The Open Draft Project: Innistrad: Midnight Hunt Edition

*cue theme music*

Welcome back to the Open Draft Project, where the draft is made up and the games don’t matter! I’m your host, old “Uncle Cardboard,” and this set features an impressive cast of some of your favorite drafters. But first, a reminder of what on earth we’re doing here.

As always, we’ll be challenging folks to select cards in the same seat of an Innistrad: Midnight Hunt draft hosted by DraftSim. The bots will shift based on selections from our pros, so just like a human draft, their actions have consequences. They’ve been instructed to snag cards as if this were Best-of-Three, so sideboarding is a consideration here. If you’d like to play along at home, you can draft a very similar pool, although DraftSim has updated the bots since these took place.

Spoiler alert: that basically means you’ll see one fewer Startle, one more Organ Hoarder, and a couple of small differences throughout.

Draftees this round: Alex Nikolic, Ben Stark, Cedric Phillips, NumotTheNummy, Ryan Saxe, Sam Black, and Voxy! Go mash their respective like and subscribe buttons, as they’re all tremendous humans for lending me their time. Also, my apologies to Kyle Rose who drafted an amazing Izzet Spells deck but was a victim of the bot update I mentioned earlier and was drafting a slightly different pool.

Okay, let’s see what they drafted.

Pack 1, Pick 1

Alex Nikolic: If I can, I want to start in blue or black (I like white, as well). I like both of the gold uncommons in this pack, but I think Falcon Abomination being monocolored and in one of the best colors is where I want to start.

Pick: Falcon Abomination

Ben Stark: Not a great pack. I would probably take Croaking Counterpart. I think that card’s pretty good. There’s a lot of creatures with enters-the-battlefield abilities and deathtouch and powerful little abilities. I’m not happy about first picking a gold card but it is splashable. Join the Dance is a lot worse of a splash. Sacred Fire isn’t a bad splash if you wind up in a Gruul deck or something like that.

Pick: Croaking Counterpart

Cedric Phillips: I’m going to first-pick Falcon Abomination. For me, it’s between that and Shipwreck Sifters. Both take you down different pathways but Falcon Abomination takes you down the path of Dimir which is the best deck in the format.

Pick: Falcon Abomination

Kenji Egashira: Okay, a couple of standout cards here Pack 1, Pick 1. I like the power level of Sacred Fire but it’s kind of iffy to take a two-color card, so I’m looking at Falcon Abomination and Galedrifter. Between the two, I’m really looking at Falcon Abomination. Just so much value for a three-drop so I’m just going to take that here.

Pick: Falcon Abomination

Ryan Saxe: If one of these blue commons was Flip the Switch, I would take it. For me, this pick boils down to Spellrune Painter for Izzet, Join the Dance for Selesnya, or Falcon Abomination for Dimir, and I’m super-unhappy about it. If there was a card for Izzet to wheel, Spellrune Painter would be more enticing. 

Pick: Falcon Abomination

Sam Black: I’m taking Falcon Abomination. Sacred Fire in a vacuum, in another format, would be a better card, but that’s not what this format is. I’m not willing to first-pick a Boros card, basically, full stop. Falcon Abomination is the most powerful and open-ended card that doesn’t put me down a path I consider dangerous.

Pick: Falcon Abomination

Voxy: Jesus Christ! I’m always so hesitant to go into double colors in Pack 1 to keep myself open. I think I take Falcon Abomination.

Pick: Falcon Abomination

Pack 1, Pick 2 

Alex Nikolic: There’s Vampire Socialite which looks powerful but Vampires is a deck that I don’t think reaches the requisite power level as often as I would like. I think it’s between Stromkirk Bloodthief and Shipwreck Sifters, a card I think is really good in Azorius. I think Bloodchief is a generically good black card that does well in Dimir because we have a decent number of evasive creatures.  

Pick: Stromkirk Bloodthief

Ben Stark: Nothing too exciting here. Looks like we’re gonna get a drafting-the-hard-way draft. The best cards in the pack are Socialite, but it’s a Rakdos gold card, and the Bloodthief. I suppose we could still go Dimir and end up splashing the Counterpart. Probably just the Bloodthief because it’s just one color and depending on what we see the rest of the way, we can still make use of it.

