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For Sealed this year, I ended up putting together what I can only describe as a defensive stall/attrition deck, which I have not really seen before in the category (and never attempted).  Below is how I reached the final product, and why I made the decisions along the way.

When choosing the packs, I was torn.  There are lots of debates as to what to choose, because they all have potentially-great additions to at least one of the decks you can pull.  Kings is probably the most consistent pack, but as I said to Chris F. upon registering, “I feel like I need to gamble to have a chance to win.”  Therefore, I picked 3 Priests packs.  Here are the reasons that these packs are my choice each Sealed:

• The potential to add Teal to the hero-starved starters as a viable third brigade.  As this was the introduction of the brigade, there are many potential pulls that would make priests an option to include, and they can be very strong against the starter deck defenses.
• Purple: Large kings (3) help with the lack of heroes.  The set also has several great enhancements that work well in these starter decks.  Unified Kingdom, Prayer of Faith, and Haman’s Plot Exposed are auto-adds, and Pentecost is a strong play as well.
• Silver: A couple of mediocre angels (3), but a Protection of Angels is an incredibly strong pull.
• White: There is a large Covenant Keepers hero that is not killed by Ishbibenob.  Also, the musicians (3) and their enhancements work really well with the Ruth component of the J deck.  Sing and Praise is recurrable with Ethan, and he, Heman, and Asaph can all band together.  Fellowship is almost certainly a battle winner (watch out for Coliseum Lions though) and a fantastic draw, while Bronze Cymbals adds a huge power boost before playing a battle-winner, considering the lack of CBP (cannot be prevented) in the starter decks.  First Fruits, like Pentecost above, is a strong play for the draw.
• Gold: Large heroes (3) again help with having few heroes.  However, the enhancements are probably not going to help you, and would not help that offense.
• Black: Malchus is fantastic in the I deck, since if he loses he generates a soul, and is thus one of the few ways you can actually counter soul drought in Sealed.  Otherwise, you have several large characters in the High Priests (3), though little in the way of actual useful cards.

In the end, I received the “I” deck (Disciples/Angels, Philistines/Israelites) and opened my 3 Priests packs.  Here is the deck I ended up with:

Total Cards: 55
Heroes (9)
Andrew
Angel at Bethesda
Gabriel
Gathering Angel
James
John
Legion of Angels
Peter
Melchizedek (Add)

Good Enhancements (14)
Angelic Guidance
Angelic News
Authority of Peter
Eaten by Worms
Fishers of Men
Glad Tidings
Loaves and Fishes
Overwhelming Presence
Raising Lazarus
Walking on Water
Wonderment
You Are the Christ
Unified Kingdom (Add)
Holy unto the Lord (Add)
Miraculous Catch (Cut)
Water to Wine (Cut)

Evil Characters (10)
Delilah
Ishbibenob
Nabal
Saph
Selfish Kinsman
Shaphat
Sanballat (Add)
Unfaithful Priests (Add)
Unfaithful Priests (Add)
Prince of Tyrus (Add)
Achan  (Cut)
Lahmi  (Cut)

Evil Enhancements (11)
Achan’s Sin
Ashtaroth Worship
Bad Dealings
Ishbibenob’s Spear
Ishbibenob’s Sword
Lahmi’s Spear
Sin in the Camp
To Each His Own
Wickedness of Delilah
Shimei’s Malicious Curse (Add, traded for with demon support)
King Saul’s Jealousy (Add, traded for with demon support)

Lost Souls (7)
Basic x6
Resurrection

Dominants (4)
Angel of the Lord
Christian Martyr
Son of God
Strife

Brown became my main evil brigade based on my packs.  I actually pulled 3 copies of Unfaithful Priests, but based on the number of enhancements you need to hit in each deck (silver or white), it was not beneficial to add the third, and only 2 made the cut.  Sanballat was a beast regardless of the deck I faced; if my opponent used Gabriel or Elders of the City to search out a battle-winner when a negate was available as well in discard, then I knew that they did not have one in hand.  Blocking with him then sent that battle-winner back to discard, and allowed me to use up their negates in a futile attempt to win by numbers (the defense in the brown was sufficient).  One game, I also used him to block late-game against a King’s version of Gabriel my opponent pulled.  They were going to take away a powerful evil enhancement in my depleted deck, leaving me vulnerable, but by negating the search I could keep that card and hope to use it next block (I did end up drawing it the next turn).  King Saul’s Jealousy was often a second Strife in my deck (especially against the Disciples) and saw a great deal of use.  Shimei’s Malicious Curse never failed to win a battle, and allowed me to waste quite a few of my opponent’s enhancements and heroes each time.

After the additions and subtractions, I found my deck as a defensive-reliant stall and destruction deck that removed the end-game options for my opponent.  The black in the deck allowed me to cross-table band (to destroy their defense with their own battle-winners) or force them to use up those resources through the giants and their weapons.  After enhancements hit discard in this early game process, I used Unfaithful Priests to start removing cards from the game, and my opponent would quickly run out of options to recur in both decks.  Meanwhile, I waited for my small number of heroes (as I got no real boost from my packs in that regard) to come out, and whittled away at their defense with careful rescue attempts until I could set up my end-game James and John band or Gabriel victory recursion.

The problem with this strategy was that I would often have to give up souls in the early game to force the resources into my opponent’s discard pile, and I was slow to rescue myself.  We were almost always the last table done, but I succeeded in half my games to almost or completely shut out my opponent at the end (leaving only 3 heroes alive with no enhancement support in one case) and I always managed force my way through to get the final souls.

Since I was relying on this strategy, my differential was abysmal.  Even though I was undefeated at 6-0 in the end, my games were 5-3, 5-4, 5-4, 5-4, 5-4, and 5-3 for a total of +8.  I had to get lucky in one of the games that my opponent had Son of God in his last 4 cards, and that I drew John to stop Quirinius from drawing it (it was indeed the top card when we checked afterwards, and in the previous turn he draw Christian Martyr, which was the only block he had left…epic game).  In each other game, I had to rely on the brown in my deck being good enough to stall or shut-out in the end-game while I waited for my heroes, and I had to make zero mistakes or I would surely lose.  It ended up working, but had I lost a single game (even the last one), I would not have placed due to the differential.

Would I take the gamble with Priests packs again, and would I play a heavy defense again if it were handed to me?  Probably.  But I would seek advice from a cardiologist first.

To read advice I would give on avoiding mistakes, please see the Land of Redemption article I wrote on the subject.