It's not what you would initially think, but unbanned modern is actually a pretty diverse format. You can play so many different archetypes competitively.
Want to play all-in combo? There are tons of options - Storm, Second Sunrise, Elves, Infect, etc etc. In no-ban modern, these combo decks often lose to slower combo that has control elements, or the pure control / tempo decks. Twin variants, Delver Variants, or Dark Depths decks all have good matchups here.
Want to play Ramp? 12post is a thing, and scapeshift is also still viable (with dig through time). These decks generally have good matchups against anything without a fast clock as they'll go right over the top. With that said, they can be quite weak to aggro strategies or decks like Infect.
Want to play control? There are tons of options, ranging from Tezzeret Variants, to Stoneblade Variants, to Miracles, and more. Preordain and Ponder being legal along with top make the control archetype strong once again, and the format having more "all-in" style combo decks means reactive control is more important as a policeman.
Want to play aggro? Zoo is still viable, as are the more degenerate combo-aggro decks like Affinity, Burn (eidolon craps on many of the formats' combos) Zooicide, Dredge, and other similar types of decks.
Want to play midrange? Believe it or not, there are tons of viable options, including straight midrange, or combo midrange. Options include Birthing Pod decks, GSZ style maverick decks, Junk, punishing fire jund (with DRS), Delver variants, Death and Taxes (actually has tested as one of the better decks in most no-ban modern tournaments), and Eldrazi.
There are also of course the hybrid decks that play multiple roles like dark depths decks, twin variants, and other similar decks.
Given, there isn't a legitimate metagame, and if this were played on MTGO, the meta would likely settle in a good bit with some decks falling down to tier 2 or 3 status, and some emerging as favorites, but no ban modern is a surprisingly balanced and diverse metagame despite all the degenerate cards that are in it. The prevalence of the degenerate cards requires more anti-combo cards in the main-deck, but there are some relevant tools that are legal such as Top, Mental Misstep, and certain cards become maindeck-worthy as the metagame becomes so graveyard-focused (such as Relic in Tezz decks).
For Baral, Chief of Compliance, do we really find it to have high enough upside over goblin electromancer that control decks would want to play it? I just don't see how UW control, for instance, can afford 2 mana's tempo early game on a do-nothing card.
Storm - that's about it imo.
For this card, you wouldn't play it turn 2 in a situation you could get burned on. You hold it until turn 3 with a Mana leak or Remand backup, then go from there. Also, his filtering ability with counterspells should be quite relevant - it allows you to dig for answers as well as discard extra Baral copies.
I don't think he'll be a difference maker in Modern for control decks, but I could definitely see him making a splash in some standard control deck possibly.
So I'm curious if there is some flavor implication here, it seems a clear play off planar portal, and I could easily see this being some sort of link to New Phyrexia (especially with the artifact theme already being prevalent here).
It's been a very long time since I logged into this forum, but I'm logging in to state this specifically.
Instead of printing more hate cards, or growing the sideboard slots to 20 in Modern, Wizards needs to take a different approach with their "hate".
They need to power it down. Basically, they need to print hate cards that are strong, but not devastating against certain strategies. But, this is not something they should do in isolation, which brings me to my second and most important point.
If they want to control a strategy or keep something in check, they need to make MAINDECK WORTHY ANSWERS to very powerful linear strategies. The last two cards we got in this realm were Abrupt Decay and Kolaghan's command. Both are powerful cards, but far from over-powered. They also both are important pieces of keeping certain decks in check or at bay.
Unfortunately, we need more versatile answer cards that don't completely suck if you stick them in your maindeck, but also won't 100% blow out your opponent if they land. Right now, given the state of the meta, there needs to be more answers to aggro decks (or aggro-combo) and decks that can just burn you out.
As the person who created this deck originally, he's not wrong. One of the main issues this deck runs into is that the curve is a bit high and paths aren't great early on. Here are some of my thoughts and musings.
1. If you're playing Coiling Oracle, you need to go all in or not. I love oracle, it's a wall of omens that can ramp and attack in a lot of ways, but you need to support it with Serum Visions. It also plays well with Halimar Depths if you want to. Otherwise, it's a wasted slot for 1 card.
