PTQ Born of the Gods: Core Set M14 Sealed Format

One year ago, I made a choice to begin playing Magic: the Gathering competitively.

Last year, I experienced the loss of loved ones that I wasn't sure how to cope with. My foundation was rocked and I didn't know who I was anymore or what I wanted to accomplish. I wasn't particularly open to finding a means neither; in a way, I was stuck.

An epiphany hit me one night; do what you like and be good at it. Be good at.. Magic? I knew I liked playing Magic and I thought I was relatively decent at it, but could I really take my play to the next level? And even if I did become good at it, what could I accomplish playing a card game? Initially, I was wrought with doubt from others' ridicule and low self-esteem. But the Pro Tour dream never died. Ever since I learned to play Magic, I was hooked. I would research new cards on Gatherer and watch Pro Tour coverage all the way back to the 90s to see what kinds of cards people played with. Wouldn't it be amazing to play on the Pro Tour some day?

Before long, I made the commitment; I would compete in the PTQ Gatecrash season regardless of the doubt. The format was Sealed and would require no huge monetary investment into a Constructed deck and I've drafted a ton with my roommates back in Gainesville; how hard could it be? Without realizing, I had created a makeshift schedule and a practicing regiment that I followed almost religiously for several months. I would do a draft via an online simulator, then a sealed, then research several archetypes, then look at MTGO's winning decklists, then force draft a peculiar strategy at Ed's store, fail, then rinse and repeat. I continued doing this until I was confident with the cards in the set and what archetypes were relatively viable. Then it hit; my first PTQ in Ocoee, Fl.

This one will always be a little special to me since it was the first event we had ACTUAL team shirts, I made a new friend, and it was the first Magic event I practiced and prepared for. I was absolutely terrified to say the least. It all worked out though; I walked away with a Top 16 finish, which I could be proud of. As the season progressed, I did well here and there, but the most amazing part was all of the support. I had friends and family reading the posts over the CNG site or Facebook and wishing me good luck and offering encouraging words. Most of all, I'm thankful for all of that.

Three seasons later, here we are. Although I didn't qualify for the Pro Tour, I found a job as a Tournament Organizer for Campus Cards & Games and I became an L1 Judge. Magic became a huge part of my life and I can't say that I regret one bit of it. Recently, the PTQ Theros season was kind of my off-season as I took some time away from the PTQ grind and focused on organizing tournaments and learning how to be a better Judge and role model. Now, I take Magic somewhat less seriously than I did before; I was humbled by both my success and failures during the past three seasons and I'm just excited to play in a PTQ nowadays and I strive to do the best I can rather than stress about how many wins I need to Top 8. Probably the most important lesson I learned was during the PTQ Dragon's Maze season; support your team and support your loved ones. Everyone's dream is different, help them achieve theirs.

Now begins the PTQ Born of the Gods season; what does that mean for me? For the team?

Unlike the Sealed and Modern seasons this past year, I won't be attending the PTQ grind in full force. I'll be spending most of my time dedicated to school and catching up so I can eventually finish up here and apply to Grad School soon. There are two PTQs on my radar in Fl: North Miami and Maitland. North Miami's format is M14 Sealed coming up in a little under 2 weeks, while Maitland in October will be Theros sealed. Luckily, I get a taste of both formats, so I'll do my best to prepare for both. As for the team, I know some of my friends will be preoccupied with school, but most of the team will be competing. Now that Stephen's off the ban list, I assume he'll be taking charge of the N. Miami PTQ while Maitland is on home turf. I'm excited for this to be a good season.

'Why all the backstory? Get with the cards!'

In order to crash course our way through Core Set M14, we should first premise the differences and similarities between it and our old friend, M13.

