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Drafting Magic 2010 Part 3: Blue July 27, 2009

Posted by James in : all, reviews, strategy, tips, limited, draft , trackback

I already reviewed the first picks and second picks. Here are the other best commons and uncommons to look for when playing blue:

First Picks

Second Picks

Decent Cards

merfolk looter

A second turn Merfolk Looter is hard to beat. Just keep using it to get better cards in your hand. If Merfolk Looter is in your deck, it can also be a good idea to save some lands in your hand to have something to get rid of.

phantom warrior

Phantom Warrior is one of the best blue creatures, but still pales in comparison to Air Elemental.

wind drake

Wind Drake is very vanilla, but flying is pretty important.

snapping drake

Snapping Drake looks like a huge 5/5 Dragon, but it’s not. Still worth playing because it has flying though.

Mentionable Cards

ponder

Ponder is a great card. It might be better than I think.

divination

Divination is OK, but it is important to play a lot of creatures. The time it takes to draw two cards might be the time the opponent plays a small army.

unsummon

It can save a powerful creature from being destroyed, it can slow down the opponent, it can ruin an opponent’s plan of double blocking a creature, and it can help destroy creature enchantments, such as Armored Ascension.

Overview

Blue is one of the best colors. Mind Control and Air Elemental are some of the best uncommons in the whole set. Sleep and Levitation are great in an aggro deck, so blue-green can be a good color combination. Mono Blue isn’t necessarily a good idea. There isn’t much of a reward for doing so, and Sleep and Levitation aren’t as good in a mono blue deck than in a deck that makes use of powerful aggro cards found in other colors.

Comments»

1. alexgcuevas - July 27, 2009

I think Illusionary servant and ice cage are overrated. They can be very strong against certain decks, but can be completely terrible against others. They are still playable, obviously, but they get sided out often enough that I would not waste first or second picks on them.

2. James - July 28, 2009

Alex, I discuss those cards in a different article. Would you take any of the decent/mentionable cards over them? I still think they are better than the competition on the lower level.

3. alexgcuevas - July 28, 2009

I would take Looter over both of them, and I think snapping drake and phantom warrior are about on par with the Servant (although ice cage is probably better than them). The thing with Servant is that the extra toughness boost over snapping drake is really only relevant on defense, when its drawback becomes much more apparent.