Magic: The Gathering

Hey guys, i was recently thinking about starting to play M:TG.  If anyone plays it, i'd love to get some answers to these questons.
 
1) How much does it cost to get and stay competitive?
2) How often does the meta-game shift to make certain combos / cards obselete?
3) Hows the international circuit? Can i expected official tournaments here in Australia?
 
and the most important question
 
4) Is it worth getting into? Have you found it a redeeming past time or do you look back and consider it time wasted?

No idea about the first 3 questions but I can kind of answer the fourth.
I used to play at my School with a bunch of friends and it was really really fun, it wasn't competitive or anything. From playing MTG I made many good friends which I still have now. I would say if I were to play competitively I wouldn't find it that fun because I wasn't that great at it, but if you play it with friends it is really good, and so worth it.

ONLY DORKS PLAY MAGIC: THE GATHERING

1) Quite a bit. Regardless of what format you play, if you're playing competitively, you're making an investment.
2) I don't follow the meta-game much anymore, but blocks and core sets cycle faster than you'd like sometimes (in standard at least), leading to the scenarios you mentioned.
3) I have no idea.
4) Yes. I've collected other card games in the past, but I've yet to come across one that does art and lore as well as Magic. If that's not your thing, well, buy some anyways. It's a great system, and it has some flaws, but what doesn't?

1. A lot, depending on how you want to get cards. Old ones are more expensive. I spent waaay too much money on Magic when I used to play.  
2. I played like 4 years ago so I wouldn't know how the current game is changing. But back then it wasn't too much. 
3. No idea 
4. If you want to play a card game, Magic is the only choice. No other games is as complex. There are so many ways to play that it makes it very rewarding when you find yours. It was time well spent, but I also had friends who were playing with me. I met people along the way too, but I started out small with my close friends.

You need to spend a lot of money to keep up with the constant barrage of expansions that Wizards puts out each year and depending on what format you're planning on planning( block, type ii, etc) you could be looking at a couple hundred dollars every year for cards that will be obsolete in a year or two. Don't waste your time.

I had a sudden urge to start playing a TCG and ended up going with Magic  
 I regretted it as soon as they all fell out of my pocket in the street in the presence of some serious talent, who then proceeded to stare while I scrambled desperately to pick them up. 
Same thing happened with my pokemon cards but it was in a school assembly...

I would recommend buying the game that just came out on Steam and see if that gets you your fix. It doesn't have a large library of cards, but it's still a lot of fun to load up and mess around with every now and then. And I'm just playing the demo.

I haven't played Magic in a couple of years, but I'll give you my experience as a previous player that won and placed in a few tournies.  
 
1) It depends on what format you're playing, generally though you're looking at about 500-$1,000 per year, less if you stick with one deck (assuming that deck archtype remains competitive throughout the year).  

2) New sets are released every 3 months, so theoretically...every 3 months. Though archtypes will usually be set early in the season and last throughout the year with only slight modifications as sets are released. Some general archtypes (such as Red Deck Wins, a slash and burn aggro deck consisting of only red cards) change little, and can last a very long time. Regardless, you will still be looking at what I said in 1) most of the time in order to maintain the competitiveness of your deck.   

3) Official tournaments happen all over the world, even in smaller areas. Generally speaking, you're never more than an hour's drive from a place where you can play a sanctioned tournament as long as you're in at least moderately urban location.   

4) I deeply enjoyed Magic. I would spend dozens of hours just sitting there and playing out game simulations in my head, and adjusting the smallest details about my deck. The reason I stopped was because of my hectic university schedule, as soon as I graduate I'm almost assuredly going to get back into it again. It's a great game set in a great universe and the thrill of the tournament setting is also quite unique. 

If you're worried about the cost of staying competitive, ironically playing in sealed deck and drafting events tends to work out cheaper in the long run. You're also playing with fresh cards every time, using different colour combinations, facing all sorts of weird decks, so there's a lot of variety. It's my preferred format because I feel it tests all your skill at the game, not just your ability to pilot something you got off the net to victory.

" @Immuniity: Question: What happens when all the magics have gathered? What then? "