Drafting with Wagz #8 - Beating Poison

By Wagz

Hi all, apparently I haven't done one of these in a while. Zendikar and Worldwake were truly awful draft formats but I'm not sure why I didn't bother with Rise. Probably because I was having too much fun drafting to spend time writing about it. Zendikar and Worldwake regularly beat be out of tickets and boosters on Magic Online because each time you have exactly a 1/8 chance of winning the draft and those odds are hard to beat. I bought enough tix to do a Rise of the Eldrazi prerelease and have ridden that investment, going infinite for a while. I drafted a lot of Rise and then M11 2-3 times a week before Scars of Mirrodin came along.

This draft format is hard!

But fun. So many options, lots of things to do with your mana on any given turn, and very skill intensive. With Zendikar draft, even the stupidest of opponents couldn't much up happening to have a 1-drop, 2-drop, 3-drop draw but I've seen many opponents throw away games in Scars because there is so much to play around and so much to do.

My going infinite got me down to a mere 10 tix and a booster yesterday, however. I sold off a couple of Mythics I'd got during M11 (Gaea's Revenge has gone up in value ^^) to get me up to 20 and invested in the remaining 2 boosters to fire up an 8-4. Here's how it went:

  Pack 1 pick 1:




  My Pick:





I was obviously tempted by the rare but he's not very good in draft. The real options were Clasp, Red Trigon and Plague Stinger. These are all good in infect decks but the Clasp is good in any deck so I took it to keep my options here. I love drafting infect as much as the next man but when all 8 players are drafting it, as it seems to be on magic online at the moment, it doesn't often come off. I was, therefore, a little disheartened to be passing a Plague Stinger because this basically guarantees one of the two guys on your left will be in infect, sadface.


  Pack 1 pick 2:




  My Pick:





I guess I should have taken Glint Hawk Idol here but I was still living the infect dream and Cystbearer is really good. Plus he's fine in a G/X control deck, so fit in many of the same decks as Clasp. The other option is Sylvok Replica, who is really good but puts you mostly in the same Green control deck when you're passing this many infect guys.


  Pack 1 pick 3:




  My Pick:





*holds onto dream*


  Pack 1 pick 4:




  My Pick:





*gives up*. Arrest and the other white cards here are a clear sign that White is open on my right. I don't rate Auriok Edgewright at all but since it is the 4th white card it lowers the probability that there were more white cards in here before and so increases the likelihood that white is open. Slam down the Arrest (which I didn't see for a while because the foil Soliton was shiny).


  Pack 1 pick 5:




  My Pick:





Slice in Twain also should not be this late. Infect is clearly a dead end so I'm prepared to be a Green/X control deck at this point, probably Green-White although I'm not sure what that deck would look like.


  Pack 1 pick 6:




  My Pick:





Ooh, a rare! This will help with all my mana problems! Yes, that'll do.


  Pack 1 pick 7:




  My Pick:





I like the Wall a lot. At this point we notice a few blue cards have gone round, the Lumengrid Drake last pack and 2 Invisimancers. The Wall of Tanglecord will definitely go in any colour control deck though and moving in on a 2/1 for 3 isn't amazing. Obv I didn't notice the rare.


  Pack 1 pick 8:




  My Pick:





Nothing really here except the Trigon which is okay but not amazing. It costs a lot of mana but card advantage is card advantage and it's a better option than the rest of the pack.


  Pack 1 pick 9:




  My Pick:





Really had no good picks for the rest of the pack.


  Pack 1 pick 10:




  My Pick:





Oh, except this one was interesting. The Ezuri's Archers are a good sideboard card against Poison decks (well, Plague Stinger decks) but if I do end up control then I need some way to finish the game. The Hellion will be good if I can pick up removal. The Panic Spellbomb is also good but I prefer it when I'm definitely a lot of red, definitely not splashing that one.


  Pack 1 pick 11:




  My Pick:






  Pack 1 pick 12:




  My Pick:





O.o


  Pack 1 pick 13:




  My Pick:






  Pack 1 pick 14:




  My Pick:






  Pack 1 pick 15:




  My Pick:






  Pack 2 pick 1:




  My Pick:





I heard this guy was passable in a control deck so I drafted him to try him out. You should always try out rares that look okay to get a feel for them. That is to say I am now White based control because this guy is absurd.


