Dragons of Tarkir Prerelease

[korvys]

Dragons! Lots of them. This weekend is the Dragon's of Tarkir pre-release, and this is the thread to talk about it.

Which dragonlord are you going align yourself with? Or, if you're reading this after the fact, which did you choose, and how did you do?

I think I'm going for either Ojutai, as I've been on a bit of a tear playing Jeskai lately, or Silumgar. Because I like value.

[DelphiSantano]

Dromoka on Saturday and Ojutai on Sunday for me.
This is going to be the first pre-release this block where I haven't chosen Sultai/Silumgar.

[AdmiralMemo]

We've got several Maryland Runners trying to prerelease Dragons of Tarkir together on Saturday. We're going to try to do it at Canton Games.

2101 Essex St
Baltimore, MD 21231

We're looking for more, if they would come.

[RadioshackRaider]

I'm doing 3 pre-releases, Atarka tonight, Silumgar on Saturday and Kolaghan on Sunday. Temur was the only clan I didn't play, so I'm making it up with playing Atarka. I also play Sultai and Mardu for Khans so I thought I'd mirror that.

[ZePancakes]

Did the Midnight flight, went 4-0 with GW Anafenza Aggro.

[korvys]

*trainwreck noises*

1-2-1 with Silumgur, but the win was a bye :S

[Omega Lairon]

Just got back from the third of my pre-releases... not the most pleasant of experiences, but not as terrible as I figured. Note for next time though - doing a midnight event after being up from 2am the preceding day... not a super good move.

Anyway, here's a quick TL;DR of my day.

Midnight
Brood: Atarka
Promo: Crater Elemental
Rares: Surrak the Hunt Caller, Sulimgar's Command (x2),Thunderbreak Regent, Mastery of the Unseen, Illusory Gains
Shinies: 2
Bonus booster rares: Dromoka's Command, Blessed Reincarnation, Volcanic Vision, Silumgar Assassin
Shinies: 1
Record: 2-2-0
Notes: Played straight R/G formidable, nothing too fancy. I don't remember most of this one, honestly.


10am
Brood: Silumgar
Promo: Necromaster Dragon
Rares: Corpseweft (x2), Dragonscale General, Crater Elemental, Atarka's Command
Shinies: 0
Bonus booster rares: Sidisi Undead Vizier, Living Lore, Gleam of Authority, Narset Transcendent
Shinies: 2
Record 1 (bye)-3-0
Notes: Apparently I'm terrible at playing exploit decks. Stayed B/U, but never got any value from my promo dragon. I got Wandering Tombshell too, and put him in for sentimental value, but I don't remember ever drawing him.

Later on, I traded Narset to some dude for a half dozen assorted rares. I know I got the short end of the deal, but since I have absolute 0 interest in playing constructed paper MtG, I couldn't care less. Plus, it stopped him from bugging me to trade already, so win-win.


4pm
Brood: Atarka (again)
Promo: Harbinger of the Hunt
Rares: (another) Harbinger of the Hunt, Alesha, Pitiless Horde, Sunbringer's Touch, Arashin Foremost
Shinies: 0
Bonus booster rares: Dragonlord's Prerogative, Sunbringer's Touch, Descent of the Dragons, Sunscorch Regent.
Shinies: 1
Record 1-2-0 (dropped after round 3)
Notes: My red and green were both a little shallow, so I mixed in some white critters to pick up the slack. Not the best move in hindsight - the R/G and W parts of the deck wanted to do different things and didn't really synergize. I don't think anything in my deck could trigger formidable.

[Tinfish]

Apparently there was some kind of shipping error and the store I went to didn't have the prerelease boxes in, so we ended up doing sealed with 5xDragons+1Fate instead of the seeded booster thingy. Apparently we can pick up the prerelease thingies later when they arrive though. A bit of a mess honestly, I'm not sure if it changed things.

I put my name down for Dromoka, but the cards I drew ended up more like half a decent Kolaghan deck and half a decent Atarka deck. So I put them together and ended up with a halfway decent Jund deck.

To my sorrow, I was unable to Jund 'em out; the lack of fixing proved to be a bad thing, and I lost several games because I didn't get the right color land, or got too little land, or too much.

