Friday, May 29, 2015

First Daily!

Well this went pretty well too.

For those that are unaware, Magic Online events are notoriously poor value. By that I mean unless you are at the very top of the game (win rate ~75%), entering almost any event is a losing proposition. One exception to this has been the Daily events, which run at a scheduled time, daily (who would have thought). Unfortunately, due to higher redemption fees, pack prices have fell off the face of the Earth, and now even the Daily events are probably not worth it.

Regardless, I'm trying to get better, and Daily events bring out the best competition. With that said, check the rest of the post for how I did!

I entered the 12pm Mountain Time Modern Daily with my exact list from a couple posts ago.

Round 1
Merfolk

I was pretty happy to see the turn 1 Cursecatcher. Out of all the Twin variants, I think Tempo Twin has the best matchup against the fish. Also, I had just finished a match against Merfolk in the Tournament Practice room so I was feeling pretty confident.

Game 1 I had some removal, a cryptic, and some land. Not sure if that's a keep. It doesn't do very much, but I kept it. It kind of paid off since the removal was live and cryptic is quite strong here. I made a pretty big mistake here, I don't know if it cost me the game, but it could have:



I figured that I wasn't too worried about the image, so I'd just let it resolve. Then he copied the Adept, drew a card, and I realized my mistake. I was going to hit the Adept before combat anyway, so I clearly should have dome it before he could draw a free card.

I made another pretty big mistake when I discarded Spinter Twin off of a Desolate Lighthouse activation. I'm pretty sure it should have been the Cryptic, since I really need the combo to win at this point. I drew into more Snapcasters, but he found more Adepts, which found more Lords, and eventually overran me.

Game 2 I kept a no removal, combo heavy hand. I was extremely forunate todraw into bolt and Grim Lavamancer who saved the day. I'm pretty sure Grim Lavamancer is my new favourite card. After some Snapcaster Mage pressure I got him to tap out and comboed on Turn 6.

Game 3 I kept a more reasonable hand on the draw, but my Spell Snare looked pretty silly against two Aether Vials. Kira, Great Glass-Spinner is incredibly hard to deal with, but I luckily drew two Exarchs into Twin, and I was able to tap his Mutavaults just in time.

Current Record 1-0

Round 2
Scapeshift

I've only played this matchup once on this side of the table. From the Scapeshift side, it feels prettu 50/50. Either the Scapeshift player gets a mana advantage, and lands a Scapeshift backed up by a number of counters, or the Twin player lands 1 or 2 threats and pressures the Scapeshift player into tapping out, or just dying to damage.

Game 1 I made a greedy Pestermite play when I should have just Spell Snared the Steve. Luckily, I landed a couple tappers, and cryptic + spell snare was enough to counter the Scapeshift.

Game 2 I tried to make him combo my naked Snapcaster, but he didn't, so I didn't go for the Blood Moon. I made a pretty big mistake when I countered a Peer Through Depths with Cryptic Command. Later, he countered a Vendillion Clique, leaving me with a good change to land the Blood Moon, and hope he didn't have Krosan Grip. The good news is he didn't have Krosan Grip. The bad news is he had Nature's Claim. He had the Scapeshift, I had double Spell Snare, which unfortunately doesn't counter a 4CMC spell.

Game 3 on the play, kept a two lander, with a tapper, some counters, and a Clique. Basically if we draw land #3 we are in good shape. Snared a Steve, but missed land number 3. Played a naked Snapcaster. Missed land #3 again. Decided to play around Electroylze by not playing Snapcaster #2. Hit land #3. And it was a Sulfur Falls which meant I could stay above 18 life. Here was another huge mistake. I had just played around Electrolyze, but I decided to play Clique anyway. He had the Electrolyze. The 3 for 1. Ouch.I did get to take his Scapeshift with the Clique, but it still hurt. That clearly should have been an Exarch. Probably end step in case he played some ramp or something, But he only had 2 Blue mana, so maybe upkeep was right. On Turn 7 the replayer says that I didn't play land number 4 but he conceded next turn, so obviously something happened, but now we'll never know.

Current Record 2-0

Round 3
Burn

Another matchup I feel comfortable in. I like how linear it is, and there is often one right play. I don't have much to report on this matchup. Games 1 and 2 were quite close, me inches from death both times, winning one, and losing another. But then my opponent just conceded Game 3, so it wasn't much of a match :(

Current Record 3-0
Grixis Control

He opened with Creeping Tar Pit, and I automatically assumed Grixis Delver or Twin. I did see a Young Pyromancer, but not the other two. I basically got stomped in these two games. I sided for delver in Game 2, which amplified the problem because I got out-controlled and lost even worse. I'll have to take another look at these games later, if the replayer works.

Final Record 3-1

A cash in my first Daily with the deck! Gotta be happy about that. As you can see, I made a ton of major mistakes throughout the Daily, which is definitely encouraging since we did so well regardless. I'm hoping to hit the next noon Daily tomorrow and see what happens!

Thanks for reading!
- Chris

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