The Magic Decision

In my inbox:

Each year every DCI Judge needs to renew and actively judge events (based on level). Failure to do either can result in your judge membership expiring soon

It's been about 9 or 10 months since I last judged or played in a tournament. It's been 6 to 8 months since I last bought a Magic card. I haven't actually played Magic since I moved to Seattle (which is silly, considering that the HQ of judging and the game itself is like 20 minute drive away). I need to make a decision.

Here's the options I see before me:

1. Dive back into it. Recommit to judging before my Level 2 expires. Find a place I want to play and/or judge, and go do some casual games from time to time. Start buying cards again so I can get up to speed on what the formats are like and how the rules have changed.
   
2. Get out. Set up an ebay account and start selling all my cards. Score some money, and free up shelf space.
   
3. Follow plan #2, then regret it later, and feel like an idiot.

It's the existence of course #3 that makes this tough.

my game store

My game store will always be Active Imagination in Albuquerque. Partly that's just 'cause I used to manage the place, but mostly it's 'cause it has a wider selection than any other game store I've been too. I GM RPGs, but I also really dig boardgames (especially cooperative ones), I collect miniatures, and used to judge Magic tournaments. I like a little bit of everything, so variety and depth are big deals for me. AI scored huge in that department.

I'm about to hop on a bus to pick up my copy of Scion: God at Golden Age Collectibles down by the market. It's a good store, but it's really a comic shop. I have Scion: God on reserve, and it turns out it's the only copy they ordered. Their gaming section is pretty small. The game section is 90% RPGs, with about 5 or 6 boardgames and a few CCGs to round it out. The rest of the store is Comics, Action Figures, Lovecraft Memorabilia, Movie Scripts, Posters, etc. Fun stuff, to be sure, but it's focus and mine aren't quite in sync. Yet it's my favorite "game" store in Seattle.

Speaking of Seattle, the game stores here are all overly-specialized. My other choices locally include Uncle's Games and Blue Highway Games, both of which focus on board games. Blue Highway doesn't even carry RPGs, and Uncle's pretty much just carries Wizards of the Coast RPGs. Games Workshop Store #174 is here as well, but it, as you'd expect, only carries GW stuff. The search for links to those shops turned up Gary's Games as well, which I haven't visited, but will have to sometime (next paycheck?). They are all in different directions from me, so I can't even get the "total package" fix by hitting multiple stores - doing so would take all day.

*Sigh* You never know how good you've got it till it's done and gone.