It's time for another edition of Old vs. New on The Mana Pool!  Finishing up the guilds in Return to Ravnica, we're hitting the old Azorius guild this time around.  How do the various Isperias stack up against each other?  Well they don't, because they don't go in the same category!  Yeah, Chewie didn't know any better either.  This one actually gave us some of our closest matches ever, along with some of our most one-sided.  Yeah, the Azorius are pretty hardcore. 

Also, we were short one Dirk due to his grab school work again. But rather than bring in a couple of suckers...I mean guest hosts, to replace him, we just soldiered on without him.  There was a bit of talk about Mike's Launch experience, a rules update, and the usual nonsense.  Hope you all enjoy!

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music - Won't Get Fooled Again by The Who - http://thewho.com

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Sadly this episode we are one Dirk short of a full cast due to grad school holding him down and beating him.  But to replace him, we brought along two guest hosts! We have a half-Dirk veteran, our old buddy Bill Bloodworth (@SqueeGoblnNabob) joining us again!  And the other half of Dirk is our buddy from GP Charlotte and GP Pittsburgh, JT Kohnen (@NerdPop140)! You know and love him as CyberPunkOtaku01 on the forums.

So what were we actually talking about this episode? Well of course the Prerelease results were the first thing. Everyone but Chewie is here to tell you all about how they did and what they played.  Chewie missed his first Prerelease in no one knows how long, but at least Brian's sealed pool still thinks it's a Ravnica block.

After that, we had to talk about all the cards that are rotating out of Standard. It's not something that we usually talk about, but it's a tradition here on The Mana Pool!  Every rotation we rant and rave about all the crap we don't have to hear about any more, and it's great!  Since Bill and JT pay attention to Standard, and Mike and Brian do too, it's a really good discussion.

A moment of silence please for JT's Deadeye Navigator deck.  It will be missed.

JT's NerdPop blog: http://nerdpopularity.blogspot.com/

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music - We Don't Need Another Hero by Tina Turner - http://www.tinaturnerofficial.com/

This episode’s post: http://themanapool.com/podcast/episode-296
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All the dorks are present and accounted for this episode, as we cover the entire Theros set!  As usual, we jump around kind of haphazardly to discuss any and all of the cards that catch our fancy. There's really nothing else to say, so now I'm just filling space on the website.  How are you doing?  Everything okay?  Did you remember to eat?  You should probably do that.  Also, have you called your mom lately?  I bet she'd love to hear from you.  And you.  No, not you, that other guy.  You.  Take off that silly ass hat.  Seriously man.

Theros Card Image Gallery: http://www.wizards.com/magic/tcg/article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/theros/cig

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music - My Hero by Foo Fighters - http://www.foofighters.com

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We're joined this week by Tom Delia, formerly of the now-defunct MTG Radio podcast, current streaming guy on TwitchTV, and member of this year's winning Community Cup team! 

After talking a bit with Tom, which is only fair because he's on the show and all, we jump right into the previews!  And goodness knows there are lots.  And lots.  And we didn't even get them all.  Seriously.  But anyway, enjoy our ranting about new cards!

Theros Card Image Gallery: http://www.wizards.com/magic/tcg/article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/theros/cig

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music - Hero of the Day by Metallica - http://www.metallica.com

This episode’s post: http://themanapool.com/podcast/episode-294
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Preview season is alive and well here on The Mana Pool!  Since we're short one Mike, we decided to draft one of our oldest young listeners, Ben Ahrendt!  He's been around for almost as long as we have!  You can follow him on Twitter @Panahinuva.

But there's really nothing else going on, so here's the link to the Card Image Gallery: http://www.wizards.com/magic/tcg/article.aspx?x=mtg/tcg/theros/cig

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music - Heroes by The Wallflowers - http://www.thewallflowers.com/

This episode’s post: http://themanapool.com/podcast/episode-293
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Hey look, there's a small handful of Theros previews out already!  And then an Izzet Old vs. New.  Izzet Old vs. New? Yes, yes it is!  Look, these are the jokes, get used to them.  But we didn't do it that many times.  I don't think.  Anyway, we did those two things.  We also took a look at Mark Rosewater's State of Design column and the Theros teasers contained within.  That was pretty much it.  It was a lot of fun though, so I hope everyone enjoys it!

