It’s been rather a while since we’ve discussed Limited, and with a Grand Prix in the format this past weekend it seems now would be an excellent time to recap what we’ve learned about Shadowmoor. I started the format strong with a lot of winning, followed up with a long, dark period of a lot of losing, and seem to have finally crawled back up into the light of “understanding the format” when it comes to Shadowmoor draft, and as Steve Sadin could attest this week on Limited Information, even the best can make a subtly wrong judgment about the format and suffer accordingly.
Day 1 coverage can only give us so much information, especially when it is two coverage reporters versus 1,121 Magic players. Looking at the 8-0 decklists can give us some common trends, though, especially in light of the fact that it seems the assumption going in was that this wasn’t a very quick format, and that drawing first was generally the right thing to do. While I’d say that the “drawing first” rule is a correct starting point for any Sealed Deck format, it helps to be paying attention to how fast your opponent’s draws look in the first game so you don’t just get run over… and if they want to break the “draw first” rule and intentionally play first, it’s quite possible you should be giving that the same consideration.
Deck #1 – Cody Damm
Grand Prix: Indianapolis, 8-0 Day 1 (prior to last round)
1 Cinderbones
1 Glen Elendra Liege
1 Gravelgill Axeshark
1 Medicine Runner
1 Puresight Merrow
1 Raven’s Run Dragoon
1 Rune-Cervin Rider
1 Safehold Elite
1 Scuttlemutt
1 Silkbind Faerie
1 Smolder Initiate
2 Spiteflame Witch
1 Wilt-Leaf Cavaliers
1 Wilt-Leaf Liege
1 Aethertow
1 Elsewhere Flask
1 Gloomlance
1 Gnarled Effigy
1 Incremental Blight
1 Steel of the Godhead
1 Turn to Mist
Relevant sideboard cards: 1 Aphotic Wisps, 2 Torture, 1 Oona’s Gatewarden, Pale Wayfarer, Mercy Killing, Strip Bare
One thing and one thing only bothers me about this deck, and that is the inclusion of Smolder Initiate with only seven other cards in his deck that triggers it. This isn’t the most aggressive deck around, though it does do a good job of putting early pressure on, and the inclusion of a 1/1 for one when he could have had his choice of Aphotic Wisps, Torture, or Oona’s Gatewarden in that slot instead leaves me wondering. Torture isn’t the most cost-efficient removal spell, but it is a removal spell, and I’ve found more and more in Shadowmoor Limited that the cycle of Wisps are incredibly potent tools for shutting down the utter stupidity that an unchecked “God” enchantment can be. I play them when I have them, I draft them higher than most (and not just the White one, which is incredible even when it’s not mucking with your opponent’s color-based effects) and I’ve found I don’t lose to unchecked enchantments basically ever. With a very limited number of potential answers to Steel of the Godhead on a W/U creature – just Turn to Mist, Incremental Blight, Gloomlance, and Aethertow – I’d think that the sneaky Wisp that happens to also grant someone Fear if you need to sneak the last few points in there would fit well in an aggressive deck such as this one, while also being better than the Smolder Initiate who is easily outclassed and of limited use against non-Black decks. And with Black being one of the more maligned colors in the set, most of your opponents will have very few Black cards… even including the Hybrid bleed-over into other colors.
Looking at his curve, we see the following for creatures:
1cc: 1 (Smolder Initiate)
2cc: 5 (Medicine Runner, Puresight Merrow, 2x Spiteflame Witch, Safehold Elite)
3cc: 4 (Cinderbones, Scuttlemutt, Silkbind Faerie, Wilt-Leaf Cavaliers)
4cc: 4 (Glen Elendra Liege, Wilt-Leaf Liege, Rune-Cervin Rider, Raven’s Run Dragoon)
5cc: 1 (Gravegill Axeshark)
That’s a pretty speedy deck, and also one with some nightmarish mana requirements as it could potentially want either a WWW or BBB Liege on turn 4 and not realistically be able to play either. But an aggressive package and some powerful removal carried him to a strong record.
