Rakdos Intolerant
I have returned to Ravnica, even though I’ve never been there in the first place.
Saturday saw the Pre-release Event for the new Magic expansion Return to Ravnica. I understand Ravnica was one of the most popular expansions in Magic’s history, though I wouldn’t know as I took a 15 year break from the game in order to pursue a mastery of the Sloth Style kung-fu. As such, the Pre-releases this weekend were a bit off the hook, or at least as off the hook as a crowd of 40 nerds playing Magic can get.
First, let’s talk the ridiculous popularity of the events. If you weren’t standing in line when a store opened, or better yet had preregistered, you were shit out of luck Saturday, and probably Sunday as well. I missed my spot on the waiting list by 15 seconds because I went to buy a sandwich. DAMN YOU SANDWICH! People were showing up to stores, asking if there were spaces available, and then driving down to the next store when they were turned away. And in testament to popularity of the set, they were actually making those drives, and multiple times, in hopes to get a chance to PLAY with the cards, not just grab them and sell them on eBay.
Next let’s talk format. Return to Ravnica is a bit different than the average Magic set because it’s not just a collection of cards connected by play balance and a loose Dragonlance/Forgotten Realms style fantasy story. Return to Ravnica is extremely bound up in the theme of guilds. The set features 5 guilds, each combining 2 of the primary colors in Magic, with a whole pile of multicolored cards. The guild idea is so core to the set that the Republican party is trying to strip their collective bargaining rights.
Multicolored cards are traditionally more difficult to play, and play WELL, especially by new players. Wizards of the Coast has been trying to make inroads into lowering the bar of entry for Magic, and Sealed event Prereleases are one of the ways they do so. This time their new and returning old player event featured a set with some pretty difficult to play cards. They solved this problem in a brilliant fashion, in my opinion, by creating specific card boxes for players to open at the event. Each guild had its own box, containing 5 regular boosters and 1 booster specifically for the guild you chose. Your guild booster had enough goodies specifically for your guild that basically no one could build a COMPLETE shitty deck (though I saw a lot of people who made their best efforts toward mediocrity).
These special boxes had a HUGE impact on what I want to talk about next – the actual play. It was FUN AS HELL. Because no one had a completely bum deck, the games were way more intense with far less complete blowouts than you usually see at a Sealed Event. What you opened in your boosters played far less of a part of the day, and who was standing in the winners circle at the end had more to do with how well you play than how lucky you were.
Each guild in the set has its own special play mechanic, and matching those up against each other was the most fun I’ve had in Magic since I started playing again 3 months ago. My guild was Azorius, the cops of Ravnica. Their special mechanic is called detain, which lets you shut down one or more of your opponents creatures for a turn while you breakdance and try to get in the footage Wizards is shooting at the event. Compared to a lot of the other guild mechanics, detain seems a bit weak at first. It’s temporary, generally only affects one of their guys, and often your guys can’t even attack when you do it. The Azorius guild is more about controlling the tempo, the rhythm and flow of the game than it is about impressive beatdowns. This is nerve wracking in a Limited event, where your tempo deck is usually destroyed by aggressive beatdown decks that just want to Mike Tyson your blood. It turns out, Azorius is the strongest of the guilds in Sealed. You feel nervous about your deck, but if your play is solid, suddenly you discover while you were fumbling around with the radio, your Winnebago of a deck has just turned your opponent into a long smear on the paved road to Loserville. It’s like when you’re looking for hot sauce and on a lark you take the little unmarked bottle off the shelf to try, then you eat some and it’s so hot your great-grandfather’s colon seizes and explodes, and you were never born. I hate it when that happens.
This Prerelease was so much fun I’d play in a few more if I could. I’d like to give the other guilds a shot, because I noticed some cool cards while I was busy stepping on my opponents inner children. Draft is going to be super fun for this set, and it’s also going to add a lot to the Standard field of play. Several of the cards will even make their way into Modern. So, get your ass out to a Friday Night Magic and Return to Ravnica, even if its your first time there.
Final Score: Azorius guild, 3-1 (beaten by an Azorius player that had better cards in his packs)