  Pack 2 pick 2:




  My Pick:





White Myr will be very good with the Angel I've just taken. I'm itching for a couple of the other cards but this guy will always make my deck and always be very good. One thing to notice at this point is that infect wasn't an option, but also metalcraft isn't the way this deck is shaping either. I'm willing to be in the market for just good cards if they have a deck strategy at least - control. One way to get ahead here is to go in on fliers and stuff up the ground - this means I might actually go in for blue cards. Blue was open but we don't really have any blue cards yet. We do still have all those green cards, but I'm kind of okay to let them go if I'll get set up for the rest of the draft - at this point I'll be on the lookout for Blue being open from my left as well.


  Pack 2 pick 3:




  My Pick:





Revoke is a great control card and we pass on Invisimancer #17.


  Pack 2 pick 4:




  My Pick:





Sky-Eel School is a funny one. It's very good, but it never gets taken. That's because it's just a `good stuff' card. I think that blue mostly just wants to be a good stuff colour (well, it is the best colour in Magic) so we take it but accept that it might not be a signal. Trinket Mage also being in the pack, however, might be.


  Pack 2 pick 5:




  My Pick:





Control needs counter spells, but this will most likely just be a sideboard card.


  Pack 2 pick 6:




  My Pick:





Erm, so 4th pick and 6th pick Arrests presumably means I'm the only white drafter. Not sure why the packs have been relatively empty then but I happily take the #1 common removal spell.


  Pack 2 pick 7:




  My Pick:





Gotta love the fatties. I'm not a big fan of this guy but you need a way to win somehow and he essentially has unblockable because if they have no artifacts they probably have nothing on the table.


  Pack 2 pick 8:




  My Pick:





Definitely the only white drafter - screw my green cards!


  Pack 2 pick 9:




  My Pick:





Bad removal is still removal and it gets better when you have more good removal because you don't have to waste your good removal on their less good things.


  Pack 2 pick 10:




  My Pick:





The jury's still out on this one in draft as he's bad against infect but I need him in this deck.


  Pack 2 pick 11:




  My Pick:






  Pack 2 pick 12:




  My Pick:






  Pack 2 pick 13:




  My Pick:






  Pack 2 pick 14:




  My Pick:






  Pack 2 pick 15:




  My Pick:






  Pack 3 pick 1:




  My Pick:





This was a bit empty. Part of me wanted to take the Galvanic Blast to keep the green and red splash open but this seemed a bit greedy as I only really had a Shania Twain that I would want to splash in green. I take the mana Myr because I really need a few of those in this sort of deck. I've plenty of removal so I'm on the lookout for 1-2 more mana myr and a few more 4-5 drop fliers at this point, as well as anything else ridiculous the packs happen to offer me.


  Pack 3 pick 2:




  My Pick:





This guy is a great stalling mechanism in an empty pack. There's a stoic rebuttal here and there was one in the last pack so one will probably come back to me, which is nice.


  Pack 3 pick 3:




  My Pick:





Mana Myr - check!


  Pack 3 pick 4:




  My Pick:





Something ridiculous - check!


  Pack 3 pick 5:




  My Pick:





4-5 drop fliers - check! Getting into a decent shape here.


  Pack 3 pick 6:




  My Pick:





Didn't need it but wasn't going to play anything else except the remote possibility of Darksteel Myr. Turn to Slag deals with the only ways we have of winning though so I remove it.


  Pack 3 pick 7:




  My Pick:





The snapsail glider is decent but will mostly be a 2/2 in this deck. There's another 2/2 for 3 in this pack who interacts very favourably with 4 of our 2-drops (3 mana and the perilous Myr) so we take it for a bit of curve and synergy.


  Pack 3 pick 8:




  My Pick:





I take the Accorder's Shield in case I need to Shield up my ground creatures or fliers in fights but it's unlikely to be great for me.


  Pack 3 pick 9:




  My Pick:





Ding!


  Pack 3 pick 10:




  My Pick:





I take the Certarch in case I need him and the Liquimetal Coating from pick 6 comes back in pick 14 but I don't have enough artifacts here. I'm still missing a good flier so I'm a bit concerned but I do have plenty of removal and a good curve.


