I need to make a confession to you, though, about my lack of success in draft since October. I haven't had much luck with Theros, and with the inclusion of Born of the Gods my Limited game has gone right out the window. My last draft was a 1-2 drop and most have been similar. I went home last night, dejected, dragging my 12 year-old home with me as well (he went 2-2 as well, so we were both out of the price support).
What's a guy got to do to win a draft? Heck, I'd be happy finishing with a winning record.
Dad!
So as puttered around Saturday making breakfast, I was still smarting. My youngest, being the perceptive gentleman I've raised him to be asked what was wrong. I grumbled something about feeling off of my game.
"Dad...dad...DAD!"
"What?" I so eloquently replied when I finally answered him.
"Let me look at your deck. It's still together, right?"
"Sure son, it's together. Go ahead and look, but you won't find anything wrong with it. It was a great deck, I don't understand how I did so poorly." I went back to stirring my eggs, grumbling some more to myself.
Following breakfast came the wonderful chore of cleaning up the mess I had made in the kitchen. As I did, I could hear him rustling in the other room. No sooner had I finished than he came in, beaming. "I know what you did wrong," he declared.
Uppity kid. How could he know what I did wrong? I didn't even know what I did wrong, and he's going to tell me? Kids, they think they know everything these days.
"Alright then, Mr. Super Draft. Tell me, what did I do wrong?"
And tell me he did...
Old Dog
He dragged me out to the living room, where had commandeered one half of the card table. On it, my deck was displayed in it's naked glory. He had it sorted in a pretty standard formation. The cards were organized from left to right with increasing CMC and was split in half with bottom row just being spells.
"Ok," he says, "Let me show you where you messed up." Allow me sum up how I felt at that moment. First, I'm ticked I went 1-2 drop the night before. Second, I'm not totally awake as my big Saturday morning breakfast was weighing a little heavy on me. And thirdly, I was feeling a little ticked that he thought he knew something I didn't.
And then he started to talk...
The Deck
Shoot, there I go again. Getting ahead of my story. Before we go one step further, I need to lay out my deck for you in the same way he did for me. Here it is in CMC and sorted:
Creatures
1x Battlewise Hoplite
1x Vaporkin
1x Phalanx Leader
1x Traveling Philosopher
Match one, the Philosopher was a Coastline Chimera
1x Elite Skirmisher
1x Ghostblade Eidolon
1x Triton Fortune Hunter
2x Observant Alseid
1x Heliod's Emissary
1x Chorus of the Tides
1x Sealock Monster
1x Mnemonic Wall
1x Prescient Chimera
1x Horizon Scholar
1x Elspeth, Sun's Champion
Spells2x Battlewise Valor
1x Stymied Hopes
1x Hold at Bay
1x Nullify
1x Dawn to Dusk
1x Griptide
Lands
1x Temple of Enlightenment
8x Plains
8x Islands
(Take that Nathan Holt, 40 cards)
Pretty strong W/U deck, right? Not so fast there Sparky, my son has something to teach me (or is that us?).
New Tricks
"Your first mistake was playing Dawn to Dusk. It's an awful card, and you've got Revoke Existence in your sideboard. You should have played that instead." I argued with him. I told him about all the upside to Dawn to Dusk. And then it hit me...not once did I capitalize on the full potential of the card in the 8 games I played the night before. Could the kid be right? Nah, there's no way he's right. Dawn to Dusk would not only get rid of an enchantment, but I could get one out of my graveyard as well. Surely it was better?
"The next thing you did wrong was you've got 9 playables with a CMC more than 3. Look at my deck." Having said this, I was immediately suspicious. After looking and pulling cards out though, I was a little bewildered. I was so confused at what I saw that I went through his deck from the night before again, but I found no proof of shenanigans. He had 3 cards over 3 CMC. Now, I'm not sure if he's 100% with his draft choices, but after shuffling through his deck a third time I could see it had more synergy and speed than mine. In the current Limited format, he obviously made some great choices while picking cards.
"Jacob, I can see were I went wrong. Thanks. I'll try to be more aware of what I'm picking next time."
"Dad, I'm not done." Really? You found something else that I did wrong? Well then, let's see about this.
"Go ahead buddy, show me what else I did wrong."
"Well, you don't have any 1 drops." Again, I argued. But it was futile. He was right. Sure, in my colors during my draft I didn't see any choice 1 drops that I could recall, but that didn't mean that I there weren't any. He may have a point here. Is it wrong not to be able to play a creature on the first turn? Maybe it is, especially with how fast the format has become.
"Oh, and dad? You also had a problem with 2 drops. Two of your four playable creatures had restrictive casting costs." I'll grant him that one. With Battlewise Hoplite and Phalanx Leader in my deck, if my mana was off when I drew I could be in trouble.
Mostly Right
"It's not all bad, dad. There are some things here that are great." He went on to show me what he liked about the deck, from the choice of Hold at Bay (it did win a game for me, essentially Fog in white is pretty sweet and most players don't seem to realize its potential) to having both Horizon Scholar and Ghostblade Eidolon. He also pointed out that swapping the Chimera for the Philosopher was a good idea, but I should have also taken out Sealock Monster.
"Why should I have gotten rid of Sealock? He's awesome!" My arguments are always more eloquent in my head.
"Dad, it's too slow and conditional in this format." Yes, my 12 year old just used the conditional argument against me. Stink of it was, he was right.
So we talked a little bit more. As we did, I realized two things. First, I really need to think a little bit more about my casting cost in this format. I often rush a little bit too much when making picks. Instead, I should think about where I am more and worry about how to make it all fit into the big picture. I did recall an Omenspeaker being available at the same time as the Sealock, perhaps I should have taken it.
The other thing I realized is this kid is bright. He knows his stuff. No, he's not perfect. But he does take his time to consider the big picture a lot more than I do. He can frame it better than I can - what he needs to win. He isn't as driven as I am by the big, bad creatures. No doubt in mind, when he has another year or so of experience he's going to have other players begging for mercy.
Even if I keep drafting the big baddies, at least I know one of us will do well.
___________________
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Endnotes
1. The joke about 40 cards is in good fun, I'm sure Nathan Holt actually runs the occasional 40 card draft deck...right?
2. This article is certified 100% #crackgate free.
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