Un-prep (things I did not do)
- Follow spoiler season. Following MtG spoilers and product releases in 2023 is a full-time job or hobby, I swear.
- Draft at all
- This is foreshadowing of later.
- Play on Magic Arena. So many things that turn me off trying to grind Arena
- Dominance of Bo1 queues
- Cross-pod draft play
- Priority interaction with combat tricks
- Low mental investment/commitment of digital play
- Value-drafting
Prep (things that I did do)
- Search up the signpost uncommons on Scryfall before my first event of the format and call it a day.
- Play four prereleases at SCG Columbus across Friday & Sunday, winning six out of eight matches (only playing the first two rounds per three-round event, since the third was always worth drawing).
- Judge three different Two-Headed Giants tournaments on Saturday.
- Practice WOE sealed deckbuilding using DraftSim.
- Read the Magic.gg World Championship Draft primer
- Five color nonsense huh? Someone on my Discord said to avoid that, but I really like the fixing because I'm a greed monster who loves multiple pieces of fixing at common - Prophetic Prism, Evolving Wilds, Brave the Wilds and Return from the Wilds? Hell yeah
- This is foreshadowing of later.
- Except the next paragraph itself is nonsensical, that someone will simply pass a third pack Gruff Triplets or Virtue of Persistence?? Maybe in cross-pod league play, but in high-stakes limited no way in hell are those cards going to be passed to pick 2.
- Use 17Lands data to identify cards with the highest and lowest IWD (Improvement When Drawn) rates.
- Use 17Lands draft data after qualifying for day 2 to see cards with gaps between ALSA (Average Last Seen At) and IWD metrics.
- So remember when that article mentioned players passing over rare bombs like Gruff Triplets and Virtue of Persistence? Well guess which two cards have the absolute lowest ALSAs but highest IWDs.
Day 1 - Sealed
Sat down for registration. After laying out pack 1, my registration partner requests that I count out my cards commons, uncommons, rares, etc. Sure, that's reasonable.
I lay out pack 1 again. 9 commons, 3 uncommons, 1 rare, 1 enchantment, 1 basic land. 15 cards, all normal.
Pack 2. One two three four five commons... uncommon? One two three four five six seven uncommons JUDGE.
Props to my partner for keeping an eye out. Also turns out that our neighbors are experiencing the same issue. Judges rule that we will get to keep the extra uncommons in our pool, which checks out with tournament policy. I end up with three packs with extra uncommons, totaling 29 uncommons in my pool (expected: 18). My partner unfortunately ends up with six perfectly normal packs.
Sealed Deck (Scryfall) | Registration sheet
I rule out white and red almost immediately for no creatures (identified visually and counting spells during registration). Green and black are both super deep, so it's a no-brainer really.
The thing to understand about modern Magic sets is that every card does things now. There hasn't been a vanilla creature printed in years. Every card does something, but in order to build a cohesive deck you need cards that do something together. A lot of cards are secretly multicolor, and mostly dead/filler for other archetypes.
Zooming in on my deep green pool: Graceful Takedown, Redtooth Vanguard, and Tanglespan Lookout are secret GW cards. Verdant Outrider and Garruk's Uprising are secret GR cards.
A ton of solid spells. Splash into blue for Goose Mother and Restless Vinestalk, with three fixing spells - effectively five blue sources for Goose Mother, four for Vinestalk.
- I played 4 of my 7 rares, with The End being a foil rare. All solid
- I played 7 of my 29 uncommons.
- During deckbuilding I tunnel-visioned in on playing extra uncommons, and sided 2 of them out in every match. Not an especially egregious error.
What I would have changed: -2 Faerie Dreamthief, -1 Rowan's Grim Search, +1 Leaping Ambush, +2 Stingblade Assassin.
I ended up siding in Decadent Dragon in most matches (basically any green or black opponent), but I think it's correct to start it in the side when not playing red.
Round 1 vs Noah Root LWW (1-0)
OTP, keep a 7 and miss land 3. He's on GB as well. Forget the details, but I definitely bring in Decadent Dragon and in a sideboard game I Titanic Growth my creature in response to a Faunbane Troll for blowout.
Round 2 vs Rob Pisano LWW (2-0)
Game 1 he rushes me down with RW, including a Goddric. Games 2 and 3 he switches over to Sultai/BUG, which is coherent but not as powerful as my own. Game 3 I have to eat five Food tokens to stabilize.
Round 3 vs Matt Barber LL (2-1)
BG. In game 2 he's beating me down with a flying 3/5 (High Fae Negotiator). I attack with my 5/5 Gingerbread Hunter, figuring I can Leaping Ambush it next turn to get the flyer. I forget that he has the double block with a 1/4 + 4/3 and welp that's my trick wasted.
