Did two drafts. I hadn't looked at the full spoiler in detail beforehand, so I was kinda just guessing. Started out trying to go green ramp/domain, as I managed to get an everflowing chalice, Horde of Notions (which I proudly proclaimed as a "go for it" signal) rampant growth, Ant Queen and two tribal flames pack one. Pack two was FULL of good red cards like Incandescant Soulstoke Soulbraider and Inner Flame Igniter. I took a small number of black cards (two of the Eldrazi Drone guy at 5 and the 2/1 wither) and whatnot. After two dismally bulk rares I opened a Kozilek, and finished up the drafting. I ended up winning 3 games entirely off the back of a single Sooulstoke and Igniter with 7 mana. Ended up going mostly red, with 5 or so black cards and three Tribal Flames (plains, island, forest for them in the deck)

Next draft, went mono-white. You heard right. Mono-white. Had five living weapons in my deck, three of the flying double strikers, two Taj-Nar weaponsmith, a Copper Caraspace, and about 4 random 2 drops. Lost round one to guy in red splash green who had Spikeshot Elder, the Hydra, three smash to smithereens, the green convoke naturalize, two lightning bolts and two burst lightning. But I did get to kill him game one with a 10/5 flier, so that was neat. Ended up opening a Noble Heirarch and a Wilt-Leaf Liege in the draft, so that was good.


Thoughts:

It is a little crazy that the elementals are all uncommons. UG Proliferate is much better than I thought, Thrummingbird is wild at common (friend drafted 4 in a draft, AND had Tide) and Inexorable Tide is a much better card in this format. Black seems on the weak side, you either play Spirits or... something? Red/black bloodthirst is a thing, but the best reason to play black in aggro is at uncommon (the Vampire) and really I think you are better off playing red/white if you want to be aggro.
Ant Queen is a really good card. Affinity can be good, but seems like an all-or-nothing sort of thing, with little space of an "okay" deck.

Inner flame igniter and smokebraider and soulstoke are not "good" cards.

I know. They're "great."

Seriously. People were ragging on the cards when I played against them, then I crushed them. Deck was decent in Lorwyn limited, much better in this format because they're all commons. I might also be rating them higher than I should, because Soulstoke is a 2CMC 2/1.

They're barely playable.

Entered a 4 player draft, we were all bad at drafting, archetypes that got drafted were:
5 color GR me
Rgb equip(I think
WU affinity
Bw spirits

Got 1-2 due to terrible mistakes(sided deathmark over etched oracle against Rgb twice, tuns out that other one of these 4/4 graft for four his other green cards were bad and I lost(should have realized that since my green cards were good and my red cards were almost all archetype specfic)
Lost against Bw because I forgot that soulshift existed and used the 2 damage burn spell on a rusalka on turn 2 to not discard a land.

Deck was
Land-18
2 GB bounce
1 RB bounce
1 GU bounce
1 GW bounce
1 terramorphic
1 plains
1 island
1 swamp
4 forest
5 mountain(or 5 forest-4 mountains, I'm not sure)

Creature - 14
2 of that red knight that becomes a dragon
2 mactas rioters
1 etched oracle
1 etched monstrosity
1 primeval titan
1 nest invader
2 of that kavu with convoke and kicker
1 of the phoenix with a WGRUB ability
1 of the manta with sunburst
1 aetherspine
1 gnarlid pack

others -8
1 sphere of the suns
2 wayfarer bauble
1 rampant growth
1 tribal flames
1 burst lighting
1 vines of vastwoods
1 BR four mana kill spell that can pop lands

1 card I can't remember

Respectfully disagree, based on my own play experience.

Æ alt +146
æ alt +145

Alt146 thersnipes. nonono

but Æthersnipes .. oooooo shiny

I don't do grammer or spelling.

Inner Flame Igniter is fine if you're drafting a heavy red deck as you can turn your Viashino Slaughtermasters into real powerhouses.

The original idea I had was that the format was going to be ruled by Karoos and bomb rares. Bomb rares are certainly strong in this format as sometimes they'll play some giant idiot and you'll just lose. However, the karoos are way less powerful than I thought originally. In original Ravnica block draft, you just took all of them and signets and just played whatever good multi-color spells that nobody else could draft. This time around they only really help facilitate 4-5 color good stuff decks, which is certainly a good deck type. In the linear aggressive decks you definitely don't want the tempo loss of playing a karoo and a lot of the time the aggressive decks only need one type of both mana as there aren't that many double mana requirements outside of the Shadowmoor uncommons.

