FNM Draft 2017-12-01

I tried to get people interested in an Iconic Masters draft, and we had just about the 8 we needed at the same time the Ixalan draft seating was coming off the printer, but we decided to be kind to the tournament runner and just stick with Ixalan.  There were about 23 people in the draft, which ended up being 5 rounds.

It was my first Ixalan draft in a month, but but it's an easy enough format that I jumped right in without any extra prep.  Here is what I drafted:

My first pack rare was Spell Swindle, and there weren't any great removal spells or other exciting mono-colored cards to keep me open, so I decided Shapers of Nature was good enough to just try to force Merfolk.  I didn't see anything to tell me I was wrong, and 3 Shaper Apprentices in the next 4 picks said I was right.  I cut blue hard in the first pack, with only a sideboard card in green.

Second pack Dreamcaller Siren is a very strong rare in Pirates and just a good rare in Merfolk.  So I was happy to find a couple copies of Storm Fleet Spy (another pirate) that I was happy to play with Merfolk.  Meanwhile, Tishana's Wayfinder (x2) was the first really good green card for my deck that I was willing to draft over blue cards.  The late Chart a Course was a pretty good signal that everyone else except maybe one other drafter in my pod had given up on blue -- it was the second best blue card from my pack that had Dreamcaller Siren and probably one of the top 5 cards in that pack overall.

Pack 3 gave me Sorcerous Spyglass at rare and nothing applicable at uncommon, so I took a strong 2-drop common in Deeproot Warrior.  Siren Lookout gave me a 4th pirate to go with Dreamcaller Siren.  Then I started seeing strong Merfolk build-around cards toward the end of the first pass, which was a clear indication that no one else at the table wanted blue merfolk at all.  Deeproot Waters in particular was a big find, because other than Shapers of Nature I didn't have many cards that build value over a longer game.  Favorable Winds was also a good find because I had a ton of fliers and needed more ways to make them threatening.  Dive Down (target creature gets +0/+3 and hexproof until end of turn) was a card I had passed several times but was happy to sneak a late copy of since I didn't find any River Heralds' Boon to interact with combat or removal.

Here is the deck I played all night:

One thing you'll notice right away is no Kumena's Speaker or Deeproot Champion.  Since I was so heavy in blue, I decided to treat green almost like a splash color, with 10 islands and only 6 forests.  This meant that cards that want a turn 1 or turn 2 forest were fairly risky, even though both the Speaker and the Champion are good aggressive cards.

This deck's plan is to go 2-drop, 3-drop, double 2-drop, then play something like Watertrap Weaver (taps down and freezes an opposing creature) once the board is set.  For example, here are two of the common paths through turns 2 - 4.  If my 3-drop is Tishana's Wayfinder, I can attack with flying on turn 3.  If my 3-drop is Storm Fleet Spy, I get to draw a card and then turn on flying the next turn.  No one was playing to block early, so I was able to get raid triggers at will.  Since I had so much redundancy, these starts happened often (subbing in River Sneak as the 2-drop if I was lucky).

Opt was my only 1-drop, and when I got it in my opening hand it made for very smooth starts.  Depths of Desire was the closest I had to a removal spell (I was so all-in on merfolk that I took Shaper's Apprentice for my second overall pick over a Savage Stomp, a pretty good green removal spell).  Emergent Growth looks like a card I could use to beat down with fliers/River Sneak or win a race against a tapped out opponent, but in practice it was an expensive Diabolic Edict -- they block with their worst thing.  That isn't horrible, but it wasn't as good as I had hoped.

Here is the sideboard:

I was expecting Slice in Twain to be a good sideboard card, but I never actually used it because I didn't run into much I needed to destroy with it.  In practice all I brought in was the Deeproot Champion in matches where I needed to be aggressive and Cancel/Spell Pierce in matches where I saw a card I couldn't beat other ways or thought I could surprise an opponent.

Since I had such a low curve, my sideboard plan on the draw was to take out an island and add more action (usually either Deeproot Champion or Cancel).

So how did this deck do?

Round 1 vs. C.

C almost always wins against me.  He was playing white-red Huatli Junk.  First game we whittled each other down, and he won a tight finish.  Then I rattled off two straight wins.  Game 2 he didn't get his plains, and game 3 I mulliganed correctly (2 forests and no islands -- a hand I have sometimes kept with bad results) and had a super smooth curve while his was not so good.  Win, 2-1.

Round 2 vs. R.

