Introduction
This is part 3 of the transcription of the limited level-ups episode 37. “How often pack 1 pick 1 should make your deck” and “Rarity blinders - better drafters are more likely to pick commons over uncommons of that same color”. Here you have a list of all parts of the transcription: part1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6.
Transcription
…but from here, I were to shift onto a couple of habits that we see from people, when they are drafting, when they are sitting down with the seven other people at the table, and this is one that, you guys talked on the podcast about one or two episodes ago, about how often pack one pick one should make your deck. And what we found here, I thought it was going to be, sort of like you guys were saying a couple weeks ago, that people were not having those A-level bombs make their deck at a high rate. But, actually we saw in both the highly effective drafters and the comparison group pretty similar rates of those A-level bombs making their deck at around 88 to 90% of the time, where we did see a difference was the better drafters are more likely to move off of their first pick if it’s a B-level card or worse. So yeah, so we’re seeing like 77% of the little group hold on to that B-level first pick and stick with it versus 47% for people in the highly effective group. What are your thoughts on that?
That’s super interesting and I think, it lines up, with you know, that kind of clicks with me the way I like to draft right like it. I think if I do have an A-level bomb like a Felidar Retreat or a Zareth San or something like that, like that is the time, and especially if I follow it up with another good white card after Felidar Retreat or something. I have three successive pics in a row that go with my bomb first pick, those are the times where I’m more likely to carve out my lane or at least what I would call carve out my lane. I wonder if, you know, carve out my lane can be, you know, it’s almost an euphemism for forcing my first pick or can be viewed as that, but, I think maybe some people are like quote-unquote forcing. But I think that’s okay. Like, I think that there is a stigma in the Limited community and just you know, and content Creation in general for like sticking to your first pick for too long, it’s so ingrained in us that you know, you should be drafting, you know, reading the signals and a hundred percent because if a new drafter doesn’t do that in just six of their first pick, I think I think that can lead to some trainwrecks. But at the same time, I think you should be fighting for that first pick. And now, when you move on to the second part here, where you know, they’re less likely to hold on to B-level cards like that also resonates with me and almost especially for this set, for Zendikar, because if I’m thinking of like what are the B-level cards in this set, these are generally like the archetype payoff-cards, like the gold cards, right, or Relic Amulet or something like that or maybe like Scion of the Swarm, the 5 man 3/3 flier that gets a counter on it when you gain life. Those are great cards in the deck they belong in, but, I’m just not going to be forcing for those cards, right? And, I think that if you can find a lane with that those cards are great. They almost perform at A level, right? But if you’re not in the lane where those cards perform very well, they’re almost at sea level, right? You don’t want Scion of the Swarm in your, you know, black red deck a lot of time but in your black white deck, it almost performs like a low-level A card. So yeah, I just think like if I’m to take it, you know, have a take-away from this, I would just say, like, be willing to take those archetype payoff card, this is what I’ve been saying all format, right, take those archetype payoff cards in this format and then be willing to move off of them because they’re not actually going to be that great in your deck, if your deck doesn’t end up in a place that wants to play them and I think that, you know, that might sound obvious to a lot of people. I think the key thing that I see a lot of people not doing, is not be willing to take those archetype cards early first three picks of the draft lets say, and say all right, if that doesn’t work out, that’s okay, because the potential to take those cards is worth the risk of it not working out in the end.
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Yeah, and one of the thing I’m curious to get your opinion on and I’ve been trying to think about this a little bit but is how the sort of power level of the set affects this, so imagine, like in a set, like we have here with Zendikar, there aren’t as many, like if I look at your tierlist, I don’t think you have any A+ level bombs. Obviously, there are some As, A minuses, but I think there are fewer than there have been in past sets and so the power level is a little flatter than it is in other sets. I’m curious how you think that might play out in how you should be playing these high-level bombs or mid-level first picks.
Oh, yeah, I think that totally matters because if I think about Theros Beyond Death, which is basically like one of the most prince formats we’ve had in a while. I mean, in recent memory, I can’t think of a more princely format then Theros Beyond Death, maybe, Dominaria if you go back a little further, but in Theros Beyond Death, I was very very unlikely to move off of a Dream Trawler or Kiora Bests the Sea God or basically any of the top 20 cards in the set. It will take me a lot to move off of those because their power level is so much higher than anything else you could be doing. But I think like, in Theros, if a good, red white beatdown heroic synergy deck came together or a good red black sacrifice deck came together, the power level of those decks were still usurped by the best bombs in the set. If you had an Archon of the Sun’s Grace in an otherwise medium blue white deck, I think your deck would be better than an average to good red white beatdown deck, right? So, I think that certainly matters. And then in a set like this, like Zendikar, where I think the best decks, are the streamline synergy decks, not even so much the decks with like three rares in them. I think you should be more willing to find that lane more easily. Because, like, I did a draft yesterday, where I first picked a Felidar Retreat, the one of the best cards in the set, if not the best, and that wasn’t my lane, white was not the lane I was supposed to be in and I started to carve for a little bit. I started to be like, all right, you know take the white cards, take the White cards, take the lower power white cards and the higher power red cards in the pack for example, right, but then it was so apparent that I was supposed to be red blue by the end of the draft and my deck ended up fantastic. The deck I ended up was much better than a medium blue white deck. So, I think in this format in particular, yeah be willing to move off of your Dranas or Felidar Retreats or your Moraugs or whatever you have is the best card in the set.
