{"id":74,"date":"2009-08-15T01:14:34","date_gmt":"2009-08-15T08:14:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/?p=74"},"modified":"2009-08-15T10:45:55","modified_gmt":"2009-08-15T17:45:55","slug":"who-says-reds-no-good-in-m10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/?p=74","title":{"rendered":"Who Says Red&#8217;s No Good in M10?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>(This post has very little to do with the class. Just my observation from a night at FNM)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>For about the first time since Kamigawa, I&#8217;ve been paying attention to drafting, mostly because I&#8217;m actually going to FNM, and, for the first time, I actually stand to benefit from knowing. One of the most commonly discussed topics is what colors are the best. Here&#8217;s what I heard:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>White: It&#8217;s solid, and probably square in the middle. The opinion about white has been pretty stable. Obviously, both <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Serra Angel\">Serra Angel<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Baneslayer Angel\">Baneslayer Angel<\/a> are amazing, and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Safe Passage\">Safe Passage<\/a> has been a good surprise. <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Elite Vanguard\">Minor<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Veteran Armorsmith\">soldier<\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Palace Guard\"> themes<\/a> work out pretty well, and having both cheap creatures and big fliers mean that it can be flexibly played both as an aggro and control color.<\/li>\n<li>Blue: Initially, everyone thought it sucked. Its removal looked weak (I lost an <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Ice Cage\">Ice Cage<\/a> to a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Jump\">Jump<\/a>, once), and its creatures are a little wimpy. Then everyone found out that blue is awesome. Its <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Snapping Drake\">fliers<\/a> are pretty solid, <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Sleep\">Sleep<\/a> wins games, and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Merfolk Looter\">card<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Divination\">advantage<\/a> has turned out to matter a lot. I think the biggest discovery with blue is that M10 is actually a fairly luck-dependent format. As such, you pretty much win if you get <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Borgardan Hellkite\">good<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Overrun\">bombs<\/a>. And the only way to beat bombs is to have <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Essence Scatter\">good<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Negate\">counters<\/a>. Right now, I would say that blue is considered the open secret in M10 limited.<\/li>\n<li>Black: Black has been good, and continues to be good. About the only complaint is that the <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Nightmare\">good<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Consume Spirit\">black<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Looming Shade\">cards<\/a> are very color hungry, so it has to be a main color. Mono-black is a great deck to have: it has <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Doom Blade\">removal<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Dread Warlock\">creatures<\/a>, and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Sign In Blood\">card advantage<\/a>. Probably is (and people know that it is) the strongest color.<\/li>\n<li>Red: Red looked really sexy when it first came out. With Wizards moving towards creature-heavy games, they brought back <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Lightning Bolt\">Lightning Bolt<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Ball Lightning\">Ball Lightning<\/a>. There are the <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Shivan Dragon\">bombs<\/a>, and there&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Prodigal Pyromancer\">repeated<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Goblin Artillery\">removal<\/a>. What people noticed really quickly, though, is that beyond that, red is very shallow. Quickly, you&#8217;re looking at <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Lightning Elemental\">4\/1 hasties<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Goblin Piker\">2\/1 for 2<\/a> as the new hotness. Not so much. Thus, it has been relegated to <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Fireball\">splash<\/a> status at best; like black, its color requirements are heavy, and people are going to draft the good cards to splash, so it really can&#8217;t be a maindeck color. This is well known.