MTG Arena Open Beta

[Jason Salvano]

As of last week, anyone who wants to play is in: https://magic.wizards.com/en/mtgarena

I played the Closed Beta a grand total of ten hours. My first impression was that it was dismal. There were no social features and I couldn't figure out how to concede a game. 

Well, there are still no social features in the Open Beta. But the game is much more polished than it was six months ago, and I've been having fun just playing the introductory decks on the free-to-play ladder. Is anyone else playing?

I hear they don't plan to wipe accounts again, so now might be a good time to get rolling.

Finally, I've read lots of complaints that the game is too expensive to play. Only whales win. Here's my hot take (the world is a hot take): If your win rate is 50%, of course it's going to feel expensive. I'm going to test my idea by building a relatively inexpensive standard deck, and running it in one of the Quick Constructed events. The break even point seems to be four wins (before taking three losses). I'll report back.  

[Richard Romanowski]

I'm expecting a similar investment that is needed for mtgo. Has been that your experience?

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[Jason Salvano]

It's a question that I can't correctly answer for lack of experience. Right now, I have very few cards and very little currency in game.

Here are the external resources I'm working with.

Expected rewards given a win rate: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-opvcuESDeS-6sO5w286oGMjNjOEYVobnj5BVUldWZk/edit#gid=163395424

Cost and profit analysis: https://www.toiletdrake.com/arena-guides/event-reward-profit-and-analysis-guide/

And here's some of my own speculation. I'm optimistic about a generous free-to-play model because I think that the team wants to create a product that can compete with Hearthstone and anticipated releases, like Artifact. I'm pessimistic because the team more tightly holds the economic reins than in mtgo. There's no secondary market for packs and cards, and the fifth copy of a card vanishes. They control the event costs and the daily quest rewards, and only real money for gems helps you skip ahead.

[Tom H]

I've been playing enough to grab the daily rewards. With those you can gather enough gold to do a free draft every 3 days or so. Unfortunately, (at least for now) the only drafts that you can enter with gold are a set behind - so M19 in this case. You can win gems from that, but even if you get to 7 wins before 3 losses (not super hard given some of the competition) you still don't win enough to enter a current set draft. It also seems like card accumulation is a lot slower than it was in the last iteration of the beta. I've built a constructed deck using up my mythic wild cards, but it's still only a mediocre deck dues to lack of good cards. I remember in the last part of the beta I had several decks that I was pretty happy with, each with multiple mythics.

Grinding the constructed leagues might speed things up, but my deck isn't where I'd like it to be before wading in there too much.

As for the social aspects, they really need to add some phrases to the canned responses. Stuff like, "Nice topdeck, luck sac!" and "Damn shuffler making me miss land drops again!"

[Richard Romanowski]

Agreed, Tom. Voicing your displeasure with magic is what the game is all about

[Tom H]

BTW Jason, I just played against a sweet value Jund deck. Seemed like your kind of deck. Played the new Golgari uncommon 3/4 that returns a permanent from your graveyard to your hand. Basically every spell in the deck was a 2-for-1 (Ravenous Chupacabra, Elvish Rejuvenator, Demonlord Belzenlok, Demanding Dragon, Vivien...). I might try building something like that if my idea for a combo deck using Doom Whisperer doesn't work out.

[Jason Salvano]

I've seen Golgari-only versions of that deck, but not Jund! Apparently it's full of so much value that the Teferi decks have a hard time against it and it's not too shabby against red either. Going Jund would probably make the matchup even better against blue while sacrificing a bit against red. Thanks for the idea.

I really like the cycle of 4-colored-mana creatures from Guilds. They're terrifically designed for limited, forcing you to commit to get the power. (I hope I don't see a deck with 6 Utopia Spawls that can cast all of them.) It's hard to pick a bad one from the bunch, and I do like the Golgari 3/4.

Turning off emotes in any digital card game is the first thing that I do.

[Tom H]

Dang. Now I need to find the 5-color sealed deck that I built to see if it had any of the 4-color uncommons. I'll get back to you... :)

[Josh Zirkel]

Long time no see everybody!

I agree with most of the stuff that has been already said. There seems to be a viable grind path available for free users and the daily rewards/ weekly free packs are enough to start a collection. Having one free sealed for GoR also helped add to the collection but mainly for wildcards. In the beta I was able to make 1 or 2 competitive decks after grinding for free the whole time but I had access to make more decks from wildcards (Turbo fog mill was too much fun). 

I'd add that there seems to be a match making system in place that causes players who are using the starter decks to face one another more frequently so new people don't get stomped by turbo fog. That said I did see a nice interaction between Molderhulk and Memorial to folly where the guy just grinded my control deck out. Value decks and GB control decks seem really strong right now because not everyone has a ton of cards.

Josh

[Jason Salvano]

Ah, that must explain why everyone's deck is as bad (or the same) as mine.

[Jason Salvano]

I'm going to use that common wildcard for a Utopia Sprawl.

[Tom H]

Utopia Sprawl (it's actually Urban Utopia now I think), lets you cast all of your bombs, which really just makes it a bomb by the distributive property of bombiness.

[Jason Salvano]

My apologies to all Utopias. I appreciate the Hummel distributive property of bombiness.

Here are some random thoughts and an update on my experience with Arena. I'm just going to bullet point my thoughts because I read somewhere that lists are more attractive to the eye. Probably in a list.

