The Hobbit Draft Guide: Off to Victory!

Want to prepare for an unexpected draft? This early version of The Hobbit Draft Guide is at your service!

Below, you’ll find all the big picture stuff you need to know about the format, such as best commons, archetype overview, deck examples, and a tier list. Ideally, this should will help you win more games and get you up to speed with everything that’s going on.

Without further ado, it’s time to set out on our journey!

UPDATE: (August 20th) The set’s been around for a couple of weeks — time for a major update. The format was much faster than expected, so a lot of changes were made. While some minor shifts might happen, the vast majority of information below will still be true.

What’s Going On With The Hobbit Draft?

The Hobbit is a small set. This means there are only 193 cards as opposed to 276 with most modern era sets. (Recently, the two small sets were Spider-Man and Ninja Turtles.)

This means that there are only 5 supported archetypes. Each archetype is tied to a specific mechanic. So, instead of our usual mechanic overview, we’ll discuss those in the Archetypes section.

• White-blue: Humans with recruit
• Red-white: Dwarves with storied
• Black-red: Goblins with amass
• Black-green: Wolves with ferocious
• Green-blue: Elves with landfall

The problem with small sets is that if one archetype is weak, you’re left with just four main options. (In a regular set, that would still allow for nine other archetypes.) Sadly, that is the case for The Hobbit draft.

Fast Format

The largest reason for that is the format’s speed. It’s the fastest draft format since Phyrexia: All Will Be One. So, your deck needs to affect the board early — there’s no time to mess around.

Consequently, green-blue deck suffers from that. It’s whole shtick is to play a long game, using slightly overcosted cards that provide card advantage. Unfortunately, that’s not the winning strategy, as we’ll further discuss below.

One last thing to note — the draft format should work well with pick-two draft, but also as a regular 8-player pod. Which one is used depends on the store, but if you’re playing on Arena, you get to choose.

Best Commons for The Hobbit Draft

When you draft a new set, it’s easy to be overwhelmed with multiples options, as you need to read all the cards before the timer runs out. Thus, it can be helpful to recognize the good commons at glance.

This way, you only need to compare them to higher rarity cards instead of examining every card. Anyhow, here are the commons you want to pay attention to.

White

1. Patient Instructor

We’re starting with a hybrid card, so a quick note about these. We decided to put them by a color with fewer strong commons. While they are at their best in decks that use both of their colors, they can easily fit in a deck that uses only one.

Anyhow, Patient Instructor plays great, which showcases just how strong recruit is. Most of the time you’ll want the additional body, but sometimes you’ll also discard that extra land.

A hybrid card being the best white common also reflects the fact that white commons are somewhat weak overall.

2. Magnificent End

Given how fast and aggressive the format is, getting the discount isn’t that hard. Sure, it’s not the greatest card to deal with blockers, but the card deals with attackers so efficiently, you’ll still happily play it.

3. Dwarven Provisioner

Every deck needs two mana plays, but the ones that are also relevant in the late game are especially strong. Provisioner is one of those, as buffing your whole team is a big deal.

Sadly, it’s not as great as it would be in some other formats. As mentioned, The Hobbit drafts are really fast, and activating it twice in a turn happens less often than you might expect.

Still, it is a neat two mana play, as sometimes your opponents won’t even block your creatures, in fear of this activation. In that case, you don’t even need to use it, but simply play another spell in your second main phase.

Blue

1. Plunder the Trollshaws

Two mana to draw a card isn’t good and neither is paying four to draw two. But once you tack both effects to a single card, you end up with a really strong draw spell.

It’s somewhat surprising that this plays so well in such an aggressive format, but a lot of that comes from its synergies. It’s an excellent card to discard to recruit effects — you get the 1/1 token and a draw two spell for later.

Furthermore, it plays well with Lakeshore Apothecary, which is a relevant two drop for blue decks, but more about it later. So, whenever you’re playing blue, you won’t mind picking up even multiples of this card.

2. Bilbo Baggins, Burglar

In most sets, Bilbo would already be a candidate for the best common in the set. (Not just in blue, but overall.) However, the speed of the format, makes it a bit worse — but not by that much.

It still allows you to set up your draws, put a creature in play and maintain card advantage. Plus, if the game goes longer, it becomes a great topdeck, giving you card selection and advantage.

