with Fletcher Peatross

New Horizons Constructed

Its three weeks until the Event Horizons Invitational and I'm getting a bit hyped up. It's exciting to think that I'll be playing against some of the best players in Texas in some of the craziest formats that still allow for skill. I played last year, and honestly was not at top form. I was a total ass and deserved to lose. This year, I'd like to win, but I'm more looking forward to the fun aspect of it. Much more than I did last year.

And a trophy. I'd like a trophy this year. Just not the last place one.

This is the first article of three where I'll be talking about what I'll be doing in the upcoming event. Today I'm going to talk about what I'm going to play in the Event Horizon's Set tournament. I'm not afraid of theft of my tech because all decks had to be submitted already. If the players want to know badly enough, they can read my decklist and get an advantage. I'd like to think that I'd be able to overcome that advantage.

Next week's installment will be on the two Limited events, and the last installment will be posted the weekend of the event. As those two constructed events have such interesting rules attached to them, if I give away my advantage people can build decks knowing how to beat mine. I'd hate that.

Before we start, go take a look at the spoiler to the fantasy set here: http://www.ehevents.com/nhspoiler.html

Now that you've looked at it, here's my decklist:

4x Chronodrake
4x Kevisfish
4x Ancient Drake
4x Temporal Zephid
2x Avatar of Illusion
13x Island
3x Swamp
4x Collapsing Dam

4x Reject
4x Counterspell
4x Bounceback
4x Blatant Forgery
3x Conjuror's Theft
3x Zaire's Vengeance

1x Conjuror's Theft
1x Zaire's Vengeance
3x Cold Spell
3x Crucify
4x Giant Snapper
3x Brainscan

The blue is obviously really good. The question is, how good? The other colors have the possibility of being exceptionally fast. Black can just go nuts on the first turn with Dark Ritual goodness, Red can haste you out. Green has some really nice fat and white is just.. slow. But all of the colors are balanced I think.

It's very difficult to do playtesting so I had to base this entire deck on my own thoughts on the set. I took a generally decent color combination in blue/black and modified it to fit the format. Black has some decent removal in Zaire's Vengeance and blue has some great control cards. I do have lots of OMC though, so that could be a problem.

I figure these things are going to happen:
I'm going to be 'time-spiraling' almost every time.
I'm going to have a 2/2 flier for 2 every time.
I'm going to be drawing 3 cards every time.

But who knows. Its up to the opponent now isn't it?

I should be laying some Avatar beats as well.

And if this deck IS horrible, even though I don't think it is, I'll be only playing with the deck for 3 rounds. That's the beauty of this tournament. You aren't stuck playing something awful the entire time. Unless you are horrible and keep building awful decks.

Until next time,
Fletcher Peatross
The Biggest Ass in Texas
Magic Pojo Content Editor

P.S. Welcome back to Scott as managing editor of the site.