I think you're misinterpreting me. I meant precisely that the themes became weaker. This draft experience will be less determined by your ability to craft the perfect balance of ingesters and processors, or of making ALL of your creatures colorless, or of making ALL of your creatures allies, or of making ALL of your creatures play into a life gain plan.
I agree with you that the power level of this set is higher, at least as it relates to constructed viability.
This is much less a thematic environment than BFZ was. Ingest/Process got worse. Allies got worse. Landfall got worse. "Awaken", though not a strategy in its own right, had its numbers reduced. There are now less "colorless matters" payoffs like Vile Aggregate or Tide Drifter. I'm still skeptical that Black/Green got enough support to have a legitimate sacrifice strategy. Heck, the "allies" strategy no longer seems to be aggressive but rather the slow inevitable buildup deck, like Abzan "outlast" in KTK.
Despite the above, the biggest difference is that there are no large creatures in this set that are comparable to the Eldrazi from BFZ. Ruined Processor becomes a top 2 pick now.
I can't tell whether it will be fun or not. The format seems very unkempt and untidy.
It looks like Black will be the strongest color. Good controlling cards which play well with a lifegain strategy with white or a control strategy with blue. I hope green isn't abysmal, and it seems that that will be the case because the synergy from the other strategies has gotten worse. One way to get stronger is for everything else to be made weaker
I'd rather they neuter Tron than Bloom. I think there are too many axes that one has to defend against in Modern. One can't have Graveyard hate, spell hate, creature hate, and land hate. At least Bloom is using sorceries, artifacts, and creatures to get the job done. Maybe just banning Tolarian West would be acceptable, but even now I think Bloom is okay and isn't frustrating to play against. Needing to play Ghost Quarter, Tectonic Edge, and Fulminator Mage to combat Tron is a real drag though.
What they SHOULD do in my opinion is ban Ancient Stirrings. They could even use the excuse of "now that colorless cards are their own color, Ancient Stirrings is now more powerful than it was ever intended to be, and for the sake of the Modern format we are banning it." Boom, then you've weakened Bloom AND Tron.
In Standard, I think this helps Elves the most. The problem is that I think "Elves" is really far from being tier 1, and I don't think this is amazing enough to get them there. It seems like a fine card though.
1) BFZ draft was not balanced. 1 Landfall drafter would not have as a good of a deck as any of the 3-4 grixis colorless players. Green sucked. Ramping into Eldrazi was not a draft strategy.
2) Standard playability of the cards was subpar, although when Khans rotates some of these cards (like Drana) will have a chance to shine.
3) They designed "converge" cards without giving ANY non-rare fixing except Evolving Wilds. It just seems like draft design was a cluster****.
3) The first set of the block does not seem to transition well into the second set. I can't fathom why we haven't seen any ingest/process cards. All of those cards are going to wallow in OGW-BFZ draft it seems. Now that there is some color fixing for converge, converge doesn't seem to have made it to the second set.
4) Repetitive --> we've had +1/+1 counters as a theme every set for over a year. And funnily enough, "counters" didn't even breach tier 1 constructed standard playability. In this set we have two +1/+1 counter keywords in support and (maybe) cohort.
5) Bad game design to not begin the <> symbol in BFZ instead of OGW. Calling some cards "devoid" while requiring colored mana and then making some cards colorless requiring colored mana seems dumb and arbitrary. BFZx3 draft would have been so much more balanced if the UB, BR, and RU decks had to draft some "Wastes" lands to play some of their cards, just like the ally decks often had to be Naya or Abzan in order to boost their powerlevel.
I really think the coherence of the limited experience is what is most lacking. The entire block, which feels more like two different 1-set blocks lodged onto the same plane, feels like it was designed in a haphazard manner.
Nah, it won't be the Alara lands. It those last 5 cards are a cycle, it will probably be the Mirage lands. If it's not a cycle, it will probably be evolving wilds and 4 other random lands.
I started playing Magic last year because of the exploration of Greek Mythology, but I strongly shied away from drafting. It was too expensive, and I was no good at it. In part this might be because I was new to Magic. I did Block Constructed, but once KTK came out, I decided to make the jump up to Standard. I also decided to try my hand at drafting.
