SoM Draft experiences so far

[Paul Hodgson]

So it's Scars drafting season, and already I'm far more interested in the format than M11. The sheer number of possible interactions is staggering, and there is a lot of depth to the format just waiting to be explored.

Couple of points from last night's draft :

Never pass shatter, this shouldn't wheel in a 9 man pod.

Bouncing scrapmelter is never a good idea.

Take Myr as early as possible, they're the cornerstone of almost every deck (exception possibly being the infect deck).

Only good 1 infect deck can really be supported unless the packs are very deep, and you need as many 2 drops as possible - if you're going down that route grab proliferate highly as well.

Equipment is awesome, strider harness is great, razor pinions are surprisingly useful (not a lot of evasion in the set) etc although echo circlet is terrible, don't take that.

Haven't got a pick order figured out yet, although something like:

Bombs > Removal (shatter, slice, scrapmelter etc) > Myr/Infect > Equipment > Dudes

[Daniel Royde]

I agree with you in principal, the problem is that it's tiring and that a lot of people want to be better, not work on improving (I'm also very guilty of this).

I did this for 3 years at uni and my level of play has gone down since then. I don't know if it's causal, but certainly putting magic time/effort into helping other, much worse, players means less time spent working on your own game.

I would also argue that splitting off into a separate draft is useful. Sometimes at uni we have a good players draft and a bad players draft. We start the bad one off first, and then help them with the first few picks. By doing it over someone's shoulder you have all the information they have and can say helpful things.

I hate having to tell my opponents how to play, even when they're really bad, if there's prizes on the line.
Separate drafts avoids that.

On the other hand I think everyone loves telling their teamates how to play-> Teamdrafts people they teach you!



Thomas David Baker said:

Your job is to drag these players up! If you split off into some separate universe to keep away from the noobs then the noobs will drift away or never get any good. You need to say, "hey - can I see your deck?" a the end of the match and talk them through how lifegain doesn't affect the board position and how they want their dragon to be 1 in 40 not 1 in 57.

You know the best player I ever played at the Games Club? Geoff Fletcher.

You know the player who gave me the most advice about deckbuilding and manabases and drafting when my rating was heading down towards 1500 and I was maindecking Worldpurge in SHM/SHM/EVE? Geoff Fletcher.

Now, I'm not any good. But my limited rating is currently 176x in paper and 180x online and I once thought that an 8-mana, two-sided Sorcery that my deck was not built to take advantage of was maindeckable in draft. It's your community, improve it!

(Agree with Gary about 8-4s. I'd love to play in them but the variance/EV if you are an average or below-average player compared to the rest of the 8-4 players is horrendous. I will stick to dominating the Swiss and seeing 2-1 as a bad result ...)

[Thomas David Baker]

You make good points Dan.

It all depends what you want, of course. If you're currently a 1900 player and you want to be Pro Tour caliber then you need a playgroup that supports that goal.

I like to dream that you can be nice to the noobs and help them out and talk to them but also achieve everything else. But maybe that's part of why I plateaued below 1800 and show no signs of ever going any higher :)

[Dan Barrett]

Would just like to add that I've since spoken at length to Jason about this, which made me feel a lot better about the situation, and he suggested the following:

We (4+ of us) all arrange to come along on the same night, and he'll make sure we're in the same pod - it might not be an 8 man, and we may still have some newer players in it who'll need some advice, but it should be better from a "fun" perspective.

Royde, thanks for chipping in, you put some of what i've felt much more eloquently.


We should perhaps also consider printing off some draft guides to leave at the club (or even writing our own) people can just pick up and read while they wait for it to start, or maybe even organising a special day/evening once every few months for some of the newer players just to try and get them over some basic hurdles (like maindecking cards that only gain life, number of lands to run, running 40 cards, etc).

[The Games Club]

James Mills said:

...8k release event

The Launch Party (formerly Release Event) is a 16K tournament.

Currently only FNM and Prerelease main events (individual Sealed Deck) are 8K.

[James Mills]

Still don't really justify trying to get someone disqualified at a release event.

Maybe I should have persued it but meh whatever.

Just out of interest Jason, reading the situation on here what stance would you have taken as a judge at a release event if I would have called you over becdause my opp was cheating/using his cards wrong to gain an advantage?



Jason Howlett said:

James Mills said:

...8k release event

The Launch Party (formerly Release Event) is a 16K tournament.

Currently only FNM and Prerelease main events (individual Sealed Deck) are 8K.

