We had six at our last chaos draft, a first in recent times! The selection of packs was excellent, but I brought some special packs for myself:
- First pack: Ravnica Remastered, which I bought on my honeymoon at Alaska Robotics, which is a little art gallery downtown in Juneau, Alaska that also carries games and comics. It was not obvious ahead of time that they had gaming supplies, but the local bookstores sent me in the right direction. I don't know that they hold events there, but the store is super cool and the cashier was wicked nice. If you are on a cruise, as we were, it's very easy to get to from the rest of the town.
- Second: Dominaria Remastered, which I picked up at the end of my honeymoon at Rain City Games in Vancouver, British Columbia. This is a big store with walls of board games and a big space to play games. The staff was super nice and I wish I'd had time to play there. This store is in a cool international mall.
- Third: I was hoping to have a third pack from my travels, but a later COVID diagnosis cancelled those plans. So, I followed my habits and opened Streets of New Capenna.
Here's what the six of us picked to open overall:
I've opened some Time Spiral Remastered packs in chaos drafts before, but the Ravnica and Dominaria Remastered seemed more fun somehow. (Maybe I just got really lucky with these two packs.) Here are my picks:
I felt really good right off the bat. My first two picks from the Ravnica Remastered pack were both dual lands. Combined with the World Weary and Alabaster Host Intercessor, I felt really confident in my first seven cards. (Of course, I was determined to run Time Sidewalk.) I do think I probably took Xira Airen too soon in pack 2, as she probably would have made it around the table.
Here is the deck I built from these picks:
(I started with Invasion of Segovia and put the Deadly Derision in later.) The biggest question I had for the night was: How good is Time Sidewalk? Luckily, I was able to answer that question!
In the first round I lost to the player who won the tournament. They ran a quick Selesnya deck that steamrolled me in the first game. In the second game, I exiled Time Sidewalk from my opening hand. Boom! Four Time Walks shuffled into my deck! I drew three of them in a row early on the game, which turned them into nothing-burgers as I didn't have a land to drop on any of those turns. I lost that game as well. Me: 0-1; Time Sidewalk: 0-1.
In the second round, I was up against a quick Mardu deck. My opening hand was rewarded with the Time Sidewalk, but with only one land.
I lost. I put up a fight, but I did wind up losing that game. I fell behind and just couldn't catch up. I may have blown my chance by searching up a Forest off of World Weary. I drew two Time Walks after that, but didn't have the proper land to cast it and another spell that same turn. Had I grabbed an Island instead, it could have worked out. (Maybe I should have mulliganed that hand.) I did manage to pick up the next two games, though, mostly on the back of Xira Arien and Nexus of Becoming, two good cards that get even better together. In game 3, I also hard cast Time Sidewalk for an extra turn, which seemed a bit crazy. Me: 1-1; Time Sidewalk: 0-2.
We didn't have enough time to get a third match in last night, but I kept my deck together and got a match in today on SpellTable against one of the other drafters. My opponent had a strong Izzet deck. I got slapped in the first round by efficient little aggro creatures, including an Erebor Flamesmith, and some counterspells that kept me out of the game. In the second game, I drew Time Sidewalk in my opening hand.
It was on! Storm God's Oracle slowed my opponent down and I got Xira out and even cast one of the Time Walks. Unfortunately, my Nexus of Becoming got countered and I didn't keep up. I got Hinata down against a field of some small creatures with 10 life left, thinking I could turn it around. Unfortunately, Hinata perished in a Mine Collapse and the remaining critters were enough to kill me. Me: 1-2; Time Sidewalk: 0-3.
Is Time Sidewalk bad? It's certainly bad if you don't have it in your opening hand. if you do, however, 4x Time Walk seems like a real benefit. It does unbalance your deck a bit, though, as you suddenly have four new non-land cards in there. I can't imagine that it's not worth it, though! I can't imagine a situation where you have an opening hand with Time Sidewalk that you're keeping and you don't exile it. Please share your opinions on this! No matter what, it was really fun to run it.
Other Takeaways:
- I need to play better, especially when playing around counterspells.
- Remastered packs are really fun in a chaos draft! (Maybe I just had bad luck with the Time Spiral Remastered packs I've opened before.)
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