Innistrad Draft Report - 2nd Place
Last night, I played another @TheSundry Innistrad draft at Novel Places in Clarksburg. I *believe* I finished 2nd place. My record was 3-1 and my loss was in the last round to the guy who won at 3-0-1. I got paired down in the final round, so I couldn’t draw in. It was a pretty frustrating match, but I’ll get to that.
The Draft Highlights
I went in hoping to be on Travel Preparations, but my first few picks weren’t anywhere near GW. As a consequence, I ended up passing later GW to the guy who won the event. He was also sitting next to his girlfriend who hadn’t drafted before and probably sent him some spicy stuff.
The only pick where I didn’t have a clear choice was taking either Manor Gargoyle (hint: Gargoyle) or Murder of Crows. I ended up passing the Crows because I think Manor is just super strong and it was early enough that I could have moved out of my second color blue into white or red. I ended up on UR anyway, but I still think Manor was the correct pick.
I ended up with a removal suite of 2x Brimstone, Geistflame, Claustrophobia, Silence Departure and Harvest Pyre. I felt pretty good about my deck against anything that wasn’t Travel Prep as I had a good curve, two Waifs to punish the slow decks and the ability to play the late game very well.
I did hate draft one Gavony Township, which was probably a good choice since the only card in my color would have been a 4th or 5th pick dude and I had plenty of those already.
My bombs ended up as: Manor Gargoyle, 2x Galvanic Juggernaut, Ludevic’s Test Subject, Blasphemous Act
The Matches
Round 1 - Kevin w/ RW - on the play
Game 1, I have to mulligan and he manages to win the game with fliers and Rally the Peasants. I write that one down and we sideboard.
Game 2, I leave in Reckless Waifs, since I’m on the play. I open with a Waif, it flips and gets in for 9 damage before I take him down.
Game 3, I side out Waifs on the draw and aim for a more grindy game where I can blow him out with Blasphemous Act or take over with Manor Gargoyle. We instead play a fairly normal game and my higher-grade removal takes it out.
1-0
Round 2 - Leo w/ UB - on the draw
Game 1, I get a pretty fast start and just beat him to death. Nothing of interest to note here. I didn’t get to write down any cards, although I did know going into this that he had a Falkenrath Noble.
Game 2, I side out Waifs again. I keep a hand that’s solid if I draw a Mountain in three turns. I fail to draw a Mountain for four turns and my 3 Islands don’t help me remove his Lantern Spirit whenever he’s tapped out, so I get behind and lose pretty decisively.
Game 3, I leave the Waifs out because he has a lot of black’s low-grade removal like Dead Weight and Corpse Lunge and I wanted to present harder or less attractive targets (e.g., brought in another Pitchburn Devils). We play a very long, very grindy game in which the major action is that I set up a Blasphemous Act to clear his board, but have to go to 4 from his Falkenrath Noble. That said, I know he has no direct damage and I have creatures in hand, so I’m confident that I will just own the board at that point. I play out a Rage Thrower and a Galvanic Juggernaut and set up a trap where he dies regardless of which he kills.
2-0
Round 3 - Serge w/ UB - on the draw
Game 1, I go in knowing that Serge has Bloodline Keeper, Liliana of the Veil and 2x Corpse Lunge. I win a grindy game at 1 life, again in a situation where I take a lot of damage, but Blasphemous Act my way into control of the board and take him out from there.
Game 2, I leave the Waifs in because his deck appears a bit slow, but I bring in a Dissipate hoping to catch his Bloodline Keeper. I’m confident I can handle Liliana, having several cheap creatures and burn at my disposal. Geistflame is pretty good against her. I steamroll him really fast with a turn 1 Waif that he flips and can’t kill for 3 or 4 turns.
Game 3, (which we play for fun), I steamroll him again.
3-0
Round 4 - Andrew w/ GW Travel Prep - on the draw
I really did not want to lose the die roll here. But I did. I got paired down, so we couldn’t draw in. Which meant that if I lost, I’d lose a pack from draw and two packs from win.
Game 1, I mulligan, he opens with his one-of Selfless Cathar into his one-of Gatstaf Shepherd. Then he plays Butcher’s Cleaver. I manage to win this one by getting Sensory Deprivation on his Gatstaf Shepherd and the pair of a Juggernaut and flipped Ludevic’s Test Subject with Silent Departure to keep his Avacynian Priest from activating.
Game 2, he opens with his one-of Selfless Cathar into his one-of Gatstaf Shepherd. I sided in Ancient Grudge for his cleaver and Juggernaut, but don’t see it. He kills me with double Travel Prep on the flipped Shepherd before I can find a Brimstone Volley.
Game 3, he opens with his one-of Selfless Cathar into his one-of Gatstaf Shepherd. Must be nice. I had to mulligan again and as a result, my Harvest Pyre was one turn two slow to fuel up to kill his Gatstaf Shepherd. And then he got the Cleaver again. I ground out a pretty long game and actually almost turned it around (again, he had no burn and I had some big dudes) but he top-decked a Fiend Hunter and finished me off. Since he couldn’t Smite my Gargoyle, he needed either that or a Feeling of Dread.
3-1
Thoughts
Travel Preparations is a bit too strong for the format, especially given how deep white is as a color. I’ve concluded that it’s strictly incorrect to draft anything else if you get the opportunity. That said, sometimes you won’t. Hopefully Dark Ascension will dilute the card pool a bit and not give GW too many upgrades or easy substitutions. There were two Travel Prep players at this draft and they were on opposite sides of the draft rotation from each other, so they both got nearly perfect decks.
I thought my deck was pretty good and UR certainly has the tools to beat anything. Blasphemous Act was good, but not as good as I anticipated. In most cases, I would have rather had another Brimstone Volley, actually. It certainly won me a few games, but those were games where I set it up and could have just played differently for targeted burn. Then, I lost some games where it would have been dead due to the low # of creatures down and my limited mana. I would have infinitely preferred to have either Heretic’s Punishment or Devil’s Play, honestly.
