I played Ramunap Red at Grand Prix Denver, and maybe I shouldn’t have.
Ramunap Red and Temur Energy effectively dominated the tournament, with three copies of each in Top 8. Granted, those red decks were a little more innovative than mine, but at the end of the day, I wasn’t unhappy with my deck choice.
Creatures (22)
- 4 Falkenrath Gorger
- 4 Bomat Courier
- 3 Kari Zev, Skyship Raider
- 3 Hazoret the Fervent
- 4 Ahn-Crop Crasher
- 4 Earthshaker Khenra
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (24)
Spells (12)
I started 5-0 (after three byes). Round 6, I sat in the feature match area against Brad Nelson for the first time in a while.
Game 1 came down to me having six outs that killed him no matter what I did on his end step, five cards that killed him if I sacrificed a land to Ramunap Ruins, and roughly 40 cards that allowed me to keep playing if he didn’t have Glorybringer.
If I sacrifice a land and draw another land, I have to keep Hazoret back to block Bristling Hydra and will eventually lose to Skysovereign, Consul Flagship and company. I don’t automatically lose, but my situation is way worse and I’m drawing to Incendiary Flow or Collective Defiance.
I thought he had Glorybringer, so playing for the win with those nine cards may have been the better choice. There was also a line where I could have sat back with Hazoret the Fervent for a few turns, but I don’t think it gets me very far. Maybe I should have been chucking the creatures I drew at him with Hazoret, but they translated to two points each either way. The only thing that would have been different is if I didn’t let him get that first attack in for seven with Bristling Hydra.
Brad employs bush-league tactics from time to time, but what I was picking up on was far more subtle. I think it was safe to assume he had a Glorybringer, but that lingering doubt made me think I had options other than sacrificing that land. There was always the chance he was hamming it up and didn’t actually have it.
I had a shot in the second game; didn’t cast Incendiary Flow on a turn that I should’ve (even though it didn’t matter, it was still disheartening); and eventually I lost to Whirler Virtuoso. Having Sweltering Suns in my deck like other people do could have helped that situation, but sideboarding that card in on the play isn’t exciting.
Following my match with Brad, I played a mostly fun, not-so-close match against Sean Inoue. I won a tight Game 1 with only Ramunap Ruins and colorless lands for mana, but Games 2 and 3, I ran afoul of flood and screw.
His Aethersphere Harvesters did work against me, which I’ve yet to really see happen against the new Ramunap Red versions with tons of removal and Abrades. Pia Nalaar isn’t the midrange trump that Aethersphere Harvester is. Lesson learned.
After that, I was 5-2, and I dropped.
Uh, What?
This is the fourth time in my life I’ve dropped from a Grand Prix at 5-2. So far, I have zero regrets.
At the end of the day, there is more to life than a Magic tournament. Even more important is my sanity and well-being. I’ve won out from those situations and made Top 8 before, but given I was considering dropping, I highly doubt it would have been one of those tournaments. The best thing for me was to get outta there, so I did.
I enjoy my role as “the dude who does stuff no one would ever consider doing.” You aren’t obligated to do anything, and there is certainly no obligation to stay in a tournament just because you’re live for $200.
Aside: Obviously $200 is a lot of money, so my message could be construed as coming from a place of privilege. In a sense, it absolutely is, just based on the fact that I’m able to fly to Denver to play in a Magic tournament. If $200 is a big part of the equation, I wouldn’t recommend flying to a tournament in the first place. The flip side of this coin is that the flight and tournament entry is the way to maintain sanity for some, as it is for me at times. In this case, it was the opposite.
If I can inspire someone to ignore common sense and make a decision that betters their own life rather than following tradition, I’ll be very happy about including this personal anecdote in this article. Either way, it involves maintaining a certain amount of self-awareness to know exactly which decision is correct.
Anyway, when I booked my flight for Denver, I thought I had a good mindset and was ready to compete. Even when I showed up to the tournament, I thought I wanted to compete. When I finally sat down to play, I was kind of off it.
I’m feeling pretty good against #GPDC, but who knows.
Either way, I won’t be registering Ramunap Red. The deck is still great, but Temur Energy is a little more my speed. Deck selection in this Standard format is basically everything, but you also need to be comfortable with your deck.
