The Game of Global Dominaria (WUBRG Drafting)

With all the fun my local group has had with Ravnica: Clue over the past year, I was curious how things would work with other "classic" board games.  I thought Risk might have the best chance of being a fun mashup with Magic.  So, I drafted up some rules, bought a used Risk set on Vinted, and tried to organize a free draft playtest with students last week.  That fell through, but I gave it another shot this week and we got enough people to play.

This set was in pretty good shape!

I made a number of miscalculations.  I posted the rules to our school's club's discord.  Here's a copy of those rules in case you want to look through them:

I will wait to address all the terrible ideas until they become relevant in the game.

 

The bulleted TL;DR of that is:

• Everyone has territory cards, some face up and some face down.  Each creature can attack a territory.  To do so, you have to flip one of your territory cards face up that is 
• either in the same continent as the target territory, or 
• on the border of that continent (e.g. Egypt can attack anywhere in Asia, but South Africa cannot), 
• or, if the target territory borders another continent, you can attack that territory from anywhere in that continent (e.g. any territory in South America can attack Central America).
• The player who has that territory card must reveal it and then they are the defending player for that attacker. 
• If a creature attacking a territory deals combat damage to the defending player (the player who has that territory card) then the attacking player takes that card from the defending player.
• At the end of your draw step, you get (tapped) tokens depending on the number of territories you control, with bonuses for controlling entire continents.
• You win the game normally: by being the last player standing. 

I figured this would work best with 3-5 players.  We initially had five, then one had to back out, then two people joined in, then a seventh person joined in.  I thought it might be better to "stress test" it with more people, so I went along with it.  We drafted with my free repacked cards with seven people.

I realized this was going to be messy.  Many of the players were very new to Magic.  I taught one of them with a half game between two duel decks right before we drafted.  Drafting is a terrible way to learn to play Magic, but everyone was enthusiastic, so we just went ahead.  My expectations were lowered even further when it was clear many people didn't realize we were going to be playing a Risk + Magic mashup.  Thankfully, they were game to give it a go.  Even more importantly, I decided not to take careful notes because I would be needed to explain rules to people.  So, for those of you interested in the details of the game, my apologies!  If you're interested in what I drafted, here were all my picks:

Triton Shorestalker is awesome in this format.  One of the other players realized that and drafted two also.

I built a majority-blue deck from this.  I decided to keep the curve pretty low, which was a good idea:

Very blue-focused.

I dealt out the Risk territory cards.  There were 42 total, so each of the seven players each got six cards.  The seventh player decided not to play during deckbuilding, so we redistributed their six Risk cards, one to each of us.  For fans of the Huddle-Up-In-Australia plan, I was quite lucky.  I had Southeast Asia, New Guinea, and Indonesia among my cards.  I already knew what my strategy would be.

While looking at my cards, I thought I had made a grand mistake.  With seven different territory cards, I could attack a lot of places using the adjacency rules described in the TL;DR above!  As the game played out, though, I was glad we had those rules.  I might have gotten one thing right!

The first round of turns went pretty standard: mostly lands and one player cast Triton Shorestalker (not me, though I cast mine on turn two).  On their second turn, I realized Mistake #1: I should have spelled out the steps to combat better.  It should go like this:

• The attacking player enters combat.
• The attacking player declares their attackers.
• For each attacking creature, the player decides whether that creature is attacking a territory or not.  (If not, they can attack an opponent as normal, but then they don't win any territory by dealing combat damage.)  
• For each creature attacking a territory, if that territory is face up on the board, then it must be legal for that creature to be attacking the player controlling that territory.  (E.g. in case the defending player has Teferi's Moat or something like that.)  If necessary, the attacking player may need to pay costs.  If at this point a creature cannot legally attack that territory, they must be redeclared to a new territory or player without choosing a territory.
• For each creature attacking an unrevealed territory, if a player controls that territory, they must flip it face up.  If no player controls it, then there must be a face down deck of uncontrolled territories.  A creature in this case "gets lost" and will draw the player the top card of that deck (face down) if they have a positive power during the combat damage step.
• If a player does control the territory, then they reveal it, placing it face up in front of them, then they are the defending player for that creature.  If for some reason the creature is not a legal attacker, then that creature "gets lost" instead and follows the process for that.
• Continue with all other steps of combat including blockers and damage.  
• After combat damage has been resolved, any territories attacked by creatures where one or more of those creatures dealt combat damage to the defending player are claimed (face up) by the attacking player.
• Any creatures with power greater than zero that "got lost" each earn a territory card from the uncontrolled deck for the attacking player.  (That player cannot earn more of those cards than there are in the deck.)

Nevertheless, we sorted out any confusion from attacking and the first Shorestalker claimed a land.

As the third round of turns started, the bonuses from holding territory cards kicked in.  Very few territories had changed hands, so nearly everyone got a tapped Construct creature token.  Mistake #2 was very glaring: I should have used Soldiers, not Constructs!  This is Risk!  At least that'll be an easy one to fix.  I was also lucky that Mistake #3 didn't come into play, but: the Constructs Soldiers probably should not be artifacts.  It just makes artifact strategies that much more unbalanced.  I had a few artifact-synergy cards in my deck and it was probably good that I didn't get them.  

Everyone kept choosing the Construct option.  We had a ton of them on the board and I spent a lot of my time scribbling up Infinitokens and handing them out.  Mistake #4 is that I need to have a bunch of the necessary tokens on hand ready to go.  I already do this for my Ravnica: Clue kit where I keep a bunch of Treasure tokens.  If I do this again, I need to have them ready to go.

During each player's turn, most players had between three and eight territories, which made them eligible for either a Food or Construct.  When people went above, we had to consult the table from the document above, which I had on my phone.  Mistake #5: I should have printed out the table so everyone could see it.  

Players kept choosing Constructs (myself included).  When people started attacking three territories at a time, it got pretty complicated.  That leads me to Mistake #6: I need a second set of territory cards so people can put them in front of their creatures to show where they're attacking.  Multiple times we had people get confused about what they or other people had said.  

The player with the other Shorestalker had to leave but another person showed up nearly simultaneously, so they took over for them.  (Lucky!)  I did a good job of conquering Australia, then started into Asia.  

