Yes, the blog article title says so. The main sponsor that made the deck possible again is the recent Magic: the Gathering set released, Outlaws in Thunder Junction. The new set’s Big Score subset got a few reprints of relevant cards such as the Grand Abolisher which is very huge and powerful. I remembered the first time I made a deck with the card in the Selesnya (Green/White) colors and it performed well against the top-tier decks in the Standard format back in the day.

In the current deck build setup, the Mono White aggro shell is still a viable setup for the new cards to fit. Another relevant reprint is the Archangel of Tithes which is also suited for the deck strategy plan that I have thought of. I made the decklist on the Archidekt website and also came up with the deck discussion video to detail each card’s choices. Do take note that this is just the initial version and possible changes can happen.

Check out the video below and also don’t forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel, DeathMarked TV.

While we get on the ride with the three-color decks supported by the Streets of New Capenna set, we should also check on what cards from the recent set have become a good upgrade for the current Mono Colored deck builds in the Standard format and maybe for some older ones like Pioneer.

For today’s Mono Deck discussion, we take a look at the Mono-Black Aggro list and see what new cards were included.

Here below is the updated Mono-Black Aggro decklist:

Creatures
2 Blade of the Oni
3 Bloodvial Purveyor
3 Biting Palm Ninja
3 Graveyard Trespasser
4 Shakedown Heavy
4 Skyclave Shade
4 Tenacious Underdog
1 Tainted Adversary

2 Bloodchief’s Thirst
3 Infernal Grasp
2 Reckoner Bankbuster
1 Hagra Mauling

4 Okiba Reckoner Raid
1 Life of Toshiro Umezawa

Lands (23)
4 Hive of the Eye Tyrant
2 Takenuma, Abandoned Mire
17 Swamp

The Streets of New Capenna cards added are Shakedown Heavy, and Tenacious Underdog which are very relevant creatures in the new lineup. The 3-drop Heavy gives a slight disadvantage of a card draw in exchange for combat damage, but that means more gas to you as you continue to curve up to the fourth and fifth turn. Tenacious Underdog can be a late-game attacker with its recursion Blitz ability with only the mana and life for the cost.

Okiba Reckoner Raid is a delayed one-drop but can deal life loss to opponents as its lore counters tick. The utility three-drops consist of the trespassers and Biting Palm Ninjas. The former deals with relevant graveyard recurring cards and the latter with discarding the best card from the opponent and knowing their next moves.

I have included two copies of Reckoner Bankbuster with the two options: card draw and early huge attacker. Most of the creatures in the lineup can crew it for early attack and in the late game, extra mana can be used to activate its card draw.

I have yet to check on its performance on the MTG Online and Magic Arena tournaments and if ever you guys have started a grind with this deck, feel free to share in the comment box your insights and strategy to certain matchups and the best cards to include or update.

That is a wrap for now on this Standard deck tech, until the next blog post.

One of the deck archetypes that I am looking to build in the Streets of New Capenna Standard is the Naya or Cabaretti Aggro. The current support lands to these colors are already stable enough, and with the new tri-land inclusion and some Treasure-producing creatures, it is now possible to curve an aggressive start for an aggro deck build. That is also with fewer worries about the color screw.

Here below is what I think the decklist would look like. Do take note of the new Capenna cards added.

The main deck’s typical lineup of mana dudes to ramp out the best creatures and Esika’s Chariot as early as possible. With the same enough mana, various cards can be combined and more tokens can be generated.

Jetmir, Nexus of Revels is the superstar creature in the deck, providing pump effects and more so if you control six or more and nine or more creatures. Jinnie Fay acts as a major token converter with the choices of 2/2 hasty Cats or 3/1 vigilant Dogs. Having spare Treasure tokens turned into creatures is just a good advantage.

The deck’s utility cards such as Cabaretti Charm, Valorous Stance, Fable of the Mirror Breaker, Wedding Announcement, and The Wandering Emperor are to be used for various board scenarios i.e. spot removal, generating more creature token threats, etc.

