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Good Game: A Little Fae, a Little DraftBy Andrew Hanson on May 29th, 2009 · Filed in Good Game, Limited, Standard (Type 2) · 11 CommentsGood Game: A Little Fae, a Little Draft
The reason this was a solid choice? The metagame here in Arizona is chock-full of B/W Tokens and, on that particular Saturday, Turbo Fog. Faeries has decent game against the B/W deck, and in theory, it should have decent game against the Fog deck as well. An end of turn Mistbind Clique should severely hamper their fogging capabilities. So what happened? Why, if Faeries was a decent choice, do I call my Regionals experience crap? Let's do a match-by-match report. Round One, vs. Road Work My hardest opponent that day. That, of course, forced me to do some regular street driving, which really slowed me down. It slowed me down even more when the ramp to get back on the freeway was closed, and I was forced to drive a mile or so in the wrong direction. By the time I got to the venue (we even had our decklists written up, so we wouldn't have to worry about getting them ready), the judge had just finished the players' meeting and was collecting their lists. My hopes rose as they hadn't started yet. But the TO had already printed off pairings for Round One, and we couldn't get into it. Loss. Granted, it's not really a loss, as we don't lose any rating or anything, but we enter Round Two without any match points, so from a "I want to top eight" perspective, it's a loss. Match Results: 0-0-0, but might as well have been 0-1-0 Round Two, vs. Finest Hour Counterspell? He still grows. The first game went my way pretty soundly. He played a turn two Shorecrasher Mimic, but I countered pretty much everything after that, as I did make a turn two Bitterblossom, which makes Spellstutter Sprite a hard counter from there on out. The thing that really hurt my opponent: he must have thought that he had to resolve a blue and green spell in order for the Mimic to get huge. Whenever I countered a creature that pumped the Mimic, he never swung with it, despite the fact that I couldn't kill it. Just picking a good deck isn't enough. You need to know how to play it, too. I boarded in my Terrors and Sowers for the next game. I didn't have the turn two Blossom, but my hand was full of Faeries, including two Scion of Oonas. He dropped an early Scattershot Archer, but I handled it. Then he dropped two more. I didn't have enough time to remove them and he was able to clear my board. Well, three Archers is a hand I'm probably allowed to lose to, but I would like to say that it was still close. Game three, he once again had three Scattershot Archers, but misplayed them this time. When he had the opportunity to run out two of them at once, he only ran out one. At the end of that turn, I flashed down a Scion of Oona, then had a second one to play on my turn. But, between my kill spells and counters, he never did get the other ones down and online, and I beat him with a pumped up airforce. Match Results: 1-0-0 Round Three, vs. B/W Tokens This version of the token deck did not include the persist creatures, but Knight of Meadowgrain instead. We both came out pretty well, me with a turn two Bitterblossom, him with a turn two Tidehollow Sculler to steal my thunder. We both began building up an army, and my double Scion (one on the board, one in hand) would really help me a lot. I even had a Jace Beleren out, so all I really needed was to draw a Cryptic Command and I could swing for the win. That's not how it happened because I'm an idiot. Does not pump itself... Game two went fast, as I hit Mistbind Cliques and my opponent didn't get to play Magic. I could go into detail about it, but really, that's all that happened. Two Mistbind Cliques. Game three, my hand was great, but it was only two lands. I was on the draw, though, so I kept. I didn't see my third land until turn four, and I didn't see my fourth land until turn seven. But, like I said, my hand was great, so this wasn't a blowout. No, instead, it was the opposite—the opposite of a blowout is a good game. Once I hit my fourth land, I started taking the game back from him. Then the judge called time. By the end of third extra turn—which was his—he had nothing in play but land, and no cards in hand. I had a Mistbind Clique in play, with two Sowers and an Agony Warp in my hand. Sadly, his life was still above 20. Those Knights of Meadowgrain got some work done right off the bat. In the end, we