A friend of mine gave me a push this week to go to a live magic event (Thanks Joe!) and I finally pulled the trigger today, with the help of a Microsoft site that pointed me towards the various Magic events occuring in the area. There were a few options, and I ended up going with Uncle's Games in Crossroads.
This was my first Friday Night Magic, since I was playing Contested Cliffs, Molder Slugs, Ravenous Baloths, Plow Unders and Pulse of the Tangles in Kamigawa Standard. I remember losing hard to the BG "Rock" decks with Barter in Blood, Death Cloud, etc. Man I liked that deck, it really crushed most decks into the ground, with recursive removal, and Plow Under to kill all hope.
That was like a million years ago though, and pretty much nothing from that era is around any more. The format was Scars/Beseiged/NPH draft. They had 36 people there, and room for perhaps two tables inside, so we went out into the general mall area to find some tables. The third draft pod lucked out there, but there wasn't enough room for our pod as well. We moved back inside the store, and the employees moved some tables and chairs around, and we had our setup. It was kinda cool, because we had 36 people, and there were 36 packs in each box, so we managed to consume three boxes of cards exactly between the various drafts.
I opened my NPH pack, and took a look at the cards.
What I remember was Volt Charge, Reaper of Sheoldred, Grim Affliction, Parasitic Implant. With three good Black cards, and the only other red card in the pack being something absolutely terrible (Ruthless Invasion?) I grabbed the Volt Charge, and put what I presume to be several people on my left into Black. I don't even remember the rare, I think it was an artifact? Soul Conduit perhaps?
I grabbed the next pack, and snatched another Volt Charge. The next pack had a Razor Swine, and the pack after that had another Volt Charge (cha ching!)
I grabbed an Artillerize, a Flameborne Hellion, an Immolating Souleater, another Razor Swine and a Blinding Souleater to round out what i played from the pack, with a Suture Priest, Shriek Raptor,Furnace Scamp and two Ruthless Invasions to round out my "Red".
I felt pretty good at this point. I had 4 solid removal spells, the tapper, the phyrexian firebreather, two Razor Swines and a Craw Wurm cemeting me in red, with maybe some white, but nothing too strong pulling me in that direction, just like the pros!
So, I open the MBS pack, and hope I see something big and rare staring back at me, but the pack was 100% blank. There was absolutely nothing I'd want to play in it, and a Green Sun's Zenith, which I took presuming that it was worth something (and likely more, with Valakut coming back with a vengance). I grabbed Burn the Impure out of the next two packs, and a Mortarpod out of the fourth. The fifth pack was pretty terrible, and I took some artifact, looking to stay open (Bladed Sentinal, or Hexplate Golem, I forget which). The next pack had a Into the Core, which was pretty awesome given my 0.0 artifact removal spells at the time. Next came a blank pack, which I took a Tangle Mantis out of (bleh), and then I saw like a 7th pick Fangren Marauder. I grabbed it immediately, and filled out the rest of the pack with another Tangle Mantis, a Ringleader, a Plaguemaw Beast, and a bunch of other terrible cards.
So at this point, I have a Shriek Raptor, and a Blinding Souleater pulling me towards White, and a Fangern Marauder, two Tangle Mantises, and a Plaguemaw beast pulling me towards Green. I know I'm going to play the Fangren and the Blinding Souleater in whatever deck I make, so I'll just be filling in either option with whatever cards I see in pack three. I was pretty worried near the end of this pack that I'd not have any creatures in my deck, and that it would just be all removal spells, but I picked up some "solid" fatties near the end, in the Plaguemaw Beast and the Ringleader.
I open Mimic Vat, and take it, since if there's anything this deck can do, it is kill creatures, and I might as well use them if they're just going to put them in the graveyard.
In the next few picks, I saw an Arc Trail, a Molder Beast, and a Sylvok Replica, which I gladly took. I also got a pretty late Slice in Twain, and a Turn to Slag, which felt awesome against a potential weakness of my deck (high toughness creatures). The Replica and the Slice shored up huge holes in the enchantment front, since people will want to steal or pacify my various Craw Wurms.
I ended up getting 2x Molder Beast, 1x Cystbearer (Early defense, and apparently lethal offense), as well as a Embersmith and Lifesmith, to go with a Flameborn Hellion and a Viridian Revel. I ended up playing neither smith, because my main-deck had something like 5 artifacts.
