Evolutionary Gardening

I love Limted format Magic: The Gathering. Given the choice between constructed or draft, I’ll crack the packs every time. As much as I love to hear about players going in to drafts with a solid plan in mind, as much as I would like to do the same, “forcing” a specific archetype of deck from a pod of 8 players is something I’ve never actually done. If you an avid listener (like I am) of the Limited Resources podcast, you know there are two types of drafters; the Architect is the one who has a plan and builds around it, and the Gardener is the one who plants a few seeds and watches what grows. At a recent Wednesday night draft, I embraced my inner Simic and watched what genetic harvest grew from my first blue green seed.

Rather than break down the draft and tournament (I’ll have a deck list and round summary at the end of the blog post), I’d rather devout a paragraph or two to some key bullet points; addressing each in a more general way rather than look at one event or one game and rely to much on results oriented thinking.

PACK ONE, PICK ONE
What do you take? While I try not to rare draft, admittedly pack one of this draft gave me a Godless Shrine and I all but snap-took it. I did thumb through the rest of the pack quickly, and seeing nothing that really inspired me, I opted for the money, not to mention it finished my playset of the black-white land. The upside to this pick is it left me completely open on colors, and gave me some fixing should I move in to Boros, Orzhov, or even Dimir with subsequent picks, but that’s it. As much fun as it is to open money cards while drafting, the Shocklands in particular do not win you games, so if you sit to either side of me, don’t be too surprised if you ever get passed one.

Yes, even this Guildmage.

So what cards would I considering exciting to first pick in pack one? Without getting to specific, utility 2-drops are right up there; Syndic of Tithes, Burning Tree Emissary, Wojek Halberdiers, Guildmages for all the guilds and so on. After that I’d look for 3-drop creatures with at least 3 Toughness or some form of evasion; I like a good low curve as Gatecrash draft seems to be a fairly fast environment. Very rarely do I want to pick a non-creature spell as a first pick. If I couldn’t get a decent creature at any mana cost, X spells like Aurelia’s Fury, Clan Defiance, Mind Grind, Cinder Elemental (basically any game ender) would be a solid pick.

WATCH IT TABLE

Pick two came to me and I saw the Drakewing Krasis and the Simic seed was planted. A 3/1 Flyer with Trample for three mana is a pretty sweet pick up in the format, and gives me room to look for an Evolve game plan or move in to Gruul and splash for the blue. As the packs kept getting passed, more and more playable Simic made its way to me. Less good red cards were being passed also, along with almost no white, indicating that at least two players on my right were Boros or Orzhov, likely one in each. Snagging a few mid pack picks of Cloudfin Raptor, Greenside Watcher and Crocanura, I felt like a nice curve was developing. Then came the hard decision of pack one: Zhur-Taa Swine or Adaptive Snapjaw?

Both creatures work to trigger Evolve on my entire board, but one requires a color splash while the other is a curve topper that is unlikely to ever see more than 3 toughness. That small point right there is why I picked up the beefier Swine, cutting a very playable Gruul card from a player on my left. It’s really my experience that there is a huge jump from 3 to 4 Toughness in most Limited environments, and Gatecrash is no exception. I’m also completely ok with letting my deck grow in to a red splash naturally, as there are some very good cards with single red color requirements. The Swine along with Ghor-Clan Rampager, Disciple of the Old Ways, Mugging and Arrows of Justice all are powerful and cheap enough in their opportunity cost to splash in a green based deck, especially if I can find a Gruul Guildgate or Keyrune in packs two or three. So imagine my surprise when not only did I snag the Zhur-Taa Swine, but the Adaptive Snapjaw came back around as the final card for pack one.

MY LEYLINE FOR A FISH MUTANT!!!

Play ALL the creature types!!!

Pack two presented a disheartening realization: someone on my left was in Simic too. Playbles were few and far between, and I found myself forced to pick mediocre on-color cards just to keep my creature count up while watching two Madcap Skills pass me by in favor of developing my creations’ roots. It was also in this pack that I picked up a second Crocanura over a Rapid Hybridization I knew would not table.

As the title of this subsection indicates, I was dearly hoping to grab a Shambleshark or two for my deck. I’ve seen that little 2/1 with Flash do a lot of work, and with a few Crocanura’s already in my deck, the Flash can provide a very potent combat trick under the right circumstances. If anything, I was a little heavy on 3-drops and needed to lower my curve just a bit if I wanted to have a chance against quick and swarmy Boros decks. That’s probably one on the biggest considerations you have to consider when looking at drafting a non-Boros deck, how will you slow them down so you can go over the top?

WAITING FOR THE FLOWER TO BLOSSOM

As the final packs moved around the table, I was really looking for the final touches for the deck. I picked up an early Drakewing Krasis and Cloudfin Raptor, giving me two and three copies respectively. What I really wanted however was a single unblockable for the deck, an Elusive Krasis if I was lucky enough. I showed a small amount of restraint and passed a Keymaster Rogue while picking up an Ivy Lane Denizen, and then was rewarded by finding another Keymaster in the next pack. This deck was really starting to come together.

