On the eve of the LR clan making it into the Top 5 list, I decided to take some winnings into the 8-4 and roll the dice. Ended up with quite a fun and unique BW deck with good early removal and aggressive creatures that I just threw at them to feed the Reaper later on and turn into 3/3 Deathtouch zombies (and Lifelink if mana was up). First two matches were against very aggressive RW decks (one had 4 Blood Ogres) and I was able to just keep the board clear and then pour on the zombies and end it with Sengir or Serra Angel or a pumped up Shade. Opponent wanted to play out the finals instead of splitting (had Overrun, Jade Mage, Pharoah, and Markov, no wonder) and it went down to the wire in 3 games with both us under 5 HP. Opponent just had the right card at the right time to take it home.
The only choice here is whether or not to play the companion or crown over sacred wolfs or blood seeker or plummet. In retrospect I probably like maindecking the companion over plummet and siding in plummet most of the time.
M1G1 - Versus UW. We faced down a T1 lawkeeper, a griffin rider on wing with a few griffins and a Pegasus. We plummeted one griffin, but he aether adepted our sengir vampire who was planning to block out of the way. When we tried to blow him out with doom blade on Griffin #2 he staved off then we lost.
M1G2 - it looked like he flooded out. We put the pressure on early. T2 child of night. T3 Sacred Wolf. T4 Runeclaw Bear. T5 Jade Mage. T6 Plummet Serra. FTW.
M1G3 - we mulled to 6. Got stuck on 4 swamps with all green spells and sengir vamp in hand. When we finally ripped our 5th land to drop sengir... villain mind controlled it and crashed in for lethal.
M2G1 - We kept a pretty greedy one lander, got punished for it and lost.
M2G2 - Replay got lost, but we won.
M2G3 - Replay got lost, but we won.
M3G1 - Replay got lost, but we won.
M3G2 - So this game we beat a resolved overrun. I think he got a little greedy and cast it too soon because it put us in a fairly good board state afterwards. I guess he was scared because it was his only card in hand while we had two (gravedigger and land.) If you're going to survive overrun turns out gravedigger is the card to have! Also a reassembling skeleton in play soaks up 1 damage for "free." Top decking gravedigger post-overrun for infinite gravedigger recursion was also nice. It gave me two infinite blockers to his two dudes. All the while he's at 8 life, so he can't really attack. Ripping vampire outcasts gives us some nice breathing room, then we rip into stampeding rhino and things are looking up! He plays out two dudes (taking two from the blood seeker and going to 6). We rip doom blade and attack FTW in two turns.
LISTEN ALONG WITH ZACH
With the Beatles - The Beatles second studio album. Sometimes I get so wrapped up with listening to the late great beatles albums (revolver, sgt. peppers, abbey road, let it be, etc.) that I forget how great and different their early albums are.
Universal Truths and Cycles - Guided by Voices - The thing about having 3100 albums is that sometimes things come up and you wonder what they are and where in the world they came from. This was like that. I enjoyed it, though.
The original off-broadway cast of Mayor - If you haven't heard of this 1985 Charles Strouse off-broadway show... that's totally understandable. I'm fairly certain this marks my first listen to the complete album.
Be warned that this draft was unlucky 13 and the MTGO client crashed halfway through R1. I wasn't able to restart in time so we never got to see how this deck piloted. If that bothers you... don't watch this draft.
I don't think there were too many decisions here, but feel free to let prove me wrong in the comments.
Listen along with Zach
We only got one album in because of the shortened draft time Marc Cohn'sListening Booth 1970. Which is a collection of Marc Cohn's favorite songs from 1970 when he was growing up. I hadn't listened to this album before and found it to be quite a treat.
So I think the deck is pretty sweet, it's a little removal light, but before we ran into tons of white in the games we felt like we had read the signals really well!
Do you get greedy and try to splash the fireball? I felt like having the consistency was better. I wish I had played a merfolk over my dignitary, I think.
M1G1 - we came really close, but just couldn't get there against a flameblast dragon. We pacified it, he unsummoned it, we unsummoned it, he recast it, we aether adepted it, he recast it. We ripped land and lost.
M1G2 - this game was super sick. We o-ringed his dragon, traded a bunch of guys. We stabilized in the air with our sphinx. He tried to burn our sphinx, we negated it. He mind controlled our azure mage, we mind controlled his drake FTW.