2. The wraths are better off in the sideboard. There just aren't that many decks that you want a wrath against. Most of the time, you can simply win off recurring spot removal. Things also get awkward when you are forced to path a creature, only to then want to play a wrath 2 turns later. Wraths are really only worthwhile when you can force an opponent to overextend, only to wipe their board.
3. I would definitely cut down the number of witnesses. Switch one for a snapcaster, and only play 2. That's all you really need. Playing 4 is a bit overkill.
4. Play repeal. It is significantly better in a control deck, especially when you can value-repeal your own creatures.
5. Cut one Bant charm, replace with path #4. You'll need it without maindeck wraths, and it'll be super useful against a deck like infect.
It's not a matter of 'can work' or not, Coco is simply better. Any human tribal without Coco is simply an inferior list. Coco makes tribal humans both more explosive, more resilient, better at finding hate, and even more consistent.
The other idea is that you play with 4x Aether Vial, but this really isn't all that strong in Humans. Vial is a bad topdeck, we don't have the combat tricks to utilize it like Death and Taxes, and even in the best scenario, it'll allow for modest tempo gains. Those tempo gains can be made simply by playing 4x Hierarch and 4x pilgrim, which allows for super explosive draws, allows us to mitigate not getting lands, and provides a huge range of overall benefits.
Kessig Malcontents is only good (meaning decent) with a big board (a 3/1 for 3 without haste is really bad otherwise), it's a strictly win-more creature in my opinion.
I'd rather play Lightning Bolt or Lightning Helix instead.
The thing is, you almost always have a big board in this deck, especially with coco. It essentially does the same thing that Shaman of the Pack does for Elves. I would argue it's even better than Shaman of the pack since this deck is more of a beatdown aggro deck than combo, which often puts the opponent in range of lethal damage from a resolved malcontents pretty early. Furthermore, It's nice to do direct damage sometimes since unlike the creature in here, it can't be blocked, and especially considering how often it will deal 5+ damage upon resolving, It's more of a "end the game fast" creature than a "win more" creature.
Also, this is a tribal deck. It's all about synergy and bolt / helix don't do a ton in the synergy department. They also provide fewer coco targets.
Hanweir Garrison is interesting but does nothing before it attacks and can be killed by blockers or bolted rather easily, maybe a 1x-of can be ok but definitely not 4x.
Even something like Thatcher Revolt for multiple triggers and going wide seems better in my opinion. Gather the Townsfolk is always solid in a Humans deck.
Thatcher Revolt is only good as a single burst of triggers, and does not trigger on Collected Company. If we're talking about win-more, this is WAY more win more than Malcontents is, without the same upside. Gather the townsfolk is a bit low impact and doesn't trigger on Coco. Garrison also can single-handedly take over the game if not dealt with. Yes it can obviously be bolted, but so can any creature in this deck ( at least when they resolve). In Elves, you don't avoid playing Archdruid because it can be bolted. You don't avoid playing Marrow Reejery in Merfolk because it dies to bolt.
I've been testing Hanweir Garrison, and it's a stud in here. The big thing is that it gives a ton of board presence, while also pumping your champions and lieutenants x2 each time it attacks. I'm playing it along with Knight of the Reliquary, which allows you to search up a singleton Hanweir to meld together if that's what you want to do.
Another card people need to consider is Kessig Malcontents. Especially if you're playing CoCo, your Malcontents will often deal upwards of 6+ damage upon resolving as early as turn 4. Here is the extremely consistent and aggressive list I've been testing since seeing the spoilers. I'm completely cutting removal and other stuff for now, focusing on how aggressive and fat this can be.
Final note - this deck is simply 10x better when you play mana dorks + coco. More consistent, more resilient, more explosive, etc etc. I had tried making vial humans work for a while along with more standard white weenie, but the Coco version is just so much stronger.
Some fair deck could compete with the right configuration of their lists but it's clear that unfair, linear (combo) decks profit the most with No Ban Modern List. Most cards on the ban list are there because they provide too powerful combos with other cards.
