Aetherdrift Limited has been out for a decent amount of time. While I'm enjoying the set more than I thought I would, the format has some issues.
The recipe for success is not a widely kept secret. Green seems to be outperforming every other color. Outside of green, the colors are well-balanced. I would put white in last place, though it's not unviable by any means.
Let's get into why green is so dominant.
The worst green cards in the set are a pair of commons, Silken Strength and Alacrian Jaguar. Alacrian Jaguar is a playable but unexciting five-drop. I'm not ashamed to play it in the absence of other top-end, but it's just passable. Every other green card in the set either has its uses or is actively good. This also includes gold cards.
Top-to-bottom green is super deep. On top of that, green arguably has the best removal spell in the format at common, Run Over. Run Over paired with any number of vehicles or Venomsac Lagac is a one-mana removal spell. It can be risky using punch cards, but it's more than made up for with Run Over's efficiency.
Green also has the best removal. Creatures are the real issue with balancing green. It's not new that green has the most powerful creatures. In fact, a feature of green is the above-curve creatures that can attack and block well. The issue is that green creatures can be raced with evasion, especially with efficient interaction to back it up, and green tends to have weak interaction.
There are a lot of green creatures with reach in Aetherdrift. Migrating Ketradon and Hazard of the Dunes, two of green's best common creatures, have big bodies with reach to boot. Both of these creatures are also bigger than most of the creatures in the format. It's hard to get into combat against a green deck once a single copy of these two cards sticks.
Hazard of the Dunes has trample and reach, and it outgrows nearly every creature in the format with its exhaust ability. It can literally do it all. If I were balancing the format, I'd remove one of the two abilities, likely reach, and see how things played out. Removing reach from this one common could better balance the format. Hazard of the Dunes does a lot of heavy lifting and helps carry green into the territory of dominance.
Green has additional reach creatures at all rarities, and you can main deck Broken Wings reliably in this format, as there's an abundance of artifacts in every color.
Every single green rare is good, and some are great. This includes gold cards. In a world where rares are more available thanks to a new booster pack structure, cutting off green is rewarding because it's almost always good to see a green rare.
It's probably not news to you, but games in this Limited format often go long. There's a lot of resource exchanging and board stalls, so it's important that you have ways to spend mana later in the game. Because of the exhaust mechanic, green has quite a few ways to spend mana.
In long games, mana sinks aren't the only deciding factor in how a game is going to end. The depth of your cards will help decide too, right? If you have a few bad underrate cards and you get to the bottom of your deck, then you've seen those cards. If they aren't lining up properly, you'll get overpowered. Green's depth allows it to win those longer games because even the two-drops at common play well in the mid and late game, specifically Beastrider Vanguard and Venomsac Lagac.
Green's creatures play offense and defense effectively, allowing green to win fast or prolonged games. So far there have been a few ways to approach beating green decks, but it's not easy.
The most reliable way I've been beating green is by decking them, otherwise known as good old-fashioned mill. Aether Syphon is my pick for the sleeper card of the format. I'm happy to first pick it in an otherwise weak pack and hopefully find another copy or a copy of Riverchurn Monument, which is one of the set's best cards, yet I get it late in pack one sometimes. I love to draft around Aether Syphon with a lot of cheap evasive creatures like Skystreak Engineer to get to max speed and slowly grind out the opponent.
Sweepers is another way I've been losing with, and am able to beat, green. Green needs to play to the board, which is what it does best. In doing so, they're usually susceptible to the sweepers of the format. Cards like Spectacular Pileup and even Explosive Getaway can give green issues. These are rares, but rares are more common these days thanks to play boosters.
Aetherdrift Limited is still fun, but I'm curious to see how it is at the Pro Tour, in pod. It's a unique balance situation where we have a strong color but a reasonable balance outside of that. I love blue, black, and red when I can get these colors. I'm lukewarm on white, but it can come together.
I need more time to diagnose how to approach this format in best-of-three, as all my play has been best-of-one. I suspect things will change a little, but mana sinks will likely become more important.
I'll work more on solving Aetherdrift Limited this week, so hopefully, next week, I can go over some draft coverage from the Pro Tour and give my thoughts on the approach of the broadcasted drafters. I can't wait to get into it. See you then!