Howdy, like many of you fine Magic players this weekend I indulged myself in some sweet limited action in the form of the Shadows Over Innistrad Prelease. Heading in to the weekend I was trying to curb my enthusiasm and keep a calm head, but like everyone else on Saturday morning I was eager to start. The players were registered and packs handed out, then it began and I dove straight in to trying to unravel the mysteries of SOI limited!

Prerelease No.1

My first Prerelease rewarded me with an aggressive R/W deck:

SOI Prerelease No.1 – R/W (4-1)

Creatures:

1 x Thraben Inspector

1 x Ember-Eye Wolf

1 x Kessig Forgemaster

1 x Unruly Mob

1 x Sanguinary Mage

1 x Breakneck Rider

1 x Cathar’s Companion

1 x Spectral Shepherd

1 x Paranoid Parish-Blade

1 x Inspiring Captain

1 x Voldaren Duelist

1 x Odric, Lunarch Marshal

1 x Gastaf Arsonists

1 x Reaper of Flight Moonlight

1 x Flameblade Angel

Spells:

1 x Malevolent Whispers

1 x Tormenting Voice

2 x Stength in Arms

1 x Dance with Devils

1 x Humble the Brute

2 x Vessel of Ephemera

Lands:

1 x Warped Landscape

8 x Mountain

8 x Plains

Other Notable Cards:

Triskaidekaphobia

Confirm Suspicions

Soul Swallower

Invocation of St Traft

Corrupted Grafstone

This deck pays homage to the old homage in Magic that when in an unknown format, just play red! This deck could hit hard and fast and still had the late-game covered thanks to Flameblade Angel and Reaper of Flight Moonlight. Odric, Lunarch Marshal (the Promo in my pool) made combat math pretty easy when you could give your whole team flying, made possible thanks to two Vessel of Ephemera! The white vessel is second only to the green vessel, as I would find out later in the weekend.

I was lucky that the rest of my pool was fairly weak, and my other rares uninspiring, as I could easily have been led astray and not found the true joy of casting a Voldaren Duelist to win a game, or killing an opponent from 16 with their own The Gitrog Monster thanks to a Malevolent Whispers!

I think the R/W archetype will be a solid archetype in both Sealed and Draft, key pieces will include Thraben Investigator, Kessig Forgemaster, Breakneck Rider and Voldaren Duelist that you can reasonably expect to find in your boosters.

Prerelease No.2

With the first Prerelease done and dusted players took a well-earned break to grab food, share combat stories and to share strategy for the evening Prerelease. As for my friends and I well… we ended up in the pub! Lucky for me I opened a strong R/G pool and got to experience Werewolves in limited for the first time.

Prelease No.2 – R/G/b Werewolves (3-1)

Creatures:

1 x Sanguinary Mage

2 x Quilled Wolf

2 x Hinterland Logger

1 x Kessig Forgemaster

2 x Ulrich’s Kindred

1 x Convicted Killer

1 x Bloodmad Vampire

1 x Tireless Tracker

2 x Voldaren Duelist

1 x Mad Prophet

1 x Cull of the Waxing Moon

1 x Watcher of the Web

Spells:

1 x Vessel of Nascency

1 x Fork in the Road

1 x Fiery Temper

1 x Rush of Adrenaline

1 x Aim High

1 x Throttle

1 x To the Slaughter (Promo)

Lands:

2 x Swamp

8 x Forest

7 x Mountain

Other Notable Cards:

Engulf the Shore

Welcome to the Fold

Anguished Unmaking

Always Watching

Thalia’s Lieutenant

Werewolves, double-faced cards and lots of combat damage? Sounds like fun to me! The black splash to make it slightly Jundish also helped. In all seriousness, R/G Werewolves could be one of the best archetypes in the format, you get great, efficient creatures that get bigger and you have access to the best vessel and excellent combat tricks!

There are some great pay-off cards too in the form of Cull of the Waxing Moon and Silverfur Partisan. Kessig Forgemaster may be the best common in the set, or at least the best common creature, and over-performed in a format full of X/1’s and X/2’s.

The deck itself worked well for the event and only lost to a deck that played Archangel Avacyn both games, always be aware that this is a real card that can mess up your combat both in limited and standard, and often came out to fast for most decks. The format contains no real sweeper effect, so you are not punished for unloading and going all in, but with cards like Cull of the Waxing Moon you can also be rewarded for sitting back and manipulating your double-faced cards and building up a pack of wolf tokens.

Because of the swarm-like nature cards like To the Slaughter are not as effective as they will likely be in a constructed format and you will want to play your targeted removal to push through your creatures.

Highlight of the Weekend:

Stealing a The Gitrog Monster with Malevolent Whispers and dealing my opponent 16 damage in one turn.

Low point of the Weekend:

Getting milled by Startled Awake in 2 games, whilst the card is flavourful it sure sucks to be on the receiving end of it.

Top Common/Uncommons

#5 Thraben Inspector

A one-mana 1/2 will fit in to most aggressive white decks, but coming with an additional permanent that you can sacrifice to your Angelic Purge or use to draw a card at the end of your opponents turn is always a massive bonus.

#4 Angelic Purge

A common catch-all removal spell works really well in a format where you often have excessive permanent in. I would look to include 1 or 2 in any deck in this limited format.

#3 Tenacity

The white hits just keep coming! This spell can be a blow-out, both offensively and defensively and the additional lifegain will often put the game out of reach of your opponent.

#2 Vessel of Nascency

This enchantment may be the best Delirium enabler in the format, how good the Delirium decks will be only time and lots of limited action can tell. But for now I would look to pick up the vessel if your shaping up to be in green and playing with your graveyard.

#1 Kessig Forgemaster // Flameheart Werewolf

I think this may not be a surprise, I mentioned the card above, but this is not a card to be underrated. In combat this front and back of the card will often shoot down the opposing creature without having to put itself a too much risk. At uncommon you may only pick up one per draft but I would highly recommend snapping off the pick if you are even mildly considering being in red, it’s just that good!

That’s all from me this time, I’ll be back later in the week with a Standard brew that I have been working on. Be sure to check out Steve George’s articles as our resident tuner looks to take on some sweet SOI decks!