Hearthpwn

Can't you tell by the pixels and from having seen a few 'shops in your time?

Kodo a Death Lord

Can I then also demand that Equality and Consecration always go together, and Doomsayer and Frost Nova? 

Buduls is right. I was doing super poor recently because I was mainly focusing on "value" instead of curve and situation. But in this pally run - also 7-3 - I think I got it mostly right:

http://arenamastery.com/eVnd

I've annotated the draft and explained most my choices. To improve, I feel that it's great to re-visit your draft after the arena run and think if you were happy with the draft.

http://arenamastery.com/arena.php?arena=361851

Mh, I thought I had a really nice curve on this one, and *generally* solid minions (Sure, Wolfrider not so great as a 3, but Shattered Sun, Harvest Golem and Injured Balde are all really great 3s). Still got wrecked unfortunately.

Mh, something must have messed up the posting of my cards? For example in #30 I really did pick the Kodo, and for #10 I did indeed pick Ysera. But thanks so much for the indepth explanation!

Well, this one had the perfect curve, but the card quality was way too low... Several super-bad drafts. :/

http://arenamastery.com/OCGX

Thanks, I guess I needed to hear that.

I did indeed look closely at the tiers that Arena Mastery assigned to the choices, but I'd like to think that I didn't do it "blindly", I did adjust a bit for curve, but from what it sounds like I didn't adjust enough. Okay, I guess my next arena run I'll focus more on curve and pay less attention to the "value"...

Slerpy, if you just want to net a lot of wins (to get the 10 gold bonus for winning 3 games, and for the quests), you'd rather play against low-level players. So, you go on a massive winstreak in the lower ranks, then concede a bunch, then go on a massive winsteak again etc etc.

Mh, the other arenas off the day didn't go too well either... I thought my play itself is more or less solid and that the drafts were bad:

A 1-3 warlock draft (well, I got tricked into picking 4 flame imps and one pit lord...)   http://arenamastery.com/fSIh

A 3-3 Rogue (best run of the day) http://arenamastery.com/BHp4

That run confirmed once more that Preparation is a dead card.

Well.. just went 0/3... I feel that I definitely could have done better, nice synergy with Imp Master, Violet Teacher, Dragonling Mechanic + Power of the Wild... but in the first game, the enemy mage had a Blizzard at the right time to wreck my board and then finish me off with Flamestrike, 2nd game enemy warlock has all the removal, final game the Druid stalls long enough with his own 3 wraths to draw into two ironbark protectors in a row and then argus. ARgh.

I feel that in this draft I didn't really have much of a choice since most alterantives to cards I picked were utter crap. Should I have disregarded card quality more, in favor of a better curve?

http://arenamastery.com/aeZJ

Leppy doesn't have a strong effect on the board and doesn't do useful stuff in the turn he's played, and doesn't draw you a card.

Well, one obvious combo is Power Overwhelming: Buff the minion, deal tons of damage with it, then eat it. Another obvious combo is Ancient watcher: Dirt cheap, but can't attack? We can fix that.

Of course Void Terror puts you at severe card disadvantage and you better have your fingers crossed that your opponent doesn't have hard removal.

Questions to ask about cards:

1) Does it have the potential to go 2 for 1, i.e., will I gain card advantage by playing this card? Minions with Divine Shield often require 2 cards from the opponent (one to ping the shield, one to kill off the minion). Minions such as Chillwind Yeti, Boulderfist Ogre and Venture Co Mercenary also often kill off at least 2 enemy creatures or require some very hard removal. The flip-side: Shy away from cards that put you at a card disadvantage. In Arena, Coldlight Oracle is terrible: You give up one card in your hand and gain 2, so in total you gain 1 card. Your opponent gains 2. Terrible!

2) Ask yourself: Does this card do me any good when I am behind? Does it affect the board? When you are in a losing position, i.e., your opponent has a bunch of minions out and you have none, does healing yourself for 8 really do that much? Sure, in some rare occasions it gives you the extra turn needed to finish off your opponent, but it's better to pick cards that, on average, to you more good.