Power 9 Pro – Magic The Gathering Accessories – Tournament Discussion – Deck Analysis

I generally do my best to keep up on deck tech. I don’t consider myself a rogue deck designer, most of my creations have been pretty straightforward or modifications of known strategies. I tend to look for interesting decks that I feel would be fun to play and tweak them. Sometimes this means I will play a straight tier 1 deck, and other days I’ll try something rogue. I tend to have this issue of not focusing as much on my own decks as much as playing the “bad guy” deck in our gauntlets and testing. I generally have 3 or 4 decks and offer to play whichever my opponent needs, and of course Jund was the matchup everyone wanted. While this makes me a fine a Jund player I really didn’t see myself playing infinite Jund on Jund matches so I’ve had my eye open.

What interested me about Open the Vaults was Niels Viaene’s performance at PT San Diego. Considering Boss Naya was the deck to beat leaving that tournament, I heard from folks on and off the team that Naya was not looking forward to playing against it at all. Yet there was no discussion on whether it was a valid deck or not. It seemed like a cool deck in the write ups, it just stumbled on mana in the finals. I asked around and no one had really played with it or against it. I had also played a lot of Turbo Fog and it seemed an auto-win over so many decks. However, Olivier Ruel did poorly with it at the PT and when we tested Boss Naya against it I just couldn’t beat its fast starts. I broke apart the shell and thought about playing U/W Chapin control but I knew testing would be even worse since it takes so long to resolve games. I finally just decided to put together Filigree, tested a few games, and took it to my FNM. I figured if it didn’t work I’d audible to Jund or just play Vampires at the 5K, which seemed decent in our testing.

Sideboard

Overall the strategy is pretty simple –

• Cycle your men to get your combo and fill up the yard.
• Use spreading seas as a psuedo-remand – it can definitely slow their mana down and gives you a card.
• Use all your enchantment-based removal to shut down their men.
• Stabilize your defense with Sphinx, or one of your artifact men if you have no choice.
• Open the Vaults and win.

FNM Feb 26th

Round 1 vs. GWU Bant Ramp
Neither of these games was very close, with all my removal for his big guys going unanswered. We did have a nice O-ring battle over Baneslayer for a while but I pulled out a 117 life combo and Open the Vaulted a dead O-ring onto the angel.

Round 2 vs. Vampires
This was a closer match – I had multiple spreading seas in both games to make his Mind Sludges less valuable. In game two he had a Ravenous Trap for me when I open the vaulted, but I had enough time to hardcast an angel and gain enough life to survive, filled my yard, and Open the Vaulted again for the win. Sphinx of Lost Truths is such a power card with great toughness and a great way to refill your hand after getting hit by discard.

Round 3 vs. UW
I honestly don’t remember much about this matchup, but I did win it.

Round 4 vs. Eldrazi Green
In both games he curved out quickly into Eldrazi and I never drew wrath or an O-ring for his ultimate Garruk.

I walked away from the games feeling pretty confident in the deck overall, but felt I needed more answers to aggressive starts so I put in the 3 Journey to Nowhere main. I thought I would get Pithing Needles for the board as well but never got around to it.

I spent the remainder of the night practicing and making some extra decks to give out at the 5K so I arrived in San Jose at exactly 5 minutes til the tournament started and scribbled out my decklist quickly with the original sideboard.

5K Main Flight Feb. 27th

Round 1 vs. Chapin control: 1-1-1
I found myself staring down a string of PTQ top 8 pins attached to a rather old playmat. I was a little embarrassed of my worndown Windwright Mage mat, but after seeing his mat I brought it out.

Game 1 – He thought I was U/W as well at first (common mistake everyone made) – Then I Spreading Seas his early white sources and Tectonic Edges but this let him cast Jace. I eventually O-ringed Jace out, but he countered almost everything I cast, eventually drew Iona and called White, and that was basically game. This was about a 25 minute game mainly waiting for him to decide Jace effects and resolve draw spells

Game 2 – I sided in my negates, stopped his early Jaces, got the combo off going to 27, which he Martial couped, but I combo’d again to 91 life. We now had about 10 minutes left.

Game 3 – I get smashed down with Baneslayer to 6, but I had three negates in hand early and eventually got the combo through as we went to time. I dealt with Baneslayer, and swung for 24 on turn 4, but it wasn’t enough to finish the game out before time was up. So now I’m in the draw bracket…

Round 2 vs. Naya 2-0
Double Spreading Seas made short work of his mana, and I let him flail around with a Hierarch or two and saved my removal for his big finishers. Knight of the Reliquary and Ajani are the big threats out of this deck. My removal aced all his threats one by one. He did hit me a bit but I never got below 12 and ended both games well above 20 life.

Round 3 vs. UWR 2-1
Good games, but getting Open the Vaults was too strong- He had Jace but instead of drawing cards he kept fatesealing me. This is bad when you’re playing a slow control deck. I drew O-ring for Jace and eventually combo’d out. He got Ajani out really early on the second game and blew all my lands with Jace at one step away from ultimating me. In Game 3.Spreading seas kept him off red and Ajani and I combo’d pretty early and finished him out.

Round 4 vs. Aggro Red 2-1
My opponent was undefeated but freely admitted he didn’t play standard much. This was my worst match up and he quickly blew me out with Goblin Guides, Ball Lightnings, and direct damage.

Game 2 – Spreading seas kept him off Ball Lighting mana. He got down early goblin guides but I Journeyed them. He really didn’t draw much more gas and I instead of cycling my two Architects of Will, I played them and kept him from drawing any thing else while I set up my Vaults.

Game 3 – He kept a two fetch land hand but failed to draw anymore land. At end of turn he would discard Punishing Fire instead of casting it – I think didn’t want to fetch for fear of decreasing his potential land count and I got down double sphinx to finish him off. He showed me a hand of Hell’s Thunder and Ball lightning after I finished him.

Round 5 vs. Jund 2-1
This was a pretty long match as we both got deck checked, then when I got my deck back we noticed my sleeves (which I had just bought) had some color imperfections in them. I had to re-sleeve after the match but it was definitely a distraction.

Game 1 – My removal aced his early Putrid Leeches, but I didn’t do much while he got quickly to Bloodbraid into Thrinax, and I didn’t get much down to block or trade.

Game 2 Was almost the same scenario with the top end of him casting Malakir Bloodwitch multiple times and my wrathing at least Three times. He eventually got some men to stick and hit me down to 4, and I Opened the Vaults back up to a very healthy life total and took him out.

Game 3 was similar to game 2 except my end life total was even higher. Admittedly though I would have lost without a topdeck Open the Vaults.

Round 6 vs. Naya 2-0
This was covered on Channelfireball. Again it was spreading Seas basically keeping him out of the game.

Round 7 – We draw in to the money round.

Superstars 5k – Top 32

Round 1 vs. 5-Color Cascade
Game 1 – This was a crazy matchup since I had no idea what he was doing. I seas his Exotic Orchard and Rupture Spire which allows him to cast Jace. I o-ring the Jace, but I’m stuck on 4 mana. He casts two enlisted wurms which cascade into Bitumous blast (no targets). I journey and wrath his men, and down comes Jace #2, which I eventually draw into O-ring for. He hit me with Bloodbraid into a Blighting (discarding Angel),and lands Ajani but Sharuum comes down with his pal Filigree Angel and Ajani dies. We trade back and forth a bit with him running extreme cascades but I Open the Vaults and my force overwhelms him.

Game 2 I seas his stuff again and deal with planeswalkers and Open the Vaults a small army which he has no answer for.

Round 2 vs. 27 land Jund.

Game 1 I get down early Spreading Seas, he casts rampant growth, and gets out a turn 3 elf, which I kill, and thrinax, which I kill, and turn 4 siege gang, which I wrath.

He casts broodmate and I wrath.

He casts broodmate again and I get out a Sphinx drawing and discarding 3 cards. I had OTV in my hand but never drew a third removal spell or put Angel in the yard. Broodmate took me out.

Game 2 he’s smart enough not to blightning me and though I can kill all his men on the ground, it’s his man lands that eventually get past me.

Thoughts:

The new sideboard is still a work in progress. Courier’s capsule is “most likely to get sided out” in favor of what game you’re playing, and depending on how many and what type of men your opponent is playing you go up or down on the removal. Pithing Needle tends to hit all the cards you would O-ring (Ajani, Jace) but it mainly combats the man lands as well, which this deck has trouble with. Mind Control goes in against U/W against baneslayers and Iona.

61 card Open Filligree v.2

Sideboard

When I applied to write for Power9pro.com I highlighted the fact that I attended drafts pretty often and would be glad to write about them. One of the local stores has draft FNMs as well as a draft every Tuesday night as well. But with LOST moving to Tuesdays and trying to factor in dating with PTQs every saturday, my draft nights have been few and far between.

One of the great things about Magic Online (MODO from here on out) is it’s super easy to get in a draft. UNLESS those drafts happen to be the 64 man release event drafts. Those you have to sign up for days in advance. I haven’t had a chance to do one of these since I top 4′d an M10 64-man. What a top 4 in these events does is qualify you for the set release championship. It’s a sealed tournament where first place is a foil playset of the new set. Not bad. So my ultimate goal was to qualify for this. And being on a hot run of limited lately, I thought my chances were pretty good.

I had monday off so I spent it running errands and cleaning my apartment and playing MODO. I kind of got sick of that so I started playing xbox. I did this thinking I had all afternoon free b/c I signed up for the 8pm 64-man draft. Only I didn’t, I signed up for the 4pm. So when I got up to check my email for a second and saw the MODO tab blinking I was pretty pissed. Luckily I only missed one pick. I didn’t have my draft recorder set at the time (reformatted my CPU recently) but I can only imagine what I passed someone for the very sweet autopick of Soaring *Bleeping* Seacliffs.

Already disenchanted, I did my best with what I could scrounge up and ended up Red/Black with 2 plated geopede, 2 corrupted zendikon and light black removal. I had to pass 2 searing blaze because I was extremely low on creatures. I did end up with chain reaction, which I figure would get me back into games I was behind, but I only drew it once and I never cast it.

I never had to. I went 2-0, 2-0, 2-0 winning my pod and top 8ing.

Here’s the deck I ended up with. It’s missing a card but 3 of my game replays from the first pod were missing and whatever the card is, I never ever drew it in those three games.

Notable sideboard cards were Mind Sludge, Mire Toll and Bog Tatters. I don’t pick mire toll early, but it can deal with a guy who is otherwise undealwithable.

Now a few words about my personal feelings on Zendikar Block Limited.

-I really, REALLY like blue. All it’s good creatures are excellent. They have a lot of tricks with bouncing and tapping down and paralyzing. Vapor Snare might be the best non-rare in limited right now.Everything they do is really strong but you have to stay aggressive with them. I think that UB or UR are exactly what I want to be seeing and while I’m not willing to force it, I feel like if I can get blue even if it’s UW I’m going to be happy with having the chance to play into the top 4.

-I think white is really strong, but I don’t ever know what to couple it with. I’ve never been able to pull off mono white but I think if one could pull that off it’d be pretty awesome. White has some great stuff and I’d e happy to open any white.

-Unless I’m mono green I don’t really want anything to do with it.

-Above all else, I want to open Ob Nixlis he is the card I pray for every time I queue a draft or sign up for a sealed.

The draft converter software online does not come out well on our webblog here so I’m pasting the good old MODO converter text below so you can check out my picks with commentary!

Pack 1 pick 1:
–> Ob Nixilis, the Fallen
Piranha Marsh
Sky Ruin Drake
Journey to Nowhere
Makindi Shieldmate
Caller of Gales
Mark of Mutiny
Bladetusk Boar
Needlebite Trap
Grazing Gladehart
Desecrated Earth
Cobra Trap
Forest
Cliff Threader
Turntimber Grove

1 – I barely looked at the rest of the pack and saw I was sending Journey and mostly junk. I don’t like BG so I didn’t care about the gladehart, but I do like Black with any other color and wanted to be cognizent of what was shipping. Ob Nixlis is my favorite first pick. He’s the guy I pray for every time I start a draft. I even joked to my friend Andy about likely passing him in the first draft when I missed my pick.

Pack 1 pick 2:
Ruinous Minotaur
Slaughter Cry
Blade of the Bloodchief
Joraga Bard
Stonework Puma
Feast of Blood
Scythe Tiger
Akoum Refuge
Mire Blight
Sunspring Expedition
Paralyzing Grasp
–> Mark of Mutiny
Pillarfield Ox
Mountain

2 – This pack blows. My options are paralyzing grasp, mark of mutiny, stonework puma, slaughter cry or blade of the bloodchief. Forcing vampires is hard, so blade and feast of blood are off the table. I narrow it to mark and grasp, I’d really like to be UB but I don’t want to force it and I take the mark.

Pack 1 pick 3:
Ior Ruin Expedition
Swamp
–> Disfigure
Pillarfield Ox
Explorer’s Scope
Punishing Fire
Trapmaker’s Snare
Vampire Lacerator
Kor Hookmaster
Bala Ged Thief
Brave the Elements
Sky Ruin Drake
Timbermaw Larva

3 – I don’t like lacerator much and it’s not nearly as much a signal as disfigure, as disfigure rules combat so well. For disfigure to get 2 packs to the left means I should have no problem getting enough black to justify my bomb.

Pack 1 pick 4:
Seascape Aerialist
Noble Vestige
Merfolk Wayfinder
Tempest Owl
Shatterskull Giant
Spell Pierce
Zektar Shrine Expedition
Hedron Scrabbler
Plains (FOIL)
–> Giant Scorpion
Bloodghast
Swamp

4 – I go back and forth on this pick quite a bit and I actually originalyl almost slam-clicked bloodghast. Bloodghast is fine but like lacerator gets outclassed quickly so I take the scorpion who is usually a great piece of removal.

