Rainbow Angels Attack!

OK - a very short write up of our latest casual games day at Digital Dragons in Lichfield.  Only 6 players, which was less than I'd hoped for and kept us at three rounds plus possible play off action (which was cancelled - see later).

Round 1 was me Vs Paul the shop owner and was a fairly lacklustre affair seeing me loose out as I didn't really see the right parts of the angel deck.  Playing the shop owner while customers are about is always dangerous (but means we have a 'floater' that can jump in to make even numbers and is better than a bye).  We mostly talked toot about the events and the cards we had.  Due to retail happenings I conceded as time was called.  Then I spent a good 30 mins hovering over the one remaining game that was still on it's game 1.  It seems the elves had spawned all their mana producers and Birthing Pod couldn't break through!  Eventually (ironically as I put them on turns) Pod missed a combat trick and Elves found their Ezuri to break through for the win.

Round 2 saw me against the Birthing Pod.  I expected to loose badly to this Event Deck++ after stalling in round 1, but I seemed to nail the starting hand with a mix of lands and a few angels for when I got there.  And then I got to reveal the secret reason for wanting to play my Angels - the oversized promo cards!

Hooray - Sigarda, Host of Herons hits the board and grows too!  As the keen player may have spotted my opponent is a little mana screwed here.  Infact the only play he did have was a turn 4 Skinrender whose only legal target was itself! (oops) This was a far cry from both of our last games and didn't really show off the cards I'd suggested for the pod deck so we rushed to game two.

This happened in game two - double mythic promo angelic action!  I started with Giesela in hand and Double Abundant growth followed by Scroll of Avacyn was ripping through my deck to find what I needed to get her into play.  The pod was racing me handily, but doom-bladed my life linker angel on the turn before I dropped the Blade of Goldenight teaching the important lesson to wait with your instants!  My pod buddy was very nice about the 20 in the air that ensued, but we didn't get chance for a game 3 as the Elves had caused a massive rout on the other table lining them up to fight the mono white humans deck that one of the local players had got.

My game 3 was another slow affair against the other local player with his white Angels & Humans deck - we were both grinding out and playing similar cards (I did loose my Bruna, Light of Alabaster a little too hastily to try to trade) until the White Mikeaus started to get going.  This caused me to loose very slowly indeed as I found all my mana guys and BOTH birds of Paradise that I put in to ease the lack of white that side-boarding all the dual lands caused.  After many turns of not doing much he finally got big enough to be close -then silent departured all my guys - nooooo!  That was a 1-0 loss that put me at the bottom of the standings, but with a big smile on my face.

During the last round a family came in with two small boys and after sheepishly watching a few games decided to make their first ever Magic purchase in the Venser Vs Koth Duel decks (that I'd been tempted to pick up earlier but resisted due to all the Planechase goodies).  This was during my match so out of respect I didn't leave it to go and advise.  They did pop back in later to complete the purchase and pick up boxes and sleeves too - so I rushed over and found them some of the promo cards from the Gateway things we had so they had a Gather The Townsfolk and a Nearheath Stalker to add to their collections.  I had a flick through my trades folder to see if there was anything else suitable (idiotically forgetting about all the Avacyn commons I'd dumped in the store collection earlier) but decided not to confuse things.  While the Duel Deck would not have been my choice for two young players I think that the balance and flashiness of it all was what attracted them to it.  I offered to help them if they ever came to one of the store events in future.

Elves smashed the humans in the last round, and in the standings this meant that Elves were top just above the Humans so it seemed silly to have a play off and we moved all the tables and had a massive 6 player game of Zombie Fluxx instead with some of the YuGiOh Players joining in while the shop was cashed up.

Another great day had by all with more to come soon in June!

Playing Fair

Sometimes in Magic: The Gathering (as well as in real life) it's hard to play fair.  This isn't due to pre-ordained cheating strategies or even 'forgetting' to activate triggers but due to things that occur outside the game.

This realisation came after organising the first real sanctioned tournament at Digital Dragons in Lichfield and coming away the winner - with a deck I'd designed to either win fast or loose fast.  It turns out that just having a good card pool to pull from and throwing together a green and white humans deck made almost entirely out of promotional rares can do quite a lot!  The deck was essentially Fateful hour based which meant that it punished the other player a little too much and wasn't all that fun.

In the run up to the second 'big' tournament (we schedule casual events frequently when there happen to be games in store) I decided to make a deck that was competitive but would be fun to loose to, and hopefully fun to beat.

Here is my basic mana curve:

As you can see (if you tilt your head) this is all the Angel creature cards from Innistrad block. And the 1 M12 Angel too. And Angelic Wall as I figured it was lonely.  There are some very overpowered (in terms of the players that may turn up's collections) cards here in the 5 AVR Mythic Rares, but this time they are singletons. No more will they have to battle through multiple copies of the same depressing Humans - now there are Singleton Angels to have to read - if I can race up the mana curve.  I figured that this strategy will give me a lot of variability, while also allowing me to try out the new cards in a fun setting.

Last time I put up all the prizes and intend to do the same again - I skipped myself and started the prizes at 2nd and 3rd place.  This means I'm not too worried if I do happen to win, but I am worried that the less experienced players won't have as much fun.  This is reflected in my support cards.

I've put in Borderland Ranger instead of Scorned Villager, but kept the Avacyn's Pilgrims.

I've dropped Ponder entirely and reduced Gitaxian Probe to a two of in favour  of Fleeting Distraction (it has little fairies in the art to help with the theme).

I am playing 4 Seraph's Sanctuary and 4 Scroll of Avacyn.  I'm also starting with all basic lands, with the 9 dual lands hiding in my sideboard for when I face the couple of experienced players that will be going.

I also have a few more tricks that should help the deck plough through it's cards in search of it's 18 Angels and help with the multicolour deck.  I will post back a report next week.

TO be...

I am now officially a Tournament Organiser for Digital Dragons (and have figured out phone blogging)!

This means I can set up events and keep an eye on things from home which will be a lot more convenient , if less sociable.

Yesterday we did a mini casual event of mini masters using my boosters I'd just bought. Good fun all round. I now have three Moonsilver Spears which I think will turn out I be much more
Important than people currently realise...

Off to a launch event this morning, but the store seems to be closed still. We will see...