I got all my colors too!

The other Shorestalker player took Africa.  Another took South America.  Two other players were fighting over North America.  The game quickly became a fight with everyone swinging in with most of their Constructs.  On one hand that was good because it's kind of Risk-like.  On the other hand, perhaps the Constructs were more powerful than the Treasure tokens and Clue tokens, despite those two options listed higher on the table.  I genuinely don't know whether this is a mistake or not!  Should I reorder the tokens in the table?

Another shot of the game.

The other players attacked each other a bunch instead of me, so I continued to go after Asia.  I took out the player to my right, claiming some of their territory in the process.  When they died, all their other territory went into the unclaimed deck in the middle.  Mistake #7: I didn't make that process clear.  What should happen is that all players have a chance to see which cards are face up before putting them into the uncontrolled deck.  That's really important because the next player can attack those places and know that their creatures will Get Lost and earn them territories without having to fight through blockers.  

I conquered nearly all of Asia, but my opponents continued to fight over Africa and North America.  No one else attacked the territories the dead player had had, so I took that advantage and named a bunch of their prior territories to gain a bunch.  (I didn't make it clear exactly how good that was, but I was also surprised how easy it worked.)  Sometimes it took us a bit of time to figure out who controlled which territories and we had to consult back and forth between the map and the cards everyone had.  This is because of Mistake #8: we didn't use the army figures.  If we each had a color, it would have been so easy to just put one army on each of our territories to show who owns what.  I already had Retreat to Emeria out, so when I played a land I gave all my creatures +1/+1 and swung at players directly, leaving only one standing.  I killed them on the next turn.  

Here's what I learned:

• The mechanics of the game seem okay.  It definitely promotes attacking, which is what you really want in any multiplayer format to help move the game along.
• I won because I knew best what was going on (either because of the rules of Magic or the rules of this Risky Magic).  I think it would be more fun if people knew what was coming.  
• I need to amend all eight mistakes above for things to run more smoothly!
• I don't know whether I need to update the token.  Would it be better with fewer 1/1 tokens all over the place?

The hardest is of course going to be making another set of territory cards.

Hopefully I'll have better news when I try it again!

Happy Megalomaniacal Magicking! 

Reality Fracture Draft (WUBRG Drafting)

I made it to a Reality Fracture draft at Intergalactic Plastic on Friday.  I hadn't made it to any prereleases, but I was really eager to make it to the first FNM draft of the set.  There were only six of us in the pod, but it was a good group of strong drafters.

Not as chaotic as my usual drafts, despite reality fracturing.

I think I drafted really well, except that I didn't read cards fully and missed the fact that Hexhaven Battalion was the white Basiclandcycling card, so I didn't take any of them.  Oops.  Here are all of my picks:

Fblthp knows my way.

I have lots of notes:

• I got really lucky with a lot of these picks.  Four Undulating Witnesses seems really good.  
• I had lots of removal.  
• Red wasn't really heavily drafted and I took advantage of that.  Kiora of Fire and Ashes and Theorist's Sanctum were both great cards to get.  Of course, packs are just very deep these days.  
• I got a few Konstrari Charms, but never cast them for their ramping mode.  I just always forgot that was an option.  

I was very happy to have a pool with tons of mana-fixing.  Here's what I put together:

Who needs 3-drops?

I'm not used to red being the main color, but I think I chose my basic lands correctly.  There were definitely some times where Fblthp only fetched me a few lands.

The first round was epic.  I was matched up against someone playing Yore-Tiller (WUBR).  We were both okay with late game strategies; nothing happened in the first three turns besides land drops and my Twinned Vision.  On turn four, I cast Desperate Futurescribe, but they hit it with a Wrath of the Bloodmane at the end of turn.  On their fifth turn they played Tomik, Izzet Sparkmage.  (They were stuck on three lands.)  I hit it with Violent Echoes on my fifth turn, getting my first taste of a Planeswalker token.  They played Arni, Humble Scribe on turn six and used its looting ability a ton.  I went ahead and played my first Undulating Witness, figuring I would take care of Arni on a future turn.  They finally got their fourth land and played Saheeli, Jewel of Avishkar on turn seven.  I figured that was a bigger threat, so I hit it with Awaken the Inferno and swung in the air for four.  On turn eight they played Tetsuko Umezawa, Pursuer.  I again thought that was a bigger threat, so I took it out with Surgical Precision.  I also cast Fblthp and accidentally overpaid by two because I'd already played two non-mountain basics.  Oops.  I hit them for 4 again and passed the turn, thinking I was sitting pretty.  ("Pretty pretty"?  "Fairly pretty"?)  On turn nine, they cast Frostbite Pyromental and hit me.  I attacked them and they turned my combat trick around.

I don't often draft combat tricks, so it was sad to see one get nullified.

Fblthp died and Arni did not, but the Witness got through.  They were at 7 life and I was still at 16.  Still sitting pretty pretty.  

On turn ten they cast Ajani's Anguish to take out the Witness.  I cast Living Library.  At this point I was using Theorist's Sanctum to amass Jace and surveil every turn.  On turn eleven they cast Traxos, Academy Guardian and Mabel, Valley Hero.  I played a second Undulating Witness, which they Unsummoned on turn twelve.  I replayed my Undulating Witness and dropped my Hall of Echoes, which I used a ton.  They played Proft, Consulting Detective on turn thirteen.  I attacked in, but I am bad at counting and needed to use Stingerquill Charm to kill the blocking Traxos.  I ended the turn with my opponent at 7 life and me at 9.  On turn fourteen they cast Chandra's Emberling and used Fulminous Forte to kill the second Witness.  

I'm in danger.

On turn fifteen they cast Infinite Coursework and attacked.  I blocked a bit and then flashbacked Twinned Vision, which I'd forgotten about.  I played Mabel, Bitter Recluse and passed the turn at 3 life.  (They were still at 7.)  On turn sixteen they cast Hallway Heckler and immediately used the Vicious Verse.  They swung in, but I used both of the cards I'd drawn from the Twinned Vision, Prophesied End and Konstrari Charm, to turn that combat around.  On my turn I kill the last threat with a second Awaken the Inferno and then swung in to tie it up at 3 life apiece.  On turn seventeen (you read that right) my opponent played Diviner of Victory and used the prepared spell to put Mabel back in my hand.  I replayed her and cast Undulating Witness number three on my turn.  On turn eighteen they had nothing and I swung in for the win.  As we cleaned up our cards, time was called.  1-0.