The final list, for comparison:
Removal:
3x Volt Charge
2x Burn the Impure
Into the Core
Arc Trail
Mortarpod
Artillerize (almost left it on the sideboard, since I have no artifacts, and few creatures)
Turn to Slag
Slice in Twain
Sylvok Replica
Blinding Souleater
Infect creatures:
Cystbearer
Razor Swine (+1x in Sideboard)
Dinosaurs:
Fangren Marauder
Flameborn Virion
2x Molder Beast
2x Tangle Mantis
Other:
Mimic Vat
Immolating Souleater
Lands:
9x Mountain
8x Forest
1x Plains
Not played:
Green:
Lifesmith
Plaguemaw Beast
Green Sun's Zenith
Viridian Revel
Tel-Jilad Defiance
Red:
Embersmith
Kuldotha Ringleader
Razor Swine
2x Ruthless Invasion
Furnace Scamp
Flameborn Hellion
White:
Suture Priest
Shriek Raptor
Bladed Sentinal:
Artifact:
Training Trone
Hexplate Golem
Necrogen Censer
Horrible:
Horrifying Revelation (I saw some people maining this, ug)
I had alot of dinosaurs to choose from. I went with the Flameborn Virion over the Flameborn Hellion, because it was +1 power, and it allowed me to not have to attack. I went with Molder Beasts over Ringleaders, because trample is pretty awesome, and I can kill some artifacts. Hexplate Golem hit the sidelines, because he was the most expensive of all options, and was vulnerable to artifact removal. I could definitely see playing a different set of creatures for my dino slots, I'd be happy to hear opinions form the peanut gallery about other approaches to this pool.
I really didn't have room for a ton of creatures in my deck, because of all the removal, so they all had to be fairly independantly good. Razor Swine *1 was a nod to aggro, but I left the other one in the board because there are a ton of one damage (or one -1/-1 counter) effects, and I can't have a win condition die to Blisterstick, Virulent Wound, or Pith Driller. I did bring in the 'Smiths and the Razor Swine against the most aggroeyest deck I saw, but they were just there to block.
The card I was most unsure of was the Blinding Souleater. I had so much removal already, that this seemed like the worst piece, and it was also an artifact, so it would draw alot of early fire, with me not having a ton of other outlets for their spells in my deck. It also did dilute my mana somewhat, I did have some practice hands where I had no red or no double green mana, which worried me.
I played 18 lands, because I felt like my deck was pretty awesome, and all I needed to do was play my spells, and I'd be in the game.
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Match One, against "Ramey" (apologies for the poor spelling), playing UR bounce-everything, and sporting a pretty nifty hat.
The first game, I got him to 6 poison, and 7 life, via Razor Swine and Molder Beast. He played Vapor Snag, Quicksilver Geyser, and Disperse to keep my big dinosaurs bouncing between in play and on the battlefield. He got me pretty close to death with these tempo plays, with a Koth's Courier and another 1-power guy beating down, but a Burn on the Courier, and more and more mana off the top let me eventually play two dinosaurs a turn, even with some of them being bounced, which was good enough for the win.
In the next game, he got off to a fast start with a Chancellor of the Forge into some semi-aggro creatures, but I had a mitt full of removal, and eventually got to a stable board position with a bunch of dinosaurs waiting to come down (and be bounced). The poison squad didn't show up this time, and Tangle Mantis did 21 damage to him over 7 turns.
We played another game for fun, and let me tell you, Chancellor of the Forge on a Mimic Vat is filthy...
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I was getting pretty hungry at this point, so I asked how long was left in the round. They said 15 minutes, and I was pretty sure I wouldn't be able to order, wait for preparation, and eat food in that time, so I walked around checking out the other matches. People were having a pretty good time, and there was alot of magic going on, between the remaining draft games, and a few games of standard that were going on to fill time.
Round two was against Allen, who seemed quite professional. He had a playmat, and dice at the ready. He was playing a URB deck, that always had Grixis mana on turn three. He was playing some reasonable removal, and had quite a few Ichor Wellsprings in all of the games, so I always felt like he was in a better spot than me.