Pack 1 pick 5:
Kabira Crossroads
Mold Shambler
–> Windrider Eel
Goblin Ruinblaster
Hagra Crocodile
Graypelt Refuge
Cliff Threader
Soaring Seacliff
Island
Oran-Rief Recluse
Teetering Peaks

5 – It could be wrong but I took the presence of EEL to be a signal. Eel is great if they don’t have removal and can end games on his own. I really would like to be blue over any other color so I slam this down figuring the croc will wheel if I really want it.

Pack 1 pick 6:
Swamp
Unstable Footing
Beast Hunt
Cancel
Quest for Ancient Secrets
–> Bog Tatters
Shieldmate’s Blessing
Crypt of Agadeem
Slaughter Cry
Kor Outfitter

6 – Even if I’m not playing black this guy blocks big guys well and is a force to be reckoned with when turned sideways.

Pack 1 pick 7:
Vampire Lacerator
Highland Berserker
Landbind Ritual
Vastwood Gorger
Harrow
Trailblazer’s Boots
Kor Cartographer
Island
–> Whiplash Trap

7 – Another tough one, again I don’t like lacerator and though my deck isn’t aggressive right now, I don’t expect it to stay that way and I windmill slam one of my favorite cards in the format.

Pack 1 pick 8:
–> Goblin Shortcutter
Plains
Desecrated Earth
Caller of Gales
Spidersilk Net
Caravan Hurda
Trailblazer’s Boots
Narrow Escape

Pack 1 pick 9:
Piranha Marsh
–> Sky Ruin Drake
Caller of Gales
Needlebite Trap
Cobra Trap
Forest
Turntimber Grove

9 – one of my favorite blue cards, should be called Stabilizer Drake.

Pack 1 pick 10:
Scythe Tiger
–> Akoum Refuge
Mire Blight
Sunspring Expedition
Pillarfield Ox
Mountain

Pack 1 pick 11:
Ior Ruin Expedition
Swamp
Explorer’s Scope
Trapmaker’s Snare
–> Bala Ged Thief

11 – She could make it if I end up with some Umara Raptors or other allies.

Pack 1 pick 12:
Noble Vestige
–> Tempest Owl
Plains (FOIL)
Swamp

I don’t hate tempest owl as a board card when I’m playing a deck that will just stall the board out.

Pack 1 pick 13:
Kabira Crossroads
–> Soaring Seacliff
Island

Pack 1 pick 14:
Swamp
–> Quest for Ancient Secrets

Pack 1 pick 15:
–> Island

—— ZEN ——

Pack 2 pick 1:
Bog Tatters
Archmage Ascension
Shoal Serpent
Khalni Gem
Grim Discovery
Kor Outfitter
River Boa
Spell Pierce
Runeflare Trap
Torch Slinger
–> Crypt Ripper
Forest
Demolish
Territorial Baloth
Soaring Seacliff

16 – Pretty bad pack, but I’m heavy black and would like to stay that way and Ripper is just fine for that. He also commands the board if I run 10+ swamps.

Pack 2 pick 2:
Heartstabber Mosquito
Beast Hunt
Gomazoa
Summoning Trap
–> Welkin Tern
Forest
Needlebite Trap
Spidersilk Net
Soul Stair Expedition
Shieldmate’s Blessing
Shoal Serpent
Plated Geopede
Molten Ravager
Sejiri Refuge

17 – Tough call here, but as I said before I’d like to be aggressive and welkin tern is the most aggressive 2 drop that blue has.

Pack 2 pick 3:
Turntimber Basilisk
Highland Berserker
Reckless Scholar
Magma Rift
Savage Silhouette
Zendikar Farguide
Shieldmate’s Blessing
–> Mind Sludge
Bog Tatters
Mountain
Slaughter Cry
Kabira Crossroads
Cancel

18 – Awful pack. I don’t much like reckless scholar, and in the off chance I am nearly mono black I take the sludge.

Pack 2 pick 4:
–> Guul Draz Vampire
Tuktuk Grunts
Narrow Escape
Expedition Map
Blood Seeker
Kazandu Refuge
Spreading Seas
Harrow
Island
Seismic Shudder
Hagra Diabolist
Goblin Shortcutter

19 – I’m not a huge fan of guul draz but I don’t love blood seeker either. Guul draz has a lot more upside so I snag it.

Pack 2 pick 5:
Ior Ruin Expedition
Scythe Tiger
Nimbus Wings
Harrow
Relic Crush
–> Summoner’s Bane
Frontier Guide
Trapfinder’s Trick
Vampire’s Bite
Mountain
Spire Barrage

20 – I don’t love this pick but it is a great sideboard card and a tempo swing. Vampire’s bite is possible but I didn’t see myself running it as most of my guys have some form of evasion so far.

Pack 2 pick 6:
Magma Rift
Baloth Cage Trap
Mountain
Mire Blight
Zendikar Farguide
Soul Stair Expedition
Khalni Heart Expedition
–> Jwar Isle Refuge
Quest for Pure Flame
Molten Ravager

21 – this pack sucks but I’ll take the fixing.

Pack 2 pick 7:
Plains
Goblin Shortcutter
Lethargy Trap
Tanglesap
Hellfire Mongrel
Goblin Bushwhacker
–> Crypt Ripper
Blood Seeker
Spidersilk Net

22 – Was really excited to see this guy, at pick 7 in this pack I’m likely the only heavy black drafter.

Pack 2 pick 8:
Savage Silhouette
Ravenous Trap (FOIL)
Hagra Crocodile
Island
–> Windrider Eel
Stonework Puma
Quest for Pure Flame
Kor Cartographer

23 – Though I now have a lot of high drops, they’re all top notch.

Pack 2 pick 9:
Archmage Ascension
Shoal Serpent
–> Spell Pierce
Runeflare Trap
Forest
Demolish
Soaring Seacliff

Pack 2 pick 10:
Beast Hunt
Forest
–> Needlebite Trap
Spidersilk Net
Shoal Serpent
Sejiri Refuge

Pack 2 pick 11:
Savage Silhouette
Shieldmate’s Blessing
Bog Tatters
Mountain
–> Cancel

Pack 2 pick 12:
Expedition Map
–> Blood Seeker
Island
Seismic Shudder

Pack 2 pick 13:
Scythe Tiger
–> Trapfinder’s Trick
Mountain

Pack 2 pick 14:
Mountain
–> Mire Blight

Pack 2 pick 15:
–> Plains

—— WWK ——

Pack 3 pick 1:
Surrakar Banisher
Jagwasp Swarm
Nature’s Claim
Kitesail Apprentice
Eye of Ugin
Corrupted Zendikon
Swamp
Kitesail
Smoldering Spires
Crusher Zendikon
–> Bloodhusk Ritualist
Join the Ranks
Refraction Trap
Cosi’s Ravager
Ricochet Trap

31 – This pack is brutal. I love corrupted Zendikon and I really want it, and it would go along with my “be aggressive” aim here, but Bloodhusk ritualist is a blowout, look for it to win me a game down the road.

Pack 3 pick 2:
–> Horizon Drake
Claws of Valakut
Mordant Dragon
Groundswell
Veteran’s Reflexes
Quest for Renewal
Surrakar Banisher
Fledgling Griffin
Grotag Thrasher
Snapping Creeper
Plains
Halimar Excavator
Shoreline Salvager
Khalni Garden

32 – Shoreline salvager is awesome and obviously with UB he’s so premium, but is a 3/3 four drop really going to compare with 2 rippers and 2 eels? probably not. Though horizon drake is tougher on my mana, he makes the three best Zendikons look so stupid, and he gets in for 3 in the air.

Pack 3 pick 3:
Mire’s Toll
Battle Hurda
Island
Halimar Depths
Quag Vampires (FOIL)
Twitch
–> Dead Reckoning
Leatherback Baloth
Permafrost Trap
Refraction Trap
Akoum Battlesinger
Explore
Agadeem Occultist

33 – I hate to see a second refraction trap get passed as it’s probably the biggest blow out instant in the format, but I love dead reckoning, especially with Ob Nixlis considering I couldn’t snag any grim discoveries.

Pack 3 pick 4:
Swamp
Kitesail
Enclave Elite
Nemesis Trap
Dread Statuary
Bojuka Bog
Ruthless Cullblade
Grappler Spider
Hedron Rover
Bull Rush
–> Caustic Crawler
Iona’s Judgment

34 – Another high drop, but he has so much value in this format. there are hundres if not thousands of creatures in Zendikar and Worldwake with just 1 toughness. But it was tough to pass a two drop.

Pack 3 pick 5:
Walking Atlas
Ruthless Cullblade
Hedron Rover
Roiling Terrain
Sejiri Steppe
Battle Hurda
–> Urge to Feed
Dispel
Forest
Calcite Snapper
Sejiri Merfolk

35 – Here I pass another ruthless cullblade for urge to feed because I’m really removal light. Calcite snapper was another option but I would rather not double blue.

Pack 3 pick 6:
Grotag Thrasher
Surrakar Banisher
Forest
Veteran’s Reflexes
Vastwood Animist
Selective Memory (FOIL)
Snapping Creeper
Perimeter Captain
Khalni Garden
–> Halimar Excavator

36 – Halimar Excavator is fine, he blocks a ton of guys. I don’t end up maindeckiing him but I board him in every match.

Pack 3 pick 7:
Bull Rush
Iona’s Judgment
Island
Grappler Spider
Scrib Nibblers
Bojuka Bog
–> Ruthless Cullblade
Enclave Elite
Spell Contortion

37 – Finally I take a ruthless Cullblade.

Pack 3 pick 8:
Perimeter Captain
Forest
Cosi’s Ravager
Kitesail Apprentice
Grappler Spider
Mysteries of the Deep
–> Æther Tradewinds
Halimar Depths

38 – I’m not going to run mysteries and I really like tradewinds, bounce in general is good when you’re trying to be aggressive.

Pack 3 pick 9:
Surrakar Banisher
Nature’s Claim
–> Corrupted Zendikon
Swamp
Smoldering Spires
Cosi’s Ravager
Ricochet Trap

39 – Never have I been so happy to see a card wheel.

Pack 3 pick 10:
Veteran’s Reflexes
Quest for Renewal
–> Surrakar Banisher
Snapping Creeper
Plains
Khalni Garden

40 – He won’t make the cut.

Pack 3 pick 11:
Mire’s Toll
Island
Halimar Depths
–> Quag Vampires (FOIL)
Twitch

41 – This guy is an all-star and I got him 11th pick, makes my curve so much better with his presence.

Pack 3 pick 12:
Swamp
–> Enclave Elite
Bojuka Bog
Bull Rush

42 – Same potential as the vampires but not as good and could come in out of the board.

Pack 3 pick 13:
Roiling Terrain
–> Dispel
Forest

43 – Awesome. In case of refraction trap!!!

Pack 3 pick 14:
Forest
–> Veteran’s Reflexes

Pack 3 pick 15:
–> Island

Here’s the 40 I end up with:

I ran the maindeck cancel over mind sludge b/c if I drop Ob Nixlis with Cancel backup they only have one turn to kill him before he’s going to end the game. Also it’s just good for dealing with bombs that my deck is not built to handle very well. Also cancel is just a huge tempo swing when you have crypt rippers beating in next turn.

I ended up boarding out Guul Draz Vampire almost every match for Halimar Excavator. the 1/3 is just too good of a statline to ignore and I never drew GDV.

Top 8 Round 1 vs. LAB103

Game 1 I kept 2 swamp, 2 island, Jwar Isle Refuge, Urge to Feed, Windrider Eel on the draw.

He starts with Bojuka Brigand on turns 2 and 3 but he never sees a third land. I drop a topdecked Welkin Tern on 2, urge to feed his 3/3 on 3, drop my eel on four, then on 5 drop a land with corrupted Zendkon and crush.

Game 2 I brought in Bog Tatters for Guul Draz Vampire and kept this on the draw: 2 Island, Jwar Isle Refuge, Windrider Eel, Bloodhusk Ritualist, Cancel, Bog Tatters.

He gets stuck on land again after leading with a Bojuka Brigand and Corrupted Zendkon. I trade Death Scorption with his 3/3, then Curve into Eel then Bog Tatters. He has hideous end for the Eel, so I drop a cullblade leaving cancel mana up. He taps out for Nimana Sell-Sword and I cancel it, then drop ripper and strike him down to 4. He has gatekeeper to pare down my board but he has nothing for Bog Tatters who swing in ftw.

So I’m qualified for the Worldwake championship, which was my goal. I missed the 64 man drafts for Zendikar, but I got to the top 4 in an m10 64-man. That time I bounced out due to bad keeps in the top 4 when I had an extremely strong deck. I didn’t want that to happen this time.

Round 2 vs. Ace of Drafts

Game 1 is missing from my recaps but I know I got there with Ob Nixlis despite his Felidar Sovereign. I know I was really low so I had to triple block the Sovereign to kill it even though I feared refraction trap, luckily he didn’t have it and Ob Nix went the distance.

Game 2 I decided not to bring in dispel b/c I didn’t see refraction trap but I did bring in the excavator. I kept: 2 Swamp, 1 Island, Eel, Drake, Crawler, Whiplash trap.

Definitely a slow hand, but he had a slow w/r deck game 1. This game he comes out swinging with Kazaandu Blademaster followed by cliff treader. He swings on 3 and tries to Join the Ranks to pump his blademaster but I cancel it.I drop my eel and trade with his treader, which may have been a mistake b/c when he dropped Grotag Thrasher next turn I really was behind in combat for the rest of the game. I stabilized a bit until he dropped Bladetusk Boar who went the distance.

Game 3 I keep 3 swamp, ripper, crawler, bloodhusk ritualist, halimar excavator on the play.