That single game was one of the closest back-and-forth games of limited I've ever played.  It took the entire first round and was very tight over and over again.  My notes are only as detailed as they are because there were so many tough decisions to make that I had time to write up what was happening.  I'm bummed we didn't get to play any more games!   

In round two I was up against a Golgari deck.  In game one, they started off with a turn one Blessed Ghoul, which got in over and over.  On turn four they played Loot, the Nexus, which I hit with a Stingerquill Charm.  On turn five they played Budding Insurgent and I played Undulating Witness.  On turn six they attacked and played Compel Brutality to trade the Insurgent with the Witness, then played Marwyn the Preserver.  I followed that up with the Desperate Futurescribe, but they hit that with Silence the Echo on their turn seven.  At this point I lost track of the notes because things sped up on the board.  After a little bit they played Verdant Kraken.  I played another Undulating Witness, but it wasn't enough to keep me alive and I died two turns later.  My opponent was still at 29 from the Blessed Ghoul!

Game two went a bit quicker.  I had a turn two Way of the Pyromancer, which really helped me ramp for the remaining turns.  At the end of the game, I was starting to gain ground back on my opponent, so they made a risky attack in.

Thankfully, I had good enough blocks.

My opponent scooped at that point, which was good because I didn't have to show them the Face Yourself I was about to draw.  (Thanks, Token Jace, for all the surveilling!)

Game three went really fast!  (I'm surprised time didn't get called.)  I got Kiora of Fire and Ashes and the Hall of Echoes, and then hit the next turn for ten with double dragons.  I didn't get to hit for ten again, but I won two turns later thanks to the dragon attack.  2-0, squeaking past both times.

In the third round I was up against a very fast Orzhov deck, playing for the winning spot.  In the first game they played Unflinching Hortimancer on turn two.  I cast Way of the Pyromancer, but I did not keep up at all.  It was so fast I hardly took any notes. 

Here's a glare-filled photo of me getting beat up.

 

I died on turn seven with my opponent going up to 24.  

In game two I put up a slightly better fight, but still lost on turn nine or ten.  2-1.

I think I lost round three in under ten minutes total.  I guess the nice thing about losing that fast in the last round means you don't have to stick around.  

This was so fun!  I think this set is a WUBRG-winner.  There are so many dual lands and so many basic landcyclers that it's totally reasonable to make it happen.  If you give it a try, let me know how it goes!

Happy Fractured Magicking!

The Prodigal King Returns to Chaos

I ran a draft on Wednesday and at the last moment people were interested in a Kingdom draft!  I have been looking forward to this, so I joined right in!  We had a player who had moved away but was visiting, and they pulled the King role.  Everyone picked the packs we were opening first, but we probably should have handed out the roles first.  I don't know whether anyone would have changed their picks based on the role, but then they could've!  Here's what we opened:

The Battle For Zendikar-War of the Spark-Zendikar Rising triple was the King.

We didn't reveal our roles yet, but we certainly knew them while drafting.  I got the Knight card, which was pretty crazy, because the last time I drafted in a Kingdom, I was the Knight for the same player!  That time I did a terrible job convincing them I was the Knight, so I vowed to do better.  I tried to keep my role in mind while drafting.  Here's what I picked:

The sixth card I picked in pack three is hard to read, but it's Queen Brahne.

I've got some notes about these picks!

• I almost didn't draft any white cards!  Whew!  I'm not a WUBRG-fraud!  (This time, at least.)
• I picked the Balamb T-Rexaur over The Lunar Whale.  That was probably the wrong pick, but the T-Rex did a lot for me.  
• I took more combat tricks than I normally do.  The plan behind that was that using them to help the King out would make it more clear that I was on their team.  Spending cards like that means committing a lot of resources! 
• I think we need to be more strict about table talk during Kingdom drafts.  When Queen Brahne came back around, I mused aloud that the King probably should have taken it.  That could have outed me as the Knight if people had thought more about it and figured out what card I was talking about.  I decided to take her because I figured it would be okay for me to get the Wizard triggers so long as the King was in agreement.

Here's the deck I built from those cards:

Deepway Navigator needs to be in there!

In addition to keeping table talk down so we don't reveal our roles accidentally or otherwise, I think it might have been beneficial for us to build our decks separately.  If anyone had looked closely at what I'd built, they might've noticed that I was running more combat tricks than normal and figured out that I was the Knight.  On the other hand, we're not exactly a competitive bunch so it was probably fine.

We sat down to play:

• P1 was the King, running a WUBRG deck (on purpose).  They started with 26 life while everyone else had 20.
• P2 was running Selesnya with an unknown role.
• P3 was me, the Knight (but only I knew that) also WUBRG.  (Team WUBRG, let's go!) 
• P4 was playing Boros with an unknown role.
• P5 was running Sultai "Elves and Rares" with an unknown role.

If you're unfamiliar with this format, it's important to point out that everyone pretends to be the Knight from the beginning.  Saying "my liege" becomes a bit of a meme.  My claims were drowned out among the group.  

P4 and P5 are quite good friends and they always seem to wind up on the same team.  There was a 1/3 chance they were teammates again, this time barbarians! 

In the first round of turns, only P4 cast a spell: S.H.I.E.L.D. Spy Kit.

On turn two, only P2 had a play: Old Thrush.

Things heated up on turn three.  P2 attacked P4 with the Thrush.  It's good for the other players to be attacking each other instead of the King, but it made P2 look like the Knight, which was bad for me.  I cast Down in the Valley to search up a swamp.  P4 cast Dori, Bearer or Friends.  

On turn four, the King finally made a play with H.E.R.B.I.E. Scout Unit and played the extra land.  P2 cast Dwarven Shortsword and then hit me with the Old Thrush.  I played a land and got an Elf token from Down in the Valley.  P4 cast Fin Fang Foom and then P5 cast The Lunar Whale.  Big things were starting to land.