I'm beginning to really dislike R/G, at least in prereleases - for Fate Reforged I went Temur and bombed terribly, but there might have been enough good white in that draft to do fairly well as Abzan or Dromoka. In Dragons I went Dromoka and ended up heavy R/G.

I'm thinking of going again tomorrow for the Sunday round - I'll probably pick Silumgar, not that it matters much, because I feel like I need cunning and ruthlessness instead of durdling beef. I definitely think that a fast aggro deck would have a lot of advantage in prereleases.

I can also tell you that the warrior deck is real, and will wreck face. I had only half a dozen or so warriors in black, but they did pretty well - especially Blood-Chin Rager (who makes your warriors unblockable by only one creature when he attacks).

[Kapol]

Apparently there was some kind of shipping error and the store I went to didn't have the prerelease boxes in, so we ended up doing sealed with 5xDragons+1Fate instead of the seeded booster thingy. Apparently we can pick up the prerelease thingies later when they arrive though. A bit of a mess honestly, I'm not sure if it changed things.

That actually happened all across NZ from my understanding. Shipment issues made it so prerelease packs didn't get there in time. But they wanted to let people play. So they did 5-1 packs. Better than Russia, who had to put off their prerelease until next week due to customs.


Too tired to give a full rundown on my prerelease tonight. I'll try tomorrow. But for now... turns out a 8/8 flying trample that kills 1-3 creatures when it ETBs is an unfair card. It cost a lot, and I died with it in my hand a couple times (often due to mana screw honestly). But when it hit the table, I don't think I lost a game. I was sad my rares were spread over every color though, and I couldn't go Dromoka which ate up a lot of a whole pack due to heavy green. Mardu Strike Leader, Secure the Wastes, Atarka, Pristine Skywise, Zurgo the coward, and promo Avatar of the Resolute made for a hard choice for colors.

[Duckay]

I was a bit disappointed with my Kologhan pool because I clearly misjudged it, because I was 4-0 going into the final...

...where I lost 1-2 to my best mate. Who was piloting a deck that at the beginning of the event, he predicted would go 2-3.

[Kapol]

So, instead of just saying how I did and posting my deck, I decided to write out my pool, give my initial thoughts. Then show the cuts, give thoughts, and finish with the deck and thoughts on it. Then a bit of what happened. I'd be interested in seeing what other people would have done with it.

Uncut pool:

Click to Expand

Pool (uncut):

Artifacts:

1x Ancestral Statue
1x Spidersilk Net
1x Silumgar Monument

Multicolored:

1x Dragonlord Atarka
1x Pristine Skywise
1x War Flare
1x Savage Ventmaw
1x Cunning Breezedancer
1x Harsh sustanence

White:

1x Secure the Wastes
2x Misthoof Kirin
2x Dromoka Warrior
1x Resupply
1x Dromoka Dunecaster
2x Territorial Roc
1x Glaring Aegis
1x Champion of Arashin
1x Wardscale Dragon
1x Herald of Dromoka
2x Sandcrafter Mage
1x Surge of Rightousness
1x Orator of Ojutai
1x Echos of the Kin-Tree
1x Scale Blessing
1x Soul summons

Blue:

1x Ojutai's Breath
1x Palace Familiar
1x Dance of the Skywise
2x Ojutai's Summons
1x Frost Walker
1x Write into Being
1x Zephyr Scribe
1x Silumgar Spell-Eater

Black:

1x Mardu Strike-Leader
2x Coat with Venom
1x Reach of Shadows
2x Vulturous Aven
1x Acid-Spewer Dragon
1x Hand of Silumgar

Red:

1x Zurgo, Bellstriker
1x Magmatic Chasm
1x Hardened Beserker
2x Twin Bolt
2x Volcanic Rush
1x Gore Swine
2x Kolaghan Aspirant
1x Sarkhan's Triumph
1x Sabertooth Outrider


Green:

1x Avatar of the Resolute
1x Segmented Krotiq
1x Naturalize
2x Sandsteooe Scavenger
1x Servant of the Scale
2x Shape the Sands
1x Ainok Artillerist
1x Sight of the Scalelords
1x Ambush Krotiq
1x Sheltered Aerie
1x Epic COnfrontation
1x Aerie Bowmasters
1x Explosive Vegitation
1x Circle of Elders
1x Whisperer of the wilds
1x Colossodon Yearling

Land:

1x Scouring Sands
1x Evolving Wilds


Honestly, I wasn't super happy with my pool The rares were spread over all five colors, with two of them being multi-colored. It also suffered the problem of being strong in some colors, and weaker in others. I felt that the brood I picked (Dromoka) was actually fairly weak. It had some solid cards. But not enough to build a really competitive deck. There were some fairly easy cuts for me to make at the beginning though.