While I’ve been trying to keep my streak of “play the best deck (or something close)” alive, sticking to what I can play well is also important. If I were playing Temur Energy, I don’t think I would have been in quite as complicated a situation as I found myself in against Brad. Even if I were in a more complicated situation, I would know what to do intuitively. When playing red decks, it’s not quite the same case.
Standard has always been about metagaming to some degree, but this Standard format is particularly conducive to finding the right size of deck. If you peg the metagame correctly, you need to pick a deck that’s slightly bigger than the majority of your opponents, or find something that can go under them.
The speed hierarchy of Standard is roughly:
U/W Approach
G/X Ramp
B/G Delirium
Temur Energy
Mono-Black Zombies
Ramunap Red
W/U Monument
These are the relevant decks in Standard at the moment, although some are more relevant than others. Some, like G/X Ramp, are potential players but have yet to put up huge results. Others, like W/U Monument, are decks that were good at one point and could potentially be good again. Still others, like the various God-Pharaoh’s Gift decks, are solid but maybe need a little refinement or to be in the right place at the right time.
Note that, at one point, W/U Monument was a deck that tried to get under some of the more successful midrange decks, such as Mono-Black Zombies and Temur Energy. Neither matchup was perfect, but W/U Monument was able to hang, which not a lot of decks could do. One copy made Top 8 in Denver, so the deck clearly has legs. I love the deck, but feel like it’s dramatically underpowered for a Grand Prix.
Abrade is a card, but despite the deck name, W/U Monument doesn’t rely on Oketra’s Monument to win games. It’s yet another “dies to Doom Blade” argument that doesn’t quite hold water. Yes, Abrade is good against you, but it’s just as good as any other two-mana removal spell.
U/R Emerge is a deck that, like W/U Monument, could get under the best decks in the format. G/R Pummeler is in a similar space, and it’s also a deck that can bob and weave in the post-sideboard games with things like Woodland Wanderer. New Perspectives could also be good in this slower environment. The biggest thing to worry about is the Merfolk-like “Fish” angle from Temur Energy, which likely isn’t going away anytime soon.
Now, the game has changed, and Temur Energy is the one doing all the winning. Their success is due to having a reasonable clock and countermagic to disrupt the bigger decks. Temur Energy gets to play Fish against the big decks and control against the smaller decks, so it sort of breaks the paradigm. Because of that, I don’t expect Temur Energy to get hated out this coming weekend.
Green has been the best color in Standard for a while because it’s consistent. Cards like Attune with Aether, Traverse the Ulvenwald, and Tireless Tracker help make your land drops and give you something to do with that mana late. It has card advantage and good threats, and can easily fix its mana to splash some removal from a different color.
Obviously, sometimes it’s not well-positioned. B/G Constrictor is vulnerable to certain metagame setups, but, as I mentioned, Temur Energy sort of breaks that mold. What if, instead of anticipating metagame shifts and playing a deck that beats Temur Energy, you play Temur and build it with the mirror in mind?
Something like this is crazy enough to work.
Creatures (26)
- 4 Woodland Wanderer
- 2 Tireless Tracker
- 4 Longtusk Cub
- 2 Bristling Hydra
- 2 Whirler Virtuoso
- 4 Servant of the Conduit
- 4 Rogue Refiner
- 2 Glorybringer
- 2 The Scarab God
Lands (21)
Spells (12)
Who can actually beat a Woodland Wanderer right now? The Scarab God is incredible in mirror matches due to the fifth toughness, and Woodland Wanderer notches that plus adds vigilance into the equation. Getting the sixth toughness up front is particularly relevant against Hazoret the Fervent. Maybe it’s worse than more Bristling Hydras, but I’m unsure about that.
If you don’t like Woodland Wanderer, something closer to Michael Jacob’s list from Denver is likely where you want to be, and I took more than some inspiration from his list to form this one. He went 6-0 in mirror matches, although I’m sure at least some of that is a mastery of midrange mirrors on MJ’s part.
Creatures (21)
- 4 Longtusk Cub
- 3 Bristling Hydra
- 3 Whirler Virtuoso
- 3 Servant of the Conduit
- 4 Rogue Refiner
- 2 Glorybringer
- 2 The Scarab God
Planeswalkers (2)
Lands (23)
Spells (14)
Given how dominant Temur Energy was last weekend, I expect it to be out in full force for Grand Prix DC. I wouldn’t want to be B/G Delirium or Mono-Black Zombies if that’s the case. If I don’t play Temur myself, there’s a world where I register Oketra’s Monument.
