Dr. Jaeckel and Mr. Hyde: Prerelease Spectacular

Scars of Mirrodin is a pretty exciting set for limited play. Since the next PTQ season will be Scars sealed, it will be important for anyone planning to play PTQ's or GP's to become acquainted with the nuisances of the format. Alex Jaeckel brings you his Prerelease report to help you improve your game!




Here is my final decklist:

AJ Build | The Rusty Machete

17 Creatures:  
1 Bleak Coven Vampires
1 Copper Myr
1 Etched Champion
1 Geth, Lord of the Vault
2 Leaden Myr
1 Lumengrid Drake
1 Mariok Reaver
1 Mariok Replica
1 Neurok Invisimancer
1 Neurok Replica
1 Platinum Emperion
1 Precursor Golem
1 Silver Myr
1 Sylvok Replica
1 Snapsail Glider
1 Vedalken Certarch

5 Spells:  
1 Darksteel Axe
1 Instill Infection
1 Tower of Calamities
1 Trigon of Corruption
1 Volition Reins

18 Lands:  
9 Island
8 Swamp
1 Forest

0 Sideboard:  

I knew I was playing black because of Geth but I was thinking about red for a while over blue because
the only card that actually drew me to blue was Volition Reins, which is a bomb btw, and red hat a lot of
decent and good cards including Galvanic Blast. In the end I went with blue because I figured since I was
only playing 4 blue cards anyway the Volition Reins was worth the other worse cards. I also played 18
lands alongside four Myr because my deck really wanted to make it to 8 mana consistently, and it did.

Round 1

I’m pretty sure my first round opponent was in elementary school and he told me it was his first
tournament so the games were not very eventful. He played GWu with Kemba, Kha Regent but because
of his lack of experience, it didn’t do much. Both games were pretty uneventful as I just played dorks
and beat him down with them. I helped him throughout the game and he was pretty good for his age
but I took it 2 – 0.

1-0

Round 2

My opponent was playing mono-green with strata scythe. Game 1 went to the late game and I was able
to abyss him every turn with Tower of Calamities and just beat down. He got out Strata Scythe this game
but I was able to blow it up with Sylvok Replica. Game 2 he got out Strata Scythe again and I couldn’t
deal with it. Game 3 he had a great start with 2 Carapace Forgers with metalcraft early and Strata Scythe
yet again. At one point I blocked his 9/9 Carapace Forger with my Precursor Golem and both tokens and
he decided to deal all the damage to just one, letting my other guy live. I then ripped Sylvok Replica, blew
up his Scythe, and took the game over from there.

2-0

Round 3 against Rich

No offense Rich if you are reading this, but this round was not fun. Both games he got out Venser along
with Skinrender and locked me out of the games. This match was over quickly.

2-1

Round 4

Both games I got Geth out very quickly and my opponent got stuck on lands game 2. The games were
not close. Precursor Golem also played a large part as well. First time drawing Geth all tournament
though. I guess he is good…

3-1

Round 5 against Kai

He does a pretty good job detailing this match from his point of view in his report and I don’t really
remember much so you should look at his. All I have to say is that I misplayed way more than he did
so if I had played better then I still think he would have lost. I did topdeck the Replica to blow up his
Volition Reins when we didn’t mill with Geth but I could just as easily have top decked my Volition Reins
or Platinum Emperion as outs as well and if I had played better earlier I don’t think we would have been
in that situation anyway. Hindsight is 20/20 though. Game 3 I also sided in Memoricide and took out his
Carnifex Demon when it was in his hand so that was pretty saucy.

4-1

Round 6 against Jacob

This was the first (and only) poison deck I played against all tournament. Game one he leads off with
double Plague Stinger and some other random guys, a few with infect but I was able to ramp up into my
late game spells which were just better than his. Game 2 he got out both fliers again as well as Blight
Mamba and I got rid of both fliers but ended up getting 7 or so poison counters. I eventually got an
active Tower of Calamities that Blinding Mage'd his Mamba every turn. I took a little bit of damage from
the creatures he played but eventually drew into my bombs and killed him.

5-1

Round 7 against Alex

ID

My final record was 5-1-1 which put me into Top 8. I don’t remember everyone’s name in the top 8 but
I know there were Rich and Alex. I wanted to split and so did 6 of the other 7 remaining people but Rich
wanted to play so we played.

Top 8

My top 8 opponent really wanted to split and leave so he was on tilt the entire game. Round 1 he mulls
to 6 and gets flooded and I play bombs and win. Game 2 goes much longer. At one point I play Precursor
Golem and he Slice in Twain'd it drawing 3 cards. Awkward… He also has Wormcoil Engine which I
eventually kill with Replica but he regrows it with Razor Hippogriff. I play Platinum Emperion which
makes the game go really long.

I eventually draw Neurok Invisimancer and when I play it making Platinum Emperion unblockable he said
okay right away. Since he was tilting all game I knew that the only reason he would say okay so calmly
was if he had an answer. I didn’t know about dispense justice at that time so I was just worried about a
neck snap card and I didn’t attack. In hindsight I could have attacked with more than 2 creatures but like
I said, I didn’t actually know of that card.

Eventually he played Putrifax and made all my guys block his Tangle Angler so he got through for 5
poison. He then starting proliferating with contagion clasp giving me more poison counters but I had
Volition Reins in hand to steal it. The rest of the game was a complete stalemate and he eventually
drew out his deck. Once he had only a few cards left in his deck he got mad because he didn’t draw his
Argentum Armor earlier. However, I had a bunch of ways to deal with it including taking it with Volition
Reins so it wouldn’t have helped him.

So we got to top 4, Rich lost which I think is funny, but someone else decided they wanted to play it out.

Top 4

I don’t remember much from top 4. Game one I play bombs and kill him. Game 2 he deals with my
bombs and I lose. Game 3 I draw my bombs again. I made a huge amount of mistakes this match. I’m not
saying they were justified but it was late and I was tired and I had a bunch of people watching me which
made me nervous so those definitely contributed a little to them.

The guy who made us play top 4 offered the split. I was going to play it out but I didn’t want to misplay
my way out of the match so I just took the split.

Overall, the prerelease was a little more bomb heavy then I would liked but that is how sealed always
is. Poison doesn’t seem to be too powerful but maybe it will probably be better in draft where you can
draft a bunch of poison dudes and most likely pick them up pretty late. I can’t wait to draft this set.
The fat pack battle is this week so hopefully I will be able to top 8 that as well and bring you all another
report!

Alex Jaeckel