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M10 drafts are still all the rage so there's another one after the link.
Well, I'm still feeling lost and I want to see three other decks besides mine before entering back into the single elimination queues so Swiss this time.
Pack One
Pick One:
Wow can I not open good cards. What to take here? Not on the rare and none of the uncommons are something I want to first pick. That leaves the commons. The only card that I can even take from here that I know will make my main deck is the 2/1 flier. I really don't like anything else from here accept for the Horned Turtle which is definitely not a first pick.
Pick Two:
OK, another pack of mediocre cards with the one stand out being the 3/2 flier and the beginnings of another u/w flier deck.
Pick Three:
Well, I'm not taking red cards, the Pyroclasm is quite late, but red in general is not deep enough for me to want to switch out the aggro blue picks.
Pick Four:
I know I don't like the Servant that much, but it does usually swallow a removal spell and when played on turn two will get a hit or two in pretty reliably. I'll cut it and probably play the flier and hope to get good blue throughout packs two and three.
Pick Five:
Two of them? OK, I'll cut the best blue card here.
Pick Six:
Now I'm getting a plan of playing some quick fliers and holding the ground with big dudes and counter spells. This counter is about the best card in the pack anyway.
Pick Seven:
Speaking of big dudes on the ground, this is the guy that I want for that duty and I'm going to take it. I hope I get another chance at a Negate.
Pick Eight:
Wheel the very excellent reprint of Remove Soul? I will happily take it here.
Pick Nine:
Knew it. The blue card is for me, comes down quick, or later with counter spell mana up.
Pick Ten:
The packs are drying up now. I'm not really afraid of any of these cards, but if I'm going to play the two Servants, I think I will put my picks in lowering the chances of a cheap spell destroying him.
Pick Eleven:
A nice late gift in case I don't get a Divination.
Pick Twelve:
I almost thought that was a Negate there.
Pick Thirteen:
Pick Fourteen:
Pick Fifteen:
Pack Two
Pick One:
Another pack of crap for me. I have some options though. Thus far, my luck with the Armored Ascension has been terrible as I get wrecked by so many of the commons in the set, like Excommunicate, Divine Verdict, Pacifism and the like. I'll take the card that pushes a tempo strategy of quick fliers.
Pick Two:
Wish I could take the Bolt, but I don't think so. I like the Cloak too, but the Passage negates an alpha strike or an Overrun while hopefully doing their creatures in.
Pick Three:
Dang some decent red, looking like my right hand drafter is pretty happy since I didn't see a decent red card in the whole first pack, he is probably liking these picks. For now, more quick fliers for my pile.
Pick Four:
Nice green cards. I think I should have cut one here as I don't yet have a solution to big fatties as of right now. I have seen the Soul Warden hit the board and gain over ten life in this format, for one mana, that's pretty efficient. I'll give it a shot here.
Pick Five:
Multiple drake creatures are making me want to try to combo with the Coat of Arms, not. I'll go for the excellent blue removal spell.
Pick Six:
This should finish out the top end of my curve for ground pounders while I hope to get more decent fliers.
Pick Seven:
Not much left. I'll cut a removal spell over one of the other cards I won't be playing.
Pick Eight:
Now that's what I like to see, Snapping Drake number three is nice.
Pick Nine:
Another wheeled Turtle for my deck.
Pick Ten:
Not playing it.
Pick Eleven:
A nice late card in the Owl hopefully letting me get the best of my draws early.
Pick Twelve:
Pick Thirteen:
Pick Fourteen:
Pick Fifteen:
Pack Three
Pick One:
The Twincast is good, but the Control Magic is just so much better. Hopefully, the Divination will come back around.
Pick Two:
I don't want to put too much risk into Servants as they die to cards like the one I'm taking from this pack.
Pick Three:
Nice.
Pick Four:
Yes, I will play three of these.
Pick Five:
Now for the king of 4/4 fliers at uncommon and below.
Pick Six:
Yes, I'll play four of these.
Pick Seven:
Not sure I'll have room for three of these as my deck is looking pretty solid to this point.
Pick Eight:
Just duplicates now, not sure I'll play both though.
Pick Nine:
I'd rather have the sideboard solution for tough artifacts and enchantments over the battle trick from this pack.
Pick Ten:
I'll take the cheap bounce spell here over more risky Servants.
Pick Eleven:
Pick Twelve:
Pick Thirteen:
Pick Fourteen:
Pick Fifteen:
Final Deck
Every creature but four of them are fliers and I have solutions for bomb creatures both before and after the fact. Plus, cards to even out my draws. I'm hoping to get some fliers out then hold back with Turtles and Essence Scatters. And if I tap out and they land a monster, I can take it if I need to.
