Brains!!! Zombie Draft Deck

     Hello again. I have not written a blog entry in a while but I will try my best to keep up with it! I have finals next week so that makes things a wee bit tough. After that though I don't have anymore classes, and that means more time for Magic! However, today I am making time to write an entry because I drafted a really, really awesome deck.

     It was an 8 man draft and I first picked a Gravecrawler because let's be honest, that's basically not a bad "money card" and it's easy to trade off. Also, it's about what my draft would have cost me if I didn't use store credit! I started drafting seriously though and was passed a Tragic Slip, and then another, and then another! THREE Tragic Slips. Now with a nice rare and three great removal spells I was pretty satisfied so I started making a fun deck. I tried to pick as many Zombies as possible to bring back Gravecrawler since I did first pick him. When there weren't any Zombies in a pack I would choose the best card available and ended up with WB. When I opened my Innistrad pack I kept a Woodland Cemetery even though I was not playing green because I'm sure it'll be worth more soon. Again, I started taking all of the Zombies and did a bit of rare drafting.

       

     For the last round of packs I felt okay about my Zombie themed deck and could probably have stayed mono black, but I kind of have a thing for Moment of Heroism and other combat tricks. I also started hate drafting all of the really good cards and picked more Zombies when I saw them. Then I saw an Endless Ranks of the Dead and chuckled to myself a bit. I did not pick it though because I was more than confident that it would wheel. Next came an Unbreathing Horde which I let pass too because I highly doubt that anyone else at this draft had any Zombies. I took them all! Boom! They both come back to me and I was successful in taking some really good cards away from possible opponents. What are the odds of me drafting three great Zombie rares?! If only I had Zombie Apocalypse... This is how my deck ended up:

1 Gravecrawler                 1 Altar's Reap                              10 Swamp
1 Diregraf Ghoul               1 Ghoulcaller's Chant                    7 Plains
3 Walking Corpse             3 Tragic Slip
2 Highborn Ghoul              2 Moment of Heroism
1 Unbreathing Horde         1 Endless Ranks of the Dead
2 Ghoulraiser
1 Markov Patrician
1 Sightless Ghoul
1 Elgaud Inquisitor
1 Mausoleum Guard
1 Hollowhenge Spirit

     I was probably way too excited about my deck and laid it for my boyfriend Andrew and my friend Robby to see. They both warned me about Endless Ranks of the Dead not being good in draft because I might get it too late or that it might just be a useless enchantment. They also said that Unbreathing Horde was unreliable because I only have 10 other Zombies, but I felt like that was so many!

    My first round was against a guy playing BR. I won the dice roll and played first with Swamps, Plains, Endless Ranks of the Dead, Highborn Ghoul, Tragic Slip and Sightless Ghoul in my hand. He played a turn one Typhoid Rats and passed. Turn two I had Highborn Ghoul out and found Gravecrawler on turn three. I just had to play Endless Ranks of the Dead and was so excited to get my first Zombie token! My opponent was pretty surprised and saw what was about to happen with that enchantment out. I drew an Unbreathing Horde, played him instead of Sightless Ghoul, kept up mana for Tragic Slip and started attacking next turn. Neither of us were attacking before, but now I was continuously gaining Zombie tokens and had Gravecrawler out. I attacked with everything and Typhoid Rats blocked my Highborn Ghoul while Feral Ridgewolf blocked Gravecrawler letting Unbreathing Horde and my Zombie token go through for five. Then he used Tragic Slip on Unbreathing Horde but I was doing fine because I casted Gravecrawler and would get two more Zombies next turn with my three tokens and him out. After that I won the game pretty fast and had nine Zombies out before winning!