I have met with a certain amount of success. I've been playing in the 4-3-2-2 queues, and on average I've won 1.75 matches per draft (14 drafts). I've noticed that it isn't altogether difficult when you pick up a bomb rare with the first pick, and then you draft around that card. What has been more spotty for me has been when my opening P1P1 has been either Altar of the Brood or a fetchland (~6/14 drafts). Sometimes those packs have contained cards like Dead Drop or Murderous Cut, which helps give me some direction, but even still, I sometimes feel really aimless drafting when this happens. I've recorded 2 videos of my past 2 drafts and have created a channel on dailymotion so y'all can view them. Conveniently, both times my opening pack has not had a bomb rare. I did end up going 2-1 and 3-0 in these drafts, but I don't feel like I drafted very well, and I lost in the first round in the same situation just before these two drafts (it was that draft that inspired me to take the steps necessary to receive input from the Magic community). My goal is to become a better drafter and a better player.
Please feel free to offer critiques of my drafting. Also please let me know if audio of some kind would help. I've seen people make videos in which they just record themselves as they draft, and I've seen videos in which they orally go over their draft post factum. The latter takes more effort, but am happy to do it if it is vastly superior. Some of these games can be fun to watch, so let me know if you would like for me to record the actual matches. *Note* Because I haven't yet posted 5 times, this website won't let me link to the drafts, so I just put a space between the www*
I. KTK Draft #1: http://w ww.dailymotion.com/video/x2ak55d_khans-of-tarkir-draft_videogames
Questions:
1) My first gut feeling that blue was open was when I was passed Riverwheel Aerialists in P1P4. Is that too early to read a signal? Should I have taken Arrow Storm instead?
2) When the Vizier wheeled (@6:00), should that have been the moment that I jumped into Sultai? If not, when was the correct moment to alter course?
3) What should I have taken P2P1?
II. KTK Draft #2: http://w ww.dailymotion.com/video/x2akank_khans-of-tarkir-draft-2_videogames
1) Is Sultai Ascendancy the correct first pick? I opted for Saddlebrute, but I have been very impressed with Sultai Ascendancy in 2 of my other drafts. Since we all seem to be running 18 lands, our decks are prone to mana-flood, and Sultai Ascendancy resolves that problem perfectly. I have yet to lose a game in which I casted it. With that said, I didn't want to first pick it because it is 3 colors. I don't like Saddlebrute too much either, since it wants you to be an aggro deck, especially a BW Warrior deck, and it seems that there are always several people drafting that deck. My worst drafts tend to be the ones in which I go "Warrior aggro" or "Abzan".
2) I'm actually curious as to how y'all would have done my first several picks. There seem to be so many different options. Looking back on it, I think Horde Ambusher or Jeskai Windscout would have been better than Incremental Growth (although I did end up using Incremental Growth in my final deck).
3) Around P1P8 I developed a suspicion that Red was open. This feeling died down, but in P2P4 I finally said, "you know what, Red is open, I'm going to slide on in here. Seeing 2 Arrow Storms back to back is too strong a signal to ignore".
No need to limit responses to the questions above - I'll take any helpful advice or criticism y'all have to offer!
I wish this article had an MTGO section, or at least did an MTGO card value evaluation alongside the other. It does take some work to calculate the MTGO prices because you need to manually look at the price of other versions of the card from GoatBots or Cardhoarder, but that's what would make the article valuable for us MTGO folks!
I think you're misinterpreting me. I meant precisely that the themes became weaker. This draft experience will be less determined by your ability to craft the perfect balance of ingesters and processors, or of making ALL of your creatures colorless, or of making ALL of your creatures allies, or of making ALL of your creatures play into a life gain plan.
I agree with you that the power level of this set is higher, at least as it relates to constructed viability.
Despite the above, the biggest difference is that there are no large creatures in this set that are comparable to the Eldrazi from BFZ. Ruined Processor becomes a top 2 pick now.
I can't tell whether it will be fun or not. The format seems very unkempt and untidy.
It looks like Black will be the strongest color. Good controlling cards which play well with a lifegain strategy with white or a control strategy with blue. I hope green isn't abysmal, and it seems that that will be the case because the synergy from the other strategies has gotten worse. One way to get stronger is for everything else to be made weaker
What they SHOULD do in my opinion is ban Ancient Stirrings. They could even use the excuse of "now that colorless cards are their own color, Ancient Stirrings is now more powerful than it was ever intended to be, and for the sake of the Modern format we are banning it." Boom, then you've weakened Bloom AND Tron.
2) Standard playability of the cards was subpar, although when Khans rotates some of these cards (like Drana) will have a chance to shine.
3) They designed "converge" cards without giving ANY non-rare fixing except Evolving Wilds. It just seems like draft design was a cluster****.
