Written by I would generally like to release a new brew every week on Wednesday but this week has been woefully busy!
This weeks’ brew isn’t anything combo, it isn’t anything fancy or new so to say, but rather a very solid deck I have spent a grand amount of time editing and playtesting.
I actually had plans on taking this brew to the TCGPlayer 50k tournament in Indianapolis, IN, but plans for this event fell through for me so I will just post the list up for all of you wonderful people to critique.
Here is the list:
This deck is really consistent and offers a wide range of winning, nearly unbeatable opening hands when left unopposed by early removal.
Your enemy when playing this deck are cards like Searing Spear, Ultimate Price, and Pillar of Flame, when accompanied with a solid follow up. But that’s how it works when you play an aggressive strategy. Luckily for us we have cards like Selesnya Charm and Faith’s Shield to protect our team while setting up a winning swing.
The deck is very resilient versus most midrange decks and has the capability to set up a lethal swing out when you are opposed by multiple Thragtusk.
I initially had Sublime Archangel‘s in the deck but found them very clunky and counter productive to the overall strategy of the deck which tends to be setting up swarms of human creatures and swinging out for loads of damage. The Sublime Archangel helped alot when paired with Champion of Lambholt when facing down things like Griselbrand but I found Selesnya Charm to be much better and much cheaper, plus it is never a dead card.
Because I’ve included my sideboard in this article I will tell you how I would sideboard against the widely played decks currently in the Standard meta.
V.S. Bant Control
-1 Odric, Master Tactician
-2 Champion of Lambholt
-1 Ajani, Caller of the Pride
-2 Garruk Relentless
+1 Selesnya Charm
+3 Sundering Growth
+2 Faith’s Shield
This matchup is really good for us, the Bant decks are slow and clunky at times, and if they miss a land drop, it is usually game on the spot.
I would take out the Odric, Master Tactician simply because you should never have a board stall in this matchup, the Champion of Lambholt for the same reason. The goal is to lay your humans down and if they oppose them with cards like Detention Sphere and Oblivion Ring, you get rid of it with Sundering Growth or protect your men with Faith’s Shield.
V.S. Reanimator
-1 Odric, Master Tactician
-1 Ajani, Caller of the Pride
-2 Garruk Relentless
+3 Rest in Peace
+1 Selesnya Charm
This matchup is about a 50/50 simply because game 1 will likely go to the Reanimator player if pretty much any of their dig spells hit an Angel of Serenity + Unburial Rites.
The sideboarded games will go alot smoother for you when you slam down a Rest in Peace when they have a full graveyard to pull from. I always wait until around turn 3-4 depending on the situation to play this spell so I get the most value out of it.
V.S. Jund Midrange
-1 Rancor
-1 Hamlet Captain
-1 Ajani, Caller of the Pride
-3 Precinct Captain
+2 Faith’s Shield
+3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
+1 Champion of Lambholt
This matchup can be difficult because the Jund decks have so many removal spells for your men. I know it may seem counterproductive to board into more Faith’s Shield while also boarding in your Thalia, Guardian of Thraben‘s but you really need all the help you can get against their early game removal in order to set up a winning situation. The idea is to get an Odric, Master Tactician or Champion of Lambholt out and swing past their swarms of Huntmaster of the Fells and Thragtusk. It is a bad matchup overall but if they don’t have the answers early on you can steal games with massive swings.
V.S. Selesnya Aggro
+1 Odric, Master Tactician
+1 Champion of Lambholt
Generally we will always have a huge advantage in this matchup because we are much faster than most Selesnya decks out there so winning shouldn’t be a problem here. Once you get your Champion of Lambholt big enough, the only answer they can have is going to be a Selesnya Charm to exile it, but if they don’t have it, swinging out, generally for 30+ damage after a stall is enough to take them down past the life they may have gained through Thragtusk.
V.S. American Midrange
-1 Odric, Master Tactician
-3 Selesnya Charm
-1 Ajani, Caller of the Pride
+3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
+2 Faith’s Shield
This matchup is fairly easy post sideboard with Thalia, Guardian of Thraben due to the American Midrange deck really relying on gaining tempo though burn spells + counterspells.
V.S U/W Flash
-1 Odric, Master Tactician
-3 Selesnya Charm
-1 Ajani, Caller of the Pride
+3 Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
+2 Faith’s Shield
We already have a huge advantage against this deck because we run Cavern of Souls so game 1 they are out of luck when drawing their counterspells and we can simply swarm them with our humans. Game 2, Thalia, Guardian of Thraben sets them even further back. Add to that their Unsummon suddenly becomes twice as bad when we have 4 Faith’s Shield.
V.S. Red Deck
This matchup has no hope, sorry. Pray that they don’t have early burn and you win.
I think that sums up the majority of the current meta for Standard, if I missed anything, apologies.
That’s all I have to say this week guys, leave comments/suggestions/what you would like to see in the comments or if you have a brew you want me to post, feel free to email it to me:
(brews@ajmtg.com)
Until next time, good luck and have fun!
Bryan Elliott
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