Magic: the Gathering – Ups and Downs

I have a strange relationship with Magic: the Gathering. I love the game to bits, but I don’t like playing quite as much as I like brewing decks. I could spend days or even weeks perfecting a build for my favourite deck – but the same can’t be said for my passion for playing Magic.

I quit collecting in 2007, not playing after Future Sight had made its debut. I started again in 2009 - about two and a half years later. This was when Zendikar had entered the scene. I came back in only to acquire the numerous full art lands. (I’m happy to say I have a very good number of these, and no you can’t have them.) As it turned out, it was a good set to be back in – power crept up a bit for Zendikar block, especially for lands, which if you play Magic, you’ll know are the most ridiculous amounts of money you will ever plop down for a card that needs other cards to work.

Not long after that, I came back to Australia for work. At that point, Scars of Mirrodin had just come out. At this point, you could say I had quit. I wasn’t collecting or playing actively for any reason. It was partly because I couldn’t afford it, and partly because I had lost interest. However, I decided somewhere in April 2011 that I should get back into the same – and did so with New Phyrexia. I went in and won the second draft event I had ever participated in.

At that point, I had settled down enough to afford to play and collect cards again – so I did. Eventually, chewxy invited me to go to Grand Prix Brisbane 2011. I thought this was a fantastic idea, and went off to brew what was blue-white Humans deck with a control frame. (An interesting fact is that pretty much identical decklists showed up a month or two later winning a couple of events, until Dark Ascension showed up.) I ended up not playing, although I went to watch chewxy play. After he had finished playing all his 8 rounds, we went off to get some sukiyaki for dinner.

As it happens, I continued to play a little here and there, and decided that I should play Limited exclusively. I wasn’t too bad at building decks on the fly for a given environment and it would certainly help limit my (notably excessive) spending on singles.

An opportunity to play in a Limited Grand Prix arose at the end of March 2012 – Grand Prix Melbourne 2012. I went to chewxy to said event - and proceeded to lose pretty much every match except my first one, despite having an excellent Zombie deck. I just always happened to have bad hands and bad draws for 3 matches in a row. This wasn’t the reason I chose to quit again, however.

After losing that many matches, I was determined to put in more practice so that I could come back for a better Grand Prix run next time. However, I had to wait until after my examinations before I could justify spending the time playing Magic. In that time, I decided that I wasn’t making a sound decision. There was no way I could play Magic on a decently regular schedule. The local game store only runs Sealed for prereleases, and drafts pretty much close to 10pm on Friday nights.

To be honest, I’m not quitting because it’s inconvenient to play. I’m quitting because it’s beginning to not make any more sense. Of course, I’m sure I’ll be back in about a year or two again. I’m sure I’m never leaving Magic permanently until perhaps I have family. Even then, if Magic is still around, I’m sure there will still be many fun games to be had.

New Theme, New Host

I've decided to switch to a new theme again. The last switch was around 3.5 years ago, in October 2008. That was the first switch to a simpler design. The one I used up until September 2008 was a more complicated theme, customized to my liking, and even had an AJAX search box. What's the difference between this theme and the old one? The top bar has been simplified and streamlined - I've kept only the newer categories, and removed all the smaller, less important ones. It no longer has a hover dropdown. The theme is also responsive - which means it'll work on smaller screens as well as larger ones. As a consequence of this change, I've shrunk the Google Adsense ads again. Why would I do this? So the theme will work perfectly on an iPhone screen. I have no idea what it looks like on an Android screen at the moment, but it should work on a 320 by 480 screen, so I don't think it'll break anywhere else.  (If you've been reading my blog for a while, you'll notice every time I switch themes my ads seem to grow smaller).

I've switched to a new host: WebFaction. Why? I was outgrowing my old host in terms of what I needed. I was with the previous host for a total of nearly 8 years. (It is, in fact, paid for until the end of this year.) I needed space for my other websites as well, so WebFaction, which I have grown familiar with because of Pressyo and its projects, seemed like the perfect fit. I have a few projects of my own, and this was really outgrowing what Cpanel hosts were capable of. What projects are these? You might or might not have seen ManaHelix or MagicCardRank. I started those projects some time last year, while I haven't updated them in a while, I will. They are just simple hobbies for now, but I hope that they'll grow into more interesting projects as time passes.

