I just played the deck yesterday too. (With the subs above). I played against an exalted (Rafig), a green land acceleration (Baru), and a Uril deck. Each of them went crazy with pure stomping power. While I had a Ker Keep (which really was the save my ass card) and a couple of non threatening creatures. My best in hand creature was a Woodfall but I really needed to hold it to get rid of the Armadillo Cloak and Bear Umbra on Uril, or the Sword of Vengeance and Basilisk Collar on Rafig.
Anyhoo, the other players got so powerful that they battered and ganged up on each other. The Baru was the first out because he was dropping three or four land a turn so Rafig and Uril ganged up on him. Rafig was got about nineteen damage from uril so he was almost out (via lifelink Rafig had crazy amounts of life). However Rafig pulled a the sword of vengeance and got enough damage through to take out Uril.
That left myself which really seemed totally nonthreatening (I mean Baru had the chance to wipe me out with a bunch of 7/7 tramples, against my kobolds) and a player with sixty life. He got one 16 damage attack on me with his commander before my Woodfall took care of the sword. After Ker Keep saved me with his lack of trample. Siege-gang came out later to help with a nasty Shapeshifter that would have copied my Woodfall. Eventually I whittled him down, near the end when he was at about twenty I had a Vicious Shadows in my hand that I didn't play because he always had only one or two cards. But he played a Mind Spring and victory was pretty much assured (I mean siege-gang could nuke my left over goblin and himself for 14!)
Anyhoo, this deck is pretty brilliant (probably one of my favourite from your series). I think mainly because it does what any good commander deck should do, not come on too strong but really ramp up near the end. The problem with alot of decks, is when you become the most powerful on the board, you are the target. Whereas if you are a sleeper deck, no one really pays attention until it's too late. This really does seem almost broken and useless until the end.
I don't like the chances of being able to get enough playable red cards to go mono-red. Tunneler + Hellhound is a nice combo though, and Chandra's Spitfire and Fire Servant both combo well with burn spells.
I have seen the Act of Treason/Fling/Sacrifice creatures/Reassembling Skeleton deck executed to perfection, though I have not drafted it myself.
If you can get 2 or 3 Acts and a Skeleton, the other cards are easy to pick up. One problem is that in order to actually get 2 or 3 Acts, you are probably going to have to pass cards that are just better. That's a big commitment to make early, when you are not even sure you will see the card you need.
I'm not too worried either way as I played with Extinction when it was wasn’t banned and it was good against decks like Elves and Merfolk but it wasn’t always against the more unusual tribal decks or decks with larger creatures as they tend to have allies from different tribes.
There is also the saying "don’t put all your eggs in your basket at once" which is very true when playing tribal if you play all the creatures you draw and don’t keep any reserves in your hand then expect to get caught out by a wrath effect.
Nice read. The most difficult aspect about Pack 1 Pick 1 is that you only have 2 minutes (2.5??) to make up your mind. Tough Choice.
You said, "Next time I see a skeleton early I might just nab it and try to force - the archetype has various cards most people don't want at all." Are you sure that you didn't miss a lesson from your own epic atricle? That mentality is what I felt caused the train wreck that was your "Elixer Draft".
Right.... but then if you look at P2P2 and say "well, I would have picked the removal in the previous pick, but you didn't. Lets look at P2P2 as if I had picked what you picked in P2P1," then you don't run into that problem because you are assuming the draft played out exactly as it actually did. You're just rethinking each individual pick.
Except where the pick dramatically changes what your opponents think/see and how they react. For example passing a bombworthy creature in favor of advanced removal (2-1 etc) changes the nature of the draft for everyone in your range, and may have ripple effects for all 8 players.
Im against rebanning Extinction. In the brokeness that is legacy extinction is no more broken imho than any of the other cards and combos available. Merfolk + Vial for example.
I generally don't consider something a "signal" until at least picks 3-5 unless it's a top quality card. Looking at pack 1, pick 2 the rare is missing, so really all he's telling me so far is "I opened a quality rare". Which could be in the same color or different colors than the best commons & uncommons in the pack. It's also telling me zero about the guy two seats to my right so far, pick 2 only tells me anything about the guy one seat to the right. Whereas if I see a good removal spell or high quality creature in pick 4, say, then I know 3 people were willing to let it pass my way.
