Since I attended the pre-release for War of the Spark, I received a free coupon for a Tradition Draft in Magic Arena. Now, while I already spent that coupon, I did well enough in the free draft that I earned enough gems to cover another attempt.
So I figured, why not do this draft on stream, to show off my limited skill in… Limited.
Drafting in MTG requires a whole different mindset constructed formats. There’s a skill to drafting effectively that I haven’t had much of a chance to cultivate. Other, more skillful players have already produced YouTube videos about how to draft, so I see no need to speak over their voices.
Arena differs from a standard draft in 2 distinct ways:
- Rather than drafting with humans, an AI will simulate the other players who would be supposedly choosing cards in the same pool.
- The players one plays against in the draft league will have chosen from card pools that are distinctly different from them.
While I can’t be certain of this, but from my experience, this means that the players in Arena Draft are able to construct better decks than one might be able to in a regular draft in paper Magic. The person who managed to draft 2 Teferis is a strong example for that, because the odds of getting that in a normal draft are simply absurd.
That said, this is a good way to satiate one’s Limited craving if they have it, and the cards drafted are kept no matter how well/poorly that player performs. It’s certainly a fast way to build up a collection, but it’s also an expensive way to do so, considering the entry fee.
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