I can’t stop brewing.
I don’t think I want to, but it would be pointless to try. That’s nothing new for this time of year; the full spoiler dropped last week and cards have been
riffle shuffling through my head ever since. March from the Tomb seems broken, wait no, I missed the word “total.” Drana is silly. Is there a landfall
aggro deck? Is devoid aggro better? Can we break Zada, Hedron Grinder? Will Ob Nixilis Reignited signal a return to Jund Midrange, or does he just make
Abzan better? Does Retreat to Coralhelm just bust Modern wide open? Is Gideon really that good?
While there are myriad of questions still to be answered in the almost two weeks between now and the Open Series chugging over to Indianapolis to play some
brand new Standard, they all really boil down to one overarching question. It’s the same question that pros everywhere are trying to answer even now before
the Pro Tour heads to Milwaukee in a few short weeks:
What’s the best deck in Standard?
We may not find the answer in one, two, or even four weeks. It almost always takes time for a format to settle down, but it seems like a good place to
start is with a deck that was already a player but isn’t losing a lot. Jeskai Aggro, Jeskai Tokens, U/R Sphinx’s Tutelage, and Hardened Scales all seem
like reasonable places to start, but I’d much rather spend the first couple of weeks doing unfair things.
I’m going to a Rally.
What Does Abzan Rally Lose?
If we’re starting at the Rally deck because it keeps its core, we should look at the cards we are losing. Here’s a fairly stock list:
Creatures (32)
- 3 Nantuko Husk
- 2 Fleshbag Marauder
- 3 Elvish Mystic
- 2 Mogis's Marauder
- 4 Satyr Wayfinder
- 1 Anafenza, the Foremost
- 3 Grim Haruspex
- 3 Merciless Executioner
- 4 Den Protector
- 3 Deathmist Raptor
- 1 Minister of Pain
- 3 Liliana, Heretical Healer
Lands (20)
Spells (8)
The biggest loss from this plan is going to be Mogis’s Marauder. It’s the reason that we are heavy on black creatures, as well as the engine that lets us
attack after a Rally resolves, so Marauder’s loss is the major hit for the deck. Without the Marauder we are going to need to find another way to win with
a bunch of creatures at once. Thankfully we have options on that front.
Satyr Wayfinder is also a big hit, because even though we can still fill the graveyard with Gather the Pack, it’s not a creature and can’t get us a land.
That little two-drop 1/1 is a speed bump that matters against some of the faster decks, a role which Gather can never play. That said, we do at least have
a natural replacement for the Wayfinder, which cannot be said about Marauder. Looking at one more card does sort of make up for it, but don’t forget that
the original deck runs twenty lands and wants to get to five mana. We will have to account for that.
According to people who know the deck, Elvish Mystic is not a big deal to lose. The ramp looks to be less important in the upcoming metagame as the format
appears set to slow down, and if we do end up needing to ramp, we have two-mana options that are still fast enough to get us to Rally mana earlier than
expected.
The manabase loses both Mana Confluence and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth. The latter isn’t likely a huge problem, but as we’re probably going to need to branch
out into a fourth colour to make this concept work, Confluence could hurt. We do have the ability to change our fetchland assortment to allow us a better
selection of Battle lands, and that might be our saving grace when it comes to making sure we can cast our spells.
What Predators Are Leaving?
It wouldn’t be fair to assess the power of the core of the deck without looking at the hate cards that are rotating as well. The major ones are the red
tandem of Magma Spray and Anger of the Gods, both of which make it very difficult for the deck to win. Unlike a lot of graveyard-centric decks, Rally
doesn’t really stock its graveyard from the library, choosing instead to do so through attrition with cards like Merciless Executioner and Fleshbag
Marauder. Anger really cramps those plans by exiling everything we try to do, and although Magma Spray is a more pinpoint answer, it can be a problem if it
hits the right piece. The loss of both of those cards is a boon to our chances.
If Mono-Red strategies are going to be forced to slow down by a paucity of cheap burn, we get more time to stock our graveyard. If they are switching to a
creature-based strategy, our sacrifice effects become better tools too. In fact, a general slowing of the format can only be a benefit to what is, at its
heart, a combo deck.
There’s also the departure of the catch-all answer and combo wrecker that is Thoughtseize. One of the reasons Rally doesn’t rely on cards like Commune with
the Gods to fill up the graveyard is that there’s a real risk of milling over too many Rally the Ancestors. With Thoughtseize in the format, the opponent
can strip away our game-ender, leaving us as a bad Abzan Midrange deck.
How Do We Build Going Forward?
To compensate for the lack of Mogis’s Marauder, we need to go deeper into both the colour pie and the curve. First and foremost, we need to look at X=4. We
also need to go into red. Chasm Guide is our best bet for giving our team haste, and Butcher of the Horde will allow us both a second sacrifice outlet and
a way to attack without hitting Chasm Guide. Oh and there’s that Siege Rhino guy at four as well, I guess, I hear he’s pretty okay.
Red also gives us Firemantle Mage, which is the closest thing to being able to grant intimidate that we’ll be able to find. If we want it, we can also get
Tormenting Voice as a dig spell and discard outlet. However, as we’re in four colours pretty solidly, we don’t want to go much deeper with the red cards.
