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<p><br></p><p>After months of excitement and anticipation, today we had our first taste of competitive Artifact! Beyond the Summit (BTS) is hosting a closed-beta draft tournament, casted by Luminousinverse, Fwosh and Swim, in addition to analysis from Savjz, Lifecoach, Hyped and Joel Larson. The day started by watching Lifecoach’s draft. It took awhile for Lifecoach to find a direction, as the packs were not giving a clear signal. That changed when Lifecoach a second Bounty, followed soon after by an Iron Fog Goldmine and a Horn of the Alpha. Expensive items like Horn of the Alpha are generally not strong in draft, as they are so difficult to buy, but given a good density of gold generation, Lifecoach was able to put together a decent red black green Econ deck.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><img src="https://www.googleapis.com/download/storage/v1/b/artifaction-gg.appspot.com/o/articlesImages%2F57db221a76e221d102f26946abe71cab?generation=1541957011294206&amp;alt=media" width="230" style="display: block; margin: auto;"></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Though Lifecoach had a difficult draft, you wouldn’t know it watching his first match. His opponent FeelsGoodMan was on a 3 blue, 1 black, 1 green build. The squishy blue heroes were tracked and killed one-by-one to the point that Lifecoach was able to buy out his entire item deck two games in a row! The real highlight of round one was the nailbiter between Savjz and Bloody. Game three was a long grind, which favored Bloody’s deck, given the 2 copies of Sniper (giving access to 6 copies of Assassinate), and Time of Triumph. Unfortunately for her, none of these haymakers showed up, allowing Savjz to sneak out a win.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>In round two we followed MTG Pro Joel Larson with his blue green control deck. His deck featured 2 copies of Zeus, meaning was got a full 6 copies of Thundergod’s Wrath, as well as an Ogre Magi for a chance to get even more copies. His opponent MELO was playing an aggressive red blue deck. Game one was a brutal display of the power of Thundergod’s Wrath + Satyr Magician. The second game was much closer – by the late game MELO had completely abandoned the left lane while Joel Larson had abandoned the middle. All the action came down to the third lane, where Joel was barely able to pull out a draw on the back of a Thunderhide Pack dealing lethal siege damage at the same time that MELO’s army busted down Joel’s tower. The third game felt more like the first, with Thundergod’s Wrath dominating the late game, leaving Joel undefeated after the second round.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Round 3 we once again watched Joel Larson, but this time he battled against Hearthstone pro HotMEOWTH. Game three was especially exciting, as Joel fell way behind in the early turns, as the opponent built up a mountain of gold from early hero kills. HotMEOWTH used this gold to buy up a pile of equipment, only to see it all wiped away by Joel’s Corrosive Mist. Joel then set up a triple kill Thundergod’s Wrath on turn 8, which reversed the momentum, and allowed Joel to finish the first draft 3-0.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>For the second draft we continued to follow Joel Larson, as he put together a monstrous red blue tempo deck, including a copy of Ursa, Bristleback, Beastmaster, and 2 Ogre Magi. Given his 3-0 finish in the first draft, the panel felt he had a very good chance of making the top 8 of the event. Joel was also the feature match in round 4, where we watched him face off against VanKelsier’s red green black deck. Both games were tight, but Joel was once again able to work out a win, ultimately taking game two by dogpiling the mid-lane Ancient. Primal Roar also did some serious work, disrupting VanKelsier’s plans. We finished out the round watching bukka take down Bloody in a three-game set with a grindy GBR deck on the back of a Mist of Avernus.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>In the Fifth round we followed Hyped as he faced against his teammate RobAJG. Not only was it the Team Liquid Mirror, but the strategies were similar as well, as both had built econ-focused decks, each including a copy of Vesture of the Tyrant. While Vesture of the Tyrant has been hyped as an all-star for competitive play, we had not yet seen it in action much, so it was time to see if it lived up to the excitement. Game one was defined by Hyped initially going hard in the middle lane with the help of the Oath, then pivoting to pressure all three lanes, eventually pushing Rob out of the game. The second game was quite explosive, as both players were sitting at about 25 gold after the second turn. RobAJG was able to find two copies of Calszureme Hourglass, but Hyped grabbed the Vesture of the Tyrant, which eventually carried him to victory. Hyped was able to fight through Hourglass’s lock effect on the back of his Vesture, to pull out a 2-0 victory, moving up to 4-1.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p><img src="https://www.googleapis.com/download/storage/v1/b/artifaction-gg.appspot.com/o/articlesImages%2F720952c0684fd662624937e8e9350678?generation=1541957047128492&amp;alt=media" width="230" style="display: block; margin: auto;"></p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>In a day of swingy, dramatic, and complex games, round six was probably the highlight. We followed Lifecoach as he battled against Dane in a red green midrange mirror. Now, red green midrange might sound like an auto-pilot-man-fight-smash-fest, but creep placement, play sequencing and hero deployment are incredibly important. Game one Lifecoach had a strong showing with his Cheating Death, though Dane was able to battle through by chaining haymakers like Divine Intervention, Hand of God, and Berserker’s Call. Game two looked like it would be a bloodbath, as Lifecoach was struggled to keep up with his opponent’s card quality, but through some creative playmaking and lucky rolls from Cheating Death, Lifecoach was able to grind out a win due to a placement error from the opponent in the late game. Early in game three Dane moved all-in on the third lane. It looked as if this would be an over-commitment, and Lifecoach would be able to win the game through lanes one and two, but Dane had a plan. After killing the tower Dane hard-committed into the right lane, deploying a Mist of Avernus from lane two, and then jammed a Disciple of Nevermore off his splashed Sniper to set up a one turn Ancient kill. When looking at Lifecoach’s reaction after the game, he seemed to be thinking “I’m not even mad. I’m impressed!”</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>The last round of the day was a heartbreaker. We stopped in to watch the Chinese player KG Chamberlain battle against the Gwent pro Mogwai. Mogwai took game one before we came by to watch, but as we joined game two KG Chamberlain was mere inches from victory. Chamberlain’s deck was a sweet 4-color masterpiece, headlined by Time of Triumph.&nbsp;Moments before he could close out the game KG Chamberlain lost his connection, and therefore surrendered the match. In a day full of heroes, the only villain was Chinese internet. We also had a chance to watch an nmal (believed to be TI champion KuroKy) crush Teldo with a deck described by Swim as “the best draft deck I have ever seen”.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>At the end of the day we were left with a clean break to top 8, where all the 6-1 and 7-0 players made the elimination rounds. The players who will be playing in the top 8 tomorrow are Joel Larson (heffaklumpen), Feno, Dane, GameKing, an naml (KuroKy), space_loner, Mogwai and Naiman.</p><p><br></p><p><img src="https://www.googleapis.com/download/storage/v1/b/artifaction-gg.appspot.com/o/articlesImages%2Fb434f5f6c06219948a6e11666cb003c5?generation=1541957066389688&amp;alt=media" style="display: block; margin: auto;"></p><p><br></p><p>Congratulations to them, and we all look forward to more great games tomorrow! Be sure to tune in to <a href="https://steam.tv/artifact/" target="_blank">steam.tv/artifact</a> at 9am PST to catch tomorrow’s action.</p>