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On October 20 2013 13:08 slyboogie wrote:Show nested quote +On October 20 2013 12:39 deth2munkies wrote:3rd place in the PTQ today. Had a sweet sealed pool with a bunch of bestow/pump shenanigans, a couple heroic creatures, a bit of removal (in 1/1 deathtouch and 6 mana kill you form mostly), and Arbor Colossus and Mistcutter Hydra to finish out games. Only loss in the Swiss was to one of the SCG grinders (name escapes me) who ended up winning the thing. T8 draft went really well for me, had a ton of early chump/draw/scry cards (3x omenspeaker, 2x Triton Fortune Hunter, couple of the card draw enchantment) and 2 of the 5/5 krakens, the 6/6 kraken, and Abhorrent Overlord among other things. Sadly only 1 griptide as my only non permanent in the deck because, as I found later, the guy to my left was black and guy 2 over on the right had 4 Journey's End, 2 Griptide, and a Sea God's Revenge among others (granted I passed a Journey's End and SGR for a fortune hunter and the Overlord). Beat him in the first match of T8, he got a bit flooded G2 and G1 I just shut him down with mono krakens. I ended up losing in 3 to Polukranos with an amazing G/W deck to back him up. Possible misplay on my part. I was at 10, he had Polukranos, Nemesis of Mortals, and Nylea's Disciple and was at 12 life. I had a monstrous 5/5 Kraken with Aqueous Form on it and a land, Nimbus Naiad and Triton Fortune Hunter in hand. Both of us are on 7 land with enough of our colors, he has 3 cards in hand. What would you do? + Show Spoiler +I played both out seperately and swung, scrying to find I had Abhorrent Overlord on top. He monsterous'd Polukranos and killed me with the pump spell. Had I kept the kraken back, I could have lived that turn, but would have lost the Kraken, drawn the Overlord, then probably won the game as he had no trample. Ah well, hindsight 20/20. Did end up getting Elspeth and a bunch of trade fodder that resulted in me getting my Standard deck almost completely un-proxied. Here's the main: + Show Spoiler +
4x Overgrown Tomb
4x Godless Shrine
4x Temple Garden
4x Temple of Silence
3x Forest
2x Swamp
1x Plains
4x Sylvan Caryatid
4x Voice of Resurgence (could be Fleecemane Lion, not sure, still testing)
4x Loxodon Smiter
4x Desecration Demon
3x Alms Beast (might end up being some number of Ready//Willing, Selesnya Charm, Read the Bones, or Golgari Charm)
4x Advent of the Wurm
2x Obzedat, Ghost Council
2x Blood Baron of Vizkopa
2x Elspeth, Sun's Champion
2x Doom Blade
3x Hero's Downfall
2x Whip of Erebos
Still tweaking, and the sideboard is in flux, but I've been working on my 4x Thoughtseize, because that's definitely in. By playing them separate weren't you putting yourself dead on board if he had a land? Hydra monstrous at X=3? Kills both creatures swings for 8+5? EDIT: He doesn't even need the land for that play, sorry.
3 damage doesn't kill 2 2 power guys.
