Draft Table #1: Get There

I’m usually really bad at drafting. The reason is that there are about five important guidelines and I always forget at least one. Creatures are good, disruption is VERY good, have a smoothish mana-curve, stick with a few colors, and be able to finish the game. On top of this, I usually find it difficult not to money draft (even if the money card is bad, like Memoricide). Regardless of my limited success in Limited, I still greatly enjoy the format. It’s interesting, it’s wonky (Sorin’s Vengeance is viable?) and the best players aren’t the ones with the most money. Similarly, everybody is usually pretty social about picks and nobody is super serious about their decks, as they can’t be consistent, so the environment is simply more casual.

With that in mind, I draft about once a week; usually at CoolStuff because it’s a middle ground for me and David. This Tuesday, we went to Coliseum of Comics in Kissimmee to say good-bye to our buddy Orion, who is going off to college this week way up the East Coast (good luck hombre!). Now, CoC is about 45 minutes from my house, so this location is less than convenient for me, but hey, everything is better with friends. I got there about an hour before drafting, introduced myself to the locals and started Magic-ing.

When the draft finally started, we had about 24+ people opening packs and making picks. My first pack was lackluster: Warstorm Surge and some hate Uncommons, so I ended up picking the Chandra’s Outrage. By pick eight of pack one I was playing primarily blue with red and green as possible back-up colors. I snagged a pick-two Mind Control and was PASSED another one later (opened my third one in pack-three), with some Aven Fleetwings and other fliers making up the bulk of my creature base (hey, evasion is good, right?), so I now had to decide on my second color. The early Chandra’s Outrage followed by a Shock had me leaning towards red, but a Cudgel Troll and a pack-three WHEELING Jade Mage nudged me to play green. I hadn’t picked up any Manaliths, so tri-color was out of the question, so I was faced with a real tough decision.

I knew my blue could probably stand by itself, but I had some very strong support cards in two other colors that I thought could complement my deck. I looked at the two colors and considered the functions they covered. Jade Mage is an absolutely incredible card that can both create blockers for you and possibly set up a win if you happen upon an Overrun. As I was not fortunate enough to pick up an Overrun and I figured I would sooner be pouring leftover mana into Azure Mages, this pick was not as strong as it could’ve been. I ended up going red for one reason: Fling. I had two Flings and I believe there is little more satisfying in draft than taking control of a creature (usually via Act of Treason), attacking my opponent with it, and Flinging it at their face for an encore of damage. Coupled with the Mind Controls I had, this seemed like a solid bet (Shock and Outrage helped, though). On a more serious note, burn spells and Fling often help you close out the game if your opponent gains field position (via more creatures or Gideon Jura) or as surprise finishers. With those decisions made, I sleeved up my Ur-fliers and sat down for round one.

 X3

Round one was another UR deck with an emphasis on Bloodthirst. Bloodthirst creatures can really control the board if they have reliable damage. Cards like Tormented Soul, Goblin Fireslinger and Scepter of the Empires make activating Bloodthirst easy and the creatures usually have a secondary ability to make up for their mana-mediocrity (Flying, First Strike, Lifelink, etc.) I won a close first match with a Mind Controlled Gorehorn Minotaurs after a bit of a stand-off of big creatures (Belltower Sphinx doesn’t KILL much, but nobody likes attacking into it). Match 2 was close at first, but he always seemed to have one more Shock than me to get creatures through unblocked. Match three was pretty much a blow-out as I got Mana Leak, Skywinder Drake, Aven Fleetwing and Chasm Drake out in perfect succession for too much flying and disruption to handle. Victory!

Round two was against mono-black with artifact support. David has mentioned this before, but Crown of Empires is pretty freakin’ good. Similarly, Throne is amazing and Scepter doesn’t hurt. Well this guy had them all. I lost match one to a brutal Tormented Soul with Dark Favor (holy 4/2 unblockable, Batman) and some good early game trades. Match two was fairly close but again, one Crown of Empires isn’t great against two Mind Controls. Match three was a bit of a nail-biter where I almost lost to two un-boosted Tormented Souls and a Scepter of the Empires (being on a clock is NOT fun). I made a very frustrated play near the end and was forced to Shock one Soul and Mind Control the other (yes, I spent 5-mana on a 1/1) to slow my clock down by a fair bit. I almost stabilized at the end but a Sengir Vampire with Swiftfoot Boots took me by surprise for the loss.