Overall, the Cabaretti Aggro is a recommended aggro deck build for a new look and feel of the cards from the Streets of New Capenna set. Let me know what you think of this list and what you would recommend in the comment box below.

That is a wrap for now, until the next blog post.

While checking on the card spoilers of the upcoming Magic: the Gathering Set, Streets of New Capenna, I came upon one Red creature card in one of the batches of previews. The card is Devilish Valet and upon first look, I somewhat got a glimpse of its potential which can win you games with just an attack of it.

The core colors I have used for the deck build are Red-Green which I think are the right colors to fit the strategy. Here below is the deck tech video I made and uploaded to my Youtube channel.

Today’s Magic: The Gathering Innistrad Crimson Vow Standard deck feature looks to check on the updated build of the Boros Aggro deck archetype. While the Mono-White version goes with the consistency in the mana-base, having access to Red is a minimal change with the lot of dual lands in the format for mana-fixing.

The deck maintains the strategy of just swarming with cheap casting creatures on their board and overwhelming opponents before reaching their sweep spells. Clarion Spirit and Usher of the Fallen generate free tokens pretty well, so you would commit less on your other creature spells and make them as the backup batch in case. Reckless Stormseeker grants haste which is relevant in dealing damage on idle turns where you cast your non-haste critters.

The late-game card draw of choice is still Showdown of the Skalds and also gives free +1/+1 to your dudes whenever you cast a spell in the next turns. Thalia, Guardian of Thraben, the new addtion to the White aggro lineup, is considered as a sideboard on this deck build. Maybe it is given that aggro was the dominant deck in the tournament.

The full decklist below was played by Steffen Berning in the Crokeyz Crimson Vow Tournament @ Team Liquid last Nov. 13th. He finished in the Top 16 of the event, out of 356 players.

Reference: https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=33321&d=454309

I have thought of this deck for a while ever since the Innistrad: Crimson Vow card previews started, and it confirmed my thoughts last time that Vampires will get full support in this new Magic: the Gathering set. We had initiated a previous decklist with the Rakdos colors, and the upgrade is adding a third color on White. The main reason is the printing of Edgar, Charmed Groom, and other support Vampires.

I have created a deck tech video for the Mardu Vampires deck last night, which I uploaded on my Youtube channel Deathmarked TV. Explained in the video are the details on the creature and spell choices as well as the sideboard plan for the current and expected metagame.

Check it out below.

Here is a quick rundown of the main decklist:

3 Abrade
4 Blightstep Pathway // Searstep Pathway
1 Bloodvial Purveyor
2 Brightclimb Pathway // Grimclimb Pathway
2 Cemetery Gatekeeper
1 Drana, the Last Bloodchief
4 Edgar, Charmed Groom // Edgar Markov’s Coffin
4 Falkenrath Pit Fighter
2 Furycalm Snarl
2 Mountain
2 Needleverge Pathway // Pillarverge Pathway
2 Nullpriest of Oblivion
1 Plains
2 Shattered Sanctum
4 Shineshadow Snarl
2 Sorin the Mirthless
2 Swamp
4 Vampire Socialite
2 Vampires’ Vengeance
4 Vanishing Verse
4 Voldaren Epicure
3 Voldaren Estate
2 Welcoming Vampire
1 Zagras, Thief of Heartbeats

I have mentioned in a previous blog post that the Dimir (U/B) Zombies deck will have a fully functional deck once the full Magic: the Gathering Innistrad: Crimson Vow card spoilers are out and that people will know what cards to utilize and fill the decklist. This is then be followed by a trial playtest in the actual face-to-face or via Magic Arena to see its actual gameplay and also check if the added cards are relevant or not.

At the moment, I did not have the time and resources to do an Arena playtest of this deck archetype, and so, I will get the reference from a few of my followed MTG Arena streamers. Today’s decklist and gameplay are courtesy of LegenVD Youtube channel. His version of the deck utilizes the Exploit mechanic combined with the shenanigans of Zombie tokens produced.

See his full decklist and gameplay below.

