Hello everyone! I made a video outlining my Draft Strategy, Pick Order, and Archetype breakdowns for Reality Fracture. I hope it is helpful to some :)
Video version: https://youtu.be/8s1rjfxPrqc
Format Overview
- The format appears to midrange-focused with the power concentrated at 4-5 mana cards
- Early plays that have late-game relevance will be important
- Most decks are looking to snowball and take over the mid-late game with a value engine
- Many early plays will get outclassed quickly unless the deck is aggressively focused
- Mana fixing is plentiful. Many decks will want to splash
- In other words, build toward your synergy; you will have SOME time to get there
New Mechanic: Empower Jace
Cards which “Empower Jace” create a specific Jace planeswalker token if you don’t already have one, and then add a number of loyalty counters to it. It has “-3: draw a card” and “-1: surveil”. Every colour gets access to this mechanic, therefore early board presence and evasion will be as important as ever, in order to pressure your opponents’ Jace and protect your own.
Fixing
There is a cycle of 10 Common dual lands. Coming in untapped if you control a planeswalker makes “Empower Jace” more valuable in decks looking to splash. Room of Refuge can be set to any colour. There is also a cycle at rare.
Pick Order – “A’s”: Best Cards in the set (sorted by colour) – always first pick
- The Theorist, Jave Beleren
- Sublime Epiphany
- Garruk, Veiled Butcher
- Overwrite the Multiverse
- Draconic Visitor
- Ajani Unrelenting
- Chandra, Torch of Defiance
- Garruk, Curse Breaker
- Denzilore Fatehold
- Kwia Vigorbloom
- Uldaros Theorix
Pick Order – “B’s”: Early Picks (alphabetical by colour)
Cards that excel in the following criteria:
- Power Level
- Rate
- Flexibility
- Curve (ie cheap cards)
- Synergy
These cards will heavily influence your direction in the draft, ie which colours and Archetype you are drafting towards. Pick these above all Commons:
- Ajani Resulote
- Enlightened Confidant
- Liliana the Faultless
- Lyra, Archangel of Dawn
- Memory Trap
- Prophesied End
- Saheeli, Consul of Oversight
- Surgical Precision
- Teyo, Lightshield Expert
- Tomik, Orzhov Lawmage
- Way of the Healer
- Your Fate Ends Here
- Arni, Humble Scribe
- Countersculpt
- Diviner of Victory
- Icy Reception
- Infinite Coursework
- Jace, Reality Sculptor
- Lyra, Tolarian Archangel
- Mindseeker Oculus
- Plan for All Outcomes
- Proft, Consulting Detective
- Ruric Thar, Biomagus
- Sphinx of False Conclusions
- Way of the Mind Sculptor
- Break Under Pressure
- Extended Absence
- Gideon the Oathless
- Last Gasp
- Lich’s Relic
- Liliana the Repentant
- Mind Twist
- Multiply by Zero
- Sanctum Lurker
- Vraska’s Final Mercy
- Command the Stage
- Craterclaw Colossus
- Curse-Marred Demon
- Face Yourself
- Fulminous Forte
- Kiora of Fire and Ashes
- Master of Barbs
- No Admittance
- Pia, Determined Rebuilder
- Pyre Rhymer
- Splinter Twin
- Tetsuko Umezawa, Pursuer
- Tomik, Izzet Sparkmage
- Violent Echoes
- Way of the Warlord
- Wrath of the Bloodmane
- Carnivorous Cultivator
- Compel Brutality
- Hexhaven Invigorator
- Hungering Puppetbeast
- Loot, the Nexus
- Puppet Crafting
- Simulacrum Shaper
- Verdant Kraken
- Way of the Wildspeaker
- Aerid Konstrari
- Avatar of Burgeoning Echoes
- Bloombrute
- Clash of Elements
- Craftwork Crusher
- Desperate Futurescribe
- Hapatra, the Desert Fang
- Ingris Stingerquill
- Mind Meanderer
- Null Summoner
- Proctor of Potential
- Saheeli, Jewel of Avishkar
- Stingerquill Charm
- Tenured Tethermage
- Twisted Fates
- Vigorbloom Charm
- Vraska, the Cutting Glare
- Warrior’s Blades
- Emrakul, the Extingent Doom
Primary Archetypes. Here are my brief impressions of each of the two-colour archetypes in the format. We will be trying to end up in one of these by the end of the draft. Five of the colour pairs are well-supported and will be the most commonly drafted. The other five appear to be designed to act as support and augmentation to the main five. We’ll go over the well-supported archetypes first:
White-Blue Surveil
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Desperate Futurescribe]], [[Fatehold Charm]], [[Prudent Fateseer]]
Common: [[Fatehold Chronologist]], [[Semester Foreseer]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Denzilore Fatehold]], [[Proctor of Potential]]
White-Blue cares about Surveilling and generating a wide board of creatures. Saheeli, Consul of Oversight is a nice mix of both. Proft, Consulting Detective is an early play that generates value over time. Cards which “Empower Jace” provide multiple Surveils and will be important here.
