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Been enjoying the post MBS world of Magic.  However, work is keeping me very busy (though while I'm working I'm thinking too much about Magic).

I've also been diving into MSS drafting a lot more and I think my Magic is improving as a result.  Still pretty scrubby, but at least my understanding seems to improve and I am much more comfortable playing draft than I've ever been.

Two weeks ago I started looking at the block constructed decks that have been getting played.  While Mono-Black Infect seems to be going 4-0 the most, I'm convinced that Blue Black Control (Commando) is the best deck in Block.  Will have to watch more (and hopefully play more) matches to better understand the real story.

But I love how the deck is built around Neurok Commando which does need a path cleared for itself with counter spells and removal--which is how the deck plays out.  Consecrated Sphinx is insane if it can stay in play too.

The deck has inspired me to play around with trying to make UR work in Standard.  Mainly because of Neurok Commando. Red Deck Wins wedging itself into the metagame (even if it'll only be shortlived) with the result in Edison also inspired this idea. 

I'm not a good deck designer at all, but here are some of the ideas I am having towards a fun (probably not competitive) UR Control Deck.

* Heavy on Red Removal/Damage

* Does use Neurok Commando

* Goblin Guide is currently in the deck because I feel some good forecasting of opponents hand is big in control--especially this type of control.  This can also provide some recovery by putting another threat out with haste.

* Blue support via Counterspell package and Into the Roils -- in the maindeck this is probably just limited to 4 mana leak (or spell pierce with all the tapping out happening now?) and 4 Into the Roils.  But post-sideboard can adjust the Blue support package in either directions.

* I'm thinking of two big win conditions for this deck...  The one I'm playing with the most because it's one of those "crappy cards unless you can build a home for it" is Chandra Ablaze.  I'm generally not a big fan of this card, but if it can work in a deck--I think this one is it.  Though I end up probably wasting space by putting in an inexorable tide to the deck to increase the chance of winning with this card.  I'm probably way off, but I think it's fun.  This deck is high on spells and is trying to get card draw.

* The other win condition for the deck I've been thinking about is Pyromancer Ascension, but then it almost feels like one might as well just play Pyromancer Ascension deck then and not bother so much with the commando.  Card draw in this deck is good, but not the scrye-fest of the usual Pyromancer build.  So I'm just not really thinking of Pyromancer much here.

* I did put Koths in the deck, but in the sideboard.  Just sort of want to try a more burn heavy with some counters game in game 1.  However, Koth is really good at ramping out Chandra fast or even Inexorable tide (which can now accelerate either planeswalker into ultimate territory).  I may eventually build some amount into the maindeck.

In any case, my deck designing ideas and abilities are pretty primative, but this idea so far seems fun.  I'll keep trying it out!

This week I played in a couple of drafts out of a desire for more cards with a chance of profit. 

Well, I'm still bad at drafting.  My gameplay decisions are getting better, but my deckbuilding and especially my drafting skills still have a long way to go.

On the upside, I did build up my collection and if we base earnings on market value, then my drafting has at least been profitable.  I've made more in card value than I have paid to play in the drafts.  

I know this luck only goes so far and at some point, the only real profitable way to draft is to actually, you know, draft properly.

In my first draft of the week I went ROE.  The typical bot price for ROE packs is 3.55 each (so 10.65 Tickets for a draft set) and drafting is 2 tickets entry fee, so 13 Tickets.  The shocking moment came at the get-go when my first pack had Vengevine.  So right away I got the Most Valuable Card in ROE (32 tickets on MTGO).

The deck I built wasn't all too hot though, I really need to watch more ROE videos and read more ROE draft articles and get a sense for the general decks people build.  Green also seemed to be pretty hot in the draft as there were at least 3 of us eating up the green cards.  I ended up with Black-Green and at least put up a good fight against my opponent, but I lost 1-2.  

Today, I played SOM draft and came away with Venser, the Sojourner and a dual land (I also got a few other decent cards but those two were the highlights).  I ended up creating a Blue White deck and sided in Black Splash in games 2 and 3.  the good news is I put up a really good fight and games went well.  I didn't have enough removal though, bounce kept me alive though.  However, the lack of removal is what I get for rare drafting a decent chunk of the time.

It's been very fun doing more drafts, but I still feel M11 4-Pack is the best thing for me to learn the game on and it will still be my primary focus.  I just found myself a bit more strapped for time than usual, so I went ahead and drafted.  I also got a little greedy for expansion cards.

In any case, good times.  

It's interesting to see how typical bot prices of cards get influenced by something like Worlds.  

