Advice for drafting Ikoria

[ilovesaprolings]

Any miracolous tips for drafting Ikoria?
I built a crappy mardu menace deck because i picked ruinous ultimatum and a couple of sonorous howlbonder. I was able to win some but i lost against well-built decks, most notably i was devastated by a cycling deck and a ramp deck with tons of honey mammoth.
The main problem of the deck was probably that i ran too much combat tricks.

So some tips? How much creatures? Which colors are the best? It is optimal to keep the curve low?

[DirkGently]

Any miracolous tips for drafting Ikoria?
I built a crappy mardu menace deck because i picked ruinous ultimatum and a couple of sonorous howlbonder. I was able to win some but i lost against well-built decks, most notably i was devastated by a cycling deck and a ramp deck with tons of honey mammoth.
The main problem of the deck was probably that i ran too much combat tricks.

So some tips? How much creatures? Which colors are the best? It is optimal to keep the curve low?

This set is an absolute blast. I've been playing a ton of arena going infinite+ in traditional draft. At this point I've been playing so much that my set collection is nearing completion.

In my experience, the main archetypes are:

RW cycling (can splash into U or B, but it usually - not always - has both R and W) - you want a lot of 1-mana cyclers and some payoffs, zenith flare being the biggest one. The fox and the token making guy are probably number 2 and 3. I've gone down as low as 13 lands for these decks and with a really good one you might be able to go lower.

WB humans (can splash into other colors but there's not really much synergistic reason to) - there's not a ton of payoffs, but Sanctuary Lockdown can be a big deal if you get a lot of humans, especially token making. With 2 lockdowns the deck can be pretty good, and it has a lot of good removal, but it can have a hard time against decks that go bigger. You should probably prioritize at least a little draw to compensate.

Sultai-ish mutate - most of the best mutate is in sultai, and not many humans so you don't have a lot of misses on your creatures. The otter is among the better non-mutate cards in the deck since a lot of mutates can turn it into a draw engine if you can give it evasion or enough stats to get through.

GB reanimator (most typically splashes into white) - the main goal here is to get the big cyclers - the 11/11 trample, 7/7 wurm, and 8/8 deathtouch dudes - and then reanimate them with the one that gives them lifelink or Back for More. You're generally looking to ramp so you can just play the big fatties if you draw them late. Like the humans deck, this one is pretty dependent on uncommons. You ideally want to see at least 2 good reanimation spells for this to work, but if you just have 1 it can be decent.

RU spells - hasn't really been a real deck in my experience, I don't think there are enough payoffs. That gremlin is trash-tier.

The companions are very real build-arounds. I've done a lot of them by now, here's my breakdown:

Yorion - Not a lot of really high value etbs, Farseek is about as good as it gets generally. As long as you found your colors early this is doable, and he's a major threat. Don't absolutely wreck yourself if your bottom-end playables are bad, though. And probably don't pair with cycling since cycling naturally wants to play fewer lands, which makes it harder to find enough playables. If you can't do it, he's still good in-deck of course, just from stats.

Gyruda - Very doable, a lot of the best cards are even. Very high impact to cast. If you P1P1 him, go for it absolutely. Also good in deck, even if you whiff occasionally.

Obosh - I've played him twice. You give up a LOT of good stuff to make him work. Most of the good removal is even. That said, he's still amazing and totally worth it just because of how insane his effect is. If your opponent can't remove him immediately they're probably in for a bad time, and he's immune to almost all the non-black removal.

Jegantha - hard to remember to draft correctly lol, I accidentally took a double-colored card at a crucial pick, oops. He's not that strong but he's mostly a free roll, you don't sacrifice a lot to run him usually.

kaheera - played it in-deck but never as a companion. I've seen it played against me though. It's very strong but the build-around does seem difficult. I'd say if it seems doable, though, it's worth going for, though it's much easier to kill than Obosh, for example.

Lurrus - You really want it P1P1 if you're going to build around it, because a lot of cards go way up, like the crappy 2-mana cantripping artifact, dead weight, the other crappy artifact, etc. Totally a real deck if you get the right stuff, in fact honestly pretty OP. But it can falter very quickly if he gets removed, unless you have an incredible deck. I've played against people using him and when he dies they usually run out of gas. Pairs nicely with the cycling 2-drop dudes too.

