(Now I find out that we're able to discuss RNA-including decks here...I'd thought that was relegated to New Card Discussion until at least the 17th.)
Frilled Snake...Justiciar's Portal...and Mission Briefing...It's not quite RAV-TSP Blinking Snake, as there's no flashback to make the repeat dependable, but I think we could have something.
Nice as it would be to have Siren's Ruse in, despite there being no pirates (unless you somehow vector Arcane Adaptation in, and I don't think that's worth it), I didn't have room for that.
There's always the option of using Gaea's Blessing to recycle some of your blink cards, but that'd depend how much trouble you're having with just the portal and briefing
I've updated my list dude. I think aggro is going to be king this standard so I've altered my list to combat that.
Branchwalker and Jadelight are great at finding our land drops and moving us forward. Riverwise augur I found to be too Cute. I cut gaea's blessing as well. Teferi seemed to be unnecessary as well.
Can I ask why you settled on a few choices that you did? Why incubation druid? I don't think he's what we want here in our 2 drop slot. The only thing worth ramping into is hydroid krasis and he's only a 2 of and you really don't want to blink him.
I found exclusion mage to be kinda meh.
I really wanted to put Angel of Grace in as I think she'd be great at keeping us alive, but I don't really think that's where we want to be, fighting for survival.
Silhana Wayfinder is a cool card and I may try it. But right now I like the Branchwalker in the 2 drop slot to progress our game plan, with the ability to trade up considerably.
Lyra is kinda meh as well. Especially as a 1 of as she dies to quite a bit in this new meta.
Cleansing Nova I see as a big no no. We want to be able to blink our creatures not kill them. Settle the wreckage is dope for this. As for that Pesky Spellbreaker card, we can blink deputy on our turn to take care of him then sweep em out.
Nature's Spiral to buy back some creatures is alright, but it's a sorcery and only brings back 1 thing.
Mm, with the Nova I was thinking of what I at least thought was a hard rule--if the mana base lets you, always have sweepers to break deadlocks. I'll look into Settle the Wreckage, though, and possibly River's Rebuke (although my deck has blue overreach as is).
Lyra had actually been a recommendation of the advisor on TappedOut (likewise the Wayfinder), as a possible brawler, along with Growth-Chamber Guardian and Adanto Vanguard. The only reason she was one-of was because I was struggling to figure out who I wanted more, her or the Benthid. (That, and I'm still hesitant to put more than one of anything legendary in a deck.)
That said, I'm considering Huatli anew, primarily for the card draw her emblem lets us get from flickering. Might consider Camaraderie, despite it being a massive six mana.
EDIT: This time, I've put Mystic Justice on the on-site deck archive, so the list on this post is going to be changing with my edits.
Emissary of Sunrise, rather than Jadelight Ranger, is in mostly to avoid making color imbalance too severe.
That said, are you sure removing the Angels is a good idea? I don't see anything in your mainboard or sideboard that can interdict fliers that make it on-board (well, aside from the Deputy exiling them, but besides that...).
I really think Benthid is going to be solid in this deck. Branchwalker, into jadelight, into open mana for frilled mystic, into Benthid is going to be extremely OP.
I don't see flyers being that big of a problem tbh. Gruul and Rakdos are going to be heavy early on. None of which threaten flyers, maybe the occasional Hydroid Krasis, but deputy deals with him and he can't come back in as he will have no counters. maybe harpooner in the SB?
Took your implicit advice and removed the Krases, and instead put in two Warrant // Warden (either a flyer or getting a dangerous attacker out of my hair for two turns, effectively) and a Camaraderie (which I'm hesitant about; should it have instead been a third Silhana Wayfinder, or Huatli even as a one-of?).
I'll admit that I'm trying to keep to the suggestion offered, when I was tending towards Sultai, to keep creatures and spells fairly balanced with regards to each other, in case I have a Portal drought while Mission Briefing comes up.
{sigh} And the posts don't change when the deck does, even if the link took the form of the deck number...
Some notes after a bit of Arena play (and after swapping out the Wayfinders for End-Raze Forerunners and a fourth Deputy)...
--Deputy is proving invaluable in here.
--Frilled Mystic really is pretty sticky to cast in three-color.