[The Games Club]

James Mills said:

Just out of interest Jason, reading the situation on here what stance would you have taken as a judge at a release event if I would have called you over because my opp was cheating/using his cards wrong to gain an advantage

You would have been disqualified for cheating for allowing your opponent to miss multiple triggers over several turns, thus giving you a significant in game advantage.

[The Games Club]

James Mills said:

Just out of interest Jason, reading the situation on here what stance would you have taken as a judge at a release event if I would have called you over because my opp was cheating/using his cards wrong to gain an advantage

Or a more likely outcome is that following an investigation to establish if either player was thought to be cheating, your opponent would have bee issued a "Game Play Error - Missed Trigger" penalty and you would have been issued a "Game Play Error - Failure to Maintain Game State".

And if you avoided by disqualified for cheating following the investigation in to how you resolved the Contagion Engine activated ability, you would have received a "Game Play Error - Game Rule Violation" and you opponent would have received a "Game Play Error - Failure to Maintain Game State".

The most important thing to take away from this is ALWAYS CALL A JUDGE. Even if you think it is a trivial matter or you believe you know how to fix a problem. There may be more to the situation than you realise or you might actually make a problem worse.

In all circumstances a judge is likely going to react more favourably to a situation if they are called over by one of the players and may even downgrade the penalty if the offending player calls the judge on themselves (immediately).

It should also be noted that if an observer sees something in a game that they think may be wrong they should tell both players to stop playing an call a judge over - they shouldn't point out to the players what the problem is, they should let a judge handle it.

You should try to get in to the habit of think that there is something wrong with the game and we need a judge to fix it and not that you don't want to get someone disqualified or the morality of asking a judge to help when something is wrong..

[Dan Barrett]

I know you already do a nice introduction at the start of an event including judges names etc, but it might be nice to really hammer the point that calling a judge is not a bad thing, and should be welcomed by both players in the event of a mistake or confusion.

I think many fairly casual players (who only attend pre-re's, not regularly, say) have read some judge-related "horror stories" online, and make the assumption that judges are there to punish them, and that anyone who calls a judge is a douchebag.

One problem I've encountered is that even when I have "done the right thing" and called a judge on a minor error, my opponent has said something to the effect of "if you have to be like that", then acted funny for the rest of the match, killing any enjoyment.

At the end of the day, even if it's "only" a monday draft or release event, you are playing to win some (small) prize. If you genuinely think it's unimportant, why bother playing at all, why not just concede every round?!

[stevie_b]

if u can run the drafts unsanctioned - less than 8 man or round robbin - i'll join in one monday night

x

br/>
Dan Barrett said:

Would just like to add that I've since spoken at length to Jason about this, which made me feel a lot better about the situation, and he suggested the following:

We (4+ of us) all arrange to come along on the same night, and he'll make sure we're in the same pod - it might not be an 8 man, and we may still have some newer players in it who'll need some advice, but it should be better from a "fun" perspective.

Royde, thanks for chipping in, you put some of what i've felt much more eloquently.


We should perhaps also consider printing off some draft guides to leave at the club (or even writing our own) people can just pick up and read while they wait for it to start, or maybe even organising a special day/evening once every few months for some of the newer players just to try and get them over some basic hurdles (like maindecking cards that only gain life, number of lands to run, running 40 cards, etc).

[Thomas David Baker]

(Out of interest the "you should play 8-4s" conversation has now cost me at least $30, 25 points of rating and some self esteem. Plus I now understand why everyone gets so mad at "the shuffler", etc. - when you lose in one of those things you really lose!)

[Gary Lynch]

Thomas David Baker said:

(Out of interest the "you should play 8-4s" conversation has now cost me at least $30, 25 points of rating and some self esteem. Plus I now understand why everyone gets so mad at "the shuffler", etc. - when you lose in one of those things you really lose!)

Have you improved at all while loosing this money?

Im gonna guess no. 8-4's are for people that nearly always win 4322's. Anyone one else is just asking to loose money.

Playing good opponents will help you get better but not on MODO as no one is helpfull on there.

[Thomas David Baker]

Have I improved? Sort of.

The only specific thing I can think of is that I got punished for attacking Silvercoat Lion into a board of Black Knight (w/Ice Cage), Child of Night (w/Ice Cage), Goblin Tunneler. Which is not the world's most subtle thing, but it's something I might have got away with elsewhere.

And of course my decks are not 7 removal spells, two Foresees and some fliers and are more "hmm, Armored Cancrix or Elixir of Immortality as my 23rd card".