The first Friday after Release Day is both thrilling and frustrating. On one hand, new and old players alike get a fresh start with the new Standard format, casting off those cards they hated and striking out into the unknown. Everyone’s guessing, and that’s part of the fun.
On the other hand, in a more practical sense, card availability is low for that first Friday Night Magic; your local game shop has only had since the Prerelease to get some of the new cards in, but demand is very high. If your shop is anything like mine, the counter will be swarming with people around 6:30, a half-hour before FNM starts. Your pre-order on StarCityGames.com won’t come in for a few days, so you’re left stranded with new deck ideas but no cards to put them into action.
Thus, I’ve found the best strategy for the first weekend of this Standard is tweaking old decks to accommodate the few Kaladesh cards you can get your hands on. Even better, if you’re able to create a new idea that already uses what’s in your binder, you get to try something new and you’re not heavily reliant on a swath of fresh cardboard.
So, with that in mind, let’s look at two decks based around what I hope to be an easy-to-get card for this Friday, Animation Module.
This card forms a three-part series of “Module” cards, and while I think the two uncommons are too expensive and risky at the moment, I’m a big fan of Animation Module. The variety of abilities, broad application (the other two interact with and require Energy, which reduces their relevant card pool considerably), and efficient cost make it the most enticing of the trio.
Two decks, then.
If you’ve been playing Standard Magic, even for a short time, you’ve probably heard that aggressive decks, specifically mono-red decks, are common and potent strategies for the first week. They’re cheap, reliable, and fast enough to destroy fancier decks. Seems like a reasonable choice, but I’d like to take the aggressive plan in a different direction: +1/+1 counters.
+1/+1 counter synergy has existed for years, and it’s made a resurgence in this set. After Khans of Tarkir‘s Hardened Scales vanished following the previous rotation, the +1/+1 counter creatures of Standard had been left without their favorite noncreature permanent. Now, Animation Module pushes that plan back to the fore.
Because +1/+1 counters are evergreen, every set in Standard contains something that cares about these counters, which means you’ve probably got some of these cards slotted in your binder or sitting in your shoebox right now. Dig ’em out and grab some dice!
Creatures (18)
- 4 Endless One
- 3 Drana, Liberator of Malakir
- 1 Rot Shambler
- 3 Obsessive Skinner
- 4 Grim Flayer
- 1 Verdurous Gearhulk
- 1 Armorcraft Judge
- 1 Oviya Pashiri, Sage Lifecrafter
Planeswalkers (6)
Lands (21)
Spells (15)
Creatures
Endless One has had a wild ride since its release last September. Releasing at around $3, sinking to bulk rare status, and then skyrocketing to $10+ following the Modern Eldrazi fever can do a lot to mess with your tentacles. While it’s never really made a splash in Standard at large, I’ve had considerable success with it in decks like this, where cost flexibility is important to staying relevant late in the game. Grim Flayer has proven to be a solid choice in Modern and Standard, and he helps fuel the more synergetic +1/+1 component, Obsessive Skinner. They pair well together anyway; the Skinner’s triggers give Grim Flayer’s trample more teeth, and a 5/5 trampling creature for two mana is no joke, no matter what format you’re in.
Drana, Liberator of Malakir has waited a long time for her due, but this might be the best application I’ve found yet. Get sideways with the team, and with Animation Module out, once she hits, you can summon an army of 1/1 Servo creatures to block for you. Swing with abandon, dissuade the counterattack. Love it!
Armorcraft Judge seems like a natural fit; I like it better than the similar Inspiring Call, mostly because of the body attached to it. Verdurous Gearhulk is obviously a monster, so if you’ve got one, play it. If you’ve got three, play them all. The fact that it’s an artifact creature makes delirium-matters cards happy, too. Rot Shambler seems to have a nice ring to it; when one of your creature dies, it gets bigger and you can pay mana to replace them with 1/1 Servos. Finally, Oviya Pashiri, Sage Lifecrafter is the closest thing we’ve seen to Rhys the Redeemed in a while. There’s a lot of potential in this little 1/2, and she’ll likely get her own deck down the line. She makes Servos for fun, and sometimes, she’ll make a monster Construct.
Spells
As with all delirium decks, spell selection is disproportionately vital, even in a creature-based deck. Without the right blend, delirium will be difficult or even impossible to achieve. Every card type is present in abundance in this list, starting with the artifact Animation Module.
This thing is useful even from the graveyard! Traverse the Ulvenwald makes sense in most delirium decks these days, and you’ll be hard-pressed to find a reason to disagree with them. This deck is color-hungry, so getting a black source or double green in a timely fashion is critical. Later on, it can find your single Verdurous Gearhulk to close out the game. Sinister Concoction has proven to be an exceptional delirium enabler in the past; while not as strong in a deck like this that doesn’t use its graveyard as much, the Concoction is still a very powerful form of removal. Grasp of Darkness, while black-heavy, is the best two-mana removal in the format now.