Even being legendary isn’t that big of a downside, as you can still play the sorcery part. Plus, if you can’t trade of the first Bilbo, you can still cast the second one in a pinch to draw another card.

3. Lakeshore Apothecary

There aren’t that many great two drops, but Apothecary is one of them, even if it seems fragile. The fact that it’s easy to follow it up with other blue recruit cards, makes it a 2/3 on turn 3, which is good enough. Anything more is excellent and not even that hard to do.

This is a relevant board presence and one of the best things to spend two mana on in a blue deck. If your opponent needs to cast a removal spell on this, you’re also content with the exchange.

Honorable Mention

Speaking of recruit cards, Long Lake Nuisance is another great option at common.

Black

1. Crude Bent Blade

The best common in the set, and the biggest over-performer is certainly this equipment. Typically, sacrifice effects aren’t that great, as they’ll remove your opponent’s worse creature. However, this one leaves behind a very relevant equipment.

The +2/+1 buff for just two mana plays so well. It makes any creature into a relevant threat. After your opponent deals with it, you simply attach Blade to another creature.

Once you combine the two effects in a single card, you get a potent effect. Particularly in a format that’s so much about the early board presence.

2. Gollum, Silent Slinker

The adventure part of the card is surprisingly relevant in this format. A single +1/+1 counter can open up a profitable attack, while a couple of life can help you survive one extra combat, which might be all you need to win the race.

Of course, you’re also eventually getting a 4/3 Gollum out of the deal, which can be pretty hard to block.

3. Bilbo’s Deadly Slice

Murder is back, this time with a Bilbo-flavored version. The only downside of this card are the two black mana symbols. This might not seem like much, but sometimes you won’t be able to cast it.

Thus, you’d want to get to at least 10 black sources to properly support the card, but you’ll even play it with fewer. The ability to efficiently deal with any creature is just that good.

Honorable Mentions

We mentioned how good two drops are hard to come by, and Ravening Warg is one of those premium ones. It trades with anything and as mentioned a couple of life can help you swing a race in your favor.

Red

1. Pinecone Strike

Three mana at instant speed for three damage is mighty efficient, as it can easily trade up in mana.

Furthermore, there are ways to bring back creatures, so exile is neat, as is randomly removing a Treasure token. Doesn’t really change how good the card is, but a welcome addition nonetheless.

2. Goblin Plate Mail

A two mana 2/1 with menace is a useful card in an aggressive format. This is pretty similar, but it often plays out even better.

When you attached it to your existing Army, it becomes larger and harder to block. You’ll typically have a safe attack on the turn you play it.

While the equip cost is quite price, it’s still a great effect to access, as it can change the combat math, making it quite annoying for your opponent.

3. Dori, Bearer of Friends

Dori doesn’t need much additional support, as it’s a pretty solid card on its own.

Nevertheless, it does work with your other cards too. It’s a legendary creature that creates an artifact — that’s enough to turn on enduring story, provided you also control a storied card.

Honorable Mentions

Gundabad Opportunist is another common creature that replaces itself. It doesn’t quite draw a card, but given that you can play it until the end of your next turn, you’d usually be able to cash it in.

Green

1. Quarrel

Cheap? Check. Your creature doesn’t take damage? Check. Instant? Check. Power buff? Sadly missing, but this does check most of the boxes for a good green removal spell.

You do need to be careful, so your creature doesn’t get removed in response, though. (In that case it won’t deal damage.)

2. Duskwatch Hunter

Hunter does a lot of small things well enough, so you don’t mind including it in your green (and black) decks.

We’ve mentioned how good a +1/+1 counter can be when discussing Gollum, and they same is true here. You’ll typically put it on another creature and get a safe attack in right away.

Of course, you can also target Hunter itself. Most often when you don’t control other creatures, or when you want to get a 4-powered creature in play for your synergies.

Finally, the line about tokens not being able to block it is surprisingly relevant. The wolf evades both Armies and 1/1 recruit Soldiers.

3. Attercop

The last common is this unassuming spider. It’s a perfectly fine turn two play, as it trades with anything and also powers up your Quarrels.

The attacking boost is also nice, but for the most part you’re playing this card for deathtouch and reach.