First off, I should let everyone know that Scars of Mirrodin Boosters are super cheap this week on the bots.  It's a good time to stock up for your drafts and sealed events!  I am seeing SOM Boosters for 3.55 tickets.  

That's ROE low and it hasn't been this low for Scars in something like 4 or 5 weeks which has been hugging at just under 4.00 tickets for a long time.  I will probably be buying up some packs for later drafts (SOM Sealed is just too random it seems--sealed is random, but some sets work really well with sealed).

In my first year watching Worlds, it's interesting to see how various card prices change right away with that event.  Sort of like when the Vampires Deck was being written about by Gavin Verheys (it was already gaining buzz elsewhere at the time though) and the price of Kalastria Highborn and Bloodghast shot up right away.

Anyways, here are some of the price trends I saw:

* With Brian Kibler's "Caw-Go" deck going 6-0 at Worlds followed by a lot of coverage and writing about the deck (I'm also a fan), the price of Gideon Jura saw a crazy weekend spike.  The card went from somewhere around 18 Tickets to 28 by Friday, 32 on Saturday, and has since been steadily going down to more sane levels.  I feel that with this deck, the card should be just under 25, and it certainly hit 24 on Monday, but it's now pushing back up towards 27 tickets.

* Necrotic Ooze is hitting another one of those "this card has such great potential" spikes.  Thanks in large part to Conley Woods' deck which, to me, still seems over complicated and falls under the trap of all of the Necrotic Ooze decks I've seen and tried to build myself--it just takes too long to setup a combo to make an Ooze plan a serious Plan A.  The ooze, which used to be as high as 5 tickets when Scars first came out found itself below 0.50 tickets, I think 0.20 at one point.  Sometime around Sunday, the card found itself at a whole 2.00 tickets and it's still there.  However, the buying bots seem to know they shouldn't be paying out much for it--last I checked, 0.3 or 0.15 was the best I could hope for getting on the card.  But I'm sure I could sell it on classifieds for 1.00 tickets within a few hours.  Don't get me wrong, I love the ooze and I'm guilty of the horrible joke that it "oozes with potential" but I don't think the ooze found its home yet.

* Titans bow to Primevil and Grave Titan.  This probably surprises nobody.  Grave Titan is up to 20 tickets after UB's performance at worlds and especially how it flooded the Top 8 Finals.  Valakut is still the deck that's dictating how people are playing standard and as such, it has found a price hike to 40 tickets.  Valakut might not have won worlds in any way, but everyone still had to build their decks around it.  Frost Titan is dipping back down, part of its crazy trendy history.  It went from being considered mediocre, to being underrated (thanks to Spagnolo's Blue Black Control I think, but I'm sure for other reasons too), to now everyone saying it's overrated--but it's still good.  Frost Titan is now below 9 Tickets.  Sun Titan is still dipping, it's below 4 now.  I still like Sun Titan a lot, but I have to admit, it doesn't "win" the way other decks do, it more or less recovers your components (but I still love that, lately been enjoying ratchet bomb with Sun Titan).  Inferno Titan is holding steady around 7-8 Tickets.

In the last post, I covered the events of our first 4-Pack as a group/clan. In this part, I cover the cards I opened and the deck that I built.  

I am also very much looking forward to people's comments on the decks and what they themselves would have built!

READING THE CARDS

Here are the Mythics/Rares/Uncommons I got.  I liked the Rare/Mythics, but felt I could only use one this time.  Would be happy to be proven wrong, though ^_^

I 

I felt that Garuk would have been great if I had a lot of creatures.  He also spawns 3/3 tokens so that's very strong too and he could be a creature machine.  However, I didn't feel that I was getting much quality in the creature department, especially in the early game creature department to warrant using him.  But at the moment, I am starting to wonder if I could have made a very strong Blue/Green deck using Garruk.  He certainly would have buffed my Blue creatures while producing one or two tokens.  Acidic slime is a green card I like, not enough experience to tell how valuable it is in this format but deathtouch and land/artifact destruction is a wonderful thin imo.

Royal Assassin is the card I went with.  He's so good in this format and nasty with whispersilk cloak.  In this list of Mythics/Rares/Uncommons alone, he pairs very well with sleep as well (though almost anything pairs well with sleep).

Merfolk Sovereign just wasn't happening in this tournament imo, and though I ended up playing him--he's the card I think I should have cut.

So let's see the full card list of what I got...

I didn't have too many complaints about my cards.  I just didn't see enough creatures for an army, but at the same time I really liked the quality of my creatures!

There weren't any special lands, so nothing is missing in the above picture.

White has cards I want, but not enough of them or not enough support (aside from squadron hawk).  It quickly fell off my list, but in retrospect, I wish I splashed it for Blinding Mage.

