Sam Black was one of the original champions of R/W Tokens in this format, but now he’s shifting his R/W gameplan to a new strategy! See if it pays off before #SCGLA this weekend!
There are a lot of ways to build R/W decks in Standard at the moment. Previously, I preferred a token strategy that tried to make my opponent’s spot removal bad. I still think that’s a good approach, but Monastery Mentor is a powerful enough card that I also think it’s worth trying to build around that.
Today, I’m going to try a version of R/W that forces the opponent to have answers to its powerful threats, and then tries to win attrition wars by overloading on Outpost Siege and Chandra, Pyromaster.
Hordeling Outburst and Outpost Siege were definitely the most impressive cards in that match, though sadly, I wasn’t the one with the Hordeling Outbursts. Missing my fourth land in the second and third games was also clearly fatal.
I convinced myself to go down to 23 land because this deck didn’t have any five-mana spells, and the curve is lower than I’m used to in R/W, but that was definitely a mistake. Monastery Mentor and Outpost Siege are a lot more mana hungry than they look, and this deck really can’t afford to miss any early lands. I’m cutting a Stoke the Flames for a second Wind-Scarred Crag.
Round 2
The first game was basically how I’m looking to have games in this matchup play out. I thought I’d be okay in the second game, but my lands were a little too slow, and my opponent’s draw was a little too fast. It’s worth noting that if I had Chandra, Pyromaster instead of Outpost Siege, I might have been able to win that game. I have generally been impressed with Outpost Siege, as not being able to be attacked or killed with Hero’s Downfall is great, but Chandra definitely has a lot of extra value against decks like this.
The third game was the most depressing because my opening hand was great, and I really thought I was going to win, but I just kept drawing four-mana spells instead of lands and gave my opponent too much time.
Other writers have really liked Valorous Stance, but it hasn’t been good for me. I’m probably just playing the wrong matchups, but it has consistently underperformed. Similarly, Hushwing Gryff probably isn’t a good maindeck card right now. I think I want to cut both of them for a pair of Hordeling Outbursts, given how good that card is in the mirror and against red.
Round 3
After getting punished in some matchups where high impact creatures are worse than token makers, it’s nice to play a matchup where I really get rewarded for having creatures that need to be answered against an opponent who’s just trying to go bigger and ignore them. Tokens could easily be ignored, but Monastery Mentor and Goblin Rabblemaster are pretty good at closing a game there.
Round 4
My opponent really needed to figure out that I was holding Stoke the Flames in the first game, and the second game, my opponent kept a speculative hand and missed. Not the most exciting match.
One more for good measure.
Round 5
This basically just confirmed what we’d seen in the red/white mirror before. Hordeling Outburst is good, Outpost Siege is great. Stormbreath Dragon is also pretty good. It’s possible that I should try to play some now that I have a lot of targets for removal spells anyway.
