My First Magic 2014 (M14) Draft

At the M14 Prerelease, I lost in the finals. The deck that beat me? Blue/Green. My opponent used Zephyr Charge+Plummet to kill my non-fliers, and given the fact that I had 10 or so fliers in my deck, the Plummets were usually just Doom Blades. It was quite the savage beating.

So I went in to my first draft thinking about how good fliers were, how good green was, and how good black was. I know that white and red can also be very good, but only in the right circumstances. I knew that I would lean on green in some capacity unless blue/black presented itself or another color came on really strong.

I would post the draft visually, but it looks like the draft converter is having troubles.

Here is the deck I ended up building:

Round 1:

My blue/green guys outpace his white/red guys rather quickly. He does win the flip on Molten Birth twice, though!!! I was pretty freaked out by that, but still had enough to win. Archaeomancer getting back Enlarge did the trick.
2-0 games

Round 2:

Played against blue/white fliers and good stuff. I was terrified of this guy because he was playing very well and had a lot of counterspells. He also had the flier that taps my fliers, which could just completely swing the game in his favor. Luckily for me, he had to go see a movie and he conceded in game 2. I hope it was the Wolverine; I hear that movie is sweet!
2-1 games

Round 3:

This time I face off against a red/black deck. Yikes. Talk about a powerful color combination. And he does not disappoint. I steal game one thanks to a pretty darn good draw. Game two, however, winds up with his Mark of the Vampire on his Canyon Minotaur and my bunch of dudes. Crazily enough, though, he swings into my wall of guys and we trade like 2 for 2. In the end, it looks like he just drew a lot of lands and 3 unidentified cards in his hand. Perhaps all enchantments or lands?
4-1 games

Won!

Overall, I had fun with the draft and am definitely looking forward to drafting core set for a while. I feel like the simplicity of the format is more appealing after the crazy gold-fueled madness that is Return to Ravnica block.

My favorite color is green, and it does not disappoint in this draft format. Thankfully I’m also fond of the other colors so I can keep my options open. If I had one piece of advice for those trying to improve their draft game… Don’t jam your favorite color/archtype and try to force it. You have to evaluate each pack on its individual merits. You also need to pay attention to what’s coming your way and what you’re passing. Identifying something good that tabled could be your key to victory.

Until next time, have fun with Magic 2014!

M14’s Effect on Standard

These are the top Standard decks before M14:

R/G Aggro
Junk Reanimator
UWR Flash
Junk Aristocrats
Jund Midrange
Bant Hexproof
G/B Control
Naya Aggro
The Aristocrats
Bant Control
Naya Blitz

More important than the deck name is the deck’s strategy. What does that particular deck do to win the game?

R/G Aggro: Play fast creatures with high value. Overwhelm the opponent by attacking, some burn to finish the job.
Junk Reanimator: Plan #1: Reanimate powerful creatures. Plan #2: Hard-cast powerful creatures.
UWR Flash: Play the game on your opponent’s turn, but the spells cast on your turn are game-winning.

Junk Aristocrats: Creatures all work together and form a horde to overwhelm the opponent.

Jund Midrange: Use powerful spells to gain incremental card advantage over time.

Bant Hexproof: Load a guy up with enchantments and attack.

G/B Control: Kill opponent’s creatures while playing large creatures of your own.

Naya Aggro: Larger-size small to midrange creatures that all provide value and redundancy.

The Aristocrats: Plan #1: Overwhelm with creature swarm. Plan #2: Combo-kill with Reckoner/Blasphemous Act.

Bant Control: Counterspells and creature control until taking the game over with Sphinx’s Revelation.

Naya Blitz: The fastest aggro deck. Creatures have low individual value but good as a team.

So, trying to keep all of those strategies in our minds is a little tough when looking at a brand new set. I’m going to attempt it in this post, but I am sure I will be wrong in several areas. I am going to try to keep in mind mana cost vs. power level, sheer power level, etc, etc. (Also, I’m going to skip cards I don’t think will have much of an impact) This should be fun!

Celestial Flare

This card gives a serious weapon against Bant Hexproof. I think it will see some play in sideboards at the very least. Also keep in mind that you can play this in the combat phase after damage has been dealt and the Angel token from Geist of St. Traft has been removed. should be very effective.

Imposing Sovereign

Standard midrange and control decks are able to stop creature attacks with three strategies: Wraths (Bant Control, UWR Flash, G/B Control), Spot Removal (Jund, Naya Midrange), and blocking with creatures (Junk Reanimator, Aristocrats, other aggro decks). The Soverign really hurts that last one. It makes it very tough to get extreme value out of Thragtusk.

Generally playing a Thragtusk allows you to gain the life, block and trade with a big attacker, and still have a 3/3 for the next turn’s attack. This removes two thirds of that value proposition. Watch this card for sure.

Lifebane Zombie

This guy is pretty awesome. Toughness is generally irrelevent on an evasion creature in Standard (Intimidate) and his ETB ability is pretty amazing as it plucks Thragtusk, Angels, and even Loxodon Smiter!

Xathrid Necromancer

This guy seems to slide right in to Aristocrats and could even spark his own Black/White deck when combined with the humans from Innistrad block.

Mindsparker

This guy seems very good against any deck with blue and/or white in it. Probably a sideboard card.

Young Pyromancer

This guy has valuetown written all over him. 2 mana for a 2/1 with an extra ability that doesn’t require mana? Sign me up. Seems good for R/G Aggro.

Kalonian Tusker

While most think he won’t see play because of his “prohibitve mana cost,” he just might surprise you…

Scavenging Ooze

No shock here. He completely messes with all graveyard-recursion angles.

I’m really not sure how things are going to shake up, but I actually wrote this before the SCG tournament in Richmond. As of the time I’m posting this, I see that W/B Humans has won that tournament! Wow.  I guess we’ll get to see if my predictions hold up.  Let’s check each card to see if it landed in the top 8:

Celestial Flare wound up as a 3-of in sideboard of the 8th place deck. That’s it. Ah well.
Imposing Sovereign wound up in the same deck a a 4-of. Yay!
Lifebane Zombie was a 2-of in the sideboard of AJ Sacher’s winning deck. Interesting.
Xathrid Necromancer was a 4-of in the winning deck. YARRRR.
Mindsparker…. Nowhere. Doh!
Young Pyromancer had a lot of hype but was absent in the top 8.
Kalonian Tusker didn’t even make the cut in a mono-green deck.  This is not a good sign for this little (big?) guy.
Scavenging Ooze was in 5 of the top 8 decks. I think it’s safe to say that this guy is going to be a standard staple.

Well there you have it. Results!  I can’t wait to see what comes of this format a couple of weeks down the line. It seems like M14 has added some spice to the pot, but we might need to let this cauldron bubble for  a while!