Chaos with a WUBRG Durkwood Boars (WUBRG Drafting)

Is 12 different sets from four drafters too much chaos?  Definitely not!

I managed another draft of four people, and everyone was very excited about using wacky packs.  I opened Dominaria, Rivals of Ixalan, and Dominaria United, three wedding gift packs.  Here was the group's overall choices:

One of these twelve stands out.

I did not do a great job drafting.  I missed a couple of dual lands and should have first-picked a Traxos.  I did, however, maintain my identity: I saw WUBRG and took it, in the form of Tom Bombadil.  Of course, I didn't see a saga the entire time.  Oh well!  Here were my picks:

Seriously, what was with that first pick?

I did manage to make it out with three mana-fixing lands, a Path to the Festival, and a Blighted Burgeoning.  Nevertheless, when I'm in a group this small, I think I need to be even more aggressive about fixing my mana base.  The Maestros Ascendancy did help me win a game, though...  One thing I did well here was to pick up a bunch of removal.  That certainly made a difference.

My mana base was tough.  Here's the deck I put together:

I am very willing to hear about my bad picks for the deck!  Let me have it!  What shouldn't I have cut?  (Besides Tom Bombadil.  I wasn't getting rid of my hard-to-cast Durkwood Boars.)  

We agreed to play single-game rounds because it was a week night and we somehow got a slow start even after gathering early.  One of the attendees also brought six cards that made for the best way to decide who-goes-first I've ever seen:

Rock Lobster, Paper Tiger, Scissors Lizard FTW

In the first round, I was matched up against an aggressive Izzet deck.  I lost quickly to two attackers: Fanatical Firebrand and Balmor.  After those hit the board, some counterspells and bounce spells kept my board clear and sometimes powered them up.  I died on turn 6 or 7, with an uncastable Tom Bombadil in my hand.  0-1. Since we finished so fast, we played three more (exhibition) games while the other match had their first game.  I did not lose all three of those games!

In round two, I was matched up against an efficient Selesnya deck that also took me to the powerwash.  Guardian of New Benalia and Leonin Vanguard came down and started delivering quick beats and card advantage for my opponent, putting me to 14 on turn 3.  In the Trenches hit the turn after, promising 7 damage-per turn from the Guardian.  I avoided a turn 5 loss by throwing down some chump blockers for a few turns, but I didn't get the colors I needed and lost, again with Tommy B in my hand.  0-2

In the third round, my opponent was running Dimir self-mill.  They had a bunch of graveyard-matters cards combined with ways to get cards into their yard, including Monstrous War-Leech.  This time I put up a drawn-out battle and managed to out-value my opponent.  I cleared a path for my creatures (including Tom Bombadil!) but would likely have won by unintentional decking anyways as my opponent burned through his library.  We were able to get in a second game afterwards, and I finally got value out of Splashy Spellcaster, ending the game with four creatures with Sorcerer's Roles.  1-2

I think that with a bit more mana fixing, I would have been in a much better spot.  It's likely that that would have cost me some of my other good cards, though.  Nonetheless, I had a blast with this deck.  I got to cast Defenestrate for the first time ever, and I felt like Tom Bombadil was my commander with the number of times it showed up in my hand.  If only I had had some sagas to feed him!

I've had some great chaos drafts lately, and this one was as wacky as ever.  I love it!

13-Player Repack Draft (WUBRG Drafting)

12 students showed up to my free draft yesterday!  I can't believe it!  I haven't run that big of a magic event since grad school!  I was ill prepared: I ran out of sleeves for everyone and barely had enough land.  Still, we managed to have fun and make it a worthwhile draft!

I got lots of multi-colored lands (caveat: I made the recipe for these repacks) but I may have hurt myself by taking them over some removal I saw.  (Especially given how well I drafted on Friday.)  Nevertheless, I felt pretty confident when reviewing my picks.

Talon of Pain is a workhorse.

Notes:

• The two people that saw Draco before me were both commenting that I should take it.  (I wasn't sure what it was until I saw it.)  I have a bit of a reputation.  As the draft went on, I realized it would be bad for me to actually run it, but I ran it anyways.  That became important later...
  
• I didn't take any cards that needed two of the same color!  I was really excited about that and it made it really easy for me to cast all of my spells.
• I got lots of removal, which was all based around little bits of damage, but much of it was repeatable.  

As I mentioned above, I kept Draco in, but I also kept Stratadon in.  I had so many multi-lands that didn't have basic land types that these turned out to be a bit detrimental.  Here was my deck after cuts:

This is possibly the flattest mana curve I've ever had.

 

Since we had 13 people, we set up single game rounds and just played as many as we each could.  This was a bit problematic for a few pairs because their games lasted over an hour.  (In hindsight I probably should have just acted as a facilitator and not played myself.)

I was almost never color-screwed. I think that in three games I started off with a turn 1 guildgate, followed by Gateway Plaza on turn 2, which was great.  I went 3-2, and I think my games were in the following order.  (I will certainly edit any mistakes as I learn about them!)

In round 1, paired against a Bant deck, I got both Infused Arrows out on turns 4 and 5, with four counters each.  I then got a few creatures out and was able to keep my opponent's board clear long enough to push through for the win.  I was really excited because my opponent was able to cast a Scaled Wurm off of some ramp and I got it off the board immediately.  1-0.

In round 2, I was matched up against an opponent running mono-green stompy.  On turn 2 they got out Scorned Villager.  I couldn't cast a spell on my second turn, so it flipped on their turn 3, and they powered out a Spined Wurm with their five mana.  I stalled as well as I could, but I got shorted on lands and could not get answers fast enough.  The Spined Wurm survived with Trollhide on it and I died from that and other creatures.  1-1.

In round 3, I fought an aggressive Rakdos deck.  We traded creatures to removal a bunch.  I took a bunch of damage to Battle-Rattle Shaman, then made a bad decision to Arrest it.  My opponent immediately dropped a more threatening creature.  I thankfully drew into removal, then backed it up with my own creature.  My opponent used Spontaneous Combustion (sacrificing the shaman) to reset the board, but I was down 7-14.  We had a few "draw, land" turns and then I drew into a chain of creatures that were enough to win the game.  2-1.

(I may have the next two rounds backwards.)

In round 4, I was up against another 5-color deck!  They had pulled Sisay and drafted for it, but never got another legend.  They didn't have the multicolored land support that I did, however, and got stuck without any green sources after eight turns and had to use a Diabolic Tutor to get a forest.  Up until that point I had kept things locked down with removal (thank you Infused Arrows) and was pinging each turn with a Razorfin Hunter.  I drew like a pro and kept the board locked down while I added creatures faster than my opponent to win.  3-1.

In my last round, I faced a Grixis deck, played by a Rakdos-enthusiast.  My cards were coming out slowly compared to my opponent, but I thought I was going to be able to catch up.  I played my Scab-Clan Giant--an excellent card--thinking I was going to get a good 1-for-0.  Instead, my opponent followed that up with an amazing combo:

Oof.  Act of Treason followed by Mind Extraction caused me to empty my hand of all my colored cards.  Brutal!  I did not recover from that.  The Heliophial was able to take out a creature, and I nearly stabilized at 2 life.  Unfortunately, I got stuck with only Draco in hand, but couldn't cast it. 

1 mana short.

I lost soon thereafter.  3-2.

This was great fun!  I met some cool people outside of our department and played five great games of magic against five people.  We didn't complete as much of our potential round robin as possible, but I think everyone enjoyed themselves.

Angled to cut the names out.

It's unlikely that I'll get to run another one of these before the year is up, but I'm really glad I managed to make two happen this semester!