Yet in most NBL modern events, linear combo decks do not win. How do you explain this?
Another important point everyone is missing here is that Mental Misstep is actually a pretty decent check against the combo decks in the format. It's not quite force of will, but NBL modern combo decks are still not nearly at the level of Legacy combo decks.
As for the combos, keep in mind, yes, they were banned because they're too powerful, but also, those combos were often banned simply due to speed or due to warping the format (including the decks that they played vs.). The interesting thing, is that a lot of the hate you would play for this format is more universal, and isn't so narrow. Thalia, or Gaddock Teeg for instance do a ton of work against just about every deck in the format. Chalice of the void for decks that can support it wrecks a huge portion of the metagame.
Now, the current modern format is not a format that is set up to beat combo decks, so if you were to introduce a fast and consistent combo deck to the format, it would possibly dominate. But in a format that has a big presence of fast combo decks, you would see the rise of midrange and tempo decks that prey on those fast combo decks. Old extended was a format very much akin to this. There was a lot of combo, but there were also decks like Zoo (with Meddling Mages), Next Level Blue, Tezzerator, Faeries, and quite a few others that preyed on the linear decks like Hypergenesis or Elves.
1)nothing fair as all broken stuff are legal and there's no FoW to stop them here, all we need is to figure what is the most broken thing of the pool
2)again nothing fair, i'd bet towards MM Infect or clamp affinity though
3)not really, it's just a format that combines the worse elements of Modern and Legacy, both Legacy and Modern are superior formats imo (standard too but way too different to compare)
Hypergenesis is not that good: It never was that good. Not sure where this "consensus" is coming from. I'm guessing none of these people have ever tried playing this format, nor did they ever play old extended back before modern existed. Hypergenesis is a turn 3 combo deck that has a very tough time fighting through disruption, and will often lose to it's own terrible hands. You would be far better off playing Storm, Eggs, Affinity, Elf-Ball, or Infect if you want to play a deck that wins super fast, yet can actually win through some disruption.
And yes, fair decks are perfectly viable in NBL modern: Stoneblade, Countertop, Miracles, Death and Taxes, UR Delver, Burn, GW Maverick, Tezzerator, Deadguy Ale, Faeries, Jund, Junk are all both viable as well as competitive in this format. I wouldn't doubt that a competitive hatebear-oriented Pod or Coco list could be playable as well. I also wouldn't be surprised if Lantern Control could be a strong player in this format, although it would get a lot of splash hate with how powerful the artifact decks are.
This also isn't including the combo-hybrid decks like Twin, Amulet-Bloom, Cloudpost or Scapeshift that are still unfair, but play more of a combo-control game than the other decks seen in here.
Another tip: Chalice of the Void shuts down the majority of the super unfair decks that people in here say would win with ease. Stony Silence wrecks many of the top decks, and rest in peace is another similarly dominant SB card.
Final point: Infect is just a worse version of dark depths combo - requires 3 combo pieces (shoal, creature, 9 mana red spell), has less redundancy, and is easier to disrupt (far easier to kill an inkmoth nexus or blighted agent than it is to kill Marit Lage).
I've actually played this format quite a bit, so I should dispel some notions here. This is mostly stuff I've found from actually playing a good amount of un-banned modern, not from just sitting in front of a keyboard.
There are a lot of options (obviously). Personally, I would probably opt for a deck that can beat up on the unfair decks, but has the ability to combo out on it's own as well. BTL Scapeshift (with Dig Through Time), Junk Depths, or maybe Jeskai Ascendancy Combo would be my choice.
2) What general deck do you think will win the tournament?
Quite often, you have pikes try to bring the most unfair deck possible to tournaments like these. As a result, you often have unassuming "fair" decks like Death and Taxes clean up off the back of simple maindeck cards like Thalia, along with sideboard stony silences. Just be prepared to have a sideboard that can deal with graveyards, artifacts, and can stop decks from playing lots of spells in one turn (either maindeck or sideboard).
