I’m not going to lie; I’m actually very much looking forward to Grand Prix Toronto next weekend. I missed out on the last one due to exams, but the timing this time around actually works out pretty well for me. I’ve been drafting a crap-ton of Theros online (well, it’s a crap-ton for me anyway), but I haven’t actually done that many Sealed decks. Part of that is that I don’t enjoy playing Sealed as much as Draft, but it’s also because Sealed requires a bit more of a time commitment. I’ve only played two actual Sealed tournaments in this format, both of which were Pro Tour Qualifiers, and neither one of which did I do particularly well in. I don’t think I misbuilt either one of those decks, but then again, I’ve definitely been wrong before.

I thought it might be a good exercise to practice with some Sealed pools. Getting some discussion going can help me identify if I’m making any systematic errors. I’m going to start with the Sealed pool I had at the last Pro Tour Qualifier I played in—just because I happen to still have it with me. Let’s first look at the card pool, make some general observations, and then end with the deck I submitted.

"Sealed Pool"

• White (17)
• 1 Celestial Archon
• 1 Chosen by Heliod
• 1 Dauntless Onslaught
• 1 Divine Verdict
• 2 Glare of Heresy
• 1 Gods Willing
• 1 Lagonna-Band Elder
• 1 Last Breath
• 1 Observant Alseid
• 1 Scholar of Athreos
• 2 Setessan Battle Priest
• 1 Setessan Griffin
• 1 Spear of Heliod
• 1 Traveling Philosopher
• 1 Yoked Ox

• Blue (9)
• 1 Benthic Giant
• 1 Coastline Chimera
• 1 Crackling Triton
• 1 Griptide
• 1 Omenspeaker
• 1 Swan Song
• 1 Triton Fortune Hunter
• 1 Triton Shorethief
• 1 Wavecrash Triton

• Black (13)
• 1 Asphodel Wanderer
• 1 Baleful Eidolon
• 1 Blood-Toll Harpy
• 1 Cavern Lampad
• 1 Disciple of Phenax
• 1 Loathsome Catoblepas
• 1 March of the Returned
• 2 Mogis's Marauder
• 1 Read the Bones
• 1 Returned Centaur
• 1 Scourgemark
• 1 Tormented Hero

• Red (13)
• 2 Deathbellow Raider
• 2 Demolish
• 1 Flamepeaker Adept
• 1 Ill-Tempered Cyclops
• 1 Lightning Strike
• 1 Pries of Iroas
• 1 Rage of Purphoros
• 1 Satyr Rambler
• 2 Titan's Strength
• 1 Two-Headed Cerberus

• Green (21)
• 1 Agent of Horizons
• 1 Artisan's Sorrow
• 1 Bow of Nylea
• 2 Fade into Antiquity
• 1 Karametra's Acolyte
• 2 Leafcrown Dryad
• 1 Nemesis of Mortals
• 2 Nessian Courser
• 2 Nylea's Presence
• 1 Ordeal of Nylea
• 1 Pheres-Band Centaurs
• 1 Satyr Hedonist
• 1 Savage Surge
• 1 Time to Feed
• 1 Voyaging Satyr
• 1 Vulpine Goliath
• 1 Warriors' Lesson

• Land, Artifact, Multicolored (9)
• 1 Unknown Shores
• 1 Flamecast Wheel
• 1 Fleetfeather Sandals
• 1 Prowler's Helm
• 1 Traveler's Amulet
• 1 Kragma Warcaller
• 1 Polis Crusher
• 1 Spellheart Chimera
• 1 Triad of Fates

Buy This Deck

Build Process

So definitely what jumps out at me at first are the green and white weapons. All of the weapons are extremely powerful, so right away, I’m drawn to those two colors. White also has a Celestial Archon, which is a massive beating. However, the fact that you open bomb rares doesn’t mean it’s always correct to play them. Blue, black, and red don’t really offer much though. Blue has almost nothing going for it, so it’s easy to eliminate it. Black has some solid creatures and is worth considering, but it doesn’t have any bombs or removal. Red is very shallow, with only a handful of playables. So it’s looking as though G/W is the way to go. Unfortunately, after the rares, the card quality drops off significantly. The question remains as to whether to splash anything. I decided to splash the Polis Crusher since it’s good in the late game and can really crush (hurr hurr) decks that rely heavily on enchantment creatures.

