Gatecrash has been out for a couple weeks now, and the general consensus of guild power is as follows:
Orzhov / Boros > Gruul / Simic > Dimir
Poor Dimir. He's the kid in high school gym class that always gets picked last for teams. Sure, he's undoubtedly a weaker pick than that arrogant jock Orzhov, but always last pick? That takes a toll on the ol' self-esteem.
Worse, it gives you folks the impression that Dimir is worse than it actually is. Most "pro player" draft videos are just Borzhov over and over, which gets very Borzhing. You don't get to see the sweet Dimir cards that exist, and yes, they do exist! Cards like Dinrova Horror, Bane Alley Broker, and Call of the Nightwing are bombtastic and super fun to play with.
With so many people staying away from Dimir, you also have a unique opportunity to jump into a color combination that will usually be underdrafted. While most people are fighting over the Borzhov cards, you're getting fed some sweet Dimir stuff. In that case, your fed "weak" guild is definitely going to stomp on some malnourished Borzhov scraps!
So here's where I come in. I've set myself a challenge. I'm going to force Dimir in drafts until I go 2-1 or better two times with the guild.
I only have a couple rules for this challenge:
1) 8-4 drafts only. All my drafts are 8-4, this challenge will be no different. I have a pet peeve when people say things like, "Guys! I discovered this super sweet strategy! Look how successful it is.. in this swiss draft." Nope.
2) Splashing a color is allowed. In fact, I'll almost always splash either white or green. White if I'm going control/mill for more removal, green if I'm going cipher for basically just Elusive Krasis.
3) I'm allowed to raredraft if the card is expensive enough to pay for the majority of my draft. Basically if I see Domri Rade, I'm taking it.
For those that would prefer to hear the details of the challenge in my soothing Barry White voice, you can:
Will this strategy win often? No, of course not. It's never a good idea to force a color combination. Sometimes I'll be lucky and Dimir will be open, other times Dimir will be cut hard and I'll be stuck with the crappiest cards imaginable. But this is for fun and entertainment. I want to show off Dimir decks and see the results. Did this entertain you? Then gimme 5 fireballs up there on the top of this article!
Now, on with the challenge!
Attempt #1: Cipher
Drafting
This was a pretty sweet cipher deck. We have a total of 7 evasive attackers, Shadow Alley Denizen that can make creatures evasive, and Gift of Orzhova that also grants evasion. That's a good number to make our cipher package work, though I quickly learned that Last Thoughts is not main deck material because of how miserable it is against aggro.
The big mistake here was trying to make a Simic splash work for no reason. I took a Mystic Genesis splash over an on-color powerful Sapphire Drake which is a big no-no, and the Shamblesharks are certainly not worth splashing for either. I'm hurting my manabase for very little payoff and it'll cost me in the long run. Seriously, don't do this.
R1 G1:
I had a great hand. Unfortunately, never drawing a fourth land means that great hand doesn't matter.
R1 G2:
My opponent got his lands on time but only managed to cast 3 spells, which is strange. I'm not sure what was going on there.
My deck worked here basically how I hoped it would: evasive beats with cipher backed by counters.
R1 G3
Incredibly close game that ended with me topdecking Rapid Hybridization for the win. Notice how my crappy green splash almost cost me the game with three dead cards in my hand. Also it was a bad opening hand but psh, details.
R2 G1
Probably was a bit too eager to trade my creature. I ended up never seeing another one except for a stupid jellyfish, so the second Hands of Binding that I drew was dead and my opponent proceeded to stomp me with a stream of creatures and removal.
R2 G2
My opener looks very promising until I draw a third 5-drop and a card I can't cast, leaving me with 4 dead cards in hand while my opponent has no trouble casting all his spells and has removal for my two threats. Guess who won.
Closing Thoughts
My sketchy manabase and unfortunate draws led to an early loss. The former has an influence on the latter, however, so in the future I need to be more mindful of my splashes.
The deck itself was a blast though. You should really give Cipher a try. I felt like I was piloting Ninja.dec . I mean, have you seen the artwork for Shadow Slice?
What I learned:
- Don't splash for Shambleshark. Why would you do that?
- Clinging Anemones would be good if it had flying. I feel like it's poop outside of some heavy evolve synergy deck.
- Simic Manipulator always dies before he does anything. Always.
- When going for Cipher, have a evasive beater (carrier) to cipher spell ratio of 2:1.
- Hands of Binding and Call of the Nightwing are the two best Cipher spells. Shadow Slice is third, while Midnight Recovery and Last Thoughts are good sideboard options against slow decks that are low on removal. Paranoid Delusions is bad.
That's all for now. Currently 0-1 on my challenge. I'll be back with more Dimir goodness soon!
