Modern Masters phantom drafts haven’t even ended yet online, but here we are, with a prerelease this weekend for a new Core set: Magic 2014. While everybody’s mind might still be on sacrificing Mogg War Marshalls to [card]Greater Gargadon[/card]s, I’m here to help you get excited about M14!

To showcase M14’s addition to the standard metagame, I picked one card out of the set for each color, and built a deck that features that card prominently. These are the cards I’m either very excited about, or that I’m sure will make a real impact. They are not the only M14 cards that you’ll see in this article either. There’s plenty of spice in the set, despite there not being much hype for it (I’m sure having a set with Dark Confidant/Tarmogoyf/Vendilion Clique coming out right before probably didn’t help).

Let’s kick it off with an innocent little reprint that helped Paul Rietzl win a Pro Tour in Amsterdam three years ago.

White: Brave the Elements

[deck title=White Weenie by Jay Lansdaal]
[Creatures]
4 Champion of the Parish
4 Boros Elite
2 Dryad Militant
2 Wingcrafter
3 Azorius Arrester
1 Deputy of Acquittals
2 Knight of Glory
4 Precinct Captain
3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
4 Geist of Saint Traft
2 Lyev Skynight
3 Silverblade Paladin
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
4 Brave the Elements
1 Feeling of Dread
[/Spells]
[Lands]
4 Glacial Fortress
4 Hallowed Fountain
1 Island
1 Moorland Haunt
11 Plains
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
1 Purify the Grave
2 Bonds of Faith
2 Imposing Sovereign
1 Rest in Peace
1 War Priest of Thune
2 Banisher Priest
2 Fiendslayer Paladin
3 Frontline Medic
1 Nevermore
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

[card]Brave the Elements[/card] getting through [card]Geist of Saint Traft[/card] will probably end a lot of games, especially when it simultaneously pushes through about four other creatures (be sure to cast the spell after declaring attackers, but before blockers, so that your Geist’s Angel also gets the protection).

Other M14 highlights are found in the sideboard. Banisher Priest is a better [card]Fiend Hunter[/card] in this deck thanks to the extra point of power. Imposing Sovereign turns every opposing aggro deck into Zombies: slow and not very good in aggro mirrors. The third M14 card, Fiendslayer Paladin, is probably a better lifelinker than [card]Nearheath Pilgrim[/card], as it’s much harder to kill.

The general gameplan of this deck is to just slam a bunch of creatures, and kill your opponent as fast as possible. There was a similar deck in Standard right after Return to Ravnica came out, and I think it’s bound for a comeback. It picked up a couple more tricks with [card]Deputy of Acquittals[/card], and some more power with [card]Boros Elite[/card]. On top of those additions, it’s not like [card]Champion of the Parish[/card], Thalia, [card]Silverblade Paladin[/card] and [card]Geist of Saint Traft[/card] are suddenly less powerful than they were. Perhaps the format is too hostile if Jund keeps being a big player in the metagame, but [card]Brave the Elements[/card] even helps there.

Following the color wheel, next up is every casual’s favorite color to hate on: blue!

Blue: Gladecover Scout

[deck title=Bant Hexproof by Jay Lansdaal]
[Creatures]
4 Avacyn’s Pilgrim
4 Gladecover Scout
4 Invisible Stalker
4 Geist of Saint Traft
3 Silverblade Paladin
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
2 Abundant Growth
4 Ethereal Armor
4 Rancor
4 Spectral Flight
2 Simic Charm
4 Unflinching Courage
[/Spells]
[Lands]
4 Breeding Pool
1 Cavern of Souls
3 Glacial Fortress
3 Hallowed Fountain
3 Hinterland Harbor
3 Sunpetal Grove
4 Temple Garden
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
4 Nearheath Pilgrim
4 Voice of Resurgence
2 Detention Sphere
2 Advent of the Wurm
3 Rootborn Defenses
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

Okay, so I’m cheating. It’s my article, I can do what I want! At least the deck has some blue…

Honestly, so far nothing in the blue section of the M14 spoiler jumped out at me as something to build a deck around. The playable cards are already in standard (Jace, [card]Essence Scatter[/card], [card]Rewind[/card]), so I picked the card that felt the most blue out of the other colors, which in this case was [card]Gladecover Scout[/card]. Believe me, I’m not happy about it either.

This deck will probably be a big player in the new standard metagame, whether you like it or not. An extra cheap Hexproof creature makes me want some extra cheap enchantments, just to speed up the deck even more. [card]Abundant Growth[/card] seems to be the best of them besides the standard 16 (the other ones in the deck). It has seen play before, and I’ve always liked it to fix the strained manabase a bit.

