With Wizards of the Coast announcing the end of the Magic Pro League and professional play last year, I was happy to find myself with an already started Magic career in content creation. In today's blog, I’m going to talk to you about how I started streaming and some of the key parts to becoming one.

The MPL didn’t only mean we were playing tournaments for the highest stake the game of Magic has ever seen - we also signed a contract for Wizards of streaming Magic Arena, 10 hours a week for a year.

I’ve been a content creator for ChannelFireball for over 5 years at this point. I was making articles and videos, mostly my famous Legacy veedeos, and I was very happy with my work.

People loved them and often asked me why I wouldn’t start streaming. My answer was simply that I didn’t have time to fit in my busy schedule of student, aspiring professional Magic player and content creator.

The MPL gave me an opportunity that I was seeking. It funded me well enough to overcome the initial costs of streaming (which would be unpaid work) and it made me able to focus entirely on Magic, practice and content creation.

You may think I had an easy cruise and always got a high number of viewers, but in reality, the first months were actually quite rough. I would find myself playing and talking like I was recording a video and would see no one messaging in my chat for tens of minutes.

Consistency is the key

It gave me a strange feeling of loneliness. When you record a video, you know that you’re by yourself, but when you stream and don’t have anyone to talk to, it feels awkward, and I wasn’t sure exactly what I could do to get better.

The answer was consistency. In the first few months, I wasn’t really planning my life, mostly just announcing on Twitter an hour prior. That wasn’t good at all to create a group of people that always showed up and expected you to be there.

I decided that I would stream on a schedule, every day Monday-Friday for four hours from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m (Italian Time Zone). Once I actually stuck to that time schedule, I saw my stream numbers going up, the chat box being filled with the usual people and a whole community was created!

Over two years later, I’m proud to say I built a good community. I’m very happy to turn on Streamlabs at 9 a.m. every morning, saying ‘buon giorno’ to the chatters and play Magic Arena for four hours while having fun, showing off cards from my collection and engaging with the viewers as much as possible.

You might read this article and think that it’s easy, that anyone can just start streaming constantly and earn a good amount, but I’ll stop you there.

I started from a very privileged position of being a very well known player who also had experience in content creation, but mostly I was getting paid by Wizards to stream. I streamed for many months with only about 10 subscribers because I knew Wizards had my back.

What Should You Do If You Want to Start Streaming?

First things first, you have to realise what your goal is exactly. Don’t expect to be the next Numot the Nummy; it tooks years and years of streaming eight hours a day to build what he has.

Have moderate goals at the beginning and assume the first months will be a lot of unpaid work that can pay off if your efforts continue.

Be nice to your viewers and your opponents and you’ll have a community of nice people. In another profession, you love when your customers are polite, right? It’s the same as a streamer; treat the next person with respect and politeness and your viewers will do the same to you.

Share as much as you can with your viewers and on social media. Social media is an incredibly important part of being a streamer. You not only have to keep your past viewers entertained, but you always have to get the attention of possible new viewers.

Share your coolest decklists, share your good results with them, make some sideboard guides and throw them out there to advertise your stream.

SELF ADVERTISING IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING FOR A STREAMER. YOU NEED PEOPLE TO KNOW WHO YOU ARE AND WHERE THEY CAN FIND YOU.

There’s obviously a limit to that - don’t make bold claims like “I broke the format, this deck is unbeatable” if you’re 20-5 on the ladder.

People like to follow a streamer that has good results, but it’s easy to see when one is just making things up or overhyping things to sell themselves up.

I touched upon many topics, but the most important one I haven’t touched is that while streaming is a job to somebody, try to focus on entertaining yourself in the beginning. Have fun playing the game and your enjoyment will become infectious to others.

You can find Andrea streaming on Twitch here: https://www.twitch.tv/andreame...