I am a little curious how viable mono-red is. Goblin Tunneler + Fiery Hellhound, anyone? It does have a lot of potential reach with Fling and Lava Axe and the like. But everyone else is gonna snipe your Lightning Bolts and Fireballs all day. I think it's likely to be a deck with a high luck factor, with some unbeatable fast draws, and plenty of losses when the plan doesn't come together as well. Maybe I'll draft it sometime and see. I have been wanting to get the red/black archetype somewhere, with Act of Treason into Fling, Bloodthrone Vampire, and Viscera Seer, and ideally a couple of Reassembling Skeleton as well. Next time I see a skeleton early I might just nab it and try to force - the archetype has various cards most people don't want at all.
I actually read the first thread you discuss in this very article, which was very spirited to say the least. I find the customer service side of things a little intimidating because I'm in Australia and 6 months or so new to MTGO but I have to say I appreciate the jobs the ORCS do. I play alone and exclusively online because no one I know is interested in the game. So having approachable moderators has been very important to me.
Oops, that was my mad typing skillz. It was meant to be "Mr Jahn already"... as in Peter Jahn. He had two articles covering the advantages of paper and MTGO respectively. I was just trying to avoid well-worn territory.
Thanks for the feedback on length and such . . . rookies need to know things like that.
Yeah, that sounds awesome to have so much to choose from. I'm certainly envious. =)
2 - Fire Servant isn't just bad b/c of lack of combos . . . but because you're not expected to have RR on turn 5 that often (so the green 5-drops are wayyyy better).
3 - I still think 15 land is too few ... it's not "results-oriented" to note that you'll wind up with markedly more 1-landers than usual, that you can't keep without an Elf and possibly a Ranger to follow up. 15-land decks are those with low curves - not those expecting to draw into mana producers. There are simply too many combinations that cock you up and require you to draw crazy hot. (For reference: see why trimming with Rav lands is different from simply using Elves.
Alright, yes, I was being a little jerky with my list of cards. I was getting frustrated reading all these comments. It's a good discussion, but it just seems to hit against the wall of "LD is not fun." That really is a valid opinion, I'll admit.
But --- a lot of people on here have offered advice on how to make it less not-fun, and those should be discussed rather than just dismissed. Somewhere in the comments someone said something like "it shouldn't be the player's responsibility to build an anti-LD deck". You don't have to build a totally anti-LD deck, but knowing that it's something you might face in the casual room, I think deckbuilding should include provisions for it. Perhaps some acceleration or whatever. A few Lotus Petals easily go in any deck. Playing white? Flagstones of Trokair. Black? Dark Ritual. And if your opponent isn't playing LD, none of those cards are dead draws.
I know I am more excited to win and have more fun when I come prepared and defeat a deck I particularly hate (I'm looking at you, Goblins!). That's all I'm saying - there are options and not even considering them is just keeping you from exploring more aspects of the game, which, hopefully would lead to more fun.
Very well written, and good analysis - just one point to consider: while red is indeed shallow in M11, it's not so far behind the other colors that you can ignore signals and take Azure Drake over Outrage.
It's pretty clear that the red was flowing - possibly from others saying the same as you (i.e. red's the underdrafted color). Might be time to take the Zvi approach and cut the 'bad' color hard? Either way, your final deck is markedly better if you move into red w/ the Outrage.
Great analysis of the Doom Blade v. Serra Angel was excellent though - it's a VERY close pick and there's no one right answer (I don't think), but I loved how you explained your preference and your plan. Very cool.
Well I admit I picked up the deck myself with a few alterations for budget reasons...Mainly no Cobra...(yet) and Fauna Shaman over Survival. Also Im short the Bloomtender, SIegeGang and Woodfall. But those are all staples I tend to pick up eventually except for the Bloom Tender, it just seems meh. But the deck is a blast. I love warping into Ob-Nixilis or the Baloth.
Edit: Also I was slightly disappointed but In the Web of War does not work with Warp World...it made me cry tears of sadness, but then I remembered Akroma's Memorial...it made me cry tears of joy.
