“There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and
statistics.” phrase, falsely attributed to Benjamin
Disraeli by Mark Twain.
Hello, my name is still Valeriy (despite my friend’s failed attempt to Martial Coup me out of the contest and post here his article about U/B Control), and I’m glad to write here again. The three kinds of lies are my topic today, and Mr. Twain’s falsely attributed quote already gives us an example of the first kind.
I moved “the damned lie” to the end of the article so that we can go directly to the statistics. Statistics is the worst kind of lie because it creates a false sense of security, as if you have prepared for everything, and it usually is nothing similar to pairings in the real-life tournaments. Half a year ago, I played in a national qualifier with Jund. I looked at the statistics and decided to play a couple of Great Sable Stags maindeck to beat the mirror, but throughout the tournament, I saw Jund players around but played only one mirror match and played four times against various red decks. However, having statistics is better than nothing, because it allows us to avoid traps that are well known to everybody who actually prepares for tournaments. So, let’s dive into the Dark Depths of deception.
When I prepare for tournaments, I usually gather statistics about the metagame. The main sources of decklist data are articles, Top 8s of various large tournaments (StarCityGames.com Opens are a good example), and MTGO daily statistics. The first source is inappropriate because articles contain only good lists (or bad and untested ideas, depending on how much time the author of the deck had before the deadline). Top 8s and Top 16s are a common source for choosing a decklist (“Hey, that guy won a 300-person tournament!”), but I think that using these lists for metagame analysis is a mistake. For example, you know that some deck won a nine-round tournament, posting a total record of 10-1-1 (Top 8 included), but who were those twelve people? Nobody knows. How did that guy win? Nobody knows (unless he’s not lazy enough and actually writes a report).
MTGO daily data is strictly better for analysis because it’s not a reflection of one lucky day in the life of one lucky guy. Something like 20-30 tournaments per week are held featuring players from all over the world with hot tech and ideas spreading like fire. Full data is still not available, but we have access to more than a third of decklists (and the most successful at that), which is just about enough to form an educated opinion (or, in other words, create a plausible delusion).
I analyzed eighteen events from November 1 to November 3, which included 1008 players and provided 315 decks. I also have last week’s data for comparison. See the spreadsheet below.
Public Enemy Number One
Valakut – 21.6% (20.2% previous week)
Runner-ups
U/B Control – 11.1% (9.4% prev.)
Boros – 10.2% (9.8% prev.)
Tier 2 “The Pursuers or the Paupers?”
U/W Control – 7.3% (6.2% prev.)
Vampires – 7.3% (new kid on the block, less than 1% previous week)
White Weenee – 7.0% (greatest disappointment, 14.7% previous week)
UGR Ramp – 7.0% (5.2% prev.)
Eldrazi Ramp – 6.7% (6.2% prev.)
Mono Red – 6.0% (6.2% prev.)
Tier 3 “The Rest: Scavengers and Dark Horses”
Mono-Black Control – 2.5% (1.2% prev.)
Infect – 1.9% (2.6% prev.)
Elves – 2.2% (2.3% prev.)
Goblins – 2.5% (2.0% prev.)
Pyromancer Ascension – 1.6% (no sufficient appearance previously)
U/G/x Fauna – nothing (2.3% previous week)
Others – 4.8% (6.5% prev.)
Let’s look at the spreadsheet. There are three clear tiers: “the Big Three,” “the Tier 2,” and “the Rest.” The only actual combo (Pyromancer Ascension) is surprisingly extinct from the Online metagame, so we can consider the metagame as consisting of three viable and popular strategies – aggro, control, and ramp. This statement is a good example of statistics’ ability to deceive, especially when you’re paired against a “statistically nonexistent” deck. The danger becomes clearer with the fact that there were three “statistically nonexistent” Pyromancer Ascension decks in the Top 16 of StarCityGames.com Open: Nashville. But forget about it, there’s no chance to be prepared for everything (this is a lie again, but I’m not able to elaborate on that in this article because construction of a good sideboard is a topic for another article).
Thanks to Valakut’s domination, ramp makes more that 35% of the field. Control decks sadly are weak against this strategy, so their part is less than 20%, which means that half of the metagame is various aggro variants. This statement leads us to an important conclusion: Pyroclasm, Arc Trail, and Ratchet Bomb are used to ensure the positive outcome of post-board games, and aggro decks should have ways to beat Pyroclasm and co. to have a shot at winning.