The Hobbit Draft Archetypes

As mentioned, these are the five supported 2-color archetypes:

• White-blue: Humans with recruit
• Red-white: Dwarves with storied
• Black-red: Goblins with amass
• Black-green: Wolves with ferocious
• Green-blue: Elves with landfall

As you can see, each one is tied not just to a mechanic, but to a creature type too. (If you read the book, you’ve probably recognized that these are actually the Five Armies. If not do yourself a favor and read it.)

For the most part, it isn’t hard to support archetypes’ synergies. For example, if you simply pick strong blue and white cards, you’ll naturally end up with Humans that recruit.

The only archetype that doesn’t fit that criteria is green-blue, which is simply too weak. Thankfully, the other four archetypes are all pretty solid and fairly balanced. A solid version of any of them can reach seven wins (or go 3-0 in a Traditional Draft).

With that said, let’s take a closer look at those archetypes.

Blue-White: Humans Recruit

Recruit Rules

Whenever a card instructs you to recruit, you draw a card, then discard a card. If you discard a nonland card, you create a 1/1 white Human Soldier token.

This is similar to connive mechanic, except you’re getting a 1/1 creature instead of a +1/+1 counter. As far as draft goes, that’s a relevant upgrade. In the late game, you’ll still typically discard a land card, but earlier, the decision will be much closer.

Better players will have more success with this mechanic, as choosing the wrong card to discard can easily desrease your win rate.

When in doubt, ask yourself: “Do I need this nonland card later, or is the 1/1 token more impactful right now?” Additionally, if you need to keep hitting your land drops, you’re also more inclined to discard a nonland card. (Unless you need to affect the board immediately.)

On its own, recruit is a powerful mechanic and you should value these effects highly. It allows you to improve the quality of cards in your hand, while potentially affecting the board. In a long game, a player who recruited more times is generally favored.

Additional Synergies

There are a few cards that care about drawing cards, but two of them stand out: Lakeshore Apothecary and Bard the Bowman. Recruiting on your turn will trigger them, which is neat. Both of these cards are great counters to opposing aggressive starts.

Lakeshore Apothecary can quickly grow above its mana cost. Thus providing a blocker and attacker, while allowing you to chain card advantage. In the late game, Bard the Bowman can be responsible for a large life swing, completely turning the game around.

Deck Example

This time around, we’re also trying something new. For each archetype we’re also including an example of how a solid deck could look like. These aren’t insanely powerful, but strong enough to reach seven wins in hands of an experienced player.

Ideally, this should give you a good idea of what to aim for and highlight some patterns. (If you enjoy this feature, let us know in the comments, so we keep on doing it.)

As you can see deck isn’t that reliant on rares and uncommons. Of course, you’ll want them, but you are getting a pretty solid package from your common recruit cards too.

Ideally, you’ll want to prevent your opponent from dealing to much damage early, then turn the corner in the late game with all of your card advantage.

Red-White: Dwarves Storied

Storied Rules

Storied cards care if you control at least three artifacts, legendaries or Sagas (in any combination). If you do, you have an enduring story for the rest of the game. This is a boost for your storied cards.

As long as you control a storied card, it checks if the conditions are met. (It doesn’t just check when it comes into play.) Once you get enduring story, you don’t lose it, even if you no longer meet the requirements to achieve it.

Should You Build Around Enduring Story?

It’s easy to see how you can optimize your storied cards. Simply draft a high count of useful artifacts, legendaries and Sagas. However, is building around enduring story something you should even be doing?

Not really — for two reasons. First, it’s pretty easy to achieve it accidentally. Second, the payoffs just aren’t that great.

Sure, Fíli the Pathfinder and Kíli the Resourceful are excellent with enduring story. But they are also really strong without it. That’s the case with most of storied cards. Their become slightly better, it’s not like a card goes from mediocre to insanely powerful once you achieve enduring story.

Dwarf Aggro & Equipment

So, what should you be doing instead? For the most part you should simply draft a good aggressive deck with lots of cheap creatures and strong removal spells.

