Hello folks !
So what’s up in the world of Magic these days? M11 is soon to be released, which is good and bad news. Good because it will be a relatively new Limited format, although I’m not too excited about it. It will bring us some new cards to play with in Constructed. Bad because Rise of the Eldrazi will only be played “for fun” and no longer in high level tournaments. The Limited part of French Nats will be played in M11; Göteborg, my second home, will be hosting an M11 Limited GP. Not that it’s something we didn’t know before, but it feels like we have not even had time to go deeply enough into the set, and it’s already gone. It feels like I wrote my ROE preview yesterday… Anyway, so long ROE Limited!
The other big news is the change of the Extended format. PT: Amsterdam will host a brand new format. While there would be a lot to say about it, which decks are going to be dominant, what will happen to the Legacy format… now is not the time. There are still Standard PTQs to be played and some metagame calls to be made.
Antoine asked me to be his playtest partner for his column this week, and I believe the matchup that we have tested for you is one of the most interesting and relevant in today’s metagame. The matchup between the two decks that won the last two Standard GPs: Next Level Bant and Mythic Conscription. Antoine played Yuuya Watanabe’s version of the NLB (Top 8 in Manila, while it was Brian Kibler who won GP Sendaï with it), and I piloted Naoki Nakada’s MC that won in Manila.
Creatures (23)
- 2 Birds of Paradise
- 2 Ranger of Eos
- 4 Noble Hierarch
- 1 Scute Mob
- 2 Sphinx of Lost Truths
- 4 Sea Gate Oracle
- 4 Vengevine
- 4 Wall of Omens
Planeswalkers (8)
Lands (24)
Spells (5)
Sideboard
Creatures (25)
- 4 Birds of Paradise
- 4 Noble Hierarch
- 4 Knight of the Reliquary
- 3 Sovereigns of Lost Alara
- 3 Dauntless Escort
- 3 Baneslayer Angel
- 4 Lotus Cobra
Planeswalkers (8)
Lands (25)
Spells (2)
I had no idea how much time this experience would take, but I didn’t honestly think it would take that long. Sure, I’m not the fastest player. Sure, Lotus Cobra adds a lot of triggers to resolve. But I didn’t expect to be playing Magic Online for 8 hours!
I focused a part of my GP: Washington report on the reason why I opted for a version of Mythic Bant without Eldrazi Conscriptions, which is more or less a mix between these two versions. Vengevines and Knights of the Reliquary without Sovereigns/Conscription. In no way I am saying that the deck I played was superior to any of the above. The only statement I made and which still holds, is that the Sovereigns/Conscription combo takes a lot of stability off the deck. More on this below.
MAINDECK GAMES
17 wins, 7 losses
70.9% games won
On the play: 9 wins, 3 losses
On the draw: 8 wins, 4 losses
Not that I was particularly surprised. I knew the matchup was in my favor, but you rarely reach a better winning ratio than that. But when you think about it, it all makes sense.
Next Level Bant is a very stable deck, probably the most stable deck in the format. It has access to a bunch of very powerful cards that you can drop on turn 3 with Birds and Hierarchs (Elspeth and Jace), and ways to protect them and dig your deck to find them faster (Wall of Omens and Sea Gate Oracle). It also has Vengevines that will speed up the games or make your opponent’s life a living hell since it will always come back. While NLB’s game plan is very efficient against Jund and UW, two of the most played decks of the field, at least the classic versions that were not designed to beat it (with less Jund Charms in both maindecks and sideboards…) with constantly recurring 4/3 hasters, lots of planeswalkers to deal with, both decks nightmare, it just does not do what it takes to beat MC.
Let’s compare both decklists together and highlight the similarities and differences:
1) The Threats:
a) Creatures:
MC
3 Baneslayer Angel
4 Birds of Paradise
3 Dauntless Escort
4 Knight of the Reliquary
4 Lotus Cobra
4 Noble Hierarch
3 Sovereigns of Lost Alara
NLB
2 Birds of Paradise
4 Noble Hierarch
2 Ranger of Eos
1 Scute Mob
4 Sea Gate Oracle
2 Sphinx of Lost Truths
4 Vengevine
4 Wall of Omens
MC’s mana creature package is a lot more efficient than NLB’s. The 2 extra Birds and Cobras make sure you are not missing your turn 4 Jace or Elspeth and allow you to make insane turn 2s that NLB has no way to deal with. I have in mind a Cobra powered by a bird, fueling a Knight of the Reliquary on the same turn thanks to a fetch land.
The threats in both decks also don’t have the same power level. On one side you have:
Vengevine, a 4/3 haste creature that virtually doesn’t do much against a deck able to generate blockers with Elspeth or chump block for long enough when life is in the red.
