Dies to Removal

I think you'd be surprised how many others here have done that or more. Build character I guess

Besides, 12 hours is a long time for find time to sneak off with the hotties...just sayin'

Opened a hammer, got a boon satyr in my 1 prize pack(lost to my buddy round 2, misplayed my way out of round 4 at 5 in the morning).

My teams pulls:

foil xenagos, xenagos, xenagos, xenagos, stormbreath dragon, stormbreath dragon, temple of silence, temple of abandon, hammer, whip, polis crusher, reaper of the wild, thoughtsezie.

We're getting pretty prepared for standard.

@JS: Talking about reading japanese? all i can read is the typeline insutanto!

Khaos, for your problem, set the magnification on the website to around 70% and you will be able to hit the button. I had the same problem.

I'm kinda sad I missed prerelease, but I think I'm gonna hit it up on MODO. Or maybe I'll just beat Khaos over and over to make myself feel better.

Warning: long post

Thoughts on the Prerelease

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*Heroic is ghastly in limited. Anax and Cymede plus Phalanx Leaderwas just gross combined with Dauntless Onslaught I had that used against me, and it hurt a lot. Anax is quite powerful. Watch out for Tormented Hero. Turn one Hero plus [card]Titan's Strength[/card] hits for 6 with his trigger. Heroic could mean that board wipes aren't nearly as effective when a single guy can hit like that.

*Whip of Erebos is a destroy-on-sight target. Giving the entire team lifelink is just nasty, especially
with a monstrous Hundred-handed One or a bunch of flying tokens thanks to an Abhorrent Overlord.

*The amount of removal in this is not very high. Use it sparingly unless you open a lot. I had Lightning Strike, Magma Jet, and 3 Sip of Hemlock. They worked when I had them, which was rarely enough.

*Ember Swallower was nuts. Pulling the trigger on its monstrosity usually meant death for the opponent. It was very difficult to kill because of its big butt. I'm hoping it makes an impact in constructed because it's a lot of fun to drop something that big in red.

*Coordinated Assault is an excellent little card. Allowed a lot of my guys to survive, especially against deathtouch, which is everywhere.

*[
card]Two-headed Cerberus[/card] did a surprising amount of work, especially with Assault.

*Fanatic of Mogis was very powerful. I crafted a minotaur deck focused around Deathbellow Raider, Minotaur Skullcleaver, Rageblood Shaman, Borderland Minotaur, and Kragma Warcaller. I got to cast those on that curve one game and just stomped my hapless opponent. I find it strange, and a little disappointing, that the Borderland Minotaur has the best stats when not in combat. Minotaurs need their lords; otherwise, they're overcosted and underpowered on their own, except for Reckoner, of course. Deathbellow may be a card to consider because of its 3 toughness, which was relevant in a lot of matches even with the must-attack clause.

*The Ordeals can grow things very quickly, especially with other Heroic triggers.
The 10 life from Ordeal of Heliod was not insignificant. Neither were the counters.

*Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx was very useful. Getting 7 mana from 5 lands was very nice. It's a powerful ramp effect that should not be overlooked.

Overall, my impression of the set matched my initial thoughts. It's a set with a lot of interactions, and it can reward skill-intensive plays built around powerful synergies. The interesting catch is that those synergies do need some time to set up, so the amount of good removal currently in Standard could suppress that for a while. The two-target heroic enablers like Coordinated Assault and Dauntless Onslaught were very good.

Despite a fairly good deck that hit hard, I went 2-4. The last two rounds I lost to mana problems. For three games, I put down almost 9 mana each game. Drawing land after land and no creatures or removal killed me in several matches, even with a Hammer on
the field. When I needed an answer, I got land. More than one match came down to if I drew anything but a land I would have won, so I drew land. I hardly ever saw any of my removal. I cast Lightning Strike and Magma Jet twice during the night. I understand variance happens, but it's still frustrating as hell when it happens that frequently.

As for the cards, I pulled nothing exceptional other than the Shrine and a Collosus of Akros. I did get a foil Gift of Immortality, which is quite striking with the foil effect. I pulled cards that I had already ordered playsets for, so it was kinda nice to play with them before I got them, but I spent less for over 40 cards than I did for the Prerelease, so that was disappointing. I felt like I was playing a shitty version of the Standard deck I want to construct.

I did not like how the store handled the release. Rather than set aside the colors people wanted, they started and then gave people their
choice of color based on the order that they paid for the release. That was stupid. The whole point of paying early is to guarantee the color choice. And they called out player's names for the matches instead of printing them on a sheet and labeling the seats. That added an unnecessary amount of time to wait.

tl;dr Set is fun and filled with powerful interactions. I complained a lot about variance and got a lot of cards I had already ordered.

I only remember having 2 monstrosity cards in my deck, (M)Ember Swallower and Hundred-Handed One. Both were pretty good. I agree with you on the (M)Ember Swallower, if that monstrosity got activated, I was usually able to win soon after. Dropping them down to 3 or 4 lands is pretty brutal when there's so much expensive stuff. The handed dude was better than I thought too. Once he's monstrous, you can keep swinging in and not leave your defenses open.

Is there a way to sell all craps at once? I have around 100 commons/uncommons/rares I'd want to sell - but every bulk cards sale lasts for 5 mins and I'm selling 5 cards and it just gets boring.

also pre re in an hour. fuck yeah