Thoughts on Innistrad Drafting

I was talking with Will Bax last Friday about Innistrad drafting on MTGO, and he seemed to insinuate that us London drafters kinda sucked.

“Are you losing all of your Innistrad drafts like the rest of us?” he asked.

“Actually, I’m doing pretty good!” was my reply.

… Then I proceeded to 1-2 my next draft. :S

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I’ve drafted 3x times now and gone 2-1 / 3-0 / 1-2 in that order.

What has been working out and what hasn’t? Let’s take a look at the builds that I played:

1)      2-1 = White / Blue Flyers

I tried to pick as many flying creatures as I could that had a decent CC and P/T. Highlights from the deck included cards like:

2x Abbey Griffin

2x Chapel Geist

Avacynian Priest

Doomed Traveller

2x Voiceless Spirit

Claustrophobia

Lantern Spirit

This deck was pretty good! Most of the flyers are in U/B/W so by cutting most of the flyers out of U/W that meant that the only “air force” I should really be expecting would come out of a B player. My loss was, indeed, to a Black deck… my opponent ended up having too much zombie recursion for me to deal with :(. This deck was pretty fast and had a good curve, which was what I think helped me win quite a few of my matches. My first impression of the format was that it is slower than the past few, so if you’re playing a fast deck against their fatties, you’re going to win.  I was often so ahead that even once my opponent DID start dropping bombs, they were already in the red so far that they couldn’t recover. Either that, or they started dropping big monsters that had to walk the earth and couldn’t interact with my flyers as they closed in for the kill.

2)      3-0 = Blue / Black Humans

I REALLY think a fast aggressive deck is the way to go in Innistrad. Pump out quality creatures on a consistent basis and overrun them! In this build I was lucky enough to score some REALLY good human equipment in the form of Silver Inlaid Dagger AND Butchers Cleaver! Not only that, but my deck was like, ½ creatures, all of which were pretty decent! Here’s a quick breakdown of some of the stuff that made the cut:

Invisible Stalker

3x Delver of Secrets / Insectile Aberration

Diregraf Ghoul

Disciple of Griselbrand

Falkenrath Noble

Manor Skeleton

Morkrut Banshee

Screeching Bat

Lost in the Mist

Murder of Crows

Silent Departure

3x Stitched Drake

Spectral Flight

This deck was incredible! Lots of T1 plays, lots of humans to equip. I even managed a T1 Delver into T2 flip! Once again I am convinced that speed > fatties in this format, and that having good reusable tools will win you the game every time! Oh yea! T1 Delver into T2 flip and drop Silver Inlaid Dagger is REALLY good and had someone scoop on their T3 to it. The Delvers did not flip often, but they were there mostly as an early threat AND because they’re humans to weild my weapons of war.

3)      1-2 = Black / Green Fatties

I should have seen the signals and switched to red, but I got greedy when I saw some late removal in B and some decent big green creatures surfing the tables. I thought to myself: “Don’t do this… don’t get into the fat stuff… you KNOW they’re too slow and that the morbid becomes too hard to activate!” But I did it anyways. I won my first match (barely) then proceeded to get crushed in 2 straight twice in a row. My deck looked something like this:

Bloodgift Demon

Corpse Lunge

Curse of Death’s Hold

Markov Patrician

Morkrut Banshee

Skirsdag High Priest

Stromkirk Patrol

2x Festerhide Boar

Grizzled Outcasts

2x Villagers of Estewald

Spider Spawning

Yea… you can see how a deck like this one may as well scoop to the 2 decks I played above. IF I was able to make it to T3-4 without them dropping a creature, or doing ANYTHING AT ALL, I was golden… but if they had a play on T1-2 there was no way I was able to recover. Especially since by the time I had a creature in play, they had 2x and would just “remove” my blocker to keep pressure on me until I died. I had a HUGE problem activating morbid since my guys were beef and tended not to die when it would be beneficial to me…. No one wanted to chump block me into morbid :(.

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So I guess my experience with Innistrad has been that it’s a FASTER format than I’d originally thought. Unless you draft a fairly aggressive deck with multiple points along the mana curve, don’t expect to win with fatties. Ramping to fat is fine, but just piling them all in there and expecting to win will result in disappointment.

I’ve also found that unless you’re an aggressive deck, you will have a problem activating morbid. Smaller creatures = good for morbid. Bigger creatures w / high CC = bad. People can see your “swing into bad trade so that I can activate morbid” tech from a mile away… you’re not fooling anyone! The only GOOD thing about this was that I was able to play mind games w / 1 opponent and swing in for a couple points of damage w / a 1/1 he wouldn’t block in the fear of a Banshee… the joke was on him because all I had in my hand was land (5 of them)!