As far as synergies go, there is some support for Dwarves and equipment, especially at higher rarities. Here are a few examples:

• Dáin’s Company
• Dáin Ironfoot
• Dwalin, Weaponmaster
• Dwarven Mauler
• Dwarven Mattock

Borrowing Themes

One more thing to keep in mind, you should also borrow from other color pairs. For example, don’t avoid good recruit cards (like Celebrate the Mountain-king) just because that’s supposed to be a blue-white’s theme. You can easily utilize them here too.

Of course, this goes for all archetypes, not just this one.

Deck Example

As you can see, this is a typical aggro deck with some minor synergies. Lots of efficient creatures paired with strong removal spells. The deck is slightly more reliant on uncommons, as opposed to blue-white.

When red-white is open, you should definitely draft it, as there are quite a few good red and/or white rares that you might get passed.

Black-Red: Goblins Amass

Amass Goblins Rules

If a card instructs you to amass Goblins X, you put X +1/+1 counters on a Goblin Army you control. If you don’t control one, you create a 0/0 black Goblin Army creature token first.

Essentially, you create an X/X Goblin Army — unless you already control one. In that case, it just gets +X/+X.

Two Uses for Amass

This can be a potent effect in a vacuum, but in this specific draft format, it plays particularly great and allows for different ways to use it.

The main one is to simply add to your existing army. This grants your amass effects pseudo haste. A common curve of: Tidings of War, Goblin Plate Mail, Rage into the Valley, flashback Tidings allows you to attack for:

• 3 damage on turn 2
• 5 damage on turn 3
• 8 damage on turn 4

You also get to draw a card, and put an equipment in play for your “troubles”.

The other option is to feed small armies to various sacrifice effects. (Bolg of the North, Stir Up Trouble, Gollum the Abandoned) This way, each instance of amass generates you a new creature.

Which way you’ll choose depends on how the game plays out, but just know that amass cards are good.

No Lack of Removal

So, these two colors can certainly enable explosive starts in The Hobbit draft. Not just because amass cards and creatures in black-red are strong, but because there’s so much strong removal here.

Red gives you Pinecone Strike, Gandalf, Spark Starter and Burn, Burn, Tree and Fern. Black also isn’t lacking with cards like Gnashing of Teeth, Bilbo’s Deadly Slice, and Crude Bent Blade.

These are all commons and uncommons, so it’s pretty easy to get to a solid red-black deck even without many rares, as you’ll see from the following example.

Deck Example

This is far from the strongest possible black-red deck, but it can already hold it’s own against other archetypes and potentially even win the whole draft. Of course, you’d prefer some additional rares, but if any archetype can get away with only a single one, it’s this one.

That’s another reason why red-black is so good in the Hobbit draft. Its cards are simply good and powerful across all rarities. You’ve good strong creatures, good amass cards, paired with efficient removal. What’s not to like?

Black-Green: Wolves Ferocious

Ferocious Rules

Cards with ferocious improve, if you control a creature with power 4 or greater.

Pretty straightforward mechanic, right? It looks like the same is true for this deck.

Aggro-Midrange Deck With High-Power Creatures

In the past, decks featuring ferocious (or similar mechanics) were essentially just regular midrange decks trying to play more high-power creatures than usual. So far, it seems like this is also the case here, with one small caveat. The deck is more aggressive than it would be in a regular set.

For newer players — midrange decks are typically just a sum of their parts, as they don’t relying much on specific synergies. For the most part, they just play cards that are strong on their own and don’t need additional support.

The only synergies here are that you’ll want to play some creatures with 4+ power. This will turn on your ferocious cards, such as Nasty Little Rabbit.

Furthermore, cards that can permanently buff creature’s power (say Crude Bent Blade, Duskwatch Hunter), can also help.

With more ferocious cards in your deck, you’ll naturally want more creatures with 4+ power. But keep in mind that you still want a good mana curve with lots of two drops. You don’t want to play a ton of expensive creatures just because their high power.

Agressive Payoffs

One reason for that is because there are just six ferocious cards in the set:

• Nasty Little Rabbit
• Nighthowl Pursuer
• Ravening Warg
• Wargling
• The Chief Warg
• Wilderland Scrounger

As you can see, four of these cost two or less mana, and five of them trigger on attacks. This is another reason for why this archetype is a more aggressive midrange deck. After all, most of your cards don’t benefit on blocks. Furthermore, the two cards casting 4+ mana, are significantly weaker the other four payoffs.

