At a Local this last weekend, we had a fairly small group for Booster. Four players, two player games, round robin tournament. Halfway through the draft, I was not feeling confident in my picks. With five cards left in (I believe) the CoW pack, I was passed what seemed to be a hand of junk. The only things of note were a Gates of Samaria and a Samaria site. With nothing else even remotely worth taking, I took the Gates and took a gamble that the Samaria would make it back around, since who takes a no SA site in booster?
Samaria made it around, of course. In the remaining packs, I was able to draft a significant number of brown cards, including Kings King Omri and King Joram (who can search for a Samaria site and draw a card if Samaria's in play, respectively), Complainers, Stiff Necked, and most importantly, RoA King Jehoash. In addition, I grabbed a Well Reopened from the back of a FoM pack and a Shem's Wife to use it on (and reveal a hand).
It is no exaggeration to say that Gates of Samaria, even with only three kings and one site, won me the tournament. With multiple ways to pull Samaria (and getting lucky enough to draw Gates early in multiple games), the ability to pick off heroes and buff kings in a format where numbers are very important was incredible. King Jehoash especially was a great buff target - a 16/13 with CBN first strike and a CBN negate last good enhancement as support is difficult to beat. I had a fair amount of Assyrians as well, and nobody wanted to mill themselves to stop Assyria Conquers Israel from discarding Samaria, allowing me to get value from Well. This powerhouse of a defense allowed me to stall until I could find my light-but-persistent clay offense, leading me to win two games from behind 5-4 and shut down one 5-0.
Does this mean Gates is good in booster?
....eh. Not really. I got lucky, it was a small tournament, and I had a lot of other support options even without having to build around it completely. That said, I love how Booster can bring back archetypes that aren't necessarily as good anymore.