Round 4 vs Lander WW (3-1)
BR w/ Bitterblossom. I'm OTP in G1 and am able to pressure through the first few tokens, then manage to remove it before getting out of hand.
Game 2 he draws seven and finds two cards hiding under his lifepad and that's a judge call. Reset the seven card hand, he keeps a 1 land Bitterblossom and I put him away pretty cleanly. He called it a risky keep, but I feel like he self-pressured himself after the judge call (no penalty issued, no real problem) because a 1 lander OTP is veeerry risky.
Round 5 vs Sebastian Pineda LWW (4-1)
He's on RG and aggros me out of G1. During game 2 I cast The End and peep through his library which includes a Royal Treatment, some other generic tricks. Game 3 he telegraphs the Royal Treatment and I slow roll my own trick, blowing him out when he goes for a win in combat. He drops a Rotisserie Elemental in game 3 which I found highly questionable - the card wasn't even good on an empty board!
Round 6 vs Daniel Deckmann LWW (5-1)
Another Bitterblossom player. I keep a 5 lander on the play and draw 8 lands in G1.
Sideboard games I answer the Bitterblossom with .. I forget, Ouphe probably, and grind him out. Iirc I exhaust his resources and finish with Goose Mother.
Round 7 vs Matt WW (6-1)
He's on some kind of RGW Naya deck. Game 2 I get a bunch of foods out and have to calculate if I can lethal with Night of Sweet's Revenge w/ two tramplers + three non-tramplers, vs about four blockers (I don't, but he's at 3 with no meaningful board vs 16 life).
Sixth win locks me for day 2.
Round 8 vs Ben Anderson WW (7-1)
GBr. He has a The End which he uses in both! games to hit my Gingerbread Hunter, my only two-of in the deck! In both games though I make a ton of food, build out a board with Night of Sweet's Revenge, and top off with a big ol' Goose Mother.
Game 2 is funny because we both keep double swamp hands and discard to hand size. But I'm able to adventure Decadent Dragon to yoink a Mountain off his deck, draw my own Forest, cast Night of Sweet's Revenge and four? turns after discarding to hand size I have about nine mana to play with & a bunch of board permanents.
Really happy with my blue splash. I have one loss to play with for day 2. One bad fumble of a combat trick, and should have changed my main deck by 3 different cards.
Draft 1 - Pod 6
Pack 1 pick 1 was a choice between Decadent Dragon and an Imodane's Recruiter. Both very playable, but took Dragon and picked up a different Recruiter later. RB was open - solid deck but a little light on creatures (14) esp. considering the number of tricks/pumps.
Round 9 vs Jason Chan aka Amaz WW (8-1)
The great part of playing people on social media is that we get to see their decklists!
Wasn't feeling great about the deck but it popped off vs Amaz. Game 1 OTP, turn 3 I attack my Grand Ball Guest (2/2) into his Octopus (1/3). Cast Pest Problem at instant speed to build board state & win combat easily. Turn 4 Voracious Vermin into turn 5 Twisted Sewer-Witch was basically the nuts. Then Bellowing Bruiser // Beat a Path to cruise through blockers.
Game 2 was slower and I ended up playing a control role, but had a solid hit off Expensive Taste to hit island + Obyra's Attendants. He bounces it back to his own hand eventually, but my spells are pretty good while his UR stuff feels like a lot of wheel-spinning.
Round 10 vs Adam D WLW (9-1)
He's on BG splashing W. Game 2 I use Scarecrow to sneak a Rat Out trick by him (holding up Mountain, filtering for B). Few turns later I cast the knight token half of Imodane's Recruiter, so I have a pump effect at the ready but he manages to plays ton of blockers preventing profitable attacks. I stall out at five mana when I really want six to keep adding bodies & having access to tricks, but lose this one. Game 3 we try to play quickly with 8 mins on the clock, but he keeps a triple swamp hand and gets mana screwed.
Round 11 vs Jesse Hampton aka Slax LL (9-2)
Pretty brutal. Seemed that he got all the B removal, went for the Hatching Plans + Ice Out plan with Farsight Ritual. Immense card advantage, got buried very quickly.
WWL 2-1 in pretty solid for my first draft in the format, but I need to win out my second draft to make top 8. Also realize during this write-up that Jesse's been to sixteen PTs, so facing strong opponents is definitely the theme of the day.
Draft 2 - Pod 3
Decided to try forcing what Jesse did to me - P1P1 Horned Loch-Whale which is a solid and splashable bomb, P1P2 Candy Grapple, P1P3 Faerie Dreamthief into see no more B cards for pack 1. I get passed a lot of big blue/green creatures, some white stuff but see zero fixing or black removal from my right. Pack 2 I pass about 5 blue/green cards in one pack that I'd be happy to wheel, but none of them come back. I pick a number of white cards thinking I might pivot to UW but nothing remotely exciting. My signal senses are tingling.