Now I’m going to stop lying about the metagame in general (yes, as one M.D. said, everybody lies, and I’m not the exception) and start speaking about the decks, from first to last.
Valakut Ramp
Valakut is the public enemy number one now, so when you’re choosing a deck, it’s good to have an answer to the question, “How good is this deck against Valakut?” Valakut’s attractiveness is based on its power and flexibility. Personally, I like to compare Valakut to Faeries: variety of game plans and capability to change your plan on the spot feel completely unfair. There’s an opinion that Valakut is a “Primeval Titan deck,” but the deck has ways to win even after being Memoricided for Titans, not to mention “minor difficulties” such as removal or counterspells.
I covered this deck extensively in my previous article, so I’d like to post a slightly updated list and note that my friend recently went 5-0-2 at Game Day without dropping a single game during the whole tournament.
Creatures (14)
Lands (28)
Spells (18)
Sideboard
U/B Control and other U/x decks
There are three U/x control decks that differ in popularity, from “the second most popular deck” in the case of U/B to “nearly nonexistent” in the case of U/R. Let’s look at these decks assuming that there are objective reasons for everything being the way it is.
U/B Control is a good deck packed with everything necessary in the current meta: removal, disruption, card draw, and exciting finishers. Looks great in a vacuum, but there are some problems in reality.
The first problem is that the deck is full of 1-for-1 spells, and it relies almost solely on Jace to fuel it with card advantage. Doom Blade? Good but a 1-for-1. Duress? Great but still a 1-for-1. Day of Judgment? Wait, is it a control deck without mass removal? Consume the Meek and Ratchet Bomb are its only options, but they look subpar compared to Pyroclasm (an all-star now) and the good, old Day of Judgment. Therefore, I’d say that U/B has some significant problems with a well-placed turn 1 Goblin Guide or a Steppe Lynx.
UW control is so bad that I can’t name my control-playing friends “pesky wrathmages” anymore – they all jumped off the sinking boat and migrated to U/B Control. Reread everything I just wrote about U/B, and then imagine a control deck that traded almost all of the black-aligned advantages for Day of Judgment. Condemn is much worse than Doom Blade when you play against any kind of Titan. You have no access to any kind of disruption (remember these words when you’re paired against a nonexistent Pyromancer Ascension combo, or when Valakut hits an un-Memoricided Primeval Titan with Summoning Trap). Sounds doubtful? I think you should ignore all your doubts when choosing
not
to play U/W, at least for now.
U/R? Really? Trade Doom Blade and Condemn for Lightning Bolt? Trade four-mana Day of Judgment for seven-mana Destructive Force? While Frost Titan + Destructive Force is a very powerful lock, it looks a little bit embarrassing in the world where mana ramp is allowed to hard-cast Emrakul a turn earlier than you can cast Destructive Force. Anyway, access to the Lightning Bolt and Pyroclasm looks very attractive, but I think that Jace and Lightning Bolt become more powerful in the deck with Lotus Cobras. You can find such a deck somewhere below, but here I want to make a conclusion that it’s better to focus on U/B Control than waste time falling into a common trap: “someone plays it, so it may be powerful.”
So, here we are with U/B control again. How can we address the problems and improve the deck?
First, do not play Trinket Mage. The Mage is flexible, but he’s a little bit too slow for this format. Its only decent applications are Elixir of Immortality against the mirror and Brittle Effigy to get rid of Abyssal Persecutor. But what are you searching for against Valakut, Goblin Guide, or a horde of Elves?
Second, play Abyssal Persecutor. He’s cheap, fast, and provides a reasonably tight clock against aggro, ramp, and control. Persecutor requires having some seemingly subpar spells in your list like Into the Roil, but he’s still the best available option.
Third, some hot tech: try Royal Assassin. Yes, Royal Assassin. He repeatedly kills creatures, assassinates Creeping Tar Pit, persecutes Abyssal Persecutor (yours included), and is immune to Doom Blade. He even slightly improves your match against non-red aggro! His only weaknesses are Titans, but who isn’t weak to Titans these days?
There’s a list kindly provided for me and control-playing readers by teammate of mine, Bogdan Volostrigov.
