Exactly. Statistics may say the probability, but as long as it is possible, that 1 in WHATEVER may still occur. It isn't guaranteed to, but it also isn't guaranteed not to.
It is pretty much guaranteed that the opponent did not shuffle their deck properly.
When you discard the assumption that his opponent was playing within the rules, the possibility of that event occurring becomes so unlikely as to be effectively impossible. It's one in several hundred trillion.
Really guys? One dude says "he must have had 6 shamans" as a kind of an over-exageration and u go out of your way to pull out math and a serious discussion based on pretty much nothing? Dude had 2-3 shamans and managed to pull 1 of them out every time on turn 2, what's the big deal I don't get it.
My orzhov friend pulled TWO ghost dads and the Orzhov mythic angel. The only game he almost lost was when he played his second ghost council while the first one was in play. How often do you think of the legend rule when playing limited?
Eh, my round one opponent had 4x Legion Loyalist, one of them foil. He only ever had two on the board at once, though. They were actually kind of underwhelming, at least alongside the other creatures on his board. First strike and trample don't do much against creatures with lots of toughness, which I had playing Simic, and are abundant in other colors as well (at least in Orzhov).
3-2 with BUG. With about 40 People at the Pre-Release. Only 2 unplayable rares in my pool, a Godless Shrine, and an Aurelia's Fury. Though I did build a 2nd deck with my Boros cards, even though I did not play it once.
The winner was my friend who had the nut Boros/Gruul deck.
Had 2 Guild Leaders in my pool, Simic, and Dimir. Crypt Ghast was a total beast allowing me to ramp out my bigger drops early. Every game that it hit the table, I won easily. Consuming Abberation just wins games if it isn't removed quickly. Had no charms which was sad. I really wanted a Dimir Charm, and a Simic Charm.
Both rounds that I lost, I lost to the same exact deck. Boros Legion. Battalion is a very strong mechanic, and matches up well with Bloodrush.
Cipher and extort is crazy good synergy. The Simic decks I played against just couldn't generate enough card advantage to over come my combination of mill and card advantage. Urban Evolution is CRAZY good, Ramping it out turn 5 with counter magic backup is very powerful. Hands of Binding is broken good with Rogues to encode it on.
Speaking of Counter Spells. Unlike most limited formats I feel counter magic is a very, very viable source of removal in this particular format. I had 4 Spell Ruptures and 1 Psychic Strike. I only ran 2 of the Ruptures, and Psychic Strike did work every single game. Including netting me a copy of Aurelia herself when I milled her with Lazav in play (I still lost that round in game 3).
Over all my impressions are Boros is the strongest stand alone Guild, mixed with Gruul it's insane. Followed by Dimir as a stand alone, my other friend had a nutty Dimir deck that took second place. Then you have Orzhov, Extort is a scary, scarweee mechanic and can make for some total blow outs. Gruul wasn't played much as a stand alone guild, it was often splashed for the combat tricks the creatures can be. Simic rounds out the guilds as the weakest. Evolve is a good mechanic, and it can easily net you card advantage, but often at the expense the size of your creatures. A very, very good support guild. Zameck Guildmage won me 1 game when I was facing lethal next turn and I needed any form of removal to clear the road of the 1 blocker preventing me from swinging with my 24/24 Consuming Aberration I dug 4 cards deep to get to my All-Star card that did so much work for me Totally Lost. It may be expensive, but let me tell you... Every time I used this card it enabled me to win the game. EVERY SINGLE TIME.
So that's my experience, it was a blast, I opened money, and playable cards.
I was playing dimir and my opponent was also playing dimir, he had an 18/18 Consuming Aberration on the field, I play [CARD]Grisly Spectacle
[/CARD] and mill him to death.
I went 3-1-1. I was 3-1 then my opponent for the 5th round and I agreed on a draw so we both would go to the top 8. I played against 3 Dimir and 1 Orzhov.
I lost the first round due to overwhelming from Nightveil Specter on the first game and Consuming Aberration on the second game (Abberration was the best guild promo in the pre release, by miles). Then I won against Dimir with a magnificent Rapid Hybridzation on my own Anemones, then I defeated Orzhov due to Frilled Oculus beatdown and then for a very well timed Totally Lost, then I won against Dimir for being able to control the game better.
On the top 8 I faced Boros. I don't even need to say how quickly I lost, right? There's no way to beat Boros in this pre release, especially if they have Aurelia and the Charm (and that guy had both).
So, as a prize for reaching the top 8, I got 2 boosters! Rares were Signal the Clans and Rubblebelt Raiders.
Pros:
>First Pre Release ever
>f****** awesome pulls
>Lost only 2 matches, one of which was unwinnable anyway
>Defeated Orzhov with SIMIC
Cons:
>Aurelia for the most broken guild leader in the entirety of the limited format
>Nightveil Specter stealing your lands isn't a good feeling at all
>Not having pulled a SINGLE 1-drop for Simic
>Not getting any Guildmage/Charm
Yep I went with orzhov had no real bombs but I had removal for days and easily stalled the game out in my favor in every match but the first one. Went 3-1, the first guy got his damn Zegana in games 1 and 2 roughly about the time he got 6-7 lands. Zegana is really dumb in this format and the card annoyed me greatly.
