Just wanted to share a quick draft I did that was Zen-Zen-WWK on MTGO. I was seriously torn on the first pick between the Skyfisher and the Sovereign but the Skyfisher is easily my most drafted playable common — I think I have more Beast Hunts and Scythe Tigers than any other 10 commons combined. I got passed a Sphinx of Jwar Isle and did not look back. I had been hoping to be blue white allies but I was fine with them being just a sub-theme. The main theme of the deck was Basilisk Collar and I ran the table without much incident.

Take a look and feel free to ask in the comments section about any of the picks.

I am not so sure how “cool” this is — as was promised by Matt Wang in a previous post — but I did manage to wrangle Limited Information author and Top8Magician Steve Sadin to do a draft walkthrough with me just before Christmas. Steve and I did a couple of these way back when and they were always fun.  I remember a podcasting session where we forced blue-red Storm in Time Spiral block. Using the fancy-pants technology of RareDraft.com we were able to visually record all the draft picks and you can hear our discussion about the picks in the first installment. We also talk about how the draft played out in the second installment.

I have been drafting a lot of MonoWhite or nearly MonoWhite in triple Zendikar and this draft played out pretty much according to that plan. Here is the draft:

Here is where we discuss the draft in two parts:

Sadin Draft Walkthrough Part 1

Sadin Draft Walkthrough Part 2

Finally, here is the deck that we built:

1 Kabira Crossroads
1 Kor Aeronaut
1 Journey to Nowhere
1 Bold Defense
2 Kor Skyfisher
2 Steppe Lynx
2 Kor Cartographer
2 Kor Hookmaster
13 Plains
1 Kazandu Blademaster
1 Brave the Elements
1 Stonework Puma
1 Explorer’s Scope
1 Celestial Mantle
1 Devout Lightcaster
1 Kor Outfitter
1 Burst Lightning
4 Mountain
1 Kor Duelist
2 Nimbus Wings

This is essentially a test post to play around with the Rare Draft player that Daniel Too (of TCGBuddy fame) has been beta testing. This is an 8-4 draft I did on Christmas morning. I ended up with a midnight mass of Hedron Crabs and a couple of — fittingly given the name of the draft player — rares to pull it all together.

If this works I will be able to even more draft recaps without having to send you over to my Google site to see them. (I know it is a little cut off on the right but hopefully that will get worked out down the stretch of “getting out of beta”)

Here is the deck I ended up playing and going 3-0 with. The Archive Trap has become my most drafted rare on MTGO and it won me most of my games following a turn two Crab. I also got to kick Rite of Replication on an Umara Raptor for the win in one game which was … you know… awesome.

Crabs for Christmas

1 Shepherd of the Lost
1 Pitfall Trap
1 Rite of Replication
2 Umara Raptor
4 Hedron Crab
1 Sky Ruin Drake
1 Archive Trap
2 Makindi Shieldmate
1 Gomazoa
2 Æther Figment
2 Kor Skyfisher
1 Whiplash Trap
1 Living Tsunami
1 Paralyzing Grasp
1 Into the Roil
1 Kabira Crossroads
1 Sejiri Refuge
9 Island
7 Plains

This is a recent email that I received from Paul Jordan aka PJ, that I thought would be useful to all of you Top8Magic fans. The images did not come out in the post, but the original file is here: Draftcap Instructions.

Enjoy

Matt

Draftcap Instructions (Courtesy of Paul Jordan)

Creating your own “Drafting With” series is pretty straight-forward. All you need is Magic Online and your own webpage. If you don’t have a webpage, you can easily create one at Google, which is what I’ve done.

Creating your webpage

To start a webpage at Google, first make sure you are signed in. Then just go to More > Sites

Then click on Create New Site. Go through the steps, choosing your site name and URL and you’re done.

Recording drafts on MTGO

Go to Menu > Settings > Gameplay and make sure the box for “Enable Draft Recorder” is checked.

MTGO will record all packs and picks and put them into Documents > Games > Magic The Gathering Online > Drafts as text files.

Converting those text files

Go to http://www.zizibaloob.com/convert_images.html and paste the contents of the text file into the Image Converter box and hit Convert Draft. Now there will be 3 boxes on the screen:

Image Converter (where you pasted your text file contents)

Output (what you copy for future use)

Preview (what it will look like on your webpage)

Copy the contents of the 2^nd box (output) onto your clipboard for the next step.

