So, we have to try and beat Abzan again?
Two weeks ago, it was all Jeskai, all the time — So what happened? Did Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger really beat up on all those Jeskai decks, or did
Jeskai just not show up? According to the metagame breakdown, Jeskai was the second most popular deck! And yet, its best finish was ninth, although it did
litter the Top 32. Given that Jeskai’s dominance can at least be toppled, if not fully halted, I have hope for the coming weeks.
With the rise in popularity in Silkwrap, I suppose it was only natural for Dromoka’s Command to make a comeback. The best Dromoka’s Command deck is
probably Abzan Aggro, although Brad Nelson (only) got 13th with Bant Megamorph and he put Valentin Mackl into Top 8 with the same list. As it stands now,
Abzan is far more popular than Megamorph, but that could all change in the blink of an eye.
Both decks do very similar things. Abzan Aggro is merciless and provides a quick clock, whereas the Megamorph deck is better at grinding into the midgame.
Given what’s happening on the week to week, we could easily see these decks trading off the top spots in the metagame.
The Rise of Esper Tokens
Last week, I wrote about Fabrizio’s Anteri’s deck from the
MOCS, an odd mish-mash of Esper Control and Sam Black’s Bant Tokens. Oddly enough, the deck is quite good. The possible weakness?
Traditional Esper Control.
You can defeat them in the sideboard games with a pile of Duresses, counterspells, Painful Truths, and sticky threats, but they basically have the same
stuff! The older Esper Tokens lists were much better against Esper Control with their copies of Ob Nixilis Reignited and Ruinous Path, so we’ll probably
have to go back in that direction rather than piling on Wingmate Rocs for the midrange mirrors.
Creatures (10)
Planeswalkers (6)
Lands (26)
Spells (18)
After a few more matches against Esper Control (one of which was a sound beating from Logan Nettles, Reid Duke’s cousin), I wanted to make some changes to
my deck. Making it so my deck pounded the midrange mirrors could only take me so far. At some point, I needed to make my deck a tad more well-rounded.
A few notes:
-The Negate maindeck was fine, but I’m trying to diversify my counter-suite a bit. In the Game 1s I’ve played, Dispel has been the most impressive. After
sideboard, I still like Negate over Disdainful Stroke, but Abzan Aggro has me running a mix.
-I stole the Windswept Heath from Michael Majors’ manabase, and I like it. Sadly, I’ve ran into issues with only playing one Sunken Hollow with Ruinous
Path and Ob Nixilis Reignited in my deck, so I’ve gone back to the second copy. Caves of Koilos is now a necessary evil as well.
–Ob Nixilis Reignited is like a big Painful Truths against control decks. I board it in very sparingly.
-You want answers to both sides of Jace, planeswalkers, and Dragonlord Silumgar. Hangarback Walker is an annoyance, but you can attack around it if
necessary.
-This is one of the few decks I don’t mind losing die rolls with. Aside from Hangarback Walker, there isn’t much to do profitably on Turn 1, but being on
the play does make your planeswalkers and Painful Truths better. If you’re on the draw, you can cast Silkwrap on Turn 2 and Knight of the White Orchid on
Turn 3 and still be happy.
So far, I like what I’m seeing, but as the metagame keeps evolving, so will this deck. This isn’t like Abzan Aggro where you are basically playing the best
cards and there isn’t much else you can change. Because of how reactive Esper Tokens is, it’s a pile of 75 cards that you configure for your matchup. There
also has to be some adjustments based on the play or draw. Such is the nature of a deck with Knight of the White Orchid. Even things like Gideon, Ally of
Zendikar can be vary wildly depending on if you’re on the play or draw.
Sideboarding and Matchups With Esper Tokens
VS Atarka Red
Out:
In:
This matchup is about as straightforward as they come — try not to die, and specifically, try not to get comboed out by Temur Battle Rage and Become
Immense. Play or draw, Knight of the White Orchid is a fine body.
VS Esper Control:
Out (on the play):
In (on the play):
Out (on the draw):
In (on the draw):
Since we’re mostly fighting them toe to toe with planeswalkers and card advantage, choosing to draw first isn’t crazy here. If you end up on the play,
skipping your land drop with a Knight of the White Orchid in hand is a viable strategy, but that’s what made me want to potentially be on the draw anyway.
Being able to remove Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy is the first order of business. Past that, you should be controlling them with your discard and counterspells
while trying to lessen the impact of their removal. That means don’t let them get good value with a spot removal spell or a sweeper. You need to be
pressuring them but not overextending.
If you can, you want to set up a turn or sequence of turns that puts them in a bad situation. For example, you can give them a juicy opportunity to tap out
for a sweeper or maybe even Ugin, the Spirit Dragon, but you’ll be able to play Secure the Wastes into Gideon, Ally of Zendikar to kill them. Maybe it’s
just by killing them with Shambling Vents and Hangarback Walker.
VS Abzan
Out (on the play):
In (on the play):
In (on the draw):
Out (on the draw):
This matchup has felt fine to me, but scary. You don’t have the raw power that their creatures do, but your cards are more difficult to deal with on
average. Then again, Brent Clawson defeated this deck en route to winning Grand Prix Indianapolis.
If possible, don’t let them get a good Dromoka’s Command. Either you want to Silkwrap their Hangarback Walker or hold it until you’re convinced they’re out
of Dromoka’s Commands. Keeping in Duress may be useful for stripping Gideons and Commands, but the battle is mostly about what’s on the battlefield, so I
haven’t liked that in practice. If they are wise enough to side out their Hangarback Walkers, then you should definitely be siding out your Silkwraps.
