MTG Salvation

Have you considered divine deflection? This can be a huge blowout with massive amounts of mana. It can also be played at any point in the game,either to save creatures from burn,deflect burn,remove creatures etc. and it has the surprise factor going for it.

I tested a few matches against grixis,UWR,and bant control today splashing red for rakdos's return in the sideboard and it absolutely crushes control. Post sideboard odds are greatly increased just by playing it.

I see where your coming from with the charm vs abrupt decay and I'll have to test abrupt decay out. Another card I am interested in trying out is divine reckoning against aggro decks. Being able to wipe the board on turn 3 on the draw against U/W humans or rakdos aggro seems good.

I noticed you mentioned abrupt decay to get Vraska out of Oring/detention sphere. Why not play golgari charm in the control matchup? It can protect your guys from sweepers and destroy pesky enchantments all at instant speed for the same cost as abrupt decay.

So my LGS has been wanting to compile a list of all the competitive decks and projected competitive decks for the meta to put together for all of our players to playtest/practice with. It is fairly difficult since the meta is so underdeveloped currently but I think there are a few decks you are guaranteed to see at any major tournament.

I thought I would start this thread called The Standard Gauntlet which is basically a compendium of all the competitive deck variations at least until we have the established deck section open. Let me know what you think about this idea and what decks you think belong here. Once we have a solid list I will include decklists of each archetype that have Top'd major tournaments.

B/R zombies
B/x zombies
Jund Midrange
UWx control
Tokens
U/W humans
Reanimator Variations

Do you think golgari charm is a good sideboard card for zombies? It takes out all their 1 toughness creatures at instant speed including aristocrat. I've been trying to decide between it and curse of deaths hold in the sideboard since golgari charm cost less and does double duty against control,saving your creatures against sweepers and destroying pesky enchantments such as detention sphere and oblivion ring.

I agree in that this archetype is extremely powerful. Definitely tier 1 material but I hope it doesn't catch on. As is it can fly under the radar. If it gets too popular the meta will be more prepared for it and it won't be as good.

B/R zombies is definitely the hardest matchup.Another tough one is the more aggressive G/W list running champions,silverblades,sublimes and rancor. If they are on the play and have a fast hand you basically just lose. What I have noticed though is that most of my games against B/R zombies are won by a hair.

My only loss at this FNM this week was to B/R zombies.

G1 he was on the play and had quadruple 2 power 1 drops into geralfs into aristocrat. His hand was empty and I was at 3 health. I played a non miracle terminus and he played a land. I then followed up the terminus with a Griselbrand,my hand was angel,griselbrand,terminus. He top decked a brimstone volley and won.

G2 He got triple 2 power 1 drops I miracled a terminus and he followed up with geralfs,geralfs,aristocrat. I was at 4 life and he Sac'd both geralfs for the win. Next turn I had angel to exile his 3 creatures.

Later that night we played a couple more matches and I won every one of them. However my list runs lingering souls which does a great job at slowing them down. Terminus combined with sideboard sever was also key here.

FYI G/B zombies is a total joke. I can't believe it got hyped so hard. Aside from having a more stable manabase and a mediocre 2 drop in the form of LOLtroll it is no better than B/G zombies was pre-rotation. Jund zombies splashing green for either troll or rancor are decent though.

Quote from Aukland

Very nice job man, Congrat's on the first place!!

How were those Zombie matchups, looks like a lot of them lol. Did you get the benefit of running into that Bant control list?

Speaking from my personal experience this archetype already has a pretty good matchup against zombies. Cassial's list looks even more so geared towards beating the early game aggro decks with gatecreeper+keyrune+angel+disciple and centaur healers and curse in the sideboard.

My bet is he had a pretty easy time against the zombie decks.

Quote from emuhell

Congrats! I like the archetype and will try a slightly different version of your deck soon.

I'm really curious about your usage of Underworld Connections and Vraska.

Underworld does work against control decks or other long grindy games. Vraska I would assume does the same. You bring her in against control and use her to vindicate their troublesome planeswalkers and enchantments.

Why would you play gatecreeper vine over mulch? Mulch is far superior at insuring you hit all your land drops and can grab any kind of land. It can also put targets for AoS in the graveyard and unburial rights if you run that.

Quote from kazujin

I've been playing with Entreat the Angels and I have to say that everyone who is playing a G/W ramp shell should seriously consider using them in conjunction with Armada Wurms.

I had planned on it but decided not to since they jumped 8$ since the open last weekend.

Has anyone considered mulch? It insures that you never miss a land drop. Sure it isn't ramp and it leans more towards reanimator but if most the lists are running some number of unburial rights,jarad's orders and angel of serenity you can still get additional value out of milled cards.

I don't see what the issue is. From my experience a cardboard sandwich is actually stronger than a toploader. Unless of course they are using super thin cardboard. I usually use double wall corrugated cardboard.

It will end up being a 1-2$ rare.

This makes absolutely no sense for a rare that has been printed 3 times in one year.

I feel bad for steven wu with his rakdos deck wins. Mulligan to 5 first game then 8 lands 4 spells game 2 :(. I weep.