Deck #2 – Eric Franklin
Grand Prix: Indianapolis, 8-0 Day 1 (prior to last round) >
1 Chainbreaker
1 Cinderhaze Wretch
1 Furystoke Giant
1 Grief Tyrant
1 Manaforge Cinder
1 Mudbrawler Cohort
1 Mudbrawler Raiders
1 Murderous Redcap
1 Painter’s Servant
1 Rustrazor Butcher
1 Scuttlemutt
1 Scuzzback Marauders
2 Silkbind Faerie
1 Watchwing Scarecrow
1 Burn Trail
1 Consign to Dream
1 Flame Javelin
1 Incremental Blight
1 Rite of Consumption
1 River’s Grasp
1 Steel of the Godhead
1 Torture
Now here we have an odd, odd deck… but one that should be pretty indicative of the format. We have a lot of Red/Black Hybrid guys and artifact creatures, so between the main two colors the exact land base is decided by the remainder of its spells, weighing in between Incremental Blight on the Black-heavy side and Flame Javelin on the Red-heavy side. Looking at the “relevant sideboard cards” we see: Boggart Arsonists, Oona’s Gatewarden, Zac Hill BFF the Loamdragger Giant, Wanderbrine Rootcutters, Torpor Dust, and two copies of Scar. Nothing in the deck seems to contradict what I think I know about the format, like that Smolder Initiate that set my spider-senses tingling, and instead we just see a B/R splash U deck. It’s the new “two colors.” Steel of the Godhead ‘only’ has Silkbind Faeries to target, but can also be set up with Painter’s Servant or Scuttlemutt, and Rite of Consumption is a potent finisher that works with a few cards like Grief Tyrant and Furystoke Giant that are eager to hop into the graveyard anyway.
Looking at the mana curve of the creatures, we see:
1cc: 1 (Manaforge Cinder)
2cc: 4 (Rustrazor Butcher, Painter’s Servant, Chainbreaker, Mudbrawler Cohort)
3cc: 3 (2 Silkbind Faerie, 1 Scuttlemutt)
4cc: 3 (Mudbrawler Raiders, Murderous Redcap, Watchwing Scarecrow)
5cc: 3 (Cinderhaze Wretch, Furystoke Giant, Scuzzback Marauders)
6cc: 1 (Grief Tyrant)
Overall a much slower creature curve, and thus the implementation of defensive two-drops like Rustrazor Butcher and Painter’s Servant to control the early bleeding so that powerful spells like Murderous Redcap and Furystoke Giant can have time to do their ‘thing.’ I suspect Rite of Consumption would have earned the cut over something smaller like Scar even if it just sacrificed a creature to gain life, so the ‘option’ of additionally dealing damage to the opponent with this particular spell is just gravy. Likewise, the splash for not just two Silkbind Faeries but also a Steel of the Godhead to enchant them with is risky… but as already noted, two of the Scarecrows can enable Steel of the Godhead on any creature, and the controlling deck is content to patiently bide its time in the early game, by which point the Faerie plus God enchantment combo can put the opponent away with risk-free tapping and steady life-gain. Oh, and again, incidentally you damage the opponent. Right.
Deck #3 – Clayton Mooney
Grand Prix: Indianapolis, 8-0 Day 1 (prior to last round)
2 Ballynock Cohort
1 Barrenton Medic
1 Briarberry Cohort
1 Faerie Macabre
1 Grief Tyrant
1 Heartmender
1 Mistmeadow Witch
1 Murderous Redcap
1 Oona, Queen of the Fae
1 Oona’s Gatewarden
1 Puresight Merrow
1 Silkbind Faerie
1 Sootwalkers
1 Wanderbrine Rootcutters
1 Barkshell Blessing
1 Curse of Chains
1 Elsewhere Flask
1 Flame Javelin
1 Gloomlance
1 Incremental Blight
1 Last Breath
1 Turn to Mist
Looking to the sideboard again for potential playables, we see: Cinderhaze Wretch (the last opponent loved him, after all…), Lurebound Scarecrow (not my favorite man, but some love this particular cheap 4/4), and two copies of Watchwing Scarecrow. Again my spider-senses are tingling, and that is because while there are plenty of Blue-hybrid cards that you can cast off those Islands without them disrupting your manabase in this deck, and you certainly want to have Islands so you can activate your Mistmeadow Witch, there is only one actual Blue spell… and that is Briarberry Cohort, a two-drop flier in a deck with three Islands, and which requires one of your White or Black creatures to likewise be Blue before it’s really any good. So long as we are relying on a creature being Blue to make your man ‘good,’ wouldn’t the non-Blue Watchwing Scarecrow be comparable? An artifact four-drop is at least as castable as a two-mana drop in your third color, and being a 2/4 with Vigilance even if you can’t assemble the part that gives him Flying sticks out to me as a place where I would rather have strayed from where the 8-0 deck ended up and dissented with this particular card choice.
