Modin's Set 2.0

[Modin]

Hello there!

The title isn't even accurate anymore as I am currently building on the 2.1 version of my set. Set you ask, yes set, a rarity based draft format of ~ 250 individual cards. It's basically my own version of Mondern Masters. I'll post the introduction of Chris' Set-Thread because I'm too lazy to write those things down myself. My situation should be about the same except some of the number's might have changed. Here is the List!

Based loosely on the set design of Modern and Vintage Masters (color-pair archetypes and modal-archetype card choices), I started building cubes in frantic attempts to recreate the "Masters draft feel". After several marginal cube iterations, there was only one clear way (in my demented mind) to create the experience that I desired: build a fantasy set.

I knew the workload to build a fantasy set was beyond reasonable, but the true depth of mind and manual labor didn't make itself apparent until later into the design process. (And by then, I had already reached the point of no return.) Initially, I broke down some of my favorite draft format archetypes (self-mill in ISD; all VMA archetypes, but especially goblins) and then the formats by removal/evasion/creature-to-spell ratios among common and uncommon rarities to set up mathematical guidelines for my set and archetypes. (Much to my surprise, only about 45 percent of common and uncommon cards are creatures; maybe that's why conventional drafts often feel like they have so much dreck.)

(...)

To recreate the set feel, beyond grouping cards by fantasy rarity levels, I looked into developing print runs. (If you don't know much about print runs, I highly recommend this article by Laura Mills:http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/article.asp?ID=6995) Print runs allow for certain cards to appear more frequently paired with other unique cards (i.e., one positioning of Treasure Mage, a 4-card uncommon-slot inclusion, is with Triskelion and Etherium-Horn Sorcerer 2-3 slots away in either direction), as well as creating different chances of a particular rarity of card appearing in a set of packs (as seen above). Lastly, print runs help to balance color distribution within boosters through simple pattern management (using WUBRG for common1 and WBGUR for common2 to guarantee no more than 3 of any particular color of common and at least 1 of each). The print run design has been the most difficult part of this project, and I hope to slowly start tweaking them after 5 or 10 drafts.

Issues with Version 1.0​

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As the title suggests this isn't the first time I am trying to get this thing going. I had some issues with the first version and therefore stopped working on it for quite some time until I got motivated again and build the whole thing again with different themes and ideas in mind. There were a number of issues I had with the original version:​

1. Too many playables: This might be the biggest issue of such projects, only inserting good or at least playable cards into the set creates the issue of people having to cut ~6-10 cards from their deck that are perfectly fine and in their (two) colors. This makes deckbuilding harder than I would want it to be(the last time my more inexperienced drafters were just tossing me all their cards and asked me to build the deck for them). It also makes reading signals much harder which again ends up in feel bads.
2. Strong mono colored decks: This has to do with the first point but also with the in color balance, colors(esp. Blue) had enough inbuild synergy that players didn't need to go into other colors to have a strong balanced deck, I was trying to change that a bit in the new version but at the same time I don't want to cut down on fun cards. Does anyone have an idea on how to tackle this issue?
3. Way too many flyers. Also the combat interaction's between creatures weren't really where I wanted them. I guess that has to do with my somewhat schizophrenic design as I want some of the retail limited feel but with stronger cards.
4. Some rares being too impactful. Cards like Whip of Erebos have since been cut, but I feel like that is still something to look out for. I feel like especially cards that aren't easily answered and come down somewhat early are problematic.
5. Reliability vs. Diversity. Some people were annoyed because they felt that they weren't seeing some of the commons as reliably as they wanted/needed. On the other hand diversity which leads to replayability is a huge thing I want to encourage as I am putting quite some time into this project.

Goals​

• Create a limited environment that profits from the possibilities that printruns and rarity levels create. (the ability to somewhat enable tribal, and more niche archetypes)
• Archetype diversity (I want tempo decks to be a thing [aggressive and disruptive decks that attack on multiple levels(read: interact with bouncelands)])
• Intersections between archetypes or in other words, drafting specific archetypes shouldn't feel too much like on rails.
• Format depth and cool interactions.
• The combat step shoudl matter.
• A good balance between removal and answers(who would've guessed that!?)

