With Born of the Gods to be released in less than a month, we seem to just become stagnant and wait for the card previews for us to create more deck archetypes. What I will say though is that we should never stop developing ideas, strategies and card interactions for us to enjoy the game. This should be a continuous process for us and that in the long run makes us excel. We might not have all the time, but noting down a certain idea and then developing it step by step can be a start.

Speaking of which, a deck idea lingered to my brain as I was drinking my coffee in a rainy afternoon. This is a remake of a classic deck strategy back when I started playing Magic in the early 2000s. It is nicknamed as the “mill plan”. Here is the list below.

Lands
3 Mutavault
4 Temple of Deceit
6 Island
6 Swamp
2 Dimir Guildgate
4 Watery Grave

Spells
1 Jace, Memory Adept
2 Jace, Architect of Thought
3 Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
3 Far/Away
1 Dissolve
1 Essence Scatter
4 Pilfered Plans
1 Elixir of Immortality
2 Millstone
4 Psychic Strike
2 Crypt Incursion
1 Ratchet Bomb
3 Hero’s Downfall
1 Doom Blade
1 Ultimate Price
2 Devour Flesh
3 Thoughtseize

The reminiscing card would be the two Millstone, which I remembered way back when my kumpare Muzzy used this card in his Blue White Control deck. He would just stall the board with Wrath of Gods & lifegain and then mill out your deck.

The current version though has enough card components from the current Standard sets that make us choose the Dimir (Blue/Black) approach. Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver is a powerful three drop planeswalker that really fits in this type of strategy. He is then backed up by Jace, Memory Adept as another source of your mill plan.

The four-of Pilfered Plans and Psychic Strike are pseudo-mill utility cards that are also for counterspells and card draws. Crypt Incursion and Elixir of Immortality are for your further stall of the game with lifegain as well as reusing your graveyard in the late game.

The rest of the card choices are the usual inclusions based on Esper Control and that of Yasooka’s Dimir Control deck. I’ve decided not to include any critters just as to waste the opponents’ creature removals in Game 1, though they can have a chance to kill my activated Mutavault.

This might not be considered a competitive tier 1 deck, but this archetype approach is for someone who’d want to try something different in a field of usual Standard suspects.

Until next post and thanks for reading.