FNM Ravnica Allegiance Draft 2019-02-22

First draft in a while, and first draft of Ravnica Allegiance.  Everyone else is about 4 weeks in, so despite being familiar with the cards, I was at a bit of a disadvantage in terms of knowing the play patterns.  I did a few practice drafts on Draftsim and read some good draft articles, so at least I was ready to build a deck.

Before the draft, I played 2 games of Standard with my life swap WB control deck against a red burn player and lost both.  It was fitting because I beat him in 2 games at the last Standard Showdown I attended.

There were 21 people drafting (including a store guy acting as a placeholder sitting next to me), so we had 3 tables of 7, and we played 4 rounds and cut to top 8.  I forgot to lay out my draft sequence for a photo, so I'll go a little more fluid on description.

I knew going in that Orzhov (white-black) is pretty good in this format, and my pack was thick with WB cards.  The rare was Revival // Revenge, which is a very good card, but I felt like Mortify was a more valuable effect.  In the second pack I took the Syndicate Guildmage, and I think there was one in the third pack also, but I took something else instead.  Fourth pack had a Skewer the Critics, which is definitely surprising that late, and I almost took it, but I stuck with my colors instead.  My neighbor on the left (the store guy) ended up drafting black-red, so I'm glad I didn't end up fighting over red cards with him.  Green was clearly open later in the pack, but I felt pretty good about where I was headed.

Pack 2 rare was the unplayable Smothering Tithe, and I'm pretty sure I took Grotesque Demise or something like it.  There were some really strong red-green cards toward the end of this pack and I considered changing, but I was sure it was too late.

I think my Pack 3 rare was Verity Circle or another blue or blue-green card, because it was a pretty easy pass.  I stuck with Orzhov and got some good cards out of this last pack, including Imperious Oligarch and possibly both my Grasping Thrulls (possible winner for creepy art of the set).

Here is the deck I built:

The last cuts were tough.  I almost cut Screaming Shield, but I had just read an article touting it as underrated, and I'm glad I stuck with it because it was very good in this deck.  I had a ton of cheap deathtouch creatures and removal, but very little card advantage, so I felt good about being on the draw in general with this deck.  In sideboarded games I was usually on the draw and frequently went down to 16 lands.

Here are my sideboard cards:

I was very heavy on removal spells, so I ended up cutting a few of the more situational ones and only bringing them in for good matchups.  The second Undercity Scavenger seemed like more of a sideboard card for when I really needed a 5/5, but when I brought it in, it was great.  And Expose to Daylight was good backup for Mortify, which I would usually prefer to cast on a creature.  There are some wicked enchantments in this set though, and Expose was very useful to have access to.

Round 1 vs. Orzhov
This was the mirror match, and he had a lot of the same cards as me.  I goofed right from the beginning and forgot to play Screaming Shield on turn 1, which would have allowed me to equip it on turn 3 and make better blocks early on.  I ended up winning this game despite various mistakes and fighting an uphill battle against Ill-Gotten Inheritance most of the game.  Second game the Inheritance got me, and third game Angelic Exaltation was monstrous as I couldn't keep him below 3-4 creatures.  Loss, 1-2.

I finished Game 3 by making this mistake for the first of two times:

"Arrester's Zeal on your attacker."  Those two cards look exactly the same, right?  I had one of each in my main deck and brought the additional Summary Judgment in frequently, and I could not distinguish them from each other.  I also tried to cast Summary Judgment on an untapped creature in a later round, so it was mistakes all over the place with these cards.  The other mistake I made at least once was attacking into a creature I had put Sky Tether on because I forgot that it can still block.  So many mistakes!