"Final Deck"

• Lands (17)
• 9 Forest
• 7 Plains
• 1 Mountain

• Creatures (14)
• 2 Leafcrown Dryad
• 1 Traveling Philosopher
• 1 Voyaging Satyr
• 1 Lagonna-Band Elder
• 2 Nessian Courser
• 1 Observant Alseid
• 1 Karametra's Acolyte
• 1 Polis Crusher
• 1 Celestial Archon
• 1 Setessan Griffin
• 1 Nemesis of Mortals
• 1 Vulpine Goliath

• Spells (9)
• 1 Gods Willing
• 1 Traveler's Amulet
• 1 Prowler's Helm
• 1 Savage Surge
• 1 Bow of Nylea
• 1 Dauntless Onslaught
• 1 Spear of Heliod
• 1 Time to Feed
• 1 Divine Verdict

Buy This Deck

It’s not the most impressive Sealed deck ever, but I feel that there wasn’t a whole lot to work with. Two of the cards are questionable in my opinion: Traveler's Amulet and Prowler's Helm. For mana-fixing, I wasn’t sure if I would rather have the Amulet or Nylea's Presence. I decided that the Amulet was better if I was going to be curving out, but I did swap it for a Nylea's Presence whenever matchups looked like they were going long. Prowler's Helm isn’t a great card, but it’s at its best when you have fat green creatures. This deck is probably less powerful than average, so having the option to cheese the opponent out with an unblockable monster was an attractive option. I did side it out a lot though. One card that didn’t make the cut that a lot of people may disagree with was the Ordeal of Nylea. I admit it was a late cut, but I don’t actually like it very much in general. If you have a lot of heroic creatures, fine, you’ll always play it, but I have zero. I don’t have a lot of early creatures that I actually want to attack with either, and fetching two lands that late in the game is almost worthless. It just seemed that playing it was overly risky for how little benefit it provides. I was prepared to side it in if I felt that it was worth it, but it never came up.

The remaining Sealed pools are going to be randomly generated. This randomization isn’t perfect since it doesn’t account for print runs in packs, but I’m certainly not cracking a bunch of real packs. I die a little on the inside every time someone opens a pack that isn’t for the purpose of a Draft or Sealed deck. Here’s the first one:

"Sealed Pool"

• White (19)
• 1 Chosen by Heliod
• 1 Dauntless Onslaught
• 1 Gift of Immortality
• 1 Gods Willing
• 2 Hopeful Eidolon
• 1 Hundred-Handed One
• 1 Last Breath
• 1 Leonin Snarecaster
• 1 Observant Alseid
• 1 Ray of Dissolution
• 2 Setessan Battle Priest
• 2 Silent Artisan
• 1 Vanquish the Foul
• 3 Yoked Ox

• Blue (13)
• 1 Annul
• 1 Breaching Hippocamp
• 1 Crackling Triton
• 1 Griptide
• 1 Mnemonic Wall
• 3 Omenspeaker
• 1 Ordeal of Thassa
• 1 Sea God's Revenge
• 1 Triton Fortune Hunter
• 1 Triton Tactics
• 1 Vaporkin

• Black (21)
• 1 Blood-Toll Harpy
• 1 Cavern Lampad
• 2 Disciple of Phenax
• 1 Felhide Minotaur
• 2 Fleshmad Steed
• 1 Gray Merchant of Asphodel
• 1 Insatiable Harpy
• 1 Loathsome Catoblepas
• 1 Mogis's Marauder
• 2 Pharika's Cure
• 1 Read the Bones
• 1 Rescue from the Underworld
• 2 Returned Centaur
• 1 Returned Phalanx
• 2 Scourgemark
• 1 Sip of Hemlock

• Red (12)
• 1 Akroan Crusader
• 1 Boulderfall
• 1 Firedrinker Satyr
• 1 Flamespeaker Adept
• 1 Ill-Tempered Cyclops
• 1 Magma Jet
• 1 Ordeal of Purphoros
• 2 Portent of Betrayal
• 1 Satyr Rambler
• 2 Spearpoint Oread

