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On the surface you are quite an inefficient removal spell. Four mana for just -4-4, heck Dark Deed was recently printed and there you get the same effect for only 2 mana. That is the thing with removal, if you pay less mana for your removal spell than your opponent did for their creature you can get some nice tempo out of the play, especially if you are also clearing a blocker to get through some damage. But even though you are an inefficient removal spell, last Friday night, my dear friend Danny completely wrecked me twice with you.
You are not just a removal spell Soul Enervation. You are a synergy piece. No wonder that you are part of my Synergy Cube, full with ‘leave graveyard’ synergies. And that is why Danny drafted you, because of your synergies. He drafted a green and black ‘leave graveyard’ deck. I also drafted black, together with red, and I picked up almost all the removal in the draft. Danny didn’t pick up a lot of removal, he only had you, Soul Enervation.
The thing in a Synergy Cube is that removal is usually very strong because destroying something to tear apart a synergie usually nullifies other cards as well. So my strategy in the draft was to draft all the removals. Danny didn’t pick up any non-synergistic removal in black, and the other red drafter, Oskar, didn’t pick up any non-synergistic red removal. Oskar had a red and blue looting deck with cards like Monument of Endurance and Irencrag Pyromancer. Danny was punished by Oskar for not drafting removal, because Oskar burned his face to shreds with these powerful cards. Personally with all my removal I had quite an easy matchup against Oskar, tearing up his synergies. I didn’t have an easy matchup against Danny.
The thing with my strategy was that I picked removal over cards like Moonshadow (which Danny picked up) and Marauding Mako (which Oskar picked up). My deck had a hard time applying pressure. And against Danny and all his green and black recursion like Vanille, Cheerful l’Cie and Deadwood Treefolk my removal was not as efficient. I had to race him before his late game would run away with the game. Both games I got him to 3 life, before you, Soul Enevervation, hit the battlefield. Not only killing my best creature, but afterwards slowly getting Danny out of reach, one drain at a time.
I could state that Danny was lucky that he drew you both games, because without your removal and lifegain he wouldn’t have won those games. But I should have drafted better. I had an abundance of removal, where I should have drafted more aggressive creatures to be able to pressure my opponent better. Danny should have drafted a couple of removal spells more instead of purely focussing on the synergies. A drafting lesson for us both. But I do love that the best removal spell of the evening, is on the surface, just an inefficient removal spell.
With love,
Hanjo
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