Round three was UB fliers with direct damage. I won game on the back of his Djinn of Wishes. That’s not to say he made it easy. The first time I Controlled it, he used Æther Adept to break my enchantment; so I Controlled it again. He responded with a SECOND Æther Adept, but I top-decked a third Mind Control and a Fling the next turn for the win. I lost match two to a hilarious Sorin’s Vengeance (which I originally mistook for a Sorin’s Thirst). Match three was also ultra-close wherein an early Sorin’s Vengeance put me a bit behind and Consume Spirit’s “spend only Black mana on X” stipulation kept me from losing on the spot.

2-1; not bad so far. Round 4, my opponent had dropped, so I cruised to 3-1. Round five was Mill America (RWU) where I won 2-0 quickly with two unanswered fliers and a Fling in match one and another 1-2-3 punch of fliers in match two.

I ended up 4-1 and second place (my only loss had been to the first place fellow) at around 1am. Two key take-aways from this experience were: (1) Don’t be the stranger. If it’s your first time drafting somewhere, try not to be reclusive or cliquish and try to integrate yourself into the community. I spoke with a pair of resident drafters there and they said they didn’t like losing to strangers because they came to draft mainly as a social event. Most people don’t mind losing to their friends, but some random guy who shows up, drafts and leaves can be a tad annoying—why was this guy here anyway? (2) Try to help new drafters. I can’t complain too much about my three Mind Controls, but I felt like I could have helped more by high-lighting the importance of removal in draft. I think half of the people at my table were inexperienced drafters, as I was passed two Shocks and two Mind Controls and the gentleman across the table from me had three Chandra’s Outrages and three Doom Blades. Advising new drafters also helps build relations a la take-away (1); people see you’re not afraid to help others at your own expense and will likely be more welcoming.

Drafting is a ton of fun and I recommend it to everyone. If you can’t get to a card shop on the right days, consider getting a pool of 8 friends together and buying a box (~$13/person and you get one extra pack to keep!) Thanks to everyone I played at Coliseum of Comics for a splendid night of Magic and shout-outs to David Jetha and Orion Taylor for joining me.

Interested in more Magic content? Check out every series on the MTG Casual Network Archive!

-Javier Remy


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COMMANDER! Review: Part 5

Sorry this one is extremely late, but unfortunately the writers of these articles weren't able to complete the article. I'll do my best with this impromptu article featuring Kaalia of the Vast and Riku of Two Reflections.

Kaalia of the Vast

So Kaalia of the Vast. I've had the opportunity to play against Kaalia many times and honestly, I have to say I was rather unimpressed. Unfortunately, she didn't have Swiftfoot Boots accompanying her (or a good pilot.. ooh burn on you CJ). A general like this is obviously extremely aggressive, but how can you make it better? Kaalia is missing one very important thing. Haste. Throwing in equipment like Lightning Greaves and Helm of Kaldra make Kaalia really dangerous. Throwing in a Bogardan Hellkite, Angel of Despair, Iona, Shield of Emeria, Rune-Scarred Demon, or Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon tapped an attacking on turn 3-5 is just scratching the surface of Kaalia's potential. You could even throw in some Conspiracy shenanigans or use changelings to make Kaalia into a throwing uncounterable creatures at your face machine. Kaalia runs into a few problems, where she's a 4 mana 2/2, which makes her easily kill-able by burn or a pinging planeswalker, so protecting her becomes an issue. If she starts consistently dying, paying 2 mana after every death becomes taxing and almost unplayable when the game starts hitting turn 15+ and paying 8-10 mana for a 2/2 flyer won't cut it.

