Insert Column Name Here - My Insanely White Deck

“You need a name for your column,” Craig said.

I frowned. “Do I really need one?” I asked. After all, I’d been making do with The Weekly Something-Something-That-Rhymes. I liked being untethered and fancy-free.

“Everyone else has one,” Craig said. “It’s this new editorial policy, you see. So get one.”

I thought. Nothing came to mind.

“How about ‘The Adventures of King Salad’?” I asked.

“That’s… interesting,” Craig replied. “But not really a Magic title that’s going to rope the punters in, now is it?”

“Not really, no,” I admitted. “How about ‘Views from a Pierced Nipple‘?”

“Yes,” Craig said slowly. “Let’s sound like we’re a porn site, now, shall we?”

“Well, I don’t know!” I cried. “That’s why I never got a tattoo! I hate being tied down to one image for the rest of my life! What if I come up with this uber-cool name for my column and I wind up hating it after a few weeks? Then I’ll change it! I’ll lose my branding! No one will know who I am!”

“I don’t care. You have to have one.”

“It has to involve the name weasel,” I said thoughtfully. “Or ferret. Just so people know that I’m all down with the mustelids.”

“You could ask the readers.”

“I guess,” I said slowly. “But they usually hate helping me out. If there’s one thing StarCityGames.com readers are lacking, it’s firm opinions on things that have nothing to do with them at all.”

We then collapsed in laughter for a good twenty minutes. When we arose, I wiped the tears from my eyes and continued.

“All right,” I said. “I’ll ask. Let’s see if they have anything good for a column name. They’re probably a lot smarter than I am, after all.”

Then I went to the prerelease.

Sealed Deck Pool

Ferrett Steinmetz

Test deck on 01-28-2007

Time Spiral Limited

Creatures (63)

Lands (3)

Spells (23)

Hey, it’s just cards. You want to know what my experience was like? Read my Magicthegathering.com tomorrow for some real complaints (but no worries, I saved the best prerelease anecdote for you, you special people you). But let’s start with the unusual go-through:

Red
Solid Playables: Goblin Skycutter, Keldon Halberdier, Orcish Cannonade, Thick-Skinned Goblin

Okay. Look at the anomaly here. Do you see it?

Here’s a hint: It’s so vaguely freakish I called over a judge just to witness it. Ready?

Three Planar Chaos packs. One Red card.

I mean, the rest of my Red in Time Spiral is decent. Halberdier and Cannonade and Skycutter are all right in my book. But with three packs, I expected to at least get a little help.

But no. The only Planar Chaos card I got was Skirk Shaman — and the unblockability is nice, but not enough to pull me into Red all by itself.

White
Solid Playables: Amrou Scout, Chronosavant, Crovax, Ascendant Hero, D’avenant Healer, Dawn Charm, Momentary Blink, Riftmarked Knight, Saltfield Recluse, Serra’s Boon, Stonecloaker, Whitemane Lion, Voidstone Gargoyle, Zhalfirin Commander

Okay. Well, the Lord taketh and the Lord giveth away… And He took my Red and handed me an insanely solid pool of White. I almost — almost — went solid White, since I had twenty White cards that were damn near playable. And maybe that wasn’t the best strategy, but when was the last time you heard about anyone going mono-colored in Sealed?

Alas, I didn’t feel like taking that kind of risk. Twenty cards would mean 50% land, and that would lead to a lot of manascrew. It’d be hella-fun to pilot the mono-White deck, but not so much fun to go 2-3 with it because I kept getting mana-flooded. My kingdom for a Candles of Leng….

But I had removal in the form of Serra’s Boon, global neutralization in the form of Voidstone Gargoyle, protection — oh, how I had protection — in the form of Whitemane Lion, Dawn Charm, and D’Avenant Healer, and an awesome Air Force.

(But there was one flaw with my White Army. See whether you can find it. I sure did in Round 2.)

So that meant that White was clearly the way to go. Red was too weak to play support… But then again, I didn’t need a lot of support. Five, maybe six cards would do it.

So I went to the other colors.

Green
Solid Playables: Aether Web, Durkwood Baloth, Giant Dustwasp, Savage Thallid, Wormwood Dryad

Is Citanul Woodseeker good? Probably. Not as good as Harmonize, but the ability to pay six mana and get two cards is most likely solid (if expensive). You can play it earlier, of course, but who wants to?

Likewise, one has to wonder whether Evolution Charm is good. It does several things, but none of them affect the board much; you can resurrect a dude, or thin the library, or give something flying. That’s a lot of things, but I don’t know whether they’re worth the investment of a card yet. My gut says that it’s a 23rd card, but not a mainstay. [Gotta admit, I love this card. — Craig.]