Creatures (9)
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (25)
Spells (22)
- 2 Duress
- 4 Mana Leak
- 4 Doom Blade
- 2 Into the Roil
- 3 Everflowing Chalice
- 1 Consume the Meek
- 2 Consuming Vapors
- 4 Preordain
Sideboard
This list takes an aggro-control plan of “turn 3 Persecutor/Memoricide” to the extreme, while almost entirely eschewing 5+ mana spells. Calcite Snapper is there to help the “beatdown backed by disruption” plan against Ramp and is a fine blocker against aggro. It also allows us to win Jace wars without upping our Jace count. Grave Titan in place of Frost Titan is here to help with the mirror match (there’s no profitable way for U/B to get rid of him).
Boros
Boros is the most popular aggro deck now. The deck lost many important cards with Alara (Ranger of Eos, Path to Exile, and Elspeth come to mind), but it’s still alive and is threatening everybody in town. Synergy with fetchlands, Steppe Lynx, and Plated Geopede is as wonderful and charming as ever before.
Unlike other common decks, there are two different builds of Boros right now: the first is all about equipment (like Zen-block Koros), and the second is more like Barely Boros – Mono-Red with a splash for Steppe Lynx and maybe Journey to Nowhere. The Koros version is faster and can provide truly explosive starts (important against ramp and control); Barely Boros is better against creature-based decks and is more stable. I assume that speed is more significant now, so here’s a Koros list currently advocated by Alexander Privalov, Russian 2008 national champion.
Creatures (24)
Lands (24)
Spells (12)
Sideboard
This deck features thirteen fetchlands (and pseudo fetchlands), is less vulnerable to Pyroclasm (despite the lack of four-drops), and is heavily focused on beating mana ramp and control at the expense of a certain weakness against creature-based decks.
Now it’s time for the decks that are in pursuit of the Big Three in popularity rating. The gap is large but not overwhelming, and each of these decks, alongside with some advantages, has significant problems, solutions to which are required if you want to be successful with them.
Vampires
Mono-Black was always a popular casual archetype, even more when Zendikar came around with its Vampire theme. Just one week ago, Vampires was nowhere to be seen, but now they’re rampant. Are you surprised? I thought that Vampires were completely dead without Vampire Nocturnus, but they’ve found some solution against sunlight and are still filming new episodes of
Twilight,
with Kalastria Highborn as director and Bloodthrone Vampire as producer.
I think that the main problem of the current Vampires lists is their lack of flexibility. The deck looks fairer than a successful deck might be – no disruption, no massive air attacks. The Kalastria “combo” is attractive, but it’s too complicated and shaky, especially when compared with a multipurpose, one-card combo like Primeval Titan. I never believed in Vampires as a deck, and I don’t believe in them now, at least before they prove their power in long-term perspective. Nevertheless, I think I should provide you a sample list. Know your enemy.
Creatures (32)
- 4 Bloodghast
- 4 Vampire Lacerator
- 4 Kalastria Highborn
- 4 Pulse Tracker
- 4 Bloodthrone Vampire
- 4 Pawn of Ulamog
- 4 Viscera Seer
- 4 Captivating Vampire
Lands (22)
Spells (6)
Sideboard
Argentum White
Argentum Weenie became extremely popular a week or two ago, but it lost ground catastrophically in the last couple of days. The White Weenee of today features Argentum Armor which is clearly not Eldrazi Conscription but still extremely powerful on turn 3 or even 2. Argentum Armor forces us to play weird cards like Quest for the Holy Relic or Kor Outfitter, but this deck is a classic example of one that sacrifices card quality for tempo and synergy. It’s fast, which is helpful when trying to race Primeval Titan but brittle and pretty unstable. Vulnerability to Pyroclasm only exacerbates the shortcomings.
Summing up, I wouldn’t recommend this deck, unless you’re an aggro player at heart, and you aren’t willing to play a red deck for some reason.
U/G/R Ramp
This deck is the descendant of Turboland and Zen-block U/G/R Ramp, which dominated the Constructed portion of PT San Juan. A strategy that was successful in Block Constructed should be worth it in Standard, especially with additions as powerful as Frost Titan, Pyroclasm, and Mana Leak. Sadly, this deck is weak against Valakut, except for explosive Cobra-Jace-Titan starts or when you get lucky and counter some Harrows (the exact reason why I don’t run Harrow in Valakut). Combination of powerful threats and answers makes this deck one of the most flexible in the format, but Valakut spoils everything. Anyway, you can try to improve this matchup with some options like Spell Pierce or Goblin Ruinblaster. I think that the list used by Corey Baumeister to win North Dakota States title is a good starting point for testing.