I really liked Blue right away.  It seemed to have a package to keep me in the game and eventually control it.  I am a little prone to mill, but I felt that in this deck, it was finally warranted--especially if paired with Rise from the Grave in black as well as some discards.  I believe an early game erasure followed by a preordain, and eventually a tome scour puts a lot of pressure on the opponent and pairs well with something like Rise from the Grave.  I'm also a very big fan of Sleep and Mind Control.  At least Mind Control can make up for a creature deficit and give you some choice.

Black might be where my bias shows here.  I really like the black package despite it being the fewest cards I had on the table.  I'm almost wondering if someone will shake me and say "your Green might actually pair well with your Blue" or something.  In any case, I liked Black too much maybe and went with that.  I felt it went so well with Blue.  Discards, grave robbing, and assassination felt like great control cards.

The hard part about Red was that it's all support.  I like all these spells, but I just didn't feel I had an aggro army in either color that wanted to use them as much.  I felt these were the slower red cards that would be nice if I already had speed on my side (which I don't think I had at all).  

Green was tough and I don't think I spent enough time considering it.  Garruk is good and I have a late game army that could probably win.  Sylvan helps me thin the deck while ensuring early land.  If I spend time thinking about Blue and Green, maybe that would have won me over...  But I do think it would depend too much on drawing Garuk or Mind Control.  Looking for comments on my green ^_^

For the artifacts, there was no question I would use whispersilk cloak.  Lifegain is too slow without something like a pridemate--it costs tempo and and you buy yourself one turn at the cost of who knows how many spells.  And voltaic key obviously has no targets (and that would be too complicated to rely on anyways).

CHANCHAI'S BLUE BLACK CONTROL DECK (wish I splashed White too)

In general, I like playing control decks as well as combo decks.  I'm not great at it by any means, I still have to improve my fundamentals.  But I love playing these types of decks.  In a sealed format, it feels very different--the consistency you are used to isn't there so each turn can be a little dramatic if your opening hand wasn't great or you don't have a lot of draw or scry engines (gotta love how good crystal ball is in 30 card decks).

I did not intend to make a control deck coming into the event.  In fact, I always hope I can build the sort of decks that germanjerk usually ends up with, great balance of early game aggro and control and maybe a couple bombs.  But it wasn't happening in this tournament.

In any case, here is the Blue Black control I used in the tournament.  

It was hard for me to narrow my cards down.  The biggest obstacle was creature count at 8.  Eventually, I felt that Mind Control counts as a creature, Rise from the Grave counts as anywhere from 0.75 - 1.50 creatures (1.5 if the situation calls for using it on grave digger) and Grave digger is 1.5 creatures in lategame.  Thinking about it that way, I was comfortable with the lower creature count and I still had my options.

I think Merfolk Sovereign was a mistake.  It only has tiny synergy in this deck and costs a lot for not using those abilities.  In retrospect, I wish I tossed sovereign out and splashed in a Blinding Mage which works in this deck if it comes out to play.

Cloud elemental is good, but weird.  It can only block flying creatures which isn't really a problem in this format, but when your creature count is low, you might run into situations where you don't have enough ground creatures to block your opponent.  His value is still okay, but it becomes good with a decent aggro set.  He did keep flyers at bay, so I have to consider how good that value was.  I don't think there's anything I would have cut him for in the current card list.  Again, always happy to be proven wrong (much easier to learn from being wrong usually).

The idea of this deck was to slowly control and hopefully mill the opponent down while building a win condition.  Royal Assassin, Whispersilk Cloak, and Sleep were wonderful at stalling and controlling the fights.  I'm also glad that Josep used the Cloaked Assassin Combo too.  

I love Aether Adept's ability to control tempo.  I especially like having it as an option for Gravedigger.  Speaking of Gravedigger, I like having Liliana's Specter as an option for it too (and of course, Royal Assassin).  Rise from the Grave is also nice for these applications, but I try to save it for grabbing something really worthy, for a win condition.

I don't think there's much to say about Mind Control aside from how nice it is at robbing advantage and controlling tempo.  

I was partial to the mill package of Erasure, Preordain (after Erasure if possible, but also for getting out of a bind), and Tome Scour because of how I felt it would work with Rise from the Grave late game.  It also puts a clock on the opponent and I felt my deck was able to control long enough to make full use of it.  A second Tome Scour or a Traumatize would have been wonderful however.  A second Tome Scour, I think, would have been game winning.