My recommendation for a deck like Kaalia would to play a lot of card draw, so hitting your opponent with a hasty Kaalia is always good. Cards like Promise of Power, Greed, Sign in Blood, Ancient Craving, and Wheel of Fortune become very strong in powering the Kaalia engine. Also, being able to tutor your powerful answers becomes very important in getting the right dragons, demons, or angels you want on the board. Stoneforge Mystic and Stonehewer Giant are very good for tutoring up your haste/shroud/indestructible equipment to give your Kaalia resilency so she's not repeatedly killed.

Riku of Two Reflections

On to Riku of Two Reflections. I like this card a lot. He has a lot of versatility, allowing you to copy instants/sorceries and creatures. I mean, what creatures (that are not legendary) would you not want two of? How many turns do you want? I'd like to clarify that with Riku's triggered abilities, you can only make 1 copy, because a single creature card enters the battlefield 1 time. Same with instants/sorceries, those spells are cast only 1 time, so the trigger occurs once. Some people ran into problems with that not too long ago. Moving on, doubling spells like Time Stretch, Tooth and Nail, Act of Treason, and Harmonize just seem to win you the game. I don't see how your opponent's can win from all that carnage. Chandra the Firebrand seems to work pretty well with that strategy. You could also copy non legendary eldrazi creatures, creatures that untap your lands when they enter the battlefield (like Palinchron), or creatures that have strong 'enter the battlefield' triggers in general, like Mulldrifter or Acidic Slime. Copying creatures that make more creatures seems good too, like Emrakul's Hatcher.

Riku runs into the problem of dying to a lot of black spells that target nonblack creatures, like Shriekmaw, Doom Blade, and Bone Shredder, which are fairly common to see in Commander games. Also, since it's a 2/2, it's more easily kill-able, similar to Kalia. Riku needs protection from shroud or hexproof and needs an arsenal of creatures and spells to copy to end the game quickly. To get to the mana you'll need to start copying spells, you'll need a lot of early-mid game mana ramp and have the ability to draw a lot of cards, so you can fuel the late game with a barrage of copied spells. Riku will end games a bit quicker than say Kaalia would, but he needs a lot more of a setup to win.

This ends (our very late) Commander product review. I hope that you like the discussion behind all the generals. If you'd like to get our insight on the 5 enemy-colored generals, let us know in the comments. Until next time Magic players.

Interested in more Magic content? Check out every series on the MTG Casual Network Archive!

-David J.

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Post #15: Commander with No Green

After playing Commander/EDH for a couple months, I've noticed that Commander is a very expensive format to start playing in. With increased popularity, Commander staple cards are becoming very expensive because they are either out of print or not many copies of the card exist in circulation. Since formats like Legacy and Vintage spike the prices of dual lands (from Alpha-Unlimited), keeping them out of reach, and the new Modern now jumping the prices of Shock lands from Ravnica block to $20+, getting the proper fixing for your more than often multicolor deck becomes extremely taxing on your bank account. The lands for your EDH deck establish the foundation for how the deck will perform because the ability to fix your mana before your opponents will give you the edge in every match. The prices of cards like Mind's Eye and Damnation that see play in many EDH decks are also slowly rising. Sadly, cards like Solemn Simulacrum and Life from the Loam, which are very good in EDH, have a price that is dependent on more competitive formats, making them more expensive. I'll give out some of my tips for getting those expensive cards and building solid decks without dishing out your savings and staying on budget. These tips are aimed at almost every other format too. 

Trade. I can't emphasize this point enough, but trading is probably the best way to get any card you're looking for. If you've purchased cards in the past and haven't found a use for them, slip it away into a trade binder or booklet so you can try to 'move' those cards for cards you really want. If you're the type to get really attached to your cards, then this option might not be the best for you. Trading does take a while to get used to and become good at, but you'll get there eventually. I recommend getting a trading binder of some sort and putting your rare cards, uncommons/commons that are worth $0.5+, and foils and organize them in. The more presentable it is, the more enticing it is to a potential trader it becomes. It's almost as if you're trying to a sell a product to potential customers. 