Looking at the critter curve again, we see:
1cc: 1 (Oona’s Gatewarden)
2cc: 3 (Puresight Merrow, Briarberry Cohort, Mistmeadow Witch)
3cc: 4 (2 Ballynock Cohort, Faerie Macabre, Silkbind Faerie)
4cc: 4 (Heartmender, Murderous Redcap, Sootwalkers, Wanderbrine Rootcutters)
5cc: 1 (Barrenton Medic)
6cc: 2 (Grief Tyrant, Oona, Queen of the Fae)
Again we see a deck that largely fits into the controlling role, simply due to the mana curve of its creature drops, but this is a deck that will very quickly be able to overwhelm an aggressive deck’s two-drops with its own 3/3s, some of which will have first strike. Add to that some cheap removal spells and again, Incremental Blight, and we see another not-slow but certainly controlling deck.
Deck #4 – Jamie Parke
Grand Prix: Indianapolis, 8-0 Day 1 (prior to last round)
1 Ballynock Cohort
1 Boggart Ram-Gang
1 Crabapple Cohort
1 Glamer Spinners
1 Gloomwidow
1 Grim Poppet
1 Heartmender
1 Kitchen Finks
1 Mudbrawler Raiders
1 Order of Whiteclay
1 Rune-Cervin Rider
1 Safehold Elite
1 Safehold Sentry
1 Tattermunge Duo
1 Aethertow
1 Barkshell Blessing
1 Elsewhere Flask
1 Firespout
1 Gnarled Effigy
1 Last Breath
1 Prison Term
1 Puncture Bolt
1 Turn to Mist
The coverage certainly supports Plains in the maindeck over Islands, to contradict the deck as listed in the coverage as going 8-0, and also includes a Consign to Dreams (and 41 cards) that I am just going to assume didn’t get played off zero Islands and one Elsewhere Flask as the 41st card, but instead presume it was unclear on the decklist and was likely jumping in and out of the deck over the course of construction before settling on “out”. Relevant sideboard playables include Gleeful Sabotage, Juvenile Gloomwidow, Pili-Pala, 2 Presence of Gond, Scrapbasket, and Tattermunge Witch. Many were not included for the obvious reasons, leaving just the Witch and Sabotage as things worthy of thinking about further to see if they might suit the deck.
1cc: 0
2cc: 2 (Safehold Elite, Safehold Sentry)
3cc: 6 (Ballynock Cohort, Boggart Ram-Gang, Gloomwidow, Kitchen Finks, Order of Whiteclay, Tattermunge Duo)
4cc: 3 (Heartmender, Mudbrawler Raiders, Rune-Cervin Rider)
5cc: 2 (Glamer Spinners, Crabapple Cohort)
6cc+: 1 (Grim Poppet)
Again we don’t have the true dedicated aggression creature curve we saw in Cody Damm’s two-drop heavy deck, but the three-drops are excellently placed to outclass two-drops, with a variety of 3/3s or 1/4s, or even ‘just’ Kitchen Finks for heavy blocking duty. The removal spells work just as well on aggression as on defense, being largely cheap, but the deck doesn’t consider itself “aggressive” to the point where slow, late-game cards like Grim Poppet or Gnarled Effigy were left on the wayside… so again we have a controlling deck, but this time we have one that happens to beat down convincingly. With that note it makes decent sense to leave an aggressive two-drop like Tattermunge Witch on the sidelines, because a weak beater is a liability to the deck’s overarching plan… the two-drops it has are good against other two-drops, and good against bigger creatures in concert with other members of the team. Moreso than the other decks we have labeled as ‘controlling,’ this one controls tempo rather than specifically the opponent’s plays… but then, the other decks we labeled as ‘controlling’ had Incremental Blights, while this one ‘only’ has Firespout.