  Pack 3 pick 11:




  My Pick:






  Pack 3 pick 12:




  My Pick:






  Pack 3 pick 13:




  My Pick:






  Pack 3 pick 14:




  My Pick:






  Pack 3 pick 15:




  My Pick:








The rest of the packs don't give me anything to work with so I set about constructing my deck as:

Gold Myr
Copper Myr
Leaden Myr
Perilous Myr
Wall of Tanglecord
Riddlesmith
Contagion Clasp
2 Revoke Existence
Myr Galvaniser
Stoic Rebuttal
2 Arrest
Halt Order
Darkslick Drake
Bonds of Quicksilver
Trigon of Infestation
Sky-Eel School
Trigon of Thought
Sunblast Angel
Darksteel Sentinel
Volition Reins
Scrapdiver Serpent

I don't have replays of my matches but round 1 was against RB poison hybrid (not enough poison guys) and I shut him out on the ground before getting in with some fliers. I didn't even have my Angel this match but a 2-0 win in classic Magic™ fashion was enough.

My opp for round 2 didn't show up, leading me to believe that I'd accidentally clicked on the swiss queue and lost my first round. When I came to my senses I realised I'd been given a bye to the finals, very strange.

The finals was against UGB poison with not enough poison guys. This is the problem with poison at the moment - everyone's scrabbling for the guys and no-one gets enough playables. The best way to capitalise is as I did - solid cards and fliers. Since you have to trade a lot against poison, metalcraft decks struggle to hold onto metalcraft so you may as well play cards which are good anyway. Ways to stop the Plague Stingers are pretty key so Contagion Clasp-a-likes and slightly bigger fliers will blunt the assault very quickly (but don't play Blunt the Assault). When you have them unable to do anything you can pull ahead with your superior cards and card advantage mechanisms.

I now have 10 tix and 8 boosters in my account - guess I'll try to keep going infinite for a while.

Guest Article - A Newbie’s Story Part 1: Manchester Game Day

By Sam Fryman

Rob mentioned a couple of weeks ago on the blog that he wouldn’t mind having a guest writer, and I have dutifully volunteered. The superficial reason that I am writing is that a lot of magic articles are written by the winners, covering their good plays and any small (but often rare) mistakes they make. I am approaching this from the other angle: I am not a particularly good player, I make many mistakes, and I’m not helping by attempting to play one of the most difficult archetypes to master: UW Control.

(The real reason I’m writing is due to the vague hope that if I write down my mistakes I will actually remember them.)

Anyway, a quick background: I started playing around about the release of Rise. After several months casual pestering from Rob I joined in and, at his suggestion, bought the UW Worldwake Intro Pack. The only card I distinctively remember was the foil rare, the Archon of Redemption: a rubbish rare by all accounts, but I liked it... not least because I also picked up a Rite of Replication at some point and wanted the ability to gain 90 life. Aside from the odd deck – a borrowed Goblins deck, an extremely flawed RW lifegain, and possibly a white-knight-weenie - I’ve mostly stuck with UW Control.

Along the way I’ve borrowed heavily – Elspeth, Baneslayers, and Martial Coup spring to mind – and it has only been with the introduction of Scars and the loss of the Shards of Alara block that I’ve managed to get the cards.

Here’s the deck I took to the Manchester Game Day that Rob wrote about in his last post:

4 Celestial Colonnade
2 Seachrome Coast
4 Tectonic Edge
1 Mystifying Maze
4 Glacial Fortress
5 Plains
5 Island
4 Mana Leak
2 Stoic Rebuttal
4 Spreading Seas
3 Day of Judgement
3 Condemn
3 Journey to Nowhere
4 Wall of Omens
3 Baneslayer Angel
2 Frost Titan
1 Sun Titan
1 Sunblast Angel
3 Jace Beleren
1 Elspeth Tierl
1 Venser
Sideboard:
2 Negate
3 Celestial Purge
2 Revoke Existence
2 Spell Pierce
4 Flashfreeze
1 Sun Titan
1 Volition Reins


Overall, in my mind, quite a good deck. No Jace the Mind Sculptor because... well, for a start, I’m working on a budget. Plenty of anti-aggro, plenty of anti-ramp (especially Valakut), enough card draw... my main worry was the control mirrors, hence the extra Sun Titan in the sideboard (for bringing back Jace to kill my opponent’s Jace 2.0) and the Volition Reins for stealing anything nice, such as Gideon.