Now, Nissa, Voice of Zendikar is arguably the best planeswalker possible with Animation Module. Untapping with Nissa, Voice of Zendikar and an Animation Module is big trouble for your opponent; she places a +1/+1 counter on your whole team, triggers the Module for each creature, and gives you a bigger army of Servos. If you untap again, they’re probably just dead.
Liliana, the Last Hope balances Nissa, giving a bit more removal, a bit better topdecking, and another planeswalker to add to the list for delirium. Finally, Durable Handicraft slides right alongside Animation Module; this card is pretty worthless with an empty hand, so just one should do it. Animation Module can always do something.
The sideboard is a bit of a mess, but I’m just not sure what people are going to have at Friday Night Magic. As you might have found, too, it’s hard to find proxy testers in your neighborhood, but goldfishing this deck was encouraging. More than most decks, though, this one relied heavily on hitting the right combination of lands and spells and was particularly sensitive to that balance. Grim Flayer helped a ton, and sticking a Grim Flayer and following it up with a +1/+1 counter of some kind was really helpful in keeping the pressure on and increasing the likelihood of delirium. Animation Module did pretty well, too, though four might be too many, which is just fine; you may not be able to find four before tomorrow anyway!
While I dug this strategy, which uses some of my favorite cards from Shadows over Innistrad and Eldritch Moon, it did seem a little simple. The deck was not as flexible as I might want, especially when going into an unknown field. Lucky for us, though, I found an interesting line on Animation Module. Its activated ability allows us to increase a counter on a player or permanent, not just a creature. Planeswalkers are permanents, aren’t they?
People have been messing around with Oath of Gideon since its release, trying to find the right blend of planeswalkers to make this card solid (hint: just look at its name for the best one.) This puts us in white for our next deck, and redundancy and repeatability of this effect provides some startling levels of loyalty counter production.
Planeswalkers, assemble!
Creatures (8)
Planeswalkers (7)
- 2 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
- 2 Nissa, Voice of Zendikar
- 1 Tamiyo, Field Researcher
- 1 Nissa, Vital Force
- 1 Dovin Baan
Lands (25)
Spells (20)
- 2 Planar Outburst
- 4 Clutch of Currents
- 4 Oath of Nissa
- 4 Oath of Gideon
- 4 Declaration in Stone
- 2 Animation Module
Sideboard
Creatures
Planeswalkers-matter decks are tough to build from scratch and without considerable testing; you need to have the ratios of creatures to non-planeswalker spells to lands correct or the whole thing plays like frozen mud. However, we have two interesting creatures in the maindeck to keep things smooth. Sylvan Advocate has proven to be one of the best two-drops in Standard, and it’s never irrelevant. Its creature-land ability is also relevant thanks to its companion creature, Halimar Tidecaller. I’ve been high on this and good awaken cards for a while, but in practice, this is a fine blocker that occasionally has some solid upside. Awaken is important here because of Animation Module; remember, it’s a permanent, so you can make a 1/1 Servo every time you awaken something. This might not happen too often, but I like these kinds of effects.
Spells
Declaration of Stone and Clutch of Currents are my low-cost removal. Bounce is a little more relevant in planeswalker decks than in other, midrange kind of decks. Most of the time, creatures present the biggest threat to planeswalkers, so spending just one mana to keep them from attacking next turn and taking time to actually recast the darn thing will keep your planeswalkers growing.
Oath of Nissa and Oath of Gideon, both excellent playsets, serve their well-documented purpose in planeswalker decks. Planar Outburst has recently been unseated by Fumigate as the sweeper of choice in white, but you can’t get Fumigate back with Halimar Tidecaller.
Each of the planeswalkers is familiar except Dovin Baan.
We lost Narset Transcendent due to the rotation, and Dovin Baan takes her place. He’s, well, dull. Yeah, I know, he’s just fine, but at least Narset had some cool synergies surrounding her rebound ability, and her emblem was backbreaking against decks that couldn’t deal with her. Dovin Baan, even at his best, will be fine. I think his best mode is bleeding him off to his -1 as many times as you can. He barely beat out Kiora, Master of the Depths for the slot. Barely.
This one had more powerful draws than the B/G deck listed above it, but it also had really rough ones too. It didn’t take many hands with Oath of Nissa and no green sources to realize that it was easy to get in a pickle. Still, this manabase reflects considerable testing and refinement. Assuming Lady Luck is on your side, this deck was powerful. Animation Module took a back seat, but it still served an important role in the deck. It’s no The Chain Veil, but that’s probably a good thing.
The deck you choose to like is up to you and your style of play. Both are fun and play very differently and remember, these are just “first week” decks; within a few days, you’ll likely have everything you need to tweak, upgrade, or even completely abandon these decks. Reminding yourself of Animation Module’s bevy of abilities and interactions is important, and it’s a fun card to tinker with nonetheless.
What’re you taking to Kaladesh’s first Friday Night Magic? Are you just stripping Dragons of Tarkir and Magic Origins from your tried and true deck, or are you striking out into unknown territory?