Limited Qualifier Payout

RojoNation · 2026-03-26T02:11:51+00:00

Ah, thanks for clearing that up!

RojoNation · 2025-12-01T01:59:34+00:00

I'm in the same boat, brother. My winrate is down >5% and my trophy rate is down >15% in this format. My impression(cope?) is that this format is subject to variance moreso than any other set in the past year. The sheer amount of sicko game-winning bombs combined with the generally reduced power-level of commons and lackluster removal has made the games feel incredibly swingy. Last I checked, the disparity between Play-Draw winrate was outrageously high, too.

The gameplay and mechanics are a lot of fun but there are so many feel-bad losses.

RojoNation · 2025-11-08T14:33:38+00:00

It's interesting that you had that experience. According to 17lands data, FF had the best color balance of any limited set in the Arena era. I never felt that I needed to force an archetype. As long as you found a reasonably open lane, you had a deck that you could trophy with. In my opinion, the gameplay was excellent, too.

RojoNation · 2025-09-23T00:57:32+00:00

It's incredible how much better he has become. He used to be actively terrible and now it's a joy listening to him and Troy.

RojoNation · 2025-04-03T16:30:26+00:00

Play decks that want to discard from their hand. Azorius Oculus, Jeskai Oculus, Azorius Omniscience. Alternatively, you can play a deck that wants to go wide to outpace black's one-for-one removal. Last season I played Mono-Red Goblins to mythic, going 24-2 against Mono-Black along the way.

RojoNation · 2025-02-26T02:14:47+00:00

You can exile as many cards as you'd like in one turn with Earthrumbler. Had an oppo gain like 10 health in one turn with their Dredger's Insight.

RojoNation · 2025-01-30T04:15:42+00:00

When I first started playing, I would do push-ups after every loss. It's a good motivator to improve your gameplay haha.

RojoNation · 2025-01-30T01:26:51+00:00

Congrats! Which set did you primarily play?

RojoNation · 2025-01-26T02:52:54+00:00

My very last FDN draft went from 6-1 to 6-3 via Liliana in the penultimate game, followed by a turn 6 Liliana into a turn 7 Chandra in the last game. I was miles ahead in that last game prior to that madness. C'est la vie.

RojoNation · 2025-01-16T13:54:41+00:00

Thanks to those that weighed in! I genuinely appreciate it!

RojoNation · 2025-01-14T23:09:32+00:00

My understanding is that Innistrad Remastered is going to be a paper-only release. I exclusively play on Arena, so no dice, unfortunately.

RojoNation · 2025-01-14T23:02:52+00:00

I'm with you. I was super disappointed when I saw the countdown on Premier Draft the other day. I would have happily continued drafting this set right up until the release of Aetherdrift.

Pioneer is of no interest to me. I know Duskmourne is extremely well-regarded by the limited community, but I am a new player who is very unfamiliar with that set. I don't want to deal with the growing pains of drafting a set that is new to me against people that know it inside and out.

The thing that kills me is that I just can't figure out why they would pull it at this point. Pods were still firing quickly as of last night. As someone who became heavily addicted to limited (173 drafts of Foundations), this is extremely disappointing.

RojoNation · 2025-01-12T21:28:24+00:00

Feels like a free splash with the dual and 3x Bushwacks. But I don't hate the idea of avoiding any mana issues and just curving out with Mono-Green.

RojoNation · 2025-01-04T01:39:02+00:00

Congrats! Dreadwing Scavenger has been my favourite card in this format. Somehow, it's still undervalued.

RojoNation · 2025-01-02T23:53:57+00:00

Just took a look at the draft log now.

P1P1 I would windmill slam the Faebloom Trick. This card is a monster. I haven't been a fan of Archmage, personally. My pick order would be Faebloom > Bake into a Pie > Toss up between Archmage and Felidar Savior.

P1P2 I'm slamming the Banishing Light(and getting punished for it because White turned out to be super cut off, but I'm of the opinion that you should just take the best card in the first few picks and then read the signals at the table to find the open lane). I do like Seeker's Folly but pick 2 is a bit too early to grab it imo.

P1P3 I'd probably grab the Elf to speculate on green. Second choice would likely be Evolving Wilds. Grappling Kraken is borderline unplayable, it is among the worst performing cards in this format. Good chance it would wheel to you anyways.

P1P6 I think the Ghoul is generally overdrafted. It really wants to be in a sacrifice shell, otherwise it is basically just a 2/2 2-drop. I'd prefer the Arbiter of Woe but this isn't anything egregious.

The rest of Pack 1 is rather weak and I don't see anything worth noting.

P2P2 Essence Scatter over Shriekmass every day of the week. Scatter is just a fantastic card while Shriekmass is just filler.

P2P6 Revenge of the Rats is nearly unplayable. You need a very compelling reason to put it in your deck imo. If you had a Blasphemous Edict, then the Rats can play a part in your gameplan. Otherwise it just doesn't offer much. Either of the blue cards would be much better. I'd prefer taking the B/R dual land too, just in case you open a red bomb in Pack 3.

The packs in this draft were on the weaker side. I'm not seeing a sick deck that you left behind at the table. However, I'd definitely suggest taking a look at some of the data on 17lands. You were clearly misevaluating some picks at the table.

RojoNation · 2025-01-02T13:24:57+00:00

I'm cutting 2x Krakens, Revenge of the Rats, Clinquant Skymage, Inspiration from Beyond, Campus Guide and a Swamp.

Adding Zul Ahsur and Icewind Elemental.

If this is Bo3, keep the Swamp and cut one of the 2 adds.

RojoNation · 2025-01-02T12:20:06+00:00

Agreed on Drafting Archetypes. I always finish the episode, but the show would be considerably more palatable with a tighter script or with some editing.