As for the sideboard, it could very well be the [card]Voice of Resurgence[/card] should be a [card]Strangleroot Geist[/card], as it’s a little better after a [card]Supreme Verdict[/card], which is the main card this deck is worried about (that’s also why the [card]Rootborn Defenses[/card] plan is actually defendable; normally I wouldn’t suggest playing more than one or two of a narrow effect like this). [card]Voice of Resurgence[/card] is a bit easier on the mana, and is a better card overall. If you find yourself never making tokens that are bigger than 3/3, this might be an easy swap.

There’s not much else to see here, as it’s a fairly standard build. The next color comes with a more interesting deck…

Black: Corrupt

[deck title=Mono Black Control by Jay Lansdaal]
[Creatures]
3 Geralf’s Messenger
1 Disciple of Bolas
3 Thragtusk
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
2 Cremate
3 Tragic Slip
4 Doom Blade
2 Runechanter’s Pike
4 Sign in Blood
2 Victim of Night
1 Liliana of the Veil
3 Liliana of the Dark Realms
3 Mutilate
3 Corrupt
1 Rakdos’s Return
[/Spells]
[Lands]
4 Blood Crypt
10 Swamp
3 Mutavault
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Woodland Cemetery
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
2 Duress
2 Golgari Charm
2 Crypt Incursion
3 Lifebane Zombie
2 Rakdos’s Return
1 Mutilate
1 Sever the Bloodline
2 Vraska the Unseen
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

Last time [card]Corrupt[/card] and [card]Mutilate[/card] were both legal, Mono Black Control was actually a deck (this was around Odyssey block, with [card]Corrupt[/card] appearing in 7th edition). The deck had a lot of fans, and they have been trying to resurrect the deck ever since. No real luck so far, but perhaps now is the time?

The problem with previous attempts at building “MBC” has often been the lack of lifegain, as the card advantage options in black often cost life. With M14 legal besides M13, we have both [card]Disciple of Bolas[/card] and [card]Corrupt[/card] to gain some life. With the shockduals, we can also splash [card]Thragtusk[/card]. We might only have eight green sources, but [card]Liliana of the Dark Realms[/card] makes you have a virtual eleven (they can each fetch [card]Overgrown Tomb[/card]s).

[card]Liliana of the Dark Realms[/card] can also help fetch [card]Blood Crypt[/card], which lets us splash a [card]Rakdos’s Return[/card] main, with another two in the board. [card]Rakdos’s Return[/card] is a great one of to draw against slower decks, and together with [card]Corrupt[/card] gives us the option of actually fireballing out our opponents if need be.

The deck is based mostly on the current BG control decks, but with a couple of upgrades, and a little less creatures. Thanks to the awesome combo of [card]Mutavault[/card] plus [card]Runechanter’s Pike[/card] and the addition of [card]Corrupt[/card]s, we’ll have plenty of ways to win games, so we don’t need cards like [card]Desecration Demon[/card] anymore. [card]Mutavault[/card] is mainly great against control decks, as an uncounterable threat that cannot be killed with a sweeper, and together with [card]Runechanter’s Pike[/card] (and 22 spells in our deck) it is basically an abyss against creature decks as well.

For those of you who know what Sam Black plays in Legacy, the next deck shouldn’t be much of a surprise.

Red: Barrage of Expendables

[deck title=Zombie Barrage by Jay Lansdaal]
[Creatures]
2 Deathrite Shaman
4 Diregraf Ghoul
4 Gravecrawler
3 Blood Artist
2 Bloodthrone Vampire
4 Lotleth Troll
4 Treacherous Pit-Dweller
3 Geralf’s Messenger
2 Varolz, the Scar-Striped
4 Falkenrath Aristocrat
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
3 Barrage of Expendables
1 Gruul Charm
[/Spells]
[Lands]
4 Blood Crypt
3 Cavern of Souls
4 Dragonskull Summit
4 Overgrown Tomb
1 Rakdos Guildgate
3 Stomping Ground
1 Swamp
4 Woodland Cemetery
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
2 Deathrite Shaman
2 Duress
3 Lifebane Zombie
3 Tragic Slip
2 Abrupt Decay
2 Mark of Mutiny
1 Zealous Conscripts
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

What this deck aims to do, is attack early on, and then use sacrifice effects “for value” with Barrage of Expendables and [card]Blood Artist[/card] picking away at your opponent’s life total.