Umori - Never played with him or against him as a companion. Obviously a good card in-deck. Not totally sure how good the all-creatures version is (can't plausibly do any other type, I imagine), but a guaranteed 4/5 for 4 is sweet for sure. I'd love to try it.

Keruga - Played him 2-3 times. Seems tough but it's very doable. 3 drops are really good in this set. Playing him and drawing 2-3 cards is pretty gross, you really can't lose the long game.

Lutri - Never seen him in draft but played against him a few times. Seems pretty doable, maybe not in the cycling deck but everywhere else should be ok. It's not a nothing restriction but it's not too bad. Value can be pretty major if you copy a good spell, otherwise it's still pretty nice to have a guaranteed 3-drop.

Zirda - I threw a probably guaranteed 3-0 deck to try playing him as a companion in round 1. He's not impossible by any stretch, but he's just not worth it imo. It's less that the build-around is difficult and more than the value he provides is pretty minimal. Theoretically he provides tempo but it's not enough to justify the loss. Plus most of your stuff is cycling, and you lose a lot of the good cycling payoffs. I could only REALLY see him being good if you had a multiple-zenith-flare deck with like 20+ cyclers, and you just went all-in on zenith flare/fox/token dude without the common payoffs.

One thing to note is that all of these dudes are pretty telegraphed, so watch out for enemy counterspells or removal the turn you have enough mana to play it. If you suspect they're going to counter keruga, for example, play out more dudes and force them to make the first move. They'll either counter a subpar target, or they'll keep falling further behind while keruga becomes more devastating if he resolves.

[ilovesaprolings]

GB reanimator (most typically splashes into white) - the main goal here is to get the big cyclers - the 11/11 trample, 7/7 wurm, and 8/8 deathtouch dudes - and then reanimate them with the one that gives them lifelink or Back for More. You're generally looking to ramp so you can just play the big fatties if you draw them late. Like the humans deck, this one is pretty dependent on uncommons. You ideally want to see at least 2 good reanimation spells for this to work, but if you just have 1 it can be decent.

Played that. It's awesome. The essence of glasscannon. Even more glasscannon than a glasscannon. A sandcastle nuke. But nothing is better than losing 22-3 and then winning 25-0 with a lifelinker dinosaur. (yeah, unbreakable bond > back for more imho)

spells - hasn't really been a real deck in my experience, I don't think there are enough payoffs. That gremlin is trash-tier.

Hard to draft but can be good. Sprite dragon is amazing. Blitz of the thunder-raptor is straight top-tier removal in late game.

Zirda - I threw a probably guaranteed 3-0 deck to try playing him as a companion in round 1. He's not impossible by any stretch, but he's just not worth it imo. It's less that the build-around is difficult and more than the value he provides is pretty minimal. Theoretically he provides tempo but it's not enough to justify the loss. Plus most of your stuff is cycling, and you lose a lot of the good cycling payoffs. I could only REALLY see him being good if you had a multiple-zenith-flare deck with like 20+ cyclers, and you just went all-in on zenith flare/fox/token dude without the common payoffs.

Does Zirda work with cycling?

[DirkGently]

Played that. It's awesome. The essence of glasscannon. Even more glasscannon than a glasscannon. A sandcastle nuke. But nothing is better than losing 22-3 and then winning 25-0 with a lifelinker dinosaur. (yeah, unbreakable bond > back for more imho0

I don't think I'd agree. back for more is guaranteed value. Unbreakable bond can be better but if they have removal you get owned.

My sweetest moment was when my opponent had the uber-bomb kogla. I eerie ultimatumed 7 creatures including the 11/11, with the lifelink mentor giving the 11/11 lifelink, then I ram throughed the kogla (he was tapped out) and swung for 11 lifelink, gaining 22 life and punching for 17 in one turn :D Gotta be one of the most insane limited blowouts I've ever done in my life.

Hard to draft but can be good. Sprite dragon is amazing. Blitz of the thunder-raptor is straight top-tier removal in late game.

Sprite dragon is definitely legit, I don't think blitz is that exciting though. Sure, it's good removal, but it only reliably works late-game, so they're still worse than other removal without a setup cost.

I'm not saying it can't happen I just wouldn't generally be trying to draft it unless forced to, and I'd probably want at least 2 sprite dragons to really feel like it was worth it.

Does Zirda work with cycling?

He does. Not with mutate, though.