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Drafting With Rich – Shards of Alara #3

Draft With Rich Hoaen every day... at StarCityGames.com!
Wednesday, November 12th – Canadian Draft maestro Rich Hoaen returns to the pages of StarCityGames.com. Each day, he brings us a triple Shards of Alara draft from Magic Online, from pick 1 to pick 45, sharing his insight on the more difficult picks along the way. For more in-depth analysis, visit the forums!

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Resounding Thunder
Oblivion Ring
Blightning
2 Sanctum Gargoyle
Archdemon of Unx
Knight of the White Orchid
Tidehollow Sculler
Obelisk of Grixis
2 Dregscape Zombie
2 Bone Splinters
2 Fleshbag Marauder
Knight of the Skyward Eye
Yoked Plowbeast
Battlegrace Angel
2 Skeletal Kathari
Bloodpyre Elemental
Metallurgeon
Grixis Panorama
Jund Panorama
1 Mountain
8 Plains
7 Swamp

I took Resounding Thunder over the potentially more powerful Stoic Angel because of a personal distaste for first picking gold cards especially three-color ones. I certainly wouldn’t fault anyone for taking the Angel but I think a good single-color card is a better first pick. From there I took the best card in the pack for a while including an extremely weak third pack. My fifth pick was interesting. I took what I thought was the best card in the pack but I could be way off in that appraisal.

I wasn’t really looking to draw White Black but also couldn’t really find a way out. I didn’t really mind because I’d been wanting to experiment with non-allied colors. Opening the Angel made it work out but I’m not sure if this is the best deck I could’ve had.

I played against a Green Red White deck round 1. I won the first game with a bunch of two-for-ones after drawing first. He ran out of threats well before I ran out of answers and he died to a Leotau and Skeletal Kathari. Game 2 he had a quick draw but I had Angel on turn 5. He conceded on the spot.

The second round was very similar. I got maximum usage out of a Dregscape zombie in game 1 first sacrificing it to Fleshbag Marauder then to Bone Splinters to trade with two of his best creatures. Game 2 he was missing a color and my collection of mediocre creatures let him have it.

I played against a token deck in the third round which was an absolutely horrible matchup. Game 1 he had Dragon Fodder turn 2 followed by Goblin Assault and a couple removal spells and a Hissing Iguanar. I nearly won with a topdecked Angel but I was just too low and had to block his Sprouting Thrinax which gave him three more dudes to kill me with next turn. Game 2 I simply felt foolish. I had sideboarded out a Bone Splinters and Fleshbag Marauder but still drew one of each while he had a bunch of 1/1s and a Carrion Thrash giving me the business.

My enemy color experiment went well enough but it’s not something I’m going to be looking to draft again any time soon.

Until tomorrow…

Rich

[Editor’s Note – Nick is taking a break today while he installs a new graphics card. He’s back tomorrow!]