Oddly, since the set was spoiled so long ago, content creators seemed to have forgotten about it, so there were not many pick order or strategy guides for this set. There were a lot of people at the LGS interested in drafting it, but very few who knew much about the set aside from what valuable cards were in it, so I actually had a little bit of a preparation advantage over the more experienced players, who did more money-drafting than usual.
The format was single-elimination pod drafts with $35 entry. First place prize was 2 packs and second place was 1 pack. Here's what I drafted:
My first pack rare was Graven Cairns, a red-black dual land worth a few dollars. I went with Ulcerate, one of the best uncommons in the set. Pick 2 gave me one of the most iconic of iconic creatures, Serra Angel. Third pick I passed on some probably better cards to take Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir, the card I most wanted from this set for my Commander deck. By the end of the pack, I looked like white-blue but was still very open.
I had been taking mana ramp cards (which draft guides seemed to think should go highly), so the Rune-Scarred Demon in Pack 2 seemed like a good top end if I ended up back in black. Pristine Talisman came from an unexciting pack (I think it had a lot of good red cards). Seeker of the Way (formerly a strong uncommon in KTK, now a common) is an easy pick for a white deck, and then I made a greedy choice to take Thran Dynamo out of a pack with a Doom Blade. The Dynamo has a little money value, but Doom Blade was by far the better card for the deck I was building. After a second Seeker of the Way, I realized my path was toward white aggression, although as you can see from the two Sandstone Oracles, I was still not quite sure.
The first picks of my third pack were synergistic with the white aggro plan (with a minor lifegain theme), so that's where we ended up.
Here is the deck I built:
I was sad to cut the top end cards and ramp, but I felt that the 2-drops packed so much power in this deck that I shouldn't dilute that power, and instead I could use my 3/4/5-drop fliers as finishers. Survival Cache is amazing in this build because it curves out with Seeker (which is 2/2 Prowess and gains lifelink when you cast a noncreature spell) or Ajani's Pridemate to give life, power, and card advantage. All the Rebound spells are good with Seeker, and Seeker is good with Pridemate, so as long as I could get those guys out early I would be hard to race.
My primary sideboard had a little more defense and specialty removal depending on what kinds of opposition I faced. Sustainer of the Realm is really good for blocking 4/4's, and this set is full of them.
Here is the ramp package that I decided wasn't good enough for main deck and was only a marginal sideboard plan:
Turn 4 Rune-Scarred Demon would have been great, but I thought it wasn't worth the risk of clunkiness. I think the set is designed for the mana ramp cards to fit best in a red-green deck full of X spells and massive creatures. Another thing I realized was that Teferi is probably an insane Limited card in the right kind of deck, but I just didn't have enough blue to make it worth playing the number of islands I would have needed for him.
Round 1 vs F.
F was on Jund (black-red-green) midrange with bad mana fixing. He had a bunch of aggressive red creatures. First game I kept a hand with 2 Swamps on a mulligan to 6, and by the time I drew my Plains on turn 3, I felt like I had to add a creature rather than cast Survival Cache -- in hindsight I think I should have used the Cache first because it was my last chance that game to draw cards from it. I lost pretty quickly and was one loss from elimination. Next game went much better, and I was able to win pretty easily. Third game he got his Kiki-Jiki out, but my lifegain and powerful curve kept me in it, and I won with 4 life remaining. Win 2-1.
Round 2 vs. A.
A seemed to be on a more focused draft plan than some of the other folks, with a pretty focused blue-black deck with a minor mill theme. He had an Oblivion Stone, which made life horrible for me. In the first game he got a Jace's Phantasm down, and I played around Oblivion Stone as well as I could by holding back Serra Angel, but after he killed everything but Phantasm it was 5/5 and I was racing against time. He had Ojutai's Breath to tap down my Serra and Sustainer of the Realm on consecutive turns for the win. Game 2 I battled with everything I could, getting my best 2-drops followed by Survival Cache. He got the Oblivion Stone again and rebuilt with small fliers that milled my deck. I took him down to 1 life but lost to a lethal attack while also sitting with an empty library. Loss, 2-0.
