The Clues Come Together in the Chaos (WUBRG Drafting)

I got a group together for a five-player Clue draft last night.  We decided to play starting at 25 life, though we forgot about that until after the game had started.  I actually think 20 would have been fine.  Here's how it all went down.

We had a real good mix of packs for this Wacky Draft:

We had already divvied out the Clue cards.

With five players you reveal and remove three of the room cards before you deal out the Clue cards to all players.  I was dealt Emissary Green, Mastermind Plum, and the Kitchen.  (I didn't start filling out my sheet yet because I like to put the players in turn order.  I waited and then almost forgot to do it afterwards.)

During drafting I did pay attention to mana fixing, but I also had some other priorities.  I pulled Homunculus Horde in pack two, so I looked for ways to draw extra cards and get that trigger.  I also dipped into some life gain combos after getting Pest Mascot later on in that pack.  I got real lucky with vivid cards, though, including the second-to-last pick of Wildvine Pummeler.  Good mana fixing came around late too, including the Bebop and Entish Restoration.  Here were all my picks:

Sadly I didn't get enough Legends to make the Delighted Halfling a powerhouse.

I made cuts pretty quickly and put this deck together.

I had to run the Ruinous Ultimatum, right?

I rolled to go last.  Against me were:

• P1 playing "American Robots" 
• P2, running "Orzhov Othello"
• P3 on "Azorius Merfolk", and
• P4 with a defensive Jeskai build.

In the first round of turns, P2 cast Dream Beavers to get the only creature on the board.  

In the second round, P1 played Knowledge Seeker, an excellent card for the format.   P2 cast Sanguine Syphoner and then hit P3 with their Beavers.  They guessed Apothecary White, Knife, and Ballroom.  P3 passed.  The case was on!  I ended the round by casting my Delighted Halfling.

On their third turn, P1 played Flaring Cinder, immediately buffing their Knowledge Seeker, which they sent at me.  I didn't want to lose my Halfling yet, so I took the three.  They guessed the same trio: White, Knife, and Ballroom.  I had to pass.  P2 kept up the attack on their turn and hit P4 and me, guessing Green, Candlestick, and Billiard Room.  I gulped, but P4 revealed a card first so Emissary Green was safe in my hand.  P3 cast Farfinder, P4 cast Brazen Scourge (but didn't attack!), and I cast my Homunculus Horde.  

P1 started the fourth round by playing Gathering Stone, naming Warrior, and immediately getting a card off of it.  (I don't remember what it was.)  Then they hit me with the Knowledge Seeker again, guessing Mustard, Pipe, and the Library.  I passed again, but I had already leaked a ton of information.  P2 attacked and snuck in Oroku Saki to hit P3 and P1.  They guessed Scarlett, Wrench, and Secret Passage.  P3 showed a card.  P3 hit P2 back and guessed everyone's favorite: White, Knife, and Ballroom.  P2 passed.  P3 then dropped a Chitinous Graspling.  P4 also hit P2 and guessed Green, Pipe, and Billiard Room.  P2 passed again.  Then they dropped Tanufel Rimespeaker.  The tide had turned away from me, but I played Dreadwing Scavenger and my Homunculus got a copy, expecting I might get a target from that.  P2 still had lots of life and I could get through on them, so I joined in on the dog pile.  I guessed Peacock, Rope, and Kitchen; P2 passed.  

Somewhere in turn four.

P1 played Oreplate Pangolin on their fifth turn.  P2 cast Leering Onlooker and then hit P3 and P1 again.  They guessed Mustard, Rope, and Kitchen, and P3 showed a card.  P3 played Mondo Gecko but couldn't swing in safely.  P4 cast Kavaron Skywarden and also held off.  (We knew nothing about their hand yet!)  I attacked with my bird, which doubled my Homunculuses to 4.  I hit P1 and guessed Plum, Wrench, and Study.  He showed me the Wrench.  I played Larval Scoutlander and tapped three of my Homunculuses and the Halfling to immediately fully station it.  Although I had picked up the Archenemy mantle, P4 was still way ahead on relative Clue-knowledge.

On the sixth turn, P1 played Hovel Hurler and Burdened Stoneback.  They attacked but didn't get through.  The Gathering Stone had been packing their graveyard, however, so they were able to Collect Evidence 6 and made a guess on everyone: Scarlett, Candlestick, and Conservatory.  P2 passed, but P3 revealed a card.  P2 cast Bile-Vial Boggart and Dream Seizer, then hit P1.   They guessed Peacock, Wrench, and Study.  P1 showed a card (maybe the Wrench?)  P4 cast Tablet of Discovery and continued to hold back.  I realized I couldn't just keep doubling my Homunculuses or everyone would start swinging in to me.  I attacked, but sent some of my horde to their death so that I was attacking everyone.  They still doubled at the beginning of combat.  Out of all the attacks, I only hit P1.  I guessed White, Pipe, and Kitchen.  P1 passed.  I cast Squawkroaster and Foraging Wickermaw and ended the turn with six Homunculuses.  I also had lands to generate two white, one red, and one black (among other colors).  There's no reason that's important.

At this point people were talking about being close to solving the murder.  I did not feel that way.  I don't know if that's because I was too busy taking notes and not analyzing the situation, but there was still a lot of empty space on my sheet.  I had deduced very little.