Not the best hand but it’s fine and I almost never mulligan in limited. He has a turn 2 steppe lynx, I play a turn 3 Corrupted Zendikon and a turn 4 blood seeker without a fourth land and swing with the Zendikon. He swings with his lynx and on my turn I rip blue and drop the excavator after swinging with Zendikon, seeker. He join the ranks and trades a token with my seeker. He swings in with his lynx and a hellfire mongrel he played the previous turn. I block the lynx with the excavator and disfigure the mongrel. He has no play so I drop ripper and swing him down to four, still fearing a refraction trap that never comes. Then he drops Felidar Sovereign. Great. So he has 2 card in hand, I have 5 lands out but one is the Zendikon. I can Bloodhusk Ritualist him out of a hand, but he’ll definitely be able to swing in with his Sovereign, I decide on this and he discards Land, Brave the Elements which would’ve had me calling my mama if he had the chance to play it.
On his turn he swings and goes up to 8 and I’m at 8. I go in with just the ripper with 4 swamps up, he chumps with the ally token. I pass b/c I just ripped urge to feed. He comes in with sovereign after Passing Ionas Judgement on my Zendikon. I block with Ritualist and Excavator, Urge to Feed pumping my Ritualist and he scoops to his dead Sovereign despite being at 9 life.

Finals vs. DutchMojo – This guy was cool, one of the cool few people I’ve come across on modo. He wasn’t spiteful about my bombs and even pointed out when I handed im game 2. He said he doesnt modo a lot but I threw him on my buddylist b/c I like to see when ppl are in certain rooms playing events. I’m a total stalker.

Game 1 on the draw I keep – 1 island, soaring seacliffs, jwar isle refuge, disfigure, ob nixlis, ritualist, ripper.

His first two turns he spits out Adventuring gear and Trusty machete, with no guys, and only mountains.

He plays a goblin shortcutter on 3 and equips the gear, figuring he’s short on guys I disfigure it. I rip cullblade and drop that. He pays three for a goblin torchslinger. I attack and he doesnt block, so I drop ritualist kicking once, he discards grazing gladeheart. He double equips the slinger and beats me down to 15. I swing him down to 14 and drop ripper in main 2 with a swamp up so I can trade if he doesn’t hit a land. He hits a forest and swings me down to 9 and drops summit apes. I’ve got ob nixlis and 2 islands in hand. I drop my ob nix and make him a 6/6. he double equips the apes, plays a land making him a 9/5 and swings. I trade my cullblade, my ripper and my ritualist for the apes. My turn comes I rip whiplash trap, make Ob nix a 9/9 and drop a welkin tern that I drew the turn before. He drops oren-rief recluse and passes. In his endstep I whiplash his 2 blockers and alpha ftw.

Game 2 on the draw I keep 2 swamp, Island, Jwar Isle Refuge, 2 rippers and Aether Tradewinds.

He leads with a shortcutter and I rip bloodseeker and drop it. He plays claws hitting me for 5. I swing for 1. He drops goblin guide and swings in. He gives me a swamp and I tradewinds the bloodseeker and his shortcutter getting rid of his claws. He redrops shortcutter in main 2. I rip horizon drake and drop it hoping to block and trade b/c I don’t want to trade either of my rippers who will totally outclass his 2 power guys on turn 5 becuase I can pump and control the board. I trade with his goblin guide after it reveals Quag Vampires. I decide instead of ripper to drop the Quag as a 2/2 and drop bloodseeker, hoping to trade across the board and then let my crypt rippers reign supreme. In his main 2 he drops a slinger for 3 and passes. I do my aforementioned play but he has a second shortcutter to mess up my blocks. I play a ripper next turn and swing pumping once and drop my second ripper with just 2 islands in my hand. He drops adventuring gear, equips and passes. I swing with a ripper for 3 and drop a windrider eel keeping my 2 lands in play. He plays a land and swings with his equipped shortcutter which I chump with bloodseeker. Then he drops summit apes.

Here’s where my opponent says I screwed the pooch and after rewatching I totally did. He’s at 11 with a summit apes and a goblin shortcutter. I have eel, and 2 crypt ripper with 7 black mana sources. I dropped an island making my Eel 4/4 and decided not to swing with just the eel. But If I had done the math I would’ve realize that he had to block both my guys or he dies. As a result he ended up dropping two more guys and being able to get me to 4 and spire barrage me out. so I lose game 2.

Game 3 on the play I keep 2 swamp, 1 Island, death scorpion, crypt ripper, urge to feed, whiplash trap.

He has a turn 1 goblin guide (for the record has anyone ever won with a turn 1 goblin guide in limited? I know I haven’t) revealing halimar excavator which I play on turn 2. His turn 2 is Basilisk Collar. SERIOUSLY?!. I swing w/ my 1/3 and drop another 1/3 in Death Scorpion. Instead of equipping he plays claws of valakut putting me to 14 since I can’t block it. His GG gives me a swamp and I rip another swamp on my turn. I attack him to 17 with my army of 1/3s and urge to feed his goblin guide. He has no play on turn 4 so I drop the ripper with one swamp up but I choose not to pump for fear of punishing fire or burst lightning or something. (while I haven’t seen these cards, I almost never tap out with ripper on the board if I can help it, he’s too important to let die).

On his turn he drops highland bezerker and equips the basilisk collar. I rip jwar isle refuge, drop it and then aether tradewinds it and his bezerker so I can beat in for 5 and catch him down to 8. He plays Spire Barrage on my ripper then passes and I swing him to 6. I topdeck dead reckoning which I use to get back my ripper and shoot his bezerker for 2 but he has groundswell to keep it alive! Haymakers are going left and right right now and I’m out of answers to his basilisk collar for the moment.

He goes, equip gear, plays a land and drops shortcutter and goes up to 10. My hand is whiplash trap and swamp with Crypt Ripper on top of my deck. I drop my ripper but he moved his collar to the shortcutter to hold me off. This turn he swings in and trades with my scoprion but goes up to 14. Then he equips his bezerker and passes. My draw is ritualist, so if I wait on attacks and whiplash trapping, I can let him gain more life but will be able to bounce in his end step, then make him discard his whole hand, basically taking him out of the game. So I wait again and he swings again and I don’t block so it’s 18-8 in favor of him and I’m pretty sure he thinks he has the game. He drops Crusher Zendikon in main 2 and passes. In his end step I bounce his enchanted land and his bezerker, then in my main2 I discard his hand with ritualist after swinging for 10. On his turn he rips a shortcutter and equips but I drew disfigure so I kill it and swing in for the win before he can try and re-stabilize with life gain.

So I win my first ever premiere event, pocketing 20 packs and 6 QPs. I’ve come up short on QPs the last two seasons with 7 each, but this season I’m already at 9 and it hasn’t even been a week, so at this point I’ll be just trying not to choke. But with a trip to New Orleans slated for next week I’m going to be hard pressed to fit in MODO. I’m also going to be missing one of almost a dozen PTQs online and in New England over the next two weeks, which is kind of a bummer, but I already let magic affect my every day life well… every day, I really don’t want to let it affect the special plans I make to take trips and do things with friends and/or babes.

Thanks for reading,

Mike Gemme
mike@power9pro.com
Bobbysapphire on MTGO

Decks can sometimes come from the most off-handed and reckless thoughts or actions. It seems a fitting occurrence that such impulsiveness would get Goblins into my bag for a trip to our local store’s new “Playtest Tuesday” event. The plan was to have players gather at the store for a couple hours of building, trading, talk, and testing, followed by a brief casual three round swiss tournament. Part of the idea is to try out deck ideas that you maybe wouldn’t want to trot out at FNM, but still want to give a good shake.

My Tuesday afternoon was to be busy and as I’m about to head out the door I looked at all the halfway torn apart decks and my FNM deck and decided this simply would not do. Needing to get out the door, I quickly put together in my head the not-yet-complete Legacy Goblins deck that I’ve been piecing together and a seemingly random Uncommon out of Worldwake: Quest for the Goblin Lord, which I remember being last pick in a recent draft.

Goblins are a competitive consideration for Legacy, made occasional showings in Lorwyn-era Standard, and briefly blipped on the radar shortly after M10 was released. Decks built around the tribe can put out impressive damage very quickly; there was a new card to play with, and I had a core set of cards to pull from already set aside and aching to be played. Besides, the night was to be ideas and semi-casual competition, right?

With around ten minutes of searching and sleeving, I cobbled together the following decklist, although I will admit a certain amount of shame at the poor sideboard that I just slapped together:

I arrived at the store just before the tourney, and I didn’t really get any time for small talk or discussion of the deck. I quickly asked around for my missing Quests, as I only had that single draft reject when I built the deck, and the folks there were plenty happy to be rid of them.

With only three rounds, the night was due to go quickly, but I was excited to try out my contraption against some of the decks I saw there. My matches went Jund, Boss Naya, and ended on UW Chapin. I ask forgiveness as in my haste and the casual nature of the night, I lack detailed notes on each game, and that’s not really the point of this article anyhow, but I will recall briefly what I can.

Jund seemed to suffer from being Jund against the massively fast amounts of damage Goblins could dish out, being slow on mana, and only getting guys down on turn two and three allowed me to quickly roll them. Getting Quest online and dropping Chieftans into play as early as turn 3 didn’t hurt either and Jund stumbling on mana just laid down and died.

Boss Naya, other than the name giving flashbacks to my console gaming days, gave me figurative fits. I quickly applied ludicrous amounts of pressure game one, but quickly came under the hammer, quite literally, as a resolved Behemoth Sledge began to eat my guys and bring the Naya player from burn range to victory in short order. This is where I became grateful for one quick consideration I did make during my speed-building session: Tuktuk Scrapper in the SB.

This little Goblin Ally comes in with a handy Shatter that will handle a Sledge or Basilisk Collar and ping the owner of such implements while he’s at it. My only regret is not having at least one more SB. Thanks to the Scrapper, I take game two. Surprisingly, and thanks to game one’s Naya come back from the brink, game three ends with a draw due to a frantic race in turns with Naya only one (missing) top decked Lightning Bolt away from death.

UW Chapin is a frustrating and strange deck to sit across from. Game one, again I get a high-powered Warren Instigator in before there is anything the opponent can do, and I roll them like a ball downhill. Game two, and for this I kick myself, I fail to consider that the opponent might side in Kor Firewalkers, In my defense, I had not seen the UW Chapin list yet, so I was not fully informed, but I slapped a playset of Unstable Footing in just for such a circumstance.

Quickly applying pressure, I bring him down to the single digits when he drops a Firewalker. I mentally roundhouse myself, but also can’t help but smile at what may be one of my new favorite creatures.  Besides, even with him gaining life and having a protected blocker, my goblin swarm can get damage through, and if I resolve an Eldrazi Monument, the game will be mine. I keep him on low life, even with him countering my guys and gaining from it. Of course this means when I have him at two life he drops another Firewalker.  Thanks to Ruinblaster and Edge eating his manlands, the game goes on till he finally drops Iona, Shield of Emeria with only 2 minutes left in the round. We called it a draw.

Good for a cheap pack, I took this deck to play against some buddies the next night. My goblin horde has eaten a weak Vampire deck, a UB Ally Combo deck, and in the toughest matchup, they lost to a Bant Shroud deck, courtesy of Deft Duelist.

In discussion of the deck, we have considered a couple of splash opportunities, using either Arid Mesa to enable a Stoneforge Mystic package with Firewalker as a possible extension, or going with Scalding Tarn and a package of cheap and unexpected counterspells like Dispel to help power down things in the control match, or fend off opposing removal.

I’m personally leaning towards the white splash, allowing me to do tricks such as the one suggested by fellow Power 9 Pro team member Dillon Wilson, equipping SGC with a Basilisk Collar. Tentatively, I think the package will look something like this:

Out

In

The sideboard needs some help, but I know that I’m going to be looking for at least one more Ruinblaster and Scrapper, likely more Searing Blaze, and possibly a Path to Exile or two. I want to avoid going too Boros, but the power of the Stoneforge Mystic and Basilisk Collar are undeniable, and having a couple non-goblins allows me to run Assaults without leaving the door open. Another great thing is that the Quest for the Goblin Lord only cares about goblins as they enter the battlefield. Once it is online, it’ll gladly give everyone a +2/+0 boost.

Now, I’ll open up another thought or two for feedback which you can leave in the comments below. Should Voracious Dragon take the place of Eldrazi Monument? Should we look at Glory of Warfare instead of the Quest?

I’ve had a lot of fun with this randomly thrown together, Quest-inspired deck and look forward to working on it and making it as strong as possible. Is there a chance that WotC is throwing us a bone here and that the tribal deck that maybe poised to kick Jund off its throne is not Vampires, but rather Goblins? Packing synergy, speed, and power, I really think the little red guys have a decent chance.

Rob J.
P.S. Follow me on Twitter @RobJelf

When it comes to Magic: The Gathering, hype is a strange beast. With the universal language of the internet greasing the wheels, a magic meta can spin out of control in a mere 24 hours. I fell into this trap last night playing in the latest online ptq. Today I’m going to take a look at what transpired over the 24 hours leading up to the PTQ and how I bought into the hype and got burned, and then address some of the same issues I’m dealing with in preparing my friend on the Pro Tour for PT San Diego.

Two weeks ago when I top 8′d my first PTQ, the meta was pretty much one deck: Dark Depths / Thopter (DDT). In the two weeks leading up to that tournament, DDT was absolutely dominant and top 8’s were littered with the list all over MTGO. I was more than happy to sleeve up a very fast zoo deck to beat them to the punch; it was such a good meta-call that I could play sloppy whilst drunk and on no sleep and still go 7-1 losing only to running turn 1 blood moons- but I digress.

The last two weeks have seen the online, Extended meta get mixed up a little bit more. There was a bit more dredge, some faeries, and a little zoo but most of the good players online were still playing DDT. I had tested some different zoo builds in that time and mainly not done great, but I finally settled on one with maindeck meddling mages with damping matrix in the sideboard and 3-1′d a daily event the night before the ptq.

When I looked at the decklists from the event the next day, there were a LOT of zoo decks that 3-1′d or better. And then I caught the lists fromt he Premiere event that started at midnight on Thursday morning and six of the top eight decks were zoo with Knight of the Reliquary, most with maindeck Jitte and one with main deck Blood Moon!