The Gardener in me was really enjoying the success this deck was gaining before even playing a game. Part of what made the gardening process so successful for me was knowing when to prune some rotten leaves in favor of drafting a off-color playable. As you’ll see in my pool I have a few playable cards that other decks would probably have wanted. By identifying bad Simic cards early, I was able to watch them table back to me as I cut other players from cards they likely needed for their decks. The one Simic card I knew I would never play was Hydroform. Watching two copies come back to me over the course of the draft, it appears the other players in the pod knew them to be bad as well. While it looks like a solidly playable card for two mana, it really costs three, as you need the land you target to be untapped if you really want it to do any work. I’d much rather have any other of the 3 mana creatures or Keyrunes in the format, even in a splashed color, than spend 3 mana on a temporary threat your opponent can then use their removal on to cut you off an entire turn of board development on. While ultimately a subpar card in of itself yet infinitely better than Hydroform, is Burst of Strength, which ended up making the cut for my deck as the 23^rd card.

BATTLE!!!

Before I reveal the deck list and sideboard, I have a few quick card specific notes on my games. The best card I never got to cast was Mindeye Drake. This 5 mana 2/5 flyer easily made the cut for the deck over one of the Adaptive Snapjaws simple due to the inherent upsides the card has. While lacking Evolve, its high toughness will trigger Evolve on probably all my other creatures, and the Flying makes it an amazing blocker. The extra push that gave it the nod over the Snapjaw, is its mill five death trigger. This can easily snag a few good cards from your opponent and if you hit their bomb can really give you an edge in a close grindy match.

Gatecrash's Eyes in the Sky

The elephant in the room when most people talk about Gatecrash Limited is Madcap Skills. This small 2 mana Aura seems to be the cause of a lot of headaches for players. I really think that this card has a lot of over hype on it regarding its turn 2 or 3 play. The four or five games now that I’ve had someone run out an early game Madcap Skills instead of developing their board, I’ve been able to eventually stabilize, kill their Skilled Creature in a favorable manner, and then go over the top of them. There is really only one way I feel an early Madcap Skills should be played, and that’s if you have a early game Flyer against a non-Green opponent. Green has several ways of interacting with Flyers profitably, and almost all of them are playable main deck. Where I think Madcap Skills will really shine is mid to late game, when you can drop it on a hearty toughness attacker and either force through a large chunk of damage or set up a 2 for 0 bad block situation. Obviously there are corner cases everywhere, but give a little more thought to your game plan at large when before you run out that little Aura on your Foundry Street Denizen.

Now without any more rambling, here’s the deck I played and my round summary:

SIMIC DRAFT DECK
Main Deck
x1 Biovisionary
x3 Cloudfin Raptor
x2 Crocanura
x2 Drakewing Krasis
x1 Experiment One
x1 Frilled Oculus
x2 Greenside Watcher
x1 Ivy Lane Denizen
x1 Keymaster Rogue
x1 Metropolis Sprite
x1 Mindeye Drake
x1 Rust Scarab
x1 Sage's Row Denizen
x1 Scab-Clan Charger
x1 Slaughterhorn
x1 Burst of Strength
x1 Pit Fight
x1 Simic Charm
x1 Simic Guildgate
x8 Forest
x8 Island
Sideboard
x1 Angelic Edict
x1 Nav Squad Commando
x1 Keymaster Rogue
x1 Skygames
x1 Ripscale Predator
x2 Structural Collapse
x1 Adaptive Snapjaw
x2 Disciple of the Old Ways
x2 Hydroform
x1 Purge the Profane
x1 Zhur-Taa Swine
x1 Armored Transport
x1 Gruul Keyrune
x1 Skyblinder Staff
x1 Godless Shrine

In the end, I felt I had enough playables in green and blue alone that I didn't need to dilute the mana base by adding in the Gruul Keyrune and adding a few Mountains. Had I ended up doing so, the Zhur-Taa Swine replaces the Rust Scarb and the Disciples push the Greenside Watchers to the 'board. The Gruul Keyrune probably edges out the blue Denizen in this situation, but that slot could be up for debate. Here's how the tournament went down.

Round 1: Boros Rare Swarm (On the Play) Lose 1-2
Games 1 and 3 are over very quickly, with my opponent playing Boros like Boros should be played, quick, swarmy and with plenty of First Strike thanks to a Legion Loyalist Battalion trigger. The only reason we had three games is I was able to grind out a longer game by playing Pit Fight early and keeping him off a turn 3 and 4 Battalion.
Round 2: Borzhov Triple Madcap (On the Draw) Win 2-0
My opponent drops a Basilica Screecher turn 2 and the Aura's it up with Madcap Skills, attacking in to my Cloudfin and Crocanura without knowing about the Crocodile Frog's Reach. Game two, I curve out almost perfectly by going Cloudfin, Cloudfin, Drakewing, Slaughterhorn as my opponent can't get any flying defense and his life total quickly hits 0.
Round 3: Gruul Aggro (On the Draw) Win 2-1
Game one I manage a fairly quick clock, but get Bloodrushed to 0 after a few quick attacks.Game two I manage to stablize against a Madcapped Legion Loyalist then grind out the win with my Rust Scarab that threatened to take away his Skills should he ever block. Game three, I hit another quick Evolve curve and my flyers quickly race his ground pounding beasts.
Round 4: Orzhov Midrange (On the Play) Win 2-0
My opponent sets up a very good play by hitting my sole Island on turn two with a Contaminated Ground, cutting me off from the three blue creatures in my hand. Fortunately he floods out before he can put the pressure on me, and I manage to top deck three solid green creatures and win before he can Extort me out. Game three, we both hit our game plans strongly, but he doesn't see quite enough Extort and I manage to take him from 12 to 1 life in a single turn thanks to a Bloodrushed Slaughterhorn on a Drakewing Krasis and a few Cloudfins after he bounced back and forth on either side of 10 life for a few turns. He draws dead on his turn and can't mount a lethal crack back.