I've been testing like a crazy person since Khans dropped. Spent an ungodly amount of money on cards. Really pumped about the meta right now.
There's one thing I noticed that's kinda wacky. In every build I brew up with green in it, I find it gets better when I drop the dorks. It just feels like, with all the great manabases, 1-for-1 trading and high-impact cards around, they really reduce your threat density by an unjustifiable amount for a questionable upside. Getting things out a turn early seems a lot worse than having another bomb to drop or a solid answer. And fixing is basically redundant with all the fetches and trilands out there.
Has anyone else noticed this, or is it just a function of my play style? I've cut completely caryatid and mystic from every single build, and rattleclaw is on the chopping block for me now too.
I've had the opposite reaction , I find it almost impossible to play Savage Knuckleblade on turn 3 without them. In an ideal world I would cut all the mana dorks and be able to play everything, but hitting Savage Knuckleblade or the mana for Polukranos is more important.
Best removal in the format is cheap red burn spells. This is a bad spot for mana dorks. This is why you see decks with only caryatid since he cannot be killed with spot removal. Honestly I'd rather just have rampant growth back. At least then I could ramp into board wipes.
I've actually noticed the opposite. Maybe it's just my meta (which has a noticeable skew towards aggro) but Caryatid's been a stand-out all-star that's both a good blocker and good mana fixer in Abzan (plus it helps ramp into 6/7 drops). Granted, it's a terrible topdeck, but that's just the normal price any deck pays for having that early to mid game utility. I can't imagine that cutting it would do me any good since the opportunity cost is so high with regards to the heavy colour commitment I run (there've been a large number of times where landing an early-game Drown in Sorrow or Brimaz or whatever is only possible off Caryatid, for instance).
I don't always see Mystics, but I see Coursers and Caryatids in just about every local deck that runs green in any form.
I haven't seen literally a single tournament top 8 in temur that plays either of those 2 cards. The aggro deck is showing up in big numbers in top-8s but that plays neither courser nor caryatid.
I tried playing green-black devotion for a bit and I noticed that I was boarding out a lot of dorks because many decks have access to Drown in Sorrow and Anger of the Gods, which will be sideboard staples for as long as Boss Sligh is a thing.
I haven't seen literally a single tournament top 8 in temur that plays either of those 2 cards. The aggro deck is showing up in big numbers in top-8s but that plays neither courser nor caryatid.
Well Temur is way more slanted towards being aggressive than its other Gx counterparts so I wouldn't use that as a baseline for how green decks should be built right now.
I tried playing green-black devotion for a bit and I noticed that I was boarding out a lot of dorks because many decks have access to Drown in Sorrow and Anger of the Gods, which will be sideboard staples for as long as Boss Sligh is a thing.
That's all fine and well but why would someone board in Drowns/Angers against Gx Devotion in the first place?
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The format doesn't have a 4 mana wrath. This means that getting your threats out a turn early doesn't really matter. I mean unless you get either Mana Confluence and Yavimaya Coast with an Elvish Mystic you're not going to get Savage Knuckleblade out on turn 2 anyway.
You're better off taking less pain and just playing a Frontier Bivouac. This doesn't mean you don't still have a few painlands and fetchlands for untapped mana along with the basics.
Sometimes you end up in a grindy game and when you top deck a mana dork it's such a feel bad. Not even Sylvan Caryatid can do anything about a Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker or Siege Rhino beating you down.
I think there's something to be said about threat density in this format.
Wrath? Along with not being 4 mana they don't have the hate text of "Go shove your counterspell" so you can use Negate, Disdainful Stroke and Stubborn Denial to just wave it away and keep deploying those big threats.
I have a bit of a thing for Soul of Shandalar. It's like having your opponent on 17 life. They know they'll get hit for 3 at some point unless they can exile it.
The problem is that the top end creatures and walkers you are seeing are incredibly high impact, and the good creatures at the lower end, are significantly worse - even if they are still good cards.
You find these board states really boiling down to who has more hearty stock. There are so many times I have seen someone stabilize their board and get blown out of the water because their opponent draws a Sarkhan, Stormbreath Dragon, Nissa, (or so many of the other endgame cards decks run) only to draw a land themselves. This really takes me back to the days of Titans, where it really came down to who drew one first and did their opponent stumble for a turn in response.
A 4 mana wrath made mana dorks more playable back then, but a 5 mana wrath that is in colors that want to be playing better cards means that the wrath really is not all that great and mana dorks are not great as a result.
You can afford to play a slow game in this format, you can't afford to run a constructed deck that blanks at the most inconvenient times.
If you're running Nykthos, in a G/x devotion build, those dorks become somewhat more important as a means to get early devotion so you can start doing broken stuff like Genesis Hydra or Crater's Claws for too stinkin' much before your opponent can respond.
