#premier draft

[i-am-nickelbolt]

The Brothers' War Bronze to Mythic draft #7!

Pack 1, pick 1 Siege Veteran. Boom! Pick 2 Mishra's Command out of a pretty weak pack. Looks like they picked an uncommon. Pick 3 Sardian Cliffstomper over Queen Kayla bin Kroog and Dwarven Forge-Chanter. No white cards. Maybe mono red is on the table? Pick 4 Goblin Blast-Runner, I'm liking where this is going. Pick 5 Unleash Shell, still no white cards. Pick 6 snapping off Evolving Wilds to splash Siege Veteran in mono-red. Pick 7 Conscripted Infantry over Aeronaut Cavalry. Pick 8 snapped off second Evolving Wilds over Blitz Automaton and Dwarven Forge-Chanter. I got Whirling strike on the wheel and a couple filler-level red creatures. I'm feeling a little underpowered, no Scrapwork Mutts, no Excavation Explosions, no Strongbulls, but I got all the red cards and I can easily splash my bomb, so it's hard to be upset.

Pack 2, I got a Mutt pick 1, a Strongbull pick 3, then... kinda bricked the rest of the pack. No white or red cards of note, I did get a couple Combat Couriers 6th and 8th.

Pack 3, I got another pick 1 Mutt, and second Sardian Cliffstomper pick 2. There was a pick where I had to choose between 2nd Blast-Runner and 2nd Strongbull, and in hindsight I think I should have taken Strongbull. I don't really have the sacrifice outlets for Blast-Runner but I don't really have the artifacts for Strongbull.

My first loss was to black red removal. My hand looked pretty good, but they Explosioned my 2 drop, they Shelled my Cliffstomper, and they got my Chaindancer's throat, and somehow managed to play an off-color 3/5, which is a nightmare stat for me. I drew my Siege Veteran, but couldn't cast it.

My second loss I'm going to chalk up to a pretty significant misplay. I had 2 Forge-Chanters and a Cliffstomper up against their 4/4 with a Courier, Mishra's Domination and Supply Drop. I ended up playing the domination on the 4/4 and getting in for 8, but I think I should have just attacked and Supply Dropped to kill the 4/4 on blocks. Bad play on my part.

My third loss was to drawing 9 lands and my opponent having turn 3 Siege Veteran.

I have to admit 2-3 was pretty disappointing. I didn't think this deck was great, even though whenever you're mono-red you end up having to run some derpy cards, but I thought I was at least fine for 4 wins. I was hoping to get a good curve out at least a couple of times, and I didn't have a 1 drop in any of my games.

I do want to say though, this set is slowly creeping towards my "all-timer" limited formats. mtg dads don't always get to draft as much as they would like, but I'm really wishing I could play this one more than I am. This is going on my medium list for set cubes I want to build.

[i-am-nickelbolt]

The Brothers' War Bronze to Mythic draft #6!

Sometimes you open a Titania's Command. I mean, that's just the draft. Pick 2 Skyfisher Spider, lets go! Pick 3 Boulderbranch Golem. Pick 4 Gnawing Vermin over Mishra's Bauble and Evolving Wilds. Pick 5 Haywire Mite over Emergency Weld and Unleash Shell. Pick 6 Energy Refractor over Audacity, Gaea's Gift, and Moment of Defiance. Pick 7 Goring Warplow over Ravenous Gigamole and Hoarding Recuse. Blanchwood Prowler and Mightstone's Animation wheeled.

Pack 2, pick 1 Liberator, Urza's Battlethopter (which is my pick for the most dystopian sounding name in the set; I don't know if I trust Urza to truly liberate anything.) Not many interesting picks, but a lot of good white cards wheeled. I think I could have gotten into white here somewhere.

Pack 3, pick 1 Overwhelming Remorse over Draconic Destiny. Pick 2 Gix's Command. Golgari it is.

It's hard to say that I didn't like my deck when I have two of the best rares in the set, but it felt kind of medium. I liked my early game, and I liked my late game, but the middle turns felt a little lacking.

Two of my three losses were games that I just played so, so badly. One of the games I got too aggressive for no reason, killed the wrong things for no reason, then got buried by Third Path Savant. It was just such a bad, bad game.

My second loss was to a soldier curve out where they had Skystrike Officer and Thopter Mechanic. I had a turn where I could remove both, but I exiled the Mechanic thinking to avoid the Thopter, but they had Recommission for Skystrike Officer. Literally every single time I have ever killed a Skystrike Officer, they have Recommission. Ugh.

My third loss was very much like my first loss. I was needlessly aggressive, and got myself in a position where they had Rust Goliath and I attacked my Liberator into it because apparently Rust Goliath has reach. They topdecked better than I did, but it shouldn't have mattered.

6-3 is what it is, but like, if I can go 5-3 in every draft for the rest of time, I would take that.

I also want to say that I've heard people complain about how bomb-y Brothers' War is, and I have to say I don't really see it. It's not anywhere near as bad as Crimson Vow was.

[i-am-nickelbolt]

The Brothers' War Bronze to Mythic, draft #5!

Whenever I do poorly in a draft on Arena, I always get this thought like, "Whelp, that's it for me, I'm never going to win a game again and all my gold and gems will disappear." And I know that's silly, I have a 64% win rating in limited since I started using 17lands a few years back. I am a good drafter and I will win again.

