Last week, I promised you some Standard deck-lists, and I have plenty of new ideas for you. Before we begin, though, I want to thank everyone who provided feedback on what they liked and didn’t like. Writing for a new audience is like going to a new school, and there’s always an adjustment period for getting settled in. I appreciate all of the words, (even the criticism) and I encourage all of you to keep it up. I love to hear from the community, good or bad.
Let’s jump into the Standard card pool and see what we can dig up. After that, I have a nice tip on how to build a manabase.
The first deck I have for you today is my update of ManuB’s Faeries deck from last week . As with most Faerie decks, the core is pretty unchanged. Spellstutter Sprite, Bitterblossom, Cryptic Command, and Mistbind Clique all make their requisite appearances. The manabase is fairly unique, changed to accommodate the sideboard.
Creatures (11)
Lands (24)
Spells (25)
- 3 Broken Ambitions
- 4 Cryptic Command
- 3 Eyeblight's Ending
- 3 Peppersmoke
- 4 Ponder
- 4 Thoughtseize
- 4 Bitterblossom
Sideboard
The main deck upgrade I’ve made is Eyeblight’s Ending over Terror. With the Esper Shard bringing more artifacts to the forefront, as well as Broodmate Dragon being a strong Five-Color Control option, I find Terror becoming weaker. However, there really aren’t very many creatures being played that I can’t take out with Eyeblight’s Ending.
The one change I could see happening is Islands in for Mutavaults. I have personally not had any trouble with them for mana persons, but if you expect to see a lot of Path to Exile, then you’ll want at least two islands in your mana configuration.
One card I still can’t understand being played is Infest. I understand that it gets past Forge[/author]-Tender”]Burrenton [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author]-Tender for Kithkin, but are there really that many Forge-Tenders seeing play right now? Even then, they have to have it, which is only about 50% chance by turn 3 anyway. It just feels like a bad sweeper for Faeries. I’d much rather have a Firespout that A) hits higher up the toughness scale, and B) doesn’t hit my guys at all. In the words of Patrick Chapin, “The more interesting question is will Faeries players finally give in and embrace a third (or even fourth) color? I have my eyes on either Red or White, as both add interesting dimensions to a Faeries deck.”
To me, Red feels a lot stronger right now than White, although White is certainly on the upswing in power. Sill, Firespout solves a big need, and a lot of people are expecting Volcanic Fallout. This means that three toughness is expected to be stable and safe, and this really punishes players who think that two is the new three. There’s also the option of a late-game Cruel Ultimatum, as you’re in the right colors already. Hmm, Faeries with a miser’s Cruel?
Speaking of Cruel Ultimatum, I’ve actually taken it out of my Five-Color Control deck. Don’t get me wrong, I still think it’s amazing. I just don’t think Cruel Ultimatum should be the finisher of choice in Five-Color Control right now. Patrick, you know I love ya, bro, and we had a blast in Chi-town on the patio, but it’s time to let it cool down, and come back as surprise tech later. Too many players are sitting on it, waiting for you to throw it out there, and sandbagging their counterspells for it. Here is my new take on Five-Color Control:
Creatures (8)
Planeswalkers (7)
Lands (25)
Spells (22)
Notice the large amount of uncounterable spells. Your end game spells are cycling Resounding Thunder and Banefire for X=5 or more. Amazingly enough, those spells are pretty similar. For 8 mana, you get, respectively, 6 damage and a card, or 7 damage, both of which are not counterable in standard right now. This gives you some game against Faeries, especially if they have already taken hits from their own Bitterblossom. I have two Broodmate Dragons in there, but depending on the proliferation of Faeries in your meta, you may want to change one or both of those to Cloudthresher. Thresher is also a solid idea for the two damage it does to players, creating more direct damage, as necessary.
Volcanic Fallout is obviously a powerful sweeper, and can be used in the end-game to get those last few points of damage in. As I was putting this together, I came to the last three slots, and couldn’t decide between Kitchen Finks or Mulldrifter. I wanted Mulldrifter for the card advantage, but Finks for the life. As you can see, in the end, I decided on neither, going with Jace Beleren, who does a decent enough job of doing both tasks well enough. I also find that many players make poor choices when choosing whether to attack a player or Planeswalker. It’s still one of those angles of play that a lot of intermediate and even good players haven’t grasped yet.
You may be wondering why I went with 2 Twilight Mires in the main deck. I’ll explain that in the manabase section for you, so hold tight. If you just can’t resist, scroll down to the first table you see, then read that whole area.
