Building R/W In Standard

I’m going to GP Memphis this weekend, and I’m almost definitely playing R/W, as I have been since Worlds. It feels like I’ve already written about the deck
a lot, but given its recent increase in popularity, the amount that it’s changed with Fate Reforged, the number of different ways to build the deck, and my
familiarity with it, it feels justified. The build I’ve been playing most recently is basically the deck I recorded videos with earlier this week, but I want to take a closer look
today. I’m going to start by talking through what I’d want my list to look like against each major deck and why, then get to the best way to approximate
that.

R/W Aggro

First, let’s look at how I want my deck to be set up against R/W Aggro, which seems like it will be one of the most played decks at the tournament. The
world seems to have come to something of a consensus about the R/W deck I’m expecting to face, and it looks roughly like:

In my mind, the most important cards in this matchup are Outpost Siege, Hordeling Outburst, and Stormbreath Dragon. Stoke the Flames is important as an
answer to Stormbreath Dragon, but it’s pretty bad for other things. It answers Brimaz, King of Oreskos, but Glare of Heresy, Chained to the Rocks, and
Valorous Stance also do that. Wild Slash and Magma Spray are great because they stop you from falling behind against Seeker of the Way or Goblin
Rabblemaster, and they’re cheap enough that you can sometimes play a threat while holding them up to answer Goblin Rabblemaster before it makes a token.
Arc Lightning is another good answer to Goblin Rabblemaster that also answers Hordeling Outburst, which is hard to answer otherwise. The best answer to
Hordeling Outburst is to keep creatures in play, but there’s so much removal in this deck that that can be hard to do.

My goal is to build my deck to have Outpost Siege more often than my opponent and to make better use of it when I have it. I also want my threats to be as
cheap as possible or otherwise resistant to removal, like Stormbreath Dragon or Hordeling Outburst.

I’ve recently started experimenting with siding out Chained to the Rocks. This feels weird, given how good the card is, but Goblin Rabblemaster really
wants an instant answer, and it doesn’t interact with Stormbreath Dragon, their most important card. Also, after sideboarding it increases your exposure to
Erase, Glare of Heresy, and Peak Eruption, which I haven’t seen people use in the mirror yet, but it seems like it should be very good, and the mirror is
becoming popular enough that some people might start making room for it.

I think my ideal post-sideboard configuration would be something like:

I like Monastery Swiftspear because it lets you get ahead, and it’s a way to make a tempo positive play in a matchup where I think that’s pretty important.
I don’t like Stormbreath Dragon because I think it makes the deck too clunky, but if I’m not going to play it, I need to focus on closing the game before
my opponent wins with it, which Monastery Swiftspear helps accomplish. Peak Eruption is another important support card for this plan, which helps with the
goal of ending the game before they can use a Stormbreath Dragon.

I like Monastery Mentor because it can take over a game fairly easily, and it’s not hard to get real value out of it against a removal spell by playing it
with another spell or two in the same turn. You almost never want to cast this on turn 3 in the mirror, so it’s more of a lategame card, which is why I
don’t want too many of them and only have three in this configuration.

Hordeling Outburst is the ideal play on turn 3, especially because I’m planning to have Goblin Rabblemaster in my maindeck, so my opponent will have to
respect it, but then the removal spell they had ready for it will be pretty ineffective.

This deck doesn’t play any three-toughness creatures, so Lightning Strike isn’t the removal spell you want. Magma Jet is much better, because the games go
long and some cards are much more important than others at different stages of the game, so scrying is a really big upside. One-mana plays are also huge,
especially with Monastery Mentor, and exiling Ashcloud Phoenix is important when I’m siding out Chained to the Rocks, though Wild Slash can finish off an
opponent, and more importantly, it can trigger prowess on an empty board, which comes up most often when your opponent tries to Wild Slash one of your
prowess creatures.

Arc Lightning is clunky and not great, but I think it’s a necessary evil to answer Hordeling Outburst.

