|
By Jon Mason
Today I want to give you some news about the magic online Pauper format, and then I have a report on a ALA-CON-ARB draft held here in Coventry.
Firstly, how would you like to receive an invite to the 2009 MtG World championships in Rome? There is a new qualifying route via what WotC call the Magic Online Championship Series (MOCS). Winning one of the 7 (8?) MOCS season championships gets you invited. To play in a season championship you need to earn 15 qualifying points (QPs). Here is the good bit, you earn 3 QPs if you win one of the monthly Pauper format Premier Events (PEs). This little fact is attracting some of the best magic brains around to the pauper format. If you missed the news about pauper PEs, they so far attracted over 100 players each. The first two were won by mono black control decks leading many to think the format had already gone stale. Then MOCS arrived and the format has flipped around completely. An affinity deck won this months PE, and the top 8 published here not only has no mbc, but is full of diverse viable decks. Good times. Just a quick rundown, we have affinity, gw slivers, zoo, mono blue control, white weenie, storm combo, zoo again, mono blue aggro. The next Pauper PE is on June 21st, so put it in your diary. Now obviously online pauper occupies a lot of my time, because, as someone once said, "nobody knowns you're nekkid on the internets". Unfortunately every local magic group needs a self-elected publicist to put COVENTRY on the map, which is why this week I'm attending Wednesday Night Magic at UoW. I have a slight case of pre-draft tension as usual; it just demands so much concentration. The first thing to do at WNM these days is locate the peripatetic games room. This week we're in a room opposite the library where the UK Star Trek TCG championships were once held, and I conspicuously scrubbed out with a risky Maquis deck, but I digress. It's good to find 14 players have made the effort despite all the difficulties of sustaining sanctioned play. I came here with hopes of reporting everyone's first picks, colours and deck types, but due to time pressure I won't be able to mention the second draft pod again, except to give you the finishing positions in descending order of Stephano, Dr Chris, David, Nigel, Hector and Joe (mysterious). In my pod I sit between Martha left, Grahame Wilkes on my right, then Glen who would have us believe he's forcing cascade/exalted archetype. My plan is to pick all the best cards I see, assuming that colour fixers will happen. Immediately I'm given a problem in that my pack has lots of playables, notably a choice of Executioners Capsule or Realm Razer which I pick, despite previous bad experiences. This offers Martha black, and in fact she ends up in RGB. My mental note to prioretise artifact mana sources gets lost somehow, and altogether I pass one obelisk and a borderpost. Idiot. Pack two is weak, and I take an Ancient Ziggurat. Spellbinder Behemoth is better from pack three, meaning I have to pass a Terminate to Martha. Assembling my deck I fear that I have too many high cost fatties and not enough removal. My last draft I tanked in RG against fast aggro decks, and this time I'm in RG again with splashes of bw. Well at least I should have lots of time to make notes. I get paired against Glen who really has drafted cascade, facilitating quite a few free flying creatures over the course of the match. He is playing some counterspells and lots of lifegain. I'm on the draw with mulligan, and put up a spirited offence with lots of attackers and yoke of the damned only to see him finish on 36 life once he figures out that exalted plus Wall of Reverence make a good combo. I win the next game, which goes long due to life gain, making the match a draw after extra turns. I am now convinced I have a bad deck, and have developed an aversion to the Ziggurat which always seems to appear when I'd rather have a basic land. Joe has made it loudly clear that he has drafted le-deck-o-suck, which still manages to beat Graham's Esper based pile. It's WGRu with a fpfp Knight Captain of Eos. He wins the toss and soon has three creatures in play to my one. I am faced with Hobson's choice of doing nothing or playing my Realm razer. Either way I am going to lose some life. Of course he has the Path to Exile to rfg our lands. I have two land in hand, and I stabilise first on five life. Unfortunately a Sigil Blessing wipes out all my guys and we're onto the next game. Only we're not, because Joe mulligans to 4 and promptly concedes. In the third game I curve out with a volley of goblin and saproling tokens thanks to Dragon Fodder and Jund Battlemage and ride the beats to victory. You'd think I'd be happy, only twice in this game I got set back. I wrongly thought I could use Ziggurat mana to unearth Kathari Bomber, then I overlooked a multicolour aura which was giving his creature shroud; both avoidable mistakes. So with a draw and a win I am doing better than expected, but by now everyone has heard about Danial and his all conquering Lavalanche and Obelisk of Alara. Luckily for me I am paired with Tom instead, which does little to cheer me up since he is a better player than me. On the play for the first time tonight I make my land drops for a T4 Behemoth, and not even multiple unsummons and an Esper Charm double discard can save him. He very reasonably points out that I don't need to be depressed any more, and I relax for the first time tonight. On the evidence Tom is playing Wub, though in the next game we see the real story is UBw and a trio of flyers led by a Tower Gargoyle do me in. The last game Tom misses several lands, and despite using the esper charm to draw more he cannot halt the combination of combat damage and removal that I am able to deploy. As expected Danial has won all his matches and is first. I am second! The rest in order are: Simon, Glen, Tom, Joe, Martha, Graham. The deck turned out to have a lot of early game survivability and some thumping great finishers. There were no fast decks to worry about after all, or any block themed combos of note. Tom might have posed a threat had he not had mana issues. The moral, as a wise man once wrote... Don't Panic! Props to everyone there for keeping Magic alive, and to Dr Chunk if he awards me half a free draft for writing this. Discuss this article on the forums. (0 posts) |