I hope this helps some of you with your drafting experience. I’d love to hear what YOU’VE had success with so that we can share notes and improve our game as a community.

Cheers!

Carl Szalich

(NOTE: My 2^nd article for www.quietspeculation.com went live today! YAY!! :))

FNM: 12-0 With U/W Aggro-Control!

Last week I had the pleasure of playing at Imperial Hobbies for FNM. It was an intense and grueling 5 rounds of battle, and I was pleased with my 4-0-1 which was really a 5-0 since we played out the last match (we’d drawn to ensure we got foil GftT). I then had the opportunity to square off against Eric’s Tempered Steel deck (which had gone 4-1) to see if I could beat the monstrosity that has a 40-0 record vs. my terrible G/U self-mill deck and took that one in 2 as well… 12-0 for the night!! ;)

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I played a list similar to this one with a few updates:

"Ponder"ing the Aggro Solution

Here is the new list:

Removal Spells:

3x Oblivion Ring

2x Dismember

3x Day of Judgment

8

Control Spells:

4x Mana Leak

3x Dissipate

2x Timely Reinforcements

9

Card Advantage:

4x Ponder

4

Creatures:

4x Snapcaster Mage

2x Sun Titan

2x Consecrated Sphinx

2x Phantasmal Image

3x Hero of Bladehome

13

Lands:

26x Of Them!

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Since I was finally able to pick up my 4^th Snappy (thanks Jeremy!) I had no choice but to play him and make room for the 4^th ponder and another dissipate. I’d found that the Sun Titans weren’t making as big an impact as I’d hoped, so cut them to 2. Same with phantasmal image, he was ending up dead a lot of times, so he became the 4^th Snapcaster.

There were some good lolz while playing Brandon. Quotes!

Brandon: “What the hell! You’re gonna mana leak it AGAIN, right?”

Me: “Yep! Mana leak #3… put that Mirran Crusader in the Grave!”

Brandon: “Cast Hero… mana leak #4?”

Me: “Nope! Mana leak #3… again. I cast Snapper and flash it back!”

Brandon: “That’s 4 mana leaks! Dude, I hate your deck! Crusader?”

Me: “No again… I cast another Snappy and flash another Mana Leak.”

Brandon: “5 LEAKS??? I HATE THIS GAME AND I HATE COUNTERSPELLS!!”

Me: “LOL!!”

Yea, take that aggro players!

MORE NOTES ON SNAPCASTER…

Snappy enables so many awesome plays! I was down to 1 life, played a Timely Reinforcements to go to 7, played another to go to 13, flashed it back with a Snapper to go to 19 (He was still @ 20 at the time)!

I find it interesting that Snapcaster seems to have had more success in Modern than Standard! It could simply be because the 4x Tempered Steel decks that made it to the T8 strangled out any other archetypes, but there was not a single control deck to be seen…

Meanwhile, Snappy has been showing up in a SLEW of great modern builds! Whether it be U/W/R control, Tempo-Zoo, Red-Bant, U/W Control or any number of other impressive decks. When ZOO is rockin’ him to double up on Lightning Helix, you KNOW the card has got to be good! :)

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On another note, my first article finally went live for www.quietspeculation.com! Whether fortunate or unfortunate, it’s an “insider” article, so you won’t be able to read it unless you subscribe… sorry! :*(. I’ll still be sharing stock tips with you when able though, so no worries!

BUT if you were interested in taking a look at my premium articles, I can honestly say that if your interests are more related to FINANCE, that it’s an EXCELLENT site to sign up for! If you’re more interested in decklists and strategy, it has a few articles on that as well, but it is primarily a financial website designed to help you trade, buy / sell, and profit.

I’ve been a site member there for almost a year now and can honestly say that it’s been paramount to stepping up my game and staying ahead of the curve when it comes to price changes and stock tips. Again, if you are interested in Financial tips and tricks, this is the place to be!

// END ADVERTISEMENT! (lol)

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THE OLIVIA VOLDAREN EXPLOSION!

How many of you had been heeding my words and have invested in a few Olivia when they were $5? Anybody?? Well you all know that your hero (me) did! Up to at least a dozen copies around $4-5 each that are now worth $12+… good times! Had you been speculating like I was, you’d have made some good coin on this one! J

12 (Quantity Owned) x $5 (Value upon Purchase) = $60 (Original Investment)

12 (Quantity Owned) x  $12 (Present Value) = $144 (Current Value)

$144 (Current Value) - $60 (Original Investment) = $84 (Profit)… it was that easy!