Well my friends and I went into crisis mode: we needed Deathmark in the sideboard; I needed Jittes, probably in the maindeck; my Goblin Guide had to be Knight now that it was going to be outclassed. My Gmail inbox was overloaded during my Thursday workday and the two hours after work leading up to the PTQ was crafting the perfect deck to beat Zoo and probably still be good against DDT.

Guess how many Zoo decks I faced: ZERO.
I even dropped a match to DDT, something I’d only done once and mainly do to mulligans.

Would three maindeck Meddling Mage gotten me past my gauntlet last night? Perhaps, I did face Hive Mind, Pox Rock and Thopter Foundry three times. Did Jitte win me any games? Nope. Did I attack once with Knight of the Reliquary last night? Septuple Nope.

I bought into the hype, and I got burned.

A card that has received a ton of Standard buzz lately is Jace, The Mind Sculptor. I’m expecting to have to face this guy tonight at Friday Night Magic as I battle for 90 in store credit so that I can buy my own 1.5 Jaces.

I have had the opportunity to play with and against the Mind Sculptor on Magic Workstation and so far I’m not buying into the hype.

My friend Jason Ford is Qualified for San Diego after his top 50 finish in Austin and we’ve been testing the balls off of Grixis and the new blue cards in Worldwake and here is some of the things we’ve found.

Treasure Hunt is doing just what you want it to. It’s smoothing out your draws and getting you a spell. Sometimes it flips another treasure hunt and it’s kind of lame and sometimes it gets you through three land and hits Earthquake after your opponent cast Martial Coup and has you dead on board.

Calcite Snapper is better than advertised. I’ve been loving this card. It locks down a board that can’t swarm, and when you’re packing 4 Lightning Bolt and 4 Terminate you can probably keep the swarm down. Then, when your opponent over-extends to push through, you can earthquake his team or drop a land and beat in for four.

Then there’s the aforementioned Jace. We’ve played a bunch of games with Jace and I think a blue deck won when he hit the table once, maybe twice. He’s not easy to protect as a Jund player can simply hold his Blightning or Maelstrom Pulse for when a Planeswalker hits the table. And unless you’re scrying for one right when he hits the table (which isn’t very gamebreaking) and Lightning Bolt will do.

Grixis, mainly, has not been cutting it. The deck is no Jund. It can do some fun stuff and has some strong cards but it has struggled to get the win. After some games there are always times where an Earthquake here would’ve won it, or if this Cruel ultimatum was a Sphinx of Jwar Isle the Blue deck likely would’ve won, but Jund doesn’t normally have those games where it couldn’t draw enough to win. What Jund does is unfair, what Grixis does isn’t.

One thing We’ve taken to doing with some of our standard builds is make a list with a bunch of singletons in it, so that we’re constantly hitting different “game plans” and generally get a taste for things that are working and arent. I would say that counters are not working right now, and spot removal is. I think if you’re playing blue and red, then you should pack Double Negative in your 75 because it’s at worst a cancel.

A couple more things about Grixis: you can leave Mysteries of the deep on the bench, you’ve only got 4 fetches in the deck and while instant speed is good, you’re better off just playing divination if you want to draw two cards.

Cruel Ultimatum isn’t that good. When your only 7 creatures have shroud, there’s a damn good chance you’re not getting a guy back from your graveyard. And playing things like Architects of Will is not even remotely the same as packing Mulldrifter like in the days of yore. A number of times the Grixis player has cast Cruel Ultimatum and still lost because it’s not that hard to play around discarding three cards, and in Jund when almost every creature you play is actaully two creatures, sacrificing one doesnt matter.

The thing that is ending games for Grixis is Sphinx of Jwar Isle. No he does not beat Baneslayer Angel but you have answers for that guy in Terminate and Jace. The only thing Jund has for this guy is double blocking with Broodmate Dragon (unless you’re dead on board already), which is pretty darn narrow.

There is some Buzz about using Everflowing Chalice to get you to Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker but that just further turns on your opponent’s maelstrom pulses. I know I’m focusing a lot on Jund right now, but if you’re not beating Vampires with this deck you need to see if you can beat Jund and UWR and we started with Jund. Grixis couldn’t beat it so we mostly moved on.

This is the list I would run if I was going to sleeve up Grixis, using Cruel Ultimatum Only in the Board. This might get you through Jund, but vamps and other control decks are still a major issue.

My opinion is that the blue decks are going to have trouble finishing games no matter what. Sphinx of Jwar Isle is clearly the answer in my eyes, it’s just a matter of getting to him.

For the record, I would just play Jund. Jund may have some issues with Ajani Vengeant and UWR (though I did get a 9/9 Raging Ravine to take out some Wall of Denials), but for the most part Jund isn’t losing much. I’ve been using Jund and beating the control decks at a steady clip, doing it without Great Sable Stag to boot. A lot of your removal is dead against these control decks obviously, but savvy Jund players are terminating their Sprouting Thrinax with Oren Rief out to make a little army in their opponent’s end step to push through damage and kill planeswalkers.

Thanks for reading,

Mike Gemme
Bobbysapphire on MTGO
mike@power9pro.com

Elder Dragon Highlander is one of my favorite formats to play.  The rules of this format allow for some very exciting interactions with cards that would be rarely played in any other format.  The most important aspect of EDH is the General.  Any Legendary Creature can be the General for your EDH deck with very few exceptions ( Braids, Cabal Minion is banned for example), and with the release of Worldwake some new potential Generals join the fray.

Anowon, the Ruin Sage is a strong new General for mono-black EDH decks.

Anowon has an ability that reminds us of the Abyss.   Mono-black is a strong color in EDH and with the addition of Anowon, vampire themed decks get a power boost.  There are plenty of Vampires running around in Magic but the fact that their creature type lets them dodge a bullet from Anowon makes them really shine.  Vamps that work well on team Anowon include Ascendant Evincar which can destroy token strategies; Repentant Vampire shines against other decks running swamps; Mephidross Vampire is a house when you start turning your opponents team with Krovikan Vampire and Soul Collector.  Anowon’s Worldwake friends are also welcome additions to the army: Bloodhusk Ritualist, Butcher of Malakir and Kalastria Highborn.

The next addition to the EDH world is Thada Adel, Acquisitor.

Thada Adel will give any opposing player fits as most decks run very powerful artifacts.  Thada will see play not only as a General just for the chance to steal things like Mindslaver, Nevinyrrals Disk, Rings of Brighthearth, and Oblivion Stone.  Even nabbing a Sol Ring can be devastating.

Next up is Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs

Kazuul is not quite as impressive as an EDH General as Anowon and Thada but it’s ability can be good.  Red has access to Land destroying effects that can make it more likely for Kazuul’s ability to resolve.  I like the idea of adding Pandemonium to prevent people from attacking you with swarms.  If you wanted to try an Ogre themed deck pick up Deathforge Shaman, Rustmouth Ogre, Initiate of Blood and Heartless Hidetsugu (who makes a good General himself).

Representing Green we have Omnath, Locus of Mana

The great thing about this General is that its low casting cost ensures that it will hit the battlefield early and often.  Cards like Early Harvest, Extraplanar Lens and Gauntlet of Power make this Elemental a beatstick.  Omnath’s best friend is Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary.  Mana ramp is a must when playing Omnath, so be sure to have Staff of Domination and Helix Pinnacle for alternate win conditions.

Last on our list of new EDH Generals we have the killer Kraken Wrexial, the Risen Deep

Big body, evasion and a relevant ability makes sure that Wrexial wrecks stuff.  Using a semi-mill strategy can ensure plenty of juicy targets for our sea monster friend.  Glimpse the Unthinkable, Mind Funeral and the other deep-sea threat Nemesis of Reason go perfectly with Wrexial.  Other graveyard loving cards that can go along with our General are Beacon of Unrest, Memory Plunder and Puppeteer Clique. Sexy Wrexy definitely has a lot going for it.

EDH just got more exciting with these new Generals.  I wish there was a new white Legend to round out the list.  Out of all of these newcomers I feel that Anowon and Thada will have the biggest impact, but that won’t stop me from putting Wrexial in my Szadek, Lord of Secrets deck.

I hope that everyone had a great prerelease weekend and enjoyed playing with the new Worldwake cards; I know I did. Unfortunately things like school and work have prevented me from posting this earlier, but I have, as promised, a second Worldwake prerelease report for you guys. I was thankful that I had gone to the tournament the day before, because now I had some semblance of an idea as to how all these new cards worked. Let’s dive right in, shall we?

Here’s what I opened on Sunday:

There were a few things I really liked about this pool. First we have a nice, foil Celestial Colonnade and a Nissa Revane, which are always exciting to open. We also have a higher number of playables than the previous day’s pool.

The two colours that jump out at me right away are black and white. Black has some serious removal from the Zendikar packs (2x Disfigure, a Hideous End and a Marsh Casualties), and white has 2 copies of one of my favourite cards: Brave the Elements. However, I realized that there were 2 bombs I really wanted to play that warranted a splash: Vapor Snare and Celestial Colonnade. Then of course I struggled with the dilemma of how deep to make my splash. Cards like Welkin Tern and Calcite Snapper were attractive, and I became faced with a decision. Do I play only a light splash and keep the mana in my deck more consistent, while at the same time perhaps playing some poorer-quality cards in my main colours? Or do I risk the bigger splash for an increased overall card quality with a shakier mana base?

I think I made the right call here and decided to play blue only for the Colonnade (which itseld taps for blue) and the pseudo-Mind Control. The lesser strain on my mana base also permitted me to more safely play some colourless lands, such as Quicksand and Dread Statuary. I figured that a single Island would be enough to satisfy my blue requirements, and with the Pilgrims Eye I opened, it could be searched out rather easily.

Here’s the list I ended up playing.

Round 1: vs Atilla

Atilla is a local player who is know for always playing Bant. Be it extended, standard, or legacy, the man plays Bant. For this sealed deck he neglected green and went with a white-blue control type of deck. He gets a turn 1 Hedron Crab and follows it up by playing lands for the next 5 turns, defending with an impressive 3/7 Makindi Shieldmate. However, I manage to get Celestial Colonnade online with enough blockers to stave off his attacks. This absolutely destroys him, as his only removal is a Surrakar Banisher which doesn’t do enough against my flying land.

In game 2 I get a turn 1 Vampire Lacerator and follow it up by equipping it with Hammer of Ruin on turn 3. By the time his Kor Sanctifiers is able to deal with the equipment, I have an Archon of Redemption which finishes the job.

1-0 (2-0)

Round 2: vs Blaine

Blaine is a guy who started playing years ago, quit, and came back a few months ago. He’s a great guy who is always trying to become a better player (aren’t we all) and is a fun guy to play with. He starts things off aggressively with an Umara Raptor and a Stonework Puma and starts pummeling me in the air. Luckily I draw a Hideous End and dispatch the flyer. He fights back with an Oracle of Mul Daya who probably drops him an additional 6 lands over the course of the game, and he combines her with Living Tsunami to keep increasing his land count. However, I’m able to keep up with Hedron Rover, Ruthless Cullblade and Archon of Redemption. Eventually, I trick him into blocking an un-pumped Rover, and I then blow him out with Marsh Casualties. My creatures then just get there.

In game 2 I keep a sketchy hand of 2 land and a Pilgrims Eye. Turns out that Blaine also had a hand that was light on mana, and he had no blue mana on top of that. I drew into a land quickly and got my Eye down. Equipping it with Hammer of Ruin did so much damage to Blaine that by the time he drew another land, it wasn’t enough to block my army of the thopter, Vampire Lacerator and Ruthless Cullblade.

2-0 (4-0)

Round 3: vs Brian

Brian is one of the best players in the province of Alberta, and I was hoping that my deck would be able to take whatever brew had got him to the 2-0 bracket. In game 1, his tempo was hindered by the fact that nearly all his lands came into play tapped, and I was able to bring in Hedron Rover, Ondu Cleric and a host of other allies to capitalize on his deck’s lack of speed. A timely Vapor Snare was all it took to bring his Umara Raptor over to my side, and a Marsh Casualties cleared the way to victory.

In game 2, I noticed Brian sideboarding a single card, but I didn’t now what. All I knew was that his deck was blue-black, and I was clueless as to what he had against me. At the end of Brian’s turn 4, I cast Join the Ranks in an effort to swing in big next turn. It resolved, and on my turn I tapped out for a kicked Marsh Casualties to wipe his board. It turned out that he had sided in a lone Spell Pierce and used it to counter my board sweeper. After he cast a kicked Heartstabber Mosquito to kill my last flyer while I was at 4, I foolishly animated my Celestial Colonnade and swung with my team for the win, forgetting that his mosquito could block my land. I regretted it as soon as I did it, but I after joking with Brian about what a terrible play it was, I scooped up and we were off to game 3.

In the final game, Brian got mana screwed out of black, and my removal was more than enough to destroy what little attempt at an offense he could muster. I resolved a Hammer of Ruin and just kept swinging with my guys for the win.

3-0 (6-1)

Round 4: vs Gabriel

This is the last round, and the winner of this round gets a full box of Worldwake. We agree to split the finals, and then play out our game with only 2 packs at stake. I win in 2 games (although game 1 took half an hour due to an Eternity Vessel set at 13), and I went home with 20 packs.

So all in all the day was a success. I got a nice foil rare, and a bunch of packs, and some DCI rating points (my limited play was very poor during the summer and now it’s finally back to where it was).

As always, feel free to post in the comments or email me at zak -AT- power9pro.com with any questions or article suggestions. You can also find me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/zturchan.

Cheers, and have a great Worldwake Launch Party.

-Zak-

PS: I also got this for coming in first (Gabriel said he didn’t want it).

Everyone is writing about Worldwake right now and we probably have at least another week or two of reading about the impact of the set in Standard, Extended, Sealed, Draft, Legacy, EDH, Type 4, Mental Magic… the list goes on.

This article is more focused on deckbuilding in the new sealed format. Any type of Magic player has the opportunity to run in this format over the next couple weeks whether it be release events this weekend, release events online two weeks from now, or maybe most importantly (at least for me) the Last Chance Qualifier for Pro Tour San Diego on February 18th in sunny Southern California.