Round 12 vs Justin Bliek WW (10-1)
Justin is on a blue-black perfectly fine draft deck. He didn't get the Hatching Plans-Farsight Ritual that Jesse did to me, so I'm okay. Game 2 comes down to a race with my Hollow Scavengers, and I tempo him out. Iirc Royal Treatment got a sick trick off.
Round 13 vs Dominick Paolercio aka karatedom LWW (11-1)
Forest swamp plains mountain ... ah, this is the 5-color deck that was foretold. Game 1 I make a percentage misplay - I'm sitting on 3x Island 2x Forest with a Forest and land drop in hand. I live the Jesse Hampton-inspired dream and Farsight Ritual off Hatching Plans to effectively draw 5. But because I didn't play the Forest first, I am unable to hold up UU for a bargained Ice Out!!! This is bad because he casts Seek the Beast (adventure side of Questing Druid) on my end of turn, which he rides to victory in 5C. I am forced to bounce it at some point but he's got a range of white removal and what-have-you.
Boarded into 2x Swamp + Candy Grapple + Back for Seconds to grind a bit. Games 2 and 3 he stumbles on mana and the Hollow Scavengers are solid again.
Candy Grapple is solid & my splash is pretty clean.
He bluffs a Kellan's Lightblades on the last turn of game 3, but I draw Vantress Transmuter which guarantees me a safe attack and post-game reveals that he didn't even have it. Also mentions that he didn't get a lot of fixing. Foreshadowing
I'm still live for top 8!!
So something that started around round 6 or 7 was that I started to mind-read my opponents. Observing their mana and posture (physical and in gameplay) to determine that they have an instant-speed action, then playing around it.
Matched up against skillful limited players, they always have something going on, flooding very rarely due to clean deckbuilding, so we end up playing around each other's tricks - lot of respect going on. There was a lot more draw-go than one might expect in a "normal" limited experience.
Round 14 vs Jason Ye LL (11-3, bubbled down to 18th on tiebreakers)
Looks like they posted their own tournament report. Game 1 I keep a four with Hatching Plans, Wolf, Ice Out but no second Island. Miss a food crack game 1 on EoT for 3 life, but I get pretty run over.
Game 2 we grind for a while, then I get combo'd twice: Freeze in Place + Tenacious Tomeseeker + Gadwick's First Duel to basically tap down my team for the whole game. Then Song of Totentanz + second Tenacious Tomeseeker to lethal me with a bajillion rats.
Welp there it goes. Sucks to lose the last and most important match like that.
Round 14 excuses/copes/perfectly rational explanations
- Kept a hand that didn't do anything in R14G1. I think this is defensible - I could have worked with a lot of draws but drew poorly.
- Didn't see Song or Tenacious Tomeseekers in R14G1, had the option of boarding into 2x Ground Seal out of the board. This could have made a huge difference for G2.
- Boarded into Candy Grapple and Back for Seconds again, but this wasn't as impactful as their greed-monster 5C deck.
- Part of why I beat Dom in R13 was his lack of fixing - Jason was upstream on packs 2 & 3 and took at least six pieces of fixing.
- Melee issues delayed the round by most of an hour, which cooled me off a bit too much
- I had never drafted the set before Las Vegas, versus
- Jason who did seriously solid prep ahead of Vegas, including 20-something MTGA drafts, *at least a week of in-house team draft testing*, card evaluations, and misc. Twitter thoughts
- In both drafts I lost to opponents who drafted "3-0 decks" while I drafted more conventional "2-1" decks
- My opponent Jason ended up 3-0ing the day 3 draft too, so clearly they're pretty good at this format
- Also my draft 1 finals opponent was the other day 3 finalist WELP
- My signal senses were triggered correctly: Dom was directly to my right (5C), Justin was 3 seats right (UB), and Jason (5C) was right past them. So they yoinked all the fixing and removal, not to mention the others in the pod. Given that ... it's probably really impressive that I cobbled together what I did.
Summary
- I never expected to make it as far as I did, and this is definitely my deepest run at a GP-level event.
- My prep pales in comparison to some of my opponents, but I thought it was spectacular from a time-efficiency standpoint.
- I think my opinions on modern limited formats holds. To excel, you can't just draft "good and consistent" decks - the cards need to come together to make 2+2 = 5. 1-for-1s are rough unless well-costed. 2-for-1s are obviously great. But if you can combine something like Freeze in Place + Gadwick's First Duel that's something like a 4-for-2.
- Props to all my opponents, who were very strong. Every match felt like a battle of wits and mettle.
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