Round 2 vs. Azorius (white-blue) Durdle.
This was a really weird deck to me.  It was playing a kind of control that seemed to be more about card draw and counterspells than removal.  In Game 1 he had a Sphinx of Foresight and I accidentally ran my Plague Wight right into it because I had played the wrong mana color for Final Payment.  He ended up with way more cards than me and I just didn't stand a chance, plus he was one of those super-serious fast-playing guys who you can tell play in higher level events, so I conceded the game and went to sideboard to regroup.  This was the match I needed to bring in my crappy aggro creatures and play first, so in came Haazda Officer and friends.  And in playing the aggro, I was able to bust through his lack of creatures and curve into two wins.  In the last game I had a moment of grand happiness when I tried to declare attackers and he backed me up pre-combat to cast Lawmage's Binding on my 5/5 Scavenger.  I let him resolve it, then I cast Expose to Daylight to destroy it and attack anyway.  I was so excited that I forgot to scry.  Win, 2-1.

Round 3 vs. 3-color or 4-color Gates.
This deck had at least white, blue, and green in it and maybe another color.  It was packed full of rares.  Game 1 my removal matched up with his threats and I got the win.  Game 2 he only drew 3 lands and none of them white, and he died to a bunch of small creatures while holding a hand of stuff he couldn't cast.  Win, 2-0.

Round 4 vs. ???
At 2-1 my opponent and I took the plunge and decided to try to draw into top 8.  It wasn't a 100% sure thing, but it was pretty good odds.

Bonus game of Commander!
I got in on a 4-person Commander game in the downtime, and played my white lifegain deck.  One guy was doing all sorts of artifact stuff with Tezzeret the Seeker, and had a bunch of artifact mana and a Winter Orb making everyone else's lives hell while he searched his deck and cast whatever he wanted every turn.  He was probably a turn away from winning when I got Felidar Sovereign out, and no one had any way to get rid of it or do me 5 damage to get me below 40.  Cheap win!

Back to the tournament!

For the top 8, I was probably one of the last couple seeds.  I got paired against a powerful red-green deck that was 3-0.  And it was glorious!  I know him to be an aggressive player and I was able to use that to my advantage.  All my little deathtouch roadblocks and instant speed kill magic were perfect against his big hasty monsters.  He got me down to 5 life in both games with the potential to kill me immediately with a topdeck, but I managed to work through it.  For added bonus, in the final game, I used the Screaming Shield to get the mill win while just sitting back with a motley group of blockers.  Win, 2-0.

Top 4 split the prize pool, so I got a promo Light Up the Stage and $21 store credit.

So this deck just did better and better the more I played, and once I got used to it, I was making a lot fewer mistakes.  My 3-1 match record and 7-3 game record were excellent, and this was one of my better FNM drafts all time despite feeling pretty grim after I lost the first game against the Azorius player.

Here are the other cards I drafted and didn't play, plus the promo:

This may be the first time ever that I drafted no rares at all.  The promo is about $6 (last I checked) and Wilderness Reclamation and Persistent Petitioners are about $1 each (I money drafted them over bad cards in my colors late in packs).  So my drafted cards were nearly worthless, but winning prizes made up for it entirely.

Next time I hope to make far fewer mistakes, but I can't really hope for better results.  Thanks for reading!

Standard Showdown 2019-02-10 with Upgraded Axis of Mortality Combo

So I made some upgrades to my Axis of Mortality / Lich's Mastery combo deck and took it out for another try.

First, the pack I opened was pretty good.  We get such low turnout for SS at my store that they just give away a prize pack for showing up.  If there are enough people to play, you also pay $5 entry, and the prizes for winning are store credit.

Sulfur Falls is about $9 and Gilded Lotus goes for about $2.50.  The foil price for Gaea's Blessing is under 50 cents, which is fine because this one came out of the pack a bit nicked at the top.  The prices on the Ravnica Weekend foil lands are still in flux as the vendors catch up to the fact that they're available in SS packs, which makes them a lot less rare than they were before.

So the biggest changes I made to the Standard deck were:

• I added 3 copies of Kaya's Wrath and 1 copy of Cleansing Nova (1 Kaya's Wrath is in sideboard at the moment).  This was a big upgrade against aggressive decks.  They replaced Font of Agonies, which is cute with my life-payment combo but just didn't feel better than Murder in most games, and I'd rather have a Mortify or a Wrath than a Murder.
• I changed the sideboard from an aggressive vampire transformation to a more traditional board with specific answer cards.  Now for aggressive decks I had the extra Kaya's Wrath and Cast Down, and for control decks I had 2 Sorcerous Spyglass, 4 Duress, and Zetalpa, who can be very hard for unsuspecting opponents to deal with.