--We're sure Incubation Druid isn't a good idea? The Branchwalkers don't actually accelerate your land drops, and with the Mystic's stickiness...If only Seaside Citadel were Standard-legal...Granted I only have two of each dual land at the moment, but...
--I'm sorely tempted, on the other hand, to find some way to get River's Rebuke in. It may just be inexpertise with the deck, but deadlocks pop up pretty often.
The branchwalkers aren't to accelerate your land drops, they are to find them. I have yet to test my list, but will be come Saturday/sunday. Mystic being sticky to cast is because you're only running 12 Green sources in your mana base. to effectively cast mystic turn 4 you'd want at least 16, preferably 17-18 if you're running Jadelight ranger like I plan to. I am even considering dropping another U/W dual for a simic guildgate. My game plan is to basically out advantage them. To do so I may have to add back in teferi or another vivien. We want to slow them to a stop with our early threats which help us find our lands. Stall the board with mystic and deputy, then drop our heavy hitters in carny t or vivien reid to take over the game.
Figures that the way you were talking about it, I thought the Benthid was your idea of a "heavy hitter". I was hoping for something that wasn't overused (Carnage Tyrant), at the very least. Not to mention that would tie directly into the flicker theme. At least, despite the whopping eight mana, End-Raze Forerunners qualifies.
Looking back over my list, it seems I utterly neglected to even think about discrete "win conditions", expecting instead to chip away at the opponent with the 3- and 4-power creatures. Failed to remember that even in my old RAV-TSP Blink deck, I had a couple of Simic Sky Swallowers for deadlock breaking.
Why is Mission Briefing here ?
You barely have any spells to replay and no real incentive to fill the graveyard so it just seem like a waste of a slot that could have gone towards removal or countermagic.
Mission Briefing is there specifically to reactivate Justiciar's Portal (you didn't think four blinks would be enough, did you?)--taking the place of Momentary Blink's flashback, basically. Still, I know I can't always expect to have a Portal in my graveyard, so I fluffed out the spells with Nature's Spiral, Settle the Wreckage, and Warrant // Warden. (That's the hard part; figuring out how many spells I need to make sure Mission Briefing has a chance at something to do, while giving Justiciar's Portal a good range of potential jobs.)
Although I have wound up replacing the Warrant // Wardens with Hydroid Krases, after realizing I wasn't using Warrant all that often. So that leaves a question of what other spells I could be putting in. Without kicking out Mission Briefing (we are agreed that the Portal is the keystone of the deck, yes?).
Note that Emissary of Sunrise is used rather than Jadelight Ranger primarily to even out color representation (I'm worried about land/card mana mismatch, even with this many dual lands). End-Raze Forerunners and Vivien Reid...I'm not entirely decided which one I want. Forerunners can benefit from Portal, while Reid isn't nearly as expensive to summon.
Mesmerizing Benthid might be an ok card though seems overly defensive, I'd prefer Trostani Discordant instead as the extra bodies can attack (and have lifelink) as it boosts the rest of your board of generally weak creatures.
I've tried out your pattern (although with one less each of Wildgrowth Walker and Knight of Autumn, simply because the idea of running less than 24 lands unnerves me). It actually works pretty nicely, except it's still possible to hit a creature deadlock if the Deputies/Mystics aren't cooperating. (At least the recent deadlock I remember was broken with my own Finality...) So once again, I'm looking for a good flier...except I wouldn't know what to displace for it. The Walkers, maybe? In any case, I'm actually thinking Angel of Grace (you don't have to cast it in response to a fatal strike, after all. Especially given how easily mana for a Portal/Ruse is left over.).
Azor, the Lawbringer? It has an ETB effect that can be useful, and it actually can be blinked for value, unlike Hydroid Krasis, while fulfilling the same role of gaining life and drawing cards. Angel of Grace is probably better, but Azor seems to fill a niche in your deck that is currently held by a card with less overall value in Hydroid Krasis, so it would be an easy swap.
