First off, I hope many of you are planning to attend JordanCon in Atlanta this weekend. (Details here—you can still pick up a badge at the door.) This is a great convention, perhaps my favorite of those I attended last year. It’s warm and inviting, not too big but not too small, full of relaxed times and good fun. You’ll be able to meet Harriet and Wilson, which is a real treat. Red Eagle entertainment will be there too, so you will get some answers to your Wheel of Time video game and movie questions.

Even if you’re not a super huge WoT fan, there will be plenty of good times. For the aspiring writers, I will be doing two full lectures on writing topics (a pair of my favorites from the class I teach.) (Full schedule is here; click the tabs at the bottom to go look at the different tracks.)

And, of course, there will be some gaming with Brandon. That’s actually the main point of this post, so if you’re not interested in me turning into an ultra-nerd, this would be a time to click away. . . .

MAGIC WITH BRANDON

The main “Play Magic with Brandon” time is Friday night at 8:30 until whenever we decide to be done. I want to emphasize that you DO NOT have to be an expert Magic player to come have fun with us. I tend to play casually, and I stay away from overpowered decks and focus on quirky ideas and oddness. If you don’t have cards, it’s not a big deal. So show up and play.

For anyone wondering on more specifics, I’ll be bringing a Highlander deck (sixty cards, no repeated cards.) I like playing Highlander or Elder Dragon Highlander, so if you’re making decks, bring one of those. I’ll also have something wacky (not sure what yet) along with Standard deck made with only Worldwake cards (the ones I bought at Minicon) and my old faithful zombie deck. (That is fun to play but never wins.)

CAN WE DO A DRAFT?

Now, that said, my favorite Magic format is limited. I’m sure I’ll have time to play people’s constructed decks. But I would, really, really LOVE to do a draft with Rise of the Eldrazi. (The set looks awesome.) How many of you out there, going to Jordancon, would be interested in this? I figure if we can get eight people or so wanting to do a draft, we could each pitch in $15 or $20, send someone to buy us a box of cards. We’d have enough for a draft with a few left over packs to give away as prizes.

To do this, I’d need at least seven other willing people. (Once again, you don’t have to be an expert Magic player to join in the fun. We’d probably run two brackets for the prizes—the “I play Magic all the time” bracket and the “I owned a deck once when I was 18” bracket.) Drafts are fun since they level the playing field a little. Everyone plays just with the cards from this limited pool, and nobody has terribly overpowered decks.

If you’re interested, email me. Again, this one would cost money, but you’d be taking home cards in exchange for it. Email me tonight or tomorrow so I know we have enough interest.

DOES ANYONE IN ATLANTA AREA RUN A GAME STORE?

The absolute best case, if we could somehow manage it, would be to have someone who owns a game store show up and sell us the cards to use and run the draft. Maybe you could bring some of those nifty foil cards that Wizards gives out as prizes. (I missed the pre-release on this one because I was at a con. Hint hint.) So, if you run or work at a game store, and you would be willing to come sell us cards on Friday night, I’ll get you into the con for the day for free. You’ll be able to bring flyers about your store, I’ll sign your books and write nice things about you, and will post about your awesome store on my website. I might also buy a box of cards from you (in addition to the ones people buy for the draft) to make it worth your time.

And even if you can’t come run the draft and bring us prizes (Snif snif) I’d like to buy some cards from you instead of sending someone around randomly to find some. So if you want to drive over to the convention during the day and bring some Eldrazi boxes to sell me, I’d be happy to meet you and buy them. (If it’s close, I could probably send someone from the convention to pick them up, if I had to.) Con is located here, in case you are wondering.

Heck, I’d even be willing to trade you books for booster packs, if that’s something you’d be in to. (You’d have to email me early so I can know what to bring. I have some cool foreign editions of some of my books, and some rare advance copies of some of them too. No Way of Kings copies left, I’m afraid.)

Assuming I have responses to this from people wanting to play, I’d probably be willing to buy two boxes worth. I would be looking for a good price point on them. I’m used to buying my boxes on-line at $80 a pop, but don’t expect game stores to compete with the internet for pricing. But I’ll be spending my per diem money from Jordancon and from Constellation on these, so I’d be hoping to avoid full price. . . . 😉

Anyway, if you run/work at/own a game store and are interested in meeting me, selling me cards, running a draft, or the like please drop me an email. (Or if you know someone who owns one, send them this link.) Best if you contact me before tomorrow at noon, but anytime before Friday afternoon would probably be okay.

In other news, I really need to get some sort of contact going over at Wizards so I can get them to give me prizes to give away at “celebrity magic drafts” at conventions like this. Anyone know if Maro reads Wheel of Time? 😉

Also, forgive spelling errors. My 3-month-old is on my lap and currently attacking the keyboard.