Matches
My last draft landed me at 1760, here's hoping for a gain from what should be a very consistent deck. Here's my starter:
Not a very good hand and an easy mull to these:
Much better, I keep. My opponent throws away his Giant Growth and one of his creatures early in the game but his draw has a lot of removal and he plays it out nicely.
You see the land difference there? I have missed a few land drops while all my spells are at five and above. When I play out my topdecked creature and it also sees a removal spell, the game is sealed.
Even though he gave me a two for none, he got back a three for none when I couldn't get my fifth land, hope they don't all go this poorly. Looking better already with these seven for game two:
One, two, three and four drops all while setting myself up for goodness, here we go. Ponder on turn one let's me set up a turn three Illusionary Servant. I don't mind if he uses a removal spell on him as it will let my other guys stick around longer. He doesn't have the amazing draw that he had last game though and he is on the draw while my fast start has him on his heels early.
He is eventually able to kill the Servant, but not before I have pretty much put him out of outs, all while not taking a single point of damage.
OK, let's go to game three. Game two was what I was thinking my deck would be like. I start with this hand:
Not fast, but powerful. Plus, I have a good chance of drawing something decent and I can play out the big guys, I keep. I draw some guys to hold the ground and I only get in one hit with the Air Elemental before it is tapped down for good.
That's OK, I have another flier in hand and many more in my deck. I get in a couple attacks and when I draw the Mind Control, I save it for anything that might be a threat and when he plays out his guy, taking it for my team earns a concession.
A win, cool. Not much of a gain though as I am now at 1764. I'm just hoping for more of game number two for the rest of the draft. I start the second match with this hand:
Another mulligan, bummer. I kept a hand similar to this back in Lorwyn days and I paid for it with a loss so I'm going to try a new six:
Much better, I keep as I will have the flier and more fliers after I set up my deck. Unfortunately, my plan of holding the ground while being aggressive in the air is ended by a maindeck Deathmark and his two guys are doing more damage than my guy.
I continue playing out guys but he has removal for my big damage guys all while getting in with pumped Looming Shades.
His removal has put him ahead to a situation where I cannot win with my topdecked Island.
Not happy with the mulligan situation and losing there but it did seem like my opponent's draw was a bit fortunate and I hope to turn it around with this hand:
Not amazing, but I've got some nice fliers and any land will let me play a nice defensive guy to help me get my fliers online. I end up drawing just fine and get a nice start after my two-drop flier gets killed by his Deathmark. My Servant ate his Doom Blade and I'm hoping to draw more fliers to get through. I have counter magic and open lands for his plays but I was not expecting his not creature plays.
That pretty much stops me cold and we lock up for a while in a stalemate. Why couldn't I find a Sleep in all that good blue that got passed to me? I eventually think it's time to force some damage through and go for an attack hoping to get some life taken off of his total and I don't see a way for him to not lose some advantage or take some decent damage in the process. He surprises me with a Glorious Charge and takes out many of my guys while only losing one of his while he only takes one damage and now it's not looking good for my plan. I have to lose a couple guys to prevent his Shade from getting out of hand.
My opponent ends up giving me about six or seven extra draws this game as I should not have survived as long as I did and even though I finally drew into a solution for his Armored Ascension, it's too little too late.
I remember being flooded for quite a bit of this game and even though my opponent tried to let me draw out, he didn't draw any lands while I was slowly killed. You know that I lost a lot of points here. 1752 is my new rating, ouch. No biggie, I'll just win against an extremely highly rated opponent in round three. I start with this:
Another mulligan, not a good start. Six:
Better, drops and removal any Island and it will be tough for my opponent. I play out my flier and my opponent Fabricates for a Howling Mine on turn three. I draw more dudes and counter a couple of his big guys and he finally lands a big guy which earns my Pacifism.
He Traumatizes me late in the game and I see that his plan is actually one of decking so now I know I must play aggressive and end the game as quickly as possible from here on out. I side in Unsummon and Cancel to further my plan over a couple cards that weren't going to do any good in this battle. I start game two with these:
Decent start, I keep. My opponent has a turn two Merfolk Looter and continues to hit lands until turn five when he casts Traumatize. No biggie, I have a decent board presence but not when he double Tome Scours me and puts out his Howling Mine to end the game by decking on turn seven.
Talk about turbo mill, I hope that was a god draw as I start game three with these:
Looking good, I keep. I get a nice aggressive start while he does not traumatize me on turn five. My fliers smash him low and we trade off guys but I use my cards to keep my guys on the board until he finally does not have a solution and I pull out the win.