Deck #5 – Randy Wright
Grand Prix: Indianapolis, 8-0 Day 1 (prior to last round)
1 Fire-Lit Thicket
8 Forest
8 Mountain
1 Boggart Arsonists
1 Boggart Ram-Gang
1 Crabapple Cohort
1 Demigod of Revenge
1 Farhaven Elf
2 Hungry Spriggan
1 Medicine Runner
1 Mudbrawler Raiders
1 Old Ghastbark
1 Raven’s Run Dragoon
2 Safehold Elite
1 Scuttlemutt
1 Tattermunge Witch
1 Burn Trail
2 Manamorphose
1 Reknit
1 Scar
1 Torrent of Souls
1 Tower Above
1 Viridescent Wisps
There is no mistaking this for a control deck, with its haste men and dedicated attackers like Hungry Spriggan to push damage across. Looking for relevant sideboard cards we see a Runes of the Deus that went untouched, with only three targets for the full benefit of these particular Pants. The only cards worth looking at that fit the deck’s strategy are Nurturer Initiates, Giantbaiting, and Mudbrawler Cohort, and these are not really up to snuff… just played sometimes when drafting the aggressive form of this deck. Manamorphose fixes the mana for your Demigod of Revenge and Tower Above, and can even provide the Black mana for Torrent of Souls, and… well, it’s probably better than the alternative if the ‘alternative’ is either splashing or playing Giantbaiting.
1cc: 0
2cc: 4 (2 Safehold Elite, Medicine Runner, Tattermunge Witch)
3cc: 6 (Boggart Ram-Gang, Farhaven Elf, Boggart Arsonists, 2 Hungry Spriggan, Scuttlemutt)
4cc: 2 (Mudbrawler Raiders, Raven’s Run Dragoon)
5cc: 3 (Old Ghastbark, Demigod of Revenge, Crabapple Cohort)
Unlike the first deck we saw, this one pretty clearly focuses on the 3’s… and given that this seems to be where the successful controlling decks are focusing their mana-curve, to stop beatdown with three-drops and four-drop 3/3s, I’d say the Ram-Gang/Spriggan attack force was successful for a reason. Cody Damm at least had some serious removal to lean on, like Incremental Blight or the conspired Aethertow, while this deck has a Scar, a Tower Above, and a Burn Trail for removal. Strong two-drops into aggressive three-drops presumably did a lot of the work here, because the removal spells certainly didn’t.
And so we get to the last deck.
Deck #6 – Tim Galbiati
Grand Prix: Indianapolis, 8-0 Day 1 (prior to last round)
2 Glamer Spinners
1 Grief Tyrant
1 Grim Poppet
1 Merrow Grimeblotter
1 Merrow Wavebreakers
1 Oona, Queen of the Fae
1 Oona’s Gatewarden
1 Plumeveil
1 Scuttlemutt
1 Scuzzback Marauders
1 Slinking Giant
1 Sootwalkers
1 Tatterkite
1 Whimwader
2 Wingrattle Scarecrow
2 Burn Trail
1 Firespout
1 Power of Fire
1 Puncture Bolt
1 Scar
Looking at the sideboard for potential playables, I see only one card worth noting: Illuminated Folio. It is quite possible however that it got cut because of its cost, as this deck has a very high curve compared to the previous decks, even if it also happens to have an awful lot of sauce as well. I imagine the decision came down between ‘card advantage engine’ and ‘worst removal spell,’ and the assumption would be reasonable to say that in a deck with Oona, Grim Poppet and Firespout, so long as you stay alive you should win the game, and thus Folio wasn’t especially helpful against reasonably-aggressive decks.