I think orzhov is easily a very strong guild but it takes a nice dosage of removal to make them really dominant. Also orzhov has to build for the late game meaning that some people build the guild completely wrong.
Really guys? One dude says "he must have had 6 shamans" as a kind of an over-exageration and u go out of your way to pull out math and a serious discussion based on pretty much nothing? Dude had 2-3 shamans and managed to pull 1 of them out every time on turn 2, what's the big deal I don't get it.
I played against a guy with 6 Burning-Tree Emissaries... and I know because he played every single one on turn 2 against me
ie: His opponent played 6 BTE on one turn.
Anyway as for my prerelease stories. I got orhzov I opened it and got what looked like the most mediocre pool I have ever seen, the only rare in my colors I got was in the guildpack: Alms Beast.
I cobbled together something that I thought could maybe do something against the triple mythic decks that were floating around the room.
Honestly all night I didn't see many of my rares a common lines of play was a T1 Thrull Parasite T2 nothing T3 Removal w/extort T4 Extrort guy with Extort, etc. I just sat there pecking them to death baiting out their removal on my extort guys while I held a bomb.
From all this I learned that extort is really powerful, one game against a simic who had 4 Drakewing Krasis among some other dumb things. I sat there behind a dutiful thrull with a Gift of Orzhova on it. And just dealt him 18 points of extort damage by playing durdley spells.
Momir Vig, Simic Visionary
Melek, Izzet Paragon
Oona, Queen of the Fae
Bruna, Light of Alabaster
Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
Rhys the Redeemed
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord
Sen Triplets
The Mimeoplasm WUBRGSliver OverlordGRBUW WUBRGSliver Hivelord(Superfriends)GRBUW
My prerelease story -
Went 4-2 and got top 8, or at least should have, I didn't stay to find out. It was 8 in the morning.
I went Simic and had what I considered to be an amazing pool. I went in thinking BUG or RUG, and I ended up cutting the extra colors because they just weren't necessary. I had 2 unplayable rares being Biovisionary and Watery Grave. I had 2 Biomass Mutation, a Sylvan Primordial, and a Prime Speaker Zegana.
I felt like I had a great shot at winning the tournament, but then I saw how broken all the other decks were in the room. I really feel like WotC is stacking these packs. There were just way too many on color rares in everyone's pool.
Also, to rant on a similar subject, I believe I'm over this whole "play your promo" stuff. It creates, in my opinion, uninteresting decks. After playing the tournament, I feel like the power level on these promos were way too spread out. I thought the Gruul and the Dimir promos were on a whole different level all night. One is a huge monster who is latched to an entirely uninteresting mechanic (mill), and the other one is just a tap 3 and kill someone for not blocking.
After this prerelease, I hope they get away from this boring "choose your deck before walking in the room" and go back to a format where you build the best deck with what you are given.
Went 3-1 with after choosing Simic as my guild. Went UG/r for Rubblehulk and Ground Assault.
The bombs were Stolen Identity, Rubblehulk, Simic Charm, and 2x Aetherize. Stolen Identity was hilarious after copying the RW prerelease card all weekend. Never heard so much complaining in my life.
Frilled Oculus: My god this guy was amazing. Arguably the best "Rootwalla" that has been printed in years. Blocked everything early, opponent could never block nor make profitable attacks, and in combination with Hands of Binding won me several games.
Hands of Binding: Won me at least 3 games that I could recall. Forcing the Boros players to commit more to the board which lead to bigger Aetherize blowouts was hilarious.
Crocanura: Debatable if this or Deadly Recluse is the best common spider ever printed. Got him to at least a 3/5 in every game. And also works really well with ...
Ivy Lane Denizen: Dear god this guy was insane. My Shamblesharks became combat tricks and worked insanely well with Fathom Mage.
Overall, I was really impressed with Simic but I had the prefect cards to counter Boros. Which leads me to ...
Boros is way too good in this prerelease format. Hopefully it changes in the future but I am very disappointed in the power scaling of cards for the guilds. Boros was and is the best guild for the prerelease and it wasn't close. So many people chose Boros for the midnight prerelease that they "sold out" of it for the other flights.
This sequence of events actually happened to me.
Turn 3: Skynight Legionarie. Attack. M: 18.
Turn 4: The red enchantment that gives +3+0 and can't be blocked except by 2 or more creatures. My Crocanura = worthless now. Attack. M: 13.
Turn 5: He bloodrushes the +3+3 and double strike on his Legionaire. M: -5.
I'm dead on turn 5 to 3 cards in limited. My board was GU Guildmage, Crocanura, and Ivy Lane Denizen. Holding a Totally Lost but couldn't play it since I was on the draw. Losing to 2 commons and a rare is just dumb. Another match my opponent went turn 1 Foundry Street Denizen, turn 2 Bomber Corps, and another Bomber Corps turn 3 so basically every attack after that he was attacking for at least 3 and dealing 2 damage to a target. This was only 3 commons.