The Set-Up​

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The whole thing consists of 252 different cards distributed in four different rarity levels:​

• 60 individual Common 1, 6 in each pack
• 48 individual Common 2, 4 in each pack (I might mess with the c2 in the future)
• 80 individual Uncommon, 4 in each pack
• 60 individual Rares, 1 in each pack

As for lands I'm using a mixture of Bouncelands(at uncommon) and KTK gain lands(at both c1 and c2) plus a "lonely" Terramorphic Expanse at c2. I added much more lands than the last time as I am hoping they would deal with the issues 1) and 2) in providing both fixing and non-spell picks.​

The Themes​

I tried​

to provide every guild with a theme and added some cross color shenanigans to provide some depth and give people more space to experiment with. The themes I wanted to include are the following:​

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UB Faeries, still good.


RB Aristocrats



RG Stuff that interacts with lands(rather unfocused)


GW +/+ Counters n' Pants


BW Ghost Dad


GB Compost/Morbid


UG Faeries wearing Pants


UR Cheap Spells/Arcane Mill


RW Most Heroic Aura Aggro




Apart from that there are some subthemes and build around cards:

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I need your help!​

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The whole thing is still under construction and nothing is really set in stone. I'm unsure about some things. I need your ideas on the following:​

• Ways to tackle the issues I described above
• The big overlap between RB and GB making those decks too strong. I was toying with the idea to make the RB theme more like Big Red (Control) but I don't really have an image of how that could look like
• Rarities are pretty hard to balance, I don't want too many strong cards in lower rarities(c1 or c2), removal might need to be more rare
• Inbalance of archetypes/colors, cards that are simply too high a powerlevel
• Suggestions of cards that I could've missed, especially fun rares

 

[Chriskool]

​

​

... There were a number of issues I had with the original version:​

1. Too many playables: This might be the biggest issue of such projects, only inserting good or at least playable cards into the set creates the issue of people having to cut ~6-10 cards from their deck that are perfectly fine and in their (two) colors. This makes deckbuilding harder than I would want it to be(the last time my more inexperienced drafters were just tossing me all their cards and asked me to build the deck for them). It also makes reading signals much harder which again ends up in feel bads.
2. Strong mono colored decks: This has to do with the first point but also with the in color balance, colors(esp. Blue) had enough inbuild synergy that players didn't need to go into other colors to have a strong balanced deck, I was trying to change that a bit in the new version but at the same time I don't want to cut down on fun cards. Does anyone have an idea on how to tackle this issue?
3. ...
4. ...
5. Reliability vs. Diversity. Some people were annoyed because they felt that they weren't seeing some of the commons as reliably as they wanted/needed. On the other hand diversity which leads to replayability is a huge thing I want to encourage as I am putting quite some time into this project.

...

As for lands I'm using a mixture of Bouncelands(at uncommon) and KTK gain lands(at both c1 and c2) plus a "lonely" Terramorphic Expanse at c2. I added much more lands than the last time as I am hoping they would deal with the issues 1) and 2) in providing both fixing and non-spell picks.​

Hi Modin! I wondered if you were still working on this recently, as I just made a third one... Glad to see that you are

Let me preface this with I will be overly brief until sometime after tomorrow; I aim to comment on more of your issues and help foster discussion, but I have an obligation first. The undisciplined child in me beckons to comment to some degree right now, though!

Issue #5 (reliability vs. diversity) sets the framework for a discussion in how a fantasy set (essentially a set on steroids) should be constructed to (1) provide drafters with coherent strategies to assemble, (2) provide variance in the drafting/gameplay experiences of the set and (3) limit the total number of possible decisions just before the threshold of decision paralysis would be reached by the average player. We should probably dissect traditional and "masters" sets in their composition of construction to fully explore how Wizards has approached this issue before fantasy sets can be created to fun effect; their lessons are great tools, even if they are failures (like Avacyn Restored). I hope to revisit this topic soon!

It's neat that you've decided to add more lands to address your big problems; as I have worked on initial environment ideas, played with sets and further edited works-in-progress, I have seen how increased mana-fixing frequency combines with lower-powered cards to create environments where players are more willing to branch out of 1-2 colors to create more interesting decks. It's also a nice side effect that playable lands give many drafters at a table some incentive to pass a playable spell in their color(s) to open options in deck building or increase the consistency of their current deck (while perhaps limiting their options during final deck construction and sideboarding).

(Aside: sideboarding should play a very big part in Fantasy Sets, which is something not as often thought about in conventional cubing from my experience watching locals play. I also hope to revisit this tangent.)