Now that mana curve…
1cc: 1 (Oona’s Gatewarden)
2cc: 0
3cc: 5 (Tatterkite, Plumeveil, Scuttlemutt, 2 Wingrattle Scarecrow)
4cc: 3 (Merrow Grimeblotter, Slinking Giant, Sootwalkers)
5cc: 5 (2 Glamer Spinners, Merrow Wavebreakers, Scuzzback Marauders, Whimwader)
6cc+: 3 (Grief Tyrant, Oona, Queen of the Fae, Grim Poppet)
This is a really high curve, and thus the deck has a strictly-defensive orientation, even going so far as to include what will be in many cases a 6/4 Wall in addition to the three-drop 4/4 Wall and one-drop 2/1 Wall. That is a lot of Wall-based action, even if Whimwader can attack sometimes… it’s only sometimes, not something the deck can control or tries to rely on, after all. Little wonder then why it played Scar over Illuminated Folio, or a 6/4 Wall over Illuminated Folio… this is not a deck that wants to invest time into winning the late game, it’s a deck that needs to buy time because it will win the late game.
Looking back at the “Play versus Draw” decision, I would imagine that the two decks we decided were “clearly aggro” with the two-drop, three-drop curve-out plan would be very happy to play first, even if the rule is “draw first in Sealed Deck.” After all, rules were made to be broken. Likewise I would imagine that the last control deck, the one with the very high curve, couldn’t really afford to draw first, as even on the play it is in danger of being the one backpedaling just to stay alive. Otherwise “The Rule” should be in good effect, with Franklin, Mooney, and Parke’s deck all content to play the “Draw First” plan and get the extra card as they are playing at or near the ‘optimal’ speed for Sealed Deck, rather than slower-than (like Galbiati) or faster-than (like Wright and Damm).
It’s worth noting that here among the best decks, there weren’t a lot of “God” enchantments, so (unlike Draft) it’s not quite as necessary to reach for color-changing effects to include in your deck. As a paranoid sort of guy, my draft decks tend to have not just removal spells but Wisps and Scuttlemutts and Prismwake Merrow to deal with Shields of the Oversoul and Steel of the Godhead, because frankly they come up quite frequently there and I got rather tired of losing to them. (And thus a secret to the format is learning how not to lose to enchant-creature spells.) Steel of the Godhead appeared twice out of six undefeated decks, and didn’t have a bunch of targets like you would tend to see in Draft. While these power commons have a habit of overpowering Draft matches, and thus need to be accommodated for as frequently as possible regardless of your color combination… in Sealed, if you get one, will you even have guys in your pool to put it on?
With this Grand Prix past us, sadly it seems that Shadowmoor Sealed Deck will largely be relegated to Magic Online events only for competitive tournament play… the next Grand Prix with a Limited format is Madrid, which will include Eventide, and while many of the lessons of Shadowmoor Limited will still apply, it will nonetheless require learning all over again. Looking into these decks has been pretty informative, I’d say, as it states a simple fact: the “flash point” for Shadowmoor Sealed is the three-drop, as opposed to Shadowmoor draft where greater synergy can be built into a deck and the two-drop is much more relevant. Because the industry-standard creature is the 3/3 for 4, the aggressive cards have to match or exceed that size to be relevant, or at least do more than uselessly sit around looking like a dead card once a Hill Giant appears.
And as for those bomb-laden, super-nutty Sealed Decks of doom that carry lesser players to the victory? Well, there didn’t seem to be so very much of that here. Sure, there’s Oona and Firespout in the same deck, or Oona/Blight, but largely the games were played with “mere mortal” commons and the occasional power uncommon, unlike certain Time Spiral Sealed Decks I can remember that featured the Sacred Mesa / Disintegrate Timeshifted run. Playskill and good deck design seem to be carrying the day… something you can say a lot more about Shadowmoor than we could about its lighter, happier cousin, Lorwyn, where you got the good tribal deck, or you lost to the good tribal deck. And while there seems to have been a lot of early grumbling about Shadowmoor, the set has proven it has a lot of depth and rewards good play in Sealed Deck, instead of the best luck at the crap-shoot of opening crazy pools.
Sean McKeown
s_mckeown @ hotmail.com