This past week I’ve played a lot of Magic Online while simultaneously watching the SCG Tour stop in Atlanta. To say that I’ve got Standard on the brain is an understatement, to the point where I don’t think I’ll be bummed out if I do poorly at Grand Prix Richmond because the PTQ on Sunday is Standard. While I don’t have my deck nailed down quite yet, I think I have some good ideas about where I want to be.
Creatures (18)
- 2 Archangel Avacyn
- 4 Thraben Inspector
- 2 Thalia, Heretic Cathar
- 4 Scrapheap Scrounger
- 4 Toolcraft Exemplar
- 2 Walking Ballista
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (25)
Spells (13)
First and foremost, there is an elephant in the room. Mardu Vehicles took down the SCG Open in Atlanta in the hands of one of the best players in the room, Andrew Jessup. Now, you could try to garner too much information from that result, but the moral of the story is this: Mardu Vehicles was a built deck, needing very few new cards to function optimally. New archetypes need a lot of work in order to become viable in the current metagame, and as a result we watched Mardu Vehicles just obliterate people over and over again. On top of the late banning of Felidar Guardian, everything just fell into place for Mardu Vehicles to take the tournament.
Somehow, we’re still finding things that are your fault.
The strength of Mardu Vehicles lies specifically in its versatility. Its sideboard plan of sideboarding “bigger” with more planeswalkers is tough for most opponents to deal with. While the planeswalkers themselves might not win the game on the spot, they do offer a lot of threat diversity in the archetype. Just imagine you’re a B/G pilot, and you have to decide in sideboarding whether or not to leave in all your copies of Fatal Push and/or Grasp of Darkness. If your opponent sideboards out Toolcraft Exemplar or Heart of Kiran, how will you win if you draw a bunch of dead removal spells?
I’m a pretty big fan of having deck-altering sideboard plans. I like putting my opponent in a tough position if they pick wrong on what deck I’m going to be after sideboarding. I talked about this aspect of B/G Constrictor quite a bit back when Mardu Vehicles first started implementing this sideboard plan, but times have changed. Even though I wrote about B/G Constrictor a lot last week, I’m not even confident the deck is viable anymore.
Instead, for the Magic Online PTQ this past weekend, I decided to take a different approach. After getting some help from Brad Nelson, I ended up registering this list:
Creatures (15)
- 2 Pilgrim's Eye
- 2 Mindwrack Demon
- 1 Tireless Tracker
- 3 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
- 4 Grim Flayer
- 1 Gonti, Lord of Luxury
- 1 Noxious Gearhulk
- 1 Manglehorn
Planeswalkers (3)
Lands (23)
Spells (19)
Brad and I collectively put in hours of work with the archetype, trying to find the best configuration to maximize our chances in each of the big matchups we expected to play against. Those archetypes were:
- Mardu Vehicles
- B/G Constrictor
- B/G Delirium
- U/X Gearhulk
The main problem we had going into the tournament is that a deck like B/G Delirium can just lose games if you draw one or two awkward cards in a given matchup. Slow enablers like Grapple with the Past and Vessel of Nascency aren’t great against Mardu Vehicles or even B/G Constrictor. Simply put, you don’t have enough time to really get those engines going in the early turns, and you need your removal spells to slow them down. After you’ve bought yourself some time, those cards get infinitely better because you gain delirium for Ishkanah, Grafwidow. And once you start chaining Ishkanah, Grafwidow, most creature-based decks can’t put up much of a fight.
We had already written off the Aetherworks Marvel matchup, understanding that anything we did outside of adding a color (blue) to the deck would ultimately improve our chances of winning by a minuscule amount. And adding a color is a lot harder than you might think, even with Traverse the Ulvenwald. Your best bet is to treat them like a control deck and just hope to stick your early creatures. Well, that and hoping they brick on finding Aetherworks Marvel.
Sometimes it is important to know how changing your deck will help you beat a certain archetype. If those changes only increase your chances by a small percentage, it will likely be a mistake to play those cards. In the case of Aetherworks Marvel and B/G Delirium, they’re just going much bigger than you, and your cards that help stall or eventually win the late-game become invalidated. We toyed with the idea of playing ways to strip them of their combo. Dispossess was the frontrunner for a while, since it could also take all of the Torrential Gearhulks from the control decks, but after testing for a few days we found it lackluster.
