Magic: The Gathering number crunching for limited
January 22, 2016 Leave a comment
An Oath of the Gatewatch prerelease pool, how I misbuilt it, and some observations about the format.
http://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/lessons-from-the-oath-of-the-gatewatch-prerelease-sealed-pool-construction
January 20, 2016 Leave a comment
An Oath of the Gatewatch prerelease pool and some observations about the format.
http://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/lessons-from-the-oath-of-the-gatewatch-prerelease
January 14, 2016 Leave a comment
My compact version of the official release notes for Oath of the Gatewatch is at http://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/oath-of-the-gatewatch-compact-release-notes. It’s 11 pages vs. 28 pages for the original, so it’s much easier to carry if you want a printout for the prerelease.
January 14, 2016 Leave a comment
My usual list of the removal in Oath of the Gatewatch, categorized by type, color, and rarity, is available at http://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/oath-of-the-gatewatch-removal.
January 12, 2016 Leave a comment
My usual list of the instant-speed tricks in Oath of the Gatewatch, categorized by converted mana cost, color, and rarity, is available at http://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/oath-of-the-gatewatch-instant-speed-tricks.
January 11, 2016 Leave a comment
I’m now writing for MTGGoldfish. My compact spoiler is available at http://www.mtggoldfish.com/articles/oath-of-the-gatewatch-compact-spoiler. It provides searchable card texts before they’re available from Gatherer. It’s also just 6 pages, as opposed to the card image gallery at DailyMTG which is 52 pages, so it’s more environmentally friendly if you choose to print it out, and it’s easier to carry around in your pocket for reference.
January 5, 2016 Leave a comment
The diagram below is a visual representation of the mainstream archetypes in BFZ/BFZ/BFZ draft, i.e., archetypes which can reliably be drafted in a typical 8-person draft without relying on “build around me” uncommons. A line between 2 colors means there is an archetype in that color pair or an archetype in which those 2 colors are the primary colors. The line is labeled with the archetype name.
Some observations:
December 29, 2015 Leave a comment
My last few posts have explored potential G/X decks in Battle for Zendikar draft. My conclusion was that G/W tokens/Allies and R/G landfall are possible, but that B/G sacrifice and G/U ramp/converge are difficult to pull off in a typical 8-person draft. Most of these posts have had at least one person respond saying “green is terrible.” I’ve generally stood up for green, saying that it can be good if it’s underdrafted and if you know what you’re doing, but I do agree that green doesn’t have very many good cards in Battle for Zendikar, and I want to try to quantify that.
Let’s start by looking at the playable green cards by rarity:
This means that an 8-person draft has an average of 24.6 playable green cards, or enough for 2 G/X decks, which is what I’d expected. However, I do see some deficiencies as I look through this list of cards:
I still think it’s possible to draft green successfully as long as you keep these weaknesses in mind. Green can usually only support 2 decks at an 8-person draft, so you probably shouldn’t commit to green until pick 3-5, which means it should usually be the second color you select. B/G and G/U decks are difficult to pull off, so you should only consider green as your second color if your first color is red or white. Both R/G landfall and G/W/x/y tokens/Allies decks should prioritize 3-drops like Valakut Predator and Tajuru Stalwart. Since green lacks bombs, you need to focus on a good curve even more than usual, since you can’t rely on drawing a bomb to help turn the tables. Green also lacks playable removal, so you need to ensure you draft some in your other color(s), along with pump spells that help you break through the myriad 4-, 5-, and 6-toughness creatures in the format.
December 22, 2015 4 Comments
In Battle for Zendikar, blue and green have the most cards with converge and the most cards that generate Eldrazi Scion tokens. That means G/U could potentially function as a deck that uses manafixing to maximize converge and/or a deck that uses ramp spells and Eldrazi Scions to cast expensive spells. However, are there enough of either card to make this a deck that can be consistently drafted?
Let’s take a look at the blue and green converge cards first:
Neither of the blue commons with converge are particularly good, especially in multiples, so there’s little reason for a converge deck to be G/U. Green provides both the manafixing and the good commons and uncommons, so any G/X deck can play the green converge cards and splash Exert Influence and the G/U cards. G/W Allies is the most likely candidate since it often splashes additional colors for Unified Front anyway, and Tajuru Stalwart and Skyrider Elf are also Allies.
Next, let’s consider the cards that produce Eldrazi Scion tokens to see whether a G/U deck is likely to end up with enough of them to build a ramp deck.
An 8-person draft usually has about 3 people in each color, but many drafters tend to avoid green in Battle for Zendikar, so we’ll instead assume that there are 2 green drafters and 3.5 drafters in each other color. Then, we might expect to end up with 1.7 of the blue cards and 3.5 of the green cards, along with an occasional colorless card. Unfortunately, both the green commons are filler and a G/U ramp deck would have to play them in order to have more than a couple of cards that produce Eldrazi Scion tokens.
A G/U ramp deck would also have access to more traditional green ramp spells. However, green gains little from being paired with blue in that scenario, and is probably be better off as a R/G landfall deck since the ramp spells help it trigger landfall more frequently.
Unfortunately, a deck like this is likely to have draws that only have ramp spells/filler Scion producers or only have expensive spells with insufficient ramp. Also, the environment has a number of ways to deal with large creatures: white has Sheer Drop and Smite the Monstrous, blue has Clutch of Currents, Murk Strider, and Tightening Coils, black has Bone Splinters, and all colors have access to Scour from Existence, and that’s just at common.
Consequently, it seems that G/U(/x/y) is not a good color combination in this environment. Blue has little to offer in terms of converge spells and G/W Allies can make better use of the green converge spells. Similarly, blue has little to offer in terms of ramp spells and R/G landfall can make better use of the green ramp spells.
December 15, 2015 Leave a comment
B/G in Battle for Zendikar limited is sometimes referred to as a sacrifice-based deck and sometimes as an Eldrazi Scion ramp deck. Let’s crunch some numbers to determine which, if either, of these is an accurate description of what B/G has to offer.
Let’s start by looking at 3 categories of cards that are important to either or both decks mentioned above. Within each category, cards are organized by rarity and converted mana cost. The highlight indicates the color of the card, with some exceptions: no highlight (white background) is used for lands, grey highlight is used for colorless/artifact cards, yellow highlight is used for white cards, and gold is used for multicolor cards. Unless specified otherwise, monocolored cards require one colored mana.
I don’t see much potential for a B/G sacrifice deck in these tables.
Consequently, I would rather draft G/W Allies (which has other ways/reasons to produce tokens) and splash Bone Splinters and Brood Butcher.
How about a B/G ramp deck that uses Eldrazi Scion tokens to power out large monsters? From the Scions table, it’s clear that G/U is a more appropriate color combination for a deck aiming to do that. I also don’t think a strategy focused on ramping out a single large monster is viable since there are many answers available at common: white has Sheer Drop and Smite the Monstrous, blue has Clutch of Currents, Murk Strider, and Tightening Coils, black has Bone Splinters, and all colors have access to Scour from Existence.
So there doesn’t appear to be a good B/G deck in this format. While there are some interesting interactions, they don’t appear to be numerous or powerful enough. G/W/b/x Allies and perhaps G/U monsters are better alternatives.
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