Today, we have an article from long-time limited specialist Chester Sy. C is a regular drafter from Madison Wisconsin playing alongside Pro Tour champion Mike Hron for the most part of his active playing days. Although he still has the skills and ratings to play in high level events; these days, he prefers to just play casually and on very rare occasions.
We are very glad that he chose to play at Titan during the Worldwake prerelease, and we are honored that he chose to write a tourney report for us to publish in this site.
Prerelease Report: Worldwake Midnight Pre-release @ Titan
by C
Humorous thoughts in parenthesis. Heh.
So Wednesday rolls around and I get a message at like 10pm, asking if I’m playing at the prerelease. Magic doesn’t really interest me nowadays, as killing dragons (in the real world, of Warcraft) is just a tad more fun than slinging cards. I blatantly ignore the message and go get me some EPIC LEWTZ!
Thursday night, while drunk from one too many beers in the streets of Alabang, Franz calls me up asking if I wanted to prerelease it up. At the back of my head I’m like, what the f do u want from me! (but of course I didn’t say that). Apparently a lot of my officemates, including the always wacky Celsus and king of awkward nights Jem are coming. In my tipsy state, I commit (f peer pressure~).
We were supposed to meet at 9pm at the office on Friday night, but I’m obviously late (killing dragons take a lot of time) so I arrive at the very fashionably late time of 10:30pm. Passengers in the C-mobile: Celsus, Jem, Franz and me. Excited as they were, all talk on the way to the site was about them cards. I chipped in as much as I can, but I only scanned the spoiler an hour before I left the house (and I saw zero exciting cards).
So we obviously arrive at the site with 45 minutes to spare. The gang was hungry, so we stop by the BEST cheap pizza place ever (that, and I had to park my car somewhere; ulterior motive). Jem starts to talk about some guitar $h!t; some dude from some band was having some guitar lessons sometime the next day (I obviously wasn’t listening). Franz starts $h!tting out poltically incorrect jokes about sex (gender), and Celsus predicts Jem’s loot for the night as consisting of 3 Eye of Ugin and 3 Magosi, the Waterveil (what do those cards do anyway). I think about all the wasted time playing with paper when I can be killing pixels instead~
A few slices of pizza and countless number of mojos later, we arrive at the site and I register the following (might be missing a few cards):
White (14)
Bold Defense
Cliff Treader
Join the Ranks
Kor Outfitter
Makindi Shieldmate
Ondu Cleric
Steppe Lynx
Windborn Charge
Apex Hawks
2 Guardian Zendikon
Iona’s Judgment
Kitesail Apprentice
Marshal’s Anthem
Blue (14)
Caller of Gales
Reckless Scholar
Seascape Aerialist
Spreading Seas
Trapfinder’s Trick
Welkin Tern
Windrider Eel
Aether Tradewinds
Enclave Elite
Halimar Excavator
2 Mysteries of the Deep
Sejiri Merfolk
Thada Adel, Acquisitor
Black (16)
Crypt Ripper
Disfigure
Guul Draz Vampire
Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet
Nimana Sell-Sword
Quest for the Gravelord
Ravenous Trap
Vampire’s Bite
Bojuka Brigand
Corrupted Zendikon
Dead Reckoning
Nemesis Trap
Ruthless Cullblade
Scrib Nibblers
Tomb Hex
Urge to Feed
Red (13)
Goblin Ruinblaster
Hellkite Charger
Highland Berserker
Plated Geopede
Seismic Shudder
Shatterskull Giant
Bull Rush
Claws of Valakut
Comet Storm
Goblin Roughrider
Skitter of Lizards
2 Slavering Nulls
Green (14)
Baloth Cage Trap
Beast Hunt
Beastmaster Ascension
Harrow
Oran-rief Survivalist
River Boa
Scythe Tiger
Vines of Vastwood
Arbor Elf
Feral Contest
Grappler Spider
Graypelt Hunter
Vastwood Animist
Vastwood Zendikon
Akoum Refuge
Jwar Isle Refuge
Kabira Crossroads
Seijiri Steppe
Hammer of Ruin
Hedron Rover
Kitesail
First thing I do for normal formats like this is count the number of cards of each color I have. Black had 16, so I started with that color. It seemed deep enough for a main color. Next up was the bombs. You don’t have to dig hard enough to realize red has the most: hellkite charger (RORIX) and comet storm (fireball LEWLZ). Red did seem pretty shallow after that; fortunately there’s the two nulls that would otherwise been relegated to the bench if I didn’t play black.
