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Main » Articles » Shadows over Innistrad: Spoilers, Part 1

Shadows over Innistrad: Spoilers, Part 1

Emma Handy
Posted on March 10, 2016
 Reddit

Spoiler season is intoxicating. For a few weeks each quarter, we are blessed with a few cards at a time that get everyone’s creative juices flowing in ways that are untouched by tournament results and net decks. The release of Shadows over Innistrad will coincide with the first spring rotation that will soon be the norm for Standard Magic players.

Typically when new cards are spoiled, it is easiest to try to slot the new cards into existing archetypes instead of trying to brew entirely new decks. This is much harder to do in a smaller Standard format that rotates more frequently than the previous iterations of Standard.

Invasive Surgery

One of the first cards to be spoiled this season was something that Modern had been lacking for a while now: Envelop. With a strict upgrade on the former card, Wizards made sure to make it worth the wait. Alongside the reprint of Dead Weight, it is pretty easy to imagine a U/B control shell that has a very reasonable game against the various Painful Truths and aggressive strategies.

Dead Weight being an enchantment is actually incredible for the delirium mechanic. It’s common to hear “the usual suspects” when talking about Tarmogoyf’s power and toughness in reference to the typical card types that you’ll find in a graveyard: creature, land, instant, and sorcery. Having the ability to diversify these card types early in the game will be an incredible boon to decks that need to enable certain delirium spells as soon as possible.

I actually plan to start somewhere around this list after rotation:

U/B Control ? Shadows over Innistrad Standard | Emma Handy

The list is incredibly untuned and has several splits that are to try out different cards. The copies of Invasive Surgery in the ’board will most assuredly be instrumental in some very specific matchups. It’s hard to imagine this type of deck not adopting Painful Truths over time—answering opposing copies and removing the rest of the opponent’s deck is incredibly important for winning the card-advantage arms race.

Against the ramp strategies, there aren’t very many answers to early ramp spells that also do enough on the draw. Invasive Surgery is able to counter Ruin in Their Wake and Sylvan Scrying in situations in which the control pilot has only had the opportunity to play a single land. Having access to cards that will exile every copy of Explosive Vegetation also has merit that can’t be ignored.

It’s unfortunate that Invasive Surgery is probably too narrow to see main-decked play. It’s a cost that many players in eternal formats will be willing to make in order to beat the more linear decks that rely on Scapeshift, Past in Flames, and Show and Tell. I’m not one to often dabble in speculation, but picking up foil copies of an eternal-playable counterspell is a surefire financial gain in the long term.

Brain in a Jar

Brain in a Jar has thus far been compared (rather fondly) to Aether Vial, and I’ll go on record saying that I don’t buy it. One of the biggest draws to Aether Vial is that it makes the creatures it puts onto the battlefield uncounterable. Brain in a Jar casts the instant or sorcery involved in its activation, meaning that the spell can still be countered just like any spell being cast normally. Having to put a counter on Brain in a Jar each time it is activated isn’t something that’s conducive with good deck-building.

The biggest issue with having varying mana costs is that the controller of Brain in a Jar has to draw the instants and sorceries in the correct order. In cases when this doesn’t happen, the Brain is in play, doing nothing, and there are cards stranded in its controller’s hand—and the deck just isn’t doing very much. The exception is if the deck is loaded up with cheap spells. In the case that the deck is loaded up with cheap spells, having to spend more mana on the front end (as in, the casting of the Brain) hardly seems worth it. Decks that are hyper-efficient with streamlined spells (and mana costs) very rarely want to have cards in their deck that don’t do anything.

Brain in a Jar has a unique, albeit splashy, effect, but the fact that it doesn’t do very much on its own (without significant mana investment over several turns) is going to keep it out of tournament halls and on kitchen tables.

Aberrant Researcher

I’m honestly offended that they’re outclassing Cloud Manta so soon after it was printed. I quit playing Yu-Gi-Oh! because of how insane the power creep was in that game. If Wizards of the Coast doesn’t watch themselves, they’re going to lose me as a dedicated tournament player. The line has to be drawn somewhere.

(This card is not good. Do not play it. I am happy to be proven wrong on this.)

Archangel Avacyn

This card is absurd. For those who haven’t been playing Magic very long, there was a significant chunk of Magic history in which Serra Angel was the most powerful creature in the game. Wizards of the Coast adding eleven lines of text onto the already great card is a pretty surefire way to make it Constructed-playable again.

Finding a new shell for Avacyn is difficult and easy at the same time. The first thing to note is that Avacyn is a great Magic card on her own. This means that it isn’t hard to find decks in which she would have applications. The difficult part is finding a deck that can actually abuse her abilities. With so many abilities on a card, there’s a small laundry list of ways to apply her strengths (and compensate for her detractions) in different archetypes.

Using her as a combat trick is the first thought that comes to mind when seeing a creature with flash that grants your side of the battlefield (herself included) indestructible until end of turn. It’s academic to use Eldrazi Displacer with such a swingy enters-the-battlefield ability. This synergy in particular lends itself to a more aggressive creature deck that uses the Displacer as a combat trick and for value with other enters-the-battlefield effects.

W/U Aggro ? Shadows over Innistrad Standard | Emma Handy

This list in particular has fairly iffy mana at best, and Avacyn being a 5-drop leads one to think that the best aggressive shell for her may not be as low to the ground. Going a bit bigger but keeping her aggressive, we turn to tried-and-true favorite Deathmist Raptor.