I'm glad you liked the deck enough to write about it. It's been a big hit in my playgroup. It saddens me that I couldn't afford to play it on Magic Online though. I don't even want to think about how much the physical cards are worth.
You're absolutely right about other permanent heavy decks being potential trouble after Warp World. That's the fun part! It's interesting to see when other decks are capable of competing on such an altered gameplan. Grave Pact effects make up for a lot of ground against those decks though. I used to run an It That Betrays + Malfegor combo to potentially Warp into a permanent Insurrection, but cut it because the cards were pretty weak individually.
I'm interested in the differences in our mana bases, specifically Temple of the False God and Gaea's Cradle. I had completely forgotten about the Cradle, to be honest, but it seems like a natural inclusion in a deck that's mostly creatures with a token subtheme. Temple I'm a little dubious on. With that first hand you drew, if ToFG had been any green producing land, that hand would have been a solid keeper. I just don't like how it doesn't do anything if you draw it in your opening hand, and the mana boost later is barely worth it, especially with all the land accelerators we're playing.
Nice game play-by-play as well. That's exactly why I love playing the deck. It just feels like you're doing something completely broken while everyone else is busy doing nothing relevant, but you're doing it in a socially acceptable way.
I do suspect the blue Leyline is mostly a trap. I would take a white Leyline a little higher than a basic land, and sideboard it in against lava-axe.dec.
I will be doing some Scars drafts and writing them up as time allows. Though I might not be doing any "alternate color choices" analysis in this kind of detail, at least not until I know the set better. I am of course looking forward to getting some of each new leonin card, since I'm a cat dude myself!
Obviously you can't predict things with perfect accuracy, but if you are looking at each pick as if all of the previous picks had happened exactly as they did in the actual draft I think you can get pretty close.
I read one of the pros say once that reading the signals passed TO you from your right is more important than what signals you send to the left. Because whatever's coming from your right you'll get in packs 1 and 3, what you cut to the left you may only get strongly in pack 2. I see a lot of wisdom in that. It's worth noting too, that if you cut a color, let's say blue, you might have bad drafters that don't read signals downstream of you. Or you might have a guy that opened pack 1 Mind Control and is determined to stay blue even though you're cutting it.
That theory argues more in favor of taking the white in pack 1, really.
I will say also, looking at the early pack 2 Cudgel Troll and Giant Spider that ended up in the pod winner's deck, I'm almost certain he was immediately to my right, cutting all the best blue & taking those two good early green cards I passed him before anyone else could get a shot. Of course I didn't realize that at the time.
Another tool I see the pros mention that's too much straining my memory right now (maybe with more practice) is to remember pack 1 or pack 2, see it come back, and go "Oh yeah, these 7 cards are what's missing, so I know something about what colors the rest of the table is in". Or at least "It's surprising that a strong black card tabled since it was a weak pack, not many black drafters here" or "The black card I wanted tabled, but that doesn't mean black is wide open because I remember that pack was stuffed with ridiculously good cards, and this still quite good black card is weaker than most of them."
When (if!) I get to that level, I think my win percentage will go up some more. :) It would be easy enough here to compare pick 1 with pick 9 in all 3 packs, and pick 2 with pick 10. The excercise is probably worth doing.
What I need the most when mastering each new format that comes out is plenty of walkthroughs of what cards were picked, and why. At the end there should be a decklist and a short summary of how the matches went, as a point of interest and to help give some context as to how strong the deck turned out to be. A few comments about which cards were left out and which included to cull down to 22-23 cards is sometimes useful, though some decks don't have any tricky decisions there anyway.
I've cut down on my long game walkthroughs for the time being, I think I learned what I needed to from them & hopefully some of my readers did too. But they're very time consuming to make, and the hope is I can post draft walkthroughs more often if I just complete the pick analysis and add short game summaries. If I can find the time to draft more while looking for work/consulting/contracts, anyway!
You would hope to be locked in by pick 8 pack 1 but that isn't always the case. If you get a little unlucky or are missing the signals you can end up forced out of your chosen colors 2nd pack. In addition 2nd or 3rd pack 1st picks can cause some changes in plan. As RoninX points out, you can't really predict with accuracy how the draft would have gone had your picks been different because you don't know what the rest of the draft table looked like.
