Draft and Deckbuilding
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Sorry, no third match.
Limited Resources: M12 Draft #4
Posted on September 2, 2011 by Limited Resources
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Limited Resources Limited Resources podcast co-host Marshall Sutcliffe provides coverage on North American Magic events and writes for DailyMTG. He educates listeners about limited and heads the highest-prizing clan on MTGO.
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Super unlucky. M12 seems super dynamic now that this control deck can exist, though I suppose it would have folded to the red deck with the minotaurs.
Do please post videos (somewhere, if not here) of some cube drafts once you’ve got them sorted out. I love cubing as well as LR. Go Marsh!
Hey Marshall –
Doom blade vs. sengir vampire. What a crazy pick!
M1G1 – Turn 2 you snap wring fleshed his looter, I feel like I would have offered the looter for elves trade, especially with digger in hand if you need to. There’s very little chance he takes the trade, but nuts and bolts, right? (obv. you wring flesh post combat.)
M1G1 – When he has a griffin rider and we are fairly certain he has a griffin in hand, I’d love to know your thinking on doom blading the 2/1 flier, I feel like I would have held off to try to get the sweet 2 for 1 but maybe I’m just not aggressive enough?
Thanks for losing R1 so I have more time for reading tonight. B-).
In general when I have overrun in my deck I don’t think I’m quite as aggressive as you because I want to hold onto my dudes cuz the more dudes I have the more likely I am to win. Of course, then if I don’t draw overrun I just don’t win because things get stalled out.
Thanks for the mention on the blog! drafthelp.blogspot.com .
And thanks for the great limited resources work.
-Z
More of these! I need them like once a day plz kk thx
Killing Pegasus G1 was definitively suspect…
Thank you for posting love these
I think attacking with Spider into Griffin Rider G1 was probably a mistake. If you attack with just Vampire and Soul, his blocks will leave him with either an irrelevant 1/1 Rider or an Assault Griffin that can’t get past Spider. If he doesn’t block you’re still trading 5 damage for 4 on his crackback and you already have the life lead. Trading the Spider with the Rider kinda just gave him free value.
@cock horse Thanks for the support dude, and I will for sure be doing cube videos once that gets going!
@Zach Orts One of the closer picks I have faced in a while that Doom Blade vs Sengir.. Tough choice! Ya I watched the part where I Wring Fleshed the Looter pre-combat, and I think I actually wanted to keep the elf alive there. After seeing all his 1-toughness guys now though I think I would have been better offering the trade. Agreed that he never blocks anyway, but ya Nuts & Bolts
Thanks again for doing the blog, it’s sweet.
@Mike lol I can talk to the management about doing more videos for you
@Lunco I think it was correct to kill the Pegasus, as it gets me in 2 more damage and presses my advantage vs a mana-screwed opponent. I could just attack with the spider and the soul, he likely doesn’t block, but I miss 2 critical damage and if he bricks on land it puts my in the driver seat to take over. Considering my hand at the time, I think it was correct.
@Malum Thanks for watching
@RWB17 Looking at it now, I wanted to keep the pressure on since I had virtually nothing in hand, but if I can get in for the full 5 damage and leave my spider back, that would have been a better play. I think it’s fairly close and a turning point in the game, but I also think I like your play better. Thanks for the feedback!
Usually I agree with you, but your first pick was horrible.
I had to stop watching, here is my reasoning.
A.) minus Grim Lavamancer, Stingerfling Spider and Overrun are the next 2 best cards in the pack.
B.) Overrun is in fact OVERRATED in this set.
C.) Overrun is committing you to green way to early.
D.) Stingerfling Spider can be splashed whereas Ovverun can’t.
E.) There are a ton of flyers in this set, that Stingerfling stops cold.
F.) Stingerfling is a 2-1.
G.) Since reason a.) You will most likely have a green drafter two seats to your left, screwing you for pack 2.
H.) If you take the Lavamancer your not passing any other red.
I.) Lavamancer = $$$$$.
J.) Green is the worst color in this set.
All of these reasons would lean me towards the Lavamancer, but I do like Stingerfling Spider very much, Overrun is third on the list and its not even close.
@ apricio
I think Overrun is definitely the choice. It’s basically the “I win” card if it resolves. I’ve seen it win too many games for it to be overrated.
Grim Lavamancer on the other hand seems to die more often than it gets to shock in my experience.
Stingerfling is good, but it’s not half the bomb Overrun is!
