Disney Lorcana draft rules: How to draft Lorcana
Crack a pack and jump in with our guide to Lorcana’s Booster Draft format.
Disney Lorcana, the House of Mouse’s brand new card game, can be played in a number of ways. One of the most exciting and popular TCG formats is Booster Draft, which combines the discovery of pulling cards from booster packs with the strategy and fun of crafting a deck before you do battle against your opponents. It’s easy to get started, so read on to wise up on the Lorcana draft rules you need to know.
How to draft Disney Lorcana
- Can Lorcana be drafted?
- What is Booster Draft for Lorcana?
- How many boosters do I need to play Lorcana draft?
- Lorcana draft rules
- How to build a draft deck in Lorcana
Learning how to play draft in Lorcana will come as second nature if you’ve played a draft format in other trading card games such as Magic: The Gathering. Like those TCGs, the format is all about building your deck with the cards you pull from a series of booster packs, picking carefully to make your own deck as strong as it can be without handing too many powerful cards to your opponents. It’s a very social way to play that supports bigger groups of players, and is often one of the most popular formats when playing at local game stores as a result.
One of the best parts of drafting is that the excitement and discovery of opening booster packs becomes part of the game itself, with the dilemma of picking the best Lorcana cards for your own deck weighed up against denying your rivals the cards you think they might need based on what gets snapped up.
While knowing how to play Lorcana will help when building your draft deck, you don’t need to be an expert player to give it a go - sometimes just throwing some cards together can be a fun way to see what the game can do and discover new combinations and possibilities. If you’re new and feel intimidated by not knowing the most powerful cards, just go with your gut and pick the cards or abilities that appeal to you - even if that’s just choosing your favourite Disney characters.
Working out how to build a Lorcana deck can also be easier when playing Booster Draft, as there aren’t the same restrictions or expectations as carefully refining your custom deck for constructed games. Sometimes, you might not even have a choice - you can just end up with whatever’s left at the end of a round of drafting!
Whether you’re a drafting pro or brand new to the format, learning how to draft Lorcana can open your eyes to a new way to enjoy the Disney card game. Below we’ll run through everything you need to know about drafting Lorcana, from the essential Lorcana draft rules to making your deck and what you’ll need to get started.
Can Lorcana be drafted?
Yes, Disney Lorcana is draftable. This means that the card game supports a Booster Draft format, similar to Magic: The Gathering’s Draft format.
In fact, if you’re familiar with how to draft in MTG, learning how to draft in Lorcana will be very easy, as many of the rules are shared or similar.
What is Booster Draft for Lorcana?
In any Booster Draft format, whether it’s for Disney Lorcana or Magic: The Gathering, players build their decks as part of each game by opening a set of booster packs (giving the format its name!)
This is the format’s biggest difference from other ‘constructed’ formats where players are able to build their deck ahead of time. Between the two formats is another format known as Sealed Deck, where each player opens a number of booster packs (at least six per person) to build their deck of 40 cards, but don’t have to draft cards against their opponents.
Like other TCGs, one of the biggest appeals of the Booster Draft format in Lorcana is its affordability: you only need to buy four boosters (costing around £20/$24) to play, and you’ll usually be able to take the cards home with you if you’re playing at a local store.
Another benefit of this is that no-one’s deck can have an advantage simply by paying more for the most expensive or rarest Lorcana cards - everyone starts on the same footing, having to build their deck from whatever they pull from the booster packs.
How many boosters do I need to play Lorcana draft?
When playing Disney Lorcana in its Draft format, each player needs at least four booster packs. That’s four boosters each - so if there are six players, you’ll need 24 packs in total. (Which just so happens to be the number you get in a standard Lorcana booster box.)
Disney Lorcana draft rules
In Lorcana’s Booster Draft format, players each open a booster pack before choosing a card from their pack’s cards. Once they have chosen a card, they pass the remaining cards to their neighbouring player before repeating with the cards they are handed by their own neighbour: choose a card and pass the rest on.
Once the current cards have all been drafted, players repeat the process by opening another booster pack each, drafting cards one at a time and passing the rest to their neighbour.
With each new booster pack, alternate which direction you pass your cards for that round of drafting: first to the player to your left so the cards travel clockwise, then the player to your right so they go anti-clockwise, and so on.
Repeat this process, alternating the direction with each pack you open, until you have drafted all of the cards from every pack. You should end up with 48 cards in total.
How to build a draft deck in Lorcana
In Lorcana’s Booster Draft format, each player will build a 40-card deck. This is a change from the standard 60-card deck when you build a Lorcana deck for use in its Core Constructed format.
As you should end up with 48 cards from the cards you draft - as each booster includes 12 cards - you will essentially be looking to decide which eight cards you want to discard and not include in your deck.
In another major change from Lorcana’s standard deck-building rules for its Core Constructed format, which limits your deck to a maximum of two different ink colours, you can include cards of all six inks in your deck when playing Lorcana’s Booster Draft format.
One final change from the standard Lorcana deck-building rules is that you can include more than four copies of a card with the same name. This includes both the name of the character - for example, Captain Hook - and their title, which is printed underneath, such as Forceful Duelist.
Buy Disney Lorcana products on Zatu, Magic Madhouse and Best Buy.