SCG Talent Search – Hot-Boxing Sealed

Welcome back! For this article I’m going to return to the Sealed deck I showed you
last week,
give you an overview of the format as I see it, and leave you with a story about the inner chaos of my mind. Writing about Sealed can be a little dry, but stick with it — I think you’ll enjoy this one.

Last time, I left you with a Sealed deck that I thought was particularly interesting due to the power level of the cards in various colors. I feel this pool offers unique challenges, and although I definitely misbuilt it, I feel that it has given me a keener insight into the format. I tried to get as close to an optimal list as possible by going through this process:

First, I sort the cards by rarity just to see if I opened any money rares (note this is something I do for fun — there’s no real strategic value to it, unless your strategy is to lucksack your way into multiple $30+ mythics; then more power to you). Next, I sort all the cards by color and then place each color in its own pile. For reference here was what I opened:

After one run through I came to this:

White:

2 Arrest
Auriok Sunchaser
Dispense Justice
Kemba’s Skyguard

Blue:

Scrapdiver Serpent
3 Sky-Eel School
Darkslick Drake
Disperse
2 Riddlesmith

Black:

Skinrender
2 Instill Infection
Moriok Reaver
Blistergrub

Red:

Flameborn Hellion
Koth of the Hammer
Oxidda Scrapmelter
2 Blade-Tribe Berserkers
Vulshok Heartstoker
Spikeshot Elder

Green:

Alpha Tyrranax

One thing to clarify, I do create an additional column to the far right of my pool for infect, which is almost like a sixth color. Since the mechanic is linear, it doesn’t interact very well with the rest of your cards, so it helps to remove it from the rest of the pool. Remember to place Tainted Strikes and Untamed Mights in this column as you’ll almost never use them outside of this archetype. (One caveat, Necropede gets placed here, but will almost always make your maindeck.)

Next, I run through the artifacts and separate them, based on one of five factors:

1) Does this artifact have the infect mechanic? If yes, place into the infect pile.

2) Does this artifact have an ability that requires a colored activation cost? If so, place into the appropriate color’s pile.

3) Is this an artifact that I’ll play in my deck every time? If yes, place into a “good artifacts pile.” This column came about after getting a feel for the format. At first, I was hesitant to place certain cards in here like Tumble Magnet, Rusted Relic, or Sylvok Lifestaff. But I came around to them, and now I firmly believe those cards belong in your forty; maybe not in multiples, but at least one should be correct.

4) Is this artifact useful in certain situations, or a card that I’ll play sometimes, but not all the time? If yes, put it in the maybe pile between your good artifact and infect piles. (I always put mana Myr in this category, since you won’t know which ones you’ll play until you decide your colors.)

5) Is this artifact too difficult to use effectively, or just terrible? Is so, then I just leave it where it is. (This will probably draw the most ire from you all, but I’d include trap cards like Grindclock, and Grafted Exoskeleton. I know some people like the Exoskeleton because it can win you games on its own, but every time that card has been played against me, it always results in an immediate 2-for-1 once it gets equipped. )

Once I was done with this process, my artifacts looked like this:

Always Played:

Golem Artisan
Trigon of Corruption
Lux Cannon (I wasn’t sure how good this was at the time, but now I think it’s worth it)
Rusted Relic
Perilous Myr

Play some of the time:

Clone Shell
Darksteel Myr
Throne of Geth
2 Silver Myr
Livewire Lash (placed this here, but it’s probably good enough to always play it; it’s practically a one-mana-more Darksteel Axe)
Iron Myr
Glint Hawk Idol
 
Now I look over each of the colors and look for which ones offer the most power. This pool is surprising because each of the colors has powerful options. White offers strong removal, red offers Koth and solid creatures, blue gives us multiple fliers, and green gives us a bomb in Putrefax for infect. When I looked over this pool, there were so many directions I could go — the first build I did was this:

2 Blade-Tribe Berserkers
Darksteel Myr
Flameborn Hellion
Golem Artisan
Iron Myr
Oxidda Scrapmelter
Perilous Myr
Silver Myr
Skinrender
Spikeshot Elder
2 Sylvok Replica
2 Vulshok Heartstoker
Vulshok Replica

2 Instill Infection
Koth of the Hammer
Livewire Lash
Lux Cannon
Rusted Relic
Trigon of Corruption

10 Mountain
7 Swamp
2 Forest

There were a few things I liked about this build, but I was worried that it wasn’t really focused. Then I tried this build:

