This past weekend I attended the Scars of Mirrodin prerelease, as I'm sure a lot of you did. In my earlier years, I attended every prerelease religiously, but these days I only manage to make it to every other one. Still, it's always a fun time, and this weekend was no exception. I happened to be exceptionally not-busy, so I even managed to attend both days of prerelease fun.

On Saturday, I opened what I think was a pretty good sealed. Most of my rares were Artifacts, and good ones. I also opened a Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon, and even had a bunch (about 10) of Infect creatures to go along with him. I build a mono-black deck that was about 50% Artifacts 50% Black, and easily poisoned my first three opponents to death. My final opponent was playing a Poison-based deck as well, but his was BG with Putrefax, multiple Plague Stringer's, and multiple Untamed Might's. Those last two cards work particularly well together, and he used them to win the poison race by 1 turn in two very fast games.

3-1 was good enough to get me some packs, and I even finished in time to sign up for the 2HG event. 2HG is one of my favorite formats. I really just like everything about it, from choosing color pairings, to exploiting cleverly worded cards. If you've never played Luminarch Ascension in a game of 2HG, you're missing out – yeah, it works that way. Anyway, Matt Ferrando and I ended up building a GB Infect deck, and a UR Control deck. We poisoned our first opponent out so fast that we actually had time to get food, which is not a common luxury in a 2HG tournament. In the 2^nd round, Matt kept a very solid 2-lander, with a Spellbomb and a Steady Progress, but he never saw his 3^rd land. Even with Matt unable to cast the majority of his spells, we made a pretty good game of it, and I'm confident we would have won if he had drawn lands. Round 3 was a repeat of Round 1, a quick, poison-fueled victory.

After all that, I did a team draft where I drafted a UR deck based on Charge counters and Proliferate. I had Inexorable Tide, Contagion Clasp, and lots of Trigons and Tumble Magnets. The deck seemed decent, and I won my first Round, only to find that my team was already down 1-6 (counting my win), and we lost our 7^th match shortly thereafter. My opponent first opponent in this draft was playing a BW Metalcraft deck with a ton of bombs, but I don't think he had enough support for his high-curve deck.

On Sunday, I entered another prerelease flight. I went 3-1 again, losing to Nick Spagnolo after mulligans and mana-screw, although what I saw of his deck made me think that I probably would have lost a fair fight too. In this sealed I didn't open nearly enough Infect creatures for that to be a viable strategy, nor did I open enough Metalcraft cards for that to seem good. So, with both of those options out, I decided to try to build the most controlling deck possible, and play as many of my bombs as I could. It ended up being pretty solid, and 5 of my 6 wins were on the back of using Venser's ultimate, in one game I even used it twice!

I joined a draft after that and easily went 3-0 (6-0 in games) with a GB Infect deck featuring a whopping 17 creatures with Infect, and 2 Untamed Might's to go with my 4 Plague Stingers. Being the only person drafting Infect at the table may have been an unrealistic situation, but I think it was actually a very good learning experience. I found that the 4-drop slot is incredibly crowded. I initially thought that Tel-Jilad Fallen would turn out to be one of the best commons in the set, but I found myself picking Ichorclaw Myr and Plague Stinger over him, to ensure that I would hit my 2-drop Infect creature consistently, and because I had no shortage of 4-casting cost cards, between Corpse Cur, Blackcleave Goblin, Instill Infection, Carrion Call, Tangle Angler, Tel-Jilad Fallen, Trigon of Infestation, and Slice in Twain, GB Infect has alotof very playable 4-drops.

Nick Spagnolo was also in my draft, and he built a pretty good looking BW deck that was mostly Artifacts. He played multiple Golem Foundry's and Throne of Geth to go with them. Black and White were really just there for removal, and to pay the activation cost of his 4 Moriok Replica's. It seemed to work out alright for him, although he punted in the 2^nd round by not reading Indomitable Archangel, so I didn't get to face him in the finals. He was raving about his deck after that draft and seemed to think that heavy artifacts splashing for some removal was a very solid strategy. He seemed particularly happy with Golem Foundry, which is a card that I have to say I thought was garbage.

