81: How to Recognize What You Have Control Over with Brock Mosley - a podcast by Shaun Penrod talks tips and stories with professional Magic: The Gathering

from 2016-03-25T08:00

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Brock Mosley is 22 years old and has been playing Magic for about three years. He’s a member of team The Pizza Leagues and made his first ever Grand Prix day two AND top eight at Grand Prix Houston 2016.

Click to Tweet: I got a ton of value from Brock Mosley when he shared his story on #MTGProTutor today! Click here: http://bit.ly/mtgprotutor-ep81

First Set

Ravnica: City of Guilds Ravnica

Favorite Set

Innistrad

Favorite Card

Stormbreath Dragon

What makes Magic: The Gathering fun for you?

Brock started his Magic journey while playing other board games like Diplomacy with his friends. His competitive nature drove him to take the plunge into Magic, where he could exercise his critical thinking and problem solving skills in the fun and competitive framework Magic creates.

Early Challenge

When Brock first started playing he was afraid of the mulligan process. He would just hold onto terrible cards and end up losing games that he could have potentially won.

Brock feels that he improved tremendously when he finally got over the fear of taking a mulligan, which he did by recognizing that the cards he drew simply weren’t working. He made a rule for himself that he would never keep a 1 land hand or a 6 land hand.

Level Up Moment

Brock’s greatest period of growth came when he and his friends founded their team, The Pizza Leagues. He started playing casually with his friends in college, but eventually Brock migrated towards playing with more advanced and competitively driven players.

In founding The Pizza Leagues Brock surrounded himself with other Magic players with similar goals to his, and he started to buckle down, play a lot, and improve as much as possible.

Proudest Magic Moment

Making his first Day 2 and his first Top 8 at Grand Prix Houston 2016 still has Brock in a little shock. For the last year his goal has been to try and make it to the Pro Tour, and he’s excited to get to play against the best players Magic has to offer.

Best Format

Standard

What Would You Say To A New Standard Player?

Brock believes one of the best things a new Standard player can do is find out what sort of strategy works for them. When starting out linear decks make a good entry point, and will help a player determine if they like that kind of play style.

Sometimes it takes playing a Mono-Red Aggro deck to realize you actually want to play a Control deck instead. Finding out what you like to play is crucial, because you need to like your deck enough to spend hours and hours practicing with it.

Biggest Mistake Players Make

Misattributing the reason why they won or lost a game is one of the most common mistakes Brock sees players making.

He finds that people are more comfortable with losing if they can assign the reason for it to something beyond their control. Some players don’t realize that their decisions in the game, and outside of it, have much bigger effects on the game than they think.

Brock combats this by looking specifically at what decisions he made, and not focusing on what cards his opponent drew. He is honed in on the aspects of the game that he can control, and doesn't let variance frustrate him and affect his play decisions.

How To Play Magic For Little Money

Brock was in college when he started and bought the pieces for a Red-Green Aggro deck online for about $30.

He played it for as long as he possibly could, and even went to his first Star City tournament with what he calls “The Jankiest Red Green Deck” that has ever been played.

He didn’t wait to have an incredibly optimized deck before pushing his Magic skills as far as he could. He believes that as you feel more comfortable playing Magic you can start to slowly build your deck and work on it over a longer period of time.

Improvement Suggestions

Brock uses Xmage if he can’t find other people to play with, as it is free and easy to use. When he plays a certain deck he will try swapping certain cards out to see how that affects his play. He essentially plays different versions of his deck to see how they hold up against certain matchups.

What's in Your Tournament Bag

Deck

Deck Box

Tokens

Playmat: The Pizza Leagues

Dice

Water

Pretzels

Binder

Pen & Paper

Dragon Shield Copper Sleeves

Final Wisdom

Brock knows that Magic is a game and is meant to be fun. However, he sees a lot of players not having fun with it at all. He would urge you to find a way to have fun with Magic, or find something else to take its place.