So how should I ensure that I end up covering my Original Investment ($60), make a tidy profit, and still have some Olivia? My plan is to sell 8x of my copies and keep the other 4. This will leave me with the following calculation:

8 (Quantity Sold) x $12 (Present Value) = $96 (Total Sale)

$96 (Total Sale) - $60 (Original Investment) = $36 (Profit) + 4 Olivia in Hand

I want to sell 8x of them now while they’re hot in case they slide a little, but I want to keep at LEAST 4x for myself to play with / continue to speculate on. As I keep saying over and over again, there are still 2x more sets to go that will have a strong Vampire theme and could make her even BETTER.

^^^ Look at all of the above a second time and begin to familiarize yourself with doing little calculations like these. They are VERY important if you plan on speculating, as you always want to have a “plan” in mind so that you can avoid possibly taking a loss, and plan out what your cash flow will look like for your NEXT investment.

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I’ll be playing FNM @ L.A. Mood this weekend and may even have a new deck… Prepare yourself foolish mortals! :P

Cheers,

Carl Szalich

Post Innistrad Standard Decks

I’m going to be looking through a few of the recent http://www.magic-league.com/ decklists today to see what’s been shaking up the metagame! Glad you could join me :).

Disclaimer: You don’t normally find the most ULTRA decks on magic-league, but they have a very large sample size. This isn’t a showcase of decks that won 1^st place at various PT’s, but more a general listing of some of the newer decks that have placed well in their tournaments. The goal here was to find consistent, high placing decks over many events, not one be-all-end-all decklist that won a single major event.

Here are a few of the new decks that seem to be emerging. I’ll post them, take a look at why it’s successful, then offer advice on some of the cards that may be under the radar at the moment so you can pick them up on the cheap! :P

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 GR Kessig Ramp (Oct 13 – Comodope’s List)

SPELLS	LANDS	SIDEBOARD
3 Primeval Titan 1 Acidic Slime 4 Viridian Emissary 3 Wurmcoil Engine 3 Solemn Simulacrum 1 Birds of Paradise 4 Garruk, Primal Hunter 4 Beast Within 4 Green Sun Zenith 3 Slagstorm 4 Rampant Growth	2 Kessig Wolf Run 4 Rootbound Craig 4 Inkmoth Nexus 4 Copperline Gorge 3 Mountain 9 Forest	1 Slagstorm 2 Tree of Redemption 3 Thrun, the Last Troll 3 Sword of Feast and Famine 1 Viridian Corruptor
34	26	15

This deck seems to be popping up quite a bit lately on the Magic-League results. There were 2x of them in the top 4 of the nights performers, and it looks pretty solid. It reminds me of Valakut without the Valakut. It controls the aggro with Slagstorms & Wurmcoil Engines, has must-counter threats vs. control, and an alternate win condition in the form of Nexus + Pump from the Wolf Run. Looks like our old buddy Garruk, Primal Hunter finally found a home in this deck as well! I can only imagine swinging with a Kessig pumped Wurmcoil and then using his -3 ability to draw 1,000,000 cards :S. Thrun out of the board shores up on the U/B matchup since it basically can’t be killed by anything in their deck except for Black Sun Zenith, and the Tree seems pretty awesome vs. Mono Red and other fast decks.

Cards to keep an eye on that haven’t hit the big time yet or had fallen out of favor:

Thrun, the Last Troll

Tree of Redemption

Wurmcoil Engine

Garruk, Primal Hunter

UB Control (Oct 13 – Kayser’s List)

SPELLS	LANDS	SIDEBOARD
1 Geth’s Verdict 1 Psychic Barrier 2 Batterskull 4 Think Twice 1 Army of the Damned 3 Forbidden Alchemy 2 Tribute to Hunger 2 Dismember 1 Negate 4 Dissipate 3 Black Suns Zenith 1 Go for the Throat 1 Doomblade 4 Mana Leak 4 Snapcaster Mage	2 Ghost Quarter 4 Darkslick Shores 4 Drowned Catacombs 7 Island 6 Swamp 4 Inkmoth Nexus	1 Black Sun’s Zenith 1 Tribute to Hunger 3 Flashfreeze 3 Surgical Extraction 4 Phyrexian Crusader 2 Steel Sabotage 1 Ratchet Bomb
33	27	15

I’m surprised to see a U/B list here instead of a W/U list TBH. White has equal power removal in the form of Dismember and DoJ and I think DoJ > BSZ right now because of the “ramp” style strategies being played. Granted, DoJ can’t kill a Thrun, but aside from that 1 card, it just seems so much better! Snapcaster makes a showing as we all knew he eventually would, bringing back lots of removal and counters. 7 card draw spells and 10 counters makes this deck seem like the control decks of yore, preferring to counter instead of respond to a resolved threat. Another thing that I think U/W has going for it is the Moorland Haunt to generate more CA, which this deck doesn’t have. In fact, I don’t really see many ways to win except by Army of the Damned which is really cool, but seems unreliable. But hey, it almost got there, so maybe there’s something I’m missing?

