Murders of Karlov Manor is an interesting draft format.

On the one hand, after a few extremely complex sets in a row, it feels like a bit of fresh air as far as complexity goes - draft a nice curve, some combat tricks, and do your thing. However, there's also a lot of room for growth as well. Rares are more common thanks to the new play boosters as well as the list cards, which means there are a lot of fun build arounds and reasons to try different things.

There are also a few very interesting wrinkles in commonly accepted draft theory.

Since the dawn of limited it has been drilled into our heads that removal is good. The common Black and Red removal spells, from Doom Blade to Lightning Strike, are almost always the best commons in their colors, as well as some of the best commons in the set.

Not so in Murders of Karlov Manor draft!

Murder is somehow an almost undesirable card, while seemingly premium and above rate removal spells like Makeshift Binding and Galvanize aren't even the best (or even second best) commons in their colors!

There are a few reasons for this. The first, and perhaps most obvious, is that most common play your opponent is going to make on turn three or four is going to be very hard to kill with traditional removal. Every disguise creature having natural ward 2 makes Murder more of a five-mana spell and Galvanize more of a four-mana spell, both pretty below rate at that point.

Furthermore, the format is often more about a bunch of weaker creatures going wide than leaning hard on some bigger and more powerful creatures. This is what pulls cards like Inside Source and Person of Interest above their in-color removal counterparts. It's an aggressive format, which makes getting on to the board as much as possible of paramount importance.

White is the best color at this, both getting on the board and then exploiting being on the board with tricks, which makes it the best color in the format.

However, what if I told you that your White decks didn't need to be aggressive?

Just because the natural flow of the format is aggressive, doesn't mean it will always be there in your drafts. Going in to each draft planning to do the "usual" thing is totally fine, however because it is the thing that most players will seek to be doing, it's a great idea to have a fallback plan.

Defensive Draft Decks In MKM Draft

So, what gets you into a defensive draft deck in Murders at Karlov Manor draft? Honestly? It's usually some sort of bomb rare.

There are a lot of rares in this format thanks to the new play boosters, and while many of them are beatable by quality fast decks full of commons and uncommons, they do give you a reason to branch out and do other things. Once you've got a card like Cryptic Coat, Izoni, Center of the Web, or Doppelgang in your pile, you've got a reason to try and drag the game out and play defensively.

This sort of going against the grain can work very well as long as you operate inside the rules that have been established for the format. This means, you better get on the board early and be really good at blocking!

Green is quite good at this and probably the best base color when you're trying to play rares, as the manafixing from Nervous Gardener and Topiary Panther can allow you to play almost any rare you open. Nervous Gardener does a great job blocking early, and don't discount cards like Vitu-Ghazi Inspector which is another excellent defensive card.

However, what's interesting is looking to White, the best color in the format but one that is extremely aggressive, for good defensive cards.

Defensive Hidden Gems In White

With White being the best color, it is often fairly contested, but that doesn't mean you can't get good White cards late in a draft. All it means is that the White cards you'll be getting are the ones that the other aggressive White players don't want as much.

A card like Sanctuary Wall isn't very good in your typical White aggro deck, but is actually a very solid defensive 2-drop that only gets better as the game goes on. Not on My Watch is playable but not super desirable in aggressive White decks, not allowing you to remove blockers, but is an otherwise great removal spell if you're looking to be on the defensive.

And last but not least, Case File Auditor is one of my favorite cards in the set. White obviously has a great enchantment removal spell in Makeshift Binding, as well as a few decent cases, but there are a number of excellent enchantments across almost every color as well - Soul Enervation, Buried in the Garden, Coerced To Kill, A Killer Among Us, and Dramatic Accusation, as well as great rares like Blood Splatter Analysis, Proft's Eidetic Memory, and Lost in the Maze. You usually want at least 3-4 enchantments to go with your Case File Auditor, but having 5 or 6 isn't completely uncommon. If you get a solid defensive creature that has a 50% chance of drawing a great spell, that's an awesome place to be.

