Limited Resources: Innistrad Draft #9

Posted on December 16, 2011 by Limited Resources

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  3. uggh… R1 loss? now what am i going to do with my friday morning? always thought that with the number of games you play (and could possibly record), that you would just ship this recording back and do a new one.

    really wasn’t impressed with the UB grinding archetype w/o the solid removal package. and with a top cc of 5, would you have considered going down to 16 lands? maybe 9-7 in favor swamps?

  5. That stinks I am disappointed. It looked like a fun deck. It would have been cool to see more. I would chalk that one up to variance. However, there was a lot to learn from that game especially the ghoulraiser/altar’s reap play

  6. It’s always fascinating to see what happens with a “messy” draft like this, but it always feels muddled with two people talking through what’s going on. I’ll toss my vote in the pile of “no guests” for this reason.

  7. Hey Marshall,

    Not sure if that’s gchat or ichat in the background, but both have an option to shut off incoming dings.

  8. I was astonished that you guys talked about the possibility of taking spider spawning after you passed over a Mayor and an Elder without more than a quick comment about how bad it sucked you had to pass them. I think that first pick brimstone blinded you from having a good BUG deck, but that’s just me.

  9. I did love the ghoulcaller/altar’s reap play though, I’m going to be doing that one from now on.

  11. @jason – :( indeed

    @anonymous – imagine how I felt :)

    @dasMetzger – I am going to address your first point below. I agree about the lack of removal making it hard for the deck to really perform.

    @Nolander – I love having Kenji on too! That Ghoulraiser thing was my favorite :)

    @Tom – I agree, R1 exits suck. I subumitted this one becase I thought it still had some redeeming value.

    @Ethan – Thanks for the feedback, and duly noted.

    @Zonko – I will listen again, I am not sure what dings were coming in, but I have tried to curb it as much as possible.

    @Cloglord – It’s always hard to move off of a strong first pick, but I noted in the video very early on that we weren’t committed to red by going that route. It’s hard to balance the view in hindsight afer opening the Mayor and Elder, but you may be right anyway. Would you have that opinion had we opened on color bombs? The ghoulraiser play is the best :)

    @shdwcat For sure, free shocks seems good!

  12. Hey guys,

    I wanted to put a note here about the process in the background for these videos.

    My number one concern with my videos is their overall quality. How much do you learn? How well is the information presented? Do you enjoy watching them? These are the questions I am trying to nail down the best I can.

    Another goal I have however is being forthright with my videos. I am not a professional Magic player, and I have a lot to learn about the game still. I work hard to improve and the videos help me do this as well as you. What this means is that I want to show mistakes. Last weeks video showed me trying out a new archetype and new cards for the first time, and I made some mistakes. This is normal for me and I want to show that to my viewers.

    Along these same lines, there are the first round exits. I have plenty of these, and I think everyone does. It always worries me when I see draft videos from pros where they win virtually every one. I know for a fact that they are experiencing plenty of frustrating R1 losses just like all of us. These are part of Magic and any game where variance is a factor.

    But I am doing videos for this site, and the expectation is that the videos provide a certain amount of quality content for you the viewer. That means that generally a R1 exit isn’t worth putting up simply because there isn’t much material to work with. I have been pretty lucky for the most part, in that when I sit down to record a video I almost never R1 bust. I think this is mostly just coincidental luck, but also might have to do with the fact that I talk out my plays on the video and try to be more cognizant of my play in general.

    That didn’t happen this week however. On Sunday I did 2 video attempts, both R1 losses. On Monday I did 2 more, both R1 losses. On Tuesday I got home from a poker game, and tried again. R1 loss. None of these losses were particularly notable, I was either just running bad or my opponent was running well or I drafted a crappy deck or whatever. So Wednesday rolls around and I don’t have anything to submit. I decided to mix it up and include Kenji. Sometimes a fresh perspective can help. We did 2 videos together, both R1 losses.

    If you are counting, that is 7 R1 losses in a row. A personal best!

    The reason I decided to submit one of these was 2-fold: 1. I needed to because I was out of time. 2. I wanted to show that these bust-outs happen.

    If you are of similar skill level to your fellow 8-4 competitors, you will win on average 1/8 of the 8-4s you enter. Usually you will have a finals appearance in there as well. So not winning an 8-4 in 7 drafts isn’t that far out of the realm of thinking. I think that my skill level is a bit higher (although not a ton) than the average 8-4 player on MTGO, and I have seen better results than winning 1/8 over the long term. But these variance streaks still get you. I have gone back and watched some of the videos and while I found a few things I may have done differently, I didn’t find anything egregious.

