More Magic Fun

Last night I went to Gnome Games for their weekly Wednesday night draft.  I love drafting.  Always enjoy it.  Plus on Wednesday nights, Gnome Games runs a $10 draft, which means you get 3 packs of cards for the draft for less than it actually costs to buy 3 packs of cards.  Plus you spend a few hours playing a fun game with fun folks.

In the Dragon's Maze pack I opened Council of the Absolute and Ascended Lawmage. The Council seems like a fun card to build around, but with draft emphasizing creatures, it didn't seem like it would be a good fit in any decks. So I took the 3/2 hexproof flyer. I was passed a Warleader's Helix. So the guy to my right (Wesley) either had a good rare to first pick or isn't going RW. Pack 3 he passed me a Deputy of Acquittals. Passing a 2/2 for 2 mana that's also a neat combat trick AND allows you to reuse come into play effects seems like a good sign Wesely wasn't going UW. So I decided to go RWU and started looking for manafixers in those colors while watching for any remaining good picks.

I got two Gatekeepers (white and blue), but was disappointed to only get one Gate. Meaning I might have to get lucky in the next packs to make the keepers playable. I wasn't really disappointed in any other way with Dragon's Maze, but the only other notable card I picked was Blast of Genius. I wasn't sure I'd play it, and almost didn't, because six mana is kind of expensive in draft... but I figured they were saying the format is slow and if nothing else it's a net two cards and the possibility of killing an opponent's creature. Plus I was very light on removal. I had the Helix and two Rubblebelt Maaka for good combat tricks, but really nothing else.

Turns out I had read the signs wrong regarding open colors. Wesely was going RWU, but just had even better picks in the packs he passed me. With both of us in those colors, it meant I would have first shot at RW picks in Gatecrash, but he would have first pick at both WU and UR in Return to Ravnica.

About half way through Dragon's Maze I was passed a pack containing both a Rot Farm Skeleton and a Golgari Cluestone and all the cards were either green or black. I almost, almost switched to BG right there.  Not because those are so amazing, but it seemed apparent that BG was open to draft, at least at my end of the table. Maybe if my 3 chosen colors weren't all NOT either black or green I might have. But man, I already had the Lawmage, Deputy, Helix and both Gatekeepers. So I stayed my course. Watching all the good black and green cards that came my way after that I kept second guessing myself the whole draft. It turned out okay, but who knows? Maybe it could have been even better. Especially considering that the players to my immediate right and left were both sharing colors with me. Wesley, of course, in exactly my colors and the other guy in WUB.

Ah well. Noteworthy in Gatecrash: I somehow thought that having gotten 2 Maakas, the Helix and the Blast, I had a good start on removal, so I would prioritize creatures. I opened a Luminate Primordial and was happy to take it despite it's heavy cost. Pack two I was passed a Stomping Ground. There was also an Emberbeast and a Punish the Enemy, but a dual land man! It's worth more than I paid for the draft. I had to take it. The Emberbeast circled the table. The Punish did not. Next I was passed an easy decision Wojek Halberdiers, 4 or 5 packs in I got a Sunhome Guildmage and managed to pick up one more guildgate. Otherwise, the picks were okay, but not spectacular. Again, I saw a lot of late black and green cards.

Then in Return to Ravnica I opened a Corpsejack Menace. GAH! Why didn't I switch into BG!? Of course, it was way too late at that point, so I passed it. Wesley passed me a Street Spasm. He must have opened a simply amazing card, but at the time I just assumed it was because I'd read the color signs correctly and snagged it fast. Other than that though, there was nothing spectacular in the last round of the draft. Solid, but not spectacular, including a third guildgate, an Essence Backlash and I rounded out my set of 3 drops. I probably should have recognized that meant I'd read the color signs incorrectly, but what could I have done about it anyway?

Over the course of the draft I actually passed on a lot of removal. Not once did it ever circle the table back to me. Because they were expensive I passed on Punish the Enemy, Angelic Edict, Trostani's Judgement and Explosive Impact. Because they required double colors (RR or UU) I passed on Homing Lightning, Annihilating Fire and Counterflux. Because of their conditional natures I passed on Smite, Spell Rupture, Avenging Arrow, and Arrows of Justice. Simply because they appeared in packs with some good creatures, I passed on Act of Treason, Mugging and Dramatic Rescue.

Conventional wisdom says you don't pass on removal unless you're taking something spectacular. In all those cases I had decent, but not necessarily spectacular creatures to take instead. Maybe in this format conventional wisdom is wrong. Maybe there are sufficient easy to cast, cheap removal spells so passing on most hard to cast or conditional spells is the correct thing to do.  It worked for me, anyway.  The only one of those I wanted in the end was the Mugging.