Round 1 I initially had a Bye, but then another player arrived and we started late. I recognised Kat from the Altrincham PTQ... and as she was sleeving up, recognised what I hoped was a fairly standard Eldrazi Ramp deck (editor's note: I was sat next to their match and she was sleeving up face-up..). I can’t remember it exactly but it went something like this: Kat played Game 1 and I think got a little mana screwed for a couple of turns (which wasn’t helped by a pair of Spreading Seas). A few small creatures and then a DOJ on my part later and she cast Ulamog (I think), which I successfully countered. A few turns of bashing with a Baneslayer (I managed to cast 2) and I was 1-0 up. We sideboarded for the second game, and within two turns heard time being called. Kat insisted we keep playing (extra time for being late). I cast a Baneslayer with no counter in hand (with the mana open for the bluff, obviously). Kat played Summoning Trap and I waited with baited breath for something big and stompy... but fortunately she drew nothing. I managed 3 turns of bashing with the Baneslayer before our 5 rounds were up and we called the game a draw. 1-1-0 for the Round (this is a win for Sam. Wagz).

Round 2 I played Elliot Coen and his copy of Rob’s deck (though with Dispels instead of Spell Pierce in the sideboard). I successfully countered a couple of things (and even killed his Jace with mine), but eventually lost Game 1 to bashings from Oracle of Mul Daya and Lotus Cobra. I sideboarded for Game 2, but stupidly didn’t counter his turn 2 Lotus Cobra and went down to Avenger of Zendikar, having failed to draw a Day of Judgement.

Round 3 was against Goblins. I kept a 2-land hand (Island and Tectonic Edge) with a mana leak and 2 wall of omens. He played, and cast Goblin Guide. I revealed Jace, which I drew and dropped a land before passing the Turn. A second Goblin Guide (though still only 1 mountain) and I was down another 4 life... revealing another Island and the Mystifying Maze. I eventually drew a Colonnade and fended off with my walls for a couple of turns but some extra goblins and lightning bolts wiped me out. We sideboarded and I won games 2 and 3 fairly quickly with Baneslayer Angels.

During playtesting with Alex Gershaw and Andy Pemberton I had constantly been tapping out (a bad move for control decks, apparently). I had been doing the same against the goblins, saving my Baneslayer for turn 7 instead of casting him on turn 5. Alex mused that I could safely cast the Baneslayer without much fear of repercussion.

Round 4 went up against an Elves deck. The first game I successfully countered an Elvish Archdruid and Joraga Warcaller but couldn’t counter an Eldrazi Monument and took millions of damage to the face. Game 2 started slightly better: I opened with a Revoke Existence for his Eldrazi Monument, but it then went downhill. I failed to draw a single blocker or DOJ. As a last ditch attempt I brought out Elspeth and her tokens, and immediately lost them all. My one last hope was to draw my Sunblast Angel... which didn’t happen, and I scooped for a very infuriated 2-0 loss.

Round 5 I faced Aaron Copping and his mono-black deck. Neither of us could make top 8 (though Aaron had the better chance). His deck had Duress, Inquisition of Kozilek, and Mind Sludge as well as Liliana’s Specter. First game he brought out a Mimic Vat and Doom Bladed my Baneslayer, bashing me with Baneslayer tokens from the Vat. Second game he Mind Sludged me without a single counter in my hand, so I was forced to draw from the top. I did manage to get a Volition Reins on his Grave Titan, but that was about it. Overall an annoying loss, especially as I had been expecting Vampires or Infect, both decks I knew I could fairly easily beat.

Overall the day was slightly disappointing. I had expected to do better but had obviously underestimated one thing: my ability to make stupid plays. My deck had plenty of threats and solutions but not enough secure ways of drawing them.

I’d best make some changes then...

