M12 Pre Release Promo Loot

As part of the promo event run by Magic Geek .co.uk I picked up two of the new M12 Intro Decks, Mystical Might and Blood & Fire, along with two Promotional Bloodlord of Vaasgoth.
















First up the Blue White Illusions deck Mystical Might.  This is pretty fast and can cause some trouble for beat down decks as by the time they are playing threats this deck has counter magic up and running.  I managed to hand the first loss to a high ranking agro goblin deck that was playing in the sealed deck, and beat some constructed decks with it too.  It'd be fairly easy to upgrade (there are a lot of non illusion creatures).

The rare card Lord of The Unreal is the star and the deck only lost once when I'd got that out.  Extra copies would make this more consistent.

















The other deck is slightly different - it's a balanced Red Black deck that focuses on the Bloodthirst mechanic so has burn and direct damage as it's theme.  It's also good but seemed less able to beat the decks on offer.  I ran out of time so only played the six necessary games to earn the promo, but never got to play either of the high cost mythics - M12 is just that fast.

The mythic vampire promo would slot right into this deck and boost a good few of the cards.  It'd be harder to supplement the bloodthirst mechanic as M12 is the only standard legal set featuring the keyword.  Haste creatures would be a great way to get first turn damage to start the chain though.




There are some great uncommons in these packs - O ring in Blue White & Swiftfoot Boots in the Red Black so if you aren't looking to get too many boosters it may be a cheaper way to get the star cards of the set in workable decks without breaking the bank.

I didn't open the boosters.

M12 pre release

I completely forgot to live blog the pre release. Things got a bit hectic! I got two intro decks and played around 15 games to earn my promo cards. Pics another day.
Sent using a Sony Ericsson mobile phone

Full Duels of the Planeswalkers Promo Deck Lists - finally!

Turns out that the correct product name for the new Planeswalker promo decks is sample decks and here the listings all are:

MTG D12 M12 Planeswalker Promo Decks



Finally got one of the modern decks (Blue B) to confirm this & to bring the total of Grave Titan Promos to 4.

Full test pic

Planeswalkers big attack

Testing sending pic from phone

Post Planeswalkers, & Pre M12

Well it does seem that I got old decks instead of this years ones - but as the store has run out of cards I can't get my hands on the new ones for a while!

We are kind of in an odd MTG gap now, while people gaze at the new cards and formulate decks that they may never get to play.  I like the Zombie tribe. The Black Deck seems to eat anything that's put in it's way (it's basically designed to mill creatures) and a zombie version could be interesting.  I have three Grave Titans afterall so anything is possible.

I'm thinking that SuperDrome at £83 a booster box (about £2.20 a pack) as a walk up price will be my chosen store again.  60 packs would be ideal so 2 boxes would give me enough to let friends buy and to use as gifts.  Need to pick up some of the starter decks too so hopefully can do that at the pre-release (I'm not playing but it seems rude not to pop in).  Will take a decent camera - the store is like a nerdier version of Mr Magorium's Wonder Emporium.

Real life is too busy to worry about finding the cheapest cards & best decks.  I've sorted out my (growing) spares collection and only kept 4 of anything. Digital playtime is where it's at, loosing for fun and winning for unlocks.

MTG Duels Of The Planeswalkers 2012 Promo Decks

Today I started off with these:

And ended up with this!  The irony of printing out full colour laser prints of cards then trading them in for the same but on cardboard was not lost on me...



ED: These Decks seem to be the Planeswalkers 2009 decks instead of the 2012 decks!

FULL DECK LISTS OF PLANESWALKER PROMO DECKS HERE

 I picked up 4 of the 5 possible promo decks that you get free with a voucher from buying the Duels of the Planeswalkers 2012 on Steam, Xbox 360 or PS3.     It turns out the cards are mostly from the set 10th Edition (or X) released in July 2007 (usually 16 commons and 2 uncommons). Are 4 year old cards worth having for free? Certainly! Especially if you are new to the game.  Also I feel some of these will see M12 reprints so be standard legal.  All have 12 lands.

First up Lilliana - Black

Seems to be a typical black deck - a few cheap creatures and lots of destruction.  Not much discard and only one creature above 2/2.  Seems a nice beginner Black deck.

Chandra - Red

Burn deck! Also this has Lorwyn and Morningtide cards in so has a bit more variety.  I think that the uncommons in this deck are pretty good, and Prodigal Pyromancer is very useful in this short format too.

Garruk - Green

Mana ramp, creatures and consistency - it's only got one less card than the other decks (13 land) but 3 less types of card than the red & black decks. Lots of big creatures and targets for other's spells - most having 4 body is a problem for many of these decks.

Anjani - White

And lastly a white life gain deck. No equipment but a few boost spells to ramp things up. Angel's feather  only has 17 possible targets to gain life from as you are unlikely to be playing another white deck.  In this smaller format though it may work.

Not got Blue, but I'm guessing the deck list will be online and I may end up with another voucher before the offer runs out anyway as more non-paper MTG friends buy the game!

I'm going to play a few games with these to see how it all works - 30 card mini decks may be ideal for our lunchtime games. I'll probably pass these off to the people who gave me the vouchers to start off their card collections...