This shell is therefore the perfect place for Desolation Prowler. The card is already insanely good on its own, but is also the only two drop that can turn on ferocious on its own.

Deck Example

This deck uses the best ferocious payoffs. Ideally, you’d want to get even more of those, but this is already a solid based. The rest is tied together with good creatures (lots of them with 4+ power) and efficient removal spells.

Blue-Green: Elves Landfall

Landfall Rules

Landfall cards benefit you whenever one of your land enters.

Typically, landfall cards feel great to play. In the late game, even if you’re flooding, at least those lands you’re holding will do something. But of course, the power of landfall effects varies from card to card.

As it turns out, most of these in The Hobbit draft, aren’t quite where you’d want them to be.

What’s the Issue With Blue-Green?

There are multiple reasons for the blue-green’s weakness, but most of them can be tied to the speed of the format.

This is a deck that wants to generate small advantages over the course of a longer game. Given how The Hobbit draft is the fastest format in recent years, you simply don’t get the time to develop this game plan.

For example, Silvan Reveler‘s stats are horrible for a 3/2. Sure, you do get an enters effect, but it doesn’t even affect the board. If you want to get it back in play, you’re spending seven mana to do so.

Furthermore, green and blue just don’t mesh that well together. They both got limited removal options, and they each want to go in a slightly different direction. On top of that, green commons are also mediocre.

On top of that, most of blue-green’s multicolor cards aren’t that great. The best cards are often cards in single color (such as Mirkwood Pathmaker and Bilbo, Luckwearer), but those get picked up by black-green and blue-white players too.

Should You Avoid Playing Blue-Green?

If you’re doing only a few drafts of this set, then yes — you should rather draft something else.

On the other hand, if you plan ton drafting The Hobbit a lot, then you might find spots where you could draft a fine blue-green deck. That would happen when other drafters catch up to how weak the archetype is and actively start avoiding it.

If you can recognize when that happens (say you get Thranduil’s Company P1P4 or Thranduil, Sindarin Liege P1P7), you might want to move into this archetype and end up with a deck like this one.

Deck Example

This deck doesn’t rely much on commons. Attercop is useful with Quarrel. Uneasy Partings and Enchanted River’s Grasp are your other two interactive spells. Even these aren’t particularly exciting, but the rest are even more whatever.

The power should come from higher rarity cards. Thranduil, Sindarin Liege is good, as is Mirkwood Pathmaker. Sadly both of those can get picked up by other players.

For the deck to pop, you really want multiple rares. The good thing is that if you’re the only blue-green drafter at the table, you should get all and that get opened in the table, as they’re at their best here. Still, you’d want to get some additional raw power, with a power house like Beorn the Fierce.

Additional Archetypes

So, are these all the archetypes that matter? While there are no payoffs for a five-color deck or something similar, you could still explore other options.

The most common shift is to simply splash a powerful card of a third color. Say Bard’s Company in a red-white deck.

You could also draft an unsupported color pair. That can happen when you’re simply picking the best card out of every pack, and you end up with good cards in a color pair that isn’t supported.

Among them, black-white works the best. (With blue-red and blue-black also being somewhat viable.) Let’s take a look at one such deck.

Deck Example

As you can see, this is pretty much a deck consisting of powerful standalone cards. There aren’t many synergies here, but it’s not like you need those for the deck to function.

The two included rares are particularly powerful, but you could also perform well with something slightly weaker, provided your commons and uncommons are as good as above. You’ve got fine creatures, solid removal spells and a pretty low mana curve.

Everything you need for a fast format such as this one!

Building Around a Rare

Finally, you could try to build around an unusual rare. Imagine a deck prioritizing flyers, in order to support The Lord of the Eagles. Or build a mono-red deck with Desert Were-Worm and Last Light of Durin’s Day.

Sadly, even when the circumstances align for a deck like that, it’s probably more fun than good. The power level just doesn’t seem to be quite there.

Power Rankings

Now that you know about the archetypes, it time to rank them. So, here are the five supported archetypes ranked.

• Tier 1: blue-white recruit, black-red amass, black-green ferocious
• Tier 1.5: red-white dwarves
• Tier 4: blue-green landfall

Early on, black-red amass seemed like the best thing to be doing. However, the best players were actually winning the most with blue-white recruit. The deck does offer a lot of decisions so it makes sense that more experienced players would find more success with it.

