#mtgsealed

Last night was a bittersweet night for me.  Today is my birthday (the big 3-0) and I was planning on taking the night off to celebrate but my dad said I could go so I decided to go and try my luck and to also use my Sarkhan playmat one last time.  It was sealed and I was expecting it would be like the other times I’ve done it where I get absolute garbage pulls and I end up with a crap deck but that wasn’t the case at all.  Since I wasn’t planning on going I didn’t bring my limited deck box with the empty sleeves and basics so I had to break out my emergency kit which I put together full of sleeves and basics that I keep in the glove compartment of my car in case I forget sleeves and basics like last night.  Second pack I pull a Heliod, Sun-Crowned which made me build a deck with white but I was struggling to come up with a second color.  I was leaning towards Boros because I pulled a Hero of the Nyxborn and a Haktos the Unscarred but I didn’t have that many lower-cost creatures so I did Selesnya instead.

First round I lost but won one game at least so I figured my deck wasn’t that bad.  Second round I went up against the guy who conceded to me last week to avoid a tie.  Another notable pull last night was an Archon of Sun’s Grace which he beat me with last week.  I ended up winning that match with the help of both Heliod and Archon.  I was only able to get Heliod into a creature (or “online” as my opponent calls it) once but by then it was too late.  That was the game I lost.

Third round I went up against this little kid who was clearly new to Magic because his deck must have had around 60 cards without sleeves.  Once we got to playing he built Grixis and had trouble drawing cards he needed.  I won in absolutely no time at all.  It was still a little early to call it a night so I decided to stay for the fourth round but the round went over by around 20 minutes so I decided to drop.  I got my two packs in credit and traded in the Heliod for credit to get myself two each Temple of Silence and Godless Shrine for my Zombie Rally deck.

So all-in-all I went 2-1 which is rare for limited, yet alone sealed.  It was also the perfect night to retire my Sarkhan playmat in favor of the new one I custom-ordered for my birthday.  Anyone who knows me knows I’m a HUGE wrestling fan and my all-time favorite is the late great “Rowdy” Roddy Piper so as soon as I saw this artwork for Elvish Piper I had to make it into a playmat.  It came out a lot better than I expected but it still seems a little “empty” so I’m probably going to order a second one with the artist’s signature at the bottom right and maybe one of his most famous quotes on the bottom if I can find a good placement.  Next week I’m going to bring it for the first time and hopefully people will recognize him.

Even though I already got a taste of M20 last week when I did prerelease I still wanted to test my luck at Sealed.  Going in I wasn’t expecting much but to my surprise I got TWO Leylines from my packs: Leyline of the Void and Leyline of Abundance.  I built my deck with green and white and included Leyline of Abundance to go with a couple of Leafkin Druids I pulled.  Other notable pulls I put into my deck were Loxodon Lifechanter and Elvish Reclaimer.

Long story short I went 1-3 with my one win coming from the second round against someone who was still pretty new to the game.  First game he got me down to one but I still managed to make a comeback.  Afterwards I gave him some tips and passed on the “bread” theory to him.  There were not one but TWO people who pulled Chandra, Awakened Inferno from their packs including my first-round opponent who managed to get three emblems on me before scooping.  The second was a little kid who was sitting next to me and didn’t bring any sleeves so I lent him my spare set and gave him an emblem to use.

The first game of the third game something funny happened.  My opponent had a Portal of Sanctuary out and I cast a Pacifism on his Vengeful Warchief and he kept returning it to his hand thinking it would get rid of the Pacifism but I returned it to my hand as per the wording on the card only to enchant it with Pacifism when he recast it.  Then on the third time he said “You have another one?” and I told him it was the same one.  Then he tried to correct me saying it should have been in the graveyard but then I showed him the card and he suddenly realized that I was right and all Auras attached to targeted creature do return to their owners’ hands.  Even though I lost it was still pretty funny.  For those who have been following me from the beginning this was the guy I passed that Torrential Gearhulk to back when Kaladesh first came out and it was still a $20 card so needless to say he was pretty experienced when it comes to Limited.