I beat a RG, RW, and RW deck during the draft. All of them had some Metalcraft going on, but none of them could really keep up with me.

At the moment I think Infect is the strongest archetype in draft, but that obviously changes depending what everyone else thinks. Infect does not play well with non-Infect, and I think you can end up in big trouble if you commit to Infect early and end up fighting over it with your neighbor(s). Metalcraft seems like another solid choice, but there is some tension in that strategy as well. Curving out Green/White Metaldraft creatures isn't actually good, because you weren't playing Artifacts during that time. That said, I think that the Metalcraft creatures which are also Artifacts should be picked over non-Artifact Metalcrafters, if you are persuing that archetype. White seems like the best color to be Metalcrafting with, because of it's efficient creatures, great removal (Revoke Existence, Arrest), and synergy with Equipment in Sunspear Shikari.

Standard

In terms of Standard, I've done a decent amount of testing. I don't really have concrete lists yet, but I have had a chance to formulate some theories about the format. U/W Control seems like the default "best deck". It gains Sunblast Angel, Venser, Trinket Mage (and with it, Nihil Spellbomb), and potentially even Volition Reins. It's a powerful and consistent strategy that can easily overtake any opponent who stumbles at all. People used to talk about Control decks not being able to take advantage of opponents with awkward draws, but I think that is not the case anymore, with most Control decks packing a healthy number of Planeswalkers. Speaking of Planeswalkers, they all get significantly better without Bloodbraid Elf, Maelstrom Pulse, Oblivion Ring, and Pithing Needle in the format, so dropping a Planeswalker early in the game is probably a better play now than it has ever been before.

Moving on from UW, I think the top strategies are RDW, Fauna Shaman + Vengevine + Eldrazi Monument. General wisdom about Block Constructed was that RDW was advantaged against anything except UW Control, but with the printing of Koth, that match-up has to have gotten better. It really seems like RDW is going to be a tier 1 deck in the new Standard format, so I would definitely be watching out for it and actively planning against it.

Fauna Shaman decks are next up, and while being weak to RDW, this strategy seems incredibly powerful against most other decks. Vengevine may not have Bloodbraid Elf around anymore, but if you splash Blue, Trinket Mage can team up with Memnite to do a great impression. Plus, not playing Bloodbraid Elf means you can play other good spells, like Mana Leak. If Blue isn't your thing, then you can run White for Squadron Hawk, which not only has synergy with Vengevine, but also Fauna Shaman, Eldrazi Monument, Garruk Wildspeaker, and Ajani Goldmane, to name a few cards that might be in this deck as well. Eldrazi Monument was arguably the best card in Zendikar Block Constructed, and having played a fair amount with it in the new Standard format, I can say that it's still apowerhouse.

Finally, I think there are a few Fauna Shaman targets that people are overlooking, and those are Tajuru Preserver and the new Bellowing Tanglewurm. All is Dust is a very powerful card that is sure to show up in Eldrazi ramp decks. The great thing about the Preserver is that decks playing All is Dust generally don't have a good way to remove him, and if you have an activate Fauna Shaman, and they can't use their All is Dust to reset, the game is probably going to be pretty well for you. Bellowing Tanglewurm is a card that I didn't even see on the spoilers the first time I read through them. It wasn't until I opened him in sealed that I realized he even existed. I think he will play an important role in Fauna Shaman decks in the coming months, allowing Vengevines to get around Wall of Omens, and Sea Gate Oracles, when a UW player might otherwise think they're temporarily safe. I don't think I would play more than 1 Tanglewurm, and I'm not sure I'd run him in the main deck, but as a roleplayer I think he's great.

That's all for this week. I'll be away next week, but when I come back we'll have results from States, which should give me plenty to write about. Have fun at your release events, and good luck to everyone attending the 10k weekend in NYC. I'm not going to be able to make it to that, but I'm looking forward to seeing what people come up with for it.

-Benjamin Hayes