Tome Scour is a tough card to have great discipline with, imo.  In this deck, I only get one crack at it.  And it has a secondary purpose in this deck of finding a target for Rise from the Grave.  Therefore, throwing it down early doesn't feel so right when you might just scour land.  You hope to get a bomb, but there are still good odds the opponent has them already. However, as the game progresses, and with the control being applied in the game, it does feel like the opponent will be put into a position of relying a little more on a top deck later--not to mention you can always count lands late in a game to know the odds of a scour.  If the opponent had terramorphic expanse played already, at least the deck is already thinner.  And if you have already forced the opponent to discard most or all of his hand (which this deck has done), the value of tome scour imo seems to go up.  

IT WAS A BIG CHALLENGE TO TELL MYSELF NOT TO SCOUR UNTIL LATE IN THE GAME.  Well, there's one exception.  If opponent is mana screwed, I think it's worth tome scouring, but even more valuable to force discard.

Anyhow, that's how I felt about this deck I built.  It's not the best deck it could have been, but I somehow feel like I built a contender in this one.  But control in this environment is hard because of the lack of consistency.

Also, oddly enough, I did not include negate or counterspell.  You can rely on people casting creatures on this format, so negate is a hard call for me--it feels like it only belongs in sideboard and used when you know what your target is.  If that target never arrives, it's a wasted card and that happens a surprising amount in this format, I think.  Counterspell is better suited and can stop a big bad creature.  I do feel I should have kept it in but am struggling with that debate in my head.  Hope someone clarifies to me the value of counterspell.

Finally, here is the deck that I now wish I had built.  

It simply replaced Merfolk Sovereign with Blinding Mage, took one Swamp out for a Plains.  

True to germanjerk's article on building an M11 4-Pack deck, double color requirements are difficult to work around.  This deck prefers to have more Swamps than Islands, but it still really uses those Islands.  I wasn't sure what the best way to distribute land was, I'm almost wondering if in this final (post-tournament) deck, if I should have added one more Swamp at the cost of an Island.  But it's really hard to say with the mid-game blue stuff.

Looking forward to seeing what decks other people would have built!

-Chanchai

Also, because I had the wrong image size set (Wizard's default) for scoreboard, here it is again (sad my results don't look so hot despite how upbeat I feel about this tournament).

First, a shoutout to germanjerk's blog post: How to do an M11 4-Pack Sealed.  

This is a well written, concise (unlike me) and illustrated article about germanjerk's process of building M11 4-pack decks.  I highly recommend it to everyone who plays 4-pack sealed.

This is the first of a (hopefully) multi-part series:

PART 1: Tournament Report (from Chanchai's perspective)

PART 2: Chanchai's Cards & Decklist

PART 3: (hopefully) Ewiper & Josep's Decklists (and maybe more perspective on their matches)

WE BE PACKIN'

I had a blast last night (or this morning as some would put it)!

Three of our clan members went into the same M11 4-Pack tournament and it made for a great time.  We didn't get the best results we wanted, but we all had mostly wonderfully competitive games and the mood was high during and after the event.

In this post I will summarize the event.  In the next post, I will cover my card list and deckbuilding.  And hopefully, in a third post, I will cover the card and decklists of my clanmates!

JOSEP GETS TO THE FINALS

Josep had the best result of all of us, fighting it out in the finals and losing a very, very close 3 game match to the champion.  As far as I saw, he played very good Magic the whole tournament.

In the first round, he fought the notorious Vizzerdrixzzle who is a regular (I wonder if the guy sleeps) in M11 4-Pack.  Unfortunately, Josep got to see why this guy is notorious--a good enough player with a pretty lousy attitude who is prone to harassing his opponents after he loses and sometimes during the game.  

FORTUNATELY, Josep put him in his place in the first round, but it was a well fought first round (to everyone except Vizzer anyways, he thinks it was all luck).  Sadly, Vizzer harassed my third round opponent mid-match which probably made this tournament a lousy experience for that player (not to mention that my deck completely lamed him out by taking control of the whole match until his oversized deck was milled).  I hope that person, my third round opponent, doesn't get too demoralized by this event.  If Josep reports Vizzer, I know that he isn't the only one who has filed a complaint against this player--competitive is great and fine, but harassment is way over the line and this guy sets a new bar for poor sportsmanship.  Fortunately after this post, if I mention Vizzer again, it'll be a short statement that he had to be dealt with and hopefully that is all.

In any case, CONGRATULATIONS TO JOSEP for making it to the finals and playing great Magic all throughout the tournament!  

EWIPER FIGHTS THE GOOD FIGHT

I think M11 4-Pack is growing on Ewiper.  That or he's just happy to play some sealed with me.  He's usually a drafter (and a great friend).  

Ewiper lost the first round, but I think he had almost no regrets.  He really made his opponent earn the victory and played very solidly.  The only regret Ewiper seemed to have was that he didn't maindeck his best deck for the format.  I will cover that in another post (assuming permission to post the card and decklists).

