Okay, finally worked through my crippling Valheim addiction in time for a new set to drop. Strixhaven is built around five colleges, each a separate two-color pair. My assumption is that drafting this is going to be similar to the most recent Ravnica blocks, where finding the open guild is rather important. As such, it’s important to have a strong sense of the best commons in each color AND each college.

Best in Color

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It’s tricky picking out the key monocolored cards as you want to try and find the ones that would play well in both colleges. I went for the basics: 2-for-1s, removal, and/or raw power. Each color (except blue naturally) has a decent removal spell that is pretty flexible and reasonably priced. I also gave extra consideration to efficient 2-drops, hence the Illustrious Historian. Outside of that, I think that Essence Infusion, enabling attacks with a big lifegain swing, is too efficient to ignore. And the Professor of Zoomancy putting down 5/4 worth of stats for 4-mana is quite the value proposition.

Best College Cards

In order to prevent drafting-on-rails, it looks like Wizards tried to give each college two different things to do.

Prismari: fast attack or big spells

Lorehold: c.a.b.s. pressure or graveyard value

Witherbloom: sacrifice or lifegain

Silverquill: Aerial attacks or +1/+1 counters

Quandrix: 8-lands or fractal growth

Then there’s an additional complexity of the hybrid mana options at common. Each college has a creature, a Lesson that summons, and a random spell. For example, Lorehold has:

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Obviously these spells are easiest to cast in RW, but both Prismari and Silverquill could cast with some difficulty (double-pipped cards are annoying but not inconceivable). So let’s dig into each college’s commons and see What’s up.

Lorehold

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Lorehold has efficient creatures, a minor payoff from graveyard shenanigans and a looter on steroids. I think the combat trick will overperform, just don’t underestimate single-mana tricks. Aside from that I think the Pledgemage is the strongest, though I could see Silverquill also valuing that card since it wears +1/+1 counters so well.

prismari

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I think Spectacle Mage will always be prioritized in UR since it’s aggressive and helps cast the mega-spells. I also think Elemental Summoning will play better than it reads. Normally 5-mana for a vanilla 4/4 is pretty blah, but since it turns on every Magecraft *and* benefits from the handful of cheapening cards (like Spectacle Mage)

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It is interesting that the cards that the ‘fractal’ synergies are all sitting at common: Biomathematician, Summoning, and Square Up. That said, I’m not convinced that’s where you’ll always want to be in Quandrix. I think the reliable card advantage of Eureka and the flexibility of the Needlethorn Drake will always be reliable.

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Note: I can’t find the hybrid spell for Silverquill. Strange! Anyway, with the exception of the weak 3/3 flier, I think all of these cards are pretty powerful. Spiteful Squad is a great 4-drop that can stabilize the board and also provide value in death with zero work. The real question is how good Exhilarating Elocution turns out to be. Inspired Charge is meh, but having two +1/+1 counters is pretty big game, especially if it turns a 2/1 flying token into a 4/3 beater.

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The college Signals

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