Ranger of Eos/Scute Mob. That’s a cute combo, but again, in this matchup, it’s just too slow and not very efficient. Getting more Hierarch also is useless.
Wall of Omens / Sea Gate Oracle are just expensive cyclers that won’t do much once they hit the board. The fact that they help you bringing back Vengevine is also irrelevant.
Sphinx of Lost Truths provides a fine blocker for a Baneslayer Angel while digging for better answers…
When on the other side you have:
Baneslayer Angel. Left unanswered, it will go all the way quickly. The dreadful flyer often keeps NLB’s Jace busy for some time, or meets its demise in the hands of Gideon. Knight of the Reliquary will make sure the above scenarios do not happen with the help of Sejiri Steppe.
Knight of the Reliquary wins on its own in 20% of the main deck games. NLB has 3 Oblivion Rings and 2 Paths to Exile to deal with it, but only one turn to do it. It will rarely attack or fetch a land at the end of your opponent’s turn. It will rarely attack just to get rid of a Wall of Omen and leave itself unprotected. It’s there to back up your Baneslayer Angels, block Vengevines since they are usually bigger, force your opponent to stack up two removal spells to kill it, when the damage is often already done. And most importantly, it makes sure you win the game instantly when you cast a Sovereigns of Lost Alara.
Speaking of which, the Sovereigns win 15% of the games on their own – less than Reliquary, but in a very quick manner. You will always find a window to safely play it and win on the following turn. Two instant removal spells is just not enough to deal with it reliably.
Dauntless Escort is virtually useless. It can sometimes save a tapped Knight of the Reliquary from Gideon.
b) Planeswalker/Manlands:
Same amount in each deck. Note that MC has more mana to activate the Colonnades and takes care of opposing planeswalkers more easily.
There is absolutely no question about the efficiency of the threats of MC compared to those of NLB…
2) Stability
Let’s have a look at the manabase
MC
1 Arid Mesa
4 Celestial Colonnade
4 Forest
2 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
2 Plains
2 Sejiri Steppe
1 Stirring Wildwood
2 Sunpetal Grove
1 Terramorphic Expanse
2 Verdant Catacombs
NLB
4 Celestial Colonnade
5 Forest
2 Island
4 Misty Rainforest
1 Plains
4 Seaside Citadel
1 Stirring Wildwood
3 Sunpetal Grove
25 lands in MC against 24 in NLB.
Sources of Green:
NLB 17
MC 14
Sources of Blue:
NLB 14
MC 11
Sources of White:
NLB 13
MC 13
The main difference is the use of Seaside Citadels in NLB that makes its manabase a lot more stable. The fact that they come into play tapped, in this matchup, doesn’t make a big difference since the only three-drop is Sea Gate Oracle that you are not that in a hurry to play anyway. Playing your Birds on turn 2 is not that bad.
Overall, the MC player will be lacking Green mana more often and it is one of the main reasons they will have to mulligan.
The big difference comes from the average casting cost of spells. I already stated that NLB is a very stable deck and that you could goldfish a thousand games and will basically see the same games over and over again, without mulliganing too much or ending up waiting for a winning condition for too long. It’s a different story for MC though. The Sovereign/Conscription combo is indeed very powerful but it makes the draws quite scary sometimes. Being hand jammed with 6 and 8 drops in the first turns gives your opponent a lot of time to set up his later game.
MC is a stable deck, but has a hard time recovering from hand jams. Every time you mulligan a hand with no green mana, you pray not to hit a Sovereign or a Conscription in your next 6- or 5-card hand.
And that’s pretty much what the main deck games are about. Out of the 7 games I lost, all 7 were due to my not “getting there,” either mulliganing or hand jamming. I was never really outmatched by Antoine’s planeswalkers or creatures in a “regular game”.
When you think about it, it makes sense: 30% of the time, the deck won’t deliver the way you would like it to. In some matchups, you will be able to recover from a bad start either because you will meet your opponent’s 20 to 40% chances to fizzle as well or face a suboptimal draw. In this matchup, your opponent won’t fizzle, or MUCH less often. Even though NLB mulligans sometimes, it doesn’t suffer much from it. Even though I talked about how there was no match for NLB’s creatures against MC’s, it’s not the same story when it’s not facing any adversity.