So it sounds like so much *****ing but the Boros decks were killing so fast that after game 1 I cut my MYTHIC rare Giant Adephage for another Shambleshark. How is that a healthy format? Crack a 7-drop mythic rare that is a bomb in most limited formats only to see it in the SB as a match-up dependant card.
I enjoyed the prerelease but Boros is way too good. It seems like Wizards made the "random" Boros pack way better than any other guild.
Ended up going 3-2-1 as Orzhov. My observations are that Orzhov is very weak without good removal to back it up, because Simic and Gruul creatures simply outclass yours if you have no way of getting rid of them. The only removal I pulled consisted of 2 Devour Flesh and 1 Arrows of Justice, but I had nothing playable in other colours so I felt compelled to stay Orzhov. Both my losses consisted of getting blown out by huge fatties because I had no way to deal with them, which pretty much sucked because I felt helpless. Extort is a great mechanic, but I felt that without removal it was simply too easy for Orzhov to be outclassed by other guilds. I imagine it will be a great colour in draft, but it felt extremely weak with minimal (and situational, at that) removal to keep my opponent's board under control.
Played Gruul went 3-3 drop but got some good games in
Things I learned, Gruul can just kill out of no where there were multiple situations where I killed my opponent down from like +10 life out of no where thanks to bloodrush and things like Gruul Charm
Also Gruul Charm is kinda the nut against Orzhoz since they are mostly a ground stall deck that kills you with fliers or extort which means its great at faltering for the win or just wiping out like 2 Kingpin's Pet and 1 extort bat or something
I was Simic with a small Gruul splash, not very exciting pool, but I went 2-1 (2-1, 1-2, 2-1 we had only 3 rounds as it was midnight pre-release).
Considering my lack of skill in deck building I was happy, especially that I cracked foil Domri Rade in my first GTC booster Other than that I was positively surprised by Ivy Lane Denizen and Burst of Strength that can even out the situation a little when you are low on evolve creatures/ enablers (like it was in my pool)
Took Dimir, got the worst pool ever, stomped everything
Because Dimir is amazing and it is, IMO, the best prerelease guild by far
Details, man! Dimir seems pretty underpowered to me so I'm curious what you got that was so good (mono-blackish creature base with multiple Denizens, Deathcult Rogues, and like x3 Hands of Binding?)
====================
I just got back from a 10 AM prerelease. Went Simic and got the last Simic box in the tournament. My rares were pretty meh for the guild but had good value...
Promo: Fathom Mage
Guild Pack: Unexpected Results (reason won out and I did not maindeck this)
#1: Boros Reckoner (nice card, but not for me)
#2: Mind Grind (everyone else who pulled this played it. Color me unimpressed)
#3: Obzedat, Ghost Council (yay paying my entry fee! Couldn't justify abandoning ship to run him though)
#4: Biovisionary (is there a worse Simic card for limited?)
#5: Rubblehulk (yaaay promo card :()
Despite the fact that I didn't pull a single usable rare, my Simic pool was pretty strong. I built the following deck:
I ended up going 3-1, crushing Simic, Esper, and Orzhov with the evolving curve. My only loss was to another Orzhov list: game one I got stuck on two lands and mauled by his intimidate/flying army, game two he just had all the answers with a removal spell + extort damage for almost every creature I cast. Some notes:
Cards that were as good as expected - Cloudfin Raptor, Drakewing Krasis, Zamek Guildmage, Hands of Binding, Simic Charm, Crocanura: these formed a solid basis to my deck, with Hands in particular being a heartbreaker each time I cast it. I'd say Simic are pretty reliant in general on pulling at least one evolving one-drop and multiple Crocs or Elusive Krasis dudes. Rapid Hybridization was also quite good but I almost always used it to kill one of my own men, usually in response to removal, to instantly evolve the rest. Simic Charm was a counterspell most of the time but the unsummon mode let me win one game.
Cards that were much better than I expected - Skygames (even just getting sharks and guildmages airborn let me win some races), Adaptive Snapjaw (eats everything and gets out of hand fast with high toughness creatures), Miming Slime (worst case scenario it is often a 3/3 for 2G: one game it was a 7/7 who evolved the whole team. Great at evolving creatures with higher power than toughness like the Shark and Snapjaw).
Cards that were much worse than expected: Merfolk of the Depths is just unplayable; it was almost always win-more and never big enough at that stage of the game to evolve anyone. Additionally, the flash on Shambleshark is rarely worth forgoing the offensive evolution, and he was basically just a mediocre evolve bear. I'd still gladly play him but I thought he was the strongest common evolver and I was waaaay off.
In nine games I didn't draw Aetherize or Bioshift once, so I can't comment on them. Pre-prerelease I rated the guilds as Gruul > Simic > Orzhov > Boros > Dimir. Now that I've seen them in action I'd say my rating is Boros > Orzhov > Gruul > Simic > Dimir. I had a lot of success with Simic and it is really close with Gruul, but the deck can just fizzle and die with bad pulls or bad draws and it really needs to near-perfectly curve out. Boros on the other hand is fast and vicious and laden with bombs, and Orzhov can easily swarm you with evasive efficient creatures then drain you out with Extort (the rest of the top 4 were Orzhov and Boros).
