Draft Table #5: M13 Sealed Practice 1

Hey guys! It's been a while since I've written an article for the blog. Honestly, this summer has been pretty busy and I haven't been able to crack down on those magic projects that I really wanted to do like fixing/spoofing up The Trade Grounds, working on the Bramble Cup Beta to get a Fall campaign up and running, and even some new Commander decks still stuck in the deck building tool shed. Even with all these setbacks, I still got a chance to pick up Avacyn Restored product and even snuck in a couple M13 drafts. 

Recently, I've been thinking about things I wanted to do with my life, something most of you college kids can understand quite well. I came to the conclusion that one of my bucket list items was to be in the Top 8 of a Pro Tour. It's by no means a conventional aspiration, but it's something I know I would love to do one day. So, I decided, I'm going to qualify and attend Pro Tour Gatecrash. Huge feat, I know. I figure with a lot of hard work, dedication, and a little luck, I can get there. So, the next few months will be dedicated to school (first priority) and qualifying for the Pro Tour (second priority). To get to the Pro Tour, I'll need to either get Top 4 at a Grand Prix or win a Pro Tour Qualifier. Yikes. Since there aren't any GPs in the area this season, we'll aim for winning a PTQ.

My upcoming Magic PTQ schedule looks like this:

9-15 Ocoee, Fl - Phoenix Games
10-13 Tampa, Fl - Armada Games
11-10 Tallahassee, Fl - Gamescape
12-1 Davie, Fl - Coolstuff Games

The PTQ in Sept. will be M13 sealed and the latter 3 PTQs will be Return to Ravnica Sealed. So, let's get the ball rolling as we prepare for M13 sealed.

So after opening 6 fresh packs of M13, here's the list of cards I opened. I uploaded the video of me opening the packs on my YouTube Chanel (link in the Usefeul Links section), it's uploading now, but it should be done when you guys see this article! What 40 card deck would you build with this list?

White:
Attended Knight
2x Aven Squire
Silvercoat Lion
Divine Verdict
Guardians of Akrasa
Battlefield Eagle
2x Erase
Pacifism
Captain's Call
Safe Passage
Show of Valor

Blue:
Omniscience
2x Wind Drake
2x Merfolk of the Pearl Trident
Faerie Invaders
Harbor Serpent
2x Downpour
Sleep
Divination
Kraken Hatchling

Black:
2x Shimian Specter
Duty-Bound Dead
2x Dark Favor
Ravenous Rats
2x Veilborn Ghoul
2x Sign in Blood
Vile Rebirth
Mark of the Vampire
Mind Rot
Tormented Soul
Duress
Essence Drain
Murder

Red:
2x Goblin Arsonist
2x Wall of Fire
Bladetusk Boar
Kindled Fury
Mog Flunkies
Torch Fiend
Rummaging Goblin
Canyon Minotaur
Chandra's Fury
Crimson Muckwader
Smelt
Dragon Hatchling
Volcanic Strength

Green:
2x Fungal Sprouting
Garruk's Packleader
2x Primal Huntbeast
2x Ranger's Path
Centaur's Courser
Deadly Recluse
2x Plummet
Spiked Baloth
Yeva's Forcemage
Primordial Hydra

Artifacts:
Ring of Thune
Ring of Evos Isle
Ring of Valkas
Ring of Xathrid
2x Tormod's Crypt
Kitesail
2x Elixir of Immortality

Lands:
Hellion Crucible
Reliquary Tower

Multicolored:
Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker

The Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker was REALLY tempting to try out some sort of Grixis deck, but I didn't have any Evolving Wilds to make my wet dream come true. The Primordial Hydra was also really tempting, but my Green creatures were nothing but Vanilla X/X dudes. Red has been so good to me before.. cough* TWO Thundermaw Hellkites, but definitely was not in love with me in this sealed pool. The Black cards were decent, but there weren't many of them. The White cards were some of the weaker ones, but still playable. Blue had nothing but drakes. Stupid drakes.

So the deck I ended up building was a B/W aggro deck. Since sealed is a slower format compared to draft, I figured I could out-tempo my opponents before they had a chance to play their bomb rares. White also had two removal spells (Pacifism and Divine Verdict) and Black also had two (Murder and Essence Drain). Green had no Prey Upons and Red only had a copy of Chandra's Fury (weak). Blue did have a pair of Downpour and one copy of Sleep. Unfortunately those cards are only good if you're able to apply a ton of pressure very early (like having more copies of Duty-Bound Dead). Overall, the Blue cards were mediocre, so I stuck with a more reliable source of creatures in White. If you look carefully at the Black, there weren't many creatures, so I had to definitely reach out to a color that did (which in this case was White or Green). The amount of playables in White made it a clear-cut choice as our 1st color and the power of Black's removal spells and early-game pressure made it our splashed color.

The final list looked something like this:

Spells (23):
1x Tormented Soul
1x Duty-Bound Dead
1x Elixir of Immortality
1x Duress
2x Aven Squire
1x Silvercoat Lion
1x Ravenous Rats
1x Dark Favor
1x Ring of Xathrid
1x Ring of Thune
1x Pacifism
1x Attended Knight
1x Guardians of Akrasa
1x Safe Passage
1x Murder
1x Mind Rot
1x Shimian Spectre
1x Mark of the Vampire
1x Captain's Call
1x Divine Verdict
1x Battlefield Eagle
1x Essence Drain

Lands (17):
9x Swamps
8x Plains

In the mana-base, I decided to run 9 Swamps and 8 Plains because I have two spells that require XBB and all my White cards were simply XW. We had both rings in color, so I decided to play both. The Ring of Thune simply because I have a ton of White creatures and the Black one because the 'regenerate' ability is very powerful and it pumps some of the more nonthreatening Black creatures like Simian Spectre. The odd part about this deck are the copies of Duress, Mind Rot, and Elixir of Immortality. Since I don't have as many creatures as I'd like, Duress helps keep opponents' removal spells off of our early-game threats. Mind Rot and Elixir are more unconventional choices, they help give us a little bit of reach in the late game if my opponent lived long enough to cast Planar Cleansing or had a ton of removal spells. Mind Rot being a strong mid-game disruption spell and the Elixir rebuying my removal spells in case I need to kill off a bomb creature.  Elixir is obviously strong in the mirror, so it's a fine choice as a one of.

In the heavy creature matchups, I'll probably side in Dark Favor and Show of Valor as ways to get around stalemates and maybe bring in a copy of Erase if I expect some sort of Voltron play. Against the heavier control/removal decks, I'd probably drop the Black cards and move into a Boros (R/W) deck using this package:

-Drop all the Black cards, Ring of Xathrid, and Elixir (12)
-8 Swamps

+Bladetusk Boar
+Dragon Hatchling
+2x Goblin Arsonist
+Ring of Valkas
+Volcanic Strength
+Torch Fiend
+Crimson Muckwader (keeping that 1 Swamp)
+Rummaging Goblin
+Canyon Minotaur
+Chandra's Fury
+Kitesail
+Hellion Crucible
+7x Mountains

Against the heavier control decks or the ones that are able to stabalize against the B/W tempo deck, I'd probably use this more 'all-in' strategy that commits to killing my opponent very quickly and playing a lot of creatures that are frankly not worth killing (like 2 mana 2/1s and droves of Goblin Arsonists).

I'm always looking for some advice and help with limited. What do you guys think of the B/W deck I built? What would you have done with this Sealed Pool? Let me know what you think in the comments! I'll be doing a ton of these within the next few months as I prepare to win a PTQ to qualify for the Pro Tour. Until the next sealed pool, Magic players!

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-David J.

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