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By: Gameben23, Ben Leemaster
Oct 11 2007 12:40pm
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It's been awhile since I last posted, but I am a man of my word. Here's the second in what I hope to be a very good series, Limited Teachings. Last time I wrote about many of the skills one must have to succeed at draft. The first couple things I listed were "Knowing the Set" and "Value"(placing a value on a card, thus determining how early you take it). Today we are going to go more in depth into these skills.

 

I think value should come first, because you can't really analyze a set until you know what makes a playable card in draft. I define value as how willing you are to take a card in draft, the more willing you are to take a card the more you are willing the sacrifice(other cards in the pack) to take that card. I normally look at three things when adding a value to a card. Those are power, efficiency, and difficulty to cast.

Power- A cards power often derives from its effect on the game. A card like
Wrath of God has a tremendous effect that sets everyone to zero creatures and can allow you to comeback from what used to be an inferior board position. A card like Blaze has power due to its ability to send your opponents remaining life points to zero in the late game. Power can often be rated on its overall impact on a game, greater the impact the greater the power.

Efficiency- A card can have a lot of power, and not be efficient for your deck or, in some cases, against your opponents’ deck. For instance, a card like
Giant Growth is a Great card due to its effect and how easy it is to cast, but it isn't good when your deck is light on creatures. Another card like Earthquake is very good because is can essentially be a Wrath of God, but overall it may not be good against a deck with a lot of flyers. If a card is in anyway only good in certain circumstances, then its value is lower than a card that is good in most circumstances.

Difficulty to Cast: Case in point, the Nephilim cycle in Guildpact. Every one of them has a powerful effect that is can ultimately turn the game in your favor. So what's wrong with them? They are nearly impossible to cast unless you build your deck around them. Any card that sends you into a certain color is outclassed by cards that are either colorless or can be splashed.
This actually reminds me of a conversation I had with an Ervin Tormos(you might know him for having two Pro Tour Top eights in the past couple years, one for Extended and one for TSP block limited). He mentioned that he often takes
Clockwork Hydra over cards like Lightning Axe early in the draft. I would normally take Lightning Axe due to its power being more than that of Clockwork Hydra, at least in my opinion, but he takes it for the fact that it doesn't put into a color. It allows you to stay loose and decide your colors later on.

 

What do you need to know about the set? Well, that is fairly simple. When looking through a set you need to take account of certain kind of cards. What kind of cards? It basically comes down to what cards help you get ahead whether it is via card advantage, board advantage, and etc. These can be classified as bombs, removal, tricks, good creatures, and others.

Bombs- Bombs are called bombs for a reason. When a card generates an effect that can alter the game completely into a players favor at almost any point in the game that is a bomb. So what kind of effects can make a card a "bomb"? It can be many things. It can be anything from destroying creatures to enhancing creatures. If that’s the case, then how do you know when you have a bomb? It comes down how good the card is as a whole. Is it worth it worth tapping all those lands for what it does? For that matter, how easy is it to get the man you need for it? A card is truly a bomb when it is easy to cast (often only having one specific mana in its cost), has an effect that will make your opponent shout obscenities, and basically can win the game for you all by itself.

Removal- This is very simple, removal is anything that removes a creature from play and sends it to either the graveyard, remove from game zone, somewhere in its controllers library(not the top), or just nullifies the creature to where it doesn't do anything. These are most often in red or black, as that is how the color wheel is designed (more on the later). Red has cards that say "deals damage to target" and black has cards that say” destroy target". You also get cards in white that can kill a creature in combat or just nullify a creature. Blue doesn't get many, it has counterspells and every now and then it gets a card that puts a creature back into the library. Green normally never gets any good removal, except against flyers. Removal is where red and black gets its power, with the ability to control their board position.

