Finding A Home For Kiora

Sometimes it’s 11pm on a random Saturday night and you’re bored to tears, so you go to bed. Those Saturdays aren’t much fun, but as I get older, they have
become more and more common. Other times you get a text at 11:30PM on a random Saturday inviting you to your local store to play some Cube. Those Saturdays
are way better. It was during one such random Saturday Cube draft that I assembled the most ridiculous Cube deck I have ever managed to draft. Four
colours, nine planeswalkers, five sweepers, and a ton of cards that helped me get to the point where I could resolve my ‘walkers in succession.
That night we coined the catchphrase “Are planeswalkers good in Cube?” which continues to haunt one of my friends and co-drafters from that night.

It turns out that yes, they are in fact good in Cube. They’re also pretty special in Standard for the most part, as we have seen in the early days of new
Standard. Gideon, Ally of Zendikar has made multiple top 8 appearances already, Ob Nixilis Reignited is being heavily hyped, and of course Jace, Vryn’s
Prodigy and Nissa, Vastwood Seer have been seen far and wide since Magic Origins hit the shelves. Somewhat left out in the cold is our
fishy friend, our aquatic ally, our maritime mate…Kiora, Master of the Depths. With all the hype over making Knight Allies and destroying creatures, the
abilities on Kiora have caused few ripples in the waters of the top tables.

Breaking Down Kiora

Rare has been the planeswalker that has made no impact on Standard, so the lack of chatter around Kiora means one of three things:

– She’s poorly positioned

– She’s been overlooked

– She’s actually just bad

I wasn’t sure which one applied, but I’m betting on one of the first two being correct. Modern, on the other hand, has been surprisingly low on
planeswalker count in successful decks. Very few people are running planeswalker removal, and so if you’re immune to Abrupt Decay like Kiora is, then
really the only thing that is likely to scare you is Maelstrom Pulse. So is she going to see any play? Let’s take a closer look at Kiora and her abilities.

2GU for four loyalty and three abilities
. Four mana has been the sweet spot for powerful walkers in the past. We may never see another Mind Sculptor, but it’s seemed to be the case that the
difference between four and five mana is enough to ask more from your abilities before we’ll play it at the higher cost. The old Kiora started with two
loyalty, with a +1 that helped to protect her and a -1 that ensured you got some sort of advantage from her if she was being pressured. That said, her
ultimate at -5 was surprisingly easy to hit and, like most ultimates, was likely to win you the game.

We still get to go down twice from her starting loyalty if we want, but we do need an extra turn to reach her ultimate. She’s definitely more sturdy than
her previous incarnation, and five is a lot to knock down in one turn, so on the very base line her stats are enough to earn a slot in the conversation.

+1: Untap up to one target creature and up to one target land
.

The obvious application here is with mana accelerants, allowing us to generate large amounts of mana in a hurry. Creatures that can tap for more than one
mana are especially valuable here, and in Standard right now we have two: Circle of Elders and Shaman of Forgotten Ways. Both of those are conditional, but
nonetheless very powerful if their conditions can be met. Similarly, if we have lands that can tap for multiple mana, we can get even more out of this
ability. Standard only has one right now in Shrine of the Forsaken Gods, and that one has a bunch of restrictions on it. Still, it’s one to file away.

“Obvious” is not, however, synonymous with “only.” We do have Sheltered Aerie for example to make any land tap for two mana of any one colour. Aside from
being able to enchant a fetchland with it, we also get the application of enchanting a Battle land to add even more flexibility or a basic land to protect
against Crumble to Dust (if that becomes a thing). It’s been a while since we only had one of those effects in Standard, so I have to wonder if maybe
R&D knew this interaction was good.

Kiora does have one very large friend in Dragonlord Ojutai. He really, really likes being untapped, and Kiora is more than happy to oblige. Conveniently,
turn 3 Shaman lets us cast both Kiora and Ojutai on turn 4. That seems like something in which I might have some interest. There’s also Jace, of
course, who will flip a lot faster when we can loot twice a turn. Oh, and I guess Hangarback Walker does some fun stuff here too. But then, when doesn’t Hangarback Walker do fun stuff?

Besides when Abzan Charm is around, of course. Go away, Abzan Charm. Nobody wants you here.

In Modern, the applications get scarier still as we have Nykthos and Voyaging Satyr to untap for fun and profit. The green devotion deck is already a
contender in the format with Garruk to untap lands, so having another way to do that as well as a way to find more threats is a plan that I can get behind.
We also have Somberwald Sage and Elvish Archdruid in the big mana category, both of which can be used to power out a Craterhoof Behemoth way ahead of fair.
I’m pretty interested in untapping Knight of the Reliquary, especially if we can also do this with Retreat to Coralhelm, which gives us another angle to
play.

-2: Reveal the top four cards of your library. You may put a creature card and/or a land card from among them into your hand. Put the rest into your
graveyard.

This is the most exciting part for me. Satyr Wayfinder taught us the power of this type of effect, and being able to get a land and a creature
without a mana investment is probably more powerful. While we don’t get the speed bump to go with it, we do have a planeswalker that can still tick up.
With Den Protector still being a force in the format and Sidisi being a poor forgotten card, there’s probably a sweet Sultai deck here that we can salvage
from the wreckage of Sultai Reanimator. Tasigur and Gurmag Angler are still around, after all. It’s possible that we could splash white in this deck for
Emeria Shepherd, another card that isn’t seeing nearly enough play and that synergises very well with the engine we’re constructing.