In the second round, Ewiper and I had great battles.  We even made a conscious decision to not scout each other and just enjoy the match.  Games 1 and 2 were very close--in fact, I honestly believe I threw away Game 1.  It's hard to know for sure because the margin was very tight and the final life count was 1-0.  I won the second game by milling Ewiper.  The third game was a blowout, I took a poor 6 card mulligan and got flooded.

I haven't watched Ewiper's Round 3 match, but apparently it was pretty epic.  I will check out the replay a bit later.  In the end, Ewiper came out with a Round 3 win to get 3 packs for his efforts this tournament!

CHANCHAI'S FIGHTS FOR CONTROL

Sadly, I went 1-2 in this tournament.  However, I'm not upset about it at all.  In fact, I feel that it was one of my better tournaments in terms of deckbuilding and overall playing.  I still made some bad errors, at least one of which I believe cost me a game and possibly an entire round.  But we live and learn.  

My first round opponent seemed good to me and he was very respectful. He played GRW (white seemed splashed with missionaries and veteran).  He seemed to like my control deck.  In our first game, I was struggling to stay alive but I kept the match going hoping I could pull out a win condition but no such luck.  In the second game, I won with a decent amount of control, a cloaked attacker, and finished with casting Rise from the Grave on his Ember Hauler to do finishing sac damage on him.  Our third match was me trying to survive long enough to pull out another win condition, but I let in too much damage in during the middle game (I could have chump blocked, but I felt I had enough turns to use life as a resource).  In the end, I let a single attacker through that got Giant Growth'd for the kill.  I believe I wasn't too far from taking control in another turn, but victory was still unlikely.

I covered the match with Ewiper earlier, so I'll just explain the error in Game 1 I made.  

LESSON #1: Learn to read.  For some reason, just looking at the art and not even the name--I stupidly assumed that Water Servant was a flying creature.  Even more stupid, I made this gross assumption twice.  That's like 2 seconds that could have spared me some agony.  The error that resulted? First, it led to a poor attack/block.  I mindcontrolled his water servant and put a cloak on it next turn.  I could have attacked with it, but I didn't because I somehow thought it could still defend against his flyers (side note: I was tapped out of Islands I believe).

LESSON #2: Learn to count.  I miscounted mana cost one turn, no idea why.  But let's say the end result was the cloaked water servant didn't get the proper buff it should have as a result.  Keep in mind the final life count of this match was 0-1 and he can't diminish a water servant with Whispersilk Cloak on it.

My third round opponent seemed a bit new to the game, but had some good cards.  I don't have a replay of the games, however, because he dropped out of the tournament after I won the first game.  He was completely locked out of our game because I was able to get Royal Assassin in with a Whispersilk Cloak on, which completely stalled his aggro.  My army steadily built (almost all 8 of them) and eventually I stole his Air Servant from his graveyard.  He conceded when, after casting Angelic Arbiter, I tapped (Air Servant) and killed it on his turn.  The next turn would have likely been a sleep, attack, assassinate one or two times scenario.

Here is the final results board.  Though I'm ranked 7th (for losing first two rounds), my win & makes me feel like I'm #5 :P  I wasn't able to play a second game of Round 3 though.

In any case, I'm really happy about our first 4-Pack together and I'm really looking forward to more.  I'm especially proud of Ewiper and Josep and I hope we can have some commentary soon about how exactly their matches played out and their perspectives.

Another day, another Sealed 4-Pack with M11.  Still loving it, though I'm still trying to improve.

Question for everyone out there who has done Sealed (of any form).  How would you describe your time spent Deck Building and how would you describe your process?

Right now, I spend a lot of time deckbuilding but it's still a bit chaotic, panicked, and sometimes looking things too much on color.  I love synergy, but I'm somehow blind to it in the 20 minutes (more than enough time) that they give you.  

I let the time pressure get to me, and I think there's probably a bigger fundamental flaw behind the mess that is my deckbuilding--something I must work to improve on:

I think I am setting myself up for failure by trying to create options (Plan B's) instead of using all my time to focus on and really make a good (winning) PLAN A.  

First off, this mostly happens when there's no super-duper obvious big bomb that I recognize.  But let's also acknowledge that my lack of experience in the game (which should no longer be an excuse soon) reduces my ability to read card value right away.

What happens is, I'm not sure which color to pick, I see a few decent candidates, and I am especially confused when the creature count is low.  If I saw a lot of two-drops and a couple bombs in a color, I'm going there.  But the last 3 or so events, I feel like I haven't had that many creatures within any particular color.  And I end up confused.