Pick: Stromkirk Bloodthief

Cedric Phillips: My pick out of this pack is Shipwreck Sifters. Nothing of consequence should wheel out of this pack in my opinion, those cards being Candlegrove Witch, Galedrifter, and Stromkirk Bloodthief, and I have Sifters ranked higher than Galedrifter. 

Pick: Shipwreck Sifters

Kenji Egashira: To follow the Abomination up, we have maybe two cards that really lend themselves to me: the Stromkirk Bloodthief and the Galedrifter. Given that I’ve already taken a blue card, I don’t mind taking a slightly less powerful card in the form of Galedrifter just to stay on one color for now.

Pick: Galedrifter

Ryan Saxe: So I hate Galedrifter. I basically hate most of the cards in this pack. Neonate’s Rush is a great Izzet card. If I know the Painter is going to wheel I would probably take the Rush but I really don’t want to take it here. The highest-upside pick here is probably the Sifters because it can be playable in any blue deck and there’s a Sifters I know has a chance to wheel. I think Sifters is better than Witch in the average Azorius deck, I don’t want to take any of these gold cards, and I want to stay blue. 

Pick: Shipwreck Sifters

Sam Black: This is not a strong pack. Vampire Socialite is the only really impressive card but I don’t want to move into Rakdos. My preference for avoiding red is pretty strong. That leaves me between Shipwreck Sifters and Candlegrove Witch. There was a Shipwreck Sifters in the first pack that I didn’t take and I could potentially table that and I do like the Azorius deck. I already have a blue card and I think Shipwreck Sifters is a lot better in Azorius than Candlegrove Witch is.

Pick: Shipwreck Sifters

Voxy: Wow, shitty rares for everybody, huh? All right. I like the Bloodchief.

Pick: Stromkirk Bloodthief

Pack 1, Pick 3

Alex Nikolic: This is a lot easier; I’d just take Eaten Alive here. It’s a great black card and we’ve already taken a great black card. There’s a Burly Breaker, which is a decent uncommon. I think, big picture in this set, green and red are good, but there’s a big divide between them and the blue, black, and white cards.

Pick: Eaten Alive

Ben Stark: I’m not going to get to play all of these cards and I like Eaten Alive just fine but it feels like Rakdos is what we’re seeing. Maybe not. Maybe it was just a really good pack. We’ve got a Burly Breaker here, too. This is a hard draft. I’m probably supposed to take Eaten Alive following Bloodthief, solidify in black and splash the Counterpart or drop it. 

Pick: Eaten Alive

Cedric Phillips: I’ll take Eaten Alive. Just a really good removal spell, the best card in the pack. Pretty straightforward I think.

Pick: Eaten Alive

Kenji Egashira: I’m going to go with Burly Breaker as what I believe to be the most powerful card in the pack. 

Pick: Burly Breaker

Ryan Saxe: Could have been rewarded by the gold card, but that’s okay. We’ll just follow this up with Eaten Alive and be pretty happy about that.

Pick: Eaten Alive

Sam Black: I’m kind of wishing I had two Vampire Socialites. Good on whoever’s willing to do that here. If I was committed to Shipwreck Sifters I would take Mourning Patrol, but I think Mourning Patrol is enough weaker than Eaten Alive that I’ll take Eaten Alive and see which way the wind is blowing here.

Pick: Eaten Alive

Voxy: Oh my God. Damnit. I’d probably take Eaten Alive if I had to pick. I’d be between that and Burly Breaker, but I’d pick Eaten Alive.

Pick: Eaten Alive

Pack 1, Pick 4

Alex Nikolic: I’m very happy to see an Ecstatic Awakener. I think this is one of the most underrated cards in the set currently. I think it’s up there with the tippity top of commons in Organ Hoarder and Revenge of the Drowned.

Pick: Ecstatic Awakener

Ben Stark: I mean, awkward, but I’m probably grabbing Storm Skreelix. It’s a really good card, and if I wasn’t taking that, I’d be taking Ecstatic Awakener or Falkenrath Perforator which are fillerish.

Pick: Storm Skreelix

Cedric Phillips: Ecstatic Awakener. Again, pretty straightforward. I think it’s the best card in the pack and I actually don’t like Heirloom Mirror.