Initially, I thought 40 percent of packs containing a tri-land would give players more incentive to speculatively dip into colors beyond their main 1-2, but in my first few drafts of Limited Masters, the overall power level of cards was so high that fun (and powerful) secondary-color cards were often in the sideboard even with a few tri-lands drafted. After neutering the strategies that were overly powerful (nearly mono white aggro, black sacrifice), adding a few more manafixing cards at common/uncommon and adding in more non-primary-color-theme rares, I hope to see more successful three color decks when I have the chance to draft again.

My main concern with adding lands (or increasing their frequency) to foster deck/drafting diversity lies in the "Triple KTK effect": I don't want to see someone draft 13 nonbasics every other draft and have a high chance at a 3-0 goodstuff deck that doesn't care about much about themes. My advice would be to never include dual-color lands in the most frequent common slot (I'm guessing c1). You might also consider a dedicated land slot like Dragon's Maze/Fate Reforged had for color-fixing and/or including some non-fixing lands in the normal rarity levels (Blighted cycle from BFZ, Cycling lands, colorless manlands, etc.) to offer non-spell choices to drafters.

Apart from more mana-fixing to combat issue #2, I suggest looking at your uncommons and rares for creating color diversity (and supporting the reliability of issue #5) without giving too many tools in any given draft for strong, mono-colored synergy decks. Part of the fun of a set like Innistrad is having to really prioritize certain cards that power decks due to their scarcity (such as a very low number of sacrifice outlets at common) or multiple roles (Armored Skaab drafted in self-mill, in zombies or as defense in any blue deck). Since commons show up so frequently, one color cannot have many cards that play the same role (and especially not many that play only that one role); with large populations of rares and uncommons, the danger of having the same role is mitigated by the lower frequency. (It might be worth looking into frequency of outcome math to really fine the acceptable numbers.)

 

[Modin]

Wow, thanks for the awesome reply! I thought about many things you said and changed some things in my list. Giving my uncommons the "mentality" of triple Innistrad seems like a great thing and I also reduced the amount of similar effects in the same color. As a result, UW is now much better defined and I think Riptide Chimera should fit perfectly into what the deck is trying to do. I'm still kind of unsure about the GR color pair though.
Regarding lands: My solution might be a bit weird but I think it could work just fine. Right now there are 3 of every gain land in all the cards of c1(=30 cards total=5 c1 slots), 2 of every gain land and 2 of the BFZ mono-lands in c2(=30 cards total=6 c2 slots) and 3 of every bounceland in u. This adds up to 80 dual lands + 5 Terramorphic Expanse as the "mana base" of the format. That is about 9% of the entire card pool which is a bit less than in most of the cubes on this forum. I think this could be a suitable solution and also I'm don't mind people going 5c too much. If it does become an issue I think I'd just cut some of the fixing for utility lands.

Here are some very rough drafts of how decks could possibly look. Though print runs will have additional impact:

UW Value Control from CubeTutor.com

BR Aristocats from CubeTutor.com

RG Aggressive Midrange from CubeTutor.com

 

[Modin]

Sooo... we had our first (three) drafts yesterday and I quite liked the outcome. Not everyone was pleased with facing so many new cards and adjusting to a whole new environment. I believe that some of the issues noted above have been damed and enjoyed the darfting process as well as playing the decks. Some rarity changes will be done though and I'll probably have to remove Sylvan Safekeeper but more on that soon...

The Some Decklists:

From Draft 1:
Green control is awesome! And it's totally a thing in this set Countering/Bouncing or ignoring most of what the opponent is doing until you can play bigger creatures that just devalue the opponents board. I once played a Turn 4 Titania+Safekeeper off Nest Invader and Fertile Ground which was pretty pathetic. In a way the combo feels like Kiki+Pestermite(probably even worse) and I'll therefore cut the Safekeeper.

UG Control 3-0

I faced this deck in the finals. Despite it's lack of cmc 2 creatures it put on a lot of pressure, with the most obnoxious Blood-Cursed Knight which at C2 was just too common. Coat with Venom once killed like 3 of my blocking Elementals and even though it might look like a pile of 3 drops it gave me a very hard time in the finals.

Mardu Auras 2-1

Double Thief of Hope paired with double Nameless Inversion, need I say more?
Afaik he lost to the deck above. Growing big creatures seems to be quite a good strategy in this format as most of the common removal is damage based. That might have been how the Mardu Guy won but I'm not sure.