The seventh round of turns started and P1 dropped Sourbread Auntie and then Collected Evidence 6 again and guessed White, Pipe, and Library.  P2 immediately showed them a card.  P2 continued the gravy train and also Collected Evidence 6 to guess Plum, Pipe, and Lounge.  P3 and P4 passed so I had to show Mastermind Plum to P2.  I took my treasure token.  P3 played Honorbound Page then hit P2 and guessed Mustard, Wrench, and Secret Passage.  P2 showed a card.  P4 played Stone of Erech, really good at slowing down players using their graveyards to make guesses.  They cast Temporal Cleansing on my bird, ending my combo with the Homunculus Horde (I put it second from the top) and finally Collected Evidence 6 themselves to guess White, Knife, and Kitchen.  I showed them the Kitchen and took another treasure token.  White, White, Red, Black, Foraging Wickermaw for another Red and then my two treasures: I cast the Ruinous Ultimatum that had been in my hand all game.  P4 immediately used the Stone of Erech against me, dumping my graveyard.  With a clean board, I hit everyone with creatures.  I guessed White, Rope, and Secret Passage.  P1 passed and P2 showed me the Secret Passage.  I ended my turn, but everyone was still at above ten life.  I didn't want to kill anyone because I figured I would lose the Clue battle.

The unexpected downside of that play was that everyone now had a full graveyard.  To start off the eighth round, P1 Collected Evidence 6 for Mustard, Candlestick, and Lounge.  P2 showed a card right off the bat.  P2 killed my Scoutlander and then Collected Evidence 6 for Green, Wrench, and Study.  P3 passed but P4 showed a card, saving me from having to reveal Emissary Green.  P3 also Collected Evidence 6, guessing White, Candlestick, and Study.  P4 showed another card.  P4 cast Kinbinding and also Collected Evidence 6 for White, Pipe, and Ballroom.  Pass, pass, pass... pass.  Thankfully there was a bluff in there.  They spent their accusation and guessed White, Pipe, and Billiard Room.  The checked the envelope... incorrect!  I took my turn and played the Dreadwing Scavenger again to put my Homunculus count to 12.  I was pretty confident about Apothecary White and the Pipe, but I didn't know between the Ballroom, Lounge, and Study.  (I should have been able to rule out the Ballroom, but I didn't realize that yet.)  I didn't think many people knew that I held Mastermind Plum, so I hit everyone with creatures to guess Plum, Pipe, and Lounge.  (I didn't have a weapon to cover up that guess.)  All four of my opponents passed!  It was the Lounge.  I accused White, Pipe, Lounge, and was correct.  I won!

I know I got lucky in this game.  I got the Scavenger with the Horde at just the right time so I could start doubling them.  If I hadn't had all those Homunculuses, I couldn't have been attacking to make two wide guesses at the end.  I also got super lucky with the two treasures right in time to cast the Ultimatum.  Finally, I got lucky that things lined up so I could solve the murder right at the end.  

It sounded like if I hadn't won, it would have been won by any of the next three players.  Whew!

Here are my takeaways:

• I think 20 life is probably best with five players.  No one was in any danger of losing to life loss, which might have been different if we'd all had 20 instead of 25.  I still like 25 for four players and I'm not sure for three players.
• We didn't make any mistakes this time!  The last two clue drafts had had a mistake on each of them, which changed who won.  I'm not sure what we did that prevented an issue this time.  I said at the beginning that I wanted to be very deliberate with resolving guesses, but I'm not sure I actually did anything to slow us down and be more careful.
• On that note, it was really helpful that I was taking notes about each guess.  Many times people asked me what had just been asked.   
• This is my favorite format and I don't know why.  I like big multiplayer games, but why this Clue thing specifically?  I'm not even particularly good at the Clue part!  I think it's because the game doesn't go too long and anyone can pull out a win in the end.  It also does work really well with chaos drafting.

Happy Magicking and Murder-solving! 

Two-Player Sealed vs Minotaur Horde and Xenagos Revel (WUBRG Sealed)

A friend and I got together on Tuesday afternoon to try our hand against two Theros-block horde decks and test out my web implementations of them.  (I did find some errors I haven't fixed yet, so I won't link to those quite yet.) 

We decided to open more recent packs, so we each cracked three packs of Murders at Karlov Manor and Outlaws of Thunder Junction.  Here's what I opened:

I shouldn't have left the lands in front.  I don't know why I did that.

I built this deck from those cards.  I kept the curve really low because my experience is that you either lost in the first few turns or survive long enough to mount a comeback.  Let me know what I could have done better!

There was enough fixing that I was okay, even with only three multi-lands.

We played five games.  I didn't take many notes about what was going on during those games, mostly because unlike normal games of magic, I didn't really have any "down time" where I wasn't actively talking with my teammate.

We played two games against the Battle the (Minotaur) Horde deck.   In the first game, we let the Horde deck play three cards per turn instead of the normal two.  (The instructions say to modify the number of free turns the players get to adjust the difficulty, but I wanted to tinker with this instead.)  We were able to win easily on turn 9 or 10.  In the second game, we bumped that up to four and still won around turn 8, again without problem.  Maybe the right thing to do is to change the number of turns the players get.  

At this point, we switched to the Xenagos deck.  I had just played against the physical cards on Friday, and immediately the rules we had come up with came into question, namely:

• Players share a 20-point life total, and
• If a creature is blocked by one player, it is blocked for all players.

The reason we came to the shared life total is due to this old MTGSalvation thread that seems to be the best thing to a ruling I found online.  It describes a situation where the player team has two players and is dealt eight damage by Xenagos's Strike instead of just 4.  