Pick: Ecstatic Awakener

Kenji Egashira: It’s between Locked in the Cemetery and Ecastatic Awakener for me. Locked in the Cementery is more filler removal for me so I’m just going to take the Ecstatic Awakener. 

Pick: Ecstatic Awakener

Ryan Saxe: I like Izzet and there are the Skreelix and Crasher which are really good, but my blue cards aren’t great for it and I really like Ecstatic Awakener, so I’m just going to take that and stay on the Dimir train here. If I have to pivot into something else, I have to pivot into something else.

Pick: Ecstatic Awakener

Sam Black: Pretty happy to see Ecstatic Awakener. There’s a good chance it’s the strongest common in the set and somewhat underrated. Given that I got Eaten Alive third and Awakener fourth, that seems like a pretty clear sign that’s where I should go. Sorry to the person I passed these two Socialites to. 

Pick: Ecstatic Awakener

Voxy: [laughing] Awakener for sure. It’d be between that and Baby Jail (Locked in the Cemetery) but Awakener.

Pick: Ecstatic Awakener

Pack 1, Pick 5

Alex Nikolic: We’re deep into black and there’s not really a good black card I want to take here. There’s Bat Whisperer which is fine. I’ve played the card and it hasn’t been the worst. Kind of a weird pick here but I would actually take Winterhorn Blessing. We just took three black cards but it’s the only card in the pack I “care” about. I could see a world where we end up Simic and I’m not missing anything for my black deck here basically.

Pick: Winterthorn Blessing

Ben Stark: Winterthorn Blessing I guess. If I’m going to splash, I can splash that, too. Again, it’s a good card. I’m not excited about taking it, but if I’m not taking it, what am I taking? Neonate’s Rush? 

Pick: Winterthorn Blessing

Cedric Phillips: No Way Out. Mind Rot is actually really good in this format and the fact that it makes a 2/2 Zombie actually makes it pretty good.

Pick: No Way Out

Kenji Egashira: Well, pretty easy Winterthorn Blessing now. We already took the Burly Breaker which is a fantastic green card and I think Simic is actually a really solid archetype so that’s a slam dunk.

Pick: Winterthorn Blessing

Ryan Saxe: So now we have a pack where there’s really nothing good except for this Winterhorn Blessing. The question for myself I guess is am I supposed to speculate on Winterthorn Blessing because I think it’s the best card in this pack even though my blue cards don’t really go blue green? Or, because of the quality of playables I’ve seen so far—like, all of these packs are kind of filled with trash—am I supposed to take a card that doesn’t make my best decks, but whatever if it’s my 23rd card? In Dimir, that role is best played as No Way Out. In all other black decks, I think that role is best played as Bat Whisperer, and in all other blue decks, I think that role is best played as Stormrider Spirit.

Pick: Bat Whisperer

Sam Black: Winterthorn Blessing is the only exceptionally strong card here. Neonate’s Rush is probably good for those people but not for me. Bat Whisperer is fine and in color. Because Winterthorn Blessing is gold, I don’t want to take it as a strong sign I should be moving into green. I’ll just take the Bat Whisperer here.

Pick: Bat Whisperer

Voxy: None of these are particularly good but I’d probably take No Way Out just to stay in black.

Pick: No Way Out

Pack 1, Pick 6

Alex Nikolic: So now we get Contortionist Troupe, which is the only good card in the pack I would say. Rotten Reunion and No Way Out are fringe playables in black decks. Contortionist Troupe is pretty good in most green decks.

Pick: Contortionist Troupe

Ben Stark: Now I’ll take the Troupe which I actually like a lot. It’s a clear pick in my opinion. One of the clearest that we’ve seen.

Pick: Contortionist Troupe

Cedric Phillips: I’ll take a second No Way Out although I’ll note that Rotten Reunion is actually quite good and I don’t think people rank it highly enough.

Pick: No Way Out

Kenji Egashira: I guess I would question who I’m drafting with and then just take the Contortionist Troupe.

Pick: Contortionist Troupe

Ryan Saxe: What I’m seeing here is a higher chance that green is the open color. There’s a green rare which is just fine. I actually like Troupe quite a bit, but I don’t think Troupe is good in Simic and I don’t like Golgari. Given my start, let’s not touch green, let’s commit to black. I’m either going to pair it with blue, red, or white, and that’s entirely dependent on the wheel. On average, No Way Out is the card that’s most likely to make my deck, so I’ll take that here.

