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Main » Articles » Five Decks You’ll Play This Weekend

Five Decks You’ll Play This Weekend

Brandon Isleib
Posted on April 22, 2015
 Reddit

Welcome to Gathering Magic's weekly quintet of Magic Online you should be aware of this weekend, whether you're playing a major online event, going to a Grand Prix, or hitting Friday Night Magic. In an era of big data, Magic Online provides some of the biggest data, so even a quick-and-dirty snapshot of recent activity gets you ahead of the competition. This week, we'll catch up on Standard and Legacy after Pro Tour Dragons of Tarkir and Grand Prix Krakow and Kyoto.

A note of apology for last week's omission: Magic Online wasn't pulling decklists properly for several days, so I had no data to report on. Reporting on a broader scope of days as compensation lets me play with the article format by pulling in more Dailies; if you like this bigger scope, let me know.

Ojutai Time? O, Je T'aime!

Wednesday's Standard Daily didn't post (it was the day they fixed the other days), but we have everything from Thursday to Monday. The Dailies are structured so that, when maxed out, they will produce eight 4-0 decks. Thus, Thursday to Monday yields 40 4-0 decks. Combining those, here are the archetypes that showed up at least twice (Bold = won a Daily):

  • Red Aggro: 9

  • Abzan Aggro: 6

  • Esper Dragons: 4

  • Green Devotion with Red: 4

  • Sidisi Whip: 3 (won 2)

  • Abzan Midrange: 2

  • Blue-Black Control: 2

More so than usual, there are variants within the archetypes, so don't think that it's all the same few 75s popping up. It's worth digging in and deciding what versions you like. Maybe you like these:

Red Aggro ? Standard | birdology

Saturday's winner went with the classic 20/20/20 mix in the maindeck, eschewing the popular (and successful) Atarka's Command splash. Even as Dragon Fodder opened up a Goblins-centric build, Zurgo Bellstriker, vying to become the most-played Orc since Sligh's heyday, moves away from it, while Dragon Fodder and Hordeling Outburst like giving prowess to Monastery Swiftspear, vying to become the most-played Monk since Avacyn's Pilgrim. So it's the higher quality of one-drops dictating the shape of the red deck, which isn't surprising at all.

Lightning Berserker is a key card to this build, as it creates a critical mass of both one-drops and dash creatures (though don't dash too often with Eidolon of the Great Revel out). Dash annoys the snot out of control decks, and Lightning Berserker is something of a Blaze with buyback against them. If control maintains its popularity, expect more Berserkers until the control decks adapt.

(And Firedrinker Satyr's totally out of the equation. An FNM opponent two weeks ago played a turn one Firedrinker Satyr against me. My turn two Roast was enough for him to change his deck at the end of the tournament.)

If you're not a red fan, what about most of the other colors?

Abzan Aggro ? Standard | Nukkinz

Surrak, the Hunt Caller has been making the rounds in Abzan decks, giving extra oomph to compensate for what can be a slow mana base. Deathmist Raptor doesn't have its recent friend Den Protector to go into loops, but Dromoka's Command and the sideboard Mastery of the Unseen are great complements, while Sorin, Solemn Visitor's turn-cycle lifelink looks good on a 3/3 deathtouch body for offense or defense. Deathmist Raptor isn't a "normal" Abzan card yet; Warden of the First Tree is. But experimenting with it seems like a good call depending on what you're expecting.

Speaking of mashing new cards into old decks, Sidisi Whip scored big wins, and one of them took an unconventional approach:

Sidisi Whip ? Standard | ti09

On the one hand, you've got normal Whip of Erebos kinds of things - Satyr Wayfinder, Courser of Kruphix, Sidisi, Brood Tyrant, and Tasigur, the Golden Fang. On another hand, there's Sidisi, Undead Vizier and Dig Through Time for impressive card selection. On a third hand, there's Haven of the Spirit Dragon to combo with Dragonlord Atarka and Ugin, the Spirit Dragon. Dragonlord Atarka closes the three-handed circle by being a fantastic reanimation target, not just in general but specifically here with Whip of Erebos's lifelink.