G/W Megamorph ? Shadows over Innistrad Standard | Emma Handy

Evolutionary Leap pulls double-duty in this list by fulfilling several roles at once. It turns the tokens from Gideon and Nissa into real cards, gets more use out of Deathmist Raptor returning to the battlefield, and can transform Avacyn the turn you cast her—well, it can trigger her the turn you cast her. It’s a way to make a non-Angel creature die when there is an invincibility clause on other creatures.

The biggest concern with both of these lists is they don’t really want Avacyn to transform. A timely Grasp of Darkness could spell disaster for these decks. The combination of Firespout and Lava Spike is hardly worth every single Soldier and Lizard that the aggro player has been able to muster. The next logical step is to look at Avacyn in a slower midrange-to-control context:

W/B Control ? Shadows over Innistrad Standard | Emma Handy

This seems to be a great home for Archangel Avacyn. The key here is to think of her as something much more akin to a removal spell with awaken than a simple creature. At its core, this deck is incredibly reactive, but it is capable of some very aggressive draws with Gideon and Avacyn working alongside one another. Jeff Hoogland has made a similar deck quite popular this Standard season with Sorin, Solemn Visitor and Monastery Mentor. Avacyn slots into the archetype quite naturally, and at this point, it seems more of a question if this deck has a spot in the future meta game than if she is a good fit in the deck itself.

Relentless Dead

This is the card I am the most excited about by a significant margin. The fact that this card has a Bloodghast-esque effect and has the ability to block is a huge step up from its predecessors. A low-costed mythic rare that is good on offense and defense is a recipe for an expensive Magic card.

Todd Stevens was the first person to bring up the idea of a B/G Artistocrats shell on Twitter, and it’s difficult to ignore the possibilities at this point. Relentless Dead is a creature that is efficient in combat with benefits to it being sacrificed.

B/G Aristocrats ? Shadows over Innistrad Standard | Emma Handy

Nantuko Husk being a Zombie is a much bigger deal in this deck than it has in the past. Most Aristocrats decks tend to suffer a good bit if the sacrifice outlet can be dealt with. Relentless Dead’s bottom ability is a way to recur Nantuko Husk or Fleshbag Marauder directly to the battlefield. Normally, a deck with a mana sink in Relentless Dead and a play set of a 4-drop wants to play twenty-three or twenty-four lands, but with eleven creatures that can make Eldrazi Scions, it appears it would be less of an issue as games progress.

Thing in the Ice

It may be early to be making comparisons, but the similarities between this frozen fright and Tarmogoyf are incredibly difficult to ignore. Taking a bit of extra work on the front end may push this card just out of the range of playable in Legacy and Vintage, but being in the middle of Tarmogoyf and Young Pyromancer is a great place to be.

The first type of deck that this seems to lend itself to is anything with a significant number of cheap spells and cantrips. Seem familiar?

Temur Delver decks in Legacy have been blue decks that splashed some red cards and some green cards in order to actually kill people, usually via Tarmogoyf, Nimble Mongoose, and Lightning Bolt. U/R Delver decks have been popularized by the likes of Bob Huang and Andrew Schneider as much more aggressive takes on the archetype, incorporating more burn in with their take on hyper-efficient creatures. Thing in the Ice gives an on-color alternative to Tarmogoyf that plays quite nicely with the archetype, and it seems it could be a natural inclusion going forward.

U/R Delver ? Shadows over Innistrad Legacy | Emma Handy

This decklist really pushed Thing in the Ice to the limit and does what it can to make it transform as quickly as possible. Another way to push Thing in the Ice to the front and center of an archetype is revive something a big older:

Nivmagus Combo ? Shadows over Innistrad Modern | Emma Handy

This is all in on making a 7/8 creature and killing the opponent in the same turn. Part of this archetype’s weakness was not having enough durable creatures to force through a combo with. Monastery Swiftspear and Kiln Fiend were (unsurprisingly) weak to the poster child of Modern removal: Lightning Bolt. Thing in the Ice surviving most damage-based removal (save Roast and Galvanic Blast) is an asset that is hard to ignore. The ability to bounce everything that could block the creature is also an enormous effect in this type of strategy, as it removes the need for an evasion combo piece.

The biggest thing holding back this particular archetype (along with half of Modern) is the Eldrazi menace. Apostle's Blessing doesn’t force your Nivmagus Elemental or Death's Shadow through very much when the opponent’s entire board is colorless, and Eldrazi Displacer’s ability to “reset” Thing in the Ice is a special level of miserable. This doesn’t even factor in how strong Drowner of Hope is against this entire archetype. For those looking to surprise their opponents, this deck is going to be a great starting point when Eldrazi is inevitably knocked down a peg or two with the coming of the next banned-and-restricted-list update.

These just scratch the surface of different brews that can be built around the new cards. While I’ll be sad to see Khans of Tarkir and Fate Reforged go (and with them my beloved Rally the Ancestors), the anticipation surrounding this set is almost palpable. Be it through flavor or power level, Shadows over Innistrad is going to leave an unforgettable mark on Magic.

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TAGS articles, standard, constructed, rumors & spoilers, competitive, decklist, brews, tech, shadows over innistrad, #mtgsoi, emma handy

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