I will confess I'm not sure how likely this is to place even Tier 2, given the lack of one-drops and low card draw. (No Coiling Oracle or equivalent available to my knowledge, for starters. Merfolk Branchwalker doesn't quite come up to it.) I also wonder if the Ruses could be replaced by Quench, or even Absorb. I will freely confess that the main impetus behind crafting this plan was simple RAV-TSP nostalgia, though, alongside a strong desire to have my deck's centerpiece be Frilled Mystic. (And now Deputy of Detention is running a close second. Even if I haven't had cause/means to try out, say, Ravager Wurm.)
I will confess I'm not sure how likely this is to place even Tier 2, given the lack of one-drops and low card draw. (No Coiling Oracle or equivalent available to my knowledge, for starters. Merfolk Branchwalker doesn't quite come up to it.) I also wonder if the Ruses could be replaced by Quench, or even Absorb. I will freely confess that the main impetus behind crafting this plan was simple RAV-TSP nostalgia, though, alongside a strong desire to have my deck's centerpiece be Frilled Mystic. (And now Deputy of Detention is running a close second. Even if I haven't had cause/means to try out, say, Ravager Wurm.)
I haven't been able to test my list yet, I will be on Thursday night against a plethora of decks. I have also been thinking of the coiling oracle problem and thought that branchwalker would help in that area. I'm honestly considering going esper for dusk legion zealot, but that means we lose knight of autumn who is quite the swiss army knife, and mystic who is the sole reason I thought about this deck. I may try out a couple more omenspeaker in the maindeck and see how that plays out. He's a 1/3 so he can be used defensively in the earlier turns while smoothing our draws.
My sideboard is definitely questionable and from my testing I really like Mirror Image in the deck and I also really like having access to quench to counter earlier than frilled mystic...this is also why the lands are very bad. I would appreciate your thoughts on this since it seems you had similar idea. Honestly I forgot about the pirate blink card but with the new white one and mission briefing not sure if more is needed..also I countered a spell in arena today with 2 white mana up and it felt awesome so I think it could be more unexpected to have moments like that where you can counter when they don't expect it. Also I originally considered Growth spiral or Merfolk Branchwalker over Llanowar elves but having the quicker mana which I understand growth spiral still does is really helpful. Earlier in the day I did turn 2 deputy of detention on my opp turn two Growth-Chamber Guardian which felt awesome! Sorry for the formatting. Also if the card Clear the mind was an instant then I would most likely want one or so of those to be able to shuffle back in graveyard. I wasn't even considering it before but the draw card it gives is nice and I watched a twitch stream of Adrian Sullivan using it in his draft on arena and it looked really good there so could be a possible option as well.
Frilled Snake...Justiciar's Portal...and Mission Briefing...It's not quite RAV-TSP Blinking Snake, as there's no flashback to make the repeat dependable, but I think we could have something.
Nice as it would be to have Siren's Ruse in, despite there being no pirates (unless you somehow vector Arcane Adaptation in, and I don't think that's worth it), I didn't have room for that.
4 Frilled Mystic
3 Deputy of Detention
3 Exclusion Mage
3 Incubation Druid
3 Knight of Autumn
2 Angel of Grace
2 Hydroid Krasis
2 Riverwise Augur
1 Huatli, Radiant Champion
Sorceries
2 Cleansing Nova
Instants
4 Justiciar's Portal
4 Mission Briefing
3 Unbreakable Formation
Lands
4 Forest
4 Plains
4 Island
2 Sunpetal Grove
2 Temple Garden
2 Hinterland Harbor
2 Breeding Pool
2 Glacial Fortress
2 Hallowed Fountain
(Land setup obviously not final.)
I've been apprised of other viable denizens of the deck--Mesmerizing Benthid, Forbidding Spirit, and Tempest Caller, for instance--so there's probably still some flex to think about. I'm also considering End-Raze Forerunners as a deadlock breaker, and Wilderness Reclamation to make off-turn initial casts of the Mystic and (if included) Spirit easier.
(Now if only we had something like Cloudstone Curio coming up in War of the Spark...)
Branchwalker and Jadelight are great at finding our land drops and moving us forward. Riverwise augur I found to be too Cute. I cut gaea's blessing as well. Teferi seemed to be unnecessary as well.
Here's the updated list.
