Tag Archives: Magic

MTG Reflection: Battle for Zendikar Pre-Release

Conduit of Ruin

A Tale of Two Local Game Shops

For those of you who have somehow missed the bus Battle for Zendikar’s Pre-Release, it was last weekend, and it was one hell of a time.  There has been a lot of hate in the MTGFinance community going on, and claims like the only value will be the Expeditions.  Today I would like to talk about a totally different value I found, and the BFZ Pre-Releases I attended over the weekend.

After playing Magic for some time there are a lot of things we forget, and of which I was reacquainted with this past weekend.   First, we trekked out Saturday to play at a different shop.  There are three things I want to point out of which I had forgotten about: One, not all shops are created equal.  Two, not all decks are created equal.   Keep these two things in mind.  Thirdly, cracking packs is always fun.  That last one isn’t as relevant.

New Game Shop

It’s always fun going to a new game shop.  It was a nice change from the typical MTG shop I go to. I opened a ton of value you can see here on Twitter.

(https://twitter.com/MTGSpeculation/status/647822528505712640)

Now the thing I love most about the game is how things can be very unpredictable.  Honestly, I thought my deck was going to be terrible.  I thought there was no way in hell, my Red/Black non-ramp Eldrazi 5+ 6 drops deck was going to cut it.  I had pretty much chalked the day up to: “Awesome I opened an Expedition, my blessings were counted for the day.  Time to go home.” Kind of a day.  I was proven wrong, and even more so realized how fun it is to play “BIG ASS CREATURES”.

Once, my Eldrazi’s were up in place they fed themselves. I also have a love hate relationship with Bane of Bala Ged.  Bane is a lovely sight when you aren’t defending against him.  Another card that really worked well for me was Conduit of Ruin.  The conclusion I came to with Eldrazis, is if my opponent didn’t have any to match the might of my own, or the removal…they were toast!  I also, never ran my Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger.  I probably could have actually cast him every game too. As you can see this turned out to somehow be a killer deck.

The thing is I don’t actually know if the deck was really that good.  I mean my friend, and I met in the Finals, split the packs and went home.  However, it left something lingering with me.  Did I actually build a good deck, or was it the level of players at the shop?  I think I may have to go back a few times to find this out, but I do know that the shop doesn’t host weekly either.  It was also a nice experience being able to help players learn about the new mechanics.  I was asked what is exile anyway? In short I responded with, “Exile works like a second graveyard.”  If anyone has a better explanation I would love to see it in comments.

Angelic-Captain-Battle-for-Zendikar-MtG-Art

My Game Shop

I feel like everyone has that game shop that they call home, at least the one they go to the most.  Anyway Sunday went way better than planned on the cracked packs. I didn’t expect to get anything good because Saturday had gone so well.  However, I was wrong.  I pulled Ob Nixilis Reignited as my promo, and my buddy pulled Ulamog as his.

Today was not my decks day though.  I ran a red/white ally deck. Surprisingly, I had a lot of cards for it. Two Lantern Scouts, Dragonmaster Outcast, Radiant Flames, Angelic Captain, and a ton of Allys.  I also had a Retreat to Emeria, and loved hitting two for ones with my evolving wilds and cracking them during combat to spike all my troops.  A lot of players did not see this coming.  So, keep it a secret between us.  Alas, my day ended going 1-1-2, and my buddies did go as well either.

Again, I put myself into a similar question.  Was my deck really that bad or were there just better players here?  Typically this game shop I consider to have decent players, which play a lot and know the mechanics of the game.  They also invest a lot of their time outside of the shops learning as well as prepping for things like releases.

Can’t Anticipate Everything

Overall, thank you Wizards for a fun new Block.  The Pre-Release was a great gaming experience, and nice change in format.  I also, need to remember that even if you think your deck is going to be amazing or be terrible, you can’t fully anticipate the outcome of the day.  With that we may never know if I build good decks, or was it the fact that everyone showed up with their “A” game.  Enjoy the new Battle for Zendikar block, and if you didn’t catch the Pre-Release at least try and get out for the Release.  I believe you will get amazing value with your time, even if the cards don’t end up being worth much.

MTG: Troll-Shroud Cannot Save You From Everything

Asceticism

Today, The Other Side of the Coin takes a vow of Asceticism, and offers a few simple words regarding one of its author’s favorite green cards of all time.

Five-mana enchantment. Scars of Mirrodin. Creatures you control have hexproof. 1G: Regenerate target creature. Every creature on your side of the field becomes Thrun, the Last Troll.

And there he stands on the art.

Tiny, far off in the distance, looking up and away from the viewer. He can see the area that would be inhabited by the viewer; look at him. He sees you.

He is ignoring you.

He refuses all company, attentive only to his surroundings. He is wounded. He is burdened.

“Let my ignominy build walls thicker than iron and stronger than darksteel.”

Ignominy. Contemptible conduct, the utter disgrace of one’s name.

Thrun saw what happened to Glissa when the green sun was born. He saw her confrontation with Memnarch, who caused all other trolls on Mirrodin to vanish, back to the planes from which they came. He understood the meaning of Phyrexian oil.

He understood, and he told no one.

“His crime was silence, and now he suffers it eternally.”

