilling this need to play my decks. Once the stuff I have is gone, there is no getting it back, and there will forever be this urge I can't satisfy. I'm really struggling with it. I try to remember the negatives of the game too. I remember that along with making friends, there are a ton of annoying people that you meet as well. There are also extremely irritating rules to follow and frustrating games that are played. This is a tougher decision to make than deciding to sell video games, because cardboard Magic requires other humans to play. 

I think maybe if I went to the club and found a way to play some games, perhaps I would find that I don't like the game anymore. Maybe I would find it too irritating and decide to sell after all. I don't know what to do. So usually, when I don't know what to do, I sit on it and think about it some more.