EDIT: Prize packs included Breeding Pool, some jank, and Gideon! Overall it was a great day.
There wasn't a single bad card in the whole deck. everything I played with was an MVP. I only lost my very first game when my opponent pulled a godhand and I almost held him off except for a single extortionist on his side. the next two games in that match were lightning fast and involved me countering his stuff and obliterating him. Ironically enough, only mystic genesis really helped him get me far down enough to win because even when he had like 3 5/5's I had enough creatures on the board to mount a stable defense!
The real awesome thing behind simic is that it shines when you have creatures with high toughness pumping up your creatures that have high power and low toughness. you end up very quickly turning chump blockers into 2/6's or higher - sometimes with reach, sometimes unblockable and netting you an extra card every turn.
Even against boros for the last two matchups, nothing could stand up to the one-two punch of EOT Shambleshark, followed up by Drakewing Krasis.
If you measure the power of a sealed deck by how few cards end up dead weight, this is one of the best I've ever seen.
I was awfully tempted to splash black for dimir and the five - yes five GOOD mill cards that I could have run, but decided against it, not because I couldn't, but because it wouldn't have added power to my deck on account of how awesome it looked already.
60-man midnight pre-release, I went 3-0-1 with an intentional draw to lock up top8 in the last round.
Picked Orzhov box, got High Priest of Penance, Treasury Thrull #2, Assemble the Legion, and Firemane Avenger along with so many playable cards it wasn't even funny - I could have built a 60 card deck and had zero reservations about any spell in there. 3 Basilica Guards, 3 beckon Apparition, 2 syndic of tithes, boros charm, grisly spectacle, and shadow slice were all in there.
Match 1 was against a boros box that didn't pull a single battalion creature. He tried forcing naya, then went to BUG after realizing that his pool had **** for the guild he picked. Forced game 3 with the BUG deck, but triple basilica guard was able to gum up the ground long enough to drain him out.
Match 2 was against a boros box that actually had support for his guild, but their dudes can't really deal with 4 toughness that well, and a timely grisly spectacle on a 9-power foundry champion milled away all his threats. Game two I get assemble the legion online and kill him by swinging with way too many 1/1's.
Match 3 was against an orzhov box that was very defensive and almost had no win cons outside of extort, although he had plenty of it. We kept trading life points at a time through all our extort triggers before I played skyblinder staff, put it on kingpin's pet, and broke the stalemate. Second game he gets mana screwed and I roll him.
4th Match I draw to ensure we both make it into top8. She had a gruul box and in playing for fun, she completely wiped me - turns out her deck was 17 lands and 23 bloodrush creatures (!!!)
In the end, the top8 was 3 boros, 2 simic, 1 dimir, 1 orzhov (me) and 1 gruul. (who I drew in) One guy says he wants to go to the top8 draft, but we're able to talk him into just splitting the prizes 8 ways before he's able to take a seat at the draft table. So each of us gets 13 packs (6 for the 3-0-1 record, 3 for the draft set, 4 for one-eighth of the draft prize pool) and I crack 3 shocklands along with domri rade.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Top 16 - 2012 Indiana State Championships Currently Playing: GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
I had a very different experience with Orzhov. I found it to be the strongest of the guilds, bringing me a 4-0 1st place win. I played it like WB weenies, and just capitalized on extort. Even without a lot of removal, I only had two losses the whole day:
I gained a minimum of 7-8 life off extort per game alone. Treasury Thrull + Death's Approach is stupid busted and actually won me a game. Can't say enough about the extort mechanic, it is crazy strong.
I have a question for people playing the prereleases... do you guys often wish u had maindeck naturalizes? Between keyrunes and lots of retaded creature enchantments, is it worth it? I'm afraid of the white protection from creatures enchant / madcap skills and the orzhov flying/lifelink enchant
I gained a minimum of 7-8 life off extort per game alone. Treasury Thrull + Death's Approach is stupid busted and actually won me a game. Can't say enough about the extort mechanic, it is crazy strong.
My 2x Death's Approach did work for me all day I eagerly went for creature trades early in game just to activate that card lol.
It is pretty much guaranteed that the opponent did not shuffle their deck properly.
My prerelease is tomorrow! Here's to hoping!
When you discard the assumption that his opponent was playing within the rules, the possibility of that event occurring becomes so unlikely as to be effectively impossible. It's one in several hundred trillion.
R Citizen Cane (Feldon of the Third Path)
The winner was my friend who had the nut Boros/Gruul deck.
Had 2 Guild Leaders in my pool, Simic, and Dimir. Crypt Ghast was a total beast allowing me to ramp out my bigger drops early. Every game that it hit the table, I won easily. Consuming Abberation just wins games if it isn't removed quickly. Had no charms which was sad. I really wanted a Dimir Charm, and a Simic Charm.
Both rounds that I lost, I lost to the same exact deck. Boros Legion. Battalion is a very strong mechanic, and matches up well with Bloodrush.
Cipher and extort is crazy good synergy. The Simic decks I played against just couldn't generate enough card advantage to over come my combination of mill and card advantage. Urban Evolution is CRAZY good, Ramping it out turn 5 with counter magic backup is very powerful. Hands of Binding is broken good with Rogues to encode it on.
