Drafting WUBRG: Strixhaven (Third Time's a Charm)

Well, not that much of a charm... I went 1-2 again, but I had another great time.  Here's what I drafted.  Packs 1 to 3 left-to-right.  Front-to-back in the pack order.

This time we had 8 people, but my counts turned out pretty much the same as normal:

• 8 non-basic lands, which is fine, except that one of those is Biblioplex, so that didn't help with mana fixing.
• 6 lessons.  That's pretty normal.
  
• Only 4 ways to Learn, however.  That was definitely a missing part of the puzzle.

Somehow I need to pay attention to my counts for all three of these things while drafting.  I don't think I'm allowed to write that down while it's happening, though, and I tend to get distracted pretty easily.

I also passed on a Cultivate I opened, which was a bad idea.  Verdant Mastery was real good, even for the cheaper cost.

Here's what I built:

 

I think the choice of lands was correct.  (Except that I should probably have ditched the Biblioplex.)  I like the spells I chose, though Double Major was probably too much to ask for.

However, I do think I'm too eager to be on the draw.  This is probably a mistake I've been making for a while, since enter-the-battlefield-tapped duals have been common in land slots for a few years.  This means I'm playing with lots of mana fixing so I don't need the extra card as bad, and I need to avoid getting rushed before I can put some big stuff down.

On that same note, I should probably consider going 22-18 (lands to spells) instead of the 23-17 I have been sticking to for years.

Drafting WUBRG: Strixhaven (Round two)

After my second Strixhaven draft, I can definitely say that it is an excellent format for five-color-drafting.  I again pulled off a 5-color deck and was very seldom in trouble color-wise.  I again drafted a ton of great cards.  And I again went 1-2.  I still think this went better and I nearly won both rounds I lost.

This time I kept my pulls in the order that I drafted them so you can see how that went.  Here's my card pool (complete with my 5-color (d)rafting deckbox):

The first pack is the left column, with picks starting in the front.  Some things to point out:

• My first five picks were all rares.  That felt pretty weird.
• I went more heavily into lessons.  They are real good.  I will continue to do this if I get to draft Strixhaven again.  I don't think I needed 3 Environmental Sciences, though.
  
• Learn cards are great.  Pop quiz is an amazing card in draft.  I should take it more highly in the future.
• I still managed to pull off 9 non-basic lands.  I think I should keep track of how many I get next time, as more than 9 would probably be too much.

With the 9 non-basics and 9 lessons, I only had to cut 4 cards to get to 23 spells.  (45 - 18 = 27)  It was still pretty hard.  Here was my deck:

 

Without Quintorius this week, Lorehold Excavation wasn't as amazing.  Later on, I put Fuming Effigy in instead, which I probably should have done throughout.  I will say that double Returned Pastcaller is really amazing.  

Last week my deck was mostly Quandrix, this week it was definitely more of a Prismari-Lorehold mix, and that worked quite well.  Although I missed the presence of a Bookwurm, I would be happy to get a pool similar to this again.  I think I could play it better as well.

Happy Drafting!

Drafting WUBRG: Strixhaven (First time)

There has been a gap in my drafting of over 14 months; my last in-person draft was near the end of January, 2020.  COVID-19 prevented me from drafting paper Magic.   Last night I was finally able to safely get back in the store and return to the glory of drafting five colors.  Thankfully, Strixhaven is a good set for this.

Note: there were only six people at the draft.  Not many kids have been fully vaccinated, and many people may not yet feel safe drafting at the store.  Hopefully the numbers return soon.

Most of my magicking in the past year has been playing EDH and Oathbreaker online, most recently using Spelltable.  Even though Strixhaven has been out for a while, I was very unfamiliar with the set.  So, I took a look at the commons and uncommons.  Mostly I realized that the best helping cards were going to be the lands: Archway Commons and the dual scry "campus" land cycle (e.g. Silverquill Campus).  I thought I might also be able to use some Letter of Acceptance and Environmental Sciences, but I didn't see any of those.

I did see a lot of rares and mystical archive cards, though I unfortunately realized I didn't have any good knowledge of the individual card prices.  I also saw two of the rare dual lands, which I certainly snapped up.  I really got distracted by the mystical archive cards... the diversity of cards that are available in packs is crazy, but it's also really cool.  I saw multiple packs that had three rares (a normal rare, a rare lesson, and a rare mystical archive card).  I was even passed a pack like this.  After drafting, here's the card pool I was working with:

 

Here's the deck I put together.  I didn't have much of any time between rounds, so I didn't make any changes the entire night.  (I probably should have!)

I went 1-2. (2-0, 1-2, 0-2)  I definitely think I could have done better.  The last game I mulliganed, then kept a 6-land hand.  I knew this was a mistake, but I did it anyways.  I then went on to draw land the first four turns.

I still had a blast and my deck worked very well many times.  Aside from the lands, cards that did a lot of work:

• Zimone: I got to 8 lands easily with her.  In some games I had to stop drawing to not deck myself.
  
• Bookwurm: For the same reason.  This card can really help you come back from a tough board position.
• Quintorius: Along with other cards that dropped things from my graveyard, Quintorius was great.  I even got to exile Faithless Looting and net a creature.
  
• Removal.  I had lots of it and it was great.  This includes Needleborn Drake.
  
• Anything with Learn.  I had four lessons: Elemental Summoning, 2 Fractal Summoning, and Introduction to Annihilation.  Having cards that also essentially put a creature in my hand are real nice.
  

I also got real lucky with the Cultivate, though I only used it once.

For next time:

• Grab more Learn cards and Lessons, if possible.
• I didn't get any early blockers, which was often a problem.  The three games I won were all on a slow comeback.  That's fine, except when I don't have time for the comeback.

I really hope I'll get to draft again next week!