• Green (14)
• 1 Agent of Horizons
• 1 Artisan's Sorrow
• 1 Defend the Hearth
• 1 Mistcutter Hydra
• 1 Nemesis of Mortals
• 1 Nessian Asp
• 1 Nylea's Disciple
• 1 Nylea's Emissary
• 1 Satyr Hedonist
• 2 Satyr Piper
• 1 Staunch-Hearted Warrior
• 2 Voyaging Satyr

• Land, Artifact, Multicolored (5)
• 1 Temple of Abandon
• 1 Temple of Silence
• 1 Unknown Shores
• 1 Guardians of Meletis
• 1 Battlewise Hoplite

Buy This Deck

Build Process

While not having any slam-dunk bombs, this pool does have a lot of solid cards. White and black seem to be the deepest colors, and there are enough quality black cards to make Gray Merchant of Asphodel good, so that’s my frontrunner so far. Black also has a few removal spells, including Sip of Hemlock, a card that becomes much better in Sealed (as opposed to Draft). What I usually do is arrange the cards by mana cost and see what the color is lacking. That makes figuring out the support color easier.

This tells us that black is lacking in early plays and finishers, so let’s scan through the other colors and see what they have to offer. The only color I don’t want to play is red. While it does have some good cards, those cards don’t really interact that well with the black cards. I’m going to try blue first and see what it looks like, partly because I like U/B a lot (big surprise), but also because of how powerful Sea God's Revenge is. Plus, Returned Phalanx becomes a lot better when you can activate it.

I like the looks of this so far; I just need to make a few cuts. I normally play eighteen lands in U/B, but because of the card-draw from Scourgemark, Triton Fortune Hunter, Ordeal of Thassa, and Read the Bones, I don’t think that’s necessary. That means I’ll have to make three cuts, namely Annul, Crackling Triton, and Felhide Minotaur. Blue definitely solves the lack of early plays problem, but it only adds Sea God's Revenge as a late-game finisher. I’m actually fine with this because of the decent number of flyers. A turn-two Vaporkin can often do a lot of damage, so Gray Merchant is more likely to be lethal. The evasion combined with pump effects from the enchantments means that this deck shouldn’t have that much difficulty closing out games.

I did take a look at W/B and B/G, but I think U/B is just better.

"Final Deck"

• Lands (17)
• 10 Swamp
• 7 Island

• Creatures (13)
• 1 Returned Phalanx
• 3 Omenspeaker
• 1 Vaporkin
• 1 Blood-Toll Harpy
• 1 Mogis's Marauder
• 1 Triton Fortune Hunter
• 2 Disciple of Phenax
• 1 Insatiable Harpy
• 1 Cavern Lampad
• 1 Gray Merchant of Asphodel

• Spells (10)
• 1 Triton Tactics
• 2 Pharika's Cure
• 1 Ordeal of Thassa
• 2 Scourgemark
• 1 Read the Bones
• 1 Griptide
• 1 Sip of Hemlock
• 1 Sea God's Revenge

Buy This Deck

Let’s try one more randomized Sealed pool before calling it a night.

"Sealed Pool"

• White (15)
• 1 Battlewise Valor
• 1 Chosen by Heliod
• 1 Divine Verdict
• 1 Evangel of Heliod
• 1 Gods Willing
• 1 Heliod, God of the Sun
• 1 Heliod's Emissary
• 1 Hopeful Eidolon
• 2 Lagonna-Band Elder
• 1 Observant Alseid
• 1 Phalanx Leader
• 1 Scholar of Athreos
• 1 Setessan Battle Priest
• 1 Silent Artisan

• Blue (20)
• 2 Annul
• 1 Aqueous Form
• 1 Artisan of Forms
• 2 Coastline Chimera
• 2 Crackling Triton
• 1 Fate Foretold
• 1 Horizon Scholar
• 2 Lost in a Labyrinth
• 1 Mnemonic Wall
• 1 Nimbus Naiad
• 1 Omenspeaker
• 1 Prescient Chimera
• 1 Sealock Monster
• 2 Swan Song
• 1 Thassa's Bounty