     Game two was a bit more difficult. He was on the play and eventually brought out Hinterland Hermit, Falkenrath Torturer and Falkenrath Noble (I'm always so scared of him). This time I played Gravecrawler, Walking Corpse, Walking Corpse and then Elgaud Inquisitor. I attacked with Gravecrawler and  Walking Corpse in hopes to use Tragic Slip on Falkenrath Noble. He managed to attack me once with Falkenrath Noble and passed the turn to let Hinterland Hermit flip into Hinterland Scourge. On my turn I drew Altar's Reap and attacked with Gravecrawler and a Walking Corpse once again. This time my opponent decided to block Gravecrawler with his Falkenrath Torturer and Walking Corpse with Hinterland Scourge, but  I finally got to Tragic Slip his Falkenrath Noble. However, he also had a Tragic Slip and used it on my other  Walking Corpse.

     After combat I casted  Gravecrawler to sacrifice for Altar's Reap before casting him again and drawing into Endless Ranks of the Dead. During his turn he played Kessig Wolf and passed. I drew into a  Ghoulraiser which I played to get a Walking Corpse back and then cast. Afterwards he had Abbattoir Ghoul after attacking with Kessig Wolf. I drew Ghoulcaller's Chant but didn't need to use it so I cast Endless Ranks of the Dead. It was getting bit scary though, I was at 13 and he was at 22! Next turn I drew Moment of Heroism and attacked with my Elgaud Inquisitor and Walking Corpse. Both were blocked and I used Moment of Heroism on Walking Corpse which was being blocked by Abbattoir Ghoul. Now I had 17 life since he gave Kessig Wolf first strike. Slowly after that though I started building a Zombie army and eventually won while he kept drawing into lands. I also won my next two rounds similarly with Endless Ranks of the Dead in four games. When I told my friends what happened they were surprised but happy for me and that was the end of my favorite draft deck ever so far. The end.

Mythic > 2 Rares

     The day before yesterday was Tuesday! That means that I went drafting at CoolStuff mostly in hopes to open up some good money cards for trading but to also win more packs to put on credit. Also, I just love drafting in general. Ask anyone! However, drafting for packs continuously is very, very difficult and has too much variance to win regularly. Do not try to draft infinite! I have learned that the hard way and that is why I play FNM.

     During a draft I had first picked a  Deranged Outcast and then second picked  Requiem Angel. Of course I was going to try playing GW after that, it's one of my favorite color combos in draft. Green and white are very aggressive, work fantastically well together and have great combat tricks. In the second pack I opened I was torn on between choosing a foil Forbidden Alchemy (because it was so pretty... and worth $6!) or a Devil's Play. I decided that winning six more packs would be more profitable and took the Devil's Play because it is definitely worth splashing for. Also, I drafted a  Dawntreader Elk earlier so I felt confident about my splash.

     My deck began to look better and better. I was thrilled to see  Fiend Hunter passed over to me and then right after that  Slayer of the Wicked. They are so good! Two for one cards have my heart. Anyway, when the draft finished I felt really excited to build my deck and ended up with this:

Creatures:                            Other Spells                          Lands
1 Darkthicket Wolf               1 Bonds of Faith                     1 Mountain
3 Voiceless Spirit                2 Wild Hunger                       9 Plains
1 Dawntreader Elk                1 Devil's Play                         7 Forest
1 Slayer of the Wicked         1 Rebuke
1 Gavony Ironwright             1 Hunger of the Howlpack
1 Village Bell-Ringer         
2 Chapel Geist
1 Fiend Hunter
1 Niblis of the Urn
1 Elgaud Inquisitor
1 Ambush Viper
1 Elder of Laurels
1 Requiem Angel
1 Deranged Outcast

     During the first game I figured out that my opponent was playing a RG deck with some werewolves in it and also had some burn spells like Burning Oil. He had won game one pretty fast after casting Huntmaster of the Fells and then passing his next turn to let it transform. During our second game I was on the play happy and hopeful because in my hand were Deranged Outcast, Elder of Laurels, Fiend Hunter and lands. After I passed the turn my opponent played Scorned Villager. I decided not to attack on my turn because I didn't want to trade Deranged Outcast. To my horror I realized that I should have attacked when my opponent played a turn three Huntmaster, gained his two life and brought out his wolf token. This is when I played Fiend Hunter to get rid of his wolf token and attacked with Elder of Laurels.