Atarka stood out to me right away. She's one that, if you manage to play her, you will pretty much win the game. That was better to me than the Skywise who, while strong, wasn't nearly as big of a bomb. I also thought that Secure the Wastes would be interesting to play with as well. So I went from there.

Cut pool:

Click to Expand

Pool (cut):

Multicolored:

1x Dragonlord Atarka
1x Pristine Skywise
1x War Flare
1x Savage Ventmaw
1x Cunning Breezedancer
1x Harsh sustanence

White:

1x Secure the Wastes
2x Misthoof Kirin
2x Dromoka Warrior
1x Glaring Aegis
1x Champion of Arashin
1x Wardscale Dragon
1x Herald of Dromoka
2x Sandcrafter Mage
1x Surge of Rightousness
1x Orator of Ojutai
1x Echos of the Kin-Tree
1x Scale Blessing
1x Soul summons

Blue:

1x Ojutai's Breath
1x Palace Familiar
1x Dance of the Skywise
2x Ojutai's Summons
1x Frost Walker
1x Write into Being
1x Zephyr Scribe
1x Silumgar Spell-Eater
1x Sultai Skullkeeper
1x Updraft Elemental
1x Dirgur Nemesis

Black:

1x Mardu Strike-Leader
2x Coat with Venom
1x Reach of Shadows
2x Vulturous Aven
1x Duress
1x Sibsig Icebreakers
1x Foul-Tongue Invocation
1x Acid-Spewer Dragon
1x Hand of Silumgar

Red:

1x Zurgo, Bellstriker
1x Magmatic Chasm
1x Hardened Beserker
2x Twin Bolt
1x Rending Volly
2x Volcanic Rush
1x Gore Swine
1x Dragonrage
1x Mardu Runemark
2x Kolaghan Aspirant
1x Sarkhan's Triumph
1x Sabertooth Outrider


Green:

1x Avatar of the Resolute
1x Segmented Krotiq
1x Epic COnfrontation
1x Aerie Bowmasters
1x Explosive Vegitation
1x Circle of Elders
1x Whisperer of the wilds
1x Colossodon Yearling

Land:

1x Scouring Sands
1x evolving wilds


I think at this point, I kind of felt like I had to go three colors. My green was fairly weak overall. There were some solid cards, but most of it was just filler or worse. Avatar of the Resolute seemed solid. But I didn't really get enough of the cards it needed to be great.

My red was stronger though, and much more aggressive. It had a lot of early drops and ways to finish the game. That, coupled with Atarka and Ventmaw, made me decide that I was going G/R. It was just going to be G/R/X. But the green seemed largely at odds with the red. It felt like it was trying to be more defensive and ramping. Which, in retrospect, was really good for Atarka. But I felt was overall weak for what I was trying to do.

I also realized that red didn't really have much removal. Two Twin Bolts isn't the worst. But it couldn't deal with bigger things. I would have really liked the 3 damage to creature and 3 to a player if you have a dragon, or a Bathe in Dragonfire, or a Pyrotechnics. Hell, I would have been happy with the 5-mana 5 damage that deals 2 to you if you don't control a dragon. But I didn't get any.

Black, on the other hand, seemed to have a good amount of solid removal. The Coats seem very powerful to me. And a Reach is just going to kill most things I care about. Sign In Bird (Vulturous Aven) also seemed powerful to me. But in the end, it felt like black would have been a really good splash color. And that wasn't what I was looking for, considering I was likely going to be splashing green already.

Blue seemed much more tempo than anything else. It had strong cards. But, considering I had already decided to be in red, they felt like they were at odds. I didn't feel like the blue/red combination would work with my pool. I wanted to hit early, and I wanted to hit often. Ojutai's Summons and Frost Walker would have been nice. But weren't enough to make the jump.