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On October 20 2013 13:33 deth2munkies wrote:Show nested quote +On October 20 2013 13:08 slyboogie wrote:On October 20 2013 12:39 deth2munkies wrote:3rd place in the PTQ today. Had a sweet sealed pool with a bunch of bestow/pump shenanigans, a couple heroic creatures, a bit of removal (in 1/1 deathtouch and 6 mana kill you form mostly), and Arbor Colossus and Mistcutter Hydra to finish out games. Only loss in the Swiss was to one of the SCG grinders (name escapes me) who ended up winning the thing. T8 draft went really well for me, had a ton of early chump/draw/scry cards (3x omenspeaker, 2x Triton Fortune Hunter, couple of the card draw enchantment) and 2 of the 5/5 krakens, the 6/6 kraken, and Abhorrent Overlord among other things. Sadly only 1 griptide as my only non permanent in the deck because, as I found later, the guy to my left was black and guy 2 over on the right had 4 Journey's End, 2 Griptide, and a Sea God's Revenge among others (granted I passed a Journey's End and SGR for a fortune hunter and the Overlord). Beat him in the first match of T8, he got a bit flooded G2 and G1 I just shut him down with mono krakens. I ended up losing in 3 to Polukranos with an amazing G/W deck to back him up. Possible misplay on my part. I was at 10, he had Polukranos, Nemesis of Mortals, and Nylea's Disciple and was at 12 life. I had a monstrous 5/5 Kraken with Aqueous Form on it and a land, Nimbus Naiad and Triton Fortune Hunter in hand. Both of us are on 7 land with enough of our colors, he has 3 cards in hand. What would you do? + Show Spoiler +I played both out seperately and swung, scrying to find I had Abhorrent Overlord on top. He monsterous'd Polukranos and killed me with the pump spell. Had I kept the kraken back, I could have lived that turn, but would have lost the Kraken, drawn the Overlord, then probably won the game as he had no trample. Ah well, hindsight 20/20. Did end up getting Elspeth and a bunch of trade fodder that resulted in me getting my Standard deck almost completely un-proxied. Here's the main: + Show Spoiler +
4x Overgrown Tomb
4x Godless Shrine
4x Temple Garden
4x Temple of Silence
3x Forest
2x Swamp
1x Plains
4x Sylvan Caryatid
4x Voice of Resurgence (could be Fleecemane Lion, not sure, still testing)
4x Loxodon Smiter
4x Desecration Demon
3x Alms Beast (might end up being some number of Ready//Willing, Selesnya Charm, Read the Bones, or Golgari Charm)
4x Advent of the Wurm
2x Obzedat, Ghost Council
2x Blood Baron of Vizkopa
2x Elspeth, Sun's Champion
2x Doom Blade
3x Hero's Downfall
2x Whip of Erebos
Still tweaking, and the sideboard is in flux, but I've been working on my 4x Thoughtseize, because that's definitely in. By playing them separate weren't you putting yourself dead on board if he had a land? Hydra monstrous at X=3? Kills both creatures swings for 8+5? EDIT: He doesn't even need the land for that play, sorry. 3 damage doesn't kill 2 2 power guys.
You're right, but my point is the same - he had 7 mana - so he could have gone up to 5 damage, 6 if he had the land. He only needed 4 to wipe the relevant blockers after your attack.
EDIT: No, I'm wrong again, it's XXG, sorry! I always thing it's XGG, i haven't played with the card at all.
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Big congrats to my friend Jack Fogle for day twoing at GP Louisville with a detention sphere less Esper list. He was 9-0.
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United States24799 Posts
Man going 9-0 in any competitive activity is so hard.... really impressive when people pull that off.
Does anyone know how face the hydra works? Does ratchet bomb (zero counters, sac) kill all he hydra heads? Does it kill all the hero cards?
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x-0'd Game Day, split finals and gave him the mat for more prizes.
Ratchet Bomb kills all the heads but I don't think it affects the Hero cards since those aren't permanents IIRC. Watched the Hydra die to Balustrade Spy + Ratchet Bomb, was hilarious.
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Huh. I never thought to use Ratchet Bomb as a 2-mana turn-of token destroyer. Seems obvious now, lol.
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Man, what a stacked top 8 that was. Somehow BBD emerges victorious.
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United States24799 Posts
I entered a standard constructed tournament today (first time). As I mentioned earlier, I didn't acquire any additional cards as I built my deck... I just built a deck with what I had. Also, I was going to do some research to understand more about deckbuilding... but I basically just read a few decklists, read a few comments posted online about those decklists, and then said "screw it I don't have time for serious research" lol.
Here is the deck that I used. I didn't ask for any feedback from anyone because I wanted to try it for myself. A few cards I put in knowing they would be atypical, and a few I didn't put as many in as I would have if I had more of them.