• I haven't yet played in a Constructed event because I've been gated by this one-premade-deck-a-day quest line. I don't want to wildcard anything that I've going to get "for free," so I'm going to need about another week of playing. I've only gotten 3 of the two-color decks so far, and I really like the W/B and U/R ones.
• My only method of playing so far as been the (best of one) ladder. After making some modifications to the premade decks, I've hit the quest circuit and I have just enough gold (5,000) to casual draft, though I'm waiting for M19 to disappear and for Guilds of Ravnica to replace it.
• I think I've been doing well for myself, and I'm close to silver rank, though for the life of me I can't figure out how rank works or what it's good for. Sometimes I win and I get almost no rank, and other times nearly my entire bar fills up. Can anyone enlighten me? Has there been a prize for achieving a certain rank?
• I'm going to reiterate that I really like the U/R premade deck. I made half a dozen small changes to it, including adding in a bit more removal, a Crackling Drake, 2 Demanding Dragons, Ral, and the 4/3 flash surveil bounce guy. I Banefired some doofus for 12 and he tried to Sinister Sabotage it, which gave me a good laugh. I guess he was trying to hit the drain 3 black card that triggers if it goes from your library to your graveyard. What's your favorite/the best premade?
• On the topic of tells, I've noticed that if you have something you can cast, Arena always offers up all the priority passes. If you have nothing, it auto-passes to combat or the opponent's turn. Even a slightly savvy opponent can probably intuit what's going on. Can you pull in all the stops and selectively auto yield as in MTGO? Are there any other shortcuts or game settings that I should be using? 

   

[Josh Zirkel]

1. Good call on waiting for M19 to rotate you probably should only run a few to get the Gem rewards if you can crush and get 5+ wins. GoR is up now and you can still get 7 plus wins by just going boros (in a best of 1 aggro wins a ton)

2. Quests I found were the best way to constantly generate gold and allowed me to build my collection slowly but consistently.

3. I have no clue what calculates how much rank you win or loose per match. I'm assuming it's based on some hidden MMR system. As to achieving rank I was able to get to gold 1 in an earlier  version of the beta and there were no rewards for rank then. I do not know if it has changed now but I suspect it has not. 

4. My favorite of the premade deck is the black blue deck because it allows for card draw and removal once I got a lot of the useless pirates out of it. Still fun to run mono green if I need to grind out wins since removal among the premade decks is limited and inefficient.

5. You can turn on "Full control" from the settings menu under game play and that will make it such that you have to control everything such as tapping lands or responding to spells/triggers.

6. If you want a good way to grind, singleton is fantastic. You can scrap together all of your bombs and make a sweet control deck that will win 5 games consistently since aggro is inherently inconsistent  in singleton. Plus if you get 0 wins you are guaranteed a rare and an uncommon. Since it's a 500 gold buy in you basically get half a pack where the only card you care about is the rares and uncommons anyway. I made a solid Esper control deck and I can get 4-5 wins fairly consistently. 

Josh

1 Drowned Catacomb (XLN) 253

1 Isolated Chapel (DAR) 241

1 Glacial Fortress (XLN) 255

1 Chromatic Lantern (GRN) 233

1 Watery Grave (GRN) 259

1 Thief of Sanity (GRN) 205

6 Island (RIX) 193

6 Swamp (RIX) 194

1 Hostage Taker (XLN) 223

1 Connive // Concoct (GRN) 222

1 Azor, the Lawbringer (RIX) 154

4 Plains (RIX) 192

1 Teferi, Hero of Dominaria (DAR) GR6

1 Settle the Wreckage (XLN) 34

1 Cleansing Nova (M19) 9

1 Mystic Archaeologist (M19) 63

1 Nezahal, Primal Tide (RIX) 45

1 Dire Fleet Poisoner (RIX) 68

1 Vraska's Contempt (XLN) 129

1 Twilight Prophet (RIX) 88

1 Demonlord Belzenlok (DAR) 86

1 Seal Away (DAR) 31

1 Take Vengeance (M19) 40

1 Conclave Tribunal (GRN) 6

1 Hieromancer's Cage (M19) 14

1 Disdainful Stroke (GRN) 37

1 Essence Scatter (M19) 54

1 Omenspeaker (M19) 64

1 Blink of an Eye (DAR) 46

1 Cancel (M19) 48

1 Sinister Sabotage (GRN) 54

1 Chemister's Insight (GRN) 32

1 Sift (M19) 72

1 Divination (M19) 51

1 Radical Idea (GRN) 52

1 Walk the Plank (XLN) 130

1 Kitesail Freebooter (XLN) 110

1 Murder (M19) 110

1 Price of Fame (GRN) 83

1 Ravenous Chupacabra (RIX) 82

1 Notion Rain (GRN) 193

1 Submerged Boneyard (M19) 257

1 Dimir Guildgate (GRN) 245

1 Forsaken Sanctuary (M19) 250

1 Meandering River (M19) 253

1 Dimir Locket (GRN) 234

1 Chart a Course (XLN) 48

[Jason Salvano]

Thanks for the advice, Josh!

Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to play any Singleton this weekend. My collection is still *extremely* sparse (I only just finished the "deal 100 damage" quest for the rest of the two-color decks), so I'm not sure that I can even Singleton well. Perhaps I'll play it next month, assuming it's a recurring thing.

