Ready, Set, Build!

     So, in my effort get back into magic more lately, I've been working on building a competitive Standard deck. I've always had a tendency to play white more than anything else, and I definitely didn't break that mold with my current construction, I've gone with a mono-white humans build, I'd call it loosely based on the meta deck haunted humans. It's usually a blue white deck, but as I've never really enjoyed either 1) playing blue and B) xeroxing Meta-game decks, but that's a post for another time. I'm going to go ahead and post the deck list, let you form an opinion, then write more about what I'm thinking about it. 

Standard Humans

21 Plains

     21 Lands

4 Champions of the Parish

4 Gideon's Lawkeeper

4 Thraben Doomsayer

2 Hero of Bladehold

2 Elite Vanguard

4 Doomed Traveler

3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

     23 Creatures

2 Elspeth Tirel

2 Gideon Jura

     4 Planeswalkers

4 Oblivion Ring

4 Gather the Townsfolk

4 Honor of the Pure

     12 Spells

     There it is, it hasn't been through nearly enough testing to say this is the final build. but after some discussion with a good friend and an amazing player, Barret Haskins (his blog here), I think it's at the very least a very solid start. The win condition is fairly straight-forward, it's pretty much beat-down, I can use Elspeth to keep myself in the game in case it goes long, or to help me mob the board with either cannon fodder in a pinch, or even some solid beaters if I have a copy or two Honor of the Pure on the board. I can also use Gideon Jura (who's a beast!) to 1) smack some sense into people, 2) as creature control to take care of any specific creatures who may be causing me grief, or D) I can (maybe?) sack him off by forcing my opponent to swing at him with all of their creatures, opening the door for me to get as much damage through as possible, even if he dies it's, as barret put it, "no skin off my balls", because I, if played the way it's supposed to, should be able to seal the deal on the next turn when they have no blockers.

     I put Hero of Bladehold in because, well, because she's fan-fucking-tastic a 3/4  for 4 mana that brings in 2 soldier tokens every time she swings. and for every 2 she brings in, or Elspeth brings in, or the Doomsayer brings in, or Gather the Townsfolk brings in, (see a theme here?) my Champions will get beefed up beyond recognition. 

     The deck should have no problems at all opening up quickly, with 10 creatures on the 1-drop, 12 options for the 2-drop, and then my power cards curving out nicely. So, between me opening strong, I also am running a solid amount of control and disruption in the form of the O-Rings, Gideon, Elspeth, the Lawkeepers and Thalia, who will slow their game (and mine, which is why if anything in here is possibly on the chopping block, it's her). 

     I feel like it's going to be pretty strong, I still need to tweak it and build a sideboard to gear it towards playing against the Meta-Decks. I'm hoping there are some solid players out there who may have some tips and or critiques for me. 

Drafting like it's my job

     So I played in a booster draft friday at my local game shop. it was an innistrad block draft and we ended up having a total of twelve players, 2 pods of six (a bit unorthodox but was better for payouts). the draft started beautifuly for me, pulling enough good black and white to make a run for the top slot, or so I thought, the biggest pulls I made however, I'm sad to say were cards I just couldn't bring myself to pass, namely a Snapcaster Mage in pack 3. but thats not really the point.
   
     Set one was a real kick in the teeth, I was playing against one of the shop owners/DCI Judges. He had managed to pull together a beast RB Vampire deck, and scored 2 Stromkirk Captains. Game one I had to mulligan to 5 and was still hosed for mana, only being able to drop 2 all game and dealing a total of 2 damage.... moving on. Game 2 was much better, I had a beautiful opening hand was was smacking for 3 second turn, my deck curved out beautifully and I was able to get ahold of the minimal control I'd drafted to handle the captain he dropped. I won game 2 still sitting on 13 life. Game three was the best game by far however, even though I ended up losing. Both decks opened and curved well and it ended up being the most fun game of the set. Like I said, fun, but not productive, I was now 0-1 going into round 2.

     When round 2 pairing were posted I was the lucky(?) bastard to get the bye. it set me up as 1-1 automatically which is nice, but it also left me basking in the shame and disappointment of round 1 for an hour or so.  oh well

     Round 3 started with my deck opening well, and my opponents just simply not. he ended up scooping on round 4. it's a win, but I don't like winning that way, it's just not any fun. We kicked off Game 2 both pulling decent opening hands and basically ended up racing to deal enough damage, I ended up losing this game to myself, but thats what happens when you don't think your turn through and shoot yourself in the foot. Game 3 I managed a turn 2 Thalia, Gaurdian of Thraben, which shut down his mana light UB Control... and I wiped the board with his tears...

     All in all I pulled 2nd in my pod, 3rd over all, which pulled me 2 packs in prizes, out of which I managed to pull Archangels Light. making for a fun and profitable day of drafting, I promptly traded off the snapcaster for 2 copies of Gideon Jura and 4 copies of Doomed Traveler, all of which I needed for my standard deck (which I'll outline in a future post)

Heres the Deck I drafted and played:

9 Plains
8 Swamp
  17 Lands


2 Thraben Sentry
2 Typhoid Rats
1 Midnight Guard
1 Village Bellringer
1 Highborn Ghoul
1 Mausoleum Guard
1 Manor Skeleton
1 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
1 Gavony Ironwright
1 One-Eyed Scarecrow
1 Loyal Cathar
1 Avacinyan Priest
  14 Creatures


2 Night Terrors
1 Lingering Souls
1 Wooden Stake
1 Tragic Slip
1 Deadly Allure
1 Curse of Exhaustion
1 Inquisitors Flail
1 Rebuke
  9 Spells

.....I'm BACK!

Hey folks, it's been a while and until recently I have been out of my gaming phase for a bit but that is at an end, I'm in tampa and have been getting back into Magic pretty heavily. it's been a lot of fun, and I'm really looking forward to getting deeper into it, my next few posts will cover the decks I'm working on, and some of the play and events I'm participating in. for now, however, I'll leave you in anticipation for posts to come.... or... something...