Actual paper Magic

I haven't played paper Magic since the last PTQ, and rather than sit at home and blow away dollars on 8-4's, I decided to actually get out, enjoy the unusually beautiful Seattle weather, and do a paper draft in Redmond.

I ended up 4-0'ing with a very odd Esper deck splashing Red for Blood Cultist and activating Vein Drinker. Here's what made the cut.

1x Grixis Illusionist
1x Zombie Outlander
1x Tidehollow Sculler
1x Esper Battlemage
1x Blood Cultist
1x Aven Windwatcher
1x Brackwater Elemental
1x Viscera Dragger
2x Fatestitcher
1x Tower Gargoyle
2x Dreg Reaver
1x Vein Drinker

1x Bone Splinters
1x Path to Exile
1x Courier's Capsule
1x Yoke of the Damned
1x Gleam of Resistance
2x Oblivion Ring
1x Resounding Wave
1x Kiss of the Amesha

1x Jund Panorama
1x Esper Panorama
1x Unstable Frontier
1x Mountain
4x Swamp
4x Plains
5x Island

(not sure about the mix of Swamps, Plains, and Island, but it was definitely 5-4-4)

So initially I thought the deck was pretty slow and would get blown out by a Bant deck pretty easily. Luckily, I did not play against a Bant deck, and against everything else the deck was pretty solid. I elected to draw every time I had the choice, since I was definitely a control deck and I thought my mana was atrocious, and the amount of removal I had, plus double Fatesticher + Esper Battlemage and Blood Cultist, made winning relatively easy in the late game, be it with Vein Drinker or Dreg Reaver.

A couple of notes about my actual play:

I started out writing down every card my opponent plays again, but then I noticed that as I was taking a note, my opponent would make a play and I'd instinctively say "Sure" without even considering the board and my hand. After that, I'd only write down cards when I truly had idle time, and then even only noted important cards like tricks and guys that actually change the board.

I'm still not finding the most correctly play fast enough. In my last game, I made a couple of not-so tight plays, but luckily my opponent didn't make me pay for them. Maybe I need to slow it down a little bit, but I think it was more a lack of concentration. I need to eliminate the number of times I say "Wait, that play was awful" immediately after I make plays. I do that a lot.

Anyway, for my efforts I got credit for at least three more drafts at Redmond, a sweet playmat, and foil Path to Exile #2. Magic is fun when you win. :)