I think a completely respectable alternative strategy is cutting the Monastery Swiftspears, Monastery Mentors, and Peak Eruptions for more removal of any
variety, as well as Stormbreath Dragons. Removal plays well enough with Outpost Siege that it makes up for the fact that Stormbreath Dragon is a little
worse with it, and having four Outpost Siege and four Stormbreath Dragons offers the best end game available, which means that buying time with removal
spells should favor you.

My preference for the aggressive option may largely hinge on Peak Eruption, as going the control route will likely require Chained to the Rocks staying in
the deck, and Peak Eruption is great at constraining Outpost Siege in addition to Stormbreath Dragon. If you don’t have access to that or you’re on the
draw, the control plan is likely better.

Abzan Aggro

I expect my Abzan Aggro opponent’s deck to look something like this:

This is a matchup where I really liked my old R/W deck’s gameplan. Overloading on Chained to the Rocks with Heliod’s Pilgrim and Glare of Heresy meant that
their creatures were easy to deal with, and Heliod’s Pilgrim helped enable Wingmate Roc, which their deck couldn’t beat unless they had their own. Moving
toward high impact creatures that die to removal, like Goblin Rabblemaster, makes this matchup much worse. Overwhelming their removal or sticking a
Monastery Mentor isn’t a realistic goal because Drown in Sorrow is so good against that.

Given that those creatures are so bad, you want to try to become an Outpost Siege Control deck, but Back to Nature is always going to be game-breaking when
you go that way.

For this matchup, I want my deck to look like this:

This build minimizes the effectiveness of their removal while letting me stay ahead at all points in the game through having more efficient threats and
answers, more of my lands enter the battlefield tapped and my spells all trade with theirs in a way that generates card and/or mana advantage.
Unfortunately, this requires a number of cards I don’t like that much in other matchups. For a deck that looks closer to what I’ve been playing, my post
sideboard configuration would look more like this:

This is much worse. My removal doesn’t line up as well, my threats are more easily answered, and my end game is worse. Previously, this was why I played
the build that I did, and that’s still a consideration, but I’m not sure if there’s enough Abzan that I have to respect it that much now.

Abzan Midrange

Expected opponents will have roughly:

This looks a little easier to compete against because your creatures, especially Goblin Rabblemaster, seem less terrible when they don’t have blockers. You
don’t have to worry about them running over you, and you can plan to play a long game. They’re trying to win with two-for-ones, which Outpost Siege easily
beats if they can’t remove it. They have answers, but not very many of them, so grinding them out seems possible.

My ideal configuration would look like:

Magma Jet doesn’t seem great, but it gives you a way to trigger prowess on the opponent’s turn to save your prowess creatures from D rown in Sorrow, and scry two is good here. This is definitely one of the weaker slots,
and Raise the Alarm would be better, but I think I’m unlikely to have access to that. I’d also prefer Brimaz, King of Oreskos to Monastery Mentor, but I
don’t like Brimaz much, in general, so I think I’m unlikely to have access to it. Additional Mastery of the Unseens would be great here, which makes me
tempted to consider them in my sideboard over Ashcloud Phoenix. Both are there to punish decks like Blue/Black that are trying to go long and don’t have
good answers to them, but Mastery of the Unseen is better here because Abzan Charm is an answer to Ashcloud Phoenix. On the other hand, going that way
takes another step toward never beating a Back to Nature if your opponent happens to have that.

Monastery Mentor is definitely among the worst cards still in this deck. It takes work to get going and gets trumped by sweepers. It might just be worse
than Ashcloud Phoenix, despite the “exile” problem.

Green Devotion

Mono-Green and G/R Devotion are the primary considerations here, but I think G/R is a little more popular at the moment. I’d expect to play against
something like:

This is the matchup where I’m happiest about having Goblin Rabblemaster and Monastery Mentor. I want to kill as many of their creatures as possible and
take over the game with one of those. After sideboarding my deck ideally looks like this:

I could also see wanting Soulfire Grand Master just to stay out of range of Crater’s Claws, but I don’t think that’s much of a concern, and the body is
pretty bad other than that. Outpost Siege makes Hornet Queen much less of a problem than it used to be, but I wouldn’t hate having an Arc Lightning or two
anyway, since it’s great if your opponent has Elvish Mystic or Mystic plus Voyaging Satyr, and it’s generally going to be good against Xenagos, the
Reveler.