"Simic Manipulator always dies before he does anything. Always."
As a guy who has gotten wrecked by Manipulator + Illusionist's Bracers in limited, let me say "not always". Although when it's ME who controls the Manipulator, then sure, always. :)
It's really all about the board state. Sure if you plop it down with nothing else out and your op is playing a typical deck they are going to have something to kill it with. But if you treat it like the combo card it is you will have better success.
It was more of a joke but yeah, don't run it out as your very first threat and you'll get more mileage. On the other hand, Simic Manipulator is different in that you HAVE to play it before most of your other creatures for its mechanic to function.. and it can't activate for an entire turn, so it does limit how you use the thing.
For these reasons I'll probably start taking straight removal over it most picks.
Getting it out with one other drop that evolves it in the same turn is probably enough. Because a 1/2 is a bit harder to kill than a 0/1 and at the same time it doesn't look that offensive until you get a couple counters on it.
I have also been forcing Dimir trying the cypher mill style and i'ts really hard to win with that in mind. I am wondering though if you have made this article a week before it was published because right now I always go against a Dimir guild in my drafts. But I am playing 4-3-2-2 and maybe 8-4 drafters has a different take in gtc drafts.
I started this challenge on monday and the next two drafts for next article were recorded this week. And yes, Dimir feels like it's been quickly rising in popularity. I've only felt like Dimir was underdrafted once, and the other times Boros was underdrafted twice and once Simic. Which is making my challenge more.. difficult.
Glad you're doing these videos, happy to see Dimir getting some love. As for your comments early in the draft I have not had success with the Dimir "mill" deck. The trick is that you don't want to play any only mill cards (except mind grind). All of your mill is coming off incidental value (Grisly spectacle, Balustrade Spy, the Blue Denizen) and then if you stall out you can win the game with undercity informer.
P1P5 - I would not think of Balustrade Spy and the Blue Denizen as "fine, but only in the mill deck." I actually take Balustrade spy here over the cloudfin, just because I've found I'm not reliably evolving him in Dimir.
P1P7 - Definitely just slam the Denizen here. In my experience wer'e not going for the "cipher deck." You want to have a couple cipher cards tops. (And you already have two HoB, which you should be thrilled about and not looking for more cipher cards, really). The Blue denizen is just super solid as a 2/3 for 3.
P2P2 - As I said above... you want that Mind grind. It's the one exception to not wanting to play just "mill" cards. It's a fireball for their deck but better, and you always played that, even without incidental mill, right? Even if you don't believe me and dont' want mind grind, Bane Alley Broker just has to be the pick here.
P2P3 - Again, Death's Approach is not JUST good in mill. It's extremely good with extort, it's good with dinrova horror, it's good with blue denizen, it's good with balustrade spy, it's good with the edict. All cards that you actively want even if you're not all in for mill. It's a totally solid removal spell, I probably still take sapphire drake here but I'm not sure if it's right. Only gotten sapphire drake once and it was totally solid for me.
P2P4 - Yeah, I'm not sure how you can say you're forcing Dimir and then not take the guildmage. He is suuuuuper solid, and he's super solid even as just a grizzly bear! Dimir needs bear, and this guy has some very solid upside. You're looking at him as a mana sink late game to make your blue creatures (with blue denizen on the table) have a kicker of deal x damage to target player, or for your balustrade spies to have kicker, or for an EoT mill 2 to see if you get your Undercity informer closer to winning.
P2P5 - Mindeye Drake is not a mill card! It's a solid guy with mill upside!
P2P6 - As Matt said in his article Slate street ruffian, while being unexciting is not unplayable.
P2P7 - I definitely prefer dimir charm over psychic strike. It kills a lot of relevant stuff, esp. Simic before they get started and Boros.
P3P1 - Definitely prefer guildmage over rogue for reasons stated above.
P3P3 - Corpse Blockade is very important to the dimir deck. Sac outlets are good, and it lets you trade your SADs up if you need to.
P3P6 - Midnight Recovery is much better than Shadow Slice, FWIW.
P3P10 - "The [Keymaster] Rogue doesn't do too much." Except where hands of binding, trigger your blue denizen infinitely, bounce a dinrova horror, bounce a shadow alley denizen (which you have three of) for another extort trigger, get rid of One-Thousand Lashes, Infinitely evolve your simic manipulator...
My thoughts on the draft if those are helpful at all.
