From: Jeremy Swenson [jswenson@grandecom.net]

Subject: Drafting Duel Masters - Jeremy

Hello, Today I will be going over drafting, or building and playing decks from a limited card pool, with the new Duel Masters card game. 

Please note that formats for drafting discussed here are not sanctioned by Wizards of the Coast nor are they the official rules for drafting Duel Masters, these are merely the guidelines my friend and I came to agree upon after testing some different variations.

First of all, for those of you who are unfamiliar with this format from other card games drafting puts an influence on skills as a deckbuilder when given limitations as to what cards you can include.  This is most commonly done with booster drafting, meaning players form their deck by drafting individual cards directly from booster packs.  When starting out to create a draftable format for Duel Masters there were many pros and cons I immediatly saw:

Pro's

- no need to provide land cards or any cards other than what comes in

the packs

- easy to build a 3 (possibly 4) color deck

- set contains multiple colors that focus on creature hate (darkness-

destroy, water- bounce)

- "super rares" AKA 'really expensive yet amazing, game changing creatures'

Con's

- 10 card booster packs

- constructed already has a 40 card deck

So onto making a format for drafting that can overcome the barriers in

deck size and booster pack size and take full advantage of the game

mechanics mentioned above.  Here are the numbers I have found to be most

effective:

1)  Each player will draft with 4 booster packs (containing 10 cards each)

2)  Each player will build a deck with a minimum of 32 cards

3)  Players will remove 4 shield cards at the beginning of the game

rather than 5

4)  The game will still end upon attacking your shieldless opponent one time

5)  Each table will contain between 2-6 players

6)  When drafting a player will take one card and pass the cards face

down to the player to his left on the first pack, his right on the

second pack, and continue to alternate.

Okay, for some explaining, numbers 1&2 should be pretty self

explanatory, we found 32 to be the right balance of having a large

enough deck while still being able to throw out those cards that just

aren't playable; on shields it just had to drop some, we found that too

often draft decks could stabalize and alternate killing off creatures

without being able to finish the game, cutting the shield count by one

seemed to greatly help with this although draw games are still a

potential.  And although most games use 8 person draft tables that

seemed to be to inconsistent and we fealt that you should be seeing most

packs twice.

Some strategy in drafting:

1)  Alright, this line deserves a gold star and alot of glitter:  DON'T

be left without creature kill/removal, as mentioned earlier the best for

this are water and darkness, I would recommend getting into one of these

early in the draft, red is a close second with some pretty good

creatures that offer kill and a few spells that focus on killing the

weak creatures.

2)  Also when drafting dont automatically assume super rares will be

amazing, if they see play they will, but you will also be hitting some

matchups against speed decks and your cost 8 dude isn't going to have

anything to say about those matches.

3)  Be a good drafter, pay attention to the signs you're getting, if

you're 2nd, 3rd, and 4th packs contained no water cards then the guy

next to you is prolly drafting it, look at what he is passing to you and

keep in mind that drafting that means you are more likely to get a

larger quantity of better cards than if you try to pick the stuff the

guy passes you in the color he is drafting.

4)  Blockers and Double Breakers- These guys are more amazing in a

limited format than ever in constructed decks, double blockers set you

forward and are a huge advantage while blockers can be used to set them

back and to take out other good creatures an opponent might have pulled.

5)  Shield Triggers- you have the exact same odds of any shield trigger

card being in your shields as you would in a constructed deck (neat, how

we made that work, huh?)

$Rare Drafting$  Okay, so you're drafting and you open that super rare

you need to finish your deck, what should you do?  Well, first you need

to evaluate your position, if you're drafting for fun with friends and

there is no reward for the winner, then go ahead and grab the card you

need for your real deck, but if you're in a professional event you

should consider what you're doing in taking a rare you will not be

playing in this event- first, you are essentially drafting out of

someone elses color, and when you start doing that to them they will

prolly get that pack and see nothing and counter draft as well, and the

more people that end up doing this the worse your draft deck will be;

however even if you are at an event if you open a card that is of such

high value that taking it is like winning the prize for the event there

can be alot said in favor of taking it, just don't make a habit of rare

drafting anytime you see something you might want, it is easy enough to

draft correctly and talk to whomever picked it up later about trading.

If you do decide to try out this format please email me at

jswenson@grandecom.net and let me know how your experiance was!

~jeremy