This format is extremely hard.  I had been trying on my own the day before and couldn't beat the deck even when it started with only one reveler on the board.  On Friday we had some really good decks, but we were only able to beat it in twice in five tries.  The good news is that the games can go really quickly when you're losing.  

For the two of us on this day, we first tried against two revelers.  We lost on turn two.  We tried again with only one reveler and died on turn five.  Oof.  We had no real chance in either of those games.

We modified the rules to give ourselves a fighting chance:

• We had separate life totals, but
• We still said that when a creature was blocked it damaged none of the players.  Unblocked creatures hit all players, just like in Cutthroat blocking.  

We started with just one reveler on the board with Xenagos.  This time we managed to survive through the most dangerous turns and then stabilize our life total.  We won around our turn ten, but it was still tough.

I'm really torn about how I want to play against this deck.

• On the one hand, sharing a life total seems to be the way it's meant to play, as the MTGSalvation thread quotes from the old Daily MTG article.  Unfortunately, it just does not scale.  If there are four players, Xenagos can easily kill the table on the first turn.  And even at one player, the format is extremely difficult.  
• On the other hand, with separate life totals and cutthroat blocking, we won, but the game did turn into a bit of a slog.  

I'm going to have to test more.  I wonder whether there's another (smaller) change that can make the multiplayer game work better.

However you decide to fight Xenagos, Happy Magicking!

Store Draft became a Team vs Hordes Draft (WUBRG Drafting)

I went to a Secrets of Strixhaven draft last night that didn't fire; we only had three and needed six.  The two other players are common players in this blog, so we discussed what to do.  I was lucky and had brought some extra supplies: Ravnica Clue, three extra packs in case there was a post-draft chaos draft (Ikoria, Foundations, and Strixhaven) and the three Theros Horde decks.  I needed all three of those to do what we did!

We did a team draft against the Horde decks.  We first opened a jumpstart pack each (revealing to each other what the title card was) and then drafted the three packs.  However we made a slight (but important) change to the drafting process: we made two picks instead of one after opening a pack; so only replacing the first pick.  Importantly, we agreed we wouldn't collude after revealing the title cards of the jumpstart packs.  Here's what we opened:

I'm glad I brought those three packs and that I brought my Clue box.  (That has assorted Jumpstart packs in it.)

Here's what it looked like when we revealed the Jumpstart title cards:

Let's go team monkeys!

I have no experiencing drafting in a way that benefits my teammates without colluding... but I made at least one good choice in the beginning.  My friends figured I would be WUBRG drafting, so they were nice about passing mana fixing.  I opened Lutri and passed it, which the Adept player picked up.  I did not know that they had also opened Iroh, Grand Lotus in his first pack, so they were ready to go spellslinger.  I made another good choice and passed them a Tolarian Terror from the second pack.  I saw that Boros cards were getting taken, so I let those go through too.  On the other hand, I saw lots of black cards weren't getting taken, so I took a bunch from that.  I think I would have been much better at this if I had any skill in reading and sending signals in packs.  

Here are all my picks and the spells from the first pack:

I don't think I've ever owned a Kibo before!

Here's the deck I built from those cards:

I am certain I don't receive enough criticism of my deckbuilding.

That is the deck I used against the Minotaurs and Xenagos.  For the Hydra, I had some 3-drop 3/3s (apparently these are "centaurs") instead of some of the anti-artifact apes like Uktabi Orangutan.  I ran Kraul Whipcracker because we looked up and saw that the horde creatures count as tokens, but I can't find where we determined that.  (I'll update here if I find it.)

We played nine games.  We played pretty fast, so I didn't take notes of the different plays during the games, only the results of each.

The three decks are similar in some ways and very different in others.  I won't go into great detail in how each of them works, but I will mention the differences in similar stats (and how we modified them as we played).  I am very interested in how to modify these for various situations and difficulties!

Face the Hydra

This is the horde-precon I am most familiar with, having played against it once many years ago and then multiple times recently.  In this one:

• The players have separate life totals.
• The horde creatures do not actually attack the players.
• The base number of starting creatures is 2.
• The deck plays one card per turn.
• The players go first (but don't draw) and the horde goes directly afterwards. 
• The players attack the creatures instead of the deck directly. 

In game one we played against three heads.  We won handily on turn four.  In game two we started against four heads and won on turn six.  These games were easier than I expected; I thought we would have a harder time.  Since we'd won two, we moved on.

Battle the (Minotaur) Horde

I am second-most familiar with this one having played against it on my own a few times a few days prior.  This plays more like the Zombie Horde deck that presumably inspired all of these "official horde" decks.  Against this deck:

• The players share a life total.
• The horde creatures do attack the players.
• There are no starting creatures.
• The deck starts off playing two cards per turn, but that can increase over the course of the game.
• The players go first (don't draw on the first turn) and then get two additional setup turns before the horde takes their first turn. 
• The players attack the deck directly. 

In game one we played with the horde playing three cards per turn.  We got real lucky with the horde's plays and won on our sixth turn.  In the second game we had the horde start playing right after our first turn and still played three cards per turn.  We won on turn nine.

Defeat a God 

I had never played against this deck before.  It takes interesting parts of the other two, but there are a few areas that aren't 100% clear.  Since the horde creatures attack the players, it seems like the players should share a life total (or use cutthroat blocking rules).  However, there are also spells like Xenagos's Strike that deal damage to each player, which makes it seem like the players should have separate totals like against the Hydra.  In the end, we read an old mtgsalvation thread that convinced us to have a single life total, but damage-each-player spells scaled up in a scary way.  It was real easy for us to die out of nowhere.  Here are the stats for this as we played it:

• The players share a life total.
• The horde creatures do attack the players (though not every turn).
• There are two starting creatures.
• The deck plays two cards per turn. 
• The players go first (don't draw) and then the horde deck goes.
• The players attack the creatures, not the deck.