I ran in two flights on Saturday and went 3-0-1, 3-1 with a sole loss to a pretty oustanding black deck featuring Sorin Markov and Butcher of Malakir among other fun things. My decks had some pretty slick cards as well; but I’m not 100% sure if I built my decks correctly, and that’s what this piece is going to try and figure out. I welcome and encourage any type of suggestion or criticism in the comments section. Like I said I’m looking to grind into the Pro Tour in two weeks so any help is appreciated.

Here’s a look at my first pool (a * denotes Foil):

BLACK – 14

Bloodhusk Ritualist
Dead Reckoning x2
Giant Scoprion
Guul Draz Vampire
Nemesis Trap
Mindless Null
Pulse Tracker
Ruthless Cullblade
Ruthless Cullblade *
Scrib Nibblers
Surrakar Marauder
Tomb Hex
Vampire Lacerator

BLUE – 13

Calcite Snapper
Dispel
Living Tsunami
Mysteries of the Deep
Paralyzing Grasp
Rite of Replication
Spell Pierce
Tideforce Elemental
Treasure Hunt
Umara Raptor
vapor Snare
Whiplash Trap
Welkin Tern

GREEN – 11

Arbor Elf
Cobra Trap
Explore
Feral Contest
Greenweaver Druid
Nissa’s Chosen
Nature’s Claim
River Boa
Relic Crush
Vastwood Zendikon
Vines of Vastwood

RED – 15

Bladetusk Boar
Deathforge Shaman
Goblin Roughrider
Goblin Shortcutter x2
Grotag Thrasher
Hellfire Mongrel
Plated Geopede
Quest for the Pure Flame
Ricochet Trap
Rotting Terrain x2
Searing Blaze
Stone Idol Trap
Torch Slinger

WHITE -17

Apex Hawks x2
Arrow Volley Trap
Battle Hurda
Caravan Hurda
Devout Lightcaster
Guardian Zendikon
Kabira Evangel
Lightkeeper of Emeria
Loam Lion
Join the Ranks
Kor Skyfisher
Journey to Nowhere
Narrow Escape
Nimbus Wings
Noble Vestige
Rest for the Weary

ARTIFACT – 8

Explorer’s Scope *
Hedron Rover
Khalni Gem
Lodestone Golem
Spidersilk Net
Stonework Puma
Trailblazer’s Boots
Walking Atlas

LAND – 6

Halimar Depths
Jwar Isle Refuge
Lavaclaw Reaches
Sejiri Steppe
Teetering Peaks
Turntimber Grove

I got to build across from my good friend Andy Roman in Flight 1 which is a great advantage in a Pre Release since you can talk about building and card choices and what not; since you really haven’t had any time to truly evaluate the cards before this point. Right away I knew that Black and Green were out (there were no black cards in my first pack at all), and that I would definitely be playing Blue or Red. The only decision I had to make was whether or not to run one of those with White. White was really lacking creatures even though it had some good ones with Evasion. All Five creatures I would run with White had either first strike or flying. There wasn’t a good chance of me playing Kabira Evangel or Devout Lightcaster since I had such little allies nor enough White to warrant a WWW casting cost. The only thing white gave me that I loved was Journey to Nowhere.

After a second glance at everything I decided that I was definitely playing Blue as my best cards were clearly Living Tsunami and Rite of Replication. 11 of my 13 Blue cards were striaght up good, and I ended up playing that many. I then do what I normally do when building a sealed deck, which is put my Blue cards in the middle by curve and the Red and White cards above and below to see how the decks would look. It became pretty clear when I had nine solid Red creatures as well as Searing Blaze and Stone Idol Trap which I felt was a pretty strong bomb even though Andy sorta disagreed. Turns out it was, especially when I got to say “I’ll Rite of Replication my Stone Idol token.” Leaving me with a permanent 6/12 trampler on the board (since the instant says “exile it at the beginning of your next end step” instead of the instant indicating the token has that text.

I went 3-0-1 with the following deck, choosing to Intentionally Draw in the final round so my opponent and I would each get six packs instead of eight and four.

Normally I run 18 land but I only curve to 5 (considering I’ll never cast Stone Idol Trap for 6), I had nearly no landfall and I have Living Tsunami, so I went with 17.

Some limited analysis of the new cards.

Treasure Hunt – I am pretty underwhelmed by this card, especially on turn 2. If you cast it on turn 2 on the draw you’re automatically discarding if you had no one drop. A couple of times I hit 3-4 cards off of it and most of the time I ended up discarding a land or two. One time it was huge though when I had 5 lands in hand and 2 spells I ran it just to discard and I drew 3 more lands and could dump 5 lands to my graveyard. That seems pretty rare.

Mysteries of the Deep – this card was great, even if I was wasting a turn playing it to draw 3.

Searing Blaze – Might as well just say sorcery in this format, but it’s a pretty good sorcery.

Stone Idol Trap – a total bomb. won me several games including a gunsling vs. Darwin Castle.

Hedron Rover – Was really good, a 4/4 attacker for 4 was really solid all day.

Halimar Depths – was always really, really good for me. Bouncing it every turn with tsunami was even better.

Grotag Thrasher – not great stats but he can really open up a clogged board for him and some friends.

Deathforge Shaman – Another game winner. This cycle of guys who multikick for their color are all really strong, this guy is good; the black version is great.

Vapor Snare – Unfortunately I never cast this card but it seems quite outstanding with a limited drawback, especially in a deck with a lower curve like the one I ran. Does not combo well with Tsunami.

Here’s my second card pool (again, foils have a *):

BLACK – 17

Agadeem Occultist *
Bojuka Brigand x2
Dead Reckoning
Death’s Shadow
Grim Discovery
Guul Draz Spectre
Guul Draz Vampire
Heartstabber Mosquito
Kalitas, Blood Chief of Ghet
Mire’s Toll
Nimana Sell Sword
Scrib Nibblers x2
Soul Stair Expedition
Vampire Hexmage
Vampire’s Bite

BLUE – 13

Aether Tradewinds
Enclave Elite x2
Halimar Excavator
Hedron Crab
Merfolk Seastalkers
Shoal Serpent
Sky Ruin Drake x2
Sphinx of Jwar Isle
Tideforce Elemental
Trapfinder’s Trick
Treasure Hunt
Twitch

GREEN – 17

Arbor Elf
Beast Hunt
Beastial Menace
Cobra Trap
Explore
Grazing Gladehart
Grappler Spider
Graypelt Hunter
Nissa’s Chosen
Oren-Rief Survivalist
Relic Crush
Scythe Tiger
Savage Sliouette
Slingbow Trap
Snapping Creeper
Turntimber Basilisk
Vines of Vastwood

RED – 12

Akoum Battleslinger
Bazaar Trader =(
Burst Lightning
Deathforge Shaman
Magma Rift
Quest for the Goblin Lore
Searing Blaze
Skitter of Lizards
Slavering Nulls
Tuktuk Grunts

WHITE – 13

Apex Hawks
Battle Hurda
Brave the Elements
Iona’s Judgment x2
Kor Hookmaster
Kor Outfitter
Kor Sanctifiers
Marshal’s Anthem
Shieldmate’s Blessing
Veteran Reflexes x2
Windborne Charge

ARTIFACT – 5

Adventuring Gear
Hedron Rover
Spidersilk Net
Trusty Machete
Walking Atlas

LAND – 6

Bojuka Bog
Dread Statuary
Graypelt Refuge
Halimar Depths
Khalni Garden
Piranha Marsh

I’m definitely interested in analyzing this pool because I most hastily built it. I kid you not, that the kid I was stuck sitting next to spelled so bad that I thought I was going to vomit all over my packs while waiting to open them. That and, interestingly enough, I opened both Sphinx of Jwar Isle and The Bloodchief of Ghet in my FNM draft the night before, played U/B and split in the finals of my pod. Now I have them both again not 24 hours later. Weird.

I had enough playables in Blue that because of the Sphinx I should run that color. Depending on how much you devalue the Bloodchief, you could consider going green here, but there just aren’t enough playables. I just put a list together and I struggled to get to 20 and I don’t want to run two Enclave Elite. Black just had way too much power with Heartstabber Mosquito, Guul Draz Spectre, plus it gave me a really strong ally subtheme due to the synergy with Agadeem Occultist, Halimar Excavator and Hedron Crab.

A quick aside about milling in limited: normally I think milling with just a crab that’s going to maybe hit for a few isn’t that great, but with the excavators you’re not milling 3-6 cards anymore. With six allies and the crab I had the potential to mill 20 or so cards per game, meaning that I’m no longer just changing my opponent’s next draw, I’m actively stripping their deck. That coupled with the Occultist’s ability to steal creatures and Guul Draz Specter stripping their hand, I was actively attacking their deck; so I went for it.

I end up with a pretty decent curve but very light on creature removal. My goal was to hopefully mill enough good cards to let my bombs do the talking. That went pretty well as I went 3-1 losing only to an absolutely ridiculous deck aforementioned.

Some takes on the cards here:

Agadeem Occultist: Sadly I never got to use his ability because he was a lightning rod for removal due to all my milling/allies, but if I ever tapped him it was going to be GG.

Tideforce Elemental: I love tappers, even bad ones (sup Vectis Dominator). This is going to be one of my favorite cards in limited in the near future. He was always oustanding be it on offense or defense.

Dead Reckoning: This card was extremely impressive. At one point an opponent of mine Heartstabbered my Kalitas and his friend said “that’s how they do it on the pro tour!” It was pretty embarassing when I Dead Reckoning’d his Machete equipped Flyer next turn and my board was soon Kalitas, Sphinx and vampire tokens.

Aether Tradewinds: Not very exciting but it gets things done.

Halimar Excavator: I’ll take a 1/3 for 2 in Blue, especially if I can swing more allies. I liked him all day.

Bojuka Brigand: These guys were great when I kept hitting allies but when a 3/3 comes down and they can’t even chump it kind of sucks.

Dread Statuary: I loved this guy, especially with grim discovery. He got into the red zone, he defended intimidators, and he killed guys the rest of my team couldnt. I’d run him anytime I have him.

Enclave Elite: Pretty dumpy, I sided the second one in against Blue for the Hedron Crab a bit. My friend Andy really liked multikicker but I didn’t use it much and found it pretty underwhelming when used to add +1/+1 tokens against me, and only really good with the guys who multikick for one color to make you discard or burn or gain life.

My initial thoughts on Worldwake was that it was going to be mainly inconsequential, and I think mainly that was right. I hadn’t considered the fact that it would be super fun, and I walk away from these events with the realization that it is. I’m sure winning certainly helped that feeling, but I enjoyed playing almost every card I laid on the table on Saturday.

I really feel like I want to be blue at the LCQ in San Diego. It is really easy to clog up the ground with white and blue but I think blue has a little bit more trickery with cards like Into the Roil and Whiplash Trap to get you through it. It’s already tough getting through Kraken Hatching, and Calcite Snapper one-ups it. I’m also in love with Tideforce Elemental. But really, I would follow your bombs because there are so many of them in this new set.

I will say this about draft: I think the draft format is going to be defined by allies. There are so many allies now it frightens me to the point that I don’t know if I want to draft much if I’m going to be fighting over allies for three packs; but we shall see.

I’ll leave you with my recommendation of the top three Worldwake cards I’m picking up right now, aside from the obvious mythic rares: Chain Reaction, Lavaclaw Reaches and Celestial Colonnade.

Later,

Mike Gemme
BobbySapphire on MTGO
mike@power9pro.com

This morning I woke up only to receive a telephone call from my friend Matthew, asking if I wanted to go to the prerelease in the nearby town of Sherwood Park. Normally I go to a closer one on Sunday, but with the offer of a ride extended, I packed my Dragon’s Egg and trade binder and was off for a prerelease a day earlier than I had anticipated.

When I got to the site, I was happy to see several faces that I hadn’t seen for several months, and exchanged pleasantries for several minutes until the product was handed out. Here’s what I received.

The first thing I noticed in this pool were the rares. We can safely say that Bazaar Trader and Emeria, the Sky Ruin are unplayable, as we don’t have an Abyssal Persecutor or enough cards to warrant a mono-white deck to make either worthwhile. We also have a Mordant Dragon, which is an amazing bomb, although ti requires a heavy commitment to red. Likewise, we have Celestial Mantle, but that is hindered by the same high-colour cost as the dragon. Finally we have Guul Draz Specter, a card I’m always happy to have, and the new Theda Adel, Acquisitor which has the potential to steal a timely Blazing Torch, Trusty Machete, or even a Lodestone Golem.

Looking at the white cards in this pool, we have some very good support cards, such as an Ionas Judgment, an Apex Hawks and the always amazing Brave the Elements, in addition to the aforementioned Celestial Mantle. All in all, I don’t think that there are enough high-quality cards for white to warrant being a main colour, which pretty much excludes the mantle from getting played.

Blue in this pool is actually quite deep. We have bombs like Living Tsunami, Vapor Snare and Merfolk Seastalkers, as well as the neo-Sleep: Permafrost Trap. This can definitely be a main colour, as it has some of the most powerful cards in the pool.

When we look at the black cards, we unfortunately come up a little light on removal. However, we have solid cards like Giant Scorpion and Vampire Nighthawk. Also worth noting are the 2 copies of Pulse Tracker, which can act as a pseudo Savannah Lions, so if we have the cards to play a bit more aggressive deck we can go that route.

The red cards in this pool are okay, but they all have a tendency to get outclassed relatively quickly. While Crusher Zendikon and Goblin Shortcutter are fine, I just don’t know exactly how much we can count on the red cards in this pool to still be relevant in the late game.

Looking over the artifacts and lands, nothing super-special jumps out at me, except for the pair of Adventuring Gear, the double Tectonic Edge and the Quicksand. However, I don’t want to play too many lands that produce colourless, and I think the Edges are best suited for the sideboard, to be brought in against any opponents lucky enough to open a new manland.