@apricio @ nate
I agree that I probably would take lavamancer here over overrun (ha!), but the way green is drafted these days (read: not) I think it’s a totally defendable pick because deciding to go green from first pick can frequently get you a super sweet deck since no one wants to do it. I think Marshall defended and explained his pick well, which is really what we want from these vids right? Especially because I’d be taking the lavamancer I’m very happy to see Marshall take the overrun since it’s something I would love to do and I’m happy to see him do it on his dime. Also, even if he didn’t explain his pick sufficiently I think I can speak for everyone (I hope) that it really tilts me when people say “I had to stop watching.” If you don’t want to watch, don’t watch but claiming that you stopped watching merely weakens your credibility in my eyes.
@ nate so lets say you get cut from green ? then what? You waste your first pick? or put together a bad 3 color deck splashing green for overrun?
Also, m12 is far different from m11 where you saw it win many games. There’s more trading and removal than m11. Making its value go down still a good card, but not the pick.
@ zach of course I was gona get the I had to stop watching comment. I did because I was dissapointed in the pick it wasn’t very well explained. It was almost like a young little kid slam-picking a carnage wurm over a doomblade first pick. Also, homework became more productive at this point, because I had lost interest. I believe that if Marshals perogative is to slam the overrun and try to draft a mono g beats, cuz it is very underdrafted, he should proceed to explain why this may not be correct. He could even say lets have some fun with this draft and slam this overrun.
I often-times don’t even watch the games, and just view the drafting itself. therefore I am much more critical of the picks. Taking overrun Is essientiely rolling the dice and asking too much to go your way. Can It? Of course it can. Will it all the time? ABSOLUTELY NOT. consider this situation in a risk vs. reward analysis. You may get rewarded but a high percent of the time a pick like this will blow up in your face.
@apricio – just because it may be true doesn’t mean that you have to say it. It’s like when you’re girlfriend asks you if that shirt makes her look fat, sometimes you don’t say things that might be true simply because they are true.
That is one of those statements that is offensive and unproductive and I think if you want your comments to be taken seriously you’d do better not to say it.
When did magic players turn in to insecure lil girls?
I gave 10 good reasons why.
It was very productive.
Overrun wasn’t in M11, so it wasn’t particularly good there. Definitely agree with that pick; it’s not as if Lavamancer is game-winningly powerful. It’s unusual if you get to activate it twice or more in a game, and while a 2-for-1 is still really good, it doesn’t seem on the same level to me. Bomb > Arc Trail. If you’re talking signals you’re sending, if you take Overrun there is a very good chance that the person next to you takes the Lavamancer over the Spider anyway, so you have a bit of a buffer there. Plus even if the person next to you does go into green (which is unlikely, since everyone hates green in M12), whatever, you’re hosing him in the first and third packs and pack two is why decks have two colours.
Totally agree with Zach regarding the Doom Blade choice in M1G1 – he was making it incredibly clear that he had a griffin in hand, and none of your creatures comes out better off when fighting with a 4/4. Him playing the Pegasus means you could just attack for a few turns with just the spider and the Tormented Soul, wait for him to play the griffin and attack with the Rider, and then blow him out by Doom Blading the griffin and eating his 1/1. This would have resulted in you almost certainly winning that game. You might not have been able to get in with the Bloodrage Vampire for a few turns because of the Pegasus, but you have inevitability with the Tormented Soul, plus you have Overrun in your deck, why do you care if the board gets clogged. My eyebrows shot up a mile at that play, especially because there was so little discussion accompanying it.
I have to agree that the Doom Blade on the Pegasus despite absolutely knowing he had a griffin in hand was odd. Yes, he was *sort* of stuck on mana… he missed a land drop but it’s not like he had to get to six or seven to make the play. He was very likely going to get there way before you finish him with the extra pressure the Doom Blade provided and now when he does get there you’re only answer is to throw away your board.
I think the better play would have been as penix stated, let just bash with the spider and Soul until he plays the griffin then blow him out by blocking the Rider then Doom Blading the griffin.
I’m not a fan of overrun in this set either, I’d take lavamancer in a heartbeat, especially if if the next playable card was going to be green.
I’m also not a fan of Doom Blade over Sengir. Sengir is just better than every other common in the set. He isn’t Mind Control but he is bigger than every other common flier, so he’s great offensively and defensively. If they don’t have an answer he will often take over games, and black has a real weakness in the creature department.
@penix
“Overrun wasn’t in M11, so it wasn’t particularly good there.”
Good call, forgot about this but it was in m10. AND was a bomb there. Also overwhelming stampede was first-pickable in m11 all day.
@apricio
First of all, I don’t think I’m being a little girl here. It’s not my feelings you’re hurting, nor is it probably Marshall’s, but I’m standing up for him because I think it’ll bother him but not enough for him to respond to you.
