Chaos Jumpstart Clue

Can it be considered Chaos if you have Jumpstart packs from four different sets?

I'm really enjoying this Clue format and I had some extra Jumpstart packs on hand.  I hate opening packs without using them in some game and three of my friends wanted to play, so we did!

We picked these packs:

The brown bags have the two tutorial packs from the Avatar Beginner's Box.

And then opened them to get these decks:

Two mono-color decks!  Wild!

Of the four of us, only one had not done Clue before, but they picked it up totally easy.  We decided to play starting at 30 life.  We dealt out the Clue cards, revealing Billiard Room and Lounge to everyone, and I got Candlestick, Lead Pipe, Ballroom, and Conservatory.  I sleeved my deck without looking at the cards I'd opened, Welded + Zuko won the die roll to go first (so they're P1), I took two mulligans (the first one's free) and we were off!

I was the only one with a first turn play: Young Wolf.  In the second round, I hit P1 guessing Peacock, Pipe, and Dining Room.  They showed me Senator Peacock.  I cast Pestilent Wolf and passed.  P4 dropped a Selfless Spirit, which put in a lot of work.  

In the third round, P1 played Fire Nation Soldier and hit P2.  They named Green, Pipe, and Hall.  P2 showed them a card.  P2 played Sledding Otter-Penguin and passed.  I hit P4 with the Young Wolf and suggested Scarlett, Rope, and Conservatory.  They showed me Scarlett.  I dropped my Ferocious Pup and ended the turn.  P4 hit P2 with the Selfless Spirit and guessed Plum, Wrench, and Library.  P2 passed.  P4 then played Pilgrim of the Ages.  

In round four, P1 turned the Fire Nation Soldier on me, which I blocked with my 2/2 wolf parent.  I thought I was fine, but they played Run Amok!  Oof!  They guessed Plum, Wrench, and Library, which I had to pass on.  This is really bad because it cost me both a blocker and information.  P2 dropped an Aardvark Sloth, then they also attacked me with the Sledding Otter-Penguin.  I really wanted to stop revealing information, so I threw my Pup in the way.  I wanted more info from P2, though, so I hit them back with Pestilent Wolf.  I guessed Mustard, Knife, and Secret Passage.  They showed me the Knife.  At this point I was stuck with an all-land hand.  It was not looking good!  P4 kept up the pattern and hit me with the Selfless Spirit.  They guessed Peacock, Pipe, and Secret Passage, and I showed the Lead Pipe.

P1 started off round five by playing Draconic Destiny on the Fire Nation Soldier.  Thankfully they sent it at P4, suggesting White, Wrench, and the Billiard Room.  P4 passed.  "I think I'm almost there," P1 said, which was more terrifying than the Fire Dragon Soldier they'd created.  (This is the Clue way of declaring yourself the Archenemy.)  P2 played Tundra Wall and Sokka, Wolf Cove's Protector.  Then they attacked me and P4 with the Otter-Penguin and Sloth.  We both blocked (me with the Young Wolf on the Otter-Penguin).  I sent my 2/2 Young Wolf at P1, but they hit it with Explosive Shot.  I played Chandra's Magmutt (I'm team Canidae) and left Pestilent Wolf back to scare off would-be attackers.  P4 hit P1 and me with flyers.  They suggested Peacock, Rope, and Hall.  P1 showed them a card.  (I knew they had Peacock.)

P1 had another big turn to start round six off.  They tapped out and used two treasures to drop Fallaji Dragon Engine at full cost.  "I don't think there'll be enough turns for someone to die," they said confidently.  Then they sent the Fire Nation Soldier at P2, but they killed it with Razor Rings.  P2 played Katara, Heroic Healer, pumping up their whole team.  Yikes!  They swung in on P4, who was able to block one of the two attackers.

Block and kill the Aardvark Sloth!

They suggested Scarlett, Wrench, and the Study.  P4 showed them a card.  I attacked P4 (the only vulnerable person) with my Magmutt, but they Divine Verdicted it!  Oof!  I played Master of the Wild Hunt, then decided to use my whole graveyard to Collect Evidence 6, suggesting White, Candlestick, and Study.  P4 and P1 passed, but P2 showed me the Study.  I was getting closer, but still had lots of rooms to figure out.  P4 then made the big move and cast Hour of Reckoning.  They had three 1/1 flying Spirit tokens, which they used to hit everyone.  They suggested White, Rope, and Ballroom.  P1 showed them a card.  I already knew they didn't have Apothercary White, so they must have showed the Rope!  That means the only weapon left was the Wrench; Guildmage Boddy was murdered with the Wrench!  I got real excited.

P1 immediately killed my excitement.  They played Fire Nation's Conquest, then Collected Evidence 6, suggesting White, Rope, and Library.  We all passed, but I knew they had the Rope.  Maybe that wasn't a final guess.  Well, it was final enough, because they immediately accused White, Wrench, and Library.  They were right and with that they won!

This was another blast of a game.  Maybe 30 life was too high (I don't remember what the final totals were) but it was okay.  The game was definitely about getting in for little amounts of damage to make good guesses, which is the way it should be.  I don't know whether any of the jumpstart sets were over- or under-powered with respect to the others, but I had a blast and the rest of the group seemed to too.

Some notes for myself for the future:

• P1 said I had been suggesting only cards not in my hand, which was not the case at all.  I thought they would get stuck by this, but they didn't.  Oh well!
• I think I made a play mistake by not leaving the Pestilent Wolf back to block.  Deathtouch is a good Rattlesnake ability!