The King made two plays to start off turn five: Vine Gecko and The Chief Warg.  P2 cast East Wind Avatar and then attacked P5.  They were being aggressive against everyone who wasn't the King, which is a good Knight play.  I was the only one who knew they weren't the Knight, so I was thinking of the other options:

• If they were a Barbarian (most likely) this was all a ruse. 
• The same is true if they were the Doppelgänger; they wanted someone to die, but probably weren't in a rush to kill anyone.
• If they were the Black Knight, then they were happy for everyone else's life totals to drop.  
• If they were the Villager, they were trying to get someone to react and kill them.
• If they were the Gravedigger, they were trying to kill other players.

For now, though, they were doing a good job of looking like the Knight.

I continued turn five by casting Mirkwood Nurturer.  I put Down in the Valley back in my hand but had a nice little board of elves.  P4 retaliated against P2 and hit them.  P5 cast Thranduil, Sindaran Liege.  (Update: he is not a rare, thank you, P5.)  The life totals were all still quite high: King: 26, P2: 19, Me: 19, P4: 19, P5: 17.  At this point I had an inkling that P4 was a Barbarian.

On turn six, the King cast Samut, Tyrant Smasher.  That's one of my Oathbreakers, so I knew how it worked.  P2 cast a Mirkwood Pathmaker and attacked me.  I think I blocked their equipped dwarf with one of my elves.  I recast Down in the Valley got my sixth land and cast Queen Brahne.  P4 attacked P2 with Fin Fang Foom, then Suplexed their Shortsword.  They copied the Suplex onto the Shortsword because they didn't see any other targets.  Post combat, P5 pointed out that the Lunar Whale was an artifact.  Suspicious!  They then played Oin the Brave and were storied.  P5 played a third Mirkwood Nurturer and bounced a land.  They they played Kraven the Hunter and attacked me.  I'm sure the King was happy with all the subjects attacking each other, so I was too!  The life totals were still high: King: 26, P2: 15, Me: 16, P4: 19, P5: 17.

On turn seven, the King cast Nori, Teller of Tales.  They were suspicious of P2 and there was a bunch of wrangling where P5 promised not to block Nori so it could grant first strike and the King could safely swing into P2.  P2 cast Attercop and Moment of Glory, and then attacked me.  I foolishly blocked with my Murkwood Nurturer.  They then started a Quarrel with Queen Brahne to kill her.  At this point, other players were wondering aloud whether P2 was the Black Knight and I were actually the Knight.  P4 and P5 couldn't go wholesale into that, though, because then they would be outing themselves as the two Barbarians.  I cast Plunder the Trollshaws, drew a land, played it, and got another elf token.  P4 cast Dwarven Mattock.  P5 launched a big attack on the King, but I cast Roilmage's Trick to save my King a lot of damage.  Now my Knighthood seemed quite evident.  P5 finished their turn by playing Dawnhand Dissident and Astonishing Ant-Man.  The life totals were King: 25, P2: 11, Me: 13, P4: 19, P5: 15.

The King passed to start turn eight.  P2 flashbacked Moment of Glory and then attacked me.  I cast Balamb T-Rexaur to regain some of the life lost.  P4 cast Crimson Operative.  P5 swung at the King's Samut with The Lunar Whale and then cast Secret Invasion to get their own Mirkwood Pathmaker.  They also summoned Master's Councillors and Serpent Specialist.  The life totals were now at King: 26, P2: 11, M3: 11, P4: 19, P5: 15.  

On turn nine, the King cast Retreat to Valakut.  P2 swung in to me with their flyers, but I stayed alive.  I responded by casting Widow's Bite to take out their Attercop and then swung with my T-Rexaur.  Post combat, I cast Roll-Roll-Roll-Roll to blink it and again gain some of my life back.  At the end of my turn, P4 cast Outnumber.  With Fin Fang Foom, it copied and killed both the King's H.E.R.B.I.E. and P2's East Wind Avatar.  The dragon villain now had 4 +1/+1 counters on it.  They untapped and then attacked me and P2 with lethal damage towards us both.  Fin Fang Foom was coming my way with the Dwarven Mattock, which granted Ward 1.  I had exactly four mana untapped and P4 didn't think there was any removal that had gone around the table for three mana or less with the ward.  Thankfully, I had Eject, which got around the ward with its uncounterability.  P2 had no such response and died, revealing that they were, in fact, the Black Knight.  That meant that P4 and P5 were definitely the Barbarians.  P5 cast Large Bear.  With Kraven now a 7/6, they launched a big attack on the King.

Chips and all.

The King dropped to 7 life and P5 finished their turn by casting Erratic Visionary.  The life totals were now King: 7, P2: dead, Me: 9, P4: 19, P5: 15.  

The jib was up.  We were toast.  The King decided to try to end the game on their own terms by attacking me, but they only put me to 2.  I cast Hawkeye's Bow and attacked P4, but it wasn't enough.  P4 cast Friendly Neighborhood and attacked the King to kill them.  I was unable to protect the King!

This was a great game!  I can't believe the teams turned out to be so predictable, but it was wicked fun for everyone.  The game had taken nearly two hours, so two players had to leave.  The two Barbarians stayed around to play a three-player bonus game with me.  (They actually said they wanted more action for this blog, which is exciting for me!  So, I took notes.)

I won the roll to go first, so it was me and then P4 and P5 from the Kingdom game.  I'll keep those names for clarity.

Only P5 had a play on turn one with Party Dude, a card I don't think I'd ever seen. 

On turn two, I cast Frog Butler.  P4 cast Mouser Foundry.  P5 cast Creakwood Safewright.  

On turn three, P4 cast Colleen Wing and P5 cast Silvan Rally, which comboed with the Safewright by putting an elf into the graveyard.  

On turn four, I played Hawkeye's Bow and put it on my Frog Butler.  I used this to deal them both one damage each turn for many turns.  P4 cast Dwarven Shortsword.  P5 upgraded Party Dude to level two.

On turn five, I cast my Balamb T-Rexaur.  P5 took Thranduil off of the adventure.  

