I only attended one prerelease for Dominaria, and did resonably well with a 3-2 record, where I lost one match to a bad matchup against a good deck piloted by a good player, and lost the other due to playmistakes on my part. So I'm not complaining, especially since the last match's three games where all just ridiculous and we both had lots of laughs during that match.
However, I'm wondering, how I could have had a better deck with my pool, since despite that last match's hilarity it strikes me as quite generic. I had 17 lands in the beginning but added an 18th as 41st card for better mana development (I could not decide what to take out for it).
All right, fresh off my amazing 9-0 Friendly Sealed league on Magic Online I've now decided I'm a master at sealed and will share with you the benefits of my accumulated wisdom (ignore those 2-3 competitive league finishes, ignore them I say! Those were bad pools!)
If I were trying to build this. This is what I'd be looking at:
(1) Bombs: You have Verix and Helm of the Host as your best cards. Traxos might be a semi-bomb, depending on how much you can support him. Grunn and Slimefoot are cards that demand answers. I don't consider the Scriptures a "bomb" in this sense either, though it's a great card.
(2) Removal: You have no Red removal (:(). Two black spells. Three White spells. Two Deep Freeze in Blue. This is not a lot.
(3) Fixing: Ideally in sealed the games are slower and you have more time to develop, so you an play more colors and more of your most powerful spells. But you still want some amount of fixing. Looks like you don't have very much of that either, with 1 Grow from the Ashes and maybe an Envoy.
(4) Your Red isn't exciting except for the dragon. And the dragon is great, don't get me wrong (I had him in my afore-mentioned 9-0 deck) but it does appear to be the color where you have the most dudes, so you might have to play Red just to get the right creature count. I feel like you might be forcing the Black, though, for the Scriptures + removal spells, when it's not very good otherwise.
(5) I am definitely running that Traxos, and also the Replicator, as they both want the same kinds of spells anyway. It you have even 5-6 ways to activate them they are worth it, imo, and between your Legends and equipment you should easily have that.
(6) I might try a R/G build, and splash the Black for Slimefoot and the removal spells. That might look like:
Which seems all right. You have 9 historic spells, even without the Guardians, which seems like enough. You could try and jam the Eldest Reborn in there as well, but that seems a little dicy.
Ambush Krotiq makes me laugh so much. I keep rereading the card and it keeps not having Flash. In what sense is this an ambush again? I just have visions of this huge Krotiq poorly concealed in some bushes, feeling slightly sad that his carefully planned ambushes never seem to work.
Thanks a lot. The deck does look solid enough. Though without further shenanigans to untap Traxos, like a Voltaic Servant, I felt and still feel that I'd have a hard time untapping it. I feel similarly about the Self-Replicator with its need for additional mana when casting a historic spell to make use of it. Multiples sound awesome, but getting them and then paying for their triggers was too much of an effort for my tastes. At least with what the pool offered. And under pressure of time I chose to simply not play it. Probably would run the Pierce the Sky as another removal instead, I've seen a lot of flyers (Lyra, Serra Angel, etc.) that it can take down. And then fill the other slot with the second Keldon Overseer or an 18th land. Playing and equipping that Helm was quite problematic in my games, and the 18th land smoothed that out a bit.
I think your color choice was fine. Green is pretty shallow. Black has the most removal in a pool lacking in removal. I prefer removal to non-evasive fatties. But you left some powerful cards in the board and played a lot of vanilla. At the prerelease this is understandable. It wasn't obvious how slow and grindy this Sealed format would be at the time, making bears seem better than they are.
I would have played this. Still RB, because Scriptures and so much other good removal.
@FTW1987
I would still try to somehow squeeze Final Parting in. It has helped me greatly in the prerelease to find my removal, allowing me to Eviscerate Lyra in time, or lecture a whole bunch of opposing creatures with the Scriptures (the Juggernaut wouldn't listen, though). It's an expensive tutor, essentially costing a turn to use it, but still very useful. Plus, it could grab me another historic card for the historic interactions.