In the first game we didn't do the multiplayer rules correctly, and we flipped three cards instead of two per turn, losing on turn 4.  (Two of us died the prior turn.)  In game two (sharing a life total) and only flipping two per turn, we won on turn five.  This one showed how crazy things could be as we lost 15 life on Xenagos's first turn.  In game three we also flipped three cards per turn and lost on turn three.  In game four we had the deck ramp up to three cards, so they played one (on turn 1), two (on turn 2), then three every turn thereafter.  They killed us on turn four.  For the fifth game we did the same thing and pulled out a win on turn 6.  Against Xenagos, it seems like the best plan each turn is to attack and kill as many of their creatures as possible, even if you're putting yourself in danger of getting hit back.  With Impulsive Return, if you have multiple players you can just die out of nowhere.

This was incredibly fun!  I would like to figure out "Easy", "Normal", and "Hard" settings for each deck with different numbers of players (assuming sealed decks, not exactly what we did) but I'm not sure where to put that now.  Xenagos might be the most interesting in that you don't need to scale it up for different numbers of players.

If you have experience with these decks, please tell me what you've done, especially if it would make things better!  Happy Horde Magicking! 

Theros: Face the Hydra (WUBRG Sealed)

Since the release of the TMNT Team-Up box set (which I haven't played yet) I've been interested in other co-op formats.  I have the old Theros-block horde decks, and I enjoy playing online via SpellTable, so I decided to try to make web implementations of them, starting with the Theros set's Face the Hydra.  Here's the site I'm working on.  

 It's pretty rudimentary.

 

Two friends helped me playtest it yesterday against Sealed decks.  We got together (so we didn't test the link sharing feature) and played four games to test how hard it is to play against the hydra deck with different numbers of starting heads.

Secrets of Strixhaven just came out, so we opened a bunch of that and old Strixhaven. 

I opened my two GameStop packs and four old Strixhaven packs.

The player who opened six Secrets packs built a Sultai deck, mostly Witherbloom with a splash of blue.  I'll refer to them as Witherbluum.  The player who did three and three got a bunch of great Izzet pieces, so they're Prismari.  I opened the following pool:

I think five dual lands is enough to go WUBRG.

Deckbuilding was a bit tricky.  I spent a lot of time and prioritized 3-power creatures and ditched many combat tricks.  I did not think Flying, Trample, Vigilance, etc, were useful abilities, so I mostly ignored those cards.  Here's what I built:

I miss the learn-boards from OG Strixhaven drafts.

Game 1: In the first game we tried to face down three heads, which is listed as the "Normal" setting.  After playing, I think that meant "Normal" for a single player, not a team.  We were never in any danger of losing this first game.

Since it's a more-than-two-player format, we decided that the first mulligan is free.  All three of us took one in the first game.  The Hydra started with three Hydra Heads in play.  When playing, the players share a turn and go first, but don't get to draw.  We each played a land and then the Hydra deck took its turn.  It cast Noxious Hydra Breath, essentially a whiff as we chose to destroy all the tapped creatures which we didn't have.  Then the hydra dealt us all three damage (one for each of the Hydra Heads) and ended its turn.

On the second turn, Witherbluum played Mindful Biomancer, Prismari played Multiple Choice, and I played Emergent Sequence to get a 2/2 Mountain.  The Hydra flipped Strike the Weak Spot, and we killed one of the heads and gained our two life.  When a Head dies, the Hydra deck flips over the top two cards of its library; any revealed Heads go on to the battlefield.  Thankfully, we didn't get any.  The Hydra dealt us two damage and was done.  

On turn three, we attacked and killed both heads thanks to Prismari's Bulk Up on my Mountain.  One regrew another Hydra Head, so it wasn't dead.  (If the Hydra has no heads at the end of any turn, the players win.)  I played Deluge Virtuoso and froze that head.  On the Hydra's turn, it flipped a Ravenous Brute Head.  Elite Heads deal two damage each turn, but tapped Heads deal nothing, so we only took two total damage.  

On turn four, we attacked to kill the Ravenous Brute Head; no heads regrew.  Witherbluum cast Lluwen, Exchange Student, and I kept the remaining head tapped down with Procrastinate.  The Hydra cast Disorienting Glower and did nothing else.    

We had enough to kill the last head in combat on turn five, but it regrew.  The Hydra played a second Hydra Head on its turn and dealt us each two damage.

On turn six, Witherbluum cast Blech and Prismari played Elemental Summoning.  We attacked to kill both Hydra Heads, which regrew a Ravenous Brute Head.  The Hydra cast Grown from the Stump and resurrected two Hydra Heads.

We ended the game on turn seven, still all above twenty life.  Prismari cast Zaffai and the Tempests, then Banishing Betrayal on the Ravenous Brute Head (bouncing a head is as good as killing it) but it regrew into a Hydra Head.  We attacked to kill all three heads, and only one regrew into a Ravenous Brute Head.  Witherbluum cast Grapple with Death to kill the last head which did not regrow anything.  Win!

 

Game 2: Since we were never in any real danger, we jumped up to five starting heads for the second game.  Once again, we all cashed in on our free mulligans.

On turn one, the Hydra player cast Disorienting Glower, then hit us for five.  We were down to 15 already.  (From here on I will continue to mention the lowest life total among the three of us.)  