In the end I decided to play an aggressive blue-black build, using my early drops like Pulse Tracker and Welkin Tern in conjunction with Adventuring Gear to swing in for lots of early damage, and then use my late game cards to clean up the leftovers.

Here’s the list I ended up playing:

In round 1 I was paired against Tom, who told me that this was only his second sealed deck tournament ever, after starting around Conflux. I didn’t want to let my guard down, as I wasn’t familiar with the new cards he might have, so I made sure to treat him just like any opponent. I game 1 I got the jump on him with a pair of Pulse Trackers and an Adventuring Gear, and when he finally mustered a defense in the form of a Shepherd of the Lost, I had the Vapor Snare to punish him for playing such a good card, and he quickly succumbed to the beats doled out by his own angel.

Game 2 was quite different, with him resolving both the Shepherd of the Lost and an Archon of Redemption. He also had an Oracle of Mul Daya which ensured that he was able to dig through to his threats extremely quickly. I made one misplay in this game which probably would have bought me an extra turn or two. He had a 3/3 Gnarlid Pack which he attacked with into my Caustic Crawler. I blocked and used my Quicksand to weaken his attacker and ensure the survival of my creature. Looking back, I should have let the creatures trade so that the next turn I could cast Dead Reckoning for 4 to kill off his shepherd, rather than keep taking beats from the angel. Eventually I get a Vampire Nighthawk and equip him with both copies of Adventuring Gear, gaining 6 life in a single swing, but I fail to draw enough lands and quickly roll over to Baloth Woodcrasher and his fliers.

In game 3 he gets a Hada Freeblade on turn one, which I meet with my double Pulse Tracker and Adventuring Gear. On turn two me casts Explore and fails to play a land, while I augment my forces with Vampire Nighthawk and Thada Adel, Acquisitor. Even when he finally gets a third land, my fliers have dealt too much damage to him for him to recover.

1-0 (2-1)

In round 2 I’m up against Andrew, a player who was showing off his triple Windrider Eel and double Harrow earlier, so I’m wary of landfall creatures. He has a Wind Zendikon which trades with my Welkin Tern, and I play a turn 3 Theda Adel, Acquisitor when he has an Island on the battlefield. When the merfolk connects, I snag a Blazing Torch, which I use to later dispatch a Windrider Eel. Theda gets through on the next two turns to snag a Pilgrims Eye and a Walking Atlas over the course of the next 2 turns. Add an Adventuring Gear to my unblockable merfolk and the game is quickly mine.

When sideboarding I think about boarding in a Tectonic Edge to lessen the impact of a Zendikon, but I decide that my mana base is fragile enough with all the early drops I want to make, and the Quicksand is probably a better utility land in this situation. In the second game, I again get a Theda Adel, Acquisitor, as well as my Living Tsunami and a Vapor Snare to take a Windrider Eel. He can’t really do anything against this, and I take the match in 2 games.

2-0 (4-1)

In round 3 I’m up against my friend and ride for the day Matt. I’ve seen that he has a red deck packing both Mordant Dragon and Hellkite Charger, in addition to an Omnath, Locus of Mana. Needless to say, I’m worried. He starts out with an Arbor Elf and a Vastwood Animist, but doesn’t draw any mountains for a while. I punish him with my Ruthless Cullblade suited up with some Adventuring Gear, and his lack of removal spells defeat for him in game 1.

In game 2 he has a pair of early Harrows to ramp up his mana, and he quickly resolves a Hellkite Charger. I think I’m set when I draw a Vampire Nighthawk, but he has Claws of Valakut to make my vampire a lot less impressive. However, I have enough creatures on the board so that he can’t attack multiple times with his dragon and live, so he needs to spend 7 mana (including his Arbor Elf) to give his dragon pseudo-vigilance. Luckily for me, I draw the 5th land I needed to cast Vapor Snare, taking his untapped dragon and swinging for the win thanks to the dragon’s haste.

3-0 (6-1)

In round 4 I’m up against another one of my good friends, Josh. I know he’s packing Sorin Markov, Abyssal Persecutor, and Lodestone Golem. In the first game he resolves a Marsh Threader and swampwalks his way to victory, aided by a Hedron Rover. In game 2 I take the draw and Quicksand his threader as soon as he attacks with it, and I use Welkin Tern and double Adventuing Gear to pound for 6 repeatedly and clinch the second game. In the rubber match, I keep a 2 land hand on the play, and live to regret it, as I don’t draw a land for 2 or 3 turns. By the time I cast Vampire Nighthawk, I’ve been taking 4 a turn to the double Marsh Threader assault, and he has no problems casting a Journey to Nowhere.

3-1 (7-3)

Due to my tiebreakers I get second place, earning me 5 packs of Worldwake. I realize that I shouldn’t have kept the 2 land hand in the last game, and I realize that I need to mulligan more often, as I have a tendency to keep sketchy hands. I also realized that Treasure Hunt is a very poor card in limited. I must of cast in 7 or 8 times in the day, and I never drew more than a single card off of it. I think that it is much better in constructed, but in limited, I’d much rather have something that affects the game state more. Like Twitch, and I have a personal vendetta against the reprinting of Twitch. I also love the irony of how in yesterday’s article I touted Marsh Threader was extremely important in this new limited format, only to lose to a pair of them in the finals.

Anyway, the tournament was great, and I look forward to using what I learned tomorrow, when I play in another Worldwake Prerelease. If you want live updates of how I’m doing, make sure to follow my twitter feed at www.twitter.com/zturchan, and as always, post any comments, suggestions or questions in the comments section, or email me at zak -AT- power9pro.com.

Cheers,

Zak

Well it’s that time of year, where Magic players from all around the world gather together to play in the prerelease for the latest set, in this case, Worldwake. This set brings with it some of the most powerful cards to hit standard in recent memory such as Jace, the Mindsculptor and Abyssal Persecutor. However, standard isn’t currently in season, and I’m still getting a feel for extended, so I decided to write about limited, and how to best succeed at your local prerelease.

Unlike Zendikar before it, Worldwake is a second expansion, which means that we’ll still be using three packs of Zendikar for our sealed pool. Thus, we cannot simply consider cards in the context of the Worldwake set, we must consider them in the context of the entire Zendikar block thus far.

For example, take the new one-drop ally, Hada Freeblade. In Worldwake, there are 11 allies, 4 of which are rare. We can discount the rare ones because they will seldom show up in a limited card pool. Of the other 6 non-rare allies, none of them share a colour with the Freeblade, and although we will often play multiple colours in a limited format, the benefit of any ally is greatly reduced when you have a low density of allies. Of course you could remedy this by increasing the number of colours you play, but then you run the risks associated with an unstable mana base. Thus, we can say that in a format that only includes worldwake, the Freeblade is most often going to be a white Norwood Ranger.

However, when your sealed pool is a 3-3 split of product, the power of freeblade goes up because of the number and quality of allies in the Zendikar expansion. Freeblade is best when you can follow it up with a turn 2 ally, ideally Kazandu Blademaster, but something like Oran-Reif Survivalist also works. Compare the survivalist to something like Bojuka Brigand, and you see the difference in card quality.

Another card I think has huge potential in Limited is Marsh Threader, the companion to Zendikar’s Cliff Threader. We saw in 6x Zendikar sealed that the most popular colour combination was without a doubt red/black. This card is a tool that will hopefully be good enough to see mainboard play because of the sheer number of players that choose to play black for cards like Hideous End, Urge to Feed and Disfigure. The allure of the removal spell is a strong one, and many players will choose these colours for that reason. Therefore, I think that this card is an extremely viable candidate for any deck playing white. In Zendikar limited, having efficient creatures is of the utmost importance, and so when we have a creature that will be unblockable against the majority of the field, we might wish to overvalue it a little bit more. In the same vein, Quag Vampires might be a bit more playable in this format than it normally would, but the colour commitment for that card is slightly higher and thus makes the vampires slightly less attractive.

Oftentimes in Zendikar limited, I would notice that some creatures were amazing in a vacuum, but never stayed alive long enough to be absurdly powerful. I’m talking about cards like Territorial Baloth, Merfolk Seastalkers and Baloth Woodcrasher. All these cards were powerful, but they were only a Hideous End or Inferno Trap away from being destroyed. Even some bombs out of Zendikar packs could be quickly invalidated by removal, making them a lot less spectacular. For this reason, I believe that Canopy Cover is a Worldwake spell that should not be overlooked. Of course it can be responded to, but it adds so much resiliency to your creatures that are otherwise so vulnerable that I would run the risk of the 2-for-1 that accompanies all aura to better enhance my long-term game plan.

These are the 3 cards that I believe should not be undervalued now that Worldwake has been added into the mix. While most players will be able to identify the likes of Bestial Menace and Apex Hawks as powerful in limited, the best players will look beyond those for the cards that are best suited to the environment.

If you have any ideas as to what cards might be great in limited out of Worldwake, sound off in the comments. Any questions/comments/suggestions can also be aired there, by emailing me at zak -AT- power9pro.com or via my twitter feed at www.twitter.com/zturchan.

I wish you all luck in your prereleases, and may open many copies of Jace, the Mindsculptor.

Cheers,

Zak

Welcome to the Green section of our Worldwake Set Review series. We began with white here, for those just tuning in who’d like to see all the reviews. As usual, I will add my comments, evaluating each card with an eye toward primarily limited play, but with the occasional anecdote on Eternal formats and the beloved EDH format. James will then add his comments evaluating each card for standard, block, and extended play.

Here we go!

Arbor Elf
G
Creature – Elf Druid
1/1
{T}: Untap target Forest.
Rarity: Common

Hmm. Well, I guess he’s essentially a Llanowar elves, which makes him very playable. He’s got a slight edge on the original, though, since you might have a forest that’s a creature, or is enchanted with something like wild growth, or more likely some modern equivalent. Anyway, he’s a great mana ramper, and will let you drop a 3-drop on turn 2, etc. A solid common, especially for monogreen or base-green.

JAMES

Playable. I like this in extended for untapping Murmuring Bosk. This is defintily a good construction worthy card. I say, take out the Llanowar Elf and put in Garruk, Wildspeaker’s little cousin.

Avenger of Zendikar
5GG
Creature – Elemental
5/5
When Avenger of Zendikar enters the battlefield, put a 0/1 green Plant creature token onto the battlefield for each land you control.
Landfall – Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you may put a +1/+1 counter on each Plant creature you control.
Illus. Zoltan Boros & Gabor Szikszai
Rarity: Mythic Rare

This will be huge for the random monogreen drafter who opens it. Even better is someone who is in Gw or Gr, because they can splash Bold Defense or another global pumper… even something as seemingly innocuous as Goblin Bushwhacker could become quite deadly… the tension in non-mono-green builds, however, will be that the fewer forests you run, the fewer plants you get at the outset. Anyway, this is very solid, giving you a big beater, a ton of tiny guys, and a way to grow them. Alas, as a mythic, you can never really plan for this guy, you just have to get really lucky. Then again, this might be passed by anyone not heavy in green, so maybe you’ll see it more often than the typical mythic… so slightly-less-than-never rather than just “never”.

JAMES

Wow. What a great ability. If you can stick this one turn and then next turn follow up with an Overrun it’s probably good game. It does setup up for boardsweepers like Day of Judgement and the new red sweeper Chain Reaction. But we can look at cards like Cloudthresher which was the same 7cc and know that it’s not completely out of the question for a Green player to plop something like this on the table. If you don’t have an answer it is seriously GG.

Bestial Menace
3GG
Sorcery
Put a 1/1 green Snake creature token, a 2/2 green Wolf creature token, and a 3/3 green Elephant creature token onto the battlefield.
Rarity: Uncommon
Set Number: #97/145

I love the wackiness of this card. How random! Wtf are a snake, a wolf, and an elephant doing together? It almost sounds like some kind of joke… “a snake, a wolf, and an elephant walk into a battlefield…” Anyway, this is a stone cold bomb in limited, and I’m already pumped for monogreen between this crazy uncommon and the Llanowar variant in common. this is not “just” 6 power and 6 toughness for the bargain basement price of 5 mana. It’s THREE bodies! This is very nice. It exponentially increases the relevance of spells like the aforementioned Bold Defense, albeit by an exponent of 3. Still, as Broodmate Dragon should have proved to us all beyond a shadow of a doubt, making several creatures is very very strong, often quite a bit stronger than a comparable creature that rolls solo. This is going to wreck shop, I’m convinced. Just be aware of the sweepers like Marsh Casualties!

JAMES

5 cc for three creatures totaling 6 power/toughness. Interesting. If it was something like “choose one: 6 1/1’s, 3 2/2’s or 2 3/3’s” I might be more inclined to say, “yeah, this is gonna make it” but the lack of options make me think it’s too underwhelming. Compare to the Avenger of Zendikar above and you get a LOT more for your mana.

Canopy Cover
1G
Enchantment – Aura
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature can’t be blocked except by creatures with flying and/or reach.
Enchanted creature can’t be the target of spells or abilities your opponents control.
Rarity: Uncommon
Set Number: #98/145

This is an aura I can get behind. The main reason is that it shields the creature it’s on, protecting you from the ubiquitous 241 associated with auras. It also provides evasion, which is nice… Green has trample and that’s it, typically, but this is a neat combination of the abilities from Troll Ascetic and Elven Riders, all at an affordable cost. If you have something that needs to connect, this is the ticket.

JAMES

Nice. Evasion and shroud. What would you stick this on though? It better be damn worth not playing a more utility card. It’s also fairly narrow. Tough call. Auras just don’t get much loving and with good reason: they suck. lol.