I've been reading some of the ugly facts about the bot-AI drafting in Arena. Apparently Dimir Spybugs and Skyknight Legionnaires after the wheel is a common occurrence, which means that you're more facing superhuman than realistic draft decks. Furthermore, the field can end up completely skewed. Everyone can and simply should--barring a very strong rare--play the consensus "best" guilds (Boros, Dimir, Izzet), because you're not playing in a self-correcting system. And even then, is a March of the Multitudes better than three late copies of Skyknight Legionnaire? 

Anyway, I'm going to try drafting best-of-one this week (I don't have any gems to play the competitive best-of-three version) and I'll report back. But I'm apprehensive about the format (no sideboards...) and concerned about not drafting with humans. 

[Tom H]

Yeah, the drafts are pretty wonky. I think the developers just have the bots first pick removal very highly and stick to a set pick order, *maybe* with the bot correcting for the colors they've already picked. It seems very exploitable. Almost every deck that I draft is at least an 8 on a scale of 1-10. Dimir decks with 2x Nightveil Predators, and 3x Artful Takedown kind of stuff. My current deck has Ral, Expansion/Explosion, and Hypothesizzle in a mostly blue deck that's splashing both black and red. Running the double Devious Cover-Up to protect me from decking (which has come up already).

I think Arena certainly has some pluses and minuses vs. MTGO, but given the cost difference and how my Magic time has cut back lately, I think I'll be doing most of my drafting on Arena outside of premier events.

[Jason Salvano]

That deck sounds like a joy to play against. 

Exploitable sounds like a good word for it. At first I thought maybe it would be like drafting at a table where everyone's card valuations were wildly varied. But I've read that people have pick orders that take into account drafting inferior mono-colored cards knowing that guild cards will wheel. That's not drafting. That's like memorizing the eye chart before taking your vision test.

[Tom H]

Thanks for the deck Josh. I swapped out the Notion Rain (should have been the Divination if making this swap, but I didn't think too much about it) for The Eldest Reborn, but otherwise built it card-for-card. So far 2-0 in the Singleton league vs. a BG value deck and a UR spells deck with Ral and Niv-Mizzet. Teferi > Ral Zarek + Niv-Mizzet. Well, ok, he had lots of help from Azor and some removal spells. What a great feeling when the opponent plays Adeliz and you realize that your instant speed Price of Fame only costs two mana to kill him.

[Josh Zirkel]

Thank you Tom! Yeah price of fame is really good in the format. A cheap murder with scry 2? Sign me up! The deck does have a lot of card draw so putting in another relevant spell makes sense. I've had a good number of games where I've gone more than halfway through the deck still searching for a threat to close out the game. I did not include Eldest Reborn because I did not want to give my opponent the option for which creature to sacrifice and I did not feel the meta was steered towards control enough to warrant it's inclusion (it felt more mid rangey/value based). However, it is a fantastic card and with all the surveil synergies it would be a great option. The nice thing about the deck is that I cobbled it together from the cards of the Premade deck and what collection I had earned. The major problems for the deck are Carnage Tyrant and Banefire. While I do have two wraths for Carnage Tyrant, I'm really just banking on stone walling any other red deck. It is by no means perfect but It's fun to pilot.

Josh

[Tom H]

Yep, Carnage Tyrant is a bit of a problem. I went 4-0 before losing a game to Carnage Tyrant + Josu Vess kicked. I had mulliganed then stumbled on mana for awhile or it might have been a close one, but he played around my Settle the Wreckage really well and I couldn't find the other wrath.

[Tom H]

Oh, and The Eldest Reborn ran into exactly the problem that you mentioned, but mostly because I stumbled on lands after a mulligan again in my next match. By the time I was able to cast it instead of killing Teferi or Niv-Mizzet it ended up killing a 2/2 token from Jace then brought back a creature of no significance. Kind of underwhelming :)

[Josh Zirkel]

Yeah the deck is filled with single target removal which means that it will fall behind to go wide strategies or holding onto strong removal for too long. Each card needs to pull it's weight and Eldest wasn't doing the trick for me. Plus I wanted to keep my mana costs as low as possible so I could rip 2 removal spells or a removal spell and a counter in a single turn. Granted that needs a good amount of mana (and colored mana) which is why I have a lot of card draw to keep card advantage and get to relevant lands and spells. If there was a bunch of tokens running around I'd include golden demise or ritual of soot to keep things under control but those spells are difficult to cast consistently with the current mana base of the deck because of the double B.

Josh

[Jason Salvano]

All right gentlemen, do or die. 6-2 in the Dimir and Boros infested bo1 draft format playing Izzet. I just double Sonic Assaulted and alpha'd my previous opponent for 11. Let's see if I'm a legend (aka not even bronze tier). 

[Jason Salvano]

Dead. I made an overly aggressive attack and I missed a good double block, but I don't think it would have changed the result. My opponent had Inescapable Blaze. 

Despite the dodgy draft (way too many good guild cards wheeled), it was fun. Here's what I used. 

Why does MTGA blow up your draft deck when you're finished?

[Tom H]

Looks like a pretty sweet deck. I had an aggro Izzet deck yesterday as well. I had picked up multiple Beamsplitter Mages, so I started taking Sure Strike and Maximize Altitude highly. Had one swing for 20 damage, which was pretty sweet. Two Beamsplitter Mages out along with a Piston-Fist Cyclops and Goblin Electromancer. Maximize Altitude on Beamsplitter Mage and copy it to Piston-Fist Cyclops, Jump Start Maximise Altitude on the other Beamsplitter Mage and copy it onto the Electromancer, then Sure Strike on a Beamsplitter Mage and copy it onto one of the other creatures. Felt pretty good.