I think this is an interesting idea -- a sort of draft clinic of sorts. I'd need to get reader submissions, of course, but beyond that I think it's definitely doable.
I hear your concerns RoninX, and I share them. I think if I were to do this I would need to offer two lines of commentary:
1. What I would have done, choice for choice, in the first 8 picks of the draft. The actual drafter's decisions have no impact on any of these picks, so we can safely comment on them. In some situations it may be able to comment past the first 8 picks, but this will generally be limited.
2. What I would have done with the rest of the draft given the first 8 picks that the original drafter selected. In other words, we're locked into your basic plan now -- so how would I execute it?
I'm going to have my hands full mulling over Scars in the coming weeks but I'd be happy to comment some Rise drafts if people are interested in submitting them. Let me know here what you think and I'll make a gmail account to send submissions to if there are enough volunteers.
I dont have a targent word count, but when I do write articles, I write them in Microsoft Word, and I try to make them at least 3 pages long. I don't worry too much about unimportant details. I try to stick to the point, but if I get off the point, I eventually come back. Leaving those unimportant details can be a sign of your characteristic. As long as a majority of the article is not off topic.
I consider it fortunate to have a store locally and if I ever move again, I will try to make it a point to have a thriving store with a good magic community within a fair driving distance. The downs side is all thoe stores are about 50 miles one way.
I decide which to go to based on my day. I take in factors such as when I get out of work, what time the events are starting, what type of event it is, and if my wife is working a morning shift or a night shift. There is literally at least one event a night I can choose from at one of the stores I frequent. It's one of the bennefits of living in a tourist area.
I just played the deck yesterday too. (With the subs above). I played against an exalted (Rafig), a green land acceleration (Baru), and a Uril deck. Each of them went crazy with pure stomping power. While I had a Ker Keep (which really was the save my ass card) and a couple of non threatening creatures. My best in hand creature was a Woodfall but I really needed to hold it to get rid of the Armadillo Cloak and Bear Umbra on Uril, or the Sword of Vengeance and Basilisk Collar on Rafig.
Anyhoo, the other players got so powerful that they battered and ganged up on each other. The Baru was the first out because he was dropping three or four land a turn so Rafig and Uril ganged up on him. Rafig was got about nineteen damage from uril so he was almost out (via lifelink Rafig had crazy amounts of life). However Rafig pulled a the sword of vengeance and got enough damage through to take out Uril.
That left myself which really seemed totally nonthreatening (I mean Baru had the chance to wipe me out with a bunch of 7/7 tramples, against my kobolds) and a player with sixty life. He got one 16 damage attack on me with his commander before my Woodfall took care of the sword. After Ker Keep saved me with his lack of trample. Siege-gang came out later to help with a nasty Shapeshifter that would have copied my Woodfall. Eventually I whittled him down, near the end when he was at about twenty I had a Vicious Shadows in my hand that I didn't play because he always had only one or two cards. But he played a Mind Spring and victory was pretty much assured (I mean siege-gang could nuke my left over goblin and himself for 14!)
Anyhoo, this deck is pretty brilliant (probably one of my favourite from your series). I think mainly because it does what any good commander deck should do, not come on too strong but really ramp up near the end. The problem with alot of decks, is when you become the most powerful on the board, you are the target. Whereas if you are a sleeper deck, no one really pays attention until it's too late. This really does seem almost broken and useless until the end.
I don't like the chances of being able to get enough playable red cards to go mono-red. Tunneler + Hellhound is a nice combo though, and Chandra's Spitfire and Fire Servant both combo well with burn spells.
I have seen the Act of Treason/Fling/Sacrifice creatures/Reassembling Skeleton deck executed to perfection, though I have not drafted it myself.
If you can get 2 or 3 Acts and a Skeleton, the other cards are easy to pick up. One problem is that in order to actually get 2 or 3 Acts, you are probably going to have to pass cards that are just better. That's a big commitment to make early, when you are not even sure you will see the card you need.