 

How do avoid getting ripped off in trades? There are two different types of trading, trading in terms of value and trading in terms of utility. Personally, I do both. In value trades, both parties assign a value to their cards and in the trade you attempt to make the values of the trade equivalent with each other. You can accomplish this by looking at the local stores sell prices or you can download a pricing app for your smart phone. Either way, the prices should be kept current. Even with these resources, I try to keep someone around who is current on pricing because formats can change over night and it's good to know what cards are hot right now and which ones are not. If you're just starting to trade heavily, I strongly suggest having a (Goblin) Guide with you to help you out with pricing. The other type of trading is for utility. Some cards just have a higher 'overall' value than other cards. This is more aimed at older cards, such as expensive lands and cards that have been out of print for a long time. Older cards tend to trade at a slightly higher value than newer cards. Also, some trades can be conducted by rarity or necessity. I think these trades are fine as long as both parties understand what the cards are going to be used for.

My final tips on trading are to be observant. If you're opening new product, do it with an audience. Sometimes, you'll open cards that you really really don't care about, but someone else will. Make some trades, if they want a card badly enough, they'll make an offer you'll like. Also, try out new card shops, the more you go to, the more card pools you have access to. Hit those shops up when their big events like FNM or when their weekly casual night is. The more players, the larger the card pool. Don't be hesitant to make small trades. Sometimes a small trade can lead to a bigger trade down the road.

Another tip to making your deck unique without spending the big bucks to buy foil versions of all your cards is to look at promos and alternate art versions. Most of the time the extended art versions or foil alt art promos are within a dollar of the original art's value, sometimes less. Unless the card had a low print number, most promos are very affordable. You could also purchase version of a card that are played or slightly played which are usually several dollars cheaper than the original. In trades, you could also argue about a cards condition and usually knock off a few dollars off it's value with someone reasonable. You could also get into the artistry of the game and do your own custom paint or proxy jobs. They are a bit time consuming and require some research, but some of the work I've seen have come out very well.

To stay on budget and find great cards for your casual or commander deck, look at the most recent set. For casual, M12 has a lot of playable cards that are more than affordable, like Master Thief, Elixir of Immortality, the mage cycle, among other rares that are within 1-3 dollars. Since a lot of people are opening M12 product right now, they won't be hard to find as well. Look around after a draft and see what people are opening, you'll usually find someone who packed a playable rare they weren't planning on using. If you're a player who wants to stay current but doesn't have the funds, switching formats in trading is a good idea. You could trade away your EDH/Commander staple cards for Standard or Casual cards and vice versa. Switching formats in trade becomes a really good tool as you find different audiences looking for different things all the time. 

Personally, finding old, expensive cards is really fun, but you have to be very patient. For new cards and casual players, it's much easier to find them because the cards are still in print. There are other ways of getting the cards you want, but the methods are a bit more complicated. You could always check out the Trade Document on the right hand side of the website. =] Until next time Magic players.

-David J.

Post #14: Commander, All Around

After beginning Commander (again) after the Summer Commander product release, I've had a great time playing in many chaotic and enduring battles against friends. Some games have been fierce and friends and I have talked about them for days, while others have been extremely stale. Here are my field notes after playing Commander exclusively for the past 2 months.