Speaking of Counter Spells. Unlike most limited formats I feel counter magic is a very, very viable source of removal in this particular format. I had 4 Spell Ruptures and 1 Psychic Strike. I only ran 2 of the Ruptures, and Psychic Strike did work every single game. Including netting me a copy of Aurelia herself when I milled her with Lazav in play (I still lost that round in game 3).
Over all my impressions are Boros is the strongest stand alone Guild, mixed with Gruul it's insane. Followed by Dimir as a stand alone, my other friend had a nutty Dimir deck that took second place. Then you have Orzhov, Extort is a scary, scarweee mechanic and can make for some total blow outs. Gruul wasn't played much as a stand alone guild, it was often splashed for the combat tricks the creatures can be. Simic rounds out the guilds as the weakest. Evolve is a good mechanic, and it can easily net you card advantage, but often at the expense the size of your creatures. A very, very good support guild. Zameck Guildmage won me 1 game when I was facing lethal next turn and I needed any form of removal to clear the road of the 1 blocker preventing me from swinging with my 24/24 Consuming Aberration I dug 4 cards deep to get to my All-Star card that did so much work for me Totally Lost. It may be expensive, but let me tell you... Every time I used this card it enabled me to win the game. EVERY SINGLE TIME.
So that's my experience, it was a blast, I opened money, and playable cards.
[/CARD] and mill him to death.
Standard:
RUG Midrange :symrg::symgu::symru:
Casual:
EDH:
Jhoira :symu::symr:
Teysa Extort :orzhov::orzhov:
Favourite Guild
Second favourite guild
Aurelia's Fury
Prime Speaker Zegana
Sepulchral Primordial
Simic Manipulator
Stomping Ground
Gruul Ragebeast
Pretty damn fine, right?
The deck was:
1x Fathom Mage
2x Drakewing Krasis
2x Frilled Oculus
2x Clinging Anemones
2x Ninbus Swimmer
1x Adaptive Snapjaw
1x Scab-Clan Charger
1x Simic Manipulator
2x Pit Fight
1x Naturalize
1x Totally Lost
1x Hydroform
1x Rapid Hybridzation
1x Sapphire Drake
1x Wildwood Rebirth
1x Shambleshark
1x Burning-Tree Emissary
2x Simic Guildgate
7x Island
8x Forest
I went 3-1-1. I was 3-1 then my opponent for the 5th round and I agreed on a draw so we both would go to the top 8. I played against 3 Dimir and 1 Orzhov.
I lost the first round due to overwhelming from Nightveil Specter on the first game and Consuming Aberration on the second game (Abberration was the best guild promo in the pre release, by miles). Then I won against Dimir with a magnificent Rapid Hybridzation on my own Anemones, then I defeated Orzhov due to Frilled Oculus beatdown and then for a very well timed Totally Lost, then I won against Dimir for being able to control the game better.
On the top 8 I faced Boros. I don't even need to say how quickly I lost, right? There's no way to beat Boros in this pre release, especially if they have Aurelia and the Charm (and that guy had both).
So, as a prize for reaching the top 8, I got 2 boosters! Rares were Signal the Clans and Rubblebelt Raiders.
Pros:
>First Pre Release ever
>f****** awesome pulls
>Lost only 2 matches, one of which was unwinnable anyway
>Defeated Orzhov with SIMIC
Cons:
>Aurelia for the most broken guild leader in the entirety of the limited format
>Nightveil Specter stealing your lands isn't a good feeling at all
>Not having pulled a SINGLE 1-drop for Simic
>Not getting any Guildmage/Charm
Have all of them.
Join us on Cardgame Coalition!
Yep I went with orzhov had no real bombs but I had removal for days and easily stalled the game out in my favor in every match but the first one. Went 3-1, the first guy got his damn Zegana in games 1 and 2 roughly about the time he got 6-7 lands. Zegana is really dumb in this format and the card annoyed me greatly.
I think orzhov is easily a very strong guild but it takes a nice dosage of removal to make them really dominant. Also orzhov has to build for the late game meaning that some people build the guild completely wrong.
Feel free to bid on my cards here!
Read the post he says:
ie: His opponent played 6 BTE on one turn.
Anyway as for my prerelease stories. I got orhzov I opened it and got what looked like the most mediocre pool I have ever seen, the only rare in my colors I got was in the guildpack: Alms Beast.
I cobbled together something that I thought could maybe do something against the triple mythic decks that were floating around the room.
It ended up being:
2 Basilica Screecher
1 Basilica Guards
1 Syndicate Enforcer
1 Kingpin's Pet
1 Deathcult Rouge
1 Alms Beast
1 Treasury Thrull
1 Dutiful Thrull
2 Devour Flesh
1 Killing Glare
1 Grisly Spectacle
1 Arrows of Justice
1 Death's Approach
1 Purge the Profane
1 Foundry Champion
2 Assault Griffin
1 Balustrade Spy
1 Gift of Orzhova
2 Mountain
1 Boros Guildgate
2 Orzhov Guildgate
8 Swamp
4 Plains
Honestly all night I didn't see many of my rares a common lines of play was a T1 Thrull Parasite T2 nothing T3 Removal w/extort T4 Extrort guy with Extort, etc. I just sat there pecking them to death baiting out their removal on my extort guys while I held a bomb.
