Viral Drake
Viral Drake: Creature - Phyrexian Drake, New Phyrexia. Flying. Infect. 3U: Proliferate. Printings, market prices, rulings, and format legality on Mana Grove.
- Mana cost
- {3}{U}
- Mana value
- 4
- Type
- Creature - Phyrexian Drake
- Colour identity
- Blue (U)
- Power / toughness
- 1/4
- Rarity
- Uncommon
- Set
- New Phyrexia (NPH)
- Released
- 2011-05-13
- Collector number
- 49
- Artist
- Lars Grant-West
- Commander rank
- 7,027 (by how often it appears in Commander decks)
- Keywords
- Flying, Proliferate, Infect
Build around this card with Grover
About Viral Drake
Viral Drake is a Magic: The Gathering card, an uncommon blue creature from New Phyrexia (NPH), an expansion set released in May 2011. It is collector number 49 in that set, with art by Lars Grant-West. It costs {3}{U} (three generic and one blue mana) to cast, for a mana value of 4. It is a 1/4 creature. Its colour identity is blue. It is legal in Modern, Legacy, Vintage, Commander, Duel Commander, Oathbreaker and PreDH. It has been printed in 2 sets, from New Phyrexia (2011) to The List (2020). The latest aggregated market price for this printing is $1.24 (normal finish, as of 2026-11-02).
Card text
Flying
Infect (This creature deals damage to creatures in the form of -1/-1 counters and to players in the form of poison counters.)
{3}{U}: Proliferate. (Choose any number of permanents and/or players, then give each another counter of each kind already there.)
Market price
Latest aggregated market price for the normal finish of this printing: $1.24 (as of 2026-11-02).
The figure covers this printing only; other printings carry their own price on their own page.
Format legality
Legality of Viral Drake by format. Formats in which it is not legal are not listed.
| Modern | Legal |
|---|---|
| Legacy | Legal |
| Vintage | Legal |
| Commander | Legal |
| Duel Commander | Legal |
| Oathbreaker | Legal |
| PreDH | Legal |
Other printings of Viral Drake
Viral Drake has been printed in 2 sets. The other printings are listed newest first, with the rarity and release year of each.
| Printing | Rarity | Year |
|---|---|---|
| The List (PLST) #NPH-49 | Uncommon | 2024 |
Official rulings
Six official rulings apply to Viral Drake, newest first.
- Players can respond to a spell or ability whose effect includes proliferating. Once that spell or ability starts to resolve, however, and its controller chooses which permanents and players will get new counters, it's too late for anyone to respond.
- If a permanent ever has both +1/+1 counters and -1/-1 counters on it at the same time, they're removed in pairs as a state-based action so that the permanent has only one of those kinds of counters on it.
- If a player or permanent has more than one kind of counter on it, and you choose for it to get additional counters, it must get one of each kind of counter it already has. You can't have it get just one kind of counter it already has and not the others.
- You don't have to choose every permanent or player that has a counter, only the ones you want to add another counter to. Since "any number" includes zero, you don't have to choose any permanents at all, and you don't have to choose any players at all.
- An ability that triggers "Whenever you proliferate" triggers even if you chose no permanents or players while doing so.
- To proliferate, you can choose any permanent that has a counter, including ones controlled by opponents. You can choose any player who has a counter, including opponents. You can't choose cards in any zone other than the battlefield, even if they have counters on them.
Similar cards
Other creature cards with a blue colour identity, ranked by how often they appear in Commander decks.