Once I laid out my picks by casting cost I realized I could put together a relatively fast deck. I was concerned that the number of 2 toughness creatures would be a problem in a game of x/4 blockers, but between the Helix and the Maakas it turned out to be not a problem.

Land
Azorius Guildgate
Boros Guildgate
Izzet Guildgate
Stomping Ground
Island x4
Mountain x4
Plains x5

Creatures
2cc:
Deputy of Acquittals
Goblin Electromancer
Sunhome Guildmage
Wojek Halberdiers
3cc:
Ember Beast
Selesnya Sentry x2
Tower Drake
Viashino Firstblade
4cc:
Ascended Lawmage
Cobblebrute
Keymaster Rogue
Knight of Obligation
Opal Lake Gatekeeper
Rubblebelt Maaka x2
Sunspire Gatekeeper

Other Spells
Blast of Genius
Essence Backlash
Last Thoughts x2
Street Spasm
Warleader's Helix

I rarely cast the Maakas as creatures. They were just that good as a combat trick on the attack. Being able to use them as creatures was simply a nice bonus in the one game that my draw came up creature light.

Notable things I cut:
Armory Guard
Blustersquall
Concordia Pegasus
Izzet Cluestone
Luminate Primordial
Mizzium Skin
Prophetic Prism
Syndic of Tithes
Transguild Promenade

The Cluestone, Prism and Promenade were cut because I felt good about my mana base with 3 guildgates. Plus, trying to focus on a faster deck, I didn't want to spend any early turns on slow mana any more than 3 guildgates already forced me to. I think it's noteworthy that I didn't have any spells with double color casting costs. That turned out to be a smart thing. Even with all the color fixing in the format, all three of my opponents, at some point, sat with cards in hand they couldn't cast because of the mana requirements. I had to mulligan twice over the evening because of bad mana in my opening hand, but otherwise never had any mana issues.

The Blustersquall and Mizzium Skin would actually have been decent tricks in my deck and maybe I should have played them instead of the Last Thoughts. Especially because I have few creatures with evasion. The Last Thoughts generally only drew me one or two cards. Which for four mana... well, I don't know. Drawing cards is nice and there was one game when I drew a bunch of cards off a ciphered Last Thoughts.

What might have been even better is putting in Syndic of Tithes and Concordia Pegasus in instead of the Last Thoughts. I definitely should have put in the Armory Guard instead of the Sunspire Gatekeeper. Most games I had one Gate in play and a 2/5 with Vigilance would have been better than a 2/4. Only, like, twice did I have two gates in play when I played a gatekeeper.  Although one of those times I was able to play the Opal Lake Guardian 3 times off a Keymaster Rogue and a Deputy of Acquittals.

I think the Luminate Primordial has potential to be very good. However, the 7 mana casting cost is just too much for a fast deck.

The matches were a lot of fun. Match two I played a kid who was new to magic and had, accordingly, made some questionable calls building his deck and playing. He was a quick learner, though, and the games weren't exactly cake walks. I did win 2-0. Game two I was actually very lucky. I drew no sources of blue mana, but also drew no spells that required blue mana. The game was something like T1: land, go, T2: Halberdier, T3: Sentry, swing for 3, T4: Sentry #2, swing for 6: T5 Helix a blocker, swing for 9, he chumps 3 with a lifelinked creature. In turn six he had one blocker, 7 life and I had a Maaka to pump the dude he didn't block.

In fact, MVPs in all three of my matches were my 3 power drops: the Halberdiers, Sentries and Emberbeast, backed up by Maaka combat tricks. I was able to beat down very quickly and remove blockers well.

Matches one and three were both against experienced players and were well fought, intense, close, fun matches. I won the first 2-0. Fun play to win Match 1 game 2: I knocked my opponent to 5 life before he got a blocker on the table staring down my two attackers. So I pointed the Blast of Genius at his head, drew three cards and discarded a Gatekeeper to take him to 1 life. His turn he played a second blocker. My turn I played the Sunhome Guildmage I drew off the Blast, created a 1/1 token with haste and swung in for the win.

Match 3 was against Wesley who took my good RUW sweetness. He won game 1 on the back of his own Ascended Lawmage, Scion of Vitu-Ghazi and Tenement Crasher. He also showed my a Punish the Enemy, Izzet Staticaster and Counterflux that I had passed. With such meaty creatures in his deck I figured I'd need better ways to deal with them in mine so I swapped out the Sunspire Gatekeeper for the Armory Guard and a Last Thoughts for the Luminate Primordial. I figured that even if it was unlikely I'd cast the Primordial, neither was it impossible and I'd need to get a little lucky to win against a creature set that clearly outclassed mine.