Building a deck takes a long ass time. You want options to a lot of different strategies, since there's so many different types of decks out there. You don't want to get blown out by a turn 0 Leyline of the Void or a Day of Judgment, wiping your entire army away. Having the ability to: draw more cards, tutor for cards in your library, recur or Regrowth cards from your graveyard, and remove your opponents' creatures, artifacts, enchantments, and planeswalkers becomes paramount in surviving the onslaught of multiplayer. I've run into difficulty building EDH decks because there are just so many different cards to choose from. For my first EDH/Commander deck, I chose Teneb, the Harvester because he was my first card I ever owned, so I had to pay my Due Respect. I built mine with a heavy graveyard theme, playing a lot of cards like Sun Titan and Sheoldred, Whispering One and playing cards that help me fill my graveyard or sacrifice my creatures, such as Greater Good and Birthing Pod. I've had a lot of fun with the deck and enjoy bringing back an undead army every game. I enjoy playing cards that are versatile, like Beast Within or Diabolic Tutor, which seem to get me out of rough situations time and time again. Playing with a general is really awesome, because I have access to my 6/6 flyer at almost any point in the game, not to mention his incredible recursion trigger. Your general plays a bigger role in the deck than I first expected and not taking advantage of him/her seems foolish. I really like the decks that heavily revolve around their general, even though sometimes those decks don't perform as well as a 'good stuff' deck, I think the flavor behind the decks makes them very unique. There's also something aesthetically pleasing about seeing your general in the general zone on a throne, constantly reminding you why the deck exists.

Switching over from 60 card casual decks to EDH/Commander wasn't very difficult, but the transition changed how I played the deck. In casual games, my goals were to establish a strong board presence and kill players off in the late game. Now, the goal of my games aren't as easily defined. My strategy can range from trying to race and kill my opponent early all the way to destroying my opponent's combo pieces so they don't combo off and kill me. Each game unravels differently, since none of the decks carry an aggressive amount of consistency. The randomness and power level of the cards you're playing are probably the biggest reason the format is so enjoyable for casual players looking to have a good time.

One of the biggest changes coming to the format was drawing cards. I can't emphasize how important drawing more cards becomes. After someone knocks out your hand with a Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur, Mind Shatter, or Identity Crisis, having card draw can keep you going in the game. In Commander/EDH, having cards in your hand is just as important as having lands on the battlefield. When almost every card in your deck can have a devastating impact on the board or help you come even closer to winning the game, having more cards in your hand than your opponents will swing the game in your favor every time.

The hardest thing I've learned is the format is being a good sport. In casual, games go very quickly when everyone is at 20 life and your early and midgame are where most of the action is. If a game becomes too tedious, the game can usually end quickly or get close to finishing. In EDH, games can gruel on and if several people are committed to freezing the board, the game can last forever. Personally, I don't mind long games, but there are some games where players can be doing nothing and turns begin to blend in as land-pass is put on repeat. Although I'm very competitive and I hate losing, sometimes it's better just to call it gg and move on to another match. When your opponent casts Obliterate or Genesis Wave for 30, the game is probably over. There's no problem in going against the waves and try to grind out a win or have a fight for the death attitude, but sometimes that can go a bit too far.

When building EDH/Commander, be prepared for silly things and seeing some outrageous cards you've probably never heard of. I still like playing magic in a competitive way, but I feel EDH/Commander has made me realize how fun it is to be a casual magic player and play cards that are out of scope and underrated. My tips to beginning a Commander deck from scratch is to find a legendary creature that you can relate with well and build a deck that complements that card and your play style.

On an unrelated note, here's some housekeeping. For all the new players that joined MTG Casual Net, I'd like to welcome you to our community. Our group is a great way to network with other players, discuss strategy, spoilers, deck tech, rulings, and any other things you can think of. If you want to participate in trading cards, we have the Trade Document (on the right hand side) that's directly connected to the group. Please understand that most of the players in the group live in Florida, so if you're out of state, you'll have to make appropriate arrangements. Since the Trade Document is available, please refrain from posting trade requests on the Facebook group to avoid spam notifications for other members. Our group is run by a handful of admins who are here to help and have experience in many formats of the game. Here's a quick introduction:

David Jetha: 4 years of Casual magic from Orlando, Fl
Sean Wang: 2 years of Casual magic from Gainesville, Fl
Carlos Cabrera: 2 years of Casual magic from Gainesville, Fl
Nick LoCastro: 2 years of Standard magic from Gainesville, Fl
Michael Hood-Julien: 2.5 years of Casual magic from Miami, Fl
C.J. Hunter: 1 year of Standard magic from Orlando, Fl

If you have any questions, feel free to ask any of the admins, judges, or other members on the group. Until next time, Magic players.

-David J.