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Drafting with Kenji – Scars of Mirrodin #3!

Tuesday, November 23rd – Kenji learns a lot in this draft of Scars of Mirrodin, and he passes his lessons down onto you! Follow him pick-by-pick and talk about the draft in the forums.

  Pack 1 pick 1:
















  My Pick:

I started this draft off with a very good rare dragon. I didn’t have to think too much about my pick but I did note that this pack could put several players in the draft into poison.

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  My Pick:

I already knew that I didn’t want to try to draft poison because I’d already passed two good poison cards. Passing two more good poison cards in this pack makes it extremely unlikely that I’d try to draft poison at any point in this draft.

I didn’t like passing the Turn to Slag but the Galvanic Blast is the clear choice here.

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  My Pick:

Arrest is an answer for my Dragon and it was the truly best card here.

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  My Pick:

Fourth-pick Revoke Existence seems fine. Though I’ll never forget that Shuhei told me “Don’t take too many artifact removal spells just one or two is fine because sometimes they do nothing.”

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  My Pick:

Ghalma’s Warden is an okay card even if I don’t end up playing a metalcraft deck.

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  My Pick:

There was nothing else very good for me in the pack and if the right cards come I could easily end up building my deck around Furnace Celebration.

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  My Pick:

Glint Hawk is the best card in the pack but I felt it was a bit dangerous for me to take Glint Hawk without a single artifact in my deck so far.

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  My Pick:

It wasn’t a great pack but at least I got something good out of it.

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  My Pick:

I’ve learned that Arc Trail is actually the best removal spell. I was wrong in my article when I said that Arrest is better.

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  My Pick:

If I had had more artifact creatures and I needed a good way to win I might have taken the Golem Artisan (it’s a lot better than most people think it is) but the pick wasn’t close given how few artifact creatures I had in my deck.

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  My Pick:

I don’t need a second Clone Shell so I took Culling Dias which could be a great combo with my Furnace.

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  My Pick:

My deck wasn’t aggressive and it didn’t have any Glint Hawks so I took the Saberclaw Golem over Panic Spellbomb.

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  Pack 3 pick 1:
















  My Pick:

Another Dragon! These two Dragons make my Myr a lot better.

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  My Pick:

This was a difficult pick for me. Both Embersmith and Blast are very good but I always feel sick when I see an Embersmith on my opponent’s side of the board.

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  My Pick:

This pick showed me that white was the right choice.

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  My Pick:

I was happy to get an on-color Myr this late.

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It’s good with Furnace and I need more four or five-mana drops to make all of my Myr useful.

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1 Barrage Ogre

1 Clone Shell

1 Copper Myr

1 Embersmith

1 Ghalma’s Warden

1 Glint Hawk

1 Gold Myr

1 Hoard-Smelter Dragon

1 Kemba’s Skyguard

2 Leaden Myr

2 Saberclaw Golem

1 Snapsail Glider

1 Steel Hellkite

1 Arc Trail

2 Arrest

1 Galvanic Blast

1 Galvanic Blast

1 Horizon Spellbomb

2 Revoke Existence

9 Mountain

8 Plains

Sideboard

1 Plains

1 Melt Terrain

1 Bladed Pinions

1 Fulgent Distraction

1 Kuldotha Rebirth

1 Furnace Celebration

2 Goblin Gaveleer

1 Swamp

1 Tainted Strike

1 Salvage Scout

2 Auriok Sunchaser

1 Echo Circlet

2 Loxodon Wayfarer

1 Relic Putrescence

1 Golden Urn

1 Withstand Death

1 Culling Dais

1 Soul Parry

1 Assault Strobe

I like my deck. It has a lot of removal and some bombs. But after some games I found that I should’ve cut a land and put a Culling Dias in the
maindeck.

The other problem that I had was that I couldn’t figure out if it was right to play or draw with this deck.

Round 1 G/B/u Poison

Game 1

He won the roll and chose play first. He played Ratchet Bomb and Nihil Spellbomb while I played Kemba’s Skyguard and Revoke Existence on his
Ratchet Bomb. Soon after it became clear to me that he was playing a poison deck.

When I play against a poison deck my strategy is to play as defensively as I possibly can. If I have the choice I’ll never attack unless I have
enough blockers to stop all of my opponent’s creatures.

I managed to keep myself at zero poison counters until turn 7 but his poison creatures with Sylvok Lifestaff eventually dealt me four poison counters.
A few turns later my opponent played Asceticism and Putrefax. I was bit mana-flooded so I couldn’t do anything to stop him.

Game 2

I chose to play first and kicked off the game with Gold Myr followed by Leaden Myr Horizon Spellbomb and Barrage Ogre. He played turn 2 Blight Mamba
and turn 4 Trigon of Corruption. I answered it with Revoke Existence added Glint Hawk to my board and passed.

He used Instill Infection and Contagion Clasp to kill both my Ogre and my Hawk. But in order to do this he need activate Clasp every turn so my
Saberclaw Golem and Embersmith got him.

Game 3

My Leaden Myr on turn 3 was the first play of the game. His first action was a turn 4 Tel-Jilad Fallen. I played a Barrage Ogre on my fourth turn
which is a pretty good answer for the Elf. Unfortunately his Grasp of Darkness removed my Ogre before he attacked played Strider Harness and passed
the turn.

I untapped looked at the double Dragons in my hand and played the red one. At this point I had a Dragon on my board and only three poison counters so
I felt very safe. But he played Putrefax next turn. He equipped Harness to it then attacked with his two infect creatures. I blocked Tel-Jilad with my
Dragon and took six more counters. Meaning that if my opponent drew Contagion Clasp (or Ichor Rats) I’d die.

Happily he didn’t draw it and my two Dragons gave me the match.

Round 2 U/W Metalcraft

Game 1

I had a good start with Horizon Spellbomb Gold Myr Ghalma’s Warden and Saberclaw Golem. My opponent mulliganed to six and played Origin
Spellbomb and a Ghalma’s Warden of his own. They weren’t enough to stop my creatures but an Arrest caught my Warden and Volition Reins stole my
Golem to put me in a little bit of trouble.

Fortunately I was able to remove his Reins with Revoke Existence and after a couple of bloody combat steps neither of us had any creatures or any
spells in our hands. Over the next few turns he drew three 2/2 creatures while I drew three lands and a Galvanic Blast. I couldn’t stop the
other two creatures and soon the game was over.

Game 2

My opponent didn’t do much and I was able to win this game pretty quickly.

Game 3

I kept five lands Copper Myr and Steel Hellkite on the draw. He played Memnite Kemba Kha Regent Auriok Replica and Etched Champion and five
Plains.

Normally this would be good for me because he got color screwed. But I drew five more lands straight. When I finally got to cast my Dragon I was
already down to ten life.

I’d seen Dispense Justice in game 1 so I decided to never attack with my Dragon unless he didn’t have three mana available. When he cast Strata Scythe
and left himself with only two mana I attacked with my Dragon only to have the damage prevented by his Replica.

At this point the board seemed fine for me but he had an answer for my Dragon. It was a Sunblast Angel. I played an Arrest on his Angel but then I
kept drawing more lands. I got Hoard-Smelter Dragon with my Clone Shell but his own Arrest got it and soon the game was over.

I should’ve cut another land because I had four mana Myr and Horizon Spellbomb. This mistake caused me to get mana-flooded in a ton of games.

See you next week!

Kenji