I'm not too worried either way as I played with Extinction when it was wasn’t banned and it was good against decks like Elves and Merfolk but it wasn’t always against the more unusual tribal decks or decks with larger creatures as they tend to have allies from different tribes.
There is also the saying "don’t put all your eggs in your basket at once" which is very true when playing tribal if you play all the creatures you draw and don’t keep any reserves in your hand then expect to get caught out by a wrath effect.
Nice read. The most difficult aspect about Pack 1 Pick 1 is that you only have 2 minutes (2.5??) to make up your mind. Tough Choice.
You said, "Next time I see a skeleton early I might just nab it and try to force - the archetype has various cards most people don't want at all." Are you sure that you didn't miss a lesson from your own epic atricle? That mentality is what I felt caused the train wreck that was your "Elixer Draft".
Right.... but then if you look at P2P2 and say "well, I would have picked the removal in the previous pick, but you didn't. Lets look at P2P2 as if I had picked what you picked in P2P1," then you don't run into that problem because you are assuming the draft played out exactly as it actually did. You're just rethinking each individual pick.
Except where the pick dramatically changes what your opponents think/see and how they react. For example passing a bombworthy creature in favor of advanced removal (2-1 etc) changes the nature of the draft for everyone in your range, and may have ripple effects for all 8 players.
Im against rebanning Extinction. In the brokeness that is legacy extinction is no more broken imho than any of the other cards and combos available. Merfolk + Vial for example.
I generally don't consider something a "signal" until at least picks 3-5 unless it's a top quality card. Looking at pack 1, pick 2 the rare is missing, so really all he's telling me so far is "I opened a quality rare". Which could be in the same color or different colors than the best commons & uncommons in the pack. It's also telling me zero about the guy two seats to my right so far, pick 2 only tells me anything about the guy one seat to the right. Whereas if I see a good removal spell or high quality creature in pick 4, say, then I know 3 people were willing to let it pass my way.
I am a little curious how viable mono-red is. Goblin Tunneler + Fiery Hellhound, anyone? It does have a lot of potential reach with Fling and Lava Axe and the like. But everyone else is gonna snipe your Lightning Bolts and Fireballs all day. I think it's likely to be a deck with a high luck factor, with some unbeatable fast draws, and plenty of losses when the plan doesn't come together as well. Maybe I'll draft it sometime and see. I have been wanting to get the red/black archetype somewhere, with Act of Treason into Fling, Bloodthrone Vampire, and Viscera Seer, and ideally a couple of Reassembling Skeleton as well. Next time I see a skeleton early I might just nab it and try to force - the archetype has various cards most people don't want at all.
Extinction
Keep it Banned Flip
On another note it's ok making it Legacy but once again we see wizards have spent less then 30secs thinking about the format.
As they left it without our extra bannings it was still open to combo/tribal shell decks.
Shame they don't read this site as every week at least we have a Tribal Article discussing the problems of the format.
Wizards are starting to fail... no they are failing the players of a very good format
I actually read the first thread you discuss in this very article, which was very spirited to say the least. I find the customer service side of things a little intimidating because I'm in Australia and 6 months or so new to MTGO but I have to say I appreciate the jobs the ORCS do. I play alone and exclusively online because no one I know is interested in the game. So having approachable moderators has been very important to me.
Great article and a fascinating look at community
Oops, that was my mad typing skillz. It was meant to be "Mr Jahn already"... as in Peter Jahn. He had two articles covering the advantages of paper and MTGO respectively. I was just trying to avoid well-worn territory.
Thanks for the feedback on length and such . . . rookies need to know things like that.
Yeah, that sounds awesome to have so much to choose from. I'm certainly envious. =)
Forgot to rate - great article and very nice draft, man. Good work!
1 - This is a GREAT deck for Fling.
2 - Fire Servant isn't just bad b/c of lack of combos . . . but because you're not expected to have RR on turn 5 that often (so the green 5-drops are wayyyy better).
3 - I still think 15 land is too few ... it's not "results-oriented" to note that you'll wind up with markedly more 1-landers than usual, that you can't keep without an Elf and possibly a Ranger to follow up. 15-land decks are those with low curves - not those expecting to draw into mana producers. There are simply too many combinations that cock you up and require you to draw crazy hot. (For reference: see why trimming with Rav lands is different from simply using Elves.