How did it go?  On to the gameplay!

Round 1 was against a guy I played last week, but he had an entirely different deck -- Izzet Drakes (blue-red).  Game 1 was a bit of a nailbiter as I tried to stay alive long enough to get my combo down, but then I turned the Axis and swapped his 20 life for my 1, drawing 19 cards off the lifegain with Lich's Mastery, and attacked for the win.  Game 2 I couldn't keep his Drakes in check, and he got the win.  Game 3 went to turns, and we drew a match that was not clearly in anyone's favor.  Draw, 1-1-1.

Round 2 was against another opponent from last week, playing the same Jeskai Control deck as before.  I lifeswapped him down to 4 in Game 1 but didn't have any way to close it out, and he eventually had two 8-power Drakes attacking.  My sideboard worked well against him in the second game, with Spyglass shutting off Teferi for most of the game.  I also got Zetalpa into play, but I knew he had Settle the Wreckage in hand and couldn't attack at all, so Zetalpa just served as a wall against Lyra and Drakes for about 10 turns.  The biggest problem was I couldn't resolve any important spells, as I didn't get off to a fast enough start, and once we both had 12+ lands he could just cast his card draw spells and counterspells at will.  He eventually got Ixalan's Binding on my Spyglass, tucked away Zetalpa with Teferi's -3 ability, and attacked with a 19-power drake.  Loss, 0-2.

Round 3 was against Red Burn.  This plays like a typical aggro - control matchup: if I can survive to my 6th land drop, I will probably win.  It was kind of nice playing a straightforward match after the brain-numbing decisions of the first two matches.  First game he got me down to 8 through two Revitalizes and had Experimental Frenzy coming down after I cast my Axis of Mortality, but he had a rough Light Up the Stage for 2 lands and couldn't get me below 5 before I spun the Axis and then attacked for the win with Doom Whisperer.  In the second game he got me to about 4 before I flashed in Angel of Grace on his attacker and followed up with Lich's Mastery, but I had enough cards to exile that I was able to fade his damage (down to -5 life) until I got the Axis half of the combo.  Win, 2-0.

My 1-1-1 match record was good for 5th place out of 7 (my Round 1 opponent beat me on tiebreakers even though his only win was a bye), but I felt like I learned more about the deck again.

Some notes and thoughts:

• Match 3 opponent said "I lost to a brew!!" in anguish, but the truth is this deck has evolved more into a black-white control deck with a combo finish.  And the combo cards are just plain good individually in a lot of matchups, which is important because they aren't very redundant, meaning I'm not going to assemble the combo every game.
• That said, Adanto Vanguard is pretty bad.  But I think it's a necessary evil in Game 1 as a way to make sure I can lose life if the opponent isn't hitting my life total.  Then I think they should be the first card I thin or cut for sideboard cards in Game 2.
• I'm just waiting for the game where Lich's Mastery gets punished by something like Cleansing Nova or Dispersal (which, ironically, are both cards I play in this deck).  I haven't run into anyone who can cast the Dispersal half of Discovery // Dispersal yet, even though it gets played a lot just for Discovery.  I can cast it off treasures or the 1x Glacial Fortress, although the situation rarely comes up.
• The reason I played with 2 Dusk Legion Zealots and 2 Revitalizes is that I only owned 2 Zealots.  I just got my other two in the mail.  It was a good experiment though, and I'm not really sure which is better in this deck.  I like having a lot of cantrips to support my relatively low land count and help find the combo pieces.  Both are pretty good against aggressive decks.  Both are just a cantrip against control.  Revitalize is good when Lich's Mastery is out, but sometimes the 1 life loss from the Zealot is actually useful too.  Which is better?  Should I have more of both?
• Playing against hardcore control with counterspells, like the Jeskai deck, is really hard, and I am glad to be getting practice with it.  I really want to get a Twilight Prophet for that specific kind of matchup as a different way to win that also just draws extra cards and combos with Lich's Mastery.  I'm also thinking I need to add my second Arguel's Blood Fast, maybe in sideboard.
• Treasure Map is just amazing and I won't stop playing it until it rotates, but it's one of my "slow spots" in gameplay.  I am working on playing faster with this deck, and my speed with Treasure Map and the surveil cards is getting better.  Going to turns is not great.
• I'd like more Godless Shrines, but frankly the mana has been just fine in this deck.  I rarely have a draw where there is a significant difference between Forsaken Sanctuary and Godless Shrine.