I do not like Reflex Sliver, Sam-I-Am. Unless you really are Slivertastic, a lot of the better Slivers have tappy abilities that are quite broken. I don’t mind that, because ideally I get to use them first. But if my opponent busts out with some crazy Sliver of his own, I want him to pause for a turn before he gets to start whuppin’ me. Time may prove me wrong on this, but I wouldn’t play it.

This would be a reasonably solid Green. But does it pair up with White? Well, no, because it offers pretty much one combat trick. It’s got good guys… But every time I think, “Gee, I can get by with nineteen guys and one removal spell,” I get my butt stomped. We have a handful of tricksies in White — but I want something solid to get other guys out of the way, and White does not offer that by itself.

Neither does Green. Green’s got some tricks to help on defense, but I don’t want to be on the back foot. So b’bye.

Blue
Solid Playables: Crookclaw Transmuter, Fathom Seer, Looter il-Kor, Pongify, Shaper Parasite, Snapback, Wistful Thinking

That’s some Blue with some niceness. Snapback is a good bounce card — and as my friend Josh said about Pongify, “There are plenty of cards where I’d rather have a 3/3 bashing me.” That’s your dragon? Ook.

Plus, even though I hate hate hate the name, the card is funny as all hell. Your dude’s a monkey? Altered States, baby, Altered States.

Wistful Thinking, though, I underestimated at first, but both times I saw it played it wrecked me. Because my mistake was thinking that I’d cast it on myself. And why would I want to play such a whacky discard spell that was so inefficient? Then I was sitting there, two very good cards in hand, and my opponent pointed it at me.

Right. I’ll draw two cards and then discard them, along with all of the good stuff I was sandbagging. I get it. So I don’t know whether it’s an auto-play, but I’m probably overrating it right now because hey, it cost me the game.

Is Veiling Oddity good? It looks nice. And the effect is certainly powerful. But the idea that my opponent can see it coming miles away weakens it, and Lord knows what sorts of ugly combat trades I might have had to make in the interim.

Yet is all of this enough to pair with my magnificent, magnificent White? Mmmmmmaybe. It’s got some nice bounce, and a good combat trick or two, and even some limited removal in the form of the Shaper Parasite. And I love the Looter il-Kor, even though he’s not nearly as cool on turn 5.

It’s not a bad choice. But what does faithful Black, the color I consistently overrate, have to offer?

Black
Solid Playables: Dark Withering, Deadly Grub, Faceless Devourer, Mana Skimmer, Midnight Charm, Mirri the Cursed, Rathi Trapper, Urborg Syphon-Mage

Okay. This has two highly conditional removal spells — Dark Withering and Cradle to Grave — which, while sometimes more troublesome than they’re worth, are always welcome. (I mean, I like removal in Sealed. Call me scrubbish if you must.)

Mirri the Cursed is a little difficult to splash, but then again since I’m so heavily White I almost don’t need to worry about it. If I’m 80% White and 20% Splash, I don’t need to have an 80/20 manabase — I can go 60% White and still be reasonably assured of not getting screwed. So her double-Black? Not an issue. And she will do quite well in the sky.

I might still vaguely flirt with Blue, but then I see we have some quasi-removal that can, occasionally, be searched up with Amrou Scout — Rathi Trapper is still some good. And then I look at the Mana Skimmer for flying and the Urborg Syphon-Mage to get the whole madness bit for the Dark Withering, and I’m in.

All right. Black it is. But there have to be some cuts; after all, the top end is going to be choked between Crovax, Chronosavant, Voidstone Gargoyle, and Dark Withering. Chronosavant? You’re out.

1 D’avenant Healer
1 Dust Elemental
1 Whitemane Lion
1 Rathi Trapper
1 Serra’s Boon
1 Zealot il-Vec
1 Riftmarked Knight
1 Urborg Syphon-Mage
1 Saltfield Recluse
1 Dark Withering
1 Dawn Charm
1 Cradle to Grave
1 Stonecloaker
1 Mana Skimmer
1 Zhalfirin Commander
1 Voidstone Gargoyle
1 Amrou Scout
1 Crovax, Ascendant Hero
1 Chromatic Star
1 Mirri the Cursed
1 Momentary Blink
1 Mycologist
1 Pallid Mycoderm

10 Plains
7 Swamp

So How’d It Go?
Here’s the uber-quick roundup.

Round 1, I faced a pleasant guy, and I came out of the gates blazing. The deck did what it was supposed to — it laid threats, one after the other, and I’d beaten him in fifteen minutes. It wasn’t even close, though I will admit to topdecking a Crovax when his Saproling army was about to stabilize him helped.