Yes, it's a surprisingly diverse format (at least with how it is currently set up in an unsettled meta) that allows even fair decks to thrive. Some decks can be insanely quick, but those decks often lose to slower decks that have the requisite answers. Even a deck like Burn can be a strong contender to win a tournament.
Overall Thoughts on the Format From Actually Playing It
1. Skullclamp isn't as overpowered as people think. That's not to say it's bad, but it's far from ridiculously over-powered. The two decks it is super powerful in are Elves and Affinity, both of which you would need to have a lot of hate for anyway. In non-combo decks like UR delver, it's strong, but not really any stronger of a card advantage source than something like Treasure Cruise. Also, considering you have to sacrifice your own creatures, it's important to realize it is also a tempo disadvantage unlike Cruise.
2. Affinity and other linear decks are insane, but also extremely vulnerable to artifact disruption and general hate. People who say Affinity will reign supreme must be forgetting the fact that everyone will be packing Stony Silences and other uber-strong hate cards in their sideboard.
3. Hypergenesis is bad. Seriously, it's a linear combo deck that at it's best, is no faster than the other linear combo decks (Storm, Elves, Dredge, Shoal), but is way easier to disrupt, and loses to its own bad-draws way more often.
4. Twin is a great format policeman. In essence, it still plays the role of "combo deck that beats other linear decks" quite handily.
5. UR delver-style decks will obviously be a staple, but have their own weaknesses as well.
6. Dark-Depths decks are significantly underrated. One of the best decks I played with was a Junk-Depths list that was a standard midrange deck with a lot of disruption that could occasionally win out of nowhere with Depths. With Thespian's Stage int he format, there is a ton of inevitability, and there is nothing a control deck can do to counter the playing of lands.
7. Cloudpost decks are strong - they can wreck most of the fair decks in the format, and with enough disruption, can possibly have game against the unfair decks as well. I prefer UR cloudpost, although UW cloudpost could work well since Path to Exile may be more important in the format with Twin and Marit Lage.
8. All-In Red is really powerful, and gets better the more people want to play unfair decks, which tends to be the majority of people in tournaments like these.
Been playing a similar list on MTGO, I don't think I'm going back to vengevines. They just take too much work to enable unlike Narcs and Amalgams. This deck can win turn 3, and consistently wins turn 4.
I will say, I'm a huge advocate for Rally the Peasants. When you mill out 4-5 bodies as early as turn 3, it basically becomes the same thing as dread return on Flame-Kin Zealot. I've won a few matches as early as turn 3 with this.
One of the small differences is i'm not playing tome scour, I'm playing 4x Hedron Crab, and 2 more lands (I'm at 21). This enables me to use crab to its full extent, while also allowing the easy alpha strike with Rally.
For what it's worth, I really like Stitchwing Skaab as a 1-2 of in here. It's one of the most reliable ways to get back vengevines via double gravecrawlers, and is a decent beater from the graveyard in it's own light. It's also a reliable means of triggering Amalgams without having to rely on landfall triggers.
I've been playing 2x Amalgam and a singleton Fatestitcher in my Grixis (green splash) variant.
Visions slots easily into UWR control variants, UW control, and pretty much any other controlly deck. Some tempo decks and combo may want to try it as well.
As for SOTM, I'd look to extended Tezzerator lists around 2010 for a starting point for a thopter deck.
Want to play all-in combo? There are tons of options - Storm, Second Sunrise, Elves, Infect, etc etc. In no-ban modern, these combo decks often lose to slower combo that has control elements, or the pure control / tempo decks. Twin variants, Delver Variants, or Dark Depths decks all have good matchups here.
Want to play Ramp? 12post is a thing, and scapeshift is also still viable (with dig through time). These decks generally have good matchups against anything without a fast clock as they'll go right over the top. With that said, they can be quite weak to aggro strategies or decks like Infect.
Want to play control? There are tons of options, ranging from Tezzeret Variants, to Stoneblade Variants, to Miracles, and more. Preordain and Ponder being legal along with top make the control archetype strong once again, and the format having more "all-in" style combo decks means reactive control is more important as a policeman.
Want to play aggro? Zoo is still viable, as are the more degenerate combo-aggro decks like Affinity, Burn (eidolon craps on many of the formats' combos) Zooicide, Dredge, and other similar types of decks.