Thanks for reading!  What do you think, Dusk Legion Zealot or Revitalize?

Standard Showdown 2019-02-03 with Axis Combo

I went for my first Standard Showdown of the new season to try out my Axis of Mortality - Lich's Mastery deck.  It was secretly also a Font of Agonies deck.  Here is the list:

https://www.mtgvault.com/nathangw/decks/standard-wb-life-swap-combo/

First round I was matched up Against a Golgari deck that looked a lot like last season's Golgari -- Wildgrowth Walkers, Jadelight Rangers, Vivien Reid, and Carnage Tyrant.  In the first game, I assembled the full combo but he had a pretty big board.  He should have won by attacking with everything, which I think would have exactly exiled all my cards except Lich's Mastery, leaving me without Axis to swap life totals.  He made a mental mistake and only did a partial attack instead, and lost.  The next two games were decided by Carnage Tyrants that I couldn't deal with effectively.  My only real answer is blocking them with Doom Whisperer.  Loss, 1-2

Second round was against a guy who essentially brought a bunch of draft deck cards.  I'm not sure why that was what he had, but his deck was Boros Aggro made of mostly commons and uncommons.  I lost the first game to a good aggressive curve.  Second game I won because he couldn't beat a Doom Whisperer.  Game 3 I got the full combo out, and he laughed with joy and ran off to tell his friend about the combo.  Win, 2-1

Third round was against Jeskai Control, again looking like a deck from last season.  In the first game I maneuvered through his Teferi and card draw and used Doom Whisperer to stack the top of my deck so that I would have access to Axis two turns in a row if he tucked it with Teferi, which he did.  I felt good about that win.  Game 2 I shifted into the aggro sideboard and surprised him with a fast hand including 2 Legion Lieutenants.  He was dead to an all-out attack on turn 4, but did he keep Settle the Wreckage in his deck after sideboard, and did he draw it?  It turned out he did, and I lost all my creatures and eventually the game.  Game 3 I kept the aggro deck because we were short on time, and I had a much worse draw.  We went to turns but he was going to win with Lyra and a Crackling Drake, so I conceded.  Loss, 1-2.

All in all, not bad but not super.  About what I expected though.  I didn't feel like Font of Agonies was very good, even with lots of ways to add counters.  Lots of games it ends up as Murder with the casting cost spread over two turns.  TCGPlayer had a 10% sale on Monday, so I pulled the trigger on 2 Kaya's Wrath and some other potential cards for the deck.  I'm leaning into the control side of the deck, and here is what my next list looks like right now:

https://www.mtgvault.com/nathangw/decks/standard-wb-life-swap-combo-2-2/

Oh, and it wouldn't be Standard Showdown without a prize pack:

This time they're recycling some promo guild-themed basic lands instead of having a unique set, but these still look good and are fun promos.  TCGPlayer has the Ravnica Weekend version of this Forest at about $12, but that can't be a realistic price if it's in SS packs now.  The same art appears in the Guilds of Ravnica Guild Kits, also as a foil but with a different collector number, and it's around 75 cents.  Awaken the Erstwhile is a neat card but not a great foil, but I like the other two rares pretty well.

While I'm showing off, check out the cool dice bag my wife crocheted me for Christmas!

Thanks for reading!