Game 2 I got a turn 2 Halberdier again while Wesley stalled out on two mana until about turn six. So I beat him down, using overpowered removal (Helix and Blast) on really small blockers, but that allowed me to keep the Halberdier going and knock him down to, like, 5 life before he started to get mana and stabalize the board. He nearly even came back to win, but a Street Spasm (which he passed me in the draft!) for 4 to all his non-fliers cleared the way for me to win.

Game 3 was kind of anti-climactic. He got the wrong mix of colors in his mana and had a fistful of uncastable spells. Once again I started with just the Halberdier in play, but I was holding a Helix, Backlash and a Maaka. So I just played carefully, keeping Backlash mana open and hitting for three at a time even though I had other creatures I could have played. So when he drew a single white mana I stopped him from stabalizing and he never drew the second white he wanted.

Altogether a very fun evening.

Geeking Out

Two weeks back I went to Chaoticon, the annual game convention put on by the UWGB Gamers' Club. It's usually a pretty small affair. But folks get together, play games, and I get a chance to meet up with friends I had back in college whom I haven't seen since, well, Chaoticon the previous year. I go every year to support the Gamers' Club because I'm an alumnus. I wasn't there quite at the beginning, but since, like Chaoticon 3, I think.

This was pretty much the same. Chris and Adam Bauknecht came up from Madison with a friend of theirs named Eric. Chris and Adam are two of the Gamers' Club's original founders. It's pretty cool to see something they started 22 years ago still there. One current member commented, "I didn't even exist the first year you held Chaoticon." To which Chris responded, "Awesome. That's exactly what we hoped for."

Just this past year Chris inivited me to play World of Warcraft with the group he and Adam raid with. Eric is part of that group. Raiding hasn't actually panned out yet... but we've been doing challenge modes and unlocking achievements instead and it has been a lot of fun. Even if I do have to play Horde.

Anyway, the four of us played a couple games. First we played Chaos in the Old World. It's a war game-ish conflict between four gods of Chaos from the Warhammer 40K mythos. There are a couple paths to victory. The one that is common to all players is bringing chaos and ruin to the various regions in the land. You do that with your demonic army, cultist followers and special action cards. Each player has a limited number of action points to use each turn moving his forces around the board, taking actions. The more ruin you bring, the more points you rack up. Most points wins the game. Each player also has an individual win condition specific to his god. For example, since I played the god of war, I advanced in my individual condition by winning multiple fights each turn against the other gods.

It's a very well balanced game. A lot of fun. It was a close contest. Adam had advised that the best ways to win were either (a) pursue points or (b) pursue your individual goal, but trying to do both usually meant you couldn't get far enough in either. So I tried for (b), everyone else tried for (a).

I managed to position my armies where I could make steady progress on my track. Specifically, I was central enough to pick fights consistently and I prevented the ruin of the largest (highest point) region, which allowed me to stay competetive in the race. Still there was plenty of ruin going around and we eventually hit a critical turn in the game where Chris, Adam and Eric started racking up tons of points very quickly as regions fell. Chris nearly won the game on turn n. All he had to do was ruin one region. No one was close enough to ruining any other regions to rack up more points than him and I needed both turns n and n+1 in order to possibly win enough fights to achieve my individual win condition.

Fortunately, I had an action that stopped the ruin of a region for one turn. Everyone took turn n to pile on ruin, I won some fights. Turn n+1 we were all in contention for the win. It was just a matter of who could ruin which regions first or could I win enough fights. In the end, I did. Very close. Very fun.

We also played Vegas Showdown. Each player takes the part of a Vegas entertainment mogul building the next big attraction. You bring in money each turn based on what you've built and use it to bid against other players on new additions to your complex. There's a real balance to strike as the starting bid price of each addition drops each turn it is not bought, you want to get additions as cheaply as possible and also get better additions than your opponents. Then you have to factor in that some additions get you increased revenue, others get you points, some get a combination. There are also certain configurations you put into your complex to get bonus points.

Also a very fun game. Even more fun beause I won it, too. I've got to admit, a large part of my Chaos in the Old World win was due to the other 3 players knowing how to play the game well. They knew how to time the point accumulations and how to interfere with each other's progress. Had it been just me against any one of them, they'd have run away with the game and crushed me. However, I won Vegas Showdown because I did everything right. Bought cheap revenue generators early, saved up, bid on cheap improvements when my opponents were low on money and that allowed me to have enough money on hand to outbid them for point generators when they came up. At the right time in the game I switched my focus to points over revenue and won by a pretty good margin.

