Secrets of Strixhaven MTG Draft & Sealed Guide

The archetypes

Simic: +1/+1 counters

theme cards 21average mana 3.02two-drops 11removal 8

signpost Growth Curve

Quandrix: counters. The strongest theme the data finds in the set, by a distance. Wild Hypothesis makes a Fractal for one mana, Pterafractyl enters with counters and flying, Growth Curve doubles them, and Berta, Wise Extrapolator pays off every counter placed. Studious First-Year // Rampant Growth is the ramp and it is a common. Slow to start, and the only college that does not want removal first.

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Boros

castable spells 79average mana 3.03two-drops 15removal 20

signpost Molten Notetheme soft, drafted on card quality i

Lorehold: cards leaving the graveyard. Hardened Academic grows a creature and Garrison Excavator makes a 2/2 whenever cards leave your graveyard, and the deck's own cards do the leaving: Stone Docent exiles itself for life, Soaring Stoneglider costs two graveyard cards instead of mana, and every flashback spell counts. Molten Note is the signpost and the finisher.

Golgari

castable spells 82average mana 3.07two-drops 10removal 15

signpost Root Manipulationtheme soft, drafted on card quality i

Witherbloom: life gained this turn. Teacher's Pest gains on attack, Bogwater Lumaret gains on every creature, and then Poisoner's Apprentice and Foolish Fate turn on. Grapple with Death is the best common removal in the set and it is gold, so the pair is worth being in for that alone. Be in it for the removal and the Pests, and never for the Infusion.

Izzet

castable spells 82average mana 3.28two-drops 10removal 18

signpost Stress Dreamtheme soft, drafted on card quality i

Prismari: spells, and big ones. Opus creatures get bigger on every instant or sorcery and better on a five-mana one. Expressive Firedancer is the common, Colorstorm Stallion the rare that copies itself, and Stress Dream the signpost that removes and digs. The control shell: it has the second-most removal of the colleges and wants to be the pile.

Orzhov

castable spells 81average mana 3.01two-drops 12removal 17

signpost Killian's Confidencetheme soft, drafted on card quality i

Silverquill: Repartee. Every instant or sorcery that targets a creature is a trigger, and the cheap ones target your own: Dig Site Inventory for one mana with flashback for one, Rapier Wit on their blocker. Lecturing Scornmage grows a counter each time and Melancholic Poet drains. The other white deck, and the faster one.

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Where the removal is

Secrets of Strixhaven has 50 removal spells, and 32% of its creatures have toughness 4 or more.

The colors at common

The fixing

The most common mechanics

Prepared

cards 38at common 10mostly blue and black

Infusion

cards 12at common 4mostly black and green

Repartee

cards 12at common 3mostly white and multicolor

How to draft it

Two formats share one table. The curve sits at the recent average and the games do not: white decks race, and everything else builds a removal pile and wins late. The pile is the honest read of the numbers. Removal runs to 50 spells and 27 of them are instants, the highest share of any recent set, and only 138 of the 266 cards are creatures. So a body dies to open mana more often than usual, and the deck with more answers than the opponent has threats wins the long game.

Lorehold is the pick and Witherbloom is the trap. Lorehold has the most removal castable of any college and the most two-drops, and its flashback cards give the aggro plan a late game the other white deck lacks. Witherbloom's Infusion payoffs each ask for life gained this turn before they do anything, which is a condition, not a plan, in a format this full of instants. Prepared is the mechanic to understand before the first pick: Elite Interceptor // Rejoinder is a one-mana creature carrying a spell, and a set with thirty-eight of them plays like every creature is two cards.

The picks at common

Removal first. The two-mana kill, the four-damage burn, the exile at five that costs two on a tapped creature, the tuck that costs three on an attacker, the green fight, and the gold answer.

Then the Prepared creatures, which are two cards each, and the two-for-ones.

The five-colour pile

Converge rewards every colour you can produce. Snarl Song makes two Fractals with a counter per colour, Arcane Omens discards one card per colour, and Sundering Archaic exiles anything cheaper than the colours spent. Strixhaven Skycoach fetches a basic and flies, and Studious First-Year fetches another on turn one. The pile is real here where it is not in most sets, because the removal is deep enough to survive the stumbles.

What to play around

Two open mana is Last Gasp in black, Essence Scatter on a creature spell in blue, Glorious Decay against a flier in green, and Harsh Annotation in white, which kills anything and leaves them a 1/1. White at two after your creature is tapped is Ajani's Response. Three is Unsubtle Mockery in red, Stand Up for Yourself in white against power three or more, Run Behind in blue against an attacker, and Foolish Fate in black. Attack into open mana here only when the trade is fine either way.

Splashing

The five common duals and the rare ones belong to the five colleges only, so a college pair splashes its third colour off Strixhaven Skycoach, Studious First-Year and Environmental Scientist, and an enemy pair does not happen. A white aggro deck stays two colours. A pile splashes whatever the Converge cards ask for.

Questions about Secrets of Strixhaven