Magic

Today John E., Ian E., Jon G. and I enjoyed being the FINAL FOUR (out of 4) in a makeshift Magic: The Gathering CCG draft. We decided ahead of time that any 15 card, non-Unglued boosters would work fine, and brought 4 each (3 to use, 1 for the prize pot). John and Ian brought a lot of the new Time Spiral, which is a great set that features a lot of re-released cards and game mechanics. I brought 2 each of Champions and Saviors of Kamigawa and Jon brought some Guildpact and Kamigawa, and I think I even saw some Coldsnap so it was all relatively recent stuff. To me, to be honest, it would not have mattered much what cards were in the packs because playing Magic is just a lot of fun. Plus, it had been a long time since most of us had played.

Final ranking was 1. me (6-1), 2. John (5-3), 3. Ian (2-4), 4. Jon (1-6). I ran heavy white, with medium blue and a splash of black and artifacts. John included green/red, Ian used black/red and Jon ran white/green/blue. Read on if you're interested in more details.

During the draft, I saw some okay white and blue flying creatures and cards early, and they seemed to keep coming, so I stuck with those colors mostly. I only drafted a couple of red and green cards, but there were a few black cards I thought I just might use, because blue/white is weak on creature removal/control. In draft, artifacts are almost always useable, and I got three or four useable ones. I know I let a lot of good cards go and could have made some better choices for my deck but on the whole I was happy with the cards I chose as they came around.

The most memorable play of the game for me came late in game one of my first match, when John tapped 8 mana to play a red dragon, some kind of Hellkite (Shivan or Balduvian, I think) that's a 5/5 flyer and does 5 damage split any way among creatures or players when it comes into play. I countered it for 4uu with Draining Whelk (Flash (You may play this spell any time you could play an instant.) Flying. When Draining Whelk comes into play, counter target spell. Put X +1/+1 counters on Draining Whelk, where X is that spell's converted mana cost. 1/1 rare from Time Spiral. All of a sudden, with a card I had not planned on including in my deck at all because of its high casting cost, I had a 9/9 flyer! Incidently, that card has excellent artwork. I went on to go 2-1, winning the first and third games of the first match, but each game was long and close. John is an excellent player both in deckbuilding and game play, and a great guy too. He was topdecking well with an artifact, and made good use of massive red removal. His deck also produced excellent mana and some big green creatures that were difficult to deal with, and everything seemed to work together. Most of my creatures had a toughness of 3 or less, and kept all getting killed off at once. For me, Fortify (a white common instant from Time Spiral that gives all my creatures either +2/+0 or +0/+2) helped me a lot. I had two, and each time I used the card, I used for power, not toughness. So did Clockwork Hydra, an uncommon artifact creature that automatically "Tim's" for 1 whenever it attacks or blocks. My white and blue weenies and relatively low-casting cost fliers were the workhorses of my deck, but I think it was the surprise factor of instants like Fortify that won games. One of my favorite aspects of Magic is finding really useful commons.

The second match I played Ian, who had just beaten Jon 2-0 very quickly. His deck was a very fast and focused black/red Sligh style deck, well-tuned for draft. His deck had cool graveyard effects too. A guy this good, this young has real potential. I was a bit concerned that my life total might dip into the danger zone because so many of my cards (especially the fliers) cost 4 mana or more. But it seemed like every draw I got just what I needed. Thunder Totem (U, TS Artifact 3 tap: add w to your mana pool. 1ww: Thunder Totem becomes a 2/2 white Spirit artifact creature with flying and first strike until end of turn) helped speed my mana curve, as did my 1-cost (Drifter il-Dal, Children of Korlis) 2-cost (Silent-Chant Zubera, Fathom Seer) and 3-cost (Descendant of Kiyomaro, 2x Icatian Crier) creatures. It was interesting that Ian and I each had a creature with shadow in play in game 2. One of his favorite creatures was a black 3/1 with flanking for a casting cost of 2b, that is a common (I forgot it's name). What really saved me against stuff like that was first strike. Creatures like Shinen of Stars' Light (2w Creature-Spirit First strike Channel 1w, discard Shinen of Stars' Light: Target creature gains first strike until end of turn.) and especially artifacts like the Thunder Totem and also No-Dachi (2 Artifact--Equipment. Equipped creature gets +2/+0 and has first strike. Equip 3.) really did help. So did that splash of black, especially for Ostiary Thrull (3b, Creature--Thrull. W, tap: tap target creature 2/2). In the later part of the games, blue enforcers like Viscerid Deepwalker (4u Creature -- Homarid Warrior u: Viscerid Deepwalker gets +1/+0 until end of turn. Suspend 4 -- u) really came in handy too. The effect that caught my attention in the second match was the combo of Promise of Bunrei (2w Enchantment, whenever a creature you control is put into a graveyard from play, sacrifice Promise of Bunrei. If you do, put four 1/1 colorless Spirit creature tokens into play), Icatian Crier (2w, Creature--Human Spellshaper 1w, tap, Discard a card: Put two 1/1/ white Citizen creature tokens into play. 1/1) and Fortify. It's not hard to make white goblin-like hoards and pump them up quickly. I had two Criers and two Fortifies in my deck, and didn't pick up on the combo until we were actually playing. Promise of Bunrei is one rare that would be scary in a constructed enchantress-type deck, especially something with recursion...

When I played Jon in the third match, I could see early on what he was going for with the cards he had chosen for his deck. Although his deck shared colors with mine, he had more creature enchantments, while I had more creatures. One of my bigger fliers, Castle Raptors (4w, Creature--Bird Soldier Flying As long as Castle Raptors is untapped, it gets +0/+2 3/3) came in helpful, as did No-Dachi. I finally got to use Kaho, Minamo Historian (2uu Legendary Creature--Human Wizard, When Kaho, Minamo Historian comes into play, search your library for up to three instant cards and remove them from the game. Then shuffle your library. X, tap: You may play a card with converted mana cost X removed from the game with Kaho without paying its mana cost. 2/2), one of the reasons I drafted blue in the first place. What a great card. Unfortunately, in the game situation where he came up in game two I had to insult Kaho's ability by pumping him up with No-Dachi and just attacking with him, instead of using his ability.

Next D&D Game should be Sun, Dec. 3rd at noon

Next Magic: TBA.