Enjoying this format again. Running 18-19 lands (instead of 17-18) and not getting godawful luck seems to have ended my mana issues.
@Nav: BR seems fine. I got 3 3-0s last night with BR. Found it wide open. A week or two ago, it was Devoid that was always cut and UW control was more open, but now everyone seems to be drafting blue like crazy and I'm getting good red cards late. I think I was even trying to go blue, but kept getting pushed into BR with open signals.
My 2nd deck successfully double-wheeled P2P12 and P2P13 Molten Nursery, which is not a great card, but is pretty nice reach next to 2 Nettle Drone + almost all colorless deck. Boarded them out vs control, but they were very nice to have vs Allies and Ingest. T2 wall, T3 Nursery, T4 Complete Disregard killing two guys, T5 Touch of the Void killing two guys, gg? There were also combo turns where I went double ping -> Pilgrim's Eye into land -> triple ping -> Vestige of Emrakul -> triple ping.
My 3rd deck had 4 Nettle Drone, one of which I passed and wheeled back to me at P2P13...
In the first deck (which was not really devoid, just RB good stuff), I was getting stuff like Ondu Champion, Valakut Invoker, Shatterskull Recruit and Mire's Malice picks 11-14. These aren't amazing cards, but they're certainly playables and getting playables that late is just pure value.
It's interesting to see how the meta shifts as people's perceptions of what is good or not changes.
For example, at first you used to see a good mix of archetypes and many people trying the Gx ones. Then everyone was playing Devoid, green was avoided, and white-based decks seemed to be more open (UW control, Allies). Then there was a point when people realized everyone was avoiding green and you'd see multiple 3-color decks running a bit of green for mana fixing/ramp/ignored converge bombs, taking advantage of those unwanted green cards. Now it seems people are shifting towards UW and red seems more open again. At least this is what I'm observing on MTGO. I enjoy seeing the meta shift - sign of a good format!
So, after being fully immersed in the format, I don't think it's very good. Blue is SO much better than the other colors. Green really is as bad as advertised. Allies just isn't a good strategy. The format has 5 real decks IMO: U/R devoid, U/B Ingest/Process, U/W fliers/awaken, BR devoid and W/B lifegain. W/B lifegain is way below the first three, but it really does pay off if you get the right cards. BR is generally worse than UR or UB, but it can come together nicely.
I do like taht the games play out slower, as that's much more skill intensive. But there is so little vareity in what you should be drafting that I can't give the format high marks.
I don't know that I'm that low on the format, but I have definitely come down from where I was during the first month. I still find it fun, but I'm looking forward to things being shaken up by OGW, which was not the way I felt after triple Khans, so I'd have to say that on the whole I liked 3xKTK better.
After tanking like an idiot during the first week or so, I'm now eight times 3-0 and twice 2-1 over my last 10 drafts.
No offense, but after you talking about leaving Dragonmaster out of a red deck I'm having a hard time believing your claims about your record. Are you playing MTGO swiss drafts or something?
Enough. Let's not stoop down to pointless bickering. We're better than that. It's eminently possible to win despite ignoring conventional wisdom, and it's also eminently possible that you're making mistakes even though you're winning.
Green not being a particularly viable color really limits the variety of the format which limits my enjoyment. However, I still face plenty of green so the variety of opponents is at least good. I am getting somewhat tired of the same-ol' same-'ol in terms of my own decks, and we still have a month to go before the new set, but BFZ is still fun.
After tanking like an idiot during the first week or so, I'm now eight times 3-0 and twice 2-1 over my last 10 drafts.
No offense, but after you talking about leaving Dragonmaster out of a red deck I'm having a hard time believing your claims about your record. Are you playing MTGO swiss drafts or something?
It's funny you say this because for BFZ, swiss drafts on MTGO, in my experience, are stocked with generally better players than the 4-3-2-2 tryhards. If I want an easy 3-0 I hold out for 4-3-22 single elim queues and make finals most of the time, usually with a sick deck as I pick up p1p8 nettle drone and p1p9 touch of the void. If I want a reasonable competition and a guaranteed three rounds I do swiss and I find it is far more challenging to 3-0 a swiss than a 4-3-22. If I want coherent draft signals I do 8-4, which is the only queue where anything makes sense imo.
This has not necessarily been the case in other sets where both single elim. queues are about the same skill level and swiss is easy mode. I think something about the signals in this format throws people for a loop.