I recommend the random (chaos?) JumpStart packs with Clue.  I do expect that the Clue packs that come with the set would be more powerful, but I'm not certain.  In any case, Happy Magicking! 

Chaos is Clued In (WUBRG Drafting)

I had another draft earlier this week.  Yet again we did a Clue draft!  (I don't think I'll be able to get away with this for very long, so I'll take it while I can.)  When we don't pre-plan these things, everyone in the draft group has veto power to return to a "normal" wacky draft.  I'm really glad we did this, though, for a few reasons!

• I like the social aspect of playing games with lots of people.  (I don't dislike duels!)
• I like doing variant formats.
• The Clue stuff is just really fun!

There were four of us.  Here's what we opened:

Not actually very chaotic.

Two interesting things happened while we were drafting:

• The player across from me "bought out" the first two packs of Avatar they opened.  This is an option that I need to make sure is more official.  Basically the idea is that if you open some really expensive cards, instead of making you pass them, you're allowed to keep that pack and open a different pack instead.  It's called "buying out" because when playing in an official draft at a store, you have to buy the new pack from the store (if they allow this practice).  I first heard of it in Journey to Nyx when there was the possibility of "God packs".  
•  We decided to use the "Andrew McLoughlin Magic: The Gathering Addendum" rule.  According to this rule, you're allowed to replace your third turn draw with selecting any basic land from outside of the game and adding it to your hand.  Andrew (one of the drafters there) proposed it and we all agreed.  (I was very clear that this practice was probably really powerful for people like me who drafted a lot of colors.)  This was apparently the first time it's ever been used.  Unfortunately everyone decided to draw their third card as normal in the game.

Here's everything I picked:

I am apparently a magnet for board wipes.

I rolled to go fourth and was dealt the Clue cards Lead Pipe, Rope, Ballroom, and Billiard Room.  The Library and Hall were removed from the deck for everyone to see.  Let's go!  (Update: we started at 30 life.)

Apparently the murderer killed Guildmage Superman instead of Guildmage Boddy.

Here's the deck I built:

No swamps, but lots of black sources.

My opponents were:

• P1: Selesnya
• P2: Rakdos
• P3: Dimir

I had a distinct advantage because I was the only one who had played this format before.  Nevertheless, everyone seemed to have a real good grasp of the rules, and P2 and P3 seemed to have really good Clue skills. 

In the first round, I played Mardu Devotee, the only 1-drop, but in the second round, P2 played a Callous Inspector, which is a great card for the format.  Sadly, they didn't have it on turn 1.  I attacked P3 with my Devotee and guessed Green, Wrench, and the Billiard Room.  They showed me Emissary Green!

In the third round, P1 played Friendly Ghost and P3 played a Pirate Peddlers, which they realized would be great in the format because you get extra treasures!  They attacked P1 with their Callous Inspector and guessed White, Candlestick, and Ballroom.  P1 showed them a card.

In the fourth round, P1 hit me with Casper.  They suggested Green, Candlestick, and Billiard Room.  I showed them the Billiard Room.  P2 attacked P1 again with the Inspector and me with the Pirate.  I flashed in Brineborn Cutthroat to make the blocking trade (before they got any treasures).  They guessed (on P1) Mustard, Knife, and Conservatory.  P1 showed them another card.  I attacked P2 with my Devotee, but they Firebending Lessoned it.  I played my Gadget Technician face down and passed.   

P1 started the fifth round of turns by hitting P2 with Casper.  They guessed Scarlett, Pipe, and Dining Room.  Again they got one right and P2 showed them a card!  It was tough for those of us not getting in many of the attacks!  P2 played Krenko's Buzzcrusher and I spent my outgoing land's mana to flip the Technician.  They hit P3 with the Inspector and guessed Scarlett, Wrench, and the Billiard Room.  Finally, P3 passed.  Whew!  I hit P1 and guessed Plum, Rope, and Lounge and they passed.  Bummer!

In round six, P1 hit me with Casper and guessed Peacock, Pipe, and Kitchen.  I showed them the Lead Pipe.  P2 hit P3 with the Inspector again and claimed to be close.  They guessed White, Rope, and Secret Passage; P3 passed.  Then they dropped Kavaron Turbodrone and Tiger-Dillo.  They gained Archenemy status real quick!  P3 hit me with Flexible Waterbender, guessing Green, Candlestick, and Billiard Room.  I showed them the Billiard Room.  I continued to attack, hitting P3 with my Thopter token.  I guess Mustard, Rope, and Study, and they showed me the Study.

In round seven, P1 dropped Astelli Reclaimer, then hit P3 with Casper, guessing Mustard, Candlestick, and Study.  They showed P1 a card.  P2 sacrificed the Lander they just got to cast Deadly Precision on the Reclaimer.  They played a Marauding Blightpriest, Turbodroned it, and P1 with it while the Tiger-Dillo came at me.  I blocked with my Gadget Technician for the trade and P1 chumped with one of their creatures.  P3 voiced that they had given up on Clue and was trying to win with Magic rules.  They hit me and P1 with their creatures, guessing Green, Candlestick, and Study.  They were expressly trying to give away zero information, so they guessed with cards they already had!  Naturally we both passed.  I played Kylox and hit all three of my opponents with my creatures.  I guessed Peacock, Knife, and Kitchen.  P1 passed and P2 showed me the Kitchen.  I was unfortunately in a "shields down" position with no blockers.