R was extremely polite and talked through every move thoroughly, which was great for communication but also made for slower play.  His deck was white-green Dinosaurs, and I could tell from some of the things he said and did that he wasn't a top level player.  In the first game, he beat me down with a 3/3 flier while I slowly set up my defenses and took my hits.  The life totals were 30-4 before I began my comeback.  With Shapers of Nature, Deeproot Waters, and eventually 8+ lands for multiple activations per turn of the Shapers, I grew a Shaper Apprentice to 8/7 and a Wind Strider to 5/5 and took the game.  Second game played like a less dramatic version of the first -- he gained some life and we built our boards, then I got him with a few tricks and more evasive creatures.  Good thing too, because we were close to time.  Win, 2-0.

Round 3 vs. E.

E is a pretty good player who was in black-red Pirates.  He had a Kitesail Freebooter that annoyed me several times, and a Skullduggery or two that frustrated my 2/1s to no end, but I had the better cards or made the right moves, and I finished with a pretty easy 2 wins.  In the second game he mulliganed down to 5 on the play, and he just ran out of cards too fast.  Win, 2-0.

Round 4 vs. A.

I play A all the time in these drafts, and he is very good.  This time he had a black-green aggressive deck that was trying to play Blight Keepers (1/1 flier) and put Mark of the Vampire (+2/+2 lifelink) on them.  In game 1 on the play, I had River Sneak on turn 2 and just rushed him into oblivion.  In game 2 on the draw, we played a more even race, but I was holding a timely Depths of Desire to bounce his biggest attacker, taking me to 1 life for a win on the backswing.  He did play an unexpected Boneyard Parley but only got a Watertrap Weaver out of his 7-mana investment.  Win, 2-0.

Round 5 vs. S.

We were the only 4-0 players, so we took an intentional draw.

I was the first seed heading into Top 8, so I got paired against the 8th seed T.  I would have been happy just splitting the Top 8, but someone wanted to play so play we did.  Cool thing about being a high seed in the Top 8 is the higher seeded player chooses who goes first, so I was on the play in game 1.

Round 6 vs. T.

His deck was either mono-red or very close to it.  In the first game I had a great draw and his draw did not match up well, so I took the game easily.  Then I started running into trouble.  Game 2 on the draw I had a good hand but his stuff all had haste (Nest Robber on 2, Captain Lannery Storm on 3, and Charging Monstrosaur on 5) and he had good tricks like Sure Strike to win combats when I blocked.  Game 3 I stayed at 15 lands on the play and just prayed I would get a better draw than him.  My draw was a little slow but I kept rather than going to a non-functional hand because I knew Deeproot Waters had a chance to help stabilize me if I fell behind.  He had the strong curve again, and I had to change gears out of race mode after he played Monstrosaur to do 11 damage rather than the 5-7 I expected.  I had a plan to stay alive the next two turns at 4 life, and I cast Dreamcaller Siren to tap his big stuff before combat on his next attack.  Then he just cast an Unfriendly Fire on me to end it.  Loss, 2-1.

So even though I ended up with the 5th-8th place prize (3 packs), I felt really good about this deck and my gameplay.  My record for the night was 4-1-1 in matches and 9-3 in games, surely my best result ever in a draft.  In the last round, I played an opponent whose best draws matched up well against my deck, and I honestly don't know how I could have played differently and won.  If I was on the draw game 3, I might have sideboarded into all-defense as much as possible and tried to drag the game out with a flier to do damage, but on the play I just wanted to race it out since I had been successful in the first game.

So what was the draft worth?

I drafted 3 rares, which is as expected, and 12 uncommons, which is slightly above the 9 expected from 3 packs.  Blue has some money cards below rare in Ixalan, including Opt and Chart a Course both in the 50 cent to $1 range.  Spell Swindle is also $1, mostly for its use in goofy UB artifact decks trying to win with Marionette Master or Revel in Riches.  It might also be popular in Commander.  It also has amazing art, as the character is turning the countered spell into literal gold coins that are raining down on her and her monkey/goblin friend.  So my draft was worth maybe $4 or so.

But wait, there's more!  Between rounds, some high rollers were opening packs of Iconic Masters and Modern Masters 2017, and one of them was actually putting his bulk cards in the trash can.  I wasn't too proud to look through them, and I took home some of the more interesting ones.  See below.  Inquisition of Kozilek was the big prize; it's a card I actively want for Modern, and it runs close to $3.  Azorius Signet is about $0.80 due to few printings.  Other than that, I took some other cards that are possibly useful for Modern or Commander or Cube or giving to friends.  And I left the rest of the trash on the table for new players to grab.

Oh, and of course I also had the 3 prize packs.  Good times!  Ixalan may be unpopular, but it's a format where I can win, and I won't argue with that.