Joe Choo's Journal

StarCity Article - "The Regulars"
We all have our group of regulars; those that we see each week at Friday Night Magic, or during a draft. These are the guys that you are comfortable around, you joke with as you play, and the very same that groan when you pull out "that" deck. Almost as a rule, Magic players are a trusting bunch. We allow people to paw through our cards, looking for tradebait, while we may be doing other things - like winning or losing, or even going to the restroom. What happens, however, when you go to pack up for the night and you realize that something is missing? Did someone you know, someone you trust, rob you? If you are missing a particular playset of a popular card, or an old gem from your collection, what's to be done? Can you live, and continue to play, knowing that someone, somewhere in your group is a thief? Somehow, someway, I seem to have done just that.

Back when I started playing, I knew every single person I played with. I visited their homes to play, played with them at school, and invited them over for games. Eventually, I met Mouth, who introduced me to the guys at (the now extinct) Paradox Games, in Methuen, MA. Immediately, I tripled my group of "trustees", banking on my trust in Mouth's judgment of character. After all, if he was comfortable playing and trading with a group, why should I not be? In time, I grew to know and like everyone who had ever touched a Magic card. I greet them as brothers in a fraternity, bound by a fascination of cardboard and ink.

During my Sophomore year of high school, I was introduced to DCI sanctioned Magic in the form of a Junior Super Series, in Boston. I was amazed to see hundreds of people all playing, but even more so, trading, buying, and selling with each other and the dealers. Trust, it seems, was not something the Magic community was lacking. This is one reason why I was both awestruck and disheartened when my first trade binder was stolen. When that happened, I didn't know what to do - it was just surreal. Could the people that I've trusted have done this to me? Was it someone that I did not know, and just saw an opportunity to gank some free stuff? Regardless of who took it, or why it was taken, I was broken. I didn't want a damn thing to do with the game anymore, and it took me over two years to regain my faith in not only players, but people in general.

While I was attending Umass Lowell, I joined a student club called MaGiK - Master's Gaming Konnection. It was an ideal way to get myself back into the game, while providing me with a close knit group that I could trust. We played a lot of chaos multiplayer, and had a lot of long weekends (and school nights) taken away from me via Psionic Blast or Chain Lightning. One Friday night, I was invited to a small local Type II tournament, which I incidentally won with a shadow WW deck, laden with Tithe (and 15 land), Empyreal Armor, and the big surprise, maindecked Cursed Totem. To me, I felt as if my dues had been paid - evidently, winning a 16 man tournament makes up for the hundreds of dollars and hours spent collecting and subsequently losing my entire binder. Maybe I'm simple like that.

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