For the second draft of the day, I covered Adam Prosak, a well-known player who has reached the Top 8 of multiple $10Ks. I’ve listed the cards in the order in which I’d take them, with Adam’s choices in bold.

Big Barda; Super Strength; Superman, Clark Kent

Narrow Escape; Prankster; Izaya ◊ Highfather; Forager

Hordes of Apokolips; Female Furies; Path of Destruction; Superman, Kal-El

A third-pick Hordes here would have been the best choice, as Big Barda can be splashed in any deck. Even with the second-pick Izaya (a choice that I didn’t fully agree with), it was early enough to switch teams or choose to play New Gods and Darkseid. Furthermore, with Hordes already being passed by the two people on his right, there was a good chance that he would be fed even more good Darkseid cards later. However, since he didn’t take the Hordes, any Darkseid cards that come along later would lose value.

Izaya ◊ Highfather; Forager; Eradicator, Doctor David Connor; Hordes of Apokolips

Eradicator, Soul of Krypton; Big Bear; Metron

Metron; Fastbak; Boom Tube

Superman, Clark Kent; LexCorp; Men of Steel

Vykin; Gog; Trok; Darkseid, Uxas

The Source

Prankster; Gangbuster

Scorn

Eradicator, Doctor David Connor

Massacre

Desaad

Adam took a different approach to pack 1 than most players. Most people prefer to take support cards over characters, but Adam did the opposite, and it gave him a strong base of characters to build upon. However, he certainly needed a team-up and some good support cards.

Superman, Clark Kent; Kara Zor-El ◊ Supergirl; Armagetto; Boom Tube

Adam’s second pack was quite lackluster, and at that point, he certainly had to be kicking himself for not switching to Darkseid’s Elite with a third-pick Hordes.

Metropolis; Escape Artist; Forager; Professor Emil Hamilton

Cadmus Labs; Escape Artist; Cir-El ◊ Supergirl; Prankster

Superman, Red; LexCorp; Metron; Mark Moonrider

Narrow Escape; Forager; Omega Beams

Female Furies; Back to Back; Cir-El ◊ Supergirl

Prankster; Scorn; Mark Moonrider; Connor Kent ◊ Superboy, Tactile Telekinetic

Superman Robots; Play Time; Alpha Centurion

Mark Moonrider; Blockbuster; Boom Tube

Escape Artist; Men of Steel

Escape Artist; Superman Robots; Play Time

LexCorp; Serifan

Omega Beams

Mr. Mxyzptlk

Adam picked up his necessary team-up in his second pick and finally grabbed some support cards in Cadmus Labs, Narrow Escape, and Female Furies. He then had some great late picks with back-to-back Escape Artists. Going into pack 3, Adam was looking pretty good, needing a 3-drop, three 5-drops, a 6-drop, a 7-drop, and four support cards for what I’d consider to be an ideal deck. The 5-drops could be the only place where he’d get into trouble.

I Hate Magic!; Metropolis; Stopped Cold; Superman, Kal-El; Phantom Zone Projector; Eradicator, Soul of Krypton

Adam opened a monster third pack with six great, playable cards. It upset him to get so many great cards in one pack, but that’s certainly better than none.

Cadmus Labs; Superman Robots; John Henry Irons ◊ Steel; Boom Tube

Devilance; Back to Back; Scorn

Big Bear; Serifan; John Henry Irons ◊ Steel

Back to Back; Superman Robots; Blockbuster; Armagetto

Remember what I said about switching to Darkseid? Adam’s deck would have been amazing, but hindsight is 20/20, and regardless, Adam’s deck was shaping up well. However, the player at the table who did draft Darkseid would be hard pressed to lose a game.

Forager; Orion, True Son of Darkseid, Men of Steel; Gog

Devilance; Lois Lane; Superman, Clark Kent; Beta Club

John Henry Irons ◊ Steel; LexCorp

Gog; Metron

John Henry Irons ◊ Steel; Play Time

Kara Zor-El ◊ Supergirl; Scorn

Detective Work

Bizarro World

Roy Harper ◊ Speedy

After filling in his curve with some great characters such as double Devilance who can be played as a 5- or 7-drop, Adam finished with some great rare drafting. As Adam filled out his decklist, I had time to put together what I’d play with given the cards he drafted.

2s: Vykin; Gangbuster; Serifan

3s: Superman, Red; 2 Mark Moonrider; Big Bear

4s: 2 Izaya ◊ Highfather; 2 Superman, Clark Kent

5s: Scorn; Forager; 2 Devilance

6s: Big Barda; Superman, Kal-El; Kara Zor-El ◊ Supergirl

7s: Eradicator, Soul of Krypton

Support cards: Metropolis; Narrow Escape; Female Furies; 2 Escape Artist; I Hate Magic!; 2 Cadmus Labs; The Source; Back to Back; Play Time

I would play only one 7-drop, because Devilance can double as one, thus providing room for extra support cards. I like The Source, because although its primary ability is nigh useless, it allows you to see your opponent’s entire hand and deck, which can be great information. You can count the number of support cards left in the deck and in the opponent’s hand to determine within one or two how many useable cards he or she has in the support row.

Adam’s final deck was the following.

2s: Vykin; Gangbuster; Serifan

3s: Superman, Red; 2 Mark Moonrider; Big Bear

4s: 2 Izaya ◊ Highfather; 2 Superman, Clark Kent, Fastbak

5s: Scorn; Forager; 2 Devilance

6s: Big Barda; Superman, Kal-El; John Henry Irons ◊ Steel

7s: Eradicator, Soul of Krypton, Gog

Support cards: Metropolis; Narrow Escape; Female Furies; 2 Escape Artist; I Hate Magic!; 2 Cadmus Labs; Back to Back

I asked Adam what his impressions of the pod were, and he told me that he felt the pod had a lot of strong players, yet he was surprised at the number of quality cards that were being passed around. I would agree with that, and not having seen the other players’ drafts, I can only surmise that they’re stronger Constructed than Limited players (as many players tend to be). I also asked Adam about his atypical strategy of drafting characters over support cards early. He said that it wasn’t usually his strategy, but in his first pod, he had a difficult time getting his curve, so he wanted to make sure he didn’t have that problem this time. However, the two drafts were of two different sets, MMK being one in which acquiring a good curve is more difficult than in other sets. Regardless, when it was the strategy of most to draft support cards first and characters later, it wasn’t necessarily a bad strategy to do the opposite. That’s something I’m interested in testing myself in the future.

Considering the number of powerful Darkseid cards Adam passed, I asked him about his third-pick, first-pack passing of Hordes of Apokolips. He too was surprised at the number of quality Darkseid cards going around, but he had never had luck drafting that team, and that was why he passed up the third-pick Hordes.

Adam was happy with his deck, and he predicted winning at least two games with it. I agreed that it was a strong deck and that he would only have problems if he went up against the pod’s Darkseid deck, or if he unluckily missed his drops.

Click here to see Adam's draft deck in action in his Round 16 Feature Match!