P2 played Cruel Administrator on their eighth turn, then Turbodroned it.  They attacked me and P1, but P1 blocked.  They suggested White, Rope, and Ballroom and I showed them the Ballroom.  P3 joined in and hit me also, asking Green, Rope, and Hall.  I showed them the Rope card.  I lashed back out, hitting both P2 and P3.  I guessed Mustard, Knife, and Conservatory.  P2 showed me Commander Mustard.  At the point the life totals were P1: 13, P2: 17, P3: 20, and me: 13.

On their ninth turn, P2 hit me and P1, guessing Green, Rope, and Secret Passage.  I showed them the Rope.  At this point I had six treasures!  I was giving away too much information!  I Collected Evidence 6 and guessed Plum, Wrench, and Secret Passage.  P1 showed me the Secret Passage.

P1 led off the tenth round by Collecting Evidence 6 and guessing Plum, Rope, and Lounge.  P2 passed, but P3 showed a card.  P2 attacked P1, hitting and guessing Plum, Wrench, and Secret Passage.  I thought they showed the Secret Passage, but they actually showed P2 the Wrench, as I later learned!  P2 made an Accusation: Plum, Knife, and Secret Passage.  It was incorrect!  "Violence Prevails!" they proclaimed, ready to try to win via normal magic rules.  P3 hit P1 and P2.  They guessed Green, Wrench, and Hall.  Both P1 and P2 passed, but this is where P2 should have shown the Wrench.  Oops!  I hit P2 and guessed Scarlett, Rope, and Dining Room.  They showed me Headliner Scarlett.  There were a lot of creatures on the board, so I let loose with the Beyond the Quiet that had been in my hand the entire game.  I hadn't solved the murder, though, so I passed the turn, with Ambush Wolf in hand, plenty of mana, and life totals at P1: 6, P2: 4, P3: 21, and me: 8.

An eleventh round!  P1 played Rebellious Captives and hit P3 with the earthbent land.  They guessed Peacock, Knife, and Kitchen.  I think P3 passed on that suggestion.  They were stuck without any creatures in hand, so we were hoping we could come back and defeat them in their big lead.  I hit P2 on my turn, guessing Peacock, Knife, and Dining Room.  They passed.  I still didn't have all the answers!

Round twelve!  We're still going!  What a game!  P1 hit me and guessed Plum, Knife, and Kitchen.  I passed, then they played Cat-Owl.  P3 Collected Evidence 6 and guessed Peacock, Knife, Secret Passage.  P1 showed them the Secret Passage.  They P3 made their accusation: Peacock, Knife, and Dining Room.  It was correct!  P3 won!  I should have accused from my guess the turn before! 

This was especially crazy because they had appeared to give up on the Clue aspect back on turn seven!  They did a great job figuring it out late.

Notes:

• I'm surprised how the game can go quite long or quite short with the murder being solved.  It's excellent!  I think this is the longest I've gone.  
• People didn't want to kill opponents until they were confident they could solve the murder.  It's dangerous to kill someone and reveal all their cards if you can't make an accusation and win that same turn.  
• I feel like I should have been able to solve the murder ahead of time, but I didn't know.  I'm not yet super awesome at Clue.  I haven't even decided my favorite way to make notes.

This is such a great format for WUBRG drafting, though.  The treasure mechanic really makes a difference.  It wasn't as necessary for me this time, since I got Barrels of Blasting Jelly down on turn two, but the extra mana always helps.   

Ravnica Clue EDH over SpellTable

Over a month ago, I made a webpage to play Ravnica Clue remotely.  Since then I've failed to get a group together to play, until tonight.  I convinced two victims friends to play with our commander preconstructed decks and we set up to play on SpellTable.  I wanted someone else to be in charge, so we randomized the play order until I wasn't first, then P1 opened the site and started a new 3-player game.

... and there was immediately an error!  The buttons that were generating the links for everyone weren't working right.  I fixed it, uploaded the new version of the page, and we were off again.

We decided to play with 35 life instead of 40.  (Looking back, I think 40 is probably the correct amount.)  P1 was on Vren, the Relentless.  P2 was running Y'shtola, Night's Blessed.  I was going third, playing Celes.  

Here was my hand of Clue cards for the game:

 
One suspect and five rooms!  Yikes! 

The first two turns were all spent playing land and mana rocks, but P1 started off the third round by dropping Vren.  I played The Warring Triad and Phoenix Down, getting ready for Celes next turn.     

P1 started off the fourth round of turns by hitting me with Vren.  They suggested Mustard, Candlestick, and Ballroom.  I had to pass.  Then they cast Tribute to Horobi.  We took our tokens and they passed the turn.  P2 hit P1 with a Rat token, guessing White, Wrench, and Study.  P1 showed them a card.  I cast Crackling Doom, then hit P2 with a Rat.  I guessed Peacock, Knife, and Hall, and they showed me Senator Peacock.  

In the fifth round, P1 gave everyone another token, then cast Lord Skitter's Butcher.  P2 cast Y'shtola.  I attacked each of my opponents with one rat.  Both blocked and killed them, which was good because then they weren't going to go to P1 on their next turn.  I played Celes, discarded Strago and Relm, and then Reanimated them.  

In the sixth round, P1 hit me with Echo of Death's Wail, guessing Plum, Lead Pipe, and Secret Passage.  I passed.  P2 cast Lingering Souls.  I cast Priest of Fell Rites and attacked P2 with Celes, but they blocked with a Rat.  I was close to having Threshold and was feeling pretty good.