M1G3 - this match was a tempo battle. He had double unsummon plus aether adept plus ice cage. I had unsummon and frost breath to keep his flameblast from attacking long enough to get him to lethal next turn. I cast my harbor serpent and am attacking for exactsies in the air and island walk next turn... But a mind control on our harbor serpent was the nail in our coffin.
This was a bummer match to lose because I felt like if he hadn't drawn flameblast in either of the two games he won he wouldn't have won. I also felt like I played really tight just to have a chance against flameblast. Also, maybe I should have sided in the Fireball to have more ways to deal with the flameblast? What do you think about that?
M2G1 - Well... do you keep this hand?
Here's the thing. Since watching LSV and Simon I have been a less aggressive muller. I think Marshall and Ryan tend to err on the side of more aggressive mulling so a couple months ago I was more aggressive as well. Simon at Modern Magic talks about how much he thinks that extra card is worth and he likes to trust his deck to be good and perform the way he wants it to. LSV also has taught me be a little more greedy with low on land hands because you are much likelier to rip into the couple lands you need than the steady stream of spells you need to stay in a game if you have a 4 or 5 lander. The thing with this hand is if we hit any land in two draws we can drop two creatures. If we draw a plains we get a pegasus. Then we're hoping to get to our adept, frost breath and chasm drake. I kept it and ripped 3 lands in a row. He didn't even stand a chance.
Do you think that hands a keep?
M2G2 - This game had a tricky decision early. On his turn 3 he attacked with his gideons lawkeeper into my Azure Mage. I chose to block, thinking I was trading Azure mage for a stave off but it turned out I was trading azure mage for a mighty leap. I think this was probably a misplay, but I'm not sure about that. Do you block a lawkeeper with your azure mage when they have 3 open mana on turn 3?
He demystified our O-ring on one of his lawkeepers and it turns out it's really hard to beat two lawkeepers. We tried really hard and got close, but he stabilized with Serra and ran us over.
M2G3 - Got lost. But we won.
M3G1 - yeah. We got greedy and kept a one lander, which turns out is ok when villains deck is really slow and sucks. And by sucks, I mean has a bunch of crappy low drops plus primeval titan and garruk's horde. Mind control on garruks horde + lawkeeper to tap the titan + chasm drake allowed us to pull out this ridiculous game. We were full on control and simply outplayed villain.
M3G2 - T1 - Lawkeeper. T2 - Pegasus. T3 - Benalish Veteran. We were slowed down by his elixir and angel's mercy... but that's no big deal and was a perfect example why those cards are bad. When he finally dropped his primeval titan we had our pacify ready. Cast assault griffin. Win with Mind Control, Unsummon and Frost Breath in hand.
LISTEN ALONG WITH ZACH
Music aficionados will have to wait because my buddy drafted over my shoulder again, so I was not listening to music this draft.
This deck ended up a little spotty, but ultimately where I felt it would be pretty good. I SURE wish I had that incinerate that I misclicked in. The gameplan was to let quad looters get us to our dragon and grim lavamancer, and sometimes this worked and sometimes it didn't. I feel like the deck was better than it's 1-2 record, but c'est la vie.
I wish I had maindecked the Cancel over the Tunneler and sided it in almost every match. Sometimes I sided in the alluring siren instead.
M1G1 - he gets stuck on two lands and our deck performs beautifully to punish him. Lavamancer into looter, into a bunch of stuff no one cares about... into Volcanic Dragon. The best feeling was redirecting his last ditch fling effort to try to kill my lavamancer but instead 3 for 1ing him!
M1G2 - This game his draw was pretty clunky with stuff that doesn't affect the board (circle of flames and whatnot). We get out our fleetwing with a greatsword on him. After that our manaleaks hold the board for three turns to put him at 5. He plays a stingerfling spider... and we luckily topdeck frost breath for the win!
M2G1 - This game I might have punted because I played my frost breath during my mainphase like an idiot. The extra turn might not have been important, but it certainly didn't help! Also, him O-ringing my dragon was pretty bad.
M2G2 - This game we won thanks to a timely unsummon into cancel for his sengir vampire. He played his second vamp, but we frost breath (End of HIS TURN this time) for the win.
M2G3 - I had a pretty rough hand: looter and two five drops. He exploded and punished me for keeping the hand and I couldn't stabilize before I died.