So here’s the final deck, after a few curve checks (sorted to when I think I’m casting the cards):
1-drop:
Guul Draz Vampire
2-drops:
2 Slavering Nulls
Plated Geopede
Highland Berserker
Ruthless Cullblade
Corrupted Zendikon
Bojuka Brigand
3-drops:
Skitter of Lizards
Goblin Roughrider
4-drops:
Shatterskull Giant
Goblin Ruinblaster
Nimana Sell-Sword
6-drop:
Hellkite Charger
7-drop:
Kalitas, Bloodchief of Ghet
As per-need basis:
Urge to Feed
Tomb Hex
Nemesis Trap
Dead Reckoning
Quest for the Gravelord
Disfigure
Comet Storm
Kitesail
I was lucky enough to open seven 2-drops: the format seems a hell of a lot faster than most formats. Aggression is key; I’ve seen so many games in this format where one player empties out his hand by turn 5 while the other is stuck with 6 cards in hand.
I don’t actually remember any of my matches in detail, since I didn’t plan on writing a report, so I’ll just give some highlights:
(1) Went 4-0 with the deck, which was totally unexpected. The curve was decent but needed a bit of work. I thought it was good enough for 3-1, but definitely not a perfect record.
(2) All my matches went to 3 games, and all of them had the same pattern: one game where I killed the opponent on turn 6 or less, one game where I didn’t come out fast (lost all of them), and one game with actual interaction (fortunately, I won all of them).
(3) Specific cards:
a. A Sphinx of Jwar Isle may or may not have traded with a skitter of lizards in combat.
b. Nemesis trap was poop. The only time where it was useful was against a fun game against Nick (Ortega), where I killed two of his dudes with two mana. Pretty sure this should be relegated to the side for aggressive decks.
c. Comet storm was obviously the bomb. I finally DID a very skillful card in sealed (have bad luck with that). Remember lava-LOLanche? This one hits your opponent too! And as JT pointed out, IT’S AN INSTANT!
d. Slavering Nulls weren’t as hot as I thought they would be. I would take almost any removal spell over them. Ravenous Rats are almost better…
e. …except when you have KITESAIL! I admit, that’s the only reason why I played this usually garbage card, but it’s A-MAZING for aggro decks. Most of the time I just had to punch through for five or so damage, then all my stuff comes online (Guul Draz and Cullblade).
f. Dead reckoning was TERRIBLE. It’s on the level of Magma Spray I think.
g. Corrupted Zendikon was the BOMB. I was glad to have it at any point in the game. 3 mana 3/3 haster is almost too good!
(4) Combined record of the people riding the C-mobile: 10-6. pretty good, considering all of us play magic pretty casually these days. :)
(5) You get your picture taken when you play at Porter’s (Titan)! Definitely a reason to play there, if you are in search for stalkers (like me).
(6) We didn’t have time to do the Chester Challenge yet for this prerelease; will probably do it this week. (for those who don’t know, the Chester Challenge is when you try to play someone’s deck with cards from their sideboard. So far, I’m 3-1 in Chester’s Challenges :) my pool is a good one to do the challenge too; there’s a decent blue-white deck in there :)
(7) I recognized quite a few of the old-timers playing at the prerelease. To all that said hi, thanks! Nice to see old folks that still play this game :)
Alright, I think that’s it. Oh wait, still need:
Props:
(1) Porter for a well-run tournament. The whole thing was done in less than 5 hours from start to finish, which is a milestone for the Philippine magic community. I didn’t get to play at the Zendikar prerelease, but I heard similar things. Keep up the good work!
(2) Everyone that said hi!
(3) My opponents, for not bitching about my lucksack moments (and I had a few)
(4) Team Rama (the C-mobile crew might disagree, but I think we’re all team Rama wannabee’s)
(5) Shakey’s for the best cheap pizza ever. So good!
(6) Celsus for lending me sleeves
Slops:
(1) Smokers. Gtfo!
(2) Peer pressure. I didn’t get to do my dailies that day, dammit.
Comments, suggestions, rants, and raves, send to xeyloderixed at gmail dot com.
