This past weekend I got to take my beloved G/W Tokens deck for one last ride at #SCGWOR in the Standard Classic. I was in line to register for the Modern Classic and at the last minute decided to play Standard because I enjoyed playing G/W Tokens so much this season. I managed to win the tournament, solidifying my everlasting love for the deck.
Creatures (14)
Planeswalkers (8)
Lands (9)
Spells (29)
But now that we’ve gotten a look at the full spoiler for Eldritch Moon, I think things may change in Standard. Here are some of my initial thoughts on some of the cards from the Eldritch Moon spoiler and how they will impact Standard and in some cases Modern.
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Decimator of the Provinces has a lot of Constructed applications. I see this card slotting in nicely into Cryptolith Rite strategies and potentially G/W Tokens as a finisher in the mirror. Oddly, I think this is the worst of the three rare emerge creatures and it’s the only mythic rare.
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With all the talk about Elder Deep-Fiend, I think Distended Mindbender is flying way under the radar. Distended Mindbender has the ability to almost Mind Twist an opponent on turn 4, taking up to two important spells and upgrading whatever body you cast into a 5/5. I think Distended Mindbender is going to see some playing time and won’t be surprised if it’s a staple in Standard.
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Elder Deep-Fiend is a scary card. It’s a 5/6 flash creature that can Mana Short your opponent and also can tap all of the opponent’s blockers, giving you a free path to victory, or even just clear the path to take down a planeswalker singlehandedly. Early talk seems to have this card as a Standard staple, and I definitely agree.
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There’s been some talk about Lupine Prototype potentially slotting in to Modern Affinity decks. Ensoul Artifact comes with haste attached and only saw a small amount of play. I don’t expect Lupine Prototype to be played much.
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I could see this card played as a one-of in a delirium strategy or in some kind of Reanimator that can take advantage of putting cards in the graveyard, but I still think allowing the opponent to loot is too high a cost to want to activate this card frequently.
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Hanweir Battlements is an attractive value land in addition to its synergy with its meld counterpart Hanweir Garrison. It’s a colorless land to cast cards like Myr Reshaper, Thought-Knot Seer, and Reality Smasher, while also giving creatures haste later in the game when we have free mana. I expect Hanweir Battlements to see some play in red decks, both with and without Hanweir Garrison.
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As much as I’d like to see this card be good, I don’t quite think Zombies will be a viable strategy in Standard. A four-mana 4/4 is nothing to write home about these days, but one upside: when we have leftover mana, we can cast Gisa and Geralf and another Zombie in the graveyard in the same turn. This means we’ll have to play a high density of Zombies, which is something I don’t really anticipate doing.
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This is a pretty simple evaluation. Grim Flayer scales throughout the game well, increasing in size as the game progresses, similarly to Sylvan Advocate, but also enables delirium, a potentially key mechanic moving forward in Standard. I think Grim Flayer will be a four-of in plenty of B/G Delirium strategies.
MISS (for now)
Heron’s Grace Champion falls victim to Collected Company still being legal in Standard. Too expensive to take off of Collected Company and also being the same color makes it really difficult to find a reason to put this card in your W/G Humans decks until Collected Company rotates out. Might be worth revisiting this card when Collected Company does rotate out.
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Wow. What? Spell Queller is another potentially oppressive Azorius three-drop that also happens to be a Spirit, a key creature type moving forward. Collected Company decks got a great new tool in Spell Queller, but they also got a little trickier to both play against and play with. Collected Company in the main phase to play around an opponent’s Spell Queller?
Casting Collected Company in combat to try to ambush-block a creature or Reflector Mage a creature may not be the correct line because of the ability to potentially hit a Spell Queller for their second main-phase spell. Spell Queller also plays nicely with Reflector Mage, allowing us to bounce a creature that can’t be recast for a turn and then get the creature on the way back down the following turn. Spell Queller is an early standout that is definitely going to be played for as long as it’s legal in Standard.
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This is one I’m going out on a limb on. I could easily be wrong, but my early intuition says Tamiyo, Field Researcher is not going to be great. Both non-ultimate abilities require us to have creatures on the battlefield for Tamiyo, Field Researcher to be effective. Sure, we can target the opponent’s creatures with the +1 ability to draw some cards, but Tamiyo, Field Researcher is acting as a Divination in that case.
The ability to tap down two creatures is good on certain battlefield textures that we can leverage the tempo advantage, but overall I think Tamiyo, Field Researcher is a little too win-more. I suspect Tamiyo, Field Researcher will see play in Bant Company decks, but I expect the numbers to shrink as Standard season progresses.