So I came to white. White seems very aggressive in this set. And since that's what I was going for with red, it ended up being the mix color. I liked Echos and Scale Blessing. But they didn't go in the deck I was building. This also gave me access to War Flare. Another finisher for my deck. In the end, I kind of crafted it around Securing the Wastes for a lot, then killing my opponent next turn in a massive attack.

Deck:

Click to Expand

Deck:

1x Dragonlord Atarka
1x War Flare
1x Savage Ventmaw
1x Segmented Krotiq
1x Secure the Wastes
2x Misthoof Kirin
2x Dromoka Warrior
1x Champion of Arashin
1x Wardscale Dragon
1x Herald of Dromoka
1x Sandcrafter Mage
1x Magmatic Chasm
1x Hardened Beserker
2x Twin Bolt
2x Volcanic Rush
1x Gore Swine
1x Kolaghan Aspirant
1x Sarkhan's Triumph
1x Sabertooth Outrider
1x evolving wilds
7x Mountain
7x Plains
2x Forest

Sideboard specific cards:

1x Rending Volly
1x Surge of Rightousness (which I sadly forgot about)
1x Glaring Aegis (should have been made board as a 1-mana tap a guy spell)
2x Territorial Roc (Brought in against faster aggro as a 2-mana blocker)


And here's the final deck. I ended up being as aggressive as I could be, with three dragons to help fill up the high end as finishers. The big plan of the deck was to flood the board early. Then, when I saw an opening, swing with the team and use mass pump like War Flare and Volcanic Rush to finish them off. Volcanic Rush ended up being a big win-con for the deck, and killed more than a couple of people. Being 5 mana is rough, especially on a Trumpet Blast-looking card. But the trample is much more relevant than many think. It makes it so your opponent can't just chump to survive. And if they think they can, they're just dead.

One choice I was still uncertain about was Zurgo. In retrospect, I should have included him. But I felt a 2/2 that couldn't block if I needed him to just wasn't good enough. Bad thinking in an aggressive deck to be honest.

As I mentioned before, I was disappointed by the lack of removal. On top of nothing for later in red, I didn't get anything great in white. No pacifisms for me. Hell, I didn't even get the 5 mana kill shot. That left me with two Twin Shots and Atarka as removal. The Twin Shots are really good in this format, I feel, with a lot of 1 toughness guys. But despite having two in my deck, I saw the card twice all night. Atarka, however, was a much bigger deal. 5 damage was enough to consistantly kill any threat I needed gone. It often killed 2-3 creatures. And then opponents couldn't deal with an 8/8 flier with trample.

I feel like I played a really bad card for a really good reason. Draconic Tutor (Sarkhan's Triumph) is a narrow card. But when it tutors for a huge bomb, and has a couple targets behind that, it ended up playing a big role. It helped me consistantly be able to find Atarka. A fact that some people acted like was cheap since I was fairly consistantly able to draw her. Still, it would have been sketchy to play it without 3 dragons in the deck.

Results of the night:

Click to Expand

I ended up going 4-1 over the night. The ending was a weird situation where I beat the person who beat the person who beat me. There were four 4-1s and no undefeated players. So I ended up getting second. The person I beat got first. And the person who beat me got third. Honestly, I feel like I should have 5-0'd. But varience killed me. Game one of the match I lost, I didn't draw a single land outside my opponent hand. Otherwise I could have just killed them with Volcanic Rush. 4 mana didn't get there though. Game two I won based on a surprise Volcanic Rush to make up for game one. Game three I lost because I couldn't hit my splash. I was pretty salty about game one, and annoyed at game three. But losing due to not hitting a splash is my own fault. I just didn't like having two of the splash cards in hand without the color.

I was fairly consistently able to get Atarka into my hand. Playing her was another matter. I can think of two games I lost with her sitting in my hand. That said, every time she came down, I won. She's not a fair card. An 8/8 flyer is normally enough to just kill people. Put trample on it, and it's nuts. Give it the ability to kill stuff, and... well, there's not much recovery.