But worse than being confused, I convolute myself by this idea that I can get out of it by creating alternate decks.  

And now I'm thinking... in this time when I need to work on my fundamentals... it's more important to spend that whole 20 minutes building one damn good deck, one that should win game 1.  

It's obvious, I know.  But when I'm so uncertain about how strong of a deck I can build with the current choices, laziness creeps in telling me to just create more options... Now I have to tell myself, one good deck is way better than ANY NUMBER of mediocre decks.  

Again, it's obvious--but fundamentals and lessons have to be things we instinctively understand and practice--and under pressure I'm just not showing it (yet).  Maybe I'll post sticky notes.

The time pressure really does get to me though.  That's not a complaint, just something I'm dealing with.  20 minutes is a lot of time, a whole lot of time, but I'm a slower decision maker by nature (part of why I have no confidence in drafts--yet) and so I like to polish basics and fundamentals in a slow manner first until it becomes a quicker action for me.  

Anyways, today's list was interesting for me.  I think a GREAT deck can be built on it, though it doesn't have much removal.  It has a few big hitters, it does have nice small fries that work well together.  But it also seems to push control over aggro removal and direct damage (well it really doesn't have much direct damage).  

I think I was lost in how to utilize that control theme really well.  And yes, in this sealed, I did the same thing as I said I had done above--I scrambled and made two decks without spending the time to really build a truly winning Plan A.  

The tournament is still going as I type this (already scouted).  I won the first game of the first round, but lost the latter two (it was a close third game, I got milled second game).  In the second round, my opponent had a strong start but I guess life was calling him as he pulled out of the tournament early in the first game.  So after some scouting, I wanted to post this and really freshen up my thinking.

Also, I think my alternate deck is stronger than my Main Deck.  I actually built the alternate first, but the creature count bugged me.  I felt the main deck would allow me to read an opponent's deck and get comfortable with a bit more control with a few more creatures than the alternate.

If you read all this, thanks for reading it all!  

Here's the card list, followed by the two decks I built!

CARD LIST

1 Ajani's Mantra

1 Ajani's Pridemate

1 Angelic Arbiter

1 Angel's Feather

1 Blood Tithe

1 Child of Night

1 Corrupt

1 Duress

2 Arc Runner

1 Yavimaya Wurm

1 Lava Axe

1 Plains

1 Garruk's Packleader

1 Brindle Boar

1 Bog Raiders

1 Island

1 Merfolk Sovereign

1 Mana Leak

1 Act of Treason

1 Autumn's Veil

1 Berserkers of Blood Ridge

1 Mass Polymorph

1 Mind Rot

1 Phylactery Lich

1 Whispersilk Cloak

1 Liliana's Specter

1 Stabbing Pain

1 Tireless Missionaries

1 Sylvan Ranger

1 Plummet

1 Ice Cage

1 Merfolk Spy

1 Fog

1 Naturalize

1 Azure Drake

2 Bloodcrazed Goblin

1 Maritime Guard

1 Alluring Siren

1 Solemn Offering

1 Forest

1 Cultivate

1 Duskdale Wurm

1 Goblin Balloon Brigade

1 Thunder Strike

1 Combust

1 Dryad's Favor

1 Mind Control

1 Æther Adept

1 Preordain

1 Inspired Charge

1 Jace's Erasure

1 Sorcerer's Strongbox

1 Dragon's Claw

1 Safe Passage

1 Silvercoat Lion

1 Holy Strength

1Inspired Charge

MAIN DECK

1 Ice Cage

1 Azure Drake

1 Bloodcrazed Goblin

1 Scroll Thief

1 Prodigal Pyromancer

1 Magma Phoenix

1 Incite

1 Fire Servant

1 Arc Runner

1 Diminish

1 Augury Owl

1 Mana Leak

7 Mountain

1 Whispersilk Cloak

6 Island

1 Harbor Serpent

1 Thunder Strike

1 Goblin Tunneler

1 Air Servant

ALTERNATE DECK

1 Tireless Missionaries

1 Bloodcrazed Goblin

1 Pacifism

1 Prodigal Pyromancer

1 Cloud Crusader

1 Magma Phoenix

1 Mighty Leap

1 Incite

1 Fire Servant

1 Arc Runner

1 Inspired Charge

6 Plains

6 Mountain

1 Whispersilk Cloak

1 Thunder Strike

2 Holy Strength

1 Goblin Tunneler

1 Elite Vanguard

1 Blinding Mage

Thanks for reading!

-Chanchai

As I am posting this, I'm in another M11 4-Pack Sealed Tournament.  Outlook isn't too great, but it's fun and I'm getting cards.  Nothing too exciting this time though.  