3 Frilled Mystic
4 Deputy of Detention
4 Merfolk Branchwalker
3 Knight of Autumn
3 Jadelight Ranger
3 Mesmerizing Benthid
2 Carnage Tyrant
1 Omenspeaker
Planeswalker
2 Vivien Reid
Instants/Sorceries
4 Justiciar's Portal
2 Mission Briefing
4 Siren's Ruse
3 Forest
1 Plains
2 Island
4 Sunpetal Grove
2 Temple Garden
4 Hinterland Harbor
4 Breeding Pool
3 Glacial Fortress
2 Hallowed Fountain
3 Settle the Wreckage
2 Suncleanser
2 Deathgorge Scavenger
2 incubation//incongruity
2 Negate
3 Rescue
1 Forbidding Spirit
4 Frilled Mystic
3 Deputy of Detention
3 Exclusion Mage
3 Incubation Druid
3 Knight of Autumn
2 Angel of Grace
2 Hydroid Krasis
2 Silhana Wayfinder
1 Lyra Dawnbringer
1 Mesmerizing Benthid
Sorceries
2 Cleansing Nova
2 Nature's Spiral
4 Justiciar's Portal
4 Mission Briefing
Lands
3 Forest
2 Plains
4 Island
2 Sunpetal Grove
2 Temple Garden
2 Hinterland Harbor
3 Breeding Pool
3 Glacial Fortress
3 Hallowed Fountain
3 Absorb
3 Unbreakable Formation
2 Amulet of Safekeeping
2 Crushing Canopy
2 Deathgorge Scavenger
2 Rampage of the Clans
I found exclusion mage to be kinda meh.
I really wanted to put Angel of Grace in as I think she'd be great at keeping us alive, but I don't really think that's where we want to be, fighting for survival.
Silhana Wayfinder is a cool card and I may try it. But right now I like the Branchwalker in the 2 drop slot to progress our game plan, with the ability to trade up considerably.
Lyra is kinda meh as well. Especially as a 1 of as she dies to quite a bit in this new meta.
Cleansing Nova I see as a big no no. We want to be able to blink our creatures not kill them. Settle the wreckage is dope for this. As for that Pesky Spellbreaker card, we can blink deputy on our turn to take care of him then sweep em out.
Nature's Spiral to buy back some creatures is alright, but it's a sorcery and only brings back 1 thing.
Lyra had actually been a recommendation of the advisor on TappedOut (likewise the Wayfinder), as a possible brawler, along with Growth-Chamber Guardian and Adanto Vanguard. The only reason she was one-of was because I was struggling to figure out who I wanted more, her or the Benthid. (That, and I'm still hesitant to put more than one of anything legendary in a deck.)
That said, I'm considering Huatli anew, primarily for the card draw her emblem lets us get from flickering. Might consider Camaraderie, despite it being a massive six mana.
EDIT: This time, I've put Mystic Justice on the on-site deck archive, so the list on this post is going to be changing with my edits.
2 Sailor of Means
2 Trostani Discordant
4 Deputy of Detention
4 Merfolk Branchwalker
4 Jadelight Ranger
4 Knight of Autumn
4 Frilled Mystic
2 Azor, the Lawbringer
Land
2 Glacial Fortress
2 Sunpetal Grove
4 Hinterland Harbor
2 Island
2 Plains
2 Forest
3 Temple Garden
3 Hallowed Fountain
4 Breeding Pool
4 Siren's Ruse
4 Justiciar's Portal
Sorcery
2 Find // Finality
2 Deathgorge Scavenger
2 Amulet of Safekeeping
2 Crushing Canopy
3 Absorb
2 Rampage of the Clans
3 Unbreakable Formation
Emissary of Sunrise, rather than Jadelight Ranger, is in mostly to avoid making color imbalance too severe.
That said, are you sure removing the Angels is a good idea? I don't see anything in your mainboard or sideboard that can interdict fliers that make it on-board (well, aside from the Deputy exiling them, but besides that...).
I'll admit that I'm trying to keep to the suggestion offered, when I was tending towards Sultai, to keep creatures and spells fairly balanced with regards to each other, in case I have a Portal drought while Mission Briefing comes up.
{sigh} And the posts don't change when the deck does, even if the link took the form of the deck number...
