Hello again. I took a week off of writing for the first time in 85 weeks of writing last week. You could call it a creative slump, or you could just
call it playing a lot of Limited. As Jon Corpora
Talent Search article
points out, there are a lot of articles about Scars Limited I could write that you really wouldn’t be interested in, and with MTGO making me feel like I didn’t know what I was doing, trying to tell you “how it is” while losing all my drafts didn’t really seem like the most useful idea.
So now we’re in the next week of this “creative slump,” and I’m still playing a lot of Limited, but lately I’ve found another way to throw tickets away as well: chasing the dream of using mechanics for which there simply isn’t enough support printed yet to try to win Standard matches.
Standard’s been pretty depressing for me since States. Everything I could ever want to do in Magic seems to get crushed by the combination of Primeval Titan and Summoning Trap. Other people tell me their blue decks are playable, and perhaps they are, but I’ve yet to master the art of beating Summoning Trap with counterspells. This has forced me to try to find my more elusive second (first really, but it’s elusive enough that it doesn’t come up much) love in Magic: winning with bad cards.
More background.
I’ve been spending all my time drafting. That line’s probably unnecessary to repeat, but here it’s used to explain the beginnings of this Constructed deck rather than my week off. Anyway, for my first 30-50 drafts, I never touched infect. I believe I won my first game in a draft through poison counters with Contagion Engine and my opponent’s Ichor Rats in my R/W Metalcraft deck. I’ve probably taken Panic Spellbomb over Cystbearer, but I couldn’t swear to it, since I probably wouldn’t have even noticed the Cystbearer in the pack. It just wasn’t one of the cards I’d consider taking.
Anyway, I eventually tried drafting poison just before the GP, and Friday night in my hotel room, I drafted a poison deck online and did awesome things with Throne of Geth. I was hooked instantly. I needed to try to make Throne of Geth work in Constructed.
The core was:
4 Throne of Geth
3-4 Contagion Clasps
2 Contagion Engines
4 Everflowing Chalices
4 Necropedes
4 Ichorclaw Myr
4 Corpse Cur
4 Tumble Magnet
0-2 Lux Cannon
0-3 Culling Dais
1-2 Mox Opal
The details needed to be worked out. I tried Spellbombs, Eldrazi Conscription, Vector Asp, Thrummingbird, Emrakul, Ulamog, All Is Dust, Voltaic Key, Trinket Mage, Plague Stinger, and a number of other cards. The lands included Tectonic Edge, Mystifying Maze, Dread Statuary, Eldrazi Temples, Eye of Ugin, Khalni Garden, Teetering Peaks, and assorted basics.
The deck can do some awesome things, but it’s inconsistent, and ultimately, I’m pretty sure it’s something to keep in mind for after the next set comes out rather than right now. It’s hard to get the first poison counter on them consistently, and, of course, you need to draw a good mix of things that proliferate and things that need counters.
I never really thought it would work, but it was a fun project. And at least now I can say I’ve used Eye of Ugin to find Necropede and Corpse Cur.
I probably wouldn’t have mentioned any of this, but I managed to assemble some interested spectators who seemed to like the deck in the Tournament Practice room, so I figure if anyone’s looking for a very fun casual Standard deck, at least you might be able to take advantage of this early work. It can cast Emrakul surprisingly quickly once the gears start turning.
The only other bit of wisdom I have on Standard is that U/B seems pretty good against decks without Primeval Titan and pretty bad against decks with Primeval Titan, and the same seems to be true for most other blue decks.
As for Scars of Mirrodin Limited, the goal of the set was to create good game play (I assume that’s always the goal, but whatever), and I think they succeeded amazingly well.
It became apparent to me very early that I was really hesitant about the draft format because the general archetypes seemed extremely scripted, and the differences within the major categories were largely inconsequential. It seemed like a format that could get stale quickly. At the same time, I noticed that I was having a lot of fun with it and wanted to keep drafting it. It took me a long time to figure out what was going on.
There are a ton of fun interactions between cards in the set, and a lot of tricks and ways to get blown out that are sometimes different than the kinds of tricks we’re used to. In my first several Sealed events online, about half of my losses were to Dragons and half of my losses were to walking into Dispense Justice (what an aptly named card—I always deserved it). I didn’t lose to anything else, always to one of those things. I’m a slow learner. My impulse to never play around anything is deeply ingrained. I’ve been trying to force myself to make exceptions for Dispense Justice and Darksteel Sentinel, but it’s hard.
