Most of it's pretty simple; you're going for gates and gates-matter cards. In Guilds, take any of these immediately:
- Guild Summit. This is a complete bomb. While playing, if you get a Guild Summit early on, you might shift your strategy to playing non-gates first just to get it out sooner. That's fine. Playing gates after it's out is just as good as having them around untapped when you first play it. Get it out sooner.
- Glaive of the Guildpact. Seriously, all my opponents have to read the Glaive multiple times, and then they forget about one of the three abilities it grants. It turns anything into a 3-turn clock... with menace! It often turns Garrison Sergeant into a 1-turn clock.
- Gatekeeper Gargoyle. This is awesome, but I might take Glaive over it. Maybe.
- Garrison Sergeant. This is a common bomb. It will always have double strike. I usually get 2. If you can get 4, go for it. It's so good. And, as mentioned above, wrecks house with the glaive.
Aside from these, you're going to want to draft gates very highly. This is easiest to get away with in pack 1; often the other people at the table will settle in to colors in packs 2 and 3 and start to take gates then. Beat them to it by getting lots the first time around. You'll want at least 8, but I find that 11-12 is fine. You won't need many basics. As far as Gateway Plaza is concerned, I would only take 2, maybe 3, of these. That should be plenty.
Aside from gates and gates-matter, grab any cards that are normally bombs. I played tonight with Trostani, Swathcutter Giant, and Nightveil Predator. (The predator was one of only two black cards in the deck. No problem!)
I've been playing heavy in Selesnya/Boros and being very creature heavy, which tends to work well. In addition to meaning you should always have the colors for Garrison Sergeant, this plan pairs well with these cards:
- Guildmages' Forum. This is obviously good because you're going 5-colors, but it's often worth it to spend the extra mana on a creature.
- Centaur Peacemaker. Don't let the game end early. This one plays double duty by slowing down the pace and being a big roadblock for 3 mana. A ton of these will come around at the end of packs. Snap them up! If you're winning on the board, you don't have to cast them. If you're not winning, this will help tip the scales in your balance and stave off death a while longer.
- Sumala Woodshaper. Go cycle through to another creature. No problem!
- Rhizome Lurcher. These are often taken by other players, but if they go untouched, grab them. If your deck is full of creatures, you can just wait to play these later, which only makes them better.
- Rosemane Centaur: I always undervalue this while drafting, but then am really happy to see it show up.
Finally, choose to go first. I know that may be obvious, but when running 5-colors in other formats, it can be best to choose to draw to get a higher chance at mana fixing. If you take tons of gates, though, you won't have to. And if you're playing only gates for the first 3 or 4 turns, that can effectively put you a turn behind. Choose to go first to help keep up.
Here's my deck from tonight: (Note: I got 11 gates, and there were only 6 people in the pod, so more is definitely doable.)
Gates:
- 2 each of Boros, Dimir, Golgari, Izzet, and Selesnya gates. (I did not plan that!)
- 1 Gateway Plaza
- Guildmages' Forum (I never even saw it, but I've played with it before. Awesome!)
- 1 Guild Summit
- 1 Glaive of the Guildpact
- 1 Gatekeeper Gargoyle
- 2 Garrison Sergeant
- 1 Boros Challenger
- 2 Centaur Peacekeeper
- 1 Hammer Dropper
- 1 League Guildmage
- 1 Nightveil Predator
- 1 Rosemane Centaur
- 2 Sumala Woodshaper
- 1 Swathcutter Giant
- 1 Trostani Discordant
- 1 Watcher in the Mist
- Direct Current
- Integrity/Intervention
- Invert/Invent
- Urban Utopia (I should probably like this better, but I almost never draft it!)
- Vivid Revival
