MTG: A Lot of Sol (Ring)!

A couple of years ago now, I wrote a post detailing my History of Magic, and in it I included the iconic card that is the face of magic to me, Sol Ring. I included a whole bunch of pictures of various versions as it has been re-released with new sets, as special editions and as promotional releases for special events. One such version was the Masterpiece Series: Kaladesh Inventions Foil version.

This particular masterpiece series was very limited and some cards in it went sky high in price while others stayed more reasonable ($40-80 being what I call reasonable). There were 54 cards in total and about 40 of them all stayed under the $200 mark. That’s actually pretty surprising. But those remaining 14 cards. The top card was one called Mana Crypt and it has been running around $950 on average at a place called TCG. So on a lark, I looked up the Sol Ring version, just to see if maybe I could pick one up for the sake of simply having a shiny.

Holy smokes! There were only 9 copies available that were under $1000! A typical magic card weighs about 0.06oz. So with the foiling, lets just go wild and say this particular Sol Ring weighs 0.1oz. For $1000. To put that in perspective, 0.1oz of gold is worth about $180 currently. Is that insane or what?!? We’re not talking about artistic treasures from history here folks. The Kaladesh Inventions cards were released in 2016.

A Sol Ring as pictured immediately above costs about $15. So I could buy about 60 (I’m giving myself leeway for shipping, jerks who don’t actually send near mind condition ones, etc) regular versions for my Sol Ring Collection OR I could buy 1 Super Duper Special Version that I’ll never play with, never use but simply put it behind plastic and let it sit there, knowing I own it. I’m not going to do either of those options, but it’s fun to think about. If I win the lottery some day, you know?

Just for the record, I bought that group of Sol Ring’s when the price was almost half of what it is now.

Universe 1 ★★☆☆☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Universe 1
Series: Universe Anthology #1
Author: Terry Carr (ed)
Rating: 2 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 213
Words: 63K

Man, I had forgotten what utter balderdash was written by hippy wannabe’s in the 70’s for SF. Bunch of prententious wanktards thinking sex and psychology are enough to sell a story without having to actually write a good story. There’s a reason most of the authors in this collection are completely forgotten today and probably made zero impact back in their own time. What a bunch of losers. People like them are what gave SF a bad name.

And yet.

There are at least 14 volumes in this series. I’ve got some random ones and despite my trashing above, I’m going to give the editor, Terry Carr, one more chance. But after this book, each one has to impress me or I’m dnf’ing the series and consigning Mr Carr to the dust bins of forgotten history, where he already appears to be though if I’m being honest.

★★☆☆☆

Groo and the Tale of King Sage (Groo the Wanderer #13) ★★★✬☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress & Blogspot, by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Groo and the Tale of King Sage
Series: Groo the Wanderer #13
Author: Sergio Aragones
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Comics
Pages: 24
Words: 2K

The Sage, introduced in Groo #7, becomes the King of a small but prosperous country. Groo stumbles across said country and asks to be made a general of the armies. For some reason, the Sage can’t say no to Groo and thus makes him a general. To mitigate Groo’s “groo’ness”, he sends him off to guard the northernmost pass of the country. Along the way, Groo makes everyone become a farmer and thus brings discontent to the whole country. The Sage is deposed and beats Groo about the head to show his displeasure.

This was an amusing little story. AND IT ONLY COST 75¢. In comparison, Bone #16 cost $3, four times as much. And Aragones gives us not only an amusing story with a start, a middle and an end, but it is also in color. Now maybe the paper material itself was pulp and Bone was high quality paper? But let me tell you, if I had $3 in 1986, well, really, I’d probably spent it at the dollar bin at Bradley’s (a now bankrupt and defunct department store) buying star wars figurines, BUT if I were to spend it on comics, I’d choose 4 months of Groo over one month of Bone every single time. Even right now, I would choose the same exact thing, ie, star wars figures, then if you forced me, Groo comics, hahahaha 😀

I am also finding the ads just as fun as the stories. In this comic, there is an ad for Captain America: The Broadway Musical. I kid you not. And here’s the proof:

