This is my first Trial by Frost draft deck. The draft itself was pretty messy, but I came away having learned a lot about the set for limited.
The draft
This is about on par with an average common, but I'll take any unique!
I started the draft with a solid Ebenezer Scrooge (U), passing on Fen & Crowbar. I took it mainly because it was a unique, but I was also happy to bias towards Ordis with in hopes of picking up Sigismar & Wingspan as a hero. I took an early Mobile Armory (R) to go with it but didn’t see other strong Ordis cards for the rest of the pack.
Kojo & Booda came in at either P1p2 or P1p3, and I was happy to secure a strong hero this early. I also took a Fire Rabbit (R) and several Axiom cards.
Demeter (C) is worth speculating on Muna for.
In the middle of the pack, I saw two Demeters, one (C) and one (F), which I grabbed as powerful late-game bombs. I noted that I was passing strong Lyra cards by taking each of them. That on top of the early Fen I had passed meant I was likely sending my neighbor to the left into Lyra.
Seeing this P1p11 is an unmistakable signal that Lyra is open.
Nearing the end of P1, I was most certain about Bravos and looking to be Ordis and Axiom as well. For P1p11, The Snowman (C) was one of the two cards left in the pack. I had sensed that Lyra was open from the right, but it still surprised me to see such a strong common so late. I had taken no Lyra cards, so I passed it, hoping to solidify my neighbor on the left into Lyra in order to get better cards from other factions.
I also hadn’t been passed any Yzmir cards worth taking, so I would be extremely unlikely to jump into the faction.
At the beginning of P2, I picked up an early third Demeter (C), which kept the Muna-Bravos Demeter on table.
Early P2 isn't too late to move into a new faction.
Around P2p3/p4, I saw Persephone (F) still in the pack. Despite having stubbornly ignored Lyra from the right, I couldn’t pass up such a strong card that had great synergy with my Demeters. From this point, I started taking Lyra cards whenever they were the best in the pack.
I picked up a Vaike, Energy Pioneer (R) early in P2 but noticed very little Axiom in the rest of the pack. I also picked up a second Ordis Liaison (C) but continued to only see weak Ordis cards.
By the end of the pack I had nearly given up on Axiom and Ordis. I had the most Bravos cards and had pivoted into Muna and Lyra. It took me a while to get there, but these factions were the three that best supported Demeter.
The rest of the draft was pretty straightforward, with me taking the strongest card from Bravos, Lyra, and Muna. I took solid 2-drops like Bravos Trailblazer (C) and Haven Seiringar (C) very highly.
At the end of the draft, I found out that my neighbor to the left was predictably in Lyra. Both of my neighbors were in Axiom, which explains why I got pushed out of the faction. My neighbor to the right wasn’t in Ordis, and the player two spots over was only minimally Ordis, so the faction wasn’t closed off, I just didn’t see many strong Ordis cards.
Uniques
Ebenezer Scrooge: 3/7
This provides a fair rate for both the stats and the sabotage. Sigismar can get extra value if you can break the symmetry by taxing an opponent’s reserve more than your own. There’s a bit of anti-synergy with the from-reserve sabotage, since the card you’re sabotaging would have cost 1 more anyway.
The deck
This is a Bravos-Lyra-Muna deck that found its factions a bit late and is playing a few underwhelming cards as a result; I barely made playables.
The best thing the deck has going for it is four copies of Demeter (C/F), which is a late-game powerhouse if she sticks around for just one extra turn. Eat-Me Energy Bars plays well with Demeter: if it makes her gigantic, she’ll stick around if either of the expeditions she moves into are in forest.
I drafted around Demeter wherever I could, picking up a Geyser (C) for ramp and Persephone (F) for region manipulation, but I didn’t see much beyond that.
The rest of the deck is filled out with solid tempo cards. Kojo & Booda and the three copies of Fire Rabbit mean I’ll likely be in the lead by the mid-game, which gives me some breathing room to drop Demeter.
Takeaways
Because of Kojo and Booda and a high concentration of on-rate 1, 2, and 3-drops, Bravos is looking like the strongest tempo faction in Trial by Frost limited.
Don’t double-down on a bad draft decision. I passed many strong Lyra cards in P1, but I shouldn’t have mentally locked myself out of playing Lyra as a result. There’s no world where I shouldn’t have taken the P1p11 The Snowman (C), especially because it’s so easy to splash a third faction in Altered draft. If anything, this was a sign that P3 would be full of strong Lyra cards for me.
While Sigismar & Wingspan are still the strongest hero, Ordis is not an especially strong faction in Trial by Frost draft. Many of the commons support the if-behind/defender theme, which is rough since limited revolves around tempo. I thought Ordis wasn’t open because I wasn’t seeing many cards I wanted, but it turned out neither of my two neighbors to the right were meaningfully in Ordis; there just weren’t that many strong cards to begin with.
Bravos-Lyra-Muna is a faction combination that’s worth trying to be in if you’re drafting around Demeter. Muna and Bravos offer Demeter herself. Muna and Lyra offer region manipulation. Bravos and Lyra offer Eat-Me Energy Bars.
The games
Featured game: Round 2
Round 1 (W): Basira & Kaizaimon (Bravos-Muna-?)
Fire Rabbit (C) and a 2-drop earned me a 2-0 on D1. Booda helped me trade on D2, but being the first player meant I had to wait until D3 to Geyser (C) a Yeti (C). Fortunately, replaying the Fire Rabbit was enough to win its expedition and maintain my lead.