I’m good enough at Magic to know that most of my losses are my fault, and in this format, I think the percentage was higher than usual, and it’s not just me. Here’s a quote from Facebook:
Michael Aaron Jacob
So in Scars sealed (grand prix and a 6 round PE), I was 6-6, with 100% of my losses, all 12, being entirely my fault. Mostly not properly evaluating threats. I am now 3-0 in another and it blows my mind how every game the lessons I’ve learned help me win it.
This status didn’t surprise me at all. I mean, it’s extreme, but this is certainly the format for it.
I’m not sure what the lesson is here. Play well? Maybe that, when you’re trying to learn from your drafts, you’re probably better off focusing on your game play and figuring out what you’re doing right and wrong there than focusing on your drafting, which is unusual for draft. I suspect this is a format where you’ll get more than usual out of watching your replays closely, and thinking hard about how your game is playing out and what kinds of things you might lose to. Games can be stolen pretty easily in this format. (Chump block the one guy that doesn’t have infect when you’re at twenty life and seven poison counters even though you don’t care about the damage, and you’ll lose far fewer games to Tainted Strike.)
As for drafting, I feel like everything can be considered in terms of Infect, Metalcraft, and Good Stuff, and that each of those archetypes has an aggro and a control build.
Infect Aggro is based on taking advantage of the double strike-like nature of infect to win quickly with effects like Trigon of Rage, Untamed Might, and equipment, ideally on a Plague Stinger or Ichorclaw Myr, but any infect creature will do. These decks need a particularly large number of infect creatures so that you don’t end up with cards that need a creature to do anything, like those mentioned above, with no creature in play, particularly since infect creatures are very likely to trade.
Top ten commons, no particular order: Plague Stinger, Grasp of Darkness, Cystbearer, Blight Mamba, Instill Infection, Corpse Cur, Ichorclaw Myr, Untamed Might, Sylvok Replica, Tumble Magnet.
When you can’t get enough creatures, or perhaps when you can get enough removal, the deck shifts to Infect Control, where equipment is much less valuable. This deck takes advantage of the fact that infect creatures provide a reasonable clock by themselves and don’t really need any help to win a game, so you can play relatively few threats and a lot of removal, which will let you break up the synergistic strategies in this format. This deck is likely black and another color that isn’t green, like red, or maybe G/R, or B/W, it could be B/G, but it doesn’t have to be, because you don’t need as many infect creatures, so one of your colors can be providing something different. Here, cards like Fume Spitter, Instill Infection, and all the obvious good removal spells are at more of a premium.
Top ten commons, no particular order: Plague Stinger, Grasp of Darkness, Cystbearer, Revoke Existence, Shatter, Arrest, Galvanic Blast, Corpse Cur, Fume Spitter, Instill Infection.
Metalcraft Aggro, much like Infect Aggro, happens only when it all comes together, and you get a lot of your keyword. The idea here is to have metalcraft on on turn 3 or 4 and for as many of your cards as possible to care. You’d like to have around seventeen artifacts, and you’d like them to be as cheap as possible. Spellbombs, Sylvok Lifestaff, and Accorder’s Shield are excellent cheap artifacts that turn on your metalcraft, and Chrome Steeds, Glint Hawk Idols, and Snapsail Gliders are ideal creatures. Removal is less valuable because it takes up one of your coveted color spell slots that could be a two-mana 3/3 flier or a one-mana Icy Manipulator, although obviously a one-mana Flame Javelin is still unbelievable.
Top ten commons, no particular order: Panic Spellbomb, Origin Spellbomb, Sylvok Lifestaff, Glint Hawk Idol, Snapsail Glider, Chrome Steed, Perilous Myr, Galvanic Blast, Auriok Sunchaser, Vedalken Certarch.
