The Mana Pool

The dorks are back with...Monday Night Magic? Wait, this can't be right, let me go look. Yeah, the dorks are actually looking at the news! First up, WotC swung their banhammer wide, with a massive pile of casualties across many many formats. Holy crap. And then there was actual timely news! The day of recording, WotC unexpectedly revealed some information about the next set, Strixhaven. They expla...

The dorks are back on card games this week! We begin by taking a look at a very important nugget of information hidden in an advertisement - the first time a ban was announced somewhere other than, you know, a ban announcement. Then we're changing gears to talk about what could very well be the biggest news Hearthstone has ever seen. Then we shift into high gear to do a Magic Mad Lib with Twitch C...

This is our first non-Magic podcast episode! To help us out on this momentous occasion, we are joined by Squee, formerly of Monday Night Magic. We're taking a look at remakes, reboots, remasters, rereleases, and legacy sequels across several different media - movies, tv shows, and video games. First up we try to define what we mean by all of these different varieties and then discuss why they migh...

The dorks head back into Kaldheim to check out all the Sagas that we just missed during the last two episodes. Some of these are absolutely ridiculous, while the rest are just...well, pretty good actually. The art though! The Saga art is AMAZING in this set! Of course we also bounce around the rest of the card image gallery to find other neat stuff to talk about, and answer some questions from Twi...

The dorks return to the Kaldheim Card Image Gallery and continue poking around at the awesome stuff inside. There's a brand new Vampire Dragon (Dragon Vampire?) that makes Brian extremely happy. There's a whole new pantheon of Gods to discuss, a whole mess of weird creatures to fear, the Snow Figure of Destiny to freak out about, and a land that REALLY pisses off our old buddy Xenagos. Kaldheim Ga...

After not recording a show for a solid month the dorks are finally back! And we're taking a look at Kaldheim for the first time! We'll hit the mechanics first and then bounce around the Card Image Gallery talking about whatever new cards catch our eye! Planeswalkers, snow, gods, a legendary squirrel? What a weird set. Kaldheim Mechanics: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/kaldhe...

This was recorded six months ago on Dec 17, 2020. It was recorded on Chewie's old laptop because the dead computer. It was supposed to get posted a few days later, but then I was delayed because of putting the new computer together, and then getting bummed out, and then getting distracted, and then holidays, and and and. But here it is now! Chewie tells the tale of December, that has focused all o...

After a long delay, both intentional and not, this episode is finally here! This was recorded way back on the 10th of December, but Chewie's computer died on the evening of the 11th. It took a while, but it was finally resurrected just in time for the holidays and the obligatory no-man's land between Christmas and New Year's, with some of Chewie's life trying to fall apart in the meantime. But her...

The dorks are starting off by explaining what's up with new Akroma's art. It turns out she's got prosthetic legs, which is not something we knew about, so that's actually really cool! From there we head into the Card Image Gallery, bouncing around and talking about whatever cards catch our eyes. Yes we hit the Lotus this episode. No we weren't terribly impressed. But Thumbles is (are?) clearly the...

After accidentally not doing a show for longer than anticipated, the dorks are back to FINALLY take a look at Commander Legends! We're just bouncing around the Card Image Gallery and enjoying all the weird new stuff! And if we missed a card you wanted us to talk about (and I KNOW we did) don't worry, we're gonna come back to this set next week! Commander Legends Card Image Gallery - https://magic....

The dorks are back! And this time we're doing a Mythic Conscription for the final set of the Invasion block, Apocalypse. Apocalypse was a neat set full of all kinds of awesome cards, but how many of them could have been mythic? Weirdly enough, this is one of the hardest sets we've had to do just because so many of these cards are really good and solid rares, but not many seem to climb up into Myth...

Hey look, the dorks return with even more Zendikar Rising stuff! We're looking through the Card Image Gallery and talking about whatever catches our eye whether it's a returning legendary creature, a bizarre faceless elemental thing, a lizard made out of vines, or a CLEARLY PSYCHOTIC MINOTAUR MOOSE THING OH GOD RUN! Zendikar Rising Card Image Gallery - https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive...