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/e315pnzbj189mpg/groo13.jpg

Now, that is even better than the ad for the Jetson’s I saw in the previous Groo comic! I did a google search and sure enough, Marvel did try to get Captain American onto the stage and they failed. I hope you all join me in thanks for that failure. Nobody needs to see Cap tippity tappitying around. It did make me wonder though, what kind of parent would just send in their kids info to some complete stranger they saw in a comic book? And what kind of little girl is reading Groo? Probably not one who sings and dances is my guess 🙂

★★★✬☆

• All of My “Groo the Wanderer” Reviews

A Requiem: Bookstooge, and Silent Smartfood Popcorn, Strike Back!

Near the beginning of October (my goodness, it feels like that was forever ago) I was Banned Again from the wordpress forums for infractions unknown. I of course did not let this deter me from haunting the forums and making smart remarks in my head about both the people asking for help and the supposed staff.

But I couldn’t have endured these cold, cruel months without my good friend and Food of the Gods, Silent Smartfood Popcorn.

Every weekend when my voice was silenced by the tyrannical powers of WordPress (boo! hiss!), Smartfood helped me to go on. He reminded me that he never had a voice to lose in the first place and that I was still his friend. He also had no artificial colors, artificial flavors or preservatives so he was good for me.

I just hope that someday each and every one of you can find a friend like Silent Smartfood Popcorn was to me. While it lasted, he was the best bag of popcorn a guy could want. So long Smartfood, you’ve left your mark on my life. You are not forgotten.
(and neither are your 10,000 cousins still in the grocery stores!)

Mirrors (Hunter Bureau #1) ★★★☆☆

This review is written with a GPL 4.0 license and the rights contained therein shall supersede all TOS by any and all websites in regards to copying and sharing without proper authorization and permissions. Crossposted at WordPress & Blogspot by Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission

Title: Mirrors
Series: Hunter Bureau #1
Author: Blaze Ward
Rating: 3 of 5 Stars
Genre: SF
Pages: 146
Words: 49K

Sometime in the future, when mankind has almost destroyed himself, aliens give us a chance at survival. At a cost. We are no longer our own masters or owners of our own planet. While not in vile slavery per se, we ARE in servitude. We are the playground for aliens who can shape change and thus is born the Hunter Bureau.

Normally shape changers work alone, but this time they got smart. A pair come to Earth and one of them tries to take over a Hunter, only to be foiled by his own inexperience. He then takes over a retired Hunter while his partner begins setting things up so they can play in peace for years to come.

The problem is, the Hunter is no weak minded fool and the alien shape changer finds himself being taken over from the inside out. In the end, they form a mutual symbiosis and decide to hide the fact that the worlds top Hunter is now an alien shape changer. For the good of humanity of course.

The writing style for this book. Staccato. Bambambam. Like a gun. Going off. Right. In your ear. Choppy sentences. Cut off like a machete was taken to them. It was like the author was skipping whole sentences because he knew what he meant but as a reader it was incredibly frustrating. There were multiple instances where I had to read several paragraphs several times to figure out what in the world was going on. That’s just bad writing.

There were also a couple of key words that I only see used by people of certain political persuasions that I vehemently disagree with. I’ll be the first to admit that I could be reading too much into things, so I’m not giving that much weight in my judgment for this book. I didn’t even bother to record what they were so as not to take that idea with me into the next book.

The story itself was pretty interesting though. Realizing that the main character ISN’T the main character we thought he was amused me and I have to admit, I thought it was clever. In many ways, this reminded me of Timothy Zahn’s Quadrail series and the protagonist, Frank Compton. That same dry voice, that same almost emotionless state of being, it just struck me. But thankfully Ward does a bit better at characterization here so it’s not quite THAT dry or emotionless 😀

Good enough for 3stars and giving the next book a chance. By no means a great book or world changing though.

★★★☆☆

Blood Lust - MTG 4th Edition

Wintermint Dumpstagramm - Double the Fun

♪Double your pleasure♪
♪Double your fun♪
♪Double your dumpstas♪
♪Now you’re done!♪