    The reason I am bringing all of this up is to let you know that it’s normal. It’s normal to lose in R1 of an 8-4 sometimes. It’s normal to not win every draft you enter. And it’s normal to have pretty long streaks of losing as well. Anybody that puts any type of volume in on MTGO will be able to attest to this.

    The key is that you don’t let it shake you. You continue to review your matches and your drafts. You continue to do the things that work for you. You keep watching other people’s videos to get better.

    I also wanted to thank you guys for watching and commenting and supporting me and the show, it’s never overlooked and always appreciated :)

    - Marshall

  13. The trick works well with Fiend Hunter too- put the exile effect on the sac them sac fiend with something (reap or anything really) then the creature is perm exiled

  14. Although I just answered with a :(, I do want to say that I enjoy your videos immensely. It would have been nice if you have some stashed videos of standard just in case your draft busts out. I learned a lot here with my own personal critiques of this draft as it was being put together. And then there was the altar’s reap – ghoulraiser combo, which just blew my mind. This archetype was interesting, and I have lost so many games to spectral flight that I thought it would be solid… but like you say, not every draft turns out a winner.

    The biggest lesson I learned though: If Kenji leads you down the rabbit hole, there is no coming back.

    Without fail, I will be back Thursday at midnight for the next LR draft video. Thanks Marshall!

  15. Hi again marshall (I was the Anon from the second post). Don’t get me wrong, the vids are always great. Maybe if you have multiple R1 busts like this you can post two of them or something? I just love me some LR draft vids!

    Keep up the Good work!

  16. @kaos – Good call, haven’t had that one yet, but when the guy just has to die… :)

    @jason – Thanks for the comment, I am still grinning from the Ghoulraiser/Reap combo :D I tend to follow Kenji down his rabbit holes ahah, good or bad! Thanks for watching!

    @jon – Man, that is a really good idea. 2 R1 bustouts. I kind of wish I would have thought of that. Some people really just enjoy the draft portion anyway, and you would get 2 of those. If this unfortunate streak happens again I’ll keep that in mind, thanks for the suggestion. And thanks for watching the vids too!

  17. Thanks for having the nerve to post a R1 loss video, Marshall… and for your follow-up post above. But that said, let’s hope you 3-0 the next one, just to break the streak!

  18. Marshall, your videos kick ass and I’m always excited to see them come out each Friday.

    Don’t stress the R1 losses. If you never had R1 losses it wouldn’t be as exciting to watch because we’d always know that you’d make it to the second round!

  19. Definitely think Mayor is enough of a bomb that you can move in on green in pack 2, if it were pack 3 probably not. I have had to scoop to mayor by himself on more than one occasion.

  20. Sorry to hear about your bad streaks Marshall, I love you videos en especially your podcast with John <3

    I think the reason for this particular loss was maybe you being in the wrong colors or something. It's hard to point out where it went wrong while drafting but you did see some weird stuff coming by like the really late travel prep. Overall the deck you did end up with looked pretty weak.

  21. Kenji and Marshall FTW. Marshall, if Kenji wasn’t there to talk you out of it, you would have played G/W. And although you might have won, your video wouldn’t have been nearly as enjoyable.

    I mean the look on your face must have been priceless when Kenji showed you the trick with Ghoulraiser and Alters Reap. You must have needed a new set of pants.

    Oh and to other people out there that play constructed, that trick also works with 2 heartless summoning and 1 Corpse Cur, meaning it automatically bounces back to your hand for free infinitely.

  22. I once had the Ghoulraiser + Stitcher’s Apprentice combo…. I guess 5 mana, T for a 2/2 is fine, but I still didn’t feel like I was breaking the game or anything.

  23. yeah, I have no problem with you putting up Rd 1 losses. It shows that you don’t just pick videos that make you look good, and there was a lot to learn about color commitments from this particular draft portion. If you think they don’t provide enough content, then I think uploading it with another draft will make everyone happy!

  24. Drafts like these are interesting and I’ve seen lots of players go through this. In this draft, it felt like a slow reveal of a train wreck that the colours you should have been in were constantly taunting you, but because of how much you passed and the fact that the cards weren’t such crazy bombs as to make them impossible to resist, you keep going and keep seeing how you should have jumped ship but it’s too late.

