MtG FNM Report - Five Colour Dragon Ramp

It's been a while since I did an FNM report, so here's the run down from last week's tournament at Outer Limits Melville. I played a silly five colour Dragon ramp deck, because I love me some dragons and wanted to play them all in one deck. Here's the list I ran:

Mainboard

Sideboard

4x Elvish Mystic 3x Rattleclaw Mystic 4x Sylvan Caryatid 3x Courser of Kruphix 4x Thunderbreak Regent 3x Stormbreath Dragon 1x Kolaghan, the Storm's Fury 1x Atarka, World Render 1x Silumgar, the Drifting Death 1x Dromoka, the Eternal 1x Ojutai, Soul of Winter 1x Dragonlord Dromoka 1x Dragonlord Atarka 1x Dragonlord Ojutai 1x Dragonlord Silumgar 1x Dragonlord Kolaghan 2x Crux of Fate 2x Sarkhan Unbroken 1x Ugin, the Spirit Dragon 2x Haven of the Spirt Dragon 3x Mana Confluence 2x Opulent Palace 3x Wooded Foothills 4x Evolving Wilds 4x Forest 3x Mountain 1x Swamp 1x Plains 1x Island

4x Crackling Doom 4x Ultimate Price 2x Foul-Tongue Invocation 2x Anger of the Gods 2x Dragonlords Prerogative 1x Whip of Erebos

The main impetus behind this deck should be readily apparent: I want to play ALL THE DRAGONS! So I've got some ramp and some dragons. The only spell I've included is Crux of Fate, because it fits the flavour and a one-sided wrath seems like a good thing.

Round 1: 2-1 vs GR Dragons

My first round I was paired up against FNM regular Michael, and I was nervous. His favorite flavour of magic has been GR for a while and his GR dragon ramp deck is super scary, always well piloted and probably much more consistent than mine. It turned out to be one of my favorite games of magic ever with the game winner always swinging for well over 20 in the air each game (Game one he cast Chord of Calling to fetch Ararka, World Render to attack me for 40-something). My mana held up in games 2 and 3 as did my side-board plan of pulling out the 7 drops for more removal. 

Round 2: 2-0 vs UW morph

Round two I was paired up against a fairly new player with a pretty strong deck. I didn't give him time to get Mastery of the Unseen going and despite a really scary Master of Pearls play in game two, the dragons took it home. 

Round 3: 1-2 vs BW Death

I was paired against another FNM regular (Francois) in probably my worst match-up of the night. Game one was pretty much a write off as he had all the removal and multiple Agent of Fates triggers. I boarded in my Ultimate Price and Anger of the Gods and managed to swing game 2, but didn't draw the removal game three and multiple Agent of Fates triggers left me with no board facing down an 7 power, flying, first strike, deathtouch, lifelink, vigilance Agent of Fates.... .... .... it didn't end well for me. 

Round 4: 0-2 vs BW Warriors

In the last round I played another new-comer to Outer Limits and his "budget" BW warriors deck. He played well and.... wow.... that Warriors deck is legit. Lots of 2/1 warriors, coupled with great removal, the double striking warrior and Great Teachers decree was just way too fast for my poor little dragons deck. In both games I managed to sweep the board to stabilise (with Crux game one and Anger game 2) but he just dashed in a warrior for lethal. 

So that was the end of the night. I went 2-2, had some great games and even won booster for my troubles. I think my deck was fun, but obviously sub-optimal. If I continue with the five colour version I will have to take out some 7 and 8 drops for more removal as I was boarding into it every match. 

I'm not sure what I'm going to be playing this week... maybe a refined version of this five colour dragons list, the Mardu Dragons list that's been doing well in the international tournaments, or I might brew up a Temur Dragons list because Sarkhan Unbroken is busted (every game I played him I just felt like it put me so far ahead of my opponents). 

Hopefully I'll give you another report next week.

-Odd

"'My dragonlord is immortal. Most dragons are not.'  Kadri, Dromoka warrior" - Enduring Victory, flavour text

On the (Google) plus side

Google's attempts at a social media platform have been widely ridiculed by the internet, and with the entrenched positions of Facebook and Twitter they face an uphill battle when it comes to user adoption. I use Twitter and have a Facebook that I never check and I'm here to tell you that if you're not on Google+, you're missing out.

Why should you take all the time and effort to invest in another social media platform when you already have Facebook, Twitter and other accounts? No one you know is on Google+, so what's the pay off? Well... maybe the fact that no one you know is on Google+ is a benefit. Your grandparents are not there, and even if they were, the circles allow you to easily control what you're sharing with whom. Certainly it gives you a lot more control than Facebook.

But if no-one you know is on the platform... won't it be boring? It is anything but boring. Google+ has, in my opinion, found a perfect synergy between the publishing/subscription style of twitter, the micro-blogging abilities of sites like Tumblr and the "friendship management" of Facebook. There are enough interesting people, groups and sites posting to Google+ that if you have an interest in a subject, there are multiple feeds that you can subscribe to. Much like when you first join twitter, you can subscribe to the feeds that post content you are interested in.

As an example, here is a sampling of the posts that I've found and shared on G+:

• A post about robotic jellyfish
• A news update about the headlining fight at UFC 189
• An epic geeky tattoo
• Lots and lots and lots of awesome street art 

So maybe next time you're going to refresh your facebook page for the 12th time this hour, click on over to my Google+ page and have a look... you might enjoy the visit enough to try it out for yourself.

-Odd
"One of us, One of us." -Freaks (1932)

MtG: The State of Standard

I've been playing magic again since the end of the Innistrad block, putting in my reps playing standard every week at my local FNM and I think it's worth taking a minute to appreciate how great a job Wizards are doing with their set design.

Gone are the dark days of Kaw-Blade and Affinity where one deck ruled standard, in our modern era the Magic design team have been exceptional in balancing new sets to support both great limited and constructed formats. As I type this we are sitting the meat of the Dragons of Tarkir meta-game and I couldn't be happier.

The meta-game in standard at the moment feels really broad and open. It seems to me that there are more options for truly competitive decks in standard than at any other time I've been playing magic. You can choose between Mono-Red, UW heroic, Abzan Agro, Jeskai Tempo, Green ramp, GB Devotion, Bant Megamorph, Abzan Midrange, UB Control, Esper Dragons and Abzan Control... and those are just the acknowledged Tier 1 decks.

If we move down a half step we pick up other decks like RG Bees, RG Dragons, Temur Aggro, Sultai Whip and various flavors of collected company to name just a few. We're absolutely spoiled for choice.

The meta-game is so broad that I feel like the difference between the top Tier 1 decks and a well tuned home-brew is really negligible in terms of pure power and a lot of that difference can be made up by playing something that no-one expects. For a while I was quite happy playing a (probably hugely sub-optimal) 5 colour dragon ramp deck, and I'm currently running an aggressive Temur deck that I feel confident with against any deck in the mega-game.

It feels like every time there is a GP or PT level tournament, the entire format shifts and a brand new deck lands up on top and that makes it exciting as a brewer, a competitor and a magic player.

Well done, Wizards. Keep it up.

-Odd
"Dragons emerge from tempests fully formed and terribly hungry" - Decent of Dragons, flavour text