One game that I won and was pretty proud about was against a Grixis deck. He had a bunch of strong bombs, including Kolaghan from FRF, new Silumgar, the 4/4 dragon that makes your opponent sac when you do, and the 4/4 for 2RR that bolts every time it's targeted by an opponent. I kept a risky hand of 4 mana, Atarka, Ventmaw, and two lands. I managed to get Ventmaw down, but didn't have the last land to cast Atarka. I knew I could use Ventmaw to play her next turn. I didn't. I knew that, if my opponent drew Silumgar, he would take my 8/8 and kill me. I had him dead on the board if he didn't have that. So I decided not to over commit.

So what happens? He tutors for a dragon with Sarkhan's Triumph, getting his Silumgar. Next turn, he plays it and steals my Glaring Aegis'd Ventmaw. Then I play Atarka and take it back. I felt pretty clever for planning ahead like that and being rewarded. Though honestly, I could have killed him had I just played Atarka out earlier too since he had to spend a turn tutoring. But being cautious felt like the better plan for me.

Beyond that, my games were hit and miss. I pulled a lot of games out from under my opponent with the Volcanic Rush. And Atarka ended up causing my opponent to misplay and not take the win game 3 was match. I think all but my first match had 3 games. So it was tense all around. But I was happy with how the deck preformed overall.

Also, after playing tonight, I've decided to call Sarkhan's Triumph "Draconic Tutor" and Vulturous Aven "Sign in Bird." Also, interestingly, 3 of the top 4 decks were tri-color. Oddly enough, they were all shards too.

[AdmiralMemo]

Due to miscommunication between me and ClarkMiller, I didn't get to play. But it was a good prerelease to watch, to see how the game plays out. What seems good, what doesn't, what to look for, how to construct for Limited, etc.

[susu.exp]

I managed to oversleep and missed the prerelease I wanted to attend. The store offers a second prerelease and a parallel 2HG sealed, which tends to be a lot of fun. I get there and my usual 2HG partner has partnered up with somebody else for the event. So I wander the story trying to find somebody and end up with a pretty cool chap after getting turned down quite a few times ("I want to be in the singles" they say. Ironically there aren't enough players for the singles and everybody who turned me down ended up scrambling to make teams for 2HG).

We open a pretty good combined pool - Highlights include an Ugin my partner pulls, I get Silumgar as my promo and decide to play the janky Hedonist's trove. A card that shines in one format: 2HG sealed, where the games go long and you can be pretty sure there's an opponents graveyard with cards in one of your colors. I end up with a UBR deck, that is heavy blue and has no low drops (there are "two draw a card when this dies" creatures for extra value from the exploit cards, anything else below 5 drop is a removal spell or a counter - some in the form of morphs that counter on being flipped).
But actually I just want to steal your bomb and then steal your graveyard, too.
My partner plays WG, splashing red for Thunderbreak Regent and blue for Ojutai and Breezedancer. Two Anafenzas, two Echos of the Kin Tree. Shaman of Forgotten ways and Sheltered Aerie make the splash doable and Sight of the Scalelords is a nice way to pump the team even further.

Game 1 we face a UB controlish build along with a still somewhat fast RG deck. We get beaten down in the early game, stabilize at 12 life or so. Both sides play some removal and there's a sweet turn in which I steal Ruthless Deathfang with Silumgar and follow it up with Silumgar Butcher, killing one of my opponents creatures and forcing the other to sac another. We get to a point where all we have to do is flunge and I even have a counter up, which I forget and they get saved by Secure the Wastes, chumping our ground offense. I steal the UB players graveyard, using his removal to get their flies out of the way (it's turn 18 or so when I do it and there's 3 flattens and an ultimate price)
The game goes to time and the ground is clogged up. I play a dragon. They have a pacifism. I play another dragon. They have another pacifism. We get to untap a final time, with a total of 7 power in the air. Our opponents have a single flying blocker and are at 6. We draw blanks in the situation. I play my opponents Anticipate, hitting two lands and my own anticipate. I play my own anticipate and find a flatten. I kill the blocker and we swing for victory.
That was an entertaining game (and I'm calling Hedonist's Trove as a card LRR should draft around at least once).

Game two we were up against RB and GWU. They were both more midrangy playing all the removal they could get and stuck 5/5s before we even got going. Both my partner and I flooded out a bit and I had to steal a Gurmag Angler with Silumgar on turn 6, just to block (I kept an opener with Silumgar, the UU counter and a morph and never drew another spell, my partner kept a cheap hexproof creature, Echos of the Kin Tree and some removal, he kept bolstering the hexproof guy - by 3 each turn at the end, for some ridiculous stats). They resolved a Narset, getting hold of more removal and we had to fluge to deal with her. On the backswing, they had Mob Rule and we couldn't stop our own 24/20 hexproof (or something to that tune) from eating us.