were looking at a draw. We would both be 1-1-1, which that early and with 108 players, would pretty much preclude us from the top eight. Oh, there could be some super-slim hope, but in reality, our tie breakers would end us. But, my friends who had come with me (and also missed Round One) were already out of it. Both of them had won one match and lost one match, so were out of contention and ready to leave. I conceded to my opponent so he could still have a shot at the top eight, went back to my friend we were staying with, and indulged in beer and pizza to soothe the ache. Match Results: 1-1-0 (really 1-2-0) So, that was my Regionals. Quite the disappointment, but whatever. I guess that kind of stuff happens sometimes...probably not to most people, though. We should have left earlier, and that is a lesson learned. Screw an extra thirty to forty minutes of sleep; I'm getting to the venue when registration starts from now on. The Draft But onto something less grim. Last Friday, one of the judges at FNM decided to try and run Draft on top of the normal Standard FNM. Only eight people could get in, and I was one of the first to hear about it, so I was in. I was pretty excited about it, too, as it was Shards/Conflux/Reborn drafting, and I haven't had the opportunity to draft a full block like that since the days of Ravnica. The pod was pretty good, too. Half of us were top performers at normal FNMs, and my wife was in there. She always takes a top place at any of the Limited events she plays in (usually just Release and Prerelease events). The reason I mention the player skill in the pod is that, if the pod is strong, then the drafting that takes place is what one can reasonably expect to see in a draft. Not the best pick one, but really, not bad either. My third pack had a Feral Hydra in it. I'm not sure why that made it to pick three. Maybe the other cards in the pack were nuts, but the Hydra is really strong in Limited. It's like a Blaze that hits every turn. Maybe not that good, but it is a big creature that can keep getting bigger. My fourth pick was a Branching Bolt. How on earth does that card get past pick two? The rest of Shards was pretty blah, except for a Wild Nacatl I ended up getting pick five or six and a Jund Panorama that I got on, wait for it, pick thirteen. For real. Clearly, the people to my right were not playing green or red. In the Conflux pack I opened, my rare was a Blood Tyrant. Now, I had no real plans on running blue—I was leaning towards green/red/x, where x was white or black—but I didn't want other people to play this on me, and I did have the Necropolis. Plus, if he makes it back to your turn, he is a 7/7 flying trampler. Seems okay, so I took it. Besides, the other cards in the pack were only so-so. The third card I picked was a Worldheart Phoenix. A lot of people think this card is bad, and I don't get that. Granted, it's just a 2/2 flier for 4, but it recurses as a 4/4 flier for 5. I mean, sure, you have to be able to generate all five colors of mana, but it's not that hard, really. And with my plan on running blue for the Tyrant, I'd be foolish to let the Phoenix go by. The only other cards in Conflux that were worthwhile were a Fiery Fall, which is the best of that cycle, an Ancient Ziggurat, which I liked as it helped me play both the Tyrant and the Phoenix (that's right, the Phoenix is played from the graveyard), and a Dragonsoul Knight, another card that I feel is wholly underrated. Again, you need five colors of mana to make him the best, but with a guy like this, it's worth it. A 7/5 flying, first strike, trampling dragon? Sick. Besides, even a 2/2 first striker for three is at least a pick five. I got this guy around pick ten. But it was Reborn where my deck got good. I don't have a lot of experience drafting the whole block (first time), but Alara Reborn really seems like the powerhouse of the block. Everything up to these packs are just filler and bombs—this is where the real strength of a deck comes from. At least, that's the way it seems to me. I had at least as many playables from this last pack as I had from the first two. Maybe the best card in Alara block? I managed to pick up two Borderposts, both the Mistvein Borderpost and the Veinfire Borderpost, as well as an Igneous Pouncer and a Pale Recluse to help with mana fixing. I even managed to pick up a Naya Hushblade as one of my later picks. In the end, I was mostly green/red/black, with a healthy splash of white and a tiny splash