In both games, I had Mortarpod, which was quite good against his lower-toughness creatures, and Mimic Vat also made an appearance. I had Sylvok Replica on it in one of the games, and even though I feel like I could have played way better with it, it comboed pretty well with a Molder Beast and Mortarpod to kill from 20 in three swings. We did attrition each other out fairly well, but I felt like I had limitless removal, and far bigger creatures to draw off the top.
He did draw and cast Tezzeret a few times across the games, but he animated a Ichor Wellspring both times, and Tezzeret did not live through my turn. I'm not sure whether the blue or the Black was the splash, probably the black.
My Flameborn Virion did get Corrupted Concienced in game two, but I had a sandbagged Sylvok Replica to solve that problem. Seriously, 12 removal spells (2 of them being multi-target) is pretty insane. The dinosaurs took home the match, after we ran each other out of gas dealing with our threats.
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My third round was against Mark. Mark appeared to know which end of the sword to hold, and came out quite strong with a RW aggro deck against my slower creatures.
I won the first game to Red Sun Zenith + Panic Spellbomb, after getting him to 8 life and 6 poison (yay poison squad?) Mark had plenty of removal for my Souleater (and other artifacts), and some one damage removal to take care of my early defense, so all three matches were very close.
If he had drawn RSZ in either of the other two matches, and had it to use on me, I almost certainly would have lost. He had a good amount of metalcraft, and I was able to disrupt his artifact sources somewhat with Arc Trail and Into the Core, but he kept swinging with 2/4 ground guys and 2/2 flyers.
He had Arc Trail, the good white golem-guy, Divine Offering (which swing races well), Blinding Souleater, and Immolating Souleater, so his deck was pretty strong, but I eventually dropped some dinos that he couldn't remove, and swung for the win in 5 point incriments. If he'd drawn a RSZ anywhere in there, I'd have been a goner!
We chatted a bit after the match, and he seemed to be a pretty nice guy. It was hard to lose or win those matches, because they were definitely the closest on record. (and my only loss thus far, lucky me!)
I asked for the time in the round after we finished chatting, and it was only 10 minutes this time. I was pretty hungry though, and got a teriyaki bowl from a local store. It was okay, but mall prices are always outrageous. I ate it as quickly as possible, and thankfully another match went to time, so I got to eat a few more fork-fulls of rice before the "finals".
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The fourth game was against Brian. He wanted to draw, because he wanted to get home, but we weren't sure how the prizes were going to pay out, or really what was happening at all, so I decided to play. My deck felt pretty strong, and the games would be over pretty quick either way.
He came out of the gates with Razor Claw and some infect creatures, which I handled with my copious removal. Once the early offense was stalled, and the Fangren Marauder level threats started hitting, he scooped up his cards, clearly mana flooded.
In the next game, I got a Whispering Spectre on my Mimic Vat, but for some reason didn't use the Vat, and instead played some dinosaur. He Corruptored the Vat, and I countered with a Fangren Marauder, at 3 poison from the Virulent Wound I knew he had (to finish off a Molder Beast) and an early Clawed-Spectre hit.
I thought things were looking good after I dropped Marauder vs his Corruptor, but then he played a Contagion Engine. I then understood why he was in the top tables. Being Green-Red, I should have alot of artifact removal, but most all of my removal was for creatures, not stock artifacts. I swung with the 4-power Marauder, and played a Molder Beast. He double-proliferated the Marauder (and me - 5 poison). I played a Blinding Souleater, and Volt Charged the Corruptor, swinging in for 6 after the double-proliferate (me at 7 poison). He untapped and played a Ezuri's Archers.
I had at most one more turn to seal the deal before I was proliferated out, so I tapped the Archers with the Souleater, and swung in with the Molder Beast. My draw for the turn was perfect, as Artillerize, saccing the Souleater finished him off. I was pretty sure I was going to lose that game, but sometimes you just get lucky.
Brian got lucky with his reward-packs, opening a Batterskull, and a Sword of War and Peace.
I collected up my 10 packs, and promo Rhox War Monk (??), thanked the owners for a well-run event, and congratulated them on dealing with the adversity of the high volume of participants, and headed home.
Since coming back to magic, I'm something like 8-0 in live tournaments, and 50% at best online with Pyromancer. Maybe the banning of SFM + Jace pushing me into Splinter Twin will be for the best...
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