Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles MTG Draft & Sealed Guide

The archetypes

Izzet: artifacts

theme cards 24average mana 3.48two-drops 8removal 14

Izzet loops artifacts. Mouser Foundry makes a Robot when it enters and again when it leaves, Sewer-veillance Cam taps a creature both ways for one mana, Nobody returns one of them to hand to do it again, and Donatello, Way with Machines grows on every artifact. Purple Dragon Punks pays for it. The strongest theme the data finds in the set, and the grindiest deck.

Orzhov: Ninja tribal

theme cards 21average mana 3.03two-drops 11removal 12

Orzhov sneaks. Attack with Squirrelanoids or Dream Beavers, return the unblocked one, and Oroku Saki, Shredder Rising or Leonardo, Big Brother lands tapped and attacking for two mana or one. Shredder's Technique is a kill spell for one black mana the same way, and Karai's Technique does two things for two. The returned one-drop replays for one and its enters trigger fires again.

Simic

castable spells 59average mana 3.46two-drops 8removal 9

Simic is Mutagen. Genghis Frog, Michelangelo, Mutant BFF and Ray Fillet, Man Ray make Mutagen tokens, each a +1/+1 counter for one mana, and Michelangelo makes every countered creature hard to block. Frog Butler fixes and blocks, Venus, Torn Between Worlds grows on damage. The biggest bodies in the set, which is what a slow format rewards.

Boros

castable spells 58average mana 3.00two-drops 11removal 12

Boros is Alliance. Every creature entering is a trigger: Raphael, Tough Turtle pings, Mutant Town Musicians and East Wind Avatar grow, and Mighty Mutanimals brings a body and then hands out counters. Mechanized Ninja Cavalry and Mouser Attack! are two triggers each. Slower than it reads, with the token makers as the finish.

Golgari

castable spells 60average mana 3.30two-drops 11removal 11

Golgari is Disappear. Pizza Face, Gastromancer and Michelangelo, Game Master grow at end step if a permanent left the battlefield, and Ice Cream Kitty and Stomped by the Foot are the ways to make one leave. Frog Butler is the reason to be green at all, and the best splash enabler in the set. The engine works when it works; it is the pair most often left short of a way to turn it on.

Where the removal is

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has 36 removal spells, and 38% of its creatures have toughness 4 or more.

The colors at common

The most common mechanics

Sneak

cards 26at common 3mostly white and black

Disappear

cards 9at common 4mostly multicolor and black

Alliance

cards 10at common 4mostly red and white

How to draft it

Slow, unless somebody sneaks. The curve sits above the recent average, 3 damage kills only 62% of the creatures and 38% have toughness four or more, so the ground clogs and the games go long, the way a small set with this many rares tends to. The exception is Sneak: an unblocked attacker goes back to hand and a spell or a creature comes down for a discount in the middle of combat, and a deck built to do that every turn is the one fast thing in the format. Take the cheap removal and the blockers first, because the mediocre two-drop you never wanted is what stops Oroku Saki, Shredder Rising on turn three.

Orzhov is the pick and Golgari is the trap. Orzhov has the one-mana evasive bodies that make Sneak free, Squirrelanoids and Dream Beavers, and the drafters rank it first with Izzet artifacts beside it. Golgari's Disappear asks for a permanent to leave the battlefield every turn before its payoffs do anything, and the drafters found it harder to set up than it reads. The set designs five archetypes; the other five pairs have nothing, so a second colour is one of the two that pair with your first.

The picks at common

Removal first: the aura that exiles later, the two-mana burn that filters, the two-mana shrink with a sacrifice attached, the pizza that kills on entry, the fight, and the sorcery that exiles anything for six.

Then the commons that carry a plan: the two enablers, the artifact that triggers both ways, the fixer, the flier that draws when it dies, and the scry two.

Interactions worth knowing

Sneak returns an enters trigger. The creature you return to pay a Sneak cost is a creature you get to cast again, so April O'Neil, Kunoichi Trainee scries two more and Dream Beavers drains again when they come back down.

Bounce your own artifact. Nobody and Metalhead return an artifact to hand, which is a leave trigger and an enter trigger for Mouser Foundry and Sewer-veillance Cam, and a counter on Donatello each way.

What to play around

Sneak is the thing to play around, and the number is one open mana: Shredder's Technique kills for one black, Jennika's Technique deals two for one red, and a returned attacker means a creature you did not see is about to enter attacking. Two is Manhole Missile in red, Tenderize in green, Death in the Family in black for anything cheap, and Guac & Marshmallow Pizza in green at one, which untaps a blocker. White at two after your creature taps is Grounded for Life, and at three Make Your Move kills anything with power four.

Splashing

Each of the five archetype pairs has a common dual, Escape Tunnel fetches a basic, Frog Butler taps for any colour with deathtouch attached, and Omni-Cheese Pizza and Everything Pizza each turn into a colour once. A green deck splashes a bomb on those alone; any other deck stays in two colours, since the pairs outside the five have no dual and no reason to exist.

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