The Nettling Dad had a frustrating experience with what looked like a very solid UB deck. Aka the best color pair in the format. Trying to figure out what went “wrong” (or right) is one of my very favorite parts of Magic. Sometimes there are things outside of your control, e.g., mana screw/flood. Sometimes there are suboptimal plays that there is no one to blame but yourself. And then there’s murky middle ground, like the frustration of your opponent dropping a huge bomb. Feels outside of my control!!! Or did you blow your removal needlessly soon?
Anyway, teasing apart the circle of control vs. concern is just like life where we make nothing but decisions regarding the unknowable future with imperfect information. Way more fun doing this with zombies and dragons than figuring out the right school for our offspring. So let’s get to work!
It’s time to delve into a what’s-the-play! I was so in the tank for this that I forgot to get a good screenshot, so here’s the 17lands summary:
interesting moments
Oppo is at 7, I’m at 6. They attack and flashed-back Rise of the Ants to get some blockers down. I’ve been stuck on 6-mana for several turns now, unable to flashback my Beasts or Seize the Storm for additional blockers. But I just drew a beautiful land! What do I do now? Okay, it’s pretty clear that I can’t just defend; they can swing out and two unblocked creatures kill me. By process of elimination: I attack. Work out the lines of play if they single-block or double-block.
Let’s briefly discuss the miracle of carpooling. With Lil Chandra and her friend Lil Nissa enrolled in the same Lil Kickers (actually called that) soccer lessons, this allows for the miracle of carpooling. One parent takes two kids. This leaves one couple with an empty house and leaves me with an hour to pound out a guilt-free draft. Or two. In my defense, I’m also running two loads of laundry.
I’ve really been enjoying this format. I agree that the prevalence of Organ Hoarder and the Diregraf Horde is a bit much at common, but it’s a great contest between the flashback/disturb of the control decks versus the aggression of the other decks.
Welcome to part II of the unknown length part series on the Nettling Dad’s mono white draftravaganza. For the draft and deckbuild part see part I here.
Match Summary
This run started good 2-0. But then went off the rails for a 2-3 finish. I will not bury the lead, in game 3 my mana wasn’t perfect and I let it get to me and that propagated through the remaining games. So what do you do about it? You pick one game and call in the Benalish Dad for coaching.
Coaching Summary
A good discord chat thread and then a live screen share session and we had a solid breakdown and discussion of game 4, (details here). From that we identified a few key coaching points for me to focus on. They are:
mental fortitude – know what tilts you and step away if you can
prove it – if you read that they have a combat trick it is usually wise to make them prove it
plan – have a plan, update your plan, don’t get stuck in an outdated plan
There are couple other context points to hit.
I have been on hiatus from magic for 7 years, AFR was my first set back but as LSV points out in LR #614, ~”you cannot play matches in MID like you did in AFR, this ain’t a core set”. I am definitely digging out of a hole there. e.g., coaching point number 2 is something I worked on a decade ago and it is back with a vengeance.
Once AFR draft got boring I started grinding mono white weenie in standard 2022, once I learned the format I was winning a ton on autopilot and I think it actually caused me to lose my limited edge.
Coaching Details
The Benalish Dad provided a few step marks in my replays for us to focus on. I tried to remember where my mind was at in that moment and then compare to what I could see looking back at the replay later. In particular we identified that I was not seeing all of my options and that my lack of mental toughness (on tilt) was the root cause.
In both of these scenarios it is my turn. What’s the play? (post in the comments)
Conclusion
I now have some coaching points to work on. My plan is to isolate and focus on one point at a time until I level up then move on to the next. And then once I am better at these I will still lose games and we will still be able to recap and coach!
I started a draft and it was bonkers. And then I was joined by the Benalish Dad and Matt_Daemon for deckbuilding. Part II will be the match recap. Let’s go!
This draft was very heavy on payables, here are the late cuts.
My interest in Sungold Barrage comes from wanting a way to clear out a big blocker. In the end we decided to go with pump spells.
My interest in Lunarch Veteran came from listening to Lords of Limited (link) and their discussion about the card. I still think I should have found a way to fit them in but is 5 one drops really the way to go? Is it really better than Chaplain of Alms?
Follow up on these points in the match recap post.
Final Decklist
Come back for part 2 to see how it went!
editor’s note
That deck is pure fire! I might have put the lunarch veteran back in and cut an Odric’s Outrider (which is a fine card, but grinder than this deck)
On the way to daycare today, the FF6 song “Searching for Friends” came on. Since I like telling Lil Chandra the snippets of plot from the orchestrated video game music, I told her that this is all about a brave young woman named Celes travelling across the world trying to find her friends after a disaster. As we pulled into daycare she asked, “Did Celes find her friends?” And–choking up a little–I managed to get out, “Yes… yes she did!” /nerdparenting /takethatKefka
In a swift break from tradition for me, I’ve been drafting quite a bit (aka “more than once”) in the opening week of a format. Is fun! Spicy! Are cards any good or what? Let’s get an exciting P1p1!!
Let’s talk about black aggro aka blaggro. I had fun playing with a couple pieces in a recent draft. I got a trophy, but, it’s real early in the format, so get your grains of salt ready. Anyway, let’s go
Check out this 2-drop. It was bonkers for me. TBF, I think the value will drop as people learn the format. But for now, this bad boy grows big.
And having shown a opener lets look at a finisher that is better than you think on first glance.
In case you missed it the second part says “whenever a creature dies”. Which means ….
Benalish Dad 