Alright, yes, I was being a little jerky with my list of cards. I was getting frustrated reading all these comments. It's a good discussion, but it just seems to hit against the wall of "LD is not fun." That really is a valid opinion, I'll admit.
But --- a lot of people on here have offered advice on how to make it less not-fun, and those should be discussed rather than just dismissed. Somewhere in the comments someone said something like "it shouldn't be the player's responsibility to build an anti-LD deck". You don't have to build a totally anti-LD deck, but knowing that it's something you might face in the casual room, I think deckbuilding should include provisions for it. Perhaps some acceleration or whatever. A few Lotus Petals easily go in any deck. Playing white? Flagstones of Trokair. Black? Dark Ritual. And if your opponent isn't playing LD, none of those cards are dead draws.
I know I am more excited to win and have more fun when I come prepared and defeat a deck I particularly hate (I'm looking at you, Goblins!). That's all I'm saying - there are options and not even considering them is just keeping you from exploring more aspects of the game, which, hopefully would lead to more fun.
(PS, people should use game descriptions more.)
Very well written, and good analysis - just one point to consider: while red is indeed shallow in M11, it's not so far behind the other colors that you can ignore signals and take Azure Drake over Outrage.
It's pretty clear that the red was flowing - possibly from others saying the same as you (i.e. red's the underdrafted color). Might be time to take the Zvi approach and cut the 'bad' color hard? Either way, your final deck is markedly better if you move into red w/ the Outrage.
Great analysis of the Doom Blade v. Serra Angel was excellent though - it's a VERY close pick and there's no one right answer (I don't think), but I loved how you explained your preference and your plan. Very cool.
Well I admit I picked up the deck myself with a few alterations for budget reasons...Mainly no Cobra...(yet) and Fauna Shaman over Survival. Also Im short the Bloomtender, SIegeGang and Woodfall. But those are all staples I tend to pick up eventually except for the Bloom Tender, it just seems meh. But the deck is a blast. I love warping into Ob-Nixilis or the Baloth.
Edit: Also I was slightly disappointed but In the Web of War does not work with Warp World...it made me cry tears of sadness, but then I remembered Akroma's Memorial...it made me cry tears of joy.
I'm glad you liked the deck enough to write about it. It's been a big hit in my playgroup. It saddens me that I couldn't afford to play it on Magic Online though. I don't even want to think about how much the physical cards are worth.
You're absolutely right about other permanent heavy decks being potential trouble after Warp World. That's the fun part! It's interesting to see when other decks are capable of competing on such an altered gameplan. Grave Pact effects make up for a lot of ground against those decks though. I used to run an It That Betrays + Malfegor combo to potentially Warp into a permanent Insurrection, but cut it because the cards were pretty weak individually.
I'm interested in the differences in our mana bases, specifically Temple of the False God and Gaea's Cradle. I had completely forgotten about the Cradle, to be honest, but it seems like a natural inclusion in a deck that's mostly creatures with a token subtheme. Temple I'm a little dubious on. With that first hand you drew, if ToFG had been any green producing land, that hand would have been a solid keeper. I just don't like how it doesn't do anything if you draw it in your opening hand, and the mana boost later is barely worth it, especially with all the land accelerators we're playing.
Nice game play-by-play as well. That's exactly why I love playing the deck. It just feels like you're doing something completely broken while everyone else is busy doing nothing relevant, but you're doing it in a socially acceptable way.
I do suspect the blue Leyline is mostly a trap. I would take a white Leyline a little higher than a basic land, and sideboard it in against lava-axe.dec.
I will be doing some Scars drafts and writing them up as time allows. Though I might not be doing any "alternate color choices" analysis in this kind of detail, at least not until I know the set better. I am of course looking forward to getting some of each new leonin card, since I'm a cat dude myself!
Obviously you can't predict things with perfect accuracy, but if you are looking at each pick as if all of the previous picks had happened exactly as they did in the actual draft I think you can get pretty close.
Thanks for the info Menace - I hadn't been aware that Fiat had already tried this strat, although I am not surprised to hear it.
