So today in one of my sealed games at dr4ft.com, I came across this pool, which has almost no removal, a shortage of playable creatures and quite a few multicolored cards. Our of this pool, only red and green have hard removal, with blue having some ways to bounce stuff:
Reasoning: I thought I could try to take advantage of Liliana, the pair of Merciless Javelineers, and the lone Magma spray, and use the fixers in my pool to splash Cartouche of Strength as a desperate way to put in more hard removal.
Needless to say, the deck got slaughtered, as I was not able to stay long enough for Liliana to fix things. Is there another way I should be building this deck?
Having played the format now, I'd go with red-black splashing green too. The green has some strong cards but involves playing more filler to round out the curve and strategy, while red has more high quality commons. There isn't enough fixing to run all those great green gold cards, unfortunately.
If splashing for the Cartouche, you might as well splash for the Charioteer too.
If you are facing aggro and need more blockers, you can board in the two 1/4s. But otherwise they don't seem that great. The Sealed format seems slow enough that you can afford to miss a 2-drop in exchange for having a better card to play later.
I wouldn't bother maindecking Nest of Scarabs. There aren't quite enough -1/-1 counter enablers for this to be consistent. A lot of the time it does literally nothing for 3 mana. Javelineers is your main enabler. If I had Javelineers on the battlefield, unless I was getting swarmed and needed blockers, I'd probably just discard Nest of Scarabs to make another -1/-1 counter (for 2) instead of spending 3 mana to cast it so that the next -1/-1 counter gives me a measly 1/1. It takes a lot of work to generate value. Even if you get 2 tokens, it's subpar (3-mana conditional Dragon Fodder). You need at least 3 tokens for it to be reasonable. And due to the discard cost of Javelineers, that means investing 4 cards (3 discarded + Nest) to make 3 -1/-1 counters and get 3 tokens. That's a lot of cards invested to see marginal value. There's probably a Nest of Scarabs deck out there, but it's not with Javelineers. Javelineers is much better on offense, to screw up blocking with the virtual threat of shrinking.
I'd play Pursue Glory. Sometimes Dynacharge just wins games, and when it doesn't then you can cycle it!
Thanks for the tips! Yeah, Nest of Scarabs should not have been in the deck at all. And agreed on the Pursue Glory. Anyway, I just went 0-3-1 on what I feel is the worst pool ever. I'll post a new thread when I get things ready.
1 Djeru's Resolve
1 Sacred Cat
1 Trueheart Duelist
1 Forsake the Worldly
1 Rhet-Crop Spearmaster
2 Unwavering Initiate
1 Sparring Mummy
2 Tah-Crop Elite
1 Protection of the Hekma
1 Supply Caravan
1 Winged Shepherd
1 Approach of the Second Sun
Blue:
1 Compelling Argument
1 Tah-Crop Skirmisher
1 Winds of Rebuke
1 Cancel
1 Illusory Wrappings
1 Decision Paralysis
1 Naga Oracle
2 Angler Drake
1 River Serpent
1 Supernatural Stamina
2 Dune Beetle
1 Lay Bare the Heart
1 Miasmic Mummy
1 Trespasser's Curse
1 Cartouche of Ambition
1 Cursed Minotaur
1 Nest of Scarabs
1 Wander in Death
1 Gravedigger
1 Liliana, Death's Majesty
1 Blazing Volley
1 Bloodlust Inciter
1 Magma Spray
1 Nimble-Blade Khenra
1 Tormenting Voice
1 Ahn-Crop Crasher
1 Minotaur Sureshot
2 Thresher Lizard
1 Emberhorn Minotaur
1 Pursue Glory
1 Violent Impact
1 Manticore of the Gauntlet