    I really enjoy the videos with Mr Nummy. =) Keep up the good work, Marshall!

  25. I have a request for next video – your deck has to run Cellar Door. I’ve never seen it used and it should prove amusing.

  26. Late pack 1, when grizzled outcasts was the best card out, if you had taken that, you would have had a fantastic deck (next 2 picks had even better green). Potential lesson? Maybe in pack 1, it’s best to take the best card, since you shouldn’t feel locked into colors at that point.

    Your deck looked rather poor to me, and I was not surprised to see it 0-1. You had nothing close to a bomb, but you were passing them. About the only thing that would have saved it would have been taking stalker p1p1 and going all in on putting equipment and spectrals on the 2 you would get. You’d want unburial rites too, of course, since getting a stalker down and keeping it down is your whole deck. But I can understand not doing that whole plan p1p1. I’ve never done it myself.

    I would have taken the outcasts though, and ended up with a verrrrry sweet deck with the ensuing shift into green. I understand that some people like the snake, but they are so easy to pick up. Take the better card there, pack 1.

  27. @Marshall, jon

    that’s exactly what i thought when i was reading marshalls first comment on this page, telling how many recordings he did. why dont u upload just everything u record? if u dont like to post it in ur mtgoacademy section, at least upload it on youtube or sth so the rly addicted guys (like me) can watch it?

  28. 1st round bust or no, LR is always at its best with two people. Marshall is just an excellent facilitator/host. Most two person vids are bad ranging to awful, but a return to the two man LR format is always a treat!

  29. @daniel Ya, I don’t either but we do have a standard of quality and quantity to uphold here. I think it’s a valuable learning tool though and next time I am in this position I will probably just upload 2 of them

    @MMoggg Thanks for the feedback, and yes Kenji is and will be a regular fixture on my draft videos!

    @JFA Unlikely! I really can’t stand that card. It’s closer to playable than some other cards in the set and it’s not outside the realm of possibility to make a deck that wants it. But man, for how much you pay, it’s so not worth it generally.

    @James I think you are straddling the fine line of being ROTTY here good sir. I mean sure, had we taken the Outcasts (which may have been the best card in the pack, but are pretty mediocre in any case) we may have strayed into a better deck. But would you be saying that if we opened Bloodline Keeper instead of Mayor? It’s a valid question that can be hard to answer, but I don’t regret the pick given the information we had at the time of the decision. I agree with your point about sometimes just taking the best card early on, but I usually only do that when the card is actively good. The Outcasts didn’t do that for me.

    @rob2k Ya, it seems pretty obvious in hindsight :) The reason I don’t just upload everything I record is because there is quite a bit of work that goes into the videos both on my end and on the fine folks of MTGOAcademy, so I can’t just throw everything at them. But picking out 2 of the drafts with their respective R1s would have been good. I’ll do it next time :) (hopefully there isn’t a next time!)

    @Robin It has been really intersting to see the varying opinions on solo vs 2 person drafts. From the feedback I have gotten, it’s split pretty evenly between the 2. Some people really like the “2 heads are better than 1″ angle, but others prefer just me talking because it is more concise. I think I will probably just continue to do it this way, having guests on but usually flying solo. Also of note here, setting up and scheduling a guest can be complicated so solo makes more sense as the default.

  30. Heh, even Conley Woods won’t use the card so likely its pretty bad, but still, if you get the chance it would be pretty amusing.

    How is Ryan going at Wizards btw?

  31. I remember about a year ago i complained that there was never a video with a First Round Loss; i got a LOT of comment on that, from people calling me a troll to people accusing me of calling you a cheater. I’m glad you showed this video and the streak explanation, that might not help improve our game but it does improve our mind.
    And I support the 2-drafts-idea when getting a R1 loss :) , still enjoy the draft a bit more then the play.

  32. @JFA – Ryan is doing great at WotC! Check out the latest Limited Resources, we have him on as a guest :D

    @knx – Ha, thanks. I am going to use that suggestion in the future for sure.

  33. I must say, when watching you passing the Mayor, i felt you would have picked it because that’s the thing you usually do… but your wingman changed your mind, and as a result (to make a big jump) you didn’t get the best deck and lost… do you agree with that ?

  34. knx: cool, i remember that thread and threw my words in, good going !

    Marshall: are retro drafts no longer an option you consider ?