On turn six, I attacked P5, who blocked with their 6/6 Safewright.  P4 sacrificed their Mouser Foundry to kill Thranduil, which put the Safewright down to 5/5.  My dinosaur lived!  P4 cast their Friendly Neighborhood.  P5 cast The Lunar Whale.

On turn seven, I attacked P4.  They responded by attacking me back for 10 damage and then played Sidequest: To Catch a Fish.  P5 hit P4 for 3 with the Whale, then cast Erratic Visionary and Rescuer Sphinx.  At the end of turn, I cast my Deepway Navigator.  The life totals were me: 16, P4: 7, P5: 19.

On turn eight, I cast Chameleon, Master of Disguise to get a second dinosaur.  P4 pumped up one of their creatures with Friendly Neighborhood and attacked me, but I chumped with the Deepway Navigator.  P5 cast Lakeshore Apothecary and then put Secret Invasion on one of their creatures, exiling my Chameleon.  They swung in on me, but I turned it mostly away with Roilmage's Trick.  At the end of turn, the life totals were Me: 19, P4: 9, P5: 12.

On turn nine I cast Mirkwood Nurturer.  (I don't think I bounced anything.  I bounced my Frog Butler and replayed it.)  P4 finally stopped my Butler + Bow slow combo by Suplexing the Bow.  They attacked me and I blocked with the Nurturer.  P5 cast Scarblade Scout and then upgraded Party Dude again.  they attacked me, but I once again used Eject on a creature with Ward when I only had four mana.  The creature with Secret Invasion disappeared and I got my T-Rexaur back.  (I gained so much life off of these.  Dino life.  The opposite of Dino Damage.)  That was a good block for me; the life totals were Me: 16, P4: 8, P5: 11.

I was the archenemy, but I kept the pedal to the metal anyways.  I attacked P5.  They had a good block, but I cast Pain 101 to win it and get the T-Rexaur back (again).   I ended my turn by playing Venomized Cat.  P4 swung out.  With the Cooking Campsite and Party Dude, and a Vow to Erebor, they put me to one life.

All that sweet dino life, gone.

P5 attacked us both on their turn, killing me, but P4 blocked and survived.  They had 8 life and P5 had 4.

On turn 11, P4 attacked P5 for exactly four damage, made possible by the Sidequest.  Very close!

These games were great!  I'm really happy with how the Kingdom game turned out and it was really fun to come close to winning with my deck in a bonus game too.  I think I will get better at the Kingdom format by laying it more.  Hopefully I can draft that again sometime.

Happy Magicking, your Majesty! 

 

Update: thanks to P5 for correcting a bunch of mistakes I made in my recaps!  (Four, in fact!)

In Defense of (Wacky) Drafting

I'm not sure whether I'm writing this to explain to others why I enjoy drafting so much, or because question it myself.  I love constructed Magic.  I have a bunch of EDH decks!  Designing standard versions of Shuffleupagus helped me stay away awake back in classes in grad school.  

Drafting doesn't ignore deck-brewing/building, though.  It's a microcosm of the whole Magic hobby: opening packs, choosing cards, deck building, playing, and then incorporating those cards into your collection.  

I learned about drafting in 2002 in my last year of college.  I was very skeptical before I tried it, but after my first draft at Zimmie's Comics in Lewiston, Maine, I was hooked.  (I found an old Facebook page, but it looks like they've been closed since at least 2019.)  I think I made it to a few Odyssey-block drafts that fall before Onslaught was released in early October of that year.  I started going regularly with a group of new players as well as some amazing players.  There was always a crowd of around ten at the store and I was really bad for that whole first year.  I don't think I ever did better than 1-2.  It didn't matter, I loved it.

I won a few Nemesis packs at a vintage tournament at J&R Cards in Brunswick, Maine (another Facebook link, sorry, but this one appears to still be active).  Had I won those packs a year earlier, I would have opened them, but I had changed.  Instead I left them sealed, figuring I could use them in a friendly draft sometime.  I wasn't consciously doing any value-maxing, I just wanted to draft more.  I didn't have enough for a full draft, of course, but I bought some more packs of different sets and that snowballed a little bit.  I've been drafting and running drafts ever since.  (In the aughts, my group called these "Wacky Drafts": drafts where you bring whatever three packs you want.  I think most people refer to these as Chaos Drafts, but I also think that refers to other unexpected-pack-drafts as well, so I like the differentiation.)

I like bulleted lists.  Here are a bunch of reasons why drafting is my favorite as well as further bonuses for Wacky/Chaos drafts:

• It works with all sorts of numbers of players.  In the past year I've learned that even three players is an acceptable amount if you're willing to do a Ravnica: Clue draft!
• I love opening packs!  It's fun!  It's even more fun to be opening packs and to immediately use those cards.  When you open a pack outside of limited play, it can be boring if there isn't a valuable card in it.  In a draft, however, you get to take a closer look at those cards and hunt for the one that is going to help you win the most games.  Wacky Draft Bonus: you're probably opening different packs, which is even further from the "booster box game" where you open packs from the same set over and over (which can get a bit tedious).
• Sealed formats can overwhelm me a bit when I'm deckbuilding.  I always wish I had more time to better analyze my cardpool optimize my deck.  In a draft, I get a bit acquainted with my cards while I'm picking them.  I already have a bit of an idea of how my deck is going to look and can build faster.  
• The playing field is more level.  It's certainly possible to be more skilled than someone else in a limited setting, but at least there isn't the disparity of having access to different sized/valued collections.  Wacky Draft Bonus: it's possible to learn the ins and outs of specific draft formats, but I think it's harder to predict how a draft with many different packs will go, leveling skills even further.
• It's always different.  I can draft with the same group of four people and each draft is going to be very different.  Even a few key cards can make a huge difference.  It's really exciting to see how other people put together a deck, given what came around.  Wacky Draft Bonus: The variance is even higher when drafting from a bunch of sets simultaneously.
• I like playing with low-power cards.  There are so many cards out there and it's fun to make use of the ones that aren't playable in constructed formats.  It is really fun when some common card comes in clutch to save you.  Wacky Draft Bonus: I love it when there's an amazing interaction between cards from distant sets.  I think I had some Ravnica-block spirit (Azorius Herald, perhaps?) trigger my Innocence Kami and I got really excited about it.  
• I like the cards I walk away with.  No matter how poorly I do, I have a bunch of neat cards in a deck I built that I get to add to my collection.  Some may go in my trade binder, some may even go into decks.  Some may be copies of cards I don't have yet!  I get to sort them all out and organize them into the rest of my collection.  I know that may not be fun for everyone, but it is extremely fun for me.  As I write this, I can't wait to doing it with the cards I drafted last night!  (This is such a big part of it for me that I think it explains why I don't cube draft much.)

