Hello everyone! I know everyone is Core mode, practicing and getting ready for Realm Championship Qualifiers and the Darkmoon Faire in Los Angeles. Booooooooooooooooooooring!!! I kid, I know I am part of this group trying to figure out the hot new deck that will sweep the metagame. Even with all the testing going on, we still have time to draft.

Throne of the Tides is a very unique draft set. I find that in every practice draft I get a little crazier and try to build new different decks. Throne of the Tides rewards synergy and a goal with deck-building during the draft.

A great example of this is when I played against Jonas Skali at Worlds 2011. He drafted a Druid token deck with multiple [Bottled Rage]s. Most of the time I think [Bottled Rage] is a wasted pick in draft, but that is what makes Throne of the Tides so unique. There are decks where cards are more powerful than others. You should be picking different cards with your deck in mind.

In today's draft I wanted to try something new. I started off a rather boring pick, but a few picks later I started going down a weird rabbit's hole.

Pack 1

Pick 1:

Pick: [Bottled Death]

Pick 2:

Pick: [Nether Balance]

Pick 3:

Pick: [Hagtrix the Mindsifter]

Pick 4:

Pick: [Kolorath]

Pick 5:

Pick: [Big Cauldron of Battle]

Pick 6:

Pick: [The Culmination of Our Efforts]

Pick 7:

Pick: [Kinza, Mistress of the Elements]

Pick 8:

Pick: [Nazuk Darkblood]

Pick 9:

Pick: [Rescue the Earthspeaker!]

Pick 10:

Pick: [Big Cauldron of Battle]

Pick 11:

Pick: [Hesawa Stormwalker]

Pick 12:

Pick: [Corin Stallnorth]

Pick 13:

Pick: [Hesawa Stormwalker]

Pick 14:

Pick: [Rallying Cry of the Dragonslayer]

Pick 15:

Pick: [Hammer of the Zealot]

Pack 1 review: I started this pack with the boring safe pick of [Bottled Death], where looking back I think that [Deatheater Stroud] was a better pick. These practice drafts are to learn about how the different cards play together (going back to the synergy thing we talked about earlier). I should have taken the rare. I have never played with [Deatheater Stroud] before and this would have been the perfect opportunity to have tested him. After this pick, I started rare drafting. I picked up a bunch of different rares that I have never played with before, just for the sake of trying something new.

After picking up the [Kolorath] and the [Big Cauldron of Battle], I knew I needed a deck that could go to the long game. I knew Warlock was automatically the class to play after getting passed a [Nether Balance].

Pack 2

Pick 1:

Pick: [Soul Cleave]

Pick 2:

Pick: [Chumly]

Pick 3:

Pick: [Naz'jar Harpooner]

Pick 4:

Pick: [Seeds of Their Demise]

Pick 5:

Pick: [Zudzo, Herald of the Elements]

Pick 6:

Pick: [Shroud of Cooperation]

Pick 7:

Pick: [Murloc Coastrunner]

Pick 8:

Pick: [Glacial Tomb]

Pick 9:

Pick: [The Culmination of Our Efforts]

Pick 10:

Pick: [The Culmination of Our Efforts]

Pick 11:

Pick: [Jumahko Thundersky]

Pick 12:

Pick: [Swarmtooth]

Pick 13:

Pick: [Trista, Herald of the Fel]

Pick 14:

Pick: [Corin Stallnorth]

Pick 15:

Pick: [Verdant Boon]

Pack 2 review: [Soul Cleave] was an easy first pick since I was already Warlock. Whenever I have a [Soul Cleave] I want to pick up some low drop allies. Nothing is better than blowing out your opponent's board position by playing a one drop and destroying it to kill their best two allies.

With the [Soul Cleave] and an off class Empower ally, I start looking at [Shroud of Cooperation] more highly. The more I play with this card, the more I like it. It fits well in a deck that is trying to go longer in the game, by providing a one defense armor over multiple turns.

