Dave’s Personal Blog

I was at Superstars for this morning’s draft. It went pretty well. I drafted an Esper theme… artifacts. The packs were good, and other than a Tower Gargoyle that Josh hate drafted from me, I had good options. Here’s the build I went with:

Basic Lands (17) 6 Island 5 Plains 6 Swamp Creatures (12) 2 Etherium Sculptor 2 Thoughtcutter Agent 3 Tidehollow Strix 1 Tidehollow Sculler 1 Windwright Mage 2 Cloudheath Drake 1 Steelclad Serpent Artifacts (6) 1 Obelisk of Esper 1 Scourglass 2 Executioners Capsule 2 Couriers Capsule Sorceries (1) 1 Covenant of Minds Instants (4) 1 Agony Warp 1 Hindering Light 2 Resounding Wave

Rather annoyingly, we had 9 people drafting and I got stuck with the bye in the first round. I did well second round, with a decisive 2-0 showing. Third round was against one of the stronger players in the area. Games 1 & 2 both went to him, although they were both hard won victories for him and enjoyable games. I made a few misplays in game 2 that would probably finished it in my favor leading to game 3 and a potential 3-0 record. I’ll take 2-1 though. Far better than my drafting record a couple months ago.

Next weekend is the local Pro Tour Kyoto qualifier at Superstars (go Jon & crew… you guys are rocking!). I’ll be there. I don’t really expect to top-8, but anything is possible. A ProTour appearance is definitely in my plans for next year.

Yesterday I took Pat Chapin’s “Reflecting Cruel” 5 colour control control deck to Superstars’ $1000 tournament. (You need a premium StarCity membership to access that link… if you’re serious about Magic, it’s worth it)

After 5 rounds I was 3-2 and in 12th place.

I lost round 1 to an expertly played UBR faerie deck. My opponent went on to make top 8.

I lost round 3 to one of the Superstars regulars who was piloting an elf deck. Game 1 taught me not to Esper Charm an elf player to discard. He had two Wilt-Leaf Lieges in hand which he could choose to discard and put onto play. I lost in combat after passing the turn. I won game 2 and lost the third from combat from a superior board.

The three rounds I won were fairly one sided games.