As for Mardu Vehicles, I expected my results to be better against it. I constantly found myself against the wall, either with their early pressure or their transformational sideboard. If I picked wrong, I could just lose the game to Gideon, Ally of Zendikar or Sorin, Grim Nemesis with multiple copies of Fatal Push or Grasp of Darkness in hand. At times, it felt embarrassing, but I wasn’t about to jam Scrapheap Scrounger and Distended Mindbender against the Toolcraft Exemplar deck (actually, I did do exactly that in one post-sideboard game, and it was not good).
And now, with extra copies of Cut//Ribbons in their deck, you can’t even reliably win the game by stalling them out with Ishkanah, Grafwidow. To be frank, it was a disaster. The extra damage and reach they could get with Unlicensed Disintegration and Cut//Ribbons was bonkers, and I don’t honestly know what to do about it other than jamming three or four copies of Never//Return into the list. In all honestly, Never//Return wasn’t doing so well for either of us in testing, and we ultimately went with To the Slaughter, since it was marginally worthwhile against Torrential Gearhulk. Now? I think you have to respect Mardu Vehicles and just play the one that can kill Gideon, Ally of Zendikar without all the bells and whistles.
My instinct here is to cut all the copies of Grasp of Darkness in favor of Dissenter’s Deliverance. That gives us more instant-speed removal spells for Torrential Gearhulk, while also allowing us some flexibility when we’re flooded with too much removal. Dissenter’s Deliverance also allows us to kill Heart of Kiran without them needing to activate it. Plus, when they don’t draw too many artifacts, you can just cycle it away and try to hit something with a greater impact. That also allows us to cut out all the To the Slaughter in favor of Never//Return without too much trouble. This plan might be seem weird, but I haven’t been high up on Grasp of Darkness since the banning of Felidar Guardian, and it might end up being a welcome change to the archetype.
Liliana, Death’s Majesty was pretty great, instantly locking up games where we were able to revive a fallen Ishkanah, Grafwidow, but therein lies the problem. Since they both cost five mana, you don’t want to overload your deck with too many expensive cards. If I had to run the tournament over again, I would probably just cut Noxious Gearhulk for the second copy of Liliana, Death’s Majesty in the maindeck, but at the time we were deathly afraid of a Verdurous Gearhulk getting out of hand. With that said, it might not be all that bad if we are playing three or so copies of Dissenter’s Deliverance. After all, it’s the trampling part of Verdurous Gearhulk that gets out of control, and the fact that neither Fatal Push or Grasp of Darkness can deal with it all too well.
Of course, cutting Grasp of Darkness will come with consequences if people continue to play B/G Constrictor. In that matchup, it is imperative that you can deal with both Winding Constrictor and their three-drop creatures. If you’re stuck facing down a 4/5 Winding Constrictor on the third turn after a Rishkar, Peema Renegade hits the battlefield, you’re going to look pretty stupid with Dissenter’s Deliverance in your hand. Luckily, the deck is falling out of favor at the moment, so I’m willing to take the leap and try something new. Plus, with the addition of Never//Return, we have some hard removal that can kill creatures with more than four toughness. Finding the balance will ultimately end up making the biggest difference.
While I brought up the Scrapheap Scrounger / Distended Mindbender sideboard plan earlier, I wanted to take a moment to go a bit deeper on why I ended up playing that combo. For starters, no amount of discard is going to win you the game against a Torrential Gearhulk deck unless you can apply pressure. Scrapheap Scrounger was the original addition to the sideboard in order to help accomplish this. It just so happens that hitting a Scrapheap Scrounger off Grim Flayer, Mindwrack Demon, or even Vessel of Nascency is just bonkers.
While Scrapheap Scrounger was solid, it wasn’t quite getting the job done. Things could still get out of hand. So, in order to push our advantage gained with Scrapheap Scrounger, we wanted a blowout target for Traverse the Ulvenwald. Distended Mindbender has always been that card at the back of my mind, waiting for a reason to see play. Now, with Censor helping Torrential Gearhulk decks get back in the game, Distended Mindbender has a reason to be.
The fact that it triggers when it is cast is huge, since most control decks could deal with normal threats in the same way: counterspells. No matter what you do against them, a counterspell could usually stop a late-game bomb like a planeswalker or value-based creature. Using Scrapheap Scrounger as nightmare fuel for Distended Mindbender was just downright dirty. While one Distended Mindbender hitting their hand won’t be game over, you can bet they’re going to have a tough time rebuilding their resources while also dealing with the rest of the cards you cast.