Perhaps I’m going a tad too hard on [card]Treacherous Pit-Dweller[/card], but I’ve always kind of liked that card, and you have plenty of ways to prevent it from switching sides. The main option is to sacrifice it with it’s switch-player-trigger on the stack, but you can also remove it from your graveyard with [card]Deathrite Shaman[/card] with the Undying-trigger on the stack. You can even get it back with [card]Gruul Charm[/card] (a piece of technology I have to thank the previously mentioned Sam Black for), or discard it to [card]Lotleth Troll[/card] if none of the above options are available (which should be very rare). The payoff is that you get to play a two mana 4/3 that you can sacrifice for value twice. It’s also pretty good with [card]Varolz, the Scar-Striped[/card].

The mana base is a bit greedy, having only twelve red sources to cast and activate Barrage of Expendables with, but it’s hard to get more in there while still being able to cast [card]Geralf’s Messenger[/card]. We already have three [card]Stomping Ground[/card]s that don’t help cast the powerful three drop. Perhaps more Guildgates (Rakdos/Golgari) are in order, but I’d rather not have too many comes into play tapped lands that also don’t help with your buddy lands.

This deck also makes great use out of the new black enemy color-hate card Lifebane Zombie, which can exile [card]Thragtusk[/card]s and [card]Restoration Angel[/card]s before they ever become a problem, while leaving a relevant body behind. Against the decks you’ll be bringing it in for, Intimidate might as well read “can’t be blocked”.

The last deck in this article is definitely not the least deck. It’s a deck I spent quite a bit of money on to make sure I can play it from week one onwards, and it all revolves around the green Theros-block flavored mythic.

Green: Kalonian Hydra

[deck title=Counter Midrange by Jay Lansdaal]
[Creatures]
4 Arbor Elf
4 Rakdos Cackler
3 Flinthoof Boar
3 Scavenging Ooze
2 Varolz, the Scar-Striped
4 Exava, Rakdos Blood Witch
3 Ogre Battledriver
4 Kalonian Hydra
1 Thundermaw Hellkite
[/Creatures]
[Spells]
4 Farseek
2 Doom Blade
3 Bonfire of the Damned
[/Spells]
[Lands]
4 Blood Crypt
3 Forest
1 Kessig Wolf Run
2 Mountain
3 Rootbound Crag
4 Overgrown Tomb
4 Stomping Grounds
2 Woodland Cemetery
[/Lands]
[Sideboard]
2 Pillar of Flame
1 Abrupt Decay
2 Golgari Charm
2 Domri Rade
1 Burning Earth
2 Olivia Voldaren
2 Thragtusk
1 Thundermaw Hellkite
2 Ruric Thar, the Unbowed
[/Sideboard]
[/deck]

Sorry blue mages, the name might have put you on the wrong foot, as these aren’t the counters you’re looking for. These counters make my creatures bigger, and bigger, and bigger. I’ve seen some Kalonian Hydra lists in Simic colors, with cards like [card]Renegade Krasis[/card] and other such hits, but I’m more interested in giving my Hydra haste and swinging for crazy amounts of damage early.

This list is basically looking to curve a mana accelerator into a four drop on turn three (either Exava or the Battledriver), which then gives haste to the Hydra that comes down on turn four. It still has a minor ‘evolve’ theme going on, with +1/+1 counters on your Cacklers, Exava, [card]Scavenging Ooze[/card], and any creature that gets powered up by a Varolz. Varolz is extra powerful in this deck, as with an Exava, scavenging onto creatures in the late game gives them haste. Haste is a very powerful ability, and this deck has plenty of it.

I’m not quite sure on the sideboard, but I like where the maindeck is for now. Obviously, it might have to be adjusted depending on where the format ends up, but it’s definitely powerful.

The deck is a bit of a slower, but super powerful aggro deck, kind of like the current Naya aggro decks with [card]Thundermaw Hellkite[/card]s and Aurelia the Warleader. Those type of decks are generally fairly weak to Reanimator, but with a bunch of [card]Scavenging Ooze[/card]s in the maindeck to stop an early reanimated Angel, and some Bonfires to clear away their mana dorks, that matchup doesn’t feel as terrible as one would expect with a slow aggro deck. I also feel that if you ever land a Burning Earth against them or a control deck, you can’t possibly lose.

Out of the five decks I presented here, this is the one I’m most excited about, and I encourage you to try it out. If you do, let me know in the comments what you think about it!

Let’s set the new standard,

Jay Lansdaal
iLansdaal on Twitter and MTGO