Bulk Box Format for Kids

The Kitchen Table forum

Posted on Oct. 25, 2018, 10:28 a.m. by Weekend_Magic_NC

So a long time ago I bought a bulk box or two (a few years ago when I started playing). My kids, of course, wanted to try out this crazy game that their mother and I were playing. Unfortunately they had trouble casting spells (most of the time because of a lack of lands). So here's what we did.

-The kids put together a 40 card deck with whatever spells they wish to play (they usually did this with some help because at the time they couldn't read).

-On their side of the table we placed 5 stacks of face up basic lands (one stack for each color).

-Their 40 card deck would be shuffled and placed in line (face down) with the stacks of lands

-They would then draw their opening hand they would draw 7 cards from any combination of the piles. For instance...They draw four cards from the deck pile, two from the Swamp pile, one from the plains pile

-As they game continued when they drew a card they would be allowed to draw from any of the piles available to them. For instance...Turn 1 Draw from deck....Turn 2 Draw from Island; Play Divination draw 1 from Plains draw 1 from deck pile

-If the kids were playing each other they would have the same setup; If they were playing an adult, the adult played a normal (casual) deck.

Most of the time the decks were pretty even, and it never seemed like the kids had some kind of unfair advantage. They've since grown out of this "format" and now play 40 card casual decks and can do a pretty good job.

shadow63 says... #2

Not a bad training wheels format I like it

October 25, 2018 11:33 a.m.

Caerwyn says... #3

Overall, I think this seems like a good way to teach young players deckbuilding, which is something I’ve found a bit difficult to teach.

I had a couple academic questions about the format, several of which might not reasonably come up if using bulk cards.

I’m a bit curious how the initial draw works. Do you draw all seven face down, or do you get to look at each card before you choose which pile to draw the next from? Depending on which method is used, I feel there would be drastic implications for deckbuilding.

I am also curious how certain cards work - for example, if someone used Path to Exile, I presume you’d get to pull a basic land from the land pile of your choice. However, would that count as searching one’s library for the purpose of Archive Trap?

If you search your library for a land, would you have to shuffle your regular card library (which might have implications on top-deck manipulation)?

How about a card like Endless Horizons?

The land searching one might reasonably come up, even if the other two might not given a bulk collection.

October 25, 2018 12:56 p.m.

cdkime good questions. For the initial draws the deck cards were drawn face down. The only reason the land cards were face up was so the kids could remember which lands were where; they could just as easily be played face down. We only played bulk box cards so issues on "good cards" rarely came up. If you fetched a land for any reason we considered it a search. For instance if someone played Rampant Growth they would simply choose a basic land, and then (since the card says to do it) they would shuffle their library. I imagine that had Endless Horizons been played we would have removed the Plains cards from the top of the Plains pile (still counting it as a search, so we would have shuffled) and then play the card out from there. Keep in mind this was a format played with some pretty young kids so there was a lot of room for leniency.

October 25, 2018 1:22 p.m.

Boza says... #5

Actually, this is a great idea. My LGS has a great pile of cards from drafts and lots of lands. This can be easily setup to teach new players at the LGS and get them to play with their peers for cross contamination of the Magic bug! Great idea!

October 26, 2018 4:22 a.m.

Boza thanks. It's a pretty easy way to learn some basic mechanics of the game.

October 26, 2018 10:39 a.m.

Caerwyn says... #7

Makes sense. That’s how I’d do it also. Though, as players get more advanced, it might be worth hiding the piles so you can conceal what colours you are playing, as that information could affect mulligans.

October 26, 2018 10:53 a.m.

cdkime it honestly didn't take a very long time before they were able to just use a regular deck.

October 26, 2018 12:47 p.m.

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