Standard

Coming Home

I hope that to most of you I should need no introduction. My name is Scotty Mac and I’ve come home. I have been writing the better part of 2 years for LegitMTG.com, as the premier streamer there. Most of you however, should know me from The Eh Team Podcast hosted right here on the ManaDeprived.com network. I have been playing MTG on and off since 3rd Edition Revised, and consistently and competitively since Tenth Edition. I’m also a busy professional by day, loving Husband, and Father of two. All of these things put a wonderful strain on my ability to play Magic every week at an LGS, so I had to look for other ways to scratch the itch. I decided to try to make Magic Online a viable option, which quickly gave way to Streaming. I have a ton of fun each week talking to my boys on the Eh Team about this card game, and similarly love to meet new fans of the show at the events that I DO attend. This conveniently intersects for me on stream, and it has quickly become one of my favorite ways to enjoy the hobby we all love. After some discussions with Face To Face Games and Captain Canada here at ManaDeprived.com, we all agreed that the place for me to be was here, sharing with all of you here on this very site.

I currently am streaming on Monday and Wednesday evenings at 9pm EST at twitch.tv/mrscottymac. I encourage all of you to check it out some night if you never have. The show is called Mastering Magic, as it represents an eternal quest that we all share. The show is focused on being mostly educational, as we will often bring you the newest hot decks, and play matches with them in order to break down the strengths and weaknesses that they possess, and try to determine the best possible lines of play. When we are going deep on a deck we will have streams based on specific matchup analyses which will really help out when it comes to taking the deck to a tournament. Thankfully, I don’t have to do this alone. I have been fortunate enough to share the stream time with the largest number of guests from the professional and grinder community, with the goal during that time to understand the optimal play lines and strategies as they come up. Some of the more notable guests have been (in no particular order) Brian Kibler, Gerry Thompson, Willy Edel, Tom Martell, Chris Van Meter, Alexander Hayne, and many many others. Mastering Magic is designed to be a good resource for you to prepare for tournaments, and as a way to try to level up your game, while I try to level up mine; all the while jamming to great music and good laughs. Give it a follow!

I was able to play with two different decks this week in preparation for what the Pro Tour would bring us, one was a personal project, and the other would be co-piloted by the Control master himself, Shaheen Soorani. Shaheen is well known for his obsession with the control archetype, as it naturally fits his playstyle. After an entire standard format of playing Esper, he put down the Plains, and has gone back to some Forests which he has not picked up since finding Professional success with a 4 color control deck called The Masterpiece. Being firmly in Sultai for this run, here is the deck which Shaheen recommended as his best shot at the pre-PT format:

[deck title=Sultai Control – Shaheen Soorani]
[Lands]
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
4 Polluted Delta
3 Swamp
2 Island
3 Forest
4 Temple of Malady
1 Temple of Deceit
4 Temple of Mystery
3 Opulent Palace
[/Lands]
[Creatures]
4 Sylvan Caryatid
4 Courser of Kruphix
2 Prognostic Sphinx
[/Creatures]
[Other Spells]
4 Sultai Charm
3 Dig Through Time
1 Garruk, Apex Predator
1 Nissa, WorldWaker
1 Silence the Believers
2 Kiora, the Crashing Wave
2 Aetherspout
4 Hero’s Downfall
3 Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver
4 Thoughtseize
[/Other Spells]
[Sideboard]
1 Nissa, WorldWaker
2 Bile Blight
3 Drown in Sorrow
2 Pharika’s Cure
3 Nylea’s Disciple
2 Dissolve
1 Negate
1 Liliana Vess
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

This deck is great. It has a wealth of answers available to it, and good, durable ways to produce card advantage while keeping you alive. [card]Sylvan Caryatid[/card] blocks early aggression while providing mana fixing to fuel your instant spells, [card]Courser of Kruphix[/card] blocks half of the format’s mid game creatures while helping to clear the lands off the top of your deck. The incidental opportunities for 2 damage a turn and life gain from landfall are just extra value, and who do you know of in this community that is against free value? Kiora is likely at her best in a deck like this, as you can easily protect her, and with the volume of removal spells that are available to the deck, her bubbling of the opponent’s creatures allow you to really force some over extension into your best tempo generator; [card]Aetherspout[/card]. Resolving an [card]Aetherspout[/card] to clear the aggression from the opponent is almost always a blowout, especially if your follow up spell is [card]Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver[/card].

The real standout for me after playing this deck was [card]Dig Through Time[/card]. If it was any time after turn 4, there was no card that I wanted to see more than [card]Dig Through Time[/card]. The raw card selection which the card gave me was staggering, and felt extremely unfair, and I was even playing [card]Prognostic Sphinx[/card]! I’ve often felt like attacking with a [card]Prognostic Sphinx[/card] and scrying 3 is one of the sickest feelings I’ve had in a while, but even that pales in comparison to resolving a [card]Dig Through Time[/card] for 2 mana at instant speed to find the precise removal spell or threat that you needed to take over a game. I knew then that the card would see a lot of play in the Pro Tour, and was even starting to find slots for it in my UWR Modern decks. Shaheen and I ended up 3-1 in the daily which we played, which isn’t too bad for the first time playing the list.

