Lucky Number Thirteen: My First Limited Experience

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TzarChasm

7 February 2013

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Today I attended my local gaming shop's midnight prerelease for Gatecrash--the first limited format event I have ever played in. I had no idea what to expect and was unused to the radically different ways one must evaluate cards for this format. I don't handle crowds of strangers or overtly competitive environments very well; my hands were shaking long before I got them on my guild pack. I'd gone with Gruul mostly because I'm tuning a ferocious Naya deck for RTR Standard (deck:double-strike-holocaust-#8-on-it) and I'd hoped to coincidentally draft at least a few of the cards that I need to complete it. (I didn't. Not a damn one of them!) I wasn't sure how it would hold out, since Dimir is a serious mill threat, Simic can make gigantic fliers with little effort, and Boros is... well, Boros is Boros. Still, Bloodrush is a game-changing mechanic that allows you to overstock on creatures that double as combat instants; I figured it could contend.

As far as the packs go, my pulls were sketchy at best. My rares were Borborygmos Enraged, Simic Manipulator, Consuming Aberration, Sylvan Primordial, and two copies of Illusionist's Bracers. I pulled three Guildgates: Boros, Gruul, and Simic. There were no Keyrunes, and the only charm I got was Dimir's. I was honestly very disappointed in my pulls, as they were rather poor in my guild of choice. I decided almost at the last minute to splash white, enabling two copies of Skyknight Legionnaire and a Fortress Cyclops. This is what I ended up with:

6x Mountain
6x Forest
2x Plains
1x Boros Guildgate
1x Gruul Guildate
1x Foundry Street Denizen
2x Skinbrand Goblin
1x Scorchwalker
1x Mugging
2x Act of Treason
1x Mark for Death
2x Spire Tracer
1x Disciple of the Old Ways
1x Scab-Clan Charger
1x Sylvan Primordial
1x Wildwood Rebirth
2x Predator's Rapport
2x Skyknight Legionnaire
1x Fortress Cyclops
2x Skarrg Guildmage
1x Rubblehulk (foil promo)
2x Pit Fight
1x Razortip Whip
As it turns out, the cards responsible for the majority of my wins were Skyknight Legionnaire, Razortip Whip, Act of Treason, and Predator's Rapport. Rapport proved incredibly useful in several games--once putting me above thirty life while my opponent was below 10. (One opponent even complimented me for combining it with Skarrg Guildmage's second ability during his EoT step, netting 8 life and deeply upsetting the game.)

I won't type a game-by-game explanation of the whole night--mostly because it's 7:35 a.m., I'm exhausted, and I don't remember it well enough--but I thought I'd share a few of my favorite and least favorite moments, for good measure.

Highs:

(1) I attacked my first opponent with a 6/3 Fortress Cyclops, forcing him to block it or die. When he declared his blocker I Bloodrushed a Skinbrand Goblin, making the Cyclops an 8/4 who would survive combat, then targeted it with Predator's Rapport to gain 12 life. (2) An opponent played two Wojek Halberdiers with a Truefire Paladin on the battlefield, then passed without attacking. The next turn I used Act of Treason to steal one of his Halberdiers and targeted the other one with Mark for Death before attacking with his Halberdier, a Skaarg Guildmage, and a Scab-Clan Charger. My creatures benefited from the Halberdier's first strike, so he ate five points of damage and I robbed him of his Batallion. (3) This same opponent, in our third game, tried to use Act of Treason to steal my Skyknight Legionnaire, which had been punishing turn after turn. I responded with Pit Fight, killing his Daring Skyjek and making his spell fizzle. (4) The only Dimir player I dueled Ciphered Undercity Plague onto a Mortus Strider. I returned the favor by using Act of Treason to "borrow" it and hit him with it--ciphered spell and all.

Lows:

(1) Watching my first Simic opponent simultaneously Evolve a 4/7 Clinging Anemones, a 6/4 Drakewing Krasis, and a 4/5 Ivy Lane Denizen before dropping a Crowned Ceratok and an Adaptive Snapjaw. (2) Realizing just what a difference the quality of your boosters can make in Limited when another guy played Boros Reckoner on turns four and five, back-to-back. (3) Choking back howls of disappointment when AEtherize rips a game that you had total control of away from you. (4) Maintaining a neck-in-neck life race with one opponent for five straight turns while holding Predator's Rapport, Scab-Clan Charger, and Rubblehulk... and never drawing a single source of green mana. (One Forest at any point in time during this entire game would have been enough to absolutely guarantee me the win.)

When the dust settled I had enough points to rank in at #13 out of what looked like 40 or so players, initially. I don't know my exact point count or statistics, and this having been my first time at a prerelease I still don't fully understand it all, but I have to say that I feel pretty good about the experience. My biggest obstacles were entirely out of my hands: terrible land draws and opponents whose cards were unanswerable. My playing wasn't flawless, but I made far fewer mistakes than I'd expected to.

I hope I can go back on Sunday and do it again. If I do, I'll probably reflect on it like I did with this one. I may start writing about my FNM experiences, too, as long as there's any kind of audience for it here.

In closing, I'd like to strongly encourage anyone who's never taken the opportunity to jump into Limited games to give it a shot. Yes, it's unpredictable; yes, you could walk away with only the sketchiest of rares and wounded pride; yes, it's a high-pressure, deeply competitive scene with a lot of inherent restraints. But it's also a (Blood)rush that will test your abilities to perceive cards flexibly and find creative uses for stuff you'd never consider for Constructed formats. It's an amazing feeling to have no clue what the other guy is packing, yet to cleverly foil his plans with the one copy of "Card X" that you tossed in, hoping for this exact scenario to eventually occur. You might just walk away feeling like a better player for having done it.

I know that I do.

~TzarChasm