2000€ Portuguese Draft Challenge

Looking at the title, it seems today I'll be talking about draft, so draft it is.

After winning PTQ Porto i thought most of the questions I had about picking a deck for Nationals had been answered. However, draft is still worth like 35% of your Nats if you're planning to go all the way, and for most of the people, it represents the bigger parte of what they play, since very few reach the last 3 standard rounds alive. Now let me start by stating something that is going to be controversial.

I like to draft Swiss Queues.

I come from the Limited school of the "Draft and Play". Sure, your deck may seem amazing, but is it really? Sometimes, it's hard to evaluate the power of a draft deck since you cannot compare it in an abstract, the power is relative to the card pool of the draft pod. I've had very crappy decks, which were solid 2-1, just because no one could put a good deck together with the card pool of those 24 boosters. Also, I don't like single elimination drafts rounds. In constructed, your deck will always be deck "X" in the same format, with the same cards available, but in Limited, your deck is always different, as well as the other decks. So, you may think you drafted perfectly, and then you lose screw, screw and you can't take conclusions other than assuming. Or the opposite, you draft the worst deck ever, but you just lose quickly round 1, and then shrug and join another queue. The thing is, GP's and Nats have 3 rounds with the same deck, if you have a bad deck, you will suffer the agony of having to play 3 rounds with it.

Anyway, I'm not saying swiss draft is a better tool to practice, but it covers for some flaws of single elimination. However, I noticed that everytime i drafted swiss I ended with 27 playables while drafting 8-4 I had troubles assmbling 18 playables, let alone 22. (I may or may not be exagerating on these numbers, up to you). I ended up doing some sort of mix between the two kinds of drafts, more swiss in the beginning when I was focusing on playing with the cards, and more on the 8-4 when I was testing draft archtypes, lesson here is, don't be so dejective with swiss drafts.

Between the PTQ Amsterdam and Nats there was a weekend with an LCQ for Nats on Saturday and a 2k euros Draft Challenge on Sunday. About the Draft Challenge:

It was an initiative which came from a Portuguese card dealer who attends all the Pro Tours. He saw there was always a Draft Challenge on Sunday for a high amount of money, so he bought lots of booster cases and decided to try that in Portugal. I tought it wouldn't work, despite his optimistic views, and here's why.

At the Pro Tour there are at least 500 players gathered in a single place, who don't have anything to do on Sunday, and didn't bother to bring an extra deck, and who are confident on their draft skills, so it's no surprise it easily reaches the 128 players required.
But at local stores, for my experience, people don't really draft. They just play their own and the same constructed decks everyday, against the same decks and persons, and they thing draft is a waste of time and money. If they don't give 12 euros to draft, no way they would be paying 35 euros to join a tournament likely to attract all the sharks in Portugal. It was no surprise to anyone that the first ever Portuguese draft challenge only had 4 draft pods, sme of them with 7 players. But let me say, this was for sure the tournament in Portugal with the less EV, as all the good players from the Lisbon area had come.

However, it is silly that some players opted not to go just because they thought attendance would be low, while some players who actually showed up, waited until the end of registration to see how many players had joined and then decided not to join. If all of these potential players had joined, I believe the number could reach 50, which is still somewhat shy. Reflecting the low attendance, prizes were cut down from 2000 to 400 euros.

My first draft pod was in theory the strongest of the 4, which made things more interesting and challenging.

7 players pod:

Seat 1: Márcio Carvalho
Seat 2: Gonçalo Pinto (Márcio's Apprentice for like 6 years)
Seat 3: Narciso Ferreira (who I beat in the PTQ final the previous week and would become vice-champion on the following week)
Seat 4: a local "good kid"
Seat 5: Me
Seats 6 and 7 I didn't recognize


My first pick was Enclave Cryptologist, which is probably the best uncommon of the set.

Second pick I took Narcolepsy from a pack missing the rare.


Third pack still had the nuts, I don't remember exactly what, but I took Staggershock.

Fourth pick I took Mnemonic Wall over Forked Bolt.

Fifth pick I took a risk and drafted Kiln Fiend, because I remember packs 1 and 2 had a Distortion Strike, which I hoped to table. I got them both, and at that point, I thought my deck was going to be ridiculous.