So not quite good enough for prizes, but I felt pretty good about the deck I drafted, and if a few things had gone differently, I might have finished better. I don't think I made any obvious mistakes other than noted above, which is good considering a lot of these cards were not very familiar to me.
Here are the best value cards I drafted:
The foil cards aren't actually worth anything. At about $3, Thran Dynamo is one of the "chase uncommons" in this set along with Urza's Bauble. Rune-Scarred Demon is about $2 as this is its first reprint ever. Teferi is a little over $3. All three of these cards are valued mainly for their use in Commander and casual play, so I expect them to retain or gain value tempered by any future reprints. Still, a return of about $8 from a $35 draft is bad and I probably had the worst value at the table, as I saw other people with multiple $10 and $20 singles. None of the high-value cards passed by my seat, so even if I had gone full-greed, I don't think I would have broken $15.
I drafted about 8 uncommons and 2 rares, both below expected for 3 packs. But I think I drafted about as well as I could have for a first pass, and this was a fun break from Ixalan. And I'm super excited to have Teferi now.
Since the draft went quickly, I stuck around and tested Standard with my Black Torment of Scarabs Control deck against P's white-blue God-Pharaoh's Gift deck. I went 3-2 in games, getting lucky with my graveyard-exiling cards a few times (I even searched up Scavenger Grounds with Razaketh's Rite once). It was good practice for both of us.
And now for something completely different!
For my birthday a couple months ago, I bought myself a sealed tournament pack each of Mirrodin and Time Spiral. Each was $30, containing roughly the equivalent of 3 booster packs plus 30 lands. I missed both of these sets while I wasn't playing, so it was fun to get a chance to try them out. Mirrodin (2003) is the set that introduced equipment and a bunch of overpowered artifact-themed cards that continue to dominate in Modern. Time Spiral (2006) was an homage to classic Magic sets, with a time theme and lots of nostalgia cards. It also includes a seemingly random assortment of "timeshifted" reprints. For some perspective, both these sets were before the mythic rare rarity or the planeswalker card type existed. Over the Thanksgiving holiday, Mike and I did a Winchester draft from these cards for some retro-Magic fun.
Here are the decks we came up with. I'm white-black, and he's black-red. (The one blue card in my deck has Morph).
My deck was heavy on defense and had some good suspend cards. Mike's deck was more aggressive and had a nasty assortment of slivers. In games, Mike went 2-1. I also played a two games against Eric's pared down Kalemne Commander deck, and he won them both easily.
How about value?
Time Spiral had a few non-bulk cards at each rarity, with the best dollar value in Paradox Haze ($3), Trickbind ($3.50), and the very bizarre Norin the Wary ($5). Rift Bolt is still a surprising $1.50 after a reprint in IMA.
I got a little lucky with the artifact land cycle in Mirrodin, opening the two best in Ancient Den ($2.20) and Seat of the Synod ($1). Beyond those and a few other cards slightly above bulk, Duplicant ($3), a sneaky removal spell with combo potential, was the only single with any real value. It would be well over $10, but it has seen multiple reprints.
Another thing to note (aside from the bizarre pro-player collector card included in TSP) is that the basic lands in these sets have some minor value. I love the metallic look of the Mirrodin lands. They are iconic and unique. The Time Spiral lands are a little less pretty in general, but a few are interesting. The TSP illustrations are darker overall than normal basic lands, especially the Plains, which are more black/gray than white.
All told, the total value of the TSP cards is probably in the $15 - $20 range, and the total value of the Mirrodin cards is closer to $9 - $12. Not amazing, but it was fun to try these out, and a few of these cards are Modern or Commander staples.
Thanks for reading! I hope to play more Iconic Masters or retro drafts in the future, but if Ixalan is what's running, I'll probably end up doing that instead.
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