Hello everyone. Last week, I gave you a jumping on point into the world of Phyrexia: All Will Be One decks, but I realized I wasn't being fair to you. I only showed you Red decks, which are my usual starting place when a new set is added to Standard. But what if you're not a fan of Red decks? What if you'd prefer to start with some other color instead? To make up for my blunder, I'll be showing you some other mono-colored decks that you can use as a starting point into ONE Standard. Let's get started.
Mono-White Tokens
We'll begin by taking a look at a White deck that harkens back to the Faerie decks from the Lorwyn/Shadowmoor era. Let's take a look at the deck.
Mono-White Tokens | ONE Standard | MtgMalone, aetherhub.com user
- Creatures (11)
- 2 Mondrak, Glory Dominus
- 3 Annex Sentry
- 3 Crawling Chorus
- 3 Phyrexian Vindicator
- Planeswalkers (5)
- 2 The Eternal Wanderer
- 3 The Wandering Emperor
- Instants (7)
- 3 Plated Onslaught
- 4 Charge of the Mites
- Sorceries (5)
- 2 White Sun's Twilight
- 3 Depopulate
- Enchantments (8)
- 2 Rabble Rousing
- 3 Skrelv's Hive
- 3 Wedding Announcement // Wedding Festivity
- Lands (24)
- 20 Plains
- 2 Eiganjo, Seat of the Empire
- 2 Mirrex
Skrelv's Hive is very similar to Bitterblossom. They both have a mana value of two. Both are enchantments. Both require you to lose one point of life during your upkeep in order to create a creature token. That's where the similarities end, though. The token created by Skrelv's Hive is a 1/1 Phyrexian Mite artifact creature that has toxic 1 and is unable to block. That makes it perfect for attacking, and it can become beefier if you have Wedding Festivity in play, which gives all your creatures a +1/+1 bonus. You can further power up your creatures with a well-timed Plated Onslaught, giving your creatures +2/+1 until the end of the turn. This spell also has affinity artifacts, making it easier to cast while you have some of these Phyrexian Mite tokens in play.
In addition to Skrelv's Hive, there are numerous other ways of creating creature tokens that you can use to your advantage. Wedding Announcement // Wedding Festivity has the ability to create up to three 1/1 Human creature tokens. Charge of the Mites and White Sun's Twilight can create a number of additional Phyrexian Mite creature tokens for you. Both The Wandering Emperor and The Eternal Wanderer can create 2/2 Samurai creature tokens. Finally, if you have a copy of Rabble Rousing in play, you'll be able to create a number of 1/1 Citizen creature tokens when you attack. All of these token creators benefit greatly when Mondrak, Glory Dominus is on the battlefield, as the number of tokens you create will be doubled.
Mono-Blue Tempo
Next, I have a Mono-Blue deck that doesn't have any new cards from Phyrexia: All Will Be One, but is still very competitive. Let's check it out.
Mono-Blue Tempo | ONE Standard | MTG_Joe, aetherhub.com user
- Creatures (12)
- 4 Delver of Secrets
- 4 Haughty Djinn
- 4 Tolarian Terror
- Instants (27)
- 2 Impulse
- 3 Essence Scatter
- 3 Make Disappear
- 3 Spell Pierce
- 4 Consider
- 4 Fading Hope
- 4 Slip Out the Back
- 4 Thirst for Discovery
- Lands (21)
- 21 Island
Delver of Secrets is a great turn one play for this deck. Since nearly half of this deck is made up of instant spells, the odds are in your favor that you'll be able to reveal one at the start of your turn very quickly. Doing this allows Delver of Secrets to transform into the more powerful Insectile Aberration, a 3/2 creature with flying. That evasion is what makes Insectile Aberration so deadly, as your opponent must quickly find an airborne blocker so as not to die within a few turns.
The other creatures in this deck are also very powerful threats that benefit from the high number of instant spells in this deck. Haughty Djinn is another aerial threat that gets more and more power from the number of instant (and sorcery) cards in your graveyard. Tolarian Terror is a massive 5/5 Serpent that can be played quickly due to it having pseudo-affinity for instant and sorcery spells in your graveyard. If you're able to get Tolarian Terror in play early, you can force your opponent to choose between taking five points of damage or blocking with one (or more) of their key creatures.
