Transcendent Master was definitely the best card in my deck, even if I only saw him in 4 games.
Kazandu Tuskcaller was my MVP. For some reason, I only faced one guy who had a way to remove him (yes, a 1/1). Throw a Hyena Umbra on him, and he rapidly goes ridiculous. Ever seen someone conspiring to kill 9 elephants? It doesn't work.
Edit: Kazandu, not Krosan. WotC really needs to standardize their made up names.
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I opened one last year, got two crap worldwake packs and 8x scathe zombies, which I promptly hid around my sister's apartment for her roommates to find. But, yeah, it was a piece of crap.
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I played black/white. Overall MVP probably vendetta as I had 3 of these, with white lifegain to back them up.
Black: Nirkana Revenant, 3x vendetta
White: Gideon, lots of white removal
Eldrazi: Ulamog's crusher, hand of emrakul
The Good:
Level up guys were fantastic. I only had 1x ikirial outrider and 1x null champion, but both were fantastic. A 2/6 vigilance on turn 4 is a fantastic wall that can also slip in some damage. Null champion 4/2 swinging on turn 3 is very strong, and if he gets his regenerate up he wins games.
hand of emrakul. Maybe he shines in a deck that can reliably get 4 tokens out early, but to me he was pretty much a dud. I would have cut him if I had any other viable finishers to play. Easily the worst eldrazi - annihilator 1 is inconsequential.
gideon jura - say what? This guy pushed me into white and away from my green even tho I had a pleakka wurm AND an awakening zone. I would say 90% of the time I played him he amounted to a assassinate for 5. He's an excellent card, but do not be deceived into thinking he's a bomb who can win you games. He comes down, drops to 4 counters, then they vendetta your 1 blocker and get rid of him. I was never able to make use of his 6/6 indestructible ability.
puncturing light. I had 2 of these and only ran 1 maindeck, which I sided out several times. You'd expect it to knock out level-up guys who have a huge mana investment, but more often it was just a dead card. This has its place, but its no vendetta.
Eldrazi Conscription was easily my MVP during the sealed portion of my prerelease (our prereleases are sealed swiss with top 8 draft). The card in itself is absurd, and I even had a couple of Totem-Guide Hartebeests that I basically splashed for just to get the Conscription. In the top 8, my Mnemonic Walls were the MVPs of my blue-white control deck. The deck just operated on a different level entirely when I drew one of those walls...
Lighthouse Chronologist has won be a couple of games. He always been a good draw in the late game, while stopping early 2/2s.
Spawnsire of Ulamog was my best card, mostly powered up by Dreamstone hedron, it made me recover twice when I was at 1 life...
I've been disapointed by Ulamog's Crusher and Hand of Emrakul, even though I had a greaaat greaat card: Awakening Zone. Wow this card is soooo good. My deck also had 2 Growth Spasm and a Nest Invader so I had enough spawn generator, but when I didn't have the 4 to sac, I found that 9 was highly paid for a 7/7... As for the Crusher, the fact that he has to attack means that he's not good at recovering from early beats (where you want a wall, not a big juggernaut creature)
Venerated Teacher gets my mvp runner up. He was amazing every time I had 2-4 levelers on the board, especially on turns 3-5. Even better when I cast my renegade doppelganger first.
But the real MVP for me was Smite. Chumpblocking eldrazi with my 1/1 unleveled commons to destroy them was nice. But the reward of smiting a umbra covered eldrazi on turn 5 and then finishing the job with another on t6 to let me finish my sealed at 4-1 for 3rd was just epic.
Venerated Teacher gets my mvp runner up. He was amazing every time I had 2-4 levelers on the board, especially on turns 3-5. Even better when I cast my renegade doppelganger first.
Hm, I don't follow this. The doppelganger doesn't copy the ETB ability of the Teacher, because it is not entering play itself.
This was my second prerelease tournament and this was my second first place finish in my local shop. I was pretty happy about it but I was definitely really lucky. My opponent did a huge misplay in the second round. I went 4-0 out about 32-36 players. My pool was not good at all as my only rare (mythic) in my deck was Kozelik, Butcher of Truth. However I think the commons and uncommons were good enough to support. I had a good amount of removal which featured Flame Slash, Forkbolt, Staggershock, Corpsehatch and Bala Ged Scorpion.
I would say my MVP was probably Zof Shade or Gloomhunter. It's really hard to say because I won a different way everytime like Gloomhunter with a Orge's Cleaver, Lust of War on a 2/2 Basilisk or Kozelik himself. Hell I casted Pathrazer of Ulamog with no Eldrazi sacrifices.
The huge misplay in the second round was that he Regressed my Kozelik...in response to my attack. The annihilator ability goes on the stack and resolves.
