Friday Night Magic · 6:29pm Nov 23rd, 2019
So yesterday I went back to Friday Night Magic after several years away, at Dark Sphere in Waterloo, which has not changed at all (it's still this sort of half-gaming store, half-warehouse that lives underneath a railway line). And this time, I took my younger brother, who, aside from one practice game, had never played Magic (but is familiar with the conventions of collectible card games).
The evening started off a little tense, as I had completely forgotten that you have to register yourself and get a PCI number in order to play FNM. (I'd gotten mine years ago so I was still on their records). Thus my brother had to quickly register online with like 2 minutes to go before the draft started. He almost decided to sit out the evening, but I convinced him to go for it, so fortunately we eventually got in and into the draft proper, each with three booster packs for the latest MtG set, Throne of Eldraine.
I had chosen to avoid reading anything about the set in order to go in as fresh as possible, but once the cards were opened, I realized it was a fairytale-themed set and I think I did remember FoME or others discussing it at some point. As themes go, it isn't my favorite - I prefer sets that are more grounded in reality like that one where you can summon an island-sized megaturtle - but it has some stuff I like in it like faeries and griffins and treefolk so that's cool.
As the draft began, I took my first Rare - Folio of Fancies - and started trying to formulate some strategy. I've never really been good at understanding the strategy of Magic - I don't have that ability to look at a card and intrinsically know its usefulness in X different game situations or how it would synergize with other cards. Nonetheless, I tried my best to make good, sensible decisions in the draft and not just grab every shiny thing that I saw.
I settled early on for either blue or white as my colors and made those my focus. I decided to invest more into enchantments after seeing several creatures that are boosted by having them on the field - and with Fortifying Provisions available to me, that played nicely into my style of just sitting there and prolonging the inevitable.
My eventual deck was this:
Lands (18)
9 x Plains
8 x Island
1 x Mystic Sanctuary
Creatures (12)
1 x Charming Prince
1 x Corridor Monitor
1 x Fluttershy Flutterfox
1 x Hypnotic Sprite
1 x Silverflame Squire
1 x Wishful Merfolk
1 x Youthful Knight
1 x Shinechaser
1 x Arcanist's Owl
1 x Resolute Rider
1 x Signpost Scarecrow
1 x Prophet of the Peak
Enchantments (6)
1 x Deafening Silence
2 x So Tiny
3 x Fortifying Provisions
Others (4)
1 x Mantle of Tides
1 x Opt
1 x Mystical Dispute
1 x Weapon Rack
Deafening Silence, I found, was a bad choice; it seemed like a good idea at the time, but I failed to realize that it would generally be worse for me more than it would for my opponent. I planned to bolster my creatures with Fortifying Provisions so that they'd be able to sit there blocking threats for me, while I had some surprise buffs and counters held back in case the opponent tried anything. In such a scenario, Shinechaser (maybe my favorite card that I got, although Arcanist's Owl is very pretty) could be doing steady damage for me while still blocking threats. I also had a couple of scrying options to shift the draw in my favor.
First round, I got flattened. ^^ The opponent was experienced and moved quite quickly, making it difficult for me to keep up having just gotten back into the game. He did help me out at least by answering noob questions like how blocking works and what this new "Adventure" mechanic is. So that put me a better position for my second opponent, which was a much better game for me - I still lost, but I was able to give my opponent some real trouble. It seemed like my deck could run quite efficiently on low mana - I was sitting at 4 mana for ages and steadily hitting him with flyers, while he kept building up a huge mana supply that he didn't seem to have anything to use on. I countered his creatures a few times and actually managed to get him all the way down to 4 health before he was able to blast my creatures out of the way and turn things around. Second game, I again managed to keep him at bay for so long that the game timed out to a draw. (I also managed to take out that bloody terrifying serpent a couple of times with some magical tricks, which was satisfying.
Third game... there wasn't. I got the bye. (In hindsight, I'm glad I know what a "bye" is in a tournament contest, otherwise I would have thought they were giving me a rather brusque farewell). This meant, however, that I was able to sit down and watch my brother's last game. I got quite engaged in helping him with some newbie difficulties, until I remembered that this is actually a tournament and I'm not supposed to be interfering - and it turned out that the opponent had been too polite to tell me to shut up. :) So I just spectated the remaining rounds.
I didn't win a single game in the night, naturally. My brother won one at least, and he said that the night was much more enjoyable than he'd expected - he had a great time chatting with other players and getting to know them, cause he's good at that kind of thing.
The guy whose match I'd accidentally interfered in turned out to be pretty cool too; he let us play a game of Commander with some horrifyingly powerful decks he'd put together, full of bizarre rare cards that I'd never seen before which made me feel way out of my league. We didn't get too far into that before the venue kicked us out though. However, he was kind enough to give my brother a whole bunch of cards that he didn't want - this is something that I think experienced players do quite often for newbies, since they are only interested in specific rare cards and already have masses of commons, and they know that newbies love getting new cards. (I remember getting a bunch of my cards that way when I first started too).
He also pointed us to a nearby pub where the Magic players typically congregate after games, so my brother and I finished up the night in there, discussing our haul and the various battle shenanigans of the night. All in all, a fun evening. :)
The scope of this new set felt somehow "smaller" than previous sets - fewer creatures, smaller numbers, less crazy mechanics - I'm not sure if that's actually true or if that's just how I'm perceiving it after several years of game experience since the last time I played. But I kind of liked that, actually, it made the game feel easier to grasp after spending such a long time away.
Sounds like y'all had a great time!