When Streetz posted the first Æther Pool article, I’ll admit I was a little surprised. See, I had written that article many months ago (as you can tell by the fact that it only featured Champions of Kamigawa cards), and had given up hope of it ever being set on the red background of the website. Then, one morning, there it is. I quickly flipped through my folder of random stuff to see what I’d written for the next article. A thorough inspection told me that I had gotten rid of everything I had prepared for the series.

Oops.

So, I decided to start over, but with Ravnica this time. I started writing, planning to look at each guild as its own separate article, and then look at the Guildpact guilds. However, I got done with about a fourth of the article on Selesnya, and realized that I was basically regurgitating stuff I’d read on MTG.com. I realized that as hard as I tried, I’d never be able to come up with something original yet useful as far as drafting goes. Just about every website designated for Magic has some sort of column on drafting, and most of them are pretty good. I’d never be able to show you something new.

So what does that mean for this column? From some of the response I got from my last article, I realized that many of the people that read my article had never drafted before. This one’s for you. Today, we get back to basics, and I answer some questions about drafting.

“Hey you kids, what your doing back there?”

“A draft, dad.”

“Well, close the window, that should stop it.”

“No dad, not that kind of draft.”

Not that kind of draft...

The first, obvious question is what is a draft? I talked about this a little last time, but I’ll repeat it. A booster draft, which is the most common, is where a group of people sit down with unopened booster packs in front of them. Simultaneously, each player opens one pack, selects a card, and passes the remaining cards to the left. Then, collect your cards from the person on your right, select a card, and pass the pack left. This continues until all 15 cards in the pack have been drafted. Once pack one is done, each player opens pack two, picks a card, and passes it to the right. This continues until all the cards in all the packs are drafted. After the draft, the players build their decks with the cards they selected, and any basic lands they need.

So now on to the questions: Yes, you, The kid in the back with the blue T-shirt.

How many people play in a draft?
The number of players really doesn’t matter. The ideal number is 8, but really any number can participate. Although I don’t like drafting with less than six.

Next, the kid over here with the 'I hate Kamigawa' shirt.

How many packs do we need?
Generally, 3 packs per player is best, and usually a minimum. I wouldn’t go more than 5, just for cost factor and amount of cards drafted.

Yes, the girl with the Coke can.

What are deck sizes?
40 card minimum. I wouldn’t go over 40 cards for any reason. Because your deck usually features a one-of best card, you want the highest possible chance of drawing that card.

Umm, how about the guy in the back with the baseball cap.

How many lands should I play?
This is one of the toughest questions in drafting, and there is no definite answer. The general rule of thumb is 17 lands, however that may change depending on a lot of things. In Ravnica drafts, if you have a lot of signets and bounce lands, you probably can get away with 16 or maybe even 15 (I wouldn’t suggest that).

One more question. You, in the red hoodie.

What about colors?? How many should I draft, what are good combinations…
This will also depend greatly on the format. In a Kamigawa block draft, it’s usually best to stick with two colors. The same applies to a Ravnica draft, but you should usually stick to the guild colors. However, with Guilpact in the format, 3 color decks will probably become the norm. Also, you want your colors to span guilds from both sets; green/white/black for example.

So there are the basics.

At least now you should have a general idea of what you are doing during a draft.

The first question that comes up is what cards should I pick?

How do I know what cards are good in draft?

I talked about this in my previous article, so I’ll just touch on it here. First, removal is extremely important in draft. This is more than just “destroy target creature” effects. Anything that takes a dangerous creature off of the opponent’s board is good. Vedalken Dissmisser is a great example of non-destructive removal. When Ravnica first came out, a lot of people saw this card as a filler for Dimir milling decks. Now, however, I’ve seen it go as high as second pick. Also, creatures are important. Because of the low number of spells you play in a deck, you have to make sure you have a reliable win condition.

Expanding on that point, knowing good cards goes farther than just knowing what you will be picking. You also should look at the pack to figure out what the person to your left will be drafting. When you think you know what the person to your left is drafting, you should know what colors to avoid. Remember, the person on your left will be passing to you during the second pack. If you are in the same colors, they’ll be picking those colors before you will, meaning you won’t get many good picks in your colors. This discussion leads a lot into signaling, which I don’t want to get into right now, as it is an entire article by itself.

[I wish he did.. because I am clueless about 'signaling'.  Mind you, I've only drafter about 10 times.  ~Streetz~]

So for now, I leave you with this question: What card do you draft? Here’s the pack:

Gate Hound, Tidewater Minion, Thoughtpicker Witch, Peel from Reality, Stinkweed Imp, Dimir Infiltrator, Gather Courage, Sadistic Augermage, Brainspoil, Snapping Drake, Lurking Informant, Golaith Spider, Wojek Apothecary, Divebomber Griffin, Grave-Shell Scarab.

Secondly, what card do you think your opponent drafts? 

Let me know in the forums what you think, and I’ll share my views next time. I apologize for the super-short article, but like I said at the top, I’m transitioning. Until next time,

Peace,
~lionden_56~

You can discuss this article in the MDV forums here.

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