Last Friday I posted a few new Pioneer brews to try with Oko, Thief of Crowns and Nexus of Fate banned from the format and today we get to take one for a flight.
Dragons aren't exactly a tribe in Magic the same way that Goblins or Elves are. It's pretty hard to jam pack your deck full of them to help pay off big synergies because they're naturally already big, powerful, expensive threats. However, the plus side is that because of this they play much better with interactive elements and let you have more control over what your opponent is doing. They're also jam packed full of power, as cards like Nicol Bolas, the Ravager and Glorybringer so clearly demonstrate.
As such, you get to graft the dragon top end (alongside a few synergy cards like Draconic Roar and Dragon's Hoard) onto an already robust selection of powerful Rakdos interactive cards like Thoughtseize, Fatal Push, and Dreadbore to form a very powerful midrange deck. We can kill creatures, we can disrupt planeswalkers, but most importantly we can turn the corner quickly to kill our opponent and not let them find their way out of it.
Presenting Grixis Dragons!
Time Stamps:
Match 1 - 00:07:29
Match 2 - 00:28:22
Match 3 - 00:48:19
Match 4 - 00:58:18
Match 5 - 01:08:13
Grixis Dragons | Pioneer | Jim Davis
- Creatures (10)
- 3 Nicol Bolas, the Ravager
- 3 Thunderbreak Regent
- 4 Glorybringer
- Planeswalkers (5)
- 2 Sarkhan the Masterless
- 3 Kiora, Behemoth Beckoner
- Instants (9)
- 2 Wild Slash
- 3 Draconic Roar
- 4 Fatal Push
- Sorceries (9)
- 2 Crux of Fate
- 3 Dreadbore
- 4 Thoughtseize
- Artifacts (27)
- 2 Dragon's Hoard
- 1 Mountain
- 1 Swamp
- 1 Fetid Pools
- 1 Steam Vents
- 2 Canyon Slough
- 3 Drowned Catacomb
- 4 Blood Crypt
- 4 Dragonskull Summit
- 4 Sulfur Falls
- 4 Watery Grave
Well we started off great, but got exposed pretty badly in the last two rounds for our weakness to recursive threats. While both players' hands were exceptionally good, Prized Amalgam and Arclight Phoenix gave us some pretty serious problems.
Going forward, swapping Magma Spray in for Wild Slash is a very reasonable change, as we're almost always targeting creatures anyway, and another copy of Anger of the Gods seems like a good choice in the sideboard as well. There are even more exiling options available in cards like Lava Coil and Scorching Dragonfire if we want them. Sarkhan was also a little underwhelming against decks with Wild Slash or attackers, but Dragonlord Silumgar felt pretty awesome against everything and could be a worthy swap.
However you want to spin it there's no doubt that attacking with Dragons is awesome, and Grixis Dragons gives you the ability to just that in your next Pioneer event!