Last Friday was the first FNM I’ve been able to attend since around Thanksgiving; the chaos of holidays when you’ve got small children is not to be underestimated. I’ve also had very little time to practice Limited, probably somewhere around five drafts in total, so I decided: if I got crushed at FNM, I’d drop out and go see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and ogle Cate Blanchett. Some of you may be wondering, Cate Blanchett? She doesn’t find her way on many “Hottest” lists, but she totally does it for me. I think it’s the combination of Australian accent, Elfin queen features, and the fact that she seems to love making babies with an overweight, not-exactly-successful screenwriter. I’m am sooo envious of her husband.
Add to that Cate plays a red-headed dancer in this movie? I’m sold! Oh, and yeah – I’ve heard the rest of the movie is pretty good too.
So I make my way up to Richmond Comix two minutes late as usual and slip into the seat they have waiting for me — thanks for waiting, guys — and I crack open my first pack and flinch.
Cruel Ultimatum stares back at me.
Up until this point I’ve drafted Naya four times and Jund once, and generally I’ve done pretty well at keeping my options open as long as possible. So I’ve got several choices here:
1. Hate draft Cruel Ultimatum and then go on with my normal draft plan. I have yet to pop a Cruel Ultimatum in the numerous boosters, so this would be good for my collection too. It’s a pretty good card in Constructed, so I hear.
2. Draft Cruel Ultimatum and lock in Grixis from the beginning. There is something to be said for being bold from pick 1, right? Focus like a laser beam!
3. Draft Cruel Ultimatum and try to “splash” it into whatever deck ends up coming around the table, with a special eye out for Grixis mana fixing. Worse case, Cruel sits the bench and you don’t have to worry about it wrecking you across the table.
4. Pass Cruel Ultimatum and realize that someone to your left will be locked into Grixis and draft accordingly.
What would you do, assuming that there wasn’t (and there wasn’t) anything else in the pack that was particularly bombish?
Me, I chose #2 and ended up with a rather mediocre deck with limited removal, mostly mediocre creatures but a surprising number of playable rares – in addition to the Cruel, I got a Hell’s Thunder and a Minion Reflector. I drafted but didn’t play a Lich’s Tomb.
My first game I played turn 4 Minion Reflector, turn 5 played Hell’s Thunder and copied it, swinging for 8, and two turns later Unearthed it, copied it and swung for 8 more.
Yep, I lost that game, holding Cruel Ultimatum in my hand for four turns where all I needed was a land off the top deck. I lose the second game in much the same way, only that time I was only given two turns of trying to draw a land for the Cruel to win before losing.
The second match was a little close: I actually resolve Cruel Ultimatum and win that game, but end up losing the other two pretty handily. Why, oh why did Cruel Ultimatum have to be in my opening pack to completely put me in alien territory? I had no business trying to rock Grixis.
I drop out and go see The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and ogle Cate Blanchett. Plan B FTW! The movie was a delight, with an interesting hook, solid performances, and great technical moviecraft. Old and wrinkly Brad Pitt looks a lot like old and wrinkly Robert Redford, and I have to give it up to the guy – he did a decent job playing someone leading a very odd life. And Cate – oh, she was lovely, and did an excellent turn as the love of Benjamin’s life. I really liked the themes of birth, living for the moment, living for your dreams, growing old, and a love that transcends all obstacles. A near-perfect Hollywood romantic fantasy; one movie reviewer said it “quickly outgrows any sense of gimmickry and matures into a one-of-a-kind meditation on mortality, time’s inexorable passage and the fleeting sweetness of love.” Two thumbs up, go see it — but don’t expect Fight Club.
When it awoke, the mirrors of the world reflected only darkness.