Sultai as it turns out is not the only control deck available in new standard, as Owen Turtenwald and many others on Team Pantheon will attest. They came up with a straight UB list focused heavily on [card]Perilous Vault[/card] and [card]Pearl Lake Ancient[/card]. Ivan Floch also came up with a version of it, but he opted for a full book of [card]Prognostic Sphinx[/card] as his main deck finisher of choice.

[deck title=UB Control – Ivan Floch]
[Lands]
4 Dismal Backwater
4 Temple of Deceit
4 Polluted Delta
4 Island
4 Swamp
2 Bloodstained Mire
1 Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
1 Temple of Malady
1 Temple of Mystery
2 Flooded Strand
[/Lands]
[Creatures]
4 Prognostic Sphinx
[/Creatures]
[Other Spells]
4 Dig Through Time
4 Dissolve
4 Disdainful Stroke
4 Despise
4 Hero’s Downfall
3 Bile Blight
2 Drown in Sorrow
2 Thoughtseize
2 Silence the Believers

[/Other Spells]
[Sideboard]
2 Drown in Sorrow
1 Thoughtseize
1 Silence the Believers
3 Clever Impersonator
2 Negate
2 Returned Phalanx
1 Pharika’s Cure
1 Pearl Lake Ancient
1 Set Adrift
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

One of the decks that I have been trying to make happen in Standard right now is a Temur Midrange deck. It is similar in shell to the Jund or RG Monsters lists from last Standard season, but since it is one of the featured wedges in Khans of Tarkir, it got a lot of new and shiny toys to play with. My fellow MTGOCC teammate, and recent GP Top 8 competitor, Frank Lepore, won his release tournaments with a Temur Superfriends list that looked very attractive, so I thought that in order to celebrate his invitation to the Pro Tour that I would run his list on Monday to see how I felt about it.

[deck title=Temur Superfriends – Frank Lepore]
[Lands]
3 Forest
4 Frontier Bivouac
3 Mana Confluence
2 Mountain
4 Temple of Abandon
2 Temple of Mystery
4 Wooded Foothills
2 Yavimaya Coast
[/Lands]
[Creatures]
4 Courser of Kruphix
3 Polukranos, World Eater
3 Rattleclaw Mystic
4 Savage Knuckleblade
2 Stormbreath Dragon
1 Surrak Dragonclaw
4 Sylvan Caryatid
[/Creatures]
[Other Spells]
2 Chandra, Pyromaster
2 Kiora, the Crashing Wave
2 Nissa, Worldwaker
3 Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
4 Lightning Strike
2 Temur Charm
[/Other Spells]
[Sideboard]
3 Anger of the Gods
2 Clever Impersonator
2 Magma Jet
2 Magma Spray
3 Reclamation Sage
3 Stubborn Denial
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

Frank writes about the deck here, and discussed some of his thoughts on the deck. His initial version had too few [card]Stormbreath Dragon[/card] for anyone’s liking, so the update which we played included 2. I would even go so far as to play the 3rd over the 3rd copy of Sarkhan were I to run this one back. I again, went 3-1 in the daily which I took this through, but of more value was the fact that I learned some very valuable lessons about the deck and its position in the format.

[card]Stormbreath Dragon[/card] is the real deal. This card was already very good in previous Standard, but here, with the only clean answers to the deck being red or black, it feels very powerful. Fliers with Haste have always been good, but in this format, it feels even stronger than normal. Protection from White is extremely relevant as well, as most of the potential blockers touch this color, making Dragon nearly unopposable.

[card]Savage Knuckleblade[/card] is just that; savage. He is a good card both early and late in the game, with the only turns I’m unhappy to cast him are 5 or 6, when I instead could be raining dragon fire upon my opponent. Knuckleblade effectiveness I feel is driven by the turn index versus mana availability. Let me explain. A Knuckleblade on turn 3 with 4 mana giving it haste is extremely powerful. The following turn you might have 5 mana on turn 4, giving you the option to pump it out of reach from removal or potential blockers, or bounce it if needed. Knuckleblade on turn 5 with 5 mana makes it a hasty 4/4 on the ground with no other protection, which is likely to be outclassed by the bulk of the midrange creatures in the format which fall in this mana level. It also would be exposed to any removal the opponent might have, making it a poor play at that time. The second optimal mana availability for the card is 7 mana. This gives you the most amount of options for the creature. You can play it, haste if necessary, and then even pump or bounce as needed. I think the key to utilization lies in understanding these numbers and as we get more comfortable with them, I’m sure the card will increase in play numbers.