Yeah good point. I normally don't like expensive cards that don't affect the board this turn, but when you have "Destroy target creature", "Destroy all nonartifact creatures", and "create 2 dragons", maybe a tutor is worth it.
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I only attended one prerelease for Dominaria, and did resonably well with a 3-2 record, where I lost one match to a bad matchup against a good deck piloted by a good player, and lost the other due to playmistakes on my part. So I'm not complaining, especially since the last match's three games where all just ridiculous and we both had lots of laughs during that match.
However, I'm wondering, how I could have had a better deck with my pool, since despite that last match's hilarity it strikes me as quite generic. I had 17 lands in the beginning but added an 18th as 41st card for better mana development (I could not decide what to take out for it).
8 Swamp
9 Mountain
1 Zhalfirin Void
Creatures (15)
1 Keldon Warcaller
1 Bloodstone Goblin
2 Cabal Evangel
2 Keldon Overseer
1 Ghitu Journeymage
1 Valduk, Keeper of the Flame
1 Verix Bladewing
1 Keldon Raider
1 Rampaging Cyclops
1 Skizzik
2 Windgrace Acolyte
1 Guardians of Koilos
1 Bloodtallow Candle
1 Vicious Offering
1 Soul Salvage
1 Forebear's Blade
1 Helm of the Host
1 Phyrexian Scriptures
1 Eviscerate
1 Final Parting
There's lots of good stuff in the sideboard, so I think, there's lots of potential for a better/different deck
2 Sparring Construct
1 Traxos, Scourge of Kroog
1 Amaranthine Wall
1 Mishra's Self-Replicator
1 Navigator's Compass
1 Shield of the Realm
Red
1 Skirk Prospector
1 Goblin Warchief
1 Warlord's Fury
1 Fervent Strike
Black
1 Rat Colony
1 Whisper, Blood Liturgist
1 Cabal Paladin
1 Blessing of Belzenlok
2 Demonic Vigor
1 Fungal Infection
1 The Eldest Reborn
1 Yawgmoth's Vile Offering
White
1 Tragic Poet
1 Knight of Grace
1 Serra Disciple
1 Sergeant-at-Arms
1 Aven Sentry
1 Excavation Elephant
1 Charge
1 Healing Grace
1 Gideon's Reproach
1 Seal Away
1 Dub
1 On Serra's Wings
1 Blessed Light
1 Diligent Excavator
1 Tolarian Scholar
1 Homarid Explorer
1 Academy Journeymage
1 Cloudreader Sphinx
1 Cold-Water Snapper
1 Rescue
1 Arcane Flight
1 Wizard's Retort
1 Befuddle
1 Divination
2 Deep Freeze
1 Time of Ice
1 Syncopate
Green
1 Llanowar Elves
1 Corrosive Ooze
1 Llanowar Envoy
1 Yavimaya Sapherd
1 Gaea's Protector
1 Grunn, The Lonely King
1 Primordial Wurm
1 Pierce the Sky
1 Grow from the Ashes
1 Primevals' Glorious Rebirth
1 Rona, Disciple of Gix
1 Slimefoot, the Stowaway
Lands
1 Memorial to Genius
Thanks to anyone who shares their thoughts with me on this pool.
Former Rules Advisor
"Everything's better with pirates." - Lodge
(The Gamers: Dorkness Rising)
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science."
(Girl Genius - Fairy Tale Theater Break - Cinderella, end of volume 8)
If I were trying to build this. This is what I'd be looking at:
(1) Bombs: You have Verix and Helm of the Host as your best cards. Traxos might be a semi-bomb, depending on how much you can support him. Grunn and Slimefoot are cards that demand answers. I don't consider the Scriptures a "bomb" in this sense either, though it's a great card.
