Dragon's Maze Pre-Release Sealed: East Coast Edition

Dragon's Maze pre-release at The End Game Center in Charlottesville, VA on 4/27/13

Roughly 50 people showed up by 2:00 pm to play pre-release sealed and when I registered, they asked me for my top 5 guild choices. I was not prepared for that question. Gruul, Azorius, Orzhov, uh... Rakdos, uhhh... Dimir?

It did seem as if they didn't have a good algorithm for determining which players would get which guild, so around 2:45 they started handing out packs, and my name comes up for the Azorius Senate. It seems like the blue-white lawmages were not terribly popular, but, <SPOILER ALERT> I did meet one other Azorian at the pointy end of the tournament in the fifth round <END SPOILER>. 

I put Gruul down as top choice because i love bloodrushing, plus i liked the sound of three of the potential four secret allies (not selesnya). In a perfect world, where i could pick, I would be Orzhov-Azorius, but the potential awkward Orzhov pairings led me to put Aziorius second, since there was then a 50% chance of playing Esper.

So they toss me an Azorius pack and what's the secret ally? Yup, Orzhov. So lucky!

45 minutes of deckbuliding later, I have the following deck 

creatures - 14
2 drops
Azorious Arrester
Blood Scrivener
Deputy of Aquittals
Tithe Drinker

3 drops
Lyev Skynight
Wind Drake
Vassal Soul

4 drops
Alms Beast
Ascended Lawmage
Assault Griffin
Sunspire Gatekeepers
Ubul Sar Gatekeepers
 
6 drops
Aetherling
Skyline Predator

spells
Warped Physique
Devour Flesh
Dramatic RescueFatal Fumes
Far & Away
Debtor's Pulpit
Knightly Valor
Gift of Orzhova
Prophetic Prism

lands
2x Azorius Guildgate
2x Orzhov Guildgate
Dimir Guildgate
5x Plains
4x Swamp
3x Island

last cuts/sideboard

Dutiful Thrull

Thrull Parasite

Haazda Snare Squad

Profit & Loss

Paralyzing Grasp

Azorious Cluestone

Dimir Cluestone

Syndicate Enforcer

Court Street Denizen

I find that the guild-pack pre-release formats tend to be long on playables in your colors. Since you're generally going 3-colors, you have even more playables in-color and making the last few cuts is really difficult. I could have probably built a 60-card deck that i wouldn't have minded playing.



all stars

plus Debtor's Pulpit

• We're used to Debtor's Pulpit being too slow in Gatecrash draft, but for 10-guild sealed, it was amazing.
• Tithe Drinker will pair very well with Syndic of Tithes, Azorius Arrester, Dead Reveler and Stab Wound in full-block draft. Put Profit & Loss in this deck, too.

underperformers

 

• Blood Scrivener did not trigger once all day. it traded with an occasional two-drop from an opponent, but that slot would probably have been better as Thrull Parasite
• Fatal Fumes was fine, but generally underwhelming. It needed to be combined with creature combat to effectively remove non-utility dudes.

After a quick round 2 (and a run for gyros), we learned this particular location was running a six-round swiss tournament, not the four-round pre-release flight i have become accustomed to. I don't think I've played the full swiss pairings outside of a PTQ since I was a wee lad begging my parents to drive me upwards of an hour to go to the "Philadelphia" Urza's Legacy pre-release in the Norristown National Guard Armory. That one usually drew about 150-200 players back in roughly 600 BC.

I played against a variety of 3-color green decks for most of the day. Jund, Naya, RUG stand out a few days later. My tightly focused fliers and tempo generally ruled the day, with detain, bounce, and tapper holding off the beasts while fliers got in there. Occasionally, the Gift of Orzhova or Knightly Valor would make an appearance to put vigilance and big or lifelink and flying pants on a cheap guy to finish things up while the life gain or knight kept the race in my favor.

I played against a blue-white-red mage in round 5 at 4-0 in my closest match of the day. His battalion triggers from Bomber Corps and Firemane Avenger had the potential of eating my team, plus he had fliers to stop mine. But card advantage took over and I squeaked by in three games.

In the last round, I was paired against a pleasant young man playing Naya aggro, but he had a serious aversion against mulling to five, so he kept a 1-land, six-card hand in game one and never got there. Game two was our closest one, with him blowing me out three for one with a (very) well-timed Weapon Surge. I probably made some a mistake or two that I didn't notice, but after that blowout, I was left with only Alms Beast and I tried to get there before he could bring me down from my lofty life total. That game ended with him at one, me at one, then me dead. Game three, he mulligans, then keeps a two-lander that didn't have the right colors and stumbles for two turns before finding his third land. My turn 4 white gatekeeper plus his friend the knight cleaned up while sacrifice effects and bounce kept him off of blockers.

6-0, winner-winner!

hindsight

• In sealed, the 2/4 gatekeepers are good enough to consider playing single-color gates (or as I call them, CIPT basic lands) just to enable the white, blue & black gatekeepers in a controlling deck. 
• If you have an Izzet gate and a Rakdos gate that are off-color but otherwise let you splash the Burn side of Turn & Burn for free AND enable your gatekeepers, even better.
• The mana will be tough unless you get lucky with your gates (like I did). I never did mulligan to 5, but plenty of times to 6. My opponents mulled plenty and were often stuck on one color for too long for my tempo-based deck.
• Korozda Gorgon is very strong if you can get the time to make it work, especially in BUG. Simic counters plus Golgari counters, plus Rakdos counters make for some crazy shenanigans, including unexpected blocks from newly-leashed Rakdos cultists and advantageous use of evolve counters to shrink or kill the opposition. I'm willing to bet Mutant's Prey will shine in the right BUG draft deck. Between the 2/5 gorgon and the 4/1 Rot Farm Skeleton, some Golgari creatures seem tailor-made for evolve zaniness.

curve of the day

• t1 - guildgate
• t2 - basic land, Tithe Drinker
• t3 - basic land, Devour Flesh, extort, attack for 2. (23-19)
• t4 - guildgate, Azorius Arrester, extort, detain, attack for 2 (26-16)
• t5 - land attack, Fatal Fumes to kill the blocker on Tithe Drinker, extort (29-13)
• t6 - land Deputy of Acquittals, extort, return Arrester. Azorius Arrester, extort, detain, attack (33-9)
• a flier and a few more extorted spells later, it was all over.

My next MTG event will probably be a MODO release event. I'll be back with (probably) shorter notes then.