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Unperturbed by these minor setbacks I plunged headlong into late night drinking sessions to find an answer. From my findings I came to the conclusion that I may need to do some playtesting and maybe a draft or two. Odyssey-Odyssey-Torment booster draft is one of the hardest sets I’ve come across. It is hard to signal to your neighbour what you are taking, as there are often many good picks in the same colour. It gets even more frustrating when you reach Torment as you can build half of your deck from the black cards available. There are also a lot of "bomb" cards in this format which can win games all by themselves. Cards like Cabal Patriarch, Aboshan, Upheaval and Turbulent Dreams often mean auto win if they hit the table.

After a few practice drafts in Sydney I came to the conclusion that there are several archetypes you can draft which are quite good and one that is insane (if you get any of the bombs). Here were my findings: –

U/B - the best colour combination as blue is strong in Odyssey and Torment. Most of the bombs are in these colours too so it makes this archetype insane. Typically a 3-0 or a 2-1 depending how heavy it is drafted.

U/W – white is really bad in both sets (with the exception of a couple of cards) and it is hard to go 3-0 with this sort of deck. You really need to draft a Psionic Gift quite highly as you will need it against those crazy U/B decks. I couldn’t seem to win more than one game with this style often timing out so 1-1-1 or maybe a 2-1 if you are lucky.

R/G – these colours can be good if the right cards are present. Quick critters such as Chatter of the Squirrel, Wild Mongrel and Ember Beast are all solid picks. Backed up with a Rites of Initiation and some timely removal these decks can often beat the U/B with a good draw. Usually a solid 2-1 performer.

U/G – green is good in Odyssey but sucks in Torment. Draft good green creatures, bounce and the occasional flyer in the first two packs and hit the Torment pack for all the blue goodness. Lack of removal is often the downfall of this archetype and can give you a 2-1 record (sometimes 1-2).

These were the deck types I drafted and didn’t really have too much time to experiment with any of the others before the tournament. My other strategy was to draft as much black as possible then pick another colour towards the end of the first pack.

There was talk in Sydney about signaling colours by placing a card of the same colour at the front of the pack so when your neighbour picks up the booster they know what to steer clear from. This can get a bit complicated when there are no other cards of the same colour but after four or five picks the guy on your left should be getting the message. There are ethical reasons at play here as it is a form of cheating and it also only works if other people at the table know what is going on and can be stamped out by simply shuffling the booster before passing (which was enforced at the nationals).

Okay so I had booster draft all worked out, now for the tricky bit – type 2. The last time I had played in a type 2 tournament was at the nationals a year before so I was a little rusty. Fortunately I had a large pool of players to test with including such legends as Kim Brebach, Andrew Corney, Adam Kemp and Ben Seck.

The format doesn’t really change all that much as the same archetypes are out there and occasionally a new deck type will emerge and trounce the field until someone works out how to beat it. The deck that seemed to be the "one to beat" was Psychotog as Ben Seck was playing it and we couldn’t let him win.

I decided to use Kim's Opposition deck, which he won a local tournament with a week earlier as it played counterspells and could beat Psychotog. It splashed red for Fire/Ice and Flametongue Kavu and had unusual cards like Static Orb maindeck and Thunderscape Battlemage in the sideboard. The deck's manabase was a bit shaky (it played twenty one land and eight mana producers!) having ten sources of red mana and a lot of painlands. Kim swore by this build but I couldn't do it and cut a couple of spells in favour of some more basic land (which I eventually talked him into the night before the tournament). With our decks built and our strategy organised Egidio, Kim and myself jumped into the car and headed down to Canberra after the Thursday night draft.

We arrived in Canberra cold, hungry and tired. After checking in we did what every other magic player would in our situation, five hours of playtesting. I can remember Kim saying to me "just one more game Dan" and that was at 1.30, four hours later we went to bed.

Stay tuned for part 2 of "Tellin It Like It Is" where I shall discuss the joys of competing in the grinders, how not to draft at the nationals and why NSW sucks at playing magic.

Dan Turner

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