--Deputy is proving invaluable in here.
--Frilled Mystic really is pretty sticky to cast in three-color.
--We're sure Incubation Druid isn't a good idea? The Branchwalkers don't actually accelerate your land drops, and with the Mystic's stickiness...If only Seaside Citadel were Standard-legal...Granted I only have two of each dual land at the moment, but...
--I'm sorely tempted, on the other hand, to find some way to get River's Rebuke in. It may just be inexpertise with the deck, but deadlocks pop up pretty often.
Looking back over my list, it seems I utterly neglected to even think about discrete "win conditions", expecting instead to chip away at the opponent with the 3- and 4-power creatures. Failed to remember that even in my old RAV-TSP Blink deck, I had a couple of Simic Sky Swallowers for deadlock breaking.
You barely have any spells to replay and no real incentive to fill the graveyard so it just seem like a waste of a slot that could have gone towards removal or countermagic.
Nature's Spiral is pretty much a worse version of Find // Finality which gets two creatures instead of just one.
# You should really run the explore creatures as the base of the deck:
Merfolk Branchwalker, Jadelight Ranger and Wildgrowth Walker as they're a good way too abuse EtB triggers.
# The rest of the creatures can be focused on interaction/value like:
Knight of Autumn, Deputy of Detention and Frilled Mystic.
# Other potentially playable creatures might be:
Deathgorge Scavenger (GY-hate and lifegain), Sailor of Means (a good blocker that ramps), Elvish Rejuvenator/District Guide (ramp/mana-fixing)
and Jungleborn Pioneer (hexproof tokens).
Your finisher might as well be Trostani Discordant.
Although I have wound up replacing the Warrant // Wardens with Hydroid Krases, after realizing I wasn't using Warrant all that often. So that leaves a question of what other spells I could be putting in. Without kicking out Mission Briefing (we are agreed that the Portal is the keystone of the deck, yes?).
2 Sailor of Means
2 Trostani Discordant
4 Deputy of Detention
4 Merfolk Branchwalker
4 Jadelight Ranger
4 Knight of Autumn
4 Frilled Mystic
2 Azor, the Lawbringer
Land
2 Glacial Fortress
2 Sunpetal Grove
4 Hinterland Harbor
2 Island
2 Plains
2 Forest
3 Temple Garden
3 Hallowed Fountain
4 Breeding Pool
4 Siren's Ruse
4 Justiciar's Portal
Sorcery
2 Find // Finality
2 Deathgorge Scavenger
2 Amulet of Safekeeping
2 Crushing Canopy
3 Absorb
2 Rampage of the Clans
3 Unbreakable Formation
Note that Emissary of Sunrise is used rather than Jadelight Ranger primarily to even out color representation (I'm worried about land/card mana mismatch, even with this many dual lands). End-Raze Forerunners and Vivien Reid...I'm not entirely decided which one I want. Forerunners can benefit from Portal, while Reid isn't nearly as expensive to summon.
End-Raze Forerunners and Hydroid Krasis (before x=4 it is just bad) are eiher uncastable or useless.
If you want to play those I'd play at least 4x Elvish Rejuvenator/Sailor of Means and probably also 4x Llanowar Elves.
Mission Briefing doesn't have enough spells here, if you want more blink just replace it with Siren's Ruse.
Emissary of Sunrise is not a good replacement for Jadelight Ranger, is is just not a good creature to justify its place in the deck.
Same with Nature's Spiral compare to Find // Finality.
Mesmerizing Benthid might be an ok card though seems overly defensive, I'd prefer Trostani Discordant instead as the extra bodies can attack (and have lifelink) as it boosts the rest of your board of generally weak creatures.