[Jason Salvano]

That sounds powerful; none of my attacks were for that much. I saw a Beamsplitter Mage in draft and it sounds like I didn't appropriately evaluate the ceiling. In fact, drafting too conservatively was likely a mistake I made (Altitude sounds like it'd be preferable to Radical Idea, for instance). But I learned a bit about Izzet, so in case these points are of help to anyone:

• Sequencing of spells is a bit odd. Normally, you'd play something during the opponent's end step to clear the way for your creatures. But if you want to give your Leapfrog flying, pump your Fire Urchin and Wee Dragonauts, and allow your Cyclops to attack at all, you must spell on your turn. It's obvious, but I had to stop myself a few times.
• Another obvious one--hold onto extra lands to jump-start your tricks. I think Electromancer is more effective this time around because he allows multi-spell turns without having to play out all of your lands. 
• Maximize Altitude must have been the spell I was missing, because I felt as though I needed a single mana trick that could push damage through pesky blockers. Too many of my games turned into 5+ creatures on each side of the board until I could draw a Sonic Assault to break through. Maybe they should have reprinted Teleportal.  
• Wee Dragonauts was good as expected, but I got mine eaten on turn three by a Harpooner. Forests are very rude.

[Tom H]

Ahh, Teleportal... first pickable card with the single goal of cheesing out your opponent when they think they're in an unlosable position.

I had the same issue with Izzet - opponent's end step, I should cast my instant spell now. Don't forget that it can still be correct either defensively or when in a race to use Sonic Assault on the opponent's turn. A very tricky deck to play for sure.

I also agree - losing a 1-power creature to harpooner just seems so horrible.

And of course your assessment of Goblin Electromancer is spot on.

[Jason Salvano]

I thought for sure I was losing that game when he ate my Dragonauts. But I clawed back by trading off nearly my entire board, playing an Inescapable Blaze on his Siege Wurm after having to tap it defensively with Sonic Assault (as you mentioned), and then dropping Niv-Mizzet. 

Sonic Assault is a finesse card. It's not truly powerful, but the first time I used it after my opponent had declared attackers to pump a couple of Urchins for good blocks, tap down their blocker they left back, and then jump-start it the next turn to alpha for lethal...fun card.

[Sidney Blumenthal]

Powerful gold cards wheeling is not relegated to mtga only. This was my first draft deck of the format. I could not lose with this deck, except I did because I make poor mulligan decisions and am bad at Magic.

Sent from my iPhone

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[Jason Salvano]

Wow. That deck looks strictly better.

[Tom H]

I don't think I like 16 lands for the deck given the Jump Start cards, number of 5+ drops, and card draw in the form of Crackling Drakes and Hypothesizzles. (I'm on my phone so it's possible that I'm misreading some cards)

On Wed, Oct 17, 2018, 5:23 PM Sidney Blumenthal <sidney.i....@gmail.com> wrote:

[Jason Salvano]

Sooner or later I'll stop forcing my drafts on everyone, but that time is not here yet. 

I had a much easier time with Dimir tonight, and I think the deck is pretty average, really. But Dimir seems to have a really deep bench of commons and surveil is free, stapled-on synergy for many of the cards. 

The AI is still out to lunch, as the second pack I opened came back to me with Dimir Spybug, Disinformation Campaign, and two other black/blue playables (I first picked Dead Weight, and picked the Spybug on the wheel). This situation certainly isn't impossible in paper or elsewhere (I must have really cut Dimir hard in the first pack!), but it's adding to the preponderance of questionable AI valuations.    

Here's what I learned tonight:

• Dead Weight feels like the strongest common I've played yet. It cleared the way for Darkblade Agent (t3 Agent, t4 Dead Weight their blocker, flash in a Whisper Agent and draw a card), it stopped Boros from snowballing with Mentor, and it killed an opposing House Guildmage.
• And House Guildmage is exactly that. I played several Dimir mirrors, and I always found myself being the aggressor. So, I got used to setting a stop on my upkeep to surveil into what I wanted to draw. 
• I played against an interesting Abzan deck that played a 2/2 Vigilance guy and then convoked a Rosemane Centaur out of nowhere. He also had Midnight Reaper, which lets you draw a card and lose a life whenever you lose a nontoken creature. Needless to say, extremely good card.
• Burglar Rat into Plaguecrafter was pretty nice, and I played this sequence against my Boros opponent in my last game. I think it hits Boros pretty hard, as they can hardly afford to lose threats out of their hand and they definitely can't afford to lose the board. It doesn't seem like they have a good way of getting back into games once they fall behind.  

I now have enough gems to play in competitive draft, so I'll be doing that next. Here's to hoping the train keeps moving. 

[Sidney Blumenthal]

You are absolutely correct. I had miscounted when I took this pic. I took out the Command  the Storm, which I regretted every time my opponent played a 5 toughness creature.

Sent from my iPhone

<image1.jpeg>

[Sidney Blumenthal]

I agree, Dead weight is the best common in the set. Direct current is probably the second best for similar reasons. Even though it’s 3 mana, being able to cast it twice makes up for it imo.

Sent from my iPhone

On Oct 17, 2018, at 11:51 PM, Jason Salvano <jasons...@gmail.com> wrote:

Sooner or later I'll stop forcing my drafts on everyone, but that time is not here yet. 

I had a much easier time with Dimir tonight, and I think the deck is pretty average, really. But Dimir seems to have a really deep bench of commons and surveil is free, stapled-on synergy for many of the cards. 

