Click to view our Accessibility Statement or contact us with accessibility-related questions

Three New Decks for New Standard

more_vert
search
Guilds of Ravnica is upon us and while there is only just a few cards spoiled yet, I find some of them very exciting. In other words, its brew time! Before we get into some decklists, I would like to talk about a card that I believe is quite good, but sadly I could not find a home for yet.
search
This is no Thoughtseize, however, in a format like Standard, giving up a mana for 2 life and a scry is certainly a deal I’m okay with. I believe that the only thing that will keep this card from seeing lots of play is the fact that it is two colors.
The rotation is taking away all the other reasons to pair blue with black. Champion of Wits, The Scarab God, Torrential Gearhulk, Fatal Push, and Glint-Sleeve Siphoner all leaving force a complete redesign of the Blue-Black midrange deck.
Honestly, I just don’t know what to put in a Blue/Black deck outside of Thought Erasure and Vraska’s Contempt. Hopefully the Dimir guild will provide enough cards for the archetype to survive.
search
These two cards scream Red/White Aggro and they happen to pair very nicely with two of my favorite M19 cards, Goblin Instigator and Heroic Reinforcements, which I have never cast yet, but both looks awesome to play with. WR Aggro 4 Leonin Vanguard 4 Skymarcher Aspirant 4 Adanto Vanguard 4 Boros Challenger 4 Legion Warboss 4 Rigging Runner 4 Goblin Instigator
2 Legion’s Landing 2 Pride of Conquerors 4 Heroic Reinforcements 2 Conclave Tribunal
4 Sacred Foundry 4 Clifftop Retreat 4 Unclaimed Territory 4 Mountain 6 Plains While looking to fill my curve, I realized that Leonin Vanguard, Skymarcher Aspirant, Adanto Vanguard, Boros Challenger and Legion Warboss were all Soldiers. That should smooth our mana thanks to Unclaimed Territory. Rigging Runner is unlikely to be the perfect card for the remaining slots, hopefully the new set has some better options. As it stands, Dauntless Bodyguard could be a card that replaces it, or if we wanted to go a bit bigger, History of Benalia could be reasonable.
The spells that you decide to play is entirely dependant on the metagame of course, but if you want food for thought, Lightning Strike or Shock could totally be in there. In this specific build, I decided that I could play basically half and half of red and white cards thanks to Unclaimed Territory, but you could totally change the creature base and try either a white based approach with Benalish Marshal, or red with Goblin Chainwhirler.
Speaking of Goblin Chainwhirler, let’s hope it doesn't dominate Standard like it did in the previous format, because this deck does not want to face it.
search
WG Value
4 Llanowar Elves 2 Snubhorn Sentry 4 Emmara, Soul of the Accord 4 Shanna, Sisay’s Legacy 4 Mentor of the Meek 4 Militia Bugler 2 Tendershoot Dryad
4 Conclave Tribunal 4 Legion’s Landing 4 Song of Freyalise
4 Temple Garden 4 Sunpetal Grove 2 Memorial to Glory 8 Forest 6 Plains If you haven't played with Song of Freyalise before, I suggest you do. It’s a blast and my only experience with it was in limited where all I did was cast more creatures with it and attack with underwhelming creatures. Imagine going off with Mentor of the Meek, Militia Bugler and getting a free token off Emmara, Soul of the Accord! Conclave Tribunal is another way to trigger Emmara and honestly I would be surprised if there was not another Convoke cards that we would want once the set is fully spoiled. If that’s the case, I think Emmara will become a staple in Standard. Snubhorn Sentry and Tendershoot Dryad are two very unconventional cards that we have only seen fringe play from. Militia Bugler can find both but also one drops make Song of Freyalise much better.
Ajani, Adversary of Tyrants and Huatli, Radiant Champion were considered, but ultimately I just want to max out on creatures because of Militia Bugler, Mentor of the Meek, Song of Freyalise and Conclave Tribunal.
Shalai, Voice of Plenty almost made the cut, but again, Militia Bugler was my reason to cut it. It's possible that it could still be a sideboard card however.
search
Lands
4 Llanowar Scout 4 Dryad Greenseeker 4 Wayward Swordtooth 4 Jadelight Ranger 2 Multani, Yavimaya’s Avatar 2 Tatyova, Benthic Druid
4 Adventurous Impulse 3 Crucible of Worlds 2 The Mending of Dominaria 2 Search for Azcanta 1 Sylvan Awakening
4 Evolving Wilds 4 Field of Ruin 4 Memorial to Unity 4 Hinterland Harbor 1 Island 10 Forest 1 Arch of Orazca
You might have noticed Necrotic Wound is nowhere to be found, in fact there is no cards from Guilds of Ravnica. I swear I started out of Necrotic Wound, then as I was searching for cards that play with the graveyard, I just could not find enough. However, I did find Crucible of Worlds, a card I literally had no idea was in Standard (I haven't drafted or tried to brew any M19 decks …). Until I actually put the deck together, I thought I was going to play Stitcher’s Supplier and Necrotic Wound anyway, but those were essentially my only black cards and didn't really fit with the rest of the deck. I’ll be honest with you, the deck at its current iteration does not have the criteria to be a great deck. The lack of interaction probably means we’ll lose to any reasonable clock, unless our opponents clock is just a bunch of 2/2s, then our ⅓ Llanowar Scout and Dryad Greenseeker might keep us alive. Yet, it's possible that Guilds of Ravnica will have some kind of interactive card that this deck is interested in playing, so I will keep an eye open for that. On the other hand, doesn't this deck look awesome to play? I would have to actually play games to figure out what's the best way to win the game, it's possible that going off with Nexus of Fate is just better than Multani and Sylvan Awakening, but I would still start there as they fit the theme a bit better. I came with the idea of this shell because of Evolving Wilds, Memorial to Unity, Field of Ruin and Crucible of Worlds. Then Llanowar Scout, Dryad Greenseeker and Wayward Swordtooth seemed like they would belong in there as well. The rest is extremely subjective as this deck is nothing like we’ve seen in Standard, so I have no idea how it would play out.
I’m very excited to start playing games once the set is released on Magic Online and who knows, you might see me on camera with an iteration of one of those three decks. Happy spoiler season everyone!