I don’t think I’ve ever had a release-night like last night since Amonkhet.  As usual I bought three packs and pulled a Mythic, Mnemonic Betrayal which wasn’t bad.  Dimir aren’t my usual colors but I’ll take it.  When I got my packs I couldn’t believe what I pulled.  First pack I get this:

And second pack I get this:

As soon as I pulled Assassin’s Trophy I showed my friend Robert because he was one short for his deck and begged me to trade it to him (which I did when I was finished.  The person across from me pulled an Aurelia and I asked him if he would be willing to trade it afterwards and he said maybe but he left after the second round.  Another regular also pulled a foil one and said she would be willing to trade it so I 

To top it all off I also pulled a Thousand Year Storm and an Arclight Phoenix so I could have done Izzet or Boros but the temptation was too great not to do Golgari.  First match was pretty easy and I won in three games.  The first game I was ONE turn away from getting Vraska’s emblem out but my opponent scooped.  Second round I played against a guy who hasn’t played in almost ten years and it was easy to tell because he kept forgetting if he played a land on some turns.  It was super close and we were still playing when time was called on the round but I pulled off a win.

With the release of M19 yesterday I couldn’t wait to crack open some packs.  When I got to my LGS I bought three packs as usual and my streak of getting a Mythic from one of those packs continues.  I pulled THIS from my second pack

I was pretty surprised to get this considering it’s worth around $20 right now.  I didn’t get a Sarkhan so I was definitely planning on trading it for one if I saw anyone that pulled him.  For our packs we got pre-release kits to open because they had some leftover from pre-release so I got a die and a promo out of it which was cool.  The person across from me got a Sarkhan for his promo so I asked him if I could trade my Crucible for it and he said yes.  He said some pretty negative things about him so he was more than happy to trade him.  For my deck I built black and white with combos like Fell Specter and Duress and Death Baron and some zombies.  I also had a couple Epicure of Bloods and some life gain spells like Revitalize.

My first opponent was around ten years old and he said he’s only been playing for a month so I thought I had a chance at winning.  I was wrong.  He had not one but TWO Tezzerets (one promo and one from his packs) which I couldn’t deal with so I lost that round.  I think my inexperience with Sealed might have played a part.

I won my second round but lost my third and fourth so I went 1-3 for the night.  For my prize pack I actually pulled an Ajani, Adversary of Tyrants which I traded for a Sarkhan so in the end I got to keep both my Crucible (which went straight into my trade binder since it’s unlikely I’ll ever use it) and got myself a Sarkhan.  I’m thinking about taking the next couple of weeks off because the Modern tournaments haven’t been happening and so I can use the money to upgrade my Narset EDH deck to make it do what it does best: abuse her ability to gain extra turn after extra turn.  If this doesn’t turn me into the most hated person at my LGS I don’t know what will.

First of all sorry I couldn’t think of a better name for this blog post.  I think I got the point across at least that the deck I tried to build was centered around Historic cards.  I went to the store tonight planning on doing constructed (either Standard or Modern) but caved in at the last minute and did Sealed instead to try my luck.  I got a few decent pulls like Time of Ice (which came in handy a couple times); Zahid, Djinn of the Lamp; The Mirari Conjecture (which I didn’t put into my deck but I’m going to put into my Narset commander deck), a foil Baird, Steward of Argive; Raff Capashen, Ship’s Mage; and Kwende, Pride of Femeref.  I also pulled a Thran, Temporal Gateway to help me out with my Legendary creatures and get them on the field whenever I want (which turned out to be pretty useless because it basically had the same effect as Raff.

Tonight was another pretty rough night for me.  I went 1-3 with my only win against a red and white deck and an opponent with the same first name as me.  Even though I had a rough night I got a pack for winning and pulled a Rite of Belzenlok which was pretty decent.  Modern and Standard both fired and I saw a ton of different decks for Modern from Affinity to UW and Jeskai Control to Eldrazi Tron to the dreaded Lantern Control.  In between rounds I started looking around at the other games and once I saw Lantern Control I was a little glad I didn’t play tonight because even though I’ve never gone against it yet I’ve seen matches of it and that deck is pure evil.  Chances are I wouldn’t have been matched up with it if I did average like I usually do but still, it’s Lantern Control.

Now onto today’s big announcement: Guilds of Ravnica!!!  I for one am excited for the return to the return of Ravnica, mostly because I started playing in Tarkir and never got to experience Ravnica in Standard.  I have a Boros deck that I use for training new Modern decks so I’m a little familiar with it and the different guilds but I can’t wait to experience it myself, especially the climax of the Gatewatch story with their final showdown with Bolas.