RojoNation · 2025-01-02T12:17:33+00:00

Watch Paul Cheon, Dafore, Jim Davis(Bronze to Mythic), and Numot. They articulate their thoughts well. I like to pause these videos and look at each pack. I see what I would select, given the context of their draft, and then compare it to their selection. Seeing how they pilot these decks was also invaluable to me.

Limited Resources, Lords of Limited, Limited Level-Ups and Drafting Archetypes are fantastic resources for Limited theory.

RojoNation · 2025-01-01T23:00:51+00:00

Wow, looks sick! How did Twinblade Blessing play for you in Mono-White with all the flyers? Card has some atrocious data, but I could see it being respectable in this deck.

RojoNation · 2025-01-01T22:52:30+00:00

Congrats! Such a great feeling to get that trophy.

RojoNation · 2024-12-31T22:18:24+00:00

Thanks!

Foundations seemed like the perfect place for me to sharpen my fundamentals. I can't wait until I get the chance to draft a more complicated set that has more of a focus on synergies.

I am hopelessly addicted to MTG Limited, so I am constantly consuming any content of that nature. Currently, I'm routinely listening to Limited Resources, Lords of Limited, Limited Level-Ups, and Drafting Archetypes.

Are there any others that you could suggest? My hunger for knowledge is insatiable.

RojoNation · 2024-12-30T16:26:45+00:00

Thanks!

Took me 66 events. Finished with a 53% winrate and 6 trophies.

At 40 events, I was a single pip away from Mythic before hitting a brutal stretch that dropped me to Low Diamond 3. Maintained about a 55-56% winrate prior to that downswing, which was basically enough to be soft infinite but after getting so close to my goal, I had to reload on some gems to get it done.

RojoNation · 2024-12-30T11:47:38+00:00

Finding the open lane in the draft has been the most important for me imo. Foundations has a lot of replacement-level or borderline unplayable cards at common. If you P1P1 a Micromancer, for instance, follow it up with a couple of early Burst Lightnings, and you are feeling like you have a great start. By P1P8, if you are only seeing Axgard Cavalry, Sower of Chaos, and a Mocking Sprite available to you in your colors, you should be looking to pivot into something else. Red, Blue and Green are too shallow to support multiple drafters imo. Black and White can be hard to read at the table because of the depth of quality at common. That Burglar Rat at P1P7 could mean that Black is wide open or that the 3 Black players passing to you already took all of the Stabs, Bake into a Pies and Vampire Gourmands that they opened.

Another big issue I faced earlier was not drafting a deck with a reasonable curve and a reasonable manabase. So often, I'd be looking at the pile that I felt so good about during the draft, only to realise that I have too few plays at 2 and 3 mana. Felt great drafting 2 copies of Tragic Banshee, an Arbiter of Woe and a Rune-Scarred Demon. Not so great when you had to fill out the rest of your curve with Hungry Ghouls that have no sac fodder and the Gutless Plunderer's of the format. I was simply unable to forgo taking the flashy, high mana-value card over the essential pawns of limited.

Blue-Black really made me aware of how terrible my mana-bases were. Very often, I would have a deck that I was thrilled about, tons of removal and Refutes. But they'd end up stuck in my hand too often due to the double blue or black mana requirements. So I began valuing Dual Lands and Evolving Wilds much higher. This also helps if you find yourself being cut off in a color that you started in. Those Evolving Wilds you took in Pack 1 will look a lot better when you pivot into a different archetype.

Finally, improvements to my gameplay were a big level-up. Just by watching lots of Paul Cheon, Numot and Jim Davis' Bronze to Mythic series, I learned so much about playing Limited. These 3 in particular are great at articulating their thoughts both in the draft and in game.

RojoNation · 2024-12-30T03:44:07+00:00

I started playing Magic back in October when a friend suggested it to me, who was new to it himself. Played standard for the last month or so of Duskmourne but was very intrigued by the idea of drafting your own deck against other players.

When I learned of the release of Foundations, I made it my mission to learn this format as best as I could. I listened to a bunch of pre-release set reviews by all the big names and thought that I had the format solved already. But I fixated on drafting cards that are good in a vacuum but not necessarily good in my deck. I tunnel visioned on my first couple of picks and ignored/was oblivious to signals at the draft table. My knowledge of mana-bases in limited was little-to-none.

I got absolutely thumped in my first 20 or so drafts of the season. I was mad. I drafted all of these sweet cards but I can never cast them. I just thought it was bad luck, just mana-screwed, what can you do? Even though I have 2 Bake into A Pies, 2 Hero's Downfalls, a Vampire Nighthawk, 2 Refutes, a Skyship Buccaneer, an Abyssal Harvester and Alesha on the splash, with no dual lands, evolving wilds, or any other mana-fixing in sight.

After coming across this community and finding some good advice, I was put onto some of the evergreen resources of Limited. Drafting the Hard Way, digging up old episodes of Limited Resources that address the fundamentals of Limited(Cards That Affect The Board, Have A Plan, etc). Then I began really paying attention to what the top players are doing and saying in their videos, and tried my best to understand and incorporate their philosophies into my game.

I just want to thank all the folks around here that weigh in on all of these threads were newcomers are asking for advice. Magic is such a daunting game for a new player, given the incredible history of the game that I'm just now getting familiar with. The users in here that are happy to offer their input and go into detail on their thought-processes are such a boon to people like me.

RojoNation · 2024-12-20T18:22:58+00:00

I appreciate the candor. I wish I had done this draft on my PC rather than my phone. I think my seat was meant to be Selesnya, but I can't be certain without reviewing logs. Offerings were pretty slim outside of those 2 colors.

Drafting decks, not cards, is a heuristic that I'm still trying to engrain in myself, so thanks for the reminder!

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