Creatures (23)
- 4 Bygone Bishop
- 4 Thraben Inspector
- 3 Hanweir Militia Captain
- 4 Spell Queller
- 4 Selfless Spirit
- 4 Cloudblazer
Lands (25)
Spells (12)
Thought-Knot Seer is another card I wouldn’t mind having access to somewhere. Mono-White Eldrazi is a thing, but I think I prefer having Dusk // Dawn in W/U Monument. Warping Wail is also great, though.
If we stick with traditional W/U Monument, we need good plans against Ramunap Red and Temur Energy. Unfortunately, Dusk // Dawn is great in one of those matchups and horrible in the other, which doesn’t make for a compelling reason to choose to play W/U Monument in the first place. Thankfully, the Authority of the Consuls / Linvala, the Preserver sideboard is money against Ramunap Red. Unfortunately, Game 1 isn’t ideal, although it gets better the more they configure their deck on the midrange spectrum.
I can’t even convince myself that W/U Monument is a great deck to play, and it’s a deck I’m particularly fond of. That should be telling.
I’m always going to have a soft spot for Zombies, but it needs to adapt if it wants to participate. Prior to Pro Tour Hour of Devastation, I was messing about with B/U Zombies.
It’s time.
Creatures (25)
- 2 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
- 4 Relentless Dead
- 4 Diregraf Colossus
- 4 Cryptbreaker
- 4 Dread Wanderer
- 3 The Scarab God
- 4 Ammit Eternal
Lands (25)
Spells (10)
With a smaller emphasis on go-wide cards, Lord of the Accursed loses a lot of value. Instead, most of the games with this deck are going to be a game of Protect the Queen featuring the suddenly-very-popular The Scarab God.
The idea is that the Zombies shell is poor against Temur but still largely effective against Ramunap Red. If you cut some of the nonsense and splash The Scarab God, you suddenly have a good shot against Temur.
Your early creatures are so low in power level that, by cutting the synergy cards, you’re losing a lot of what made things like Relentless Dead so powerful. Maybe a B/U tapout deck would be a better fit for the format as a whole.
The Approach of the Second Sun deck is roughly Turbo-Fog and should be built as such. If you want to go big, you can’t exactly go bigger than that. Some of the best players like Paul Rietzl and Eric Froehlich used U/W Approach as their deck of choice, and while they fell short, the deck is quite good.
Lands (25)
Spells (35)
U/W Approach has been updated to some degree, but the core is still the same. With Temur on the loose, I don’t like this as a choice anymore.
So, what’s the truth?
Creatures (24)
- 2 Tireless Tracker
- 4 Longtusk Cub
- 4 Voltaic Brawler
- 4 Bristling Hydra
- 4 Servant of the Conduit
- 2 Greenbelt Rampager
- 2 Glorybringer
- 2 Rhonas the Indomitable
Lands (22)
Spells (14)
A version of this could end up being the best choice for this weekend. Voltaic Brawler and Blossoming Defense help get under in the “mirror” match. Not going all-in on Electrostatic Pummeler is an interesting call, as that card seems particularly well-positioned at the moment. Red removal (aside from Abrade) is difficult to use.
Oddly enough, G/R no-Pummeler kind of breaks the rule of trying to level this Standard format, at least to a degree. It doesn’t go bigger than anything else, but it does get under mirror matches, and Temur Energy isn’t prepared to deal with it. The more they slow down to fight mirrors with The Scarab God, it gets even better for the deck with Blossoming Defense.
Previously, the correct thing to do was to go over the top of people, but that’s kind of evened out now. Zombies and B/G will cease to exist, which means the aggressive decks can come out to play. Hell, even Mardu Vehicles might see a resurgence.
Moving away from Village Messenger is a mistake for Ramunap Red going into this weekend. Getting under Temur Energy, especially in Game 1, is quite easy for them to do, but only if their deck actually has that capability.
Whether you choose to run back Ramunap Red, resurrect Mardu Vehicles, or go with something new, I don’t think you can go wrong by going under people. You can’t go big on Temur Energy; it just doesn’t work. That leaves joining them or going under them.
This is the week for aggro.