M13 was a format of aggression. Most of the creatures were small and the set contained many combat tricks including the set's namesake mechanic, Exalted. Often, you would see board states filled with 1-2 toughness creatures and 'hitting your curve' or continuously playing threats was vital to success. The quality of removal spells in M13 was relatively mediocre, but in practice were very powerful because of the frailty of most of the creatures in the set. Most games would end on Turn 6-8, so your powerful 6 or 7 mana bomb Rare or Mythic rare would often sit on the sidelines as their impact on the board would be near negligible before the game ended. Being on the play in M13 was very important since you wanted to get your creatures on the board first and attacking since your creatures would always be better than your opponent's creatures in combat due to Exalted or by just having more of them. Control decks were Archaeomancer-dependent; since creature-heavy decks could play more creatures than the control decks were able to kill, re-buying your removal spells was extremely important in staying alive. Furthermore, Archaeomancer had 1 power that was enough to trade with an array of 1 toughness creatures in the format. R/G was considered the most powerful strategy because its Green creatures were large and mana efficient while Red's removal package and high creature density would crash through an opponent's board state with ease. White was often regarded as the weaker color and Black/White Exalted decks was the 'trap' archetype as they couldn't produce a fast enough clock against fast creature decks because Exalted creatures are frail upon blocking.

What does the M14 Limited format have to offer?

M14 is regarded as much slower than its M13 counterpart and the format is dominated by engines. In the Core Set M14: Top 8 Commons article, I made a few observations about the set including creatures with a lot of toughness, rares that are build-around-me cards, removal spells that are mediocre, and small sub-themes like sacrificing creatures and Enchantment Auras. It's no secret now that M14 is a slower set that requires you to setup a strategy and use synergies between cards to grind out your opponent.

Why isn't M14 an aggressive format? With fewer creatures at 1-3 mana with enough power to justify their worth, aggressive decks look to 4+ mana creatures to fuel their aggression like Rumbling Baloth and Marauding Maulhorn, which drives their curve higher and their tempo towards the mid-late game. Furthermore, the lack of good 1 toughness creatures and large amount of 3+ toughness creatures make cards like Volcanic Geyser and Flames of the Firebrand worse because you can't gain as much value or tempo as you could during M13 Limited. Generating early tempo is also difficult because of Wall creatures that force you to waste mana on combat tricks to punch through them, preventing you from developing your board on turns 3-5. If both players aren't necessarily worried about their life total, then generating card advantage is the key to closing most games.

In Core Sets, generally any 2 color combination will work if you have strong playables and pilot the deck well. M14; however, is more synergy-focused because the games are long and any type of card advantage engine will help push you ahead of your opponent. At around 38min in this video, LSV does an excellent breakdown of the format's premier archetypes at the World Championships 2013. What are the popular archetypes and how do they work?

B/R Sacrifice - The main engine of the deck is Act of Treason, Molten Birth, and Tenacious Dead while using Blood Bairn, Vampire Warlord, Bubbling Cauldron, and Barrage of Expendables to gain value off of the creature fodder. The deck's creatures are relatively frail, so the deck generally shines as the games go late. Most builds I've seen are done in an attrition style and use Black's strong removal spells to trade with opponent's creatures early to have enough mana to support some of its sacrifice engines for the mid-late game.

Mono Green - Since most creatures in the format are relatively small or just efficient walls, having the largest creatures among them will allow you to rule the red zone. Green has the advantage of having creatures larger than your opponent's on every section of the curve; Kalonian Tusker at 2, Advocate of the Beast on 3 and Rumbling Baloth or Briarpack Alpha on 4, so your creatures can attack profitably virtually the entire early game. In the late game, you have access to powerful finishers including Howl of the Nightpack and an array of Green bombs at Rare level Green also has its small engine with Advocate of the Beast that allows you to slowly grow your army until you push for enough damage to overwhelm your opponent's defenses.

Mono Black - This is one of the more popular archetypes since it uses Black's very efficient removal and the mono-Black good stuff cards like Corrupt and Quag Sickness. Mono-Black plays similarly to Mono-Blue by playing the role of the control deck with a some win conditions sprinkled in, but instead of focusing on drawing cards, the archetype prioritizes disruption with your opponent's resources via creature removal, Mind Rot, and small card advantage cards like Altar's Reap and Corpse Hauler. The deck can also be aggressive using Mark of the Vampire and flying creatures, but these lists are generally inconsistent.

