With the release of Aetherdrift, Standard has received plenty of new cards that have made the format very exciting. While the topdecks of Gruul, Esper Bounce, and Dimir remain, new decks have been doing well and there are plenty of new cards to experiment with. Additionally, the Pro Tour this past weekend gave a multitude of incredibly interesting and under-explored new lists. In this article, I will go over what new cards meta decks are playing, some of the cool new decks finding success, and some of my own brews.
What is the Metagame?
As previously stated the meta is defined by 3 top decks: Gruul Mice, Esper Pixie, and Domain Overlords. Gruul Mice is a very aggressive deck defined by the mice package of Heartfire Hero, Emberheart Challenger, and Manifold Mouse. Esper Pixie looks to generate an insurmountable amount of value by using cards like Nurturing Pixie and This Town Ain’t Big Enough to return Hopeless Nightmare and Stormchaser’s Talent to hand. Lastly, Domain Overlords looks to go over the top of all other decks by playing Up the Beanstalk with the Overlords and slow the game down with Sunfall and Zur, Eternal Schemer. In general, Domain is good against Pixie but loses to Gruul, Pixie is good against Gruul but loses to Domain, and Gruul is good against Domain but loses to Pixie. They represent a sort of “Rock, Paper, Scissors” metagame that requires for any deck to succeed they must have a good matchup vs two of the three.
What new cards are being played?
Domain Overlords
With the standard environment being massive at the moment it is hard for new cards to penetrate existing archetypes. The only card from Aetherdrift to see any consistent play in Domain has been Ride’s End a 5-mana exile spell that can be discounted to 2-mana when targeting a tapped creature. The exile is incredibly relevant as it does not trigger Heartfire Hero and being 5-mana it triggers Up the Beanstalk. In Matt Nass’ Pro Tour winning list, he ran 4 copies of the newly printed spell.
Gruul Mice
In all of the Gruul Mice lists with top finishes I found 0 new cards.
Esper Pixie
Esper Pixie got a couple of cool new tools. While Nowhere to Run is an incredible removal spell to cast repeatedly off of This Town Ain’t Big Enough, Nurturing Pixie, and Fear of Isolation, Aetherdrift introduced 2 new removal options for the deck. Grim Bauble and Momentum Breaker are very efficient and add a density of strong removal options for the deck. Grim Bauble is an artifact that for 1 black mana can give a creature -2/-2 and be sacrificed later to surveil 2. Momentum Breaker edicts your opponent and still has utility on an empty board because if they aren’t saccing a creature they are forced to discard a card. The two cards are not full 4-ofs but rather there are typically 1-3 Grim Baubles to hedge more or less against Gruul Mice and Momentum Breaker is often a 1-2 of just to add a couple more removal spells to the deck.
New Decks at the Pro Tour and Beyond
The Pro Tour is a place where some of the most innovative brews are showcased. Teams of the best players in the world convene to decide on what the best deck in the format is. Many times they will decide a known deck is best and will tune it to be as prepared as possible for the expected metagame. However, sometimes these teams will show up with decks completely unknown before the tournament. A great recent example is Rakdos Ripper in Pioneer, a deck that got Sorin banned in the format.
Completely New Brews
Golgari Graveyard
Zevin Faust got into the top 8 of the Pro Tour with this incredibly unique and innovative brew. The deck looks to fill its graveyard and deploy Up the Beanstalk to cast repeatedly cast cards like Hollow Marauder and Huskburster Swarm at a discounted rate while drawing cards. The deck looks bad but for many decks it is hard to compete with 1 mana 5/5s that draw a card.
UW Control
Many members of team Channel Fireball brought UW control to the Pro Tour aswell. Arne Huschenbeth qualified for Worlds and had a record of 9-1 with the deck. The deck got recent upgrades that lead to its viability such as Stock Up, an excellent dig spell for a control deck, and Ride’s End, a previously mentioned cheap exile spell. The deck also runs a full 4 copies of Jace, the Perfected Mind an incredibly powerful kill condition against Domain Overlords since Jace often will mill their entire deck in long grindy games.
Interesting Twists on Existing Archetypes
Golgari Obliterator
Golgari Midrange has been a decent metagame player for a while. Never the top but always decent to playable. This deck, which Cristoffer Larsen took to a 9-1 finish at the Pro Tour, is Golgari Midrange with an unfair gameplan. Because of the printing of Wastewood Verge, this build of the deck runs a full playset of Phyrexian Obliterator and Bushwhack. Each decent cards, a top end threat or a land tutor/removal spell, but when combined end the game for your opponent as they are forced to sacrifice often time 5+ permanents. The deck also has a playset of Unholy Annex and 2 Archfiend of the Dross since, while the cards are powerful they have been pushed out of being main deck-able by Esper Pixie.
Esper Paragon
Esper Paragon is an innovative more controlling build of Esper Pixie brought by the Pro Tour Team Sanctum of All. The deck still uses Nurturing Pixie and an overall similar plan to Esper Pixie but is significantly slower. Cards like Serra Paragon, and Overlord of the Balemurk are includes that emphasize this deck’s plan to generate incremental advantage. Esper Paragon runs no copies of Stormchaser’s Talent and only 2 copies of This Town Ain’t Big Enough.