The AI is still out to lunch, as the second pack I opened came back to me with Dimir Spybug, Disinformation Campaign, and two other black/blue playables (I first picked Dead Weight, and picked the Spybug on the wheel). This situation certainly isn't impossible in paper or elsewhere (I must have really cut Dimir hard in the first pack!), but it's adding to the preponderance of questionable AI valuations.    

Here's what I learned tonight:

• Dead Weight feels like the strongest common I've played yet. It cleared the way for Darkblade Agent (t3 Agent, t4 Dead Weight their blocker, flash in a Whisper Agent and draw a card), it stopped Boros from snowballing with Mentor, and it killed an opposing House Guildmage.
• And House Guildmage is exactly that. I played several Dimir mirrors, and I always found myself being the aggressor. So, I got used to setting a stop on my upkeep to surveil into what I wanted to draw. 
• I played against an interesting Abzan deck that played a 2/2 Vigilance guy and then convoked a Rosemane Centaur out of nowhere. He also had Midnight Reaper, which lets you draw a card and lose a life whenever you lose a nontoken creature. Needless to say, extremely good card.
• Burglar Rat into Plaguecrafter was pretty nice, and I played this sequence against my Boros opponent in my last game. I think it hits Boros pretty hard, as they can hardly afford to lose threats out of their hand and they definitely can't afford to lose the board. It doesn't seem like they have a good way of getting back into games once they fall behind.  

I now have enough gems to play in competitive draft, so I'll be doing that next. Here's to hoping the train keeps moving. 

<image.png>

<image.png>

<image.png>

On Wed, Oct 17, 2018 at 5:33 PM Jason Salvano <jasons...@gmail.com> wrote:

Wow. That deck looks strictly better.

On Wed, Oct 17, 2018, 5:23 PM Sidney Blumenthal <sidney.i....@gmail.com> wrote:

Powerful gold cards wheeling is not relegated to mtga only. This was my first draft deck of the format. I could not lose with this deck, except I did because I make poor mulligan decisions and am bad at Magic.

[Jason Salvano]

So it looks like Dominaria is returning to bo1 drafts on Thursday. I haven't played the set. Does anyone feel like giving me a few tips? I know a few draft archetypes (B/G and U/R) and I remember a few powerful commons (mostly black removal spells). 

[Richard Romanowski]

U/w historic was another good one. I favored green decks as they had the most perfect commons. Watch out for on serras wings. Card is responsible for me losing most of my games

[Jason Salvano]

Are there any reach deathtouch creatures?

[Richard Romanowski]

Both, no. Here are all the reach and deathtouch stuff

https://scryfall.com/search?q=%28oracle%3AReach+OR+oracle%3Adeathtouch%29+set%3Adom&unique=cards&as=grid&order=name

[Sidney Blumenthal]

You’re in for a treat. Interesting draft AND gameplay, which is a rare combination. UR Wizards/spells is the best deck in the format when it comes together, but it’s a pure tempo deck. Not that interesting to play, but one of the few decks that punish you for being slow. Outside of that, cards that seem way too clunky like Helm of the Host, or the Mirari Conjecture are absolute bombs in this set. You will have time 90% of the time to enact your game plan. 

Sent from my iPhone

[Jason Salvano]

Nice! I'm looking forward to it. It sounds like the gameplay will be more interesting than getting beaten down by Boros or getting your hand discarded by Dimir. And if the draft is more fluid than picking one of five guilds, then that sounds good as well. 

[Tom H]

Just open Teferi and you should be fine.

There are a few mythic uncommons - In Bolas' Clutches, Tatiyova, Eldest Reborn, and Icy Manipulator come to mind. In fact, there are very few rares that you should be taking over Icy Manipulator p1p1. Not only is it more powerful than most of them, but it also keeps you wide open going into your second pick since you'll play it in 100% of your decks.

The Legendary sorceries are mostly traps, but one or two of them can be great if you build around them early on in the draft. The wrath is often mediocre because your opponent is going to have legendary creatures too. The black and red ones are pretty good (Jaya's Immolating Blaze and Yawgmoth's Vile Offering).

BW historic was another archetype. Splashing is also generally good for the right cards. Skittering Surveyor is a very high pick (even first-pickable in a weak pack) and longer games means more time to find your splash color/spells.

The kicker cards Caligo Skin-Witch and Ghitu Chronicler are both excellent. Skin witch seems too slow at first glance, but your opponents will often be playing slow decks as well and will have cards still in hand on turn 7+. If not then they're probably aggro and a 2-mana 1/3 is ok anyway.

The 6-mana hexproof turtle is playable - some decks will have a real hard time dealing with it and if you can pick up an On Serra's Wings to go along with it then you can just fly that turtle to victory.

I just took a quick glance at all of my 3-0 decks and every single one of them had black in it. Paired it with every other color, but always black. Whether that was personal bias or those were more successful decks, I don't know.

[Tom H]

Oh yeah, I think BR was a sacrifice deck, but the pieces are very hard to put together (I think the enablers were all uncommons?) and then you have to draw both halves at the right times. The only steal effect was Act of Treason, which was mediocre unless you were killing their creature with it, and then you might as well just be playing a removal spell given the minor upsides to the enablers. Sacrificing Ghitu Chroniclers and Caligo Skin-witches after kicking them was the same - fine, but the upside wasn't high enough. It can be good, but generally underperformed, in my experience.

