Last night I got a chance to draft some Lorwyn! I’ve been curious about how this format would play in Draft since the pre-release. My local game store, the Fourth Place did an event, so I figured I’d take the opportunity and head over. (Side note: If you’re ever in the area, you should stop by. It’s a great store.)
I would like to say that since the prerelease, I’d practiced and learned the set. This would unfortunately be a lie, because outside of a few drafts on arena, I have done zero prep. I hadn’t even bothered to look at a pick list.
Instead, I had a simple plan: ignore what everyone else was doing, and force Blue/White Merfolk.
This was it. The extent of what I’d learned from my digital drafts was that Tributary Vaulter and Shore Lurker could take people to pieces, and that Gravelgill Scoundrel made it possible to push through clogged boards.
So yeah, that’s what I did. Spoiler alert: I won the pod.
It is a deeply uninspired list, but still managed to be a solid one. Perhaps the only notable thing about it is the lack of rares, with Deepway Navigator being the only one. It runs 24 non-lands, and has 2 cards mana value above 4. It also runs zero one drops. Pure and simple, it’s very much a “just find a way past them” style list.
The games were a pretty swift set of matchups, going 2-1, 2-0, and 1-1-1, followed a Bo1 playoff I won.
I don’t know that there’s anything I can even learn from this. While there were some close games, and I did take a few losses, it was almost always dependent on my opponent getting out something like Virulent Emissary or Scarblade Scout to have a bit more extra life, and slow down my early turns. The moral of the story seems to be that “fliers are good” and I kinda already knew that.
Overall, I have mixed feelings about Lorwyn as a Sealed/Limited set. Ignoring aesthetics and theming, the mechanics have never really clicked for me. While I was initially worried about the lack of removal during the Sealed Prerelease, draft has made it pretty clear that there actually is plenty of removal. At the same time, the very low number of counterspells remain a bit weird.
In the one to two dozen games I’ve played of Draft Lorwyn Eclipsed, games have never really felt super fun or exciting. They’ve been tense! It’s felt good when I’ve won, or pulled out of sticky situations, but I’ve never had any huge moments of dropping a bomb, or feeling like I’ve figured out something incredible, or spotted clever synergies.
Some of it may just be the colors I’ve drafted, with Merfolk have arguably the least interesting play pattern, in that it’s mostly about tapping creatures through card effects, but there are only 8 convoke cards under rare, and only two are instant speed.
I like winning in Lorwyn. I just wish I liked playing a bit more.
As a final note, I’ve seen some complaints/comments online that the set really pigeonholes you into your archtype, with very little space to branch out. I don’t think I’ve drafted enough of the set to make the same statement confidently, but it does seem accurate to the experience that I’ve had so far.
Also, I promise I’ll go back to writing about games instead of just things I’m doing shortly, but despite losing my job, it’s been a weirdly busy last few weeks.