Update: Tested on Android, both on Gingerbread and Ice Cream Sandwich default browsers - the search field fails to display (not sure why), but otherwise everything works - YAY! Also - higher resolution images for higher PPI screens browsing in webkit (also known as retina displays...).

Switching to iOS

In October 2011, I bought an iPhone 4S and left the Android camp (for the moment, anyway). The first thing one would think about is — why?

The iPad

To understand why, one needs to know the chronology of events. I hadn’t lived with either an Android device or an iOS device at the time. In July 2010, I bought a Samsung Galaxy S, easily the best Android device at the time. In October 2010, I made a far more important acquisition. I bought an iPad.

Somewhere in the second half of 2010, I was offered a job on the Gold Coast. I decided to take it. Needless to say, there was a lot of packing involved — and I needed a very important device. I needed something for small amounts of personal computing, be it surfing the web or simply playing a few games. Now that the iPad was out, it was a no brainer. Netbooks were simply inferior to the convenience that was the iPad.

I bought an iPad and never looked back.

Using an iOS Device

I was no stranger to the wonderful way Apple devices just worked. You rarely needed to know all the quirks and steps usually needed to get things running. All you needed was to follow your instincts and the device would get you up and running within moments. Back when people were busy trying to get projectors to work correctly with their laptops, Apple had long gotten it right. Plug in the cable and all would be well (for 95% of people anyway).

The iPad setup process, however, was less than straightforward. You needed to connect it to a computer for set up and other things. Fortunately, I could activate it at home. Unfortunately, I would be without a computer to sync it to until much later.

Compared to my Galaxy S, getting it to work was painless. (This was however, more Samsung’s fault than Google’s.) The GPS locked within seconds. The iPad, running with less RAM and graphics power than my Galaxy S, made my Galaxy S look and feel positively sluggish. The prevalent ‘Android lag’ I had been reading about suddenly made sense.

Regret

At that point, I had realized why people were in the Apple camp. It wasn’t just an OS thing. It was that Apple were indeed making the better smartphones. I was now in that camp as well.

As time passed, the gap between Android and iOS closed. FroYo and Gingerbread Android updates made my Galaxy S better, while iOS 4 fell further and further behind. It didn’t have notifications and still didn’t have the calendar features I wanted. At this point (somewhere in early 2011), I was still saying I would probably buy the next iPhone. I had someone who would be willing to inherit my current phone, so switching would have been beneficial to both of us.

iOS 5

Eventually, Apple announced iOS 5. This version of iOS finally came with notifications and with those notifications, quick access to my calendar items. I was sold. At that point, we were still waiting on Apple’s new iPhone announcement. (This was somewhere in June by the way.)

In October, Apple finally announced the next generation iPhone: the iPhone 4S — and so I switched to an iPhone.

(Of course, now that this is many months ago, the Galaxy Nexus has been announced. Unsurprisingly, we didn’t hear about any other new Ice Cream Sandwich running Androids until recently. Or maybe I'm just rambling and trying to JUSTIFY ALL THE THINGS!)

Why I Chose Android

Somewhere in 2009 or 2010, I decided to buy a new phone — at that point, I had narrowed it down to either a top of the line Android model or an iPhone. In July 2010, I finally took the plunge and bought a Samsung Galaxy S. This model would later become among the most popular models ever sold, but it was plagued with its own issues.

So, why did I choose Android over iOS?

Fear

I was coming from Windows Mobile at the time. I was used to being able to tweak everything from my Today screen, all the way down to actually having a Today screen. iOS would have taken all of that away. All I’d have is a list of apps. At the time, it would have been workflow breaking. I was used to having my appointments, tasks and other things the moment I unlocked my phone.

However, at that point in time, the trend had changed. Even Android, which had the customizable home screens, was still vastly different from what I was used to. However, iOS would’ve required me to lose it entirely. Having to open apps just to look at my calendar and tasks would have been terrible, so I chose the safer path and went with Android.

Price

Maxis, my provider of choice at the time was subsidizing RM1000 off a new Samsung Galaxy S handset. This was a massive amount in Malaysia, besides the iPhone, subsidies of this size off the RRP of a phone were rare. Needless to say, I took it.

Given the history of iPhone plans in Malaysia, the iPhone 4 (which would not be available for another 2 months after I made my decision), would’ve cost me more, for a phone that I would probably not like.