Metalcraft Control has a few too many colored spells or artifacts that cost a little too much mana, so it won’t consistently have metalcraft active as early. Instead, it has removal and powerful spells that take it to the late game where, having had time to draw more artifacts, its cards turn on, and it thrives. Ghalma’s Warden is perfectly suited to this in theory, as early on it holds the ground to get you to this late game where it becomes a solid finisher, not that you should need to pick it highly, because the other metalcraft decks would rather have an artifact.
Top ten commons, no particular order: Perilous Myr, Arrest, Galvanic Blast, Chrome Steed, Revoke Existence, Neurok Replica, Silver Myr, Iron Myr, Golden Myr, Shatter.
This format has a lot of really awesome cards that sometimes go very late because they don’t fit into the mechanical archetypes. Things like Necrogen Scudder, Kemba’s Skyguard, Molder Beast, and Sky-Eel School go much later in this format than they would in several other formats. If you’re willing to skip on synergies, you can often end up with a deck full of removal and extremely solid late-pick colored creatures. You’ll need enough removal to break up synergies, but sometimes a bunch of random good cards is exactly what you want in Limited.
Good Stuff Aggro takes advantage of the evasion or solid stats of colored creatures, as well as potentially punishing an opponent for relying too heavily on artifact removal. Alternatively, it could just be a bunch of white bears with Seize the Initiatives and Soul’s Parries. It’s a hard archetype to talk about, since it could really be any two colors.
Top ten commons, no particular order: Arrest, Galvanic Blast, Grasp in Darkness, Revoke Existence, Sky-Eel School, Kemba’s Skyguard, Neurok Invisimancer, Perilous Myr, Sunspear Shikari, Shatter.
Good Stuff Control often comes as a result of drafting to maximize a late-game bomb you’ve opened, or maybe a result of a number of late-pick two-for-one uncommons like Oxidda Scrapmelter, Skinrender, Volition Reins, Slice in Twain, or Darkslick Drake. Again, this deck could really be anything.
Top ten common, no particular order: Arrest, Revoke Existence, Galvanic Blast, Shatter, Grasp of Darkness, Instill Infection, Sylvok Replica, Moriok Replica, Neurok Replica, Perilous Myr.
It’s important to understand which of these directions you’re going, and to know which of each of your early picks would most like to be in. I see a lot of people playing cards in archetypes they’re really not intended for, and I’m pretty sure it’s usually a result of having done something wrong. For example, I see way too many Neurok Invisimancers in metalcraft decks. He’s fine man, but I think people are often taking him when they should be taking almost any artifact instead.
Lastly, I want to comment on Brad Nelson. The more I talk to him and obviously the more tournaments he Top 8s, the more certain I become that he’s the best player in the game right now. Obviously, you could say this is being too short-sighted or results-oriented, falling into the typical trap in Magic of “what have you done for me lately?” or you could say this is obvious – his finishes are unreal. So what’s the point?
Well, I’m not, at this moment, able to think about the game like Brad does. He gives me the benefit of the doubt, just like he does with everyone else. He assumes that everyone who’s reasonably good at Magic approaches the game the way he does, but in truth, I think very few do. Most of us are concerned with playing our cards. Every turn we try to figure out what our best play is, how to maximize our options, use our mana efficiently, play around counters, tricks, or removal, how to do what our deck does. Sometimes we look at what we should be doing over our next several turns.
Brad seems to be more concerned with his opponent’s game. He knows what his opponent is thinking about, what kinds of decisions they’re making, and how they’re sculpting their game, and he knows how to influence them to make the plays he needs them to make by playing cards to represent his game a certain way.
Brad tells me far more stories about games he wins by
not
playing cards, lands, or spells, than anyone else. Skipping land drops to make his opponent extend into a Wrath, not bothering to play a spell for a turn just to make his opponent think he’s out of gas, anything. His range is very wide. A lot of this, I think, comes from the amount of respect Brad gives his opponents. He assumes that everyone is paying careful attention to what he’s doing and reading his plays to gather information from him the same way he does for them rather than just playing their own game. And they are. Most of your opponents are pretty smart people. They’ll watch what you do, and they’ll make plays appropriate to the information you give them. This can give you a lot of power to influence them if you take the time to consider what they’re thinking about, and what your plays will make them think.
I say all of this because it’s something I think I need to hear. It’s one of the many things I need to be working on in my own game right now, so maybe it’s something you need as well.
Thanks for reading,
Sam