Pick: No Way Out

Sam Black: Contortionist Troupe is a much stronger sign I should be in green. Maybe I’m supposed to combine that plus the fact this green rare is here plus the fact that I just saw the Winterthorn Blessing as a sign that green is open. Also these black and white cards aren’t particularly good. 

Pick: Contortionist Troupe

Voxy: I really like Troupe. I’ve grown on Rotten Reunion, too, but you can always end up with one of those. To see Troupe go kind of late like that, I think Troupe.

Pick: Contortionist Troupe

Pack 1, Pick 7

Alex Nikolic: Moving back into a color I like, I’m taking Startle. Startle is, I think, a really underrated card that, like Ecstatic Awakener, people have caught on is good but it’s even better than most people think. We’re taking it here, what, seventh? I wouldn’t be too sad to third-pick the card. It goes in our potential Dimir deck or our potential Simic deck.

Pick: Startle

Ben Stark: I guess Startle, which I like a lot as well.

Pick: Startle

Cedric Phillips: Startle. Best card in the pack by a lot.

Pick: Startle 

Kenji Egashira: These are pretty much second-rate cards. I think in Simic you tend to go for graveyard synergy archetype which isn’t as good as the Azorius, but I’m going to take the Otherwordly Gaze here.

Pick: Otherworldly Gaze

Ryan Saxe: I’ll just take Startle here. It’s a great common, pretty underrated.

Pick: Startle 

Sam Black: This is just a really easy Startle. 

Pick: Startle 

Voxy: I think the best card in here is probably Startle.

Pick: Startle 

Pack 1, Pick 8

Alex Nikolic: I don’t mind Drownyard Amalgam! Actually, Amalgam is a five-drop and I can’t talk up a five-drop too much, but I’ve been really impressed with it in Simic. Simic really appreciates you milling cards because you have a lot of flashback cards and sometimes my blue decks just happen to have a lot of Disturb cards as well.

Pick: Drownyard Amalgam

Ben Stark: I don’t really like any of these, especially for this deck, but Simic does want to block and put cards in its yard sometimes if we go there, so I guess the Amalgam can be a playable card.

Pick: Drownyard Amalgam

Cedric Phillips: I’ll take Blood Pact. I don’t think Bat Whisperer is very good.

Pick: Blood Pact

Kenji Egashira: Pretty easy pick of the Drownyard Amalgam. Nothing really close in this pack and I don’t love the Amalgam but again, good synergy with what we’re planning on doing.

Pick: Drownyard Amalgam

Ryan Saxe: Otherworldly Gaze can be fantastic in Azorius so technically I could hedge on it here if the Sifters and Galedrifter wheel and I pull into that, but it’s gonna be pretty hard to get me off this Eaten Alive and Ecstatic Awakener. I don’t like Blood Pact at all. Unruly Mob can be good in Orzhov but it’s not a reason for me to go into Orzhov, so I’m just going to take another Whisperer here.

Pick: Bat Whisperer

Sam Black: Not seeing green, I guess it’s just another Bat Whisperer. Whatever.

Pick: Bat Whisperer

Voxy: I hate the fact that I’m going into Dimir but I’d probably take the Zombie Horror.

Pick: Drownyard Amalgam

After Pack 1, Pick 8, the bots will be passing different cards in some cases, so I’ll now give you the final decks, draft logs, and a little analysis for each person in the pod.

Alex Nikolic

Draft Log

Defining Pick: Revenge of the Damned

As one of the two Simic players in the seat, Nikolic opts for more interaction in his Pack 2, Pick 3 selection of Revenge of the Damned over a second Dawnhart Mentor. This color pair can be desperate for interaction and without a single fight or bite spell, it seems like a wise choice in hindsight.

Final thoughts: “Kind of cool, we do have the Creeper plus Croaking Counterpart combo. You can actually just infinitely loop those. You can make a copy of your Creeper and buy it back, make infinite 1/1’s given enough time.”

Ben Stark

Draft Log

Defining Pick: Croaking Counterpart

The sole player to pass Falcon Abomination, Stark takes Croaking Counterpart Pack 1, Pick 1, a card that wheels for every other player in the seat and immediately gave me flashbacks to his Asmodeus the Archfiend pick in the last ODP. That said, multiple drafters wound up including it in their final 40, so I won’t question the decision in the least.

