Well, I decided to do a prerelease sealed event on MODO even though it is negative EV over the release events (check the prize structure and entry fee ratio). I forgot to save a screenshot of the sealed pool but since it's the only M11 product I have here is what I opened. Be ready to be amazed at this SICK pool:
[deck=Cannot Lose Ever]
White
1 Ajani's Pridemate
1 Angelic Arbiter [R]
1 Armored Ascension
2 Blinding Mage
1 Celestial Purge
1 Condemn
1 Elite Vanguard
1 Holy Strength
1 Knight Exemplar [R]
1 Mighty Leap
2 Pacifism
1 Palace Guard
1 Safe Passage
1 Silence [R]
1 Silvercoat Lion
1 Solemn Offering
2 Squadron Hawk
2 Tireless Missionaries
Blue
1 AEther Adept
1 Augury Owl
1 Call to Mind
1 Cancel
1 Clone [R]
1 Harbor Serpent
2 Jace's Erasure
1 Jace's Ingenuity
1 Preordain
1 Scroll Thief
1 Sleep
2 Tome Scour
Black
1 Blood Tithe
1 Bloodthrone Vampire
2 Corrupt
1 Duress
2 Liliana's Specter
1 Mind Rot
1 Quag Sickness
1 Rise from the Grave
2 Rotting Legion
3 Unholy Strength
Red
1 Act of Treason
1 Berserkers of Blood Ridge
1 Bloodcrazed Goblin
1 Chandra Nalaar [MR]
2 Goblin Balloon Brigade
1 Goblin Piker
2 Goblin Tunneler
1 Incite
1 Volcanic Strength
Green
2 Brindle Boar
2 Cultivate
1 Dryad's Favor
1 Duskdale Wurm
1 Garruk's Companion
2 Garruk's Packleader
1 Giant Growth
2 Hunter's Feast
1 Naturalize
1 Nature's Spiral
2 Plummet
1 Primal Cocoon
1 Sylvan Ranger
Artifact
1 Dragon's Claw
1 Kraken's Eye
1 Ornithopter
Land
1 Dragonskull Summit [R]
[/deck]
Alright, first thing you realize is that 3 out of the 6 rares are unplayable in sealed. Chandra is one of the best cards for limited in the set, and Angelic Arbiter's ability is useless but it's still a 5/6 flier. Clone is also playable in almost every blue deck. Then you take a look at the colors. White is pretty decent even though I didn't get a single common flier, which is what makes white the best color in the set. Double Blinding Mage, double Pacifism, Condemn, and Armored Ascension are all good. Now we have to pick my second color. Black has double Corrupt, double Specter, Quag Sickness, and Rise. I could play both Rotting Legions if I have to but I don't think it's worth it. The blue has good card draw and an Adept and then I have about 5 creatures in my deck and will never win a game. Red has Chandra. Ugh this doesn't look good. Green has a couple Packmasters and a Duskdale Wurm at the least. Double Cultivate will help a splash, but splashing doesn't look appealing with this build. W/G is pretty obvious but the deck lacks playables. Here's what I went with:
[deck=Awful]
1 Angelic Arbiter [R]
1 Armored Ascension
2 Blinding Mage
1 Condemn
1 Elite Vanguard
1 Knight Exemplar [R]
1 Mighty Leap
2 Pacifism
1 Palace Guard
1 Safe Passage
2 Cultivate
1 Duskdale Wurm
1 Garruk's Companion
2 Garruk's Packleader
1 Giant Growth
1 Naturalize
1 Nature's Spiral
1 Sylvan Ranger
1 Chandra Nalaar [MR]
2 Mountain
8 Plains
7 Forest
[/deck]
I'm splashing Chandra because all I need to hit is one Cultivate to get her going and she's just that strong. I could also splash Clone off one Island but that doesn't have much power. I am forced to play cards I normally don't want to play because I have no playables, such as Elite Vanguard, Knight Exemplar (as a 2/2 first strike for 3), Nature's Spiral, Naturalize (though reasonable in this format). The deck only has four good beaters and three less efficient ones for a total of seven attackers. Makes me nervous in any format.
First round I played a guy with the nuts sealed pool, obviously. G1 he played Garruk on four but all it did was make one 3/3, then he played Liliana on five and all it did was make me discard a card. Both times I had Blinding Mage and dudes. Then he managed to find his removal and used Diabolic Tutor to search up Grave Titan. Oh and it's foil. Yeah I lost that game. The next game I managed to win because I sided in Dryad's Favor and he had no outs. He was now bragging in chat how he also opened Foil Jace Beleren and foil Day of Judgment. G3 he opens with T4 Obstinate Baloth (oh more rares!) and he has double Gravedigger for it when I manage to kill it twice, which he does instead of recurring Gravedigger. He also had Deathmark as the only way to kill my Arbiter so he just had more creatures and I obviously lost.
R2 I played against a three color deck and even though I had Chandra in all three games I still lost 1-2 because he had superior creatures. He was jund I think, he had Bolts and Howling Banshees for sure but I can't remember the other color. Well actually I can't remember this match that much and I'm too lazy to check MODO.
There you have it, a way to lose 30 tix and not even make 5 tix back in value. If anyone needs any pointers I'll be happy to help...
Why can't I open good sealed pools?
5 comments:
Angelic Arbiter's ability is in no way dead, sometimes you just win the game because your opponent can't attack into you because they can't use combat tricks.
Fair enough, didn't think about that. But my pool was still terrible.
I get what you're saying about Arbiter's ability being useless in sealed. But it's really great for making your opponent forget about it's ability and then losing the game because of it.
In was in a match against G/W where I was beating him down with the Arbiter and he was obviously on a short clock. He was trying to set up his ground forces against my ground forces for an alpha strike, as it was his only chance. On his turn when he was at 4, he speed-tapped out an Awakener Druid (and an attack-eligible 4/5 forest) and typed "GG". Meanwhile I'm laughing ass off at the dramatic pause where he's trying to figure out why the game skipped his combat step. About 30 seconds later he goes, "FML" and concedes.
Ok, I take that back. He didn't lose the game because of its ability, he lost because it was a 5/6 flyer. But it still was funny to me.
Yes, your pool was weak. Friends don't let friends play in pre-release events on MTGO.
I would like to exchange links with your site rustymachete.blogspot.com
Is this possible?
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