Game 3 was against an RB deck and a WU deck. They get off to a slow start and were seriously hampered on card quality. I stole an Ukud Cobra with Silumgar, because that was hands down the best thing they got on board by turn 10 or so. My partners deck was firing from all cylinders, and he resolved Ojutai on the same turn along with the Regent. He had bostered an Heir of the Wild to 4/6 with Echos and followed this up with Sight. Ojutai is so much better at +2/+2 and Vigilance... They quickly scooped.

Game 4 was against WU and RB again. The RB part was a combo deck, with a total of 3 Impact Tremors (which of course in 2HG shock the opposing team) and a couple of dashers. The UW just has a couple of evasive creatures.
The dash damage factory worked nicely, getting us down to 15, with some of the damage coming from unblockable creatures as well. We managed to get a couple of attacks in and also got our opponents to around 15. Then the UW player resolved Ojutais Exemplars, with two mana up. I had Silumgar in my hand (MVP so far), but there were two cards in hand and two mana up. My partner and I discussed what to do. I also had a morph that countered on flip and I felt that it'd be better to keep Silumgar in hand and keep the counter up than risk it. We announced we were going to combat. Our opponent thought that the morph was the big deal and used Dromoka Dunecaster to tap it down at the end of our main phase. I played Silumgar postcombat, stole the Exemplars and it was easy sailing from there.

3-1 got us into packs and I'm pretty happy with how it went. I'm a bit annoyed at my misplay in game 1, although it led to a more spectacular ending. Game 2 was two decks completely flooding out, which is rare in 2HG. I think our general strategy worked, in 2HG sealed you don't have to worry about aggro decks and if you build a base green ramp deck and a blue based control deck you can play all the good removal and all the stuff that goes over the top of your opponents decks.

[kjpodsia]

Scratching my report because on review some parts of my recollection of it don't make sense. Like, somehow I killed a Belltoll Dragon with Epic Confrontation? Did we both just miss that it had hexproof? Also I didn't realize until after I finished my report that Enduring Scalelord is also a dragon, and now I'm wondering how many bonus effects I missed from not realizing this.

So, truncated version: 2-1-1 with Dromoka, dragon effects didn't come up but possibly as much out of failure to notice them as anything else. Aven Sunstriker, Misthoof Kirin, Flatten, all very good cards.

[Duckay]

So my day 2 prerelease I picked Ojutai, but I thought my green was better than the blue (cracked a Dromoka in one of my Dragons packs, which helped) so I built green/white instead.

I went 4-1, losing in the final round for the second day in a row. Somehow that feels more crushing than simply doing fine today would have done.

[eostby]

I picked Ojutai for my lone prerelease, and was rewarded right away with the Dragonlord himself as my promo. I was further rewarded by finding his twin brother in one of my DTK packs. And there was also a foil Dragonlord's Prerogative for value. Put simply, I really liked my deck (and actually could have built a decent RB deck from the stuff I wasn't using, highlighted by a Brutal Hordechief from my Fate Reforged pack).

Sadly, only got to 2-2 with it. Did have a couple games where I traded off one of my Ojutais and cast the other the next turn, which was great for me and less great for my opponents. All in all, had some fun, cast some Dargons, and got some sweet cards, so I can't really complain much.

[Phi]

I went Ojutai for my only and first ever prerelease. I pulled Narset and Temporal Trespass from the boosters too. My deck was:

Click to Expand

Creature (12)
1x Dragonlord Ojutai
2x Dragon's Eye Sentry
1x Graceblade Artisan
1x Gudul Lurker
1x Gurmag Drowner
1x Misthoof Kirin
1x Monastery Loremaster
1x Orator of Ojutai
1x Sidisi's Faithful
1x Silumgar Spell-Eater
1x Updraft Elemental

Instant (4)
1x Ojutai's Breath
1x Radiant Purge
1x Secure the Wastes
1x Whisk Away