Final thoughts: “This was what felt like a much more open draft seat. I’m curious as to where people ended up. If you told me these were the cards you’ll see, if I had hindsight, I would probably start off trying to draft Selesnya.”

Cedric Phillips

Draft Log

Defining Pick: Arrogant Outlaw

“Really?” he said, laughing. I laughed, too. Sometimes a pick is defining for what it isn’t as much as for what it is, and a Pack 3, Pick 2 Arrogant Outlaw isn’t what any Dimir deck is trying to do. Overall, I think Dimir has an uphill battle in this seat and while this is a mediocre pack for a lot of the drafters, this one is downright brutal for a deck that could use a couple more playables.

Final Thoughts: “On a scale of one to ten, I’d give it a five. It’s not a very good Dimir deck at all. It’s nice to have removal but there’s a lot of removal in the format. Siege Zombies are going to have to do a lot more work than I’d like. Same for Galedrifter.”

Kenji Egashira

Draft Log

Defining Pick: Burly Breaker

Everyone goes Eaten Alive Pack 1, Pick 3, except for Numot, who heads down his own path here with the green beefcake. Where Nikolic has to settle for less powerful late-game threats like Candlelit Cavalry and Drownyard Amalgam, Burly Breaker slots in perfectly at the top of Numot’s curve.

Final Thoughts: “It’s hard to give this anything worse than a seven out of ten just because we have quite a few of the signpost Simic cards like the Creeper and the Blessing, then, of course, the Houndmaster. Those alone are going to bump the power level of this deck.”

Ryan Saxe

Draft Log

Defining Pick: Bereaved Survivor

After speculating on a few solid white commons at the end of Pack 1, Saxe opens with a Bereaved Survivor in Pack 2, Pick 1 and doesn’t look back. Several players noted that white seemed like the most open color in the draft, but Saxe was the only player to land in it, and Survivor seems to be a critical decision point.

“This deck has a lot of play to it. There’s a lot going on here and I think the more I look at it, the more I like it. Obviously, there are going to be people that ended up with a more powerful deck in this seat, basically anyone who ended up in Selesnya. Outside of that, this was a really interesting seat.”

Sam Black

Draft Log

Defining Pick: Winterthorn Blessing

Firmly in the middle of Pack 2, Black has a choice to make, teetering between Simic or Dimir. Following a sixth-pick Eaten Alive, he takes his first Winterhorn Blessing, encapsulating the difficulty he had finding a lane in this draft. Fortunately, he winds up with two Jack-o’-Lanterns and a Dawnhart Rejuevenator to help fix his Sultai manabase.

Final Thoughts: “This is one of the worst decks I’ve drafted. I’m not sure when I should have chosen a lane—I feel like this seat can bully its way into whatever colors it wants—but there would have been advantages and disadvantages to any of them. In Adventures in the Forgotten Realms, I thought, ‘This deck would beat people who did other things.’ I could see someone arbitrarily choosing a color pair and winding up with a better deck than this.”

Voxy

Draft Log

Defining Pick: Ghoulcaller’s Harvest

Winding up with a hauntingly similar list to Phillips, Voxy goes for the upside with that same stinker of a Pack 3, Pick 2 and takes Ghoulcaller’s Harvest. Ultimately, it doesn’t make her 40, and she’s “punished” by not wheeling the Outlaw. If you can even call that punishment.

Final Thoughts: “I think, given the rares we were presented, it ended up being pretty okay. I’m glad we got passed Siphon Insight. Hindsight if I was to go back? I would probably try to do Golgari, just because of the Huntmaster.”

Final Thoughts

There we have it: another ODP in the books. For those keeping track at home, we wound up with two drafters in Simic, two in Dimir, another pair in Sultai, and a lone Orzhov deck showing up. While nearly every player aligned on a couple of early picks, there weren’t any identical drafts after Saxe and Black diverged at Pack 1, Pick 6. Innistrad: Midnight Hunt feels like an incredibly healthy format currently and there’s still plenty of drafting still left to do before Innistrad: Crimson Vow is released, so if you’d like a more detailed breakdown of each draft, check out this video that includes their full thoughts on each pick. See you in the queues!