Mono-Black Control
Next, I have a Mono-Black control deck that utilizes the power of Phyrexian Arena to have extra options each turn. Let's take a look at the deck.
Mono-Black Control | ONE Standard | SlothMtg, aetherhub.com user
- Creatures (4)
- 2 Phyrexian Fleshgorger
- 2 Phyrexian Obliterator
- Planeswalkers (1)
- 1 Liliana of the Veil
- Instants (14)
- 2 Black Sun's Twilight
- 2 Go for the Throat
- 3 Cut Down
- 3 Sheoldred's Edict
- 4 March of Wretched Sorrow
- Sorceries (11)
- 2 Corrupt
- 2 Duress
- 3 Path of Peril
- 4 Invoke Despair
- Enchantments (4)
- 4 Phyrexian Arena
- Lands (26)
- 21 Swamp
- 1 Takenuma, Abandoned Mire
- 4 Raffine's Tower
While you have a copy of Phyrexian Arena on the battlefield, you'll draw an extra card each turn at the low price of losing one point of life. Since this enchantment isn't legendary, it's possible to have up to four copies in play at the same time. Be careful playing these extra copies, because it is possible to die to the life loss this requires. However, this deck is set up with ways to mitigate the life loss each turn. You have a full playset of March of Wretched Sorrow, which you can use to gain as much life as you can pay mana for. You also have Phyrexian Fleshgorger, which has lifelink. Whether you cast it for its full cost or its prototype value, the life you gain with it will be invaluable.
In addition to drawing extra cards and gaining extra life, this deck also features a huge amount of removal spells. They range from Cut Down and Go for the Throat, which can destroy a single creature, to Path of Peril, which has the ability to destroy multiple creatures. Both Invoke Despair and Sheoldred's Edict force your opponent to sacrifice their own creatures (and other permanents). There are even a couple of copies of Corrupt, which offers both a means of creature destruction as well as an additional way to gain extra life.
Mono-Green Stompy
The final deck I have for you today features Nissa, Ascended Animist and attempts to put her ultimate ability to good use. Let's take a look at the deck.
Mono-Green Stompy | ONE Standard | powrdragn, aetherhub.com user
- Creatures (25)
- 2 Cankerbloom
- 2 Defiler of Vigor
- 2 Thrun, Breaker of Silence
- 3 Armored Scrapgorger
- 4 Bloated Contaminator
- 4 Evolving Adaptive
- 4 Llanowar Loamspeaker
- 4 Topiary Stomper
- Planeswalkers (4)
- 4 Nissa, Ascended Animist
- Sorceries (8)
- 4 Awaken the Woods
- 4 Bushwhack
- Lands (24)
- 23 Forest
- 1 Boseiju, Who Endures
Since the goal of this deck is to do as much damage to your opponent as possible the turn that you activate Nissa, Ascended Animist's -7 loyalty ultimate ability, you'll need to make sure you can play Nissa as quickly as possible. To do so, you can play creatures such as Armored Scrapgorger and Llanowar Loamspeaker, which can both be tapped to provide a mana. There's also a playset of Topiary Stomper that allows you to search your library for a basic land to put onto the battlefield tapped when this Plant Dinosaur comes into play. With all this mana ramp, you shouldn't have any trouble casting Nissa for her full 7 mana value, allowing you to use her ultimate ability right away.
Nissa's ultimate ability will give all creatures you control a +1/+1 bonus for each Forest you control. They will also gain trample, enabling you to deal a lot of damage to your opponent even if your creatures are blocked. Since there are multiple creatures in the deck that can tap for mana, you might think that the number of Forests you have in play could be low, but this deck also includes a playset of Awaken the Woods, which creates 1/1 Forest Dryad land creature tokens. These tokens add to the number of Forests you have in play, providing a bigger bonus, plus they are also creatures, so they can attack. This allows you to deal some incredibly high amounts of damage, usually ending the game on the spot.
Wrapping Up
I love starting off playing a mono-colored deck when a new set comes out because I know the deck will be consistent. I'll be able to ensure that I can draw enough lands to cast any spell in my deck, and won't feel the sting of not having the correct color of mana available to cast the spells I need to cast. That's the beauty of mono-colored decks.
What do you think of these decks? Feel free to share this article with your friends anywhere on social media. And be sure to join me here again next week as I continue my search for innovative decks in Standard. I'll see you then!
- Mike Likes