I just lost the first round.  In the first game I was mana screwed and only drawing the lesser mana of my deck.  At least that's how it felt at the time.  The second game was very close, but opponent was mostly in control of the game the whole time and things might have been different if I had been willing to trade on a blocking decision (I ended up overthinking, worried opponent had a buff card... what I should have been thinking is if he had a buff card, let him use it early and waste it on small fries--still trying to learn ^_^).

That said, I think my second deck (Red-Blue) is better than my first deck (Red-White).  Black was a very interesting color and I wanted to play it, but I didn't feel I could tweak it properly in the time I allowed myself.

I'm also wondering if I should have considered some green, but green didn't scream to me that it was a deck I wanted to build (except that it did have endgame cards and some things in between).

In any case, I'm still a mediocre deckbuilder.  But I'd love to know, what kind of deck would you build with the following cards?  ^_^

Sealed Cards

1 Tome Scour

1 Siege Mastodon

1 Plummet

1 Ice Cage

1 Awakener Druid

1 Azure Drake

1 Prized Unicorn

1 Duress

1 Cudgel Troll

1 Scroll Thief

1 Giant Growth

1 Mountain

1 Autumn's Veil

1 Mountain

1 Liliana's Specter

1 Primal Cocoon

1 Nether Horror

1 Island

1 Diminish

1 Augury Owl

1 Brindle Boar

1 Dragonskull Summit

1 Gargoyle Sentinel

1 Mind Rot

1 Swamp

1Mana Leak

1 Air Servant

1 Dark Tutelage

2 Child of Night

1 Terramorphic Expanse

1 Quag Sickness

1 Harbor Serpent

1 Birds of Paradise

1 Sacred Wolf

1 Spined Wurm

1 Bloodthrone Vampire

1 Jace's Erasure

1 Solemn Offering

1 Wurm's Tooth

1 Gravedigger

1 Rise from the Grave

1 Tireless Missionaries

1 Bloodcrazed Goblin

1 Pacifism

1 Prodigal Pyromancer

1 Cloud Crusader

1 Magma Phoenix

1 Mighty Leap

1 Incite

1 Fire Servant

1 Arc Runner

1 Inspired Charge

1 Whispersilk Cloak

1 Thunder Strike

2 Holy Strength

1 Goblin Tunneler

1 Elite Vanguard

1 Blinding Mage

MAIN DECK 

1 Tireless Missionaries

1 Bloodcrazed Goblin

1 Pacifism

1 Prodigal Pyromancer

1 Cloud Crusader

1 Magma Phoenix

1 Mighty Leap

1 Incite

1 Fire Servant

1 Arc Runner

1 Inspired Charge

6 Plains

6 Mountain

1 Whispersilk Cloak

1 Thunder Strike

2 Holy Strength

1 Goblin Tunneler

1 Elite Vanguard

1 Blinding Mage

ALTERNATE DECK "B" (I thought this was better than Main Deck)

1 Ice Cage

1 Azure Drake

1 Bloodcrazed Goblin

1 Scroll Thief

1 Prodigal Pyromancer

1 Magma Phoenix

1 Incite

1 Fire Servant

1 Arc Runner

1 Diminish

1 Augury Owl

1 Mana Leak

7 Mountain

1 Whispersilk Cloak

6 Island

1 Harbor Serpent

1 Thunder Strike

1 Goblin Tunneler

1 Air Servant

Enjoy!

-Chanchai

What kind of decks would you build with the cards I got in my 4-Pack Tournament?

Just turned in a bad performance in M11 4-Pack Sealed, but as always it was a learning experience.

I will submit myself for public embarassment and list out the cards I got from the 4 packs.  I will also list out (with embarassment) the 3 decks I built from them.

I am still learning (and hopefully always will) and all respectful criticism and critiques are very welcome ^_^

The good news is that I think I've shaken off Sealed Tournament nerves!  In fact, I think my overall play was better than it had been in other events, though still littered with errors and blunders that have not become obvious to me yet.

However, I think my deckbuilding was pretty poor.  I think I overreacted to limitations set by the card choices and ended up making a deck that severely lacked answers.  I ended up building aggro decks usually with flying and big hitters, aided by some ramp, but I did not put in the necessary removal spells or counter spells to let me clear a path to victory.  Games went long and I just ran out of answers.

