Hope you are all ready for the Innistrad pre release.  I know this week’s judge of the week, Eddie Cheung, is ready.  Eddie is a level 2 judge from Guelph, Ontario in Canada.  Eddie begun playing back in 8th edition, but stopped shortly after Mirrodin. He began playing again in Planar Chaos, and has been playing ever since. As for Judging, Eddie was certified during the Zendikar prerelease in Toronto, and has been judging since. He passed his level 2 exam at Grand Prix Dallas 2011. Eddie tells us that he was really interested in the funky little quirks with rules and interactions, he constantly wanted to know WHY cards interacted a certain way.  Hence, he became a rules advisor. Eddie has been loving the ability to travel while judging.  It has allowed him to see the world for a very low cost. He loves that through judging he has been able to meet so many cool judges internationally, and keep in touch with all of these cool new friends that he has met. Talking about his most memorable judging experience he says:

“All GPs that I’ve attended, these large scale events, if you haven’t been to one, is truly one of the most exciting places to be if you’re involved in Magic.  Upwards of 1200 players.  It turns into such a high energy event, and you meet so many people.  I remember back in Atlanta and Kansas, the judges all ordered pizza to the plaza of the hotel and just sat around, talked, played cards, and just hung out, it was like an after party for a job well done.  Oh, and most in Dallas, when I got my Level 2 certification, we all went out to the closest bar and just had a really good time.”

Favorite Magic format?
Limited, I’m a big fan of drafting, it’s just so easy to get into and I’m somewhat good at it, Oh, also Commander for sure, and back at home in Guelph, we have a Stack that we play type 4 with, lots of giggles and ridiculousness happens!

Favorite Magic Card?
Reveillark, I’m personally a big big big fan of recursion, whether it’s with Karmic Guide or Body Double, and any commander decks with White I make will first go Reveillark, Karmic Guide…

What do you do outside of judging?
I’m currently a Masters Student for the University of Guelph. I’m a big fan of volunteering for festivals and events outside of GPs. Currently I’m working on a Truck team for my University’s Orientation Week. And in May, I organize a Music Festival for high school bands all around Canada.

Describe your Magic community.
I’m actually quite proud of my community, we started as a small group of people who played Magic, and monthly or bimonthly tournaments with just enough 8 people. I still remember our Lorwyn release, I wasn’t expecting much, but a whole 17 people (small for you guys in cities) joined in on the fun that day!

The community has now turned into a weekly EDH group (around 20 or so each week) with biweekly tournaments, we try to do one serious and one fun tournament each month, and with the new planeswalker points system, we’re able to get even more interest from our higher-leveled players!  We have players of every type, some people stick to the most creative decks they can whip up, while others concentrate on play testing the same deck and fine-tuning them for a PTQ two weeks from then.

The community has also grown a couple of judges, we now have 4 active judges including me in a player base about 50 people. So I say we’re doing pretty well.

Whats your impression of Innistrad so far?
Great! I absolutely love the art from this set, and the theme is amazing, the mechanics are pretty down on my list, but this is probably the most excited I’ve gotten about flavour and theme about a set since… a very very long time. (If I started before TSP, I think that would be the point where I found a set’s theme very cool)

Favorite Magic background story novel?
I really really enjoy listening to one of my fellow judges, Chris Chop, talk on hours at end about the Brother’s War, and that’s when I realized where the cards from and how they make sense flavour wise. But other than that, I’ve never actually read a Magic novel, I’ve always been meaning to pick up one of the older ones.

Your top 5 games of all time?
Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, Portal, Final Fantasy X, Kingdom of Loathing, Resident Evil