Land: 23 Swamps (I don't have any of the legendary theros land, or else I could do 1-2)
Planeswalkers: Liliana of the Dark Realms x3
Creatures: Gray Merchant of Asphodel x4, Desecration Demon x2, Crypt Ghast x2, Liliana's Reaver, Keepsake Gorgon, Shadowborn Demon, Necropolis Regent, Lord of the Void, Nightmare
Instants: Doom blade x4, Launch party, Altar's Reap, Crypt Incursion
Sorceries: Corrupt x4, Read the bones
Enchantments/Artifacts: Quag Sickness x4, Stab wound, sanguine bond, whip of erebos, strionic resonator
edit: sideboard: 3x ratchet bomb, 2x lifebane zombie, encroaching wastes, contanimanted ground, slum reaper, rise of the dark realms, shrivel, 2x ultimate price, 2x far/away, Nightveil Specter
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I'm not too experienced and I'm not too familiar with some of the cards (the non theros M14), but 39 swamps seems quite excessive. From what I've read, people recommend running around 22~24 lands in a 60 card deck (so roughly 40% lands).
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Straight outta Johto18973 Posts
You have 37 other cards that are not lands so it's probably and type and he means 23 lands and not 39. If it is 39 lands though, not only is 39 far too many, you should also never make your deck more than 60 cards.
I don't know much about Standard so I won't comment too much. Something I do recommend is putting your deck onto something like TappedOut or TCGPlayer because they have handy features that let you see your mana curve, colour distributions and also have something that lets you quickly goldfish the deck. (The RNG is not amazing but it's a fast way to quickly check, say, if you're comfortable with your mana base or if trying to hit RR on Turn 2 into UUU on Turn 4 for a Cryptic Command is overdoing it).
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United States24799 Posts
Oh oops, yea I meant to say 23 lands lol... the deck is 60 cards.
If I went 2-2 after running 39 lands in that deck it would be pretty embarrassing for my opponents.
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On October 21 2013 11:57 micronesia wrote:
Oh oops, yea I meant to say 23 lands lol... the deck is 60 cards.
If I went 2-2 after running 39 lands in that deck it would be pretty embarrassing for my opponents.
If you went 2-2 with battle of wits it would be amazebomb, albeit non-standard.
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So I played my first sealed draft (THS) and got 0-3, and was hoping to get some feedback on the deck & hopefully pick up some tips on sealed / draft formats.
+ Show Spoiler [Decklist] +10 Forests
7 Mountains
Borderland Minotaur
Deathbellow Raider
Ember Swallower
Leafcrown Dryad
Minotaur Skullcleaver
Nessian Asp (x2)
Nessian Courser
Nylea, God of the Hunt
Polis Crusher
Reverent Hunter
Sedge Scorpion (x2)
Savage Surge
Staunch-Hearted Warrior
Two-Headed Cerberus (x2)
Artisan's Sorrow
Bow of Nylea
Destructive Revelry
Time to Feed
Titan's Strength
Warrior's Lesson
+ Show Spoiler [Rest of the Sealed Pool] +Red
Boulderfall (x2)
Coordinated Assault (x2)
Demolish
Dragon Mantle (x2)
Portent of Betrayal
Pirest of Iroas
Wild Celebrants
Green
Commune with the Gods
Ordeal of Nylea
Hunt the Hunter
Vulpine Goliath
Blue
Annul (x2)
Aqueous Form
Dissolve
Griptide
Lost in a Labyrinth
Master of Waves
Nimbus Naiad
Omenspeaker
Prescient Chimera
Sealock Monster
Thassa's Bounty
Thassa's Emmisary
Voyage's End
White
Battlewise Valor
Divine Verdict
Ephara's Warden (x2)
Evangel of Heliod
Gods Willing
Lagonna-Band Elder (x2)
Ray of Dissolution
Scholar of Athreos
Setessan Battle Pirest
Traveling Philosopher (x2)
Wingsteed Rider
Black
Baleful Eidolon (x3)
Dark Betrayal
Disciple of Phenax
Fleshmad Steed
Gray Merchant of Asphodel
Keepsake Gorgon
March of the Returned
Rescue from the Underworld
Returned Centaur
Returned Phalanx
Sip of Hemlock
Others
Anvilwrought Raptor
Bronze Sable
Chronicler of Heroes
Kragma Warcaller
Pharika's Mender
I decided to go green because I got excited about Nylea and her bow, and with 2 asps and scorpians I felt like it wasn't too bad. Then I looked at the other possible colors and chose red because of the creature cards, and I keep hearing that you should favor creatures more in a sealed (or maybe it was draft? guh ...). In hindsight I wished I had gone blue instead but I'm not sure if I did poorly because of the deck or because of my play decisions.