From all this I learned that extort is really powerful, one game against a simic who had 4 Drakewing Krasis among some other dumb things. I sat there behind a dutiful thrull with a Gift of Orzhova on it. And just dealt him 18 points of extort damage by playing durdley spells.
Went 3-0 at the midnight launch.
Three people at mine got one, and I got one in my Boros box as well-
I think the *majority* of Boros boxes contained her at last night's event
Reprint Stasis!
Control needs more love.
EDH:
Momir Vig, Simic Visionary
Melek, Izzet Paragon
Oona, Queen of the Fae
Bruna, Light of Alabaster
Gisela, Blade of Goldnight
Rhys the Redeemed
Jarad, Golgari Lich Lord
Sen Triplets
The Mimeoplasm
WUBRGSliver OverlordGRBUW
WUBRGSliver Hivelord(Superfriends)GRBUW
Went 4-2 and got top 8, or at least should have, I didn't stay to find out. It was 8 in the morning.
I went Simic and had what I considered to be an amazing pool. I went in thinking BUG or RUG, and I ended up cutting the extra colors because they just weren't necessary. I had 2 unplayable rares being Biovisionary and Watery Grave. I had 2 Biomass Mutation, a Sylvan Primordial, and a Prime Speaker Zegana.
I felt like I had a great shot at winning the tournament, but then I saw how broken all the other decks were in the room. I really feel like WotC is stacking these packs. There were just way too many on color rares in everyone's pool.
Also, to rant on a similar subject, I believe I'm over this whole "play your promo" stuff. It creates, in my opinion, uninteresting decks. After playing the tournament, I feel like the power level on these promos were way too spread out. I thought the Gruul and the Dimir promos were on a whole different level all night. One is a huge monster who is latched to an entirely uninteresting mechanic (mill), and the other one is just a tap 3 and kill someone for not blocking.
After this prerelease, I hope they get away from this boring "choose your deck before walking in the room" and go back to a format where you build the best deck with what you are given.
WR Heroic
Modern
FISH
Legacy
FISH
EDH
Hanna, Ship Navigator - Enchantments
Sygg, River Guide - Fish Tribal
Mayael, the Anima - Power5orGreater
Zedruu, the Greathearted - Gifts
Shirei, Shizo's Caretaker - 1 Power Recursion
Roon of the Hidden Realm - ETB Triggers
Edric, Spymaster of Trent - TurboFog
Lazav, Dimir Mastermind - Shapeshifters *IN PROGRESS*
Krenko, Mob Boss - Goblins *IN PROGRESS*
The bombs were Stolen Identity, Rubblehulk, Simic Charm, and 2x Aetherize. Stolen Identity was hilarious after copying the RW prerelease card all weekend. Never heard so much complaining in my life.
The cards I was most impressed with at the common level for Simic was Crocanura, Frilled Oculus, Hands of Binding, and Ivy Lane Denizen.
Frilled Oculus: My god this guy was amazing. Arguably the best "Rootwalla" that has been printed in years. Blocked everything early, opponent could never block nor make profitable attacks, and in combination with Hands of Binding won me several games.
Hands of Binding: Won me at least 3 games that I could recall. Forcing the Boros players to commit more to the board which lead to bigger Aetherize blowouts was hilarious.
Crocanura: Debatable if this or Deadly Recluse is the best common spider ever printed. Got him to at least a 3/5 in every game. And also works really well with ...
Ivy Lane Denizen: Dear god this guy was insane. My Shamblesharks became combat tricks and worked insanely well with Fathom Mage.
Overall, I was really impressed with Simic but I had the prefect cards to counter Boros. Which leads me to ...
Boros is way too good in this prerelease format. Hopefully it changes in the future but I am very disappointed in the power scaling of cards for the guilds. Boros was and is the best guild for the prerelease and it wasn't close. So many people chose Boros for the midnight prerelease that they "sold out" of it for the other flights.
This sequence of events actually happened to me.
Turn 3: Skynight Legionarie. Attack. M: 18.
Turn 4: The red enchantment that gives +3+0 and can't be blocked except by 2 or more creatures. My Crocanura = worthless now. Attack. M: 13.
Turn 5: He bloodrushes the +3+3 and double strike on his Legionaire. M: -5.
I'm dead on turn 5 to 3 cards in limited. My board was GU Guildmage, Crocanura, and Ivy Lane Denizen. Holding a Totally Lost but couldn't play it since I was on the draw. Losing to 2 commons and a rare is just dumb. Another match my opponent went turn 1 Foundry Street Denizen, turn 2 Bomber Corps, and another Bomber Corps turn 3 so basically every attack after that he was attacking for at least 3 and dealing 2 damage to a target. This was only 3 commons.
So it sounds like so much *****ing but the Boros decks were killing so fast that after game 1 I cut my MYTHIC rare Giant Adephage for another Shambleshark. How is that a healthy format? Crack a 7-drop mythic rare that is a bomb in most limited formats only to see it in the SB as a match-up dependant card.