Sorcery (2)
1x Taigam’s Strike
1x Temporal Trespass

Planeswalker (1)
1x Narset Transcendent

Enchantment (4)
1x Battle Mastery
1x Glaring Aegis
1x Pacifism
1x Reduce in Stature

Land (17)
9x Island
8x Plains

I went 3-3, but was very happy that the deck did what it was supposed to do. Most games were stalled with my defenders until I pulled Ojutai, and in most cases he won me the games. Turns out that Ojutai + Taigam's Strike is very strong, but I never got to live the dream and attach Battle Mastery on him. Narset surprisingly did very little in my games, since I mostly had creatures or land at the top of my deck, and my opponent's were not really have on non-creature spells.
Overall, it was a lot of fun. I would have liked another bomb or two, maybe a Pristine Skywise. Negate and Glint would have been very valuable in it too, but I did not have them in my pool.
On a sidenote, using Reduce in Stature on Dragonlord Atarka is fun.

[Asthanius]

I went Ojutai and scrubbed out, so I decided, "hey, why not sign up for Atarka for the next timeslot" and ended up building a deck with:
1x Harbinger of the Hunt
2x Scion of Hugin
1x Herdchaser Dragon
1x Destructor Dragon
1x Dragonloft Idol
1x Dragonlord's Servant
2x Hardened Berserker

I'm telling you, the Dragon deck is REAL.

[LokiTheLiar]

Went Ojutai, ended up in Esper, 3 wins, 2 draws, 0 loses.
My promo was Dragonlord Ojutai.

My deck:

Click to Expand

[notomtolose]

I did my taxes this weekend and now expect a return, so I went a little crazy and hit all 3 at my LGS.

Silumgar 3-2-1, Silumgar 3-1, then Atarka 3-0-1 to split the top prize.

I'm deep, deep in love with the Exploit mechanic. I almost went Silumgar a third time, but the red and green in the set seem sweet, too, and obviously it worked out. Just a great weekend, love the new set! It's too bad I hear the sealed format will be 3-DTK 3-FRF; I found that too much Fate ruined the current sealed format a bit for me. DTK seem sweet, though!

[Kapol]

You know what's a really bad feeling? When a store cuts to top 4, there's 1 undefeated person and four 3-1's, and you are the only 2-1 not to get into top 4. All because one of your opponents dropped after you beat them... in round 3. :/

[guidance]

I think I maybe really bad at magic. I played Kolaghan, and man did I have a sick pool. Bolting marauder, Kolaghan's command, Blood-chin fanatic, freaking SHAMAN OF THE WILD HUNT. As well as a bunch of removal with flatten, twin bolt, defeat, even a reach of shadows. Tons of dash creatures, the guy who makes dash cheaper, and the guy who gives +2/+2 to every creature that enters the battlefield.

I went 3-2. I can only think of 1 obvious mistake that I made, I think the other games I may have made some bad decisions and I need to recognize when that happens.

[susu.exp]

Aggro decks tend to suffer in sealed. You never get your deck as fast as you would in draft and there are a lot of bombs you can't deal with going around. Some of the cheap removal suffers as well, how good were twin bolt and defeat?

Sometimes you get a pool that doesn't allow you to build anything that's not aggro. I had that at the M15 Prerelease, where I opened two Rabblemasters and something like 4 Foundry street denizens with some burn to back that up. The thing wasn't that far from a constructed mono red deck. But the reason aggro decks exist in constructed is that they beat slower midrange decks and control. And sealed decks tend to be midrange and often curve out better than the slower midrange decks would. That means you are facing a meta that is hostile to aggro decks. My M15 deck went 3:3 and that's where I would put any really good aggro deck in sealed, because there are few pools that let people build the slow powerful decks that you can beat and a large number of people will have the big beaters you can't deal with, but can still put down the 2-drop and 3-drop that will stop you from running them over.

[guidance]

Twin bolt was fine, I don't think it was ever stuck in my hand. Defeat I always sided out against green decks for that hate card that forces them to sac a white or green creature. Our top two players were aggro decks with one being a fellow kolaghan and the other b/w little dudes splashing silumgar. Admittly the games I lost were top decked atarkas so that may have something to do with it.

