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By: MarcosPMA, nn
Apr 13 2017 12:00pm
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Hello and welcome to another edition of Sealed Success!  We're back!!  It took me a little longer than I wanted to get my new laptop but now that we're here, we're not going anywhere.  In case you didn't know, my old laptop was a Dell Inspiron 1545, a laptop on its second hard drive and approaching 10 years since its release.  With 3 GB memory and an integrated chip as part of its graphics drive, it wasn't suitable anymore to do what I needed it to do: play and record Magic Online.  Besides, they've stopped updating Windows 7, so my laptop was pretty much going to be obsolete sooner rather than later.  Now I'm using an HP Pavilion 15 with a NVIDIA GeForce 940 graphics drive and 12 GB of memory.  Much faster and smoother to use than the Dell.  

Now that we're back I have some catching up to do, but there's only so much I can do.  Here's what is on the docket for this week and next week:

  • Modern Masters Draft #2, Aether Revolt Sealed League #4 videos, Aether Revolt Sealed League #5 videos
  • Aether Revolt Draft #9, Aether Revolt Sealed League #4 videos, Aether Revolt Sealed League #5 videos, Amonkhet Sealed Set Review

I wanted to wrap up Aether Revolt Limited before the set review but I felt that it was more than I was willing to work on for a short turn around so I decided that I'll wrap up Aether Revolt Limited and do the set review at the same time.  It's not the best way to do it, but the circumstances dictate that I do it as such.  With all that said, let's begin!

Modern Masters 2017 Draft #2

As it goes when you force an archetype, it may not always be open so you're taking an inherent risk by not going with the flow and letting the draft develop naturally.  You see this idea in fruition in this draft as I once again attempt to play 5 color in a draft pod that was not very friendly towards it.  I didn't see the good multicolored cards early enough to make my deck powerful enough to overcome the inconsistencies it will have.  Instead I had to pick middling creatures of any color just to make sure I had cards to play with in my maindeck.  I didn't get to play with Mist Raven or Dinrova Horror, both cards I like in a 5 color deck in this format.

Despite the mediocre draft I had a chance at pulling out a 2-1 and for a moment it looked like I could have, but victory left me and I had to settle for a 1-2.  The payoff for 5 color is fun and not necessarily win percentage.  If you were interested in solely winning, reading the draft and avoiding 5 color is the best way to go about it.  However, if you're looking to maximize fun when you're having to pay a lot for what might be very little gain, 5 color is the way to go.  Modern Masters 2017 is gone now, and I hope Amonkhet draft is fun enough to help ease the loss of a good format.

Aether Revolt Sealed League #4

We ended the first three matches at a 2-1 record, and it turns out we ran back that record to finish the first six matches at 4-2.  We have a pretty strong R/B deck thanks to all the removal we have and (Herald of Anguish) at the top of our curve.  Interaction and bombs are vital in having a good sealed deck and we definitely have it here.  That isn't to say that the deck is perfect.  The curve is high and the removal can be a bit clunky if we're on the back foot or stuck on a few lands.  With this deck it's important to have a board state early so you can make the removal at 4 mana be less clunky as you're playing the games.  The deck can go a little longer than some aggro decks, but not too much longer.  The longer the game goes the less favored this deck is (on average).  Still, we have a strong deck and have a good shot at 3-0 or 2-1 in the last three matches.

Aether Revolt Sealed League #5

When I first loaded up this league I hadn't remembered what the pool looked like, so I was scared that it would be unplayable garbage.  While it wasn't unplayable garbage, it wasn't good either.  Each of the three decks I had built were mostly splashing the second color as opposed to fully playing it, so it felt that I would be playing a mostly mono black deck no matter what.  I eliminated white and red before settling in with green, but I'm not sure if that's the correct decision.  I'm not sure what the correct thing to do here is to begin with.  All the "splash" colors seem bad because there's only one or two cards I'm actually interested in playing.  It also doesn't help that I have very little early action and no bombs other than (Aethersphere Harvester).  Now, (Aethersphere Harvester) is a good card but you need something beefier in case it gets dealt with and that's something I don't have. Since the removal I have is a little clunky it feels bad having to use something like (Chandra's Revolution) on a (Ghirapur Osprey) because I don't have something leaner to use.

I'm down 0-2 in the hole, but I should actually be 1-1 since I threw game 3 of round 2 away by not using (Rush of Vitality) on (Fen Hauler) to keep me from dying to the counterswing.  I thought that using it on (Aetherstream Leopard) would be enough, but I didn't do that math and realized that I would be taking 8 on my opponent's turn while I could have gone up to 9 life if I had made the right play.  I won't give any excuses for that one, it was just a straight punt.  Now at 0-2 I need to win out in order to get my money back, so here's hoping we can do that.  Hopefully we'll draw and cast (Aethersphere Harvester) every time on turn 3!

Conclusion

Bit of a rusty start coming back to Aether Revolt Limited, but we should be good to go to finish up Aether Revolt as we head into the set review for Amonkhet.  Amonkhet seems like an interesting set with a lot of moving parts going into the draft and sealed environment, but that's something we'll unpack next week in the set review.

If you have any comments, questions, or concerns leave them in the comments section below.  You can subscribe to my YouTube channel here where I post videos for the column a few days in advance, plus I have exclusive content to the channel such as Commander videos and pickup games with Modern Storm.

Thanks for reading/watching!