On turn two, we could only play land.  The Hydra cast Grown from the Stump and got a Shrieking Titan Head.  We took seven and had to discard a card to boot, putting us at 8.  

We could finally act on the third turn.  I played Deluge Virtuoso to tap a Hydra Head and Witherbluum cast Procrastinate on the Shrieking Titan Head.  The Hydra cast Hydra's Impenetrable Hide and put us to 4.  

On our fourth turn, Witherbluum did a little bit of lifegain so they would be able to stay alive, but the Hydra cast Unified Lunge and killed us all anyways.  Loss!

Game 3: We took it down a notch and battled four starting heads.  On the first turn, the Hydra flipped over another Hydra Head and put us down to 15.

On turn two, Witherbluum cast Slumbering Trudge and Prismari cast Landscape Painter.  The Hydra cast Hydra's Impenetrable Hide and the heads hit us again.  (We must have tapped down one of the heads because I have us only going down to 11.  Maybe I cast Procrastinate.)

On turn three, I cast Deluge Virtuoso, which Witherbluum said was our MVP.  Prismari cast Seize the Spoils.  The Hydra cast Noxious Hydra Breath, taking out the Slumbering Trudge, then put us to 8.

We started to rebound on turn four.  Prismari cast Colorstorm Stallion, Witherbluum cast Pterafractyl, and I cast Emergent Sequence.  We attacked to kill two heads, putting us to 12 life.  One of the heads regrew into a Ravenous Brute Head.  Unfortunately, the Hydra immediately got two back with Grown from the Stump and we went to 5 life from the six-headed beast.

On turn five Witherbluum killed the Ravenous Brute Head with Grapple with Death.  I cast Cram Session before combat to make my Virtuoso big enough to kill a head again, and we attacked to kill four of the basic heads.  The hydra regrew two Hydra Heads and a Ravenous Brute Head, but at least we gained a bunch of life.  Prismari cast Vibrant Idea off the Landscape Painter and gained a copy of the Colorstorm Stallion.  (We forgot it had haste, otherwise we'd've cast it before combat.)  I cast Stonebound Mentor to end our turn.  The Hydra cast Swallow the Hero Whole, which wasn't that terrible for us.  It gobbled up our Deluge Virtuoso, Pterafractyl, and Landscape Painter.  The heads "attacked" and put us to 10 life.

On the sixth turn, Prismari cast Heated Argument to kill the Ravenous Brute Head, bringing our three swallowed creatures back.  It also doubled the Colorstorm Stallions to four; we had plenty to attack and kill all three remaining heads.  They regrew into one Hydra Head and a Snapping Fang Head.  Witherbluum played Blech and we passed the turn at 18 life.  The Hydra played another Hydra Head and passed.  

On turn seven, we were in full control.  Prismari played Vibrant Idea again and doubled the horses to eight!  We attacked to kill all three Heads.  A Ravenous Brute Head regrew, but I took it out with Closing Statement.  Nothing regrew from that.  Win! 

Game 4: We decided to give five heads another try.  On the first turn the Hydra whiffed with Swallow the Hero Whole, but still attacked to put us to 15.  

On the second turn, Prismari cast Banishing Betrayal on a head, but it regrew.  (At least we gained 2 life to go to 17.)  Witherbluum dropped Bogwater Lumaret, a key combo piece.  The Hydra cast Distract the Hydra and we all just took the three damage.  After that, the Heads put the lowest of us to 9.  

On turn three, Prismari played Frost Trickster, I played Deluge Virtuoso, and Witherbluum played Pest Mascot.  

It got big.

The Hydra grew a Ravenous Brute Head and we went to 4 life.

On our fourth turn, Witherbluum cast Send in the Pest, Prismati cast Elemental Mascot, and I played Emergent Sequence.  We attacked to kill two Hydra Heads and the Ravenous Brute Head and went to 10 life.  A Hydra Head and a Snapping Fang Head regrew.  On it's turn, the Hydra got two more heads from Grown from the Stump and we went to 1 life.

We had a big comeback on turn five.  We attacked to kill three Hydra Heads and the Snapping Fang Head.  It regrew a Savage Vigor Head and a Ravenous Brute Head.  Witherbluum cast Burrog Barrage to kill the Savage Vigor Head and nothing regrew.  I cast another Deluge Virtuoso and ended our turn with 15 life.  The Hydra cast Grown from the Stump and recovered two of its heads.  We took five and went to 10.

On turn six we attacked and killed all the heads and went to 24 life.  Four heads regrew: two Hydra Heads, one Shrieking Titan Head, and one Ravenous Brute Head.  I cast Procrastinate on the Ravenous Brute head, Prismari flashbacked a Faithless Looting, and Witherbluum cast Studious First-Year.  The Hydra cast Distract the Hydra and I we all sacrificed a creature before going to 20.

On the seventh turn, we attacked again and killed all the heads, which regrew into a Hydra Head and a Ravenous Brute Head and went to a comfortable 30 life.  The Hydra cast Torn Between Heads, but it was too little, too late.  On the eighth turn we attacked and killed all the heads.  Nothing regrew.  Win!