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This is another one I think I could be proven wrong on. The fact Bruna, Fading Light can bring back her meld counterpart, Gisela, the Broken Blade, to create a Brisela, Voice of Nightmares makes me think Bruna, the Fading Light might have what it takes to be a one-of in decks playing a high count of Gisela, the Broken Blade. I think for the most part that Bruna, the Fading Light is a little too expensive and cute for this powerful Standard format that is already dominated by powerful white cards.
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Collective Effort seems like it could be a good fit in both Humans decks and G/W Tokens. The ability to pump all of our creatures in both decks is excellent, but also killing a creature like Gisela, the Broken Blade could be extremely important for both of those decks. Adding the enchantment removal effect to the card is icing on the cake. I like this card, and expect it to see some play in low numbers.
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Planeswalker’s Company. This is an interesting card that has potential to be a build-around. The most likely homes for a card like this are B/W Control and Naya Planeswalkers. The problem with Deploy the Gatewatch is you have to play an extremely high density of planeswalkers for this card to be effective, and planeswalkers aren’t cheap to cast. This card also costs six mana. The mana curve in a deck that can play this card effectively would likely be way too high to be effective. I think people will try Deploy the Gatewatch, but ultimately it won’t work out.
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Gisela, the Broken Blade is a great four-drop creature. I don’t think anyone is doubting it will see Standard play, but she does have some problems. Gisela, the Broken Blade doesn’t stand up well to Reflector Mage or basically any removal spell. Gisela, the Broken Blade is especially effective at fighting aggressive strategies, and lifelink plays really well with Dromoka’s Command. I think Gisela, the Broken Blade will be a Standard staple, but I don’t think it’s necessarily a slam dunk. I think Gisela, the Broken Blade could turn out to be Gisela, the Overhyped.
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Less to see here than the city in Rhode Island.
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I think Selfless Spirit will be a solid filler creature in a Spirit-based deck, but it has some issues outside of that. The major problem with Selfless Spirit is that sweepers are in the form of Languish and Tragic Arrogance, and indestructibility doesn’t circumvent the effects of either of those cards. Planar Outburst already suffers from Archangel Avacyn giving indestructability, so I would expect Planar Outburst to be immediately pushed out and replaced by Tragic Arrogance if Selfless Spirit ever saw some real playing time.
Not only do the sweepers dodge indestructibility, a lot of removal spells do as well, such as Grasp of Darkness and Declaration in Stone. I suspect Selfless Spirit is played only because it’s a Spirit in a devoted Spirit deck in this Standard format.
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Docent of Perfection is just too expensive for a creature that enters the battlefield with no immediate effect and also requires more cards to get additional value when you untap with it.
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Blue doesn’t get many cards that can effectively remove permanents, but Imprisoned in the Moon is a Ruinous Path that also gives you opponent a free land. Unless you’re a mono-blue deck, I don’t foresee needing this effect, as it’s done much better in other colors.
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I think Mausoleum Wanderer is one of the creatures that makes Spirit decks a viable strategy. We’ve seen Judge’s Familiar see play before, and this is a Judge’s Familiar that gets pumped when we cast other Spirits. Not only that, Mausoleum Wanderer also plays nicely with Rattlechains in that we can cast it as an instant to snipe a Collected Company or Languish an opponent tapped out for.
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If a true control deck becomes viable again, I could see this card being played in low numbers because there are not many good options for instant speed card draw. Overall I think this card is a worse Jace’s Ingenuity.
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The first copy of Take Inventory is essentially cycling a card at sorcery speed for a potential later one-mana discount on a Divination. As the game progresses each copy is a little better, but the game has to go really long for the full value to be gained. I think Take Inventory will be tested early and often, but ultimately I don’t think it will be good enough for Standard.
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Unsubstantiate is a card that got a lot of initial hype, being compared to Remand. This card isn’t nearly as good as Remand, but it’s good at advancing tempo advantages, and in a format with Spell Queller, Reflector Mage, and Collected Company, tempo is huge. Unsubstantiate is best suited in decks that can close the game early, but I think it will be an effective card in those decks. Unsubstantiate also plays nicely with Spell Queller in that we can bounce our Spell Queller with the triggered ability to exile a spell on the stack, giving us back our Spell Queller and exiling the spell forever.
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My first thought when Liliana, the Last Hope was spoiled was, “Wow another mediocre to bad planeswalker that will be hyped up just to fall flat.” When you look at Liliana, the Last Hope, however, it plays perfectly into delirium strategies by providing us with a planeswalker card type when it is in the graveyard while also filling our graveyard to achieve delirium when on the battlefield.
