Chaos needs to read the whole card (WUBRG Drafting)

I hosted a little chaos draft last week with four other people.  We decided to run best-of-one rounds and use the Andrew McLaughlin rule: you can replace your third turn draw with adding a basic land from outside the game to your hand.  The hype for Lorwyn Eclipsed is still going strong, so there was a lot of that opened.  I picked a Foundations pack and my last two packs grabbed from GameStop.  Here's what everyone chose:

I've never been disappointed by a Foundations pack.

I definitely got greedy while drafting.  At one point I picked a pretty Plains way too early.  I also picked the Survey Mechan without reading to the end of the ability.  Notably, I didn't read the cost reduction part.  I'm lucky I got it!  (I should have taken it over Broodguard Elite.)  Here are all my picks:

I did not have a coherent draft strategy.  Had I read my cards better, I might have.

I was the last one to get their deck figured out.  That was true even though someone else was drafting for the first time.  Yikes.  I definitely made some bad choices (e.g. Jeong Jeong over Sizzling Changeling) but I didn't take the time to change my deck up between rounds.  Here's the deck I ran for the whole night:

I also think Mm'memon, the Right Hand might not have been a good choice.

We completed the Round Robin so I got to play all four opponents.  I was matched first against the new drafter, running "Mild Discomfort from Above", an Esper deck with lots of fliers.  In the past few years I have a terrible record against first-time drafters.  Even with the Andrew McLoughlin rule, I still had to mull my first two hands.  (Thankfully the first mull is free in Bo1.)  I got Cori-Steel Cutter and Ba Sing Se down but they started dropping their fliers.  I played a turn five Wildvine Pummeler, but they Rallied the Monastery it.  I tried to catch back up but without any way to deal with the flying assault, mild discomfort turned into perishing.  0-1.

In the next round I was up again Ink-Treader "Kithkin Alliance", powered by (guess what) Kithkin and Allies.  I got the Steel Cutter out on turn two and played Dragonbroods' Relic the following turn.  They Liminally Held the cutter before I could get the trigger, but I followed that up with Survey Mechan.  They had a great turn five with Professional Wrestler and Thoughtweft Lieutenant, but I warped in Broodguard Elite and put the four +1/+1 counters on my Mechan at the end of turn.  I played the Broodguard for good the next turn and started swinging with the five-power hexproof Mechan.  They followed that up with Iroh, Grand Lotus and swung in with the Wrestler.  I blocked with the Broodguard for the trade and threw these counters on my Mechan as well.  (This led to the political-future-ending statement by my opponent: "You're over there with a flying 9/11.")  I swung in for big flying damage.  They used Iroh to recast Tend the Sprigs to get a reaching blocker and dropped Omni Changeling.  Then they swung for 13 damage.  I might've been in trouble, except that I had Trystan's Command to pave the path to victory.  1-1.

I faced "Counterspell!Counterspell!Counterspell!" in the third round, a Dimir control deck.  I had an aggro-style start with Spider Manifestation, Jeong Jeong, and Mechan Shieldmate on turns two, three, and four, respectively.  They played a Selfcraft Mechan, but I had a Spiral Into Solitude for it and put them down to seven life on my fifth turn.  They played Sandskitter Outrider with the token to slow me down.  I played Electroduplicate on my Shieldmate to keep the pressure on and attacked one more time.  They blocked well but went down to one life while I was at 21.  They used Dragon's Prey to kill Jeong Jeong and I was down to only the Spider Manifestation.  I got the Dragonbroods' Relic and would win off of the activation, but I needed another creature to have enough mana.  I played Doc Ock, but it got Wildly Unraveled.  Then my opponent Temporally Cleansed the Spider Manifestation, which I dropped to the bottom.  I drew into Trystan's Command and grabbed both Doc Ock and the Spiral Into Solitude while I took out the Outrider.  They Unburied it, then cast Strategic Betrayal to exile my yard, though a turn late.  I played Doc Ock and then untapped with enough on turn ten to get the Reliquary Dragon out of the Relic and win.  2-1.

My final round opponent was running "Mono G with White", a Selesnya counters deck.  If I could pull off the win, then my 3-1 record would win on tie breakers from my second round opponent.  They started off with Lys Alana Informant and dropped Goldvein Pick and hit with it the next turn.  I got Jeong Jeong out, but they attacked and tricked with Biosynthic Burst, so I didn't get the trade.  I played Survey Mechan and had Ba Sing Se, but they dropped two more creatures: Earth Village Ruffians and Rebellious Captives on turn five.  They had a big attack before I could catch up, playing Mechan Shieldmate, Bender's Waterskin, and Glacial Dragonhunt all on one turn.  Unfortunately they took out the Mechan Shieldmate with a Make Your Move, then played Sage of the Fang.  I took my turn and played Shimmerwilds Growth, which let me play Wildvine Pummeler for cheap, but they Bit it Down.  Attacking on their turn put me to 1.  (They were still at 20.)  Dear reader, I have had some great comebacks, and I planned another one here.  I cast Mm'menon and was ready to put it together, but they Flashed in Thompson, tapped my flyer down, attacked and won.  2-2.

In the whole night, I don't think a single person used the Andrew McLaughlin rule.  

These drafts are so much fun.  I love all the crazy card interactions.  Happy Magicking, no matter how you do it!

*Update: Fixed the spelling for Andrew McLaughlin and an important note: my final round opponent did take an advantage of the rule in a prior round and took a land!