3) The first set of the block does not seem to transition well into the second set. I can't fathom why we haven't seen any ingest/process cards. All of those cards are going to wallow in OGW-BFZ draft it seems. Now that there is some color fixing for converge, converge doesn't seem to have made it to the second set.
4) Repetitive --> we've had +1/+1 counters as a theme every set for over a year. And funnily enough, "counters" didn't even breach tier 1 constructed standard playability. In this set we have two +1/+1 counter keywords in support and (maybe) cohort.
5) Bad game design to not begin the <> symbol in BFZ instead of OGW. Calling some cards "devoid" while requiring colored mana and then making some cards colorless requiring colored mana seems dumb and arbitrary. BFZx3 draft would have been so much more balanced if the UB, BR, and RU decks had to draft some "Wastes" lands to play some of their cards, just like the ally decks often had to be Naya or Abzan in order to boost their powerlevel.
I really think the coherence of the limited experience is what is most lacking. The entire block, which feels more like two different 1-set blocks lodged onto the same plane, feels like it was designed in a haphazard manner.
I started playing Magic last year because of the exploration of Greek Mythology, but I strongly shied away from drafting. It was too expensive, and I was no good at it. In part this might be because I was new to Magic. I did Block Constructed, but once KTK came out, I decided to make the jump up to Standard. I also decided to try my hand at drafting.
I have met with a certain amount of success. I've been playing in the 4-3-2-2 queues, and on average I've won 1.75 matches per draft (14 drafts). I've noticed that it isn't altogether difficult when you pick up a bomb rare with the first pick, and then you draft around that card. What has been more spotty for me has been when my opening P1P1 has been either Altar of the Brood or a fetchland (~6/14 drafts). Sometimes those packs have contained cards like Dead Drop or Murderous Cut, which helps give me some direction, but even still, I sometimes feel really aimless drafting when this happens. I've recorded 2 videos of my past 2 drafts and have created a channel on dailymotion so y'all can view them. Conveniently, both times my opening pack has not had a bomb rare. I did end up going 2-1 and 3-0 in these drafts, but I don't feel like I drafted very well, and I lost in the first round in the same situation just before these two drafts (it was that draft that inspired me to take the steps necessary to receive input from the Magic community). My goal is to become a better drafter and a better player.
Please feel free to offer critiques of my drafting. Also please let me know if audio of some kind would help. I've seen people make videos in which they just record themselves as they draft, and I've seen videos in which they orally go over their draft post factum. The latter takes more effort, but am happy to do it if it is vastly superior. Some of these games can be fun to watch, so let me know if you would like for me to record the actual matches. *Note* Because I haven't yet posted 5 times, this website won't let me link to the drafts, so I just put a space between the www*
I. KTK Draft #1: http://w ww.dailymotion.com/video/x2ak55d_khans-of-tarkir-draft_videogames
Questions:
1) My first gut feeling that blue was open was when I was passed Riverwheel Aerialists in P1P4. Is that too early to read a signal? Should I have taken Arrow Storm instead?
2) When the Vizier wheeled (@6:00), should that have been the moment that I jumped into Sultai? If not, when was the correct moment to alter course?
3) What should I have taken P2P1?
II. KTK Draft #2: http://w ww.dailymotion.com/video/x2akank_khans-of-tarkir-draft-2_videogames
1) Is Sultai Ascendancy the correct first pick? I opted for Saddlebrute, but I have been very impressed with Sultai Ascendancy in 2 of my other drafts. Since we all seem to be running 18 lands, our decks are prone to mana-flood, and Sultai Ascendancy resolves that problem perfectly. I have yet to lose a game in which I casted it. With that said, I didn't want to first pick it because it is 3 colors. I don't like Saddlebrute too much either, since it wants you to be an aggro deck, especially a BW Warrior deck, and it seems that there are always several people drafting that deck. My worst drafts tend to be the ones in which I go "Warrior aggro" or "Abzan".
2) I'm actually curious as to how y'all would have done my first several picks. There seem to be so many different options. Looking back on it, I think Horde Ambusher or Jeskai Windscout would have been better than Incremental Growth (although I did end up using Incremental Growth in my final deck).
3) Around P1P8 I developed a suspicion that Red was open. This feeling died down, but in P2P4 I finally said, "you know what, Red is open, I'm going to slide on in here. Seeing 2 Arrow Storms back to back is too strong a signal to ignore".
No need to limit responses to the questions above - I'll take any helpful advice or criticism y'all have to offer!
Thanks!