BW Spiritgrind 2-1

The deck actually looked pretty good. All the built-in flood protection and mana sinks make it almost never run out of threats. The match I played against him, I went 2-1, with him having some mana issues on the way. Which, I just realised is a pretty ironic statement considering what I just pointed out. It's possible that the RG Archetype could just use some landfall beaters.

RG Aggro 1-2

Draft 2:
Very solid deck, I didn't see how well it played but I think it won the last game of the finals by Scureing the Wastes for a billion which seems to be the strategy to beat those pesky Acid and Blue Control decks.

UW Midrange 3-0

Both UW decks made it to the finals, Tallowisp ruled the draft as it is not too hard to activate once or twice and get some value in form of Acid, Arrest and the like.

UW Acid 2-1

I played RWb in the 2nd draft and lost one game(which ended up loosing me the match) to getting double stone rained by the acid deck on turns 4 and 5, having drawn no more than 2 lands all game. Sarkhan should probably have been cut as the double R cost was a pretty big obstacle. Double Flickerwisp was just awesome, bouncing Galvanic Arc for value is one of the best feelings evar.

RWb Aggro 2-1

At the time the 3rd draft came around (~2 am) the ability to capture deck lists was deminished but I think another Mardu Blood-Cursed Knight deck went 3-0. Protection spells seem to be key in those decks and early interaction is probably one of the only better ways to defeat it. All in all I had a ton of fun, I think there is still a lot to explore and I'm looking forward to bring you more decklists as the next draft approaches. As the night went on, the moaning and groaning got louder about some cards being overpowered so I'll have to look more closely into that.

List of changes I'll try for next time:
Out:



In:



I'll see how Barrage plays, I might sharpy the activation cost to 1 colorless if it doesn't perform.

Cheers.

 

[Kirblinx]

Great write up, and I feel you should get more response then just a generic like. So I thought I would ask a couple of questions to get the juices flowing on your thoughts on the cube.

My biggest question that you (sort of) mentioned in your report was rarity shifts. There was also the moaning of overpowered cards, which I wouldn't mind knowing what they were, but my main point is:
Any obvious rarity shifts that you noticed from that fist run-through?

Any archetypes that looked like they had trouble?
I would have thought faeries would have done alright to get a mention but no such luck. Wonder if they have decent support. The pack may have not aligned, cards being stolen by all the WU decks etc. Just curious on the 0-3 decks.

You mentioned sharpieing the activation cost on expendibles
Do you have any other 'customs' in the cube?

I look forward to the next great installment in the Modin draft report file

Edit: Also noticed that nearly every deck had 5+ non-basics, which seems like a fine distribution of mana-fixing. Does this level seem fine to you? Was there an abundance of lands in packs? Sorry for the additional questions.

 

[Modin]

Wh00p! Thanks for the reply and all those questions! I'll try to sort my thoughts and try to articulate how the draft felt and what rarity changes I did for what reason:

Great write up, and I feel you should get more response then just a generic like. So I thought I would ask a couple of questions to get the juices flowing on your thoughts on the cube.

My biggest question that you (sort of) mentioned in your report was rarity shifts. There was also the moaning of overpowered cards, which I wouldn't mind knowing what they were, but my main point is:
Any obvious rarity shifts that you noticed from that fist run-through?

Some of the cards that caused moaning:
Profane Command(the guy said he felt bad casting it, because of it's powerlevel), Tallowisp(though I think it needs quite some setup, might need to be uncommon), Seeker of the Way(especially when compared to Mage-Ring Bully).
One of the main "offenders" was, as mentioned above, Blood-Cursed Knight whose buff was just too easy to enable with all the enchantments flying around. It originally was Common2(5 out of 900 total cards) and is now Uncommon(3/900).
The change to Blood-Cursed Knight also affected the UG section as the following changes happened:
Blood-Cursed Knight: c2->u
Skyrider Elf u -> out (it was kinda like the elf vs the mutation and he didn't have too much play to it)
Grove Rumbler -> c2 (to give RG more definition and a little buff)
I also switched the rarity of Hopeful Eidolon(formerly c2) and Kor Skyfisher(formerly c1) because I felt that the UW Acid/Enchantment decks came together quite nicely and making Skyfisher a little less common seems like a nice little nerf to that strategy. I'll definately have an eye on it though so and it could evenutally end up being an uncommon.
It might be a good idea to list cards that performed very well for their powerlevel at the end of each report, I'll try to implement that in the next one.

