With the imminent rotation in Standard in the next month, we must prepare ourselves especially our card pool of the possible decks once Khans of Tarkir and Fate Reforged goes out. We lose the clans and the fetchlands to help our mana fixing issues and will eventually rely on the current duals and painlands as a substitute. I personally liked Abzan to leave the format so we could give way for new decks to emerge and get a few underperforming cards into use.

The deck brewing spark has got me again and the first deck that I have thought of was Jund Midrange. To recall, I have been a fan of Jund since its Shards of Alara days and it even got me one notable Top 4 finish in the WMCQ last 2013. The deck’s compo that time was Thragtusk, Huntmaster of the Fells and Olivia Voldaren. My last pilot of that archetype was a Jund Monsters version for Theros and RTR Standard.

This time and just recently, the deck has been getting good results in Magic Online dailies and even in PTTQ and Champ qualifiers. I have decided to check on some possible card components and here are some of the notables.

Goblin Dark-Dwellers – it is a solid five-drop in itself with the Menace bonus but with its ‘flashback’ ETB effect that makes its card advantage very notable. It can re-cast most of the decent spot removals in the format like Ruinous Path and Kolaghan’s Command.

Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet – Rally might be out of Standard but this guy still works well with all your removals in the deck. His bonus Lifelink is relevant against Mono Red matchup which will surely plague the format right after the rotation.

Sylvan Advocate – this Elf is a good early beater and defense in itself and can still be relevant in the late game once you hit your sixth land. He can also bonus pump your manlands (Hissing Quagmire) in the process.

Chandra, Flamecaller – Your late game relies on this fiery planeswalker as she does multi-function in certain scenarios. For instance like wiping the board or drawing your cards. She is like the Red version of Elspeth, Sun’s Champion.

Let us cut the list for now as we wait for card previews from Shadows over Innistrad. Here is version one of the creature lineup for Jund Midrange in SOI.

2 Den Protector
2 Dragonlord Atarka
4 Goblin Dark-Dwellers
3 Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
4 Sylvan Advocate

Stay tuned for Part 2 of this deck discussion. Thanks for reading and until next time.