Limited Landscape

Humble Defector

Limited Landscape

With all the excitement surrounding the Dragons of Tarkir release and the resultant flurry of set reviews and podcasts we have figured a few things out about the new set. However, in terms of limited there are always additional facets of the format to analyze.  Questions remain about the relative power level of each color and clan, the playability of a few build-around-me cards, and how we should color our perception of the format based on Fate Reforged.  Simply playing the set is often the best way to answer these questions. But having spent some time with Fate Reforged we may be better equipped, and may in fact be better served, to take another look.

Overview

Both the influx of new cards and the exodus of Khans of Tarkir have led to an interesting position for Fate Reforged in the format.  In the previous format, the set felt top heavy and lacked truly playable cards in the bottom half of each pack.  It wasn’t infrequent to open packs with only 2-3 playables.  Since the Fate Reforged packs were cracked first in the KTK format most of these playables would dry up by picks 4-5.  This generally made it hard to make meaningful reads on the cards being passed to you early and the fact that many players in a pod would be married to their first pick made feeling out the format a bit more unintuitive.

Now with Fate Reforged being opened as the final pack in the current draft format we will see a whole new side to the set.  After a dozen drafts I’ve found myself picking up high priority rares around picks 5-6 and getting high priority commons at a stage in the draft that would’ve been impossible in the FTR-KTK-KTK format.  For example, cards like Jeskai Infiltrator and many great FTR rares are being passed multiple times.  The question to ask yourself is how can I capitalize on this as a drafter?

Make the correct reads.  This format is much easier to read accurately than the two previous and the benefits of doing so are far greater.  Fifth pick Sage Eye Avengers and his ilk were fantasies in the past and a reality now.

The last general tenet of DTK-DTK-FTR drafting I would pass on is to remember that there are between 3-6 cards, all of which are rare and one being mythic, per clan that incentivize staying in their respective two color combination.  This means you can very easily go with any pairing you please so long as you consider the consequences it could have on a synergy driven deck.  So when you see an Atarka’s Command first pick first pack and don’t know whether or not to take it over a great mono color card, remember you don’t have to commit to a clan and the rewards can be great for staying open.

Fate Reforged Card Analysis

Despite the headline I won’t be going through each card and grading it or anything like that.  I’ll be outlining a few commons that I believe will either have risen or fallen given the change in format.  By no means will this list be indicative of what I believe to be the best commons in FTR necessarily.

Goblin Heelcutter:

This was my favorite FTR common in the previous format and I don’t see myself changing my tune anytime soon.  Heelcutter does things you’d expect from an uncommon and is a card you find yourself counting as a live draw for lethal.  My favorite common got even better, if you find yourself in Kolaghan colors this is the card you want to see most next to Pyrotechnics, excluding rares, in many cases.  This card absolutely punishes decks that want to exploit and go for value.  Dashing out Heelcutter early can provide enough pressure to force opponents to play sub-optimally to stay out of burn range.

Jeskai Sage:

There has been a lot said about Palace Familiar and all of those things can be said about Jeskai Sage.  The real power here is that while Palace Familiar gives you an exploit value card and something to stop all the X/1s in the format, Jeskai Sage can trade up into X/2s while providing the same level of value.  You’ll often find yourself hoping to find 2-3 Jeskai Sages from your FTR pack.

Return to the Earth:

This card was a decent side board option in the previous format, but with the addition of DTK this card is now (mostly due to the weakness of green) a true main deck option. Return to the Earth also provides green with a card to look for in their FTR pack where green is noticeably lacking playables.  It’s not the most exciting card but has certainly risen in value.

Typhoid Rats:

A Limited staple for years Rats is finding itself positioned better in this format where it can be exploited for value and cards like Tail Slash give deathtouch creatures added levels of flexibility.  DTK isn’t a set that features many “go wide” strategies whereas Khans featured cards like Ponyback Brigade, Hordling Outburst, and Take Up Arms.

Sandsteppe Outcast:

No surprises here, Outcast is still fantastic although white is markedly weaker in DTK than it was in Khans.  To this point, it is fairly common to take Sandblast over Outcast in this format where white is depending on both Green and Blue, most commonly, to provide removal.

Notably improved Uncommons.  This is a short list of a couple uncommons that benefitted greatly from synergies in DTK.

Humble Defector:

This is a card that was very strong in the previous format but has a couple cute synergies in the new set.  The primary one being with Swift Warkite, Warkite may already be the strongest of the uncommon dragon cycle in DTK.  But bringing back Humble Defector, drawing two cards for free, and netting a 4/4 flyer + a 2/1 with upside is a huge game.  If you end up with a Warkite or two keep an eye out for this card.

Merciless Executioner:

This one is a given.  It had the exploit mechanic before it was actually introduced, given that this format doesn’t feature “go wide” strategies but does feature tons of on death value creatures Executioner can do some disgusting things.

Fearsome Awakening:

Fearsome Awakening is a card that generally wheels and in certain decks has the potential to be insane.  Coupled with a couple Gurmag Drowner you can toss away morph dragons and bring them out buffed the following turn.  It makes cards like Icefall Regent borderline unbeatable and makes the uncommon cycle of morph dragons much more playable.  I wouldn’t take it very early but it will normally be available in the back half of FTR packs where there is a noticeable lack of playables for most archetypes.