BTW, if anyone knows how to implement autocard/gatherer references into these blog posts, I would be grateful if you could explain it to me so I can make these lists easier to read ^_^

So here is the list of cards I received from the 4 packs:

Birds of Paradise *FOIL* 1

Clone 1

Elvish Archdruid 1

Fauna Shaman 1

Wild Evocation 1

Ajani's Pridemate 1

Angel's Feather 1

Autumn's Veil 1

Chandra's Spitfire 1

Demon's Horn 1

Duskdale Wurm 1

Elixir of Immortality 1

Juggernaut 1

Kraken's Eye 1

Nature's spiral 1

Serra Angel 1

Stone Golem 1

Act of Treason 1

Ajani's Mantra 1

Assassinate 1

Berserkers of Blood Ridge 1

Blood Tithe 1

Bog Raiders 1

Cancel 1

Canyon Minotaur 1

Chandra's Outrage 1

Child of Night 1

Cloud Crusader 2

Cultivate 1

Doom Blade 1

Fog 1

Giant Growth 1

Hunter's Feast 1

Ice Cage 2

Lava Axe 1

Mana Leak 1

Maritime Guard 1

Merfolk Spy 1

Nether Horror 1

Nightwing Shade 1

Palace Guard 1

Rotting Legion 1

Sacred Wolf 1

Safe passage 1

Scroll Thief 1

Sign in Blood 1

Spined Wurm 1

Squadron Hawk 1

Stabbing Pain 1

Sylvan Ranger 1

Thunder Strike 2

Volcanic Strength 1

Wild Griffin 1

MAIN DECK:

1 Safe Passage

1 Sylvan Ranger

1 Elixir of Immortality

1 Nature's Spiral

1 Fog

1 Fauna Shaman

1 Giant Growth

1 Cultivate

1 Duskdale Wurm

6 Plains

6 Forest

1 Ajani's Pridemate

1 Juggernaut

1 Birds of Paradise

1 Sacred Wolf

1 Serra Angel

1 Wild Griffin

1 Palace Guard

2 Cloud Crusader

ALTERNATE DECK "B" (Note: Before playing this, I usually swapped in a Juggernaut & Stone Golem for two other cards in the list)

1 Sylvan Ranger

1 Elixir of Immortality

1 Nature's Spiral

1 Fog

1 Fauna Shaman

1 Giant Growth

1 Cultivate

1 Duskdale Wurm

1 Birds of Paradise

1 Lava Axe

1 Volcanic Strength

1 Act of Treason

6 Mountain

6 Forest

1 Berserkers of Blood Ridge

2 Thunder Strike

1 Chandra's Spitfire

1 Sacred Wolf

1 Chandra's Outrage

ALTERNATE DECK "C" (When using this deck, I sided in juggernaut and stone golem for two other cards)

1 Sylvan Ranger

2 Ice Cage

1 Elixir of Immortality

1 Nature's Spiral

1 Fog

1 Fauna Shaman

1 Scroll Thief

1 Giant Growth

1 Cultivate

1 Cancel

1 Duskdale Wurm

1 Maritime Guard

1 Mana Leak

5 Island6 Forest

1 Birds of Paradise

1 Merfolk Spy

1 Sacred Wolf

1 Clone

1 Stone Golem

-Chanchai

P.S. Just now realized that Local Text Deck saves include the sideboard, so it actually includes all the cards you got in the sealed.  I wasted a lot of time writing out the full card list (which is why it has different formatting from the rest) :P

Today is my birthday and it's been wonderful!

But it's also been shocking!!!  I got an amazing trade from a new buddy on MTGO!

I played a bit of Magic Online today on my lunch break and met a really nice player.  He was trying out a Blue Artifact Deck and I was playing a UR Mindmelter deck.  He pretty much won the match, but he let me have another turn so I won the game (I count it as his victory, he wanted to see what I was planning).   Anyways, we chat and I tell him my thoughts on his deck and what could help it out.  And then....

He offers me a Jace, the Mind Sculptor for whatever card(s) he thinks could help him out.  So I told him that from what I have, I only have Battlespheres and those could help if he wanted more of them (his artifact and myr ramp is very fast at turn 3 or so, it works with semblence anvil among other things).  He said he would do that trade.  

I try to be ethical and honest, especially to people I enjoy chatting with so I did tell him the value of TMS.  He said he knew the value but he'd be fine with the deal.  So we did it!

For the record, I personally told him I won't trade the card out because I definitely intend to use it.  So it's not like I'm going to turn around and sell the card.

I also told him to keep me up to date on the deck and how he might want to tweak it.  Furthermore, I later remembered that I had a contagion clasp foil and a spare M11 booster from a sealed event.  So I gave him those.  I was just too grateful!

I later told him it actually is my birthday too.  I hope this isn't just too good to be true!  Jace TMS for 4 Myr Battlespheres (1 foil, 3 regular).  And for gratitude, I gave him a Foil Contagion Clasp and an M11 Booster.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME ^_^