It’s not news that I have been diving headfirst into Magic: The Gathering. One thing that has been a little too intimidating for me thus far is a booster draft. Well, why not try it with one of the most complicated new sets? Well, kind of new. Ravnica Remastered is a new set of old cards and mechanics. Sod it. I’ll get to that later.
What is a booster draft?
Just like other sealed events, you open packs at the event and make your own deck. I love sealed events because you don’t need to worry about someone bringing along their $5000 deck. You make your deck alongside everyone else, and then play! It’s awesome.
So far, the events I have been to, you get packs of cards and make your deck from the cards you have. Booster drafts are a little bit different. You get three booster packs. At the table, everyone opens a pack, chooses a card, then passes the rest to the left. You then choose a card from the cards handed to you, then pass the rest to your left, and so on until everyone has 15 cards. Then you open the next pack and follow the process, handing the cards to your right.
Nek minnit, you have 45 cards to make your deck from. 45 cards plus the land you borrow from your LGS, of course.
So why was I so intimidated?
The biggest challenge is trying to get the cards you need to build your deck. If everyone at the table is trying to build a red deck, then the cards coming your way are going to be pretty red-deprived pretty quickly.
This game before the game is what had me so intimidated. What if I get crappy cards? What if someone poached all the good cards I needed to stop me? How do I keep track of which colours are clearly being picked and choose some cards to stop the pliers I will be up against soon?
It turns out that it doesn’t matter. Seriously, it really doesn’t matter. Build a deck that’s fun for you, and get stuck in. The game before the game really just adds a fresh new level of fun, and it’s so damn great. Sure, getting slammed by a card you passed up stings a little, but in a fun way.
One of the biggest challenges, especially as a new player, are the mechanics in Ravnica Remastered. Being a remastered set that has cards from heaps of different sets, there are heaps of old, unique mechanics. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what stuff does. Fortunately, they put the explanation text on most of the cards. Even more fortunately, the experienced players were looking stuff up too.
Something like this is helped by the company you keep. In my case it was the awesome community at Bea DnD.
What is this Bea DnD I’m talking about?
As if you don’t know at this point. Bea DnD is an incredible store. Everything about it. There is an amazing culture of regulars which is built by a great store and the amazing people that run it and work there. Every person in that room, from the ones stuck working, to the regulars turning up are amazing. I got my ass kicked by an 11-year-old whose dad was behind me kicking someone else’s ass and it was awesome. I notched up a few wins and got whooped plenty of times. Every game and every person I played brought something unique but fun.
We were all trying to figure out what the cards did and how they interacted together. It was awesome
If you are ner Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Te Awa Kairangi ki Tai, or in my case, Te Awa Kairangi ki Uta, go for a cruise down to the shop. Seriously, the events and the store are 80% of the fun. MTG is great, but Bea DnD is greater. Take a night to yourself and enjoy this amazing place.
Should you check out a booster draft night?
Hell Yeah! Seriously, don’t overthink it; it’s so much fun. It adds a game before the games and is such an interesting twist on making your deck on the fly. And if you balls it up, who cares? It’s casual, and everyone is there to have fun, so get on it!
I’m headed back to Bea DnD to do it again tomorrow, so yep, it’s awesome!