SIDEBOARDED GAMES
15 wins, 11 losses, 57,7 %games won
On the play: 11 wins, 2 losses
On the draw: 4 wins, 9 losses
I have 5 cards that I absolutely do not need in this matchup: 3 Dauntless Escort and 2 Gideon Jura. I talked about how useless the Escort was, but I haven’t said much about Gideon yet. This is not the right matchup for Gideon. The only thing he does is prevent your opponent play his, and that’s just not enough since you don’t really care that much about your opponent’s Gideon. There’s no creature that will be tapped and that you want to get rid of, and make him attack with all his guys is also quite useless. So no room for you, Jura.
The only way I could see the matchup improve for NLB is to turn into a more control deck, with more removal and counterspells. NLB has a lot to sideboard in: Ousts, Journey, Negate/Deprive, Martial Coup and Master of the Wild Hunt. I expected him to sideboard a bit of everything, some Walls, some Oracles, maybe Vengevine and Ranger of Eos.
My plan was to board in the 2 Linvala, Keeper of Silence, Emerge Unscathed and 2 Oblivion Rings. Linvala shuts off the Birds and Hierarch, and most importantly Master of the Wild Hunt that will totally kill you if left unchecked. It’s also a flying creature that will fly past the defenses to harm opposing planeswalkers in a more efficient way than Dauntless Escort would.
I couldn’t find room for Deprive and Negate but I didn’t want them in for other reasons: you will often be tapped out and never have the opportunity to counter what you really want to counter. You will most likely waste them of the first “okay” spell you can counter, so you can tap out on the following turn. The only spell you’re really scared of is Martial Coup (and Master of the Wild Hunt that you can take care of by either Ringing it or just be faster), but how many counters do you need to reliably counter the ONE Martial Coup of your opponent? Too many, something you don’t want. So the fact that you might lose to a big Martial Coup is not relevant when it comes to sideboarding there… Another reason why you should not board in the counterspells is that they even worsen the stability of the deck. Drawing hands with no early threats makes your game plan a lot more complicated. I’d rather have a threat that will die to a random removal than a counterspell that I won’t be using for some turns.
The one mana cost of Emerge Unscathed makes a big difference. It’s not quite a counterspell but it allows you to protect your creatures from Journeys to Nowhere and Oblivion Rings, and gives you the possibility to attack with an unblockable and lethal Knight of the Reliquary.
The only other card I considered was Bant Charm. It kills Master of the Wild Hunt, but doesn’t do much when you draw it in the midgame. Aside for the Master, you might be able to kill a Colonnade, but nothing more exciting than that. I don’t think you have any room for it.
In this deck, when you want to figure out what you can take out, you immediately turn to the Sovereign and Conscription Combo. While they sure make your deck less stable, they are cards you will win with almost instantly. In any case, there is nothing worth replacing them with anyway; I’d rather have dead cards in the early game than plain dead cards, pretty much what Dauntless Escorts are.
The other question one might ask concerns taking out one of the Conscriptions out. I strongly recommend not doing so. Once again, drawing two is hell, but you might eventually hard cast them. Drawing one when you only have one left in your deck is even worse. I have played Sovereign with no Conscription left in my deck, but it’s usually far from impressive then. You can bait your opponent, and make him counter him, but when he doesn’t have it, you’re like “meh…”.
The fact is that you will still lose 30% of the games when you don’t get there. The sideboard plan of NLB doesn’t work on the draw. It still met the same problems and wasn’t able to deal with the board while countering early planeswalkers; and once these are in play, counters don’t do much. Tapping out to attack with a Colonnade (to kill a planeswalker) opens a huge window to take advantage for MC. Eventually the stats remained the same, on the play. On the play for him though, it worked a lot better. He could actually have counter mana available on the decisive turns, something that is tough to have when you’re running so many enters-the-battlefield-tapped lands on the draw.
In addition to the 30% of the games that you will lose on your own, you will lose to:
– An unchecked Master of the Wild Hunt
– A big Martial Coup.
– A well-managed mana denial plan (Oust or Oblivion Ring on the Birds/Cobra)
– A game that reached the late game due to the extra removals/counterspells that will leave you out of gas, and leave him time to draw his winning conditions or abuse Planeswalkers that you won’t be able to deal with anymore.
Even after sideboard, the matchup is still in your favor even though NLB closes the gap a bit, especially when it’s on the play.
It is the first time I’ve played 50 games of a specific matchup, and I believe it gave quite accurate results —maybe NLB should win a few more games on the draw though- but for it to be 99% accurate, we would need to play 5000 extra games (sorry guys, that’s not happening, hehe).
I can’t give you an insight on how well Mythic Conscription will perform in the current and ever-shifting Standard metagame. All I can tell, and that’s the purpose of this article, is that Next Level Bant is a huge underdog against Mythic Conscription and that it would need more dedicated cards like Linvala in the sideboard to try to improve its odds…
Until next time!
Raph