Tournament Report - Game Day *top 8*

By Wagz

Hi all! This weekend I attended a Game Day, the descendent of County Champs. Going into it I didn't realise how casual the event has become so brought a decent deck (RUG Control) and even did a bit of testing - this turned out to be overkill. We saw on Manascrew that the event started at 11 but the shop's own website claimed it began at midday. We erred on the side of caution and arrived at 10:30ish. Unfortunately for us the person running their FNM had told everyone it began at 1 so we cubed to kill some time. Here is the deck I played, given to me by Rob Catton:


4 Copperline Gorge
4 Raging Ravine
2 Halimar Depths
4 Misty Rainforest
4 Scalding Tarn
3 Forest
4 Island
2 Mountain
4 Preordain
4 Explore
4 Lotus Cobra
3 Oracle of Mul Daya
4 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
2 Frost Titan
2 Avenger of Zendikar
4 Mana Leak
1 Deprive
4 Lightning Bolt
1 Flame Slash
Sideboard:
4 Goblin Ruinblaster
2 Spell Pierce
2 Flashfreeze
1 Wurmcoil Engine
3 Pyroclasm
3 Obstinate Baloth

Round 1 I faced a serious-looking player with a poker shirt on. He was playing UB Control but I started off with t1 Preordain, t2 Explore, t3 Oracle of Mul Daya, t4 Jace the Mind Sculptor with 3 mana open. He had a Negate instead of the Mana Leak but I soon landed a Frost Titan. Game 2 I got heavily mana screwed (27 lands, 4 Preordain, 4 Explore....) but Game 3 played out in normal fashion and I took the win. We had to play quickly to get the round done before time was called and this was unusual for me because I'm a very fast player.

Round 2 was against a Black splash Red Vampires deck. I made the critical play of not laying out turn 2 Cobra having lost the dice roll so when he tried to turn 4 Gatekeeper it I was able to crack my fetch land and Mana Leak his removal spell. I ground out something big and took the game. Game 2 was less good for me and his quick aggression allowed him to bring my life total all the way down. Time was called as we were shuffling and I began to get suspicious. We intentionally drew but I went over to the store owner to ask how long the rounds were. I got told they were 50 minutes but I checked my time-keeping device and it had been 1hr25mins since the 1st round had begun. We were thus granted an official time keeper for the rest of the day.

Round 3 I faced a mirror-match of sorts. He had a couple of Garruks, Primeval Titans and Cultivates but lacked the Cobras and Oracles to really go nuts. I later found out he had Destructive Forces but I think his more-fair version of the deck caused him problems in the mirror and I controlled the tempo of the games to win 2-1.

In round 4 I faced someone who looked at my deck during shuffling. I asked him not to and he apologised but there was no judge to call over. I told the store keeper afterwards in case there was a history but I'm not keen on being cheated, even at a casual event. He was playing a janky mono-black control deck, some kind of midrange Vampires thing. He sided in Duresses against me which are pretty bad for him but I had no answer to a Liliana Vess which kept me discarding the cards I couldn't cast off my 3 lands, very annoying.

The win-and-in round was against a GB Infect deck which was quite innovative. His previous loss was to Elliot Coen who was playing the same 75 as me and Catton and it might just be a bad match-up for him as I was able to control the games, soaking up 9 poison game 1 before making Avenger of Zendikar and his many massive minions and Jace-ing him out game 2.

I received my foil Tempered Steel for top 8-ing and began my quarter finals match against a very nervous-looking UW player. We had three closely-fought games but he out-Jaced me and countered the threats I could muster up. I think this might be a slightly rough match-up for me and he played it well so I wasn't too annoyed to lose it. The rest of Team Leeds had buggered off before this match so I got a magazine and took the train home.

Overall it was a slightly disappointing day due to the casual nature of the organisation but it was probably my own high expectations that were to blame. I think the deck needs a bit of tweaking in the sideboard as it needs some better threats against control decks (or better ways of landing them) and it has a problem with Elves but it seemed to make a good showing at the Star City Games Open mere hours later.

How was your Game Day?

