Yes, Ravenous Rats can block a Duskwalker with Kicker.

I am not, nor have I ever been, the best limited player in the world.  I’ve always been a person who liked constructed formats more, I always feel like I have more control over my fate when I’m building my own deck.  If I stink up the joint and lose six matches in a row, I know it is because I built a horrible deck, and I’ll get back to work on the deck for next time.

Limited formats like booster draft and sealed, to me, have always been the opposite.  I could open my cards, and see garbage, but the guy I play first round is the one who opened up an Urza’s Rage, a Skizzik, and a Darrigaaz.  (I saw this happen once!  Really!)

In spite of this, I still enjoy sitting down to play a booster draft on occasion, which I decided to do this past weekend.  I headed to Rama Llama Comics, where they do drafts on Sunday afternoon, ready to kick back and enjoy some magical cards. 

We sit down to draft and I know a few guys at the table, and a couple of them are experienced drafters.  In spite of my relative dislike for the format, I consider myself a decent drafter.  I have the ability to take note of what colors seem to be coming to me, which cards are good, what colors to try and get in light of upcoming packs, and, most importantly, I pride myself on being able to stick with my colors.  Generally I am set on my colors by the 5^th or 6^th pick, and I don’t waver from those regardless of what comes me way.

Normally.

We break open the first Invasion pack, and I can tell the guys to my right aren’t particularly familiar with what they are doing.  I am seeing cards across the color spectrum come to me, but I settled pretty quick on white, since they handed my an Atalya, Samite Master for my second pick.  I keep picking white cards, and end up at the end of the first pack working on Green/White/Blue, but I don’t have much to get me excited in this deck yet.

Then I open my second Invasion pack.

I should mention at this point that I’ve never opened a Dragon in Invasion drafts.  No Darigaaz, no Crosis, no Treva, not even a lousy freaking Tek.  I’ve always been trying to draft cards to deal with OTHER Dragons, but I’ve never had the chance to control a Dragon of my very own.

Until this draft.  I open up my second Invasion pack, and sitting there, staring at me, is my very own Crosis, The Purger. 

“Tiiiiiiim!”, he says.  “I’m yours!  Draft me!”

“No, I can’t!  I’m in green/white/blue, and you’re blue/black/red!  I can’t draft you!”

“Then counter draft me!  Don’t let that monkey to your left that you know is drafting red black have me in his deck!”

“No!  I don’t counter draft.  Counter drafting is dumb.  If I take you, I’m playing you!”

“Ah, the great moral dilemma.” Crosis cackles.  “Do you REALLY want to go your whole life without ever having drafted a Dragon in Invasion?  To you want that shame over your head for the rest of your life, to be passed down to your offspring until the end of time?”

“SHUT UP!  I’ll draft you!  Just stop mocking me!”

So I draft Crosis, the Purger.  And I am five colors.  And my draft goes directly into the toilet.  I have no idea where I’m going at this point.  I take a Sisay, thinking I can use her to fetch my Crosis, and I draft some other stuff, still dizzy from my argument with Crosis.

Then I open my Planeshift pack.  What do I see?  Nemata, Grove Guardian.

“Tiiiiiiim.  I’m a faaaaaatieeee.  Draft meeeee!”, Nemata says.

“AAAAHHHH!  You’re double green in your casting cost, your ability requires green, and I’m playing five freaking colors!”

“So?  Like that stopped you with Crosis.”

“Good point.”  So I draft Nemata.

Here’s an idea of how to tell your draft is going poorly.  When you get to the end of the Planeshift pack, you’re hoping people pass you the Dragon’s Lairs.  This is a sign that you have had a bad draft.

I put together a five color deck, with a bunch of spells and stuff.  I’d give you more details, but I’ve spent the past few days in therapy trying to expunge them from my mind, and dredging the details of this awful deck would just serve to hurt my mental state even further.

I sit down across from a friend of mine, Chad Jones, to play my first, and likely last, match with this deck.  Chad was smart.  He drafted red black and stuck with his colors and got a good deck as a result.  The first game I somehow manage to not get killed right away.  Nemata brings some Sparolings around and helps me keep things under control before he gets killed by some black spell that kills every green creature on the planet, but then I get down Sisay and tap her for a Dragon.  Next turn, Crosis comes wandering out and beats Chad up.  I’m getting confident.  Maybe my deck with two Primal Growth IS ok?  Maybe I might win a match?  Maybe the sun will go supernova in the next 20 minutes!

We settle in for game two, which is playing very similar to game one.  Chad gets down some quick creatures while I wait for my bigger guys to show up.  I get low on life, down to five.  However, I have big critters on my side of the board ready to swing for Chad’s head on his next turn.  He has a Duskwalker and some other creatures on the board.  I have Nemata, a Ravenous Rats, and some other guys.  Chad has zero cards in hand.  He draws.  He attacks with his whole team.  I block everything except the Duskwalker.  Chad looks at me funny.  Our friends watching the game look at me funny.  Then chad taps two mana and says “Scorching Lava you?” 

I look at my friends and he’s like “Why didn’t you block?”

I look at my cards.  Then it hits me.  Yes, Tim.  Ravenous Rats can block a Duskwalker with kicker.

DOH!

Game three I get mana screwed, or something and I lose. 

But I’ll never forget.  Ravenous Rats can block a Duskwalker with kicker.

Tim Stoltzfus
wakkodjinn@pojo.com