Orzhov Pixie
Ben Stark finished the event with a record of 8-1-1. His Orzhov Pixie deck had a similar plan to Esper Pixie but without powerful blue options such as Fear of Isolation, This Town Ain’t Big Enough, and Stormchaser’s Talent, the deck opted for more expensive and powerful options such as Unholy Annex // Ritual Chamber and Temporary Lockdown. The deck also ran a full 4 copies of Momentum Breaker.
Jeskai Oculus
Jeskai Oculus was brought by both a Pro Team from Japan and Team Channel Fireball. Kenta Harane made it to top 8 with the deck and Ken Yukuhiro finished with a record of 9-1 with the deck. The deck is a more midrange-y version of UW Oculus. While it still tries to cheat Oculus into play the deck also has an additional unfair plan of combining Proft’s Eidetic Memory with Fear of Missing Out, Steamcore Scholar and extra combats. The teams also identified Chandra, Spark Hunter as a powerful sideboard option to ignore graveyard hate post board.
Izzet Artifacts
Rémi Roudier finished with a Standard record of 7-3 with this very cool Repurposing Bay, Simulacrum Synthesizer artifact deck. A removal suite of Legion Extruder, Chainsaw, and Torch the Tower, provide the deck time to develop a pack breaking gameplan of an army of contructs or a massive Radiant Lotus and Boommobile turn to generate 20+ mana and fireball your opponent.
Roots Reanimator
While this deck did not have a fantastic showing, only a record of 5-4-1 at the Pro Tour, it is an incredibly interesting and new take on Insidious Roots. Insidious Roots generates massive amounts of plants and mana and the self mill means both casting or reanimating Atraxa, Grand Unifier are viable. Squirming Emergence also can very reasonably get back powerful engine pieces such as Insidious Roots itself or Tyvar, Jubilant Brawler.
Non-PT New Decks
Gruul Goblins
Gruul Goblins placed highly in a recent challenge. The maindeck is all red and all goblins with the exception of Torch the Tower and Agatha’s Soul Cauldron with a green splash in the sideboard for powerful green hate cards. Agatha’s Soul Cauldron is incredibly powerful in the Goblin’s Archetype because of the presence and viability of Krenko, Mob Boss. Krenko is good, but when put under Cauldron is incredible; doubling if not quadrupling or octupling the number of goblin you have is insane. I think this deck is incredibly cool and while it has put up one good finish it tends to fall apart with a couple of removal spells or a boardwipe so I do not think it is incredibly viable.
My Own Brews
The metagame has been incredibly consistent which has made it incredibly easy to brew. My general philosophy in magic is that your deck should be doing something unfair but with a strong back up plan.
Rakdos Oculus
Rakdos Oculus, like many other decks in the metagame is looking to cheat out Oculus. However, I think black and red at the moment have some of the strongest disruptive and proactive cards in the metagame. Torch the Tower and Duress provide powerful early interaction while threats like Inti, Fear of Missing Out, and Preacher of the Schism either support the Oculus gameplan or are resistant to the metagame’s removal given the prevalence of Nowhere to Run and its inablity to kill 4 toughness creatures. Postboard, the real power of this deck comes from it’s transformative sideboard plan. After sideboarding the deck can remove 4x Oculus, 4x No One Left Behind and 2x Lively Dirge as well as other cards that are bad in the matchup to bring in Sheoldred, Piggy Bank, The Speed Demon, and Unholy Annex, to completely dodge any graveyard hate. No One Left Behind is a generally powerful spell because 2 mana to return Oculus is great but also simply returning Inti, Fear of Missing Out, or Preacher of the Schism is great too. The deck also runs blue sources simply because late game hardcasting Oculus is an important option to have access to. I have had a consistently 55-60% winrate on mtgo with this list.
Dimir Oculus Control
Dimir Oculus Control is a control deck that also can put Oculus onto the field on turn 3 with Likeness Looter or No One Left Behind. Duress, and Spell Pierce are a premium in viability right now and this deck looks to take advantage of that. This deck has not been tested thoroughly but it has something to it and will require further innovation.
Gruul Cauldron
As a Tree of Perdition and Yawgmoth gamer, I really enjoy casting Agatha’s Soul Cauldron. While I can’t give my creatures the ability to swap life totals with toughness or planeswalker abilities, Loot, the Pathfinder is an incredibly card to both cast and put under Cauldron. This deck looks to take advantage of that while playing a powerful midrange shell around it. I have had a consistently positive winrate with this deck in leagues as well however the inclusion of Charming Scoundrel and Tender Wildguide are things I want to change. They are both decent cards but slightly under the required powerlevel for Standard.
Conclusion
That’s my Aetherdrift and Pro Tour Aetherdrift wrap up! I think there is a lot to do in Standard at the moment and I will continue to be excitedly testing as the Standard Regional Championship season approaches.