The Galaxy S on the other hand, would be cheaper, cost me the same amount per month on a shorter contract. It also came with 16GB of internal storage space, which was unprecedented among Android phones, and changed how Android phones worked from then on. The much anticipated FroYo update which would have made applications movable to the SD card was no longer needed — the Galaxy S would be able to handle many more apps before succumbing to the limits of data storage.

Specifications wise, the Galaxy S was slightly superior in the graphics department. I would be getting a slightly better graphics chip for my money (this would sadly, not see much use), the phone would take a normal sized SIM card and it would serve me well for my day-to-day use.

Availability

The biggest factor for me choosing to go with the Galaxy S over the iPhone 4 (which was announced in June that year) was availability. I was patiently awaiting for it to arrive in Malaysia before the Galaxy S even came over. To be honest, I didn’t even think of the Galaxy S as an option until soon after release. At the time, I was busy browsing through listings on the LowYat.Net forums, looking for either a new or preowned HTC Desire or Google Nexus One at the time.

The Galaxy S was available in July. I was also patiently waiting for the iPhone 4 to see if Malaysian carriers would be offering it with a more competitive contract. (For the record, they did — although not that much at the price ranges I was looking to spend a month.)

Merely several days after it was available in Malaysia and I was informed by my friend, @zybler about it being available in Malaysia, I went down to ‘e @ the curve’ and grabbed one of the last few units available at the Maxis store there.

Epilogue

In retrospect, I should’ve gone for the iPhone 4. However, I do not regret my decision to purchase the Samsung Galaxy S at the time. My basis for the decision was good, and my main gripes with it were the battery life and GPS reception. These two problems were mostly fixed in the next iteration, being the Samsung Galaxy S 2.

Later on, the Galaxy S also gained a powerful boon in the release of the very similar Google Nexus S. The release of the Nexus S meant that the Galaxy S would rarely be left behind in the unofficial ROM arena. This benefit is particularly clear today — Samsung decided against releasing an Ice Cream Sandwich ROM for the Samsung Galaxy S, and there are tons of custom ROMs for Ice Cream Sandwich which functioned very well very quickly thanks to the existence of the Nexus S.

And to say that the correct decision was the iPhone 4 isn’t entirely correct either. It would’ve been the correct decision because it would have been the better phone. Nothing more than that.

2012: What Now?

My blogging has become very sporadic. In 2011, I made 5 blog posts total. 2 of which were merely photos, 1 was a reflection of the past year, 1 was a random idea and 1 was just a blurb about how things were supposed to change — and didn't.  Hell, even this post - the mandatory New Year post is a week late. It seems my life is simply too mundane - too difficult for me to find things to blog about that's unique. I've been setting standards that are probably too high. Why should I talk about iOS vs Android? What about the last 3 movies I actually went to the cinema to watch? What about my last few new gadgets? It might be time to throw caution to the wind and simply blog about everything. Who cares if I start blogging about things that don't matter?

But first, I've got to reflect on the previous year:

• I bought a car, it's not strictly speaking the first car I've owned, but it's the first one which I've bought in Australia. It doesn't look like much, but it fits 4 people and runs well.
• I need to work harder on those exams. The single remaining paper remains elusive. Perhaps - it's time to try something new.
• I've returned to buying Apple products. In addition to the iPad I bought in 2010, I now own a Mac Mini and an iPhone 4S. There's a tale to be told behind the acquisitions, especially why I decided to abandon my Android phone.
• My motivation to play video games is drying up. However, I'm not sure I'm the cause. I've played many games in StarCraft II, gone through Deus Ex: Human Revolution, finished Portal 2's single player and co-op campaigns. I'm begining to think it's not my interest in games that's waning; it's that most games are no longer worth my interest, and my ever decreasing free time (despite not having a social life) is making my standards possibly higher.
• I've finally acquired some new cubes from V-Cube - I haven't learned how to solve the newer sizes and the new quirks I have to deal with, but it's going to happen one day.
• I'm quitting Magic... again. Maybe. I started again during the year for a short while, but I realized the expense was just too high - hell, I even went as far as to build a deck for Grand Prix Brisbane. That's a tale for another day.

There's probably a lot more I haven't mentioned. It's not coming to mind at the moment.