Chaoticon was a good time. The Gamers' Club itself seems to be at an ebb right now. There wasn't a lot of participation, communication & outreach for the con was weak, there weren't many events. But it was held. It was fun to see old friends. It was fun playing games all day.

The next weekend I got to geek out even more. Gnome Games, a local store here in Green Bay, held pre-release events for the new Magic: the Gathering set of cards, Dragonmaze. Friday night I got together with some friends that also play Magic, Scott and Beth Harris, and played some Magic. Saturday morning we all went to a sunrise tournament (breakfast included!) at Gnome Games.

Friday night Tabby went with me to Scott & Beth's. Becky & Ben were going to come along too (Sam was at work), but Becky had to pick up Ben at school when he got back from his design day competition in Milwaukee (2nd place in individual computer game design! Yay Ben!)... but Becky crashed after picking up Ben, laid down for a "quick" nap and never made it. Tabby had a great time with the Harris girls, though. Sierra and Dakota are about the same age as Sam & Ben, but Tabby is used to teens, right? And she loves... I mean absolutely adores, worships, LOVES!... teen girls. They watched Mirror, Mirror. Tabby told them to close their eyes whenever Prince Charming had his shirt off.

I really like how Wizards of the Coast has set up the pre-release events for the last few sets. You pick a "guild" from the Ravnica setting to represent during the event. Each guild is essentially a two color combination with it's own "flavor" so to speak. For example, I choose Selesnya, the Green/White guild concerned with preserving and protecting the peaceful, serene elements of nature. In this event you were randomly assigned an allied guild that shared one color with yours. My ally was Boros, the Red/White guild that serves as Ravnica's military and police. We got one booster pack of cards specific to our guild, i.e. containing only cards of our guild's colors, and another of our ally's, then four random Dragonmaze booster packs. From those six packs we build a 40 card deck and play four rounds of brackets.

If you're interested, here are the cards I opened. I guess even if you're not interested.

Land
Boros Guildgate
Rakdos Guildgate x2
Selesnya Guildgate
Simic Guildgate x2

Artifacts
Boros Cluestone
Dimir Cluestone
Gruul Cluestone x2
Izzet Cluestone
Selesnya Keyrune

Black
Crypt Invasion
Fatal Fumes
Hired Torturer x2
Sinister Possession
Ubul Sar Gatekeepers

Blue
Hidden Strings
Murmuring Phantasm
Opal Lake Gatekeepers
Uncovered Clues
Wind Drake

Green
Axebane Guardian
Brush Strider
Chorus of Might
Druid's Deliverance
Giant Growth
Kraul Warrior
Maze Behemoth
Phytoburst

Red
Bomber Corps
Mark for Death
Massive Raid
Maze Rusher
Molten Primordial
Punish the Enemy x2
Rubblebelt Maaka x3
Smeltward Gatekeepers
Tin Street Market
Warmind Infantry

White
Assault Griffin
Boros Elite
Boros Mastiff x2
Daring Skyjek
Eyes in the Skies
Guildscorn Ward
Maze Sentinel
Riot Control
Rootborn Defenses
Shielded Passage
Trained Caracal
Trostani's Judgement
Wake the Reflections

Azorius (blue/white)
Deputy of Acquittals x2

Boros (red/white)
Shattering Blow
Skynight Legionnaire
Sunhome Guildmage
Viashino Firstblade

Dimir (black/blue)
Haunter of Nightveil
Pilfered Plans x2

Golgari (black/green)
Down/Dirty x2
Gaze of Granite
Putrefy x2
Varolz, the Scar Striped

Gruul (green/red)
Zhur-taa Druid

Izzet (blue/red)
Goblin Test Pilot
Nivix Cyclops

Rakdos (black/red)
Carnage Gladiator
Morgueburst
Showstopper

Selesnya (green/white)
Alive/Well
Armored Wolf Rider
Centaur Healer
Risen Sanctuary
Sundering Growth
Unflinching Courage x2
Wayfaring Temple

Simic (blue/green)
Bred for the Hunt

Other
Beck/Call
Ready/Willing

With a Selsnya/Boros alliance, the obvious route is to take advantage of two boosters worth of cards focused on Green/White/Red and go those colors. But man, I saw Putrefy x2, Gaze of Granite and Varolz and thought adding black looked real strong. I wasn't sure I could pull off the mana base for Green/Red/White/Black so I dropped Red from the pool and just made a Green/White/Black deck. Even that was going to be tough to get a good mana base for and at the last minute I even dropped Gaze of Granite due to the double black required to cast it.