Tournament Report & Sealed Deck Exercise - PTQ Chesham - 3rd

By Wagz

Hi all, sorry for the lack of recent content. Jim is still in a job that doesn't allow him much (if any) time to play Magic and I've been busy with things - if anyone wants to write guest accounts then they're more than welcome :D. In any event, we're a week or so into the start of the new PTQ season and the set seems very exciting. And more importantly, it seems very difficult. I lost in the quarters of last week's PTQ in Altrincham and this weekend I lost in the semis of the 112-person PTQ in Chesham. This tells me I need to learn how to draft the set properly, but I think I know what I'm doing in sealed. I'll give you my sealed pool below and then my decklist and explanation. I went 6-1 in matches, losing round 3 and getting paired against a 5-1 with terrible breakers in the last round, squeaking a win with tight play, unfortunate mistakes from my opponent and good topdecks. What would you do with the following: (copy the cardname into http://deckbox.org/mtg/cardnamehere for a picture)

White:
1 Auriok Edgewright
1 Auriok Sunchaser
1 Fulgent Disraction
2 Ghalma's Warden
1 Loxodon Wayfarer
1 Revoke Existence
1 Salvage Scout
1 Soul Parry
1 Sunblast Angel
1 Tempered Steel
1 True Conviction
1 Whitesun's Passage

Blue:
1 Bonds of Quicksilver
2 Darkslick Drake
1 Grand Architect
1 Neurok Invisimancer
2 Plated Seastrider
1 Screeching Silcaw
1 Stoic Rebuttal
1 Turn Aside
1 Twisted Image
1 Vault Skyward
1 Vedalken Certarch

Black:
1 Blackcleave Goblin
1 Bleak Coven Vampires
1 Blistergrub
1 Dross Hopper
1 Grasp of Darkness
1 Instill Infection
1 Moriok Reaver
1 Necrogen Scudder
1 Psychic Miasma

Red:
1 Bloodshot Trainee
1 Melt Terrain
1 Ogre Geargrabber
1 Oxidda Daredevil
2 Scoria Elemental
1 Turn to Slag
2 Vulshok Heartstoker

Green:
1 Acid Web Spider
1 Alpha Tyrranax
1 Bellowing Tanglewurm
2 Blunt the Assault
1 Carapace Forger
1 Cystbearer
1 Tangle Angler
1 Tel-Jilad Fallen
1 Withstand Death

Artifact:
1 Accorder's Shield
1 Bladed Pinions
1 Chrome Steed
1 Darksteel Myr
1 Echo Circlet
1 Flight Spellbomb
1 Gold Myr
1 Golden Urn
2 Golem Foundry
1 Grafted Exoskeleton
1 Iron Myr
1 Kuldotha Forgemaster
1 Liquimetal Coating
1 Moriok Replica
1 Nihil Spellbomb
2 Origin Spellbomb
2 Palladium Myr
1 Perilous Myr
1 Prototype Portal
1 Snapsail Glider
1 Strider Harness
1 Trigon of Corruption
2 Trigon of Infestation
2 Tumble Magnet
1 Vulshok Replica



Decklist:

1 Vedalken Certarch
2 Origin Spellbomb
1 Iron Myr
1 Gold Myr
1 Perilous Myr
1 Revoke Existence
1 Grand Architect
2 Palladium Myr
1 Snapsail Glider
2 Tumble Magnet
1 Tempered Steel
1 Stoic Rebuttal
1 Chrome Steed
2 Darkslick Drake
1 Grafted Exoskeleton
1 Prototype Portal
1 Bonds of Quicksilver
1 Kuldotha Forgemaster
1 Sunblast Angel
1 True Conviction
9 Island
8 Plains

Discussion:

I noticed that White and Blue were the only playable colours, so that was as good a place as any to start off with. I collected all the playables in those two colours but it seemed to add up to 84. I decided to just lay down the cards I would definitely be playing and this summed to 22 - a great start!

I deliberated over the last couple of cards, which were essentially the Bonds of Quicksilver and the Prototype Portal. I was also considering Trigon of Corruption and Flight Spellbomb. I went with the Bonds due to my lack of removal and it being a lot `faster' than the Trigon but I wasn't sure about the Prototype Portal due to lack of experience with the card. I had 2 Origin Spellbomb and 2 Tumble Magnet as really good combos but at worst I could stick guys under it. It turned out to be really good or really bad so the jury's still out but I might pass on it next time - I mostly played
mine because Ben Scoones (sat opposite me) was playing his.

I lost round 3 to Eduardo Saggygarlic's UW deck with infi Ghalma's Wardens. I didn't have the greatest draws but I was definitely playing a game, just losing. I found it easier to beat the massive bombs really - and the thing about this sealed format is that everybody has them. You _will_ play against Koth, Elspeth, Sunblast Angel etc EVERY ROUND (unless you're losing) so you MUST build your deck with these cards in mind. I sided in Bladed Pinions against Planeswalker decks, for example.