Creatures (11)
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (27)
Spells (18)
Sideboard
Mono-Green Eldrazi Ramp
This deck is very powerful, but it strongly resembles Russian roulette. What can be more impressive than a “15/15 flying, annihilate 6” on turn 5, or, god forbid, turn 3? However, there is a revolver at your head with one bullet inside, and that bullet is Valakut.
Don’t get me wrong, Eldrazi Ramp is a great deck blooming with raw power. It boasts an acceptable red matchup and a very good control matchup, but it still stone-cold loses to Valakut. Terastodon and Acidic Slime are potential solutions to this, but you should probably accept your fate, and be ready to lose a fair share of your matches.
Mono-Red
Red decks just received a huge upgrade in Koth of the Hammer. The red strategy is solid against mana ramp (more against Eldrazi and less against Valakut) and has a good matchup against U/B Control due to pure speed and their lack of efficient mass removal, so we should consider Mono-Red as viable choice. However, there are some problems to solve:
First, fast aggro decks are probably the main problem of mana ramp decks, but ramp is adapting by packing 4-8 cards in the sideboard against aggro. Pyroclasm, Obstinate Baloth, Ratchet Bomb. Are you ready? Good, but…
Second problem of Mono-Red is speed. I think that currently Red started running more powerful cards but lost its key advantage. Let’s look at Todd Anderson list. I see eight four-mana spells and zero Goblin Bushwhackers. Is it really a Red deck? In my opinion, lack of speed is the main reason why Red is the fifth in popularity rating when Weenie and Boros are second and third.
Creatures (21)
- 4 Goblin Guide
- 4 Plated Geopede
- 4 Kargan Dragonlord
- 3 Ember Hauler
- 4 Molten-Tail Masticore
- 2 Spikeshot Elder
Planeswalkers (4)
Lands (26)
Spells (9)
Sideboard
Is there a solution for the red mages? I think yes. There’s another red deck that chose haste as the weapon against Pyroclasm. But everything has its place, and the place of Goblins is at the end of this article, between the corpse of Fauna Shaman and stinky Necropedes.
The next part of this article a is plethora of decks posting good results on MODO from time to time, but without stability, or piloted by only one or two of the same people. It’s hard to conclude (especially in case of four-round tournaments) if the deck’s strong results come from its power or from lucky pairings or unfair topdecks. Nevertheless I’ll try to present my vision and distinguish wheat from the chaff.
Pyromancer Ascension
Ascension is the only “combo” in Standard right now. Despite the loss of its actual combo with Time Warp, the deck is still able to win with multiple copies of Lightning Bolt (or quadrupled Archive Trap) with a little help from Foresee and other draw effects. I’m not sure about this deck as an actual deck choice, primarily because there are better ways to play a deck with four Preordains, four Mana Leaks, and some amount of Jaces. Statistics says that this deck is near to “nonexistent,” but statistics is the worst kind of lie, and impossible things are constantly taking place, so it’s a good idea to keep this deck in mind during your sideboard construction.
Mono-Black variations
Here we’re talking mostly about Mono-Black Control with three Mimic Vats and 57 removal spells. But… trading Jace and Mana Leak for Skinrender and Grasp of Darkness? For me it feels as painful as self-rending my skin.
Elves
Pointy-eared friends of Ezuri. By the way, who is Ezuri? The new favorite of Queen Nissa? Oh, a renegade leader you say? Done better than Lorenzo Lamas and stole a StarCityGames.com Open Champion title? No worries though! The uprising will soon be vanquished by the Royal Forces of Pyroclasm.
Fauna Shaman decks
Although there are several different builds in U/G, U/G/R, and U/G/W frames, I’d hate to tell you that they suffer a common problem: they are as dead as leaves. The main reason is a miserable matchup against any kind of mana ramp (Shaman deck’s clock is too slow), alongside the significant splash damage it suffers from sideboarded Pyroclasms, popular among ramp and control players alike.
Infect
The attractiveness of infect to young and unprepared minds is more dangerous than sepsis before Ian Fleming discovered penicillin. Infect is even more attractive for beginners than Vampires and Elves combined. But I hope you’ve already outgrown it, so forget about infect as a deck choice, at least before the release of Mirrodin Besieged. But I’m afraid that at best infect will be much like Allies – fun, interesting, and unplayable.
Oh, I completely forgot about the fact that the StarCityGames.com Talent Search is about fun. I have a cool story about infect to improve this aspect of my article.