In this matchup, I would love to have a sweeper effect. Ray Perez had an End Hostilities and a Languish, but they didn’t show up in the only sideboard game
they got to play. Had they shown up, it would have given Ray some much needed time, but his draw didn’t really cooperate either way.
VS Jeskai Black
Out (on the draw):
In (on the draw):
Out (on the play):
In (on the play):
I enjoy playing this matchup. The Esper Token deck basically exploits all of Jeskai’s weaknesses. They don’t like dealing with multiple creatures, and
that’s basically all this deck does. You will lose games if you let them have an active Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy or allow them to gain card advantage with
Ojutai’s Command, Dig Through Time, or Tasigur, the Golden Fang. Be careful about those cards and be especially careful about playing into their
counterspells.
Virulent Plague is the matchup breaker, and if you think they have it, you should be keeping in the Utter End and sideboarding in the additional copy,
which are otherwise too slow for the matchup. Since they have other targets for Silkwrap, you get to keep all of those in for Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy, unlike
against Esper Control. Hurray!
VS Esper Tokens
Out (on the play):
In (on the play):
Out (on the draw):
In (on the draw):
Because both players have Knight of the White Orchid, I think it’s wise to leave them in, regardless of play or draw. Because of Silkwrap, you may also
want to side out Hangarback Walker, because without that card in your deck, they don’t have many good targets for it.
Aside from that stuff, the biggest Secure the Wastes probably wins it, given how easy it is to give your team +1/+1, so don’t burn it early if you can
avoid it. Also, if you have to cast it main phase to play around a counterspell, that is also fine.
I like some Duresses on the draw, but don’t like any on the play. On the draw, you’re trying to not fall behind, but when you’re on the play, you should be
focusing on getting on the battlefield. If they have a pile of counterspells, Duress may still be necessary to punch a hole, but most of the time, you
should be able to figure out which counterspell they have and play around it.
VS Eldrazi Ramp
Out:
In:
I was surprised by how reasonable this matchup is, even when you have nothing special for it. A Turn 4 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar is a huge clock and very
difficult for them to deal with. Ugin, the Spirit Dragon isn’t very good against Hangarback Walker or an end of turn Secure the Wastes, and Ulamog, the
Ceaseless Hunger will likely die on sight. It’s all a matter of whether or not you can pace your threats to slam into one of their big cards.
VS Everything Else
The key to succeeding right now lies in beating Wingmate Roc. It dominates any matchup relying on spot removal. Flying is king at the moment, and having
the lifegain tacked on is just a bonus.
Two decks that do well against Wingmate Roc, mostly by ignoring it, are Eldrazi Ramp and Esper Control.
Creatures (5)
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (27)
Spells (26)
Chapin’s deck is wild, and I look forward to reading more about it, mostly to figure out what changes he would make going forward. Although, it might not
matter much. As evident by Chapin’s deck and all its one-ofs, it’s clear that this deck is infinitely customizable.
I fully expect Patrick to write about his deck [ CEDitor’s Note: which he did so here],
so I won’t dwell on it too much, but I think it is worth noting that you can’t realistically expect to jam ten removal spells into your decks and be
successful. There are too many decks out there right now that spot removal isn’t great against.
The flip side of the coin is that you can’t just play Esper Control. So far, the only players to Top 8 Grand Prix with the deck are Reid Duke and Patrick
Chapin, and I don’t think that should surprise anyone. This deck operates on some very thin margins, so you need a lot of practice. Not only do you have to
play well but you have to play quickly, as unintentional draws are a real issue.
For the most part, the Eldrazi Ramp decks didn’t fare well at Grand Prix Indianapolis. This time, it was on the radar, but not many players had specific
hate in their sideboard. The second highest finishing Eldrazi Ramp deck was a doozy.
Creatures (14)
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (25)
Spells (17)
I don’t think this deck is great, as is. However, I do think there is potential. That potential likely lies in how likely it is we can make this into a
true midrange deck with an unbeatable top end instead of the very beatable ramp strategy.
After all, wouldn’t this deck love having a sweeper?
Creatures (11)
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (26)
Spells (19)
- 2 Sylvan Scrying
- 3 Explosive Vegetation
- 2 Murderous Cut
- 2 Reave Soul
- 3 Languish
- 4 Hedron Archive
- 3 Complete Disregard
Sideboard
Explosive Vegetation might be too much ramping. Perhaps we should be relying on Shrine of the Forsaken Gods and the Sylvan Scrying toolbox to get to eight
and ten mana while playing more early interaction. Hedron Archive is kind of too good not to play though. This could be the spiritual successor to Abzan
Control.
If you wanted to, this deck could even play a fetchland + Battle land manabase with Radiant Flames, if you decided Languish wasn’t fast enough against
Atarka Red. Duress maindeck is a consideration. Evolutionary Leap is a fine sideboard card when you have Hangarback Walker and Catacomb Sifter but doesn’t
really solve any problems.
One of the things I do like about the deck is Tomb of the Spirit Dragon, which may or may not be too slow. Having something that can put you out of burn
range seems nice though.
Despite Standard seeming to be dominated by one deck from week to week, it’s actually fairly wide open. Jeskai, Abzan, G/W Megamorph, Esper Control, white
token decks, Atarka Red, Eldrazi Ramp, various Aristocrats decks, and Rally the Ancestors make up the format at the moment, and that’s a lot of diversity.
Week to week, new decks are being built, and I look forward to seeing what happens next. There’s still so much unexplored ground in Standard. Then again,
maybe Bant Hardened Scales beats everything.
Next week: A Limited article?