This week was the Team Draft League finals and we were facing off against the Hooting Tandrils. The Tandrils are comprised of Richard Tan, Johnny Cheng and Tony Ling. We battled them in the semi finals last season and they were looking for revenge.
They started the night by deploying psychological warfare. This included changing the start time from 7:30 PM to 8:00 PM and then showing up 20 minutes late! This tactic may have worked on lesser mages, but not for my team with ice in our veins.
Not like this Mr Tan.
I started off the draft with an interesting first pick. The best cards in the park were Anafenza, the Foremost, Arc Lightning, Death Frenzy, and Tuskguard Captain. I believe the best card for a number of different reasons is Arc Lightning and I would have taken that if this was not a team draft. I took Anafenza and my reasoning for this is because of the other good green cards in the pack. I was worried if I took the Arc Lightning, then Tony would most likely take Anafenza which would leave Manning with having to take a green card. I wanted Manning to not have to fight for his deck so I took the Anafenza. My choice worked out, but not as I expected. Manning was passed the Arc Lightning and in addition to his Crane Technique made his deck great.
First Most, The First Most Pick // Legendary Creature-Human Warrior
I stayed the path with my first pick and wound up with a decent Abzan deck. Manning was a Jeskai deck and Dan was strangely enough Boros. Our opponents’ decks were 5 Color Secret Plans/Trail of Mystery for Rich, 5 Color Jank (or what we incorrectly thought was junk) for Johnny, and Abzan for Tony. These games were some of the hardest that we played all season and I saw too many x=9 Villainous Wealths than I’d care to mention by Johnny. Unsurprisingly when someone does that every match they are quick to get their team three wins.
Johnny was the biggest villain of them all.
With some tight play and lucky top decks we managed to tie them 4-4 with the deciding match game down to me versus Tony. I think I got lucky to win game one on the back of Tony mana flooding at the best time for me. I thought I was going to lock up the season in game two, but Tony had other plans and won what I thought was an unlosable game for me. I was on the play for game three and through a series of lucky top decks I was able to have a 2-drop into Anafenza, this was all off of basic plains, forest, and swamp (I consider this to be tight play and not luck, for the record). Tony extended his hand after looking at a creature with three +1 counters and Anafenza on my side and nothing on his side. The Longo Khan was victorious!
The unveiling of Jamie Parke’s 1999 Worlds Playmat. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
This was a great way to cap off a season. I’d like to thank Matt Jones and Hugh Kramer for taking a chance on a kid like me and letting me join their draft league (editor’s note: I hope Longo thanks me every article). Also, thanks to Dave McCoy for being the man behind the curtain and running the website. Last but not least I have to thank my teammates Chris Manning and Dan O’Mahoney-Schwartz without whom I would be spending my weeks playing Hearthstone (editor’s note: an aesthetically insulting game).
The power of Hearthstone compels me.
Unfortunately, the Longo Khan will not be a legacy. The rules have changed and next season captains were randomly chosen and players were drafted. I was picked second (not a big deal) and my new team is Nick Forker and Dom Neitz. While I will miss DOMS and Manning I think my new team “The Lucky Chumps” has a great chance of winning this whole darned thing!
Luck Chumps, we’re part of a complete breakfast.
See you next season drafters!
Andrew Longo has been playing Magic the Gathering at a mediocre level since 1994. He managed to get lucky on the backs of his teammates to win Grand Prix Providence Rhode Island. When not playing magic he runs a D&D campaign, plays video games, and reads comics (a real triple threat for the ladies).