Imagine: Friday, 4 o’clock in the afternoon, an hour before the weekend officially unfolds upon us. Mailing list of my testing team (guys, I’m happy to be your friend, really). What can possibly be discussed by four reasonably successful professionals with above-average salaries at this point in time?
Obviously the topic is “how to make the cheapest possible competitive deck on MODO and how to break even in one day or less.” This conversation resulted in my friend Alex (who is one of the most prominent card traders in Russia in real life but a pure stranger to MODO) borrowing four Misty Rainforests, spending 5.98 tickets on uncommons and bulk commons (from “32 cards for a tick!” bots) and building an Infect deck. He started playing 2-man queues, and a couple of queues later, he found all the costs for the deck recouped! It was very funny to listen to his stories, such as “I’ve just beaten another U/B Control. My business plan is to cause some heart attacks for control players when I beat their 100-dollar Jaces with my 2-cent Blight Mamba.” He said that this deck has the best price-to-fun ratio in the world.
Creatures (12)
Lands (21)
Spells (27)
- 4 Giant Growth
- 4 Vines of Vastwood
- 4 Groundswell
- 4 Distortion Strike
- 3 Flight Spellbomb
- 4 Carrion Call
- 4 Livewire Lash
Sideboard
Finally, the damned lie
Now I stop telling stories because it’s time for damned lies. I’m supposed to recommend some deck for my readers. I’m forced to lie because I clearly want to recommend Valakut, but I’m not allowed to do so. There are some good points why you should pilot Valakut, but… but okay. I will lie.
The deck to play should have reasonable matchups against the big three and against at least three of the second six. I tried some B/U/G Ramp strategies but unsuccessfully, so I was forced to try some aggro options. The keys for successful aggro are speed (some instability is acceptable for me) and Pyroclasm protection. I’ve found the solution during our Friday “cheap deck” conversation. Full cost of the deck is about 80 tickets, 70 of which are Goblin Guides and fetchlands that I was lucky to already own. The deck is Mono-Red Goblins. I examined some lists and created the one that has no drawbacks of “classic” Mono-Red. More explosive starts and massive amounts of hasty creatures alongside synergy and some interesting interactions are everything that I want from the red deck.
I tested this deck in MTGO for some days, and it completely fulfilled my expectations: fast, explosive, and fun to play. I’ve lost count of turn 4 kills after the fifth or sixth. I won the game after my opponent cracked two Ratchet Bombs. Pyroclasm is still a problem, but it’s not hard to play around it until you’re able to cast Kuldotha Rebirth and Goblin Bushwhacker or Goblin Chieftain.
So if I’d recommend you a deck other than Valakut, it would be a damned lie to offer you something other than Goblins.
Creatures (21)
Lands (22)
Spells (17)
Sideboard
There’s no Mox Opal in my list, because I realized that it’s clearly impossible to get metalcraft online. I won at least one mirror match because of my opponent’s lack of mana caused by Mox Opal. Other artifacts necessary for Kuldotha Rebirth are Panic Spellbomb (the nuts – it even draws a card when you sacrifice it), Darksteel Axe (I’m not impressed by Adventuring Gear – don’t know why; Axe is more… trusty especially with Spikeshot Elder), Basilisk Collar (interesting), Sylvok Lifestaff (remember how good Kitchen Finks was against opposing aggro decks?), Infiltration Lens (very doubtful, but I didn’t have time for extensive testing of this card), and Chimeric Mass (quite an interesting and flexible card). Each of these artifacts costs one mana that allows us to cast Kuldotha Rebirth turn 2 without Memnite or Chimeric Mass (sacrificing Mass turn 1 is an acceptable play in many matches). In addition, we have two creatures: Memnite and Perilous Myr. Myr is a very important part of the deck at least because of its ability to deal with Kor Firewalker.
The rest of the deck is obvious: eight burn spells and a horde of Goblins. There are no Ember Haulers because they’re slow, and there are only two Spikeshot Elders because of their ability’s cost.
The sideboard contains four Tunnel Ignuses (obviously), two Tuktuk the Explorers (he’s so wonderful that I would try to find a place in my maindeck for him), four Arc Trail (for aggro matches, because we do not like to Pyroclasm our own dudes), and some artifacts against random Kor Firewalkers and other aggro decks.
Oh, now it’s time for the last small lie: I actually can write short articles. Really.
Good-bye, stay cool, listen your internal Goblin Chieftain from time to time.
Valeriy.