Also, I'm not sure if you were joking when you said this: "8-4 drafts only. All my drafts are 8-4, this challenge will be no different. I have a pet peeve when people say things like, "Guys! I discovered this super sweet strategy! Look how successful it is.. in this swiss draft." Nope" But, this is a Pet Peeve of MINE. I'm not sure where people get this idea that the competition in 84s is much higher than the competitoin in Swiss queues. I play exclusively swiss and see my share of good players AND bad players. I watch a lot of draft videos and see equal numbers of good and bad players (on the side of the villain.). I think there are a lot of not very good players with a high budget who play 84s because they can't stand the idea of "not being able to make their money back." People who buy into the logical fallacy are PROBABLY not going to be very good at magic... and I see a lot of people spouting this theory online. I'm not saying the competition in Swiss is easily the same as in 84 queues, but I don't understand where the assumption comes from that Swiss must be much softer queues than 84s.
I love your added input on the subject of the Dimir guild I might try doing a draft later to see how much of improvement your input could help me. I don't really think that doctor_anime is saying that people in swiss are softer magic players though. I believe he is saying that because winning in a single elimination game is harder and a better challenge. especially in 8-4 ques.
For picks, I'm not going to rewatch the entire draft to see where I agree/disagree, but I'm definitely in agreement with most of what you say. If you check out my latest drafts (next article to be published, Attempt #3 in particular is my most recent one because I accidentally published that one in the wrong order) you'll see we're closer in pick priority.
As for 8-4 drafts vs. swiss and "better" players.. honestly I have no empirical evidence one way or another, but my personal opinion is that swiss queues generally have worse competition than 8-4 drafts. Not that you won't find bad players in 8-4, you totally do, but I felt I was much more likely to be fed in swiss or be paired up with someone who made big mistakes. I think this is because 8-4 is known as the "skilled" queue and that scares away less confident/skilled players. To me, it makes perfect sense that a beginner would pick swiss to start in because making errors is not punished so severely (8-4 is elimination). In fact, that was my exact thought process when I started drafting, and when I talk to people at my LGS about online queues they agree that swiss is "beginner-friendly".
Again, only my opinion, no statistics to back it up. Nor do I want to belittle anyone who prefers swiss for whatever reason. My comment addresses people who sensationalize a new deck / draft archetype but their matches are all recorded in Tournament Practice where, yes, competition IS lower than something like a Daily Event. I drew the parallel to drafting and swiss vs. 8-4, that's all.
I think it would be a pretty awesome article if someone could do some research on the subject and see if rating (our only available measurement of skill) correlates to queue types. Maybe an Ars Arcanum on the subject?
Anyway, thanks for the suggestions, and lemme know what you think about the next one!
9 Comments
"Simic Manipulator always dies before he does anything. Always."
As a guy who has gotten wrecked by Manipulator + Illusionist's Bracers in limited, let me say "not always". Although when it's ME who controls the Manipulator, then sure, always. :)
It's really all about the board state. Sure if you plop it down with nothing else out and your op is playing a typical deck they are going to have something to kill it with. But if you treat it like the combo card it is you will have better success.
It was more of a joke but yeah, don't run it out as your very first threat and you'll get more mileage. On the other hand, Simic Manipulator is different in that you HAVE to play it before most of your other creatures for its mechanic to function.. and it can't activate for an entire turn, so it does limit how you use the thing.
For these reasons I'll probably start taking straight removal over it most picks.
Getting it out with one other drop that evolves it in the same turn is probably enough. Because a 1/2 is a bit harder to kill than a 0/1 and at the same time it doesn't look that offensive until you get a couple counters on it.
I have also been forcing Dimir trying the cypher mill style and i'ts really hard to win with that in mind. I am wondering though if you have made this article a week before it was published because right now I always go against a Dimir guild in my drafts. But I am playing 4-3-2-2 and maybe 8-4 drafters has a different take in gtc drafts.
I started this challenge on monday and the next two drafts for next article were recorded this week. And yes, Dimir feels like it's been quickly rising in popularity. I've only felt like Dimir was underdrafted once, and the other times Boros was underdrafted twice and once Simic. Which is making my challenge more.. difficult.
Glad you're doing these videos, happy to see Dimir getting some love. As for your comments early in the draft I have not had success with the Dimir "mill" deck. The trick is that you don't want to play any only mill cards (except mind grind). All of your mill is coming off incidental value (Grisly spectacle, Balustrade Spy, the Blue Denizen) and then if you stall out you can win the game with undercity informer.
P1P5 - I would not think of Balustrade Spy and the Blue Denizen as "fine, but only in the mill deck." I actually take Balustrade spy here over the cloudfin, just because I've found I'm not reliably evolving him in Dimir.
P1P7 - Definitely just slam the Denizen here. In my experience wer'e not going for the "cipher deck." You want to have a couple cipher cards tops. (And you already have two HoB, which you should be thrilled about and not looking for more cipher cards, really). The Blue denizen is just super solid as a 2/3 for 3.