This card is so good in the right deck. I went 6-0-2, 2 intentional draws into top, only lost 1 game all day. This card won over half of them. G/R deck, everything made eldrazi guys, and I was often finishing people with a bunch of 4/4s. Pretty good in a format with no sweepers. I have to admit, Pennon Blade is very good as well, it won me the other games.
Same. This card won me every game where I cast it, almost instantly.
With guard duty and narcolepsy shutting down creatures, and all those spawn tokens running around, there were a ton of games where I'd slam this down, and go-
"I have eight 4/4's."
Yeah, pretty much everyone offers a shake after that.
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Well, I'm greedy and went to another prerelease yesterday. This time my MVP was a combo of 3 cards.
Gelatinous Genesis. Echo Mage. Distortion Strike.
3rd match, 1st game. things are looking bleak, she has 3 fliers, I have one air blocker. I have a fully leveled Echo mage, and 2 distortion strikes in hand. 9 mana on the field.
Draw Gelatinous Genesis, put 4 4/4's on the field say go. She looks at our life totals and pass's turn. I cast distortion strike, echo it twice, cast a second distortion strike and swing for 20 damage Ooze style.
second game I get 4 oozes on the field. One distortion strike no echo mage. Still kill her with a distorted ooze token though :P. She threw her cards down and walked away.
Warmonger's chariot on rage nimbus was a beating for them. Grotag seige-runner was also amazing in a format that people thought would be super slow and defender heavy (using it in conjunction with guard duty to kill a Drana made my day).
Overall mvp was lust for war. It clocks them pretty quick if you're playing aggressively and requires them to 2-for-1 themselves to get rid of it (barring enchantment removal of course). It's a sneaky card that does a really good job at getting blockers out of the way while burning them out.
gotta be aura gnarlid. I managed 3 in my sealed pool with 5 auras (one of them the conscription) to boot meaning I usually got him out on three-5 and aura-ed him up on t4-6. (*cough* I see this as a draft archtype *cough*). With any aura that give at least +1/+1 to him he becomes unblock-able to 90 out of 122 of the creatures in the set. Usually I could bash on through b4 they could power up whatever monstrosity they had pulled. Even then someone managed to pull a Emrakul off but was at such low life if he swung I would just sack six lands ad win. Eventually I pulled a conscription and bashed through (Emrakul being unable to block a measly little gnarlid :D).
Oh, w/o aura finesse I would not have been able to pull this off, beware the pacifism effects! (multiple occasions where he guard duty'd or narcolepsy'd and i had to transfer a cool aura to one of my other dudes.)
The same card that helped me in the Pre-Release did even more damage today at the release...Raid Bombardment. I drafted tons of eldrazi spawn creators and just attacked with a bunch of 0/1. Single-handedly won me two rounds.
I have to agree with raid bombardment. I managed to draft three of them last night along with a hord of token makers. One is amazing, two is nigh unbeatable. I think raid bombardment will be like dampen thought. If you are the only one drafting the deck it will be nuts, if two people try to go for it you are both screwed.
Kargan Dragonlord and Guul Draz Assassin were amazing for me, but that's to be expected of course. Among the commons / uncommons I was really impressed with Traitorous Instinct. The +2/+0 was always really relevant for me. Explosive Revelation was also better than I expected but not amazing.
Dawnglare Invoker and Conquering Manticore are incredible. And the red Invoker is also pretty much an auto-win at 8 mana. Surprisingly, Rapacious One didn't do much for me at any point in any game. Whenever I got it out, I was either already winning or my opponent had a 4/x or an x/6 that I couldn't remove.
One card that surprised me with its power was the white rebound life + draw. In an aggressive deck it will almost always be 4 life and 2 cards for 3 mana, which is very good. It seemed to me that there was no really weak color in triple-ROE draft, which is awesome.
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Drana and Eldrazi Conscription are the obvious ones but Artisan of Kozilek is the best nonmythic Eldrazi. He is everything you would want in a finisher and is a nice "screw you" to a creature when you have Induce Depair. -9/-9!
The guy that makes Elephants is really really good, and Boar Umbra on any 2-drop will usually win the game. There are so few 2 power creatures for 2, though.
I won mine on the back of triple Vent Sentinal. Triple Narcolepsy gets 2nd, and Skywatcher Adept gets Honorable Mention for me. It was fun dealing on average 5 damage a game in the red zone and pinging with sentinals and a Brimstone Mage for the rest.
Kazandu Tuskcaller was my MVP. For some reason, I only faced one guy who had a way to remove him (yes, a 1/1). Throw a Hyena Umbra on him, and he rapidly goes ridiculous. Ever seen someone conspiring to kill 9 elephants? It doesn't work.
Edit: Kazandu, not Krosan. WotC really needs to standardize their made up names.