I ended up playing

Land
Forest x5
Plains x5
Swamp x5
Selsnya Guildgate

Artifacts
Selesnya Keyrune

Black
Fatal Fumes
Hired Torturer x2

Green
Brush Strider
Giant Growth
Kraul Warrior

White
Assault Griffin
Boros Mastiff x2
Daring Skyjek

Golgari
Down/Dirty x2
Putrefy x2
Varolz, the Scar Striped

Selesnya
Alive/Well
Armored Wolf Rider
Centaur Healer
Risen Sanctuary
Unflinching Courage x2
Wayfaring Temple

Other
Ready/Willing

Turns out it helps to read the cards. I didn't notice Hired Torturer had Defender until I went to attack with it. Had I noticed, I would have played Axebane Guardian instead of the Selsnya Keyrune and kept in the Gaze of Granite instead of Fatal Fumes. Or more likely, I would have decided I didn't like the creature base and gone back to playing Green/Red/White.

I would have missed Putrefy. 3 mana to kill anything I wanted was pretty useful. But I really wanted the Torturers to attack almost every time I had them in play. And Varolz wasn't as cool as I thought he would be. I never had creatures in the graveyard he could let me scavange. Mostly I wanted to play my 3 mana creatures, like Varolz, on turn 3. Which often meant Varolz hitting play alone, i.e. without anything to sacrifice for his regenerate ability. Maybe I just built my deck wrong to take advantage of him. In the end, because Varolz wasn't as cool as I thought, I wanted the Torturers to attack and I didn't even play Gaze of Granite, I looked over my card pool at home and figured I should have stuck with Green/White/Red and played:

Land
Forest x5
Mountains x3
Plains x4
Boros Guildgate
Rakdos Guildgate x2
Selesnya Guildgate

Artifacts
Gruul Cluestone
Selesnya Keystone

Green
Brush Strider
Giant Growth
Kraul Warrior

Red
Molten Primordial
Punish the Enemy
Rubblebelt Maaka
Smeltward Gatekeepers
Warmind Infantry

White
Assault Griffin
Boros Mastiff
Daring Skyjek
Trostani's Judgement

Boros
Skyknight Legionnaire
Sunhome Guildmage

Selesnya
Alive/Well
Armored Wolf Rider
Centaur Healer
Risen Sanctuary
Unflinching Courage x2
Wayfaring Temple

Other
Ready/Willing

The Rakdos Guildgates are there so that it might be possible to cast the Willing half of Ready/Willing. I never did in the four rounds I played, but Ready was a neat combat trick that let me get the jump on my opponents a couple times. With enough mana (and a source of black), I can see how fusing Willing with it would be good. Plus the extra guildgates also make playing the Smeltward Gatekeepers worthwhile.

I usually hate playing with creature enchantments because you're setting yourself up to lose two cards to an opponent's one at some point. In fact, several times that exact thing happened where my opponent stacked an enchantment on his creature and ran into my Putrefy. One opponent even put 2 enchantments on the same dude and my one Putrefy took out all 3 of his cards. However, I remember playing sealed deck tournaments back when Armadillo Cloak was in the set and everyone who used it loved it. So I figured I'd try Unflinching Courage, which is essentially a renamed Armadillo Cloak. It is as awesome as everyone said. It flat out won me two games and made a couple others better. One of the game wins was just stupid. Turn 2 Kraul Warrior, turn 3 Unflinching Courage and attack for 4 (gain 4 life), turn 4 Unflinching Courage #2 and attack for 6 (gain 6 life). Turn 5 my opponent finally played a blocker, I Putrefied it and attacked again. He was at 4 life while I was 36. At that point, even if he killed the Kraul Warrior for a 3:1 card advantage, I was so far ahead it wouldn't matter.


I'm not totally sure the Red/Green/White deck is better. Putrefy is really good. Much better than the six mana Trostani's Judgmenet and Punish the Enemy I'd replace them with. Down/Dirty was often nice. Played right, Down usually made my opponent discard at least one strong card. I only ever used Dirty once, but it was to get a Putrefy back and kill something important.

But what the Red version of the deck has going for it is trading Varolz, 2 Torturer's and a Boros Mastiff for Sunhome Guildmage, Skyknight Legionnaire, Warmind Infantry, Smeltward Gatekeepers, Rubblebelt Maaka and a Molten Primordial, i.e. a much, much better creature base. It also has a better mana base. The Black version had 7 sources each of Green & White mana and only 5 sources of black. There was one game, in the only match I lost, where I never drew a black mana source while I had a Putrefy in my hand that would have won me the game. The Red version of the deck has 8 Green, 7 White and 7 Red mana sources. I'd feel really good about that.

I can't really complain though. I went 3-1 in matches and had a great time.