Yeah, other take away here is, if your first pick is something that’s medium, you probably want to be more likely to be drafting the hard way, then, like you said, if you’re picking a super high level bomb.
Yeah. Alright. So next habit, we have here: rarity blinders. I love this one so much. So you say, better drafters are more likely to pick commons over uncommons of that same color. Why don’t you talk to me about this one?
Yeah, so the difference we’re seeing here is not huge. It’s like 25% versus 24%. But given the tens of thousands of picks that we have in each of these groups, this one is one of those statically significant differences here. And basically the way that I was looking at this was, only looking at pics where you picked a common over uncommon or the other way around an uncommon over a common of the same color. So like you are explicitly taking something that otherwise could be going in your deck. There’s obviously not every card that’s the same colors is going to go in the same deck like you could be picking a synergy piece or something like that. But yeah, it seems like as much as we try to put on the blinders for the rarity of the card, we’re not always great about that. And so just maybe some advice to pay less attention to the color symbol on the right side of the card.
Yeah, I think one of the things that Kyle Rose, you know ham TV, is excellent at and I think you, just like, the best player that I’ve seen, he does not care about rarity symbols. Like, he is so so good at just being like, you know. Otherwise flashy looking rare, the one that that sticks out to me was the Phoenix from Ikoria. I don’t exactly remember what it’s called. But the mutate Phoenix from Ikoria, like he, thought that card was medium. When to me, and I think to a lot of other drafters early in the format it was like one of the better cards in the set. But he was like, no, there is a lot of uncommons I’m going to take over that card especially for the cycling deck. And over, and over, and over, while he’s drafting and I’m watching him people in chat will be like, “oh, don’t you like this uncommon like this, don’t you like this rare?” No, Yep, I do, but like this common, you know, synergy piece or this really really good common removal spell is just better. I think that, you know, I, it’s almost a double-edged sword here because sometimes the cheat sheet, the cheat is like oh look at the rarity symbol to tell, you know, the designers have put it at this rarity, especially if it’s an uncommon for a reason they said okay. It’s probably powerful enough that this shouldn’t be a common for example. But also I think, especially at the beginning of the format, it’s very easy to be like, I’ll just take the uncommons over the commons. When a lot of the times the commons are better in the deck then the uncommons. One of the examples from Zendikar that stands out to me, that has really become apparent in the past few days is Kor Celebrant. The white 1/4 that whenever a creature enters the battlefield under your control, you gain a life. I’ve been taking that card over a lot of the good cleric payoffs like Relic Vial, like Scion of the Swarm, the 3/3 flier we were talking about before, when my deck really needs it. Because I think it’s just such a glue piece and almost especially when you’re in the deck when you’re already, you know, your pack 3, pack 2 and you’re already kind of, like, you found your lane, the balance of like good uncommon payoffs and maybe even good rare payoffs and like the glue at common. I think you know you really need to ask yourself, like, “What do I need here?” Because, sometimes you just don’t need more payoffs, you don’t need more flashy cards, you just need those solid cards that will tie your deck together.
And I think this is also a sort of an area where thinking through the cards and in context of one another can be really helpful because, like I said, if we look back at the statistic, people are still taking uncommons over commons 75% of the time. Uncommons are often a lot better. Sort of, like, you said, pointing back to the hints that the designers of the set were trying to give us. But, if you go back and look at your tier list and say what are all of the uncommons that are better than all of the commons and have that picture in your mind, and again, that’s going to change with the context of what else is in your in your deck halfway through the draft, but early on you can get a sense of what are the ones that are super powerful that do really more at that than uncommons. Versus what are the ones that, hey, maybe they are at a higher priority because of constructed or some other reason that you should maybe be thinking about a little less. I’d be curious to see what effect you would have if there were no rarity symbols on the cards or even if they just were presented in a random order on screen on MTGO or arena when you get on their rather then having the rare and uncommon at the top left of the pack.
Of course, the very first thing you look at is what you rare is and usually what your uncommons are. You just wanna get the look at the juicy cards. I almost wonder, if we were back a few years and unfortunately we don’t have enough data for this right now, but if you went back a few years to a time when commons weren’t as powerful and I think a lot of power was in the uncommons because the common removal wasn’t as good, maybe the synergy pieces weren’t quite as good. I wonder if this changes as we go back because recently in the past three four years, the commons have really been pushed. Especially in the last two years after the whole fire philosophy of magic 2020 started right? I think there’s been such a boost in the power of the commons that I wonder if that also has an effect on it as well.
I’m sure it totally does…
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