[RadioshackRaider]

So I'm finally rested after 3 pre-release that led me to have less than 8 hours of sleep at the weekend. My brother and I attended the first, a Friday midnight that was the second biggest of the 3 at 10 players. I went Atarka and he Kolaghan and we ended up with some decent decks. He actually ended up with 2 decks while I ended up with a pretty good Bant deck, the lsit of which follows:
Ambush Krotiq
Stampeding Elk Herd x2
Elite Scaleguard
Surrak, the Hunt Caller
Champion of Arashin
Student of Ojutai
Yasova Dragonclaw
Dragon-Scarred Bear
Silumgar Sorcerer
Atarka Beastbreaker
Gudul Lurker
Enduring Victory
Dromoka's Gift
Narset Transcendent
Reduce in Stature
Ojutai's Breath
Whisk Away
Anticipate
Dance of the Skywise
Epic Confrontation x2
Windswept Heath
Plains x5
Island x5
Forest x6

I'll say it now, I should have taken out the white. Narset was just god awful. The only thing she ever did was draw attacks. I really don't think she's good. I traded her the next day she was that bad. The other white stuff I was meh about playing, and I had enough blue and green stuff left so I probably would have done better if I realised that playing white for a bad Planeswalker was a bad idea. Went 1-3

Saturday was lots of fun. there were 7 people and I picked Silumgar. Got a cool deck out of it that I really wish I got to play. I got 2 byes and flooded out game 2 of match 1, so I got to play lots of Magic. Still traded a ton that day so I enjoyed it a lot. I even picked up about $160 worth of stuff, including an Emrakul, Sliver Queen, Overlord and Legion. My deck was as follows:
Sidisi, Undead Vizier
Silumgar Butcher
Rakshasa Gravecaller
Student of Ojutai
Ojutai Interceptor
Monastery Loremaster
Dromoka Captain
Dutiful Attendant
Minister of Pain
Kolaghan Skirmisher
Palace Familiar
Qarsi Sadist
Sidisi's Faithful
Shambling Goblin (WOOOO, functional Festering Goblin reprint)
Enduring Victory
Ojutai's Command
Skywise Teachings
Flatten
Whisk Away
Butcher's Glee
Center Soul
Anticipate
Artful Manoeuvre
Plains x4
Island x5
Swamp x9

So I technically went 2-1 with this and came 4th. Still not a great day for playing magic.

Sunday is where I shined. I went Kolaghan and Junded pretty hard. My deck was actually very similar to my brother's, which didn't work too well for him as he went 1-3 on the Friday with it, beating only me with a different deck. I opened a Dragonlord Atarka which is why I played Jund. The deck:
Dragonlord Atarka
Sprinting Warbrute
Sabertooth Outrider
Vulturous Aven x2
Sibsig Icebreakers
Ambuscade Shaman
Kolaghan Forerunners
Screamreach Brawler
Blood-Chin Fanatic
Reckless Imp
Kolaghan Skirmisher
Humble Defector
Pyrotechnics
Sunbringer's Touch
Bathe in Dragonfire
Foul-Tongue Invocation
Butcher's Glee
Tail Slash
Twin Bolt
Coat with Venom x2
Rugged Highlands
Evolving Wilds x2
Swamp x7
Mountain x5
Forest x2

I should have taken out Sunbringer's Touch as it never did anything but meh, it didn't matter. I went 3-1, losing to my last round opponent coming second for the second time, yet again playing a Jund deck that was splashing a third colour. Atarka did some work. I really wish she could hit players but she often just cleared away my opponent's smaller stuff that clogged up the ground and Tail Slashed their big stuff. Humble Defector + Vulturous Aven = 4 cards which it turns out, aggro decks like a lot. I shouldn't have one as well as did as my first two opponents only saw 1 of their colours in their last games with me. All in all, really happy with that day's results.

My thoughts on Dragonfury: It's really damn hard. Only 2 people over 3 days and 28 players and 56 rolls got all 4 of the promos (One of which was my brother, so thankfully I got the dragon). I feel like if the center spot was bigger or bad some more points to hit getting even close to 18 would've been possible.

All in all, I enjoyed this, probably more than Khans. I hop e I get the chance to draft D/D/F and get to play some dragons (I only opened 2 in all of my pools). Maybe dragons could be a real deck, and I hope to hell I at least see Graham and James draft it for one of their Wacky Drafts.