In round seven, P1 hit us both, naming Peacock, Candlestick, and Ballroom.  P2 showed a card, which didn't tell me anything since I already knew they had Senator Peacock.  Boo!  Then they cast Make an Example, which killed off my Priest and Strago & Relm.  They played a 3/3 rat token with Vren's ability and ended their turn.  P2 untapped and cast Eye of Nidhogg on their remaining spirit, then attacked and hit P1.  They guessed Mustard, Lead Pipe, and the Secret Passage.  P1 passed.

Now, note that I had already passed on those three things, from attacks by P1 in the fourth round and the sixth round.  P2 knew I didn't have them and they didn't have them themselves.  They also figured that P1 was asking about sets of cards they (P1) didn't have because in the turn prior, P1 guessed three cards that P2 had all of.  So they felt pretty confident P1 wouldn't have them.  They attacked to make sure, and then immediately accused the same, Commander Mustard, Lead Pipe, and the Secret Passage.  They used the site's accusation feature to try it out, and it worked!  

Prior to clicking the button.  (I checked their accusation on my page.)

After clicking the button!  They were right!

This game ended really fast, and seemed completely out of nowhere to me!  I learned two lessons:

• I should have been more defensive.  Yes, it's good to learn information by attacking, but it might be more important to make sure people don't learn information from you!
• It's important to include your own cards in some suggestions.  If you only ask about cards you don't have (which I did on my only guess) then you're revealing your own hand whenever you make a suggestion.   

I'm also really excited that the site worked!  (After some quick adjustments.)  I hope you and your friends can give it a try as well.

Happy Magicking and Murder Solving, even remotely! 

Chaos Collects Clues (WUBRG Drafting)

We finally got a chaos Clue draft off the ground last night!  We only had three players, but it worked and was quite fun.  Perhaps this is the way to "salvage" drafts with three players in the future; normally we cancel if we can't hit four.

We did make a mistake and only played with 20 life.  I feel confident that this number is too low and we should have gone with at least 25; maybe 30.  I'm really interested in feedback on this!

We got our packs, went over the rules, and divvied out the Clue cards: one of each to the envelope, then six to each of us and none to the middle.  I used three play boosters (Edge of Eternities, Duskmourn, and Foundations) I'd recently got in a "House of Horror" bundle-type thing.

It's just a triangle this time!  We added the Clue supplies to give the picture more substance.

I did a bad job of drafting lands, and I passed on a Moldering Gym, hoping it would come back.  It did not.  Thankfully I got bailed out by the Clue treasure mechanic as well as the land cyclers I drafted.  I picked up Crime Novelist late when I suddenly realized how well it worked with treasures!  I also went for Raise Dead/Resurrection effects because I keep telling myself to do that.  Here were all my picks:

In my greed, I took lots of 2-pip cards in many different colors.

The Clue cards I was dealt were Apothecary White, Commander Mustard, Headliner Scarlett, Knife, Rope, and Hall.  

Suspect-heavy!

I was able to put together a functional deck.  I made some choices here that I might not under normal circumstances; evasion and blocking are extremely important in the Clue format because you can win just be getting in little amounts of combat damage many times.  Here's what I built:

Disguise counts as a MV of three.

I won the die roll.  My opponents were Evasive Esper (EE) going second and Gruul You Out (GYO) going third, which means I was competing for each color with only one other person.  Prior to the game, GYO was very confident, claiming their plan was to kill us before the murder was solved.  Both of my opponents mulliganed; GYO twice, which probably put a hamper on their plans.  (The first mulligan is free since there are more than two teams.)  

No attacks happened until the end of the fourth round when GYO hit EE with Ty Lee, Artful Acrobat.  They guessed Mustard, Wrench and Dining Room.  EE showed them a card.

In the fifth round, I swung with Seedship Broodtender into GYO, guessing Plum, Lead Pipe, and Study.  They had to pass.  I sacrificed the Broodtender to get Rakish Scoundrel onto the board, but EE immediately hit it with Epic Downfall.  EE attacked GYO with a 5/5 Hei Bai, Spirit of Balance, guessing Green, Wrench, and Hall.  GYO showed him a card.  GYO struck back with a 5/4 Ty Lee and a 3/3 Earthbent land, hitting us both.  They guessed Scarlett, Wrench, and Library; I showed them Scarlett.  

In round six, I sacrificed a treasure with Crime Novelist to get out Twinflame Tyrant, immediately becoming the Archenemy.  I attacked GYO with the Novelist, but they chump blocked it.  I finished my turn with an Expedition Lookout.  GYO cast Elfsworn Giant, but EE countered it with Sokka's Haiku.    

I started the seventh round by hitting GYO with the Twinflame Tyrant.  I guessed Peacock, Candlestick, and Library, and they showed me Senator Peacock.  I cast my Dragonfly Swarm and passed.  EE decided to Collect Evidence 6 and guessed Peacock, Knife, and Conservatory.  GYO showed them a card, which I expected was Senator Peacock, but later realized must be something else.  Then GYO cast Gearbane Orangutan to have something to block my fliers, and also Collected Evidence 6 to guess White, Wrench, and Billiard Room.  I showed them Apothecary White.  

In round eight, I sent my fliers into my opponents: the Tyrant towards EE and the Dragonfly Swarm to GYO.  EE had a plan.

That panda has wings!

Hei Bai with Fleeting Flight blocked and ate my dragon.  The swarm still got in on GYO, so I guessed Green, Rope, and Kitchen.  They showed me Emissary Green, so now I knew that the murderer must be Professor Plum!  I had another flyer in my hand, though, and dropped the Quantum Riddler.  My opponents both eschewed attacking so they could Collect Evidence six again to make guesses on both of us.  EE guessed Peacock, Candlestick, and Secret Passage.  GYO showed them a card.  GYO guessed Plum, Wrench, Billiard Room.  I passed and EE showed a card.  

