Carnival Hellsteed 
One Flashback Drafter Emerges Unrivaled
Magic: the Gathering Arena player Phil Willerman estimates he’s done over two hundred Ixalan flashback drafts. “I really like pirates and dinosaurs. Especially the flying Dinosaurs even though really pterodactyls aren’t dinosaurs. But I like them the most.” Phil, who goes by the username FlyingDinosaur2011 on Arena, says normally when he drafts he runs out of gems pretty quickly, but he’s been able to keep up his pace of dozens of drafts per day by picking creatures with flying, and his favorite spell, Walk the Plank. “I like to use my pirate voice and say ‘Yarrr, time to walk the plank!’ when I cast it. It’s especially fun when it’s a dinosaur, even if it’s one that can swim. Plesiosaurs weren’t actually dinosaurs but for magic it’s cool that they can go in dinosaur decks. I also like to get the Ravenous Chupacabra because he can eat the big dinosaurs in one bite even though he’s just a 2/2.”
Willerman started the season at Bronze 4, and he says that normally he doesn’t pay attention to his ranking, he just drafts the cards that look fun. “In Ixalan all of the cards are really cool except for vampires, so I just take the ones that can fly or that kill things because if all my creatures fly I only have to worry about enemy creatures that can fly. And my dinosaurs are pretty big so they can’t beat me on the ground. The only way I normally lose is to counters and planeswalkers but most people don’t have both of those so I do pretty good. I guess the robots take all the counters out of the packs so people have to play fair.”
At the time this article was published, Willerman was surprised to learn he had qualified for the Pro Tour based on his limited rating. “I don’t know if I’m allowed to play on the pro tour, my mom wants me to focus on my summer reading. We’re doing chapter books.”