The dorks are back with Zendikar Rising previews! Apparently the preview season for this set was extra short, because the full Card Image Gallery is up! In this episode we're going through the mythics and whatever else looks good to us. Yes this does include the adorable jerboa that will, in fact, lead us all to glory. Zendikar Rising Card Image Gallery - https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/arch...

THIS IS IT! This number is just ridiculous, so we decided to do something ridiculous to celebrate! We are joined by four excellent guests to be contestants in the return of Exiled, our deckbuilding game show! It's like Chopped, but with Magic cards! We've got the original voice of Casual Magic himself, Anthony Alongi ( @anthonyaalongi ), digital alterer and longtime listener ALK Alters ( @AltersAL...

The dorks are back with another edition of There's No Plane Like Home! Do you like happiness and sunshine and friendly creatures? Or do you prefer darkness, creepiness, and danger? Either way, do we have a place for you! Lorwyn is for the sunshine people, where the most dangerous thing to worry about is...well, racist elves running you through simply for being ugly. But other than that, there's no...

The dorks are back! After a wonderful discussion about the Cube Rule of Food Classification, which is very important by the way, we're doing another Mythic Conscription! This time we're doing Planeshift, the second set of the Invasion block. Planeshift is...problematic. You'll see what we mean.  Come join us in the future! The show is live on Thursdays around 8pm(ish) Eastern time on  Twitch !   B...

The dorks finally take a look at Double Masters! It's a reprint set, so it's a little weird to talk about all these cards that we already know about, but we managed to remember how to do it! After we give you the news about YET ANOTHER new kind of booster, that is. That doesn't show up until Zendikar Rising though, so who even cares right now, right? Set Boosters - https://magic.wizards.com/en/art...

Wait, what? The dorks are doing a second RPG episode...IN A ROW? Inconceivable! But yeah, with the party split during the last episode we were really hot to try to get back together, even though we literally had no idea what the other part of the group was up to. And since I haven't listened to any of the other part, I don't actually know how to write this. Let's just say some crazy stuff happens...

We return to Brian's custom-made RPG on the strange plane of Trivester! Our party (Karim, Alaric, and the Angel) are heading towards a place called Aosk to find Gandr, who is apparently some manner of evil thing? Two of our heroes have some serious problems with their rolls, as 1s are popping up and causing all kinds of havoc. And then the unthinkable happens! No no, not THAT unthinkable! Let's ju...

The dorks dive into Jumpstart! First we'll explain what it is, and the concept is actually pretty neat. Then we'll jump into the Card Image Gallery and go through all the new cards in it. The new cards are mostly really cool. Oh, and there are Legendary creatures that have actually interesting abilities! Remember those? Wow! Jumpstart Card Image Gallery: https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archi...

New Shrines! Sure there are lots of other neat cards too, but new Shrines! There are new card versions of old characters, which is pretty awesome. We get to see more of Teferi's family. There are lots of doggos and kitty-kitties! Bronto-Dave is back! There are neat twists on old standard effects (Traitorous Greed is really cool)! There are some SWEET new goblins if that's your thing! There are som...

Hey we're back! We took a couple weeks off, first to do a non-podcast chatting stream and then out of respect for the Black Lives Matter movement. By the way, Black Lives Matter. Also, Trans Rights are Human Rights. Got that? The dorks are first concerned for Dirk, who just hadn't responded to any of our attempts to contact him when he didn't show up for the recording. Then we cover the recent rac...

The dorks are back with another edition of There's No Plane Like Home! This time we're taking a look at everyone's favorite (?) time-travel affected plane, Tarkir. Tarkir is based on various real-world Asian countries, so the physical aspects of the plane don't really change through the versions. Of course, when you're hopping through timelines, it's not really the physical world you're worried ab...

We now return to Trivester for another installment of Brian's custom MTG RPG! After the last installment's massive exposition dump Karim, Alaric, and the Angel are off to track down someone else that might have some idea what's going on. Along the way we'll be accosted by various critters that could potentially want to kill us. And of course, our beloved soldier boy really has a hang-up about figh...

The dorks head back to the Ikoria Card Image Gallery to take a look at all the weird stuff this plane has going on. We begin, of course, with the actual Sharknado. From there we find more shark things, a ridiculous number of mashed-up creatures (like a Porcuparrot and a Tigorilla), and the usual assortment of neat spells, stories told through cards, and assorted other weirdness. I'm still not goin...