Den Protector really is the key here to abusing this ability in Standard, as we lack an efficient reanimation spell. There’s an outside chance that
Graveblade Marauder might be good in a full graveyard, but Revenant still isn’t worth it. Where Denny P goes, Deathmist Raptor is sure to follow and he
even enjoys being in the graveyard. It might also be time to return to our friend Torrent Elemental, who loves being exiled. Oh, and I suppose we can play
Jace. All the cool kids are doing it, after all.

Modern is where this ability really shines. Although at four mana she’s a bit clunky for a fast combo build, she fits really well into a Dredgevine
strategy. That deck runs mana accelerants and wants to fill the yard in a hurry, and lo and behold those are two things Kiora really likes. Putting stuff
like Bloodghast, Vengevine, and/or Darkblast in the graveyard while keeping a fetchland and a Birds of Paradise can set you up for a powerful couple of
turns to come.

-8: You get an emblem with “Whenever a creature enters the battlefield under your control, you may have it fight target creature.” Then put three 8/8
blue Octopus creature tokens on the battlefield.

No, this does not go infinite. Stop it. The emblem only makes things fight. The Octopus token bit is separate. That’s why the emblem text is in quotes.

With the very odd exception (Gideon, Ally of Zendikar; Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas), playing a planeswalker because you expect to hit their ultimate and win
is a dangerous and poor strategy. Unless you are specifically building your deck to protect the planeswalker at all costs, it is highly unlikely that you
will reach that ultimate in most games. Very often you won’t even want to because you need to tick them down for the optimal line.

With that in mind, it makes more sense to assess Kiora’s limit break from a power level perspective and not from a synergy one. Essentially, are we going
to win the game if we cash in our Kiora for some tentacle-based destruction? I think often the answer here is yes, but not as often as was the case with
the first incarnation of Kiora and her Kraken-producing emblem. Yes we can likely wipe the opponent’s board and threaten lethal the next turn, but we are
still vulnerable to a sweeper from the opponent that undoes most of our work. However, Kiora is a planeswalker who is more about synergy than most others,
and the decks in which she fits will often need her to tick up and/or down several times to get their engine going. That will put the ultimate out of easy
reach in many cases, and also likely means that if you can get there you were going to win the game anyway.

Kiora, Master of Decks

We know what she looks like and what she does. What do decks look like with Kiora in them? Let’s start with the Sultai list:

Sultai Megamorph

Chris Lansdell

Test deck on 11-02-2015

Standard

Creatures (26)

Planeswalkers (3)

3 Kiora, Master of the Depths

Lands (25)

Spells (6)

Sideboard

Filling the graveyard with this deck is laughably easy. Once that happens we have multiple ways to recur the yard and get all the value we could possibly
want. The maindeck Sire of Stagnation might be a little greedy, but with ramp being so popular right now I really like that card’s spot in the metagame.
I’m also not sure about double Emeria Shepherd, as the second one might need to be in the sideboard. I’m really excited to try this and see if all the
one-of spells are as easy to find as I think they will be.

Temur White Dragons

Chris Lansdell

Test deck on 11-02-2015

Standard

Creatures (26)

Planeswalkers (6)

Lands (24)

Spells (4)

4 Wild Slash

Sideboard

This one is a little more focused on using Kiora’s plus ability to ramp into Dragons. Unlike the green Eldrazi ramp strategies, we’re able to affect the
board early while developing mana, and we’re not dead if we don’t draw enough ramp. I am a huge fan of both planeswalkers in this deck, though it must be
said that Sarkhan is much like Sorin in hating Crackling Doom. The Banes are being tested and might need to be something lower on the curve, perhaps even
Savage Knuckleblade. The sideboard is dedicated to going smaller against anything aggressive, although the metagame might be shifting to more control-based
strategies after GP Indianapolis.

What about Kiora in Modern? Well this is where I would start, greed and all:

Dredgevine

Chris Lansdell

Test deck on 11-02-2015

Modern

Creatures (30)

Planeswalkers (2)

2 Kiora, Master of the Depths

Lands (21)

Spells (8)

Sideboard

I want the Birds of Paradise in here to maximize the value from Kiora, but her -2 is going to be the biggest tool for this deck. Our mana is very ambitious
without Birds, so playing around Blood Moon can be important. Alesha helps that problem somewhat as she can bring back Golgari Grave-Trolls at will while
also operating under a Blood Moon. She also brings back Lotleth Troll in a pinch, and both of those creatures are likely to stick around with their
regeneration tacked on there.

Contraindications

I wish I could tell you that Kiora is in a great spot against the Jeskai Black menace. Truth is that she’s probably not. The best metagame place for her is
one where decks are slower and not applying pressure with three-powered vigilant flying creatures, and that could well be where we’re heading. It’s also
worth noting that a second mana creature with toughness above two will put her in a better position to protect herself with her +1 ability, and therefore
help her withstand all the cheap removal.

Another troublesome card is Utter End, but the Standard decks both present enough other threats for that card, and as a result, she should be relatively
safe. Silumgar’s Command is starting to pick up slightly, but even if we do lose her to that, she’s retrievable.

That’s not to say Kiora has no place. She is very good against decks that cannot easily remove her early, which applies to the G/W Megamorph decks and the
Eldrazi decks. The Sultai list above really feels good to me, letting us recur Kiora with Den Protector for even more value. If you have ideas for
improving any of these lists, please do let me know.

As always, thanks for stopping by and until next time…Brew On!