Finally some success in this format. The draft started off pretty strong with a pack 1 pick 1 Kaya's Wrath followed up by a pick 2 Orzhov Enforcer over a Gruul Spellbreaker. I don't recall what I picked next but then pick 4 I got passed the Gates Ablaze and I knew that I should probably try out drafting a gates deck. It felt wrong just picking up guildgates and passing very playable spells, but I basically only took gate payoffs over guildgates for a long stretch of the draft. The result was pretty powerful, since I was able to take pretty much any card I wanted in the later half of the draft. Pack 2 I picked up a Godless Shrine since it fit with the 5-color fixing theme, and pack 3 I opened Biogenic Ooze. No one seemed to be in Rakdos, and I made out with three Get the Point and three Goblin Gathering as well as a Fireblade Artist, which actually wheeled somehow. I got some major damage in with Fireblade Artist just sacrificing endless Goblin tokens while the board would stall. If things were shifting out of my favor, I used Gates Ablaze and/or Kaya's Wrath. If I took some big damage early in the game, I just gained 10-12 life back with Archway Angel. With two copies of Open the Gates as well as a bunch of card draw/scry effects, I never had any problems getting the mana I needed to cast pretty much anything at any time. Eight gates weren't really enough to reliably trigger Gateway Sneak, but they still drew me a few cards in the games I played them, so I can't complain.
The deck wound up being very strong, and I didn't really struggle to go 3-0-0 (6-0-0). The deck just has so much value, getting three or even four-for-ones with the board wipes and multiple Goblin Gathering tended to keep the pressure from the opponent very manageable. The format seems to be about big power plays, more about muscle than finesse. The best cards really do start at 4 mana and only get more expensive, and I think this is to allow for gates coming in tapped. I think I was approaching this format the wrong way previously, worrying about curving out and staying lean with the 2- and 3-drops. This isn't that sort of format. My deck had two 2-drops, for example, and I didn't miss them at all. It's almost as if nothing you play before turn four even really matters for the rest of the game, so you might as well play tapped mana, so long as you can make a big swing back afterward in case the opponent is trying to rush you down, but there's no Boros analog to punish you for not having chump blockers early. Relax, it's fall on Ravnica, just let your fatties do the heavy lifting...