We were getting really close now!  GYO was clearly honed in on the correct suspect.  They said they were close enough that guessing would be a coin flip and were afraid of dying soon.  Since the tyrant had died, though, they elected to pass instead of making a risky accusation.  There was an interesting rule question here where I was clearly considering casting a spell at their end of turn.  GYO saw this and said, okay, I pass priority at the beginning of my end step.  If the Clue rules worked the way GYO was implying, then the current player could choose to to make their accusation after other effects happen after the beginning of the end step.  My intuition is that the options for the current player to make a suggestion and an accusation both go on the stack at the beginning of the end step.  We chatted about this, but left the matter unresolved as I finished hemming and hawing and decided not to do anything.

I attacked with my fliers again to begin the ninth round, one on each of my opponents.  GYO elected not to block with his Orangutan so I guessed Mustard, Pipe, and Kitchen to them both.  EE cut the process short and showed me the Kitchen, but hopefully I was doing a good job of misleading about Commander Mustard.  I was now ahead in the life game too, with 17 against 10 (EE) and 5 (GYO).  EE and GYO made a plan and made short work of that life lead.  

Chomp chomp, Jeong Jeong's Deserters.

EE attacked me with Hei Bai and GYO Clammy Prowler, which was blocked safely by a 3/3 land.  The panda was now unblockable, however, so I took nine and went to eight.  They guessed Mustard, Candlestick, and Lounge.  I showed the only one I had, Commander Mustard.  GYO killed one of my creatures, played Treetop Fighters and swung at me with their team, using Ty Lee's ability to hamper my other creature.  I had a little trick up my sleeve.

Flash creatures are so good.

I cast Appendage Amalgam and blocked Ty Lee to stay alive at three life.  GYO guessed Plum, Candlestick, and Conservatory.  I could only pass.  They then moved to their end step and made a gambit accusation with the same choices: Plum, Candlestick, and Conservatory.  The checked the envelope and were incorrect.  Whew!

I was tapped out, but had two cards in my hand.  I needed a big turn, so I cast Bombard on my upkeep to kill EE's Dreg Recycler.  They sacrificed it in response, putting the life totals to 2 (me), 11 (EE), and 4 (GYO).  That was actually fine for me because now GYO was dead to my Riddler.  And I'd still used up the card in my hand, so I drew two from the Riddler's ability in my draw step.  One of those two was Rescue Skiff, which I was happy to use to bring back the Twinflame Tyrant.  I swung out with all my creatures and won via glorious combat.  The correct cards were Plum, Lead Pipe, and Conservatory.  GYO was really close to winning!

The big issue here were the life totals.  As I've mentioned before, the Clue format is probably at it's best when the murder gets solved right before someone dies.  So... we probably should have been playing with more life.  The best amount is probably either 25 or 30.  

We decided to squeeze in a second game.  I didn't take notes, mostly because that was part of the reason it took so long.  (I have to pause to write down what happens with each suggestion.)  GYO took that game real well.  Not only did they have a great fast start, but they got real lucky and blind guessed both the weapon and room in one suggestion and won shortly thereafter. 

The real lesson is that this format is viable and fun!  I want to do more chaos Clue drafts!  I will probably suggest this anytime I think the group would be willing to make it happen!

Happy Murder-Solving and Magicking! 

Two Multiplayer Mostly-Avatar Drafts (WUBRG Drafting)

I had a Friday free and took advantage with some moderate-distance Magic tourism, driving to Krum's Comics in Winter Garden, FL.  Their drafts are unique for being chaos (to some extent) and played in a single multiplayer game with a starting life total of 30.  (Multiple people there referred to this as "pod drafting", but I feel like "pod" means other things too.)  I am obviously a fan of both of those things and since they run two drafts back to back on Fridays (1pm and 4pm), it's worth it for me to go up every once in a while, especially since the atmosphere is really chill and new-player friendly.  I have been twice before.  (Travel note: if you do plan to go and are coming from some distance, double-check the drive time during the day as there could be Disney-traffic involved in your trip.)  The store has switched over to the pick-two format.  I don't believe that actually solves any issues with low-set sizes, but whatever.  The drafts cost $25 each, tax included.  

We started a bit late to get a full pod of four.  Everyone wanted to do straight Avatar packs for the first one, so we did that.  I decided a priori to try five-color-allies for the first time, so that drove a lot of my choices.  I did, however, remember to prioritize Vigilance, especially with evasion.  Here were all my picks:

I was desperate for fixing in the third pack.  Also, Cat-Owl's ability is like super-vigilance.

 

Unfortunately, I didn't pay enough attention to the cards that I was taking.  For some of my cool allies, e.g. Sokka, Bold Boomeranger, I needed to also have a bunch of lessons.  After taking that into consideration, my deck came together pretty quickly.  Here it is:

This is not my first time with Earthen Ally.

We rolled to go first and the player to my right won.  They (P1) were a relatively-new player who had built Selesnya Allies.  To my left, P3 was an experienced player running Yore-Tiller (all-but-green) Shrines + Appa.  Across from me sat P4, playing Yore-Tiller (yes, also) Mais and who I think started playing within the last three months.  (No wonder I'd had to fight for some mana fixing!)  My opening hand had Hermitic Herbalist and the mana to cast it, so I kept and we were off!

I dropped the Herbalist on my second turn.  P4 ended the round by playing Mai, Jaded Edge.  