2 Blade-Tribe Berserkers
Darkslick Drake
Darksteel Myr
Golem Artisan
Iron Myr
Oxidda Scrapmelter
Perilous Myr
2 Riddlesmith
Scrapdiver Serpent
2 Silver Myr
3 Sky-Eel School
Soliton
Spikeshot Elder
Vulshok Replica

Koth of the Hammer
Lux Cannon
Rusted Relic
Trigon of Corruption

10 Mountain
7 Island

But I wasn’t really happy with it. In this format, I really dislike green and blue. I just don’t think they’re as good as the other colors. They can certainly be playable — don’t get me wrong — but outside of blue’s uncommons (Volition Reins, Riddlesmith, Darkslick Drake), blue’s commons leave much to be desired. Green’s cards fare better, but they tend to cluster toward the top of your curve (Molder Beast, Acid Web Spider), and I prefer to be more aggressive in this format. I find that white, red, and black reward you the most for being aggressive. If I had to list the colors in this format, it’d look something like this:

1)   White

2)   Red

3)   Black

4)   Green

5)   Blue

This coincides somewhat with the mechanics themselves. In most cases, you’ll find yourself trying to maximize the core mechanics. I’d generally place them in this order:

1)   Metalcraft

2)   Infect

3)   Proliferate

When you examine them in this context, you can start to get a feel for how I frame the format. What colors abuse metalcraft the best? White and red. How about infect? Obviously, it’s almost exclusively in black and green. Proliferate? Found primarily in blue. Now fliers are still powerful, and blue still offers strong defensive cards like Stoic Rebuttal and Halt Order, but in general, I dislike it.

The natural gravity of the format is to play artifacts, since there are simply so many, and often your colors will be far too shallow to produce a strong dual-colored deck without artifacts. Not to mention, there are numerous great artifacts that can fit into a myriad of decks — so you’ll probably want to play them anyway. As a result of these factors, you’re going to find yourself with between seven to ten artifacts naturally. With all those artifacts it doesn’t take much to turn on metalcraft, which is arguably the most powerful mechanic, as it supercharges your cards, while simultaneously rewarding you for what you’re already doing. I think I want — as a bare minimum — eleven artifacts for metalcraft, and I try to play around fourteen if possible; though I’ll not sacrifice card quality just to increase my artifact count.

Infect, on the other hand, often requires a significant sacrifice in card quality so that you can “punch through” once your opponent has stabilized. Proliferate offers powerful combos but no real means of winning the game once you’re able to generate multiple counters a turn. That’s why the best proliferate interactions often involve some means of controlling the board (Contagion Clasp and Tumble Magnet come to mind). These are often mana intensive and can take a significant amount of time to setup. Essentially, proliferate needs assistance — metalcraft does not.

So what did I end up going with? This:

2 Blight Mamba
Corpse Cur
Cystbearer
Ichor Rats
Iron Myr
Moriok Reaver
Perilous Myr
Plague Stinger
Putrefax
Skinrender
2 Sylvok Replica
Vector Asp

Carrion Call
Instill infection
Livewire Lash
Lux Cannon
Tainted Strike
Throne of Geth
Trigon of Corruption
Untamed Might

10 Swamp
7 Forest

What the?

Yes, I know — infect. Everything you read up above was a revelation after this Sealed. At the time I was still fixated on making infect work. With an infect bomb in Putrefax, I was sure I could push this deck over the top and finally find success with the infect mechanic.  

How did I my tournament go? As you can probably imagine, not the best.

Round 1 against R/W metalcraft

I’m on the draw, and I open five lands, Skinrender, Cystbearer. A debatable keep, but I thought it was roughly equivalent to going to six, and I just needed some help.

My opponent’s first play is a Myrsmith. I play my second land and pass, having drawn a land and Putrefax. My opponent drops his third land and plays a Copper Myr and makes a token. He attacks me to eighteen. I untap and play my Cystbearer, drawing Blight Mamba. My opponent plays his fourth land (the last one he’ll play) and drops Rusted Relic and makes another token. I feel like I have control of this game, and my opponent passes.

I untap and draw my land for the turn. Now I have an interesting choice — play Skinrender and kill the Myrsmith, shrink the Rusted Relic, or play Blight Mamba with the mana to regenerate it. Since I’m a bit behind, I decided to drop the Blight Mamba with a plan to regenerate it in case he attacks with the Rusted Relic. This was probably a mistake. The problem here is that I’m banking on no removal from my opponent, and the Myrsmith gives him a long-term advantage. I probably either need to kill it or shrink the Relic so I can start applying pressure. I pass the turn.