Good thing too as I was flooding again.
Summary
Turns out, he was pretty highly rated and I gained nine points going to 1761 for a one point gain on the entire draft. I had been wanting to try a deck like his after seeing late Tome Scours in every draft. I figured a first pick Traumatize would be necessary as well. Some Safe Passages, Horned Turtles and a Wall of Frost would probably do the trick. Looters, counter magic and card draw to finish it off. I'll keep my eyes open for it in the future. For now, I got the two packs as prize and I didn't see the eventual winner's deck but I bet it had an amazing bomb.
Until the next one (most likely not Swiss),
draftbetter
5 Comments to “MTGO Draft 106”
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I like black more than white in this set so ill go for the black knight p1p1 over the 2/1 flyer, Im also not a fan of the illusory servants, i nearly refuse to play them entirely, much like creatuer enchants, but yea if they draw removal its fine, what sucks is when your opponents 1 mana combat tricks take them out or tappers or seducers ect, nice to see another post from ya. (Still dont like swiss?, more gameplay same pack reward from this one.)
Hi DB,
You have a stream of bad luck with opening M10. I know there are some good first picks in there. But you never see them. I like the deck you build, but I would not pick the 2/1 flyer as first pick.
I think your deck is fine because you had some lousy cards in those boosters. But the only card worth of a first pick was the black Knight. I think a first turn sleep or serra or stuff like that can make you go for white blue. There are a lot of uncommens that make people go to blue or white. You did not open one of those. When you play black in a 2 colour deck the knight is a very strong card.
But looking afterwards you ended up with a blue deck splash white that was very strong. So nice job. Hope that you get some some real cards next time instead of having mediocre options.
First off…play Cancel. Your deck has almost no removal and basically gets blown out by Pyroclasm. Excommunicate, a Horned Turtle, or an Illusionary Servant are all worse than Cancel.
Secondly, you should have sided in the Unsummon versus the BW player. The shade + pump and the great amounts of removal make Unsummon pretty good for you.
Finally, Im not sure how game 2 played out in the second round but when you have double essence scatter in hand then Im curious how he got the Dread Warlock into play.
Your going first…turn 2 pegasus, he deathmarks, turn 3 Illusionary Servant, he Doomblades it, turn 4 I probably quickly pass the turn, especially since it looks like youve drawn all land at that point. If you had drawn the Sage Owl then the obvious T4 play is to cast the Owl and leave 2-mana open for Scatter. If not…then youve drawn all land and know you can cast the turtle Turn 5 with Scatter mana open and drop the Drake T6 with Scatter mana open.
Casting the Drake is a high risk, low reward play on an open board T4. Hes shown you double Shade game one…he will outrace you with him and you have no answer for it in hand. You cannot play the drake that turn with double Essence Scatter in hand…plain and simple. Passing the turn is by far the best play.
Im fine with the deck you drafted. I take the Merfolk Lord pick 4 pack one and the Terramorphic Expanse over the Illusionary Servant pick 5 pack one. I also like the idea of taking two Cancels and picking up one of the X/X serpents. Consider the serpent the same as the Siege Mostodon. On turn 5 hes probably a 3/3 or a 4/4 and late game he can be a 6/6 or greater wall. Much better than what the Mostodon does for the deck, actually.
-M
Draftwise, I would have gone green in pack 1 with unicorn or black with the knight. I understand how good fliers can be though. The pick I really disagree with is the excommunicate over the armored ascension. It can be very bomby and the point of putting it into a w/u deck is to protect whatever it is cast on. Hopefully they only have a 1 turn window to kill it before you are backing it up with a cancel or negate.
The one other pick I had an issue with was pick 3 of pack 1. You seem to have a very good idea of what you are going for, in which case a lot of your creatures are going to be griffins, pegasuses, and drakes. And Pyroclasm would absolutely wreck that strategy. A hate on the uncommon and hoping to see some of those commons in another pack.
Bad luck with Lots of mulligans
As far as I’m concerned I really like Black when drafting M10.I usually go for it unless I spot a bomb and splah with the best color I can pcik,mainly even two for something like a Fireball or whatever.
So here I would have gone Black Knight Diabolic Tutor , and most likely Blue because you got passed an awfull lot of fliers.
I really am bummed by your p1p3.The flyer is OK but definitly not a third pick.Pyroclasm is really good, but I would have gone the Cloak without much hesitation.It’s one of the best uncommon you can possibly get, and I would NOT pass it here,no matter were my first picks.Every time I played it or was played against me it had an incredible impact on the game, I really think you should at least consider it next time
Keep it up, M10 is actually not all bad to draft
Nice draft and games.