M3G1 - Got lost :'(.
M3G2 - He stabilized with an Aegis angel to stop my fliers from being lethal. I probably win this game if I had attacked with my looters more times earlier in the game instead of looting. I'm not sure if it was the right call to have done so, though?
LISTEN ALONG WITH ZACH
Music for Two Pianos - Aaron Copland - I'd never listened to this album which was a mistake as it was absolutely divine.
Stephen Sondheim's Company in Jazz - the Trotter Trio - Stephen Sondheim is a giant in Musical Theatre with an amazing command over classical techniques and harmonic language not seen very often in Musical Theatre. The Trotter Trio takes his songs and puts them in a jazz forum. Quite simply, these albums rock. This one isn't as good as Sweeney Todd, IMHO, but still great.
Best that I could do - John Mellancamp - Selected Tracks
This draft opened up with a difficult choice, but I think I made the right call, and I stuck to my guns despite several temptations along the road. I was rewarded with a lovely deck that I felt could go the distance - and it did! I came out the winner of the 8-4, which was just what I needed to liven up the day :)
A pretty solid card pool, if without bombs! I think I could've gone mono-Black if I really wanted, but I felt like I could gain some efficiency while remaining pretty consistant by adding a few powerful Green cards, especially since I felt like I needed a few victory conditions if the games went long (and the Drifting Shades for some reasons weren't enough on their own). This is what I came up with for a build:
It played pretty nicely, although I wonder if I should've taken a third forest; I really wanted to up the quality of my Consume Spirits and Drifting Shades, but in hindsight perhaps 2 Forests just isn't enough to splash 3 cards, even if two of them are latecomers and none of them are intensive (then again, isn't the Mage intensive?). I'd love to hear some comments on this because it hits me now that I might have been even more consistent with as many as 4-5 forests (and that running these Greens with only 2 Forests seems like a kind of half-hearted splash that should be for good or not at all).
Anyway, on to the games! In the first match, I played against a White-Blue deck which seemed to sport few really good cards. Villain won a game on the back of an unanswered Serra Angel, if I remember correctly, but in the end I pulled out victorious! I made no sideboard changes during the match except perhaps to switch in the Deathmark, but I might not even have done that - I can't remember!
In the second match, I faced a White/Black deck, meaning that my Doom Blades were less effective (but still in the main deck after sideboarding, of course). His deck seemed slow, too slow to race mine, and Arbalest Elite and Royal Assassin are great to stop an attack, but they never lived long since I had forced him so much on the backfoot that he had to block with them to stay in the game (until I dropped the Gravedigger post-combat, of course!). I felt like this match-up was pretty good, though I grew to loathe his Stave Offs. Not regretting hatepicking one P2P2 so far.
I sideboarded in an extra forest and a Naturalize since he played Crown of Empires and Rusted Sentinel, and that really helped one game.
The finals was the most exciting match of the three; Villain played a fast R/G Bloodthirst deck with a fair bit of removal, as well as opening on Goblin Arsonist (the thing you hate to see if you rely on Tormented Souls and still want to kill it to avoid him getting bloodthirst). I lost game 1 handily, having a creature locked down by an Arachnus Web and another killed by an Incinerate while his Crocodiles and so on went to town on my Life total.
On the sideboard, I decided that I needed to be faster than him; My 5-drops both went (Stingerfling isn't too hot against GR anyway) and so did the Jade Mage, and in came three Dark Favors for a ultra-aggressive approach which just hands-down won me game 2 and 3; Dark Favor is great against Arachnus Webs, and even better with the Tormented Souls (which then can't die to Arsonist, which is a valid point in this match).
Anyway, hit me with any feedback to draft and/or deck construction you want to, and make sure to tell if my evaluation is off due to some ROT anywhere :)
If you want to listen along with me (like Zvazda usually posts in his drafts), just hit episodes 53 and 54 of Limited Resources ;)
(Thanks for the detailed writeup, LOBSTER. And congrats on the win!)
So, this draft had a very (underwhelming) tough first pick, but from there most of the draft was straightforward I think.
Deckbuilding was fairly straightforward the only thing I'm questioning here is the Siege Mastodon over Lava Axe. That extra 5 damage can be huge if you can't push through.