For sideboard cards, I recommend Jund Charm as my very strong tech. It has amazing amounts of utility if you expect any amount of Reveillark decks to show up. Plus it’s another sweeper, in case you run up against some hordes. I have switched it in for Volcanic fallout against Demigod Red decks, as I don’t want to hit myself for two early, and it can take demigod’s out of the sideboard in the late game. Some number of Cloudthreshers needs to make an appearance in the side board, as you’ll want to protect against flyers. On top of that, a 7/7 surprise ‘Thresher is goo for blocking. I would even put a Cruel Ultimatum or two in the board as well, for the matchups where it’s still awesome. It can also work as surprise tech in that manner. If they see you have uncounterable endgame in the first game, they will use their counters early in the second, thus allowing your newly entered Cruel Ultimatum to become very viable. As mentioned before, Cruel Ultimatum is best when they don’t expect it. It’s too many eggs to put into one basket if they are, though.
I still really love me some Cruel Ultimatum, though, and I want to see what we could build around it. I decided to go a little old-school and build a Grixis-colored deck around Cruel Ultimatum. This is a rough first draft, but I think it has some merit on where the archetype could go. Sam Black has also made a go at this, and you can see his angle here. I decide to revamp the Mannequin decks of old.
Creatures (12)
Lands (25)
Spells (21)
Of course, a lot of Creatures with comes-into-play abilities, and the Archmage, who does persist off of Mannequin, so your Makeshift turns into two more counterspells. Pyroclasm could easily be Firespout. A lot of people have mentioned Volcanic Fallout, but Nucklavee returns red Sorceries, and I prefer to have more options than just Cruel Ultimatum, especially the first time around.
The deck has a lot of synergy, and you can even get a “Knuckle Lock” with Cruel, Cryptic and Nucklavee. Nucklavee returns Cryptic and Cruel Ultimatum. Cast Cruel Ultimatum, returning Nucklavee if necessary, also stripping their hand. Cryptic Command counters their remaining spell, and can bounce Nucklavee to your hand if necessary. It requires a lot of mana (Tons, actually) but it is amazing very late game.
I had considered throwing in Painters Servant and Chaotic Backlash as well, and it may be an option, but I didn’t like it at all. The basic idea is that naming Blue with Painters Servant not only turns on Chaotic Backlash, but it also means you can return your Makeshift Mannequin to your hand with Nucklavee. Chaotic Backlash being a Red Sorcery also helped the synergy.
Next up, we have an evolution of a Doran Deck I posted a few weeks back on MTGSalvation.com. As I mentioned there, Doran is one of my favorite creatures to play, and I think he is an incredibly powerful centerpiece to build around. I’m trying to see if Noble Hierarch makes him viable again.
Creatures (26)
- 4 Birds of Paradise
- 4 Doran, the Siege Tower
- 4 Treefolk Harbinger
- 3 Chameleon Colossus
- 3 Wilt-Leaf Liege
- 4 Rhox War Monk
- 4 Noble Hierarch
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (22)
Spells (10)
I had some problems coming up with the final card for this build, and ended up with Ajani Goldmane. I’m fairly sure that’s the right choice but I still have some doubts. I haven’t ever been sad to see him in testing, but it just feels like it should be something else. The manabase is still rough as well. I’m running 4 colors, but really need to make sure I hit turn 1 Green open for Birds or Hierarch to accelerate into a 3 drop on turn 2. (Doran or War Monk) Ziggurat and Reflecting Pool are awesome in Synergy. I wanted to put a Vivid or two in there as well, but I just can’t find a spot to squeeze out a different land.
Wilt-Leaf Liege is actually in there for the following reasons:
1) Cruel Ultimatum, Blightning, and Raven’s Crime hate this guy. Discard Please? No thanks, I’ll take a free 4/4 Lord, though.
2) 3 more elves make Gilt-leaf Palace better
3) He helps both of my main guys, Doran and Pancake Flipper. Turn One Noble Hierarch, Turn Two Rhox War Monk, Turn Three Liege, swing with my 6/7 Lifelink?
Eyeblight’s Ending, as mentioned before, is great spot removal and also turns on Palace for me. If Only Hierarch had been an Elf. (Of course, he’s powerful enough as is. Type- Elf would have been nuts.)
Sideboard options are fantastic in this build, with Gaddock Teeg, Thoughtseize, Firespout, Bitterblossom, Garruk Wildspeaker, Cloudthresher, and Tidehollow Sculler all being viable options. Heck, some of those could easily make the main deck as well, depending on your needs for Game 1.
Next up is a deck I built for my friend for his return to Magic. He’s been away for about 12 years, and so I wanted to make a very easy deck that he wouldn’t have to know a lot about the current meta to play. There have been a few changes, and this is the latest list.