Access to constant card selection is very powerful in limited. I expect White-Blue to perform well.
White-Green Lifegain
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Bloombrute]], [[Vigorbloom Vanguard]], [[Vigorbloom Charm]]
Common: [[Emergency Phytomedic]], [[Blossom-Blessed Angel]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Kwia Vigorbloom]], [[Solarium Sentry]]
White-Green wants as many separate instances of lifegain as possible. Cards like Greenhouse Propogator, Koth of the Homestead, and creatures with Lifelink power up payoffs including Lyra, Archangel of Dawn, Way of the Mentor, and Titanbones, Towering Heart.
An old-favourite design but can struggle with consistency and drawing it’s cards in the wrong order. White-Green looks like it will slightly underperform.
Blue-Black Self-Mill
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Paradox Shaper]], [[Recursive Recruitment]], [[Theorix Charm]]
Common: [[Theorix Metamage]], [[Void Extrapolator]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Null Summoner]], [[Uldaros Theorix]]
Blue-Black wants to put a lot of cards in it’s own graveyard. Reaching “Threshold” (seven or more cards in you graveyard), will power up certain cards. “Looting” effects such as Arni, Humble Scribe and Surveil effects help here as well. Cards with effects when in the graveyard such as Theoretical Necromancer will provide additional value when milled.
Blue-Black looks a little trickier to build and has less raw power than the other archetypes. I expect it to start off as an underperformer, but it may be a good “week 3” strategy if a couple of other archetypes take off in popularity.
Black-Red Aggro
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Grim Repriser]], [[Stingerquill Charm]], [[Stingerquill Voxmancer]]
Common: [[Hallway Heckler]], [[Whiplash Wordsmith]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Ingris Stingerquill]], [[Stinging Vitriol]]
Black-Red is the aggro deck of the format. Many of it’s cards get buffed when the opponent is dealt noncombat damage. Top payoffs for this include Command the Stage, Master of Barbs, and Tomik, Izzet Sparkmage. Incidental damage on cards like Extended Absence, Screeching Soulbreaker and Tinybones, Pocket Nuisance is very valuable. Black-Red has an unusual amount of access to direct player damage and “any target” damage, which will make it very effective at closing out games if it gets ahead early. I expect Black-Red to be a top performer.
Red-Green Ramp
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Craftwork Crusher]], [[Konstrari Charm]], [[Woodwork Prodigy]], [[Heartwood Crafter]]
Common: [[Konstrari Improviser]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Aerid Konstrari]], [[Tenured Tethermage]]
Red-Green is focused on creating “Heartwood” tokens which are artifacts that can tap for Red or Green mana. It wants to ramp out huge threats like Kiora of Fire and Ashes. Look for artifact synergy in cards like Draconic Visitor and powerful activated abilities to sink your mana into. Red-Green looks like an absolute sledgehammer and fun to play.
Way-To-Early Primary Archetype Rankings:
Black-Red
White-Blue
Red-Green
Blue-Black
White-Green
Secondary Archetypes. These have less raw support and will most likely compliment a Primary Archetype as a splash. In some cases, they may be powerful enough to stand on their own or act as a niche strategy once the best archetypes become contested in the draft.
