So I had an absolutely absurd mono-white Triplicate Spirits deck today, with a Hornet Queen and Hornet Nest idling in my sideboard. In the absence of any fixing of any kind, is it worth disrupting the simple mana base for these two cards? I decided to leave them in the board, and went 2-3 overall. I honestly can't think of many situations where I would have wanted Hornet Queen over say Triplicate Spirits #3 or something, but 2 of the three people that beat me berated me for going for a more consistent deck. Are Hornet Queen/Nest good enough either alone or together to warrant inclusion in an otherwise tight decklist?
Splashing is not worth it unless it strengthens a weak deck. If your deck is already strong then splashing is unnecessary. So if you have to have more creatures or if you have no win cons then splash, otherwise don't bother.
Hornet Queen is triple green. If you're playing it, you're not splashing, you're playing GW. Depending on the rest of your pool, GW may or may not make a better deck than mono W. Can't really say unless you post your pool.
I can't for sure say anything without seeing your pool, but I believe you should have played GW. It's exceptionally rare for a mono-colored sealed deck to be better than having the second color. 2 color decks are still quite consistent and I'm sure you were forced to pay something sub-optimal to stay mono-colored.
Here's the deck I drafted today. I realize that the two walls are less than ideal, but they often got me to a T3/4 Triplicate Spirits. Otherwise, the weakest cards are the Auras and very rarely were they dead in hand.
There might be an argument for a red splash, given the red weenies synergize with token swarm convoke, you have an RW dual to smooth the manabase, Belligerent Sliver randomly comboes with the white sliver for extra removal/evasion, and possible lategame Siege Dragon. Monowhite is probably more consistent, but your red cards are not awful and some of your white cards (auras, walls) are mediocre.
I'm going against the consensus. Your deck is filled with creatures with at most 2 power and at most 2 toughness. If you don't draw your paragon or sanctified charge, you have a weeny swarm and no more. Half your deck dies to a festergloom. A lot cards will get rid of the cathars. The only threat worth removing in your deck is the paragon. You only have 11 non-wall creatures, raise to 15 with your token makers. If you don't have one of your 4 mass-ump spells, I doubt you would win a race for damage.
I'd splash for a late-game hornet queen. Not the nest, it's useless in your deck strategy. The queen, OTOH, gives you a late-game win-con. You don't need 16 plains for your deck to be consistent. an 11/6 mana base would do, cutting the two walls for a land and the queen. There is no real deep reason to go with a mono-colour deck in draft.
(You could also splash red for the dragon, sliver and marauder instead of green, although to have a chance of casting the little red guys would mean screwing too much your mana base for little value, so probably only the dragon would do. The dragon wiping all x/2 of your opponent every turn is pretty powerful.)
EDIT: In monowhite I don't see a reason to avoid Radiant Fountain. It's not like you have spells that cost WWW or WW or that you are going to keep a hand with only 1 land. In mono, it's just free life.
I agree with the earlier poster that the best deck with your pool is a Red/White deck. I do not think your mono white is strong enough and you definitely can't be green. Next time don't worry about taking off color rates, just pass them. Ofcourse I don't know how early you took them. Generator servant can help you achieve early spirits and the red white shell will be a proper aggro deck.
I tried the red splash in the deck after I got knocked out of prize contention and just couldn't find as reliable a mix of things when it was mono-white. I did like the idea of the random Sliver cooperation I pulled, as well as having the Siege Dragon come in off Generator Servant out of nowhere. I will keep that in mind about Radiant Fountain if I get this sort of draft again.
Queen and Nest were Pack 2 and 3 Pick 1 each. I was 95% sure I had a green drafter to my immediate right and that forced the Queen choice. Luckily, I made the right call there. Also, the pack had very little in the way of anything good for the convoke deck that I would regret letting go. Hornet Nest was also in a nearly dead pack at the start of Pack 3 when I was looking for small pieces to finish off the deck. At no point did I pass anything very good to "hate" out those two cards.
Also, I wound up really lucky with when the pieces for this deck were opened. Apparently I snagged the right enablers even though they were horrendously split up in the pool, which led to nobody else trying to force the archetype.
red splash with that pool seems good. No need for md sable when you have better card choices. Prob cut one wall of essence and sable for borderland and soulmender? Maybe even cut the marked by honor for the dual land, and if you go red, possibly cutting one of the triplicates for the siege dragon might seem ok as well, and then add a few mountains, and yeah. I don't love the deck, or what you drafted, but then three triplicate spirits seems good
EDIT: Sliver synergy def worth it as well. Prob not worth the generator servant imo.
