MTGO GWJ Draft
Thursday, November 9th, 2006 - 11:49am
All of the draft talk was getting lost in the big Time Spiral thread, so here is a new thread where we can see who can play and when.
The first two dates under consideration are Nov 12th and Nov 19th, with start time being 7:00 CST.
Available for either date;
TheWalt
Unforseen_Power (and friend?)
Badferret
LeapingGnome
Fedaykin98
Availabe for the 12th only:
Mumford
SocialChameleon
Availabe for the 19th only:
Chumpy_McChump (maybe)
Have expressed interest but not commented on date:
Scrub
So, assuming that those that have expressed interest can attend either date, we have seven (eight with Unforseen's friend) for either Sunday. For those who would like a free booster, I could provide it on the 19th, but not the 12th.
Lets figure this thing out.
Posting on the boards is easy. The trick is to kick someone's ass the first day, or become someone's bitch. Chiggie Von Richthofen on how to transition from lurker to poster.
I'm interested, but I haven't played since Ice Age. However, I'll only be available on the 12th. The 19th is Wii day.
Time to bone up on the rules.
Sometimes, if you wanna save the world, you have to push a few old ladies down the stairs.
-Bernard
For SC, and anyone else who is new to, or considering joining for the draft. DL and register the client, this will cost $10, but you get a $10 credit to be used in the online card store.
Current booster prices are $3.99, so if we hold the draft on the 12th, everyone would need to spend $11.97 to participate. Once the draft is over the cards that you played with are yours.
Do we want to do prizes, or just run the draft for bragging rights?
Posting on the boards is easy. The trick is to kick someone's ass the first day, or become someone's bitch. Chiggie Von Richthofen on how to transition from lurker to poster.
1) I'm in for either date.
2) I'm of the opinion that there must be prizes; that discourages rare-drafting and rewards people who actually draft to win. I know I'm biased since I'm a frequent drafter, but I actually haven't played Magic in months - not since the Coldsnap paper pre-release - and I haven't played Time Spiral at all yet.
Some ideas for prize support:
- everyone could put up, say, 2 tickets, or a pack, or something.
- we could use some of whatever it is that Farscry and fyedaddy are donating to the clan.
Normal drafts have a prize pool of either 12 or 11 packs - the two models are 8 packs to first place and 4 packs to second (8-4), or 4 to first, 3 to second, and two each to the two who tie for 3rd (4-3-2-2).
Anyway, we can determine the will of the people and figure it out from there. If we each donated two tickets, I'd suggest 8-4-2-2. If we each did a pack, I'd suggest 4-2-1-1. Just some suggestions. I don't care. In the words of Garth, "I like to play."
Quote:
- Legion, taking "keeping it in the family" to a whole new level.
Xbox Live: Fedaykin98
Another idea taken from this week's limited article at the offical Magic site would be to reward all the rares to the the top 4.
24 rares could be divided 12-6-4-2, winner gets first two picks and then alternate.
Posting on the boards is easy. The trick is to kick someone's ass the first day, or become someone's bitch. Chiggie Von Richthofen on how to transition from lurker to poster.
Yes to prizes! I'll donate a pack or tickets or whatever.
Interesting idea... and economical though tougher to implement with all the players and trades involved.
I'm good with either this (again if the implementation can be done easily) or donating a pack or tickets or whatever. A few extra bucks to enjoy the GWJ crowd is well worth it to me I'm totally for 'draft to win' over 'rare draft', so let's do whatever promotes that plan.
Bear wrote:
Xbox Live: TheWalt2
At my old store, where I learned to draft......we used to award the rares to the winners and they would take turns picking from them. But that was easy, in real life. I think online it would be tough, for purely interface reasons. I vote for packs or tickets.
Quote:
- Legion, taking "keeping it in the family" to a whole new level.
Xbox Live: Fedaykin98
I vote for packs or tix, splitting up the rares afterwards would be tough online.
Worst signature ever.
Gamertag: Tex Red
www.mumfordland.com
My friend is out. Seems like we'll have enough interest so no need to pull in random people.
I'm cool either way for prizes. Although I agree that packs are likely easier than rares.
The voices say hello.
Do we have enough interest for the 12th? By my count we've got 6. They don't allow us to setup 3v3 drafts, do they? (That would be awesome)
Worst signature ever.
Gamertag: Tex Red
www.mumfordland.com
By my count its 7, still waiting for Scrub to chime in.
Mumford, what about your RL friend who is in the clan?
Posting on the boards is easy. The trick is to kick someone's ass the first day, or become someone's bitch. Chiggie Von Richthofen on how to transition from lurker to poster.
I'll check with him, but he hates drafting. You see, he hates it because he's bad at it. I've suggested that he play more drafts at the shop because they do swiss rounds, so you get more practice, but he won't because he's bad. I offer him advice on card evaluation in draft, but he's convinced that his evaluations are better than mine. It makes me cry.
I'll find out.
** Early reports are in and it looks grim. He says he prefers to get his cards online by buying individual cards rather than randomly getting cards in a draft. He doesn't like to draft and I don't think I'll be able to convince him that being good at drafting makes playing the game cheaper.
Worst signature ever.
Gamertag: Tex Red
www.mumfordland.com
It would be interesting to see a graph that illustrates how much money you must lose learning to draft before it becomes a reasonably inexpensive was to play MTGO.
I'm sure there are people out there who have "gone infinite" (never have to pay thanks to winning things) on MTGO, but I'm not one of them. I draft because it's my favorite way to play the game. Getting a discount on the price of admission through winning from time to time is very nice, but I'd probably draft anyway. It's a different, exciting experience each time.