My opponent draws, and then Arrests my Mamba and swings with the team. I block the Myrsmith with the Cystbearer and take eight. (Now at ten). My opponent passes. I play my fifth land and survey the board. I have a Cystbearer on the board, a Skinrender, and a Putrefax in hand (drawing another land for the turn). Now, this is a point where I’m not sure what the best play is. If I kill one of the artifacts, I can turn the Relic off, but that just seems bad if he plays another. I can shrink the Relic and have a blocker bigger than all of his attackers; alternatively I can play the Putrefax and attack my opponent to seven poison counters, but I’ll go to five. I think it over and attack with the Cystbearer, and shrink my opponents Relic, as I think this leaves me with the best board position. I pass back to my opponent.

He draws and then snap-plays the Glimmerpoint Stag removing Skinrender attacking me to five. When my Render comes back in at the end of the turn, I kill the Elk. I untap and draw an Infectious Nim. I contemplate my options. I’m low on health, so I’m not sure if attacking makes sense anymore. I think for a bit and attack with the Cystbearer (probably the worst mistake so far); he has no blocks, and I cast the Nim and pass. My opponent untaps and casts a second Arrest on my Skinrender and attacks me with everything. I block the Copper Myr looking to take two, and then he Galvanic Blasts me. GG.

Geez, having just written all that, I realize now why people don’t do turn-by-turn reports — they take forever.

I’ll make the next few brief.

In the second game I mull to five. He curves out quite nicely and pretty soon I’m too far behind and have to start chumping his Rusted Relic. I line up some blockers, but his Rusted Relic, Chrome Steed, and Embersmith do me in.

0-1

Round 2: Against B/R

In both games my opponent had turn 4 Skinrender and turn 5 Hoard-Smelter Dragon. I quickly succumbed to his flier. I never really felt like I was in these games.

0-2

So now my chances getting anything more than a few token packs are completely shot. I consider dropping, but I still want to learn more about the format. I decide to keep playing just to see if I can gain any more insight.

The Game        

I looked over at the clock, 10:30. By my estimate I had about forty minutes or so before my next round started.

That’s when I started to feel it — the soft subtle twitch of desire stirring in the recesses of my brain. I wanted to play
the game.
I don’t know how this came about, probably as a result of my own ADD, or maybe just years of overstimulation on video games and television. Regardless, I loathe boredom — so much so in fact — that I go to great lengths to ensure that my brain is constantly humming along, a constant stream of photons and electrons working in harmony to keep my neurons occupied. And the downtime between matches is absolutely abhorrent.

I swivel my chair to face my friend Ryan playing a round of Team Fortress 2 next to me.

“Ryan, I’m about to play the game.”

“What? Why? What’s wrong with you? You do this every time, and
every single time
it goes terribly, and then you blame me for it.”

“There’s over forty minutes before the next round; I think I can easily make it. How long does a normal game take, forty minutes?”

“If you’re lucky. You know damn well it can take well over an hour. Just don’t do it; you know better; you’ll regret it.”

What is the game?

The game typically involves trying to complete a game of Heroes of Newearth, or a raid in World of Warcraft, but it can be any game really that requires complete mental and physical focus — that you cannot leave — before your next round begins. If you’re successful, you complete your other game before your round starts, and you have roughly zero downtime.

However, if you fail, you’re stuck alt/tabbing quickly back and forth between both games, playing them at some margin around 20-30% in a dance known affectionately as “hot-boxing.” Originally, it started as Team Fortress 2, Left 4 Dead, or some other single-player game that I could easily give up on a whim. But where’s the tension in that? Where’s the drama? I needed a harder fix. So I took it to the next level.

There’s just one problem with the game — I’ve never actually won it. (And yes, I’m aware that I need to change this habit. As per my article last week, I’m making a list of all the things I’m doing wrong, so I can try and fix them one at a time. This will probably be #1 on that list.)

So with forty minutes left in the round, I fired up a game of Heroes of Newearth. HoN, as it is colloquially called, is an action RPG that involves two teams of five playing against each other in real time. It’s a twitch-based game with a very high learning curve and a completely acerbic community that prides itself on skill and victory. Basically, it’s populated by the most diehard of Spikes.