    I had drawn Rebuke and planned to attack with everything next turn in hopes that he would do the same during his turn. Then he played a Kessig Wolf which could gain first strike now because of the Scorned Villager. After a couple of turns of neither of us attacking he had already used two Evolving Wilds to search for a Plains and a Swamp. His werewolves transformed, Huntmaster killed my Niblis of the Urn and dealt 2 to me.

    With all four colors of his deck and his transformed werewolves, my opponent decided to finally attack with everything. I blocked the Moonscarred Werewolf with Elder of Laurels, let Kessig Wolf through, and Rebuked Huntmaster. In response to Rebuke he tapped Moonscarred Werewolf for mana and then a Mountain to Fling Huntmaster at me for four! During my turn I took the opportunity to attack when he flashed in Briarpack Alpha to block my Deranged Outcast which I then sacrificed to give Elder of Laurels two +1/+1 counters.

     

 
     During his turn I realized why he played four colors. He used Unburial Rites to bring back Huntmaster and after that I felt very disheartened. He attacked for 6 bringing me down to 5 and then it was my turn. I drew a Bonds of Faith and placed it on Kessig Wolf. Unfortunately, during my next turn I did not have a spell to cast so Huntmaster dealt 2 to Elder of Laurels and brought me down to 3 life. He then used Prey Upon with Kessig Wolf to kill Elder of Laurels before attacking. After that he played a Feral Ridgewolf, attacked next turn and won the game.

    I realized that even with Elder of Laurels and Deranged Outcast on the board, beating a turn three Huntmaster that was flung at me and unburial rited is pretty difficult. His deck worked really well and he went on to win that draft, but I don't think he had another chance to Fling Huntmaster again. I keep thinking back to what I could have done better for future games. I realize that I should have used Fiend Hunter on Huntmaster rather that the token. Also, I could have pumped Deranged Outcast in order to trade with Briarpack Alpha instead of give Elder of Laurels counters. What would you have done in this situation? Do you have any similar stories you would like to share?

Introductions Are In Order

     Hello there and welcome to my Magic blog! Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Nhi Pham, I am 18 and I have been playing Magic for about six months now. It all started when I was browsing Reddit back at the end August last year and clicked on the top post that day. Remember the Gizmodo fiasco with Jon Finkel? Well, that's when I started hearing about Magic: The Gathering. However, that is not when I started playing the, what I now believe to be, fantastic game. It was on that Gizmodo article when I happened to click on a hyperlink taking me to OKCupid. At first I had no intention to make an account or to try online dating, but their opening page was so compelling. E-mail address and birthday? It really was that easy? So I thought "Why not?" and decided to sign up, but mostly because I had recently turned 18 the week before and was able to legally try out the site.

     Anyway, after several messages it seemed like at least 75% of the guys in my area enjoyed Magic: the Gathering. When I was younger, probably about 8-10 years ago, I played Pokemon. After that I played Yu-Gi-Oh for a few years before finally giving up trading card games in high school. So I thought "Well, I am no stranger to this scene, maybe I should start playing Magic so I can have another thing in common with these guys." Off I was looking for people to teach me how to play Magic. After posting a Facebook status about my desire to learn the game a friend of mine offered a box of old cards he had laying around since he had given up the game. Of course I accepted it! It's about 1600 commons and uncommons from Ravnica and not worth much, but I was really excited.

     A month later one of my dates from OKCupid offered to teach me after dinner one night and to his surprise I was thrilled because I was much too shy to ask. (I'm one of those really, REALLY quiet and shy girls...) I borrowed one of his decks, mono green with cards mostly from Worldwake and Zendikar, and started slowly playing as he explained the rules. After that first game I understood most of the basics and was excited to start building my very own deck. The next day I went on another date with a different guy who took me to the local gaming store. This time I brought along my box of Ravnica cards which we then sorted by color. I told him I wanted to built a deck but didn't know where to begin. Then he asked me which color I liked best. Well, metallic emerald green is my favorite color so I decided to try making a green deck. My date then told me to pick out all of the cards I liked, which I did. When I was done reading through all the green cards I had a nice little pile of the ones I thought were interesting. After that we added lands and I had a deck!