Cards to keep an eye on that haven’t hit the big time yet or had fallen out of favor:

Army of the Damned

Black Suns Zenith

Surgical Extraction

Phyrexian Crusader

Ratchet Bomb

Red Deck Wins (Oct 13 – Tarat’s Deck)

SPELLS	LANDS	SIDEBOARD
2 Volt Charge 3 Koth of the Hammer 3 Arc Trail 3 Incinerate 4 Brimstone Volley 4 Shrine of Burning Rage 2 Grim Lavamancer 2 Spikeshot Elder 2 Hero of Oxid Ridge 4 Stromkirk Noble 4 Stormblood Berserker 3 Chandras Phoenix 2 Gut Shot	19 Mountain 4 Rootbound Craig	1 Hero of Oxid Ridge 1 Arc Trail 4 Vulshok Refugee 2 Perilous Myr 4 Ancient Grudge 3 Traitorous Instinct
37	23	15

This is a fairly different list that what we’ve been seeing lately as it brings back an old favorite… Koth! Volt charge now seems at least decent as it will buff quite a few things in this deck: Koth, Shrine, Noble & Stormblood Berserker making it much more useful than it used to be. Hero of Oxid Ridge is starting to shine because he helps get past annoying 0/13 Trees and Timely Reinforcement tokens.

Cards to keep an eye on that haven’t hit the big time yet or had fallen out of favor:

Koth of the Hammer

Hero of Oxid Ridge

Geist.Dec (Oct 11 – Ipsecmerlin’s Deck)

SPELLS	LANDS	SIDEBOARD
4 Champion of the Parish 2 Gideon’s Lawkeeper 4 Elite Vanguard 4 Grand Abolisher 2 Phantasmal Image 2 Accorder Paladin 4 Mirran Crusader 4 Geist of Saint Traft 4 Angelic Destiny 3 Dismember 2 Oblivion Ring 1 Sword of War and Peace 1 Bonds of Faith	12 Plains 4 Glacial Fortress 4 Seachome Coast 3 Moorland Haunt	4 Negate 3 Revoke Existence 3 Celestial Purge 2 Bonds of Faith 3 Shrine of Loyal Legions
37	23	15

I love this deck, and was hoping it would do well. Looks like a T3 Geist or Crusader into T4 Angelic Destiny will just end the game on its own. The rest of the deck frankly looks terrible and untuned, but that core of the deck is so strong it can just win on its own. I’m also a big fan of the Moorland Haunt, and the fact that the tokens can be repeatedly equipped with a sword or better yet, Destiny. I want to say again how much I HATE dismember and feel it’s the kind of card that warps / ruins formats. W/U decks should not have access to such amazing removal! So if you were wondering if the Geist deck had potential, it does!

Cards to keep an eye on that haven’t hit the big time yet or had fallen out of favor:

Grand Abolisher

Mirran Crusader

Angelic Destiny

Solar Flare (Oct 04 – Styx^’s Deck)

SPELLS	LANDS	SIDEBOARD
3 Snapcaster Mage 2 Phantasmal Image 2 Consecrated Sphinx 1 Sun Titan 1 Sheoldred, Whispering One 2 Unburial Rites 4 Mana Leak 4 Forbidden Alchemy 2 Liliana of the Veil 2 Oblivion Ring 2 Day of Judgement 4 Think Twice 1 Doomblade 2 Dissipate 1 Timely Reinforcements 1 Victim of Night	2 Seachrome Coast 3 Isolated Chapel 3 Darkslick Shores 4 Glacial Fortress 4 Drowned Catacombs 1 Plains 5 Island 3 Swamp 1 Nephalia Drownyard	1 Nephalia Drownyard 1 Liliana of the Veil 1 Oblivion Ring 1 Day of Judgment 1 Dissipate 2 Timely Reinforcements 2 Revoke Existence 2 Celestial Purge 1 Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite 2 Surgical Extraction 1 Dead Weight
34	26	15

I used to play a deck similar to this using Haakon, Stromgald Scourge and Nameless Inversion. Fun times! Another control deck that is getting a lot of attention and although I don’t think this is an optimal build, it gets the point across. Lilliana or Forbidden Alchemy puts a fatty in the grave and you bring them back with Unburial Rites. Lots of counterspells and removal shore up this reanimator variant which shows a LOT of potential in the new standard. Looks a little slow vs. really aggressive decks, but has all the tools in the SB to combat them once we add Timely Reinforcements and Elesh Norn. This deck IS going to show up a lot, so that’s probably why we’re seeing so many surgical extractions kicking around these days.