As with many matchups, how good I feel here is going to depend largely on how many Back to Natures my opponent has.

I’m a little concerned about how many four-mana plays I have, but I think Ashcloud Phoenix is better than Monastery Swiftspear here, as they’re just too
likely to be able to block Monastery Swiftspear.

It’s worth noting that, if I needed to improve the matchup, End Hostilities is the best card against them, but I don’t really think it’s what I want
against anything else, so I don’t think it’s worth making room for, but it could be if Green Devotion gets too popular.

U/B Control

I think it’s reasonable to expect these decks to look similar to the winning decklist from Grand Prix Seville.

Monastery Swiftspear really shines here, as your primary goal is just to get under them, and I think a lot of U/B decks are expecting to have a good
matchup against R/W, and that a big part of that is a lack of Monastery Swiftspear in most R/W decklists. I know that the card feels very low impact, and I
get why other people don’t play it, but whenever I cut it, my deck feels a lot clunkier, and I win less.

Outside of that, you just want to be able to cut as much removal as possible for threats that are hard to deal with. Phoenixes and enchantments are best
here.

Haste is great, and I get forking Crux of Fate with Stormbreath Dragon, but a five-mana creature just doesn’t feel like the right place to be against them.

My ideal configuration against U/B Control looks like:

I’m not excited about Monastery Mentor, but I need enough threats, and it is acceptable filler. Really, I think I have enough cards here that are extremely
difficult for them to beat that I’d expect to be in very good shape in this matchup.

Raise the Alarm would be a small upgrade here, since having an instant speed threat is nice, but it’s low impact enough that I don’t think I’m really going
to miss its absence. This matchup hinges more on how many great cards you have than whether your worse cards are mediocre or bad.

G/R Aggro

Expected opponent:

This is a spot where red removal is great, and I just want as many burn spells as possible. Any time that’s my plan, I’m happy to have a lot of Outpost
Sieges. Like R/W, they have a lot of removal, so my plan against them is very similar. Basically the same cards are important, except here, Glare of Heresy
and Erase don’t do anything. I want my deck to look like this:

I wouldn’t hate another Chandra, Pyromaster, likely over the Brimaz, King of Oreskos, that I don’t plan to have access to. I mention Brimaz here because it
does seem like it’d be very good, since their removal isn’t good at killing it. Goblin Rabblemaster is potentially playable here if I had to, but I’m happy
that I didn’t feel like I needed to play it to fill out the deck. I think it’s a lot easier to get value out of Monastery Mentor in this matchup,
particularly given how many cheap spells I want in my deck. If I don’t have access to that much removal, I can fill out the deck with more Monastery
Swiftspears, and I won’t be too sad about it.

Jeskai Tokens

A typical opponent will be close to:

The most important thing against Jeskai Tokens is keeping their creatures and/or Jeskai Ascendancy off the board. After sideboarding, they have access to
Arc Lightning, Anger of the Gods, and End Hostilities, so I don’t want to rely too heavily on trying to be ahead on board. As always, I’m just trying to
grind them out with Chandra, Pyromaster and Outpost Siege. This can be hard to do against Treasure Cruise and Jeskai Ascendancy but not impossible.

I want my deck to look like this:

Stoke the Flames and Chained to the Rocks are too clunky and very poorly positioned here. Hordeling Outburst is fine, but nothing special once they have so
many sweepers. Mastery of the Unseen actually seems great here, as it comes down under Disdainful Stroke and wins an attrition war pretty easily. The
removal spells line up well against their creatures, but not great against their tokens. I’d like to have more Arc Lightning or Scouring Sands here, but I
don’t expect to have room for those.

Jeskai Aggro

This deck had fallen out of favor for a while, but seems to have been revitalized (I believe by Martin Juza’s finish, though there may be some specific
metagame shift that’s good for the deck).