I read one of the pros say once that reading the signals passed TO you from your right is more important than what signals you send to the left. Because whatever's coming from your right you'll get in packs 1 and 3, what you cut to the left you may only get strongly in pack 2. I see a lot of wisdom in that. It's worth noting too, that if you cut a color, let's say blue, you might have bad drafters that don't read signals downstream of you. Or you might have a guy that opened pack 1 Mind Control and is determined to stay blue even though you're cutting it.
That theory argues more in favor of taking the white in pack 1, really.
I will say also, looking at the early pack 2 Cudgel Troll and Giant Spider that ended up in the pod winner's deck, I'm almost certain he was immediately to my right, cutting all the best blue & taking those two good early green cards I passed him before anyone else could get a shot. Of course I didn't realize that at the time.
Another tool I see the pros mention that's too much straining my memory right now (maybe with more practice) is to remember pack 1 or pack 2, see it come back, and go "Oh yeah, these 7 cards are what's missing, so I know something about what colors the rest of the table is in". Or at least "It's surprising that a strong black card tabled since it was a weak pack, not many black drafters here" or "The black card I wanted tabled, but that doesn't mean black is wide open because I remember that pack was stuffed with ridiculously good cards, and this still quite good black card is weaker than most of them."
When (if!) I get to that level, I think my win percentage will go up some more. :) It would be easy enough here to compare pick 1 with pick 9 in all 3 packs, and pick 2 with pick 10. The excercise is probably worth doing.
What I need the most when mastering each new format that comes out is plenty of walkthroughs of what cards were picked, and why. At the end there should be a decklist and a short summary of how the matches went, as a point of interest and to help give some context as to how strong the deck turned out to be. A few comments about which cards were left out and which included to cull down to 22-23 cards is sometimes useful, though some decks don't have any tricky decisions there anyway.
I've cut down on my long game walkthroughs for the time being, I think I learned what I needed to from them & hopefully some of my readers did too. But they're very time consuming to make, and the hope is I can post draft walkthroughs more often if I just complete the pick analysis and add short game summaries. If I can find the time to draft more while looking for work/consulting/contracts, anyway!
You would hope to be locked in by pick 8 pack 1 but that isn't always the case. If you get a little unlucky or are missing the signals you can end up forced out of your chosen colors 2nd pack. In addition 2nd or 3rd pack 1st picks can cause some changes in plan. As RoninX points out, you can't really predict with accuracy how the draft would have gone had your picks been different because you don't know what the rest of the draft table looked like.
I think this is an interesting idea -- a sort of draft clinic of sorts. I'd need to get reader submissions, of course, but beyond that I think it's definitely doable.
I hear your concerns RoninX, and I share them. I think if I were to do this I would need to offer two lines of commentary:
1. What I would have done, choice for choice, in the first 8 picks of the draft. The actual drafter's decisions have no impact on any of these picks, so we can safely comment on them. In some situations it may be able to comment past the first 8 picks, but this will generally be limited.
2. What I would have done with the rest of the draft given the first 8 picks that the original drafter selected. In other words, we're locked into your basic plan now -- so how would I execute it?
I'm going to have my hands full mulling over Scars in the coming weeks but I'd be happy to comment some Rise drafts if people are interested in submitting them. Let me know here what you think and I'll make a gmail account to send submissions to if there are enough volunteers.
Who is Mr Jahnal?
I dont have a targent word count, but when I do write articles, I write them in Microsoft Word, and I try to make them at least 3 pages long. I don't worry too much about unimportant details. I try to stick to the point, but if I get off the point, I eventually come back. Leaving those unimportant details can be a sign of your characteristic. As long as a majority of the article is not off topic.
I consider it fortunate to have a store locally and if I ever move again, I will try to make it a point to have a thriving store with a good magic community within a fair driving distance. The downs side is all thoe stores are about 50 miles one way.
I decide which to go to based on my day. I take in factors such as when I get out of work, what time the events are starting, what type of event it is, and if my wife is working a morning shift or a night shift. There is literally at least one event a night I can choose from at one of the stores I frequent. It's one of the bennefits of living in a tourist area.