Any archetypes that looked like they had trouble?
I would have thought faeries would have done alright to get a mention but no such luck. Wonder if they have decent support. The pack may have not aligned, cards being stolen by all the WU decks etc. Just curious on the 0-3 decks.

There was a UR faerie-heavy list floating around at the first or second draft, I didn't get to capture it though. I think the reason why noone went into faeries is simply that it was one of the "known" archetypes from the first iteration of the set and people wanted to try out new things. Looking over the list, I think the faerie support is about where I'd want it to be. Many of the cards are seeing play in other decks so it doesn't look to poisonous, Peppersmoke might be the card that least playable outside of a dedicated faeries deck. One thing I remember from playing against the faeries deck was that one of my greatest concerns was that my opponent would just jam a Latchkey Faerie after hitting me with some other faerie so I guess that card is one of the big payoffs.
Other archetypes that might have trouble:
GW was drafted once and went 1-2, not sure about how well it was built though. As mentioned above I believe that protection effects are the way to go for Wx beatdown decks because there aren't too many ways to go wide.
RW always became RWb or BWr but those iterations did well.
GR is somewhat weird. The aggro deck didn't do too well because some of the cards just didn't perform as well as I expected (Akoum Stonewaker). I played GR Maw of Hell ramp though and had a ton of fun (went 1-1 as my opponent was already gone)
RB wasn't really present as most of the decks including red and black went into the direction of auras. A more aristocrats-esk deck didn't come up. That could be caused by the fact that it isn't new either or by the lack of support/communication which is why I added Barrage. It's a bit weird though, like people didn't even care about the 5 Carrion Feeders.

You mentioned sharpieing the activation cost on expendibles
Do you have any other 'customs' in the cube?

Just Harvest Wurm returning also non-basics, people seemed to accept that pretty well(as it doesn't change the look of the card much) but I'm not sure how to make the same thing work for Barrage.

I look forward to the next great installment in the Modin draft report file

Edit: Also noticed that nearly every deck had 5+ non-basics, which seems like a fine distribution of mana-fixing. Does this level seem fine to you? Was there an abundance of lands in packs? Sorry for the additional questions.

You wont have to wait for long, next draft will be on sunday.
The land distribution seemed alright. Some lands were picked last but my over all impression was that the distribution is fine(each booster probably has about 1,5 lands average but no more than 3) One thing I did was add additional Evolving Wilds (now there are 8 instead of 5) because I felt that they were quite important for the GR interactions, I'll keep an eye on how it works out.
Anyway, thanks for the great questions, they really got me thinking!

 

[Modin]

Here we go again! Before I'll go into the drafts and decks from yesterday I have to share a realisation that I had when waking up today: The set needs to be edict effects! A lot of the supported/played strategies are about making one big dude and protecting it, that can become rather unrewarding for both players(if the dude just gets killed for example) or if you having nothing to stop him because most of the removal is thoughness based. To give this scenario a lot more interplay, edict effects are required. They will give people the incentive to not only play 1 huge threat but to diversify and give the opponents more ways to deal with huge charged up monsters by setting up a proper edict effect. As always, this interplay of threats and answers is highly(entirely) inspired by Grillo_Parlante and the Penny Pincer Cube.

The First Draft​

We were 5 and did a Round-Robin style torunament, but played only 4 rounds because people were kinda sick of their decks. (That's why the scores look messed up)

2-1 GW Little Kid

My first impression of this deck was that it looked extremely solid. Many +/+ dudes and synergies combined with Inspiring Call and double Angel looks pretty insane. That said I think it lacked one or two powerful cards(Abzan Falconer comes to mind) to take it from great to very great. The player also seemed to have some not to great draws and as the games progressed the more grindy decks were able to overcome it some of the time. One thing we noted with this deck is that Sheer Drop is an rather awkward removal spell for an aggro deck if it isn't being raced as people are just not gonna attack.