This deck feels like it gets a lot of value out of the opponent possibly not seeing every angle of attack in game one, thinking it's a particular archetype, and sideboarding incorrectly as a result. If that edge is lost, then the deck becomes four-color ugliness. But I could be wrong; it's got a lot of great cards, at least, and who can fault its ambition?

One Spicy Metaball

In part because Standard mana's been so good that people can run many types of good stuff, finding a true out-of-the-box deck took awhile this week. (Is it weird that out-of-the-box can mean imaginative, like out-of-the-box thinking, or unimaginative, like playing a deck straight out-of-the-box?) But Jihou's 3-1 deck went a direction reminiscent of last year's Standard but with mostly new cards:

White Devotion with Black ? Standard | Jihou

First, appreciate that the starting 60 has black-producing lands and no black cards, while the sideboard not only has black cards but three more lands. That sort of weirdness gets me excited regardless of what else is going on. But there are some great synergies and metagame choices besides the initial cool factor. Multicolored spells never fully went away; it was more that Soldier of the Pantheon didn't have other good cards to go with it. Dragon Hunter adds to the one-drop metagame package, and with Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit, Heliod, God of the Sun, High Sentinels of Arashin, and Citadel Siege, there's a nonzero chance Dragon Hunter will live its dream of killing a Dragon. (I assume it's the dream, anyway - maybe Dragon Hunter is like a storm chaser but with Dragons.)

This deck also gets good mileage out of Mastery of the Unseen. Not only are the creatures cheap to turn face-up if their abilities are worth having, but the enchantment mitigates the drawback of having four-of legendary creatures in the deck, as getting them face-down beats having them stay in the hand any day.

The black splash is for Sorin, Solemn Visitor, Murderous Cut, and Ultimate Price; all seem fine, as Sorin gives a more durable dimension to the main game plan against several decks, while Murderous Cut and Ultimate Price can team with Valorous Stance for a surprising amount of instant removal against decks that can go bigger than white weenie (i.e. almost all of them).

Oh, and Spear of Heliod is pretty good at keeping Dragonlord Ojutai at home, if that's something you're looking for.

Rebelling Against the Format

These creatures you have not thought about in awhile 3-1'd a Legacy tournament:

White-Black Rebels ? Legacy | NO_Pride

NO_Pride has a recent history of playing Counter Rebels in Pauper successfully, in which you land some Rebels, then control everything while you attack and fetch more creatures. Instead of trying to control things with permission, the tactic here is Ancient Tomb/Chalice of the Void shenanigans backed with hand emptying (Chains of Mephistopheles) and shutting off several colors of mana (Blood Moon and Contamination). As strange as this may sound, Rebels are perfect for breaking the symmetry on all these cards, as their activated abilities are colorless, and Lin Sivvi, Defiant Hero can put discarded/dead Rebels back in the library to search for again. Plus, maindeck Aven Mindcensor (for fetchlands) and Big Game Hunter (for Emrakul, the Aeons Torn) is a nice metagame surprise.

So it appears the basic plan is to curve a Rebel into mana control, start searching for Rebels, ending in Mirror Entity and a very lethal attack. If the mana control shows up before it makes sense to cast the win conditions, Mox Diamond can help with future white mana, and Bitterblossom and honorary Rebel Pack Rat can be cast with Contamination's black mana. I have no idea where the sideboard Suppression Field fits with the gazillion activated abilities, but I suppose this deck's sufficiently off-the-wall that it might as well be here.

If you like one-drops in Legacy but don't like Delver of Secrets, then Ramosian Sergeant is here for you. She is, as her flavor text says of her commands, "wholly undeniable."

Conclusion

Standard mana is good enough right now that you can tinker and mix things up. It feels like we're not seeing many entirely distinct archetypes so much as we're seeing three-fourths of a deck mixed with a fourth of the player's choice. Do you like your green devotion with red, white, or both? Do you want your blue-black control deck with or without Dragonlord Ojutai? Feel like adding red to Sidisi Whip? I don't know whether it's best right now to streamline or surprise with the last few cards, but for now it's keeping the metagame in motion, which is good. Hopefully it keeps going to unexpected places.

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TAGS articles, standard, constructed, magic online, analysis, legacy, mtgo, decklist, brandon isleib, data, 5 decks, dragons of tarkir, #mtgdtk, five decks, five decks you'll play this weekend

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