I enjoyed the prerelease but Boros is way too good. It seems like Wizards made the "random" Boros pack way better than any other guild.
Things I learned, Gruul can just kill out of no where there were multiple situations where I killed my opponent down from like +10 life out of no where thanks to bloodrush and things like Gruul Charm
Also Gruul Charm is kinda the nut against Orzhoz since they are mostly a ground stall deck that kills you with fliers or extort which means its great at faltering for the win or just wiping out like 2 Kingpin's Pet and 1 extort bat or something
ok
You got 99 attackers but I'm blocking with 1.
The Winner is Judge | 7
This Winner is Also Judge | 6
Club Flamingo | Lots
Considering my lack of skill in deck building I was happy, especially that I cracked foil Domri Rade in my first GTC booster Other than that I was positively surprised by Ivy Lane Denizen and Burst of Strength that can even out the situation a little when you are low on evolve creatures/ enablers (like it was in my pool)
My deck:
1 Wasteland Viper
2 Frilled Oculus
1 Shambleshark
2 Crocanura
1 Slaughterhorn
1 Fathom Mage
1 Ghor-Clan Rampager
2 Ivy Lane Denizen
1 Leyline Phantom
1 Rust Scarab
1 Burst of Strength
1 Gridlock
1 Aetherize
1 Simic Charm
2 Pit Fight
Sorcery (1)
1 Urban Evolution
Artifact (2)
1 Gruul Keyrune
1 Prophetic Prism
1 Domri Rade
Land (17)
7 Forest
6 Island
3 Mountain
1 Simic Guildgate
1 Blind Obedience
1 High Priest of Penance
1 Illusionist's Bracers
1 Biovisionary
1 Alms Beast
1 Consuming Aberration
1 Treasury Thrull
1 Undercity Plague
Details, man! Dimir seems pretty underpowered to me so I'm curious what you got that was so good (mono-blackish creature base with multiple Denizens, Deathcult Rogues, and like x3 Hands of Binding?)
====================
I just got back from a 10 AM prerelease. Went Simic and got the last Simic box in the tournament. My rares were pretty meh for the guild but had good value...
Promo: Fathom Mage
Guild Pack: Unexpected Results (reason won out and I did not maindeck this)
#1: Boros Reckoner (nice card, but not for me)
#2: Mind Grind (everyone else who pulled this played it. Color me unimpressed)
#3: Obzedat, Ghost Council (yay paying my entry fee! Couldn't justify abandoning ship to run him though)
#4: Biovisionary (is there a worse Simic card for limited?)
#5: Rubblehulk (yaaay promo card :()
Despite the fact that I didn't pull a single usable rare, my Simic pool was pretty strong. I built the following deck:
1 Simic Guildgate
9 Island
7 Forest
Creatures: 16
1 Cloudfin Raptor
1 Metropolis Sprite
2 Shambleshark
2 Zameck Guildmage
2 Crocanura
1 Drakewing Krasis
1 Deathcult Rogue
1 Keymaster Rogue
1 Fathom Mage
2 Adaptive Snapjaw
1 Merfolk of the Depths
1 Nimbus Swimmer
1 Rapid Hybridization
1 Bioshift
1 Hands of Binding
1 Skygames
1 Simic Charm
1 Miming Slime
1 Aetherize
I ended up going 3-1, crushing Simic, Esper, and Orzhov with the evolving curve. My only loss was to another Orzhov list: game one I got stuck on two lands and mauled by his intimidate/flying army, game two he just had all the answers with a removal spell + extort damage for almost every creature I cast. Some notes:
Cards that were as good as expected - Cloudfin Raptor, Drakewing Krasis, Zamek Guildmage, Hands of Binding, Simic Charm, Crocanura: these formed a solid basis to my deck, with Hands in particular being a heartbreaker each time I cast it. I'd say Simic are pretty reliant in general on pulling at least one evolving one-drop and multiple Crocs or Elusive Krasis dudes. Rapid Hybridization was also quite good but I almost always used it to kill one of my own men, usually in response to removal, to instantly evolve the rest. Simic Charm was a counterspell most of the time but the unsummon mode let me win one game.
Cards that were much better than I expected - Skygames (even just getting sharks and guildmages airborn let me win some races), Adaptive Snapjaw (eats everything and gets out of hand fast with high toughness creatures), Miming Slime (worst case scenario it is often a 3/3 for 2G: one game it was a 7/7 who evolved the whole team. Great at evolving creatures with higher power than toughness like the Shark and Snapjaw).
Cards that were much worse than expected: Merfolk of the Depths is just unplayable; it was almost always win-more and never big enough at that stage of the game to evolve anyone. Additionally, the flash on Shambleshark is rarely worth forgoing the offensive evolution, and he was basically just a mediocre evolve bear. I'd still gladly play him but I thought he was the strongest common evolver and I was waaaay off.
