Wanna win the Golgari mirror in Standard? (As well as make life hell for anyone playing almost any type of control or midrange deck?)

I've got two words for you:

Carnage.

Tyrant.

The Golgari mirror is often a crazy grind fest of card advantage and two for ones that drags on forever, but by playing the almost unanswerable Carnage Tyrant you give yourself a way both to pressure their planeswalkers and break through. You also end up making awesome use of Find // Finality, destroying almost everything on the battlefield and leaving behind the biggest, baddest dinosaur anyone has ever seen.

This list was the brainchild of good friend and former teammate, Andrew Jessup.

Time Stamps:

Match 1 - 00:07:36

Match 2 - 00:29:00

Match 3 - 01:02:22

Match 4 - 01:34:36

Match 5 - 01:56:08

Carnage Tyrant Golgari | Guilds Standard | Jim Davis

• Creatures (26)
• 2 Midnight Reaper
• 2 Seekers' Squire
• 3 Carnage Tyrant
• 3 Ravenous Chupacabra
• 4 Jadelight Ranger
• 4 Llanowar Elves
• 4 Merfolk Branchwalker
• 4 Wildgrowth Walker

• Planeswalkers (5)
• 2 Karn, Scion of Urza
• 3 Vivien Reid

• Instants (2)
• 2 Vraska's Contempt

• Sorceries (3)
• 3 Find // Finality

• Lands (24)
• 4 Swamp
• 9 Forest
• 1 Detection Tower
• 2 Memorial to Folly
• 4 Overgrown Tomb
• 4 Woodland Cemetery

• Sideboard (15)
• 2 Kraul Harpooner
• 4 Duress
• 2 Necrotic Wound
• 2 Treasure Map
• 2 Golden Demise
• 2 Vraska's Contempt
• 1 Carnage Tyrant

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Despite a few rough matches in the video, I am very pleased with the deck, and Andrew, his brother Dan, Ben Friedman, Pete Ingram, and myself all played it at Grand Prix New Jersey this weekend to decent success.

As we saw in match one, The Immortal Sun was a very difficult card to answer, despite being somewhat fringe, as all of our usual versatile answers are planeswalkers. The deck we played against was cool but isn't really a player in the metagame yet, so it's unclear if an answer to The Immortal Sun is needed. One card that does need to be answered is Tocatli Honor Guard, as it shuts off almost our entire engine for a very low and efficient cost.

As this video was recorded before the Grand Prix, here are the updates for the list that I ended up playing:

Golgari Carnage Tyrant | Guilds Standard | Jim Davis, GP New Jersey

• Creatures (26)
• 2 Midnight Reaper
• 2 Seekers' Squire
• 3 Carnage Tyrant
• 3 Ravenous Chupacabra
• 4 Jadelight Ranger
• 4 Llanowar Elves
• 4 Merfolk Branchwalker
• 4 Wildgrowth Walker

• Planeswalkers (3)
• 3 Vivien Reid

• Instants (3)
• 1 Cast Down
• 2 Vraska's Contempt

• Sorceries (4)
• 4 Find // Finality

• Lands (24)
• 5 Swamp
• 9 Forest
• 2 Memorial to Folly
• 4 Overgrown Tomb
• 4 Woodland Cemetery

• Sideboard (15)
• 1 Carnage Tyrant
• 1 Cast Down
• 4 Duress
• 2 Golden Demise
• 2 Kraul Harpooner
• 2 Necrotic Wound
• 1 Treasure Map
• 2 Vraska's Contempt

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Cast Down isn't super exciting, but it fills the gaps and deals with the problematic cards. It also helps against the Mono-Blue Aggro deck, which can be a tough matchup once they get rolling, as well as against Crackling Drake and early Goblin Electromancers.

There's something to be said for just jamming Carnage Tyrant after Carnage Tyrant, and with Wildgrowth Walker ensuring you don't lose to fast decks and Finality cleaning up the go wide decks, you've got game against everything. Golgari will continue to evolve, but this evolution is currently atop the food chain.