With Demeter (C), this provided 6/5/5 for 2 mana.
When Demeter (C) came down on D5 and took her side, she moved into a forest region to remain eternal. That meant I could play Eat Me Energy Bars (R) on the following day to give her gigantic and flood the other side to overwhelmingly get the final progression I needed.
Round 2 (W): Gulrang & Tocsin moths (Muna-Ordis-Yzmir)
I didn’t have a 3-drop or a 1-drop, but a Bravos Trailblazer (C) was enough to trade on D1 against Pamola (C). My opponent’s Gulrang-boosted Moth to a Flame (R) on D2 narrowly prevented me from winning both sides, but I was still able to 1-0 to extend my lead.
My opponent was able to trigger this for a 3/3/3 every turn.
On the following day, they dropped The Nilam, Withered Tree (C) to generate a 3/3/3 defender Mana Moth and set up for their future turns. They exhausted my Fire Rabbit (C), but I was able to play Nyala, Gifted Conjurer (C) to swap it with my other Fire Rabbit (C) in hand, then play it to the empty expedition to 2-0 again. Getting these four progressions early was crucial, since Gulrang was getting ever closer to the 8 mana mark.
On D4, I had Demeter (C) in hand. On one side, a non-forest region was active with a forest region upcoming, but my opponent could block her on board with Pamola’s support ability and Moth to a Flame from reserve.
Instead, I played Demeter alongside Booda into a forest region with a non-forest region upcoming. My opponent could go all out blocking me, only to keep Demeter around for another turn, or they could let me progress. I was okay with either.
Like Open the Gates, Flutter of Moths is a compelling reason to draft Gulrang.
They opted to block: they spent Pamola’s support ability to exhaust my Fire Rabbit and make a Mana Moth due to The Nilam, then played a discounted Flutter of Moths (R) to shut me down with an additional 9/9/9 in defender stats.
I remember the next keep being very tricky, especially considering that my opponent would likely have a way to exhaust either my Fire Rabbit or Nyala. Their Jack Frost (R) ended up targeting the Fire Rabbit. I slow-rolled with an Icebound Peak (C). They felt pressured to Blizzard (C) my Demeter, which turned off the Eat Me Energy Bars (C) I was hoping to play. However, since they had to tap out, I could play Nyala to swap the Eat Me Energy Bars for the Fire Rabbit and give me enough stats to trade expeditions, now only two away from victory.
My opponent’s defender turned off on D6, but I was the first player, so I was free to play Demeter from reserve, getting the second trial counter on my Icebound Peak. I briefly thought there might be an option to get additional value by forking my opponent between expeditions. The risk was that if Demeter failed to move into the upcoming forest region, she would lose eternal. After mathing it out, Flutter of Moths alone represented too many stats, so I placed Demeter alongside Booda.
This generated 9/9/9 in stats for 3 mana.
They replayed Jack Frost on the other side but placed the Mana Moth contesting Demeter while also getting a discount on their Flutter of Moths. I had no characters in reserve, but the Fire Rabbit (C) I had returned to hand was able to get my third trial counter and pop the Icebound Peak. This created the 5/5/5 Dragon Shade, then boosted all four characters in the expedition for an insane 18/17/16.
My opponent could only get up to 12/12/12, so they had to accept the 1-1 trade and let my Demeter stick around.
This generated 12/12/12 in boosted Mana Moths and forced a sacrifice on my 8/7/7 Demeter.
As the first player on 9 mana, they played a Winter Nova (R) to force me to sacrifice my Demeter then create 6/6/6 worth of Mana Moths on each side. I had kept another Demeter (C/F) and Saskia, Sly Naturalist (C) to boost her to take one expedition for the win.
Had my opponent had a 1-drop (or 1 more mana), they would have been able to pass priority long enough for an even more devastating Winter Nova. Thankfully I won on this day; if I needed just one more progression, my opponent’s late-game value would have almost certainly shut me out indefinitely, despite them being massively behind on the adventure track.
Round 3 (W): Sigismar & Wingspan control (Lyra-Ordis-Yzmir)
Fire Rabbit (R) and Booda helped me get off to a quick 2-0 against Sigismar’s Chrysalis (C).
My opponent leading with Hound (C) on 4 mana meant the Geyser (C) I kept in my opener was dead in hand; they could have just replayed it to 2-0 with their Ordis Recruit. I ended up putting the Geyser (C) into mana on a later turn. Their Hound was blocking a forest region, so I replayed my Bravos Trailblazer (R) against it just to 0-1.
No upcoming forest regions meant I had to wait a turn to get Demeter (C) down, but when my opponent’s Ebenezer Scrooge (R) taxed me out of my Nyala, Gifted Conjurer (C) play, I reluctantly played out a non-eternal Demeter. Fortunately, that was enough to 1-0.
When I replayed Demeter, this time she stuck around and later forced my opponent to Sleight of Hand (R) a Blizzard (C) into reserve to deal with her. My hand was awkward enough that I couldn’t hold up enough mana to play any more than a Fire Rabbit (C), so I had to accept a trade.
Eros (C) with a Repotter Otter (C) into perfect regions made it so that my opponent could at best trade despite me tapping out immediately. When I tried to slow-roll Eros on the following day, they exhausted it with Belasenka (C), forcing me to play a non-eternal Demeter, which fortunately still won one side.
Their Hypothermia (F) let them stay in the game when I tapped out for Eros (C) into Demeter (C), but it left them with stats they couldn’t deal with on the following turn, when I had no trouble going 2-0 for the win.