Explore
1G
Sorcery
You may play an additional land this turn.
Draw a card.
Rarity: Common

Okay, this one was contentious on my discussion email thread, but we all ended up with a consensus: this is somewhere between solid and “da bomb.” Okay, break down the scenarios: Ideally you have this in your opener along with 3 or more lands. In that case, it’s a fine turn 2 play, especially if you also happen to have two 1-drops, or say, Arbor Elf and a 2-drop. This card propels you forward in a mana ramp fashion AND replaces itself! Okay, so the mediocre situation: you draw it early, but lack the land drop… you still get to cantrip. If you’re going to miss your 3rd land drop, you might as well play this to cantrip (draw 1). This is still a fine turn 3 play when you’re lacking that crucial early drop. Okay, so least impressive scenario: you draw this on turn 18, in top deck mode. You still get to just “cycle” this for 1G. That’s juuuust fine, folks. Hakuna matatta. No worries. This is solid. I’d probably run as many as 3 in a super fast mana ramp kind of deck, but 2 seems fine, and if you just have the 1, well, just hope to see it extremely early under good circumstances.

JAMES

Playable. Manaramp loves this kinda stuff. It costs the same as Rampant Growth and essentially does a better job at the task: get an extra land in play while also replacing itself. Very nice. Definitely a standard worthy card for Manaramp, Lightsaber and Jund–at least for testing to see how it goes.

Feral Contest
3G
Sorcery
Put a +1/+1 counter on target creature you control. Another target creature must block it this turn if able.
Rarity: Common

Hmm. Not really my style… it’s a pretty telegraphed “trick” and it’s the softest kind of removal, unable to hit tappers, etc. I dislike this.

JAMES

Sort of lame really. why is it so expensive? It’s not a guaranteed removal spell and it only marginally puts the attack phase in your favor…

Gnarlid Pack
1G
Creature – Beast
2/2
Multikicker {1}{G}
Gnarlid Pack enters the battlefield with a +1/+1 counter on it for each time it was kicked.
Rarity: Common

Again with an incrementally better update on a staple limited guy employing multikick. This one’s among the best of the cycle. He’s a grizzly bear! No wait, he’s a hill giant! No wait, now he’s… okay, he’s a 6-drop 4/4… not great but not terrible. Anyway, this is solid all the way around, and will be on par whenever you drop him, or above par really late, where despite being over-costed, you’re getting the flexibility part out of him… remember, this takes up the grizzly bear slot in your deck… you will still, hopefully, have high end guys too, it’s just that this grizzly bear doesn’t envoke the sigh of the original when you draw him late. Good stuff.

JAMES

I really don’t like this cycle. I guess big mana decks like green might see a use…but it’s stupid.

Grappler Spider
1G
Creature – Spider
2/1
Reach
Rarity: Common

Meh. Reach bear. Not bad, not thrilling either. Has its place, which will often be on the bench due to having better options.

JAMES

Wow. Very weak-sauce. I’d almost rather it be a 0/2…but still super lame. 0/2 Deathtouch. lol.

Graypelt Hunter
3G
Creature – Human Warrior Ally?
2/2
Trample
Whenever Graypelt Hunter or another Ally enters the battlefield under your control, you may put a +1/+1 counter on Graypelt Hunter.
Rarity: Common

Trample hill giant on common? This is strictly better than hill giant. This is very playable, even as your only ally. With any other allies, he increases marginally. In a full on allies build, this is going to be one of your premiere beaters thanks to the trample. This is a sick common ally.

JAMES

weak.

Groundswell
G
Instant
Target creature gets +2/+2 until end of turn.
Landfall – If you had a land enter the battlefield under your control this turn, that creature gets +4/+4 until end of turn instead.
Rarity: Common

No joke! This is the kind of trick you should look for in green. It’s cheap, and usually doesn’t need the land drop to do its job as a simple combat trick type removal spell. For the times when you want to alpha, you should have no problem sandbagging a land for the right turn. This makes me happy. Monogreen was already flush with these kinds of effects, with Vines of Vastwood and Primal Bellow. Now you should be able to draft the exact number of such spells that you want. When I’m in monogreen, I obviously pick Primal Bellow very high, but I might start skimping on the vines, even though they have particular effectiveness against spot removal… but now you can expect to make up for one passed vines in pack 3, at least in terms of tricks / pump.

JAMES

Cool. Green never misses a land drop. “never” lol. Anyway, It’s a decent ability. Not strong enough for constructed necessarily but a neat little pump spell.

Harabaz Druid
1G
Creature – Human Druid Ally
0/1
{T}: Add X mana of any one color to your mana pool, where X is the number of Allies you control.
Rarity: Rare

Well, again we see a theme with the better allies: they’re good enough on their own, and superb in allies. This is no exception. I can definitely see running this without lots of allies, or picking it as my first ally in pack 3. If a constructed allies deck is viable, I’m guessing this is part of it, but it’s too board-committed for constructed I think. We’ll see what James says. All in all, this rare is cool in any green deck, and obviously, even cooler in any strongly allies deck that includes green, as many such decks will.

JAMES

Not bad. It’s no Noble Hierarch but few things in life are. Allies really needed a fixer and this is a cheap, potentially powerful one.

Joraga Warcaller
G
Creature – Elf Warrior
1/1
Multikicker {1}{G}
Joraga Warcaller enters the battlefield with a +1/+1 counter on it for each time it was kicked.
Other Elf creatures you control get +1/+1 for each +1/+1 counter on Joraga Warcaller.
Rarity: Rare

Whoa… a neat rare… also introduces a small elves tribal theme. Anyway, this is a bit slow unless you have several other elves. It’s just that he’s not really big enough to live long unless you pay 6 or more… I dunno. I’m skeptical for limited. I think the times this guy’s killer in limited are few and far between.

JAMES

Nice. Very freaking nice. Elves ala Eldrazi Monument will probably like this one. 3cc for a Glorious Anthem on all your elves? Not bad. Try it out in your Elves! builds.

Leatherback Baloth
GGG
Creature – Beast
4/5
Flavor Text: GEE GEE GEE, BABY BABY BABY
Illus. Chris Rahn
Rarity: Uncommon

Yikes! This is huge for monogreen, obviously. I don’t think any other archetype can even play this, unless you’re maybe base green with a small splash. But holy cow! What a 3-drop! It can stop everything you’ll see on the ground before turn 5 or 6 at the earliest. And it can throw down too! Beats for 4 will have to be contained, and good luck killing this guy with blockers… especially against monogreen! “You have G up? Crap, now what?” I love this… it’s the kind of card that will often be passed to the delight of the monogreen drafter, because others can’t really do with him what’s best. Anyway, monogreen was already a pet favorite archetype of mine in ZZZ. Now I’m even more excited for those packs that I open Gigantiform or something, and go into monogreen.

JAMES

Am I missing something with that flavor text? I’m hoping it’s random, mtg-salvation text that isn’t real. Prety cheap. I like this as Doran #2 but the trip-G may be hard for the builds. Very solid beater in mono-green/Elf builds.

Nature’s Claim
G
Instant
Destroy target artifact or enchantment. Its controller gains 4 life.
Rarity: Common

You know, I liked this a lot early. It’s reminiscent of the speed of Oxidize or Crumble before it. It’s definitely cheap and solid, so I think it will see play. But a pal pointed out to me that this kind of spell ( disenchant variants in general) have fallen out of favor, replaced by creatures with EtB effects doing the same. Krosan Grip will still likely be the de-facto spell for older formats too. But this is an awesome option to have in your sideboard, killing pesky quests or equipment for a low cost, usually putting you ahead on mana. The life gain is negligible compared to the effect of anything you’d spend a removal spell to kill. Anyway, I still like the spell, but I have tempered my impression of it for constructed formats, and I look forward to seeing James’ opinion here.

JAMES

This is a really cheap way of dealing with a Umezawas Jitte. Also great against Edrazi Monument. This is a great looking common. I dunno. I guess as a green mage (whether jund or whatever), I’m not particuarly worried about someone gaining 4 life. Lifegain doesn’t typically worry me when it’s not attached to a creature like Baneslayer Angel or Rhox War Monk.

Omnath, Locus of Mana
2G
Legendary Creature – Elemental
1/1
Green mana doesn’t empty from your mana pool as phases and steps end.
Omnath, Locus of Mana gets +1/+1 for each green mana in your mana pool.
Rarity: Mythic Rare

EDH General? Perhaps… he’s cheap and big, and lends himself to all the various green infinite mana engines. Also, even absent those combos coming together, he’s a fine general for giving him a sword (or jitte) or even a cloak, and letting him win the general damage race. He’s definitely unshielded though, and EDH has lots of answers to creatures… so I’m guessing he ends up marginal as a general. In limited… well, I think he’s still awesome in monogreen and playable in green with splash. He’s going to get bigger and bigger. He’s a must answer threat. These are attributes that translate into “playable” or even “strong.”

JAMES

weird. Very weird. It’s pretty cool if you think about it. Add three green to your pool, attack for 4, have mana ready for Vines of Vastwood or just ready for 2nd main phase. Very cool. Worth experimenting with at least!

Quest for Renewal
1G
Enchantment
Whenever a creature under your control taps, you may put a quest counter on Quest for Renewal.
As long as Quest for Renewal has four or more quest counters on it, untap all creatures you control during each other player’s untap step.
Rarity: Uncommon

An interesting take on Seedborn Muse. I like this spell in a deck with mana elves, and it’s even okay in a straight-forward aggro deck. It lets all your guys essentially have vigilance, except it’s even better for your tappers. Looks fine to me.

JAMES

Kinda neat. Pretty easy to get going too. I like this as a varriant to test for Elves (in standard). Quest cards are sooo hard to guage. They always seem borderline hot-sauce but end up being mild and borning.

Slingbow Trap
3G
Instant – Trap
If a black creature with flying is attacking, you may pay {G} rather than pay Slingbow Trap’s mana cost.
Destroy target attacking creature with flying.
Rarity: Uncommon

Yeah, this will be good. I’m not sure whether it’s maindeck or side though… green is traditionally weak against fliers, despite all the reach creatures… I think it goes in the side, but in about half of the game 2s you play, it will save your neck from some brutal flier or other.

JAMES

I like this for dealing with Vampire Nighthawk. What a big B of a card. I hate that card. lol. Certainly an interesitng SB option but probably a bit too narrow. Worth the Jund/Elves/Lightsaber Zoo players experimenting with though.

Snapping Creeper
2G
Creature – Plant
2/3
Landfall – Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, Snapping Creeper gains vigilance until end of turn.
Its vastly spread roots alert it of distant dangers.
Rarity: Common

Lame ability, but this is still a decent ground clogger if you don’t already have enough. He stops bears, that’s his best attribute. He’s like the bear killa.

JAMES

Lol. I think of Little Shop of Horrors.

Strength of the Tajuru
XGG
Instant
Multikicker {1}(You may pay an additional {1} any number of times as you cast this spell.)
Choose target creature, then choose another target creature for each time Strength of the Tajuru was kicked. Put X +1/+1 counters on each of them.
Illus. Christopher Moeller
Rarity: Rare
Set Number: #113/145

Pretty dang good… this will end some games in a hurry because it’s an instant. EOT? Strength for 6 on my trampler! Have any removal? No? GG. Very strong.

JAMES

Sicko instant. Probably worth 5cc to put 2 plus Counters on two creatures. It’s a colorless multikick too making me think that this isn’t really restricted to mono color builds. What would this go in though? I’m not sure. It’s pretty steep on the curve but is the ability worth it?

Summit Apes
3G
Creature – Ape
5/2
As long as you control a Mountain Summit Apes can’t be blocked except by two or more creatures.
Rarity: Uncommon

Yeah, this is solid on color, and still takes either a removal spell or a big blocker / attacker with it. I’d play him.

JAMES
4cc for a somewhat evasive 5/2. Does lend itself well to taking out multiple creatures but it’s weaksauce butt makes it damn vulnerable. I guess it’s not strong enough for constructed…

Terastodon
6GG
Creature – Elephant
9/9
When Terastodon enters the battlefield, destroy up to three target noncreature permanents. For each permanent put into a graveyard this way, it’s controller puts a 3/3 green Elephant creature token onto the battlefield.
Illus. Lars Grant-West
Rarity: Rare

Very cool rare. Again, thinking about monogreen… often you’ll kill your own lands with this guy, believe it or not. In fact, I might wager that this is the usual way to play Terastodon. In that case, for 8 mana (and three lands which are mostly superfluous at that point anyway), you get 18 points of power and toughness on 4 creatures! Every once in a while, you’ll nuke an opponent’s ___________ (whatever) and take a mere 15 points of power instead. Either way, this is a mega-bomb, in my opinion, and should win you the game as often as not. This also happens to be a neat LD type spell for EDH decks, as well as a great reanimator target for some such decks. Recurring this thing seems naughty indeed, maybe with Moat in play?

JAMES

Might be okay but not as good as Avenger (above).

Vastwood Animist
2G
Creature – Elf Shaman Ally
1/1
{T}: Target land becomes a X/X Elemental creature until end of turn, where X is the number of Allies you control. It’s still a land.
Rarity: Uncommon

Well, this is an ally I’d only play in solid allies, and even then, I think there are better options. Still, in allies, critical mass is important, so the Type Line of this card may end up being its best feature.

JAMES

Too weak. the mass of Allies required to make this work is too high to justify playing.

Vastwood Zendikon
4G
Enchantment – Aura
Enchant land
Enchanted land is a 6/4 green Elemental creature. It’s still a land.
When enchanted land is put into a graveyard, return that card to its owner’s hand.
Illus. Rob Alexander
Rarity: Common
Set Number: #117/145

My least favorite Zendikon in some regards, but still decent. I think as a later drop, this has the advantage of being less of a tempo speed bump, since you’ll still probably have plays you can make, and being set back from 5 to 4 is a lot easier than from 2 to 1 mana, for example. So playing this “on curve” is easier on your tempo. I dunno… these are hard to evaluate. I’m usually going to hope for better actual creatures, but these are in the middle of my pick orders at present, especially the flying zendikon. Playable, I’d say, but uniquely weird.

JAMES

I’m not too hot on this. It’s definitly beefy enough on the attack and butt side that the stats don’t completely stink but it’s really not impressive.