As each day passes, new Innistrad: Crimson Vow cards are being previewed from various sources online, and I get myself thinking of the possible deck ideas that can be brewed from these new cards. Current decks in the Standard metagame will surely get a new gear to use, whereas possible deck archetypes that were identified before may become a decent deck build with the inclusion of the new set. One deck in mind is the Zombies tribal. The new card components from the upcoming set will get us a preview as to how the Zombies deck build will be. These notable cards are the following:

Necroduality – each nontoken Zombies you control that enters the battlefield gets a token copy and twice the value if it has etb effects. That is on Zombie spells or reanimation effects to get your Zombie creatures back from the grave, as its basic definition means. The only issue here is you get to be tapped out on your fourth turn without doing anything, given that the deck build usually is aggro so you had to maintain your creature curve early.

Archghoul of Thraben – This three-drop’s conditional gas when your Zombie is destroyed is a good card advantage for matchups with lots of removal spells. It may sound conditional as it can miss at times but it depends now on the card composition in your deck if you go with a purely Zombie tribal build.

Geralf, Visionary Stitcher – What is worse than facing a horde of Zombies? Seeing them fly. That sounds absurd in a sense, but this new card version of Geralf takes your Zombie dudes to the next level of height. The passive ability to grant them flight lets you push through big toughness blockers and at times may lead to an alpha strike attack. What Geralf also offers is the sacrifice ability of a nontoken creature your control into an X/X Zombie creature token with X equal to the toughness of the sacrificed creature.

I might have a second part on this as the spoilers for Innistrad: Crimson Vow progresses in the coming days. To conclude today’s blog post, I am certain that a Dimir Zombie tribal deck will have its fully functional build as the new set enters Standard. Will it be competitive enough for the metagame? We will find out.

Last weekend’s Magic: the Gathering Standard tournaments and events garnered a whole bunch of decklists of various archetypes. MTG Top 8 dot com is again my go-to website. This is where we are going to get today’s deck update and feature, and the lucky deck chosen is White Weenie Aggro. This was piloted by a well-known Pro Player, Frank Karsten. He finished in Top 4 of the Red Bull Untapped 2021 International Stop I tournament, where he probably lost to a Mono-Green finalist.

Let us check his complete decklist below.

Maindeck
23 LANDS
4 Faceless Haven
19 Snow-Covered Plains

31 CREATURES
4 Adeline, Resplendent Cathar
2 Brutal Cathar
2 Chaplain of Alms
4 Elite Spellbinder
4 Intrepid Adversary
4 Luminarch Aspirant
4 Stonebinder’s Familiar
3 Sungold Sentinel
4 Usher of the Fallen

2 INSTANTS and SORC.
2 Fateful Absence

4 OTHER SPELLS
2 Maul of the Skyclaves
2 Portable Hole

SIDEBOARD
2 Brutal Cathar
1 Cave of the Frost Dragon
1 Curse of Silence
1 Fateful Absence
1 Gavony Dawnguard
2 Guardian of Faith
1 Portable Hole
2 Reidane, God of the Worthy
3 Skyclave Apparition
1 You’re Ambushed on the Road

The creature choices are composed of the usual four-of for White Aggro: Elite Spellbinder, Luminarch Aspirant, and Usher of the Fallen. What is characterized by these other creature components is that they are gaining on exile effects. The card Stonebinder’s Familiar triggers a +1/+1 counter placed on it when one or more cards are put into exile during your turn. There are several cards that could trigger it making it the efficient one-drop when your play is on the curve.

Adeline, Resplendent Cathar is then the long-game creature producer that gets its power bigger as more creatures develop your board. I like how it was built to be more offensive pre-board rather than the usual tax-the-opponent route.

The non-creature spell choices are the usual and it’s on the ideal division, two-ofs on the spot removals and Maul of the Skyclaves as the finisher.

Frank Karsten may have published a deck discussion article prior to this or maybe after the event which I yet have to check. This is on his sideboard plan, on the card choices, and the in-and-outs.

That is about it for this Standard deck update, until the next blog post.

P.S. Decklist reference.

