Duskmourn has been a hit set, packing lots of playable, power-packed cards like the Overlords, the Enduring Enchantment Creatures, and even a big flying eyeball (Abhorrent Oculus) that has taken everyone by surprise. To also celebrate Halloween, we pulled together a few sealed products as prizes for a beginner-friendly Commander event, held at Singapore game store Hideout.
The event format was simple: 2 rounds of Commander, with the top 3 winners walking away with preconstructed Commander decks. But to make it friendly for the newer players (and just more fun overall), we applied some deck-building rules to both fit the Halloween and beginner-friendly themes. These were the rules we went with (feel free to adapt it to your own events!):
Commander Restrictions:
- Must contain black in its color identity
- Must include any of a list of Halloween-related creature types (e.g. vampire, bat, horror, nightmare etc)
Deck-Building Restrictions:
- Full cost has to be less than $120
- Each card has to be less than $3
- No tutors, i.e. searching of Library (except for Lands)
- No infinite combos
The black color identity requisite speaks for itself, since Halloween is associated with horror and dark magic. We also wanted the Commanders to be the face of the occasion, hence they had to have one of the pre-determined creature types.
How did we come up with the pricing restrictions? This was based off general research and observations on how a price limit will affect the card pool. By having a cap of each card price, you’d avoid seeing high-powered staples such as the Moxes or even Fetch/Shock Lands. This keeps the event accessible to newer players and not give veterans an advantage by having a larger collection. With a $3 cap, it was enough to include cards that are bulk-rare and also good Uncommon cards such as Counterspell and Sol Ring legal.
Event 1st Round Commanders and Groupings
With 14 player signed up (free entry), we had to split everyone into 2 pods of 4, and 2 pods of 3. It would have been ideal to have 4 pods of 4 but on the bright side, 3-player games go by faster.
The Final Round and Winning Deck
The ‘finals’ consisted of the 4 players who had topped their individual pods. The Commanders were:
- Clavileno, First of the Blessed
- Wick, the Whorled Mind
- Guts, true Soul Zealot + Agent of the Iron Throne (Background)
- Anowon, the Ruin Thief
Living up to the “winners”-only title, the final game was an even match all the way to the end. Clavileno created lots of flying demons, while Guts tried to steal creatures and sacrifice them to its ability. Wick tried to build up a giant, infected snail to deal 10 poison counter to everyone, while Anowon tried to swing in for whatever damage was available in order to mill the opponent and draw cards.
Wick fell first, when a bunch of goaded creatures had nowhere to aim except to the black rat. Next was Clavileno as all his creatures were tapped out, leaving 0 blockers. Down to the final 2, Anowon came out tops by going wide and using evasion to deal the final blow. See the winning deck list!
What Were the Prizes?!
Overall winner Anowon took away the Creative Energy Collector’s Edition from Modern Horizons 3. These collector’s editions are completely in Ripple foiling, which is sure to stand out in any game table. It’s even got a nice price tag to it if one doesn’t want to open it up.
The 2nd place winner (who topped another pod in the 2nd round) was Yahenni, Undying Partisan, going home with the Commander Party preconstructed deck from Commander Masters set! See the deck list.
The event’s 3rd place winner turned out to be Rayami, First of the Fallen. With a stacked deck filled with keywords such as Indestructible, Hexproof and Protection, it becomes a powerhouse if not stopped early. The winner took away a Bedeckered Brokers preconstructed deck from Streets of New Capenna! Check out the deck list.
For the rest who didn’t win a deck, each walked away with Duskmourn Play Booster packs. Thank you all for taking part in this Halloween-inspired, Commander giveaway event!
