Baneslayer

Pioneer* Obial

SCORE: 43 | 27 COMMENTS | 10133 VIEWS | IN 13 FOLDERS

Standard Showdown —June 9, 2018

Deck record: 33W, 8L, 3T

A miss-play in game three of round four proved fatal for me today.

We played a causal Standard Showdown with nine players, four rounds, and prizes to top four after standings (no top four today). Round one was against a mono-red aggro and I got there in two games thanks to angels and lifelink. Round two was against a mono-white knights/aura's deck which went a very long two rounds with some pretty janky stuff in that second game as he kept pumping up his creatures and eventually had Blackblade Reforged on Lyra Dawnbringer with 8 mana on the board. A very luck top-deck draw of Seal Away proved crucial and eventually won me the game. Match three was against a home-brew W/B control deck that beat me in game one, and lost the next two games: nothing crazy there, really.

Match four was against an aggro W/R deck with the typical red burn and haste creatures with an addition of Path of Mettle  ^Flip for additional burn later in the game, it was very well balanced. Game one had me mull down to 6 with a starting hand of one forest, a sunpetal grove, a Llanowar, Steelleaf, Branchwalker, and Rhonas (Shalai on top after Scry): basically the ideal aggro hand I could ask for, but he was on the play. He burned my Llanowar so the turn two Steelleaf was gone and the branchwalker revealed another branchwalker. I missed 2x land drops and by then it was over. Game two went better since I tried to slow things down and got there as I sealled away most of his hitters and finished strong with a Ghalta. Game three had my life total down to 2 with 5x mana and Shalai on the board and Lyra and a blossoming defense in my hand ... but only one white source on the borad. Top-decked a sunpetal grove and cast Lyra, and here's where the misplay happened: he had three creatures on the board (wimpy ones) and I thought I could just sit there with Shalai as protection, block with lifelink and ride it out and instead I should have attacked for that immediate life-gain because next turn he cast his Path of Mettle, attacked to flip it, but before damage dealt a lethal 2x to me with it's flipped ability (to EACH opponent, not target ... which is what I thought it said). So that mis-play cost me the game tonight and I ended up getting second place overall.

I'm pleased with the changes. I think History of Benalia was slowing me down. The additional protection, removal, and branchwalker seems worth it, but has made side-boarding a little more difficult since I was a little at a loss when trying to decide what to take out ... not a huge deal, just need to be more familiar with the meta to know my opponents decks.