• Black (11)
• 1 Asphodel Wanderer
• 1 Blood-Toll Harpy
• 1 Boon of Erebos
• 1 Cavern Lampad
• 1 Fleshmad Steed
• 2 Mogis's Marauder
• 1 Read the Bones
• 1 Returned Centaur
• 1 Sip of Hemlock
• 1 Viper's Kiss

• Red (11)
• 1 Akroan Crusader
• 1 Borderland Minotaur
• 1 Demolish
• 1 Flamespeaker Adept
• 1 Lightning Strike
• 1 Minotaur Skullcleaver
• 1 Portent of Betrayal
• 1 Rage of Purphoros
• 1 Satyr Rambler
• 1 Two-Headed Cerberus
• 1 Wild Celebrants

• Green (14)
• 2 Commune with the Gods
• 1 Leafcrown Dryad
• 1 Nessian Asp
• 1 Nylea's Disciple
• 2 Nylea's Emissary
• 2 Nylea's Presence
• 1 Satyr Piper
• 1 Savage Surge
• 2 Shredding Winds
• 1 Staunch-Hearted Warrior

• Land, Artifact, Multicolored (10)
• 1 Anvilwrought Raptor
• 1 Guardians of Meletis
• 2 Opaline Unicorn
• 1 Prowler's Helm
• 1 Pyxis of Pandemonium
• 1 Battlewise Hoplite
• 2 Destructive Revelry
• 1 Pharika's Mender

Buy This Deck

Build Process

White is the most obvious color here. Heliod is on the slow side but definitely still powerful, in Sealed anyway (not all that exciting in Draft, but still playable). I really want to live the dream with Heliod and Phalanx Leader. Speaking of Phalanx Leader, he can lead to some pretty absurd draws, which is another reason I’m heavily leaning toward white. As before, let’s arrange it by mana cost.

I’ll note a couple things first. I’ve listed Hopeful Eidolon under 4-mana because you almost never want to play it as a creature. I’m also playing some cards here that I don’t normally like to play, namely Setessan Battle Priest and Evangel of Heliod. The former is there because you really want as many cheap creatures as possible for Phalanx Leader. The latter is also there because of Phalanx Leader, but hey, as long as we’re playing Heliod, we might as well go balls-to-the-wall with white devotion. I’m leaning toward blue as a support color because Bident is insane in a deck like this, and it also lets us play Battlewise Hoplite. Let’s see what W/U looks like:

This looks pretty good to me. There’s a nice mana curve, although it’s a bit heavy on 4-drops. I would cut the Anvilwrought Raptor and one of the Coastline Chimeras from this and be happy with the deck. The only other option I would consider would be G/W, as it does offer some nice creatures, particularly the two copies of Nylea's Emissary. I’m a sucker for rares, though, and Bident is so good in this deck that it’s hard for me to pass it up.

"Final Deck"

• Lands (17)
• 9 Plains
• 8 Island

• Creatures (16)
• 1 Phalanx Leader
• 1 Setessan Battle Priest
• 1 Omenspeaker
• 1 Battlewise Hoplite
• 2 Lagonna-Band Elder
• 1 Nimbus Naiad
• 1 Observant Alseid
• 1 Hopeful Eidolon
• 1 Heliod, God of the Sun
• 1 Heliod's Emissary
• 1 Coastline Chimera
• 1 Sealock Monster
• 1 Prescient Chimera
• 1 Evangel of Heliod
• 1 Horizon Scholar

• Spells (7)
• 1 Gods Willing
• 1 Aqueous Form
• 1 Chosen by Heliod
• 1 Battlewise Valor
• 1 Fate Foretold
• 1 Divine Verdict
• 1 Bident of Thassa

Buy This Deck

How would you have built these Sealed pools? Let me know in the comments. I hope you guys got something out of this exercise. I know I did. If there’s interest, I can do some more Sealed pools next week as last-minute practice for Grand Prix Toronto.

Until next time,

Nassim Ketita

arcticninja on Magic Online

http://www.youtube.com/nketita