You're sitting there with your friends at your LGS. In front of you are your 6 packs, and you're praying to Sol, Ursur, and James White for the universe to have given you the elusive combination of packs that will make Riptide the correct choice to run for your sealed pool. You open them up, count your different class cards, and sigh as you start assembling another Uzuri pile.
Anyone who has played Sealed a few times has probably had a version of this experience. Every draftable expansion of Flesh and Blood has had a Sealed format with its own version of this phenomenon. This is commonly due to some inherent numeric advantage a hero has over other heroes. It may be a matter of weapon rate or access to good blocking cards, or even in some cases that it's just easier to get certain heroes to "do their thing".
In Welcome to Rathe, Bravo and Rhinar tend to be over-represented, largely due to the efficiency of their weapons.
Arcane Rising introduced the world to the "Viserai pile", as he is able to take advantage of a random smattering of attacks and non-attacks rather easily.
Prism is the Monarch sealed default thanks to the power of her Heralds, despite not having a weapon that can attack on its own.
On release, Tales of Aria was all about Briar; and while Oldhim gained a lot of ground after Briar's errata, Lexi still finds herself in an uphill battle.
"Just force Fai" was a popular strategy in Uprising draft, and sealed was no different.
In Outsiders, Assassin is top dog. With access to the most hybrid cards, weapons that don't rely on synergy to have go again, and a healthy amount of good blocking cards, Uzuri is the pillar of the format.
Sealed gives players an opportunity to demonstrate their skill by making the most of a deck with a lower power level. It's one of the best parts about the format. But while that lower power level has its place, I think Flesh and Blood tends to be more fun when heroes get to do the cool, powerful things that makes them unique, and the standard Sealed format doesn't always allow for that.
Flesh and Blood is also more fun when more heroes are viable at a similarly high level. Plenty of players around the world don't have access to a group or local scene that makes drafting a consistently available option. So for players with smaller local scenes looking for a high-powered limited fix, what's the solution?
Allow me to propose: Super Sealed.
Super Sealed is a format variant I came up with and have played locally several times with a variety of sets. It's a fun experience where everyone gets to play with busted Sealed pools and really do the thing their hero was made to do - with the added bonus of guaranteeing a balanced pool of heroes is played. Not only is it a fun experience, but early on in a new set, building Super Sealed decks can be a great way to help you learn about the power of a class’s cards relative to one another. I unironically played Uprising Super Sealed in preparation for Uprising draft at Pro Tour: Lille, and it made for an excellent crash course in the format.
The overall gist of the Super Sealed format is this:
Each player gets assigned a hero (can be at random, but doesn't have to be)
Players open their [6 or 8] packs, keeping their own pool of generics, but giving all class cards to the player with that hero
Tip: People might prefer to keep class/talent Legendaries that they open after the Super Sealed event is done, which is fine! Just make sure everyone in the group is on the same page before packs start getting cracked!
Welcome to Rathe is the first set I ever tried Super Sealed with, and in hindsight I'm very glad it was. With 4 heroes and no talents, splitting things up is as simple as it gets. Rhinar, Bravo, Dorinthea, and Katsu each get all their class cards and whatever generics were in their players packs. WTR, in general, is a great limited environment, and Super Sealed WTR is no exception. Games tend to be grindy, hard-hitting slugfests, and each hero having a critical mass of their class cards helps the heroes feel very well balanced against each other.
But not every set has the straightforward composition of Welcome to Rathe, and because of that we need to make some adjustments for certain sets. Here are my top suggestions for Super Sealed for each other current draftable expansion:
Arcane Rising:
The biggest extra consideration for Arcane Rising is the distribution of Nullrune equipment. Heroes will end up with their own class's Arcane Barrier 1 equipment - which is enough for dealing with Viserai - but beyond that it can be fairly feast or famine for arcane defense, and a Super Sealed Kano will come out guns blazing. I recommend doing a face-up draft of all the generic common equipment in this set, to make sure that everyone has a fighting chance and doesn't simply get roasted in 3 turns.
Monarch:
Monarch introduces the complexity of talented cards. There are a few ways to handle this, and the quickest, simplest one is deciding on pairs of light and shadow heroes who will exchange their opposite talent cards with one another. Another option is to lay out all the talent cards face up, and have the Light and Shadow heroes each draft their respective talent cards until none remain.
Tales of Aria:
Tales added another wrinkle to things. Each person opens up cards for 1 talent they can't use, so what do you do with those? The fastest way is to pass the pile being given away to the hero with that 'primary' element: Earth to Briar, Lightning to Lexi, and Ice to Oldhim. Or you can change things up and pass them their 'secondary' elements instead. My favorite way is to have the heroes that share the talent of the cards being given away draft them all face up, with the hero whose primary element it is getting first pick.
Uprising:
Uprising can be handled in the same way as Tales of Aria: Fai and Dromai draft the Draconic cards while Iyslander plays by herself in a corner. Face-up drafting the generics between all 3 heroes can also be a big plus here, as a lopsided distribution of Phantasm poppers and Oasis Respites can have an outsized influence on games.
Outsiders:
Sticking with the recent trend of 3 hero sets, Outsiders will work in much the same way. There are Assassin/Ninja and Assassin/Ranger hybrid cards, so face-up draft those accordingly. Ninja and Ranger should each get first pick in their respective drafts, since Assassin gets to draft from both pools. I would also suggest face-up drafting the generic common equipment in this set, as equipment really helps to kick Outsiders decks into another gear.
Super Sealed is clearly a casual format, so let's embrace it! This is something that popped into my head one day and ended up really cool, but I am sure my guidelines aren't perfect. These are some other ideas I've had to help maintain balance and maximize fun.
Equipment Drafting:
Drafting generic equipment can help keeps things balanced and avoid situations where one person has a pile of chest equipment and nothing else. Put all the generic equipment in a face up pile, randomly determine the draft order, and draft until all the equipment is picked.
Generic Drafting:
Generics have vastly different value in different sets, and certain generics may as well be class cards for certain heroes while being unplayable for others. For instance, in Monarch, generic 6 power cards come at a premium. If you're inclined to balance out access to higher power or niche generics, face-up drafting them can be a fun way to do it!
40-Card Minimums:
This one just came from experience playing Super Sealed with a few different sets. With so many cards from which to build a deck, cutting down to 30 is a more difficult task, and my playgroup found 40-card decks easier to assemble. This is particularly helpful for the sets that feature 3 heroes rather than 4, as you'll be getting even more cards than with the 4-hero sets.
Maybe You Need a Maximum?
This rule idea came from a recent twitter discussion with Bryan Gottlieb. If you think someone might try and cheese their way to a bunch of fatigue wins by running 20 more cards than everyone else, feel free to avoid that issue altogether by implementing a maximum deck size.
Super Sealed has become my favorite casual way to play Flesh and Blood, which is why I wanted to share it with the world. Your LGS will love it since it helps move product (much like drafting). So, the next time you're planning an Armory event, consider giving it a shot!
