It’s Thursday, so you know what that means! This one was a little rough because of all the different directions you could have gone in (all colors are playable; though black is definitely a tertiary color, if that). The link can be found here: http://www.wizards.com/magic/sealeddeckbuilder/index.html?draftid=20120301

Here’s what I did:

1 Darkthicket Wolf
1 Dawntreader Elk
1 Hollowhenge Beast
1 Kessig Wolf
1 Nearheath Stalker
1 Night Revelers
1 Ravenous Demon
1 Riot Devils
1 Russet Wolves
1 Scorned Villager
1 Skirsdag Flayer
1 Somberwald Spider
1 Village Ironsmith
1 Villagers of Estwald
1 Alpha Brawl
1 Death’s Caress
1 Fires of Undeath
1 Grim Flowering
1 Rolling Temblor
1 Traveler’s Amulet
2 Wrack with Madness
1 Garruk Relentless
1 Evolving Wilds
2 Swamp
7 Forest
7 Mountain

I felt the red removal and the green creatures were the strongest options this card pool had–though combining these colors without using the aggressive tools available to it leaves it quite susceptible to flyers. You’ll be able to stall the ground, but one Stormbound Geist, Chapel Geist, or a Stitched Drake causes a ton of problems–none of your red removal can beat it, and you’re not fast enough to race it (and their presumed countermagic, bounce spells, or Claustrophobias). That’s why I added the black in to the pool–I was splashing for the flashback on the Fires anyway, so another Swamp gives us two removal spells that can profitably tangle with any flyer or bomb (save something with Undying). Stormbound Geist is a problem, but this deck can handle most anything else. I might be getting a little greedy, but with two colorless fixing spells and light mana requirements for our base two colors, we can afford to be a little greedy.

What did y’all do? As always, I’m curious–let me know!

~Anthony

Welcome again to another edition of sealed deck Thursdays!

Link is here: http://www.wizards.com/magic/sealeddeckbuilder/index.html?draftid=20120223

This is by far the hardest one I’ve done yet. Looking at the rares, we have one really good blue one and decent red/green/black ones. We’re going to need to figure out what colors pair well in order to determine a deck.

Off the bat, we can eliminate white–nothing much is going on in that color. However, we can’t cut any of the other colors right away. Black has a great rare and two Moans so it’s a possibility, blue has great flyers and a bomb rare, green has good dudes, and red has great removal. Overall, it’s going to come down to the pairing of colors.

Blue needs to pair with a color that has a lot of creatures or mill enablers in order to work–it has too many guys dependent on exiling creatures in the graveyard and lacks enablers to get them there in the first place. I initially thought U/B was the way to go, but without enough guys to put in the yard, it’s not going to work out well. We can’t pair blue with red either, since red lacks sufficient creatures. We could pair blue with green, but then we’re lacking any real removal, and that’s not something I like to do in sealed. We’re probably cutting blue, which leaves us with red, green, and black. Note that if we had any enablers, then blue would be the choice for this pool–a Mulch, a Faithless Looting, a Forbidden Alchemy, etc. Let’s look at our other options.

Black’s greatest strength is in its two Moans–that card is really powerful. After that, we’ve got the 5cc flyer and a Boneflinger. Note that if we’re aggressive enough, those Bumps are going to be sweet. However, looking at the combination of red/black, we see that it lacks enough relevant creatures. That means we’re going to need green.

Our deck choice now revolves around whether we pair green with red or with black. I think that red’s removal is good enough reason to pair red with green–black’s just more shallow than red when we’re considering which color compliments green more. Therefore, let’s see what a red/green deck looks like:

1 Ashmouth Hound
1 Avacyn’s Pilgrim
1 Crossway Vampire
1 Forge Devil
1 Gravetiller Wurm
1 Grizzled Outcasts
1 Heckling Fiends
1 Hollowhenge Beast
1 Kessig Wolf
1 Nearheath Stalker
1 Orchard Spirit
1 Scorned Villager
2 Somberwald Dryad
1 Ulvenwald Mystics
1 Wolfbitten Captive
1 Blazing Torch
1 Brimstone Volley
1 Curse of Stalked Prey
1 Grim Flowering
1 Into the Maw of Hell
1 Wild Hunger
1 Wrack with Madness
9 Forest
8 Mountain

We’re going to have to be a little aggressive to win with this pool. It’s not pretty, but it’s what we have to work with. We could splash for Bumps or Boneflinger, but I’m not sure it’s necessary. If we find ourselves needing the reach against a deck without forests, then I can see cutting the Dryads and the Curse for 2 Bump and a fixer. Our deck is designed to beat the forests decks with evasion and the non forest decks with speed. My guess is that white/x decks will be hard match ups, unless they have forests, which will make it a bit easier. Most our creatures will be able to put decent pressure on the slower blue decks, or at least enough pressure combined with our removal to secure the win.

As always, let me know what you would do with this pool!

~Anthony