LoadingReadyRun Draft #49: The Charge of the Badger

This was amazing, and the ad for Badgers over the end of the last video was the perfect last touch.

So, having watched only the draft so far, I have a suggestion. You talked about how when you make general drafts some people say you should make more focused “joke” drafts like this one here. While others (me included) think that when you come up with something too constraining (like rare drafting) it’s just not fun to watch, and mostly isn’t even much funnier than just the usual clowning you guys are capable of.

Now, I purpose a middle ground. How about you always enter a draft with a clear goal in mind (“we are going to make a huge charging badger and beat the hack out of people”) and draft accordingly – but always make sure that the goal is something that could potentially be a feasible strategy if forcing it works. Actually sit down and think about it before you draft, and try to come up with some crazy, seemingly stupid strategy, a convoluted game plan, that makes the kind of forcing you are going to do work.

For example, in this draft, going mono-green and trying to break badger + aspect of hydra should have been the plan all along. You were lucky enough to stumble into a draft where green was insanely open, so you get there anyway, but what you *should* have done was never ever take a card of another color except green, and try to be mono green for the sake of aspect of hydra.

The advantages of my idea are:
1) drafts would still be crazy and weird and funny and not anything we could watch anywhere else
2) While drafting, it wouldn’t feel like you guys are constraining yourself, it would feel like you are going all in on some actual strategy. It might be a joke strategy relaying on a silly, inconsistent game plan, but a strategy nonetheless. The draft you did with Marshall from Limited Resources is an excellent example of this.
3) There will actually be some value to be gained from watching your drafts other then entertainment – actually seeing some of those weird strategies in play could show people how some cards might be used in surprising ways, or (more likely) show a gameplay example of why certain ideas are just bad

Examples of the kind of thing I think you should try out:

1) Playing 5 colors in BTT, focusing on picking up as many mana fixers as possible, and always taking multicolored spells above everything else, while committing to playing all of them.

2) The all Akroan Crusader deck – run over your opponents with a huge army of 1/1s!. focusing on the cheapest ways to target and picking up as many Nyxborn Rollickers, Nyxborn Shieldmates, and vanguards of brimaz as possible, with lots of cheap enchantments and 1 mana combat tricks

3) The mill deck – mill your opponents out with a bad UB deck that plays all those terrible mill cards floating around – obviously cards like returned centaur, thassa’s bounty and that terrible enchantment from born of the gods all work. Since you are playing that enchantment, might as well pick up an inspired creature or 2. Build a very slow control deck that will never attack, only drag time until the very few milling options you have work.

4) The life gain deck – gain as much life as possible, probably with a GW deck.

5) The Spellheart Chimera deck.

6) The scry deck

And so on. Come up with absurd strategies nobody else is using, force them intelligently, and continue to do so in the lighthearted manner that makes us love what you guys are doing!

Totally amazing! Very funny and also interesting that it worked so well. It was a bit lucky that you didn’t face off against that -2/-2 to all card or similar… I would really have like to see the mono Pegasus draft! Maybe you can do that in BTT though with Loyal and Charging…

Awesome, awesome, awesome! What about the ole Mnemonic Wall lockdown in BTT? Just pick up some number of those 0/4s and as many Rescue from the Underwold as is possible. The whole gameplan is win the late game by sacing mnemonic wall to the Rescue for a) even more advantage gained from self-milling (vie Drifters or Returned Centaur) b) Odunos River Trawler (to get some actual card advantage c) Another mnemonic wall returning counterspell/kill spell in the process, d) Shrike Harpy or Baleful Eidolon to keep opponent’s creatures back e) Gray Merchant of Asphodel or any bomb (even off-color one) you pick during the draft for closing the game. UB rocks!

(btw. this is the right deck for Champion of Stray Souls if you would ever see him)

Well. That might just be the best thing ever. Attack of the badgers is great.

As far as feedback, I love pretty much all of your wacky drafts where you’re actually making decisions. I enjoy rare drafts, but I think they would be FAR better if you didn’t require yourselves to take uncommons if the rare is gone. Try to build a good deck around all the ridiculous rares you pick up, because that’s an interesting strategy where you can make interesting decisions. But you can’t do that if it’s “oh, there’s an Opaline Unicorn that would be perfect for 4-color rares, but I have to take this Peak Eruption because it’s uncommon”.

Essentially, I like to see you make decisions. It’s fun to restrict yourself sometimes, but not too much.

@Lantis,

The combo you mentioned doesn’t work, because rescue from the underworld exiles itself. I was disappointed to find out about that, too.

I’ve only watched the draft and deckbuilding segment so far but I am squeeing all over the place. Gonna go grab some food and watch the games.

Finally, a deck that I can buy for less than a dollar. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

pretty sure you missed lethal early in M1G2, when you had the aspect of hydra in hand with 8 devotion to green and more attackers than he had blockers you could have pumped the unblocked monster or a badger for the win because he was at 10 life

I love all the comments about how you should draft – just do something where you guys have fun – we will enjoy it no matter what!

I thought some of the comments were going to be about your game play. I love how you held off on many good attacks because you wanted to go all in on badger. A 3/2 was a much better target for most of your enchantments and combat buffs, but I am glad you stuck to the spirit of the draft in game play. Just sad James was not along for more color commentary!

Also noticed how fortunately you did not face any removal, noticeably black and red were quite absent from you matches. A little bit of luck goes a long way – but then again who would want to “waste” removal on a 1/1?

Great draft and games Graham!

BY FAR the best draft i’ve seen from you guys. it was a perfect combination of a hilarious theme with a VERY strong strategy. i went 4-0 in sealed with mono green on the back of 3 aspect of hydras too so i know how insane that card can be. i’m looking fwd to watching the matches!

Loved this draft I tried to run badgers in GU with follower the first day and it didnt pan out. Wish I had done it in mono green lol.

Easily one of the most entertaining drafts I’ve seen in any format!

I do agree with the comment that your wacky drafts are most fun when they have a chance of winning, so consciously strategizing beforehand about how to implement it may make things more interesting, esp. if it’s one of the tougher restraints.

By the way, I think you missed a number of attacks you could have gotten away with without them blocking. Attacking your 1/1 badger into their 3/1 heroic guy while they were tapped out, there’s no way they would have blocked. Also you could have attacked your 3/2 centaur into their 3UU 2/2 flyer with inspired and again they wouldn’t have blocked. Getting some more hits in would have made reaching lethal potential with Aspect of Hydra a lot easier.

In the end, the Badger was so strong that the Badger won regardless. Such is its power.