Creatures (24)
- 4 Mogg Fanatic
- 4 Spark Elemental
- 4 Hell's Thunder
- 4 Boggart Ram-Gang
- 4 Figure of Destiny
- 4 Hellspark Elemental
Lands (20)
Spells (16)
As you can see, just a lot of efficient burn and creature damage. I had Banefire in there originally, but it felt too cumbersome for him. He took down an FNM with it, with no losses and 1 draw making him second on tiebreakers, but with the same record as the “winner.” I had 2 Mutavaults originally, but I’m still not sold on the Mutavaults, He seemed to find himself on two Red and a Mutavault a lot, waiting for his Flame Javelins to become live, so I switched them out to regular Mountains. The key to the deck is efficient mana use, and remembering that every Hellspark Elemental in your hand is actually two Hellspark Elementals. Once you start remembering this, your turns flow a lot more smoothly, and your card advantage looks better.
A lot of people don’t like Spark Elemental late game, but they’re pretty effective, actually. If you’re into turn 8 and draw him, you’re probably not going to win anyway. This deck should be a top-deck away from winning y the end of turn six, in the worst case scenario. If it’s not, you probably should have mulliganed, or you’re opponent has early, good life gain.
He also doesn’t have a sideboard yet, as we’re waiting on him to make sure he understands the proper plans for doing so. He’s not planning on going pro, or even doing anything more than tagging along with me to the occasional tournament like FNM or maybe Regionals. But, the deck is a lot of fun, and fairly straightforward. Plus, you know you’ll have plenty of time between rounds.
Once we get a sideboard going, it will probably look like this:
3 Everlasting Torment
3 Banefire
3 Vexing Shusher
3 Pyroclasm
3 Goblin Outlander
Shambling Remains is also an option, as is Ashenmoor Gouger, for that Outlander slot.
This is a really great deck for newer players who want to be competitive while still learning all the nuances of the game. It’s also just fun to play if you like some good-old fashioned burning faces.
Now, as promised, here’s my tip on building a manabase.
First thing I do is list out all the cards, with the number in the deck, in any order. Then, I add a table with all the requisite mana types vertically. Third, I fill in each intersection of card and mana type with the number of mana symbols times the number in my deck. For example, here is a line for Siege-Gang Commander:
I have 4 Siege Gang Commanders, each requiring 2 Red mana, so the total is Eight. I then do this for the entire deck, and sum the totals at the bottom. Here is an example for my 5-Color Control Deck, Counter This:
So, as we can see, if I were to cast the entire deck over the course of a game, that would be the specific color of mana I would need. Notice that for Plumeveil, I split the requirements, and rounded down. If I were running a BRG deck with 4 Kitchen Finks, obviously I would count it as 8 Green, not 4 green 4 white, because I’m not running white. Overall, Hybrid requires you to look a little past the numbers. For instance, when making the base, I changed it to 6 Blue, 3 White, as I’ll likely be using Blue twice as much as white.
As to the Twilight Mire Question, the reason I added it was that about 66% of the time, I wanted Green, I also wanted Black, and 60% of the time I wanted Black, I also wanted Green. Flooded Grove and Sunken Ruins wouldn’t have helped me nearly as much as Twilight Mire does. Had I been running Cloudthresher instead of Broodmate Dragon, then I would have double up on the Flooded Grove, as Green would have been much higher in count, but based in few cards. Flooded Grove will give me most of the blue I need, and also pump out a lot of Green when I need it.
Let’s look at another use of this. Here’s a use of it in Grixis Control:
As we can see, a base Blue deck, with more Emphasis on Black than Red. Again, with Nucklavee I counted the hybrid symbols a purely Blue, as the Red will almost never be needed to cast it, given the strength of Blue. This also tells me to make my filter lands base off of blue. With Blue as my main color, I’m more likely to be able to use the filter lands off of Blue than Red or Black. One other thing I did is add 2 to the Glen Elendra Archmages cost, to reflect the inherent cost of using her abilities as well. In this case, not an issue, but were they off-color, like the Battlemage cycle, for instance, they might. You can see I counted the Resounding Thunder’s Cycling cost in that table, for that exact reason.
So, use this to give you an idea of what you may need. It’s a great tool to get you very close to the correct manabase. Use test games to tweak it a little here and there, but in my experience, it’s pretty darn accurate. You can build something like this pretty easily in Excel. I personally just use my Deck Building Notebook, and draw a few vertical lines out to the right after I have the build written out.
That’s all for this week. This is Jeff Phillips, reminding you: Don’t make the Loser Choice