     It was a pretty bad deck. All of the cards were different and did not go very well together. My date had made a deck of his own using the white cards I had in my box and we started playing. That's when I truly got the gist of the game. I basically learned 90% of everything I needed to that night. I don't really remember much, but I do recall figuring out what flying and trample are which doesn't seem bad for a beginner. After that I bought a beginner's deck from Target that was GW Infect and slowly started improving it. My deck wasn't standard though. I included Invigorate, Vines of Vastwood and Armadillo Cloak. After that deck I purchased the five intro Innistrad decks and really grew to like the vampire one.

     A couple weeks later my second date then brought me over to his friend's house to draft for the first time. I was told to stick to one or two colors and that the cards I choose would be placed in a deck to play against other draft decks. I read each card from every pack and chose which ones I thought were the most powerful. After drafting my cards I took out all of the ones that weren't in my colors and added lands. I played against my date's friend's wife and lost. This really confused me because I was sure I had chosen the best cards! Upset, I asked my date what I did wrong so he looked through my deck and chuckled. Turns out that four creatures is not enough for a draft deck.

     After that first draft I began drafting at my local gaming store and won second place at FNM during my third draft ever! Most people told me that it was beginner's luck but I know I drafted a pretty good WU deck that night, even if I chose Doomed Traveler over Gallows Warden. The following week I decided to try out the standard FNM and borrowed a friend's mono red deck, which he told me was simple play. During my first round I felt like I was doing pretty well with Koth on the field at four. Then I learned that you can only have one of the same planeswalker on the field. My opponent let me take him back though which was pretty nice of the guy. Also, I'm pretty sure he felt bad for me since it was my first month of playing Magic. I went 3-3 that night and felt pretty good about myself. I was so surprised that everyone stayed out so late to play though, I was getting so tired!

     I decided to only draft and enter the draft FNM for a couple months and began collecting cards this way. My decks slowly improved as well as my playing skills. Soon I became good enough to be feared at in my school and becoming recognized at my local gaming store. After playing for about two and a half months I was on winter break and randomly decided to take a bus to New York. Since my boyfriend knew about my Reddit story and Magic he told me that Jon Finkel lives in New York. He then texted me Finkel's twitter username and I tweeted the guy who started it all if he had time to play casual Magic with me. During my bus ride to New York I received a direct message on Twitter and was so ecstatic that he gave me a "maybe"! Playing with Jon Finkel the day I had to leave New York is probably one of my favorite memories relating to Magic. Unfortunately, I was much too shy to really talk much to him and even forgot to take a picture! However, I did manage to get my Shadowmage Infiltrator signed which is in my Wrexial Commander deck.

     After New York my boyfriend gave me a werewolf deck for Christmas which I played with for quite a while. I made top 8 at a standard FNM for the first time with it and felt like I was on top of the world! Then I tried it out at a grand prix but failed quite miserably because I made top 8 the night before at CoolStuff's $500 tourney and stayed up until 4:30AM. Lesson learned. Now I just like to build my own fun decks to play standard but consider myself not too bad at Magic. On Tuesdays I draft and pay for them with the packs I've earned on credit, on Wednesdays I play casual commander and on Fridays I play standard FNM so I can earn more packs to put on credit for drafting! It's a challenging cycle.
   
     So there you have it, my background on Magic. I really do love this game and hope to be more involved in it which why I started this blog. People have told me that writing about my experiences will help me become better. I also hope to develop my writing skills with this blog and try to at least keep you entertained for a bit! Well, I should really go to sleep now. It's past three, but I was so ready to begin this adventure! Goodnight. :)