For the 30th episode of Simon Says, I recorded the Top 8 draft of one of the popular 64-player Return to Ravnica release event drafts. For those interested to see how I got there, I included a short discussion of my Selesnya deck from the first draft, followed by commentated replays of my first three matches. After you have watched these, join me as I draft for the second time and then face the remaining competition.
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Nice first place!
Congratulations, and thanks for another set of quality draft videos.
Why do the videos now all pause and screw up about 5-10 seconds from the end every time, can someone look into this plz
Thank you!
15 damage on it and still not enough to kil mighty guard.
I have problems with the videos as well. They sometimes break down at some point, and then I can’t fast forward past the point where it breaks down either. The point where it breaks down varies every time I restart the video, and sometimes it doesn’t break down at all. I have the problem both when watching on this site and when watching the youtube link.
I also have problems with the full screen when watching your vids on youtube. If I don’t use my mouse for a few seconds the video goes to ‘fuller’ screen hiding my mouse and the progress bar (as it should). But then immediately it goes back to showing my mouse and the bar again and the buffering of the video restarts so the video hiccups. So I have to either constantly jiggle my mouse or the video hiccups every few seconds.
Again, this problem doesn’t occur every time, so I solve it by just restarting the vid until neither problem occurs.
By the way I am not complaining, I appreciate the videos even with technical difficulties. I just hope input can be of help. And at least there are way less problems then at channel fireball.
Also, I actually like commenting while watching replays instead of commenting while playing. This lets you concentrate better on both playing and commenting. Am i part of a minority with this opinion?
That final game was awesome. That might get the record for most devastating plays in under one minute. Brutal.
Thank you for the videos.
Your dry comment on losing the flip in m3g2 had me laughing out loud!
Big fan of your vids, keep them coming!
That final game could not have ended any better. Kill his entire board, then top deck that enchantment for part two of the blowout.
I haven’t watched the final games yet, but it seems like including a card because it combos well with Collective Blessing isn’t a great reason. If you have that card out you don’t need even more advantage most of the time.
Nice video, thx.
Great Games. Congratulations on winning the event.
In Round 2, I would have sided out the Chorus of Might, because it seemes to expensive against a deck with bounce-effects. Probably would have played the Swift Justice or even the Rootborn Defenses instead. Rootborn Defenses seems to be a legitimate answer to Ethereal Armor on Stealer of Secrets, though it is bad against bounce spells, because you can’t reliable populate.
In Round 3, Game 2, it was kind of funny to see you struggeling between sacrificing the Volatile Rig or not and then taking over the game because of losing the flip. Amazing!
However, I don’t get how your opponent could have won the game, even if you didnt manage to clear his board.
To those discussing the video player– Yes, I’ve noticed similar problems, but they only occur on occasion for me, and they occur for me on other Youtube videos, as well.
Since I think the problem lies with Youtube, I’m not sure I can offer a particular fix for it right now (though we should all rejoice at the fact that you don’t have to watch a 30 second ad again every time the vids hiccup). However, I’ll check into alternative player options that are feasible.
When watching other Youtube videos, what I (sadly) have to do when this problem starts occurring is that I keep my mouse pointer over the video quality setting, and switch the video quality immediately when I start to notice the video choking. This refreshes with a different resolution and keeps the video going. I should be clear, though, that this is just a jerry-rigged method for circumventing the problem; I’m not offering it as a solution, nor am I suggesting that it’s fair to ask you to have to do this.
Keep letting us know when you have problems.
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And yes, the best part of these videos is that “lost” coin flip that completely wrecks the opponent’s board position.
I still have to get used to a format where you can (and often must) play so many combat tricks.
Congratulations on the win, by the way!
Awesome videos, really enjoyed them
@Jack: Without more than 1 creature it’s just a singular +3/+3 for 6 though. Your deck still needs to facilitate to it for it to be any good. This deck seemed just about flexible enough to make it a blowout every time it got played.
That rig flip at the end was gold. Also, 24 packs is so sweet.
I also have probs with youtube vids (including the ones here) hanging for a sec now and then (occasionally they just hang and don’t restart without intervention) – but while it is a pain in the butt, another solution that works for me is simply to pull the progress bar back very slightly which seems to remind it to resume buffering ahead as it goes. I assume this is probably giving it the same sort of kick in the rear as changing resolution and guess it is probably just another method to do the above.
Meanwhile… great vids and congratulations on the victory, Simon! Your first deck was amazing, 2nd one didn’t seem as strong on paper, but it obviously performed really well!
I agree with Joost. Replays would also cut down on the video time. this way the editor is able to skip lengthly thinking sessions and what not.
Guys saying replays are better are WAY OFF.
Replays are terribly boring to watch, there’s no drama or thought process going on, everything is just analysis of what they did. May as well go back to written game reports.
Also people complaining about the youtube problems are diluting it with irrelevant crap. The only actual problem is hanging at the last 5-10 seconds, not full screen problems or other youtube only related stuff.
Great videos, some really entertaining games and good commentary.
I like live commentary much better, as we hear more of the reasoning rather than just a list of plays.
While we’re getting picky about the video player, I don’t like how the clicking anywhere on the screen surrounding your lightbox closes the video. I’m often moving between tabs while watching/listening to the videos, and sometimes accidentally close it.