[Jason Salvano]

So the (small) consensus is that green and black are the deepest colors and can form one of, if not the, best archetypes (probably with the highest floor). But the highest ceiling belongs to UR Wizards, which catches all of the relatively slow decks off guard. Is that right?

W/U or W/B historic are also viable, but I'm guessing these require certain key cards to work, such as some of the legendary sorceries? 

Like Helm of the Host, are there other rares that are unassumingly broken or act as the green light for particular archetypes?  

[Tom H]

The historic decks don't actually lean on the legendary sorceries. They have a lot of cards that provide little increments of value. The BW uncommon deathtouch/lifelinker (Arvad the Cursed) for example is a great card on its own, but if it also happens to be giving +2/+2 to one or more of your other creatures it's just broken. Jhoira's Familiar can be good in one of these decks. Blackblade Reforged can be insane in these decks. Zahidd is another reason to be in something like UW historic.

Oh, and the 1-mana equipment... Short Sword I think it's called? It's better than expected - in tokens it turns your tokens into real cards, in historic decks it provides just enough value to be decent, etc. Not a high pick, but worth taking if you can pick one up at low cost. The Jousting Lance is similar.

Looking through my decks I'm also reminded that Soul Salvage is a pretty solid card since it's going to almost always be relevant and is basically draw two spells with some amount of selection at times.

I just went through the rares real quick and didn't notice any sleepers. I think you can evaluate most of them pretty accurately. Lyra is insanely good of course as is Siege Gang Commander. Phyrexian Scriptures, Multani (considered by some to be the best card in the set), Rite of Belzenlok, Muldrotha, Shalai, History of Benalia, Josu Vess, Verix Bladewing... all great cards, but all somewhat obviously so. Mending of Dominaria is pretty good I think. I guess that Traxos might not look as good as it is. If you take him early then you can give yourself plenty of ways to untap him and you can even get the combo with the common artifact creature that untaps another artifact that you control each turn. Untap him once and he's still a 7/7 wall that threatens to get in once or twice when you have a chance to untap him again. Verdant Force might be a little better than expected just because his cost isn't as much of a downside as it normally would be (BTW, 18 lands is often the default in the format). Torgarr is also pretty good. Not a bomb, but a solid card. I've had Two-Headed Giant get me good, but I still think it's a mediocre card for a rare. Having to decide to attack or not before knowing the coin flips is a big drawback, but a 4/4 for 4 is still good.

All of the triple color cards have the expected drawback. While splashing can be good, playing the triple color cards isn't as great because you really want them on turn three, so you hamstring your draft a little bit. That's not to say that you shouldn't take them, maybe even first pick. A T3 5/4 is just going to win games a lot of the time. Just beware the deck building constraints.

[Sidney Blumenthal]

I actually won a lot with white in this format as well. Pegasus Courser can be a powerhouse that the opponent has to waste a good removal spell on or jut lose the game. Nice saprolings you have there 😂. My favorite decks were all 3 and 4 color decks with a green base for Grow from the Ashes. To go along with the other mythic uncommons, Song of Freyalise is stronger than all of them imo (though p1p1 I would take Icy over it because I don’t have to be green to play it). Fight with Fire is also bonkers, as you usually play it to kill a big threat, then get it back with Ghitu Chronicler and 10 them with it. I think I lost 3 matches the entire format FYI, and I played almost every Friday. I think you’ll do great as it rewards sound drafting and play, and punishes weaknesses.

Sent from my iPhone

[Richard Romanowski]

Pegasus courser is great. I think even a little more stellar here due to the ground getting gummed up. 

Voltaic construct 2 Mana 1/3 that untaps an artifact EOT is a great role player as well.

[Jason Salvano]

Thanks for all the advice! I hope I perform well and make you all proud; I'll dedicate any wildcards towards a 4+ color deck once the rest of the shocks appear in the next set.

I found a pretty sweet visual (@dustin_stern) and it looks accurate.

[Richard Romanowski]

Cards I like more than others:

• Ancient Animus - my most contentious stance. I've discussed this at length with people who have had more success than me. But I like this fight spell since it gives green interaction, which I find limited in this format and is one of the few removal spells that let's you double spell in a turn earlier and more consistently than most. You need the bigger creature to avoid the card disadvantage, but usually not a problem with greens creatures.

• Krosan Druid - super flexible and great with mending or soul salvage or black memorial

• Syncopate

• Gideon's Reproach

• BUG memorial lands - just good value for little cost

Cards I like less than others:

• Call the Cavalry - this is a card I feel would usually be good, but with so many 1/3s and good ground creatures, it always seems like I never get to attack. Excels in super curve outs and decent blockers.

• Triumph of Gerrard (hate it) - ranked low, but just felt unplayable

• Short Sword - agree with what Tom said. But just feel the impact is lower than desired most of the time

• Blessed light

Other notes:

• 1 invoke the Divine is usually main deckable

• I enjoy the grow from the ashes deck

• Snapper + arcane flight is always something to consider in the sideboard

[Evan Lennick]

Fine, you all win. I'll download it.

Is there a Cobblebrute in any recent sets? I refuse to play Magic without him.

[Richard Romanowski]

There's a 9/3 legendary vanilla for 4B is that cobbly or bruty enough?

[Evan Lennick]

That's basically perfect.

[Josh Zirkel]

Hammer dropper is a better cobble brute.

Josh

Sent from my iPhone

[Tom H]

I heard from a friend at Wizards R&D that the next set is an "all cobblebrute" set. All of the commons, all of the uncommons, all of the rares, all of the mythics. Nothing but cobblebrutes all the way down. 

