How the CPA got started

Killer Joe

New member
It's been so long ago now I sorta forget how and why the CPA came to be. I remember it had something to do with a white sorcery card that produced three 2/2 white knight tokens but it got eratta's.....and I can't remember anything else.
 

turgy22

Nothing Special
Have you tried reading the site's mission statement?

Also, I recall hearing that much of the early debate was around errata for the card Waylay (instant, not sorcery). People were using it to put three tokens in play at the end of their opponent's turn and then attack. The rules changed so that even if you played it during the end phase, the tokens disappeared during cleanup.

Of course, I wasn't around at the time, so I'm not sure how much influence that change had on the site, but I think Orgg said it was a big deal at the time.
 

Oversoul

The Tentacled One
I knew nothing about this site back in 1999, but I was on The Dojo back then, and if I'm not mistaken, a lot of the early members arrived here from The Dojo. There was, as Turgy said, some uproar over the erratum to Waylay. There had been errata on cards in the past, but for some technical reasons that seem rather silly in hindsight, this one was considered more egregious by some players. Of course, I must note that I had a rather limited understanding of the game at the time and I only remember the bit about Waylay because I frequented The Dojo. I don't know what was being said on other sites, if anything. Someone who actually showed up here back then would probably remember it better.

I don't mean to step on any toes by calling the Waylay controversy silly. Again, I had a very limited understanding of the game at the time. And if it was the primary impetus for starting this site, then I'm grateful for it. The Dojo is all but forgotten, but this site, small as it is, still stands. Also, I'm all for not letting WotC off the hook for their many mistakes (and they deserve due credit for the things they've done well), but I really never considered the Waylay issue to be a big deal back then and in hindsight it only seems sillier. I recall some impassioned arguments against the erratum, not just at The Dojo, but also in the archives here (somewhere, and I forget by whom); so I want to emphasize that I was like 13 years old when this was going on and most of my Magic gameplay had been Portal, a simplified version of the game that WotC was trying out.

http://www.casualplayers.org/forums/threads/our-first-issue.405/#post-4045
 

turgy22

Nothing Special
I'm in complete agreement about calling the Waylay controversy silly and I hope that some (if not all) of the players who founded the site can even see that it's silly in hindsight. I mean, is Waylay really that important a card? Was it a staple of the casual community? Our own site didn't even deem it worthy of Hall of Fame inclusion. I can look back and think of other examples where I can see a community of Magic players in an uproar: the 6th edition rule changes, the nerfing of blue, the banning / restrictions of various staple cards and my personal least favorite change - the removal of combat damage stacking. But Waylay? Really? I just don't get it.
 

TomB

Administrator
Staff member
I think it was more the principle of the thing with Waylay, and the way WoTC moved to quickly shut down an innovative way to use a sub-optimal card because it was being used in a way that wasn't intended when they decided to print it. Casual players, as a rule, really like it when an otherwise awful card suddenly becomes useful (especially when they already have 4 copies of it), so the whole incident turned into a bit of a rallying cry. This site's founders were among the most vocal on the Dojo about it, from what I understand, and Mike (Ed) Sullivan I believe offered to put together this BB to give casual players a platform to use to talk about issues like this.

I personally joined more to find like-minded individuals who opposed the 6th ed rules changes than over any need to protest the Waylay errata, though I found that, as a group, we could not seem to agree on what we all disliked about 6th ed. Others also joined because of debates started on the Dojo about 6th ed rules, both for and against the changes, and those discussions continued on here. Then we found other things to talk about, and do, and more or less that's how it evolved into what we have today...:)
 

Killer Joe

New member
Right, Waylay. I remember now.

We have a Mission Statement? :)

I was a Dojo Member, too. I think I followed Chaos Turtle here back in January 2000.
 

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
I was on the Dojo and though wasn't a founding member, followed the others here when the Dojo forums were dying out. As far as I remember, I didn't agree with most of the founding members objections to any of the reasons why they set up the site (Waylay, 6th ed rules, etc) but everyone was decent and fun to talk to.

The heyday of the site was that first year and gradually most of the founders left, plus anyone they might have gotten from somewhere else (Rando, Whimsical, Purple Jester, etc). Now it's just down to us :)

The Hall of Fame stuff happened after all of that so of course it's unlikely Waylay would show up there since the people who participated weren't the ones who founded the site, by and large.
 

Ransac

CPA Trash Man
The Waylay argument strikes a huge bell now. I seem to recall theorgg talking about it briefly in casual games. I didn't show up until a year or so after the site started. I wonder what ever happened to some of the older members: DUke, Whimsical, Duel, Rando, YellowJacket, nodnarb24, fuzzy510 and Killer Joe (I heard the last two started up a Roethlisberger fan club at a Dive Bar in Pennsylstainia somewhere;) )

Ransac, cpa trash man
 

Spiderman

Administrator
Staff member
Yellowjacket/Killer Joe is still here, just doesn't post a lot anymore. I think his latest is in the Casual Decks section.

Rando came back briefly in June and started a game in the Games Run, but just made one post about it and that was it.
 

turgy22

Nothing Special
Yellowjacket/Killer Joe is still here, just doesn't post a lot anymore. I think his latest is in the Casual Decks section.
I think he started a thread about something maybe 16 days ago. I wish I could remember what it was about.
 

Killer Joe

New member
yeah, where do I sign up for that? I was looking.

Whimsical,.........I miss her her, she and Spidey had this "thing" going on and.......................................KJ starts to *trail off to lalaland*
 
Top