I still love constructed Magic.  I have a list of wanted cards a mile long for a variety of decks.  Some day I may even get them all.  But I still love drafting even more.  

Happy Magicking to you, no matter which formats you like best!

The Hobbit Draft #2 (WUBRG Drafting)

I made it to a second Hobbit FNM draft last week.  There were only seven of us, but that's more than enough for Intergalactic Plastic, so we got to draft!  

A very surprising picture of what I opened.

I continued a streak of not drafting enough color-fixing, especially in the land department.  I got some other mana fixing, but I really need to return to pulling them early.  I think that since my last try at this, Giant's Boulder has crept up the charts for perceived utility in limited, because I didn't get that many of those.  Here were all my picks so you can judge (me) for yourself:

That's one Giant's Boulder instead of four.

I got a little nervous after the first pack because I wasn't yet in black, but I made up with that a bunch in the second pack by drafting six black cards.

I was able to put together a deck that looked pretty good:

... Except one of those lands doesn't even tap for multiple colors!

I sat down in the first round against a player running Azorius Recruiting.  Very quickly it became clear that they'd pulled a bunch of the cards that they needed.  On turn two they played Bilbo, Luckwearer, followed by a Lakeshore Apothecary the next turn.  That's already a great combo, and the Snowslope Hunter I played (and later took out of my deck) didn't look so hot.  It looked even worse when they played a second Lakeshore Apothecary on turn four.  I played an Attercop I'd drawn, so I wasn't out of it, but then they dropped Longlake Nuisance.  I put up a fight and played Supper for Spiders (which also later got taken out of the deck) and Elrond, Moon-Reader, but they played another Longlake Nuisance on the next turn.  The only good part is that the Recruiting wasn't giving them more counters on the Apothecaries because they were already drawing off of Bilbo.  On my sixth turn I had Great Fierce Bee and Beorn's Hospitality.  The game wasn't over.  Then they played Thorin's Last Stand and yes it was.

I got Thror's Map on the second turn of the second game, which was one of my best cards all night.  They had a much slower start with nothing until a Patient Instructor on turn three.  I played Beorn's Hospitality but still had no creatures out.  On turn four they played a Longlake Nuisance.  On turn five I put up a good defense by flashing out Head of the Hunt, but they had Thorin's Last Stand and took it out while also putting me down to 8 life.  I Gathered the Darkness to bring my Head of the Hunt back to hand and played Well-Worn Spatula.  Over the next two turns they played Lake-town Lookout and Eagle of the Great Shelf.  I continued to put up a fight and get Wolf tokens on my side.  Sadly, my Head of the Hunt got a bit traitorous.

Hey, what are you doing over there?

That's right, my opponent cast Burglar's Plot and traded it for one of their soldiers.  I was a much less scary theat then and the two flyers plus Bilbo were enough to kill me.  0-1.

In the second round I got the dreaded Bye.  Thankfully, the manager was up for a game of Dandân (Forgetful Fish), which I'd never done!  I lost but got a real good feel for it and I really want to play it again.  I don't think I've played a single-deck format since playing Mental Magic decades ago, and surprisingly having that experience helped a bit.  This was probably the most fun I've had with a bye in years.

In round three I was up against another friend running an aggressive Boros dwarves deck.  In game one I got my Iron Hills Blacksmith out on turn two.  I really like that card, but I was immediately jealous of the Troop of Ponies they played.  I played Ragged Short Spear on turn three but didn't draw into a third land.  I had Giant's Boulder on turn four but was still stuck on two.  I played my Well-Worn Spatula, but my opponent played Dori, Bearer of Friends, an actual threat.  I finally drew into a land and played Beorn's Hospitality, then the land to make my Blacksmith quite formidable.  Unfortunately, my opponent had Magnificent End just waiting when I swung in.  They untapped and cast Dwarven Shortsword.  On my sixth turn I played Great Fierce Bee then another land to make it bigger.  They played Balin, Loremaster with Storied.  They attacked and dealt me extra damage with Smaug's Fury, putting me at 10 life to their 16.  On turn seven, I cast Burn, Burn, Tree and Fern to take Balin out and swung in to put them at 11.  They played The Mountain King's Return and attacked me to put me at 6 life.  On the next turn I played both Elrond, Moon-Reader and Thror's Map.  They returned Long-Bodied Grey Dog with their saga, then also played Ori, Keeper of Songs and attacked.  I thought I had a good block on Dori.

I guess not.

They played Nori, Teller of Tales and I couldn't do enough on turn nine to stay alive.  

In game two I looked more like an aggro deck.  I had the Well-Worn Spatula on turn one, then Thror's Map on turn two.  My opponent answered with Oin the Brave.  I ran out Elrond, Moon-Reader on turn three and they played Troop of Ponies.  On turn five I played Great Fierce Bee and attacked in but lost Elrond to Smaug's Fury.  They played Misty Mountains Raider, which I immediately hit with Burn, Burn, Tree and Fern on my turn.  They played Gandalf, Spark Starter and killed my Bee.  On turn seven I conjured a Gathering of Darkness to get Elrond back to my hand and then cast Ravening Warg.  My opponent cast their own Iron Hills Blacksmith, attacked, and hit for a lot with Smaug's Fury again.  On my eighth turn I cast both Fili the Pathfinder and Elrond.  Fili was big enough to scare away attacks and on my next turn I played Boughside Wanderers.  (I don't remember what I got in my hand.)  I swung in and put them to 8 life.  On my tenth turn I played another Great Fierce Bee and swung in again, putting them to 4 and taking out many of their defenders.  I won on my next turn, but time had been called so we were done.  0-1-1.

