Game(s) Played:
River Dragons
Airlines Europe
Smash Up
For Sale
Before I jump into the session report proper, I thought I’d do a mini-report on my first try at drafting in Magic: The Gathering with my brother. I’ve been on the Magic scene since 4th Edition came out and played casually until Urza’s Saga, after which the distaste at losing continuously to my friends’ really expensive decks made me sell most of my good stuff and bequeath my entire collection to my younger brother. Having read up on drafts and cube formats recently, I got my brother to dig up the dusty old box and we played a round of Winchester Drafting using cards from the Urza’s Saga set (my biggest set by far).
Apparently the most cheating set to date
For those not in the know, drafting is basically the mechanic used in games like 7 Wonders & Seasons where Players get to choose the cards that will eventually make up their deck/hand & choices are usually determined between taking a card that is good for you or denying a card that is good for your opponent.
The Winchester Draft (for 2 Players only) works by dividing 84 cards (or 6 booster packs) into 2 piles (1 for each Player) and then opening 2 cards from each pile to create 4 draw piles. Each Player chooses 1 of the 4 draw piles and draws all the cards there into his card pool. Once each Player has done so, another 2 cards are opened to replenish / add on to the previous 4 draw piles and this goes on until there are no cards left. Players then build their deck from the card pool they have, add lands as they see fit and play a couple of rounds with all the remaining cards as sideboard after the first round.
Drafting was really fun for us because it changes the focus of deck building from "it’s good, let’s have 4 copies of it" to "what you have got" and is basically a test of, dare-I-say-it, a Player’s "true" deck building skills as well as playing skills. I know my cards pretty much inside and out and knew that I had better green & black cards in my set since my constructed decks were mostly in that colour way back when. I also knew I had surprisingly good blue cards which I couldn’t trade away because not many people I knew played blue then. White & red, mostly meh.
Serra Zealot was probably my best white card
So I started out the draft aiming for green creatures, black removal & blue/red sorceries & instants. Mo on the other hand, went for white, green & blue. I got lucky by snagging 2 Sanguine Guards early in the game (Mo had trouble remembering the good cards) and 2 Vampiric Embraces to hopefully give me 2/2 Flying First Strike creatures that grow and can regenerate. I was soon to meet my nemesis and a card I never thought was good in the form of Sanctum Custodian, Tap to prevent 2 damage to Player / Creature. Man was that Cleric annoying, like a permanent Protection From Everything +2 that I couldn’t seem to get rid of. I’d attack, the Cleric would prevent the damage and then swing on the counter. If anything, this taught me to never underestimate commons, especially from the Urza’s Saga set.
Sanctum Custodian = Must Remove!
I don’t really remember the score but I think I went 1-0 then lost in first to 3 and first to 5, Mo can confirm it in a comment at the bottom. But man was it fun, every card was dangerous and had potential, not just the Yawgmoth’s Wills & Serra Avatars. Take for instance Game 5 when I was sure I was going to win 1 turn before my opponent could get me for lethal, I should have guessed Mo’s nonchalance at the fact when he produced a Symbiosis out of nowhere to swing for lethal 1 turn early. I lost but it still felt good because (1) it was a bloody good engineered turn-around and (2) I really should have not ignored the most important aspect of Magic , the study of human nature.
I’m really tempted to buy boosters to just draft again as I’m aware that my collection is skewed towards certain colours and have even thought about finally doing what I couldn’t do all those years ago, which is buy a booster box because it didn’t make economic sense. Now though, I’d be able to draft with it *cue maniacal laughter*. I’ll just have to see how good the Theros previews are…
Giant Elvish Archer
Okay let’s move on to another announcement.
It has been tough to get any boardgaming time lately, mainly because of lack of any real organization/commitment on my part. A lot of my sessions were mostly impromptu and with people who are increasingly busy socially on top of Padawan Minigeek still needing her naps, feeds & play time. Feeling somewhat depressed about the whole deal, I decided to establish a dedicated time once a month to play boardgames in a neutral area (not my house) and organize it with two other dedicated hosts who can also supply Players & boardgames. At first, I wasn’t sure how it was going to turn out since none of our invited Players could come (which I wouldn’t have minded since the three of us could just play a few games) but apparently word of mouth got around the church and we ended up having a "modest" turn out of about 15 people.
Gideon started the first table by teaching & playing River Dragons, a game of "uncooperative", "take that" and "fastest to the prize" gameplay that can ruin friendships or inadvertently let on that you have a crush on another Player. I’ve personally never played River Dragons simply because I’d prefer my "take that" games to have a global rather than personal effect due to the evil dictator personality in me.
Not sure if I’m right but it sounds like it took a long time to teach Smash Up which is a bit surprising
Gideon had Zombie Bears! That would be scary
I on the other hand, started the Airlines Europe table with max Players. I made two mistakes teaching this game, (1) I forgot to give everybody a starting hand of cards and the game was longer than usual (2) I should teach with a few example rounds, somehow everyone understands how the game is meant to be played only AFTER the first scoring round is done. Still it was just as enjoyable to teach and mediate the game, besides I had my sights set solely on Smash Up anyways.
Shameless product placement
Toilet break time
Towards the end with not much expansion space left
Once the River Dragons group had ended, I taught & played For Sale whilst running the Airlines Europe table at the same time. As usual For Sale is an instant hit for those looking for something rules-light and gameplay-quick at the same time. I ended up giving up my place to another Player so that I could join the next round of Smash Up but there were a handful of good comments about For Sale that I think I’ll probably bring it again the next time.
The space station cometh!
It is always fun when someone runs out of bidding coins early in the bidding round
I finally had a chance to sit down and play Smash Up which somehow ended up being a game between the three organizers. I’d mostly read the rules so we could jump right in. I was originally going for Robotic Ninjas (so cool!) but Gideon beat me to it to have Steampunk Ninjas and I had to settle for Robotic Dinos (Go Dinobots!) whilst Jimmy went for weird with Leprechaun Aliens.
In a nutshell, Smash Up is about using various factions such as those mentioned above which are represented by individuals (T-Rex, Raptors, Triceratops etc.) in the form of cards and using these individuals to take over the WORLD (okay, they’re called bases in the game) to get points. The first Player to a certain number of Points is declared the winner. The game’s selling point is the convoluted interactions you get from the unique effects of playing each individual from the various factions and on top of that you get to mix TWO factions to create really cool factions like the Dinobots (Robots + Dinosaurs), Clan Ghost Bear for the Mechwarrior fans (Ghosts + Bears) or even weird ones like Zombie Tricksters (Michael Jackson’s Thriller anyone?).
The bases also have their own unique effects and may not necessarily reward the Player with the most power at the base when it is conquered, as the points distribution may sometimes be skewed to the second or third Player getting more points when a base is scored. This neat design ensures that tricky factions like the Magicians, Tricksters & Ninjas with special effects are essential to turning the course of the game. I found my Robots to be really cool as their ability to place a group of them and getting group strength bonuses really outweighed the fact that they were individually weak which was more than compensated by my mighty dinosaurs.
Jimmy was locking up the board with his Leprechauny traps but he inadvertently gave me the win when he swapped one of the bases (that’s a pretty powerful effect) such that I was the only one who scored. Gideon’s assassinating & blocking Steampunk Ninjas tried to stop me but in the end it was just not enough alone as my Dinobots powered into the win. Roar!
If I mangled you then you got off light! Roar!
As the pilot episode was such a success, the host of organizers have agreed to run the series for a season. Look forward to the upcoming episodes!
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