I'd suggest something along the lines of:
4x Merfolk Branchwalker
4x Wildgrowth Walker
4x Jadelight Ranger
4x Deputy of Detention
4x Knight of Autumn
2x Sailor of Means
4x Frilled Mystic
2x Trostani Discordant
4x Siren's Ruse
4x Justiciar's Portal
2x Find // Finality
Lands (22)
1 Glacial Fortress
2 Sunpetal Grove
4 Hinterland Harbor
2 Island
2 Forest
1 Plains
3 Temple Garden
3 Hallowed Fountain
4 Breeding Pool
2 Sailor of Means
2 Trostani Discordant
4 Deputy of Detention
4 Merfolk Branchwalker
4 Jadelight Ranger
4 Knight of Autumn
4 Frilled Mystic
2 Azor, the Lawbringer
Land
2 Glacial Fortress
2 Sunpetal Grove
4 Hinterland Harbor
2 Island
2 Plains
2 Forest
3 Temple Garden
3 Hallowed Fountain
4 Breeding Pool
4 Siren's Ruse
4 Justiciar's Portal
Sorcery
2 Find // Finality
2 Deathgorge Scavenger
2 Amulet of Safekeeping
2 Crushing Canopy
3 Absorb
2 Rampage of the Clans
3 Unbreakable Formation
I will confess I'm not sure how likely this is to place even Tier 2, given the lack of one-drops and low card draw. (No Coiling Oracle or equivalent available to my knowledge, for starters. Merfolk Branchwalker doesn't quite come up to it.) I also wonder if the Ruses could be replaced by Quench, or even Absorb. I will freely confess that the main impetus behind crafting this plan was simple RAV-TSP nostalgia, though, alongside a strong desire to have my deck's centerpiece be Frilled Mystic. (And now Deputy of Detention is running a close second. Even if I haven't had cause/means to try out, say, Ravager Wurm.)
I haven't been able to test my list yet, I will be on Thursday night against a plethora of decks. I have also been thinking of the coiling oracle problem and thought that branchwalker would help in that area. I'm honestly considering going esper for dusk legion zealot, but that means we lose knight of autumn who is quite the swiss army knife, and mystic who is the sole reason I thought about this deck. I may try out a couple more omenspeaker in the maindeck and see how that plays out. He's a 1/3 so he can be used defensively in the earlier turns while smoothing our draws.
Seems like a way to just retrigger a whole buttload of your ETB effects again. Easy to cast too.
//Creatures (20):
2 Mirror Image
2 Dream Eater
1 District Guide
2 Knight of Autumn
4 Llanowar Elves
1 Angel of Grace
1 Mesmerizing Benthid
1 Incubation Druid
4 Deputy of Detention
3 Frilled Mystic
//Planeswalkers (1):
1 Vivien Reid
//Non-creature Spells (15):
2 Settle the Wreckage
2 Chemister's Insight
1 Mission Briefing
2 Find // Finality
3 Justiciar's Portal
3 Quench
1 Open the Gates
//Lands (24):
1 Hinterland Harbor
1 Isolated Chapel
2 Sunpetal Grove
1 Glacial Fortress
3 Plains
5 Island
4 Forest
1 Orzhov guildgate
2 Temple Garden
2 Breeding Pool
2 Hallowed Fountain
//Sideboard (0):
1 Shalai, Voice of Plenty
1 Tempest Caller
2 Ixalan's Binding
2 Carnage Tyrant
2 Cleansing Nova
1 Pelakka Wurm
1 River's Rebuke
2 Murmuring Mystic
1 Knight of Autumn
1 Tithe Taker
1 Lavinia, Azorius Renegade
My sideboard is definitely questionable and from my testing I really like Mirror Image in the deck and I also really like having access to quench to counter earlier than frilled mystic...this is also why the lands are very bad. I would appreciate your thoughts on this since it seems you had similar idea. Honestly I forgot about the pirate blink card but with the new white one and mission briefing not sure if more is needed..also I countered a spell in arena today with 2 white mana up and it felt awesome so I think it could be more unexpected to have moments like that where you can counter when they don't expect it. Also I originally considered Growth spiral or Merfolk Branchwalker over Llanowar elves but having the quicker mana which I understand growth spiral still does is really helpful. Earlier in the day I did turn 2 deputy of detention on my opp turn two Growth-Chamber Guardian which felt awesome! Sorry for the formatting. Also if the card Clear the mind was an instant then I would most likely want one or so of those to be able to shuffle back in graveyard. I wasn't even considering it before but the draw card it gives is nice and I watched a twitch stream of Adrian Sullivan using it in his draft on arena and it looked really good there so could be a possible option as well.