@ Robin: Just click on the Youtube button and watch the video on Youtube. I always click the window away too and that’s simple yet effective solution.
Awesome couple of drafts there, congrzts!
However, there was a place where I think you misjudegd a play or two:
the last game of the third match in the first draft – it was approaching the end of the game, he was attacking with a million bird tokens and his two 8/8 vigilance tokens. You were facing the choice of either casting only the fog + populate spell (which means you don’t take damage and eat a couple of birds), or casting both the fog + populate and the indestructable + populate. You eventualy decided to go for the former option which I think is a mistake, given that you had the oppertunity to also eat his two 8/8 creatures if you would have cast the rootborn defenses that same turn. You later did go for the “kill the 8/8s with rootborn defenses” play, only a couple turns later, which is not quite as good since you lost 2 turns which you could have used to attack with at least some of your creatures.
Also, right after he attacks with all of his birds, at your very next turn, you are staring at a board where by simply attacking with all of your creatures you can kill him because he dosen’t have enough blockers – now, I understand that you might want to play cautiously, but you should at least consider trying to win right away.
Congrats! These were one of my favourite videos i’ve watched. You played so well, dodging every single attempt from the opponents to two-for-one you and luring them into traps yourself. Very tight play, good card evaluation, interesting commentating – i’m very glad you won!
Both live and replay commentating have their merits – live may be slightly more dramatic, but replay is infinitely more time preserving. Personally, i didn’t even find replays to be any less dramatic.
Keep being the best!
Nice draft. Well played! Pretty boring that you went GW both drafts but it was by far the best deck being passed to you and collective blessings counts as a bomb. I disagreed with basically none of your picks.
Simon does your win mean you get an invite to another special event?
awesome
wow… just plain wow.
Thanks so much for recording this. I definitely learned a lot about who to draft and play Selesnya in this format. I actually didn’t mind watching the replays of rounds 1 to 3. Particularly since you made the top 8 and there was still a whole draft and 3 rounds to watch.
I think you made some mistakes in round 1 of the top 8. Basically, you keep creatures back to block when you weren’t really playing around anything relevant.
On the whole, great play during all the rounds. I think this really goes to show how powerful these combat tricks are in the hands of a skilled player.
pick 18 call of the conclave, pick 19 selesnya guildmage…
wonder why i never get to draft with idiots
Nicely played but, well, they just threw the cards at you !
Top 8 out of a 64-player event are not what I would call idiots! Simon has even mentioned before that when playing with such high-caliber players they are very focused on what they are drafting and you end up with 8 of the best decks ever seen from one draft. By pack 3 everyone has settled on their decks and their guilds, so unless they are going to hate draft good cards from other guilds, you are going to get passed preemo stuff if you read and made the right signalling in packs 1 and 2!
Simon, what a difference between your RTR draft from last week and this week! Wow, just wow! Would you mind sharing how much RTR you played inbetween these two RTR drafts for which you have videos up? If you play these for someone with the sound off, there is no way anyone would guess they are the same player.
I can’t wait to see Marshall’s next RTR video! He also had a pretty sketchy first outing in his first RTR draft video! Can’t wait to see how much he has improved.
Hats off to you, Simon. I can see why you have the ranking you have and are the one to be teaching the rest of us!
@knx
Seriously, never seen the bomb Selesnya uncommons go later than pick 2. Seems like everyone knows it’s the best archetype, and value call of the conclave and the guildmage as though they were bomb mythics (they basically are). Guess that isn’t always true though!
@Simon
The deck was absolutely disgusting, in a good way. I was a little curious as to why you didn’t play the gatecreeper vine and two axebane guardians though. I will always play those cards in my selesnya decks, because they are almost always mana hungry with cards like coursers accord and, most importantly, the guildmage. You were even running horncaller’s chant, which is a card I generally only include when I have multiple axebanes. That said, I usually splash a little black so the fixing aspect has utility, and I can’t argue with results!
Thanks for the videos. Great to watch!
To all the people having trouble with YouTube. I have the same problem sometimes, and after some research, have found that it’s a memory problem. Restarting your computer will prevent the problem from resurfacing for a while.
Thank you very much for sharing such an entertaining and high quality tournament.
That last game was so very epic.
Contrary to some, I didn’t mind the first three games being only replays. It added variation, being a quick way to get us up to speed with the first few games and allowed you point out a few play mistakes/ different choices that you could have made. Also cutting the content length by an hour or so makes it less of a marathon to watch.
Congrats again and I hope your luck continues.
Will we see you in the Release Championship event on Saturday?
Why on earth would you play the guildgates?
Are you looking for a way to lose? there were so many scenarios in those matches where the guildgate severely would have weakened your curve or straight up lost the game for you. There is absolutely no need for the effect that the land gives you either mana. All it does is being a land which has a huge drawback and basically no upside.
Wow, you gave us two drafts for the price of one this week — what a deal!
Seriously fun stuff. I love having both the replay and live action formats as well. I think I tend to like the live action better so that I can “listen in” to your thought process in the moment, but I appreciate mixing it up with the replay commentary as well. Your work is much appreciated, Simon! And congrats on the back-to-back winning!