As for the B/G Constrictor matchup, this is the deck I wanted to face off against the most. While some of their starts were tough to beat, we have all the tools at our disposal to dismantle them. Do you remember when people started sideboarding Gonti, Lord of Luxury in B/G Constrictor to beat the mirror? Well, we have one copy maindeck already, and two more in the sideboard to push the envelope. Deathtouch is surprisingly relevant here, as they usually won’t want to trade their best attacking creature for your 2/3. And they’ll most likely just have to burn a removal spell if they want to start attacking. That usually leaves your Ishkanah, Grafwidow with some time to resolve, which in turn buys you more time to use all your card advantage to lock the game up.
This is also the matchup where Liliana, Death’s Majesty shines. Being able to return Gonti, Lord of Luxury over and over again is just disgusting. And if they can’t immediately kill the Liliana, Death’s Majesty, the game should be over the moment you get to untap. You should take this with a grain of salt, but just know that Liliana, Death’s Majesty is ridiculous here when you’re chaining Gonti, Lord of Luxury. Any sideboard plan they try to enact is going to fall flat when dealing with this combo.
As for all the artifact destruction (four pieces between maindeck and sideboard), we were obviously coming prepared to beat Heart of Kiran. Unfortunately, that also meant their sideboard plan of taking out all copies of Heart of Kiran and Toolcraft Exemplar could make us look stupid. At the very least Dissenter’s Deliverance could cycle, so it wasn’t all bad. The problem is that I still had a tough time beating Scrapheap Scrounger. I also chose to go mostly full-on control instead of trying a more aggressive gameplan. I also tried hedging. None of it worked.
But that was, at its core, an issue with the deck being misbuilt for a Mardu-heavy metagame. In eight rounds of play, I only played against Mardu Vehicles twice. And leading up to the PTQ, I didn’t play against it more than a handful of times in Leagues, which led me to believe that it wouldn’t have as big of a presence in the tournament. Moving forward, I know that I have to plan to beat it, and I need precision. I need to understand how they’re going to sideboard on the play, on the draw, and even what they’ll do based on what cards I show them in each game.
And that, really, is why Mardu Vehicles is so good. I’m the one having to react to them. And if I choose poorly, or make a mistake, I will get punished. Their cards are just powerful and proactive, which is a dangerous combination for a deck trying to establish control of the battlefield.
So, with all of these things in mind, here is the version I would likely play in a tournament this weekend.
Creatures (14)
- 2 Pilgrim's Eye
- 2 Mindwrack Demon
- 1 Tireless Tracker
- 3 Ishkanah, Grafwidow
- 4 Grim Flayer
- 1 Gonti, Lord of Luxury
- 1 Manglehorn
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (23)
Spells (19)
The major change here is a move away from To the Slaughter and Grasp of Darkness in favor of Dissenter’s Deliverance and Never//Return. As a side note, the popularity of various Zombie decks on Magic Online leads me to believe that the archetype is the real deal, and the best way for a deck like B/G Delirium to shut them down is with cards that exile their creatures. Flaying Tendrils and Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet out of the sideboard can really give them headaches and buy you enough time to allow Ishkanah, Grafwidow to get the job done. And since we moved some of the sideboard cards to the maindeck, we can easily facilitate this increase to help solidify those matchups.
I really liked the rest of the archetype and most of the numbers we had come to before the tournament. It was only after losing to Mardu Vehicles a second time that I realized we needed to rethink how we approached the matchup. And at this point, I think it might even be best if we did bring in Scrapheap Scrounger after sideboarding to present more pressure for their planeswalkers. It will take a few days of testing to figure out the optimal configuration after sideboarding, but I like the direction we’re moving. Never//Return not only gives us a way to deal with their planeswalkers, it can eliminate their longevity entirely by exiling either Scrapheap Scrounger or Cut//Ribbons. While the back half of Never//Return isn’t exactly efficient, the front half is more than serviceable. And now that we no longer have to fear the Felidar Guardian combo, access to sorcery-speed removal that can take care of problematic permanents is desirable.
Spider People Unite!
Well, that’s all I have on B/G Delirium for today. If I ended up figuring out all the nuances of sideboarding before next week, expect a full primer for B/G Delirium leading into the Pro Tour. For now, I must depart and spend the next day or two drafting Amonkhet in preparation for GP Richmond. Wish me luck! I’ll certainly need it. And if I don’t do well, there’s always a Standard PTQ on Sunday!