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Black: Nirkana Revenant, 3x vendetta
White: Gideon, lots of white removal
Eldrazi: Ulamog's crusher, hand of emrakul
The Good:
Level up guys were fantastic. I only had 1x ikirial outrider and 1x null champion, but both were fantastic. A 2/6 vigilance on turn 4 is a fantastic wall that can also slip in some damage. Null champion 4/2 swinging on turn 3 is very strong, and if he gets his regenerate up he wins games.
I had 2x lone missionary which are solid if you're running vendetta.
ulamog's crusher fantastic. Cheap cost, and annihilator 2.
The Bad
hand of emrakul. Maybe he shines in a deck that can reliably get 4 tokens out early, but to me he was pretty much a dud. I would have cut him if I had any other viable finishers to play. Easily the worst eldrazi - annihilator 1 is inconsequential.
gideon jura - say what? This guy pushed me into white and away from my green even tho I had a pleakka wurm AND an awakening zone. I would say 90% of the time I played him he amounted to a assassinate for 5. He's an excellent card, but do not be deceived into thinking he's a bomb who can win you games. He comes down, drops to 4 counters, then they vendetta your 1 blocker and get rid of him. I was never able to make use of his 6/6 indestructible ability.
puncturing light. I had 2 of these and only ran 1 maindeck, which I sided out several times. You'd expect it to knock out level-up guys who have a huge mana investment, but more often it was just a dead card. This has its place, but its no vendetta.
Spawnsire of Ulamog was my best card, mostly powered up by Dreamstone hedron, it made me recover twice when I was at 1 life...
I've been disapointed by Ulamog's Crusher and Hand of Emrakul, even though I had a greaaat greaat card: Awakening Zone. Wow this card is soooo good. My deck also had 2 Growth Spasm and a Nest Invader so I had enough spawn generator, but when I didn't have the 4 to sac, I found that 9 was highly paid for a 7/7... As for the Crusher, the fact that he has to attack means that he's not good at recovering from early beats (where you want a wall, not a big juggernaut creature)
P-M
But the real MVP for me was Smite. Chumpblocking eldrazi with my 1/1 unleveled commons to destroy them was nice. But the reward of smiting a umbra covered eldrazi on turn 5 and then finishing the job with another on t6 to let me finish my sealed at 4-1 for 3rd was just epic.
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Ditto. And it was amazing with Bramblesnap and Pennon Blade as well.
Hm, I don't follow this. The doppelganger doesn't copy the ETB ability of the Teacher, because it is not entering play itself.
I would say my MVP was probably Zof Shade or Gloomhunter. It's really hard to say because I won a different way everytime like Gloomhunter with a Orge's Cleaver, Lust of War on a 2/2 Basilisk or Kozelik himself. Hell I casted Pathrazer of Ulamog with no Eldrazi sacrifices.
The huge misplay in the second round was that he Regressed my Kozelik...in response to my attack. The annihilator ability goes on the stack and resolves.
turn 3 play brood birthing,
Sac 4 spawn tokens play Hand of Emrakul GG if they cant remove it.
Same. This card won me every game where I cast it, almost instantly.
With guard duty and narcolepsy shutting down creatures, and all those spawn tokens running around, there were a ton of games where I'd slam this down, and go-
"I have eight 4/4's."
Yeah, pretty much everyone offers a shake after that.
Gelatinous Genesis. Echo Mage. Distortion Strike.
3rd match, 1st game. things are looking bleak, she has 3 fliers, I have one air blocker. I have a fully leveled Echo mage, and 2 distortion strikes in hand. 9 mana on the field.
Draw Gelatinous Genesis, put 4 4/4's on the field say go. She looks at our life totals and pass's turn. I cast distortion strike, echo it twice, cast a second distortion strike and swing for 20 damage Ooze style.
second game I get 4 oozes on the field. One distortion strike no echo mage. Still kill her with a distorted ooze token though :P. She threw her cards down and walked away.
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I've actually found lust for war really strong in my U/R/w skies/burn. narcolepsy was strong too. Skywatcher adepts really dished it out with training grounds and venerated mentor
Overall mvp was lust for war. It clocks them pretty quick if you're playing aggressively and requires them to 2-for-1 themselves to get rid of it (barring enchantment removal of course). It's a sneaky card that does a really good job at getting blockers out of the way while burning them out.
Loving this limited format.:D
Oh, w/o aura finesse I would not have been able to pull this off, beware the pacifism effects! (multiple occasions where he guard duty'd or narcolepsy'd and i had to transfer a cool aura to one of my other dudes.)
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One card that surprised me with its power was the white rebound life + draw. In an aggressive deck it will almost always be 4 life and 2 cards for 3 mana, which is very good. It seemed to me that there was no really weak color in triple-ROE draft, which is awesome.
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The guy that makes Elephants is really really good, and Boar Umbra on any 2-drop will usually win the game. There are so few 2 power creatures for 2, though.
the card is REDICULOUS, a 3-turn clock.
Too situational. But probably much better in sealed than draft.
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