In the third round, I played Zuko, Exiled Prince.  These were followed by Iguana Parrot and Earthen Ally on my fourth turn.  I didn't get to attack with Zuko all that often, but I did on my fifth turn and I pushed all my mana through Earthen Ally to turn my Rumble Arena into a 5/5 creature.  

While I was going off, P1 and P4 had built up respectable boards, but P3 had already played two Crescent Island Temples for four prowess-powered monk tokens.  I was not ready for the shenanigans that were to come, but for the moment I was quickly becoming the Archenemy.

My usual philosophy in these multiplayer games is that I should try to keep opponent life-totals relatively even unless one player is an obvious current or future threat.  Nevertheless, I painted that target on myself and overextended, using the Firebending mana + Earthen Ally trick on the next two turns as well, painting a big target on myself.  The first of those animated a second land while the third buffed my Rumble Arena when it got caught in a bad block.  

On my seventh turn I was idiotically holding a big target.  That allowed P3 to flash out Appa, Steadfast Guardian and airbend both of his temples.  I sensed a bigger threat brewing.  

In the eighth round, I attacked with my 10/10 vigilant Rumble Arena (I don't remember who chump blocked or with what) and made another 5/5.  More importantly, P4 played their second Mai, this one the Scornful Striker.  My deck was heavy on creatures, so I was very happy with this change, especially if it hurt P3 for playing more shrines.  

On my ninth turn, I attacked into everyone with some safe creatures.  (My Iguana Parrot had been regularly getting in for damage.)  P3 played Barrels of Blasting Jelly on their turn, however, and correctly took out my Earthen Ally.  

On my tenth turn, I attacked again.  P3 cast Lost Days on my Rumble Arena.  At that point, my Archenemy horns were quite broken, but no one seemed to notice.  P4 cast Razor Rings on my Iguana Parrot, so it's days of easy damage were also over.  On their turn, P3 cast Ember Island Production, copying Appa, which airbent both temples (again) and the original Appa.  There were going to be a lot of monk tokens!

I was stuck on turn eleven, but P3 wasn't.  They replayed the two temples, which also triggered the prowess on the army of monks they already had.  After playing an additional Invasion Submersible (another prowess trigger) they attacked me with an army of 4/4 monks.  I blocked with a bunch but took mega damage and went to 1 life.  My opponents were at 15 (P1), 11 (P3), and 17 (P4).  

I did leave my Cat-Owl alive.  In the twelfth round, I (foolishly) attacked P4 with it.  P3 recast the original Appa and put the temples back in play.

Monks and Monks and Monks and Monks

With their new monk army, P3 swung out and killed P4.  Without my Cat-Owl attack, the attack wouldn't have been enough.  Oops!  

P1 started the thirteenth round by swinging out on me.  I lost most of my creatures (bye Cat-Owl!) but didn't take any damage.  I cast Sokka, Tenacious Tactician, but it wasn't enough.  P3 attacked us with over twenty creatures and won the game.  

We ended almost exactly at 4pm.  P1 had to leave, but another person showed up right in time and took their spot.  They also seemed to be a relatively new player and this was their first draft.  (That person wound up winning the roll to go first and no one switched seats, so I won't bother to rename people.)  We assured the new P1 that this was a chill group and format, so they could certainly ask us questions at any point.  

This time we agreed to do a chaos draft, but everyone chose three Avatar packs.  

I flexed my chaos muscles.

 

I ditched the ally plan and drafted for fun instead.  My opening pack had two rares and a mythic.  When Zuko, Conflicted tabled back to me, I figured that as well as Iroh, Tea Master meant I was in for some donating shenanigans.  Here were all my picks:

People are always welcome to pass Ozai, the Phoenix King to me.

This deck was more difficult to cut for.  I only went down to 24 with 16 lands since I had the two land cyclers.  Risky, but I went with it.  Here was my deck:

Fewer of these are Nobles than I realized.  Sorry, Lo and Li.

My opponents this time were P1 on WUBRG, P3 on Witch-Maw (all but Red) Tokens, and P4 on Ink-Treader (all but Black) Metalbending.  I think this is the most number of opposing colors I've ever had to compete with in a four-person draft!  I can't believe I nabbed so much mana-fixing!

My opening hand had Iroh, so I went with that and gifted my food token to P3 on my third turn in exchange for a 2/2 ally.  I kept it up on my fourth and fifth turns, donating that and then a 3/3 ally.  On my sixth turn, I played Canyon Crawler and donated the food token to get another ally.  At some point in this mess I got Jem lightfoote out, my vigilant flier of choice for this game.  Throughout this, P1 was stuck on three lands, though they had four colors.  So, they were usually the target of my donations.  

On my seventh turn, I gifted a 3/3 ally and attacked with the Crawler and Jem.  P3 followed that up by getting to a third copy of Joo Dee.  At this point they had Tolls of War out so they had an Ally token to sacrifice every turn.  

Awesome combo moves from P3 in both games!

In the eighth round I swung with Jem again and she got killed to Osseous Exhale.  P4 was good at killing my vigilant fliers!  

Unlike the first game, I lost track of the turn numbers.  Things stalled out.  I had to stop donating my creatures (until I later popped my Mardu Monument for three more donateable warriors) and P3 kept building up an army of Joo Dees.  P4 had played Toph, the first Metalbender and built their own land-creature force.  