R1G1 - this game was a straightforward beatdown, Turn 2 pegasus, turn 3 veteran, outrage his child of night so he can't race, drop tunneler, tunneler gets the veteran in for three, boots on the tunneler so he can't kill it he burns the veteran instead, make the pegasus unblockable, incinerate ftw.
R1G2 - this was a little tougher. He turn 2'd an unbloodthirsted berseker, into a Bloodrage ogre. I pegasused, into warhorse, into arbalest elite... at which point he untapped and fireballed our pegasus which I considered to be a serious error because the Arbalest Elite was going to completely shut him down. The boots were an allstar here coming down the next turn and protecting our arbalest for a turn. Hasty pegasus into hasty crumbling colossus =gg.
R2G1 - Our beatdown was shutdown by a Siege Mastadon, Grand Abolisher and Alabaster Mage. The abolisher completely shut down our arbalest elite and we probably win this game if we had drawn a second mountain for our outrage before 5 turns had gone by.
R2G2 - we were looking good, until we ran into celestial purge, double pacifism and double deathmark every time we tried to stabilize. And we had to use our incinerate on his spirit mantled duskhunter bat instead of the grand abolisher.
R3 was a bye.
LISTEN ALONG WITH ZACH
Listen along with Zach was on hold for this draft due to my buddy drafting over my shoulder. It'll be back next draft though, fear not! (also, for those of you who may not know, JonathanCoulton's new album came out out on September 2nd. I just purchased it and haven't listened to it yet, but I highly suggest that if you're familiar with JoCo's work you download it and if you're not... get familiar with it!)
A final moderation note, so far response and traffic to the blog has been excellent. Most importantly, the comments have been exactly the respectful and insightful thoughts that I expected from limited resources members, so thanks for being awesome guys!
(Alright! Let's all give it up for the debut of our most phallic-sounding member: PENIX!)
This draft started as a huge train wreck, but I think I managed to salvage a respectable deck out of it. I ended up going 3-0 due to a combination of luck and how good Merfolk Looter is.
M1 - Lost G1 to a double lawkeeper, rune scarred demon deck. I won G2 thanks to frost titan... and would have won G3, but I ran out of time. I wasn't playing super slow or distracted or anything they were just grindy games with a lot of decisions.
M2 - my fliers just got there against his (apparently) spiderless green deck. Frost Titan was essentially a 6 mana frost breath for one creature because of all his hexproof guys though! (but then he could block, but he couldn't attack into a dungrove elder who was a 6/6!)
M3 G1 - he couldn't deal with a phantasmal dragon, who just cleaned up for the win. His double skywinder drake couldn't block thanks to my lawkeeper.
M3 G2 - Frost Titan, Lawkeeper and dignitary helped me survive til I could hit inevitability with titan and serpent.
LISTEN ALONG WITH ZACH
This was a fast draft so we only got two albums in (after finishing American Beauty from last draft)
Way To Normal by Ben Folds. Ben Folds is one of my favorites and I know his stuff inside and out. Way to Normal houses one of my current favorite Ben Folds songs: Kylie from connecticut.
So, this deck ended up 1-2ing but I made some hideous mistakes in deckbuilding and a couple of epic misplays in R3 including not knowing how to play fireball... and attacking my sacred wolf into a circle of flame. Both of which cost me games against a not very good player and not very good deck. But then again... I can't really consider myself a good player for that day.
I don't think playing red was worth it, and I don't think playing trip companions was a good idea. Probably should have brought in the croc for fireball and kept my manabase more consistent. I was in the mindset of "always play fireball" but I think it was too greedy here.
LISTEN ALONG WITH ZACH:
Revival by Gillian Welch
The original Broadway cast of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella (yes this felt a little weird to draft to...) Thick as a Brick by Jethro Tull - I have yet to get fully into Jethro Tull, though my Mom has his (nearly) complete discography. This is, however the one album that I know fairly well and I like it a lot.
American Beauty by Grateful Dead
Would love to know how others would have drafted this. One of the weirdest drafts I've done and somehow went 2-1 with this quirky RG deck anchored by an Inferno Titan who was asleep until the last match and then raged all over my opponent. Deckbuilding wise, I think it retrospect I went a little 1-drop crazy and should've got 1 scout and 1 slinger and added the 2nd croc and gorger in. That's pretty much what I did each match from the sideboard.