2-1 Blue Pod

Pod is alive! I originally went UG Control with a ton of counterspells but dropped them for Pod when I saw it pick 1 pack 2 which might have been a bad decision as my deck until then looked pretty sweet. The pile you see above did but play rather well(much to my suprise) and the mana base was acutally quite okay. (To be fair, I once held 4 cards with cc costs in 3 different colors in hand and couldn't cast any of them)
Playing very bad cards only because they are three-drops payed off, as I got to go Elder Pine into Ember Swollower some of the time(a card that I couldn't cast too well otherwise). The decks lategame was pretty awesome as I got to grind people out very well with my great top end cards. Zulaport Cutthroat was also a card that won me some games (especially against the pesky Esper list that made attacking rather awkward).
Cards that performed above my expectation:

2-1 RG Landfall

That is some aggressivly curved landfall deck. On paper it looks even sweeter than I thought it would. It turnes out that Mogis's Warhound + Savage Punch interact very nicely with eachother. The deck looks pretty focused but has some mediocre cards at the cmc 2 slot, Wild Mongrel would have been awesome there. Also Slime and Scavenger make it look more midrange than what I'd have expected but it did well and Zendikar's Roil surely closed out games.(Especially in combination with the retreat). Antoher thing it would've liked is 1-2 Terramorphic Expanses as those would have really shone in the deck. That said I think the guy was able to hit land drops almost every turn thanks to the bounce lands.

1-2 Esper Enchantment Control

Ugh. Playing against this deck was the worst. Durdles over durdles over durdles. The deck was constructed in a way that you could hardly ever have good attacks but didn't close out the game almost ever. I think one of his wincons was having double Grim Guardian in play and triggering it a bunch of times. Demonic Pact was good but not too good as the cards he drwe didin't have that much of a game-ending impact. The deck would really have liked a proper finisher like Skeletal Vampire or much rather Ajani's Chosen. Suffice to say he games against this thing went on for ages.

1-2 Abzan Midrange

This deck looks somewhat unfocused. It's kinda about spirits and value sacrifice but doesn't have a high enough density of spirits or arcanes. He said himself that he shouldn't have gone 3 colors as the manabase seemed to be a little awkward too. The deck played alright dispite the flaws I just mentioned and I saw Oyobi hitting the battlefield a couple of times and I actually lost to this deck 1-2 because I got Suffer the Pasted for like 6? It was one of the more effective ways that deck closed out games. Also Skeletal Vampire is just a powerhouse in lower powered environments.
Also an honorable mention: This deck used Reincarnation the best I've ever seen it, as a green reanimation spell which was pretty awesome. In the same sense, Unearth was just awesome, but more on that in the next draft...

The Second Draft​

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If there is one thing to take away from the first draft, it's that building focused 2-color (aggresive) decks is a strong strategy, something that was the case in KTK too. If you go into 3 or more colors, you kinda need strong cards to make that commitment pay off. In this draft, my brother drafted but didn't play which is why there are only 4 decks to showcase:​

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3-0 UB Faeries

They are back. Back in black. This deck was a blast to play. Almost all the games were nailbiters and I won many matches 2-1. I originally wanted to go UR spells but decided to move into black as more of it got passed to me. At first I was flirting with going 3-color but I had to prioritize other cards over the lands and eventually decided to go UB, which seems like the right decision looking back. It was kinda risky to go the faerie route as I hadn't seen much more than 1 Spellstutter Sprite until then, but man did it pay off The deck basically aimed to counter the important stuff and disruption the opponent(Pestermite a bounceland in the upkeep) while hitting face with 1/1s and eventually closing things out with one of the big drops. One of my most beloved plays was going Marsh Flitter into Mistblade Shinobi, replay Marsh Flitter. Spellstutter Was highly effective, once even countering a three-drop. I believe that the deck wouldn't have done as well without the insane rares I got passed that were in my colors. Mind Control is a powerhouse, even at 5 mana and Skirsdag High Priest stole a game on his own. This deck was a dream come true for me.

2-1 Jeskai Spirit Midrange

I just love those 3-color red decks. As you can see here ~6 fixing lands are a good amount if you want to go 3 colors. The deck looks very smooth. Combining the Tallowisp engine with Red isn't new, leaving black out of it is. Blue gives the deck the old Acid+Stalker/Skyfisher(or the value repeal) interaction with Peregrine Drake producing a ton of mana and enabling huge Secure the Wastes. The deck seemed to always have something to do with it's mana also as Tallowisp and Ordeal of Thassa make sure you don't run out of cards.
All in all the deck looks super solid and could've easily gone 3-0 but it's probably a little weak to disruption.
Having one Acid and 2-3 Enablers looks like a good amount to have that interaction come together at an acceptable rate. Acid is very popular right now(playing with it, not against it) and I am considering making it an Uncommon as getting your bounceland blown up is just a pain.