Flavor text of Ink-Treader Nephilim
Okay, so back to Magic – and back to the Elder Dragon Highlander game I got to play in a few weeks back. Late last year I’d decided I wanted to build a deck featuring the Nephilim, and I detailed some of my initial thoughts in a column you can read here if you missed it the first time around. Here’s what I ended up playing:
1 Horde of Notions (General)
1 Maze of Ith
1 Ivory Tower
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Skullclamp
1 Berserk
1 Firestorm
1 Red Elemental Blast
1 Pyroblast
1 Saffi Eriksdotter
1 Fellwar Stone
1 Sun Droplet
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Eladamri’s Call
1 Sylvan Library
1 Lim-Dul’s Vault
1 Allay
1 Shattering Pulse
1 Sakura-Tribe Elder
1 Vexing Shusher
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Dismantling Blow
1 Eternal Witness
1 Reaping the Graves
1 Coalition Relic
1 Darksteel Ingot
1 Wood Elves
1 Yavimaya Elder
1 Loaming Shaman
1 Undead Gladiator
1 Aura Shards
1 Electrolyze
1 Wildsize
1 Spiritualize
1 Twitch
1 Cytoshape
1 Ink-Treader Nephilim
1 Witch-Maw Nephilim
1 Yore-Tiller Nephilim
1 Glint-Eye Nephilim
1 Dune-Brood Nephilim
1 Masked Admirers
1 Brawn
1 Anger
1 Filth
1 Wonder
1 Spike Weaver
1 Glen Elendra Archmage
1 Solemn Simulacrum
1 Loxodon Hierarch
1 Bound / Determined
1 Genesis
1 Gustcloak Savior
1 Silklash Spider
1 Bringer of the Blue Dawn
1 Cauldron of Souls
1 Mulldrifter
1 Reveillark
1 Elvish Aberration
1 Twisted Abomination
1 Wort, the Raidmother
1 Broodmate Dragon
1 Keiga, the Tide Star
1 Deadwood Treefolk
1 Krosan Tusker
1 Eternal Dragon
1 Tropical Island
1 Bayou
1 Taiga
1 Savannah
1 Breeding Pool
1 Overgrown Tomb
1 Stomping Ground
1 Temple Garden
1 Bloodstained Mire
1 Wooded Foothills
1 Windswept Heath
1 Krosan Verge
1 Thawing Glacier
1 Prahv, Spires of Order
1 Skarrg, the Rage Pits
1 Sunhome, Fortress of the Legion
1 Svogthos, the Restless Tomb
1 Winding Canyons
1 Mikokoro, Center of the Sea
3 Island
3 Plains
3 Forest
3 Mountain
3 Swamp
Alright, the goal of this deck, over and above just Nephilim shenanigans, was this: target Ink-Treader Nephilim with a cantrip spell with enough other creatures on the board to draw your deck and Firestorm the remaining players out of the game, with Pyroblast, Red Elemental Blast and Vexing Shusher as protection from counterspell foiling my evil plan. The nice thing about Firestorm is that, as an instant, even if you’ve got more cantrip copies than you’ve got cards left in your deck, you can draw your last card and Firestorm everyone with the remaining triggers on the stack. So, some notes on the cards I chose to play:
Electrolyze, Wildsize, Spiritualize, Twitch: the cantrips of choice. I originally had more cantrips in the deck, but I didn’t want to have so many that someone might put two and two together and realize something crazy was brewing. These seemed to be the best of the bunch, as each is decent on its own. In particular I was hoping to do something like end-of-turn Twitch my Ink-Treader to tap everyone’s creatures down, then untap my creatures and swing in at whoever had a high life total, and then Firestorm everyone else.
Cytoshape: this played on Ink-Treader seemed like it might make for some interesting situations, not least of which would be someone attacking someone else with a swarm of token creatures that suddenly became Cloudthreshers or something.
Brawn, Anger, Filth, Wonder: Glint-Eye Nephilim pitches cards for fun and profit, and since all the Nephilim need to be attacking to do their cool thang, giving them evasion from pitched creatures seemed useful. I figured Undead Gladiator could be used to pitch these into the graveyard too.