Mono Blue - Blue is arguably the best color in M14, so why not have a deck full of blue cards? The engine of the deck resolves around Divination, Archaeomancer, and Opportunity to simply draw a bunch of cards. In a format bound by card advantage, Blue reins on top of the other 4 colors. The archetype is generally filled with a ton of removal and a few win conditions sprinkled in including Water Servant and Air Servant. Mono Blue utilizes it's draw power to play a heavy attrition game with its opponent until they are out of threats. In this archetype, the Staff of the Mind Magus really shines because it can gain you life that you may have lost in the earlier turns, helping buffer some of the early aggression from other archetypes. Generally, this archetype can also splash into other colors for removal. Often times, Black and Red cards are splashed because the quality of Doom Blade, Chandra's Outrage and even Shock in the early turns is relatively high. This is probably the most viable archetype in Sealed because splashing is relatively easy and the power level of most of the Blue cards is high enough to carry on a small splash of a 2nd color.

B/W Enchantments - This archetype uses the engine of Blightcaster and Black and White's powerful enchantments, Quag Sickness and Pacifism. The deck uses some utility with Auramancer to rebuy these enchantments while keeping your opponent's board clear. This deck also plays like a psuedo-midrange deck and makes blocking difficult for your opponent. The deck also allows you to play a Voltron-style using Mark of the Vampire, and Blessing for a little extra mileage that may even encourage playing an enchantment into an opponent's open mana because Blightcaster's -2/-2 trigger serves as a free spell with every Enchantment cast. You also have access to the Angelic Accord engine that you can support off of Bubbling Cauldron, Trading Post, Solemn Offering, and Congregate, but this is not strictly dependent on Black as the splash color, since it is also viable with Green's Brindle Boar and Voracious Wurm to capitalize on playing life-gain spells.

R/G Aggro - Traditional R/G aggro is similar to its M13 counterpart. The deck plays an aggressive curve of creatures including Goblin Shortcutter, Rootwalla, and Marauding Maulhorn alongside efficient burn and removal spells to clear the field and bash your opponent in the face. Although the strategy has lost some favor due to the Wall creatures in the set severly throwing off your ability to tempo your opponent early, the deck can make effective use of Green's large creatures and both colors' combat tricks like Giant Growth, Thunder Strike to power through. Furthermore, the archetype can take advantage of the format's mediocre removal and use Shiv's Embrace and Trollhide to create a very powerful win condition that can pressure your opponent to either over-commit resources to survive, or flat-out die.

Slivers - The archetype is pretty straightforward, play all the slivers. Generally some combination of G/R/W will provide you the most creatures and Manaweft Sliver is the backbone of the deck allowing you to cast everything in your hand. Fortify is arguably the 2nd most important card in the deck since you can save your army from a Shrivel early or punch for a ton of damage late. Slivers is arguably the 'trap' archetype in M14 as the deck is difficult to build, has a somewhat inconsistent mana base and is dependent on having the bomb Sliver rares to help fuel the deck. This archetype might be more viable in sealed since you have guaranteed access to 6 Rares slots, which could yield a couple of the bomb Slivers you need to play for the archetype.

U/G Tempo - Usually playing large green creatures and blue flyers along with Blue's powerful disruption including Time Ebb and Disperse. The deck is efficient because the Green creatures are very capable of pushing for damage while Blue's efficiency at drawing cards, countering spells, and removing creatures off the table is enough to have longevity if the game goes very late. Furthermore, Blue's evasive creatures like Trained Condor can push for damage as extra reach for the deck against decks trying to stabilize against it.