Finally, P1 broke the stalemate by casting Suki, Kyoshi Warrior.  When it swung on the next two turns, it came crashing in as a 10/4.  This caused P3 and P4 to start swinging back.  I did not like this because I needed to convince the table that P3 with their Joo Dee army was the main danger.  That failed, though, as P1 swung out again at P4.  (I don't remember how Suki died, but I think it only got the two attacks in.)  I had Destined Confrontation and Ozai in my hand, so I was waiting for the right time to nuke the board.  I got Iguana Parrot out for the second game, and started swinging away.

My field, mostly consisting of donation-created allies.

 

Then P3 used Shifting Grift to steal Toph, which fractured their alliance.  This was in preparation for their main move, though.  I played Combustion Man, thinking I was going to get ahead, but P3 surprised us on their turn with Foggy Swamp Visions.  They paid 10 and took advantage of our deep graveyards.  

Hey, some of those were mine!

P3 launched an attack on P1, smaller than I expected, but it was reasonable.  It was also enough that P4 was able to finish off P1 on their turn.  

I untapped.  I wasn't sure I could win, but I went for it anyways.  I swung out with enough to kill off P3, then dropped the Destined Confrontation.  My Pirate Peddlers was very happy to gain 10 +1/+1 counters.  Without enough to get through on me, P4 had to pass their turn.  I cast Ozai the next turn, floated the two extra mana to give it flying, and attacked for the win.  

I really enjoy these chill drafts and playing the big multiplayer games.  

Happy Holidays and Happy Magicking!

A Full Pod of Chaos (WUBRG Drafting)

I got a wacky draft running this week.  I had five people total, but that jumped up to eight right before the event.  Excellent!  There are good things to say about lots of different numbers of people, but eight is a perfectly round number for pods.  

It's early December, but the holidays are chaotic.  I might not get another chance this month, so, just in case, I went festive with my pack colors: Red, White, and Green.  Here's what everyone opened:

Very chaotic!

 

Before we were getting things figured out, though, one player brought a bunch of packs and was putting them in piles of three.  I'm not exactly sure what they were doing, but it was exciting to see the different packs!

Maybe planning for future drafts?

We decided to do best-of-one rounds.  (I was a bit dumb and forgot to tell people that the first mulligan was free... oops!  My fault!  Thankfully the veterans brought it up pretty early in the playing.

 

You can tell from my draft picks that I'm greedy.  I turned down a few good mana-fixing cards, but I did have some good finishers.  The real boon came in the third pack, when I was passed an Ultima!  That bailed me out on my first pick of that pack, the Archpriest of Iona.  I did have at least one each of the creatures for a full party, but I don't think there was enough to be good enough.  Here were all my picks:

I should get more criticism for these.

After ditching the Party theme, I quickly built this deck:

My deck includes the cards for an ethical dilemma.

 

We paired up and got to playing.  I managed to get in my rounds with five opponents, starting off against a Jund Mana-Dorks deck.  My opponent played two early mana dorks and played Saber-Tooth Moose-Lion on turn four!  That was followed by a Spinewoods Armadillo, then turn six yielded an Honest Rutstein, which got the Moose-Lion back, which also hit the board (again).  If that wasn't enough, turn seven brought Beifong's Bounty Hunters.  Thankfully I drew into a plains that following turn and I was able to cast Ultima.  Thanks to the "End the turn" part of that spell, the Bounty Hunters' ability didn't resolve.  Even with that, the game was not decided.  They Sold Out my Mongoose Lizard, then played Feral Deathgorger.  I was able to handle that with Master Piando and either the best or only mana-fixing combat trick, Prishe's Wanderings.  From then on I just kept attacking and won.  1-0.

The second round pit me up against a deck of Orzhov weenies.  They started with Abandoned Air Temple and then played little creatures including a Rally the Monastery.  

Court Street Denizen kept triggering!

I got Hakoda down on turn four, and Jeskai Brushmaster, but it wasn't enough to hold off the onslaught and I died on the next turn.  1-1.

In the third round, I faced my first Glint-Eye (non-white) deck of the night.  (Why is everyone drafting so many colors?)  

It's like I'm playing against myself.  Oof!

I was doing pretty well, but my opponent had a great play against me.  I tried to Lightning Bolt their Locke Cole, but they played Fleeting Reflection.  Targeting my Fblthp.  My one-for-one turned into myself getting two-for-oned.  Then they played Flopsie.  I thought I was sunk there, but I did get Ultima.  Somehow my opponent still drew more bombs and played Iron Giant the turn later, killing me the following turn.  1-2.

Next up I challenged an aggressive Boros deck.  I had more time than I should have against a deck like this, to the point where I was able to cast Malboro on my sixth turn.  I thought I might have a chance to come back, but my opponent got two 3/2 fliers that I couldn't deal with: Aang, The Last Airbender, and Wanted Griffin.  I thought I had another turn to find an answer, but my opponent played How to Start a Riot and I was done early.  1-3.

In the fifth round I was up against my second Glint-Eye opponent!  For a while it was my Blind Hunter against their Goblin Assailant, just trading hits back and forth.  They played Teval, but I put it to some Honest Work.  I got the Brushmaster down and Glider Kids and got there.  2-3.

What a great draft!  I feel like my deck could do a bit better than it performed, but I found nonetheless.  I'm not sure what I can do to beat faster decks aside from draft more early blockers like the Temur Devotee that I pulled this time.  I am genuinely interested whether I could have built a better deck from my draft pool too.

I hope you have some Happy Magicking and Happy Holidays!