I've played Mono red, black and white as well as an almost mono-green deck. I think the mono-color decks are good in the format because there are a good amount of cards that are xyy on three that make your mana tough. The mono-color decks don't really have trouble with the curve as each color sans blue have multiple quality twos as well as a bevy of 3s to pick from. In addition to this, all colors, outside of blue, have all of the pieces you want for your deck at common.

Early on in my playing I want to be green white all of the time because you got good removal and the tokens let you go wide. After drafting this more, I felt the white cards were less necessary to this deck. You want all of the Scatter the Seeds, Nest Invaders, Scion of the Wilds, and 1-2 Kavu Primarchs (all conveniently common). The hard part of playing this deck is that a lot of your cards are double green which makes splashing a color pretty difficult. You don't really want Rampant Growths but Karoos are fine in this deck because you can convoke Scatter the Seeds.

The mono red deck is pretty nuts. Fireslinger is fine but not as good as you might think. You want it to enable Bloodthirsty but it's not essential. It's better to get fire and double strikers. Viashino Slaughtermaster is way better than the elemental piker because it doesn't die to everything in the format and nobody wants to block it because it looks like garbage so you'll get your bloodthirsty guys from it. It's also fine to have pump because it will just murder them. This deck is good because you get the double double strike Hobgoblin guy which is nuts and Ashenmoor Gouger (I've never lost a game in which I put it into play). The best part of this deck is that people will pass you Nobilis of War because it's impossible to cast in every other deck and the RW pump deck gets all of it's pieces grabbed from other drafters.

I have a lot more to explore from this format but right now I want to play aggressive decks because I don't want to allow people to gain enough traction to be able to cast their bomb rares and kill me. I think playing a game that is focused around who can rip more bomb rares is pretty awful but forcing people into racing situations they can't win is much better.

I've drafted MM2015 twice, once going WB spirits and the other time going UG Graft. Went 2-1 with spirits and 3-0 with graft (although I still got second because it was an 11-man pod ) I think the WB spirit deck could have done better if I adjusted my land count and didn't get mana screwed Round 1.






First draft, I first picked Dismember, got passed Hikari, and decided to commit to the spirit plan (even though these two cards hardly commit you to that plan). I got rewarded for it with multiples of Thief, Ghostly Changeling, and Waxmane Baku (getting my second Waxmane as the last card in pack 3). Feels like the deck only worked as well as it did because nobody contested me for the spirits.

Round 1, played against RW doublestrikers with multiple Brute Forces, Otherworldly Journeys, and topped off with Nobilis of War. Game 1 starts poorly for me as he Journeys his Pilloried dude and then Brute Forces a Nameless Inversioned Viashino Slaughtermaster. However, I start bleeding him with Thief of Hope and stacking counters on Waxmane Baku, holding off one or two creatures every turn thanks to a steady flow of spirit/arcane spells. Nameless Inversion put in work, finishing off dudes that got blocked by Thief (twice, thanks to Death Denied). Finally get him down low enough to just alpha strike through his team, which included a Nobilis of War at this point.
Games 2 and 3 are relatively fast as I can't find enough lands to muster a defense after mulliganing (to be fair, he had to mulligan to 4 and I to 5 game 3). Probably should have +1 plains and -1 Swamp.

Round 2, played against UR proliferate?. I didn't see much of his deck but notable cards include Thrummingbird, Blood Ogre, and Novijen Sages. He was probably the weakest drafter at the table and I 2-0 him.

Round 3 was another UR deck, but more Niv-Mizzet and Electrolyze. While I don't remember much from the games, I remember blowing him out with Devouring Greed through a Pilloried Niv-Mizzet in game 2 of the 2-0 series. End up 4th over all.


Second draft, first picked Niv-Mizzet, got passed Mulldrifter, followed by Narcolepsy and Shrewd Hatchling and felt really comfortably like I was going UR Elementals. Then I saw no red for several packs, but did find a mid/late Plaxcaster Frogling, followed by Lorescale Coatl, which prompted me to switch to Green. Got a little misled pack 3 after seeing multiple soulstokes, thinking I might go RUG. Got a Vigean Graftmage last card, so that worked out again.
Round 1 was against UR stuff. Turn 1 my opponent Burst Lightning and Gut Shots my face, which means he had no removal when I got plaxcaster frogling out. That was a fast match, although his Thrummingbird made my Shrewd Hatchling look a little silly in one of the games.

