With the Standard rotation two months, I can say that people get bored of playing it with the current metagame. Even here in our local community, they get tired of seeing Solar Flare, Wolf Run Ramp, Red Burn, Tokens, etc. Maybe the partial cause is the addiction to EDH but still. I personally know that there are still a lot to explore in the current sets in Standard and I’m looking forward to innovate more in the format while waiting for Dark Ascension in February.

As for the current, here are the two deck archetypes I’ve been working on.

Mono Black Control Infect

Taking the infect archetype a different approach, my friend John Paul made a control-ish list (with Phyrexian Obliterator and lots of removals) and piloted it last Saturday’s Standard tourney. I liked the list and made a few upgrades. Here it is:

Lands
4 Inkmoth Nexus
1 Buried Ruin
20 Swamp

Creatures
3 Phyrexian Obliterator
1 Wurmcoil Engine
2 Phyrexian Crusader
3 Reassembling Skeleton

Spells
1 Batterskull
4 Tezzeret’s Gambit
1 Sever the Bloodline
1 Tribute to Hunger
1 Contagion Clasp
1 Grafted Exoskeleton
4 Distress
1 Black Sun’s Zenith
4 Lashwrithe
1 Go for the Throat
2 Victim of Night
2 Doom Blade
3 Liliana of the Veil

The first change is that I balanced the number of removal spells as the original list seem to be overloaded with those.

I added two Phyrexian Crusaders which is pretty awesome against top decks in the current meta, a Wurmcoil Engine for lifegain and also the unusual Reassembling Skeleton. I know you had that awkward look after seeing that card in the list. My main reason is that the deck needs a constant creature to equip the four Lashwrithes and the Batterskull.

This is to give the deck more options as to either go the typical beatdown or the poison kill. The Grafted Exoskeleton gives you the additional card for that and works well with the skeleton. Skeleton and exoskeleton, a coincidence lol.

We are still finalizing the sideboard and will be updating on that on future posts.

Now for the second project…

Naya Aggro

I’m taking another look at the aggro decks in Standard, and I am trying to combine the approach of Green White Tokens and Mono Red Burn. Here is my initial list:

Lands
4 Mountain
3 Plains
2 Forest
2 Clifftop Retreat
2 Rootbound Crag
2 Sunpetal Grove
4 Copperline Gorge
4 Razorverge Thicket
1 Gavony Township

Creatures
4 Avacyn’s Pilgrim
4 Stormblood Berserker
4 Stromkirk Noble
2 Geist-Honored Monk
4 Blade Splicer

Spells
4 Volt Charge
2 Elspeth Tirel
3 Garruk Relentless
2 Travel Preparations
3 Midnight Haunting
2 Oblivion Ring
2 Incinerate

Looking at the list, it is pretty much a hybrid RDW. It is more like early turns of Noble and Berserker, and a late game of Garruk Relentless and Elspeth Tirel. I’m thinking of giving it a try on this Friday’s FNM tournament. Also very much hoping that Glorious Anthem was reprinted in M12. 🙁

Anyhow, that are the two deck projects at the moment. I am wishing they would be decent enough to compete for the upcoming Iloilo Champs 2011 this 29th. *crosses fingers*

I guess that’s about it. Until the next post and thanks for reading y’all.