Wrath of God

 


Tricks- Tricks are anything that you can use to protect your creatures or give you some kind advantage over your opponent. Green has many like
Giant Growth that can save their creatures by pumping said creature to where it can't die from something like Incinerate or it can just be used to add that last couple points of damage through to kill your opponent. Blue has many cards that return a permanent to their owners hand (also known as the “bounce” effect). I don't consider this removal as they don't take card of the problem permanently or for an extended period at least (as the case with a card like condemn). Another point to add is that you often want to use bounce spells on your own creatures. When? Well, often it is after damage is on the stack (you can save your creature and kill your opponents via combat damage) and when you opponent tries to remove a creature you control you can "rescue" that creature. Red normally gets a couple spells that boosts their creatures power like Fists of the Anvil, often not too great due to the fact you want removal over these cards. Same goes for Black, you often get cards that grant your creatures Fear, but you really just want to remove your opponents’ creature so yours can get through. White has a couple good ones. These often do things like prevent damage or just give a power/defense bonus to your creatures. The only problem with whites’ tricks is that they are often made to just counteract other effects. The better tricks from white are cards that give bonuses to you creatures. Cards like Fortify can often end the game in your favor very fast.

Good Creature
Vague title I know, but what makes a good creature? This comes down to everything that determines a cards value. Green has very BIG creatures that are normally just the biggest thing on the board.  Of course the down side of Green having the biggest men, is they often times come with huge mana costs.  The problem with them is they can be a little slow and are easily removed by blacks removal spells and its hurts to have them "bounced" as it often means tapping all your land again. They are good creatures; don't get me wrong, because they are just big. This means that if they go unanswered for long then they can spell trouble for the opposing player. Black gets some creatures that often double as removal. For example,
Nekrataal, Black has many other creatures that have come into play effects that have a negative effect toward your opponent, but also end up having a weak power and toughness (also known as "body"). And on the flip side black also has creatures that are big for their mana cost, but often have a negative effect toward you. Thus, the archetype "Suicide Black". Often, at least in limited, when the creatures that have a negative effect toward you the negative effect out weighs the positive effect of the card. The better creatures for black have Fear, a early good form of evasion which allows you to pick at your opponents life total throughout the game unless they have an artifact or black creature. Red's creatures are often weak. The exception being dragons, of course. Dragon's pop up for red here and there, but they are almost always rares and you can rely on getting them. Red's best creatures are often have a strong power and are fast, often having haste. You could almost say they are like burn spells. Red also has some BIG creatures like Green, often when the giant creature type is in the set. These "giants" are fine but ultimately are bland. Now my favorite, Blue and White. Their best creatures are good for the same reason really. Flying. This form of evasion when utilized well will quickly send your opponents life total to zero if they can't remove or match your creatures. Blue and White often end up getting cards like Master Decoy or Puppeteer that allow you to keep your opponents creatures tapped as you attack through to get in damage. That is the best creatures that each color has to offer, I know there are exceptions, but they often end up being rare and considered bombs. 

Others- This is basically just any card that card that can only help you in certain circumstances like a
Smash. It goes straight to the sideboard, but should definitely be picked up during the later part of a draft in case a card like Loxodon Warhammer or Platinum Angel comes up.

That's it for this edition of the Limited Teachings. I hope that you learned something for the analytical stand point of looking into a set. Even when you can learn how to draft a set from coverage or watching others draft, it is best that you learn a set yourself before you play with it. I know you guys want to learn about signaling, but you need to learn this first. Signaling will indeed be my next installment in the Limited Teachings series, but I may be taking a look at Lorwyn from an analytical stand point and bring you a detailed article about cards to look for when we finally get to draft it on MTGO a few weeks from now. 

Until then, Have Fun and Good Luck.

Knowing the Set

Value

0 Comments

Good Article by mtgotraders at Fri, 10/12/2007 - 09:23
mtgotraders's picture

Good Article but could use some depth and maybe some examples.  This is a good article for people that don't draft often but it's common knowledge for the ones that do draft a lot. 

Yeah by Gameben23 at Fri, 10/12/2007 - 10:54
Gameben23's picture

Yeah...I should have antic ipated that not many would comment as most MTGO players possess this knowledge, but nonetheless I want to use it as a precursor to my limited analysis of Llorwyn...coming soon.