Magic Origins Pre-release. How'd you do?

[Tinfish]

So apparently prerelease hasn't happened on MTGO yet - meaning I can still get in there despite being screwed over by my LGS. And now I have to decide between green and red - I'd been planning to go the thopter route but green just looks really strong and beaty.

[AdmiralMemo]

The way it usually works is IRL Pre-release -> (next week) IRL Release -> (next week) MtGO Pre-release -> (a few days later) MtGO Release

Also, James is doing a Pre-Release on MtGO on Friday, and I'm thinking a lot of Runners will be waiting, joining in when he does.

[Tinfish]

Do you have that in UTC (or, even more helpfully, NZT)? I'd certainly be interested in coming along!

[Atifexe]

Just did a MTGO prerelease. Went 1-2 and dropped in the fourth round, since I'd get two packs either way and it was looking like I'd go 1-3 anyway.

Mainboard - Click to Expand

Sideboard - Click to Expand

When this deck worked, it hammered through whatever was in its path and came out the other side unscathed. Unfortunately, I won only 3 of the 7 games I played, and my opponent in the first round was mana screwed both times. I would appreciate any advice anyone is willing to offer. Is there a better deck in there that I just didn't see?

My own thoughts: The black wasn't useful, and Mage-Ring Network didn't do what I thought it did (for some reason, I thought you could get coloured mana out of it).

[Tinfish]

I went red in the pre-release, didn't really open anything in the way of red rares (although I did get Liliana and Erebos' Titan). Built a red/white aggro deck that ended up being fairly durdly - it was rare for me to be able to get down and defend more than one threat. The removal is real. Celestial Flare is especially real; that card blew me out every time it was played, and some people had three of it! Ultimately I went 1-3, which is probably about average for me. My opponents were a blue-black deck, a red-black deck, and two red-white decks. I'm considering doing another prerelease sealed today, though I'm not sure what color I'd pick.

[Lord Hosk]

I went White and could have gone mono white my pool was really strong for sealed.

I could have gone red white or green white, I went red white because I ran out of time while I was trying to decide. looking at it now my green white may have been stronger.

In my red white pool I ended up having to cut 7 cards after I had decided which cards were Solid or better. I had 9 cuts in green based on the same standards.

Amazing
Great
Solid
OK
weak
bad
unplayable

[Duckay]

I have my suspicions (although I could be wrong, of course) that Celestial Flare will go down a little as the format progresses and people get more and more used to playing around it. That said, right now you're absolutely right, it is a real card.

[Tinfish]

So I did a second sealed prerelease thing, this time picking white (because white + something tempo seems to be something I gravitate towards). Opened Kia & Piran Nalaar and Jace, Vryn's Prodigy, and attempted to put together a janky red/white/blue tempo deck ... which didn't work very well. In every second game of the match I had to strip out the blue and go red/white aggro ... which still didn't work very well. I was sadly light on removal of any color.

One game I came up against a Managorger Hydra and was just unable to deal with it at all. That thing is nasty.

Ultimately I went 1-3 again. I don't think I have enough black and blue cards to make a decent blue/black deck with my Liliana and Jace, so I might just trade them for tickets. If it was one thing I seemed to have good luck for, it was pulling offcolour rares I couldn't run.

[Lycodrake]

First post hype and unintended necro, I suppose?
I chose White for my pre-release box and was rewarded handsomely with lil' Chad as my promo foil, which was awesome. I also got an Archangel of Tithes. Wound up going WG Renown.
Made it to Top 8 despite a terrible run-in with Outland Colossus and Liliana (record of 3-2-0). Lost to WU control. Willbreaker's a jerk.