Adding a draft to your webpage

Back at your page in Google, click on Create Page. Enter in a page name and URL. If you’re going to be doing multiple drafts, you probably want a standard naming convention (draft_## or something like that) but it isn’t necessary. Once you have your name and URL, click Create Page. You’ll have a screen something like this:

Click on the HTML button on the top bar and paste the output from the draft converter and hit update. Now your screen should look like this:

You can now add comments, your decklist, or anything else. When you’re done, click Save on the top right of your screen. That’s it, you’re done.

Note – if you want to keep your decklist, you need to save it separately in MTGO during deck construction. To do this, when building your deck click “Save As” and save it as a text file. Then you can just copy/paste it into your commentary.

Last time I wrote I was confessing to missing top 8 of a sealed ptq with an absolutely insane pool.  At that tournament, as often happens for a seat-all-players, I was sitting near Chris Calcano for the sealed build.  Before we opened our pools to get started, I had offered him the blind-trades, and he had turned me down, poor fellow.

Well, fate had his back this weekend.  Chris opened up a sealed pool which allowed him to play 1 Mountain and all plains and forests for basics, splashing 1 red card, 1 blue card (off 2 obelisks) and still playing 6 rares.  Yes, 6.  Included in those six were 2 battlegrace angels, a stoic angel, and a sigil of distinction.  Unlike myself, Calcano was able to parlay his insane pool into a top 8.  I draft-capped him, and here’s approximately what happened.  Relevant cards are listed, bold is what he picked, and discussion follows in italics with me (GCB), Matt Ferrando (MF) (who also watched Chris’s draft as it progressed) and Chris Calcano (CC).

–Pack 1–
1: Arcane Sanctum, Sharding Sphynx, Soul’s Fire, Kathari Screecher
GCB: I guess I can see it as a forceful choice, but at this table I would take the bomb.  True, you pass 3 blue cards which is better signaling, but Sharding Sphynx can win games by itself and I like to draft a little more passively.
MF: Sharding Sphinx is definitely my pick, its not easy to deal with and unlike “dragons” it starts to take effect immediately if you have other artifact men in play.
CC: I think Soul’s Fire is one of the top red commons in shards draft, i figured with it being the lone red card in the pack my neighbor would pick up on that and make my draft go smoother. I later discussed the pick with GCB and Matt F and we all came to the conclusion that I was dumb and should’ve taken the Sphinx lol.

Read the rest of this entry »

I was in a draft this weekend and the following gameplay situation came up and I am not sure which is the correct way to play it out. Basically I was up against local Level 3 judge Eric Smith and his Grixis-Esper monstrosity which featured six or seven pingers and plenty of instant speed removal including multiple Grixis Charms I had seen in previous games. I was bashing for three a turn with Waveskimmer Aven while Eric was swinging back for three points a turn with Cloudheath Drake. Eric had recently played a Stinger but I was way ahead on damage. I had gotten Eric down to two life and was holding Call to Heel in my hand, which I had planned to use if he had a removal spell for my Aven, and he used the vigilance ability on his Drake intending to chump block my Aven. My dilemma is this:

1. Do I continue to play it slow and steady? Sit back on my Call to Heel in case he has a trick, let him chump my Aven, and hope to finish him off next turn. Eric had all his mana untapped at the time and if he drew anything/was holding anything for my Aven he would have plenty of mana to play it plus I would be giving him a card with the Call to Heel. Even if he drew another blocker he would have to invest his mana into that creature and I would be able to more safely bounce it and swing for the win.
2. Or do I go all-in and press for the win? I could attack, allow my Exalted to resolve, and bounce his Drake. Statistically it is most likely that he is going to draw a creature or a land off of the card and — assuming he was not sitting on a spell the whole time — not be able to do anything about my attacker.

I chose the slow-and-steady approach and Eric did the only thing he could do — putting his Drake in the path of the on-coming Aven. He peeled the next card of his deck for what he seemed resigned to accepting as his last turn of the game and happily slammed Sharuum the Hegemon into play. The recently departed Drake jumped back onto the board and my chances of winning the game plummeted to about zero. I would need to draw the second Call to Heel, bounce both fliers, AND have Eric draw nothing to deal with my Aven. I ended up losing the game, the match, and ultimately the draft for my team as a result.

Although, to be fair, I was down a game to Eric’s ridiculous deck to begin with and he swept through the draft with little resistance. None of which changes my initial dilemma about whether or not I should have just pushed all-in for the game or not. What would you have done under the same circumstances? You do know he has Sharuum in his deck and multiple instants speed removals and bounce such as Grixis Charm and Resounding Wave.