In nine games I didn't draw Aetherize or Bioshift once, so I can't comment on them. Pre-prerelease I rated the guilds as Gruul > Simic > Orzhov > Boros > Dimir. Now that I've seen them in action I'd say my rating is Boros > Orzhov > Gruul > Simic > Dimir. I had a lot of success with Simic and it is really close with Gruul, but the deck can just fizzle and die with bad pulls or bad draws and it really needs to near-perfectly curve out. Boros on the other hand is fast and vicious and laden with bombs, and Orzhov can easily swarm you with evasive efficient creatures then drain you out with Extort (the rest of the top 4 were Orzhov and Boros).
EDIT: Prize packs included Breeding Pool, some jank, and Gideon! Overall it was a great day.
RCRDaretti: Superfriends Forever RCR
WGBDoran: Ent-mootWBG
GGGMultani: Group Bear HugGGG
GB(B/G)The Gitrog Monster: Dredgefall DurdleGB(B/G)
RGWGahiji, the Honored Group Hug MonsterRGW
UB(U/B)Yuriko, Ninja Trinket AggroUB(U/B)
WUBRGAtogatog: Assembling a OHKOWUBRG
simic keyrune + prophetic prism
2 simic guildgates
fathom mage (I love that "haters gonna hate" pose)
2 mystic genesis !!!
2 elusive krasis
nimbus swimmer
drakewing krasis
shambleshark
2 totally lost !!!
2 spell rupture
voidwalk
scatter arc
last thoughts
frilled oculus
simic fluxmage
2 naturalize !!!
2 crocanura !!!
slaughterhorn
There wasn't a single bad card in the whole deck. everything I played with was an MVP. I only lost my very first game when my opponent pulled a godhand and I almost held him off except for a single extortionist on his side. the next two games in that match were lightning fast and involved me countering his stuff and obliterating him. Ironically enough, only mystic genesis really helped him get me far down enough to win because even when he had like 3 5/5's I had enough creatures on the board to mount a stable defense!
The real awesome thing behind simic is that it shines when you have creatures with high toughness pumping up your creatures that have high power and low toughness. you end up very quickly turning chump blockers into 2/6's or higher - sometimes with reach, sometimes unblockable and netting you an extra card every turn.
Even against boros for the last two matchups, nothing could stand up to the one-two punch of EOT Shambleshark, followed up by Drakewing Krasis.
If you measure the power of a sealed deck by how few cards end up dead weight, this is one of the best I've ever seen.
I was awfully tempted to splash black for dimir and the five - yes five GOOD mill cards that I could have run, but decided against it, not because I couldn't, but because it wouldn't have added power to my deck on account of how awesome it looked already.
Picked Orzhov box, got High Priest of Penance, Treasury Thrull #2, Assemble the Legion, and Firemane Avenger along with so many playable cards it wasn't even funny - I could have built a 60 card deck and had zero reservations about any spell in there. 3 Basilica Guards, 3 beckon Apparition, 2 syndic of tithes, boros charm, grisly spectacle, and shadow slice were all in there.
Match 1 was against a boros box that didn't pull a single battalion creature. He tried forcing naya, then went to BUG after realizing that his pool had **** for the guild he picked. Forced game 3 with the BUG deck, but triple basilica guard was able to gum up the ground long enough to drain him out.
Match 2 was against a boros box that actually had support for his guild, but their dudes can't really deal with 4 toughness that well, and a timely grisly spectacle on a 9-power foundry champion milled away all his threats. Game two I get assemble the legion online and kill him by swinging with way too many 1/1's.
Match 3 was against an orzhov box that was very defensive and almost had no win cons outside of extort, although he had plenty of it. We kept trading life points at a time through all our extort triggers before I played skyblinder staff, put it on kingpin's pet, and broke the stalemate. Second game he gets mana screwed and I roll him.
4th Match I draw to ensure we both make it into top8. She had a gruul box and in playing for fun, she completely wiped me - turns out her deck was 17 lands and 23 bloodrush creatures (!!!)
In the end, the top8 was 3 boros, 2 simic, 1 dimir, 1 orzhov (me) and 1 gruul. (who I drew in) One guy says he wants to go to the top8 draft, but we're able to talk him into just splitting the prizes 8 ways before he's able to take a seat at the draft table. So each of us gets 13 packs (6 for the 3-0-1 record, 3 for the draft set, 4 for one-eighth of the draft prize pool) and I crack 3 shocklands along with domri rade.
Currently Playing:
GBStandard - Golgari Safari MidrangeBG
RBWModern - Mardu PyromancerWBR
RLegacy - Good Old Fashioned BurnR
Clan Contest 3 Mafia - Mafia Co-MVP
2 Slate Street Ruffian
2 Kingpin's Pet
2 Syndic of Tithes
2 Dutiful Thrull
2 Basilica Screecher
1 Gutter Skulk
1 Vizkopa Guildmage
1 Balustrade Spy
1 Treasury Thrull
1 Shielded Passage
1 Devour Flesh
1 Holy Mantle
1 Merciless Eviction
1 Riot Gear
1 Hold the Gates
2 Orzhov Guildgate
I gained a minimum of 7-8 life off extort per game alone. Treasury Thrull + Death's Approach is stupid busted and actually won me a game. Can't say enough about the extort mechanic, it is crazy strong.
My 2x Death's Approach did work for me all day I eagerly went for creature trades early in game just to activate that card lol.
Feel free to bid on my cards here!