1.1 - What You Don't Know... Explained by Ming the Merciless. The first thing that you may notice in this strip is this "Regionals" thing we mention. Regionals are, hence the name, regional Magic tournaments that are held annually. They usually have very large turnouts because anyone can attend. The victors of all the Regionals earn invitations to Nationals, which is an invite-only national tournament, which in turn leads to Worlds. Worlds is the world championship of Magic, which determines the best player on the face of the Earth (a very nice title to have). The next thing that you may not understand are the points that Cal mentions. These are called Pro Points. Whenever a player wins, or places high enough, in a particular event (such as Regionals, or any other large tournament), he or she receives a number of Pro Points. These points are mostly used to allow people with enough of them to skip the first few rounds of tournament play. It is assumed that people with Pro Points would just breeze right through the first few rounds, so they are given a free pass to a level that would challenge them. The last thing that needs explaining is the names that appear next to ours on the pairings list, and the reason we freak when we see them. Those players are three of the best, most consistent players in the world: Chris Benafel, Chris Pakula, and Kai Budde. Playing them is almost an automatic loss to anyone like us, who are solely aspiring to be like them, and to one day play at their level. Make sense now? Go back to this comic. Legal Stuff Magic: The Gathering and all related trademarks and products mentioned belong to Wizards of the Coast. Any other trademarks and products mentioned are the property of the companies that produce them. Any card art is copyrighted by the artists and Wizards of the Coast. The use of these trademarks, products, and cards should not be construed as a challenge to those rights. All other content is © Copyright 2002 Burnham/Dominguez/Wacker/Yarrow. Contact Us Art: Bryan Yarrow (aftershock@tenchiclub.com) Scripts: Cal Wacker (reverend16@excite.com) Cooking: Andrew "Mingy" Dominguez (andominguez@fordham.edu) Website: Ted Burnham (tburnham@abacus.bates.edu) Come chat in the FlopJocks IRC Channel at irc.netfrag.com #flopjocks