On Tue, Oct 23, 2018, 9:42 PM Evan Lennick <elen...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Josh Zirkel]

There’s even a 4/2 for 1 called cobblestone.

Josh

Sent from my iPhone

[Jason Salvano]

Tell me you chose cobblebrute as your username.

[Evan Lennick]

Agh I did not, I am the worst.

I have played a bunch of Onakke Ogre's if that's worth anything.

[Jason Salvano]

Not sure I understand. So your username is OnakkeOgre?

[Jason Salvano]

Direct Challenge is coming in November: https://forums.mtgarena.com/forums/threads/40563

Play against my bad decks. jms#36567

Also, behold mediocrity?

[Evan Lennick]

I would but I have no idea how to add friends in this crappy interface.

I just tried a draft. Didn't realize it's just the same as Hearthstone now where I'm drafting against the CPU and just playing against whoever is in the entire giant pool of players. Does that mean MTGO or a LGS is still the place to go if you want an actual draft against real players that then play each other?

I almost lost a game with Josu Vess and Aryel and several other knights out because I didn't understand the Aryel interface and killed my own creature. I also timed out my own turn thinking it was my opponents turn. I need a little practice.

[Jason Salvano]

Yeah, don't look too hard; you can't add friends yet. I was jumping the gun on my previous email, but they're saying that sometime in November you'll be able to issue direct challenges to people.

The AI drafts are less than ideal. I don't know Dominaria very well, but I don't see the same egregious misevaluations as with Guilds. I'd hope you can eventually draft against other players (even if only in a specific draft mode), but it seems unlikely that they would ever include pod play. 

 Hey, at least the game will keep you honest and stop you from casting 4-mana Knightly Valors.

[Sidney Blumenthal]

I know you guys are probably off GRN since Arena moved back to Dominaria, but I went 3-0 with this spicy little number at FNM. It was a lot of fun to play.

Sent from my iPhone

On Oct 29, 2018, at 9:58 AM, Jason Salvano <jasons...@gmail.com> wrote:

Yeah, don't look too hard; you can't add friends yet. I was jumping the gun on my previous email, but they're saying that sometime in November you'll be able to issue direct challenges to people.

The AI drafts are less than ideal. I don't know Dominaria very well, but I don't see the same egregious misevaluations as with Guilds. I'd hope you can eventually draft against other players (even if only in a specific draft mode), but it seems unlikely that they would ever include pod play. 

 Hey, at least the game will keep you honest and stop you from casting 4-mana Knightly Valors.

On Sun, Oct 28, 2018 at 3:09 PM Evan Lennick <elen...@gmail.com> wrote:

I would but I have no idea how to add friends in this crappy interface.

I just tried a draft. Didn't realize it's just the same as Hearthstone now where I'm drafting against the CPU and just playing against whoever is in the entire giant pool of players. Does that mean MTGO or a LGS is still the place to go if you want an actual draft against real players that then play each other?

I almost lost a game with Josu Vess and Aryel and several other knights out because I didn't understand the Aryel interface and killed my own creature. I also timed out my own turn thinking it was my opponents turn. I need a little practice.

On Thu, Oct 25, 2018 at 11:04 PM Jason Salvano <jasons...@gmail.com> wrote:

Direct Challenge is coming in November: https://forums.mtgarena.com/forums/threads/40563

Play against my bad decks. jms#36567

Also, behold mediocrity?

<image.png>

[Richard Romanowski]

Wow lots of gates. My last draft was 2-0-1 boring golgari. Dudes and removal, still good

[Jason Salvano]

I love all of the gate synergies and the Glaive of the Guildpact, especially. I've been hearing and reading murmurs that this kind of deck is real, so I'm glad to actually see it! I think some mentored hawks or on curve legionnaires would be the biggest nightmare for this deck?

[Richard Romanowski]

Flyers do am to be the answer, though the cards quality of his deck seems to indicate either absurdly stacked packs or a less than stacked pod of drafters

[Tom H]

Looks pretty sweet. I'm still a fan of Guilds, but FNM is pretty hit or miss for me these days and given the costs of MTGO vs. Arena, that's a no-brainer, so I'm usually playing whatever is on Arena. I wouldn't even mind paying a bit to play MTGO and be playing versus real people, etc., but Wizards just never got their heads out of their asses about the whole economy there.

I've been playing a nice surveil deck on Arena (I'm sure that Jason would appreciate how fun it is to play against). Thought Erasure to make sure that the way is clear into Disinformation Campaign just feels so good.

[Jason Salvano]

Haha there's always that. But I'm not so sure this deck is necessarily too out of the ordinary. I haven't even drafted this set in a pod, but I'd bet that gates actually wheel and I know that people hate Golgari. Quasiduplicate is a card that I've passed because I thought it wasn't very good...but I think I was very wrong. I am surprised to see those two Bonds out of nowhere, but I think this draft was just taking advantage of an unknown/open archetype.

[Sidney Blumenthal]

Yeah, I wheeled both gargoyles, so I was the only one trying to do this. I really like the version with only a few creatures (like Ledev Champion or Murmuring Mystic) and tons of removal, which is why I ended up taking the 2 bonds early, but I just didn’t get there (the removal just wasn’t there). I just took the best card out of each pack, or a guildgate if the pack was mediocre, and eventually ignored red as I didn’t see much from either direction. I played a good Boros deck in the finals, but the player made a few mistakes I was able to capitalize on. Boros is definitely the bane of this deck.