Maybe we play some Crackling Dooms or Radiant Flames in the 75, but the core is still in Abzan colours.
The great thing about the new rally mechanic is that the triggered abilities affect all your creatures, not just other Allies. That gives us more
deckbuilding freedom if we want it, but I’m not sure we do. If we don’t go with Rhino and Butcher, I can see us completing our new creature complement with
mostly Allies. Kalastria Healer will do a great Siege Rhino impression when entering the battlefield, and as we’re almost certainly keeping Nantuko Husk,
we can look to Zulaport Cutthroat to finish the deal. In fact, if you are feeling particularly brave, you might try leaving out red entirely and trying to
win with the ETB and death triggers, plus your incidental damage from throughout the game.
If we do go with red, it might look something like this:
Creatures (31)
- 3 Nantuko Husk
- 2 Fleshbag Marauder
- 4 Siege Rhino
- 3 Butcher of the Horde
- 3 Grim Haruspex
- 2 Merciless Executioner
- 3 Den Protector
- 3 Deathmist Raptor
- 3 Liliana, Heretical Healer
- 1 Smothering Abomination
- 2 Chasm Guide
- 2 Firemantle Mage
Lands (23)
Spells (7)
As you can see, this version is a lot lighter on the Ally theme, choosing instead to rely on the hard-hitting power of the four-drop twins, Butcher and
Rhino. Hmm, I wonder how exactly one would go about butchering a rhino? I imagine the answer is probably “very carefully.”
The core concept of the deck is still here, but we have upgraded our Plan B to use creatures we’d be glad to play anyway. With more four-drops in the deck,
we’ve cut Collected Company and used a couple of those slots to make up for the lack of Satyr Wayfinder. I want to try Smothering Abomination here as
another way to draw cards and fill our graveyard, but it might be too cute so we’ll stick with one for now. With Rhinos and Butchers, we can afford to run
only three Rally the Ancestors simply because the deck is less reliant on the combo kill than the next version we’re going to look at.
If we stay Abzan and go the Ally route, we end up somewhere like this:
Creatures (30)
- 3 Nantuko Husk
- 2 Fleshbag Marauder
- 2 Elvish Visionary
- 3 Grim Haruspex
- 3 Merciless Executioner
- 4 Den Protector
- 3 Deathmist Raptor
- 2 Liliana, Heretical Healer
- 4 Kalastria Healer
- 4 Zulaport Cutthroat
Lands (23)
Spells (8)
We’re looking for more of a combo kill here, and in doing so we can stick with the X=3 plan from the original deck. The tradeoff is that the creatures are
worse on their own and less likely to win a game without the Rally.
It’s possible that we can go even lower and try an X=2 version, maxing out on Elvish Visionary and adding things like Qarsi Sadist and Runed Servitor. The
problem is that we don’t have a card like Cartel Aristocrat or Bloodthrone Vampire, so we would be relying completely on the combo kill with Kalastria
Healer and Zulaport Cutthroat. We might be able to run Nantuko Husk as well, but then we have to be able to keep it alive. Probably not the time to try
this plan, but worth keeping in mind for later.
What Scares Us?
The single biggest threat to the entire strategy is still Anafenza, the Foremost. That’s why both decks have sideboards that allow us to either deal with
Anafenza or win without a Rally. In fact, in the red version, I would be tempted to cut the Rally plan entirely in the face of the Foremost.
As with many combo decks, a single counterspell can ruin our day. Both versions of the deck attempt to minimize that damage, one with some ability to win
without Rally and one with the ability to win at instant speed if and when the control player ever taps out. The control decks also top out at Ugin, but he
actually isn’t that scary as long as we can keep our board clear. He might also see less play with devoid looking like it could be a thing.
The prevalence of exile effects could be a huge problem for this deck, depending on how they end up playing and how good they are. Can we reach critical
mass with ingest being a thing? That’s a question we’ll need to answer when playing this. Blocking will be very important.
What Didn’t Make It?
There were three major feelbads when I was looking at this deck. As I alluded to in the opening paragraph, I initially misread March from the Tomb as
returning all Allies with CMC 8 or less. Yes, I should have realised that that was too good to be true, but at the time it was previewed we hadn’t seen any
other Allies so it seemed plausible.
Catacomb Sifter seems like a good fit for either version of the deck, letting us find the cards we need and also giving us extra creatures when it enters
the battlefield. The only thing keeping it out is that I can’t justify taking out something that’s already there. Once I’ve had a chance to play some with
the list that may change.
Sadly, there are two Allies at five that would make the deck insane: Tajuru Warcaller and Resolute Blademaster. With so few lands and no mana-producing
creatures to be found, we can’t justify going to seven mana to try and go off. Even if the payoff is enormous.
I’m really looking forward to trying these lists out and getting stuck in to the new format. Rally the Ancestors is such a powerful effect that there
almost has to be a deck waiting to be built around it, and having a solid starting point is only going to help. We’ve got a couple of weeks until we get to
see BFZ cards in the wild.
So until then…Brew On!