Games Casting a Spell

Magic: The Gathering, the most popular trading-card game ever, has become a mass movement of players who battle it out with the help of spells, creatures, and other powers printed on cards at casual gatherings. The more serious planeswalkers (in Magic-speak) take part in dozens of competitions around the world. The majority are young men in their 20s, but people of all ages, backgrounds, and levels of experience play Hasbro’s game. “The boring games are the ones where you just draw better cards,” says Simone Aiken of Denver. “The exciting ones are when by luck and math you should have lost. That isn’t probability. That’s you.” ——

Number of Magic fans who attended the event