Was thinking about Drafting today in Destiny. I had searched for topics but only found topics that were a few months old so figured I'd start a new one.

I figure you would probably need open 2 or even 3 boosters each round to have enough cards to pass around.

First step, open packs, and inspect dice - ensure that all dice match the card - and that there are no misprints. Then put all dice in the center of the table, or in a bucket or something so nobody can see them (Leave them in the cardboard).

Then combine your packs and pick one, pass left, etc.

Probably need to do like 2 rounds? maybe 3?

The problem would be if you get really unlucky and get no characters. Or suppose you get ONE character and it's a weak character like a 1st order stormtrooper. How do you fix this? the best way to ensure that characters are fair would be to bring your own characters - but doesn't that kind of cheapen the draft experience? What what good are heroes then when you open them during a draft? If I open a Legendary Darth Vader booster during a draft, but I've brought light-side heroes, then well...

Or do you have a rule that each person can have only 1 character? Once you draft a character you must pass all future characters? That couldn't work either really - suppose you open a stormtrooper and pass because you are hoping for something better - but just don't see any characters the rest of the draft.

Or do you simply do less boosters, but insist that each player also bring one of each Starter and have to pick one to use, so they will at least have a certain baseline to begin deck construction?

I'm thinking of something along the lines of allowing players to bring up to 1 copy of each non-unique character. That should allow decent deck construction no matter what gets drafted.

The more I think about it, the more I think drafting is a bad idea for this game. If I open a booster with Luke or Vader in it (and I don't have those cards yet) I'm standing up and leaving! lol All kidding aside, I think drafting could be done in this game, but in a way that is very different (and maybe isn't really drafting). Destiny is not a MTG clone nor does it want to be. It needs something different.

What if you brought with you 10 cards, characters, and a location. Then you purchase 4 (or 5) boosters. After opening your boosters there will be a trade period before the tournament begins. Here you can openly trade with your fellow gamers to help build your 20 card deck (for tournament play I would suggest 20 card decks instead of 30. This will make it easier to build decks and promote faster games.) If a free trade turns out to be too chaotic, or the less outgoing are put at a disadvantage, then a draft of sorts could be created. A set amount of cards (and a required number of cards with dice) must be contributed by each player to participate. The dice are placed in the center, and all the cards are shuffled into "packs" to be distributed among the players to start a more traditional draft. This would allow players to keep the cards they REALLY want and draft for cards that they need.

I really want to find a different way to draft and play this game. Its strengths should be used to create a great (and different) experience for everyone.

Suppose each player can bring a single die version of each character that comes in a starter - so you can bring a 1 Die Finn, Rey, Kylo, and 1st order Stormtrooper, as well as each starter location - Now any characters you draft can be fielded in addition to what you've brought.

Looking over the dicemasters rules for rainbow draft and knowing a pack of dicemasters is $1 for 2 dice and 2 cards... I'm inclined to think that some sort of hybrid system is in order.

Do you just get starter characters? Probably should get those at least. Dicemasters says to bring the basic function dice to your draft.

Magic says 8 people around a table, with packs of 15 cards. Again, roughly $12 cost of entry and you "bring your own lands" (basic function of the game)

Magic drafts end up with 2/3 of a "standard deck" size after draft.

$12 of SWD would be 4 boosters per player, bringing along the basic items of the game. I think you'd probably at least need a starter to get the rest of it to augment your deck. Or have both starters and choose which one to add in.

Taking in all that I'm going to try this with my booster box and a buddy:

Put in 4 packs per player to draft. Open them all up, set them aside. Put the characters aside and shuffle. Draft characters first (I have some ways for 2 player drafts, but this could be any way you choose), then draft the rest of the cards. Augment the drafted cards into your starter set and play. 20 point character limit, 20 cards limit in deck.

I haven't gone through everything, but are there enough gray cards to function as "starter" cards if you had both sets?

Suppose each player can bring a single die version of each character that comes in a starter - so you can bring a 1 Die Finn, Rey, Kylo, and 1st order Stormtrooper, as well as each starter location - Now any characters you draft can be fielded in addition to what you've brought.

What if your packs are heavy with yellow villain cards, or red hero cards?

i've been thinking about this myself.

my idea is:

1. you choose 21pts of characters.

2. build a deck of 10 or 20 cards following standard rules. the amount can warry depending on how many boosters you will open.

3. choose 1 battlefield.

then at the event you sit down with the others and draft the cards.

after the drafting you can switch characters if you drafted any one (not sure if it should open up to 30pts or stay at 21pts.)

then you add cards into the deck until its 30 cards, ignoring all decbuilding rules. like you have only blue hero characters but now you can add red and yellow cards and villain cards.

finally you can switch out the battlefield.

i know it's not like mtg draft bu i think this could be a fun way to do it.

The problem with limited is the strict deck building rules and the way the product is packaged. I think FFG is going to have to find a way reduce or do away with entirely one if not both of these limitations.

One way to make it more viable is to do away with the color restrictions and/or faction restrictions. This could prove a point of contention for fans or theme oriented players. A potentially bigger issue is that FFG may not have balanced the game to allow for these changes.

Another option would be to produce villain and hero boosters. Players could bring a starter then supplement it with boosters of the appropriate faction. There would still need to be some details worked out to make sure everyone could still build a legal deck.

Or maybe FFG already has some creative solution ready to put in place.

The main problem I have is that not each pack contains a character:

If you (out of 6 packs) pull 1 night sister, 1 milenium falcon, 2 outposts, a scout and a survival gear, you're not gonna have a good time.

Lukas Litzsinger and his team are looking into drafting to make that possible or denying it all together. Source:team covenant video 1 of the many

A buddy and I tried this today: drafting with two people

We each opened up 5 packs simulating a $15 draft

7 characters - 4 heroes, 3 villians

If we drafted along those lines, him hero and me villian, we each ended up with 15-16 cards of that type, and there were 4 battlefields and 12 neutral cards left.

Rochester drafting may be best on this if you're doing 2 player. But you definitely want to draft characters first.

If we also used our starter cards (all the gray ones) to augment the deck, there would not be enough cards if we chose red and yellow characters. We would be forced to play blue cards (and characters). You could easily say "play 2 characters" and draft/build, but there probably won't be enough to actually build a 20 card deck if you don't play either Kylo, Rey, or a drafted blue character.

4 packs might scale well up to 8 people because you could essentially "box draft". 5 would be a little better for more characters, but who knows so far.

Will try something else later while spitballing ideas, but I'm off to paint for the day. Any other ideas on drafting?