Want to play midrange? Believe it or not, there are tons of viable options, including straight midrange, or combo midrange. Options include Birthing Pod decks, GSZ style maverick decks, Junk, punishing fire jund (with DRS), Delver variants, Death and Taxes (actually has tested as one of the better decks in most no-ban modern tournaments), and Eldrazi.
There are also of course the hybrid decks that play multiple roles like dark depths decks, twin variants, and other similar decks.
Given, there isn't a legitimate metagame, and if this were played on MTGO, the meta would likely settle in a good bit with some decks falling down to tier 2 or 3 status, and some emerging as favorites, but no ban modern is a surprisingly balanced and diverse metagame despite all the degenerate cards that are in it. The prevalence of the degenerate cards requires more anti-combo cards in the main-deck, but there are some relevant tools that are legal such as Top, Mental Misstep, and certain cards become maindeck-worthy as the metagame becomes so graveyard-focused (such as Relic in Tezz decks).
For this card, you wouldn't play it turn 2 in a situation you could get burned on. You hold it until turn 3 with a Mana leak or Remand backup, then go from there. Also, his filtering ability with counterspells should be quite relevant - it allows you to dig for answers as well as discard extra Baral copies.
I don't think he'll be a difference maker in Modern for control decks, but I could definitely see him making a splash in some standard control deck possibly.
Instead of printing more hate cards, or growing the sideboard slots to 20 in Modern, Wizards needs to take a different approach with their "hate".
Unfortunately, we need more versatile answer cards that don't completely suck if you stick them in your maindeck, but also won't 100% blow out your opponent if they land. Right now, given the state of the meta, there needs to be more answers to aggro decks (or aggro-combo) and decks that can just burn you out.
Original deck thread can be found here (more of a primer). http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/the-game/modern/modern-archives/modern-archives-deck-creation/220012-eternal-gifts-8-2012-9-2013
1. If you're playing Coiling Oracle, you need to go all in or not. I love oracle, it's a wall of omens that can ramp and attack in a lot of ways, but you need to support it with Serum Visions. It also plays well with Halimar Depths if you want to. Otherwise, it's a wasted slot for 1 card.
2. The wraths are better off in the sideboard. There just aren't that many decks that you want a wrath against. Most of the time, you can simply win off recurring spot removal. Things also get awkward when you are forced to path a creature, only to then want to play a wrath 2 turns later. Wraths are really only worthwhile when you can force an opponent to overextend, only to wipe their board.
3. I would definitely cut down the number of witnesses. Switch one for a snapcaster, and only play 2. That's all you really need. Playing 4 is a bit overkill.
4. Play repeal. It is significantly better in a control deck, especially when you can value-repeal your own creatures.
5. Cut one Bant charm, replace with path #4. You'll need it without maindeck wraths, and it'll be super useful against a deck like infect.
It's not a matter of 'can work' or not, Coco is simply better. Any human tribal without Coco is simply an inferior list. Coco makes tribal humans both more explosive, more resilient, better at finding hate, and even more consistent.
The other idea is that you play with 4x Aether Vial, but this really isn't all that strong in Humans. Vial is a bad topdeck, we don't have the combat tricks to utilize it like Death and Taxes, and even in the best scenario, it'll allow for modest tempo gains. Those tempo gains can be made simply by playing 4x Hierarch and 4x pilgrim, which allows for super explosive draws, allows us to mitigate not getting lands, and provides a huge range of overall benefits.
The thing is, you almost always have a big board in this deck, especially with coco. It essentially does the same thing that Shaman of the Pack does for Elves. I would argue it's even better than Shaman of the pack since this deck is more of a beatdown aggro deck than combo, which often puts the opponent in range of lethal damage from a resolved malcontents pretty early. Furthermore, It's nice to do direct damage sometimes since unlike the creature in here, it can't be blocked, and especially considering how often it will deal 5+ damage upon resolving, It's more of a "end the game fast" creature than a "win more" creature.