 

Here are my takeaways from this day of fun:

• For the three of us, I think five starting Hydra Heads was the most fun.  Perhaps the-number-of-players-plus-two is a good heuristic for the number of starting heads.
• There are a couple critical turns early on that you just need to get past to be on course to win.
• One big creature does not break the game, since Trample doesn't matter and it can only kill one Head per turn.
• Bears are probably better than I expected.  Two power can't kill a Hydra Head alone, but they can work with other creatures to take down the big ones.  I might put more of them in when building.
• Lifegain is pretty strong.  Things that trigger off of lifegain are wicked strong, since you are killing heads often.
• We opened packs, built decks, and played the four games in about 3.5 hours total. 
• Tooting my own horn: playing with the webpage made it easier to remember all the triggers.  
• Thanks to my two friends!  I made a bunch of updates to the site and it's much improved from what it was.   

    

So, now you can Face the Hydra with your friends!  If you use my site, please let me know what you think.  Happy Magicking!

Chaos Clue Draft #2 (WUBRG Drafting)

I got to hold a draft with three other people on Tuesday last week.  I was really hoping I might be able to convince people to do a Clue draft, and then one of the participants suggested it.  

Looks like there's a murder to solve!

The other two participants had not played before, so we explained the rules.  (There's a lot to it, but I think I did a good job going through everything.  I tried to reexplain things as they came up during play, in good board-game-hosting fashion.)  We dealt out the Clue cards, picked our packs, and then got down to drafting.  The Hall and Conservatory were the excess revealed cards.

People were really excited about the second Strixhaven prerelease three days later.

There were a lot of reject rares that came around during drafting, and I realized that is one of my big weaknesses.  It's a kind of FOMO, along the lines of, "I may never get to draft this card again".  That's probably true.  Many times I made the wrong choice in the-card-I-want versus the-card-I-should-take.  It's probably clear from the cards I picked:

Another freaking Mythos.

Michelangelo's Technique seems specifically bad in a limited format where hitting with unblocked creatures is core.  Nevertheless, I managed to get enough mana fixing to put a pretty good deck together:

There's a lot of good mana-fixing in there.

We decided to start with 20 life (for time reasons), shuffled up, and sat down to play.  Twenty life isn't super low, and I reminded the group that it's not smart to kill people until you think you can solve the murder, as all their clue cards get revealed.

• Player 1 was running Mono Red.
• Player 2 was on Orzhov.
• I was going third.
• Player 4 had built an Esper deck.  They were the only other person that had played Ravnica Clue before.  

For Clue cards, I held the Rope, the Knife, the Lounge, and the Billiard Room. 

I took careful notes on the Clue-actions again, which turned out to be a really good idea on multiple occasions.  (I highly recommend this at least with first-time players.  Write down what each guess was (do this before anything else, even if you're involved in the guess) and then write down whether the result was a pass or show.)  It's very common for people to ask exactly what was just asked.  

Before anyone took a turn, Player 4 announced Leyline of the Void from their hand.  This was a really big deal because until we could remove it, it shut off the Collect-Evidence-6-based suggestions for three of us.  

In the first round, Player 1 dropped Blisterspit Gremlin and Player 2 cast a Diregraf Ghoul.   

The gremlin hit me at the beginning of the second round.  Player 1 named Headliner Scarlett, the Knife, and Billiard Room.  I showed the Billiard Room and took my treasure token.  Player 1 then played Oreplate Pangolin.  Player 2 followed that up by hitting me with the ghoul.  They named Peacock, Candlestick, and the Ballroom, which I had to pass to.  I used my treasure to play Spineseeker Centipede.  Player 4 played Arrogant Poet.  I love wacky drafts!

In the third round, Player 1 hit Player 2 with the pangolin.  They named Scarlett, Lead Pipe, and Dining Room.  Player 1 showed them a card.  The ghoul served up some retribution and Player 2 guessed Peacock, Candlestick, and Ballroom again.  Player 1 passed.  Player 2 played Venomized Cat, then passed the turn.  I hit P4 with my centipede, then guessed Green, Rope, and Study, which was a miss.  With the tapped creature I was able to web-sling in Spider-Man, Brooklyn Visionary and search up another land.  All my ramping was coming together!  Player 4 cast Novice Inspector, then hit Player 2 with the Poet (flying).  They guessed Peacock, Pipe, and Dining Room and P2 showed them a card.  

In the fourth turn, Player 1 cast Kavaron Turbodrone.  Player 2 played Web-Shooters, then sicced their cat on Player 4, who took it out with a Desculpting Blast.  I apologetically hit Player 4 with my Spider-Man and guessed Plum, Wrench, and the Lounge.  They had none of them.  I replayed my Centipede for my third land search and to have WUBRG basics on the field.  Player 4 attacked me with another creature they had.  They named Scarlett, Knife, and the Billiard Room.  I showed them the Billiard Room I'd already revealed to Player 1.  

Player 1 started off the fifth round by attacking P2 with their pangolin, but they had a Dire Tactics to fend it off.  Player 1 played a Battle-Scarred Goblin and passed.  Player two dropped a Heraldic Banner (naming Black), then struck back at Player 1 with the Web-Shooting Diregraf Ghoul.  They named Mustard, Knife, and Billiard Room and Player 1 passed.  I hit P1 and P2 with my two creatures and guessed White, Knife, and Kitchen.  P1 showed the Kitchen and then I dropped my Spectral Snatcher.  Player 4 hit Player 1 with the Poet and guessed White, Wrench, and Kitchen.  Player 1 showed a card (Kitchen?) and then Player 4 mutated Cavern Whisperer onto the other creature and we all learned more about how mutate works because the question came up of what would happen if the mutated creature no longer existed.