Cards to keep an eye on that haven’t hit the big time yet or had fallen out of favor:

Day of Judgment

Glacial Fortress

Drowned Catacombs

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So there is a small sample of some of the newer decks that are making appearances at the top tables. I didn’t include decks like: Birthing Pod, U/W Control or any of the “old” decks, as I wanted to spotlight on some of the newer decks that really focused on Innistrad cards. Those favorites of yesterday are still out there, but these are some of the ones you may not have had a chance to face or build yet.

The format still seems very open, so there is LOTS of opportunity to deckbuild! I’m sad that there were no werewolves, but it looks like humans are at least getting a chance to shine (though not in G/W as I’d anticipated). The day to brew is young, and when night DOES finally come, hopefully you’ll have a few Lycanthrope buddies to watch your back! :P

Cheers,

Carl Szalich

Innistrad Check Up / My Buys!

I hope you’ve all been doing your homework and staying current with your Innistrad prices as they develop! I’ve been able to secure a few goodies at the prices that I’d listed in my Innistrad primers:

MYTHICS / RARES

So far I’ve been able to pick up:

GOOD ONES! (93)

17x Parallel Lives

7x Bloodline Keeper
7x Reaper from the Abyss

7x Kessing Wolf Run

8x Moorland Haunt
7x Mentor of the Meek

4x Olivia Voldaren
3x Mayor of Avabruck Foil Promo

4x Mayor of Avabruk

1x Mikaeus, the Lunarch
5x Elite Inquisitor
5x Mindshrieker
5x Laboratory Maniac

4x Gavony Township

4x Stromkirk Noble

OK ONES! (150)

4x Ludevic’s Test Subject

4x Mirror-Mad Phantasm

8X Unbreathing Horde

8x Undead Alchemist

4x Cackling Counterpart

4x Bloodgift Demon

4x Gutter Grime

4x Moldgreff Monstrosity

4x Splinterfright

4x Stont Silence

8x Geist-Honored Monk

12x Instigator Gang

12x Kruin Outlaw

4x Angel of Flight Alabaster

4x Back from the Brink

4x Creeping Renaissance

8x Curse of Stalked Prey

8x Dearly Departed

13x Divine Reckoning

4x Evil Twin

2x Daybreaker Ranger
1x Sturmgeist

5x Charmbreaker Devils

1x Diregraf Ghoul (Uncommon)

13x Kessig Cagebreakers

1x Curse of Stalked Prey (FOIL)

TOTAL: 243 cards purchased

Equivalent to: 243 / 36 = 6.75 boxes (> 1 CASE!)

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That’s right. I bought all that stuff and I’m proud of it! (… Don’t tell my GF!)

LOL if you NEED any of the cards that I’ve listed above, hit me up with a message and we can talk turkey! :P. As you can see, I’m chock-full of Werewolf and Zombie Goodness so far!

Some of the cards I’ve seen picking up heat already are:

Kessig Wolf Run

Stromkirk Noble

Olivia Voldaren

Bloodline Keeper

Moorland Haunt

Mentor of the Meek

These have all gone up in value since my first posts about Innistrad (as I’d predicted) :).

My tip of the week is as follows:

Yes, Werewolves and Zombies don’t seem like they will be tier one decks right now, but there are 2 more blocks to be released. They are pushing tribes HARD in these sets, so I’m SURE that we will be getting more of these creature types in the future. As such, if there is anything that is released that has the potential to make any of these tribes TIER 1 competitive, you can expect the support characters to increase in value. All of the werewolves are poised to see an increase IMHO, but I’m not sold on the Zombies yet since they seem to really be pushing the mill theme which I find weak. The groundwork is set, now we just need those tribes to explode!

TALKBACK!

How has YOUR shopping been going?

Did YOU cash in on cheap Buy-It-Now’s on EBay?

Are you speculating, or buying for decks?

Have fun at your release tournaments, I’ll be at a wedding so will prob miss out on all the fun! :*(

Cheers,

Carl Szalich

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NOTE:

CHRISTINA MARCHIONI & CTRLMJOLLNIR!!

Could you please send me an email to: cszalich@hotmail.com?

I’d like to get you your prizes but your Google profiles have no info ;).

Thanks!