The top 8 draft didn't go so well for me, I began by attempting to force Infect but ended up in a kind of Green Black Rock deck with a bunch of card advantage but nothing really powerful. I'll write on draft when I actually figure out what I'm doing. I did 4 drafts on Modo since it came out on Wednesday and went 9-3 between them but real life is different, and PTQ drafts always require a 3-0.

See you in the top 8 of the next one - don't beat me!

Tournament Report - 15 Card Highlander Part 2 - the banning of Sadistic Sacrament

By Wagz

Hi all, as a follow-up to my previous article on 15-card I thought a lot more on the format and what the good cards were. We had a 15-card WNM on 29/09/10 and two of the decks I was interested in trying were Mono-Black control and Sti's Grixis deck with some improvements. After both decks were doing alright but having complementary weaknesses I amalgamated the two to create:

Inquisition of Kozilek
Lightning Bolt
Gatekeeper of Malakir
Liliana's Specter
Sadistic Sacrament
Consuming Vapors
Goblin Ruinblaster
Grave Titan
Crumbling Necropolis
Creeping Tar Pit
Lavaclaw Reaches
Dragonskull Summit
2 Swamp
Tectonic Edge
Sideboard:
Pithing Needle
Doom Blade
Leyline of Sanctity

The deck is full of 2-for-1's with the key card being Sadistic Sacrament as it is just a blow-out and will now be banned from the format if I'm organising it. I gave my list to Rob Catton and we both went in to battle in the 18-man event.

Round 1 I faced Andy Pemberton with a good WRg planeswalkers deck. I made Sad Sac early both games and removed his opportunity to cast spells. I felt extremely mean as you shouldn't win by resolving a 3 mana spell as your only spell.

Round 2 was against Chris Simpson. He had entered the event and then just after round 1 pairings went up came to me saying that he hadn't got a deck. He said he had a bunch of standard-legal cards and I said he had 5 minutes to put a deck together. Turned out he meant future standard as he had a GB poison deck. Luckily the poison creatures are all a bit tiny and after I dealt with them he didn't have any way of winning.

For round 3 I was paired against Rob Catton and we agreed to ID rather than mirror it out. I beat him in the for-funsies game so I vaguely regretted playing it out but we were pretty sure we had the best deck in the room and would easily both 4-0-1 anyway.

Round 4 I played Mick Edwards who was back to Leeds for a week to see people. He had a mono-white control deck which had Luminarch Ascension and Elspeth to trouble me. Sad Sac did its thing and Pithing Needle after boarding dealt with our 'Spethial friend. 4 counters is a lot to get on the Ascension and I let him have 3 before stabilising the board - manlands are good for this.

The final round was against Steve Tyson with Naya planeswalkers. Once more I beat him with Sad Sac, including one for the last 3 cards in his library - Ajani V, Elspeth and Garruk.

Rob and I both went 4-0-1 with this sick deck. Sadistic Sacrament is definitely too good for the format as an unconditional 3-mana 3-for-1 but I think the deck is still really good anyway, with lots of card advantage. Planeswalkers are also very strong in the format but a lot of the good planeswalkers are rotating out so we'll have to see how they work out in new standard 15-card. The deck moves into new Standard by replacing Crumbling Necropolis and a Swamp with the new Black dual lands (so good in 15-card) and the sideboard Pithing Needle for something; it really doesn't lose much, if anything. If your TO doesn't ban Sad Sac (and does run 15-card, probably a harder find) then I'd run this deck as it is by far the best deck. Thanks, as always, for reading.

BONUS! I just won a 4322 with the following:
1 Preordain
3 Tome Scour
2 Doom Blade
2 Jace's Erasure
2 Augury Owl
2 Maritime Guard
1 Gargoyle Sentinel
1 Assassinate
1 Call to Mind
1 Mind Rot
1 Aether Adept
3 Scroll Thief
2 Foresee
1 Azure Drake
1 Nether Horror
1 Terramorphic Expanse
4 Swamp
12 Island
Sideboard:
1 Cancel
2 Negate