This is another spot where I just want a lot of instant speed red removal, and then to win with Outpost Siege, which is definitely a recurring theme for
me. This deck doesn’t have tokens, so removal is better. It’s leaning very heavily on haste creatures, and if you have a removal spell ready, those
creatures are just less efficient than others would be. I basically just want to prioritize staying alive here, and as always, Goblin Rabblemaster isn’t
great against red removal.

Chandra isn’t great here because they have so many flying creatures with haste and no tokens to pick off. I still haven’t actually played with Mastery of
the Unseen, but it looks like a good plan to complement the removal-heavy strategy I want to take in these matchups.

Mono-Red Aggro

There are two major different flavors of mono-red aggressive decks: one is heroic, with an extremely low land count and Titan’s Strength, Hammerhand, and
Dragon Mantle; and the other plays a higher land count for cards like Goblin Rabblemaster and Hordeling Outburst. The sideboard has access to Searing Blood
and a lot of other removal, and they might try to go bigger or play Peak Eruption. Preserving a life total and not letting them get under you is very
important.

I want my deck to look like this:

This is another spot where Brimaz, King of Oreskos would be particularly great to have access to.

W/U Heroic

The expectation:

This is another spot where instant speed removal is great. With my old Red/White deck, I’d sometimes lose because my answers were mostly white sorceries,
so Gods Willing was hard to beat. With more red instants, I can try to kill their creature on their turn, and then I can use my white removal if they spend
their mana saving it. Also, as with Mono-Green Devotion, this is a deck that’s very vulnerable to Goblin Rabblemaster and Monastery Mentor because of their
lack of removal.

I want my deck to look like this:

I’m not sure about Outpost Siege. I generally like it when I’m overloading on removal, but trying to attrition them can work out badly against Treasure
Cruise, and I’m generally going to be ending the game quickly with Monastery Mentor and Goblin Rabblemaster. It’s possible that Ashcloud Phoenix or
Monastery Swiftspear would be better in that slot.

Sultai Reanimator

This is probably the most common amalgamation:

Attacking on the ground in this matchup is difficult, which is a problem for a configuration like mine. Drown in Sorrow is also a serious problem. I want
my deck to look like this:

I have to play my high impact threats and hope that my exile-based removal can clear a path for them and that my opponent runs out of removal. Ashcloud
Phoenix is likely my best chance. I don’t like Valorous Stance in general, but it’s great here, as it’s the only good answer other than Chained to the
Rocks to a Tasigur, and it kills a lot of their other creatures. The ability to counter a removal spell is actually important here, since their removal
spells are a lot more expensive than the red decks.

Compiling a Deck

Having seen what I want my deck to be able to look like, my next step is to take those results and enter them into a spreadsheet as follows:

The number in the total column gives me a sense of the relative weight of each card in my deck based on how often I want it. From here, I’m looking to
select 51 cards that will be the spells in my maindeck and sideboard, and then distribute them between main and sideboard. It’s worth noting that neither
the number in the total column nor the numbers collectively tell the whole story, but this can provide a useful data point.

Drawing from this data, I think the 51 spells I want access to are:

4 Monastery Swiftspear

4 Seeker of the Way

1 Soulfire Grand Master

4 Monastery Mentor

4 Goblin Rabblemaster

2 Ashcloud Phoenix

2 Wild Slash

4 Chained to the Rocks

2 Erase

1 Magma Spray

1 Magma Jet

4 Lightning Strike

3 Glare of Heresy

1 Mastery of the Unseen

2 Hordeling Outburst

2 Arc Lightning

1 Chandra, Pyromaster

4 Outpost Siege

4 Stoke the Flames

1 Brimaz, King of Oreskos

Dividing those between my maindeck and sideboard, I think I want:

I clearly need to test Mastery of the Unseen to see if it warrants another sideboard slot.

I’m worried that I’m not skewed enough toward beating the mirror or Abzan, and I might need to take more specific steps–I don’t have Peak Eruption or
Stormbreath Dragon, so I can’t position myself quite the way I’d like to there.

Overall, I’m mostly happy with this approach, but there are certainly a few last details I need to test to be ready for Grand Prix Memphis.