Unfortunately, a very easy pick. Spearpoint

Benthic Giant wins draft pods. Its a bomb.

Oread is decent enough,maybe we should change colors?
Oread+pharagax giant/cyclops of one-eyed pass is a 3 turn clock(and the former is a pain to take down).

We have more chances to get a Benthic Giant. I'd rather take the card we will play multiples of instead of the card we might play one of.

Spearpoint Oread

Oread for days. It's already hard to find a good Red Common in Theros, we can't pass those.

We won't see the Benthic Giant table, but yeah... we *might* see more of it in another pack. I won't be holding my breath since this pack is down to one blue.

I tried to convince them of this at the theros draft. We saw three at least and took 1.

There's not much as soul crushing as staring across the table at a Benthic Giant and knowing he's too big, too untargetable... and did I mention too big.. to do anything about.

If he gets pants... forget about it.

Because 5/x creatures are so hard to come by when you both have 6 lands out? So it's murder on any deck not running bestow or monstrous or heroic.

Basically R/B, although if a heroic deck hasn't killed you by the time you can cast benthic giant, chances are it can't build up a 5/5 anyway...

Is it really more soul crushing to not have an answer or to frantically dig for your divine verdict or sip of hemlock? You want soulcrushing? Turn 2 any two drop Turn 3 ashiok.

And one is probably enough.

Regardless of whether this one wins drafts, I often see them go by late. It's never a problem getting one. And you need to take control of the board, or at least stay near parity, before this one, bestowed and bedecked, can win for you. You won't get Voyage's End or Griptide or even Aqueuos Form pick 8, but you will get the Giant. At least, in Swiss queues online where I play.

Ugh 6 mana.There is bestow for that,and maybe we can find an horizon scholar later if you really want a 6 drop.
Let's focus on not autolosing to RW for now.

Hmmm... we should dig up the theros MTGO draft stats...

CFB took down the art but the google saves all: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/s ... us&strip=1

- Benthic Giant has a 50% win rate WHEN CAST. Given it's difficulty to cast - this made it the 194th best card in Theros draft by Silvestri's spread sheet (back in october... so YMMV)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc ... ring#gid=0

Three most comparable cards: Vanquish the Foul, Rage of Purphoros ... hmmm... Steam Augury???

TO BE FAIR... You can certainly argue that it's better than spearpoint oread by this metric.

Pack 1:

Nyxborn Triton
Oracle of Bones
Chorus of the Tides
Stratus Walk
Bolt of Keranos
Meletis Astronomer
Floodtide Serpent
Impetuous Sunchaser
Fearsome Temper
Weight of the Underworld
Pharagax Giant
Epiphany Storm
Cyclops of One-Eyed Pass
Culling Mark

Pack 2:

Ordeal of Thassa
Griptide
Flamespeaker Adept
Spearpoint Oread

Next...

Nylea's Emissary
Voyaging Satyr
Mnemonic Wall
Setessan Griffin
Boulderfall
Nylea's Disciple
Lash of the Whip
Messenger's Speed
March of the Returned
Coastline Chimera

I can't stomach the thought of taking a Mnemonic Wall here.

Lash of the Whip

how the hell is blue and red getting shut off from the left?? we had that on lockdown!

Whip or Emissary for me. Both splashable and playable late game.

It was likely an empty pack. This is why I wanted CG to post the other players picks :v

Nah, it's typical. The guy on the left opened a red bomb and went RU. Anyway, green has two great cards here, so it's probably more open than black, and it brings fixing if the worst happens and we need to switch. Bestow rules, and so on.

Nylea's Emissary

Yeah, I can't justify passing a Nylea's Emissary.

Emissary and pray that Green is really open.

Green is also deeper and drafted less than black. Emissary.