[card]Stubborn Denial[/card] is the truth. This is the card I wanted to most often bring in, as [card]Negate[/card] for one mana is outstanding, and even catching a greedy Elspeth or rushed wrath effect can be game ending. One mana is easy to hold up, especially with [card]Sylvan Caryatid[/card]s in your deck. [card]Temur Charm[/card], although more flexible, often felt awkward and inefficient as the demands on the mana made leaving it available difficult while trying to advance my board. I’m not looking to play a high number of these in my current 75 if I can help it at present. Denial on the other hand, will easily find 4 slots in my 75. It stops all the cards you need to prevent and gets the nod over [card]Disdainful Stroke[/card] for that reason.

Planeswalkers while very powerful, feel very fragile right now in this archetype. Jeskai decks are showing up in force, and the combination of [card]Mantis Rider[/card] and an unending stream of burn spells make low impact planeswalkers a poor proposition. Any planeswalker not called Sarkhan, The Dragonspeaker likely will not make the 75 right now. Although Kiora and Chandra are uniquely positioned to help leverage further synergy with [card]Courser of Kruphix[/card], I just don’t feel like it is what we should be doing with those slots. This brings me of course to [card]Courser of Kruphix[/card]…

I will not be playing [card]Courser of Kruphix[/card] in my Temur Monsters decks anymore.

Yep. I said it. In the words of Mike Sigrist at PTKTK: “It just doesn’t do enough.”

If I’m going to just focus on getting my opponent dead, then why am I screwing around with the top of my deck instead of just getting down to business? I have been scouring lists all week for Temur, and ultimately I’ve not found any that I’m 100% sold on, but this has been a real close place to start.

[deck title=Temur Midrange – Sean Peconi]
[Lands]
4 Forest
4 Frontier Bivouac
4 Mana Confluence
2 Mountain
2 Temple of Abandon
4 Wooded Foothills
4 Yavimaya Coast
[/Lands]
[Creatures]
3 Boon Satyr
4 Elvish Mystic
3 Polukranos, World Eater
4 Rattleclaw Mystic
4 Savage Knuckleblade
4 Stormbreath Dragon
[/Creatures]
[Other Spells]
2 Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker
3 Xenagos, the Reveler
2 Crater’s Claws
4 Lightning Strike
[/Other Spells]
[Sideboard]
3 Anger of the Gods
2 Back to Nature
1 Keranos, God of Storms
3 Magma Spray
1 Sagu Mauler
1 Clever Impersonator
4 Stubborn Denial
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

This list is based on a 1st place list in a TCG States tournament, and is a real interesting take on this right now. I have some big questions right now about Xenagos, The Reveler, as everything I have previously said about Planeswalkers goes doubly true here, but I also think that as a deck, Temur is best able to take advantage of the potential mana efficiency which Xenagos can provide, as there are a lot of cards and tricks here which can be played or left up and available if Xenagos is able to provide the mana to advance your board. Imagine this scenario:

T1 – [card]Forest[/card], [card]Elvish Mystic[/card]
T2 – [card]Yavimaya Coast[/card], play morphed [card]Rattleclaw Mystic[/card]
T3 – [card]Mana Confluence[/card], unmorph [card]Rattleclaw Mystic[/card], play [card]Xenagos, the Reveler[/card], add mana, play [card]Savage Knuckleblade[/card] with haste, swing.

Should you get the chance to untap here, you would essentially be able to keep your lands open for [card]Stubborn Denial[/card]s or [card]Boon Satyr[/card]s while you continue to force big threats down your opponent’s maw. Magical Christmas Land? Maybe. But maybe the juice is worth the squeeze. Only testing will tell for sure. I would of course love to see this also

T4 – [card]Wooded Foothills[/card] into Mountain, Xenagos +1, [card]Stormbreath Dragon[/card], swing with Dragon and Knuckleblade, pump Knuckleblade
T5 – [card]Crater’s Claws[/card]? Is this good??

There are a lot of exciting things happening at the Pro Tour right now, and I for one can’t wait to watch more. I’ll likely playing in the Modern Overdrive Tournament sponsored by Face to Face Games online with Kar Yung Tom and getting in a KTK Draft also on Monday, and then stay tuned for Wednesday, as we see who makes an appearance from the Pro Tour!

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and I look forward to seeing you on the stream tonight! I can be reached on Twitter at @MrScottyMac and you can email me anything you’d like to see on the stream, or any questions you have about the decks I’m playing at mrscottymac@gmail.com. Of course, most of those things are answered weekly on The Eh Team Podcast, right here on ManaDeprived.com!! I’m really glad to have all of my stuff in one place finally, and I hope that you all feel the same!

It really is nice to be home.

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