I tried the red splash in the deck after I got knocked out of prize contention and just couldn't find as reliable a mix of things when it was mono-white. I did like the idea of the random Sliver cooperation I pulled, as well as having the Siege Dragon come in off Generator Servant out of nowhere. I will keep that in mind about Radiant Fountain if I get this sort of draft again.
Care to post the list your boarded into? If you want the 23rd card nitpicked, that is. Also, I'd put Raise the Alarm and Trip Spirits in with the creatures, not the spells in your decklist.
Queen and Nest were Pack 2 and 3 Pick 1 each. I was 95% sure I had a green drafter to my immediate right and that forced the Queen choice. Luckily, I made the right call there.
Please take a moment to read through this thread. Do you still think you made the right call?
Overall, your cathar/charge/raise/trip core is SUPER strong. Here's what I would have built:
I'm going to dissent a little bit here, so bear with me.
You were right to pick Hornet Queen and Hornet's Nest. You were right to not play them.
But I think you drafted this deck wrong.
Your main includes cards that I really don't think matter that much to the Triplicate Spirits plan. You are playing Divine Favor, Marked by Honor, and Heliod's Pilgrim to go find them. That's cute, sure, but it's making something decent out of cards that by themselves are just ok. Divine Favor is a lot scarier in the deck running multiple Oreskos Swiftclaws, of which you just don't have any. I have to believe that at some point during your draft you had the choice between these white cards and much stronger green (or red) cards, and I would suggest that you should have taken them instead.
Hornet Queen/Nest fit perfectly into the GW token strategy because they generate a whole freaking fleet of tokens that work with your Sanctified Charges, your Selfless Cathars, and all the rest. Queen might be the perfect seven drop, as far as seven drops go, because she will utterly brick almost any offense and totally lock down the board. There is almost nothing that can swing into Hornet Queen apart from Soul of Theros related shenanigans. She's a straight up bomb, and as soon as you had her, you definitely should have moved into green, no matter what your opponent happened to be doing to your right. He gets to affect exactly ONE pack out of three; unless you were flanked both left and right, you should have had decent access to green to support a GW deck.
That's why I think that while your deck (or Merl's) is probably the best you could assemble from the pool you had, I have reason to suspect you drafted the pool incorrectly to begin with. Do you happen to have the draftcap?
I don't mean to sound abrasive, it's just that I'm not sure you're asking the right question here.
Mogis, God of Slaughter
Daxos of Meletis
R Norin the Wary: I've Got a Bad Feeling About This
UG Thrasios & Kydele: Knowledge is Power
RG Borborygmos Enraged: The Breaking of the World
BG The Gitrog Monster: All Glory to the Hypnotoad
WUR Zedruu the Greathearted: Endless Possibilities, One Outcome
WBG Karador, Ghost Chieftain: What's Dead May Never Die
Turn your junk into something great with PucaTrade!
1 Constricting Sliver
1 Kinsbaile Skirmisher
1 Heliod's Pilgrim
1 Paragon of New Dawns
1 Preeminent Captain
1 Razorfoot Griffin
2 Selfless Cathar
2 Sungrace Pegasus
2 Wall of Essence
1 Divine Favor
1 Marked by Honor
1 Oppressive Rays
1 Pillar of Light
2 Raise the Alarm
1 Sanctified Charge
3 Triplicate Spirits
16 Plains
1 Accursed Spirit
1 Battlefield Forge
1 Belligerent Sliver
1 Borderland Marauder
1 Congregate
1 Festergloom
1 Generator Servan
1 Hornet Queen
1 Hornet Nest
1 Krenko's Enforcer
1 Profane Momento
1 Radiant Fountain
1 Siege Dragon
1 Soulmender
1 Staff of the Flame Magus
1 Staff of the Sun Magus
1 Tireless Missionaries
1 Waste Not
Mogis, God of Slaughter
Daxos of Meletis
I'd splash for a late-game hornet queen. Not the nest, it's useless in your deck strategy. The queen, OTOH, gives you a late-game win-con. You don't need 16 plains for your deck to be consistent. an 11/6 mana base would do, cutting the two walls for a land and the queen. There is no real deep reason to go with a mono-colour deck in draft.
