In our first ever Stress Test, we put my GW bolster deck through its paces.
Round 1, Game 1
*Author's note: I apologize for the shoddy video work. I decided to record the videos from the playbacks, not realizing how fast they streamed, then, made the mistake of covering the life counters in my overlay. I promise the next series will be cleaned up properly!
*Author's note: I apologize for the shoddy video work. I decided to record the videos from the playbacks, not realizing how fast they streamed, then, made the mistake of covering the life counters in my overlay. I promise the next series will be cleaned up properly!
Straight away, I have to mulligan my opening hand. The curve is ok-ish, but I'm going to be thoroughly screwed unless I have a patch of mana sitting right on top of my deck. My new 6-card hand isn't fantastic either, but I can make due with either land drops or with drawing into my handful of 2-drops, so I decide it's worth it to keep, rather than mulling down to 5.
I draw into my third and fourth lands quickly, making it easy enough to curve out from turn 3, onward. My opponent's board isn't very threatening with a Jeskai Sage and Zephyr Scribe, so dropping something with a lot of health as a miniature wall stops the bleeding fairly quickly. Unfortunately, he takes to the air, and I don't have anything I can immediately drop to take care of his flier. I decide to hold onto my Herdchaser Dragon instead of morphing it, and choose instead to play out my Student of Ojutai, figuring I'd have a better chance of drawing out the game if I have the potential for lifegain on the board when I draw into my non-creature spells.
My foresight pays off, and I draw into a Hunt the Weak. This is where I make my first mistake, immediately playing it when my opponent just finished doing a draw-pass with 5 untapped mana. He 2-for-1's me by blowing out my creature with Hunt the Weak on the stack. While the actual spell wasn't the bad play (he likely would have killed one of my creatures EoT anyway), I should have attacked in first, baiting any potential removal. I could have just as easily played Hunt the Weak during my second main phase, after giving my opponent the option to only get a 1-for-1 with his removal spell. On the plus side, casting the spell still gives me the 2 health buffer from Student of Ojutai.
I try to shore up my defenses with my own flier, but he pulled out Void Squall to bounce (and rebound). This puts me back, since I'm struggling to keep creatures on the field and my health is starting to get low. Instead of playing out my flier again, I use up all my mana to toss down two ground creatures, knowing that he's going to bounce something back to my hand either way, and I'd rather keep something on the board.
He makes the mistake of attacking in with Zephyr Scribe (trying to close the game, I assume), and I gladly take the trade, cutting off his ability to dig for answers. At this point, I have 6 life, and desperately need some answers. I draw into a flier, which keeps him from attacking in for a couple turns, and buys me the time I need to draw into some lifegain as well. He goes aggressive, putting me down to 2, but I counter his aggressiveness by replaying Student of Ojutai and laying down Pacifism, locking down an attacker and gaining life at the same time.
We take turns building our board, until eventually the opponent feels his position is strong enough to force the win. With only 1 card in his hand, I have no qualms making blocks that might prove risky if he has some sort of combat trick or removal. Fact is, at 7 health, I can't afford to play around whatever is in his hand, I have to play as if he doesn't have anything. I set up blocks so that he loses most of his creatures, I keep most of mine, and I flip Artful Maneuver to nuke his Frost Walker off the ground, gaining 2 life to counter the 3 damage I let slip through to my face.
After losing all his creatures, he's about run out of steam, but has one final trick up his sleeve. He drops Palace Siege and starts pinging me for 2 life per turn. He almost eeks out the win, putting me down to 2 health once more, but after drawing several lands in a row, a topdeck removal keeps me in the game just long enough to pull out the match.
My opening hand in the second match could go either way, depending on what sort of removal my opponent has in his hand, but since I didn't see an Ultimate Price in the first match, I'm going to assume that I should be pretty safe until turn 5-ish. In which case, my combat trick and removal spell should keep me safe for at least the first 4 turns. I decide to keep.
I curve out decently well over the next couple turns, while my opponent seems to be struggling to get out anything very threatening. On turn 4, I decide to punish his slow play by Pacifying his blocker and swinging in with everything. He trades with my 1/1, which is fine with me. I placed the +1/+1 counter on my herald instead of my morph, so that I would have my board presence split between multiple creatures, in the case of spot removal. I know that once I get another counter with Hunt the Weak, Sight of the Scalelords is going to come online in a big way. That said, since Pacifism is better at removing big stuff, the better play may have been to attack in first, let him block, then use Hunt the Weak in conjunction with my morph to finish off the flier, leaving the better removal spell back for a bigger threat.
I use my Hunt the Weak to kill the morph, so I don't have to deal with it later, then swing in for a bunch of damage. With no creatures on his side and a lot of aggression from my side of the board, he scrambles to remove anything with Foul Tongue invocation and get some blockers up. I ditch my morph because I'm going to need more mana to flip it either way. I consider dropping Sight of the Scalelords and forcing him to block a 6/6, but instead I go the more conservative route and attack in for 4, then drop another creature on the field. He still has 3 cards in hand, and he hasn't played much in the way of removal, so I don't want to be stuck trying to refill my board, because I got excited to do 2 extra damage to his face.
Fortunately for me, I was right, and he nukes my 4/4. Unfortunately for him, he attacks in with his only potential defender, so I punish him for it by dropping my enchantment, gaining back the life I lost, and swinging for 4. With vigilance.
He doesn't seem to have much to play, dropping a Zephyr Scribe and passing, so I swing in hard for another 4 next turn, forcing him to chump block to buy some more time. On the second main phase, I drop Enduring Scalelord, which he has no way to block, putting him on lethal next turn. He tries to dig for an answer with his scribe, but doesn't seem to get anything, because he immediately concedes.