Theros Intro Pack Rares - http://wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/1307
Mark Rosewater's State of Design column with Theros teasers - http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/mm/262

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music - Holding Out for a Hero by Bonnie Tyler - http://www.bonnietyler.com/

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The decklists for Duel Decks: Heroes vs. Monsters have been revealed, and with them two of the mechanics from Theros along with a small handful of cards.  The dorks go over all of this new stuff and and decks themselves.  Spoiler alert: They look like fun.

After that, we did another Old vs. New, this time focusing on the horrific antics of the Rakdos guild.  Two versions of Rakdos himself, a pair of Blood Witches, and of course the guildmages face off to determine whether the old guard or the new hotness are superior.  You know, once we remembered what we were doing.

We finished it off by reading a pair of very inspiring and wonderful listener emails.  This led to us being exceptionally mushy and giving out some of our patented life-enriching advice.  Well, patent-pending.  It's good stuff though, so do enjoy.

By the way, here's where you can find the list for the Duel Decks: http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/feature/261And here's the link to the first reveal of Rakdos Augermage that we discussed: http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtgcom/daily/bd223

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music - The Munsters' Theme by Jack Marshall

This episode’s post: http://themanapool.com/podcast/episode-291
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Hey look, another live episode!  The dorks gathered at Dirk's house to hang out, play some Magic, and try to remember what each of us actually look like.  Oddly enough we look just like our cartoons on the website, only slightly less cartoony.  Hey, I said slightly!

We played a rousing game of Commander right off the bat, with some happenings that happened that were seriously awesome.  Okay, so I either don't want to spoil anything or I don't actually remember anything that happened.  I'll leave that up to your imagination.   Either way is fine.  It was a pretty good game though.

Then we took a short break and played a game of Horde Magic with the deck sent to us by a listener, Lou.  Of course, he built it for other more intricate reasons, but my incredibly well-prepared self had neglected to bring the rules he made up for the alternate format.  So we played a simple game of Horde Magic, treating all the */* Minion tokens as 2/2 zombies.  Then we played another one, treating them as having power and toughness equal to the number of them on the battlefield.  Both were fun games, and we hope you enjoy listening to them as much as we enjoyed playing them!

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music 1 – Rickroll/Mario Mix by I Fight Dragons - http://ifightdragons.com
Break Music 2 – Under the Sea by Samuel E. Wright (as Sebastian the Crab) from Disney's The Little Mermaid

This episode’s post: http://themanapool.com/podcast/episode-290
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On this episode, the dorks take a nice long look at From the Vault: Twenty.  We're taking a long look at each card in it and explaining (to the best of our ability anyway) why it deserves to be there.  Of course, with an in-depth discussion of each card, this topic went on longer than we thought it would.  So after that we did some quickfire news, taking a look at the Hall of Fame, Worlds, and the new Holiday Gift Box before calling it an episode.  Hope everyone enjoys!

From the Vault: Twenty - http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/rc/259

Worlds coverage - http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/eventcoverage/wc13/welcome

Hall of Fame inductees - http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/twtw/258

Holiday Gift Box - http://wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/1290

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music – nope, not this week

This episode’s post: http://themanapool.com/podcast/episode-289
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So by now you've heard all about this from any number of other sources, but you still haven't heard it from us!  At the San Diego Comic Con and Pax Australia, Wizards decided to announce a lot of nonsense about the future of Magic.  So of course, we decided to give our two cents about all of that.  There's plenty of talk about some upcoming Helvault-style silliness for Theros, From the Vault: Twenty reveals, Commander previews, and probably some other stuff. 

Then we went with a listener idea! Our old buddy Beach (no longer Beach, but it's how everyone knows him) asked us to hit the Commander Banned List and give our opinions on the cards there.  So we went through all of them, rattling off reasons why we think each card should or should not be on the list.  Then we threw out a few cards that we think probably should be on there that currently aren't.  It was a fun discussion, we hope you guys enjoy it!

The Deck Brian liked
http://admin.starcitygames.com//deckdatabase/displaydeck.php?DeckID=57494

SCG's SDCC roundup
http://www.starcitygames.com/news/177_Theros+Information+and+more!

GM's SDCC roundup
http://www.gatheringmagic.com/greg-haenig-news-07202013-san-diego-comiccon-panel-roundup/

Commander preview cards
http://mtgcommander.net/rules.php

New Commander product
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/arcana/1281

Extended is dead
http://www.wizards.com/Magic/Magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/other/07222013

Intro & Outro Music – Diamond by Swift – http://www.myspace.com/swiftband
Break Music – Not Afraid by Eminrm - http://www.eminem.com

This episode’s post: http://themanapool.com/podcast/episode-288
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