What color would you have gone / how would you have splashed etc?
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Coordinated assault is very good. If you are playing red you should definitely be playing those.
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With a pool as weak as the one you had, the best thing to do is usually to go as aggressive as possible. You almost did that, but I think Dragon Mantle, Coordinated Assault, and Portent of Betrayal needed to be in your deck over slow cards like Nylea/Staunch Warrior/Warrior's Lesson/Artisan's Sorrow.
The other option would be to splash blue for Voyage's End and Griptide to give you a little more board control, but you have no fixing and a fair amount of double cc cards, so I don't know if it's great. I think blue as a color is too weak to play, you've just got Dissolve and a couple of random 5-drops, and the Naiad which is also splashable.
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Ah that's very helpful advice thank you. I often felt in the games I've played that I "ran out of steam", and then the opponent would proceed to win (one game he was at just 1 life :<), so those early game / offensive cards would probably have helped end the game faster.
I'm planning on doing a draft tomorrow - would you recommend the same idea? (If I get some good fast cards, try to build a fast deck vs if I get good control, try to build around that)
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On October 21 2013 15:56 slOosh wrote:
Ah that's very helpful advice thank you. I often felt in the games I've played that I "ran out of steam", and then the opponent would proceed to win (one game he was at just 1 life :<), so those early game / offensive cards would probably have helped end the game faster.
I'm planning on doing a draft tomorrow - would you recommend the same idea? (If I get some good fast cards, try to build a fast deck vs if I get good control, try to build around that)
The best draft strategy in this format is usually midrange, but it really just depends what you get. My advice on going aggressive was just general advice for weak sealed pools, since it's hard to win a long game without a lot of powerful cards or removal.
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On October 21 2013 15:56 slOosh wrote:
Ah that's very helpful advice thank you. I often felt in the games I've played that I "ran out of steam", and then the opponent would proceed to win (one game he was at just 1 life :<), so those early game / offensive cards would probably have helped end the game faster.
I'm planning on doing a draft tomorrow - would you recommend the same idea? (If I get some good fast cards, try to build a fast deck vs if I get good control, try to build around that)
I'd recommend drafting "good" cards over drafting a strategy. See what comes to you and draft around that. If you go in with a specific draft strategy, you may never see any good cards for that strategy. And just from my personal experience, aggro strategies are really bad in Theros unless you can godly picks. Theros is more geared towards midrange and big dudes.
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On October 21 2013 23:31 caelym wrote:Show nested quote +On October 21 2013 15:56 slOosh wrote:
Ah that's very helpful advice thank you. I often felt in the games I've played that I "ran out of steam", and then the opponent would proceed to win (one game he was at just 1 life :<), so those early game / offensive cards would probably have helped end the game faster.
I'm planning on doing a draft tomorrow - would you recommend the same idea? (If I get some good fast cards, try to build a fast deck vs if I get good control, try to build around that) I'd recommend drafting "good" cards over drafting a strategy. See what comes to you and draft around that. If you go in with a specific draft strategy, you may never see any good cards for that strategy. And just from my personal experience, aggro strategies are really bad in Theros unless you can godly picks. Theros is more geared towards midrange and big dudes.
Yeah. I've semi-forced U/W and G/W heroic multiple times in this format, and the deck always feels awkward. It can be powerful, but it's way too dependent on the specific combination of cards you draw, and how many answers your opponent has. I've only tried drafting red aggro once, but it seemed really awful, even though I got a decent version of it.
The strength of the best cards in this format is their flexibility; the ability to pay X mana for something decent and then X more to make it better. Aggro decks in this format don't really take advantage of that strength. On top of which, the stats on their creatures just don't match up very well. In some formats, a 3/3 for 3 is among the best commons in the set, but in Theros it's just kind of mediocre.
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You need some really good cards for mono-red and often times multiples of them, I do agree that aggro seems really hard to get.
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EPT