(You could also splash red for the dragon, sliver and marauder instead of green, although to have a chance of casting the little red guys would mean screwing too much your mana base for little value, so probably only the dragon would do. The dragon wiping all x/2 of your opponent every turn is pretty powerful.)
R Norin the Wary: I've Got a Bad Feeling About This
UG Thrasios & Kydele: Knowledge is Power
RG Borborygmos Enraged: The Breaking of the World
BG The Gitrog Monster: All Glory to the Hypnotoad
WUR Zedruu the Greathearted: Endless Possibilities, One Outcome
WBG Karador, Ghost Chieftain: What's Dead May Never Die
Turn your junk into something great with PucaTrade!
Queen and Nest were Pack 2 and 3 Pick 1 each. I was 95% sure I had a green drafter to my immediate right and that forced the Queen choice. Luckily, I made the right call there. Also, the pack had very little in the way of anything good for the convoke deck that I would regret letting go. Hornet Nest was also in a nearly dead pack at the start of Pack 3 when I was looking for small pieces to finish off the deck. At no point did I pass anything very good to "hate" out those two cards.
Also, I wound up really lucky with when the pieces for this deck were opened. Apparently I snagged the right enablers even though they were horrendously split up in the pool, which led to nobody else trying to force the archetype.
Mogis, God of Slaughter
Daxos of Meletis
EDIT: Sliver synergy def worth it as well. Prob not worth the generator servant imo.
Care to post the list your boarded into? If you want the 23rd card nitpicked, that is. Also, I'd put Raise the Alarm and Trip Spirits in with the creatures, not the spells in your decklist.
Please take a moment to read through this thread. Do you still think you made the right call?
Overall, your cathar/charge/raise/trip core is SUPER strong. Here's what I would have built:
1 Bronze Sable
1 Kinsbaile Skirmisher
1 Generator Servant
2 Sungrace Pegasus
2 Raise the Alarm
1 Belligerent Sliver
1 Heliod's Pilgrim
1 Preeminent Captain
1 Paragon of New Dawns
1 Razorfoot Griffin
3 Triplicate Spirits
1 Constricting Sliver
1 Siege Dragon
1 Devouring Light
1 Marked by Honor
1 Sanctified Charge
11 Plains
5 Mountain
1 Battlefield Forge
1 Borderland Marauder
1 Soulmender
1 Divine Favor
1 Pillar of Light
2 Wall of Essence
1 Accursed Spirit
1 Congregate
1 Festergloom
1 Hornet Queen
1 Hornet Nest
1 Krenko's Enforcer
1 Profane Momento
1 Radiant Fountain
1 Staff of the Flame Magus
1 Staff of the Sun Magus
1 Tireless Missionaries
1 Waste Not
Curve (* is Trip Spirits for a discount)
1 ccs
2 ccccccc
3 cccs
4 cc***s
5 s
6+cc
You were right to pick Hornet Queen and Hornet's Nest. You were right to not play them.
But I think you drafted this deck wrong.
Your main includes cards that I really don't think matter that much to the Triplicate Spirits plan. You are playing Divine Favor, Marked by Honor, and Heliod's Pilgrim to go find them. That's cute, sure, but it's making something decent out of cards that by themselves are just ok. Divine Favor is a lot scarier in the deck running multiple Oreskos Swiftclaws, of which you just don't have any. I have to believe that at some point during your draft you had the choice between these white cards and much stronger green (or red) cards, and I would suggest that you should have taken them instead.
Hornet Queen/Nest fit perfectly into the GW token strategy because they generate a whole freaking fleet of tokens that work with your Sanctified Charges, your Selfless Cathars, and all the rest. Queen might be the perfect seven drop, as far as seven drops go, because she will utterly brick almost any offense and totally lock down the board. There is almost nothing that can swing into Hornet Queen apart from Soul of Theros related shenanigans. She's a straight up bomb, and as soon as you had her, you definitely should have moved into green, no matter what your opponent happened to be doing to your right. He gets to affect exactly ONE pack out of three; unless you were flanked both left and right, you should have had decent access to green to support a GW deck.
That's why I think that while your deck (or Merl's) is probably the best you could assemble from the pool you had, I have reason to suspect you drafted the pool incorrectly to begin with. Do you happen to have the draftcap?
I don't mean to sound abrasive, it's just that I'm not sure you're asking the right question here.