Player 1 decided to grab the archenemy mantle on turn six and cast Overlord of the Boilerbilges.  They hit me for four, gave it haste with the Turbodrone, then swung in to kill Player 2.  Player 2 revealed their hand of Clue cards: Peacock, Scarlett, Ballroom, and Secret Passage.  They did not make an accusation, however, a very dangerous move!  I took my turn and attacked both of my remaining enemies with my big creatures, but they both chump blocked.  I played my Daemogoth Woe-Eater, then played Wurmwall Sweeper and tapped my Centipede to station the Sweeper half way.  

One big blocker is enough to stay alive.

Player 4 hit my Woe-Eater with Mage Hunters' Onslaught and I was suddenly without any blockers.  They passed the rest of their turn and then Collected Evidence 6 to make a guess: Green, Wrench, Dining Room.  We both passed, but they did not make an accusation; safe to figure Player 4 had one of those three cards themselves.

In the seventh round, Player 1 cast Heated Debate to kill Player 4's Arrogant Poet.  Then they swung out at the two of us, killing me and hitting Player 4 as well.

I revealed my Clue Cards before they made their guess.  I don't know whether that is the right order.

Player 1 guessed Mustard, Candlestick, and Kitchen.  Player 4 showed him a card.  Then Player 1 spent their Accusation: Plum, Pipe, and Dining Room.  They looked at the confidential envelope; they were incorrect!

Player 4 attacked for four and guessed: Green, Wrench, and Library.  Player 1 showed a card.  Then Player 4 accused: Green, Wrench, and Dining Room.  They looked at the envelope.  Incorrect!  

Player 1 revealed that they had Emissary Green.  Player 4 suspected a mistake had been made.  Thankfully I had my notes; so we looked back to see that Player 4's guess on the previous turn had shown a mistake.  Player 1 had passed on a previous guess with Green.  The best solution here was to award the game to Player 4, who would have won otherwise.  

Making these kinds of mistakes is very common!  It's best to go slow when resolving guesses.  I'm not sure we did a good job of that, especially with some new players.  

Even though there was a mistake and even though I got killed, this was really fun!  I'm not sure Player 1 made the most strategic choice by taking people out, but the outcome was still really fun.  I love this format and want to do it more!

Now that it's made a difference in a game, I really want to know which happens first when a player dies in combat.  Does the attacking player make a guess or does the dying player reveal their hand first? 

Happy Murder-Solving Magicking!

Chaos hears the Call of the Ring (WUBRG Drafting)

I got real lucky and a little draft that almost failed turned into a draft with seven people!  I'm starting to think that seven is my favorite number.  (I haven't yet been confident enough to suggest two Ravnica Clue games (3 and 4 people) instead of duels, but I'm sure I'll get there.)  That doesn't mean I would be disappointed to have eight or more, but seven is probably the largest where it's possible to get all the single-game matches (21) in on a week night, which is exactly what we did.

And we had a great selection of packs too!

I don't draft black-heavy very often.  Of the five colors, it's the one that I have the fewest cards of, meaning it's likely my least-drafted color.  For this draft, I went heavy into black.  Here were all of my picks:

I have drafted so many Mythoses.  :-\

Here's the deck I put together:

The missing card is Bandit's Talent, which won me some games.  I traded it away before I took the deck photo.

Warning: my notes are a bit spotty here!  It's been over a week since we played! 

 

I was paired up against a Glint-Eye player first (everything but white).  Sinkhole Surveyor really showed up for me here.  I put a bunch of counters on it until I thought it was big enough, then started making tokens.  I played Bandit's Talent and started reusing creatures from my yard.  I got really lucky because I won at 10 and my opponent had Hidetsugu's Second Rite in deck!  1-0

In round two I faced a Jeskai deck packing a devastating Endstone to stay alive late game.  Demon Wall came down for me turn two, which was a great play for me multiple times.  I need to remember how good that is for me in the future!  Spineseeker Centipede helped fix my mana on turn three and then I curved right into Fungal Colossus on turn four.  They got a Rooftop Percher on the next turn, but I still swung in.  They played Omni-Cheese Pizza and swung back, and some instant-speed removal went both ways.

Condemn versus Seized from Slumber.

I pumped my Demon Wall and started to swing in.  My opponent played Hare Apparent and Patched Plaything.  I attacked and played Feed the Cycle to come out on top on the blocks.  We both attacked in the next turn, then my opponent dropped The Endstone, gambling they would be safe going down from 16 to 10 life.  I had already played Debris Field Crusher, which now had two counters on it.  I played Spectral Snatcher, tapped to fully station the Debris Field Crusher, then swung in for exactly ten damage!  2-0.

In round three I was up against a mean Grixis deck.  I had a turn five Wick's Patrol, but it wasn't enough.  My opponent played Dream Harvest and hit well.

The Mythos of Brokkos and Dragon's Prey!

I did not recover.  2-1.

In the fourth round I was up against a tough Bant deck.  They played Lita, Little Orphan on turn two.  I spent a Dragon's Prey on it two turns later.  I got some flying support, but perhaps I should have held on to my removal.

Treetop Snarespinner ruined my game.  All by itself.

I couldn't get around it and it ended up killing me.  2-2.

In the fifth round, I got Bandit's Talent out on turn two against a swift Boros deck.  They played Brightspear Zealot and I responded with Gravestone Strider.  They played Unsettling Twins and I dropped the Demon Wall and Swiftfoot Boots.  Whisperquill Scribe came down and they started swinging in.  I got Morbius down shortly thereafter and the life gain kept me in the game.  My opponent played Unswerving Sloth, which I hit with Feed the Cycle before it could be saddled next turn.  They played Rite of the Dragoncaller.  I saw that with Demon Wall I could attack for the win without casting a spell, so I went for it.  They didn't have a play so I won!  Whew!  If I had cast something, they had Reprieve in hand and could have punished me.  3-2.