You did provide 10 points that were very good and excellent discussion. I’m merely pointing out that if you hadn’t had that specific comment they would be viewed much more like a “man” and less like a “lil girl” (your pejoratives, not mine). To me, if someone has enough anger about content that is being provided for free that they are willing to stop watching something just because they disagree with a first pick it sort of makes me not want to take their opinion into consideration. It is my belief that when someone says “I had to stop watching…” that they frequently continue to watch and use it as a instigating statement. I also believe that if you stop watching, you should probably continue watching before you comment. (I’m not encouraging being ROTTY, but I am encouraging having full information before you go and make your post known to the world.)
Could you explain the point in game 1 where you doom blade the pegasus?
Given you’d already put him on a griffin, it seemed like the perfect card to blow him out by doom bladeing his griffin and therefore killing his rider. The only thing you’d potentially lose is a gravedigger, and I’d personally be very happy to trade my gravedigger for the pegasus. I guess if he didn’t trade, then the bloodrage vampire is a little awkward, but I think you’d want to doom blade post-combat at the very least.
The other play I was somewhat surprised by was in game 1 where he had an arbalest elite and you decided to trade off your creatures to clear up the board.
To me the best play seemed to be letting him hold up the 2W mana while developing your own board.
I would have chosen the Lavamancer. Sure it is killed often, but then your opponent spends a removal on it, what else do you want from a 1 mana creature? Overrun is great, but fixes a color, and the third good card in the pack is also green. Surely someone nearby takes it and takes some good green cards from the second pack. Doom Blade over Sengir is also a bad decision, you don’t have enough big guys.
And yeah, Doom Blade on the Pegasus is th worst. If the Pegasus blocks, he kills a Gravedigger, so what?
It seems like you liked to use your Doom Blades early on small creatures when they might have been better served by taking out larger ones later on.
You also liked to clear the board a lot depsite having an overrun. In game 2 (I believe game 2) you traded off a bunch of stuff against an Arbalest Elite, drew into an overrun (called it awkward), and lost to a throne. If you held back there and waited instead of clearing the board, it is likely you could have won with your Overrun.
I definitely disagree with your attack into Azure Mage and Arbalest g1. If you had just attacked with the rhino, he’d have to either trade with Azure Mage + activation (leaving him at 2 + tapped Arbalest), or trade with Arbalest (crysis averted), or chump, which means you win. Attacking with everything made you have nothing after combat and nothing in hand, so yeah, I guess that was the key mistake of the match.
I felt you were offering too many trades with Overrun in your deck; that’s the tactic you should use against a deck with Overrun, so that by the time they draw it, its impact is reduced. You executed the anti-overrun plan on yourself, and sure enough drew Overrun on an empty board.
I also echo the comments that the snap use of Doom Blade on early threats was suspect…I watched the vids yesterday and don’t remember all of the details of those scenarios now so it’s possible that sometimes it was the correct play, but it at least warranted stopping and thinking through. Unless I have a deck loaded with removal, I look for reasons not to cast Doom Blade on a two drop.
All that being said, I’m a big fan of your work and appreciate your videos! Keep it up!
-Some Guy
Thanks for another great draft video! I love watching them! Especially when they’re two-headed, because I love the discussions
One nuts & bolts situation I wanted to bring up:
R1G1 at 9:57:
You attack with the Soul, the Swarm and the Rhino, opponent has Arbalest Elite and Azure Mage and 3 mana up.
Your decision was to clear his entire board and lose everything but the Soul and deal 1 damage in the process.
I believe that attacking with just the Rhino here is a much better move.
It leaves opponent with these options:
- no block (go to one, you have “even more lethal” on the board
- block with Arbalest Elite, shoot, take 1. End result you stil have dealt one damage, and you keep two evasive threats.
- block with both, take no damage but lose both guys. no damage, but whole board gone.
At this point, the Azure Mage does absolutely nothing for your opponent except he can sort of trade for the Rhino damage.
The Arbalest Elite is what holds down your Soul. But in this situation he has to put it in front of the Rhino if he doesn’t want to drop to 1.
So thi seems to be like the perfect opportunity to get the Arbalest Elite out of the way.
Remember: Azure Mage is irrelevant because it doesn’t block either of your evasive guys.
So why bother risking any of your evasive guys to “clear his entire board” when you can just trade the Rhino for the specific part of his board that you care about?
The Swarm he can probably block with any of his flyers (he is UW after all).
The Soul, though, he basically has very few outs to. If you manage to take down the Elite, you put him on “Draw Pacifism in 4 turns or die – less turns if you don’t have a flyer for the Swarm”.
This way you gave him the option to take one last shot at taking out the deadly Soul. He still needed an out to the Swarm, but he is UW, any flyer will do.
What do you think?
One more funny thing, you know that I thought when you decided between Sengir and Doom Blade?
“Put them in the arena!” :-)))))
Man these drafts are incredible quality compared to CF these days. Nice draft too awesome as always keep them coming man