Previous Articles · Meet the Massdrop Teams: http://dro.ps/mtg-team-announce · *2nd* at Pro Tour Ixalan: http://dro.ps/ixalan · Unclaimed Creature Types: http://dro.ps/ari-creatures · Why I Never Drop From Tournaments: http://dro.ps/eric-nevergiveup · The Art of Sideboard Construction - Sultai Energy: http://dro.ps/jon-sideboard · A Commoner’s View on Pauper: http://dro.ps/mark-pauper · Blue Moon Beach Control: http://dro.ps/scott-bluemoon · Top 5 Modern Decks: http://dro.ps/pascal-modern · Storm in Vintage Cube: http://dro.ps/ben-storm · An Early Look at Rivals for Standard: http://dro.ps/shaun-rivals · A Standard Approach to Evaluating New Cards: http://dro.ps/rob-newcards · Drafting Rivals of Ixalan: http://dro.ps/tim-ixalan · Team Sealed Secrets: http://dro.ps/eric-secrets · Steal My Standard Ideas: http://dro.ps/tommy-secrets · Vexing Devil. Any Questions?: http://dro.ps/jon-devil · Team Massdrop Rivals of Ixalan Limited Primer: http://dro.ps/ari-primer · Gestation of RG Eldrazi: http://dro.ps/ben-gestation · Top Tim Tournament Training Tips: http://dro.ps/tim-tips · What Makes Someone Bogle?: http://dro.ps/tommy-bogle · A Pauper Adventure: http://dro.ps/pascal-pauper · Blue Moon at GP Phoenix: http://dro.ps/rob-bluemoon · Brawling into Dominaria: http://dro.ps/scott-brawling · Looking at The Current Lands(cape) of Legacy http://dro.ps/jarvis-land · Deconstructing Dominaria Limited: http://dro.ps/jon-dominaria · Diving into Dominaria Standard: http://dro.ps/mark-dominaria · What are your.. drives?: http://dro.ps/tommy-drives · Top 10 Cards for Dominaria Modern: http://dro.ps/rob-dominaria · Brewing Standard with Dominaria: http://dro.ps/pascal-dominaria · Dominaria Team Sealed: A Case Study: http://dro.ps/tim-dominaria · Battlebonding in Vintage and Legacy: http://dro.ps/jarvis-battlebond · Decks I Almost Played at PT Dominaria: http://dro.ps/ben-dominaria · RB Chainwhirler for the Non-Aggressive Player: http://dro.ps/jon-chainwhirler · Top 4 at GP Vegas: http://dro.ps/mark-top4vegas · Return to Core Set Limited: http://dro.ps/eric-core · Drafting Rares with Core Set 2019: http://dro.ps/ari-core · Tuning Jeskai Control in Modern: http://dro.ps/shaun-jeskai · Secrets of Sealed - http://dro.ps/eric-sealed · A Spike's 1v1 Commander Notes, Parentheticals, and Asides - http://dro.ps/tommy-spikes · Gang Green - http://dro.ps/tim-ganggreen · How to Steel Wins in Legacy: http://dro.ps/scott-steel · Hitting Hard and Ghast in Modern: http://dro.ps/shaun-ghast · Reconstructing Legacy for Richmond: http://dro.ps/jarvis-legacy
2
Comment
remove_red_eye
1.3K

search
close

Let’s get the conversation started!

Be the first to comment.

Related Posts
Trending Posts in More Community Picks