Matt's TS draft #1

[Matt]

Well I went and got my first taste of Time Spiral last night. I started by opening Enduring Renewal, and took it. Biiiig mistake, the card is actually horrible. But I let it shape my entire draft, passing up the white 2/2 griffin and taking the echoing goblin token-making-goblin...yuck. I picked up two pingers though, the Fledgling Mawcor and Pirate Ship. Pack 2 was not great either. I was vaguely going U/w/r, not knowing any of the archetypes. Then in pack three I opened Teferi AND Avatar of Woe! I agonized for awhile, then took the Avatar. In the end I had drafted some great green cards (double-mana and unsplashable) some awful red, some mediocre white, some good blue, and one bomby black bitch.

2 Temporal Eddy
2 Eternity Snare (1 foil)

2 Coral Trickster
Dream Stalker
Fathom Seer
Crookclaw Transmuter
Voidmage Husher
Fledling Mawcor
Pirate Ship
Viscerid Deepwalker
Errant Ephemeron

Opaline Sliver

2 Jedit's Dragoons
Duskrider Peregrine
Foriysian Interceptor (foil)
Errant Doomsayers

Strangling Soot
Avatar of Woe

Chromatic Star
Jhoira's Timebug

Dreadship Reef
2 Swamp (both foil)
6 Plains
8 Island

SB: Harmonic Sliver
SB: Hail Storm
SB: Penumbra Spider
SB: Spike Tiller
SB: Mindlash Sliver
SB: Dementia Sliver
SB: Enduring Renewal
SB: Plated Pegasus
SB: Locket of Yesterdays
SB: 2 Ancient Grudge (1 foil)
SB: Ivory Giant
SB: Goblin Skycutter
SB: Subterranean Shambler
SB: Flowstone Channeler
SB: Orcish Cannonade
SB: 2 Mogg War Marshal

Round one my pingers beat the fuck out of some guy with poor English skills and a lot of x/1s. He also had some mana problems.

Round two I played against suspending red green.dec. My 5 toughness guys held off his red totem and 4/1 first strike guy. He Cannonaded something early, and then later when I dropped Avatar instead of controlling the board I just killed him in 3 hits.

Game two I was stuck for land and had to Gush to dig, and that set me back enough to lose when he began casting Wurm Calling for 6, 7, 8, and 9. I played two morphs (Coral Tricksters) and finally cast Avatar but I couldn't live to lose its summoning sickness and wipe the board.

I sided in Dementia Sliver. Game three neither of us saw our bomb rares (I had Avatar but never a second black source). I started off with 4 blue cards, AoW, and Island. I suspended Deepwalker, and eventually drew some land. I played rope-a-dope this whole game, using every out. I prided myself on knowing just when to start flying in with Mawcor and I won the race. This gam featured him casting four copies of that red storm card that plays Planeswalker's Fury on the opponent. He rolled up Avatar, Island, Eternity Snare, and Island, smacking me for 14. But that's all he hit me for, and I even resolved a Jedit to jump back to 10.

Round three I got crushed by one of the best limited players in town, Jim Mason, with a r/g deck featuring Greater Gargadon and THREE Firemaw Kavus. Yeah, no shame in losing to that deck.

U/W was surprisingly solid. Eddy was really good against suspend. Jedit's Dragoons were amazing, as was 5 toughness - there's a lot of 4/xs around. Eternity Snare was also solid removal against some large monsters. This seems like a slow format, and there's not much sacrificing/bouncing of their tapped men like there was in Ravnica..

Timebug was useless, but I wanted a laugh and needed a slot. Should have been Pegasus or Dementia Sliver - not many options left for that last slot, since I had wasted so many picks on red and green cards.

I'll probably try U/W again next draft, possibly splashing black again. Soot was good and I could have had mulltiples if I wasn't so stuck on running red.

[Anusien]

I am surprised you got Avatar out as often as you did.  Is TS Draft that slot a format that you can rely on drawing two of what, 4 ways to find it?  Although I suppose Dreadship Reef can play double.

[freakish777]

Soot was good and I could have had mulltiples if I wasn't so stuck on running red.

Yeah, if you're already in red, just fricking plan on splashing black is you see Soot.  If you can play the Flashback, Soot is hands down the best black common in the set.  Card advantage, targetted removal is some good I hear.  The other way around:  If you're in black and see Soot, grab it and plan to splash red a little (especially if you have anything like: BR storage land, Prismatic Lens, Chromatic Star, Terramorphic Expanse, what have you) unless its pack 3 and you have no fixers (which I'd find a little hard to believe).  If you decide, hey I can splash red a little and grab Soot in the first or second pack, it also opens you up to running that Sudden Shock you might open or are passed early in the next pack (or Rift Bolt, or Lightning Axe as an extra madness outlet).

I'm very partial to UBr in this environment (I love Ephemeron, Soot, and burn).

[UR]

If you are planning UBr I'd pick Dark Withering over Strangling Soot. It is much better with the Looter and Trespasser.

[freakish777]

I don't think I would.  I'd rather have have the guarenteed 3 mana kill something small, and the card advantage then the tempo.  As many have essentially said, this is a slower limited format then some, which makes every extra card count.  Also, from the games I've played (and from listening to some of my friends talk about their games) it seems like a lot of times it comes down to who has a creature left after the board is shot up, so you're not guarenteed to draw Withering + Looter (or whatever else) and you're probably not likely to have your creature around for very long either for that matter (decreasing your chances of have Withering in hand when you can Madness it).

As far as killing something small versus killing something large, that's what the rest of your removal is for.  Here's a quick list of things you should see fairly often and be able to get that handle the things Soot doesn't, in UBr:

Lightning Axe
Tendrils of Corruption
any more Witherings you see
Smallpox
Assassinate
Telekenetic Sliver
Bogardan Rager
Firemaw Kavu
Phthisis
Premature Burial
Sudden Death


Outside the box solutions (not really, but you get the idea):

Cancel
Mindstab
bigger guys, or bigger guys with evasion that race


In this format I think I'd rather go for the slower, card advantage driven, more inevitable deck then the "Give my 3/1 shadow and blow up a guy for some quick tempo" deck.


EDIT:  Obviously, some of these cards (Like Phthisis) aren't necessarily something you'd want to pick early, and as such can wind up being like, 22nd or 23rd card, just making the cut.  I don't think that's really an issue.  I'd rather have Soot + Phthisis in my deck then Withering + Phthisis in my deck.  Also, the Lightning Axe is a "among the cards available, its likely I'll see something later to deal with larger creatures" card, as opposed to already having it.  If you already have it, I might lean more towards Withering, but still, I like Soot hands down the best.  Assuming you've been passed Soot and Withering, and you're going black anyways, I don't think you should be complaining or really agonizing over what the correct choice here is anyways (assuming you're already in red/have discard outlets).