Furthermore, moving up to rare, a card like No Witnesses is rarely a card that any go-wide White deck will want, despite being a reasonable sweeper. However, if you're the more off-plan controlling White deck, you can often get it and even other sweepers like Deadly Cover-Up much later than expected.

Remember though, you want to be playing toward something. Being slow and controlling just for the sake of being slow and controlling isn't a great plan in this set. But if you have a big top-end bomb to play toward to make it worth it, being defensive can pay off big time when everyone else is trying to beat down.

Here are two example decks from my recent Bronze to Mythic run that are both excellent looks at how to build solid defensive decks in the format with just a few rares and some cards other decks don't really want that much.

Esper Control | Jim Davis | Murders at Karlov Manor Draft, 7-1

• Creatures (12)
• 1 Alquist Proft, Master Sleuth
• 1 Basilica Stalker
• 1 Case File Auditor
• 1 Faerie Snoop
• 1 Private Eye
• 1 Novice Inspector
• 1 Sanctuary Wall
• 1 Sanitation Automaton
• 2 Sanguine Savior
• 2 Unscrupulous Agent

• Instants (6)
• 1 Murder
• 1 Toxin Analysis
• 2 Long Goodbye
• 2 Not on My Watch

• Enchantments (5)
• 1 Case of the Shattered Pact
• 1 Coerced to Kill
• 1 Makeshift Binding
• 2 Soul Enervation

• Artifacts (1)
• 1 Cryptic Coat

• Lands (16)
• 2 Island
• 6 Plains
• 6 Swamp
• 1 Scene of the Crime
• 1 Undercity Sewers

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Black is the one color that does play defense decently well, while also being the most underdrafted color in the format, which means you can pick up good defensive cards like Toxin Analysis and Unscrupulous Agent late to pair with your base color cards.

This deck has five enchantments to go with Case File Auditor, a bunch of good two-mana plays, some good removal, and big things to play to in Cryptic Coat and Alquist Proft, Master Sleuth.

Abzan Sweepers | Jim Davis | Murders at Karlov Manor Draft, 7-2

• Creatures (14)
• 1 Case File Auditor
• 1 Culvert Ambusher
• 1 Flourishing Bloom-Kin
• 1 Izoni, Center of the Web
• 1 Museum Nightwatch
• 1 Nervous Gardener
• 1 Sanitation Automaton
• 1 Sharp-Eyed Rookie
• 1 Topiary Panther
• 1 Vengeful Creeper
• 2 Greenbelt Radical
• 2 Vitu-Ghazi Inspector

• Sorceries (5)
• 1 Deadly Cover-Up
• 1 Extract a Confession
• 1 No Witnesses
• 2 Bite Down on Crime

• Enchantments (3)
• 1 Case of the Locked Hothouse
• 2 Buried in the Garden

• Lands (17)
• 8 Forest
• 2 Plains
• 2 Swamp
• 1 Escape Tunnel
• 1 Public Thoroughfare
• 1 Shadowy Backstreet
• 2 Branch of Vitu-Ghazi

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Well of course you did well this draft Jim, you had Izoni, Center of the Web and two sweepers!

Yes, Izoni was the first pick, but both sweepers both came in the middle of pack two and three. When combined with a few Buried in the Garden, another excellent controlling card, as well as a great suite of early defense like Vitu-Ghazi Inspector and friends, you've got a very nice deck that can defend early and play late.

Zig When They Zag

Again, you really want to start out on this sort of path after exhausting more tradition options or after you open a nice rare, but be aware that you can do other things than play 2-drops and combat tricks. In our Pro Tour testing we often found Black was the fallback plan when your draft wasn't going super well, as it was usually open and then could lead you down this controlling path where you could hopefully open/get passed a bomb and move in later in the draft.

Just make sure you understand that you've gotta keep that curve low and be ready to defend starting on turn two!