With a deck that wants to go to the longer game I prefer to have a lot of quests. I started scooping up [The Culmination of Our Efforts] as my preferred quest for this deck. There were a lot of different expensive cards that I could use to win with. My plan was to keep the board as empty as possible and drop a the cauldron or the epic monster. I wanted these cards to make sure that plan happened, so I wanted this quest specifically to dig for them.

Pack 3

Pick 1:

Pick: [Gilblin Plunderer]

Pick 2:

Pick: [Gilblin Bully]

Pick 3:

Pick: [Bottled Cunning]

Pick 4:

Pick: [Jagrok, Herald of Trickery]

Pick 5:

Pick: [Soul Cleave]

Pick 6:

Pick: [Hellisa]

Pick 7:

Pick: [Nazuk Darkblood]

Pick 8:

Pick: [Murloc Coastrunner]

Pick 9:

Pick: [Bubblegil]

Pick 10:

Pick: [Nazuk Darkblood]

Pick 11:

Pick: [Bottled Knowledge]

Pick 12:

Pick: [Waters of Elune]

Pick 13:

Pick: [Wuzlo Grindergear]

Pick 14:

Pick: [Funken Fusemissile]

Pick 15:

Pick: [Shaylith Swiftblade]

Pack 3 review: This pack was pretty straightforward. The early picks were filling out the curve and adding in more defensive cards. The most interesting pick was probably pack 8. I had the choice between [Runzik Shrapnelwhiz] and [Murloc Coastrunner]. In a vacuum the [Runzik Shrapnelwhiz] is a far superior card to the [Murloc Coastrunner]. That one damage can be a game changer, finishing off a large ally, or just taking the steam of out your opponent’s sail by killing their one drop. This pick highlights the point that a cards value will change depending on your other drafted cards. With [Chumly], [Giblin Plunderer], [Jagrok, Herald of Trickery] and [Bottled Cunning], the Monster Rogue was the clear pick.

Final Deck

Hero: [Voidbringer Jindal'an]

Allies

2 [Murloc Coastrunner]

1 [Swarmtooth]

1 [Naz'jar Harpooner]

1 [Chumly]

1 [Hellisa]

1 [Hesawa Stormwalker]

1 [Gilblin Bully]

1 [Jagrok, Herald of Trickery]

1 [Jumahko Thundersky]

3 [Nazuk Darkblood]

1 [Gilblin Plunderer]

1 [Hagtrix the Mindsifter]

1 [Zudzo, Herald of the Elements]

1 [Kolorath]

Ability

1 [Nether Balance]

2 [Soul Cleave]

Equipment

1 [Big Cauldron of Battle]

1 [Bottled Cunning]

1 [Bottled Death]

1 [Shroud of Cooperation]

Quests

1 [Rescue the Earthspeaker!]

1 [Seeds of Their Demise]

3 [The Culmination of Our Efforts]

1 [Waters of Elune]

Final Deck Review

The deck played fairly well. My two Soul Cleaves made it fairly easy to enter turn 6 with facing an empty board. At that point the Big Cauldron came down and all the randomness happened. With the cauldron on board, [Kolorath] would come down and make sure the board stayed clear while the cauldron did its thing.

I ended up going 2-1 with the deck. I wound up losing to the has-been-come-back-to-life Dane Young. I completely bashed him in the first game, but he made some mid match adjustments that made it nearly impossible to beat him. Dane’s deck featured two [Lodur, Herald of the Elements] and 3 [Shock of the Elements]. Dane would always save the [Lodur, Herald of the Elements] for my [Kolorath]. He also knew he only needed to deal 6 damage to me if he saved all his [Shock of the Elements] for my face. Him having all three of the [Shock of the Elements] was not a hard goal to accomplish when I made a deck that wanted to go a long game.

What do you think of my approach this draft?

-Tim Rivera