History of Magic draft

History of Magic is an exciting and skill-intensive draft format. Players begin at the dawn of Magic in 1993, with its plethora of obscenely powerful spells, and progress to the present, drafting cards along the way.

The draft begins with a group of players. Unlike booster drafts, History of Magic drafts do not require exactly eight players. In fact, the flavour of the draft is heavily influenced by the number of players involved.

The draft is comprised of 60 rounds and begins in Alpha/Beta/Unlimited. Each round, each player secretly chooses five cards from their current set, and ranks them 1 through 5 (referred to as "first pick" … "fifth pick"). Once everyone has submitted their picks for the round, the first picks are revealed. Every player whose first pick appears just once among the cards revealed so far this round receives that card; each other player reveals his next pick. These newly revealed cards are checked in the same way. This process is repeated until all players have received a card for the round, or until fifth picks have been examined. Any player who has not received a card after all five picks have been examined does not receive a card for the round.

There are thus three ways that a pick can fail:

• it clashes with another pick revealed at the same time
• the card was involved in a clash earlier in the round
• the card has already been given to another player

At the beginning of each round except the first, each player may elect to advance to the next expert level expansion (with the exception of Alpha/Beta/Unlimited, core sets are not included). This decision is kept private, so players can only guess as to whether others will advance. For example, if a player picked cards from Tempest last round, this round he may advance to Stronghold and pick cards from that set, or he may pick cards from Tempest again.

When advancing, a player must advance exactly one set. While players can only travel forward in time, Time Spiral provides the opportunity to at least feel as though one is going back in time with its "timeshifted" cards. Also, time does not wrap: one cannot reach the most recent expansion and then "advance" to Alpha/Beta/Unlimited. Once you reach the present you must remain there until the end of the draft.

After all 60 rounds have been completed, each player constructs a 60 card decks (with optional 15 card sideboard) using the cards he drafted and any number of basic lands (which may be snow-covered).

First round example

Four players — Bob, Jon, Kai, and Zvi — secretly submit their first round picks. They are as follows:

Bob

1. Ancestral Recall
2. Demonic Tutor
3. Sol Ring
4. Balance
5. Fastbond

Jon

1. Ancestral Recall
2. Demonic Tutor
3. Timetwister
4. Time Walk
5. Mox Sapphire

Kai

1. Ancestral Recall
2. Sol Ring
3. Balance
4. Mana Vault
5. Winter Orb

Zvi

1. Fastbond
2. Timetwister
3. Tropical Island
4. Counterspell
5. Power Sink

Here's the outcome of the first round:

Bob

1. Ancestral Recall (clashes with Jon's first pick and Kai's first pick)
2. Demonic Tutor (clashes with Jon's second pick)
3. Sol Ring (already drafted this round by Kai)
4. Timetwister (already drafted this round by Jon)
5. Fastbond (already drafted this round by Zvi)

Jon

1. Ancestral Recall (clashes with Bob's first pick and Kai's first pick)
2. Demonic Tutor (clashes with Bob's second pick)
3. Timetwister

Kai

1. Ancestral Recall (clashes with Bob's first pick and Jon's first pick)
2. Sol Ring

Zvi

1. Fastbond

Bob opted for picking five of the most powerful cards in Alpha/Beta/Unlimited, but came unstuck here and ended up missing out on a card for the round altogether. This means that he will draft at most 59 cards in this event. He may, however, advance to Arabian Nights in the second round.

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