1-2 RUG Spells

This is were the UR lands went. Also it's a very sweet looking spells/landfall deck that had some pretty nice options in there. Quirion Dryad was growing really fast with all the cheap red and blue spells, the Grove Rumblers frequently hit for 5, ignoring opposing defences(can't really chump that guy with a Faerie/Goblin token). Elder Pine allowed him to play a lower land count and still hit his landfall triggers, and the deck had very nice synergies over all. 1-2 Glacial Rays would have added a whole new dimension to this deck though. It was to his misfortune that I had picked up both a Glacial Ray and a Volt Charge earlier in the draft, which would have given the deck the amount of extra punch it needed.

0-3 Esper Midrange

The guy who drafted the Abzan Midrange deck now tried blue as his third color, clearly liking Blood-Cursed Knight and the enchantment synergies. I didn't realize until now that his curve is actually a rectangle which is kinda hilarious. Besides Myth Realized fitting very well into this deck and the Enchantment synergies coming together seemingly natural I love the double Unearth in this deck. It plays 3 high powered 3-drops and 2 other nice Unearth targets in Dream Stalker and Carrier Thrall. Hideous Laughter was used to great effect against my faeries deck and looks like a very real maindeck card. The reason this deck went 0-3 is in my opinion not because it was bad or built in a wrong way but just due to the fact that the player who piloted it doesn't play magic outside of our drafts(while the other three of us do so more frequently). In addition to that, I was able to steal a game off him with Skirsdag High Priest that he wasn't able to answer, which brings me to the following conclusion: If the draft had countained more (black) removal, this deck would have benefited the most from it.

That's it for my draft report. I'll leave you with a Booster that wasn't cracked at the draft:


EDIT: I believe that there still is a ton of other things to explore and I might change the rarity on Tallowisp and Reality Acid to make people look into other things too.

 

[Grillo_Parlante]

Modin this looks really great. These decks look really fun. That faerie deck in particular is something I want to play.

Do you feel Your previous issues have been met with this update?

 

[Modin]

That's a good question, I'll look at what I wrote down and comment on each one:

1. Too many playables: This might be the biggest issue of such projects, only inserting good or at least playable cards into the set creates the issue of people having to cut ~6-10 cards from their deck that are perfectly fine and in their (two) colors. This makes deckbuilding harder than I would want it to be(the last time my more inexperienced drafters were just tossing me all their cards and asked me to build the deck for them). It also makes reading signals much harder which again ends up in feel bads.

I think including enough dual lands and "bad" cards that only shine in specific decks and situations made the draft feel much more real and drafting decisions matter a ton. I feel like the bigger the group of people, the more this can become an issue because people end up in more niche archetypes (I guess). But all in all I think that this isn't much of an issue anymore (check)

2. Strong mono colored decks: This has to do with the first point but also with the in color balance, colors(esp. Blue) had enough inbuild synergy that players didn't need to go into other colors to have a strong balanced deck, I was trying to change that a bit in the new version but at the same time I don't want to cut down on fun cards.

There are decks that have a strong focus on a single color but splashing is made so easy that people are just not incentivised to go mono color. Blue is still one of the colors that could go monocolored but it didn't happen yet. It would need everyone else to shy away from that one color which is made more inprobable by the colorfixing available(good cards being snapped up by other drafters that just splash them or move in)

3. Way too many flyers. Also the combat interaction's between creatures weren't really where I wanted them. I guess that has to do with my somewhat schizophrenic design as I want some of the retail limited feel but with stronger cards.

This isn't as easy of an issue. On the one hand, some of the combat tricks do work (esp. Coat with Venom) on the other hand creatures growing into huge monsters doesn't make blocking good which somewhat annoys me. Flyers are still strong but not as oppressive and not as many as before, I quite like where they are at.

4. Some rares being too impactful. Cards like Whip of Erebos have since been cut, but I feel like that is still something to look out for. I feel like especially cards that aren't easily answered and come down somewhat early are problematic.

Some rares are strong, but I didn't notice anything too oppressive in the last drafts.

5. Reliability vs. Diversity. Some people were annoyed because they felt that they weren't seeing some of the commons as reliably as they wanted/needed. On the other hand diversity which leads to replayability is a huge thing I want to encourage as I am putting quite some time into this project.

This one is still kind of unknown. I like the change to 10 commons instead of 8 and the fact that some strategies need the stars to align to be played(mill) which I think gives the whole thing some replayability. Again the fixing does that too as you are much more freely able to mix and match colors and themes, I like where the set is at in this regard.

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