Gustcloak Savior: again, most of the Nephilim need to be attacking to do something special, so if you don’t have evasion the Savior keeps them from getting killed when they attack.
Loaming Shaman: assuming I go off with the Firestorm trick but there’s someone at the table who’s at some ridiculous life total, I figure I might need this fellow to reset my deck to keep from running out of cards.
Spike Weaver + Cauldron of Souls: yes, this is a very obnoxious combo.
Red Elemental Blast; Pyroblast; Vexing Shusher; Wort, the Raidmother: one problem with Firestorm is that the pitching of cards is a cost of the spell, so if it’s countered you now have no hand and a bunch of very alarmed players getting ready to take their turn. These cards were in here to try and make sure that Firestorm resolved, with Wort playing the part of doubling the effect either to help a copy resolve or double the effect for players with really high life totals.
Bound / Determined: This card is doubly good in this deck, both sides are very helpful – Determined is another way to make sure Firestorm resolves, and sacrificing a Bound (or your Horde of Notions) gets back 4-5 cards from your graveyard.
We had a great turnout, with 16 players showing up to battle it out at noon on Sunday, despite the NFL wildcard playoffs:
Bennie Smith played Horde of Notions
Nick Turk played Sygg, River Cutthroat
Chris Blenderman played Zur the Enchanter
Jessica Miller played Doran, the Siege-Tower
Harrison Black played Captain Sisay
Trent Montague played Oona, Queen of the Fae
Michael Rooks played Sol’Kanar the Swamp King
Josh Krause played Sliver Queen
Jonathan Weih played Brion Stoutarm
Mike Webb played Vhati il-Dal
Kenny Meyer played Rith, the Awakener
Brandon Conger played Arcum Dagsson
William Roberson played Visara the Dreadful
Joey Page played Dralnu, Lich Lord
Logan Donovan played Isamaru, Hound of Konda
Ray Varner played Momir Vig
We debated having one big 16-man game, but ended up voting to split the game into two 8-main games, especially since a couple of people needed to leave by 5 o’clock or so. I seem to have misplaced my notes so I can’t give a detailed blow-by-blow, except to say that Ray Varner got out to an early lead with a Overbeing of Myth followed by a Thought Reflection that went on for quite a few turns before I finally drew my Dismantling Blow for the Reflection when he tapped out for something. Ray did a good job bluffing that he kept drawing into card-drawing spells and no action, so that most everyone else battled each other until suddenly Ray was casting Time Stretch, Regrowth, and Time Stretch at an opportune time, ended up killing everyone over the course of his four extra turns.
Over at the other table, there sounded like a lot of action going on, with a lot of hooting and hollering, and at the very end 11-year-old Logan Donovan was the last man standing up to the broken Zur the Enchanter deck. Zur ended up winning, but I thought it might be fun to get young Logan’s perspective on his game. His dad helped write this up for him:
“Logan played his general on the first turn, to the delight of the other players. They all joked good naturedly about his going aggro on the first turn. An hour or so into the game and Josh (Sliver Queen), the opponent to his right, had over 1,000 tokens of various types in play. He didn’t last long as everyone was afraid of his army. Logan wasn’t worried about it at all as he had a Magus of the Moat in play. A bit later Logan managed to use Elspeth’s big ability, and suddenly his board was indestructible. He then dropped Blazing Archon making it impossible to attack him. The indestructible Archon seemed to be a game winning play, but his final opponent Chris had an untargetable Zur the Enchanter who was loaded up with the best enchantments the game had to offer. Because of lifelink and some other shenanigans that Logan couldn’t exactly remember, Chris had well over 200 life at this point in the game. After a long stalemate Chris finally managed to bounce the Archon and swing away with his unblockable untargetable general for the win. This was Logan’s second 2nd place finish in an EDH game.”
