Three Strikes, but Chaos Isn't Out (WUBRG Drafting)

I ran a little chaos draft last week.  It initially looked like we might have 10 or 11 people, but then a little Florida flu went around town and we were down to five.  Nevertheless, we had a good selection of packs.

So much chaos, we couldn't even line up the pentagon well.

I did pretty well in the draft.  I thought I took more removal than I actually wound up with.  The real problem was that we were extremely short on mana-fixing.  (I think I managed to be the only WUBRG player, but not for good reasons.)  Here were my picks:

Pick 1, pack 3: a rare lesson.  Bonus!

Looking back, I thought that all my instant-speed card draw would make a bigger difference than it actually did.  I also thought that would all combo real well with Manaplasm.  I felt like my deck would be able to make things happen.  Here's what I put together:

My office apologizes for the glare.

We had five players and got a bit of a late start, so we went for single-game rounds.  I managed to play three of my four opponents.  In the first round, I was matched up against a Mardu player, who got out an absolutely nutty combo on turn 2.

Kumano Faces Kakkazan + Mauhur = beats

I dragged the game out a bit, but I was on the back foot the whole time and lost. 0-1.

In the second round, I faced an Abzan deck.  I felt like things were going pretty well until turn five, when Glissa, Herald of Predation hit the board.  I had already exhausted a removal piece and I was never able to keep up with all the incubators that kept dropping.

The three rules cards are all incubators with +2/+2.

I was slowly devoured by Phyrexians.  0-2.  (That Phyrexian domination won the draft 4-0.)

In the third round, I was up against an often-WUBRG drafter who still managed a Witch-Maw deck in our fixing-desert packs.  Guess what?  I got steamrolled.  My opponent got value-creature after value-creature.  They named Mutagen Connoisseur with Natural Unity, which was a great choice.  I held it together, but then The Goose Mother came out.  I did kill off a Bounding Felidar that hit the ground, but it was after it gave out a turn of +1/+1 counters.  It was not enough to hold off the onslaught.  0-3.

I don't even remember how I held on in each of those games.  The Workshop Warchief never saw the battlefield.  I think the Undercity Scrounger was one of my winners, because it helped me with some fixing.  I never learned, so I didn't get to cast the Teachings of the Archaics.  I never even got to scry off of Rivendell.  I still had a lot of fun, especially just trying to keep up with all the things headed at me.  With some more chances, I think something would have come together, even if it wasn't a winning something.

I can't wait to do it again!