Since this PTQ season's format is Sealed, some of these archetypes we just discussed may not be feasible to build because of the sheer amount of specific cards they require. However, we can use our knowledge of the metagame's archetypes to build decks around known engines. To close up this article, let's take a look at a M14 Sealed Pool. Today (or.. a couple weeks ago), I opened up a quick 6 boosters of M14 and went ahead with one of my sealed deck practices. Check out the video to me opening the packs and my rambling thought process while doing so! BrambleVid #16: Core Set M14 Sealed Pool

Here were the following contents:

White (18):

Ajani's Chosen
Auramancer
Charging Griffin
Dawnstrike Paladin
2x Fortify
Imposing Sovereign
Indestructibility
2x Master of Diversion
2x Pacifism
Pay No Heed
Serra Angel
Siege Mastodon
Stonehorn Chanter
2x Suntail Hawk

Blue (14):
Archaemancer
Armored Cancrix
Claustrophobia
Coral Merfolk
2x Disperse
Divination
Domestication
Seacost Drake
Spell Blast
2x Time Ebb
Trained Condor
Zephyr Charge

Black (17):
Altar's Reap
Artificer's Hex
Corpse Hauler
Corrupt
Dark Favor
Diabolic Tutor
Doom Blade
Festering Newt
Liturgy of Blood
2x Nightwing Shade
Sengir Vampire
Shadowborn Apostle
2x Shrivel
Vampire Warlord
Vile Rebirth

Red  (15):
Academy Raider
2x Act of Treason
Barrage of Expendables
2x Blur Sliver
Canyon Minotaur
Chandra's Outrage
Cyclops Tyrant
Lava Axe
Lightning Talons
Maurading Maulhorn
2x Smelt
Wild Guess

Green (14):
Deadly Recluse
Elvish Mystic
Enlarge
Giant Growth
Kalonian Tusker
Plummet
Predatory Sliver
Rootwalla
2x Rumbling Baloth
Savage Summoning
Sporemound
Verdant Haven
Voracious Wurm

Artifacts (6):
Accorder's Shield
Darksteel Ingot
Bubbling Cauldron
Millsone
Pyromancer's Gauntlet
Staff of the Wild Magus

Deck I created:

Creatures (16):
Elvish Mystic
Imposing Sovereign
Deadly Recluse
Kalonian Tusker
Voracious Wurm
2x Master of Diversion
Rootwalla
Auramancer
Ajani's Chosen
2x Rumbling Baloth
Charging Griffin
Sporemound
Serra Angel
Stonehorn Chanter

Spells (7):
2x Pacifism
Giant Growth
Bubbling Cauldron
Verdant Haven
Indestructibility
Enlarge

Lands (17):
10 Forests
7 Plains

Although this deck isn't one of the main archetypes discussed earlier, I like it for a few reasons. It tempos really well because it has creatures like Imposing Sovereign and a pair of Master of Diversions that make blocking more difficult for my opponent. This decrease in blocking efficiency increases the stock of my larger Green creatures because they can attack more profitably. Furthermore, the Ajani's Chosen engine with my few Auras can produce a small number of 2/2 Cats which are more bodies to attack with and Bubbling Cauldron if I start to fall behind. I'm not exactly sure where to put Indestructibility, since it is easily answered with a Disperse or Time Ebb on the enchanted creature or an Act of Treason + sacrifice outlet, but I felt like it could be useful with Ajani's Chosen. If I had to go back, I probably wouldn't use it because it's not a combat-based format and doesn't do enough work.

Overall, I feel that G/W was the best approach with this pool. The Blue cards were criminally deficient of creatures, so I couldn't justify sleeving up the color. Even with a Verdant Haven in our list, I don't think it provides enough consistency to splash the third color. Fortunately, no two players will see a Sealed Pool the same way, so let me know what you would have built out of this pool.

On an unrelated note, I'm super tired right now and I have to go to school early tomorrow morning, so I don't have a fancy transition or exit. So...

Let's take home a Pro Tour invite in N. Miami! 

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-David J.