Black-green is also quite up there in its power level. The black cards are good enough to carry somewhat weaker green.

Red-white dwarves do seem a bit weaker than these three but only slightly. You shouldn’t avoid it or anything like that. Just use this as as tie-breaker between cards of a similar power level.

Then there’s blue-green, which is in a bad tier of its own. As discussed, you better avoid it unless it’s open like Bilbo’s pantry when thirteen hungry dwarves arrive.

We didn’t rank the off color pairs above, as they don’t come together quite as often. If you want those, here how they most likely perform:

• Tier 2: black-white
• Tier 3: red-blue, black-blue
• Tier 4: green-white, red-green

The Hobbit Draft Tier List

We’ve been talking a lot about simply playing the strong cards. However, how do you know which ones fit the bill?

With some guidance of our The Hobbit Draft Tier List, which grades all cards from this set. That article will give you a good idea of which cards actually matter and which ones can be easily replaced.

Fascinating Interactions

Before we wrap up, let’s take a look at few interesting interactions that might or might not come up in your games. Experienced players will probably know about most of these, but there might be something you missed.

• You can destroy your Army with Azog, Moria’s Ruin to replace it immediately and draw a card.
• You can block with Troop of Ponies and then sacrifice them. This way you won’t take damage from the attacker (unless it has trample), but still get a couple of lands in play.
• Along the Crooked Way pairs nicely with Gollum the Abandoned
• If you draft Thorin, Mountain-king, you really want to prioritize drafting equipment. The card is pretty bad without it, but spectacular when you can destroy a creature when it enters.
• Don’t let the mana cost on the adventure part of The Arkenstone deceive you. The card is solid in any deck — even if you never can’t cast Seek the Heart.
• If you get to twelve mana while controlling Gandalf, Wandering Wizard, you can activate it twice. (Hold priority while you do so — press CTRL on Arena.) This way, you’ll draw six cards total.
• Riddles in the Dark enables a lot of mind games. The easy choice is to split the cards into 2-2 piles. But if the four cards aren’t particularly great, you might want to put a land face down, and reveal the other three cards to your opponent. They might give you three cards, just because they’re afraid of what you’ve got hidden.

Final Verdict

The Hobbit draft format is a controversial one. Early on, players complained about how fast the format is (“The only thing that matters is the die roll!”), how bad blue-green is and how black-red is better than anything else.

Some of these things are true:

1. Format is really fast.
2. Black-red is strong.
3. Blue-green is weak.

However, the other three archetypes are are pretty balanced and can certainly prevail against black-red. As mentioned, the blue-white has a higher win rate than black-red among the top players.

Furthermore, you can occasionally draft non-supported decks, especially black-white. (Plus, blue-red and blue-black to a lesser extent.)

Games being fast also don’t mean that the games are less reliant on skill. You need to know how to build your decks for the fast games. You need to make proper mulligan decisions and pay a lot of attention how to sequence your early plays. One small misstep in the early turns can easily cost you the whole game.

As such, the games can be even more punishing to an extent. Sure, sometimes you’re on the draw, your opponent has the nuts, and your cards don’t quite line up against theirs. That does happen in every format, although it can happen more often here.

So, while the set is not without its problems, it seems pretty fun and skill-intensive and I’m personally looking forward to drafting it more.

The Road Goes Ever On and On

So, that’s it for our The Hobbit Draft Guide, at least for a week or so. But that doesn’t mean that there’s nothing more to explore about this set. Here are some articles that might interest you:

• The Hobbit Box Toppers (iconic reprints included with every box)
• Scene Boxes from The Hobbit (12 exclusive cards)
• The Hobbit Bundle: Gift VS Regular (which one is better)
• The Hobbit Spoilers (all currently revealed cards and more details)

Finally, if you plan to draft with your friends, you’ll need a Play booster box, which you can order on Amazon.

Last but not least, shout-out to 17Lands. If you’re unfamiliar with the site, it tracks a bunch of data from Limited events, and displays it in a useful manner. We’re using it to further augment our understanding of the format.

Until next time, enjoy journeying back to the Middle-Earth, and may you win lots of draft games!