<\/li>\n<li>Green: Green started out looking really good, and it is. It has <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Cudgel Troll\">fantastic<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Centaur Courser\">creatures<\/a> (I&#8217;ve only found 2 ways to kill cudgel troll in M10: <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Polymorph\">polymorph<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Planar Cleansing\">planar cleansing<\/a> anyone know any others?), <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Rampant Growth\">acceleration<\/a>, a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Acidic Slime\">little<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Entangling Vines\">removal<\/a> (did you know that <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Deadly Recluse\">Deadly Recluse<\/a> is just as good as a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Serra Angel\">Serra Angel<\/a>?), and the <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Ant Queen\">bombs<\/a> to make the world go round. <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Howl of the Night Pack\">Howl of the Night Pack<\/a> + <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Overrun\">Overrun<\/a> is just disgusting. Actually, just Overrun is disgusting. Even so, I think the open secret right now is that it&#8217;s overrated. There are a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Giant Spider\">lot<\/a> of <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Horned Turtle\">creatures<\/a> with more toughness than power, and a lot of games end up in the mid-game stalemate with 5-6 creatures on both sides. At that point, green doesn&#8217;t have the evasion to win. Its best chance is overrun, and when people see it coming, they can <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=fog\">deal<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=negate\">with<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Safe Passage\">it<\/a>. I would say the other open secret is that green isn&#8217;t <em>that <\/em>amazing. It&#8217;s good, but it&#8217;s not the automatic win.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So what does that mean the best color to play is? Well, 2 weeks ago, I would&#8217;ve said blue. LSV has been touting <a href=\"http:\/\/strategy.channelfireball.com\/featured-articles\/initial-technology-drafting-uw-skies\/\">U\/W skies<\/a> as a legit deck, and it works. Blue isn&#8217;t the strongest color, but would seem to be the best metagame choice for balancing power level and popularity. Now? I think mono-red is worth a shot.<\/p>\n<p>Note that above, I said that red isn&#8217;t great as a maindeck color. Which might be true. Go mono though, and it might go great. As far as popularity, yes, you&#8217;re not going to get passed a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=fireball\">fireball<\/a> or <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=earthquake\">earthquake<\/a>. That&#8217;s life. You&#8217;re not going to get passed bombs. That&#8217;s also to be expected. These aren&#8217;t game breakers. People might still pass you some very good <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Fiery Hellhound\">color<\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Goblin Artillery\"> intensive<\/a> creatures and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Seismic Strike\">removal<\/a>. So availability of quality cards is high.<\/p>\n<p>Card quality is also a lot better than you might think. 2 cards that I think have been great surprises are <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Viashino Spearhunter\">Viashino Spearhunter<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Kindled Fury\">Kindled Fury<\/a>. First strike is huge. The <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Canyon Minotaur\">creatures<\/a> may not look beefy, but <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Beserkers of Blood Rage\">they&#8217;ll<\/a> stand up in combat, and will do just fine. I think the important choice here, though, is that it works only really well in mono red. <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Firebreathing\">Firebreathing<\/a> is absolutely insane in mono-red. You might think that it&#8217;s a 2-for-1, but if you play it on a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Sparkmage Apprentice\">sparkmage apprentice<\/a>, you hopefully found <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Llanowar Elves\">one<\/a> of the <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Child of the Night\">many<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Stormfront Pegasus\">good<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Merfolk Looter\">targets<\/a> for the 1 damage, and you made a 1\/1 something to pay attention to. They actually might need to expend removal on it. At worst, the block it, and you use your 8 mountains to kill a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Kalonian Behemoth\">Kalonian Behemoth<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>So a lot of that sounds speculative, and it is. Here&#8217;s what I managed to draft at FNM, though, with my deck being all the red stuff + the howling mines:<\/p>\n<p>17 Mountains<br \/>\nCreatures (14)<br \/>\n1 Goblin Piker<br \/>\n1 Sparkmage Apprentice<br \/>\n2 Fiery Hellhound<br \/>\n1 Goblin Chieftain<br \/>\n2 Prodigal Pyromancer<br \/>\n2 Viashino Spearhunter<br \/>\n2 Canyon Minotaur<br \/>\n1 Dragon Whelp<br \/>\n1 Beserkers of Blood Ridge<br \/>\n1 Shivan Dragon<br \/>\nOther Spells (9)<br \/>\n1 Act of Treason<br \/>\n1 Kindled Fury<br \/>\n3 Lightning Bolt<br \/>\n2 Firebreathing<br \/>\n2 Howling Mine<\/p>\n<p>1 Angel&#8217;s Mercy<br \/>\n1 Glorious Charge<br \/>\n1 Veteran Armorsmith<br \/>\n1 Convincing Mirage<br \/>\n1 Levitation<br \/>\n1 Telepathy<br \/>\n1 Mind Shatter<br \/>\n1 Sanguine Bond<br \/>\n1 Birds of Paradise (!)