P2P2 - As I said above... you want that Mind grind. It's the one exception to not wanting to play just "mill" cards. It's a fireball for their deck but better, and you always played that, even without incidental mill, right? Even if you don't believe me and dont' want mind grind, Bane Alley Broker just has to be the pick here.
P2P3 - Again, Death's Approach is not JUST good in mill. It's extremely good with extort, it's good with dinrova horror, it's good with blue denizen, it's good with balustrade spy, it's good with the edict. All cards that you actively want even if you're not all in for mill. It's a totally solid removal spell, I probably still take sapphire drake here but I'm not sure if it's right. Only gotten sapphire drake once and it was totally solid for me.
P2P4 - Yeah, I'm not sure how you can say you're forcing Dimir and then not take the guildmage. He is suuuuuper solid, and he's super solid even as just a grizzly bear! Dimir needs bear, and this guy has some very solid upside. You're looking at him as a mana sink late game to make your blue creatures (with blue denizen on the table) have a kicker of deal x damage to target player, or for your balustrade spies to have kicker, or for an EoT mill 2 to see if you get your Undercity informer closer to winning.
P2P5 - Mindeye Drake is not a mill card! It's a solid guy with mill upside!
P2P6 - As Matt said in his article Slate street ruffian, while being unexciting is not unplayable.
P2P7 - I definitely prefer dimir charm over psychic strike. It kills a lot of relevant stuff, esp. Simic before they get started and Boros.
P3P1 - Definitely prefer guildmage over rogue for reasons stated above.
P3P3 - Corpse Blockade is very important to the dimir deck. Sac outlets are good, and it lets you trade your SADs up if you need to.
P3P6 - Midnight Recovery is much better than Shadow Slice, FWIW.
P3P10 - "The [Keymaster] Rogue doesn't do too much." Except where hands of binding, trigger your blue denizen infinitely, bounce a dinrova horror, bounce a shadow alley denizen (which you have three of) for another extort trigger, get rid of One-Thousand Lashes, Infinitely evolve your simic manipulator...
My thoughts on the draft if those are helpful at all.
Also, I'm not sure if you were joking when you said this: "8-4 drafts only. All my drafts are 8-4, this challenge will be no different. I have a pet peeve when people say things like, "Guys! I discovered this super sweet strategy! Look how successful it is.. in this swiss draft." Nope" But, this is a Pet Peeve of MINE. I'm not sure where people get this idea that the competition in 84s is much higher than the competitoin in Swiss queues. I play exclusively swiss and see my share of good players AND bad players. I watch a lot of draft videos and see equal numbers of good and bad players (on the side of the villain.). I think there are a lot of not very good players with a high budget who play 84s because they can't stand the idea of "not being able to make their money back." People who buy into the logical fallacy are PROBABLY not going to be very good at magic... and I see a lot of people spouting this theory online. I'm not saying the competition in Swiss is easily the same as in 84 queues, but I don't understand where the assumption comes from that Swiss must be much softer queues than 84s.
I love your added input on the subject of the Dimir guild I might try doing a draft later to see how much of improvement your input could help me. I don't really think that doctor_anime is saying that people in swiss are softer magic players though. I believe he is saying that because winning in a single elimination game is harder and a better challenge. especially in 8-4 ques.
For picks, I'm not going to rewatch the entire draft to see where I agree/disagree, but I'm definitely in agreement with most of what you say. If you check out my latest drafts (next article to be published, Attempt #3 in particular is my most recent one because I accidentally published that one in the wrong order) you'll see we're closer in pick priority.
As for 8-4 drafts vs. swiss and "better" players.. honestly I have no empirical evidence one way or another, but my personal opinion is that swiss queues generally have worse competition than 8-4 drafts. Not that you won't find bad players in 8-4, you totally do, but I felt I was much more likely to be fed in swiss or be paired up with someone who made big mistakes. I think this is because 8-4 is known as the "skilled" queue and that scares away less confident/skilled players. To me, it makes perfect sense that a beginner would pick swiss to start in because making errors is not punished so severely (8-4 is elimination). In fact, that was my exact thought process when I started drafting, and when I talk to people at my LGS about online queues they agree that swiss is "beginner-friendly".
Again, only my opinion, no statistics to back it up. Nor do I want to belittle anyone who prefers swiss for whatever reason. My comment addresses people who sensationalize a new deck / draft archetype but their matches are all recorded in Tournament Practice where, yes, competition IS lower than something like a Daily Event. I drew the parallel to drafting and swiss vs. 8-4, that's all.
I think it would be a pretty awesome article if someone could do some research on the subject and see if rating (our only available measurement of skill) correlates to queue types. Maybe an Ars Arcanum on the subject?
Anyway, thanks for the suggestions, and lemme know what you think about the next one!