Monday, June 30, 2008

SSS 03 - Corrupted Draft

Had some issues for the games for this draft, so you just get to see the draft itself. For the record, I lost in the second round after defeating an amazing W/R deck that featured Jaws, Swan, Knollspine Invocation, and a good gun package with at least one PoF and several quality untappers. Much better than I should hope for with this misdirected pile.

(The Google video is taking a while to process, but here is the download link in the meantime...)


Download this video in all its full screen glory from FileFront!


P1P1 - Blight or Swan? I go with Blight simply because it seems to win out on pure power, but a strong case could be made for the Swans (which somehow table around to my 1st round opponent - unless there was another in the draft). Also Blue and White are far better colors in this format than Black.

P1P2 - A very clear choice, but also one of the main reasons this deck didn't come together. Why? Well I think I try to maximize my first two picks by going mono-black. This works for Jaws of Stone because adding 2-3 more damage to a Jaws can net you 1-2 more removed creatures, whereas a bigger Corrupt only gets you a bit more life unless you aim it at their dome, and even then the extra oomph doesn't give you enough reward for the sacrifice. Also mono-red is a significantly better deck to try to draft than mono-black, as the card quality and synergies are far superior. In the end my picks end up corrupted by attempts to draft a mono-black deck.

P1P3 - A bit of a weak pick, but it doesn't commit me to anything and it helps me cast the two pricey cards I already have in my pile.

P1P4 - Still not sure what to take here. My final pick Kindler is pretty underwhelming, and the Aethertow seems like it would be an OK selection (I'm inexperienced with U/B). I think I should of thought about B/G at this point with the Cohort. I haven't drafted a cross color deck yet, but in hind sight I should have considered going this route here.

P1P6 - I time out here because I know that the Rage Reflection is a potential bomb, but my curve is already so high I do think that I can take an expensive non-creature, non-black spell and I settle for the Duo (the worst of the cycle even) as time runs out.

P1P7 - Arsonist was the pick, but I incorrectly tried to stay mono.

P1P9 - I like the red Intimidator a lot, and if I stayed the course and drafted more red this would of probably been a good pick.

P1P10 - Same as the last pick.

P1P12 - Headache gives me a good sideboard option if I need it.

P1P13 - Cohort all the way.. the Mono-black deck isn't coming together and my best option now is to draft for R/B with a red focus and use the two first picks as late game support. This is just a bad bad pick.

P2P1 - The Duo fits perfectly into the deck I should be trying to draft. I take it because there are few other options, but if I was in the right state of mind I would of snatched it up with no hesitation.

P2P5 - Should of been a tougher call between the Scuzzback and the Faerie, but I think given the last two cards black heavy picks that the Faerie is the correct card.

P2P6 - Given the last few picks were heavy black, the Mentor is a good selection, but I should of given more thought to the Tattgermung Duo as it was probably the better pick.

P2P8 - Cohort with the red cards I've passed up already would of focused my deck considerably. The maniac was a distant second in the correct deck.

P3P1 - Yep, at this point I mono-blacked myself out of a much better card than I was going mono-black for in the first place. I should of taken the Valleymaker as a couple of activations from this guy is all you need to win, and despite my mispicks I still had enough red cards to give him enough Mountains to work with.

P3P3 - Sure wish I had taken some of those nice and cheap red Cohorts...

So.. as bad as I did drafting the deck... I did a much worse job in building it. Unfortunatly I had the card counts to make the black heavy deck happen, but in retrospect I didn't have enough reason to make it happen. I even had the Flask to power out a full strength Corrupt if I needed it.

The Fists, Duos, and Kindler was not what this deck wanted - I brought in the Tattermunge Duo, Arsonists, and Skuzzback in every sideboarded game, and upped the Mountain count.

Long story short - Don't fall in love with a plan when the plan makes no sense and isn't working out.

3 comments:

Barmonk said...

The signal was definitely there for you to switch into a red aggro deck very early in the draft with tons of the best low cost aggro creatures going around real late in Pack 1 and the Furystoke Giant in the 3rd pack would have just been some delicious icing on the cake.

Ed Kompik said...

I think you let your one Corrupt shape your draft WAY too much. You were passing up lots of juicy red cards while muttering about trying to stay mono-black, which was kind of uncalled for since in a BR deck a Flask can fix your Corrupt and even when you don't draw the flask you're still likely to be able to use Corrupt to kill a mid-sized critter and gain some life. Then again, you probably won't even see Corrupt for half your games, so why would you want to shackle yourself with a pile of meh black cards? In short, I think you got greedy with Corrupt and couldn't see past that for the rest of the draft. (Personally, if I was able to pick up a *second* Corrupt by the time I'm going thru the second booster, that's when I think about going all-in with mono-black.)

AAZipzop2 said...

These comments are really just for your first pack, since its the only one you have no control over.

Please feel free to visit us at limitedunderstandingmodo.blogspot.com I post there as AAZipzop2, now we don't have videos, but plenty of strong deck lists and strat.

Here is my feedback:

Pack1

P1P4 - Sootstoke kindler is definitely not the choice, Aethertow is a completely splahable card that timewalks your opponent at worse, and at best lets you alpha strike, you might even conspire it off UB cards you cast for B.

P1P8 - Rustrazor butcher this guy basically reads '2/2 creatures cannot attack' with a power of fire on it, it now reads '3/3 creatures cannot attack'

6th last Bloodmark Mentor is nuts, 6th last, its completely nuts.
3rd last Mudbrawler Cohort over rite of consumption, you will see lots of these. Red is open. whir the klaxons. No one else is taking red (loud and clear)

Pack 2

Pick 1 Bloodmark mentor. Makes red completely nuts. Gloomlance is slow, you already have corrupt, and if you draw a 5 caster you better hopes its blight.

Pick 5 Scuzzback Marauders this late is nuts, completely playable for only the low low colour cost of R.

Pick 6 - Tattermunge Maniac is nuts in limited, again like some other cards, it basically has printed 'deal 6 damage to opponent if dropped on first turn.' Cohort would have been okay choice too.

Loch will table, and if you fear colour screw, just take mudbrawler, they are also insane.

Pick 7 - wild swing, it's removal, random, but removal. Sideboard.

Pick 8 -
Overall I definitely have to agree

The rest: Cinderbones is a good wall, Cinderhaze is insane, Bloodmark mentor tabled, thats a big sign, and there are 3 cards that any self serving red player would want in his deck or sideboard.. big signals imo. Dieflyn goes from 'that sucks' to i think i'll play it with my 2 bloodmarks'

Pack 3

Pick 1: Valleymaker, burn on a stick, you never turn it down, and you've obviously not got enough strong playable black cards and some really strong red cards, play mountains, burn his creatures.. .

Pick 2: Flask, wisps will table, this is 2nd pick of pack 3.

Pick 3: Furystoke, I think red is open.

Pick 4:

Overall I completely agree with the above commenters about falling in love with a card from the first few picks.

I note you say 'the red is starting to flow better this last pack'

It actually started flowing from pack 1!

A note about ember gale - it's a thoughtweft gambit for 4 with a situational 1 dmg burn.

Also I notice you don't sort by mana cost, are you creating the deck before deckbuilding?

I love watching your drafts, to see what other people are thinking and doing in my drafts!

Cheers

AAZipzop2