Since the release of Battle for Zendikar, I have only had the chance to play with the limited and sealed formats thus far, and other than my success at the pre-release, my other decks I have drafted haven’t been that incredible to say the least. Not that the decks weren’t good, it was more the fact that I personally don’t feel I had configured the decks correctly and I am sure I could do much better if I were to draft those particular archetypes again.

However, today was a different story. I tried something I hadn’t tried yet in the current format. I ended up opening seeing a lot of cards like Coastal Discovery, Roil Spout and Sheer Drop alongside a load of flying creatures going around the table, which I took immediately. My initial thoughts were to draft UW  Awaken and see how it went but I kept getting past a lot of fairly decent creatures in Black like Silent Skimmer and Malakir Familiar. It wasn’t until I managed to pick up 2 copies of Drana’s Emissary that I was locked into Esper. A card I wish I was able to pick up a few more copies of was Halimar Tidecaller, being able to pull cards like Ruinous Path and Coastal Discovery out of my graveyard and then recasting them a turn later felt extremely powerful.

My second pack contained a Lantern Scout and my third contained a Ruinous Path, both of these cards found a slot in my deck immediately and both were absolute powerhouses when I found them. Another card that I found was particularly useful was Stasis Snare. It was able to take out my opponents’ threats as well as slowing them down enough in the early game for my deck really to come into full swing.

The power of the awaken mechanic became apparent to me during the event and I can tell you that casting Roil Spout and Sheer Drop for their awaken costs are such massive blows to your opponents and really just pushes you even further out of reach.

Overall the deck performed way beyond my expectations and if I believed the colours were open, I would have no doubts in drafting this deck again. The evasion from the creature base combined with the power of the Awaken mechanic just pushed the deck over the edge and the deck took the win for me, so I couldn’t have asked for more. The decklist I constructed is below and I would highly recommend trying to draft something similar if you think it’s open to you.

Esper Awaken:

Instants/Sorceries                                                                                  Enchantments

2x Sheer Drop                                                                                           2x Stasis Snare

1x Ruinous Path                                                                                        1x Tightening Coils

2x Roil Spout                                                                                              Lands

2x Coastal Discovery                                                                                 5x Island

2x Spell Shrivel                                                                                           5x Plains

1x Smite the Monstrous                                                                            4x Swamp

Creatures                                                                                                   1x Evolving Wilds

1x Halimar Tidecaller                                                                                 2x Skyline Cascade

2x Drana’s Emissary

1x Cloud Manta

2x Silent Skimmer

1x Lantern Scout

1x Serene Steward

1x Malakir Familiar

1x Courier Griffin