Commander 2015 has been fully spoiled and comes out next week, but we still have plenty of Battle for Zendikar technology to explore. This week we’ll look at five decks from across Standard, Modern, and Legacy featuring all manner of exciting interactions. We’ll start in Standard, where we have fresh takes on both Eldrazi ramp and Black-based Aristocrats decks. Then we’ll move into Modern where an Open the Vaults combo deck awaits us. Last, we’ll head to Legacy to find out if Retreat to Coralhelm and Standstill have what it takes to compete. Lets’ get started!

Over the last few weeks, we’ve seen the breakout of Green-based Eldrazi ramp decks utilizing the dearth of powerful 3- and 4-mana accelerators in this format to power out early Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hungers and Ugin, the Spirit Dragons. Zvi Mowshowitz knows a thing or two about powering out monstrous threats, and this week he shared a build that may just outclass the G/R version we’ve become familiar with. Check out Zvi’s Green-Blue Turboland:

Turboland ? Battle for Zendikar Standard | Zvi Mowshowitz

• Creatures (17)
• 2 Nissa, Vastwood Seer
• 3 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
• 4 Leaf Gilder
• 4 Rattleclaw Mystic
• 4 Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger

• Planeswalkers (6)
• 3 Kiora, Master of the Depths
• 3 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon

• Spells (14)
• 3 Explosive Vegetation
• 3 Nissa's Pilgrimage
• 4 Nissa's Renewal
• 4 Part the Waterveil

• Lands (23)
• 3 Island
• 7 Forest
• 1 Prairie Stream
• 4 Lumbering Falls
• 4 Shrine of the Forsaken Gods
• 4 Windswept Heath

• Sideboard (15)
• 3 Sanctum of Ugin
• 2 Dragonlord Dromoka
• 1 Nissa, Vastwood Seer
• 4 Jaddi Offshoot
• 1 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy
• 1 Hangarback Walker
• 1 Kiora, Master of the Depths
• 1 Ugin, the Spirit Dragon
• 1 Plains

Buy This Deck

This deck is absurd. You have many of the same strengths of the other Ramp decks, namely the consistency and inevitability provided by playing many copies of both Ulamog and Ugin, but you also have the ability to play some absurd Blue cards.

First, it is important to note that Zvi has opted to play with Green mana creatures rather than focusing purely on Hedron Archives and Nissa's Pilgrimage. It’s also worth noticing that Zvi is playing the full four copies of Nissa's Revelation. This card allows you to ramp up to nine, which is an important number for both Part the Waterveil and Ulamog.

The second major improvement is Zvi’s ability to play Jace, Vryn's Prodigy and Kiora, Master of the Depths. Jace’s ability to flashback ramp spells like Nissa's Pilgrimage, Explosive Vegetation, and Nissa's Revelation backed up by Kiora’s ability to let you double up on both Shrine of the Forsaken God and a mana creature mean that you’re able to generate mana more quickly and more consistently than the G/R builds of the Eldrazi ramp deck.

Finally, this deck enables you to play Part the Waterveil. Part the Waterveil lets you quickly run away with the game if you can start resolving copies with lots of mana in play. Imagine resolving a Part the Waterveil with some combination of Ulamog, Ugin, Nissa, Jace, or Kiora in play. How is your opponent ever going to win that game? And that’s without considering you might be able to awaken your spell. It’s not difficult to hit a point where you could chain together awakened Part the Waterveils, which would allow you to close the game out very quickly and with minimal resistance.

In short, if you want to play a big mana deck in Standard, you should ignore the G/R deck and focus on Zvi’s build, which appears faster, more consistent, and more resilient.

Over the last few months of Standard, we’ve seen a number of decks which focus on Nantuko Husk. Whether it’s Blue decks with Whirler Rogue, Green decks with Catacomb Sifter, or White builds with Rally the Ancestors, there are many awesome things you can do with sacrifice outlets in Standard. Unfortunately, some of these decks have a tough time winning when you don’t draw Nantuko Husk, which leads to issues with consistency. Fortunately, ryota09 may have found a solution: supplementing Nantuko Husk with Butcher of the Horde as a secondary sacrifice outlet:

Mardu Aristocrats ? Battle for Zendikar Standard | ryota09, 3-1 Standard Daily Event

• Creatures (26)
• 1 Smothering Abomination
• 1 Sultai Emissary
• 2 Zulaport Cutthroat
• 3 Butcher of the Horde
• 3 Liliana, Heretical Healer
• 4 Bloodsoaked Champion
• 4 Carrier Thrall
• 4 Nantuko Husk
• 4 Hangarback Walker

• Spells (10)
• 2 Mardu Charm
• 2 Murderous Cut
• 2 Temur Battle Rage
• 2 Bone Splinters
• 2 Outpost Siege

• Lands (24)
• 2 Mountain
• 2 Swamp
• 2 Caves of Koilos
• 1 Canopy Vista
• 1 Prairie Stream
• 1 Smoldering Marsh
• 3 Shambling Vent
• 4 Bloodstained Mire
• 4 Polluted Delta
• 4 Wooded Foothills

• Sideboard (15)
• 2 Act of Treason
• 3 Arashin Cleric
• 2 Despise
• 1 Ob Nixilis Reignited
• 1 Painful Truths
• 2 Ruinous Path
• 1 Self-Inflicted Wound
• 3 Transgress the Mind

Buy This Deck

This deck may not be revolutionary, but I think it does a fantastic job of combining the strengths of several of the previous takes on Nantuko Husk. You have Liliana, Heretical Healer and Zulaport Cutthroat as your primary payoffs, with Outpost Siege functioning as a backup Zulaport Cutthroat when you want to kill your opponent outside of combat.