Also, I can't remember the last time I drew a hand of seven lands!  Thank you, free mulligan!

In the sixth and final round, I was up against a player running Gruul Lizards.

Nearly Team Lagac!

I got Demon Wall out early and used Call of the Ring over and over.  (I'm not sure I've ever maxed out tempting the ring before!)  Late in the game I played Fungal Colossus for one green.  My opponent played Wheel of Potential for three, but I drew far more cards than them and used that economy to win.  4-2.

Quick notes:

• I did well because I had plenty of fixing, good creatures, and loads of removal.
• When we opened the first pack, one person bought out a pack and opened something else.  I expected it to happen more, but it didn't.  I still like using this rule!  

 

Wacky drafts are still my favorite.  Happy Wacky Magicking!

NYC Draft: Spiders, Turtles, Turtles

There's an extra sense of excitement when your FLGS runs an "alternative" draft that doesn't follow a normal set of packs.  So I was real excited when, at the last minute, I was able to go to the NYC Draft at Intergalactic Plastic: Spider-Man, TMNT, TMNT.

It is true that there's a lot of spiders and pizza in New York.

We had exactly eight people, so I'm sure they were happy I came as well!  I didn't plan ahead, which is probably good, because then I might have tried to build a Villains theme... which would have been bad because the "bad guys" in TMNT don't have the villains type.  In the end, I did get a bit of a menace theme instead!  Here are all my picks:

I was looking for J. Jonah Jameson for a deck too!

Most importantly, check out all the land cyclers; I got seven in total!  Including two Bebops, two Rocksteadys, and a Bebop & Rocksteady!  Because I got all those land cyclers, I made the dangerous decision to run only 15 lands.  I think that was too much and I should have gone 16 instead, because I did mulligan a lot.  Nevertheless, here's my deck:

Only two cards in the five and six-drop piles don't have landcycling!

In the first round I was up against a very aggressive Rakdos deck.  In the first game, they played Raphael, Tough Turtle on turn two, which wound up being the MVP.  My life total got too low too quickly and I couldn't catch up.  In the second game, I got Bebop & Rocksteady on turn four, but my opponent handled them with The Spot's Portal.  My Ninja Teen came out the next turn, though, and I learned just how amazing that card was, especially with all the land cyclers.  I out-valued my opponent and won.  In game three, I got J. Jonah Jameson out early, then Bebop & Rocksteady.  My opponent was stuck on three lands and couldn't keep up.  1-0.

Before the next round, I got in a bonus game against an Orzhov Ninjas deck a friend was running.  I died to Dark Leo & Shredder.  I put up a fight and kept trying to remove it, but continually failed.   

In the second round, I was up against another Rakdos deck, but this time control-focused.  They played Raphael, Tough Turtle on turn two of the first game, but didn't lay down an absolute barrage of creatures right after, so I got back into the game.  Sadly, South Wind Avatar came down a few turns later, and the combo of creatures hurting me when they came in and left was enough to take me out.  

That card is not from the Avatar: TLA set.  TIL.

In game two, Hobgoblin came down early and got in some big hits, but I was able to deal with it.  Sadly, South Wind Avatar came out again and I lost a lot from it.  I hit it with Retro Mutation late, but my life total was real low.  I finally stabilized at 1 (against my opponent's 24) with the help of Ninja Teen.  At ten lands, I matched my opponent's creatures with my own for many turns and got them under 20 life.  I knew I had limited time, so I needed to keep the pressure on, then use Ninja Teen sneaking to get a creature back in my hand and replay it.  I was keeping enough blockers up to stay alive until my opponent drew Death in the Family and I was toast.  We played a bonus third game and I lost that one too, without facing down the South Wind Avatar.  This loss was not a fluke.  1-1.

In the final round I was up against a removal-filled Abzan deck.  In the first game I got out Bebop & Rocksteady, but they got Grounded for Life.  My opponent, meanwhile, got a Michelangelo, Game Master and a Lurking Lizards out and just kept hitting.  

They got pretty big.

In game two, I got J. Jonah Jameson down on turn three and was ready to go off.  Unfortunately, my opponent Grounded them for Life, then did the same thing to the Putrid Pals I played.  Thankfully I kept drawing into creatures and they drew into lands and more lands.  I was able to win with a flying attack of Sun-Spider with Hard-Won Jitte among others.  In game three, my opponent played Transdimensional Bovine and used that to power out a bunch of good cards.  I played creatures, but they ate it to removal.  (They said they were packing eight removal cards!)  My opponent got six creatures down with the help of Friendly Neighborhood and I could not keep up.  1-2

 

Here are my takeaways:

• Some nights I take better notes than others.  I definitely feel more pressure to keep up the pace of the match at the stores.   
• I got lucky with my game wins.  I think this could've (should've?) gone worse than it did. 
• I'm not sure what to say about massive amount of land cyclers.  I really like them, but perhaps 15 lands is too few and I should have run 16 instead.  When I went with 17, I felt like I was getting flooded all the time.  Maybe 16 is the sweet spot.
• Everything Pizza is amazing.  So many games I got to seven mana and that card made a difference.  Two copies was great.

Not everyone may love the idea of a NYC-themed draft, but this was fun for me because I hadn't done a TMNT draft before.  Happy Magicking to you, whether your next draft takes place in New York or not!