Sent from my iPhone

[Sidney Blumenthal]

As an aside, Dead Weight is the best common in the format by a mile and I would play as many as I could in a deck like this. I would play 10 of them if I got them.

Sent from my iPhone

[Tom H]

This week's Limited Resources went through the archetypes for Guilds and they did cover the 4 or 5-color deck. Their approach was pretty much the same - If the pack has a bomb, take it. If not and it has removal, take that. If it has neither then take the guild gate. Marshall said that he's been trying to force it for a bit with uneven results and neither of them was convinced that the deck was a real thing.

[Jason Salvano]

Here's another podcast that mentions the strength of the 5-color archetype: https://soundcloud.com/user-773872916/lords-of-limited-69-how-to

They talk about remaining open and keeping this archetype in the back of your mind as an audible if you take 3 or 4 strong picks in different guilds to start your draft. I rather like that way of thinking about it. 

[Richard Romanowski]

Whoops, lost the group.

Also, everyone ok with email still? Any favorite non-FB owned chat about apps you would prefer instead?

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Richard Romanowski <romanowsk...@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, Oct 29, 2018, 3:33 PM
Subject: Re: [CAM-magic] MTG Arena Open Beta
To: Jason Salvano <jasons...@gmail.com>

Yeah, my friend was working from home a bit then he moved, became a mod on their channel. So he was our connection, they came over for beers and cube. He just got his 21st trophy today in guilds. Was watching him play Boros

FYI, a friend of mine James Eveland just qualified for the pro tour. Judge in the area, some of you might know him.

A bunch of us are going to GP, I mean Magicfest, Cleveland Feb 22-24. Will definitely be getting a house and stuff, always a blast if anyone wants to join. 

On Mon, Oct 29, 2018, 3:16 PM Jason Salvano <jasons...@gmail.com> wrote:

Nice. Small world. I think I found the podcast via Starcity. I got the impression that they are college-age or so; it sounds like they've played hundreds of Guilds drafts (an unfathomable amount, to me, considering the time I have now). I feel like I'm a generation too old for Twitch.  

I was impressed with how scripted (not in a bad way) and well-produced the podcast was for seeming like a relatively new endeavor. So many times I'll find a new podcast and turn it off after 5 minutes of listening: hosts/co-hosts constantly interrupt each other, speak in very monotonous or idiomatic patterns, or clearly haven't spent any time writing down talking points. In short, found it on a whim and was pleasantly surprised. Cool that you know them. 

On Mon, Oct 29, 2018 at 3:04 PM Richard Romanowski <romanowsk...@gmail.com> wrote:

Fun fact: I've met these guys twice at GPs through a friend. One is currently streaming now on twitch lordtupperware. Super friendly dudes and good at magic

[Jason Salvano]

Yeah, I remember James. That's cool. Did he top 8 a GP? I'm not sure if my motivation to play Magic reaches that of a "Magicfest" these days, but I'll let you know closer to the event if I'm in. I can't really see past the holidays right now.

I'm in favor of changing the communication medium if there's something more convenient for everyone. Looks like about a half a dozen of us are active and I know a few more folks are reading (there are about twenty current members who receive the emails). Does anyone else have any input or suggestions?

[Tom H]

I have Discord on my phone, so that would work. I'm also on Slack for work, but I don't think that's as easy - might need a server, etc.

I've been listening to Lords of Limited for a few months now. I think they're just past college age, because MisterMetronome (his Twitch name) is a music teacher or something like that. They definitely put out a pretty good podcast quality-wise and it's a nice change of pace to get their opinion vs. Marshall and LSV.

I played some Dominaria draft last night and today. Seems like everyone is trying to just go aggro, curve out and play silly enchantments (like the +2/+2 and menace to target creature). I've faced more Skirk Prospectors in the last 24 hours then I did for the entire duration of the Dominaria format. I was thinking that I had some bad drafts because I had to play one or two of the Tolarian Scholars (2/3 for 3) with no synergies. Turns out those guys are beasts when the opponents are playing all 1-mana 1/1s and 2-mana 2/2s. Easy gems. :)

[Evan Lennick]

I can't believe you still remember the 4 mana Knightly Valor.

I'd be down for Discord or Slack. I use both pretty constantly. You do not need a server for either one, you can just create a group and start using it with either one. Slack does have limitations on how long it'll hold history though if you don't pay money. Discord also comes with voice chat for free built-in if you ever need it.

[Richard Romanowski]

https://discord.gg/VGWNPjA

Feel free to join

[Jason Salvano]

The Discord server is live (thanks Rich!), and you can join here: https://discord.gg/CnbxdH

(Discord is available for free in web and app here: https://discordapp.com/. If you haven't used it, it's supplanted a lot of the old stuff like Ventrillo and Teamspeak, and works as a combination voice/text/media app.)

The email list won't go anywhere, but Discord is a lot more convenient for doing live drafts, in particular. 

[Tom H]

I got an error message that the invite link is either expired or I don't have permissions. :(

[Tom H]

Are they maybe one-use invites?

[Jason Salvano]

Try this: https://discord.gg/WSfGwu

[Jason Salvano]

I think they might be time-sensitive. It's been forever since I've sent a Discord invite and I've never used them for exactly this purpose.

[Tom H]

That one worked, thanks!

[Jason Salvano]

Are you Aardvark?

[Tom H]

Yes, that's me :)