Competitive vs. Casual

I try to make non-Magic friends. I really do. It turns out one of my non-Magic friends is actually a Magic friend getting back into it, but he's very much a casual player and just drafted for the first time at a pub that does EDH every Wednesday and a draft every month. Now why did it take so long to figure out beer and Magic together is awesome?

One night this friend offered to cover my tab if I gave him some of the unopened Magic packs I was talking about. Just mised not paying a $20 tab! Anyway, I hand over 8 packs, and of course he cracks them on the spot.

His commentary was one of the most interesting things I had heard in a very long while. My eyes immediately shot to the rare every pack, and then I started thinking "Well, first pack first pick what do I take?" But he'd make comments like "Sweet, an Oblivion Ring, this card's pretty awesome!" or "Word, an Air Elemental, that'll be good in a blue deck." He cracked all 8 of those packs, and was genuinely happy that I gave him these packs at a discount (consider MSRP is $3.99 and even a draft set is generally $8).

Moral of the story: Every time Mark Rosewater writes on the Mothership about designing cards for different psychographics, he's telling the truth. People play Magic for different reasons. The commons you throw away after a draft could make up nearly an entire deck for another person, and people are sure to value cards differently than eBay. Drafting and Type II are not the be-all end-all for Magic!

Just an interesting tidbit I couldn't get out of my head.