Before we reflect, we have a bonus round!  I got to play against a friend who still had their deck together from their prerelease!   They had put together a Rakdos deck.  On turn two, they played Ravening Warg.  I thankfully had Thror's Map and played that on my turn, then played Great Fierce Bee on turn three.  On turn four, I played Iron Hills Blacksmith and the Well-Worn Spatula.  On their fifth turn they Stirred Up Trouble with their Warg and then cast Dreaded Bat-Cloud for cheap.  Thankfully I had Fili the Pathfinder on my turn.  I attacked to keep up the pressure and put them down to 12 life compared to my 16.  On turn six they hit Fili with Bilbo's Deadly Slice, but didn't have any way to stop a double striker with a few good equipment.  I won on turn seven.

In game two they had Goblin-town Flunkies on turn two. I was very fortunate to get Thror's Map yet again.  They played Goblin Plate Mail on turn three and put me to 15 life.  I didn't have any blockers, but did have a Giant's Boulder.  They played Reverent Howl on turn four to put my life even lower and gain five.  I played Burn, Burn, Tree and Fern to take out the army, but they attacked the next turn to put me to 7.  I had Gandalf, Wandering Wizard on turn five to get me back into the game, but they played Crude Bent Blade on turn six and he Gandalf wandered to my graveyard.  I played Boughside Wanderers took his place on my turn, but Bilbo's Deadly slice didn't let them stick around either.  On my seventh turn I played both Fili the Pathfinder and Iron Hills Blacksmith.  They spent turn eight playing The Great Goblin and Tidings of War.  I went to one life while they were at 25.  I couldn't let them untap with The Great Goblin, so I Spewed Flame on him and played the Well-Worn Spatula (yet again).  On turn nine they played Desert Were-Worm (what a cool card!) but they only had three mountains out.  I equipped up my Iron Hills Blacksmith and braced for an attack.  They didn't swing in right away, but prepped by summoning their own Great Fierce Bee and the Ravening Warg.  I played Smaug, the Great Calamity.  On their turn eleven, they flashbacked the Tidings of War and swung in.  I pulled off a good block.

Thankfully, no Smaug's Fury here!

I played Gathering of Darkness to bring the Boughside Wanderers back and played my own Ravening Warg and got in for some damage.  On turn twelve, against a mostly-empty board, I played Dwarven Shortsword and swung in for 22 damage for the win.

We played a bonus bonus game (I didn't take notes) against the other deck they'd put together: Boros Dwarves.  I lost bad; they were at 31 life when I died! 

After two drafts, my total The Hobbit draft record is now  1-3-1.  That is definitely in the Not Great category.  Is that because I'm bad at Magic or that the set isn't good for WUBRG drafting?

• I definitely didn't mulligan aggressively enough and I failed to get enough color fixing.  So, I am clearly at fault in both drafting and playing.  I hope I get another chance to do better at this format.  Sadly it's nearly Reality Fracture time, so it might be a long time.
• I think the jury might still be out on how friendly The Hobbit is to WUBRG drafting.
• The common dual lands are quite good and it seems like players take them early.  Please let me know if you're having a different experience!
• Other fixing is also highly sought-after.  Giant's Boulder and Troop of Ponies are really good in all kinds of decks.  This is interesting because it's different from the Conflux/Ravnica Allegiance problem where many people are shooting for five colors.  That's certainly not happening, but the fixing resources are disappearing nonetheless.  

I hope I get more chances to play this in the future!  I would really like to prove that it's possible to do better (even for me).  

Happy Hobbit Magicking!

The Chaotic Ninth Legions of Yorion (WUBRG Drafting)

If you're opening Ikoria first with the goal of getting a companion, then when you open something like Yorion, it's time to build around them.  Wait, is Yorion the worst companion for WUBRG drafting?  Was it a mistake for me to shoot for a working 60-card draft deck?  Maybe!  As is common, however, I'm getting ahead of myself and avoiding the actual story of Thursday night last week.  The real story here is the packs.

A beautiful hexagon of impending chaos.

Yeah, you see that right: one player opened Legions and Ninth Edition!  Another opened Journey Into Nyx!  The player who opened Return to Ravnica got a Cyclonic Rift so they decided to keep it and open another pack instead, choosing Throne of Eldraine.  That means we opened packs from 2026, 2025, 2023, 2020, 2019, 2014, 2005, and 2003!  The only recent thing that compares is Wacky Worlds 2026.  

We decided that since there were six of us, we would play single-game rounds.  This works much better with an odd number of people, but things went pretty well without too much waiting.

Okay, so I first-picked Yorion and built around it.  Three years ago I drafted Yorion and that experience is exactly what convinced me to get in the pack rut I've been in.

"Open the Ikoria pack first.  Open the Ikoria pack first.  Open the Ikoria pack first..."  - peak wisdom, three years ago. 

There's two parts to Yorion (and every companion):

• I needed to meet the condition and draft a 60-card deck.  That means I needed to pick a lot of spells, because I'd want a split of about 35 spells/25 land.  With 41-44 non-Yorion cards I would draft, that's not many spells I wouldn't run.  I think I actually went too far in this direction and should have taken more lands.
• I needed to pick cards that actually comboed with Yorion.  I didn't pay good attention to this facet because I'm dumb, but I got lucky and got a bunch of them anyways.  

Here're all my pulls:

White borders in pack two!

I was really excited about a lot of my pulls!  I remember how good Skinthinner and Skirk Marauder are.  Divergent Equation and the two Ragged Short Spears are all great and came around really late.  My only real problem was the lack of mana-fixing in a larger-than-normal deck.  Here's what I put together for the draft:

Good cards, a good curve, but bad mana.