Also, this is a tribal deck. It's all about synergy and bolt / helix don't do a ton in the synergy department. They also provide fewer coco targets.
Thatcher Revolt is only good as a single burst of triggers, and does not trigger on Collected Company. If we're talking about win-more, this is WAY more win more than Malcontents is, without the same upside. Gather the townsfolk is a bit low impact and doesn't trigger on Coco. Garrison also can single-handedly take over the game if not dealt with. Yes it can obviously be bolted, but so can any creature in this deck ( at least when they resolve). In Elves, you don't avoid playing Archdruid because it can be bolted. You don't avoid playing Marrow Reejery in Merfolk because it dies to bolt.
Another card people need to consider is Kessig Malcontents. Especially if you're playing CoCo, your Malcontents will often deal upwards of 6+ damage upon resolving as early as turn 4. Here is the extremely consistent and aggressive list I've been testing since seeing the spoilers. I'm completely cutting removal and other stuff for now, focusing on how aggressive and fat this can be.
Final note - this deck is simply 10x better when you play mana dorks + coco. More consistent, more resilient, more explosive, etc etc. I had tried making vial humans work for a while along with more standard white weenie, but the Coco version is just so much stronger.
4x Noble Hierarch
4x Avacyn's Pilgrim
4x Champion of the Parish
2x Kytheon, Hero of Akros
Two cmc creatures
4x Thalia's Lieutenant
4x Mayor of Avabruck
Three cmc creatures
1x Eternal Witness
4x Hanweir Garrison
3x Knight of the Reliquary
3x Kessig Malcontents
4x Collected Company
Lands
1x Hanweir Battlements
1x Horizon Canopy
1x Gavony Township
1x Ghost Quarter
19x Other lands
3x Vithian Renegades
3x Fiend Hunter
4x Fulminator Mage
2x Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
2x Rest In Peace
1x Avalanche Riders
Yet in most NBL modern events, linear combo decks do not win. How do you explain this?
Another important point everyone is missing here is that Mental Misstep is actually a pretty decent check against the combo decks in the format. It's not quite force of will, but NBL modern combo decks are still not nearly at the level of Legacy combo decks.
As for the combos, keep in mind, yes, they were banned because they're too powerful, but also, those combos were often banned simply due to speed or due to warping the format (including the decks that they played vs.). The interesting thing, is that a lot of the hate you would play for this format is more universal, and isn't so narrow. Thalia, or Gaddock Teeg for instance do a ton of work against just about every deck in the format. Chalice of the void for decks that can support it wrecks a huge portion of the metagame.
Now, the current modern format is not a format that is set up to beat combo decks, so if you were to introduce a fast and consistent combo deck to the format, it would possibly dominate. But in a format that has a big presence of fast combo decks, you would see the rise of midrange and tempo decks that prey on those fast combo decks. Old extended was a format very much akin to this. There was a lot of combo, but there were also decks like Zoo (with Meddling Mages), Next Level Blue, Tezzerator, Faeries, and quite a few others that preyed on the linear decks like Hypergenesis or Elves.
Please read this article first people - http://www.moxboardinghouse.com/media/modern-no-banned-list/
This isn't bad either - http://magic.tcgplayer.com/db/article.asp?ID=13333&writer=Melissa DeTora&articledate=6-13-2016.
Hypergenesis is not that good: It never was that good. Not sure where this "consensus" is coming from. I'm guessing none of these people have ever tried playing this format, nor did they ever play old extended back before modern existed. Hypergenesis is a turn 3 combo deck that has a very tough time fighting through disruption, and will often lose to it's own terrible hands. You would be far better off playing Storm, Eggs, Affinity, Elf-Ball, or Infect if you want to play a deck that wins super fast, yet can actually win through some disruption.
And yes, fair decks are perfectly viable in NBL modern: Stoneblade, Countertop, Miracles, Death and Taxes, UR Delver, Burn, GW Maverick, Tezzerator, Deadguy Ale, Faeries, Jund, Junk are all both viable as well as competitive in this format. I wouldn't doubt that a competitive hatebear-oriented Pod or Coco list could be playable as well. I also wouldn't be surprised if Lantern Control could be a strong player in this format, although it would get a lot of splash hate with how powerful the artifact decks are.