(2) Removal: You have no Red removal (:(). Two black spells. Three White spells. Two Deep Freeze in Blue. This is not a lot.
(3) Fixing: Ideally in sealed the games are slower and you have more time to develop, so you an play more colors and more of your most powerful spells. But you still want some amount of fixing. Looks like you don't have very much of that either, with 1 Grow from the Ashes and maybe an Envoy.
(4) Your Red isn't exciting except for the dragon. And the dragon is great, don't get me wrong (I had him in my afore-mentioned 9-0 deck) but it does appear to be the color where you have the most dudes, so you might have to play Red just to get the right creature count. I feel like you might be forcing the Black, though, for the Scriptures + removal spells, when it's not very good otherwise.
(5) I am definitely running that Traxos, and also the Replicator, as they both want the same kinds of spells anyway. It you have even 5-6 ways to activate them they are worth it, imo, and between your Legends and equipment you should easily have that.
(6) I might try a R/G build, and splash the Black for Slimefoot and the removal spells. That might look like:
1 Corrosive Ooze
1 Keldon Warcaller
1 Bloodstone Goblin
1 Llanowar Envoy
1 Yavimaya Sapherd
1 Slimefoot, the Stowaway
1 Keldon Overseer
1 Valduk, Keeper of the Flame
1 Verix Bladewing
1 Traxos, Scourge of Troog
1 Keldon Raider
1 Rampaging Cyclops
1 Skizzik
1 Mishra's Self-Replicator
1 Grunn, The Lonely King
1 Primordial Wurm
1 Vicious Offering
1 Grow from the Ashes
1 Forebear's Blade
1 Helm of the Host
1 Eviscerate
Which is a curve of:
1: CS
2: CCCS
3: CCCCCSS
4: CCCCSS
5: CC
6: CC
Which seems all right. You have 9 historic spells, even without the Guardians, which seems like enough. You could try and jam the Eldest Reborn in there as well, but that seems a little dicy.
Former Rules Advisor
"Everything's better with pirates." - Lodge
(The Gamers: Dorkness Rising)
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science."
(Girl Genius - Fairy Tale Theater Break - Cinderella, end of volume 8)
I would have played this. Still RB, because Scriptures and so much other good removal.
1 Keldon Warcaller
1 Bloodstone Goblin
1 Cabal Evangel
2 Keldon Overseer
1 Ghitu Journeymage
1 Valduk, Keeper of the Flame
1 Verix Bladewing
1 Keldon Raider
1 Traxos, Scourge of Kroog
1 Rampaging Cyclops
2 Windgrace Acolyte
1 Guardians of Koilos
1 Mishra's Self-Replicator
1 Fungal Infection
1 Bloodtallow Candle
1 Vicious Offering
1 Forebear's Blade
1 Helm of the Host
1 Eviscerate
1 Phyrexian Scriptures
1 The Eldest Reborn
//Lands:
1 Zhalfrin Void
8 Mountain
8 Swamp
1 Soul Salvage
1 Cabal Evangel
1 Whisper, Blood Liturgist
1 Yawgmoth's Vile Offering
Historic: 10
Replicator and Traxos should have sufficient support. Guardians has synergy with reusing Scriptures or Eldest Reborn to really wreck opponent's board.
You could maybe play Whisper, Blood Liturgist to have even more historic and more recursion, but the other 4 drops all seem like much better blockers.
I would still try to somehow squeeze Final Parting in. It has helped me greatly in the prerelease to find my removal, allowing me to Eviscerate Lyra in time, or lecture a whole bunch of opposing creatures with the Scriptures (the Juggernaut wouldn't listen, though). It's an expensive tutor, essentially costing a turn to use it, but still very useful. Plus, it could grab me another historic card for the historic interactions.
Former Rules Advisor
"Everything's better with pirates." - Lodge
(The Gamers: Dorkness Rising)
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science."
(Girl Genius - Fairy Tale Theater Break - Cinderella, end of volume 8)