In the first round I was up against an Azorius player who was drafting with us for the first time.  I played Gristle Glutton on turn two, which is a card I wound up using a lot throughout the rounds.  My opponent played Gravelgill Scoundrel, which turned out to be a problem later on.  I played a Clay Spider (a face down Skirk Marauder) on turn three and my opponent played a Quill-Blade Laureate.  Before that could be a problem, I flipped my Marauder on turn four to kill it.  On the following turn I put Yorion into my hand.  My opponent cast Unexpected Assistance when I passed, then cast Primary Research on their turn.  We traded off spells back and forth for the next few turns: I played Ragged Short Spear, they played Rosie Cotton, I played Wildvine Pummeler, they played Dreadful Apathy on it, then I played Market Festival.  That gave me enough mana that turn to also cast Repulsor Blast on the Gravelgill Scoundrel, which had been hitting me a bit.  My opponent played Frost Lynx and I cast Goblin Glasswright.  They cast Captain America, Living Legend and ended their turn with me at 4 life and them at 17.  It was time to cast Yorion, so I did after swinging in and bounced a lot of my board, including the Pummeler and the Short Spear.  On their turn they played an Eagle of the Watch and Lake-town Toymaker.  

The calm before the storm.

I summoned Explosive Prodigy and took Captain America out with four colors.  I swung again to keep the pressure on, but they turned the tables a bit on their turn by killing Yorion with Stone by Sunlight.  My opponent also cast Realm-Cloaked Giant (I got real lucky that I had my own giant, so the adventure wouldn't have got them out of the jam fast enough).  On my turn I played Skinthinner face down and swung in to put them down to 1 life while I was still at 4.  I was able to win on the next turn.  1-0.

In the second round I was up against another Azorius player who was also drafting with us their first time.  (They both drafted great decks for having been cutting each other throughout!)  They played Suntail Hawk on turn two, then cast Ithilian Kingfisher on turn three.  I thankfully had Vulpikeet on turn four and felt good until they played Syr Alin, the Lion's Claw on turn five.  I cast Embrace the Paradox to try and find an answer to that, but I didn't dig right to anything.  On turn six, I played Barrow-Blade and Signpost Scarecrow, one of my favorite draftable mana fixers.  Sadly it went back to my hand with a kicked Cunning Geysermage.  I waited a turn to replay it and cast the Esgaroth Garrison on turn seven instead.  They played Raft Security Officer, which was going to be annoying and then Riptide Director as well.  (I thought I was pretty familiar with all the Legions cards, but I don't remember this one at all!)  I played the Scarecrow again and Cloaked Siren, which they followed up with Rise of Eagles.  On my ninth turn, I drew into Conciliator's Duelist, which fetched me Spider-Woman, Secret Agent.  That was enough to turn Syr Alin off.  They cast Checkpoint Officer, providing a second creature to lock mine down.  I played Skinthinner face down on a pretty gummed up board.  My opponent played Timid Shieldbearer, a real threat to break through.  Things got pretty intense, so I don't remember exactly the plays thereafter.

This is the board after Yorion came down and I'd cast Hop to It.  I don't remember how many turns'd passed.

I won the game, I think after luckily surviving a big attack and then swinging back all at once for around 13 damage to win.  2-0.

In round three I was up against a Golgari Menace deck, but I didn't even see all the menace cards.  On turn two they played Skull Prophet, curving into The Chief Warg on turn three, which I thankfully had Mana Leak for.  On my third turn I played Ravenous Rats, but they caught back up on cards with Cost of Brilliance on their next turn, then got a big threat with Stoic Grove Guide the next turn when they put me down to 12.  I played Bolg of the North, but didn't bother sacrificing the Rats since the Skull Prophet had the +1/+1 counter.  They attacked again on turn six, but a Shield's Might turned my good block into a bad one.  

The card economy wouldn't have been so bad if it weren't on an adventure!

I cast Hop to It and Azog, Moria's Ruin.  I thought I was in a better place, but then they played Spry and Mighty and swung to put me at 5 life.  I played Stratosoarer on my turn, but on their eighth turn, they cast Entish Restoration and then another big threat: Scathing Shadelock.  I brought Yorion out, but they had Broken Wings for it on their next turn, as well as a Callous Inspector and Blighted Blackthorn.  I died shortly after that.  2-1.  That player wound up winning the draft.

In the fourth round, I was up against a Sultai deck that led right off the bat with Wildwood Tracker on the first turn, though the following turns were a bit slow.  I played Gristle Glutton on turn two, which kept me in it, but they came up with Pterafractyl the next turn.  I played Signpost Scarecrow on turn four but got caught in a bad combat yet again when they cast Dreadful as the Storm on turn five.  They cast Beorn, Reluctant Host on turn six.  I had Spider-Woman in hand, but since she has flash, I figured I'd wait until the last minute to get her out to lock Beorn down.  

That was a mistake.

I cast Killian's Confidence and Hop to It, but I was already down 5 life to their 18.  They cast Illusion Spinners non-flashy, then I cast Wildvine Pummeler to get back into the game.  On turn nine, they played Vindictive Warden.  At five life, I was in danger of just getting killed by it alone in just a few turns.  I had two blockers for their two fliers, but I needed to get damage in right away.  I cast Concilliator's Duelist, hoping that I would soon be able to get Killian's Confidence back, bounce Spider-Woman to tie down a blocker and get in.  (I had Divergent Equation in hand to get the Killian's Confidence.)  I passed the turn and went to 3 after the Duelist's life loss and a pain point from the Vindictive Warden.  They only had the mana to activate it two times on their turn.  They didn't need it, however, because they drew Capture Sphere to tie down a blocker and swing in for the win.  2-2.  

That was the end of the night, but I got to get my fifth game in two days later as my opponent and I agreed to keep our decks together.  They started off with Almighty Brushwagg on turn one.  I have died to many such Brushwaggs over the years, but that wasn't the decider here.  I had kept a hand with off color lands and spells, but a good future if they would ever overlap.  They had Vastwood Fortification on turn two, which wasn't too scary, and then Smitten Swordmaster and Oracle's Restoration on turn three.  It wasn't looking good, but I did draw into Gristle Glutton for turn three.  I thought I might turn it around, but instead died on turn six.  2-3.

We got in a bonus game and that one was way more interesting.  The game was quite even and I pulled out a long win in the end.

2-3, but how can this be anything other than a win?  I got to play with all sorts of fun decades-old cards, I had another chance to make Yorion work, and I got to play a bunch of fun magic with friends.  

Happy 20-cards-too-many-Magicking!