Additionally, you gain access to Butcher of the Horde as a powerful curve-topper, backup Nantuko Husk, and efficient source of life-gain to swing races in your favor. You can reasonably expect to give this guy both haste and lifelink, which seems enormously difficult to beat if the game is at all close.

Another interesting pick-up this deck gains is Temur Battle Rage, which I’d never thought to put together with Nantuko Husk before. Battle Rage may be this deck’s version of Whirler Rogue, granting pseudo-evasion and effectively doubling your creature’s attack. It’s important to note that Temur Battle Rage is turned on by both Nantuko Husk and Butcher of the Horde, and can allow you to steal games out of nowhere.

Second Sunrise may have been banned, but that doesn’t mean we can’t play degenerate graveyard decks. After the banning of the Eggs combo deck, some players tried to go a little bit bigger, focusing on Open the Vaults rather than Faith's Reward. Despite many players exploring the idea, nothing much ever came from it. At least until now. Check out Caleb Durward’s take on Open the Vaults in Modern:

Open the Vaults ? Modern | CalebD, 3-1 Modern Daily Event

• Creatures (2)
• 2 Emrakul, the Aeons Torn

• Spells (39)
• 1 Remand
• 2 Thirst for Knowledge
• 4 Ancient Stirrings
• 4 Open the Vaults
• 2 Mind Stone
• 2 Thopter Foundry
• 4 Chromatic Sphere
• 4 Chromatic Star
• 4 Ichor Wellspring
• 4 Krark-Clan Ironworks
• 4 Prophetic Prism
• 4 Mox Opal

• Lands (19)
• 1 Plains
• 1 City of Brass
• 1 Glimmervoid
• 1 Tendo Ice Bridge
• 3 Darksteel Citadel
• 4 Urza's Mine
• 4 Urza's Power Plant
• 4 Urza's Tower

• Sideboard (15)
• 1 Remand
• 2 Dispel
• 1 Echoing Truth
• 1 Engineered Explosives
• 2 Erase
• 2 Kor Firewalker
• 2 Pyroclasm
• 1 Repeal
• 3 Torpor Orb

Buy This Deck

This deck is doing a number of really interesting things that previous takes weren’t. Previous iterations of the deck were focused on comboing out, using Urza lands and Krark-Clan Ironworks in conjunction with Open the Vaults to jam Emrakul, the Aeons Torn into play as early as possible. Caleb’s take does things a little differently.

The problem with previous builds was consistency. If you can’t find one of your four Krark-Clan Ironworks, your deck just doesn’t do anything. Sure, you have cantrips and Thoughtcast to help you get there, but that is by no means an assurance you can find your pieces on time. Ancient Stirrings certainly helps, but I think the biggest, new inclusions are Thirst for Knowledge and Thopter Foundry.

Thirst for Knowledge is the card that improves the most when you switch from a Faith's Reward engine to an Open the Vaults engine. This card allows you to dump cantripping artifacts into the graveyard for Open the Vaults while digging for Krark-Clan Ironworks, which is the perfect combination for this deck.

Likewise, the inclusion of Thopter Foundry allows you to stock the graveyard while providing the backup plan of sacrificing artifacts to generate Thopters and life. If your opponent has an aggressive deck, the extra life and blockers will buy you the time you need to set up shop. If you’re playing a more controlling opponent, the additional pressure will help you force your opponent to tap low to deal with your tokens and give you an opportunity to resolve a key spell.

A few weeks ago, we looked at how Knight of the Reliquary and Retreat to Coralhelm might be the basis of a new breakout combo deck in Modern. While that deck was definitely awesome, I never would have guessed that the combo was powerful enough to make waves in Legacy. I’ve never been happier to be wrong. Check out this Legacy take on Retreat Combo built by ironclad8690:

Retreat Combo ? Legacy | ironclad8690

• Creatures (21)
• 1 Gaddock Teeg
• 1 Rafiq of the Many
• 1 Scavenging Ooze
• 1 Scryb Ranger
• 2 Qasali Pridemage
• 3 Stoneforge Mystic
• 4 Knight of the Reliquary
• 4 Mother of Runes
• 4 Noble Hierarch