Pack 1, pick 1 Phyrexian Dragon Engine. The wheel for this pack is going to be bad. Pick 2 Hajar, Loyal Bodyguard over Corrupt, Blanchwood Prowler, and Wing Commando. Double R on the dragon unearth put me off Corrupt, but maybe that was just wrong. It seems like I've always been able to get an Elsewhere Flask. Pick 3 Scatter Ray over Hulking Metamorph, Wing Commando, and Deadly Riposte. Pick 4 Combat Courier over Yotian Tactician, Overwhelming Remorse, and Prison Sentence. I ran out of time on this pick. Pick 5 Giant Cindermaw, which felt like a signal that red might be open but there just weren't any good red cards. Pick 6 Scrapwork Mutt over Scatter Ray. Pick 7 Scrapwork Rager over Elsewhere Flask, which was a last second choice. Pick 8 Gaea's Gift over nothing. Pick 9 Branchwood Prowler wheeled, which I did not expect. Also got a Giant Growth and an Argothian Sprite, which kind of pulled me back towards green-red.

Pack 2 all of the green cards wheeled, but other than the Skyfisher Spider, it was a pretty mediocre pack overall. Pack 3 went really well, with multiple burn spells, the Arbalest Engineers... I did punt on a Blitz Automaton, which i didn't see in the pack, but I would have liked the option of a nice 7 drop, and with all my combat tricks, a hasty 3/2 would have been fine too.

I originally thought my deck was great, but the more I looked at it, the more I felt like it was just a bunch of mediocre creatures, especially at 3 and 4. I also just thought Fallaji Chaindancer had double strike naturally. Whoops.

My first loss was to Urza, Prince of Kroog. I couldn't for the life of me draw a removal spell. That said, I was really not impressed with what else was going on in their deck, it was just they had uncontested Urza and I couldn't break through.

My second loss was to GW. Their draw lined up pretty well against mine. I think I might be underrating Warlord's Elite. It seemed more like filler and I think it's maybe a C+? At least it seems like it's always been good against me. I guess I don't see the games where it rots in their hand when they can't cast it early. Anyway, I think I messed up a block late in the game and they topdecked me when we were at parity. I was 2-2 at this point and really feeling the mediocre creatures.

I should also point out that I misread Phyrexian Dragon Engine. I forgot entirely about the Unearth trigger. I was trying to go for a Giant Growth shot for 10, but the game didn't let me respond to it's etb. So I had to decline and they had a removal spell. Disaster! I still won that game though.

My other loss was to a "mirror," where we traded off all game, except they had Ironclaw Crusher, which notably has 6 toughness, with Audacity, and I only had 5 power with which to block. I died with two Unleash Shells in my hand that I couldn't even cast because I drew the maindeck Swamp I played instead of the Mountain it would have been had I not splashed.

5-3 was okay with this deck. I seemed to be in the "Bant colors" bracket, and I was really hoping the Argothian Sprites would be unblockable more often. I saw zero black cards in 8 games, and the red cards I saw out of the two blue-red decks I played were not impressive.

[i-am-nickelbolt]

Bronze to Mythic, Dominaria United premiere draft #1, new dad style! Which means I probably don’t have the time or energy to *actually* get to mythic this time, but whatever, lets gooooooo!

Pack 1 Pick 1, I took Tori D’Avenant out of a weak pack. I don’t like taking gold cards early unless they’re busted, and especially not one with double color pips (WW) but it was a weak pack. Pick 2 got me Ertai Resurrected, which is *exactly* the kind of gold card I will take pick 2. It’s busted, it’s splashable, short list for personal favorite card in the set, yes please! Pick 3, Lightning Strike over Timely Interference and Phyrexian Espionage. It’s still early, I will splash Lighting strike in UB or Ertai in UR, and its enough better than the other two cards, even though I want both of them. Pick 4 Tolarian Geyser, yessss. Pick 5 Impulse. This is maybe earlier than I would like, but I still think Impulse is pretty good in basically every blue deck. 4 cards is just so many cards to look at! Finished off the pack with a couple dual lands, Haunting Figment and Soaring Drake wheeled, I like where I’m at going into pack 2.

Pack 2 was not the greatest. Pick 1 Essence Scatter then the two Tolarian Serpents picks 4 and 6, but not much else. I was feeling a little cut off, but I think the packs were weak in UR spells because the other blue and red cards wheeled. Even so, I’m in good shape, I just needed spells over everything in pack 3. First five picks delivered: Lightning Strike, Timely Interference, two Flowstone Infusions, and an Impulse. Perfect. Deck is built.

The deck was good, not great. I think I drafted the seat correctly, at least I don’t think there was any busted deck I missed out on. These types of decks tend to be half and half. If you draw a mix, your deck is insane. If you draw only one half, your deck struggles. My first loss was to black/red grind-em-out. They just had better late game card advantage than I did, and I drew air on the last few turns.

My second loss was to the mirror. They were a little tricksier than me and my first blue was a tap land on turn 5 or 6. I think it’s a fine keep. Mulligans are awful in limited, don’t mulligan for the most part unless your hand is non-functional.

My third loss was kind of a heart-breaker. I thought I was super duper dead, but I somehow managed not to die (Ertai is busted). Then I thought I was winning somehow, but they had the blue Saga that wraths the board and makes that many zombies for each player. Even so, I was a tiny bit ahead, and just needed to draw an action spell. So many live draws in my deck, but I ended up drawing blanks.

Set seems super fun and interactive. I hope to play a lot more, but new dad style is not friendly to spending hours and hours drafting.