Wednesday, February 26, 2014

You Make the Pick 5

Hey Zoners! Welcome to another You Make the Pick. This is a short weekday segment where I show you a booster pack, tell you the story behind it, talk about the cards, share what my pick would be, and then you guys let us know in the comments what you would take.

Last weekend was Pro Tour Born of the Gods, if you missed out on any of the coverage then you should definitely go check it out on dailymtg.com. They have text coverage, decklists, player interviews, video of every feature match, and also: a draft viewer, where you can see every pick from every seat in the exciting Theros block team draft format. There was a draft tech on day one of the coverage featuring Hall of Famer William 'Huey' Jensen. He was at the table drafting with other notable names like Travis Woo and fellow HoF member Antione Ruel. This is what Huey saw for his first pick of the draft on day one of the Pro Tour:



It is pretty interesting to step inside the mind of a Magic pro, especially one of the all-time greats. So here we have a playable rare in Fated Intervention, which is strong, but not crazy good and requires a heavy Green commitment. Drown in Sorrow is a decent card, but hard to abuse in booster draft. Black happens to be one of the better colors in Born of the Gods and the flat out best in Theros in my opinion. Staking a claim early could be very profitable if you see some Gray Merchants later in the draft. This format seems to be a little faster than triple Theros, so having a sweeper might come in handy if you plan on drafting a slower strategy. Aerie Worshipers is also pretty incredible in limited and a fine pick here, although Blue is weaker in Born of the Gods. That could be good or bad because it might actually scare other drafters away from the color. Most all of the commons are pretty bad, the only one worth talking about is the Bolt of Keranos.

That just so happens to be what Huey took from the pack. Starting off with a removal spell is a great idea and Red a strong color in all three packs of this format. Taking the bolt here will send a signal that Red isn't open since the next best card is...well yea there isn't another Red card worth taking early. I think that I would probably have taken the Drown in Sorrow because I really like Black, but he is the Pro and I am the chumpy community author. The only real question left to ask is...what would you take?

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