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In MagicTheGathering, a creature that taps to deal one damage to target.

Also used by TimRetout to sign his posts.
I sign one post with this name and this page springs up... what next? Besides, I may now have become TimeTrout, but I'm not sure...

Also the name of the Scottish sorceror in Monty Python and the Holy Grail. This provides the origin for the first-given meaning. One assumes (Peter?) that Tim, the Enchanter from the Monty Python set is, in fact, a Tim?
Sadly not - though it's the same class of things.  --Vitenka

I thought - rather more prosaically - that tims are called tims because MoonShadow once knew a guy called Tim who used them a lot. And MoonShadow is responsible for infecting AlexChurchill with MagicTheGathering, who spread the term wider among the Magic-playing crowds here in Cambridge. I could be wrong. Is Tim the Enchanter a tim? - SunKitten

The name 'tim' for them is common at least to the north of England and ScotsLand? as of ooohh.. 1993 or so.  The alternate name is 'prod' (from the worms least effective but most humiliating weapon) - they poke you each turn.  (Oh, additionally  from a shortening of the name, obviously)  --Vitenka (who knows a Timothy whose nym became Prod)

Cool. I prefer tim, though. Especially when there's a real Tim playing - it can be a cause of confusion, which is amusing - SunKitten

Using "Tim" to mean MTG: Prodigal Sorcerer or a similar creature is also common in lots of North America.  It's from the MontyPython and the Holy Grail scene, where Tim the Enchanter shows off rather by sending fireballs and rockets at random nearby scenery.  The "Tim the Enchanter" from the MagicTheGathering MontyPython set is also a 3-mana blue 1/1 which taps to deal damage, but in rather different fashion.  --AlexChurchill
Not to be confused with the word Timmy?, which has a rather different significance in MagicTheGathering.
And that significance would be?  --Vitenka
Basically, WizardsOfTheCoast R&D define three groups of MtG players. Mark Rosewater gave a nicely worded [explanation] of them a while back, which spread the use of the terms wider. Basically put, Timmy is the "power gamer"; he likes playing with huge creatures and spells with massive effects. Most players start out as Timmy and grow up. His companions are Johnny and Spike. Spike wants to win; he doesn't particulalry care how. Johnny wants to do things with style. Winning is somewhat incidental. StuartFraser and AlexChurchill both self-define as "unrepentant Johnny"; the remainder of GamesEvening's MtG group all admit to some level of Spikishness, I think.
I wouldn't have done, until recently, but yes... It's starting to look that way. I appear to be trying to build decks which win with style - I assure people that I'm trying to avoid doing it in conventional ways, though... -- TheInquisitor
PeterTaylor thinks of himself as a Johnny / Timmy. Some of the best games he's had he's lost.
Well, I don't play magic, but in the games I do...  Johnny and Spike I guess.  Play my way, but try to do as well as possible.  I don't much like this way of classifying though, it seems too limited.  I find my fun in discovering new ways to play and in improving my game.  The ultimate aim is to win, but it's not a short term goal.  I dunno how you describe that - but then, you don't have to describe it perfectly to sell to me.  Just give me a game where you can make endless tiny variations and work towards a local maxima, and then get bored, do something totally silly just to be silly, and discover a whole new maxima.  Not me, but when you can be rebuilding a deck, accidentally pick up the stack of cards you cut rather than the ones you put in, and utterly demolish your opponent, you've got a good game.  --Vitenka (well, sorta me.  I was the opponent.  Best game I ever played, I think.)

Oh joy.  He's gone and overloaded "Power Gamer" to mean almost the reverse of PowerGamer?.  I presume "newbie" "killer" and "veteran" were too loaded for them to use?  (reads article)  Um.  What do I do if I've never HEARD of the cards listed?  I read the next page anyway, obviously.  Yup, about what you described.  How odd that they use GameDesign? theories without using any of the standard terms.  --Vitenka
What do you do if you've never heard of any of the cards listed? You click on their names and look at the card images that pop up.  Then choose the two or three that struck you most as "oooh, that's cool".
As for the names - Timmy is not "newbie", and Spike is not "veteran".  Most tournament players are Spikes, but not all.  Most newbies start out as Timmies, but not all Timmies are newbies.  Some have intricate grasp of the rules, deckbuilding subtleties, and the rest of it; they just happen to enjoy throwing 8/8 trample Avatars at their opponent more than most players.  All three types of Magic gamer are represented in most casual groups.  And there are some groups where "veteran" would be taken to mean "Johnny", while some groups would take "veteran" to mean "Spike"...  --AlexChurchill
It's still fairly standard naming - the newbie likes big shiny things, the killer wants to win, and the veteran likes to play around at the edges of the rules.  At least it's fairly standard to the games I've been in the communities for.  While, obviously, not literally true - nor is newbie ever really meant to mean literally 'new player', more 'acts like a stereotypical new player'.  Veteran is certainly more arguable - but 'grumpy old curmudgen' isn't really a standard term :)  Explorer would, I suppose, be more standard - but doens't seem as aplpicable to MtG.  --Vitenka
Ahh, OK.  Sorry, I hadn't come across those meanings of "killer" or "veteran" before.  Obviously we move in different circles :)  I don't think Mark Rosewater could have used "newbie" as one of his three categories of player, though. Not without offending a large chunk of his audience!  --AlexChurchill
Well.. Let's see.  It's a mush of two circles really.  ExplorerSocialiserAchieverKiller is from Bartle? - it breaks down the types of MUD players, and is surprisingly accurate surprisingly often.  A whole set of theories exist about how the dynamic of a world (its MetaGame) evolves based upon the proportions of each player of each type present.  Newbie and Veteran are from fps games, where I guess the full categorisation would be NewbiePubberClannerLLamaVeteran - though there is way less theorising and way more arguments about pubber vs clanner mindset and (mis)classifying newbies as llamas.
Newbie, clanner, and veteran or easy enough to guess at.  Anyone care to fill me in on pubber and llama? - Kazuhiko
Pubber is probably someone who plays on public servers (pubs) for fun with his buddies.  Not too concerned with competition.
ReiFied?.



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