Wolfbriar Elemental
2GG
Creature – Elemental
4/4
Multikicker {G}
When Wolfbriar Elemental enters the battlefield, put a 2/2 green Wolf creature token onto the battlefield for each time it was kicked.
Rarity: Rare

Bomb. Absolute bomb. Nearly a bomb without being kicked, but not quite. Kick it twice and it’s out of control. Even once is great. When you top deck this on turn 14 or whatever with 8+ mana in play, you’re going to win, absent a counterspell. Very strong

JAMES

Balanced on the cost side but it’s not as good as Master of the Wild Hunt because you can’t use the wolves for spot removal. Hmmm, it’s tough to say. It’s certainly big enough but I worry that if I pay 5cc for this and get a 2/2 I’m going to be a little behind on board position. It’s also not an “on curve” play like the Master of the Wild Hunt because I have to drop this on turn 5 or 6 to really get my mana’s worth… Maybe I’m being too conservative?

That does it for Green. Stay tuned: our multicolor, colorless, and lands batch will finish our review series up, and should be published in the next 24 hours or so. Thanks for reading, and as always, let us know where we screwed the pooch in the comments!

Time to look at some red cards. If you’re just tuning in, we’ve broken the new Worldwake cards into colors and given you our initial reactions to them. I will evaluate each card with an eye toward limited play with an occasional word about EDH or eternal formats. My colleague James will gear his comments more toward constructed formats like standard and extended. To read the series from the beginning, start with our white review, here.

Tally ho!

Akoum Battlesinger
1R
Creature – Human Berserker Ally
1/1
Haste
Whenever Akoum Battlesinger or another Ally enters the battlefield under your control, you may have Ally creatures you control get +1/+0 until end of turn.
Rarity: Common

I like this global pump ally. It’s a more fleeting kind of ability than the counter based allies, but this should help fill out an aggressive ally build for sure. A nifty common.

JAMES

As I’ve mentioned a few times through out the set reviews (white, Blue and black), I don’t see Allies being much of a powerhouse. They’re generally “meh” so for the time being I’m going to forgo looking at Allies cards from a constructive perspective–at least unless something really catches my eye. The time frame for constructing a kick-ass Standard/Type 2 build using Allies is just not within the scope of these reviews. One avenue worth examining is whether Boros Bushwacker could be converted over to an Allies deck (at least partially)…

Bazaar Trader
1R
Creature – Goblin
1/1
{T}: Target player gains control of target artifact, creature or land that you control.
Illus. Matt Cavotta
Rarity: Rare
Set Number: #72/145

Well, I’m immediately reminded of Trix, a notorious deck that used Donate on Illusions of Grandeur as its kill. I’m not sure what the best thing would be to use this ability on in recent times. Abyssal Persecutor, also from Worldwake seems cute, but not very good, really. Immortal Coil? Donate your Platinum Angel…. no wait! Maybe you donate your Platinum Angel to the guy who controls Abyssal Persecutor! Then what? I’m getting sidetracked here. In limited, I can’t think of a reason you’d activate this either. Maybe I’m missing something huge, but I think this is the Steamflogger Boss rare of Worldwake, only for limited you don’t even get a hill giant, but rather an anemic bear I’d probably not play in my monored deck.

JAMES

why would I want to do something like this? I am writing this review through a fog of [what I hope is] a 24 hour flu but I’m not seeing this. Maybe I’m just a selfish player but I can’t think of a card that if I gave it to my opponent, he/she would lose…so wtf would I want to do this for?

Bull Rush
R
Instant
Target creature gets +2/+0 until end of turn.
Rarity: Common

Well, it’s an okay trick I guess, but it’s definitely nothing flashy. Seems old fashioned. I like its simplicity, which is has in spades, and doesn’t have much else.

JAMES

At least it only costs R is all I can think of. There are so many better cards for constructed that deal two points of damage and have more flexiblity than this.

Chain Reaction
2RR
Sorcery
Chain Reaction deals X damage to each creature, where X is the number of creatures on the battlefield.
Illus. Trevor Claxton
Rarity: Rare

Holy smokes! Say hello to one of the chase rares, folks. Feels a lot like a red Wrath of God, doesn’t it? Can’t praise this more than that. This is a global sweeper, and is an extremely strong card in limited. But sometimes it will be a lame pyroclasm, so it’s not quite the same as WoG. But for most intents and purposes, it’s a red wrath. Very cool.

JAMES

This is pretty sicko. A new varition on a Day of Judgement for red. Mass removal at 4cc is typically played extensively across a number of formats. I’ll wager this makes SB for Type 2 decks like mono-red burns (to bring in against Vamps and Jund). This is the kind of card that completely reverses the card advantage-nature brought about by Bloodbraid Elf, Sprouting Thrinax, Broodmate Dragon, and Gatekeeper of Malakir. I can also see this in the U/W/r control decks as another way of punishing players for over extending. That is [card]Wall of Denial[card] will likely sitck around (x/6 butt is huge) while the opposing players entire force will be reset. Hawt card.

Claws of Valakut
1RR
Enchantment – Aura
Enchant creature
Enchanted creature gets +1/+0 for each Mountain you control and has first strike.
Rarity: Common

A strong aura. I have an aversion to auras because I love snagging someone in a 241 by killing their dude in response to their aura, or just killing it whenever with an aura like this that doesn’t shield the creature. Also, I don’t like having to carefully play around this pitfall when I’m the one wielding the aura… I often fail and fall in the 241 pit. So I have this aversion. But… this is the kind of aura that CAN be an exception in some narrow circumstances. In a very quick monored or similar deck, especially with evasive creatures, this can be the nail in the coffin. As your opponent struggles to keep up with your early pressure, you’ll have an opening sooner or later to confidently lay this on an evasive guy, and get in for serious damage. Anyway, this is usually not my bag, but I’ve seen it done to great effect, and if I’m in fast monored, I’ll definitely try one of these.

JAMES

Pretty interesitng. If you can plop this on a creature with at least an x/4 butt this could be nasty. I can’t think of many auruas that see play–and the reason is obvious: auraus go to the graveyard if hte creature dies–contrasted with equipments that stick around. (ahem, Mr Obvious). So while probably a good play for a mono-Red play in limited it’s not that great for constructed. Too bad it’s not +x to toughness where x equals the nuber of non basics you control. that would be slick.

Comet Storm
XRR
Instant
Multikicker {1} (You may pay an additional {1} any number of times as you cast this spell.)
Choose target creature or player, then choose another target creature or player for each time Comet Storm was kicked. Comet Storm then deals X damage to each of them.
Illus. Jung Park
Rarity: Mythic Rare

I like comet storm, but I am of the opinion that banefire is superior. This is not germane to the discussion of limited, in which this card is hands down bonkers nuts, and I’m glad it’s a mythic. Fireball type effects that can dome or is creatures are already sick in limited, and ones that can do both are fantastic. Ones that can potentially hit several creatures AND dome for a significant amount later on? Well, that’s just nutty. Comet storm does have speed issues, but this is Zendikar, home of landfall and 19 land limited decks that curve out at 3. I mean, you’ll have a chance to do stupid things with this. Or, hopefully, you’ll just need the one target, amirite?! Love comet storm.

JAMES

Well, let’s see. 8cc to deal 5 damage to a Baneslayer Angel and 5 to an opponent. On the low-end it’s pretty cheap to knock out a bunch of creatures–it’s cheaper than Fireball at least that is massively epxensive to hit multiple creatures with any real affect. Anyway, this is a good card. I’d not be surpised to this going into a Mono-Red Burn deck as a 1-2x or a x/R-control style deck that needs more kill outlets late game, such as Crypt of Agadeem powered deck. (not really controlling, I know, but it came to mind as a “big mana” deck).

Cosi’s Ravager
3R
Creature – Elemental
2/2
Landfall – Whenever a land enters the battlefield under your control, you may have Cosi’s Ravager Servant deal 1 damage to target player.
Rarity: Common

I’m not that pumped about this. This is too expensive for a piddly 2/2 that has a cute ability that won’t hit creatures. Nope, I don’t dig it.

JAMES

It’s aight. Not going to be very good in constructed.

Crusher Zendikon
2R
Enchantment – Aura
Enchant land
Enchanted land is a 4/2 red Beast creature with trample. It’s still a land.
When enchanted land is put into a graveyard, return that card to its owner’s hand.
Rarity: Common

“Teetering Peaks, your time has come my friend.” TP: “I’m a real boy!” Sorry, Pinocchio reference. Yeah, I’m not into the red one as much as the blue and black ones so far. Still interested to see how this gets put to use.

JAMES

Lol @ Joe. Anyway, these aura series are okay. I mentioned liking the blue variation and I’ll stand by that being the most likely to see play.

Cunning Sparkmage
2R
Creature – Human Shaman
0/1
Haste
{T}: Cunning Sparkmage deals 1 damage to target creature or player.
Rarity: Uncommon

Yeah, this guy’s got the goods. Very nice. He’s even better than Vulshok Sorcerer, IMO, since the one power isn’t relevant on a pinger / timmy, and the extra R made the sorcerer less spashable. But a haste pinger is always superb.

JAMES

I don’t THINK this is good enough. I like pingers and a hasty pinger is definitly better. I just don’t think it’s good enough. I guess I have to ask myself, “If this guy/gal cost 5cc and did 2 damage, I would say, Yeah!” but as it is now, only 1 damage isn’t enough. I guess I just can’t think of a deck where I’d rather play the pinger over a straight up burn spell…

Deathforge Shaman
4R
Creature – Ogre Shaman
4/3
Multikicker {R}
When Deathforge Shaman enters the battlefield, it deals damage to target player equal to twice the number of times it was kicked.
Rarity: Uncommon

Pop Quiz: how many times do you have to multi-kick Deathforge Shaman before it is more efficient than a Comet Storm to the dome? You might be surprised to hear that a Deathforge Shaman multikicked four times (total mana cost 4R + RRRR or CMC 9 is more efficient than comet storm for X = 7, also costing 9, and the efficiency then grows in favor of the shaman. Kicked only three times, the two spells are equally efficient, costing 8 and doing 6 damage. This is all providing you have tons of red mana, as this multikicker requires. Plus Comet Storm is removal too, I’m just pointing out that this guy can be every bit as much of a late game neutron bomb laser beam as any X spell of old, and a 4/3 ain’t shabby either. I dig this guy.

JAMES

Cool. I like Joe’s breakdown actually. Need a LOT of mana to get it going but you do have the creature too. Neat. I’ll bet it’s too expensive as a 5 drop but the concept of a 1x is interesting. But building decks with a bunch of 1x’s is for the EDH crowd. What I mean is, this is too expensive for constructed play.

Dragonmaster Outcast
R
Creature – Human Shaman
1/1
At the beginning of your upkeep, if you control six or more lands, put a 5/5 red Dragon creature token with flying onto the battlefield.
Rarity: Mythic Rare
Set Number: #81/145

Yowza yowza. Okay, so this seems totally crazed. Than goodness this is a vulnerable 1/1! I think if you even get one dragon out of him, you’re looking just swell. Man. I’d definitely run him and I think I’d splash him as my only red card if I see him but aren’t playing red. “Used all your removal yet? Let’s find out.” It’s a must kill removal bait if nothing else. And if they don’t have such, you just won the game for sitting there and then tapping a mountain. This is the kind of thug that makes removal king of limited.

JAMES

Ultimately the issue I have the 1-drops that do amazing things (like Scut Mob) is that they are seriously vulnerable and you don’t have much incentive or playing them early game. And Red decks don’t like have 6 mana on the table. That means they missed a copule of burn spells or the opponent was able to stablize and the game state is swinging toward the red burn deck ‘never’ winning. There is the off-hand chance that this makes an excellent SB option for Red that (as I just said) has serious issues digging out of late game states…Testing will tell.

Goblin Roughrider
2R
Creature – Goblin Knight
3/2
Rarity: Common

Well you can’t be strictly better than gray ogre and be less interesting than this, I think. Still, not bad stats for a vanilla guy.

JAMES

Nothing here.

Grotag Goblin Thrasher
4R
Creature – Lizard
3/3
Whenever Grotag Goblin Thrasher attacks, target creature can’t block this turn.
Rarity: Common

Yeah, I like this. I’ll wait a turn and pay more for my hill giant for this. Very cool.

JAMES

WAAAY to expensive for contsructed.

Kazuul, Tyrant of the Cliffs
3RR
Legendary Creature – Ogre Warrior
5/4
Whenever a creature under an opponent’s control attacks you, put a 3/3 red Ogre creature token onto the battlefield unless that creature’s controller pays {3}.
Rarity: Rare

Hey, not bad! Swell body for the cost, and maybe an ogre here and there. More likely you staunch much of their attacks until they can kill this. Also, this is a dud EDH general.

JAMES

Very freaking interesting. Very. The general stats are good enough to warrant a look. My biggest hestiation is that it costs 5cc and doens’t “mana-sap” your opponent enough. There are plenty of deadly two drops like Putrid Leech that will take this bad boy out. I guess that means I don’t see this being a constructed staple.

Mordant Dragon
3RRR
Creature – Dragon
5/5
Flying
{1}{R}: Mordant Dragon gets +1+0 until end of turn.
Whenever Mordant Dragon deals combat damage to a player, you may have it deal that much damage to a creature that player controls.
Rarity: Rare

5/5 flier for 6 is damn good in limited, and this one pumps and represents long term reusable removal. This is a house in limited, in short.

JAMES

Cool dragon. It’s no Broodmate Dragon but it acts as a piece of flying removal too. That’s pretty cool. Red Deck Wins style decks should toy around with this. I know it seems expensive but being able to knock out creatures is nothing to scoff at. It’s an “investment” play. That is, you’re investing in next turn removal. Maybe too risky in the end but DAMN worth experimenting with.

Quest for the Goblin Lord
R
Enchantment
Whenever a Goblin enters the battlefield under your control, you may put a quest counter on Quest for the Goblin Lord.
As long as Quest for the Goblin Lord has five or more counters on it, creatures you control get +2/+0.
Rarity: Uncommon

Well, I dunno about this one. How many goblins are there? Torch slinger. Goblin shortcutters. I’m not sure you can get enough of them to make this even go active. Even if you did… well, I guess if you did it’s still a constant