Ravnica Clue + Avatar: TLA Beginner's Box

On a bit of a whim, I picked up an Avatar: TLA Beginner's Box from my FLGS, Intergalactic Plastic.  That's likely a bit unethical of me, since I'm not the intended audience, but I was really excited that it had exactly the right number of Jumpstart decks (not exactly packs) for a five-player game of Ravnica Clue.  

That parenthetical may need a bit of explanation.  The Beginner's Box comes with ten 20-card Jumpstart-style "decks" of 20 cards:

• I don't want to say "packs" because they aren't individually wrapped.  They are all packaged together with divider cards between them.
• There are two for each color.
• All ten are different from the decks that can be found in the Jumpstart boosters for the set!
• Two are designed for a scripted game and are meant to be played one against the other to teach two people how to play the game.  (One is Red (Zuko), one is White (Aang).)
• The remaining eight decks function like individual Jumpstart packs.

I put each of the ten decks in a perfectly-sized paper envelope and kept them with my Ravnica Clue box waiting for the right time. 

This week I got lucky enough to get a group to try it out.  I sat down with three other people to play.  Since there were four of us, not five, we decided to leave the two scripted packs out and used the other eight.  I think it would have been okay for those to be part of it, though.  

We decided to try playing at 20 life.  (A higher number might have been better.)  We rolled to determine who was going first and I was second.  Player 1 (P1) had the Earthbending and Allies decks.  I had Firebending and Attacking.  P3 had Waterbending and Counters.  P4 had Big Creatures and Spells.  For Clue cards, I was dealt the Lead Pipe, the Billiard Room, the Dining Room, and the Secret Passage.  Revealed to everyone were the Hall and the Library.

My opening hand had good land but not enough small creatures to participate in the first few turns.  In the first round the most interesting thing that happened is that P3 dropped a Gilacorn, which they hit me with on the second turn.  They guessed White, Candlestick, and the Ballroom, which I passed to.  

In the third round of turns, P1 hit me with their Kyoshi Warrior Guard (slightly better than Squire).  They guessed better with Mustard, Knife, and Billiard Room.  I showed them the Billiard Room.  With that treasure, I was able to cast Fire Nation Archers on my turn.  That was enough to turn away attackers for a bit.  P3 hit P4 and guessed White, Candlestick, and Ballroom.  P4 showed them a card.

In round four, P1 hit P4, guessing Green, Pipe, and Conservatory.  P4 showed them a card.  P4 later hit P3, guessing Mustard, Pipe, and Conservatory.  P3 had to show them a card.  (At the time I was not sharp enough to notice that this meant P4 probably had Emissary Green.)

In round five, P1 hit P3 and P4.  They guessed Scarlett, Rope, and Dining Room.  P3 immediately showed them a card.  I figured I needed to get in on the attacking so I swung into P1.  I guessed Plum, Wrench, and Kitchen; they showed me the Kitchen.  P3 also hit P1 back and guessed Plum, Candlestick, and Kitchen.  They obviously showed P3 a card.  P4 attacked me with their Turtle-Seals.  I had Roku's Mastery, but only five lands, so I took the damage.  They guessed Mustard, Pipe, and Secret Passage.  I showed them the Secret Passage and gained a treasure token.

At this point, battlefields had started to get pretty wide, but people were mostly attacking with one or two creatures just to make suggestions. 

P1 started the sixth round off by attacking me with their Glider Kids that had a +1/+1 counter.  With the newfound treasure, I was able to kill them with Roku's Mastery, saving myself from having to reveal any new information.  On my turn, I played one of my favorites: Mongoose Lizard.  I took out P1's Haru, Hidden Talent with the ETB.  I didn't attack with the archers just because I was wary of more creatures coming on me.  P3 played Fire Nation Sentinels, but P1 immediately Rocky Rebuked it.  Undeterred, P3 attacked P4, guessing Green, Candlestick, and Ballroom.  P4 showed them a card.  P4 made the big play, however, bouncing my two creatures with Water Whip.  They hit me for six damage and guessed Peacock, Pipe, and Billiard Room.  I showed them the room and put my life counter to nine.

The seventh round started with P1 finishing me off.  Oof!  I revealed my Clue cards to everyone and they seemed pretty confident that the game would end soon.  (This does bring up an important rules question that I'm not sure about.  If a player dies to combat damage, does the person who hit them have to make a suggestion?  The only reason this matters is because it means they couldn't do that and make a Collect-Evidence-6-based suggestion at the end of the turn.)  P1 didn't have enough information to win, however, and passed.  P3 took their turn and refused to attack.  They Collected Evidence 6 to guess Mustard, Knife, and Ballroom.  P4 passed, but P1 showed a card.  P3 then made their accusation: Mustard, Knife, and Study.  It was correct; they won!

 

This game was great!  I did die very suddenly, but that seems to have been a tactical misplay by P4 and P1, as it led to P3's immediate win.  So, there's an open question of whether 20 life was too small.  Here are some arguments for more life:

• It's good when life totals get small right before someone's about to solve the murder, but no one was close to that until my cards got revealed.
• 30 life is the amount for the Ravnica Clue Jumpstart-style packs that come with the set.  These "packs" seem similarly aggressive.  

On the other side, however:

• Killing me did not help either of those players to win.
• Do these packs actually have as much evasion as the Ravnica Clue packs to aid in getting damage through?  Maybe not!

I would love to know what you think?  How much life should we have started with?  More importantly, though, have you played Clue with some other Beginner's Box or Jumpstart packs?  I want to play this format over and over again!  I have already put my other Jumpstart packs together to hopefully use in the future.

No matter how you're playing, Clue or not, Happy Magicking!