Planechase 2012

Planechase is out on Magic Online! Or at least it's out on the beta client. But since I have access to the beta client, it's all good.

So far I'm not a fan of the cascade deck. Cascade is a fun mechanic, but I played two or three games and never managed to do anything interesting. It was disappointing.

I played one game with the devour deck. It was pretty bonkers--I dropped an Awakening Zone followed by a Dragonlair Spider, followed by a 10/10 Preyseizer Dragon, followed by a 10/10 Thunder-Thrash Elder, at which point everyone else had scooped (and I still had all these Flings!). I'd call that a good experience.

And I played a couple games with the aura deck. Some very sweet plays there. One game I played Pollenbright Wings on a 9-power creature to start making 9 saprolings a turn. Then I rolled chaos on Astral Arena to kill them all...and pump my Lumberknot to 39/39, before enchanting it with Spirit Mantle and swinging in for the win. Good times. Another game I only got Lumberknot up to 11 counters with the help of a pair of enchanted Dreampod Druids, but that plus a Rancor was enough.

The ninja deck is pretty cool. I played one game with it and managed to do some cool ninja stuff. Didn't win, but it was fun. Towards the end of the game I flipped the Warp World phenomenon and it gave me like ten creatures and one land--pretty sweet, but unfortunately my opponent got a Broodmate Dragon that killed me.

So yeah, lots of fun. I like it. I want to play some more of it. This weekend is a special incentive event, so anyone who plays at least two Planechase free-for-all games, participates in at least two Avacyn Restored 4-man Swiss drafts, and fills out a feedback survey gets three free booster packs added to their account. I love those! Free stuff! Yes!

There are some weird bugs and interesting changes in the new beta client, but I don't think I'm allowed to talk about them. I'm also not allowed to take screenshots of my games, which makes me sad because I had some great screenshots I would have liked to share. But oh well, it's free.