Round 2 was against WU artifacts, with multiple Somber Hoverguards, Myrsmiths, and Gust Skimmers. Game 1 saw a board full of flyers and potential flyers and after he dispatched my Cloud Elemental, it was pretty much over. Didn't see my Helium Squirter or Aquastrand Spiders that game. Side in Plummet and Wings of Velis Vel to fight the fliers. Game 2 went much more smoothly as I found my plummet to get rid of a hoverguard and he couldn't go as wide as I could. Game 3 was very rushed as we only had about 5 minutes left in the round. Probably should have ended in a tie, but he played a little bit sloppily (missing tumble magnet triggers) and I eke out a win.

Round 3 was against WB spirits, interestingly enough the gentleman I had beat the week before in Round 3 with WB spirits. Game 1 I go wide with predator, thrummingbird, thrive, et al, and he can't mount a defense. Game 2 he gets Ghostly Changeling and Restless Apparition out. I can't block either of them profitably and die to Devouring Greed. Game three is pretty much the same story as game 1.


One gripe that I have with this format is people's fixation with Rares/foils. People feel like they have to get some value out of the draft so they end up taking off color rares/foils not to hatedraft them, but because of the color of their expansion symbol. I got a third pick Mirror Entity pack 2 in the second draft, which is probably okay if there were better cards and you weren't in white (I wasn't but no way is 5 color stuff next to me or WB spirits one person down going to get it), but in the first draft, the weak drafter took a Long-Forgotten Gohei pack 2 pick 3.

I saw an interesting point the other day, and I'd like to hear if anybody has any experience with this.

How high are people picking Darksteel Axe? Is it any good outside of the double strike deck and affinity? Is it really going first or second every time?

Darksteel Axe seems really valuable, but I don't think it's being picked especially high. I could see it in green decks, but theres enough removal in black and red that I dont think it fits well there.

Just draft a U/B control proliferate-ish deck that worked pretty well. Mana screwed in game two against a Domain/Bloodthirst deck, but I think they may have been able to beat me anyway.

The cards:

I went with 16 lands because most of my spells were 3 CMC or less and they bought a lot of time or draws. Probably should have had Sphere in the main deck, but I couldnt figure out what to swap out...probably Steady Progress...it rarely did much.

I've never been so annoyed about -1/-1 and +1/+1 counters in the same set until my only target for Grim Affliction had Graft or Bloodthirst.

I've done 10+ drafts so far and while I have gotten a few Darksteel Axes 4-6th pick you don't see that many of them. It's really good just in general. If you're playing the tokens deck you basically just upgrade your guys. It's a lot better in the double strike deck but not really necessary for the affinity deck. It's good in all decks except some type of control deck without many creatures and I would still think about playing it there.

Yeah, it's pretty solid. Agree with everything Chu said.

Is anyone else having issues with people quitting real early in matches? Half my games people are dropping after turn 4 game 1 and then dropping from the match...its weird.

Playing a pretty fun "mono"-red Elemental deck right now:

Deck:

I was totally wrong on keeping Guile in and totally forgot the Hammer needed white...sided quite a bit.

Edit: Ended up 2-1..again. Lost to a weird b/g token deck.

Ugh...P1P1: Lodestone Golem, Dismember, Myrsmith, Wrecking Ball and useless Commons...

Why is that ugh? You snap up dismember.

Rule #1 of MM15 draft: p1p1 you snap pick Dismember unless there's something that wins 90% of the games you play it in the pack.

Wrong. You pick up Dismember if it's in the pack. Any card you pick over it better be worth more than the money you paid for the draft.

There a quite a few Rares that I pick over Dismember.

Because I wanted combinations of all four lol. I came into the draft wanting to force artifacts and hoping to pick up Myrsmith (I was in a weird mood)...then I get that. I also don't like leaving Wrecking Ball because someones gonna snag it down the line and probably start cutting black in pack two.

So...its ugh because I immediately have to not pick a card I wanted, and because picking the right card leaves a card I don't want someone two/three players down picking. Also, Dismember tends to not work out well for me for some reason. I only seem to draw it when -5 isnt enough or I can't afford the tax and don't have the land, so even though its the right call, I hesitate picking it over "kill anything" removal.