• Spells (16)
• 4 Swords to Plowshares
• 4 Green Sun's Zenith
• 2 Sylvan Library
• 3 Retreat to Coralhelm
• 1 Batterskull
• 1 Sword of Fire and Ice
• 1 Umezawa's Jitte

• Lands (23)
• 1 Forest
• 1 Cavern of Souls
• 1 Dryad Arbor
• 1 Karakas
• 1 Maze of Ith
• 1 Sejiri Steppe
• 2 Tropical Island
• 3 Wasteland
• 4 Flooded Strand
• 4 Savannah
• 4 Windswept Heath

• Sideboard (15)
• 3 Meddling Mage
• 2 Ethersworn Canonist
• 2 Gaddock Teeg
• 2 Containment Priest
• 2 Path to Exile
• 2 Armageddon
• 1 Sigarda, Host of Herons
• 1 Sword of Feast and Famine

Buy This Deck

The plan here is basically the same as the Modern build. You have a Splinter Twin-esque two card combo that ends the game in the form of Knight of the Reliquary plus Retreat to Coralhelm. That two card combo allows you to tap a Forest or Plains for mana, then sacrifice it to Knight of the Reliquary to fetch up an untapped land. That land then untaps your Knight or any other creature and allows you to repeat the cycle.

There are two reasons that this deck is substantially more powerful than the Modern version. The first reason is Green Sun's Zenith. This card functions as acceleration, letting you tutor up a turn one Dryad Arbor to ramp into Knight of the Reliquary. It also functions as additional copies of Knight and other toolbox creatures. Lastly, it allows you to play a singleton Rafiq of the Many as a way to guarantee that your enormous Knight of the Reliquary can present lethal damage.

The second reason this deck is absurd is Mother of Runes. Mother of Runes is awesome at protecting creatures that can win the game on their own, like Stoneforge Mystic and Knight of the Reliquary. Mother of Runes is also great when you’re trying to force through Knight of the Reliquary for a lethal attack. Mother of Runes gets much better when you have Retreat to Coralhelm into play. Suddenly a fetchland allows you to untap Mother of Runes at instant-speed, forcing your opponent to string together multiple removal spells. Additionally, you can tutor up fetchlands mid-combo to untap both Knight of the Reliquary and Mother of Runes to get protection from an additional color.

All told, this deck is packed with powerful cards and cute interactions, and I’m excited to see what comes of this wacky combo in Legacy.

One of the cards that I miss the most in Legacy is Standstill. Decks built around Standstill have phased in and out over the last few years depending on the state of the format. In the wake of the Dig Through Time banning, Delver of Secrets strategies have come back to the forefront. This makes it a great time to try to play controlling Ancestral Vision strategies like Shardless Sultai. Dsck went a level deeper, and decided to play an even more controlling version of Sultai, featuring Standstill, Pernicious Deed, and high count of spell-lands.

Sultai Standstill ? Legacy | dsck, 3-1 Legacy Daily Event

• Creatures (6)
• 4 Deathrite Shaman
• 2 Vendilion Clique

• Planeswalkers (5)
• 2 Liliana of the Veil
• 3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor

• Spells (26)
• 2 Disfigure
• 2 Spell Snare
• 3 Abrupt Decay
• 4 Brainstorm
• 4 Force of Will
• 1 Inquisition of Kozilek
• 1 Life from the Loam
• 2 Thoughtseize
• 3 Pernicious Deed
• 4 Standstill

• Lands (23)
• 1 Bayou
• 1 Misty Rainforest
• 2 Creeping Tar Pit
• 2 Mishra's Factory
• 3 Tropical Island
• 3 Underground Sea
• 3 Wasteland
• 4 Polluted Delta
• 4 Verdant Catacombs

• Sideboard (15)
• 1 Vendilion Clique
• 1 Life from the Loam
• 1 Thoughtseize
• 2 Blue Elemental Blast
• 1 Diabolic Edict
• 3 Ethersworn Canonist
• 2 Flusterstorm
• 1 Nihil Spellbomb
• 1 Notion Thief
• 1 Scrubland
• 1 Surgical Extraction

Buy This Deck

Standstill allows this deck to apply pressure to opponents in a lot of interesting ways. First, the ability to use Standstill as a way to buy time while you put Creeping Tar Pit and Mishra's Factory into play is a very reasonable plan to set up for the late game. Similarly, Wasteland allows you to keep your opponent from hitting a critical mass of mana to fight through your Standstill by casting multiple spells in a turn. Additionally, this deck is capable of resolving a Standstill with a Planeswalker in play, which is an enormously powerful position to be in.

It’s also worth mentioning that Pernicious Deed is a card that is very well positioned as the format shifts toward aggressive and midrange creature decks. Deed is a powerful way to protect Planeswalkers and does a fantastic job of allowing you to resolve Standstill on an empty board to force your opponent to act first.

Add the ability to play Abrupt Decay and the Life from the Loam plus Wasteland soft lock, and you’ve got a deck with a lot of powerful tools against Delver variants, midrange creature decks, and other Stoneforge Mystic/Shardless Agent control variants.