I definitely noticed this. I ran a GR Monsters deck to start the format and it seemed like my dorks got killed, or they did their job and ramped out a 4/5 drop, which would also just get killed with an efficient kill spell for 3 mana. If your hand is ramp and 2 threats, once those are easily dealt with (and yes, they were usually always easily dealt with) then you have nothing and die.
When using mana dorks, you need cards that will catch you back up like Genesis Hydra or Planeswalkers that are always a 2 for 1 like Sorin. In fact, this whole Standard can be boiled down to who plays the better 2-for-1 or efficient cards, i think. With such tight win margins, every small incremental card advantage is a win.
I run four each of Caryatid and Elvish Mystic, and three Courser of Kruphix in a Naya monsters/Walkers deck of mine. So far, I've had little trouble with having them killed, and I can often get a turn 3 Polukranos or turn 4 Sarkhan or Stormbreath. Honestly, more often I fear ramping into those guys, just to lose them to Hero's Downfall. Even aggro decks often seem to ignore my dorks! Maybe it's just the two card shops at which I play, but that's my 2 cents. I guess my opponents usually don't think my dorks are worth using up a card for.
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EDH/Commander
UBR Sedris RG Omnath, Locus of Rage UB The Scarab God RUG Maelstrom Wanderer WU Dragonlord Ojutai
However annoying it may be, i completely agree with that replacement for Abzan. If you dont draw a Carytid, so what, you still have kill spells and sick 3 drops, makes perfect sense.
Abzan is even harder to beat this way. Brimaz def helps them against the aggro builds, too.
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There's one thing I noticed that's kinda wacky. In every build I brew up with green in it, I find it gets better when I drop the dorks. It just feels like, with all the great manabases, 1-for-1 trading and high-impact cards around, they really reduce your threat density by an unjustifiable amount for a questionable upside. Getting things out a turn early seems a lot worse than having another bomb to drop or a solid answer. And fixing is basically redundant with all the fetches and trilands out there.
Has anyone else noticed this, or is it just a function of my play style? I've cut completely caryatid and mystic from every single build, and rattleclaw is on the chopping block for me now too.
UR ....... WUBR ........... WB ............. RGW ........ UBR ....... WUB .... BGU
Spells / Blink & Combo / Token Grind / Dino Tribal / Draw Cards / Zombies / Reanimate
I haven't seen literally a single tournament top 8 in temur that plays either of those 2 cards. The aggro deck is showing up in big numbers in top-8s but that plays neither courser nor caryatid.
Well Temur is way more slanted towards being aggressive than its other Gx counterparts so I wouldn't use that as a baseline for how green decks should be built right now.
That's all fine and well but why would someone board in Drowns/Angers against Gx Devotion in the first place?
The format doesn't have a 4 mana wrath. This means that getting your threats out a turn early doesn't really matter. I mean unless you get either Mana Confluence and Yavimaya Coast with an Elvish Mystic you're not going to get Savage Knuckleblade out on turn 2 anyway.
You're better off taking less pain and just playing a Frontier Bivouac. This doesn't mean you don't still have a few painlands and fetchlands for untapped mana along with the basics.
Sometimes you end up in a grindy game and when you top deck a mana dork it's such a feel bad. Not even Sylvan Caryatid can do anything about a Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker or Siege Rhino beating you down.
I think there's something to be said about threat density in this format.
Wrath? Along with not being 4 mana they don't have the hate text of "Go shove your counterspell" so you can use Negate, Disdainful Stroke and Stubborn Denial to just wave it away and keep deploying those big threats.
I have a bit of a thing for Soul of Shandalar. It's like having your opponent on 17 life. They know they'll get hit for 3 at some point unless they can exile it.
You find these board states really boiling down to who has more hearty stock. There are so many times I have seen someone stabilize their board and get blown out of the water because their opponent draws a Sarkhan, Stormbreath Dragon, Nissa, (or so many of the other endgame cards decks run) only to draw a land themselves. This really takes me back to the days of Titans, where it really came down to who drew one first and did their opponent stumble for a turn in response.
A 4 mana wrath made mana dorks more playable back then, but a 5 mana wrath that is in colors that want to be playing better cards means that the wrath really is not all that great and mana dorks are not great as a result.
You can afford to play a slow game in this format, you can't afford to run a constructed deck that blanks at the most inconvenient times.
When using mana dorks, you need cards that will catch you back up like Genesis Hydra or Planeswalkers that are always a 2 for 1 like Sorin. In fact, this whole Standard can be boiled down to who plays the better 2-for-1 or efficient cards, i think. With such tight win margins, every small incremental card advantage is a win.
UBR Sedris
RG Omnath, Locus of Rage
UB The Scarab God
RUG Maelstrom Wanderer
WU Dragonlord Ojutai
Elvish Mystic was replaced by Brimaz, King of Oreskos.
Abzan is even harder to beat this way. Brimaz def helps them against the aggro builds, too.