1 Desert Cerodon
Green:
1 Stinging Shot
2 Dissenter's Deliverance
1 Initiate's Companion
1 Benefaction of Rhonas
1 Cartouche of Strength
1 Hooded Brawler
1 Ornery Kudu
1 Pouncing Cheetah
2 Spidery Grasp
2 Giant Spider
2 Colossapede
1 Shefet Monitor
2 Greater Sandwurm
1 Wayward Servant
1 Enigma Drake
1 Failure
1 Khenra Charioteer
2 Ahn-Crop Champion
1 Bounty of the Luxa
2 Merciless Javelineer
Land/Artifact:
1 Canyon Slough
1 Cradle of the Accursed
1 Painted Bluffs
1 Sunscorched Desert
1 Throne of the God-Pharaoh
1 Bontu's Monument
1 Rhonas's Monument
Out of this pool, I chose to run the following:
2 Dune Beetle
1 Nimble-Blade Khenra
1 Manticore of the Gauntlet
1 Cradle of the Accursed
1 Cursed Minotaur
1 Painted Bluffs
1 Ahn-Crop Crasher
6 Swamp
1 Gravedigger
1 Emberhorn Minotaur
1 Supernatural Stamina
6 Mountain
1 Nest of Scarabs
1 Tormenting Voice
1 Cartouche of Ambition
1 Minotaur Sureshot
1 Liliana, Death's Majesty
1 Magma Spray
1 Miasmic Mummy
2 Forest
1 Wander in Death
2 Merciless Javelineer
1 Cartouche of Strength
1 Canyon Slough
1 Desert Cerodon
Reasoning: I thought I could try to take advantage of Liliana, the pair of Merciless Javelineers, and the lone Magma spray, and use the fixers in my pool to splash Cartouche of Strength as a desperate way to put in more hard removal.
Needless to say, the deck got slaughtered, as I was not able to stay long enough for Liliana to fix things. Is there another way I should be building this deck?
1 Nimble-Blade Khenra
1 Miasmic Mummy
1 Ahn-Crop Crasher
1 Minotaur Sureshot
1 Cursed Minotaur
2 Thresher Lizard
1 Khenra Charioteer
1 Emberhorn Minotaur
1 Gravedigger
2 Merciless Javelineer
1 Manticore of the Gauntlet
1 Desert Cerodon
1 Liliana, Death's Majesty
//Spells: 8
1 Magma Spray
1 Supernatural Stamina
1 Tormenting Voice
1 Lay Bare the Heart
1 Cartouche of Ambition
1 Cartouche of Strength
1 Wander in Death
1 Pursue Glory
2 Forest
1 Painted Bluffs
1 Canyon Slough
7 Mountain
6 Swamp
Curve:
1 - ss
2 - ccss
3 - ccccccsss
4 - ccccs
5+- ccp
If splashing for the Cartouche, you might as well splash for the Charioteer too.
If you are facing aggro and need more blockers, you can board in the two 1/4s. But otherwise they don't seem that great. The Sealed format seems slow enough that you can afford to miss a 2-drop in exchange for having a better card to play later.
I wouldn't bother maindecking Nest of Scarabs. There aren't quite enough -1/-1 counter enablers for this to be consistent. A lot of the time it does literally nothing for 3 mana. Javelineers is your main enabler. If I had Javelineers on the battlefield, unless I was getting swarmed and needed blockers, I'd probably just discard Nest of Scarabs to make another -1/-1 counter (for 2) instead of spending 3 mana to cast it so that the next -1/-1 counter gives me a measly 1/1. It takes a lot of work to generate value. Even if you get 2 tokens, it's subpar (3-mana conditional Dragon Fodder). You need at least 3 tokens for it to be reasonable. And due to the discard cost of Javelineers, that means investing 4 cards (3 discarded + Nest) to make 3 -1/-1 counters and get 3 tokens. That's a lot of cards invested to see marginal value. There's probably a Nest of Scarabs deck out there, but it's not with Javelineers. Javelineers is much better on offense, to screw up blocking with the virtual threat of shrinking.
I'd play Pursue Glory. Sometimes Dynacharge just wins games, and when it doesn't then you can cycle it!
Edit: Thread is up.