of blue (the only card that needed blue to be played was the Blood Tyrant). Here's the deck: The deck wasn't the fastest, but its threats were good and it had a nice amount of removal. My biggest concern was with the mana base. To maximize those Borderposts, I would need basic lands, but I only ran ten of them. And that Ancient Ziggurat can be problematic. Yes, it's great for playing my creatures, but it can't even contribute to playing anything else, not even the activated abilities of my creatures. That actually bit me in the backside during my fist match. Speaking of which, let's move on to the games. Round One, vs. Esper This is pretty rough to go up against. There is a card I would like to mention, though. Mind Funeral. Is it good? I'm not sure. I've never been a big fan of the milling game, but this card always seems to shred a dozen cards off the library, and this game, it even hit two of my Mountains. The reason that mattered was because I already had one in play, and I'm an idiot (see Scion of Oona above). When I mountaincycled my Igneous Pouncer, I didn't realize all my Mountains were in the bin or in play until I went through my whole deck. Now, I'm not saying my stupidity is what makes Funeral good, but in a format full of all kinds of splashing, playing a mill card that has to hit lands before it stops could be pretty rough. What do you think? Playable or not? Game two went much the same way, only no mulligans. I came out with a Court Archer and Wild Nacatlt, and he again stole my five drop with a Slave of Bolas (this time, it was a Naya Sojourners). But my deck, even though it wasn't really fast, was faster than my opponents, and I don't think he had the removal necessary to come back. Round Two, vs. Esper again Just nip it in the bud. Forest, turn one Borderpost. Turn two Hushblade. I blocked his turn two Vedalken Ghoul and lost my 4 life because unchecked, that Ghoul will deal more than 4 damage. But, my opponent ended up being mana flooded. At one point, he played Deny Reality on my Borderpost (it was the only legal target), and cascaded into a Parasitic Strix. That play, though, let me cycle my Sojourners at the end of his turn and put the +1/+1 counter on my Hushblade, as it lost shroud. Then I replayed the Borderpost, and had a 4/3 shroud beater. I also dropped a Goblin Wanderer, and my opponent couldn't keep up with my board. He did not, however, miss a land drop the entire game. Not as great as it sounds... Game two, he again came out with a turn two Vedalken Ghoul, and I blocked it again. This time, though, he had other creatures to drop, and I couldn't start attacking him until my Dragonsoul Knight was down. But, my hand was nuts, and I managed to get five-color-production online by turn five. The game ended by my turn seven. Turns out, a 7/5 flying, trampling, first striker is a bit good. Round Three, vs. Jund Kinda scary. No, scratch that. Really scary. Game two, he got the Dragon down on turn six, and I couldn't take the board back. It was close, but I didn't have enough tempo to seal it. Game three was looking to be the same thing, but then I got down a Dragonsoul Knight and managed to get all five colors, again. And my opponent dismissed my Knight as some bad creature, walking his Dragons right into him. After he lost the first Dragon, the game went downhill for him, and my Knight put on the pressure, which finished him off. Sadly, because we drew, I took second on tie breakers. Which meant I only got two packs instead of four. Probably won't draw like that again. At least I helped out his Limited rating by drawing (mine is high enough while his is low enough that he probably took a few points from me). Again, this was the first time I've gotten to draft the whole block, but it seems like mana-fixing is probably the most important thing to have. If no one drafts your colors, you may be able to draft enough cards in two colors to get away without it, but I wouldn't bet on it. Plus, with the all-gold set seeming like the strongest of the three, getting some color-fixing in early is probably advisable. And since you never know about your colors until the end, never fear taking a fixer that hits only two of your colors and an off color. That may come in use later, if you draft power cards to splash for. You just never know where pack three could take you. By Andrew Hanson on May 29th, 2009 · Filed in Good Game, Limited, Standard (Type 2) · 11 Comments |
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