I fire up the game and choose my hero — Tempest. In team fights, I play the role of the initiator — the person who’s responsible for engaging and disabling the opposing team. The fact that I’m on the clock means I need to complete this game as soon as possible. I let my team know in advance that we need to win this as fast as we can.

The game starts off, and I manage to trap someone and get the first kill. Sweet. Soon I’m able to quickly farm up items that allow my team to firmly control the midgame. Right as we’re about to engage our opponents for a team-wiping genocide, my screen minimizes, and an orange blinking box glares at me from my monitor.

“Oh no. Not again.”

I quickly tab back into my HoN game, but it’s too late. My team is completely dead.

“Tempest what the hell, noob? Why didn’t you blink in?”

“My window minimized.”

“*&^S!”

Now it begins.

I feverishly try and play both games simultaneously, tabbing back and forth as best I can trying to help my team while not leaving my Magic opponent to linger too long. (I know what some of you are thinking, and yes I’m
that
jerk.) Very soon it becomes evident that playing both of these at a diminished capacity is going to ruin my chances at winning either of them. I have to make a choice. With a heavy heart, I let my HoN teammates know that I’ve hit my time limit and ask them to concede. After numerous epithets and slurs I won’t repeat here, they concur, and we concede the game.

“Ryan, why the hell did you let me do that? This is your fault you know.”

“God damnit.”

“Okay, new rule — no more playing the game.”

“You said that last time.”

“This time, I mean it!”

****

In rounds 3 and 4, I managed to infect my opponents quite handily. With good draws and a few timely Untamed Mights, I managed win my last two matches 4-0 in games. Like I said above, I learned a lot from this Sealed, and everything I wrote earlier highlights the lessons I’ve learned about this format. If I were to open this Sealed deck today, here’s what my build would look like:

2 Blade-Tribe Berserkers
Darkslick Drake
Golem Artisan
Oxidda Scrapmelter
Perilous Myr
2 Riddlesmith
2 Silver Myr
2 Sky-Eel School
Soliton
Spikeshot Elder
2 Vulshok Heartstoker
Vulshok Replica

Koth of the Hammer
Lux Cannon
Rusted Relic
Trigon of Corruption

9 Mountain
6 Island
2 Plains

Even though I said I dislike blue, I’m not sure I can pass it up in this pool as the other colors just aren’t as strong. You have very good uncommons to work with and a minor splash in white. I really like this deck and wish I’d built it the first time around as I’ve soured on infect.

Now, when I stare at my infect pile, I pick up all the cards and shuffle them quickly toward the sideboard. Don’t get me wrong — infect
can
work — I just think that you need about eight or nine infect creatures and at least one infect bomb to pull it off. I’ve done roughly about 15-20 Sealed Decks at this point, and I’ve never felt that my infect deck was doing anything more powerful than a well built metalcraft deck. I did get steamrolled once by a well constructed infect deck, and asked my opponent his thoughts on the archetype. He said that you need at least a Corpse Cur, since you have no real card advantage, and ideally, a couple of good equipment, with at least one or two ways to kill your opponent out of combat. That can be anything from Heavy Arbalest to Contagion Clasp to Throne of Geth. He also said to try and maximize your utility cards (like Panic Spellbomb, Skinrender, etc.) and to stick to two colors as much as you can.

***

The problem with infect is that, well, it’s infectious. From the moment we met, I was consumed by a bitter longing. At first, I wasn’t sure if it could work, and even if it could,
was I good enough?
My natural predilection was to wave it off as nothing more than a passing fancy. But I started to think. Then, I started to dream. My mind began racing at fantastical speed, conjuring up scenario after scenario where I was “living the dream” and everything fell perfectly into place. I tried, repeatedly, to get it to work — to no avail. The pieces just didn’t seem to fit. I started to force it, trying to change things —
trying to change myself
— but in the end…

The dream never came.

No matter how hard I tried, things just never worked out. Maybe the timing was bad, maybe all the pieces were never there; I could never quite grasp it. Sometime later, I would see someone else who met with better success, his jovial grin like a dagger in my heart. Furious, I’d probe inward —
why can’t that be me?
I’d question what went wrong; blame myself as I replay the events over and over again. Alone in the silence of my room, I’d curse myself for my own shortcomings. I still tried to foster my delusion, convincing myself that it could’ve worked if things had been different,
if only they’d been different.
Eventually, although molten in my own sullen isolation, I realized the truth—

We were never meant for each other.

***

Have a great week everyone, and thanks for reading!