Monday, December 8, 2014

KTK Sealed - two pools from a local tournament 2 of 2

This is the second of two sealed pools I looked at this weekend. My friend Eugene opened the packs and we built the deck to practice against my deck from the tournament.





You can download the Magic Online .dek file here.

The first things to notice are the large quantity of gold cards and the very forgiving mana. At first glance, it feels like you can do anything you want with this pool, which is a nice luxury to have.

Let's look at the removal next.

Kill Shot, Suspension Field, Bring Low, Sultai Charm, Master the Way, and Jeskai Charm (sort of). There's also a pair of Singing Bell Strikes, if you count that (although I'd rather not), and a Ride Down, which isn't necessarily that good in a deck that isn't aggressive. Minus the Sultai charm, the removal all points to a Jeskai-based deck. However, the white and red creatures mostly suck. The best creatures are green (THREE! Woolly Loxodons) and Temur (two Snowhorn Riders and Surrak).

Since our mana conveniently lets us easily accommodate every color except black, this points to a U/G based deck that plays white for some extra removal, and red for some good creatures, adn also some extra removal.

Here's the deck we ended up with:



The last question Gene and I were trying to answer was, should we play these 2 black cards or not? It's pretty easy to fit 3 black sources in (one of which is Polluted Delta, which helps fuel Treasure Cruise as well), and Sultai Charm is fine removal while Armament Corps is a secret bomb (I have found it very, very difficult to win in games that my opponent casts it).

I think it's close. You lose out on a bit of power by not including these 2 cards I think. You'd be replacing them with things like Highland Game and Sagu Archer. Those are fine, playable cards, but not nearly as strong. We decided to get greedy and go for it - our mana base is super nice already and the only inconvenient adjustment to make by including the black cards is adding a single Swamp (and maybe cutting the Delta for an Island, if you're not into that kinda thing).

Some other questionables are Jeering Instigator and Flying Crane Technique.

These cards are both very strong, but perhaps don't fit into this deck. It's certainly not an aggressive deck, which is where these cards are best utilized. Jeering Instigator in particular loses a lot of value when you can't reliably cast it on turn 2 (although you aren't too far off from that here). As far as Flying Crane Technique goes, there's not that much prowess, and with a slow, midrange-y type deck like this one you aren't likely to have more than 2 creatures on the board at any given time.

The argument against cutting them is the same one as for the black cards - you are replacing them with way less powerful cards like Highland Game and Sagu Archer. I can see wanting Highland Game if the opponent has a rush deck, but those are not as common in sealed as they are in draft.

Ultimately I like the deck better with them - Jeering Instigator can still always just be a morph, and following a Loxodon unmorphing with Flying Crane Technique is a lot of damage out of nowhere and can catch a lot of people off guard.

Some other notes about card choices:

Bitter Revelation - I get yelled at a lot by Tommy Ashton and Yoel Izsak for not including this in my decks. In general, they're right about it - it's a really strong card draw/selection card. At the beginning of this format, I was scared to include it because I was scared of the rush/tempo decks, and I felt like casting this on turn 4 instead of improving your board was basically asking to get aggro-ed out. The reality is that most (good) decks end up midrange, and getting to draw your best 2 cards from the the top 4 and/or clearing out some crap from the top of your deck is really strong. It's also not really a 4 drop (unlike Scout the Borders) - it's best cast in the midgame on a stable board.

In this deck, on the other hand, I didn't include it just because it feels weird to splash it off so few sources. I can definitely see adding it over Flying Crane Technique if you're skeptical about that card. I usually want my decks in this format to have a decent amount of card draw.

Death Frenzy - Splash issues aside, this card is not as effective as it might seem since this format always ends up being so toughness heavy. I find it more effective out of the sideboard.

Ivorytusk Fortress - Even though this card gots da butt, it's just a pretty hard to cast 5/7 in this deck that lets you occasionally get a free pump in on Tuskguard Captain. It's also more stress on your mana base. It's definitely powerful, but it's one of PV's "inconsistent 9" vs. "consistent 8" type things - you aren't losing that much power from your deck by not including it.

Herald of Anafenza - This deck can't produce a draw that can cast this card on turn 1. Maybe that's irrelevant since you can't outlast it until turn 3 anyway, but it still didn't feel right to splash for just this card. That said, I can definitely see playing this over Jeering Instigator. Maybe that is better.

The rest of the cards are either not very powerful, or best suited to aggressive decks, or both.

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