<br \/>\n1 Borderland Ranger<br \/>\n1 Bramble Creeper<br \/>\n1 Centaur Courser<br \/>\n1 Emerald Oryx<br \/>\n1 Fog<br \/>\n1 Lurking Predators<br \/>\n1 Mist Leopard<br \/>\n1 Oakenform<br \/>\n1 Rampant Growth<br \/>\n1 Regenerate<\/p>\n<p>Maybe not too exceptional until I point out that I was actually rare-drafting here. Since I have to take the train home after FNM, I can never stay for the 3rd round, so the best I can ever do is to go 2-0 and get 1 pack for it. Instead, I find that it&#8217;s usually worth it rare-draft instead and take the money while I can. Here&#8217;s more context<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>My opening pack had a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=howling mine\">foil howling mine<\/a> and an <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=guardian seraph\">guardian seraph<\/a>. I went with the money and took the howling mine, so I knew I wasn&#8217;t going to go white, and that the guy on my left probably would. I think I also shipped some good blue cards, so that was out as well<\/li>\n<li>My 2nd pick had not a lot notable in it. All I know is that I rare drafted a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Lurking Predators\">Lurking Predators<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>Going through the rest of my first pack, it looked like I would be going red\/green. I took some fogs and mid-rangy green creatures. The quality of the cards wasn&#8217;t great, but such is life. I&#8217;m pretty confident that the reason why is because the guy on my right was also drafting red\/green, and because I was rare-drafting, I had missed the signals. Oops. Apparently, he got quite a few lightning bolts.<\/li>\n<li>My 2nd pack had a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Birds of Paradise\">Birds of Paradise<\/a> and a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Fireball\">Fireball<\/a>. As I said, I was money drafting. Had I known that I was going mono-red, I would&#8217;ve looked at the fireball for 1 more second, then taken the birds.<\/li>\n<li>I think in picks 3-6 in the 2nd pack, I got 3 Lightning Bolts and had to pass in Goblin Artillery in one of those. This was a huge clue that red wasn&#8217;t being played around most of the table<\/li>\n<li>My 3rd pack opened with a Shivan Dragon, I think. Or maybe it was the other howling mine. I can&#8217;t remember<\/li>\n<li>So in theory, I was getting cut off from red again this round, yet I still ended up with some good stuff<\/li>\n<li>By the time I was done drafting, I still didn&#8217;t know I was playing mono-red, so I had passed both Seismic Strikes and a Pyroclasm out of ignorance and greed<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>When I put my deck together, it was red\/green. I was actually going to get lands when I counted my cards and realized I only had 6-7 green cards, and they actually weren&#8217;t amazing. At that point, I counted and saw I could make mono-red if I put the howling mines in. Gross. Even so, I had heard good things about playing mono colors. Fewer mana issues justify the slight loss in power, so I did it.<\/p>\n<p>And it really worked. Round 1 was basically the story of me not having drafted Seismic Strike. I can&#8217;t deal with Serra Angel, and that was bad news. Even so, I got an amazing win in the 2nd game doing 5, then 7 damage with a Dragon Whelp. Lost that one 1-2. In the 2nd round, I lost the first game to a Baneslayer Angel. Game 2, the Dragon Whelp came again, and in game 3, double lightning bolt took out a Baneslayer Angel, and a Shivan Dragon for 9ish + another lightning bolt.<\/p>\n<p>So 6 firebreathing cards was great. Having 17 lands causes a minor flood every game (since I really don&#8217;t need the high land count to fix colors, but having exactly 23 playable cards meant that I literally could not replace a mountain with another card), but that&#8217;s not bad news when you can firebreathe up to 10 damage. I mean, when you&#8217;re 1-2 lands from overcoming a <a href=\"http:\/\/magiccards.info\/autocard.php?card=Righteousness\">righteousness<\/a>, I think that&#8217;s good. Actually, 6 firebreathing cards is disgusting.<\/p>\n<p>Granted, while I&#8217;m moaning about how my deck would&#8217;ve been better had I taken the fireball, pyroclasm, goblin artillery, lightning elemental, seismic strike, and other good creatures, my deck was still pretty good. 3 lightning bolts + shivan dragon and more is nothing to scoff.<\/p>\n<p>Which is exactly my point! I was on the left of someone drafting my exact colors, and I wasn&#8217;t intending to build this deck, but simply picking half-decent cards netted me a good red deck. I think it&#8217;s an archetype that&#8217;s worth a shot if you notice you&#8217;ve picked up a couple good red cards.Of course, this is all based on a single draft, so I might be horribly wrong, but it&#8217;s worth considering. And remember: firebreathing is amazing, and love the fact that you can get it 13-14th pick.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(This post has very little to do with the class. Just my observation from a night at FNM) For about the first time since Kamigawa, I&#8217;ve been paying attention to drafting, mostly because I&#8217;m actually going to FNM, and, for the first time, I actually stand to benefit from knowing. One of the most commonly [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=74"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77,"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74\/revisions\/77"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=74"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=74"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/magic.kevinleung.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=74"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}