This also isn't including the combo-hybrid decks like Twin, Amulet-Bloom, Cloudpost or Scapeshift that are still unfair, but play more of a combo-control game than the other decks seen in here.
Another tip: Chalice of the Void shuts down the majority of the super unfair decks that people in here say would win with ease. Stony Silence wrecks many of the top decks, and rest in peace is another similarly dominant SB card.
Final point: Infect is just a worse version of dark depths combo - requires 3 combo pieces (shoal, creature, 9 mana red spell), has less redundancy, and is easier to disrupt (far easier to kill an inkmoth nexus or blighted agent than it is to kill Marit Lage).
There are a lot of options (obviously). Personally, I would probably opt for a deck that can beat up on the unfair decks, but has the ability to combo out on it's own as well. BTL Scapeshift (with Dig Through Time), Junk Depths, or maybe Jeskai Ascendancy Combo would be my choice.
Quite often, you have pikes try to bring the most unfair deck possible to tournaments like these. As a result, you often have unassuming "fair" decks like Death and Taxes clean up off the back of simple maindeck cards like Thalia, along with sideboard stony silences. Just be prepared to have a sideboard that can deal with graveyards, artifacts, and can stop decks from playing lots of spells in one turn (either maindeck or sideboard).
Yes, it's a surprisingly diverse format (at least with how it is currently set up in an unsettled meta) that allows even fair decks to thrive. Some decks can be insanely quick, but those decks often lose to slower decks that have the requisite answers. Even a deck like Burn can be a strong contender to win a tournament.
Overall Thoughts on the Format From Actually Playing It
1. Skullclamp isn't as overpowered as people think. That's not to say it's bad, but it's far from ridiculously over-powered. The two decks it is super powerful in are Elves and Affinity, both of which you would need to have a lot of hate for anyway. In non-combo decks like UR delver, it's strong, but not really any stronger of a card advantage source than something like Treasure Cruise. Also, considering you have to sacrifice your own creatures, it's important to realize it is also a tempo disadvantage unlike Cruise.
2. Affinity and other linear decks are insane, but also extremely vulnerable to artifact disruption and general hate. People who say Affinity will reign supreme must be forgetting the fact that everyone will be packing Stony Silences and other uber-strong hate cards in their sideboard.
3. Hypergenesis is bad. Seriously, it's a linear combo deck that at it's best, is no faster than the other linear combo decks (Storm, Elves, Dredge, Shoal), but is way easier to disrupt, and loses to its own bad-draws way more often.
4. Twin is a great format policeman. In essence, it still plays the role of "combo deck that beats other linear decks" quite handily.
5. UR delver-style decks will obviously be a staple, but have their own weaknesses as well.
6. Dark-Depths decks are significantly underrated. One of the best decks I played with was a Junk-Depths list that was a standard midrange deck with a lot of disruption that could occasionally win out of nowhere with Depths. With Thespian's Stage int he format, there is a ton of inevitability, and there is nothing a control deck can do to counter the playing of lands.
7. Cloudpost decks are strong - they can wreck most of the fair decks in the format, and with enough disruption, can possibly have game against the unfair decks as well. I prefer UR cloudpost, although UW cloudpost could work well since Path to Exile may be more important in the format with Twin and Marit Lage.
8. All-In Red is really powerful, and gets better the more people want to play unfair decks, which tends to be the majority of people in tournaments like these.
I will say, I'm a huge advocate for Rally the Peasants. When you mill out 4-5 bodies as early as turn 3, it basically becomes the same thing as dread return on Flame-Kin Zealot. I've won a few matches as early as turn 3 with this.
One of the small differences is i'm not playing tome scour, I'm playing 4x Hedron Crab, and 2 more lands (I'm at 21). This enables me to use crab to its full extent, while also allowing the easy alpha strike with Rally.
I've been playing 2x Amalgam and a singleton Fatestitcher in my Grixis (green splash) variant.
As for SOTM, I'd look to extended Tezzerator lists around 2010 for a starting point for a thopter deck.