I recently had the opportunity to play in a Magic tournament at the Wizards of
the Coast Game Center where fun was the main idea behind the tournament. This
tournament was a two-headed giant sealed deck tournament. For those of you not
familiar with this format it is named after one of the cards from the original set,
the Two-Headed Giant of Foriys. It is a team format in which two teams of two
players each try to kill the other team. Both teams start with 30 life and play
alternates between teams so that one player from each team gets a turn after a
player from another team.
In this tournament you built two forty card decks using 2 Tempest starters,
2 Stronghold boosters and another 2 boosters from Exodus. With a total card
pool of 196 cards plus 44 land you should be able to make 2 decent decks that are
mainly one color with a splash of a second color. Of course you and your team mate
would be playing different main colors, but if there are a decent amount of cards
in the color you choose to splash with you can limit the total colors that your
team is using to 3. The reason you might want to do this is to limit the amount
of color hosers that your opponent may be able to use against you.
Another thing to consider is that when a card deals damage to all players,
such as the Magmasaur, that both "heads" take damage making those cards twice as
effective. You should also note that while you announce that you are attacking
one head, the other head may choose to block for him, but if you have a creature
with landwalk ability that matches the head you are attacking neither heads can
block. These minor changes in the way the game is played allow for a whole
different type of play.
Generally all the players that show up are just their for a good time.
There are small prizes awarded to the winner consisting of unopened Magic decks
and boosters, but nothing major. This helps add to the fun atmosphere of these
and other fun events that Wizards of the Coast is holding at their official
tournament center. If you think this sounds like a fun idea you should talk
to a retailer in your area about holding some fun tournaments. Remember that
Magic wasn't created for hard-core tournament level play. It was designed
for fun.