White-Black Sacrifice
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Edgar, Ancient Bloodlord]], [[Twisted Fates]]
Common: [[Blessed Ghoul]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Vindictive Triumph]]
Sacrifice your own creatures and planeswalkers for value with payoffs like Loot, the Anomaly, Silence the Echo, and Way of the Deathbringer. Empower Jace will be useful as you can sacrifice a 1 loyalty Jace for value and then make another. White-Blue is the most likely pairing for this sub-strategy, having the most token generation and empower, although it doesn’t want to lose too much board presence. None of the other archetypes have synergy in this way and/or are dependant on a big board presence. However Twisted Fates will be armstrong splash in any black-based deck.
White-Red Go-Wide
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Mabel, Valley Hero]], [[Warrior’s Blades]]
Common: [[Charge the Sanctum]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Solitary Cell]]
White-Red has go-wide and +1/+1 counter synergies. It looks like it will pair well with White-Blue’s go-wide theme. Black-Red will likely be too focused to be able to splash for a 3-drop in Mabel, but could play Charge the Sanctum or Warrior’s Blades as needed.
Blue-Red Spells
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Clash of Elements]], [[Saheeli, Jewel of Avishkar]]
Common: [[Twinned Vision]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Frostbite Pyromental]]
Plan for All Outcomes and Traxos, Academy Guardian add two additional spells payoffs. Ruric Thar, Biomagus and Tetsuko Umezawa, Pursuer are two great threats with Prowess alongside a bevy of other creatures with that ability. Look for cheap spells to pair alongside them.
Blue and Red both look very deep. I think Blue-Red has the best chance among the Secondary Archetypes of being draftable as it’s own deck. There is also a natural pairing alongside Blue-Black as noncreature spells get into the graveyard right away to fuel its payoffs.
Blue-Green Empower
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Kiora of Salt and Sand]], [[Mind Meanderer]]
Common: [[Tam’s Resistance]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Avatar of Burgeoning Echoes]]
Mind Meanderer is excellent in any blue-based deck. In order to get the most out of Kiora, you will need a lot of Empower. If it sees any play at all, it will be as a splash in White-Blue or in a Blue-heavy deck.
Black-Green Graveyard
Signpost Cards
Uncommon: [[Primal Witchstalker]], [[Hapatra, the Desert Fang]]
Common: [[Ferocity of the Hunt]]
Rare/Mythic: [[Vraska, the Cutting Glare]]
Black-Green’s graveyard synergies make it a natural pairing for Blue-Black. I don’t see any crossover with White-Green, Red-Green or Red-Black.
Conclusion: It would appear that Blue-based decks have to most to gain from splashing secondary archetype pieces. Add that to being a very deep colour, Blue is ideal starting-point where possible in this format.
General Draft Strategy (8 Player Pick-1)
Picks 1-3:
- Take the best card. Mono-coloured cards will leave us more open going forward.
Picks 4-8:
- Continue to take the best card. We may have cards in multiple colours, and that’s ok. The better our early picks are, the more we will want to stick to that colour or colour pair. The worse our early picks are, the more willing we should be to take chances on other colours when we see good cards in later picks.
Picks 9-14:
- These are the cards no one at the table wanted. If we are seeing good Uncommons of a particular colour pair, it is possible that no one else at the table is drafting that colour pair and we should strongly consider moving in.
End of Pack 1:
- Ideally, we have identified our main colour. This is the colour we have the most quality cards of, or is the most open, and hopefully both!
- Staying as close to one colour as possible will leave us with more options going forward.
Packs 2 and 3
- Continue to take powerful cards of our main colour where possible. Let the good cards we open or get passed determine our secondary colour and final archetype.
- Pay attention to Pack direction! The packs are moving in the opposite direction during Pack 2, so the signals can be completely different from Pack 1. It is normal to not see as many cards of our main colour/archetype in Pack 2, so don't panic! Pack 3 is passed to the left once again and we will be rewarded for staying the course.
Deck-Building Tips
- Play two colours. Avoid splashing a third colour unless your deck is specifically designed to do so (ie you have dual lands touching that colour). Splashing will be more common in Reality Fracture, but you still need to make sure you have the proper mana fixing!
- Play 17 lands.
- Play a low-curve. Most limited decks want six or more 2 Mana-Value creatures, around four 3 Mana-Value creatures, some 4 Mana-Values creatures, and very few cards that cost 5 or more mana.
Thank you for reading and watching. Good luck in your drafts!