Unfortunately, in the rest of the draft no one else opened a single Kiln Fiend, and the player to my right had indeed first picked Sphinx of Magosi, and as I tought it might happen, the Forked Bolt, despite being a weaker pick, by passing him, it send wrong signals. The problem is, some players have wrong card evaluations, some players here consider Forked Bolt first pick quality, so seeing one late they take it as a clear go red signal. I ended up with this deck:

1 goblin arsonist
1 Lavafume Invoker
1 Goblin Tunnerler
1 Sea Gate Oracle
1 Grotag Siege-Runner
1 Emrakul's Hatcher
1 Valakut Fireboar
1 Magmaw
2 Enclave Cryptologist
1 Mnemonic Wall
1 Kiln Fiend
1 Lust for War
3 Fleeting Distraction
2 Wrap in Flame
1 Traitorous Instinct
1 Narcolepsy
1 Staggershock
2 Distortion Strike

9 Mountain
8 Island

For me, this deck is quite acceptable, 2 cards short of being very good, which are 2 Kiln Fiends. I won the first two rounds against the local kid and Narciso Ferreira. I lost the final round to Márcio's Apprentice, we both screwed one game, and he got the third thanks to a sideboard card, whenever Enchanted creature attacks or blocks he gains 4 life. I make an aggressive attack with Strike, which puts him at 2 the following turn, which will give me enough time to find something, I think, as his board was reduced, and he had to stay back with everyone in case I had something. Problem was he played that aura, so the turn he was supposed to be at 2, he went up to 10 instead, so he never had to stay back, and kept attacking me.

2-1 was a fair result, but there were lost of people being dejective on my deck and how lucky I must had been in order to 2-1 with this deck, which was annoying me a little. Of course, Distortion Strike, Fleeting Distraction, Kiln Fiend, Wrap in Flames are sub optimal cards on abstract in Limited, but... well no matter what I said, I still had to battle some extra games just to prove my point that this deck wasn't bad, and I would be happy to skip the second draft and just play the remaining 3 rounds with it. I wish that could be done, as my second draft was just horrible.

Funny curiosity, I was 2-1 (Win/Win/Loss) and I went to Draft Pod 1 with all the 3-0 and Portugal regulars, I believe everyone on that pod had Pro Tour experience, and Márcio Carvalho with 2-1 (Loss/Bye/Win) went to pod 3 of 4, with 6 players I didn't recognize whose scores were 1-2.

The cut for Top 8 was 4-1-1, so Márcio ID his first round of the second pod against one of our friends, the other 2-1 of the Pod. By Round 6, all the other players from that Pod dropped, which meant both Márcio and his friend had Byes for Top 8. So Marcio's score for Top 8 was 2-1 plus one ID plus 2 Byes Must be!

Enough with lots of Byes for Top 8, back to draft Pod 1. I opened a pack with absolutely nothing except Kozilek Butcher of Truths, and very unhappily took him, as I hate, hate drafting Green,it just auto loses to Islands in Limited, why would you do that to yourself. Second pick another dry pack, just Overgrown Battlement, which happens to be a great start for a Green Ramp deck. I went for it, but it just didn't happened, so I was stuck with the worst deck ever.

2 Overgrown Battlement
2 Wildheart Invoker
1 Grotag Siege-Runner
1 Stomper Cub
3 Vent Sentinel
1 Dreamstone Hedron
1 Joraga Treespeaker
1 Ulamog's Crusher
1 Emrakul Hatcher
1 Might of the Masses
1 Kozilek's Predator
1 Kozilek, Butcher of Truth
1 Lavafume Invoker
1 Aura Gnarlid
1 Nest Invader
1 Soulsurge Elemental
2 Lagac Lizard

10 Forest
8 Mountain

I lost the first round to a Red/Black, it seemed very very weak, but he played 3 rares in both games, Drana, Conquering Manticore and Lord of the Shatterskull pass.

Then I lost to a BLue/Red/Black all good spells deck. Never had a chance, it was for sure his easiest win of the tournament. Actually one game, I had turn 4 Crusher on the play, thanks to 2 Overgrown Battlement. He Deprived it. Then turn 5 Wildheart Invoker, he also Deprived it. Then turn 6 I had 4 Forest and 2 Wall in play, my hand was all Red. I passed. He played Consuming Vapours, and I went from 8 mana back to 4, and his life up to 28. Not nice! However, I think I lost well, had we played 8 games, I think my deck would be able to win 1, and it was probably this one.

Not surprisingly, the same persons who tought my first deck was awful and couldn't understand how I went 2-1 with it, they tought this second draft was solid, and couldn't understand how I went 0-2 with it. In their own words, all these cards are solid, not running bad cards like in the other, you have ramp and creatures.

First, I think their card evaluation sucks, as this second deck is full of mediocre cards. Second, it has absolute no sinergy, or solutions. However I agree with them saying I had one good deck, and one bad deck in this tournament, we just disagree which one's the good and the bad. LOL
But yes, with Nationals coming in one week, I wanted to improve my Limited game, so I accepted Márcio Carvalho's invite and I went to his place a couple of times during the following week for some draft sessions and exchanging points of view.

With the PTQ and the Draft Challenge behind, I had already tried my hands in Standard and Draft in real live tournaments. Keep following my blog, until we finally reach the big prize, Nationals!

And... Big Congratulations to Gonçalo Pinto Madcat, winner of the First Ever 2k Portuguese Draft Challenge!

Thank you for reading!