Last week my article briefly touched on problems that i often see in peoples game, this week I’m going to go more in depth with a few examples of situations where playing lands correctly has won or lost games.
Last week I talked about how I see people tap their mana incorrectly and gave an example of leaving your mana open to optimize the most tricks to be played around. I had many people poke holes in this example which is fair enough because I didn’t give the context that I was thinking in. That particular example I was in the mind-frame that I have no tricks but cards in hand and I’m playing against a deck that does not use Tectonic Edge or any kind of similar disruption to affect the situation. Therefore I said it was correct to leave the 2 land up that represent the most tricks.
Magic is an always ever-changing game because of new cards and rules being introduced all the time therefore the way you play your lands also changes depending on a given context of a format. I’m going to use the current type 2 format as an example for this article. In the current standard environment their are a few land based tricks to be wary of, these include Tectonic Edge, Spreading Seas, Goblin Ruinblaster and Mana Leak off the top of my head as the most used tricks. So in any example I give throughout the rest of this article be aware that the correct play will often change depending on the tricks you might have to play around.
Ok so you are playing red deck wins and you have Staggershock, Ball Lightning and Hellspark Elemental, in hand you know your opponent is playing Blue White control, you have 5 mana untapped to their 2, one blue one white what do you do? Well first of all look at what we’re going to play around to optimize the amount of damage we do this being the most relevant thing for a red deck(So follow your game plan). It’s game 1 and they’re on a fairly healthy life total so the tricks I would think about playing around before making a decision are Path to Exile, Mana Leak, Essence Scatter, Negate and Condemn. With these tricks I would play Hellspark Elemental and pass the turn after getting in the red zone and leave Staggershock up for end of turn. This play optimizes the damage you’ll be able to do over time while taking into account what tricks they might have. If they have Condemn or Path to Exile I would rather it be played on Hellspark Elemental instead of Ball Lightning because although it is the same amount of damage Ball Lightning costs one less and the damage can be done in one turn so if Hellspark gets dealt with it’s likely that they won’t have a second instant speed removal spell for the Ball Lightning. If they have one of the counters Mana Leak being the most likely and most played of the 3 presideboard. Then the mana is up to pay for it, if it’s Essence Scatter then Ball Lightning has free reign and if it’s Negate they can’t counter it anyway. This play also lets you have Staggershock end of turn to either bait counter magic of just reduce their life total. As you might be able to notice this play actually optimizes the amount of mana used letting you potentially use all of your mana for 2 turns if unanswered (Hellspark and Staggershock, then Unearth and Ball Lightning). When I play magic these kind of situations come up all the time and this is where thorough testing really helps to know the tricks to play around and also the way to play the game.
Ok another lesson that I had to relearn when I was playing Jund a lot online a couple of months ago was keeping in mind how the order in which I play my lands effects the curve I’ll have for a game. The ideal Jund curve is often something like turn 2Putrid Leech, turn 3 Sprouting Thrinax, turn 4 Bloodbraid Elf, turn 5 whatever. This often doesn’t happen though even if you draw the cards because of the many tapped lands and the order in which you play them. These are the main things I think about when playing my lands in a game and just keep asking yourself questions why are you making the land drop in that order or tapping your mana that way? These questions and every extra bit of thought put in before even making a land drop will make you a better player.
Mulligans Part 2
Mulligans are something that every player does differently in my opinion I for one keep hands often based on quick rules that I’ve taught myself as short cuts and statistics (when I know them). Ok so a few examples of this, I’m going to use a classic Jund deck as the sample. Your hand is Verdant Catacombs, Savage Lands, Sprouting Thrinax, 2 Siege Gang Commander, Sarkhan the Mad, Bituminous Blast. Going in blind I definitely mulligan this hand I don’t want to not draw land and be screwed and die to a fast draw, but if I know I’m playing against a slow deck and I’m on the draw I would keep. Next hand is Savage Lands, Raging Ravine, Dragonskull Summit, Forest, Blightning, Bloodbraid Elf, Terminate. This is an easy keep, it has a good colour spread in the land department and the Terminate gives you some early game while backed up by BBE, Raging Ravine and Blightning.
Mulliganing is mostly determined by the amount of testing I do, if you don’t test enough you will make marginal keeps and bad mulligans. Mulliganing provides a significant disadvantage so the rule I use with the decks that I play is to make them as consistent as possible especially in land to spell ratio to avoid mulliganing as much as possible. So to sum up my thoughts on mulliganing make your deck as consistent as possible and test a lot with the deck and it should be fairly obvious which hands are mulligans or not.
Ok guys that’s all I have time for today. Another one coming soon.
Aaron Nicoll