P.P.S. You can also check on the previous Standard deck updates here.

I am happy to share today the news that a Werewolves deck was able to finish in the Top Two of a major Magic: the Gathering tournament, Clearly Frame Advantage featuring MTG Arena where they sponsored a FREE $2,000 CAD prize pool Standard event. A free event with that cash prize automatically attracted players from all around the globe, and the total of Enrolled Players was 256.

The deck was piloted by Taras Kohut and is finished with a 9-2 record in the tournament. The two losses were from Mono-Green Aggro in the Swiss rounds and Izzet Dragons in the Finals.

Here below is the full decklist:

Reference: https://mtgmelee.com/Decklist/View/168765

Related post: RG Werewolves First Build

The Magic: the Gathering Arena Standard Challenge took off last weekend and is probably one of the major tournaments in the platform catering to the newly-rotated Standard format. I was not able to participate myself but was able to witness a friend’s playtime last night. The expected deck archetypes were present: aggro, control, and midrange, and one of the decks that flourished in the metagame was Izzet Control. Prior to the rotation, the deck’s components were already playable and are rotation-proof.

The addition of new cards from Innistrad: Midnight Hunt would just do the trick, and it actually bolstered the build. Powerful Blue (Memory Deluge) and Red cards (Smoldering Egg) replaced the rotated ones and retained the deck archetype to be the pillar of control decks in the current Standard metagame.

See below an example decklist of the Standard Izzet Control.

Izzet Control – Lull N
Mountain Tea Cup # 3 @ Sana’s Tournament

Maindeck

18 LANDS (24)
1 Den of the Bugbear
2 Field of Ruin
4 Hall of Storm Giants
1 Island
6 Mountain
4 Riverglide Pathway

10 CREATURES
4 Goldspan Dragon
2 Malevolent Hermit
4 Smoldering Egg

32 INSTANTS and SORC.
4 Alrund’s Epiphany
4 Burning Hands
2 Disdainful Stroke
4 Dragon’s Fire
4 Expressive Iteration
4 Jwari Disruption
3 Memory Deluge
4 Prismari Command
1 Saw It Coming
2 Shatterskull Smashing

Sideboard
2 Burn Down the House
2 Disdainful Stroke
2 Fading Hope
2 Inferno of the Star Mounts
2 Malevolent Hermit
1 Negate
2 Pithing Needle
2 Test of Talents

Reference: https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=32481&d=449552&f=ST

For more of the recent Innistrad: Midnight Hunt Standard decklists, you can check it here.

By Standard, we based on the Magic: the Gathering deck build of an aggro deck to be composed of one-drop 2/1s, and two-drop 2/2s or 3/2s, partnered with an anthem effect to bolster them. That is the usual package. This is not the case though in today’s Innistrad: Midnight Hunt Standard Deck feature.

Checking on today’s version is the way a White-based creature deck is filled with utility dudes that gets more powerful the longer the game progresses. Utility creatures in the form of the Adversaries, Elite Spellbinder, and Skyclave Apparition. The more it curves in the early game, the disruption effects it causes to the opponents to not establish their board.

See the creature lineup and full decklist below.

Maindeck
27 CREATURES
4 Brutal Cathar
4 Elite Spellbinder
4 Intrepid Adversary
4 Luminarch Aspirant
4 Skyclave Apparition
3 Sungold Sentinel
4 Tainted Adversary

4 INSTANTS and SORC.
4 Silverquill Command
4 OTHER SPELLS
4 Firja’s Retribution

25 LANDS
4 Brightclimb Pathway
2 Cave of the Frost Dragon
2 Hive of the Eye Tyrant
7 Plains
4 Shineshadow Snarl
2 Snowfield Sinkhole
4 Swamp

SIDEBOARD
1 Bloodline Culling
2 Dancing Sword
2 Liesa, Forgotten Archangel
2 Maul of the Skyclaves
4 Skyclave Shade
2 The Meathook Massacre
2 Vanishing Verse

Reference: https://www.mtgtop8.com/event?e=32462&d=449464&f=ST