After tanking like an idiot during the first week or so, I'm now eight times 3-0 and twice 2-1 over my last 10 drafts.
No offense, but after you talking about leaving Dragonmaster out of a red deck I'm having a hard time believing your claims about your record. Are you playing MTGO swiss drafts or something?
It's funny you say this because for BFZ, swiss drafts on MTGO, in my experience, are stocked with generally better players than the 4-3-2-2 tryhards. If I want an easy 3-0 I hold out for 4-3-22 single elim queues and make finals most of the time, usually with a sick deck as I pick up p1p8 nettle drone and p1p9 touch of the void. If I want a reasonable competition and a guaranteed three rounds I do swiss and I find it is far more challenging to 3-0 a swiss than a 4-3-22. If I want coherent draft signals I do 8-4, which is the only queue where anything makes sense imo.
This has not necessarily been the case in other sets where both single elim. queues are about the same skill level and swiss is easy mode. I think something about the signals in this format throws people for a loop.
Can't speak to the 4-3-2-2 really, as I've only played it once (when time was limited and it was about to fire, whereas the 8-4 wasn't close). But IMO there is a pretty big gap between Swiss and 8-4, which is what I was talking about. That gap includes drafting/building/playing, and usually seems to equate to 2-3 competitive rounds in 8-4's vs only 0-1 in Swiss.
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@Nav: BR seems fine. I got 3 3-0s last night with BR. Found it wide open. A week or two ago, it was Devoid that was always cut and UW control was more open, but now everyone seems to be drafting blue like crazy and I'm getting good red cards late. I think I was even trying to go blue, but kept getting pushed into BR with open signals.
My 2nd deck successfully double-wheeled P2P12 and P2P13 Molten Nursery, which is not a great card, but is pretty nice reach next to 2 Nettle Drone + almost all colorless deck. Boarded them out vs control, but they were very nice to have vs Allies and Ingest. T2 wall, T3 Nursery, T4 Complete Disregard killing two guys, T5 Touch of the Void killing two guys, gg? There were also combo turns where I went double ping -> Pilgrim's Eye into land -> triple ping -> Vestige of Emrakul -> triple ping.
My 3rd deck had 4 Nettle Drone, one of which I passed and wheeled back to me at P2P13...
In the first deck (which was not really devoid, just RB good stuff), I was getting stuff like Ondu Champion, Valakut Invoker, Shatterskull Recruit and Mire's Malice picks 11-14. These aren't amazing cards, but they're certainly playables and getting playables that late is just pure value.
It's interesting to see how the meta shifts as people's perceptions of what is good or not changes.
For example, at first you used to see a good mix of archetypes and many people trying the Gx ones. Then everyone was playing Devoid, green was avoided, and white-based decks seemed to be more open (UW control, Allies). Then there was a point when people realized everyone was avoiding green and you'd see multiple 3-color decks running a bit of green for mana fixing/ramp/ignored converge bombs, taking advantage of those unwanted green cards. Now it seems people are shifting towards UW and red seems more open again. At least this is what I'm observing on MTGO. I enjoy seeing the meta shift - sign of a good format!
I do like taht the games play out slower, as that's much more skill intensive. But there is so little vareity in what you should be drafting that I can't give the format high marks.
No offense, but after you talking about leaving Dragonmaster out of a red deck I'm having a hard time believing your claims about your record. Are you playing MTGO swiss drafts or something?
It's funny you say this because for BFZ, swiss drafts on MTGO, in my experience, are stocked with generally better players than the 4-3-2-2 tryhards. If I want an easy 3-0 I hold out for 4-3-22 single elim queues and make finals most of the time, usually with a sick deck as I pick up p1p8 nettle drone and p1p9 touch of the void. If I want a reasonable competition and a guaranteed three rounds I do swiss and I find it is far more challenging to 3-0 a swiss than a 4-3-22. If I want coherent draft signals I do 8-4, which is the only queue where anything makes sense imo.
This has not necessarily been the case in other sets where both single elim. queues are about the same skill level and swiss is easy mode. I think something about the signals in this format throws people for a loop.
Can't speak to the 4-3-2-2 really, as I've only played it once (when time was limited and it was about to fire, whereas the 8-4 wasn't close). But IMO there is a pretty big gap between Swiss and 8-4, which is what I was talking about. That gap includes drafting/building/playing, and usually seems to equate to 2-3 competitive rounds in 8-4's vs only 0-1 in Swiss.