I STILL haven't touched Time Spiral, but one of things I'm looking forward to is being forced to draft just 2 (or so) colors. Ravnica turned into a 4 or 5 color draft for me almost every time. Which was fun, but it also meant the experience differed more based on what cards I saw rather than trying to draft a particular strategy (not that I usually start a draft with a strategy in mind).
Quote:
- Legion, taking "keeping it in the family" to a whole new level.
Xbox Live: Fedaykin98
Drafting isn't free for me by any means. I've only done one draft online and I got 2 packs, but I did open an Akroma. Combined, that will basically pay for my next draft, so 2 for 1 sounds like a good deal to me.
I think I drafted RGD up at the shop about 4-5 times and I ended up making prizes in about 3-4 of those drafts. I've drafted Time Spiral 3 times at the shop and made prizes twice, but placed high enough every time that I've probably gotten in for the monthly prize (I'm guessing 2nd which is $30). It seems that I've been drafting off and on for about a year, probably putting in 2-3 drafts each month if you average it out. It's cheaper than building decks for constructed, and has helped me put together decks for those tournaments anyway. I also play with nearly every card I obtain these days as well, and that's where the value really shines for me. Rather than cracking 36 packs and sorting them, I open three at a time and then play with them.
My friend will only draft at pre-releases and when he drops from larger tournaments. Most of the time he just rare drafts, so it's not like he really even tries to understand how to get better at drafting. Oh well.
I'm just looking forward to my two free drafts that I've got at the shop, and hopefully I'll be able to get there consistently in order to get back in the monthly prize.
Worst signature ever.
Gamertag: Tex Red
www.mumfordland.com
mum - you play with almost every card you obtain? What format is that?
Quote:
- Legion, taking "keeping it in the family" to a whole new level.
Xbox Live: Fedaykin98
Drafting, eh? You get 45 and I end up playing with 22-23 of them, more if you consider sideboarding. Compared to constructed, where you play mostly rares, this sounds like a good deal.
If I were to open three packs in a draft, I will play with about half of them. If I open those three packs and use those cards to put together a constructed deck, I may not get any of the cards that I actually want for a constructed deck from them.
Worst signature ever.
Gamertag: Tex Red
www.mumfordland.com
I've probably done about 20 drafts total online. I would say in monetary terms the prizes have paid for 60ish% of that. I've made it to the second round at least 10 times (2 packs) and to the third round maybe 4 times (3-4 packs).
mum - oh, I misunderstood what you were saying. I thought you were saying that you used almost every card that you opened AFTER the draft, in some format. Never mind.
Quote:
- Legion, taking "keeping it in the family" to a whole new level.
Xbox Live: Fedaykin98
I might be interested in playing but most of my experience with MTG is pretty old. I have a pretty big collection of physical cards but nothing newer than 3rd edition. The last major expansion I bought any of was Legends. I did dl the MTGO client the other day and have played a couple of casual games but someone would have to explain the whole drafting process to me.
Roger, draft works like this:
8 players sit down at a table with an upopened pack in front of each player, the draft starts with each player opening his pack, and selecting one card within a certain time limit. Once the set amount of time is up (or everyone has made their pick), all of the players pass the remainder of their pack to the person next to them. With this new pack (which will have 14 cards in it) you again have a set amount of time to pick one card, before again passing the remaing cards on. Rince and repeat until all the cards from the opening packs are gone. There are three rounds of drafting, ie you will open a new pack in the first, second and third round.
A player could go into a draft planning on drafting specific colors, and stick to that no matter what, or you can open that first pack, pick the best card and shape your strategy on the fly.
After the draft you build a 40 card deck and then everybody plays each other.
Posting on the boards is easy. The trick is to kick someone's ass the first day, or become someone's bitch. Chiggie Von Richthofen on how to transition from lurker to poster.
Well, I'll pop in tomorrow at 7pm CST to see if we'll get enough to do the GWJ draft.
TheWalt, you still have that Ventrilo server running? If so, you have a link for it?
Worst signature ever.
Gamertag: Tex Red
www.mumfordland.com
will the MTG:online software take care of the draft stuff? I've never done a draft online... I have drafted a few times in real life.
I'll be online 7PM EST tomorrow as well to try this.
The voices say hello.
Yeah, MTGO will take care of all the picks and stuff. It's really easy. I'm guessing it will also handle all of the pairings as well. The draft will be a user created draft, rather than going though a draft queue. All you need to do that are 8 people and 3 boosters from each. We'll also be throwing in a pack or tix for a prize, since there won't be prizes paid out by the system.
Worst signature ever.
Gamertag: Tex Red
www.mumfordland.com
I'm going to have to bow out this time. Some personal crap came up I have to handle tomorrow. Maybe next time. :\
Sometimes, if you wanna save the world, you have to push a few old ladies down the stairs.
-Bernard
I'm down for the GWJ draft tomorrow @ 7pm.
Mum- yes the Ventrilo server is still up and running. The link for Ventrilo information is here.
Bear wrote:
Xbox Live: TheWalt2
Either is good. Sorry, didn't see this thread until 5 minutes ago.
XBL Gamertag: Bear Patrol
Blog: Triple Point Blank Fire
So how does this work?
Does the MTG:Online client support casual drafts? Do we all have to get into an official one? (The same official one)
I also assumn we need to purchase our 3 packs of TSP. DO we need tickets as well?
The voices say hello.
You can start your own draft in the casual play sealed room. No tickets needed.
The last 3 mentions of the starting time have mentioned EST, CST, and no time zone at all.
I'm going to assume it's CST because that's what ferret listed at the top of the page.
Suddenly, my future mother-in-law is visiting our new house today, so knowing the time is important for me.
Quote:
- Legion, taking "keeping it in the family" to a whole new level.
Xbox Live: Fedaykin98
It's CST... the EST thing was my fault...
The voices say hello.