Nice going, Logan! Here’s the deck he played for those who are curious:
1 Isamaru, Hound of Konda (General)
1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
1 Ajani Goldmane
1 Yosei, the Morning Star
1 Serra Avatar
1 Serra Avenger
1 Loxodon Gatekeeper
1 Knight of Meadowgrain
1 Ranger of Eos
1 Galepowder Mage
1 Brigid, Hero of Kinsbaile
1 Magus of the Disk
1 Cenn’s Tactician
1 Knight-Captain of Eos
1 Purity
1 Northern Paladin
1 Windborn Muse
1 Blazing Archon
1 Conclave Phalanx
1 Akroma, Angel of Wrath
1 Magus of the Moat
1 Reya Dawnbringer
1 Pristine Angel
1 Spirit of the Hearth
1 Order of Whiteclay
1 Knight of the White Orchid
1 Springjack Shepherd
1 Forge[/author]-Tender”]Burrenton [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author]-Tender
1 Eight-and-a-Half-Tails
1 Leonin Sky Hunter
1 Masako the Humorless
1 Mirror Entity
1 Sigiled Paladin
1 Soul Warden
1 White Knight
1 Austere Command
1 Reprisal
1 Resurrection
1 Angelic Chorus
1 Concerted Effort
1 Resounding Silence
1 Boon Reflection
1 Heroes Remembered
1 Return to Dust
1 Mass Calcify
1 Glorious Anthem
1 Wrath of God
1 Dolmen Gate
1 Predator, Flagship
1 Akroma’s Memorial
1 Well of Lost Dreams
1 Howling Mine
1 Mind’s Eye
1 Citanul Flute
1 Loxodon Warhammer
1 Feldon’s Cane
1 Candles of Leng
1 Skullclamp
1 Sensei’s Divining Top
1 Quietus Spike
1 Vedalken Orrery
1 Icy Manipulator
1 Rustic Clachan
1 Maze of Ith
1 Icatian Store
1 Lotus Vale
1 Springjack Pasture
1 Eiganjo Castle
1 Karoo
1 Kjeldoran Outpost
1 Flagstones of Trokair
1 Strip Mine
1 Wasteland
1 Mutavault
1 Rishadan Port
25 Plains
After my first game, five us shuffled up to play an “aggro” EDH game – the house rule was that, if you had a creature that could attack, you had to send at least one creature attacking somebody to try and speed things up. Lucky for me I got about as aggro a draw as I can get, with a turn 3 Dune-Brood Nephilim and started accumulating a horde of sand warriors. Not too long and there were just two of us still standing: me and Kenny Meyer and his Rith, the Awakener deck. Yep, that’s right — two former Virginia State Champs, locked in an epic battle! Unfortunately for me Kenny’s deck was going nuts with Nemata, Grove Guardian and Gaea’s Cradle cranking out an ever-growing horde of Saproling tokens. Things were going to go pretty badly for me until I ripped a Spike Weaver to go along with Cauldron of Souls. I managed to hang on to that for a while as Kenny dug for answers to break through. I tried to combo off with Electrolyze, but he sacrificed all his Saprolings so I only got to draw around 20 or so cards, not enough to kill him, but I hang on to Spiritualize for another chance. As I attack through the air Kenny cuts me a break – cracking open a Hideaway land and playing Storm Herd, giving me enough targets for Firestorm to be lethal – provided I had enough cards left in my deck. Kenny was at 34 life, I had 39 cards left in my deck so — whew! Pulled off the second game with the intended combo.
I wanted to thank everyone who took the time to send me an email regarding last week’s interview with Aaron Forsythe, it seemed many of you enjoyed hearing from the Director of Magic as much as I did! It’s nice to know there are folks in the halls of Renton that enjoy this cool casual format too. It’ll be a little while before I come back to EDH – this week I dip back into Standard for FNM in preparation for the StarCityGames.com $5000 Standard Open, and there’s an Extended PTQ coming up, and of course there will be Conflux stuff to talk about.
See you next week!
Bennie
starcitygeezer AT gmail DOT com