Not only that, it curves perfectly with Grim Flayer, which can then attack through a Sylvan Advocate. Three-mana planeswalkers always seem underwhelming to me and always overperform where I think they will end up. Liliana, the Last Hope is going to be great.
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I think planeswalkers are too important in current Standard to play Murder over Ruinous Path.
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I think Whispers of Emrakul might be a solid sideboard card in delirium decks against control decks, but I don’t see it playing a huge role in Standard.
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This is an interesting card. I think Bedlam Reveler has a chance to be played in Modern alongside cards like Gitaxian Probe and Thought Scour, but I don’t quite see it in Standard. We have cards like Tormenting Voice and Magmatic Insight in red, but I’m not quite sure this card can get a big enough discount early enough to want to include it in a deck in Standard.
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Collective Defiance I think is just short of Standard-playable. I think that may change when Exquisite Firecraft rotates, but the inability to singlehandedly kill a Gideon, Ally of Zendikar or Nissa, Voice of Zendikar is working against it. This card is right on the border of playable to me so I could go either way.
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I suspect I’ll see a lot of this card in aggressive red decks moving forward. Hanweir Garrison is a more reasonable version of Goblin Rabblemaster, but unchecked it can do a ton of damage. In addition to its already reasonable stats, we also get the ability to meld with Hanweir Battlements to turn into Hanweir, the Writhing Township. Hanweir, the Writhing Township will very easily close the game on its own, and including a colorless land in your deck comes at a relatively small cost, so I expect to see some melding happen in Standard. Don’t sleep on Hanweir Garrison with Thalia’s Lieutenant either; that is a sick curve that can get out of control quickly.
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I think Incendiary Flow is going to see play in red decks, but I’m not too impressed with this version of Lightning Strike. The ability to exile a creature is somewhat relevant with Hangarback Walker still being legal, but I’d much prefer to get just get plain old Lightning Strike back. Red decks do need the ability to go to the face, though, and that’s a plus from where we were with just Fiery Impulse and Draconic Roar.
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Interesting card as it’s somewhat resilient to removal out of creature-based decks, but I don’t expect this card to see any play in Standard.
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Nahiri’s Wrath is pretty good at killing multiple planeswalkers, but Archangel Avacyn is going to be a huge problem for this card in the middle of the game against creatures. I’ve never seen a card I wanted to target with Spell Queller more than Nahiri’s Wrath.
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Okay, the miss tag is mostly for dramatic effect and the vast overhype I feel Eldritch Evolution is getting. Eldritch Evolution reads to me like a one-shot Birthing Pod activation that can jump a level but also can be countered. I do think this card might see some play, but I think it’s worse than both Chord of Calling and Collected Company in Modern and is difficult to utilize effectively in Standard.
Building a combo deck around this card in Modern to get an early Griselbrand requires you to take drastic deckbuilding measures, and the consistency will fall short because the effect of this card can’t be replicated by another. Decks like Grishoalbrand have died in popularity because of their inconsistencies, and I feel that decks built around Eldritch Evolution will also fall flat.
I do think Eldritch Evolution can see play in decks strictly using it to produce value sacrificing a Kitchen Finks for a Thragtusk or Sigarda, Host of Herons. As for Standard, this could be a value card in green decks sacrificing a Nissa, Vastwood Seer to upgrade to The Gitrog Monster or Reality Smasher, but again, this is another card I can’t wait to target with Spell Queller.
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I think Ishkanah, Grafwidow is an extremely powerful creature if you have the ability to turn delirium on effectively. As a five-mana creature with a powerful enters-the-battlefield effect, Ishkanah, Grafwidow passes both the Reflector Mage test and the Spell Queller test. I expect Ishkanah, Grafwidow to make appearances in delirium decks, especially in those playing Traverse the Ulvenwald.
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Wild Mongrel was a good card back in its day, but Magic has changed a lot since then. With nothing to madness in green, Noose Constrictor will stick to being a Limited all-star.
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I don’t think Splendid Reclamation is a good Standard card because it’s hard to abuse without fetchlands, but it may have a chance being played in Modern because there are many more ways to get lands in your graveyard to exploit Splendid Reclamation, such as dredging. This card could potentially see play in decks with Life from the Loam, both cards that want to put lands in the graveyard.
Whew!
That’s it for my review of the spoiler. Eldritch Moon looks like a really powerful set for Standard overall. I’m sure I’ll be wrong about plenty of cards, as I have some pretty controversial opinions on some of the more popular cards in the set. I can’t wait to get to testing to prove myself wrong. If there’s anything you think I’m wrong about, feel free to let me know!