Round 2 was awkward. I faced a very ugly matchup — a guy with Green fatties and Arena. This was bad for my White guys, even though I could protect them.

I eked out a win in the first round, winning by dint of pure speed — Mirri is quick, and I got the power of the fourth-turn Mirri the Cursed, EOT Stonecloaker on turn 5, attack for six in the air on turn 6, game over.

Game 2 of Round 2 saw me discover the problem with my deck — I had one non-bouncy creature and two bouncy guys, which was definitely one too many. He killed my non-bouncy guy right after I cast him, leaving me with too many dudes in hand.

In retrospect, perhaps I should have left out the Dust Elemental, since it’s bad against Blue and often Black. When 20% of your guys require other creatures in play to be effective, that’s a little too much. Stonecloaker was golden, the Whitemane Lion was good at saving my guys… Dust Elemental was a thunderous finisher, but I had finishers. So maybe not.

The third game was… Awkward. He had scooped his cards and conceded the game when a passerby said, “Oh, by the way, I’ve been watching you for ten turns now and your Voidstone Gargoyle doesn’t affect lands. So it hasn’t shut down his Arena. See ya!” And with that, he wandered cheerfully off.

Okay, buddy. Thanks for pointing it out when it’s too late to do anything about it. Mentioning something during the game or dropping a hint to a judge would have been too much, I guess.

I called a judge. My opponent hadn’t noticed it, either, so the judge conferred with the Head Judge and said that since neither of us had noticed, we would both get a warning. My opponent’s 1-2 loss to me? Stayed on the record.

I felt terrible. The truth is that I probably would have won that regardless — he didn’t draw a whole lot of beef, and I was holding a Momentary Blink in my hand the whole time, so I think I could have ridden to victory. But, as they say, awk-waaaaard…..

You see, a couple of weeks ago, some very smart guy had this advice to give:

“These cards hate you. They look so harmless inside the plastic sleeves…. But really they are hateful, asphyxiating babies trapped in a dry cleaner bag, loathing you for placing them there, wishing for your painful and slow death.

“They are longing to betray you. Know that in your bones, and do not trust these living cardboard avatars of spite. Mulligan. Mulligan.”

I was playing someone Josh had pointed out as a pretty good player, and I got a hand with all Swamps and a perfect White curve. “Surely, I’ll draw a Plains!” said I. “Then this hand will be magnificent?”

And, um, you know what happened.

The second game was close, but I lost it just as I was about to turn it around. I had the sense that his deck slightly outmatched mine, as it was stuffed with solid tricks… But how would I know? He destroyed me in the first game because I was dumb enough to keep a really bad hand.

In Round 5, I faced a guy with a Blue/White deck that was very aggressively bouncy-and-stally. Ironically, I won on tempo; I came out of the gates ludicrously fast in Game 1, winning literally one turn before he would have stabilized and then I would have been helpless. (He had five cards, and an Errant Ephemeron coming online during his next upkeep; I’d played out my hand.)

The next round saw the vindication of everything I believed in.

I picked up a hand that could have been good, if only I drew two lands. But that wasn’t enough; I’d just been pounded for not listening to myself. So I mulliganed.

There were no lands in the next set of six. Back they went. Finally, I went to five cards on the play, a sided-in Midnight Charm and Dawn Charm in my hand. And I was due to lose.

But here’s the thing: my opponent? He kept a hand that would have been awesome had he drawn the land. And he didn’t.

The cards were talking to me. “See?” they crowed. “You listened. He didn’t. And because you’re such a nice fellow, I’m going to give you everything you need right off the top while he struggles for land.”

And so I won. I went 4-1, coming in fourth for nine packs. Not bad. I’d been hoping for a box with this deck, but… Hey. Shoulda listened.

Never trust the cards.

Rulings From Last Week
Last week, I wondered whether Stonecloaker must target a card in a graveyard when it comes into play. It does not.

With regards to Magus of the Arena, I heard some compelling logic about how it should work, which I think is correct, but I still wanna run it by a judge. Interestingly enough, our own Ask the Judge team hasn’t gotten back to me on it yet — and they’re usually great about it — so I suspect my email has vanished into aether. I’ll find out next week f’sho.

Next week, since I’m running out of time, I will discuss The Worst Draft In The History Of Mankind, which is the story I saved for you folks and you folks alone. I was the charter member. I am ashamed.

Wait until you hear of my victory. And my loss.

Signing off,
The Ferrett
TheFerrett@StarCityGames.com
The Here Edits This Here Site Here Guy