13 years.
That's how many years since I've touched Magic cards.
I even spent some time learning the new 6th ed rules. Yeah, I'm old.
I'm still getting crushed online. Apparently drafts aren't really for casual players, and you really shouldn't be reading the cards while drafting. So after trying to draft LLM without knowing the cards, I had my proverbial handed to me on a platter.
I quit LLM pain lessons and started drafting Shadowmoor at my local card shop.
Now let me share with you my first SSS draft online. I made the finals (!).
Like everyone, I think U/W is the most powerful archetype. I'm partial to steel of godheads and counter spells.
My preferred style is to draft the best cards in any colour, with preference to good blue cards, then I'll start cooperating with whatever my right guy is handing me, generally trying to force a mono colour, and hope my friend on the left decides to be friendly.
This particular draft was full of sharks, mostly 1800+ and 1900+ players. I actually preferred this, I noticed much stronger signals, and less hate drafting. I received one of my steel of godheads as late as 7th pick.
I won't go through every pick but here are my high ranked picks:
Inkfathom Infiltrator (this fellow is a turn 2 clock and won many games by his lonesome)
Steel of Godhead (Even on a lowly Silkbind's 1 power, this is a 6 life swing, every turn)
Consign to dream
Curse of Chains
Somnomancer (if you don't take them, they will not table. ever. and a steel of godhead somnomancer is no laughing matter)
Scuttlemutt (turns off enchants, mana ramps, this card is amazing)
Some commentary on spell syphon:
If you're in blue, this is your bomb.
Spell syphon is ridiculously strong, it's much easier to hide than 4 mana open for aethertow, and in this aggro format your opponents will tend to tap down often to throw their bombs out. Spell syphon for 1 is still a bomb if your opponent doesnt have 1 mana spare and when you are mono blue it's not as situational as with other decks.
Rounds 1 and 2 were vs. RB Aggro.
My first round was against a 1950+ rated player (D_STERN)
I won 2-1. With massive mana screw in my last game. I had 3 islands (from my starting hand) out for over 10 turns.
So how does a blue deck win with massive mana screw?
Turn 2 Briarberry Cohort, turn 3 Wasp Lancer, turn 4 Steel of Godhead.
He was on 2 life, when he tapped out to cast his Ashenmoor Liege (game winner if it resolved), I showed him a spell syphon, he considered for 2 seconds, and conceded.
You have no idea what it's like for a casual noob to stare down a 1950+ player and win.
The finals went 2-1, mana screw first game, stomped him down with a Steel of Godhead Somnomancer (8 life swing for 5 turns) for which he had no answers for, and then lost the final game to a pretty sick incremental blight. Damn that card.
And yes... I uncommon drafted the Kitchen Finks for 4 tix. :P
Cheers all,
AAZipzop2.
PS I have a zip file set of pics from my draft and picks, if you are interested shoot me an email at nornicle@gmail.com and I'll send you the file.
1 comment:
Hey welcome back after 13 years. I remember learning 6 edition rules too :) Yeah, there are a bunch of old fogies still around. My first purchase was a bunch of Arabian Nights and unlimited. I still remember going to a GenCon, having some kid show me a grizzly bear on a bus, and seeing this silly black and white photocopied advertisement for some odd game played with cards called Magic and thinking...this will never catch on. I believe they took over the convention the next year.
On to drafting...nice job. That deck is pretty sweet. How was fate transfer...there's not a lot in your deck to support it...so you'd mostly be working off of other people's counters situationally. I'm wondering how it performed or if you'd rather have another creature or another one of those counterspells in its place (I noticed another in the board). Nice post!
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