Standard Breakdown

As everything settles down after Rise of the Eldrazi, we get to see how the Standard format is going to adjust itself with these new additions. We see the birth of some new decks, modifications of others, and possibly even a field that the horror of Jund will not be as dominating in!

So I hope everyone enjoyed last week’s article on Make Your Own Standard, but it’s back to business, and what better business to go back to than Standard? With the addition of the new set, we’re seeing an entire slew of new decks coming out of the woodwork, and possibly even having some of them making a bid for tier one deck status in this format. Let’s go through the breakdown of some of the serious contenders.

Now, you can’t talk about Standard without at least talking about Jund. The monster in the room is still here, as a deck like Jund doesn’t just die out overnight, but the good news is that it looks like it’s not getting any better. Here is the Standard Jund list that I’m working with at the moment:





If you’ll look at the list, the deck gained almost nothing from Rise of the Eldrazi! The single card that I’m running is one Emrakul, The Aeons Torn, and that is really only to fight a few rogue decks such as Turbo Fog, and adding that one card to my 75 makes that match essentially un-losable. So the deck gets next to nothing new, but can it handle the other decks in the field? The short answer: Yes. The longer answer: Yes, but it’s getting harder and harder. With more and more decks in the format playing cards that generate their own card advantage, such as Planeswalkers, Jund can no longer just grind their opponent out with things like Bloodbraid and Sprouting Thrinax. Now there are enough aggressive decks in the format that Jund has actually started to have to worry about being just straight-up killed before it can do anything. Red has that ability, and decks running Wall of Omens are causing a serious problem, as Bloodbraid into Lightning Bolt isn’t going to clear that problem up, and just about every card in the deck is stopped by four toughness, forcing Jund to *gasp* get 2 for 1’d killing it. Sure, they probably made both answers with one card, but they had to use both to kill it, so at least they’re not getting further ahead!

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Next up is the long term nemesis of Jund, and in the previous format arguably the only deck that had a really solid matchup against it: Mythic. For those of you who don’t know too much about the deck (as it seems to have been slightly below the radar) it is a // list that uses solid creatures and Noble Hierarch and Lotus Cobra to just power those creatures out and overwhelm your opponent with more threats than they can handle. I’ve always been a fan of this deck, and even before it became recognized as a deck I came up with a list with a similar concept (as can actually be seen in my first article here) Here is the list of modern Mythic:





So as you can see this is obviously slightly different than the list I was working on, I underestimated how good Knight of the Reliquary was in the deck, and how much of a beating a Thornling or two can give you. This newest version of Mythic also has an additional toolbox: Sovereigns of Lost Alara and its ability to go grab an Eldrazi Conscription to just smash face. Tossing one of those on a creature that has been “Rafiq’d” that is going to really hurt. My general feeling of the Sovereigns tech is that while cute, too many people are going to be just trying to set that up, and if you’re going all in on that plan you’re going to find that decks playing lots of removal are just going to let you pull it out, then Terminate your guy and call it a day. The tech is cute, can be powerful, but needs to be taken in stride. This deck was, and still is, a considerable threat, as while the cards don’t generate that much card advantage, each threat needs to be dealt with or the game will simply end right there.

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One of the new contenders on the block that has been getting a lot of attention is a rising interest in the / control deck commonly called “Tap-out.” The deck is based around two powerful :x: sorceries in the format Mind Spring and Martial Coup, and just powering them out until you’re opponent simply drops. The deck uses the very powerful Everyflowing Chalice as well as a Knight of the White Orchid/Fieldmist Borderpost to power out early mana, getting to the late game with just such powerful mana advantage over your opponent. Here is a standard list:





As you can see, the deck is jam packed with a very low curve, and then ramps up until you hit an X spell to sink all of your mana into. The one thing that I don’t like about the list above is that it doesn’t abuse the amazing addition to the deck that is Wall of Omens, it is still playing at the straight up 8 X spell build, that I’m not sure is the correct choice. This deck, as a new archetype still is very much in flux, has a lot of disagreement on the actual numbers behind the deck, especially as you draw so many cards each game that you see all of them.

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This next deck is essentially the same deck as Tapout, but just taken in another direction. The deck abuses the fact that there are now so many planeswalkers in this Standard format that we can reliably stuff them all into one deck:





As you can see, the deck shares a lot of similarities with Tapout, sharing the same shell, but instead of using the end game plan of X spells to overwhelm your opponent, it just packs the board with Planeswalkers and then wins through them. Each Planeswalker fills a very important role. Jace gives you card advantage and lets your smooth our your draws when combined with the fetches. Elspeth generates the tokens you need to block, Ajani keeps the threats tapped down, can be sort of removal, and has the ultimate end game, and Gideon acts as the general shield for the others. The deck is a machine, making forms of creature removal almost irrelevant, while at the same time needed to break through the few creatures you do make in order to have any chance at your planeswalkers. The other beauty of the deck is that it cut all need for Red mana except for the three Ajani. That means that they need one Red source on turn 4, but after that it doesn’t really matter if they get hit by a spreading seas or anything like that. The deck is powerful, synergistic, and I think has the possibility to overthrow Jund and take its place as the best deck in the format.

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So there is the breakdown of what I think the top tier decks are in the format. While a bunch of other decks like Mono Red, Polymorph, and Vampires are close, they just can’t get enough power and card advantage together to battle these monsters. As I said, I think Planeswalkers is going to be the next big deck, as it can kill of Jund reliably, and while it’s possible that Mythic will make a stab and being a powerful aggro deck, it has a lot of powerful hate to fight through. So that’s it for this week! Drop by the forums and let me know what you guys are playing in Standard!

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